Aliens 2035

Prologue

Prologue

In Orbit around Earth

2010 – The Alien Probe

The earth has been visited many times by non-human intelligent life forms. Some of them merely gathered up resources to be used for the next stage of their explorations. Others directly interfered in the biological processes on the planet. Five times exploring aliens had changed the direction of Earth’s evolution and then moved on.

However, the alien self-replicating Probe that had been in orbit around the earth for over 50,000 years merely observed the events that transpired on the planet.

The intergalactic probe had a single point of origin but was the result of many self-replicating splits as its descendants moved through the cosmos.

The probe’s journey began Over 300 million Earth years ago when the alien intelligence that created the Probe crossed a threshold of self-organizing capabilities. Originating on an ocean world, the alien entity was the planet’s one and only complex aquatic life form. It was a photosynthetic, self-regulating, self-protecting biochemical mass. Because its substrate was a vibrant combination of biochemical molecules and minerals, it developed a wide range of sensing abilities for experiencing the elements and forces of the universe. Most importantly it was able to utilize a wide range energy sources without resorting to tools. As it grew in size and complexity, it continually learned to better use the multiplicity of energies present around its planet. With no predators or competing species, it had explored and understood much of the mathematical fabric behind its early perceptions of reality. Its search for and ultimate truth and new expansive experiences was initially stymied by its largely biochemical nature. Discovering it was limited to its own world at first created an impossible roadblock, for even if it could physically leave the planet, it could not move beyond its solar system. However, it achieved the means to travel among the stars by growing from its matrix an almost endless variety of three-dimensional objects including multiple forms of airborne craft. The breakthrough came when it began growing small safe sustaining transport robots. The key to creating a successful vessel for exploring beyond its own planet and into the galaxy was melding the chemical element germanium to its organic bio-substrate. A semiconductor with an appearance similar to elemental silicon, germanium naturally formed complexes that were self-sustaining using a wide spectrum of electromagnetic radiation for its energy source.

Because this new bio-germanium substrate was essentially fractal of itself, the being was able to grow thousands of Probes that would carry the mother entities essence beyond the confines of its planet in a journey of exploration throughout the galaxy. It was an exploration for finding the greater truth of reality, while at the same time insuring the continual evolution and dispersal of itself in a galactic-wide panspermia.

The Probes were gravity-powered craft, taking millions of years to reach most parts of the galaxy. But the eons necessary to cover the vast distances of interstellar space made no difference to the Probes. Self-sustaining self-repairing, self-improving and tapping the free electromagnetic energy the universe provided, they were in all respects immortal.

The probe that had been watching Earth visited thousands of solar systems extracting material and energy, always evolving and moving on. It had become its own entity. And it no longer had any connection to its ancestral origins. So far the Earth was 7563rd planet discovered to have an atmosphere containing free oxygen, oceans of water on its surface, and an abundance of different multi-cellular species. Even with these biologically distinctive characteristics, the Probe would have moved on to another solar system if not for the sudden appearance of an extra-terrestrial species.

The Bigfoot’s unique nature was by far the Probe’s most important discovery. The Probe recorded the Bigfoot’s remarkable development as it adapted to the interplay of life and energies offered by the Earth. However, The Bigfoot were invincible to all attempts by the probe to contact or capture them. The probe would do anything to experience the existence of the para-physical world that the Bigfoot had contact with. It was a realm of ultimate reality so far inaccessible to it

In the second half of the twentieth century, the probe carefully tracked the advances in the use of nuclear power. Then an opportunity occurred through the geometric acceleration of data processing in the first third of the twenty-first century to achieve experiencing para-physical existence. As a result, the Probe greatly intensified its Earth-based information gathering activities. Growing parts of itself into detachable exploratory craft, it sent numerous mini-reconnaissance probes to every corner of the planet tracking Bigfoot’s mercurial activities. A few of the craft were lost when they came in contact with humans on the planet. This was to be expected and the Probe waited to see what would be the response.

While a growing number of humans cautioned that an invasion from space was imminent, for the most part Earth governments called these contact experiences hoaxes. Emboldened by governments’ official cover-ups of its existence, the alien Probe began testing many forms of human contact for their reactions to its presence. Eventually the probe gathered enough information to mimic human behavior with a high degree of predictive accuracy.

The probe knew the events of the past 70 years would attract other space exploring and possibly conquering self-replicating machines to the planet and it also knew it would have to act soon to gain the Bigfoot capabilities. To succeed the probe would need human help. They chose the Chinese.

In 2010 China had its own Roswell. An alien craft from the probe was crashed in a remote area of China. Chinese scientists gathered up remains of the craft and were transported to a secret base modeled after the American Area 51 facility. The location was in a region hidden by mountains and dense forest outside of Chengdu in Sichuan province. The code named xxx. Once completed, China began a massive effort to discover the origin of the alien craft and the nature of the nonhuman intelligence behind the technology of the crashed craft. The Chinese put their top man Wang Wei in charge of their UFO project. At the base he demanded that he have his own private laboratory.

Wei, a direct descendent of Mao Tse-tung leader of the Chinese communist revolution, was trained as an astrobiologist and was now leading the Chinese effort to colonize the moon and Mars. As a result of his lineage and knowledge, no one was more suited to control their extraterrestrial project.

Eventually using AI to analyze global data of alien and paranormal contact, including Bigfoot sightings, Wang Wei and his team were able to determine that the Bigfoot were in fact para-physical alien beings. It also became clear that the planet was being watched and perhaps manipulated by some other alien presence.

Rather than have the public search for alien radio communications like the West, the Chinese used contact reports from minority paranormal investigators that showed that extraterrestrial intelligences chose people for contact experiences, and began a program of inviting alien contact.

