Then, as suddenly as it had happened, the alternate reality retreated.
“Erin, are you all right?” Erik asked in concern as soon as his mind cleared. “What just happened? Oh, you dropped your tray.” He smiled and knelt down to help her pick up the fallen containers and silverware. “Something must have gone wrong with the navigational systems. I feel like someone just used my head to crack walnuts,” he laughed.
“Do you remember anything strange happening in here a minute ago?” Erin asked tentatively, looking around, but their surroundings had returned to normal.
“Something special, you mean?” Erik regarded her in confusion. “We just bumped into each other. I guess I’m not always light on my feet. Hard to imagine, isn’t it?” he said, offering a charming smile, hoping to calm her down. She seemed genuinely disturbed by something, but he couldn’t understand why.
“Oh, you.” Erin waved her hand in mock exasperation. “Can’t you be serious even for a minute?”
“I used my minute up a while ago,” Erik said.
She laughed, momentarily succumbing to the power charm and handsome features hold over female hearts.
A moment later three tones sounded, preceding an announcement from Colonel Kansier. The entire mess hall stilled to listen.
“Attention, crew,” Kansier’s voice boomed from above, “do not be alarmed if strange things occurred within the last few seconds. Our navigational computer shows that in the last few seconds, our spatial coordinates have changed. Zhdanov agrees with me that somehow we have been able to... pardon the term—jump across space. Those of you who were on the observation decks may have observed the phenomenon. Our visuals show what we believe was a wormhole gate in space that the ship just passed through.
“If you feel a bit disoriented, that is probably due to the acceleration we experienced just prior to the space jump. Our instrument readings have completely changed, and we are at present trying to calculate how far we have traveled and where our new position is. Therefore all secondary bridge crew members are requested to report back on the bridge. Primary bridge crew report back one hour before scheduled duty.” Three tones replaced Kansier’s voice, signaling the end of the message.
Lively conversations began at the other end of the room.
“Well, it looks as if I’m the one who has to rush off,” Erik said quickly, “but actually I do have something I’d like to talk over with you later.”
Erin watched him leave; he ran to the adjoining corridor and extended a hand to the doorway to sling himself around more quickly.
No longer in a hurry, Erin fingered her unopened bread packet, and tore the seal open. But when she took a bite, it seemed like the texture of the bread had changed and become soggy. But it did not taste soggy at all, which would have happened if the seal had been broken in rehydration.
She dismissed it as a badly preserved ration pack item and got up again to take her tray to the sanitizer.
* * * * *
Back on the bridge, Kansier was asking for an estimation of the distance they had traveled.
“We’re plotting the radio waves and luminosities we’ve received, sir. Once we’ve correlated the new readings with our old measurements, we’ll be able to estimate how far we’ve traveled.” Lieutenant Svetlik, a tall, lanky redhead, responded from the communications console.
“Can you create a visual representation of the space we’re heading into?” Kansier demanded.
“I believe so, sir. We’ll transfer our signals into colors in the visual range, but that may eliminate some of the anomalies ahead which are outside our visual range.” Lieutenant Taylor responded.
“Well, just as long as we can get some idea of what the area looks like magnified closer than it appears outside the forward viewport,” Kansier said, gesturing towards the constant view of distorted lights of stars as the ship moved through space.
“Sir, I’m bringing up the present corrected visual transmissions,” lieutenant Taylor added.
“We were heading in the direction of the Coma Bernicies constellation before the ship jumped,” Knightwood reminded him.
A collection of thousands of stars and galaxies corrected to appear stationary appeared in the viewscreen.
Kansier remembered the moments prior to the jump through space. He had noticed the dark pinpoint in the sky only after it enlarged, forming a dark, flat, rectangular face in the backdrop of stars. Gaps had begun to appear in the stars as they spread into bands of light, multiplied as if by coming into contact with some dark prism. The lights had continued to multiply and spread out across visible space, patterns of individual star groups repeating again and again, until they filled in the dark patches across the sky.
