A Letter to the Editor

(To appear in the Newtown Herald)

It has finally happened! I am usually not one to address the press. When I put pen to paper, it is mostly to document what would undoubtedly be the most mundane of observations imaginable to most people. Therefore, my writing only appears in well respected scientific journals, although this small bit of pride is only a slight relief of the monotony of the actual work. Occasionally I also get the satisfaction of being able to put some colleague who is still wet behind his ears and thinks they are reinventing physics in their place. The latter only happens so often as not to become equally dull as the former. However, the events of the last few weeks have moved me to honor this occasion with a weak attempt to make myself heard outside my field.

I joined the inter-system survey program by our department precisely ten years after the deployment, in the final stage of the Vanguard Mission. Back then, I could not wait to leave academia for working in private space exploration, so I stopped pursuing my doctorate. I had naively believed that the millions and billions being poured into the company were an indication of the continuation of exponential research efforts of decades prior. Space was the last frontier, and it seemed that everybody and their grandmother was appreciating the discovery of further clues as to the past, present, and future of our universe. Very soon, however, I came to realize my naivety, as the shackles I thought to have escaped manifested again. This time their first name was "management". There is no such thing as a free lunch, after all.

So I had traded my shabby office at the university for a shinier one with modern furniture and colleagues with an average mental capacity of a single-celled organism. My department owes its continued existence to our somewhat consistent discovery of meteoroids rich in ferromagnetic and fissile materials with a suitable trajectory for future interception. That much is certainly true, but I like to believe that my discoveries stand out as being exceptionally scientifically valuable. I would like to point to the tiny meteoroid PICO-1415, which appears to have entered a perfect circular orbit around our planet with a perfectly constant distance of 1.415926535 light-years. There is also RADI-0100, a pulsar in a chaotic dance with its twin, which has already collapsed into a black hole. When translating the bursts of light which emanate from this chaotic motion into sound, it played the most popular music from the year I found it. Predictably, among these two and many others, only RADI-0100 received some notoriety outside our offices, for obvious reasons.

Now it is not surprising that the discovery of intelligent carbon-based life outside our own planet would reinvigorate the general excitement about our work and perhaps equip us with the means to return to the scientific productivity of yesteryear. However, the actual significance of this discovery lies in the details. There was never any doubt that we are not alone. Believing otherwise is a symptom of too little or too much knowledge of biology, often with an unhealthy dose of spirituality. A far more appropriate reason to be shocked is our collective reaction to this news, which brings me to my main concern. My profession demands that I tolerate any hypothesis, stupid as they may initially sound. It is getting harder and may soon even be impossible to state facts without causing an avalanche of speculation. Some people will attempt to pick up the pieces to the impossible puzzle in an attempt to make sense of what is, what somebody wants to be or wants them to think is true. I do not care much for their intentions, but the outcome might threaten everything we, the few competent individuals in this organization, have worked for.

Thus, I hereby call on you to put more care into crafting your headlines in future issues. The ac ute shortage caused by "PREPARING FOR INTERGALACTIC WAR—will we perish before alcohol and canned tuna do?" is depriving me of the last two things that made my evenings bearable. Furthermore, I would like to use this opportunity to remind everybody that I do not appreciate being stuck in traffic for hours on a Friday evening. The increasing number of individuals deciding to seek connection to our interstellar peers by meditating in the most inconvenient of places is most annoying. Give me a break, dammit!

Sincerely, a disgruntled VWare scientist.

I. The Discovery

In an ordinary spiral galaxy situated in an equally unremarkable cluster, eight or nine planets, depending on who you ask, orbit a star which is roughly eight thousand parsecs from the center of its galaxy. Our story takes place somewhere on the third-closest planet of that star (this one is generally considered a planet, except by a very small vocal minority of its inhabitants). On it, a large meeting room on the highest floor of a very impressive building is currently reserved for a very, very important meeting. The importance of the meeting that is about to take place demands no less of a room than this one. Three of the four walls of the room are made entirely of glass. Two in one corner, opening up the clear blue sky above and mostly gray, packed parking lots below. Not far away, there is another, slightly less tall building that is likewise surrounded by a giant parking lot, and behind it another, and another, and so on. Behind the opposing glass wall of the room, the floor continues into a suspiciously pleasant reception and just a few offices, of which none seem to be occupied at this moment.

The time is precisely noon, lunchtime, on a late summer Thursday. However, none of the three people sitting close together at the enormous and very luxurious wooden table are under the illusion that there could be anything more important at this very moment than what they are here to discuss. They sit in silence, waiting for the arrival of the people to whom they need to speak. The excruciating silence in anticipation is clearly taking its toll on the young Indian man fumbling with his pen. He has almost dropped it five times now. The middle-aged woman with red shaggy hair sitting next to him seems no less anxious. She alternates between adjusting her glasses, her notes, and the complementary glass of water in front of her, out of which she has yet to take the first sip. The older man, however, merely gazes at the analogue clock mounted on the only plain, windowless wall of the room with an expression of chronic tiredness. As a veteran of many years at the company, the upper floors no longer intimidate Mr. Dickens, head of the IPSS project. It is now ten minutes past noon.

Seven more minutes pass without anything noteworthy happening, except for the aforementioned pen finally falling off the table and rolling out of reach below it. Suddenly, the door opens, and the silence is interrupted by four men in very expensive suits chatting and loudly laughing.

