by Ben Bova
One in particular raised hopes of being really Earthlike: Sirius C. It was almost the same size as Earth, and although its parent star was a fiercely blazing blue-white giant, much larger and hotter than the Sun, the planet’s orbit lay at the “Goldilocks” distance from Sirius where its surface temperature was not too hot, and not too cold for liquid water to exist.
On Earth, liquid water means life. Beneath the frozen iron sands of Mars, liquid water melting from the permafrost hosts an underground biosphere of microbial life forms. In the ice-covered seas of Jupiter’s major moons, living organisms abound. In the planet-girdling ocean beneath the eternal clouds of giant Jupiter itself, life teems and flourishes.
But Sirius C was a challenge to the scientists. The planet shouldn’t exist, not by all that they knew of astrophysics. And it couldn’t possibly bear life, Goldilocks notwithstanding, not sandwiched between brilliant Sirius A and its white dwarf star companion, Sirius B. The dwarf had erupted in a series of nova explosions eons ago. The death throes of Sirius B must have sterilized any planets in the vicinity, boiled away any atmosphere or ocean.
But there it was, a rocky, Earth-sized planet, the only planet in the Sirius system, orbiting Sirius A in a nearly perfect circle. Spectroscopic studies showed it had an Earthlike atmosphere—and oceans of liquid water.
Might there be a chance that the planet did harbor some kind of life forms? The astrobiologists worked overtime concocting theories to support the hope that the Earth-sized planet might indeed host an Earth-type biosphere. The popular media had no such problem. They quickly dubbed Sirius C “New Earth.”
For nearly a full century, while governments and corporations all over the world toiled to alleviate the catastrophic results of the climate change, Earth’s eagerly inquisitive scientists hurled robotic space probes toward Sirius C. Even at the highest thrust that fusion rockets could produce, the probes took decades to reach their objective, more than eight light-years from Earth. Yet once they arrived at the planet, what they saw confirmed the most cherished hopes of both the scientists and the general public.
Sirius C was indeed a New Earth. The planet bore broad blue seas of water, its continents were richly green with vegetation. There was no sign of intelligent life, no cities or farmlands or roads, no lights or radio communications, but the planet truly was a New Earth, unpopulated, virginal, beckoning.
Impatient to explore this new world in greater detail, the International Astronautical Authority asked the World Council to fund the human exploration of Sirius C. The Council procrastinated, citing the enormous costs of mitigating the disasters caused by the global climate shift. Then the lunar nation of Selene stepped forward and offered to build a starship. Shamed into grudging cooperation, the Council reluctantly joined the effort—meagerly.
They named the starship Gaia, after the Earth deity who represented the web of life. Gaia would travel to Sirius more slowly than the robotic probes, to protect its fragile human cargo. It would take some eighty years for the ship to reach Sirius C.
Men and women from all around the world volunteered for the mission. They were carefully screened for physical health and mental stability. As one of the examining psychotechnicians put it, “You’d have to be at least a little crazy to throw away eighty years just to get there.”
But the crew of Gaia would not age eighty years. They would sleep away the decades of their journey in cryonic suspension, frozen in liquid nitrogen, as close to death as human bodies can get and still survive.
Gaia was launched with great fanfare: humankind’s first mission to the stars. The explorers would spend five years mapping the planet in detail, studying its biosphere, and building a base for the backup missions to work from.
By the time the ship arrived in orbit around Sirius C, eighty years later, only a handful of dedicated scientists back on Earth were still interested in the mission. Most of the human race was struggling to survive the catastrophic second wave of greenhouse flooding, as the ice caps of Greenland and Antarctica melted down. The backup missions had been postponed, again and again, and finally shelved indefinitely by the World Council.
Even the eagerly waiting scientists saw nothing, heard nothing from the explorers, for it would take more than eight years for messages to travel from Sirius back to Earth.
ALONE
Alone in the wardroom, Jordan poured himself another cup of tea, then sat at one of the tables and stared in fascination at the planet sliding by in the wall screen’s display.
