Chapter 6: The Second Day of Negotiations

“Well, the good news is that the virus is not going to harm us,” Aline said as she stood before her computer screen. Her left hand was at her right hand. She was busy pressing a couple of keys on her projection screen.

It was now morning as Kane stood in the medical lab. He could feel the weightless environment as before. The night had passed as he remembered what he saw in the email sent to him. It weighed heavily on his mind. Instead, he had his hand to his chin as he contemplated things and listened to the doctor.

“I went and analyzed the virus thoroughly,” Aline told him. “It’s very unique. I had a chance to study both the physiology of Ifra and the virus she carries.”

“She called it ‘Zilik’s Disease,’” he explained to her. “I heard it’s also called ‘Zilik’s Syndrome.’ Apparently, some doctor or scientist decided that it was best to wipe out the male population in hopes of stopping the clan wars within the Itreans themselves. She apparently managed to succeed in wiping out the males, but it didn’t stop the war.”

“Well ... she is right. This disease is unusual,” Aline said as she changed the overhead projection by the medical bed. It began to display an image of the virus itself. Then, the projection was altered to show a graphical depiction of the DNA coding inside the virus. The DNA started to rotate on the display.

“This,” the doctor explained. “This is what the virus is. You are looking at its blueprint. It is a virus designed to kill a specific type of Itrean.”

“According to Ifra, there are three races of the Itreans as a whole. The Yutilians, the Aksren, and the Shal’rein were all hit equally by this virus. It succeeded in wiping out all the males within two weeks.”

“I can tell you more, just from looking at it,” Aline replied. “This virus is designed to lay dormant in the bloodstream. It’s invisible to most scanners. In fact, only a deep tunneling scan could even highlight the thing. It was why this thing couldn’t be picked up by the scanners in the passageway. The virus will not attack unless several weeks go by. I can also tell that there is some sort of activation signal in the DNA block itself.”

“Are you sure we’re not in any danger?”

“No. I have had blood cells placed in front of it. Even though they have been long-activated, the virus simply ignores human blood. I even tried male and female blood, and the results were the same. We are not Itreans, so it won’t hurt us.”

“It’s just crazy,” he commented. “To see a virus like this and how it operates.”

“A virus is the most simple form of life. To use it as a weapon is not much different than what we did so long ago. What is interesting is that the DNA blocks in this virus are designed to ignore the X chromosome completely. It’s why she is alive right now. If this virus saw an Itrean with a Y chromosome, it would seek out and destroy the body. Only something human-made, err ... Itrean made could do this. This thing would even kill male babies if it wanted to. If the Itreans have no males, then there is a clear reason as to why.”

“Unfortunately, I only know so much information,” Kane commented. “Do we have the ability to make something like this?”

“I only know so much. The engineering to construct a virus like this is insane. We might have the ability, but it’s very specific in how it functions.”

“Ifra told me that the virus was created by an expert scientist. Apparently, they used biological warfare on each other, just like other weapons.”

“If they have a lot of experience in this, then it would explain it. I can’t imagine what it must have been like for them. One day, you wake up, and the other men start to die. You bring them to the hospital just to watch others die or get sick. Quarantine is issued, but it does little to nothing to stop it. From the way this thing works, you have to tell it to activate it. If I were this Zilik, I would have had it designed so it would wait for a while till everyone had it and then activate it. In less than a year or two, every male Itrean would have the disease, and then ... pop! You activate the virus and watch the male population die off. Horrible ... just horrible.”

“I can’t imagine what it must have been like for them, too,” Kane said. “This must have impacted their society greatly. Do you know if we can be cleaned from the virus?”

“No ... in fact, we will all have it in our system whenever we associate with them. We won’t have to worry about it hurting us, but we will be carriers of the disease. If there were some other male Itrean out there, we would spread the disease to them, and they could die from it. I am going to look into a way we can have it completely eliminated from our system, but ... I imagine the Itreans have been doing this for a very long time. If they don’t have the cure, then we are beyond all years from ever achieving what they managed to accomplish.”

