What Other Cradle?

Who can tell what other cradle
High above the Milky Way
Still may rock the king of heaven
On another Christmas Day?

Sidney Carter

Balthazaar frowned at the planisphere projection: a three-dimensional map of the entire galaxy in miniature. His hand flicked over the user interface, and the projection changed. The galaxy rotated, then exploded outwards as a sector was magnified. Balthazaar still didn't know what to make of it.

"It looks like a new star," he said at last.

Gaspar joined him at the planisphere. "What kind of star - a supernova, do you think?"

Balthazaar shook his head. "Not in that sector."

"What then?"

They lapsed into puzzled silence as they stared at the unexplained point of light.

"Idiots!" said Melchior, giving them both a hearty slap on the shoulders. Can't you tell a hyperspace trading beacon when you see one!"

Balthazaar called up a statistical analysis and studied it for a moment.

"True," he said, "it has the same frequency as a trading beacon - but it's thirteenth magnitude!"

Melchior wasn't to be put off. It was his ship, and as an astro-trader, he was always on the look out for new markets.

"Well, that must mean its a very important trading station!"

Balthazar, the astro-navigator, was more cautious.

"Then why haven't I seen it before!" he said, "and why isn't it on this list of galactic trading stations." The 3D projection now glowed with a sprinkling of multi-coloured lights, showing the galactic trading stations according to their different degrees of importance and principal commodities.

Gaspar, astro-engineer, was equally cautious. "It seems a bit odd to find a grade 1 galactic trading station at the edge of the galactic empire! What is it called, again?"

Balthazaar flicked the control interface, and the projection showed a 3D map of the sector complete with labels. The beacon seemed to indicate a planet called Planet Palestine.

"Never heard of it!" said Gaspar dismissively. "Now, let's get back to work. I thought I asked you to plot me a course for Perseus 5..."

"Wait!" said Melchior.

Gaspar and Balthazaar looked at each other despairingly. Melchior was clearly in the grip of another of his wild ideas. "That's obviously a new trading station of some importance. We'll make a killing if we get there before the mad rush!"

"But...", protested Gaspar.

It was no use. Melchior had made up his mind. "No 'buts'. I'm the owner of this ship, and I say we set a course for Planet Palestine!"

Moments later, Balthazaar felt the familiar space-sickness as the ship leapt into hyper space - it was not the only thing that was making him feel sick!

To say Planet Palestine was a disappointment was an understatement. The beacon had guided them to a down-at-heel space port on the outskirts of Planet Palestine's capital city, Bethlehem.

"We're certainly before the mad rush!" quipped Gaspar, "the place is deserted!"

"And falling apart too," said Balthazar, looking with disgust at the rust and grime on the docking bay.

"It'll be worth it, you'll see!" snapped Melchior, "Gaspar, you go to the office and find out what their principle trading commodity is, and what their price is for our plasticised plasma blocks. Balthazaar, you stay on board and see if you can hook into the space port main computer. Find out what you can about this place."

Melchior settled down to make the appropriate entries in his space log and to await the results of his orders.

"What do you mean - Soya-synthesised mutton substitute!" yelled Melchior. "What kind of a commodity is that!"

"I'm only reporting back..." said Balthazar, affronted at Melchior's tone.

"OK, I'm sorry," said Melchior. "What will they offer for our plasticised plasma blocks?"

Balthazaar hesitated. "Er...they have no use for pasticised plasma because their industrial base is limited. Their product base is quasi-agrarian, with a particular specialism in semi-synthetic consumables."

"Come again?" said Gaspar, "Don't forget I'm just an engineer not an egg-head like you!"

"Well, to put it simply," said Balthazar, "they sell mutton."

"No kidding!" laughed Gaspar.

"It's no joke!" groaned Melchior. "This ship, along with most of the galactic trading fleet is designed for low bulk, high value commodities - we'd better get out of here."

"Hang on a minute..." said Gaspar. He went to his control interface and a series of figures flashed before him. "I thought so," he said, "we can't get clearance until tomorrow. 25-83-04 Galactic Central Time precisely."

Melchior groaned.

