I decided to take an extended trip to the outer reaches of the universe to see if I could learn anything else that would aid in our defenses. While exploring I came across some interesting places and met creatures I would have never imagined could exist. The truly strange, unique places were more common outside the Doxades, since Phos and his underlings exercised stricter control over the development of their creatures. I focused my research on Michael’s and Gabriel’s domains.
In one solar system in Mallachia, the creatures were fanatical builders. They called their world Tektos. These Tektonians built the finest spaceships imaginable. Even though practically no civilization could compare with the Atala at first, these builders architecturally surpassed them after a few centuries. They constructed wonderful buildings, sculptures, and to my surprise even weapons. Since their realm was quite near the Doxades and since some of their neighbors were all too friendly with Phos and his henchmen; they were building powerful strongholds and defensive weaponry.
”Have you seen our space station yet?” their leader asked me.
“No,” I answered. “I didn’t see anything orbiting your world.”
“I don’t know how you missed it,” he said grinning. “It’s as large as Tektos, but it orbits our star along the same path as our world. We built the entire thing with stealth technology and made it optically blend in with the surroundings. Unless you were only a few miles from the surface, you’d never see it!”
“Wow, you have to show me this,” I said.
We boarded a shuttle and flew out to a seemingly empty void in space. Then, “whump!” it appeared out of nowhere right in front of us, armed to the teeth. The surface looked like a prickly sea urchin because of all the gun barrels. The most impressive was a powerful antimatter cannon capable of destroying an entire planet. I nicknamed this enormous fortress ‘The Death Star.’ My guide didn’t know what I was talking about and thought the name was too morbid. The reason they built it was to help defend their home world and to have a place of refuge, should their planet be overrun or destroyed. In fact, the ‘Death Star’ was capable of sustaining life on the same level as their planet. Everything had to live beneath the surface, but otherwise they could theoretically transplant their entire ecosystem onto their space station.
I asked them if I could share some of their technology with the three loyal planets in Helios’ system. They were glad to help, but they warned me not to build things too similarly to their designs. Their open animosity to Phos and his cronies was well known. If three planets in the middle of his realm suddenly started building ‘Death Stars,’ Phos would know where our loyalties lay. Nonetheless, I took as many plans as I could for weaponry, architecture, and spacecraft to share with the Atala and Martians.
One of the planets in Gabriel’s realm named Gania was like night and day when compared to Tektos. These beings turned their entire planet into a well-cultivated garden. They also built structures deep in the oceans and jungles (if such a well-manicured garden could be called such) to facilitate the observation of their wildlife.
They shunned space exploration, but their neighbors near and far would come visit them to tour their amazing ecosystem. The Venusians would have loved to visit this world, but being millions of light years away and unable to use wormholes made this impossible. I brought them some pictures after my visit, and they were utterly amazed. They really preferred a more rugged natural world to live in, but the wildlife observatories they saw inspired them to build similar structures. They even started receiving visitors from other planets who wanted to see their amazing plants and wildlife. I also brought some textbooks from Gania on genetic manipulation that I thought would come in handy. The Venusians were good, but they were still having difficulties with their pyrokinetic beasts, so I figured this would help.
The Atala had a few observatories built on their planet, although the wildlife on Earth wasn’t nearly as interesting as on Venus. I was glad they made them though, for I knew they’d come in handy whenever the humans made their debut on the planet. I knew the first human would take a keen interest in naming all the animals, and another human would arise later who had to collect samples of each living creature. These observatories would make their work much easier.
One planet I visited deep in Gelashalem named Akholenia had some creatures with an unusual habit. These beings had a very slow metabolism. They were almost like snakes, eating only a few times a year at most! They’d actually build their dwellings out of edible material and then eat them every couple of months – giving new meaning to eating oneself out of house and home! Shortly before the architectural feeding frenzy, they’d build new houses in which to live so that they’d have a place to call home after the feast. They were baffled at the way I had to eat every few hours. I technically could have managed without food, but I had been getting regular meals all my life, and it was one habit I could never completely break. These creatures would allow me to take a few bites out of their homes here and there whenever I felt like it. It was strange – Hansel-and-Gretel strange. Still, they didn’t seem to mind at all, as long as I didn’t eat holes into the walls. I couldn’t find anything here that I thought would be useful for my neighbors on Earth however.
On another planet named Chronia – this time in Mallachia – the beings were obsessed with astronomy and time. They had all the planetary movements in their system calculated with extreme accuracy and built large clocks and observatories to track them.
