Annihilation: Book 05 - Searcher Page 7

  Matt for his part could stare at the beauty next to him on the stage for eternity. Angel was angelic; her black hair and hazel eyes were perfect. Her shape was perfect. Her mind was extraordinary. She was not tall; only five foot six, but she was something to behold. He sat there stealing glances at her and the four hours of video seemed to pass too quickly. Finally it ended and the room was deathly quiet.

  Matt stood and approached the podium. The beings you have just seen are more than three hundred million cycles of your planet around the star old. They have come to our universe at least twice during that time and have totally consumed every intelligent race. The beings who recorded this were not consumed because their color was not seen by the invaders. Only one other race was not consumed during the last harvesting,” Matt noticed some in the crowd flinch at that word, “the second were intelligent beings that were part of their ships. They simply turned off their power and slept through the period. All other intelligent beings were consumed by these creatures that are called Eight Legs.”

  Matt paused and looked back at the video screen which had a picture of an Eight Leg sinking its fangs into a victim. “Now for the important part; they are coming back and we have been informed by our leaders that the time is getting short.”

  The crowd remained deathly quiet. Goige looked at the screen, “How do your leaders know this?”

  “Our leaders are chosen for their psychic abilities. They possess the ability to sense when they are going to be placed in danger. Until recently, they have not sensed danger coming, however, now they can feel that sense of impending attack.”

  One of the other planet’s leaders stood and asked, “What are you doing about it?”

  “We are building ships like you have recently seen. We have more than five million of the small ships in our fleet and they are being used to search our universe for intelligent life and try to warn them of what’s coming. I am one of those Searchers and I have been assigned your galaxy. That is what brought us into contact with your civilizations.”

  Angel was watching the Gresh Warlord and saw him flinch when Matt said five million ships. “Universe just got smaller for you,” she thought to herself.

  “What can we do to protect ourselves? We don’t have your technology.”

  “There are two things. First build enough ships to transport your populations and we will provide a planet for you to hide. We think we have a screen generator that will surround the planet with the color the eight Legs can’t see. You will remain there until they move to another universe.”

  The Warlord said, “What’s the second choice.”

  “Petition the King of the Stars Realm for membership. We will then bring our technology to your planet.” The room started talking among themselves and Matt sounded the tone. Once silence was restored he continued, “I know that some of you are thinking that this is a hoax and just a way to force you to join our Realm. We really don’t care whether you believe us or not. I should also tell you that just because you petition the King doesn’t mean you will be accepted into our Realm. We will not give our technology to any civilization that harbors aggressive intents. All of our members will give their lives to defend the other members and we will not tolerate any race that cannot live by our principles. We, however, cannot stand by and not try to save you; that’s why we offer the first choice. Quite frankly, some of you would not be allowed to join our Realm because of your aggressive behaviors or your desire for revenge.”

  Angel stood and joined Matt at the podium. Matt looked at her and she tuned to the crowd, “There is a third option.” Everyone grew silent to hear what it was. “Don’t believe us and just go your way as you have always done. Convince yourself that we were trying to take advantage of you and that you were too wise to fall for our obviously false statements. You should understand that we don’t want anyone in the Realm that cannot embrace our reverence of life. We will never force anyone to accept our views.” She looked up at Matt and then said, “We know that to ignore civilizations and not try to help them goes against everything we hold holy. We have told you and now if anything happens, we can hold our head high and maintain our sense of worth. To do otherwise would erode our belief structure.”

  Matt then turned and faced the assembly, “We are going to leave your worlds.” He looked at the Warlord and said, “We have agreed to come to the defense of the planets you attacked. We are leaving a device they can use to contact us.”

  “What if they attack me,” the Warleader asked?

  “Then they forfeit our good will and defense. I suspect, however, Warlord, that you are fully capable of defending yourself. Most of your fleet is still intact.”

  The Warleader stood facing the stage, “I am going to order all of my military forces recalled and all of our warships converted to commercial vessels. I will also disarm our more violent nobles. We will remove any mechanism of war from my planet within the next hundred rotations and will not build any in the future.”

  The entire room was stunned. Matt looked at Angel then back at the Warleader, “What is your intent in performing those actions?”

  “I fully intend to petition your King for membership. I am going to do everything in my power to do the things necessary to persuade him of our sincerity. I sense that you are being truthful and the time is short.”

  Matt looked at the Warleader and could tell he was serious. He closed his eyes and he could actually hear the Warleader’s thoughts. “Warleader, why did you attack the eight planets?”

