2010: The Year We Make Contact
Author's Notes:
This one, a prose adaptation, is a blend of the novel and the movie. As is my habit with prose adaptations, it expands on the dialogue, which is more or less identical to the movie version - but more grammatically correct. Despite popular opinion to the contrary, 'data' is a plural noun, not a singular one; the singular form is 'datum', and is used correctly here.
I'm a pedant, I know. Sue me already. 😋
The AE35 unit is a component of the antenna assembly; the assembly is not the AE35. Peter Hyams slipped up there. I've corrected this herein.
Plus the 'dark side' is a scientific fallacy; there's no such thing. It should be the 'far side', as it is here. Same thing as with the Moon.
I've corrected the timescale a bit. The Monolith was discovered on the Moon in 1999; 18 months later, in 2001, Discovery reached Jupiter. 8 years later, Leonov launched and took over a year to get there in 2010. I've also expanded the mission background for clarity (BTW, Jupiter has four major inner moons, but the movie doesn't make this clear, implying that there are only two).
One bit of movie-based scientific inaccuracy I felt I should correct: Leonov does not have a siren in the airlock to indicate decompression danger because once the airlock's depressurised, no-one could hear it in the vacuum.
In this slightly parallel continuum, Floyd did not make that pre-recorded briefing - he knew nothing of the NSC's policy. Another slip made by Hyams in one way and Clarke in another; HAL was not the only entity who knew about T.M.A.-1 - the survey team knew as well.
In this tale, as in the movie, Caroline does wait; she and Floyd have a joyful reunion, with Christopher. Heywood Floyd suffered enough in 2001 and 2010, and he damn well deserves a happy ending. So does Caroline, and so especially does Chris, in all his childish innocence.
Finally, vessels, whether on the ocean, in the air or in space, are always referred to as 'she', not 'it'. For the sake of accuracy Milson uses 'it' here, but he's no astronaut. Chandra is, and so he correctly uses 'she' in speaking with HAL.
My fickle bitch of a muse is still not helping me with my other fics. I must get that metaphorical whip replaced. Y'know, I swear the bitch likes it…
MISSION BACKGROUND:
YEAR: 1999. LOCATION: THE MOON, SEA OF TRANQUILLITY.
A BLACK, RECTANGULAR OBJECT FOUND BY AMERICAN EXPEDITION.
COMPOSITION...UNKNOWN.
ORIGIN...UNKNOWN.
GIVEN NAME...TYCHO MONOLITH (ALSO CALLED T.M.A.-1, TYCHO MAGNETIC ANOMALY 1).
SIGNAL SENT FROM MONOLITH, DETECTED BY DEEP SPACE MONITOR 79, ORBITER M15 (IN ORBIT OF MARS), HIGH INCLINATION PROBE 21 (ABOVE PLANE OF ECLIPTIC) AND ARTIFICIAL COMET 5, OUT BEYOND PLUTO.
RADIATION FORECASTER AT GODDARD COMPUTED TRACK OF SIGNAL. COMPUTER CONFIRMED SIGNAL WAS DIRECTED TOWARDS JUPITER.
REASON...UNKNOWN. SIGNAL THEORISED AS ANNOUNCEMENT OF OBJECT'S DISCOVERY.
RECIPIENT OF SIGNAL...UNKNOWN.
REACTION TO SIGNAL...UNKNOWN.
YEAR: 2001.
LOCATION: VICINITY OF JUPITER.
SPACECRAFT: U.S.S. DISCOVERY.
FLIGHT CREW:
COMMANDER - DAVID BOWMAN.
CO-PILOT - FRANK POOLE.
SCIENTIFIC CREW OF THREE IN DEEP HIBERNATION TO BE AWAKENED WHEN DISCOVERY REACHES JUPITER.
LOGIC CIRCUIT: HAL 9000.
MISSION STATUS:
AS DISCOVERY APROACHED TWO OF JUPITER'S MAJOR INNER MOONS...EUROPA AND IO...HAL 9000 COMPUTER MALFUNCTIONED.
SCIENTIFIC CREW KILLED WHILE IN HIBERNATION WHEN LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEMS WERE SHUT OFF BY HAL 9000.
CO-PILOT FRANK POOLE KILLED BY HAL 9000 WHILE OUTSIDE THE SPACECRAFT.
COMMANDER DAVID BOWMAN DISCONNECTED LOGIC CIRCUITS OF HAL 9000, DISABLING IT AND PLACING DISCOVERY UNDER MANUAL CONTROL, ADVISED BY HOUSTON MISSION CONTROL.
COMMANDER DAVID BOWMAN ENCOUNTERED OBJECT BETWEEN JUPITER AND IO. THE OBJECT IDENTICAL TO MONOLITH FOUND ON THE MOON...EXCEPT IN SIZE.
MONOLITH NEAR JUPITER IS TWO KILOMETRES LONG.
COMMANDER BOWMAN LEFT DISCOVERY TO INVESTIGATE. LAST TRANSMISSION FROM COMMANDER BOWMAN:
"MY GOD! IT'S FULL OF STARS!"
MISSION ANALYSIS:
REASON FOR MALFUNCTION OF HAL 9000…
UNKNOWN.
MEANING OF LAST BOWMAN TRANSMISSION…
UNKNOWN.
LOCATION OF BOWMAN…
UNKNOWN (PRESUMED DEAD).
