The Girl With Acrylic Eyes

by Greg Krojac

  Karen went to the canteen and got something to eat during the fifty minutes she had to wait for Coppélia’s next comment.

  “I enjoyed posing for all those selfies. They were – are – good people. Over.”

  Unfortunately, the time that had been dedicated for the call was coming to an end.

  “I have to go now Coppélia – they want their comms back. It’s been great talking to you. I hope we can do it again when you’re nearly home. Take care, my friend. Over and out.”

  A conversation that would have taken less than five minutes in real-time had taken over five hours to complete. Karen and Coppélia reluctantly agreed that it would be impractical to attempt to hold a conversation in the future – the time-lag would increase exponentially – so they agreed to send video journals instead.

  Karen was disappointed that she would no longer be able to have actual conversations with her friend, but she’d seen for herself the technical limitations of communications between Mission Control and the Carl Sagan. Forced to resort to video journals instead of video chats it dawned upon Karen that it was more than not being able to chat with Coppélia that was causing the ache in her heart, the sensation that her Chilean neighbours might call añoranza. It was the presence, the sharing of experiences, a real sense of loss. And it hurt.

  15

  Sat alone in the space-pod, safety restraints applied (she was a very expensive piece of equipment) Coppélia performed self-diagnostics of her internal systems whilst the spacecraft’s main computer did the same for the Carl Sagan’s systems. Billions of dollars had been invested in the project and it would have been tragic if it were to fail due to a miscalculation. Satisfied that her own systems were functioning perfectly, she waited for the all-clear from the Carl Sagan. Once she had received confirmation from the ship’s main computer, an audible metallic-voiced countdown began, signalling that the space-pod was about to launch.

  “Ten…nine…eight.”

  A set of clamps holding the cradle that encased the space-pod released their charge.

  “Seven…six…five.”

  Small thruster engines on the cradle automatically primed themselves for the journey to the planet’s surface.

  “Four…three…two.”

  The engines ignited.

  “One.”

  The cradle containing the space-pod shot forward, the gap between it and the mother-ship widening with every second. A human may have been tempted to want to look behind him or herself at the receding image of the Carl Sagan, but Coppélia had no such whims to fall prey to. Her attention and computational power were focussed solely upon the task at hand. She and her landing shuttle were now entering uncharted territory and she would have to rely upon the speed of her ability to react and adapt in order to guide the space-pod to a safe landing area, and then execute as soft a landing as possible. Thousands of computer simulations had been performed and the structural design of the landing shuttle had been revised a number of times as a result of those simulations, but there was always the possibility of an unexpected variable influencing the outcome.

  Suddenly the forward-facing interior wall of the sphere, which had previously been a dull, lifeless, blank canvas, was filled with a mosaic of what was outside the landing vehicle. Scores of high definition cameras positioned on the outside hull of the vehicle sucked in images of the planet and its surrounding space, and sophisticated software merged the individual images together to form a visual tapestry of Proxima b. Coppélia gazed at the image of the planet below, in awe of the fact that she was the first representative of planet Earth – machine or human – to look upon the countenance of this distant alien planet. The images were transmitted instantly back to Mission Control in Chile, initiating their 4.24 year long journey to Earth.

  Whereas Earth looked very blue, Proxima b looked as if an artist had mixed a palette of brown and salmon pink and had stippled the surface with various shades of the resulting colour. She could make out ridges on the surface, some more defined than others, but she saw no evidence of water. The planet is tidally locked, so one hemisphere was bathed in the relentless direct sunlight of its star, whilst the other faced away from the star and was subject to eternal darkness. An equatorial belt – the Terminator Belt – around the planet had been assigned as the most suitable area in which to land, avoiding the extremes of temperature that gave no respite to the two hemispheres. Coppélia looked to her right and saw the dwarf star, Proxima Centauri, and, to its right, in the background, the Alpha Centauri binary system.

  The landing shuttle’s engines gently eased the craft closer and closer to the surface, minute corrections being automatically relayed from the craft’s on-board computer to the relevant thrusters which were dotted at regular intervals around the space-pod’s cradle and allowed for 360° manoeuvrability. Decades earlier, there had been a fly-past by minuscule, sail-equipped nano-probes that had travelled at 20 percent light speed propelled by powerful ground-based lasers, but the information that they had provided was limited. The Coppélia Project was much more ambitious and ground-breaking, not just observing but experiencing the planet. Once the landing shuttle had descended to 500 metres above the planet’s surface, control passed completely to Coppélia who would select a suitable landing site, relying on her own highly advanced and sophisticated computational skills to land the ship safely.

  Everything the android saw was recorded for posterity, both visually through her eye-cameras and also through a processing unit that converted her thoughts into audible records of the experience.