  “Why to protect ourselves from their planned aggression.”

  The entire room stood and started yelling. Matt looked at Angel and saw confusion on her face. “Stem, are you watching this?”

  “Yes, I am and I must confess that I’m uncertain of what is happening.”

  “I need you to perform an experiment with me. Will you help me?”

  “What is it that you need, Searcher?”

  “I need the coordinates of the ships that are waiting for a pilot. I also want you to teleport down here and take the Warleader and me with you to their location. Angel, I need you to maintain order until we return.”

  “Why would you possibly want that?”

  “I have a feeling and I need to see if I’m right. Will you do it for me, Stem?”

  “On my way.”

  Matt hit the loud tone and said, “I am going to make a short trip with the Warleader. I want everyone here to wait for us to return.” The Warleader looked puzzled when suddenly a plant appeared next to him and in the next instant the plant, the Warleader, and Matt disappeared from the meeting hall….and reappeared on a large flat barren plane with numerous rows of ships.

  The Warleader looked at the ships and said, “They’re absolutely beautiful.”

  Matt walked up to the Warleader and said, “I want you to try something.” The Warleader forced his attention away from the ships, looked at him, and nodded. “I want you to look out at those ships and command them to rise.”

  “What are you doing, Matt,” Stem asked quickly.

  “I’m going to administer some healing but first I have to see who is really sick.”

  The Warleader looked out at the rows of ships and was lost in their beauty. He thought, “Rise, oh beauty, rise.”

  On the back row twenty ships lifted off the ground. Stem was stunned silent. Matt then said, “You can lower them now.” The twenty ships returned to the ground.

  The Warleader looked at Matt and said, “This is how you feel about your friend, isn’t it.”

  “Yes it is, Warleader, and it’s surprising that you know that it’s a friend.”

  “How could it be anything else? They are miraculous creations.”

  “What’s going on, Matt,” Stem asked?

  “Stem, we have found a race of very high powered psychics. The Gresh are not an aggressive people by nature, and Warleader, you can correct me anytime I say something that is untrue, but found that they had to learn war to protect themselves from
the members of the eight planet trading partners. His people could sense the danger they represented to his race. The Gresh knew they were going to come and destroy them.”

  “We could actually sense it long before we developed space travel. We knew they were in our future and we were doomed unless we could stop them.”

  Stem leaned to the side showing his shock. “So you attacked them because of your sense of impending doom.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why were you so brutal to their populations?”

  “We have been sensing their danger for more than a hundred generations. That built up a tremendous amount of pressure on our minds. My warriors felt they had to be destroyed to protect our people. We saw them killing every member of my race.”

  “Why are you giving up your weapons now,” Stem asked?

  “Because I could see the truth in your recording and part of the danger we felt was not from them but from the coming horde. Your psychics are right; they will be here in less than six cycles from now.”

  Matt and Stem were speechless. What is your name, Warleader?”

  “My name is Life. All of our Warlords are named Life for their prime responsibility; saving their people.”

  Matt stared at the huge Gresh, “I am no longer going to address you as Warlord. I am going to call you Life.”

  “If you will give me one of those ships, you can call me whatever you want. My life will not be complete unless I can have a friend like yours.”

  Stem looked at the two and asked, “Life, how many of your people possess the mental skills you’ve shown us?”

  “Why, all of us.”

  Stem looked at Matt stunned, “By the creator, the universe is full of surprises.”

  “We have one more task to perform.”

  Stem nodded and punched his teleport device.

  Matt and Life reappeared on the stage at the meeting and the room fell silent. Matt looked out at the assembly and everyone could see the almost anger on his face. Angel began to worry about the safety of the Gresh. She wondered what the Warlord had done to make Matt so stern.

  “I am going to ask you some questions and if any of you are dishonest I am going to close this meeting and leave your planets to fend for themselves against the Eight Legs. Does everyone understand?”

  The eight Planet Leaders looked at each other and Goige stood and said, “I will speak for all of us.”

  “I want to know how long ago your eight planets had a meeting to plan an invasion of the Gresh.”

  The room started to yell and Matt yelled, “Silence. Your lives depend on an honest answer.” The room grew instantly still. Angel wondered what was happening.

  Goige looked back at the people in the room and then turned and said, “We planned to invade them fifty years ago and were building up the forces to make it happen.” Angel was shocked beyond speech.

  “I want each of you to listen closely and understand what I’m saying. You were attacked by the Gresh because they knew of your attack more than five hundred years ago.” Now everyone in the room was shocked silent.

