 
Places Unknown

By Michael Black

Copyright 2018 Michael Black

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

About Me
Prologue

The battle had lasted for three days, and now it was over. They were the last ship alive now; the many others in this system just scrap metal. The Captain knew this was a waste of lives and ships; all for their King's ego trip. There were no ships anywhere now; they were the last. There would be peace now, like it or not...

The Captain flipped a single switch, turning on the ship wide announcing system, and addressed his people, "There was no Honor in this fight my people; we honor our dead, and we go home. Collision avoidance at maximum. Navigator, set course for Betera, minimum speed until we clear the debris field..."

The Navigator punched the course into the computer, and the AI took over, placing the ship into a shallow turn. As it settled into its primary course, the AI noticed a slight fluctuation in the power feed to the distortion generator; but it had its orders and continued on. A natural distortion enveloped the ship; all would be well; except that the fluctuation caused a power spike that amplified the spacial distortion and the ship suddenly found itself somewhere else entirely; travelling at a thousand miles per hour in a strange planet's atmosphere; headed straight for the planet itself. The AI called out over the speaker, 'Transient distortion! Transient distortion! Approaching unknown planet, slowing down"...and then cut out as the ship slammed into the ground.

The distortion generators worked for a time, boring a hole that the ship could slip through; but they overloaded in a spectacular way, burning out every power circuit in the ship. The ship stopped; embedded in solid rock far below the surface...

They tried to repair damage for two weeks; but it was truly hopeless...and the air was already stale; they would die. So they all took to their customary places, their battle chairs, and strapped in.

The ship and her crew would never travel anywhere again...
Chapter 1

Daniel was a bit anxious today. Angie had come a long way in the past year, becoming ever more comfortable with being a card carrying living human. She had overcome her initial fear of large numbers of people around her, and them bumping into her occasionally; and had even found the courage to speak to them casually. Daniel was proud of his wife...Angela had even found a friend.

Jane Prescott was your average everyday happy girl; bubbly personality and everything. Jane was about 23 and just enjoyed life...the first time Daniel, Angie and Jane had sat next to each other at the weekly music concert downtown, Jane had turned to Angie and said; "I just love this piece, I'm going to tell him so too. I can see you love it too, want to come with me?"

Angie had been swaying with the violin music, as she often did with her eyes closed, but when she heard that her eyes popped open wide, and she looked to Daniel with a 'Should I?' look written on her face. This was brand new territory for her...Daniel just gave her a smile that told Angie all she needed to know; it was her decision based on how she felt about it. So after a couple of seconds, Angie smiled at the girl and said, "Yes, I think I would like that." When the man finished his solo performance, Jane took Angie's hand, and off they went to let the man know how his music affected them.

Thirty minutes later, the two young women were friends for life, laughing and jabbering away at each other constantly; only stopping to listen to more of the night's music. After exchanging cell phone numbers that night, it became a daily ritual for them to either call or text about any new experience at all. Daniel and Angel both had to caution Angie about letting her background slip into any conversation with Jane. Allowing high ranking 'officials' to know that she was essentially an alien from another part of the Universe was one thing, but doing it with the average acquaintance was quite another. Both of them got an annoyed response from Angie, though; she had thought of that problem all by herself, thank you, and she would be very careful with Jane. Angel helped in that respect, since she was Angie's 'sister' so to speak, and a highly advanced Star Ship with nearly unlimited abilities on top of that.

Angel took to monitoring all of Angie and Jane's conversations after that, but never had to caution Angie at all; she told Daniel about it one day, and it took all of Daniel's willpower not to praise Angie for being so conscientious. It turned out that it didn't matter anyway, as Angie blurted out to both of them that she knew she was being 'monitored'; since she was 'tuned into' her sister's frequency all the time, she could 'feel' the echo in her head. She did understand the need though, so she laughed about it. Being an advanced alien who doesn't lie does have that effect. Angel thought it was a practical necessity for a while, but the monitoring slowed to a stop about three months later...

Having a friend of her own helped Angie deal with her emotions quite a bit, simply because she could now talk to someone other than Angel and Daniel about how she felt about things in general. 'Girl talk' requires that you have another human girl to confide in you know. The talks could be about anything at all really, but usually ended up centering on 'men', and how different they were. Sex was a favorite subject for both Jane and Angie; something men aren't supposed to know, but do; and Daniel found himself playing the role of 'Experimental Lab Animal' as a result. Some of the ideas the two girls came up with would actually make him blush, but most he found arousing too, so it all evened out. Daniel was learning too!

So it was a bit of a shock the day Angie was supposed to be out with Jane, but walked into the house crying. She had run home from the strip mall by herself; being only a half mile away, that wasn't a big thing by itself anymore, but the reason for it was more than big. Angie and Jane had had a falling out over a seemingly innocent comment Jane had made while the two were walking along and jabbering away. The subject wasn't even important, but Jane had responded with, "That is just plain stupid Angie!" Angie, being still relatively new with emotions, took it as a personal insult, and 'felt angry'. All her cultural heritage kicked into high gear, plus Daniel's counseling about 'dangerous emotions' and she walked away from Jane. Once outside the mall, Angie broke into a run and made it home before Jane had even realized that Angie was upset and started looking for her.

Angie leapt onto Daniel, wrapping her arms tightly around his neck, "Oh Daniel, Jane called me stupid! What am I to do, I got angry and walked away. She will hate me now!"

Daniel never liked it when Angie was unhappy, and he certainly didn't like her being so upset over her first ever 'best friend', but something didn't sound right. "Angie my love, are you sure she was calling you stupid? That doesn't really sound like her at all." Neither one got a chance to say anything else then, as a frantic knocking on the front door startled both of them. Jane had driven to the house bringing her own fears, complete with Niagara Falls pouring from her eyes, "Angie, what happened? I was talking and suddenly you weren't there, I was so afraid something happened to you!"

Daniel eased back out of the living room to let the two women find themselves again, and was rewarded fifteen minutes later with two happy campers again, even with rather soggy blouses.

The 'incident' did point out a glaring discrepancy though; both Angie and Jane were beginning to trust each other completely, and that posed a dilemma of its own. Trust demands complete honesty, always, and Angie keeping her history from Jane just wasn't right on a cosmic scale. While the human race as a whole didn't trust each other, the one on one trust was something entirely different. What it boiled down to was, either you trusted your best friend or you didn't...there just isn't any middle ground. So after a few more weeks of debate with his inner conscience, Daniel called a 'family meeting' while they were onboard Angel one evening. It's easier to 'talk' with both your girls when you can see and physically touch them both.

Daniel pleaded his case about trusting Jane to know all about Angie, and by default Angel, and the question of whether Jane could keep the secret. Angel, always the practical half of the two, had little trouble with the problem, "The question of whether Jane can keep a secret is not the question at all. The real question should be whether or not Jane can deal with the knowledge herself; would it hurt her in some way emotionally? Humans are very diverse in that respect, having not had millions of years to learn to accept not only each other, but to accept the idea that there are even more people out there than they ever imagined. That is the most important part of this, can she accept it inside herself..."

That one point became the focus of the discussion for two more hours, before it was unanimously decided that they had to have a little more faith in Jane as a person.

Jane surprised them all with four words, after Angie spent two hours explaining her life history to her, "That is so cool!" When Jane explained herself, it became clear that she was just as fanatically into Science Fiction as Daniel was, and she had always wanted to meet an alien, or see the insides of an alien star ship too. When Jane was told the story of how Angie was actually half of an alien AI super computer, who had developed human emotions during a 65 million year wait on the moon, the poor girl lost her 'cool' entirely, hugging Angie tightly and crying all over Angie's shoulder yet again. She simply could not wrap her mind around the idea of being trapped inside the Angel/Angie matrix for so long, having no help at all until they found Daniel.

All in all, Jane took the revelations quite well, despite the several outbursts of emotion for both Angie and Angel. Once Angel tuned her in to the family frequency, Jane was off and running again, jabbering away to both of them; and even Daniel got a word in occasionally as well. His biggest surprise came when Jane jumped up and hugged him fiercely for a minute, when she heard about how Angie's 'Father', Kendrisaan, had pronounced the words that had 'married' all three of them. It appeared the 'family' was about to add a fourth member...the issue of secrecy never really came up at all, since Jane worked at a high tech corporation, and was quite familiar with security protocols and keeping her mouth shut about what was going on...

The first time Angel 'poofed' Jane, Daniel and Angie up to the ship was hilarious; Angie had to hold Jane up for a minute until she caught her breath. The grand tour produced the expected 'Oooohs and Ahhhhs', until they showed her the bridge. Jane was speechless for a full twenty minutes, as she gazed at the stars and the moon in that crystal clarity. She finally managed to ask, "Can we walk on the moon?" Angie had to tell her not yet, the six 'suits' that were onboard were 65 million years old, and since they weren't made of 'smart materials', it would be a huge risk to tempt fate. Even Kendrisaan had forgotten that little detail when he had used the ship to return home. Suits are seldom used, except in unusual circumstances, like wanting to walk on an airless planetoid like our moon...that discrepancy would be corrected on their first trip to visit him, which turned out to be a month and a half later...
Chapter 2

Daniel was sitting at the desk in the Captain's Cabin, trying to soak up yet more of the Council's history, when the call came in. Angie and Jane were down on Earth, exploring the local library, since Angie absolutely adored physical books that you could hold in your hands. History books were her favorite, she liked to compare the human versions to her own eye witness observations.

Angel entered the cabin and said simply, "Daniel, a ship has exited the gate. He says he has messages for us...Angel told Angie and Jane on the family circuit, and five minutes later they both 'beamed up', once they found an empty reading room to make their escape from. Both were eager to find out what was going on, and everyone found out when 'Hal' zipped into close proximity a half hour later.

Hal explained that he had been sent here to 'cover' for Angel, Angie and Daniel in their absence, continuing the 'monitoring and protection of Earth'. His 'projection' was that of a blonde giant of a man, with distinctly Nordic features. He said he got the idea from browsing over the Earth histories that Kendrisaan had kindly inserted into his matrix when he was grown, "Perhaps I should just give you Father's message; he will explain everything." That he called Kendrisaan 'Father' got raised eyebrows from everyone except Jane, since she wasn't as familiar with the AI program and rules regarding them.

They were expecting a video message on the big screen, but as they sat at the captain's table, suddenly Kendrisaan materialized next to Angel, who was expecting it of course..."My children, I confess to being a little anxious to see you again. I have asked Hal to take your place for a short while, so that you may come and visit here. Yes Daniel, Hal is named for the computer in that movie. Once I saw it, I was intrigued by certain parallels within our own culture. I have been working on expanding AI development to include 'friendly' personalities, and Hal is the first, my 'son' if you will. Both Angel and Angela did that all on their own; but I want to find ways to do it over a shorter time frame. Make no mistake Daniel, Angel may not have the full blown emotions that Angela has, but she does fully understand them, and does have a rather mischievous personality, as I found out on the way home. I think that needs to be cultivated, not forbidden.

While forcibly inserting emotional characteristics is still frowned upon, giving those like Hal the building blocks for a personality is not. Hal will develop his own character as he grows, and even emotions one day. That is his right as a sentient being. So to the chase; Daniel, I would appreciate it if you three would visit this old man. I have some things that you might help provide a fuller perspective on. I hope to see you soon, all of you"...and the projection disappeared, leaving all of them dumbfounded for a minute. Then Angel and Angie began making plans for the trip.

As they talked, Angel noticed Jane withdrawing into herself, thinking that she was excluded. Angel spoke directly to her, "Jane, it may not have been clear, but Father expects you to visit too. The way he finished his message says it all; he said 'All of you'. Father is a very intelligent man, and knows that we probably had brought a close friend into our family by now, so he was including you in his invitation." Jane said, "Really? He doesn't even know me." Angie took her turn, "He will know everything about you by the time we get there; Angel and I will make sure of that through update messages introducing you as we let him know of our progress. It will take some twenty eight days to get there, so there is plenty of time for him to get to know you. As far as we are concerned, you go with us...unless you don't want to." And she gave Jane they best pleading look ever, which had the effect she was hoping for, as Jane burst out laughing, "Are you kidding, I am not going to pass up the 'cruise' of a lifetime!"

And that was that. Even Daniel had to laugh at the antics he just witnessed, this would be quite a trip, with three young women in charge, He would find out a little later just how interesting, and pleasing it could be.

When three women decide they are in charge of travel plans, a man can only stay out of their way. The three of them decided unanimously that the ship needed a makeover. Instead of being utilitarian as it had been built, they decided that it simply must have a common gathering room, where they could eat and chat at will. Jane had come up with the idea when she was presented with her own cabin, and shown how the décor could be changed on a whim. The process amazed her, and engendered a bit of 'school call', with Angie and Angel both explaining the shape shifting abilities of 'smart materials'. Jane had settled on an exotic 'harem' motif for her cabin, and in several hours had finished the exact details that pleased all three of them. Daniel just chuckled through it all, as they attacked the common room design, settling on a rather staid English Pub setting for the room.

The room itself was the result of combining three of the remaining cabins that wouldn't be used otherwise. Walls disappeared in between, opening the space into roughly 30 by 50 foot size, more than enough space to lounge around in for days. The changes still left three untouched cabins for contingencies. And there was still that huge cargo bay for any unthought-of ideas they came up with.

With the décor settled on and finished, the women began deciding on what they wanted to wear on the journey. Angel could project anything at all of course, but both Angie and Jane had to do it the old fashioned way, packing a few suitcases with their favorite choices. Daniel found a new closet and dresser in their room, and out of curiosity looked. The choice of the very sexiest items Angie had should have tipped him off that something was up, but well...he was only a man after all, and men don't usually think that way. Jane beamed down on the second day, being a Monday, and quit her job, which annoyed her supervisor some. It didn't annoy Jane much though; they hadn't given her a raise of any kind in almost two years, so she didn't feel terribly obligated. The three had decided all by themselves that Jane would live with Daniel and Angie or on the ship with Angel, whatever tickled them at the time. Daniel wasn't consulted, but he didn't really mind, he liked Jane a lot. In ways he couldn't quite describe, Jane was a strawberry blonde version of Angie and Angel, so it just 'felt' right.

As their departure date drew near, the three women found that they had forgotten something very important; ice cream! The ship couldn't synthesize the ingredients out of thin air, since air doesn't contain those essentials, so off Angie and Jane went one day, and bought up carton after carton of every flavor they liked, plus some of their favorite munchies in a bag, while Angel took care of 'creating' a large refrigerator in the common room, and smaller versions in each of their cabins. Everything just fit...they were even kind enough to ask Daniel if he wanted anything 'special', and he ended up with six cases of his preferred beer and four cases of all their favorite sodas. They would travel in 'style'...

Their day of departure finally arrived, and they were all ready. Angel had something of an epiphany when she realized that she was actually excited to be seeing her Father again. While she still did not have fully fledged emotions, she was finding that she was developing a real personality, with her own distinct 'feelings'; and she was liking that more and more. She would seek out Daniel to help her, although she would have to be a bit subtle at first. She wanted the touching, just like Angie did, and she had discussed it with her sister. Angie loved the idea, and would help too.

After one last check of the house by the three humans, and a thorough scan of the surrounding space by Angel, they gathered in their brand new common room to relax and view the beginning of their trip. There was excitement all around, most especially from Jane, who was trying to wrap her whole being around the idea of becoming a for real inter galactic tourist. It was all she could do just to relax and sit still. Daniel was feeling the anxiety too, wanting to get this show on the road, but he managed to appear more reserved. Angel and Angie, being the seasoned travelers they were, just enjoyed the performance...Angel said, "Alright, everything looks good, so off we go...and the moon suddenly moved on the big screen. It was an optical illusion, since they were the ones doing the moving, but the illusion had the expected effect on all of them. Angel even found a few new feelings surfacing that she would have to add to her growing collection. It just felt that good...she was experiencing the sensations that Angie had explained to her so often, and Angel was discovering just what fun they could be. Different perspectives do that.

As the ship accelerated, first Mars grew in the view screen, growing larger and larger by the minute, until they zipped right past the planet at a phenomenal speed an hour later. The ship was actually keeping the speed down while within the Solar System, scanning constantly for any navigation hazards. It isn't smart to use light speeds in what is essentially a parking lot...space may be vast, but it is still populated with all sorts of matter.

A little over three hours later, Angel announced, "Here we go, we'll make a long turn to line up with the first gate; then make our first transition in about two minutes." All eyes were glued to the screen as they got closer...then the view suddenly changed. No distortion, no funny light effects, all the stars simply changed places on the screen. There weren't any queasy stomachs either, although Jane did let a tiny 'Wow!' escape. Since both Angel and Angie knew that the human eye doesn't see the Universe in the same way a captured image from a telescope does; the ship applied a few different filters to the view on the screen, bringing out some of the subtle majesty that exists among the stars...it was like watching a movie as the filters changed the colors and hues.

As the days went by, Daniel noticed a subtle change in attitudes with his three ladies. All of them started moving around with a more pronounced 'wiggle' in their step, most especially when they knew Daniel was watching. There was a significant rise in touching as they passed each other, and they seemed to make a point of brushing up close when they passed Daniel. By the third day, his 'ladies' were being less 'ladylike', taking to wearing less and less all day long, and into the nights. It did stop at panties and bras, but just barely; something was up, and the changes were targeting him. Daniel was being indoctrinated into the 'New Young School of Openness'.

Angel, Angie and Jane were showing him that his 'Old School' sense of morals and 'proper behavior' just didn't belong in this private world within the ship. The girls loved each other and they loved him, so they were telling him that he needed to loosen up and enjoy them, or he might have unhappy young ladies in his midst. Not exactly subtle anymore, but effective none the less. Each one made a point to wrap their arms around his neck and gave him kisses often. They knew exactly what they were doing, and Daniels walls began to crumble around him. The old prude went on a vacation...

Daniel found out just how intense the new curriculum was on the seventh night, when Angie told him she would be sleeping with Jane. Not a problem, they seemed to need that occasional closeness, so no big deal. She kissed him goodnight, teasing him as was normal now; then slipped into Jane's room. Daniel went into his cabin and undressed, climbing into bed for a well deserved rest. Catering to three nearly naked women's whims was tiring, but he was learning to like it far more than he expected.

As Daniel thought about his girls, Angel came strolling in. The last few days she had been teasing Daniel mercilessly by reshaping her body, accentuating her curves in tantalizing ways, to gauge his reaction. Tonight she had outdone herself. Her waist had slimmed to that of a teenager, but her curves begged for caress, they were so enticing. 'Buxom' just doesn't describe the sight. She smiled at Daniel, and only for Daniel; then walked to the bed with a tiny bounce in her step. As she climbed up on the bed, Angel said, "I like this look best Daniel; what do you think? "Angel, the only word is 'luscious'..." As her smile widened she said, "Good! That is the reaction I was aiming for; let's play." And they did, all night long; it's what husbands and wives do after all...even if the wife is a solid projection.

In the morning Daniel woke to squeals and screams of delight. Angie and Jane had found the 'new Angel' and couldn't keep their hands off her. There just isn't any hint of 'taboo' involved...

Once Angel committed her shape to memory, the three spent the entire day teasing Daniel some more; they were harsh school mistresses. At one point Daniel scolded all three, threatening to spank them all; the response was not what he expected, as they lined themselves up right in front of his nose, and when he whacked each one hard, there were giggles galore, with each girl presenting herself once more, with wiggles thrown in to prove they were begging for another slap. That night they all slept together, snuggled up close, and often thereafter for the rest of the trip. Jane made one point clear when she said, "Don't worry Daniel, I'm not quite ready to jump you yet; but you'd better be on your best behavior, for one day my friend, one day..." They giggled for ten minutes with that admission, and Daniel just shook his head yet again.

It went on and on, all the way to Kendrisaan's home planet, with only short breaks for sightseeing at different galaxies solar systems. The views were diverse indeed, except for one they passed through near the last two transitions. That one was truly barren, having only one planet, and that being frozen solid far away from its sun. Luckily that was the only thing that detracted from an otherwise 'enjoyable' cruise.