It certainly looks like Earth, he thought. The data bar running along the base of the screen showed that the planet’s atmosphere was astonishingly close to Earth’s: 22 percent oxygen, 76 percent nitrogen, the remaining 2 percent a smattering of carbon dioxide, water vapor, and inert gases. The biggest difference from Earth was that Sirius C had a much thicker ozone layer high in its atmosphere: not unexpected, since the star Sirius emitted much more ultraviolet light than the Sun.
Jordan shook his head in wonder. It’s like a miracle, he said to himself. Too good to be true. But then he realized that this was the first planet orbiting another star that human eyes had seen close up. What do we know about exoplanets? Perhaps Earthlike worlds are commonplace.
Enough speculation, he told himself. Get to work. Time to go to the command center and see what the mission controllers have to say to us.
Clasping his half-finished mug of tea in one hand, Jordan went back into the passageway and walked to the command center. It was a smallish compartment with a horseshoe of six workstation consoles curving around a single high-backed chair whose arms were studded with control buttons. Display screens covered the bulkheads, most of them showing the condition and performance of the ship’s various systems; others offered views of the planet they orbited.
Jordan slipped into the command chair and frowned briefly at the keypads set into its armrests. He tried to remember which one activated the communications system. The symbols on each pad had always reminded him of children’s sketches. The propulsion system’s symbol was a triangle with wavy lines emanating from it. Life support a heart shape.
Communications was the headset symbol, he recalled. Touching that pad, Jordan called for the latest message from Earth. He reminded himself that the message he was about to see was sent from Earth more than eight years ago. It takes messages eight point six years to travel from Earth to Sirius.
A woman’s face appeared on the main screen, above the row of consoles. She was a handsome woman, with dark hair pulled tightly back off her face. Strong cheekbones and a fine, straight nose. Her eyes were large and so deeply brown they looked almost black—and unutterably sorrowful.
“I am Felicia Ionescu, the newly appointed director of the International Astronautical Authority,” she said, in a carefully measured alto register. “This message is being sent to reach you on the day that your ship attains orbit around the planet Sirius C.”
Recorded more than eight years ago, Jordan repeated to himself.
“I hope that you have all survived the flight to Sirius and that you are well, and ready to begin the exploration of the planet.”
Jordan thought her welcoming message was strangely heavy, bleak. Where’s the congratulations? Where are the clichés about how all of Earth is thrilled that you’ve reached your destination?
“When you departed from Earth,” Ionescu went on, “eighty years ago, we were recovering from the worldwide flooding caused by the global greenhouse warming.” She took in a breath. “Unfortunately, now—eighty years later—a new wave of flooding has struck, caused by the continued warming of the global climate.”
Her image disappeared, replaced by pictures of devastation: cities drowned, coastlines inundated, storms lashing fleeing refugees. Jordan stared in open-mouthed horror.
“Because of these calamities,” Ionescu’s voice said over the views of disaster, “the World Council has been unable to authorize the backup missions that were in the IAA’s original program plan.”
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nbsp; The screen showed her face once more. She looked miserable. “I will work to my utmost to get the World Council to fund backup missions, eventually. But, for the present, you twelve members of the Gaia mission are alone in your exploration of Sirius C. I wish you well.”
And her image winked off.
THE NEWS FROM EARTH
For long moments Jordan sat in the command chair, shocked beyond words. He could feel his heart thudding beneath his ribs, his stomach roiling.
Alone, he thought.
At last he pulled himself to his feet. Very well, then, he told himself. Alone. We have everything we need for a five-year stay at Sirius C. We’ll do the best we can with what we’ve got and then we’ll go home.
Yes, he thought. Now to break the cheery news to the rest of the team.
As resolutely as he could manage, Jordan marched back to the wardroom. Only one other person was there: Mitchell Thornberry, the roboticist, standing before the wall-screen display of New Earth.
“Hello, Mitchell.”
