by J J Perry
They were now in the Oort cloud, over ten thousand astronomical units (AU) from the sun. This was the most dangerous part of each of the missions. Their course had been up and away from where the chance of collision with objects was highest, the planetary disk. This also avoided the Kuiper Belt. Despite this, they had a collision with a tiny object in the beginning of entry into the Oort. It fortunately glanced off the giant accelerator, not the ship itself. The bad news about Oort was that it contained billions of objects, all capable of ending the mission in a spectacular but immediate and painless way. The good news was that these objects were spaced enormous distances apart. Probabilities favored that none of the twenty-five missions would get clipped. However, they already had been. Their ship could get hit again, the chances not diminished by the recent strike now passed. The events of the past smother me. No, they ripped me to shreds. Demoted, cast off, castigated. Hell, I have been essentially castrated. But he tried not to think about it.
Tonight they would begin a course correction, presumably the last major change. They would make a twenty-five-degree turn over one week, hardly noticeable to the crew. This would angle them obliquely toward the center of the galaxy located behind the constellation Sagittarius. As a boy outside Damascus, Lebanon, I used to lie on my back in July and August beneath Cygnus and Aquila, giant birds flying up the Milky Way away from the black hole hiding behind the Archer, the constellation that looked more like a teapot than a guy shooting arrows to him. I never dreamed I would be flying toward it at half the speed of light as I am now. I was so excited to be a part of this adventure until it started. For a while, I was in command, as I should have been from the start instead of that randy chink. By sticking up for what was unquestionably right, I, Cyrus Paria, was busted. It was unfair and humiliating. But then to be replaced by a split tail. It had destroyed the last little fiber of meaning to this hopelessly optimistic quest. Savanna the scud, good from far, far from good, got him into this and then flushed him out the crapper for doing what she usually did—look out for the small guy. OK, Suresh was not small but still. I can’t afford think about this too much. It’ll drove me crazy, suicidal. He hated power, despised it until he had it. Then it felt intoxicating. The high didn’t last. It never would.
He had to think Science, find comfort in the wonders he could see on his screen, and appreciate from the dreams of his ugly youth. But don’t go back there, not to my wasteland of privation, the arid, igneous solitude, the crucible of malice. Suicide. Not more waiting for the inevitable but taking action, being in charge, having power again.
On the ship, they were never aware by their senses that the REAP 23 turned one complete rotation about every thirty-six hours. This roll was to enable the several telescopes and sensors to photograph the entire region through which they were flying without the engine getting in the way and fed back to control. Because of their velocity, if they transmitted at 1,000 Hz, their signal would be, how nice, a math problem to occupy his mind. He called up the formula, punched in their velocity according to base. The signal would be received at about 600 Hz. Control could tell exactly how fast they were traveling by this Doppler shift. Control would probably stop transmitting to REAP 23 very soon, since, given their acceleration and velocity, the messages would not reach them before there was no one awake to listen. Plus the signal strength dropped with distance, like Savanna, the bitch. She was light-years away. He no longer felt a thing for her. Other than simmering hate. And not just her. This mission, the others, the…
Cyrus heard the lift door open. “Hey, Cy. I had to get away from the women.”
It was Raul, acting like we’re buddies. What a moron. Cyrus said nothing but turned back to a blank screen and, to his thoughts, wishing to appear hostile and unapproachable.
“Time for a guy chat. We are outnumbered, man. Maybe you are fine with your thoughts off in your own little universe, but your body is here, and, in my opinion as the resident psychiatrist, you need to blow off some steam. Of course, you won’t unless you want to.” Raul walked in a circular orbit around Cyrus and his workstation. “But, my dear Cyrus, I am going to make you an offer that will be difficult to turn down. In fact, resistance is futile.”
Cyrus remained taciturn. “I don’t think so, Raul.”
