The Curator and the Corydonian

The Curator and the Corydonian

The Kraken rose from the frozen depths of the southern ice pack on the small planet of Corydon. He was a terribly huge, slimy black octopus-squid-like creature, extremely angry at being disturbed from his thousand-year hibernation. By his reckoning, he should have been sleeping for at least another hundred and sixty years. The fact that the reckless beings populating the surface of the planet had somehow managed to raise the temperature to a point where the deepest and coldest ice had turned to slush, infuriated him. However, what really sent him over the edge was the realization that while he was sleeping they had had the audacity to send sharp steel tentacles miles down into his innermost cavern. In search of who knows what, he didn't have a clue, nor did he care. This was more than he could stand.

He turned towards the light blue world above him, constricted violently and raced through the liquid he called home. "I'll annihilate them," he roared in an ancient language that had not been heard on Corydon for centuries.

He broke through the surface of the frigid southern water like a meteor smashing through a gas giant. The lack of friction and the sudden feeling of near weightlessness as he ascended into the thin cloud-filled atmosphere surprised him. He stretched his sixteen massive tentacles in all directions, grabbing for any foothold that he could find. There was none, he was airborne. His seven eyes blinked and squinted in the bright sunshine of the two nearby suns. The warm rays burned his heat sensitive skin. It smelled rancid, but above that was the smell of lush vegetation, nitrogen, methane, and carbon dioxide flooding his gills—this was not the world he remembered.

For countless millennia, his species had dominated the ice-encased world of Corydon. Even at the beginning, when his family was born from amoeba like microbes, they ruled unopposed. They had evolved at a steady, but careful, natural pace, underneath the frozen surface of the planet. Unlike many intelligent species on other planets, the cold nature of their world allowed them to grow gradually, physically and intellectually. There was no hurry towards a solution, a better future, or a final conclusion. They were perfectly suited to their perfectly balanced world.

The Corydonians, as they later named themselves, had enjoyed an unlimited supply of everything they needed to thrive. Algae trapped in the ice crust constantly regenerated the levels of pure oxygen in the planetary sea. Their gills, lungs and overall physiology efficiently metabolized the life-giving chemical. Breathing was never labored; oxygen was abundant. They fed, competition free, on the smaller warm and cold-blooded organisms that inhabited their liquid domain. They grew to gigantic size, unimpeded by disease, famine, war, or the need for exploration.

As the average Corydonian's dimensions expanded and the population bloomed, they developed a society based on one thousand year cycles. Adults adopted these cycles in order to keep the balance between the resources available on the planet and the stress created by the requirements of their huge size and appetite—half the population hibernated while the other half patrolled the seas. This agreed upon norm, along with their long life, the average Corydonian lived to be around 180,000 years old, and the fact that females reproduced only once during their lifetime, kept the population in check, and the planet in balance. They were at peace with nature and themselves. They were satisfied with their cold liquid world and their place in the universe.

That was then, during the apex of their evolution, before the Giants of Corydon made the fateful decision to break through the frozen layer of ice surrounding their world.

It was an accident, really.

Bits and pieces of the ancient memory flashed through his mind.

As a young Corydonian, less than 20,000 years old, he knew from the teachings of his elders that there was a thin inhospitable atmosphere above the ice. He had been taught that their planet was one of several in their solar system with two giant suns, and that an infinitely large and complex universe held everything in place. The Corydonians understood that they were not alone in the universe, but they had no need to venture beyond their borders. Nevertheless, a combination of boredom and curiosity, both byproducts of superior intelligence and millions of years of a peaceful mundane way of life, had pushed him to poke his bulbous head through a meticulously burrowed hole in the planet's icy crust. He had been hunting new species of algae, but he had gone too close to the surface. The ice cracked and a great hole opened. He was sucked up into the atmosphere—that's all he remembered. He had woken up in his father's cavern. The scolding and lectures, he preferred to forget.

And now, here he was again.

The Corydonian giant opened his mouth wide, fangs dripping with acidic saliva, and gasped as he rushed through the layer of clouds. His gills kicked into overdrive, straining what little oxygen was available from the warm mixture of gases. He thrashed about in the thin atmosphere, trying to make his way back to his liquid home, but he had gone too far. He had over extended himself. Gravity let go. Open space greeted him. The lack of oxygen and the feeling of weightlessness were vaguely familiar; he had lived through a similar experience once before when he was very young.

