Abductees

by Alan Brickett

  “Please, mammalian, take your time. I will await your response and payment of the docking charges.” Izzix settled back in a neutral kind of crouch—for a Dadarian.

  Ormond manage to work out how to link the other three into the conversation just as Connor blurted into the channel, “Charges? Oh geez, are we going to have to figure out how to pay this thing?”

  Meriam, Lekiso, and Marc all stiffened and looked over at Connor as his voice sounded in their heads as well. A sudden swirl of voices came all at once, which had them looking around at each other in alarm.

  “Hold on there, you lot,” Ormond projected over to the rest of them, and it seemed to work—probably because he’d started the connection, he suspected.

  “We have coms, alright. Don’t question that now, and let us deal with one thing at a time. You should get that, hey, darling?”

  Lekiso picked up on the cue of Ormond nodding towards her.

  “He’s right. Connor, what’s on that device?”

  “Let’s see. It’s translating itself for me, right into this weird display on the inside of my eyes,” Connor replied.

  “Yeah, this is so weird. I can even see it on the inside of my eyelids, so it’s some kind of contact lens display or wired right onto the optic nerve. Google Glass looks like the Stone Age compared to this,” Marc babbled excitedly before Lekiso cut him off.

  “What does it say, Connor?”

  “Right. It lists the mass and volume for a ship docked at port thirty-seven, no repairs required, no refueling, no services of any kind, actually. The ship’s name, registered on the docking form, is listed as ‘Vector,’ and the docking period is seventeen days at a fee of four hundred and fifty-seven Domum marks.”

  “Um. Whoa, ok. I have files on the Domum Marks and exchange rates across various species’ home planets or systems, and this is like one of their space stations, so everything is done in their galactic currency,” Marc said excitedly.

  “The math on that would be a conversion to the dollar at a rate that would let you buy, like, a McDonald’s Big Mac meal for each of us for each day of the seventeen days.”

  “Marc, we are trying to focus here!” Lekiso looked over her shoulder at him.

  “Um, yeah, yeah, I know, but, like, get this. It means that these Domums, whoever they are, have a great economic value going here. I mean, that’s, like, super cheap, don’t you think, to charge so little for a spaceship to dock at a space station?!”

  “Um, mate, think about what you’re saying for a minute,” Ormond somehow said quietly into the channel.

  “Yeah, guys, this means we just stepped off some kind of spaceship and that it arranged that we dock here.” Connor was staring at the tablet display to avoid looking up at Izzix.

  “It arranged? Spaceship? Does that mean that room we were in with the other locked door was so that we couldn’t get back into the spaceship?” Meriam’s voice over the channel was tightly controlled, but Ormond could hear the edge of fear and possibly anger in it.

  “Crickey!” Ormond paused along with the rest of them at that thought.

  It took a while before Lekiso broke the silence. “OK, whatever has happened has happened. We need to deal with it and move forward.”

  Typical officer training.

  Ormond couldn’t help a slight grimace from reaching his face; he knew it all too well.

  Always moving forward, don’t give them time to think about how bad things might be, just focus on solutions to get people through tough situations.

  Ah well, in this case, she’s right. This poor lot will just freeze up if we don’t keep moving, and we aren’t going to figure anything out if that happens.

  “That’s the ticket, luv, some steady momentum to carry us on through, hey?” He had not meant it to come out sarcastically.

  “Hey! There’s no need to get that kind of attitude.” Connor turned around to face Ormond with the tablet in hand, at which point, Izzix stirred.

  “Is there a problem, mammalians?”

  Ormond answered before anyone else could get a word in. “No problems, mate. Everything is just tip-top. We’re just a little jet-lagged, hey, long journey and all that.”

  “Humm, well, I’m not sure your translation software got all of that over correctly, but I will take your comments as reassurance and relax back into patience.”

  “Sure, mate, great. And uh, we’re humans, by the by.”

  “Humans? Interesting, that’s a new species name I have not heard before.” Izzix tilted its head down to bring its compound eyes forward, a gesture of puzzlement and interest.

  “Really? How about Terrans? Or maybe even Solarians? We could be known by different names,” Marc blurted out, taking a few steps towards the alien before realizing what he was doing and hurriedly taking another few further back when Izzix tilted its head over at him.

  Izzix turned its head towards Marc to reply. “No, not to my knowledge, not at this station. Perhaps you are in a Domum database. But please, do not let that put you off. We are very welcoming here.”

  “Uh, yeah, we can see that.” Connor held the tablet back out to the Dadarian. “It all looks fine, uh, Izzix.”

  “Most excellent, human. If you would please transfer the fee payment, the form will be complete.”

  “Guys? Anyone know how we pay this thing?” Connor looked back at the tablet while he spoke over their channel. “I don’t see any kind of card machine on this thing, even if we still had any credit cards in these getups.”

  “Um, well, I think that we do it electronically,” Marc said hesitantly, which Ormond found interesting since Marc’s voice was pushed by thought. “Um, like bitcoins or some kind of other money on the internet. “

  “Hey, these little graphics and things we can all see, one of them might have to do with our money, like electronic wallets?” Meriam sounded like she wanted to be helpful. “After all, this icon looks like a three-dimensional hologram for WhatsApp, which is what we are using to talk to each other right now.”