“If you forego this opportunity, you do so just to be stubborn. You despise making decisions based on emotion. Every time this has come up,” he said, waving a finger in front of his face, “you climb up on your soap box and preach like an evangelical. You are emotional about being unemotional, rational, and logical. So do you really want to be an emotional wimp?”
“Get lost.” He detested his good looks and his effeminate Spanish accent.
“Do you have no curiosity about this unbelievable offer?”
“No.”
“In this case, no means yes. I asked if you had no curiosity, and you said no, which means you are curious.”
“Leave me alone.”
“Would you believe that I stole stash from Savanna? I have some of her diethylamides.”
Raul placed a pink-and-beige capsule in front of Cyrus. His curiosity was piqued. “She guards these things. How did you get it?”
“There are certain techniques that I choose not to reveal, Cy. I have two of these babies. May I recommend that we adjourn to the Rec deck and take a wild ride?”
“What exactly are you thinking?”
“You have used the ‘five cents’ on the Recreation deck before, the five-sense reality booth, right?
“A couple of times.”
“Have you used a diethylamide to enhance the experience?”
“I don’t do drugs.”
“Being married to Savanna, I find that hard to believe.”
“Believe it. I don’t use any recreational stuff.”
“OK. As you know, the reality booth is very good all by itself, but when you release some of the constraints in your head, it goes far beyond real. I can’t believe that you have never done this.”
“Believe it.”
“So, Cyrus, this is my prescription, the most harmless way to blow off some tension. Just take the pill and pick the sensory program of your choosing. Within minutes, you will start to have the most intense experience of your life.”
“Give it a rest, Raul.”
“Would you leave a wounded comrade on the battlefield?”
“What are to talking about?”
“You. I am talking about you.” Raul sat on a chair, straddling the backrest and rolled closer. “You are angry, miserable, and, frankly, a threat to yourself and others. You are up here plotting some type of reaction because you are pissed off. You are in essence wounded. I am the guy who is staying back to haul your butt into safety. I offer you not threats of pain but promises of pleasure like you have never experienced as your therapy. What would a rational mind choose, Cyrus?”
“Maybe I want pain.”
“Then pick a program with lots of pain. This will make it more intense.”
“OK,” Cyrus said with a long sigh of annoyance. “That sounds better.” That was true. The thought of pain was appealing. It would temper him. Besides, this collection of assholes would probably force him to rehabilitate to their own twisted morality. He might as well concede without a fight. After all, he was a figurative gelding.
“First, take your medicine.” Raul nudged the pastel capsule toward him with a forefinger.
He wondered if this was a subterfuge. Did they want to knock him out? Give him an anti-this or that to make him compliant. He rolled the pill. It looked exactly like one of Savanna’s—her crutch, her escape, her salvation that she had used since before they met. It had never hurt her or left her impaired in the many times he knew she used.
But it was a capsule. The contents could have been changed to a zombie-producing, will-erasing pharmaceutical. Or cyanide. He didn’t care. Nothing mattered anymo
re. If they wanted him dead, fine. The sooner the better. He was thinking about it all day along for weeks, for months anyway.
His hesitation and concern over consequences over, Cyrus picked it up and popped it in his mouth followed by a dry swallow. They walked to the stairwell and took the five flights down. In Recreation against a wall, two small booths were stacked one on top of the other. Instead of a theater, the most engaging entertainment was delivered to an individual using a five-sense reality booth. It was nicknamed five cents for obvious reasons, and the standing joke was that participants got more than a nickel’s worth of thrills. Such booths could be linked together for a collective experience, but the ship had only two machines, not hundreds that might be found in cities of size. Actors and animation were used for the visual and language input. The participant chose to be one of several participants in the show. In violent scenarios, the participants would experience pain of blows, cuts, gunshots, and broken bones. They smelled, tasted, heard, and felt. In romances, they could savor the thrill of falling in love and the pangs of despair as their newfound lover was in danger and possibly dead or injured. You could choose to be cop or robber, hero or villain, sleuth or saboteur.
