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Sail the Sea of Stars - chapter 1

 
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 18, 2016 12:36 am    Post subject: Sail the Sea of Stars - chapter 1 Reply with quote

______________________________________

These are just the current drafts of the novel I'm working on, so please disregard the typos and just enjoy what I hope will be a worthy sequel to The Wishbone Express.

Feedback is welcome, but I won't be shocked if I don't get much, because there weren't many replies for either of the other two novels I posted on All Sci-Fi. I just thought it would be fun to share a few chapters each week as they became reasonably complete.

That said, here's how the story begins.

________________________________________




CHAPTER 1

MP-141


The little pilgrim was further from home than any traveler had ever been in the history of the galaxy. In fact, it had to leave the galaxy entirely to gain this lonely honor. It raced through the cold and the dark, traveling one hundred twenty-five thousand times the speed of light.

Not bad for a little crystalsteel cylinder just 9 meters long — small enough to fit into a fair-sized living room.

Behind it the Milky Way Galaxy floated in the blackness, a tilted disk of light, like a hat worn at a cocky angle. Ahead of it was the bulk of the Large Magellanic Cloud. Magellanic Probe 141 had already visited three hundred twenty-two star systems when it cut its hyperdrive to take a look at the planets in yet another simple G-type star it detected ahead of it. Its on-board computer was a zealot when it came to finding habitable worlds, electronically obsessed with planets that might someday serve as homes for one or more of the many races it served.

MP-141 was just one of a hundred and fifty robotic brethren who had been sent out by the University of New Dusseldorf three years earlier to gather data on the star systems of the Large Magellanic Cloud. In three years, MP-141 had barely penetrated the outer edge of this satellite galaxy. But all its lonely brothers, spread out along the southern rim of the vast cluster of stars, had delved no deeper than MP-141.

Despite the fact that the Milky Way Galaxy itself contained thousands of intelligent species who belonged to the Alliance of Sentient Life, not one civilization with faster-than-light space travel was known to exist in either the Large or Small Magellanic Clouds.

That didn't mean there weren't any. Whole interstellar empires could exist among the millions of stars in the Magellanic Clouds. But even an empire twenty light years across was a mere fly speck in comparison to a region of space a thousand times large. Space had no respect for the egos of its mortal inhabitants. It humbled one and all.

MP-141 paid no attention to the outer planets of System 323 (the 323rd system it had investigated), because they were too cold and inhospitable even for the most esoteric life forms of the Alliance of Sentient Life. MP-141 plowed into the system at a fair percentage of light speed, and it didn't slow down until it reached the third planet from the primary. Even then the little probe only slowed to one half light speed, racing past a banded gas giant to video its system of rings and to plot the orbits of its waltzing entourage of moons. Then the probe pushed inward, toward the two terrestrial planets it detected closer to the primary.

The innermost planet was obviously too close to the star for optimum environmental conditions — too close even for marginal conditions. But the second planet was eighty-eight million miles from the star, and that was a very good sign. The size, mass, and general composition of the second planet seemed very promising, and MP-141 arrowed towards this ripe plum with all the computerized enthusiasm its single-minded programming could muster.

Alas, the planet proved somewhat of a disappointment. Although it had an atmosphere with sufficient oxygen and other gases to support a multitude of life forms, there seemed to be no indigenous life at all and no liquid water on the surface.

And yet . . . strangely enough, there was a contradiction here. If there was no life and no liquid water, where did all the oxygen, carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and other beneficial gases come from? The little probe decided to look closer.

In a tight orbit around 323-B (second planet out from the 323rd star system investigated by the probe), MP-141 carefully examined the surface of the dry, dusty, desert world. It videoed spectacular canyons, many miles deep, which wandered across the dust-blown deserts. Even the north and south polar regions contained scant traces of water. And yet the canyons gave evidence of having been created by erosion. MP-141's brilliant (although single-minded) inboard computer studied the evidence and compared it to what it had been taught about geology, geography, plate tectonics, erosion, tidal stresses and all the other forces which shaped worlds.

MP-141 speculated that in this planet's early history, great oceans had existed here. But in the dim past, some force — the gravity of a passing object or the impact of a colliding asteroid — had opened up the cold hard crust of this already ancient world and allowed the water to run down into vast subterranean cavities.

Speculation only. More data was needed. More detailed videos and a complete map of the surface. MP-141 settled down to work. It orbited 323-B for four hours, carefully examining every inch of the planet with video, surface radar, deeprange radar — every method of detection it possessed.

