“Under your feet”, I motioned, “is the greatest collection of mineral resources ever brought under human control. To put it in perspective, I want you to imagine the greatest resource discoveries of all time – the Ghawar Oilfield in Saudi, the Mirny diamond mine in Siberia, all that coal out in Wyoming – and just double it and double it and square it twice, and you’ll still be nowhere near the value of the energy, minerals, water and metals inside this asteroid”.
Liz was nodding. “Yeah, great. I’ve also noticed its thousands of miles out into space.”
“It is”, I conceded. “But why, do you think, has Dvalin been placed so carefully over an equatorial country like Gabon?” She looked blank. “Because, my dear, the equator is by far the best place from which to run a space elevator cable up to geostationary orbit, where we are now.”
“An elevator?” This was Beasley, who had paused his lengthy, slightly buzzed flirtation with Captain Tanner in order to eavesdrop on the interesting bits. “Imagine that… 14,000th floor… going up!” That gave everyone a chuckle but I wanted to get this point through to Liz.
“All the construction work up here has been done by robots, right?” She nodded. “Well, the robots are going to churn out millions of tonnes of material while making the habitable space inside this rock, and that material is going to be processed by really neat factories, all solar-powered, to produce just about anything we need”.
“And what do we need?” asked Evelyn, setting down her champagne.
I grinned at her. “Diamonds. Lots of them”.
She lit up, played the ditsy bimbo for a moment. “Oooooh! Shiny and sparkly!!”
“Not exactly”, I intoned, reluctant to burst her high-carat bubble. “These will be industrial nano-fibres with the strength of diamond, but highly flexible and easy to work. Well, easy if you’ve got the kind of technology we’re going to have here. The robots spin out a cable, made from Dvalin material, which will stream down towards the earth. There will be little engines along its length which fire periodically to keep it where we need it. Once the spinning-out is complete, there will be a cable strong enough to bring huge elevator cars, the size of the Sears Tower, up and down every few hours, at a minimal cost in energy”.
The three stared at me. An elevator into space. Just the thought was at once preposterous and breathtakingly simple. “Imagine free transport to high earth orbit, for anyone who needs it. We bring up people and their belongings; the returning elevator cars bring down thousands of tonnes of metals, high-grade glass or industrial materials, whatever we need.”
Hal had been attentive, as ever, and was putting together a holographic show depicting the elevator in place, tethering Dvalin to Gabon like a Roman gladiator swinging a morning star around his head, only the swing was tiny. The rock just appeared to hang there, dutifully following the earth in its orbit.
“But that’s not all. We need plenty of power up here, so we’re going to divert some of the materials to produce high-efficiency solar arrays which will sit with us in this high orbit. They’ll be huge… each the size of a big city on earth… and we’ll need dozens of them. Near the anchor station for the elevator in Gabon, there will be a microwave receiving station to which we’ll beam down the power – billions of terawatts a year – and from there, a new high-capacity power grid will distribute the power around the world.”
Beasley caught on first. “Annual subscription, or pay-as-you-go?”
I looked him square in the eye. “Free. Forever.”
Liz had a million questions still, working hard on her notes and preparing what would become an award-winning sequence of documentaries and editorials, but I was starting to feel the champagne and felt the need both to stop talking (strange to relate, I don’t actually love the sound of my own voice) and to freshen up before our guests arrived. I answered a couple more queries about the pricing system, or lack of it, and then kind of gave up and plugged her first into the hour-long documentary, and then a lectern. We didn’t see her for a quite a while. I knew Hal wouldn’t let her get into anything which would melt her brain too severely.
Chris, Evelyn and I told jokes, compared experiences during the breakout from DC, and relaxed for the first time in what felt like weeks. Even with my enhanced capabilities, this had been a white-hot intense period of my life and I was glad of the quiet. No press up here (save the enthralled and endlessly curious Liz), no politicians to glad-hand (save Beasley, and he was plentifully glad enough already), no radical groups to struggle with. Hal had given me a quick briefing as we arrived in the lounge, and things were a bit messy downstairs on Earth.
