Solar Express (39 page)

She paused. “Marcel … do you have any better data on 2114 FQ5? Perihelion time and distance?”

“No, Dr. Wong-Grant. Until COFAR can observe the object again, more accurate calculations are not possible.”

“Thank you.” Alayna went back to the message.

 … According to our present calculations, sometime last Sunday you and the Solar Express [officially known as 2114 FQ5] crossed Earth's orbit, not that Earth is all that close to where you are. For what it's worth, the artifact isn't behaving like a normal small body. Unless our calculations are wrong, and that is always possible, it has been speeding up more than can be accounted for by the sun's gravity as it moves in-system. We won't be able to calculate better speed and approach data for another week, but I thought you'd like to know, because you may not have as much time there as initially calculated.

The following quote struck me as intriguing because while it mentions passion in passing, it also deals with the issue of time. We think of what happens in the here and now as so vital. To us, it is, but … was it to whoever built the artifact? I have to wonder. Any beings that built something to last tens of thousands of years must have had a different perspective … or am I missing something?

Don't ever debate anything with a geologist. They're passionate enough, and they care, deeply, about good science, but for them, a million years is a short time, and so many of them really don't think that anything that can happen in mere decades or centuries can matter all that much, but it can, as witness the recent global warming. Astronomers who study galactic dynamics are similar, but haven't had their various applecarts upset yet …

Yet, here I am trying to upset applecarts, and you're dealing with one. Sorry to distort the metaphors totally out of proportion.

Anyway, I hope my poor suggestions have helped in some way.

Do take care.

She sent the message immediately, but wondered, not for the first time, if and when he might receive it.

Two hours later, Alayna's observation time came to an end, and she immediately asked Marcel, “Have you found anything interesting?”

“The granulations in the latitude belt being studied appear to be somewhat more violent. Based on past observations, that would indicate they are shorter-termed. There is also a higher number of multi-fractal mini-granulations. It will take several more days of observation to determine whether multi-fractal mini-granulations are also shorter-termed.”

“Thank you.” Alayna had been squeezing in minutes and fractions of hours on the optical array for the past several days, but this was the first indication of increased solar convection, and such an increase did not exactly fit the long-term observed pattern. But then, over the years, that pattern had been interrupted, changed, even reversed upon occasion, and supposed period of solar minimums and maximums had been anything but that.

After reviewing the images selected by Marcel, Alayna had to admit that the AI was on to something. Not only was there a five percent increase over the mean in the numbers of multi-fractal mini-granulations, but the definition appeared to be more distinct.
But why would that be?

“Marcel, are there any usable images from the Lick contract yesterday? Ones we could use as a baseline.”

“Those were for a high latitude study, Dr. Wong-Grant.”

“Wasn't that a multi-day study? How many days? Could you scan their images to see if there are any multi-fractals over the course of their observations?”

“That is possible.”

“Make the comparison scans, please. Let me know what you find.”

“Yes, Dr. Wong-Grant.”

While she waited for what Marcel might or might not discover, she wondered if she might be the first to be observing the multi-fractals at such a time. She shook her head. That was highly unlikely.
But you can hope.

Less than ten minutes later, Marcel reported, “There is a slight increase in convection activity in the higher latitude bands, but it is well within normal parameters.”

“As possible, keep track of that.”

“Yes, Dr. Wong-Grant.”

Alayna realized that her mouth was dry, and she had a headache … and that she hadn't had anything to drink in almost four hours. With a wry expression, she headed for the galley, still wondering if the slight uptick in convection might reveal her solar man who wasn't there.

So far.