"Oh, you are already here!" notices the loudest of them. His appearance has something of two spheres on top of each other, a smaller, shiny one, sitting on another one that has been pressed in a three button jacket. "Sheffield" he points to himself "I represent the board, and this is Crawfield, finance, Winfield, communications, Mayfield, operational," he says, pointing at each of his more slender companions.

"Hello Rich!". The old man, Richard Dickens, silently acknowledges Mr. Mayfield with a nod. They sit down at the opposite end of the table.

"I'm Dr. O'Reilly; this is Dr. Vaigyaanik," the woman introduces herself and her younger colleague. "Thank you very much for giving is the opportunity to …"

"Yes, I understand, you would like to discuss your bonus for your discovery," Mr. Sheffield interrupts her. "I have already talked about this with Mr. Crawfield, and we think it would only be appropriate to opt for a compensation in the form of options in this case. You will agree that this way you or your children and grand children will get more out of the exploitation of the resources …"

"No, I mean … this is not why we are here," Dr. O'Reilly interrupts him back. "The third planet of the S02N-3230 system is not only resource rich and habitable … it IS inhabited!"

"Yes, I have read your report, but I do not know why I should be in any way bothered by potential 'microbial life'." For the last two words, the big man raises both his hands to his shoulders to gesture quotation marks, thereby putting enormous stress on the buttons of his jacket.

"Actually, there is much more than that." Dr. Vaigyaanik finally speaks up. "This planet is or was inhabited by an intelligent life form. They seem to have deployed several artificial satellites into orbit around their planet, and occasional bursts of gamma and neutron radiation indicating nuclear activity. We are looking at a potentially very advanced civilization." With this statement, the tension that has evidently built up inside him is released, and Vaigyaanik sinks into the backrest of his chair. For a short moment, the silence returns to the room, such that the motion of the pen beneath the table could be a road roller.

"Riley and Antariksh came straight to me with this information. I was the one to suggest omitting these details from the report." Richard leans forward. "It is paramount that we decide to whom and how we disclose this information. It is not very likely that somebody will also just stumble upon this discovery, so it may be best to only disseminate this knowledge to a select few in the international scientific community … maybe the prime minister."

"And you are sure about all of this?"

"One hundred percent positive!"

"I mean … shouldn't we nudge the government into contracting us to send a probe to confirm it first?" Upon Mr. Winfield's question, another agonized sigh escapes Antariksh Vaigyaanik's mouth. Evidently not everyone had read their report in preparation for the meeting.

"Did the boys from research and development pull a miracle and get their near-light-speed engine from a stationary hunk of metal the size of a power plant into a functioning prototype yet? Even then, it would still take more than twenty-five thousand years to get there. So perhaps we can put that plan into action in about forty years?" The sarcasm in Richard's last statement is of such magnitude that even Mr. Winfield cannot be oblivious to it.

"Ok, Mr. Dickens … what do you suggest we do, then?"

"I don't know. This is not my job. This is why I asked you to set up this meeting in the first place." Again silence.

"I think first we should copyright it."

"WHAT?"

"Well … anything else would be foolish considering the potential for commercial exploitation. Imagine if Columbus had been able to trademark America." The sudden, brief collective frown on the opposite site of the table makes the scientists momentarily appear each a decade older, but goes unnoticed. "I think we can start with informative and entertaining media productions," suggests Winfield.

"Perfect! We can take a few people from Rich's team to assist the production and be in front of the camera," adds Mayfield.

"Absolutely not!" But the protest goes unheard.

"Perhaps we can offer an experience of sorts … give people a tour of the facilities, display a full-scale replica of the probe that made the observation, and so on," Crawfield contributes, drawing from his prior experience as the managing director of an almost successful theme park. The nodding from the other executives finally seals the fate of the meeting, as the remaining one and a half hours are spent on devising at least fourteen additional opportunities to capitalize on this recent discovery. After concluding with a round of shaking hands, three mentally exhausted and disillusioned scientists make their way towards the elevator and four very content and energetic executives for their offices on the same floor. Thus concludes this perfect demonstration of the regime of meritocracy that produce hierarchies in corporations.

The Vanguard Mission

(Excerpt from "The race to space—rockets, satellites, and probes until 1985")

The Vanguard-II probe is a multipurpose observatory weighing about eleven and a half tons, with full spectral sensing capabilities to pick up both non-ionizing and ionizing radiation as well as extremely low frequencies using a complex multi-band antenna. This sensing suite was developed by a joint research group of multiple leading national research universities. The propulsion and control systems as well as the deployment vehicle were taken from existing stock dating back to the space race during the Cold War.

Originally, the Vanguard was supposed to also evaluate a custom space vehicle platform by the Viper Hard- and Software Group (Viper Ware) using a near-light-speed propulsion system. However, since the project stayed in the concept phase even beyond the completion of the other components, they were swiftly transitioned to the Vanguard-II, which ironically launched before Vanguard-I.

Although a private Viper Ware venture, the project received numerous subsidies by the government, which contributed a total of eighteen billion of the budget for the project equivalent to twenty-one billion dollars. The duration of the mission was set to be fifteen years, and it was projected to generate a constant 2.4% return on investment per year. This was later extended for another five years, after which Viper Ware intends to auction it off between interested universities, to recoup some of its investments into the project. The selected academic institution will then continue to fund the operation of the probe for educational and research purposes.