Thornberry turned to face Jordan, a wide smile breaking across his fleshy face. “Top o’ the morning to ya.”
He was a solidly built man from the University of Dublin, just about Jordan’s own height but thicker, heavier in the torso and limbs. His jowly face almost always displayed a quizzical little smile, as though the ways of his fellow humans amused him slightly. Or puzzled him.
Thornberry was wearing a loudly patterned open-necked shirt hanging over rumpled trousers. He looked as if he’d just come in from an afternoon picnic.
“And a very pleasant good morning to you, sir,” said Jordan. And he thought, I’ll wait until they’re all here, the whole team together. No sense breaking the news eleven separate times.
“Well, we made it,” Thornberry said, jabbing a finger toward the wall screen.
“It’s uncanny, isn’t it?” Jordan said. “It could be Earth’s twin.”
Thornberry shrugged. “It is what it is.” Heading toward the dispensing machines, he added, “I’ll let the scientists argue about how the planet could be so Earthlike. Me, all I’ve got to do is set up a working base down there on the surface and tend to me robots.”
Pecking at the food dispensers, Thornberry pulled out a thick sandwich of beef cultured from the biovats, and a tall glass of chilled fruit juice.
“They should have packed some beer aboard for us,” he grumbled as he brought his tray to the table where Jordan was sitting.
“No alcoholic beverages,” Jordan reminded him. “The health and safety experts agreed on that.”
“Ahhh,” Thornberry growled. “A bunch of pissant academics with water in their veins.”
Jordan smiled at the Irishman. Then he remembered that he too was hungry. He went to the dispensers and selected a salad from the ship’s hydroponics garden. Then he returned to his cooling tea and sat down beside Thornberry.
“Wasn’t your hair darker?” Thornberry asked, his thick brows knitting.
“It was,” said Jordan, unconsciously fingering his mustache.
“Do you feel all right?”
“Yes. Fairly normal,” Jordan replied as he sat down next to Thornberry. “A little shaky. I wonder how effective the memory uploading really is.”
“Good enough,” Thornberry said. “I can remember what we had for dinner the night before we left. And the Guinness that went with it.” Then he sank his teeth into his sandwich.
“And you?” Jordan asked. “How do you feel?”
Thornberry swallowed before answering, “All right, more or less. Cold. Deep inside, I feel cold. I don’t know that I’ll ever feel warm again.”
“Psychosomatic, I imagine.”
“Oh? And who made you a psychotechnician?”
That stung. Of the dozen men and women on the ship, Jordan alone was neither a scientist nor an engineer. He was merely the head of the mission.
As brightly as he could manage, Jordan changed the subject. “The artificial gravity system seems to be working fine, after all these years.”
Thornberry shrugged. “It’s just a big Ferris wheel. Nothing exotic about it.”
“No, I suppose not.”
“Here we are!”
Turning, Jordan saw his younger brother, Brandon, entering the wardroom, together with Elyse Rudaki, the Iranian astrophysicist.
Brandon looked like an improved edition of Jordan: younger, taller, handsomer. Brandon’s nose was thinner, nobler, his eyes a shade lighter. When he smiled he could light up a room. Like Jordan, he wore a turtleneck shirt and comfortable denim jeans.
Elyse looked like royalty: tall, slim, elegant, her sculpted face unsmiling, utterly serious. Her complexion was light, almost pale, a stunning contrast to her thick, lustrous dark hair, which she had piled high on her head, making her look even taller, more regal. Although she was wearing a casual blouse of light blue atop darker slacks, Jordan pictured her in a glittering red and gold sari.
But he thought she seemed somewhat uncertain of herself, as if slightly disoriented from drugs or drink. The upload, Jordan told himself. It’s not perfect. Then he thought, Perhaps she’s frightened. We’re a long way from home. Or perhaps you’re just projecting your own fears.
Getting to his feet again, Jordan smiled as he held out a chair for her. “Welcome to Sirius C, Elyse.”
