Chapter 3: Encounters of the Interdimensional Kind (Prologue 3)
At the same time as the Movie
Zootopia Year P.E. (Post-Evolution) 2062
Earth Year A.D. (Anno Domini) 2016
Location: Cliffside Asylum, Zootopia.
Time: 1:09 am
It was well past midnight when the lone limousine silently slid into the tiny parking lot, several wolf guards already scrambling over to open the door and show the mayor around. The car door lined with extra armour for protection bolted open, and a tall, muscular lion in an expensive suit emerged from the comfort of the vehicle apartment. His name was Lionheart, the first predator in the city's history to be entrusted with the title of mayor. He was now the most powerful mammal for miles around. The sheer delight of the amount of power he had at his fingertips was enough to make him tingle…..he had the power to make anybody in the city disappear without trace(not that any citizen was to know about it, of course). The commander of the guard saluted stiffly as the gates opened, and the mayor was welcomed into the facility. The lion walked as vainly as though he were the main actor in a play, not casting a single glance at the dozens of minions swarming around him.
This wasn't his first visit. Lionheart was exactly the one who had authorized the confiscating of the Asylum and adapting it to government means…..turning it over to the very institution devoted to researching the unknown, the ZERB. Sure, their original goal had been to research other things, but their massive amount of resources and personnel meant that they could easily adapt to any form of work that was destined to be firmly concealed from the public eye. He was well aware that the guards accompanying him at the moment, save the few he had brought from his urban office, all belonged to the ZERB, instead of other organizations such as his trusted ZPD. He knew Bogo dearly, and had been friends with him at a young age due to their father's close connections. Yet he was still not prepared to tell him everything he knew, everything the city had kept hidden from its people.
He secretly pondered whether if the ZERB was becoming a threat. He understood perfectly that they were an independent governmental organization, perfectly capable of functioning on its own. Moreover, the ZERB still possessed a huge amount of money accumulated from the decades of taxpaying, the huge quantity of resources so willingly devoted to the development of Energy-14 by the government itself. Yet after 45 years, what had become of the project? Even Lionheart himself merely had a vague idea. What the ZERB was messing around with he almost had no hand in.
His thoughts continued to overwhelm him as he proceeded into some containment room, observing the dozens of savage predators chained behind the extra-thick glass as if they were some bizarre exhibit in an exotic carnival. Deep down inside his heart, the mighty lion began to tremble. He was tampering with things he should not be touching. When was his turn going to be, being one of the most prominent predators in the city? He had already tried his best to update his security measures, never letting the media show him in public, recruiting taste-testers etc….but all these cures did nothing to kill the nervousness that was chained to his conscious.
He became increasingly annoyed with the doctor, his stammering turning into some sort of unwanted and unnecessary buzzing of a distant insect. Out of the blue, he just snapped, unable to bottle in his emotions anymore.
"Enough! I don't want any excuses, doctor, I want answers!"
"Please, Mayor Lionheart, we're doing everything we can."
"I ain't see nothing but your stupid power reactors out west! Seriously, when was the time you guys did something useful?"
Little did they know a certain sly bunny and dumb fox were videotaping everything they said.
The next thing the mayor knew was that he was being hustled out of the room, his guards forming a shield all around him and yelling something frantically that he was uninterested in finding out. An assassination attempt. It had to be. He long since had access to the real information of what had happened to the previous others…
"Security, sweep the area!" the doctor ordered on his radio.
The doors on his limousine slammed and before long his vehicle was kicking up the dust of a highway miles away, finally a safe distance from the Asylum. He sighed and wiped his brow. He was positive he had heard a few beeps next to him back in the containment facility. What had it been? Was it the time to consider the ZERB a threat more than an asset?
Back in the safety and comfort of his office, Mayor Lionheart was just trying to finish up a few more reports on his computer before going off to bed when one of his express phones rang. It was a private number. Nobody but the ZERB and a couple of others had any knowledge of it. He groaned as he picked up the receiver.
"Yes? Have you got my answers yet?" he demanded rudely.