“This is a place the Martians from my system could enjoy,” I told them. “Your skill at building spaceships and timepieces is second to none.” Their purpose in making them, however, was to expand their knowledge of the movements of the heavenly bodies and not necessarily to travel or explore. People would come from all over to learn their technology. Their navigation devices, clocks, telescopes, and space ships were always in high demand. Unfortunately their technology was based on their own position in their universe and their own measurements of time, so nothing they built would help a civilization millions of light years away in a different position in the heavens. Besides, the Atala and Martians had no small skill in astronomical devices and space ships.
Another planet I encountered, also in Michael’s realm, had creatures who were nearly invisible. They were physical creatures – solid even – but they were very hard to see. Additionally, they built nearly everything they could out of transparent materials. They all had well-developed senses of smell, hearing, and touch upon which they primarily relied. Fortunately I was also able to use those senses well, or else I would have constantly been running into things. Their technology was quite interesting and would have been downright useful, but it required having the right raw materials. Their planet was teeming with a kind of invisible plant which gave off invisible fruits and invisible sap. It was the basis of their diet and construction materials. The plant spread like kudzu and yet did not damage their environment. Unfortunately I could not get the samples I picked up to grow on Venus, Earth, or Mars. Try as I might, there was something about the ecosystem there that supported this interesting plant which did not exist anywhere else. The name of this realm was Anorasis.
One planet I found was so close to its sun that the entire surface was molten lava. There was no crust whatsoever to speak of. The creatures living there were capable of withstanding incredibly hot temperatures. They looked like mermaids and mermen, but their skin was very thick and heat resistant. They were actually in the Doxades, right on the border with Mallachia. They aptly named their planet Hades after the agent in charge of processing the souls the dead, who lived on the surface of their neighboring sun, an old brown dwarf star which was running out of nuclear material to burn.
Normally Phos would not have tolerated such an unusual development of beings by planetary agents under his control, but much of their design occurred by accident. The planet was a little closer to its star than had been intended, but the agent of light, Hades, could not successfully move it out of its orbit once it was fixed. The planetary agents therefore had no success forming a crust for the planet. It was basically just a large metallic, molten core surrounded by a gigantic mantle. When they couldn’t cool off the mantle’s surface enough, they just designed creatures which could swim in lava.
I wasn’t entirely sure where their loyalty lay, but Proxima later told me they were acting as spies. They maintained a close relationship with the rebel agents and nearby rebel creatures on other planets, but they would never side with them if they openly rebelled. They built absolutely no defenses to speak of, for no one could have attacked them anyway. Even the agents, upon taking up physical forms, could not bear the heat for very long. The only ones who could were agents of light or higher, and there weren’t many of those. Unless millions of these upper-level agents were to abandon their armies, weakening their realms’ defenses dramatically, and attack solely this planet, they could never hope to defeat them. Even if they did this, what were they going to do? These beings throve on heat, so nuking them with a sun-like fireball would have made them stronger. The planetary agents who ran this world would not have stood a chance. The physical beings were quite powerful without any additional help from weaponry or architecture. Proxima was excited about the fact that this world would basically end up becoming annexed into Mallachia while Phos could do nothing about it.
I did not like visiting their planet. I was able to survive, but I never really liked hot places that much.
The next world I visited, Mayima, was almost the exact opposite of this place. It was in Gabriel’s realm, and it was entirely underwater. There were no land masses, so everything was aquatic. “The Atala would be speechless with excitement if they could see this place,” I told the Mayimans. “Could I get the blueprints and manuals to your undersea vessels?” These were a lot faster and sturdier than those the Atala had and would dramatically improve their transportation assets in the water. They were more hydrodynamic and mimicked the living sea creatures on that planet, so unless one was specifically looking for them, they’d be mistaken for whales. I hoped the Atala wouldn’t feel insulted that I included these design improvements. They were very proud of their maritime technology.
“No problem!” their leader answered. “Anything to help your poor planets stuck in the middle of ol’ Phosphoros’ realm.” Wow, the news of our situation had traveled disturbingly far. I made sure they didn’t mention this to anybody else.
Another realm in Gelashalem named Luculentia was shockingly opulent. The entire place seemed to be made of precious metals! They weren’t even that precious here. Practically everything they built was made from gold, silver, platinum, palladium, etc., or some alloy or amorphous combination of them. The cities here were breathtakingly beautiful. I warned them to defend themselves, should Phos get greedy and try to capture their world. They were a good ways from the border of the Doxades though, so it would have been somewhat difficult for Phos to achieve victory here. Gabriel’s realms were not big on warfare and defenses, but they knew enough to prevent Phos from overrunning them. Besides, had Phos tried a massive invasion of Gabriel’s realm, Michael would have attacked him viciously on the other side, and Phos would have gained nothing.
