by Ken Pence
The E. S. officer knew cultures who were highly advanced, yet had risen to civilization apart from the Central Government. They always had technologies that produced leaps in the knowledge gained.
This Tros must tell me where he landed.
Little did the officer realize that Rett did not remember exactly where he had landed since his chosen landing site had been arbitrary. Rett would not yield to the interrogations since he knew with certainty that if he let that fact be known, his usefulness would be ended. Rett, apathetic in most cases, would not allow his captors the satisfaction of a final confession.
Their ship stayed outside the lunar orbit and studied Earth and its broadcasts. The work was speeded up when the Chief Technician unraveled the scanning technique used to transmit pictures and the ship was almost overwhelmed by new data but the linguists were frustrated by the numerous languages being used. Two main languages were concentrated on and broadcast language lessons speeded progress immensely.
The E. S. officer was confused to find a planet so highly advanced technologically, yet this was a planet that did not seem to have a single basic language.
APPROACHING TAU CETI
Susan regarded the destination of her choosing as they crossed the orbit of Tau Ceti's outermost planet. According to her calculations, there should be a range from this sun that could support life. There could be life where planetary atmospheres were radically different from Earth's composition on planets outside this range, but chances were that the best chance lay between the plotted extremes.
Since most boundary conditions were from calculations or educated guesswork, many answers would be obtained if they found any life. Susan knew that with each answer there are posed many new questions. The mass of the planet must be such that a dense enough atmosphere could be retained. The rest of the crew was asleep or, too involved with their own projects to help her. Susan wanted to get a jump on this survey because she had felt out of place since this trip began.
Her specialty had not been needed much, so she had tried to coordinate and assist the others in their work. She did not wish to simply be the Captain's companion for this voyage and she knew that her ‘real’ challenges were out there, where the computer projection showed the rapidly growing image of this system's sun.
The crew would soon be up and about, and she would have to take up her duties as coordinator, but right now, she felt the thrill of challenging the unknown. Already, the corridor lights were brightening in their morning cycle. She tore her gaze off the viewscreen and went to the galley to fix herself some breakfast.
The feeling of exhilaration was contagious as the crew prepared for the coming day. The ship was now in an orbit around the sun and Susan who had already eaten, was scanning for suitable planets now that the main drive field was shut off. Yawning and stretching, Fran and Ling came into the control room to see preliminary data being displayed on the views screen.
Andrew and Joel came waltzing in shortly after when Susan remarked, "Looks like we have a likely prospect. It's still pretty far away but from readings of the new sensor system, its size is roughly comparable to Earth but its gravity should be about .87 Earth normal."
Andrew turned to Joel and said, "Check everyone out with the new belt and see that they know how to use it; especially Ling and Susan. Also, see if you can help Tod and Steve finish the large 'pressor' field projector for the ship. I'll check with you later."
Andrew then walked over behind Susan's chair and leaned next to her so he was close to her ear. "I see you're up early. There isn't any need to prove yourself you know. Everybody knows you're good at whatever you put your mind to..."
"I was just restless and so keyed-up I couldn't sleep. This is more than I even dreamed about and I'm afraid if I go to sleep, I'll wake up and I'll be back at the university preparing for a project entry classification. This is magnificent and I'm not going to miss a minute of it."
"When you finish this and we get into scanning range of the planet; you go and get some rest." When she looked sullen, he said, "and that's an order."
"I want to go in one of the trips to the surface," Susan said defiantly.
"You'll do as I say but I've already made preparations for you to lead a team with Fran, Ivan and Brad working with you. I haven't decided who is to go in the second team yet but I thought you would want to know."
"I never thought of leading a team but I've sure put everybody through their paces up here. Of course I can do it," Susan said half to herself and half to Andrew.
She really let the thought of it get to her and her eyes lighted up. "Really, Andy… Uhm. Thank you, Captain. I'll try to be worthy of your trust," she said smiling.
"You'll have a few days to get ready. Go over and use the set of survival training in Brad's teaching machine if you haven't already taken them. Brad has been setting up to do geological work. We have to do topographical surveys and have the computer print maps. Then we've gotta’ decide where to set down. Everybody will remain in suits, at all times, even if the air is breathable. Make sure Ling tests for bacteria, fungus, or airborne particles or spores that could be harmful. I'll want your group to carefully test the new belts we've added. We couldn't test them on board due to the built in deck weight regulators but the components function perfectly separately," Andrew said.
"Aye, Aye Captain," Susan said merrily turning back to her console display.
Brad cornered Andrew in a lounge and he seemed quite disturbed; not usual for him.
"What's this about Susan leading the first expedition on the planet?" Brad demanded.
"That's right, Brad. Problem?" Andrew replied calmly.
"Don't I have more survival training."
"Yes, Brad," Andrew replied tiredly.
