"I don't" "We're not there yet." "It's right between decks 18 and 14." "There." "Did you smell that?" "I didn't smell anything." "What do you mean?" "You didn't smell that?" "I don't smell anything." "You're a telepath." "I thought all your senses were supposed to be enhanced." "I don't use my abilities unless required to by the new regulations." "And this has nothing to do" "It smells like something died out in the tracks." "We've had a maintenance crew out there 3 times." "They haven't found anything." "Then they haven't looked." "Yes." "Captain, you're needed on the bridge." "What is it?" "We're picking up a distress signal... 1,500 clicks to starboard." "Identification?" "Unknown, sir." "All right." "I'm on my way." "Revise destination, bridge deck." "Confirmed." "Send out another crew." "I want that smell located, identified, and removed." "Aye, sir." "Object is 12 meters in diameter, short-range engines." "Markings and distress signal would seem to indicate a life pod." "Not like any we've seen before." "Looks like a first contact situation." "Aye, sir." "We're reading 2 life signs." "Orders?" "We can't leave them out here to die, Lieutenant." "Send out a rescue team." "Bring her aboard." "Make sure there's a translator standing by." "Aye, sir." "Bay pressurized." "Clear for entry." "All right, let's go, move in." "Get in front of the pod entrance." "Ok, I'll take the right side." "Yes, sir." "One more step and I'll kill you." "Matthew Gideon, Captain." "Attached to the Earth Alliance starship Excalibur." "To find a cure to the Drakh plague before it wipes out all life on Earth." "Anywhere I have to." "Who do you serve?" "And who do you trust?" "Everyone, just back away!" "Put your guns down!" "We can't do that." "You in charge here?" "I'm the Captain." "Good." "I want my ship recharged and cleared to leave." "We can do that." "And I want him." "That we can't do." "Fine." "Well, I'll take somebody else, but one of you is going with me." "Why?" "Why are you doing this?" "We just saved your life." "Don't give me that!" "You won't make me disappear like everyone else." "I'm going back, and this time, I'm taking proof." "What proof?" "Aah!" "Durkani!" "Easy!" "Take them to the brig." "Hold them for questioning." "Questioning." "Is that what you call it now?" "Is that the latest code word for torture and murder?" "!" "You can kill us, but you can't kill the truth!" "Go!" "You all right?" "Yeah, I'm fine." "It's just a strain." "I'm not used to contact with alien minds." "Did you have a chance to look around while you were in there?" "Negative." "Projection is allowed under defense protocol, but alien or human, unauthorized scans are not permitted." "I wouldn't expect you to do a full scan." "Just a sense of the room, so to speak." "Showing that we can obey the new regs is all that stands between us and the creation of a new psycorps." "I'm not gonna be the one to mess that up." "All I got were emotions." "They're confused..." "Desperate..." "Determined..." "And deeply frightened." "Of what?" "Us." "Listen..." "Durkani, is that you?" "Where are you?" "Not far." "Are you ok?" "I came back to the office." "You shouldn't be there." "It's dangerous." "They're watching." "I had to check just in case they left anything behind." "Durkani, they burnt the files." "Tore the place apart." "There's nothing left, except for what we grabbed on the way out." "What are we gonna do?" "Well, you always said you wanted to go places you've never been." "Now's the time." "What are you talking about?" "Look, we can't go home, and we can't go to the authorities without the proof, but there's one place we can go where we can find the proof." "Where's that?" "Out there." "Meet me in half an hour in the usual place." "I'll take it from there." "Well, it looks like they've calmed down." "Looks like." "Save me from myself." "Have the last cup of coffee in here." "One more, and I'm gonna be up all night again staring' at the ceiling." "I swear they're adding caffeine to this stuff just to mess with me." "Not as good as the genuine article, but..." "It'll do." "You know what else I miss besides real coffee?" "Wind." "I'm not talking about, uh, fans moving pressurized air through the vents." "I'm talking wind." "The ebb and the flow of it." "From a breeze, to nothing, and then wind again." "You never get wind on a starship or a space station." "Strictly a planetary artifact." "Whenever I got leave, the first thing I'd do is go home, hop back in my house, close my eyes, and just sit there." "Glass of iced tea, my feet up, and feel the wind on my face." "Now, that's paradise, Lieutenant." "So, what's the latest on our guests?" "Dr. Chambers just finished going over the latest readings from the brig med scanner." "Despite appearances, their biology- especially their cardio, pulmonary, and neural systems- is very different from our own." "Then why do they dress like us?" "Hell, they even speak English." "Yes, but it's not their native language." "E.e. g. readouts indicate a high level of neural processing whenever they talk to the guards." "Proving that they're translating their own language into English." "Exactly." "Now, I've gone over all the alien contact logs, wired back to Earth for more information, but so far, there's no record of a species like this on our charts." "As far as I can tell, this is the first