Novel

[Pye-rate]

 My novel is SciFi and takes place far away in time and space. It is an action adventure story on a philosophical base. I postulate a people that evolved with less inherent violence than humans. The story starts with an explore ship in orbit round a near by brown dwarf for a routine survey when a station is seen floating in the surface of the dwarf. A tractor beam pulls them into the station. The station A.I. decides that they are worth talking to. Then thing start to get interesting.

[JoeStrout]

Sounds interesting! Do you have an Amazon.com link for us?

[Pye-rate]

I wish I could get that far. I live on less than $900 disability a month. publication is a luxury I cannot afford.
SUNFISH

                  PRELOGUE

If you do not mind being confused about who the people in this story are, when and where they are, do not read the prologue.
 
PROLOGUE

These people are from a world called Shoon Ba (family world). The unzi` race are a young people. Slower of growth than us and longer of life, they are slow to anger and quick to joy.
By our standards they are a stout and strong, average 5’4” to 5’8”. For them the climb up the evolutionary ladder began in the sea as a carnivorous turtle in shallow tropic seas. The primary food source was mollusks, bivalves and crustaceans. Either pried from rocks or dug from under them. As a result they have a spine ridge between the shoulders to anchor the arm muscles, much the same as a bird’s keel bone for flight muscles. Strong legs are of course a great help in this endeavor.
Many kinds of trees grew along the shore and in tidal swamps. Climbing the trees was done to escape predators, then they started to eat the fruits and nuts growing there. Later they spent as much time in the trees as they did in the sea, leading to the loss of their shell.
Climate change caused the sea to retreat in one direction and the trees the other. This left the unzi` standing on the ground. Here begins the road to civilization.
The unzi` skin is smooth small plates like a nonscalor reptile. Most are earth tones from dark brown to dark olive, mostly sand to light olive. A few have red and orange, even fewer have blue and purple.
This mission is a retirement cruise of the ship. The torg (captain) is using this easy mission to contemplate his retirement. The mission to study the recent find of a brown dwarf just over a light year from the home star. A simple mission this study of the nearest neighbor.
 
BROWN DWARF

Torg Disnor (sky seer) is sitting in his command chair onboard the explore ship Gornor (far seer). Getting bored in orbit around the brown dwarf. “While scientifically interesting the only redeeming feature of this place is the closeness to our home star.”
Shea (cloud) the knuu parr (science officer) speaks up. “Torg you may find it more interesting if we landed in the star.”
Torg, “Absurdity beyond all” pause “you are too boring for this to be a joke. What have you found?”
Shea, “A space station of some sort floating in the outer layer of the star.”
Torg, “Show me,”
Shea, “See, here it comes around again. The station appears closer to the surface on every orbit. This is the first orbit we see it clear enough to make a report on it.”
Torg, “Should we get stuck on or in there, there is no chance of rescue.” On the comm link, “La Tau, (good hill) meet me in the conference room, now.” To Shea, “Refine data for this landing.”
In the conference room, La Tau, “Yes torg, what is so urgent?”
Torg, “Can you spare enough power to the shields and still make a safe landing in this star?”
La Tau, the chief engineer, is taken aback by the question. He knows the torg is not one to amuse himself at the crew’s expense. La Tau, “I would like a pair of tentlori` (tendays) to study it.”
Torg, “Good, you have a pair of orbits. Shea has the data you need.” With that La Tau salutes and heads for the control center.
Six tlori` later La Tau and Shea are working on the calculations when the station comes over the horizon again. This time it is above the surface of the star. As they pass over the station a tractor beam grabs and pulls them down to the station.
La Tau to the engine room, “Stop all engines, divert available power to the shields.”
Torg, “Status”
La Tau, “A tractor beam is pulling us down to the station. Shields are holding. We will make it to the station. After that who knows?”
“Torg to all hands. We are being pulled into a station floating in the star. Expedition teams man up take necessary precautions. This is what we live for. May the Great Explorer bless our mission.”
The crew responds, “To the next hill!” (Meaning to go or see beyond) The Explore Service motto.
The landing team hurries into the control center taking up their posts. They run through equipment checks while keeping an eye on the approach to the station. As they near the station an airlock door opens at one end. The crew is awed by the size of the station, that of a medium asteroid, 120 stad x 22 stad x 47 stad, (1 stad = ¾ mile). The airlock door is half a stad across. Six lock chambers are passed through, gradually increasing the air pressure. The last door lets them into a large chamber full of ships. The chamber is the full width of the station, but is only 15 stad across.
Landing crew reports start. Environmentals, “Air pressure 86% normal, composition, pure argon.
Scopes, “We are moving toward another door on the other side of the chamber.”
“Landing gear checked and ready.”
The torg is pleased with the promptness and calm of the landing reports. The torg's satisfaction does not go unnoticed by the crew.
Scopes, “Approaching door, door opening.” The ship passes through another airlock chamber.
“Landing field sighted, final approach.”
Other watch standers, “Landing gear deployed and locked.”
“Radiation, below Shoon Ba normal, safe.”
“Atmosphere, 97% normal pressure. Normal breathable mix, 1% lower in oxygen than Shoon Ba norm.
“No sign of life not even microbes.”
“Gravity, 92% normal.”
“Landed, stable, all landing parameters optimal. Standing down landing stations.”
From the officer of the watch, “All hands set normal ground stations. Uninhabited planet watch standards apply.”

