CHAPTER 9 – NEW FRIENDS
10:03 (Universal Time)
Saturday, September 10, 2321
Krazts family cave, Grand Island, New Shouria (Wolf 1061c)
Second planet of the Wolf 1061 System, 13.8 light-years from Earth
‘’I AM GOING OUT ON A HUNT, MOTHER.’’
‘’ALRIGHT, BUT BE CAREFUL: KEEP YOUR DISTANCES FROM THOSE BIPEDAL CREATURES.’’
‘’DON’T WORRY, MOTHER: THOSE BIPEDALS HAVE NOT SHOWN THEMSELVES TO BE HOSTILE TOWARDS US TO DATE.’’
‘’STILL, BE CAREFUL, RIAK.’’
Young Riak, the sole female offspring of her parents, then walked out of the family cave, using her two powerful hind legs while keeping her wings folded in order not to scrape them against the rock surface of the short tunnel leading to a sort of balcony naturally formed on one side of the forested hill containing the cave. Once fully out, Riak deployed her feathery wings to their full eight-meter span and took off from the balcony. Riak was still fairly young for a Krazts, being what a Human would consider a young teenager, and was noticeably smaller than a fully grown Krazts, who had a typical wing span of eleven to thirteen meters and a length of seven to nine meters from their toothed beak to their feathered tail. The Krazts were the prime predators on Wolf 1061c but, more importantly, were also the only local intelligent species, with an average I.Q. of 80. That level of intelligence allowed the Krazts to make and use stone tools, light fires, speak among themselves and even have a writing system, all things that helped them dominate the fauna of the planet. That was until the arrival of strange bipedal creatures who had come from the sky and then started building large floating structures along the coastline of the big island claimed as Riak’s family’s hunting territory. The first and sole direct encounter of her family with those bipedal creatures some time ago had nearly ended in tragedy but, thankfully, one of those bipedal creatures who had been about to be eaten had shown herself to be an intelligent being with sensitivity and comprehension, something that had prevented a massacre inside the family cave. Since then, Riak and her two brothers had followed the wise directive from their mother, Koory: ‘Bipedal creatures are off the menu from now on’. So, Riak was firmly decided to limit her hunt to the various fish roaming the ocean around the island and to the herds of herbivorous mammals roaming the plains and forests around the family cave.
Deciding at first to try her luck at fishing, Riak flew eastward from her family cave, heading towards the waters of the wide passage between the island and the nearby continent visible on the horizon. Those waters were normally full of fish of all kinds and sizes ready to be grabbed when they broached the surface and became vulnerable. Strangely enough, the new bipedal neighbors of her family, while having built huge floating structures, had not yet been seen by Riak to even attempt to catch fish in those rich waters. Maybe they didn’t like fish, or maybe the taste of the local fish was not to their liking? In truth, Riak and her family knew next to nothing about the newcomers, having cautiously kept their distance from them after that first, near fatal encounter. Flying in large circles once well over the ocean, Riak started looking down for some fish ready to be caught in the sharp claws of her hind legs. Her upper legs, which also acted as arms when she walked at the vertical, had sharp claws as well, doubling her lethality and efficiency as a hunter and fisher. She had made three such circles before she saw a fish swimming just under the surface. Her two keen eyes fixed on her prey, Riak dove straight at the fish and, right after cutting that dive, managed to grab her prey in her claws. Flying back to medium altitude, Riak saw that the fish was too small to be worth bringing it back to the family cave, so she decided to devour it herself while flying. That took her only a few minutes, but the fish was enough to fill her stomach and give her more energy to continue her fishing.
Riak had just let go the remains of the fish she had just eaten when a movement to her left caught her eyes. Looking in that direction, she saw one of the flying boxes used by the bipedal creatures as it came down from high altitude, heading towards her family’s island and the floating cities moored along its coasts. As Riak had grown accustomed to, that flying box proved impossibly fast, despite its complete lack of wings. She wondered for a moment how that was possible but finally shrugged it off and concentrated back on her fishing. As for the flying box, it either didn’t see her or, more probably, simply ignored her and continued its descent.
