Chara and the Planet

Chapter No. 48

Chapter No.48.

The journey to the new candidate habitable planet was uneventful. As was her practice, Chara dropped out of warp several million miles away from it in order to avoid any surprise attacks.

"This planet is larger than Earth," Alma revealed. "It measures 1.3 times the size of Earth. Its atmosphere is thicker but does contain oxygen. The planet orbits a G3 class dwarf star at 102 million miles, which is within the habitable zone."

"I'm not detecting any vessels near the planet," Myra said. "There is no evidence of satellites or space stations in orbit."

"Looks like you've discovered a good one again, Chara," Ryan said. "How old is this planet?"

"Based on the star's spectra, I would say it's around three to three and a half billion years," Chara replied. "Since I do not see any threat, I will move us into orbit but remain cloaked."

That maneuver required twenty minutes.

"There are structures on the surface that are not natural," Alma said. "However, they are not organized in anything that would suggest a city."

"I am unable to detect any electromagnetic signals or collimated light from the planet," Myra said.

"That's probably consistent with the planet's relatively young age," Ryan commented. "I suppose our only choice is to send down probes."

"Send five class-3 probes down to the surface," Chara ordered.

Alma activated the probes to be released from a hanger deck portal and fire rocket engines to slow so that they could drop down into the atmosphere. This process required twenty minutes before the probes arrived near the surface, entered cloaking mode, and began to fly around to locate anything that was moving on the surface.

The video feed revealed strange looking vegetation, large maroon leafed trees and flowering plants that were twenty feet high. At first, the probes didn't find anything that resembled animal life, but when they approached some structures, they revealed what could only be described as a weird anomaly.

"What the hell are those?" Ryan said. "They look like cats."

"They're much larger than domesticated cats," Myra said. "And they are standing up on two legs."

"If I were asked to describe them, I would say that they look like the cast from the musical 'Cats'," Ryan said. "But, in this case they look more like real cats."

"Let's say they do resemble what we consider felines," Evan said. "That would suggest that this planet evolved placental mammals, which would mean that it's well on the course of evolving intelligent life."

"Maybe these creatures are intelligent," Ryan said. "They obviously created domiciles."

"This could be the prehistoric form of intelligent life on this planet," Myra said. "It would indicate that they're primitive but might have evolved to use language."

"They are making sounds that suggest that and they do make noises that resemble those from cats."

"I will activate the universal translator," Myra said. "Maybe it can make sense of their vocalizations."

The universal translator took time to come up with a translation, but when it did, it definitely indicated that these cat creatures were intelligent."

"Doesn't surprise me that they're intelligent," Ryan said. "Everyone who has ever had domesticated cats knows that they're intelligent little devils."

"We will remain here to determine how intelligent they are," Chara said.

It wasn't until later that evening that Ryan came back up to the command deck to see how things were going.

"I've detected a comet in this solar system that is on course to collide with this planet," Alma said.

"How soon?" Ryan asked.

"It will merge with the planet's orbit in seven days."

"Are we going to stop it?" Ryan asked Chara.

"Yes. I am plotting a course to the comet's present position. It's too late to change its course. Our only course of action is to blast it into small pieces that won't cause much damage when they intercept the planet."

"Yes, I agree."

Chara moved the Avenger out of orbit and on a course to intercept the comet. That took an hour of careful maneuvering to get into the proper position to blast the comet.

The comet was fairly large, about a hundred kilometers in diameter. A comet that large would cause a life extinction event if it collided with the planet. It already had a tail that extended back hundreds of kilometers.

Chara decided to try a energy weapon on it, a millions-of-degrees concentrated plasma ball that would collide with the comet at thousands of miles per hour. The brilliant ball blew out of the Avenger's main weapon's array and quickly flew to the comet. The explosive collision resulted in a brilliant flash of energy that rattled the ship but did its job of blasting the comet to flaming pieces, resulting in intensely hot gas and dust streaming back from the debris.

Chara returned to the planet but inserted the ship into a high orbit that would not be struct by the comet's debris field. The collision occurred five hours later, and as expected, the atmosphere absorbed most of the punishment.

"Well, we saved this species, hopefully to evolve into a technical society," Ryan said.

"Maybe we can return here to see if that's the case," Chara said.

Ryan didn't reply, and her statement was the main subject for the humans' communal supper that evening.

"It will take thousands of years for that species to evolve into a technological society," Evan said. "We'll be long gone by then."

'"Maybe not," Ryan reacted.

Evan's face twisted with confusion. "What do you mean?"

"Theoretically, we might end up being immortal because of the nanobots they injected into us. It's possible that by keeping us from aging, we might end up living for hundreds if not thousands of years."

"That means that we're effectively in purgatory," Myra said. "We are being punished by these androids for being human."

"We could end up going mad if we have to live like this for that long," Marsha said.

"I don't think that the androids will allow that to happen," Gloria said. "They will go out of their way to keep us happy."

"How can we be happy when we are unable to be truly human?" Julia asked.

Everyone realized what she meant by that, but it was obvious that there would never be a time when they would live a normal life of begetting children and looking forward to retirement. That dilemma would make many people consider suicide. However, they knew that there was no easy way for them to take their own life because of the nanobots.

"I think that what we're experiencing is more tolerable than these androids torturing us," Ryan said. "It's taken me a long time to make Chara realize that we are here to help them. It's at least a tolerable détente that we can live with. We have nice accommodations, good food, and recreation facilities. We have jobs to do. It's a compromise, but at least we're still alive."

However, the die had been cast, and it would result in a serious dilemma for both the humans and the androids.