Outward Borne

by R. J. Weinkam

  MaxNi briefly rose to explain how the appearance of the sun was accompanied by a rise in temperature, but by then he held no one’s attention. The images were now of thin white streaks composed of the highest ice crystals and down toward the billowing heights of soft bright white cloud layers with their deep purple shadows leading to an even more intricate depths and shapes. The pictures ended abruptly when the balloon fine skin was breached and the camera fell toward ObLa.

  From beneath its thick opaque layers and ever-present mist, the dark and featureless ObLa had been shown to be a beautiful dynamic mass. Many were overcome with emotion and pride that they had never before experienced. Some rose and left the room, much as MaxNi had, to move into a new world that had changed in wondrous ways from only moments before.

  The world was changing in other ways for MaxNi. In this new land, he was days away from being ObLa’s most famous scientist, and the dumpy old COW would become a shrine and tourist haunt. The world beyond ObLa became larger than MaxNi and the COW could manage. Within weeks, a consortium of cities was formed to explore the universe. MaxNi became a public figure and a source of information for other agencies that intended to move beyond the limited technology that the Center could assemble.

  The data and images from MaxNi’s famous flight were made available to every ObLaDa who wished to see it. Which was just about everybody, so when MaxNi finally had some time free from his fame to consider the motion and spatial relationships between ObLa and its moons and sun, he was one of hundreds who were tackling the same problem. The consensus opinion was that the light emitting bodies, the sun and all of the stars were distant and stationary and that the two reflective bodies were close and in motion. Most agreed that the moons circled ObLa, although the data was so limited that only the crudest estimate could be made of their orbits.

  This awoke an old memory and MaxNi went back to his work with RaLak LemTer on the Fickle Flow of Filim. They had determined the cycles of the three forces that matched the micro tides in Head and Foot lakes, and MaxNi wanted to see if these might correspond to the luminous bodies that he had found. Indeed they did. Old RaLak had used his data to predict the orbits of the three bodies, assuming there were such things. MaxNi reprinted RaLak's little paper with an addendum showing how well the orbits that RaLak predicted matched the movement of the newly discovered sun and moons. Indeed, they were the most accurate then available.

  Six months later, the Space Exploration Agency launched a new balloon that remained aloft for weeks and confirmed everything. The fact that someone could gaze at the water flowing through the Filim channel and describe the motions of the unseen sun and moons through the heavens raised RaLak and MaxNi to the rank of legend and assured that ancient YoLa MeSom had all the conversation that her front porch could bear.

  Chapter 5 The New Universe

  The discovery of the universe, the existence of stars, planets, moons, and of endless distances had a profound and enduring effect on ObLaDa society. That ancient, scientifically sophisticated civilization had evolved with no history, belief, or mythology of an extended universe, and no concept of that a world might exist beyond the surface of ObLa. Even the simple fact that the sky could be clear, or that distant objects could be seen, was contrary to all experience. Facing the incontestable imposition of an entire universe onto their collective consciousness, the ObLaDas responded by developing an obsession with space exploration and travel that would change the future of the galaxy.

  The certainty that they existed among a countless number of other stars struck at the emotional core of the population. It inevitably led to the formation of planet-wide consortia to develop new technologies needed for more telling astronomical observations and for the eventual exploration of space. This was no easy task on a perpetually cloud covered planet. The balloons that were used in the early discoveries were an especially poor platform for astronomy. They would not stay in one place, and the Das had never been good flyers. Fixed wing planes never took off, so to speak. Flight meant immediate entry into fog, rapid disorientation, loss of any sense of direction, and an ever-present threat of an overly abrupt return to solid ground, or with forty percent statistical probability, to wet muck. The ObLaDas had never dreamt of flying amongst the clouds and soaring with the birds as we have done, since you could touch the clouds by standing upright and there were no birds.

  On the other hand, the mathematically gifted Das had advanced theoretical physics far into the heights. They understood that satellites were the only feasible platform for the exploration of space. While the ObLaDas had a marvelous understanding of materials and could fabricate almost anything, they had no large industrial base. The population was distributed among the many small villages and towns that were scattered across the land. One place was much like another. The necessary dispersal of effort between innumerable small laboratories and factories made the development of large rockets and exploration technologies inefficient, but it was just the type of cooperative effort that made the ObLaDas feel good about themselves.

  The ObLaDas’ conquest of space started with nothing and had a long way to go. Progress was ever slow on ObLa. Nevertheless, their program advanced at a steady pace. Their early satellites were small short-lived things, limited by weak rockets launched from drones that flew high into the thick atmosphere. But they progressed, decade-by-decade, century-by-century, to place proper platforms into high orbit and begin the serious exploration of outer space. And popular it was, too!

  Keeping up with the new images, discoveries and theories of the universe was far and away the favorite hobby on ObLa. Every village and town had its society of space enthusiasts who were directly connected into the latest findings, all freely distributed from the telescopes, space probes, and radio antennae. They collected the reports and theories from the space research centers and compared these to their own ideas and proposals, not always favorably. They looked forward to the launch of the large radio telescope array that was to be used for deep space exploration and construction of a radio wavelength map of the Universe. The most important contribution from this large array, ironically, was that it replaced a smaller space-based radio telescope that, after some debate, was devoted to a full-time search for artificial radio transmissions within the galaxy.