 

52

R
ECON
T
HREE

15 N
OVEMBER
2114

Tavoian woke with a throbbing headache on Thursday morning, and his eyes burned. Wondering if something had gone wrong with the environmental systems, he immediately checked the oxygen and CO2 levels, and the internal atmosphere analysis. Oxygen and CO2 were fine, and there were no worrisome levels of contaminants in the air, especially not of ammonia, carbon monoxide, or formaldehyde. With the possibility that he might be somewhat dehydrated, Tavoian drank half a squeezebottle of water before starting in on his tea. While he drank, he checked his messages, but all that had arrived while he was sleeping were news summaries. That suggested that whoever vetted his messages at Donovan Base hadn't gotten to them, or that the colonel hadn't signed off on them.

He would have liked to use both ISVs at once, especially before the manned Sinese expedition arrived, but he couldn't use the first one for his spy-eye expedition until he repaired the AI rover so that it could place the space anchors.

So he had the ship's AI dispatch the second ISV to inspect the circumference where dark green and silvery white joined, and while the AI was monitoring that, he forced himself through an hour of heavy exercise, after which he cleaned up. By then, his headache had slowly dissipated, and he began on the repairs to the first rover AI.

The hardest part was removing the damaged grabber arm without disabling the connections that had been splashed with globs of instantly melted materials that had, in turn, immediately solidified upon striking the connector. That alone took more than an hour of painstaking work. Then he had to clean the connections before he attached the new grabber arm. Once the repaired AI rover was back together and tested, he set up the first ISV with the spy-eyes, the rover, and the space anchors, ready to launch from the lock.

Then he headed back to the controls, where he checked on the progress of the circumference inspection. So far, no other traces of material from the artifact that could be retrieved or sampled had been discovered. Even if the ISV did discover another “thread,” Tavoian had absolutely no intention of using his remaining laser to try to cut anything loose. He did want to be able to report that he'd covered the entire rim, especially since it was indeed possible that something might be caught or attached where the hull and interior were exposed side by side.

“What have the Sinese been doing?”

ANOTHER TEN SPY-EYES ARE INVESTIGATING SURFACE AREAS OF THE ARTIFACT. THOSE AREAS ARE BEING NOTED. THEIR ISV CONTINUES TO SWEEP THE SURFACE OF THE ARTIFACT.

“How much thruster propellant do they have?”

THAT INFORMATION IS NOT AVAILABLE. WITHOUT HABITABILITY REQUIREMENTS, ASSUMING SIMILAR INTERIOR PARAMETERS, THE SINESE CRAFT COULD CARRY A MINIMUM OF THREE TIMES THE PROPELLANT ABOARD RECON THREE.

“More like five or ten times,” murmured Tavoian.

THAT IS POSSIBLE.

“Keep searching with the same pattern and parameters.”

SEARCH CONTINUING.

At 0917 Tavoian decided to dispatch the second ISV. He watched as it neared the passageway between the two hexagons he had selected as providing the closest access to the route the rover had taken to the hull chambers he thought might contain drives or engines or some sort of propulsive system. The rover set up the anchors and the cable between them, then attached the signal repeater and the fiber-optic line to it, before returning to the ISV, which then eased into the passageway.

It was well past 1100 when the first of the five programmed spy-eyes left the ISV on the way through the passageways toward their objective.

With little more to do than wait, Tavoian began to draft a report to the colonel. He could at least outline what he had programmed the ISVs, rovers, and spy-eyes to do, and it wouldn't hurt to mention that he'd repaired the one rover.

He'd almost finished drafting what he could when the ship's AI announced,
A SINESE SPY-EYE IS MONITORING THE SIGNAL REPEATER POSITIONED BETWEEN THE TWO ANCHORS AND OVER THE ENTRY PASSAGEWAY.

“How far away is it from the repeater?”

TEN METERS.

“Can you tell what it's doing?”

IT IS LIKELY ATTEMPTING TO INTERCEPT ANY SIGNALS SENT FROM THE REPEATER.

“What's the probability that it can?”

THAT IS UNKNOWN.

