We Are Stardust (pt. 2)
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Nyoka couldn’t slow her heart rate nor control her breathing. The tiny acrobat’s speed became unmanageable and it careened off the bar, launching into orbit. Nyoka walk-jogged to the docking bay where Massoud and Rivera had just offboarded.
Both women were smiling, laughing. Do they not understand the problem? They looked like teenagers unloading a bus that had just arrived home from summer camp.
“Rivera, Massoud, I need an immediate debrief.”
“Of course, Commander,” Massoud said without turning to face her superior. “I just need to get these recordings into—”
“You just need to obey direct orders.” Nyoka strode from the bay without looking back. Echoing footsteps in the glimmering hallway told her they chose to follow. In the distorted reflection overhead, Nyoka watched the two exchanging looks and shrugs.
As soon as they entered the command office, Nyoka rounded on them.
“Explain yourselves immediately.” She squeezed the words roughly through teeth clenched shut.
Rivera opened her mouth, about to speak, but Massoud lifted her hand, silencing her. “This hardly concerns Private Rivera. Everything she did was done on my watch; with my approval.”
Nyoka’s face fell deadly calm, a smooth mask of composure. “Rivera, you are dismissed.”
The younger woman looked sick, but saluted and made her exit. Massoud didn’t turn to watch her leave, opting instead to meet Nyoka’s unflinching gaze. For a moment that stretched out awkwardly, the small office was filled with the silence of a hidden predator. Nyoka refused to fill the void, refused to repeat herself. She waited for Massoud’s explanation, and she would wait till Petram II’s young, red star burned itself out, if she had to.
“They aren’t dangerous,” Massoud broke first.
“You can’t know that. Your choice to interact with an alien species was beyond reckless.”
“We didn’t choose to interact with them. They came out of nowhere. If they had intended to harm us, they would have had ample opportunity. They’re… Primitive…” Massoud hesitated and made a face like the word was sour in her mouth. “… simple. No clothing, no tools that we saw. Highly curious. Shockingly gentle. Kind even.”
Nyoka tried to keep her face stony and unreadable, but she could not hide her bafflement. “They are an alien species about which we know nothing.”
“All the more reason for us to interact with them and learn about them!”
Nyoka abandoned all efforts to stay calm and shouted, “How arrogant do you have to be to think you can possibly draw any conclusions about their behavior? They evolved on a planet 140 trillion kilometers from Earth—”
“In an environment that so closely matches Earth we came to try it out for ourselves!”
“Do you even hear yourself?! They are an alien species!”
“We’re the aliens here!”
The words hung dangerously in the air, a mist or fog through which Nyoka couldn’t see. “We are pioneering a path forward for humanity.”
Massoud’s temper subsided. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “What if that path is set to barrel over the only other intelligent life discovered in the universe? That’s not what we signed up for and you know it.”
Nyoka furrowed her brow. “I know.” Her anger had dissipated as well. “You’re dismissed.” The words came out soft as a fluttering of moth wings.
Massoud turned to leave, but stopped. “If my actions on-world jeopardized our safety… I don’t think they did but… you’re right that I can’t know for sure. I’m sorry, Commander.”
“Apology accepted. Tell Rivera I want to see that footage.”
Rivera and Massoud huddled around Nyoka and Hughes as they watched the footage from the ground expedition, anxious to share their incredible discovery.
Nyoka held her breath when the creatures came into frame. Massoud was correct, they had come out of nowhere. Rivera and Massoud trudged through the jungle, thick with deep purple foliage and bulbous fruits in dozens of colors. Then, without warning, Rivera spun on her heels to face… a face. Two eyes, a nose with two nostrils, a narrow mouth with white teeth, and presumably ears beneath a shock of dark hair. The camera jerked a bit and soon was being held at an odd angle extremely close to the too-human face. Off screen, Rivera’s shout of fright quickly evolved into laughter.
“Their hands were strong, but so delicate. It actually tickled,” she explained.
Then, on the video, the camera dropped to the ground. From that less-than-ideal vantage point, the five Petrans (as Nyoka decided in her mind to call them) could sort of be seen grasping, twisting, turning, examining Rivera and Massoud.
