Solbidyum Wars Saga 4: Too Late for Earth (27 page)

“Hmm,” he hummed.  Next he took a large hammer from another of the team and rapped the door soundly in the lower left-hand corner and after that he looked at the instrument again.  Finally, he used another device to measure circles of equal diameter from each of the three suction cups and instructed a third member of our team to use a laser drill we had brought along to burn holes where the lines of the circle intersected.  I had assumed that the lasers would burn through the plate quickly so I was astonished when it took nearly 20 minutes to burn the first hole through.  About ten minutes into the process A’Lappe instructed two others of our team to burn holes at the other intersection points and finally after about 30 minutes all the holes were drilled.

“Will the door open now?”  I asked A’Lappe.

He turned and looked at me with those blinking eyes that seemed to mesmerize, “Not yet, but we are close.”

“Next he took a snake-like item that had some tools attached at the end and a small light and camera. This he inserted into one of the holes and moved it about inside the door, finally he located something inside and using the tools attached to the snake cable, he pushed some little pin, next he inserted a rod into another hole and twisted it and finally tapped it soundly with the hammer.  Then he nodded to two of the men with us and they came forward and grabbed the handle of the door, twisted it and pulled and slowly the door swung open.

The vault was smaller than I had hoped it would be, but it was obvious the caretakers at the museum intended to save as much as possible at it was tightly packed crammed full of art objects.  For a moment I think I felt what it must have been for Howard Carter when he peered into King Tut’s tomb for the first time and I began to wonder if any of Tut’s items survived and were they in Egypt or somewhere else when the asteroid hit.  I decided I needed to put looking for these items on a list for future explorations.

“Oh, look,” one of the members of my party exclaimed, there is a Monet, and over there is a Renoir.  Tibby will your ship be able to hold all these treasures?”

“I certainly hope so, because I want as much of it saved as possible.  We can set up a temporary museum and exhibits in one of the vacant compartments on the ship, and once we return to Megelleon we'll set up a proper Earth exhibit.  Maybe one day, when the Earth’s atmosphere settles to what it once was and humans return here, we can have these items on exhibited here once again.”

That night when we returned to the ship, it was with our shuttle so filled with artifacts there was barely room for us in it even though we had scarcely reduced the number of items stored in the vault.  One particular painting in the batch we found caught my attention; it was Vincent van Gogh’s Self
Portrait With Straw Hat
.  I decided to display it in my study office on the ship and had Piesew seeing to hanging it when suddenly A’Lappe appeared at my arm.

“Sort of looks like you a little Tibby.”  He said in a merry tone.

“You think so?”  I don’t see the resemblance, his chin and nose are more pointed than mine for one and for another I don’t have a beard.”

“True, but you both have red hair and your lips are similar.”

“H-m-m!”  Just then Kala entered the room.

“What do you think Kala?  A’Lappe says that I resemble this painting.”

“Well,” Kala began comparing me to the painting, “you both have red hair, and your lips are similar, but your nose is definitely different.  You don’t have the beard either.  I wouldn’t think anyone would confuse this painting as being you, but they might think it was a relative.”

“There actually were many painting Vincent Van Gogh did that were
Self Portraits With Straw Hat
,” Lon Chow said as he entered the room behind Kala.  “This one looks like one of his earliest.  I always regretted the war going on.  So many of the great western paintings and art works were not available to us to see in China, I am glad now that I will be able to see so many of them close up, but I am sad about  the circumstances behind it.”

“Over the next few days it became apparent that even with as large as the
NEW ORLEANS
was we were rapidly going to fill most of the empty spaces with artifacts from the Louvre, the British Museum of Arts and Science and the Smithsonian.  Unfortunately, we were unable to recover many items from the last two as portions of the lower floors and basements of these museums were flooded, nevertheless; we were able to extract many items on the upper levels.  By now the science teams that had gone to Antarctica had located and retrieved the seeds and genetic materials stored there and they were all safely aboard the
NEW ORLEANS
in refrigerated compartments.