10:34 (Universal Time)
Koorivar interstellar shuttle SHEMAK
Eight-year-old Terry Anderson was avidly looking out of his window when he shouted in excitement and pointed at something in the sky.
‘’DAD, I SEE A FLYING DRAGON!’’
His father, Jake Anderson, bent down to look outside and effectively saw what looked like a very large bird covered with a colorful livery of red and yellow feathers. It had a long neck supporting a head with an impressive beak and also had a long flexible tail ending in a large feathery fan that seemed to act like a plane’s rudder. The creature was however quite far away, looking like a small bird due to the distance, and was flying in large circles at low altitude over the sea.
‘’Aaah, that must be a Krazts, the species of giant, intelligent birds known to live on New Shouria. It looks like it is fishing. It certainly looks like a magnificent creature, with its red and yellow feathers. This is a chance for you to take a picture of it, Son.’’
‘’I sure will, Dad!’’ replied the preteen boy, who then filmed for a few second the Krazts until it was out of sight. On his part, Jake was happy for his son to have been able to spot it. As a space miner working and living in the Main Asteroid Belt of the Solar System, he and his little family had been dying for a long time for such a vacation on a habitable planet, so that they could change their minds from having to live in a space city located under the surface of Pallas, a large and irregularly shaped asteroid that was the center of one of the biggest space mining networks in the Solar System. The view he and his family now had of the large oceans and forested lands of New Shouria convinced Jake that he had made the right choice by booking a one-week vacation at the recently opened New Shouria Resort Center, run by the Koorivars. The heavy, 1.3 G gravity of New Shouria had at first made him hesitate between it and the equally new resort center on the nearby moon of New Haven, which enjoyed a 0.78 G local gravity, but the fact that the New Shouria Resort Center had artificial gravity decks set to normal Earth gravity, along with the more diverse fauna and flora than the one found on New Haven, had decided Jake into booking a safari tour vacation on New Shouria. Judging from the full cabin of the shuttle, plenty of Spacers hungry for open air and beaches had done the same, something quite understandable when you had lived your entire life in enclosed space cities, save for infrequent vacations on a still overpopulated and polluted Earth.
A few minutes later, their shuttle landed in the middle of a large, floating landing pad anchored just off a luxuriant coast. The landing pad, like three other similar landing pads big enough to accommodate a full-sized starship, was in turn linked by anchored floating bridges to a large floating city on one side and a smaller but still substantial floating complex on the opposite side. When the Anderson family came out of the shuttle, along with the other passengers, they effectively felt only a normal Earth gravity as a guide directed them to a waiting group of buses. The 120 or so passengers quickly filled the three big vehicles, while their unaccompanied luggage were taken out of the shuttle and were then loaded on an air truck. Jake’s wife, Janet, rested her head on his left shoulder after they sat down inside one of the buses, looking out with contentment at the ocean and land scenery.
‘’Oh, Jake, it is so nice to see real nature for a change. This place looks beautiful, apart from being pristine, with zero pollution in evidence.’’
‘’It sure does, honey. The tourism agency did not lie about this place. Considering the reasonable cost of booking this tour, I think that we should take more frequent vacations on such new worlds.’’
‘’A great idea, Jake. I understand that we had the choice between this and three other habitable new worlds and that more may become available for tourism in the coming months and years, right?’’
‘’Correct, Janet!’’ replied Jake before consulting his pocket data pad. ‘’Apart from New Shouria, we had the choice between resort centers or cruise ships on New Haven, the first moon of this planet; on Hyanesu, in the Gliese 581 System; and on Oceana, also in the Gliese 581 System. The latest information is that at least three more habitable systems with moderate to warm climates have been selected for colonization and resort building: Vinland, in the Gliese 832 System; Borealis, in the Trappist-1 System and New Venice, in the Tau Ceti System. A fourth place, Icelandia in the Trappist-1 System is also mentioned but, due to its sub-zero average temperatures, will be a Winter sports center on top of having cities.’’
‘’Isn’t the Gliese 581 System the one that contains the home planet of a hostile and aggressive alien race?’’
