by Olga Werby
Ian summed up. “So the Earth always had an unequal distribution of plants and animals with good domestication properties; and the direct result was an unequal growth potential for the humans living in different geographic regions. Some humans won the domestication lottery; others lost it.”
“Exactly. Australia, for instance, got the short end of the deal,” Vars said. “It’s hard to build a high-tech civilization without being blessed with great initial conditions.”
Ian nodded. “And this would also apply to natural resources, like the easy availability of copper, iron…”
“And even good river clay,” Vars agreed. “There’s a very good reason why the Dordogne Valley in France is one of earliest birthplaces of pottery: the clay there is particularly conducive to making it.”
“Would this also be true on the scale of planets and whole star systems?” Ian asked.
Vars stopped to think. “Well, it depends on what resources are necessary to support advanced civilizations. We know what those are for humans…”
She didn’t need to finish the thought. It was obvious to everyone that the aliens that had built the communication device on Mimas would have their own unique needs.
Ian looked around the room. “I want everyone to think about the lottery that our alien friends had to win in order to get their artifact into our solar system. Please consult with Dr. Volhard—Vars—and let’s get some theories going. We want to be more prepared to tackle this when we get there.”
“Get there?” Vars felt herself sink into the chair.
“Our departure date is scheduled for early next month,” Ian said. “I know it’s a very short notice for you, but we’re hoping you’ll be able to catch up on our side of the project while we’re en route to Saturn.” He turned to Alice. “Would you mind helping our new colleague get up to speed?”
Alice smiled. “Certainly.”
Vars didn’t even notice when the room finally cleared. Even Major Liut and his partner left. Only Vars and Alice remained.
“Come,” the woman said and gently guided Vars out of the room. “Allow me to show you around a bit.”
Vars let Alice take her by the arm and walk her out of the building into the surrounding redwoods. Spiral stairs wound their way between the giant tree trunks and down onto the forest floor below.
“Where are you taking me?” Vars asked.
“We should talk, no?” Alice said. She gestured to a narrow path among the trees. “In private.”
Vars noticed again how short Alice was—barely four and a half feet tall. Shorter, if the woman took off her shoes. Yet Alice didn’t have any obvious dwarfism characteristics—everything was well proportioned—but it was still extremely uncommon for anyone to be so short in this day and age when every child was carefully screened and all genetic abnormalities were dealt with…one way or another. Perhaps the woman had some Pygmy ancestry? After the Keres Triplets, however, not much of Africa had survived.
As they walked into the forest, Vars spotted a small drone following them. “Alice?” She nodded toward the flying machine.
Alice pulled up her sleeve and activated something on a strap-on tablet. Apparently she didn’t have any D-tats either. The drone changed course, flew ahead of them, and then rose up into the canopy. “It helps to be important,” Alice said with a smile. “Now. We have only a few minutes of privacy. Let’s use it well.”
“I need to talk to my dad,” Vars said. “He must be frantic—”
“I’ve already sent a message to Matteo.”
“You know my father?”
“We’ve met,” Alice said cryptically. “But the important thing is that he now understands what’s going on, and he knows not to expect a communication from you in the near future.”
“But I want to talk with him,” Vars objected.
“He knows that. But it can’t be helped. The EPSA freaked out when they found out your dad was a Seed.”
“I didn’t know! He never told me.”
“Of course he didn’t,” Alice said. “It’s not something we like to broadcast to the world.”
Vars stopped dead in her tracks. “We?”
“I’m surprised you hadn’t guessed yet.”
Vars looked at Alice again. The woman was obviously a genetic outlier. Vars finally put two and two together.
“It’s called a Green Beard effect,” said Alice, gesturing to Vars to keep walking. “Markers or signs that identify an individual as belonging to a group. You can instantly identify an athlete, right? You can probably even identify the sport. Lean and short are probably marathon runners. High jumpers are tall with very long legs, similar to basketball players. American football players are built differently from the athletes that succeed at the other type of football. We’ve been playing with sports genetics for some time, with predictable results.”
Vars noticed that Alice’s voice never rose nor fell. Vars found it soothing—it turned down the volume of her own emotions. Her dad did that too, she realized. He was also good at controlling his emotional responses and presentation.
Alice raised an eyebrow at Vars. “I’m not saying I’m an athlete—obviously. But have you ever seen someone, anyone, who looks even remotely like me?”
Vars never had. She shook her head.
“My body screams that I’m a Seed,” Alice said.
“I never…” Vars felt embarrassed to even to be discussing this.
“Most people don’t,” Alice went on. “We’ve been civilized not to pay attention to such gene expression.” She waved her arms over her body to point out her obvious Pygmy traits. “But you would have guessed, if you ever thought about it.”
Vars had thought about it—but the whole “Seed” concept simply wasn’t something she had ever given any thought to prior to today. “So as soon as you found out about my dad, you reached out to him?”
“No. I already knew your dad. From our time in the Vault. His Seed-sibling, Phoebe, was my teacher back then.”
Vars almost tripped over her own feet.
