ENERGIA
By Michael Centra
Copyright 2016
SmashWords Edition
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter One: Arrival
Chapter Two: Discourse
Chapter Three: Departure
Chapter Four: Return
Acknowledgements
About the Author
CHAPTER ONE: ARRIVAL
Mission Specialist Isaac Faraday was in the middle of a delicate repair on one of the outer module walls of the International Space Station. At first he thought the momentary splash of refracted light across the module had been sunlight reflecting off one of the ISS solar panels or perhaps off of an errant piece of nearby space debris. However, something about the light and it's pattern seemed too precise to be a random accident. He turned and attempted to locate its origin. He looked behind him, trying to guesstimate the source of the beam. With the sun as a reference point, he concluded it came from somewhere over his left shoulder. He scanned the blackness. Nothing. But just as he turned his attention back to the module his attention was again called away. The mysterious blue beam, as if passing through the quivering surface of a lens made of water, made its third jolting appearance, confirming in a millisecond what the previous strikes had prepared Faraday's mind to assess. An unknown anomaly. This time Faraday's attention was in perfect alignment for the flash of light that followed two seconds later. A broken and randomly speckled pattern of blue beam flashed across his clear visor onto his unblinking eyes and blank expression in the absolute silence of space. He acted.
"ISS. Charlie, do me a favor and look out the port window of node five. Faraday, over."
From inside ISS, Commander Charlie Akari acknowledged specialist Faraday with an affirmative and floated to the window of node five.
A minute later, Akari's voice crackled in Faraday's headset. "Ah, is there anything I'm supposed to see out of node five? ISS, over."
"Affirmative on that", Faraday said. "Please allow about a minute of observation, if you will, Commander. Over."
"Roger that."
Ten seconds later, a light danced over the entire station.
Faraday's radio blared with his palatable excitement, "Whoa! ISS. Requesting confirmation of light event from your position in module five! Over."
"Affirmative, Affirmative. What the hell is that?" Commander Akari muted ISS communications with NASA. Minutes passed as the crew of the ISS observed a series of subsequent flashes, all the while scanning the void for the source. In response to one of these light events, the astronauts fixed their gazes on an area of the inner solar system, near Mercury.
"Isaac, can you confirm an origin for the observed light event?"
"It's starting to look more artificial from here, Charlie, but I don't want to rush to judgement. I see an intermittent projection of a laser-like event. Looks to be a massive formation of some kind, as near as I can tell. Can ISS confirm?"
"Copy that. Right now we're postulating ninety-nine percent certainty on artificial."
Mission Co-Pilot Illana Yugarov weighed in over Akari's shoulder. "Couldn't it be an asteroid formation? What is the source position in relation to the Earth?"
Akari shot that hypotheses down. "Negative. Asteroids don't reflect sunlight like that and the belt is nowhere near where this is. It's coming from the direction of Mercury, and the formation pattern is far too uniform. The light is undoubtedly artificial. This is fucking amazing."
They allowed another ten minutes of steady observation to confirm both astronauts and the rest of the accompanying ISS crew were all not hallucinating. After the ten minutes had elapsed, the phenomenon had only strengthened the validity of their conclusions.
"There must be tens of thousands of them," Faraday said.
Commander Akari opened a private communication line with NASA.
"Houston, this is ISS. Are you reading us?"
"Roger that, ISS. You are loud and clear."
"Ah, Houston, can you confirm any artificial probes or activity scheduled for any of the inner celestial bodies at this time? Over."
"Stand by, ISS."
"Standing by. Over."
"Ah, that's a negative on any scheduled inner celestial activity. Over."
Akari took a moment before responding. He looked out the window of node five again. There could be no mistaking it. After a long pause and a few glances exchanged with the crew, all reflecting back their mutual disbelief of the strange scenario, he pressed the button on his mic.
"Houston, this is ISS. We've got visitors."
Before NASA could even respond, one of the spacecraft, considered less a potential threat at its previous distance, was upon them in an instant. A spacecraft that must have been the size of a small city, slide into perfect view of the space station as the panicked Russian and American crew watched from the windows.
Commander Akari and the rest of the crew lost all composure. "Houston, we need to get out of here! This ship…It's massive! It's right on top of us!"
Outside, Faraday was frantic, "I can see beings in there, Charlie. They're at the windows. Thousands of them. Bloody God, what a view."
This ship appeared almost immeasurable in size. Its shape somehow giving the inexplicable impression, for a craft so different in form and use, of an English galleon but with a massive rectangular vertical tower section in front and slightly less massive and flatter vertical tail section. Both were sandwiching a similarly scaled horizontal body balancing an enormous disc-shaped dome on its back, with the outer edges of the disc jutting out like fat wings into the space on either side. Thin ribbons of windows encircling the dome periodically at tiered levels in its shape revealed its possible use as an unfathomably large greenhouse or artificial habitat. This dome alone appeared to be ten times the size of the largest stadium on Earth.
Back inside the station, Akari was just regaining his focus when a voice in an unintelligible language rose from the station's ham radio system.
The visitors were attempting to open a channel with the space station.