e-Ghosts of Rogue Planet

Chapter 16

The image on the main screen frightened us. It dominated the screen with a vengeance, capturing our eyes. Dust and gas whiled around in the opening at mind numbing speed, and we were being sucked into it along with the rogue planet and its moon.

“Can’t we move out of the way?” Alisha cried.

“There isn’t enough power in the universe to escape a black hole,” I said, trying like hell to maintain composure. “The gravity is way too powerful for our measly engines.”

“What are we going to do, just let it suck us into oblivion?” James said.

“We have to assume that this is being done by the e-ghosts,” I said. “Although, I have no idea how they could muster the power necessary to create a black hole.”

“Maybe this isn’t just a black hole,” Marie said. “Maybe it’s the entrance to a wormhole.”

“If that’s the case, then we’re going to wherever the planet is headed,” I said. “Let’s hope that this wormhole can accommodate us along with the planet.”

In the blink of an eye, we were in propelled into a huge rotating tunnel, and at first it didn’t seem like we were moving, but in fact we were effectively traveling at many times light speed. The tunnel’s walls were not well defined. They appeared to be an energy field gone wild, rotating at hyper speed and emitting fluctuating blue light accompanied by lightening flashes. We could feel the energy as prickly tingling on our skin.

We saw things happening in slow motion as if we were in a NFL game replay. I saw the others moving slowly as they reacted to the terror of the event.

“I . . . don’t . . . like . . . this,” Marie said in a low-pitched voice that seemed to take forever as her mouth moved in slow motion.

“I . . . hope . . . this . . . doesn’t . . . take . . . very . . . long,” James said in slow motion.

I watched their bodies shimmer as if they were ghosts vibrating in the wind. They were fading in and out of existence as the ship appeared to be stretching and compressing.

The ride ended as quickly as it started when the ship flew out of an opening along with the planet and ended up orbiting it as before.

But, there was a major difference. The star the planet was orbiting was not the one that the planet Earth went around. We were in a totally unfamiliar solar system.

“We may as well get busy trying to figure out where we are,” Marie said.

“That may not do us any good,” I said. “We can’t travel interstellar space in this ship. We’re stuck here unless we can reverse the process that got us here.”

That’s not going to be easy,” James said. “We don’t even know what the process is.”

“Are we going to go back down to the planet?” Alisha asked.

“I’m not sure that we should,” I said. “We can’t report back anything we’ve found so far to Earth Control and I don’t think there’s any other species down there. Besides, I’m not sure that we wouldn’t end up being made permanent captives.”

“The e-ghosts must have brought the planet here--wherever here is--because there’s another sentient species living on a planet in this system,” Marie said. “Let’s wait and see if they show up here.”

“That’s assuming that they’re already are aware that a rogue planet just suddenly popped into existence in their system,” I said. “We humans had no idea that it was in our solar system all that time.”

“Maybe they’re not as dumb as we are,” Alisha said.

“We don’t know,” I said. “Let’s see if we can determine where we are and then decide how to proceed in forcing the e-ghosts to send us back to where we belong.”

“How long could we survive on this ship?” James asked.

“I would say about twelve, maybe fourteen months, if we employ some basic care in what we do. The main problem is oxygen. We have a finite supply.”

“Fortunately, we know that we can survive in the underground world on the planet,” Alisha said.

“That’s what the e-ghosts want,” I said.

“At least we would be alive,” James said.

“Yes, but we would be the prisoners of a bunch of electronic circuits. There has to be a way out of this.”

“The only solution that I see is getting into the programming of the computer system that runs this rogue planet,” Alisha said. “If I could determine a way in, I may be able to effect a reversal of the process that brought us here.”

“Finding a backdoor into what has to be a complicated alien system is not going to be easy,” James said.

“We need help,” I said. “But, I don’t know if the two sentient species on the rogue planet are capable of helping us.”

“This is certainly a different solar system,” Marie said. “I can see two large Jupiter-sized planets and two rocky planets. There may be others on the other side of the star.”

“Do any of them appear to be habitable?” I asked.

“One does, but I’m not sure. I have to do more observations and scans before I can say for sure.”

I rubbed my chin. “Here’s what we should do: you and Alisha can work on determining where we are and how the aliens system works. James and I will see if we can restore the computer system in the shuttle.”

“Oh, that’s just great!” Marie said, her beautiful eyes shooting fire. “You give us the hard job, while you guys get to putter around with technical toys.”

“You’re the one that always tells me that women are smarter than men. Here’s your chance to prove it.”

The looks I got from them were enough to set me on fire. I grabbed James’ arm and pulled him away.

“Nice comeback,” he said with an ornery grin.

I shrugged. “Hey, they have the PhD’s in the areas that are needed for that. I’m just a rocket jockey with some knowledge in engineering.”

“I know what you mean,” he said. “I just study rocks.”

We laughed, but deep down we were not in a jovial mood. We both knew that we were in a serious situation that required all of us to work together to find a solution.