Questions, More Questions
Meanwhile, on the distant planet called Qu’uda.…
This, Bilik Pudjata thought, is far from the center.
He stared at the image of the fuel tank of the Egg-that-Flies, which stretched out before him, long and faceted. At the other end, barely visible in the dim starlight, was the bulbous half-asteroid forming the ship’s living quarters.
Alone in the cramped compartment next to the propulsion system, away from social contact and with the ship halfway to the Kota star system, he felt like an outcast. For just an instant, a wave of rejection swept over him. It was a brief taste of the insanity that came with societal isolation. Every Qu’uda must belong and this was a taste, just a brief taste, of isolation.
He shivered.
How did I get into this? he thought. Is it worth it? It was not chance that brought me here to the depths of interstellar space. I had wanted it—no—I’d lusted for it, right from the very start, almost fifteen years ago.…
It was during the time I was female, large with egg, Bilik recalled. I was monitoring data from the deep space observatory, searching for the aliens when my biocomputer alerted me to a faint signal coming from a nearby star system.
“Show me.” Bilik slid from the wicker-sleeping basket. Her abode, cool and yellow, with the bed-nest its only furniture, seemed stuffy and closed in. Even its moist yellow-green vegetation brought no feeling of refuge. She felt a tingle run from the top of her head crest to the tip of her stubby tail—something was amiss.
“Picture format, maximum amplification,” she said.
A holographic image formed, projected before her by tiny subcutaneous fiber optics at each side of her eyes, a direct feed from the biocomputer that nestled beneath the skin of one of her upper limbs.
A snow of static blurred the image. She unsheathed her claws instinctively. Something electric sparked in her egg-heavy body, like the start of the mating-cycle. “Broken Egg.” Her mouth filled with a taste like that of dune-drift sand. “What’s wrong with this signal? Where’s the audio?”
“Listen,” the biocomputer’s voice said.
A piping squeal filled her ears. Sleeting electronic flotsam coalesced into a shadowy creature with two limbs draped from its upper torso. Its small head had hair and it made animal sounds.
“Egg-sucker.” The only creatures that Bilik knew that had hair were mammals. Ugh, she thought. Mammals gave messy live birth and were an evolutionary dead-end. This creature was ugly, like all dry-land mammalian vermin. It gestured from behind a boxy structure emblazoned with a circular emblem. At one side, a piece of fabric hung limply from a stick.
The creature’s appearance filled Bilik with an urge to seek sanctuary in an ancestral swamp, to wriggle deep into its mud until only her nostrils showed.
“Oh, my Egg,” she said. “It can’t be.” She felt the scales in her skin ripple. “It has to be alien.”
The image faded into the snow of random noise.
“Location?” she said.
“End-point receptors indicate the source is the Kota system,” said the biocomputer.
That was but ten light-years distance.
“Biocomputer, call the Community of Investigators.” Bilik paused. “No, wait. Validate the signal’s integrity; search for evidence of signal reflection and check for external feed into the observatory.”
Before I dare bring this to the attention of the Community of Investigators, she thought, I must be sure that it’s not someone just tickling my tail. That meant checking thousands of receptors. If this is the Hoo-Lii, I must notify the Defenders of Qu’uda, and immediately. She tried to guess what the Community of Investigators-on-Interstellar Life would want.
“Compare this with known Hoo-Lii signals. Quick, do it now.”
As she waited, thoughts nagged at her. Are they a threat to Qu’uda? Will it affect my hatchling? Will this move me closer to the center, or further away? I want facts within my claws before I talk to the Investigators. Maybe I’m showing too much initiative. I’ve got my place, she thought. And it’s far from the center.
The signals were not band-spread digital, therefore not Hoo-Lii; they were analog with frequency and amplitude modulation.
Egg, she thought. It’s another alien, different, and close. Why did we not see them before? I know we’ve looked at Kota previously.
“Biocomputer, compare the Kota and Hoo-Lii star systems.”
“Specify parameters.”
“Compare spectra and planets in biozone. Compare the historical observations with the latest information received, note anomalies. Visual display.”
A holographic listing of the two-star systems appeared: Both had planets within their habitable zones, but they differed in size and amounts of water—not the same.
Now, Bilik thought. I can call DalChik DuJuga, the Head Investigator, to tell of my discovery.
After Bilik’s call, the universal communication link—the Comm-net—spread the news planet-wide in less than a day. That set off a great debate and a consensus forming—a quooning—about what she’d discovered and what should be done. Each individual’s implanted biocomputer—linked to the Prime Communicator—provided instant access to anyone and all data resources on their world. The volume of communication rose to an all-time high.
