Chapter 2
Farside Observatory, SpaceGuard Center
Korolev Crater, the Moon
December 31, 2120
“It’s Europa Eye again.” Gil Gomes had heard the SpaceGuard alert chime on and off several times during his shift. It was starting to annoy the hell out of him, especially since he’d lost the lottery and had to pull the New Year’s Eve shift.
Darlene Van Horn was the other analyst on duty at the watch command center that day. She sighed, turned back to a console behind her station and checked status on the south and north lateral arrays. “I see it. VLF and Submillimeter are tracking in. Same coordinates?”
“Looks like it. Northern hemisphere…longitude one ninety two, latitude twelve north. East of Conamara Chaos. Same as before. Eye’s seeing geysers all over the place. Jeez, Europa’s bubbling like a club soda at the Lagoon.” The Lagoon was the Fiji Island Lagoon, Farside’s attempt to make its rather spartan canteen down in Kepler Wing a bit homier and cozier.
“I’m sending another dispatch to UNISPACE,” Van Horn advised. “Third one this shift. What the hell’s causing all this fizzing?”
Gomes studied the visuals Europa Eye was sending back. An orbital detection network, the Eye kept a close watch on the surface of the moon, watching for any sign of activity from the Keeper. Optical, neutron flux, radiometers, spectrometers, the Eye was designed to provide early alert for any kind of unusual surface or immediate subsurface activity on the frozen billiard ball that was Europa. Nobody wanted the Keeper doing things even four billion miles away without being warned.
“Maybe Europa’s got indigestion,” Van Horn suggested. “Any high thermals? Unusual EMs down there?”
Gomes nodded. “Radiometer’s showing some kind of mass moving just below the surface. Probably ice. Maybe one of those diapirs. Whatever it is, it’s poking holes in the surface like it was a balloon.”
“Hey, anything else on that dust stream we saw the other day? “
Gomes shook his head. “Interferometers backtracked the origin to somewhere in the Jupiter system. Probably one of Io’s burps. Volcanic crap with enough speed to get ejected out of the gravity well. It’s happened before. ISAAC’s still crunching and chewing on it. I’ll see what he’s got today.” Gomes pecked at some keys, called up the diagrams the Farside master computer system had generated. Only two days before, SpaceGuard had detected an unusual stream of dust or debris drifting from Jupiter orbit toward the inner solar system. Interferometric observations couldn’t pin down a source. No known object could have produced a dust cloud with the signatures SpaceGuard was seeing. By default, Io and its volcanic surface was the chief suspect, but there were anomalies that ISAAC couldn’t explain. Nobody else could either.
Van Horn peeled a banana as she studied Eye’s visuals on the Europan surface, scrolling by while the satellite net orbited that world. Cracked billiard ball was an apt description of its battered, icy surface. “There’s something else about that dust stream that bothers me, Gil. Did you see the WorldNet reports last night on those meteor showers? All over the world, north and south, east and west. And the astros can’t find a source for that either. Earth’s not crossing any known cometary debris fields. The Geminids have come and gone. Unless some rogue asteroid’s come whizzing by and broken up, something SpaceGuard hasn’t catalogued.”
“Unlikely…maybe it’s part of this dust stream.”
“Gil, when’s that vidcon supposed to be?”
Gomes checked the time. “Crap…about two minutes from now. You got all the reports and files ready?”
“Right here.” Van Horn ‘s fingers flew over the keyboard, and visuals of Europa’s surface were quickly replaced by charts and diagrams and graphs. A UNISPACE vidcon had been scheduled for 0900 hours and rumor had it that CINCSPACE himself would be on the circuit. Van Horn quickly checked her face and hair reflection in a nearby screen. Campground couture…that’s what we call this look, she thought ruefully. Have to do something about that skin tone…maybe more hours under the lamps.
The vidcon was made with connections to UNISPACE Paris, Farside Observatory and Gateway Station, orbiting at the Earth Moon L2 point. Right away, Gomes and Van Horn knew this ‘con’ was going to be different. Not only was CINCSPACE running the show, in the person of General Ravi Ramachandran…and that almost never happened. The Great Atomgrabber himself, General John Winger, had linked in as well, from some cubbyhole at Table Top Mountain, in the USA.
