New world course of the.., p.1
New World (Course of the Worlds Book 2), page 1
New World
Part Two of the Course of the Worlds
by
J.A. Hawkings
Ebook protected by Digital Rights Management
© 2015 All rights reserved by author
All rights reserved
First edition July 2015
This novel is a work of fantasy. Names, characters, places, organizations and events are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
This work is protected by Copyright laws. Any unauthorized duplication, even in part, is prohibited.
Table of Contents
New World
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One
They had tried everything to get past that nightmare.
Their inability to send subspace signals was literally driving Commander Bj'ava out of his mind. How was it even conceivable that those great sons of a Sno'rth1, the Terrestrials, were capable of opening gaps in the cosmos, but knew nothing of subspace structure? It was unacceptable and damned illogical; especially since considerable Ni'bira technology had fallen into their hands. Perhaps it was due to inaccuracies in the manuals they had studied and their ineptitude at guessing certain inner workings. Even the space jumps towards Ni'biir had ended badly. All that his people had learned over thousands of years just didn't seem to work on that damned ship.
One more reason to hate the humans.
After their first interstellar jump, Bj'ava and his crew had landed at the edge of a dwarf orange. They had managed to elude the star's gravitational pull by a hair. Despite that, their hull had suffered numerous microfractures, their bodies had been bombarded with radiation, and the engine's propulsion was reduced by half. Even the instruments on board had been compromised. When they directed their radiotelescope towards the Ni'biir system, they could barely make out one of its gaseous giants, but weren't even certain which planet it was. It was an absurd situation which might mean their deaths on the outskirts of an insignificant dwarf star. “We should consider ourselves fortunate,” the captain continued to say. “We reappeared in a completely different region than the one intended. We could've slammed into a blue giant, a neutron star or worse, even a magnetar2.”
It was an error which had placed them in danger and their navigation system in crisis. It had taken them weeks to ascertain where their own sun might be. The problem was the same one that they'd had in identifying in the key Terrestrial players: a host of completely different astronomical references. It was a fact that they couldn't attribute to some human deception, unless it was the ship that was making them believe that one thing was another; and frankly, after numerous tests, they couldn't exclude that.
When the power level dropped even further, leaving just enough for one more space jump, no one had the courage to tell the commander about the wide margin of error the Ni'biir had detected. The spectrum corresponded, but the geometry of the stars nearby differed in a disturbing way. Risking a return to the future was out of the question. As far as they knew, they didn't have the power, some phases of the procedure were unclear, and Bj'ava would've preferred to die a thousand times rather than give up and have to explain it to the empire.
In the end, after lengthy discussions, threats of betrayal, accusations of insubordination, references to ancient religious beliefs and the triumvirate's charter, the three Ni'bira dedicated to the issue lied shamelessly to their captain. So, after more than one hundred twenty-five standard days since their escape from Dulce, the futuristic time ship emerged in the Ni'biir system, looking as rundown as an archaic scrapheap.
After an initial sigh of relief, Bj'ava's scream would've been heard throughout that entire quadrant of the galaxy if the sound waves could've spread into the void.
“Sttiu'nk zdrar je!” he screamed angrily.
A human who understood the Ni'bira language might've interpreted that as “Where the fuck is it?”
And, grasping the problem, this hypothetical Terrestrial would've understood Commander Bj'ava's behavior. After all, what human, upon returning to his own solar system and failing to find Earth, would've abstained from cursing?
“This is impossible!” the captain stated.
“But sir, the star's spectrum is...”
“The instruments are fucked up! It's unthinkable that a planet could vanish into thin air.”
“From here, we should be able to see it with the naked eye, like a faint point of light in the sky.”
“So we must be in the wrong star system,” yelled the commander, who wouldn't listen to reason.
Humiliated and defeated, the crew said nothing.
Then Bj'ava asked: “Is there a habitable planet in this system?”
The response was: “Two gaseous giants; one is rocky and has no atmosphere and the other is a frozen planetoid.”
A fancy way of saying "no", Bj'ava thought and understood that this was the end.
“How much power do we have left?”
“Reducing our consumption to the minimum, the life support systems may hold out for another six days.”
“Na'kh,” Bj'ava said.
It was a term which had its exact equivalent in the Japanese language.
The captain went toward the weapons cabinet. He took out six phasers and gave one to each Ni'bira.
The last one remained in his hand.
