by Olga Werby
“Precisely,” Sophie agreed. “And what better way to spend that time than seeding the galaxy with life?” She moved around on her side of the glass, rearranging Matteo’s nanobot samples.
“Are you saying that these bots are life spores from some super advanced civilization?” Matteo said.
“Oh, no.” Sophie laughed. It was a carefree, gregarious sound. She sounded just like the same old Seed Sophie that had shown up at Matteo’s lab just a few days ago. “The cosmic gardening was done eons ago. The nanobot incursion is just the final preparation for harvesting.”
Matteo and Phoebe watched in horror as Sophie pulled the emergency metal shutter down on her side, blocking out their view of her lab partition. Apparently, the conversation was over.
They spent the night on the floor of the lab again, but Phoebe couldn’t sleep. Her mind raced with questions. What were the nanobots doing to Sophie? They had clearly taken over her body—had they taken over her consciousness as well? Was there still a Sophie in there somewhere? And what was going on outside the lab? Were similar stories playing out all across the planet?
Phoebe slid out from underneath the blankets. It was so cold. She pulled up the collar of her jacket, if only to feel more protected inside the cocoon of her own clothing. Quietly, so as to not wake Matteo, she crept toward the lockout controls that separated their space from Sophie’s. She activated the mechanism to lower the shutter on their side of the window. If they couldn’t look in on Sophie, she shouldn’t be able to look out at them either.
Feeling a bit better, she went over to the communications station and tried calling the Vault again. Whatever was happening outside, the Vaults would be the last to fall. Or at least she hoped so.
“Elder Alaba? Elder Alaba?” she called gently into the darkness, but there was nothing but static on the feeds. The connection must had been cut, the communications cable physically severed.
She considered going outside. At this point, what, really, did they have to lose? They had limited supplies, so it was never a matter of if they would go outside; it was only a matter of when. And per Sophie, the invasion was happening. Or about to happen. Either way, there was no way to stop it from inside this lab.
“Phoebe?” Matteo called. “What are you doing?” He stood up, wrapped the blankets around himself, and walked over to her. “I tried contacting the Elders just a few hours ago.”
“I couldn’t sleep,” she said.
He wrapped one side of the blanket around her shoulders and pulled her close. It was nice.
“I was thinking,” she said. “That we should leave.”
“I know.”
That wasn’t the answer Phoebe expected. “I just don’t think we’ll learn more from Sophie. She seems…”
“Not Sophie anymore,” Matteo finished her thought. “And she is not willing to tell us more. We are no longer in control of the lab, so there doesn’t seem to be a point to staying. I think we should try to head toward the wardens’ station. I don’t think they’ll let us back in the Vault, but perhaps we can at least establish communications with the Elders, tell them what’s happened here, find out what’s going on out there.”
“That’s thirty miles from here,” Phoebe said. It would take several days to walk that distance, and the cold of Finland’s winter would fight them all the way. “But we can make it,” she added after a hesitation.
“Of course we can,” Matteo said.
They were both silent for a bit, each lost in their own thoughts.
Then Matteo spoke. “I’ve been thinking about the last thing Sophie told us—about ‘cosmic gardening.’ Why wait so long before…‘harvesting,’ as Sophie put it? The Earth has been habitable for years. Why now?”
“You mean what’s different now as opposed to the time of the dinosaurs, for example?”
“Yes. We’ve used up a lot of Earth’s natural resources. We’ve polluted the hell out of our planet, created radioactive wastes. We’ve built things. We’ve traveled to other worlds and built there. We’ve gotten stronger, and we don’t want to surrender our planetary system. It’s ours. Why wait until there’s a dominant, sentient life form? Why wait until we’re strong enough, established enough to fight back?”
“Perhaps that’s precisely what they’ve been waiting for,” Phoebe said. “Perhaps it’s not just about the real estate. Maybe they need us too.”
