by Nick M Lloyd
The smile Sharnia returned was all teeth and didn’t get close to her eyes. ‘As it should be.’ She let her gaze drift down the length of Jenkins’ body and back again to his face. ‘As it should be.’ Then she turned on her heels and marched away.
Jenkins let out a breath, not realising quite how long he’d been holding it for. He closed his eyes and took a few calming breaths. She was always unnerving; there was so much blood on her hands only a fool would underestimate her. Jenkins shook himself back to the present. He had work to do.
Chapter 7
Aytch stood in the middle of the crew room with various bits of Earth data projected on to pretty much every wall of the crew room. Many graphs, tables and statistics were overlaid on top of each other like the pieces of a giant jigsaw waiting to be connected.
Justio entered and looked at the main display for a few moments. ‘Interesting items?’
‘Aggregate accidental death rates still steady at three million per year.’
‘Not dipping at all?’
‘The actual number has been reducing in some areas; but once we allow for safety improvements and the like, there is no statistical significance. We’re most likely still in the range of 0.1% Alphas.’
Justio took a nutrition energy tube, his face grimacing slightly as he inhaled. ‘Sounds about right.’
‘It’s not really moved since we got here, since we took Bill Jones. I’m worried we’re stuck in a perpetual Partial Emergence.’
Shaking his head, Justio walked over and sat down. ‘It’s only been 50 years. If you’re getting impatient then take a stasis break. I can watch the ship for a few years, wake you up if things get interesting.’
‘My expectations are probably too high, but we were unlucky taking Bill Jones didn’t herald more.’
Justio frowned. ‘We were incredibly lucky not to get a Full Emergence when we took Bill Jones. I’m actually ashamed I championed the original decision. It would have been carnage, their civilisation was not emotionally or intellectually ready.’
Aytch paused. ‘You’re probably right.’ He turned back to the screens, his eyes focusing on a number of Earth news feeds. ‘They don’t seem any more mature now.’
Justio nodded and looked around at the data covering all the walls. ‘Is this general revision or a specific investigation?’
Aytch showed his communications tablet to Justio. ‘I’m just creating some new correlation programmes. The computer can’t handle the logic so I have to do the manual logic linking.’
Bringing up some additional screens, Aytch showed maps on Earth pinpointing where Gadium had their data interceptors located. There were thousands sequestered across the globe. Some were simply pieces of software hidden within the operating systems of strategically selected computers, while others were actual miniature robots physically recording sounds and pictures from key locations.
Justio chuckled. ‘This monitoring is so much easier now they’ve got up to speed with personal mobile communications and the internet. I’m glad we gave them a nudge there.’ He walked towards the doorway, then turned, and with exaggerated solemnity poked a finger towards Aytch. ‘And their 256 bit encryption keeps everything they say completely secure.’
‘Which reminds me, I haven’t checked in recently on the US AI programme. Have you?’
Justio nodded. ‘I checked a few weeks ago. They’re making progress, but nothing to give us any worries. When their Emergence comes they’ll have to give up the AI programmes as part of their treaty with us. We’ll ensure there’s no Skynet issues for us.’ He paused. ‘I’m just going to check on the QET grid—we’ve got a status report to send.’ At the doorway he turned. ‘I’ll be back.’
Aytch looked up and saw Justio looking at him expectantly. ‘Don’t forget your cultural assimilation lessons, Aytch.’
Once Justio had left, Aytch turned his attention back to the maps on the largest wall. As usual, he was a little worried about the relatively large number of red shaded areas representing locations where they struggled to get real-time signals from either Gadium assets or subverted Earth assets. The main issue remained their lack of ability to process vast quantities of data.
Pulling up some statistical analysis on a range of reported accidents, Aytch accessed hospital records and, running correlations with police records, looked for survival patterns. Dangerous accidents tended to be a rich area for locating individuals who were potentially Alphas—the fear generated within an accident triggered a survival instinct. The numbers seemed to be a little skewed from the expected. Possibly there was a general increase in crash survival, nothing statistically significant yet.
Aytch instructed the computer to open up a communications application. There were two options, (Option A) instantaneous QET communications to Gadium planet, and (Option B) tight-beam signalling, which would take 1,200 years. Aytch dictated an instantaneous QET message first. ‘All is well.’ The computer used a conversion matrix to strip the message down to a single character and then stored it.
For a few moments Aytch considered his position; he wasn’t sure if he should waste his allocation of QET communications; after all, his wife was safe on Gadium—frozen in time in a stasis pod. It would be at least fifty more years until she was brought out for her next periodic medical check regarding energy state mutation. But these long distance relationships were so complicated and Aytch had seen a few of his friend’s relationships go sour, so he felt a time-stamped message showing he was thinking of her would help. This will almost definitely come up in my exams. Relationship pressures of long distance travel. Aytch decided to check up.
‘Computer, please bring up my next revision section on Family Unit.’
The text appeared with an accompanying narration.