Gravitational lensing was Cheung’s name for the strange effects they had witnessed. The fractured light had become blueshifted and grew in its intensity until they hit the bright collage of colors... and suddenly Kansier was blinking at an image of normal space in the visual holomonitor.
The Discovery had passed through the mouth of the wormhole and appeared again in a foreign region of the universe. If they all had any doubts before, now they knew that there would be no returning to the Earth.
“I have an estimated distance, sir.” Taylor updated, interrupting Kansier’s recollections. “We’ve traveled approximately 52 thousand light years. We are now outside the Milky Way Galaxy.”
“Good Lord,” Kansier breathed. “What is our present cruising speed?” He finally managed, though his voice was low.
“About .076 light speed.”
“Course correction, sir. 2.54 degrees, 6.12 degrees, by .79 degrees.” One of the navigators informed him.
“Kansier,” Cheung said suddenly, looking up from one of the visual panels he had been using to replay and analyze the footage taken before the jump through the wormhole. His expression was calm, but Kansier knew that he would not have spoken so quickly unless he had made a groundshaking discovery.
“Yes,” Kansier focused his attention on the Chinese scientist, and Knightwood and Zhdanov also turned from the holo-monitor to listen to what he had to say.
“That image I saw, the small object near the mouth of the wormhole—the one that appeared to give off some kind of exotic pulse near the mouth—it was some kind of gravitational wave receiver.” Cheung said, keeping his voice calm.
“You mean a monitor—” Knightwood began excitedly.
“—an object capable of canceling out the gravitation forces that close off the mouths of wormholes.” Cheung interrupted. “It canceled out disturbances in the field before our acceleration waves could destroy the wormhole channel. Only that isn’t the most important thing.” Cheung added.
“The throat of the wormhole was threaded with exotic matter that creates a field of negative pressure capable of sustaining and stabilizing the wormhole.” He went on. “The field exerts negative pressure, anti-gravitational waves, if you will, keeping the wormhole open. But the gravitational wave receiver ensures that no approaching object can disturb that balance.”
“Incredible,” Kansier breathed.
“Yes,” Cheung agreed. “As you saw, the wormhole’s monitoring device began to engage to cancel out our sudden acceleration, but then—and I don’t know how—Discovery suddenly released its own negative pressure field. It was the field surrounding the ship, not just our relativistic acceleration, that contributed to the strange effects we experienced on board just as the ship entered the wormhole.” Cheung smiled in conclusion, pleased by Knightwood’s surprised expression.
“Hmmm,” Kansier nodded, digesting the information. “We can only guess as to which civilization is responsible for this creation, of course,” he shook his head gravely, “but I hope for our sakes it was not the beings who created Discovery—the Charon aliens.”
“What do you mean?” Zhdanov’s eyebrows pulled together in confusion. Because—if they aren’t capable of wormhole sub-space travel, we may have just surrendered the Earth to destruction,” Ka
nsier said. “We can only hope that they can use wormhole travel as well, that they will follow us somehow, and do not return to our galaxy again. Otherwise, the Earth we love may be left defenseless now.”
* * * * *
At last Ornenkai, computerized entitity on board the spaceship Selesta, realized his mistake. Ornenkai, once Vice-Emperor of the entire intergalactic empire of Seynorynael had made a devasting miscalculation. All those years ago, on his own home world, he must have made an error in his translation of the ancient Enorian texts prophesying that a singularity would come from Kiel3, or the Earth to destroy the empire—but how could that be, that he had miscalculated? No, Ornenkai protested, there could be no mistaking the importance of Kiel3 in Seynorynael’s destiny, in the destiny of the entire universe. If the singularity would not come from Kiel3, he thought, then perhaps the creatures of Earth would find it. It was a long shot, Ornenkai knew, but he held on to his hope.