He and his crew undressed and took care to set their weapons to the maximum. Then they pointed them at their midsections; and, at the captain's command, pressed the triggers in unison.
Six shining bodies exploded, flooding the ship with a viscous silver liquid.
Harakiri.
End of game.
Two
“Christine, are you sure?”
“Yes, Dad.”
“You could still change your mind...”
“No.”
Michel Pierre looked at his daughter with resignation, then asked: “Why did you keep this from me until the very end?”
“Would you have tried to convince me not to go?”
“Probably.”
“That's why I didn’t tell you.”
The man's face softened, then he said: “Out there, I'll be your admiral.”
“And I'll be your midshipman.”
“You ended up with a good commander.”
“Who's in charge of my ship?”
“Wilbur Canavan, the best captain you could ever hope for.”
Christine smiled. “If the admiral trusts him, so do I.”
No, it's your father saying this, Michel thought.
“So I'll see you on the other side.”
“Yes, Midshipman.”
“Admiral,” Christine replied, bringing her right hand to her forehead.
Some nights, the orbiting spaceport was the brightest object in the sky; a celestial promise which had saved humanity.
They sailed from there on the day of the summer solstice. Fourteen ships, divided into two divisions: An immense flotilla, such as had never been seen before. Every terrestrial weapon had been placed at their defense, in the hope that the Ni'bira threat would overlook them, at least this once. The crews had been forced to holoscan for more than a week. No alien would set foot in the second temporal area, according to John Valley, the governor of the spaceport.
The fourteen monsters were made of osmiridium, a superalloy, intended to be their guardian angels. They were, however, in actuality, armed demons, arrayed in two triangular formations.
The first division accelerated, achieving their designated position. At that point, the OSG3 opened up the largest temporal wormhole ever created.
One by one, the ships filed slowly into the arms of another era. As soon as the last of the seven had vanished into the gap, the OSG used the last of its energy and the passage closed.
The second division would have to wait until the generator was recharged.
“Go, Michel, hand them their asses!” said Admiral Evans.
Three
In the three years since the disappearance of the alien beings, America had interpreted most of the data in its possession, and had armed itself. Having found powerful, discrete partners, it had plumbed the depths of the solar system and was prepared for the worst.
But, after the anticipated wait, nothing happened.
And the same that following year.
A world at peace, without winners or losers, dedicated to the usual power games, among which Steven Sims, the new president of the United States distinguished himself. The man was surprised by the stories about the aliens, so much so that he became a skeptic in that regard. But, by his third week in office, he was forced to change his mind. It wasn't the holo videos or the stories which he found unsettling. Those images could've been faked and the stories might reflect fantasies, but not the weapons. Those were real and too futuristic to belong to the year two thousand eighty. Their development hadn't come from alien data nor from the genius of illustrious researchers. It had actually come from the recovery of the ship which had crashed on Callisto. It was a triumph of nanotechnology, an ode to space propulsion and an inspiration to the most ambitious armies. A technological leap which had virtually launched the United States into the twenty third century. A potential, thought Steven Sims, which could be download
Four
They were traveling through centuries and yet it only took an instant.
“Are we all here?” Michel Pierre asked the helmsman.
“All seven ships.”
“Good. Our position?”
“Forty five million kilometers from Saturn.”
“We emerged pretty far into the system.”
“More than expected, sir.”
“Let's investigate the situation with the Saturn colonies, checking for the presence of any enemy ships; and let me know what you find on Earth.”
“Yes sir.”
The admiral retired to his room and took a bath. The xintotine hadn't entirely negated the effects of jump sickness. In a few minutes, he'd feel better. He had been faced with, and had overcome, many other problems in his life.
Christine was settling into her role on ship number five, with one single persistent thought: to annihilate the Ni'bira.
“You know, it was a miracle that we escaped,” said one of her companions in the cabin.
“Alien machines?” the young Ms. Pierre suggested.
“No, no way. It was a gravitational issue. After the jump, according to our calculations, the astronomical units…”
“Sorry, but I don't understand things like that.”
“It's nothing complicated. Listen to me: distances can be classified in...”
“No, really. I'm not interested,” Christine replied.
“May I ask why?”
“I'm a soldier.”
“And so?”
“I'm only interested in one thing.”
“What?”
“Fighting!”
“Are you sure, Capitano Canavan?” the admiral asked.
“I can confirm it one hundred per cent, sir.”
“Then we're in real trouble.”