time our races have met." "Then how do they know the language?" "I have no idea." "I see." "Well, I guess I'm just gonna have to ask them." "I can do it if you'd like." "First contact protocol is still in effect." "It's Captain's prerogative, and I'm curious." "I'll do it." "Yes, sir." "Should I apologize now or later?" "Since we may not have a later, now is probably best." "I am sorry I didn't believe you until now." "All this time, I thought you were just... crazy?" "Certifiable?" "Deluded." "Ah." "But I was wrong." "These aliens really do exist." "That I've always known." "What we have to do now is make sure we can keep on existing until we can figure a way out of here." "Hope I'm not intruding." "Thought I'd see how you were doing." "Make sure you're being treated all right." "I've been in worse places." "But you know all about that, don't you?" "No, I" "What are you going to do with us?" "Well, that depends on you." "We could put you back in your life pod, but it only has about another day of breathable air." "We're not really in a position to take you home." "And so far, you haven't given me any reason to recharge your life pod." "I'm deeply moved by your desire to help us." "It's a welcome and almost convincing change of heart." "But given our past history, you'll forgive me if I don't believe you." "What past history?" "We've checked our files." "There's no record of any prior contact between our species." "No, I'm sure there wouldn't be." "Then how do you know our language?" "Let's just say that certain top secret recordings found their way out of file cabinets buried half a mile under the capitol." "I spent years going over them... decoding them, learning your language." "I played the tapes for some of my colleagues, but they said it was just random noise." "They wouldn't accept" "Ok, look, I'm lost." "Let's just take this one step at a time." "You're saying that there has been contact between our races?" "That's correct." "But there's no proof of that, aside from your knowledge of English." "And you could have gotten that by intercepting broadcasts that left our world hundreds of years ago." "There's proof, all right." "It just keeps being erased every time someone finds it." "Come on." "You know the truth as well as I do." "And what is the truth?" "Your people have been visiting my planet for centuries." "You've ruined lives, devastated parts of my world... and helped create certain high-placed agencies within the government to conceal those facts." "I've dedicated my life... to exposing this conspiracy of silence." "No." "If this were going on, I'd know about it." "Assuming you're not lying." "And assuming you're not lying, either." "All right." "You've got my interest." "I'll tell you what." "You say you can prove these allegations?" "Show me." "If you can back this up," "I will personally take you back to your world so that we can investigate these charges further." "Is that a deal?" "For now." "Good." "I'll have one of my people go to your life pod, bring anything you need." "You can't be serious." "Did you see his eyes?" "I believe he genuinely doesn't know." "Maybe their government is hiding the truth, same as ours." "You can't trust him." "I don't." "I trust no one, but we have to take this chance, or we may never make it home alive." "Any luck finding that smell?" "Lieutenant," "I've gone over this whole area 3 times." "There's nothing here." "Tell you the truth, after poking around this place for 6 hours, the only thing that stinks in here is me." "Hey, you think he'd go for that?" "Somehow I doubt it." "Keep looking." "Aye, sir." "So far, all our attempts at space travel have been limited to our own solar system." "We sent long-range probes out to neighboring stars, but officially, they didn't find any sign of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe." "You say officially." "That's always been the party line." "But then the sightings started." "What sightings?" "For years, strange craft have been seen hovering in the sky over rural areas, seen by reputable people- businessmen, farmers, law enforcement." "Here." "This... is a blimp." "I've never seen one of them personally, only in history books, but it's- according to our government, what you're holding in your hand is a picture of swamp gases." "And this." "This is a drawing made by a witness when one of the ships crashed in the desert area on our world." "They were 6-foot tall, had hair on their heads, and small round eyes." "Our government tried to dismiss the whole thing, said it was just..." "A weather balloon." "You've heard this story." "Somewhere." "Go on." "Well, they tried to cover it up, but this time, we have physical evidence." "We found this at the scene of the crash." "We think it's some kind of weapon or recreational device maybe." "It's both, actually, depending on how the game goes." "But there's more." "Strange drawings cut into our crops, music no one's ever heard before coming through the radio, but this-this is the supreme insult to our intelligence." "I told you a moment ago that we sent out probes to other stars." "Well, one of them sent back this image as it passed over your world." "Because our government maintains there's no life on other planets, they insist that those aren't faces." "They say it's a trick of light and shadow, an optical illusion." "But this time, we knew