French Toast
A smooth sound woke me up, I never heard something like that before.
I guess it is a frequency to help you wake up, so you get up without feeling tired or lazy; it is great.
After that some kind of hologram appeared in the middle of my room, this time another being showed up. The being was more like a human but with differences about the position of the eyes and the nose. Somehow they were more symmetrical and separated.
The being said, “Hello Chris, please proceed to the food court on this facility, so you can get your required food. After that you will proceed outside to the section A17, in that area you will receive some education today.”
It was a short message, but pretty straight forward. So with that in mind, I got out of the bed. As I approached to the shelves to get some clothes I noticed in the wall a button I didn’t notice before. It was engraved on the wall and it had the image of drops of water falling onto a shape that to me looked like a human. Since it was in my room and it seemed like some kind of shower image to me, I pressed it. A circular light covered me from top to bottom and it paralyzed me for a few seconds. My clothes went out of phase, as if they were on me, but almost invisible. Inside of the tube of light I got sprayed with something like a mist of water. It was really fast. After that my clothes went back to normal and the light disappeared. I got my movement back. I was feeling like when you take a shower and you just dried yourself with a towel, you feel fresh and clean at the same time.
I changed my clothes and I proceeded to find the food court.
In the food court there was a bunch of tables and chairs and smooth lights in the ceiling. There were a lot of devices on the edge of the room. Each device had a circular surface in the bottom, some kind of futuristic lamp in the top, and a little keyboard formed by images of familiar dishes at the foot of the device. The amazing thing was, that the top part was practically floating above the bottom without anything to grip it. There were no cables nor anything attached to the device.
So far I have been understanding, that you need to experiment to learn around here. So, I pressed the key with the image of eggs and ham. The lamp thing turned on flashing a light on the bottom part, so in the surface an image of eggs and ham appeared. Then the bottom part created some kind of energy spark, and the image of the food got materialized. After that the machine turned off again.
I grabbed my plate from the machine, it looked very good indeed. As I approached to the nearest table, somebody touched my back.
Lisa said, “Good morning Chris.”
She looked somehow happier now although you could tell that she cried a lot last night.
Chris said, “Good morning Lisa, How are you?”
Lisa said, “In a word, Tired, but the bed was very comfortable.”
Chris said, “Yeah, it is very comfortable and… why did you cry?”
Lisa looked away from Chris.
Lisa said, “Memories… I think that word sums a lost mother and a lost young brother, that I… will probably not ever see again. Anyway.” She looked at Chris again. “I am hungry, let’s eat something.”
I understood completely how she was feeling. After all, we all lost someone. She was trying to do what I taught her, forget about the past and concentrate on the future.
Chris said, “This food definitely tastes like home, I am amazed.”
Lisa said, “Yeah, I got this French toast and it is good, let me try some of yours you can try mine.”
Chris said, “Sure.”
It was a fact the aliens knew how to cook indeed.
Lisa said, “So… you got the hologram about the education?”
Chris said, “Yeah I got Area A17, what about you?”
Lisa said, “Area B09. Are you excited?”
Chris said, “Hehe, it’s been a while since I’ve been to school.”
Lisa said, “I wonder what they will try to teach us.”
Chris said, “I have no idea, but one thing is for sure. I am not going to obey blindly, I mean we don’t know their intentions. I want to learn more about this race and what their plans are. Only then I will be able to trust them.”
Lisa said, “Well, I don’t think they want to do harm to us. If that was the case, then why did they bother to rescue us?”
Chris said, “I hope you are right. It’s just that with the recent events, I feel like I cannot trust everybody so easily.”
Lisa said looking worried at the eyes of Chris, “So you don’t trust me?”
Chris said, “Lisa… with you it is different, I feel like I can trust you.”
Lisa smiled in relief.
Lisa said, “I need to be trusted by someone in here, and also, I need to trust someone too, I mean I am alone just like most of us, so it’s important to me.”
Lisa was very sincere and innocent about her feelings. She was neither shy nor afraid of saying what most of the people were probably thinking.
I smiled back at her. And we had a few moments of silence. It was easy to get lost in our thoughts, our memories, our ideas, a mix of fear with excitement. Our minds were filled with anxiety and we were so tired of having so many questions in our heads.
Chris tried to make some conversation to avoid the silence, “Well I was a little numb and tired too when I woke up this morning. But the shower sure helped me a lot.”
Lisa said, “Wait, shower, where did you take a shower?”
Chris laughed surprised about the answer.
After I explained about the shower button Lisa swore that the first thing she would do after coming back to her room, was to take a bath.
We finished our breakfast.
