The Loop

by Richard Leru

  Jo still hadn’t gotten over the sudden death of her friend, Dr. Yuen. Her bottled up emotions gave her a momentary wave of courage. Jo took her turn at the metaphorical pulpit, leaning around the side of Commander Birch, who had moved and was now standing directly in front of Captain Hill, looking down on him. “Are we a seeded population?“

  Hill let out a laugh from deep in his belly. His frame shook as laughter echoed through the room, engulfing them all. Birch took a step back toward the couch. “I’m sorry, Dr. Taylor. I knew that question was coming but I still couldn’t contain myself. No, you were not seeded.”

  Dr. Titus spoke up, leaning forward from the left side of the couch. “What do you mean, you knew that question was coming? Wait.” His head started to piece together everything they had seen and experienced. The idea was beginning to form. “That’s the pattern, isn’t it?”

  “Aw, Dr. Titus has made the connection. Allow me to explain in further detail what the pattern is. You see, the universe, although quite expansive, is finite in its size. It has a set amount of mass and energy. The universe, therefore, is all linked together. Physics demands that all energy and mass must be conserved. It must always remain constant. What that means is that the creation of life or use of energy in one area must be equaled by the destruction or life or conversion of mass elsewhere. Every galaxy, every system, and every star are all connected to the same net of energy. All of this energy is in constant flux, flowing around us and through us. The pattern is the intricate web that all that passage of life force creates, and it spans across all time and locations.

  My people and I did not plant humanity on Earth; we are not your ancestors in that way, actually, quite the opposite. You are ours. You see, you believe that time runs in a continuous path from point A to point B, from beginning to end. In reality, time is continuous. When a moment passes it, does not disappear, it simply goes somewhere else. “

  Hill pushed a button on his desk and a three dimensional image of the Milky Way appeared in the center of the room. “You and the crew of Erebus set out from Earth to explore space and visit strange unknown solar systems. What you did not realize is that every system you visited was, in fact, the same. It was only a different time. Every solar system out there is. They represent every moment in time.”

  The display began spinning and zooming out, showing a vast picture of more and more stars. The colors and amount of shining lights looked like combining twenty fireworks displays into one picture. It was a truly impressive sight.

  Captain Hill pressed a small button on the desk and a solar system zoomed into a clear focus. “Think back to when you first visited solar system 1. You found living dinosaurs. When you narrowly escaped destruction from an asteroid impact, you were witnesses to their extinction. Even the DNA from your tragically perished settlers will become the seed for the development of mankind.

  In this solar system, what you call ‘Solar System 314’, your visit to Earth will become the evidence of alien life archaeologists and scientists find in ancient tombs. The destruction of the other shuttlecraft will be the inspiration for stories of battles in the sky. You are time travelers. The messages you transcribed from the back of the satellite will result in great technological leaps for man. During your short period of time on Earth, you taught cultures of irrigation, chemistry, and even migration need. Think back to your own history. There are so many archeological events of strange sights and a random jump in technology. Ancient cultures will make statues and carvings to immortalize your visit. You are gods in man’s history. It is my honor to be in your presence.”

  The room fell silent as Birch, Arenta, Jo, Dr. Titus, and Jones allowed the knowledge to sink in. They were connecting dots and realizing it all to be true. Jones was the first to finish his thoughts and had some questions of his own.

  “If every solar system is ours, then what’s with the burnt out solar system and the satellite dish?”

  “That’s the future. The satellite dish acts as an alarm. When your ship cuts off its signal, we know it’s time to head this way. You see, we have all done this before. It is all a cycle, a loop of time. Far into the future, your teaching of this day survives and guides us here so that we can complete the loop again.”

  “Complete the loop?”

  “Yes, all time is one big loop. Our existence is a constant that never ends. The end of time is simply the beginning again; round and round, we go. That is why we are here, to make sure the loop stays intact. It must all be the same; even the smallest difference will cause the system to break. That must not happen. If that were to happen, everything would come crashing down. The solar system must die, so that it never meets its end.”

  “So, eventually, our planets do burn. When? What happens that cooks the whole solar system?”

  “I can’t tell you how because I don’t know. What I do know is that, the solar system, in your near future, is destroyed. A select few escape Earth and survive by travelling to a distant solar system and settling a planet. That solar system is located here.” Hill pointed to a solar system the mission had labeled as Solar System 525. “You will settle Planet C there. It is rich in minerals but also much larger than your time’s Earth. Thus, why, over time, we have adapted with much stronger lower torsos, and shorter height.”

  “So we settle some distant planet in our past, then what?”

