Page 29 of The Space Traveller's Lover
THE DAY OF THE
FIRST MEETING
And here we are, asking for your gracious welcome.
The police-escorted car carrying Sam Sheppard, Professor Khan, and John Sanders, makes its way through the high-security fence’s opening gates.
The motorcade stops by the row of heavily armed officers guarding the building entrance as Sam eagerly stares at the large, glossy doors, his heart rapidly pounding.
It’s 11 a.m. in LA on a breezy September morning, and the serene blue sky portrays a deceptive image of tranquillity. The events of the past two days on Tinian Island are fresh on everyone’s mind. They are all feeling nervous but, at the same time, curious.
The ARA live stream channels broadcast the images from its headquarters to the world.
Everywhere, there is a heightened sense of anticipation as the composed experienced men, accompanied by the keen youngster, step out from the black vehicle.
Flanked by the highly eccentric but revered Professor Khan and the worldwide admired John Sanders, Sam looks like a rooky intruder eager for the limelight.
Before entering the high-rise building, they turn around to wave at the row of closed-circuit cameras focusing on their every move.
Their resolute faces reveal an iron determination, like fearless rescuers on the verge of entering an unknown dangerous place from where, perhaps, they would never return.
They put on and seal their see-through helmets on their protective suits.
In preparation for the first meeting, the highest security measures are in place.
The whole compound and its surroundings had been evacuated in a hundred-metre radius.
Heavily armed guards patrol the fortified wire security fence.
Rows of wide-field cameras, radar detection systems, and telescopes constantly survey the sky while fighter jet squadrons fly over the area.
Inside, closed-circuit cameras, speakers, microphones, air contamination sensors and motion detectors line up all the corridors and rooms, transmitting their signals to the central operations office, their command centre.
Located outside the main building but behind the security fences, the buzzing command centre is where the ARA generals from the North and South Regions have gathered to oversee the event.
All their systems are now on high alert.
Only the chosen interlocutors will be allowed to enter the main building and walk into the planning room, where the pyramidal object has landed. The order is for everyone to stay at home and close all windows and doors or retreat to their underground shelters. The city is in complete lockdown.
The men cautiously go up the stairs towards the second floor and turn into the broad aisle.
As they walk towards the big empty room where ARA rescue teams usually plan their long-term missions, Sanders looks at Sam to his left.
It strikes him that, one month ago, he was preparing to rescue Sam from Diablo’s cave.
Now, the spirited teenager, whom he helped to pluck from the perilous side alley, is decisively walking next to him, as determined as he is to face the unknown unpredictable power of the mysterious visitors.
They stop at the smashed entrance doors, inspecting the iridescent outline of the alien object as it stands upright on top of the long table at the back of the room, glowing in tenuous rays of multicoloured hues.
“We are ready, sir,” Sanders announces to the command centre, speaking firmly into his microphone.
“We hear you. Go ahead.” General Stewart’s stern voice comes through their earphones and the wall speakers.
Holding their breath, they cautiously make their way inside. Standing at a prudent distance in front of the glassy pyramid, Sanders, Sam, and Khan impatiently wait, transfixed by the colour changing light shafts glowing on them and their surroundings.
They keep glancing at the rows of time zone wall clocks, as the minute hands seem not to be moving fast enough. But soon, the long thin pointers strike midday in LA.
Suddenly, they hear a rumbling buzz ringing in their ears. The persistent sound whizzes around their heads, ebbing high and low until they can start to discern some spoken, albeit unintelligible words. It’s not any language they know, although they can distinguish distinct syllables.
“Sheban lai. Sheban lai. Seya” (It is high time. It is high time. Welcome)!
The speaking voice keeps repeating the sentence as a spinning hazy flat disc begins to form off the floor, floating in between them and the pyramid.
Startled, they watch the unravelling images, their tense faces and wide-open eyes fixed on the expanding revolving disc.
Swirls of sparkling bands thicken and brighten inside the rotating structure, eventually coalescing into the shape of a beautiful spiral galaxy while its centre glistens in a golden ball of light.