Jake had to search through his data pad for a few seconds before he answered her.
‘’You are correct, Janet. The third planet of the system, Gliese 581c, is home to the Vorlaks, a cruel and dangerous race. However, that planet has been put under firm quarantine by the Spacers League and is closely watched by both armed satellites and warships. The Vorlaks have already earned themselves a series of nuclear strikes which took out their space capabilities and many of their governing complexes. Still, I would tend to agree with you that maybe we should avoid that system altogether. Right now, though, let’s enjoy our family time on this planet.’’
Their bus, driven by a Koorivar, then started rolling, taking one of the floating bridges towards the smaller complex. The latter was still a very substantial structure, as the Andersons could see when their bus stopped in front of the main entrance. It covered a good two hectares of floating platform surface and its twelve-story-high main tower rose more than forty meters above the anchored floating platform supporting it. The resort staff which greeted the fresh batch of tourists was mostly made of Koorivars, a reminder to the Andersons that this planet was now the new official home of the Koorivars. The resort manager, a mature Koorivar, greeted the group in the main entrance lobby, near the reception desks, once the tourists had recuperated all their luggage.
‘’Good morning to all of you, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the New Shouria Resort Center. My name is Shirak and I am the general manager of this complex. For your general information, this complex, like the other installations built on this planet, uses Earth’s Universal Time as well as Earth’s standard calendar as date and time references, so you won’t need to synchronize your wrist videophones during your stay. The reason for using Earth time is simple: this planet completes an orbit around its red dwarf star in only a bit less than eighteen days. It is also tidally locked to its sun, which means that it always presents the same face to Wolf 1061. It will thus be daylight all the time at this complex. However, I am sure that this point will not bother you after living most of your lives in underground space cities and facilities.’’
A concert of approving comments met that declaration by Shirak, who then pointed at the long reception counter and at the bank of elevator doors visible behind him.
‘’Once I am finished speaking, you will be free to go to the reception desk to my right, to register your arrival and obtain your access cards and service bracelets before going up to your rooms to drop off your suitcases and relax a bit before lunch. If you were wondering about possibly being disoriented by looking around this lobby, don’t worry: if you see the elevator cabin doors move slowly, that’s because the whole main tower structure of this resort is rotating constantly on its central vertical axis, doing one complete revolution every hour. Because of that feature of our resort complex, you will be able to enjoy from your rooms a panoramic view of the ocean and of its coastline.’’
‘’Now, that is a nice feature!’’ said softly Janet to Jake while holding the hand of Lisa, their small four-year-old daughter. Jake could only nod approvingly to that as Shirak continued speaking.
‘’After making yourselves at home in your respective rooms, you will be welcome to come back down to this level to go have lunch at our buffet restaurant, the ‘Sunshine Buffet’. Following lunch, you will be able to start your vacation with a guided safari tour around the nearby plains and forests. Don’t worry about the 1.3 G local gravity during that tour: we will provide you all with gravity compensation harnesses. The safari tour will depart the resort’s main entrance at one o’clock.’’
Enthusiastic exclamations and comments greeted those last words by Shirak, who then invited his guests to proceed to the reception counter.
At 12:42, after having dropped their luggage in a large, nice suite on the ninth floor of the resort’s tower and going back down for a copious lunch, the Andersons showed up in the main entrance lobby, where staff employees provided them with gravity compensation harnesses of the adequate size, including baby harnesses for the few infants present. Then, at precisely one o’clock, the excited tourists boarded a small caravan of all-terrain vehicles, anti-gravity passenger carriers which could fly as well as roll on the ground, with one Koorivar guide per vehicle. Jake Anderson, who boarded the lead vehicle with his family, couldn’t help ask a question to their guide on seeing a Human man carrying a holstered pistol board their carrier.
‘’Uh, Mister Korvan, why is this man armed with a pistol?’’
The Koorivar smiled benevolently at that question and answered him in a reassuring tone.
‘’Mister Mark Donovan is the armed escort for this safari tour, sir. We will be getting quite close to numerous local animals that are still not familiar with our presence on this planet. The tour is actually very low risk, but Mister Donovan will be with us simply as a precaution against any unexpected incident.’’