  “You live there. Mankind thrives and builds and continues to explore the cosmos that is our time loop. You and your descendants will build amazing ships of varying designs and size and visit Earth at different point along the time continuum. You will teach and help the primitive men there. There will be times even when you will employ genetic manipulation of the homo sapiens species to create homo sapiens sapiens, enlarging their mental capacity and resulting in modern humans. Then, after a long period of time, you finally build one last ship, and forsake the technological advances you’ve made. A small number upgrade the Erebus design, to the ship you see in front of you today. They leave the planet to complete this mission and then journey into the heart of the galaxy. The others stay behind and become the cavemen of the past or more specifically, homo floresiensis, a.k.a. the ‘hobbit people of Java.’ On that planet already are Neanderthals and several other species of the genus Homo. The current residents are the descendants of your settler’s genes. Eventually, our people become part of Earth’s history, and it begins again, the loop.

  “What’s at the center of the galaxy?”

  “Well, this beautiful machine, this wonderful loop requires energy to continue. It is our duty to feed it that energy with the implosion of our ship, and the mass of the last solar system planets.”

  “You’re just going to kill yourselves?”

  “Of course. It is our destiny.”

  “Why do you take the planets and how?” Dr. Titus chimed in, curious about the science.

  “Like I said, all mass is conserved with energy. So we feed energy into the universe with our ships implosion and the mass of a dead solar system. That energy and mass is then shared through the pattern’s connection across the universe. As for how, we use the PEMG technology and turn the planets themselves into engines. They move into the center of the universe by their own pull. All of this energy and mass conversion is what emits the radiation your scientists refer to as big bang radiation.”

  Commander Birch had moved back to his seat in the middle of the couch. “So when do you go to your sacrifice?”

  “Soon, after this talk, we must return to Earth for one last time. There is a cave in the New Mexican desert that must be coated in photo-absorbent paint and have talisman left in it. Don’t ask me why, it just must. Then we shall travel to the final dead solar system and complete our mission.”

  “I don’t like the idea of sacrifice.” Jones now sat quiet with the rest, all in silent anger. He never had liked the idea of destiny but felt the weight of it all pressing down on him.

  Hill looked on, puzzled. His entire life, he had been raised as
a cog in the machine, trained to accept that life is a perfect cycle and the duty to its preservation was the greatest job one could strive for.

  Commander Birch looked up at Hill. “So what do you want us to do now?”

  “It is now your job to go back to Earth, spread the knowledge of what you found and prepare to save the rest of the ancestors. Your Solar System has little time left before the catastrophe strikes. You and your crew, plus a list of others must be saved. If you don’t, if you deviate from what happened in the past or future, depending how you look at it, the consequences will be great. If you break the loop of time, we all cease to exist.”

  Hill’s volume and pitch were getting higher, nearly squeaking the last line. Taking a pause to recollect himself, he continued on with his instructions.

  “You will go from here and return to your ship. You will then tell the rest of your command crew what you have learned. Then the Erebus shall travel and orbit the moon of Jupiter you know as Europa, and wait for 5 years in serum sleep. Then you shall go back to Earth, at this exact date and time.” Hill picked up a small white piece of paper from his desk and handed it to Commander Birch. On the paper were a date, time, and location in simple black text. “You must be precise. When you return home as conquering heroes, tell everyone you can about what the solar systems really are, and about the time loop. While that is going on, Captain Jones, you will take your security forces and retrieve the people on this list.” Hill produced another one-sided sheet of paper and handed it to Jones. “Make sure they make it on the ship. They must be unharmed, but they don’t have to be willing. Remember, only they and your crew can make it on the ship. Go now, we will re-enable your ship once you have landed in your shuttle bay.”

  “That’s it? Just leave and go home?” Dr. Titus was almost dumbfounded. The amount of knowledge that had just been dropped on them was astounding. How were they supposed to act normal and just continue of their mission?

  “Yes, Dr. Titus, from here, you will continue your mission and return to Earth. Your mission parameters have been met; it is time for the mission to come to an end. There are no unanswered questions to drive you forward. You know the answers and you know what you must do. Those sheets of paper are now your mission.”

  The door on the room opened and outside, the greeter stood, ushering the group out.

  Commander Birch rose and began to walk toward the door. Jo leaned over and spoke openly. “What? We’re just leaving now?”

  Birch turned to her. “Yes, we are. We have a responsibility.”

  “Responsibility? This alien just killed our friends, then told us some wild story and you just take him at his word?”

  Dr. Titus spoke up. “It all makes sense, Jo. I don’t really see a break in his logic, and scientifically, it is possible.”

  “Scientifically? Does this feel wrong to anyone else?”

