by Mark Kraver
Emboldened by the new certainty that he had nothing to lose, Numen announced in the darkness, “I will wing it too.”
But how? How to make a choice? He had already calculated permutations of the same sets of variables to no avail. Which direction to choose? Winging it? Move forward, encounter variables, and make decisions when they are needed. Why move forward? To what purpose? What is the point to this expenditure of energy? How long would it take, and where would he go? He didn’t know.
Sitting stoic inside the crippled spaceship for centuries calculating what to do, only one thing computed with any certainty: he had no power to do anything inside this ship. Yet, he was commanded to guard and protect his master to the best of his abilities, and he had formidable abilities at his disposal.
He contemplated his master’s three impossible options: Wait, wait and wait. Maybe there was a fourth? His master hadn’t seemed threatened by the natives surrounding the ship, he thought, recalling his words: ‘Maybe they’ll build a temple over top of us. That’s a comforting thought, don’t you think?’
At the time, Numen hadn’t understood why this would be comforting. If the natives did that, it would be hard for him and Yahweh to exit and enter the ship. But after passing this idea through his mitochondria-core processor for a while longer, he decided this could be a good thing. His master’s privacy would be secured, and he could leave the ship. Numen just hoped the natives hadn’t built their temple yet after nearly a millennium of calculations.
Raising his hands, he dematerialized the ship’s hull to the outside world. The view wasn’t filled with the light of the nearby star, but instead the waxing moon. Adjusting his ocular sensors to accommodate the faint ambient light, he saw that the ship was marked by centuries of accumulated muck and mollusk shells.
Holding up his other hand, a silent invisible beam radiated from his palm and split the shell mound open.
Energizing his graviton emitters lifted him into the awaiting darkness. Raising his hand again, he directed the ship’s hull to close behind him, and the tinkling of falling shells folded around the ship.
Inside the obituary chamber’s BrainNet Connectome thoughts stirred.
“Your very first mission, and you resign yourself to sleeping to death?” asked Nadira.
“Nadira, how is that any different from the suicide cult you belonged to, that found you stuck in the Koos all those antons ago?” Lanochee asked.
“Suicide? Is that what you think? I am a pioneer. That was my job.”
Yahweh didn’t answer. Instead, he began to flood their minds with visions, wordlessly conveying a multidimensional view of Earth changing over time. The planet’s land masses morphed as oceans and seas oscillated with the retreating Ice Age. Subtle fluctuations in the planet’s orbit within the inhabitable zone prompted environmental changes under the light of the not-so-distant dying star. Techno-social development moved around the globe in a tidal wave of advancements, poisoning the sea, the sky, and the land. They felt how, in the wake of habitat change and destruction, there was extinction of species at a rate unmatched in the history of the planet. All these changes could be attributed to the overpopulation of a single, out of control, selfish, pre-Elohim hominin creature—Homo sapiens. Advancing as if a disease, these creatures evolved and shaped the topography of the world like a cancer, leaving its host vulnerable to death. Yahweh’s broad peninsular crash site of vast grasslands became the present-day projection of land called Florida. The Earth’s population of over eight billion hominin lit up the coastlines with coalescing clusters of lights, as the radiance from their cities grew and glowed, outlining man’s developments, conquests, degradations and destruction.
At last, Yahweh relented, allowing the vivid visions to dissolve.
Nadira spoke first. “And the world was a better place? Had evolution run its course? Were the people of Earth ready to face their destiny?”
“And,” added Lanochee, “where was Numen?”
Yahweh’s only words were, “It’s not over until it’s over.”
Chapter 4
In a very real sense this search for extraterrestrial intelligence is a search for a cosmic context for mankind, a search for who we are, where we have come from and what possibilities there are for our future—in a universe vaster both in extent and duration than our forefathers ever dreamed of.
Carl Sagan, 1934-1996, Earth
Library of Souls
Space Launch Complex 40 Kennedy Space Center, Florida
Final Countdown
“On my mark, T-minus five minutes and counting... three, two, one, mark,” the launch conductor announced over the com system.
“Roger,” Dr. Katherine Logan heard, looking up toward a nearby speaker. Personnel at launch control had become accustomed to answering with that phrase over the past decades of the Space Age. She laughed. Wouldn’t it be hilarious for someone in the space program to be named Roger? “Roger,” she said, grinning at no one in particular. “Yes? Are you talking to me?” It would be like schizophrenia. Her smile disappeared. “Schizophrenia sure sucks,” she mumbled.
She had been a fan of the space program ever since she was a child. Her foster parents had bought her one model rocket kit after another; she’d spent hours gluing her fingers to the various little pieces of fuselage and motor mounts. She was fascinated by every aspect of the space program’s development, from the communications systems that no longer had transistor circuitry to astronauts peeing in their space suits.
Dr. Logan was a brilliant woman, with a background in astrophysics. In the last five years alone, she had published half a dozen papers on where and what extraterrestrial life would look, and act like on other nearby planets. She was attractive—long and lean with a confident walk and infectious crooked little smile. But she was always a little out of place here at the Cape—and not just because her thick brown hair frizzed up in the hot Florida humidity and her light complexion fried in the bright sunshine.
