Tomorrow's Paradise World: Colonize (7 page)

It was agreed by this first council that they would temporarily abandon the pursuit of technology. Their main purpose was to concentrate on the recovery of the people and their world. Captain Talbot specifically stressed to them that they would eventually require this technology again, when their world became filled with inhabitants. The people would be entirely ignorant of technology by then. So, all the records of their previous advancements would have to be preserved. They collected all the manuals, other scientific books, with schematics that were records of their progress up to that point. It was decided that they would store them in the
Chamber of the Past
. They were still there, on shelves along one of the walls in the launch bay they described fittingly as the
Chamber of the Past
.

Victor and Taerg also looked at the chamber more closely. There was a small room off to the side with one bed in it. The bedding fell apart in Taerg’s hands, for it had deteriorated over the passing of many centuries. It was probably Captain Talbot’s bed initially. Maybe he was assigned to this particular base. Perhaps this base was unknown to the Kastat rebels and this is why he survived the great conflict along with his ship. One end of the chamber had a huge set of doors. There was a blue button and a yellow button on a box beside it. Taerg decided to try the blue button. He smiled as the doors slid open immediately. They peered outside and saw that they were on the other side of the cliffs overlooking the sea. It was a vertical drop to the waves below, a smooth rock face all the way down. Through these doors is where the ship would enter and then land in this enormous docking bay. They closed the doors and realized that this was not the source of the breeze in this chamber. In between two panels on the wall was a small passageway leading up to somewhere. They followed the steps up to a level place, with a stone railing overlooking the sea. There was a stone table with a bench next to it.

“Your people in general,” said Victor, “never knew about this place because it is inaccessible from the outside. The smooth cliff face made it too dangerous for them to even attempt to climb up here.”

Taerg nodded his head in agreement. They went back into the chamber and examined it more closely. There were tools and spare parts lying everywhere on benches with wheels. Victor went aboard the ship. Its hatchway was already open, so he walked to the bridge and looked above the doorway inside and saw the nameplate for the ship. She was called
Advisor
17
. He leaned forward and tried to turn on the power, but the instrument panels would not even light up. There was no power for some reason. So, he went into the small engineering room and discovered that cables for power were disconnected from a part that was missing. He went outside and looked more closely at what was on the tables and carts. There were various tools and spare parts. In a few moments he found what he was looking for, a circuit panel box that had been removed from the ship. He looked closely at the circuit boards within. There were twenty-five circuit boards in it. Of the twenty-five, only three looked fine. The rest were all melted and destroyed by an onboard fire that had been quickly put out, but the damage had been done. The fire must have happened while the ship was still in the docking bay. She would have crashed or been sent adrift in space if the fire broke out during flight. Perhaps Captain Talbot had attempted to fix a smaller problem but he only made matters worse. In any case, the damage was done and it was quite significant. He looked around for spare circuit boards. They had all the components there to make up a typical circuit board, but none were built. Captain Talbot was obviously not an engineer or even a technician.

“So,” said Taerg, “do you think you can repair this ship?”

“If this is all that is wrong with it, yes I can, with a little patience and time. I may need to send you out for some supplies that I will need. Although, you know we will need the permission of the grand council to tackle this time consuming task.”

“Yes, that is true. I think we have enough to report our findings to the grand council. They likely will allow you to proceed. They will probably agree, when we tell them about Captain Talbot’s idea that we will need this technology. It will be essential, in order to travel to the moon when our planet is fully populated.”

“I hope so, but I am going to propose another use before then. I think that both you and I should travel to the mothership, to communicate with my people the true situation here. We absolutely need to do this, in order to avoid the colonization of your moon, by my people.”

“You want me, to fly in that thing with you?”

“Don’t worry Taerg, I’m a good pilot. I just haven’t flown this model yet. It is very old.”

Taerg smiled and said, “If you say so Victor. I trust you.”

Chapter Six: Ambassador Taerg

Two days later they were once again before the grand council. It turned out that they did know about the chamber of the past. Each of them had been inside and viewed the ship. They knew about their past since they had all read some of the historical records. There were only two things that they did not know. One, was that Victors’ people were the ancestors to the Kastat rebels. The other, was that the plant life on the moon was taken from their planet. It was thriving up there, ready for whenever they needed it. Victor showed them the video he had taken while he was there. It seemed to amaze them. However, these two new pieces of information only made them more resolved. Now they were even more determined to not allow Victor’s people to colonize their moon. Victor agreed with their resolve.

The grand council agreed to Victor’s idea of repairing the ship for future generations and also for his trip to the mothership. It was essential that the Kastat colonists be convinced or persuaded not to colonize the moon. They agreed that Taerg should go with him and upon Victor's suggestion made Taerg an ambassador. They made it very clear that they did not want ships flying around their planet disturbing the people in their everyday village lives. The rebels were welcome to visit them, but only if they landed their ships in the deserted northern glacier field, so they would not be recognized. They would have to then make the long journey on foot to the villages without their technology. Except they could bring their personal recorders as long as these were not given to the people.