Bilik realized these aliens were a dilemma, for there were other aliens, Hoo-Lii, somewhere, out there, too. These aliens, the second species, were close and proof of a habitable planet. She knew their over-crowded world, Qu’uda, needed living space.
Over the next six sleep cycles, Bilik became widely known, because consensus makers now called upon her frequently to discuss her discovery. The Qu’uda, in their formal and methodical way, quooned. All participated in the decision-making to a greater or lesser degree, depending on their closeness to the center. The exposure to the privileged core made her confidence grow. As a result, she moved closer to the center. It was intoxicating. Her ambitions rose.
After the seventh sleep cycle, PiRup, the Prime Communicator, announced; “The aliens may be a threat to Qu’uda. Yet, their planet may offer living space.” It was the quooning—the consensus garnered from a massive web of bio-computers—which tied their society together, polling them for their opinions.
“Our Defenders must go to Kota, the alien’s star system and investigate this planet, to see if it is habitable.” His words echoed and reflected the hopes of a crowded world. “We must continue to search for the other aliens, the Hoo-Lii.”
We’re going to make contact with the aliens, Bilik thought. I want to be a part of it. I must be.
“We shall build an interstellar spacecraft, strong and large enough to protect itself from attack,” said Mata ChaLik BuMaru, speaker for the Defenders-of-Qu’uda. His voice resonated with the harsh tonalities of one who came from the continent of Ma. “We shall investigate the alien’s planet in the Kota star system.”
It was then Bilik vowed to be on that ship. Why not? I now have the status that just might make it possible.
“Bilik Pudjata.” Mata ChaLik BuMaru’s holographic image appeared before Bilik.
He was in a pale-yellow room with dark brown sinuously carved wood furnishings. It had a richness that showed his closeness to the center and all its attendant privileges.
With rudeness bordering on challenge-to-combat, he said, “There are voices near the center who speak your name. Voices to whom I must listen. So I must take you on the expedition to Kota. I’ve decided you will construct the drive system.” Mata ChaLik directed the ship’s construction.
“You’ll also be the expedition’s alien specialist since you discovered the aliens.” Mata ChaLik heaved on his perch. A yellow-green bower of twisted vines and drooping ferns moved into view. Water dripped freely from a Podu tree with a scarred and torn trunk.
“Report to DalChik DuJuga on the ship,” he said in a formal fashion. His head crest vibrated as though anger bubbled near the surface. “Now.”
Bilik felt a surge of triumph. A stray thought intruded. That garden looks a little tattered, like it’s been used recently for mating. Is Mata ChaLik like most males? Or is he one of those who doesn’t need female stimulation to become aroused? It was rumored he sought out gravid females for trysts in his garden.
Ugh, Bilik thought. She barely hid her distaste.
Mata ChaLik briefly unsheathed his claws, indicating his growing impatience. He came from Ma, the smallest continent, whose inhabitants had a reputation for quick temper. “So, do you need more instruction?” He waved his limb in dismissal.
A bittersweet victory, Bilik thought. I must leave my wriggler to my family, for they want me to succeed. Soon, I shall be male and be a Defender, like him. The vision disturbed her.
When Bilik arrived at the partially constructed ship, the Egg-that-Flies at its orbit high above Qu’uda, he met with DalChik DuJuga.
“It’s much larger than I imagined,” Bilik said. Each end of the ship was made from a half of a hollowed-out asteroid, with a gigantic tubular fuel tank between the two ends.
“We intend to avoid the fate of the Star Seeker,” DalChik said.
She referred to the exploratory craft that had died at the claws of the powerful alien lasers of the Hoo-Lii.
“Come, I want you to meet the navigator.”
They descended from the outer rim of the living quarters toward the center of the ship at its forward end, which was also a giant centrifuge that provided gravity. It held a crew of five hundred and all the supplies needed for their thirty-year voyage. The forward part of the ship had an end-cap of one-half of the hollowed out asteroid. Its thick metal protected the crew from the hard radiation that would come from particle collisions at relativistic speeds.
“Meet Cha KinLaat DoMar, the navigator,” said DalChik. “He’s also an environmental analyst.”
The room’s solitary occupant turned and waggled his head crest. “Hello, DalChik.” He glanced at Bilik.
Bilik noticed an odd smell, a distasteful smell.
“Cha KinLaat DoMar,” DalChik said. “Meet Bilik Pudjata.”
