Lokians 1: Beyond the End of the World (7 page)

Admiral Lay’s new Eon colony was a short
distance from the
Phoenix’s
first landing near the original
dig site. The large ship slowed to a hover and released the
hydraulic, landing stilts. Upon touching ground, the captain tried
to relax. He left the bridge to be alone with his thoughts, but
changed his mind, and considered grabbing Swain.
His excitement
might help to persuade the admiral.
He stopped in a corridor
next to a comm. panel.

“
Lieutenant Commander Swain, please
report to the loading zone ASAP.”

From there, he marched to the loading zone.
Swain was already waiting for him.

“
What’d you need, Captain?” Swain asked
with his brow furrowed.

“
Just your excitement,” O’Hara
smirked.

“
Not sure I follow….”

O’Hara had a glint in his eye. “Just dial
your spaz factor up a few notches. We’re going to see the admiral,
and I want to convince him to allow us to work on those
beacons.”

“
Yes, Sir,” Swain laughed. “I
appreciate you taking me with.”

O’Hara gave a cocked up nod, implying the
plan was a long shot. Soon, the ship settled and the buzzer in the
loading zone rang. Swain hit the switch, causing the door to rise
slowly. Eon’s orange light spilled over the steel floor. The
loading platform then dropped to the ground. The two men took a
short walk to the makeshift town. Upon seeing the military tents
and bunkhouses, they both glanced at each other and steeled
themselves.

As if sensing their presence, Admiral Lay
emerged from one of the tents. He was in full dress as usual with
his hat tucked under his left arm. He took it and placed it
squarely on his head. Swain and O’Hara saluted. The admiral
returned the salute once he was within a few paces of the two.

“
To what, exactly, do I owe the
pleasure, gentlemen?” his tone belied fatigue,
frustration.

“
Sir, if I may,” O’Hara began. “I know
this is asking a lot of you, but Swain and I, and the rest of the
crew, have a favor to ask.”

Swain was unable to contain himself; grinning
like an idiot, he said, “Yes, Sir, Admiral Lay…Sir, I have a
perfect plan for the frequencies the beacons exhibit. You see,
according to planetary harmonics.” Swain was cut off in
mid-sentence as O’Hara raised a hand in front of him.

“
Admiral, we believe we know how to
utilize the beacons. I took a vote among my men. We all want to be
a part of this. Swain believes we may be able to make first contact
with the aliens that left those things behind. At the very most, we
only ask for a few weeks of your time. Then, we’ll make for Century
colony, as I’m sure that’s what you have planned.”

Lay shifted his body weight and took one of
his patented, long inhalations. He locked eyes with O’Hara.
Naturally, he said nothing, letting his baby blues create a little
drama.

“
Captain, you just asked for more time
aboard the
Phoenix
. Now, you take my time from this colony
to ask me if you can play with some alien toys?” Admiral Lay
accosted.

Swain nearly fell over from the brunt of the
admiral’s tone.

“
Admiral, I fully understand and
appreciate the situation, but this is practically unheard of. You
had confidence in me and my men earlier. Please have that
confidence now,” O’Hara retorted.

The Admiral almost smiled; an unusual sight.
“Well, you get one week. What’s the plan?”

O’Hara and his friend traded a look. They
were flabbergasted. Swain actually grabbed hold of the captain’s
arm.

“
Well, Sir,” he started. “I have the
entire theory worked out. I relayed messages to the scientists at
Presh. I think I know how to relay a message to the owners of the
beacons. With any luck, we can get a response, effectively making
history,” Swain said, beaming with pride.

The admiral smirked at that. “I see. Like I
said, one week, now, if you’ll excuse me, pressing matters call my
attention.”

The men all saluted. Swain and O’Hara watched
the old man enter his tent before they celebrated with the slapping
of hands. The two promptly returned to the
Phoenix,
where
O’Hara plotted a course for Presh to gather the beacons and
scientists. Swain chose Levine, Nandesrikahl, and Tulley to help
him with recalibrations.

