Hope (Nadyozhda)

by Wil C. Fry

  After the actual ship was complete, the crew toured it and stowed their personal gear in their private compartments. Then the five crews had made their way to their respective Freeze Bays. Crew #5 had been frozen first, after saying their very last and completely final good-byes to families and friends. One by one the crews had been frozen, over several days. The day after Crew #2 had been put to sleep, a Dr. José Riceberger III had published his now historical treatise on anti-aging treatments, along with assurances that it had been proven to work.

  Many thought that the Hope's entire crew should be revived and given the still-experimental longevity medicines. No, the scientists had said, for such an action would take too much time, throwing the trip permanently off schedule. It was necessary, they said, for the expedition to pass the larger planets at just the right time in order to use their gravitational pulls for extra acceleration.

  Then some had said to administer the treatment to only Crew #1. Sociologists in connection with the project said the unfairness of that would cause instability in the crew years down the line. So it was suggested that the ship's medi-labs be equipped to administer the dosage. This bickering went on and on, as the scientists watched their clocks and calendars.

  Meanwhile, on Earth, Riceberger was making a fortune. He had sold the treatment to the Terran Federation, with subcontracts to several smaller governments and medical corporations for enough money to live off for many centuries, with sub-clauses allowing him the money only if the treatments worked. All over the already overcrowded planet, millions and billions of people began lining up at the doors of hospitals, new treatment centers, clinics, and anywhere it was rumored that they could be treated for their aging.

  Tensions between Venus and the nations of Earth began to rise, due to the Venusians' desire to be independent. The United Moons of Jove (Jupiter), or J.U.M., and Independent Mars started getting nervous. To appease the scientists, many of whom were from Mars, the coordinators of the Hope project did not awake the already sleeping crews. To pacify the colonization specialists and sociologists, the Hope's medi-labs were hurriedly equipped for the still-unproved longevity treatment, while at the same time, Crew #1 was frozen into their cryogenic bays.

  Simultaneously, computer programmers finished running their checks on the masterpiece of their generation. The Nadyozhda's master control computer (or M.C.C.) was by far not the largest computer ever assembled. Several of the largest space cities in planetary orbit had larger computers for their climate control and ecology manipulation. And it was said that Independent Mars' current chairman, Vargas Glover, depended on a computer the size of a city block to help him govern his twelve million citizens. But the Hope's M.C.C. was a marvel. Every circuit and component had been produced, crystallized, tested, connected, and activated in a complete zero-g environment, and in total vacuum where necessary. The entire ship's library was contained in the M.C.C., as well as every bit of information the scientists could imagine, from bee-keeping to bar tending to boll weevil eradication. This machine controlled every aspect of the ship's climate. So also was the repair computer, the defense and safety system, the guidance mechanisms, the power plant, the communications, the ship's clock, the history of the ship's crew, the maintenance robots, and every port or hatch or airlock.

  But perhaps the most amazing thing about the M.C.C. was that someone fell in love with it. Scott Hayford was one of the assistant designers and chief programmer for the M.C.C. throughout the last decade. From the very first, he had known he was in for the long haul. He had sold his home and office complex on the 170th floor of Tokyo's Bill Gates Tower and bought housing modules from Lunar Housing, Inc. There were three modules, each over thirty feet long and fifteen feet in diameter on the inside, shaped something like a DazzleWater can. At first, he had lived in these, commuting to the construction site in his short-range Jeep. Shortly, he had paid for "Parking & Power" at the growing station next to the construction site. At that time, Hope City was a mass of tangled docking tubes, power modules, solar cells, radar antennae, and housing modules. Scott Hayford got assigned to docking tube #12, and a space tug pulled his three modules into position and the driver hooked him up.

  Six days a week, Scott Hayford and his team of three other computer programmers spent at least twelve hours a day in the frame of the slowly developing starship. Before the framework was wrapped in skin, the main elements of the M.C.C. were installed, and then that section of the ship was the first to be pressurized. The team then began to live on board, to finish the assembly and begin the arduous task of programming the computer, while the rest of the ship grew around them. Every time an airlock or radio or camera or any mechanical device was added to the ship, this elite team made sure that it was connected to the M.C.C., and that there was a failure-alert circuit tied in.

  Scott Hayford did not take advantage of his privileged status. While each of the others in turn took their four weeks of paid leave every year, Scott would find recreation by watching one holo per week, spending the majority of his time with the M.C.C., or as he called her, "Hope". From the beginning, the Russians had wanted the name Nadyozhda (nuhd-YOHzh-duh), or "Hope" for the ship, and no one had ever offered a strong argument to the contrary. But Scott used the name to refer to the mind, or brain, of the ship, the M.C.C.

  The rest of the team couldn't be sure, but they suspected that their computer responded more favorably to him than to the rest of them. Ever since they had installed the voice circuits, they had talked to the computer of course, and as do most talking computers, it had a feminine voice. But they could almost detect a smile or wink in the voice when it talked to Scott, even if saying, "Radio test for secondary backup radio in power plant is complete."