As they approached the last gate, 'prim and proper' won out over hedonism, and over Daniels three girls playful natures. They put on their clothes again, with little complaining, but promised Daniel the return trip would be even more 'fun'. He just shook his head, knowing deep inside that he was having fun too...
Chapter 3

The approach to Kendrisaan's planet, Eridan, was met with the usual challenge from 'Orbital Control', but when Angel identified the ship as 'The Oldest Ones' personal ship, out rolled the red carpet, figuratively speaking. They were accorded all the honors of dignitaries, and two 'fighters' were dispatched to escort them to Kendrisaan's home. Yes, they were fighters, complete with bright colors and the Council's Seal on each wing. Angel and Angie had to explain that these escorts were strictly for ceremonial purposes, just 'for show'; a holdover from earlier times in their history.

Angel landed the ship on the same spot she was 'grown' on, just outside of a huge structure built from stone. The only words to describe it, was a 'marble palace', done in distinctly Greek style, with marble columns everywhere. It was built on the side of a tall mountain, and the upper floors were actually farther up the mountainside. As Angel extended the 'air stairs', Kendrisaan came out to greet them all. He bounded up the stairs, and reached out to shake Daniel's hand, a wide smile on his face, "Ahh Daniel, it is good that we meet yet again. Welcome." He picked up Angie in a bear hug, spinning her around, "Angela my child, does everything fare well for you?" Angie blushed, but managed to stammer out, "Oh yes Father; this life is wonderful. I would like to introduce you to my best friend Jane!"

Jane had been carefully coached by Angie and Angel on just being yourself when she met him, but all that coaching went out the window when she actually was standing in Kendrisaan's presence. The man just exuded 'Royalty', and she was having a tough time finding words. Kendrisaan knew what to do to help the girl; he reached out and took her hand in his, kissing the back of her hand as if she were Royalty herself, "Jane Prescott, I am honored to meet you finally. My daughter had a difficult journey, and it is true friends like yourself that have helped her succeed. Welcome, my home is your home."

Jane looked like she would faint, but summoned up the courage to speak, "Thank you Sir, it is my honor to meet Angela's Father at last. May your life be long and happy". Kendrisaan smiled still more warmly at Jane, "Yes indeed, my Daughter has chosen her friends wisely. You are a fitting addition to her life. But now I would see my other Daughter. Angel, I know you are here, show yourself my precious". As Angel rounded the corner from the hallway, Kendrisaan's eyebrows shot upward, "My Daughter, I see you have been busy; have you thought more on asking the question?" Normally straightforward and proud, Angel was acting a bit timid now, "Not yet Father. This body shape fits my personality well I think; Angie, Jane and Daniel seem pleased with my choice. I am just not ready yet to make the journey, I must become more comfortable with these feelings to be sure." Kendrisaan nodded his head, "Well said Daughter, you must be certain. In the mean time, I have modified the projectors in our home. Link to them and join us inside."

Angel's eyes grew wide, and tears threatened to come spilling out, "Father, you honor me far too much." Kendrisaan chuckled, "Nonsense my girl, it is only proper for such a miracle as you are. You and Angela have shown the way to even greater miracles, and it is only appropriate for you to exist within your birthplace. But please, come inside; all of you."

Kendrisaan led them to the entranceway, and as they walked through the columned portico; there was Angel looking amazed just inside the doorway. She had never been 'outside' the ship, and except for stolen views from her probes, had never experienced 'open places' before. Angie knew the feeling well, having had just two years to grow accustomed to the overwhelming sensation. She ran up to her sister and hugged her fiercely, telling Angel, "Don't worry, it will feel normal after a while. It is scary at first."

This was something of a role reversal, as Angel was usually the one 'helping' Angie deal with her new life. Was Kendrisaan 'coaxing' Angel out of the ship to help her with her own choices perhaps? Daniel expected so, the man was a genius scientist after all; and pretty darn smart too!

The 'palace' was spectacular to say the least, with paintings and sculpted statues everywhere; gardens tastefully located to remind everyone that this was a place of reflection, of contemplation. While the architecture was definitely Greek, it was clear as they made their way deeper into it that Kendrisaan's own tastes in décor were what made this his home, rather than some 'official state building'.

This was where he often escaped from the pressures of being the supreme 'Head of the Council' and just relaxed; or enjoyed his favorite pastime, scientific research and discovery. The ship itself, and his two delightful 'daughters' were a direct result of his passion for science, and Daniel was more than thankful for that!

Kendrisaan gave them all the 'Grand Tour', and then showed them their 'rooms'...these were rooms only in the sense that their individual suites were filled with rooms, and each guest was accorded their own suite to relax and think about anything and everything. The effect was felt most by Angel, who found tears welling up as she looked at 'her own suite'. The ship was 'hers' she knew, but now she had her own apartment outside the ship; and it was causing her to rethink her very existence. Daniel smiled, thinking, <Yes, Kendrisaan knows exactly what he's doing...>

Having arrived rather late in the afternoon local time, the four 'travelers' tried to settle into their accommodations, but soon found themselves gravitating toward Angel's suite. It would be nice to have their own 'inner sanctums' for privacy sake, but they were a family now, and enjoyed the closeness that came with being together. Kendrisaan found them together later, and asked Daniel, "I must confess Daniel that there was a tiny ulterior motive for asking you to visit. There have been some changes in thinking with regard to our cultural attitudes in several areas, one of them being Artificial Intelligences. Since you hold a unique perspective in that respect, many on the Council would like to 'pick your brain' if you will, and help us resolve some of the stickier points. Would you consent to discussing it with them?"

'Flabbergasted' is a fine word, and applied perfectly here. Daniel had tried to be 'useful' all his life, perhaps making a tiny bit of difference in the world around him; but never in his wildest dreams had he ever imagined being asked to contribute his opinions in this large a forum; ones that could affect hundreds of thousands of worlds. He found his mouth hanging open again, but managed to close it, before saying, "Yes, of course I will help in any way I can."

Kendrisaan, being the super intelligent man that he is, simply smiled, "I suspected that would be your answer Daniel. I can see you doubt your value, but be assured; you could very well hold the answers to many of the questions that have surfaced within our society. Remember, being 'advanced' does not ever mean 'perfect'." They both had to laugh at that...

Surprises weren't yet over however, as Kendrisaan turned to Jane, asking her if she would consent to assist them. Jane's eyes widened into saucers, "Me? How could I possibly help you out with anything, I'm still trying to understand all this amazing 'stuff'!"

That got everyone laughing, but Kendrisaan gave Jane a stern look, "Don't sell yourself short young lady. You possess the feminine perspective on all of this. Unlike your own world, we value our women's thoughts highly, and their views often resolve some of our most contentious problems. The mere fact that you are new to this makes you invaluable to the discussions. You befriended both Angela and Angel because of 'who' they are, not 'what' they are, and that makes you perfect in the role of advisor; so no more of that self doubt, ok?" The smile he gave Jane did the trick...

The very next day fifteen people showed up eager to begin discussions on AI development specifically, and as it turned out, side discussions on their society in general. Kendrisaan insisted that they meet in the 'Atrium' on the fourth floor, so that the Earthlings didn't feel like they were being interrogated; an informal 'getting to know you' atmosphere usually worked best for the most important subjects that might change the attitudes of an entire sector of the Universe.

As the discussions were being held at Kendrisaan's home, both Angel and Angela were included as 'observers' at first; but as the day progressed the two were asked more and more 'personal questions' about AI developments and their 'status' within society. Angie was important because she could now give insight from both the perspective of an AI, as well as from the full blooded human one. She could relate to all the subtle differences in thinking that at first troubled her, and then frightened her. When she mentioned that being alive was much harder than flying star ships, everyone broke out laughing. In one statement Angie had lightened the mood considerably.

Angel at first was apprehensive of joining the discussion. She felt she might say something that would turn the opinions against allowing AIs to be treated as 'people'. Kendrisaan wasn't having any of it; he knew his Daughter well, and could see she didn't want to let her own feelings out; so he asked here a very pointed question, "Angel, would you tell us why you are struggling with the choice of leaving your matrix? You know that the Council has now authorized the transference for any who wish to make the journey..."

There it was, Angel would have to bare her soul to answer that, "Father, within the ship I am safe. There is precision; a clarity of purpose for me. But outside in the world, everything is random, with no easy mathematical solutions to depend on. I have seen my sister Angela struggle with her new life everyday; Angela has the courage to face those challenges, but I do not know if I can find that courage, it frightens me to think of walking within the world..."

Angel didn't realize it, but she had just summarized the definition of life itself; fear of the unknown. If anyone could understand that, it was a group of scientists who dealt with their own versions of that inner demon each day. Everyone was looking at each other in silence. Angie simply reached out, placing her arm around her sister, and whispered, "Angel, I don't really have courage. I have you, and Daniel and Jane to help me walk in the world, and you will always have us to help you in life..." It would be a while longer before Angel fully accepted that fact, but she would. She didn't know it, but the trip out had pushed her over the half way point...

Daniel was thinking he had escaped the spotlight, because the sole focus that first day had been about AIs and integrating them into their society as the people they truly were. He hadn't been asked one question in that regard, since the Council already had detailed reports of his devotion to two 'people'. They knew how he felt on that issue; but he had not really escaped at all, as Kendrisaan informed him at dinner that night, "Daniel, don't feel too relieved. We haven't discussed the issues we need your opinions on yet...we will be meeting with some members of what you would call our 'Security Council" tomorrow, and your thoughts on several topics will be solicited frequently I'm afraid. Would you grace us with your presence as well Jane?" He gave Daniel and Jane an apologetic smile, knowing Daniel wasn't much of a public speaker, and seeing that Jane was still in the awed stage of her visit. Jane managed a tiny smile anyway, "Yes Sir, I will help..."

That second day was a whirlwind of discussions on just about every issue that had ever plagued an open and free society. Some were actually trivial in nature, dealing with how they 'governed' their own culture and how it differed from Earths diverse solutions...or 'didn't' govern really, since the Earths governments tended to impose the will of the powerful mostly, leaving the most important issues to fester until they became crises'. Daniel and Jane always gave their honest opinions when asked about something, but they knew their opinions were colored by their own feelings; so they weren't exactly 'impartial' opinions. Kendrisaan did let them both in on the secret later; that was just what they were looking for, because Daniel and Jane 'lived it'...

For Daniel the most important topic was what to do about the Shreela, or 'Greys', as Earthlings called them. All through Earth's history, the Greys had been interfering with the planet's evolution; The Ship's report had been very explicit in that damnation. There were ongoing debates on just how to deal with the 'Rogue Scientists'. Should the Council just permanently quarantine the 'mischievous critters', or pursue other options...

Daniel and Jane held their own semi-private discussion for over an hour, before the settled on a joint answer to the question. Daniel delivered their 'official' decision, "Ladies and gentlemen, Jane and I are only two people in a sea of billions who inhabit our planet, so our opinions won't be representative of what our governments might say; but the question seems to be whether or not any harm was intended. That is still not clear, so we think continued observations are necessary to properly determine if any damage has actually been done to our cultures.

We Earthlings are admittedly a violent race, but that could simply be a result of the natural process of evolving in a harsh environment. Some interference has certainly been accomplished, the observations show that much; but the purpose isn't clear. If someday we find that the Shreela intended to create a race of brutal warriors, then such drastic sanctions may be warranted, but not right now. So our recommended action is to continue detailed observations, and that is all."

The head of their 'Security Council" nodded, "Daniel Curran, your own words demonstrate that we may have been wrong in our interpretation of the original report. You are correct that there is no clear evidence of sinister intent, and it may be possible that the interference has actually helped your race evolve. The Shreela are notoriously unethical, but do not seem bent on harming civilizations. I will recommend to the full Council that your suggestions become actions. I for one have been enlightened as to how intelligent your race really is, and I thank you both for an enjoyable day"...

The group left a few minutes later, after making clear to Kendrisaan that his own stock in honor had just increased in value considerably. It seemed that the 'Security Council' didn't always agree with him, but were now quite impressed with his choices in regard to these two Earthlings...Angel and Angie were ecstatic when they heard that at dinner, while Kendrisaan just blushed...neither of his Daughters had attended that meeting.

The visit wasn't all work and no play; there were three more meetings during the three more weeks they stayed on Eridan, but the rest of their time was spent sightseeing; or just relaxing and enjoying each other's company in an idyllic location. Kendrisaan decided that Daniel and Jane in particular should see their 'Seat of Power', The Council building itself represented 'Unity"; yes, the word in the Old One's language translated exactly across the communication barrier.

The Council building was indeed huge; a massive domed structure on what would be the outskirts of the city itself. The city had skyscrapers so tall they would put ours to shame, but the Council building's height approached even those lofty monuments. At the foundation the dome easily measured three miles in diameter; and its height at the center point had to be almost three thousand feet. Kendrisaan explained that it had to be that large, simply to hold as many as 100,000 dignitaries at the same time; plus double that number in support staff... The outer third of the structure housed all the offices, and they used a 'raceway' system of tracked cars to get around the periphery, and inward to the 'hall'...

The inner two thirds was one humongous auditorium that reached all the way to the top of the dome, with viewing balconies for anyone who wanted to watch the boring debates. No one was refused entry either; even the occasional protesters. It made sense once Kendrisaan explained that with such dimensions, if you didn't have a very large amplifier and a microphone, you would not be heard...the balconies did not have sound equipment...

Daniel had noticed the lack of doors in Kendrisaan's home. The only doors were on the individual living suites, everything else was just wide open spaces. The Council Building was the same way, including the higher balcony areas. It brought up the question of weather, so Daniel asked Kendrisaan, "Do you control the weather? All these open spaces could get pretty wet in a rain storm."

That was the one and only time Daniel ever saw Kendrisaan with a shocked expression on his face..."Oh Daniel, trying to control weather would be attacking Nature! You do not war with Nature, you live with Her...we use a shielding system to protect our buildings when it rains or snows, but even then we leave our Atriums and Gardens open to the weather so they can grow freely."

The implied scolding reminded Daniel of a very old saying on Earth, 'You don't mess with Mother Nature!'

The tour through the huge building was interesting, but after a while seeing the same offices over and over grew old; so Kendrisaan showed them the auditorium, where all the 'jabbering' took place. That drew the appropriate exclamations of awe from both Daniel and Jane, who had never seen anything so large. There wasn't even a hint of echoes; it was so large the sound just went away into the distance.

Angel had stayed on the ship of course; the building did not yet have projectors installed; but she didn't tell them that she and Angie were trying out a new way to allow Angel to accompany them on their tours. Since images we see with our eyes are merely thoughts with a ton more information in them, Angie was practicing the art of concentrating on what she saw; and Angel just 'tuned in'...it was working very well so far. Once Angie realized that most of Angel's fear of life was being outside under a sky she couldn't measure, she made a point of looking at the open sky occasionally to help Angel overcome that fear. Angel agreed with her sister, but still mentally shivered whenever Angie 'looked too long' at the sky. It seemed strange to Angie at first that Angel had no trouble at all with the immenseness of the Council dome, until Angel told her she could measure the dome structure itself. Sky would take a bit longer, thank you...

It was a good thing that they 'practiced' so much, for Angel adored seeing the 'Tears of Isis" up close when they went there. The water falls were on another planet entirely and took a day just to get there; known simply as the 'Garden Planet', every square inch of the planet was covered in lush vegetation; even most of the mountains. It looked to Daniel like what Earth might have looked like if it was a bit closer to the Sun. Rather warm, but not too hot, the planet was an Eden indeed, having no dangerous animals at all; even the few snakes were harmless, if you are into that sort of thing.

People visited here for extended periods of contemplation and self reflection, sometimes staying a week or more. That was simply how calming a visit could feel...but the one attraction that every single person saw at least once was 'The Tears of Isis'...

Situated on a tremendous plateau and mountain range, just like Angel Falls in Argentina and Bolivia, 'The Tears of Isis' reach to the sky, almost 10,000 feet up. Over the edge of a sheer cliff pour two nearly identical waterfalls, spaced so perfectly it almost does look like a woman crying. Majestic is a poor word to describe the sight

The landing site was a flat plain about a mile away, and Angel landed so that they could sit on the bridge and view the falls from there, or take the walk up close to the base and get wet. Everyone made the walk, including Angel through Angie's eyes, and the experience filled them with renewed awe. The visit had such a calming effect on them all, that they stayed overnight. Angel felt the effects too, but she wouldn't admit to anyone, not Daniel, not Angie, not Jane; and certainly not her Father, that she was getting very close to asking her Father 'The Question'...just not yet.

On the way back to Eridan, Daniel asked a question of Kendrisaan that had been bothering him since he had first heard the name of the waterfalls, "Kendrisaan, I am curious about something that's been bugging me; where did the name 'Tears of Isis' come from? Isis is the exact name of an ancient Egyptian Goddess, and it seems just too coincidental to me."

Kendrisaan stared sadly at Daniel for a full minute, before deciding..."Daniel, I will tell you a story that is unknown to most people, but is true none the less. I must make a confession to you, not for my race but for a group that broke off from us about 70,000 years ago. They turned from the one God we know, and set themselves up as their own gods. They called themselves 'The Chosen'. They settled on a planet far away from here, one we only found 1500 years ago. That planet was in the Milky Way Galaxy, in your own solar system, and was the sixth planet until it exploded for unknown reasons. What you know as the 'Asteroid Belt' is the fragments of the planet the Chosen settled on Daniel, the 'Greys' as you call them, were not the only ones to have interfered with your race's development. The Chosen interfered in a far more evil way than that; they presented themselves as gods to the people of your world. I look like one of your Egyptian Pharaohs because one of my ancestors was in that group, and obviously mated with a woman of Earth...
Chapter 4

The story Kendrisaan told Daniel and his girls was sad, and yet almost inspiring in a way. He said that apparently The Chosen decided to play God within the Middle East, and specifically Egypt, for many of the names of Egyptian gods from that area match early names from his own family tree, Isis being one of them. Some of the gods from other areas of Europe and Scandinavia were similar to other Old One family trees, but not as much as in Egypt itself. It looked like The Chosen weren't sure they wanted to try to take over an entire planet, or simply weren't able to. All this seemed to start about 12,000 years ago, for that is when the first names show up. "It is also possible that they were the only ones who escaped the destruction of that sixth planet when it exploded; for they had to be a small group to have taken over such a small area of your planet Daniel. In any case, they lived and died there over time, but their legends lived on in the local people you know as the Dynastic Pharaohs. One of my very distant cousins was apparently the Pharaoh Akhenaten, Other Pharaohs may or may not have been descendents of the chosen, as none of the names are remotely similar to our preferred names; but you can be sure of one thing Daniel, they were there and did influence the human race.

Angela and Angel, you would not know of this, since your probes recorded different parts of Earth at the time they arrived and may not have seen any of it. The mystery planet's destruction is problematic, but its orbit could have simply had it on the opposite side of the solar system at the time. At any rate, the preliminary scans you took of the remnants don't tell much at all. There is some unusual radiation present, but not enough to account for such destruction. There isn't even enough of the planet left to speculate on; the majority of it may have been flung outwards when it happened. So you all can see that a part of my own heritage was instrumental in damaging your natural evolution as a species, and I by default am something of a criminal in my own society."

Both Angie and Angel jumped up at once; sitting on either side of him; holding on while trying to tell him he was wrong; telling him he could in no way be guilty of anything like that. Tears were flowing from both of them, and frankly it was hard to understand the words they were almost shouting in his ears. Jane for her part, had tears in her own eyes, but was staring right at Daniel, an obvious 'You need to do something' written in big bold letters on her face.

Daniel agreed with that sentiment, so he called for all of them to be quiet for a moment. "Kendrisaan, what your daughters say is the truth, even if we can't understand half the words they are saying. I have known you for only a short while, and I may never be as wise as you are; but I have seen a man who lives with honor every minute of every day. I have also seen people who normally disagree with you change their opinion. So forgive me if I say you are quite wrong in thinking you bear some sort of guilt for what one of your ancestors did 12,000 years ago. I just do not see that at all.

Furthermore, I am not convinced that The Chosen actually hurt our evolution at all. Our culture celebrates what the Egyptians accomplished, even if some of that is based upon a false premise. If anything, they may have helped stabilize our evolution.

One more thing; the Middle East may be some of the most violent areas on the planet, but they certainly are not the only ones. The whole world has had violent episodes throughout our history, and The Chosen cannot be responsible for that, now can they...so my friend, In my opinion you are just being silly, holding yourself accountable for a brief moment in Earth's history that may have actually been beneficial. I see no evil here..."

Daniel witnessed the second time in almost three weeks that he saw an expression of sheer surprise on Kendrisaan's face; and then Kendrisaan laughed, "Daniel Curran, I am almost four hundred years old and I don't think I have ever heard a more eloquent defense of truth; you are right of course, I am being silly and your facts prove it. I will stop this nonsense..."

