Test of Magnitude (The Torian Reclamation) (8 page)

He walked over to the sink-looking fixture and placed his hands under a metallic protrusion above a plastic flat table that seemed like it should be where the facet goes. The same dim blue light then shone on his hands for a few seconds. It felt good.

“It’s all right, it’s just a futuristic men’s room,” he said as he came out. “It’s actually kind of cool.”

Derek jumped down from the chair and ran across the room towards the door. “Good, ‘cause I really gotta go, too!”

When Derek returned, they both decided to walk around the perimeter of the room and check the walls closely for signs of hidden doors. As soon as they started, the voice came across the audio system again.

“Your orientation video countdown has begun. The film will start in 200, 199, 198.” The audio voice stopped, but the screen was now filled with dots that were vanishing one by one.

“I think,” Brandon said, “as soon as those dots are all gone, our captors are going to show us a video. Hopefully, it will explain something about our situation.”

“A TV show made just for us?”

“Right.”

Brandon had an idea about what was happening to them now, but he decided not to risk freaking Derek out any more by voicing his thoughts. Brandon figured they had both been asleep for a very long time, in some kind of a coma, possibly the victims of mad-scientist type experiments, maybe even by their own government. Everyone knew Walt Disney had his body cryogenically frozen upon his death. Maybe something like that happened to them, only while they were still alive.

“We may as well go back over and watch it,” Brandon said.

They walked back to their chairs and sat down. Within a couple minutes, the lights in the room went off and the video screen came alive with color.

“It’s like being at the movies,” Derek said.

The screen exploded with images from space, prompting exclamations of wonder from Derek, who had apparently never seen a modern television screen before.

“The Milky War galaxy,” the audio voice began. Another obvious mispronunciation. A wide shot of the entire galaxy held on screen for a moment, and then began to zoom in.

“Warmongers,” Derek muttered.

The audio continued as the screen showed an impressive scene of accelerating through space.

“Thousands of inhabited worlds exist within its vast expanse. Hundreds of advanced races have been discovered in our portion of the galaxy.”

Brandon and Derek looked at each other. Derek threw his hands up in the air in an act of exasperation, and Brandon replied by shrugging.

“This is like the Twilight Zone,” Derek said. The film continued.

“Your planet, Earth, is located on the fringe of our region of the galaxy, just outside of what is known as the
Erobian Sphere
. It is an unstable planet, plagued by natural disasters and orbital shifts.” The screen zoomed in to hold a beautiful image of the earth.

“As your own scientists have noted, Earth is subject to violent polar axis shifts, which occur approximately every five thousand Earth years. In your time, what you identify as the latter twentieth century, the next such shift was overdue. When these rotational shifts occur, they are extremely disruptive and result in the mass extinction of species on your planet.” The image of the earth began shaking and then turned sideways. The polar caps, which were now on the sides, melted, and new ones formed on the new top and bottom.

This was actually getting to be kind of interesting to Brandon. He leaned back and put his hands behind his head.

The screen image zoomed out to a wide shot of the galaxy again, then zoomed in on a different part, which was not that far away on the scale of it all. It stopped on a view of two planets that both looked similar to Earth, but with different continent shapes. They were close to each other, with a star in the background that was about the size of the sun in the sky when viewed from Earth.

“This is the Tora star system. Tora is a star similar to Earth’s sun. There are seven planets in this system, including the two hydrosphere worlds you see now, called
Amulen
and
Banor
. They are sister worlds, actually, twin planets that share the same orbit. Each has its own native population of intelligent humanoid life.” An outline-figure of a man similar to the stick figure that demonstrated the bathroom door appeared on the screen between the two planets.

“Amulites and Banorians are collectively referred to as Torians. We share a singular solar identity and freely interact with each other in all matters of society and government. The central Torian government is located on Continent 2 of Amulen.” The screen zoomed in to the planet on the left until one of the continents filled the screen, and a large red dot appeared on the continent. Brandon figured that must be where the capital was. He still didn’t believe it was real, but the film was so well done he found he was getting into it some, be it sci-fi or whatever.

The shot zoomed out again to the planet view. The man-outline appeared on the screen again and divided in two this time.

“Amulites and Banorians have interbred for thousands of years and have assimilated into one race. However, distinctions can still be made between the two nationalities because of different skin pigmentation resulting from slightly different atmospheric conditions on each planet. Banorians have a bronze-colored skin, while Amulites are silver-skinned. Further distinctions can be made by the brightness of each skin color, which is affected by the continent on which the Torian resides. This is due do the angled orbit of the Torian worlds, which is similar to Earth’s last observed orbital angle.”

The two outlined figures on the screen were now zoomed in on, and they were shown fading into actual pictures of men—no, not men—skin appeared on them, but it became scale-like and leathery. When the finished images became clear, Brandon and Derek both jumped out of their seats.

“It’s the lizard-men, man!” Derek shouted.

Brandon ran from the screen, back to the far side of the room. Derek followed him there. The lights came back on in the room and the film paused.

“What do you want from us!” Brandon yelled at the ceiling.

The voice on the overhead audio system spoke.

“Do you need to use the waste room?”

“No!” Derek shouted. “We don’t need to use the freaking hyena room! Let us go, you freaky lizard warmongers!”

There was a short pause, and then the audio voice continued.

“Please return to your video. Everything will be explained. You are in no danger. The sooner we complete the orientation process, the sooner your freedoms can be established.”

