Faster Than Light: Dobhriathar, Page 3

  “The four were hailed as heroes and called Dobhriathar. After being ridiculed and hated, they were validated as prophets of the Goddess Airlanni. Without them, there would be no Airlann. Either we would have died out or we would have become another planet dependent on the off-worlders. But the Dobhriathar brought us a solution that allowed us to preserve our people and our culture.”

  From that date forward, Morgance explained, the word “Dobhriathar” became synonymous with a group of people chosen by the Goddess Airlanni to accomplish some great task for their planet or their city. Sometimes they were prophets, sometimes they were war heroes, sometimes they were, like the first Dobhriathar, regular citizens who rose above their birth to change the world.

  As Caitlin grew up, she began to doubt many of her mother’s stories. The legends of Airlann all followed the same pattern. An off-worlder brought some awful disaster down upon the planet as the people fell under the spell of his devices. Everything was thrown into chaos. The Goddess intervened, usually through some convenient earthquake or storm, and sent the off-worlder fleeing from Airlann, never to return.

  The tale of the first Dobhriathar was different. It felt more plausible. It didn’t have the same isolationist slant. The most recent Dobhriathar appeared within her mother’s lifetime, in Balashyre, to help resolve a war between the Eastern and Northern continents. There were people who remembered meeting the chosen ones who brokered the peace deal.

  And most importantly, Caitlin wanted to believe in the Dobhriathar. She wanted to believe that Airlanni touched the lives of real people, and chose them. She wanted to believe that her heroes were real.

  *

  “What are you talking about? I don’t want to go home.”

  Caitlin stared blankly at Commander Hathaway. That was the last thing she expected to hear. Certainly, a man stuck for years away from his planet would want to return. He would want to feel the comfortable embrace of her gravity, breathe the fresh air of her skies, and drink her cool waters.

  Realizing that the miners were friendly, Seth stepped out front to take over for the dumbfounded Caitlin. “Of course you don’t!” he exclaimed, though he was clearly also confused. “As Miss Adair indicated, I am Captain Seth Garland of the I.S.S. Fenghuang. Now, if you don’t want to go home, how is it that you require our assistance?”

  Commander Hathaway glanced left and right, as if trying to make sure that no one was listening. Then he leaned in close, sticking his head between Seth and Caitlin. “Not here,” he said, whispering. “Not where we might be heard. I don’t want to scare anyone.”

  The haggard man turned on his heel and started down the hallway. After a few steps, he turned and motioned for them to follow. Seth exchanged glances with Alena, who just shrugged. There was nothing else to do but go with him.

  While Caitlin’s last few weeks had been full of new places and experiences, nothing shocked her more than the interior of the mining platform. She couldn’t understand how anyone could live there. Seth had told her before that the space station would have real gravity and sunlight. That was looking like just another thing he made up to get everyone to go along with his plans.

  Long, narrow, snaking hallways stretched from one end of the platform to the other. There were no windows or even view-screens. Everything was illuminated by a sickening blue light. The walls were sterile, the floors were rigidly even, and the disgusting artificial air choked her more with every breath.

  As uncomfortable as the Fenghuang was, she couldn’t wait to get back. At least there was pleasant lighting and where she could look out at the stars.

  They seemed to walk forever, until they finally reached the commander’s personal sleeping quarters. Several other miners passed them as they went. Every single one looked terrible. They glanced left and right as they walked, their hands visibly shaking as they held them at their side. It was like they were all waiting for something terrible and they were certain it was around the next corner. Commander Hathaway shouldn’t have been so worried about scaring them. They were already scared.

  Once they were in the commander’s quarters, he offered them seats across from his desk. There were only two chairs. Feeling lightheaded from the stale air, Caitlin quickly claimed one of them. Seth and Alena quietly bickered for a second after Seth offered the other chair to Alena and she took offense at the courtesy. They glared at each other until Seth finally gave in and sat down, letting Alena stand in the back, towering over everyone.

  Finally situated, Seth began to question the commander. “What are you doing here?” he asked. “Why didn’t you leave in the relocation? Did the People’s Republic even send a ship to rescue you?”

  Commander Hathaway leaned back in his chair and laughed. “Rescue us? You mean they tried to kidnap us. When they came here with their fancy ships and their bureaucratic nonsense, I told them what my crew told me. The only way we were leaving this station is on our backs.”

  Caitlin leaned forward. “Are you insane?” she asked. “What is wrong with you?”

  “I thought we brought you along to be the calm one,” Alena quipped in the background.

  Fortunately, Commander Hathaway didn’t take offense at the Airlannian’s surprise. “My father worked this mine for years. He taught me the craft. Every summer since I was a boy, I’d come here from NewPasTur because it was so much more pleasant than the factories there. It’s safe. It’s calm. My friends are all here. My wife is here. We have greenhouses that supply us with food. There are no diseases to worry about. Why would I want to go back? This is my home. Ask anyone here and they’ll give you the same story.” He grunted. “Besides, when all of this blows over, y’all are gonna be glad we’re all still here. You know how long it would take to get this place started up again if we just abandoned it?”