"Sir? This is Project Gotterdammerung calling. We just received reports of an assassination attempt in the containment facility, we…"
The mayor swore under his breath. Operation Gotter-whatever-rung was killing the profit he earned. In the past few years it had become more of a liability than of an asset, a project he could no longer place his faith in. Would it be too late to take action, to terminate this pest which hindered his path onto wealth and fame?
"Don't tell me something I know, private. I was just going to bed when you losers interrupted me. Finish your business and leave me in peace."
"Sir, it's the power lines. We're doing another demonstration in 15 minutes. This time should work."
"You mean you're mining the Helium-3 again?"
"Uhh….yes sir." the private on the other end chewed on his paw. Good soldiers should not be lying to their superiors.
"For your personal safety we advise you not to attend, sir," he continued, "Just sleep tight with your guards. There may be a power cut a few minutes later. I'm merely saying that it's perfectly normal in the procedure, sir, it's been expected and the power should be up again in a jiffy."
"Damn, ZERB, you gotta get it right this time."
"We definitely will…"
"Or before you know it I'll send my guards over and smash up whatever shit you've got in that foxhole!" He slammed the phone down furiously.
Above him the lights to the office flickered and dimmed. Mayor Lionheart shut off his computer and decided to call it a night instead. He did not intend to mess with whatever shit the ZERB was coming up with….it was just an obstacle in his career.
Before he could do anything the huge doors to his office slammed open. Dozens of ZPD officers swarmed into his office, tranquilizers raised and pointed at him. What the hell was happening? Come on, where was the respect he deserved? His guards stood next to him protectively, their paws already on their holsters.
Mayor Lionheart motioned for them to not to resist, and went willingly towards the guards. It wasn't going to take long.
~300 Miles Away~ (Power Station E-14)
The panther put down his phone in shock. It wasn't the first time the mayor had threatened to close down the project, but for some reason it felt the most realistic. He...he was nervous for his future, for how the government and mayor would react to what they had been building in the facility all along.
He was the son of one the earliest generations of the ZCID, the investigation group beholding even more power than the ZPD. As his father died, all the knowledge of the Incident and Project Gotterdammerung had been passed down to him. He had been welcomed into the ZERB'S circle, fresh new blood to be used and relied upon. He was now doing things he could not even tell his wife….they were actually trying to open a portal! A wormhole to possibly another dimension, or even another time in the distant past or future.
He rubbed his temples, trying to banish the mind-boggling facts that always bothered him. Their scientific knowledge of the world was primitive, barely sufficient to understand how all the existing power of all the power stations in the city combined could be connected together and used to increase the transparency of the portal, the condition needed in order for anything to be transferred interdimensionally. As one of the project's scientists he knew the portal was only 15% open in terms of interdimensional transparency, only 3% more than what it had been 20 years ago when they turned to the development of the portal instead of mining the Helium 3.
He put on his radio headphones and listened for his orders. In a few minutes, they were going to unlock the power and energy lines from the city to the facility, disabling all electrical functioning in the metropolis and instead transferring all of the energy to feed the ZERB's needs. It wasn't safe of course, to negotiate and even reveal their existence to either other government institutions or the public. So they had just sent teams of engineers to alter the lines slightly, adapting them to their own use little by little. It was fully ready by now.
Their mission was to increase the transparency of the portal to at least 30% tonight, enabling a long-term foothold on the wormhole. This was the initial part of the Project that they had envisioned for so long. Radio messages could get through by 35%, solid matter by 55%. Organic matter had to wait all the way up to 75%, and inevitably use up a massive amount of energy for every transfer. Naturally, they also had to wait for the safety of the wormhole to be confirmed-The panther smiled to himself, they could always find some test subjects though…
He had carefully calculated the amount of energy they needed. Without any assistance in the form of power from the other side, the entire amount of electricity generated by the power stations alone was barely enough to send the transparency up to 35%. What really was tempting to the scientists was that, the electrical current leftover was still sufficient to keep the portal running for an indefinite amount of time.
