Chapter 10: Triumph and Disaster

“Everyone,” Kane called out. “I had to make an official meeting of the recent discovery made by Doctor Aline. This meeting is crucial. I needed to have Ambassador Ifra, myself, Captain William, and Commander Ramírez all available to discuss what’s been found.”

It had been an hour later. Kane had made an official emergency diplomatic meeting that required as many essential people nearby to be present. He felt nervous, but the information was so vital that it could determine all future negotiations and even generations to come.

The room that all four were sitting in was the Captain’s stateroom on the centripetal ring. Ifra was sitting with her tail folded around the vinyl chair. Her eyes were focused on Kane as he stood overlooking the three. Captain William was sitting in the same chair as he was before. Ramírez had a cautious look as he watched Ifra and Kane. However, he kept a content look on his face as he had to listen to the ambassador talk.

“Captain...” Kane addressed him. “Have we got into comms with the Adjunct on the Atra?”

“Not yet,” he replied. “Ambassador Ifra, you said that she was ready to respond to the established meeting?”

“Yes...,” she replied. “Her time will be short, but it should be enough for her to have a window to overhear this meeting.”

“I still question why, as to this importance?” Ramírez questioned.

“We will get to that,” Kane replied.

There was a beep sound that came from the table. The mounted computer tablet gave a signal for the captain to hear it. William looked at the information displayed and nodded.

“That is the adjunct,” the Captain said. “It is audio-only.”

Kane nodded as the captain pressed the button to open the channel between the Gabatrix and the Atra. It turned on immediately as they listened in on the voice that came from it.

“Captain of the Gabatrix,” a female voice called out. The voice sounded a little bit deeper than Ifra’s voice but had a similar accent to it. “This is Adjunct Tara’talar of the Atra,” there were a few clicks in her voice. “Why have I been called?”

Kane responded immediately to the call. “Adjunct, my name is Kane. You already know me when we first contacted you. I am the Ambassador of this peace negotiation between our two peoples. I have called a meeting between all trusted individuals. You and Ambassador Ifra must be made aware of the discovery that has been made in the last couple of hours. The Captain and 2nd in command are also present for this meeting.”

“Explain...” Tara’talar replied in a hesitant tone.

“I will. Everyone ... about an hour ago, Doctor Aline, our chief medical officer on the Gabatrix, had a chance to examine the blood from Ambassador Ifra. She was able to conclude that human DNA and Itrean DNA have a similar trace lineage. We both originated from the same planet.”

“What?” Ramírez replied.

“I ... what?” Ifra replied, shocked as well.

Captain William’s eyes widened a little bit as he put his hand to his beard.

There was silence on the audio portion from Tara’talar. Finally, there was a series of words spoken, followed by chirps, squeaks, and cackles. Once again, Kane had a chance to hear the Itrean language being spoken. It seemed to be directed to Ifra as she also replied in a series of obscure words with chirps, clicks, and cackling sounds. Kane could only imagine that Ifra was confirming what he said out loud to the adjunct.

“Continue ... Ambassador Kane,” Tara’Talar finally said in English.

“Doctor Aline has all her findings. It was discovered by comparing human and Itrean blood together. It leads back to a planet that will all come from ... we call it Earth, but I know what you call it.”

“Itrea...” Ifra replied.

There was a pause as Ifra ensured that the words were translated correctly to the adjunct. Ramírez had a skeptical look on his face. The captain, on the other hand, had remained quiet as if he was thinking about everything.

“There is more to this,” Kane explained. “Ifra ... Tara’Talar ... I suppose you are well aware of the Itrean Pamphlet?”

There was a series of words exchanged between Ifra and the adjunct, but it was only a few seconds. “Yes...,” the adjunct replied.

“I have run an analysis of the drawn continents that depict the sacred homeworld that you call Itrea. The Itrean Pamphlet and Earth are the same millions of years ago. The torn portion of the pamphlet is the only thing from making it a near-perfect match, but right now, it is an 81% match. Your oldest artifact came from our home of human origin.”

“Are you saying that the Itreans ... are dinosaurs?” Ramírez asked.

“It is what the evidence is showing,” Kane replied.

“Dinosaurs?” Ifra asked.

Tara’Talar asked a few words in her language. Ifra replied back as if she was confirming it.

“Explain...” Tara’Talar replied.

