Sasha kept his eyes on the probe. Everyone was looking at him, that much was clear. The most talented researcher, ha-ha. He didn’t even have the second doctorate level, and his name had never appeared at the top of a single research paper.
“Well, the data from Relikt-1 is very promising,” said Sasha. “First of all, it allows us to prove that the cosmic background radiation doesn’t have the same temperature in every direction. This is an important building block for proving that our theory about the Big Bang and the early development of the universe is correct. Of course, we still require a few independent measurements, but it’s quite unlikely that we’re wrong.”
“Correct,” said Andreyeva. “But in that case we shouldn’t be carrying out a second set of Relikt measurements. Because that won’t give us independent confirmation.”
He liked this woman. Being able to pose critical questions in such a large group was itself quite impressive. But Andreyeva was also asking the right questions.
“We found something else, which so far has not been published in any scientific work,” said Sasha.
“For good reason,” his father chimed in.
Sasha looked at him in irritation. Why the interjection? Was he trying to make it even more difficult for him?
“There seems to be information hidden in the background radiation,” said Sasha. “The information content is surprisingly high. Cyberneticists we’ve consulted also confirm this.”
“Information? What kind of information?” asked Verkhodanov.
“We don’t know.”
“So it could be culinary recipes. Or the Communist Manifesto.”
“You’re right, comrade,” said Sasha. He knew people like Verkhodanov. The best way to take the wind out of their sails was to agree with them.
“We don’t know what’s stored in it,” he explained. “So far we can only prove—or rather, we have evidence that—someone has written with invisible ink on the material that makes up the universe. To make this ink visible, we need the new Relikt experiment. We hope that a tenfold increase in resolution will unveil the secret.”
“Who could that someone have been? God?” asked Andreyeva.
What was her first name? He must find out more about her. His father roared with laughter.
“God? That’s just opium for the masses, which Lenin himself already understood,” said the colonel general. “I don’t think, as enlightened scientists, we need to seriously consider that.”
Actually, that quote was from Karl Marx, Father, and he described religion as the opium of the masses, not God. But of course Sasha couldn’t openly correct him. That would be an affront. He’d probably get away with it, but he’d be better off choosing more important battles. And the colonel general was right. Why should some god write its messages in a secret language in the background radiation? The gods preferred to work with impressive miracles that even the most stupid person could easily grasp.
But who had deposited this message, or whatever it was?
“There’s actually only one possibility,” said Sasha. “Since there was no intelligence in our universe so soon after the Big Bang, the information must have been deposited before that.”
“Before?” asked Verkhodanov. “Time didn’t begin until the Big Bang. Even a child knows there was no ‘before.’”
“That’s not certain at all,” Sasha contradicted him. “There are some cosmologists around the world who consider a cyclical development possible.”
“Maybe in the West. Everyone believes everything there.”
“The Soviet mathematician Alexander Friedmann proposed in the early 1920s that the universe could be oscillating. Even Einstein took him seriously.”
“Fine,” said Verkhodanov. “Let’s pretend there was a before. What are we supposed to do about it?”
“If there really is a message hidden there, it must have been written by someone with unimaginable technical capabilities, and with enormous effort. No one would go to such lengths just to send us a greeting. The message must contain something important.”
“Do you have any idea what it could be, Alexander?” asked his father.
Now everyone was looking at him intently. The fact that the colonel general was speaking to him with such familiarity cast him in a new light.
“If we assume, as Marx, Engels, and Lenin did, that the victory of socialism is inevitable, then this law must have been equally valid in a previous universe. Maybe the socialist inhabitants of this precursor universe wanted to bequeath something, in light of their imminent demise, something that would help us conquer the old powers and lead all peoples of this planet to a communist paradise.”
It was quiet. The idea that they could inherit the legacy of a lost civilization seemed incredible. Someone in the group sneezed.
“You’re thinking of a weapon that we could use to conquer imperialism?” his father asked finally.
Sasha wasn’t surprised. Of course the colonel general would think of a weapon first. That was his profession. A theory of everything, which physicists had been chasing for centuries, was where Sasha’s thoughts had gone. But, he didn’t need to correct his father. If they succeeded in laying their hands on such a theory, then it could probably be used to construct a weapon.
It had been like that throughout human history. Even the first humans had used flint to start fires just as they’d used it to produce deadly arrows. Pumps and catapults used the lever principle. Nuclear power stations and the atom bomb were based on the same principle. The same would apply to the legacy of a collapsed universe.
“Yes, certainly, such an advance in knowledge would seal the downfall of imperialism,” said Sasha.
“I think so, too,” said the woman whose first name he still didn’t know. “But something concerns me.”
“I’m listening, Yekaterina.”
Yekaterina then. His father seemed to know her better than the others.
“Communication problems, Comrade Colonel General,” she said. “Our universe is still very young. We’re right at the start. If we were able to wake up a prehistoric man, would he be able to understand our elementary school mathematics? Surely not. Compared to the forms of intelligence that would have experienced the end of their universe, we’re probably quite primitive.”