Unable to prevent the escape of the Cruiser, and thwarted in their annihilation plan for Dvalin, the death throes of the US administration featured a spasmodic wave of attacks on my facilities. Risking the end of the ‘special relationship’, European-deployed USAF fighter-bombers had been tasked against Sculthorpe. The results had not been pretty. Hal, in his usual omniscient genius, had seen them coming and just switched off their engines. No missiles, no guns, no drama. The pilots, faced with a spontaneous flame-out, had no option but to eject. Typically, Hal had made sure that the only damage on the ground were the craters formed by the crashing planes, either in fields or over the sea.
He was less able to deal with a string of odd incidents such as brick-throwing at embassies, which in one case led to lots of arrests and a day-long riot, and six separate coups d’états which removed governments who had angered their citizenry by botching their response to the information modules; some were deposed because they had not stopped the re-entry vehicle’s arrival, while others were kicked out for trying to destroy it. Still other governments fell just because it seemed the right time to try something audacious. Over the years, many of these revolutions would prove ill-conceived; others would hugely enhance the lives of their citizens. In all, Earth’s politics would continue as ever it had, but a tiny bit wiser. And a little bit less prone to small thinking.
As I sipped my fourth glass of champagne, there was an excited yelp from Liz. “Hey, the Phoenix is leaving!” She darted a look at me. “Can we still get home?”
Evelyn smiled in an almost big-sisterly way. “Relax. You remember we are going to have guests up here?” She watched the sleek, silver Cruiser making its initial de-orbit adjustments, small thrusters firing to kick the shuttle craft into a slower, lower path around the earth. Hal chirped up, taking this opportunity to educate the fledgling astronaut Liz as to the wonders of orbital mechanics.
“Newton’s Second Law applies here with great importance”, he reminded her a moment or two later, as the Phoenix became merely a small dot on the horizon, heading towards the night side. “Each kick of the thrusters provides an endless amount of turn – there’s nothing in space to stop us spinning, no air to slow us down through friction – so each firing is carefully balanced with others to ensure the right rate and direction of turn”. Liz had just finished wrapping her head around the least intuitive element of this particular form of transport – that when you piled on the gas, you went slower, not faster – when I arrived with another bottle of champagne.
“Easy, cowboy”, said Evelyn. “You don’t want us all three sheets to the solar wind when we meet your distinguished guests.” I sat, refilled all of our glasses – Beasley was staring reflectively out of the window and nursing his own cocktail – and then sat back.
“There’s so much more you’re not telling us”, Liz began. “The time travel, the faster-than-light spaceship”. The words emerged from her mouth a little reluctantly, belying her lack of familiarity with this Star Trek stuff. “This civilization…”
“Takanli”, I reminded her.
“Well, yes, Takanli… they must be phenomenally in advance of us in terms of technology.”
“Indeed.” I continued sipping my champagne. Somewhere, in the hinterland of my consciousness, was the thought that I should be drunk, only I wasn’t. I dismissed it. Getting slightly buzzed these days would take
several bottles, and who wanted to actually swallow that much gas?
“I mean, is time-travel easy? Is it like getting in a DeLorean and accelerating to 88 miles an hour?”
There was going to be a lot of this, I knew. Educating the public. It was central to the plan, and it was wrong to abuse an opportunity to help. “It requires six wormholes in space, a specially-designed spacecraft made from materials we’ve never seen before, and to get the ball rolling, a jolt of energy the scope of which is normally found only at the centre of a star.” She stared agog. Of course. “Really high speed space travel requires a nuclear fusion engine which converts different forms of hydrogen into pulses of energy by zapping them with an electron laser while they’re trapped in a cusp of molybdenum. The resulting hot gases are forced out the back. It is incredibly efficient and, as you know by now, in space there’s nothing to slow you down, so remarkable speeds are possible.” Liz scribbled furiously. “But to exceed the speed of light you need to warp the fabric of space itself. That’s much more difficult, and I needed a huge amount of help.”