“Ifra told me that her body had been altered by genetics for a long time. Actually, she said that all Itreans have been genetically modified to various degrees. She even showed surprise with my augmented arm.”

“Me too. Without having past Itreans to compare, it will be difficult to do that. If the Itreans mastered genetic engineering, they might not need to have augmentation or mechanical organs. They would look at all this and think we are silly for doing it.”

“Unfortunately, I need answers,” Kane said. “What I saw in the email last night shocked me, to say the least.”

“I know ... I wasn’t expecting that either.”

“Do you think it is possible? Are we truly that compatible with them?”

Aline went and took her arm and began keying in new commands. The display screen switched over to show a DNA chain. The swirling array of circles started to appear. It then displayed what looked like a series of X’s on the screen. There were twenty-three in total.

“I want you to take a look at this, Kane,” the doctor told him. “What do you see?”

“These ... I think they are chromosomes if I still remember my biology class.”

“That’s correct. These are DNA molecules that connect to genetic material. This is what makes you ... well, you. The threadlike structures will connect together to form those lovely little x shapes that you see. You have forty-six or twenty-three pairs. The last one of the group is what makes us male or female. The female will have an X, and the male will have a Y. That little difference is what makes our genders. Our concept of life reflects around this basic principle. All living animals have different numbers of chromosomes. The virus that the Itreans have will search for that little Y shape and target the host. There are some things though that you should know...”

“Like what?”

“Humans have twenty-three base pairs. The Itreans have forty, but it doesn’t make them better or different from us. Some animals on Earth had more or less. Sometimes, we can find similarities between other animals and us from former Earth. For example, Humans and chickens share about a 65% similarity in DNA. Humans and the extinct chimps share about 98%. This, however, puzzles me. Do all alien life forms need to have base pairs like these to survive? Do they need to have a Y chromosome to make them male or female? I know that some animal species will have XYY and XXYY chromosomes. The fact is, Ambassador, I looked at this, and it made me wonder just as much as you did. From what I see here, they have a female. They claim they had males.”

“She even had breasts...”

“Yes, she did.”

“I’m surprised at that, though,” Kane commented. “She looks reptilian in nature. Don’t reptiles avoid nursing their young?”

“From past archives on our knowledge of reptiles, it is rare. There is a reptilian-like creature on Oshun where the mother sheds its skin and converts it into proteins and fats that the young can feed off of. Insects and some birds on former Earth even generated milk to feed their young. There are advantages to having breasts. We, as a species, keep our babies close. We take a long time to reach adulthood, and we have to have longer times to provide nursing in return. Evolution-wise, it makes sense for mammals to have them. I don’t see a reason why reptiles like the Itreans couldn’t have breasts either.”

“Hmmm ... it just from what I saw in the pictures from that email. Are we truly compatible with the Itreans?”

“With our technology, the answer would be no. A male human could not impregnate an Itrean woman. The DNA blocks here show that would be impossible.”

“Yet the picture shows differently...”

“I said with our technology ... I don’t know about the Itreans. Perhaps the masters in genetic engineering may have the ability that we lack. There was a unique paper that was written a while back that I know about. Do you know of Doctor Aarnov?”

“My history has never been good, Doctor. I don’t.”

Aline smiled. “It is alright. Even this is advanced knowledge. I had to research a random doctor in physiology on Venus. The one I researched was Doctor Aarnov. Aarnov was a leading biologist at the beginning of the 23rd century. At the time, there were efforts in trying to preserve some of the wildlife on Earth as they were being brought to Mars. The Orange Muck pretty much contaminated the entire water supply on Earth. 90% of wildlife perished, and humanity made some efforts to save some of the species from dying out. A few animals were brought along on the ships in the great Exodus to Mars, but even that wasn’t enough to completely save entire species from extinction. Instead, we took what we could to be farm-raised for protein. It’s why we have chicken today. Besides saving animals for food, we did try to save creatures such as the chimpanzee from extinction. The problem was that the Orange Muck and human actions pretty much killed off the remaining chimps on Earth, to begin with. Only a male and female could be saved to be brought along on the trip. Unfortunately, the male chimp died during the transit, and all they had was just one female.”