  “Yeah, love, that’s brilliant. Connor, browse through your options there, mate.” Ormond kept his own private thoughts about Meriam to himself so that they didn’t leak out into the channel.

  I wonder if this thing has some kind of picture sending.

  His typical male thought was interrupted by Connor.

  “OK, I think I’m getting the hang of this, did you guys notice the little Android robot icon on some of these screens? It’s so weird having things move in front of my sight while I just think of it. So, that one is for interfacing with the tablet, this one is a scan, and that one’s apparently monitoring me… Oh, I see. Hang on, I got it. I interface with the device, and it gives me this menu with an option to pay the fee.”

  Ormond just looked at Connor while Lekiso spoke for all of them. “So, select it and pay the nice alien so that we can get on with it, Connor.”

  “Sure thing. There, done. Says transaction completed.” Connor offered the tablet back to Izzix and said out loud, “There you are, sir, and thank you for your kind assistance.”

  “Oh my, you are most polite.” Izzix took the tablet back in one claw and brought it close to the smaller set of arms just below the claws on its thorax.

  These smaller claws typed away on the tablet surface before Izzix looked up at them again. “Thank you, humans. Everything is now in order. Would you like to travel down the elevator with me? It has plenty of room.”

  “Guys?” Connor asked on the channel.

  “I’m not sure I feel safe with that thing,” Marc mumbled, actually mumbled mentally.

  “I think we should just go along. If it was going to hurt us, it could have tried,” Lekiso said quickly, and she made a motion to Connor to respond.

  “And besides, mate, you can just stand behind the rest of us,” Ormond cheerily replied while Connor accepted Izzix’s offer.

  The Dadarian swiveled its head around on its neck like an owl, and Ormond winced before realizing that this was normal f
or the alien. Looking behind itself, Izzix scuttled back into the lift and shifted over to one side to make room.

  Connor looked over Lekiso’s head at Ormond and asked silently, “After you?”

  “Yeah, mate, thanks. Follow me, Marc. Come around and go into that corner.”

  Ormond walked ahead of them, with Marc angling up the right-hand side of the corridor to follow him into the lift and all the way to the back. Meriam took advantage and followed Marc in, leaving Connor and Lekiso to bring up the rear, forming a front line between herself, Marc, and the enormous insect taking up most of the spacious lift.

  Izzix reached out with one giant claw and tapped a button on the inside black panel.

  The doors slid shut with a quiet hiss, and the lift started to move. Ormond could only tell that they went down because the lights in the shaft moved from beneath them to up over their heads, disappearing just as a new set appeared at their feet.

  Just as he was wondering what the layout of the place looked like, he got an icon in his heads-up display. Concentrating on it gave him some helpful memories that it was an external scan option.

  Ah, what the hell.

  He selected it, and a new area of his sight was blocked out in violet lines as an image started to form in the middle of it, a box with various graphical details and options that showed the six of them in the lift.

  Lines drew themselves to show the schematic of the elevator and the shaft it was traveling down.

  “Hey, you lot, try out this scan option if you have it. It’s wicked detailed,” he sent out on their channel, briefly noting that there were still options for the channel available when he thought about them.

  “The military would die for this kind of shit.” Lekiso probably hadn’t meant for everyone to hear her, but Marc responded to her half-whisper anyway.

  “Um, hey, yeah, this is awesome. It’s like a little mini-map in a computer game, just with way more control. They never really did think through all the options when they made those science-fiction games, always limiting the map options based on the need for the game to be a mystery or playable. No thought about realism.”

  “What are you talking about?” Meriam asked.

  “Don’t mind him, luv. He’s just having a nerdgasm about the cool stuff. But he’s missing the point.” Ormond paused for the expectant silence.

  “Whoever or whatever brought us here has certainly made sure we are set up, right? I mean, this isn’t your average kidnapping. This kind of tech doesn’t even exist, does it?”

  “Not that I know of. My military unit didn’t have anything even close to this.” Lekiso was looking around the lift as if she were looking at something other than what the rest were seeing.

  “How many options do we have?”

  “I think we’ll have to figure that out as we go along or wait for these memories to finish telling us.” Connor was rubbing his temples.

  “Um, are you also getting those?” Marc was wide-eyed, but his gaze was unfocused; he was obviously looking at the displays.

  “I am,” Meriam said.

  “Me too. And they hurt.” Lekiso rubbed her forehead as well.

  “Yeah, not to state the obvious, but I think that we are probably all going through the same kinds of things at the moment. What the hell kind of hypnosis or whatnot does it take to give us all this info anyway?” Ormond resisted the urge to ease his own aching head.

  “Um, well, there are theories for memory and information download into the human brain using images, light, various drugs, and that sort of thing. So far, nothing material has come from it. Would be awesomely useful, though. The things we now know would have taken some people weeks to memorize from something written down.”

  Marc sounded so cheerful Ormond could just spit, but he decided not to in case the Dadarian took offense. His memories, though, promptly told him it wouldn’t; the Dadarians didn’t have anything like spitting, so it would just assume it was like a sneeze or a cough.