The men are so focused on the captivating display that they do not notice someone else standing at the glowing disc’s edge.
“Look to your right!” The alerting voice from the command centre makes them jump.
They all look to the right simultaneously. Even though they can clearly see her, it takes them a few seconds to realise that it is no other than Shaillah standing in front of them.
Immediately, she sends a thought-command, making the floating galaxy tilt and rotate until it stops and zooms in on the Orion spiral arm.
“Welcome, my friends! Let’s fly to your local zone through our beautiful galaxy, shall we?” She readily greets them.
The men can’t take their eyes off the breathtaking images; swathes of billowing star-forming nebulas, crisscrossed by dark, dusty gas clouds are constantly flying in one after another in front of their eyes.
The spectacle is so realistic they have the sensation of actually flying through the Milky Way .
Miraculously, they feel as though they are gliding over the orbits of familiar planets and moons until the frame stops at a close-up of the serene white-blue image of planet Earth.
“Yes, we have come from very far to visit the humans,” she adds in a vibrant voice.
“Where … do they … come from?” Khan opens his eyes wide, his voice faltering and breaking up at every word.
Shaillah looks back at the galaxy as its free-floating image slants backwards, revealing the bulge below the galactic plane. It keeps zooming in until a glistening double star system appears as its centre.
“The Rom-Ghenshar system, in the direction of the Eridani constellation from your location—seventy thousand light-years away, below the galactic plane, on the other side.” She amplifies the image even further, revealing the majestic binary system of an immense yellow star and its smaller red companion, bound in an oblique orbital path.
The extended line-up of multi-sized planets poised around the glowing double stars soon appears in the unfolding view.
Zooming in further, the image veers off and focuses on a colourful globe, accompanied by four golden-red moons locked into a close embrace through a thin, dusty ring.
“And this is our mother planet!” she proudly announces.
“May I remind you, Erin Lobart, you were born here on this planet. How can you claim you’re one of them?” A rattled Professor Khan erupts in a challenging tone, as if he has regained his confidence.
“Ha! Correction, Professor Khan. My name is Shaillah. I may have been born here, but my genes and my cells are not human anymore—”
“Not again, Erin! Tell us the truth. He kidnapped you against your will,” Sam yells as he runs towards her.
Shaillah does not make the slightest move to avoid him. Instead, she walks towards him. And Sam finds himself running through a puff of sparkling particles that reform themselves back into her image behind him.
The men’s gasps blend in with the clatter from the room’s speakers as everyone watching cries out in utter confusion and amazement.
“She’s only an image, a hologram!” a stunned Sanders shouts.
“Right. At the moment, I am, but I can get even stronger, unreachable and impassable,” Shaillah replies while Sam runs back to the side of John Sanders, straining his eyes while staring at her in disbelief .
“What do you want from us?” Khan says in a tone of utter resignation.
“Collaboration, understanding, trust. That’s not much to ask,” she responds, slowly pacing in front of the startled men.
Shaillah shows more details of the majestic multicoloured planet. In front of them, there is a crimson watery world peppered with long rocky islands beneath pearly and gold city skylines, each island surrounded by a thick green canopy.
“We call our mother planet Rom-Enjie, the largest of the watery worlds in the Rom-Ghenshar system. This is our ancestral home. More than ten thousand years ago, our ancestors travelled to planet Earth from Rom-Enjie. They came, they stayed, but it ended in tragedy. It was a shame that they had to leave in a hurry, but that is another long story. The important thing is that we have now returned, with a new plan, a new beginning. And here we are, asking for your gracious welcome, but above all … your understanding.”
“Erin or Shaillah,” Professor Khan says hesitantly, “tell the Rom … uh—”
“The Rom-Ghenshars, sir.”
“That we’re ready to collaborate … but we need to know their plans first and foremost!”
“And where are they?” Sam daringly asks in a sarcastic tone while looking around him.
Shaillah arches her eyebrows, warmly smiling at Sam. “Our Supreme Commander Kuzhma-Or says he feels privileged to visit the humans but apologises for his absence today. He has urgent matters to attend in another star system. And I’m bringing you his message.”