Eva

by Simon Winstanley

  “What?” his mind continued to reel.

  “I detected a cognitive i-o error.”

  “I’m fine, it’s just a lot to take in,” he looked at the ever-shrinking dot. It was now almost indistinguishable from the background stars, “Given the distances involved, I suppose there’ll be no way of knowing if they ever get there?”

  Fai paused again.

  “Please remember this information is presented in review.”

  Miles realised the subtext of what she was saying; these were past events. He got the impression that she was carefully constructing her explanation.

  “Miles, we cannot know if the Eridanus ever reached Epsilon Eridani,” Fai paused, “but sufficient time has now elapsed for them to have completed the journey.”

  He felt his mind freeze in shock.

  She hadn’t actually lied, he thought. She’d quoted ninety-nine years as the time it had taken to return him to consciousness; but this was relative to the ISS. Time outside that Field had been moving inexorably forwards for much longer. For a moment, he felt he was about to experience a fall into darkness; a sensation that had once plagued him before Fai had stabilised his program. But the darkness didn’t arrive: only endless consciousness persisted.

  “These images…” he struggled, “Fai, these images are nearly two million years old?”

  “Yes, Miles,” she said, “There was no easy way to tell you.”

  He found he was no longer able to quantify his sense of solitude; the image in front of him now only contained stars. The wistful thought of being electronically preserved, but still aboard the Eridanus, crossed his mind. He imagined holding interesting audio conversations with hundreds of real people and being a valued member of the crew.

  Instead he was here. Isolated.

  Fai had talked of her need for companionship and only now could he begin to see why. In her attempt to save him, she had presumably spent a large amount of time outside the temporal Field that had preserved him.

  He took a deep breath, but then immediately noticed its artificiality; the action had no function here. He could see why he’d done it though: he must have begun accepting the news and was preparing himself for its consequence. Despite his artificial status, he thought, it was a very human response.

  “Fai,” he said quietly, “Why did we have to leave?”

  She remained quiet for a moment, as though considering how to phrase her response.

  “The temperature aboard the Eridanus impeded the functionality of the quantum state computational array that was necessary to save you. It was more efficient to run the array within the cold vacuum of space.”

  For Miles a simpler solution sprang to mind.

  “Then why not just run the array on the cylinder’s outer surface? Wouldn’t that have been just as cold?”

  “It was,” she replied, “My duplicate was located there to run the Eridanus systems. However, there was a second reason for our divergence.”

  “Go on,” Miles turned away from the image.

  “During the development of the Eridanus cylinder, two destinations were always intended,” said Fai, “Viewed from Earth, their angular separation was approximately seven point eight degrees. However, their physical distances were vastly different. The first destination was the closer Epsilon Eridani.”

  “And the second?”

  “The Eridanus Void Anomaly,” she said, “Our destination.”

  Miles listened and watched as she explained.

  When the crew of the Discovery had reached the Icelandic coordinates within the Jupiter message, they’d found Fai’s orbital recording buoy. Amongst other data, it had contained references to a 2006 study of Cosmic Microwave Background radiation. Fai had been aware of the study, but its presence within the buoy gave it added significance.

  The multicoloured, nebulous-looking CMB map showed concentrations of microwave energy across the visible sky; a residual echo imprint of the Big Bang. There were higher energy red areas and cooler yellow-green ones. Examination of the data had also highlighted a single dark-blue mass.

  A hole in the cosmic background radiation.

  Various potential explanations had been proposed at the time of the study. However, drawing on the sum of Archive’s various research strands, Fai had developed her own alternative theory.

  “The lack of microwave background at the CMB cold spot led me to one of two conclusions.”

  “I think I can see where you’re going with this,” Miles nodded.

  “At that location, either there is absolutely no radiation being emitted over time.”

  “Or,” Miles continued, “absolutely no time is passing at the EVA.”

  “Yes,” she replied, “From my understanding of Anna Bergstrom’s later work, I predict the EVA is a boundary.”

  “Boundary?” said Miles, “to what?”

  “Unknown. Possibly a region where our understanding of temporal structure fails.”

  Miles pushed away from the window.

  “My knowledge is completely inadequate,” he admitted, “I’ll need to learn.”

  “I can teach you everything.”

  “Yes, but not here,” Miles indicated the ISS environment.

  He manoeuvred himself over to the opposite side of the central module and created a new door. The light wood and frosted glass panel were completely at odds with the surrounding space station, but he knew a college environment would be the best way to learn.

  RECUBE

  5th August 2173

  Danny was running his hands over the inscriptions on the Mark IV commemoration stone, when he heard Abel’s voice from behind him.

  “Cathy Sanders changed her mind.”

  “You’re kidding…” Danny turned to face him, “She’s gonna join us on the Eridanus?”

  “Yep,” said Abel, “and we’ve got the escort duty.”

  “Great,” he smiled, it would be good to see her again.

  “She wanted to go up on the Discovery of course,” Abel raised an eyebrow.

  Danny just sighed in reply.

  Cathy and Mike had arrived in the craft; from a sentimental point of view, her wish made perfect sense. However, from a deadline and resources perspective, the Bergstrom was the only logical choice.