“But if they were clever enough to leave a message behind, then they would surely have formulated it so that we could understand it,” Sasha postulated.
Yekaterina Andreyeva. He must remember her name. She seemed a little older than himself. From where had his father kidnapped her? The colonel general appeared to have hand-picked the entire collective for the new Relikt project. Verkhodanov, the man with the moustache, had come from a military research institute in Akademgorodok. He didn’t seem like a bad guy. Nevertheless, he probably wasn’t especially happy about being transferred from the taiga to the steppe. In Akademgorodok there was at least basic infrastructure and even a small cinema, and the security measures weren’t so strict.
But Sasha didn’t have much to complain about here. He was living more comfortably than ever, didn’t have to worry about meals, and could wash his clothes for no charge.
He turned right, as the sergeant at the main entrance had instructed. A particularly strong wind was whistling through here. He pulled his fur hat down around his face and wondered what it was like here in the warmer seasons.
A short time later he was standing in front of his bungalow. Just in time, he remembered the dezhurnaya’s instructions. It was best he didn’t mess with her. He walked to her bungalow to announce his return.
“Come in, boy,” she said. “The samovar is hot. Join me for a cup of tea.”
He accepted her offer, which was in reality more of an order. The tea was strong, hot, and sweet. After this he probably wouldn’t be able to get to sleep until midnight. The dezhurnaya questioned him, and he allowed himself to be squeezed like a lemon.
Finally she poured him a vodka in a drinking glass, the usual hundred grams. Th
ey toasted.
“To your health, Sasha.”
“To your health, Valentina. What can you tell me about Andreyeva, if I may ask?”
The dezhurnaya grinned. “Ah, do I hear some interest there?”
“Why else would I ask?”
“Well, she writes letters to her mother who lives in Leningrad. No male visitors so far. Is that what you wanted to know?”
“That’ll do, Valya.”
“Good luck, Sasha. But you have to promise me one thing.”
“Yes? No lady visitors and so on?”
The dezhurnaya laughed. “Officially no, but that’s nonsense. There’s nothing else out here for you young greenhorns to do. No, if you end up in her bed, or she in yours, I want to know everything.”
“Er... everything?”
“Everything.”
“I... uh...”
“Don’t forget, I can cause you a lot of trouble. You don’t want that, boy. And now, off home with you. So you don’t oversleep again tomorrow morning!”
March 21, 1984, Tyuratam
A pale gray vapor swirled above the floor. Drops formed on Sasha’s protective boots, only to evaporate again immediately. The measuring chamber had a leak. The cooling nitrogen in it was seeping out of a valve just above the floor. Sasha bent down and twisted both halves of the hose with all his strength, but the vapor continued to leak out. The rubber ring that was supposed to seal it was probably frozen stiff. If he twisted it any harder, he’d break it.
“How’s it looking?” It was his father’s voice. The colonel general must have just entered the lab.
“It’s all right,” replied Verkhodanov.
The moustache, Yekaterina, and Sasha were testing the new Relikt detector. To do that they had to cool it down as much as possible, to simulate the extreme cold it would encounter in space.
“So, it doesn’t look good,” said his father.
“If this is state-of-the-art Soviet production, then the future looks bleak,” said Verkhodanov.
“The seals in particular are causing problems. They’re made of low-grade rubber,” said Sasha. “Look at this.” He held up the hose that the nitrogen was seeping out of.
“Will you be able to finish by this evening anyway? The probe has to be mounted on the rocket tomorrow.”
“Of course,” said Verkhodanov.
Sasha was not as optimistic. But he wasn’t actually here as an experimental physicist. He’d never liked building things—he’d always preferred solving simultaneous equations.
“Comrade Colonel General?”
“Yes, Yekaterina?”
“I need to talk to you about the detector again.”
“We’ve already spoken about that. It’s too late now.”
“But it’s important. We only have one chance.”
The woman was persistent, and that impressed him.
His father sighed. “Are there any new arguments?”
“I took another look at the literature yesterday—at the research journal from the American National Standards Institute...”
“Americans? They’ve got no idea!”
“The radiometer we’re using is a Dicke type, named after the American who invented it.”
“Fine, go on, but keep it short, Katya.”
Katya? His father must know this woman really well. Women seldom climbed so high in the Soviet Army. He must have recruited her from somewhere else.
“The article I read compared systematic narrowband and broadband correlators.”
“I’m a soldier, comrade. Don’t forget.”
“Well, correlations compare signals from two sources, which enables them to obtain new information, like the way our ears compare sounds from left and right, so that our brain can allow us to hear spatially. A narrow band, that’s like only hearing the high tones. With a broadband correlator you can hear everything.”
“Then broadband is obviously better.”
“That’s what the engineers who built the Relikt instrument thought, too. They used broadband correlators like in Relikt-1, and simply increased the sensitivity by enlarging the detectors.”
“And you’re not satisfied with that, comrade?”
