Extinction Crisis

by James D. Prescott

  “Will you not stay a while?” she asked.

  He shook his head. His features were perfect now, even down to the mop of dark hair that fell down over his forehead. “I will be leaving soon.”

  “Leaving? Where will you go?”

  “Back home,” he said wistfully. “The journey is far and will take many of your years, but I must know whether I am the last of my people.”

  Anna took his hand. “And if you are? Will you return?”

  “Do not worry. You are different now, Anna. You need only think of me and I will be there.” He gently touched the pads of his fingers to her temple.

  She wrapped her arms around him in a hug. “This is how we say goodbye on Earth.”

  Caretaker remained still, his hands by his sides, until Anna reached down and coaxed them around her waist.

  Afterward, he handed her a clump of nanocells. “Use it wisely,” he said, before raising a hand in farewell and stepping through the portal. A second later, it shrank down to the size of a pinhead and was gone.

  Chapter 55

  Jack and Mia stood at the top of a snowdrift. Behind them was Northern Star and the setting sun, casting shadows along the snowscape. Silently hovering a thousand feet off the ground was the doomsday ship, or at least what might have been. They had been observing the craft with wonder for what felt like hours, standing in the frigid Greenland air, protected by their biosuits.

  “Can you imagine their disappointment?” Mia said. “Flying all this way for nothing.”

  Jack gave a hollow-sounding laugh as he noticed a plane flying in low and touching down next to the habitat. “There’s one pilot who’s probably wondering if he’s seeing things.”

  “I noticed you didn’t retaliate against Gabby for turning on you.”

  He drew in a cold breath, the freezing air hitting his lungs like a thunderbolt. “I hated what she did, but I suppose I understand why she did it.”

  “Do you think you’ll ever speak to her again?”

  “That’s hard to say,” he replied, staring up at the bottom of the craft and the shimmering waves of energy it was giving off. “Perhaps, given enough time. And you? I suppose you’ll be off to see your daughter the first chance you get.”

  Mia nodded. “Soon as everything here gets wrapped up. There’s a lot I missed and I’m not leaving until you fill me in on all of the details.”

  “It’s a deal,” he said and meant it.

  A nearby voice called out. “It sure don’t get weirder than that, does it?”

  The Aussie accent caught them both off guard.

  Mia swung around to see Ollie, wrapped in a parka, sauntering up the mound of packed snow. She flew into his arms, nearly knocking him over, kissing every inch of his face.

  “All right, there’ll be plenty of time for that later.” He looked over at Jack and stuck out his hand. “Jack.”

  Jack returned the gesture. “Glad to see you’re in one piece.”

  “I was one of the lucky ones, mate. We lost some really terrific people.” He motioned to the ship. “And I reckon we might have lost a lot more if that bugger hadn’t been stopped.”

  “We were seconds away,” Mia told him.

  “You like living on the edge, don’t ya, Jack?”

  Jack grinned. “I’ve been known to cut it close.”

  Blue lights danced along the body of the craft, winking on and off at an ever-increasing speed.

  “Looks like they’re trying to tell us something,” Mia said, cupping her eyes.

  Ollie gave a wry grin. “I have an idea what they’re saying.”

  Jack mirrored the Aussie’s expression. “So do I. ‘See you again in fifty million years.’”

  And just like that, the craft lifted into the air and shot into space.

  Chapter 56

  Three months later

  After a three-hundred-mile journey north of San Francisco, Jack finally arrived at the Allen Telescope Array, the home of SETI, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. A small collection of single-story buildings made up the new research wing and the destination he had travelled so far to find. He reached the first building, climbed a small set of stairs and let himself in.

  “You’re right on time,” Eugene said, patting him on the back. “Everyone’s in the other room. The telescope’s just about to come online.”

  He was talking about the Chandra X-ray Observatory currently orbiting sixty-five miles above the Earth. Although launched two decades ago, Eugene and his team had successfully managed to upgrade the satellite’s capabilities via a series of firmware updates. The theoretical physicist led him into a room filled with a number of familiar faces.

  Mia greeted him first with a thunderous hug.

  “Easy, don’t ruin the guy,” Dag said, taking a far gentler approach.

  Grant was there too and did the proper British thing by shaking Jack’s hand.

  “Anyone speak to Gabby?” Jack asked, wishing almost at once that he hadn’t.

  A stony silence descended over the room.

  “I heard she went back to Nebraska to be with her mother and help rebuild,” Eugene said.

  Jack nodded. “That’s good to hear.”

  One of the other scientists in the room was new to him. She was a young woman in her twenties with dark shoulder-length hair and warm, pleasant features.

  “Oh, yeah, where are my manners,” Mia said, playfully slapping her forehead. “I forgot you two haven’t officially met.”

  Jack put out his hand.

  “Jack, this is…”

  He looked in her eyes and was struck by an overwhelming sense of familiarity. He swallowed hard, staring now, but not able to help himself. “Anna?”

  “Hello, Dr. Greer,” she replied, the hue on her fleshy cheeks deepening.