And then MP-141 saw something very odd. It focused all its electronic senses on a ten-square-mile region. When its orbit took it past the region, it pushed itself around the planet to bring it back as quickly as possible, then it applied braking thrusters and went down for a closer look.

There was much to see — something quite different from the desolate desert, something quite unnatural for the bleak planet, something that defied understanding by MP-141's computer. The curious little probe dropped down to within ten miles of the surface. It videoed and scanned the peculiar area all over again, acquiring a wealth of additional details. But the new data raised more questions than it answered.

At that moment, something spoke to MP-141. Something chatted with it briefly in the mathematical language of the electronic mind. MP-141 chatted back. Much more information was given by MP-141 than it received — but that wasn't the little probe's fault. And when the conversation was over, the one who spoke to the little probe decided it didn't want MP-141 to remember the conversation. So it told MP-141 to forget it — and the probe obeyed.

MP-141 blasted back up to orbit and did a quick systems check to determine why thirty-eight point six seconds seemed to be missing from it's memory. No reason was found, no malfunction detected, so it logged the incident as unexplained. What choice did it have?

Forty-five minutes later, MP-141 was leaving star system 323. Just before engaging the hyperdrive that would send it streaking towards the next star on its route, MP-141 transmitted its periodic report by jinn wave back to the University of New Düsseldorf. A flood of data leaped across the void between the Magellanic Cloud and the bright, sprawling Milky Way galaxy. The data included the high-resolution pictures of the anomaly that existed on the planet's surface, along with all the physical data the probe's sensors had gathered.

MP-141 had no idea that it had just done something that would affect the lives of every creature in the Alliance of Sentient Life.

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


Last edited by Bud Brewster on Tue Jan 31, 2023 5:45 pm; edited 11 times in total
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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 18, 2016 12:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I am intrigued.

Is the system being investigated one so unknown to us....or,......is it us?
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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Mon Aug 22, 2016 12:15 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Re-reading this chapter I was struck by the thought that it reminded me of Arthur Clarkes introduction to his novilization of 2001. I reffer to the narrative style.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Mon Aug 22, 2016 8:49 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Wow! High praise indeed. Thanks, Gord.

I wondered if my style actually resembled the writing of Arthur C. Clarke (pause for modest cough Wink), so I copied chapter 1 of 2001 and posted it below for comparison.

I'll let the good folks here at All Sci-Fi judge from themselves. (And the ones who don't agree will be kicked off my board!) Sad

Just kiddin'
Laughing
________________________________

Chapter 1

The Road to Extinction


The drought had lasted now for ten million years, and the reign of the terrible lizards had long since ended. Here on the Equator, in the continent which would one day be known as Africa, the battle for existence had reached a new climax of ferocity, and the victor was not yet in sight. In this barren and desiccated land, only the small or the swift or the fierce could flourish, or even hope to survive.

The man-apes of the veldt were none of these things, and they were not flourishing. Indeed, they were already far down the road to racial extinction. About fifty of them occupied a group of caves overlooking a small, parched valley, which was divided by a sluggish stream fed from snows in the mountains two hundred miles to the north. In bad times the stream vanished completely, and the tribe lived in the shadow of thirst.

It was always hungry, and now it was starving. When the first faint glow of dawn crept into the cave, Moon-Watcher saw that his father had died in the night. He did not know that the Old One was his father, for such a relationship was utterly beyond his understanding, but as he looked at the emaciated body he felt dim disquiet that was the ancestor of sadness.

The two babies were already whimpering for food, but became silent when Moon-Watcher snarled at them. One of the mothers, defending the infant she could not properly feed, gave him an angry growl in return; he lacked the energy even to cuff her for her presumption.

Now it was light enough to leave. Moon-Watcher picked up the shriveled corpse and dragged it after him as he bent under the low overhang of the cave. Once outside, he threw the body over his shoulder and stood upright - the only animal in all this world able to do so.

Among his kind, Moon-Watcher was almost a giant. He was nearly five feet high, and though badly undernourished weighed over a hundred pounds. His hairy, muscular body was halfway between ape and man, but his head was already much nearer to man than ape. The forehead was low, and there
were ridges over the eye sockets, yet he unmistakably held in his genes the promise of humanity.

