Quiet Invasion

by Sarah Zettel

  Going to have to get over that and fast, Vee, she told herself. Or you are going to be no good to anybody.

  “If we do this,” Adrian said, laying the emphasis heavily on the first word, “we do this quickly. We go in, we fly a couple of circles to let them know we’re still around, and we come back. That’s it. Okay?”

  Vee nodded soberly, covering her private triumph. Finally! Something to do besides sitting around and watching the world blow by.

  “I’ll go inform Sheila of our new assignment.” Adrian slid past Vee, heading for the rear of the scarab. Sheila had probably heard every word and decided to keep out of it, something she was very good at. Vee hadn’t been able to get more than two words out of the woman since they’d dropped down. Vee suspected she was withdrawing from the utter strangeness of what was happening around her, which Vee could understand intellectually but not emotionally. How could you not want to know everything there was about the People? How could you not want to find a way to make friends?

  Especially since it sounded like they were determined to be neighbors.

  Had anybody else thought about that? Everyone had seen the transcripts of all the conversations, but had they really thought about it? The People were coming. No, they were here, and they were here to stay. They planned to transform Venus. Had anybody really thought about what that meant?

  Adrian came back up the aisle followed by Sheila, her mouth pressed into a thin, straight line. Another thing she wasn’t happy about. Vee turned to Josh, who just shrugged again, as if to say, “It was your idea.”

  I’ll buy her a coffee when we get back. It seemed to be the official beverage of Venera.

  “If you two could strap down please,” said Adrian as he set-tied into the pilot’s chair.

  “Right.” Vee patted Josh’s hand. “Come on, back to the cocoons.”

  Josh didn’t say a word until they were both strapped in and their couches’ indicator lights all shone green. Then he turned his head toward her.

  “What if they say no?”

  “What?” She lifted her head just a little so she could see his whole face over the edge of the couch.

  “When we show up, indicating we want to talk some more. What if the People say no?”

  “Then we’ll know.” Vee let her head drop and focused on the view screen. “Anything’s better than not knowing.”

  Through the intercom, she could hear Adrian and Sheila running through the preflight checks. The tourist-guide banter had completely vanished, and Vee found herself missing it. It had made her feel they really were a united team, that they all agreed this was something worth doing. Maybe she’d been kidding herself, but that was how it felt.

  “I hope you’re right,” said Josh as the scarab lifted off the ground. The soft hum of the flight engines crept through the walls. On the screen, the twilight landscape of Venus sped by under the scarab.

  “Are you afraid?” she asked.

  Josh was silent for a moment. Then he said, “Yes. I wish I weren’t, but I am. I mean, I was there. I saw them rescue Scarab Fourteen too. I’ve sat here and talked with T’sha, and she’s civilized and curious, and incredible, and I’m scared to death of her and everything she represents.” He licked his lips. “They might be stronger than we are. If they decide they don’t want us here, there might not be anything we can do. But at the same time, I don’t want anybody else thinking that way, because I’m afraid somebody down at the U.N. is going to do something really stupid, like decide we don’t want them here under any circumstances.”

  “Oh, good.” Vee gave him a watery smile. “I thought it was just me.”

  They lapsed into the silence of their individual thoughts. Venus continued to slip by underneath them, twilight deepening into darkness. The wind rocked the scarab gently, just to make sure they didn’t forget it was out there. Vee knew where they were going. They had detailed satellite images of the portal now. But what would they find when they got there? Was T’sha there, or was she still with her sick city? Vee thought that was likely. If T’sha had come back, she’d surely have returned to talk with them. Unless something or someone had prevented her….

  No, there was no reason to believe that. Except that the People had politics too. Politics made human people do strange things. Who knew what it made aliens do?

  “God and Mother Creation,” came Sheila’s stunned voice through the intercom. “They’re everywhere.”

