Chapter Seven

Few of the people drawing up the First Contact Protocol thought that it would work like that in practice, and when the time came it didn't. For many centuries there was some debate about exactly when "First Contact" between mankind and aliens took place. The Martian Invasion of 1997, of course, was always cited as the definitive moment, but it had become clear years before then that the major governments had positive proof of the existence of extraterrestrial life. Aliens had visited mankind for thousands of years, leaving their trails across the archaeological strata and their subtle influence on human development. Visitors from other worlds were worshipped as gods or hunted down as monsters through the centuries.

In the late twentieth century, as the human race began to venture out into space, they had reached a level of scientific understanding that allowed them to interpret the old legends and superstitions. They also now possessed a level of technology that allowed aircraft and radar to sweep the skies for unidentified flying objects. Alien spacecraft and other artefacts began to arrive on Earth with alarming regularity.

The year that the United Nations drew up the First Contact Protocols, the governments of half a dozen of its member states were already concealing the existence of aliens from their citizens and from each other. The UN realised that such insularity was dangerous, and that if one country were to acquire alien weapons or other technology, then this would destabilise the carefully balanced world order. During Waldheim's term as secretary-general, restricting access to alien science became just as much a priority as preventing the proliferation of nuclear technology. A policy decision was made at the very highest levels of government that the public should not be informed about any alien 'incursion', regardless of its significance.

This level of secrecy means that historians were never able to reach a consensus over when what they call 'The Real First Contact' was made. Some still preferred to count the Arcturan Treaty of 2085. That had been an official, peaceful contact. The first time that human and alien sat down and talked, rather than attempted to commit genocide.