The Quantum Series Box Set

by Douglas Phillips

  “Dr. Rice, let’s shift the conversation to Core,” the chairman croaked.

  Core was, of course, the extraterrestrial cybernetic organism occupying an alien megastructure in four-dimensional space near the star VY Canis Majoris. Everyone on Earth knew that much. Core self-described as part biology, part quantum computer, and served as a central communications hub to a collection of alien civilizations. A gatekeeper.

  Over the past eight months, Core had revealed bits and pieces of the alien civilizations that it represented: a web of interconnected planets previously unknown and invisible to curious human eyes spread across several thousand light-years of space in one corner of the Milky Way galaxy. Each planet connected to the central hub through the newly discovered technology that compressed space.

  The chairman continued. “You and others have met with this entity Core eight times now. Beyond the revelation of this new boson it doesn’t appear that we’ve gathered much in the way of new science. Would you agree?”

  The hyperbolic paraboloid boson was the newest addition to the Standard Model of physics, responsible for the shape of space itself. Once Core had revealed the fingerprint of the new particle, ecstatic physicists around the world had quickly confirmed its existence and spun off multiple studies to examine its properties.

  “I’m not sure I would agree, Mr. Chairman. While it may be true that Core reveals only what it wants us to know—and by the way, I completely agree that this perceived caginess can be frustrating to scientists—”

  “Not to mention the military,” the chairman added.

  “Yes, our military and security organizations are fully justified in their cautious approach toward Core. But that said, I would argue that Core has at least hinted at additional science that will be disclosed at future dates. For example, it has alluded to an entirely new branch of physics that describes the quantum nature of time. We are only in the beginning stages of this exploration but the yin-yang device that was left in the Russian Soyuz capsule is a prime example of technology that uses this new science.”

  The chairman looked up from a paper on his desk. “I understand this device was turned over to the Russians along with their capsule.”

  Daniel shrugged. “Yes sir, an obligation of the international space treaty. But we had a good look at it before it was passed along to the Russians. I believe the device itself is not as important as the science behind it.”

  “Which Core continues to withhold.”

  “Technically true.” Daniel seemed to be constantly defending Core though he felt the frustration as much as anyone. Too soon, Core often said. You will learn. Daniel had become the de facto representative, the scientist who had made first contact with an alien intelligence and often the central figure in subsequent conversations.

  Each session was much like the first, a radio link via compressed space that allowed for voice and data transmission. A live video link showed the exterior of Core’s structure—the hand grenade, they had joked. Although its surface never changed, a mesmerizing parade of alien devices orbited, each apparently functioning as a communication link back to a home planet. A joint effort among Earth’s space agencies was working to build a similar communications relay that would eventually replace the flimsy duct-tape-and-baling-wire electronics package cobbled together at Fermilab.

  “I believe some topics are left for future conversations,” Daniel continued. “The current focus is on the newly announced mission to the Dancers’ planet, Ixtlub, and on the portal technology that will take us there. In this area, Core has demonstrated a level of openness that has elevated the fledgling science of exobiology to a major branch of study. We have received a detailed map of the self-replicating molecule that powers all life on their planet, similar to our DNA. Needless to say, biologists are having a field day comparing the two molecules. This information will certainly be of use when we make physical contact with the species of this planet and dramatically advances our understanding of what it means to be alive.”

  Several members of the committee nodded their heads. Biology was one of the sciences that seemed to be poised for explosive growth and the politicians were eager to capitalize on funding for studies in their home states.

  “We’ve also received considerable information on the two intelligent species who inhabit the planet. I’ve read some of the documentation myself and I envy those who will be selected for the mission. Assuming we get a video feed, it’s going to be quite the show.”

  One of the minority party members perked up at this comment. “Dr. Rice, you’ve been on television and at other public appearances so I’m sure you’re aware than many people don’t trust these aliens and have grave concerns about the announced mission. What assurances do we have that it will be a friendly meeting and what safeguards are we establishing in case it is not?”

  It was an age-old question, and eight months without any aggression hadn’t dimmed raging fears in the slightest. That the aliens hadn’t “shown themselves” was a common rallying cry among critics even though Daniel had pointed out that the viral video of the beautiful and delicate creatures they’d called the Dancers had more than five billion views on social media platforms.

  “I am aware of public concerns,” Daniel answered. He could have pointed the congressman to one of several children’s science programs in which Daniel had appeared, including a fun Sesame Street bit designed to provide comfort to preschoolers about alien life. He decided against it.

  “As you know, Congressman, NASA has joined with ESA to plan the mission in tight alliance with our national security agencies. I’m confident they will produce a plan that will both be diplomatic and ensure global security. In addition, Core revealed in our last session that it will provide an emissary to Earth, an android in humanoid form who will prepare us for our first encounter with another civilization and act as our guide on the mission. I believe this is a positive indicator that demonstrates Core is primarily focused on diplomacy, not security.

