Space Scout - The Makers

by S A Pavli

  “Do you find that you have much in common with each other?”

  “Oh yes. Very much so,” I said.”

  “That is so interesting,” she said, looking pleased. “You see, our early pioneers were not certain when they made the genetic changes, what would be the result and to what extent they would be successful.”

  I was amazed by her statement. It seemed irresponsible to me that they would make such far reaching changes to a species genome without having a clear idea how they would turn out.

  “They were not certain?” I tried not to sound accusing.

  “We knew there would be no bad outcome. There would either be no effect, or a good effect. But how good, we were not sure.”

  I remembered the primates we had met on the jungle planet.

  “Yes, we found a planet with a primate species. They had the genetic changes, but had not evolved. Or had only evolved partially.”

  “Unfortunately, that is what happened in all cases, except yours”

  “Just us? Two species only?” I asked.

  “You and two others. The Dansai and the Saraya. We changed twenty two species, but I’m afraid Nature is very stubborn and insists on doing her thing.”

  I wanted to ask why we, Humans, Hianja and Dansa looked so different from the Cypraeans, but I could see many others were itching to ask questions.

  “If you are agreeable, I will allow questions from everyone. Cora, can you put questions from the ship? Put your hands up and I will be chair person.”

  For the next two hours everyone fired question at Jana and her friends. They introduced themselves on at a time, taking turns to answer questions. Some of them were scientists and answered questions from our own scientists. They did not hold back and promised further details on the genetic engineering technicalities.

  We were all beginning to need a break at that point, although our ‘virtual’ friends seemed indefatigable. Someone asked them about their virtual environment, how real it was and how did they choose which life to live. Jana smiled like a cat and turned to her friends briefly, as if to communicate with them. Were they telepathic? I asked myself. Living within a virtual environment there was no reason why they could not be. She turned back to us.

  “I have a proposition for you.”

  Hello. I have never been propositioned by a virtual entity before. I suppressed a grin.

  “Would you be willing to try our virtual universe?”

  I suddenly felt just a little nervous. I looked around and Manera was looking at me apprehensively.

  “Ah, is it dangerous?”

  “Not at all because you will only sample the environment. Your mind will not be transferred

  One of the Earth officers stepped forward to address me.

  “Excuse me sir, I’m lieutenant Crossley from the ESDF Atlantis.”

  “Yes lieutenant. Good to meet you.” We shook hands

  “Sir, I’m not sure we should take that risk.”

  I looked at him enquiringly.

  “What’s on your mind?”

  “This is an alien AI and we have no idea what its intentions are. It has already attacked one of our ships.”

  “Are you concerned about the safety of the process lieutenant? Or do you think they are lying to us in some way?”

  “One or both sir,” replied the young man. I nodded to show my agreement.

  “Yeah, I can understand your concerns Lieutenant. But if they wanted to do us in I suspect there is nothing we could do to stop them. At this point, we are pretty well in their power.”

  “I assure you that we have no ulterior motives,” interceded the android.

  “All right. I will not allow anyone to take a risk that I am not prepared to take. I believe there is no problem so, I will go first, and if all is well, then we can all take the trip.”

  “Paul, can I speak to you?” Manera pulled me to one side. “You don’t have to do this.”

  “Manera, I really don’t see any danger darling. What could they possibly want to do to me?”

  Manera turned to the screen.

  “Jana, can I have your promise that there is no danger?”

  “Of course Manera.” Jana smiled encouragingly out of the screen. “If there is any brain incompatibility, the system will warn us and stop the process.”

  “Then I will come with you,” she said firmly. I knew better than to argue with Manera.

  “I will arrange a small excursion into your pasts first before you join us in this world,” said Jana.

  A small excursion into my past? What could that mean? I shrugged. In for a penny….

  “Prime, lead the way.”

  “Of course.” The android turned and we followed it towards a door set in the pristine whiteness of the curved wall. The door led to a wide corridor and into a broad room filled with seats, each one raised on a pedestal. Above each seat was a circular metallic hood attached to a gimballed arm. It was like a scene from an ancient SF movie where the mad professor reveals his bizarre invention. A time machine or a machine to steal your brain or soul. I began to understand the young lieutenants fears. The android led us to the machines.

  “Please be seated.”

  We both sat and turned to look at each other as the metallic hoods buzzed ominously and came down slowly over our head.

  “Darling, see you over there.” Manera’s face was the last thing I saw as it covered my eyes.

  Chapter 21

  I was seven years old and living with my grandparents in a tiny village at the base of some low mountains. I stood on the edge of a craggy slope leading down to the sea. Ahead of me, a broken winding path led down to a pine forest that spread along the base of the mountains around the coast. To the edge of the forest, the green blue of the sea merged into the blue bowl of the sky.

  The sun blazed down, but this was February and the heat was pleasantly moderate. I carried a bag because today, I was going mushroom picking. The lower slopes of the mountains, just below the village, were well forested and an excellent source of mushrooms this time of the year. My little home, where I lived with Grandma and Grandad, was just above the slope that led to the forest. I scrambled down the slope, leaping over rocks, boulders and gullies, laughing and enjoying the thrill. I heard my grandmother shouting.