  Vee’s gaze jerked to her view screen. It showed nothing but the Venusian surface, glowing brightly in the darkness. She unsnapped her straps and struggled to her feet.

  “You’re not…” Josh stopped himself and undid his owns straps.

  Swaying with the rocking motion of the scarab, they both made their way out into the main corridor. When Vee could see what lay outside the main window, she stopped dead in her tracks.

  The people soared and wheeled in the night like birds, but they had none of the random motion or simple, obvious purpose of birds, and they glowed. Each one of them was a shimmering, living flame. Those flames rode the winds surrounded by clouds of their shining jellyfish. They tied new, big, shimmering white bubbles to their established base. They launched silver-scaled dirigibles into the air. They hovered, staying still relative to their base in knots of twos and threes, probably talking earnestly. They lit the night with their very presence, and Vee knew deep inside she’d never forget the pure beauty and wonder of this one moment, no matter what happened next.

  What happened next was that they were spotted.

  A trio of People broke away from the others and dived toward the scarab. Sheila’s hands convulsed on the wheel.

  “Wait for it,” said Adrian, gesturing to her to relax.

  The People pulled up sharply in front of the main window, close enough that Vee had to squint against the light they radiated until her eyes adjusted. She could see their muzzles opening and closing and their flexible lips covering teeth that looked like a forest of tightly packed toothpicks. Their shining wings rippled minutely in the wind, each centimeter of skin adjusting itself to keep them from being blown away. Their jewel-colored crests spread wide. What were they for? Stabilizers? Sensory organs? She hadn’t asked. It seemed like she hadn’t remembered to ask anything important.

  But, God and Mother Creation, they were beautiful.

  One of the People drifted forward from the others, until its (his? her?) muzzle floated a bare centimeter from the thick layer of quartz that separated the humans from the outside.

  “Isn’t he one of T’sha’s engineers?” Josh traced the air with his finger, indicating the interlocking circle pattern on the underside of its wings. The tattoos stayed black, despite the surrounding light. The effect was startling.

  Vee nodded. They never told us the engineers’ names. Why? But he did look familiar. She stepped forward, leaning between Adrian and Sheila, and looked straight into his eyes.

  Do you see me? Do you know me?

  Outside, Semi-Familiar swayed from side to side, as if he were taking the measure of the window. Adrian seemed torn between working the controls to keep them steady and staring at the People to try to guess what Semi-Familiar might do. Semi-Familiar circled the scarab. He flew above and underneath. He peered into the rear hatch window. He hovered a long time beside the treads.

  “What’s he doing?” demanded Sheila all of a sudden.

  “He’s an engineer,” Josh smiled. “He’s saying, look, here’s a cool new machine. How’s it fit together?”

  Vee managed to stifle her laugh. But Josh was right. That would be the first thing an engineer would do.

  At last, Semi-Familiar returned to the main window, and he stayed there for a long moment, doing nothing but looking in at them, not quite touching the window while his fellows talked—maybe argued—behind him.

  Finally, he backed away, drawing almost level with his companions. He said something, and they responded by lifting their muzzles, and deflating and reinflating. Agitatedly? Appro
vingly? She could tell nothing from their eyes.

  Semi-Familiar flew off to the northeast a little and then darted back. He repeated the move several times.

  “I think he wants us to follow him,” said Vee.

  Adrian’s hands clenched the wheel and then released it. “Okay,” he dragged the word out like a sigh.

  “I am officially protesting this,” said Sheila. “I end up like Heathe, I’m coming back and haunting the hell out of you, Makepeace.”

  “You end up like Heathe and I’ll deserve it.” Adrian adjusted his controls and eased the stick forward. The scarab flew gently after the Person they thought they recognized.

  Their passage did not go unnoticed. The People swarmed around them, thrusting their glowing muzzles toward their windows, and peering inside the scarab with their silver eyes.

  “Keep out of the damn way,” breathed Sheila, but it was more like a prayer than a curse.