  “Altitude constant, 500 metres above ground level. Horizontal velocity, 5 kph”

  There was no point in travelling any faster; it wasn’t as if Coppélia had anywhere else she needed to be. She turned on the vehicle’s floodlights in order to better see the terrain below her. As anticipated, the surface of the planet was rocky in nature, the diagonal direction of many of the crags giving credence to the theory that it had once been a living planet, with volcanic eruptions and geological trauma causing the surface to fracture and ripple. Now, everything was still – if there had once been any form of life on the planet it had long since been extinguished by the stripping of the atmosphere due to the sporadic but intense solar flares that poured from its mother sun, Proxima Centauri. If any life did exist on the planet it certainly didn’t conform to criteria that mankind believed it should.

  The projected inhospitality of the planet was exactly what had precluded a manned mission to the planet. The twenty year flight would have been feasible, but there was no way that it would have been possible to put a human on the surface of Proxima b. The planet was regularly battered by stellar wind pressures 2,000 times more powerful than experienced on Earth and received 400 times the X-Ray radiation that Earth receives. Coppélia, on the other hand, was made – quite literally – of much stronger stuff. Her outer skin had been designed to withstand exactly the conditions that were expected on the planet and hundreds of computer simulations and actual physical tests had assured Raef’s team that she could tolerate the environmental challenges that the planet would throw at her.

  Coppélia augmented her visual receptors so that she could see more clearly as the search for a suitable landing place continued. The light outside was much dimmer than normal daylight on Earth as even the side of the planet that faced the dwarf star only received, at best, 2.1% of the light that Earth did. The light side of the planet was thus enveloped in an eternal twilight state and, although visibility may have been better the further one went towards the focal point of the sun’s light, the extremes of temperature would have caused additional problems. The dark side of the planet fared no better, being eternally starved of light, and would have suffered extremes of temperature at the other end of the scale. So the safest bet – and the route taken – was to land somewhere in the Terminator Belt.

  The landing shuttle, suitably named the deGrasse Tyson, slowly made its way along the belt until Coppélia spotted a potential candidate for a
landing site. Below her, she could see what appeared to be a valley between two towering ridges, whose floor seemed to be reasonably flat and level. She turned the landing shuttle around to take a better look. There was one spot in particular that looked like it had been constructed for just such a purpose. She allowed the vehicle to hover for a minute or two whilst she double-checked the site. She couldn’t see anything that suggested it may be a bad place to land.

  Preparing to land the deGrasse Tyson Lander Craft. Horizontal velocity, zero kph.

  The horizontal thrusters didn’t shut off completely but instead made such minimal course corrections that any movement was imperceptible to the human eye. Coppélia’s technologically advanced eyes could see the movement, but the data was treated as unnecessary and ignored. She made her descent.

  Altitude 45 metres above ground level. Horizontal velocity, zero kph

  She made a couple of adjustments on her control panel.

  Altitude 30 metres above ground level. Horizontal velocity, zero kph

  The surface of the planet appeared to be rushing up to meet the lonely little spacecraft.

  Altitude 15 metres above ground level. Horizontal velocity, zero kph

  The deGrasse Tyson was almost there. It was about to become the first man-made object to land on a planet outside of Earth’s solar system.

  Altitude 10 metres above ground level. Horizontal velocity, zero kph

  Only a second or so left.

  Altitude 5 metres above ground level. Horizontal velocity, zero kph

  And then.

  Altitude 0 metres above ground level. Horizontal velocity, zero kph. The deGrasse Tyson has landed successfully on exoplanet Proxima b

  Back at Mission Control, it was a day pretty much like any other. There was official acknowledgement that it was the day when the interstellar lander craft, The deGrasse Tyson, should have landed on the surface of Proxima b, but Raef and his team had no way of knowing if the mission had been a success, or even if the mother ship, the Carl Sagan, had actually reached the planet safely. The Project Coppélia team was still in existence but it had been downsized to comprise of a rotating shift of ten people whose job was to monitor the Deep Space Network for signals. Often, days would go past without hearing from Coppélia – sometimes even weeks – as there simply wasn’t much to say. It’s not as if there was anything new to report.

  Karen still visited the control centre to view the sporadic messages from Coppélia, but only when Raef informed her that a message had arrived. She preferred to spend time at home with their children, while her husband oversaw the project. Project Coppélia was his baby, even he wasn’t giving the project his full attention now. His interest seemed to have waned since he got involved with the colonisation of Mars – a necessity now that the world’s population had risen to 11.2 billion and showed no signs of slowing down.

  Raef had made a point of being at Mission Control on that particular day; Project Mars could do without him for a few days. Everything was running smoothly, so it’s not as if he would be needed elsewhere. He also knew it was important to his wife that they mark the occasion, so he ensured that there was enough champagne on ice (although he took the point of view that the real time for celebration would be when they received confirmation that Coppélia had landed on Proxima b).

