“I never expected anything like this the alien said when he stepped out of
the elevator in the Utility cavern and onto the waiting bus. They were whisk
away through the Ocean cavern, then a slight detour through the vineyards in
the Hour Glass cavern to New Phoenix. When they got off at the old Federal
building in New Phoenix all of the leaders of Mars were waiting for them. They
had all either heard or been briefed on what the alien had to say. “If what you
have to say is true and so far we have every reason to believe that it is perhaps
we can help you. Here is our situation.” He described the destruction of Earth,
and the loss of their nine billion people. He explained that the population of
Mars had been depleted to help with the re population of our home planet. He
told them that either Mars, Earth or Arton could accommodate their entire
population. Our question for you is how fast you could move people to Arton
and how fast could those people learn our language.”
The Alien studied the chart, did some computations then announced, “I
make it to be a little under one light year from ####### to Arton. We have thirty
ships, capable of Warp speeds They can each transport 864 passengers. With
no cargo and over crowing we could maybe take 2,000 per trip. A round trip
would take by your calender, about five of your months. That would only be
60,000 of our people in one of your years. By making new ship production our
only priority, we could possibly move a little over one million of our people to
Arton, and then if our planet remains viable for another fifteen of your years.”
You must understand that we never entertained any hope of getting all of our
people off of Our planet. Our aim was to establish a significant presence on
some other planet in order to preserve our race.”
Captain Cummings put in, “the people that you transport will not be able
to remain on Arton indefinitely, but Arton is still closer to your home planet than
it is to our home planet of Earth. Arton would be just a temporary place for
your people to wait for transportation to Earth. There is someone here that I
want you to meet. Gil come up here.” A little Artonian stepped forward and held
out his hand to the alien. “These people have said much but let me be the first
to say “Welcome to Mars.” A dead silence fell over the crowed. Gil had just
addressed the alien in his native tung. “Captain Cummings stammered “Where
and how did you learn their language, Gil?” “Oh, I am not yet proficient in their
language yet but I have been listening to every word that has they have said
since they arrived and I have picked up enough to say a few simple things, it
would probably take me more than a week to become proficient. How did you
think that all of us learned your language as quickly as we did? There are some
things that Artonians are better at than humans are . Language just happens to
be one of them. You might just say that Artonians have a faculty for languages.”
Gil then addressed the alien “ You have probably guessed that I am a
native of the planet Arton. There are about as many humans on Arton as there
natives. Soon I will be able to speak your language fluently. Our brains are
arranged differently than the human brain. The temporal lobe of our brains is
almost three times the size of the temporal lobe in the human brain. The
Frontal Lobe however is half the size of the frontal lobe of the human brain. In
a nutshell this means that humans are better than us at reasoning and problem
solving and we are better at languages and speech. Humans show more
individuality.” Gil spoke his later words in English and they went through the
translator machine.
Captain Horn of Arton Three spoke into the translator. “ We only have
four craft capable of Warp speed but they can carry up to five thousand people
at a time if we carry no cargo and put atmosphere into the cargo holds. Our
ships are larger than yours and are capable of speeds up to Warp eleven. How
long do you have before your planet is no longer habitable?” “Perhaps at least
ten but not more than 20 of your years. I am just not comfortable yet in
converting time to your years.” “I am sorry for that but it is the only way any of
us have ever thought about time Increments. One year is how long it takes our
home planet to make one complete orbit of our sun, for example a man can
generally live for about eighty years.” “In that case we may have from 15 to
thirty years. Where is your home planet, Captain?” “It would have been the
next planet you would have come to in your search of our solar system. Had
you not found us on Mars you would be on Earth by now. Earth is six times the
size of Mars and was overpopulated by twelve billion people when war
destroyed almost every living thing on the planet. That was only about fifty
years ago. People from this colony on Mars have repopulated the Earth but
with only about two hundred thousand people. The infrastructure was only
damaged and has been found to be ninety percent usable. It was the animals
that all died from radiation poisoning. We believe that the war came about from
a lack of our ability to really communicate with one another. There were over
three hundred languages on Earth at the time of the destruction and more than
150 separate nations. Most of them possessed nuclear weapons so when the
first one went off everyone else launched all they had at the nation they
perceived to be their arch enemy. In two hours the atmosphere became lethal.
