107: IMPLICATION

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The process of explaining the issue takes long enough that the designated time for Movie Night ends partway through. Captain Klees sheds random costume paraphernalia as he paces back and forth in the Engine Ring.

“Everyone stay calm,” he says in a tone that is decidedly not calm. “There are explanations for this that aren’t dramatic and terrifying.”

“Most explanations are dramatic and terrifying, I think,” Denish says.

“Regardless. Possibility one: a measurement error. Sam, what are the chances that the indications of there being an ozone layer are simply wrong?”

“I’m… not sure. I haven’t been studying Kleiner science for long. This is the first time I’ve used the array. The machines do have an error rate, especially since our array is quite small and we’re measuring from a moving starting point. And I’m not experienced, so I could make a mistake. But the chances of that happening? No idea.”

“High or low?”

“Very low. But not nonexistent. I think.”

“Can we just wait until we’re a bit closer and get a better read?”

“Yes and no.”

“Yes and no?”

“I can take as many readings as you want, whenever you’re willing to have the engines down. But it’s not just a matter of distance. The orbit matters, too. In about two months – well, one month technically, but we won’t get the light for two months – Hylara will pass between us and the sun, and we’ll have the backing glare to deal with. The Kleiner array can deal with that, but it’s a massive amount of interference, and will introduce far more errors than distance. Hylara has a very long year; we won’t get a clear view again for about eight months after that.”

“Okay. Low chance of error, no way to improve the reading in any practical timeframe. Let’s assume the reading is correct for now, and retake once the planet’s on the other side of the sun. Next possibility: some natural process that makes O2 that we’re not aware of. Or one that makes O3 in these concentrations. What are the chances of that?”

“Impossible to determine,” I say. “By definition, since it’d be a process we’d never heard of on a planet no one’s seen. Normally I’d say no, that’s impossible on a timeframe like this; any possible abiotic process would’ve burned itself out and the oxygen long reduced. But there are planets made of diamond out there, and planets with mercury oceans and three hundred degree carbon dioxide atmospheres and made entirely of gas and with chloride rains. It’s not impossible that Hylara has some process we’ve never thought about.”

“It is worth noting, though,” the Friend adds, “that it would be something that humankind has never seen, in our analysis of hundreds of planets. Whatever that says for the likelihood.”

“Okay. Other options. Human colonisation. We’re late to arrive; maybe they sent out a second Javelin Program, a resupply or a second chance in case any of the first ships failed, and they overtook us.”

“And carried the equivalent of Earth’s entire atmosphere with them?” Denish asks, raising a brow.

“Or brought plants into an existing carbon dioxide atmosphere.”

I shake my head. “No way. That’s an entire planet out there. Tal, how long have we been travelling, Earth time?”

“I don’t have enough data to be sure. One hundred, one thirty years? Surely no more than one thirty.”

“Even if they launched a second program immediately after we left, they’d take about eighty years. So they can’t have been here more than fifty years. The most efficient way to oxygenate an atmosphere would be fast-growing algae, assuming liquid water oceans are present, assuming correct nutrients are present, assuming decent temperature and sunlight access, but even with that, no way in fifty years. No way. They still live in domes on Mars for a reason. An entire atmosphere is just, it’s an unfathomable volume of oxygen. That atmosphere was here long before we were born and it’ll be here long after we die.”

“Meaning.”

“Extraterrestrial life, yeah. Photosynthetic, or something equivalent.”

Captain Klees rubs his temples. “Intelligent? Are we picking up any, I don’t know, radio signals? Electric lighting?”

“We’re too far away to see electric lighting with our eyes through the light telescope,” Sam says, “but I can run an analysis to try to detect any unusual luminance. No radio, no.”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Lina says. “Earth had intelligent life long before electricity or radio. My instincts say that the chances of anything with humanlike intelligence evolving are incredibly small, but Earth is a sample size of one, so.” She shrugs.

“Speaking of sample sizes of one,” I add, “we have no reason to think that we should expect radio from an intelligent species, either. It seems obvious to us because human culture grew so reliant on it, but so far as historians and sociologists know, it was invented only once. There’s no reason to assume it’s an inevitable development of an intelligent species.”

Captain Klees nods. “Sam, keep checking for radio anyway. But I still think that even if we’ve found life, it’s almost definitely not intelligent. The chances have to be low.”

“Do they?” the Friend asks. “It confers a significant survival advantage in the right contexts. It could be all but inevitable, for all we know.”

“There’s no need to jump to conclusions,” I say. “If it was that advantageous or inevitable, we’d see far more examples of it on Earth.”

“Didn’t we kill the other examples?” Tal asks.