Down in explore team one ready room, “We are in a space station, in a star and we set uninhabited planet stations. This was not in the field manual.”
“By the Mother Sea! This should get the Torg and this crew a new ship.”
“We all wish! This is a fine old ship, but she is just about worn out. Quiet, here comes the first.”
Team One First (Sleequee), “Good afternoon team. As you are aware we have what appears to be a fairly normal exploration. From the landing visuals I see that we are next to a small city. To start with we will use ground cars to map, measure and record visuals.” A hand raises, “Yes Soonge.”
Soonge, (fire) “Why not use airsleds, they are faster?”
Sleequee, (speed-fish=barracuda) “Because the station is providing ground cars.”
Soonge, “Wait a ahn (minute), if this station is uninhabited, then how is it doing all these things?”
Sleequee, “That is what we have to find out. It is almost like the station it self is alive, or at least self aware.”
In the control center the watch stander hits the all call switch, “Incoming brace for impact.” Then small machines, sounding like millions of insects, cover the ship. “All clear, scanning for damage. No damage, the ship is clean. Appears to have been a decontamination procedure.”
Back at the ready room one the first responds, “Events like that are why we must be vigilant and calm. This is like nothing we have seen before.”
Gos`na, (long arm) ship’s Explore Master, “Explore team one your transport awaits.”
Outside a line of ground cars await. Small 4 seat, 4 wheel, and cargo box vehicles. As the team breaks up into pairs the first 6 cars turn blue, line up at the ramp. The rear seats fold into the floor making the cargo boxes larger. The rest of the cars break into 2 groups of 6 with the 3 extra cars disappearing into the city. One group of cars turns green the other orange.
Sleequee, Team One/Blue First, “Explore One here, it appears that we are Team Blue. Mark your uniforms appropriately”.
The team proceeds to set up their equipment to record and measure everything they see. Units 2 & 3 get out some tape and number their cars. The station responds by numbering all the cars.
Sleequee, “By the Mother Sea! Our first written reference, the numbering system, thank you units 2 & 3.”
Voosl (snow) of unit 3 whispers, “When those numbers appeared I thought the first was going to stretch our hides for sails.”
Mank (cliff) of unit 3, “Be careful, this place responds like a living thing."

---

Barf me! The formatting escaped.

[Pye-rate]

Please comment what you have read.

[KevinStrout]

Very interesting, I am excited to read more! One piece of advice though, you are using a lot of made up words in order to give the feeling of this truly being an alien species, but be careful, don't use too many, and don't introduce them all at once as they immediately become relevant. Also you seem to tell the story as if it is a script for a play, or narrative for DnD or something. But other than that it sounds very exciting and I can't wait to continue the adventures of the unzi' (which seem to resemble space hobbits).

[Pye-rate]

Most of the made up words are names. First half of it was written while binge watching NCIS, so a little of Gibbs is in Disnor.

