Music of the Spheres (The Interstellar Age Book 2) Page 2

  Kenny flicked his hand dismissively. “Never mind about that. You had rations for one week—two if you pushed it. So how did you survive after that? What happened in the almost two-and-a-half months between when you arrived in the Centauri system and when you made the return trip. You just—what—floated in space all that time in the pod?”

  “It’s a little foggy,” Alex said. “I think I was suffering some aftereffects from being quantized. Time didn’t really flow in an ordinary way.” He wasn’t a very good liar. From the look Kenny gave him, the physicist didn’t believe him on that point.

  In his debriefing to Quantum Resources—when it was still a joint venture between USA, Inc. and Canada Corp.—Alex had reported that his escape pod had detected a star beacon, an identical cousin to Sol System’s Dis Pater, on the outer rim of the Centauri System. Another huge monument that resembled an electron cloud, the alien structure rested on the surface of a minor planet a fraction of the size of Charon.

  Alex repeated himself for the hundredth time in the past two years. “I used the pod’s jets to head for the alien star beacon. When I got there, it just … sent me home.”

  Fixing Alex with a look of frustration, Kenny said, “And if all of the Kinemet blew up with the Quanta, how did ‘it’ send you back to Sol System?”

  That was one of the many questions the Quantum Resources scientists kept asking, but they continued to disbelieve any answer Alex gave them; and they were right. It was unfortunate that he was unable to tell them the truth.

  He hated that there were things about his story he couldn’t share. But if he shared his secret before the world was ready, it would lead to…

  He didn’t even dare think of it.

  The frustration he felt had only sharpened over the past few years. The world needed to develop the Kinemet technology as fast as it could, but they had encountered a brick wall. Coupled with the worsening economy, it seemed no one was that interested in investing in Kinemet.

  At times, Alex wanted to scream to get the world motivated, but he knew he had to bite his tongue.

  Time was running out; at the rate of things, it might take decades for the science of Kinemet to get where it needed to be.

  Because of his health, Alex didn’t have decades; he most likely didn’t even have years.

  But whenever Calbert Loche or Raymond McGrath sent up a new physicist to Quantum Resources, Alex did his best to help them, hoping they were the ones who could unlock the secret of Kinemet.

  Inevitably, due to his reluctance to tell the complete truth, and also because those details he did share were difficult to believe, those newcomers eventually discounted the rest of Alex’s story.

  Kenny was a little more stubborn than his predecessors, but he was on the wrong track. Alex knew where today’s conversation was heading, and the day’s events had taken a toll on him. He didn’t have the strength to endure an argument, and at this point, he didn’t care if Kenny Harriman pitched a fit over it.

  Alex said, “I’m tired. I need to rest.”

  Vibrating with barely suppressed anger, Kenny stormed off and tapped his report into the haptic console. One of the lab assistants approached and assisted Alex out of the simulator’s cockpit.

  ∞

  It had been over two years since Alex’s return from the first interstellar voyage. The world financial crisis had intensified in Alex’s absence. USA, Inc. and Canada Corp. had banked heavily on a successful mission for the Quanta. Contact with an alien race would have made the country corporations’ stocks soar. New technologies, medicines, and even the possibility of interstellar trade would have boosted shareholder and consumer confidence.

  With Alex’s report that he had seen nothing out there except the distant flare of the Centauri system’s red dwarf star, Proxima, the media had descended on the two country corporations, hungry for blood. They accused the United Earth Corporate Council of wasting trillions of dollars on an empty space fantasy when they should have concentrated their efforts on the realities of increasing population, famine and energy depletion. The UECC had backed out of the Quanta trials, and after NASA and Quantum Resources’ repeated failures, USA, Inc. decided to follow suit.

  Quantum Resources barely survived USA, Inc.’s downsizing efforts by selling all shares to Canada Corp. and relocating its quantum research facility to Canada Station Three.

  Without a steady supply of Kinemet for practical trials, Quantum Resources had turned into more of a theoretical analysis laboratory. At the moment, their only solid asset was Alex Manez. Despite his agreement to be their guinea pig—and as his body continued to fail him—he found himself becoming more and more obstinate.

  As had happened during his self-imposed exile on the pirate base on Luna, without the direct influence of Kinemet, Alex had begun to physically deteriorate once more. It was as if the radiation emitted from that element, while basically harmless to those who had not been exposed during a transfer reaction, had become a requisite substance for Alex. He fed off it; it replenished him and kept him alive.

  He had no idea how long he would live without it.

  The harshest side effect of his condition was that he could not tolerate Earth’s high gravity anymore. While the main labs, administration areas, and the common and recreation centers on Canada Station Three were all fitted with the latest in artificial gravity technology, the levels in the living quarters were completely adjustable by the occupants. Alex, when home, kept gravity to a bare minimum.

  Unable to stand on his own for more than a few short minutes at a time, Alex had purchased a set of hydraulic leg braces which would support his weight. He purchased them with the proceeds from the severance package given to him by NASA.

