“An alien-” He looked around. The nearest surfer was two dozen meters away. He whispered anyway. “An alien ship?”
“We detected it five months ago. NASA’s working on a plan to get there.”
“Alien? An alien ship?” Chad rubbed the stubble on his wet chin.
“Yes. An alien ship.”
Chad sat up on his board, legs crossed in a lotus pose. The surfboard widened itself in response, creating a stable platform. “They’re launching a robotic expedition?”
“No. Manned.”
“Manned?”
“We don’t know what to expect when we get up there.”
I bet you don’t. “Senator, I need you to get me on that mission.”
“I would love to do that for you, Dr. Tanner. NASA is dead set on sending one of their own scientists. Dr. Okoye is training for the mission.”
“I understand. Thank you, Senator. You can count on our enthusiastic support for your re-election.”
Chad disconnected then dialed Tyson Webb.
“How’s the new surfboard, Chad?” Tyson asked.
“NASA is sending a manned mission to Jupiter. Dr. Okoye is on it. I need to be on it instead.”
There was silence. “Understood,” Tyson said.
“Oh, and Tyson? Triple Senator Dees’ contribution this year.”
Changes
Elena Teplova appeared in Sara’s lower-left field of view.
“Hello, Elena. It’s late. Did something happen?”
“I don’t think so. That’s why I’m calling.”
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean. You and Jake.”
“Jake’s a friend, nothing more.”
“You keep saying that. You see, there’s the problem. Nothing happened. But it should have. All summer, nothing happened. You hardly even saw him this fall. It’s almost Christmas, and you’re still alone.”
“How do you know?”
“That you’re still alone?”
“That nothing happened between us.”
“I called him.”
“You… what?”
“You weren’t going to tell me the details. Don’t worry, I was tactful. We were talking about a work issue anyhow. I just inquired in passing about your dates and observed his reaction. He’s easy to read, you know.”
“Elena…”
“Look, I don’t mean to pry.”
“Yes, you do.”
“OK. I don’t want to pry, but I must. For your sake.” Elena looked resolved.
Sara stood and walked to her balcony. “Where do you want to talk?”
“Florida.”
“Florida, it is.” Sara’s ocular implants shifted to immersive mode. They generated a stunningly realistic visualization of a broad, white beach, with the full moon lighting the sand, and waves gently lapping at her feet. Elena walked at her side.
“Now this is a relaxing setting to talk, is it not?” Elena asked.
“Sure, but there’s not much to say. Jake’s kind, funny. Handsome.”
“Sexy. Don’t forget sexy.”
Sara blushed. “Yes, sexy.” She took a few steps along the beach. “I don’t have time in my life for a real relationship.”
“Of course you do.”
“You can’t win an argument just by disagreeing with me.”
“Sure I can. Look, you’re one of the best at what you do. You work hard for that, maybe too hard. You’re not in homeostasis. If you don’t balance your work with other joys of life, you’ll blow a gasket.”
Elena put an arm around Sara. The virtual environment didn’t simulate touch, but Sara could almost feel her friend’s embrace. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to melt down on you. I’ll find time for a partner, but not now.”
“If not now, when?”
“When there isn’t a crisis that demands my full attention.”
“When will that be? There’s been one crisis or another for as long as I have known you. Will Jake still be there when you decide you have time for him? How long will it take you to find another Clark to your Lois?”
“A who to my what?”
“Another man that suits you so well.” Elena scrutinized Sara’s reaction. “Wait, there’s more, isn’t there?”
The two walked a dozen slow steps in silence, only the rhythmic splash of gentle waves filling the air.
“They say a girl is drawn to men like her dad. Well, Jake’s a lot like him. Like my dad. It brings back memories.”
“Was your father mean to you?” Elena’s tone changed. She sounded concerned.
“What? No. He was kind, loving, respectful, encouraging.” Sara felt a warm tear run down her cheek and to the corner of her mouth. Salty, like the virtual ocean sloshing at her feet. “He was also betrayed. It cost him his life.”
“Betrayed? By whom?”
“I… I don’t want to talk about that now.”
