A preliminary, unchecked chapter.
Don't expect too much from it.

==

.

As Jeff got out, the view he found was breathtaking. The suits had landed on a plateau. Resting against a mountainside it stretched for several miles, leaning slightly downwards toward a valley, so that it offered him a unhindered view of the slope all the way down. And down there he could see forest’s, all spread out in patches, but as he got out his field glasses he realized that it was the distances deceiving him. After being on the ship, and then in the suit, he found that he once more had to adapt to the freedom of space, in a real world. And this world, this world was so much bigger than anything he had seen before, not that he had that much to compare it too. The forests, when looked at through the field glasses, was more than just patches, they were mighty. The valley had to stretch an awful long way he thought as he studied them.

The perimeter was, as Royal had stated, clearly marked by the tripods, and also by the combined sonic and electro magnetic barrier created by them, effectively stopping any wild life. It seemed to heat the air as it worked, giving Jeff much the same visual effect as a very hot day might create, hot air dancing on the tarmac.

“Oh Jeff, what a sight.” He heard Janelle.

She looked out from his Tri-D, seeing much the same as him. but she missed the intense fresh smell that had hit Jeff, from the first moment he stepped outside. It was unlike anything he had ever meet, at the same time as it somehow felt familiar. He had no idea, but to us it would have been instantly recognizable, very similar to what you feel just after a rain, with the ozone still suffused through the air. And although he felt a little heavier, the oxygen concentration was well over normal, giving him a slightly lightheaded feeling of wellbeing and happiness. Not that he needed it, just being outside felt exhilarating enough

“Yes.” He agreed. “Incredible, is this what Earth looks like?”

“Once it must have done, and some places still have it.” Earth had been used, reused, and overused by so many cycles now that only the very richest could afford restoring it to what it once had been, and the costs for doing so was more than astronomical. But she had visited the late king’s palace once, and the view there reminded her of this, but only if magnified by a thousand.

“I wish I could come out with you.” He heard her sigh longingly. “Could you at least pick some flowers for me?”

“Any specific you want?”

“Yes, those red ones, with the purple petals.”

As he started to walk to them Royal came online again.

“Please do not pick anything just yet Jeff. We have analyzed the flora, even though our first estimate is that they do not expose any threat they have unusual characteristics and gene patterns to them, we are still building up our knowledge base.”

“Royal, how can you be so insensitive.” Janelle complained, half jokingly, half serious. “You refuse to let me out, and now you refuse me my flowers too?”

“I’m sorry Ma’am, our results from the preliminary tests are inconclusive, but we can’t exclude the possibility of them being sentient.”

“Sentient flowers?” Jeff exclaimed as he stopped dead in his tracks. He had almost stepped on one, but now he gave it a respectful distance as he walked around it.

“You joking, Royal?” Janelle asked.

“No Ma’am, there are a rudimentary nervous system and also a reaction to sensorial input.”

“Shouldn’t you have told me that before I went out Royal?” Jeff asked a little irritated.

“Sorry Jeff, we are doing further tests as we speak, this is just a precaution. There are no signs of them communicating, nor of any cognitive capacity.”

“So they are not the masters of the planet then?” Jeff asked, half in jest.

“No.” Was the curt answer from Royal.

Jeff sat down on the grass, it felt like grass and looked like grass, darker than what he had seen in the ships garden but grass all the same, to take a closer look at the flowers. They were fairly big, half his size, and had delicate purple petals with a network of thinner green and brown veins decorating them.

The flower itself was a dark red, changing to an almost dark blue color inside it its cup, at the bottom. And it smelled, the smell was more of the one he had felt from that meat-eating flower Janelle’s mother had picked though, a sweet pungent reek, reminding him of meat gone bad. He moved away from it a little as he described it to Janelle.

“Meat-eater.” Janelle asked.

“Sorry Ma’am, we’re still examining, it’s highly possible though.” Royal answered.

“Any insects?”

“Ma’am, we exterminated all life inside the perimeter before allowing Jeff out. We are still in the preliminary stages.”

That was standard procedure when landing in a unknown environment, as Janelle well knew, but her interest had peaked with Jeff’s description. She wanted out now, to see for herself, suddenly she found the wrap just as unbearable as Jeff had.

“Royal, I want out.”

“Ma’am we don’t know..”

“Phieew, if Jeff can, I can. Don’t argue with me Royal. Let me out.”

As Jeff looked back he saw the wrap move and Janelle come out. He was quite impressed by her audacity, somehow he had started to feel as if the suits were the ones commanding here, but now he was reminded once again of in whose hands the real power rested. But he just had to think of her snoring to feel a little more relaxed, she was just as human as him.

“As she came she sat down beside him. She carefully sniffed the air around the flower.

“Ouch, You’re right Jeff, smelly thing, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” Having her so near him, and being on a real planets surface instead of in the suit made him feel better that he had done in, for ever actually. He looked at her carefully inspecting the flower, feeling all empty, as if all thought had gone and this moment was forever, and to him, it was.

The flowers, on their side, had just started to do their job. The planet was now examining their cellular structure finding it carbon based. As Jeff had touched the flowers stem, microtubes, some thousand micrometers in diameter, had taken samples of both his cells, and his blood, then breaking it down into its compounds. Carbon based life was no news to the planet, after all, that was what it used too. It was common too many galaxies, even SpaceTimes. But there was other life forms existing too, using other combinations.

As the planet started to search through its’ collective memory it found several bubbles answering to the general description, but it needed to narrow it down further. As it cogitated over how, Janelle and Jeff shared turns looking through the field glasses, down at the valley. It looked so inviting and calm to Janelle, with its sprinkles of blue and even lakes. She really wanted to go there.

“Royal, how long until we can move down?”

“Sorry Ma’am, we can’t move down.”

Janelle could understand the Royal’s reasoning, she also knew the protocols demanded in a situation like this. But, working against it was her need of exploring, and her need of maybe making this planet a new home. She desperately needed to find her connection to it, it was as much human need as it was her lust for exploration talking when she told it.

“Protocols be damned Royal, I’m prepared to stay here three days, and if you haven’t found anything that demands survival mode, we’ll then move camp to the valley.”

Royal was quiet for some seconds.

“Yes Ma’am.” It answered finally. Because, all said and done, if hers was to command then its was to obey.
==