“It looks like a mirror image, doesn't it?”
“I am not sure what it looks like.” Doctor Delton looked at the screen amazed.
“It looks like there is a mirror somewhere in the System reflecting each planet back to us.”
“That is one way of look at it I suppose.”
Doctor Delton and Doctor Reed were two of the scientists on the Haughton Moon Base. The base was on Charon one of the moons around Pluto. It was the best place to see the phenomenon they were planning to study.
The screen in front of them displayed a perfect double image of the solar system. It looked like the display was cut in two, one side reflecting what the other side showed. The image arrived to them curtesy of one of the most powerful telescopes ever created located just outside their biosphere. It was capable of viewing the solar system almost in its entirety. On screen there were two Mercury's and two Venuses and two Earths and so it continued for each rock, moon and asteroid in the entire solar system.
The ripple which was suspected to create this effect was discovered five hundred years ago by accident by the crew of the Hague Shuttle. The shuttle was undergoing the first inter planet journey from Venus to Mars exactly five hundred years ago. The crew witnessed a strange sight. Where ever they looked they saw the same image. On both sides of them there were the same planets. After a lot of research and speculation many scientists agreed that this would happen again only when the planets aligned as they had for that first sighting.
This experiment that was going on now on Charon was the work of hundreds of scientists and astronauts over the last 200 years. Doctor Delton was awestruck by the phenomenon in front of him and could not think of a sane way to describe it.
“We have to call the commander, let him know it has started. We will have very little time to launch the ship.” Doctor Delton shook himself out of his awe and started to implement the protocol. “We need to get as much data as possible and get the crew ready to cross.”
“If they can cross.” Doctor Reed said.
“They have to cross.” Doctor Delton said with more conviction that he felt. “We have to know what is on the other side.”
“Commander Bishop.” Doctor Reed tapped his ear and connected to the Commander. “It is time to get everyone ready. The alignment has begun and the Mirror Image of the planets is almost in full focus.”
“On our way.” Commander Bishop responded.
The crew would consist of only three people in a small very well protected space capsule. It was built to withstand a meteor since no one had any idea what was waiting on the other side of the ripple. Commander Bishop and his two crew members, Officer Samuel and Officer Daem were all highly skilled pilots. They had flown countless test flights together to ensure that they were ready for this mission. This was one of the most important missions since human being had travelled outside of their solar system for the first time. They had found no life out there yet but had not yet stopped looking. This was a chance to see if the life they searched for. A sign that they were not all alone in the universe could be found not in this universe but in the next.
If the last ripple was any indication it would last for 30hours. They had to travel to the second earth and back in 30 hours. And to do it they had the fastest strongest ship every built.
As the Commander and his crew climbed into the capsule the entire base of over 300 hundred scientists, astronauts and their families came out to see the historic flight. They were heroes going out into the unknown to seek friendship.
“OK let's move out,” The commander said as soon as they were all strapped on. The Capsule lifted off the surface of the moon as the flight doors opened and as soon as they had cleared the moon’s atmosphere raced to the ripple.
As they got closer the turbulence got shaky, but they were used to it, it was part of what traveling through space was about. Suddenly the ship was thrown from one side of the ripple to the next with a violent jolt.
The crew were disoriented and when they looked outside, they were not sure which side of the ripple they were on. All they could see was that both sides of the capsule were exactly the same.
Which way did they go. Their navigational equipment offered very little help. The jolt from being thrown had shaken the capsule too much and the equipment was malfunctioning. It gave the same readings from both sides.
“Commander which way.” Asked Officer Daem.
Commander Bishop looked at the reading on the equipment and saw that they were slightly closer to on side than the other. “I don’t think we crossed that ripple just to go back, did we?”
“But did we cross,” Officer Daem asked.
“Have you ever felt anything like what we just went through? Of course, we crossed.” Officer Samuel supported Commander Bishop. “Commander shall we proceed.”
“Yes proceed.”
The capsule travelled closer to the other Earth and readings began coming in from the sensors. They showed various readings on the people and the buildings on the planet. A few distant lights, not a bright as their earth, began coming into view as they come closer to the planet and entered orbit around earth.
“We did choose the right earth. This one is rotating in the opposite direction to ours.” Officer Samuel confirmed.
“Correct, both Earth and Mars are both rotating opposite to their usual orbit. Amazing. The other planets must be the same as well.”
Officer Daem looked at the readings closer. “Commander we are also being scanned from the surface.”
“Do you think they have the same capabilities we have?” Commander Bishop asked.
“It seems they do. Maybe they mirror us in other ways too.” Officer Daem speculated.
“Are you saying that maybe there are the mirror image of us out there somewhere?” Officer Samuel asked incredulously.
“It looks like there may be Officer.” Confirmed Daem.
“Commander we have a ship approaching.”
“We will not have long to wait to find out it would seem.”
“Well, here we go Officers. We did not know what to expect. Let's hope they do not shoot us out of the sky.” Commander Bishop joked.
“They are demanding that we land on the moon Commander.”
“Do it, we are on their side of the ripple. Do as they say.”
