Alpha Contact

by P. K. Hawkins

  “I… I wanted to talk to you about the nuclear device,” Johnson said. She wouldn’t look him in the eye, which made it easier for him to hide his surprise.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Bernhard said.

  “I like movies.”

  Bernhard paused, unsure how he was supposed to respond to that. He knew that scientists had a reputation, not always earned, of being odd, but this was just plain baffling. “Uh, okay. I’m not sure what…”

  “I like all kinds of movies,” she said. Finally, she looked at him with a bizarre intensity. “I like action movies. Sci-fi movies. Superhero movies. Things like that.”

  “I’m still not…”

  “In movies, something big or strange happens,” Johnson said. “Like some kind of creature shows up, or something magical happens, and no one knows what to do about it. People get scared. The military gets called in.”

  Bernhard thought he was beginning to understand the point this strange woman was trying to make. “You’re not happy that the first thing we’re doing when a potential alien ship appears in orbit is to send a military strike team, are you?”

  “I understand why that’s necessary,” Johnson said. “I don’t like it, but I understand. I would love to think that this is first contact and there are some extra-terrestrials aboard the Visitor that is going to bring us a new era of peace on Earth. But if that’s wrong, that’s what you guys are there for. I get that.”

  “But there’s still something you’re uncomfortable about, isn’t there?” Bernhard prompted.

  Johnson nodded. “In the movies, there’s always some kind of backup. A way to destroy everything if something goes wrong. The military will attack the creature or the ship with something. If they’re afraid of it enough, the thing they attack with is some kind of nuclear weapon. There’s always a nuclear weapon in these situations. And it’s always a terrible mistake. It makes the creature stronger, or the aliens turn it around on the good guys.”

  “Okay. I see where you’re coming from, Dr. Johnson. But this isn’t the movies. We’re not taking some kind of nuclear bomb up to the Visitor.”

  “Of course that’s what you would say,” Johnson said. “And I don’t blame you for lying to me. But I know it’s part of the plan. It always is.”

  “Dr. Johnson, maybe this isn’t the kind of thing you should be talking with me about,” Bernhard said. “If you’re that convinced there’s some secret agenda to destroy the Visitor, you should talk about this with the people who planned this mission.”

  “If I did that, I would probably get kicked off the mission. They would think I’m being too paranoid.”

  “But you don’t expect me to believe that?”

  “No, because you know the truth. We’re going to be sent up there with some kind of bomb, probably nuclear, and you’re going to be expected to use it if anything doesn’t go according to plan. I’m asking you not to.”

  “If you’re concerned about your safety…”

  “I’m not. Sure, I don’t want to die in a nuclear explosion, but that’s not why I’m asking you not to do it. Whatever the Visitor is, whatever we find up there, it’s the greatest scientific find in all human history. You can’t destroy it.”

  “Okay, look. There’s no nuclear bomb going up with us. And trust me, if there were, I would know. But just let me play devil’s advocate here. What if we get up there and we don’t just find superior technology, but we find a clear and present threat to humanity. You honestly think the best course of action would be to not destroy it?”

  “Why would the only options be destroying it or not destroying it? I guess all I’m asking you is to not just assume that the situation is going to be black and white. Even if we find something bad, imagine all the good that might come out of it.”

  “You know, when a beautiful woman walks into my bedroom, this is hardly the kind of conversation I expect to have.”

  Dr. Johnson blinked several times. “I don’t understand what you mean.”

  No, Bernhard realized. She didn’t. She didn’t understand the awkwardness here, nor did she seem to realize that Bernhard found her at all attractive. All in all, that was probably for the best. No one on this mission could afford to think of anything other than the task at hand.

  “Well, let me just say it one more time. There is no bomb. That is not part of the plan. But even if there were, I would take your advice into consideration.”

  “That’s all I ask,” she said. Without further ado, she stood up and walked out the door, not even bothering to say good-bye.