II. The Evening Show with Boris

The weather had, much like the meeting on the top floor between the important people and those who think of themselves as such, changed drastically over the course of the afternoon. The bright and optimistic day had now turned to a miserable, all consuming gray. The clouds, which are pouring seemingly without end onto the concrete, are hanging low, blocking anything from view that is taller than a two-story house.

Dr. O'Reilly is clutching the steering wheel of her car. She is desperately trying to make out the road in front of her between the wipers, which hurry from left to right and back across her windshield in a futile attempt at clearing the view. The radio host, a certain Boris Bloomfield, is just introducing a new guest on the show. O'Reilly turns off the radio in order to stay focused.

Back at the office, Mr. Richard Dickens is sitting in his chair in front of a small FM radio tuned to the same station, feet on his desk. He has dozed off waiting for the cleaning staff to make their way through the building before he will brush his teeth. He will then be spending the night at the office, as on any day except Friday.

This leaves only Dr. Vaigyaanik to witness tonight's program. Like O'Reilly, he is also on his way home through the downpour. The raging storm is whipping around the antenna of his car radio, distorting the signal, and a wave of noise washes over the sound periodically. Consequently, the young man does not hear the name of the guest being introduced by the host, a certain director of communications of the Viper Hard- and Software Group and vice director of the defense and space division: Dr. Winfield.

"So Winnie …" the moderator begins after a few minutes of meaningless chitchat interrupted by popular songs and advertisements for lab grown canned tuna, "… our listeners are dying to know: Is the statement your company put out earlier really true? Did you find a second planet like ours?"

" Not just this, Boris, but we have reason to believe that it is habitable and may in fact already be inhabited by primitive intelligent life."

"Fascinating!"

Antariksh slams on the brakes. He awkwardly fumbles with the little knob on the radio trying to increase the volume while he reaches out of the side window, yanking at the antenna on the roof of his car.

" Yes, and we have great plans to let the public all in on it very soon , " Winfield continues. "We are going to give you exclusive insight into our discovery process, as we have just started producing an exclusive documentary about this historic discovery. Furthermore, we will open our laboratories to guided tours , and to a dedicated few, we will soon offer tickets onboard the pioneer expedition to humanit y's new home."

Dr. Vaigyaanik groans.

"Fascinating! Fascinating!" This Boris character is evidently intellectually overwhelmed by a topic that goes beyond simple celebrity drama. He is most definitely blissfully ignorant of the massive headache that his show and subsequent headlines in the newspapers will cause the three scientists who have just ended their workday by reporting this finding. Antariksh turns off the engine, leans back into the car seat and looks out of the window at a sign saying:

"Welcome to Newtown—Home of the Viper HQ (Population: 56,312)."

He makes a mental note to call his colleagues as soon as he would get home before restarting the engine.

Winfield eventually leaves the interview, but not before the host has a chance to promote the Viper Office and Home computing package, as well as exclusive space news from the company for a third time. Then, it is time for ordinary aether wave dwellers to chime in.

"We want to hear from you, dear listeners …" Boris proclaims. "What would have been your first course of action if you had made this phenomenal discovery?"

The first caller sounds like he has been waiting to answer this question all his life: "Actually, this is quite in line with what I predicted several years ago. If we had invested into more advanced space exploration and manned vehicles with the ultimate goal of deep space colonization …" Shortly into the call, Boris cuts off the nerdy rambling by fading to music.

After the song and an update on the weather situation, the next caller is put through. He has a voice which, somehow, paints the picture of a very big man with a mustache crowning the face of a bulldog."I say we nuke 'em," he barks."You never know. They might not hesitate to strike first. You know … the art of war and all that." This sentiment is echoed by the next caller and the one after that, quite to the amusement of the host, Boris. Only various callers later does the shy voice of a young woman ask: "I don't know … shouldn't we try to talk to them first?"

Editorial Statement

(Editorial Statement to appear in the Newtown Herald)

At the Newtown Herald, we strive for best-in-class journalism and reporting. Our mission is to bring you, our readers, the truth in all matters. We often have to face attempts at suppression of information, legal threats and outcry from the intellectual elites. We pledge to continue to stand against all these odds for the sake of our readers.

However, yesterday's coverage of the discovery and investigation of what is now colloquially referred to as "the twin planet" left much to be desired of our usually so rigorous journalistic integrity. Our front page article bearing the title "ELITES ESCAPE TO SPACE?!—what could follow the discovery of planet no. 2?" could have led to serious consequences, and the widespread belief of false information. To maintain the integrity of our outlet and to curb any such unwanted effects, we have decided to issue this correction together with a sincere apology to all those affected by it. In the original article, we made a baseless and dangerous claim about the Viper Hard- and Software Group, which is credited with the discovery being reported. We incorrectly stated that this publicly traded company has previously been unsuccessful in making promised breakthroughs in their civil space business efforts, which caused some confusion among prospective and current shareholders.

Fortunately, authorities took swift action to limit the damage caused by the rogue author/editor. Trading will reportedly resume as normal next week, and the Newtown Herald is reassessing its business relation to this former contractor. Although we did not find any wrongdoing among Newtown Herald employees, we are happy to announce that we are introducing a new strategic partnership with Viper Ware. With the help of the newly provided expert systems and computer intelligence, future publications will once again adhere to our standards of quality and factuality.