"Don't I have combat experience? Military leadership training? Skill with weapons?" Brad demanded.
"Yes, to all that, Brad," said Andrew.
"Then why aren't I leading the first expedition?" Brad asked showing considerable control now.
"How are you on intuition?" Andrew asked.
"You're kidding! Women's intuition?" Brad jeered.
"In Susan's case, yes. But only because she is an intuitive leader; the fact she is female is only coincidental. You know how she developed all the scheduling and work details on the ship. She is the one that picked this system," Andrew said trying to explain.
"I'll grant her all that, but what about my qualifications?"
"It's because of your qualifications that you are going on the first expedition and not me. Don't you think I want to go? Your job; your primary job will be to protect the expedition. Geology will have to be secondary. Every minute you're on the surface, you will be awake and be prepared to defend the group only when members of the group or the ship are jeopardized with grave bodily harm. I don't need two leaders; I need someone to keep the leader and other group members alive when they're thinking about things other than their well being."
"I'm more than a bodyguard. I'm not just the gun bearer for the queen," Brad painfully said.
"Believe me. The other members of your expedition aren't exactly helpless. I believe Ivan and Susan are almost unbeatable as knife fighters. I also heard that Fran has some pretty extraordinary wilderness skills," Andrew said.
"Wilderness skills?" Brad asked.
"Tracking and survival skills. You know," Andrew stated.
"But you know I've had all that stuff until it's coming out of my ears." Brad said.
"Sure. You're probably the best at it near Tau Ceti, but you've got to admit that those with you are quite resourceful and certainly not helpless," Andrew said.
"Alright, I know when I'm outvoted. You'll notice that I never once mentioned that Susan and you were intimate," Brad said showing his old grin again.
"Why you bastard!" Andrew said and they walked off ...busily talking and laughing together.
LANDING ON TAU CETI
Three days later, they had decided upon several likely landing spots. The gravity
of the planet was as predicted but there seemed to be much fewer ore deposits than on Earth. The planet appeared to be warmer than Earth but not much more so even though the atmosphere was not as dense as Earth's atmosphere.
The planet had sparsely spread patches of dense yellowish-green vegetation. But what was most startling to the crew was the fact that during the orbital survey they discovered small clusters of what appeared to be crude, artificial huts near several small bodies of water. The rest of the planet was either high mountains or apparently barren desert, but there were even larger clusters of buildings throughout the barren areas.
Even from orbit, the buildings, if that was what they were, appeared long deserted with reddish sand completely or partially covering many of them.
After much debate, it was decided to land near one of the areas of vegetation about one hundred and sixty kilometers to the nearest visible surface water but close to a group of buildings in a barren area.
The planet had a very old and elliptical orbit but not so to preclude life. Only about five percent of the planetary surface was covered by water and this was highly scattered, small lakes or ponds. There were no large single bodies of water. This fourth planet out from the sun also had no natural satellites like Earth's moon.
EXPLORING TAU CETI
As the ship landed, exhaustive tests were performed to test for harmful bacteria or fungal spores. Brad analyzed the atmosphere and found that the oxygen content was less that of Earth's at sea level and there was proportionally less nitrogen but almost as much carbon dioxide as Earth for some reason. The suits would be sealed at all times and the new belts would be field tested close to the ship.
Brad was first to touch ground in an effort to check soil samples. This segment was dutifully recorded for posterity in its import to human history. Tod was to test the suit belt unit and Brad was arming the exploration team. Susan was checking everyone's equipment and all were clucking around like mother hens to see everything went right.
Brad and Susan were on the surface as Tod turned on his belt field to about half strength.
"Throw a rock at me, Brad," Tod said obviously proud of the workman-ship.
Brad hefted a good-sized rock and let fly from about five meters. It sailed at Tod, stopped about 20 centimeters from his chest, seemed to float there for an instant and then fell to the ground. After a little experimentation, Tod found that he could only have the field at one-quarter strength if he wished to move around without falling with it on.
Tod grabbed the front waist control on his belt and put the field at full strength, becoming inertia-less and then moved the control gently upward. He shot upward and was one hundred meters high before he brought himself to a hover. He experimented and though he appeared to move in very darting, jerky motions, he actually felt no acceleration and became more adept in about half an hour.
Tod's figure darted almost out of sight and then came back to hang as a dot over them for a moment. Suddenly Tod's figure came shooting down at them. Brad yelled and Susan involuntarily gasped. When they thought Tod would be dashed to bits on the ground, he stopped, grinned at them, and turned off his belt unit.
"My, that was fun. We'll just leave the ship at Earth next time and take these," he said through his communicator while pointing to his belt, "Theoretically I don't need to close my eyes for landings."
"What about time distortion effects, Tod?" Susan asked.
