Assemblers of Infinity Read online

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  CHAPTER 5

  LOCAL MISSION CONTROL -- WASHINGTON, DC

  Major General Pritchard looked fascinated and horrified at the same time. Celeste McConnell glanced at him, then back to the main window displaying the remote analysis of the Daedalus sample. They had expected to detect some kind of anomaly on the regolith -- thermo-shocked granules, a change in the crystalline structure, perhaps even traces of exotic chemical residue. But nothing like this.

  On a separate image, the Columbus control center buzzed with activity.

  "Are you sure it's contained?" they could hear Dvorak say as he looked at the image of the goo-covered sample.

  On Earth, General Pritchard muttered to Celeste. "Of course it's contained. Nothing outside could have survived that sterilization dose, and the sample is behind four-inch lead shielding."

  "But what if the contamination can break out?" Celeste said.

  She turned to Albert Fukumitsu; all of his techs were staring at the moonbase transmissions. Even the Japanese guards at the doorway had turned to watch. "Albert, are we still on? I want to transmit something."

  Fukumitsu tossed long hair out of his eyes and indicated one of the techs as Celeste stepped into the transmission zone. "You're on," he said.

  "Jason?" She paused long enough for him to look up. With the transmission lag she tried to plan two seconds ahead of his reactions.

  Dvorak turned toward her. "Ms. Director, I don't have a clue what's going on, so please don't ask just yet." His voice was sharp and tired.

  "I just want you to consider some drastic actions, in case this turns out for the worst. I want all of your people to be prepared to evacuate Columbus if it becomes necessary."

  Two seconds later -- "How are we going to implement something like that? Take us up to L-1?" Dvorak sounded weary, defeated. "The Collins could never hold this many people, and there's no way the supply shuttles have the capacity to pull off a rapid evacuation. We're stuck."

  Celeste pulled her lips tight. Dvorak had a point. What good would an emergency evacuation do? He had turned his attention to her now.

  "Look, Ms. McConnell, we appreciate your concern, but the people on my base are accustomed to day-to-day threats. Everything's dangerous out here.

  We're used to dealing with it."

  "I hear you Jason," she said. Have I just been trying to look good for the newsnets? she wondered. Celeste had never worried about that before --

  especially now, with no need to impress anyone. As Agency Director, she reported to no one but herself. Over and over, the newsnets had lambasted her for those sweeping damn-the-consequences types of decisions, even though they almost always proved successful.

  "Okay, then let's figure out what this thing is and we won't have to worry about it. I've got a hunch I'd like your team to try."

  When he nodded, she said, "Whatever's happening there is taking place on a much smaller scale than we can see right now." Celeste drummed her fingers on her chair. "Use higher magnification. I mean very high. You might need to try x-ray spectroscopy, but use the TEM first."

  Dvorak blinked. "We're still trying to finish the testing protocol.

  There's a strict sequence of procedures we have to follow -- "

  "Super high magnification," she said again. "I think I know what this might be. There's a chance you've stumbled onto something we've been investigating down here -- "

  "Investigating?" Dvorak looked up sharply. She could see the angry boy behind his features. "What do you mean? Is this something the Agency has done?

  Are you testing something at Daedalus that I don't know about?"

  "No, but we're working on some concepts in Antarctica, as part of the Mars project. This might be something similar."

  Pritchard looked at her with a puzzled expression. She motioned to him to wait. All he knew about was the simulated Mars base camp in Antarctica.

  "And just what is that, Director McConnell?" Dvorak said after the two-second light delay.

  "Nanotechnology."

  Pritchard straightened. Most of the people in Mission Control didn't seem to know what she meant. Neither did Jason Dvorak.

  "Whatever you say," Dvorak answered. He motioned to Newellen, still running his telepresent analysis. In the main window showing the closeup of the regolith sample, the view spun inward, defocused, then resolved through a different sensor to show the view from a Transmission Electron Microscope.

  Suddenly, the crystalline structure of the regolith sample looked like an enormous city during rush hour. Tiny objects bustled across the screen, swarming and chewing, dismantling the rock, building copies of themselves.

  Little machines like busy microscopic bulldozers, racing their way up and down tiny structures in the regolith.

  A murmur swept through Mission Control, half a second before a similar transmitted undertone reached them from the moonbase.

  "Is it a virus?" Pritchard asked, moving closer to the screen. "An infestation, like a plague? Microorganisms -- "

  "No, not a disease," Celeste said, cutting him off. "They are ...

  mechanical. Tiny, tiny machines."

  The microscopic shapes were fuzzy, boxlike, with tiny lumps that could be arms and levers, crystalline cores that must hold some kind of controls.

  There seemed to be half a dozen different designs, modifications in the number of flagella, the size of the core. Larger substations were scattered throughout the structure, like control centers.

  Celeste pulled a chair up and sat. She rocked forward in her seat and gripped the arms of her chair. "Jason, you need to destroy that sample. Before it gets loose."

  "It's inside a lead-lined vault." Dvorak looked puzzled.

  "Now!" she said. "Lead won't stop them. Once they finish taking apart the regolith sample and the debris from the recovery canister, they'll start dismantling the inside of the shielding wall, atom by atom, to keep reproducing."

  As Dvorak hesitated, General Pritchard stepped into the transmission area, and raised his voice. Good, she saw that Pritchard at least immediately grasped the nature of the threat. "Dvorak, you saw what happened to your hopper and to those three people -- and if these things can dissolve an entire spacecraft, they can sure as hell eat through a lead wall."

  Celeste made her voice placating. "Jason, we can't lose Sim-Mars yet.

