Cover Illustration by Rachiel Cox
Editing by Lindsay Dominguez
SOLBIDYUM WARS SAGA
Book 1- BATTLE OF THE NEW ORLEANS
Some stories are best told when started in the middle, or at the very least where the teller enters the story. Later, as a means of explanation, the storyteller may relate facts going back to earlier events that put things into perspective. So it shall be with this story, for I shall relate it to you as it happened to me.
My name, as given to me on Earth by my parents, is Thibodaux James Renwalt, but while growing up, everyone just called me Tibby, or Tib for short. Today most people throughout the Galactic Federation know me as Tibby the Recoverer or First Citizen Tibby. I’m sure there are a few other names that I’m called by those less enamored with my existence; however, those names seldom reach my ears. But before I digress, you’ve asked to hear my story and so you shall.
Earth is a remote planet on the other side of the galaxy in a region not fully explored or colonized by the Federation. The dominant species of this planet is an intelligent humanoid life form that has existed for only a few thousand years. When I lived there in my youth, humans had developed enough technology to achieve the very beginning stages of space exploration, but manned space flight had progressed only as far as the moon that circled the planet.
I lived in a coastal region of the northern hemisphere that was known for its swamps and marshes and for a rather unique city named New Orleans; I grew up in a smaller town about ninety five kilometers, or seven and a half dragmas in galactic units, outside of New Orleans. If you’re familiar with the Halo-vids of the planet Irribis and have seen how the villagers capture food from the water using poles and lines with hooks on the ends, you will understand what on Earth was called fishing, though this particular practice was more of recreational than a way of life.
My story begins on a day when I decided to go fishing.
The morning was warm and very muggy when I started out navigating the small aluminum fishing boat through the bayou… a bayou is what the local residents called a slow-moving stream that meanders through the marshes of that part of the planet. The region had been plagued by a drought condition for the preceding five years, leaving water levels throughout the wetlands lower than normal. In some places channels had dried up completely. Still, the swamp remained forested, shading me with large bald cypress and overcup oaks, species similar to those found on the planet Golsax that thrive in shallow waters of its subtropical regions. The drought had left some of these groves protruding from banks of rich, moist land; so, using a long wooden pole, I propelled my small boat through a deeper channel that still existed toward a somewhat circular clearing in the swamp referred to by the locals as Mound Island.
Mound Island was small, as islands go, and was a strange feature in this lush landscape, as no trees would grow on it. Some shorter grasses had periodically thrived on its barren surface, but even these had mostly died out in the hot, dry conditions. When I was a boy, some friends and I tried camping on the island, but we were unable to drive tent stakes deep enough into the ground to hold the tent down. There seemed to be a huge rock under the shallow soil that covered the island, which was peculiar in itself, as a swamp is essentially a delta of accumulated mud laid down by an ancient river basin – not the kind of place that normally hosts boulders. Nevertheless, Mound Island had been there as long as anyone could remember, so no one really questioned what lay beneath the mysterious surface. My grandfather often took me there to fish as a small boy; and as I approached the bank, I remembered him telling me how the ancient indigenous people of the area were superstitious about the island, refusing to set foot on it. He said that since nothing grew or lived on this island other than the sparse grasses, the natives felt it was cursed. It was true, for reasons I never really pondered the animals and birds that flourished in every other part the wetlands were never seen on the island mound. There even seemed to be fewer bugs and biting insects around the island than elsewhere in the swamp.
Despite all the oddities of the island, I always enjoyed fishing from it and usually had good luck catching some rather large bass and catfish (these fish are native to the area’s bayous and are delicious to eat). I pulled the nose of the boat onto the island to prevent it from drifting off and collected my gear to prepare for a day of fishing. I had only taken a few steps when my foot slipped into a small hole, catching me at the ankle and causing me to fall face down on the dried island mud. Spitting dust as I cursed and checked my gear, I scanned the featureless ground to see what could possibly have escaped my view and cause me to fall. Through the settling cloud of dust I was surprised to see in the dirt what appeared to be an old bronze or tarnished brass bowl with some sort of bar or rod sticking through it. My foot had slipped into the depression of the bowl and under the recessed bar and had been the cause of my fall.
I must confess that my reaction was a bit on the irrational side; I was angry at this stupid object that had caused my fall. My impulse was to grab the piece of trash and hurl it out into the swamp. Without any real thought I grabbed the bar and gave it a yank, thinking I would easily dislodge this annoyance from the dirt; and though the bar seemed to give a little, the bowl didn’t budge at all. Now even angrier, I bent over and took hold of the bar with both hands, braced both feet and, with a deep, grunting breath, heaved with all my might.
What happened next is still confusing to me. I suddenly felt myself being pitched into the air in an uncontrollable spin and then landed on my back on the ground. Stunned and breathless, I nearly blacked out waiting for the pain to ebb. I don’t really know how long I laid motionless before mentally checking myself for injuries and talking myself into getting up to confront this opponent.
