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[An amalgamation of viewpoints in this chapter, again using Paula Wilson as the main point of view, but lots of diplomatic notes were used to help me piece together this visit of the Earth leaders to the seat of Federation government. RBB]
The Ronoi landed on the main moon of Arlucian to await the arrival of the other five starships. All of the leaders would be transferring to the flagship for the final visit – to the Federation’s capital planet, Arlucian.
First, however, as part of the moon visit, we were accommodated in a luxurious hotel resort set into a sealed dome on the moon’s surface. Gravity was about a sixth that of Earth and most of us enjoyed strolling around a delightful park. Even the most severe looking leaders couldn’t resist jumping to see how easy it was. Great fun, even when President Ivanov lost his balance coming down and dived headfirst through some shrubs. Injured pride, but nothing else. Thank goodness none of the official Earth camera teams had filmed it, because it would have gone viral.
The park was so exciting, filled with strange trees and shrubs. One I liked in particular was a woody plant which formed a dome-like bush approximately three metres in diameter. Its leaves were variegated, but like no plant on Earth, the colours of the stripes along the top surface of each leaf were quite extraordinary.
When it first caught my eye, all the stripes were changing from a dull grey and black to a vivid chartreuse green contrasted against the black. The green, however, wasn’t just a colour. As I looked, it glowed as if lit from within by tiny LEDs. Then, as I began to stare at it, the green morphed through deep ocean blue into bubblegum pink which then, too, took on an inner radiance.
I took out my camera and began to film, noticing that several of the other leaders were also gathering around the shrub, their own cameras capturing the event for posterity as it cycled through more colours than any rainbow I’d ever seen. I wondered how natural selection had caused this wonder of nature to evolve.
Eventually its signal presentation repeated. I was the only human remaining and set off to catch the others, but, en route, I was continually distracted by many other beautiful, if not so luminescent specimens.
I arrived at an open area, in the centre of which was a quartet of automatons playing several instruments including one of the terasco devices I’d watched Ya Mistorn playing on the flagship.
Everyone was sitting, with drinks and lunch plates which hovered within range of your hand. I was given my favourite fruit juice and a plate of food and sat near Perfect. It was most unnerving releasing your drink in mid-air and watching it just hovering beside you. Amazingly the drinks and plates seemed to be aware of their surroundings and who they belonged to. If someone passed nearby, they’d move to the other side so as to not be knocked.
The food was strips of meat, fish, and vegetables with soft, buttered tortillas. The flavours and textures were so different to anything we had back home, but the meat was reminiscent of tongue, which wasn’t a personal favourite.
I looked upwards through the ceiling of the dome. The seat realised my intention and reclined to give me a more comfortable position. I saw that many of the others were also taking in the scene above our heads.
Against the pitch darkness of space was Arlucian, a stunning Earth-like planet with enough swirling clouds, green and brown land masses, and cerulean oceans to make me feel homesick. It filled more than half the sky and its current aspect to us displayed a pristine white ice cap, but even more impressive was a band of rings, thinner than Saturn’s but closer to the planet. The outer ring was cobalt blue, the mid-ring, eggshell, and the inner ring an almost iridescent butterscotch.
The camera was soon to hand, and I took both video and still images which I’d treasure for a lifetime.
Behind me, I overheard a conversation. President Spence said, ‘So this is the capital world, Ya Moroforon?’
‘Yes, Yol Spence, although government is actually spread among a number of worlds. This is where the Central Council meets. It comprises four hundred and thirteen delegates representing the quarter of a million Federation civilisations.’
‘It must be very unwieldy.’
‘Not really, Yol Spence. When a government system has been in place for more than half a million years, it becomes a very smooth machine. Delegates are extremely busy, of course, keeping in touch with all of their assistants. Most delegates have an average of two assistants for each world. More if the world is new. The most annoying aspect is inertia. When things have always been done in one particular way, it’s difficult to get delegates to consider alternatives.’
‘Is there a map of the Federation planets? I have trouble getting my head around so many worlds.’
Ya Moroforon laughed and said, ‘You and me both, Yol Spence!’ I heard him laugh too. Was this a strategy to try to woo him from the dark side?
‘Ya Moroforon,’ said Prime Minister Grange, ‘is this resort controlled entirely by robots?’
‘I should imagine so, Ya Grange, although there may be a few people who just enjoy working in such places. This little quartet has two people in it.’
‘Oh. I hadn’t realised. Which two?’
‘The being playing the terasco is not a mechanical person, nor the creature with the drums, Ya Grange.’
‘Where are they from?’
‘I have no idea, Ya Grange. You could ask Ya Mistorn. She would know if she has ever come across them before.’
