Part one of a story by Matthew Payne
Ruxto leaned back in his seat and looked at the report he just wrote. It was a summary of the last seeded-planet they had visited. It had been a disappointing planet. The robot-seed had crash-landed almost a thousand years ago, and all Ruxto found were the ruined remains of the original factory-ship. That meant that the whole solar system was empty of robot-life, since the seed-robots were programmed to send only one seed to any individual solar system.
The chair Ruxto sat in was white plastic, stuffed with duck-down. It could fold into a comfortable single-bed. To the left of his face a window looked out to the stars. The software attached to his brain recognized constellations and told him what they were. In order to take this job he had been required to accept several implants. He needed lung implants, with a compressed-air compartment. He had his bones strengthened and many of his muscles replaced with synthetic contracting-sinew. He replaced the sword from his home with a laser-pistol and a knife. His debilitating visions of a strange world had been replaced with soothing dreams at night. He still had his different coloured eyes – one solid red with a black pupil, the other solid blue.
Granger came in through the liquid door. Granger was very thin and tall. He was a clone, engineered for space-travel. He had a piece of paper in his hand and a smile stretched across his face.
“There’s a robot-seed on Pledvi-L-5.”
Ruxto said, “how? The Pledvi seed died on impact on Pledvi-L-2.”
Granger said, “it’s not from the Pledvi seed! It’s from the Omni seed, and it’s only four-hundred years old!”
Ruxto put down his report. “That’s interesting. It seems like the Omni-seed made it to the Omni-system, then set up a factory and sent more seeds out. One of those seeds must have made it here.”
Granger nodded, and his long neck swung his head far back and forth.
“So it’s OK that we haven’t found a good planet yet. At least one seed has made it to the factory-stage: the Omni-seed. And it’s seeding other planets. I’m completely reassured right now. We will eventually find a planet that has been terraformed or bio-domed. Maybe it will be Pledvi-L-5.”
“Are we moving to the planet yet?”
Granger said, “we’re about to change direction. The Galaxers will be happy we found this. I wonder what we’ll find. Nobody’s found a second-generation seed except the corporations, and they don’t share their information.”
Ruxto said, “they don’t share their information, but it’s pretty common-knowledge that they’ve found dangerous robots. That’s almost what I’m hoping for here. Something to fight.”
He wasn’t lying. He had lived his life as a killer in two different worlds, but now he was living an easy life and doing a tedious job, flying through empty space and making reports about non-events and empty planets. But his personal mission was important enough that he was willing to endure long times of quiet. He used it to read, meditate and practice weaponry and martial arts. He had peace of mind, and there was always paperwork to do and reports to write. Any info or observations from the frontiers of human-space were of great use to the people back in the Earth solar system.
“We don’t know what to expect,” Granger said. “The planet is sending out the safe-seeded signal, but it’s sending out other signals too. We don’t understand them all.”
“Well I’ll go down by myself then,” Ruxto said. “Just in case the robots have become dangerous.” That was his job. He was hired as security.
Granger said, “we can all go down in an energy bubble. I haven’t even stepped foot on any of the planets or moons we visited yet, and this one holds the most promise. I want to see it first hand.”
In the cockpit, Ruxto stood beside Granger. They looked towards the planet they wanted to land on. It was massive on their screen, magnified by a computer. They were still hours away. The planet was yellow and black, sand and rocks.
Granger said, “the beacon says they have several bio-domes with vegetation and the whole planet has breathable air because of massive machines. I hope it’s true! Can you imagine?”
Ruxto was curious, wondering what it was like inside the bio-domes.
He said, “It would be nice to stay there and enjoy the planet. We weren’t paid for that though. We have to label it on the map, hospitable or inhospitable. Then move on to the next solar system.”
There was a long panel of lights and buttons beneath the screen. This was how Granger piloted the shuttle.
“I still can’t understand the other signals coming from the planet.”
Ruxto said, “what kind of signals?”
“Bursts of radiation.”
Ruxto Chexter was studying an encyclopedia, displayed on the back of black sunglasses as he sat in his white chair. He looked up the Omni-seed and found that a non-profit technology-group had designed it and thousands of identical seeds that went out in a massive wave three-thousand years ago. They were built to experiment with terraforming methods, to adapt to unexpected alien landscapes. When they got to the point of producing new seeds to send out into space, the Omni-seed and its identical brothers were programmed to experiment with new types of seeds. The new seeds would be built based on the Omni-seed’s observations of the surrounding planetary environment. Ruxto wondered what kinds of improvisation the Omni-seed might have employed in sending a new seed here to a different solar system. The encyclopedia said that the destination solar system for the Omni-seed was seventy light years away, four solar systems away. Ruxto thought about how far the seed had traveled, and how fast it had to move. The Omni-seed must have been experimenting with types of transportation too. This one must have moved fast. Ruxto wanted to see the planet where the original Omni-seed had landed. He wondered what that alien-colony would look like. Did it terraform, or build a biodome? What had this new seed, this child of the Omni-seed, built within its biodomes in this solar system?