The scientist looked at his screen. The countdown had begun. The numbers began to flash before his eyes. 10, 9, 8, 7...he shut his eyes and waited. Project Gotterdammerung rested on this fateful moment.
Energy began to trickle from the city to the power station. The panther watched on as he monitored the amount of energy passing through the power lines to the reactors. It was a carefully-controlled procedure, observing extremely strict protocol. Everything had to be just right-they were careful not to let too much energy go through the channels and break free of their grasp. Nothing was allowed to go wrong. They all knew even a slight mistake was enough to deem the entire experiment a failure.
The energy accumulated was building up, and there would soon be enough to increase the transparency. The scientists watched in awe as what they had planned on paper decades ago became true before their very eyes. It had taken decades for the ZERB to reconstruct the facility from top to bottom, restructuring and expanding what the power station had been before the Incident 45 years ago. They observed in silence as their computer screens showed them the newest data from the generators, automatically commencing the transparency increase. Everyone held their breath. At this point, the reactors were either going to hold on and work successfully….or explode exactly like 45 years ago.
The entire hall cheered in joy as the screens showed the change in the portal's transparency-it was growing slowly, percent by percent. The reactors had held successfully.
Dr. Sturmer, now aged and wrinkled, watched on from the balcony, the ghost of a smile growing on his lips. His legacy was just beginning. There was still much more to come.
Xi'an, China ICED Research Facility A.D. 2016
The late-night controller stifled a yawn as he counted the long seconds till dawn. He was one of the few still on duty in the "weakness point" containment chamber, the others all as tired and sleepy as he was. His computer screen was forever linked to the ever-constant data of the portal-transparency, stability….he was sure nothing had changed in the past 5 years. Damn, he couldn't even switch the computer system to Weibo and search up something interesting. It had taken 4 years for all those "brains" to come up with a hypothesis, an equation of how a massive amount of energy generated from the nearby brand-new nuclear station could cause a breakthrough in the space-time continuum, enabling the transference of radio waves, solid...or even organic matter.
Of course, it all had to wait. The wormhole had just been confirmed, known to only the best of the country's scientific elite. There was naturally a huge logistics challenge, of how so much power could be acquired and safely used to increase the transparency and stability of the portal. But still nobody had questioned the Chinese Government when they suddenly planted the giant of a nuclear station out of nowhere, the residence of at least ¼ of the world's nuclear fuel rods. That was a damn lot of fuel. However, they had been told the Helium 3 waiting on the other side was enough to put the number of fuel rods to shame.
Assistant-Engineer Zhao Feng was just about to stretch his legs and buy another late cup of tea from the canteen when something flickered on his monitor. His first thought was that it had been another quick alteration of the wormhole stability, which always varied on the time of day. Sometimes it was even safe enough to send through organic matter….provided that they could amass enough energy of course. But curiosity soon got the better of him, and he planted himself once again unwillingly into his swivel chair and did a quick check through the portal data.
"Temperature, check. Humidity, check. Stability,average, Transparency…." he muttered in Chinese as he ran his eyes through the newest analysis. "Transparency….27%?"
He couldn't believe his eyes. Had he been drinking too much tea lately? He pressed the refresh button on the screen and waited impatiently for it to load. Zhao then rubbed his eyes and hurriedly scrolled down to where the transparency figure was located. His jaw dropped open, and his pair of pupils widened greatly. It was true. The transparency of the portal was increasing itself.
It was gradually growing, perhaps by one percent every 5 minutes. He knew clearly that wasn't the work of his institution….all the nuclear generators were still turned off, unused and clean. If so, what had been the entity that was powering the wormhole?
There was only one possibility left. Zhao had always dismissed it when his colleagues mentioned it to him, but one of Sherlock Holmes axioms immediately came to mind.
"When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."
His hand instinctively reached for his walkie talkie, hardly used nowadays apart from the occasional obscene banter or so. This time, his fingers flicked the channel switch to "Exclusive", the highly secretive one that was connected directly to Central Command and was reserved for emergencies only. Well, he thought, this definitely is something worthwhile.