“Dinosaurs are what lived millions of years ago on the planet Earth ... err Itrea,” Kane explained. “According to our data, the dinosaurs, or what we chose to call you, lived over a time span of over a hundred million years ago. I had to look up the information, but sometime over 66 million years ago, an asteroid struck the planet. It’s believed that the dinosaurs lost a large amount of their number. It’s what helped the mammals or us ... eventually become the dominant member of the species on Earth.”

Ifra translated the information to Tara’Talar.

“Continue...” Tara’Talar demanded.

“It is ... believed that some of the dinosaurs survived. We had birds that evolved on Earth, including sharks, snakes, lizards, and other reptilian creatures that continue from that time period. They descended from dinosaurs. I had a chance to see that the Shal’rein are sharks. The Yutilians are possibly or maybe similar to what we had that are called Velociraptors. They are small reptilian bird-like creatures known for their feathers. Your race has a little bit of resemblance to them, assuming the evolution continued. I haven’t had a chance to see the Aksren, but from what Ifra told me, they might be similar to Oviraptors.”

“This is...” Ramírez said, almost shaking his head. “Insane...”

Ifra translated the rest of the words to Tara’Talar. There was a pause in the communication as the two Itrean women spoke to each other.

“Kane...” Tara’Talar said. “Do you wish to see an Aksren?”

“Umm ... yes.”

There was a pause as the audio-only communication switched. A 3D image was displayed on the computer tablet. It showed a live feed of a face that Kane had only seen from the models shown by Ifra. The image was that of a reptilian face, but it looked different than Ifra or the Shal’rein that Kane had seen earlier. This face had a snout almost with a pointed beak to it. The large cranial crest protruded from her nose and head. The scales had a combination of red and green colors mixed together. The eyes also had a reptilian look to it. Unlike Ifra, he could see that this Itrean didn’t have feathers on her head.

“You’re an Aksren...” Kane responded in shock.

“The Aksren!” Ramírez replied. “The same race that blew Cipra to pieces?”

“Yes...,” the female image replied. “I am an Aksren. I grew up in the worlds that belonged to the T’rintar clan. I Tara’Talar have ... always...” She paused as she looked at Ifra. She said a few words to each other and then continued. “I always ... fight for T’rintar. The Aksren clan is ... bad.”

“Evil...” Ifra corrected her. “They are evil. Tara’Talar has proven over and over again that the Aksren that fight for clan T’rintar are loyal.”

Ramírez remained skeptical, but he calmed down. The Captain nodded his head.

“Do I look like the ov ... ovo ... riptor?” Tara’Talar asked.

“You do,” Kane said.

The adjunct looked down and did a series of quick nods. She closed down the 3d live feed projection as it switched back over to the audio-only communication.

“I believe,” Kane continued to explain. “That the Itreans lived on Itrea for millions of years. The asteroid impacted Earth. The results were a global extinction-level event..., but there were survivors. I think it’s been shown before that nature reclaims buildings and structures over time. It naturally falls apart if things are left alone.”

“It is true,” the captain said. “We have good examples on Earth after we mostly abandoned it. Within less than two hundred to three hundred years, most of the buildings have decayed and fallen apart. What hasn’t been swallowed up by the oceans is eroding. It wouldn’t take much for a civilization to develop on Earth several million years ago. If you abandon it, within a million years, there would be nothing left of that civilization to count.”

“How could the dinosaurs develop a civilization?” Ramírez asked.

“Maybe a few of those velociraptors survived. Maybe a few of those oviraptors walked away from the asteroid impact and continued to survive. Sharks can evolve, too. I think they are one of the oldest known creatures that existed on Earth. Even Oshun has a sort of shark creature. Give enough time, and they start to evolve to the point that some of them start to walk on land.”

“After an extinction-level event?”

Kane shrugged his shoulders. “I can’t say for certain. Earth went through a rough time period to survive and recover. A civilization would struggle to make it. Maybe they built underground cities. Maybe they got to the point that they needed to find a new world to live on. The Equatis Wreck could have been one of their testing ships. They discovered folding space and abandoned Earth. Sound familiar?”

“Hmmm...,” the captain thought.

“The Equatis Wreck...” Tara’Talar called out. “Can you ... tell us more?”

“The Equatis Wreck is an old alien ship, adjunct,” Kane responded. “It wasn’t made by us. It’s located on Mars, the neighboring planet. It only had one thing that could be salvaged, and that was the technology to fold space.”

