Chapter 19: Fantasy Land

We aren’t alone in the Universe. Life exists right here on the green planet. Not only is there fauna hiding in the flora? There are canoes being paddled on the twisting rivers between villages along the banks. The entire planet appears to be inhabited. Civilized, in a primitive way.

Rivers are everywhere, and all have small primitive villages separated by a distance of a few hours paddling. All we have seen so far. No cities or ruins of ancient cities to be seen.

We are photographing everything from enough altitude, the Space-Plane isn’t distinguishable from a high flying bird. There is plenty of those also. Resembling birds, not identical to. Form follows function?

The population appears human or almost human, bipedal and erect, but observed only from a distance. Intelligent enough to build huts raised on pilings and canoes. Sentient but with low probability of ever developing an advanced technology by themselves, is my appraisal.

No mining dooms them to no mechanized industries, forever remaining a manual labor society. Would love to visit their markets. Imagine the superb handicrafts their artisans probably lovingly create? What could we use for a medium of exchange?

What we haven’t discovered, is anywhere to set down, and that’s a problem. The only clearings large enough, are lakes. Thousands of them, but the Space-Plane doesn’t have pontoons to land on water.

Several low mountain ranges, more accurate to call hill country, ridge the single continuous global continent. Tectonic plates colliding and submerging, give rise to the hills is a process well understood on earth. Also indicate likely earthquake zones exist too.

Only one summit rears above the rest in lone distinction. This bald rocky peak is unique in achieving an elevation barely above the tree-line. Blasting and grading could flatten a tabletop plateau for a small spaceport on top.

Ideally, a facility should blend in with the planet’s primitive culture. A monolithic granite pyramid for a terminal, rather that neon lighted, huge hologram billboards, spires and spidery arches.

After high resolution photographing the entire surface of the planet, or honestly, only the entire rainforest’s canopy, we return to MOM.

The GRAND DAMES listen to our report and decide, we should not invade an already inhabited world.

Back we go to the less hospitable water world, to investigate the scant islands there. We observed several simultaneous hurricanes scouring the seas while we orbited over there. More storms were constantly being created, to take the place of the ones dissipating.

Agriculture isn’t likely sustainable on the weathered and eroded islands. Reconnaissance won’t take long, with the Space-Plane. Very little exists on the blue world to photograph.

Our resident astronomer and telescope chief, Marshall, is already cataloging all nearby stars as potential alternative candidates.

We need an alternative candidate. The water world is inhabited, too.

No sentient species encountered, but densely inhabited by monsters.

The islands are disgusting piles of deep guano, bird shit, deposited by eons of generations of the large avians filling the planet. A morphologist, taxonomist, or cryptozoologist would have a field day on this world. All the different avians look weird as hell, but the largest appear as a hybridization of a bat, pterodactyl, a crab, and a big mottled moth.