  At 4 pm sharp, the door to Mission Control opened and Karen walked in with the couple’s three children – ten-year-old Felipe, eight-year-old Lucas, and six-year-old Carolina. She went up to Raef and gave him a delicate kiss. Felipe handed out self-chilling biodegradable champagne glasses to the ten members of Team Coppélia that were on duty, not forgetting to keep two glasses for his mother and father. Raef twirled his empty glass by the stem.

  “You do know that we have no idea whether Coppélia has landed on the planet or not, don’t you?”

  Karen pressed a finger to her his lips to stop him talking.

  “Of course, honey. I’m not daft. But I’m being positive. As far as I’m concerned – unless we hear anything to the contrary – Coppélia has landed on the planet.”

  She poured some self-chilled champagne into his glass.

  “Now, don’t say another word, Raef, unless it’s something positive.”

  Raef surrendered to his wife’s good mood. He waited until everybody had their glasses charged with champagne – and the children had glasses of Kem, a pineapple soda drink. Raef raised his glass.

  “Ladies and gentlemen. Today sees a major milestone for Project Coppélia. Today is the day that the landing shuttle, the deGrasse Tyson, has hopefully landed on the surface of Proxima b. Please raise a glass to Team Coppélia, to yourselves, and thank you for all the wonderful work you’ve done over the years and the work you’ll continue to do.”

  Everybody in the room took a sip of their champagne. Karen took a sip and raised her glass again.

  “And to my friend Coppélia. May she return safely and with many stories to tell.”

  Again, everybody toasted Coppélia, although most – like Karen’s husband – saw Coppélia as simply a machine doing a job. Karen suddenly remembered a box that she’d left on a table by the entrance.

  “The cake, Raef. We have to eat the cake.”

  Felipe helped his mother slice the cake and distribute it to the team members. Raef looked at his wife, thinking that he was a lucky man indeed to be married to such a wonderful woman. And she had given him three beautiful children too. He hoped that they would always be this happy.

  Karen was just about to leave when a buzzer went off. She knew what that meant – there was a message from Coppélia coming through – and there was no way she was going to go back home without seeing her friend’s message. She sat down on the sofa that had been installed six years previously, gathered her children to her, and they all waited for the holographic image to arrive.

  Coppélia gradually faded into view.

  “Hi, Karen. Hi, Raef. Hi, Felipe and Lucas, and baby Carolina. I hope you are well.”

  Karen had sent a message to her friend when she and Raef got married, and on the birth of each of their children – although Coppélia had only learned about six-year-old Carolina’s birth about two years earlier. Life was going on for both Karen and Coppélia, but their experiences were as different as chalk and cheese. Coppélia’s message continued.

  “Hello everybody. If everything has gone according to plan – you’ll have received this message on the day that I’ll land on the exoplanet, Proxima b. I’m probably on the planet right now. Anyway, I have a gift for you Karen – a very special gift – something that I hope will bring back some fond memories.”

  Coppélia’s hologram dissolved away.

  Karen was worried.

  “Is that it, Raef? Is there something wrong with the system?”

  Coppélia materialised into view again.

  “Sorry about that, everybody. I had to get changed.”

  Sure enough, instead of the snug-fitting emerald-green space-faring suit that Karen was used to seeing her friend in – made out of the same protective material as her outer skin – Coppélia was wearing a deep blue leotard and a pair of ballet shoes.

  “I hope you like the colour, Karen. It’s Hex #4F5A77”

  The numbers didn’t mean a thing to Karen, but she did like the colour. On the spaceship, Coppélia went over to the large porthole window of the space-pod, although all Karen saw was the figure of her friend walking, yet not changing location.

  “I’m by the large porthole now. Deep space really is beautiful.”

  Coppélia did some totally unnecessary limbering up exercises – she had no muscles to warm-up – but the video course that had taught her the choreography said to do them, so she did.

  “Do you remember when you took me to see that ballet? The one whose title was my name? I could have downloaded the moves into my database, but I wanted this gift to be special, so I studied and learned it the hard way. The human way. I hope you like it.”

  Coppélia finished
her warm-up exercises and walked to the centre of the space-pod’s floor-space where she sat down on her solitary chair. Karen’s children had no idea what was going on, although they had seen a hologram of Coppélia before. She opened her palms as if she were reading an invisible book and sat absolutely motionless.

  Suddenly she stood up and let her legs spread a little with a jerky motion, before throwing the imaginary book away to her right. She raised her right arm in a robotic movement and let it fall back to its original position, and repeated the movement with her left arm, before jerking her head to the left and then to the right. Karen had told Felipe about both Coppélia and the ballet. He had an observation.

  “Mum?”

  “Yes, Felipe.”

  “Aunty Coppélia’s a robot isn’t she?”

  “Yes. Well, strictly speaking, she’s a gynoid. An android in female human form.”

  “And she’s playing the part of a mechanical doll?”

  “Yes.”

  “So she’s a robot playing a robot?”

  “I suppose she is, yes.”

  Felipe gave a knowing look.

  “This must be really easy for her then.”