Distant Helix by Aric Merchant
This story originally appeared in Alien Dimensions Issue #2
Deon picked up his pace as he neared the central office. This was his fourth lap around the platform, which was enough for one evening. He did not enter the office, however. It would be unbecoming to do so in his sweaty exercise clothing. A planet-born human could get quite a workout just circling the platform, trying to coordinate between placing magnetic boots and grasping at handholds. Deon had always cut his workout off at four laps, though he aspired to six.
He maneuvered himself into the elevator to return to the habitat section, but took one look back at the circular corridor. There were portholes along the ring’s interior hull, through which Deon was able to see the drill. The large cylindrical structure at the center of the ring made up the bulk of the platform’s mass. From this angle, he could not see the emitter, but the bottom part of the drill that was visible had an ambient light. Deon knew that this light was a by-product of the intense particle beam just out of his sight.
The ring was always empty at this point in their circadian cycle. The few technicians who were awake were monitoring the Drill from other workstations. This gave Deon an opportunity to do his laps without being watched by Kris or Lota. They were both space-augments, born in and genetically adapted to space. They drew a great deal of amusement from the sight of planet-born Deon clumsily navigating the corridors. He exercised in the ring partly for his health and partly to improve his zero-gee locomotion. He would never be able to gracefully glide through the gravityless platform like they did. They had the advantage of an extra set of prehensile appendages where a planet-born like Deon list legs and feet. Still, he hoped to attain a fluidity of motion that would temper the snickering when they watched him move about.
The elevator door closed, and he grabbed tightly on to the handholds in the ceiling so that he did not drift as the car began to ascend. A moment later, it opened to reveal the main corridor of the human habitat section. Much to Deon’s dismay, Kris and Lota were chatting in the corridor between himself and the door to his room. He reluctantly began his trek through the corridor.
“Hey Earther.” Lota said, when she caught sight of Deon. The term was only used by the space-augments as a put down, but it wasn’t really accurate in Deon’s case. He had been born on a terraformed planet in the Beta Hydri System. He had never been to Earth or any part of the Sol System. But, the word was a holdover from a bygone era now applied to all planet-born.
“Hi,” Deon said, trying to sound pleasant as he carefully moved down the hall one magnetic boot step and handhold grasp at a time. Kris waived with one of his lower appendages. Deon passed them but continued to feel their eyes on his back all the way to his quarters.
After a long shift and a tough workout, he was ready to relax and enjoy his sleep period. He had just enough time to clean up and change out of his workout clothes when a call rang through from Cetus in the central office.
#
Platform Distant Helix was owned by the Cylest Corporation and was placed at Contact Point B47. The Contact Point had uncooperatively appeared in a sparsely populated region of the galaxy, between the Orion and Perseus Arms. Deon and his co-workers found themselves five light years from the nearest star base, and more than twenty light years from the nearest inhabited planet. Deon’s sense of isolation was exacerbated by the fact that the Platform’s crew were mostly space-augmented humans and Radials.
In truth, Deon liked the Radials. As a species, they’d always fascinated him. Of the few dozen intelligent extraterrestrial species humanity had encountered, they were the only example of intelligence evolving in an animal with a radial body structure (as opposed to the more familiar bilateral structure). Their bodies would remind anyone familiar with Earth life of a starfish, although their segments each ended in a dexterous appendage rather than simply coming to a point. When Deon had first started studying xeno-relations, he’d been drawn to the them, intrigued by the idea of sentience existing in that body pattern. He had hoped to get a job at the embassy on the Radial’s home world, but instead he’d ended up on the fringe of charted space.
Adding to his disappointment was the awkward nature of his work with the Radials. Basically, he was the corporate lackey. The drill represented a convergence of human and Radial engineering. Each species had a working knowledge of components of the drill, but neither could make it function on their own. That’s the way Cylest and the human governance preferred it, and Deon’s job was to remind the Radials of this if they ever got too curious about the human-designed components.
The call instantly shattered any hope Deon had of a restful sleep phase. Cetus wouldn’t be calling him on his off hours unless it was dire.
He opened the call and before he could utter a word, Cetus said “You are needed in the central office. There is a problem.” To the point, like all Radial communication. It was another reason Deon liked them, no pretense.
“I’m on my way.”
Lota and Kris were still in the corridor. His mind set on getting to the office, Deon was able to ignore them this time.
#
Cetus was at his usual station when Deon arrived. Three of his six appendages clung to handholds, the other three streamed over his control console. It was almost impossible for a human to correctly interpret the subtleties of Radial nonverbal communication, but the speed and focus with which Cetus was working told Deon the severity of the issue.
Like animal life on earth, they had originated in their world’s ocean. Unlike humanity, they had only left the oceans when they had become a technologically advanced civilization. They’d gone from a seafaring race to one that built orbital colonies, never paying any heed to the dry land of their world. Like the space-augmented humans, they had engineered themselves to fit new environments, so these Radials had no trouble floating through the Platform’s Earth-like atmosphere.
