Galactic Gods

GALACTIC GODS

By younghrted2

The space lab was old, but all who had worked aboard her had grown accustomed to her idiosyncrasies, at least, most of them. After all, since they were in a stationary orbit around a planet many lightyears from Earth, it was difficult to get replacement parts for anything that wasn't absolutely essential. That was why several of the items in normal, everyday use had been allowed to continue to function at less than top efficiency. The crew was only one of many whose long-term mission had been to observe the social evolution of the intelligent beings on Critero's fourth planet.

The equipment which was used to study and observe generation after generation of the inhabitants operated with unvarying perfection, but 'glitches' had developed in several of the internal machines. Thus, the crew of three who manned the station could microscopically analyze the changes found within the bipedal beings who inhabited the world beneath them, but they weren't able to produce a cup of coffee without resorting to aggression: an elbow jab to the water canister, followed after a 3-second pause by a light kick to the lower left quadrant of the heating element housing.

Fortunately, the crew changeover schedule allowed for a two-week orientation period while supplies were off-loaded from the transport craft. Otherwise, the newer crew would have had a rough time of it.

Some of the problems were really minor, like the retractable hangers that held their spacesuits in place unless the waste disposal mechanism was activated, at which time the hooks fled back into the recesses of the compartment, only to be coaxed back into performance of their duties by turning on the pump which brought the water for their showers from the lower storage tank. Until that was done, the suits lay in a heap, looking like guests who had stayed too late at the party.

The most annoying difficulty faced by these men of the Humans Evolution Viewing; Non-interactive Corps, otherwise known as HEVN, was the frequent but unpredictable loss of gravity they experienced whenever the gyroscope stammered to a momentary halt. None of the crew had escaped being bathed by hot coffee when the liquid had floated free into great globs, only to descend again as the artificial gravity was restored. Aside from the appropriate expletive being muttered, (or shouted, depending on where the scalding liquid landed,) nothing was done to attempt to correct the situation.

The men were pioneers, after all. They knew that the day might come when no supply and replacement ship would arrive to dock with them, and they could be forced to land on the more or less hospitable planet below to live out their natural lives. They expected to endure some hardships on their tour of duty.

Biologist Daniel Cheetsus sat at his console studying one of the female specimens of the planet's most intelligent life forms as she moved about her rank-allotted territory gathering the elliptical fruits which formed the staple of her people's diet. The sound of flesh smacking metal intruded on his consciousness, and Dan automatically counted off 3 seconds before deciding whether to investigate. When the noise of a boot-clad toe striking a second blow reached his ears, he relaxed. It was just the navigator, Tom King, helping himself to a cup of 'wake up' before starting his shift.

Tom had almost reached Dan's side when the ship suffered one of her gravitational hiccups. Suddenly weightless, Tom had no way of stopping his forward momentum, and crashed unceremoniously into the console.

"Shit...," Tom muttered. He only muttered it since the coffee had soared its way clear over to the viewport before being robbed of flight by the return of gravity. It hadn't splashed on Tom, it simply was no longer available to drink. He turned back to repeat the brewing ritual, not aware that the biologist behind him was frantically checking the readouts from his machinery, shaking his head all the while.

"No! ... uh, uh ... it can't be," Dan chanted. "Please, let it have been trained on a leaf, a clump of dirt, anything but the female!"

"What's up?" Tom asked, as he returned to the observation galley, refilled cup in his hand.

Dan sat slumped at the console, head resting in his hands. "you wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Oh, yeah? Catching some 'hot stuff' on your little scope?" Tom snickered. He made frequent use of the ships X-rated video library, along with the body massage cabinet.

"It's not funny, King. When you bumped into the console, I accidentally activated the Molecular Stimulator."

"So what?"

"It was aimed at a young female at the time. My readouts indicate we stimulated one of her ovum."

"So what?" Tom repeated.

"You asshole!" Dan exclaimed, all patience exhausted. "We just made a female pregnant!"

"Why are you so worried about it?" the navigator asked with heavy sarcasm. "Do you expect her brother to appear in the airlock with a shotgun?"

"Goddamn your ignorance," Dan growled. "We aren't supposed to interact with these beings at all! You know that. We are only here to observe their progress through their natural societal evolution."

"Yeah... so?" Tom said, more to aggravate the scientist than from any lack of understanding.

"So... this unmated female is now going to have a child. That will have a definite effect on their society! Besides, they kill any offspring that are abnormal."

"Look, Dan, why make such a big deal out of it?" Tom soothed. "No one will guess the child has no father. It's just like cloning, right?"

"Yes, yes," Dan said distractedly, "the cells will reproduce with the same patterning traits as the mother. The child won't look unusual in any way... but that's not the point."

"The mother is going to be alright and the kid will be normal, so just what is the point? What's got your bowels in an uproar?"

Cheetsus looked at the navigator in disgust. "We've been here on station studying this planet for almost two years, now, and you still don't know the first thing about it, do you?"

"All I need to know, Mr. Scientist, is how to get us here, how to get us home, and how to get us down to the planet surface if necessary." Tom coolly drank from his cup. "Damn!" he said, grimacing. "I think the ship started mixing the orange juice powder with the instant coffee, again."

"As I was saying," Dan resumed, "you haven't learned the first thing about these people. She'll be the wrong color to have a child. The female's fur reacts to the hormones released during mating, by changing pigmentation. This one is pregnant, but she's still the virgin hue."

"Hey, that's right," King breathed. "Say, have you ever thought what it would be like," he asked, a venal gleam in his eye, "to figure out what would make human girls turn different colors every time they screwed? A man could make a fortune selling it to jealous husbands, boyfriends, you name it!"

