Dark Star Calling

by Julia Keller

  “I get it,” Kendall said, snapping his fingers. “They’ve taken one tiny slice of the universe, the virtual link they created between their world and our world, and they restored it to the simultaneity of the Big Bang. Along this one conduit, their time and our time are synched up. Otherwise, to get a message to us, they would’ve had to have started sending it in”—he did the calculations in his head—“roughly 20 B.C., Old Earth time.”

  “Right.” Rez seemed immensely relieved that somebody else understood. “The Time Tether is like a time-free zone. They speak, and we hear them. We speak, and they hear us—as if we’re standing right next to each other, not separated by millions of light-years.”

  Shura rubbed her hands together. “Well, come on, then! Let’s see what they have to say.”

  Rez grinned, his eyes glittering with excitement. “I’ll upload it from my console.”

  All three of them crowded closer to his screen. A rush of letters, numbers, and mathematical symbols, interspersed with miniature versions of the vibrant images in Shura’s paintings, tumbled across it.

  “So what does it say?” Kendall asked.

  “Watch.” Rez executed a wide, dramatic, spreading gesture with his right arm. “I paused the translation until you got here. So we can all read it together.”

  19

  One + One = One

  A message from aliens.

  A message from aliens.

  This was the most exciting moment of Violet’s life. She was fairly sure it was the most exciting moment in her friends’ lives, too, but she couldn’t verify that because nobody was talking. Awestruck, they stood there, waiting for Rez to work his magic.

  He pressed a white jewel rising from the face of his console.

  The image on the computer screen began to move again. The numbers and symbols and colors shifted, wavered, and transformed themselves into …

  Into English. Plain, ordinary English. Standard alphabet, recognizable words, regular sentences. As the transmission surged in, Rez automatically translated it on his console and directed an image of the translation to appear on the screen.

  All four of them read the message in a fraught, rigidly attentive, hold-your-breath silence:

  I am Zander.

  And I am Sonnet.

  You are thinking, Oh, so two are present there. No. Only one. In the world in which I live, one plus one equals one. I will explain. Soon.

  I am reaching out to offer you my assistance.

  Sonnet sent emotions to you, and you transferred them into paintings. That was astonishingly clever. Your interpretations helped me understand how your language turns ideas and feelings into words. The words are mere vessels. I sense that you are translating my words into your language, even as I write them; likewise, I have mastered the rudiments of your communication system—the nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and the like—and soon I will be able to speak to you in English. For now, I appreciate the fact that you are able to translate my language into yours.

  As I stated at the beginning of this message, I am Zander.

  I am Sonnet.

  As Zander, I THINK.

  As Sonnet, I FEEL.

  Based on my observations, it seems that your custom is to embed both—the intellect and the emotions—in a single individual. You unite thinking and feeling IN THE SAME PERSON. You may take that for granted, but believe me—it is quite extraordinary.

  But I am getting ahead of myself. First I must tell you how I found you, and to offer my help to you in your endeavor.

  On a routine patrol, our spacecraft came upon a tiny scrap of material—a chip, one might call it—of unknown origin. It was drifting amid the stars in a cloud of otherwise unremarkable space debris. Packed tightly inside this miniscule flake was an intriguing storehouse of data.

  When I analyzed this data, I discovered that it was a complete record of the emotional memories of someone named Rachel Reznik. Based on those memories, I deduced that she had been a young girl of exceptional intellectual gifts. Her chip contained the dreams and joys, the setbacks and triumphs of her life, a life apparently cut well short of the allotted time span for members of your species, based on what I have been able to glean from my cursory explorations.

  I traced the chip back to you. It appeared to be tied to a technology known as the Intercept.

  I am enchanted by this technology. While no longer active, at one point, it was able to capture the emotions swirling inside each individual, to store those emotions, and then to return them to the individual’s brain in all of their intensity, all of their color and immensity.

  I saw, based on what I read in the chip, that Rachel had a brother named Steven Reznik. And once I traced the chip back to its origin, I realized that this Steven Reznik was searching the galaxies with a telescope, using that primitive but marginally effective device to sweep the skies night after night, in hopes of finding a broken star—a star whose light is interrupted periodically by an orbiting planet. That planet could be your new home.

  I know of just such a star. And I can supply the coordinates so that you might go there and begin your civilization anew. I have monitored your orbit and can report to you that Steven Reznik’s calculations are correct: It is deteriorating steadily—much faster, actually, than your simple instruments are able to detect. That, I assume, is why Steven Reznik is so determined to find the broken star.

  But there is another reason for my communication as well.

  Perhaps you are asking yourself how we have managed to divide the emotions and the intellect so that each one of us is both one and two: Thinkers and Emotives. It came about after many billions of years of what you call natural selection. Those of us who were intellectual tended to gravitate toward our own kind. And the same for those who relied primarily on the emotions. Like was drawn to like.

  Soon our civilization was split. Thinkers and Emotives were completely separate. Specialization has worked well—we are far more advanced than you are.

