First Contact (5.3)

After their trip to Lask's Capitol Library, Trib led the team to a teleporter in the Library lobby. After he pressed a few preset buttons the machine dropped them off at another machine on the corner of a street dotted with much smaller buildings. As Trib led them down the quiet street the team noticed that, like most of the buildings on Lask, these single story buildings were also made of packed sand bricks. Small gardens of desert friendly plants adorned the yards around these small square buildings. The large towers of the city couldn't even be seen on the horizon.

After passing a few buildings, Trib led them toward the door of his own home. The front of his home was carved in a stacked ripple design as though the sandblown winds had naturally created the design over time. A swirled design decorated the small wood front door.

"No windows?" Laurie asked.

"The living space is all underground to shelter the occupants from this hot, hazy weather," Trib answered before he remembered that the team couldn't feel the weather through their protective suits.

He tugged open the front door to reveal a dark set of steps leading down into the ground. The stairway lit up as Trib stepped through the door leading the team into his home.

"But the house extends out above ground as well," Captain Mitchell noted before passing over the threshold.

Trib paused for a moment, midway down the stairwell.

"I… don't have your word for it," Trib pondered outloud, "Um, storage?"

"Oh! Like an attic!" Dr. Kingston exclaimed with a grin!

Trib shrugged in agreement since the rest of the team seemed to also agree with Dr. Kingston's word choice.

The Star Traveler crew followed Trib down the flight of stone steps that opened up at the bottom into a large room decorated with star maps, different landscapes, and architecture that were all much more diverse than the sights the crew had seen since landing on Lask. The room resembled a study more than a living room. Multiple bookshelves overflowing with papers and books lined the walls. Two large desks also littered with papers and books monopolized the middle of the room.

"I spend most of my time outside of my home, working," said Trib, commenting on the state of the room.

"Now where did I put those disks about Exandra? Ah there they are," he said, digging them out from under a pile of papers and objects on one of his desks

Trib's people were not accustomed to sitting in chairs. The crew of the Star Traveler found pillows they could sit on, and arranged themselves in a horseshoe formation. Although more flexible than spacesuits of the past, it took some maneuvering to find a comfortable position.

Trib put the disks into a slot in the wall. Then the crew's eyes widened in surprise as images started to appear suspended in the middle of the room. The images twisted and turned, showing all the different plants and creatures that the Laskonians had thus far cataloged on Exandra.

As he slid another disk into the wall, a holographic image of Exandra, as seen from space, formed in the middle of the room. The image dissolved and different pictures of specimens or artifacts from Exandra appeared in full 3-dimensional color. Turning in midair it was tempting to reach out and touch the vibrant colors.

"Exandra appears Earth-like, except that everything is on a larger scale; there is only one land mass, one ocean, and the animals can talk," Dr. Smith said, taking notes.

"One more thing," Trib interjected, "Exandra's weather cycle incudes a violent winter every quindecennial… in other words, every fifteen years. It usually lasts for a full six months. We call it Nichaeljen; it brings severe snowstorms and plummeting temperatures. Of course then it takes several months for the snow pack to actually melt."

"Something we may want to warn EASA about if they plan on sending more people to establish a colony there," Eli commented.

Trib nodded in agreement.

"Has anyone from your planet who has visited Exandra seen a cylinder similar to this one, or something with the same characters?" Laurie asked, projecting an image from her MTD.

"Not to my knowledge," Trib replied, "but then, we haven't explored the entire surface. I will ask around, though. Perhaps someone has heard something."

Armed with the information from Trib, the crew of the Star Traveler delivered Trib back to his ship on Exandra. They then continued their research on the colony site, their search for the alien cylinders. Each day they reported their findings to EASA and added information that would be particularly helpful to the manifests and selection of colony members.

As the plans for the new colony progressed, EASA asked the Star Traveler to return to Earth in order to lead the colonial mission. Upon landing at the EASA headquarters, they found that it was, shockingly, teeming with life. As the crew disembarked from their ship, they were met by four EASA escorts. The Star Traveler crew followed the four EASA employees down the tarmac, into the main building, and through a maze of hallways.

The EASA employees ushered the crew through a final doorway and large room filled with the din of many people talking at once. The crew looked over the large group of people assembled before noticing a group of scientists waving them toward the front of the room. As the space travelers were led forward, the EASA employees quieted the room and asked for everyone to take their seats. The occupants shuffled around to find their designated seating arrangements and EASA officials took their seats behind a long table at the front of the room before beginning the introductions.