“Sara, Jake is not your father. He is a wonderful man that you chose because he embodies the best of what you remember about your father. By allowing him into your life, you allow in all the wonderful traits that your dad wanted for you. It honors his memory to allow those qualities to blossom in your life.”
Sara looked down at the silvery, moonlit sand. She gave it a kick and wondered at how realistically the sand particles seemed to spray.
“When are you seeing him again?”
“Tomorrow. We’re going sailing.”
There was a splash. Loud. Close.
Sara jumped. “Gah! What the…”
A pair of bat rays thrashed about in the shallows, a meter from the shore.
“These simulations are getting more realistic by the day,” Elena said.
Sara took her hand. “Yes, they are.” They walked in silence past one beachfront hotel then another. “You gave me something to think about.”
“I’m glad I could do that.” Elena turned to Sara. “I better let you go. I’m sure your day starts early tomorrow.”
“Why don’t we walk the beach a while longer?”
“I would like that.” Elena looked out over the ocean water, moonlight reflecting off the gentle swells, and smiled.
#
“Mayday, mayday, mayday. Ellington tower, NASA Niner Zero Niner. Medical emergency.” Distress leaked through Major Chapwell’s professional veneer.
“What’s the nature of your emergency?” a tower controller asked.
“My passenger is displaying symptoms of a heart attack. Request immediate landing.”
“Roger, NASA Niner Zero Niner. Lone Star Three Fife, immediate go-around. November Three Whiskey X-ray, turn right heading two seven zero. NASA Niner Zero Niner, cleared to land Runway Two Two. Emergency services are rolling.”
“Clear to land Runway Two Two,” the NASA pilot repeated. He brought the jet in hot, crossing the runway threshold twenty knots faster than usual. The aircraft glided in ground effect for half a mile, stubbornly resisting the pull of gravity until it finally slowed enough for the wings to lose lift. The wheels touched down half-way along the eight-thousand-foot runway. He rolled fast toward the far end and braked sharply as his aircraft neared a row of emergency vehicles, coming to a well-timed stop only a few meters from them.
The canopy slid open as an emergency responder in a powered fire-fighting suit pushed a ladder up to the jet, climbed it two steps at a time, reached into the rear seat and cautiously lifted a limp body.
Dr. Okoye was not breathing.
The responder jumped off the top of the ladder and landed with the grace afforded by a powered exoskeleton. She hurried to a squat, four-legged, silver-and-white robot waiting next to the fire trucks. An auto-EMT. Two human EMTs stood next to it. There was nothing the men could do but watch. The AI-driven medical robot provided far superior care.
The robot inflated a thin green mat fast as an airbag deployment. The bed cradled Dr. Okoye’s body and began sensing vitals the moment the emergency responder laid him down. The auto-EMT extended a needle-tipped tube
with explosive speed, precisely penetrating a vein in the patient’s arm. A respirator mask shot out of a compartment in the robot’s chest, sealed over Abel’s face, and forced oxygen into his lungs while a scanner picked up medical records from a nanochip in his shoulder. A pair of centimeter-thick tubes tipped with metallic teeth reminiscent of a lamprey grabbed and pulled Abel’s flight suit on either side of his heart. A third, thinner tube ending in a scalpel sliced the suit open. A bundle of fiber optic cables attached to a five-by-four-inch lens darted into the exposed area, attaching to the skin over his heart.
Brilliant blue light flashed from the lens, flooding through Abel’s skin around the device. Pulse-pulse. Pulse-pulse. Pulse-pulse.
An EKG display on the auto-EMT mirrored the flashes. Abel’s heart responded to the light pulses, beating to the same cadence.
The pilot pulled the emergency responder quietly aside. “How is he?”
“He’s responding to optogenetic therapy. That’s a positive sign. The electric paddles we have to use otherwise are such crude tools. They can cause a lot of damage.”
“Is he going to be OK?”
“It’s too early to tell.” An ambulance raced from the airport gate, orange-and-red lights flashing and its siren wailing. “He’ll be at a top facility in ten minutes. We’ll take excellent care of him.”
