Wake-up Call: 2035

by Robert J. Traydon

  WAKE-UP CALL

  2035

  Robert J. Traydon

  WAKE-UP CALL: 2035 – Copyright © 2015 by Robert J. Traydon

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  The right of Robert J. Traydon to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  Amazon Kindle (mobi) ISBN: 978-0-620-69229-8

  CreateSpace ISBN: 978-1-523-68997-2

  Although the author has made every effort to ensure that the information in this book was correct at the time of publication, the author does not assume and hereby disclaims any liability to any party for any loss, damage, or disruption caused by errors or omissions, whether such errors or omissions result from negligence, accident, or any other cause. The views expressed in this novel do not necessarily reflect those of the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, companies, organisations, nations, governments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Available from Amazon.com and CreateSpace.com

  CHAPTERS (TABLE OF CONTENTS)

  1.REFLECTION

  2.DISCOVERY

  3.JUDGEMENT

  4.ENCOUNTER

  5.ULTIMATUM

  6.CONSOLIDATION

  7.UNIFICATION

  8.RESPONSE

  9.RETURN

  10.CONSEQUENCE

  11.AFTERMATH

  12.RETALIATION

  DEDICATION

  For planet Earth, and the abundant diversity of life that depends on it.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  To my family for their inspiration and support. To those who read through the manuscript and provided valuable feedback.

  IMPORTANT PRE-READING NOTES

  Text appearing in square brackets [*] is nonessential to the storyline, but provides interesting context.

  All references to time and duration are denoted using Earth Standard Time. For example, a year refers to an Earth year. The same applies to months, days, minutes, etc.

  The United States’ Eastern Daylight Time (GMT - 04:00) is used throughout the novel, unless stated otherwise.

  All references to length, height and distance are depicted using the metric system (kilometres, metres, etc.).

  The theory of relativity and principles of quantum mechanics have been incorporated into the narrative as far as possible.

  For convenience, all dialects are represented in English.

  ABBREVIATIONS / SYMBOLS

  EDT – Eastern Daylight Time (Washington, D.C. and New York)

  GMT – Greenwich Mean Time (United Kingdom)

  BCE – Before Common Era or BC

  CE – Common Era or AD

  °C – Degrees Celsius

  cc – Cubic centimetres

  kg – Kilograms

  km – Kilometres

  km/h – Kilometres per hour

  km^2 – Kilometres squared

  m^3 – Metres cubed

  MW – Megawatts

  > – Greater than

  < – Smaller than

  ^ – Exponent

  1. REFLECTION

  Stellar System 413

  The beautiful blue planet drifted silently around its humble host star. Its radiance was in stark contrast to the backdrop of desolate vastness. Only a thin layer of atmosphere separated the abundant life support system that existed on the planet’s surface from the cold and inhospitable space that surrounded it. This fragile frontier defined the Universe’s ultimate disparity: life and death.

  The planet was regarded by all those who knew of its existence, as the galaxy’s most wondrous and unique creation. Its eminent reputation was rightly deserved, as it was unsurpassed in the wide diversity of life that it harboured.

  |GMT + 01:00| 9:00 a.m. Earth: Oxford University (Wednesday, 12 September 2035)

  “Good morning, everyone. Please take your seats.”

  The lecturer straightened his notes on the desk in front of him, then looked up at his students and began.

  “I’m Professor Edward Payton, and I’m going to start today’s lecture with an interesting question. Here we find ourselves in the year 2035, fast approaching the middle of the 21st century and facing an increasing occurrence of extraordinary weather events. These include extreme high and low temperatures, category five hurricanes, cyclones and tornadoes, devastating floods, droughts, sand storms and blizzards, the unexplained slowing and reversing of traditional trade winds, extensive smog and more. Not only that, we are also witnessing sea levels continuing to rise at an unprecedented rate, placing even more pressure on vulnerable coastal cities …”

  Edward Payton was widely considered to be the world’s foremost environmental scientist. At first appearance he came across as an unassuming university professor, but to those who knew him, he was revered as a world-changing environmental pioneer. His colleagues often joked about him having an Indiana Jones-like character. He had studied two Bachelor of Science degrees concurrently at Oxford University, majoring cum laude in both Environmental Science and Astrophysics. He then went on to obtain Honours, Master’s and Doctorate degrees in the fields of Climate Change and Environmental Sustainability.

  Over the two decades that followed Payton single-handedly established the highly regarded Centre of Environmental Awareness in London. This extended his reach and renown around the world, and he became known as the ‘colossus of the global environmental awareness movement’. He was a leading advocate of the call for all nations to embark on a journey of environmental restoration and sustainability, and in spite of unyielding resistance from many social, political and economic arenas, he soldiered on with his campaign unfazed – slowly gathering support.

