by Ezra E Manes
Her candor in stating they did not know about the planet impressed Carlos.
She continued, “Our scientists would also like to know if you could make other specific observations within our solar system to support their research. In particular, they are studying solar flares to better correlate their occurrence and resulting radiation peaks that affect our communications networks, and would appreciate close observation of our star during your full transit of our solar system.”
“We will gladly conduct such observations,” Carlos said. “And our physicist, George Sayer, also plans to make additional observations of the outer asteroid belt. Surprisingly, additional planets have often been discovered in such rings orbiting other star systems, and it is possible one may yet be found orbiting in your system.”
They continued a dialogue addressing observations of the solar system and agreed to set up a separate communications link to transmit the observation data. They also agreed to daily communications starting at 0300 Zilan time each morning. The initial focus would be on setting up procedures for the Earth team’s arrival.
By the end of the interchange, both Carlos and Counselor Largena were having difficulty keeping their salutations formal, but both knew they should because of scrutiny of this initial communication by others on both home worlds. However, her forward, bold nature came through in her closing comments.
“Carlos, I appreciate your open and candid communication,” Counselor Largena said as she reached up and brushed a long strand of brown hair back across her shoulder. Her intense hazel eyes seemed to bore into him. “We have a good start to a long and productive relationship that will benefit both our civilizations.”
Her comments about a relationship set Carlos back for a moment, but he coached himself mentally to not read anything into it beyond diplomatic meaning.
“And I appreciate your openness as well, Ceripe,” he replied in kind, trying to suppress his unease. “I believe our teams will get along very well indeed.”
With morning communications with the Zilans, daily communications to the Messier Colony, and observations of the Zilan solar system, the remaining time to reach Zilia passed very quickly. The two teams became very comfortable in dealing with each other by the time the New Horizon completed its braking orbit around Arzét and approached an orbital position around Zilia.
Slowing the spacecraft for entry into planetary orbit was uneventful as they maneuvered to avoid numerous satellites. Those in nearequatorial orbits were probably communications satellites, with a few weather observation satellites mixed in. There were also some satellites in polar orbits, probably of the type that had enabled first detection of Zilia during the New Horizon’s maiden voyage to the planet Democritus. There was very little debris orbiting Zilia, which implied the space junk resulting from earlier attempts to establish a successful satellite launch and operation program had long since fallen from orbit.
Carlos guided the spaceship into a near-equatorial orbit but one slanted about fifteen degrees from the equator and slightly outside the orbits of most Zilan satellites. This enabled better direct observations periodically of both the northern and southern temperate zones of the surface and would minimize potential interference with the Zilan satellites as well. The spacecraft circled the planet once approximately every two hours at a nominal distance of nine hundred kilometers. The near-planet orbit was important to accommodate access to the surface by their small shuttlecraft.
The crew of the New Horizon felt a great sense of relief at finally being in orbit around Zilia, and they could hardly wait to again set foot on terra firma. They were even more interested in meeting the Zilans after observing all the satellites in orbit around their planet. They certainly had the technology to launch people into space but apparently had no interest in doing so, which greatly puzzled the team. That was just one of many mysteries about this civilization they hoped to solve once they set foot on Zilia.
TEN
ARRIVAL
Carlos normally slept peacefully after an intense lovemaking bout with Gloria, but not the night before descent to Zilia. It had worked wonders for her, and she slept through his tossing and turning. He was as restless as he had been the night before making his first trip to a planet’s surface.
He finally drifted off to sleep but woke sometime in the wee hours of the night, still thinking about his first trip to the planet Hope. He had reached the age of ten before leaving the Messier Space Station for a visit to the surface.
Carlos had found it impossible to maintain his composure as he said good-bye to Aunt Claire the morning of the field trip to the Hope surface colony. His excitement was boiling just below the surface of his emotions, ready to erupt in childlike behavior. He hurried through the passageways to meet the rest of the class convening near the shuttle launch bay, carrying a backpack containing clothes and personal items he would need on the surface.
He was the first student to enter the briefing room where the class was to meet. Two teachers and three parent chaperones were already present. They abruptly stopped their discussion when he entered and all turned and looked awkwardly at him. He got the distinct feeling they had been talking about his previous, almost disastrous, short trip in a shuttlecraft at age seven.
The arrival of several additional students broke the awkward silence, and soon the entire class was present. Their primary teacher took charge and had them sit down for a briefing on safety and rules during the trip. A parent chaperone conducted the initial safety briefing. He flew aboard shuttles regularly in his job supporting construction work on the planet’s surface. Carlos again felt uncomfortable when the man looked directly at him while indicating that everyone was to take seats quickly upon boarding the shuttle and not wander off anywhere.
