Chapter No.38. Contact.

We achieved orbit around Gliese 185-b without incident. Cursory observations didn't reveal much except for a strange object in what appeared to be a desert.

"It looks like a monument," Sharon said. "But I don't see signs of activity around it."

"This is definitely not the lizard alien's home world," I said. "But some intelligent species took the time to build a monument."

"I don't see any signs of cities or even settlements," Janet said. "If there is an intelligent species here, it must be extinct."

I blew out a disgusted breath. "We'll have to go down there and see what's going on, but we'll have to wear bio suits."

"Who are you taking with you?" Sharon asked.

"You and Bridget. Bridget is the exo-biologist and you're the planetary expert."

"Need a military specialist?" Kali asked.

"Yeah, you can lug the laser rifle."

She smiled.

The trip down was uneventful. I flew over the monument location and around the edges of the desert, but there was no indication of large animals or intelligent creatures, so I sat the shuttle down near the monument but not too close just in case we needed a quick escape.

After getting into our bio suits, we exited the shuttle and approached the monument.

"This thing is much larger than I expected," Sharon said. "It appears to be constructed from some unnatural substance, not indigenous stone."

"That's odd," I reacted. "Why wouldn't they use stone from the planet?"

"Maybe stone suitable for making a monument is many kilometers away."

"I hate to tell you guys, but this thing has English inscriptions on it," Kali said.

I walked over to her and what I saw blew my mind. "What in the hell is going on here! This thing says that there was a human settlement on this planet in 2078. That's completely ridiculous."

"If there was a settlement here, what happened to it?" Sharon asked.

"Good question. We didn't see any evidence of it."

"I think this monument is made from that instant cement shit that they came up with to build houses with," Kali said. "They must have hauled it here."

"This joy-cruising around the universe is putting us into the future big time," I said

"Yeah, all we're doing is picking up the pieces," Sharon said.

"The big question is: where did they go?" Kali asked.

"Maybe they gave up on this planet and went to another," I said. "But another possibility is that the lizard aliens took them away."

"If that's the case there would still be evidence of the settlement."

I sighed. "It's definitely a mystery. Let's get back to the ship."

We entered the shuttle's air lock and went through the disinfection routine before entering the shuttle proper to return to the ship.

"What'd you find?" Janet asked when we arrived back at the crew deck's command station.

"The monument indicated that there was a human colony there in 2078, but there's no evidence of it remaining."

"I thought that was when the second mission launched."

"Yeah, you're right. That doesn't make sense. The monument indicated that the colony was founded then. Does that mean that there was a mission launched before us?"

"It's confusing because of this time screw up in hyperspace," Janet said. "We have no idea what date we're at, and even if we did, it would only be true in reference to Earth."

"We're in back-to-the-future time," I said.

She laughed.

But I just realized that this was not funny. I turned to Kali, who was sitting next to me. "You told us that you were attacked by an alien ship. Did they look like lizards?"

"I don't know. All I saw was the ship that attacked us."

"You had to be attacked at Gliese 185-b. Did they come up from the surface?"

"No, they arrived from hyperspace."

"Why did your ship come here?"

"I don't know. I was not part of command. I just did what I was told."

I turned to Janet. "This means that the lizard aliens are from a nearby system."

"They could have come from a distant system," she said.

"If that were the case, why would they be concerned about humans on a planet that's not near their home world."

"I think we're going to find out," Janet said.

We watched a ship that had just dropped out of hyperspace approach. The vessel had a strange design that looked more like a thin cone.

"What are we going to do?" Janet asked, her face exhibiting fear.

"We're not equipped to do anything violent. If I try to shoot the laser at them, they'll more than likely destroy us."

By then, the rest of the women joined us.

"What's that?" Natale asked.

"Probably the aliens that destroyed Kali's ship."

"Are we going to run?" she asked.

"Wouldn't do any good. By the time we get in our G-chairs and stop the wheels for a burn, they will have destroyed us."

The vessel came to a stop relative to our orbital velocity around the planet. We watched it just sit there a thousand meters away.

"If they're going to destroy us, why are they waiting?" Bridget said.

"I assume they're trying to determine if we're a risk."

You could cut the tension with a knife. It was like waiting for a bullet you knew was coming.

After several tense minutes, it changed.

"I'm getting a ping for a communication link," Sharon said.

"Accept it."

The face that appeared was not something you would want to run into in a dark alley. Green scales and an evil look that was enough to make me swallow hard.

"Why are you here?" the creature asked.

"We're trying to find where a large group of humans went after we left Earth on a mission to Centauri-Proxima-b."

"Are you aligned with the species you call Greys?"

"No. We're not out here to make alignments with anyone or to colonize a planet. We're just curious."

"Why did you come to this planet?"

"We've been to several habitable planets near Earth. This just happens be one of them. We found evidence that it had a human colony but they're not here. Look, we're not out here to do anything aggressive. I'm alone with five females. I don't have time to be causing trouble. Besides, our vessel is not equipped for combat."

The words that we were happy to hear came after a tense silence. "We understand."

The communication link broke and the alien vessel accelerated off.

"I think he decided to leave in peace after he saw all you women."

"Yeah, we women are not aggressive," Natale said with an ornery grin. "We just like to tease."

They laughed, mostly to relive stress.

"Evidently, the Greys and the Lizards are not on good terms," I said. "Who would have thought that we would run into a galactic feud out here. This is yet another reason why humans should not be out here trying to find a new Earth."

"Yeah," Kali said. "A galactic feud that we're in the middle of."

"What are we going to do now?" Bridget asked.

"I think that the Lizard aliens are not living on a planet orbiting a star like our Sun. Let's see if we could find a star system like ours near here."

"We'll work on it," Janet said.

I stood up. "I'm going down to check the agricultural deck robots. With six mouths to feed now, we'll have to keep them at peak capability."

This time, Kali asked to accompany me, and what she told me was outrageous.