Infinity Born

by Douglas E. Richards

  “I don’t know anything about myself,” said Trish with a grin, “but that sounds like something I would think. Still hard to imagine I’d actually stow away on a spaceship, though.”

  “You’re well aware that I’ve made the trip twelve times now, and that it’s pretty routine. I’ve told you I think it’s safer than being on the freeway back home, which probably overcame any worries you might have had. You must have thought this would be the perfect surprise. The perfect gift to me.”

  “Based on your reactions, I was wrong about that, wasn’t I? Why do I have this sick feeling you’re about to tell me something really bad?”

  Dalton’s eyes moistened, confirming her worst fears. “I love you, Trish. More than I can say. But there were a few details of the hibernation process you didn’t know about. Details I never thought it important to tell you, since I never thought in a million years you’d try to stow away.”

  “Like what?”

  “The drug cocktail that induces deep sleep is carefully tailored to the genetics of each crew member. To safely keep a human body near death for three weeks is not a simple thing. Dosing depends on body weight and a person’s genetic ability to metabolize drugs and clear them from their system. Everyone responds to meds in slightly different ways, and this is amplified when it’s a cocktail of meds delivered continuously over many weeks. The upshot is that the hibernation chamber you were in was set to Steve’s specifications. His body is deficient in Cytochrome P450, a family of enzymes that breaks down the main hibernation drug we’re using.”

  Trish thought about this for a moment. “Meaning that the drug stays in Steve’s system longer in its active form than it does for most people.”

  “That’s right. So he doesn’t need much of it. You must have a highly active Cytochrome P450 system, so that the drug is rapidly cleared from your bloodstream. So the dose that was right for Steve is wrong for you. You’ve awakened about ten days early. Since I’m ship’s captain, the computer reversed my meds to awaken me when sensors detected that you were coming out of deep sleep.”

  Trish winced. “Okay, so we’re both up early. So we have to endure the boredom of close quarters for seventeen days instead of seven. But surely we can make lemonade out of this. As soon as my memory comes back, as soon as I remember how much I love you, we can screw each other into a coma. We can try positions impossible in gravity. We can jointly publish the space-based version of the Kama Sutra.”

  She paused. He really was the most spectacular male specimen she had ever seen. “Hell, even if my memory doesn’t come back, I’m willing to take your word that we’re engaged and have a go,” she finished with a smile.

  Dalton didn’t reply. He unhooked himself and pushed off gently from the wall, drifting across the few feet that separated them. He wrapped his arms around her, kissing her softly on the lips, despite knowing he was still a stranger to her. She didn’t resist.

  When he finally separated from her fifteen seconds later, several tiny droplets of water were floating between them. Tears had silently left his eyes, and while some had stuck to his face like they would have on Earth, others now drifted like pollen nearby.

  “Seventeen days of being with you would be heaven,” he said sadly. “But it’s not that easy, Trish. Hibernation isn’t just about avoiding boredom. It’s also about conserving oxygen. In deep sleep you use very little.”

  A sudden bout of vertigo swept over her as the portent of these words sank in. The ship seemed to be spinning out of control, as though tumbling through space in nauseating fashion. She fought back vomit until the vertigo passed, knowing that vomiting in zero gravity would introduce a whole new level of disgusting as the contents of her stomach floated throughout the cabin.

  Dalton had been in a dour mood since first spying her, and now Trish knew why. No wonder he looked like he was going to a funeral. Because he probably was.

  “Let’s just go back to sleep, then,” she said hopefully, but in her heart she knew that if it were that easy, his eyes wouldn’t still be wet.

  “Can’t. Can’t yo-yo back and forth. Once you come out of hibernation, you can’t go back in for at least thirty-six hours.”

  “Why not?”

  Dalton shook his head. “Not even our best doctors are positive on that one. But you go in again before, say, thirty hours, and you never come back out. So we’re left with no solution. This ship was loaded with incredible precision. But your weight wasn’t accounted for. It’s only the tiniest fraction of the total, but it adds up over a distance of more than thirty million miles. We can jettison an equivalent weight in supplies to be sure we don’t run out of fuel, but we’re only carrying enough oxygen for me, since Steve wasn’t coming. We removed his oxygen supply to save weight, so we could squeeze in additional cargo.”

  “You didn’t keep any extra air for emergencies?”

  “Yes, there is plenty of cushion—for one man,” he replied pointedly. “One man who was expected to be in hibernation and barely using any oxygen for three weeks out of the four. Now we have two people, both now conscious, with normal physiology, burning through the air supply at a greatly accelerated rate.”

  There was a long silence in the spacecraft.

  “Then I have to stop breathing, don’t I?” said Trish softly.

  Dalton shook his head vigorously, his features hardening. “No! That’s not the answer,” he whispered.

  “Level with me, Burt. When do we reach the point of no return? Assuming you reenter hibernation in thirty-six hours, when would I have to stop breathing for you to still be able to make it under these circumstances?”

  “That’s not going to happen,” he insisted stubbornly, his expression numb.