“Those were our cousins. And there’s some debate about… with the interbreeding and the environmental changes, ‘killing’ might not… it doesn’t matter. Point is, something intelligent like us still only evolved once and branched out.”

“Depends on your definition of ‘intelligent’,” Lina says. “But that’s not a productive discussion right now.”

“Isn’t it?” There’s a slight hysterical edge developing in Captain Klees’ tone. “It sounds like it might become pretty fucking important.”

“It probably won’t,” I assure him. “What we’re seeing here is evidence of something photosynthetic, or similar. Something like an algae. We currently have no reason to think there’s anything else, and if there is, we have plenty of time to see and plan around it.”

“I hope there is,” Tal says. “Aliens rule.”

“Aliens do rule,” Denish agrees. “But if there are alien people down there, that very much complicates things. With no radio signals, we can assume they are probably not as advanced, yes?”

“Not really,” I say, but Denish ignores me.

“Humans coming in big groups to settle somewhere on land that belongs to someone else? Usually goes very badly.”

“Not necessarily,” Sam shrugs. “It can go well, it can go poorly. But since we’re couriering people who intend to build a convict colony in deep space, my money is on poorly.”

“We’re all getting ahead of ourselves,” I cut in. “We have evidence for there maybe being photosynthesis. That’s it. But even that is a serious issue. If there’s life there, even primitive life… that’s the first extraterrestrial life ever encountered. We can’t contaminate that.”

Captain Klees frowns at me. “Aspen, are you saying we shouldn’t land?”

“If there’s life there? Yeah. That’s what I’m saying.” And now I’m rehashing all Shia’s interview positions. Disorienting.

“Mmm, no.” Tinera shakes her head. “I’m not dying in space and taking thousands of people with me for a fungus.”

“I’m saying that we land somewhere else. There’s other planets in the solar system – lighter or heavier, colder or more exposed to meteors, but they’re there. Humanity is on the moon. We’re on asteroids. We don’t need a perfectly earthlike planet.”

“The moon and the asteroid mines have trade with Earth,” Denish points out. “They would not survive on their own. Mars may someday survive on its own but Luna never will. Hylara is our best bet.”

“We can make it somewhere else. You’d rather endanger the only extraterrestrial – ?”

“Endanger what?” Tal asks. “It’s not dangerous to share a planet with existing life. It’s dangerous to us, if anything. Humanity’s never, ever been powerful enough to destroy a biosphere. Oh, we changed every ecosystem we entered on Earth, sure, but change is normal. That’s how ecosystems evolve. If we change life on Hylara, so what? We can’t kill it.”

“Is that a chance you want to take?”

“Yes! You said yourself, atmospheres are big! If there’s enough life to keep that atmosphere oxygenated, we are simply not capable of wiping it out, no matter how big our domes get! And if we affect its evolution in some way, by adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere or something like that, then frankly I don’t give a shit. Meteors and solar flares and other live evolving all does that anyway. We’re no more a ‘contamination’ than a meteor shower is. We’re all freaking out over a threat that doesn’t exist.”

“Assuming,” Captain Klees says, “that there’s not intelligent life down there.”

“Yeah. Assuming that. And wonky definitions of ‘intelligent life’ and rights to human status and all that aside, what are the chances of that? Really? Say what you want about Earth being a sample size of one. The chances are miniscule.”

“We stay on course and we scan for radio transmissions just in case,” Captain Klees says. “Denish, you’re clear to take down the electrostatic shielding at any time you think it’s safe. Sam, take another Kleiner reading and double check the ozone layer result, just in case it was some random reading error, then fire the engine back up. Everyone else… we’re about one year out from orbit, so keep brushing up on whatever you need to know for landing procedures and after, and we’ll just… factor in whatever this ozone turns out to mean as best we can, when we have more information. Friend, Lina, sometime within the next six months I want you to do full physicals on the entire crew, and I mean full physicals – anything we can safely test for, do it. Once landing procedures start, our access to medical facilities will drop drastically; if anyone has so much as a rotten tooth I want it treated before we hit orbit. Tal, your main priority is still keeping us safe from whatever automated processes might still be lurking in the systems to accidentally kill us, but I also want you looking for any digital diaries or other electronic data that Captain Kae Jin’s crew may have kept. We know that at least one of her crew, Rynn-Hatson, was involved in this mad science project; if any others were, I want to know before we start waking them up for landing procedures.”

It’s really happening. After all this time wanting nothing more than to get to the planet already, we’re suddenly far, far too close. Just one year until we make it to our new home.

And something, maybe even someone but definitely at least something, already lives there.

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