As I struggled to get up while my head throbbing and with alternating waves of red fading into darkness then back to light passed through my vision. I was still fighting for breath; the hard landing had knocked the wind out of me, yet my mind continued to race, trying to comprehend what had happened. When my head cleared and my eyes began to focus, I found myself looking at a large, dark object protruding from the ground at my feet that had not been there before. It was somewhat oval in shape with traces of soil and grass clinging to it; and where it was bare, I could see that same dark bronze or brass color that had noticed earlier when examining the bowl. Before long, my eyes came to rest on a smooth depression in this slab and I recognized the rod passing through it. Obviously what I had assumed to be some small bit of junk was part of this larger monolith at my feet.
At this point, I was able to move, though still in pain. I sat up to take a closer look at this mysterious object that had obviously been responsible for my unintentional excursion into the air. Slowly I got to my feet and began to walk around to the other side when, to my amazement, I saw a gaping hole in the ground where the object had previously been lying flat. Clearly, the slab was some type of door or closure over this large space. I peered inside, but couldn’t comprehend what I was seeing. There appeared be a floor about twice my height at a distance below me. Everything inside seemed to be spotlessly clean and the escaping air had a dry, sterile scent that reminded me of the smell of a newly built house. A dim glow coming from some place within illuminated the interior, but nothing I was seeing made sense. The surface below me slanted away at an angle and I could see an edge where the floor appeared to drop off into a deeper area that I could not see from my vantage point. I took a closer look at the door. It measured about as thick as the distance between the tip of my thumb and my little finger with my fingers spread as far apart as possible. “About 20 c
entimeters thick,” I thought to myself. I could see a tapered edge around its circumference to fit a corresponding taper where it closed against the surface of whatever it was attached to below my feet. There was no sound emanating from inside the hole at all; other than the wafting cool, dry air, all was still. I wondered what lay further inside and whether I should go for assistance or stay and investigate more on my own. I had about ten meters of rope in the boat that I used for docking. Curiosity prevailed and I decided to lower myself inside to get a better look before reporting my find to others. I retrieved the rope, but the barren mound offered no anchor other than the strange door itself. I first thought of the bar I was gripping earlier when the door was activated. I didn’t trust to use that, instead I settled on securing the rope around the single hinge mechanism at what I assumed was the base of the door. After a bit of tying and testing of the knot and looking about hoping I would see someone mysteriously appear to help me, I lowered myself inside.
When I entered the chamber, the dim glow within began to brighten, as though some kind of sensor was detecting my presence and adjusting the light level accordingly. As I descended, it became clear that what I thought was a floor below me was actually a wall and what I had assumed was a wall adjacent to me was in fact the floor. Whatever this structure was, it was lying on its side and buried deeply in the mud of the swamp. Mound Island had been around all my life; I knew from the stories my grandfather told that it had also been there all his life and during the lives of the generations of natives preceding him. Suspended in the middle of this surreal space, I tried to interpret my surroundings as if it were positioned upright. My mind filled with questions, “What is this place? Who built it? What kind of energy source was lighting the interior? Why can’t I see any light fixtures? I noted a small rectangle on the surface of the interior wall by the door, a panel illuminated with several small lights and what I thought might be buttons. With my usual impulsive curiosity, I reached out to press on the panel, but common sense took hold and I figured it would be safer not to touch anything else until I had a better idea of what might be activated.
I continued to lower myself by the rope until I was standing on what I now knew to be a wall. I carefully moved in the direction of the edge that I had previously thought was a drop off but now saw was the receding corner of the wall. Peering past the edge, I saw the same diffuse light illuminating a corridor that dropped for a distance longer than my rope would allow me to investigate, so I turned my attention in the other direction. The corridor I was standing in didn’t extend far before terminating at what I thought might be an interior door. Another small rectangular panel adjacent to this door glowed with a faint, pale green jade color. Without thinking, I touched the panel, which responded immediately by retracting the door into the wall starling me while revealing a large room that extended below me. A series of three high-back chairs were mounted to the floor in front what I thought might be a control console of some sort. Just behind those chairs and staggered between them were two more chairs. The wall in front of the console seemed to be made of a different material than that of the other walls, though it was the same dark color as the rest of the room. The console, however, was illuminated with numerous lights, two of which were flashing – one amber and one red. Several smaller screens built in the console appeared to be displaying images; however, my vantage point and the distorted, sideways view prevented me from discerning what was displayed.
As I leaned inside and tried to contort myself to get an “upright” view of the nearest screen, I lost my grip on the doorframe and tumbled into the room.
In mid fall I managed to grab onto the back of one of the mounted chairs. There I hung for a few moments, trying to ignore my aching ribs as I sorted out how to pull myself up and sit on the arm of the chair. Once situated, I looked up at the entrance to assess what kind of challenge I was facing to climb my way back out, only to see the door silently slide shut. I could almost feel my pupils flare with panic as I realized that, even if the door had not closed, I had no way of being able to get near enough to it to get back out…and now, calling out for help in hopes of another fisherman hearing me was out of the question.