“Do you ... believe that our people ... long ago ... we made it?”

“I have no idea. I am just throwing out guesses for everyone to hear. We just don’t know.”

Ifra turned her head. There seemed to be some relief in her eyes.

“It was a matter of time before we would find another sentient race,” she said. “Make sure that you present all this evidence so that I can present this to the clan government.”

“You believe all this?” he asked her.

“Yes,” she replied as she looked at the captain and the executive officer. “I believe that our people were going to find our original world. It was sacred to us even if we started to lose faith that it ever existed. It seems that we were led to you. You have led us to the promised land.”

“The question is ... what happens next?” the captain asked.

There was a short pause as if Ifra had thought things out carefully. She leaned forward a little bit.

“We want Itrea,” she respectfully demanded. “We want Earth.”

“Yes,” Tara’Talar added. “If this is true. We want this planet.”

Kane realized that this had gone entirely in the direction that he wanted. Yes, it might not have been an ideal direction, but it would lead to perhaps the best bargaining chip that the UWA could ever have. It was more valuable than any other planet that the Itreans could ever receive.

“Wait ... are you seriously considering this?” Ramírez asked. “Ambassador, no.”

“What would we gain by giving Earth ... Itrea to you?” Kane said.

“You would have our old warships,” Ifra said. “We would be your partners in the fight against the Aksren and the Shal’rein clans. We wouldn’t just be partners ... you would be our friends.”

The captain nodded as he heard everything.

“Captain. This is Earth! We are just going to give it away?” Ramírez yelled out.

“I believe it would be the best course of action,” Kane said.

“Politicians ... Itrean or not,” Ramírez said as he pointed his finger to Ifra. “We still have people living on that planet. There are still hundreds of millions of people living there. They chose to live there after we made it uninhabitable. Are you proposing that we just ditch them to the enemy that has already conquered one of our colonies? All their warships will be right next to Mars! It’s insane!”

“It would work...,” the captain said.

“Captain ... you can’t be supporting this. It’s madness.”

“With what?” the captain questioned his executive officer. “We gave up on Earth long ago. There is nothing there. If the Itreans want it, then they can have it for all I care. The catch is, of course, the 200 million still living there.”

“We would not force them off the planet,” Ifra said. “Give us Itrea, and we assure you that they will be left alone.”

“What about the fact that Earth ... errr ... Itrea is not suitable for the Itreans to live on?” Kane asked her.

Ifra smiled at him. “You humans apparently don’t have much experience terraforming planets. I saw the video that you showed me of Earth. Our technology and resources can easily fix that. It would take time, of course, but in the end, we would have our homeworld, and the humans living on it would enjoy our company.”

“Wait ... you can restore Earth?” Ramírez asked her.

“Yes. It has some problems with it. It might take about 15 to 20 of your years to clean it all up again, but yes, we can bring it back to normal conditions. Our resources are vast, and we are used to facing harsh environments. We assure you that humans will be treated well, and they will get to benefit from our efforts to make it livable again.”

Ramírez seemed to calm down a little bit the moment that he heard her say that. Kane even smiled upon hearing the news.

“Hmmm...” Ramírez thought. “It seems that I might be a little quick to judge. The Earth First Movement might either thank you or be scared out of their minds with this idea.”

“We ... will need to have the data to confirm,” Tara’Talar said. “Once it is verified by our people, then the peace treaty can be ... ho ... hone ... honored.”

“We agree on that,” Ifra said. “We understand that everything that you have said about the issue of it. Is the information correct? We must confirm it.”

“Good,” Kane said. “You’ll get it.”

“There will be something else as well,” Ifra said. “If all this is true, we will broadcast it to the other clans. It will either encourage them to slow down or think twice about attacking your worlds.”

“Or we can have a full-blown Aksren or Shal’rein fleet on top of us,” Ramírez countered.

“You say that like it isn’t happening at all,” the captain replied to him. “We can have a fleet come and attack us regardless. At least with this, the Aksren might not deploy a bioweapon over Earth. T’rintar would defend Mars from an assault, and with the additional ships, we would have a defense force to help protect ourselves. It is, as you said, Kane. We have nothing but to gain in all this.”

“Alright...,” Ramírez said as he slapped his knees. “I don’t know what else needs to be said about this. If the Itreans can fix Earth, then let them. I guess in the end, we don’t have much choice.”