A TV monitor relayed the Cruiser’s steady arrival at a sequence of pre-arranged points. Hal was doing the driving, the chatter with air-traffic control, all while continuing to run my organization, keep Dvalin and a thousand other ships in orbit, feed and oxygenate huge, torus-shaped halls of plants and crops, and keep an eye on the Dow Jones. He had still only bust out a double-digit percentage of his processing power on one occasion, and that was when I’d asked for an interactive, holographic representation of the whole universe. It took him nearly a minute.
There was time – blessed, sacred time, of which I’d had so little since this adventure began - while the earth rotated beneath us and Hal operated a mini-airline with Phoenix. Chris had made an early acquaintance with the ‘Hangover Pen’ as I had come to call it, and merrily poured himself another glass. He was ticking along nicely after his treatments, all smiles and jokes now, with the occasional sage comment or thoughtful question. He walked over and joined Liz and I. Perhaps he sensed that the interview needed to be steered away from geek-science, and more toward the changes which were about to transform the earth.
“Is this person bothering you?” he quipped, taking a seat next to Liz.
She giggled. “Only by confounding me with science, but I’m starting to get the hang of it”. It was true; Hal had just given her a quiz on the fundamentals, to make sure we weren’t communicating mankind’s grandest plan through the kind of blonde bimbo Fox News irritatingly employed. Liz was keen, sharp and seemed to relish finally having a story to tell. Her notepad was filling up with indecipherable scrawl, which I privately and earnestly hoped would result in a Pulitzer. I wasn’t wrong, as I’m sure you know by now.
“The thing I want to understand”, began the Senator, “is how you expect mankind to adjust quickly to all these changes. I mean we’ve got the confirmation of alien life – First Contact, for God’s sake!” He counted them on his fingers; “lightspeed drives, time travel, the asteroid and its elevator, free energy for everyone... A lot of people are going to freak the fuck out”. Only a rejuvenated Beasley would have chosen those words. I loved the old man all the more for it.
Liz nodded throughout. He was right. I was asking more of mankind than anyone had ever thought could be asked. The old Russian space theorist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky had written a statement which Hal had emblazoned on my office wall at Sculthorpe: Earth is the Cradle of Mankind, but Mankind Cannot Stay in its Cradle Forever. Surely, we were about to leave the cradle. But I was asking the newborn to sprint on its first day. If Neil’s leap was giant, this might, for some, prove unbearably colossal.
“It was always going to happen this way.” Not much of a response, and Liz frowned slightly. “Look, we have been headed towards an interaction with intelligent alien life ever since we came down from the trees. We would meet spacefaring civilizations, encounter phenomenal new sources of energy, see for the first time how truly advanced societies transport themselves, feed themselves, avoid conflicts... it would have been in a hell of a rush, whenever it happened. Just be thankful it happened in the 21st century, when at least we had the shared experience of the Space Race to guide us. If Takanli had become verifiably known at the time of Percival Lovell and his Martian canals, the lid would truly have come off. Or worse, Neanderthal man... can you imagine?” They tried. Beasley was thoughtful, tapping his glass quietly, rhythmically, with his fingertips.
“What will the average person-in-the-street notice?” Liz asked. Terrific journalist’s question.
I thought for a second. “Well, there will be volatility in the markets. Perhaps even chaos. Certainly, anyone in the business of non-renewable resources is going to have a bad week.” This was already true, Hal had informed me. The codes of international business were being rewritten so quickly it was going to take years to sort it all out. The stock market was doing things no-one thought possible. I tried my best not to give a fuck; if the capitalistic system were more robust, and could actually provide for mankind, it would whether this storm. That it would not (as you now know) was ample testament to its structural and moral failings. It’s a shoddy house of cards, I reasoned. Let it collapse.
“But millions will lose their jobs. Many could die. There will be shortages, rationing, chaos. Public services could be suspended. Is that really what you want?”
I filled my glass for the thirteenth time. Outside, the familiar shape of Phoenix was beginning initial docking manoeuvres, having collected its final passengers in Australia and Indonesia.
“No, it is not. And I know that all hell is breaking loose down there. Like I say, this was always going to happen, and I can’t see what Hal or I could have done about it.”