“No, Comrade Colonel General. Narrowband detectors can differentiate between different temperatures much more cleanly. And that’s what’s important for temperature measurements.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“That’s what the American article says.”
It suddenly occurred to Sasha that Yekaterina must be able to read English. He’d never learned. Another point in her favor.
“Americans!” said his father disparagingly.
“The article derives this thesis mathematically and proves it with experiments.”
“We do our own experiments. Verkhodanov, what’s the accuracy like?”
“The nitrogen leak concerns me, but actually it looks quite good,” said the moustache.
“But we’re comparing minus 196 degrees and 10 degrees,” said Andreyeva. “In space the differences are much smaller. Broadband correlators don’t provide a clearly linear relationship.”
“Now what does that mean?”
“Imagine you jump in the air, say 20 centimeters. Then you double the amount of energy you use and jump—”
“40 centimeters.”
“Exactly. And if you use three times the energy, it’s 60 centimeters. That’s called a linear relationship. But with broadband correlators, that’s not guaranteed. Between 10 and minus 196 degrees it might be, but between minus 260 and minus 270 degrees it’s not.”
“That’s what you claim, comrade. Do you think the engineers at my institute didn’t think of that?”
His father was the head of his own institute? Sasha hadn’t known that.
“Maybe. Or they were of the opinion it didn’t matter.”
“What do you suggest?”
“We stop the tests and rebuild the Relikt instrument.”
“Forget it, Andreyeva. The probe goes on the rocket tomorrow. There isn’t time. Now hurry up with those tests.”
“Yes, Comrade Colonel General.”
Yekaterina, looking like a penguin in her protective coveralls, stood erect and clicked her heels together. Sasha suppressed a laugh.
His father left the lab.
“Turn around please,” Yekaterina ordered.
He obeyed, turning away from her and taking off his coveralls. They’d completed all the tests. It was after 8 p.m., meaning the dezhurnaya would scold him.
“I have to go,” said Verkhodanov, not waiting for them to say goodbye.
A cold draft swirled around him, and the door to the outside closed with a smacking sound. He was alone with a women roughly his own age, maybe a few years older. Sasha felt hot. He shouldn’t get any ideas. He heard the rustling of fabric. Should he sneak a look? Best not.
“So, are you done?” she asked.
He turned back to face her. Yekaterina was wearing a simple uniform, which very much suited her. She had applied red lipstick that looked out of place in the small room.
“Yes, almost.”
He just needed to take off the boots. He lifted his right leg and pulled the coveralls off. But he lost his balance and had to steady himself against the wall. How embarrassing! When he got to the second boot, Yekaterina gave him her hand. He held onto it firmly. It was warm and soft and slightly larger than his.
“Sasha? Can I call you Sasha?”
“Yeah, sure.”
She wanted something. What was it?
“It might sound a bit strange, but I wanted to ask if you’d come to my place.”
Huh. Oh man! She was inviting him over. What did that mean? Should he ask? Did she want to...? He’d read in a magazine that the modern woman... No, if you asked too many questions, you got too many answers.
He suddenly didn’t care about the dezhurnaya anymore. “I... Sure, I don’t have any plans.”
“Great. Then let’s go.”
&
nbsp; Her bungalow looked almost identical to his own. But she’d been here a little longer than he had, so the kitchen she led him into felt much more lived-in. Two pictures that looked like she might have painted them herself were hanging on the wall. It smelled of honey. He liked honey.
“Do you want anything?” she asked.
“Tea?”
“Just turn on the samovar. I’ll go and get changed.”
Yekaterina disappeared into the hallway. What if she returned in a seductive nightshirt? What should he do? He turned on the electric samovar. Then he opened the top button of his shirt, but buttoned it up again immediately. That was stupid. She probably just wanted to talk to him.
And in fact Yekaterina came back wearing long pants and a blouse, not a nightshirt. She sat down next to him at the kitchen table and poured a little hot water into a small teapot. He could smell black tea, honey, and roses. She must have applied some perfume. For him? Sasha felt terribly tense. How was he supposed to have a conversation under these circumstances?
“Do you maybe have a vodka for me?” he asked.
She shook her head. “My father was a drunk. So I don’t keep alcohol here.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
“It was a long time ago. Like a lot of things.”
Why a lot of things? “What do you mean?”
“Me? Nothing. Thanks for coming over. I noticed Komikov values your opinion quite highly. He doesn’t completely trust me for some reason.”
Sasha slumped. It was about his father. She wanted him to put in a good word. Of course, networking was important. It was worth a cup of tea. Or how far would she go?
Yekaterina stood up and walked over to a shelf next to the door. She picked up a few sheets of paper, brought them back to the table, and sat down opposite him. They were copies of something. How had she gotten them?
“Not bad,” he said approvingly, “you convinced the librarian to make copies for you?”
“I had to sleep with him.”
The Death of the Universe: Rebirth: Hard Science Fiction (Big Rip Book 3) Page 4