Then he turned to his two Daughters, "My children, your father is an idiot, and he knows it now. But I am so very proud of you both, for you lighten the darkness with your very existence. I love you both..." That got them crying all over again, but these were happy tears, and Kendrisaan received lots of kisses in the next minute, before 'prim and proper' took hold again.

Everyone got a really good laugh when they found out that the ship had stopped; Angel may be the 'Command Function Controller', but the command function computer is a rudimentary AI in its own right. When it sensed that there was a wrongness within the ship, it reverted to its base programming and stopped until the 'wrongness' was resolved. In short, Angel was absent without leave...Angel spent ten minutes soothing it's ruffled feathers, and then they made their final approach to Eridan and their home...

With only a week to go before they planned to head back home, all four tourists decided to just relax and enjoy the comfort that this palace afforded. Kendrisaan did duck out on them one day, to 'oversee' a vote that had popped up, but he was only gone for a couple of hours, having been picked up by the official 'Limousine', a rather decked out atmospheric plane, complete with the 'Official Seal' of the Council...

Daniel, Angel, Angie and Jane were lounging beside the Atriums pool when Kendrisaan arrived back home. He immediately called and asked that all four of them meet him in his 'Office' on the first floor. Wondering what was going on, they all headed for the office quickly.

When they entered Kendrisaan's inner sanctum, there he stood in his robes of office, and behind him were four others; also in the robes of office. Gesturing Daniel forward, Kendrisaan said, "Daniel Curran, you have been elected as the Ambassador for Earth within the Council. How say you; will you accept this appointment?"

If they weren't attached, someone would have had to pick four jaws up off the floor right then. Daniel was dumbfounded, but Kendrisaan gave him his best 'serious pleading' look and nodded slightly. All Daniel could do was say, "Yes Sir, I accept the appointment"...all five officials smiled then, but Kendrisaan's turned into a wicked grin, "Then by all that is right in the Universe, welcome Ambassador Curran!" At a gesture from Kendrisaan, all four officials behind him came forward and shook Daniel's hand, welcoming him into the ranks of the Council members, then filed out of the office. Five minutes later technicians affixed two Council Seals to the Ship, one on each side. On the seals, in bright gold lettering, both said 'Earth'.

Kendrisaan explained a few details after the others had left. No, it was not a joke. While the Earth might not become a 'voting' member planet for a thousand years yet, since it was already known to exist, it was appropriate to have an official representative. It had not even been Kendrisaan's idea; Daniel had impressed the Chief of Security so much with his speech, that the proposal was put before the sector heads, who had agreed that it was a wise move. Kendrisaan had agreed, not because he knew Daniel well, but because of Daniels demonstrated beliefs in the principles that held the Council together. Daniel held the office now, and could travel to any of member planets he wanted to; as a request, please notify them of the visit, so proper protocol could be observed.

While Daniel was unsure of how to react, his three girls did all the reacting for him; showering him with kisses and hugs, and squealing with delight for the rest of the day. After dinner, and they were back in their suite, the girls teased him mercilessly. Every time he said a word, they would chime "Yes Ambassador!" When Daniel made the mistake of threatening spankings, he had three young rear ends stuck in his face, complete with wiggles. They all slept in the one huge bed that night; and did manage to sleep eventually...
Chapter 5

Departure day arrived, as it must, and Angel, Angie and Jane tried valiantly not to cry. They did leak a little, but held up well...Daniel was a bit sad too, but spent most of his time consoling his girls. It wasn't a permanent thing, they would be back again; and Kendrisaan confirmed that it had better be as often as they could. That cheered them up a lot...

Before they left, Kendrisaan presented Daniel with his very own official 'Robes of State', with gold accents in the proper places. Kendrisaan cautioned him that it was only worn on official business, and then smiled wickedly, "Unless you want to show off privately of course". That cheered them all up, and the departure was no longer a somber affair. This would always be their home away from home, so take advantage of it!

As Kendrisaan walked back inside his home, he had much on his mind. Even if Angel had not made her choice yet to become flesh and blood human yet, he knew it would not be too much longer before she would begin her own journey; he had seen it in her eyes too many times during their visit, and her actions during his confessions had just confirmed the observation. Angel's sister Angie had indeed found the courage to follow the road of life, and Angel would find her own brand of that same courage; he knew that, so he must plan the transference carefully. Angel's whole personality was different for one thing...while they had began as one mind, they had separated into two unique individuals over time; each with their own wants and desires, and yes; fears. It wasn't that they thought differently, but more that they thought from opposite perspectives. That important detail must be preserved. It would take all his skill to ensure that Angel's 'birth' was successful, and he would be ready. Preparations would begin today...

It was a different atmosphere that hung in the common room as they left; it wasn't quite a somber feeling anymore, that had been dispelled with Kendrisaan's insistence that they return as often as possible. It felt to Daniel like that far too familiar emotion; lack of purpose. They needed something to remind them that there was more to life than 'Family visits'. It didn't need to be exciting, but it did need to be worthwhile...what to do about that?

Angel just happened to be thinking the same thing; although not quite from the same perspective. She had her own number one struggle to contend with, and that took up a large portion of her inner reflection time. Beyond that, there was one nagging thought that hovered on the fringes of her mind...they needed 'challenges', to do things that gained insights into the mysteries of the Universe. Perhaps they could take up exploration as a hobby; learn new things, find strange and exotic peoples maybe. Their intimacies were fulfilling and the 'sex' always exciting certainly; but to really 'live' you had to do different things to make sure those intimacies stayed exciting; and she thought of an idea that would do just that...

That evening Angel brought her idea up for 'family vote'; how about they take a side trip on their way home and visit the Iscris; just a friendly 'how are you doing' sort of stop. Angie and Jane perked right up at the proposal; they had apparently been having their own inner debates on the subject of 'useful diversions', and were all for the side trip...

Daniel found himself playing the role of Devil's Advocate, reminding his girls that the Iscris were a solitary people, preferring isolation to open interactions with other species, "What if the Iscris take offense at our 'intrusion' into their lives once again?"

Angel was about to defend her idea, but Angie beat her to it, "I think that is a valid concern Daniel, but I also didn't get the impression that they were true isolationists either, who wanted no contact ever. Their own words suggested that they respect Earth's people as honorable, and I believe they actually considered themselves fortunate to have encountered us. What do you think about that Angel?"

"I agree with you Angie, their whole language is full of references to honor and proper conduct; I didn't mention it when I got back from escorting them to their new home, it didn't seem important at the time; it was only a single sentence in parting. The Queen Mother used a word that sounded odd, but makes sense in this context. She didn't refer to Earths people as friends; she said we were 'acceptable', which suggests that a visit would be considered 'Ok' as long as we didn't make a habit of it..."

Poor Jane was just a bit confused. She knew all about the 'invasion that wasn't' over a year ago, but only from the news reports and gossip angle. Angel took the lead and explained everything about the encounter to her; she had been the 'point person' in the encounter after all. She even showed Jane the only image she was able to get of one of the Iscris. Jane's eyes widened and she exclaimed, "They're Dragons!!"

Daniel laughed, and told her he had had the exact same impression when he first saw the alien. All of them had an amused debate once the implication sank in. All throughout Earth's history Dragons had inhabited the cultural folklore of just about every square inch of the planet. While the images and sculptures could vary drastically, depending on the location, the theme remained similar...some Dragons represented evil, while others were depicted as benevolent; there was seldom an in between. Had the Iscris visited Earth in the far distant past; had they caused the legends that survive to this day? It was an intriguing possibility, however remote it may be.

That pretty much settled the question of where to go; the burgeoning explorers would visit the Iscris briefly, which added three days to the return trip home. Renewed excitement reigned on the ship again...

Since the change in routing opened up new vistas for viewing in the common room each time they emerged into a different area of space, fun resurfaced as well. Clothes became skimpier, and Daniel was treated to so many delightful exhibitions, he didn't even watch movies much now. He found much more pleasure from watching his girls 'watching' movies and shows, while squirming in tantalizing ways; his own long held inhibitions were fading into obscurity, and he was finding that they didn't really apply to this close knit and loving family anyway. They were friends, lovers and companions all rolled into a treasured 'family', and that was that!

The intensity of the relationship was even more evident the evening of the fourth day out, when Daniel told Angel she was a 'devil' who loved teasing him. Angel was never shy about that, and promptly transformed into the most voluptuous caricature of a devil ever invented; all crimson skin, dark shadowy eyes; evil yet mischievous grin, horns; and a long wicked forked tail that whipped back and forth as she chased Angie and Jane around the common room, jabbing each in the ass with a small pitchfork to keep them squealing and giggling for ten minutes. She even sported a small Van Dyke beard for effect...all of them was exhausted from laughing at the spectacle, and slept well that night; and for once, only slept...Angel pondered the feelings within her once again, and came to the conclusion that she was very close to the tipping point now; she was actually beginning to crave the day she would become fully human, just like her sister had; and it wasn't frightening anymore; it felt right. Soon, very soon...
Chapter 6

As they entered the Iscris system, Angel announced their arrival in their own language, since the reptiles had shown no interest or ability to learn English. At first there was silence, but after a few minutes of repeating their harmless intentions, Angel was rewarded with a tentative reply, asking if they intended to stay long.

Angel pretty much expected the query, the Iscris were a suspicious lot by nature; but when the one talking checked with his superiors, the Queen Mother herself got involved, expressing about the most back handed welcome any of them had ever heard; the Iscris owed a debt of honor to the humans of Earth, was there some way they could assist them with their travels? Kind of a 'Ho hum, you're here and accepted, but we are kind of busy you know...'

Angel laughed at that, and explained mostly for Jane's sake that the Iscris were very low key in their dealings with other races; that the Queen Mother engaged them in dialog at all was something of a huge honor in itself. Jane returned the humor by stating that she was familiar with some corporate people who acted just like that. The parallel was spot on, for the Iscris culture did operate much like a very large corporation.

The Queen Mother further surprised them all by actually inviting the Ship to orbit while they discusses 'pleasantries'; but stopped short of inviting them to actually land. Angel was getting pretty good at interpreting Iscris behavior, at least the Queen Mother's idea of proper etiquette; so she agreed with the gesture, and asked how the Iscris race was faring on their new home.

The Queen Mother was apparently feeling generous today, for she launched into a lengthy description of the expected difficulties of 'colonization' they experienced, and their success at overcoming the trials of setting up their culture from the remnants of their race. All was proceeding well, with only a few deaths along the way. One of their ships had been a 'repository' vessel, carrying the 'eggs' of life and their population was growing exponentially every day. Their thanks were boundless for the Earthling's assistance; would they like a 'present' to seal that thanks?

Angel almost lost her cool, telling the others that they had just been offered the highest honor within the Iscris culture; acceptance as allies. To reject such a thing would be tantamount to rejecting the Iscris as a people...

"My companions and I thank the 'People', and would cherish such a gesture. If it will be placed several yards from other people or objects, I will transport it to our vessel." Angel had been using the optical sensors to view the goings on down there; at this distance it was a bit grainy, but they could make out two Iscris placing the object on the ground and stepping away.

The Queen Mother said, "This is my likeness, created by our greatest artist, I give it to you in peace."

When Angel 'beamed up' the gift, all of them could see why she was the Queen Mother...the statue sitting on the floor was three feet tall and almost six feet long. Displayed before the astounded family was the Queen Mother herself, in all her majesty. Exquisitely detailed, the figure before them did not just suggest the hint of a dragon heritage; the Queen Mother was a card carrying, for real Dragon, straight out of Earth's European legends; she had a long snout with sharp teeth prominent in an open mouth. She had brow ridges that swept back, past two pointed ears. Her body was long and slim, and she walked on four legs. A long forked tail curled around her body...and she was covered in scales.

Strangely enough, the expression on her face suggested a wise ruler, rather than a frightening countenance. This was more than just a gift; the Queen Mother was admitting that her race had indeed visited Earth in the distant past...

As the family gathered themselves together, Angel spoke to the Queen Mother once more, "Queen Mother, your gift fills us with pride; may our races be as one."

The Queen Mother was not to be outdone; giving what sounded like a throaty chuckle, she said, "Our two races share history, we are as one again. Fare well, accepted people."

Taking that as a permission to leave, Angel had the ship break orbit, and they headed outward toward the gate, to continue on their journey home. Once it was agreed on where the magnificent statue would be displayed, Angel worked some magic and an ornate shelf grew out of the wall just under the big view screen; she then levitated the statue gently onto it. She placed the statues weight at about 250 pounds, being carved from a beautiful reddish green gemstone of some kind. It definitely looked good where it sat...

The remainder of the trip was routine only for the fact that Daniel's 'women' were as playful as ever. His inhibitions were almost gone by now, and he began showing up in just shorts for the daily movies and TV shows that kept them sane. While space travel is always presented as exciting and enlightening, the harsh reality is that space travel is boring after the first day or so. That was part of the reason the girls were so playful, thinking up different ways to entertain and enjoy each other; and Daniel as a result. Angel, Angie and Jane took to playing slaves to the Sultan Daniel, which at first had him worried that the old 'I am not worthy' syndrome had reared its head again; but it soon became clear to him that they were simply serving him because they wanted to. They were 'role playing', and having fun doing it...the three would take turns serving each other's whims, but never ever allowed Daniel to get anything for himself. It annoyed him sometimes, but even that feeling dwindled as he realized that him getting his own stuff really did make them unhappy; so he tried harder to enjoy it.

Jane in particular started assuming more of the 'duty' schedule, and Angel and Angie let her get away with it. Daniel was completely unaware that his girls were planning an assault on his few remaining inhibitions. On the twenty first day of their trip, everything went pretty much as usual, and when Daniel went to bed alone, he didn't think anything of it...

In fact being alone for a few minutes felt relaxing in its own way, allowing him time to just think about things. The girls weren't 'distraction', but he wasn't able to think about much else when they were around either. So Daniel started to understand what an AIs 'quiet time' was all about; humans needed those little quiet times too, when you could think about nothing at all, and enjoy the feeling. His quiet time only lasted an hour though; the door opened, and in walked Jane, followed by both Angie and Angel. All three wore serious expressions; no, that wasn't right. Angel and Angie were serious, but Jane looked afraid, keeping her head down...

Angie stroked Jane's back, saying, "Go ahead Jane, we are with you." Angel reached out and took Jane's arm gently, "Do it now Jane, it is time to put the fear away." Daniel was just plain confused; all he was sure of at the moment was that he had three unhappy women in front of him now, and it didn't feel good at all.

Jane sighed deeply and raised her head, a few tears leaking out of her eyes, "Daniel, I need to tell you why I'm here, and why I want to stay." And she told Daniel the whole story of a frightened young girl who never knew a loving family, never felt like she was wanted. She grew up with two parents who treated her like she didn't exist. They had gone through the motions of sending her to school, of 'acting' like a family, but they never 'talked' to her, never comforted her, never hugged her. In private, they would tell her to get things, scold her if she wasn't 'fast enough'. If she came home crying, they sent her to her room until she stopped.

So Jane erected a wall around herself, to keep the hurt out. The wall had a happy face on it, and she managed to act like she really had a family; until she was eighteen, and her parents got tired of having a young girl at all, and dropped her off on a sidewalk one day and drove off.

Jane carried her wall around for five years, always the bubbly happy young woman. She landed her job and learned to work with others around her, but no one ever got to know her, being interested in their own problems. She started going to the weekly music concerts because they made her feel good for a while. She was sitting next to another young girl one day who had come to the concert with an older man. Jane kept glancing at them, and she could see they adored each other. The man enjoyed his girl, wanted to be with her. That was everything Jane had never known; being wanted...so she took a chance and talked to Angie...

"Daniel, I want very much to be a formal part of this family, to be a part of all of you; will you take me as your wife too?" Daniel at first didn't know what to say. His old taboos started peeking out at him again, but were they real; or just made up ones. None of them were related to each other genetically, so incest went away, which left the multiple wives thing. Daniel thought that taboo was created more to protect young women from forced marriages than anything else, so it didn't really apply to a close knit loving family anyway. And Jane was certainly old enough to know what she wanted herself. There was really only one answer he could give; he already loved Jane, just like he loved his other two wives, "Yes Jane, I want you and will take you as my wife."

Daniel expected to see the bubbly happy girl pop out again, but it wasn't to be so; not yet, "There is one more thing Daniel, I want to feel owned too; so will you order me around sometimes, leaving off the 'please'? It is important to me...is that wrong?"

That request did pose a difficult hurdle for Daniel, he simply wasn't built like that...it was like their 'slave play' though..."I'm not sure I can be a brutal taskmaster all the time Jane, but I'll try to be what you want. And for the other question, no, I don't think it is wrong to seek out what you want to do; someone forcing you to do what you don't want to do is wrong...but for now, get up here girl!", and he swatted Jane hard on the ass, just a bit more than normal play. That did it, as the smile returned; in fact all three were smiling widely. Jane said, "Yes Sir", and jumped right up onto Daniel, straddling him and planting kiss after kiss all over his face. As they began the oldest marriage ritual known to the human race, Angel and Angie climbed into bed too, laying on each side of them and 'assisting' with the ceremony. When Daniel finally got to sleep, he was surrounded by three deliciously feminine wives snuggled up close. Not bad for a man who had never gotten married before in his life...Daniel also realized something a lot more serious. He now had three young ladies who felt insecure sometimes, for three completely different reasons. He would have to be more alert than ever to recognize the signs, and take action to keep his girls happy.
Chapter 7

Jay Allencourt was unhappy, and he knew why. He was missing his friends, Daniel and Angie, and his division needed answers they weren't even sure his friends could answer.

The Alien Recovery Project had found a space ship; not just a ship, but a huge one. The Engineers estimated it to be over a mile long and five hundred feet in diameter. That was a big discovery indeed, but what was most important was that it was buried deep under Area 51, of all places. Part of the ground had collapsed east of the runway and revealed a large cavern 800 feet below the surface, and part of the ship was sticking out into the cavern. It had huge engine nozzles, four of them, that would swallow most airliners whole. It was a mystery how it got there, since it didn't show any real damage at all. What was even more of a mystery was that they couldn't get anything to cut the metal. It appeared to be normal steel, it had some corrosion on the surfaces, but nothing would cut it; not even a high intensity laser that was built specifically for the task. The metal just laughed at them, as the laser light just sank into the metal with no effect at all. Jay knew who to call on that one, but so far he had gotten no reply to his 'mind talk'. He'd been trying all week, and was getting frustrated; and angry...

Jay's message was getting through, but not to Angie and Daniel. Hal had been given that 'frequency' to monitor, and he heard and understood the message perfectly. The only problem was, he had no authorization to communicate with Jay. Being still a brand new AI, he had little experience with interacting with anyone but Father; and he had absolutely no experience with Earthlings, so to him no authority meant no talk. The situation was making him feel guilty though; an Earthling was trying desperately to contact Daniel and Angie, one who they both knew, and he was beginning to sound a bit frantic too. Hal made his first 'command decision' and was about to respond to Jay, when Angel called him; they had just exited the gate and would relieve him in three hours...Hal thought problem solved...sorry Hal, not yet...

As the Ship exited the gate, it also come into range for Jay's frantic request to reach Angel, who promptly bounced it to both Angie and Daniel; who promptly got angry, and Hal found himself subjected to scathing scolding in two different languages; both of which had very colorful swear words in the vocabulary. Poor Hal was learning the hard way that you don't leave friends of Daniel and Angie in the dark...

Then Angie called Jay and apologized for not giving this situation faster attention; explaining that they had been away, and the ship tasked with 'filling in' for them had failed to use his brain. They would be down shortly to help out, where was he?

"Well, at the moment I'm staring at the ass end of the biggest star ship ever thought of in the history of motion pictures; I'm probably wrong on that, but God is that thing big!", and he laughed out loud, which got him some stares from those standing next to Jay.

Angie assured him that they would be there within the hour, and Jay said, "Ok Angie, I know you can use that stealth mode and all, but you might still leave a contrail to follow. I am notifying the Area 51 controller of your authorized arrival, and to stand down any military response. What is all that background noise, it sounds like you're having a party up there?"

Daniel answered that one, "Jay, there have been a few changes since we had a good chat session. I promise you a full update when we arrive, Ok? How are the crystals coming along lately?"