Chadwick Chatfield (Chief Editor)

III. Mad Monday

Riley sits at her desk, chewing up her pencil as she hunches over a litter of scribbled notes and calculations. Her eyes dash from the papers in front of her to the monitor of her computer, to her calculator and back to her notes. She reaches out for the mug of by now cold coffee when somebody violently bumps into her chair. Knocking over the mug spills the brown liquid over her keyboard and the papers strewn across her desk, completely ruining, among other things, a preprint of "On space-time compression and nonlinearity".

"What the hell … can't you watch out where you're going? We are trying to work here," she spins around in her chair to yell at the person behind her.

"S-sorry!" Distractedly, the young man with scruffy hair and oversized glasses steps aside and continues to fumble with his camera. He and three other peculiar figures are being led by Mr. Dickens through the office.

"… and this is just our office where we process all the data and come up with the computations to run on the mainframe we saw earlier." he explains to them. "This also marks the end of the tour … any final questions?"

At this, the nerdy guy with the camera blurts out as if he has only been waiting for such an opportunity: "Actually, I was wondering if you would like to take a look at my resume. I took some classes on astrophysics in college and have been following developments in space travel religiously since …" but he is cut off by Richard.

"We currently don't have any open positions, but you can always send it to our HR department. I think Mr. Hadfield would be delighted to take a look at it." Having swiftly brushed aside the request, he whisks the group away towards the exit, as Dr. O'Reilly returns to her desk with a new cup of coffee, making sure not to cross paths with the group again. Her colleague, Dr. Antariksh Vaigyaanik, who was swift to help her clean up the spilled coffee in order to protect his mess of books and papers on the adjacent desk, is studying a now soggy sheet of formulas.

"And you still think it wasn't something with the spectral analysis?" His voice carries an unmistakable sound of doubt.

"No …" she responds, mildly infuriated, but still trying to maintain a professional attitude despite the massive coffee stains on her clothes. "I ran the simulation three times over. It should be in exactly that spot now, and this only leaves this conclusion."

"But don't you think this sounds a little far-fetched?" Antariksh counters and continues: "Yes, it could perhaps be physically possible, but the chance of this happening is so astronomically unlikely …"

"Sorry for the mess, Riley," Richard interrupts their discussion as he returns bringing another apologetic mug of coffee. "I already told these dough-bags from the top floor that they can't just expect us to guide strangers around the facilities all day like in a museum. It's bad enough that we got all those lunatics running around outside. I almost didn't make it home on Friday because the bus ran over one of those 'space hippies', twice. You should brace yourself … In the afternoon, we'll get another visit from the ministry of defense." Antariksh and Riley exchange skeptical looks.

"Erm … Boss, there is something you should know." Riley's face takes on a look of concern. "It's gone!"

"What do you mean it's gone?"

"We took several pictures of where it ought to be, but we only get background radiation." What little Monday morning enthusiasm that is left in Mr. Dickens visibly fades from his eyes just as his pager announces with a headache-inducing beep that Mr. Crawfield requires his assistance. "Great … this moron needs another nerd to fend off the press again. Oh … and you two better find our little planet again." With this, he turns on the spot and swiftly marches to the exit for the next elevator up to the executive floor.

Dr. Vaidyaanik turns to his colleague again. "You didn't even tell him about the signal the instruments picked up?"

"Did it seem like he was ready to hear about it?" she claps back at him.

He raises his hands defensively. "Sorry! It's just that I've never seen something like this. Only one large peak across the whole spectrum, and then complete silence. This seems like a message."

"Oh, Antariksh, don't be silly! There is probably a more mundane explanation for this. Maybe had some residual charge building up on the sensor. That could also explain why we don't see anything anymore. It's just fried."

"Goooooood morning stargazers! Hahaha! Well … I say good morning, but it is almost lunchtime, " Boris' unmistakable voice blares out of the tiny speaker of the FM radio on Mr. Dickens' desk.

Dr. Vaigyaanik walks over to turn down the volume, then he hesitates. He picks up the device, looks at it thoughtfully, and turns to Dr. O'Reilly. "In what range did you see the spike again?"

Pandora's Remnants

The Falling Star retribution system (creatively named after an illustration of the likely and last impression on any would-be ground target) remains the only fully functional deterrent from the Cold War that is deployed in space. As a matter of fact, the deployment of this weapon is often credited with ending the hostilities altogether although most historians and other civilians don't seem to care much about the terrible shadow still cast on them from above.

With the expenses of conventional thermonuclear weapons slowly but surely driving all participants to the brink of bankruptcy, military leaders turned their eyes towards a new goal. Thousands of individual missiles capable of delivering a sustained nuclear Armageddon would merely keep the enemy from raising his head to reach for their own button. Thus, they sought to replace them with a single warhead so powerful it could dig out the enemy commander in chief from the wine cellar of even the deepest bunker. This endeavor would culminate in the development of the Falling Star system. Through the use of artificial dark matter, ten rockets, no larger than "conventional" intercontinental ballistic missiles, orbit the planet in unpredictable paths indefinitely. Their combined payload: One teratonne of TNT. The energy source for their production and containment technologies have yet to be declassified and probably never will be.

With the threat of complete annihilation, all foreign adversaries were forced to lay down their weapons of mass destruction, resulting in a military singularity. The inventors of such horror had carefully factored in the inevitable moral outcry and fear when devising this planet-killer. After all, through the use of such a highly volatile substance, decommissioning the weapons is for all intents and purposes impossible. Once assembled, it's either explode upon command or explode anyway, if the containment is disturbed.