Gomes and Van Horn looked at each other when Winger’s chiseled face materialized on the screen. It was like looking at Moses coming down from Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments. Winger had written the book on everything ‘quantum corps’ for decades. What on earth (or elsewhere, for that matter) would bring one of the founding fathers to a lowly UNISPACE vidcon?
They soon found out.
Ramachandran had his school-teacher specs on and looked especially professorial on the screen.
“Okay, folks, everybody’s online. Let’s dive right in.” CINCSPACE went off-screen for a moment, calling up more displays. “I’ve asked General Winger to make himself available for us during this con since he’s had some experience with the Keeper. Farside, I’ve studied your latest downloads and data. The consensus here is that what we’re seeing on Europa is something more than normal geyser activity, despite the public pronouncements. The signatures are all there: electromagnetics, high heat levels, increased atomic activity…General Winger: would you concur? This is nanobotic in origin. The only swarm of bots we know about on Europa is the Keeper.”
Winger wasn’t one to mince words. “No doubt in my mind, General. We first encountered the Keeper years ago under the ice, submerged in the ocean at a depth of two hundred meters. We have to keep in mind one thing though. It’s true that the Keeper is a swarm of bots, but it’s also a quantum system, with some rather unusual capabilities. Proximity or contact with the swarm can create extraordinary displacement events, displacement in time and space. Although it’s conceivable that what Eye is detecting is just a displaced piece of the Keeper, my read of the data is that this is the ‘mother ship’, so to speak. The full swarm has somehow bored through the ice and is at or near the surface. That may account for a lot of the increased geyser activity. The specialists can speak better to that.”
For a few moments, Gomes and Van Horn went over the data they had downlinked to Paris, fielding questions from CINCSPACE, Winger and the two analysts at Gateway…Nordeen and Samachar. When he was done, Gomes added:
“The biggest unknown at this time is this dust stream we’re seeing.” He drew everybody’s attention to the charts. “For the moment, we’re calling it MARTOP. That’s Mars Transiting Optical Phenomenon, since the leading detectable edge was just passing Mars orbit when ISAAC beeped us. ISAAC’s chewed on the optical and radiometric data for hours and so far, he can’t pinpoint a source, other than to say somewhere in the Jupiter system. It’s just too diffuse. It’s possible that there are parts of MARTOP even around the Earth-Moon system, given reports of unusual meteoric activity coming from isolated points on Earth. Gateway, have you seen anything like this from your end?”
Nordeen and Samachar admitted their own limited systems had detected an uptick in the local dust environment.
“We figured it was the tail end of the Geminids,” Nordeen told them. “So we didn’t log it at first. Now that we know what to look for, we’re seeing some of the same signatures. I’d say MARTOP’s well past Mars orbit now…we’ve got our whole array of radiometers and spectrometers watching this field go by. If I didn’t know better, I’d say it resembles debris more than dust. But we don’t have the resolution to see down to particle size. You know, Gateway’s just a garage in space. We don’t have the gear to do serious analysis. “
CINCSPACE cut in. “Okay, we’ll deal with MARTOP later. The big question is Europa. What, if anything, shou
ld be done about this apparent surfacing of the Keeper? Can anything be done?”
Winger spoke up. “Doesn’t Europa Eye have some kind of weapons capabilities?”
“I can answer that, sir.” It was Van Horn. “I was with Frontier Corps when that system was designed and deployed. Eye has limited HERF capability. The emitters and magazines are all pretty standard, but targeting and control was always an issue. The distance is so great, we had to set up a special AI system called ERIC…Europa Reconnaissance and Integrated something or other, just for targeting and engaging any surface or orbiting targets. ERIC controls the firing, based on parameters we loaded. He’s a self-contained gunner. He has to get final approval from UNISPACE, but the engagement is pretty much on auto after permissions are received. To be honest, sir, nobody really thought the thing would be that effective. It was cobbled together to get something on-site after you departed Europa.”