  And lastly, the new transfer portal that is under construction at Kennedy Space Center will give us physical access to any other location in the galaxy with a corresponding portal. It’s important to note that this technology, like any network protocol, requires a handshake from both sides. That is, our portal is open only when we permit it to be open and the same is true for the destination portal.”

  The congressman grunted. “We may have built this portal, but the design was alien. Who’s to say what it will do when they turn it on?”

  It was true that none of the engineers involved in the portal assembly understood exactly how it would work. Most expected it would be one of the first actions taken by the android, who was due to arrive on Earth within days.

  4 Katanauts

  Marie Kendrick could almost sense the ghosts of the past walking the halls of this historic place. The Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building at Kennedy Space Center in Florida went all the way back to the 1960s Mercury program. Interior spaces had been upgraded over the years to support the changing needs of each spaceflight era, but the exterior of the building was still vintage 1960s. She could easily imagine Ford Falcons and Chevrolet Impalas, tail fins and all, scattered across the parking lot.

  She stood alone at the center of the O&C clean room, as they called it, a cavernous space long enough to hold two Airbus 380s end to end. The Apollo Lunar Excursion Module had been assembled here in the 1960s, as well as most of the sections of the International Space Station in the 1990s. The overhead cranes used for these historic projects still hung from the high ceiling, but now idle.

  The O&C clean room was no longer used to assemble spacecraft and no longer quite as clean. It had been repurposed as a gateway to other worlds. Alien worlds.

  Marie brushed back a strand of hair and stared up at the large banner that spanned one wall, imprinted with NASA and ESA logos and the words Mission to the Stars. She marveled at the circumstances that had brought her here. It had been a roller coaster of emotions
over the past several weeks.

  It had started with the announcement of the first mission to an inhabited alien world and the selection process for the lucky few who would go. They would visit a watery planet more than three hundred light-years from Earth, inhabited by creatures that appeared as delicate wisps swaying in ocean currents—intelligent creatures known as the Dancers.

  I was so close, she thought.

  The right education, the right background. Years of NASA experience, including eighteen months working directly for Augustin Ibarra, the administrator of human spaceflight. She’d been a key player in the mysterious disappearance, and recovery, of the Soyuz capsule and its three astronauts, and a partner to Daniel Rice, a science guy straight out of the White House. She even had a presidential commendation.

  In the end, her sparkling CV hadn’t been enough to grab one of only two slots allocated to NASA. Two others had been selected, both with spaceflight experience, a skillset missing from Marie’s resume.

  As she stood in the O&C clean room, that particular job qualification now seemed entirely unjustified. A large white oval doorway dominated the center of the room. For this mission, no one would be flying. They’d simply pass through a portal.

  It had been erected on a raised platform—literally a doorway about eight feet tall made of polished white metal, looking not much different from an airport metal detector. For now, it was a portal to nowhere. Step through it and you’d still be standing on the platform inside the clean room. But that would all change once four-dimensional docking technology was initiated. The big event was less than a week away.

  Administrative coordinator. That was the response to her application. It wasn’t a rejection, of course. She would still be involved in the details of the mission. She’d even be managing much of the training and preparation process. But she wouldn’t be going anywhere, at least not now. There would be future missions to the Dancers’ planet, assuming this one went well.

  The Dancers. Just a funny name that someone had made up—was it Daniel? Possibly, but that was eight months ago, and a lot had happened since then. The lone video of the aquatic species from the planet Ixtlub, a name few could properly pronounce, had gone viral worldwide. A new NatGeo series featured jellyfish-like creatures, and a summer blockbuster movie was in the works, already cross-marketing a line of toys featuring squishy sponge creatures. Of course, no one had yet met them in person. But four intrepid explorers soon would.

  The lucky team members formed a tight group on the raised platform, standing alongside racks of electronics equipment and computer displays—the Transfer Command Station. Two men and two women dressed in blue jumpsuits listened to a NASA engineer who provided a briefing of the systems that would assist in their upcoming journey. Marie checked the training task off from a long list on her tablet computer.

  They’d been labeled katanauts. In the days of extra dimensions and compressed space, explorers to new planets now traveled by way of the ana or kata directions, the fourth-dimensional equivalents of up and down. The days of rockets flying through outer space were over, a mental image now as quaint as a 1950s sci-fi movie.

  The key player in the construction and operation of this new technology was not even from Earth. The alien android called himself Aastazin, but nearly everyone shortened it to Zin, a change he didn’t seem to mind. He stood behind the katanauts on two shiny metallic legs. Officially, Zin was Core’s emissary to Earth and would guide the team once they passed through the gateway. Rumor had it that Core’s brain was a quantum computer and that Zin’s intelligence was derived from a quantum entanglement with his maker.

  He was mostly copper in color, though his exterior was said to be a mix of high-performance metals and carbon fibers. He had a head and two arms ending in hands, which he often rested on metal hips, giving him a very humanlike stance. Most people agreed there was nothing coincidental about the human form or his apparent male gender. The robot’s internal intelligence had occupied bodies of many types. His current incarnation was merely this month’s shell. When on Earth, assume a human form so as not to scare the locals, or something like that.

