Chapter 8: Day 0

Even as Steve Miller began to awaken, he realized something weird was going on. Normally, he awoke quickly and easily. This time, he was groggy, and felt like his brain was wrapped in cotton.

He was lying on his back, which he never did. He always slept on his stomach, or on his side; his sinus problems meant that sleeping on his back resulted in snoring, which resulted in his wife poking him until he rolled over. Twelve years of marriage made avoiding his back completely automatic.

There was also the fact that he usually slept in a cut-off pair of sweat pants, or less if he was on the road; he seemed to be wearing some kind of cross between pajamas and a martial arts gi. And to the best of his recollection, he didn't own any clothing in a green and red pastel rose print.

Finally, there was the minor fact that the last thing he remembered wasn't going to bed, but sitting at a roadside picnic table staring at a road map as he tried to decide the best way to get around some road construction on his way home.

Sitting up, he looked around. He was laying in a ridiculously large bed, in what looked like a typically anonymous hotel room. The only things missing were the generic art prints, and a large window with a lousy city view. Interestingly, the wallpaper matched his oddly-patterned clothing. Instead of a door, there was an open archway, through which he could see a long hallway, and hear the babble of assorted voices.

He rose from the bed, and walked through the doorway. There were several other open archways along the length of the hall, leading to rooms similar to the one he'd found himself in. There was no one else in the hallway, and a glance through the nearest archways showed nothing but empty rooms. All the beds had been slept in, but they were all empty.

Somewhere down the hallway the voices could be heard, so Steve walked in that direction.

Entering a large open area, he found a small crowd of women, in several groups, who seemed to be busily discussing the fact that they didn't know what was happening, and that they hadn't found anyone who did. The confusion level couldn't have been higher if it had been going on in multiple languages.

His attempt to select a conversation to join was rendered moot when a loud, brassy voice spoke up, overriding the rest of the conversations.

"Well I'll be damned, we've got us a man after all. I'm glad to see you, son, I was afraid we were all going to have to go dyke or do without."

Steve saw several of the women flinch. He couldn't tell whether the volume or the terminology was what set them off, but suspected that each was a factor.

"Trying to butter me up or something, young lady? It's been twenty years since someone called me 'son', and he was pushing fifty at the time."

"Young lady, my ass. I've got grandkids your age, you young whelp."

Since the 'grandmother' in question looked to be about 21, if that, and would definitely have gotten carded when Steve was bar-tending back in college, Steve wasn't sure what to say. He noticed several of the other women staring at her, though, so he wasn't the only one confused.

A young Asian woman spoke up. "You're a grandmother? If you had a kid at twelve, and she had a kid at the same age, then maybe. Otherwise, no freaking way."

As the loudmouth gaped back at her, the Asian said, "Look at your hands. Are those the hands of a grandmother?"

Her words had the desired effect. She filled the resulting silence by introducing herself.

"I'm Susan Chan. I'm a graduate student at the University of Phoenix, studying geology. I was on a field expedition, and the next thing I know, I woke up here."

"Steve Miller. Long-haul truck driver and former computer security consultant. I was in a rest area trying to figure a way around a major construction mess on the way home, and I woke up here, wherever here is."

Susan said, "That was Luanne Cross who greeted you. She's from Texas, I gather, but she hasn't told us much about herself."

Luanne was staring into space, running her fingers across her face. She seemed to be going into shock, and was suddenly unsteady on her feet. Steve stepped up, took her arm, and walked her over to a chair. Easing her down into it, he knelt beside her and touched her cheek. "Are you going to be OK, Luanne?"

Shuddering a bit, she said, in a much quieter voice, "Yes, I think so. What's happened to us?"

Steve shrugged. "I don't know. Do any of the rest of you remember anything?" He looked around, but saw only shaking heads.

One of the women at the back of the crowd began to curse. "Dammit, I want answers." She looked up at the ceiling, and yelled, "What the hell is going on? Why are we here?"

There was a quiet chime, and part of the previously blank wall lit up and a picture of the Earth as seen from space appeared. The view held steady for a moment, then a sudden flash of light appeared to one side. A shudder seemed to run through the surface, as the cloud formations suddenly changed to a series of concentric circles, apparently centered on the flash point. A second flash appeared almost instantly on the opposite side of the globe, accompanied by a huge geyser of what looked like rock, or lava. The globe visibly deformed, and a large burst of rock and lava spewed out of the wounds from both flashes. There was silence in the room as the various ejecta started raining back down on the planet, causing large secondary impacts.