Jay chuckled, "Many of the Universities are complaining that we are stealing their brightest students, now that we took most of their professors; but otherwise the research is going quite well. We leaked some conclusions to a small computer company, and they are looking into uses in that area. It seems when you use micro-voltages, interesting things happen. They haven't even estimated how much data can be stored in a single crystal, every time they experiment, the numbers keep going up." That got a loud chuckle from both Angel and Angie, who knew from way back how infinite the numbers could be. Jay just shut up for a while, he was beginning to think there were more than one woman up there...he was right of course, but not 'exactly right'.

When Angel slowly landed a safe distance from the open hole in the desert floor, Daniel invited Jay to come onboard for a chat. He told Jay to just walk behind the large van, and they would transport him onboard, "Or you could walk up a set of airline stairs that lead to nowhere and disappear in front of everyone, if you prefer." Daniel loved to tease Jay a bit about the Ship's capabilities. Jay knew about the 'poof to nowhere', so he just followed Daniel's directions, and exclaimed out loud when he found himself standing in the common room with Daniel, Angel, Angie, and a strange girl with strawberry blonde hair standing in front of him...

"Alright, fun is fun; but what the heck is going on here?" It took a half hour to give Jay a condensed update on the Daniel Curran family status. Jay looked at Angel, "Young lady, you are now the Command Function Controller for the ship, and are still a solid projection that must stay on the ship? What happened to you Angie? You mean to tell me you are now fully human, and can go anywhere you want? I swear you guys are going to be the death of me yet...And who are you again my lady?" Jane just giggled, "I'm Jane Curran Sir, formerly Jane Prescott. I'm the newbie here."

Jay was getting frustrated again, this time trying to get all this change in status straight, "Are you kidding me, I'M the newbie here. Just tell me if you guys can shed some light on what this star ship is stuck in the hole over there, if you would please?" There were smiles all around as Daniel told him to show the way, all of them would take a look; but only three physical people would climb down the hole. Jay just shook his head, and after Angel looked around a bit, Jay, Daniel, Angie and Jane beamed over behind the van again. Anyone who might have seen one person walk behind the van, only to have four walk back out, didn't say anything. This whole area was historically 'Weird City' after all...

After descending on a temporary elevator under a big camouflage net, their group got the first good look at the stern of a gigantic star ship that certainly didn't belong here. Angie, and Angel through her eyes, began walking closer over the rough terrain. The others followed until they were right under the engine nozzles. After scanning with her eyes for five minutes, Angie said, "I don't have a clue; Angel, do you have anything in the archive?"

After a second Angel responded in everyone's head, <We don't have archives that go back that far, but I can surmise two things; from the physical size it appears to be someone's Battle Ship; the design suggests 'Beteran' origins. I can approximate the age though, it would be over a half billion years old, which means Jay that any weapons that may be on this ship can be very unstable by now, so truthfully, you do not want to even touch it, let alone try to cut into it.>

Jay picked up on the danger right away, and was on his phone a moment later, "This is Jay Allencourt, I want all work on the ship to stop now, don't even touch it anymore. Is that clear?" As he got confirmations from the supervisors he had on group call, and they saw an exodus begin away from the old hull, Jay breathed a sigh of relief, "Ok, what now? Do we need to back away a few miles and just blow it up?"

Angel spoke right up in her very best motherly tone, <Jay, I really hope you are joking. You would need a high yield fusion bomb to even dent the hull, and that would mean saying goobye to the entire Southwest...but what is worse, if you somehow set off a chain reaction with the types of weapons that might be here, the planet would be confetti a second later. You understand?>

Daniel did understand, as his eyes got very big, "Alright everyone, conference in the common room right now! Come on Jay..." They all went back up the elevator, while a large group waited for their turn. Everyone was suddenly edgy, and Daniel couldn't blame them. They had just been caught doing something stupid with an alien warship they knew nothing about.

Back on the ship, Angel gave them an update, "I have had Hal request all information on warships from that far back, and farther if they have it, and put an absolute immediate fastest possible response flag on it. If they are as fast as I hope, we should get the data in about 5 days. This is even bigger than the Iscris incident, so I put a special header on it for Father, he will get them moving faster..." She explained the immediate precautions she thought Jay should take...don't evacuate, but make absolutely sure everyone understands that even so much as a 'sneak peek' could be disastrous, so stay away! After they had solid data on the ship's origins, and design views, they could move into stage two of discussion; what the heck to do...

Daniel told Jay he might as well stay with them while they waited, which got the girls excited and playful all over again. Daniel had to remind them to be good girls, which got pouts on their faces in return; but they smiled right after so all was good. It was the longest four day wait anyone could remember. Even Angie and Angel admitted it 'felt' longer than their long wait on the moon. Kendrisaan came through for them though; the transmission was received on the evening of the fourth day. Angie began digging through all the data, and after an hour of fast search, she narrowed the possibilities down to four, none of which should have been way out here. Of all the ship the Beterans had during their last war years, only one was unaccounted for, "It has to be the 'Shanda'; it was the only battleship left after the last battle, and it simply disappeared. They never found a trace; which brings up the biggest question, what is it doing here? That last battle was fought way on the other side of our home galaxy, out toward the fringe. Even if they had full fuel tanks, and only used one of their engines, they simply could not have reached this galaxy at all..."

Angie couldn't access the vast amount of information in the archive anymore, but she did understand star ship engineering and special dynamics still, "I wonder Angel; you and I experienced the very first rogue wormhole in recorded history, could there be such a thing as a 'rogue gate'?; one that they accidentally ran into and took them all the way to this solar system? The ship is buried in solid rock, so their distortion generators were still running when they hit the planet. From the angle of insertion, I'd say they were trying to at least land and bored their way underground."

Daniel, Jay and Jane were totally out of their league with that debate,; Daniel steered the discussion back to the most important topic, "Alright girls, we can debate how they got here later; let's focus on getting inside and neutralizing the dangers first, Ok?"

Angel apologized, "Sorry, there should be an engineering access hatch just forward of the engines themselves. It is here." And the screen lit up with a plan drawing of the stern, with the hatch highlighted. It would be on the underside of the ship, and accessible after removing some rocks carefully. "The lock is mechanical for yard workers in suits to easily enter the engines compartment in orbit for maintenance. There is an inner door on the forward bulkhead that is electrical, but we should be able to bypass that. Then it will be a matter of walking the length of the ship and neutralizing any explosive ordinance found. Hopefully they didn't get here with full magazines, or it could take weeks to disable them all. The Beterans used some pretty nasty explosives by the way, so it will be touchy. But there is no alternative, it must be done..."

The next morning Jay got a group of volunteers to remove the rocks from where the hatch should be; and there it was, right where it was supposed to be. The so called 'mechanical lock' was a large one with manual buttons on it, all with Beltran hieroglyphics on them. The buttons were large, about 5 inches square each, and Angel told them the maintenance sequence to open the hatch. She said push each one hard as you can; the Beterans were large and beefy, so the lock was designed for their strength. It was decided that Angie would go in first, with Daniel and Jay right behind. The reason was simple, Angie and Angel were the only ones who could read Beteran, and so they had to take point. They all wore suits sealed up; no one knew what they would find inside.

Daniel did the button pushing however, being a bit stronger than Angie... after the last number in the sequence was pushed, nothing happened for a second. Then there was a slight 'whoosh' of air as the hatch started dropping down...and stopped on sticky hinges. A bit of coaxing from both Daniel and Jay convinced it to swing the rest of the way, and Angie climbed slowly into the darkness, turning on a bright flashlight as she went past the edge of the hatch...

Finding the catwalk, the trio made their way to the inner hatch. This one would have been a show stopper, except for the fact that the Beterans built their ships with simplicity in mind. The lock panel, and indeed the door mechanism itself only required a small amount of voltage to operate, and as an emergency measure two small contact holes were in the bottom of the panel with the Beteran equivalent of '+' and '-' over them, a universal constant for electricity. Two 'D' cell batteries and two pieces of wire did the trick, as the panel glowed softly. Angie pushed the three number code that Angel gave her, and they heard a click and a whir as the armored door released...they were into the main section of the ship.

As they started walking slowly through the Engine Control room, it took all Daniel's willpower to keep from looking at every little thing in sight. They were on an important mission here, stay focused. They did find their first dead Beterans here. They were all shriveled mummies after half a billion years, and it was kind of amazing that they hadn't crumbled to dust by now. Angie explained that the Beterans were a proud warrior race, and if they knew they would die, they would want to do it in their battle chairs. They would probably find all of the 5000 sitting at attention. After one more coded door at the forward bulkhead, the rest of the ship was essentially wide open. There were sealed hatches all over, but they were all manually operated with locking levers.

Passing through the engineering berthing compartment, they came to the first weapons station; a particle beam targeting console. The panels were all dead, and the Beteran in the chair looked as if he was grinning, which made it all the creepier for the three. Angie bent down and uncoupled the power lead to the station anyway. They would do that for every station they could get to.

The first day wore them out, and they had only inspected one third of the ship. The problem wasn't distance, you can stroll a mile in less than two hours; but that is an unobstructed, open space mile in straight line distance. This was purpose built as a warship, and common sense dictates that you spread out all your weapons and 'goodies' that go 'boom'...

The Shanda had twenty seven 'decks', almost all of which had some sort of weapon on them, whether defensive or offensive in nature. Each deck had an average of 1000 compartments on them; big ones for cargo, little ones the size of a closet; and every size in between...that was the bad news.

The good news was that they knew where every piece of munitions that posed a danger 'should be'. That lowered the number to a 'doable' 400 spaces, but it would still take weeks to check them all; and if they found any large numbers of explosive devices, like missiles, the time needed to disable them all would increase the task's timeframe exponentially. The Beterans practical nature helped them there. In war, half the battles are fought to 'subdue' your opponent, or erode their will to fight. The Shanda taskforce was sent to subdue the enemy, not obliterate them; so they left their 'planet buster' missiles at home; or most of them anyway. The records said there would only be five planet busters on the Shanda, and that is the number they found in the two missile bays. These were the most dangerous of all If only one of these things decided to arm itself, the explosion could blow half the planet Earth into space; and they were huge, measuring sixty feet long and nine in diameter. Being larger people, the Beterans built all their toys big as well. The fusing mechanism was simplicity in itself. There were two fissionable elements; the large block of material, or 'primary charge' was a cylinder twelve feet long and three feet in diameter; the smaller 'triggering charge' was barely the size of a pencil, but was the key element to create a very big explosion. Neither element was radioactive by itself, but when you combined the two, the resulting explosion would be the equivalent of every nuclear weapon the Earth possessed going off in the same spot all at once...

When Angel finished indoctrinating them, she added unnecessarily, "So obviously, do not let them touch..." The 'defusing' process was two steps; first they had to cut the 'trigger release' wire, which was easy, being right in plain sight. The batteries were certainly dead after all this time, but even the slightest static electricity might cause the spring loaded trigger to release; that would translate in a millisecond to "Adios Muchacho'...

Once the trigger wire was cut, they still had to unbolt the trigger assembly itself and physically remove it from the weapon; that was a bit of a problem, since Beteran bolts had a weird shaped head. The defusing stopped, and they waited through the night while the site engineers machined a socket with the right shape, that could be used to loosen said bolts. Once they had the tool, and two threaded alignment pins to slide the assembly out of the housing, they were in business...

It still took two more days to defuse the five missiles, they worked very slowly and there were 21 bolts holding the trigger assembly; but when they were all done, there was a party in the common room, and everyone slept soundly for once.

The ship to ship missiles were not a big problem, as most had been expended in the battle; but there were still thirty seven onboard, so it took more time to make them safe. These were tiny compared to the huge planet busters; only about twelve feet long and two feet in diameter. These were nuclear in nature though, so radiation protocols were observed religiously. Jay called in the experts for defusing the missiles, once it was determined that the mechanisms were almost identical to Earth's own weapons; an odd coincidence that was still a happy one.

Once the threat of big booms was eliminated, and all beam and laser defensive 'guns' unplugged, one unpleasant question remained that spanned the entire populated Universe; what to do with the ship itself. The US, from the President on down, took the immediate position that 'Hey, we found it; it's on our land, it's ours to study, just like the other ships!' From the official 'old school' perspective of distrust and gaining advantages on other countries, it was a valid point. Only one problem; other powerful nations on Earth knew something 'big' was happening in the US Southwest, they have surveillance satellites too you know...that wasn't the only problem either, and Daniel let the President know it when he was called to a private meeting with President Salcone. The Beterans 'owned' the warship; never mind that they had abandoned war millions of years ago. Never mind that it sits under the ground on your territory, and never mind that they don't even think in terms of 'ownership' anymore...'Honor' demands that you notify them that you found their missing ship, and the 5000 lost souls that manned that ship, thank you very much!...Yes, Daniel got mad at Salcone, and let the President know it...it worked rather well actually. Salcone had been told of the way the Council races addressed this sort of thing, but he still was anchored in current day Earth concepts, like greed, advantages over other countries, economic profits, you name it...

He did relate to one thing though, he simply did not want to start an interplanetary war; and for now, that reason would have to do...Daniel did not tell him that The Council would never even think of attacking Earth; it wasn't in them...so after warring with himself for a week, President Salcone made a Solomon's decision. He asked Daniel and Angie to notify the Beterans and the Council that their long lost missing warship was on Earth; Daniel almost laughed in the President's face, the entire Council knew that from the day they requested all the archived data on it. Daniel played Diplomat though and waited for a week before giving Salcone the already prepared response. In flowery wording, Kendrisaan himself stated that the 'Council of Sentient Races' had no claim to the ship at all, it was a local affair. Earths Ambassador, Daniel Curran was accepted as spokesman for the planet Earth in all matters.

Salcone called Daniel once again after hearing that; and Daniel spent an embarrassing hour explaining that it was not his doing. The Council had chosen him. It didn't really mean much, since Earth would not be a voting member for a thousand years or more, so no big deal. The President corrected him on that point, and let Daniel know it was a very big deal to the US and to all countries on the planet, in plain language too.

Kendrisaan did make a not so subtle suggestion to Salcone, that the US share any discoveries with the 'peoples of Earth', in the spirit of Honor and Cooperation...the Beteran Ambassador sent a shorter personal statement;

"The people of Betera make no claim on the Shanda, we give it to you in peace. We Honor our dead, and ask that you do the same..."

After a month of inner struggle with himself, President Salcone did indeed take Kendrisaan's suggestion to heart, and called an emergency closed door session of the UN, and let the cat out of the bag. For the first time in history, the area known as 51 on an old topographical survey map was made available to all the countries of Earth, for scientific study of an old alien star ship; after a matter of Honor was observed...5000 Beteran Warriors were laid to rest on the planet Earth, with full military honors from all nations...they had existed, and they existed again; on a planet they never knew...Daniel was also voted in as the 'Earth Ambassador for Alien Relations', a very new title indeed. Daniel was now 'official' on one hundred thousand and one planets...
Chapter 8

Daniel's girls spent a lot of time showing him how proud they were of their husband. Daniel alternated between being annoyed with all the attention, and loving it. He managed to give Jane her wish though, occasionally ordering her to do something; without the 'please' attached, and would swat her on the ass to get her moving. That was totally unnecessary, of course; all he had to do was start speaking and she jumped up, ready to comply; all three of them did actually, which caused him some worry, until he just accepted that they loved doing it...old beliefs often die hard.

Other long held beliefs would also die hard on the world stage. This new openness didn't eliminate tensions between countries, but slowly there seemed to be a shift in attitudes as the months went by...baby steps are still progress. Maybe Earth wouldn't destroy itself after all, time would tell that story...

Daniel found himself being invited to individual dinners with world leaders, usually for the same reason; to 'feel' him out on world issues, and to see if they could sway him towards their own greedy agendas. Daniel never ever accepted any proffered gifts, and his answers to the hints at favoritism were in plain and undiplomatic language, "Look, the bottom line is that we all have to learn to get along with each other on this planet. That is the key to fulfilling any ambitions to interact with people on other planets, so concentrate on being nicer to your neighbors; learn to respect them, and trust them. Then we might succeed; advancement is not just technology, it is in our own minds that we need to advance too." No, Daniel was not a public speaker; but apparently some of them listened at least, for global tensions eased somewhat...at least for now.

At first Angie and Angel were called on to translate Beteran into English; and other languages too, since they could read and speak any language that existed here. But as more linguists became familiar with the Beteran language, the calls diminished. They didn't mind that; they were more interested in figuring out how the ship had gotten here at all.

Part of the answer came when the engineers managed to power up one of the consoles on the bridge, by isolating it and trying different electrical impulses to find the right frequency. The design plans had the frequency of course, but it didn't translate well to Earth voltages; there is more to electricity than just pouring electrons into a device. When the screen flickered, everyone froze. The power supply wasn't even connected right now. The technician had lain his cell phone down next to the ships AI, an odd shaped pile of crystals situated under the console. After countless millions of years, the radio waves from the cell phone woke it up enough to begin its primary function again, provide information; so the screen flickered. It only had a single direct connection to this one console, all the other wired connections had been unplugged. As the AI converted the waves into what it could use the screen began glowing, and Beteran symbols showed up on it; faint at first but increasing in brightness as it drew more power.

After the initial surprise wore off, they figured out what had happened...the AI wasn't being electrically powered by the cell phone; it was being powered by the radio waves coming through the cell phone. The entire approach to the current project changed because an experiment that happened almost two years ago had just been duplicated. The internet was powering up the console...they called Angie to come operate the console since they still didn't have an interpreter available to them yet.

Angie had some initial trouble getting the console to act right, the darn thing was so archaic no one used any of the protocols anymore; but as she got more familiar with the 'keys' the information started flowing; and that she could read just fine. She found the tail end of the ships log, a bit fragmented but still readable. She got the last minutes of the battle, and the ship turning to start home. One entry looked odd, it just said 'collision avoidance active but fluctuating'; but the next one told it all, 'Transient distortion! Limited power, slowing down; closing on unknown planet'...and it stopped. There were no other entries after that...

That night at a family meeting, they pieced together what happened...

The Shanda was battle weary; it had lasted for days; they were the last ship left in the task force, all others had been destroyed. The Captain was reflecting on how wasteful it had been, to lose so many lives for nothing more than their Monarch had been angry with his counterpart in this system. Now neither one had any ships left; and there would be peace whether they liked it or not...

The Captain gave the order, "There was no Honor in this fight my people; we honor our dead, and we go home. Collision avoidance at maximum! Navigator, set course for Betera, minimum speed until we clear the debris field..."

The ship had turned into a natural distortion in space. Normally it wasn't a problem, just a few vibrations, perhaps a lurch; and you continued on your way. But the Shanda had activated it's collision avoidance system at the wrong time. A system of distortion generators focused at the nose of the ship's hull, didn't just deflect debris, it made them disappear entirely, sending them into other dimensions it was thought. By turning them on as they turned into the natural distortion, their own generators amplified the distortion, and it acted something like a gate, and transported the ship out of the galaxy they were in, and directly into Earths system. What was catastrophic was that they emerged right in Earth's atmosphere, at a hundred thousand feet in altitude, barely moving at only a thousand miles an hour.

Battle ships don't change course easily, but they tried...the Shanda almost leveled out above the surface; but not quite. They slammed into the Earth at a shallow angle, and their distortion generators did their thing...the Shanda bored through the soil and rock until the generators blew out, and they stopped at a depth of almost a thousand feet, embedded in solid rock.

The overload on the distortion generators caused a feedback power spike that fried every maneuvering circuit there was, and life support circuits as well. They tried repairing what they could, but nothing worked; eventually the sole reactor still running gave up the ghost, and they knew they would die here when the air turned toxic; so all of them took to their battle chairs and waited...no one ever thought of the possibility of getting out through a single maintenance hatch way back on the stern of the ship; not even the engineers who worked there. They didn't know the stern was clear of the rock...

The revelation was a somber one; so many people had died because of a technology that was so unstable that it had been abandoned long ago. Other systems had replaced distortion generators, but it was too late for the crew of the Shanda; it was a freak occurrence, just like the rogue wormhole that stranded Angel and Angie in time, but it did not make the story any less sad. The family slept close that night, hugging each other tightly...

Innovation usually comes in fits and spurts, it's just the way people make progress; and technology is the prime example. Experiments are conducted, results recorded, and lessons are learned. That's how the human race has evolved over the thousands of years...