"Why don't we make the best of it while we're here?" suggested Balthazar. "The Space Port Computer says there's a hotel nearby. Let's have a change of food and a decent bed to sleep in for once!"

"Sorry, no room," said the attendant in an almost unrecognisable dialect of Galactic Standard.

Melchior protested, but his status as galactic trader and owner of a Mk V Mega-container Ship counted for nothing here. "I'm sorry," the attendant replied, "I've even filled the shuttle bay." He nodded in the direction of a small building that was used to house the small vehicle that ferried the hotel's guests to the space port and back.

"What are all these people doing here?" asked Balthazar.

"Visiting, I guess," said the attendant absent-mindedly, and turned away to carry on with his other duties.

But Balthazaar wasn't satisfied. He flicked open his wrist computer and ran a series of checks.

"I'm picking up something strange on the entity-locator," he said after a moment. But there was no-one to hear. The others were walking back to the shuttle. He repeated his words more loudly.

"Well?" snapped Melchior.

"There's a high-significance entity located in that shuttle bay," said Balthazaar.

“How important?” said Gaspar.

“Well the read out is on the scale maximum of ten.”

“Why would he be in a shuttle bay, and not the Bethlehem Hilton?”

“No idea, but that beacon seems to be hanging right over it."

They looked up. High overhead shone a light like a star, but brighter.

Melchior cheered up at the sight. "Perhaps that's what it's all about. The beacon is directing us to an important trader. He hasn't even started trading yet - perhaps we're the first. Come on - we'll get a great deal."

Melchior and Gaspar pushed forwards, but Balthazaar wasn't sure yet. He continued to run checks on his wrist computer. Minutes later they rejoined him.

"We can't get anywhere near because of all the soya-synthesised mutton substitute production personnel..."

"What was that you called them?" interrupted Gaspar.

"OK, shepherds, to you," said Melchior, "not that there's any sheep, or fields, in their production processes."

"Oh!" Gaspar didn't want to admit that he wasn't sure what shepherds were, either.

"Anyway," said Melchior, "to get back to the point. If this is an important trader, we ought to introduce ourselves with gifts. What have we got?"

"About 50,000 pasticised plasma blocks," said Gaspar.

"No, no," said Melchior, "they're for trading. What we need is something personal. What else have we got?"

"Well we've got some Galactic Currency Units – they're better than gold!" said Gaspar.

"We've got some air-freshener aerosols in exotic aromas," said Balthazar.

"OK, and I'll take a pack of that preservative neo-plastic cling-film - it always comes in handy!"

"There's just one thing," said Balthazar. "The maximum-significance entity is other-dimensional, or at least partly so."

Melchior waved his hand dismissively. "Even if your readings are correct, that's not a problem. We know that other dimensions exist, we just haven't been able to access them. This could be a great trading opportunity."

"But..." Balthazaar didn't know whether it was worth persisting. "But according to this readout, that other dimension is the spiritual dimension."

Melchior stopped in his tracks. “What do you mean, spiritual?”

“Well, I don’t quite know how to put this but...”

“Go on,” said Gaspar and Melchior together.

“The simple word for a maximum-significance spiritual-dimension entity is...”

“Well...?”

“God.”

“The concept is purely mythological, a survival from the earlier, superstitious ages of our race...” began Gaspar.

“Whatever kind of entity it is, it’s important,” interrupted Melchoir, and it doesn’t seem to be doing any harm to those soya-synthesised mutton substitute production personnel. So let’s take a look.”

They elbowed their way through the crowd and into the shuttle bay. There in front of them was a man and his wife - a very ordinary man and wife, not the high-status entities they had been expecting. However, they noticed that the centre of attention seemed to be the refuelling cradle. This was a metal container about the size of a real cradle that was designed to dispense a lithium-xantium fuel cell when the right number of Galactic Currency Units were put in the slot. This refuelling cradle held a baby.

Balthazar ran some checks on his wrist computer. He looked at the readout in stunned silence, then knelt before the refuelling cradle. Gaspar and Melchior didn’t have to ask what he had found out, they sensed it and also knelt.

Before them was God, made flesh in the image of their kind: compound eyes, green skin and twelve tentacles.

© Kit, 2007.All rights reserved by the author.