Chapter One: Visitation

I was on Hwy 18, just turning onto old 218- Avenue of the Saints, in northern Iowa. I was watching the wind turbines disappear behind me. They were a new invention of the past decade, and I still loved to watch them turn in the wind.  

I was going 70 miles an hour when my car stopped. And I literally mean stop. Let me tell you, it’s a strange feeling to be cruising along at 70 miles an hour and then to just stop. No inertia. No back whip. I sucked in a breath of air in shocked surprise, eyes widening. What in the-

            I was no longer on the sunny highway. I felt a rush of air from my open window and a sizzle. I felt stretched, and then nothing, just blackness all around me. I looked around, trying to make some since out of what had just happened. I felt like I was in an enclosed space, but couldn’t tell for sure. As I stared out my driver’s side window, I noticed a figure coming towards me. He seemed odd, humanoid but not human. I took a deep breath, trying to calm my nerves. It was an alien. I was surprised at how quickly I was putting these strange facts together. Thankfully, fear had not yet surfaced; I could feel it, though, bubbling beneath my stomach.

“Please shut off your engine and disembark. We will not harm you.” He said in broken English. I looked at my dashboard, realizing my car was still operating at 70 miles an hour. Cruise control, I thought, my eyes widening further yet. I weighed my options quickly, and decided I should turn off my car. I turned the key, removing them out of habit, and taking my purse before looking out the window again.

The alien had stopped a few yards from my side of the car, watching me with curiosity. It was still dark all around us. I couldn’t see where the walls were, but I knew they were there. There was just enough light to make the alien out. It stood on two legs, eye’s lightly larger than I had seen before, average height, I suppose, from my position, anyway. Its head had two bulges on either side, showing coarse hair. His mouth, I could see that it was a male now- he had no lips, same appearance as a human with the exception of no lips.

He was watching me, watching my reactions to this strange place. “Please disembark- we will not harm you.” He repeated in a soft voice. We? I thought, unbuckling my seatbelt, while trying to see if there were others in the blackness behind him. What do they want? I slowly stepped out of the car, wincing as the overhead light came on. My breath quickening, I tried to take slower breaths.

“Sorry I’m late, Niro.” A man said from somewhere behind the alien. The alien nodded in acknowledgement at the voice, never looking away from me.

A new figure emerged from behind the alien- Niro, I guessed. A human. I felt a bit of relief at a familiar sight. He was dressed in a military uniform that I hadn’t seen the design of before. He had dark hair and statuesque features, Roman nose, gorgeous brown eyes and a nice mouth that seemed easy to grin. Boys actually scare the bajizzas out of me, so this did not help.

“Where am I?” I asked in a small voice, pitifully clutching my purse and the car door at the same time, as though they could give some sort of strength.

“You materialized her without me?” The man said to Niro, stepping up to me. He placed one hand against my face while he studied me, “It’s ok, and you’re among friends.” He said softly, “Medics!” he then, called over a shoulder, “Don’t worry, it’s just part of protocol. Transporting her without me, however, is not.” He said looking at Niro. A small group of medical personnel came out of the blackness, carrying medical cases. The medic group consisted of two aliens of Niro’s species and human female, not much older than me with curly red hair done up in braids. The man stepped back to allow them by.

They came over and began scanning me with digital devices, “99.9, a little high for a human, but to be expected.” One alien commented, putting the information down in a sort of computerized notepad.

“What’s your name?” The girl with curly hair asked me, shinning a bright light in my eyes.

“Anya Banks.” I said without pause, watching the man and that alien, Niro, converse softly behind them.

“How do you feel, Anya?”

“I’m fine,” I said, starting to feel a bit harassed. The girl smiled, gently, and then jabbed me in the arm with what must have been a needle, except it didn’t leave a mark, “What was that?” I asked.

“Vaccinations and a mild sterilization- Captain, she’s fine. Just make sure she gets a thorough examination in the med room before she departs.” The man nodded, walking back over to us as the medics picked up their things to leave.

“Sorry for being rude, we usually follow a better protocol.” The man commented.

“I did learn from the last solo attempt, Nathan.” Niro said, from behind the man.