  “The Gresh are a race of psychics. They sensed hundreds of years ago that they were facing destruction from your planets; they could sense that you were coming to destroy them. Every member of their race could feel your threat and they grew up knowing you were coming. They struggled and worked to develop space travel and warships to protect themselves and finally they attacked you to prevent the danger you represented. Just like our rulers can sense danger, the Gresh also possess the power to see danger approaching. They are not the danger in this room, you are.”

  Goige hung his head, “You are right. Now I understand the hatred they showed when they invaded.”

  Life stepped forward and looked out at the assembly. “No you don’t. Our hatred was misplaced.”

  Goige looked up, “What do you mean?”

  “The tremendous danger my race was feeling was not coming from you but from those creatures we were just shown. We thought it was you that was going to totally eradicate my people but it wasn’t just you. We also felt those creatures and we could feel that they were coming soon. We thought it was only you but that was a mistake. They will be here in six cycles, or years as this speaker uses the term. I sense that everyone in this room will be dead within ten of those years if nothing changes.”

  Angel looked at Matt and he nodded at her.

  Life then said something that changed everything, “I can sense that these strange beings that came to us and forced peace between us are being truthful. They are a good people and one that we should attempt to learn what they know. I also sense that they want to use my people to help them in their war against the coming horde. We will agree to do so but only if your eight worlds are brought under the protection of their Realm.”

  Goige looked at the former warlord with a puzzled expression and asked, “Why would you want to save us?”

  “Like them, we revere life. We made an error thinking you were going to eradicate us. We were more heavy handed with you than we should have been and I am truly sorry for our actions against you. I hope that by being in their mist they can save you from yourselves. I sense that you are worth saving.”

  Matt looked at the gathering, “I do not have the authority to make these decisions. I will ask my leaders and will let you know what they decide.”

  The meeting ended and the Leaders of the eight planets came on stage and talked with Life. It appeared many years of mistrust were now over for the nine worlds.

  Matt looked at Angel and thought, “Looks like a trip to see our Royal Family is in order. Are you up to going with me?”

  Angel thought to herself, “I will follow you all my life,” then thought back to him. “I’ll have to dress for the occasion. When do we go?”

  “We’ll go immediately. You have an hour to get ready. However, with your beauty, you don’t need to do much.”

  “Why, Magic, I never thought you noticed.”

  “It’s like trying to ignore a super nova; it’s just not possible.”

  Angel felt her heart grow. “Now I know; he does care for me.” She held that feeling close as she took Life back to his ship before boarding fly Girl.

  Chapter 4

  “Well, it looks like he is coming to see us.”

  The King looked up, “Why?”

  “It seems our Searcher has uncovered an entire planet of super psychics that have the temperament to join our armed forces. It also appears that they can raise the Alphas.”

  The King was genuinely surprised.

  “That’s not all love. It appears this race of psychics have determined that the Eight Legs will be coming in six years.”

  The King sat straight up in his chair. “Do you think they are accurate?”

  The Queen thought for a moment, “I believe they are. Unlike us they have a whole planet to focus on the danger so cumulatively they are probably not far from the truth.”

  “My sense of danger has been growing. I suspect that if their timetable is accurate then it matches closely with the progression of what we sense.”

  The Queen looked the King directly in the eye and said, “The Searcher saw the truth in the situation even when a seed from Sprig and Twig missed it. He was able to prevent punishing an innocent race for other’s actions. I sense that his power is growing faster than a normal latent psychic.”

  “Why do you think that is?”

  “I’m not sure. There’s also something about his ship that seems different from any I’ve sensed.”

  “Are we going to meet with him?”

  The Queen closed her eyes and thought for several minutes. “No.”

  “Are you sure, My Love?”

  “I do not want to diminish what he could possibly become. I’m concerned that our first contact when he was an applicant may have slowed his development.”

  “Usually the reverse happens.”

  “I don’t think so in his case. We should let him meet with Anglo and give
him the approval he needs to move forward.”

  “Are we going to tell him about his genetics?”

  The Queen smiled, “And spoil the fun of him finding out on his own. I don’t think so.”

  Aladdin and Wings teleported into the Ross System and before Matt could ask for permission to approach Ross his com activated and a young man wearing the Royal Colors said, “Welcome, Searcher; your meeting has been approved and scheduled in thirty minutes. It will be held in the map room of Castle Gardner. The coordinates have been sent to your display. We will be expecting you and your fellow Searcher.”