As he looked out upon the hostile world of the Pleistocene, there was already something in his gaze beyond the capacity of any ape. In those dark, deep-set eyes was a dawning awareness - the first intimations of an intelligence that could not possibly fulfill itself for ages yet, and might soon be extinguished forever.

There was no sign of danger, so Moon-Watcher began to scramble down the almost vertical slope outside the cave, only slightly hindered by his burden. As if they had been waiting for his signal, the rest of the tribe emerged from their own homes farther down the rock face, and began to hasten toward the muddy waters of the stream for their morning drink.

Moon-Watcher looked across the valley to see if the Others were in sight, but there was no trace of them. Perhaps they had not yet left their caves, or were already foraging farther along the hillside. Since they were nowhere to be seen, Moon-Watcher forgot them; he was incapable of worrying about more than one thing at a time.

First he must get rid of the Old One, but this was a problem that demanded little thought.

There had been many deaths this season, one of them in his own cave; he had only to put the corpse where he had left the new baby at the last quarter of the moon, and the hyenas would do the rest.

They were already waiting, where the little valley fanned out into the savanna, almost as if they had known that he was coming. Moon-Watcher left the body under a small bush - all the earlier bones were already gone - and hurried back to rejoin the tribe. He never thought of his father again.

His two mates, the adults from the other caves, and most of the youngsters were foraging among the drought-stunted trees farther up the valley, looking for berries, succulent roots and leaves, and occasional windfalls like small lizards or rodents. Only the babies and the feeblest of the old folk were left in the caves; if there was any surplus food at the end of the day's searching,
they might be fed. If not, the hyenas would soon be in luck once more.

But this day was a good one - though as Moon-Watcher had no real remembrance of the past, he could not compare one time with another. He had found a hive of bees in the stump of a dead tree, and so had enjoyed the finest delicacy that his people could ever know; he still licked his fingers from time to time as he led the group homeward in the late afternoon. Of course, he had
also collected a fair number of stings, but he had scarcely noticed them. He was now as near to contentment as he was ever likely to be; for though he was still hungry, he was not actually weak with hunger. That was the most to which any man-ape could ever aspire.

His contentment vanished when he reached the stream. The Others were there. They were there every day, but that did not make it any the less annoying.

There were about thirty of them, and they could not have been distinguished from the members of MoonWatcher's own tribe. As they saw him coming they begun to dance, shake their arms, and shriek on their side of the stream, and his own people replied in kind.

And that was all that happened. Though the man-apes often fought and wrestled one another, their disputes very seldom resulted in serious injuries. Having no claws or fighting canine teeth, and being well protected by hair, they could not inflict much harm on one another. In any event, they had little surplus energy for such unproductive behavior; snarling and threatening was a much
more efficient way of asserting their points of view.

The confrontation lasted about five minutes; then the display died out as quickly as it had begun, and everyone drank his fill of the muddy water. Honor had been satisfied; each group had staked its claim to its own territory. This important business having been settled, the tribe moved off along its side of the river. The nearest worthwhile grazing was now more than a mile from the caves, and they had to share it with a herd of large, antelope-like beasts who barely
tolerated their presence. They could not be driven away, for they were armed with ferocious daggers on their foreheads - the natural weapons which the man-apes did not possess.

So Moon-Watcher and his companions chewed berries and fruit and leaves and fought off the pangs of hunger - while all around them, competing for the same fodder, was a potential source of more food than they could ever hope to eat. Yet the thousands of tons of succulent meat roaming over the savanna and through the bush was not only beyond their reach; it was beyond their
imagination. In the midst of plenty, they were slowly starving to death.

The tribe returned to its cave without incident, in the last light of the day. The injured female who had remained behind cooed with pleasure as Moon-Watcher gave her the berry-covered branch he had brought back, and began to attack it ravenously. There was little enough nourishment here, but it would help her to survive until the wound the leopard had given her had healed, and
she could forage for herself again.

Over the valley, a full moon was rising, and a chill wind was blowing down from the distant mountains. It would be very cold tonight - but cold, like hunger, was not a matter for any real concern; it was merely part of the background of life.

Moon-Watcher barely stirred when the shrieks and screams echoed up the slope from one of the lower caves, and he did not need to hear the occasional growl of the leopard to know exactly what was happening.

Down there in the darkness old White Hair and his family were fighting and dying, and the thought that he might help in some way never crossed Moon-Watcher's mind. The harsh logic of survival ruled out such fancies, and not a voice was raised in protest from the listening hillside. Every cave was silent, lest it also attract disaster.

