The Andromeda Evolution

by Michael Crichton

  “This is manipulative, even for you, Doctor,” said Stern, putting a hand to his forehead and wiping away cold sweat. “You’ve taken ‘act first and ask forgiveness later’ to an entirely new level.”

  “We’ve got it. Do you understand, General? This genie is out of its bottle, and it can’t be put back. But the genie is ours.”

  “Okay, I’ll bite. What have you made?”

  “The Andromeda Strain tried to trap us on this planet. Instead, I hijacked its incredible physical properties to build a ladder to the heavens. General, we own a fully functional space elevator, with this space station acting as counterweight. The United States now has the capacity to put thousands of tons of material into orbit for next to nothing in cost. It’s a new manifest destiny, and it will be our people who spread to every corner of this solar system.”

  “A space elevator,” said Stern, sitting down.

  “The instructions were just under the surface. Andromeda is a machine, and not a particularly complex one. Reverse engineering the strain is my gift to the human race, and in particular to the United States of America. General . . . I defy anyone to stop me—to stop us, I mean. We, as a species, we will ascend.”

  Stern was quiet for a long moment, one hand again pressed to his forehead. He had not missed the mania lurking under Kline’s passionate voice. Her proclamations were pompous to the point of absurdity. He later reported his striking realization: “Having overcome the personal barrier of physical disability, Sophie Kline had focused all her genius on destroying what she saw as the civilizational barrier presented by the Andromeda Strain.”

  And the implications were staggering.

  It was dawning on the general that if it really worked, Kline had created a machine more valuable than anything that had existed in the history of humanity. An asset of such incredible utility would instantly upset the balance of world power. To protect and exploit such an asset would require staggering economic incentives to the other superpowers; it would hinge on the naked threat of sheer military muscle; and it would call for a thousand ludicrous promises to everyone else.

  These were all things the United States had in surplus.

  Stern seriously considered the proposal for a moment.

  Kline had been correct in predicting that, as a father, Stern would be a devoted protector. However, she had not considered the fact that, like most parents of teenagers, the general had also become an expert at constantly and soberly considering insane demands—and then denying them.

  “Kline, you’ve put our species at risk. Your elevator is built from something we don’t fully understand. It could easily wipe out every living thing on this planet. Right now, I want you to focus on getting yourself and your crewmates safely back to Earth. I’d very much like for you to avoid the death penalty.”

  “I’ve been living under a death penalty since I was a child,” replied Kline. “That threat doesn’t scare me, so here’s a threat of my own. I’ve already informed the Russian and Chinese governments of exactly what I just told you. They are mobilizing substantial military resources to determine who this machine truly belongs to. Make no mistake, they will claim it if they can. So you can either take my offer, or rest assured they will.”

  “So the patriotic talk was all posturing,” said Stern. “You’ve got no real loyalty to anyone.”

  “My loyalty is to humanity, General,” responded Kline. “I suggest you make history with me. Or get out of my way.”

  Ten seconds of tense silence passed.

  “I understand,” said Stern, finally. “But a decision like this is above even my pay grade, Kline. I’ll contact you again in a little while.”

  “You have thirty minutes,” responded Kline, disconnecting.

  Stern put down the phone. He stepped to the glass door of his back office, letting it swing open into the command center. An entire room of analysts looked up at once, conversations ceasing. Nodding at the closest analyst, Stern spoke in a calm, even voice.

  “I’ll need another cup of coffee, please,” he said, moving into the room slowly and rubbing his eyes. As he reached the command console, Stern added one more thing, as if he had just remembered.

  “Oh, and I suppose I’ll need to speak to the president. As soon as possible.”

  Z-Axis

  THE THREE SURVIVORS SAT TOGETHER IN THE CENTRAL chamber, listening to the wind whistling high above. The sight of the bright shaft in the ceiling and the spire rising through it had grown no less bizarre and exhilarating.

  And if nothing changed soon, Stone knew the view would be his last.

  The chamber was beginning to feel more and more like a tomb. An exhaustive search had revealed only a single half-finished opening: another hexagonal tunnel opened at an angle through the wall, likely used to bring in the supplies. Only the size of a wooden crate, the passage was too narrow to imagine squeezing through. He supposed eventually they would have to try.

  The prospect of survival was growing dim.

  Stone and Vedala had at least worked out how the structure functioned. The concept of a space elevator wasn’t novel, having first been proposed in 1895 by the Russian scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. Generations of physicists since then had repeatedly determined that the idea was scientifically possible, but not plausible—not without radically advanced construction materials.

  Most important, the tether needed to be incredibly strong and flexible—each individual thread able to sustain at least 150 GPa (gigapascals) of force. Meanwhile, the counterweight needed to have hundreds of tons of mass and be parked beyond geostationary orbit. And finally, a mile-high compression tower had to be built on Earth’s equator.

  These were all impossible requirements, or had been.

  Armed with the reverse-engineered Andromeda Strain, Kline had grown a ground-based compression tower and tethered it to the only large enough counterweight available to humankind—the International Space Station. Currently, she was accelerating just beyond geostationary orbit. The distance of over twenty thousand miles had been formidable, but newly launched communications satellites routinely reached it in a matter of hours.