Before she could reply, Brandon gasped, “My god, Jordy, your hair’s turned totally white!”
Forcing a smile, Jordan replied, “I prefer to think of it as silver. Rather becoming, don’t you think?”
“I guess so,” Brandon said uncertainly. “Are you … do you feel okay?”
“I feel fine,” Jordan assured him.
Still looking doubtful, Brandon turned toward the wall display and called to the voice-recognition system, “Display screen, show us news broadcasts from Earth.”
“No, wait…”
“Don’t get huffy with me, Jordy. We can look at the planet any time. I want to see what’s happening back home, don’t you?”
With a resigned nod, Jordan replied, “I suppose so.”
Elyse still stood beside him while Jordan held her chair. The wall screen broke into a dozen separate pictures. The IAA is beaming news and entertainment vids to us, Jordan remembered. It’s all automatic, preprogrammed. And it’s all eight years old.
The screens showed cities that looked unfamiliar to Jordan, women dressed in strange styles, newscasters wearing what looked like uniforms, sports matches that looked superficially like football and cricket and even tennis, but not quite right. Distorted. Changed.
Where’s the flooding and disasters Ionescu showed me? Jordan wondered. Then he realized that newscasts and entertainment vids carefully avoided such unpleasantries.
“Palm trees in Boston?” Brandon marveled.
Elyse said, “The fashions are very revealing.”
“Must be summertime,” said Thornberry.
“Everywhere?”
“Eighty years have passed on Earth,” Jordan pointed out. “Everything is slightly different. It’s not the same world that we left behind us.”
Thornberry wiped his mouth with his napkin and commented, “That’s the way things were back home some eight years ago. It’s taken eight and a half years for those signals to get from Earth to here.”
“Eight point six years,” Jordan murmured.
“Ah, who’s counting?” Thornberry wisecracked.
But Brandon did not smile. “Look at them. Going about their lives perfectly normally.”
“There doesn’t seem to be any war,” said Elyse, her voice hushed, subdued. “No violence.”
“Or the news nets aren’t showing any,” said Brandon.
“Or mission control decided not to let us see any,” Jordan said.
“Saints alive!” Thornberry pointed at one of the scenes. “Look! There’s people scuba diving through a drowned city.”
They all stared at the underwater scene.
“It looks like Sydney,” Th
ornberry muttered. “Look! There’s the opera house, half underwater.”
“But not a word about us,” Brandon grumbled.
“That newscast is eight years old,” Thornberry pointed out.
Brandon insisted, “They knew we’d have arrived at our destination. But there’s nothing in the news about it.”
“I think I know why,” Jordan said.
OUTCASTS
Thornberry looked up at Jordan from beneath his shaggy brows. “Do you, now?”
“What is it?” Brandon demanded.
“Let’s wait until the others get here,” Jordan said. “I’ll explain it to all of you at once.”
Thornberry looked curious, Elyse worried. Brandon put on the irritated look that Jordan had seen all his brother’s life: half sulking, half impatience.
One by one the other members of the team filtered into the wardroom: three more women, five men. They all looked uncertain, a bit shaky. Only to be expected after an eighty-year sleep, Jordan thought. You didn’t look too peppy yourself, those first few minutes.
How will they feel once they’ve heard the news I have to tell them? he asked himself.
The others helped themselves to food and drink, then slowly sat at the tables and watched the screen displays from Earth.
Brandon sat himself beside Elyse and said, “All right, Jordy. We’re all here. What is it that you’ve got to tell us?”
Jordan stepped in front of the wall screen and looked at the eleven of them. Four women, seven men, their eyes focused on him.
“I’m afraid I have some disappointing news,” he began. “There isn’t going to be a backup mission.”
“What?”
“No backup? But the IAA—”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s been a second wave of greenhouse flooding,” Jordan tried to explain. “Even worse than the original floods, five generations ago. The World Council has reneged on the backup missions, they’ve got too much reconstruction and resettlement to do.”