Space for Evolution

by Zurab Andguladze

  He only remembered that it was during this senseless, drunken rage that a strange idea arose in his head. He still couldn’t understand what it was. He only knew for sure that this mysterious idea had been living in his subconscious all this time. Perhaps if he had followed it then he could have caught up with it and grasped what its essence was. But being drunk, he couldn’t concentrate on this task and instead jumped onto something completely different.

  “All my life I’ve spent waiting, but I’ve got nothing!” he announced out loud.

  After this statement, Georg resolutely poured another portion of vodka into the glass, drank it, and addressed the equipment in the room: “So what? Our ancestors created this project, clearly understanding that they would never know about its results… but what about our descendants?”

  Chapter 20

  Moving through his memories, Georg finally caught up with the present. In the morning, he dug up the beds in his vegetable garden beside his house and by noon had finished his work. He took up his jacket that had been hanging on a pole, put it on, and threw a hoe over his shoulder. He left the garden and closed the wicket.

  He’d walked only a few steps along the twenty yards that separated him from his house when he saw that the door had already opened. A woman appeared on the red brick path and hurried to him.

  “Georg, come on, hurry up,” his plump wife urged, holding out her hand with the phone, as if she wanted to give a baton to a teammate. The hem of her blue robe, decorated with green roses, couldn’t catch up to the round-faced, gray-haired woman of average height, and it accompanied her like a train.

  “What’s happened, Camilla?” her husband asked tiredly.

  “It’s Carl. He says it’s urgent,” she replied energetically.

  Puzzled, Georg took the phone from his wife’s hand.

  “Georg,” his coworker appeared on the screen, a pale, almost forty-year-old man with glasses. “A message has come from the fourth ship. It seems you need to come to the Antenna.”

  “What are you talking about?” the older man said after a brief pause. “At least several decades are left before the report of that expedition—”

  His colleague eagerly interrupted him: “This is an extraordinary report!”

  “What is an extraor...?” Georg felt something cold penetrate his heart. “Well, I’m on my way.”

  He looked briefly at his wife, gave her the hoe, still resting on his shoulder, and said, “There,” and he waved his hand toward the antenna, “Something’s happened.” With these words he went to the bicycle leaning against the house.

  Georg tried not to pedal with full force; he wasn’t a young boy, after all. Though impatience still tried to accelerate his movement, because Carl Hansen wouldn’t be worried about a trifle. If his new colleague had demonstrated so much alarm, there was a good reason for it.

  On this cloudy day, rolling past the roadside bushes, Georg felt a gradual deterioration of his mood. It didn’t take much insight to understand that a ship couldn’t reach its goal ahead of schedule. Sending an unplanned test signal was also excluded. Since it had still sent some kind of information, highly likely it was the herald of disaster. It couldn’t be something cheerful like: “During my flight, I met a beautiful asteroid, so I took a selfie with it and sent you a photo.” No, undoubtedly something bad had happened.

  It was exactly because of the possibility of receiving such a kind of unscheduled message that the extremely expensive antennas had been following the trajectory of the ships for centuries. Otherwise, it would be enough to simply point the radio telescope toward the planet at the right time, and that would be all: a tremendous amount of money, energy, and resources would be saved.

  Arriving at the Antenna, the elderly astronomer tried to climb the stairs to the second floor slowly, but he couldn’t keep himself from doing it with excessive speed all the same. He entered the SOC room already breathing heavily. There, as soon as he caught Carl’s stiff gaze, he immediately realized the correctness of his reasoning.

  His younger colleague silently extended his left hand to the middle of the three monitors standing on the table. Georg, still struggling with his breath, pulled glasses from the top pocket of his jacket and put them on his nose before sitting in front of the screen. The following text shone on it: “The fourth expedition designed for the Bootes constellation, for the first planet of the star Tau, sends an unplanned message.

  “On the two hundred and sixth year of the flight, the sensor recorded an unexpected vibration of the hull and activated the general-purpose computer- 4.

  “Inspection of all systems has shown that the thermoplasmic engine was damaged. The RA-4 was dispatched to study the breakage. When advancing, it made a movement not corresponding to zero gravity and lost contact with the ship’s hull. Currently, it is moving on a parallel course, but the distance between it and the ship is constantly increasing. There is no technical option to bring it back.

  The RB-4 acted according to the corrected algorithm. It managed to get to the engine and to study the situation.”

  A description of the engine’s present look and its photos followed this introduction. Georg glanced briefly at the technical details; he hurried to see final part of the report, which said:

  “Fact: the plasma-confining magnetic field cannot be turned on. The reason is the destruction of the magnetic field generator.

  “Variant of explanation: during the passive phase of the voyage, the ship collided with an unknown object, which caused the accident.

  “Conclusion: With such damage, the engine cannot be turned on to slow down the ship.

  “Results: The starship will not enter orbit around the Tau star, and therefore the planetary ship will not land on the first planet of that system.

  “Further actions: The spaceship will continue broadcasts at the usual half-century intervals until the energy in the RITEG-4 is depleted. All other systems are functioning normally.”