He pressed the speak button and his voice instantly reached the loudspeakers of Central Command, one of the numerous rooms in the huge facility. The fatigued workers looked up, interested in what Zhao had to say.
"Guys….I think we may have just found something, I mean someone on the other side."
~18 hours later~
The portal containment room was crammed full of scientists from all around the country, clipboards in hand and asking each other the most unanswerable questions that absolutely nobody had the answers to yet. Zhao found himself at the center of attention, his workplace crowded and swarming with the country's top elite lining up just to interrogate him about the night's events over and over again.
"Are you positive that you saw the transparency level going up?" a huge bald scientist had demanded of him impatiently.
'Yes, sir." Zhao replied. 'I'm 100% sure I saw the levels going up."
"Can you show us the data please?" a petite, young lady spoke this time, "I'm the Chief Engineer on the site. I'm quite confident the transparency was still 25% the last time I checked, the exact same as 5 years ago when we had first started."
Zhao shrugged. 'See for yourself." he turned the monitor over to the flock of curious researchers.
The transparency level had definitely changed. It was still going up 4 hours ago, then it had abruptly stopped and failed to climb higher. Maybe the entity on the other side experienced a major power failure….it had a certain high risk of blowing up. Yet the increase was tremendous. It had changed from 25% to 33% in the space of 4 hours. The amount of energy they had used must have been unimaginable!
The chatter grew, the number of confused voices increased, and soon Zhao found himself swarmed by even more scientists, some of whom he had often seen being interviewed on CCTV, the state television. Before long, he couldn't take the interrogation any longer, the millions of voices cramming themselves into his mind. He was just strolling away from his desk to leave the room when the entire containment facility was plunged in silence.
President Zhou strode in, his face even more powerful than it had been portrayed on television. His presence seemed to fill the whole room, even though he was only about 5 feet 7 inches in height. Instantly the room exploded into applause, the scientists delighted to see their president and leader amongst themselves. The president waved at the crowd for a few moments before raising his hand for silence, as if he were a conductor conducting the symphony of an orchestra.
Over the next half hour Zhao was continuously questioned by the president and the rest of his staff, who nodded their heads and wrote something down whenever the young engineer mentioned anything. He had concluded early on that the irregular bursts of energy from the other side had been artificial and not natural, the frequency having being recorded by the sensors implemented near the portal. It was also believed by the Chinese Government that the entity which caused the increase of transparency was a civilized race, similar to or even more advanced than Earth in terms of technology.
Humans have always been afraid of the unknown. This occasion wasn't any different. There was almost immediately a heated debate in the room, an argument on whether the development work on the portal should continue. The scientists had been much in favor of mining the Helium 3, having been exposed to the real effects global warming had on humanity and on the environment. There might not be an Earth to protect if they did not seek actively an alternative source of fuel, possibly sufficient for even a century's use.
The PLA, on the other hand, had different views. They insisted that the entity on the other side might cause a security problem to the People's Republic, and whatever race that possessed enough technological assets to develop such a wormhole must be advanced enough to pose a threat to the well being of the nation. The PLA representatives complained that more units would have to be sent to the facility to safeguard the portal, which would soon cause unwelcome attention from the public.
The argument might have went on if the president had not ordered for the work to continue. Zhao listened in pleasure as his leader decreed that researching for obtaining Helium 3 was definitely worthwhile no matter in any means, ordering directly that additional PLA units be sent in to the site to protect the equipment and personnel from whatever entity that lay on the other side. The generals accompanying him reluctantly agreed, and excused themselves briefly to make telephone calls to Beijing.
So it was decided. The nuclear power plant was to be thrown directly into service the next day, the workers selected from various power stations all over the country. The president also agreed as a compromise with the military to demand peacekeeping units from the UN, in addition to the troops the PLA was sending in. Before he left for the airport, Zhou had entrusted in Zhao to successfully lead the operation of the ICED, and personally promoted him to one of the leading scientists in the scheme. Zhao couldn't have been more honored.