I studied the little band. They could easily have all been mechanical, but looking more closely, the eyes of the drummer were definitely moist. The terasco player had me beat, though, until he or she coughed. I guessed that was a giveaway.
««o»»
The Ronoi slowly lifted its bulk from the moon holiday resort and pointed towards the northern hemisphere of the mesmerising planet. I couldn’t take my eyes off the rings and filmed a long sequence as we passed by them and then slid through the atmosphere beneath. We approached a large, pear-shaped continent. Within the hour we were parked on a spaceport outside the capital city.
We’d been warned that the city would be quite cool as it was approaching winter in the northern hemisphere and we all dressed appropriately. There were over forty of us in total and a luxurious coach collected us from the ship and drove into the centre. There was a lot of traffic and it was plain to all that it was autonomous. Cars, coaches and trucks whizzed this way and that, crossing each other’s paths with never a hint of slowing down or braking.
I heard Perfect ask Yol Merofort, ‘Would a living driver be able to drive here or is this traffic strictly mechanical?’
‘Technically you could, Ya Okafor! A very effective and very quick way to commit suicide?’ he replied and laughed.
Perfect laughed with him, but he continued, ‘In fact, I mean most of that in jest. You could drive here. If you were self-driving, the vehicle would be transmitting that information and everyone else would create a safe passage for you.’
‘What, seriously?’
‘Oh, yes, but be honest, would you want the stress of trying to drive your own car through the streets here, when you could hire any fancy, sporty, or luxury autonomous vehicle you would ever want?’
‘No, probably not,’ the Secretary General said, laughing and lapsing into silence.
We entered the nearest thing to a traffic jam I had seen since leaving New York. We were on a broad thoroughfare, eight lanes wide, four in each direction. Those heading towards us were travelling as normal, but on our side, the left, the vehicles were bumper to bumper and moving not much faster than walking pace.
The street was lined with bright lights and it was clear that we were nearing a place of great importance.
The council building stood at the end of the road. It was an enormous dome-shaped structure, peppered with lights which shone from row upon row of windows. I guessed it was far larger than the largest athletics stadium on Earth, and completely enclosed.
Yol Merofort stood up and walked to the front of the vehicle, picking up a portable microphone.
‘We will soon be arriving at the General Council. As you can see, this is a pretty busy place and most of these vehicles will be full of tourists. Our plan here is to disembark and move into one of the reception areas where we will meet the councillor who would be responsible for the Earth during the transition if you decided to join us. Her name is Ya Prold Churmbin. She is a Delarkon which is a planet not far from Earth... only eighteen light years, in fact.
‘After seeing her, we are hoping to meet President Ye Strighiton Dimorathron briefly. There will then be some free time for you to explore the government buildings. Please wear the blue necklaces we gave you earlier. If you need one of our team press the red section on the back of the pendant. When it is time to leave, your pendant will buzz and glow light blue. If you press the arrow on the front, directions from where you are will appear in front of you, only visible to you, to show you how to reach the meeting point.’
Yol Merofort returned to his seat as the cavalcade inched its way closer to the dome.
««o»»
Organised chaos came to mind. The entrance area was like St Pancras Station during a pre-holiday rush hour.
But instead of the chaos being humans, these were every type of alien under the sun.
As we followed Yol Merofort’s diplomatic flag, there were hordes of people going this way and that. We were immersed in an atmosphere which continually changed its smell. I caught a whiff of the pungent characteristic of chlorine. Ugh! The scents of the creatures and traces of the gases many of them were breathing, was providing the aromas. The city’s air was not as pleasant as any of the other’s we’d experienced. I supposed that the body odour of thousands of species was uncontrollable in such a busy place.
The variety of their shapes and sizes was also a surprise. I was amazed as a flat hoverboard, about three metres by four, floated past me, a few centimetres from the ground, carrying a black tentacled creature, who unnerved me by fixing me with a stare from his single enormous eye, the size of a dinner plate. I got the impression he or she was assessing whether or not I might be a tasty morsel. To each side of him were cylinders, two or three times the size of large camping gas bottles, with networks of tubes disappearing into folds of gelatinous flesh at the front. Its hoverboard gave out a beep-beep warning sound like one of those airport transport devices for disabled passengers. I pressed myself tighter to President Toscano and a few people in front of it looked around and tried to make enough room for it to glide past them.
There were green people, red people, purple people, scaly people, hairy people, skinny people, grossly overweight people, people with two legs, four, six, and even eight, plus one that looked so much like the acromantula in Harry Potter that I almost did a Ron Weasley and fled the scene!
Countless is a word which is often overused, but to say there were countless different types of aliens entering and leaving this enormous building would be a justifiable use of the word.