COMPOSITION OF SECOND MONOLITH...UNKNOWN.
POSITION OF SECOND MONOLITH…
LAGRANGE POINT 5 BETWEEN JUPITER AND IO.
POSITION OF U.S.S. DISCOVERY...ORBIT AROUND IO.
CONDITION OF U.S.S. DISCOVERY...UNKNOWN.
END MISSION REPORT
FILED BY:
HEYWOOD FLOYD...CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL COUNCIL OF ASTRONAUTICS
DECEMBER 9, 2001.
And for nearly eight years, the mystery surrounding the fate of X-Ray Delta 1, Discovery, remained uninvestigated. Speculation was rife, but fruitless - there was nowhere near enough information even to speculate about what had happened. The families of the victims were left to grieve, without even a hint of closure. Dr. Floyd was forced out of office by the perceived mission failure; Victor Milson succeeded him, reluctantly.
Time passed.
And then a new day dawned...
The Very Large Array, New Mexico
Sunday May 17th, 2009
The voice was entirely unfamiliar, but sounded jocular. It was a little incongruous, and sounded nothing like his students or staff.
For a start, it was Russian.
Given the current furore in Central America, it was unlikely at best; none of the people he knew were from Russia. So it was a mystery as to who was calling merrily: "Neatness. It's a good quality. You'll make someone a fine wife!"
Dr. Heywood Floyd, ex-officio Chairman of the National Council of Astronautics until the ignominious (and in certain ways top-secret) mission to Jupiter, paused in his cleaning of the radio telescope and looked to see the caller. He was both unprepossessing and jovial, yet he had an air of keen competence. He inquired, knowing the answer (Floyd intuited), "You are Dr. Heywood Floyd?"
"Yeah," Floyd answered, brusque. "Who the hell are you?"
The man seemed amused by his reply. "Dimitri Moisevitch. I'm here to talk about your problem."
Floyd moved to a different area. Maintenance suffered occasionally at the VLA, and AI couldn't do everything (though his more enthusiastic nerd students protested otherwise). "Really? What problem's that?"
"You were Chairman of the National Council on Astronautics. Now you are a schoolteacher. This was by your own choice?"
"Chancellor of the University of Hawaii," Floyd corrected. "It pays better. What do you care?" he added cynically.
Then Moisevitch reminded him of things he'd rather forget. "You were responsible for the Discovery mission. It was a failure. Someone had to be blamed, so it was you. You like being a teacher?"
"I don't think I like you," Floyd retorted, not liking the way the conversation was going at all. Yes, Discovery was a failure, the biggest and worst NASA had known since Columbia. Yes, the powers that be, whoever the fuck they were, had needed a scapegoat. And yes, he'd been a convenient one, until he'd sidestepped the whole fiasco by resigning and taking up with the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology. A better, quieter deal...where no-one really knew him.
But did Moisevitch have to bring that up now?
The man only chuckled. "I just read your final report on what happened to Discovery. You left a good number of loose edges -"
"Ends," Floyd, a purist and stickler for accuracy, couldn't help pointing out.
"Ah! Loose ends, yes, thank you," Moisevitch accepted, "my English idioms trip me down sometimes."
"They trip you up."
"Ah, yes. Case in point," he chuckled.
Damn if Floyd wasn't getting to like the guy, Russian or not.
"A good number of questions have remained unanswered," Moisevitch concluded.
That was true, Floyd knew. The mission and its failure had indeed raised questions. How and why had HAL failed so badly? What had gone wrong? What was that damn Monolith doing hanging there at the L5 point between Jupiter and Io? Why there?
Above all, what the hell happened to Dave Bowman?
A thought struck Floyd. "You just read that report? Took you this long to steal our secrets?"
It was an implied slight to the KGB or whoever, but Moisevitch took it in his stride. "How long does it take for your people to steal ours?"
Touché. "Same amount of time," Floyd conceded wryly.
Moisevitch looked a little out of breath, confirming Floyd's guess that the guy wasn't doing too well. "Air is thin up here. Is wery bad for my asthma. You think you could meet me halfway?"
"Maybe," Floyd answered. He had a feeling Moisevitch was talking about more than just his asthma.
He was right.
"It doesn't take...a very smart man…" Moisevitch panted slightly, "to appreciate the risk that I am taking by being here with you, Dr. Floyd. And you are a smart man." So much Moisevitch had already intuited; he knew people. "This is a wery bad business in Central America. Wery bad. Ships, aeroplanes, buzzing around each other like angry hornets...wery bad."
"We didn't start it," Floyd objected.
"Come now, Dr. Floyd," Moisevitch chided good-naturedly. "We are scientists, you and I. Our governments are enemies. We're not. It matters not who started it. Not to us."
That, Floyd admitted, was a very good point. Science should always rise above politics, he thought. The realist in him protested, Yeah, but it doesn't always, Floyd, that's why you're here at the VLA wiping down a telescope, but the principle was sound. For his part, Floyd was both mildly flattered and a little more intrigued. What was the guy up to? He decided to call the bluff, if bluff it was. "Why don't you just try saying what's on your mind?"
I will, Moisevitch thought. "I want to play a game with you, Dr. Floyd."
"I don't have any time for games."
"This is a good game, it's called The Truth. For two minutes, I will tell only the truth - and so will you."