In one sense, the attempted signal theft didn't bother Tavoian, because the only signal Recon three was receiving was an image from the ISV that showed a featureless passageway some five hundred meters inside the artifact. In another way, the effrontery angered him. But he really didn't want to take out the Sinese spy-eye because, first, it was clear that the Sinese had far more of those than he did, and if they retaliated, he'd be the one who came up short. Second, that would give the Sinese a pretext to claim Noram was behaving militaristically. And third, with a crewed Sinese vessel due to arrive in another five days, he'd be outnumbered and likely outpowered, as well as outequipped. “Let me know if it moves any closer.”

Tavoian had no sooner shifted his attention back to finishing what he could of his next report when the faint chime of an incoming message surprised him. He was even more surprised to see that it came from Alayna, but he immediately began to read it.

Dear Chris,

The images are stunning, and I wish I could send you some of our images taken from a distance, but COFAR won't be in position to view you and the artifact for another week …

Won't be in position?
He felt stupid when he read the next words. He hadn't thought about the fact that a Farside observatory really wasn't optimal for real-time intelligence or observation of the entire sky or of parts of it for weeks, no matter how ideal it might be for astronomy or astrophysics.

He did enjoy her words, even if the observation about the artifact's increased speed worried him as well, although he'd noted that earlier, but he hadn't checked in the past few days. He immediately asked the ship's AI, “How much farther in-system are we than projected by the mission profile?”

TWENTY POINT THREE MILLION KAYS.

Tavoian immediately checked the mission profile. He moistened his lips when he saw the date the colonel had projected for his return—December thirteenth. If Alayna was correct, and he had no doubt about that, he and Recon three would be charred to ashes if he waited that long.
And she's implying that the alien artifact may reach perihelion even sooner than that.
He had realized that they were traveling slightly faster than projected, but he'd also known that their inbound velocity increased daily. He just hadn't made the connection. Alayna had, and he very much appreciated the early warning. He also realized two other things. First, he had less time than planned, and second, if the artifact and Recon three were also traveling faster, that likely meant that he might have to break off the mission even before crossing the orbit of Mercury or, rather, the figure for the orbit used for mission purposes. He couldn't imagine that was something the colonel would like, either.

How could everyone have been that wrong?

He shook his head. In so many ways, they'd all been wrong. No one had expected the materials and construction of the alien artifact, or the difficulties involved in finding out anything meaningful about it—

A wry smile crossed his lips. He'd found out a great deal that was meaningful in more ways than one. What he hadn't discovered was a single thing that was useful to Noram or the human race. Not a single recognizable tool or element of technology, just impossibly hard and durable materials and an inscrutable or hidden science behind the creation and operation of the artifact … and the hint that the strange dark green material, or its surface, was photoconductive, and most likely also had been selectively plastic in being able to shape itself to the needs of the structure or its users. Another thought struck him.

“Have you detected any radiation or any activity showing energy, heat, or the like from the artifact or anywhere nearby?”

THE ONLY SOURCES OF RADIATION OR ANY FORM OF ENERGY WITHIN A MILLION KAYS ARE RECON THREE AND THE SINESE LONGLINER.

That was good … and bad. Whatever was causing the acceleration wasn't coming from the artifact.
Or it's something we can't detect.
But that didn't make sense. How could something, particularly something without any energy signature, come from an artifact that was tens of thousands of years old? And an artifact that was only a piece of something much larger?

All he could do was to inform the colonel that Recon three could not detect any cause for the increased inbound velocity, but there was no point to sending him a special message, not when there were three weeks or so before they neared the orbit of Mercury, even at their higher speed. He'd just address the issue and what he hadn't found—like so many other things he hadn't found—in the next report.

He lingered over Alayna's last words, then realized another message had arrived. It was from Kit. That gave him a chill, because he'd only sent off his last message to her the night before, and a quick turnaround didn't mean anything good. He immediately began to read.

Chris,

I wish I knew where you are. You've been so vague. I know. With all the problems the Sinese are causing, you can't tell me. But we all worry, especially after the border attacks near Korba and Bruini …