Jake nodded his head at that, approving that measure, which was a good, common sense one in his mind, especially now that he was with his two young children and his wife. The only doubt he was left with was about the weapon carried by the said Donovan: a simple pistol didn’t sound much of a weapon in his opinion when possibly facing a charging wild beast. He however kept that thought to himself and sat back in his comfortable seat next to his wife, with Terry and Lisa sitting in the two seats across the centerline aisle from his seat.
After rolling some 200 meters down a large pier linking the floating resort complex to the coastline, the caravan of five all-terrain carriers drove down a trail cut through a thick forest, going slowly to allow the passengers to admire the luxuriant alien flora, which included trees with purple and red-colored leaves and pink flowers and bushes. Janet Anderson opened her mouth with admiration as she looked around at all that alien but beautiful nature.
‘’Look at all those colors! This is magnificent!’’
After rolling through the forest for maybe 600 meters, the convoy emerged out of the tree line and onto a wide grassy plain dotted with small clusters of large trees. The sight of the various animal herds grazing and roaming that plain made both Terry and Lisa shout with excitement.
‘’LOOK, DAD! BUFFALOS! I CAN ALSO SEE SOME KIND OF ANTELOPES!’’
Consulting his data pad, Jake gently corrected his eight-year-old son.
‘’Those ‘buffalos’ are called ‘Musks’, while those antelopes are more properly called ‘Tars’. However, I will give you that they look quite similar to their Earth equivalents. Mind you, those musks look both big and powerful. Hopefully, they won’t have a temperament as mean as that of African Cape Buffalos.’’
Janet, who had visited South Africa a few times in the past, nodded her head at that.
‘’Yeah, those ones can be mean enough, even when faced with lions.’’
‘’Do they have lions here, Mom?’’ asked Terry, prompting Jake to again consult his data pad.
‘’Nope! The only predators known around this planet are a sort of six-legged wolf called ‘Berdash’ and the giant dragons that we saw from our shuttle and that are called ‘Krazts’. The rest of the fauna is described as being mostly herbivorous.’’
‘’Ooooh, I hope that we will be able soon to get out of our vehicles, so that we could approach some of those alien animals.’’ wished out loud the excited Terry.
The boy’s wish came true some ten minutes later, when the caravan of vehicles rolled to a stop next the wood line and let out its passengers near a large herd of grazing animals which looked like small pink goats. Those goats, apparently unphased by these newcomers, only gave them a passing look before returning to their grazing. Korvan, the guide in charge of the tour, assembled the 142 tourists near the vehicles before they could approach the goats.
‘’What you see now are called ‘Gendus’. They are strictly herbivorous and are very sociable animals. You will soon be able to approach them and even touch them, but I will urge you not to try to pick them up, especially the young Gendus: that could trigger a defensive reflex from their mothers.’’
‘’Uh, can I ask who named all these animals we saw to date?’’ asked a man who was a bit overweight and had a camera with telephoto lens hanging by a strap from his neck. ‘’Those names sound rather alien.’’
Korvan smiled and nodded his head at the question.
‘’True, but that’s because they are alien names: they are the names under which they are designated by the sole intelligent species on this planet: the Krazts, the giant, feathered birds of prey that you may have spotted up to now.’’
‘’How intelligent are those, uh, Krazts?’’ asked another tourist.
‘’Intelligent enough to make stone tools, light fires, have a verbal language and even have a writing system of their own. They are carnivorous predators by nature and hunt fish and herbivores for food and can be both dangerous and deadly. However, they are also social beings who form small family groups, which in turn occupy distinct hunting territories that they fiercely defend against other intruding Krazts. When the first exploration team arrived on this planet a bit over a year ago, one of our people was grabbed and nearly killed by a Krazts who had decided that she was going to be his next lunch. Thankfully, our team was able to free her and arrived at a sort of understanding with the Krazts family that considers this island as its exclusive hunting grounds.’’
‘’You sound like those Krazts are few and far between, no?’’