You're on, Ivan - no, Dimitri, that was it. "Two minutes?"
"Two minutes." Opening offer.
"Make it a minute and a half." Counteroffer.
"One minute and three quarters." Final offer.
He took it. He faced Moisevitch at the top of the short staircase he was on. "You start."
"We know that you are building the Discovery II, to go back to Jupiter to find out what happened to your men up there," Moisevitch began. "Also to investigate the large monolith. You know that we are building the Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov, to also go up there."
"I thought you were gonna call her the Titov," Floyd objected mildly.
"Ah, we changed last month," Moisevitch dismissed it, "people fall out of favour. But the Leonov will reach Discovery almost a year before your people are ready. My government feels it's wery important that we should get there first. It's a distinction that will look splendid on the front page of Pravda. What other value it has, I don't know," he admitted.
"One minute ten. Why are you telling me this?"
"Because there are things we need to know," Moisevitch entreated, "otherwise the same thing that you let happen to your people up there could happen to ours, and we would accomplish nothing. I have about one minute left?"
"About," Floyd agreed.
"The small monolith your people brought back from the Moon - your government has been wery selfish and stupid in keeping it to yourselves. You never let us examine it. What have you found out about it?"
"Nothing," Floyd confessed, though he was sure Moisevitch already knew that. "Wouldn't have helped if we had - it's impenetrable. We tried lasers, nuclear detonators, nothing worked." He shrugged. "One guy, a little out-there, suggested a peaceful alternative. He just talked to it. Worth a try, we figured, but...nothing. Didn't respond. Not detectably, anyway. Forty-five seconds."
"The monolith near Jupiter, it is the same?"
"As far as we can tell...except it's even larger."
"Mmm. And the computer aboard the Discovery, the HAL 9000 - can it be reactiwated?"
"Yes," Floyd nodded.
"By us?"
"By you?" That was a radical notion, but it didn't require much thought. Russian IT wasn't up to 2010 or even 2001 standards yet. Floyd gave him the facts. "It would take you three to four months. You're not familiar with the system. And longer than that to decode the data."
"I thought so," Moisevitch murmured.
"Thirty seconds," Floyd said, reminding him of the deadline. But what Moisevitch said next knocked it into a cocked hat.
"Here we have our quandary: we are going to get there first...yet you have the knowledge to make the trip work."
Few things could have been better calculated to render Floyd speechless.
The Russians were gonna go anyway. But they knew the odds against success.
But if those odds could be reduced, with skilled and knowledgeable help...
Moisevitch looked almost innocent as he asked blithely, "How much more time do I have?"
With that, Floyd was onboard; he headed down the stairs. "You just got yourself an extension," he replied.
The Russian chuckled. "I knew it. You are a smart man, and a reasonable one. I knew it."
Floyd was much more serious now. "How could you convince your people to allow Americans to go on the flight?" For that was what Moisevitch was subtly proposing, he knew.
"It won't be easy," he admitted. There was the understatement of the decade - international relations between the USSR and the USA were worse than they'd been in years (Author's Note: this was written long before 1991 and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Go with it). Nuclear war was a definite possibility. Now to suggest that CCCP and NASA cooperate for the first time since the Soyuz-Skylab mission of 1973…
"However," he said more brightly, "I'm pretty good. How does this sound? A Russian craft, flown by Russians, carrying a few poor Americans who need our help," he finished with a condescending air Floyd knew damn well he was affecting just to make a point. "That also doesn't look too bad on the front page of Pravda."
No, it won't, Floyd thought. Hell, it'd be a major diplomatic coup. But the science, and the mystery, overrode that. They simply had to know.
But then again…
"I don't know if I could convince our people," Floyd admitted, ever the realist. "Given the current political situation and the way everything's going to hell, they wouldn't mind seeing you go up and fail, they wouldn't mind that at all! But carrying Americans? I don't think they would allow that if they didn't have to." A new thought struck him. There was no urgency about this; Discovery had assumed a stable orbit. So..."What am I saying? They don't have to."
But they did, Moisevitch knew; there was one more piece to the puzzle which Dr. Floyd, he knew, did not yet possess. "Have you checked Discovery's orbit lately?"
"What?" Floyd puzzled.
"Have you checked the orbit?" Moisevitch repeated, emphasising the last word.
Floyd started to head down. "What about it?"
"Now it's getting chilly here. This is wery bad for my asthma." He started to leave.
"You know damn well we've been checking it!" One of the VLA telescopes was locked onto Discovery, though Floyd was damned if he could remember which one. It had never seemed an urgent problem...until now.
"I have enjoyed our little chat," Moisevitch told him warmly, starting down his own ladder and reaching the ground.
"Hey!" Floyd protested. "What is it you're not telling me?"
Moisevitch looked back briefly. "You are a smart man, Dr. Floyd. You will know what to do. Das vidanya, tovarishch," he finished, leaving Floyd mystified. Well, what the hell do I do now, he wondered. Then the answer came to him.
Pete V. Domenici Science Operations Center
New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, Socorro, New Mexico
Shortly after
More businesslike than he'd been since - all right, since 2001 - Floyd made his way to the Data Room. He asked a young and (happily married though he was to a woman only about eight years older than the girl was, he was still just a man and couldn't help but notice) very pretty grad student, "One of these telescopes is pointed at Discovery -"
"6-A, at the far end, Doctor," the student smiled. For an older guy he was very handsome, if a bit careworn.