  They did, barely sometimes, but they did. They were born knowing what was needed for flight, and they did not interfere with the scarab’s wing or block the forward path. They did swoop in wide circles all the way around the transport and hover alongside, keeping pace with the machine easily.

  “I swam with the dolphins once, in Hawaii,” said Josh. “That was like this, only, this is more…”

  Vee nodded, understanding perfectly. She remembered the time her mother took her and her brothers and sisters to a butterfly atrium in St. Louis. She’d stood still in the middle of the garden, sweat and humidity soaking her clothes, while butterflies fluttered all around. The little blurs of color appeared here and there, holding still for a moment before taking off or landing, according to their needs of the moment. She’d felt herself to be in the center of a whole new world, one that belonged to butterflies instead of people.

  That feeling came back to her now, impossibly magnified.

  Now the portal spread underneath them. Vee hadn’t been prepared for how big it would be. It must have been at least a kilometer across. More. It stretched out until the darkness hid the far edge in her sight. The support struts hunched up like mountain ridges.

  The air at the portal’s center trembled, and the scarab vibrated in response. Adrian gritted his teeth and eased the scarab backwards and up. He glanced at Vee as if he wanted to tell her they were leaving now, but he didn’t say anything, and Vee silently thanked him.

  Outside, Semi-Familiar stopped, fanning his wings to keep his place. Another Person rocketed up from the portal’s edge. This one had a blue-and-white striped crest that Vee definitely recognized.

  “Ambassador D’seun,” she said. Josh nodded once.

  D’seun swelled up in front of Semi-Familiar, and whatever he was saying, he was saying it fast and there was a lot of it. Up until then, Vee would have bet nothing could make her take her eyes off the People, but, beneath them, the center of the portal began to glow.

  A net woven of strands of pure, white light formed in the massive portal. The strands thickened and strengthened until they became a sheet of light that twisted and folded, and Sheila and Adrian were shouting at each other, and the scarab was backing away and the world clenched itself up for a minute and a whole flock of shining golden bodies shot out of the center of the portal like a living fountain.

  D’seun turned his back on Semi-Familiar. We have to find out what this one’s real name is. The ambassador swooped down into the center of the arrivals. They lost sight of him among the others wheeling and diving in the twilight air.

  Semi-Familiar looked over his shoulder at them, trying to send them some message they had no way to understand, and followed Ambassador D’seun down into the flock of newcomers. His arrival stilled them, and they fanned out in an uneven sphere around him.

  “Scarab Three, Scarab Three,” called the intercom. Everybody jumped. “Scarab Three, where are you?”

  “Not where we’re supposed to be,” muttered Sheila.

  Adrian shot her an aggravated glance and opened the radio. “We’re doing a reconnaissance on the aliens, Venera. Everything’s okay. What’s up?”

  Or maybe they’re doing reconnaissance on us. The newcomers were heading their way, fanning out like geese, if geese fanned in three dimensions.

  “Dr. Failia’s on her way down to the Discovery site. She wants to talk to the People for herself. Is your ambassador back?”

  The latest crowd of People surrounded them, hovering, peering and talking, unheard and uncomprehended, to each other. One large, bright Person with an amethyst crest hovered alone in front of the main window. The wavering tattoos around its muzzle matched both D’seun’s and T’sha’s.

  “I think we’ve got a new one, Venera,” said Vee.

  “Then bring them back with you, but get back there. Everything’s blown up, and we need to sort out what they’re doing here.”

  “Roger that, Venera,” said Adrian, fervently. “We’re on our way back.”

  “Okay, kids,” said Sheila as she and Adrian worked the controls, banking the scarab in a wide arch. “Time to play follow the leader.”

  “That was the New People?” asked Z’edi, both wonder and amusement filling the air between her and D’seun.

  D’seun dipped his muzzle. “Their engineers, rather than their ambassadors. No ambassador would have been so rude.” He could not believe Br’sei had brought them here to disrupt the welcome he had planned for Z’eth and the other ambassadors, to display the New People before D’seun had a chance to say anything.