Within days they had clearance to move
forward. Shortly there after, the beacons were taken back to Eon,
where camp was erected a mile from the ship. There, Swain and his
comrades set about their task.

It was 09:00 hours when Swain and Levine
finished setting up. They worked quickly to disable the magnetism
module then set the beacons to resonate as one. They had discovered
a partition in the mechanism, which provided the frequencies. With
the new arrangement, they were even able to set up near electrical
equipment.

Tinkering with a panel, Swain pieced all the
objects back together. He stepped back to glance at Levine. She
smiled.

Behind them, against a tapestry of grayish
brown clouds, and shimmering, gold leaves swaying from passing
breezes, O’Hara and Lay stood with their feet spread and their arms
folded. It was unclear whether anything had happened, so Lay turned
to O’Hara with a frown. He, in turn, glared at Swain.

“
What’s going on, men?” Lay
demanded.

“
Yes, Sir,” Swain choked. “Levine
decided on a frequency to relay through satellites back to Earth,
you know, to make sure they work first….”

Just then, a response team from Earth relayed
back via speakers, stating they had picked up the frequency from
Eon. The mere fact that the beacons functioned was great news, but
Swain wanted more. He and Levine tried using a handful of different
outputs. Everyone waited impatiently.

“
Fellas’,” Lay chortled. “How long is
this going to take?”

“
Yeah, Swain…what’s going on?” O’Hara
dove in.

“
Uh…well, you know, our team on Earth
was aware of our signal, which one, and when we were broadcasting.
In this case, there’s no way to know if our signal is picked up by
the aliens.”

“
You must be joking,” Lay sighed.
“Look, I won’t lie to you, I’m intrigued by this whole thing, but
you get one more day. If they don’t answer in one day, we’re done
here. Am I clear?”

“
Yes, Sir,” everyone
replied.

Normally, waiting an entire day for a simple
response was something excruciating, but the exercise gave all of
Phoenix Crew a chance to play on Eon. Lay also revealed to O’Hara
that he was glad to be out of the tents. Matters regarding
construction of the colony had him stressed. The captain tried to
empathize.

Suns moved across the sky. Soft clouds melded
into one another, changing shapes and size. Then, it happened.

“
Admiral Lay, this is Doctor Jenson. Do
you copy?” the voice asked.

“
This is Admiral Lay, we copy. What do
you have, Jensen?”

The camp’s monitor station had been geared to
receive new transmissions and relay them back to Presh, where more
sophisticated equipment was used to sort through various channels,
frequencies, and energetic wavelengths. Presh station said a form
of communication was coming in from somewhere outside the Gemini
system. It was a signal unlike anyone had ever witnessed. Someone
was responding.

The satellite, project overseer at Presh came
in on the camp’s channel. “Sir, we have a transmission coming in.
We are recalibrating our transistors...it’s a repeating signal,
Sir. Attempting to trace...it’s coming from the Spider, Sir,”
Jenson gasped.

The Spider was a nebula one hundred and
thirteen light years from the Gemini system. No Humans had reached
that far and had no plans to investigate. It was more reasonable to
finish the Eon colony before moving to the next closest area, the
DaVinci system. Plans for anything further weren’t feasible until
DaVinci was secured, so they had zero information on that area of
space.

“
This is amazing,” the admiral replied.
“What does the signal say?”

“
We’re attempting to decipher. It’s
going to take some time to translate, Sir,” Jensen
replied.

The admiral turned to O’Hara’s crew, who were
all standing ready. “Ladies and Gentlemen, you’ve outdone
yourselves. I must admit, I didn’t think anything was going to
happen, but transmissions from the Spider? Seems impossible…now
listen, a signal doesn’t mean there’s intelligent life out there,
but I’ll head to Presh. From there, I’ll send out coordinates to
the Eon colony.

“
By the time everything is up and
running, there’s a possibility we’ll be able to make contact,
assuming we’re dealing with real, live aliens and not some old
transistors. If these beings can work with our network of
wormholes, we can schedule a face-to-face meeting in about fifteen
years.”