“Thank you.” The pilot looked down at Dr. Okoye. The scientist looked sallow. His lids were closed, and his eyes were rolled back in their sockets. His jaw was slack, and spittle gathered in the corner of his mouth. The pilot climbed back into his aircraft and called Director Evans on a secure line. “Roy, we have a problem. I’m afraid it’s bad.”
#
Ian and the Chinese man sat on the familiar wooden bench in Austin, Texas. It was hot again, unusually so for a December afternoon, without a shadow in sight. Ian sipped an iced lemonade. A street performer, dressed as a black-and-white clown, delighted a small crowd on the far side of the fountain with a humorous song and a juggling act.
“I need to know something about your engine specification,” the Chinese man said.
“You still owe me a fan.”
“A fan?” The Chinese man looked puzzled. “Ah, yes.” He reached into a satchel and pulled out a high-quality, hand-made Chinese fan and set it on the bench between them.
“Why do you care about my engine specification? I didn’t tell you where we’re headed, so why do you need to know about the engine?”
“Curiosity.”
“Bulldunky.”
“Bull-? Dunky?”
“That means I don’t believe you. Nobody pays so much money because he’s interested in space.”
The Chinese man pulled at the back of his neck. “All right, I have only told you some of the truth. My boss does love space. His passion led him to acquire an interest in Shenzhen Astromining. There is concern your mission is to test American technology to rival Chinese asteroid mining. He wants to know what he’s up against.”
I guess this guy doesn’t know the real purpose of Mars Station. Does the Chinese government? They will soon enough. “Asteroid mining, huh?” Ian set down his drink and tugged on his ear. “There’s a lot of money in that. You know, my poker debt is pretty insignificant with those stakes at play. In fact, I want to earn something out of our… collaboration. Get back in the game, as it were.”
The street performer let his juggling pins fall to the ground. He ripped off a costume shirt revealing black body armor emblazoned with three bold, yellow letters. FBI. Two members of the audience pulled out pistols. The trio sprinted toward the bench, weapons pointed forward. Two large, fast vehicles cut off the retreat. “Federal agents!” the faux performer shouted.
A half-dozen people emerged from the vehicles. “FBI, down on the ground! Now!” The agents swarmed the park bench, assault rifles at the ready. Ian and the Chinese man recovered from their shock well enough to raise their hands as the first armed men reached them. Both were thrown to the ground, hard. “Damn traitor,” one of the FBI agents muttered under his breath. Each man was hauled off to a different vehicle.
One vehicle sped away, tires screeching. Ian was thrust inside the other. The door slammed behind him. This was not an austere prison transport. It brimmed with advanced surveillance and communication equipment, large 2D video panels, and a 3D hologram platform behind the driver. Two agents inside pressed him into a sturdy chair, to which his wrists and ankles were shackled. The agents sat on a bench without speaking a word. Ten minutes later FBI Agent Oxley, a powerfully built bald man in a tailored suit, opened the rear door. “Major Weemes.” The impeccably dressed man studied Ian’s face. “Nice touch. With the fan.”
“I thought so.” Ian grinned, still cuffed to a seat in front of one of the video panels. It streamed drone footage of the van transporting the Chinese agent. Updates came in over coms every few seconds from both human and AI agents involved in securing the prisoner’s journey to a detention facility.
“That kind of detail sells it.” The man walked with deliberate steps behind the chair, his heavy footfall drowning out the faint chatter of the communication equipment. “You did the right thing, coming to us as soon as they contacted you. Of course, you’re still going to be in deep shit at NASA. Now that we’re done, we need to report it. The Chinese can still get at you since the debt is to a private Chinese corporation. Your boss has to know.”
“And here I thought you were going to let me go back to life as usual.”
“Hey, Ian, I’m sorry. I really am. You’re a decent man, just caught in a bad situation. My report will reflect that.”
“Your report. Great.”
Agent Oxley patted Ian’s shoulder and walked to the door.
“Hey, are you going to let me out of here?”
The FBI man snickered and walked out. A moment later, he yelled from somewhere outside, “Bailey, give the Major a ride back to NASA.”