  “Pauli, be careful. Watch out for snakes.”

  “Don’t worry gran’ma. I’ll be careful,” I called back. Always fussing, was gran. I usually went with gran’da, taking the long way around because the old man could not manage the slope. But today gran’da was still at the café, no doubt playing backgammon with the other old men, the plastic tokens making cracking noises on the table as they shouted and laughed over their moves.

  I loved the smell of the damp vegetation as I pushed my way through bushes and clumps of long grass. I was close to the sea and I could smell its salty ozone and hear the crash of waves on the boulders in the small bay beneath the village. I turned away from the sea toward the growth of trees in the lee of the mountain. Once in the cool shadow of the trees I focused down to the floor, looking for the tell tale signs of the hidden fungi. I knew a spot where there was always a good crop and sure enough I found them, hidden under leaves and moss. But they could not hide from me! I worked my way through the mottled shade, picking only the largest. I would come back for the others on another day. My shoulder bag gradually filled. Deeper in the forest the trees were thicker and thorny bushes grew between them so I turned back heading towards the path. By the time I found it, my bag was full.

  The path led down to the sea and then around and eventually back to the village. A small snake wriggled ahead of me on the path but I wasn‘t worried. There were lots of snakes down here amongst the boulders and you had to be careful where to tread. But if you did not bother them, they would not bother you. I came to a small beach that all the children of the village regularly used, but it was empty. Perhaps it was a bit late in the day. I scrambled down the slope and once on the beach I removed my clothes an
d dived in for a quick swim. The water was cold and I gasped and shouted from the shock. But I soon got used to it and swam out to some big rocks twenty yards out. I climbed up on the rocks and sat on a big one, dangling my legs into the sea. They had become very brown since I had come here from the town.

  My thoughts turned to my mother, the famous actress travelling the world. I felt a pang of pain and loneliness, and resentment at not being included in her life. She always made a fuss of me when she came to visit, but I had the feeling sometimes it was all false. Little fishes came along to nibble my toes, distracting me, and I could not help laughing. They tickled!

  The sun was low on the horizon. My gran’ma would be going to the door looking for me. Probably she would send gran’da down the path to find me. I dived back in and swam back. I put on my clothes. They got wet, but would dry by the time I got back. I hoisted up my full bag of mushrooms and headed home. Gran’ma would cook them with some onions and maybe a bit of liver if she had some. Gran’da would enjoy them with a big chunk of bread and some red wine and tousle my hair and give me a hug for being such a good hunter. Whistling, or trying to. I had been told by gran’pa that I was ‘pretty tuneless’, I headed home, throwing stones at lizards sunning themselves on the rocks. I loved the way they scuttled away, and then stopped dead still, looking around jerkily, like robots.

  The world around me faded and I was suddenly Captain Paul Constantine again, renown explorer and hero. But the little boy in me remained and I struggled to hold back my emotions. Those painful childish feelings of rejection, that I had thought were forgotten, had come back to haunt me. I remembered Grandma and Grandad’s unstinting love, and my distress at their deaths, one after the other, as if one could not live without the other.

  I marvelled at how real the experience had been. It had been total with no hint of my grown up persona. I was again that little boy living with his grandparents on a small Greek island. A little bit of an outsider with the other children, at first, because I had come from England. But later I had become one of them, brown and boisterous, roaming the countryside and swimming in the sea like a native.

  After the grandparents died I was returned to England to a boarding school. The difference in environment could not have been more stark. But my English was excellent, private lessons in Greece had ensured that, and there were many other foreign boys in the school, so I was not exceptional. School and University turned me into an Englishman, but the little brown boy never disappeared. Was that why I loved exploring virgin planets, tromping through alien forests, perhaps to find alien mushrooms?

  My consciousness cleared and I was on a broad veranda. Spread before me as far as the eye could see was the fabulous Cypraean city. I felt a hand slip into mine and I turned to see Manera smiling at me.

  “Hey gorgeous, fancy meeting you here.”

  “I was told it was a good place to meet handsome young men,” she quipped. We kissed and I held her close for a few moments.

  “Pretty fantastic huh?” I waved a hand at the city. “I thought Hian was something special. This, well, it is unbelievable. How long does it take to build a city like this?”

  “Mmm,” It was a rhetorical question and she made no attempt to reply. “We could go and see the original,” she said. I grunted with surprise. Of course. They had said that their home planet was not far from here.

  “Would there be anything left? After 3 million years.”

  “Of course,” she said. “Look at it. If the bones of dead creatures can survive for millions of years, so can that. Some of those materials must be so hard, they would never decay.”

  And she was right of course. Those fantastic architectural excesses must be underpinned, literally, by super hard materials. They may even be still standing. It was an enticing thought.

  “On a more personal note, I had a trip into my past before I came here. I was a seven year old picking mushrooms and swimming naked in the sea.”

