Other Worlds Than These

by Gabe Sluis

  “Oh, I’m glad to see you, Sir,” Crescent said. “I saw from the bridge that we were boarded. And gravity! What the hell is going on!?”

  “Are we ready to go?”

  “Yes, Sir,” Crescent said. “But, I thought your secondary was security. Wasn’t Major Farris supposed to command this ship?”

  “I don’t know,” Aros said, climbing the latter ahead of the other two. “All I was told was to take command and get this thing launched as fast as I could. What’s the normal complement? Five?”

  “Yes, Sir. But you two are the only ones that have shown up!”

  “We have big company coming. We can’t wait. The other must have gotten stuck.”

  “We had to take two Scalies down on the way here. I almost got trapped, but apparently I wasn’t the only one…” Jane said, also climbing aboard.

  “Yeah, we are missing Pilot, Weapons, and Comms, assuming you are Sensors and you are in command, Sir.”

  Aros jumped into the command seat, set the stolen gravity projector beside him and pulled up a display. He pointed at the pilot chair, “You know how to fly this thing. Novalis, take sensors and route communications to your secondary panel. I will be command and cover weapons.”

  “I don’t know,” Jane said. “Should we wait a little longer or get conformation from the bridge?”

  “We have no time. I have orders to launch as soon as I am mission capable. ‘In the absence of orders, I will take appropriate action,’” Aros said, quoting the officers creed.

  The reference to oaths taken decided the point for the unsure. The hatch was sealed; the dock room was locked and depressurized. Against protocols, the ship launched itself out into the hostile space with only three crew members aboard.

  ***

  “Sir! I am detecting the launch of Aurora!” Internal Control reported above the bridge commotion.

  “Launch of the gunships was not authorized! Who gave the command!?”

  “The crew ID code that gave authorization was… all zeros? I don’t know, Sir.”

  “Just what in the world is going on! Call that ship back! What the hell is Farris thinking?!” The Captain said.

  “Sir, East and West have moved within fifty thousand passus of our position. The Aurora is moving off, heading towards West,” Sensor reported.

  “I want to talk to those fools NOW!” The Captain yelled. “This is unacceptable!”

  “We are right here, Sir,” a voice said from the back of the room.

  Captain Bartlett got up and turned to see Major Ferris, Warrant Officer Lete and a Communications Specialist entering the bridge.

  “What is going on? Speak, Ferris!”

  “I’m confused, Sir,” Major Ferris said, sounding on the edge of anger himself. “Each of us got redirected to alternate secondary assignments. The three of us got messages to report to sensor array four, on the other side of the ship from Aurora. After a few minuets it made no sense! Our scrolls aren’t working to confirm with IC. So we came here. Is that the Aurora?”

  “Sir, I am leaving the bridge. I will link up with the security teams and make sure the Ushas is secured,” Colonel Plash informed his superior. “I won’t let those reptile irrumator take a second ship.”

  “Go,” Captain Bartlett turned back toward the main screen. “Why am I still not talking to them!”

  “Sir, something is malfunctioning with our systems,” the communications officer said. “Wait! The Aurora is transmitting on all frequencies! I can receive but we can’t transmit. Oh meus deus… I am recording and putting the audio on speakers.”

  What came out was not Latin. It was low frequency with high sounds spiking through in places. It sounded like a song with warbles and growls. It was like a language no one on the bridge crew had ever heard. And then it stopped.

  “Plash was right, those damn creatures some how took the Auror…”

  The Captain was cut off by a reply to the Auroras transmission. This time, the language was much more harsh. It grated on the ears, despite the reasonable volume. Every member of the bridge crew stopped what they were doing and listened with wide eyes.

  “Sir, my linguistic analyzers are telling me this is not a human language.”

  “That seems pretty obvious to us all, Lieutenant. Thank you,” the Captain snapped.

