Colonization Read online

  Colonization

  The Ominbus

  Scott McElhaney

  BOOK ONE

  Kepler Moon Alpha

  Zane

  Chapter One

  Water…

  I’m surrounded… underwater…

  Swimming?

  No…

  Panicking!

  Don’t inhale!

  Which way is up? Where am I?

  Sunlight…

  Rippling light, but too far away…

  Swim!

  Calm down and swim for the light!

  I fought the urge to succumb to those burning lungs that insisted I’d never make it to the surface before passing out or inhaling a lungful of water. I believed my own lie as I swam decisively for the surface. The sun must have been twenty feet or more above me and I had no idea how long I’d been underwater. It felt like a half hour. I did know however that I needed to breathe now and I secretly knew I’d never make it.

  Confusion set in as I kept reaching for the sun. I was kicking and reaching, all the while wondering why I was here. Why was I even in the water? Why would I ever find myself in such deep waters? I couldn’t even recall the last time I went for a swim in a place that would allow for me to somehow be twenty feet underwater.

  I reached and reached. I kicked and reached, knowing I couldn’t hold my breath any longer. I must inhale. I needed to breathe. I wouldn’t make it.

  I broke the surface, gasping and choking. I regurgitated a mouthful of saltwater as I struggled to keep my head above the waves. I continued coughing and breathing as I searched my surroundings for the beach.

  Did the undertow take me out to sea?

  Where was I swimming at anyway?

  Treading water as I attempted a three-sixty, I quickly discovered that I was not swimming here by choice after all. The evidence looming merely ten feet away from me suggested that I wasn’t swept out to sea while vacationing on a beach somewhere. I apparently wasn’t even supposed to be in the ocean today.

  I wasn’t all that familiar with passenger jets and I couldn’t even remember the last time that I had flown on one. I did however know what the tail section of a jet looked like, even if that enormous white tail happened to be rising from the ocean at an angle that wasn’t natural. The cone shape that formed the last several feet of the tail just bobbed there with the stabilizer fin acting as an unwanted billboard for the curious airline. It rose and fell with the ocean swells, as did I.

  I watched the aircraft slowly sink to its watery grave as I put some distance between me and the beast. Try as I might, I couldn’t recall even getting on a plane today, much less getting off that plane. I obviously just escaped from an aircraft that had crash-landed into the sea, but I couldn’t recall that miraculous escape.

  Am I the only survivor?

  Where is everyone?

  Chapter Two

  After what felt like an hour of treading water beneath the hot sun, I located three foam items covered in blue fabric. One of these floating seat cushions literally found me when it hit me from behind. It was after this welcome discovery that I was able to find two more cushions floating nearby. In reality, I had probably only been in the water for a total of fifteen minutes before God had provided something to assist me, but exhaustion from constantly trying to stay afloat made it seem much longer.

  I could see other floating objects in the distance, but I wasn’t going to chase any of these things down. I had three seat cushions and that would do me just fine for the moment.

  As I looked around me, I was continually faced with the concept that I may have been the only survivor. I was also faced with the fact that I had no particular destination ahead of me – not now and perhaps not even when I was aboard the mysterious plane.

  Where was I going?

  Was the destination overseas?

  Was it a business trip… vacation… to see family?

  Was I alone?

  Did I just lose someone I loved beneath the waves, and if so, shouldn’t I be mourning?

  Better yet… who am I?

  I didn’t even know my own name. I looked across the tumbling waves as I searched my mind. I searched not only for a name, but also an occupation. I searched for family. I searched for a home. A house.

  Nothing…

  I’ve got nothing…

  Chapter Three

  Again, time moved at a pace that I couldn’t measure. I had no wrist watch on. If I had any electronic devices in my pockets, they would surely be ruined. The sun above me spoke of midday when I had breached the surface earlier and it wasn’t much further along on its journey to the horizon.

  I seemed to be drifting away from all the flotsam that had marked the final resting place of the plane. I found myself continually riding up and down these watery hills with no control whatsoever over my future. Heck, I had no command or control over my own past it seemed, so why would I think I had any command over my future?

  It was in that moment that I saw something as I crested a wave. It was there for only a moment before I found myself back down in the valley of the waves again. As I crested the next hill, I saw it again. There was a hill of green on the horizon. I slid down the mound of water and then rose again, verifying with certainty that I now had a destination directly ahead.

  I released two of the seat cushions that I had been holding together beneath me as a makeshift raft and only kept hold of one. I tucked my arms through the straps of the cushion, resting it before me as a life preserver against my chest. I then struck out for the island in the distance, swimming as best as I could through the giant swells.

  I kept up this posture for several minutes, kicking with my feet and knifing my hands through the water, all the while watching the island remain equally as far as it ever was. I was exhausting myself and getting nowhere. Yet I couldn’t stop or I would never stand a chance of surviving.

