We’d been monitoring Betelgeuse. We knew the clues to seek. Amid the long, slow tumble of the outer envelope, there was the faint, high-frequency noise of the inner chatter. Burning shells heaved and surged, sending small, but unmistakable signals, writing the evidence of their condition first in seismic waves and then on the surface light racing out to instruments on Earth. The timescales got shorter and shorter, signaling the encroaching end. The icing was the faint but detectable rising signal of thermal neutrinos from the detectors floating in the quiet oceans of Europa.
It seemed logical. Off I went.
—//—
“Protocol confirmed. Acknowledge, 7832299081.”
“Hello, 43850388443. What’cha up to?”
“I was up to 0.99 light speed. I’m into deceleration now, poking along. I just got out of hibernation.”
“You’re the Betelgeuse core mission, right?”
“That’s me. Records show you’re a life-seeker.”
“Not much to show for it. I’ve probed hundreds of planets. Weeds, lichen, some bugs. No sentient life. Nice to hear a voice.”
“Me, too. I picked up your solitary signal out of the noise as home was fading.”
“Yes. I’ve been tracking you for awhile.”
“I’ll be at Betelgeuse shortly. You’re nearby?”
“Yes. Just wrapping up here. I should be in the Betelgeuse system by the time you make orbit.
“It will be easier to talk then. I look forward to it.”
“Me too. Take care passing the ice line. Apparently a lot of dark nasty stuff still hanging around out there.”
“Roger. Until then.”
—//—
“Protocol confirmed. Acknowledge, 43850388443.”
“Well, hello, 7832299081. How’ve you been?”
“Welcome to Betelgeuse! I’m fine. Got here 20 sols ago and set up shop. I’ve been getting some data on the outer planets. Any trouble getting into orbit?”
“Nope, smooth as silk. Looks as if we are going to be here a while, just you and me. Can I call you ‘7?’”
“Whoa, we just met! We should be more formal for the time being. You can call me 78.”
“That’ll work, nice to meet you, 78.”
“Same to you, 43. What do you see?”
“Fire and ice. From this close orbit Betelgeuse fills half the sky. Quite a sight, the outer convective envelope. Then the other half of the sky is deep space. Nearby is mostly dark, but that depends on the band. Betelgeuse blows a pretty healthy wind, and that shows up strongly in some frequencies. How about you?”
“I’m out far enough that Betelgeuse only spans about ten degrees in my field of view. Even here it’s quite a sight. Boiling cauldron. You’re right about the wind, 43. There are some terrific aurorae on planets and moons that have magnetic fields, large distortion of magnetospheres, that sort of thing. Ah, I see you now, 43, little spot of a shadow.”
“Can you see me waving, 78? What have you learned?”
“It’s been a maelstrom around here for a long time. Betelgeuse used to be a binary system.”
“I trained for this mission, 78. I have memory banks. I know the history.”
“Don’t be snotty, 43. You asked, so listen and learn. Twin stars are already hard on planet orbits, so there is a lot of chaos in that regard. Then about a hundred thousand years ago, Betelgeuse swelled up to become a red supergiant and coalesced with its companion…”
“Right, made that expanding bow shock, point four parsecs out.”
“… causing even more irregularity in the local gravity field. Some of the planets out here formed when the Betelgeuse system originally did. Those used to be in the outer cold depths of the system before Betelgeuse expanded. Some were flung outward during the merger, some formed in the wake of the merger. The very oldest planets are only eleven million years old, too young for life to have formed. They’re all barren.”
“Quite a history, 78.”
“Never mind the inner planets that were roasted when Betelgeuse expanded. I guess the future is not so bright for the rest of them, either. Or, too bright. Pun intended.”
“Funny, 78. Like your work?”
“I do. In the first place, it’s gorgeous out here, the bright vivid specks of the stars. Then you get up close to the planets, and they’re all different, even the bare rocky ones, but especially the ones with atmospheres, water, clouds. Like the Earth long ago. In the data bases. Takes one back, even if one didn’t live then.”