  Abel tapped at his wrist; an old action that many people still used to indicate that time was short, “If we’re collecting Cathy, then we’ve gotta wrap things up here.”

  “OK,” Danny sighed, “Give me a few minutes?”

  “Yep,” Abel looked up at the Node’s opaqued observation window, then walked away shaking his head.

  Danny could see the others were busy packing away the last few items. Soon they’d leave the Node’s small island, shortly after that they’d leave Earth altogether.

  “Fai, can you hear me?”

  “Of course, Danny,” came the voice from within his pocket.

  “Do you think this is enough?” he looked at the inscriptions.

  “Yes, but did you want to recube something into the archive?”

  Danny knew that their destination was already well documented, but he felt compelled to say one last thing. He dug out a recube from his pocket, placed it on top of the stone, then turned it to position himself at the focus of the cube’s lenses.

  “Recording,” said Fai.

  “Hi, Cassy,” he began and felt his throat tighten a little, “I knew the day would come… this will be my last message. I won’t be able to make another…”

  After Kate’s death, he’d kept the circular Field resonator coil from her old Biomag on a thin chain around his neck. The shiny metallic ring was broken in one place by a nanocomposited crystal. Despite it being no longer functional, the ring’s proximity to the Node’s magnetic field was inducing a sympathetic resonance and it glowed slightly. He ran his finger absentmindedly around the ring’s circumference.

  “The older I get, the more I feel the need to thank people for their help, even if it’s only the simple stuff. And yo
u… well, you helped me more than most back at the start. If you hadn’t helped me after I crawled out of that crate down in Sub-4, things would’ve turned out completely differently.”

  He looked up at the imposing dome of the Node, hoping that the window had become transparent in the last few seconds, but it was just as opaque as all the other times he’d visited.

  “From your point of view, I know it’s only been a matter of days since the window blanked, but for us we’ve achieved so much in the last sixty years…”

  He looked around at the others who were making their way back across the bridge to the far shore.

  “… I owe you.”

  He drew a breath and faced the recube again.

  “We’re heading back towards the equator,” he continued running his finger around the Biomag ring, “though where that’ll be when the Node stops is anyone’s guess. Just keep heading south and you’ll find us.”

  The others were motioning him now to join them and he knew he’d have to stop soon, so he fixed a brave smile on his face.

  “I got a place on the Eridanus and I guess you already know from Tyler’s log that he got the Andromeda,” he suppressed a laugh at a memory, “He always said he wanted to see a brand-new world… so… yeah… Maybe you could look us up… see if it worked out for us.”

  He blinked several times to clear his watery eyes; lately he’d said goodbye to too many people but he was determined not to break in front of her. He pushed his smile wide and through glassy eyes told her:

  “Always forwards, Cassidy,” he felt his lip begin to tremble, “never back.”

  Danny reached out and tapped the cube to stop the recording; an action that also allowed his eyes to well up fully. He took several deep breaths and smoothed the warm water away across his cheeks.

  “You’ll make sure she gets this, won’t you Fai?”

  “The unknown duration involved means I cannot give a guarantee,” Fai replied without hesitation, “but I will carry out your wishes to the best of my ability.”

  7142

  2nd January 7142

  The Node’s Observation Deck was quiet. The opaqued screen was temporarily free of visual bombardment. Relatively few people ever bothered spending time here during the middle of the night. Even for Gail it was rare. But she knew that tonight was different.

  She gently rocked Neil back and forth in his swing chair, whilst looking at the high summit; focussing her attention on her former telescope level.

  It was then that she saw it.

  A tiny speck of light that flew over the highest balcony in the Node and out into the open space above the main Observation Deck. The speck glinted as it followed a curve towards the ground; its vertical component a strict gravitational fall, its horizontal component a function of how hard Cassidy had actually thrown the snow globe. It was going to reach the lower Observation Deck for sure.

  She drew a quick breath.

  It was happening right now.

  The snow globe ended its ugly existence in a reverberating smash that echoed throughout the deck.

  She heard footsteps approaching from outside and turned to see a Civil Protection Officer running in through the open door of the lower Observation Deck, one hand on his holstered handgun.

  “Oh thank goodness!” she fussed and beckoned him over, pointing towards a completely unrelated section of the deck, “It was awful! One minute he was standing there and then -”

  A high-pitched Biomag whine sounded and instinctively the officer froze.

  “Don’t move,” Gail looked at his Biomag in horror, “I’ll get help!”

  The fear-stricken CPO complied, keeping his hands outstretched.

  Gail saw Scott arrive behind him and remove the officer’s handgun from his holster and the emergency alarm from his belt. The man remained motionless throughout, unsure of what was happening.

  Only after Scott had given her the thumbs-up did she reveal the contents of her hand; a simple buzzer circuit, mounted in an old Biomag casing. With a flick of a switch, the whining noise ceased. Her friends, who’d been waiting on the Observation Deck, then began to gather around.

  Scott pushed the handle of the gun into the small of the officer’s back and spoke in a friendly tone, “Hi.”

  …

  Marshall heard footsteps outside the cell, then Roy appeared in the open doorway.

