Arrival at Proxima b
A Science-Fiction One Shot
Captain's Log, 7th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
Our thirty year journey is coming to an end. I barely recognise the man who stares back at me in the mirror after all these years. Some believe cryogenic freezing stops ageing. That is not true, it merely slows it and every time I was awoken by the ship cost me years of my life. The process of waking from cryo-sleep, and re-entering it, takes a toll on the body and for that reason the other 9'999 people aboard have slept the entire journey from Earth to Proxima Centauri b. I do not begrudge them the sleep nor the years it cost me to see them all safely here for I am still alive and will be for decades to come.
I hope.
Captain's Log, 8th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
Proxima Centauri flares ahead of us and the Ark's instruments can detect Proxima b well enough to show a clear image. It is more than anyone on Earth could have imagined. Liquid oceans, cloud formations, mountains and valleys, forests, marshland, prairie. Life. The planet lives, all that awaits is for man to colonise her.
Captain's Log, 9th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
0900 hours
The Ark has begun waking the colonists, there is an order to it, one decided back on Earth. I wonder if they feel the thirty years or if it is like waking up from a good night's sleep. I never had more than a few years in cryo at once and regular sleep is much too short. The on-board MedA.I. assures me my sleep will return to normal within the month.
1900 hours
The engineer and logistics teams are awake, along with their families, and only a handful suffer from sickness, mostly children. This bodes well for the rest of the colonists. The biologists and geologists survey the maps the Ark has created of Proxima b's surface searching for a suitable location for settlement. Doctor McTaggart has requested I awaken an archaeologist ahead of schedule, his reasons are unclear but the implication is like crystal.
Captain's Log, 12th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
0900 hours
Anna Pearson, archaeologist, is suffering from cryo-sickness in her eyes and ears. McTaggart has shown her images but she struggles to see anything clearly. MedA.I. has forbidden the Doctor from entering her room. A decision I wholly agree. Pearson had a student with her and he is currently being roused from cryo-sleep. I suggested McTaggart pray for his health.
1400 hours
Our new home is visible with the naked eye. She is a mirror of Earth. A garden world.
Captain's log, 16th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
The Ark intercepted a signal in the early hours. It is not the first signal the ship has caught in our travels between star systems but it is the first to have a rhythm that could be interpreted as language. A single linguist is on board, due to be wakened once we orbit Proxima b.
Captain's Log, 17th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
Updated images of the surface have been handed to Anna Pearson's student, Gabriel Mackerson. He has agonised over the images since he has been able to see clearly. He refuses to say anything for certain without Pearson's involvement. I've seen the print outs, I've seen the rock formations he has highlighted. They look like buildings.
Captain's Log, 23rd February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
1000 hours
We have entered orbit around Proxima b. Half of our compliment have been roused and by month's end the first shuttle will descend to the surface. I have sent word back to Earth though it will take many years to reach home I can only pray that faster ships have been invented and new colonies are being planned.
1530 hours
The linguist has analysed the most recent signal and hears nothing but interference. I have ordered a full investigation into the Ark's instruments. The ship is certain everything is fine but human eyes will double check.
Captain's Log, 24th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
All systems are functioning normally. Nothing is damaged. A second signal has been intercepted, the same length as the first.
Captain's Log, 25th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
1145 hours
Anna Pearson has regained the use of her eyes and has confirmed Gabriel and McTaggart's suspicions. There are buildings on the surface of Proxima b. Targetted surveys have been added to The Ark's timeline. First descent has been delayed until we know more.
1700 hours
Our linguist breached protocol and was caught playing the intercepted signal recordings in the mess hall for all to hear, apparently trying to decipher it. I have detained her for now.
1830 hours
A man by the name of Taliesin has come to me claiming to be able to translate the signal. He overheard it in the mess and is confident he can identify the language. I have granted him access to the data, everyone aboard the ship knows about it by now and any assistance could prove invaluable.
2000 hours
A third signal has been intercepted. The three recordings are all the exact same length and feature the same pattern of sound, it is not interference. Taliesin is working through the night to decipher the message.
Captain's Log, 26th February in the Year of Our Lord 2731
0400 hours
Pearson and Mackerson have discovered a city. Not a ruin. Not some odd rock formations. A full city with surrounding towns and a road network. The pair are searching through the Ark's observations for signs of inhabitance but as of yet it appears abandoned.
0500 hours
I have not slept all night and there is no point in trying now. Taliesin has figured out what the message says, and what language it is in. His theory sounds improbable. He claims the messages we have been intercepting aren't intercepted at all and have been sent to us directly. The language is a variant on Ancient Greek and his approximate translation is as follows:
[Unknown word] to ship identifying itself as Ark, greeting. We pray to the gods this message reaches you in good health for it has been many a century, nay millennia, since we last received word from Gaia. [Unclear sentence.] Sensory information on the surface indicates your ship is without the ability to land, assistance do you require it? [The remaining text is yet to be translated. A great deal of it is composed of unknown words.]
Taliesin, when queried, said he was a classicist. Had he told me that from the beginning I would have sent him away and I was so distracted as to forget to ask him then. Good job I didn't. He says the dialect, or whatever he called it, is not one that he has ever come across. He wishes to see a written example of the language.
My concern is if these people are a threat?