But there were still problems to be solved. How would they communicate with the entity, once the portal was stable enough for communicating? How would they react to humanity's existence? Was there enough power generated in the nuclear facility to power the portal? Well, the hardest parts of the project had already been completed by the entity. It was time for them to do their part. It shouldn't be hard to power the final percentage to allow radio transmissions.
With a huge responsibility now on his shoulders, Zhao set off to work. He still had much to complete before daybreak.
~4 Days Later~
"All power lines functionable and awaiting transfer, sir!" the engineer announced as the team did their final checks on the reactors. The nuclear power station was fully operational now, the fuel rods being fed through at a tremendous rate in order to feed the hungry generators used to power the portal.
Zhao looked through the recently-installed bulletproof glass into the containment chamber, where the weakness point had been located all those years ago. It was finally ready, awaiting impatiently for his commands. Communication experts sent by the ICED had already developed a type of communications device, a machine capable of sending and receiving radio waves interdimensionally. Provided that the aliens understood their language, which was extremely unlikely under the circumstances. Meanwhile, sensors had been set up close to the weakness point (WP), extremely powerful mechanisms that were capable of sensing body heat and radio signals from the other side.
Different representatives from the ICED nations had already been flown in, working on various logistics and scientific challenges presented to them by the endeavour. It had been decided at the start that more information on the other side was required for the quest to continue. Thus half of them had set off to work, almost without rest, to develop a type of stealthy unmanned probe, complete with cameras and devices to possibly extract specimens. These inventions only seemed like fantasies in Zhao's mind.
Slowly, the energy from the nuclear power station was channeled through the 10 major pipes, still brand-new and clean despite being constructed over 10 years ago. Everything had to be brand new for this to work, a nearly impossible feat in the terms of even modern scientific knowledge. The squad of researchers had their eyes glued onto their monitors as the generators accumulated the electricity, waiting until a sufficient amount had been stored up. Zhao knew if anything went wrong right now in the programme, the reactors might burn out...or even worse.
He could scarcely keep his eyes open as the energy level reached the desired amount. His trembling hands reached for the bright red lever covered by a glass lid on his desk. Hesitantly, he flipped over the lid and pulled the lever. There would be no turning back.
He sighed in relief as the energy accumulated gradually began to react with the portal, the WP shimmering behind the glass. There was probably tons of radiation behind the bulletproof material right now, the containment technology barely strong enough to keep it out. The dose inside the chamber was possibly even lethal, and would need to be cleared out before human access. But that would have to wait.
Clicking on other buttons, Zhao authorized the full commencement of transparency increasement. The generators came to life and processed the massive amounts of power already stored up, unlocking the wires that would allow them to react when in contact with the WP. It was all a gamble. Would this endeavour, only a hypothesis recently proved on paper, be possible in real life?
~Power Station E-14, Zootopia~
"Sir! Something's changing!"
The panther looked up from his magazine to see the PV (Point of Vulnerability) shimmer, the surface of the portal reacting with huge amounts of energy. Hastily his paws ran through the energy processing data-who had authorized the sudden transfer of energy? Without strict protocol, the reactors were undoubtedly going to blow up! The portal might even be devastated, and the only flaw in the system would resume to normal. His mind was in full-blown panic mode, one of his paws reaching for the "Abort" lever. The rest of his staff gasped and pointed anxiously at the portal locked down in the containment chamber, the radiation indicators going off scale.
The panther instantly knew something was not right. This was not the type of energy they used.
Over the next 5 minutes, he confirmed with the Energy Authority in the facility that all the power lines to the power stations outside the city had been blocked, save the few that brought electricity for the facility's personnel use. He was confused, bewildered even, of where the energy had come from.
He recalled of the experiment they had gone through with nearly a day ago. It had been partially successful, proving that the reactors did work and the energy generated was enough to react with the wormhole and stabilize it, even though the major power failure last night forced the ZERB to temporarily abort the experiment and wait until enough energy had been accumulated once again. Meanwhile the portal transparency had merely been increased to 35%, not even enough to send radio waves through. There was still a major problem looming ahead of them.
