Alcantaran 1: Alien Abduction (23 page)

"I hadn't thought of that.
 
What if we set Auntie down right there on top of the ice?" Ron mused thoughtfully.

"That would take a lot of fuel to do all the maneuvering and would leave a pretty good trail if the Bugs come sniffing around," Gus declared.

Tik broke in, "That's not true.
 
If we just match speed fairly close, why not use the tractor beam to pull us down?"

"Yeah, just like we did with the crippled freighter.
 
Being in outer space, it didn't seem like we were moving but the mother ship was actually cooking along at a pretty good clip.
 
How fast do you think they were going when they did the hyper-space jump?
 
I'll bet the freighter is still there," Ron said.

Tik said as she pointed, "Here's what we need to do to match the speed.
 
We'll also have to move closer.
 
Auntie shows that we need to fire the engines here.
 
I don't know where this bad boy is going yet.
 
I need a little more path to plot the probable trajectory."

Ron quickly sat down in the pilot's seat and told everyone to strap in.
 
He strapped himself in and made the setting suggested by Auntie.
 
Tik counted down for him and at the right time, he fired the engines for just a short period.
 
He looked out the window and could see the asteroid off to his left.
 
He gingerly maneuvered Auntie closer to the big rock.
 
Tik switched on the external lights and he could now see the ice in the bottom of the v.
 
The engines were now off and he was maneuvering with jets of compress air.
 
Gus sat at the controls for the tractor beam and, as they came within a hundred yards of the asteroid, Ron directed him to grab it.

Gus was staring at his monitor and stretched out the tractor beam.
 
The beam grabbed the asteroid and they felt a slight bump as the two matched speed exactly.
 
Gus started pulling Auntie down to the surface.
 
He had to roll her some to make sure she sat down on the bottom instead of her side.
 
They came closer and closer to the surface with Ron calling off the distance.
 
Finally, they gently touched down.

There was silence and the three looked at one another as they realized they were now sitting on an asteroid flying to who knows where.
 
They all wanted to get outside to see what it was like.
 
Tik checked the gravity level and said, "We'd better leave the tractor beam on.
 
There's hardly any gravity and we might float off.
 
I wonder if we stand out like a big black blot on this ice field."

"That's a thought.
 
Would the shield make a difference?
 
Maybe we could set it to reflect about the same amount of light as the ice field," Ron said.
 
"If we set the shield to a minimum, we wouldn't use very much fuel."

Gus commented, "I don't know about you two, but I'm beat.
 
What have we been up, 35 or 36 hours?"

Ron nodded as he said, "I agree.
 
I want to explore but right now I need sleep.
 
Before we explore, we need to unlock the rest of Auntie.
 
There may be other things in the locked area that could help us.
 
Besides, we need to find a way to store the water and air and I think those will be somewhere in the locked area."

"Well, big boys, you don't have to invite me twice.
 
I'm ready for bed now, and then we can tackle these problems when we're fresh.
 
Tomorrow, I'll plot the trajectory for this asteroid."

The trio headed to crew quarters and slept that night like the dead.
 
Tik was the first one up and she was an hour and a half later than her normal time to get up.
 
She was in the galley making something to eat when Ron and Gus came in.

"Morning, big boys.
 
I thought of something else this morning.
 
We need to catalog all of the supplies and other items we took from the freighter and the Bugs.
 
We really have no idea of what we have and we might need to ration some things to survive.
 
Why don't you two do that while I work on unlocking the rest of the doors?"

"Now wait a minute, little red one.
 
I want to be there when you open the locked area," Gus snorted.

"I do too," Ron exclaimed.

"Oh, I promise that I won't open anything until you are there.
 
I'll just get everything unlocked," Tik protested.

"Something just occurred to me.
 
Did you ever find anything that gives a clue about what happened to the Alcantarans?
 
Does Auntie have anything in her computers telling what happened to the crew?" Ron asked thoughtfully.

"I didn't find anything in the Bug's records.
 
I think the part of the memory that tells about what happened on this ship is either damaged or locked in another part of the computer that's only accessible in the computer room.
 
We'll have to get into the locked area to get more answers," Tik responded.

"Do you think they could have caught some kind of virus like the one that attacked the Bugs?" Gus asked.
 
"Would any of the viruses still be alive in those locked areas?"

Ron and Tik looked at one another.
 
No one had thought of that possibility.
 
Ron said, "When we open those areas, we need to be in space suits and we need to seal off as much of this area as possible."

Gus grinned slightly as he said, "I think a couple of the Bug's portable shield generators found their way on board.
 
Maybe we could set up something like we did in the hangar."

"I wonder how those things happened to find their way here.
 
That sounds almost as bad as someone sending a robot with the radioactive fuel canister to the computer room on the mother ship," Tik said light-heartedly.

Gus looked at Ron and asked, "Who sent a robot to the computer room?
 
That won't put
Kota
in danger will it?"

"Well, I must admit I might know something about that.
 
The computer will still work for everyday things.
 
It will just take awhile for the Bugs to get the mother ship turned around and get back here to search for us," Ron said sheepishly.

The trio laughed together and then pitched into their morning meal.
 
