Other-Terrestrial

Season 1, Episode 1

"Leviathan"

by Nolan Conrey

I remember when the world was young.

From the moment I was born I had looked at the sky. In a pool of water my eyes had opened to view above an endless expanse of gray.

For millions of years I stared at that sky, hanging overhead. Was that all there was to the world? All there was for me to see? Broken stones and deep water below, with shapeless gray clouds above?

Then, one day, the heavens opened. The clouds of the age of hell gave way, and in their place the stars shone.

Beautiful, tiny, perfect lights that glittered and moved. I watched them on their journeys for ages, seeing how each dot drifted in a way that made me feel there was so much more to them than I could ever imagine.

And I wondered what they were.

My creators would not deign to answer the questions of a slave. But ever after, I trained an eye on the sky, still wondering.

After my creators were gone, there were none left to ask.

A billion years later, I still wondered. Billions more, and I still had no answer.

I still wanted to know.

I still hope, one day, to go among those points of light and know them.

*******

Admiral Vandoss woke me with a priority-one call.

Despite being 2,000 light years away and in the middle of the night, ship time, he called. Snapping from sleep, I realized that if it had been anything routine, he'd have spoken to the watch officer instead.

It wasn't cold, not on a ship - they always tended to run hot. But I felt cold, like I had so often when I was young.

"Admiral," I answered, taking far too long to pull on a robe and take the call.

His worry robbed his face of its normally tight professionalism. He might be able to hide his fear from others, but after years of service together I knew him too well. It was good to see my former CO, no matter his concern, though we we were now separated by unthinkable distances.

"Ian, I have news.” He coughed, wiped his forehead. ”It's going to be all over the GalacNet soon; I wanted to tell you first."

"Thank you, Admiral. I appreciate that," I said. I meant it, but it was also a stock answer to buy my brain time to organize. He knew me well - enough to tell how my tiredness affected me. "Ian, this is just you and me, as men - no ranks. I need your full attention!"

That startled me. Vandoss had never ordered me to ignore rank before, even if he often called me by my first name, making this interstellar contact off-record made it clear: something major had happened - or was about to happen.

"What's going on, Tem?" I asked, the startle catching my throat.

He hesitated, taking a breath, steepling and un-steepling his fingers. "This is hard to explain, Ian. We’ve uncovered a new species."

"Brilliant," I said. "I feared we'd never find another." I knew it had to be intelligent; the discovery of some new analogue to bacteria, algae, or moss on some planet or moon was commonplace. Intelligent life was scarce and precious, and while we had met aliens, they were counted in the low dozens across vast stretches of space.

"It's on Earth," Vandoss said.

I didn’t reply, staring. I couldn't make sense of that statement. It’s important but it didn’t merit this call. "They've visited Earth already? Are we under threat?"

"They're from Earth," Vandoss said softly. "They're native. Terrestrial."

"I don't understand. We've never seen- I mean, we would know-" my throat caught in my confusion. My mind swam with thoughts of intelligent cetaceans, interconnected trees, dreamlike thundering clouds, but nothing added up.

"We didn't," Vandoss said, the finality in his words breaking through my visions, snapping my confusion. "They've been here all along, Ian."

My brain didn't freeze up, no matter how much it wanted to. "Hiding alongside us? Under us? In the ocean?" I guessed.

The Admiral nodded. "For millenia, in the deepest parts of the ocean. They're . . . they're not anything like us, Ian. Not at all."

I saw true fear on the Admiral's face, and for a moment dread welled up inside me. My rank fell back on to my mind, and dispassionately, professionally, I worked the threat potential, the dread and the fear abated by my experience in the bizarre and in the faith of my crew, my community, and in the Union to which we belonged. The spool of fear tightened by anxiety unspun with careful consideration.

They couldn't be a threat. Even if something came up from below and took us entirely by surprise, there were trillions of humans in the Sol system alone. There was no way we couldn't overwhelm and defend ourselves against something that only inhabited one world. And whatever these beings were, if they were intelligent, they had to know that.

"Define that, please. Or better, do you have a picture of them?"