Winger well remembered. “We were ordered back to Earth…I wanted to stay and take on the Keeper with everything we had. But we had our orders.”
“Europa Eye was designed as a tripwire, nothing more,” CINCSPACE said. “But I would like to get authorization from UNSAC to use ERIC if the Keeper has actually surfaced. We may need it.”
Nordeen chimed in from Gateway. “Has anybody looked to see if there are correlations between the surface activity on Europa and this MARTOP thing?”
CINCSPACE nodded. “We’ve had analysts and our branch of ISAAC checking that. Not enough data to make any conclusions yet… but it should be looked at. Farside, have you seen the boards on that unusual brightening around the Pluto-Charon system? Mauna Kea and Atacama both called that in just about 0400 hours our time this morning.”
“We did have a SPACEGUARD alert, sir…just about the same time. ISAAC’s given us no conclusions yet. We’re thinking it’s a surface effect, maybe even something like Europa. Pluto’s heading out into the most distant part of her orbit…could be some kind of ice avalanche, mass sublimation, that sort of thing.”
“Or some kind of probe by the Old Ones,” said CINCSPACE. A hint of a smirk crossed his face, saying in effect nobody with half a brain believes that. “Remember what happened with the Michelangelo. While I’m asking, any changes in that Delta-P anomaly lately?”
Delta-P had been detected ten years before, something that had everyone scratching their heads. Opinions grew like mushrooms: it was a micro black hole, it was a rift in the space-time continuum, it was the mother swarm of the Old Ones, it was a cosmic tooth fairy. Passing by and through the 51 Pegasi star system, the phenomenon was too distant to get much resolution on its structure.
“No significant changes in the last six months, sir,” Gomes told them. “The thing’s still 25 to 30 light years away. We still can’t resolve that much.”
“And no one really knows what happened to Michelangelo either,” Winger said. “Human error, a system failure, sabotage, her plasma torch engines blew up…scuttlebutt’s all over the place.”
“That’s one accident we’ll never solve,” agreed CINCSPACE. “Despite what the Board concluded. The Old Ones are a myth, I’m certain of that. What Michelangelo encountered out there in deep space is something well within human understanding…hell, probably somebody just pressed the wrong button. Screw-ups happen all the time.”
Winger was about to say something, but thought better of it. In his own mind, the existence or lack thereof of the Old Ones was something he hadn’t had time to ponder. Liam didn’t buy it; they’d argued that point just a week before. There were all kinds of causes and theories about what had happened to Big Mike, but the truth was that more information was needed. The Board did the best it could with what it had.
“We’ve got to keep Europa under close surveillance,” CINCSPACE was saying. “And we’ve got to find out what this MARTOP thing is, get some eyes on it. I’ve been checking the ship schedule the last few minutes. Looks like Francis Bacon could make an intercept in a few weeks…she’s on the EMV-1 route, heading by Earth.”
Winger’s eyebrows went up, a reaction noticed by everyone but CINCSPACE. Cycler ships weren’t diverted from their scheduled routes without good cause. “Maybe she could take some samples too,” he suggested. “Get us better information, so we’ll know what we’re dealing with here.”
CINCSPACE liked the idea. “Trajectory plot I got this morning from Traffic Control shows the Bacon could make intercept in less than a month, maybe a few weeks if she makes an emergency burn. Of course, that eats into her reserves. We don’t allow that except in extraordinary circumstances.”
“This one may qualify, sir,” said Nordeen, from Gateway. “But does anyone really think the ‘particles’ or whatever they are in this debris cloud are big enough to cause damage on Earth?”
Gomes piped up. “We can’t take that chance, Gateway. There’s too much traffic between Earth and L2 and the Moon to let anything disrupt normal shipping schedules. Schedules and trajectories can accommodate Geminids and Perseids and known dust clouds. It’s the unknown ones that make people nervous.”
“I don’t want another Michelangelo on my watch,” CINCSPACE decided. “I’m authorizing the diversion of the Bacon. Orders will be cut within the hour.”
Winger could sense the unease among the vidcon participants. The MARTOP anomaly, the Keeper’s movements on Europa, the unusual brightening on Pluto that very morning, all of it made stomachs churn. He felt for Ramachandran. CINCSPACE had to make the best of a bad situation. Winger had been there himself…and a large part of him was glad he wasn’t there anymore.