Aline was explaining as she queued in the next picture. Kane looked at the image of the chromosomes. A second picture popped up on the screen. It showed a series of forty base pairs of chromosomes underneath the human DNA. This had to be Ifra’s DNA that I scanned from her yesterday.

“The problem was the last female chimp would eventually die,” she continued. “Doctor Aarnov was doing what he could to save the species from the inevitable. There was no male chimp sperm available. Cloning could work, but even that had issues. Cloning still required more of the species to be available to do it. Instead, what he proposed was being able to use human sperm and rewriting it into male chimp sperm.”

“What?” Kane said in shock. “Is that even possible?”

“No, it wasn’t, at least with the technology. In fact, even to this day, we can’t do it, but his idea was sound. He would introduce the concept known as Artificial DNA Replication. In his papers, he would usher ideas where human DNA can be used as a base to construct additional base pairs to match the DNA of other species. Humans could actually create the additional DNA pairs and match them with the chimps. The DNA of the human could be eliminated or altered if you wanted. He actually made attempts at this by using human sperm to get into the building blocks of DNA. He did manage to add additional base pairs to human DNA and implant it with chimp DNA. The problem was that it still failed in the end. Even he admitted that he couldn’t accomplish it. The project failed, and eventually, the last chimp would die out a few years later. Aarnov, however, did work on Artificial DNA Replication much later and concluded that it was theoretically possible. With the right advancements in technology, you could have what you see in that email the Intelligence gave to you.”

“But we are talking about the Itreans here...”

“Yep ... but without further knowledge about this, all we can make are guesses. My best guess is the picture is proof. The Itreans have this ability, and you need to talk to Ifra about this as well.”

“Trust me ... I have plenty I need to talk to her about as well,” he said with some agitation. “She needs to explain this. Our people were kidnapped and...,” he stopped and shook his head as he thought about the images from last night. “Ifra is going to return. We need to continue the negotiations.”

“Well ... I will continue my research here. It might be possible for me to try to find some sort of cure for the Itreans. Someway ... somehow. Maybe we have something we can offer to help fix that or at least have us look into it. Maybe they missed something that we can contribute.”

“Alright. Thank you, Doctor.”

“Good luck, Ambassador.”

Kane stood outside of the hatchway that led into the Atra. He gathered his courage. This time, the negotiations would be different than yesterday. He had spoken with the captain and felt that it was only fair. Ifra had agreed to this as well. It was time. He knew what was going to happen.

He looked at the guards that were in place. They were the only humans that were by him, but it wouldn’t be for long. Kane wanted no escorts. Much like what Ifra had done, the need to have additional personnel with him was not needed.

“Alright...” He said as he made a step forward. The magnetic shoes clicked underneath his feet. He approached the guards as they nodded their heads toward him. They stepped aside to let him walk into the hatchway.

Kane’s thoughts were all over the place. He was going into an alien ship. He was against the idea, to begin with, but he knew it was necessary. The adjunct of the warship was very much disturbed by Captain William’s threat to her. It was apparent that the threat of detonating nukes because the captain didn’t trust the Itreans didn’t help at all. Kane didn’t blame the captain and understood his threat. The Itreans might be playing innocent while they try to spread a pathogen to human beings. They also had to adhere to the Euterans. The images that he saw weighed heavily in his mind. The adjunct of the Atra would only allow Kane to enter her ship and no one else. Ifra was not permitted to enter the Gabatrix.

Kane stepped into the extended passageway. He was leaving his ship. His adrenaline kicked in a little bit, but a part of him was interested in what he was going to see. This was what true diplomacy was going to become. He could only hope that everything was going to be alright.

The passageway was long. It had to be since both ships had to be almost together. Careful navigation was needed to prevent both ships from colliding with each other. Ship collisions in space were infrequent due to the size of space itself, but it could still happen. Meetings and interactions between ships usually involved passageway tubes to be extended and connected. These tubes could only stretch so far, so ships would have to be next to each other. The UHN Gabatrix’s nose was dangerously close to the centripetal ring of the Atra. It was that or use a shuttlecraft.