  “Tell me!” she demanded. “Do you think this is an easy question for me to ask? How long?”

  Dalton held her determined gaze for several long seconds and then, without a word, pulled himself toward the ceiling and manipulated the touch screen once again. “A little over three hours from now.”

  “What if we returned to the Moon?”

  “Won’t help. Either way, we won’t make it. But if we turn back, the colonists all die too.”

  Tears began flowing from Trish’s eyes, some wetting her cheeks and some drifting away to co-mingle with those of Dalton’s. “I have to stop breathing,” she said again.

  “No!” he said adamantly. “One of us has to stop breathing. But it isn’t going to be you.”

  Trish gazed at Burt Dalton in amazement, his image blurry through her tears. What a gallant gesture. She had chosen well. It was too bad they would never have a chance to have a life together. “I can’t let you sacrifice yourself for me. This is my fault, not yours. I won’t have you pay for my mistake.”

  “You had no idea. You thought this would be the best surprise of my life. And if we had enough oxygen, it would be. This isn’t your fault. You’re impetuous, rash. You don’t look before you leap—that’s one of the things I love most about you.”

  “Doesn’t matter if I meant to cause this problem. Here we are. Even if I were willing to let you make this sacrifice for me—which I’m not—the ship needs its pilot.”

  He shook his head. “The ship can land on its own.”

  There was something in his expression. Something subtle but recognizable to her subconscious. She couldn’t even remember knowing him, but her intuition was sure he was lying. And even without intuition, his claim was absurd on the face of it. If the ship could land on its own, why the need for a pilot? Why was Burt Dalton the only man who could take this mission?”

  “Why lie to me?” she said softly. “I can’t land if you’re gone, so I’ll die anyway. Along with all of the colonists.”

  “The autopilot is good enough to safely land the ship eighty percent of the time.”

  “Leaving a twenty percent chance the colonists die. And you’ll die no matter what. And not because of anything you did, but because of my actions.”

  She closed her eyes and balled
her hands into fists. She had to stop crying. Had to face her fate with as much dignity as she could manage. “We both know you have to stay alive and land this craft on Mars. This is hard enough. Don’t prolong it.”

  Dalton held her once again, this time for several minutes, and if she hadn’t finally separated, she wondered if he ever would have.

  As if the situation wasn’t horrifying enough, she wouldn’t just be losing her life, she would be doing so as a blank slate, having no memory of herself, her friends and family, or the man who had become the love of her life. And Burt Dalton would watch her die, anguished by her death and burdened by an incomprehensible level of guilt that would stay with him forever. Guilt that she had done what she had done for him. Guilt that he wasn’t clever enough to find a way out of the trap. Guilt that he would remain alive while she perished.

  She could somehow tell from his expression that he preferred his own death to being forced to take the life of the woman he loved—and live with it afterward.

  “I am so sorry it’s come to this,” he said. “But I’m begging you to reconsider,” he added, confirming her intuition. “You could continue hibernation in thirty-six hours, and you and the colonists would still have a four in five chance. Four in five are good odds. And you’re a better human being than I am. Let me make this sacrifice for the woman I love,” he pleaded.

  She imagined her imminent demise. He would use drugs to put her to sleep and then shoot her out of the airlock so he wouldn’t have to jettison her weight in vital supplies. She wondered if the vacuum outside would preserve her. If her lifeless body, without microbes to digest it, would float for eons in the bitter cold of space.

  She closed her eyes. How could she just willingly let herself die?

  She couldn’t. She had to fight with all of her might to go on, no matter what it took.

  Trish Casner considered the offer. Eighty percent odds really were quite good.

  But how could she allow this man to take her place, to make the ultimate sacrifice for her? Had she been madly in love with him, she wouldn’t entertain the idea for a moment, but as it was, she didn’t know him from Adam. She couldn’t deny that it was tempting, as much as she wanted to believe otherwise.

  “No!” she shouted finally, as her internal wrestling match resolved itself. “My decision is final. You need to survive, Burt Dalton. You need to save these colonists and do great things with your life.”

  Her chin quivered. “But let’s get on with it as quickly as we can. Every second we prolong this is agony,” she added, as tears began to pour from her eyes once again.

  And this time she knew they wouldn’t stop in the few minutes remaining until her death sentence was carried out.

  So much for going out with dignity.

  6

  Dr. Melanie Yoder felt pins and needles all over, despite no part of her body having fallen asleep. She hadn’t known this would be her reaction to extreme anticipation, but then again, she hadn’t known anticipation could possibly be as all-pervasive as what she was presently experiencing.

  What an exciting day. Perhaps the most exciting day in the history of humanity.

  Or perhaps not. Perhaps just another day that would bring yet another failed attempt, the latest in an endless series of failed attempts, each one more expensive than the last.

  Artificial General Intelligence really shouldn’t be this hard. Not given the current state of computer technology. But somehow it was.

  Biological evolution was hit-and-miss—sloppy. Generation times were agonizingly long, making the process take forever. The building materials nature worked with, on the whole, were frail and easily damaged.