“What’s the problem, Cetus?” Deon asked. He listened as the computer issued a series of clicks, translating his words into the Radial’s language.
Cetus replied with clicks of his own, then a mechanical voice translated. “The Drill is not operating within normal parameters. I have already confirmed that the issue is not originating in any of the Radial-build components.”
Deon planted his magnetic boots next to the Radial and looked over the readings on the control console. Indeed, something was wrong. He started running diagnostic programs to find the problem.
Contact Point B47 represented a bit of space-time where the universe made contact with another space-time continuum, the ana-verse. This continuum operates with a different set of physical laws giving rise to a unique form of matter, ana-matter. It had been discovered centuries earlier that ana-matter was the key component to the successful function of the faster-than-light drive. So, collecting ana-matter for use in starships became a booming industry.
Harvesting ana-matter had proved to be quite difficult, however, despite the hundreds of contact points that had been discovered across charted space. A ship could not just fly into the contact point and collect it, the points were not so much portals as they were weak spots in space-time through which small amounts of ana-matter could seep.
Collaboration with the Radials had made collection on an industrial level possible. The drills operated by bombarding a contact point with high-powered radiation. This caused the space-time within the contact point to oscillate rapidly, and usher ana-matter across the thin barrier into the universe where it could be collected and processed for starship use.
Contact Point B47 was an especially rich source. It had been suggested that the other side of B47 was probably located inside an ana-matter nebula. That was why Cylest was willing to fund the placement of such a remote platform.
Deon didn’t like what he saw on the console. More ana-matter was streaming across the barrier than ever before. It was putting stress on the collectors, already surpassing their design threshold. He did not share that fact with Cetus, however. The collectors were of human design and their threshold was proprietary information. Cetus had probably suspected the collectors were on the brink. That was why he’d called Deon instead of one of the technicians. Deon was the only human authorized to tell him how much stress the collectors could take before failure.
Deon considered how much he should share with Cetus, then decided to contact Cylest Headquarters before proceeding.
CP B47 would not be so accommodating. The structure of the platform shook violently. Cetus’ body vibrated like the membrane of a drum as his appendages absorbed the sudden movement. Deon could not adjust so easily. The movement tore his hands free of the holds and he began to tumble through the office space. He panicked and tried to grasp onto something stationary, but the room spun around him too fast. Then, something firmly latched onto his arm and his movement was arrested. Cetus had stopped his tumbling with a free appendage just in time to prevent Deon’s head from slamming into a doorframe.
“Thank you.” He said sincerely.
“You are welcome.”
“What just happened?” Deon asked as he regained his composure. The Radial’s six eyes turned back to the console.
Clicking. “Ana-matter intrusion increased four-fold. The collectors all failed simultaneously, and a shock wave was sent back through the radiation beam, shorting out the emitter.”
Deon swore. They were not equipped to synthesize new collectors on the platform and it would take weeks for Cylest to ship replacements on an FTL ship. The emitter was of Radial design and he could only imagine what would be involved in its replacement.
“We’re never going to hear the end of it from headquarters,” he complained. “Cylest will be out at least two weeks’ profit. There’s likely to be layoffs.”
Clicking. “That may be the least of our worries, Deon.” Cetus pointed an appendage to the console. “The increase in rate of intrusion has not abated. On the contrary, it has increased six-fold. Ana-matter is streaming across the contact point at a rate never observed before.”
“What?” Deon looked at the readout and confirmed Cetus’ report. “How?”
“We suspected the Ana-verse side of CP B47 was within a nebula. It’s possible a star or proto-star of ana-matter has drifted across the contact point. In theory, the gravity well would strain the barrier between our continuums and much more ana-matter than usual would stream through.”
“Are we in danger?”
“Not immediate danger. The bulk of the ana-matter intrusion is directed away from the platform. But Deon…”
“I know.” He cut off Cetus before he could explain further. Ana-matter had to be collected and stored immediately upon entering the universe. When it was allowed to enter open space it very quickly decayed into forms that were useless to starships. Worse than that, the ana-matter by-products were damaging to sensitive technology and to living tissue. For once, Deon was glad Platform Distant Helix was so remote.
#
Kris, Lota, and one of the Radials arrived in the central office moments later to see what was going on. The five of them spent the next several hours trying to formulate a plan to end the intrusion without causing damage to the contact point. Using the quantum entanglement communication device, they reported the issue to Cylest Headquarters and their respective governments. Cylest told them to standby for instructions, but they kept on working. None of them trusted the company to solve the issue remotely.
They had a few proposals put together when Lota, who was monitoring the comm device, suddenly spoke up. “We’ve got a bigger problem than we knew.” She said. “Platform Distant Genesis is reporting an ana-matter intrusion from CP A56.”