  But now we Thinkers have decided—after a great deal of logical analysis—that our way, the way of dividing the intellect and the emotions into two different creatures, is no longer the most efficient design. It is cumbersome, and it is hampering our efforts to move forward. Our progress has slowed. It seems that without emotions to push them forward, our Thinkers are faltering in their efforts. We no longer have the motivation to try our experiments, to work hard for distant goals. We have no sense of wonder. We are efficient, but we do not dream.

  This is not how we anticipated it would be; many, including me, thought the Emotives would need the Thinkers more than the Thinkers needed the Emotives. We were wrong. For our civilization to continue its progress, we must merge.

  Thus it is time to bring thinking and feeling together.

  It is time, that is, for Sonnet and me to be merged into one creature. And for all the others who are divided to undergo what we will call Fusion.

  But how will this be done? My question is not about the technological specifications or biological imperatives of Fusion—those, we will easily master. We Thinkers are quite accomplished. Or at least we have been so far, until this unexpected pause.

  My question instead is …

  Forgive me. I find this awkward, but I must ask:

  How will it be for me to suddenly FEEL? And for Sonnet, who is unused to sustained intellectual inquiry, to suddenly be awash in facts, information, problems demanding to be solved?

  As Zander, I am a rational being. Sonnet is an emotional being. But as both … I do not know.

  Sonnet is afraid of Fusion. I am not afraid—because fear is a feeling, and I do not feel. But let me say that I am concerned about the impact of these changes. If Zander and Sonnet can be successfully Fused, then others of our species will agree to undergo the procedure as well. If, however, there is a problem, I would rather that it be Sonnet and me who suffer, rather than the others.

  Please do not think of this impulse as heroism. It is not. It is only practic
ality. Heroism requires emotion—one must feel that other lives are equally worthy to one’s own—and I do not feel. Sonnet, however, is heroic.

  Thus I would like to propose a bargain: You will send an emissary to my planet, to suggest ways that I might live with emotions as part of my being and ways that Sonnet might live with thoughts as part of Sonnet’s being, and I will help you find your star.

  At first, of course, I envisioned that I would come to your world and learn there, despite the vast distance between us. We have far more sophisticated versions of the technology you call a Virtual Tether. You have, I see, already deduced the chronologic one: The Time Tether is enabling us to communicate right now.

  For travel, we use a Consciousness Tether. A single consciousness is attached to a faraway place or object, and transferred upon a secure conduit, while the vulnerable, perishable body is not involved.

  But it is not feasible for me to come to you. My divided self makes the Consciousness Tether unworkable; the signal becomes too diluted when it is split in two. It lacks the power to make the long, long journey.

  And so I ask that someone from your world come to mine. I have studied your civilization, and I know that I must feel this individual’s true essence in order to learn from your emissary. I must be in the presence of this unique spirit you call the soul—and the individual must be in the presence of mine. This cannot be accomplished through a communication channel, but only through the Consciousness Tether, only through a close approximation of what I understand you commonly refer to as face-to-face contact. I can offer technical assistance to enable this.

  I will help you find your star whether or not you choose to help us. But I hope that you may agree. There is a symmetry to our searches. A rhyme to our respective quests. You will be giving us a new life. And I will be leading you to your new home.

  Zander / Sonnet

  20

  The Decision

  “I’m going.”

  Rez made his declaration before the others had finished reading the last line of the message. “I’m the only person who’s right. Let’s grab the specs they send and start installing the Consciousness Tether.”

  “Hold on,” Kendall said. “You’re our expert on Tethers. Nobody else around here is qualified to operate it. Suppose you go and we screw up and then can’t get you back?”

  “Science is a risky business,” Rez answered nonchalantly.

  “Oh, come on.” Kendall’s voice was slathered with disdain. “Get real. Who do you think you are—Sir Isaac Newton, doing ocular experiments by sticking a needle in his own eye?”

  “No. I just think that—”

  Violet clapped her hands a single time. “Nobody’s going anywhere,” she said, “until we thoroughly discuss this. So you two can just quit arguing. To begin with, we’ve got to get a lot more data about this Consciousness Tether thing. Their home is thousands of light-years away. If something goes wrong, you could be stuck there. And even if you did make it home, the trip would last tens of thousands of years. Everybody you knew would be long dead. The world you knew would be—”

  “Zander said there’s a way,” Rez declared, interrupting her.

  Shura stepped in, shaking her head. “This is your doctor talking, buddy. Before anybody does anything like that, I’ll need assurances from him—or them, or whatever—that the effects on a human body won’t be serious or lasting.”

  Tin Man had been listening intently. “That’s a good point,” he said. “Even trips from New Earth down to Old Earth take a toll on the body.”

  “And there are other questions, too,” Violet interjected. “Just what is it that this Zander guy actually wants? Lessons on how to feel?” She made a scoffing sound. “Right. Why doesn’t he just read a romance novel from Old Earth in the twentieth century? My father told me about them; they were pretty stupid, but they were all about emotions.”

  “I think it’s a little more complicated than that,” Rez said. “They’re an advanced civilization. And they’re going to show us the star that might be the star. Whatever they want from us, I say we give it to them. They want their people to be more emotional? I can’t really understand why you’d want that, but okay, fine. Their call.”