Suddenly an idea clicked on Chief Engineer Taylor's mind. He opened the recording of the sensors, the devices devoted to measuring how much the transparency had increased. He could see the transparency was rising steadily, already 5% higher than where they had left off. What forces could be at work? His own certainly weren't responsible for it. In a few minutes, the wormhole had stabilized considerably and the transparency had already reached 40%.
The risk and danger of radiation leaking out caused enough panic to throw the entire place into frenzy. The emergency alarm had been triggered, announcements made from the klaxons carefully located all over the compound. Different calls had been placed to various units of the ZERB within the facility, the squad of scientists apart from Taylor being fully evacuated. The research compound was in full lockdown, no vehicles being allowed in or out. The orders continued to squawk through his radio.
"Order in the 1st Containment Unit! Report immediately!"
"Who the hell authorized the energy transfer?"
"Get everyone the hell out of here! The radiation is going off the scale!"
These frantic commands continued to be transmitted unceasingly until Taylor decided to turn off his wireless. Couldn't they see everything was actually fine?
Fortunately for the scientist, the reactors didn't buckle and the radiation was firmly contained inside the chamber. More and more guards in primitive radiation protective suits stormed in, yelling orders at everyone they knew. They were actually preparing to seal the place down. The panther knew the consequences of a leak. The entire area around the compound would have to be completely evacuated, the civilians taken to some other place for treatment. The facility had to be sealed off no matter what.
Then the truth hit him, the theory that he had listened to so many times yet had disbelieved every ounce of it. He double-checked the energy input of the generators. There had almost been none after the experimental failure. Had it been the leftover current? Impossible. The energy that remained wasn't even enough to raise the transparency by 1%, let alone by 15% more. Only one possibility remained….
There were creatures on the other side.
~Xi'an, China (ICED Research Facility) ~
All was going well. The research team continued to monitor the process in satisfaction as the energy gradually trickled through the power lines. It had paid off to have them replaced several months ago, with newer and improved equipment from the US that could take up and transmit at least 5 times as much energy than the last one. Unlike their counterparts in Zootopia, their nuclear power plant was much more sophisticated than any other in the world and was devoted to the facility alone, providing much more energy and power than all the Zootopian power stations combined.
Zhao continued his watch in satisfaction. On his computer screen he could see that the transparency had just risen to 63%, the surface of the portal continuing to shimmer endlessly. He really hoped that their anti-radiation equipment was strong enough to keep everything in. It just wasn't worth it to give everything up at this point!
"Okay! Enough! Stop the transmission!" he ordered.
Instantly the nuclear reactors stopped giving off electricity, the entire compound falling silent. Inside the containment area the WP continued to shimmer, the leftover electrical current sufficient to keep it open for a while. Zhao walked over to the main screen and checked the transparency meter. It had just reached 65%, sufficient for radio waves to be sent and received. Fortunately, organic matter could still not be transferred….just yet. The PLA units could wait.
The researchers held their breath as some of their colleagues turned on their sensors, the devices used to detect radioactivity and body heat on the other side. They had been fully turned off during the reaction period, lest that their functioning caused a disruption in the transparency. It was finally time to check for signs of life.
One of the men at the controller's desk threw off his headset and whispered something to the woman next to Zhao. She opened her eyes in disbelief and shock , turning to her superior.
"Sir," she addressed Zhao, "You've got to see this."
The duo walked over to where the operator was sitting. The short man at the table motioned for them to put on the 2 pairs of headphones prepared for them on the desk. Curiously, Zhao put them on to hear what had been detected from the other side.
What he heard would throw him into complete and utter shock.
"Send in the 1st Containment Unit! Report immediately!"
"Commander Sturmer, what's the status quo?"
"The radiation levels are going off scale!"
He put down his earphones and stared breathlessly at his colleagues. What he had heard was delivered in clear English….in an American accent to be exact. He turned to the operator.