I really couldn’t find anything useful on this planet. Earth, Venus, and Mars all had these metals and knew of all the uses they served. Granted, we had not even a fraction of the amount they did and weren’t using them to build houses, streets, or spaceships! I recorded a few images of what I saw here so I could show the Martians and make their jaws drop. Otherwise, I left empty-handed unless you count a few dozen pieces of normally priceless jewelry I picked up for Cala for the price of a song. Now I just needed to find a planet that had diamonds, rubies, and sapphires instead of sand!
The next world I visited, called Palusingens, wasn’t nearly as glamorous. This one was in Mallachia, and the entire planet had no distinctive oceans or landmasses. Instead, it was a gigantic swamp! The creatures there were straight out of a ‘Swamp Thing’ horror story. They were kindhearted, friendly swamp-things, but they looked just like I’d have imagined – scaly, fish-like amphibious creatures with fangs and claws that lurked just under the surface and would pop up, scaring the daylights out of any unsuspecting visitor (me). After I explained to them that where I grew up, we had horror stories involving creatures that looked similar to them, they understood why I was so jumpy, but they seemed to be somewhat offended that we’d paint such a negative picture of life in a marshland.
I did not find many useful things on this planet, but the variety of creatures did astound me. They had every sort of creature imaginable, from minuscule little flies to gigantic loch-ness-like creatures which would dwarf the most enormous whale or sea-lizard back on Earth or Venus. One species I saw was a mile long. I couldn’t believe it! When it opened its mouth, it could have swallowed a blue whale whole. Fortunately it only ate plants. Still, I wouldn’t have wanted to be one of the gargantuan trees that lived on this planet when one of these was hungry. I’d watch thousand-foot-high, sky-scraping swamp trees as wide as a mountain disappear in a matter of minutes when this creature dined. I felt sorry for the smaller birds, bugs, and lizards that inhabited the doomed tree, but they usually could hear this behemoth coming from a long way off and fled for another one before it started chomping down on their home. These gigantic beasts thankfully didn’t eat very often, but watching them when they did was like witnessing a natural disaster.
I took some more pictures for the Venusians to marvel at when I got home. The only useful bit of technology I could find here was a device that enabled them to navigate through swamps easily. It would help us build headgear that could ‘see’ through mud, using a rather complicated combination of sonar and viscosity sensors. I figured the Venusians could use it to hide in their abundant swamps, sneak up on any enemies who might venture into those areas, and scare the living daylights out of them. When the ‘swamp-things’ demonstrated how their navigation equipment worked, they scared the pants off me. One minute I’d just be wading through some mud, and the next minute some swamp creature would emerge next to me, grab me, and pull me under before I could even let out a scream of horror. I later convinced the Venusians to add horns and fangs to the headgear so that the wearer would look truly horrifying. I suspected I’d have to explain my adventures here on this planet to a psychologist someday.
On my expedition through the universe, I predictably came across a civilization of creatures that could change shape. This planet, named Polydermata, was also in Mallachia. I couldn’t honestly say what they looked like. There were various levels of beings here. I guess some of them could be classified as insects, birds, land animals or sea creatures, but it was hard to distinguish them any further. Perhaps there were only five species – the four I just mentioned plus the intelligent beings. Any further classification would have been impossible for me. The intelligent beings were actually capable of taking on any form imaginable in any size. They could look like a tiny insect or a large sea creature. They changed size by changing density. If they shrunk to the size of an insect, they were still as dense and massive as they were before, but if they took on the form of a large sea creature, they would end up being rather airy and light. To counteract this, they would swallow a large amount of water or mud while in this form to add to their mass, and when they converted to something smaller, they’d regurgitate it back out. It was somewhat disgusting to watch, but entertaining nonetheless. I think it would have been neat to be able to sprout wings and fly. Forget changing size! Just give me the ability to fly or swim like a fish, and I’d be happy.
They didn’t have any technology I could have considered useful. They were not near the border with the Doxades, but if they needed to defend their planet, they could sprout deadly weapons from their arms and legs. I watched as one turned his hands into swords and sprouted tiny spikes and dense plates all over his body to defend himself. He then proceeded to chop up a nearby tree faster than any lumberjack I’d ever seen. I certainly would not have wanted to attack an army of creatures which could do that! Add wings or fins to one of these living porcupines, and they’d be able to stop anything anywhere. I took one last longing look at them and their amazing anatomy before leaving in search of other strange worlds with more useful technology.