  Everyone she knew believed that NorHan NorBa had the most interesting job on the planet. NorHan did little to correct the impression. For forty years, the old radio telescope had panned across the galaxy measuring the intensity of radio transmissions from the vicinity of main line stars. For the past twelve of those years, NorHan NorBa was the chief communications technician in the Space Exploration Institute’s. She was there to monitor the incoming interstellar communications from distant civilizations whenever they occurred. They had not yet occurred, however, so her job consisted of running system performance checks.

  This was quite all right with NorHan as she lived her life at home. Home being one of twelve buildings within a city block in Tometsur, the third largest city on ObLa. All of these buildings faced inward toward one another in the center of the block forming the home for an almost communal group of thirty-eight people. The children were raised in common, but for NorHan, this meant her own two children plus four to six others were usually trouping through her little place succumbing to her natural attraction and the sense of comfort that surrounded her. The children loved her and she was happy with that. She was not given much else to do. She liked her job well enough, but mostly she liked it because it did not disrupt the rest of her life.

  That suddenly changed. Late one night a faint but stronger than expected signal was detected from the vicinity of XK-47, a star located on the edge of the galactic core, about one hundred and twenty light years distant. This was no beacon into space announcing the presence of a living planet, but a more-or-less continuous signal that had greater amplitude and was less dispersed than background static. It was not much, but it met many of the pre-established event requirements defined by the Institu
te and thus it detection triggered a flag on the signal monitoring computer system, no alarms or get-out-of-bed-quick message, only a note stating that an unusual finding had been detected. The message was added to a file that no one was there to notice. The telescope moved on to the next designated star.

  Four hours later, NorHan arrived at work, fresh from a three-day vacation. She was a bit late that day, but when she arrived, NorHan squatted before her computer to check the night's activity. The notice for a Suspect Intercept was highlighted and flashing when she opened her data record file. She assumed it was a malfunction, of course, that always were. She double-checked all her control data and it all looked good, that is to say normal. Reference stars were where they were supposed to be, the antenna pointed in the right direction, everything worked and so the data seemed to be real.

  NorHan spent some time replaying the signal from XK-47. It was not particularly interesting; however there were some minor modulations, no obvious pattern, but it was contained within a particularly narrow range of wavelengths that had a somewhat unusual energy distribution. At least it was different from radio-emitting galaxies. She had seen plenty of those. NorHan refocused the telescope on XK-47. The signal was still present. She saw hints of a pattern and some interesting low frequency variations when she focused on a narrow wavelength band. It was something, so she set off to alert her supervisor. It was a twist of fate that her supervisor and the next two levels of management were not in that day, and NorHan ended by taking her discovery directly to the Institute’s director, Kel UnFel, much to her personal discomfort and future fame.

  The entire staff gathered around NorHan’s station to examine the signal. The continuous record was copied and parceled out and most of Institute spent the day double checking the event and applying their best signal analysis tools to the continuous beam to see if there was any hidden pattern, or nonrandom elements, within the apparent noise. No one could be sure, but variations over the next four days gradually convinced them that the radio transmissions were the unintended result of local telecommunications between the inhabitants of some planet.

  Kel Unfel announced that Extraterrestrial Intelligence Branch’s NorHan NorBa had discovered an unusual radio frequency signal from the vicinity of the star XK-47. It was the Institutes’ belief, almost certainly, that the signal was generated artificially by an advanced civilization. NorHan NorBa, the discoverer of alien life, became famous. NorHan did not react well to her sudden and time consuming fame. She felt increasingly lonely while traveling and making presentations. She was adrift without her family and familiar habits. NorHan wished that she had not paid any attention to that silly signal.

  ObLa went on to discover, not at all quickly, that technologically advanced civilizations were thin in the heavens. Lapses of several decades occurred between new leads, which turned out to have a natural origin, and centuries passed before a truly purposeful extraterrestrial signal was intercepted. Finally, a clear, information-rich radio transmission was received from a star about twenty-one light years distant from ObLa, practically a neighbor.

  This civilization, which the ObLaDas came to call the Primaforms, was an experienced interstellar communicator. They broadcast a continuous a stream of data designed to establish a language. Transmissions consisted of beeps; beeps corresponded to numbers, mathematical operators, mathematic and geometric equations, and formulas describing physical and chemical principles that were common throughout the universe. The Primaforms restated all these numbers and symbols in written form to establish a vocabulary and grammar, which they eventually used to express more conceptual ideas and provide information about themselves. The Primaforms repeated this searching message on a 10-year cycle. Unfortunately for ObLa, they were over seven years into the message when it was first discovered.