  He still thought that the Fall would just “blow over”. Most people had figured out that was just another Republic lie. The Republic said that as soon as they came up with a safer method of interstellar travel, then they would re-open all the trade routes and everything would be back to normal. But there was no safer method. The Heilmann Drive was the only method. In the two thousand years since its invention, it had never been replaced and never been improved.

  “So, if you want to stay here, how can we help you?” Seth asked.

  Commander Hathaway suddenly fixed on Seth with a fierce glare. “We have a problem on the Antigone, Captain. And it’s a problem that none of the engineers on the station have been able to solve.”

  “Then I have good news for you, Commander. The woman standing behind me is literally the most famous engineer in the galaxy.”

  Hathaway stared at Alena, who just smiled. “Good!” he exclaimed. “Because I need you to look at our engines, our gravity drive... Everything!”

  “You don’t know what’s malfunctioning?” Alena asked.

  “No, but I know we’re in trouble. We’re falling into the star below us.”

  A sudden quiet fell over the room as everyone considered what the commander said. Caitlin tried not to stand up and run screaming from the room. She remembered how close the platform looked to Epsilon Andrii on the view-screen. It was just on the edge of destruction. And now...

  “You’re falling into the star?” Seth finally asked.

  Commander Hathaway nodded. “Or the star is expanding. We don’t know. But it’s obvious. We’re inching closer and closer. It’s only a matter of time before we burn up.”

  Sweat sprung up across Seth’s forehead. Caitlin wondered if he was feeling what she was feeling. The room was suddenly hotter.

  “We would be glad to help you,” Seth said. “In exchange, we would request a fairly small amount of solarium crystals. Is that acceptable?”

  “Of course,” Hathaway replied. “We’ve been mining and refining them for nothing for awhile now. You’re free to take as much as you want.”

&nb
sp; Seth nodded. “I’ll get the rest of my crew on board. We’ll want to get this figured out as soon as possible.”

  Hathaway seemed to relax. It was as if all of his worries melted away. He seemed to trust that Seth and Alena would be able to fix his problem. “Thank you so much,” he said. “But I also have one more request. Please don’t tell anyone what I told you here. Most of my crew doesn’t know about the...deteriorating orbit or whatever it is. I don’t want to cause a panic.”

  “Of course,” Seth told him. We’ll be completely discreet.”

  Chapter 3

  In the year 2447, the explorer Geovany Andrews became the first person to visit the Epsilon Andrii star system. Andrews was a pioneer of interstellar travel. At the time, most of his counterparts spent their time trying to find habitable planets. But Andrews believed that this was foolish. In almost two hundred and fifty years, humans had colonized dozens of worlds already. Most of these worlds were barely populated. There were more than enough colonies.

  Andrews was looking for something else. He wanted to find alien life. On all of the planets, in all of the star systems found by mankind, they had yet to discover a single living organism. Plants and animals from Earth flourished on every colonized world, but there was no evidence that any of them had any life of their own. Either it died so long ago that even fossilized bacteria was destroyed, or it never existed at all.

  Unlike most of the other scientists searching for extraterrestrial life, Andrews did not believe it would be found on Earth-like planets. He believed that life could evolve anywhere, out of any system, and that the spontaneous emergence of life on Earth was so unlikely that even across thousands of worlds, something like it would never be repeated.

  Andrews never found what he was searching for. Instead, he found something almost as remarkable. The Epsilon Andrii orange dwarf was a star like no other star. It was the most stable celestial body that had ever been discovered.

  Epsilon Andrii appeared to be very near the beginning of its main sequence. The magnetic fields surrounding the star were in absolute harmony, never creating any resistance. There were no solar flares. There were no sunspots. Every measurement showed that it was a perfect sphere.

  The People’s Interstellar Republic immediately ordered the construction of a research station, which would eventually become the mining platform Antigone. Gathering minerals within the corona, which was a dangerous proposition on most stars, was perfectly safe at Epsilon Andrii. The star could also be used as a forge, as the temperature at various distances from the core was always consistent. After the mining platform at Epsilon Andrii was built, the Republic and other interstellar governments built similar stations on other stars, but none of them were as safe or as reliable.

  Meanwhile, Geovany Andrews didn’t just give up his search for extraterrestrial life. He gave up on science. To him, Epsilon Andrii was a repudiation of everything he used to believe in. It was proof of God, of a great designer, because it was so impossibly perfect. His contemporaries justified its existence just as they justified the existence of life itself. There were millions of stars in the universe. An entirely stable star was inevitable. Andrews refused to believe it.

  He devoted the rest of his life to the star. Disowned by his peers, he was not allowed to actively participate in the study of the celestial body, but they compassionately allowed him to live on the research station, where he recorded his own observations and performed his own experiments...

  *

  “What are we looking at?” Caitlin asked . She was staring over Alena’s shoulder at a computer screen embedded in a large panel. It was more complicated than anything aboard the Fenghuang. Numbers and words scrolled across the screen at an unfathomable pace. Caitlin wasn’t sure how Alena was keeping up.