We were nearing the end of our expeditions to Earth but before we left I decided I wanted to take a look at what was left of the United States.  Kala, A’Lappe and Jenira went with me on the
ALI
as I flew about trying to find recognizable landmarks, which were not as easy as I had hoped as most of the old coastline and coastal cities were now underwater.  New York City had buildings that rose from the water, the Statue of Liberty had water up to her waist, but she still stood.  The Tidewater area in Virginia was underwater and the Chesapeake Bay was gone and now part of the Atlantic Ocean.  Only a small island remained of what once was Florida, my home state of Louisiana was now under the Gulf of Mexico; a third of Texas was underwater as well.   Nowhere did I see a living thing; trees and grass were gone and any of the structures that had been made of wood were now ashes.  It was hard to determine where we were at many times because recognizable land marks were missing.  I wanted to show Kala the Grand Canyon but when we arrived where the Canyon should have been all we found was a large active lava field.  Even though it was hundreds of miles from Yellowstone, the shock wave that went through the Earth when the asteroid hit caused the magma underneath what had once been the park, to erupt sending rock and ash across half the nation.  After the major eruption, lava began flowing south and west from the caldera following rivers, valleys and canyons and joining up from lava flows from dozens of smaller ancient volcanoes that were now active again.  These flows had eventually reached to the Grand Canyon and filled it nearly full with lava flows.  The planet I had lived on and grown up on was now as alien to me as any other planet in the universe.

“Tibby, did you really live upon this planet?”  Jenira signed to me.

“Yes, but it didn’t look like this then.  There were trees everywhere, and it was green with grass and plants most places.  The sky was clearer then and blue, not gray and cloudy like it is now and the oceans were blue and the water clear and there were people and towns everywhere.  When I lived here there were billions of people on this planet, now nothing lives here.”

“That’s not exactly true Tibby,”  Kala said,  “Dr. Volkov said he found living cultures of some bacteria in the oceans and in the ice at Antarctica and that given time they will evolve into new life forms here.”

“Probably,” I answered, “but I doubt they will be anything like what was here before.”

“Maybe not the same, but most likely similar,”  A’Lappe answered, “just as most life forms on the planets in the Federation have different but yet similar attributes, so too what evolves here in the future will be comparable.

The last place I decided to visit before we left was Mount Rushmore National Memorial in South Dakota but when we arrived over the area, I was disappointed to find the sculptures covered in snow so deep that we were unable to find the mountain and carvings, if they still existed at all, and so it was with great sadness that I returned to the
NEW ORLEANS
.

We were preparing to leave Earth’s orbit when I received a call from Commodore Stonbersa on the bridge.  “Tibby, we are getting readings of a large ship heading this way.  It should arrive here within an hour.  Do you wish us to cloak or remain visible?”

“For now, I suggest we cloak,” I answered.  Contact Captain Slater of the International Team and Ming, have them meet with me in the Conference room near the bridge, and have video feeds from the sensors sent to the vid screen in there.  The Chinese refugees claimed a large ship was responsible for guiding the asteroid that hit the Earth and that it has been coming back from time to time.  It’s possible this might be that ship.  I would like to see if Ming or Slater can give us any insight when they see the ship.  Once you have contacted them get Norkoda on the bridge and make sure there is at least one Nibarian in engineering.  I have a hunch it might be the Tottalax and should they attack us with their sleep weapon at any time I want the Nibarians to keep this ship cloaked protective and active.  Tell all the Nibarians aboard that their first priority is the ship and its safety, while the rest of us may not be in comfortable positions we won’t be aware of it.  If we are attacked, I want Norkoda to fire a volley of nuclear missiles at the Tottalax.  You can target them beforehand so all he needs to do is press a launch button.”

The Commodore replied, “I’ll see to it Tibby, but what makes you think it might be the Tottalax?”

