Foothold, page 9
part #1 of Foothold Series
“Hey!”
John and Heidi looked at him.
“Thanks.”
The final 5-second pips were sounding. John and Heidi smiled, and then their smile was frozen in place for another forty years, as the final pip sounded.
“Now us?” Grace enquired.
“Soon. I’d like to top off the accumulators first.”
“Right. I guess we don’t want to push our luck after what we just went through.”
“Let’s go then.”
“Where?”
“Well, we do have a couple of hours to kill…”
“You are incorrigible,” Grace said, grinning.
“I try.”
Geneva, Earth
June 15, 2067
Edward Harper reviewed the report with interest. So, the Hope had encountered a navigation problem he mused. This was exactly the kind of information that he expected, and desired. He did not believe for a second that everything would go perfectly onboard Hope, and privately was ambivalent about their chances for success.
His starship, however, he fully intended to see make the journey safely to Tau Ceti, or somewhere else if Tau Ceti proved to be inhospitable to human life.
Which is why it was so important to monitor the results from the flight of the Hope. Let them make the mistakes first.
It was also why it was so important to delay construction of the Inspiration as much as he possibly could. The original plan was that the Inspiration would be completed and launched within 10 years of the Hope departing; it would not wait for the Hope to successfully establish a colony first.
This would not do for Edward. He had not told anyone, even Carla, but Edward intended to travel on the Inspiration himself, and there was no way he was going to launch himself into the void without knowing what was at the other end, if he could possibly avoid it.
It was also why he needed to renegotiate the deal for support of the project. If the project was to be postponed, then he needed access to a stasis chamber; he didn’t want to be old when it came time to depart.
Fortunately, these two goals were not mutually exclusive. All he had to do was apply the pressure at the correct places. And wait.
***
Konstantin Losev narrowed his eyes as he tried to comprehend what the Harper Industries representative was telling him.
“Are you telling me, that Harper Industries is prepared to pay Russia’s contribution to the project?” he asked incredulously. “All of it? 250 billion dollars? And Russia will still maintain rights to send two cosmonauts?”
“Yes, you understand correctly,” Claude Robard answered, with as sincere an expression as he could muster.
Losev, as head of the Russian Space Agency, was momentarily stunned. The amount of money required to build the Inspiration had inflated to a round trillion dollars in only three years; the fiscal drag on the Russian Space Agency had been crippling, forcing them to postpone or cancel most of their other programs.
“But why?”
“Harper Industries plays the long game.”
Claude was careful to maintain an open expression.
“We see a lot of potential in interstellar trade, but delays in the project will prevent us from realizing a return on our investment. We understand that some of the partners are finding the payment schedule challenging, and as we are able to assist, we feel that we should do our part to ensure the project proceeds in a timely fashion. However,” he added, “we also recognize the valuable contributions from each of the partners and do not wish to lose that. Therefore, in return for your support in certain endeavors, and access to the expertise of your staff, we would be prepared to guarantee Russia two cosmonaut slots.”
Losev glanced up momentarily and nodded. It was too good to be true, but already his mind was spending the money, provided he could hold on to it.
He squinted at Claude as though trying to spot the catch literally.
“What endeavors?”
Claude smiled. He could see he had Losev hooked. Now he just had to reel him in.
“As we know, development of starships takes a long time. Development of interstellar trade will take even longer, given the time that it takes to travel between the stars. In order to provide the continuity that will be required, Harper Industries intends to propose to the project group that stasis technology be made available for further development.”
Konstantin lowered his eyebrows as he regarded his guest. The program for interstellar travel had developed the stasis technology, but there had been an international ban on deploying it for any other purpose. The United Nations, generally toothless at any other time, had scored a rare victory, putting forth that the technology, if widespread, would be disastrous for the planet as it would tie up precious resources and cause the population, already barely under control, to explode. For the same reason, they had opposed the use of life-extension drugs. The current state-of-the-art could extend a human lifespan to over 150 years. This, of course, had led to an extensive black market for these very substances.
“You do understand the implications?”
Claude nodded.
“We do not propose widespread adoption. For the foreseeable future, we would develop a site on Earth that would allow us to further develop and refine the technology, and provide a service for those that are directly involved in interstellar travel and commerce. Combined with longevity treatments this should enable humans to spread subjective time over several thousand years, perhaps longer with further developments in the field.”
He smiled his sincerest simile.
“This would, of course, include those members of the Russian Space Agency that are involved in the project.”
He could see Losev’s expression change. The fish had taken the hook. Who didn’t want to live forever? Now, he just needed to close the deal.
“Harper Industries has a special projects team that has been studying the implications and implementation details of such a service. It would, of course, entail taking a fresh approach to how we manage relationships. Although we understand the concern the United Nations has with regard to allowing such continuity of lifespans, we foresee that the core group would need to have the ability to maintain key relationships during their extension program.”