  “Oh great. All the knowledge in the world splitting me head open.”

  “Did you say something?” Lekiso asked on the silent channel.

  “Hey? Oh no, not me. Sorry.” Ormond thought very carefully about not transmitting anything.

  Blimey, got to watch this. Next thing, we’ll be able to read each other’s memories. Mind you, I might do with a peek at some of hers.

  He gave a casual glance at Meriam.

  Why is she so distracting? He couldn’t help the dark thoughts coming up from old memories. He had to let it go. All this new health was probably playing with his hormones.

  The entire exchange had taken a few seconds, and Connor interrupted Ormond’s thoughts

  “Hey, guys, look at your scans. This place is vast!”

  “Did you really just say vast?”

  “Uh, Do you have another word for it?”

  Ormond was shifting his display back to the scan that had popped up to cover a third of his vision. With a thought, he zoomed in on the messy grid of lines that had been drawn into the small schematic space, trying to orient the viewpoint on the lift again.

  Izzix turned its head to Connor and asked, “So, human, have you ever been to the Puzzle Box?”

  “I’m sorry, what?” Connor was taken by surprise.

  If he had been messing with the map display like Ormond was, then Connor probably would have had more than half of his sight obstructed. He was trying to look up at the Dadarian’s compound eyes.

  “This station, the various species that travel through here didn’t like the Domum alphanumeric numbering and gave it an easier name. I’m not sure what your translation software is interpreting the words as, but we call it the Puzzle Box. Look outside, and in a moment, you will see it in all of its glory.”

  Izzix put both of its massive claws out in front of itself, gesturing towards the doors of the lift.

  Connor was about to ask Izzix what it meant, and Ormond was wondering the same thing, when the last light swept up past the lift and they were in a suddenly transparent box, with open space and the Puzzle Box itself strewn about all around them.

  The humans were captivated by the sight of it stretching for hundreds of thousands of miles across the backdrop of stars, red clouds swirling among them.

  Oh blimey. Ormond kept the thought off the channel. This ain’t what I expected at all.

  Marc wasn’t quite so controlled, however. “Um, we are in outer space!”

  Automated log update.

  Subject’s memory implants have taken effect upon encounter with first species native to the target galaxy. Effectiveness of memory implants differs per individual but within defined parameters.

  In-depth, detailed memories will be consumed when they sleep, as expected.

  Neural displays functioning at peak efficiency, and organic integration of computing components show no sign of rejection.

  All enhancements to subjects’ biological profiles operating.

  Monitoring continues.

  * *

  On a human scale, the Domums discovered the solar system, which would come to house the Puzzle Box, about a hundred and fifty years ago.

  At the time, their researchers theorized that the blue star had undergone some sort of rapid expansion and then collapsed during its early phases. The resulting erratic shift in the orbits of the planets led to them crashing into each other in what was likely a massively spectacular scene of destruction.

  The resulting solar system was left with some broken moons and huge chunks of planetoids that had all started to drift closer together.

  By the time the star stabilized, the most massive pieces of what had once been the forming cores of worlds were now in very close orbit to each other about one and a half AU from the sun, the equivalent distance being a bit further out from the sun than Mars.

  During early formation, a solar system gathers chunks of rock and heavy metals, which group together in orbits.

  These formations collapsed under their own weight t
o form the cores of planets. With some distribution or outcropping starting to cause a wobble and a roll, these cores would begin to turn and gather onto themselves more space debris, eventually forming outer crusts and the surface of worlds.

  Since this solar system hadn’t gotten that far, the dense cores and heavy metals were exposed and drifting in what was, for universal coincidence, an opportunity for any spacefaring species. The Domums immediately saw the potential and set up mining operations.

  On several of the most worthwhile chunks of rock, strip mining was acceptable since they would impact nothing living.

  To supervise the operation, the Domums built a command spire, a single cylinder of metal-encased living quarters with a diameter of about nine hundred feet and extending over a mile long.

  Capped by a plate-shaped structure with viewports on all sides to see the full panorama of their operation, it looked like a stick with a flying saucer parked on top.

  The command saucer itself was seventeen hundred feet in diameter and ninety feet high. It was filled with the operational areas, computing instruments, and communications systems to organize the mining and refinery operations.

  With the help of the Dadarians and their own automated machines, the Domums were quickly set up and mining deeply into every rock in the vicinity. Within ten human years, they had fabricated space-based factories for refining the metals and ores, housing for the workers, and some light manufacturing factories all cluttering up the area.

  Domum engineering and organization had another go at the buildup and reorganized the structures into a wideband linked by magnetic accelerator carriages. They traveled in a loop that connected the primary planetoid-sized rocks and moons together.

  The factories and housing were then linked to this loop, and more sprouted like spines on a giant wheel.

  The command center got upgraded through the successive decades, situated in the middle of the giant circles and connected by three spokes of magnetic-accelerated carriage connections. Eventually growing to about five miles long and a full mile and a half in diameter with the sphere of hoops that connected the magnetic carriageway at the bottom.