Nevertheless, he knew it was time to return to the Celestian worlds of Rigell where the rest of Ornenkai’s people lived, and where Alessia was waiting for him to fulfill her promise to him and return her daughter to her.
Unfortunately, Ornenkai foresaw difficulties in returning to the Celestian worlds. He could not risk a spontaneous space jump without using the wormhole gates, for fear of damaging and possibly destroying the frail Earthlings or Selerael herself, yet to Rigell’s Celestian planets Ornenkai knew now he must return. He had promised Alessia he would return her daughter to her. Who knew then what they might do together to destroy the evil empire of Seynorynael, and if Alessia could help him to fulfill his mission to destroy the intergalactic emperor Marankeil, once his best friend.
There was only one choice left: to retrace the wormhole path created by Hinev’s explorers. Yet the path that would return him to the Rigell system would also take the spaceship Selesta to the ancient territories of the Seynorynaelian Empire; as safe as he was from retribution for the part he had played in subjugating the galaxies, Ornenkai’s mind gave him no peace. Could he bear confronting his own guilt? As Vice-Emperor he had subjugated half of the universe and had used brutal means to keep it under control. He consoled himself now with the thought that the people who had suffered under Marankeil’s council, of which he had been a part, had been dead for more than fifteen thousand years. Yet Ornenkai had no choice but to face his own demons. He had been a butcher of millions.
Ornenkai had begun to regret how he had stolen the Earthlings from their home, by using the power he held over the ship Selesta’s guidance systems. Even that power could be taken from him, he knew, if Seleral, known as Erin to the Earthlings, ever learned to take control of the ship. He would be left in utter isolation, without any influence in the material world; communicating to the Earthlings over the communications network in his own language would have been equally futile.
In truth, Ornenkai was bitter about his situation, and his own helplessness was in part why he had been so cruel to the Earthlings and taken control of the ship to take it back to Rigell right away. The first day, however, Selerael had thwarted him and wrestled control away from him, and he had been obliged to wait to carry out his plan, obliged to wait, while fearing that Sargon would come to claim the ship. Ornenkai had a few regrets that he had taken the creatures from their world, yet it could not be helped. Ornenkai only cared in small part for the Earthlings as he saw them as a means to an end, as possibly they would find the Enorian singularity, the most precious of all anti-matter in the universe, for him. Also, they had befriended Selerael and must now be protected by him, if it meant him no great loss. Ornenkai was frustrated for another reason. Though he had depended upon Selerael as his familiar in the physical world, and had once controlled her with simple telepathic urges, he found he simply could no longer reach Selerael’s mind on his own and without her telepathic help. Instead, she remained stubbornly detached from him, ignoring all of his feeble attempts to speak to her in his limited command of English. She thwarted him in his every attempt to reach her mind now that she had grown older and more powerful, and she had fully succumbed to the attractive illusion of life as an Earthling. Ornenkai didn’t understand enough of the present human languages to verbally communicate with her or any of the Earth humans, so he didn’t talk to them. How he wished then that he might have had Hinev’s greatest gifts, that he might invade their minds and learn English, that he might then understand the creatures of Kiel3, that they might be understood by him!
Ornenkai felt no sorrow for the Earthlings in that they had been taken from their home by him, yet he wasn’t immune to the suffering he had caused. Though their words and thoughts were closed to him, he watched them unseen, holding images of their Earth families. In the private moments of their lives he was with them; he watched as they shed hidden tears to keep the others from being affected, unaware that they were not alone.
No, none of them were alone. For though there had been no sign of Enlil, Ornenkai knew that Sargon would follow Selesta, even to the mouth of hell.
* * * * *
“So what you’re saying is that, in your opinion, we won’t change much even though we’ve left our home for good?” Nikolai asked, tapping his empty glass against the console in the middle of the mess hall, the counter in front of the main drink facilitator unit.
Nikolai and Kusao had run into each other in the mess hall late that evening and sat down for a drink; somehow they had ended up in a good-humored argument about how isolation was going to affect the crew now that they had left the Earth behind forever.