“Ah, you’re the one who discovered the aliens in the Kota system. May you move ever closer to the center.” Cha KinLaat flattened his head crest to indicate respect. “Welcome to the navigation station,” he said. “It won’t get much use now I have another biocomputer.” Cha KinLaat indicated a lump on the inside of his upper limb, with fresh, green scar tissue. “I can navigate from anywhere on the ship.” He pointed at a bundle of wire hanging from a console. “I had to replace the station’s biocomputer with an electronic computer, because its life support system failed.”
“Oh.” Bilik recognized the odor of rotting flesh. How does he control two biocomputers simultaneously? “You’re the one who gives commands to change the course of the ship?”
“Not really.” Cha KinLaat’s head wagged. “That’s Mata ChaLik who speaks for the Defenders. I do as he bids. Only those orders which the Keepers approve.” DalChik’s head crest flared slightly.
The Keepers-of-the-Egg were the restraining claw on the Defenders. To get this ship built, Mata ChaLik and the Defenders had to accept quooning partners. Many still remembered the military sects’ propensity to dominate.
“Well, yes.” The topic seemed to make Cha KinLaat nervous. “A ship this size doesn’t change course easily, nor stop quickly. Most of the trip, I’ll just confirm vectors and location. I’ll also monitor the electromagnetic spectrum of Kota.”
“What’s it like on the ship?” Bilik wanted the real facts.
“It’s been non-stop for almost two years. I feel like an overworked machine. I can hardly wait until we’re underway.”
“That won’t be for several more years.” DalChik’s head crest rippled with amusement. “Don’t rush things. Come, explain your system, and show Bilik its capabilities.”
Without a word, Cha KinLaat activated the external monitoring system and focused on the planet below to show Qu’uda’s five continents intertwined about the equator with oceans covering both Polar Regions. Mountains bisected the continents from sea to sea, with tongues of the ocean licking far inland. Even from orbit, the bright green of swamps and cultivated fields and the red-brown of mud flats were visible. The star’s orange light gave the land mass an amber hue and the oceans a turquoise color. A swirl of white clouds covered a quarter of the vast northern ocean, with fluffy arms curving across the supine land.
“The first hot season storm.” Cha KinLaat sent a thread of red to the heart of the white swirl. “It looks like a big one.” The red thread danced across the image to the largest landmass following the equator. “That should fill the swamps and mud-flats, even on the interior of Yata.”
That triggered Bilik’s memory of the initiation for gender change, crossing the ocean to Yata in an open wind-boat during a storm. On that passage, fear of dying had triggered hormonal changes causing the gender transformation. It was the only way to become female. It was horrible, seeing others drown and fearing that would be his fate, too. After he’d reached the safety of land, the gender change had come. Bilik sought out a mentor, MuLaak YataBu for an explanation.
Bilik initiated a sexual coupling with him, pushed on by a powerful drive. Afterwards, MuLaak explained a nubile female’s powerful drive to couple came from the survival instinct of their species. Their world, subject to monster storms that roared out of its vast oceans, had periodic population collapses. All life on their world had a genetic mechanism to become female and breed furiously after such disasters.
She remembered dropping her egg in the birthing swamp that lay between high mountains. As her egg had ripened in the sun-warmed mud, her claws grew large and she developed a ferocity that surprised her. After her little wriggler clawed its way out, Bilik took him to the safety of a shallow pond. Through the cool, dry season, she guarded him. As the water level dropped, her wriggler’s gills atrophied. Before the first rain of the hot season fell, she took her wriggler home.
A red line flickering out to a depression centered in the far end-cap of the ship brought Bilik back to the present. It was a short, stubby tube that was small in comparison to the massive ship. “That’s the drive system,” Cha KinLaat said. “The main propulsion tube still hasn’t been made.”
“Why not? I’m supposed to work on it,” Bilik said.
“Well, it’s behind schedule. We didn’t get the zero-gravity metal-forming unit needed to cast the propulsion tubes.” The droop in Cha KinLaat’s head crest indicated that there was a story behind it. “You’ll find out about it soon enough.”
Cha KinLaat moved the red indicator to eight slender arms that radiated at right angles from the front of the Egg-that-Flies. The arms, connected together with a faint net of wires, extended like a giant frill several times the ship’s length. Winking fusion torches outlined its structure.
“That’s the magnetic sail. It’ll gather deuterium from the atmosphere of Bata as well as provide deceleration at the trip’s end.” Cha KinLaat referred to the system’s giant gas planet.
Bilik felt at ease with the young navigator. “I’d like to see more of your system, but I must go to another meeting.”
“Do come again. Next time, you must tell me how you discovered the aliens in Kota, with all the technical details that PiRup left out.” Cha KinLaat bobbed his head.