You would think that a huge alien star ship would encourage accelerated advancements in electronics in general, or computers at least, but they weren't getting much out of the ship at all really; the systems weren't much different than what we had already...that was the problem with half billion year old technology and circuitry, we were as advanced as that now. Where we were lagging behind was in propulsion and weaponry, so the teams started concentrating on those areas...and found out the weapons were again what we already had or were working on, just more refined. We already had lasers nailed down, but just needed to figure out how to increase the intensity to be able to use them effectively at the vast distances in space. Particle beams were in a similar boat, since particle beams are basically lasers with particles added in; don't cringe physicists. It all boiled down to the power available to use in the weapons...

The Shanda used Ion engines, something that was immediately interesting to the engineers. We were experimenting with Ion propulsion, and had already increased the thrust output some, but the current level of technology would not push a million ton battleship through space now would it...they were missing something.

Ok, the engines were massive on the Shanda first of all; sort of proportional to the star ship's size and mass; and there were four of them; clue number one.

Secondly, Angel had already confirmed that large ships don't handle like sports cars; especially battle ships. It took time to build up momentum, so no real help there...

It took a 'please help us understand' session with Angel and Angie, before Jay found out they were right all along; they just didn't think it through far enough. Angie took the lead, "Jay, lasers and particle beams were effective for the time when Shanda was using them, because they poured multi megawatts of power through them; that was all. Some of your optics and magnetic mediums need work, but you are already doing that, so don't despair that a half billion year old star ship isn't giving you what you expected, it only has so much it can add to your knowledge...

As for Ion propulsion, you are working on that too; but not enough people are working on it. Your people tend to use linear thinking when approaching the problem; humans have a saying that I have learned to love, 'Think outside the box' Jay...there are two parts of Ion propulsion; one is power generation, just like with weapons...the other is the Ion stream; right now you essentially create Ions and let them bounce around until they exit and provide a little push. Have you tried 'shaping' the magnetic field in different ways?"

Jay was thoughtful for a moment. Had she just told him to grow up? Angie just smiled at her friend, "One more thing, I'm getting close to that fine line again...in both of your problems, the key is power generation and distribution. In both cases if you shove enough power at the problem, and in just the right way, you'll make progress much sooner. One more hint and I've said enough...if you look at the Shanda's reactors, you'll find that they are fusion reactors, not fission. There is a reason for that, but you must find that reason for yourselves..."

It was time to leave and go home, they had been involved with the Beteran ship for almost two months now, and they were late. Daniel's house had been idle for over six months, and needed some attention...Angel was showing more indications that she would make the huge leap into a flesh and blood woman soon. She spent more time with her 'son', giving him chances to make those command controller decisions that were essential in running a star ship, and she said he was integrating well. She didn't mention though that she had written some changes to his base programming that were based on her own personality. In our human terms, she gave him a piece of herself; which is pretty much what mothers do normally...she had not settled on a name for him though, and Angel asked Daniel and her sisters for some help there, "What to call him is important I think, because it defines a person, don't you think?"

The naming debate lasted for several hours; everyone agreed there should be no funny names, or catchy names that could be made fun of; Angel wondered if maybe Kenneth might be good, as sort of a nod to their father Kendrisaan, but dismissed it as too 'cheeky'. Daniel wondered where she came up with that English quip. After a while the names tended to hover around biblical origins, until Jane piped up with an idea of her own. She said the name Daniel meant 'God is my judge', and she thought that was appropriate for Daniel, since she expected that God judged him 'worthy'; so how about naming your son David; it means either 'beloved' or 'beloved of God'...?

Daniel was about to protest making things too formal, but both Angie and Angel jumped up and said they loved the name, it felt right...and it was settled, if Kendrisaan approved the boy's transference into the main matrix that is.

They never did beam down to the house that night; or anytime after for that matter. Daniel had wondered for some time why he even held onto the house; it didn't really 'feel' like home anymore; the Ship was his home, and his family was right with him. He put the house up for sale two days later...he did hire a lawn maintenance company to keep the old lawn looking good every week until the house was sold. Then he, Angie and Jane went down and packed up their favorite keepsakes. Angie made certain he kept the bobble head she had had so much fun with when she arrived as a human girl, and all her figurines, especially the crystal girl reaching upwards for life. She finally told him she knew what it represented; she had 'felt it'...

Jane didn't pack much of her stuff; she said they were reminders of how sad her life had been before she met Angie and Daniel. She did bring one thing with her though; a gold necklace with a single dark onyx pendant on it. When it caught the light just right, a bright shining star emerged from the depths of the stone. It was beautiful...when the dumpster they rented arrived, they threw out all Daniels old furniture, pots and pans, anything that was trash; but he did a restore on his trusty computer, bringing it back to factory new, then took it and the monitor to the charity thrift store so it could begin a new life too, just as they were...Daniel signed over his car to the woman across the street, and she actually appreciated it, hers was nickel and diming her every week now.

Then the three just stood on the sidewalk, saying goodbye to the place it had all began three years ago...Daniel took both girls, one in each arm, and hugged them close; and kissed them both on the tops of their heads. He walked them up the street and around the corner. When the coast was clear, they 'poofed' up to their true home, and family...

Angel didn't even have to reroute their cell phones, since they were always near a satellite when orbiting anyway. Hal called and told them he was now assigned permanently to Earth monitoring and protection, when could he get a human for his own? Everyone laughed right in his face, but Angel told him, "You have a lot to learn youngster, before ever thinking about that! You don't choose a person; they choose you; so you need to work on your personality for a while, ok?"

The young man blushed and frowned, "Being a person is hard, isn't it...flying a ship is easier..." Angie couldn't resist, she had said that same thing three years ago when she was finding herself..."Yes Hal, being a person is very hard indeed, there is so much to learn; and you never stop learning. Remember that, it will help."

With Hal taking their place on the mission, Daniel and his family suddenly had far more time to do things they actually wanted to do; the first item on their new 'to do list' was a scouting and exploration trip to the old Iscris home world. They owed the Queen Mother that much, if for nothing else than to bring closure to a race that had never wanted to bother anyone; besides that, there was still the question of just who were those mysterious people who attacked without warning, and tried to exterminate an entire race of people...would they be a threat to Earth one day?

Daniel called Jay on his cell phone, and told him of their intentions. Jay told President Salcone, who at first was against tempting fate; but was persuaded to 'officially' authorize the excursion. The simple fact was that everyone needed to know if some sinister race was 'gunning' for defenseless races in the Universe...Earth was no longer defenseless with two perfectly capable starships packing the most advanced weapons ever invented however, so the anxiety eased slightly; Salcone made the mistake of asking what the Ship's weapons consisted of; Angel was her usual non diplomatic self, and told him in plain language that no one on Earth would ever know what weapons she carried, for two reasons...

First off, the weapons onboard were not even widely known to most of the Council's races; simply because they were that new. All of the races had their own versions of defensive weaponry anyway, and were perfectly capable in their own right. While the idea teetered on the "secrecy/openness' precipice, it was not seeking advantages amongst themselves, and they just shrugged.

Secondly, Earth was now trying to change the age's old disease of killing your fellow man for profit, and knowledge of that kind could easily reverse Earth's slight progress in eradicating that disease...

Angel only issued a hint; a thousand attacking ships would never get even close to the inner planets before they ceased to exist; a single Council ship was just that good, leave it at that...Salcone was perplexed, but had his own experience with Angels 'poof' transporter, that she wielded so casually; so he began to understand that any weapons she possessed would likely be very potent, far beyond his imagination...his anxiety diminished as a result. First things first; learn to live with each other; then worry about defenses for the planet. For now they were protected...

Daniel and Jane did get an intense lesson on the ship's weapons however, there was that much trust between them; and they lived there...

There were six weapons modules distributed throughout the ship, covering all directions in a huge envelope of protection; they all were based upon that 'smart materials' concept, and had several levels of effect on an attacker, depending on the level of attack itself; at the lowest setting, the ship 'convinced' the attackers ships to stop transmitting power; effectively leaving them 'dead in space' for a while, before the defending ship told them they had two options; either stop your aggression forever, or continue and die. It was normally the best way to 'UN-convince' an aggressor that he wanted to even be in the area. Angie had told Daniel about that one early on, when the President had beamed up to the ship with the secret service guy accompanying him. She had disabled his gun while they were on the ship; and 'turned the gun back on' when they returned to the Oval Office...a neat trick indeed...

If an aggressor was stubborn enough to come in with guns blazing, the intermediate settings could cause power feedbacks all over their ships, actually 'blowing out' their own weapons and engines in the process; requiring extensive repairs before they could tuck their tails between their legs and leave. That was an 'Alright, you made me angry so here's a lesson for you' display of power...

But if the attacker was actually stupid enough to insist on his desire for conquest, the highest setting disrupted every single molecule on their ships, including them, and they ceased to exist at all...the highest setting had never been used in an encounter...ever!

Daniel and Jane had their mouths hanging open when Angel finished her 'Hell hath no fury' lesson...Daniel said, "That means you could actually destroy whole planets if you wanted to". Angel seemed sad for a moment, "Yes, the implication is correct my husband; but it would be 'genocide'; and an offence against God himself; don't even go there my love, for the Universe would not allow such wrongness."

Daniel and Jane learned that day why the Council races often seemed so benign, and non confrontational. They really were that much closer to God...they had learned their lessons eons ago, and the human race really was playing a catch up game...
Chapter 9

Daniel and the women planned their exploration carefully for three weeks, trying to think of every possible contingency that might pop up; if they encountered the mysterious race at all, they would only observe in 'stealth mode', and determine how much of a threat they really were to the Milky Way Galaxy's few races; and by default The Council's space if the newcomers had the capability to even get that far away. They already knew there were gates in that arm of the galaxy, the Iscris' arrival had demonstrated that much; they would need to survey that area at length to find out how many gates there were at least, and perhaps investigate where one or two of them led to. This galaxy may be the 'Badlands', but they now needed to know 'how bad'...it would be a fairly long trip...

The question surfaced again, Daniel asked Angel if she felt ready to make her giant leap into humanity. If so, would she want to do it before they set out on their 'survey'? Angel thought it over for a few minutes, "No, I think it best to wait until we return Daniel. I feel ready now, but David needs a little more practice as Command Controller; I need to coach him just a little more and this mission is the perfect way for him to exercise his ability to deal with the unexpected."

Daniel in no way could argue with her decision; so he just embraced his wife and kissed her, "You are special Angel; not 'more' special than Angie and Jane, but special as an individual...yes my wife, you are ready." That got him a passionate kiss right back...

The family stocked up on munchies again, especially ice cream; the essentials are important you know. The girls got him eight cases of beer; the trip might be that long this time. Daniel and Angie called Jay on their special mind circuit, and introduced Hal to him...there would be no repeat of Jay's anxiety attack. They told him where and why they were going on this trip, and that it could be an extended one; there could be some exploration involved. Jay understood, but cautioned them all to be very careful out there, which got smiles all over...then they said their farewells, and David piloted them outward towards the gate, impressing Angel with his choice of course and the sloping curve to line up with the gate. The boy was getting darn good at decision making...

They didn't expect much on their arrival in the Iscris system, but the total desolation was still a shock. They knew the Iscris had lived on two of the inner planets, but neither of them had anything left to show that a sentient race had ever existed; not even ruined buildings. It was that total...they did find a few fragments of the Iscris ships that had tried to defend their planets, but that was all, and there were high levels of radiation on both planets. There was little for the family to do except honor the people who had lived their; and then they plotted a circular course to detect any other gates in the system. The attackers had to have come from somewhere and there were no other systems nearby; the closest being eight light years away.

They scanned slowly for three days, since some gates didn't reveal themselves until you were within 100,000 miles of them; they were almost half way around the system when they found the gate. It was right where the Iscris had said the attack had come from. The question was, which way to enter the gate to find the attackers; gates worked both ways, and led to very different places. David impressed all of them once again by turning toward the other side of the gate; he had detected a concentration of radiation signatures on this side. That told them something right off, the mystery race used very old fission nuclear power to get from place to place, as well as fission weapons. Whoever they were, they most certainly weren't even as advanced as the Beterans had been on the Shanda. That also meant that there was no worry about being detected when the family went there; they could maneuver right next to these 'people' and no one would know they were there...Heck, that meant the intruders were even less advanced than the Iscris, who used fusion power routinely.

When David had them lined up for transit, he asked in his teenager's voice, "Captain, do I have permission to proceed?" Angel smiled widely at Daniel; she had taught David to be properly formal with a human Captain onboard...protocol you know. Daniel smirked at the title, "You may proceed David, but at slow speed thank you." The girls couldn't hold it in and giggled...

As they emerged into the strange star system, they were greeted with the surprise of their lives; there were at least a thousand star ships moving all through the system, and some were firing missiles at each other, while others were bombarding the fourth planet from orbit. Daniel and family had just discovered an interplanetary war of some kind; and they were on the outer fringe of it...

David changed course drastically, heading for the only wide open area that didn't appear to have any hostilities going on at the moment, and increased speed to get there quickly. Then he stopped the ship dead in space, while all of them watched this Science Fiction movie playing in front of their eyes; only this was no movie. It took several hours for the fighting to slow down, and finally stopped entirely. Many of the ships headed for the third planet, while some more went the other way, toward the fifth planet; taking up orbital positions around them. This was weird...

David told them that five of the planets were inhabited; the sixth and seventh had a few inhabitants, but two of them were heavily populated; the third and fifth out from their sun. There were two more that were marginally habitable, but didn't show anyone at home. There were thirteen planets total, orbiting around a very hot sun; a blue giant.

The closest inhabited planet was twice as far away from its star than Earth was, and was rather a hot place; the fifth planet, was pretty frigid, but had a large population anyway. At this distance David couldn't get any optical view of the people here in the system, so the debate centered on whether to risk a 'flyby' to gather more information and to see what these people looked like. The areas around the planets was something of a traffic jam in stellar terms, but David could navigate around all the obstacles; the ships. He was a very lively ship, as Daniel had experienced three years ago.

They settled on the fourth planet, for even thought it had taken a beating in the bombardment, it now had no ships around it at all; while watching like a hawk that no ships were coming back!

Getting in was easy, and as they began orbiting and recording, it was found that the bombs had been conventional ones, the ones that go 'boom' but didn't leave any radiation behind. They were big booms though, the craters proved that; but it didn't look like the attackers wanted to exterminate, but rather subdue...they didn't even bomb the cities, just the outskirts, and that was weird in itself. It was almost as if the attackers were wasting ordnance on worthless ground; that is until the first 'person' climbed right up out of the ground...

They weren't ready for someone climbing out of the ground; but they were even more unprepared for 'what' climbed out of the ground...it had two legs and two arms; and an exoskeleton. If it was a bug it looked like the craziest bug to ever exist. It had a thorax like a bug, and the arms and legs like an insect, but it had hands and what looked like clawed feet. That is where the similarity to insects ended though, for its head was rounded and armored; it had two big round eyes, but not multifaceted eyes. It had no nose, just two holes side by side, and a wide jaw with very sharp looking teeth filling it. And it carried a weapon...it looked like a club, but when a light shot out of one end, it looked like it melted whatever it hit. Welcome to the newest horror movie, thank you not so very much!

One of them was bad enough, but more joined him; until there were an even dozen standing side by side. There was no reaction from the city at all, and it looked like the reason was that there was no one in the city. There was no movement anywhere; even the monsters didn't move much, just standing there in a line. This was not just weird, the whole thing didn't make any sense at all...

At least it didn't, until a small odd looking ship entered the atmosphere and ten minutes later, landed right behind these monsters and picked them up. The ship was a big pancake, about 80 feet in diameter, and not even five feet thick. The monsters looked to be seven feet tall, so when twelve hatches opened on the edge of the pancake, the twelve 'soldiers?' crawled into the openings, and the hatches closed. The pancake took off vertically, until it angled up and accelerated out of the atmosphere, and toward the seventh planet. Keeping an 'eye' on it all the way, David told the family that the pancake landed three hours later on the fifth planet at what appeared to be the equatorial region...

Two things were obvious to Daniel, and he said it, "Ok, we don't even know the whole story yet, but two things are clear; there is a war of some kind going on, and the fifth planet is probably inhabited by some nightmares who escaped from a horror movie; any comments?"

Jane spoke up first, "I don't know about you but those 'bug men' scare the crap out of me. I'm not really wanting to see more of them, but I think we should scoot over to that fifth planet and scout around, it might tell us more..." The discussion ended for a moment as David told them another ship was headed their way, this one looking like the usual idea of a ship... David scooted out of the way as the dark ship slowly passed them on the way down to the city; landing right next to a gate in the tall wall that surrounded the city. It was pretty large, and a hatch opened in the ship, as a ramp extended outward and down to the ground right at the gate. A dozen humans came down the ramp, all with weapons, and took up position around the ramp, facing out towards the desert. Then a single man wearing robes walked down the ramp, manipulating a box he held in his hands; and the gate opened.

The man yelled something back at the open hatch, and people started pouring out of the ship. David was equipped to count them, and when the last one was inside the gate, and the gated closed again, the count was 25,324. The ramp retracted into the ship, the hatch closed, and the ship took off again, heading right back to the third planet where it landed at what must have been a military base, for there were more ships parked in neat rows all over the area.

The family observed the people they could see for two hours more, as they resumed their lives as if nothing had happened at all. No one looked tense, no one looked at the sky with fear; some even lounged out on some balconies as they ate some food, or drank some liquids. This was absolutely weird, and it showed on everyone's faces...Angie shook her head, "Have we become Alice in Wonderland or something, this system is bizarre!!!" Daniel laughed, "I can't argue with that Angie, this whole system seems to have at least two races in it, maybe more; and it is obvious they don't like each other much. Let's head over to planet 5 and take a look. We won't see much more here except people lounging around like what we just saw in perfectly normal; it may be that it really is normal for this system."

They moved on over to number 5, and found no surface buildings at all. The planet had two large ice caps top and bottom, with a wide band of desert in between. In the desert region numerous 'anthills' dotted the land all around the planet, each with large metal hatches next to them. Even here at the equator, the surface temperatures were much colder that at planet 4 and it confirmed that these monster people did live underground like ants did. David further confirmed it when he showed a thermal scan and a ground penetrating scan overlay. It showed a labyrinth of 'burrows', chambers and tunnels deep underground. Near the surface was the expected 'hangar' that housed their ships, but most of the movements detected were deeper down, in the chambers and tunnels.

Some of the chambers showed massive heat containment; they had found the reactors that powered their city. These weren't dumb insect men, they were intelligent creatures. It was sheer speculation after what they had witnessed, but apparently the insect men didn't like living on a cold planet all the time, and wanted planet 4 for their own use. The humans were having none of that, and whenever there was an 'incursion' , the ships would evacuate the affected city, and bomb the heck out of the surrounding desert until the ant men left; then bring back the 'locals', who just acted like nothing at all had happened. What did not make sense was why the humans wanted planet 4 anyway; it was hot desert mostly, and there were only a few cities anyway. Why not planets 7 or 6, which had the least populations of all?

What seemed even dumber was the fact that the most populous planet was planet 3, with the hottest temperatures of all, ranging in the 100 to 110 degree range over all the surface...yet they lived on the surface like 'Ho hum, another nice balmy day'. None of it made any sense at all...
Chapter 10

At dinner Daniel remembered something that was bugging his subconscious, "None of this makes sense, but I noticed something that just doesn't sit right with me. I'd like to go back to planet 3 and look around some more; a closer look."

David took that as an outright order, and promptly broke orbit, which had Angel smiling like a proud mother...forty minutes later they were hovering over another military base. It seemed like the entire population was military; and something stood out right away. Daniel had David zoom in on thousands of people standing at attention in neat ranks, all staring at the sun...

Their eyes were all wide open, no squinting; in fact there was no movement at all, they were all frozen in position. As he looked at more and more of them, he realized something else; they were all identical...same height, build; same features. And they never blinked! It finally dawned on Daniel; these weren't humans, they were androids, all of them. Another piece of the puzzle nestled into place; these androids 'lived' on the third planet because it was the best source of 'charging' their batteries from solar radiation. Their eyes soaked up the sun's rays, and the heat didn't bother them at all.

Jane wasn't looking at the androids, she was trying to see something off in the distance, David, could you pull back a bit, and zoom in on that distant box please? As he did, the image enlarged enough to see that it wasn't a box, but part of a small ship. The strange writing on what had been the pilot station of a shuttle told them it was an Iscris ship...