  “Gravitational data from the star below,” she responded. “I want to make sure there haven’t been any fluctuations that might have caused the Antigone to begin a slow descent out of orbit.” Caitlin just sighed. That barely made any sense to her. Alena looked back at her, away from the steady stream of numbers. “You don’t get it, do you?”

  Caitlin met her gaze. “I come from a world that has banned the combustion engine. Nothing you say is going to make sense to me the first time around.”

  Alena took a deep breath and tried to simplify the situation as much as possible. “This mining platform was designed after years and years of absolute, unwavering stability from the star below. Every machine and program here just assumes that nothing about the star below will change. A single variation in the gravitational pull might disrupt the orbit and send the mining platform hurtling downwards.”

  Despite the fact that most of Alena’s explanation went over her head, Caitlin was beginning to understand the problem. Epsilon Andrii was so predictable that the platform was unprepared for any changes.

  “It is like so many of the planets we have seen after the Fall,” Caitlin said. “They were so reliant on the trade routes, which provided them with a constant flow of resources, that as soon as they were disrupted everything fell into chaos.”

  Alena narrowed her eyes as she glared at Caitlin. “It’s nothing like that,” she hissed. “What are you even doing here?”

  “I want to help these people,” Caitlin said.

  “Yes, and I’m sure they appreciate the enthusiasm. But I’m not sure how you’re supposed to do that. The only reason this platform would be spiraling down into the star is a mechanical failure. And you’re not going to help us find that.”

  Caitlin slumped her shoulders. “I... I just...” She knew that Alena was right. She knew that there wasn’t anything she could do to help the people on the Antigone. There was no reason for her to be aboard the mining platform. And she certainly didn’t want to be there. She wanted to return to the pleasant air of the Fenghuang and let the others deal with the problem.

  She just couldn’t.

  “Show me,” she said. “Show me what you are looking for and I can help.”

  Alena tapped a few buttons on panel. The screen froze. “Are you joking?” Alena asked.

  “No. All you are doing is watching numbers. You must be looking for something. A pattern, a decline, an increase... I can do that too, if you tell me what to watch out for.” Alena didn’t respond. Not yet. “That way, you can devote your talents to something that actually requires them.”

  A soft chuckle escaped Alena’s lips. “Fine.”

  “Really?”

  “This is starting to make me nauseous anyway.” She motioned for Alena to look at the screen with her. “But before we begin, I’m going to have to teach you a little bit about gravity.”

  Caitlin gulped and wondered what she’d gotten herself into.

  *

  She could still see the numbers when she closed her eyes. After a thirty minute lesson about the intricacies of creating an artificial orbit around a celestial body Caitlin spent five hours watching green digits speed across a black computer screen. Alena was right to stop when she did. Caitlin was sure that she was going to throw up.

  It wasn’t just that the motion made her sick. It was also the fact that she didn’t find anything. According to Alena, one of the most likely problems was a slight fluctuation in the amount of artificial gravity produced by the space station. A malfunctioning on-board gravity generator could, theoretically, throw off the carefully maintained orbit. And the space station computers, designed around the perfectly stable star below, would be hard-pressed to fix the problem if it got out of control.

  The numbers on the screen in front of her represented the amount of energy exerted by the gravity generator paired with the mass and volume of everything on the station at the time. Alena said that there wouldn’t be a perfect ratio of artificial gravity to the weight of the station, but that it should be close. A malfunction in the gravity generator, especially one large enough to cause the very orbit of the station t
o change, would stand out among the numbers.

  There was nothing that stood out. There was no malfunction. In fact, Caitlin began to suspect that Alena was wrong. Just looking at a few of the number sets, and doing a quick calculation in her head, Caitlin realized that there was a perfect ratio. The gravity generator wasn’t just not malfunctioning. It was working at perfect efficiency—at least at the times that Caitlin randomly picked to calculate.

  But it was more than that. After an hour and a half, Caitlin started to think that the numbers were repeating themselves. She saw certain pairings of mass and energy expenditure that looked familiar. At first she thought that there had been a malfunction and the flow of data started over. But the dates and times were new.

  Three hours into the process, Caitlin saw the same numbers a third time. Then, as she was completing her examination of the artificial gravity generator records, she saw them a fourth time. It didn’t even begin to make sense to her until she was done and she saw exactly what database she’d been examining. The time frame for the numbers was the last five revolutions the platform made around the Epsilon Andrii star.

  “It’s not possible.” Those were the first words out of Alena’s mouth when Caitlin presented her findings. “You must have done something wrong.”

  Caitlin was prepared for this. Even though she felt awful, as if her time in front of the computer screen had sucked the life out of her, she was ready to defend what she saw. “Everything was set up just how you left it. Maybe the data is wrong, but what I saw was not. The number were repeating. And if I am not mistaken, they repeated five times.”

  Alena thought about this. She considered what it meant and tried to simplify it so Caitlin could understand just how ridiculous it sounded. “It takes two years, three months, and fifteen days for the platform to revolve around the star,” she said. “So what you’re telling me is that two years, three months, and fifteen days ago... This station had the exact same mass, volume, and used the same amount of energy to maintain the artificial gravity?”

  “I guess that is correct. That is what I am saying.”