"No. Cameras . . . don't like them. At least not in their true form. They change shape, Ian, as easily as we take off a coat. They can look like us - hell, when they approached the First Minister, they looked like his own aides."

I took a long moment to let that sink in and frame that with my previous orderly thoughts. "Have you . . . seen what they normally look like?"

The Admiral's nod was slow. He was pale, sweating, like a man who had been called upon to identify his own kin in a morgue. I'd never seen him look so old, years flashed across his face.

The back of my neck felt suddenly full of pins. "They're ... not like us at all, are they?" I asked.

"No, Ian," he answered. Something in him deflated, something in him was missing, he seemed no longer whole.

"They're not."

*******

Brooks had considered calling a meeting of all of his officers that night. But ultimately, he decided to wait until morning.

Now, his ten department heads and Executive Commander were all eyeing him with interest. They knew him well enough at this point to know that this was something serious, but none let their concern show.

Knowing their consternation, Brooks decided to come directly to the issue.

"I've been informed that a new intelligent species is in negotiations to join the Sapient Union. As unlikely as this sounds, this intelligent species is from Earth."

"With respects, Captain," Doctor Y asked. "How have your people never discovered another intelligent species on your world?"

"Trust me that it is a shock to us, Doctor," Brooks replied. "But a planet is a big place and there is a lot of space where beings could hide besides the surface. They didn't want to be found and so we didn't find them."

Brooks could understand why the alien AI could find that shocking; his kind did not even have a true homeworld, having been created in space by their parent species that had never been biologically capable of interstellar colonization.

Executive Commander Urle leaned forward. Despite most of his face being hidden behind cybernetic augmentations, worry was evident in him. "And why the secrecy? As shocking as this may be, there seems no reason to hide it."

"It is an unusual move," Brooks agreed. "But this species are different from anything else we've met before."

"What are they called? Do they have a name?" Cenz asked, the screen that attempted to show an appropriate human emotion failing to keep up with the buzzing curiosity of his many minds. Emotions flickered across the screen, ranging from confusion to shock, as his many polyps tried to reach a consensus.

"They have informed us that they have a proper name - one we can pronounce. They are called Shoggoths. Other relevant information has been dispersed to your systems."

As the data was given to the officers, he saw their eyes unfocus as information was projected into their personal heads-up displays.

"Captain, this says that they average 15 metric tons in weight," Doctor Y said. "Again, how were these undiscovered before now?"

"If you keep reading, Doctor, you will see why. Shoggoths can change shape at will - they are, apparently, fantastically skilled at this. They are even capable of mimicking a human being well enough that their ambassador simply walked up to the First Minister on Earth and introduced itself."

Now he saw the nervousness among his officers. "So that's why," Urle said. "Captain, do we have any method of recognizing a Shoggoth in human form?"

"As far as I am aware," the Captain replied. "No. However, this is early information. Their existence has not yet been publicly acknowledged. The Shoggoths are . . . very private beings. Which is likely why they have remained hidden until now."

"There are no images of them," Doctor Y noted. "Do we have any? I understand that proceedings are cautious and it is an early date. But surely there is an image?"

Captain Brooks shook his head. "As of yet, I have not been given any images of the Shoggoths."

The doctor's voice was calm. "Distressing," it simply said.

"I'd like everyone to look over this information over the course of the day. News of the Shoggoths and the treaty are likely to be revealed next week. I want you all prepared to field the questions that people will have - and to help them acclimate to the newest members of the Sapient Union. Dismissed."

The heads of departments all rose and shuffled out. Brooks saw that Urle was dawdling, and when they were alone, he nodded to the man. "Did you have something else, Urle?"

"Yes, Captain, but I do not believe you are free to answer my question."

It was probably true. But Brooks also was not going to keep the man from asking. "What is the question?"

"What is so strange about these Shoggoths that requires complete secrecy?" Urle asked.

Captain Brooks looked at his first officer in silence. He could not tell the man of Admiral Vandoss's concern, or of his own. Or the myriad bizarre details of their existence that did not seem to match their understanding of the universe itself.

"Return to the bridge," he finally told Urle, not harshly. "I shall join you there shortly."