The Sleeper of the Ages Read online

  #2 The Sleeper of the Ages

  by Hans Kneifel

  Perry Rhodan has discovered a huge space ship, an ark in space, carrying a population of humans who set out on their journey 55,000 years ago, from Earth – Lemurians, the legendary forefathers of mankind.

  After the Akon Empire has seized the ark of the stars, Perry Rhodan has to come up with new ways to solve its mystery. A reconstruction of data found on the ark points the way to a sister ship. But Perry Rhodan is too late: That ark has crashed on a planet. Among the survivors, Perry Rhodan finds an unlikely passenger ...

  LEMURIA 2

  The Sleeper of the Ages

  by Hans Kneifel

  Translated

  by Dwight R. Decker

  Pabel-Moewig Verlag KG, Rastatt

  Prologue

  Silent Cosmic Thunder

  The first intelligent being was created many millions of years after the Big Bang: a tiny grain of living, glowing stardust. Uncountable time periods later, as evolution took its first breath, planetesimals and other building blocks of worlds formed from a red-hot chaos of dust and diffuse matter. The star ignited and hurtled particles out into space, where planets cooled in the darkness. On their surfaces, life took on ever more complicated forms and configurations. Tiny particles of solar matter, driven by the solar wind over the planets' early seas and the first forests, congregated like blindly twitching protozoa. They formed the first large organisms that could move freely, and over cosmic-scale time periods they branched out into more complex molecular structures and less vulnerable individuals. During this first long phase of their evolutionary history, they multiplied without restraint and developed into feeling, instinctive beings. Aware of their origin in the sun, they strove to bathe in its light as well as in cosmic radiation.

  Meanwhile, on the planet where they developed, evolution brought forth rich flora and fauna in many eon-long stages. Individual branches died out but others conquered the seas and the land, and still others changed over the course of history.

  But other than the offspring of the sun, whose medium remained the atmosphere and beyond, far out into energy-rich space, no other intelligences emerged. Movement, finding partners, conception and development of new life, took place in almost complete silence; only the highly sensitive creatures that appeared to consist of pure solar energy could perceive their own faintly audible self-expression. It was a whispering, sub-molecular rustling, much softer than the silvery sounds made by sand grains rubbing against one another in the fiery breath of the desert winds. In the silent world of those who dwelt on the planet, it might have sounded like "menthththiiiath."

  Individual beings soon collected into groups. In that they resembled young fish that learned to move in protective swarms in the sea, or nectar-sucking birds who descended in thick, humming masses on blooming trees and pollinated thousands of blossoms within moments. A group of the "Menttia" that came together over the breakers of a nameless shore, discovered a natural principle that fascinated the collective individuals: the larger the swarm of single beings, the greater the group's capacity for thought. Within a short time, the single beings and small groups gathered into large swarms whose massed mental ability allowed them to perceive their surroundings, to accurately interpret them, and to recognize and use numbers. The process, which went on for hundreds of thousands of planetary orbits, created differing "clans" between the poles. Above seas, forests, and deserts arose gigantic masses of silently whirling light-beings. Later, they gathered into individual clans, choosing to linger over those areas of the planet that they preferred. They ruled the skies all the way up into that realm in which the planet's reflected light faded out and the distant suns could be discerned. From the instinctive behavior that served nourishment and movement grew the knowledge that every form of energy necessary to sustain life had its own flavor. With ultra-fine subatomic receptors and with infallible precision it could be sensed, absorbed, and assimilated. As the continental plates of their home world drifted apart, thus began a million-year long study, an age of gaining knowledge for many billions of Menttia. When visitors finally landed, the light-beings knew that they were not alone in an apparently boundless universe. The events associated with the strangers' visit were forgotten, becoming seemingly meaningless memories in the collective consciousness; healed scars in the skin of the present. But they were not lost ...