“Doesn’t make a difference now, Anya was it?” I nodded, licking my lips and taking slow careful breaths, “Well, Anya, I am Captain Nathan Crossbark. This is Niroconoconolaby from the galaxy Ares; we call him Niro for short. And we are all aboard the sub-station Burbank.”

“Burbank?” I asked, “Over the earth? I’ve never heard of it.”

“That’s because it’s classified by the UN. We’re a sort of secret organization, and because it’s hidden to look like a satellite.” Nathan said, taking my arm and gently led me away from my car.

“Wait,” I said, digging my heels into the ground, “What is going on here? How did I get here? I was driving on Highway 218- going 70 miles an hour, no less! Aliens and humans working together? In some, some sort of secret organization?” I said trying to keep the growing hysteria out of my voice, “What- is Star Trek some kind of actual conspiracy theory?” I had to giggle just a bit at that thought, oh, how all the trekkies would love this.

“Moxy- Good. You’ll need that, that and an easy since of humor.” Nathan commented, pulling my arm toward the blackness, “But, really, Anya. They need to sterilize your car and place it in storage. Don’t worry; it’ll be kept safe for you. Might be a bit out of date when you get back, though” He said in a lower voice, “Let’s walk and Niro and I will answer all of your questions.”

“But how did you transport me without anyone noticing?”

“Micro-simulacrum, switched your car with that. It’ll appear like you in your car, and then just turn onto a side road and once it’s in a safe spot, transport back here.” Nathan said, leading me and Niro through the darkness, to the wall that I hadn’t been able to see before. He stopped and pushed a button that I hadn’t noticed, part of the wall disappeared to make a doorway.

“What is that?” I asked curiously looking at the panel. It had three buttons, marked with symbols. The top, an o, middle a c, and the bottom a filled in o.

“Controls for the door,” Nathan explained, pointing to the symbols, “top from bottom; open, ajar, and closed- if it’s closed, there appears to be no door, just wall, ajar, you can see a visible door, but no entry without invitation, open, you know, just open.” We walked through the door, Nathan with his arm around mine.

Probably to keep me moving, I thought, “But how?” I asked, looking back at Niro, closing the door.

“Great,” Nathan remarked, sighing, “curious as a kitten.”

“The door is Phelpian technology.” Niro said, walking behind us, “That is where I am from. You will see that much of the equipment aboard is. Phelp is located in Palaoxy Sector 3 of the Palaoxininidia Galaxy.” The hallway we were walking through was all white metal, with columns every few yards.

“Huh, interesting,” I said, not sure what else to say, “So… why am I here?”

“Well, I should start with saying that I am human,” Nathan replied as we walked, “I was born in New York, in 1910.”

“What? But that means you’re what? Almost 100 years old? No way.” I said, looking at him, he appeared about 30 to me.

“Yes, way.” He said, with a touch of laughter in his voice, “Sorry, I sometimes have trouble adjusting to the new eras, fads and trends are always changing. Sometimes it’s hard to keep up.”

“The Captain was one of the first humans we brought aboard.” Niro commented.

“Yes, and I was in the army at the time. You were lucky I didn’t have a gun on me at the time,” He said looking at Niro, and then back at me, leaning down, “I freaked out.” I had to laugh at that, I might have been close, but I hadn’t freaked out. “The Phelpian people were able to calm me down and explained matters to me. They come from a race that is telepathic and empathetic. They gain insight and wisdom by helping other cultures.”

“Yes,” Niro said, beside me now, “We have been studying matters with earth for quite a while, and decided we should intervene before you destroy yourselves. Humans have potential to do so much good. You actually remind us a lot of Phelpians and their ancestors.

“We devised a plan to help you help yourselves; find humans with the potential for low level telepathy, bring them unto our kin, teach them how to help fellow humans, and help a little with their evolution before matters get out of hand.”

“So, this is like a school or a training camp or something?” I asked. We had stopped at a large window that showed the earth down below. The actual facts of this situation were finally settling on me. I had never been in space before, nowhere near the education needed to be an astronaut. I could see the sun slightly to the side of the earth, the moon to the right, and below that, the earth- wisps of clouds in some areas and the blue, blue sea. It’s easy to forget that the earth has so much water. It was so beautiful.