One world I encountered, named Hygrosiderous, was pretty incredible. There was no water whatsoever on it. It was like a desert. The only liquid available was mercury, which would be deadly for the carbon-based life forms I was trying to help. Here the creatures consisted of silicon and mercury – the two most abundant substances on that planet. Their bodies were therefore very tough and dense, which was fortunate since their climate was so arid and replete with sandstorms, dunes, and oppressive heat. It brought back too many bad memories. Their usefulness to me was limited, owing to their lack of advanced technology and the fact that contact with any living creature here would have been deadly for my neighbors. They were from Gelashalem and did not feel the need to travel through space or develop into an advanced civilization. The only thing at which they excelled was surviving in one incredibly harsh environment. They were friendly enough and very helpful to me, but they understood when I told them they had nothing I could use. Apparently a lot of creatures living near them couldn’t survive contact with mercury either. I thanked them for their hospitality and continued on my journey.
One of the last places I visited was in Mallachia on the planet Thaumasthesia. The creatures here were, hands down, the most unusual I found anywhere. The flora and fauna were rather normal in comparison to other worlds I visited, but the intelligent beings I met were beyond weird. They had no distinguishable eyes, noses, ears, or mouths. They looked quite scary actually. The only sense they had was their metaphysical one. When they communicated with me, it was via telepathy. When they moved about, they sensed the metaphysical aspects of nearby objects to avoid collisions. Now, I had some sense of spiritual things, or I would have truly been lost here, but their senses were far beyond mine. It was probably because I had not spent much time developing my own, but since they only had the one sense, they had honed it into a finely tuned instrument. They could ‘see,’ ‘hear,’ ‘smell,’ and communicate on a spiritual level, which actually enabled them to take in their surroundings with perceptions normal creatures couldn’t have compared with. There was no sneaking up on them, for example. In a fight they would have been almost undefeatable, for they could sense what others were going to do before it happened. They did have a standing army, since they dwelt closer to Phos’ realm than most and could sense disturbing things coming from there. One of them showed me how well he could fight in an unarmed duel with me. I couldn’t land a punch nor could I defend myself from him because he anticipated everything I did and countered me with exactly the thing that would best exploit my weaknesses.
I actually spent a rather long time with the Thaumasthesians. They recognized my underdeveloped spiritual sense and insisted I spend some time training with them. They blindfolded me, stopped up my ears, administered medication that eliminated my sense of smell and taste, and forced me to rely on the metaphysical realm. I perfected telepathic communication, although it would be useless back on Earth except for talking to agents. I learned how to fight using their techniques until I was good enough to hold my own against one of their warriors. I felt like going back to Venus to see if their war champion could defeat me now that I could fight blindfolded. I also felt like I could perhaps facilitate the development of theirs and the Atala’s and Martians’ own metaphysical senses a little more. If that worked out, then what I learned on this planet would come in most handily.
After a few months of training and learning from these amazing creatures, I bade farewell and headed back to Earth. I spent the rest of the time we had before the impending rebellion imparting the knowledge I had picked up on my expedition to the Venusians, Atala, and Martians. The technological devices were the easiest to share, but the spiritual training I had received last was the most difficult to pass on. The other creatures simply did not have as developed a sense for metaphysical things as I had. I managed to teach them a few tricks, but I never could manage to telepathically communicate with them well or teach them to move objects with their minds. This last skill – telekinesis – was something I used quite sparingly. In a battle, I might discreetly hamper an opponent by spiritually ‘tripping’ him, but I did not use it in day-to-day business. Everyone to whom I showed it found it to be incredibly disturbing, so rather than risk being ostracized, I refrained from openly displaying my new talent.
The creator also advised me to use sparingly any abilities I had that the other creatures did not share. He reminded me that later on when I was dealing with humans, they would find such abilities to be downright revolting or evil, and so I’d best not flaunt them in public. Still, when I was alone, it certainly was convenient to be able to grab something from across the room by making it float to me or by switching on a light without getting out of bed. Cala knew how I had learned such skills and tolerated it better than most, but I could tell that even she found such activities to be a bit unnerving. She absolutely forbade me from telling her something telepathically or trying to read her mind. This last ability I could never have done without her express permission anyway, but I refrained from any metaphysical communication with her. She didn’t mind when I turned on a light switch from across the room or made a book float off a bookshelf through the air into my open hands, so I left it at that.
The metaphysical training setback notwithstanding, our defenses on Earth, Venus, and Mars were never better. Adding to the relentless war preparations, these new little technological bonuses I picked up on my expeditions had me thinking we were pretty much unstoppable. The only way we’d know was once the rebellion started. Time was running out as far as I could tell. The transfer of creatures from Semesh to
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