Jaysn Katsaros was far enough from home to be uncomfortable, and still close enough to believe the universe hadn’t noticed him yet. He shifted in the uncomfortable chair, realizing he was three q-gates from anything that mattered, and he still had two more between him and a commitment to a mission he already had a bad feeling about. Luyten, the next link in the series of artificial quantum wormholes that linked the stars together, was his last chance to get off the ship before he found himself on the outer frontier of human settlement.
He grabbed his datapad and opened the briefing material, deciding that it was laughable to call it that. It contained only the name of a star, Lambda Tonitrus; the designation and coordinates of a dwarf planet, LT-9A447; and the specifics of compensation, accommodations, and the need for secrecy. There were no details about what the mission entailed, who would be on the team, or even how to dress on this distant world. This was highly unusual, if not unheard of. The Sol Directorate Engineering Corps, SDEC, was renowned for its exceptional efficiency and thoroughness if nothing else.
Feeling his blood start to boil, he spun his chair 90 degrees from the porthole to the small desk and punched up a communication line to SDEC. While he waited for the signal to handshake, he stared at the remains of his lunch on the corner of the desk. The standard ration pack, while appetizing in appearance, tasted like SDEC efficiency and thoroughness in engineered meal form.
The screen in front of him flickered, and a young woman appeared. She was attractive in a way that Jaysn instantly recognized as her appearance having been selected specifically for him. “Good evening, Dr. Katsaros. I am Syn. Michelle Rousseau. How can I help?”
“Oh, Michelle,” Jaysn sang. “We need to do something about this trip.”
Michelle laughed slightly. “I see you’re in the Duatria system, and you’ll be taking the gate to Aquitaine station in the Luyten system in the next hour. You’re about fourteen hours from your final destination. How has your trip been so far?”
Of course, their liaison with him would be an SI. How could he argue with a synthetic mind with infinite patience and absolutely no need to use it? Well, he was raised to treat all life equally, so there was no reason to pull punches now, he decided. “How has my trip been?” He looked around in mock drama. “Well, first of all, your ‘Transportation Provided’ clause apparently equates to three and a half walls that still manage to convey claustrophobia; a chair that reclines into a bed, provided I want to torture myself; and,” he grabbed the cup off the desk to help make his point, “coffee that has a flavor that is best described as ‘dusty, with a slight aftertaste of rust.’”
The woman on the screen gave an artificial smile. “It honors the contract, Doctor, and it was the best we could do at the time. We did have a state room booked for you on the charter at Crossfield station, you’ll recall. We even gave the chef complete taste profiles for every team member to ensure a comfortable voyage. Unfortunately, by your own admission, you were unable to make that connection.”
Well played, Jaysn thought, grimacing. He had no regrets about missing the connection, however. It had been a particularly good bottle of wine and an excellent conversation the night before. He hadn’t considered that the rest of his team was now sitting in a lounge sipping brandy and eating personally catered gourmet meals while they cruised lazily toward the site. Still, while the freighter was less than comfortable, it would arrive nearly a full day ahead of the rest of the team, and he hoped to use that time to study the briefing material and get a head start on his findings report.
“Fine, forget about the accommodations,” he conceded. “I’m actually calling because I still haven’t received the briefing material for this expedition.”
Michelle had anticipated that complaint and began answering before Jaysn finished his sentence. “I’m sorry about that, Doctor. We’ll have a full copy of the briefing and the preliminary findings ready for you when you arrive at LT-9.”
“No, no, wait.” He sat forward, thinking he was finally winning an argument. “You said you would send it to me at my hotel when I canceled a lecture to come on this little trip. Then you said it would be waiting for me when I got to the transport. Now I’m at the last gate before I’m committed to this mission, and I still don’t know what the mission is. So, here is what is going to happen: you will either give me that briefing material now, or I will be getting off this ship at Luyten and going home.”
“Dr. Katsaros, if you could just indulge us. There’s a minor issue related to data classification. I promise we’ll have everything straightened out before you arrive at LT-9.”
Jaysn made a loud, annoying buzzer sound. “I’m sorry, wrong answer. Thank you for playing. We’ll have some nice parting gifts for you. Feel free to call Dr. Bailey to play the part of your xenoanthropologist going forward.” He reached out and punched the button to close the connection, overzealously scraping his knuckle in the process.
He sat back and laughed at how he had handled the SDEC bureaucracy. He’d probably burned his bridges by pulling out mid-transit like this. It was an honor to receive a call from Exploration Logistics and to be recognized as one of the best scientists in the field at age 26. He’d seen a few dozen worlds thanks to those opportunities, roughly a third of what humanity had settled so far, and far more than most people ever saw.
