Dark Contact

by Logan Haelstrom

  But Austin knew better.

  Every effect had a cause, and even if it were nothing more than early breakdown—after all, the accident, while minor enough, had been unforeseen, even if it were human error from Jase while working on technical experiments—he felt the minds back home should know. It was one reason he wanted to get back to his work. His best guesses seemed impossible, as nothing could do that without exceptional mass and nothing like that was near. A passing asteroid would have to be huge, and even then, no one would ever know unless they cared about numbers and happened to look for the change. But that was his thing. He lived for numbers, data and how things worked.

  Yep, he was a hit at dinner parties.

  But what could it be? Before the accident, he remembered thinking about all the different scenarios. What could cause the station to work and expend unplanned energy to keep it on the proper orbit? Mass and distance would be related of course. If something had more mass, it wouldn’t need to be as close, and vice versa.

  But that wasn’t what troubled him.

  If the station was experiencing a malfunction two months into the crew arrival, they had other problems on their hands—explosion notwithstanding. But if it wasn’t the station…

  He had no explanation and was back to square one.

  Probably aliens. He smiled at the thought and wondered if they’d be green and little.

  The soft chirp of the door stole him from his thoughts. “Come in…”

  “Just checking on ya bud. How are ya feeling?” Deacon stepped in, looking concerned for his friend.

  Austin walked back to his bed and gestured to the monitor. “I think I’ve had enough sitcoms for a while anyway. How about you? Did the boss have the meeting yet? You guys know what’s up?”

  “Everything was self-contained and the AI shut most everything down in time. It rocked the boat, but that was the displacement energy piping working as intended. But what do I know, I’m just the company liaison. Of course, even I know to be locked down in those habs.”

  “How you got the job is beyond me. Don’t they know you never do anything out here? Although that’s probably not fair, the Sudoku puzzles didn’t solve themselves.” Austin quipped with a weak smile.

  “I can see your humour has gotten any better either,” smiled Deacon in return, “matches your looks; ugly. Listen, just take it easy like the boss-lady said. I’ve got to go outside in a few hours, just routine stuff, but they’re gonna want a report from a visual inspection as well. You know,” said Deacon doing air quotes, “ ‘a human touch.’ At least I can do that much.”

  A space-walk sounded like a fresh change of routine. They usually assumed he closeted himself away and interfaced with the main station AI all day, yet he was up for something exciting right about now.

  Austin thought about the anomaly and wondered whether to bring it up to Deacon. There was a chain of command for that stuff, but Deacon was a friend and it wasn’t critical enough yet to make a stink about it. It was his own “data OCD” that made him even notice it. Yet a look outside would be fun. He hadn’t had a space-walk since the second week as part of the routine training, and he decided to go.

  “You know, I think I’ll join you.”

  Deacon looked surprised. “You just get knocked out for about a day, and you want to go outside?”

  “I’m fine, really. You heard the boss.”

  He put his hands up. “Hey, if you can convince her, I’m all in. But you’d have to ask and I’m sure she’ll say no. Her job is to say no. I can’t imagine she’d approve a walk. Not in your condition.”

  “Oh yeah? And what condition is that?” said Austin, knocking back the rest of the water by his bed, the processed chips had made him thirsty.

  “Medically? I think the term is ‘unattractive to women’.”

  Austin threw his pillow at Deacon. “Have seen my wife, Deac?”

  “Yeah, but has she seen you?”

  Austin laughed and sat back down. “I’m fine. Trust me. But fine. Maybe I’ll do it later this week. You just go ahead.”

  “Hey man,” he said, “I’d love to have you, but she’d be right to say no this time. You got hit hard and I don’t need to be distracted if you start hyperventilating on me or something.”

  “No worries. I think there’s still a show I still haven’t seen from 2007.”

  “You got weird taste, man.” He turned to leave, then stopped in the doorway. “Hey, if you wanna burn off some steam, hit the gym. It works wonders for me.”

  Austin nodded as he left and lay back down.

  Deacon made his way back to his quarters and sat down at his terminal, firing up the camera to record his message. The time delay was under ten minutes at their current position.

  Deacon thought about his words carefully. The private channel was secure, that wasn’t the problem. But by now his employers back home would know he’d failed, and they’d want to know he had everything contained. His job, at least prior to finding out Austin was coming close to compromising the company’s priorities involving the alien craft, was to discover the origins of the so-far unresponsive craft and find a way to get probes on board. Was it first contact? Who knew. The alien vessel had been completely unresponsive so far and shown no signs of intelligence beyond the fact that it existed. Yet it posed as the greatest astronomical discovery—and more importantly—the greatest discovery for BenDeCorp, since man first discovered fire. Or so the folks back home felt anyway.

  The potential for advanced technology was too impossible to pass up trying to take it for themselves. If aliens actually were inside the thing, they weren’t very forthcoming about it. Deacon was convinced nobody was home. But the ship itself? It was certainly a treasure waiting to be exploited.

  He just had to get in. Those were his orders.

