Shackleton's Folly (The Lost Wonder Book 1) (37 page)

The sly old King asked, “Then there is nothing you want yourself? A reward for bringing my daughter home, perhaps?”

“If there was something I wanted, I am sure it would not be something you could give me. It’s something that must be earned.”

The air limousine lifted higher and headed to the ancient temple on the prominent hill in the middle of the park. Alec got a better view of the city park. The hill was in the center of alternating rings of water and land radiating from the hill. First came a moat nearly a kilometer wide, then a kilometer of land with buildings from the same period, then another kilometer of water, then another kilometer of land. Three rings of water connected to the channel they had flown over, and then they entered the city. The park ended a kilometer outside the third and final ring of the structure.

The concentric-circle waterways surrounding the city core they had crossed on their way here were obviously an homage to the original builders of Atlantis.

Alec sat in awe seeing the temple up close, “And, that? Poseidon’s temple?”

King Coeus replied, “The Temple of Poseidon.” The building’s exterior of white marble was accented with red and black marble and with the use of gold and precious stones. “There is Cleito’s palace and one for each of the ten kings. It is tradition that we live in the palace of the eldest king. These other buildings have civic use today.”

The air limousine landed lightly on a landing pad near the crest of the Hill of Cleito. King Coeus stood and led the party from the craft toward a building of much grandeur and elegance. Alec waited for Electra to exit the car, and they walked together at the back of the group. The polished serpentine walkway cutting through the grass up to the second building’s steps was accented with gold inlay between the red and white marble slabs. The rich, green grass lawn surrounded the building.

Electra leaned close to Alec. “What did my father ask you?”

Alec followed the others up the stairs. “Not much, why?”

“That’s not a good sign,” she replied.

“What does that mean?”

Electra considered her father as they ascended the stairs. “He usually has many questions for my friends.”

The doors of the palace were held wide by automated systems within the walls. They closed neatly behind Alec and Electra. The twins said their goodbyes and left for their volunteer jobs helping the senior citizens of the city keep in contact with the rest of the world and not become shut-ins. They would need even more help with the gardens being as they were — on the verge of pulling themselves apart.

King Coeus strode through to the rear of the palace and out the back door. “One of my ancestors talked the Groundskeeper into building an Access Point to the gardens here. It took her ten cycles before the work even started.” King Coeus strode up the short flight of stairs, with the group still following him. “The garden’s structure dictated where it needed to be built, and here it is.” The group entered the building through the enclosure containing the statue of Poseidon. Alec stopped momentarily beneath the statue. The craftsmanship of the original Athenians shone distinctly through the thousands of years separating him from the time of the construction. The precious gems accented the 15-meter chryselephantine sculpture of Poseidon.

Alec was beyond surprise by this time and just took in the sight. “My pleasure,” he said as he nodded a salute to Poseidon. Electra led him by the arm to a side chamber.

The head of the council’s committee on public safety greeted their King and family. “Your majesty, we have been anxiously awaiting your arrival,” bowed Councilman Atlas.

Electra, with a bound, left Alec and met an old friend and teacher with a broad smile and hug. King Coeus noted a questioning look from Alec. He said in a low voice to Alec, “Councilman Atlas is one of Electra’s oldest and most respected instructors at the Atlantis Academy of higher learning. He tried to dissuade Electra from leaving the gardens, but her stubbornness won out.”

Councilman Atlas and Electra spoke in low tones as they tried to catch up the years of separation in a matter of moments. As they continued their conversation, it was hard not to notice that it now included references to Alec. The Councilman’s attention now and then included intermittent glances in his direction. Then the Councilman stated loudly, “It is good to have you home, Captain.”

Electra asked, “What of the Groundskeeper?”

Councilman Atlas shook his head. “Nothing. We had projections of the Gardens holding out another 100 cycles before any serious changes.” He looked to the other council members. “Today, something happened to cause a resonance on the walls. The structural forces have gone critical, and we have no way to stop the gardens from coming apart.”

