COMING OF AGE
The world had been at war for the last three hundred solar
years. I had been born into war and the way things were going I would die in
war. We had been fighting endlessly it seemed.
At the start it was the Xeega. A delegation had arrived at
our planet to discuss trade, but we knew they had come to spy so we imprisoned
them. Their warships arrived soon after and the war commenced.
No sooner than we had defeated them when the Charein
contacted us seeking permission to set up a base on our planet. We replied with
missiles and rendered their home world sterile. We knew that they had planned
to invade us and needed to be taught a lesson.
One hundred solar years later the Quaang had arrived and
putting their space vessels into stationary orbit beamed down onto our world.
They were an ancient race who had developed superior technology which they
‘said’ that they wished to share with us. We just decided to take their
technology why share when we were the stronger side?
The war began and we had been fighting the Quaang ever
since.
I lay face down as the heavy tanks rumbled by on the other
side of the road. I clutched my rifle and prayed that they didn’t stop. I ate
the dirt for half an hour as the machinery moved by and then there was silence.
I had got away with it. Now, to rendezvous with the rest of the group.
I slowly arose checking about me for any activity. It all
seemed quiet but appearances can be deceptive.
The dart launched by a small weaponoid struck me in the
shoulder. They had left these small mechanical sentries along the route like they
used to lay mines. Movement triggered their weaponry. This was a change in
their methodology and it had caught me out. I felt unconsciousness wash over me
and blacking out I fell to the ground.
When I awoke I found myself without my rifle, in a small room. It had no windows and
although there was a door I knew instinctively that it would be locked. As if
to confirm my fears I attempted to open it, but I realised that I was right. I
was a prisoner.
I rubbed at the mark left by the dart and noticed that the
wound looked infected. It was red around the edges and I could feel the flesh
was very warm.
I spent a few minutes banging on the door to no avail. I
could hear the sound of my assault echoing down what seemed to be a very long corridor.
My watch was still working and after a few hours had elapsed
I resumed my attack on the door.
“Hey!” I shouted. “I need some food and water! I am a human
being!”
Two hours later I heard movement in the passage outside and
I began hitting the door again and shouting. I heard something scratch the
outside of the door and then there was nothing.
I had had just about enough of this. If they wanted to kill
me then so be it, but I wasn’t going to be imprisoned like an animal. I grabbed
the door handle and twisted it – it opened.
I was at the head
of a long corridor and along the floor I could see splashes of what I took to
be blood. There was lighting of a kind and I could make out that the gory trail
ran the entire length of the passage and led to another door at the far end.
Suddenly I heard a crash behind me and turned just in time
to see the room where I had been imprisoned collapse in on itself. If I had
still been in there…. Then I noticed that the walls of the corridor were also distorting
and folding. I turned and ran towards the far off door as some force began
systematically destroying my prison.
Throwing the door open wide I threw myself through and
crashed into a sandy surface. I was in a desert and as I got up I could see
that it extended out in all directions. Looking back I saw my exit doorway fold
in on itself and disappear. A thin wind blew over the area and I shivered.
Where was I? Was this to be the end of my life?
The light from the planet’s red sun faded as a type of
evening approached. I wondered how long the period of darkness would last for.
I needed food and water, but as I gazed out on the fast fading plain I wondered
where to start looking.
I must have slept, for when I opened my eyes I realised that
it was light again.
Some distance off I saw a dark square object sitting in the
sand. I leapt to my feet and ran across to where it stood. It hadn’t been there
when I went to sleep, I was sure.
It was a flagon of water and alongside lay bits of cooked
animal flesh and black bread. Never had I tasted anything so good, I finished
all the food and washed it down with copious amounts of cool pure water.
“You are rested, fed and refreshed,” a voice boomed from
behind me. I swung round and found myself facing a Quaang mandarin. Standing
eight crells high, he gazed down at me.
“Where have you brought me to?” I shouted. “Return me to my
planet. I am a warrior and I demand to be taken back to the battle.”
The Quaang mandarin, a superior in the armed forces, raised
his arm. It was metalloid and carried various weapons.
“You will get your chance to fight,” he said. “A challenge
has been set up. You will fight an opponent, if you win, we, the Quaang will
leave your planet forever, but should you lose…well, your home world will be
destroyed!”
“But I am wounded,” I said showing the mandarin the wound
inflicted by the weaponoid.