Melinda entered through the liquid door. She was pretty, with serene green eyes and short black hair. She was the third member of the three-member crew. She leaned against the wall in her tight white two-piece suit.
She said, “maybe we can just live in one of the biodomes down on Pledvi-L-5. Exotic trees and fruits, self-cleaning ponds, servant-robots.”
Ruxto switched off the encyclopedia in his glasses and said, “I want to see other planets, and other robots. We don’t even know if this planet is safe yet.”
Melinda shifted and leaned on her left arm instead of her right. She was smiling at Ruxto, then looked out the window as she talked to him.
“If we crash land somewhere,” she said, “I’m supposed to repopulate any seeded planet with Granger. It’s in my contract.”
Ruxto said, “You’ll be the mother of all the human life on one planet.”
Melinda said, “can you keep a secret? If we crash land I’m coming to find you first.”
Ruxto said, “I’d be a bad father. It will be a long time before I settle down. It would be nice to have a kid though. To train it.”
“Train it?” Then she changed the subject: “what’s with your eyes? You’re obviously a clone, but why are your eyes a different color?”
Ruxto said, “I’ve been told that it’s the trademark of the man who made me. One red eye, one blue eye in all his creatures.”
“Creatures?” Melinda had her arms crossed and looked down at him incredulously. “He doesn’t just make humans?”
Ruxto wondered how much to tell her. “He makes whatever he can. Well, that’s what I’ve heard. I never met him, though I hope I will eventually.”
Melinda looked confused. “You were cloned, but not by a corporation? That’s illegal, isn’t it? They wouldn’t let you in to the Galaxers if you were an illegal clone.”
Ruxto said, “I’m not in the Galaxers, remember? I’m a mercenary, here to protect you and Granger. But I was cloned somewhere else… not really cloned though. Or maybe cloned… I don’t know.”
Melinda said, “somewhere else? Do you mean Mars?” She spoke cautiously, not understanding but not wanting to offend him. “The clone-laws are still enforced on Mars.”
Ruxto said, “Have you ever heard of Jimmothy Knack?”
“Yeah, he used math equations to convince some scientists that he was from another universe, right?”
Ruxto said, “yes. Do you believe him?”
Melinda shook her head. “Why would I believe that? Do you believe him?” She seemed amused.
Ruxto looked out the window. “I believe him.”
Melinda laughed. “Why did you ask me about Jimmothy Knack?”
“Don’t you have experiments to do?”
“I’m nervous about that planet,” she said. “Nervous and excited. I hope it’s inhabitable.”
The shuttle shook back and forth unexpectedly, knocking Melinda to the ground. Ruxto was thrown up in the air and then back down hard onto the soft chair. From the window was a strong purple glow which Ruxto couldn’t explain. There were no stars. The shuttle kept shaking.
Melinda was on the ground on all fours, looking up at Ruxto. She didn’t scream. She said, “what’s going on?”
Ruxto looked down through his black glasses. “I don’t know.” He smiled. “Maybe this is our emergency.”
She said, “that’s not even funny. Where’s Granger?”
Ruxto tried to stand but got thrown back into his seat by the shuttle’s turbulence. “He’s probably trying to pilot the shuttle.”
The lights went out completely and the turbulence stopped. Ruxto felt weightlessness.
He heard Melinda say, “I’m not on the ground… I can’t touch the ground.”
He felt like he was falling, and the shuttle was falling too. He floated up by the window, where the purple glow persisted. Looking at an angle, he could see the desert-planet through the purple glow. They were close to the planet, rushing towards it very fast. They were about to die, smashed on the planet. They all had brain-image storage, but there was nowhere here to upload their brains to after the shuttle was smashed. Ruxto was very surprised. He thought he had good reasons to believe that he would live long enough to meet his father. He thought he would still live for thousands of years. But he saw the ground getting closer and closer.
Melinda said, “Ruxto! What do we do?”
Ruxto pushed away from the window and found her.
“Here,” he said. “Hold my hand until the lights come back on.”