"They'll be no rescue this time," he thought. "I'm the last."

Strangely, this realization didn't increase his anger or need for revenge, instead, a sad calm overcame him. As soon as he had awoken, he knew that he was the last of his species. When Corydonians were awake, they retained telepathic connections with every other Corydonian on their planet. He knew instantly, that they were all gone. He had no idea what had happened to them. He was however, still slightly curious, that was his nature even during these last few minutes just before his impending death.

"It doesn't matter," he said to Corydon as he floated further and further away from his home. "I relinquish you to the humanoids now."

He stopped thrashing about. He stopped trying to squeeze the last bit of oxygen from the atmosphere. He retracted his fangs and relaxed. His superior intelligence took control of his runaway emotions. He calmly examined his current position and predicament. He was no longer angry. In fact, he was somewhat serene.

The clouds parted below him and with his seven magnificent eyes, he saw new landmasses and cities for the first time. The alien life that had come to his world just a short time ago had been busy. Over the last 850 years, while he had been hibernating, they had terra-formed most of the planet. Where shiny smooth white ice had once existed, mountains, valleys, meadows and forests had been born. The great under-surface seas had been reduced to small lakes and rivers; some contained by huge gray rock-like structures. He easily deduced their purpose, but lacked the vocabulary to name them.

Massive cities and sprawling industrial complexes spread across the landmasses. He knew what they were; he had seen images of them on faraway planets. The Corydonians had studied the flow humanoids for thousands of years, long before they had begun to conquer and explore the galaxies. These stone and metal zones created the heat that had destroyed his world. He looked at the city lights with interest. The light the dwellings emitted reminded him of the iridescent gems found in the deepest caverns. The scene represented something horribly beautiful and serenely deadly.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" a soft chirpy voice said.

The question smashed through his consciousness. His sonar-based auditory organs picked up the sound even though he was several miles above the Corydon Sea. His seven eyes broke wide open. He focused intently on the 360° view within his range of hearing, attempting to confirm that he had really heard something. He saw nothing, but suddenly the shrill, high-pitched voice came to him again.

"I'm glad to see you've lowered your blood pressure and calmed your nerves," the voice sing-songed. "Acceptance is good."

He twisted his gigantic body in all directions, trying to pinpoint the source of the tiny voice. Despite the reassuring words, which were not Corydonian, but still understood without translation, he was beginning to become angry again.

Corydonians were very polite. They never interrupted one another without permission, and they took great care to respect the boundaries of family groups and other relationships. The alto register and the confident nature of the voice irritated him. He refused to engage in conversation until he knew whom he was talking too. Its' useless comments were not welcome, especially during this final episode of his very long and happy life. He preferred to spend these last moments remembering, rather than creating anything new.

"Remembering is good," the voice said. "I apologize for not introducing myself earlier. Please call me Scarlett. I am a Red and White-Banded Cleaner Shrimp, a crustacean from the family Hippolytidae. My scientific name is Lysmata amboinensis. My relatives are commonly found on planets with warmer oceans and coral reefs."

The voice was real. It came from somewhere nearby, but vibrated throughout his inner brain. He sensed that the voice originated from someone or something that had attributes similar to the telepathic abilities of his species, but it was unlike anything he had experienced before. The voice, the words and the meaning played his head, but the evolutionary connection was not there. This was an intrusive voice coming to him through very different channels.

"I'm over here, just in front of your central eye," the voice said. "A response of some kind would be nice."

The Corydonian giant turned his attention to his seventh eye in the middle of his massive, oblong shaped head, above his gaping mouth. A tiny bright light blinked just out of reach of his longest tentacle. He focused on it. The light dimmed and the metallic silver skin of a coconut-sized starship revealed itself. He had never seen a coconut, nor a starship for that matter, but the words defined themselves as soon as they appeared in the language center of his brain.

"Who are you?" He boomed in his baritone voice.

"I'm Scarlett, a crustacean. My scientific name is..."

"I know all that already," he interrupted. "Who are you?"