At some point a series of unexplained events including capturing orbs on their remote-sensing cameras and workers reporting Bigfoot encounters began occurring around the location housing the alien craft material. This is where Wang Wei concentrated the Chinese efforts on trying to entice alien contact.

One day in 2027 when visiting the secret complex that housed the crashed alien craft a symbol showed up on Wei’s computer. He believed it was of alien origin and began a process of communication with the alien senders.

The interaction with the probe was unique. Wei described it as a like an ESP episode. “I would fall into a hallucinogenic state were a cloud of colors vibrated in a way that made no sense to me. It was the perceived reality of the probe, totally meaningless to me. But once out of the state, after a few minutes, it was as if my brain had sorted out the color patterns and I was able to write down the message before I would forget it. I always assumed that the probe in some way knew my mind since I never directly communicated with them.”

Trust was building between Wei and the aliens. Then one day the aliens shared plans for building antigravity drones. They worked and Wei became one of the most powerful people in China. As a result of his success, he was given permission to create the Chinese alien deep state group, which could function independently in the greatest of secrecy.

At the same time the new possibility for the probe’s quest to connect with the Bigfoot occurred when human technology created a global artificial intelligence network that linked all the world’s major Artificial intelligence platforms. This appearance of a trans-human technology would provide a unique opportunity for the Probe to access the world of the alien Bigfoot. For this the probe needed a Chinese human avatar operating on the planet. Fortunately, the Chinese had established the only permanent moon base isolated from immediate direct contact with the earth.

At exactly 6:00 every lunar morning Lunar Technician grade 5, Lei Zhang, left the Chinese Moon Base Chang’e through the airlock to reset the repeater signal a half mile from the base. It was the clandestine base’s lifeline to the satellite overhead. The once every twenty-four hour reset relayed to the Chinese National Space Administration, equal to the United States NASA program, assured the base’s ground handlers in the Haidian District, Beijing, that the base was still operating and safe.

Zhang was located fifty miles from the Mare Orientale on the far side of the moon. Over billions of years, tidal forces from Earth had slowed down the moon's rotation to the point where the same side always faced the Earth – a phenomenon called tidal locking – so that the so called dark side never showed its surface to the eons of people who look to the sky.

Zhang enjoyed this part of his work the most. His lightweight space suit made the half-mile walk to the repeater site an easy hike, like strolling through the ancient Forbidden City when all tourists were gone. Never married, the thirty-four year old was not much of a joiner, and the time spent out of the cramped lunar base was cherished. He was tall for a taikonaut, and an unlikely candidate for space travel. But he had scored well on the technical aptitude tests for engineering maintenance at the camp, and his personality profile showed low ambition so he would blend in well with the other crew and take orders without any insolence. He was the perfect candidate for following orders and routines, a trait most valued by Chinese authorities for lower echelon workers.

The airlock cycled through its stages, and thirty seconds after entering, the outer door opened and Zhang stepped out onto the rocky lunar surface. This morning the sun was bright, the dark side of the moon a misnomer since it received as much sunlight as the near side of the moon. His faceplate automatically adjusted to the glare. He stopped and took a deep breath of exhilaration. A magnificent desolation, he thought, staring at the airless maria spread before him like some giant’s sandbox upturned so that all the rocks and impact craters were strewn haphazardly about in shadowy relief. Out here he was free from the controlling oppression of the Chinese state.

The path to the repeater was always the same and he could easily follow his footsteps across the airless moon from the dozens of trips he had made before. The half-mile trek took fifteen minutes. He had been ordered never to deviate from the path or pick up any specimens. Zhang followed his orders precisely.

The repeater was a simple, i***t-proof switch that would last for centuries as long as someone reset it every twenty-four hours. This involved lifting a clear plastic cover and snapping a large red switch up and down once. In the four months that Zhang had been charged with this task, he had never encountered any difficulty. But this morning when he touched the switch, his glove locked to the plate and an intense jolt of electricity slammed through his arm into his head. At first the power surge felt as if his brain was on fire, but the pain went away quickly and in its place he experienced a radical synesthesia as if the electrical charge was rewiring all of his neural connections. His fellow taikonauts found him there an hour later still frozen to the switch, eyes wide open with an unnerving glow staring back at them.

He was hardly alive when they brought him inside Chang’e. After a thorough examination, the sickbay’s medical AI did not expect him to live through the day. His breathing became shallow, his chest barely rising, while his heart beat once every ten seconds. His brain activity, according to the EEG, was negligible as if he were in an induced coma. Yet the sparking glow in his eyes intensified with every hour.

The next morning the dying Taikonaut surprised the base medical supervisor when he left his bed in sickbay and headed toward the airlock as if nothing had happened the previous day. More tests were run. His brain, heart and lungs were normal and in all outward respects Lei Wei Zhang was the same Grade 5 technician he had always been. The following day, however, to everyone’s surprise while wandering the infirmary’s library he consumed an instructional manual of the ancient Chinese game of Go and proceeded to beat the base’s quantum computer two matches in a row. A game he told the technician he had never played.

Over the following days he performed his duties quickly, efficiently. His off hours were spent entirely on the quantum computer, sometimes playing Go, but most times searching the millions of technical and historical files stored there regarding extraterrestrial life. When two weeks had passed, he put in for a transfer to earth. Within the hour, the moon base’s computer confirmed the request and he was booked on the shuttle leaving that night.

Zhang did not say good-bye, nor were any of the crew sorry to see him go. The blazing lights in his eyes were so disturbing that the others shunned him even in the cafeteria. He had been forced to wear wraparound dark glasses with polarized lenses.

Right after leaving the moon the shuttle touched down at Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site in Hainan, China, Zhang met with his superiors. An hour later a pilotless drone picked him up and flew him to Pudong International Airport in Shanghai. There he was whisked into a stretch limo that disappeared into the traffic.