that we had them." "The lie was too obvious, too transparent." "So we forced the government to send the probe back for a second look." "They resisted, of course." "Said it was too difficult, too expensive, but we succeeded, and this- this is the picture we got back." "Go ahead." "Tell me that photo has not been doctored." "Of course it has." "This is mount rush more on my world." "That's Earth." "Well, then-then you admit that all this is true." "No, it isn't." "But you just said- that it is my world, but that doesn't mean that we're doing anything to your world." "Look..." "What I don't understand is, where do you fit in all of this?" "I've been on the trail of these sightings for years..." "Trying to prove that aliens were interfering with the development of my world." "My partner lyssa joined me a few years ago." "At first, she didn't believe me." "But then, the proof started mounting up until..." "Until we had to go." "We were working late... going over several reported abductions by your people when they came for us." "We weren't sure what it meant, but someone obviously thought we were getting too close to the truth, and our lives were in danger." "Come here." "Yeah." "We decided if our lives were in danger anyway, we might as well go the whole way." "We decided to stowaway on a ship bound for the edge of our solar system and ejected, hoping to find... you." "And we did." "Well, I'll give you this - it's a hell of a story." "But you still haven't answered one question... why?" "What's the goal?" "You said my people have been interfering with yours." "How?" "When money for our children's education is cut, we know it's because the outsiders want our people to remain more ignorant so they can be used and manipulated more easily." "When public funding for housing is cut back, it's because they need the money to build more secret underground bases." "The crime and poverty rates have increased to keep us off balance." "Every facet of life on my world has been affected." "This isn't our native style of dressing." "This has been pushed upon us by fashion designers working for the government so the aliens feel more at home among us." "So they can move more freely." "Captain, assuming this is not just some trick to see how much we've got," "If you-if you truly don't know that your government is involved, then I plead with you... help us." "Come to my world." "Your arrival there will give us all the proof we've been waiting for." "All right." "Let me take the rest of the night to look this over." "I'll have a decision by morning." "Thank you." "Bridge to Captain." "Yes." "Long-range scanners are picking up a ship on approach." "Identification?" "Unknown." "Gettin' kind of crowded out here, Lieutenant." "How am I supposed to sleep?" "I expect you to find a quieter sector next time." "Aye, sir." "If they begin firing on us, should I tell them to come back in the morning" "When we're all fresher?" "Negative." "I'm on my way." "Alien ship still on approach." "Have you tried contacting them yet?" "Not necessary, sir, they're hailing us... in English." "Then we've either got more of the same race, or there is one extremely busy English teacher hiding out here somewhere." "Put them through." "Aye, sir." "My name is Captain Matthew Gideon of the starship Excalibur." "Identify yourself." "Special agent Kendarr." "I believe you have intercepted 2 of our citizens." "We would like you to return them to us at your first convenience." "May I ask why?" "Why?" "To execute them, of course." "Refresh me, Lieutenant." "How did we get in the middle of this again?" "I believe it was an act of mercy, sir." "Remind me never to do that again." "Aye, sir." "No good deed goes unpunished." "I'll have that embroidered on a sampler when we have time." "Ah, special agent Kendarr, welcome to the Excalibur." "Thank you, Captain." "It's a remarkable ship." "Far better than anything in our own fleet." "Well, then perhaps you'd like to look around." "We could talk." "Excellent." "This way." "And you can tell me why you want to kill my houseguests." "And so I would like to see the prisoners as soon as possible." "I'll have them brought up from the brig so we can talk, but just to talk." "Captain" "I have a slight problem turning them over to you knowing that they're going to be executed." "But surely, Captain, even on your own world, there are some offenses that are punishable by death?" "High crimes are usually punishable by death of personality," "Not physical death." "We believe- but there aresome, are there not?" "Mutiny, treason, one or two others." "On my world, there are very few crimes that merit the death penalty." "One such is to commandeer a spacecraft and take it beyond the limits of our solar system, as these 2 have done." "There are many dangerous races out here, Captain, most of whom are far more advanced than we." "The ship that brought me here is one of only a few we've built so far, none of which are capable of entering hyperspace." "And without the presence of a jumpgate, we are limited to our own small system." "You're at a tactical disadvantage?" "Exactly." "And until we catch up," "As a duly appointed law enforcement officer, it is my responsibility to make sure that no one goes out and attracts the wrong attention." "How can you justify penalizing your citizens for contacting aliens, while at the