“
We can send satellites out their way
with some of our own frequencies in conjunction with the
frequencies we pulled from the beacons, making a sort of language
bridge,” Swain added. “This way, we can communicate for the whole
fifteen years before they arrive.”

“
I know we’re all thinking it, so I’m
just going to say it,” O’Hara frowned. “It’s possible they’re
hostile, and equally possible that they may not want to meet us.
With any luck, though, we can avoid any sort of problem with
Swain’s idea.”

The admiral also praised the idea. The
wellbeing of Eon was of the utmost importance. Commending everyone
for their hard work, he left them for Presh.

While he took a shuttle from Eon, the
Phoenix
and her crew were ordered to stay behind and assist
Rear Admiral Shaw with the continued colonization. O’Hara and crew
traded ideas about the possibilities of an exchange with aliens.
The captain was worried that his mission might be affected
negatively; being solely responsible for starting a war with aliens
was a frightening thought, but his friends reminded him that they
had all banded together, so they were all equally responsible. Day
added that there was no reason to get pessimistic.

Meanwhile, scientists on Presh sent
satellites towards the Spider. A total of thirteen were sent, one
for every wormhole leading to locations in the Spider’s vicinity.
Satellites traveled at just under light speed, but the procedure
was not unreasonable for a long-term goal. The satellites carried
every deciphered marking from the beacons along with the
corresponding, Human languages. These included Sumerian, Cuneiform,
Hieroglyphics, Greek, Latin, and English along with some tribal
dialects. It was the safest way to initiate the exchange of
information.

Along with the data was included a breakdown
of the Human form; DNA structure, blood types, psychiatric
evaluations, history of space travel, and data recovered from Eon.
The hope was that along the way, the other beings learned to make
sense of Human languages and return communication or information
regarding who they were and what they were after.

Weeks passed during which only the repeating
signal was received. In the meantime, the Eon colony expanded to a
full blown, military outpost. Over two hundred people were
inhabitants, and a makeshift town was erected beyond a fenced area,
where civilians were made to live. There were no schools, or
children, or any sort of entertainment facilities yet, but there
was a lab, and hangars for small ships and shuttles.

Chapter Five

One morning, at 07:00 hours, Presh station
received new transmissions. The beings called themselves
Thewls
, and an English-Thewlish translation was underway.
They unknown creatures revealed they, too, were of a double helix
DNA, but their ATCG make up was slightly different. They also had
two arms, two legs, two eyes, and a strikingly similar genetic
makeup. They were carbon based and breathed oxygen. Finally, they
specified that the repeating signal they originally broadcasted was
a distress signal. Their planet had been attacked ages ago.

That was big news. Not only had Eon made
first contact with an unknown race, there was a second, unknown
race out there also capable of space travel, and bearing
destructive powers. The Presh scientists were told the other beings
were radically different in their genetic makeup. They were also
hostile. News traveled quickly, and Admiral Lay set up a briefing
with Phoenix Crew. A top-secret mission was underway. Eon colony
was not to be informed.

****

The AMS came on general broadcast, calling,
“O’Hara, Day, Martinez, Swain, Imes, Becker, Nandesrikahl,
Zakowski, DeReaux, Fitzpatrick. Admiral Lay is ready to receive you
in conference room B.”

After hearing the summons, the crew proceeded
from the mess hall, or crew quarters, or from whatever post they
occupied. One-by-one, they filtered into room B. Admiral Lay was
sitting next to the lectern, his legs crossed. Once the crew lined
up at attention, the admiral stood. The crew saluted, and he
saluted back. The soldiers waited impatiently for briefing.

“
Be seated,” Lay started. “What I’m
about to tell you will not leave this room.” The admiral took a
patented, long inhalation. “Over the past week, the Thewls have
informed us of a great many things. Turns out their communication
abilities surpass ours by a long shot. Other than exchanging
pleasantries, we’ve been informed of a hostile race they call
Lokians
. We know that the Lokians destroyed the Thewlian
home world. Now, they’re telling us Human colonies might be
next.