If there had been more time to engage in the meeting, shuttlecraft would have been used. It would help limit exposure to diseases or pathogens that one race could spread to the other. Unfortunately, nothing could be done. Thankfully, Doctor Aline found nothing else spreading from either ship. If there were a deadly pathogen, then Kane would have noticed it by now. Ifra already had touched him, and he wasn’t sick. Perhaps the Itreans were right. Maybe they had some advanced immune system that could kill any type of virus. It would make sense. This Ziliks must have spent a lot of time trying to come up with a virus that could destroy an entire male population of the Itreans as a whole.

Kane could see the exit of the passageway. He wished he could see what it looked like outside. The Atra was a warship used by an alien race. What was inside such a creation as that? He had to know.

He reached the exit of the passageway. Upon stepping through, he could feel a difference in temperatures. There were no scanners to check out his body. It felt very ... organic.

The atmosphere was breathable. It felt a little warmer than the Gabatrix, but not too warm. The exit went into a passageway that led to the left or right. The central passageway of the Atra looked very different than the Gabatrix. It didn’t have those white overhead cozy lights, pasty-colored sealable doors, and emergency sealing bulkheads. The Atra was different. It had what looked like wooden branches and vines that stretched over the green-colored metal walls. The branches were the biggest highlight of his attention. It was like walking into some sort of alien greenhouse. The light brown wooden stems reached endlessly through the hallway. There were small triangular-like green leaves that protruded from the network of branches. The deck had a brown color to it. There was a strong overhead light that illuminated everything correctly.

Kane could still feel weightlessness, but he did feel a very slight tug towards the deck. It was very, very light, almost as if the ship was generating 1% of Luna’s gravity. If he dropped a pencil, it would probably take a minute before it ever touched the deck. He could understand what Ifra meant about the lack of gravity. The Itreans seem to have some sort of grasp on generating it, but it was only minor and barely noticeable. The ambassador understood why the Itrean ships still had centripetal rotating rings. He could understand why Ifra had the magnetic straps that she wore on her feet. Even walking with this light gravity was still enough that you could accidentally propel yourself into the air if you were not careful.

Besides the exit hatchway were two other noticeable individuals. A pair of large alien women resided by the hatchway. They were huge and in some sort of power armor. These were not the Yutilian guards that came in with Ifra yesterday. These guards stood a foot taller than him. They wore a black covering armor that had dark purple etchings painted onto it. A small green patch was painted on the wrists of the guards. The armor completely covered their bodies. He attempted to mark what they looked like.

The guards stood with large rifles. The guns were just as big, if not bigger than the marine posted on the other side of the hatch. It had two barrels on the top and bottom. These rifles had large scopes on them and looked like they were heavy to wield. He could tell that they were female as the breast coverings protruded a little bit, but that was the only indication. These Itrean guards looked intimidating. These must have been the Shal’rein that Ifra had mentioned. They were the same race that served in the T’rintar clan and the Shal’rein clan. They wore helmets that covered their jaws. Fins protruded from all portions of their bodies but were covered in a heavy armor weave. They stood on two digitigrade legs and had a large tail that protruded from their back. There was almost a red-like visor on the helmets. It almost seemed as if the Shal’rein were the commandos of the T’rintar clan. Imagining there was an entire clan of only Shal’rein just seemed as terrifying to Kane, if not more. No wonder Ifra meant what she said about them. These guards meant business, even if they were playing the simple role of guards. He mustered the courage to greet them.

“Hello,” Kane introduced himself to them. He felt a little tense as he looked up at them. These guards could win a fight with one hand. One shot from their gun would splatter his remains on the other side of the bulkhead. He had to remind himself that they must be following simple orders and that they were sure to meet him in response.