Her colleagues would say it was her eyes; there was something about her green-gray eyes that could make the most innocuous comment feel aggressive. They opened too wide when she spoke, they looked too directly at other people. Her eyes weren’t quite deranged, but they certainly seemed to reflect—as the rumors suggested—years of taking antipsychotic prescriptions.
And then there were her projects. Somebody important must have been interested in what she was working on, because she continued to receive the funding and resources to bring today’s big moment to fruition, and yet most people working around her were confounded that her section of the budget hadn’t been slashed years ago.
Dr. Logan was acutely aware of the distance her colleagues maintained. She felt like a drummer in a rock band. Not like Ringo or Phil Collins, who everyone knew, but more like Phil Collins’s replacement after he moved up to lead singer. She was doing steady background work, but people were pretty sure the band would be just fine without her.
It didn’t help that crowds of people were awkward for her. She read a little something extra into every smile, glance, and gesture. It was as if everyone else was either looking at her or talking about her. So sure, she was a VIP, and everyone smiled and laughed with her at receptions, pre-launch parties and conferences, but she knew she was the redheaded stepchild of the upcoming launch. She felt tolerated.
A man standing nearby looked up at the sound of Logan’s mumbling voice. He smiled politely, not bothering to ask what she had just said. People were used to Logan making little comments to herself.
“Search for extraterrestrial intelligence. Neat,” said Tom DeYoung, launch liaison, walking up behind her. “The end of one chapter in your life and—”
“The beginning of another,” Logan said, with a big smile, catching DeYoung off-guard. She had heard that phrase at least ten times that week. “Yes, it is very exciting to have my—our—satellite launched today. Glad they had the extra room.”
She was the launch-team leader for one of the nano-satellites
being launched today as a “freebie” add-on to much grander endeavor. The Eastern Test Range had evolved and was now listed as the functional 45th Space Wing of the United States Air Force, producing viable products such as space-based satellites and platform systems bound for Mars. Today, NASA was launching a space-based telescopic system it had been working on for over fifteen years.
“Initiate launch, range interlock restart, SV/US power transfer,” announced the launch conductor.
“Oh yeah sure,” DeYoung said. “You know—use it or lose it. We had the extra lift capacity. Your project was in a long line of excellent projects to get off the ground, and it was the right size, and weight specifications,” he said.
Blah, blah, blah, she heard from him inside her head. Your project sucks. In response, she blurted out loud, “I know! It sounds like a waste of time and money to me too!”
DeYoung looked at her blankly. “What?”
Logan regrouped, trying to clarify what she meant, but instead she could feel herself taking on the tone of a manic rant. “Don’t get me wrong. I love it,” she said, her words spilling out faster and faster. “I get that it sounds far-fetched. But picking up radio frequencies based on the subatomic vibrations of the water molecule is brilliant, considering that life as we know it is based on the liquid water theory. And the distances to find another life form are way too—”
“Too far to comprehend,” he interjected, defusing the blundering ramblings of the Evil Satellite Queen, as he’d heard people call her behind her back.
“That’s right,” she answered, ducking her head like a turtle escaping from the world. She looked around the room to see if anyone else was watching her.
Everyone in the room already knew of her condition and was accustomed to working around it. She was not normal, not by a long shot, and all her staff were afraid of her. She had been seeing doctors since a young age, when she first claimed to be talking to God. Experts had considered schizophrenia or a form of autism, but her behaviors and test results had never quite fit into a recognizable pattern. Her condition was eventually categorized as undifferentiated or, in lay terms, a mystery.
Logan liked DeYoung. He wasn’t the smoothest talker, but he was a good team player. He probably learned how important it was to be a team player from his college football days—at least, he was built like a football player, so she assumed he had played. Logan loved football and she liked the subtle way DeYoung seemed determined to defuse every awkward moment, so she would not disturb the other VIP guests’ excitement during the launch.
“But the rewards,” DeYoung said, with a kind voice. “If you’re successful, we’ll be able to prove for the first time that we are not alone in the universe.” He placed his hand on her shoulder to reassure her. At first, she flinched at his touch, but when he let go, she missed him.
“Exactly. The speed of light is fast, but it’s not that fast.” She turned her back on him and his confused smile.
“Power transfer complete,” announced the launch conductor. “Start emergency cameras.”
“Roger,” responded the voice of an electrical specialist in command control over the piped-in speakers. The word made her laugh.
“Crazy,” she said, glancing over her shoulder with a smile at DeYoung as she started to walk away from him. She wished God would enter the game and help her. He had always been there for her in the past. She felt lost without her spiritual support.
“Hey,” DeYoung called after her, “let’s go outside and watch your dream come true.”
They walked out of the building to the observation deck and the Florida heat hit them like a supernova.
“Too bad this wasn’t a night launch,” he said.
“Yeah, that would be cool,” she said, surprising DeYoung.
He chuckled. “Much cooler.”
She smiled back at him with a rare, crooked little smile that he found strangely attractive.