Chapter 6.3.A—Family Unit & Stasis Controls
Overview
The social upheaval generated by relationships skewed by stasis is controlled by tightly enforced legislation to protect all parties from emotional imbalance. The basic rules are as follows:
1. No Gadium citizen may have any contact at all with any descendants more than 3 generations distant; the ancestor must enforce this even if they are (due to stasis) biologically younger than their descendants
2. No Gadium child may be placed in stasis before their 12th year; No parent may enter stasis if children are younger than 12 years old
3. Any Gadium citizen entering a deep space trip (defined as > 7,000 light years) must renounce all relationships or take those parties with them. It is not sufficient for the parties to commit to long-term stasis
4. Any Gadium citizen who shows more than 20% degradation in their cellular function is restricted to the home system
5. No Gadium female may give birth whilst on a mission of any type, or whilst their partner is on a mission of any type, unless the partner has renounced parental status
As the narration stopped Aytch heard a sound behind him and turned. Justio was standing in the doorway looking at the rules with a grim expression etched on to his face.
After a moment of thought, Aytch spoke. ‘I was 25 when my father went away on a 30 year round trip. It was a critical treaty review and he agreed with my mother we wouldn’t go into full-time stasis. When he returned, he’d been in stasis for most of his trip so we were fresh in his memory. My mother, brother and I had lived through over 10,000 full days continuously without him, almost no stasis. It was difficult for a while.’
Justio just grunted and tapped away at his communications tablet. ‘The QET grid is down to 40 per cent; clearly we used up a lot of entangled pairs in the early days. But we’ve also had a fair amount of entropic decoupling. We need to enforce more stringent usage controls.’
‘I just requested your authorisation for a QET message to my wife. I’ll cancel it; we can’t risk losing QET contact with Gadium.’
‘How many characters?’
‘One.’
Justio shook hi
s head slightly and turned to the screens. ‘Commander Aytch - QET message approved.’ Justio turned back to Aytch. ‘So what happened with your father?’
‘We patched it up, but there were scars for a while.’ Aytch pointed at the section of the wall displaying the manual entry on Family Unit. ‘I can’t quite see why we legislate, it seems like common sense.’
Justio was a silent for a while, then limped into the middle of the crew room and sat down. ‘Do you think it’s common sense not to love your family?’
Too late, Aytch remembered Justio’s expression from a few moments before, and reading the pre-mission reports detailing Justio’s complicated family history. ‘I suppose it can get difficult.’
Justio fixed Aytch with a cold stare. ‘So do we need legislation or not?’
‘I apologise. I know your situation was complicated.’
‘You don’t know everything about my situation.’ Justio paused for a moment and then continued. ‘If I could travel back in time to the point I accepted my original deep space mission, not all the money in the universe would get me on to the ship.’
Aytch took stock. He’d been told by Sharnia to find opportunities to talk to Justio as an equal, but Aytch had never discussed this with Justio before. He’d avoided the subject studiously for many years—embarrassed to accidentally highlight a deficiency. ‘Why didn’t your wife and children go into stasis?’ He looked at the floor.
Justio let out a long breath and spoke slowly, pushing each word out. ‘It was my duty to take the mission. I was the best qualified. She promised to go into stasis and take my 12-year-old twins as well. We’d been waiting for the twins to reach that magic birthday. The whole mission had been waiting for it.’
Aytch looked up and when he met Justio’s eye, Justio continued. ‘For the six months leading up to the trip, I played with my kids for ages every day. I knew they would be frozen in time until my return, but I was storing memories to cherish during the one thousand days I would be awake…I was to be away for fifteen thousand years.’
Another pause stretched, then Justio spoke again, his voice sounding increasingly hoarse. ‘After I left, my wife decided to stay out of stasis up to the end of the year to finish off a project she was on. So the kids kept her company. Then, after few months, she extended, and by that time, I was on an unstoppable ticket for a fifteen-thousand-year round trip.’
The silence stretched on. Justio seemed to be blinking back tears. Then he spoke in little more than a whisper. ‘I shouldn’t have left. My children and my grandchildren all lived happy fulfilled lives on Gadium. They grew up, lived, loved and died. I’ve read their diaries. They were happy, but they did it all without me. I was dead to them.’
Aytch remained silent.
Justio turned away from Aytch. ‘Perhaps you can turn off the caring in some circumstances. Emotionally cut your great grandchildren or grandchildren loose. But your kids…not so easy. I never found a way to turn it off. You hold them, feed them, clean them, clothe them, comfort them and teach them. Your love is selfless and limitless—as much as you can give. And yet, somehow, you get it back double strength. Love mainlined.’
Aytch remained silent. Justio paused and continued.
‘And it’s good. Their love is amazing; it’s fulfilling, it’s all you need, and at the same time it’s the barest minimum you feel you could possibly survive on.’ Justio shuffled from foot to foot, looking downwards. ‘I never tried to find that level of happiness again. Just threw myself into mission after mission. But I don’t forget the loss.’
Justio turned and left the room.
Chapter 8
Louise woke up at 5am on Sunday morning. For a few minutes she lay awake staring at the ceiling. Just another quick look…then back to bed.