  “I bet you was incredibly cute,” she said.

  “Yeah, all bony knees and elbows,” I laughed. “Where did you go?”

  “I was fifteen and in love. And he did not know I was alive.”

  “Ah, the tragedy of young love,” I said mockingly. She punched me on the shoulder and sniffed.

  “It was tragic. I was going to kill myself.”

  “What? You kill yourself? The totally pragmatic Miss Hatekan.”

  “I know, hard to believe,“ she laughed. “Amazing how hormones can stunt the reason. I met him recently and could not believe how ordinary he was.”

  “Compared to me.”

  “Before I met you, mister irresistible.”

  We kissed again, long and intimate.

  “It is a total vindication of our plans.” The speaker was Jana and we turned to see her and the other Cypraeans at the door leading into the building. “That two beings evolved on different planets can love each other.”

  “Well, I’m so pleased,” I said sarcastically. Manera gave me a reproving look, but Jana laughed.

  “I apologise. That must have appeared very patronising.”

  “Just a bit,” I said, feeling a little cross.

  Jana looked at her colleagues and turned back to me looking thoughtful.

  “Do you think it will be seen in that way?”

  “By some people, yes.”

  “But that is not the case. We simply gave evolution a push in one direction. A helping hand if you like. It retrospect, it now appears more luck than judgement.”

  “Whichever way you express it, the idea that we would not be human without your interference will not go down well with many.”

  “It is not something we considered,” she said.

  “Well, I confess that I am surprised,” I said. “You never considered the psychological aspects? The fundamental beliefs that a species has about its origins, its place in the Universe? ”

  I was not sure why I was suddenly feeling jaundiced. Was I overwhelmed by the majesty of what I was seeing, and feeling insignificant by comparison? Or had the patronising satisfaction of the Cypraeans at the success of their experiment annoyed me?

  “We were alone in the Universe,” said Jana. “We just wanted some company.”

  Her statement was so simple, so elemental in its emotional appeal, I just had to relent. I laughed, shaking my head in disbelief.

  “You just wanted some company.”

  Manera took my arm.

  “Paul, people will believe what they want to believe. After all, we all have parents. It just happens, the Cypraeans are ours.”

  “Of course,” I said. It seemed churlish to get into a philosophical or religious discussion at this point. “So this was your home, millions of years ago. Why did you leave it. The original physical home that is.”

  One of the other Cypraeans stepped forward. He was a man, tall and athletic looking with long blonde locks.

  “My name is Santol,” he said with an amiable smile. “Let me explain. The habitable planets here in the cluster are unstable. We think that the closeness of other stars and the central black hole interferes with them and over long periods their climate varies dramatically. There is also a paucity of habitable planets in the cluster. Over two million years our civilization expanded to populate all the habitable planets, only about twenty of them. But, as Prime explained earlier, we abandoned most of them to migrate to the centre of the galaxy which is rich in habitable planets. Our civilization now inhabits hundreds of planets.”

  “Why have you remained here?” I asked.

  “As Prime has explained, we are here to monitor events in the cluster and report to our home civilisation.” replied Santol.

  “Are you were in contact with them?” asked Manera.

  “Yes, via hyperspaces communications. Our AI, Prime, was in continuous contact with others like him. We also get visits occasionally, normally by specialist teams to carry out repairs and upgrades to the habitat. But sadly, something has gone badly wrong and we have been ab
andoned.”

  I looked at Manera. The next question was obvious, and I let her ask it.

  “So you cannot inform your home civilization of our arrival?”

  Santol looked at Jana and allowed her to answer.

  “I am afraid not.”

  “Well, that is disappointing. But tell me, why have the Dansai here in the cluster been abandoned? They were in severe danger from the Saraya before we arrived and helped them.”

  “We were not aware of that,” said Jana. “It was our policy not to interfere with the development of these new civilisations. And also, because of technical problems our contact with affairs in the cluster has been minimal in the last few thousand years.”

  “Tell us about the Saraya,” I said, deciding to change the subject. “Genetically, it is interesting that a reptilian species was able to evolve high intelligence.”

  “It is more than interesting,” said Santol, who seemed to be the scientist in the group. “It’s impossible.”

  Manera and I looked at him with incomprehension.

  “Because,” he continued, “the Saraya are not reptiles.”

  “I have never seen anything that looks more reptile than them,” I protested.

  “Yes, how was that possible?” asked Manera.

  “They were amphibious mammals. They gave birth to their offspring on land and nursed them on land until they were able to swim. They were able to move freely between river and forest.”

  “Remarkable,” said Manera, “Did you give them the same genetic changes that you gave us?”

  “More or less,” replied Santol.

  “You seem to have created intelligent monsters,” she said, with distaste. “Why would you do that?”

  “We thought that we had a duty to create intelligent life whenever possible,” said Santol. “It was our gift to the universe.”

  “Dear God,” groaned Manera, closing her eyes in frustration. “What monumental arrogance.”

  “We would not expect you to understand,” said Jana loftily.

  Manera looked at her with disgust, then turned to me.