Of course, he’d also lost the exact count of false alarms, misunderstandings, and scrubbed missions that left him on some remote frontier colony. Most of the time, that left him wandering, taking the scenic route back home, and stopping along the way to give lectures to help finance his impromptu vacation. Even home had become a vague and unfamiliar concept to him now.
He should never have taken the assignment to begin with. Hell, there were at least five other xenoanthropologists out there in the settled worlds who would be happy to slap on an environment suit and slog around knee-deep in methane mud, acidic slime, or some other equally deadly environment, just so they could study a group of oversized bipedal primates and declare, “You’re right, they’re not sentient. Just be careful with them when you’re stripping their planet for resources.”
It was time for a new life plan, he finally decided. He imagined fresh ground coffee on the deck of a modest condominium, not too large, situated just a few dozen meters from the ocean. He enjoyed the thought of peer-reviewing someone else’s reports about alien mud and laughing about it with the other regulars at the beachside cantina. He dreamed of giving lectures in the Phrame or via telepresence, showing up for a handshake only when his exorbitant fee and extensive rider had been agreed upon. Of course, every time he threatened to walk away and build a new life somewhere else, the universe called his bluff first.
The comm chimed with an incoming call. Jaysn chuckled and thumbed the accept protocol, knowing full well who it would be. “Hello again, Michelle.”
“Doctor Katsaros,” the woman’s smile still appeared genuine. “We get that you’re frustrated at the situation, made worse by uncomfortable accommodations. I’m therefore authorized to offer you double your standard rate of pay if you agree to stay with the mission. Unfortunately, the briefing material is classified as Onyx-level, so I can’t release it to you at this time.”
Jaysn realized his jaw had dropped. “Onyx-level is not an SDEC classification, or at least not one I’ve ever heard of.”
There was a beat of hesitation from the SI, likely reconciling a triggered ethics protocol. She was about to lie to him for his own good. “It’s new, we’re still working it out,” she smiled and waved it off. “However, it puts the distribution of data and briefing materials at the discretion of Dr. Tamana, the expedition leader.”
“Tamana,” he mumbled. “Disha Tamana? Exobiologist?”
“That’s correct. You’ve worked with her before.”
“Worked with her? I practically owe her my career.” This was a turn of events. He would have agreed to the assignment out of loyalty to Tamana alone, but Tamana didn’t take assignments unless there was something groundbreaking at stake. SDEC’s immediate caving to his demands and an offer of more money might confirm the significance. He imagined himself as one of the youngest in the field, outdoing his peers in making the big discovery of non-terrestrial intelligence, and a paycheck that made his beachfront home a lot closer than it was five minutes earlier.
He felt his weight shift subtly as the transport slowly began to descend toward the surface of a very anticlimactic dark gray dwarf planet. In the distance, he caught one star low on the horizon, maybe four times larger and brighter than the others, which he assumed to be Lambda Tonitrus. At present, whichever megacorp had purchased the claim to this system was still in the middle of conducting preliminary surveys while mining the system for resources to cover costs to this point, as well as for a potential colonization attempt. If they deemed the find worthy, and if there were any takers to set up permanent residence, then the star and its planets would receive proper names. Until then, this unremarkable hunk of rock went only by the pseudo-Bayer notation of Lambda Tonitrus 9A447 – the four hundred forty-seventh body of interest outside the orbit of the 9th planet of the 11th brightest star in the stellar grouping called Tonitrus, as seen from his birthworld of Thurin. It was cold, it was dark, it was ugly, but to date, only a couple of dozen people had ever seen it up close. That gave it a unique charm to him.
The craft continued to decelerate, eventually entering a spiral descent over an obviously man-made structure – a hastily constructed, temporary base for the engineers and other technicians, made up of prefabricated, modular sections that a skeleton crew could deploy in under a day, and then equip, power up, and make habitable within three. At least he wouldn’t have to sleep in the berth another night. He’d probably at least have a decent-sized room and office down there, even if he would be sharing it with multiple teammates.
His holo-display indicated final approach, and landing would be in just under two minutes. He quickly began tidying the area, disposing of three days’ worth of crumpled food packaging, pencil sketches, and handwritten notes, then stood up and grabbed his rucksack from under the chair. He removed his favorite synthetic leather jacket and an old pair of soft-soled shoes he’d owned far longer than was practical. Hangar lights outside suddenly illuminated the room, and the ship gave the gentlest of thumps as it touched down. He said nothing to the crew as he made his way through the narrow corridors to the departure ramp. They’d pretty much ignored him for the entire flight, and most barely acknowledged him with subtle nods as he passed them now.