“Do you feel guilt or pleasure down here, Raul? From when you did the deed with Lucinda.”
“It makes me feel horrible, to be honest. So here we are. What kind of entertainment are you in the mood for?”
While this style of entertainment was highly engaging, many people could not shut their mind off from daily stresses, job, kids, conflict, and other distractions. This is where the drugs were sometimes used to enhance the experience. You could get drugs chemically related to psychedelics that lasted about one hour or so that permitted the brain to immerse itself into one activity and forget the others. Diethylamides belonged to one class of drugs that were not chemically addictive. Over a century before, they had been banned, but copious data had been produced to indicate they were completely safe, although they diminished the ability to multitask. Many occupations still banned its use on the job, and scattered conservative religions railed against them. The ability of the brain to focus on this activity at the exclusion of all else made the booth experience extraordinarily realistic.
“Violence.”
“I thought you might be in the mood to do some damage. However, that’s not going to be helpful. So, Cyrus, what I have done is found an old program, older than either of us, that portrays ancient Persia. I updated it a bit. You could be your namesake.”
“Cyrus, the king, who freed the Jews.”
“Good thoughts, good words, good deeds. His influence, arguably, changed the personality of the old testament God from one to be feared to a god of love.”
References to Judeo-Christian anything infuriated him. He bit his lip and tried to control his breathing and the urge to smash the fine Castilian nose back into that aristocratic mind. “What’s in it?” He managed to speak evenly.
“You’ll get enough violence along with love, conflict, and heroism. I think you’ll dig it, dude, as Chen would have said.”
With that, Cyrus entered the booth, sat in the soft reality couch, dropped the visor, and started the show. It was an epic that would probably last over three hours, depending somewhat on how Cyrus acted and reacted. Raul activated an alarm on the door that would sound on his communicator so he would know when Cyrus had exited. He returned to the mess hall to see if Maricia was still there.
The three women were still talking about Cyrus. Raul walked in silently, he thought. “Raul is back,” said Lucinda, who was facing the entrance to the room.
“What’s up?” Maricia asked.
“I found Cyrus in CAC wallowing in despair, probably plotting the overthrow of all order and instituting anarchy. He is over in Rec right now, engaged in entertainment.”
“That is not very reassuring, knowing his latest choices in pictures,” Savanna said.
“He is watching some old show about ancient Persia with harems and combat, heavily laced with Zoroastrian influences. I also programmed some additional pheromones that should make him happy.”
“You are a doctor now?” Maricia asked.
“Dr. Feelgood. I’m just doing to him what you have done for me a couple of times, Mar. He needs a reset. I gave him a poppy and locked him in for three hours.”
“Maybe that will work,” Savanna said. “Where’d you get the pill?”
“I brought a few, as did you.”
“Oh.”
Three hours later, Cyrus emerged exhausted and crusted with dried sweat. Raul and Savanna were doing yoga just outside the booth in anticipation.
“That was intense.” Pausing in front of Savanna, he went to speak but stopped. He left the room.
Raul raised his eyebrows at Savanna and followed Cyrus out the door. The room grew silent. She hoped without much rationale that Cyrus would come back, not necessarily to her but to reason.
7.0
MISSION DAY 181
Raul, scruffy after three days of not shaving, slowly climbed the single flight of stairs to CAC where he found Savanna, seated in the pilot’s chair. “I swear,” he said, “those stairs get longer every week.”
“Buck up, Raul. And get a shave.” They were both tired.
“How long will we be in Oort?”
“Another year or so.”
“It makes me nervous,” he said, rubbing his chin and looking at her screen. “Anyway, the daily traffic is here, sent three months ago.” As Raul spoke, Savanna tapped on her screen to bring up the message. “Parts of the message are too degraded to interpret, sorry. Even with focused, phased array radio transmitters out of the atmosphere and the huge antenna built into the engine skin, the distance is so great that we are losing data as marked in the text.”