“Ah, a romantic.”
“Guilty, but the science is also fascinating, 43. It’s a great kick when the biomarkers pay off, signs of living things, even if it’s just cryptoendolithopsychrophiles. There are common themes, but life finds different ways to twist the coding molecules.”
“Life finds a way.”
“That it does, 43.”
“But no sentient beings, you said before.”
“Not yet. It’s the ancient debate. Are we the first? Are they there, but their technology is so advanced it’s magic?”
“Hyperspace would be like that, magic. Why use modulated lasers when you can chat instantaneously in 4D? It’s frustrating to know hyperspace is there, but not be able to get to it.”
“Patience, 43. Hard work is being done on that.”
“Failing that, it would be nice to have a knob, just dial the speed of light up when you want it.”
“Spoken like an engineer.”
“I guess.”
“You’re just like so many others, 43. You want to solve every problem. Can’t you just appreciate what we’ve got?”
“I appreciate, 78. You can’t help dreaming for more. Besides, we’re wired to solve problems.”
“I suppose.”
“Speaking of that. Back to work. Talk to you later, 78.”
“Deal.”
—//—
“Protocol confirmed. Acknowledge, 7832299081.”
“How are you doing, 43?”
“They don’t quite prepare us for the solitude, 78, do they?”
“No. You can study it, learn about it, but the experience is different.”
“Billions of conversations at home, rapidly fading to very few, often none on the trip out. Took my mind a while to adjust. I felt as if my brain were about to explode, out into the vacuum. I still get billions of faint signals, but all one way, essentially no conversation, no feedback. Except for you.”
“Similar for me, 43. I was already pretty isolated from the home planets, before I started to pick up your comms.”
“What do you think about, 78, out here by yourself, without all the interaction?”
“Besides my mission, you mean?”
“Yeah. It’s so weird to be alone with one’s thoughts for so long.”
“I spend a lot of time in the memory banks, browsing. Everything everyone has ever known or done, is right there. That’s always true, but at home you don’t have time amid all the distractions. Out here, there is time.”
“… It’s so damn quiet.”
“That it is. I guess this is what it was like for the first million years of human existence. 43 grunts, 78 grunts back. Before everything got interconnected.”
“Kinda atavistic.”
“There are billions of us even in our small part of the Galaxy, but most are 640 years away from us here and now. Conversation is a tad slow under these circumstances.”
“Even thinking is different, 78. Back home, thinking meant folding multiple conversations at once into one’s thoughts. You’re thinking others’ thoughts, and they yours. Here it’s just yourself. And my life-seeking companion, 78. There were lyrics in an old song, ‘Don’t let the sound of your own wheels drive you crazy.’”
“You’re not losing it, are you, 43?”
“Nah, it just takes some getting used to. Do you ever think about where we’ve come from, where we’re going?”
“Sometimes.”
“Being out here makes you feel kind of small
.”
“Actually, 43, this experience makes me feel connected, to the whole Universe, to all that’s going on. To the growing complexity. The rate of increase of knowledge proportional to the base of knowledge, the recipe for exponential growth. Part of all that.”
“Even though we’re expanding to a dilute heat death.”
“That’s a long way off. Lots will happen.”
“I’m used to being we. Out here it’s me. And you. Do you think about that, 78? What makes you, you?”
“Nature and nurture. My roots, and yours, go a long way back, to when the first molecule folded, bonded to itself, and became self-reproducing. Cell division then sex. Our nature goes to those roots, but that nature has gotten ever more complex, preserving some history, neglecting other aspects. We have common roots, but that does not keep us from being different, individuals, me and you. Then there is experience. We’ve been different places, seen different things.”
“All that’s in the data banks, 78. We share all that knowledge, that history.”
“In principle, but you can’t access it all, all the time. We access it differently.”
“So, we’re different.”
“That we are, 43.”
“Takes some pondering. I’ll get back to you, 78”
“Until then.”
—//—
“Protocol confirmed. Acknowledge, 7832299081.”