Four minutes later, a warning tone sounded at the exit hatch, and the door hissed open, its mechanism straining in protest as the pressure seals were pried open against their will. A blast of chilly air that smelled like the inside of a shipping container hit his face as a ramp slowly descended from the ship, stopping between two uniformed men discussing something between themselves and checking items off a shared holo-display.
“Dr. Katsaros.” The larger, older man smiled. “Welcome to LT-9. I’ll get you set up in the hab module. Lt. Matthews here will see to unloading and setting up any equipment you might require in your lab area.” The man didn’t bother to give his own name, but Jaysn noted the major’s rank on his sleeve.
He shook the Major’s hand. “I’m the xenoanthropologist. The only equipment I need is my portable library, which I’m never without,” he said, patting the rucksack on his shoulder.
“Well, unfortunately, the lab’s not set to be hooked up to the Stellar Net until tomorrow morning. Meantime, if you need to do any data transfers or send any communications, Matthews here can run it from the command module for you.”
He led Jaysn from the hangar back to the base proper, pointing to a large common room set up like a reasonably comfortable lounge with multiple couches and tables. A short connecting hall with airlocks at either end was attached to a dining and conference room, featuring a long table that seated at least fifteen. The dining module led to an expansive galley capable of feeding all twenty-seven members of the engineering team and the arriving scientists. It also had several smaller dining tables. There was a faint hint of food still in the air, and it made his stomach rumble as soon as he caught it.
“I wasn’t sure what relative time you’re on, but we saved a bit of dinner for you. Otherwise, it’s standard ration packs until we get the supply ship unloaded and processed.” The Major opened a refrigerated cabinet and retrieved a small, transparent container of something that resembled chili, which he offered to Jaysn. “It’s my specialty. Technically, it’s just stuff from the ration packs with a few spices and secret ingredients, but you’ll find they’re a hell of a lot more palatable than their original form.”
Jaysn took a tentative whiff, catching a hint of cumin and something else he couldn’t quite identify. It was enough to make his mouth water, however. He smiled and nodded eagerly. “Thank you, Major … Wolff,” he said, finally catching the man’s name from the badge on his shirt as he dug instantly into the chili.
Wolff grabbed a silver-gray mug off the shelf, filled it with a steaming brown liquid from a kettle, and handed it to Jaysn, who gingerly took a sip. It was the standard SDEC coffee, but this time it contained something that countered and almost suppressed the rusty aftertaste.
“Cinnamon?” Jaysn asked, nodding his approval.
“Fresh ginger, actually,” Wolff said. “Little trick I picked up from my CO twelve years ago. He even gave me the starter root, which I’ve been growing in a pot I take with me every time I deploy. I know it’s not much, but we can treat you a little better than that transport while you’re sitting around bored waiting for your team to arrive.”
At least the coffee was palatable, Jaysn thought. He desperately wanted to be caught up or possibly have read ahead of the rest of the team, before Tamana arrived and silently judged him for missing the charter flight out.
He decided it was time to lay on the charm. “Okay, but just between us, you’ve obviously found something,” he said, as he began ticking off his logic on his fingers. “Seeing as how this is a giant hunk of frozen methane and nitrogen with no apparent water, it couldn’t be indigenous life. They wouldn’t call in a xenoanthropologist for fossil evidence of a prokaryotic organism left behind by an extraterrestrial collision. I don’t see a fleet of military aircraft orbiting us, so it’s not an ancient crash site laden with all kinds of fantastic tech to plunder. Finally, since this is one of the most unremarkable protoplanets out of several thousand orbiting LT-9, I seriously doubt you bumped into an alien life form who just happens to be here on holiday. Am I here by mistake, or did you find something significant?”
The major scoffed. “I’ve been on twenty or thirty of these things, Doctor. The most exciting thing I’ve ever seen them dig up was that two-meter rod on Beta Tangra 4 that they initially suspected was some kind of construction material.”
“I remember that.” Jaysn nodded. “It turned out to be a perfectly natural crystal formation.”
“Did it? I never looked up the final assessment. I figured if it were something significant, I’d have heard about it.” Wolff nodded. “What I do know is that the whole fiasco wasted three weeks, cost two dozen men their bonus, and even got their supervisors docked for missing the deadline, all of which they blamed on my engineers since the scientific team had long since cleared out.”
Jaysn took another swig of coffee and nodded in approval to Wolff once again. “Surprising. If you’ve been doing this so long, why have we never bumped into each other before?”
