Three weeks. It took me three whole weeks to see Sphere Team Six. Magnus didn’t go into detail on what made them take so long. Whenever I asked, he would just look embarrassed and give some vague answer about them being very busy. I didn’t doubt they were busy if they were working on constructs that could terraform planets. Given my situation, anything at all would have been a nice update, even if it was the pjulsen equivalent of a middle finger and a slammed door in my face. Magnus insisted it was something about their secret science gathering needing more attention than was originally expected and taking longer than usual.
I wasn’t mad at Magnus, and I tried to tell him that. He had been nothing but kind and was quickly growing to best friend status for me right up there with Lori and Lizzy. He had custom clothes designed for me so I could wear things similar to what I had on Earth. He went out of his way to help get me shoes that worked for my bizarre human feet. He even helped describe my desired haircut to the hargon groomer, which ended up being something akin to a taper haircut, only cut a little shorter than usual at the top. It screamed “normal haircut” that I could manage without the grooming tools I was accustomed to on Earth. I couldn’t forget that he had a phone charger built for me so I could keep track of Earth time. He’d done more for me than I could have ever asked while never asking for anything in return. I wasn’t having any of that, so I made sure I busted my ass to get as many chores in his apartment taken care of.
But I was getting increasingly distraught over my chances of making it home. Every night, I looked at my phone and flipped through the pictures I had of my friends and family. When training with Sven was rough or I had a day where I felt lost, reminding myself of them helped me keep my goal in mind, even if it was agonizing how much I missed them. How could something so grounding be so brutal to look at? Every time I saw Rebecca’s green eyes and bright smile or Megan’s adorable, pinchable cheeks, it felt like my heart was being ripped out of my chest.
I knew the Spheres and the pjulsen who got their powers from them were significant cultural icons, more so than any actor, musician, or writer on Earth. So, I understood enough that I needed to respect the work the scientists were doing, but I did feel like I was being hung out to dry a little bit. None of that was Magnus’ fault, and we both knew that. That didn’t stop the guy from taking the blame himself for how long I had to wait. I still wasn’t good at tying my emotions off through our link, so no doubt he was getting some of that. I made sure to apologize to him for being moody and frustrated, apologies he, thankfully, accepted every time.
As far as I was concerned, all of that was water under the bridge the moment we met up with the scientists. We were both anxiously—no doubt caused by my own fluctuating emotional state—sitting in a futuristic laboratory. Instead of weird tubes and burners and cackling lunatics in dirty lab coats, it was a sleek room filled with computers. The team there was already aware I was an alien, but that didn’t stop them from freaking out a little when they finished up what they’d been working on and got to me. I’d gotten used to that reaction when the pjulsen saw me out in public. It didn’t matter who I was with. They always had that reaction if they were seeing me in person for the first time.
The leader of the team was a very tall lady who looked to be around Sven’s age. She carried herself with this calming, confident aura, almost like a cross between Abigail and Lizzy. Her skin and eyes were both hunter green, and she had markings all over her exposed arms that reminded me of freckles. The markings on her head were similar but darker and bigger. Magnus—telepathically, of course—insisted that she was hot and intimidating. Being human and in a relationship that I was very happy with, her being hot by pjulsen standards meant nothing to me. Plus, she seemed nothing but nice and friendly, not intimidating. After all, the name she gave me sounded way too much like Salisbury, so she said I could just call her Sally. Would an intimidating lady let me do that? I didn’t think so.
It was just us three, so Magnus was easily able to link our minds so we could understand each other. Without meaning to devalue her privacy, it was nice to have someone else be unaccustomed to Magnus’ Anomaly. We were both hit with each other’s memories, giving us a quick overview of what we’d dealt with in our lives. At least we could both share embarrassment over our awkward teenage years.
“Wow, your skin color is so odd,” Sally told me, looking at my left arm, including the scar that hadn’t healed much. She had asked for my permission before doing any touching, a gesture that didn’t go unnoticed or unappreciated by me.
“That’d be a pretty offensive thing to say on my planet,” I said, snorting to hold back a laugh.
She dropped my arm and covered her mouth, eyes wide with horror. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to offend.”
“No, no, I’m not offended. It’s just one of those things that would, uh, get you some funny looks if you said it on Earth.” I let her continue to examine me, even though she wasn’t my doctor. At that point, everyone on Clamor wanted a little time to poke and prod Ethan the Friendly Alien.
“I can’t believe I get to see an alien that doesn’t want to kill us!” She made a few little gestures with her hands that reminded me of short, happy claps back on Earth.
“Hey, same here. I’m glad none of you guys have tried to dissect me or feed me to your pets. You know, it’s been so nice here. It’s taken some of the edge off not being home.” I was slowly getting used to life on Clamor. I was very much an outsider and still felt like it, but with Magnus’ help, I was able to do things like buy groceries. I never thought I’d hit a point in my life where buying groceries was one of the hardest things I had to do.