same time denying the existence of any life forms outside your world?" "That denial... serves a purpose that would take too long to explain." "But in this case... do you smell something?" "Commander Paine, you're needed on the flight deck." "Commander Paine to the flight deck, please." "This way." "That's all." "One thing I don't understand- you say you've been aware of other races besides your own for years, that you have been monitoring and recording these transmissions." "That's correct." "So why are both of you fluent in this one, in English?" "If, in fact, there hasn't been any prior contact between us, why all these sightings on your world?" "And why do so many of them relate specifically to Earth and humans?" "Your story sounds good on the surface, but... something doesn't add up." "It will all become clear soon enough, Captain." "It better." "That's why I wanted to see you all together." "I figure if I put all of you in the same room," "Maybe the truth will wander in by accident." "Lieutenant, you have the helm." "Aye, sir." "I was wondering when you were gonna show up." "You chose this." "You made it inevitable." "And you- after everything you said, you sold us out." "He tried to kill us 3 times." "I just brought you here to talk." "I haven't sold anyone out." "Wait a minute, what are you saying?" "Aah!" "Don't move!" "Listen..." "Look, we've been through this once already." "This doesn't help" "Quiet!" "And you!" "Stay out of my head!" "Try anything and he's dead." "Durkani, where are you going to go?" "This is my ship." "I control every way in and every way out." "I want the lightpod recharged and ready to leave in one hour." "If it's ready, we'll leave peacefully." "If it isn't, he dies!" "Listen to me - one hour!" "They headed down there!" "Check the hallways!" "Should I get started embroidering that sampler, sir?" "Get me security." "I want them tracked, and I want to know how the hell a weapon got past the scanners." "Nice job pretending to be a dangerous nut back there." "Who's pretending?" "Durkani, this won't work." "You can't hope to escape, and this is certainly no way to treat a former employer." "That's right." "But unfortunately," "I don't see any barbed wire laying around, so you'll just have to wait." "In there!" "Go on!" "Well, look on the bright side." "If we die here, at least we'll take him with us." "This is a bright side?" "Well, ok, granted, it's not much." "But right now, a quick death is about all we got left to hope for." "Make sure everyone gets a look." "Yes, sir." "We've got teams moving up every deck." "We'll find them soon enough, sir." "Finding them is less of an issue than what we do once we find them." "Is their lightpod recharged?" "Almost." "Captain, are you sure you want to give in to their demands?" "This isn't our fight, Lieutenant." "We got dragged into the middle of this mess." "It's got nothing to do with us." "As far as I'm concerned, you can wall up the lot of them, they can fight it out to their hearts' content." "Any word on the landing bay scanners?" "We've gone over them 3 times, Captain." "They're in perfect working order." "Then how did Kendarr smuggle a weapon past them?" "I don't know." "The scanners are set to pick up any known kind of weapon- slug throwers, energy weapon, plasma gun." "Then this must be some new kind of weapon, something we haven't seen before." "No, these aliens are less advanced than we are." "It's doubtful they could come up with a more advanced weapon." "It doesn't make sense." "There's a lot here that doesn't make sense." "But before this is over, it will make sense, or I will have someone's hide hanging on my office wall." "We've located the intruders, sir." "They're in the level 14 tube." "All right, get a tactical team up there in one of the bullet cars." "We'll go in through the nearest work shaft and catch them in the middle." "And make sure we can contain the situation this time." "Aye-aye, sir." "Just in case this doesn't work out, if you have any last thoughts you'd like to share with the rest of us, now would be a good time." "So you're ok dying with all of this on your conscience?" "I have..." "Nothing on my conscience." "All this is for the best, for us, even for you." "I'm just a soldier doing my job." "So the lies, the betrayals, the conspiracy to hide the truth, that's just part of doing your job?" "The truth..." "Has never been in anyone's best interest." "Almost there." "Heat 'em up, people!" "Let's go, go, go, go!" "That's it." "That's what?" "That's where that smell is coming from." "The seals on this waste disposal tube are loose." "Every time the bullet car comes by, it probably shakes the whole thing loose a little bit more." "Oh, it couldn't be that loose." "Lieutenant, I'm looking right at it." "Oh, what is that?" "Ohh!" "Ohh!" "Ohh!" "On the other hand... keep climbing." "Aye, sir." "Do you smell something?" "Yes." "Up!" "Right now!" "That's far enough." "Put the gun down." "Without him, we'll never get out of here." "Wrong." "You put the gun down, and we'll make sure you get out of here safely." "If the other ship interferes, we'll take care of them." "After we've gone, we'll let him go." "But he'll kill me, Captain." "Nobody is killing anybody, not on my ship, not on my watch." "I mean it." "Hold it!" "I said, freeze!" "If we wanted to kill you, we could do it, without harming