Here Comes Earth: Emergence (20 page)

I
hadn’t been sure I’d totally understood Dr. Spelini’s reasoning but he
was
a genus and Dr. Spencer assured me that Anzio had an eidetic memory and would
be best suited to keeping Silva from prevaricating.

Sometimes
you just had to trust your team and so far I’d been pretty pleased with mine.

Looking
directly at me Silva continued, “This is going to take us down that path of
things you need to know but it will probably take all afternoon. Should we
start now?”

I
glanced around at what I was starting to think of as my inner circle and not
seeing any hesitations I nodded assent.

Dr. Mark Spencer

I
was fascinated by the political intrigue that was apparently taking place
between the Noridians, the Coridians, and the rest of the galaxy.

I’m
not a political person in the sense that I have no desire to shape current
policy, but as a student of history and mankind I have to recognize and
understand that politics are the fundamental driving force behind everything historical
except natural catastrophes or other changing environmental conditions. The
better I could understand the political forces and dynamics that shaped history
the better I could understand where we might be headed; and now with models of
somewhat similar civilizations that have already progressed beyond where we
currently are the easier it would become. The intellectual in me would have
been content to spend the next few months just learning but the realist in me
knew that now was the time for action – just as soon as we figured out what
that action needed to be. Also, I hadn’t forgotten the fact that the Major had
given me an assignment; find a way for Earth to survive without violence.

Up
to this point I’d been stymied. The introduction of a third political force,
the Coridian Dynasty, could change that. I wasn’t yet sure how but it opened up
a new world of possibilities.

When
the Major had called a break I made sure someone was getting Captain Silva
whatever he wanted (I think he asked for an apple) but I still had questions
and I was, well… impatient.

The
main thing I wanted to know was exactly how long Captain Silva had been on
Earth. If he really was Captain Silva as he’d said then he would have needed to
enter the military 12 years ago just like it said in the personnel file that
Julie had shown me on her smartpad.

He
also looked more muscular than the other Noridian males; why was that? Were the
two cultures physically different? Also, how had he managed to infiltrate the
mission without the Noridians knowing who he was?

Unfortunately
Captain Silva didn’t want to address them, it least not immediately. He
politely agreed that they were good questions and that he would answer them but
it was part of a larger answer that Major Reagan deserved to be present for.

“Ok,”
I said. “At least tell me one thing that I believe I already know the answer
to… there are other Coridians on Earth, aren’t there?”

After
hesitating a moment he looked at me and said, “Yes doctor, there are.”

∆∆∆

Once
the leadership team returned and shortly after the questions and explanations
had started Captain Silva declared it would be a good time to jump into the
long explanation he’d been promising. As he was saying this he gave me a long
glance that seemed to say,
‘Here’s where you’ll get all your answers.’
At least I hope that’s what it meant.

“The
first thing you need to put in perspective,” he started. “Is just how
incredibly old the galaxy is.

“The
universe was created 13.7 billion years ago in the Big Bang and what you call
the Milky Way galaxy coalesced a half a billion years later. Your sun didn’t form
until 4.6 billion years ago so your solar system wasn’t even around for
two-thirds of galactic history and Homo sapiens didn’t evolve until around
200,000 years ago – so Homo sapiens have missed everything.

“The
galaxy is old; and your part of it, out here towards the edge of the Orion
spiral, is relatively new. If you’ll forgive me for saying so these are the backwaters
of galactic society.

“Some
of what Jaki told you about history is correct and some of it isn’t; and
there’s a lot more she just left out. So I’m going to give you the broad
brushstrokes and we can clear up the details with your specialists at a later
time.

“First
of all a little over 500 million of your years ago there was life in Earth’s
oceans but that was about it. The people you have dubbed the First Prometheans
finally made their way to this backwater at about the same time and started
their bioforming project. They seeded the earth with what has now become the
common genetic ancestry of the galaxy. Your scientists cannot fully explain
this sudden expansion of life but do have a name for it; they call it the
Cambrian Explosion. This much of what Jaki told you is true.

“It
is also true that this small portion of our galaxy was invaded by others around
66 million years ago. You probably owe them a big thank you because they put
your evolution back on the ‘right’ course when they bombarded your planet and
created an extinction event. Our common genome, for reasons we don’t yet
understand, has a propensity to evolve two legged primates that look remarkably
similar to each other but it doesn’t always happen that way. Up until that
point Earth’s evolution was off track.

“We
suspect that this was the original attraction for the ‘Chextigans’; perhaps
because of the original evolutionary divergence Earth’s primates were
developing differently. So 200,000 years ago the Chextigans did something that
is proscribed and all but forbidden by The Accord; they genetically altered
Homo erectus into Homo sapiens.”

“Why
did they do that?” I couldn’t help but asking.

Captain
Silva expelled a large breath and said, “We don’t really know. Maybe because
they thought they were helping Earth back to the right track; maybe just to see
if they could. No one really knows, even the Noridian’s aren’t clear on why and
they did it.”

“Ah,
Captain Silva,” interjected Anzio. “I’m afraid you just contradicted yourself.”

“No,
Dr. Spelini. This is the part that Jaki mislead you on; Chextigan is the home
world that the Noridian Dynasty evolved from over half a million years ago. She
tried to confuse the issue but it was the Noridian Dynasty that placed a colony
on Earth.”