There was a container in the food court with a hole on the top so you could put things in it. Inside of the hole was some sort of light barrier covering the top, above the container a sign indicating to put your dishes in there. After you put the dishes in there a spark was generated inside of the container and then you could see how the dishes disintegrated.
We went outside. There were a lot of domes with signs of letters and numbers on the ground outside. The domes weren’t in there before so I assumed they were just installed.
Lisa said, “Well, I am going to look for B09. I’ll be seeing you.”
Chris said, “Sure, I have to go to A17, have a good day at school, hehe.”
Lisa seemed worried, “You too.”
I walked away to look for my area but Lisa stopped me.
Lisa said, “Chris…”
Chris said turning to Lisa, “Yes?”
Lisa said, “Mmm… Please be careful.”
Chris said “I will.”
Lisa said, “Bye.”
Lisa went away with a swift step.
After passing several Areas and exploring the surroundings I found area A17. I entered the Dome. Inside you couldn’t hear any sound of the exterior. The dome seemed to be of the same crystal-like material, similar to the door of my room. It had the same functionality that the one on my room had. The dome was big enough to garrison around 120 people with plenty of space to make some activities. Inside some men and women were waiting. There was a bunch of comfortable seats on the ground. The seats looked like pillows. They also had the capacity to be shaped in any form so you could be in the most comfortable position possible .
I sat down and waited for the class to start. After a while around five more people came to the Area and then finally the class started. A beam of light was flashed from the sky to the inside of the dome, from it the same being from the hologram in the morning appeared. After that the beam disappeared. The being looked strong and fit. He was carrying a sword on his back.
The being speaking telepathically said:
“Greetings I am Balk, I am a Norsak, I come from the planet Valhal. I am a Battle Chief rank B. This is the official form to present yourselves before the entire universe; remember it, name, species, home planet, and rank. Your rank is like your profession, currently all of you are Colonist. This planet will be your new home planet since you were forced to escape the former one. The name of this is Terra, also your real species name is Terran, I will explain this to you later so you can understand why this is so.
To present yourself you have to stand always if possible. You must speak in a straight position showing respect for the people you are presenting to and for yourself. Please present yourself.”
The being pointed at one of the women in the room.
The women stood and said, “I am Emma, I am a Terran, I come from Terra, I am a Colonist.”
Balk said, “Good, now the rest.”
One by one all of the people presented themselves. As my turn came I thought about the significance of not being called Humans but Terrans. The reason for that was more than a simple name.
Balk said, “Good, now we all know each other. Through all the universe races from different beliefs and genetics make contact very often with new races, and a lot of misunderstandings occur. Most of the time this is because of inadequate communication. We need to learn how to present ourselves with others, so others will know that even if perhaps we are not as advanced as they, we are rational and in possession of consciousness.
Many races will not hesitate to treat another race like a beast of burden or as an animal, just because that race doesn’t know how to speak for their kin. In the universe most of the races believe that this is a requisite to be considered an intelligent race; anything else can be considered as an animal.
So if you cannot express who you are, and you display fear of a different race just because you don’t know it, you are acting as an animal. Intelligent beings are not afraid of what they don’t know, but curious and eager to understand it. Also an intelligent being always explains what he represents showing that he possesses self awareness.”
Balk looked serious about it. And I agreed about that. How many times we were scared about things we didn’t know, acting like animals attacking it, or fleeing from it?
Balk said, “As I said I am a Battle Chief, that means that my path and destiny in this existence is to fight for what is right. Also this means that I have a proficiency in matters of battle and fighting.
Understand that I was chosen to teach all of you, because you also have this destiny and path, and also you possess this proficiency. And although you are not a Battle Chief yet you will be trained by me as a Battle Scout, and soon you will become better and better in that; so one day you will be a Battle Chief too.
And finally the reason why you have this destiny, is because your genetics, your blood. All of you have in your blood DNA of other species. You all have a part of the Norsak in you.”
Everyone remained silent after that short speech. I just wanted to hear more.
All my life I wanted to be free, I wanted to be strong, to look for the weak. I used to get excited by heroes and everything about fighting for the unjust. I loved kung fu and karate movies and I daydreamed about doing those fighting movements too. Nevertheless I always thought I was wrong and that I was wasting my time thinking about it. My life gave me a different kind of life. I had a very boring job, and I lacked physical conditioning to do any of those things. Anyway still… I always had that feeling waiting to jump out of my heart into my head. That feeling always waiting to take control of myself. I thought, “I don’t know if Balk is brainwashing us about that, or if he is deceiving us with such words… but… I want to believe in it… I want to believe that he is true”.
By HectorP