The guards’ heads turned to look at him. He was no threat to them. He was an unarmed human, an insect to them to be crushed under a boot. Instead, they simply looked down at him. One of them lifted the rifle upward and held it with one hand. She then took her left hand and raised it near her visor. It made a simple beep sound as she called up to whoever she was reporting.

“Cha ... Tre, ka ... Kane human,” the guard said in a deep female voice. The voice made a series of clicks in the voice, similar to what Ifra would do when she talked. “Talra, Ifra, ralta,” the voice ended with a slight hiss sound before she closed the channel on her wrist communicator.

The guard lowered her wrist and resumed holding her large rifle. Kane could tell that she was looking down at him. She simply watched him and said two words.

“Human ... Jolar’till,” she said to him.

“I guess that is the way of saying, ‘Wait here,’” Kane replied to her.

She chose to ignore him and instead held a resumed guard stance by the door along with her other guard companion.

Kane decided to sit by and wait. It wouldn’t take long before somebody showed up, and he was right. He looked to his left and saw a Yutilian woman approach him. She was dressed in the same clothing as before. The guards near Kane seemed to tighten their stance a little bit as if some royalty had appeared before them. Their gazes went straight ahead of them instead of Kane’s direction.

“Hello, Ambassador Kane,” Ifra greeted him.

Kane felt at ease upon seeing her. The sense of seeing a familiar face in an alien world seemed to affect him and his feelings of being tense. Instead, he relaxed a little bit the moment he saw her.

“Hello, Ambassador Ifra,” Kane greeted her.

Ifra approached him. She had a smile on her face as she slouched forward a little bit. Her small digitigrade legs moved her with ease with the magnetic straps that kept her on the deck. As she got near him, she did the same thing as before. She tilted her head at him and did her rapid blinks. He held out his hand to her, but she did her same routine as before. She walked around him and noted every detail of him. The only difference this time was that her tail touched his uniform more. It felt strange to him like he was being checked out, ready to be turned into some meal. Instead, she simply walked up in front of him. Then she used her clawed hands to grip onto his arm. He noticed that she wasn’t gripping onto his arm as tightly as before.

“I am happy to meet under these good circumstances,” she said. “Follow me. We are heading to the ring.”

“Of course,” he replied. He walked with her down the long passageway.

He felt some unease with the situation. He was professional, but things troubled his mind with the email he received from UHN Intelligence. Kane tried to keep the images buried, but it was something that he needed to bring up to her. Instead, he simply marked the inside of the Atra.

“I have some good news to tell you,” she told him. “My people are willing to release the Euteran people back to you, but I would like to discuss more of that in the meeting room.”

“That’s good to hear,” he replied to her in a neutral voice.

Ifra tilted her head to him as they walked. She seemed to note the tonal changes or lack thereof in his voice, almost as if she were studying him carefully.

“Are you well?” she asked.

“It’s something that needs to be discussed alone.”

She seemed to tighten her grip on his arm before. Kane was getting used to this by now, as her vise-like grip appeared to be a Geiger counter of her emotions. He was starting to tell if she was tense or not. He needed answers from her, but he needed to lighten the mood a little bit.

“I notice the similarity of both our ships...” he told her.

“Nnnn...,” she responded. She made a couple of clicks in her voice. “Do you like the Atra?”

“It is different. It looks like I am walking in a jungle on Cebravis in some way.”

“I noticed that your ship is very ... artificial. Much like your left hand.”

“Why do you have plants grow in your passageways?”

“Why not?” she replied. “We enjoy our plants. We breathe oxygen, and they breathe in carbon di ... decide...”

“Carbon dioxide, or you can call it CO2,” he corrected her.

“Yes ... we genetically create plants to grow inside our ships. The ships themselves are partially alive. It breathes just like we do. It is very easy to maintain and grow. It even connects into computers.”

“Incredible,” he said as he walked past a series of sealed doors. “It’s like a vein of plant wires.”

“Yes ... in fact...” she halted a little bit as she reached her hand up to the wall. There was a small piece of what looked like fruit growing from the branch-like vines. This fruit looked similar to an orange but much smaller. Her claws quickly plucked it, and she held it in her claws for him to look at.