Kusao nodded. “If you think about it, everything about where you come from is impressed on your mind from the moment you’re born. In a way, it’s who you are. So, we have left the Earth, but we’ll stay pretty much the same in spirit.”
“Not sure about that,” Nikolai said.
“Well look at it this way,” Kusao agreed. “I don’t think any of us will ever really leave our heritage behind, but as time goes on, every future generation will begin to forget more and more about who we are. There’s no telling what we’ll evolve into in generations to come, if we survive, that is.”
“So,” Nikolai said ponderously, “Even though our children will learn their heritage from us, just as we learned it from our parents, they will evolve gradually and we’ll stay as we were.” “Yep, in my opinion. But hell, I don’t want to get used to living here, even if we have to—I know at least I’ll never forget how much I loved my home.” He said, struck by an unusual pang of desperation.
“I miss being home, too,” Nikolai said. “Still, it’s our character that makes us who we are, and if we don’t go insane living on board this ship, we should be able to build a home here that is comfortable to future generations,” Nikolai shrugged.
“Can you honestly say we can trust a ship that has a mind of its own? We might all be obliterated at any time from something living on board, much less from starvation or something else.”
“Yea, I don’t trust the silence at all.” Nikolai said. “I am always looking over my shoulder.”
“Well, at last we agree on something,” Kusao said, and got up to get another drink for himself and Nikolai.
“Here’s to pointless arguments,” Nikolai suggested, jovial once more, as Kusao sat down.
“To pointless arguments,” Kusao said, raising his glass.
They clinked cups and drank.
“It’s too bad this isn’t something stronger.” Kusao said a moment later in lamentation, peering down into his near-empty glass of lemon shandy.
“How I miss vodka,” Nikolai added, commiserating. “Zhdanov and the Ural Base technicians have some, but they’re keeping it to themselves.”
“You don’t have any?” Kusao asked, mildly surprised.
Nikolai shrugged. “I drank all of mine the day we left Earth.”
Kusao laughed.
“Well, I’ve got to be going.” Nikolai said a moment later, putting his glass into the sterilization unit. “I’ve got an early morni
ng shift tomorrow,” he said, rising from the chair. “Hmmh, morning,” he laughed. Can’t really say there’s a ‘morning’ anymore, since we live in space now. Anyway, it was good talking to you, Kusao.”
“I’ll see you around,” Kusao said as Nikolai headed for the door. He sat a few moments longer, then drained his glass in one gulp and put it in the sterilization unit. As he turned around, he saw Nathalie Quinn at a table nearby and dismissed any intentions of heading back to his quarters.
“What are you doing here?” Nathalie asked, barely looking up as he sat beside her.
“Pretty young women shouldn’t have to sit alone,” Kusao offered.
“Maybe I want to be alone,” Nathalie said in irritation, swirling her glass and watching the motion of the liquid within.
“Now why don’t I believe you?” Kusao asked.
“Hmm. Then let’s just say I don’t want to talk about it,” Nathalie said, shaking her head.
“Do you want me to walk with you back to your room?” Kusao offered, sensing her unhappiness. There were circles around her eyes, as though she hadn’t slept in days.
“No, I want you to go away,” Nathalie insisted, waving her hand, then put the same hand to her head and leaned the elbow on the table to prop herself up. For a moment, Kusao almost obliged her. He got up and moved away a few feet but felt himself irrepressibly drawn back. Nathalie never seemed to need anybody, but maybe it was a thin illusion.
“Nathalie, if you can’t be yourself around your friends, when can you be yourself?” Kusao asked, sitting down again.
“You’re still here?” Nathalie said, looking up, then sighed, as though conceding defeat.
“So, what’s going on?” Kusao prompted. “I haven’t seen you in a long time.”
“It’s not easy to talk to you about it,” Nathalie admitted.
“Why?”