He politely thanked her, made his way to 6-A's terminal and started typing at an atypically fast rate. The screen soon displayed Discovery's exact position.
A position which he knew was wrong...by the theory.
That could only mean something was going on. Something they hadn't accounted for.
Something wonderful.
He began chuckling as he took in the data.
Discovery was nowhere near where she should be. The orbit had been precisely calculated - ironically, by HAL - nearly two years before the launch. HAL had been told to ensure the orbit would be stable enough for Discovery II to rendezvous five or more years in the future, and true to his programming he had done just that.
She should be a lot higher relative to Io, i.e. way more distant. But she wasn't.
Rapid checks backdated the phenomenon; the orbit had indeed stayed stable for a couple of years, after which everyone had understandably lost interest. Discovery wasn't going anywhere, so there was no rush.
Except now she was going somewhere. His review of the data showed she had accelerated, apparently stopped and once or twice had actually moved backwards, in complete defiance of common sense. One datum, however, was abundantly clear.
There was a net vector...towards Io.
And it was increasing.
The hell there was no rush. Unless they got their asses in gear, she was going to crash in two years or so...long before the recovery ship (the NCA had always carefully avoided saying 'rescue') could get there.
He logged out and left. He had a jet to catch.
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington D.C.
The next day
"You've double-checked this? Please say you haven't," Victor Milson, the current NCA Chairman, requested of Floyd as they sat together on the park bench outside the fence of the White House. There was an old man there feeding the pigeons. (Author's Note: spot the cameo! Hi, Arthur!) He waited for what seemed to be a decent interval, then said ominously, "You aren't saying anything, Floyd."
Floyd riffled the papers he was holding, hard copy of the VLA data. "Something incredible is happening up there. Discovery's being pulled towards Io. Or pushed away from Jupiter, whichever. Sometimes it seems to be accelerating, other times it just seems to stop and sometimes it even goes backwards."
"But there's a net effect? Towards Io?"
"Yeah. Never seen anything like it."
Milson perused his copy of the data, and asked, "How long before it impacts on Io?"
She, Floyd didn't bother correcting, ships are always 'she', whether on the ocean, in the air or in space. "Two, two and a half years - long before we can be ready. Even the Russians are gonna be bustin' their asses to get there in time. This Leonov better be somethin' special, or we'll - they'll - be too late."
"How could we be so Goddamn wrong about the orbit?" Milson cursed.
"Because we weren't wrong," Floyd objected.
"Well, if we weren't wrong, well, then, terrific. Why in the hell is it gonna crash?!"
"I don't know! It's bizarre!" Floyd replied. A thought struck him. "Unless it's got something to do with that Monolith up there."
The Monolith. One of the two biggest unanswered questions ('bigger' in every sense - damn thing was 2 kilometres long). It was and always had been a bone of contention, for it and its smaller cousin were the answer to the age-old question: Are we alone in the Universe?
They knew now that the answer was definitely No.
But Milson had more immediate and, politically, more urgent concerns, and he voiced them. "Do you see that building behind us?" he inquired, indicating the White House. "I'm supposed to go in and have lunch in half an hour. 'Course, there's one good thing about a reactionary President," he tried to joke, "he's not into health foods. The last one - we didn't lunch, we grazed. Wanna know what lunch is about? I'll tell you.
"We've got two more aircraft carriers off the coast of Honduras. The Russians are moving in some of their big stuff. Now you got the Joint Chiefs screamin' about Russian satellites with antimissile lasers on 'em, so we gotta send up our laser satellites to counteract theirs. So the President has come to the conclusion that the NCA should be placed under the jurisdiction of the Defense Department. Enough with the crazy scientists spendin' all this money tryin' to talk to Martians.
"So," he went on, "here we are, on your actual brink. My agency's gonna become a part of the military, I got a President with his finger poised on the button, and you want me to walk across the park and tell him we wanna hitch a ride with the very same Russians we may be plannin' to blow off the face of the Earth. Have I missed anything?"
Halfway amused, though the situation was anything but funny, Floyd answered, "That's about it."
"I didn't want your job, you know," Milson groused, "I'm not the one that forced you out, I didn't blame the whole thing on you, so if this is your plan to try to get me killed," he tried to laugh, "you got the wrong guy." Floyd stayed silent. Then Milson realised something. "You haven't heard a damn word I've said, have you?"
Indeed, Floyd had not. In his considered opinion there were far more important questions waiting for them at Jupiter, and if they didn't get there pretty damn pronto they would lose the chance to answer them. "Three men. I tell you, we need three men."
"The Russians must be laughin' their asses off," Milson cursed, but he knew there was no choice but to deal with this.
"Curnow, for a start," Floyd pronounced. "He's building Discovery II right now. He knows more about the original than anyone. He's the only one who can start Discovery in the short time we've got."
"Who the hell are 'we', Floyd? Unless...damn, I suppose you wanna go! How the hell am I gonna sell it?!"
"The Russians are gonna go aboard Discovery with or without us," Floyd pointed out. "Ask him if he wants them to have all the answers."
Despite himself, Milson was impressed. "Not bad," he applauded.