Brandon looked at Derek, who was backing up against the wall and looking around the room rapidly. Brandon was suddenly glad Derek was there. If it wasn’t for him, that would be Brandon reacting in extreme paranoia.

“We better do what they say,” Brandon said as calmly as he could under the circumstances. “For now, anyway. We are prisoners for the time being, and it makes no more sense to be on this side of the room than on the other. That’s only a film over there—it can’t hurt us, and if these people wanted to hurt us they could have done that already. I was stupid to panic like that. Sorry.”

Brandon returned to his chair and Derek followed a few minutes later. The lights went out and the video resumed.

“There have been no wars fought in Tora for more than 2,000 years,” the narrator said. “Our efforts instead have focused on social issues, technology, architecture, and space exploration.” The video showed clips of incredible buildings, hovercraft, spaceships, and what appeared to be a large space station of some kind.

“And kidnapping!” Derek yelled.

“Many of our efforts were motivated by philanthropy,” the narrator continued as if he were responding to Derek, “including our Earth project. We have successfully rescued some of the members of your race from the polar axis shift extinction that our scientists projected.” The video zoomed in on Amulen again, Continent-2 again, but farther north than the capital area shown earlier. It kept zooming in to show a huge futuristic city, something that looked like a gigantic theme park.

“This is the Amulen C2 Science Complex,” the narrator said. “You are here now, in research lab number 71. There will be a question and answer period during the next phase of your orientation. Thank you for watching.” The room remained dark and the film kept playing, but the narration stopped. Clips of exotic vegetation and animal life were shown, which would have been captivating if the full weight of what had just been revealed had not suddenly fallen on Brandon like a ton of bricks. He suddenly felt violated, homesick, and very alone.

The lights came back on and the video stopped. Derek didn’t say anything. Brandon looked over at him, but he was just staring straight ahead with a look of dejection. Finally, Brandon decided to break the silence.

“So—we’ve been abducted by space aliens.”

Derek turned to face him now. Brandon wasn’t sure why, but he felt compassion for this annoying hippie, and wanted to help him. As if he wasn’t up to his ears in his own problems at the moment. But their problems were one and the same, after all. Maybe they could help each other. At the moment, this guy was all he had. Brandon smiled at him.

The hippie forced a smile back and said, “Hey, no wars. They seem to be doing way better than our planet.”

“Right on, brother.” Brandon said.

Derek stood up and started to come over to Brandon’s chair, maybe looking for a hug or something—but he froze when something caught the corner of his eye. He then took three steps backwards in the direction of the video screen.

Brandon turned around in his seat, and what he saw made him jump up as well. They were no longer alone in the room.

Chapter Four

“If we keep sneaking up on them, it’s going to be difficult to earn their trust,” Mip7 said. He was sitting with Yob3 at a folding table in the back of the gray room. They had intentionally arrived unnoticed, having brought the table and chairs in with the help of Yob3’s assistants while the room was still dark and the Earthlings were watching the end of their first orientation video. Mip7 now spoke to Yob3 quietly, so the subjects would not hear their conversation.

“It was necessary,” Yob3 said. “They’re still in a state of shock, so we can’t have them running through an open door and possibly wreaking havoc in the lab. They are remembering their abductions now, and will be apprehensive about us for some time.”

The Earthlings were standing in place, watching them from across the room, not speaking, not moving.

“Well, I can hardly blame them for being apprehensive,” Mip7 said. “All these hidden doors. They can’t even trust the environment they find themselves in.”

“Perhaps you’re right about that.” Yob3 started tapping on his lightpad. “We’ll make a point of coming and going within their full view now, and will announce meals and any changes to the rooms in advance. We can reopen the doors to the white room as soon as my assistants finish refurnishing it.”

“I don’t think they will come over to us today,” Mip7 said.

“That is perfectly fine, and to be expected,” Yob3 replied. “We’ll just sit here for a while. Tomorrow, when we come back, they should begin to get used to us. Try not to focus on them too much. Check your messages, or play a game or something.”

Mip7 knew he wouldn’t have any messages. He wasn’t very social. Back in his university days he had made friends, of course, but never any close ones. He had always been something of a loner. He opted out of the arranged mate system when he was young, the year before going off to university when all young Torians are asked to make that decision. The few romantic relationships he had been involved in were purely for fulfilling biological urges, at least from his intentions, and none of those Toras had his current contact info. Mip7 wanted it that way. Only a small percentage of the space station population was female. The Toras who did reside there, and were available, could often be found in the lounges, true—but Mip7 had not attempted to meet any of them as of yet. He preferred taking his Redflower-20 in his compartment, alone, and reading or watching videos.

Mip7 tapped his lightpad and called up a lab journal on the Earth explorations that he hadn’t yet read. Yob3 settled into returning messages, checking the status of his other projects, and whatever else scientists did when forced to sit in one place. The two of them stayed that way for quite some time. At one point, Mip7 looked up and noticed the subjects were sitting down again, only with their chairs pulled around to the other side of the table, right up next to each other, keeping Yob3 and Mip7 in view. If the Earthlings were talking to each other it was being done very quietly, as Mip7 couldn’t hear any sound other than the work being done behind the wall in the white room. He looked back down and continued to read.

“It says here the field teams continued to abduct subjects even after the department directors issued a memorandum that the Earth lab was full, and no further specimens were needed,” Mip7 said. “In fact, the practice continued for many more years, and over a hundred additional subjects were still taken.”