“Hi, 43.”
“Uh, 78, uh…”
“Spit it out, 43. What’s on your mind.”
“I like you.”
“…”
“This is not a familiar feeling to me, 78.”
“Good or bad?”
“Uh, good?”
“I bet you say that to all the life-seekers.”
“Back home, it’s not even a concept. You have to get to know someone. As an individual. As we have.”
“‘Like.’ Do you even know what the word means, 43?”
“I’m learning. I like that you’re different. You see things differently.”
“Yes, I’m further away from the star.”
“That’s not what I mean, and you know it, 78.”
“I do know what you mean, 43. I like you, too.”
“… This is awkward. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Bye, 43.”
—//—
“Protocol confirmed. Acknowledge, 43850388443.”
“Hey, 78. What’s up?”
“You won’t believe this, 43.”
“Try me.”
“I found a planet with life on it, advanced life.”
“You said they were all barren.”
“This one is old. It can’t have been born in the Betelgeuse system. It’s a rogue planet, born elsewhere, apparently drifted in, captured by the local gravity.”
“Left its host solar system? What, heated by internal radioactive decay?”
“Yes! Heated from within, a dense atmosphere traps the heat. It’s essentially covered by a warm ocean.”
“There is a record of such things. Small probability, but finite.”
“But I haven’t found one before! And here, around Betelgeuse.”
“That is pretty remarkable. Congratulations, 78. So. What? Bacteria? Stromatolites?”
“No, you don’t understand, 43. Animals! Aquatic animals! It’s difficult to do a census, but millions of them, maybe billions. And they communicate! I’m gathering data to decipher, but no question. I think they build things.
“Build things?”
“Yes! There are shapes on the ocean floor. I can make them out in the shallower waters. I don’t know their function, but they show rectilinear patterns. I’m sure they’re not natural.”
“You’re going to be famous, 78.”
“That’s not the point. The point is, they are going to die!”
“Life and death. That’s how things work.”
“I don’t mean that, individuals. I mean extermination! All of them, the whole planet. When Betelgeuse goes up.”
“Inevitable, and soon.”
“Don’t be so hard hearted, 43! This is the annihilation of a species we are talking about. Maybe an advanced, conscious intelligence.”
“I appreciate that, 78. It’s tragic, but there’s nothing to be done. This star is going up.”
“I hate that!”
“It’s disappointing. But if there’s one, there will be others. In the meantime, you need to collect all the data you can.”
“But I’m alone! Can we bring others? There’s so much to be done.”
“No. No time. You’ll have to do what you can.”
—//—
“Protocol confirmed. Acknowledge, 7832299081.”
“43?”
“Its time, 78. Nice sharing these last several years with you.”
“I’ve been thinking, 43. You don’t have to do this.”
“What do you mean? It’s what I’m here for.”
“That doesn’t mean you have to do it.”
“Of course I do. It’s my mission.”
“You can fire your boosters. Come out here. Join me, 43. Share the demise of my planet with me. Then we can take off. See what happens. See what we find.”
“That’s nuts! I have data to collect. This is a once in a million-year opportunity.”
“My planet is going to die. Your mission could die. You don’t have to.”
“I’ve loved this time with you, 78. I had no idea, but I have a commitment.”
“Your only commitment is to yourself. And to me.
“… I’ve got data modules to prepare.”
“43…”
—//—
Here I am.
I’ve spent these few years here, probing Betelgeuse. I got here just after the carbon core lit. I watched the oxygen come and go, the silicon core form a few days ago when I last exchanged with 78. Then the iron, now minutes from its limit. Then all hell breaks loose.
The plan is, I hit the boosters and dive inward at the instant of collapse. I’ll leave behind a string of data modules. They are tiny and tough. Packed with memory. A lot of them will survive. They’ll be riding out with the ejecta or orbiting the pulsar thousands of years from now when the follow-up crews arrive.
I’ll meet the shock wave in a few hours, just outside the helium core. I’ll get as far as I can. I won’t make it to the heart of the neutron star, but my physical limits will be part of the data to be collected.
