The Human Chronicles Saga : Boxset #2 (The Human Chronicles Saga Boxsets) Page 9

  Adam swallowed hard, trying not to lose his temper any more than he already had. What does she want from me? “Sherri, you know about Maria. Her death was pretty devastating.”

  “Oh god, not that again? It’s been almost eleven years. You really need to move on.”

  “I tried to – with you. Remember Lake Tahoe? Two months and you were gone, and then I didn’t hear from you for another three years.”

  “Well I’m here now. I came all the way back out to Juir, and not just so I could play superwoman and squash some alien bugs along the way.”

  “If you came out here to be with me, you sure did have a funny way of showing it; a night here, a couple of nights there. You have to be the hardest woman in the entire galaxy to get close to!”

  Sherri was quiet for a moment, seeming to gather her thoughts. When she spoke again, her voice had calmed. “You’re right, of course. That’s why I said everything is so out of whack, out of sync. We don’t belong here, Adam. It was different when there were more Humans around. Now there are only six of us, and you have your buddies to confide in. I have no one.”

  “Listen, babe, I would really like to spend more time talking to you about this, but I really have to go….”

  Sherri opened her mouth to say something, but then thought better of it.

  “Kroekus says if this woman – this Formilian – is not found and returned to her homeworld within nineteen days, then there’s going to be major war that will cut off Formilian technology to the Expansion. He says that will probably mean the end of the whole damn thing – the end of the Expansion. So you may get your wish about going home whether you like it or not. If the Expansion collapses, we’ll have nowhere else to go but back to Earth.”

  “Then you better go.”

  “Will you be here when I get back?”

  “That depends. I may still be on Belson.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “We’ll see. It’s obvious we both have a lot to think about.”

  Some of us more than others, Adam thought. I have a pretty good idea of what I want. I hope she can figure it out for herself.

  They embraced in the small compartment and then Adam placed a hard, wet kiss to Sherri’s lips. She seemed to melt into him, attempting to turn their bodies into one. When they separated, Adam could see the hurt in her eyes. She was first and foremost a woman, and she needed the intimacy and support of other Human beings around her. Adam wanted that, too, yet he was more of the mountain-man breed, the type of person who could go into the wild for months – if not years at a time – and never feel lonely. But he also knew that that time was coming to an end. He’d eventually get too old to play Flash Gordon anymore.

  He just wished that the Earth hadn’t changed so much, and that fame hadn’t found him. Maybe the two of them could find a little island off the Florida Keys somewhere, where they could be anonymous, forgotten?

  “Wait for me, Sherri,” he said as they left the compartment. “I really do want us to work this out.”

  “So do I, you asshole. I really do. But I can’t keep going like this.” And then she disappeared into the depths of the Pegasus.

  Riyad poked his head around a corner. “Are you okay, my friend?”

  Adam shook his head. “You can’t live ‘em … and you can’t sell them off to Silean slave-traders.”

  Riyad smiled. “I just happen to know a former Silean slave-trader. Just say the word and I’ll make the arrangements.”

  Adam poked him in the chest. “Just take care of her, you pirate. She’s very fragile right now.”

  “And you are as strong and hard as granite. You’re not fooling anyone, Adam Cain – no one at all.”

  7

  Adam left ten hours later without seeing Sherri again. He set a course for Formil, a journey that would take the souped-up spaceship of his four days to make. That would only leave fifteen days to accomplish his mission, if it were even possible.

  His first day out was spent sitting before a computer screen and digesting all he could learn about the Speakers of Formil. What he learned was fascinating, yet only served to support his belief that the Speakers were nothing but a bunch of frauds.

  And it had all started with a female named Lorilie Bol two thousand years before.

  By the time the Juirean Mass arrived in the Formilian star system, the natives of the third rock from their star were already very accomplished engineers and scientists.

  In fact, it seemed that the very next thing the Formilians discovered after fire was how to make electric batteries. From here they began to build primitive circuits and communication devices, using pre-historic light bulbs to illuminate the caves of their distant ancestors.

  The Formilians began the worship of all things having to do with electricity, even naming their two main gods Mislin and Sufor, representing the magnetic poles of positive and negative. By the time the Juireans arrived, the Formilians were far more advanced than even the Klin had been at the time the Juireans destroyed their race – a time referred to by the Juireans as The Reckoning.

  The Juireans were still very primitive at the time, having stolen most of their technology from other races, including the gravity drive they used to spread their will across the galaxy. Yet in one of the most unusual and fortunate events in galactic history, the Juireans and the Formilians formed an informal alliance. The Formilians were given unprecedented freedom and autonomy, and in return the Juireans received the exclusive rights to nearly all the Formilian technology and devices.

  One of the first contributions the Formilians made to the galaxy and to Juirean expansionism was their invention of the translation bug. Prior to this, communication between races had been a very difficult and time-consuming affair. The Juireans insisted that all conquered races learn Juirean, which in some cases was physically impossible for an alien race to accomplish. In other instances, the nuances between languages caused fatal misunderstandings among negotiators and diplomats. In one classic case, the mistranslation of a single phrase resulted in the deaths of over a million natives at the hands of the Juireans.