However, as the years went by and the former conflict faded more and more from the memory of everyone's mind, maintaining what they drew from Pandora's box weighed more and more on the shoulders of the government. Seeking to appease their taxpayers who could feel the same effect on their wallets, it was decided to transfer this responsibility to the private sector. At that time, this was the preferred strategy to lighten everyone's mood without actually making any constructive changes. This had the intended effect, and the world since returned to complaining about the unjust government welfare programs for the poor over the after-work pint. Meanwhile, Falling Star is still being maintained by the military defense branch of the Viper Hard- and Software Group.

IV. Sound Decision

Once again, it is the research personnel that is first represented at the large meeting table on the top floor, but Mr. Dickens and Dr. Vaigyaanik are soon joined by Mr. Sheffield, Mr. Crawfield, and Mr. Mayfield. In contrast to their previous meeting, the mood is evidently more serious.

"Gentlemen. I hope you had a good weekend." Although maintaining professional courtesy, Mr. Sheffield's salutation towards the two scientists carries a subtle accusation, as if to say: "The time of lounging around is over. Back to work." At the sight of a sandwich buffet, however, which is set aside for the break indicated on the agenda printed out at each seat, the mood of the big man brightens significantly. Placing himself on the far side of the table on a chair which moans and shrinks several inches under the load, he again turns to Mr. Dickens: "Is nobody else from your team joining us today, Richard? Today could be a really important day for us. I must say that your little discovery did in fact come at a very important time for us and our shareholders, and it seems that our clients are taking great interest in it." Mr. Sheffield taps on one of the handouts laying in front of him. "Since it seems we will have another moment until our friends from the ministry appear, I suggest you go over this one more time."

Having said this, he leans back in his chair, raises his arm and begins staring at his very expensive watch as if to observe the passing of time itself while he starts to whistle. "Phwwhht. Phwwhht. Phwwwwwhht." Only three notes, belonging to a C minor chord, manage to form from his lips, sustained, enumerated and repeated without being distracted by variation or creativity in agonizing monotony. Time grinds to a halt.

Suddenly, with a bang, the door to the room is thrown open, violently waking Mr. Dickens and Dr. Vaigyaanik from the trance induced by the itemized list of corporate-speak they were hunched over. Through the glass frame, a massive sphere pressed in a khaki jacket covered in colorful badges bursts into the room. On top of the massive torso, a smaller, paler sphere is supporting a massive khaki cap. The face is characterized by a nose the size of a plum and of an unpleasant shade of crimson, crowning a thick mustache and small black eyes like olives.

"William!" Mr. Sheffield jumps out of his chair to welcome General Warfield, much to the relief of his chair.

"They could be brothers." Antariksh dares to snarkily remark to his immediate supervisor under the cover of this distraction.

"They are cousins," comes the correction.

Behind the general, a slender man in an anthracite-gray suit has also appeared and introduces himself as Mr. Leicester, assistant to the minister. After the obligatory shaking of hands, each participant returns to their designated seat at the table, adjusting the printed-out agenda or preemptively reaching for one of the small bottles of carbonated water in the middle of the large table. Just as the meeting is about to begin, Dr. O'Reilly sneaks into the room and inserts herself professionally into the meeting while throwing an ominous look at Dr. Vaigyaanik. But now it is not possible to talk about what she has to tell him, preferably in the absence of Mr. Sheffield and the visitors. The first item on the agenda to be discussed is: "Review of prior performance of contracts awarded to the Viper Hard- and Software Group (Classified)" followed by "Assessment of competitive position and viability of strategic partnership (Highly classified)" and "Outstanding obligations and considerations for renegotiation (Classified)".

Finally, but just before proceeding to the anticipated topic of "Strategy concerning recent space discoveries (Internal)", they are saved by a ten-minute snack break. Mr. Dickens leaves the room in order to take a phone call. Dr. O'Reilly holds back her colleague Dr. Vaigyaanik from joining the others at the buffet and instead ushers him to a corner of the room in order to show him a printout she brought with her.

"What am I looking at?" he asks.

"You were right! It was indeed FM, and what's more, it is in the audible range."

"Did you listen to it?"

"Not yet, I don't have a speaker and couldn't find a way to hook up Richard's radio to the computer. But look …" She points at the signal waveform. "It contains almost perfect sine waves with constant pitch and few harmonic frequencies. I think this is a message, perhaps using digital encoding of sorts, just not binary." They both stare at the black ink on the hastily torn off piece of continuous paper, their mind halfway between excitement and utter confusion.

The meeting resumes before they can enlighten the returned, slightly red-faced Mr. Dickens, but not before Dr. O'Reilly can save the last sandwich from Mr. Sheffield and the General.

"To finally get to a more extraordinary point …" begins the slender government man. "I would like to discuss the recent discovery in the S02N-3230 system reported by your company which was cataloged as item A57092-C under the Contractor Transparency Directive section 5, paragraph 13. In particular, we are interested in the possible, if any, threats posed by the theory of intelligent life to national security, societal stability or …" he pauses to emphasize the last item "… the economy."

"Threat? I don't see any threats!" Mr. Sheffield vehemently counters. "This is merely another opportunity for large-scale public and private sector cooperation."

"Ha!" The General jolts up in his chair. "Spoken like a true civilian. An unknown adversary self-evidently also poses an unknown threat."