Beasley was frowning too. “They’ll haul you over the coals, you know”, he warned. “They were already calling you a megalomaniac, and that was before you brought a billion tonnes of gold into orbit and called it your own. I mean, I don’t think you could ever show your face on earth again, after all this, superhero or not.” He had a point, I was reluctant to admit. Although wreathed in my protective cocoon of superstardom these last years, I had now most definitely crossed a line. Providing cheap access to space was one thing; radically and irrecoverably restructuring global financial affairs was quite another. No-one had given me a mandate to attempt the creation of a Utopia, but I had gone ahead and done it anyway. Those who would want me arrested, imprisoned, stripped of my wealth - or simply shot at dawn - would now number in the many thousands. Maybe millions. I could find myself transformed from hero to villain, with the outcome of just one project.
Hal chimed in. “Our visitors are arriving at the aft docking bay. I have attempted to brief them during the ascent, but their questions were too many and various to answer comprehensively in the available time”. It was almost as if Hal were apologizing, but I knew that the fault was not his, but theirs. The human mind, even a very fine one, can only comprehend so much in a given time. The sixteen passengers, as the Senator might put it, would most definitely have freaked the fuck out.
“Excuse me, Chris but I’ve got to go and show my face to these new arrivals. Hold the fort here, would you?” I set down my glass, left Chris pouring more Champagne for the others and headed off back to the docking bay, following the never-learned map of Dvalin I carried in my head. Hal chattered through my communicator throughout the journey, updating me on events down on earth. What had already happened could fill a bookshelf. Spasms of violence had erupted, eased, flared, abated and shifted across the globe. Banking systems, under unprecedented pressure, were toppling and investors were panicking as traditional mediums of exchange began to fall apart. The forthcoming glut of precious resources had caused a sequence of earthquakes among trading companies and banks, while the shifts in energy production and exchange would have ramifications too vast even to predict at present. World news organizations were running to catch up. Liz continued to send regular bulletins and tried to encapsulate
what was going on from her own perspective – a lofty one, to be sure – while earthbound journalists filed fragmented reports of high-level sackings, imploding governments, crumpling finance houses and rioting city centres. Apparently, the Speaker of the House had taken over control of the US government and was appealing for calm, having closed down Wall Street trading indefinitely and moved heaven and earth to prevent a run on the banks. It wasn’t really working.
Animated voices could be heard from the docking bay. Jesus, they were arguing already? What was it with academics?
“Stephen, for God’s sake this isn’t 1917 all over again. We’re in a different century. Lenin didn’t have anything like these resources, and presided over a Medieval, starving, invaded nation of peasants. Besides, this guy hasn’t offered anything yet, never mind ‘peace, bread and land’.”
“The offer isn’t important. It’s the potential of the thing.” Stephen waxed lyrical. “Think about it: limitless precious minerals and energy, all for free! The eradication of poverty. Finally, after millennia of domination by the fatcats, we’re on the verge of...”
“Global chaos! That’s what’s happening.” I could imagine the lurid gesticulations as I hovered behind the entry-way doors. I would have to get used to this; people were massively fired up about Dvalin, and I had responsibility for the whole circus. At least, I mused, I enjoyed being in the middle of things. “We were lucky to get into that spaceship alive – you saw it, it was bedlam. He’s pulled the rug from under nine billion people, and in more than one way. Alien technologies, time travel, and now their banks have folded and their savings are useless. He’s lucky we don’t lynch him, let alone show up for a cup of tea and a chat.”
“I dare say I could manage something a little stronger than that”, I offered, finally emerging into the bay. “You sound like you need it. How was the flight?” I offered a courteous hand and introductions began.
Dr. Julia Fitzwallace of Edinburgh University almost reluctantly broke off her harangue of the elderly, slightly dwarfish Stephen Fairfax, internationally renowned political philosopher. In truth, they had been arguing for about thirty years; this latest instalment was just their first orbital quarrel. A classic case of the hard-nosed market economist versus the Utopian socialist. There would, make no mistake, be plenty for them to talk about.
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