King Coeus and Alec approached Electra and Councilman Atlas as the new group had formed to hear her story. The council members had encircled the pair but then gave way to the King and Alec. Dancer remained a few steps back of Alec, keeping an eye on things.

Electra said assuredly, “We were nearly killed by waves at the Beach garden, and, if it had not been for quick thinking by Captain Shackleton and Dancer, we would have died.”

Alec and Dancer became the center of attention. Alec asked, “If we repair the dedication plaque with these pieces, will the system restart?”

Councilman Atlas replied, “We do not know.”

“It is our only option,” stated Alec. He warned Councilman Atlas, “You may have some other visitors. They will not be friendly.”

Councilman Atlas said with authority, “You concentrate on the dedication plaque. We will take care of the intruders. Take this.” He handed Alec an arm bracelet like the one Electra wore. “If you need help, rub the band here.” He pointed to the design. Alec put on the arm bracelet. A Councilwoman touched Alec’s shoulder and backed away, embarrassed. Councilman Atlas sent for a Security Force commander. Councilman Atlas made apologies for the other council members. “Forgive us — you are the first member of our race to have visited from our mother world.”

Electra pointed out, “Captain Shackleton has two of the missing pieces, and one of the battleships has the third.”

Alec smiled. “I’m not a hero from your prophecy.”

Councilman Atlas replied, “Time will tell.”

*

Councilman Atlas and King Coeus conferred near one end of a large meeting table made from a beautiful white oak. Alec studied a holographic model of the gardens that spun slowly above the table. The detail was magnificent, even at such a scale. Alec could discern every one of the gardens. The walls that separated all of the gardens were showing signs of stress in shades of red. The brighter the red, the greater the stress force, and the ball floating in front of him was looking like a ball of flame. The Emperor’s Hanging Gardens were about to pull itself apart.

Alec just stared at the schematic. The stresses in the structure had to be released in a controlled, non-destructive way. He waved his hand over the control, and the schematic revealed its secret. Life forms of all shapes, sizes, and in just about every color of the rainbow flourished across the 1058 hexagons actually used for biospheres. The last 12 were used for maintenance depots like the one they had visited. The difference was that the one they had visited was the command and control for all the automated systems of the Groundskeeper.

The system had been offline for thousands of cycles. There were 75 billion humans just in this garden, not counting the animals and other creatures that had been transplanted here. All life had the chance to spread out and flourish. Life forms that had succumbed to human encroachment and over-harvesting and had died out hundreds of years ago were represented here. Humanity had become the caretakers of this Garden of Eden.

They expected him, Alec, to fix it. No pressure. If all the other 1058 gardens had similar population growth for their sentient life forms, it would mean there could be as many as 45 trillion — rough numbers, of course. Alec had fresh eyes on the problem. The real question was, now that they had two pieces of the inscription with them, would that be enough to fix things or not? The best-case scenario would be to get the third piece of the inscription.

Dancer made it back to the table and stood beside Alec. Dancer had a following of his own, being an artist and musician in his own right. The Atlanteans had become engrossed in his recounting of the musical puzzle he had to solve in the black pyramid. He had a long discussion with members of the council who were in charge of the arts here in Atlantis. They had a thriving art community and were extremely interested in Dancer’s collection of works from old Earth. They had promised him a senior teaching position at the Academy if he would just share with the people of Atlantis the works of art from Earth. They guaranteed his classes would be packed with interested students. It would be an experience beyond anything he could imagine. Dancer would bring life to a world these people had come to think of as only legend.

Dancer had told them he would think about it only if he could learn and experience what this branch of humanity itself had done over the millennia. They had agreed so quickly that Dancer could only do one thing — agree to teach the class.