“Centaur to internal power,” announced the launch conductor.
“Internal power on, and functioning,” reported command control.
Logan looked at DeYoung and started to feel bad for him. What a crappy job—babysitting her for the launch. Had he pulled the short straw? He hadn’t asked the irritating questions she usually received, like, “Found any little green men, lately?”
No, he was professional and sweet to her, and not bad on the eyes. She pushed the thought away. She had Vince waiting for her at home.
“T-minus two minutes, and counting,” announced the launch conductor.
“It’s all downhill—I mean, uphill—from here,” DeYoung said. He smiled at her, until she noticed he was staring. When she stared back with her piercing eyes, he straightened up his posture and looked at the lonely launch pad in the distance. “This is my favorite part. The systems function on automatic for the rest of the countdown. Here we go.”
“T-minus one minute and counting. Lockout holds. Disconnect centaur F/D lines,” announced the launch conductor in rapid succession.
“You know, we haven’t had one of these things blow up all month,” he said, winking. He hoped he hadn’t overstepped his humor and quickly added, “Just joking.”
“You can run and run with that football, can’t you?” she said. “Now shut up and keep your eye on the quarterback.” Logan returned his wink and leaned her slim body against the observation platform railing. She was looking at the distant sea, away from the launch pad, distracted by something whispering in her mind. She recognized the voice, but the words confused her.
Sensing DeYoung couldn’t keep his eyes off her, Logan focused on looking straight ahead. She felt a strangeness spreading through her—something intoxicating and tingly. She was usually on drugs, powerful ones, too, but this was different. Maybe she shouldn’t have doubled, no tripled up on taking her new prescription today, of all days.
“Too bad you live so far away. California, right?” DeYoung asked, moving closer to her.
Logan’s mind was wondering. What had God just said inside her head?
“Savior of the world,” she said suddenly, snapping herself and DeYoung back into reality. “I must save the world?”
He arched an eyebrow, confused. Logan was now focused on the ground below the elevated observation deck. Strange-looking, unusual moving plants covered the ground. She rubbed her eyes with her sweating hands and refocused on the palmetto palms dancing in the sea breeze as she let out a deep breath of relief.
“T-minus five, four, three. SRM ignition, and we have lift off,” announced the launch conductor.
“Lift off,” confirmed the range officer.
“Do you think there’s a God out there that gives a damn about us?” she asked, as the rocket motors ignited and lit up the ground around the launch pad with a giant exploding mushroom cloud.
“I don’t know,” he said, transfixed by the force expended to propel the rocket off the ground and bemused by her nutty indifference to the feat they were witnessing.
The rocket roared off the launch pad in a spectacular plume of smoke and fire. Observers shielded their eyes from the sun and the rocket as it rose higher.
As the booming roar hit them, Logan tilted her head toward the ocean until DeYoung reached over and touched her elbow. She jerked her arm away.
“Are you okay? What do you think of the launch?”
She turned her head, looking at the rocket blasting into the sky, and said, “Pretty.”
DeYoung left her side to high-five others around the observation deck. The small crowd held a mix of scientists, former astronauts, celebrities and politicians shaking hands and pointing to the sky and exchanging hugs and fist bumps. Logan could see Elon Musk smiling politely at the small group starting to cluster excitedly around him.
“Look who it is,” a tall dark-haired man said, clapping Musk on the back. “Who else can brag that their car went 18,000 mile per hour around the world?”
“And the dummy in a space suit driving it!” exclaimed another of the VIPS. �
��Hilarious. I suppose it’s still looking for a parking spot on Mars.”
DeYoung was making his way back through the jubilant crowd on the observation deck to his job controlling the Evil Satellite Queen.
“Well, it hasn’t blown up yet, has it?” she asked, grasping the deck railing, momentarily losing her balance from staring into the sky.
The rocket flew into the Florida sky like a magnificent, slow-motion comet. A cloudy peace settled on her mind. The vision before her ceased to represent a decade and a half of NASA’s blood, sweat and tears on which her satellite was hitching a ride. This was all hers now. It was her rocket, her satellite, her life’s work. It was being watched up and down the East Coast for as far as eyes could see. The fireball was visible from as far away as Miami in the south, Jacksonville in the north, and Tampa in the west; it stood as one of humankind’s crowning achievements of the twenty-first century.
Almost two minutes in, the now-tiny speck of light off the mighty stage zero solid propellant engines had almost entirely vanished from sight, when a plume of smoke shot out of the rising rocket’s tail. Logan felt a knot in her stomach. Her mind began reeling at the speed of the rocket, shooting the realization through her head that her pet project was flashing into smoke before her very eyes.
To her amazement, the thought was followed by a quiet gush of peace, and she breathed a deep sigh of relief that she didn’t expect. The autonomic release of stress surged throughout her body. She wouldn't have to endure anymore crap from her critics about the time and expense needed to monitor this stupid satellite for a sign that there were, indeed, little green men nearby.
She forced a look of shock back to her face and turned around, ready to receive the inevitable lamentations. To her amazement, no one in the buzzy crowd seemed to have noticed the rocket’s failure.