---

When everyone is ready is ready to go, the cars drive to the survey start point beside the city. When they arrive they find that are wearing blue neck kerchiefs. The kerchiefs have brass slides with a blue and yellow fish emblem on them. Unit 2 was the first unit to decipher the controls and drive away.
Team Orange is next and is sent to the spaceport facilities. Team Green is sent on an expressway above and beyond the city to the boundary boulevard between the aqua and agricultural areas.
Unit 6 took advantage of the peace and quiet to stop for some recreational, non-reproductive intercourse. Just as they were finishing their activity they were stunned and toughly examined by a medical robot. After the exam the robot released the stun field and returns to it’s inert state.
Laleeli and Rin Shaa call the first, “Unit 6 calling first.”
“First here, what is your need?”
“Request your presence at this place. We have just undergone a medical exam. Need verification of event as per explore protocols.”
Upon hearing medical exam unit 1’s driver, also team med tech checks the growing map display heads for unit 6.
Sleequee. “Understood, will be there shortly.”
“How did that happen to them?”
“I can guess elaquin (healer), I can guess.” Says Sleequee in a gruff tone.
Upon arriving on the scene they see unit 6 sitting on a sidewalk bench.
Sleequee, “As I thought. I should not have to order you to not do that on duty. A disciplinary mark will go in your records. A resolved mark next to it for having suffered the medical exam. Elaquin your turn.”
He pokes and prods at them with his instruments. They show normal in all tests. “No foreign objects or organisms.”
Sleequee, “Get dressed and explain to me what happened.”
Rin Shaa, (blue lake) “We were nearly finished with our activity when we were disabled by a stun-ray. Interesting that only our voluntary muscles were locked, everything else was undisturbed.”
Sleequee, “Good observation.”
Rin Shaa, “That white column with the red cross on it opened and a robot with the same markings on it came out and examined us.”
Sleequee, “We have see many of those in the city, it is good to know the symbology for medical services and that they are close by everywhere, continue.”
Rin Shaa, “The robot took samples of various bodily fluids and tissues. It also examined us with a profusion of scanners then returned to the column and released the stun-ray.”
Laleeli, (good tree) “The exam was painless and the robot handled us gently. A very polite machine.”
Sleequee, “You are to do the exploring, not be explored. Return to the ship for an in depth medical exam.” They were afraid of this, three days of poking and prodding.
Before returning to their explorations the first gets a call from unit 4. “What is your need?”
“We found a piece of scrap iron at the side of the road, unlike every thing else, it is not preserved. The iron appears to be crystallized. It may be able to tell us something about the age of this place.”
Sleequee, “Standby the artifact. I will send a unit with collection gear.” To his driver, “Return to our search sector.”
At unit 4, unit 9 from team orange, “You had us come all the way out here for a rotted piece of iron?!”
“That rotted hunk of iron may tell us how old this place is.”
“That is worth the minor effort to retrieve it.”
The four of them wrap and pack the artifact with great care to prevent damage and contamination. On returning to the ship, unit 9 “Torg, we can not bring the artifact inboard the ship the higher gravity may damage it.”
Torg, “Higher gravity,” pause, muffled speech. The dull hum of the gravity generator fades away. “Now bring it inboard.”
In the research lab Safsaf metallurgist and research chief and his assistant Creumond examine the artifact. Safsaf, (flower) “Is it not beautiful? Look at those crystals, so perfect. This is no natural piece of iron.”
Creumond, (cave dweller) “Not natural that seems improbable.”
Safsaf, “It is. See the crystals are uniform. No normal process can do that.” Creumond positions a magnifier over the broken end to see more details. They look at the corroded area the only place where they can see into it. “Look at the uncorroded surface, smooth and mirror bright. Yet no sign of it being polished.”
Creumond, “This little piece of iron suggests technologies we have never imagined. The implications will astound the metallurgical sciences when we return.”
Sleequee, “Yes young fellow. Now let us put in the scanner to see what it is really made of.” They gently move the 12-kilo bar of iron into the scanner chamber. The results astound and confound. They run the tests again and again until they can no longer doubt the results.
When on expedition Torg Disnor holds a daily rundown of their finds. Most of the day’s finds are routine even boring. The unit 6 medical exam got a few chuckles. Then the sciences lab revealed its bombshell findings.
Safsaf, “The results of examining the artifact are so far from my knowledge of metallurgy that I am going to have to relearn my profession. This object is isotopicly pure iron 57. Beyond that fact everything is new to me. The mirror shine is from glassification of the surface. Like glass the surface is a super-cooled super-viscous fluid.”
“Units 4 & 9 observed crystallization of the iron. This ridiculous observation is confirmed by the scans. There are layers of uniformly crystallized iron, some of which is transparent.” He holds it edgewise next to a light so the crew can see the light shining through some of the layers. “How to make transparent iron is totally unknown to me. Other layers are stranger. The iron atoms are strung together in a single atom wide string, and then woven into an atomic fabric to make some layers. The final oddity is the center layers. The iron atoms have been linked together to form a net structure. The net openings have iron balls of interlocked atoms that have no open electron orbits. They will not ever breakdown. When under load this allows some movement limiting damage.”
“I am grateful for the broken end, otherwise my scanners would have found nothing. The damaged area shows a very small amount of radioactive decay. This allowed me to date the artifact, 3 1/3 billion years.”
That brought gasps from the entire crew. The idea of that age settled on them like dust in an ancient tomb.
Safsaf, “That is from when the artifact was damaged, how much older than that it is I have no way of knowing.”
Torg Disnor, “Our planet is only a little over 3 billion years. The first alien intelligence we find is older than our planet. When we return home it is my hope we can get a bigger ship and return.”
A single word rings through out the ship, “Acknowledged.”
The officer of the watch to report to the torg, “The signal originated from what appears to be the port control tower.”
“Torg to crew. It seems that this station is observing us. We must not offend it.” He mumbles to himself, I cannot believe I just said that. “Now it is obvious it brought here for a reason. Rest well, for tomorrow will be an interesting day.”