On the other side of the table, Mr. Dickens stands up and raises his voice: "Gentlemen, perhaps we should first provide the necessary scientific details, on the basis of which it will be much easier to come to any rational conclusions. Riley, would you kindly give us a brief and up-to-date explanation of our findings."

He sits back down, but Riley, who, caught by surprise, is choking on her sandwich, turns to Antariksh for help while coughing and pouring herself a glass of carbonated water.

"Ahem …" The young scientist adjusts his tie before reciting all but the most technical points about the discovery and attributes of the planet of interest, including the strong evidence for the presence of higher intelligent life. "Today, we have received what is likely an ancient, possibly digital transmission using a crude radio signal, but the planet has vanished from sight." He glances into the surprised faces of his listeners before continuing to clarify: "We have verified the coordinates and configuration of the instruments. An error can be ruled out, but we do not have any explanation for its disappearance."

A moment of silence fills the air before Mr. Leicester asks: "This message, was it addressed to us? What are its contents?"

"A declaration of war!" barks the khaki uniform.

"Against the Paleolithic humans?" Mr. Dickens replies sarcastically, but it goes unnoticed by Mr. Warfield.

"Do you think they could have advanced military capabilities, including potentially weapons of mass destruction?" Mr. Leicester inquires, having turned a bit pale.

"They are … They were definitely space faring, so it is very plausible."

Mr. Leicester indicates not to require further explanation: "Well, in this case I have to agree with the General; this presents a direct threat to our security singularity. What do you recommend, sir?"

General Warfield straightens up. "I say we nuke 'em! This situation calls for a decisive first strike without the option of retribution. Luckily, our arsenal already contains sufficient firepower. I am talking, about the Falling Star."

"Stop! This is madness!" Riley jumps from her chair. The impact of her fist shakes the table. "We don't even know what we are looking at, and your first instinct is to blow it up? Not to speak of the fact that it would take almost literally forever to get there." The General is taken aback by the directness of this woman, the rest of his face taking the shade of his big nose.

"Calm down, Mrs.!" It is Leicester who responds. "I think this decision is beyond your responsibilities." Turning to Mr. Warfield and Mr. Sheffield, he continues: "Given the urgency of the situation and its extraterrestrial nature, I think such action would not require any further authorization by the minister. On top of that, the use of our most potent weapon would solve the lingering issue of how to get rid of them. I know all too well what a mediocre venture the maintenance of this legacy system is for your company in terms of profitability." He throws a smile of acknowledgement towards the executives. "As I previously discussed with Mr. Sheffield and Mr. Crawfield, the dissolution of the security singularity would reinvigorate the defense industry. Creating more jobs, wealth, and through technological progress, also security."

Dr. O'Reilly's mouth hangs open in perplexity, and she falls back into her chair.

"And don't worry," Mr. Leicester continues, "the government is of course committed to compensate you for the outstanding 38 years of our existing contract." Mr. Sheffield's face lights up with contentment.

"Excellent! Well … then I suppose we mustn't waste any more time with this meeting. How do we proceed?"

General Warfield produces a pen from the inside of his uniform jacket and begins to scribble on one of the papers before handing it to Mr. Dickens. "This is the address of Whitemoor operational control center, from which we can communicate with the system. We have Viper Ware personnel on site to punch in the coordinates, but we need you there to tell them which ones. None of this can leave this room, so you will join us there in an hour. It's about sixteen miles from here."

Calling an Old Friend

" Hello Dickey, how are you? This is Isaac from graduate school. Remember me?"

…

" Ah, yes … haha! But don't forget, you made me eat that raw pig ear before. What a terrible dare, I should have known that was a bad idea! I'm actually calling in response to the letter you sent to the institute last week. My dear friend, you should have known that Professor Higgins is no longer working. As a matter of fact, he passed away three months ago in his home due to complications with his liver. His wife was on vacation with friends and only found him the next week. Poor man, but then he was at a quite accomplished age."

…

" Yes, anyway, poor Stephany was very confused when she didn't know where to deliver your package to, so it ended up on my desk. I didn't have time to read your dissertation in full, but I skimmed through the first two hundred pages."

…

" But Richard, I'm sorry, you know that is impossible. I may be the acting Dean now, but I cannot do that."

…

" I admire your perseverance … how long has it been? Almost thirty-five years! It is undeniably an impressive dissertation to be produced in only a weekend, although perhaps a bit unfocused due to the inclusion of so many objects and techniques. Nonetheless, I have to disappoint you. Most of your work is already published in the form of one or more patents, and your crown jewel was just reported about on the radio Thursday evening. You know the rules, Dick."

…

" I'm terribly sorry, Dick, but you made your choice when you went into and stayed in the industry. That being said, I do think that our students would greatly appreciate the opportunity to listen to a guest lecture on this material, so let me know any time that you would be available for that. Oh, and this brings me to another favor that I would humbly like to ask of you. You are our only senior alumni at the Viper Hard- and Software Group. As such, I was wondering if you could raise awareness of the fact that besides basic research, we also have several projects making practical progress in propulsion technology and circuit design. These endeavors are obviously very expensive, which is why we are always grateful for a tax-deductible donation. If you do manage to convince Mr. Crawfield to commit to a contribution, I would be more than happy to extend an exclusive invitation to the two of you to our upcoming donor gala. Please do let me know, old friend. There is always champagne at this event."