  Then, as swift as the light between the stars and as silent as a ghost, a colossal mass approached from the interior of a blue nebula. Many millions of tons accumulated into a cosmic projectile and raced towards the red sun of the Menttia. In the star's distant glow, vague, gigantic outlines began to form out of the darkness of space. A deep cosmic droning began in the vacuum and increased in clarity and loudness over a long period of time. Space seemed to vibrate slowly, like the heartbeat of an eternal being that had been born long before the beginning of time.

  Time. The concept of passing time was familiar to all Menttia, but it had always remained of small importance. With the patience with which they observed the cosmos and which had become a part of their existence, they waited for about a hundred day and night cycles of their home planet. Then the Menttia of the Star Sparks sensed that a giant was approaching the Red Sun's gravitational field. In their indistinct perception, the deep cosmic droning grew louder and clearer. The volume of the foreign mass of energy and metal was that of a large asteroid.

  From the distortions and changes in the stream of cosmic particles, the Menttia perceived the appearance and might of the giant. One swarm added details that came from memory, and another remembered details that must have come from the general knowledge of such objects; those gifted with imagination embellished their fragments of knowledge with illuminating details. Within a short time, all the planet's Menttia knew that the black projectile was an angular ring that rotated silently and grindingly around a central axis. It was undoubtedly headed towards the system of the Red Sun.

  The surface of the ring that was turned to the sun later allowed the Menttia drifting silently in space, like spindles of fire, to make out different irregularities. What they did not recognize, their collective memory filled out: the frames of rectangular hatches; flattened, transparent domes, in which steel protective sections were folded; low, box-like elements in which might be hidden machinery, astronomical devices, or the living quarters of creatures that could not survive unprotected in the vacuum of space. Perhaps weapon systems were also lodged there, with merciless capabilities that could devastate entire planets?

  The ring's hull seemed to consist mostly of smooth ferrometal. Like a titanic steel fish that swallowed its tail and drifted slowly from out of the darkest depths of a planetary ocean, the deep black steel ring emerged from the last fringes of the nebula. There the cloud consisted only of stray motes of interstellar dust in a high vacuum. On the outer surface of the metal giant shone apparently random lights of different colors, while various transparent circles, squares, ovals, and rectangles allowed the murky light free passage from within. The giant also collected the cosmic particles that it encountered on its way in an invisible net. Surrounded by the enormous ring, the circular area within, with its invisible hub, was a capture field for neutrinos and anti-neutrinos. The energy that they gave off in their mutual annihilation was absorbed by the machinery and systems that were designed to sustain the inhabitants' lives. There was yet more that the Menttia were unable to make out; vast swarms merged and cautiously shared their first, rudimentary impressions.

  The Menttia of the Moons' Realm were alone with their knowledge. In this apparently uninhabited region of space, no organic eye, with or without the aid of instruments, had yet seen that giant moving at nearly the speed of light. On
ly the subsonic droning became louder, more threatening. As yet no organic brain had even thought of the distant possibility that unknown beings from elsewhere in the Galaxy were heading towards the Red Sun.

  Until now it had seemed to the Menttia out of the question that an extinct race from the stars, whose most intelligent and most determined minds had built the approaching metal asteroid cave, would set course through the wall of shadows and haze for a second time. Now they realized in shock that they had fallen victim to an error. Memories of that long-ago era had been passed down through a nearly unimaginable number of centuries and half forgotten. Memories of beings that by now had spread out over at least one of the ancient planets.

  The Menttia flitted in ball-like swarms, the size of clouds, through the boundary areas between atmosphere and space. There, they turned their attention to the distant event that was making itself apparent through tiny changes in the cosmic constants. Placid uneventfulness marked most of the lives of this world's inhabitants and assured them of their contemplative existence among the endless wonders and mysteries of Creation. Now though, cosmic energy particles were set in motion, exciting billions of Menttia. It was as though shining stardust began a slow, ominous dance.