  Their systems briefing complete, the group moved to a set of four reclined seats, each supported by a pedestal that disappeared into a slot in the raised floor. They looked like a row of dentist chairs, but they were far more than that. The mission documentation described the chairs as critical safety equipment that would keep humans alive during the dimensional transfer.

  As the engineer pointed out the various features of the chairs, Zin stepped off the platform and sauntered over to where Marie stood as if he recognized her at a cocktail party. His smooth motion and amiable demeanor were remarkably human.

  Marie removed her glasses. “Hi, Zin, um, what’s up?” she stuttered. The android had never been threatening or even aggressive, but it still took some adjustment to think of him as a colleague.

  Like his body, Zin’s face was humanoid too. His flat eyes, spaced wider than most, were able to pivot slightly out of their sockets in a quick snap to glance left or right. The move was mesmerizing and probably gave him excellent peripheral vision. He had no ears and not much of a nose either. It was hard to find an audio input site anywhere on his head, but he seemed to hear everything that anyone said.

  His mouth worked very much like any human’s, including a flexible tongue and lips. Marie figured the combination was probably required equipment if you wanted to speak a human language. The head itself stood on a narrower mount than a human neck, and he could turn it three hundred and sixty degrees. He’d stopped performing this feat once someone had told him it looked like a bit from a horror movie.

  “What do you think so far, Marie?” Zin said in flawless English. “Is the training going as you expected?” Strangely, he had an American accent when speaking to the Americans but sounded British when speaking to the Europeans. His mannerisms and hand motions changed as well to match each person. He spoke French from time to time with the sole katanaut from France, but English had been selected as the mission language, and he stuck to it for all but the most informal communications.

  “We’re right on schedule,” Marie told him. “And everyone seems to be clear on procedures so far.”

  Zin had no eyebrows, but a thick ridge above his flat eyes was adjustable. He pushed it down, remarkably mimicking a look of concern. “That’s good to hear, but not exactly what I wanted to talk about. Do you mind if I ask a more personal question?”

  “Um, sure.” It would be interesting to learn what Zin considered personal.

  His forehead ridge moderated. “Learning your languages and mannerisms has been relatively easy, but a true understanding of human nature is more difficult. My job as your guide and liaison, is complex, and first contact between any two civilizations is significant. If, for whatever reason, I was not meeting your expectations, would you tell me?”

  An interesting question. Very deep.

  “I’ll answer, but first a question back to you.” Marie smiled. “How would you react if we were dissatisfied?” Thoughts of crazed robots attacking helpless citizens weren’t easy to sweep from her mind.

  “It depends entirely on the person,” Zin said with a flick of one of his flat eyes. “Criticism from some members of this team could be dismissed as inconsequential. But if the criticism came from you, I would be deeply humbled and highly motivated to improve.”

  What a gentleman. Better than most guys I’ve dated.

  Marie put a hand on his cold metal arm. Could he feel her touch? “Zin, you’re doing just fine. No complaints. If you get the feeling we’re not completely on board, just remember, we’re new to this. We thought we were still fifty years away from having conversations with androids.”

  Zin’s mouth turned up at the ends—more than needed for a smile, but if she castigated him, it would ruin all the fun. Zin might be a bit quirky, but so were some of Marie’s best friends.

  One of his eyes performed a gymnastic maneuver tha
t would have won a gold medal, apparently picking up activity almost behind him. “It looks like they’re almost done. Join us for the next session? I think you’ll find it interesting.” He motioned to the platform, and she followed.

  Tim Tannenbaum, a top American astronaut with beefy arms and buzz-cut hair, sat in one of the reclining dentist chairs, strapped in with a seat harness that looked like it had been borrowed from a high-performance military jet. The NASA engineer pointed at several buttons on the armrest. “If anything goes wrong, just hit Reset,” he said.

  Tim casually looked up from his reclined position like he might ask someone to bring him a beer. “What, no control stick for manual override?”

  “No need to fly at all,” the engineer replied. “The Reset button automatically recycles to baseline, returning you home.”

  “Pretty simple,” Tim replied. He unlatched his seat harness, swiveled off the chair and stood up. He patted the engineer on the shoulder. “Good job, man. Works for me.”

  Zin motioned to the engineer. “Finished?”

  The engineer nodded. “Yeah, I think so. Any questions about transfer preparation?” He looked around at the silent group. “Okay, back to you, Zin.”

  Zin positioned himself to the center of the group. “Thank you. I’m sure everyone is fully enlightened on both suit-up and pretransfer procedures.” Zin scanned the faces, his average height allowing for easy eye contact with the team. “Next, I want to explain exactly what will happen to you during the transfer. I’ll also touch on why it works just this way, but I promise I won’t bore you with the details.”

  As far as Marie knew, the details had never been shared for most of the new technologies Zin and Core had brought to Earth. Any of the NASA engineers would jump at the chance to be bored by those details if Zin ever decided to share them.