Space Exploration

Velli Landis, stared at the monitor in his room.  He had played all his games, conquered all levels and called every one of his friends.  He sighed, teased his sister's dust bunny that watched from just out side the doorway protected by a force field. He couldn't even find a good song to listen to on his Egger1.

A buzz interrupted his thoughts; it was Deley.  “Hey what are you up to?”

“Nothing, what about you?” Deley was the one person who understood him.  His mother and father were coworkers of Velli’s mother. They stuck by each other when others in the higher classes teased them. 

“When do you have to report to the distribution site?” Deley asked quietly.  He knew Velli hated the idea of working at the plant with his dad.  He wanted to use his qualifications for space exploration.  No one in the Aeronautics Department wanted to explore space.  If there was life beyond their galaxy, no one in Aeronautics cared enough to look. They only watched the traffic in the skies above the colonies and the travel in and out of the Dome.  They were glorified traffic police, not real Aeronautic scientists.

“Come on over.  I see the Department just posted a new job for a Bedrone tester.  It’s a perfect job for us.  We are the right age and we would have those cruisers up and running right out over the terrain before they could hit the escape key.” Velli sent the listing to his friend.

Deley laughed. “Sure, we could do it, but we don’t have the right DNA. That isn’t our line.”

“So, let’s just make our own line up.  Genealogy isn’t everything and they don’t always check.”  Velli tapped on the lighted squares, “We’ll just have flown in from one of the satellite training stations.”

“Be careful Velli, you might just get caught one of these days.  The foster cube isn’t anything fun.  Faldon was sent there for 2 years.  If I hadn’t found the key code to his file he would have been sent to some out station.  As it was, I was able to get him to a station close by and then released.  He is so clean he glows.”

“I am careful.” Velli waved his hand in front of the monitor panel and it went black, he was tired of this conversation.

“I mean it.” Deley’s voice broke just before Velli press the disconnect button.

What was really out there?  All through Velli’s short life he asked that question.  No one would tell him, It wasn’t his business.  He took the lens he and Deley lifted from a storage room at the Center.  It had taken two weeks of computations to modify it to pick up anything farther than the Dome surface.  He trained it on one of the brightest lights in the sky.  While scanning; something exploded.  Sparks flew in all directions. The light blinded him for a moment. He turned the tube away from the portal. He blinked his over sized eyes and reached for the spray that was always at his side. The loose membranes that covered his eyes when he blinked were transparent. They did not reflect strong light, so a spray was made to keep the membrane dust free and pliant. It also helped if the eyes exposed to strong light.

Training the lens back to the sky, he tracked the area where he had seen the explosion.  He found residue of particles scattered in space.  What had been there?

Velli plugged the modified telescope to his computer.  A few key strokes and the result was displayed on the monitor.  He zoomed in until the debris was as large as his fist in the frame. It wasn’t rock or meteorite. The patterned, intermittent flashes of light, came from a beacon on the smaller end of the cone. 

Keeping his eye on the screen he pressed the Comm, with its pre-programmed frequencies.  Without taking his eyes off the screen he tapped out his friend's personal code.

“Deley get over here as fast as you can and bring your PDA.  I need to use one of those old codes you are always studying. NOW!”  Velli didn’t wait for Deley to answer before he disconnected the Comm.

The cone began to slowly tip, the small end turned away from him.  When the large end of the cone faced him, there was a small burst of flame from the side and the cone righted itself.  His heart began to pound.  He was right!  There was life in the outer space.  Here was proof.

A moment later the pad next to him lit and Deley’s face appeared.  Velli pressed the code to open the passage.  He smiled.  It was good to have a friend that didn’t question or give excuses, but rushed out to your rescue when you called.

“Thanks.”

“What do you have?”  Deley’s voice was breathless.  He set the PDA on the desk and stared at the screen. The cone structure filled the screen, the flashes blinked for a few seconds before Deley tapped on the PDA.  He compared the flashing sequences for a few minutes.

“It is a help sequence.  They are in trouble.  The SOS, or help signal is just three short flashes followed by three long ones followed by three short ones.  There is a pause and the same thing is repeated.  There is a pause.  I can’t figure out the next sequence.  Write down the short and long flashes while I check the code.”  Deley was busy tapping his PDA.  Velli watched for the next group of flashes after the SOS.  Quickly he wrote “long” or “short” as he watched the monitor.

“What do you have?: Deley grabbed the tablet from Velli, "I found the code. I knew I had saved it in one of my ancient lit files. Hmm, this is interesting.  It says ‘planet and station exploded…escaped alive…not enough fuel to return to base…send help.’  They are just repeating that over and over. What are you going to do?” Deley broke the silence, as Velli furiously tapped the screen on a tablet.

“What can we do?  Who knows how far away they are.”  Velli rubbed the smooth skin that covered his skull.  His long fingers tapped the tablet for a moment, then turned the tablet to face Deley.

The insignia that Deley saw made him gasp.  It was the Space Aeronautic Headquarters logo.

“What are you thinking?  Hacking into their computer?” his mouth could barely whisper the words.

“I don’t really have to hack. I have the codes, I just never used them. Now I need to find a way to get the computers to direct the porter beam at the ship and pull it in.” Velli was looking at his computer tapping out codes to hide the fact he was logging into the system. He was good at this kind of thing. What did DNA have to do with brains. He was endowed with more than the normal cells.

"Velli, you are fizzygilled. We could get in really big trouble." Deley was still sitting there. His large eyes were lit with excitement.

"Deley you can run the porter beam. We've played on the simulators for ages and you are good at it."

"Doing it for real is a different thing."

"They need our help. We just can't leave them out there."

Both of the boys nodded in agreement. "Let's go."

It wasn't long before badges were printed and permission was granted to the deepest part of the building. Velli stood with his friend at the door marked PODS. Velli scanned the badges and the DNA rec codes they had semi forged.

"Wheuu. I don't know how you did it and I don't want to know." Deley followed his friend to the POD closest to the large shielded door. "What's going to happen when they see that the doors are open?"

Velli laughed, "I programmed a simulated testing pattern. Doors open and a holographic POD leaves for a rescue mission. It was already in the system so they won't think anything other than it is is a glitch. Then it will be too late we will be gone."

"Velli you are serious about this. I thought we were just going to turn on the Promagnet and put it into the bay." Deley was taking a few steps away from him.

"We would, but they are too far out. The Promagnet won't reach them. We have to go get them." He was walking to the POD nearest the bay doors.

"Come on Deley. You say you want adventure, here is our chance."

"Velli, what if we don't make it? What if we can't get back?" Deley's voice was low and trembling.

Slowly Velli turned to his friend. He could see fear an indecision.  "I am scared to death," He saw his friend relax at his words, "Of ending up like my parents and your parents and all the rest of them. Doing just what they are told, not rocking the ship or questioning anything. If I don't make it back, it is because I tried. If I come back, what are they going to do? Send me to the Distribution Center? I doubt that. Deley, at least I did something. It has to account for something." The impassioned plea in his voice rang in Deley's senses. He straightened his spine and moved his feet with determination past Velli.

"Come on whacha waitin' for?"