  “Holy cow,” he said and for several seconds it was all he could manage. “You have an entirely new body.”

  “Caretaker left me with a parting gift, you might say.”

  “I’ll bet.” Jack blinked and let out a burst of surprised laughter. “I swear if I was standing next to you in a subway, I would never know.”

  He took her by the hands. They were warm to the touch. The nanocells were indistinguishable from human skin. “You are truly incredible,” he said, overcome and largely lost for words.

  “I retested her,” Mia said, motioning to Anna. “And her readings turned out to be even more impressive than the twins.”

  “If Rajesh could only see what you’ve become,” Jack said.

  Dag snickered. “He probably wouldn’t believe it.”

  There was some truth to that. It seemed to be the destiny of some children to greatly outshine even the parents who birthed them. That was part of the immeasurable magic of creation Caretaker had spoken about.

  “We have been busy in other ways as well,” Anna told him. “It turns out Salzburg held one final secret. By taking the encryption to the next level, I was able to decipher a new layer resting on top of the existing code. It opened what you might call an encyclopedia.”

  “Of what?” Jack wondered aloud.

  “Every technology we will need to become a spacefaring civilization. I am also in the process of building a new companion.”

  Dag rose out of his seat. “I hope this one’s smarter than Tink.”

  A yapping sound emanated from the other room.

  “See what I mean?” the paleontologist said.

  “What will you name this new companion?” Jack asked, although he thought he already knew.

  “Ivan 2.0,” she replied proudly. “Only this time I have left out the machine guns.”

  Jack turned to Mia who was standing next to him. “I’m sure your daughter was happy to have you back.”

  Mia’s eyes lit up. “She was. I’m assuming you heard that Ollie and I moved in together.”

  “I did. Congratulations.”

  Mia smiled. “Zoey just adores him. But he’s nothing compared to Sofia and Noemi. Those three girl
s are practically inseparable.”

  “Sounds like you’ve got a full house,” he said. “Maybe one day you’ll be able to tell them about how you saved the world.”

  Mia burst into laughter. “Yeah, don’t count on it.” Her expression shifted. “How about you? Was everything in one piece when you finally made it back home?”

  “You’ll never believe it. I arrived on the farm to find Gordon still recovering from a fall.”

  She frowned. “But who was taking care of things?”

  “My father.”

  Her mouth dropped open. “You’re kidding me.”

  “You can’t make stuff like that up. I arrived to find the two of them having a hoot. I decided to set my feelings of bitterness aside and open myself to the possibility.”

  “I guess Anna isn’t the only one who’s growing up.”

  He laughed and swung a playful arm around her. “Oh, I nearly forgot,” Jack said. “I got a call from Stark a few days ago. Turns out, a week after we left Greenland, something punched a hole through the ice sheet and shot off into space.”

  “Caretaker,” Anna said wistfully.

  “But Stark sure has his hands full,” Jack continued, “what with President Myers stepping down. Seems a news blog helped to expose his government’s ties to Sentinel and the internment camps.”

  “Kay Mahoro,” Mia said with noticeable sadness. “After she passed, Ollie handed the Feds her laptop. Apparently it contained a treasure trove of compromising information on the conspirators.”

  “All right, everyone,” Eugene called out, sitting before a large monitor. “It’s ready.”

  “So what exactly did you do to the Chandra Observatory?” Jack asked him.

  “We applied Mia’s research to detect the interaction between chameleon dark energy particles and the conscious mind.”

  “You remember the haze I showed you around the twins?” Mia asked.

  Jack nodded. “The way it created a bridge between them?”

  “Well, watch this,” Eugene said, slapping the enter key with a flourish.

  The screen populated with tiny points of light.

  “We’re now trained on the center of our galaxy,” Eugene explained.

  Slowly, as the data poured in and was run through the filter, an image began to materialize. It was a star system with twelve planets. The fourth planet from the sun was covered with what looked like a milky haze.

  “Is that what I think it is?” Jack wondered, astonished. It looked exactly like what Mia had showed him hovering around the girls’ heads, only this was on a planetary scale.

  “It’s life,” Dag said, his fists clenched.

  The image zoomed over to a neighboring star system and there it was again, this time blanketing the second planet from its star. White filaments were strung out in all directions, popping in and out of existence. “Not just life,” Jack said in awe. “Intelligent life. And it’s everywhere.”

  Real life versus fiction

  While Extinction Crisis is a work of fiction, several of the elements that went into building the story were drawn directly from newspaper headlines and magazine articles as well as from medical and scientific journals. Here are just a few.

  Nanobots: Nanometers in size, nanobots are still largely theoretical microscopic robots with the ability to perform a number of functions in areas far too small for precise human interaction. Currently, the most promising domain lies in medical science where nanobots may one day be used in the treatment of cancer and other serious diseases.

  Morphic Resonance: First put forward by Rupert Sheldrake, morphic resonance posits that the mind, and by extension memory, exists outside of the brain and that the rules of inheritance are more like habits transmitted from one member of a species to another via a form of telepathy. Sheldrake argues that when we observe something our minds are actually reaching out to “touch” the object. He believes this may help to explain why we can sometimes sense when we’re being watched. Although fascinating to consider, Sheldrake’s theories remain on the fringes of current scientific thought.