  And so mankind had outdone evolution over and over again. Evolution had achieved the speed of the cheetah. Mankind had countered with the car, jet, and rocket. Evolution had achieved the streamlined swimming perfection of the dolphin. Mankind had countered with the jet ski and submarine.

  And on and on. The flight of the eagle, the strength of the polar bear, the toxin of the pufferfish, the architectural abilities of the ant—in each case, mankind had found a way to blow past these performance levels as if they were nothing.

  With one notable exception: consciousness. General Intelligence. Self-awareness. Creativity.

  What trick had evolution stumbled upon to spark consciousness within a seemingly haphazard arrangement of mindless cells? A trick that continued to prove impossible for mankind to duplicate.

  Or did this particular trick only exist in God’s playbook, as many believed?

  Modern computers had continued to advance at an extraordinary rate. They were clean and sturdy, with memories orders of magnitude more capable than that of a shriveled brain, and also millions of times faster and millions of times more precise.

  So how was biological evolution still able to maintain its advantage? What magic was required to finally imbue an insensate lump of matter with consciousness?

  Biological evolution was getting the last laugh, and some experts now suspected that this would always be the case. That the one puzzle consciousness couldn’t solve was itself.

  But Melanie Yoder disagreed. She couldn’t help but believe that now that computers finally existed that matched the power and complexity of the human brain, the days of biological evolution lording its greatest accomplishment over mankind were nearing an end.

  Could today be the very day when this last domino would finally fall?

  Today was certainly the day when the most magnificent computer system ever built—which she had named TUC—was finally complete, and would be able to draw on the largest repository of knowledge ever assembled, which would be stored in a database boasting such gargantuan memory capacity it might as well have been infinite.

  For the past eight days the entire contents of the World Wide Web, all gazillion pages, including electronic copies of millions of books, had been uploaded by the most advanced web crawler and content capturer ever. TUC would never be allowed anywhere near an Internet connection, but if you couldn’t bring the computer to the Internet, at least you could download the entire Internet into the computer.

  Melanie was a geek among geeks and never stopped marveling at the Web and its content, without question mankind’s greatest accomplishment. The Great Pyramids, the Great Wall of China, the Panama Canal, the Hoover Dam, the interstate highway system—all were undeniably astonishing accomplishments.

  But they paled in comparison to the Internet, whose incomprehensible rise from obscurity to world domination had taken place in less than a generation.

  In the early 1990s, only four decades earlier, the greatest minds on Earth had no idea what to make of this new capability, with many expressing certainty that no money could ever be made from it, only lost.

  Back then, the vision was that consumers could use the Internet to access content, a supplement to the limited television channels then available. The Web could provide a sports channel, a weather channel, a finance channel, and so on: each less a television channel than a spiffed-up magazine. You could expand the number of available Internet destinations to as many as five thousand—maybe even ten thousand.

  But the great media moguls of the day balked at the expense.

  What company was rich enough to fill ten thousand channels with content? Ten thousand! It would break the backs of the world’s strongest corporations.

  Melanie thought their lack of foresight could be forgiven. After all, throughout human history up until that point, a tiny few had provided content for all of Earth’s teeming millions and billions. In the early ’90s, this remained true, as a small number of active creators delivered television content, print media, books, music, the theater, and so on. For every active creator of content, there were hundreds, or even thousands, of passive consumers.

  But then something unexpected and miraculous happened: the Internet didn’t offer ten thousand channels of content, but ten million. And more. And the Internet’s content was created, not just by a tiny mino
rity, but by all of humanity, collectively. By billions and billions of people taking a more active role in its growth than any could have ever foreseen.

  Every man, woman, and child on Earth could now create content for every other man, woman, and child, readily accessible from anywhere in the world. “How-to” videos, user forums, an online encyclopedia that had grown to over fifty million articles in almost three hundred languages, blogs, Facebook pages, and so much more.

  By 2016, more than sixty trillion web pages had been created. Astonishingly, this was equivalent to almost ten thousand pages for every living human.

  And all of this had arisen in the blink of an eye.

  Thirty thousand people were thought to have built the Giza pyramids. Over a million were pressed into service building the Great Wall of China. But the Internet demonstrated what a thousand times this many people could achieve when they were all rowing in the same direction.

  And Dr. Melanie Yoder was lucky enough to be alive in this era. Not only alive, but able to live the ultimate geek fantasy. Three years earlier she had been appointed the head of DARPA, The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the group that had actually fathered what would later become the World Wide Web.

  DARPA was created in 1958 by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, basically because he, and all of America, were freaking out over the Soviet launch of Sputnik, which had taken place at the height of the Cold War. Even civilians knew the importance of not ceding the high ground to an enemy, and space was the ultimate high ground.

  Eisenhower vowed to catch up in a hurry, and that the US would never be surprised like this again, or beaten this badly to the technological punch. He vowed that the next time technology stunned the world, it was going to be American technology that did the stunning.