David Brin - Existence

Only when he finished introductions did his mind turn to pick at something that was said earlier. “My awakening instructions were poorly thought out,” Hamish admitted. “But then… I take it that ‘something of significance’ has now happened?”

Lacey held up one hand. “Could you hold that thought, Hamish? We’re trying to settle a very important question.”

She turned to her colleagues. The man named Singh-elegant with a pointed beard, a white turban, and a dagger at his waist-said, “My best estimate is about five hundred and fifty a.u. As for speed…” He glanced at the Birdwoman, who fluttered her feathered arms and emitted a squawk. Hamish let his new, virtual aiware insert a translation:

Give me some time to finish my calculations.

Emily and M’m por’lock also consulted briefly with two other humans at the control panels. Then Emily returned to offer Lacey a sigh and head shake.

“But can’t you at least tell me what…”

“Why don’t you accompany me, Hamish?” Lacey suggested, touching his elbow and swiveling him in a new direction, with the ease of one born to graceful arts of persuasion. “I have an important errand. You and Om might as well come, too. We can talk along the way.”

“An errand? Where?”

Lacey made circular motions with her right hand. And in response, an oval portion of the glassy floor started to lift, carrying the three of them with it. Soon they were floating about half a person-height above the others.

“We are heading aft,” she replied.

Small cylinders manifested, about hip-level. When Om and Lacey clasped the ones nearest to them, Hamish realized they were handholds, he clutched one also.

“How fast are we going to-”

The newly formed conveyance took off with a jerk, then a steady surge of acceleration that did not let up, making Hamish glad of something to grip. The control center receded behind them at a rate he found intimidating.

“Aft?” he asked. “How far?”

Lacey smiled enigmatically.

“All the way… and then some.”

This vehicle, Hamish soon concluded, was a utilitarian compromise. Only a couple of fractal levels down from the crystal’s outer shell-he figured his “actual” height was now about a tenth of a millimeter. They had enough wish-power to make useful things, like the travel disc. Yet, the comparative distances weren’t too great.

Overhead, through occasional gaps in the misty overcast, he could still catch glimpses of the great black night. Looking down, he saw a realm of glob-clouds that were rich with potential to become whatever anyone wanted. Layer after layer of complexity diminished into smallness below, an infinity of minute scale, laced with occasional flashes of multicolored lightning.

A part of him knew what had just happened.

They didn’t want to answer my questions, just yet. And they know I’m still gawking around like a tourist. So they figure taking me on this ride will distract me for a while.

Well… they’re right!

Staring downward, he discovered that his tru-vus would zoom toward distant-or much smaller-things, bringing into focus occasional globs that had already been transformed into fairy-tale palaces, amusement arcades, alien parklands with purple trees, and so on. Those oases were rare however; vast, unused gulfs separated them. Well after all, the long interstellar voyage was just getting started.

Several times he almost blurted out questions, but stopped when the goggles offered a terse explanation. At one point, their hurtling path across the starprobe’s inner expanse took them above-on a nearly parallel course-what looked like an ocean-going luxury liner, complete with swimming pools, tennis courts and liveried servants. Interest-zoom brought into view tanned figures lounging or playing on deck. Several looked up and waved as Lacey’s little oval vehicle rushed by. Hamish stared. This time he didn’t need any of the subtitles the goggles supplied:

Helena duPont-Vonessen

Daphne Glaucus-Worthington-Smythe

Yevgeny Bogolomov

Wu Chang Xi

Hamish rocked back, turning to Lacey. “Socrates weeps! What are those people doing here?”

“You mean my peers from the First Estate?” she asked, using terminology that had been briefly fashionable in the 2040s and 2050s. “Come now, Hamish. Who do you think helped pay for all this?” She waved skyward, clearly meaning the entire crystal vessel. “The space factories. The giant laser? Most of the members of the Oligarchic clade accepted the doomcasts-the dire outcomes predicted by their pet boffins and farcaisters. They wanted lifeboats from a world apparently fated to fail. A lot of lifeboats.”

“But…” Hamish recalled those long-ago days when he used to fawn over oligarchs-then decades spent fighting and denouncing them. “But slots were supposed to be allocated by-”

“By merit? Yes, well.” The woman offered a ladylike shrug. “A lot of them were. In the end though, the institute decided that there’s plenty of room.”

“Plenty of… say, how many uploaded minds are aboard-”

Before he could finish the question, his tru-vus answered: 8,009.

“Eight thousand and… but I thought there was limited storage capacity for full-scale minds!”

Now the Oldest Member spoke for the first time since they arrived at the control center.

“This crystal vessel is larger than average. It has many times the normal volume. Nor is that the only difference.” Om gestured ahead, in their direction of travel.

Hamish could sense their conveyance decelerating. Already, the sky-ceiling seemed to be curving inward again, as the probe’s cylinder shape tapered at the aft end. Soon that terminus came into view. Only it wasn’t what Hamish expected.

He had figured the scene would reveal familiar constellations of brittle-pinpoint stars, with an especially bright one dead center. The still-bright sun that shone on Earth. And also, possibly, the stunning glare of the propulsion laser.

Instead, beyond the curved end of the crystal, Hamish saw a huge, flat wall of very dark brown, blocking any view in that direction. He shook his head.

“I’m confused. What the hell is that?”

Lacey nodded sympathetically.

“Here, allow me.”

She touched the side of her head. Then, with the same finger, she reached up and tapped his tru-vus, which erupted with a simple illustration.

“So… what I’m looking at is a great big box that’s attached to the rear end of our ship?” Hamish shook his head. “That’s not standard design, is it? I mean… the smaller compartment at the front is there to control the sail. But what the heck is all that for?” He motioned at the brown wall blocking their view toward home.

“We’ve speculated about that,” commented the Oldest Member. “Some of us believe that it contains instrumentalities to increase our chance of success, when we reach our destination.”

“What, you mean tools? What kind?”

“The implements might include signaling devices, to better announce ourselves to a local species. Or telescopes to study them.

“Or else, perhaps the container comes loaded with weaponry, in order that we should be better able to protect ourselves. Say, in the event that we find the new solar system infested with malignant, old-era probes.”

“Well, anything that improves our…”

Hamish halted, feeling a sudden thrill of realization. His fingers made a satisfying snap, even in this virtual realm.