  And he had to do so without letting the other crew members discover the plans. The rest of the crew were idealists. That’s a big part of why they were chosen, for crying out loud.

  But they were now deemed unimportant variables, if not impediments.

  But to find a way in…

  How he was supposed to do that when they couldn’t see it was beyond him. But smarter minds than his were working on it, and the few tries at communication had so far amounted to nothing. Yet it appeared to yield much promise, if they could only get in.

  That all the work the company had put in to the Shining Beacon was deemed to be expendable in light of the recent revelations about the craft, blew his mind. The company, or rather the public arm of the company had spent untold amounts of time, money and resources to get here. But now they were prepared to toss it all away if it meant what they were hoping it meant.

  A weapon. At least a weapon of sorts.

  The corporation had seen the potential for securing its hold on its technological and exploratory empire, both through the incredibly advanced technology and the vast wealth that technology would secure. It would also eliminate any future competition, all with the power of being the first to make contact with the yet-to-be-explored craft. Intelligent life was now proven to exist, but more importantly, it had been proven to be interested in their solar system, which meant humans had been watched.

  But where were the watchers? Any attempt at contact had gone unanswered. The company had discovered its presence quite by accident. Brilliant minds had even posited the rough size and shape of the nearly perfectly square vessel. It was there, but hidden. Yet they knew it existed, waiting, beckoning them to explore it, if only the ship would reveal itself completely and offer a way inside.

  The company discovered its presence through minute field disruption, proving that it wasn’t there before, yet had somehow travelled to be there just months ago, much like themselves.

  Did the presence of the station completion attract it? The human crew? Whatever it was, after initial fears, the company had made it a priority to secure its secrets, believing it a gift of sorts. Deacon just hoped it wasn’t a Trojan horse. Either way, he
was told to do whatever necessary to keep the secret. That meant he’d do whatever it took. He had no moral qualms about what it meant, and it wasn’t anything personal.

  But nothing could get in his way; the payoff was nearly unimaginable, especially for him. Unlimited advancement in the company, power, fame, the opportunity to be the first human to communicate with an alien species… The rewards were beyond his dreams.

  But aside from himself, the crew had been chosen years before the detection of the giant, if unseen ship, and things had now changed. After an extensive examination into the lives and personalities of the other four members from USJPN, it was decided they couldn’t be swayed; most of them were idealists and presented problems of conversion to company-vs-betterment-of-humankind kind of things. Basically, they couldn’t be trusted.

  But BenDeCorp knew how to roll with the punches. And so did Deacon.

  It was determined the only option was to communicate in secret, at all costs, with the public never knowing back home. That meant eliminating any threat to that priority at all costs if the mission were deemed to be compromised.

  The only question now was, was Austin still a threat?

  Deacon had acted quickly, on instinct. He’d seen an opportunity and taken it. He didn’t climb as high as he had by being passive. But he’d made a mistake and he’d had to reassess.

  Still, the aliens waited. Or at least their ship.

  Zero day was approaching and decisions would have to be made. Take them out or send them home.

  Or both?

  Deacon composed his thoughts and pressed record. He’d made up his mind.

  A few days later, operations returned to normal. The crew continued the same work and routine as before the accident. They’d all shared a drink and played hide-and-seek after consuming a bit too much, but it proved to be what everyone needed.

  Austin reassured them all an accident was an accident, and it was his own fault for not locking down in the work module, something required in all modules connected for EEDS’s, or Emergency Energy Dispersal Stations. The AI’s were set to 75% professional most of the time, or as Austin preferred to think of it, they actually were less “boss” and more “butthead.” It allowed for more lax and humour, even a bit of pranking from the AIs. At that setting they didn’t bug you about the rules and lock doors and other rude things if you didn’t follow procedure which is how Austin liked it, but now the rules had been put upon them again.

  Danielle, courtesy of BenDeCorp, had told them not to keep them below 85% for more than an hour or during recreation, as the company didn’t want further complications. But it was one thing for the brains back home to dictate rules and another to live with insufferable protocol 24 hours a day just because the brainchildren of the rules were the kinds of people that used to insist you buckle up to drive twenty feet.

  So Austin reprogrammed the AI’s to fluctuate between 70-85 percent, and everyone was thankful he had snuck in a longer reprieve. Now when the AI reminded him to brush his teeth, she said that, if he didn’t do it more often his breath would have an approximate 37% chance of killing all life on board and she didn’t want to go out that way. He could live with that—the comment, not the death. His breath wasn’t that bad. And the occasional humour felt better to everyone on board.

  It was the third hour of the morning shift and Austin knocked back a big gulp of his coffee. He liked the hot burn and never understood how others could nurse a coffee for an hour or more. A drink was meant to be enjoyed, and besides, he liked the unregulated caffeine rush it gave him. It worked better than the stims they had available for spacewalks and other alert-critical tasks.

  Setting the mug back down, he looked over at the desk where he’d hit his head. He was lucky Deacon had come in when he had or his hair might never lie along the part the same. He liked his hair.