"That's it!" Dan shouted, angrily jumping up from his seat. "I've had it with you!" He pulled back his fist, ready to unload a real haymaker against the jaw of the insufferable bastard, but then the ship hiccupped.

With resignation, the biologist found himself flying backward through the passageway leading to the exercise room, impelled by the cocking motion of his arm, looking like a futuristic Mary Poppins who no longer needed her umbrella to fly. He noted with some small satisfaction that the loss of gravity had caught the navigator awkwardly, as well. His reactionary crouch had been uncheckable, so King crunched inexorably against the steel flooring, rather like a crash scene played in slow motion.

As his weight returned, Cheetsus heard the navigator call out, "Come on, Dan, I was just kidding... sort of."

Over the next few days, Dan wracked his brain for any possible means of rectifying the situation. He supposed he could try to kill the fetus in much the same way he had inadvertently brought it to life, but he hated to do that. Not only would the child be the first single-parent fledgling of the species, its birth would provide Cheetsus with a unique situation under which to study the responses of the society of anthropoids. Their strict adherence to the dictum of 'survival of the fittest' (and what fit within their understanding) could be put to its most stringent test.

Captain Botemost wasn't able to provide much help, either, when Dan approached him for advice.

"You seem to have lost all objectivity," he observed, in reply to the biologist's latest question. "Are you suffering from a father complex?"

"Well, after all,..." Dan said, "we did make this baby-to-be."

"I gather you want to request direct intervention with the natives."

"Only if they act aggressively towards the female. After all, she had nothing to do with it."

"Innocent victim?" the captain suggested .

"Absolutely. And it's not fair for her to be killed for our mistake!" Dan paced the control room floor worriedly. "I know our orders forbid any contact, but there has been precedent," he argued.

"Ah, yes," Captain Botemost mused, leaning back in his command lounge. "You mean the time, a few missions back, when the crew decided to end the drought that was killing all the natives' crops." He chuckled at the memory of the report carefully recorded in the ship's logs. "That must have really been something! They had no idea how little material it would take to seed the clouds."

"Yeah, they would have been alright if they hadn't started a flood," Dan remarked, watching in fascination as the captain's suddenly weightless body floated gently above his chair for a moment.

"Well, like you, they felt it their obligation to intervene. If only they'd used a less obvious means of communication!"

"They had no time, I guess," Dan remarked.

"True enough," the captain agreed, "but still, can you imagine what the natives must've thought when a voice from HEVN's rescue ship's directional speakers boomed for them to 'Build Big Boats!'? My God!"

"Right. The report said they lay shaking on the ground for hours. But we had learned the language. I suppose it would have been even more frightening to hear us yelling in our own tongue," Dan said.

"Probably so. It apparently threw quite a scare into the native that King confronted."

"What a jerk!" Dan exclaimed in exasperation. "You know he sneaked down there against your direct orders."

"Yes, I know," the captain replied, "and I discussed it with him long since. I don't think we need to go over it, again. I shouldn't have brought it up."

"Did he ever tell you why he went during the dark phase?" Dan asked, seeing his chance to get answers to some of the puzzling aspects of the episode. "Was it so we might not find out about it?"

"No," Botemost assured him. "He went then so he could make a trial landing under adverse conditions. Of course, he also assumed that no beings would be foraging at night, so he looked around a bit."

"He just decided to take a little stroll. Is that what you're saying?" Dan asked.

The captain didn't approve of the occasional spats that occurred between his two crew members. He fixed the biologist with a stern gaze before answering. "You would have taken the same opportunity to study the terrain first-hand, wouldn't you?"

"I get the point," Dan admitted ruefully, "But, I wouldn't have forgotten that the suits radiate light as strong as a beacon!"

"Just drop it, Cheetsus. When he saw the native he got behind the nearest cover he could find. It's just unfortunate that it was only a small bush," the captain said in a sharp tone. "We all make mistakes, don't we? By the way, when is yours due?"

"Ahem," Dan croaked. "The gestation period is remarkably short. We have very little time to determine our course of action and implement it."

"Maybe even less than you think," the captain said. "I've received a communique from Earth. This time the onboard computer seems to be keeping all the R's to itself. Last week it was hoarding all the T's from the messages... I wonder why it does that?"

"Captain," Dan interrupted. "What did the message say?"

"What?... Oh. We're going home. The study is over."

"Over? Home?" Dan asked, dazed.

"Just as soon as we can make ready," the captain assured him. "They feel the reports give a fairly complete picture of the stages any society with intelligence will pass through."

"Complete!" Dan protested. "How can they think that?"

"Well, after all, we should have expected it. The Church funds all the space programs, now. Once we sent word of the spontaneous religious practices springing up on this planet, the study had gone as far as their interest."

"But, Captain..." Dan argued.

"But nothing," Botemost stated. "We have a lot to do before warping out of orbit. Get on with it."

Dan left the bridge no closer to the solution than before, but over the next two weeks the preparations to leave took all his attention.

Finally the day arrived when the spacelab of HEVN was to fire her rockets and begin her journey home.

Shortly before the scheduled ignition, Dan peered once again through his telescanner and found that the baby had been born. Just as he had feared, other people seemed to be advancing with a menacing attitude toward bewildered mother and child. Cheetsus wept in frustration; there was nothing he could do... or was there?

Knowing he had only moments to spare beyond his projected absence, the biologist raced for the rescue ship and took off for the planet below. He sped unerringly to the female's territory and hovered there, the ship brilliantly visible to the gaping anthropoids.

He turned on the directional broadcasting speakers and repeated the words he'd written phonetically, "He is my son, and it is good. Call him Hank."

He smiled as he directed the rescue craft back to the mother ship. He had always liked that name.