“Not exactly,” Nathan replied, also looking at the blue planet, “Burbank is the introductory base. Harmony is more like a school, but only to train you for working with the Phelpians and to use their and our modified technology. We give you a choice, if you choose to return to earth, than we would have to give you partial amnesia, for obvious reasons.”

“Why would anyone say no?” I asked, surprised. This was sounding like an amazing adventure that I would love to take part in.

“Well, there’s a bit of a downside,” Nathan said, resuming walking, “remember how I said I was born in 1910?”

“Yeah, I was wondering about that.” I said, watching his face.

“Well, this project is long-term. The Phelpians came up with the idea to add resveratrol and alien chemicals to our air supple. Nothing harmful. If anything, very healthy, it promotes an extremely slow break down of human cells, so that it's almost as though we're in a type of stasis.” He said, looking at me when I made a concerned squint, “The food that we eat is very healthy compared to what a lot of humans are eating, and in the program- we call it the Harmony Project, you have to have a regular exercise routine.”

“I suppose that means smoking is out of the question.” I said, “Yes I smoke cigarettes, in fact, I would love one right now.”

“Oh,” Nathan said, surprised, “Sorry. Actually, you’re not the first; I guess I just wouldn’t take you as a smoker. We actually have a very good anti-smoking plan.” He said, walking up to a box that I had noticed was spaced along the walls every 50 feet or so. He opened it; the case looked like a giant futuristic first aide case.

“First aide?”

“Yup, but each one has various medical supplies for different scenarios. I’ll just need to program the supple list to add another dose. Here we go,” He said pulling out what appeared to be a patch; “I like to call this nico-destratos.”

“Nicotine distractions?” I asked, taking the patch. It looked like a round nicotine patch.

“It’s actually a Narcotic Dissipation Application.” Niro said, “Our scientists came out with them a few decades ago, when we noticed smoking cigarettes was becoming an addictive habit among humans. They allow your mind to think of other subjects whenever you want a cigarette or other addictive substances.”

“Hm,” I said, peeling off the back and sticking to my arm. It immediately became invisible. “What?” I said, feeling the area. It was still there, I just couldn’t see it. I heard a chuckle, and looked at Nathan was accusation.

“What? They have clear nicotine patches on earth, right?” He said, laughing.

“This isn’t the same thing. Where did it go?”

“Ah, well." Nathan began coughing, when he noticed Niro watching him.

“You will have to pardon the Captain,” Niro said, “He’s very good at his job, but at bit silly at times.”

“Really, Niro,” He replied, “and you can call me Nathan.” He said to me, “Did that help?”

“Did what help?” I asked, confused at the change of subject.

“Exactly. Now, the lift.” We had reached another invisible door.

“What do you call these, anyway? Doors?”

“Oh, you can call them doors if you want,” Nathan said leading me into the lift, “They are called screens, for the most part, since that is what they appear to be. You know where the screens are by the edges, see? They kept cracks so you can still see them, that and the panel controls.” He pointed along the edges; there were cracks I hadn’t noticed before, hardly noticeable. “That’s so when you are in your housing units, you can have a feeling of privacy.”

We stepped into the lift, Niro pushed a button and we began moving. Rainbows of colored lights flew by as we moved upwards, “And what of this ‘long-term project’?” I asked, “You never finished saying- with these chemicals, does that imply we stopped aging?”

“Well, the chemicals in our air-supply and other factors have just slowed our aging. The Phelpians are only affected on a low scale; humans are affected 98% of the time.”

“And side effects?” I asked, thinking I was breathing foreign chemicals into my lungs right that second.

“Oh, a few Phelpians and humans have shown minor side effects, but, so far, once you go through your pre-evo-examination, they are able to make them unnoticeable, and then your body will adjust accordingly within the first year. But the fact is, this project will require your attention for at least 30 more years, and in that time, you will not be able to revisit Earth.” Nathan said, as the lift stopped and led me out. We were now in a sort of common room; I saw other humans and phelpians walking about, offices and other rooms to the sides.