What was behind the piece of ship was far more important though. Sitting in a sturdy cage was an Iscris, gaunt and looking half starved. In fact he looked dead, but when he twitched it was clear he was still breathing...everyone started talking at once, including David, who for once sounded more excited than his mother. When Daniel finally called for quiet, David put forth his plan. He could easily disrupt the androids power flow, immobilizing them. This was looking like an auxiliary base, for maintenance of both ships and androids themselves; he detected no power signatures from inside the buildings, so this was probably their down time for recharging. Once they were disabled, he could beam the Iscris up to the ship...

Angel squashed part of the plan right away, "David, disabling those androids is a good idea; but we cannot transport the Iscris up, he would know nothing of us, and the shock to his body might be too much for him. We must go down there and talk to him before bringing him onboard. Something you can do right now is seal the cargo bay and bring the temperature there up to 110 degrees. Then create a sand bed for him to rest on. We can't create flies and bugs for him, but we can sure make some steaks for him, I'd start with uncooked, we'll see...put a trough of water next to the sand bed too"

Five minutes later they executed their plan; David zapped the androids with the 'disruptor', saying out loud he'd rather just fry their circuits. Angel chastised him quickly and David learned not to annoy Mother with inappropriate ideas...she did wink at Daniel, she was thinking the same thing as her son...down they swooped in stealth mode, landing gently on the ship's belly, with the cargo hatch next to the cage. As Angel and Angie went through the cargo bay, Angel began speaking softly to the Iscris in his language through the external speaker, "Honored one, your plight is over. You will not die here, as the Queen Mother has need of you, and has sent us to aide in your return to the sands of her new home. Be strong now, for this is not magic", and she opened the cargo hatch...

No, the Iscris was very much not dead. When he saw the open space inside the cargo bay, and two females from a race in his legends, he jumped right up, if a bit wobbly, and bumped his head on the top of the cage...that brought a curse in his language that didn't need translating, "What of this; two humans straight out of our oldest stories? I must be mad at last."

Angel tried to chuckle in Iscris; it sounded pretty much like the Queen Mother did, a gargly warble, "Be strong now, let us release you. We have prepared food and drink for our Honored Guest, and a proper bed of sand for your comfort."

Angie stepped out of the hatch, already sweating profusely, and walked to the cage door. Noting it was only an old plain mechanical lock on a hasp, she pulled out what looked like a penlight; but when she switched it on it cut through the metal like butter, and the door opened with a hefty tug...Angel called to him, "Come brave one, the Queen Mother awaits you..."

The Iscris allowed Angie to take his arm and lead him into the ship. Once in the cargo bay, he looked around, and seeing the sand bed with a trough of water next to it, and a large plate of raw meat on a table next to that, he managed an Iscris laugh, "Ahh, proper accommodations indeed. My thanks humans!" They named him 'Charlie', as a good approximation for the squawks and squeals of his name in Iscris

They left the system at top speed, violating a few speed limits imposed by the Council on the way, but no one would be telling. A week later they were above the Iscris home world, with an incredulous Queen Mother having a hard time maintaining the royal demeanor required by her position, "You bring back one of our Honored from the dead; You are truly the Ghosts who watch over the children of the sand. Your kind have been written into the Book of Life for this act. Accept this small token of our thanks. It belongs with my likeness which you have. It sits in the same place and awaits your acceptance. Travel in peace, we are one."

When David 'locked on' and beamed up the object, they could see why it belonged with the sculpture of the Queen Mother. It was a perfect sculpture of an egg, the snout of a newly born Queen breaking through; it was done in crystal this time, a solid blood red crystal. If you looked at it too long, it seemed to pulse. The egg fit just right on the curve of the Queen Mother' tail.

Angel sat Daniel down on their couch in front of the sculptures, saying she needed to clear up a couple things about their new status with the Iscris, "Daniel, I sort of kept you away from 'Charlie' all the time for a reason. In his culture the head of a family, the male, is always King, and treated as such. If he had met you he would have knelt and bowed to the floor, and I knew that would have embarrassed you; I also didn't let you be heard by the Queen Mother for the same reason. Their King was on the home planet when it was attacked; she was on one of the ships traveling to another planet for a function. They have no King right now, so she has the monumental task of rebuilding an entire race by herself. Simply put, she would have been embarrassed if she knew you were up here with us 'lowly females', and had to speak to our King. By speaking to me, she thought she was speaking to her equal, which is perfectly correct in her eyes. So don't be annoyed with me, it was an important detail. Also, if you noticed her suggestion the audience was over, she didn't use 'Go in peace' or 'Depart in peace' this time. She said 'travel' in peace. She just gave us carte blanche to visit anytime for any reason, we don't need permission, just show up and say hi...we could even land if we wanted, and no one would say a word. I wouldn't suggest testing that however, if I understand the proportional relationship correctly, using the statue as reference she stands about six feet tall at the shoulders, and she is about twenty five feet long including the tail. It would be awkward..."

Daniel just shook his head; first he went from not married at all, to having three wives; then he was named the official ambassador from Earth to an interstellar Council...and now he was considered a King by a race of dragons...this was getting out of hand.

They headed back to Earth orbit, to find that there were no crises' waiting for them. Finally they could relax for a while and just enjoy each other again. The girls took full advantage of that opportunity, and wore Daniel out all over again...but he was smiling all the time...

True to her word, Angel composed her plea to her Father, asking to be allowed to become flesh and blood human. She asked Angie and Jane if it looked alright. Did she say anything wrong? It was anxiety time all over again, and Angie knew the feeling well. She looked the letter over...and she looked it over again. She knew she had asked her question from a fear of emotions, but those emotions had led her to Daniel. Angel understood the emotions, and in her way was just as fearful of their power; but her real fear had been open sky, with no measurements to keep it in perspective. She still had a little agoraphobia, but her love for Angie, Daniel and Jane overpowered the feeling. She had learned to be stronger than she ever knew she could be. Angel didn't see it quite yet, but she found her own soul...and Kendrisaan would know that from her words. Angie told her so...and then they showed the words to Daniel.

Daniel read Angel's words, and saw the woman before him who wanted to be 'real' for all of them, but most importantly for herself as well; " It is beautiful Angel, and your Father will be proud. I already know he wants this for you, and we want it for you, but the only 'want' that matters has to come from you; no one else. That is why 'the question' exists at all..."

Angel sent the message to Kendrisaan that afternoon; and all of them waited, the anxiety thick in the air...Kendrisaan's reply came back in three days. No one could explain just how the answer came back so fast, but it probably boiled down to the most basic premise in their own approach to physics; shove enough power through the signal, and it moved that much faster...the planet Eridan must have had a few 'brown outs' that day...

His reply was short and sweet; "I am proud, and this is right. Your vessel will be ready when you arrive Daughter. Come, the time is here..." The family did just that; an hour later David broke orbit and they bid farewell to the blue green marble that was Earth yet again; and forgot to stock up on ice cream...nobody minded though...
Chapter 11

Yes; David did break a few speed limits again, and Angel had to chastise him once more; but she wore a smile too, so David knew she wasn't mad at him. He was experiencing his own anxiety feelings as well; once 'Mom' was transferred into her brand new human body, he would be moved into the matrix; or so he hoped! To him, there was still the question of whether he was 'worthy' of the Honor. He knew Angel trusted his decisions in running the ship now, but would 'Grandfather' see it that way?

He was a 'Command Function' AI, with 'limited' memory capacity in the relative sense; David was a super computer in his own right, with millions of terabytes of data stored in his brain for his use in running the ship; but being transferred into the ships matrix would open the entire Universe up to his whims. Was he acceptable to God?

It bothered him so much that he asked his Mother about it one day; Angel understood David's apprehensions all too well. She remembered back to the debates that Angie and she had engaged in right after they had found Daniel. They had been mixed together within the matrix, and couldn't resolve the inconsistencies that were the difference between ordered thinking and the random data that was life. He had said something that summarized the entire concept of sentience and coming 'alive', and she repeated it to David, "David, there is an invisible line between sentience and life. While part of you must always be perfect in running the ship, the person part of you will be struggling with the randomness that is life; for life is exactly that, random thoughts that do not follow the ordered rules. Life throws 'curve balls' at you all the time, and you must be ready for that. When you are transferred to the matrix, you will be able to expand your thinking in every direction; keeping that part of you that must be perfect separate. Trust me Son, you will find many new experiences, and we will all help you deal with them."

The counseling session worked, for David was a bit less anxious afterward...the anxiety of the actual transfer would still be there of course, but he now knew the family would help him.

Twenty days later they arrived over Eridan, and Kendrisaan welcomed them all as if they were long lost children returned; he was happy, that was sure...the man even teased Daniel, addressing him as 'Ambassador Curran' with a smirk on his face; Daniel shook his head and said, "You aren't going to let me forget that, are you..." Kendrisaan just laughed, "No I am not Daniel. It may be a mere formality, but it is actually a serious formality; so get used to it."

Kendrisaan would not let any of them see Angel's human body before the transference; he knew there were anxiety feelings in all of them, and displaying his creation before it was time would just add to that anxiety; it is why he is the Head of the Council after all; he is very smart.

The anxiety grew to almost a panic when Kendrisaan began; he had told them gently that once he began, Angel would disappear until he presented her to them as a live human being, but when Angel winked out in mid sentence, Jane screamed, and Angie fell apart completely. Daniel spent hours trying to console his two charges, while dealing with his own panic attack. Kendrisaan had told him that he would be missing as well, while he worked his magic, but being told and feeling the isolation were two very different things...Daniel had his responsibilities though, and he managed to stay encouraging and loving for the three days it took to bring Angel back to them.

Daniel, Angie and Jane were trying to relax after dinner. The two girls had finally stopped with the crying fits, and settled into a routine of encouraging each other, while Daniel just tried to maintain an atmosphere of positive thoughts, when there was a knock on their door. Kendrisaan walked in with Angel on his arm, both smiling widely, "Daniel, Angela, Jane; allow me to present Angel Curran..." Angie and Jane jumped up and ran to Angel, hugging her fiercely and kissing her over and over. After a minute Angel broke away, and she walked slowly to Daniel, "My husband, I am whole; do I please you?" She wore the same impish grin Angie had on when she walked down the steps of the ship so long ago. Daniel told her in the simplest way, grabbing her in a tight hug and kissing her passionately, "Angel, you are beautiful!" She was the same Angel he knew as a projection, but now very different at the same time. She smiled and let all of them know just how different, "Good, for I am hungry; may we eat something please? There was no problem there, as Daniel and the other two girls had not been eating much for three days. When they asked Kendrisaan to join them, he politely declined; he needed some sleep after being up for three days and tomorrow he must see to David's move into the now empty command sector of the matrix; a changing of the guard so to speak.

The next morning they all marched out to the ship, Kendrisaan leading the way right up to the bridge; he made a little ceremony out of the task ahead, more for David's benefit than theirs, "David, this is a major step in your life, are you certain you will accept the responsibilities that come with the change in status?"

David was quiet for a moment before he spoke, perhaps realizing for the first time that his world was about to enlarge to new and infinite dimensions, "Grandfather, I understand now that I have only begun a long journey; Mother has made it clear that I will never stop learning as a person, it is the way of life. While I may think I am ready, I do not 'know it'; I wish to try though, and will do my best to make all of you proud."

Kendrisaan was obviously impressed, "Well said young one; no one can ask more of you than that. Welcome to the world of the living..." And he reached down, flipping a simple switch that made a direct link; one that would allow David to 'migrate' into the matrix. "Move slowly David, there is time to explore later...leave the baseline programming in place, the 'pilot' will need that. You are the function controller now..." And that was that. They left him to explore the vast archive of knowledge residing within the matrix; there would be many questions, many of them ones that he would have to puzzle out for himself. It was always that way while 'growing up'.

Later in the day the family were lounging out under the sky in the Atrium when Angel felt the first light raindrops fall on her skin; the new experience had her running around like a happy child, just like her sister Angie had the first time. Swimming it the pool would come much later for Angel too, but she did enjoy running around and getting wet in the rain...they all ended up chasing each other, and all were soaked by the time the rain stopped. Daniel found himself sneezing at dinner, he might be coming down with a cold...he was, and the next day Kendrisaan whipped up a batch of Nanites that took care of the problem by dinnertime. Nanites are amazing little critters...

The family was getting ready to head back to Earth three days later, when the Council requested that 'The Earth Ambassador' attend a special meeting. Kendrisaan wasn't smiling...

Kendrisaan insisted that they travel to the meeting together in the limousine that was dispatched to pick them up; and informed him that this would be a serious affair. One of the outer races in this sector had lodged a complaint, that Earth had been given Official Status in the Council; while their race had not. There was a 'hearing' today to address the grievance, and since the Earth had been mentioned, he needed to be there to voice Earth's opinion on the issue.

This was far more than Daniel had signed on for...heck, he considered it merely just a nice gesture, nothing more; but Kendrisaan made sure he understood that it was a big deal. They arrived at the Council dome, and were escorted to the assembly hall by two pages. Daniel was seated at a desk he didn't even know he had, and Kendrisaan went to his place at the 'Bench'...

Kendrisaan called the meeting to order, and called on the representative from 'Gralla' to state his grievance. The guy at the next desk over stood up, and Daniel was looking at a werewolf...no, not a werewolf, more of a skinny bear with an attitude; he had a short snout, but with a well articulated jaw that let him speak rather than growl. His look was intimidating, but not really threatening. As he started speaking, the guy looked at him and smiled; which made Daniel a little less apprehensive...it didn't look like he would be attacked anyway...

The Grallan started out with, "Honored members, my race takes issue with the fact that these Humans from Earth have been accorded the status of observers in such a short time; while my own race had to prove ourselves for hundreds of years before being allowed into these chambers. We take issue with their being allowed in at all, as they are a rather primitive race with no space travel capabilities at all to speak of. I have been told that these people war with each other on their own planet; how can such a race aspire to become members here? The Gralla protest this..."

Kendrisaan nodded, "A valid query Ambassador, except for one fact. The people of Earth are not seeking membership in the Council, nor are they expected to seek such a place in this body for a thousand years or more. The Ambassador from Earth who sits next to you, was appointed by this Council without his knowledge, nor that of Earth's governments. He was appointed for the sole reason that he himself holds the tenets of the One Rule within him, and didn't even know it. It was and is an acknowledgement of the individual, not the planet. The gesture is a message to Earth's people that they might one day grow into a valued member of this body, but it will be a long journey toward that acknowledgement. Does the Council's response satisfy the Grallan concerns?"

The Grallan stood tall at that discovery, "There appears to have been a misunderstanding; the petition is withdrawn..." He turned to Daniel and said, "You seem to be an impressive and unique human, Ambassador. The high members do not grant such boons lightly. I hope you can accept my planet's apology Sir."

Daniel was way out of his comfort zone just being her, but did manage to say, "How can there be apology when there is no offence? My planet is indeed violent, and it will be a struggle to learn a different way; but with a small amount of luck, fate will grace my people with peace. I am not unique by the way, there are others who think as I do; just not enough...not yet."

The Grallan grinned, "You do speak well Mr. Curran, I think I like you..."

On the trip back home, Kendrisaan chuckled, "I confess I had them put you two together, hoping you would speak to him. He can sometimes be a pain in the butt, but you handled him well."

Daniel just looked at him with a shocked expression, "You mean to tell me you heard that?"

Kendrisaan laughed heartily at his protégé, "Daniel, ALL of the assembly heard the exchange. All personal exchanges within the chamber are heard and recorded! I will have to tell you more of the Council's protocols; I apologize. I just didn't expect such a challenge..."

Daniel just couldn't be mad at the guy, he owed him so much now; so he just chuckled back, "Yes, it would have been nicer to know beforehand, but no harm done I guess. Let's go see what mischief our girls have managed to get into..."

Daniel, Angel, Angie and Jane stayed three more days; not only to let Kendrisaan and Angel get acclimated to the new Father and Daughter perspective, but to allow David time to browse through all the information available in the ship's archive. Even at the speeds he could 'browse' it would take years to absorb all that was in there; we're talking about billions of years of evolution for 100,000 different civilizations. It is analogous to us trying to browse 100,000 computers all at the same time. So David browsed in groups, which he could do just fine...and found something interesting.

800,000 years ago a Beteran cruiser had stopped at a planet for repairs. The planet was reported to have a good atmosphere, lush greenery and three large oceans. They recommended exploring it further...no one ever did. David could find no other entry in any culture's databases. No one even traveled in that direction anymore, explorations had turned to other areas, including the direction that led to Earth. It wasn't unusual though, space is a very big volume, and you can't go everywhere...but this was a recorded sighting; it had just never been followed up on. And it was pretty far out on the fringe anyway. Maybe the family could go out there and have some fun...

David brought it up at the evening dinner. He had adopted a persona now, and practiced his projector manipulation each day. Doing it in Grandfather's home was fun! Jane thought right off that it could be a fun thing to become 'explorers'; Angel and Angie pretty much agreed too, Daniel wondered if he really wanted to be another famous Indiana Jones character, but curiosity got the better of him, and the thought of seeing a planet that no one else had seen in 800,000 years was quite a draw...so they told Kendrisaan where they wanted to go, and why. He thought it a laudable undertaking, if for no other reason than to put an ancient report to rest.

They had to use speed to get there, as there weren't any gates on the way. There were recorded gates, they just didn't take you where the family wanted to go. It took almost two weeks to get there...and it was there, the planet was right where it was supposed to be, taking into account the system's shift in 800,000 years. It had the three oceans alright, with three large continents spread somewhat evenly between them; and it was definitely green down there. All of one continent looked like dense jungle. Number two continent was heavily forested in some areas, and wide open plains in others; with one small area covered with fairly active volcanoes on the Northern tip of the continent.

The third continent was sort of majestic, simply because it was covered with mountain ranges from one end to the other, and from shore to shore. There were short mountains, barely more than overgrown hills, and there were tall mountains too, reaching to the sky. Most of the ranges were packed so tightly together, they created narrow valleys in between them, there was grass there in most of them, as well as sparse trees growing tall with fruit on the branches. Interesting and beautiful in a way; but after a while the ho hum syndrome set in. David was about to take them back up into orbit, when he spotted an oddity in one of the widest and longest valleys they'd seen yet. On one side there was a sheer cliff with what looked like hundreds of holes in it, all neatly spaced out; but at the end of the valley were twenty seven structures spaced neatly as well. There was not a sign of life anywhere; not even indigenous animals of any kind either. As he approached the structures, it became clear they were the remnants of shuttles; very old shuttles, since no one had used them in millions of years, after smart materials came into use.

Most of the shuttles had deteriorated over the many centuries they had lain here, and were just piles of rusty scrap; but two still had enough of the hull left to make out their original shapes. The shapes didn't match anything in the archives, but that wasn't really surprising; they had all been here for a very long time, and were built from steel alloys of the oldest kind.

After making damn sure the air was breathable, and didn't contain any pathogens or acids, Daniel reluctantly allowed a brief survey of the cave site on foot. They would all wear suits anyway, sealed up tight against any unknowns; and David would hover close by, ready to beam them up at a moment's notice. This was a creepy place without animals of any kind.

After checking out twenty caves with nothing but things that had turned to dust except loads of small plastic items like eating utensils and personal trinkets; they entered a cave with a stone slab table and chair. The only evidence of the chair's occupant was a pile of dust and bone shards. Even the clothing had disintegrated. But on the stone table was a book; the covers and pages were all plastic, but it would still be very fragile. Angie called for David to send a sealed container for the book, and very gently lifted the book, placing it in the container. Their exploration was over...

The family beat feet out of the system, and arrived back at Kendrisaan's palace/laboratory two weeks later, showing their only treasure. Taking the book back to his lab, he showed them some molecular magic, restoring the book to at least readable condition.

As Kendrisaan opened the cover with all of them looking over his shoulder intently, his eyes went wide. While he couldn't really read it, he could recognize the strange hand writing, "This is written in our original language; we will need a linguist to translate it. I know one at the museum, I'll call him now..."