“Regardless of what you’ve heard and read in the tabloids,” Alice continued, “Seeds that leave their Vaults do well in this new world. We’re all well educated and are very well connected to each other, forming a web of support in every field and on every continent. Aside from Africa, of course.” It would be many centuries before Africa was habitable again.
That made sense to Vars—these people were orphans who had grown up together in tight, closed communities. As a result, their loyalty to other Seeds was probably far greater than to any other organization or state. Her dad must have been in constant communication with his home Vault. The thought hit Vars like lightning. Those distant cousins? Must all be Seeds like him.
“What about me?” Vars asked. “Why did Dad have me?”
“Actually, he didn’t know about you until he discovered you abandoned by the Vault door.”
“What?”
“I don’t know the particulars. I never saw you as a baby,” Alice said, still in the same calm, even voice. “I only know that once you were discovered, Matteo left and took you with him.”
Vars wasn’t sure how to take all this. It was a lot to absorb. The whole day had been a lot.
“What’s my dad’s Green Beard?” she asked.
“Not all Green Beards are as obvious as mine,” Alice said and laughed.
Vars immediately felt self-conscious about her lack of social graces.
It must have shown, because Alice smiled and said, “See? You’re very well trained. I can tell you don’t even feel comfortable asking. I bet you didn’t even let yourself notice how short I was, not right away. Not until it was so obvious that you had to bend your head down to talk to me.”
“Yes. Even then it took me a while,” Vars admitted.
“Civilization is meant to keep us ci
vilized,” Alice said. “And Ian brought you here to help us overcome some of those learned deficits.”
As they walked among the giant sequoias, Vars realized that the trail was like a long noodle, bending in and around itself, never crossing, but tracing a very convoluted path through this man-made forest. And now the EPSA headquarters was once more looming before them between the trees. Their private time was almost over.
“When Ian found out you were a Seed, he immediately petitioned to hire you,” Alice said. “EPSA knows the value of genetic outliers. One way or another, he was going to make sure you joined our team.”
“So I never had a choice?”
“Do you not want to be part of the team that investigates the first alien contact?”
“Yes, but—”
“Then you are exactly where you need to be, Dr. Varsaad Volhard.”
“And they all know you’re a Seed too?” Vars asked.
“I’m sure they do. It’s obvious. Although no one ever asked or even raised the possibility. And you and I won’t be discussing it again. Now listen to me, as our time is almost up: I will find a way for you to keep in contact with your father. But please, for now, just go along with the program. We all have a lot to learn.”
Chapter Five
“Thank you for meeting me in person, Alice.”
Matteo Volhard helped the elfin woman down into a boat tied underneath the pier. It was a Friday night, and the seafood restaurant on the pier was packed to capacity. It was noisy above and dark below—perfect for a private conversation.
“Thank you for arranging something that would work,” Alice said as she slid into one of the two seats on Matteo’s runabout. “We were all encouraged to visit our favorite places to eat before takeoff. But I don’t think I was followed. ”
“Of course.” Matteo piloted the boat away from the pier and into the darkness of the open water. “How is Vars?” he asked as soon as they were far enough away not to be picked up by security cameras.
“She’s handling it as well as can be expected,” Alice said. “I’m more worried about you, Matteo. How are you holding up?”
“As well as can be expected,” he parroted back. “I’ve heard that EPSA managed to get my DNA sample. I didn’t volunteer it, you know.”
“I didn’t think you did. But that’s old news now, right?”
Matteo just nodded. There was nothing to be done. It had been an unexpected luxury that he had been able to keep this secret for as long as he had.
“Did Elder Alaba inform you of my discovery?” he asked.
“No, but after he shut down all deliveries and canceled all new Seed inductees and M-Seeds exoduses, we knew something was up. It takes a lot to halt a world treaty like this. I don’t know the particulars, though. Almost at the same time, Ian informed me about the Mimas artifact and the signal. My freedom of movement had been restricted since I joined his team.” In truth, Alice’s freedom had been worse than restricted—it had been almost entirely removed altogether. The dispensation to visit a restaurant was an unexpected comfort. But she wasn’t here to complain, especially since she managed to use her visit to meet up with Matteo. Sometimes being a Seed was convenient—there was a strong network of support that allowed little luxuries like dropping off Major Liut’s radar...for a short while.
“Yes, the timing is just too striking to be coincidental,” Matteo said. He spoke softly, as if, even out here in the middle of the inky black waters of the Puget Sound, he might be overheard.
“I don’t know how much you know of my work,” he began, and Alice shook her head—she knew nothing, really.
“Okay, then,” he said. “I’ve been working on micropollution since I left the Vault. Elder Alaba arranged for Vars and me to get Canadian citizenship and secured work for me at a research facility in the Pacific Northwest.” Matteo talked and maneuvered the boat farther and farther from shore. “We couldn’t have been placed better. The job allowed us to travel safely all around the world, collecting water samples for micropollution analysis, and it gave me unprecedented access to the sites that were quarantined after the Keres Triplets and the subsequent nuclear exchange between South Asia and Africa. It also made me well known among the external Seed community. I was able to easily carry information and small deliveries to our people all over the world.