“I’m not really sure.  It’s just a hunch, but I want to take precautions just the same.”  I answered.

I still didn’t feel comfortable allowing the immigrants to have access to the bridge, the use of a conference room near the bridge would allow them to witness what was happening without actually having them on the bridge.

When I arrived at the conference room Slater was already there, but there was no sign of Ming.  Captain Slater didn’t wait before asking.  “Tibby, what’s going on?  Is there some problem?  Commodore Stonbersa sounded like there was something critical happening when he asked me to come here.”

“I’d prefer to wait until everyone is here before I answer, they should all arrive shortly.”  As I was saying this Kerabac, A’Lappe and Cantolla entered the room.  I knew Marranalis was on the bridge at the battle station in the event action was required.  Moments later Kala entered followed by Dr. Yamaguchi and one of the Chinese named Wong, who had been one of the military officers in Ming’s security force.

“I think everyone is here now except for Ming,” I said as I activated my wrist com.  “Marranalis, could you please have someone find Ming and get him here to the conference room.”

“Right away.  The computer indicates he is still in his suite.”

“We can’t wait for Ming to begin,” I sighed, “so we’ll begin without him.  The reason I called you here is we have detected a large space craft headed this way.  We were informed by individuals from the lunar colony that the asteroid which hit the Earth was accompanied by a large space ship that appeared to guide the asteroid to its impact on the planet.  We were also told that this ship returns from time to time, for some reason.  Wong can you add anything to this?”

Wong glanced about the room with a somewhat sour expression.  While he had not expressed any displeasure about being on the
NEW ORLEANS
as a refugee he, like Ming, seemed to feel that he should have some special level or recognition and station above that of others aboard the ship.  He seemed to be debating saying anything, but then he relaxed a bit and answered.

“The first time the ship returned after the asteroid impact we thought it was some advanced ship developed by the Americans and used to attack our land.  Many of us were prepared to surrender, but Ming was against it.  Things were on the verge of mutiny so Ming relented and said he would send our ship out to meet them to start negotiations.  It was the only ship we had but Ming felt it was safer than having those on the large alien ship to come to us.  Our ship made it half way to the strange ship before trying to contact them.  There was no response, they tried again and still no response, then suddenly many of the people at our Moon base fell asleep.  Those deeper underground stayed awake but many complained of headaches.  We never heard from our ship again, but we saw on recording from cameras and other instruments that the large alien craft moved over and took our ship aboard it and then departed.  After that, Ming initiated that all attempts at communication outside of the Moon were forbidden and punishable with death.  He said it was necessary for us to institute martial law for self-preservation, or we would all die.”

“I see,” I answered, “how long has it been since this happened?”

“It was about two years ago.”  Wong replied just as the door opened and Ming, in the accompaniment of one of my security team entered.”

“What is the meaning of this?” Ming fumed.  “How dare you summon me and drag me here like a common servant?”

I shook my head and sighed, “Ming, get over your delusions of grandeur, you have no rank or status here, you are merely a refugee like all the others from Earth.  I requested your presence here because it appears your friends are returning.”  I pointed toward the vid screen where the now magnified image of the alien ship appeared.  As I feared it clearly had the shape and size of the Tottalax ships we had encountered and had been reported by the Admiral as being present in attacks upon the Federation.

“That’s it!”  Ming shouted.  “That’s the ship that brought the asteroid that destroyed my empire!”  I glanced at Wong who frowned and shook his head.  “You must destroy them!”  Ming yelled with a look of rage on his face.  “I order you to open fire upon them at once, launch your fighters and destroy them!”

“Ming, we don’t; have the ability to destroy them.  Their ship is too strong, but they can’t see us, and our shields can prevent them from destroying or capturing us.  However, we still are susceptible to whatever they're paralyzing weapon is, though we have some crew members who are not affected by it.  We’re safe here on our ship but there is little we can do against them.  We will try to contact them if we can and see if we can find out their intent and perhaps negotiate a truce of some sort.”