#
“Twenty minutes until we arrive at the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center, Chad.” The soothing voice of Dr. Chad Tanner’s copilot software reverberated through the interior of his custom-modified Tesla Z, the sound of its voice generated by vibrating the car’s entire interior surface. “I have several music selections for the final stretch that are suitable to this occasion.”
“Are any of them written by humans?”
“The top ten were created by AI artists specifically to mark the beginning of a substantial undertaking.”
“Thanks, but no. I think I need to catch a wave.”
The Beach Boys’ Catch a Wave played. Chad slapped his thigh to the rhythm, wearing an ear-to-ear grin for kilometers. He glanced at the charge indicator. “The battery’s holding up fine.”
“Yes,” the copilot said. “The new structural materials gave us fifteen percent more range than the AI predicted for a stock vehicle under these conditions. I’ve sent sensor details back to improve the engineering algorithm.”
“You know, it’s a better sound insulator. Hardly any road noise.”
“Would you like me to decrease the music by two decibels? That would be beneficial for your hearing.”
“Nope.” Not today! No way. What were the Senator’s words? ‘An alien ship. As in, not made from human hand.’ Holy shit.
An icon flashed, hovering above the dashboard. Director Wells. Chad took the call. “Hello?”
Her image replaced the icon. “Just checking on your progress, Dr. Tanner,” she said. “NASA is concerned you’re still not there. Want me to send an Air Force plane for you after all?”
“No worries, Ms. Wells. The high-speed autopilot lanes are working out fine. I’m right outside Dallas. I even managed to catch a few hours’ sleep.”
“Wonderful. Let me know if there’s anything you need. Anything at all.” Sara’s image vanished.
With the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in sight, the console showed fifty-five percent charge remaining. Nice! He complimented himself with a wide smile. Chalk up a victory for st
eel-aluminum foam. Lighter, stronger, quieter. And if you want large-scale production, available exclusively from me.
It was mid-morning as he pulled into the parking lot of the Sonny Carter Training Facility, part of the sprawling Johnson Space Center dedicated to astronaut training. The lot looked full, so he disengaged automatic navigation and scanned for an open space. Just as Good Vibrations finished, he spied a single open spot near the lobby entrance. With a wide, happy smile on his lightly bronzed face, he slowed, signaled, and then ROAR! A dark blur shot past his left-hand side, turned immediately in front of him, and came to a screeching halt. A black, high-performance combustion vehicle occupied his parking space. Chad rolled to a stop behind the car, stepped out, and gazed upon the perfect Texan stereotype exiting the other vehicle.
Before him stood a man in his late 40’s, face and arms weathered and tanned from many hours in the wind and sun, standing in well-used cowboy boots. A jagged scar above his right eyebrow marred an otherwise handsome face. The man stepped forward and set a Stetson on his head with a broad, sweeping motion. His eyes fixed on Chad. He feigned surprise at his presence, then with a lopsided grin, announced in a loud, Texan accent, “Well, howdy! Pardon, didn’t see ya there.”
Chad grinned back, genuinely amused. The Californian responded in his best mock-Texan. “What’s that there you’re driving, hoss? Looks to be a carbon-burnin’, smoke-churnin’ environmental disaster.”
The Texan’s eyes lit up. He spoke in an even deeper drawl. “This baby here?” He stroked the impeccably clean, matte-black, carbon-fiber roof of his car. “Why she’s a classic 2017 Ronin GT-R. She’ll do zero to a hundred faster than you can say ‘eat my dust.’ Just so I don’t trouble anyone’s eco-sensibility, I planted a few hundred trees out on my ranch. You know, to even things up.”
Chad eyed the gasoline powered beast. “The thing’s so old, it doesn’t even have an autopilot.”
Dylan scoffed. “Now why would I want to give a machine that kind of control?” Mock indignation gave way to a broad smile. He extended a callused hand. “Name’s Lockwood, Dylan Lockwood.”
Chad took Dylan’s hand and shook it firmly. “Chad Tanner.” He introduced himself with an extra measure of California mellow.
The Gods We Make Page 11