Gifts From The Stars (4 page)

He wonders if his is how
Native Americans and Europeans talked when they first
met.

Finally, after twelve hours
of working on his language, they escort him to another room. He
notices all the material sent from his world on tables still being
examined. Another of the aliens adjust a large machine even as
others pull him to it.

One of them then talks into
the machine in his own language and out of the machine came:
“Experimenting. Experimenting. Can you understand us?”

“Yes! Yes! This is ssttt
(incredible). Can you understand me?”

Most of his words came out
the machine in their language, but there was static in places for
which a word had not yet been translated. They could see from his
face, he astonishment though.

“Yes. We can talk with you
through the machine. What is the sstt(soul-active) purpose of your
journey and how did you get here?”

“We of Earth ask, why do you
attack our world?”

“We know nothing of your
people. Your world is unfamiliar to us.” a confused official
says.

“I know I've been sent to
the source. It's your planet.”

“I'm sorry but I really
don't know what you're talking about. We are a peaceful people,” he
says and looks at the others, shaking his head.

Maybe they don't know, Dan
thinks.

It could be some secret
operation of renegades of theirs. Then, he tries to
explain.

After describing the
appearing crystals and how he walked through the doorway to the
source of the objects, the aliens look startled.

Chapter 7 – Ground
Zero

“No, this can't be! Ondoe!
Sub-radio over to Sector 7. Tell them to check out the landfill
planets, and report back immediately.”

“Now we know what has
happened, visitor,” he says and sits down.

“As any advanced society, we
have great sewage problems. We recently solved it with devices
capable of removing solid waste out of unsorted raw sewage and
convert it to crystalline shapes. This is sent to uninhabited
planets.”

Dan remembers engineering
attempts to vitrify nuclear wastes, sealing them in
glass.

“But these shine like
precious gems to our people. Why not keep them?”

“They mean nothing to us.
Our women love the rare gems we call rainbow rocks.”

“But how did they end up on
our world?”

“Apparently, there's a flaw
in our `doorway machine' and it transmitted the sewage to your
planet.” Dan starts to gag but holds himself.

“You've used our planet as a
waste dump? How? If you switched the receiving point accidentally,
wouldn't the stuff end up in interstellar space instead of on
another planet?”

“You would think so. But
nonetheless it happened.”

Before he could ask another
question, the sub-space radio crackles and the alien responds
angrily in his own language. Then he spends minutes more talking
with those in the room and over the radio. Finally, he grins and
approaches Dan.

“Yes, it has happened as
described. No sewage crystals reappeared in twelve days. We didn't
know since we have no people on those barren planets.

“But how did it end up on
our planet? Think of the odds against it.”

“Our computer experts
figured that out also. We’ve developed an astronomical database of
star systems with planets that may support life. Our astronomers
placed the third planet of your system into the
database.”

“That would be my home,” Dan
says.

“Sooner or later we would
have explored your world, though we discovered 200,000 other
prospects on the database.”

“So many? Your telescopes
can clearly see solar systems?”

“Yes. In great
detail.”

Dan remembers astronomers on
Earth can now do the same.

“Anyway, a computer
specialist working on the landfill project also worked on the
interstellar life search team. He helped design systems for both
projects. To keep things simple he used the same file structure for
both systems. He made changes to the computer controlling the
sewage doorways. When reinstalling the system, he accidentally
installed the life search database for your quadrant instead of the
landfill database.”

“You mean he accidentally
put the wrong flash drive in?”

“I'm sorry. I don't
understand your words.”

“Never mind. Continue. I
think I understand what happened.”

“Since they had the same
file structure nobody noticed the mistake. Twenty other worlds may
have been recipients of our mistake.”

“Will you be able to stop
the process?”

“Yes, we're working on it
now. We’ll turn off the machines until we reinstall the correct
data base. Unfortunately, there's nothing we can do about the ones
already sent to your world.”

“Why did the objects appear
in different locations?”

“We didn’t want to
accidentally create singularity events. There could be black holes
made if we teleported crystals inside of crystals, inside of
crystals. Thus, we spread them out over the planets.”

“Ah. You cleared that
mystery.”

“I apologize for the ones we
already sent.” The alien bows his head and closes his
eyes.

“I can’t speak for our
leaders. But, as long as no further harm happens to our people, I
don't think they’ll be angry.”

“How are the crystals
viewed?”

“Some will throw them away.
But most will probably see them as gifts. By the way, with these
doorways and astronomical tools how many civilizations have you
discovered? How far are you from our solar system? I hope you're
within our galaxy.”

The alien starts
laughing.

“Oh, yes. The material you
sent shows you're right in our neighborhood. You’re only 400 light
years away. And we've discovered seven other civilizations in our
searches.”

“That many?”

“Yes. Oh wait. This can’t be
right.”

“What?”

“I’m not sure if I’m
supposed to tell your people…”

“Tell us what?”