  Directed Panspermia: Panspermia is the idea that microbial life is spread throughout the galaxy by hitching a ride on asteroids, comets and the like. Directed panspermia takes the concept one step further, suggesting an intelligent agent could be behind such events.

  Double Slit Experiment: The idea of shining a single photon of light through a metal sheet perforated with two holes hardly seems like an exciting experiment. However, the results have led to some of the most fascinating and troubling questions in modern science. The problem occurs when that photon hits the screen on the other end. If light was a particle the image on the screen would look one way (I won’t bore you with details). On the other hand, if light was a wave, the image on the screen would appear totally different. Einstein and others demonstrated that atoms and other particles can behave as either a wave or a particle depending on when and how you observe them. Furthermore, quantum theory also suggests that all possibilities for a particle’s trajectory exist simultaneously. It’s only when an observer tries to determine which of the slits the particle passes through that it collapses into a single, unambiguous path. The implication appears to be that the mere act of observing appears to affect the results. I’m sure Rupert Sheldrake might have a thing or two to say about that.

  Quantum Entanglement: Referred to by Einstein as spooky action at a distance, entanglement occurs when two particles share the same total quantum state or spin. Keeping the double slit experiment in mind, two entangled particles don’t have individually well-defined spins until one of them is measured. Once the first is measured as say “spin up” the second must automatically become “spin down” no matter how far away that second particle might be. While it might look spooky and in some ways nonsensical to us, it’s important to remember that human brains evolved to interact with the world that describes how big things behave (classical physics) and not the world of the very small (quantum physics). Of course, there is still a tremendous way to go and many physical limitations that remain intact, but it’s tempting to imagine how quantum entanglement might one day enable us to communicate or perhaps even travel faster than the speed of light.

  Black Holes: Black holes describe a region of space where gravity is so strong that nothing, not even light, can escape. First theorized in the 18th century by the Reverend John Michell, they were shown to be a consequence of Einstein’s theory of relativity in 1916. Incontrovertible proof of black holes was finally uncovered in 1971 with the discovery of Cygnus X-1 by the Uhuru X-ray satellite. More recently, supermassive black holes were discovered to exist at the center of most observable galaxies, including our own.

  White Holes: Are essentially the opposite of a black hole. While one has an escape velocity greater than the speed of light and attracts everything towards it, the other spews matter and energy outward. Of course, while still only a theoretical mathematical concept, the idea is a valid solution to the equations of General Relativity and is no less thought provoking. One such notion asks whether the existence of white holes might account for the big bang since both events involve a spontaneous outward explosion of matter and energy from a singular point in space. More startling still is the idea that white holes might connect to the other end of certain black holes, creating a bridge from one universe to another.

  Alien plant life: As described in the story, NASA scientists such as Nancy Kiang at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies have suggested that the dominant colors for photosynthesis on alien earth-like planets will differ based on the nature of the atmosphere, where light reaches the surface as well as the brightness of the planet’s star. The chlorophyll in most plants on Earth absorbs blue and red light and less green light. Therefore, chlorophyll appears green. But not all stars have the same light distribution as our sun, which would likely result in alien plant life adorned with striking fall colors.

  Dark Energy: Still largely unknown, scientists believe dark energy makes
up 70% of the universe, with the remainder divided between dark matter (25%) and normal matter (5%). Since both dark matter and dark energy are invisible and currently beyond our ability to detect, scientists have needed to rely on observing their effects. For example, when calculating gravitational forces throughout the universe, it quickly became clear the amount of observable matter could not account for the readings. There simply wasn’t enough “stuff” to keep stars and galaxies from flying away from one another.

  Similarly with dark energy, scientists are able to measure its presence indirectly. In 1929, Edwin Hubble discovered that the universe was expanding. But instead of slowing down due to gravity, as one might expect, the universe’s expansion is actually speeding up. But what is causing this? The current contender seems to be dark energy, but nobody has yet uncovered its true nature. As with much of what we’ve discussed so far, plenty more research remains to be done before we will know with any certainty.

  Mysticism: To one degree or another, nearly every one of us grapples with two fundamental questions: who am I and where do I come from? That insatiable curiosity has been channeled into areas like cosmology, biology, religion and more recently, tracing back our personal ancestry through take home DNA tests. And yet, each one of these represents but a single thread of inquiry, a means by which we have attempted to find answers to those two vexing questions.

  In Extinction Crisis, I attributed that search to a modification inserted into all biological beings by advanced life forms, one that would only become fully active once the species developed the ability to reason. In real life, we still don't fully understand where that insatiable hunger comes from or even the source of the voice in our heads that poses the questions in the first place.

  But rather than focusing on which of those threads holds the truth, it may be helpful to take a step back and view the tapestry as a whole. Perhaps there, hidden inside that swirling pattern as it was within Salzburg, we will find the answers we've all been searching for.