  When the Formilians revealed the translation bug to the Juireans, the tiny devices became the single-most important tool – besides the gravity drive – for opening up the galaxy and allowing it to be capable of being ruled by a single race – the Juireans.

  And the lead scientist involved in the development of the universal translation device was a Formilian female named Lorilie Bol.

  As Adam continued his research, he soon found this was where the story began to morph into the theater of the absurd.

  As an integral part of the functioning of the translators, the Formilians also invented the first universal internet – the Library, as the aliens called it. Its initial use was as a way to help store the myriad of languages found throughout the galaxy. As a new language was assimilated, often into something as small and simple as a single translator bug, this information was then piggybacked from one translator to another until it reached the Library. From here the language would spread like wildfire throughout the galaxy, where it would then filter down to each individual translator.

  Since those early days, the process had changed only slightly. Now most languages were stored in the Library and downloaded to individual translators as soon as a new language was recognized. Even the translators had their memory limits, and as more and more languages – as well as dialects of various languages – were discovered, it became impossible to store all languages in every individual translation device.

  So the Library grew, providing more and coverage across the galaxy, and including information far beyond simply alien languages.

  And it was also on Formil where the main servers of the universal internet were located.

  But this is where the story of Lorilie Bol, the First Speaker, begins to emerge.

  Almost as it was with Buddha contemplating the meaning of life under a tree for forty days and forty nights, Lorilie Bol began to demonstrate to
anyone who would stop and watch how she had suddenly gained access to the very powers of the gods themselves. She would travel the land, controlling a variety of electronic devices, none of which could have been rigged ahead of time. Later, she began to conjure up balls of white hot static electricity, and in one famous parable, used the balls to defeat a rabble of violent non-believers who had come to vanquish her.

  Over time, her reputation grew and her fame spread. Vids now broadcast her amazing feats around the globe, and then to other worlds within the sector.

  Yet the genius of Lorilie Bol came not only from what she could do, but how she used her powers to reinforce the beliefs the people already held. Nearly the entire population of Formil worshiped the gods Mislin and Sufor and knew that their creation – electricity – could be used to power any number of devices. To the Formilians, the development of a new device that could utilize the power of the gods was a gift, not only to the Formilians, but also to all the creatures in the galaxy. Without these devices, the will of their gods would go unfulfilled.

  So the Formilians invented, built and manufactured countless electronic devices in an on-going attempt to please their gods, which Adam figured was far better than human sacrifice….

  And now with Lorilie Bol, the people of Formil had found a living being who could directly utilize the power of the gods. She was herself an electronic device, a living device who could communicate directly with the gods. So Lorilie Bol became The Speaker, the Giver of Life and Light.

  The Order of Light on Formil had been in existence for a thousand years before the time of Lorilie Bol, yet in her the Celebrants found a point on which to focus all their worship, all their mysticism. They installed Lorilie Bol as their Supreme Celebrant and reserved this prestigious position for only the direct female offspring of the First Speaker.

  Even for such an advanced race of scientists and engineers, their religion flourished, especially now with a living personification of their gods. And the basis for what they worshipped could be seen all around them – in the lightning in the sky, in the static electricity in their hair and in the currents that powered their devices. The Formilians saw no conflict between their science and their religion. To them they were one and same. The worship of Electricity just made sense.

  And so the traditions remained intact for another two thousand years, through thousands of Speakers and throughout all the tumult of galactic affairs. The Formilians survived, and as Adam could see, had made themselves into one of the most-vital entities in the galaxy.

  Yet if Adam couldn’t find their precious Speaker within the next fifteen days – a creature embodied in the lovely and sensual Arieel – all this could come to a tragic and violent end.

  The day before arriving on Formil, Adam made a quick CW link to Sherri aboard the Pegasus. Their last conversation still haunted him, and he wanted her to know that he was thinking of her. She seemed only half-interested in speaking with him, apparently still conflicted about her own feelings.

  Adam knew how she felt. Living out among the stars in a galaxy of aliens and alien ways was very unsettling. No matter how glamorous it all sounded, people need familiarity to be comfortable, to feel grounded in their reality. For Adam and Sherri – as well as the rest of the Humans on the team – every day brought another jolting shock to the system, when one moment you could be speaking to a 600-pound ball of alien jelly, and the next galloping through a meadow on the back of a real-life centaur. Nothing in one’s upbringing could fully prepare you for this, no matter how many George R.R. Martin novels you’ve read or how many episodes of Star Trek you’ve seen. Reality would trump fiction every time, and for going on fourteen years, Sherri and Adam’s reality had been the stuff of fantasies … as well as nightmares.

  Maybe it was time for a break? For three years Adam and his team had been fighting an uphill battle to preserve the Expansion, and for what? Earth had backed away from the rule of the Expansion, not wanting to be bothered with the headache anymore. Even if the whole damn thing fell apart, Earth wouldn’t care. Very little of what happened in the Expansion affected the Humans in the Far Arm.