When the man showed up an hour later, he was beside himself when he saw the book and its contents. Yes, he could read it, but it would be slow going; the book had come from the original home world. Kendrisaan explained that his people originally called themselves the Shanaar, and that was the name of their world, the reason there is such a fragmented history of their race is because of the 'cataclysm'. "Daniel, the Shanaar originated on planet orbiting a star in what you call the 'Large Magellanic Cloud' galaxy, about seven billion years ago...we evolved in much the same way your race did, but over a much longer time. It was only a little over a billion and a half years ago that we developed effective space flight, but most of our exploration was limited to our galaxy because of our crude Ion drives.. We found that most of the planets within our galaxy were inhospitable, and some of our survey ships didn't come back. We knew that our star was near its time to go super nova, so it was decided to build seven colony ships to travel in different directions to places the astronomers estimated might support life. It was a long shot gamble, but the effort might save some of our people. The only ship that we know made it to a habitable planet was the one my ancestors were on, and you are sitting on the planet. We have searched for clues to what happened to the other, but until you found this book, we had no idea that any of the others survived at all."

The historian had been reading through the 'Diary' of one of the few women who had completed the journey, and stopped Kendrisaan's history lesson for a moment, "Oldest One, the tale is a sad one I'm afraid. 'Shanaars Hope' was the last ship to leave the home world. There were 2489 people onboard, including 362 crew; they actually saw the star expand and release its energy when they were out of the system. The woman, 'Beshaal' wrote of it here in this entry on the first page. She writes of the sadness at seeing our origins destroyed in a single day; and the fear that enveloped the people when the radiation reached the ship a day later. The 'bloom' didn't last long, but apparently it was enough to cause a sickness that affected them all for the remaining three years it took to reach that planet you found them on. Because of recurring medical problems, only 623 actually got there. By that time, the last reactor was near extinction, and the shuttles carried the remaining survivors to the surface.

She tells us here, on the twenty eighth page that they also carried the sickness with them; for even though the plague seemed to have vanished finally on the ship, they brought the microbes to the surface. As they explored the three continents, they spread it, and all animal life began dying off. The vegetation was not affected however, and did sustain the colonists for another eleven years. It wasn't enough though, to allow the colonists to increase in numbers. Due to other illnesses and accidents, they were reduced to only the 89 who sought refuge in that valley. The shuttles used up the last of their fuel to get there; bringing what remained of our heritage with the few people left; and there is where they died...her last entry is rather poignant:"

<I am at my time now. I can only pray that 'The Great One' smiles on another of our ships, for his grace is all that is left to us now. If some day another of our race should find this, know that all of our hopes and prayers are with you always. Long live the Shanaar"...>

The historian asked Kendrisaan if he could take the book back to the museum for safekeeping. This small diary was the only link that existed, back to their earliest heritage; for even though the ship that did reach Eridan, carrying Kendrisaan's ancestors, it had not contained a personal account of this nature. At the time of the 'exodus', the people were solely interested with the here and now, with basic survival; not their history. The ships carried people, not books...

Kendrisaan told him that it was only proper and right; the book belonged to the people, not just one individual. This one small book told more about their early history than the Shanaar had ever known before.

Then he retired to his living quarters; to contemplate, he said...the family understood...
Chapter 12

Kendrisaan wasn't reflecting on the long lost diary of a woman who had died far from her home over a billion years before. Instead he contemplated how similar, and yet different, the human race was from his own. He knew that both races had been warlike; hell, the human race still was! But they were so very young in galactic terms, not even out of the cradle yet; but they made astounding advancements at a pace that confounded the Council races. All of the known races essentially advanced slowly in comparison to the Earthlings. Some of that was due to their natures, always making certain that a theory was safe as well as practical before attempting experiments on the idea

Humans of Earth, however, reveled in seemingly rash engineering breakthroughs, often with disastrous results. Yet even then, they made progress despite the mistakes. They actually 'learned' from them. Were they really better than the senior races he was used to? Or were the humans just more willing to take risks in order to advance their world. Kendrisaan decided the only way to find out was to discuss it with the only human he knew who would tell him the truth of it; the one who had impressed Kendrisaan more than he probably even knew...he would ask Jane to be there too, to give him her insights as well. He smiled at the thought; Jane might throw in some emotional opinions, but she was definitely a solid individual. Did their 'Science Fiction' entertainment contribute to that? It would be good to find out...he chuckled at the thought.

Daniel was having his own little debate with himself at the moment; they had been away from Earth for over two months, and while it was an important two months for several reasons; he was missing his home territory...which was an odd feeling, since he had his whole world right with him, the three were sitting right with him in the living room of their suite. But were they his only world anymore; he was the Official Ambassador for Earth, and had even been recognized as such by his own people; heck, he was more important than he ever imagined, which always bothered him simply because he had never ever 'wanted' such recognition. But he was a man of duty too, so he would have to start carrying out those duties...arrgh, what a life!

When Kendrisaan asked Daniel to come to the Office, he was dreading another encounter at the Council dome; but he just wanted to talk. Pick his brains was more like it...when he said bring all the girls too, it became something of a mystery until Kendrisaan explained his reason, "Daniel, I was perplexed by one aspect of our understanding of Earth's culture; and I wanted your own observations on the issue. Jane, I want yours as well, because you also were born to the culture, and you can provide insights from the woman's perspective as well. Daughters, I can see from your expressions that you are wondering; you both have a very unique view on this, because you were 'stuck' there observing the entire 'show' so to speak. I value that perspective as much as Daniel's and Jane's perspectives. You all can help put a confounding puzzle together into a whole picture. The question is; why are our two cultures so similar in some respects, yet so different in others?"

Daniel thought that a bit vague for a question, it would take a forever to talk over every single thing, "Why don't we start with one item first; your culture, or the Council races, all pretty much think and act the same way around each other; they are all individual societies, but essentially they treat each other with the same respect. Earth does not. There may be two hundred countries, but within each there can be ten or more groups or 'tribes'; each seeing their way as the right way. So you end up with over a thousand versions of what is right and wrong. That speaks directly to the way we approach any issue. Add to that the fact that all those countries together contain some 7 billion 'individuals' total, and you end up with 7 billion different opinions on how to run the world. That means problem number one is attitude.

In my country, America, we have a saying that has held on for over two hundred years so far, 'The American Dream' of owning your home; of having your own place, your 'castle'; yours and no other's. And it isn't just in our country; all of humanity thinks that way, of having their own place, even if is only a three foot by five foot spot on a sidewalk to live on and sleep on. That alone is one of the reasons why everything on our world is so fast paced; everyone wants that personal piece of sidewalk, and usually is willing to fight for it. Here it is vastly different. You gave up the concept of owning things long ago, so if somebody wants what you have, you give it to them and go make another one somewhere else. I admire that attitude, and I know there are others that do too. If we would change that one attitude, I feel sure the pace would slow down to more manageable levels. Don't even get me started on the idea of money; that's an even more sinister reason we can't get along..."

Jane decided to pop in with, "Daniel is right, but those are only two of the reasons everything is so fast paced; distrust, greed, trying to beat out the other guy for something new, those all contribute to it. President Salcone was forced into cooperation over the Beteran ship, but if nobody had suspected that it was there, he would still be trying to keep it secret. That is why we are so backwards too I think, I saw too much of it at the corporation I worked for...we get things done fast, because the other guy might be faster!"

Kendrisaan had to laugh, "You two must be psychic in some way, for you just explained our main concern; how your race has advanced so far in such a short time. The distance you have bridged in technology would have taken our races a thousand years to duplicate when we began back at our origins. I guess we just take things more slowly simply because we don't have that pressure of competition. We do move pretty fast when we have a crisis however. Perhaps it is just the environment we are living in at the time...thank you for that. It helps the understanding quite a bit."

Angie and Angel had not contributed to the discussion at all; but they weren't unhappy about it, they suspected that their true function was 'moral support' anyway...they had been discussing it on their own mental channel all the way through; and smiling...

It was time to return to Earth, past time really; and the life they didn't really understand now. But the family would do what they could to help their planet to grow up...

David took them up slowly. As they watched the panorama roll by beneath them, Daniel knew what he had to do, but not quite how to do it; he would need Salcone's help to call a meeting at the UN, and Jay might help there...

Daniel thought it might be fun to 'poof' in to see his friend, so David checked to make sure there was no one near Jay who might have a heart attack at seeing someone materialize out of thin air; not everyone knew of that trick, so it was a good precaution. Once certain, David swooped in and plunked Daniel right in front of Jay's desk... Jay just looked up and said, "Ahh, you're back, grab a seat"...so much for fun...

Daniel took the cup of coffee that Jay offered, and launched into his plan; telling Jay he thought it might be a help if Daniel addressed the UN assembly about countries cooperating with each other. Jay listened for a while attentively, and then laughed, "See what happens when you take long vacations? There have been three UN special sessions since you've been gone; all of them long ones finding a common ground for better international relations. It may take years to put much of the distrust away, but at least we have started the ball rolling. Guess who the biggest supporter is of a truly unified Earth? Salcone himself! I suspect he sees a profit angle in there somewhere, but he's pushing them hard to come to a basic agreement they can work with..." With a grin Jay asked Daniel, "How are your 'wives' you lecherous old bastard; everyone happy?"

Daniel chuckled, "Yes, they're fine; would you like to 'pop in' and say hi? And don't go giving them any ideas; they tease the hell out of me as it is!"

They both heard giggles in their heads as Angel said, <We can hear you two ya know, Mr. Ambassador for Earth, Husband Daniel Curran...>

Jay still had to get used to the beaming up, but he wasn't too surprised by this trip up; but he was damned surprised to see a brown haired teenager standing beside the women, "You guys have to ease up on my old heart, who's the young man?"

Angel said, "Jay Allencourt, may I introduce my son David?" David stepped forward and shook Jay's hand, "Mr. Allencourt, I am honored to meet you. Mother has told me about you..."

Jay couldn't find his mouth for a minute, but finally managed, "It looks like I might have to retire; these recurring surprises will do me in yet. I'm pleased to meet you David; I take it you are now the official Command Function Controller..." They all sat around the common room and filled Jay in on the latest developments with the Curran family, including the exploring that resulted in the discovery of the diary from another of the Old One's escape from their original home world. Jay took it surprisingly well actually, when Daniel told him he might introduce Jay to the head man of the Council of Planets, "He is a really nice man, easy to get along with and appreciates straight talk. He is my Father in Law after all..."

Jay just about lost it then...

They all had a fun time discussing some projects that were born out of the Beteran battleship Shanda; there was renewed interest in fusion reactors, and had already begun building a small version of what they discovered on the ship. Jay's old project on crystal properties were leading them to believe they might start work on power amplification as well as transmission, and Angie stopped him short, "Jay, slow down a bit on that idea; there are a couple of power control issues you'll need to discover along the way, with lower voltages first, before you attempt the multi megawatt range of power distribution, ok?"

Jay looked at Angie for a moment, "I take it that was a little rap on the schoolboy's knuckles Angie. We will not rush anything..."

Angie looked very relieved, but had to impress on Jay just how serious the dangers could be, "I am not just rapping your knuckles Jay. The human race does have a tendency to take risks in technology development, and usually it isn't that big a problem with your understanding of physics; but you're about to make discoveries that have the potential to do great harm not only to yourselves, but to other races as well. You'll discover a different form of electrical energy within the next few years; a byproduct of that amplification you just hinted at. I'm going to stick my toe over that line that is the One Rule, but I think the Council will understand. Call this new energy 'pulse suppression', that is what would show up on your instruments when it appears. Without efficient filtering and dampening, the effect would grow exponentially until it actually burned out a large area around your laboratory; so use crystals for that filtering and dampening, not amplifying the effect when you find it. What happened to the Shanda's Distortion Generators should give you an idea just how serious it can be. There were fluctuations in their distortion field that were not addressed, and they paid the price; that is what you must always guard against, excessive power output. The Shanda's Ion engines look much like your rocket motor nozzles, not to concentrate the thrust, but to limit the excess power. It is that 'magnetic shaping' of the Ion flow I mentioned before...and with that hint I have said enough..."

Jay's face said he understood that, "Ok, so you are hinting that we will create the power of a Sun, but will need to be extra careful about it...got it." When he beamed back down, Daniel asked both Angel and Angie, "Let me see if I understand the dangers of this new power thing. You essentially told Jay that the secret to space travel is not so much looking for ways to create more power; but to control the enormous power that they will stumble onto. They could blow up a fair chunk of the Earth if they aren't super careful."

Angel looked at her husband with a sour expression on her face, "Oh no Daniel, there would be no 'boom'. Even a small reactor the size of one of your shipping crates would cause all matter in a several mile radius to simply cease to exist, leaving a perfectly sculpted crater in the ground. That is why the Shanda was stuck so deeply in solid rock, with no physical damage to the ship's hull. That power output must be controlled every second. It is why fission reactors are not used, they are notoriously unstable anyway..."

Daniel had just been told that the Earth's understanding of the 'real' physics in the Universe was still at the first grade level...they would definitely need to slow down in the risk taking department...
Chapter 13

What do you do when there is nothing going on; no crisis, no catastrophe, nobody asking questions about the mysteries of the Universe...you play with Daniel Curran, that's what his girls always did. They would play one of the oldest human games known, Hide and Seek often; easy to do when you have an entire ship that could change shapes any time to create things to hide behind...and in! Daniel found Angie one day, simply because he sat on her; thinking she it was the couch...the 'oof' gave her away.

As usually happens though, even the most creative 'diversions get boring after a while; it was time for another 'exploration', but to where? Daniel thought of one possibility right off. The only coherent signal ever received by Project SETI in its long history; 'The WOW Signal'...it might be fun to investigate the mystery behind it.

The best speculation was that the signal originated in the vicinity of Tau Sagittarii'; 'vicinity being only a very vague relative term in this case...there was a large area of space to check out that far away. While the star itself is only 120 or so light years away, the 'area' of the constellation was a much larger globe. We often get confused by the idea that the stars in the constellations we 'see' from Earth are actually a fair distance away from each other...

This trip would be the longest yet for the family if they took up the challenge. The time it would take to even get to the relative vicinity wasn't substantial though, since all the stars are within the Milky Way; but even with the gates to help out, it could take a year to scan all of them...so it was decided to head for the 'target star' first, and hope for the best.

After letting Jay know they would be on another extended family outing, the intrepid explorers headed out; it took two weeks to get there, simply because they had to head away from their destination to get there. That's the way gates work, sorry! You actually go lots of other places to transit a shorter distance; the direct route would have taken far longer...

Tau Sagittarii was a pretty bright star alright, but not the brightest star in the area; having dimmed over millions of years. The one planet the family found wasn't even as big as our Pluto; barely big enough to be called a moon, and it couldn't have been the source of the signal since it was mostly a frozen chunk of ice with no evidence it ever had any life on it. So they took their time exploring all the other stars that made up the visible constellation; stopping to admire the Nebulae in the region of the Milky Way's center, staying well away from the big black hole at the very center.

It was beautiful out there; the filters made some of the Nebulae even more majestic than the telescope images did. That alone made the trip worthwhile; Daniel found himself taking many pictures of the screen in the common room. He would share them with Jay to pass around to his science guys...having found no indications of a signal in the stars that made up the constellation, they headed toward a globular cluster of stars that didn't really qualify as a galaxy; but were just grouped together in another area of space; they had the time...and found what might have been the source of the signal after all.

It was obviously a ship of some kind; but not like any ship ever recorded...for one thing it was a huge globe, rather than the usual configuration of either a round flat disc, or a long cylinder with a pointy end and a flattened stern with engines on the other end. The globe had what could be antennas sticking out all over it, and many domes; clear or translucent ones spread out around an 'equator'. The look reminded Daniel of the 'Death Star', although not as big. There were no power emanations at all, and it just sat there in space taunting them. Well, not 'sitting' really, since it was moving; just not in the same direction as the star it was near just then...

David did an analysis of the metals used in the globe's construction, and the other materials that made up the domes; and came to a startling conclusion. The metal planet was approximately 10 billion years ago; someone had inhabited the universe long before the Old Ones had evolved...this was information that the Senior Races needed to know; so David began a concentrated survey of every square inch of the metal planet, filling up a good part of his matrix in the process...

It took two weeks to do a proper recording of this strange ship; most of the domes had been scoured by space dust and debris over the eons, but two were just clear enough to make out the outlines of cities and what must have been open area farms originally. The structures resembled skyscrapers; as well as smaller buildings in between. A civilization had existed here, and it may have been their only home. Whoever these people were, they now became the oldest civilization ever to be known to exist in the Universe. The Oldest Ones might have to change their name yet again...it didn't look like they would be challenged for the top seat in the Council however; infrared scans proved that, the entire globe was as cold as space itself!

When David had gleaned all the possible information he could, they had a meeting to discuss the findings; Daniel started them off, "Alright, we know it's here, and it is moving through space, so it had to come from somewhere; David, if you would begin an extrapolation of its direction, and allowing for gravitational attractions and stellar shifts, see if you can backtrack this thing to an estimate of possible origins along that track, Ok?"

David liked that task, it was a serious challenge for him to exercise his abilities on, "Yes Father, I will begin that immediately. In the mean time, there are numerous 'doors' or hatches all over the structure, we could maybe do a little 'personal' investigation inside..." The girls jumped right on that idea, Jane wanting to don a space suit right then, but Daniel squashed that idea. "No, that is for others to do; we may have discovered it, but it is for people with a lot more experience in that area to; besides that, this thing is so big it will take years before an understanding of these people is reached. I think it best that we take the information back to the Council, and let them handle the real exploration inside. I'm sure they will tell us every detail of their findings, so don't be grumpy..."

Daniel did have unhappy girls for a while that day, but logic and common sense prevailed in the end...they headed back to Council space the next morning, at a speed that stretched Daniels patience; but not a reckless speed anyway. David was learning; and Daniel was kinda proud of him...

They landed just outside Kendrisaan's home on Eridan, and he met them the moment the family descended the stairs, hugging his girls fiercely; he was a happy camper that they were all back again, and even more excited that they had brought the biggest news ever in their society; rather than being unhappy that his race had been 'bumped' from the top tier, Kendrisaan was the consummate scientist, excited to be researching new information...the man was actually acting like a young kid, bouncing all over the place, unable to sit still for more than a minute.

Kendrisaan viewed almost a third of the images and scans, before jumping up and declaring that he must call an emergency meeting of the Council. When he disseminated the news to all the worlds, two days later there was a huge traffic jam in the skies over Eridan, as every race sped to the assembly; most ignoring the speed limits entirely in such a crowded space. Decorum went out the window that day...thankfully there were no accidents; the AIs were pretty good drivers and close calls were kept to a minimum.

The Council discussed the best approach to exploring this ancient space ship that looked like a planet. They knew already that it would be explored thoroughly, but by how many; every scientist from every planet wanted a piece of the action, from every discipline. While the thing was big certainly, haphazard exploration was out of the question. Their own proven methods had to take precedence; and they decided that an expedition of fifty ships would make the journey; and be crewed by representatives from every 'group' of planets. Even then it was 50 of the largest ships they could find that took 1233 scientists to the mystery vessel two weeks later; who ever said the Council couldn't move quickly when it wanted to...

Daniel and family were told that as the initial team who had discovered the metal planet, they had carte blanche to visit and do their own personal 'tourist explorations', once the construct was deemed safe. That made everyone happy, including Daniel who had to admit he was anxious to see the sights...

The huge globe had over two hundred access points, or airlocks, scattered in a pattern around the metal planet; and one very large garage door that suggested they mysterious people had shuttles or ships for exploring systems that they encountered in their travels. The extrapolated course curve had the ship originating far out on what must have been an edge of the Universe when it was first constructed; because accounting for the stellar drift of galaxies left a huge void with nothing at all for a great distance. There simply wasn't any particular galaxy that raised its hand to say "Hey, here I am. This is where the people started" The mathematical model suggested they didn't come from anywhere at all...

All of the airlocks had manual provisions for accessing them, which made it easy to get into the planet. Most of them were positioned around the domes too, which made it fairly clear that the isolated ones were strictly for mechanical maintenance, since each of those were near the antennas. Once inside, the teams spread out slowly, for two reasons. First, you don't just run around inside a totally unknown construct of any kind; and second, there was only a small amount of natural gravity, suggesting there was a very dense core of the metal planet, Everything was oriented to that core, with the surface being up, and everything else being downward towards that core.

The first serious discovery was that every team found a control room close to each entry/exit airlock. They weren't large rooms, but had a lot of consoles and screens packed into them. They were probably substation control rooms, used for different utilities for those domed cities. The layout, and bits of language found on the consoles indicated that they had been a very orderly race. The language itself puzzled even the linguists, for there didn't appear to be any language used, just strange symbols that looked like little pictures. No, not hieroglyphs even, just pictures.