  1

  Shock and Depression

  20 April 1327 New Galactic Era

  When Denetree hesitantly lifted her head and saw the look on her reflection's face, she gave a start. The surface of the deactivated vidscreen showed the flickering unease in her light blue eyes. They were opened unnaturally wide; for some seventy hours she had been constantly seeing surprising, strange, and disconcerting things onboard the PALENQUE. Unfamiliar sounds and puzzling incidents frightened her, briefly shocking her each time something happened. And when she closed her eyes, she once again saw the death of the desperate Star Seekers. Her friends, in the vacuum of space around the Ship as plainly as though the events were projected in painfully sharp clarity on the inner surface of her eyelids.

  Star Seekers ... what a hopeful name! Her brother Venron had suggested it after one of his secret forays into the forbidden areas of the NETHACK ACHTON. It had not been his own creation. He had told her that much, but not where he had found the term.

  All of her dreams lay in broken bloody shards. The second in which she had thought she saw the wonderful universe outside the Ship for the first time, stretched out into agonizing catastrophe whenever she remembered it. She had not yet grasped that on board the PALENQUE she had suffered a culture shock that forced her to leap across many centuries of development that were completely unknown to her. She forgot that she was not alone and whispered to herself: "They're all dead. My companions, Mika and the others ... Venron, my brother, the bravest Metach of all. They say threw his own life away."

  Barely audible, the words crawled across her lips like centipedes in the fields and hydroponic gardens of the star ark NETHACK ACHTON. As though it had been yesterday, she relived the last few days in the Ship: Venron's attempt to flee, the pursuit of her comrades, and the arrival of the space-traveling strangers who had been her salvation and perhaps might have also saved her friends. Solina Tormas, the Akonian historian, had saved Denetree. When the Akonian fleet took over the NETHACK ACHTON, Solina had used a bit of deception to have her taken aboard the PALENQUE. The bodies of her dead friends, the Star Seekers, were left behind, drifting in the vacuum.

  Denetree, she thought. She did not consciously realize that she was struggling to maintain her composure. Danque was just an interlude, a false identity that protected me so I could survive, a woman without a future. And now ... Solina called me a Terran in order to save me ...

  But she was a Lemurian, with all her memories and full awareness. She opened her eyes and saw from her reflection in the mirror-like glass surface that tears were running down her pseudo-Terran, light brown skin. She forgot Harriett, who sat silently next to her, and stared into nothingness, wiping away the wet traces of her memory with her sleeve and forced herself to think of something else. Of her brother's legacy, the black data chip that was inserted in the playback device at her fingertips. Of the information that they had so far been able to read from the chip. Of the excitement ...

  Her ship, the NETHACK ACHTON, was not the only star ark. There was another, at least one other, the LEMCHA OVIR. So far, the chip had only revealed that one secret—that and the course of the LEMCHA OVIR. Rhodan had explained the course to her in his patient manner: "The course tells us where the ark started from—on Lemur, the old Earth. If, like the ark that you lived on, it has been under way at near light-speed and started out at about the same time, the result is that it has to be in a corridor of about a hundred light-years. And we'll find it. We just need a little patience. And perhaps then we'll find out who built the arks and why ... "

  A second Ship! Denetree forced herself to concentrate. "Star of Hope" in the Terrans' language!

  And they were already on their way there: the Terrans' PALENQUE and the Akonian LAS-TOOR, the spacesphere with the flattened poles that, so far, Denetree knew only from the control center's holos. The two ships were racing along the LEMCHA OVIR's course, supporting as well as covertly watching each other. The friendship between the two crews was still young and fragile.

  Once again, Denetree patiently checked every connection with a hand-sized magnifying glass and the needle of a testing device. Next to her, Harriett said in a voice as calm as the even current of air through the NETHACK ACHTON's ventilation shafts, "Let's start, girl. A second, more intensive round."

  "Don't say 'girl' to me," Denetree requested in a thin but firm voice. "There was a time when I was called that. It's over, Harriett. I am Denetree and don't want to be called anything else."