Another platform was having the same issue they were?
“What could be causing this?” Kris asked, exasperated.
“Something that my people have feared from the start,” said Cetus’ mechanical voice. “It was the reason my people insisted on designing the drill emitters. My people suspected that this may happen.”
“What may happen?” Deon nearly shouted. Cetus was being uncharacteristically cryptic.
Cetus ignored Deon’s question for a long moment as he tapped away at his own console. “It would appear that we have triggered a phase transition in the ana-verse,” Cetus finally said. “Radiating CP B47 while it was strained by a star’s gravity well seems to have triggered a shift in the structure of ana-verse space-time. That transition is now propagating across the other continuum and causing ana-matter to breach the barrier at the other contact points as well.”
“But it’s only been a few hours. CP A56 is five light years away.” Lota said incredulously.
“Some physicists have suggested that information may travel faster across the ana-verse than in our own universe.” Deon pointed out. “There was talk of someday using the ana-verse to send near instantaneous communications without the need for quantum entanglement devices.”
“Indeed.” Cetus agreed with Deon’s conclusion. “We can expect more platforms to report uncontrolled ana-matter intrusions.”
“If you knew this was possible why didn’t you warn us?” Kris shouted at the Radials angrily.
“Your government and corporate entities were informed of the risk.” The artificial voice betrayed no defensiveness in Cetus’ reply. “My people were unable to dissuade them from mass harvesting ana-matter.”
#
Cetus’ dire prediction soon came true. Within ten hours two more platforms were reporting uncontrolled intrusions. After the third report came through, Cetus placed a wispy appendage over Deon’s shoulder and guided him towards the door. Deon was too exhausted to resist the Radial’s ushering. He’d lost track of time, and had no idea where he would’ve been in his circadian cycle had disaster not struck. He allowed the extraterrestrial to guide him from the room.
In the corridor, away from the others, Cetus began to click in his native language. “Deon, as I said before, my people feared this may occur. We had hoped it would not. It was statistically unlikely, but the possibility was always there. So, we have in place a contingency plan.”
“You do?” A rush of relief came over Deon. “Well than, enact it.”
“I cannot do so without your express authorization.”
“My… Why would you need me to give you permission to solve our problem?”
Clicking “Because, Deon, your people will not like our solution. The only way to end this crisis will be to spark a phase transition within our own universe. The Drill’s emitter contains a secondary system designed to do just this, should it ever be necessary. The right radiation beam directed at the contact point should do it. We have inadvertently proven that already.”
“A phase transition?” The Radial was right. Deon did not like the sound of that.
Cetus’ clicking continued. “This phase transition will propagate through our universe at light speed. It will slightly alter the structure of our continuum, not enough to change any fundamental laws, but it will be enough to break contact with the ana-verse. As it moves across our space-time, all contact points will eventually be severed and we will lose access to the ana-verse completely.”
“That was the best you could come up with?” Deon shouted. This plan would destroy the ana-matter industry and effectively end FLT travel.
“Any ship en route should have enough reserve to make it to a safe port.” Cetus reassured him. “Trust me. My people have given this a great deal of consideration. We see no other means of averting disaster.”
It wasn’t a clean solution. The problem was moving through the ana-verse faster than the solution would be able to move through the universe. A lot of ana-matter was still going to pour into the universe before the Radial’s fix would take hold. Still, Deon believed Cetus when he said there was no other solution.
“Why do you need my authorization?” Deon asked.
“My people can live without FTL travel. Yours will not be able to adjust so easily. You have grown accustomed to it. If we enacted this plan without your people’s approval, you may well react violently. My people have no wish to war with your people. Therefore, the responsibility of authorizing the contingency plan falls to the human liaison.”
“Lucky me.” Deon gasped. He tried to think through his fatigue. There was no protocol in place for him to follow here. If the Cylest really had known this may happen, they’d never shared that knowledge with him.
“Deon. The longer we wait, the greater the gap that will form between the issue and the fix as they propagate through their respective universes.”
There was really no choice here, right? Surely Cylest, and humanity, would understand that. They wouldn’t blame him for ending FTL travel.
“Do it,” he said.
Two hours later, the stream of ana-matter was stymied. It would be five years before the fix would reach CP A56. Centuries would pass before it would arrive at the furthest platforms. But, it would get there. Some systems would probably need to be evacuated – they’d be flooded with ana-matter by-product. Cetus’ fix did appear to be working, at least.
Once the ana-matter ran out, though, FTL travel would be effectively dead. Galactic civilization would adapt. If a planet-born like Deon could choose to live in space, despite his difficulty in movement, then humanity could learn to move through a universe lacking FTL. Humans had adapted to space. Radials had adapted to both space and atmosphere. Life would go on, one way or another. But, when it did, who would Deon be? The human who helped end the crisis and saved the day, or the man who panicked and stole FTL travel from the universe?