  This was Payton’s opening lecture to his new class of first year Environmental Studies students and he intended to make it a memorable one.

  He continued, “Now, here’s the question: what will humankind do if the Earth’s environment exceeds its tipping point and follows a path of rapid deterioration towards total collapse?”

  A student in the front row raised his hand. “We’ll have to adapt to the situation. Possibly start living underground, or build great isolation structures that can protect us from the collapsing environment.”

  Payton responded, “An interesting suggestion, but how many underground burrows or isolation structures will we have to build to accommodate the world’s entire population of nine billion*? Where will we grow the food needed to feed everyone?”

  [* In 2015, a Chinese Professor named Tu Youyou shared the Nobel Prize in Medicine for her work in discovering a powerful anti-malarial medicine named Artemisinin. Research continued at the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and after five years, scientists had developed a vaccine effective against a host of mosquito-borne diseases. Its comprehensive roll-out led to the worldwide eradication of malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever, West Nile virus and a host of others within just three years.

  This resulted in considerably lower mortality rates, which inadvertently led to a major boom in population growth rates, especially in the many heavily populated developing nations where these diseases had previously been prevalent. This contributed to the world’s overall human population following the ‘high population growt
h trajectory’ in the United Nations World Population Projection graph, published in 2010.]

  The student acknowledged Payton’s valid points.

  Another student in the third row raised a hand. “We could build another space station, or even a large habitable base on the Moon … and then select a representative segment of the population to go and live there.”

  Payton replied, “Options, yes. But the International Space Station was only 120 metres across and had cost an astounding 200 billion dollars by the time it was de-orbited in 2024; and it rarely supported a crew of more than 10 astronauts. It required constant servicing from Earth and certainly wasn’t a viable option to support human life independently in the long term.”

  He continued, “A base on the Moon would need to be a massive, highly advanced life-supporting structure to keep even a small human colony alive. Adding to the complication is the fact that the Moon’s days and nights are each equivalent to 14 Earth days. It also has no atmosphere, which means that its surface temperature fluctuates between 100°C during its day and -170°C during its night, which is significantly hotter and colder than Earth’s worst summers and winters. Another impracticality is that its specific gravity is six times weaker than Earth’s, which has numerous complications for long-term living.

  “As for selecting a segment of the population …” Payton shook his head at the prospect. “This would be fraught with controversy. And of course … what about the rest of the human population?”

  Another student spoke up, “What about Mars? It’s close by and the Mars Habitation Mission proved that we can live there.”

  “Good point,” said Payton. “In Mars’ favour is its eerily similar day-night rotation cycle of 23 hours and also the presence of subterranean water. But that’s about where its positive attributes end. With regard to the Habitation Mission and our having lived there; consider the time, investment and resources that were required to transport, build and commission that habitation facility on Mars – and it only supported 12 people. Think about 100 people or even 1 000 people. Now stretch your mind to 9 000 000 000 people!”

  He paused and then sombrely recollected. “Not to mention the fact that the mission also proved just how easy it is to die on Mars*.”

  [* The Mars Habitation Mission was part of the greater Mars Colonisation Project (MCP) run by NASA in the late 2020s and early 2030s. It suffered a fatal setback when a minor technical problem with the habitation’s artificial atmosphere resulted in all 12 volunteers suffocating to death after just nine months of being stationed on the planet. The MCP was not able to raise any further funding after the incident and was summarily terminated. The victims’ bodies had still not been recovered from Mars, due to the prohibitively high cost and the risk of losing further human life if such an attempt was made.]

  Another hand was raised. “Yes,” said Payton inviting the suggestion.

  The student spoke, “What about all these habitable planets that astronomers keep finding around other stars? They’ve found hundreds of them. If there’s one with Earth-like environmental conditions, surely we could travel there and colonise it? This would save us having to build any life support infrastructure when we get there.”

  Payton responded, “Well done, that’s just the suggestion I was looking for. Not necessarily because it’s correct, which it is not, but because it’s very interesting. Now let me elaborate on the planets that have been found outside our solar system, or ‘exoplanets’, as astronomers refer to them.”

  Stellar System 413: Restoration Module

  Hurtling towards the stellar system in which the blue planet resided, was the Galactic Federation’s most important Software Restoration Module (SRM). It was travelling through space at a fraction below the speed of light, close to 300 000 kilometres per second, and was within just minutes of arriving at its intended destination. Its on-board system was ready to carry out its function after 50 000 years of travel.

  The module’s deceleration drive was initiated and it began to slow down at a rate that would bring it to a stop at what appeared to be a completely arbitrary point in space, just beyond the orbital trajectory of the stellar system’s furthest planet. But in reality this was no random point in space; this was in fact the most contentious and talked about location in the galaxy … and had been for the last 50 000 years.

