Star Trek Hunter
Rock of Ages
Scene 5: A Hard Day's Night
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5
A Hard Day's Night
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The relationship between Observer Latimah and her young apprentice, Allehandro, broke just about every taboo in respectable al semoran culture. An older, divorced woman cavorting with a man less than half her age, her direct and only employee (not to mention a fellow employee in public service) and one quite willing to allow her to take the lead in the relationship - scandalous. But they had taken after each other like there was no tomorrow. There was, in fact, a tomorrow. Actually, there were four tomorrows left - after that there would be no more tomorrows.

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Neither of the astronomers allowed their illicit affair to interfere with their work. Their eyesight was probably a bit more blurry from lack of daytime sleep - but most al semorans were lacking sleep these days. And like the rest of their sleep-deprived population, their minds and reactions were dulled. No one would care about the comfort they were taking in each other's company.

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Given all this, it was not surprising they at first failed to take adequate notice of a small anomaly in the telemetry they were receiving from Horohondra's object. Allehandro was the first to notice it.

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"I thought the next missile arrival was scheduled for 62:51:19. These readings indicate a touchdown at 59:98:04," he said. He tapped one of the several screens. "It's only a bump in the recorded trajectory. Can you make sense of this?"

Observer Latimah was already standing just behind her apprentice, but she had not really been paying attention to anything. She was a little spaced out from lack of sleep (and, truth be told, anticipation of what they would do after work.) She put her hand on Allehandro's shoulder and leaned in toward the screen.

"It does appear to be a landing," Latimah confirmed. "Whatever touched down exerted about 29 units of pressure and increased the mass of the Object by .056 tors. That would be easily twice the mass of any of our missiles - and none of them are programmed to actually make contact. Scroll back the readings…"

Latimah made a series of humming noises as Allehandro scrolled the information backward. "It IS a touchdown," she said with considerable surprise. Something definitely landed. Given its location, none of our missiles would currently have a line of sight to it. If we weren't constantly measuring the mass and trajectory of the Object, we would never have noticed."

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Allehandro turned toward his mentor. "We're the only ones tracking this data to this degree of accuracy. If what you're saying is correct, it could only mean…"

Latimah reacted with horror. "We can't tell them… It can't be… We proved a hundred years ago that there was no possibility of…" She covered her mouth, looked furtively about, then whispered "…alien contact."

Allehandro drew a sharp breath. Then whispered. "We have to tell them… If it is… you know… and we do survive this… they'll think it was the gods. Can you imagine what that would do?"

Latimah was whispering furiously. "The old beliefs… They'll start up again. Worse than ever. Wars. Sacrifices. But… Aliens… That could be even worse…"

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