Then another parent chaperone, a woman named Leanna who resided in the surface colony, went over the rules to follow while at the colony. The number one rule was to never go anywhere alone, and she cast a brief look in Carlos’s direction. The second rule was to not go outside the fenced colony boundary unless accompanied by an adult. The third rule was to always spread a special cream on exposed skin to block harmful radiation from the nearby star before going outside during daylight hours.
By the time she finished going over the rules, Carlos felt some of his excitement ebb. With all the rules, how could he really enjoy being on the surface and learning all he wanted to about what went on there? He all but forgot the rules as he climbed aboard the shuttlecraft and settled into a seat near a porthole where he hoped to see the planet on the way down.
Most of the others rushed to take seats close to the open cockpit door to watch the preflight activities. Carlos felt more than a little self-conscious when the other students and teachers were all seated and strapped in, for no one elected to sit anywhere near him. Maybe they had in mind what had happened to him some three years before on another shuttlecraft.
He was brought out of this thinking when Leanna sat down beside him. “I take it this is your first trip to the surface?”
“Yes, ma’am, it is.”
“You’ll enjoy it, but it could be a little uncomfortable as you adjust to the change in gravity from that at the space station. Do you know how much more the gravity will be there?”
“Ten percent more than in the space station living areas,” he said, warming up to Leanna. They continued to chat until the shuttle departed from the launch bay; then he watched out the porthole to see what he could of the receding space station. His eyes saw nothing but the darkness of space, with distant stars seen clearly. He felt a deep chill at the thought of having only the thin shuttlecraft hull to protect him from space, but Leanna began talking again, which caused him to focus back within the shuttle.
“You’ll do well on this adventure, Carlos. If anything bothers you, please let me know. I knew your mother and father, and it’s a real pleasure for me to see you make this trip.”
His mother and father! He had not thought much about them in a long time. H
e recalled Uncle Joe saying his parents had spent a lot of time at the primary Hope colony helping build it. What had they done while on the surface? He felt a dull ache start deep inside as he thought about his parents, even though their memory had greatly diminished over time. It made the visit to the surface even more important. Maybe walking the streets and eating and sleeping in the buildings where they had stayed would make them more real to him.
The trip to the surface was uneventful, but his first steps on the surface had a dramatic effect, disorienting him for a short time. His increase in weight was very noticeable, and he gaped in wonder at the vast openness of the sky and land stretching off to the horizon.
Then tears came to his eyes when he impulsively took a deep breath of the open air. The acrid smell, immediate dryness in his throat, and itchy eyes were discomforting, but he worked to ignore the symptoms by concentrating on the surroundings. The colony had the appearance of roughness and newness about it, and also an air of permanence.
After enjoying an excellent midday meal and lathering up with radiation blocking cream, the students went as a group to the cultivated fields located adjacent to the colony compound. This colony was devoted to agriculture and grew almost all the vegetables consumed aboard the space station.
Carlos lagged behind the group as they entered the first field, kicking at the tilled dirt between the rows of plants. He knelt on impulse, took two handfuls of loose dirt, and let it trickle slowly between his fingers. This was amazing; the nutrients in the soil and the abundance of air were the stuff of life that grew food. The nearby plants were deeply rooted in the rich soil and were dark green and healthy looking. It was on such soil that humans had evolved in the distant past, setting down their own roots, so to speak.
Still kneeling, he looked up at the sky as a large cloud passed in front of the star Nepali A, providing welcome shade from the intense radiation. Dirt still trickled through his fingers as he watched the edges of the thick cloud turn bright yellow, with bands of light shining past like large wands. It was as beautiful a sight as he had ever seen. He could get to like life on the planet’s surface!
There was so much he didn’t know, so much he was not exposed to while being bound within the confines of the space station. The station was as a small clump of soil in comparison to the size of this planet, and the planet was as a grain of sand in the galaxy. He made a silent vow to not let artificial boundaries keep him from learning more about the universe around him.
“Come along, Carlos,” a gentle voice said from behind. He rose to move ahead as Leanna strode up beside him. She had correctly deduced some of the feelings he was experiencing as he knelt with fingers sifting through the soil.
“This is the environment that’s natural for people, not the space station, isn’t it, Leanna?”
“I believe it is, Carlos. Sometimes you have to adapt to survive, and that is what we all did to get here through space. It’s what many people, including you, continue doing to support building colonies here and on the moon. My place is here. Keep in mind that someday your place may also be on a planet.”
Carlos woke and sat up abruptly, causing Gloria to stir. He must have dozed off as he was thinking about that surface trip long ago. It was approaching time to get up, so he rose quietly and began getting ready for the day. They had orbited Zilia for four days and now planned to make their first trip to the surface. He mentally reviewed preparations: they couldn’t afford anything going wrong during their first trip down.
He made a mental note to make sure everyone carried their personal communication devices in case they encountered problems while out on Zilia. Then he had another thought.