Victor believed that none of his people would ever want to put themselves through all that, just to visit the people here. Sadly, they would only view the villagers as alien primitive savages. A lower form of life. Their biased viewpoint would be entirely incorrect.

The people here lived good happy lives and their lifespans were even longer than that of Victor’s people. They were a more healthy and robust people. All the science and medical advancements had not really extended life, it only prolonged suffering in most cases. There simply was no substitute for living in a healthy environment like this. Victor could see that hardly anyone ever got sick here. They nearly always made it to old age, very old age. Taerg looked twenty years younger than his age but he was only ten years younger than him. He told Victor that it was not uncommon to see a villager that was enjoying the beginning of their third century. Among Victor’s people, no one ever made it that far. Maybe one hundred and sixty if they were especially dynamic. Of course, along with whatever medical help they needed to prolong their life. The people here were more vibrant, healthy and substantially stronger physically, than Victor’s people.

Lately, Victor was feeling considerably better after having recovered from his burns with the help of the healers. He never felt better in his life. He noticed that his skin seemed healthier too. It was slightly darker than when he first arrived. His eyes were noticeably beginning to take on a pale orange hue. He felt stronger too. He was beginning to discern that he belonged on this planet, even though there was no real technology here. Even if he could not continue his research here. He missed his research, but he was not depressed about it. This perception surprised him, for he never dreamed that he could ever reason this way.

He was falling in love with these people and their superb way of living. Their unique wisdom gained over many centuries of village life was truly refreshing to him. He strongly desired conditions here to remain unchanged. He wanted the people to continue on with their expansion of village life. They had the right to fill the planet with their paradisiac life. He hoped to protect them somehow. He was determined to get the ship working again, it was the only way he could significantly help them.

The undertaking, would not easy. He would need to consult the manuals and use the old damaged circuit boards as a guide where possible. If it were modern circuit boards, it would have been much more difficult. They were far more complex and the components were much smaller. For these he only needed a magnifying glass not a microscope to see the connection points. The unfamiliar equipment was larger, less accurate than what he was used to and this was a little frustrating. At first, he felt awkward and uncoordinated while operating it. However, with concentrated effort, he learned to master them in a short time. It would take approximately a week to assemble each circuit board, so he knew repairing the ship would be a lengthy process. He decided to move in and take over captain Talbot’s bed. He asked Taerg to bring him new linens for it. Taerg did so, along with food and drink for each day. Every day and part of the night he tirelessly built these circuit boards from scratch. After he completed each one he would thoroughly test it with the diagnostic equipment available. It was truly remarkable that the power still functioned after all these centuries. That was an astounding marvel in itself. A credit to Taerg’s ancestors, to his ancestors.

After two months he had everything working on the ship. The batteries were completely depleted so he had to replace the fluids, other materials in them and then recharge them with the equipment available. After the ion drives were activated during flight they would keep their charge. The whole vessel had to be cleaned and lubricated. All contact points were inspected to make sure they were sound and free of oxidization. It was not excessively filthy since the whole place was sealed off, except for the passageway leading up to the outside. Inside both these chambers it was dry. This explained why all the documents lasted for this long. It also was the reason for the lack of significant corrosion on the metal parts of the ship. Over the many centuries, some dust from the doorway had settled on everything. Victor wanted to take every precaution before trusting this vessel with his and Taerg’s life. This ancient antique vessel.

The day finally came when they were ready to depart. Victor had given Taerg a flight operations manual to study. He had been closely examining it now for about one week. He needed some sort of a co-pilot. Once they were in space Victor would let Taerg have some time at the controls to make sure he learned to operate the vessel. This was important, just in case of emergency. Victor was not a highly skilled expert pilot, although having spent most of his life on space vessels, he had learned how to fly them reasonably well.

Victor had formulated a plan to handle the colonization issue. He was hoping it would succeed. Taerg said he would go along with it as long as he did not have to lie. Victor assured them that he would not. It would be a direct, honest ultimatum revealing the true situation of the people on planet
Paradise
.

There were no rations on this ship, so Taerg had brought food and water for them to drink. Enough for about a week. It was plenty. Victor informed him that the duration of the trip to the mothership would be less than a day.

When they fired up the engines, they sounded fine to Victor. He was a little shaky with the controls at first. He crept forward slowly out of the launching bay. When he was outside he travelled about 30 miles out to sea so no one would witness his ascent into space. It did not take long and they were in space, headed for the mothership. He looked over at Taerg and said, “How would you like to try out the controls for a while until you are accustomed to it?”

“Taerg eyes widened as he said, “I was waiting for you to say that. Okay, I’ll give it a try.” It did not take long before he was operating the vessel admirably.