As soon as they had finished and cleaned up, Ron and Gus went to inventory and Tik headed down to the cargo deck to start trying to unlock doors.
 
Ron and Gus finished first with everything except the Alcantaran relics they had captured from the storeroom.
 
They grabbed the portable shield generators and carried them up to the cargo bay deck.
 
They kept sending thoughts asking Tik how she was doing until she laid down the law.
 
She wanted no more interruptions.
 
She would let them know when she had something to report.

Ron and Gus decided to get the Alcantaran relics to see if Auntie's computer or the database from the mother ship computer could identify any of them.
 
Just before they left yesterday, Tik had copied a lot of the mother ship database.
 
They now had a list of planets the Bugs had visited or traded with and what they used for trade.
 
If there were any notes about the planet and inhabitants it was in the database.
 
There was some information about the Alcantarans and their relics but some of it was pretty sketchy.
 
They were making a little progress when they received an excited call from Tik.
 
She had found the key to unlock everything.
 
She was ready to start opening doors.

Ron and Gus rushed to the cargo bay and up to Tik.
 
She was waiting impatiently in front of one of the doors.
 
Everyone was excited about opening the door.
 
Gus moved a shield generator and programmed it to form a ball around that door.
 
The three of them then went to the rack and donned their space suits.
 
They were thinking about opening the other doors without any protection.
 
Maybe there wasn't any virus.
 
They came back to the door and Gus stepped up to it and swung it open.
 
Ron used his healer unit and checked for anything dangerous.
 
After several minutes the unit gave an all clear.

"Well, do we examine the things in this room or do we proceed to the rest of them?" Ron asked.

"I'm in favor of opening the rest of the doors.
 
It's a pain in the butt to take these suits off and then have to put them back on.
 
Besides we need to get the rest of the ship below opened up," Gus replied.

Tik said, "I agree.
 
We can look this stuff over once we have everything open and get out of these suits.
 
Big Boy, what if we found some more jewelry?
 
I couldn't try any of it on with this suit."

"Open it is then.
 
Tik lead the way.
 
Let's hurry up and get everything open so we can check for viruses or other problems," Ron said.

Gus moved the shield generator and they quickly opened the other five doors in the cargo bay that they hadn't opened before.
 
Everything checked out clean so they moved to the freight elevator in the rear of the space ship.
 
Gus pushed the shield generator into the elevator and set the other one over the entrance to the elevator.
 
They didn't want anything from below to contaminate the rooms they were in.
 
Ron and Tik followed Gus into the elevator and they went down one level and stopped

They were in another cargo bay standing on an upper catwalk.
 
The room was about 40 feet high and stretched for 300 feet toward the nose of the ship and about 125 feet to the opposite wall.
 
They could see a wall that looked like there were four levels.
 
There were stairs and catwalks along each level.
 
Sitting on the deck close to the wall were stacks of something that had been netted down to keep them from moving.
 
Along both sides of the ship were more of the storage doors.

They checked the first side and crossed to the other side.
 
All of the rooms checked out clean and they tried not to spend too long in any one room.
 
Some were empty and others had items that they were going to have to check out on Auntie's computer to find a clue for what their purpose was.
 
They worked up to the wall where they entered the passageway.
 
There seemed to be a row of rooms that sat back to back down the center of the ship.
 
On the other side of the passageway there was another row of rooms.
 
All of these rooms appeared to be very large, luxurious living quarters.
 
There was one cross passage in the middle of the row and another at the nose of the ship.
 
They took the nose passageway to the other side of the ship and then went back toward the rear of the ship looking in all of the rooms.
 
In one room, they found something that Ron thought looked like some kind of exercise equipment.
 
They finished looking at that level and dropped down to the next level.

The passageway on this level was next to the outer skin of the space ship.
 
When they stepped in, they saw a long passageway with some doors leading into the middle.
 
Tik tried the first door they came to and stepped in.
 
She stopped in her tracks as she looked around.
 
They were on a cat walk that didn't look like it was in the best of shape.
 
The metal was badly corroded and some sections had actually fallen.
 
They were looking at a desolate scene in the big room.
 
The room ran about 250 feet toward the nose, was two levels high and the width of the ship except for the two passageways on the outside.
 
The interior was covered with dead plants of all sizes and shapes and it even looked like there might be some small skeletons lying on the floor.
 
The floor was dirt and running down the middle was a small stream that had a very small trickle of water in it.
 
The stream meandered across the floor in a series of loops and right now it looked like it was pretty muddy.
 
There appeared to be a stone path following the stream and there were two small bridges over the stream.
 
In some places, there were long boxes hanging off the catwalk.
 
Ron walked over to one and saw there was dirt in it.
 
There was some kind of tube running from box to box and suddenly Ron thought of a greenhouse.
 
On the floor below, they could see more boxes but these looked different.
 
There wasn't any dirt in them so they assumed they were for hydroponics.
 
They figured out this must have been some kind of conservatory where the Alcantarans raised fresh fruits and vegetables.
 
It could have been a solarium but Ron couldn't see any way that they could pipe sunlight in.
 
He looked at the ceiling and thought he could see lights that might be a type of UV lights.