A miniscule hatch hummed open on the top of the vessel and an unbelievably insignificant lobster like creature exited and floated just above the starship. He couldn't believe how small the organism was, yet it had a strangely powerful aura surrounding it. The starship was so minute that only a swarm of millions would make a decent mouthful, and the alien being talking to him was ten times smaller than that. It was barely visible, and only then because of his great powers of concentration and focus. Under normal circumstances, the tiny speck would be flushed through his gills without notice. It wasn't even big enough to require a thought or a cleansing sneeze.

"I am Scarlett, the curator for the Intergalactic Zoological Preservation Society, IZPS, for short. I'm here to preserve you."

Images of creatures and organs floating in large jars of formaldehyde passed through his mind—once again he had never seen these things, but as they appeared in his mind, they were instantly recognized, defined and understood. He suspected that Scarlett's remarkable communication abilities had something to do with it.

"Preservation does not appeal to me," he blasted, intentionally sending acidic saliva, pieces of food and fermented odors from deep within his multi-chambered bowels towards the shrimp.

"Oh, I'm sorry for that image," Scarlett said, easily waving off the moist saliva and bits of undigested food the Corydonian giant had spit his way with his long antenna and segmented arms. "I deserve that. Preserve, is the wrong word, perhaps rescue, save, relocate or protect, would be better."

Immediately an image of a beautiful ice world similar to Corydon, but much larger appeared in the giant's brain. The temperature was perfect, the ice silent and solid, the liquid underneath full of pure oxygen, microorganisms, and fatty nutritious foods. Other creatures similar to him were socializing and playing in the oceans, some were hibernating in caverns deep within the planet.

"I see what you're doing," he said glaring at the mostly cherry red, but white banded shrimp. "They are not Corydonians, and even if they were, the planet you are projecting is a million light years away. How would I get there? Corydonians don't travel beyond Corydon. Plus, by my calculation, I can only survive another five or ten minutes in this weightless oxygen-depleted vacuum. Leave me alone."

"Corley, may I call you by your given name?" Scarlett asked. "I can help you. I can take you to the IZPS's galaxy, where you can live comfortably for many more millennia. There may even be a chance to revive the Corydonian species."

"Leave me alone," Corley exploded. "How dare you presume to know me well enough to use the name my mother gave me? I think I shall crush you, and then die peacefully without the shrill noise of your voice penetrating my thoughts."

"Perhaps a demonstration is in order."

Scarlett retreated into his starship. Seconds later, a clear bubble emerged from the back of the starship and began to expand. It grew rapidly and began to engulf the Corydonian giant.

Corley tried to flee, but he could get no traction in the thin atmosphere. He panicked. He struck out at the bubble with his tentacles and bit down on it with his sharp fangs. He spewed acid at the transparent cloud coming towards him. Nothing stopped it. It kept growing, stretching through and around him. He tired quickly, because of the lack of oxygen. He knew that if he kept struggling, he would eventually pass out and die. Resistance was futile. He gave up and let the shrimp have his way.

"Scarlett, if that is your real name," Corley gasped. "I curse you for disturbing the last few minutes of life."

Suddenly, pure oxygen surrounded him. He drank the life-giving chemical deep into his lungs. Liquid encased him. He felt cool and comfortable inside the bubble. It was large enough to hold him, and big enough for him to swim freely about. He swam for the edges, and they flexed before him. He sliced at the outer walls with his tentacles, and the clear bubble stretched, expanded and contracted with his efforts, never breaking. He was trapped, but he had been saved. He was confused, angry, sad, dismayed and amazed. He stopped struggling and waited patiently. There was nothing more to do.

"Corley?" Scarlett asked, lowering his voice an octave.

"Yes, Scarlett."

"Do you believe me now?"

"I can't believe you anymore than I can believe that my species have perished and my planet has been destroyed. Let me die."

"I can do that, but that would seem to be a waste of effort. I saved you once so that this moment could come to pass. Letting you die now would be a colossal squandering of time and energy."

"Are you suggesting that it was you who rescued me more than 176,000 years ago?"

"Suggestion, statement, fact... Call it what you want. I'm not ready to let you go, but I am willing to give you a choice."

"May I devour you and then float peacefully into deep space?" Corley grinned, hoping that was one of the choices.

"No, of course not, and please don't make that horrible face," Scarlett said.

"You can come with me to the ice planet belonging to the IZPS and live a long comfortable life, or I can bring you back down to the seas of Corydon, where you will eventually die from starvation and heat exposure."