The Blue World

The stars and galaxies had stopped moving and so they had arrived. The weeks of avoiding galaxies directly in front and galaxies speeding past as ribbons were gone and they could relax in sub-light.
Annn said, “Our trail is cold?”
“As cold as the Cosmic Background.”
She thought to the ship and the visors all around the perimeter rose at her command. Now they could see the solar system that they’d arrived in. She thought another command and covers at the back of the ship slid, the parabolic mirror lifted and started searching.
An hour later the ship said, “Only one habitable, one a drying out dust bowl, one too hot and the others rock and gas.”
“Leader, shall we head in?”
Annn asked again, “Is there any trail?”
Jimm nodded, “You know there always is but we went as slow as we could so that any exhaust would be minimal – the trail is colder than frozen helium.”
Annn again said, “But there is a trail?”
“Yes commander. But they couldn’t follow it.”
“But we’ve left a trail that is colder than the space we’re flying through. They’ll follow it.”
“No commander. Our trail will heat up in no time to match the surroundings.”
She weighed up the likelihood of the Saps following – not much chance – we could be safe here – we could start again and she said, “Head for the blue one.”
He was relieved and it showed in his voice, “Yes, Commander Annn.”
She ignored it because she had to find somewhere safe. Her thoughts and the thoughts of all the others on the ship said we’re not cowards - we’ve go to find somewhere to hide – we’ve got to give the babies a chance.
At three-quarters light they arrived at the blue one in a few hours and she issued a command, “Search for intelligence.” Four times they’d searched for intelligence and four times they’d found it and four times they’d blasted into hyper again. She hoped they’d draw a blank because bloody intelligence is everywhere in this universe but she could justify pushing a few monkeys to one side.
Conred signalled from the other end of the ship, “I think we’re lucky. Mainly mammals. Some of them are gigantic and there are monkeys in trees. None walking. Only cold blooded reptiles, none dominant, none warm. The best ones must have been wiped out years ago.”
Annn was sick with running, “Jimm. The trail. No one could follow?”
“I’m certain we’re safe here.” He emphasised, “Certain.”
Annn’s job was to make decisions. Dozens every day, and most of them could be made by others and most of them didn’t really need to be made at all. Intelligence and leaving was easy; four easy decisions and now the hard one. So she didn’t make it that day nor in the week to come and as they waited they searched the heavens for disruptions that would signal an arrival but nothing. And then she called the crew together in the largest hall, thought to the ship. It said, “Order confirmed,” and the roof visor was pulled back.
One hundred and twenty necks craned and one hundred and twenty one mouths gasped at the blue globe over them.
“I am not a frightened person. I fear nothing. I have lead you into battle many times. We had won every battle until the last one but you re-elected me to be you leader – to be the one who makes decisions.
But now I am frightened,” she paused and knew there would be one of those silences that would terrify an armoured Sap; that would make him run; that would make him cry for his mother but she stood there, breathed in and continued, “I am frightened for the babies we carry. If we stop here,” she pointed up, “and colonise this blue bubble. If we land and the Saps arrive we’ll never get back to the ship.” She stamped on the aluminium and pointed to the blue bubble, “This ship will be blasted out of orbit. Us and the babies will be trapped up there forever.” She stopped and started again, “No not forever but trapped until the Saps find us and eliminate us one by one.
There are monkeys that haven’t come down from the trees yet and are only using sticks. If they had been scrabbling in the dirt and using stones we would have been on our way again. But all I can say is that the monkeys should have been quicker.”
The audience laughed and she continued, “The monkeys are only in one place but we will land in another, keep our distance and,” she laughed, “help them if they come knocking at our door.
So you get my meaning?
Yes we are going to land.”
A cheer and she pointed to a splodge of land that was coming into view, “That will be our new home.
Get ready to land.
Dismissed.”
There was no cheering but the noise of turning, walking, gabbling to each other rose and echoed off silicon, plastic and aluminium.
Annn relaxed for the first time in weeks. She had made the decision, she had made a good decision, she had cause to breath out and she said to herself that when they were safe and walking freely on that earth she will resign, take a man and spend a month in bed.
She and Jimm strolled back to the command post. This relaxation was just like the old days when they lead the fleet and there was no one out there to hinder them, to oppose them, to push them to one side. She liked battle, especially when the won (which was most times) but she liked peace better and she’d hated the running they’d done these past years. Amble a few more steps and they be in the command centre, sit in those chairs and look up, or would it be down by now? onto their new world. She smiled and mumbled to Jimm, “To our new home I think I’ll propose a toas….!”
Klaxon
“Warning,” the ship screamed.
Klaxon.
Screaming, “Enemy!”
Klaxon.
The floor moved as they received fire.
The ship shrieked, “Damage!”