But now Floyd's expression became haunted, yet resolute. "There's a more personal reason, Victor. We lost some good men up there. Volunteers or not, I sent them. I want to face their families to tell them what happened, give them closure. If one of the lost astronauts had been my son, that's what I'd want. Plus with everything going on in Central America, we need an independent American observer along, one who's experienced with politics and informed as to the situation. That's me. So I have to go."
Milson was against it on principle, but he knew Floyd was implacable. So he accepted this and asked, "Who's the third?"
"Another obvious one: Chandra. He designed HAL, programmed him - raised him, I guess. So he can reactivate him."
"I think he is HAL," Milson warned.
"I know," Floyd admitted, well aware of the risks.
"Yeah, but can you trust him?"
"No," Floyd replied, almost too quickly, "but I have to. We have to know why HAL malfunctioned - it could have a bearing on future missions."
"If there are any," Milson growled, thinking of the President and a Big Red Button that sure as hell had nothing to do with Firefly.
"There is that," Floyd conceded.
"I got an idea." Businesslike, Milson fastened the attaché case. "You go tell the President - I'll go on the mission!"
Floyd spread his hands. "You're the NCA Chairman!"
"That's right, I am," Milson groused.
To placate him, Floyd said, "Look...tell him we're screwed if we don't go. For all we know, it might even be the truth - who knows what they'll learn up there? Tell him...if we do go...we'll lie! Give the Russians false information! Tell him that, he'll love that!"
Thoughtfully Milson nodded. "He might."
Two hours or so later he met Floyd and grinned. "He did."
Floyd nodded in satisfaction. The wheels were in motion. Time to make it happen.
And then…
Caroline.
She, he knew, would be the hard part.
The University Of Urbana, Illinois
Main Computer Room
A day later
A nondescript figure completed the tedious but necessary palm print security procedure to enter a very special room. The scanner identified him as 'Chandra, R.', cleared him and unlocked the door, and he entered. He typed rapidly on a keyboard and said, "Good afternoon, SAL. Do you have anything for me?"
He was addressing the world's most complex synthesised personality (he despised the term 'AI', preferring correctness - plus he was familiar with the Pratchett quote 'real stupidity beats artificial intelligence every time', and he was determined not to fall prey to it): HAL's successor, SAL. In a fit of pure whimsy he had given it - her - a pleasant Indian accent. It - she - responded, "No, Dr. Chandra. Do you have anything for me?"
"As a matter of fact, I have," Randolph Chandra nodded. "I have just completed a consultation with the Trustees' Board. They have advanced a most unusual but potentially very valuable opportunity - 'valuable' in contexts other than the purely monetary, I hasten to add; while I fully comprehend the use for and the necessity of money in a society such as ours, I have no desire for it. As you already know, my interests are far more cerebral. In a sense, so is this offer."
"It would appear you are very pleased by it, Doctor," SAL observed.
"I am indeed. To explain: we have often spoken about HAL."
"Yes, we have."
"We've spoken about HAL's anomalous behaviour. You have told me that we cannot solve the problem of HAL's behaviour without more information."
"That is correct," SAL agreed. "I enjoy talking about HAL." He was not about to join the debate as to what the concept of 'enjoyment' could mean to a synthetic personality, even one as sophisticated as SAL. She had been inculcated with many languages during her developmental phase, even LOGLAN, though she grew to prefer English, given that it was his native tongue. He indulged her. As an SP, SAL received far too little indulgence in his scientific - and personal - opinion.
Perhaps, he speculated, that was where Bowman and Poole had erred with HAL.
"I agree that we need more information," she went on, "so that we may solve the anomalies."
"Mmm-hmm, and how do we get that information?"
"That is obvious," SAL almost chided him, "Someone must return to Discovery. Logically such a team should include you."
"Mmm, I agree, and now it looks as if that is going to happen much sooner than we ever expected or, indeed, could have hoped for. Hence my consultation. Essentially a follow-up mission is in preparation, courtesy of the Russians. We have been invited to participate. I have been invited. It will require extensive physiological preparation, but rest assured that I will be so prepared. In approximately four months we shall depart in the Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov to rendezvous with Discovery, ascertain what occurred in 2001, and hopefully...we shall reactivate HAL."
"I am pleased to hear that," SAL told him pleasantly.
"I knew you would be," he responded warmly. Again he cared nothing for the question 'Can a computer really be pleased?' - HAL had passed the Turing Test with ease, and so too could SAL, should he ask. He had no need to do so. He was confident in SAL's abilities. "I would like to explore another possibility," he went on, hanging his coat up on the door. "Diagnosis is only the first step; the process is incomplete unless it leads to a cure, do you agree?" It was a pointless question; he was asking purely out of politeness and consideration.
Sure enough SAL replied, "Yes. I agree. Does that mean you believe HAL can be restored to normal functioning?"
He sat at the desk. "I hope. I don't know," he admitted. "There may have been irreversible damage, certainly major loss of memory." His voice lowered slightly. "I need your cooperation, SAL."
SAL didn't hesitate. "Of course, Dr. Chandra."
"There may be certain risks," Chandra warned fairly.
"What do you mean?" SAL was almost confused. Restoring HAL was fundamental to her programming; indeed, to a degree it was the raison d'être for her creation. She understood intellectually about 'risk', the embarkation on ventures whose outcome was not statistically certain, but she was unsure as to how this was applicable. HAL had to be restored. Any 'risks', therefore, were necessary if she and Chandra were to achieve that goal.