“But I also loved the work I was doing. It felt meaningful. As my library of micropollution samples grew, the companion database became the world’s research standard. About ten years ago, just as Vars started her studies at the University of Washington, I was asked to head the lab here in Seattle. It allowed me to stay close to her and still do my research. And I felt I could protect her. Silly how that need to keep your child safe just never goes away.” He looked away, unable to hold Alice’s gaze, obviously a little self-conscious about his attachment to his adult daughter. Alice didn’t see a problem with that—most Seeds learned to forge strong ties within their community. In Matteo’s case, his relation to Vars was even stronger by the strange circumstances of her birth.
“Then, a year ago, I stumbled on my first nanobot,” he continued. “It was right here in these waters. I watched as this impossibly small, incredibly able bot gathered microscopic bits of plastic, sorted them by type, and assembled them into structures. It happened fast, right before my eyes. That single nanobot was able to build what looked like a small engine. When I saw how far it progressed overnight, I froze it in nitrogen. I didn’t want this thing to complete whatever it was creating.
“But it didn’t stop there. In my other samples, there were other microscopic bots, building other structures. Fast. In hours—sometimes even minutes—assemblies went from microscopic to macroscopic.
“Starting about ten months ago, every sample I collected had at least one of these machines. Every one. From every location around the world.” He shook his head as if to shake off a bad dream; Alice saw fear in him. “That’s when I went to Elder Alaba. I tried bringing him one of my frozen samples—the microassembly stops at minus 150° C—but the wardens wouldn’t let me within even a few miles of the Vault.
“And then, when I got back to my lab, a message was waiting for me from Seed Phoebe. She told me to test my own blood. I almost fainted: it had never crossed my mind to look inside my own body, Alice. But of course, we all knew that microplastics in the environment travel up the food chain and end up in the bodies of the top consumer…us.”
They sat in silence for some time while Alice tried to digest the implications of what Matteo had told her.
“So every human on Earth has these alien nanobots scrambling around in our bodies?” she finally asked.
“All but the Seeds. The Vaults mostly produce their own food, and the Elders enacted isolation protocols after my discovery. Nothing goes in or out of the Vaults...at least on Earth. Obviously on Lunar—”
“And now we’re about to go and investigate the alien artifact orbiting about Saturn while infected with alien nanobots.” Alice shivered.
“Yes.”
“Did you try killing them?”
“So far, the only things that have worked are extreme temperatures—cold and heat. But obviously we can’t cook or freeze live humans.”
As Alice sat and watched the black waves rhythmically hit the side of Matteo’s boat, she realized that her feelings toward the waters had changed. Before, she’d always had this sense of awe while watching the churning of the Earth’s oceans. Now she felt dread. She shivered and rubbed her arms.
“And one more thing,” Matteo said, watching her. “The D-tats seem to be particularly vulnerable.”
“What do you mean?” Alice suddenly felt her own PCD tattoos itch like crazy. She’d resisted getting the implants for years but had finally been required to get them just a week ago in preparation for the upcoming voyage to Mimas.
“I’ve surreptitiously tested some of my gra
d students,” Matteo said. “The nanobots seek out the implant sites and attach to some of the bio-wiring.”
“And no one’s noticed this but you?” Alice couldn’t believe this wasn’t common knowledge. She vowed to rip the things from her body as soon as she got back on land.
“No one picked up on the nanobots in the waters either,” Matteo said. “They will, of course. It’s just a matter of time. But I want you to make sure that Vars doesn’t get the implants, you hear me? Please, Alice. Make sure my girl doesn’t get compromised further.” He was terrified for his child.
Alice saw the dread in her fellow Seed’s eyes. She shared his horror, feeling the alien plague maneuver freely in her own body. It was beyond horror...
“Take me back. Take me back now,” she ordered, her voice shrill. Matteo started the engine and reversed course. “Did you try blood-cleansing devices?” she asked after a time. “Surely they can be modified to filter out these things.”
“I’ve tried. Elder Alaba put Phoebe on the project. The problem is that everything we consume is contaminated, so it doesn’t last. The only place we’ve achieved one hundred percent success was in the Vaults…well, our Vault. They’ve stopped all food shipments, even baby formula. And as you know they’ve stopped receiving new Seeds altogether; the milk wasn’t—”
“So the only humans that aren’t contaminated by alien technology are all locked in the Seed Vaults?”
“Yes. But only here, on Earth. The Moon colonies have a problem. They still rely on shipments from Earth for life support, and the nanobots must have been imported that way. Elder Alaba was able to communicate with his counterpart at the Luna Vault and confirm the infection.” The way he said the word infection made Alice’s stomach lurch. “They’re currently working on finding ways of cleansing their Seeds, but we’re guessing that these things will be present in any person exposed to supply shipments from Earth as of approximately ten months ago. For all we know, these things will also be found on Mars and—”