"Well, possibly a little speed up, but nothing you would notice unless you could manually adjust the inner field. The way these belts are made, the inner field automatically balances the exterior field to keep your time sense normal. Everyone going on this expedition had better try these out and practice staying together as a group as you move because the controls are really sensitive," Tod said.
"Sounds like a good idea, Tod. It's still a little startling to see the effects of the total cessation of inertia with that little theatrical landing of yours," Susan said.
It wasn't long before the whole group was zipping around but it took as much, additional time to move as a group because course changes had to be announced in advance. Susan had to put a damper on the group by ordering that the group would travel no further from the ship that couldn't be traveled on foot in two days. In theory, they could stay in these suits for longer than that. Two days was really all you would care to tolerate.
Since the days were considerably longer, by six hours or so, than Earth's day; the exploration team said goodbye to those remaining and flew in a ragged group at low attitude and fairly slowly. It took them a good hour to reach within a short walk of the apparently deserted group of buildings near the surface water. They landed and turned away from each other in preparation for anything but after a few minutes they collected some water samples. With Brad leading the way they searched the buildings but found little other than the fact that they had no roofs on them and they were made out of something like adobe with one narrow opening about a third of a meter shy of two meters.
One could enter, but everyone had to duck to do so. Once one entered, there wasn't much to see since all but one of the structures was only as big as a couple of walk-in closets. There were about fifty huts arranged fairly circularly around a similar building located at the center. All the ones they saw so far were nearly stripped clean except for broken shards of pottery that they collected and put in sample bags.
The buildings showed signs of long disuse and nothing really gave any information about who had built them or what these beings had looked like. When they finally got to the larger building at the center, they found a building with three times the area of any other and it still had an intricate, stone block roof that appeared intact. This building had square openings on three sides. However, on either side of the entrance door, the openings were much larger. There were rows of two meter high carved stone racks with round notches cut every ten centimeters or so.
The racks showed much more technology than the rest of the buildings and they, for the most part, closely resembled gun racks more than anything else. The group then decided to go to the larger group of buildings about 200 kilometers south, even though they would only have a few hours of daylight search time. The central building intrigued them but offered no clue to its function.
The team wished to use their time to the greatest advantage so they flew high to get a better look of their deserted city. This should be described as a city because there were thousands of one and two story dwellings or businesses or whatever. Most of these still were intact except along the outskirts where erosion had caused many breaks in the building walls and roofs. Dark sand almost totally covered many of these buildings.
The team, even from the air, could see no sign of life, either animal or plant. These buildings were on a higher order of technology than those they first explored. Here there were still sections of tiled, narrow roadways between the buildings. They carefully searched several buildings only to find them stripped of any furnishings. Inside they were more elaborate, with signs of some type of interior plumbing, though there was no metal in evidence. At the center of this city was another large building, much larger than any of the surrounding ones. The roads leading to it were much wider and the street tiles were of different colors in soothing swirling patterns.
Again, there were no doors to open. They had eroded or been taken away, but the building had several large entranceways. Natural lighting still lit most of the building well and here they found row upon row of stone benches with stone slab tables in front of them. Series of ramps led up to the second level and here they found closely packed rows of two-meter high shelves and etched or chiseled at the ends of all shelves were symbols or numbers or both.
Ivan recorded as much as possible and they then went back down the ramps to the first floor. They explored further and found an atrium in the center...about ten meters, square. This was open to the roof.
The roof opening was about fifteen meters square to let in sunlight. At the center was a meter-wide
globe. This was quite sophisticated architecture. Around the globe base were stone boxes obviously designed for plants, but the thing that held all their attention was the globe. It was magnificent. It looked like stone, but when the dust was wiped off, it still showed a shiny luster. It appeared to be a globe to represent the planet and the sphere was a ceramic or closely akin with markings still visible in its surface.
"It's a world map. Look at this dot and symbol. This must be right here. What happened here? Look at all the rivers and lakes that are marked. It even shows polar ice caps and we didn't see any coming in," Fran said.
"What could have happened?" Ivan asked, "This planet has almost no axial tilt to speak of, thus no real seasons."
"I don't see how it could have been catastrophic land faults and volcanic activity because we didn't see any sign of that coming down. This place gives me the creeps. I feel uneasy even though it appears deserted," Brad said.
Susan was lost to most of this conversation because she was intently studying the globe.
"I don't know what this material is," she said, "but it's by far the most advanced sign of technology we've seen on this planet. We don't have much time left before dark. We'll come back tomorrow with more equipment. I've got so much stuff in my samples bag that I can hardly move," Susan said commenting on the multi-pocketed bag awkwardly hanging on her hip.
"I know what this place is!" Fran exclaimed. "It's a library. It's obvious once you think about it. I kept thinking of this place as a meeting hall or temple. You know, it's simple once you think about it."