  It was this text that plunged the veteran radio astronomer into a kind of swoon, in which he could only remember old events. A journey into the past, where he again experienced the failure of previous expeditions, took several minutes. All that time, Carl watched closely, wondering if the old man was ok.

  In the end, when the memories had caught up with reality, Georg pulled himself together and spoke: “The last sentence could be taken as a mockery if we didn’t know that satirical routines were not included in the communication program... So what? Will this expedition share the fate of the Voyagers, sent four hundred years ago on a flight until the end of time? Hum.”

  Georg leaned back in his chair and plunged into silence with a frozen look. He had to accept this failure with calm and sanity, similarly to the failures of previous missions, because what else could he do? But instead of that sanity, a sudden rage swept over him; perhaps so many disappointments spanning across his entire life outweighed common sense. His feelings revolted; it seemed he was no longer ready to endure so many endless destructions of hope. He shouted, “Was it really all in vain?”

  With these words the old man with all his might hit the screen showing the text of the message. His fist partially drowned into the plastic surface, cracking it, although it still displayed enough elasticity to not shatter into pieces. Instead, the monitor flew backward, slid off the table, and swayed, hanging from the power cord.

  “Georg,” Carl said, frowning. “I don’t even know what to say. You really have a bitter fate. All your life you have been watching how this great project is gradually being destroyed.”

  At first the old man showed no sign that he had heard anything. He just sat petrified. After that he turned to his co-worker and said with a smile, as if nothing strange had just happened, “You know, Carl, about ten years ago I got drunk and stumbled upon an idea that eluded me then, but it seems that right now I’ve caught it all the same.”

  His colleague looked at him with curiosity.

  “I think we can… it won’t do any harm if
we send a letter to the future people created by the remaining expedition,” Georg said in calm tone.

  Hearing this, Carl thought a little, shook his head and sighed. Then, realizing that the old man wasn’t joking, he said, “Even centuries ago, when probes were sent to the moon, to Mars or another celestial body, scientists first waited for a signal from there. Only after receiving a message about the arrival, or landing, or about the condition of the equipment, they could begin to communicate with their device. What is the point of talking with empty space, with a broken apparatus?”

  “So what?” Georg answered this speech unflappably, “What is wrong with such a message? It costs almost nothing, and wouldn’t take much time.”

  “Honestly, I still don’t understand the reason why you want to do this,” Carl admitted.

  Georg replied, “I can tell you the reason. Let’s imagine that finally it’s the right planet, that the theory of nuggets is correct.”

  “Hem, a six-to-one ratio has nothing to do with gold panning—” Carl began with an ironic grin.

  They had in mind the hypothesis that had become popular after the failure of the previous expeditions. It said that the ratio of the number of actually habitable planets to the number of those that seem suitable in telescopes is the same as the ratio of the weight of the nuggets to the mass of dirt sifted by the gold digger.

  It looked like Carl was going to speak for a long time, but the old astronomer interrupted him: “If my memory serves me, the travel of the landing report of the fifth mission would have taken fifty-six years. Our answer would devour as much time. Thus, any new residents, taking into account the date of their creation, would wait for news from Earth for almost a century. We can rid them of this meaningless waiting.”

  “Meaningless—?” Carl spoke with distrust in his voice, but again Georg didn’t allow him to finish his sentence.

  “I think,” he said, “that this is just the result of our ancestors’ over-adherence to space communication rules that, I believe, are inapplicable to the scale of the SQP. The extra-solar people should learn as early as possible what has happened on Earth, and how things fared with other expeditions; why not?”

  After quite some thought, Carl started a third attempt to express his idea. “If you ask me, I think if such letter were to be allowed by the committee, then you alone should write it. I know that you’re one of the three people who have worked for the SQP all their lives. The others were your mother Miriam and your ancestor Iason Azgo. Therefore, I’m sure that today only you deserve to write such a message. At least, that’s my opinion…”

  Further developments confirmed Carl’s view. Astronomers of different continents perceived the idea in the same way. No one expressed a desire to take part in composing the letter, and no one had grounds or a wish to object against it.

  Something similar to a dispute arose from one paragraph of his message. Although, in the end, the people currently responsible for the SQP project decided that the issue wasn’t worth discussing. No one spoke about it out loud, but in reality both the scientific community and the administration perceived Georg’s initiative as an old man’s whim.

  On the appointed day, Georg directed the parabolic antenna to where, in fifty-six years, the second planet of the star Rho of the Corona Borealis constellation would be. Then he switched the line to transmission mode and activated the previously prepared text. Now he just needed to press the “Enter” button, and his personal message would rush into interstellar space.

  However, before his last act, Georg felt a bit insecure. He got up, went through the SOC room and approached a series of photographs hanging on the wall opposite the desktop. These were images of all the people who had ever worked at the Antenna, including Agneta and his mother, Miriam. For some time Georg looked into the eyes of his mother.

  Then he took a few steps more and neared the mirror on the wall beside the exit. He carefully looked at his own image—at the old man with sparse gray hair, a long angular face, sunken eyes and wrinkled skin.