  Kline had constructed a tower, a tether, and a counterweight—leaving one final component.

  The platform in the center of the room was a robotic climber—a cargo platform that could scale the miles-long tether. It ascended using a simple device that looked like two rolling pins. As the pins rotated they would compress the ribbon and pull the platform up. The electric motors were powered through the conductive material of the tether itself.

  It was a simple and elegant design.

  The dam had been constructed both to provide hydroelectric power for the climber and to create a lake on which the ground station could eventually float—affording the entire base station some degree of movement. In this way, the tether could be maneuvered around potential debris or obstacles in orbit.

  But understanding the function of the anomaly had done nothing to save them.

  Tupa had remained occupied for a little while, leaping between wooden pallets loaded with crates and untying the ropes. Bright and curious, the boy had proven extremely capable. He had soon wrenched the lids off each crate. Inside, they found no food or water. It was all construction material and tools to be used to complete the elevator.

  One particular crate had triggered a shout of surprise from the boy.

  Rushing over, Stone looked inside, only to see his own incredulous face staring back from a gold-mirrored visor. It was a neatly packed space suit. Throwing the lid of the crate to the ground, Stone found there was a set of two—one large and one small. The pristine white and gold outfits were lying on a bed of packing peanuts, looking like overweight kids sinking into a ball pit.

  “Those aren’t regular issue,” said Vedala. “Kline must have used her connections in NASA to get hold of prototypes. The Z series.”

  Vedala pointed to an insignia on the shoulder of one suit. In plain lettering, it read “Z-3.” On examinat
ion, the suit was smaller and sleeker than the traditional bulky white “extravehicular mobility unit” suit known as an EMU. The upper torso was a hard shell, and the back opened up neatly for a person to slide quickly inside. Made of advanced composite materials and Kevlar-laced ortho fabric, the entire outfit was light enough for Stone to lift with one hand.

  A variety of other NASA-issued accessories accompanied the suits, including a collection of “tether hooks”—modified carabiners used to secure astronauts to the exterior of the International Space Station during EVAs.

  The astronaut gear was almost comically out of place in the middle of the Amazon jungle, yet it made the purpose of this room feel all the more real.

  Stone and Vedala sat together on the hard floor, out of ideas. Before them, they had laid out every item they had available. Their final manifest included a few MRE meals, a bladder of water from Vedala’s kit, some battery packs, and the dead canary drone. Most frustrating, they still had the Iridium satellite phone. But the shaft had proven too narrow to allow a signal. Without a clear line of sight to the sky, the phone was a useless hunk of black plastic.

  “If we drink river water from the hatch, I think we could survive in here for over a week. But it won’t be pretty,” said Vedala, with resignation. “It’s likely that Stern or someone else will try to destroy this structure before then.”

  “How could he even begin to do that?” asked Stone.

  “Probably not with a nuke. They learned their lesson on that. I’m guessing conventional explosives. Or napalm.”

  Stone took a deep breath, letting his eyes travel upward again. He imagined a waterfall of liquid fire coursing down the throat of the shaft. Then Stone’s eyes stopped moving.

  He blinked several times, putting a hand to his forehead.

  “Wait,” he said. “Wait. The tether conducts electricity to the climber, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Then it will also conduct a radio signal. We’re sitting here staring at the world’s biggest—”

  “Antenna!” exclaimed Vedala, climbing to her feet. “How could we have been so blind?”

  THE SATELLITE RADIO had been weighing down Vedala from the beginning of the journey. Cradling it in her hands, she connected the external antenna mount to the filament wire. Stone had already wrapped the other end of the exposed wire around a contact point on the climber. Now, in theory, the phone should have finally become operational. Even so, she held her breath as she activated it.

  The cool blue screen flickered, numbers swirling.

  It was attempting to reach the Iridium satellite constellation located in polar orbit above the continent of South America.

  The satphone numbers blinked and disappeared.

  “Well, it was worth a try—”

  Stone was interrupted as the satellite phone chirped a connection. A digital warble came from the handset, punctuated by a connection beep and a series of inscrutable clicks.

  “This is Northcom, come in,” said a familiar voice over the satphone speaker phone. “Wildfire? Is that you?”

  Vedala lifted the satphone.

  “General Stern, this is your field team. It’s nice to hear your voice,” she said.

  “Copy that,” said Stern. “The feeling is mutual. What’s your status?”

  “We entered the anomaly yesterday. The main structure is a hydroelectric dam. The secondary structure is a space elevator, but I’m sure you already know that. During the exploration we were joined by a boy from a local tribe, and . . .”

  Here Vedala paused, swallowing.

  “And myself, Dr. James Stone, and the boy are the only expedition members still alive. We are now located at the base of the elevator.”

  The line was silent for fifteen seconds as Stern absorbed the news.

  “You’re at the bottom of the spire?” asked Stern.

  “That’s right.”

  “I’m sorry to hear about the losses,” Stern said, finally. “There’ve been major operational changes. Have you heard from Kline?”