  “But, Sir, the strange thing the computer is reporting a recognizable difference between the quality of the speakers,” the communication officer quickly rattled off. “The program says that the similarity of languages being produced by the speakers is nearly identical, with the only difference in the vocal equipment and modulation of the first speaker being quite different from the second.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “That the computer believes that the speaker on the Aurora is human, and the respondent is not.”

  The implications of this information took a second to sink in.

  ***

  “Crescent, move us toward the closest Scalie ship. Lets set a block between it and the Prime.”

  “I’m still having problems getting in contact with the Prime Meridian,” Jane told Aros. “Our single channel protocols don’t seem to be connecting.”

  “We are going to have to just do a broad spectrum transmit. It won’t be secure, but it’s the best we can do. Let me know when you have it set up.”

  “Hey, Sir! We are coming up on that ship fast. How close are we going to get?” Crescent said, on the edge of panic.

  “You are doing good, Cress. Just hold us here.”

  The Aurora had a small main screen, and Aros pulled up a multi spectrum image of the Scalie ship. It had four main spikes connected by the rest of the ship. It was arranged like a square with the center being large and open. It was aimed, spikes in direction of travel, leaving the yellow energy arcs from the engines slightly visible.

  “This ship looks nothing like the ships that attacked Tellus…” Crescent said.

  “The channel is open, Drogen. The Scalies are probably going to hear this too, so keep it short.”

  Both Jane and Crescent turned to listen to what Aros would have to say back to their own ship. Instead, they were both shocked by what came out of his mouth. Having to extend his neck at points and odd movements with his tongue, Aros sang out a stream of vocalizations that were not human.

  Jane and Crescent had both never heard a Scalie speak, as was the case with most humans, but they instinctively knew to whom Aros was talking.

  When he finished, Aros sat with his eyes closed, awaiting a response.

  “What in the Field of Arbol was that!!?” Jane shouted.

  “Just wait. He knows what he is doing,” Crescent said in awe. A smile spread across his face when the hair-raising reply from the true speakers of the strange language came across the open channel. “Ripper…” he breathed.

  ***

  “Internal Control!” the Captain bellowed. “I want a headcount of scrolls on this ship. Tell me who isn’t here!”

  The crew continued to listen to the back and forth communication between the Aurora and the unknown enemy as Internal Control made the headcount.

  “I am missing Tech Specialist Crescent, Lieutenant Novalis and Lieutenant Drogen,” Internal Control said.

  “Drogen!” the weapons officer said under his breath.

  The Captain turned. “Lieutenant Veldt! Do you know something that I should?”

  “Sir,” Veldt began, “I have had my suspicions from the first moment I met Drogen that there was something more to him than appeared. He is too good! He doesn’t really connect with others the way one would expect an officer to. That is not to say that people don’t like him, but…”

  “The point!?” Captain Bartlett cut in.

  “Sir, I think that guy is one of the Grand Marshal’s men. I think he is one of the Archmen.”

  “You think he was a plant on this mission with his own set of orders?” The Captain stopped and thought. He had heard rumors Midord’s Archmen. He regretted lettin
g Plash take off. He needed a second opinion.

  “So, I am supposed to operate on the assumption that Lieutenant Drogen is one of the Archmen and has commandeered my gunship for some reason that I was not made aware of?” Captain Bartlett reflected aloud.

  “He is not an Archmen.”

  The room all turned to the sensor station at the front left of the bridge. Tech Specialist Gorra stood up. She spoke and walked around the station, positioning herself so everyone on the bridge could see her.

  “There are two Archmen assigned to this mission, and Drogen is not one of them,” she said aloud.

  “And you are,” The Captain scoffed. “So, are you taking command my ship or should I continue to deal with this crisis as I see fit, Archmen.”

  “No actions have yet triggered my orders. I am here to help, Sir.”

  “Sure you are,” he said dismissing her. “How far are those ships?”