“That’s what I’m thinking, too. Perhaps they want to do to us what they did to Sophie.”
“But why would they need a bunch of strange nanobot-human hybrids?”
“What’s the easiest thing to send between stars?” Matteo said. He didn’t wait for her to answer. “Information. And consciousness is information, in a way. We are each the sum of everything that happened to us, everything we’ve ever experienced and learned, all that we’ve thought and felt. All of that is just information. Our consciousness is nothing but software riding the hardware of our anatomy.”
Phoebe felt a rush of fear. “Are you saying they want to install new software into our bodies?”
“Wouldn’t that be the easiest way to move people between stars? Information travels at the speed of light. And when it arrives, all it needs is a good receptor. A compatible receptor, right?”
“So your hypothesis is that they planted us—or they planted the seeds of life that would one day evolve into us. And when we appeared on the scene—when we grew advanced enough to meet their needs—now they’re coming in to take our bodies for their own?” Phoebe found Matteo’s hypothesis revolting. She was desperate for a different theory to fit the facts...as they knew them. “That’s crazy, Matteo. Information is part of consciousness, but only a part. Human consciousness evolved with human bodies: the wetworks are a necessary ingredient to making us us. You can’t just stick another piece of software into our brain. It doesn’t work like that.” Phoebe spoke with more conviction than she felt. “I’ve studied biology all my life, and every living thing is bound by what it is—its structure, its form, its function. Even genes don’t determine who we are—they require the environment to shape them. How can something alien just come in and commandeer our bodies, our brains?”
“All of that is true, Phoebe, but…what if you had two billion years to work on that problem? There could be a solution. And if there is…it would make sense to address their survival directive by turning the whole galaxy into a garden for their essence.”
Matteo was clearly excited by the idea and didn’t notice the look of horror on Phoebe’s face. She wanted to stop him from hypothesizing further…but what if he was right?
Chapter Sixteen
Vars, Ben, and Trish were back on the ship, placed on an enforced rest period. Ron and Evi were now out on the surface with Liut’s people, who apparently didn’t require as much down time as the “pampered” scientists. Ron had cobbled together a drilling kludge with a low X-ray pointer to give the drone a way to break through the closed-up wall, and Ziva was presently busy attaching the mechanism to a drone. Liut himself was still on the ship, directing the rescue operations from there. Or perhaps Ian was directing the activity—each man seemed to think he was in charge.
It had now been over three hours since Alice had descended into the hole in the artifact. She had only fifty-three minutes of air left. Vars wished there was a way she could help, but there wasn’t; she could only watch and wait. The personal inability to do something constructive to help Alice was driving her crazy.
They all gathered on the bridge to watch the military-trained crewmen try to retrieve Alice. While waiting, they talked. They felt like they had to keep talking, keep thinking, or their minds would slip down the well to Alice... Surprisingly, Ebi and Ibe had joined them, though they only observed quietly from the farthest corner of the bridge. The twins had been practically mute since the PDCs were removed from the rest of the scientists, ghosting through most interactions on board. At least one o
f Liut’s people was always around to watch them...just in case. Vars felt a strange mix of sympathy and distrust toward the twins.
“War leads only to limited space exploration.” Vars began the old argument again. “It doesn’t support a sustained effort. Ultimately, widespread violence and conflict takes resources away from such scientific pursuits.”
“It’s only war if both sides engage,” Liut said. He always seemed to listen to Vars’s discussions, even as he was focusing on other tasks. It was as if he didn’t trust Vars to recognize when she realized something important. It was unnerving. “Was it really war when the Europeans came to New Zealand?” he challenged. “Or even to the New World?”