  The sun inched its way across the sky, heading toward the same island that I was striving toward. It not only marked the hours that were passing; it also seemed to beckon me onward toward the salvation that could only be found on solid ground. My shoulder muscles were burning, but I kept swimming onward. My legs threatened to stop working, but I continued kicking my feet and fighting for the island ahead of me.

  After probably a span of an hour, the little green hill became more of mountain. I was definitely getting closer. The base of the island became a sandy beach on the left side of the island and rocky cliffs on the right. I continued onward, heading now for the left half of the island where the sand met the surf.

  I finally had to pause and rest in spite of the knowledge that the tide would only push me further out. The minute or so that I rested and caught my breath did little to ease the burning in my arms and legs. I returned to my fight to reach the beach, swimming in spite of the soreness inside me.

  I found a pace and kept it going during the next several minutes. By the time I was able to discern some heaps of seaweed and driftwood littering the white sands on the shore, I realized the sun was touching the treetops before me. It had to be midafternoon and I must have been swimming for upwards of three hours.

  The tide was finally on my side and made the last several minutes of my journey much easier. I rested my arms, kicked with my feet, and rode the tide almost completely onto the beautiful shore. I walked the rest of the way to the shore once I discovered that the water was only up to my waist. And just like on the movies, I collapsed on the sand while waiting for the energy to return to my body. I lay in the sand staring off in the direction from whence I came.

  That was when I noticed something odd back where the plane had been swallowed up by the waves. Back on the horizon, I could see an unusual white rainbow painted against the sky. Only this wasn’t a r
ainbow because it was wider at the top and thinner along the sides… and it was angled slightly… and it was compressed as though someone wanted to squeeze the rainbow together. And just below that, creeping over the horizon…

  Chapter Four

  Either I was dreaming, or I was now somehow living in an alternate universe. After all, the universe I once lived in would have found Saturn far beyond the orbit of the Earth. And no matter how the planets aligned, Saturn would never be seen appearing as large as a dinner plate and creeping up over the horizon. The rainbow I believed I had seen on the horizon was merely the rings of Saturn.

  It couldn’t be Saturn, of course. The rings of this unidentified planet were encircling the orb near its northern pole. I was assuming, of course, that I was looking at the planet straight on and that the part inching over the horizon was indeed it’s northern pole. I guess it would all just be a matter of perspective. Those rings rising up above the mysterious planet could have just as easily been orbiting its equator.

  But if that wasn’t Saturn, then where was I and how did I get here? Heck, even if it was Saturn, should I now assume that it was orbited by an earthlike moon now with warm salty oceans, white sandy beaches, and breathable air? Nothing made sense now.

  I got to my knees and brushed the sand from my hands and my face. I finally looked down at myself and discovered that I had been wearing a khaki-colored one-piece uniform of some sort. There were patches sewn onto the front as well as on each of the short sleeves. I recognized none of these patches or the uniform itself. On the left sleeve I could see a patch that resembled a globe of the Earth with what looked like a rocket ship in front. It offered no words or abbreviations to identify the patch. On the right sleeve, I discovered a black eagle with its wings spread and beneath it were three V-like chevrons. Perhaps a rank, though I was quite certain that I wasn’t in the military or on a police force.

  Above the left front pocket was a patch that looked just like the ribbons or medals that were worn by military people everywhere. Although it was a single patch, I could see that the ribbons represented were in three rows of three and on top was a single ribbon in the middle. A total of ten. I knew what none of them meant or if the awards were even really mine. Above the right pocket I discovered a rectangular patch the same color khaki as the uniform and thankfully this had a name embroidered in black. It simply read Zane.

  I spoke the world aloud, waiting to see if it sparked a memory.

  “Zane.”

  Nothing.

  It was as foreign to me as the uniform, the jet, the island, and perhaps even the planet. Surely this was Earth, though. It wasn’t like we’d ever discover other hospitable planets that were within our reach. Did we even have spacecraft that could reach other planets? The patch on my sleeve would suggest so. So what year was this? What kind of spacecraft did I remember?

  I remember spacecraft… shuttles… and ships…

  But some of my memories felt like dreams or distant objects that were not quite real. I remembered the moon landing, but those images felt like I was seeing photos from a book. Like I wasn’t around when it happened. I remembered NASA, but again, the name and the images of shuttles and other spacecraft felt like they weren’t real. Like I never saw them firsthand and it wasn’t part of my true experiences. So many images… all just images. I didn’t recall ever seeing any spacecraft in flight. Never. There was absolutely no way that I ever flew in space, so I couldn’t be kneeling on another planet right now. Besides, wasn’t it a passenger jet that I saw sinking into the ocean earlier today?

  I saw a tail fin and just a rear cone of… of something…

  What did it say on the tailfin?

  It didn’t say anything. There were no initials or abbreviations. Only a globe of the earth with the rocket ship overtop of it. I had just assumed that it was an airliner. Yet I never saw whatever engines may have been mounted on the wings or just forward of the tail.

  Why am I even entertaining the thought?

  I did not fly to another planet! This is clearly the Earth!