They had to crawl across the shuddering floor to the command chairs and when they pulled themselves up they saw the Sap ship a few kilometres away firing cannons, missiles, lasers and getting ready to launch the fighters. In one blink Annn knew it was all over. Her ship was firing back automatically but on that side the guns were failing already, the side facing the Sap ship was punctured, bodies were twitching in space, torn, the guts of the ship were spilling out, shredded, clouds of air were condensing into fog as it froze.
The thoughts, “Destroy them, save the babies,” repeated dozens of times in the couple of seconds it took for an order to form, “Roll 360º and start firing at 330º,” she screamed so that all could hear. The ship obeyed; it didn’t roll, it span on its longitudinal axis and everyone was thrown to their nearest wall. Around and round it went blasting the Sap ship every time it reached 330º and when she saw the two halves of the Sap ship floating away she shouted, “Stop rolling!”
But the impulse thrusters were stuttering. Nothing was symmetrical, the spin reduced to a whirl but the unequal forces slew the ship head over heels and it started to glow as it rubbed against atoms and ions in the mesosphere. The tips of spars were sparkling and starting to trail like meteors, loose panels began to flap in an atmosphere to thin to feel unless you were going at 20000km/hr.
No guns were allowed on the command deck but the systems were failing and Tomm burst in and fired into the ceiling, “Into the sphere,” he screamed. The others reached for non-existent guns and he fired again.
Annn cried, “I’m not abandoning this ship and ….” Another shot smashed against her armour.
So the others could see Tomm deliberately wound up the power on the side of his rifle and took aim again, “Commander Annn and Captain Jimm, respects,” he touched his forehead, “escape sphere!”
They moved, they sat in the sphere, Tomm closed the door and said to the ship, “Release and direct the sphere into re-entry,” gates sealed, pressures equalised and the sphere was ejected.
Only five spheres were ejected out of seventy, and four of those burnt up on re-entry. The one that made it rolled two kilometres down a mountain’s foothills before bumping to a rest against a rock. Annn and Jimm were already in suspended animation and total relaxation to try to limit impact damage. But the nano-surgeons had to start work immediately to secure their cardio-vascular system, their brain function and the visual cortex. And so as they rested and repaired flakes and dust and scree fell on them and they were buried as a great civilisation arose on the other side of the world.

The door dissolved but they faced a rock wall where it had been and then a detonation nearby cracked the wall in front of them. Automatically they reached for rifles that weren’t there and another shudder went through the sphere as though a mountain was sliding away outside. Vibrations, dust, spitting rock and trickles of water were coming in through the opening but there was no one to fire at. And then a shudder that could have shaken arms out of their sockets and daylight strove in. Through the rubble tunnel they clambered out, stopped and looked out over a crater that could be a kilometre wide and down hundreds of metres to the flat floor. Annn touched the rock. It wasn’t hot. This wasn’t a new crater and the trees around the rim were standing vertical.
In the bottom they could see yellow machines going back and forth as though they were harvesting the fallen rock.
Annn signalled up and clambered thirty metres to the top and spread flat on a bed of pine needles, “Anyone see us?”
“Don’t think so.”
They both said at once, “Let’s wait for night.” First one diamond shone in the dimming blue, then Jimm pointed to another, Annn pointed to three more, Jimm a dozen and the sky was blackening and there were thousands.
“Recognise any?”
“May be. No.”
“We’re on that planet we discovered,” was half a question and half a statement.
“Got to be.”
And in the silence Jimm tortured himself with thoughts that didn’t add up. Distorted star patterns, buried in rock, people driving diggers when there are only monkeys in trees but the thought didn’t want to go away because things did add up now. He hesitated, but he had to say it, “Commander.”
She turned her head quickly because that word meant – I need your attention because I have something very serious to say and she resigned herself, “Go on.”
“We’ve been buried for many years.”
The sun wasn’t coming up yet but something was dawning on her, “Many years?”
“Million, half, hundred thousand, thousands – I don’t know. You see….”
“What?”
“I do recognise the star patterns – they’re distorted and ……”
“And?”
“The sphere was buried in,” he didn’t want to say it but the word came out, “rock. Not soil or sand or silt but rock.”
She rolled over onto her belly and looked down over the edge, dust refracting flood lights, yellow diggers in and out of black shadows, explosions and sections of the crater shearing away, “The monkeys have evolved,” was a statement. Jimm didn’t counter it. He mumbled an agreement.
“Five rescue spheres were ejected would there be any chance….?”
She said, “If what you say is true then the chance of us meeting any of the others is so close to zero..” she didn’t finish.
“Re-entry, parachutes, buried for exactly the same amount of time and to pop out of the ground now – zero.”