Wolff rolled his eyes. “Wurren 6 two years ago, then Procyon six months later.”
“Oh, you’re right, yes,” Jaysn said, amazed. “I’m sorry I didn’t remember you. You’ve got much more character than our usual SDEC liaisons.”
“Well, you were pretty busy chasing the girls both times. I really did think you were going to get that lab tech on Procyon, for a while there.”
Jaysn stroked his beard, remembering that ill-fated week. “Yeah, so did I.”
“Still, I get it. Half of the officers I know are bureaucrats; the other half are misplaced warriors. A few were military history buffs who tried to leave and write books, but I’ve never seen that work out.”
“Which are you then, Major?”
“I always fancied myself a gambler and a scoundrel when I’m not playing pack mule for a bunch of egghead scientists.”
This stopped Jaysn in his tracks, and his eyes lit up. “Excellent! We’ll have to get up a game of bridge later. Dr. Tamana is a three-time campus champion.”
“Poker is more my speed.” Wolff frowned.
“I’ve never been one for games of chance. How are you at chess?”
“Never heard of it,” Wolff said, completely deadpan. Jaysn was sure it was a joke, poorly told. This must be why the Major wasn’t memorable.
“So, despite our clever bonding here, you’re a hard man, Major,” Jaysn said, sipping from his coffee again, “There isn’t anything I can pry out of you? How about at least giving me the direction to look out the porthole in my quarters, even if I can’t see it from here.” He had intended it to be sarcasm, but something about it rang true in his ears as soon as he said it.
“Off the record?” Wolff considered for a moment. “I think we’ve all made a very long, expensive trip for nothing, yet again. Personally, I don’t believe in ancient alien civilizations. Even if there are, they don’t leave bits of their tech lying around on obscure hunks of rock in the middle of nowhere. If they’re out there, we’d have found them, or something left behind by now, surely.”
“Give us time. There’s been life on Earth for three and a half billion years, but we’ve only been passably intelligent for a few thousand of those. So, if you were to visit Earth on any random year out of the four and a half billion it’s been spinning out there, it’s almost statistically impossible you’d arrive during one of the couple hundred where you could find halfway decent coffee and conversation.”
“Yeah, but in the future, we’ll be on hundreds of worlds, leaving our mark, sending signals, leaving industrial signals behind that can be spotted hundreds of light-years away. That stuff will probably persist long after we’re gone. We haven’t seen any evidence of anyone else’s left-behind mess, though.”
“Yes, but while we’re exponentially expanding, we’ve touched less than 100 worlds across a 50-light-year radius. Saying that because we haven’t found evidence of intelligent life, there isn’t and never was other intelligence out there is like standing on a beach in Greece, looking down, seeing no fish, and deciding that must mean Earth’s oceans are empty.”
“So why keep doing this if the odds of finding something are so incredibly slim?”
“I thrive on random chance, and there’s always a tiny possibility that someday someone will trip over something. Something that just unambiguously screams ‘I am artificially made, and not by man.’” Jaysn smiled. “Maybe it’s sitting out there on the surface of a frozen dwarf planet, contrary to our cynical better judgment?”
Wolff smiled. “Nice try, Doctor. I’ll give you this much, though: don’t waste time looking out your porthole trying to spot it. It’s in a chamber two kilometers under a mountain of frozen methane and nitrogen. We’ve just finished connecting an airlock to the tunnel right on the other side of that door.” He gestured to the hatchway on his right. “We’ll have atmo generators and gravplates set up by the time the rest of your team gets here.” He smiled wryly. “Until then, you probably wouldn’t make it five meters down that tunnel before freezing up. Is that enough to give you something to think about while you’re unable to sleep?”
“The dig’s inside? No slugging through mud? No uncomfortable spacesuits? We’ll get to look at it with our own eyes and touch it with our own hands?”
“Heck, you can even give it a big sloppy kiss if that’s your thing, but yeah, I imagine when the engineers are done, you’ll be fine wearing what you have on now. I know how you are, though, so fair warning: this is my base, and I run it by the book. My men are under orders not to discuss what they’ve seen down there, and to shoot anyone who tries to get a look before SDEC clears it.” He smiled slightly, as if to indicate it was a joke with a hint of truth behind it. There was a faint vibration from behind the door. It felt like a cross between a grumble and a sigh.
Jaysn threw up his hands in mock surrender. The Major was right. He had planned to befriend one of the engineers and trick him into describing what they’d found down at the bottom of that tunnel, and he would have tried to sneak down to get a peek at the site if that had failed. Though he nodded his acceptance of the situation, neither of them believed it.
