Chapter 608

The Prison Planet

Jeff and Morales’ Conversation Continues.

...”We know that it’s sending out some type of subroutine that’s basically saying, ‘I’m here,’ or some such. Now we just have to figure out how to respond and tell it that ‘we are here and ready to transmit,’ or some such thing. How the heck do I tell that thing that I want to learn how to talk to someone halfway across the galaxy? Who says the beings that used that thing even used speech? Maybe they did it mentally. Maybe I don’t have the equipment built into me, but, by damn, I’m going to find out. If that thing back there can do it, I’m going to find out how, one way or another.”

“Or we are,” Selina inserted as she walked over and sat beside Jeff.

The Prime let out a sigh. “Look, there are probably people better equipped to talk to that thing than we are, but I don’t know who they could be. Selina has had some success, but I’m reluctant for her to go in there again.”

“I am not worried about it hurting me,” she assured Jeff.

Jeff blew out a breath as he spoke to her. “Perhaps not, but I’m far from being comfortable taking you back in there. I want you to promise to stay close to me.”

“I shall stay close,” she answered when she realized how serious he was.

With a frustrating glance at his watch, which told him nothing useful since he was on 2214, he continued, “We should have plenty of time now. So, Selina, why don’t we get your warm clothes from Ship?”

“And my Clan Queen’s as well,” Selina responded. “She said that she was going with us. And before you object, she told me to remind you that it is useless to argue. She is going.”

Morales got up to put on some warmer clothes. “I’ll tag along with you, too, but I’ll wait in the ice cave if you don’t mind. I’ve had my fill of that thing for now.”

A few minutes later, with Morales, Selina and Diana now dressed warmly, and Jeff with a light jacket, the little group donned headlamps and started toward the ice cave.

Halfway there, Jeff moved a couple more boulders out of the way. “You seem stronger than when you were here before,” Morales commented at the casual way Jeff moved the boulders aside with his telekinesis.

The Prime frowned. “I suppose that I didn’t notice. I was concentrating on that thing back there and wondering how I was going to ... communicate with it.”

“Well, I wish you could teach me to move things with my mind. Sometimes, it would certainly come in handy. From time to time, I could use a powerful set of hands to help with things,” Morales half joked.

Jeff considered for a moment. “If I could tell you, I would.” Hesitating, he realized that he meant it, and giving that knowledge away wasn’t something that he would do for just anyone – if he could. Somehow, I’ve come to respect this man, no matter what he has done in the past. Hmmm, possibly it’s because of my own background. True, I’ve killed on missions – many times – but I killed those who would have killed me, the scientists I was protecting or my people. But ... isn’t that what Morales did, only he wasn’t sanctioned by some higher command? I ordered those aliens killed, and that was before they had killed any Earth people. Where’s the balance? Who is to say which one of us was right? At my orders, my daughter – my wives – attacked and killed those aliens before they ever reached Earth or killed anyone from our planet. The aliens in the Paladins were on the way to attack and kill, but they hadn’t yet – just as were the guys that Morales killed. Do circumstances make all the difference?

He went on aloud to Morales. “I wish I could, but I’m unable to put it into words to describe how to do it.” Jeff looked at Selina and winked, but it was debatable that she could see the wink with his light shining in her face. “I suppose it’s something like how Selina tries to describe her teleporting. She says that she can see and feel it in her mind, but when she tries to tell me how to do it, the words and expressions don’t exist to allow her to communicate her knowledge. Maybe you have to be a teleport in order to be able to describe it to another teleport, but not to anyone else. Shit, isn’t that bordering on circular reasoning? I suppose that I’m trying to say the same thing about telekinesis. I can do it, almost without thought now, but I simply have no words or expressions to describe how. I just do it. Hell, how do you tell someone how to move his arm? Same thing.”

Morales glanced at the boulders that Jeff had set out of the way. “Well, if you ever figure it out, I can certainly put the talent to good use around here. But, by the way you moved those things, you seem even stronger than you did before.”

As they continued on, “It didn’t seem to take as much effort, so you may be right, but again, I don’t know the how or why. I do know that I want to get inside the thing’s mind – or whatever serves it for a mind – back there,” he said with a nod. “Somehow, I need to find out how to communicate over vast distances. It can be done. Otherwise, I suppose, that thing wouldn’t even exist.”

As they walked along, their lights shining before them, Jeff, almost without thought, moved small rocks out of the way to continue to smooth up the path, with only a slight hesitation now and then.

“Why do you want us to go with you on Ship, Jeff? I’m nothing special, and there are other anthropologists working for the General, so Jasmine could be replaced with someone else.”