‘’You’re right, sir: the Krazts population of New Shouria is quite limited and is widely dispersed all over the planet.’’
‘’Their language and writing, can we understand it?’’ asked Janet Anderson after raising one hand high.
‘’Partially! Our exo-zoologists have been studying them covertly for months now, but we still have much to learn about the Krazts. If there are no more questions at this time, I will now let you approach those Gendus. Again, do not be brusque around them and do not try to pick one up. You may caress their mane gently but exercise a minimum of caution and respect their living space.’’
That was enough to make young Terry be one of the first to walk to a Gendus and caress its back. After a first nervous twitch, the animal seemingly got quickly accustomed to the boy and resumed its long grass eating, to Terry’s happiness.
Jake and Janet, on their part, approached another Gendus with little Lisa, protecting their daughter while allowing her to touch the animal. Lisa giggled as she caressed the pink fur of the quadruped, but the strong smell of the alien animal quickly made her wrinkle her nose.
‘’Pheww! It stinks, Mommy!’’
‘’Earthly goats also stink, Lisa, so that’s not really a surprise. It is however quite a quiet beast, I must say.’’
Jake was about to add to that when an alarm was shouted out loud by someone.
‘’EVERYBODY DOWN!’’
Having zero military training or experience, Jake’s first reflex was to look up instead of ducking. At the same time, a giant shadow passed over the ground as a huge bird covered with red, green and blue feathers overflew the group of tourists, flying very low. What Jake saw next horrified him: the Krazts, as it had to be, closed its hind legs’ claws around Terry, making him scream in both pain and terror, and started flying away with the boy. Seeing that their armed escort had his pistol out and pointed, Jake screamed at him, nearly hysterical.
‘’SHOOT! SHOOT IT!’’
‘’I CAN’T! I RISK HITTING THE BOY!’’
What happened next was truly stunning.
Flying in wide circles over the plain while looking for an appropriate prey that could provide supper for her family, Riak suddenly saw another Krazts, a fully-developed adult, fly in over the area, coming from the direction of the nearby continent. The sight of that other Krazts, instead of making her happy, lit anger and resentment in her: this was her family’s hunting grounds and had belonged to her ancestors for generations. For another Krazts to intrude on it, especially to hunt, was tantamount to a declaration of war.
‘’What is that Klallat Clan asshole doing here?’’ she asked herself, identifying the intruder’s family branch by the color livery particular to the Klallat Clan, which resided on the continent. She then saw the intruder swoop down, diving on a large group of bipedal creatures standing among a herd of Gendus. Her anger was then replaced by a mix of horror and apprehension as the intruder grabbed one of the alien creatures in its hind claws and started flying away with his prey.
‘’NO! THAT ASSHOLE IS GOING TO ATTRACT RETALIATIONS AGAINST MY FAMILY!’’
Forgetting about her severe size and strength handicap over the adult Klallat intruder, Riak then dove steeply on him while shouting a battle cry. The Klallat member, speeding away from the group of now screaming bipedal creatures, did not spot her until Riak violently rammed into him, her upper members’ claws extended out. Taken by surprise and also hurting as Riak’s forward claws gnawed into his head and neck, the Klallat let go young Terry Anderson, who then fell down on the ground from a height of about eight meters, the long grass of the plain luckily softened a bit his impact with the ground. Realizing that this was a fight to the death, the Klallat then retaliated with speed and brutality, beating back the much smaller Riak with his giant wings while biting her at the upper root of her body and right wing. Riak screamed in pain but then bit back her opponent, her toothed beak closing on the Klallat’s long neck and drawing blood. Her opponent’s answer to that was to jab her, using his beak like a swordsman would stab at an opponent with his blade. With the Klallat putting all his strength in that strike, his pointy beak actually punctured right through Riak’s right wing. He then planted his hind claws into her belly and made her fall to the ground under his weight. Riak slammed down hard on the ground, her back on the grass while pinned down by her opponent. The Klallat then threw back his head, preparing to jab his beak into one of her eyes, while shouting in anger.
‘’NO RORIK ATTACKS ME LIKE THIS AND