  “Twenty eight thousand passus,” Sensors said. “The West is positioning itself at a different angle from East. Sir, I am detecting a large energy shift in West… Look!” the sensor officer said, pointing to the main screen.

  The shot was of the Scalie ship dubbed West. In the central open portion, surrounded by the body of the ship, was a bubble of aqua light. Energy beams from the ship shot inward to the central point of the open space, causing the bubble to grow. The bubble was just that, undulating and slightly transparent. The surface was not uniform; its surface had a similar appearance to the light that is thrown on the bottom of a rippling swimming pool.

  The clamor on the bridge was at a near roar when the bubble slowly began to move away from its birth point in the center of the ominous West. It slowly shifted toward the Prime Meridian.

  LT. Veldt on weapons attempted to fire on all his preset firing solutions, but the commands failed to activate missile launch. The pilot made an effort to move the ship, but turning on a dime to activate engines took too much time. The ship began to rotate, but the bubble reached it first. The alien bubble passed over the Prime Meridian, encompassing it, Scalie assault craft and all.

  In all of the confusion, it took the crew a second to realize that the aqua tented image on the main screen was slowly dissolving away to blackness. Everything disappeared beyond the thin veil. From the outside, the bubble solidified and shrank, finally winking out of existence in a fraction of a second. The Prime Meridian was gone.

  ***

  “NO!!!” Jane screamed when the Prime Meridian no longer appeared on any of her instruments.

  “What have you done!?” She turned and cried at the man sitting at the command seat. “You’ve killed us all!!”

  “Point your scopes toward the rift,” Aros said. He paid no attention to Jane’s wide eye stare as he told the sit-in pilot where to move the ship next. After he finished, he reactivated the open channel and began taking to the Scalies.

  Jane turned back to her station, wiping back the tears of rage and sorrow that clouded her eyes. As she moved the ships main sensor scopes and compensated for their movement, she thought about what to do next. Should she try to attack and subdue the mad man? No, he had dealt with two Scalies like they were stuffed toys. She would have to convince him to make a run for the rift and home. But how would she be…

  Half way across the system, the most startling thing appeared. The same aqua-green light of the bubble materialized, the same size it was before it flashed out of existence. A second later the bubble burst, evaporating away. Jane quickly pulled it up on the main screen and magnified the area. The Prime Meridian sat hanging near the rift, in the same poor shape it was in seconds before the near instantaneous movement.

  ***

  “We seem to be back in normal space, Sir!” Sensors shouted. “Computing our location.”

  “Internal Control! Get a report from the XO. Find out how we are doing with our intruders,” the Captain said. “Where are we, Sensors?”

  “It appears we are back at the edge of the rift, Sir!”

  “You have got to be joking me,” Captain Bartlett said to no one in particular. “Gravity and fast travel…”

  “Sir,” Engineering spoke up, “we have sustained massive damage from the intrusion by the enemy ships. We have systems down all over the penetrated ventral areas. If you are thinking about going back for the Aurora, the drag alone will slow us down by days. Security teams are reporting engagements in various locations. We are in pretty desperate shape.”

  “Then get repair teams working on it!”

  “Captain,” the Archmen began, “I would have to agree. We need to get back to Tellus with all this new data and technology we have obtained. The treasure trove of linguistic data from those transmission alone may give us the key to translating their language…”

  “But we left a gunship behind! I demand an explanation from Drogen. I can’t let that ship fall into enemy hands. I will not just slink away like a defeated curr!”

  “You will slink away if you want to keep control of your ship,” Gorra said in a low voice. “If you attempt to go back, I will take command from you and return us nevertheless.”

  Bartlett sunk back in his command chair and covered his face with his hands. He had waited his whole career for this appointment. And now he wrecked the crowning achievement of the human race, a ship capable of long-range travel that took five years to build. Now he would go down in the history books as the man who was defeated by the Scalies and lost a ship under his command.

