As the guards approached, one of the ship's crewmen walking with the Quests, Ted Shrir, made the rash decision to draw a gun he had on his belt. Unfortunately, one of their assailants reacted too quickly for him and shot him with an energy weapon, leaving the man lying motionless on the ground as bolts of energy occasionally coursed through his body. Bandit slowly walked over, sniffed at the man, and then returned to Jonny's side.
The same guard then pointed the weapon at the others, as if daring them to try the same thing, prompting Dr. Quest to motion for the other crewmen to drop their weapons and they all raised their hands. The doctor then told the guards, "Relax. We'll go peacefully."
The group was led through a walkway overlooking a large city with structures reaching hundreds of feet into the air. From the height, it was difficult to get a good look at the inhabitants of the city, but all did notice that a large version of the clear dome from the ship room covered the rest of the city, as well. The buildings all appeared metallic and were colored in gray, silver, or black. Several had long, thin spires on top.
"Those are probably some sort of communications towers," Dr. Quest thought.
A network of elevated metal walkways, similar to the one they were on now, intersected throughout the city. Only guards like the ones escorting them seemed to use the walkways, apparently for quick and easy routes between sections of the city.
After going a bit further, they finally reached a larger, more decorated building. The guards stopped as a beam of light from some sort of scanner passed over them, after which the doors split and slid open.
They were led into a large room, at the end of which was a tall, silver chair with a desk in front of it. Everyone correctly guessed that this was likely the leader of the aliens in the city. The room struck a balance between ornate and utilitarian, with various designs etched into the walls and painted. 2 guards stood at the doorway and 4 more lined the path to the being seated in the chair. All of the extraterrestrials were about average height, ranging from around 5-foot-7 to 6-foot-3, with skin that was sort of a bluish-gray. Besides their skin and very dark eyes, the beings otherwise looked very similar to humans. Their hair seemed to either be black or dark brown, and they wore simple clothing in various colors seemingly based on rank or position, but none of the humans could find a specific correlation.
"Greetings. I am J'orda of the Akierans," the seated alien introduced himself, before motioning to his right, where another alien, similar in appearance to him sat, "and this is Siert'a, my second-in-command and head of security.
"Hello," Dr. Quest greeted the beings, "I am Dr. Benton Quest, a scientist, and these are my sons Jonny and Hadji, my bodyguard Race Bannon, and his daughter Jessie." As he named off everyone, Dr. Quest motioned to each in turn. After introducing his family, he also introduced the crew members from the ship that were with them. Unlike Quest Team, they weren't as calm about their current situation.
"You do not seem as surprised or afraid as others from your world have been upon meeting us, including those who are with you" J'orda observed as he studied the visibly-unnerved crewmen.
Race half-smiled and commented, "Well, we've already met aliens about...4 times?" he asked, looking at the others, "So it's not really a big thing to us, anymore."
"Why did you bring us here, anyway?" Jonny asked impatiently, prompting looks from his father and Jessie.
"That is a valid question. Because of advances in human technology, we have been concerned that our existence will be exposed for the first time in 500 of your years."
Anticipating their next question, he added, "It was an explorer sailing westward with three vessels. Unfortunately, we did not record his name. After this encounter and knowing humans were not ready to learn of our existence, we submerged our entire city and employ what you might refer to as a "cloaking shield" to hide ourselves from the curious. In the past, that has rarely been an issue, but recently your vessels have been coming closer to potentially detecting the city. Your scanning technology has improved to the point of almost detecting the energy signature from our cloaking shield, so we have been more wary, transporting vessels here from somewhat further away."
Everyone nodded as the alien leader continued after pausing to let what he had said sink in, "We are unable to evacuate the entire city and, being a scientific installation, have few weapons with which to effectively defend ourselves in case of an attack. Therefore, we choose to be cautious. For many years, we have transported vessels that came close to finding our location to the room you found yourselves in upon your arrival. Usually, the humans aboard the vessels are left to remain there. You are the first to determine a means of escape."
Jonny then interrupted with some annoyance, "Yeah. We're just full of surprises."
His father, however, was still curious about the rest of the background story. "Why did you come here in the first place?"
"And where is here?" Hadji added.
J'orda looked at Hadji to answer his question first, before turning to the others, "You would know it as 'Atlantis.' Many from our world were sent here over 2000 years ago to create a colony both as a base of operations to study the inhabitants of this planet and their societal development. We were to pay special attention to the point at which you were ready for us to make our presence known and begin to share some of our knowledge with you."
It was Jessie's turn to ask a question, "So are we prisoners here or may we leave?"
The leader looked at her calmly and responded, "I believe you mean no harm. As long as you are here, you will be treated as guests and may explore much of the city, with the exception of certain areas that are restricted. However, I regret that we cannot allow you to return to the surface."
At this news, everyone was shocked. They had found the city of Atlantis and were trapped there. J'orda dismissed them to look around the city, saying that for now they would have to sleep aboard their ship, but he would have some of his people locate more permanent quarters for them. He also gave each of them translation devices that fit over their ears, sort of a more advanced form of devices the Quests had used in the past, as not all the Akierans spoke English.
"Why are you treating them so nicely, J'orda?" Siert'a asked after the humans had left, "They're humans. We can't trust them."
Still looking at the door, J'orda answered, "Because, Siert'a, they are the first humans to discover how to escape the holding room and, some of them at least, were not afraid of us and were rather calm about this. This development requires further study and I wish to keep them here so we can observe them in more advanced surroundings. If mankind has truly developed to this point, the time for us to reveal ourselves may be closer than we thought. Relax, these humans appear to be harmless."
"I'm still not convinced. I'll have someone watch them."
"As you wish," J'orda sighed, "but be sure they do not see whoever you send. I want them to be comfortable here."
As Siert'a nodded reluctantly and silently walked out of the room with a frown, J'orda thought, "I hope I do not regret this decision."
A/N: I know some of you who are paying close attention will question Race saying they've encountered aliens "4 times" when it was actually a total of five: Alien in Washington, Return of the Anasazi/Trouble on the Colorado, Other Space, Secret of the Moai, and the Dark Mountain. The reason I only count four of those is because the memories of the incident were erased from everyone's memories at the end of Secret of the Moai. Therefore, to them, it would only seem like four encounters.