Within a few days all the land creatures on earth, Including man became
extInct. Twelve Billion was far too many people, a large number of those people
were starving to death every year. Now there are too few people. We feel that
the right number of people for Earth would be from one to five billion. We made
a vow that from now on we would only allow one language to be spoken on
Earth. All of us who survived on Arton, Mars and in space spoke only the
English language so it is only logical that in the future all people living on the
Earth must speak English fluently. All of the people on Arton and on Mars
speak only English.”
Captain Cummings added, “Once we get the course down pat from your
planet to Arton our four ships should be able to transport about four hundred
thousand of your people in one years time. I am sure that all four of our ships
will be at your service but at the end of one year our ships are going to have to
start moving the people that you have on Arton to Earth. We still have three
ships that are capable of speeds just under Warp that can take of the run from
Mars to Earth. Two of these ships have been decommissioned for many years
but they are still in a parking orbit around Earth and could be put back in
service.”
The alien said I can not believe our good fortune I will radio home as
soon as I return to my ship and give them all this good news.” “What do you
mean radio home, our ships will be there long before a radio signal could reach
your planet.” “Then perhaps, my friend we have something we can give you.
Many years ago we developed hyper space radio. When I talk to my home
planet they hear what I am saying as though I was only next door.” “I always
hoped that something like that would come along, for us our radio signals are
limited to travel at the speed of light.” “We have at least six spare radios on
board. We will rig Mars with one, leave one here for your interplanetary ship to
take back to Earth and fit each of your space craft with one. I will have one of
our other ships drop one off on Arton, on their first trip there. I am going to
recall all of our space craft to ######### as soon as I return to my ship. They
could begin the evacuation before we get there. When the first of them makes
Arton orbit they can shuttle the planet leaders to the ship and you Captain
Cummings and You Captain Horn and Gil of course, can explain what is
happening.
That evening a special communication was sent to Earth and to A1and
Arton Two telling them what was happening. A communication shot back within
24 minutes asking them to confirm on the other channel. The other channel
was the voice channel and was seldom used. Once a link was established
Captain Cummings gave a verbal description of the events followed by Gil
giving a verbal account in the Artonian language then by a “COME BACK” 26
Minutes later an Artonian voice came on the line speaking in Artonian. It
requested that another Artonian send the same description of events in the
same language. After four hours of verification Admiral Carter was finally
convInced that this was the real thing and that Mars was not being held hostage
by these aliens. The Admiral told them to go back to the text channel and send
him all the details they could think of. Within an hour Mars was transmitting
everything they had learned so far. “Gil who had been talking with the Alien all
this time had told him to go ahead and shuttle his people down for a visit and a
Tour of Mars. The Alien said that their shuttles were too small so Ben asked the
Council Chairman to dispatch one shuttle to the Alien ship to bring down
passengers. Ben then ask for fifty or so videos that the alien had referred to in
an earlier conversation. Ben also requested a grammar book if they had one
and a couple novels. By this time there were fifteen Artonians listening to every
word that was spoken and learning the new language.
In their conversation Gil finally learned the Alien's name and the name of
his planet. The planet was called Dedov, the Alien was Captain Eurokoma.
Ben passed this along to the Radio Room to be Included in the next
transmission to Earth.
The shuttle landed and a bus picked up the crew members. There thirty
seven crew members on the shuttle five more had stayed behind to maintain
the ship. Twelve of the crew members were female, the rest male. The bus
driver took them on a driving tour of Mars, all of the developed caverns and
even some that had been pressurized but had little development. The driver
ended the tour by dropping his passengers off in downtown New Phoenix. Gil
welcomed them in their language. He asked if they had brought the books and
videos that he had requested, they had and they handed them to him. All of
them were a little taken aback by this strange little hairy man that spoke their
language, but not very well. They just couldn't believe that he had learned it in
a few hours. One of the council members brought a clipboard with a lined tablet
on it and asked Gil to get everyones name they it would sound out in English
and write the names on the tablet along with their rank or job or some other
identifying characteristic. Gil started gathering the requested information.