They didn’t say anything more for a couple of hours and as the workers in the quarry slowed for a break Jimm said, “I don’t fancy our chances. We need to eat. We’ll scavenge, we’ll get caught, it’s obvious we’re aliens so they’ll either experiment on us, exhibit us, do live autopsies on us, keep us locked away. Oh I don’t know.” And he stopped speaking.
She tried to brighten, “If we had some type of power they’d take us for gods. Mystical gods that have fallen to earth to lead them to?”
He laughed, “Monkeys believing in gods,” and he laughed again.
There was nothing more to say and they were woken by the blinking sun and shadows flitting back and forth. Annn nudged Jimm in the ribs and they sat on the pine needles with fear crawling up their spines. Left, figures, right, figures, dead ahead a whole gang easing forward with sticks and staves held high. Behind, a precipice. They stood and could count the legs. Four.
Four legs.
And they thought of the end to come, thought of the blood squirting and running down the walls, thought of the screams. The trembling as the Sap in the fun-room came a step closer with a cutter that he’d tested on himself. That he’d tested on that great flap of skin that was now tied back up with red dripping string. And the surrounding crowds, thousands banked and tiered almost to the sky each fighting the other to get a better view as the cutter chopped down.
Annn looked at Jimm and they both wanted to jump off that edge. A quick jump.
But in the seconds they waited others eased in and they were cut off from their salvation. They weren’t shaking yet, that was to come along with the smell as terror released their muscles and shit ran down their legs and then the sweats and dismay at the distances travelled, the survival: for what? A crazed end with flailing arms and legs and a certain calmness as they are threaded by a spear.
Jimm held on to Annn’s as one of the Saps scuttled forward in fear of them to set a tripod and plonked on top a speaker device. It scurried back and that’s when Annn not, understanding, mumbled, “Different coloured hair.”
Jimm looked and replied, “No horns.”
“They’re all different. Each one is different.”
“Yes,” said the speaker on top of the tripod, “Welcome fellow Star Travellers. We ourselves came from the stars half an aeon ago and we welcome your trepidation. We welcome your fear but you have nothing to fear.
Speak.!”
As commander Annn swallowed and muttered, “We’ve recently come here. Our ship is up there,” and as thoughts formed she spoke up, “It knows we are here, it reads our thoughts and has powerful weapons to decimate this area if harm befalls us.”
Ginger hair, four legs and two arms stepped forward, “Still warlike. You must learn that war is not the only way.
We know our history and we know your history. It was written and when our ship had cooled sufficiently to approach it, much was recovered.
We had to start a new life here until we can reach out again to the black and the sparkling stars.
Question me!”
Annn said, “Our ship will beam us up in a short while. Thank you for the information we must be going now.”
A black furred one spoke, “There is no ship. It burnt up in the atmosphere after the last great battle. Relax. Question me!”
Annn suddenly resigned herself, “How are you going to kill us?”
A chorus and the speaker almost fell off its tripod, “We’re not,” and it literally wobbled as the chorus turned to laughing and then a great shout, “Question us?”
Was she relaxing fractionally? “You seem different. You’re not identical.”
Ginger spoke, “We’re not a clonic race anymore. It was not possible after the ship crashed and the survivors had to breed.” If there could have been there would have been a wistful look in his eyes, “Breeding is nice. We spent a lot of time breeding.
The days are gone of equal amongst equals.
We have a leader now.
Elected.
Me.
Question me?”
Jimm was hungry, “Is it possible for us to have something to eat?”
Ginger snapped his fingers, “Get the servants to bring a feast,” a movement rippled through the crowd, the back parting and tables and chairs held high by pink hands being brought forward. Shock shuddered through Annn and Jimm as they caught sight of the pink creatures carrying the furniture whose smell seemed to radiate and both Annn and Jimm held their noses. Ginger laughed. Annn and Jimm stood alarmed and trembled at the horrendous sight of the creatures.
Ginger laughed again, “Question me!”
Annn, “One head, only two eyes, one body, two arms, two legs. Fingers! Tail or no tail they’re still monkeys.”
“Of course. But they’ve evolved since we landed. The fur’s gone, the head’s bigger. But they still stink.”
Jimm jumped in, “Are they intelligent?”
“As much as a dog or a pig. We think. They do talk to each other. But they like their bellies rubbed and being tickled behind the ears.
Set up for a feast,” Ginger shouted and the pink creatures scurried around putting out tables and chairs.
Ginger continued, “They might smell but the taste nice.”
Annn and Jimm’s eyes brightened.
Ginger explained, “Rub the stomach, tickle them to calm them down and quickly pull off the head. There’ll be a bright red fountain for you to suck. Have a go!”
One of Annn’s tentacles started rubbing the pink biped’s stomach, “She smiled – I think we could all live here happily.”