Ramírez stood up and proceeded to leave the room. There was a moment when Ramírez looked at Kane. He gave the ambassador a slight nod to him and said nothing else. The door opened up as he left the room.

The door closed as Ifra had a big smile on her face. She seemed proud of Kane and what he had accomplished.

“It is time,” Tara’Talar said. “I have ... heard what needs to be said. Yes...,” the adjunct replied. “I will await Ambassador Ifra’s return to the ship. Once the peace treaty is signed and agreed, we will return home.”

“Understood Adjunct,” the Captain replied.

The communication signal ceased between the Atra and the UHN Gabatrix. Ifra, Kane, and the captain looked at each other.

“Do you feel that this is good enough to convince your people to accept the treaty?” Kane asked.

“Yes ... more than enough,” Ifra replied.

“Good...,” the captain said. “I’m happy to see we are getting what we need.”

“You’re not angry with giving up your home planet?”

“I’m not happy with the idea of it. The reality is, though, that we lost Earth long ago. We had to give up on it. With the exception of the Earth First Movement, it’s pretty much a lost cause. We had more than the opportunities and tried to find a way to restore it, but instead, we chose Cebravis as our new world. Once Cebravis was settled, everyone thumbed their nose on Earth. Giving you Earth might as well be handing you a fucked up wasteland. While I might agree that we would have an Itrean fleet right at Mars’ doorstep, I would rather have the T’rintar clan within close proximity to the most important planet to humanity. Mars can’t fall, and if the T’rintar are there, then the Aksren and Shal’rein will back off. We can then receive the ships you send us, operate them ... with your peoples’ help, and then use them to defend the colonies.”

“We almost called Cebravis ‘New Earth,’” Kane added. “Maybe one day, we will simply rename it Earth and rename the original one, Itrea.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I guess we’ll figure it all out,” he turned to look at Ifra. “Ready to head to the conference room to continue our negotiations?”

“Yes,” she said happily. She stood up as Kane replied as well.

“Captain ... thank you,” she told him. “Thank you for your input.”

“Just doing my job. It is ... interesting. I remember always hearing the stories of the dinosaurs. I like to think that you are descended from them. Our galaxy wouldn’t be a completely lonely one.”

“We have many worlds. Maybe you can come and see them someday.”

The captain nodded. “Once these conflicts start to settle down, then yes, I’ll take my wife and come visit your worlds.”

Kane held out his arm as Ifra used her claws to wrap around it. The captain had one last thing to say.

“You know ... you were lucky to catch on to think the pamphlet is Earth.”

“How so?”

“It’s obvious when you think of it. None of us in this room were born on Earth. It’s a forgotten relic. I wouldn’t have spotted it. Anybody that grew up on Earth would have looked at that pamphlet and knew instantly that it was their planet. You might have had a hint from the DNA evidence, but in the end, the credit goes to you for this discovery.”

“Yes, I agree,” Ifra added as Kane nodded. “Captain ... take care.”

“You too, Ambassadors...”

Kane and Ifra walked out of the room together. The captain watched as the two left his room. The door slid closed as William looked at the drawer of his desk. He undid the lock and pulled out a metal lid. He removed the clasp, and it opened up for him to see.

The captain put his finger into the metal box and pulled out the cigar that Ramírez gave him. He admired the look of it and took a deep breath.

“Looks like I will get a chance to smoke you after all,” the captain said out loud. He reached over and undid the Velcro chest pocket before slipping it in perfectly. He checked to make sure that his one match was in there, waiting for him to light it up when he needed it. A smile appeared on his face.

Outside the room, Kane was walking down the ring passageway with Ifra. They strolled as they spoke to one another.

“Kane ... thank you for all of this,” she told him.

“I’m just amazed by the discovery,” he replied. “I didn’t think it was possible, but it did.”

“Itrea ... Itrea...,” she said with a soft-spoken glee. “We do believe in destiny. Your people will save us, we will save you, and we will have the sacred homeworld to rebuild together.”

“You really believe the DNA evidence and additional evidence I told you earlier?”

“I believed it immediately once you said it. I just ... I just feel that it is. It seems to make sense. I see the child with Kelren and Ven’re, and I know we have a chance to survive. I can rest knowing that I can have you as a mate. I can rest knowing that if I get pregnant, the baby boy won’t die in my womb. I can rest as we settle down and live our lives on Itrea. Our people will let everyone know that we found the homeworld of our birth.”