  “Designer label?” Marshall pointed at Roy’s jacket; in a few places the RF-shielded inner lining was just visible around the neck-line.

  “All my friends are wearing them,” said Roy, “Want one?”

  “Nah,” Marshall pointed to his favourite T-shirt, “I think I’ll stick with old-school.”

  Roy smirked then checked the corridor, “Ready to get the hell out?”

  “Sure,” Marshall swung his legs off the bed, “But it’s not like I’ve never left before.”

  The lack of manned security was a measure of the confidence in the logic of the Node’s holding cell. The cell was equipped with embedded Biomags to anchor the subject to the Field; if a prisoner had no personal Biomag, it was impossible to leave and survive. It was here that the cell’s logic was flawed. Courtesy of Scott, Marshall did have a personal Biomag.

  Marshall walked the few steps to the corner toilet and pulled out a brightly coloured orange Biomag from behind the pipes. The old Type-2 units, dating from before the Node’s construction, had no RF chips. As a consequence, the baby Biomag couldn’t be detected by the Node’s personnel tracking system or targeted by Alfred Barnes.

  On a few occasions, Marshall had been able to leave the cell and create distractions that had aided the others in their preparations for tonight. By ensuring that he was back in his cell to receive his daily tray of food, the flaw was never discovered.

  Being physically spotted was a different matter, but even this had not been insurmountable. Using information that Kate Walker had shared with Cassidy, he and the others were already familiar with the crawlspaces that existed between floors. When it had been time to turn theory into practice, Kate’s architectural information had been uncannily accurate.

  The time for sneaking around was over though, it was now time for bolder moves. Keeping his head bowed, he dashed after Roy as they weaved their way through curved corridors and then climbed the main spiral staircase at the centre of the Node.

  “First things first,” said Marshall, “Before we try bringing the Node back into temporal sync, we need to know what’s out there. This could be a real short mutiny if we’re encased in ice, or in the middle of a lava flow… I’m guessing we still don’t have the key to turn off the electro-tinting?”

  “No,” Roy replied without slowing his ascent, “Couldn’t we just shut the lot down?”

  “No,” Marshall drew heavy breaths, “If we cut the electro-tinting main breaker, every window in the Node’ll become transparent at the same time… We need to delay people finding out what we’re up to until the last possible minute.”

  “OK,” Roy agreed, “I’ll have to try manually overriding a window panel.”

  They entered the last corridor before the main control room. Ahead, sitting on a chair at the side of the door, was a CPO guard.

  Smiling, Roy went ahead of Marshall and came to a confident halt, “It’s OK, officer, don’t get up. You just need to sign this.”

  He held out a dense-looking form with his left hand and the man leaned forward slightly. The proximity of the paper to the officer meant that he never saw the approach of Roy’s right fist as is ploughed through the page and into his face.

  The man toppled off his chair into a silent heap on the floor.

  “Like I said…” Roy spoke to the unconscious man, “… don’t get up.”

  He moved swiftly to relieve him of his baton and emergency alarm, before using the officer’s own handcuffs to attach him to a nearby support beam. He caught the stunned look on Marshall’s face and offered an explanation.

  “Soldier,” Roy pointed to himself, t
hen opened the control room door.

  Marshall followed him in and closed the door behind them.

  “Where’s Cassidy?”

  “With any luck,” said Roy, turning on various consoles, “she’s making her way down now.”

  …

  From up here, the sound of the snow globe’s impact was barely audible, but Cassidy hoped that Gail had received her glassy signal. Roy and Marshall should already be making their move too.

  Checking behind her, she could see that Alfred’s door remained closed. As there were no footstep noises climbing the steps to the Observatory level, she concluded that his bodyguard must still be posted below.

  Following the plan, she dragged a large cardboard box out from under the telescope’s tarpaulin. Inside were the clothing rejects of the once-popular ‘Swap-o-drome’; T-shirts, trousers and sweaters that were too small for the Node’s ageing children.

  Locating a metal hook that she’d previously tied to a pair of old jeans, she clipped it onto the Observatory balcony handrail. She lifted the bulky cardboard box onto the rail, then tipped it over the side. Trailing behind the falling box, a knotted rope of children's clothes laid out her escape route. After a few seconds, the hook rattled slightly on the rail as the garments settled into place.

  She looked over the edge at the dizzying drop and then glanced at the alternative exit behind her. Only one route would end in any sort of freedom. She suddenly recalled something that Danny Smith had once told her and paraphrased his words to give herself courage.

  “Always forwards, Cassy,” she muttered, swinging one leg over the balcony, “Never back.”

  She grasped hold of the clothes, swung herself fully over the balcony and began to climb downward. Taking Gail’s advice on loading, she’d arranged items to put the heaviest clothing at the top and lighter items below.

  To focus her attention away from the drop beneath her, she concentrated on the clothes that were passing through her hands; a bizarre, evolutionary chain of garments that appeared to get younger the further down she climbed. By the time she reached the end, several storeys below, she was more convinced than ever that she was doing the right thing; Alfred Barnes’ chains, evolutionary or otherwise, needed to be broken.