“So
this is where the part about not being able to afford to blemish their
reputation comes in,” said Anzio.

Smiling,
Captain Silva said, “You’re way ahead of me Dr. Spelini.”

“Still,”
Anzio said. “7,000 years is a long time. Would there really still be these repercussions?”

At
the same time Anzio was speaking I blurted out, “Their civilization is that
old!”

Looking
around at a number of puzzled faces Captain Silva responded, “Why don’t I
finish the narrative so everybody understands and address those points as they
come up…”

“Approximately
27,000 of your years ago the Noridian Dynast started becoming more powerful. As
your planet has experienced they have always held a fascination for genetics
and they were able to present to The Accord some breakthrough work in this
area. Not long afterwards and as I mentioned to Dr. Decker their work in Temporal
Physics was recognized.

“Around
5,000 BC by the Earth Calendar, the Noridians revisited earth we think for the
sole purpose of covering their tracks. As we said, what they had done crossed
some of the strongest conventions of The Accord. Maybe they were becoming more
politically ambitious and started cleaning all the skeletons out of their
closet or maybe they knew Earth could be a huge tripwire but for whatever
reason they were determined to wipe out Homo sapiens.”

“The
Flood,” I said.

“Yes
Dr. Spencer. The great somewhat mythical flood that all ancient Earth cultures
seem to have recorded as legend.”

“So
Noah really did need an Ark,” Julie commented.

“The
original Noridian colony had been centered in the Black Sea region and by
manipulating the overflowing of the Mediterranean Sea into the Black Sea basin
they wiped out a tremendously large percentage of their work. It is also
believed that they used weapons of mass destruction in many other areas to
eliminate the living evidence. We believe that these events are the basis for many
of the ancient legends of gods and the wars of gods; particularly around the
city states of Sumer.

“And
just to make sure that any Homo sapien survivors wouldn’t flourish they
released a retrovirus that spread worldwide and infected everything.

“Shortly
after, their work done, they left; confident that Homo sapiens were a dead or
dying species,” Captain Silva concluded.

Major
Reagan then interjected with a great question, “What I don’t understand is how
the Coridian Dynasty would know any of this?”

Anzio
was nodding his head; apparently seeing the same gap in logic.

Captain
Silva looked down, then after a moment looked up and said, “It’s tougher than I
anticipated; not being trusted after being one of you for so long. I know you have
to regard me with skepticism and in your position I would do the same. You’re
watching closely for every potential inconsistency and all I can do is agree to
be an open book. Some things however won’t make any sense without context but
let me address this question directly.

“There
are really two reasons,” continued Captain Silva. “You were told about the Stasis
Bubble that shut down; you were lied to about when it shut down. It was almost
280 of your years ago and we were intrigued by the star map we found. We
decided to investigate your Solar System and were fascinated by what we discovered.
I promise I will come back and explain this but for now I must insist that you
let me continue the narrative.

“Anyway,
we were so fascinated that we established a secret outpost on Earth in the year
1749.”

“Where?”
Major Reagan said immediately.

After
only a moment’s hesitation Captain Silva said, “France.”

“Why
France?” Here I was interrupting again. “And are you still there?”

“Yes,
our Head of Mission as you would call her is still based there. As to why… well,
France either fights its wars on the soil of other nations or surrenders very
quickly when invaded, it’s politics are always in turmoil, it is an industrial
nation with easy access to the Western World, the French
Sûreté Nationale is a
very competent police force but so infused with politics that it is easily
controlled or manipulated, and quite frankly the French can get away with doing
crazy things because nobody takes them seriously and the world expects them to.”

I couldn’t argue with any of that so I just
nodded.

“Over
the years as we spread out into your civilization we were stunned to find
Noridian based lettering, numbers, and mathematical symbols on a number of your
ancient artifacts. What you call Cuneiform was obviously originally founded on
it and we saw evidence of Noridian influence as far away as the American
Southwest and Peru.”

What
he was saying was very consistent with everything I knew about the history of
man. Privately many in archeology, anthropology, and related fields spoke of
the seemingly inexplicable similarities of ancient civilizations; many times
separated by thousands of miles and even thousands of years. Of course most
serious researchers would never discuss these issues in the open; no one wanted
to be labeled as one of the ‘Ancient Astronaut’ kooks.

“Based
on that we launched a covert operation into the heart of Noridian civilization
itself. Over time we were able to fill in the blanks and confirm the events I
just described to you.

“We
had no warning when a few years ago the Noridian’s showed up and towed the Laze
Fair One space platform to Neptune. We were concerned, quite frankly, that if
our covert operations have been compromised, we could have led them here.”

There
was a lot of silence around the room; I don’t think anyone knew what to say to
that.

Of
course I’ve always had a lightning sharp intellect that many times lets me
process information faster so I took the opportunity to interject more of my
own questions but – Julie beat me to it.

“Why
would the Noridians release a retrovirus instead of a virus and what did it
do?” she asked.

∆∆∆

If
you’ve ever had to give bad news to someone you know how uncomfortable it can
make you. Some people struggle to find the words or the right approach and tend
to beat around the bush, while other people prefer to just say it straight out
and get it over with, thinking this to be less cruel.