Yol Merofort gradually led us through the multiple doorways and into an entrance lobby the size of a baseball diamond. I noticed that all of the diplomatic assistants were keeping a very close eye upon us so that no one was lost in the crush. It made me feel like a third-grade child being fussed over by teachers on a school excursion.
Once inside there was more space and we were able to follow the distinctive powder blue gorilla as he made his way to the left of the bank of reception desks and into a refreshingly almost empty room.
Waiting within were three more aliens, all relatively humanlike in appearance compared with most we’d been seeing in the foyer. One, a very tall and delicate being wearing an exoskeleton, was apparently Ya Prold Churmbin and we presumed the other two were her assistants. One was stocky compared to us, with a bald domed head and the other was similar to a bear, but with wine-coloured fur. They all welcomed us as we entered and gathered around them.
‘Good afternoon, everyone,’ said the tall, fragile creature. ‘We’re neighbours in the Orion spur of the galaxy. I’m your provisional representative if you decide to join the Federation, although you will have diplomatic support teams for at least a decade.’
She then made a point of walking around everyone in the party for a personal introduction, which went really well, apart from Prime Minister Solberg who hurt her hand when shaking it. He was mortified.
‘It is one of the hazards of being Delarkonian. We tend to be somewhat frangible as our gravity is about a quarter of Arlucian’s. Don’t worry about it. Nothing broken,’ she said, stretching her fingers and rubbing the back of her hand with the other one.
‘So, so sorry, Ya Churmbin. I feel dreadful,’ said Prime Minister Solberg.
‘As I said, no harm done.’
I guessed it was a lesson for all of us. I felt very slightly heavier here, but only by a few per cent. Delarkon must be a small world indeed.
The delegate looked at her mobile device and said, ‘President Dimorathron will be here shortly. I’m sorry that he won’t have much time as his diary was actually full for today and his team have been frantically rearranging meetings so that we could be squeezed in, between less important meetings.’
I heard President Spence say, under his breath, ‘I should think so.’
I looked around. He’d been overheard by at least four or five other leaders, Perfect and Yol Merofort, whose expression stiffened somewhat. I think Prime Minister Grange was going to react to it, but then thought better of it. There could have been trouble if she had.
I know he was the President of the United States, hugely important on Earth, but when comparing it to meeting the President of a Galactic Federation of two hundred and fifty thousand worlds, he was small change.
Less than a minute later a set of double doors opened to the left of the room and in came Ye Strighiton Dimorathron, the President of the Federation and its entourage.
The President was a strange spectacle. It was a silver tank standing about one and a half metres high and three hundred millimetres in diameter. There were a number of dials and controls on the outside. The top was the equivalent of a space helmet, a spherical glass bowl about the same diameter as the tank. Inside, a pale yam-coloured liquid was home to the President itself, a fluid shape with two sunken eyes peering out of a head which was reminiscent of an octopus’s skin. It was, of course, a budding creature, hence the honorific ye. I couldn’t say it was pleasant to look at, but the eyes were most certainly alive and full of an amiable sparkle. One tentacle, encased in a polythene-like sleeve, protruded from the front of the tank. His amiable character belied his unpleasant appearance.
Accompanying it was a Clueb who could have been Ya Mistorn’s twin, causing me to wonder how they tell each other apart. I certainly couldn’t. She, if she was a “she”, hovered beside the President’s head. Two other aliens in his team were different again. One, a short, wizened humanoid about one metre high and the other, somewhat similar to the Ecisfiipians, but with a thicker neck and browner colour.
The President’s tentacle pressed and held a green button just below the tank’s neckline.
‘Garincha! How lovely to see you again. Are these the people from the world called Earth?’ it asked.
‘It’s an honour to meet you again, Ye Dimorathron. Yes, these are some of the leaders of independently ruled nations on the planet Earth,’ said the Ambassador.
‘I must meet them,’ it said and glided over to Melanie Grange, who happened to be closest. It hooked the protruding tentacle around her hand and said, ‘Tell me about your part of the Earth.’
‘I’m Melanie Grange, the Prime Minister of a country called New Zealand. It comprises two large islands, one of which has exceptionally beautiful mountains.’
‘And what is it best known for?’ it asked with a really genuine sounding interest.
‘Ha ha, well the rest of the world thinks all we produce is a food animal called sheep, but, in fact, we’re a very technological nation and also produce exceptional wines.’
‘How sad! Oh, the cruelty of the universe! The one thing I can never do is partake of the delights of alcohol,’ it said and burst into laughter. ‘It would kill me instantly. I wonder if the buzz would be worth it!’
It turned to Anurak Channarong, ‘And you, sir, your nation does what?’
