Short Stories from Wing's Authors.

The Observer

by

Patricia Gulley

The Sagittarius Arm swept across the dark expanse of space like a trail of seeds spread by the unseen hand of a giant farmer. An apt comparison made by the chief agronomist who had planned our seeding of the new world we had left for over a century ago. Anticipation of a new life on another world in the other arm of The Milky Way made me want to equate each star with a germinating seed destined to give Jack’s Beanstalk a run for its money.

~ * ~

It was an illusion, of course, because I was buried in the lower levels of the ship  and sleeping soundly in my cryo pod. Buried—an unpleasant thought—at the very bottom of the pods bay because my work was not required upon arrival.

I knew when the dark edges disappeared and the view port filled with stars, we’d have traveled thousands of light years from Sol System and entered the star clusters of the Sagittarius Arm. We weren’t speeding toward it, more like hopping across space. I grasped the idea, not the science. What I couldn’t comprehend was the science that allowed me this visual from sleep. No one had mentioned this little perk.

I can see other colonists, or rather some misty version of them, and wish there were some way to communicate. Not that I’m lonely or anything, I don’t feel a thing, physically, but it would be nice to share impressions. I have to remember to ask the one non-farming scientist we were forced to bring with us for an explanation of this technology when I wake up. He seemed such a serious fellow, I hope he adjusts well to our farming community. Once the ship is dismantled, there won’t be much technology left for him to tinker with.

When I open my eyes again there is no strip of stars. I’m elated and I look for the same happiness on the faces of the others. Instead I see distress as hundreds of them float towards the view port and out into space without protective suits. I wait to begin floating too, but don’t, and soon they are all gone except me. The view port reveals hundreds of cryo pods streaming away in the wake of the moving ship. What about me? Am I safe? Am I alone?

~ * ~

The next time I awake an odd looking ship is parked outside the view port and there is a planet in the background. Have we arrived at our destination? The distant sound of thumping and grinding reassures me that I will know soon enough.

I wait through several more awakenings, but no one comes for me. The noise of activity has increased, and much closer to the planet. As I watch several of the odd looking ships pass by.

Funny, it just now occurs to me to wonder who these people are. We were heading for a supposedly lifeless planet that required terra forming, then seeding before we landed and colonized. The Department of Colonization had vetoed the idea of finding one suited to our species, as it might be inhabited.

Were their calculations wrong? Were we off course? Were we intercepted and attacked? Did alien pirates loot the ship and eject the colonist pods? But that happened before we reached this star system. Had these people been piloting the ship all along? Frustrating questions with no one to ask or answer.

Why won’t someone come and tell me something? Is anyone from the colony ship awake--or left? I console myself by reasoning that an alien encounter does not require a farmer. If it weren’t for the sleep periods, I think I’d go mad.

It’s hard to be patient. I’ve counted awakenings and it is my twenty-fifth when they finally arrive. A light goes on over my pod and through the clear lid I see space suits with mirrored faceplates hovering over me. Their movements can only mean excitement. I am too, but I’m also apprehensive about meeting a new species alone. I hope someone besides myself has survived.

The suits separate and another suit rushes forward—oh oh, on four legs--to have a look at me. Otherwise the head and arms look the same. The hands—one, two, three, four, five—are different, looks like six fingers no thumb.

They do not open the pod, instead it’s lifted and we float out of the depths of the storage area and along the passages to an airlock. Nothing seems to have changed. We cross out of my ship into one of theirs and I am left in a room that fills with a cloudy vapor. Decontamination, for sure, can’t blame them, but I can’t see a dang thing.

When it clears, I am surrounded by six of them, minus spacesuits, staring in at me. After the initial shock of four legs and six fingers, I’m pleased to see their heads are a lot like ours. Does the upward turn of their mouth mean they are smiling? I try to smile back.

Flurries of faces pass before me, all eager to get a look at me. Eagerness on my part battles with fear over them opening the pod.

When the decision is made we are once again on our way. Back into a ship, stored securely, out of the ship for a brief glimpse of a sky with clouds and their sun (looks a lot ours) and then into a closed conveyance. A short drive, a downward ramp, outside briefly, inside and up in an elevator and into a room that can only be a medical lab. More staring, chin rubbing and head scratching, (yes they have hair and now I think I can distinguish between males and females) and light and darkness that must mean days are passing while they cogitate.

Finally, four of them approach in what looks like environmental suits with tools that they use to crack the seal of my pod. I want to scream, no, no, what if I can’t breath the air, the pod has procedures to perform to assure I am revived safe and sound…

The seal cracks open and the lid is removed and we are back to staring at one another. Nothing has changed, I can’t move or feel myself breathing or, for that matter, doing anything to suggest I may suddenly choke and expire.

One of the suits reaches for something on my left side while two others lean over from the right to observe what he is doing. I can’t turn my head to see what’s happening, but the one on the left is lifting something and the others raise their hands in the universal movement of ‘gently, gently, be careful’.

And then a brown, desiccated appendage is raised and I wonder why I’m not screaming my head off. I’m creeped out that they’ve found something dead in my pod. It doesn’t take long for me to realize that I am the only thing in the pod.

Many tests later, which understandably I am not paying any attention to, a mirror is used for something or other and I see my mummified body.

~ * ~

When I can think clearly again, I surmise that the scientists are doing everything possible to see to it that I stay well preserved. It’s hard to believe that the dead can be depressed, but I am. I’m never going to sit up and be told what happened, if they even know, not to mention the language barrier. Untranslatable notes are left in plain view all the time.

Was there really a process for people to see out of the cryo units, or was that when I really died? Were all those people floating into space fellow dead colonists? Were all those pods I saw afterwards the real, ejected pods? What happened to the ship to cause that?