  So why should it concern Adam? He was sure there were plenty of isolated places within the growing Human Empire where he and Sherri could find some peace and quiet.

  At least for a while….

  But Adam also knew himself well enough to know he was not the type of person who could remain still for very long, even if his current crop of adventures had grown somewhat dull and predictable: land on a planet, find the local bully, and then show him who’s boss.

  Was it that Adam sought greater challenges, greater villains? As he wandered the quiet corridors of the Phoenix, alone in his thoughts, he wondered just what kind of person was he? Was he such a cliché as to be part of the classic yin-yang equation? Could he not exist without an equal and countering evil to fight against, and if so, wouldn’t this make him an accomplice to such evil, allowing it to exist just to give meaning to his own life?

  Or was he just getting bored with playing superman?

  “Thanks, Sherri, thanks a lot!” he announced to the empty corridor. “You sure know how to screw with a guy’s head. You couldn’t be content with just keeping all this crap to yourself? No, you won’t be happy until I’m just as screwed up as you are.”

  8

  Adam entered the Formilian star system on his fourth day out from Pyrum. The planet was located in your typical Class-M star system – as they would call it in a Star Trek episode – with eleven major planets and thousands of moons and comets, along with two very thin asteroid belts.

  Formil was located right in the middle of the system’s habitable zone, occupying the third spot out from their sun. Most habitable planets were found in the second to fourth positions, where the rock-core worlds were more apt to form. This location also seemed to stabilize time reference within the Expansion as well.

  Rotational velocity of these rocky worlds, located within a specific distance from their star, tended to range from twenty-two hours to as high as thirty. Any slower and the temperature variations between night and day would be too drastic for substantial life to take hold. Any faster and the rapid changes would be just as erratic. So days within the Expansion, as measured against the Juirean-standard, equated to 24.2 Earth-hours, and were nearly identical to most other inhabited worlds throughout the galaxy.

  The measure of years also followed this pattern, with Expansion-standard orbital time – also measured against Juir – to be only slightly longer than an Earth-year at 370 days.

  The bulk of star systems throughout the galaxy followed this pattern, even though about half of them were double or triple star systems, with incredibly large gas giants – many several times the size of Jupiter – occupying the inner regions of the system traditional reserved for these rocky planets. Even still, this left millions of systems with small, rocky worlds which harbored life. The surprising thing for Adam, however, was how intelligent life appeared to be more-prominent on worlds with slightly less gravity than Earth. He found this to be strange, since on his homeworld life was incredibly abundant and resilient.

  Formil was a world with about three-quarters the gravity of Earth, even though it was essentially the same size. The lower density of the planet caused the gravity variation, and placed Formil right in the middle of the galactic standard for worlds with a population of Primes – the universal designation for carbon-based, bi-pedal mammals who had evolved to dominate their worlds. The galaxy boasted a whole variety of more exotic life forms, based on a surprising mixture of chemical cocktails, yet none of these other creatures had been found capable of building advanced tools, shelters or machinery. That distinction was reserved to the Primes, and as far as prowess with the ubiquitous force of nature called Electricity, none were more advanced than the Formilians.

  As would be expected from such an advanced race, the planet Formil was very well organized, maintained and managed. There were millions of settlements scattered
across its surface, each resembling Adam’s vision of a George Jetson reality – however, still with no flying hovercraft! Even though the gravity drive had opened up the galaxy to all, it was simply impractical – and dangerous – to employ such technology in simple planetary-based transportation. So even on Formil, wheeled and winged craft still ruled.

  The Temple of the Order of Light was located in the capital city of Vull, and dominated the northern section, pre-dating the city itself by over five-hundred years. Vull had come into existence to service the various needs of the Celebrants – the priests who comprised the Order – and of The Speaker herself. It was modern city, well-kept and laid out in a logical, grid-like pattern.

  The Temple Complex, however, was another story. Appearing to have been built at a time of stone construction and ornate opulence, the hundreds of buildings making up the compound looked more like something out of ancient Rome rather than on alien world twenty-thousand light years from Earth. The contrast been Vull and the Temple Complex was stark, yet the tall, white walls of the compound wall served to clearly define the secular from the religious parts of the city.

  Adam was met at the extremely large spaceport outside the complex walls and driven by a plush transport into the maze of towering temples, agoras and balconied apartments that made up the bulk of the compound. He gawked at the elaborate carvings and adornments that were everywhere. And every building, every walkway, every street was spotless, almost to the point of appearing sterile.

  There were also people everywhere, many wearing full gowns of a soft mustard color. Even though by themselves the gowns would have looked hideous, against the rich, warm hue of the tanned Formilians, the color worked.

  And that was another thing that struck Adam about Formil – the absolute beauty of the Formilian people. Until now, the only Formilian he’d seen had been the naked image of Arieel Bol, the Speaker – and that had been impressive enough. Now he found that most Formilians were just as gorgeous, even the men. Though he admitted that Arieel was an exceptional specimen – even among the crop of the most-stunning creatures he’d ever seen – most of the other females he saw on the street would classify as Greek goddesses in their own right.