  “I would have thought they’d be bigger,” mused Ambassador P’eath. “From your description, Ambassador D’seun, I was expecting monsters.”

  “Should we follow them?” piped up Ambassador K’ptai. “They only have a single working station for communication. Is that not correct?” She turned an eye toward D’seun.

  “That is correct, Ambassador K’ptai,” he said, deflating a little in deference. “I was hoping we could take counsel first so that you could be fully conversant with the current status of New Home….”

  Z’eth overflew him, gracefully, with plenty of distance. “Perhaps we can hear what the New People say and then what you say. It is rude to keep even mere engineers waiting, surely.”

  The whistles of assent buffeted D’seun from every side.

  “I hardly think we need a formal vote here,” remarked Z’eth. “Will you lead the way?”

  D’seun forced himself to swell. “Of course, Ambassadors.” Well, let the New People show them. Let the ambassadors see what he had seen. It would happen. It could not help but happen. The ambassadors were not fools, not like Br’sei. They would see the truth.

  Besides, he had Z’edi’s promise. With that secured, all would be well.

  All the dirigibles that were not out with the engineers and surveyors were quickly summoned, including the one D’seun had been using since the beginning. It knew its way perfectly by now. It needed no prompting to take them across the plain and over the Living Highland 76 to where the two transports waited, low and gleaming in the dim twilight.

  The dirigibles slowed, reaching out their anchors to each other so they made a waiting chain while the ambassadors spilled from the gondolas. The ambassadors swam against the thickening air to hover just above the crust, circling around the transports and the communication screens, peering closely at all they saw. The air rippled with their excited commentary.

  Only D’seun came immediately to hover beside the perches T’sha had left behind.

  The translator, activated by his presence, read the words that appeared on the New People’s screen along with the familiar image of Engineer Vee. Now though, instead of shades of red, she was many colors—cream and pink and gold in coverings of pale blue and green. The New People’s engineers had been busy.

  “Ambassador D’seun?” The translator’s clear voice cut through the swirl of exclamation. “Good luck to you and to everyone who has accompanied you.”

  The words touched the circulating crowd of ambassadors and
reminded them that the formations in front of them were not just some growth on this strange crust. The ambassadors arrayed themselves in a politely interested tier, all facing the transports. Ambassador Z’eth came to hover directly beside D’seun.

  Lest I forget who is senior here, thought D’seun. I forget nothing, Ambassador. You will understand what I am doing, soon.

  “With me is the Law Meet of New Home,” said D’seun to the translator. “They wished to hear you speak on matters pertaining to this world on which we find ourselves. Is this you to whom I wish good luck, Vee?” Let it be seen that I am civilized and polite. That I am a whole person.

  There was a pause while the translator displayed the words for the New People and they formulated their response.

  “Vee is here, but does not speak. I am Helen Failia. I am the ambassador for Venera Base.” The image of the New Person on the screen shifted slightly and became smaller, rounder, more wrinkled, and a little darker, with a more abbreviated gray crest. This image too raised both its hands in greeting.

  Finally they see fit to send someone we can truly speak to. “Good luck to you, Ambassador Helen.”

  “Ambassador Helen,” spoke up Ambassador Z’eth. “Forgive me if I do not observe necessary ceremony, but the Law Meet is assembled here to seek an understanding of your claim to this world.” D’seun reformulated her words into the translator’s command language.

  Words appeared under the New Person’s, Ambassador Helen’s, feet. The translator read the words out.

  “Our claim to this world is that we live here. Before we came there was no life at all on Venus. Now, there are ten thousand of us in Venera Base. Four thousand of those were born in that base and have no other home. Our work is the study of this world. That study gives us both individual reward and our means of exchange with others of our kind. Without it, we have no home and no purpose to our lives.”