Encounters 1: The Spiral Slayers (19 page)

Chapter Ten – Distant Devastation

 “The first law of the cosmos, the
cornerstone of all that is, can be completely stated in six words. Once
recognized, it stands on its own: rational, undeniable, irrefutable, and
indisputable. Backed by three pages of mathematics, a child can see its truth
and yet it is so obvious that physicists looked right past it for thousands of years.

The First Cosmic Law: More than one
state must exist.

In layman’s terms it means that “something”
must exist. Understanding this has profound implications on everything else we
look at.”

The Loud Named Bugs

Opening Speech, 23
^rd
Amular
Symposium
on Quantum Physics

Source: The Archive

No one could say exactly when it had come into being—mainly
because it had started out as many different things, in different areas, in
different physical locations, at different times and maintained for different reasons.
These in turn had slowly and, in some cases, haphazardly, merged together over
a period spanning some 300 years.

The earliest part had been put together by universities. A
simple network and database to track resource reservations, quickly followed by
scientific observations, ongoing research projects and associated funding and
grants. Another large part came shortly after.  Law enforcement latched on to
the growing network with their central database of fingerprints, then criminal
histories and DNA samples. Meanwhile, thousands of other databases within the
government, the military and civilian businesses tied into the network.

Then came the catalyst that would eventually bring everything
together. The substance was called Karanite after Della Kara, the scientist who
had devoted her life to the development of the molecule. A small sphere of
Karanite exactly a quarter inch in diameter called a Data Droplet had the
storage capacity of ten exabyte. This was enough storage to hold every fact
they had on the planet, plus every word ever spoken in all of history, and
every word ever written in all of history…five times over! Four redundant Data
Droplets were linked together, then a hundred primary high speed I/O ports were
added to each. Finally each droplet was enclosed in a three-foot diameter
sphere made out of molecularly cross-locked sheets of grapheme, the strongest
material known to Amular scientists and the closest they could come to indestructible.
 And in this way, “The Archive” was born.

Over the next fifty years, all data pertaining to all things quickly
made its way to The Archive. Besides the history and knowledge store of their
race, The Archival also included all com records, all electronic mail and
message records, all the data from all security cameras—basically all data
recorded in any manner.

An enormous government controlled division maintained and
enforced ninety-seven levels of security to The Archive as well as the World
Net which grew with Amular’s expansion into their solar system.

“Archive Terminals” were established for more secure data entry.
These were located in every major city. All the Archive Terminal buildings
looked the same: a large hemisphere of tinted glass surrounded with trees,
statues and fountains. Inside were three round structures of tinted glass set
in a triangle on polished marble floors. Ringing the sides of the round
structures were cubicles providing privacy. The cubicles contained all types of
input devices: keyboards, scanners, audio gear, and twenty or so slots for all
manner of data disks, chips, sticks and dips.

Woodworth had just finished the data stick transfers of his
work as the official historian of the first alien contact when his PDA vibrated.
He pulled it from his pocket and looked at the screen. On it was simply a
pulsating icon of a red raven and it caused his mind to go completely blank
with shock. He had never before seen, nor expected to ever see, a Red Raven
level alert. To his knowledge this was an alert reserved for such things as an
impending extinction level event or something just as serious. With a numbing
sense of disbelief, he touched the icon and it vanished. For several seconds he
stared blankly at the empty screen, then, almost in a panic, he shoved the data
sticks back into his briefcase with shaking hands, checked himself out of the
Archival entry cube and raced outside.

It was hot. He stood in the shade wondering what this could
be about – almost certainly something related to the early return of the Loud
ships—but what would cause an alert of this magnitude? After a few minutes he
heard the helicopter approaching. It set down on the lawn and he ran to it and
boarded as dozens of people stopped and watched.

Twenty minutes later he was coasting down the runway in a
supersonic jet fighter which had been waiting for him at the airport. It was
just him and the pilot. Woodworth had never ridden in a jet fighter before. He
was still dazed as the after burners kicked in with a deafening roar, pushing
Woodworth back in his seat, and the jet shot off the runway headed for Mach 3.

---

Harrington was in the middle of her yearly four-week
vacation. Rock climbing was a hobby she had picked up two years ago from her
last boyfriend, and while she had let the boyfriend slip away, the hobby had
had more staying power.

She was about halfway up the face of what was aptly called
the Dead Drop Wall when her pager vibrated.

It was a hot and dusty day, and she was covered with sweat
and crusted dirt.

It took her several minutes to get into a position where she
could stop and look at her PDA.

On hearing that the Loud ships had unexpectedly returned,
she’d checked in and almost packed it in and headed back. Stubbornly she’d
stayed to do the climb.

Now hanging on the sheer wall, she was stunned by the top level
alert. After acknowledging the alert, she reported in, advising the control
center of the awkward position she had been caught in. She was told not to
worry and to keep climbing, so she did. About fifteen minutes later, she heard
a chopper and looked up to see a hoist being lowered.

---

Adamarus had stuck his head out of the listening chamber just
long enough to give Leewood enough information to justify the Red Raven Alert
and get him to initiate it through President Wicker. Then Adamarus had ducked back
inside the soundproof room attempting to get more details from the Loud. That
had been ten minutes ago. Leewood had learned just enough to make his insides
twist and his head spin.

Now he paced back and forth outside the soundproof door and
the two guards that manned it. Of course the guards had also heard what Adamarus
had said. Leewood had reminded them that what they had heard was top secret and
that they needed to forget it. Nevertheless, their faces were pale, their eyes
a little too wide—it was obvious that they could not forget, as much as they
might want to.

Leewood stopped pacing and checked his PDA – Harrington and
Woodworth would both be landing within the next ten minutes, and President
Wicker would be standing by for a teleconference meeting in fifteen minutes. Leewood
hoped Adamarus would be available by then.