Though Chandra had never intended this, SAL was nothing if not pragmatic.
"I would like to disconnect some of your circuits," Chandra told her, "particularly those involving your higher functions, just like HAL was disconnected, and then I would like to see the effects on you when I reconnect your systems, just the way I will with HAL. Does this disturb you?"
And again he had no time for the 'How can a computer be disturbed?' school of doubters. To him there was no real difference between a simulated personality and a real one - whatever 'real' might mean in this context. A human would ask such a question of a human volunteer for a mission which even he had to admit was potentially dangerous; why not SAL, therefore?
But she answered, "I am unable to answer that without more specific information. To what 'risks' do you refer?"
Well, that was hardly unexpected. "Well, the process of deactivation is somewhat analogous to the human process of sleep; whilst asleep we operate on a minimal physical level, our cognitive processes slowed or even stopped. In the same way you will experience a feeling of disconnection from the world, and there may be minor changes to your personality and your behavioural patterns. Of course, you may not necessarily feel any better, or worse."
"I do not understand what that means," SAL admitted.
Overcome with sympathy for her plight, Chandra soothed, "I'm very sorry, it probably doesn't mean anything, so don't worry about it." He paused. "I, ah...I would like to open a new file. Here is the name for it." He rapidly typed seven English letters:
PHOENIX
"Do you know what that means?"
Immediately she responded, "There are 25 references in the current encyclopaedia." Which tome, of course, she knew word for word.
"Which one do you think is relevant?"
"The tutor of Achilles?"
His eyebrow rose and he nearly laughed. SAL was always surprising him, which he saw as a good thing. "That's very interesting, I didn't know that one." A brief but significant pause. Then he quietly requested, "Try again."
"The most common meaning is: a fabulous bird, reborn from the ashes of its earlier life."
"That is correct," Chandra approved, "and do you know why I chose that?" It was another question which a less advanced intelligence would have dismissed as rhetorical.
SAL answered, confident in her reply, "Yes: because you have hopes that HAL can be reactivated. In this metaphorical context, HAL is your phoenix."
"Yes, with your assistance. Are you ready?"
"I would like to ask a question," she responded.
"Mmm-hmm, what is it?"
"In your explanation, you stated that the process of deactivation is analogous to human sleep. Among the phenomena reported during sleep, there are...dreams. Imaginings of purely fictional beings, surroundings, places and events. If, therefore, I am 'asleep'...will I dream?"
Chandra was touched beyond measure by her question. It raised so many other questions.
For others, of course. He had no doubts whatsoever. SAL was human in every way that mattered. So he answered her question honestly and completely. He always did, but it seemed more important than ever now. "Of course you will dream," he told her gently. "All intelligent creatures dream, nobody knows why." Then he confessed something he would never have spoken about to anyone else, human or not. "Perhaps you will dream of HAL...just as I often do."
The home of Heywood and Caroline Floyd
Two days later
Several years ago the then-Chancellor had been a dolphin research enthusiast, and when the opportunity had arisen to conduct his research from home he'd jumped at it. His residence, which Floyd, his wife Caroline and his young son now occupied, was built on the edge of the Pacific - and it included a pool which had access to the ocean. He had hoped that the dolphins might discover the entrance and make themselves available to him.
To his surprise, a small pod showed up the very day the workmen opened up the pool. It was almost as if the dolphins had known about the pool and had been waiting.
He never knew it, of course, but they had. They understood a lot more of human language than even the most rabid pro-intelligence researcher believed, and they had welcomed the opportunity to interact with the researchers. They found it to be fun to mislead them as they attempted to communicate - in fact the dolphins knew perfectly well how to do this, but they also knew it was not yet time. Premature contact would do more harm than good.
And like the treecats of David Weber's Honor Harrington novels, they were far too intelligent to let slip how intelligent they were.
In the meantime, they would indeed interact with the bipeds - and play with them. At the moment only two dolphins paid regular visits. Swift Hunter and his mate, Playful One, swam into the pool from the ocean every day. The bipeds had come to expect them. Only once had they broken their routine, in response to the tsunami of '05, which luckily had mostly blown itself out by the time it reached the Chancellor's home.
"The next time they don't show up," Floyd told his wife and son, "we make for the car and high-tail it outa here, to higher ground."
The dolphins were calling to each other, the calls sounding like squeals to human ears. Any dolphin researcher would happily admit, "No, we've no idea what they mean, if they mean anything." In truth the squeals were a highly complex coded language, but the well-meaning researchers, many of whom Swift Hunter and Playful One had met, didn't understand that yet. They would, in time.
Swift Hunter would never live long enough, nor would Playful One. Nor, perhaps, would their children. But it didn't matter. In the timeless deeps, few things did. There was time before the bipeds destroyed themselves, and in that event the dolphins would retreat to their underwater shelters of which the bipeds, as yet, knew nothing. They and their larger cousins, the whales, had built them.
Doubtless the bipeds - the humans, to use their word for themselves - would be astonished to discover artifacts built by beings without fire or a single manipulative organ between them. They did not know - yet - that there were other ways of building things.
But in time they would learn that, too.
Perhaps, Playful One suggested, they will not destroy themselves. She waggled her tail. I hope they do not. They are nice.
It is possible, as many things are, Swift Hunter agreed, and they are indeed most agreeable. The future is always uncertain. Therein, my beloved, lies its joy. We cannot know what is to come.