‘Pleased to meet you, Ye Dimorathron. Our economy is mainly agriculture and tourism, but industry is growing too. We’re the biggest economy in Southeast Asia. You’d love our tropical seas and coral reefs.’
‘Yes. That may be so. Indeed, it very well may be so,’ it moved on through the visiting leaders, eventually meeting President Spence. ‘And what is your nation most well-known for?’
‘I’m Jack Spence, the President of the United States of America. We’re the world’s richest, largest, and most diverse economy. We work tirelessly to keep the peace throughout the world,’ said the US President. ‘As the leader of the largest Earth economy, I’d like a meeting with you. Can we get an hour alone?’
‘Gerady, how is my diary?’ asked Ye Dimorathron.
The Clueb, did a somersault in mid-air. The Federation President laughed and said, ‘When she does that, it means I’ve asked a difficult question. Give her a second or two, Yol Spence.’
Gerady said, ‘We can do an hour on the fortieth at midday.’
‘There we go, Yol Spence. You have your hour with me,’ it said and turned to President Meunier, ‘and your nation?’
Each of the leaders in turn spent time telling the Federation President about their countries.
I heard President Spence ask Yol Merofort, ‘When is the fortieth? Can I attend?’
‘We can certainly arrange for you to be here, Yol Spence. Days on Arlucian are approximately three Earth days. It is the sixth today, so you would need to return in about one hundred and two days.’
‘Over three months! That’s ridiculous!’
‘Ye Dimorathron is a very busy person, Yol Spence. Every delegate wants to see him for some reason or another and many world leaders ask for meetings too. You must remember that there are nearly two hundred and fifty thousand worlds in the Federation. I’d say the fortieth is surprisingly early and I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d declined the request. Earth is not yet a member.’
‘That’s no way to negotiate, Merofort!’
‘Yol Spence,’ said the gorilla, emphasising the honorific ‘Ye Dimorathron will not be negotiating during that meeting. You’ll have agenda issues to discuss. Negotiation is done through Ambassador Moroforon, alone.’
The US President took a deep breath, turned his back on Yol Merofort, and walked away from the group.
Eventually, Ye Dimorathron’s time with us was at an end. Even I had a few seconds with him. I apologised that I was not one of the leaders and it replied, ‘Thank Arlucian for that! An ordinary citizen!’ then it laughed and whispered, ‘This is all for you, you know. The Federation exists to make your life better, longer, healthier, and more interesting. Nice to have met you, Ya Paula Wilson.’
I couldn’t believe it. The President of the Federation had spoken to me, a jobbing journalist from the Bronx, Paula Wilson!
««o»»
After the meeting with the Federation President, there was time to look around the seat of government. In a shop on the main concourse, they sold globes of planets. Several of them were different size versions of Arlucian. One was so beautiful I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. The globe itself was about thirty centimetres in diameter and the three rings circled it, completely unconnected to the globe by any means I could see. I asked the robot in the shop and he said that it would work on any planet. I just had to have it! I managed to find Yol Merofort and he purchased it for me.
‘How do I repay you?’ I asked.
‘No need, Ya Wilson. I’ll treat it as a diplomatic expense,’ he said.
We also did a little sightseeing in a wildlife park where creatures, looking for all the world like dinosaurs, lived freely. We were driven around in heavily armoured vehicles and, after something like a triceratops charged our car, I could see why the vehicles were so substantial.
In the evening, the Ronoi was en route back to Earth and the Ambassador and diplomatic staff threw an amazing banquet.
We were fed with the most wonderful dishes, every one of which thrilled the palate.
Shortly after the sweet course was served something apparently untoward took place. Two uniformed staff rushed in, seemingly in a panic, and whispered something to the Ambassador. She jumped up, called, ‘Heldy, Slindo, with me!’ and they all dashed out of the room. What the devil was that all about?
We finished our meal, enjoying a selection of beverages which passed for tea or coffee. When the door reopened, the Ambassador walked back into the banqueting hall; she looked most severe.
‘Ya Okafor, could I please have you and the Security Council members join us in the conference room,’ she said.
The rest of us watched the five leaders and Perfect leave with the Ambassador. This had to be something serious!
««o»»
[From Slindo Merofort’s video notes. RBB]
The Ambassador waited until everyone was seated then stood and said, ‘I’m afraid I have some very bad news. Two of our inspectors have been kidnapped in the north of Iraq!’
‘But they were protected by blue helmet soldiers!’ said Ya Okafor quickly.
Yol Merofort said, ‘I’m sorry, Ya Okafor, the eight soldiers you appointed to guard them have all been killed, plus four Kurdish soldiers who tried to prevent the kidnap!’