V. Deep under Whitemoor

Antariksh Vaigyaanik can barely force his will onto the steering wheel. The car struggles and flings mud in all directions as they turn onto the first paved road in minutes, leading to the gate of a fenced area with a small guard post. Past the gate, the road leads to a large clearing between the bushes and trees. Besides a few gray buildings, there is a parking spot for military trucks, a diesel pump, and a landing pad with a black transport helicopter, as well as several radio towers peaking somewhat crookedly over the treetops. Puddles everywhere indicate that it only stopped raining minutes ago.

"Thanks for the lift, Antariksh." Richard says.

"I just hope we don't get stuck on our way back. Why couldn't this jerk just give us a lift in his helicopter?"

"Maximum take-off weight!" The men try to calm their chuckle as the car rolls the last few meters and stops in front of the gate. One of the two guards in khaki uniforms staffing the post grabs a clipboard and marches over to the driver side window of the vehicle. Antariksh rolls down the window and hands the soldier their employee identification.

"General Warfield is expecting us here."

The soldier checks his clipboard, then nods, hands back the cards and vanishes into the guard post. Seconds later, the gate begins to open and the guard reemerges in a light-wheeled, open vehicle from behind the small building, motioning them to follow. They drive past the trucks, the fuel pump and the helicopter until arriving at the wide central building. Antariksh stops the engine and the two men step out of the vehicle, hurrying after the soldier, who swiftly marches toward the main door near which they have parked. From up close, the building reveals itself to be the ruin of an old castle on which has been imposed a new concrete facade, geometrical, cold and hostile. Yet, the overgrowth close to the ground has freed some original structure by pushing away bits of the concrete shell to reveal the mossy bricks below. Their escort knocks on the medieval castle door, which upon identification is swiftly opened by another soldier, who motions the scientists to step in.

Moments later, they are joined by the general and Mr. Leicester from the ministry of defense. A familiar sound announces them: "Phwwhht. Phwwhht. Phwwwwwhht." The same lazy whistling song as they had heard previously from Mr. Sheffield. Three notes in C minor. The terrible music stops as the general enters the room and, now that he stopped whistling, puts the cigar he is holding back in his mouth.

"I see you brought your colleague. Good thing it's not that lady from before. That hag would be too hard to handle! Well, shall we?" He turns on the spot and waddles to an elevator at the back of the hall. The four of them cram themselves into the rusty cabin and the General, with great difficulty and almost squishing Mr. Leicester, operates the lever to start their descent. The elevator begins to rattle and the metal wheels guiding it on its path begin to scream as they go down, down, down into the dark.

With a crash, the elevator arrives at the bottom of the pit, opening up to a long and dimly lit tunnel. Warfield takes the cigar out of his mouth and leads them along the slimy walls to an open steel door not unlike that of a bank vault. Grunting, he pushes the thirty inches of steel to make enough room for himself to fit through. They step into the room. A cold overhead light illuminates the sterile floor, office desks and large center console, surrounding a large mainframe computer. From it, hundreds of cables run to all sides of the room and along the walls like roots of an old tree. The only reminder of the location of the facility are the walls which, just like in the tunnel, consist of the exposed old slimy stones of the castle.

"Welcome to the dungeon!" The General announces loudly, startling the young man in a short-sleeved white shirt sitting hunched over one of the monitors, who swiftly turns around to face them. Beside him, only a very bored looking soldier staffs the giant room. Upon noticing the General's arrival, he also jumps from his folding chair at the back wall of the room to stand at attention. Awestruck by the control room, the three civilians are directed by Mr. Warfield over to the desk. Now standing beside him, it becomes evident from the ID card dangling on the belt of the young man, that he is a fellow Viper Ware employee.

"David! Boy! It is time to execute Operation Sunrise."

"Sir?"

"This is an order, damn it! The target is extraterrestrial. These men will give you the coordinates."

Antariksh quickly adds: "… a planet that's a bit over seven and a half kilo-parsecs away." which seems to provide more reassurance to the technician, who swivels around in his office chair and promptly begins typing on his keyboard in fast strokes. Dozens of commands and status messages fly by on his monitor, then a crude visualization of the solar system with Earth's position highlighted appears in the midst of a number of complex forms. David places the cursor in the section titled "Target Parameters", then, pushes his keyboard aside, making space for Antariksh to step forward and type in the coordinates relative to the galactic North Pole. The computer program automatically completes the entry to "S02N-3230 system".

"Is this correct?" Warfield grunts at Richard, who proceeds to rummage in his pockets for his notes on the paper with the directions by the General. He looks at it intently, then at the screen and back at the paper, and confirms the entry. Consulting a laminated protocol on his desk, the technician informs the General of the obligation to report the use of an advanced weapons system to other bases and dials in a classified frequency on the software radio. Warfield grabs a desk microphone and, switching it on with a flick of one of his sausage fingers, makes the announcement. After he is done speaking, the technician flips a small, nondescript switch and on two opposite sites of the center console surrounding the mainframe, two lids hiding keyholes spring open. Upon this signal, Mr. Leicester produces a key from the inside of his jacket and sets off to insert it on one side.

"Stop!" General Warfield points at the monitor from which the strike was requested, which displays in bold red letters: "Uncommon target selected! (Confirmation possible in 30 minutes)".

He grunts and resumes smoking his cigar. Slowly but surely, the room fills with a cough-inducing haze.