“What about my family and friends?” I asked, startled.

“You will have to let them go for now, they will worry, call the police, but never find you. You will become a missing person.” Nathan said, turning toward me and putting his hands on my arms, “You have to find a way to deal with that loss, and once this project is over, and we’re ready for phase two, introducing phelpians to human society, then you can look up any living members of your family. This is all optional, of course. As I said before, if you choose not to join our Harmony, then your memory will be wiped, and we will leave you back where you came from.”

“I won’t even be able to say good bye?” I asked, looking down. The gravity of this situation was really hitting me now, and I could feel those darn bubbles of anxiety and fear again, and a sense as though the floor was rushing up to my head.

“No, you can’t. They can’t know where you are or what we are doing. When this project first started in 1928, we thought it all through, tried to come up with a cover story for our participants. But, it always fell through. The parents would want to see their child, the lovers to be together, friends to know where you really were. We can give you 24 hours to think things through and look around Burbank. Tomorrow morning, if you choose to join Harmony, we’ll set you up with any personal items from your car and you’ll go through the pre-evo exam, make sure your ready for Harmony.” I nodded as he talked, thinking about what I had heard and seen so far, “Ah, this is Naira,” Nathan said as a bouncy blonde girl came up beside me, taking my hand.

“Hi! You’re the new recruit! I can’t wait to show you around!” Wow, I thought, really bouncy.

“Naira, this is Anya Banks. She just arrived on Transo 3.  Naira is one of the HR interns at the moment, " he said, turning toward me, "Anya my office is right over there,” he pointed to a room to our right, next to what appeared airport screens, “Naira is going to be your guide while you’re staying at Burbank. In the morning, after breakfast, I’ll need to know your decision. Naira, we'll need her here at 0900 hours.” Naira nodded, looking down at me with a huge smile, as Nathan continued, “Ok, glad to have you aboard. See you later, kiddo.” With that last remark he turned around and headed for one of the other offices.

“Anya Banks.” I turned to see Niro right beside me, “It was a pleasure meeting your acquaintance. I look forward to working with you.” He gave a small nod of his bulgy head, and walked by.

“Oh, yeh!!!” Naira exclaimed, pulling me down the corridor to a set of double ‘screens’, “I thought they’d never bring you down!”

“Sorry, I guess I was a bit confused at first,” I said, trying to decide how to handle this new girl who was apparently taking me hostage.

“Oh, no, no, no! Don’t you even worry about it! I just get a bit high-strung sometimes. What do you want to see first? The library, or the cafeteria, or, oh, wait! I know!” We walked down another hall, except this was light green in color. “Oh, I bet your noticing the colors! I’ve been practicing my telepathy, like Master Gigo said. Each floor on Burbank has a different color; white for the Transportation areas, lime for Administration, charcoal for the supplies, medical and food areas, brown for housing and recreation. Harmony is colored, also.”

The walls were lime, so I supposed that was administration we had just been. We passed by more offices, some held humans, but for the most part, I saw phelpians. After a few moments of silence I began noticing the girl was humming, ‘Hmm, Hm, Hmm, Hmmm!’ Wow, I thought, perfect case of classic ADD.

“Really, Anya,” Naira remarked as we came to a new lift and walked in, “They’ll need to give you private tutoring to keep that mind of yours quieter! I can’t believe Niro or Nathan didn’t say anything.”

“What? You heard that… sorry, didn’t mean to be rude. Wait. Niro and Nathan could hear me before?” I said, defiantly feeling as though my personal thoughts had been disturbed, my first thought of Nathan came to mind, “Isn’t it a bit rude on your part, though? It’s not like I’m used to having everyone be able to read my mind.”

“You’re right, sorry for that. I’ll try not to hear what you are thinking- it’s just so hard when I’m being trained to do so, and then we get a very easy reader aboard... And, don’t worry about Nathan- he’s cute enough, but doesn’t really date- authority and all.”

“Oh, I wasn’t.” I said, a bit embarrassed, “Don’t they teach you how to close it off, though? I mean, if you will be going back to earth in a few decades, then everyone down there will be like a loud voice in your head- and you almost sound like we're being trained as spies.. that's not what Captain Nathan and Niro said.”