“It’s war to us.” Ian was quick to answer. His voice seemed flatter than usual. Then again, Vars realized she was hypersensitive about everything Ian did or said ever since he had reinserted his cyberhumatics. She had become certain that the bots had him. Liut was obviously suspicious of Ian too now—she never saw Ian alone any more. There was always someone from Liut’s crew around wherever Ian happened to be. Like Ebi and Ibe, he must be compromised. The three of them felt like a dark presence, a heaviness. Vars tried to pretend they weren’t there. But how could she avoid listening to Ian? And wasn’t he the one who pushed for Alice to continue even after her audio feed went dead? Vars wasn’t sure anymore...
“In asymmetric engagements like these,” Liut replied to Ian, “it’s irrelevant what we think. Maybe we won’t win the war, but we can find other ways to resist.”
“The natives always do,” Vars agreed.
“Or we can be assimilated,” Trish grumbled. She cast a quick glance at Ben. “And no, I’m not talking about Borg here, Ben. I’m talking about aborigines, the locals who didn’t have a choice but to be conquered, to be assimilated into someone else’s culture.”
“So we just roll over for these Mims and give up our home? Earth? Our solar system?” Ben asked.
“If that’s what it takes to survive?” Trish said. “Yes.”
“I think we’re jumping the gun here,” Ian said. “Let’s get back to what we know and work from there. Perhaps we’re in a middle of mass miscommunication, a misunderstanding of astronomical proportions.”
Vars didn’t have to look to know that Trish was sneering. The woman’s opinions were well-known—she never held back. And yet Trish, and everyone one else, turned to Vars for answers. For some reason, they all looked to her to make it all better. She felt the pressure of their expectations like a physical weight.
“Ben and I discussed the riches of our star system,” Vars said, trying to focus on the problem, pushing Alice running out of air out of her mind...for just a few minutes, just to give herself room to think on the problem of Mims. “We’re well-positioned within the galaxy,” she continued, “and we have a nice stable star...” It was Ian. She was sure. Perhaps she could play back the ship recordings to double check who said what and when? Vars glanced at Ben, willing him to keep the discussion going.
“We’re rich in planets and asteroids.” Ben picked up the argument, and Vars felt grateful. The guilt of not giving her full attention to Alice’s plight was like a thick mental fog, making intuitive leaps or even recalling basic facts almost impossible. But Ben kept talking. “Even with a million stars in a practical colonization radius to choose from,” he lectured, “our solar system would be desirable real estate. If we were advanced enough to colonize our galactic neighborhood, we would certainly choose a system like this one.”
“Even if it’s occupied?” Ian asked.
“As Vars has illustrated, human history has multiple examples of technologically advanced groups taking what they need, without concern for the presence of indigenous peoples.”
“I would hope we would outgrow our grabbing tendencies,” Trish muttered.
Vars was with her. Wouldn’t we choose the path of light in the end? She forced herself to focus on the discussion. This was what she could do to help. She could think, theorize, reject bad ideas, argue against jumping to conclusions...conclusions that could lead to interstellar war. It’s what Alice would have wanted me to do.
“We aren’t talking about hopes,” Liut said. “We have to assume the Mims would take what they want. We need to assume the worst-case scenario.”
Vars turned to face the man. Liut seemed more open to engagement than usual. Perhaps now was the time to ask about Earth. “Terry,” she said. “What’s happening back home?”
The whole room stilled, waiting to see if Liut would answer this time. He hesitated, then shook his head in resignation. “I don’t know.”
Vars believed him. “Well, then we’re all working in the dark,” she said. “So let’s do our best not to make too many assumptions. We have no choice but to speculate, but remember that’s all it is—speculation.”
Liut nodded.
Vars continued. “We’ve established that our solar system is blessed with physical riches. But that’s only part of what we’d be looking for if we got to another star system. Ben has also talked about biomimetics.”
Ben’s eyes lit up and he started to speak, but Vars stopped him with a hand. She had an idea and wanted to pursue it before it slithered away from her.
