Lonely Paths

The Monitor

High above a blue planet devoid of life, in a space station built with materials that could withstand the wear and tear of whatever the uncertain mood of the cosmos throws its way, the Monitor sits infront of a large screen that covers most of the space in the spotless chamber she is in. She moves across the room, touching the floating screens that keep popping up every now and then, tapping away at the vast console board and generally being very busy all the while being very silent.

She just received an input from one of the Seekers she is in contact with. As she transfers it into the memory log for safekeeping and transmitting it back to her planet, she peruses it while still maintaining communications with other members of her unit. Most of the time, her job feels like nothing more than that of an Archivist's - not that that isn't an important job - it's just that with all the cataloguing she does, it's easy to forget the importance of it, or even the excitement of it. But at times like these, when she receives data that sends thrills pulsing across her being, she remembers her purpose.

The Seeker who sent this particular data has been in constant communication with her ever since he entered his destined solar system. She has monitored his activity closely since he landed upon the deserted planet he was aiming for. He found traces of life – an abundance of them – as they knew he would. He had proceeded according to protocol until he did something so stupid that it staggered her. He actually ingested a planet's untested liquid. She very nearly screamed when his neural connection went out for a while after that. In all her years of training and working, she was never prepared for that kind of idiocy. She had heard other Monitors discussing about this particular oddity of the Seekers while she was still in training but had dismissed it as an impossibility – surely no one would be insane enough to step out of their suits to feel the air, or ingest alien materials to figure out how they would have affected the species that lived on a planet – but apparently, that insanity is a distinctive and necessary trait of the Seekers.

She was relieved when she felt his mind again. And she had to admit that the information she received was invaluable. As she looked at the plethora of images and sounds and time sequences, she marvelled at the complexity of it all. This was the first civilization she had come across that had the potential to be contacted. And they were very much like her own species and yet so different. She could see that the Seeker had spent more time looking around than she had believed. He must have tuned down her access into his mind without her noticing. He was entitled to do that of course. Only the Tethers were given unrestricted access. A Monitor's presence was tolerated for the common good. He must have spent a lot of time moving across that planet to have gathered all this information. She could sense his discomfort right now as this particular line of thought seeped across their connection. She quickly restricted his access to her thoughts - he didn't need the distraction.

The images running across the screen at high speeds still showed her the obvious characteristics of this species. Humans, they seemed to call themselves. Divided into two main genders, they produced offspring in a primitive manner. An offspring that most of the times managed to thrive. She could see all the lesser species too, and their various interactions.

Once all the information was compressed into transmissible coded data that fit into a small hexagonal object, she leaves the chamber. Immediately, she feels a tug – or rather the loss of one. Even though she could still feel her colleagues' thought streams, it is on a less intense level. As she moves to the transmission module of the space centre, she feels a guilty sense of relief. It is one thing to be connected to your own Tether, but to have seven other consciousnesses nudging against your mind becomes a bit too much at times. She could easily have made the computer transmit this info without having to leave the chamber, but she liked to move about sometimes and it's not as if anyone needed her assistance right at this moment.