“Did a branch of your
species go extinct around 30,000 of your years ago?”

“30,000? Hmm? Yes. I think
that would be the people we call the Neanderthal. It was one big
mystery. Why?”

“We have a story to tell
you. But my supervisor says not to say anything further.” (author’s
note: See the ebook ‘The Legend of Lor’s Lost Tribe’).

“You can’t say anything more
about it?”

“Sorry. We
can’t.”

“Hmm? But life is very
common in the galaxy.”

“We believe life is very
common in the universe.”

“Wonderful. I guess you use
those doorways to travel across star systems instead of
spaceships.”

“Yes. We have ships. But
there’s no need to travel the depths of the oceans in order to
cross them.”

“Will you keep the doorway
to our world open?”

“Only if your people want
it. We would like to learn of your civilization and to maintain
contact. But we can send you back home and close the doorways, if
that’s what they wish.”

“You’ve shown yourselves to
be good people. I think we would want to continue contact with your
people also.”

“I think we'll be able to do
better then that for gifts to your people. Once we get you home,
after we've shown you some of the sights of our world, how do you
think they'll respond to becoming interstellar trading
partners?”

“As long as it’s no longer
sewage crystals.”

“Ha! You have a sense of
humor too.”

“I think we'll respond fine
to that gift,” Dan says as he smiles and offers his hand in
friendship.

This story came out of
articles I read on nuclear scientists efforts to surround nuclear
waste in glass. I wondered if people in the future would
accidentally stumble on it and want to touch it. I wondered if
efforts to recycle materials such as iron, copper or plastics could
lead to contamination and expose the public to it. So I used the
saying “All that glitter is not gold” to drive the
story.

The author notes referred to
two stories I wrote with links to this one. The first took place
30,000 years ago. So how could it link to today? It’s a science
fiction mystery.

The following is part of the
first page.

“
The Legend of Lor’s Lost
Tribe”

We lived in peace for so
long. Can our tribe be in danger now? Lor wondered this as he
climbed to the top of a cliff. Looking at the horizon while the
setting sun lit the valley in reds and purples, he saw bright
lights looking like slow moving shooting stars near that horizon.
Those illuminations and the recent attack his father witnessed
brought him up on the cliff. Would he see the attackers as his
father did? The lights which seemed to follow his people and the
attack felt like bad omens of things to come.

He prayed the bad omens
wouldn’t happen, and for the healing of his father, still in pain.
He waited on the cliff until the night sky replaced the twilight.
But the attackers didn’t return, so he left feeling confused. Where
are they?

However, as he walked down
the hill, he heard the rustling of leaves. He stopped. Was it the
attackers? No. But it was something deadly as he looked at the
bright eyes of a large cat piercing the darkness.

“Oh no. Not today.” He
lifted his spear, but it was too late. The tiger leaped up and used
its front paws to bring Lor down, scratching his arm. Lor felt the
cat’s breath as the giant teeth were about to clamp
down.

Lor noticed a wound on the
cat’s shoulder, so he bit down on it. The tiger roared out and
jumped off.

“I don’t like to eat cat.
But I’ll make an exception if you don’t stop.”

Lor stood up, recovered his
spear and began to poke the cat.

“Go away kitty.”

It roared again and refused
to back off. So Lor lifted his spear to make a fatal blow. But
hearing squeals from the brush, he paused.

“Mama cat? No wonder.” Lor
smiled, looked at the tiny faces shivering at him, stepped away
from them, and the cat returned to her cubs. He felt his bloodied
arm and placed leaves on it to ease the bleeding.

He walked from the cave
cliff to the valley where his tribe’s dwellings stood, made of huge
mammoth bones and skins. Approaching his family’s, he added tree
branches to a campfire near it. Inside, he saw his lady Beth
applying herbs and water to the bruised leg of his
father.

“How is he?” Lor asked
her.

“How are you?” She looked at
his bloodied arm. “What happened out there?”

“I just played with a
cat.”

“Really? Lion or
tiger?”

“Tabby.”

“Liar.” She smiled, removed
the leaves and placed herbs on it.

“Ow. Don’t press so hard. So
how is he?”

“I think he’ll be alright.
But he does sound feverish, the way he’s talking.”

The next linked story
is

“
When Is A Video Game No
Game”

A young game developer
invents a new form of Virtual Reality which empowers him, but also
causes chaos. Here is a scene from the book, illustrated by Sherry
Leak.

Now stressed by the actions
of his co-worker, he drives to a park instead of going home.
Sitting in his car, he again puts on his high-tech helmet, lowers
the visor and turns on the black box. He feels himself bounding
through the city like an acrobat.

He hops over parked and
moving cars, jumps on the girders of a bridge and walks easily
across. He climbs the roofs of tall buildings, enjoys the views and
jumps the gap to other roofs as real Parkour runners would. “This
is insane. It feels so real. My heart is pounding. It’s like a
roller-coaster.”