“Maybe this Delta P thing isn’t what we think it is., “Winger told them. “I mean, think about it. What do we really know about this phenomenon? The best Farside can offer is that it seems to be some kind of enormous dust cloud, drifting through the 51 Pegasi system. It’s too far away to be resolved any better.”
Gomes checked a nearby plot of the anomaly and sent the latest updates to everybody. “It still seems to be moving generally in our direction. Or more specifically on an intercept course, crossing our path sometime in the next 25 to 30 years. That’s what’s so hard to figure about this. Dust clouds don’t usually change course. Or travel at nearly light speed. But we just don’t know for sure. Old Ones or dust cloud, whatever it is, it’s coming our way.”
Winger wasn’t so sure. “I’m thinking the Old Ones are already here. Among us.” He still couldn’t get rid of the image of his son Liam stalking off through the snow and into the woods.
CINCSPACE cleared his throat. “I’m sure we all appreciate your input, General Winger. But that’s a philosophical question and I have to deal in facts today. Francis Bacon will receive her new orders this morning. With any luck, we should have some better imagery and samples of MARTOP in a few weeks. Meanwhile, I’m meeting with UNSAC this afternoon at 1430 hours. The Secretary-General wants ideas on how to deal with these continuing meteor showers…they’ve got millions of people spooked. If it’s MARTOP or something like that, we’ll have to come up with options to satisfy the politicos…options and countermeasures. They love options.”
Johnny Winger listened to the vidcon politely but he just couldn’t get Liam and Dana out of his mind. How could a nearly tenured professor at Cambridge fall for all that Assimilationist crap? How could his own wife turn into a cloud of bugs, right under his nose? Angels and Assimilationists…what a combination. Meteor showers and MARTOP. Delta P and the Keeper. It was enough to make an atomgrabber’s head spin…or worse. Winger flexed his fingers. He was itchy. Anxious. And he knew the symptoms. Retirement hadn’t dulled that. He needed to get small, slam some atoms. Trouble was he didn’t have the right clearances to get into Table Top’s containment lab. All he had was Doc III. He could slap new configs on that swarm left and right but to what purpose? It was like changing leashes on your dog. It might look nice but your dog didn’t really care.
“General, what do you make of all this?”
Winger shook himself out his funk and snapped back to reality. “I don’t know what to make of it, Ravi. The Keeper is what worries me most…I’ve faced that thing before. I guess I’d be most interested in seeing what the Francis Bacon can come up with when they intercept MARTOP.”
“You think there’s something to all this Old Ones crap.” It wasn’t a question.
Winger shrugged. “I’ve learned to keep my options open. After horsing around with the Keeper out there on that icy slagheap of a world Europa, I learned that what I thought was solid isn’t necessarily so solid. Quantum systems are like that. People are like that too. One minute, you think you know them. The next minute, they’re all different. People change. They’re not always what they seem to be. Same with the Keeper. You want my tactical advice?”
“I do.”
“Assume the worst. Imagine the craziest thing you can think of. You’ll be in the ballpark of the truth if you do that. I don’t know what to think about the Old Ones. But the Keeper…that was as real as five fingers on my hand.” He held up a hand and wiggled fingers. “The Keeper came to the surface of Europa for a reason. It’s a machine, even if it is a quantum system made up of a gazillion nanobots. It’s programmed. By someone. To do something. We just don’t know what. I don’t think we can afford to discount the possibility that the Old Ones are very real. And, like I said, given what I’ve seen the Keeper do…it can’t be impossible for the Old Ones to already be here among us. As a commander, I’d make damn good and sure I’ve got some kind of tactical plan to deal with that, if it turns out to be true.”
“Config Zero,” Ramachandran said, as if the thought had just erupted.
“Exactly,” Winger said. “There’s a connection somewhere, between all these things. I’m betting if we dig deep enough, we’ll find that bag of bugs right down at the bottom of the hole.”
Johnny Winger and the Europa Quandary Page 7