  The module slowed to a complete standstill. It had successfully reached its designated target coordinates intact. Phase one of its mission: ‘Acquire destination station’, was now complete. The second phase, ‘Restore station operability’, was initiated seconds later and the module moved perpendicularly towards some predetermined point. The space surrounding the module, was filled in almost every direction with a brilliant array of the Universe’s super clusters, clusters, galaxies and stars … except for the distinct area towards which the module was moving. There, the Universe’s extravagant lights were hidden from view by some large, dark stationary object. As the module drifted towards the darkness, light shimmered from a reflective surface, momentarily silhouetting an immense shape against the star-lit background.

  The module docked alongside the dormant object and immediately set about searching for the problem that had rendered the highly sophisticated piece of equipment completely inoperable for a full 50 000 years. Rectification software surged into the object’s complex operational system, scouring its abyssal depths of code for the anomaly. Within just 40 seconds, the problem had been located. It was the minutest of errors: two binary digits had inadvertently switched places – two out of 172 quindecillion (1x10^48) digits – which had resulted in an unreadable and debilitating code sequence error.

  The confederacy of super-intelligent, supreme races that had developed the piece of equipment, had long considered the malfunction to be the single greatest tragedy in their long and successful history of space exploration. It had resulted in a multi-generational delay to their study of the ‘Miracle Planet’.

  The code error was corrected and the dark object began to awaken from its unintentional mega-slumber. The exterior surface of the object, which constituted a photovoltaic energy generation membrane, began to blaze with a silvery light, revealing its full extent. It was a gargantuan structure, cylindrical in shape, five kilometres in length and one kilometre in diameter. Distributed along the length of the cylinder, were a series of gravity inducing spatial distortion gyratory cyclopacitors. These were rings of varying widths that encircled the cylinder’s outer circumference. The interior of the cylinder was hollow, with distant stars being fully visible when viewed through its length.

  Moments later, the object attained standby status and immediately received an incoming transmission containing ‘origin coordinates’. It responded by sending its own respective ‘destination coordinates’ to the origin of the received transmission. Having exchanged galactic coordinates, the object prepared to execute the function for which it had been built.

  9:10 a.m. Earth: Oxford University

  Edward Payton was a traditionalist at heart and the only lecturer at Oxford who still insisted on using a chalkboard in tandem with the state-of-the-art interpretive smartboards. His students were all humorously fond of him for it. He began to scrawl information on the board as he spoke.

  “What we are quick to forget as human beings, is just how unique the life-supporting parameters of our habitable planet are. If you think about it, for life to exist as we know it on Earth, we would need to find an exoplanet with a similar mass, diameter, volume, density, molten core interior to surface crust ratio, specific gravity, protective magnetic field, ocean to land ratio, fresh water sources, volcanic activity, mineral composition, surface temperature, atmospheric composition, surface pressure, orbital eccentricity and ellipticity, an orbital path relatively clear of debris, comet and asteroid impact history …”

  He took an exaggerated breath and continued, “… axis of rotation in relation to orbital trajectory, rotational speed that relates directly to the length of its day-nigh
t cycles, a moon of similar mass and distance to cause tidal movements in the oceans, large outer planets to divert comets and asteroids away from the inner solar system, distance from its host star in relation to the star’s respective evolutionary stage, size and energy stability, and of course, the magical spark of life that to this day remains a mystery. Not to mention the continuously evolving bionetworks responsible for maintaining the environmental equilibrium that supports this life. These are just a few of the major parameters!

  “Consider the fact that should any one of these parameters on another planet deviate slightly from what we have here on Earth, then the possibility of that planet being able to comfortably support human beings is greatly reduced. But, just for interest’s sake, let’s assume that we do find an Earth-like exoplanet that is suitable for human colonisation – we will immediately be faced with a new dilemma: how do we get to it?”

  Galactic Core: Galactic Federation

  Almost 125 000 years ago, the Auroran race – widely regarded as the galaxy’s oldest, super-intelligent supreme race – took the decision to officially recognise the confederacy, and established the Galactic Federation. It served to forge the extensive cooperation that had existed for many millennia amongst the supreme races that inhabited different worlds across the galaxy. Even though each supreme race was a unique species, they collectively referred to themselves as Galacians.

  Representatives from the various supreme races were nominated to form a Galacian Senate, which then presided over the Galactic Federation. The Senate was based on the Auroran home planet named Endurion, located in the galactic core. Since its establishment, peace and goodwill had prevailed across all known parts of the galaxy with minimal incidents of uprising or conflict. Knowledge sharing between the Galacian races had allowed for technologies to advance rapidly and improve the lives of all those who were governed by the Galactic Federation. The Galacians considered life and its diversity to be sacrosanct and were determined to safeguard it.