“Are you sure you have not done this before?”

“Only in my imagination while reading the manual.”

“Well, I have to say, you are a natural born pilot if I ever saw one. It took me two days to do what you are doing in two hours and I had the advantage of knowing the ship with all of its technical attributes.”

“I must admit, it is enjoyable.”

He watched Taerg take her most of the way to the mothership. Shaking his head and smiling he thought, “Taerg is full of surprises.” Victor would just land her in the bay once they had permission.

*                       *                       *

Meanwhile, on the mothership captain Anderson was receiving the day’s reports from the moon’s surface construction team leaders. All reports indicated they were well ahead of schedule. Everyone had a small structure that they could call a home of sorts all positioned around a huge construction project. After the massive hangar was built they could finally land the Venture in it. There were many offices in one corner of the hanger that would serve as administration. This is where they would eventually form a government, once everyone was settled. Of course he would serve as the prime minister of that government, already elected as such on Homeworld. All this had been decided before they even left on the mission to colonize this moon.

What happened to his lead scientist Victor Marcus, was unfortunate. Advancements in their technology would be slower now without him. He sent some ships to search for the crash site but they could not find anything. They were not allowed to interact with the natives, so his hands were tied. He had done what he could, given the circumstances. He did not like the man, but that did not mean that he was not valuable to their colonization efforts. There were other scientists here, but none were even near his calibre. The Homeworld government advisors postulated that he was capable of leading the mission, although he had no desire to do so. They managed to convince Victor that if an emergency took place and the two commanding officers were unable to command, that he would take over the command. He reluctantly agreed.

Victor Marcus, a man who did not want leadership. He mused, “What kind of a man does not want to lead? Why doesn’t he want to be in charge?” These questions puzzled him. He knew Victor was not a coward. He certainly had the ability to command. The way he confidently stood up for himself was unnerving. He did not understand Mister Marcus at all and loathed what he could not understand. He was threatened by Victor’s direct intelligent replies when giving him orders. Nevertheless, there was no need to worry about that now. According to the reports, his ship was burning up in the atmosphere before they lost contact with it. So probably, everyone on board had not survived. He would have to report this to Homeworld. It would be an extended wait for them to receive the message and then for their reply, but there was no way to speed that up. They would just have to wait. Perhaps, when the message was eventually received, it would state that they would send someone else to take Victor’s essential place in the new colony. Maybe such a person would arrive with the next wave of colonists. In the meantime, he would concentrate on uniting these people with a powerful government that would promote technological advancements and the speedy colonization of this moon. A government that he would be the leader of. Nothing could stop that from happening. In time he would rule millions of colonists. His election by the Homeworld government could only be undone by them. His delightful reverie was interrupted by the voice of his communications officer, Mister Richards.

“Sir, we have an unidentified vessel approaching from the planet.”

“That is strange, because the people below are not a space faring people.”

“They are hailing us sir.”

“Okay. Well, put them on.”

On the view screen appeared an individual with dark skin and orange eyes. He seemed very calm as he leaned forward and said fluently with only a slight accent, these words:

“Greetings, people of Kastat. We request to meet with you concerning your present operation. The colonization of our moon.”

“This is very much unexpected, but even so, we will be happy to accommodate you as our guests. May I ask you to identify yourself? Whom do you represent and how many are on board?”

“There is only two of us, I am Taerg Esidarap appointed ambassador for the people on the planet below and I believe you know who this is.”

Victor leaned into view. His skin appeared to be slightly darker and his eyes seemed different somehow. They looked like they were faintly orange tinted, but it was unmistakably him. He would remember that inscrutable countenance anywhere. When Victor Marcus walked into a room, everyone noticed. He possessed a certain presence that no one could deny. Yet another attribute about the man that he detested. Victor smiled and said, “Hello captain, I heard you were looking for me.”

“Victor Marcus,” he said as he faked a smile, “what a pleasant surprise. I was just pondering what transpired concerning your accident. We were all worried about you, but I see now that you survived. That is very good news. We found the co-pilot floating in space, but what of the pilot?”

“He was killed on impact,” said Victor sadly shaking his head, “and I was injured and trapped. Thankfully though, a brave fellow rescued me by pulling me out of the wreckage.”

“I thought we had lost you Mister Marcus, we were very disappointed. After all, you are valuable to our future advancements here. You must have a very interesting tale to tell. I look forward to hearing it. Proceed to bay number five. Control will direct you in from there. We will meet one hour from now in the tactical board room.”

After Victor agreed and switched off communication, Taerg said, “That was easy.”

“Yes, but next comes the difficult part.”

In the tactical board room, they found Captain Anderson and some security officers waiting for them. Captain Anderson was the first to speak. “Mister Marcus your physical appearance has changed slightly. Do you know why?”