mirevolver

Here is some more of "The Future Reaches Out" to help set the story in motion.

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They stepped into a moderately sized room with a desk in one corner, a table with chairs in another corner and in front of them were three comfortable looking chairs arranged in a triangular pattern, all facing a small table in the middle. In one of those chairs, was a Tellen man who stood upon the arrival of John.

“Hello,” the Tellen said, extending a hand toward John, “I am Liynuk, the captain of this ship.”

“Hello,” John replied, shaking Liynuk’s hand, “I’m Ambassador John Moss of the United Worlds of Sol.”

“I am very pleased to meet you.” Liynuk smiled, then gestured toward the chairs in front of him. “Please, sit. There is much I would like to discuss. As I am sure there is much you would like to discuss.”

“You’re right,” John said as he and Shyaln’tal sat down. “Though the biggest question on my mind is, Ambassador Shyaln’tal said that you have been studying us for a very long time. How were you studying us?”

Liynuk spoke first, “Roughly two hundred of your years ago, one of our ships near your star system began picking up electronic transmissions from your planet. At first it was audio broadcasts only, what you called radio. Then, one day, as we were monitoring the broadcasts, there was massive EM interference. We traced it to a nuclear explosion on your North American continent. Twenty-one days later, as we watched from orbit, there was another nuclear explosion on the island of Japan. As we watched the second nuclear explosion in Japan, we knew without a doubt that you had entered the nuclear age, and that soon you would travel into space.

“So we pulled back to your ninth planet and continued to watch from there. Soon we began picking up your television broadcasts. And after we isolated the various languages being used, we identified the most commonly used language in all the transmissions we were receiving, and worked on translating it. Once we were able to understand your language, we watched the broadcasts to understand you better. After a few years of that, we started to translate other languages. We have also kept a ship, like this one, at the edge of your star system to watch and wait.”

“Wait?” John questioned, “You mean wait for us to venture out to you?”

“Yes,” Shyaln’tal answered. “We have been here for ten months, and plan to head back to our home world in another five. Now you said you were on vacation just before you passed out. The ninth planet of your star system seems like an odd vacation spot, according to our scans, it and its moon are just dark masses of rock and ice.”

“Well, it’s not a vacation in the traditional sense of the word.” John countered, “I’m actually here to run surface scans of Pluto to help in the planning of a future colony. But as I’m an Ambassador to the nations of Earth, this is a vacation from my everyday duties.”

“We have very extensive plans of the planet. I could arrange for you to have a copy of the results.” Liynuk offered.

“That would be most helpful.” John replied. After taking a brief pause to think over his next question, he spoke, “You mentioned you would go back to your home world in another five months. How far away is it?”

“Our home planet is called, Nertel. It is about sixty of your light-years away.” Liynuk answered.

John was shocked, “Sixty light-years!”

“Yes,” Shyaln’tal replied. “It requires an eight day trip.”

“Eight days!” John couldn’t believe his ears. “I’m sorry, but we had a brilliant man in the twentieth century named Albert Einstein, he came to the conclusion that only something without mass could travel at the speed of light and nothing could travel faster than light.”

“We know about Einstein, and he was correct.” Shyaln’tal acknowledged. “But he had a limited view of things. Though, he did have a much broader view than we had expected as he theorized that space is curved. That is where the key lies, instead of traveling along the curve of space, we jump across the middle by creating a tunnel through the subspace.”

“A wormhole.” John interrupted.

“A what?” Shyaln’tal said with confusion.

“A wormhole.” John repeated, “It’s a theory about the possibility of creating a tunnel between two points in space which would allow for an object to quickly travel from one point along the space-time curve to another point. We refer to this theoretical tunnel as a wormhole. But as far as we know, it’s only a theory.”

“Well,” Shyaln’tal said, “It is not a theory to us. That is how we travel across great distances in space. Without the use of, ‘wormholes,’ it would take us years to make a trip that we can do in days.”