Losev was hanging on his every word.
“We will need to extend the service to their families, as well.”
Losev tried very hard to keep his voice even.
“I am meeting with the Prime Minister and the President next week. I will commend your offer to them.”
Claude smiled broadly. Now for the Americans and the Europeans. They would be more difficult, but he could tell already he would not fail. He simply needed to find a way for them to justify accepting the offer.
Greenland, Earth
May 31, 2071
Footsteps echoed in the corridor as Edward Harper made his way to his personal stasis suite. He paused, three separate times, to pass security barriers, each one more stringent than the last. The stasis chambers were of immense value to Edward, but the one thing he found difficult was losing control. For the time he was in the chamber, he would not only lose control of Harper Industries, but control over his own life. The best he could do was apply stringent security precautions and build in as many fail-safes as he could.
He arrived at the chamber, which was located within a utilitarian room in the project facility, built into a hillside in southern Greenland.
Once he had obtained agreement from the project executive, Harper had forged ahead with plans to develop the facility. His team had already been working on the project for years; implementation had been rapid once approval had been given.
Edward had been very thorough, as he always was. On his payroll were specialists of all descriptions, including climate scientists. What he knew was that the coming climate change crisis was going to be much, much worse than most people were expecting. Already the signs were there, with sea levels rising dramatically and desertification in the Middle East, Southern Europe and the United States.
His people had pointed to Greenland as being one of the places that would be likely to prosper in the new world, and as luck would have it, new real estate was becoming available as the Greenland icecap melted and drained into the sea.
The Greenland government had been cautious at first, and then enthusiastic as Harper Philanthropic poured in billions of dollars of investment. The new fusion power plants had provided as much cheap energy as the country could use; a new town, rapidly becoming a city, sprung up to support the workers developing the technology park he’d established, partly as a front for the more controversial facility he was now standing in.
Edward always thought big, and the stasis facility was truly huge. It could cater for ten thousand people at once, a prescient precaution given how far the web of ‘family’ connections extended once the program was up and running.
He smiled. He simply did not care about the enormous cost. The partner nations in the starship program did not realize that he was paying for all of the Inspiration’s construction. They would be surprised if they did, and shocked if they knew that it didn’t drain the accounts of Harper Philanthropic. Edward’s empire was now truly massive, extending throughout the solar system in just about every industry. There was a veritable tsunami of money funneled into Harper Philanthropic that he was free to spend as he pleased.
His private stasis suite contained only two chambers. One awaited him; Carla already occupied the other. Edward smiled tenderly as he regarded her; vulnerable in a way she never was in life. She was the only person he cared about other than himself. She was the only person who came close to understanding who he was and what he needed. She, he would save from the coming crisis, and elevate to the status of a queen.
His partners and business associates would be truly shocked if they understood the scope of his ambitions, for he planned world domination.
Just not this world. Not at first, anyway.
Starship Hope, Interstellar Space
April 19, 2104
For the next 36 years the Hope streaked through interstellar space towards Tau Ceti, until finally the time arrived for the crew to be revived again. The ship’s computer had patiently watched over the ship during its journey, and although quite capable of piloting the ship itself, was instructed to revive the pilot and navigator at the next major milestone, which had now arrived.
The ship started to come to life once more. Lights came on to illuminate the dark rooms and corridors of the habitable areas of the ship, and the environmental systems worked to bring the temperature up to a comfortable level for humans. Finally, the two humans waiting in stasis chamber 3 were revived.
From the point of view of David and Grace, nothing seem to happen apart from the short unpleasantness of the stasis field cycling. David immediately relaxed - after their last revival experience, seeing that nothing had appeared to change was a good sign.
“Ship, status please,” he said, as he squeezed out of the chamber. There was no response. “Ship, report status,” he repeated. Again, there was no response.
“Relax,” Grace said as she retrieved their ship suits from the locker. “All it means is that everything’s fine. The ship’s just reverted to its normal interface mode.”
“Yes, you’re probably right,” David replied, calling up a status screen on the control console. “Everything looks fine.”
“Of course it is, we’re nearly there. All we need to do is spin the ship around and hit the brakes now.”
They made their way to the bridge and confirmed that indeed, everything was as expected.
Grace smiled. “You see? Nothing went wrong.”
David bit back the word ‘yet’, and instead returned her smile. There would be time to worry later.
“Well, cap’n, what’re your orders?”
“Standard process, commander. Let’s take some sightings for the next few days, turn the ship around and start our deceleration burn. Then we’ll check the ship thoroughly and go back into stasis.”
“Aye aye, sir,” Grace said, continuing her mock navy routine. “I’m on it!”