  "I didn't know that," Harriett replied with patient self-assurance. "It's all right, Denetree. Let's carry on."

  Harriett Hewes, Denetree thought. Weapon systems officer and second pilot of this starship. A starship whose interior seems familiar in many places. Familiar, in a strange way, like Harriett's voice. The familiarity of frequently used, worn-down levers, switches, and fittings. Split seams and leather worn smooth on seat cushions, carefully mended with wide tape. Dirty edges on surfaces that were often touched or handled. Shining bright instruments and high-performance equipment, cleaned down to the bare metal in the places where they were most used.

  Harriett repeated her request. Denetree nodded. Power, almost immeasurably slight, flowed once more into the precious data chip. The first data strings silently left the storage cells and became visible on the display screen as jumbled rows of numbers, letters, and symbols. Denetree heard Harriett say, "Very good, Denetree."

  The keyboard's touch fields blurred in front of Denetree's eyes. The chip, her brother's last legacy. She missed Venron and could not imagine ever forgetting him, even though she had now reached the place she had longed for all her life: the stars.

  Denetree was learning Terran and Intercosmo, since the automatic translator was still unsatisfactorily interpreting her ship's own language, which was a kind of Lemurian dialect.

  "Rhodan is online," Harriett said. "He's waiting just as expectantly for more data as all the rest of us."

  "It's hard to figure out the code. Although I should know my brother's ... style." Denetree's uncertainty was hardly any less, but she was now getting around the PALENQUE with some degree of skill. She was no longer getting lost in the Terran starship, which had a diameter of only 200 meters—and fifteen main decks' worth of bewildering interior arrangements. Since leaving Maahkora, a brief stopover after the unpleasant encounter with the Akonian fleet, her self-confidence had increased a little. "I can't read anything. I don't see anything familiar. Do you know what I think? I think a stranger input the data, not one of us, which means it couldn't have been Venron."

  "We'll be able to read it clearly sooner or later, Denetree. We have something already: proof of the existence of a second ark, its name, and a usable plot of its course." Harriett's voice lay soothingly like balm on Denetree's
aching heart. "Haste is unnecessary and spoils the results."

  Using tiny contacts as well as much effort and technical wizardry, Kurt Brodbeck, the Chief Engineer, and other crew members had connected the paper-thin chip to the reading device's sensors. The Lemurian chip's shape, size, contacts, and connecting surfaces did not fit the interface format used by the Terran ship.

  The reader, built into the console next to the communications center, was connected to the subsyntron that controlled the 200-meter starship's large main computer. With the data chip, Denetree had inadvertently bought herself the right to live on board the PALENQUE along with the Terrans' unlimited good will.

  For a minute, Denetree and Harriett observed how the data stream grew stronger and hopefully more meaningful. Denetree had accepted the idea that the world outside the NETHACK ACHTON would be her world in the future. There was no going back. She did not know what to expect, but once she was over her depression she hoped to see cosmic distances, for a view stretching to the horizon such as she had seen to her awe and amazement on the strange dome-covered world of Maahkora. She also longed for the hours in which she could laugh freely and untroubled.

  "There's something," she said lowly. "A hint of another coding."

  The data solidified. The first comprehensible details about the Lemurian arks appeared on a more clearly organized level of information. Denetree glanced over at Sharita Coho's raised command station and tried to interpret the holodisplay's images quickly and accurately.

  SYNOPSIS (Logbook of the PALENQUE, Plain Text)

  On 4 March 1327 New Galactic Era, a prospecting ship with Perry Rhodan on board had been in the "uninhabited" Ochent Nebula, about 56,000 light-years from the Sol System. While searching for raw materials, rare minerals, and valuable metals, it accidentally detected a strange object that aroused the curiosity of the Terrans. Dark clouds and dust concentrations that shone in the light of large suns and hundreds of thousands of densely packed stars highlighted this sector of space. In this no man's land of the Galaxy, unusually powerful energy streams limited the PALENQUE's freedom of movement.