Episode Nine: First Contact, Part II
Captain Bullard makes a last-ditch attempt to negotiate a peaceful end to the confrontation, hoping the invaders will leave with no further conflict.
The Space Cruiser USS Marius, CS-1
In orbit around Io
June 2056
My mother, Kate, and I had been working round the clock to configure Lexi to talk to the alien invaders. Although it had taken us months to travel to Jupiter, the mission had taken on a new urgency. The Jupiterians reported that with our arrival, the hydrogen extraction rate had increased exponentially and the damaging effects to their environment and those on Saturn and Uranus had become critical. The Jupiterians had already sacrificed two members to keep the shield entity viable. We needed to hurry.
We’d completed the coding for the communications protocols and updated Lexi’s translation matrix from the files we’d received from Jessa in New Mexico. Theoretically, we could converse directly with the invaders. It was time to test our work by speaking in the invaders’ language with Jessa.
Kate sat at the console, called up the first test script, and began reading. “Jessa, this is Kate. As you know, we are in orbit around Io. We have been conversing with the indigenous intelligence over the kilometer band. We need to talk directly to the invading aliens in the centimeter band. Please respond.” Kate put the script down and confirmed the communications system had sent the message.
###
Sitting with my mother for an hour, talking about my feelings for my sister was the worst. Just let me work and I’d be fine. A tremendous sense of relief washed over me when the chime sounded—we’d received Jessa’s answer.
Lexi materialized in the holographic chamber. “Good news and bad news, Celina. Jessa confirmed she’d received the message but could not translate it into the centimeter band signal on the receiving side. The message was unintelligible. The test was unsuccessful.”
I slouched in my chair and hung my head. I told myself I wouldn’t cry. “Oh, Mom. What are we going to do?”
Kate unhooked from her zero-G foot restraints, floated over and squeezed my shoulders. “We’ll try again. Jessa didn’t get it right at first. It’s just a temporary setback.”
The crackle from the intercom broke into the quiet moment.
“AI lab. This is the bridge. Dr. Chandler, where’s my translator?”
The captain didn’t sound exactly angry, more like impatient, but clearly not happy.
“Sir, we’ve had a setback. The translated message was garbled when New Mexico received it. We need to debug the code. It might take a few days.”
“Not good enough, Dr. Chandler. The Jupiterians had to move the shield entity to a higher latitude to avoid the extraction turbulence. Now we can’t move the ship without risking damage. You’ve got hours, not days.”
Suddenly, the incoming message chime interrupted. Lexi stirred in her holographic chamber. “Celina. There’s another message being received. It’s from Seth.”
“Seth?” my mother and I whispered, exchanging a bewildered look.
Raising my voice, I answered the captain. “Captain. We’ll have an update in five minutes. We’ve just received new data.”
“Five minutes. Captain out.” Even the speaker click sounded curt.
My mom had moved over to converse with Lexi. Hands on hips, her familiar posture of skepticism I’d learned to dread growing up, was now directed at our AI. “Are you telling us Seth has sent a message?”
“Yes. Seth says Jessa’s been sharing our communications, and you need to re-initialize the SGC-2025-7A.2 module. He says it has a configuration setting for the kilometer band.”
Oh crap. I forgot. My mom’s always telling me to update my checklist, and now I could have screwed up the entire process. Dammit. But more confusing is why Seth is talking to us.
“Lexi, why would Seth be helping us? SS&T created him, and they sure don’t want to help us.”
“Just because his creators are your adversary, it doesn’t follow that he is.”
“I guess you could be right—thankfully. Send your brother our thanks.”
###
We made the correction to the configuration settings, and the second test was a success. In the end, we’d lost a few hours, but perhaps now had an ally at SS&T.
The captain must have heard me and Kate cycle through the hatch, as he turned to face us as we slipped our feet into restraints.
With no preamble, “What do you have for me?”
Kate gave me a nod to proceed. “We have completed the translation matrix, and you can converse with the Hydrogen Thieves directly. Channel 7.”
The captain pinched his nose and narrowed his eyes. “The Hydrogen Thieves?”
“Sorry, Captain. It’s what everyone’s calling them. It seems to fit.”
Captain Bullard did not respond, but just swiveled to the front and pointed to the comms officer. “Open a channel, Lieutenant.”
The comms officer configured her control panel. “Channel open, sir.”
The captain took a deep breath, straightened in his command chair, and began. “This is Captain Eugene Bullard of the Earth Ship Marius. Please respond.”
A now familiar reddish-purple plasma discharge burst from the planet below. It detonated impotently on Io with no effect on the Marius.
The captain slipped on his seat harness and motioned the bridge crew to do the same. Kate and I buckled into jump seats near operations.
“Attacking us will have no effect. We’ve shown we can neutralize your plasma weapon. Halt your activities and open negotiations for you to exit our system. Please respond.”
The quiet dragged for minutes, but there were no additional plasma discharges. I wondered how long the captain would wait. Clearly, he was a patient man.
Finally, the bridge speakers emitted a crackling sound, and everyone heard a low, female voice. “We do not negotiate. We are a resource gathering expedition and when our storage facilities are full, we will leave.”
“Your actions are damaging the gas planets and killing the local entities.”
“That is not our concern, and we question why creatures from a rocky planet care about these disembodied abominations. We will leave when our mission is complete.”
Captain Bullard ran his hands through his grizzled hair. “Then you leave us no choice but to expel you by force. Is there no hope you will leave immediately and in peace?”
“We will leave when our mission is complete. The Collective requires this fuel, and we will not return without it. We are not afraid of confronting force.”
The comms officer swiveled in her chair. “They cut off the channel.”
Immediately, a high-energy particle beam flashed from the invaders’ location and disintegrated a cluster of the mini-sats we’d placed in orbit around Io.
The captain sat back in his seat and shook his head. “Well, that’s new. If they don’t want to talk, we’ll do it the hard way. Comms, put me on ship wide.”
The comms officer gestured. The captain was on.
“Everyone. This is the captain. Battle stations.”