~ * ~

The first time I looked out we had to be in the expanse between the arms, so did we make it to the Sagittarius Arm on remote control? That would have taken us to the planet we were planning to terra form. This couldn’t be it, so did we drift somehow? Or did we get off course and turn back into the Orion Arm? Thousands of questions and no way to get answers. What a dilemma!

I mull it over a hundred times, paying no attention to the activity in the lab until they brought in a space suit from my ship. It too got scrutinized as only a group of scientists could inflict. Heck, I know how I’d act if someone gave me an alien version of an artichoke or an ear of corn. The helmet is taken off and it is no one I recognized, and this thought amuses me to no end since it’s another mummy.

However when they tilt the suit on its side, I see the nametag: Halverson. The lone technologist the Department of Colonization forced on us. Our colony group had petitioned and received funds from a number of Food Production Societies to allow us to go deep into space and start a new colony with clean soil for food production, but we also needed funding from the government. They wouldn’t supply the expedition unless it had duel purposes. We later found out that the funding came from private mining corporations, who were willing to provide money if they had someone on board to do long range studies of the other planets in the solar system we were headed for. We balked and grumbled at giving up our valuable space, but had to concede or no money.

Fortunately, the only equipment he wanted to bring was a small droid that took samples and his only request was that he be placed near the top of the cryo pods and be awakened as we entered the solar system to take readings. Suited up the way he was I assumed he was awake when things went wrong. An evil suspicion crept into whatever passed for my mind over why and who might have caused things to go wrong.

While pondering this, I almost missed them prying a recorder from Halverson’s hand. It was examined meticulously and eventually, by committee vote, one of the buttons got pressed, it squawks, and is immediately rushed away before I can hear anything.

That was the last interesting thing that happened until they moved me again. I was placed in my pod and taken to what had to be a museum. There, in a hall as big as an ancient football field, was everything from my ship. The surprising thing was that I was the only other mummy besides Halverson and he was locked in his suit. If you could get up close, you could peek in and see him, but why bother when there I was in my egg shaped pod with its clear cover visible for everyone to see. Not that I’m overly modest, but I knew the rags removed from my body were displayed elsewhere.

It made me think about all those mummies I’d seen in museums. The extremely ancient ones from the African County of Egypt were the most plentiful, but the Eurasian Conglomerate had quite a few too. I wondered about Oetzi, Rameses, Tut, Bog Man and Kennewick Man; had they gone insane yet? Distressing and unknowable. Were they still experiencing what was happening to me?

I heaved what I perceived was a heavy sigh for the millenniums I faced. Of course, I came from a more enlightened time, what had those poor creatures looked out and believed they saw? At least I had a passing knowledge of technology and had a lively childhood filled with the possibility of meeting an intelligent, alien species. I could observe this civilization with a somewhat educated eye, not so those poor buggers.

With so much time on my hands, I tried to learn the language. I listened very hard, but it was all gibberish. The museum put up some new signs and that’s when I realized that they had a multitude of languages just like we used to have. If I had any knack for languages, it should have acted as my Rosetta Stone. I gave up.

Then one day when the museum was closed, several curators I recognized came in with a female. They were most disturbed, but she seemed to be standing her ground, and they had no choice but to remove the recorder from its display case and hand it over to her. If they thought they were going to stand by and wait to put it back, they had another think coming. She made them go away, and then began fiddling with it. She had a devise I assumed was a recorder of her own and she transferred the data. These creatures did not need chairs, they rested in place and had the habit of pacing when they were frustrated.

I was tilted up, not lying flat, and as luck would have it, she stopped next to me and I was able to read over her shoulder.

Halverson had sabotaged the ship. His pod revived him after a year and his first action was to disconnect life support to the pods. His mission was to divert the ship to other coordinates.

As I’ve said, we were most unhappy having to bring him aboard. It wasn’t like we were keeping secrets; he never asked any questions about our mission. Too bad for him, I can just imagine his horror when he discovered that the computer could not be reprogrammed for anything, much less to reroute the ship; it stayed locked on course. There was no long distance communications system and no way to turn the atmospherics on ahead of time. We considered it a waste of money. Everything was on autopilot for the two-hundred-year trip. He had the air in his suit and ten others and when it gave out so did he.

Some time near his end he vented his anger and despair and jettisoned the pods. He mentioned one pod at the bottom that looked as though it had malfunctioned immediately after take off. He left it as a reminder of the only thing that the miserable ship has destroyed more than just his life. I wondered if I should feel honored?

The last entries were well-phrased curses heaped upon the heads of known mining companies and their CEOs. Unfortunately, she moved away before the text ran out and I didn’t get to find out if he’d gone on to self-analysis. What would a mass murderer have to say for himself?

I did think fondly of the group who demanded a control mechanism on the ship that cheaply moved us from point A to B. Either the mass murderer had managed to damage it, or we got what we paid for, because the ship and I arrived at C not B.

Not long afterwards, the curators brought in other items found in the ship and displayed them around me with the help of the female with the recorder. Small farming tools and containers of seed, which I recognized. Next to the seeds were small baskets and bowls of what I believe were examples of their own fruits and vegetables that they assumed were similar to what my seeds produced. I wonder if they tried to grow some of them? Probably, heck I would have. The only thing they must not have understood was the tomato, no examples there, but that’s a tough one. The whole thing pleased me. They assumed I was a farmer and that sparked some reverence in them.

I’m sure the ship and where it came from is considered a great mystery worth solving. If they’re anything like us, they have to love every minute of it.

Another ship was supposed to leave Earth fifty years after we left. They may have already arrived and someday they might consider trying to find out what happened to my ship. So I’m resolved to make these people my life’s (or whatever it is) work and anticipate the meeting of our cultures. It may take a very long time, but time is meaningless to me and I’m certainly not going anywhere.