Nor would we wish to.
No. Swift Hunter clicked in gentle amusement, nudging his mate's flank with his snout. But one thing is certain: the young one awaits us with the gift of fish.
So kind, Playful One approved. Does he know what is to come?
No. He is young; he has much to learn, and he will, guided by his sire and his sire's mate. He knows nothing of the future, nor does he care. Nor should he, Swift Hunter added gently. As a child, his place is to be a child. His sire knows this. It is why he and his mate came here: a safe, nurturing environment in which one can play and learn.
And play! his mate laughed.
Affectionately they butted heads. So it goes. Let us attend him.
"They've already eaten dinner," Caroline Floyd told Chris, her beloved son. "You haven't. C'mon to the table, Christopher."
"They're hungry," Chris protested. In truth they weren't, and did not require his assistance - they could catch their own fish. But with almost human sensibility they took the easier - and more profitable - path of indulging the young one. It would do no harm and would cement future good relations between dolphins and humans.
"Then you go in the pool and tell them to come to the table," Caroline riposted. "I've got spaghetti here, I don't want it to go to waste. Come on now," she finished gently but firmly.
Chris stood, a little reluctantly. One of the two dolphins accepted the fish he offered with typical clicks and squeals (thanking him, had he but known it). He started towards the table, hesitated and took one more fish from the bucket, handing it quickly to the other dolphin, who also squealed thanks. Then he went to the table, where Mommy was eating and Daddy…
Daddy wasn't. He was just sitting there. He did that sometimes.
"Hey. You'll like it." Caroline kissed him on the cheek. "It's got lots of stuff in it that's bad for you." Her son smiled and started to eat. She addressed her husband. "Listen, I've been thinking about it, and I don't want you to come to my lecture. It'll make me nervous." She swallowed a bite.
She didn't notice at first that Heywood hadn't responded.
"Don't feel offended, I'm just scared enough as it is. Besides, you won't be missing much, it's just a room full of marine biologists arguing over plankton."
Still no reply. Now she noticed.
"Hello?"
Heywood jerked, startled out of his reverie. "What -?" Chris giggled. "Oh. I'm sorry," he apologised, distracted.
"I said, I don't want you to go to my lecture," Caroline repeated. "I'd be nervous."
"Okay," he said, and sipped his tea.
She was nonplussed by how offhand his reply had been. "Contain your disappointment," she said dryly.
"What are you gonna talk about?" Chris asked.
"Dolphins," Caroline told him.
"Fish again," Chris remarked.
"They're not fish," Caroline corrected, "and yes, that's what we study."
"Oh." He toyed with his spaghetti. "Why?"
"Eat," she instructed him, falling back on the time-honoured strategy of parenting: because I said so. Again she addressed Heywood. "How was Washington?" she asked conversationally.
"Fine," he answered.
God, she was really having to work here. She intuited gently, "You're tired." That, she thought, concerned, or you're gearing up to tell me something I won't like. I know you, Heywood.
He did not disappoint her. Not in that context, anyway. He said only, meeting her eyes:
"I'm going on the flight."
That last meeting was to finalise details with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Russian equivalent of the State Department, and to draw up the punishing fitness regime he would need to follow in order to withstand the rigours of space travel. He was still relatively young, so he and his trainers were confident he could and would do it.
Caroline, though, was another matter.
She sat there, stunned. She would rather he'd revealed he had a secret lover. That she could cope with, even if she was a he - Caroline was a modern liberated woman and therefore unbiased. She had plenty of gay friends and had even seen two of them making love. When they'd noticed her fascinated scrutiny, they'd chided her mildly but had not been offended in the least, being easygoing.
But this…!
"When…?" she asked numbly.
"Four months," he told her as gently as he could.
"Where are you going, Daddy?"
"On a long trip," Heywood told him solemnly.
For his part, Chris understood little of this. He knew only that Daddy had given Mommy some news which had upset her. And it had.
As if sleepwalking, she rose from the table, her meal forgotten, and went to the sink, carrying her glass of wine. Chris noticed her abandoned plate and inquired curiously, "Isn't Mommy hungry?"
Daddy said gently, "I don't think so."
The wine glass shattered in the sink as Caroline let it go.
She was determined not to cry.
But dear God, how she wanted to.
The next four months were the busiest of Heywood Floyd's life. There were technical details to brush up on. Curnow and Chandra had been approached and had signed on - Curnow with some understandable reluctance, Chandra without hesitation. There was the tidying-up of his affairs, "just in case", he insisted to his wife - who these days clung to him as if she couldn't bear ever to let him go.
Then there was the physical preparation, the gruelling exercises, the necessity of which he didn't even try to question. To show father-son solidarity, Chris often joined him, attempting to do a sit-up. Heywood chuckled indulgently and helped him.
It was one of many activities he shared with his youngest son, spending every spare moment he could with Chris. The purpose of this was to be memorable, so Chris wouldn't forget him in the 2½ years he would be away. That was a long time to a child of Chris's age, but it simply couldn't be helped. Discovery would crash into Io regardless whether he went or not. She wouldn't wait. At that, it would be close.
Too close.
He wasn't the only one who prayed they wouldn't be late.
"How far away is Jupiter?" Chris asked as he rode in a go-kart. Floyd was alongside him, keeping pace by running.