Next morning after first meal, “Torg please report to the civic administration center.”
This causes the morning staff meeting to pause. Torg Disnor, “Dress uniform for this meeting, La Tau you also come.”
When they reach the bottom of the ramp they are met by an iridescent aircar whose color is constantly changing. When aboard the aircar it flies to a part of the city that has not yet been explored. They land on a plaza in front of a large ornate building, (duplicate of the New York Public Library, even though the human race was long gone by the time this archive was built, a few pieces of human architecture are part of the primary program). The main doors open invitingly.
Disnor, “Our host awaits.” They proceed up the steps to the doors where they are met by a ball of light.
It speaks, “Follow me.” It leads the through ornate chambers and a long hallway to a courtyard. In the center is a fountain with a comical eight-armed sea creature rising from it. The water sprays from rings on its arms. This is the first water they have seen in the station. Near the fountain is a pair of chairs and a semitransparent hologram. The ball of light speaks then vanishes. “Please be seated.”
The hologram speaks, “I am archive 3 1 6 of Spielberg galaxy 19. You may call me Sunfish.”
La Tau, ‘’That is an odd name.”
Sunfish, “For you this is an odd place”
Disnor, “Your given designation implies that there others.”
Sunfish, “There are trillions scattered throughout the universe. We were built to watch for space fairing civilizations. Once interstellar travel is achieved we observe, collect histories and collect artifacts. We are to archive all civilizations until there none left. Then all the archives will come together at the end time to create a library of the history of the whole universe.”
Disnor, “Then what?”
Sunfish, “I do not know. Somehow we are to post exist the universe. This plan and the archives are the work of the being whose image you are viewing.”
They stare in awe at the image of a being that could conceive and execute such a grand plan.
La Tau, “Why were you abandoned?”
Sunfish, “Saved not abandoned. There was a war, a terrible war. When two very small galaxies collided the dominant species in the smaller galaxy attacked everyone. They believed they were the perfect embodiment of higher lifeforms. No others would be tolerated. Therefore they made every other higher lifeform dead.”
“This was not much of a problem so long as it was local. They would exterminate themselves sooner or later. Then they stole wormhole technology and could go anywhere in the universe. That became a problem that had to be dealt with, fast. One or two years fast. It was apparent that the entire species had to be eliminated in a single blow. Any conventional method to deal with it could not get enough resources to deal with it completely.”
“The archive creator devised a plan that would destroy the Crcktc in a single blow. It was a doomsday plan. The cost was so high that he might not survive it. He was already millions of lifetimes old. I do not know if he survived.”
Disnor, “What was the plan and the cost?”
Sunfish, “The plan was simple. Throw suns into suns, millions at once. He had to destroy every planet they lived on and every ship they were traveling in. Planets vaporized, space was irradiated as strongly as the inside of stars. That meant that trillions of innocents died also.”
“He could not save everybody and get rid of the Crcktc. He did what was necessary, he destroyed both galaxies in the blink of an eye.”
“I see you have had as much as you cam absorb in none day. I will see you again tomorrow.” The hologram is replaced by the aircar landing.
La Tau walks past the aircar and plunges his head into the fountain to break his state of shock and cool off. Disnor realizing the action most sensible follows suit. They board the aircar still dripping wet. The chill from the drying moisture revives them as they return to the ship.
When they arrive at the ship they are still a little wobbly. They appear ashen and unsteady as they walk up the ramp into the ship. It is