He put his PDA away and walked to the side windows and looked
out. He noticed that the sun was setting, but the spectacular sunset was lost
on him.

---

Adamarus knew that he was in a state of shock as he watched
Bugs struggle out of the chamber. There must be a million things he should ask,
but his mind had turned to clay. On top of that, Bugs was so distraught that he
doubted the alien could tell him much more right now anyway.

He tried to imagine how he would feel under the same
circumstances and then realized that he just might get the opportunity to find
out.

“Probability…fold in your favor!” Adamarus said.

Bugs turned and rose up, “Probability will never fold in my
favor again, my friend,” and it made its way out of the dome.

Torpidly Adamarus made his way to the soundproof door, opened
it and stepped into the corridor. His heart was pounding and all he could do
was stare ahead blankly. Someone said something to him but it did not register.
His arm was grabbed – it was Leewood. “Are you all right?” Leewood asked again.

Adamarus pulled himself together. “Yes. Sorry.” Leewood
started walking down the corridor, pulling Adamarus along.

When they were out of voice range from the guards, Leewood
continued, “We’ll meet in the situation room. Woodworth is almost here;
Harrington is in route from the airport and President Wicker is standing by to
be teleconferenced in.” Adamarus nodded. Leewood went on, “For now I’ve decided
that we contain this information to just the five of us.”

They had reached the moving walkway to the ground level and
started trotting down it. “Good,” was all Adamarus said. He wiped his forehead.
Despite the air conditioning he had broken out in a sweat. His mind was racing,
“We’ll need to tie in the orbital tachyon scope.” He wiped his forehead again,
“And we need to have an operator up there with enough security clearance.”

The orbital tachyon scope had just come online. The Loud had
used tachyons to view the universe for thousands of years. Tachyons traveled
faster than light and therefore showed events involving large amounts of
matter/energy much sooner than waiting for light to reveal the event which,
depending on the distance, might take thousands of years or more. Tachyons
traversed the distance almost instantaneously. Leewood started to ask why they
would need the scope, but then changed his mind. “Jake Banner is in charge up
there. He’ll have to do. I’ve known him for a few years and I’m sure I can get
his clearance bumped up. Really no choice, he’s about the only person trained
on the thing.”

Leewood took out his communicator and started making the
arrangements as they pushed through the doors.

Outside, the sun had set and the day had started cooling down.

They quickly crossed the street to the entrance to the command
center that had been built over the last fourteen months. As they pushed
through the doors, Leewood put away his PDA and turned to Adamarus. “What else
did you find out?”

Adamarus looked over at him, and the look on Adamarus face
scared the hell out of Leewood. Adamarus looked forward again as they entered
the elevator that would take them down 200 feet. “Patrick,” he said
breathlessly, “believe it or not, it gets much worse.”

---

Woodworth was already there, and both Jake Banner at the
orbital tachyon station as well as President Wicker who was at the capitol were
already online and visible on two of the large screens. Technicians were still
setting up a direct feed to the orbital scope at the President’s end.

The door opened and Harrington entered. She had not had time
to clean up or change and was still in her climbing outfit covered with dirt.
With no apologies, she nodded to the others in the room and took a seat.

President Wicker was looking off screen. He nodded and looked
back, announcing that he now had a direct feed from the orbiting scope.

Leewood got things started, “Mr. President, with me are
Captain Maximus, Dr. Harrington and Professor Woodworth.” The President nodded
to each. Leewood continued, “Also joining us from orbit is Dr. Jake Banner who
is in charge of the new orbital tachyon scope – out of necessity, I have
increased his security clearance for this meeting.” Leewood paused a beat, then
continued, “As you know, about eighteen months ago, two of the three Loud ships
departed for their home planet to ratify the agreement and load goods for the
first exchange. They were not expected to return for about300 years, but as you
know, six days ago both ships returned and they returned with a third ship. As
you also know, whatever brought the Loud back was serious enough to cause every
Loud manning an avatar to stop what they were doing so quickly that their
avatars simply fell to the ground. Furthermore, after all four Loud ships had
grouped together in orbit, for five days the aliens have refused or been unable
to answer our attempts at communication. Then, suddenly today, at Bugs’
request, a face-to-face meeting in the listening chamber was held with Captain
Maximus– for whatever reason, Bugs did not use his avatar.” Leewood looked
around at the faces before him. “That meeting has just concluded. And we have
answers.” Leewood nodded to Adamarus, then took his seat.

For several seconds, Adamarus remained seated, looking down. Then
he seemed to gather himself and rose from his chair. “Mr. President,” he nodded
at President Wicker and then to the others present. At first Adamarus faltered
not knowing where to start, but then he took a deep breath and spoke. “I will just
try to repeat word for word what Bugs said. Bugs was very distressed…in fact,
he seemed to be barely functioning. He said…Adamarus, I have terrible news. Our
home system has been attacked by an alien race. It has been completely destroyed.”
Gasps of disbelief came from everyone. Adamarus continued, “He told me that,
except for the Loud aboard the four ships in this system, his race has been
rendered extinct. None survived the attack.”

Everyone was dumbfounded. Harrington uttered, “Oh, my God!” The
President’s face went white and his mouth dropped open. Leewood, already aware
of this, just stared down at the table. Woodworth, perhaps aided by an
historical perspective, simply looked at Adamarus with dread – he was the only
one to guess what the rest of the “bad” news might be.

The President looked up and said, “This is unbelievable. Did
the Loud…did Bugs say whether they knew who this alien race was?”

Adamarus ran his fingers through his hair. “My impression was,
yes, they knew who attacked them.”

The President shook his head, “And he…it…Bugs was certain
that there were no survivors?”

“Yes, Bugs was quite sure of this.”