  “This can still turn out well. We have gravity generators! We know the position of the enemy! We just traveled a quarter of the way across this field in a second! Our scientists will be poring over the data that we bring home for years. You may have saved the human race! We are leaving that gunship. Those people chose their path. There is nothing we can do for them.”

  The Captain straitened up in his chair. “Take your station, Tech. Specialist, or whatever your true rank may be. I yield.”

  “Pilot, take us home. Fast as safety allows.”

  ***

  “They are leaving? They are leaving us!” Jane cried

  “That’s perfect. Right here, Cress,” Aros said.

  Aros again switched on the channel to the Scalies and let out a croak. Ahead of them, the West began to charge another bubble.

  “Wait!” Jane jumped up. “What just happened!? How did the Prime just get back to the rift like that? What is going on!!?”

  “Sit down, Jane. I will explain everything. I promise.”

  “Are you sure about this, Sir?” Crescent said.

  “Yes, this will take us where we want to go. They can produce bubbles that transition everything inside into a baby universe. They send it in a direction with an expected distance which the baby universe will pop us back out into the real universe,” Aros explained.

  “They can do that?” Crescent said.

  “Wait. Direction of the bubbles movement dictates where we go? Why is the bubble coming toward us this way and not aiming us at the rift?”

  Aros looked at Jane. He smiled. The bubble got closer. While it was engulfing them, Jane and Crescent sat stupefied. Their minds were reeling from the events of the past hour. Aros was grinning.

  “Here we go!”

 

  Part V

  The gunship Aurora popped out of the baby universe, a miniature created universe completely separate from the original, very far away from the Unknown Field.

  “This is not Tellus!” Jane said. “Where did we just turn up?”

  “Relax. We are in the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy.” The other two stared at Aros in disbelief. “It is a small loop of stars, mainly consisting of four globular clusters, that runs perpendicular to the plain of our spiral galaxy. We are in the furthest of the star clusters.”

  “Why would you send us out here? Why wouldn’t you send us home?” Jane said.

  “If it all works out, we will all be going home. You just have to trust me.”

  “Trust you? You
must be joking. You just tricked us onto this ship, launched without permission, spoke in some alien language, got us separated from our ship, and sent us off in a baby universe to another Galaxy!”

  “Well, it’s basically an extension of our own…” Crescent tried to help.

  “Stay out of this, Specialist,” Jane snapped. “You have some explaining to do. Now!”

  “Easy enough,” Aros said, sitting back into his chair. “We are looking for a star. A very particular star.”

  “Look for it? How come you didn’t get us sent right to it? Why do we have to look for it?” Crescent asked.

  “Well, because it is small. It will appear similar to a neutron star, only very small. Probably a couple hundred passus in diameter. It will look like a white dwarf star, but emitting less light than sensors would expect, and have no mass. That fact should give it away. I don’t know exactly where it is, somewhere here in the last globular cluster, so we are going to have to search.”

  “Are you mad? A star? Why would you come out here looking for some star, thats existence sounds impossible the way you tell it?” She paused. “Did you have this planned the whole time? Did you know we would get attacked so you could steal this ship? Why did bring us along? I want to know! Start talking!”

  “Cress, lets start a search pattern. I doubt it will be close to any other bodies. Probably a serpentine pattern out towards the end of the cluster. We can do continual scans…”

  “Did you hear me?!” Jane interrupted.

  “I will explain everything in time, I promise. I will answer all your questions, but first I want you to think about our situation. We are too far away from home to even comprehend. We have no way, without assistance, to make it back in our lifetime. The only way we will ever see real ground again is if you trust me and we make it to this star. So, I will tell you this: don’t attempt to stop me. I’m sure both of you realize at this point that I will not be stopped. Second, if you attempt to sabotage any key systems, I will know. I took control of the Prime Meridian the same way. I am not attempting anything sinister; I just want to get home just like both of you. Agreed?”

  “Alright, Sir,” Crescent said. “I have no idea what is going on, but I know you are a good guy. So, I trust you.”