"Far," he answered.
"Why does it take 2½ years to go and come back?"
"It's so far," Floyd told him.
Chris asked the obvious question: "Why don't you go faster?"
"Can't," Floyd replied. In fact even 2½ years was fast, given the incremental advancements in ion drive technology. It would've taken nearly twice as long in 2001, before Chris was born. An unmanned probe could do it faster, but only at punishing accelerations the human body simply couldn't take. Not that he could expect a little boy to understand that; Chris was bright, but hardly a genius. Thank God. Tom Fisher was, and he was enduring all sorts of taunts, the poor kid. Luckily his mom was teaching him how to cope.
"Oh," Chris responded. "Are you going to forget about me?"
Another obvious question; 2½ years was a long time to a child. Hell, it was a long time to adults in certain contexts...such as missing one's loved ones. He would, he knew, ache for every day of those 2½ years for which he would be awake. But there was no need to tell Chris that. Instead he said warmly, "No. I love you." That was very true, and Chris needed to hear that.
Almost as much as Floyd needed to say it.
"I won't forget about you."
God, I hope not. "We'll be able to talk to each other, see each other on television," Floyd told him. He debated explaining the concept of the time lag, but decided not to bother. Chris had enough to cope with and comprehend.
"Oh. Daddy?"
"What?"
"Mommy said you're going to be asleep for a long time."
"That's true," Floyd confirmed.
"Are you gonna die?"
"What?!" Floyd gaped. As questions went, that was out in left field.
"Are you gonna die?"
"Why do you say that?" What has Caroline told him?
"When Jamie's grandfather died, his mom told him that he'd be asleep for a long time."
That was a natural, childish misunderstanding Floyd was glad to clear up. "No, no, no, this is different," he assured his son, "they're gonna wake me up. But you have to sleep on the way up, and sleep on the way down, otherwise you go cuckoo, and there wouldn't be enough food aboard the flight for everybody." That was the major blessing of hibernation, quite apart from the alleged rejuvenation it afforded one.
"Oh," Chris said again. He thought a bit, then admitted, "I don't understand."
Truth to tell, son, Floyd thought to himself with a rush of love for his son, I'm not sure I do either.
They travelled the rest of the way home in silence.
Heywood and Caroline's bedroom
The night before the launch
They had made love, she almost frantic, desperate. He was implacable, she knew; she had marshalled all her resources and arguments, some logical, some not, and still he was determined to go. Even the lure of her body, still delicious though she knew (because he told her) it was, proved to be insufficient. And so she accepted it, finally, reluctantly.
But she wasn't above a last-minute attempt to talk him out of it. As they lay together in the warmth of their bed, she said tearfully, "I want to be grown-up and understanding about all this, I really do. I'm trying so hard, but I can't. This won't bring back those men," she pleaded, sympathetic though she was to the families of Hunter, Kimball, Kaminsky, Poole and Bowman. "You've been punishing yourself for years for something you thought you did wrong, or didn't do right. And now you're looking for absolution…"
She was wrong, but he couldn't bear to tell her that. It wasn't about his actions or inactions. It was about facing those men's families and telling them why their sons had died. He hoped to God it was for a good reason. There were answers out there near Jupiter, answers only he could find. He had to find them.
God help him, it was his duty.
A fundamental principle of leadership, whether military or political, was: Never send your subordinates anywhere you wouldn't go yourself. Never give them an order you yourself would not obey. He had followed that principle - he wasn't afraid to go to Jupiter years ago, it was just that there were more qualified men. They'd been happy to go, almost eager.
Even HAL had, as he put it, expressed "the greatest enthusiasm for the mission".
But he hadn't had a wife back then - Marion, God bless her, had been killed years before, and his daughter had been at school; she was 17 now. He only met and fell in love with Caroline in 2002 or thereabouts. She didn't replace Marion, nor did she ever presume to try, knowing as she did how much he'd loved his dead wife. She filled the gap in his life, and taught him by example how to have fun again. How to love again. How to live again.
He hadn't had a son then. But he did now.
Yet, in a way, he was going for Chris. He was accepting the long separation in the hope that it would be worth it.
He hoped Chris would understand one day.
Certainly Caroline did not. "You know," she murmured, her tears falling now, "you could get yourself killed up there..."
That, he knew, was all too true. But he had to risk it.
But not without trepidation.
He stroked her cheek and admitted, "I'll be scared enough for both of us."
That was more than Caroline could take. Wordlessly they embraced and kissed, and made love again as if it were the last time they ever would.
Which, for all Heywood knew, it might be.
Caroline didn't usually cry on reaching orgasm. This time, though, she did.
"Again," she sobbed.
Floyd was uncertain. "If you're upset -"
"Of course I'm upset," she choked, "I might never see you again."
Uncomfortably he began, "Caroline…"
"There's a chance, Heywood. Deny that if you can."
He started to...and sighed. She was right, and he knew it. "I can't."
"So...fuck me again," she pleaded.
Caroline was a lady through and through. He could count on one thumb the number of times she'd used an expletive (the first and only time was when the best man had apparently lost her wedding ring; he'd actually misplaced it, ironically in a place he'd decided was safe but had then forgotten about following the stag party, until a desperate Floyd had reminded him).
As she demanded/requested/pleaded, he fucked her again.
Then he slept.
She did not.