“You’ve become a bit of a celebrity here. I think we’re all a little excited to have you as a guest on Clamor.” She winked at me, a small reminder of how many mannerisms our species had in common. “Well, let’s not keep you waiting any longer. I know you’ve been here for a while and I saw your little speech. We’re going to do everything we can to get you back home.”
I’d heard all that before plenty of times. Nice words, yes, but still just words. No progress had been made, so I kept my hope in check. It was a soul-crushing possibility that I would spend the rest of my life on Clamor, without any of my friends knowing that I was still alive, with me dying lightyears away from home. Hell, I didn’t even know if they were alive. I needed to believe they were to get through every day. I’d lose my mind and rip my hair out otherwise, another good reason why I got a haircut.
Still, I didn’t tell her that. Sally seemed as genuine as Magnus and Sven about getting me home, and she was the one who might have just been able to do it. No way in hell I was jeopardizing that by being a rude little teenager because I was feeling moody. My angst wasn’t any of her business nor was it her problem. If there was one problem of mine I was going to share with her, it wasn’t going to be how I felt. It was going to be me being stranded on Clamor.
“So, it’s my understanding you know a bit about the Spheres, yes?” When I nodded, she smiled. “Good, so you know that we’ve been making them for a few thousand years now and that we use them to terraform planets that we see as valuable in our expansion.”
“Yep, and one of those earlier ones must have made its way to Earth.” I still wondered how old that ball in the mountain was. It was a paradox of something utterly ancient and futuristic, both beyond what I could understand, at the same time.
“Bingo.” She held up a device that looked like a signature pad that a delivery guy would use. “This device will help us determine which Sphere gave you your powers.”
“How does that work?” I was a little scared that she would have to jab me and take a blood sample or something. Instead, she just set the device down next to me on the table. The child in me wanted to pick it up, play with it, and start hitting all sorts of buttons.
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“The real in-depth stuff is beyond most people on this planet. If I’m being candid with you, we’re playing with powers that we don’t understand still, even after those thousands of years of being able to make the Spheres. We’ve gotten better with it over the years, which is why we stopped sending Spheres out in bulk. We go to great lengths to tread carefully now.”
“Well, what can you tell me about how it works?” I looked down at the pad to see if I could decipher anything on the screen, but one glance at the symbols on there told me that was a wasted effort. Even with Magnus’ connection acting as a translation tool, the symbols still meant nothing to me.
“The Spheres are all sentient artificial intelligence. Every single one that’s been created, whether home on a planet or lost in the reaches of space, is fully sentient.” Sally paused to let me absorb that. After my interaction with the Earth Sphere, that didn’t come as a true shock to me. “The ‘battery’, so to speak, we give them is the result of the most complicated form of energy generation and storage on the planet. We discovered it thousands of years ago, and to date, we still haven’t found anything that tops it. It’s the cornerstone of our technological advancement over that time. When we first created the Spheres, we only intended for them to be simple AI helpers.”
“And something went wrong,” I concluded.
“And something went wrong,” Sally confirmed. “Well, maybe something went right, depending on how you view it. We have extensive recorded history of the Spheres and our scientific labors. And yet, no one can pinpoint why the Spheres end up as they do. Following the steps, and even altering them, we know how to create the Spheres. Despite our best efforts to this day, we don’t have a great understanding of them. We know that the power source for the Spheres gives them sentience, and it’s the same energy that gives everyone their powers. If you ask me, I think we tapped into fundamental, underlying powers of the universe. What makes things tick on a galactic scale is the same thing that gives the Spheres life, gives them their ability to terraform planets, and gives them the ability to give people powers.”
“Wow, you guys have really been playing God here.” I pictured a bunch of scientists who felt like they were on the verge of greatness before a sudden explosion occurred and left them with the first Sphere floating in the center of a ruined room, something that would change the course of two species’ trajectories forever.
“Our power is still nothing compared to God’s, but you’re right, we played with something we didn’t understand.” The fact that Sally also mentioned God probably should have had me raising more questions. I would have loved to see her discuss that with theologists back on Earth.
“I talked to the Sphere on Earth. I felt called to it. It...it was like nothing else mattered but touching it. So, I did just that. I touched it and I was taken to this weird void world. I don’t know how to describe it...abstract, maybe? Anyway, it appeared as my mother, which was a little weird. It said it needed help and was sending me here because only you guys can help fix it. I don’t know what I should have expected, but something did seem a little off about her. Like she was sick or a little loopy.” I frowned and shook my head. “It said it needed help and that humans didn’t have what it took to fix it. I guess that’s why I need you smart pjulsen scientists to get the job done.”
“When a Sphere is touched, the two parties often go to a ‘void world’ like you described. If the Sphere determines someone to be worthy to be its partner, anyway. The soul of the Sphere chooses what it thinks is best to appear as. There are no guarantees as to what appearance it’ll take. Since each Sphere has its own personality, some take a jovial approach to it. Sven’s was just a talking rock.”