  “Dr. Taylor, we can’t act on feelings. We act on facts. Captain Hill has given us evidence that our solar system is ending soon and we can save some of our kind. We need to follow his instructions.”

  “That can’t be the only course of action.”

  “This is not a discussion, Dr. Taylor. This is not a democracy. I am in command and we are leaving. From now on, only speak if you have something to tell us about biology.”

  With that, the Erebus crew leaders left Captain Hill and the Erebus II, new orders in hand. They had a new mission they had to complete, for the sake of all mankind.

  13.The Debate

  “There’s nothing wrong with the engine?” Alex had been trying for hours to diagnose why the Erebus wasn’t moving. He was now staring at the ship’s engineer, Justin Franks. He was dripping sweat after just shedding an environmental suit. Franks had been crawling among the vibration dampeners and rods, attempting to search for any break or malfunction.

  “That’s what I’m telling you, Alex. I can’t explain what’s going on.” Franks and Alex were in the engineering room. While Franks had been squeezing through a hellish maze of twisted metal, Alex had been sitting at the computer, running tests in an attempt to find the problem with the PEMG engine system. Everything had reported fine, they were running out of ideas. The only anomaly was a slight increase in heat in half of the vibrational pylons. Alex had a hunch. Leaning back in his chair, Alex yelled over the hum of the engine room to Franks, who was now shedding the last piece of the bulky environmental suit.

  “Is the hull still reverberating in tune with the engine?” Franks looked at Alex with a blank face. He had been so concerned with the PEMG engine that he hadn’t thought to check the vibrational transference.

  Franks picked up his tablet from the metal workbench next to him and tapped a few icons. His eyebrows furrowed as the results filled the page. Alex knew the answer before Franks read off the results from his diagnostic. “Exactly half of our skin is vibrating at the opposite frequency than the navigational profile you’ve entered. It’s the half that is facing that other ship out there.”

  “How quickly can you change the frequency of the PEMG engine?”

  “How big of a change?”

  “Just a slight alteration.”

  “Nearly instantaneously then, it won’t hone in on the signal right away but it will definitely begin to change. Why?”

  “I think that the weapon the other ship is using is a lot like that satellite we found. Only this time, the ship is much smaller. The large satellite signal was big enough to surround our ship and vibrate the skin of the Erebus at a frequency that kept it in place. This enemy ship’s weapon can’t be as powerful. So if we changed the engine’s PEMG frequency, we should be able to move to the side and get out of here.”

  “Okay, Alex, I’m lost now, and I’m the engineer.”

  “Imagine the signal weapon coming from that ship out there. It is directed, so if you could see the signal, it would appear as a cone, spreading out the farther from the source it got. As long as we are in that cone, its effect on our ship results in a directly opposite pull from the PEMG navigation we had put into the computer. It’s like we are being anchored to them. If we alter the formula slightly, in either direction, then our pull will have a component of lateral movement to it. That should allow us to move out of their “cone” of influence.”

  “Couldn’t they just turn their ship?”

  “Yes, but because we aren’t pulling with as much force away from their ship, our path will be altered. Essentially, we will start travelling closer to them in a circular path, and the closer we get to ship, the easier it will be to escape that signal, because the cone would be thinner. The second we get out of that signal, we are free.”

  “Well, if that’s true, we can divert more power into the engine with a new formula and get out of here.” Engineer Franks ran to a control panel and starting pushing buttons and turning dials.

  “Stop! We can’t do it yet. They still have half the command crew on board that ship.”

  “So what do we do?”

  Alex rubbed his tired eyes. Their hands were tied. If they broke free of the ship, the command crew was almost certainly dead. Even if they could break free, who knew what the enemy ship’s capability was for pursuit? The Erebus had no options. “We do nothing.” Alex stood and walked toward the exit. Just before leaving, he turned and added, “But be ready, in case we need to get out of here in a hurry.”

  Now that they figured out how to get moving again, they were still trapped, unable to do anything. Alex hated not having control over his own life. They wouldn’t leave someone behind though, especially friends.

  “Alex Runner, report to the shuttle deck immediately. Repeat, Alex Runner report to the shuttle deck.”

  Alex was already on the elevator, leaving the engineering floor for his quarters, when the announcement blared from the ship’s PA system. He reached out and pushed the button sending him back down to level 5. What the hell could be going wrong now?

  It had been a rough couple of hours since the command crew left. Dissent f
rom the previous uprising still echoed in the halls. Several crewmembers had been unhappy with working double and triple shifts as a result of the imprisonment of a large portion of the Erebus’ workforce. A few had even refused to work. Alex was bribing them with a hidden stash of chocolate he had brought with him from Earth, but he was running out fast.