Cursing my stupidity, I looked about the room for some solution to my quandary. Carefully, I climbed to a chair much closer to the console, where I could make out the details that were scrolling across the smaller monitors. To my further amazement, nothing was recognizable. Cryptic figures and shapes moved along some of the screens; on others the images were stationary. Not one of them was like anything I had ever seen before. Some of the symbols vaguely resembled Japanese characters, while others were more like hieroglyphics. On the screen next to the blinking red light, which I could now recognize as a button, figures flashed on and off like some kind of prompt. Adjacent to it was the blinking amber light and yet another screen, on which an equally obscure set of figures flashed. I deliberated for what seemed like an hour, trying to figure a way out of this mess – even moving back to the uppermost chair to reassess my distance from the door…but I could find no escape. For all practical purposes, I was trapped here until someone else happened upon my strange Mound Island discovery and investigated, hopefully with more caution than I had. “That could be weeks… or even months,” I thought, “By then I’ll have died from starvation!”
Instinctually, moving about seemed an easier way to cope with the futility of the situation than sitting still, so I maneuvered back to the center chair and, with all the ignorance of a small child pushing buttons in an elevator to see what happens next, I braced against my precarious perch, reached out and pressed the flashing red button.
Other than the feeling of a slight pressure change that made my ears pop, I didn’t notice any significant changes, though the red flashing light stopped and the display on the small screen beside it responded with a new set of characters. Thus emboldened (since nothing had exploded, nor had any poisonous gas flooded the room), I pressed the flashing amber button.
Immediately, lights throughout the room flickered into action and everything began to shake. At first I thought the place was falling apart and caving in; but as my bearings shifted, I understood that the room was in motion, slowly rotating and righting itself to position the floor beneath me. I recognized that this might be my only chance for escape; so, as soon the floor reached an orientation where I could get a stable footing, I moved quickly toward the doorway, until I was stopped in my tracks by the commanding sound of a male voice that came out of nowhere in a language I didn’t understand. Bewildered, I looked every direction within the shifting, rumbling room, searching for the source of this voice, which then repeated with the same tone and inflection whatever it had said moments earlier.
Suddenly, as the room seemed to lurch, I was propelled at incredible speed toward the wall near the exit, and then all went black.
The next thing I remembered was feeling like my head was full of buzzing bees. Images of daily life seemed to whir randomly about me, until the realization of pain grounded me again in the moment. When I finally opened my eyes, I didn’t know straight away where I was or what had happened; but slowly my surroundings came into focus and I recalled my topple into the control room and everything that unfolded after pressing that damned little flashing amber button. At first I thought the floor had again tilted into wall position, until I realized that it was my position that had changed – I was lying on the floor.
Once more, I raised myself up with a groan; this time the floor was the floor and the walls were walls; everything seemed to be oriented correctly, except possibly me, as I was in a great deal of pain and quite unstable on my feet. While I tried to sort out the events that that occurred before I blacked out, my eye caught view of the wall behind the console. What had been a large dark panel that ran the full width of the room now appeared to be a viewing monitor lit up by what I really hoped were not passing stars; but the denial didn’t last long…it became clear that they most certainly were. Periodically, colored
lines appeared on the screen that connected various stars in angular paths and geometric patterns, arguably forming navigational triangulations and calculations. After a short time, I had no choice but to accept that I was no longer on Earth, but in an inconceivably advanced spacecraft going someplace I could not fathom at speeds which I had been taught were impossible. From time to time, the male voice would speak, announcing what I could only assume were prompts or perhaps navigational details; but there was no one around to hear them other than me, at least to my knowledge.
I scanned the expanse of the control room and spotted a second door at the opposite end of the wall where I had entered. Supporting myself against the wall, I limped my way toward it and touched the green pad; as expected, the door glided open, revealing another long corridor similar to the ones I had seen when “boarding” what I now understood to be some sort of craft.
I passed through a short distance of the corridor and came to and intersected with the end of a narrower passageway, this seemed to extend across the width of the ship’s interior and connect with what I deduced would be the corridor where I had begun this adventure. Half way across this passageway I noted a door on one side and a connecting corridor on the other that extended to the right.
The periodic announcements continued to be broadcast throughout the ship as I explored further, finding what I guessed to be a galley with a table and seating for about six people; two cabin spaces, obviously meant for one person each; and third cabin designed to provide four people with sleeping spaces and seating around a table, all of which were attached to the floor. Like those mounted in the control room, these were cushioned, high-back swivel chairs, though some appeared to be locked in position by a means I didn’t yet understand. I sat in one, wondering what it was made of, as there were no visible seams in the covering. The material felt like soft leather and the cushions seemed to conform mechanically to my body’s contours just enough to be comfortable, while still providing firm support. I noted that the armrests of each chair were equipped with the familiar panels of colored lights and buttons; to be sure, I kept my hands clear of them, not wanting to repeat the consequences of my earlier curiosity where buttons were concerned. Past the quarters I found something I couldn’t easily identify, but I had a hunch it might be a secured airlock, as there was a window installed in it that allowed me to see into the chamber. Inside were suits and helmets…”Space suits,” I imagined.
Solbidyum Wars Saga Book 1: Battle of the New Orleans Page 1