“A mere flea bite,” he laughed. “The blood we strew in the
passage should have raised your physiological fight/ flight capabilitiesand
blood lust turning you into a very
capable fighting machine. Come, meet your adversary.”
The figure dressed in grey flesharmour and holding a large
pikeaxe, stood silently waiting. I hadn’t seen him or her approach but it could
have been Quaang magic or their ‘superior technology’.
“I suppose I will be getting something to fight with,” I
asked in a mocking tone.
The mandarin raised his metalloid limb and I felt a creeping
sensation over my body. I looked down and saw flesharmour similar to my
adversary’s but coloured red, begin to cover me until I was totally encased. A
pikeaxe appeared by me sticking out of the sand. I pulled it out and tested its
weight; now give me some fighting space!
We circled each other as the red sun rose in the sky. It was
hot and I could feel trickles of sweat running down my back. My opponent looked
at me from behind his/ her helmet and I felt their eyes drilling into me. This
person hated me and intended to win.
All at once I was attacked, my opponent swung the pikeaxe at
my feet and I had to leap above the blade to avoid injury. I parried and
brought my blade swinging towards his /her helmet, but with a quick duck of
their head my pikeaxe whistled by unchecked.
We fought for solar hours. I parried, they blocked. I
lunged, they countered. It was almost as if the adversary could read my mind
and I his/ hers.
Eventually as the red sun hung above the horizon, we both
collapsed on the sand, exhausted. No clear winner, a draw. But I knew that this
state could not be allowed. The Quaang mandarin required one to be a victor and
one a loser.
I struggled to my feet just before my foe regained his/
hers. I could hardly lift the pikeaxe, but I raised the weapon using bruised
and battered muscles and began to approach my opponent.
“Enough!” A voice boomed from behind us and I turned wearily
to see the Quaang mandarin standing with his metalloid arms stretched out.
He looked across at me and shook his head.
“Do you know why neither of you can defeat the other?” the
mandarin shouted.
I stood silently and shook my head.
“Do you wish to look upon the face of your enemy?”
I looked up at the mandarin and nodded. I needed to know.
He raised his arm and I felt the creeping over my body begin
again. The flesharmour was retracting and soon I stood in only my tunic,
breeches and boots.
“Gaze upon your worst enemy!” the mandarin screamed and
pointed.
Across from me stood a mirror image of myself, complete down
to the same garb. My twin looked as mystified as me.
“Yes, your breed is
your own worst enemy. You fight with everyone you meet,” said the mandarin.
“Your planet is in endless wars where populations die needlessly and the
surface of your planet is scoured by nuclear blasts. We, the Quaang have raised
our consciousness by selection and have improved our standard of life. We came
here to offer you information and technology to bring your world up to a
standard whereby you could join us as brothers and sisters. The Universe is
infinite and has many opportunities. Stop fighting now and take our hand in
friendship.”
I looked up at the alien and I felt his friendship was true.
Gone were the suspicions and mistrust. I felt that our initial partnership
could… would work. We could join with
other worlds. We could journey and make bonds and forge allegiances.
“What have you done to me?” I asked the mandarin. “I feel
….different.”
The Quaang mandarin waved his metal arm and my reflection
and I merged. It felt like the return of an old friend. Someone who I hadn’t
talked to for a very long time.
“The dart from the weaponoid contained as well as the drug,
a virus which alters brain patterns and basic modes of logic and thought
formation. It makes you more susceptible to listening and acting on suggestions
and proposals,” the mandarin explained. “Now enter the passage and let us
return you to your planet.”
I returned to the four dimensional passage and room and as I
waited I knew that for all these years my race had been wrong. We were too
closed in on ourselves, too arrogant and proud to accept new things.
A chime sounded and the door that I had entered in the
desert opened on the light of my world.
We never looked back for the virus was contagious and it
wasn’t long before our governing body was in talks with the Quaang initially
and then with other planets that we could trade with. Soon our world would be
part of a massive network of space routes which would spread outwards like a
spider web to all points in our Universe.
The Quaang mandarin and I stood below his starship as it
prepared to leave, returning to his home world.
“Thank you for opening our eyes,” I said shaking the
metalloid hand.
The Quaang ships roared into the air and I watched until
their tail fires vanished among the stars.
It would take them several solar days to return to their
planet, a world called by us as Zarran or in the Quaarang tongue – Earth.
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