  Bernhard closed his door, locked it, and then went back to his bed and the file. That had been a thoroughly perplexing conversation for many reasons, but the biggest reason of all was that she was one hundred percent right. They were being sent up to the Visitor with a nuclear bomb. And if anything at all went wrong, he’d been ordered to detonate it. It was supposed to be a secret known only to him. Not even anyone in the Chinese contingent was to know about it.

  And yet this woman had simply walked in and deduced the bomb’s existence purely because she watched too many movies. Bernhard was going to need to keep a close eye on her. He was also going to have to do his damnedest not to like her.

  Chapter Three

  The next twenty-four hours were a whirlwind of preparation for everyone. There were briefings to give to the Alpha Contact team, and due to secrecy reasons, each of the four branches of the team – American military, American science, Chinese military, and Chinese science – were given slightly different information. No one was exactly given wrong information, but Bernhard had been given very careful instructions regarding which people were allowed to know what. This was followed immediately by extensive medical and psychological testing for everyone. All of that, under normal circumstances, would have been done much earlier, and anyone who failed even the smallest test would have been expected to leave the mission. With time of the essence and the political situation what it was, though, a lot of medical leeway was given. One of the scientists on the Chinese side apparently had mild asthma, but the hastily signed agreements between nations had been adamant that he was allowed as part of the mission. One of the American scientists was diabetic, while Johnson’s terrible eyesight should have also disqualified her for any space mission.

  Bernhard tried to take it all in stride, even though his worry about the state of things got worse by the minute.

  Everyone went through as much space mission training as could possibly be fit into such a short period of time. Again, on the military side, most of the team members did well here. The scientists, unused to that level of physical stress, vomited early and often. Bernhard had a horrible vision of everyone floating in zero-g amid of cloud of partially digested food.

  Finally, the time came where they were all to be loaded on the shuttle. As they approached the enormous craft with its giant fuel tank and booster rockets, Bernhard felt a little queasy himself. This equipment had been in storage for far too long, and the rigorous safety checks that normally would have been a part of such a mission had likely been reduced to only the bare essentials. Bernhard had flown in many aircraft before, including several that the United States would publicly deny even existed, but never had he felt this level of nerves as he walked up to the facility to be outfitted with his suit.

  “You are nervous,” someone said next to him in a heavy Chinese accent. Bernhard turned to see Teng, commander on the Chinese military side. They’d met briefly yesterday, but there hadn’t been time to exchange anything more than polite hellos.

  “I don’t know that I’d say I’m nervous.”

  “I can tell that you are, but that is fine. I am too.” Teng gestured at the shuttle. “Just look at that thing. It is older than my mother.”

  Bernhard couldn’t help but smile. “Your people didn’t have anything more modern or suitable?”

  Teng smiled back. “That is classified.”

  For this particular mi
ssion, the un-retired space shuttle had been renamed the Ambassador. As with so much else regarding the mission, it was a patched-together monstrosity on the inside, as the engineers in charge of getting them all into space and back without dying had needed to basically gut it to fit all their gear and personnel. While all the scientists wore traditional astronaut jumpsuits, the military people were all already dressed for combat. If they got up to the Visitor and, immediately upon docking with it, they were rushed by alien soldiers, it wouldn’t do for them to have to try to equip themselves in zero-g. Once everyone else was on the Ambassador and strapped into their seats, Bernhard, Teng, and Zersky came on last. Zersky, having had previous experience with piloting certain experimental aircraft, would be their pilot, responsible for getting them to the Visitor, as well as hopefully docking them safely and later getting them back to Earth. Bernhard and Teng, as the leaders of the two contingents, were expected to come on last purely for looks. Bernhard noticed as they came on and climbed into their sideways seats that cameras had been set up throughout the shuttle in addition to the body cameras that every single person was expected to keep turned on at all times. Bernhard knew that mostly this was for monitoring purposes, since Novak would be on the ground, hopefully able to communicate with them if he saw anything he didn’t like, but a part of him was pretty sure that, with the mess that this mission had already proved to be before they’d even taken off, something from those cameras would end up on the news networks at some point. Hell, even with the top of the line encryptions the military would be using for the video signals, someone had probably already hacked it and was streaming the entire thing throughout the world.

