Ivan Kal - Sanctuary

Seo-yun shook her head, it wasn’t time to think about going back to visit Earth. There were still things they needed to do here. She went back to her seat and started reading the data that the probe sent back.

January 2170 – Nuva

A slight bump was the only thing that announced to Ship Master Kisaragi Hana that her shuttle had landed on the alien – Nel station. The Traveler had finally arrived at its destination, the ship itself was waiting close to the station for the Nel to repurpose one of their hatches on the stations docking ring, as Traveler wasn’t able to dock with the station. Over the last few weeks the Nel diplomat and her human counterpart had discussed many things, most of which were unimportant and simple getting to know each other. The human translators were constantly updated, now being able to convert Nel measuring units to human ones easily. The talks didn’t progress further than the introductions, Hana assumed that those would be done now, with someone more up the chain of command. But they did learn a lot until now. The Traveler’s scanners constantly soaked up information. They managed to get a better look at the Nel ships, and found that they used a different energy source. Their drives were a lot “colder” than the human ones, while producing similar pushing power. They didn’t use fusion, and for now the human scientist couldn’t tell what they did use. The Nel steered the conversations off the topics of technology. They also showed only a passing interest in any kind of trade between them. What that meant Hana didn’t yet know. As soon as she exited the shuttle, she was met with an escort, and instructed to follow them to their assigned quarters. Hana and her party followed without question. They were here to meet with Nuva’s Lanai, the person in charge of the planet. The meeting was supposed to take place later that day. As Hana walked she couldn’t help but notice that inside of the station was made from the same material as the outside, that being some kind of ceramic polymer. Human scientist were familiar with the possibilities, but chose to focus on metals. The light on the station was dimmer than what Hana was used on her ship. After a few minutes of walking they arrived at their quarters. Their escorts showed them in, pointed out a few points of interest and then left them alone. Hana and her party made themselves comfortable, and then started planning for the meeting.

Lanai Sumia sat in the Retnor Maret’s office on the main station orbiting Nuva, Retsar Isani was there as well, together the two of them were leaders of the people of Nuva. They were once nothing but lower officials in the Consortium, but now cut off, left on their own, they were the leaders. Retnor Maret was standing on her left side and Retsar Isani on her right, across from them were Hokra Gotu, Hokra Dson and Oferani Esama, the team sent to meet with the humans. Over the past few weeks they have been sending regular reports, both on the things that they could verify, and speculation. Sumia was startled when she first learned about the appearance of these humans, and even more so when she got the first images of them. But she quickly put it behind her as more and more reports started coming to her hands. They learned a lot about the humans. They were different than Nel, but looked familiar, at least her people managed to reassure her that there was no connection between Humans and Sowir. But the other news wasn’t as good. Retsar Isani informed her that the Human ship was built from metal, a primitive way of constructing ships that the races in the Consortium abandoned long ago. That single piece of intelligence told Sumia that her hopes for help from the humans were not to be. Isani did mention that his scientist were baffled how a ship with as much mass as theirs could move as fast as they could, but still, their speed was barely half of what Nel warships could attain. Isani looked at Esama who had just finished giving her final report in person.

“Is there anything else?” Lanai Sumia asked.

“No Lanai.” Esama said.

Sumia turned to Isani and gave him a small nod, signaling that he can take over.

Isani turned to Hokra Gotu. “Did you manage to uncover the reason for the readings?”

Hokra Gotu made a negative gesture with his hand. “No Retsar, they watched us closely. The only thing I can say for sure is that it was indeed coming from inside the ship.”

Sumia looked at Isani. “Readings?”

“I didn’t want to bother you, it might have been nothing but a glitch. Once our ships came close enough, they started getting readings that matched those of a ship entering hyperspace, only fainter, coming periodically from the Human ship.”

Sumia frowned. “And we don’t know what is the cause?”

“Well, we are sure that it is coming from the Human ship. It is strange, we know that hyperspace transfer within the limit is impossible, yet the readings we are getting match those of a successful hyperspace transfer. Even more baffling is that the readings sometimes come at regular intervals, and sometimes they are irregular. But we did see an increase in them since our ships met the humans.”

“Do you know what that means?” Sumia asked.

“I can only speculate. But my best people have a theory, and after reviewing all of their findings I must agree with them. The most plausible explanation is that the hyperspace bursts are in fact a form of communication.” Isani said.

“Communication? I assume that those communications were not directed at us?”

“No. And as there is no one else here, that brings us to the question, who are they speaking to?”

“And we have no idea?”

“We explored all the answers we could think of, and the one that seems most likely is that those communications are not meant for anyone in this system.”

“But you said that the bursts were regular, and we didn’t detect any comm drones entering the system.” Sumia said confused.

Isani turned his palms agreeing. “Yes, which then means that they are communicating with someone, somewhere directly.”

Sumia and the rest of the people in the room looked shocked.

“Faster than light communications?” Retnor Maret asked.

“Yes, that is the conclusion we drew.” Isani answered.

Sumia looked at Isani open-mouthed. “But that can’t be! Every Consortium scientist agreed that faster than light communications are impossible!”

“They did, but that does not mean that they were right.” Isani said.

“But how? Every report we received suggest that they are no more advanced than the Sowir were when we first encountered them. In some areas they seem even more primitive.” Sumia said.

“They seem that way Sumia. I am not entirely convinced that they are at all inferior to us.” Isani said, which surprised the others. “Their ship is made out of metal and yet moves fast, I doubt that we could have made that ship go as fast as it was moving with our drives. We just don’t know enough about them to come to an informed conclusion. We should not assume inferiority because they do things differently. We made the same mistake with the Sowir, and look where that brought us.” Isani said.

“Perhaps you are right.” Sumia said, after a moment of thought she turned to Esama. “Send for the Human party.”

Hana and Chung-Ah were escorted to a room where they were met with the diplomatic party led by Oferani Esama and three more Nel. Another female who sat at the desk at the end of the room with two males standing around her. Hana bowed her head to them as did Chung-Ah.

The female then stood, and walked around the desk followed by the two males. Early Chung-Ah learned that Nel preferred to talk while standing.