"What was that?" he demanded, "Was that from New York? From the downtown metropolis? What is it, man? Where did it come from?"
"From...from the other side, sir!" the man stammered.
"It's….it's impossible! They...I mean, we share the same language! How absurd is that?" The possibilities of that happening were probably one in a billion. Perhaps even more.
"It's the only explanation, sir." Unlike him the female was unnaturally composed, unusually calm, as if she had been dealing with cases like this for her whole life. "It's time we got in contact. We may even be able to obtain the Helium 3."
Zhao gulped and wiped off his sweat. Their confusion clearly meant they were as in the dark as humanity was. They probably didn't know another entity was trying to contact them either. He wondered if a negotiation could be undertaken, a deal to obtain the Helium 3 they needed. He pondered upon if force might be necessary.
He needed to know more first.
"Sir!" another operator announced, "We just detected body heat on the other side! There's at least 50 of them!"
"Run an analysis." he ordered, "let's see what they are carrying and wearing."
The Analysis was another new creation from the students in Beijing, a systematic rundown that could accurately picture what materials were present in the area scanned.
"Will do, sir"
The visual came up a few minutes later.
"They..they seem to be pointing some sort of weapon towards the WP, sir! There's an unidentified liquid attached to the weapon. It...it might be some sort of tranquilizer."
"Do we need to call in the PLA?"
"No." the word came in heavily from Zhao's lips. "They are probably as afraid as we are."
"Tell me, Doctor Song. Is it possible to send a solid object through the wormhole with this rate of stability and transparency?"
The woman thought for a few moments before answering, "It might succeed, sir...we just need to keep the reactors running, that's all."
Zhao smiled and folded his arms, creasing his white laboratory shirt, "Excellent." he muttered, "Bring me the ICS (Interdimensional Communications System) from Lab-4C. There's no time to lose."
Humanity was undoubtedly in a superior state. They knew fully what was going on, and had absolute control over the situation. Elite military units were already on the standby, ready to defend their world in case a conflict occurred. The Zootopians, on the other hand, were still bewildered and running around in circles.
Would a deal even be possible between the two worlds?
~3 days later (Power Station E-14, Zootopia)~
"What the hell is that?" Taylor exclaimed as he shifted the heavy, metallic object around in his paws. It had been extracted from the containment room a few hours ago, when the radiation was finally cleared and safe for mammal access. Still, the personnel and object retrieved had to go through the messy detoxification process, seriously delaying his research schedule. Didn't they know he was a busy mammal? They could have sent him the object directly through detox….he didn't mind dying as long it was for the cause of science!
He prised open the lid of the object. It was actually more like a flap rather than a lid, opening to reveal a keyboard-like tab complete with buttons in their own language. On closer inspection there was a glass screen on one side of the lid, similar to the ones he used on a computer. This device seemed like a small computer, one that could be carried anywhere instead of being attached at one's workplace.
Imagine his surprise when the sensors detected the transfer of a solid object! He had never considered the possibility of the existence of another entity on the other side, let alone one that possessed the technology to increase the transparency and send them objects! The civilization on the other side must be much more advanced, maybe even whole decades ahead of them. The arrival of the object sparked another debate within the research teams, whore were deeply divided over what to do with it. They still had no means of transferring anything back there, so sending a gift or returning the object was out of the question. The second option originated from the fears that the object was a bomb in disguise, one that had the capability to destroy the entire compound once triggered. Indeed, it was mysterious yet tempting, and Taylor had to use almost all of his own private connections to keep it in the area, as well as grant himself clearance to be the lone few to be allowed to tamper with it.
Now that he thought of it, the object did indeed resemble the appearance of a computer. It had a keyboard with fully functional Zootopian Language Keys on it, almost indifferent from the models they used. Taylor still had no idea of how the Entity on the other side had so much knowledge of their own civilization, sufficient to reconstruct a computer in their own language.
He turned the object over on his lap and tried to search with his hands any inscriptions written on the smooth hard material the device was made of. Soon his hands located several protrudes on the lower half of the 'computer". With extreme caution, he lifted the bottom of the device up to the light to be inspected.