“But how?” John inquired, “To us, it’s only a theory; a possibility that might happen between two black holes.”

“What you described is a natural wormhole,” Liynuk said. “But natural wormholes are highly unstable and unpredictable. We have an artificial means of jumping through subspace.”

“I see.” John said. “Well, there is only one more pressing question in my mind at this point. I’m assuming you are not the only species out there.”

“Correct.” Answered Shyaln’tal.

“Good.” John continued, “Two years ago, my father disappeared. At the time he was very sick, but he came to me and said he had a dream and that everything would be all right. That night he took a spacecraft and headed toward the sun, five days later we found his craft in orbit around the sun, but he wasn’t on board. The access hatch was sealed from the inside and the emergency hatch was also locked down. Now, as you have told me that you have been watching my star system, I was wondering if you could shed some light on this mystery.”

Liynuk and Shyaln’tal looked at each other. “Keln’kareen?” Shyaln’tal said.

“Seech.” Liynuk replied, “Ta priynra sra fyata Poloni?”

“Seech.” Shyaln’tal agreed, “Chash suntra’yu vot.”

“You have just helped us to solve a mystery of our own.” Liynuk said to John. “There are two races that could have done that. The first is the Verons. But this in not their style, we have enough evidence that it would not point to them.”

“And the second?” John asked.

“The second is where it gets interesting.” Shyaln’tal said. “The only other race that could fit the description is a legend.”

“A legend?” John pressed.

“Yes,” Shyaln’tal continued. “We have stories and legends passed to us from other races about a race called the Poloni. They are an ancient race, possibly as old as time itself. Our earliest stories of them date back over a million years. They were in a war with some powerful force, this war ended with the Poloni victorious. But the dark force they were fighting vowed to return one day.

“Since then, the Poloni created agents to watch for this force. The best translation into your language for them is, ‘Mages’. But roughly two thousand years ago, the Poloni left. They retreated to their home world, and the only explanation they gave was, ‘To prepare for the future.’ But the Mages stayed out and continued to watch for the ancient force, until about a thousand years ago. Then the Mages also left, they said they needed to help the Poloni. And that is where the stories end.”

“And you think that these ‘Poloni,’ took my father?” John questioned.

“It has to do with one such story, passed to us by a race called, the Katta’an.” Shyaln’tal said as Liynuk got up crossed the room and began pouring some drinks. “As the Katta’an reached a point where they began traveling beyond their own star system, one of their key political figures disappeared while traveling between planets. The way they describe it is there was a massive subspace anomaly that appeared along his flight path, was there for a few minutes, then disappeared. When the spacecraft they sent to investigate arrived, they found this person’s spacecraft floating in space and nobody was on board.”

Liynuk returned holding a tray with three glasses filled with a purple liquid. He placed the tray on the small table in the middle of the chairs and handed one glass to Shyaln’tal and another glass to John. “It is Slanden wine,” he said, “from the Slanden peninsula on our home world.”

John took the glass and watched as Liynuk took the remaining glass and as he stood before John and Liynuk, he said, “I believe humans have a custom to propose a toast in matters such as this.”

“We do.” John replied, holding his glass up. Shyaln’tal and Liynuk followed his example.

“Then I have this toast to propose.” Liynuk declared, “To a long friendship between the Humans and the Tellens.”

John raised his glass and said, “To friendship.” He brought his glass to his lips and drank the wine. It was oddly familiar in taste to red wine. Liynuk and Shyaln’tal followed his example and drank their glasses of wine.

Shyaln’tal continued his story. “Two years ago, we saw a massive subspace anomaly near your sun. It was only there for a few minutes, and we had no idea what it was. But now with what you have said about your father, I think the Poloni were involved. And to be honest, it worries me a little bit.”

“Why’s that?” John asked.

“Because, from what we know about the Poloni, when they become interested in a person, their interest does not stop there. They become interested in the entire genetic succession from that person. Which means that they might be watching you.”

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Aside from my great plans to become the future dictator of the moon, I have little interest in political discussions.