Eve, will we be able to communicate via my NI while I am on the surface?
Yes, Carlos, as long as one of our communications devices is nearby. I might be able to detect your queries directly, but I cannot be sure considering the very weak signal transmitted by your NI, and the spaceship’s orbit.
We’ll test this, but I expect to use this mode only in emergencies while on the surface.
They would land at the Earth Embassy compound on the southern outskirts of Zilerip. The city was almost entirely on semiarid land, in all likelihood to conserve the scarce rich, productive farmland in the northern temperate zone.
The shuttlecraft would descend in midafternoon on this Fifth Day of the week, the equivalent of an Earth weekend. The Zilan workweek was four days, with the fifth day devoted to religious services and family events. There had been very little communication with the Zilans on Fifth Days after the New Horizon assumed liaison responsibility. When it occurred of necessity, it was normally only Counselor Largena online from Zilia.
The crew had conducted a ship and personal sanitization process to minimize bacteria or viruses that could infect the Zilans. Of course, the human body carried myriad bacteria necessary for normal body functions, and most certainly, the Zilans did as well. They would still go through adjustments to the environment on the surface, hopefully without overly severe discomfort or illness.
To allow time to adjust, the first meeting with the Zilans was set for six days after surface arrival. During this quarantine period, the medical staff would monitor the team and scrutinize the environment within the Earth Embassy compound. The doctors had inoculated everyone with general vaccines to provide some level of protection against unforeseen infectious agents.
Surprisingly, the Zilans were unconcerned about the possibility that the team carried anything infectious to their planet. They were anxious to meet the emissaries from a distant civilization and showed aggravation at having to wait over a week before meeting them once they were on the surface. However, Counselor Largena was sensitive to the team’s perspective and effectively mitigated problems arising from the delay.
Per Earth’s direction, they would take minimal advanced technology to the surface from the New Horizon. The shuttlecraft was a very capable craft, though somewhat unsophisticated. It had conventional communications systems similar in technology to that of the Zilans. They would relay all communications from the surface to Earth and the Messier Colony through the New Horizon or the space probes orbiting Zilia. Exceptions in sophistication were the shuttlecraft propulsion system that enabled vertical takeoff and landing, and its augmented reality control center.
As a backup to the New Horizon, the shuttlecraft contained a backbone electronic bus structure to accommodate quick transfer of computer and information storage systems to the shuttle in an emergency. However, the security safeguards embedded in the shuttlecraft should thwart any efforts to garner information, even if the Zilans confiscated the shuttle. As an added precaution, the shuttlecraft also had a built-in self-destruct capability.
Two members of the team would remain aboard the New Horizon and would later switch out with two members of the surface team. This rotation would continue throughout the initial diplomatic phase of the mission, expected to take a year or more. Communications transponders would be set up in the embassy meeting rooms and public living areas to enable monitoring and participating in activities from the spaceship.
The first two to stay onboard were George and Amanda Sayer. They did not mind, for George had observations ongoing of the nearby star. As an astrophysicist and something of a cosmogonist, George was acutely interested in finding any evidence to support or counter the prevailing big bang theory of the origin of the universe. He was also keenly interested in Pezia, the third planet out from the star Arzét, which appeared to harbor life of some type, if you could believe the full spectrum analysis of its thin atmosphere.
Gloria interrupted Carlos’s mental ruminations with a warm “good morning” from bed. She stretched like a tigress waking from the deep sleep of one satisfied with her life and in particular the previous night.
“Last night is lingering with me, Carlos,” she said warmly. “Do you think our love life will be as good on the surface as it is here?”
He couldn’t help but smile at this as he finished
dressing and turned to face her. Now that he thought about it, they had only made love in space. “I think it will be as good, if not better. But then, anywhere with you is great.”
She smiled her appreciation of this comment, threw back the covers, and slowly rolled out of bed, stretching provocatively.
It was a clear day as Carlos piloted the shuttlecraft toward the surface and Zilerip, with only a few clouds hovering near the southern horizon. As the shuttlecraft approached the Embassy compound, the crew was amazed at the large number of Zilans congregated nearby. Spectators filled the city park adjacent to the western side of the compound, and the large crowd extended around the southern perimeter nearest the landing pad. Those gathered appeared to be oblivious to any danger from the shuttlecraft; they clearly wanted to be present for the historic event of representatives from another race landing on their planet.
Carlos slowed the descent during the last few thousand meters of flight to give the assembled Zilans more viewing time. The team within gave out a loud cheer as the shuttlecraft touched down lightly.
They had arrived, for better or worse!
The crew disembarked to cheers and applause from the crowds gathered around the compound. As they climbed the gentle slope to the main building, they could see the Zilans through the landscape trees and shrubs. Although no physical barrier existed to keep the people out, no one attempted to cross over onto the Embassy grounds.