  “We believe Kline is responsible for our casualties. She reverse engineered the Andromeda Strain and built this anomaly. She’s on a crusade.”

  “I agree with you, but this is out of my hands. Your orders are to stand down and wait for evacuation. That device is now the property of the United States government. It’s valuable beyond belief.”

  Vedala held out the satphone, thunderstruck. Stone gently took it from her hand. A theory had been coalescing in his mind, and now it had finally taken shape.

  He just needed the evidence to back it up.

  “Sir?” said Stone. “I need to ask you an important question. Have you seen any indication of another mutation on board the ISS? Anything strange?”

  There was no response for thirty seconds.

  “What do you know, Stone?” came the reply.

  “It’s only an educated guess, sir. But if I’m correct . . . you should be seeing another type of mass conversion. This one is probably spreading through the Wildfire laboratory module. And it’s outside Kline’s control.”

  “How could you know—”

  “Yes or no, General?” urged Stone.

  “Yes,” Stern said finally, in a weary voice. “It hasn’t been easy with the ISS twenty-five thousand miles up. But our orbital imaging assets have revealed some kind of . . . infection, spreading across the outer surface of the Wildfire module. An hour ago, it began to consume a portion of the adjoining Leonardo module. It’s made of a different material. Dark purplish strands, almost organic looking.”

  Stone handed the satphone back to Vedala.

  “We’ve got to go up,” he said.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” she asked. “Even if it were possible, why?”

  “My pet theory. The first Andromeda evolution was triggered on contact with life. The AS-2 variety adapted to eat polymer and escape the confines of Wildfire. Since then it’s been floating in the upper atmosphere, waiting to evolve again. And now I believe Kline has triggered the next evolution.”

  “How?”

  “The new infection . . . it’s another response to stimulus.”

  “You mean Andromeda responded to being reverse engineered?”

  “Exactly.”

  “And what makes you so damned certain?”

  “Because it was too easy,” said Stone. “Andromeda is the most advanced technology we’ve ever seen. It’s ancient, sent here from the stars. Kline may be brilliant, but I don’t believe the microparticle could have been reverse engineered unless it allowed itself to be.”

  “I see. And what do you think it’s evolving into now?” asked Vedala.

  “It doesn’t matter, Nidhi. It’s self-replicating, and we have no way to stop it. I don’t know what it is, and I don’t want to ever find out.”

  The light of the satellite phone pulsed as Stern spoke again, urgency in his voice. “Can you identify it? How we can stop it from spreading?”

  “Whatever it’s becoming,” Stone said to Vedala, “it’s already consuming the International Space Station. If we don’t go up there and find a way to stop it, it will eventually climb down the tether and infect our planet.”

  Vedala considered before replying, “There’s another solution. The military can sever the tether. Hit it with a missile.”

  Stone shook his head. “Even if we could convince them to try, it wouldn’t work. The ISS is moving at well below escape velocity, and there are thousands of miles of tether above us. If we sever the line down here, the sheer weight of it will slowly drag the space station into destructive reentry.”

  “Which would spread burning Andromeda material across the planet,” finished Vedala.

  “Cut the tether and the infection falls. Wait, and the infection will come down the tether. Like I said, we have to go up. If Kline made this substance, maybe we can force her to unmake it,” said Stone.

  “Or I can do it for her, using her own tools,” added Vedala.


  Stone nodded. “There is no other choice.”

  Vedala considered this for a moment, chewing her lip. She took a deep breath and gazed up the spire. Then she spoke into the satphone.

  “General,” she said, “I need you to listen to me very carefully.”

  Mission Preparation

  STONE FELT ENERGIZED, BUT ALSO ODDLY DISSOCIATED. The shining steel climbing platform rested silently on its roost like science fiction come alive. The technical challenge was how to activate and operate this unprecedented machine.

  The personal challenge was finding the guts to go up.

  “This control panel works,” called Vedala. “And I did my best to cut off Kline’s remote access. But the ISS is barely beyond geostationary orbit, which only cancels out the weight of the tether. Think of it as a teeter-totter with the fulcrum at geostationary orbit. The weight of the tether is on one side, and the ISS on the other. The ISS is much heavier, so it can sit close to the fulcrum. But until it moves farther away, there just isn’t much lift capacity. For now, this space elevator isn’t fully operational.”

  “Emphasis on fully, Doctor,” said Stone. “The lift capacity is proportional to the distance of the counterweight beyond geostationary orbit. Stern said the ISS was at about twenty-five thousand miles up, so it can carry some weight.”

  “The question is, how much?”

  “I don’t know. But it will be a ratio of the lift weight versus the counterweight. If the ISS is five hundred tons, and essentially at geostationary . . . I’d give us one percent, or maybe half that. About two and a half tons.”

  Surveying the platform, Vedala shook her head.

  “Then we’re grounded,” she said. “The motors alone weigh a ton. And with the metal platform, the rollers, and the infrastructure . . . it’s not even close.”

  “You’re right, it isn’t,” said Stone, leaning over and rummaging in a crate. “Not unless we make a few deletions.”