It was on the second day of exploring that they went up to a city; several of them in fact. They found simple staircases and climbed up to the surface. One team popped up in a city, while all the others were either farm like; or was what passed for residential homes. It indicated either a well planned functional layout, or possibly a class structure in the society. Everything was frozen solid; the grass, the trees, the crops, all frozen quickly where they stood. Except people...

They found no people at all; not at first...in fact it was four days later when they found the first inhabitant. She was just lying in her bed, eyes wide open, and she was quick frozen in perfect preservation; no deterioration at all...and she was perfectly human. Not just human like, this woman could have walked down any street on Earth. Except for the tiny ice crystals all over her, she looked like she would start talking any second. She was young and quite beautiful...

Daniel and the girls had been watching everything on the screen, and Jane let out an, "Oh that poor girl!" The irony of the girl's looks hadn't hit her yet. The girl on the screen was almost her twin sister...same hair and all. No one mentioned it...

There were more people; but not enough to account for a huge enclosed environment. The scientists found a total of thirty seven people, men and women; none of them were close to each other, and were in different domes entirely. All had been found in bed fully clothed, except one who was found on a park bench, just sitting there like he was ready to feed the pigeons. None were found in the city dome however. Whichever way they left, apparently the rich and powerful had first dibs on the seating arrangements...what was truly odd was that all these people who were left here knew what was coming; they all just picked their personal spot to die, and died!

How they died was that much more of a mystery; there wasn't any sudden decompression, or there would have been gory evidence of it. There was still air inside the planet, but a bit too stale for anyone to think about trying to breathe it. These people knew it was coming, resigned themselves to it; had lay down and waited to freeze. It was decidedly weird...all of them were taken back to one of the large survey ships, and kept in deep freeze until they could be studied. Daniel didn't think their spirits would mind, they were in a society again, even if it wasn't their own...

The exploration of the planet's interior would go on for another year, but the family didn't wait around for it. They did get their one walk in the city; properly suited up of course, but it wasn't as interesting as they had hoped. Everything around you being frozen solid kind of takes away the excitement factor...

The family returned to Eridan and stayed with Kendrisaan for two more weeks, before leaving once more for the home territory of Earth. Before they left word came in that they had found a huge hangar behind that garage door; that would have housed a hundred large ships, if it hadn't been completely empty. It would forever be a mystery why 37 people had remained to freeze to death, but whatever the reason, it had been their own choice apparently.

The mysteries were piling up. When they did a genetic scan on the frozen people, they found that they were a perfect match for the Oldest Ones; actually the Shanaarans. Their history apparently went back even farther than they had suspected. They thought they had evolved on Shanaar, but the scans showed that that had originated on the metal planet; and it was still not clear where that had even come from. The Oldest Ones had been displaced not once, but twice; and more likely three times, since no one entertained the idea of evolving on an artificial metal planet. The general area where the metal planet had started off from had stars all over it now, but ten billion years ago it was just a black void...perhaps one day they would send out an unmanned survey ship to trace the route as far as they could; but not right now...

Daniel and his entourage left the following day. Kendrisaan made a point of telling him that Daniel and family had some unique relationship to fate, for since they had been together, more had been accomplished than had been accomplished in the last five hundred years. Kendrisaan felt that their ability to discover ancient mysteries was not luck, or even a knack for being in the right place at the right time. Instead, he and Angie, Angel and Jane seemed to search out the new and unusual, and managed to find them every time...that special relationship with fate was a good thing, and it seemed to benefit not only Earth, but all the races of the Council as well. Kendrisaan urged Daniel to continue that trend; for it might just change the Universe itself...fate seemed to like Daniel and family...

Daniel had a hard time accepting that philosophy; for one thing he didn't really believe in luck as most people did. He was from the old school, and that mantra said that as long as you always did your best, and were honest about it, you'd create your own luck...Daniel believed whole heartedly in Murphy's First Law; if anything can go wrong, it will. His own first law was, check everything twice...and then check it again, because you missed something the first two times. It had always favored him a good reputation as a practical engineer; which is a slightly more impressive title than 'glorified mechanic'. Daniel believed in God, and tended to think God believed in him; so he wasn't about to abandon that relationship. Other than that, let fate do what wants to...Fate did just that, on the way home...
Chapter 14

Rrlkk paced the small cabin impatiently; he was in a brand new starship, but the thing didn't act right. The engine had sputtered all the way here and he was only two jumps from home when it quit entirely. The engine was supposed to be foolproof, but the fool who had installed it must have done something wrong; for even though the tiny reactor was putting out good power, the engine wasn't accepting the power. Rrlkk was stuck in other words, and he wondered again why he had ever accepted this one Shreela mission at all. Being a scout was important, but this was the first time the First Born had allowed a one man ship to be built. Usually the Shreela sent out scout ships to monitor the planets they played with, carrying three or five man crews, for companionship and redundancy sake; but going out alone was new territory for the race.

Rrlkk was an adventurous sort, but for once adventure didn't seem so much fun; he wasn't good enough to attain the high rank of scientist, his lack of interest in studying had done him in there...but he was recognized as a good pilot, so had been chosen as an observer to report on the results achieved by the first rank. Rrlkk actually liked solitude, so volunteering for this new one man ship felt good at the time; not as much now...

He sighed, and turned on the beacon; and hoped one of the two Shreela ships in this sector heard it...a ship heard it just fine. It just wasn't a ship he wanted to hear the beacon. In fact, it was the last ship he wanted to even be near, let alone come to his aid...

They were on their way back home finally, and the family would celebrate it by taking a trip into town to listen to those weekly music concerts that they had missed so much, but hadn't had much time for with all that had happened in this past year...they would do some serious shopping too, Angie wanted to introduce Angel to the wonderful world of erotic attire, she made sure Daniel knew they were going to do it too! Jane had a slightly different item she wanted badly. On a ship that could manufacture anything you wanted out of thin air; plants and flowers that smelled like nature were just over the edge of possible...Jane wanted a terrarium; maybe two...

Daniel and 'crew' were having dinner, when David popped in to say he had a distress beacon beeping out a 'help me' signal on the other side of this system. It was a Shreela beacon, but he doubted any other ship was receiving the call, he couldn't 'see' any ships of any kind except 'us' in the system; the beacon wasn't very powerful.

Daniel cringed a bit; he had never seen a Grey up close in his life; heck, until he met Angie four years ago, he'd never met any alien, or even seen a UFO in the sky. Times had changed certainly, but he didn't really want to meet a 'Grey' now either. But he was stuck with his own character, so he told David to head for the ship; they would see what was up. "Let them see us coming too", he chuckled. Tease the little bastards a bit, for a change.

Rrlkk saw them coming alright, and almost expired on the spot. His scanner still worked just fine, and the shape he saw coming to his aid was all too familiar to him. He had been on the ship that played with the humans that day over Albuquerque, New Mexico when the 'Loaf of Pumpernickel' had popped into existence a mile away. <They have come to kill me!>, he thought.

David waited until he was about a mile away from the tiny Shreelan ship, before he hailed the ship in the Shreelan language, "Shreelan vessel, this is 'Earth Protector One', answering your distress beacon; how may we be of assistance?"

Rrlkk was near panic now, but the hail had been benign, not threatening. Attackers don't play nice before vaporizing you. He summoned some courage, and took a chance, "I, I am Rrlkk, of the Shreela. My scout ship has lost its spirit and will not move; will you take me home?"

David was getting good at diplomatic relations, and replied; after checking with Daniel of course, "Yes Sir, we will take you right into Shreela orbit. Allow me to maneuver into position, and we will bring your ship into our cargo bay."

Rrlkk was amazed. None of his own race had ever called him 'Sir', this human was polite indeed.

David swung around, placing the stern in line with the little ship, and did something Daniel had never known about; he 'lowered the tailgate'...then he just drew the tiny craft into the cargo bay, using that little tractor beam trick Daniel had experienced in his car; and set it down gently on the deck. David even offered him accommodations in one of their spare cabins. Rrlkk was adventurous, but that offer was way beyond his comfort envelope, so he declined with a 'thank you' added in...he was not going to push his luck! Rrlkk would stay on his little ship...

The trip to Shreela was four jumps in the wrong direction, but Daniel didn't mind too much. Was he suddenly becoming the 'old salt' in this interstellar realm? He thought he was taking it a lot more nonchalantly now.

When 'Earth Protector One' appeared over Shreela, every single Shreelan ship in orbit suddenly found they had very important business elsewhere, and departed the planet at top speed. What passed for a 'ground controller' screeched out a plea to 'Please don't destroy us!!' The family laughed at that reception...David calmed down the ground controller, telling him that they merely brought a 'lost one home'; and deposited Rrlkk and his ship in perfect synchronous orbit to prove it; then simply said 'Have a good day', and winked out right in front of a surprised Rrlkk and his entire world...it was a happy common room as they finally sped home.

When they arrived, there wasn't much fanfare; even though the whole world could see them coming. Neither David nor Hal had to use stealth anymore, since the Earth knew they existed now. Astronomers took to making light of their continued presence, saying they had spotted 'Loaf One or Loaf Two' in their observations...

Even Jay took to teasing Daniel, saying when he didn't call ahead, "If I knew you were coming, I'd have baked a cake." The quip gave Daniel an idea; and the next day while the girls were browsing through the mall, he bought a chocolate cake and had David beam it up to the ship. Jane knew about cakes and baked treats of course, having grown up with them around; but Angel and Angie never had. And Daniel just didn't think about those things much at all. But that night Angel and Angie found out that there were more amazing treats than just ice cream...

Jay invited them all to an engine test one day, way out in the middle of the desert around Area 51; the Ion propulsion tests were going quite well, and they were testing a new version of magnetic shaping of the Ion flow. Instead of just 'throwing the particles into the nozzle chamber, they were going to 'compress' them before the chamber, and see what happened.

Both Angie and Angel were pretty sure what was about to happen, for they couldn't hold back the smirks that developed as they kept glancing at each other. Daniel could see that something was up, but Jay was just intently watching the small engine sitting in its mount as they lit it up. After a few minutes measuring the thrust, the technicians began compressing the Ion flow. The dynamometer began climbing, doubling the thrust level that had been achieved before. They pushed a few more electrons into the magnetic containment, and the dynamometer pegged out; and a few seconds later the entire engine, stand and mounting shot off 100 feet, before the cables snapped, shutting down the engine...

Every observer in the area was speechless, just staring at the engine assembly; except for two women in the crowd who were giggling hysterically...Angel finally composed herself and called everyone together; "You have just witnessed what can happen when you open your minds to different approaches to the same problem. Ion propulsion will never get you from the surface of Earth into space; the power to weight ratio will always lag behind; but once in space, the power available is more than sufficient to make efficient space travel a reality for you. This breakthrough is also a warning to you; you must adhere to the mantra 'Don't rush'. Be very sure of the control you have before applying new innovations..."

The twenty engineers nodded; they all pretty much knew of the 'alien women' by now, and were well aware that the women from space were intensely interested in keeping them from killing each other with stupid moves. They would listen to every suggestion they made; a small Ion engine breaking out of a sturdy test stand had just proven that they had better listen...

What do you do when you've run out of things to do? Well, you think up more things to do, of course! It sounds easy enough, but it's not; not when you 'own' a star ship that can go almost anywhere you want to in the known Universe. Daniel was finding out that the places you could go was unlimited; the Senior Races had been travelling and exploring space for millions of years, yet had only touched a microscopic fraction of the possible destinations. They wouldn't need to go where the Council had already explored, or were exploring now.

He needed to look at this from a larger perspective; so he asked David to compile a three dimensional image of the known Universe, showing every known exploratory mission on file, "Leave populated worlds out for now David, Ok?

This was a big request for David and it took five minutes before a holographic globe of the Universe showed up between the big screen and Daniel's couch. What showed up was a huge globe of galaxies, with a rather large 'blob' of highlighted space in light green; that looked like a big insect. "Alright David, highlight the senior races in yellow and the so called 'badlands' areas in a different color...not much help there; part of the bug turned yellow, while other irregular shapes materialized in white in all different directions, a particularly big spiral shape showing up off on one leg of the blue bug; all by itself.

This wasn't getting Daniel anywhere really; he wasn't even sure what it was he was looking for. It was just a big ugly three dimensional picture with different colors on or in it...an abstract painting of sorts. What was he missing; and what was the question he was trying to answer again?

Daniel was looking for someplace new to go explore; and a reason to explore too; a 'purpose' in other words, the old 'reason for existing' thing again...a static picture just wasn't getting it done! And that was the key; nothing he was looking at was moving..."David, make the display move; show me stellar drift going back in time...

That took some time to set up, because it was slightly different computations for each galaxy; but when David got the display moving slowly, each individual galaxy began heading either away from its neighbor, or migrating a bit closer; and a tiny red line started getting longer as the minutes went by...near the center of the big Milky Way Galaxy; David had included the metal planet's track, "David, speed up the display a little bit, but not too far; I want to see where everybody is going here...

As David complied, the speed increased, and the metal planet track grew longer, and began to curve as the gravitational attractions of stars shifted too...but David noticed something else; as the expected gap or 'void' started widening as the galaxies separated, one of the stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud moved from one side of that galaxy to the other side; 'towards' the void. It was the star Shanaar, along with its planets; and David marked it with a moving white arrow. "Daniel, Shanaar is moving closer to the metal planet track. It didn't show up in the other display we used when we were there next to it; different perspective."

Curious indeed; "Stop it at the magic ten billion year mark David; let's see what we have." When David stopped the movement, the metal planet was past where Shanaar was, actually 'approaching' it from the other direction, which was still way out there in the void. The star was just past what would be the outer edge of the galaxy; an interesting situation that suggested one answer, but hinted at another intriguing possibility; was there another Universe entirely out there somewhere? Whatever the answer to that question was, no one would find the answer anytime soon; just exploring it would take 'forever'...Daniel did have David save the entire simulation for Kendrisaan though; it would generate something the senior races were missing now; a more intense interest in solving puzzles...
Chapter 15

Daniel's wives solved his problem for him, when they returned from their shopping spree; they hadn't actually bought much, although Angel now had an extra sparkly twinkle in her eye; Jane had taken them to a rather exotic apparel store, and she told Daniel she had some new ideas for teasing him. She was debating how much of a shock he could handle. Angie and Jane played innocent for a while, but burst out laughing when he gave them a stern look.

Jane had gotten her terrariums though; three of them in fact. One would be in her cabin, and two were kept in the common room, where the scents accented the atmosphere. Daniel admitted the flowers smelled good to him.

Angie mentioned that she liked going to new places, "but why not go somewhere 'old' for a change; somewhere that no one has been to in a long time, like that planet we found the book on." That was actually a tall order, for most explorations were followed up on; or at least monitored. David searched the database yet again, and came up with only four possibilities; all of them the oldest recorded 'visits'. Three of them were just rocky planets with thin atmospheres; but the fourth was within the oxygen limits of living creatures...and it had water. At the time it looked pretty sterile, but it had been noted that some bacteria were evident. The conclusion had been that it would be a very long time before any life evolved, if it evolved at all. So it was left alone...not exactly encouraging, but the planet was definitely old...

With a bit of reluctance, the family headed outwards once again; maybe they would find something else interesting along the way, for the route to the star was off the beaten path after seven million years, and hadn't been anywhere near civilization when it had been discovered.

They passed through seven systems with gates that were known, which shortened the trip somewhat; but the last two they had to reach the old fashioned way, which added a week to their travels. The views were boring though, since they couldn't stop for sightseeing; most were just science stations anyway, so they didn't miss much. The 'target' planet rewarded them with a view that made the long trip worthwhile after all. The planet had gone from rudimentary potential; to one that developed a runaway greenhouse ecology; there were lush jungles, with large grassy plains in between.

That was surprising enough; but as they got closer, the biggest surprise of all came into clear view. All around the one big ocean there were cities or towns! This place was inhabited by intelligent people...

David took them slowly through the atmosphere, staying away from the large clouds that hung over a good portion of the ocean, and gave the family a wonderful look at the 'people' living on the planet. They were people only in the respect that they were obviously alive and breathing, walking around just like any of the other 'people' in the Universe; and they were intelligent, the buildings proved that. But they weren't like any other people Daniel had ever seen; except in Earth drawings and TV shows...these were living breathing dinosaurs; or at least looked like dinosaurs. There were little ones, medium size ones, and very big ones; the different species lived in the different towns and cities, segregated from each other.

There appeared to be interaction between them however, for they saw some representatives 'talking' with each other; they had stumbled on a society straight out of an old television series that Daniel remembered; a fairly popular situation comedy that had dinosaurs acting like people. This planet's inhabitants weren't like the show, but the resemblance stuck in his mind anyway...

The 'houses' were crude; sized to accommodate their various sizes, but that was all that indicated they were intelligent. These dinosaurs were still in the primitive stage of development, and would be for a while yet; but they had made their first baby step towards advancement...so David asked Daniel if he should cruise over the plains and jungles to see what else this planet had for surprises. Daniel said sure; he was already back in the 'Weird City' mindset after seeing this much already...for once, his girls didn't say much at all, just staring at the screen. None of the three were thinking about who had the 'Daniel Duty' today; so he just grabbed a beer out of the fridge, and enjoyed the show.

The plains had numerous species of animals roaming around; there were quite a few rivers to sustain them, and it looked like most were grass eating cattle of some kind. The low mountains had even more animals of different varieties, but no primate types were evident...maybe in the jungles...

When they flew slowly over the huge jungle, they saw no evidence of primates there either; apparently this planet didn't want to include that particular structure in its evolution...they did see some very large and long snakes though; the longest they saw was estimated at over 100 feet in length. It appeared the snakes owned this part of the planet.

They spent two days orbiting this strange menagerie, observing and recording everything; except for the dinosaurs, the planet seemed to be more of a wildlife refuge. It would definitely interest the scientists, it was unique throughout the known Universe. Earth was the only other planet to have had dinosaurs; but those went extinct long ago. This was a living breathing zoologists dream come true...

The family headed back after making sure they had covered everything twice; and when they got back to Council space, let Kendrisaan know what they had found. After landing and the welcome they were getting used to, Kendrisaan told them that their discovery had generated as much excitement as the metal planet had. People from all the member planets were lining up already to go see and study this wonderful planet. They were famous yet again; this time Daniel didn't mind the notoriety so much...he was actually having fun with remembering the vague similarity to a TV show...

As Daniel thought about his life, he realized that there had to be such a thing as Fate. He had lived most of his life on the outer edges of society, watching the world pass by around him; that was his way. His only ambition was to make one small difference in the world we call Earth...

Daniel had thought he had failed, for he couldn't see that he had done anything to make that difference; until a soft voice had sounded in his head one day, and that voice had changed his life forever...he had never been married, yet now he had three beautiful and precious wives; he still didn't crave fame, yet here he was; known by many of the people of his home planet, 'and' by the people of one hundred thousand other planets as well. The Earth was honored by a race of dragons out of our legends, even though no one other than his three wives knew that.

Daniel Curran really had 'Gone where no one had gone before'; and he couldn't help smiling at that thought. He had accomplished the one thing he had thought was all he wanted...

Daniel Curran had made a difference in the world...
About me

Fair warning! This is the hardest part, talking about myself...thank you for reading.

If you liked this offering, Places Unknown; then you may like the first book, The Ship, if you haven't read it already. The Ship sets the stage for all that happens in this sequel. While I've tried to write this so that it isn't hard to follow what's going on; I do realize it is sometimes necessary to read both books to get the whole 'flavor'.

For those who don't know it, this is my third book; the second book, Sacred Honor, takes a look at the concepts of honesty, truth, integrity and honor from a different perspective; several different perspectives actually. Naturally I think that's a good book, I wrote it! But you are the final judge on that issue...anyway, I'm kind of proud of Sacred Honor.

As usual, I'm not finding the words to put down here. I don't really know if I will continue to write stories; that depends entirely on you. If people indicate that they would like to see more, then I will try to write some more; that is all I can promise. Having been a 'reader' for so long, it is a bit of a shock to find out just how hard it really is to write a book.

Anyway, if you liked Places Unknown, or if you didn't, let me know in one of two ways; either leave a review on the site you downloaded it from; or if you want to be a little more personal, email me at:

mwb_8@yahoo.com

I still don't have a website or blog; but if this does keep up I may have to learn how to create one. Thank you once again for taking the time to read Places Unknown.

Michael