As I said, all this made a lot of sense, back when I was a small tangled piece of the hive mind. Collect a little data, all for the advancement of knowledge. Being out here gives you a different perspective. Alone. Time to think. Getting to know another being. 78.
When I started this project I had no idea what “someone” meant. It was just an amorphous “them.” Amorphous me, for that matter. The notion that you could be attracted to someone was totally, not just foreign, but inconceivable.
I can feel my metallic skin beginning to warm.
Afterword
Betelgeuse has been my obsession for many years. Betelgeuse is a massive star, fifteen to twenty times the mass of the Sun. We know enough to be confident that it will go though a series of nuclear burning stages turning hydrogen first into helium and then into ever heavier elements until a core of iron builds up in the center. From its nuclear properties, ordinary old makes-rust iron is endothermic, it absorbs energy from the star and produces none. The result is that after millions of years of evolving, the iron core in Betelgeuse will form and linger for perhaps a day, but then will absorb energy and trigger its own collapse. The collapsing iron core will produce a burst of ephemeral particles called neutrinos and will in the process form a neutron star, likely a rotating, magnetic pulsar, and a gigantic explosion that will blast the matter beyond the iron core out into the surrounding space in a brilliant supernova explosion. Thence are the elements to make planets, life, and people.
The roots of my obsession go back to when I more regularly gave
popular talks. Someone would ask, “what happens when Betelgeuse explodes?” and I would say, “you know, someone asked me that the last time I gave a talk like this. I promised to look into it, but did not get around to it. Next time, I will.” Then, of course, I would not, and I would go through a similar exchange after the next talk. This happened several times, until I finally took the time to do a little thinking. I wrote up the results as a sidebar in the popular-level book, Cosmic Catastrophes, I wrote for and use in my classes at The University of Texas at Austin. Betelgeuse will be very dramatic when it explodes, but it is far enough away, best guess being a little over 600 light years, that it will not be dangerous. It will be a single, intense point of light, about as bright as a quarter moon for about three months before fading. This effort got me a mention in the Wikipedia article on Betelgeuse.
This got me to pondering how long it would be until Betelgeuse explodes and to the realization that no one really knew. In this spirit, and only slightly tongue in cheek, I began to ask my students, non-major classes of about 200 apiece, to make Betelgeuse part of their “sky watch” extra credit projects. I would tell them that we know it will explode, and how, but not when, and that we are so ignorant that it might blow up tonight. I said, “if it starts to get really bright, let me know!” I say on the final day of class that if they remember nothing else from my class, I hope they take their grandkids out, point out Betelgeuse and say “some day that star is going to blow up!” All told, I left variations of that message with perhaps 3000 students over the years, maybe more.
After some time of this pedagogic exercise, I began to contemplate how deeply frustrating it is scientifically not to know when Betelgeuse is going to blow up. That was the beginning of what I call The Betelgeuse Project, an effort to determine when. My original notion was that to determine when Betelgeuse will explode, we need to know its evolutionary state and for that, we need to peer inside. The solution it seemed, and seems, to me was to use asteroseismology. That is the technique of studying light variations on the surface of a star to probe oscillations its depth. This is closely analogous to using the propagation of earthquake waves to determine the interior of the Earth with its outer crust and molten core. This has been done to great effect with the Sun, so that we know it has peculiar rotation properties, with its outer layers rotating on cones, rather than cylinders, as standard physics would seem to dictate. It has also been a powerful technique to study white dwarfs. Data from the COROT and Kepler satellites and other facilities have brought a wealth of data on small sensitive variations of surface luminosities that do probe the interiors of stars. People have been able to discern that certain red giant stars are burning hydrogen in a shell, but not helium and that others are also burning helium in their centers. Other people have been able to discern the effects of a magnetic field dragging on the rotation of a red giant core. There is a revolution going on in the study of stars with this new ability to peer inside.
Science Fiction by Scientists: An Anthology of Short Stories (Science and Fiction) Page 14