  One day, only two years before the launch, one of the other team members - Marie Clark - happened to forget her tool kit in the computer maintenance office when she stepped out to her quarters. Normally, this would not be odd, but Marie was supposed to remember everything. You see, she was to be the computer expert for the Nadyozhda, part of Crew #1. But she had not forgotten the kit on accident.

  When she stepped back into the office, she saw what she had hoped to find: Scott Hayford, draped across one of the chairs there, staring at a screen that Marie couldn't see from the doorway. He was droning on, "No, Hope, it's just hard to explain the difference between good poetry and bad poetry. In fact-"

  Suddenly Hope's voice cut him off, "Scott, someone has entered the room."

  Marie stepped in sheepishly. "Sorry to interrupt, but I forgot my tool kit. I'll be leaving as soon as I can get it." While she was talking, she had edged around the desk, trying to catch a glimpse of what Scott was seeing on the monitor, acting as if she were looking for her kit. Then she heard Hope's voice again, sounding a little irritated.

  "Marie, your tool kit is on the desk to your left."

  Marie looked at Scott, who shrugged, then she decided that she could afford a slight bit of irritation herself. "All right," she said, "what goes on here? How can I wake up at Banard's Star and do my job if you always act like I'm an intruder?" She was, against her better logical judgment, addressing the computer.

  Hope answered back, her very real-sounding voice saying, "I did not mean any harm, Marie, but Scott and I were discussing-"

  "Hold on," Scott interjected. "Look, Hope, maybe Marie's right. You two are going to have to get along for several hundred years. If anything goes wrong, Marie's going to have to fix it, right?"

  Stubbornly, Hope said, "Nothing will go wrong."

  "Hope!"

  "Okay, Scotty, but I want you to come with me."

  Marie's mouth dropped open, and she stared. "Scott, are you two in love, or something sick like that?"

  Scott grinned from ear to ear. "Yes, Marie, I think we are. Although I don't think I could marry a computer. What would the babies look like?" He chuckled.

  "But, Scott, it's a machine, for Christ's sake!"

  "At least I'm not a human!" Hope spat.

  "
Hope, I'm warning you, you can't act like this. Marie is my friend" -her eyebrows went up ever so slightly- "and if I want to talk to her I will. And she's a damn good programmer."

  * * *

  Upon entering the dining room, the first thing Petr Novgorod did was locate his wife. There she was, already wiping her plate clean, her eyes locked on the doorway through which he came. When she recognized him, her eyes lit up, and her mouth broke open in a joyful grin. Petr began to walk faster, going around the end of the long table, as she rose and rushed to meet him. Then she was in his arms again, after 150 years of hibernation, soft and warm and exhilaratingly ALIVE. He kept saying, "You are so beautiful, my love, so beautiful," while she said, "I never thought you would awaken."

  She kept one hand clasped to his while with the other picked up her plate and silverware, and took them to the kitchen, where he picked out his meal. The thought suddenly crossed his mind that they were all eating food that had been grown and processed more than a century ago. Suddenly, he wondered what was going on back home.

  "Darling, when will we receive news from our home system, do you know?"

  As they sat down, she said, "I think Marie Clark had gone to the control room to begin looking over the accumulated transmissions. She awoke early. I thought I was first, but when I began to eat, she came through to say 'hi' and that she had already eaten." Elizabeth turned to her husband. "Petr, do I look older to you?"

  "Nyet!"

  All around them, groggy husbands were being reunited with their wives, and the few single people were gathered at their own table. Most of the wives waited for their husbands to eat, but a few of them left after greeting them to begin settling in their cabins, or getting ready to assume their duties.

  * * *

  In the initial planning stages of the colonization effort, in the 2140s, sociologists, ecologists, political scientists, and behaviorists had been assembled from the Terran Federation and the newly Independent Mars to discuss the crew size, long before a design for the vessel could be decided upon. Many ecologists and some sociologists, especially from Terra, had stipulated that several thousands would be necessary for a successful colony to be completely independent. A Martian1 political scientist mentioned that the first human outpost on Mars had only been composed of two dozen scientists and engineers. It had then been pointed out that Mars was only half an AU2 from Earth, only months away even during the days of the original settlement, and now only weeks away, while Banard's Star was hundreds of years away from help, at the very fastest. The argument went on for months.

  When preliminary designs began to be submitted, a new factor was introduced. Even the largest plan available - capable of holding 10,000 humans - was a ship that could be piloted by less than a hundred people, if necessary. The smallest ship design accepted, which would hold only 200 colonists, could have a crew of under 20. So a political scientist suggested the idea of "back-up" crews, each of 500 people, to fill a ship for 2500, thus being able to operate in shifts, leave some room for possible accidents in space, and, if the opportunity arose, colonize more than one planet.

  Another stood and reminded the group of the Daniel Boone II, already in operation. It regularly left Terran orbit with 2,000 or more colonists for Luna and Mars, with a crew of only 50. It would drop off hundreds at Luna and pick up valuable ores, then carry the rest of the passengers and the ores to Mars. At Mars, the D.B. II would pick up foodstuffs and mail, carrying them out to J.U.M. Its return trip would be a cargo run, carrying minerals and expensive nuclear fuels back to the inner planets.