When he was done the councilman took the clipboard and ran off with it. The
crew members found seats at the tables in the town square. Each of them had
an empty bag that he used to put his space suit in. Gil then started describing
to them what all had taken place. By the time he finished the councilman had
returned with name tags for each of them. Gil explained that they should affix
these to their jumpsuits above their vest pockets. They willingly complied.
In appearance they were quite similar to Captain Eurokoma, similar
enough to tell that they were all of the same race. All of them possessed slight
variations in appearance just as Artonians and Earth people did. Gil asked, at
the suggestion of the Council Chairman, if any of them were hungry or wanted a
beverage. That set off a round of conversations that Gil could not follow. Then
a lieutenant Soravov asked “What do you people eat and drink?” Gil explained
human food to them then he explained Artonian food to them. He told them that
we all drink fruit juice from many kinds of fruit combined in many different ways.
It is a the most popular drink on Mars, but everyone has their own favorite
concoctions. I will just have a variety set out and you can taste several. I will
also have them set out a buffet of human food and Artonian food for you to
sample.” Within minutes there were a dozen pitchers of Juice set out and one of
plain water. There was a stack or reusable plastic cups. Within an hour there
was a makeshift buffet set out on several of the empty tables shoved together.
There were trays, silverware and napkins as well. One of the councilmen was
getting all this on video. The juice was sampled with about the same reaction
you would expect from a group of humans trying a new product for the first time.
Some of the Dedovians had two glasses of the same juice, several went for
water and had several glasses of that. More water was summoned. Some tried
a little of several juices then settled for a full glass of the one they liked best.
When they took a tray they knew what it was for. They knew what the
napkins were but examined the silverware closely before attempting to use it.
They exhibited little skill in handling the silverware. One of them fished around
in his pocket and came up with a pair of tongs. He used the knife he had been
furnished and proceeded to eat contentedly. The others just did the best they
could with a fork and a spoon. The food item that was most popular with them
were the cooked vegetables, none of them took any meat but the boiled
potatoes went well. None of them took any of the raw vegetables from the
Arton food selection but they all took raw fruit and fruit salad. Gil had a brief
conversation with lieutenant Soravov then explained to the servers “These
people from Dedov are vegetarians though they are familiar with cheese, they
would like to try our cheese and they wondered if we had any nuts. They
customarily eat with a small pair of tongs and a sharp knife. They also like
bread. They drink milk from dairy animals. They also drink wine and they like a
product that sounds a lot like beer. Could you kitchen folks see if you could find
some of the foods they like but that you do not have out.
Soon trays of cheese and crackers and bread and pitchers of wine
appeared. Several pitchers of milk were brought out and a large bowl of nuts.
“That is wonderful” said lieutenant Soravov, “You have all the foods we like.”
The fifteen other Artonians that had been learning the language
appeared and helped themselves to a tray of raw fruits and vegetables and
glasses of juice. They seated themselves with the crew wherever there was an
empty seat and struck up small conversations. Lieutenant Soravov asked Gil
“How is it that you people speak our language?” “Gil started to reply but then
realized that Lieutenant Soravov had asked the question in English! Gil replied
in English “We learned your language since you have been here, apparently
you have learned English since you have been here also.” “Not so much, we
are not as quick as your people are.”
Admiral Carter had said in his latest communication that he was willing to
take the gamble. I just finished watching the video of the crew having lunch
and we all came to the conclusion that these are sincere people of good
intentions. We are convInced that their planet is in a disintegrating orbit and we
are going to help save as many of them as we can. I will see you on Arton in
about six months Captain Cummings. Make sure that you have that radio for us
when we get there. Beyond that continue sending all the information that you
are able to gather on these people. I would be especially interested in hearing
what our Artonians discover from their videos and books. We will outfit our
ships for maximum passenger accommodations and plan to depart Earth for
Arton within one week unless we hear from you otherwise.
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