Dancer scanned the data displayed by the sphere that slowly spun in front of Alec. People milled about the room; small groups formed and then broke up and reformed with others. They were waiting for security personnel to arrive. The elite group of Hoplites were a special tactical force who fought no wars but who remained in readiness for emergencies. Wars were not possible within the gardens when the Groundskeeper was operational, but with the system down, small skirmishes between reactionary groups had occurred but were squelched quickly. This violence had not spread to their garden yet, but, as a measure of self-defense, the Atlantean government had brought back the Hoplites from the days of old.

Alec shook his head and pursed his lips. “There isn’t much time left.” He pointed to the schematic to show the areas where the stresses had built up and were at critical stage. The gardens could go at any time. “Could happen in an hour or a minute,” said Alec under his breath.

Dancer could see that this was weighing heavily on his friend. “Have a plan?”

Alec replied, “As a great fictional hero of mine once said, ‘Nope, I’m making it up as I go.’”

Dancer could see his friend was having trouble with these conflicting needs. “What will you tell her?”

Alec watched as the system tracked the debris floating about in the sphere. One object made its way from the Maintenance Citadel garden to the Atlantis garden. Alec announced, “We have company.” He slapped Dancer on the shoulder, “That’s exactly what we need. Where Wolfgang Gray goes, so does the third piece.”

Dancer said in a lowered voice, “Not what I asked.”

Alec smiled to those looking at them. “I know.”

Electra saw the Security Force Commander enter the room; he searched the crowd for someone. His face brightened as she returned her gaze and rushed to her.

Commander Astraeus picked her up in a big hug. “Electra, you’re alive! Oh, it’s so good to see you.”

Electra hugged him back as a friend might, not as an on-again, off-again lover from the past.

Astraeus put her down as he realized that two strangers had approached him and that one was cobalt blue.

Electra turned to Alec. “Alec, this is Astraeus, a good friend of mine and a commander in our Security Forces. Astraeus, this is Captain Alec Shackleton. He crossed the galaxy to return me home. He has brought with him two pieces of the dedication plaque.”

The men sized each other up. Each filled in the blanks that Electra had carefully, but unsuccessfully, left in her introductions.

“Commander Astraeus,” said Alec more formally than he would have liked.

“Alec Shackleton. But I thought it took three pieces to repair the dedication plaque,” replied Astraeus as he kept his eyes on Alec.

“Actually, it’s Captain Shackleton, and we have all three pieces here,” replied Dancer.

Astraeus and Alec continued to size each other up. Electra took Alec’s arm and turned him away from Astraeus. “I believe you were looking for Councilman Atlas,” she said over her shoulder to Astraeus.

The battleship
Illia
maintained course over and across the wall between the Maintenance Citadel garden and the next garden. The ship slowly descended as it continued to follow the
Quest
’s path. Below the warship, the blue ocean was broken up by islands, archipelagos, and continents mingled with the waters. This garden was much different from a few they had scanned during their journey through the station. They were complex biospheres but from arid worlds without much water. It was far harder to find planets with an abundance of water, which was the ingredient needed to develop a highly diverse, living biosphere. The arid worlds ended their existence as a habitable world when they would lose their life, giving atmospheres and what little water they had left back to the blackness of space.

Yet, here in this garden was a representation of a much different world — a world at midlife, where life flourished from the depths of its substantial oceans to the heights of the tallest mountain ranges. Ocean-water coverage of this garden was roughly 71 percent.

Wolfgang Gray sat quietly at a science station. At first, he did not understand what he was looking at as the figures poured from the sensors. It was certain that the Koty were ignorant of the world below. Gray said out loud what he had been contemplating as they continued on the
Quest
’s course. “I don’t understand it. This is Earth’s environment, but how can it be?”

Captain K’Dhoplon turned his attention on the human, Gray. “Not a planetary biosphere worth much. When we get this place in shape, this will all be leveled and remade in honor of the One. This station will be remade in the image of our home world. The alien life forms will be eradicated, and then we will undertake the challenge of seeding and production — the production of habitable land, enough for all of the ruling class of my people to have a place where they will be among the gods to those who live under them, at their whim.”