Jeff stopped to glance back at Morales, the two practically blinding each other with their lights before each turned his head slightly. “Primitive planets that we might find, I suppose, but more than that, I just ... feel that there is a need for you and your family to come with us. I’ve learned long ago to go with those special feelings. If I do, there is generally less hassle in the end, right Di?” he asked with a chuckle as something passed between husband and wife.

“Definitely,” she replied with just that inflection in her voice.

As they resumed walking, Morales mulled over Jeff’s response. “Jeff, please don’t change your mind. Jasmine has been talking about going since you mentioned it before, and she’ll become even more excited about going when you mention it again. Ashley and Christine will do whatever Jasmine wants, and the same for me, of course. So, count us in. If Diana has mentioned it, I’m sure Jas has told her the same thing by now,” he said as he glanced at the Clan Queen, who nodded her head. “The only problem on our end is that we’ve planted and are continuing to plant a huge garden for food this winter.”

“Well, when we go – if we go – it certainly won’t be now,” Jeff quickly responded. “There will have to be a lot of planning and followup to that planning before we can even think of leaving. And ... we’ll want your input into that as well.”

“As I said, count us in. I don’t know that we would be of any particular use to you, but you tell us what to do and it will be done.”

“Thanks for the faith in us. I know that our trip will work out, but... I have to be able to communicate with Earth while we’re gone. Should anything happen that would require us to come back, we can always mark our coordinates in Ship’s memory and jump back – probably not instantly, but far more quickly than the original trip under warp took. After our business, we can jump back to those coordinates reasonably quickly, at least compared to the time it took to work our way out there under full warp to begin with. Ship tells me that the farther we are away, the more jumps it will take to come back or return to that distant point. Once back there, we can continue our original journey under warp.

“It’s a little like our trip to 2214. The first time it was under warp all the way and wound up taking quite a while. Now, Selina computes the course using the last coordinates as a starting point, allows for the motion of the Galaxy, the system here, the system there, etc. and warps us directly here. It’s a bit more complicated than that because this is a different dimension from the one with our Earth, but you get the picture.”

Morales realized that he did get the overall picture. Hmmm, I wonder if all that studying Jasmine has set up for me is helping.

When they arrived at the ice cave, Morales handed Jeff one of the two-way radios that Jeff had left with the Morales family before and told him, “This might work if you should need me in a hurry,” “My women and I have played with the radios, and they work better in the cave than I would ever have considered possible.”

“They’re designed for cave work,” Jeff responded. “I doubt that I’ll need to call you, but who knows?”

“If I don’t hear from you guys in an hour, I’ll come looking, so don’t shoot my butt.”

Jeff chuckled and clapped Morales on the shoulder. “Give us a couple of hours before you come. I have a feeling that this isn’t going to be quick – if ever,” he added mentally.

Morales had brought a piece of hide that he put on a rock to insulate his ass from the cold, poured a cup of coffee from the thermos that Ashley had insisted he bring, and settled down to study.

The Prime, Selina and Diana worked their way through the crack and into the relay chamber – as Jeff thought of it. Still as strange as ever, he mused as he turned right to parallel the wall.

“We used a cord to mark our way before,” Diana worried.

“It’s straight down the wall, so there’s no way to get lost,” Selina reminded her.

“Yeah, but this place gives me the creeps...”

“Us all,” Jeff agreed.

They began walking along the wall on the ice-like surface that seemed to shimmer and reflect their lights from multiple directions. It has to be ice, but it isn’t quite as slippery as ice should be. Why would ice be less slick in here, yet crystal clear? Jeff wondered.

After minutes, they neared the area of shimmering nothingness that was the controller as Jeff thought of it.

Gradually things began to settle in the swirl of filled nothingness that surrounded and became part of him/them.

“It’s time to clear our minds and begin the exercises that Ship has laid out for us over the last weeks,” he instructed.

Exercise wasn’t the proper term, but then again, there was no proper term or otherwise for what they had been practicing. They weren’t born telepaths, yet a telepath was teaching them – or trying to.

Having thought this out ahead of time, they had all brought a piece of hide to sit on. Jeff motioned to the others, and they sat in a circle, slipped off their gloves and joined hands the way Ship had them do as they practiced. As they again worked through the calming exercises Ship had taught them, they began to ... feel – be more mentally aware of each other. It wasn’t telepathy, but it must have been close. There were no surface thoughts per se, but rather a distinct feeling of each other’s presence.

When their awareness had reached the limit of their abilities, Jeff tried to reach out for the controller as he thought of it.

“I strongly suspect that the area in here isn’t nearly as big as it seems,” he tried to project to the controller. “This is your bailiwick, and you alter reality to please yourself or for reasons that I don’t understand, but we do not come as enemies. I have even brought a child with us. True, a very unusual child, but she is even more evidence that we mean you no harm. We simply want you to do the things that you have been designed or may be created to do.