“Oh no, no- sorry. Every trainee gets trained on the basics of telepathy- to encorage enlightenment, but we're also trained in mental blocking and that sort of stuff.” she said, looking down, blushing, “I’m actually still in training… so we probably haven’t gotten to that yet. Right now everyone who isn't trained to block is an open book for me."
The colored lights were flying by, again. “Are those lights for the different floors, then?” I asked, wanting to change the subject.

“Oh, yes. There are also lights for the engineering areas and other spots on the satellite, I haven’t taken that class yet, so I’m not sure which is which.”

“Tell me about the classes.” I asked, curious, “Nathan said Burbank wasn't a school?”

“It's not, Harmony is more like a school- but it's more like job training." She said giggling, "We do need a base of knowledge for working with Harmony... You will love classes! Well, maybe not all of them, but you get to take Environmental Science, and Intergalactic Diplomacy, Mental Stress, First Flight, and a bunch more.”

“First Flight?” I said, looking at her startled, “You mean we get to learn how to fly? Air planes or what?”

“Of course! It’s part of Harmonies basic training. We’ll need to be capable of any of the  satellites or ships responsibilities. You’ll need to take the introductory class, but the more advanced ones are optional.”

“That is really cool.” I said as we stepped out of the lift onto a new corridor, this time brownish in color.

“Yup, the intro classes take around 3 years to complete- but don't worry, most of them really are interesting, and we have to learn certain protocols before we can actually help work within Harmony. After that you can choose to take advanced classes and intern with in the areas that you excel in. Total education takes about 10-15 years, depending on all the areas your interested in and the amount of time it takes to interen- a regular internship is for at least 1 year. 
"Right, before I forget, here’s a map of Burbank,” Naira said giving me a small oval shaped controller, it looked a bit like a pda and a walkie-talkie mixed in two. “It’s a PIC- Personal Information Consultant; this one is the limited guest version, since you aren’t actually a member of Harmony yet. But you’ll get the up graded one tomorrow when you tell Nathan you’ll be joining. Also, you can communicate with me and other supervisors on board- like Nathan.” She said winking.

I opened the PIC, it seemed fairly easy to figure out, there were only two icons, one that said ‘Burbank’, and was obviously the map, and another that said ‘contacts’. “You can’t know that I will say yes to all this,” I said, looking up and realizing we had stopped in front of a door, “Where are we now?”

“Why don’t you check your PIC,” Naira said, grinning.

I clicked on the Burbank icon, it immediately asked me if I wanted my current location or to find a location. Current, I pushed. The map came up, showing that I was in the Housing and Recreation Area; we stood right in front of a door labeled, “Zero Gravity Room”.

“Zero gravity?” I said, looking up from the small screen, “As in, no gravity?”

“Yup,” Naira said, pushing on the screen control panel, “I just need to see if there is anyone using this room right now, if there is, there is another one on the other side of this hall.”

“Well, that sounds really interesting,” I said, trying to figure out why I’d love this, “But why is it that we’re here?”

“Anya, its zero gravity! You’ll have a bunch of fun, hang on,” she finished pushing buttons on the panel, and the screen opened to an entry room. We stepped in. “You probably didn’t know about the time change, but here, it’s almost 2200 hours- 10 pm, so there usually aren’t many people using these rooms at this time.”

In the entry room, or prep room, as Naira put it, we set aside loose items, and my purse that I was still carrying. Then she opened the zero gravity room and closed the door, the room began depressurizing, and we started floating. It was more fun than I had originally thought. The zero-g room wasn’t empty, either; there was an area to play sports games, a cabinet that held balls and straps on the ceiling that you could attach to your belt loops to bounce around a bit. Naira and I decided to just bounce around.

After a while, Naira called it quits, saying she was finally worn out. I was still on central time zone, about 3 in the afternoon, for me.

“Remember, you need to be up for your appointment with the Captain at 0900 tomorrow morning. I’ll show you to guest quarters.”

“Oh, I don’t have any bathroom supplies or pajamas.” I said, wanting home comforts.