“Is that food?”

“Yes ... we do have prepared foods we bring with us, but the ship also feeds us too.”

“Wow.”

“You want to try it?” she asked as she held it out to him.

“I ... I don’t know. I’m concerned it might hurt me in some way.”

“I doubt it,” she told him. “We are more similar to you than you realize. I always enjoy these. Try it.”

Kane felt like he had no choice. If there was something that was going to kill him from the Itreans, then it would have done it by now. Sometimes, it was best to appease the locals.

“Fine,” he said as he opened up his mouth. He went to reach for it, but instead, she used her claw to pluck the small fruit into his mouth.

The taste was satisfying. It was sweet but partially bitter. It tasted more like a tangy sour apple rather than an actual orange. He chewed on it, and then it had more of a sweet apple-like aftertaste. It didn’t take long for him to eat it and swallow it down.

“Does it taste good?” she asked.

“Actually, it is pretty good. I don’t think we have anything like that back in the UWA.”

She saw another piece of the strange fruit as she plucked it from the branches. She quickly tossed it into her mouth as she gripped his right arm. They continued their walk towards the central aft section of the ship. Kane watched as she had a playful look on her face but happily chewed it.

“Food growing inside the walls of a ship...,” he remarked.

She made a series of chirping sounds. Kane guessed she was laughing. “Perhaps you should do something similar?”

“Somehow, I doubt they would. Maybe that is a loss for us humans...”

“To us, our ships are our bodies. They are an extension of who we are as we stretch out to the other systems and live happily. At least ... that is what I wish.”

Kane noted the interiors. It felt so strange to him. Even with the plants and environment, there was a sense of familiarity. The passageway was seemingly straightforward. It had some sealed doors that led to other rooms. In many aspects, it looked very similar to the Gabatrix when it came to interiors.

“It’s interesting,” Kane commented. “I noticed that you have your ring positioned just like the Gabatrix has.”

“You mean near the rear of the ship?” she asked. “Yes. I noticed that our ships have similar looks.”

“You guys didn’t steal our ideas? Did you?”

“We should be the ones to say that to you. We have existed for hundreds of thousands of years.”

They passed more doors as Ifra came to a stop. Kane could hear a spinning motion near him. It was almost a similar faint sound that came from the Gabatrix’s rotational ring. There was an alcove that was large enough for two people.

“We are here,” she commented.

“Are we by the ring?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t see any spinning motion or spinning corridors.”

“Our system operates a little bit differently. We use a ... I don’t know how to call it in your language ... nnnn ... a tube launcher ... nnnn ... elevator tube?”

“I guess I will find out,” he said.

“Lean your back to the alcove. It is designed for two people or less.”

Kane walked up to the alcove with Ifra in tow. They walked up to it to the point that she helped push him to the wall.

The moment that Kane rested his back to the wall, a rushing door closed them inside the alcove. He suddenly felt like he was being lifted. The magnetic shoes held him in place along with Ifra and her magnetic wrappings.

“Whoa...,” he commented. “It feels like an elevator, though.”

“It is similar to your elevator, but ours are on the side. It is in line with the spinning.”

He could feel the elevator slow down as it came to a stop. The moment that it did, the doors opened up. Kane could feel the centripetal pull being exerted on him. They stepped out as they were now inside the Atra’s rotational ring.

“So, you do the same thing we do?” Kane asked her.

“I don’t understand.”

“You use a rotational ring to have your crew. It feels a little bit heavier than the Gabatrix.”

“We prefer a little bit more gravity.”

Kane noticed the centripetal ring also utilized the same growing branch-like vines. The same type of fruit grew on the sides, but you could tell that everything was more weighted down.

It was here that Kane could see activity going on. It seemed to be like a city in the ring. There was the hallway that he was inside, but he could see pathways that split off into multiple directions. He remembered that the Itrean ship had two centripetal rings. It was apparent that the hallways connected to the adjacent ring. Rooms were like boxes with doors connecting to them, and it was more elaborate than the lonely ring of the Gabatrix.