"Made in China." it read.
Again, the message was in clear Zootopian. Where the hell was China? And how did the Entity know so much about their civilization anyway?
Unless, of course, they shared a common language.
As he explored the device he found a slip of paper, tucked between the lid and the keyboard. Carefully he pulled it out, keen to read what it had to say. He gently unfolded the parchment and his eyes bore into the words printed onto it, the words on it almost indifferent from how the printers and computers in his world worked.
He groaned in disappointment as he flipped through the first page, which was printed in some sort of illegible scribbles that he was quite sure no one in this world could decipher. He tried another page. To his delight it was written in his own language, printed carefully as if they had also used a computer. It was almost impossible for him to guess that the 2 worlds shared such uncanny similarities.
The paper turned out to be an instruction sheet, a carefully-written tutorial on how to operate the weird device. Another idea popped within the scientist's mind. Could it be that the object was a communications device? Were the Others trying to communicate with them? A million other thoughts exploded inside his brain, but he pushed them aside and concentrated on the piece of paper.
Half an hour later, he smiled proudly as the monitor flickered into life. It was at this moment that he noticed how similar the screen was to the monitors of his own world. He was flabbergasted, his scientific mind overwhelmed with the impossibility of events. Yet he continued on. It had already been hard enough to turn on the device, having to guess several terms such as "mouse". It had taken him ages to figure out it meant the miniature device that was connected by a wire to the object! For a while, he was actually tempted to order one of the mice from the lab up to substitute the job.
There was a tab installed onto the homepage, or so it was called. Using the "mouse" to navigate, his inexperienced paws clicked onto the only tab on the screen, marked with some scribbles and a clear Zootopian sentence:
"Messaging 通讯录"
His eyes could barely keep up with the speed the device processed things, the screen being thrown into some sort of app that resembled those he used to communicate with his friends and family. There was only one contactee listed on the page, named in scribbles. Thus came the last part of the instructions.
"Click on the contactee marked 赵博士 (Professor Zhao)."
Hesitantly he guided the mouse and left-clicked on the contactee. He was led into some sort of new page, extremely similar to the apps he used daily. It amazed him to see how much the Others had known about their civilization before coming into contact with them. Unlike his colleagues Taylor wasn't afraid, nor nervous for that matter. He was prepared to see whatever opportunities the Others might present him with, eager to gain any advantage he could obtain.
Should he type anything?
Before he could even make up his mind a message appeared onto the "messages" screen. It was in clear Zootopian, and not in the scribbles he had seen inscribed onto the first page of the instructions sheet.
"Greetings."
"Uhh….hello?" Taylor answered. The keys on the keyboard were on the exactly same spots as the devices he constantly used.
"We are the entity that helped you transparify the wormhole."
"You are the ones that increased it to 65%? Where did all your energy come from? How did it work? We have tried countless times already, with only partial success."
"Don't worry. We are here to help. All will be answered soon." came the reply.
"What do I call you? I'm not fluent in your scribbles, sorry."
The message this time was slower, and a bit ruder than the previous ones.
"You may call me Professor Zhao. Zhao Feng, to be exact. If we are to enjoy a pleasant partnership please oblige to treat our culture with respect. It's called Chinese, not Scribbles, although some of our people also share your language."
So the Others wanted to cooperate. Fascinating.
"Greetings, Professor Zhao. My name is Doctor Taylor Paulson, one of the leading scientists of the ZERB. I'm very much willing to work with you, as there is much we are distressed with."
"Thank you. I am the chief engineer of our own project, with almost unlimited amount of resources on our side. You know, we are very much interested in trading, especially in exchange for some of that Helium 3…"
The messages went on and on. Taylor tried his best to comprehend what Zhao had suggested. It would take them months, even years to finish their negotiations. But their fruits of success would be unimaginable. His father's wish would finally be completed, now only 5 years after his death.
He lifted the radio to his lips, the object forgotten temporarily for now.
"Sturmer? We've got a breakthrough."
