Discovery

April 24, 1990

In orbit around Earth

Shaped like a pen, long, thin and cylindrical, one hundred feet tall and ninety feet around, Allorien’s spacecraft floated fifty five nautical miles above Kennedy Space Center. They were young by comparison of the species, only a hundred years old. They were just recently assigned to watch humanity, five years ago. There was a senior watcher he reported to, but he was largely independent choosing the things that interested him as long as they were of historical significance.

If only the people inside the launch center could see what was above them, it was exactly what they wanted to see. Loaded upon the Space Shuttle Discovery, humanity was about to launch a new device into space that would help them see further and more clearly than ever before. It was both apt and inappropriate to be aboard the Discovery. They would discover a lot; but they would continue to overlook the one that that could make the most difference.

Sitting in a pod at the top of their pen shaped spacecraft, Allorien watched as the mission began. There were no controls on Allorien’s spacecraft. It was completely invisible, both to the eye and to instruments. The job they were assigned was simple. Observe and report, never to interfere. Too many of his predecessors did that already, including his current supervisor.

As the Discovery got closer to them, Allorien kept directly above it. The cylindrical ship responded to the slightest thought of moving. There were no thrusters, no rockets, the ship just silently slid across the fabric of the universe. Allorien sat at the edge of the atmosphere waiting. It didn’t take long before Discovery passed within 10 feet of the hull of the Watcher Ship Icarus. The humans inside Discovery had no hint there was an alien space craft 10 feet away. Allorien looked at the nameplate “Discovery” as it finished accelerating to its preordained orbit.

As Allorien followed behind the Discovery they observed the emotions of those onboard and still monitored various other things from the surface of earth. Humanity’s primitive radio and satellite communications made it easy to eavesdrop. Allorien questioned the quality of some of the things humans put out into the universe around them, but to each their own.

Allorien’s job was to observe this mission. Humanity was about to deploy into space a new orbiting space telescope. The new Hubble Space Telescope would help humanity discover things, but what they really needed to discover would still remain out of view for over three hundred more years.