They had a mountain of messages and news from home. By this time, Earth knew of their crisis with the fusion reactor and how they had survived it. Their analysis of the problem had been confirmed and their slower mission profile approved. There was also a long list of requests from mission specialists and scientists excited by the prospect of a mission that would now survey two worlds instead of one.
Personal news was mixed. David’s father had died at age 93, which was considered young by modern standards. Vasily and Joyce had added to their family and now had a son named David. Both their children were adults now of course, and had their own lives and careers. Grace had opted to become a flight engineer and was working on the Mars shuttle run. David had opted for spaceship construction and was due to graduate soon.
Will have graduated, thought David. Their most recent messages were 10 years old.
General news from Earth was mixed. It was clear that the Earth they had known had changed, and not for the better. Population growth was a problem again with lifespans still increasing. Climate changes were starting to hit home, with sea level rises meaning retreat from the coastlines. At the same time, desert areas were increasing around the equatorial regions as rainfall patterns changed. There had been small wars breaking out in the Middle East, Africa and South America, usually over migration and water.
David sighed. It was not easy news to hear.
The final piece of unwanted news was that the Inspiration project had stalled again. It was the same familiar story as had happened with the Hope - shifting politics meant a stop-start approach to the project. The most recently reported stoppage was due to the deteriorating situation on Earth - there was little political will for building expensive starships that would yield no political gain within the lifetime of their sponsor.
“It’s starting to look as if we really will be on our own,” Grace commented. “It’s been,” she paused to do the math in her head, “23 years after we left, for them, when they sent that message. It’s taking even longer than the Hope took to build. I wonder how likely it is that they’ll ever finish it?”
David shrugged.
“I’m really sorry about your father,” she added, giving David a hug.
He regarded her with a sad but resigned expression. “I guess we both knew this would happen - that we would outlive our family and our friends. It doesn’t make it any easier though. Hell, our messages that we send back now might not even get there while our remaining parents are still alive.”
Grace just held him close, it was difficult to know what to say to that.
***
After three days of course checks and preparation, they were ready to begin the deceleration burn.
“Pitching over,” David said. He initiated the sequence that would flip the Hope end over end so that the drive thrusters were pointing at Tau Ceti.
“Acknowledged,” replied Grace as she eyed the navigation screen.
There was the faintest of vibrations as the maneuvering thrusters fired and the ship’s spin slowed and it pitched over. Twenty minutes later, they fired again to settle the ship into its new orientation and restore their artificial gravity.
“Starting pre-burn test sequence,” David announced. The ship’s main drives hadn’t done anything for nearly forty years, so a cautious approach was being taken to bringing them back to life. The first part of the test sequence involved flushing propellant through the fuel lines and out of the thrust tubes using only the fuel pumps, to make sure there were no blockages. David switched to a camera view showing the thrust tube outlets. It showed a fine spray of ice crystals fanning out from each of the tubes.
“Looking good. Initiating phase 2.”
The drive accelerators now came online and start to eject propellant at a low thrust level. The spray of crystals disappeared as the propellant started to be accelerated past the range of the camera, before the cold of space could turn the liquid to solid.
He turned to Grace and smiled. “We’re back in business. We’ll leave it like this for the next day to be sure, then ramp up the power levels. How’s our course looking?”
“Course is nominal. We’ll give it a couple more days to be sure, then we can lock it down.”
Neither made any comment about their luck having changed for the better. No sense in tempting fate again.
The next day their remaining reactor was brought up to its “cruising” power level of 80%, and thrust increased to 40%. There was once again the faint but reassuring background hum of the drives operating, and they could feel a slight sideways pull from the drive acceleration.
Three days later and several minor orientation changes to fine-tune their heading, and they were ready to go back into stasis.
“After this we’ll be there,” Grace said. “It’s hard to believe, it feels like we ought to come out of stasis feeling sleepy or something. This ‘one second we’re here and the next second we’re there’ is disconcerting.”
David held her tight in the stasis chamber as the countdown pips sounded. “It suits impatient people like me.”
Starship Inspiration, Low Earth Orbit
September 5, 2080
Outwardly, the Inspiration looked almost complete; and after nearly twenty years, it damn well ought to be, Clayton Manning thought irritably. The American was part of a 4-person inspection team, one from each of the project partners.
“I don’t really understand why this ship is still here. Why isn’t it on the way to Tau Ceti already?”
“Technology upgrades, apparently,” Heinrich Kassmeyer replied, as he drifted lazily in the corridor just outside the bridge. “There has apparently been some breakthrough in stasis technology that they want to install.”
He meant Harper Industries, who were working on stripping the bulky stasis chambers from the Inspiration in readiness for installing replacements.