  That brought my curiosity back to the island I was kneeling on. Thanks to the tall vegetation and the high hill before me, I found myself kneeling in the shade on the beach. I stood up and scanned the dense growth of tropical plants, trees, and bushes that hid the island before me. The sandy beach only extended about twenty yards before me and was littered with common seashells, strands of seaweed, and some driftwood. It was by no means a pristine beach in spite of the pure white sands but it was most definitely a beach on Earth.

  If the island happened to be inhabited, I wouldn’t be able to see any evidence of it beyond the dense jungle before me. The vegetation just seemed to spring up suddenly from the patchy random weeds along the edge of the beach to enormous bushes, leaves, and trees merely ten feet beyond. The only sounds the jungle offered me were the calls of various birds.

  I turned and gaped at the enormous ringed planet still growing above the horizon. It was larger than anything I’d ever seen in the sky before. I might have lost my memories, but I was quite certain that this wasn’t part of my own history.

  Chapter Five

  Zane…

  The name wasn’t my own. Surely I’d recall my own name. I could recall how to walk. I could recall how to swim. I could recall the moon landing. I could recall what a passenger jet looked like. Surely I still had some memories in my head. Surely I had more than just a blank slate in there.

  I walked along the beach, staying close to where the vegetation started. I was searching for an opening that would permit my entry into the jungle. I decided moments ago that I would need to search for three things, none of which would be found on the beach. I would need to find civilization if it existed here, which I believed could be a real possibility considering the size of the island. I figured the island had to be at least a few square miles in area just from what I saw as I swam in.

  I also needed to locate fresh water and possibly some food. I probably wouldn’t find any food, water, or people out here on the beach. So now I found myself walking around the island away from the rocky cliffs that I had noticed while out as sea. The further I walked, the more I wondered if I’d have to force my way into the jungle. It was no wonder that machetes were a popular jungle tool when one was faced with a wall of vegetation.

  Since I wasn’t having any luck finding an opening into the heart of the island, I decided to do some more research on the mysterious man that was myself. I would still walk the shoreline and search for an opening to the island interior, but I’d also check my pockets for more clues about the guy named Zane. Perhaps if I knew him a little better, I’d begin to understand where I came from and why I was here.

  I always carried a wallet in my back pocket if my memory served me correctly. Today, there was nothing in either of my back pockets. In my front pocket, I found what resembled a credit card. It was solid black on both sides with a bunch of random numbers along the bottom. I checked my shirt pockets and found nothing else. All I carried with me from the plane… or spacecraft, was a black card that meant nothing to me at all.

  I slid the useless card into my pocket and muttered a curse. My attention was suddenly drawn to a small footprint depression in the sand before me. And it wasn’t just one footprint, but another… and another. The sand was soft, so I couldn’t tell if these were bare footprints or that of a shod person. I knew they belonged to a person rather than an animal however when my eyes settled on the charred wood and ashes of a past bonfire. Someone had not only spent some time here in the recent past, but they had also left behind a pair of binoculars and a long fork.

  Binoculars… a fork for cooking on the fire…

  I still had memories enough to recognize any items I saw. I still had the necessary memories needed to survive. It seemed that the only memories I was missing were those that defined me as a person. Could such a thing happen naturally or was my current loss of memory the results of something intentionally done to me? How did a mi
nd lose only a select group of memories?

  I knelt next to the pile of ash and retrieved the binoculars. These were fairly small in size, but when I put them to my eyes, I could see that they were surprisingly powerful. I used them to scan the foliage up ahead, adjusting the strength as I searched for further evidence of life. I located nothing of interest along the beach.

  I returned the binoculars to the sand and then stood up. It was in that moment that I noticed an opening into the jungle. It was literally right in line with the remains of the bonfire, as though someone didn’t feel like strolling along the beach once arriving from the inner island. The opening was no more than four feet wide and the sand of the beach ended abruptly at the base of a wooden stair. Curiosity brought me immediately to that bottom stair and it was there that I noticed a worn dirt path slicing its way into the jungle.

  The stair by my feet was constructed by simply dropping a 6” x 6” wooden beam onto the ground and building up the dirt path behind it. The beam had two embedded spikes holding it firmly in place and it still maintained the yellow-brown appearance that suggested it wasn’t all that old. As I looked onward from where I stood, I noticed another wooden stair about ten feet further and then another just a few feet beyond that. From there, the path appeared to veer to the right, making it impossible for me to see any further.

  The sun was still going down beyond this island, forcing me to confront the question that beckoned “how long did I have before nightfall buried me in darkness?” I could guess that it was anywhere between four and six o’clock which would give me plenty of time to explore a little. And since I had a path, I could always return here if need be.

  Chapter Six

  The path was well maintained and by that I meant that whomever decided they needed this path to the shoreline had apparently devoted some attention to regularly cutting back any invading branches and leaves. The spiders continued to announce their presence to me by leaving random lines of spider silk that would inevitably cross the path of my face.