The humanoids stood taller than either earthlings, likely around 2 meters. Their skin was a pale orangey color, and their naked bodies were visibly strong, but wiry. Their feet, while boasting an opposable toe, had only four digits. Otherwise, their external anatomy matched humanity’s to a startling degree.
Massoud asked repeatedly in the recording if Rivera were seeing the same thing. Neither could believe what was happening. Neither seemed shaken to their core by it though, Nyoka noticed. Bewildered, sure, but not afraid. Not wary. Rivera extricated herself from the hands of her kindly captors and rushed over to the camera, picking it up and remounting it on her shoulder. Then her first call to the Exodus occurred.
“There are people down here!” She said into her radio. Her words were a rush of excitement, easily mistaken for fear in a moment of unclarity. As soon as she finished, the device was snatched from her by a Petran, who darted away to show the now squawking box to his compatriots.
Nyoka’s cheeks warmed with embarrassment as Hughes’ desperate calls played in the background of the footage and she remembered her own frantic thoughts. It’s not foolish to worry about your crew.
Eventually, Rivera retrieved the comm from the creatures and gave the all-clear, but soon they had lifted her off her feet and spun her in a playful circle. That’s when Massoud managed to snag the comm. All Nyoka could see was the drastic mismatch in physical size and strength.
The video cut out, starting up again after the ground crew had time to set up a drone to hold the camera. The remaining footage showed the two humans trying to communicate with a growing crowd of Petrans. Wild gestures and over-exaggerated gesticulations ensued until Rivera and Massoud were convinced the natives understood their intention to leave, but also to return again.
The screen went dark. Each crew member sat still, stewing in thought.
The crew sat around the table the next morning, their food waiting before them mostly untouched. Hughes spoke first.
“We aren’t alone.” Obvious, but somehow still profound.
“We certainly aren’t,” Rivera replied.
“No one was supposed to live here. We sent probes ahead of us. Messages. It was supposed to be a lucky little rock waiting for us.” Clearly, Hughes was just thinking aloud. “We were so preoccupied with butting up against an advanced race, we never considered what we’d do against… them.”
“They are so new.” Massoud began voicing her own thoughts, hardly paying any attention to Hughes.
“So new,” Rivera agreed.
“We can help them. We have tech that took our species hundreds of thousands of years to discover and invent. Imagine where we’d be if we’d had that since our infancy,” Massoud said.
“I wonder how many there are in total. How many did you count?” Hughes asked.
“At one point we counted 50,” Rivera answered. “We didn’t see any children though.”
“Makes sense; they’d keep them safely away from a possible threat,” Hughes said.
“Of course, that’s assuming their offspring are small in stature like those of Earth,” Rivera said.
“An assumption, true; but surely it’s a safe one, right? Even asexual reproduction would leave two smaller copies of the original organism. Unless… Do you think those were the offspring?” Hughes shook his head as he mused.
Rivera shrugged. “I suppose it’s possible, but not likely. Their sex organs seemed developed and secondary sex characteristics were present. But then again, they seemed so naïve and trusting.”
“How many times have humans wondered what it would be like if a benevolent alien race came to help us thrive?” Massoud continued as if no one else were speaking. “That could be us! We could be their ancient legends, but… but true!”
“If we initiate the colony protocols, we’d crowd them off their own planet,” said Hughes. “We can’t settle—”
“Where else can we go?!” Nyoka finally spoke. “This was a one-way trip. You all knew that when you signed on. There are 275,000 humans on board this ship. They entrusted their survival to us. Are we supposed to leave them in stasis forever? Do you expect me to order a cast-off back into the void with no plan and no destination?”
A minute or two passed. Insufferably long and eternally significant.
“So what do we do?” Rivera, the most junior member of the expedition, both in age and rank, looked at the other three.
For a long time, no one ventured to speak. Soon, all three of her crew members were looking at Nyoka, eyes pleading for guidance. Nyoka sighed. “Step one, we need to figure out how to effectively communicate with the Petrans.”