  Finally, the group's chairman submitted the final report to the colonization committee. It stated that the ideal number of humans to start a colony on a completely alien world was around 2,000, but that with enough supplies, a successful colony on a habitable planet could start from as little as one hundred and still expect to succeed. So the Committee compromised, mostly due to budget pressures. The Hope would contain 500 colonists, all willing to leave the ship in orbit and live on the planet they found. In certain situations, however, smaller settlements could be left, in increments of 100, while the rest of the crew could continue on. The various situations in which the crew would split up were detailed in a report titled "Policy on Colonization." In its final form, the "Policy on Colonization", as released by the Hope Committee was 700 pages long, summarized for print on the market in 250 pages.

  This report contained the committee's answers to every conceivable situation or problem, and outlined plans of action to be taken by the colonist crew upon arrival. It was full of guidelines, rules, procedures, and instructions that should not be taken lightly. It was junk, thought Captain Cochran.

  Captain James Cochran, commanding officer of Nadyozhda's Crew #1, sat in his stateroom, reading the "Policy." He touched a key on his computer, and the useless words disappeared from his screen. Turning his eyes to the ceiling, he muttered, "Who did those guys think they were, telling me how to run a star ship?"

  II - The Next Chapter

  Scott Hayford finally took a vacation, during his last year of work on the starship. No one could locate Marie or Scott for three weeks, not that they were needed of course; the M.C.C. was fully operational. When they returned - on two separate shuttles and supposedly from two different resorts - they seemed much friendlier toward each other.

  First one and then the other of the two remaining programmers were sent back to their old positions on Mars, while four new team members were added. These four, along with Marie, were colonists, one from each crew, and began to learn the details of the M.C.C.'s operations. The six (including Scott) lived on the Nadyozhda for the last six months, in artificial gravity of Ê Terran-normal, making absolutely certain the M.C.C. could survive and operate for 500 years if necessary, all of them learning to call her Hope, and speak to her as a friend.

  In the 700-page "Policy", it was noted that in case of mechanical failure, one or more of the five computer specialists would be awakened, to deal with the problem. Presumably, Marie would be the first choice, but by the time this last training was complete, any one of the five could handle most emergencies.

  Sometime during that last six months, Scott Hayford sold his useless living modules to an elderly couple from Earth, and donated the money to his invalid sister on Venus. He had a dark secret...

  * * *

  When Robert Gillespie Adams-Muñoz completed his "Anti-Gravity Device" back in 2112, he thought he had built a new type of propulsion device. He had long dreamed of wheel-less cars, floating houses, perhaps even a weapons delivery system. But, to his extreme disappointment, what he developed was merely an artificial gravity field that could be sustained only inside a network of newly developed composites - highly conductive composites. He died a famous but desolate man, leaving all his great wealth to a degenerately wealthy hard rock band out of spite for what the world - and indeed the universe - had done to him.

  By 2115, an existing space city in Terran orbit had these new composites networked into its skin, and the first non-experimental artificial gravity field began its operation. By touching a button and turning a dial, the gravity-field operator could take the gravity field from zero-g to 100-g, or higher, if the power plant could take it. The gravity could pull in any direction he desired, at any strength. The entire station had to be remodeled to allow for the new gravity. The tiny space city grew tremendously during the next few years, and became Astropolis I. Soon, other existing stations began adding the field, some buying more than one, to allow for different fields at different times in different parts of the station.

  Rich colonists to Mars bought the gravity generators, so they always wouldn't be bumping their heads if they stepped too hard in the light gravity. The government of Mars, a colonial setup at the time, equipped their city gym with a field, and other government buildings. Rich people on Terra used the fields to ease the tiring effect of their home planet's gravity. The Terran Federation used the generators to train their space pilots, and accustom colo
nists to the changes in g's in space.

  But still, no means was found to use the device as a propulsion system. Unless you consider the trains that ran in tunnels which were networked with the necessary composite. These trains were expensive to build, expensive to ride in, but very, very fast. The tunnel - actually a tube, above ground for most of the trip - from New York City to Los Angeles took only forty-five minutes, which was faster than any airline. The tunnel from Chicago to Mexico City took about the same length of time.

  But what Robert Gillespie Adams-Muñoz had envisioned was a field that acted upon the gravity field of a body in space, such as a planet. In his mind, a car would have its own mini-anti-gravity machine, propelling it against Earth's pull, thus traveling extremely fast. He dreamed of wingless airliners, hauling thousands of passengers at a time, sailing effortlessly across the ocean. He saw houses, each equipped with their own field, hovering high above the city, thus ridding the Earth temporarily of its population difficulties. The inhabitants of the house would zip down to the city in their a-grav car. Buildings could be supported with much less material, if a powerful field enveloped only the construction materials, causing them to be absolutely weightless. But it never happened. And so he died.