“Back on Earth,” she said, “we set up the Seed Vaults to preserve humanity’s biodiversity. And before that, we did the same with our botanical heritage. There’s talk now of setting up embryo cryo-vaults to collect and preserve animal diversity. Why? Because biodiversity has value. Because, as we have learned after 2057, biodiversity—not just among humans, but among all life—is crucial to our survival.”
Vars saw comprehension blossom on Ben’s face and felt herself on the right track.
“Which is what makes Earth so special,” she continued. “We’ve explored the biomes of Mars, and Titan, and Europa, as well as Luna; and in all cases, the biodiversity index was low.”
“Luna doesn’t really count,” Trish objected. “And Mars is barely on the edge of the habitable zone. You wouldn’t expect biodiversity there.”
“Mars was in the habitable zone though,” Ebi said softly from her corner, “in the early days of our solar system, when the sun was younger and brighter and put out more heat.”
“And yet there are only a few bacteria found in its soil,” Vars said. “Nothing more, not even as fossilized remains.”
“Titan has more,” Ebi said. “But I get your point: only Earth has the incredible abundance of biomimetic solutions available for the taking.”
“Yes,” Ian said slowly. “What we have is valuable. It’s like a vast library of life functions.”
Everyone sat and contemplated the idea for a while.
Liut finally broke the silence. “I hear what you’re saying, Vars: they want our DNA. Our plants, our animals, all that stuff. But wouldn’t any advanced civilization have a similarly rich genetic history? And who even says that they use DNA like we do?”
“Their bots are conveniently compatible with our chemistry,” Ibe said.
“Probably because they had thousands of years to adapt,” Liut said.
“If they existed only on Earth, that hypothesis might be valid. But the bots here on Mimas are the same, almost, as the ones found all over Earth. And we didn’t bring Earth bots here—these bots were here before we got here.” Ibe looked around the bridge. “These bots didn’t evolve to be compatible with our chemistry—which means they were designed to be so from the start.”
The drone failed to break through the wall of the fractal structure. Ron and Evi tried to come up with some workaround, but eventually Liut put a halt to the rescue mission. The clock didn’t lie: Alice’s oxygen had run out thirty minutes earlier. He didn’t have to make a formal announcement of what everyone already knew.
Alice was dead.
“We should hold a service,” Ben said.
“I don’t think she was
religious,” Ian said. “Seeds tend not to be.”
Vars barely even heard them. Alice is dead. It was as if her mind had become stuck on that one thought and couldn’t get past it.
It took her a second to realize that everyone was looking at her. Someone must have asked her a question.
“What?” she said.
“What kind of service would Alice have wanted?” Evi asked. “What do Seeds do?”
“I…I don’t know.” Vars was trying very hard not to cry. The pain in her throat was strangling, making it difficult to focus on anything or anyone. She sucked in air and pushed her way out into the hallway. She wanted to be gone, away from everyone. Grief was a private thing for her. It probably is for Alice too, she thought. Was.
“Let her go,” someone said. And then she was free to run, to escape into her cabin, into her personal hell.
Vars shut the door and wished, not for the first time, that there were locks on the ship’s private cabins. She had never been a “people person,” and spending so much time in such tight quarters so maddeningly close to so many was hard. Agoraphobia and claustrophobia were the bane of space travel. Vars was feeling both. She was so far from home, so far from her dad, so pressed by everyone to find answers.
She curled up on her bed and half cried, half slept. Alice had been her one link to sanity. And now she had nothing. No one.
“Vars?”
Her door slid open. Those damn locks…
“Vars?” Ben walked in and sat on the bed next to her. He was kind enough to close the door…just not with himself on the other side of it. “Ian wanted me to check on you.”
“Why? What is he worried about?”
“You and Alice were close,” he said. “You were both Seeds—”
“I was never a Seed, Ben,” she snapped. “I never even had a clue. I have no memory of any Vault or—” She stopped herself when she saw Ben’s twisted face. He was hurting. The truth was, he had known Alice much longer than Vars had. Much better. She softened her tone. “I’m sorry.”