  “How long would you have let me lie there, Sam?”

  “You were never in any real danger, Austin, I notified Danielle immediately,” answered Samantha, the AI.

  Austin smiled. “Good.” He shifted gears and started a new research project. After a few minutes, he paused, and got up and stretched. He didn’t want new or boring. He wanted a challenge, and atmospheric data wouldn’t do it.

  He opened the anomaly file and flicked a few screens into view.

  “Okay,” he said, sighing, “tell me again about the measurements I found. What do you see?”

  “I see that you’re annoying Austin. Seriously. Don’t you trust me? May I remind you that I hold the equivalent of over 200 advanced degrees in my basic programming alone? If you hold up both hands and count your fingers about—”

  “Professionalism to 85% for the duration of the day, please,” he instructed the AI. He hated mysteries, and he wanted straight answers to what kept bugging him.

  “Fair enough. Well, as previously reported, all reporting within nominal range of standard deviations.”

  “But it’s off in ways we haven’t anticipated or been able to account for.”

  “Correct.”

  “But why?” he asked for the hundredth time.

  “Normal functions go through periods of fluctuation depending on original—”

  “--Yes, yes,” interrupted Austin, “I get that. But what I’m asking is, what part of the station isn’t working optimally? You understand, Sam? I’m trying to figure out what in particular could cause the station to self-correct at the levels it is, even if it’s nominal.”

  “The station is within range of—”

  “I know,” he interrupted again. Austin blew out his breath and leaned back, rubbing his forehead as he tried to think of how to get the answers he was looking for. “Look,” he began again, “I’m not supposed to be smarter than you are—”

  “You aren’t.”

  “—and I can’t figure out why I know more than you do—”

  “You don’t.”

  “—or why we aren’t seeing the same things. I’m just not articulating what I’m looking for.”

  “I understand your frustration, and I’m sorry I can’t understand your query. But—”

  Austin waited, then looked up when the AI didn’t continue. “Yes?”

  No answer.

  A glitch?

  “What is it Sam? Samantha?” Austin leaned into the computer. “Hello?”

  It took a few seconds. “Sorry Austin, I was temporarily offline.”

  That was odd. “Explain,” he said.

  “Routine adjustments,” she answered.

  Now that’s really odd…

  Adjustments should take microseconds at best, and they’re not to be done if they cause the user to experience lag. They were built that way on purpose.

  Austin palmed the table and leaned back again. No matter, he could look into it later.

  “Look,” he began again, “just humour me once more. If an object were passing by, or in geo-orbit with us…say within any appreciable distance—”

  “Please define distance.”

  “I don’t know. Just… whatever. Within 100km, what size would it have to be?”

  “Size is irrelevant for the purpose of the question. Mass is—”

  “Yes, yes, I know. Fine. Speculate and be open to all avenues and projections.”

  “Size and mass may or not be relevant, but for distance set within 100km, object would be visible.”

  “But nothing is visible.”

  “Correct.”

  “Okay Sam, you see my point?” Austin stood up and ran his hands through his hair, walking over to the view-screen. It faked a window since he was in the middle of the ring, but you’d never be able to tell the difference.

  The view faced empty space but he studied it as if it held all the answers. Yet there was nothing out there, he was just bored and needed something to challenge his mind. He loved his work but had to admit to himself that he was seeing problems were there were none. The numbers wouldn’t even be deemed a mystery to the brains back home, even if they knew
already, which they had no reason to if the AI was right.

  He was wasting his energy. But something about it, some detail he couldn’t put his finger on, bugged him.

  He needed to burn off some energy, then he’d come back here and do what the company had sent him here to do. His work meant something, and that should be enough. For now, exercise.

  That had been close.

  Deacon sat back, relieved that the codes had worked. The company had given him admin access as they could only do so much remotely themselves from the station back on the moon. They’d built a failsafe for themselves if needed, but plans had changed and they passed those fail-safes on to Deacon as needed.

  And he’d needed them.

  Samantha couldn’t be allowed to speculate too much or she’d lead Austin where he didn’t belong. The bastard had to question everything, and it was beyond troublesome. He’d inserted a sub-routine into her programming at root level and hoped he didn’t screw things up permanently. He wasn’t a programmer, but had enough knowledge to play it out as long as he followed their instructions. The trick worked, if only just in time. It gave him an adrenaline rush, and he liked it.

  If everything went according to the new plan, the station crew would return home 3.5 years early due to “unforeseen circumstances.” It would be a huge setback and PR nightmare for a while, but the company would recover and Deacon would secure his future and change the course of humanity with the findings. And BenDeCorp would remain unchallenged as future nation-ruler and dominant space exploration empire to the stars.

  If the plan failed and more than one or two “accidents” had to befall them all, it would severely hamper the company’s ability to do anything worthwhile for a while, and the cost would be staggering, new technology or not. The whole world was watching the Shining Beacon. There was only so much you could hide.

  And nearly all of it depended on Deacon.

  Nothing mattered more than getting the probes into the ship.