Factoring Humanity

Earth’s international space station had grown over the years, but there was no way for the starship to dock with it; the aliens were going to have to space-walk over. They moved their ship until the gap between it and the closest point on the station was about five hundred meters.

Every camera aboard the station and the flotilla of shuttles was trained on the alien ship, and every television set down on the planet was watching the drama unfold; for once, all of humanity was tuned into the same program.

The alien space suits gave no hint of what the creatures within might look like; they were perfectly spherical white bubbles, with robotic arms extending from them, and a mirrored-over viewing strip that ran horizontally just above the sphere’s equator. Five of the aliens left the mothership and were propelled by jets of compressed gas across the gulf toward an open cargo bay on the space station.

There was a possibility that the aliens might not remove their suits even after they reached the station — gravity might not be the only thing that differed between the two worlds. Indeed, it was possible that the aliens had a taboo against showing their physical form to others — that had been suggested more than once when their original radio messages failed to contain any apparent representation of their appearance.

The first of the spheres came into the cargo bay. Its occupant used its jets to dampen most of its forward movement, but it still had to reach out with one multijointed mechanical hand to stop itself against the far bulkhead. Soon the other four spheres were safely motionless inside, too. They floated quietly, evidently waiting. The cargo door began to close behind them, very, very slowly — no threat, no trap; if the aliens wanted to leave, they could easily jet out of the bay before the door finished shutting.

But the spheres did not move, although one of them rotated around to watch the door coming down.

Once the bay was sealed, air was pumped in. The aliens had to have done spectroscopic studies of Earth’s atmosphere as they approached it; they must know that the gases entering the chamber now were the same as those that made up the planet’s air, rather than some attempt to poison them with deadly fumes.

The scientists aboard the station had reasoned that if the alien world had a lower gravity, it probably also had a lower atmospheric pressure. They stopped adding air at about seventy kilopascals.

The aliens seemed to find all this suitable. The robotic arms on one of the spheres folded back on themselves so that they could touch the sphere’s surface. The sphere split in two at its equator, and the hands, which were anchored to the bottom half, lifted away the top part.

Inside was a Centaur.

The actual Centaur looked nothing like its namesake from human mythology. It was jet-black in color, insectile in construction, with giant green eyes and great iridescent wings that unfolded as soon as the being had drifted out of its space suit.

It was absolutely gorgeous.

Soon the other four egglike suits cracked open, disgorging their occupants. Exoskeleton color ranged from solid black through silver, and eye color varied from green through purple through cyan. The unfolding of the wings was apparently the Centaur equivalent of a stretch — no sooner had they been deployed than the beings folded them up again.

A door opened in the cargo bay, and the designated choice for first contact drifted into the room. And who better for that than the person who had first figured out what the Centauri radio signals were meant to convey? Who better than the person who had first detected the presence not just of humanity’s overmind, but of the Centaur overmind as well? Who better than the individual who had mediated the first contact between the overminds, preventing the human one from panicking?

All five aliens turned to look at Heather Davis. She held out her hands, palms up, and smiled at the extraterrestrials. The Centaur who had first opened its suit unfolded its wings again, and with a couple of gentle beats, set itself moving toward her. A backward movement of the wings brought it to a stop about a meter from Heather. She reached out an arm toward the alien, and the alien unfurled a long, thin limb toward her. The limb looked fragile; Heather did nothing more than let it tap against the palm of her hand.

A dozen years ago, the Centaurs had reached out with their radio messages.

Two years ago, their overmind had made contact with the human overmind. Perhaps that had been the more important event, but still, there was something wonderful and poignant and real about the actual touching of hands.

“Welcome to Earth,” said Heather. “I think you’re going to find it a very nice place.”

The alien, who couldn’t yet understand English, nonetheless tipped its angular head, as if in acknowledgment.