surrounded by an upfull multitude of advanced civilizations! Their invitation to come-ya ‘join us’… to become members of some maarvelous community of star-bredren… has already thrilled and inspired billions across our lonely planet. Though the prospect may disturb a few downpressing ginnygogs an’ trogs who are terrified of change.”
Profnoo seemed unaware of Lacey’s ironic grimace, or her conflicted loyalties. By personality, she ought to share his forward-looking eagerness. If not for her worries about Hacker, she, too, might have been fizzing about the prospect of First Contact. (Though she would express it with more reserve than the super-extrovert in front of her.)
On the other hand, her caste-her peers in the top aristocracy-foresaw little good coming out of this. Even if the alien device represented a benign and advanced federation that was both generous and wise, the psychological disruption could spur fresh waves of anxiety, paranoia, or covetous wrath. With interstellar trade relations might come wave after wave of wondrous new technologies. Some hazardous? Even the most benign might shake an already tenuous economy, throwing whole sectors into obsolescence, putting hundreds of millions out of work, not to mention spoiling many investment portfolios.
No wonder this spurred a climax to long negotiations between the clade and Tenskwatawa’s renunciation movement. Few cultures ever managed to transition after contact with superior outsiders, without generations of intimidation and victimhood. Meiji-era Japan did it. And their method was not democracy.
But Lacey pulled her thoughts back to the present. The science-showman on her payroll was continuing his rapid-fire explication, never slacking momentum.
“… even that still leaves us awash in puzzles! We can only hope the Artifact Commission overcomes all linguistic barriers. Especially now that dem lagga heads will finally allow me… and you, of course, madam… close enough to ask questions!”
“So, what should we ask first, Professor?”
“Oh, there are so many things. For example, the mere existence of the Artifact, here on Earth, proves-irie-that interstellar travel is possible!”
Assuming, again, that it’s not a hoax, Lacey pondered, while noting that Profnoo still had not mentioned an actual question.
“True, we haven’t yet learned how the object crossed the vast gulf between the stars. But from the fact that it exists in a purely crystalline-solid state-tallowah an’ sturdy-I be wagering a whole- heap that the propulsion methodology wasn’t gentle! Perhaps a truly prodigious accelerator-cannongun fired it to near relativistic speeds. Or else, maybe its compact dimensions allowed slick passage through an obeah-generated wormhole, requiring the energy of a superdupernova! I-mon have done some rudimentary calculations-”
“Professor. Please. Can you stick to the point?”
“Ah, yes. The Invitation.” He nodded. “Do bear with me, Madam Donaldson-Sander, I-and-I will get to it! For, you see, even the possibility of interstellar travel was denied for eighty years by the cult of SETI. When their program of sky worship found nothing out there at all, they trotted out the same excuse. Just a little more time. Patience-and ever-more sophisticated-bashy gear-would eventually find the needle in the haystack… that wise, elder race they hoped for!”
Huh. Lacey couldn’t help getting caught up in the spell he wove. Noozone had amassed his own fortune out of millions of micropayments, as people zigged-in to view and tactail his leaping, explanatory extravaganzas. Though some just liked his snakelike draidlocks, wafting and stirring clouds of ambiguous, colored smoke.
“Alas, interstellar travel changes everything. If advanced star-mon can deepvoyage an’ colonize, then needles make copies of themselves. Colonies send out their own expeditions, spreading an’ filling the haystack!
“But we saw no fabulous Others. Nor any huge engineering projects that we may someday build, if we become a truly bold and successful civilization. Antimatter-spaceships, vaast solar collectors, Dyson spheres, and Kardashev worksheds that lace multiple star systems, all of them detectable…” Profnoo had to gasp and catch his breath.
“And it gets worse! Earth itself would show signs, if visitors ever flushed a toilet here, or tossed a Coke bottle into our Paleozoic sea. My oh, geologists and paleobiologists would see in our rocks, the very moment when extraterrestrial bacteria arrived! Nuh true?
“No. Something was wrong with the old SETI logic. Till this marvel-stoosh Galactic Artifact turned up. Only now…” He lifted a finger-and one of his mentally activated draidlocks wafted also.
“Now, it seems that life is fairly common-and-
“-sapient life, capable of technology, is not rare-and-
“-some form of interstellar travel appears to be possible-and-
“-a peaceful community already exists that…”
Lacey raised a hand of her own, cutting him off with four braids and four fingers lifted in the air. Glancing out the window, she had noticed that the yacht bearing them from Charleston to Washington was cruising rapidly up the Potomac. Soon, they’d pass the zeppelin port and the Awfulday Memorial, before finally docking at the Naval Research Lab. Not that she minded traveling this way. Shipboard facilities let her stay in constant linkup with the rescue effort, searching for her son. But it was time to start winding this up.
“All right, then. Suppose there is a Galactic Federation we’re invited to join. Doesn’t that conflict with everything you just described? Especially the sparse cosmos that we observed, till now?”
“It would seem so, madam.” Profnoo’s earlobe rings and beaded locks clattered as he nodded. “So, where’s the overlap in conceptual space? Between the previous, downpressing appearance of meager sapience, and what we now know to be its high, upfull frequency?”
The man’s unquenchable zeal to speculate did not bother her. Vivid and aromatic, Profnoo made his intellectual frenzy into something unabashedly masculine. Frankly, his flirtatious attention-laced with rousing scientific jargon- filled some of the void in Lacey that used to be occupied by sex.
“Apparently, dem use crystal capsules instead of radio! I suppose interstellar pellets are easy, cheap, and relatively fast.” He chuckled, though Lacey found the jest rather lame. “They also allow aliens to travel as surrogates-as complete downloaded personalities. Indeed, this may prove my conjecture about networks of connection-wormholes!”
Or else, they may avoid radio because they know something that we don’t, Lacey pondered. Perhaps they deem it unwise to draw attention to their home worlds. Because something out there makes it dangerous. The thought gave her a shiver, especially since Planet Earth had been anything but quiet, for the last hundred years or so.
“But, madam, just picture the long odds that this particular crystal-this Artifact-had to beat, when dem just happened to drift within reach of that astronaut’s garbage collecting bola-tether. Without any visible means to maneuver! A fluke? Or might there be others out there?”
Lacey nodded. That may explain why Great China, India, the U.S., the E-Union and A-Union have all announced new space endeavors. I should assign some agents-real and spyware-to learn more about these missions.
Something about the notion of “other artifacts” tickled the edge of her imagination.
Why only out there? Indeed…
But the thought eluded her, skittering away as the yachtmaster’s amplified voice reverberated. It was time to stop for inspection at the security cordon near the Naval Research Center. Captain Kohl-Fennel had already made arrangements, of course. The pause would be brief. Lacey shrugged.
“You were talking about contradictions, Professor. How to explain why we saw no traces of intelligence before, in a universe that now turns out to be filled with sapient life.”
“Yes… it be a puzzlement.” His dense, expressive lips pursed. “The use of something other than radio for