Quietly she climbed out of bed and walked down to the kitchen table, where her laptop sat, still warm from the previous night. After logging on, Louise started browsing the internet, again looking for evidence as to whether Jack may have staged the whole crash. Of course there was no evidence, she chided herself, but she kept looking.
Louise looked up at the clock—9am. She stood up and walked towards the stairs. Other miracle survivors?
Switching on the kettle, Louise returned to her laptop.
Just before lunchtime, there was a noise upstairs and a few moments later Jeff entered the kitchen. ‘How long have you been up?’
‘Not so long.’
‘Your side of the bed is stone cold.’
Louise shrugged and returned her concentration to her computer. ‘I did a little sniffing around Jack Bullage; but I’m over it.’
On Monday morning Louise decided to do a little more investigation, but agreed with herself it would be in a more measured way. She got up at 6am and continued to look for miracle survivors and any background to their situations.
At 8am Jeff wandered into the kitchen. ‘Did you even come to bed last night?’
‘Of course, I’m just doing a bit of research. So how did the pub quiz go with Mike last night?’
Jeff helped himself to breakfast cereal and sat down. ‘We came second, behind some ginger moron who seemed to know the name of every beer in the south east.’ Jeff nodded towards the laptop. ‘Are you sure about this? You’ve been told to stay away.’
‘I’m not really looking into Bullage. I’m just researching miracle survivor stories.’
‘Why?’
‘Just to get it off my plate. So I can sleep tonight.’
‘And have you found anything?’
‘There are some conspiracy forums talking about miracle survivors from multiple events.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like…well, I don’t want to talk about it until I’ve validated some of it.’
Jeff looked pained. ‘Come on…I always help you with the conspiracy stuff, you know…scientific rigour.’
Louise looked intently at Jeff for a few moments and then sighed. ‘Okay, well, I found a few sites postulating that some people are intrinsically lucky. I know you don’t like the word lucky but Bullage survived the M40 crash; 12 other people didn’t.’
‘So you are investigating Bullage. Don’t do it. Anything you say will be taken out of context.’
Louise stared. ‘I’m not investigating Bullage. It’s about miracle survivors.’
‘Okay then, miracle survivals. What are your search criteria? You don’t want to look into every accident there’s ever been.’
Louise forced herself to relax her shoulders. ‘Suggestions?’
‘Perhaps you could use the Bullage crash as a template. How about only looking into crashes with one survivor and at least four deaths?’
‘They’ll be rare.’
Jeff smiled. ‘Miracles don’t come easy.’
Later that day in the Daily Record offices, with her real work done, Louise turned her attention to the online newspaper archives. She started by looking into reports from the previous 10 years where survivors had seemed to defy the odds. Mostly it was car crashes, but she also found a few building collapses.
As she browsed through the materials, the data was almost overwhelming. Louise rubbed her temples as the articles seemed to merge into one. There were so many crashes with multiple deaths and multiple survivals, but accidents with at least four deaths and only one survivor were rare.
Louise searched across news archives and internet sites to build a picture of each accident. In particular, searching for any personal testament of either the survivor or eye witnesses, trying to identify any themes.
In the evening, Louise continued her searching, and the next day, and the next. She hunted early mornings; snippets during work; evenings and late into the nights.
Her search went on unrelentingly.
By Thursday evening Louise had a good enough picture to discuss possible conclusions with Jeff. She sat at the kitchen table nursing half a glass of red wine. ‘There’s no smoking gun. Not
hing obvious. And no reported run of survivals for a single individual.’
Jeff acknowledged this with raised eyebrows. ‘Nothing at all?’
‘There was one guy who survived a crash and then his ambulance was hit by a bus on their way to the hospital, but he died in the second crash. And another guy with cancer who’d been given 24hrs to live by doctors on five separate occasions in two years.’
Jeff shrugged. ‘The cancer example won’t be unique.’
‘And there were building collapses and bomb explosions.’ Louise drained her glass. ‘But it was mostly car crashes, there’s a lot of them…one million deaths per year on the roads!’
Jeff looked surprised. ‘Any linking factors?’
‘For the deaths, yes: speeding, drinking and lack of seatbelts.’ Louise paused. ‘But in terms of the survivors, mostly the usual crap…I thought I was going to die…or…my life flashed before my eyes…or…time seemed to slow.’ Louise took a sip of wine. ‘There were a few other leads though; firstly, a number of crash survivors had testimonies indicating they’d been half-asleep at the instance of the crash. Not unusual I guess, but it resonated with me because Bullage actually said something similar yesterday.’
Jeff looked at the book shelf. ‘I’m sure I read a novel once implying half-asleep people are floppier and so tend to bounce rather than break.’
‘Good that your primary source of facts is your fiction collection. But it does make sense. But fully asleep people are floppy as well, and I didn’t find any notable correlation with fully asleep people surviving.’
Jeff remained silent while Louise collated her thoughts. ‘There was a weird, and I mean very weird, reference.’
Jeff looked expectantly at Louise. ‘Yes?’
‘I found an internet chat board talking about miracle survivors and on a few occasions there was a reference to hedgehogs. I assumed it was road safety but then I found a hedgehog reference related to a collapsing stadium in South America.’