  “Have you thought everything through to the end?” he asked his own reflection.

  In a second Georg firmly answered himself, “Yes, I have.”

  The astronomer returned to the keyboard and sent the signal without hesitation. Soon the computer reported that it had completed the transfer. Georg performed two more sessions, eight and then sixteen hours later. After each sending, he turned off the power needed for interstellar transmission, and returned the antenna to the point of today’s waiting.

  From that day on, his attitude to the signals from space changed dramatically. From then until his very last breath, Georg, instead of looking forward to news from the stars, on the contrary was afraid to hear something, because it could only mean the final collapse of the hopes of mankind.

  Chapter 21

  Having departed from near-Earth orbit two hundred and fifty-five years earlier, over the course of eight years of acceleration the ship of the fifth expedition had gradually lost its “wings”—essentially, two hundred and eighty-eight spherical stages. Due to inertia it went on flying at one fifth of the speed of light.

  A chronometer revived relays that had been dead for hundreds of years. They, in turn, activated the General-Purpose Computer 5, situated in the planetary apparatus.

  The GPC-5 checked the starship’s engine, radio channel, optical transmitter, control circuits, deuterium pressure in the remaining two tanks, and the ignition device of the chemical rockets. It reported that all components were operational.

  In the lander’s hull a porthole opened, and the telescope, looking out from it, started to transmit to the other equipment—the Signal Office Centre 5—a picture of the surrounding space.

  First the shunting chemical engines warmed up and got going, turning the ship one hundred and eighty degrees relative to its previous course. During this rotation, the telescope continuously uploaded images to the optical channel. Then the SOC-5 compared this sky with the modeled one stored in its memory, and confirmed that now the ship was exactly where it should be.

  Then the thermoplasmic engine turned on. Inside it, merged nuclei of heavy hydrogen started to produce energy, protons, and other particles. Set against that combined jet, the ship slowed down.

  Over the next month, the craft again lost almost one hundred percent of its mass and, as a result, became a satellite of the new sun. It could brake so fast because at this phase of its journey its engine was stopping an object with mass a hundred times less than it had had to accelerate in the beginning of this journey. Thus, the ship was also losing its velocity a hundred times faster.

  Having sufficiently reduced its speed, the craft began to orbit the star. Here it split into two parts: the interstellar rocket and the last two spheres remained in this orbit, while the lander flew onto its new home another half a million kilometers away.

  The craft overcame this distance in three days and, after another deceleration, turned into a satellite of the yet unknown planet. In addition, the Rho star system contained two gas giants. One of them, at a distance of 0.22 Astronomical Units from the star, had a mass slightly larger than that of Jupiter, and the other was thirteen times smaller and rotated at a distance of 0.41 AU from the luminary.

  The needed planet orbited the star along a near-perfect circle, confirming the data of the ancient astronomical observations. In addition, the ship’s instruments finally established that, unlike the other two planets, this one didn’t have natural satellites. Flying around it, the devices studied its physical properties, surface, atmosphere, ozone layer, minerals and the estimated biological mass of the celestial body.

  Once these observations had ended, the GPC-5 began preparations for a touchdown. The land mass of the planet consisted of four continents located along the equator. Three of them even exceeded the size of Africa by their area. The fourth one, three times smaller than the others, was situated a little to the south.

  The software decided that this fourth continent was perf
ectly suited as a habitat for humans and other terrestrial organisms, since it had a mild climate, and no large animals populated it. Before starting the landing procedure the ship left the satellite that had been transmitting the checking signals to Earth throughout the trip in a stationary orbit.

  Upon entering the atmosphere, two missiles slowed the lander again. Then they turned off, and a small parachute made of refractory material opened. Parachutes were deployed three more times. In the final stage, a huge dome facilitated the landing, and the missiles turned on again before the vehicle hit the surface.

  These two mechanisms ensured a soft contact between the ship’s supports and the soil. After that, the planet became heavier by about seventy tons. It was all that humanity, then yet prosperous, could deliver to the earth-twin exoplanet.

  The apparatus had landed on a plateau, which bordered a great river along its eastern side, about thirty meters below its edge. In the course of about twenty kilometers, this tableland imperceptibly descended south, where it morphed into the coastal region. Large plants covered its western and slightly elevated northern parts.

  Twenty hours passed before the fire caused by the last missiles went out. During this time, the shrubbery around the planetary ship was completely burned out. After that, a hush engulfed the ship so tightly as though it had returned to cosmic vacuum. Only the parachute lying on the ground diluted the stillness. Its folds, inflated by light gusts of the southern wind, slightly revived the landing site.

  After the fire had gone out, the GPC-5 waited another ten days before issuing the next order. In the meantime, some results obtained in orbit were double-checked. The new results confirmed that the local atmosphere slightly differed from Earth’s. It had one percent more oxygen and proportionally less of other gases. The freefall acceleration was higher than on Earth by one and a third percent, and therefore any terrestrial object was heavier by the same quantity.