There was silence in the room as the view shifted to a large array of rectangular pallets, thousands of them, in a large room. Bodies, some of them visibly damaged, began appearing on the pallets. As each body appeared, it would be surrounded briefly by a blue glow centered on the shoulders, which was then replaced by a silver cocoon covering the whole body. Each body was visible only for a few seconds before the cocoon covered it, but two things seemed to stand out. First, the bodies were predominately female, at least dozens of women for each man. Second, none of the bodies ever moved. It was hard to be sure, but it didn't appear as if they were breathing. The process continued until all the pallets were covered by cocoons. The view faded, then returned to what could have been the same array, or a completely different one. The cocoons began to disappear, revealing human figures that were uninjured, obviously breathing, and as far as could be told at a distance, younger than the original occupants.

The view faded to black, and a emotionless voice began to speak. "There was an accident. Our group of ships was off course, and one of them impacted your planet. The ship was destroyed; and all life on your planet along with it. We recovered as many as we could, from as many parts of the planet as possible before conditions deteriorated. Your group is one of many; assembled so as to maximize the probability that your species will survive this event. The appropriate authorities have been notified; we are to provide for your every need until they arrive. When they do, they will judge us, assess penalties upon us, and determine what restitution can be made to you. As we have demonstrated incompetence, your care is under independent control, and is planned to maximize the survivability of your species and culture. We are forbidden further contact unless emergencies arise, but your rooms can and will provide all that is in our power to meet your needs until the authorities arrive. What has happened makes apology or atonement impossible, but we deeply regret these events. You will be contacted again when the responsible authorities are available."

The voice fell silent.

Steve felt like he'd been kicked in the gut. He looked around, and saw similar looks on the faces of the women around him.

The angry voice that had asked the question spoke up again, "Oh, bullshit. Who are you trying to fool with that pathetic fake?"

Steve looked at the speaker. A tall, slender blonde with long, straight hair and angry blue eyes was shaking her finger at the area where the video had been displayed.

"First of all, the amount of energy it would take to have that kind of effect is enormous. No conceivable ship could have that much kinetic energy. Secondly, the time frame is all wrong. The amount of time it would take collision ejecta that got that far from the main body to fall back would be more like hours than the minute or so you showed. Thirdly, the odds that anything could hit a planet 'by accident' are infinitesimal. Oh, and if this was an accident, how did you manage to get a ship into position to record the event?"

Susan replied, when the voice didn't, "I'm not that familiar with orbital dynamics, Rachel, so I'll take your word for it. The splash patterns looked pretty plausible, though. And if the ships were FTL, then when they 'saw' one ship drop out, they'd naturally stop as well, which could put them in the past with respect to the light cone of the collision. I think I said that right."

"FTL my ass. It's impossible."

Susan held up her left hand, with the ring finger extended. "I lost the tip of this finger last year when a rock fell on it. It's back. That's 'impossible', too. Are you angry because you think someone is lying to you, or because you're terrified that they aren't?"

Now it was Rachel's turn to be struck speechless. Her mouth worked for a moment, then her face crumpled, and she began to sob. Steve had been on the edge of collapse himself, but the sight stirred his early training on the traditional role of the male as protector, and he stepped up to her and gathered her into his arms. She put her arms around him as well, and started wailing in earnest, her face buried in his shoulder.

Steve stroked her back, and whispered reassuring nonsense into her ear. He was surprised that he could say anything as ridiculous as 'everything will be all right' and 'I'll protect you'. Beings that could raise the near dead (or maybe actually dead, a cold voice whispered in the back of his mind), and restore them to youth wouldn't be slowed down by anything he could do. But the tone of voice he'd always used to calm his boys worked on full-grown women too, and Rachel's sobs slowed, and she started to breathe normally again.

Rachel stirred in his arms, and he loosened his hold, then released her as she drew away. "Thanks," she said, blushing. "I'm not normally like that."

"Understandable. I'd have joined you, but I couldn't let you fall apart." Steve looked around. While he'd been comforting Rachel, several of the other women had been trying to help each other. Susan and Luanne, for example, were sitting cuddled in the chair where Steve had guided Luanne.

None of the cuddling looked at all sexual, any more than Steve's holding of Rachel had been. Steve had known several lesbians and lesbian couples, and none of the women around him seemed to be the type. That, plus the obvious imbalance in gender ratios, made Steve wonder if this was a dream after all. Ten women (he'd finally managed to get enough of an attention span together to count them), all beautiful, all straight, and all quite likely to end up having his kids if they had any at all. If he did end up 'doing' all of them, and did it in one night, he'd definitely know he was in a coma, or a brain in a jar, or something equally unlikely.

One of the women he hadn't met yet got a confused look on her face. She stood up from where she'd been in a three-way hug with two of the other women, and moved off, looking as though she was searching for something. She vanished through an archway which reminded Steve of the layout of public restroom entrances. A moment or so later, she returned, her face ashen (which was saying something, since she was African or African-American.)

She staggered over to the cluster of chairs and couches where the rest of the group were standing or sitting, and dropped into an empty chair. Everyone was staring at her, but afraid to ask what was wrong. Finally, Luanne (who seemed to have nearly recovered her former brashness) asked, "What's wrong, Sugar?"