Twin Earth

Chapter 49

As we stepped out into the light, I realised that what had been beaming down on my face was in fact reflected sunlight from huge prisms that lined a central column of an immensely tall building. The building rose hundreds of feet above our heads, creating a stunning display of light, colour and architectural design, which would put any Earth sculpture to shame. Surrounding the prisms were endless rooms, some glass fronted, some hidden away behind colourful doorways, all of which bustled with teams of people coming and going, children playing and having fun or those working hard in various labs, formulating plans or discovering new ideas together. The difference between the quiet, orderly complex in the North was definitely noticeable.

"Wow," I whispered, staring up to the twinkling ceiling far above our heads. "What is this place?"

"This is our home, or at least one of them. In the South we live underground in vast skyscrapers. It shields us from the harsh sun and arid landscape above. The jungle in the South is much smaller and over-time has become increasingly more arid so we have developed a new way to survive."

"This is incredible!" Rachel replied, also staring around in awe. "Everyone looks so happy."

"We are, as much as we can be during such confrontational times. We have tried to create a biosphere of our own, but deep underground. We regulate the temperature according to our needs and the sun-light is reflected deep underground so we don't live in darkness. Here, let me show you one of our bio-labs."

We followed Apo down a brightly lit corridor to a vast dome shaped room that was full of trees, plants and even small streams running alongside sand covered wooden pathways.

"This is no bio lab," I breathed in awe. "This is paradise."

Smiling Apo led us around to a small grassy area where he motioned us to sit alongside a woman and a very young boy. The woman, unlike the smiling men by her side, seemed unusually quiet and perhaps a little sad, but each time her child pulled at her with a grin on his face, she would turn to him and playfully scold him.

"This is Anoxia, Adom's wife and their son," Apo softly announced, hugging her gently as she stood to greet us.

"Oh," Rachel whispered. "I'm so sorry for your loss."

"Thank you," Anoxia replied, bowing her head slightly as she did so.

"Anoxia is our lead botanist here in the bio-lab. She is also one of the few scientists here who studies the creators as a race."

"As a race?"

"Most of our scientists here work on developing the creators' technology that was left behind and studying how it can benefit us, but Anoxia prefers to study them as a people, learning more about them as a culture, as a species and ultimately why they saved our planets yet left us alone to carry on without them."

"And what have you discovered?" I asked curiously. "Apo stated earlier they are just like us, but from what we have experienced over the last few hours, they are far superior. They're more like an energy than a humanoid alien."

"That certainly fits with what I have learnt in recent years from our scientific study of their technology, but when they were here though, in our solar system, they were quite different, much more humanoid in appearance," Anoxia replied softly.

"Why bother though? Why bother saving our planets? What was the point?" I muttered. Perhaps I was more exhausted than I realised or more likely, simply nervous about what the creators had given me as my next task and I was reluctant to share that information.

Frowning, Rachel eyed me curiously.

"Maybe they were trying to save themselves. Maybe their own planet was dying and they were looking for somewhere else to go. Maybe we are the aliens. Or some descendent of," Rachel spouted, clearly annoyed at me yet again for speaking my mind.