Kendarr." "Frankly, the only thing I want is for the 2 of you to get the hell off my ship as fast as possible, and take your conspiracies with you." "Come on, let's go." "This way." "Ready, go." "Come on, move." "Well... there you go." "She's all charged up." "You can leave whenever you want." "Thank you- don't thank me." "Just go." "We're not done with each other yet." "You know that." "We will tell others what we've seen here." "Without proof, who's going to believe you?" "It doesn't matter if they believe us." "Sooner or later, the truth's gonna come out." "The truth is- out..." "Of fashion." "Mr. Eilerson just finished his analysis of this weapon." "It's useless." "No charge whatsoever." "That's why we couldn't pick it up with our scanners." "Ha ha ha ha ha." "Then you were never in any danger?" "None what so ever." "I wanted him to grab the gun, and I wanted you to think the threat was serious, but I'm not about to put my own life in danger." "All right, look, I don't know what kind of game you're playing here, but either I get an explanation right now, or you are headed straight for the- no need for threats, Captain." "My mission here is finished, and I can answer all your questions now." "You see, my people have a long history of suspicion and paranoia, which has led to an equally long history of wars, big wars, small wars, but mainly civil wars that started when our government failed" "to live up to a promise." "Once my people find someone to blame, that someone usually ends up dead." "Great." "So what does that have to do with us?" "About 200 years ago, we first picked up communications from other worlds." "We kept the specifics quiet for the reasons I told you before." "But then, it hit us." "Aliens, or... outsiders, as my people call your kind, were the perfect scapegoats for our internal problems." "Then the sightings, the evidence- it was all created by you." "You set us up." "I assure you it was nothing personal." "We chose a race at random." "It happened to be yours." "Once we decided which race to use, we used it to create a consistent feel to the sightings, which we staged and then adamantly denied afterwards." "The more you make a big deal out of denying something, the more people think it must be true." "Exactly." "Once we created this conspiracy, we could relax." "When the budget is cut, why, it must be the aliens." "When something goes wrong, it's those damned outsiders again." "They..." "You... pulled all the strings." "We're just innocent puppets, forced to obey." "Since they can't get to you and we're not to blame, well, we haven't had a single civil war since we instituted this new policy, not a one." "Then why go after Durkani?" "A conspiracy needs true believers out to unmask it, and true believers need to feel persecuted." "We don't want him dead." "We need him alive to feed the fire, keep alive the story that all our problems are being caused by aliens." "That's what led us here." "Lately, he's been feeling frustrated." "Nothing ever leads anywhere." "So we let him get this far, and were about to stage an event that would revive his interest- when we intercepted his distress signals." "Precisely." "We never imagined we'd run into the real thing." "But it worked beautifully." "Now he's even more convinced we're working together." "You've done us a great... service." "Well, I must be going." "My work is done." "One thing I must say." "In order to create the illusion of interference by your race," "I had to study your culture very carefully." "It has much to commend it- pizza, ice cream." "It's all become quite... addictive." "Good-bye, Captain." "Thanks for all your help." "Approaching coordinates." "Are you sure this is where the alien ship was headed?" "Aye, sir." "We tracked Kendarr's transmissions as he left." "The readings are accurate to within 15,000 clicks." "Good." "Jump to normal space." "Aye, sir." "Jump to normal space." "Outstanding, Lieutenant." "Just within firing range." "Sir, we're not going to- attack?" "Negative." "The only thing that we're going to attack is a lie." "I've loaded up 20 of our planetary surface probes with the latest version of the interstellar encyclopedia and the full record of everything that happened here after Kendarr and the others came aboard." "We're gonna blow this so-called conspiracy wide open." "Program the controls to set the probes down in safe areas near major population centers." "Don't want anybody getting flattened when they land." "Aye, sir." "Probes away, sir." "Good." "That should cause quite a stir when they find out what's really been going on." "But can I ask?" "Why?" "Maybe because this whole thing offends my sense of honesty." "Maybe because sooner or later we'll have official contact with these people, and I don't want Earth being blamed for something we didn't do, but mainly..." "I don't like being played with, used, or manipulated, and this should communicate that lesson very clearly." "They're probably some who'll say that by doing this, we're interfering with their culture." "Probably." "Screw 'em." "We let the truth back into the room, Lieutenant, and the truth can take care of itself." "Comm is yours." "Jump back to hyperspace." "Continue on course to the next target." "Aye, sir." "And where will you be?" "I'm going where I can feel the wind on my face for a while." "Ahh..." "Paradise."