Thinking she was just telling a joke, I chuckled a bit. The look in her eyes told me that she was serious and I nearly burst out in full laughter. Imagining the Great Defender of Clamor having to talk to a rock to gain his lightning powers was something I couldn’t take. Earth’s Sphere taking on the appearance of my mother was unsettling enough. At least it was still a person. If I had to talk to something like a deck chair or a car engine, I would have lost my mind right then and there.
“Anyway, that’s a little about how the Spheres themselves work. By the way, not a lot of people know that they’re actual, sentient intelligence, so that does not leave this room. People know we made a bunch, but if it got out that we’ve lost at least hundreds of thinking and feeling Spheres to the reaches of space, it wouldn’t go over well.” Sally leaned back against her desk, her fingers gripping the edge tightly. Her lips pursed into a thin, tight line.
“Is that why you stopped making so many?”
“Precisely. That, and with fewer Spheres, it’s easier to limit who gets powers. After the mess with the Nebula Quartet, we’re doing everything we can to avoid a repeat incident.” Right as the device next to me beeped, Sally pulled it and examined it, her eyes darting back and forth while she read the symbols that looked like gibberish. “But, since they’re all sentient and unique, do you know what that means?”
I shook my head. I didn’t know how the history lesson I’d received would help. It was like when Sven gave me the lore of his entire people in my jail cell. Some of it just went in one ear and right out the other.
“They’re all unique. Like DNA profiling, each Sphere has energy that can be traced. Each person that gains their power from a Sphere shares that same ‘energy DNA’ with their Sphere. So, for example, if we tested Sven and Clamor’s Sphere for their energy signatures, they’d match up.” Sally stopped reading her device to smile. “You’re practically glowing with its power, so all we have to do is match it to the Sphere we sent to your planet, and we’ll know which one it was.”
I jumped up and wrapped Sally in my arms for a hug. I had no idea what came over me. I’d mostly moved past my issue with touching people, or people touching me, through sheer force of will, but what I did was still uncharacteristic. I just couldn’t help it. This lady had given me the first bit of real hope of returning I’d seen. I felt like if I didn’t grab that hope, it would slip away from me, never to be seen again.
But that didn’t stop me from realizing how awkward I made everything.
“Sorry,” I said, clearing my throat and pulling away. I brushed off the front of my shirt, trying to make it look like it was no big deal. I reflexively went to run my hand through my hair before I remembered most of it was gone. So much for keeping that nervous habit of mine.
“It’s okay, I understand.” Her voice was warm, but also tense, like she had some bad news to deliver. “I...I don’t want to burst your bubble, but I can’t make promises based on what I have here. Yes, there’s a very high chance we can find out which Sphere was the one that landed on Earth. It’s a doable task, though it’ll take some time as our methods for recording energy signatures have changed over the centuries. The biggest issue will be locating the Sphere. So, unless you’re an expert at celestial navigation, we’ll still have to find Earth across the galaxy. As advanced as we are at space travel, locating a specific planet is a tall task.”
I tried not to let how crushed I was show on my face or in my body language. Yeah, I did a bad job of that. It would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack, except the haystack expands lightyears. “The Sphere sent me here no problem.”
Sally mournfully shook her head. “I’m not sure how your Sphere did that, Ethan. It might have used most of its power for it. There could have been a malfunction that enabled it to do so by drawing on more energy than its design parameters intended. There could have been something special about how that one was built given how old it is. I won’t know until I read into the Sphere itself. Even then, I might not have a concrete answer for you.
“Depending on when the Sphere was launched, we could be looking for an energy trail that’s multiple millennia old. We have faster-than-light travel, but it’s still a shot in the dark to even find Earth from here. I swear to you on my mother’s grave, I am going to do everything I can to fix this. You were caught up in a mess your people had no business being in. We won’t tolerate not making it right. I will help you, Ethan.”
The confidence radiating off her was infectious. I looked Sally hard in the eyes and was truly convinced she’d be the one to get me back home. Her determination reminded me of Shelly when she set her mind to something. She was so sure of herself, so confident that nothing would stop her, I just had to believe in it too. Right there, I understood why Magnus said she was intimidating. If that confidence had been turned around for something a little scarier, she would be a force to be reckoned with. She reminded me of Shelly in that way.
“Sally, thank you so much. This is the first silver lining I’ve had here. If you get me back home, I’m sending you a gift basket of the finest Earthly things I can find.” I couldn’t help myself. I gave her another hug. She returned it with her long arms.
“Oh, if I get you back to Earth, I’m collecting it personally.” Sally pulled back and grinned. “If that Sphere needs help, I’ll be the one to help it. A pit stop to collect some off-world goodies would just complete the trip.”