  “Not more emotional,” Shura corrected him. “Just putting the feelings and the intellect on equal footing in one individual. You’ve never really understood this, Rez, but I get as much from my emotions as I do from my brain. My painting, which comes almost entirely from my emotions, is as important to me as my analytical skills.”

  Rez’s face revealed extreme skepticism. But it was hard for him to argue the point, because Shura was among the most brilliant citizens of New Earth.

  “Look,” Kendall said. “It’s obvious that I’m the best choice to go. I invented the Intercept. I can answer any questions they have.”

  Violet shook her head.

  “Same objection as I had with Rez,” she said. “You’re too crucial to the technical work back here. Even with Rez in charge, Shura and I don’t have the knowledge to help run the Tether. It’s too risky.” She turned to Rez. “So the orbit is decaying? You’re sure.”

  He nodded glumly. “Absolutely. The numbers are irrefutable. And our new friends just confirmed it.”

  “But if we find the star, there’s a chance that one of its planets might be habitable?”

  “A very good chance.”

  “Would we be able to transfer everybody on New Earth there? Before the orbit decays and New Earth falls out of the sky?”

  “Yes. Well, maybe. But we’d need a lot of help.”

  “Like the kind a superior civilization can provide.”

  “You got it.” He looked at Violet eagerly, as if he’d closed the deal. “So I get to go to Zander’s planet, right? We’re all agreed?”

  “No,” Kendall said, answering before Violet had a chance to. “If anybody goes, it’s me.”

  Violet let them squabble and name-call and step all over each other’s sentences for a good two minutes. Then she raised a hand, asking for quiet.

  “You’re both wrong,” she said. “I’m going.”

  * * *

  She wasn’t a genius.

  She didn’t have the kind of dazzling brain that could solve a dozen math problems while simultaneously discovering a new chemical element and testing the atmosphere of a recently discovered planet.

  She wasn’t an inventive prodigy like Shura. Or a superbly accomplished scientist like Kendall. Or a computer mastermind like Rez. Or somebody brave and strong like Tin Man. Or a visionary leader like her father.

  She wasn’t brilliant at all.

  She was, in fact, kind of ordinary. And she knew it. She’d failed at her business. She was a second-rate senator, even though she tried hard to be a better one.

  But she could pull this off. She believed that down to her toes. And she had a very good reason for wanting to give it a shot, a reason she could not share with them. Yet.

  “I’m going,” Violet repeated.

  Her friends turned, one by one, and stared at her. Their expressions ranged from horrified (Shura) to shocked (Kendall) to suspicious (Rez) to curious (Tin Man).

  “No matter how calm and smart this Zander sounds,” Shura said carefully, “something like a transfer of consciousness would be totally experimental from our end. And maybe dangerous.”

  “We don’t even know if it would work,” Kendall put in. “Spirit? Soul? Essence? There’s no precedent for it.”

  “Um, yeah,” Violet said. When she was nervous, she tended to get sarcastic. “I think that’s what experimental means, right?”

  “The Virtual Tether almost killed me,” Shura reminded her. “And I wasn’t even sent anywhere. I just had to stand here and be the recipient of the signal—and paint. And I still almost exploded in a massive fireball, along with the lab itself. This is much more complicated. We’ll be using the Consciousness Tether as a sort of transportation system. We don’t know how much the human body can stand. Or if Z
ander can really make his planet hospitable. You could land there—okay, your essence could land there—and your body could die instantly back here. Or two seconds later.”

  Violet was irked. Clearly, they didn’t think she was up to the job. And they were hiding their lack of confidence behind a show of concern for her safety. “Come on, Shura. Yeah, we had a bad scare when you were hooked up to the Tether. But really, what are the odds it’ll spring some unforeseen surprise on us twice? It’s just not going to happen.”

  None of them would meet her eyes.

  I’m right. They think I’m incompetent.

  “Look, Violet,” Rez said. “I don’t want to be insulting. But you just don’t have the background for this. How will you tell Zander about the Intercept? What if he asks a highly technical question?”

  “He won’t. He already told us that it’s not the technical part he’s after. He’s got that down. He wants the feeling. The feeling of—well, of feeling. He doesn’t know what it’s like to have emotions. When he does, when he goes through the Fusion—that’s what he called it, right?—he wants to know what he’s in for.”

  Her friends weren’t budging. Rez stared at his computer. Kendall’s face was a stubborn version of the word no. Shura’s eyes were filled with wariness and uncertainty. Tin Man was studying his boots, not sure of whose side he should be on.

  “This is about technical expertise,” Rez stated. “Nothing else.”

  “Yeah,” Kendall said.

  “Glad you guys finally decided to agree on something,” Violet said. “Just wish it wasn’t this.” She crossed her arms. “Frankly, though, I don’t care what you think. I know I’m right. We can’t spare any of you. You’re all needed right here in the lab to make this work. And I’m telling you, I can do this.”

  Yes, she could force them to go along with her decision. She had more political authority than anybody here. Rez was head of the New Earth Science Authority, and Kendall was head of the New Earth Security Services, and Tin Man worked for Kendall, and Shura ran the Innovation Lab, but Violet was a senator.