Nisha woke up at first light. For the first time in several days, she heard the familiar sound of Omanji feet. Only she heard a lot of them.
“Rachel, wake up,” she whispered. “It’s Bok.”
They walked outside and spotted Bok, standing and silently ‘talking’ with about 30 other young looking Omanji friends.
“I’m glad you and your friends are here.”
“Thanks Nisha, as you can see, my tent is too small for all of us.”
“I think we can house your friends in the modified human children’s compound,” Nisha said. “We’ve returned 10,000 of the 25,000 to their parents, so a lot of room has opened up.”
“Thank you. Many more want to join me. Can they stay in the compound too? We can manufacture our own food. The Esteemed Elders officially approved our application to build a new colony at an Earth location of our choosing. My colony will be temporary, until we find another suitable planet. We don’t want to place a burden on the humans or the Omanji.”
“Thanks Bok,” Priya said. “So, building your colony is okay with the elders?”
“Yes, it’ll be okay. The elders realize there’s a need for a colony for those who don’t wish to merge. They want one now. Almost 0.1% lived in the colony of the un-merged. They chose to remain behind on Oma, and they still live there.”
“We found some empty desert land for your colony,” Rachel said. “Within a week or two, the land will be legally purchased by some technology companies, and you can begin to build on it.”
Bok and his friends wiggled their noses and turned light blue with excitement when they understood what Rachel had said.
“Thank those companies for us,” Bok said. “We can pay them back with interest by selling some of our energy into your grid and other ways. We wish to work with humans and make things better for everyone. We can’t give you recent technology though. It’s against the law. I got word that 10 more of us will join my colony, so now I have 40.”
“It’s a start Bok. I’m happy for you. Starting this colony takes a lot of guts,” Nisha said.
“Guts?” Bok said.
He paused.
“Many elements in your language are strange to us. Do you mean courage, even though guts refer to internal organs?”
“Yes,” Rachel said. “You could merge and lead an easy and predictable life. However, you chose to stand by your principles and go into the unknown on a new planet. The earth that is. You’re more courageous than me. If I were alone on Oma, I don’t know what I’d do.”
Bok wiggled his nose again.
“I like this term, ‘courageous.’ I think the elders have lost their courage. They’re rigid and too conservative. They make up their minds and that’s it. There’s no freedom of mind or thought, except the freedom to leave.”
“This is your chance to live a free life,” Nisha said. “Freedom has its perils however.”
“What are these perils?”
“When people on Earth are free,” Nisha said, “they do what they want. Sometimes anger, war, chaos, and confusion result. Without a common goal, there can be conflicts of interest. I don’t know how things will work in your colony because you’re connected. Freedom is a good thing, but rules should be established, or anarchy can break out. You know your history.
Here are the coordinates to the part of our compound where your friends can stay,” Nisha said. “There’s enough empty room for a few thousand. So, 40 is no problem if you can feed yourselves.”
Bok held out a hand with five fingers extended and one down. Nisha smiled. Nisha didn’t understand for a moment.
“Ah, I see. Okay, 50 now? That’s no problem.”
Bok walked over to his friends and silently discussed the issue. They climbed into their floating vehicles and sped off to the colony.
“Those things are impressive,” Rachel said. “Did you notice how the vehicle accelerated so quietly and smoothly?”
“Yeah, I’d love one of those,” Nisha said. “I’m not sure where I’d put the license plate though.”
“You wouldn’t need one. Who’s going to catch you?” Rachel said.
A few hours later, Nisha and Rachel were coordinating the return of the modified children to their countries, when Bok and his friends returned in several stealthy looking vehicles with unknown equipment. Bok climbed out of one of the vehicles.
“Nice vehicle-thing.” Nisha said.
“In your language, we call them racers.”
“What are you going to do with all this stuff?” Nisha said.
“We’re going to build a new colony. These are replication drones. They can build new drones of any type including more replication drones. In 10 days, we could build millions of drones which will build the new colony. The food replication devices are near my tent. Our nuclear generator is in this bigger vehicle. We’ll get several more too.”
Nisha glanced at the generator and turned back to Bok.