  When not in his quarters, Alex wore his hydraulic braces. Using fluid dynamics, biomechatronics and environmental pressure sensors, the braces were able to compensate for any external factors, such as walking on an incline or stairs, or—if he were back on Earth—snow or rain. They provided him with a more natural gait. From a distance, most people would not be able to tell he wore orthotics. Not that it made any difference: Alex looked pale and sickly; his hair was thin and stringy, and his bones continued to atrophy no matter how many vitamin shots the medical staff administered.

  All the researchers and corporate administrators treated Alex like a child. Even Ellen Yarrow looked at him as if he were something she discovered in a Petri dish. Although his body appeared to be that of a sixteen-year-old boy, according to his birth record, he was twenty-five; legally an adult. During the eight or so years when his body had been in a quantized state, he had not aged physically.

  Once the assistants secured him in the leg supports, Alex pulled on his loose-fitting trousers and fastened them at his waist.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kenny returning, and steeled himself for a confrontation.

  Kenny watched as Alex finished dressing.

  The physicist finally said, “Look, I don’t want us to be enemies. I want you to trust me. I just want what’s best for everyone.”

  Alex scoffed.

  Kenny threw up a hand. “Fine. I want what’s best for me, but that can only lead to helping you. So please, can’t we start the dialogue over again?”

  “If you truly want to help yourself,” Alex said, “then you’ll listen when I tell you that what you are doing right now is irrelevant—and quite possibly counterproductive.”

  Shaking his head, Kenny asked, “How can the study of the most advanced technology in the universe be irrelevant?”

  Kenny often spoke as if he were in a lecture hall.

  Alex sighed. “That’s not what I’m saying. It is the most important thing in the world. We need to master it before—”

  “Before what?”

  Alex shook his head. “First, you need to understand the basics of Kinemet. And we don’t even know how to stabilize it. We need to focus on how Kinemet affects people, not how to build a better quantum drive. Everyone keeps looking at the powe
r of Kinemet as if it’s just the key to light-speed travel.”

  “But it is!”

  Alex shook his head. “Yes, it can be a trigger for quantizing matter into light and powering a properly equipped vehicle at near light speeds. But that’s only the most rudimentary of its properties.”

  “What are you talking about?” Kenny scanned his notes, but Alex knew none of his predecessors had written anything about this.

  Normally, he wouldn’t try to explain himself. However, of all the researchers sent up to CS3, Alex had a feeling that Kenny’s mind might be open to new possibilities.

  Alex said, “It can do so much more than just be a fuel for light-speed travel.”

  Voice low, ears alert, Kenny asked, “Such as…?”

  Alex pointed to himself. “Human chrysalis, for one. Though we’ve failed miserably in that regard. And then there’s the Grace.”

  Kenny stared at Alex as if he were speaking another language.

  He blinked. “The grace of what?”

  Alex cursed himself and said, “Nothing. Sorry, I’m just too tired to think straight. I have to go to my quarters.”

  4

  Interim Report :

  Health Status :

  Alex Manez :

  From: Dr. Naryan Amma, Ph.D., CS3 Medical Chief of Staff

  To: Canada Corp. Health Services, Dept. of Nutritional and Metabolic Diseases.

  Diagnosis: The subject, Alex Manez, displays symptoms indicative of massive vitamin deficiency, particularly D and C, though all levels of those vitamins are with normal ranges.

  Despite bombardment of multivitamins and a diet of citrus and dairy products, Alex Manez suffers from continued hair loss, chronic insomnia, pale skin and osteoporosis.

  There is indication of onset muscle degeneration, and I expect other symptoms to become prevalent as his condition worsens.

  While his mental acuity remains in the top percentile, his emotional state has become volatile, and he is prone to depression and anxiety.

  Treatment: All attempts to correct the subject’s condition have failed to reverse or even stall his deterioration. Physical exercise exacerbates his pain, multivitamin injections and supplements show no effect, and growth hormones only serve to cause gastrointestinal distress and may lead to kidney and liver failure.

  Prognosis: Alex Manez has no more than six months to live.

  5

  Houston Interplanetary Spaceport :

  Texas :

  USA, Inc. :

  It had been over ten years since Justine Turner had seen a sunrise or sunset, since she’d looked upon the face of another person with her own eyes, and since she had even been able to look at herself in a mirror.

  She’d gone blind at the edge of Sol System. While she did not regret the events that brought her to that point—and would not trade those experiences for her sight—she found some days more difficult than others, especially in the beginning.

  One of the toughest transitions was the loss of her command status. She wanted nothing more than to captain a ship again; to breathe the stale cabin air of a control center; read digital displays and make decisions that would take her vessel out into the vast reaches of space.

  The months she had spent on the journey back from Pluto had been the hardest, when she was completely cut off from all sight.

  When she got home, she underwent optilink surgery to allow her brain to interpret electrical pulses from an optical-neural translation sensor, which she clipped to the bridge of her nose.

  Still, she had struggled with the most basic of daily chores: cooking, dressing and personal grooming to name a few. She had hired an assistant to help her the first year home, but that only reminded her how helpless she was.