  “Are you okay?” Johnson asked Bernhard as he took his seat.

  “I’m fine.”

  “You’re lying again.”

  He ignored the “again” part. “Maybe my thoughts are just top secret.”

  “Don’t you ever think that all the secrecy we’re trying to put on this mission is only going to make things worse?” she asked.

  “No, I don’t. There are always going to be some things that some people shouldn’t know.”

  “Just like that one thing we talked about?”

  One of the other American scientists, Houston, turned to look at them. “What one thing?” he asked.

  “There is no one thing,” Bernhard said, doing his best to hide his exasperation. “And if there was a one thing, it wouldn’t be your one thing to know, Houston. Remember that.” He looked at Johnson and spoke to her as quietly as he could, which was made more difficult by the growing roar of the preparations of the ship around them. “Let it all go, Johnson. That’s an order.”

  “All the secrecy won’t do anything to help,” Johnson said. “Not in here with the team, and not out there in the world. You may be used to everything and its mother being classified, but any real chance of keeping secrets about any of this vanished the moment the Visitor appeared in orbit. It would be better for everyone to be in the know from the beginning.”

  “We’re not having this conversation anymore, Johnson. Now finish your prep. Launch is in less than fifteen minutes.”

  “Oh my God. I can’t believe we’re doing this,” Houston said. “We’re actually going to space. To visit an alien space ship. In space!”

  The third and last American scientist, a woman by the name of Patricia Dufresne, spoke up. “Houston, are we going to have a problem here?”

  “Ha ha, Trish,” Houston said. “That’s hilarious. Really. I’ve never heard that joke in my entire life.”

  “Was that sarcasm?”

  “Yes, Trish. It was sarcasm.”

  “Oh come on. Just because you’ve heard that joke before doesn’t mean it’s not funnier under the current situation.”

  “Oh dear Lord,” Sorensen muttered. He was sitting directly next to Bernhard, and he leaned closer so that only Bernhard could hear him. “Are we going to have to listen to these people all the way into orbit?”

  Bernhard had to admit that he wasn’t particularly fond of that possibility, either. “Alright, everyone, knock it off.”

  “Or what?” Dufresne asked. “You’re going to turn this shuttle around and take us right home?”

  Bernhard shot an embarrassed look in Teng’s direction. All of Teng’s people, scientists included, had loaded up onto the Ambassador in complete silence and with perfect efficiency. Teng saw the look and smiled, but still said nothing.

  Babysitting, Bernhard decided. This mission was going to be mostly babysitting of the American scientists. It was a distinct relief when everything was ready and the countdown finally began. At lift off, the scientists finally shut up as the g-forces made it more or less impossible for them to do more than grimace for the entire time it took them to leave Earth’s gravitational pull. Only then did Bernhard allow himself to think again about the likelihood that this old museum-piece of a spacecraft would likely disintegrate underneath them before they reached the outer atmosphere. At this point, such a thing would have almost been a relief. Their deaths would be quick, and it meant that Bernhard wouldn’t have to deal with unruly and undisciplined people anymore.

  That was also the moment Bernhard realized he’d never actually called his daughter and listened to her voice one more time, just in case. Not that he would have been allowed to tell her or her mother where he was going. The media wasn’t going to be told they’d gone up until after the Ambassador was floating in the void around the planet. But it bothered him that he hadn’t even considered talking to her. Was he really getting that distant? More importantly, did she even care anymore?

  They could all feel the moment the Ambassador was free of its tank and booster rockets, then soon after, the disorientation hit them all as their world lost gravity. This, apparently, was the cue to Houston, Dufresne, and Johnson to talk again. While Houston and Dufresne joked about whether or not the captain was going to turn off the “fasten seatbelts” sign, Johnson looked over at Bernhard and spoke quietly to him.