“Nuclear power worries us. I don’t want any disasters happening. Do you know how to operate that thing?”
“Don’t worry. It’s a simple fusion generator. Fission generators like those on Earth are much more dangerous. We’re getting several older generators that nobody wants. They work well, but now that we’re on Earth, they built larger ones.”
Nisha smiled at Rachel.
“That’s cute. They’re taking hand me downs like teenagers going to college.”
Rachel smiled back.
“Yeah, they’re giving their kids the old pots and pans.”
Nisha glanced over at Bok’s friends, milling about, turning gray.
“Hey Bok, your friends are getting impatient waiting for you.”
“Yes, they told me that. How did you know? You don’t have an implant.”
“Humans don’t need implants to notice things like that.”
“This is another hidden talent which humans possess. Your species is more advanced than the elders believe.”
“Thanks Bok,” Nisha said. “Go help your friends get settled at the compound. You can store your equipment there. Don’t let humans get near them. I’ll send guards to keep watch but keep an eye on the guards. Humans have made no laws regarding Omanji. The guards or other humans might do unpredictable things, like steal advanced technology.”
“I understand,” Bok said. “I don’t want our technology to disrupt the human species. We’re already disrupting you enough. I’d be in trouble with the elders if humans took our technology.”
Bok and his friends sped away silently, leaving swirls of dust trailing behind them.
Rachel glanced at Nisha, shaking her head.
“Yeah, they seem more like teenagers every day. From a biological standpoint, they’re like freshmen in college. They’re close to being adults.”
“Yeah, they’re freshman from the 28th century with nuclear fusion.” Nisha said.
Later that evening, Nisha and Rachel ate dinner, watching the sun set behind the colony. Bok pulled up in his sleek racer.
“Would you like a ride?”
Nisha and Rachel glanced at each other for a moment and smiled.
“Sure,” they said.
They climbed in but no seats were to be seen. They remembered the Omanji energy field seating.
“How do we sit Bok? We can’t fall back from a standing position because we’re bent over.”
“Let me activate the default seating for this vehicle. Usually, we activate seating with our implants,” Bok said.
The seats appeared and they sat down.
“Very comfy,” Rachel said. “This reminds me of the—”
They accelerated and were buried in their barely visible seats.
“Whoa,” Nisha said.
They were soon flying above the enormous colony.
“I didn’t know these could fly at high altitudes.”
“They can go underwater and into space too,” Bok said.
“Bok, be careful,” Rachel said. “We’re near Edwards Air Force Base and they might regard us as an enemy aircraft.”
“Okay, I’ll stay near the colony.”
Rachel surveyed the scene.
“Some of these newer towers are larger than the 2,000-meter-tall ones we see everywhere.”
“They want to build the colony all within what you call the Mojave Desert, so they need a higher population density to keep 80 billion of Omanji in one colony here,” Bok said.
Nisha turned her head sideways in curiosity.
“Bok, you keep saying ‘they’ when you refer to the Omanji. Is this intentional?”
“Yes, my connection has been severed. Technically I’m still Omanji but ‘they’ will live in their colony, and we’ll live in ours. I can still travel in their traffic grid for the time being. It’s a free society.”
Bok maneuvered into a magnetic channel and the racer joined in the flow with other vehicles of varying shapes and sizes. Some of them were only big enough to hold one adult Omanji.
“This colony is much bigger than my colony will ever be. Approximately five billion live in the big colony now. Only 100 will join mine.”
“You had 50 this afternoon,” Rachel said.
“Yes. Word is spreading about my colony. I think more will join me in the coming days.”
After 20 minutes, they exited the stream of traffic and were back in front of Nisha’s tent.
“Thanks Bok,” Nisha said. “I’ve never had a more exciting ride. So, this thing can go anywhere?”
“Yes, it could travel to nearby planets too, but I wouldn’t take it out of this solar system.”
Nisha and Rachel looked at each other, wide-eyed.
“It’s basic transportation?” Nisha said, smiling.
“Yes, this will get me where I need to be.”
Nisha and Rachel laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“Never mind.” Nisha said.
Darkness fell, so they said good night.