"We drew from a large pool of applicants from around the globe and on the moon. Those that qualified have been allocated among our first five ships," a woman at the center of the table began.

"EASA will be notified when a colony is well established and ready to accept more immigrants," an official beside her added.

*****

Escorted by the Star Traveler, five Exandra Colony ships (nicknamed EC ships) brought the compliment of three hundred volunteers to the designated colony site. The volunteers slowly trickled out of the ships to be greeted by the Laskonians who had come to offer their assistance in the building of the new colony. While many of the volunteers were hesitant to interact with the Laskonians, it wasn't long before the strangeness of meeting their green skinned antennaed neighbors wore off. The Laskonians friendly demeanor and helpfulness soon overruled the humans' wariness.

The chosen volunteers had been allowed to bring their families on the voyage. The adults busied themselves with the unloading of the ships and unfolding the prefabricated homes while the children fanned off in different directions. A group of children ran off down to the coast line that was just barely visible from the landing area while a few others chased the huge, flying grasshopper-like insects through the grasses behind the landing area.

In order for the colony to be fully functional and self-sustaining each ship carried materials and supplies needed to build homes, farms, and other necessary colony facilities. The most complex and arguably most important facility was the large dome shape Central Station which would house the colony hospital, the travel coordination office, and serve as a hub for the colony utilities.

*****

"There are more of them now!" Neb exclaimed, as he came into the room that Jean had been given inside the Platonian base.

Jean felt imprisoned in her dreary and dimly lit room. She comforted herself by thinking this must be the way the Platonians lived, surely they wouldn't treat her unkindly. She sighed, how would she know, they never let her out. Because she wasn't being mistreated or harmed, Jean had eventually pushed her apprehension about her quarters aside and began to relax.

She spent most of her time reading books on her personal handheld computer. The small window aimed toward the sky, providing her only source of sunlight, projected a concentrated square of light into the middle of the room. She figured out that if she moved the desk to the middle of the room under the circle of light she could set her computer in the light to charge. Today, Neb found her sitting on the floor, legs crossed, her back propped against the side of the bed. Jean looked up at him, the light of her computer screen illuminating her face.

"Too bad it isn't winter," Jean said after a moment.

"What do you mean?" Neb asked.

"I have been looking at the information you gave me on the equipment at the colony site. They are ill- prepared for any cold weather. They would probably leave, if just for a short while, if it got really cold and stormy. Even if they didn't leave, they would all be forced to stay right where the colony is; that would at least give us more time to think about how we could stop them," Jean mused, as she put her computer down and stretched her arms over her head.

"Then it is too bad that it is not winter," Neb replied, his pointy teeth showing through his grin‒a grin that never ceased to unsettle Jean.

*****

After the colony was built, Trib and the other Laskonians returned home. Soon after Trib got back, however, the Laskonian leader, Admiral Lenoir, called Trib to his office. Trib arrived to find two scientists from Lask's weather council waiting on him. Admiral Lenoir's office served as the hub of the Laskonian Government. Video screens lined the back wall of the room giving him video feeds from various departments all over the planet. The Admiral's desk was covered in neatly stacked piles of papers, and shelves lining the sides of the room also featured stacks of notebooks and papers. A smaller screen featuring scrolling posts lay on the Admirals desk and vibrated every few moments demanding his attention.

"What's going on?" Trib asked, knowing that the Admiral was typically very busy and wouldn't have called this meeting without reason.

"The human colony is in grave danger." Admiral Lenoir replied.

"How so?"

"There is a huge winter storm brewing and it is headed straight for the colony." One of the scientists answered.

The second scientist passed Trib a screen showing imagery and data from the brewing storm.

"It's way too early for this isn't it?" Trib asked.

"We aren't sure what is going on," The scientist answered, "But if they don't prepare now they could be in trouble. If this is Nichaeljen, once the snow starts to fall no one will be able to reach them for six months."

"This isn't good. Their homes aren't prepared for the levels of extreme low temperatures that Nichaeljen typically brings," Trib explained.

"Do you think they will head back to their home planet? We could offer to host them here on Lask till the storm is over," Admiral Lenoir suggested.

"I'll head back with this news and see what they want to do. How long do they have?"

"Two days," The second scientist announced with a grave expression.