  “Penny for your thoughts, Captain Bernhard?”

  “No.”

  “How about a twenty?”

  At that, Bernhard couldn’t help but smile, no matter how hard he tried not to. “That’s a hell of an inflation rate.”

  “If you take me up on it, you’ll have to wait to collect until we get back to Earth. I think I forgot my purse in my car.”

  He laughed. Both Houston and Dufresne stopped talking for a moment at the unexpected noise. When Bernhard shot them a dirty look, they went back to ignoring him and instead snarking at each other.

  “I think you scared them for a second there, Captain.”

  “Johnson, it’s not like I’ve never laughed before.”

  “Could have fooled me. Now, you want to share why you were looking so pensive there for a while?”

  “No.”

  Johnson looked over at Hodges and McNeil. “You two have worked with him before, right? What’s it take to get him to share?”

  “Share? I’m not sure that Bernhard knows what that word means,” McNeil said.

  “Sure he does,” Hodges said. “He’s shared something personal with me before. It was, um, hmm, now just hold on. I know there must have been something.”

  Bernhard had no problem with their lighthearted-ribbing, but the last thing he wanted was for Johnson to hear that and think she could join in. She had already managed to get beneath his skin more than he was comfortable with. “Can it, you two. That’s a direct order.”

  “Okay everyone,” Zersky announced back to them. “We’re coming up on the approach with the Visitor in just under twenty minutes. Teng, Bernhard, Johnson, and Xiang, you guys better get to the cockpit. We’re going to need to start making decisions on what to do and how to approach it as soon as it’s in visual range.”

  The four of them unbelted from their seats. Bernhard had done zero-g training before on the Air Force jet often affectionately known as the Vomit Comet, so he was the one who was most at ease once he was
floating free in the air. Teng, apparently, had received some similar training at some point, as he wasn’t that bad either. Xiang, head of the Chinese science team, moved awkwardly at first but soon seemed to know what he was doing. It was only Johnson who hopelessly flailed for a bit as she had to learn that even the slightest bump against anything could send her moving in exactly the opposite direction she wanted to go. When she temporarily got stuck near the back of the cabin, Bernhard finally took pity on her and followed her back, then took a minute to show her how to use everything in her environment as either a hand grip or something which she could push off of with her feet.

  “Thanks,” Johnson said once they were both in the cockpit with the others. “It never looks that hard on TV.”

  Bernhard watched the way her hair floated in a halo behind her head, and the way her glasses, now that she had put them back on after takeoff, constantly threatened to float away from her face. It was cute, in a way that…

  “Hello?” Johnson asked. “Bernhard? Are you still with me?”

  “Um, yes. Sure. You’re welcome.”

  Doing his best to ignore any more inappropriate thoughts, Bernhard turned his attention to the cockpit window and the thing they were just now starting to see.

  Xiang said something in Mandarin Chinese. Bernhard spoke some Mandarin, but he wouldn’t have needed a translator to understand the distinct notes of awe and wonder in Xiang’s voice. Bernhard felt the exact same thing, although he wasn’t about to allow himself to show any such emotion. It had been evident from everything else that had happened in the last week that the Visitor was obviously alien in origin, but only now, as he was finally seeing it unaided and growing closer, did the momentousness of this situation start to overwhelm him.

  Humans weren’t alone in the universe. There was indeed something else out there. And for one reason or another, that something had chosen now to show up on their doorstep.

  Then another thought occurred to him, something that had been in the back of his mind before now, but which he hadn’t allowed himself to really recognize until now. He might be the first one to set foot on the Visitor, assuming they found a way to access it. Even if he wasn’t the first, he would be among the first small group. Was this was Neil Armstrong had felt like when he was the first to step on the moon? Would Bernhard’s name go down in history as one of the great explorers?