  Holoslate interfaces were based off haptic technology. It was a perfect match for those who used Braille. After learning the system, Justine was able to read any eBook, manual, or meshmail with the built-in Braille application as easily as a sighted person.

  But adjusting to a world where she was blind wasn’t the worst part; it was the boredom. She’d had nothing to do.

  So once she’d mastered the optical sensor technology, she had pleaded with the officials at NASA to reassign her to the active duty roster.

  When they offered her an instructor’s position, she jumped at the chance, knowing it was most likely the closest she would ever come again to being in command, or tasting the exhilaration of space flight.

  There was a second reason she had so eagerly accepted an instructor’s position. The feeling of satisfaction and accomplishment in passing her knowledge on to the young trainees was something she had come to love.

  She would never have a child of her own. Biologically, it was still a possibility—there were women much older than her who had children—but at this stage in her life, and with her own personal challenges, she just couldn’t see herself making that decision. By the time he or she was a teenager, Justine would be in her late sixties, and she couldn’t imagine that she would have enough energy to keep up.

  The closest she had ever come to having a child was during those short few months aboard the Quanta with Alex Manez. It had given her a fleeting taste of motherhood, and for the first time her life, she had understood the power of that instinct. To care for and impart her experiences to those who would follow in her footsteps gave her as much of a sense of completeness as she could ever have wanted.

  The years she spent as a flight instructor were some of the best in the last decade.

  Now, however, that was all behind her.

  In the past two years, NASA and USA, Inc. had suffered a great many setbacks—not to mention the loss of many lives on the Quanta experiments. That had resulted in the sale of Quantum Resources to Canada Corp. and the shoe-boxing of the entire Kinemet program. There were far too many problems here on Earth to spend any more money on interstellar exploration; or at least, that was the reason the directors at USA, Inc. had given for their decision to sell.

  Many of NASA’s independent contractors had been released from their contracts, and even many regular staff members had been offered severance packages and early retirement.

  They had offered Justine a very generous sum, enough that she could easily have weathered the troubled financial times in relative comfort for many years to come. She had taken the settlement, and wondered what to do with the rest of her life. For a time, she thought about returning to the Lowell Observatory and completing her studies there, but the call of space was too great for her to simply retire.

  With her background, she managed to secure a position with Lunar Lines Ltd., who ran their space liners between Houston Spaceport and Luna Base, as a public relations hostess.

  It was a one-week round trip, and Justine worked two flights on, one flight off. The position was much more than being an attendant or a tour guide; she was also responsible for the comfort and general safety of the passengers, as well as their peace of mind. While travel to Luna Station and the various space stations orbiting Earth was becoming more frequent, only a fraction of the population had ever undertaken the trip, and for many of those who took a liner it was the first time. They were understandably nervous flying into the void of space.

  That morning was the beginning of another of Justine’s rotations, and she always looked forward to this leg of the trip for more than just the chance to be in space.

  At the Earth-Moon Lagrange 4 point was Canada Station Three, among the Kordylewski clouds. Lunar Lines always had a one-day stopover there before heading to their ultimate destination, and it was Justine’s only chance to see Alex Manez.

  She worried about him; he seemed to become more pale and sickly every time she visited him. The last time she had stopped there, over two weeks before, he had been significantly more tired than usual and had cut their visit short.

  This time around, she hoped to get a word in with someone in charge of the Quantum Resources labs, and find out what they were doing to help him. And if she didn’t get s
atisfaction from them, she would just have to call in a few more favors.

  The apartment’s home-unit computer system sounded a chime on the main holoslate, indicating there was a vehicle in her driveway.

  “Identify,” she said out loud.

  Hucs informed her.

  “Oh, he’s early. Thank you. I’ll be a just another minute.”

 

  Justine hurried back to her bedroom and approached the bed. Resting on the sheets were her two travel bags and a specially developed harness.

  The optical recognition scanner on her optilink fed her brain rudimentary spatial data. It allowed her to navigate between one room and the next, and even gave her the ability to discern the difference between a fork and a spoon. It didn’t have the capability to show her color, texture or patterns. She could detect the frame of a painting hung on a wall, but she had no way of telling whether it was a blank canvas or a Van Gogh.

  Meeting people was just as challenging. It was as if she were face blind. Until someone spoke, Justine had extreme difficulty telling one moving biped from another, unless they had very distinct physical traits.

  Optimedia Labs, the company she had originally purchased her optilink through, was also the company who had invented the Virtual Tourist.

  A few months back, they had released the next generation in recognition software. Intended for the digital mock-reality entertainment industry, the Personal Environmental Recording Suit—PERSuit, as it was trademarked—was a step up from their Virtual Tourist Camera.

  It recorded and interpreted over ten million coded shapes, sounds, smells, colors and textures. Thousands of micro-sensors in the fabric of the harness constantly scanned all audio, video and olfactory data within range.

  Contestants on game shows or adventure shows would wear the PERSuit while participating, and then viewers could download those episodes into their septaphonic masks and experience those events for themselves, as if they were there in the contestant’s place.