“The guest rooms all have accommodations for that kind of thing- you know, you can make your own clothing. I mean nothing you’ll want to do tonight. But you can design your own pajamas for tonight.” Naira said as we gathered our items from the prep room and walked back out to the hallway.

“I can make my own clothing? That is so cool-how does it work?”

“I’ll show you.” Naira said leading me down the hall, after passing a few screens, she came to one that had a number 4 on the control panel, “Now, these have DNA recognition, you can just push the open button, and if you have clearance, it’ll open. They collected your DNA on that first medical exam, you probably weren’t aware of it but also scanned you for viruses and did a general sterilization.”

“Wow, I didn’t know. Shouldn’t they have told me what they were doing?”

“Well, maybe, but the Digital Medical Scanner- or DMS, I know a lot of new words. You’ll get used to them. The DMS, does a bunch of stuff within a few milliseconds, so it’s impossible to say what at the time until they analyze the data, they know immediately if you’re carrying anything harmful.” Naira pushed the open button, the screen shifted up, disappearing, “I have clearance to your room, since I’m your guide for now.” She said leading me into the room. It was larger than I had thought; a double bed to the right, bathroom, a small kitchenette, a desk, and a window that showed stars twinkling millions of miles away.

“Ok, so pj’s,” Naira walked over to the desk as I sat my purse down and went to check out the small kitchen. That was surprising, also. Naira pushed a couple buttons on a panel on the desk, and a computer screen rose from the surface.

“Nice. There are so many things on board that I love.” I said walking over to look over her shoulder. She typed in GUEST, and logged in, from the main screen, there was an icon marked ‘Boutique’.

“Since you’re a guest, you have more limited actions with the network, but Boutique still has a lot to choose from. Take a look in the ‘Sleep-ware’ folder, once you have found what you want, the colors and sizes, just select Create. You’re new clothes will come out of this dispenser.” She said, pointing to a niche in the side of the desk.

“Ok,” I said, pulling back the chair and started to look around the Boutique program, “where does it come from, though?”

“A bunch of tiny aliens working double time down below- kidding" she said, laughing, I grinned and watched as she showed me how the system worked, "we have storage areas of clothe, different materials. Once you select the outfits you like, a robotic system takes them and sews them together. It’s a quick process, takes maybe ten minutes on the most complicated of orders. We gain the inventory with the phelpian trade routes and with part of our contract with the UN- so there’s material you probably have never heard of before, I’d suggest just staying with what you know for tonight, though, you can experiment on Harmony, or on the trip over. You can place orders to be delivered, also. That, and after you get used to the system, you can input specific features and sizes that fit you comfortably.”

I finally decided on some plain cotton shorts and tank top, both pin-striped blue.
"Before I go," Naira said, "one more cool thing. All of our bases are enhanced with voice commands. Were you ok with this tempurature?"
"It's a bit warm, I guess- I ususually sleep better when its cooler out."
"Ok, how's 60 degrees Fareinheit sound?" I nodded in acceptance, "Command Burbank- room tempurature control. 60 degrees Farenheit. Out Burbank." There was a beeping sound and then a women's voice said, "Accepted. Room tempurature 60 degrees Farenheit"
"Wow," I said looking around, and noticing cool air being moved into the room, "Thre is a lot I'm going to need to get used to." Naira just smiled and said  good-night and said she’d see me bright and early in the morning. The guest room was nice, especially because it reminded me of a hotel room, and that it had features like a hotel room; an alarm clock, small coffee makers, a directory with maps and phone numbers on it. The phone numbers were different; they all started with letters and then numbers, A-25-6658-23 or F-66-8459-42.

After a few minutes of wandering around, checking out the bathroom and getting small things ready for the next morning, I changed and got into bed, thinking about the dramatic events that had happened just a couple hours ago. Was it really just a couple hours? It felt like days. Could I really not say good-bye to loved ones, and stay here? Did I want to be part of this project, have to take classes again for years and years? School seems almost never-ending.

These thought floated around in my mind, until my eyes felt heavy and I couldn’t keep them open. My last thought before I fell to sleep was; this is unbelievable.