The tumult died away, and presently Moon-Watcher could hear the sound of a body being dragged over rocks. That lasted only a few seconds; then the leopard got a good hold on its kill. It made no further noise as it padded silently away, carrying its victim effortlessly in its jaws.

For a day or two, there would be no further danger here, but there might be other enemies abroad, taking advantage of this cold Little Sun that shone only by night. If there was sufficient warning, the smaller predators could sometimes be scared away by shouts and screams. Moon-Watcher crawled out of the cave, clambered onto a large boulder beside the entrance, and squatted there to
survey the valley.

Of all the creatures who had yet walked on Earth, the man-apes were the first to look steadfastly at the Moon. And though he could not remember it, when he was very young Moon-Watcher would sometimes reach out and try to touch that ghostly face rising above the hills.

He had never succeeded, and now he was old enough to understand why. For first, of course, he must find a high enough tree to climb.

Sometimes he watched the valley, and sometimes he watched the Moon, but always he listened.

Once or twice he dozed off, but he slept with a hair-trigger alertness, and the slightest sound would have disturbed him. At the great age of twenty-five, he was still in full possession of all his faculties; if his luck continued, and he avoided accidents, disease, predators, and starvation, he might survive for as much as another ten years.

The night wore on, cold and clear, without further alarms, and the Moon rose slowly amid equatorial constellations that no human eye would ever see. In the caves, between spells of fitful dozing and fearful waiting, were being born the nightmares of generations yet to be.

And twice there passed slowly across the sky, rising up to the zenith and descending into the east, a dazzling point of light more brilliant than any star.

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Mon Aug 22, 2016 10:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

In Clarkes' LOST WORLDS OF 2001 he includes a pre-prolouge from the point of view of the aliens....great stuff.

As much as I love the poetical-prose language of Ray Bradbury and rhe colloquial phrasing of Heinlein, I think I love Clarkes' crisp, clear narrative the best.

I hope others see that in your "style" as well.

Behind every man now alive stand thirty ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living. Since the dawn of time, roughly a hundred billion human beings have walked the planet Earth.

Now this is an interesting number, for by a curious coincidence there are approximately a hundred billion stars in our local universe, the Milky Way. So for every man who has ever lived, in this Universe there shines a star.

But every one of those stars is a sun, often far more brilliant and glorious than the small, nearby star we call the Sun. And many--perhaps most--of those alien suns have planets circling them. So almost certainly there is enough land in the sky to give every member of the human species, back to the first ape-man, his own private, world-sized heaven--or hell.

How many of those potential heavens and hells are now inhabited, and by what manner of creatures, we have no way of guessing; the very nearest is a million times farther away than Mars or Venus, those still remote goals of the next generation. But the barriers of distance are crumbling; one day we shall meet our equals, or our masters, among the stars.

Men have been slow to face this prospect; some still hope that it may never become reality. Increasing numbers, however are asking; 'Why have such meetings not occurred already, since we ourselves are about to venture into space?'

Why not, indeed? Here is one possible answer to that very reasonable question. But please remember: this is only a work of fiction.

The truth, as always, will be far stranger.
― Arthur C. Clarke, 2001: A Space Odyssey

Moon-Watcher and his companions had no recollection of what they had seen, after the crystal had ceased to cast its hypnotic spell over their minds and to experiment with their bodies.

The next day, as they went out to forage, they passed it with scarcely a second thought; it was now part of the disregarded background of their lives. They could not eat it, and it could not eat them; therefore it was not important.

the very atoms of his simple brain were being twisted into new patterns. If he survived, those patterns would become eternal, for his genes would pass them on to future generations. It was a slow, tedious business, but the crystal monolith was patient.

Neither it, nor its replicas scattered across half the globe, expected to succeed with all the scores of groups involved in the experiment.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Mon Aug 22, 2016 3:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Gord, you continue to impress me. Cool

I feel the need at this point to assure you that the Sail the Sea of Stars is not just a series of Star Wars-like space battles. In fact the main premise of the story involves an explanation for the creation of life in the universe which involves neither evolution nor creationism.

It's a "third alternative", and I've said for years that the origin of life must be something completely different from the two popular choices people feel compelled to choose between: the religious explanation and the non-religious one.

As far as I know, it's totally original, but when you find out more about it you might notice common elements between my idea and others you've read before. However, hopefully it will have enough originality to offer something new to fans of the genre. Very Happy

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
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