1100 hours
Pearson has discovered more cities on the surface of Proxima b. Dozens on the eastern edge of the main continent, where the sun would hang in a permanent sunset. The biologists have found animal life, goats, sheep, horses, and a number of other Earth creatures alongside fauna native to Proxima b. How did horses get here?
1400 hours
Taliesin has translated more of the message but it is not usable information. Mostly about sacrifices to the gods and hopes that we respond in good time. He has requested I do so but I worry these people are a threat. I have 10'000 lives to consider. On the other hand we have been orbiting for days now and there has been no sign of danger.
1500 hours
I have recorded a reply and sent it out on all frequencies, I pray they can figure out our language.
1510 hours
We received a short reply to my message. Taliesin translated it as follows:
[Unknown word] to The Ark, greeting. Your language is difficult to decipher yet you appear to have deciphered ours, is there a reason you do not speak it?
Taliesin has offered to try and record a reply in their language, or as close to it as he can.
1630 hours
Taliesin's hasty composition was sent and a reply came within minutes, it is as follows:
Opli to The Ark, greeting. Change has been vast on Gaia from the sound of your languages, such things should be expected after so long. We have maintained the old ways in some instances and lost some others. Descend to the surface, we welcome you.
I am now in a conundrum. It could still be a trap and if we descend it could mean a waste of thirty years, yet we are here and have no where else to go. Either we claim this planet or perish in the attempt, but we have no military and only hunting equipment on board as before today there had been no evidence of sentient life beyond the Sol System.
Captain's Log, March 2nd in the Year of Our Lord 2731
0900 hours
I and ten others are descending to the surface of the planet to a designated meeting place out in what we believe to be open fields in perpetual daytime. May God bless us all.
2200 hours
The people of Opli, as they call the planet, are human. There is no doubt about it. They worship a Pantheon of gods, speak a lost dialect of a dead language from Earth, and claim knowledge of Earth that appears entirely fictional. The more our people shared the history of Earth since their departure, assuming that to be true, resulted in their joy fading into grief. When they asked of their homeland Taliesin and a number of others scoffed at the impossibility of it. Not impossible, abjectly absurd. This is a test from God, one I must rise to.
Captain's Log, March 3rd in the Year of Our Lord 2731
1000 hours
I have no choice but to bow to the wishes of the Opli people. Our ship is not designed to support a colony. It is cramped and we only have food for another twenty years. There is no way we could grow food. A serious malfunction of the water recycling system would cause us all to die of dehydration.
1030 hours
I have asked Taliesin to record a message for the surface, my words are as follows:
Dear People of Opli, forgive my people's disbelief at your claim of being from the Lost City of Atlantis. It is only that since ancient times the knowledge of that fabled city was lost and considered to be a fiction made by other peoples. We would be honoured to learn more of your history from the earliest times on Earth to the last almost three millennia on Opli.
With the Blessing of Christ.
1100 hours
A reply, translated by Taliesin as follows:
Opli to The Ark, greeting. Your shock is understandable given the history of Gaia that you shared. Your request to settle has been granted, a suitable region has been selected and the coordinates transmitted to you. When you descend we must discuss a great many things, foremost is who is Christ?
1110 hours
There is no time to waste. We must reach the surface and construct habitats.
Captain's Log, 5th March in the Year of Our Lord 2731
1300 hours
We “of The Ark” have been granted a tract of the western coast of the main continent. The Opli live on the eastern coast, many thousands of miles away. While this is disappointing it is likely for the best given our... differences.
1400 hours
The Ark has been emptied and now the astro-engineers coordinate how to land it so we can use the materials. This feels like the point of no return but in truth that was back on Earth, The Ark was designed for a one-way trip to Proxima b and it has accomplished its mission. I pray our messages reach Earth and that the second colony ship is on schedule.
Captain's Log, 8th March in the Year of Our Lord 2731
1200 hours
Representatives from Opli have arrived, they claim to have departed mere hours ago. There was no sign of their approach, nor communication they would be arriving, they simply walked into camp. One of the colonists mentioned seeing them on the horizon but thought they were a group of our people. These people who claim to be descendents of Atlanteans have crossed a ten thousand mile continent in moments. It will not have been on foot yet they refuse to reveal how they did it. Their leader claims to be on a knowledge seeking mission.
2000 hours
Disaster. The Opli understand we cannot leave but have decided our cultures are too different to integrate. There was sorrow on their faces and a little grief, as if they had held out hope all these years and now realise it was for naught. I pray cordial relations can be rescued.
2100 hours
After dinner with the representatives they saw fit to inform me, as Captain, that communication between our societies would cease. They deem Earth, and by extension us, to have veered so far from the path of excellence as to be irredeemable.
I fear we now have an enemy on this garden world of Proxima b.
Thanks for reading! This story, like a great deal of my short stories lately, got away from me. The idea grew and grew and is barely contained within a few thousand words. It seems every short I write wants to be a novella or novel or even larger. A good problem to have I think.
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It seems that humanity cannot move past their natures. There is a lot of truth here that applies in the here and now.
I was sort of hoping that the colonists could somehow integrate into the society already there.
It's not as if the colonists are criminals and supposedly the best of the best.
The story could continue in one of two ways. The colonists could live and grow where they are, or the Atlantians could destroy them.