“Yes Commander.” Officer Daem and Samuel landed the capsule carefully in the flight dock. When the crew landed on what they knew as the Carina Moon Base. There was no surprise. It was almost identical in every day to their base on Earth's moon.
Doctor Delton, who was the head of space exploration in the immediate vicinity of earth, stepped out of his space ship and walked towards the capsule with the three strangers. They were strange creatures. They had just appeared in the space above the earth, appearing on sensors as if by magic. As he and Doctor Reed approached the capsule, they were cautious. It was not entirely certain that these persons are not harmful. They could be violent of friendly there was no way to tell. At least they had landed without incident on the moon station.
As the two crews came face to face, they were both astounded by each other’s appearance. Commander Bishop and his colleagues looked on as beings with rough scaly skin looked back at them. Their eye took up the top half of their face and there was no eye lid that they could see. Whereas he needed to blink very often to be able to see in this dim light. Their new friends appeared to see them very clearly.
Doctor Delton looked on as he watched the creatures. They blinked their eyes quiet often. The two eyes on each side of their head blinked a lot more than the one in the middle. Their hands had only three fingers while he had six. Where did they came from and what did they want? The rift that he had been studying had only just appeared for the first time. Could they be from that rift. He suspected that they may be.
“Where are you from?” Doctor Delton asked. Would they understand him? Human Being had been looking for extra-terrestrial life for hundreds of years without much luck and now a strange lifeform with the smoothest skin and no hair had just visited them.
“Earth. Well, that other earth, not the one below.” Commander Bishop answered.
“You speak English.” Doctor Delton was surprised.
“Yes, we do. We are from earth on the other side of the ripple.” Commander Bishop explained. “This is very strange. We expected some similarities but the same language is a stretch and this base looks almost exactly like our base.”
“How did you come to be here, that rift only appeared today?”
“This is the second time we have seen it. We have been planning for a long time to cross it.” Commander Bishop choose to cooperate because they were the one trespassing into foreign territory. He had to answer their questions and maybe in return they may answer some of his.
“How did you cross it?” Doctor Delton kept asking questions.
“I am not sure we have the time to explain everything that went on to make this mission happen. The ripple will disappear in about eighteen hours.” Commander Bishop apologized.
“Are you from earth you look very different from us? How is that possible?” Officer Daem asked. Astounded at the look of the beings they had encountered.
“Maybe we evolved differently.” Doctor
We need to get back to report our finding.” Doctor Reed offered in way of explanation. “There is no law which says only one creature can evolve to be intelligent.”
“How did life evolve here?” Officer Samuel broke his silence to ask.
“Life evolved here over billions of years from dinosaurs to us. The final product Human Being.”
“But we are Human Beings also. On our earth we evolved from Dolphins. Do you have dolphins?”
“Yes, we do, beautiful creatures.” Doctor Reed nodded.
“Wow. Extraordinary.” Said Doctor Delton.
Commander Bishop check hi clock. “We must go, or we will be trapped here. We have to report our findings.”
“What findings are you going to report? Will you come back as friends or to concur us.”
“Friends definitely. We have been searching for other life and we are very happy we have found it. Finally.” Commander Bishop smiled and extended his hand.
“We have searched as well, and colonized many worlds in our galaxy. But there is none. Maybe in this duplicate world we will find some friends.” Doctor Delton shook hand with the Commander and his hand almost slipped right off. The Commander skin smooth and slippery.
“We can only hope to be able to recreate the ripple or some way of communicating with you the near future.”
“Thank you for traveling so far to meet us.” Said Doctor Reed.
Commander Bishop and his crew said goodbye to this world’s funny Doctor Bishop. Shaking his hand was like holding onto sand paper. He was used to the smooth skin of his friends. To stop his hand from being hurt he had to pull his hand away rather than allow it to slide out of Doctor Bishop’s grasp.
Doctor Bishop and Doctor Daem watched the crew lift off and fly away disappearing just as they had appeared.
On arrival back at the Haughton Moon Station Commander Bishop had a full report to make to his Doctor Delton. When they arrived, there was much commotion and strange being were also standing in the space dock ready to depart. These people if you can call them that had two eyes but at least they blinked. They had five fingers and soft to the touch skin and a lot of hair. They reminder him more of the primates on earth.
Just as they had to leave the other earth. These being also had to leave this dimension to get back to theirs.
Doctor Reed explained that these being had been studying the ripple for a lot longer than he had. The new beings had explained to them the effects and cause of the ripple “We all share a sun. Each of our universes is held on to the sun by a string. Different strings are available to cross at different times. You can cross at any time you only have to know how to detect them.” Doctor Reed explained to the crew. “So, we can look forward to more visitors and more missions to other universes.
“They promised to come back to show us how to detect them so we can visit ay of the universes circling us.” Doctor Delton explained. “They arrived soon after you left and explained that they are travelers as well. All of us come from our own separate earths. Isn’t that amazing!”
As the capsule sailed away Commander Bishop looked on. They had begun a new era. The search for life had expanded outside of their universe. He and this little crew had only to look out the windows on each side of the capsule to see the infinite possibilities and be ready to meet all the way Human Beings may have evolved.
The Crew