  Contact with the Primaforms caused a sensation on ObLa that was as great as MaxNi's discovery of the universe and NorHan’s first contact with an alien planet. This time it was not a shock, but an anticipated, even longed for connection with a fellow society. The ObLaDas never harbored paranoid ideas of alien space invaders – always-hostile species that were bent on destroying life-as-we-know-it for no apparent reason. Rather, they felt themselves alone in the galaxy and longed to be part of a welcoming community. ObLaDas were forever uncomfortable being alone and would never venture out by themselves when there was someone to go with. Their long-held frustration and the endless speculation on their inability to make contact with another civilization was immediately replaced by a passion to learn every nuance of the Primaform’s message.

  The Primaforms conducted their communications as an extended monologue. They operated on the theory that if two people exchanged their autobiographies, they would come to know a lot about each other without ever conducting a conversation. The fact that ObLa had missed years of preliminary information that established the common language, meant that the message was a great puzzle, some kind of code to be broken and sorted out. The interest level was so great that the full text of every message was made available to the population and the ObLaDas used their collective minds to translating the code. Clubs were formed; some even recruited experts who could help in the job. Although they didn't succeed in sorting out all the text, they made surprising progress and, when the transmitting station was ready to send a return message, they were able to do so in the Primaform’s own language. The clubs worked on their own texts, so that communication with the Primaforms became an ObLa-wide community affair.

  This time, someone, or something, was already listening. The Primaforms had picked up sporadic radio signals from the early days of ObLa satellite communication and had been sending signals toward ObLa for twenty years. They were now expecting something in return. The Primaforms had already established communications with several distant civilizations and were always keen on finding new contacts.

  The Primaforms had never left the surface of their own planet. They lacked the resources necessary to travel to other stars, but they shared what they knew and that enabled ObLa to begin interplanetary communications with all six of their contacts. Immediately, minus a few decades of lag time, a wave of knowledge and innovation swept over ObLa. Communications with alien species, and the continued stream of information from those distant life forms, held the interest of the ObLaDas for centuries. Revelations about alien beings and their planets were reported and followed with cult-like intensity. Through all of that time ObLa, like the other communicators, continued to search for new contacts.

  There are three hundred billion stars in our galaxy. The well-known assumptions about the number of stable stars, the prevalence of planets around each star, the fraction of planets that had a constant climate and abundant supply of water, and the probability that life would spontaneously originate given the right environment, all lead to the belief that there should be a billion planets in the galaxy that could support life and even civilizations.

  In fact, knowledge of the six known alien planets dramatically increased the estimated probability, for they sprung from diverse origins and not some highly specific or unusual condition that might be supposed. The collected knowledge strongly supported the fact that planets are common to the majority of stars and that water is also a common commodity within most solar systems. The presence of a continuous life-consistent climate over billions of years was rare, but some evidence suggested that abundant life forms could help maintain the required stability once they reached an adequate density.

  Still, amongst the rampant spawn of life, there seemed to be remarkably few technologically advanced civilizations, that is to say, ones capable of radio transmission. There should be millions. Why then could they only find six planets that could operate a radio? Radio transmission is not a particularly challenging of technology, so this was a puzzle. Over the centuries that followed, a few new contacts were made and the network of advanced civilizations gradually increased, but that increase was not without setbacks. Most troubling to the ObLaDas were those
planets that initiated communications, but within a few centuries ceased to broadcast. The brief appearance then the sudden or unexplained disappearance of advanced planets led some ObLaDa’s to believe that technology might contribute to the self-destruction of its own society. If the survival time of an advanced species were a few thousand years, instead of the thirty million years typical of most successful species, it would severely limit the number of advanced societies that were active at any given time. This question captivated the people of ObLa. Their interest in all things space and natural drive to care for their fellow beings, led the ObLaDas to build the machines that would take them from star to star to encounter intelligent life throughout the galaxy.

  Chapter 6 The Outward Voyager

  Dead or undead, that was the question? Robotic ships would be easier to construct and much, much less expensive than any ‘manned’ craft. At the maximum theoretical speed of their propulsion system, 0.217 LightSpeed, it would take years to travel from star to star, and decades to find the next life-harboring planet. An uninhabited ship could be shut down and cruise those long times and immense distances with little cost, but that was not an option, it would not be good enough.

  The mission would be too complex. There would be too many unknown and unpredictable problems to be solved, and if aliens, wholly unknown beings, were to be brought on board, they too would need to be maintained. Feeding, housing, and sustaining unknown alien life forms would be challenging as well as unpredictable. It was not something a robot could figure out. The ship must be ‘manned’. The Voyager would be huge, but the cost must be borne.

  The ObLaDa’s envisioned a mission that would seek out intelligent alien life wherever it may be found. How they might deal with these societies was not always so clear. Should they avoid highly advanced civilizations, should they ever encounter one? They might be dangerous. It was undecided, but promising beings could be captured and studied even if they did not yet have a technologically advanced civilization. The ObLaDas would try selective breeding, education, and training to prod their alien beings to establish a society, master the sciences, or become more technologically adept. If that were so, and they expected that it was, there remained the question, the puzzle, of why so few advanced societies existed. They hoped to find out.