Twenty-five minutes!

The General has finished smoking his cigar and, clearly bored, begins to terrorize the old walls by starting to whistle again: "Phwwhht. Phwwhht. Phwwwwwhht."

Twenty-three minutes!

Almost overcome by the headache induced by the smoke, buzzing overhead lights and irritating melody, Antariksh asks to excuse himself in order to make an important phone call.

The general grunts again. "Fine! There's one at the gate post." And motioning to his subordinate guarding the room while still holding the desk microphone: "You show him out!"

Twenty minutes!

No-Abort Doctrine

The so called "no-abort doctrine" was introduced following a recommendation by military game theorists prior to the conception of the Falling Star retribution system. Consequently, it was also implemented in this project before finally becoming irrelevant after the subsequent termination of the global arms race. At the height of the distrust among governments and fear of foreign meddling, infiltration and spying, they postulated that, in the event of an imminent nuclear first strike, the attacker would anticipate the guaranteed equal obliteration by retaliation. Thus, they would, given the chance of failing to intercept it, seek to cause the enemy to abort their counterattack. They consequently demanded that any newly introduced system, in order to be a sufficient deterrent, should be incapable of altering its target or trajectory unless to counter any threat to the success of its mission. Given the primitive state of computer systems of the time, no further thought was given to any potential flaws of this design. Many contemporary game theorists would have pointed out this foolish lack of concern for future developments, were it not for the fact that they were still busy playing with plastic soldiers and tanks on the living room carpet.

Soon after this, however, a fatal flaw became woefully apparent. With the inability to abort a nuclear strike, any enemy spies who successfully gained control over the deadly arsenal, or even a minor mistake, would turn it into an irreversible, certain catastrophe. To combat this embarrassing oversight, a new doctrine was hastily added which would delay the ability to carry out a strike in order to buy decision makers enough time in order to verify that the action was intended. The specific time was to be determined by the system automatically, based on the specified target. No wait time was imposed for foreign capitals, military bases and ports, and strike coordinates resulting in an estimated number of at least one million casualties, since this would be deemed a cost-effective utilization. Other less common targets were assigned a wait time based on a heuristic developed by a brilliant military fiction author turned military analyst and consultant. Although, sadly, all knowledge about it was lost when he died in a tragic car accident on a sunny summer afternoon just as his formula had been sealed into the computer code.

Since the end of the Cold War, most, if not all, game theorists have pivoted to working on more pressing matters, namely the investment and insurance industries. Yet, the Viper Hard- and Software Group remains the biggest employer of these specialists.

VI. Epiphany

Antariksh follows the soldier back through the slimy tunnel, up the elevator and finally through the old wooden door. A fresh breath of air hits Dr. Vaigyaanik, while the low afternoon sun forces him to squint. They continue to the entry of the military compound, which was already shaded by the trees surrounding the clearing. Entering the small building, the soldier points Antariksh to a wall-mounted telephone.

"Let me know when I should take you back."

Riley is sitting at her desk in front of the computer and a dismantled FM radio belonging to Mr. Dickens when the phone rings.

"Hello, Antariksh! How are things going with the rockets?"

Antariksh Vaigyaanik turns towards the wall, but the soldier has already left the room to smoke a cigarette outside and does not overhear him.

"I'm just happy I could get away from that Warfield for a few minutes," he admits. "He said he was glad you didn't come. He called you a hag! Can you believe it? Anyway, how is your investigation coming along?"

"I just listened to it for the first time a few minutes ago, " Riley responds, not sounding particularly bothered or surprised by the insolence of the General. Her tone is rather excited. "You wouldn't believe it. It turns out that 66, 55 and 44 centimeter correspond almost exactly to the musical notes of C, E-flat and G."

Hearing this, Antariksh is overcome by a feeling as if he had just hit a brick wall at full speed. Pale faced, he begins to hum, while the image of the General's sausage fingers around the still active microphone and of his mustached mouth shaped into an O flash before his eyes:

"Mhhhhhh. Mhhhhhh. Mhhhhhhhhh."

C minor.

The same melody.

"Wait? How do you know?" Dr. O'Reilly comes through the speaker in disbelief.

"The general just made a radio broadcast as part of the protocol."

"So that means …" she pieces together the information, "We have been looking into a mirror? I was right after all. There is something in front of the over density which makes it look as if we are part of it."

"Worse! We have been looking into the future, and it is closer than we thought! If you received the signal this morning, this means …"

O'Reilly gasps. "It means that whatever it is, it must be incredibly close."

Antariksh drops the phone and, with a frantic dash, sets off running back towards the castle, his mind racing with nonsense: "C, Minor, Major, General … Canis" as he depletes his lungs of oxygen. Then, after a few meters, he slows down to a calm walk, catches his breath and begins to laugh.

He knows that his phone call with his colleague took roughly four minutes. He knows that it is eleven minutes by foot from the gate all the way to the end of the tunnel at the bottom of the elevator, maybe seven if he runs. After waiting impatiently for the twenty minutes to elapse, the general would not spend a second to hesitate. He also knows that the Falling Star missiles travel only at half the speed of light towards the space-time defying wormhole. Yes, he has more than enough time to calmly join the men below ground and teach that pig some manners.

THE END

Bio: Ruben Horn studies computer science by day and writes fiction (occasionally also poetry) by night.

E-mail: Ruben Horn

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