“Well, the absence of the Jovian colonies doesn't necessarily mean...”
“Captain.”
“Yes, Admiral?”
“Every ship in the fleet has done its own calculations and...”
Michel Pierre himself couldn't believe the words that followed.
“And?”
“They didn’t find any colonies.”
“Not even on Mars?”
“No.”
“Shit.”
Yes, the admiral thought, this is a shit storm,a whole universe of it.
“All of the ships' computers will shortly be in sync for a space jump,” Michel explained. “A single jump towards the Earth.”
“Aren't we going to wait for the second division?”
“They won’t appear for hours. Something has gone wrong and communicating directly with the future, while a wormhole is open at the same time, is impossible.”
If their position in the temporal fabric of the cosmos has shifted, it'll take more than a correction; they'll just have to live with it, Canavan thought.
“Oh, I almost forgot. The weapons...”
“The weapons, sir?”
“I want them activated and ready for use.”
Looking after an electromagnetic cannon wasn't her highest aspiration. After all, this was the twenty third century. They didn't fight with daggers and shields any more, although a blade could certainly cut up a shapeshifter. Killing one of them in hand to hand combat would take some doing. They were more agile and stronger than humans, whom they rarely allowed to escape. But Christine had trained for years and felt ready for anything.
“Lower your weapons. I repeat. Lower your weapons,” Canavan's voice intoned from the holophone.
“No shooting,” said her colleague from the other side of the compartment.
“You read my mind,” Christine confessed.
“You're always thinking about kicking their asses.”
“True.”
The young Ms. Pierre allowed herself to smile.
“All officers in the ready room. I repeat. All officers in the ready room.”
“We aren't officers,” her colleague observed.
“Unfortunately.”
The enlisted soldiers' curiosity was soon satisfied. It took little time for the news to travel to the remotest corners of every ship. It was a disconcerting question, which left little hope even for the most ardent optimists.
“No, it doesn't make sense,” Christine began to repeat, in a chant that had soon invaded the entire fleet.
Five
The Shackleton colony certainly wasn't as comfortable as Blue Moon. It was actually one of the first settlements to have been erected on that superfine lunar powder. Called "regolite," the dust had proven to be an excellent building material. The current construction had been facilitated by means of a 3D printer which, by mixing the powder with a certain chemical compound rich in magnesium oxide, had created bricks for the base. The habitat consisted of eleven modules connected to each other and able to accommodate up to four people each. In recent years, Nicole Price had spent her life confined in these types of storage closets, as she liked to call them. Her arrival coincided with the installation of a ridiculous biological laboratory in which she was supposed to carry out obscure experiments. She was sometimes perceived more like a little girl, who had been given a toy to make her behave, than a scientist. In any case, she had applied for transfer, which, as was customary for this type of request, ended up dead on a disk in some government office. The story of her expulsion from alien affairs was really frustrating, not to mention incredible. She hadn't told anyone, not even her sister. After all, the threats she had received from Dulce had been specific; so she never heard more about the ship on Callisto or its crew ever again. Every day, she woke up fearing that it might be her last; that some evil alien civilization might take over the Earth. It was even more distressing because she couldn't share it with anyone; a fear that, fortunately, hadn't materialized. Moreover, she didn't know how this was possible. Those temponauts seemed to have taken away an unsolvable mystery. Perhaps they had been destroyed or maybe an invisible attack was taking place even now. Sitting in her storage closet, she'd be the last to know. It was intolerable, just like those sporadic holocalls from Jeff. Those consisted of sterile minutes in which any potentially interesting topic of conversation was forbidden. They always ended with moments of awkward silence, followed by Baker babbling. It was one of Nicole's nasty habits that had bothered her all of her life; but she'd have to deal with it sooner or later. She knew it in her soul. A soul that was tired and angry.
Blue Moon was the largest lunar colony. With thousands of meters squared of available space, large greenhouses and spacecraft testing, it was considered the most comfortable extraterrestrial human settlement. Nevertheless, Jeff Baker felt like he was suffocating, even more so than at Shackleton. His aspirations and his career had gone to hell that wretched day on Callisto. He was suffering the same frustration as Nicole. To make matters worse, the two had developed an infatuation. It was a feeling which had grown in the time they had spent together. An interest that he hadn't managed to overcome in four years. Jeff was sure that he could've gotten past it on Earth, but the forced isolation of a colony had intensified memories and emotions, creating deeper turmoil.