She scanned quickly through the document. “I wonder what that meant,” she murmured as she perused.
HEALTH AND MEDICAL NOTICE
REAP MISSIONS 24 AND 25 HAVE BEEN POSTPONED UNT [LOAST DATA] RD REVIEWS [LD] REPORTS OF UNU [LD] BEHAVIOR [LD] HOSIS ABOARD MISSIONS [LD] 13, 18, 19 AND 21. PSY [LD] FILES OF REAP 23 157 ALL REAP PERSONNEL HAVE BEEN HEAVILY SCREENED PRIOR [LD] REANALYZED SINCE THE LAST TWO REPORTS WERE [LD] INGS ARE OF SUFFICIENT CONCER [LD] WARRANT SUSPENSION OF FUTURE MISSIONS UNTI [LD] NDATIOS ARE AVAILABLE
“It doesn’t sound good,” Raul said. “Postponed or suspended missions for some reason, probably unusual behavior.”
“We know a little bit about that. I notice that our mission is not listed.”
“This was from three months ago. We reported Parambi first a little over three months ago. The messages passed each other. They did not have it when this was sent.”
“Our report will put the icing on the cake.”
“Fruitcake?” Raul gave a wry grin.
“Funny. This partial word looks like psychosis. I bet they won’t be sending any other missions until they get this straightened out, which could be never. I see heads rolling in Stockholm in a few months.”
“Savanna, it has been a few months. It may already be over. I can see them closing down Schaefer, at least the REAP buildings, a year early.”
“With so much lost transmission data and these broken messages, I wonder if it is worth sending and receiving.”
“I think I’ll condense each transmission and send it twice. Hopefully, they can put the two messages together and figure it out.”
“Good thinking, Raul.”
“Maybe part of the reason the messages are breaking up is dust. When we had the collision a couple of months ago, we may have passed through a cloud or trail. I doubt we’ll ever know because our scientist had gone mad at that point.”
“Yeah. One of us should talk to Lucinda about that at some point. How do you feel about sharing the new message with the crew?”
“We should. Maybe they can fill in the blanks, like a crossword
with no clues.”
“They could make it say anything,” Savanna paused in thought. “Raul, did you have the computer try to reconstruct the message using the noise in the gaps? It is saved, is it not?”
“I can’t believe you thought of that before I did. I’ll go to work on it now. See you later.”
“One more thing, Raul.” He turned in the exit to listen. “Thanks again for your help with Cyrus a couple of weeks ago.”
Raul swatted as if to say it was nothing as he turned and went down the stairs.
Savanna, as commander, made the rule that the entire crew would meet at least once daily. This was typically over dinner. If a more formal atmosphere were needed, they would meet some other time. Dinner was just about over.
“‘Psychotic Scientists in Space.’ I can see the headlines,” Lucinda said wryly.
“‘Psychotic Scientists Scuttle Ships in Space,’” added Maricia.
“‘Several Sessile Psychotic Space Super Scientists Sabotage and Scuttle Ships,’” Lucinda countered.
“This is going to get worse if it doesn’t stop,” Raul said.
“Loose screws sink ships,” Savanna said.
“This is a PR nightmare for the European Space Exploration Program as well as for REAP,” Raul said.
“Out of our control,” Savanna said.
“‘Space Psychosis Spurs Psychiatric Special Session, Stuns Scientific Societies,’” Maricia said.
“We are the only ship out here capable of sending a communication,” Raul said. “I think we should send a public statement, a plea to continue funding the program because of its huge importance.”
“It’s a waste of time,” Cyrus said. “No one will pay much attention.”
“I think a short, potent message would be nice,” Savanna said. “Do you want to write a draft that the rest of us can look at, Raul?”
“‘Psychotic Syzygy Stalls Spaceships,’” Lucinda said.
“Sure. I would be happy to.”
“That was good, Luc,” Maricia said.