  We need to alter our plan of attack. You can get another sample later -- once we've sent you some help. Now at least I know what type of expertise you need.

  And I know exactly where to get it."

  It took longer than the two second light delay for Dvorak to show his approval. "Okay," Dvorak said. He directed Newellen to flood the interior of the shielded vault with a decontamination burst.

  General Pritchard turned to her. "I can see it, but I still don't understand it. How did you recognize this? What are we looking at?"

  "Nanotechnology," she said to him again, but she knew Dvorak and the entire moonbase crew were listening as well. "Tiny self-replicating robots that can build or take apart just about anything, one molecule at a time.

  They're assembling that enormous construction at Daedalus"

  Her voice felt cold in her throat. "And these aren't anything we developed. Nothing from Earth."

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  CHAPTER 6

  ANTARCTICA -- NANOTECHNOLOGY ISOLATION LABORATORY

  A strong wind whipped snow into the air, obscuring much of the desolate Antarctic landscape. Inside the Nanotech Isolation Lab, Erika Trace blinked, startled, as Parvu brought out caviar and crackers.

  "Where did you get this?" she asked. The soft burr of her Southern accent grew more pronounced with surprise.

  Jordan Parvu busied himself with tiny cans, plastic-wrapped packages, and vials of powdered seasonings. "Personal effects," he said. "I have been waiting for a chance to use this, to tell you the truth. Now, we have cause for a celebration."

  Erika sat up straighter and smiled with the success they both sh
ared.

  Celebrating with salty fish eggs didn't sound terribly exciting, though.

  Inside the NIL, the nanocore had begun to turn cloudy as the prototype devices assembled and replicated themselves. The nanomachines had functioned better than expected. Taylor was smug upon reviewing the data; Compton-Reasor was ecstatic. Just an hour ago, the prototypes had transmitted their first data to the outside.

  Parvu and Erika had proven that they could indeed build functional replicating machines on a submicroscopic scale, machines that could make a simple analysis of their surroundings and communicate back to the macro scale.

  Erika watched Parvu open his tin of caviar. "Well, we have been waiting for this a long time." The fish eggs looked black and slimy. "I've never tried this stuff before."

  "Then you are in for a treat, Erika. This is the real thing, from the Amur River in Mongolia. Sturgeon eggs, none of those awful perch egg imitations. You will like this." He craned his head toward her. His hair was neat, his eyes bright, his eyebrows too bushy. "With as much as this cost, we cannot afford to have too many more celebrations, so let us enjoy this one."

  She nodded, keeping quiet. She would do what Parvu asked. He had rescued her from being a perpetual graduate student at MIT, pried her away from Taylor. Caviar was only one of many things she hadn't experienced.

  Growing up in Aiken, South Carolina, Erika had struggled with her out-of-place intelligence in a typical blue-collar family. Her father and her older brother Dick worked at the Savannah River Nuclear supercomplex. Both were beer-drinking, pool-shooting rowdies who listened to songs about big trucks, faithful dogs, and cheatin' women. They scorned Erika's aspirations.

  But Erika's mother had made all the difference, planning a better life for her daughter. She had put aside a college fund, collecting enough money so Erika could attend the best schools -- and her mother insisted that she excel.

  With her father's and brother's indifference and her mother's pressure, Erika had found herself withdrawing, with no escape but herself.

  She had fled to MIT and worked for Taylor, and might still be there, trying to get her degree. Then she met Parvu, and clung to him. Parvu had seen in her the makings of a good researcher, and she had given him her best work out of gratitude. Parvu seemed embarrassed by it all. He had done his best to talk her out of following him first to Albuquerque, then to Antarctica, but Erika insisted with a savage devotion. She had not felt happier or more worthwhile at any other time in her life.

  Occasionally, when she stared out through the insulated windows to see the snow and the rocks, Erika longed to be back in Aiken, with the thick forests, fresh air, and the primeval expanse of Hitchcock Woods. Sometimes she just wanted to listen to the birds again. She remembered spring, with its parade of wisteria, dogwoods, and azaleas filling the air with ever-changing perfume. She had watched from afar as rich people rode horses down the clay paths in front of their mansions.

  But then Erika remembered what kind of life she had left behind, and those scant hours of enjoyment in the woods did not make up for the rest.

  Here, in their cramped living quarters, with Parvu playing classical music over the sound system, Erika knew she could celebrate much more than just the nanomachine success.

  "Jordan," she said, "for you I'll try even salty fish eggs."

  Parvu removed two crackers from a plastic package, handing one to her with all the reverence due a communion wafer. He scooped out a bit of the lumpy caviar with a small knife. It glistened like tiny black pearls at the tip of the blade.

  He spread the caviar on his cracker, then dipped out another portion for Erika. She took a sniff and imitated his gestures.

  "Under ideal conditions," Parvu said, "you accompany the caviar with a slice of boiled egg, sour cream, and chopped white onion. Here, we must make do with their dehydrated equivalents."

  Erika sprinkled powder on top of her caviar. She wanted to take only a tiny bite, but she took the cracker whole, chewing quickly to be over the first shock of taste. She was surprised to find the caviar not unpleasant at all, salty and juicy, with only a faint fishy taste. She kept chewing, swallowed, and smiled. A real smile.

  Parvu withdrew a metal flask and poured a capful of pale liquid into it. It looked like disinfectant. "Here," he said. "Peppered vodka. It is the perfect thing. Cleanses the palate."

  Erika took it and sipped, but the alcohol and the pepper set fire in her mouth, burning away the fishy taste. She felt tears stinging her eyes.

  "So?" Parvu said. "We celebrate!"

  Just then the communications chime rang through the intercom. Someone was trying to contact them in the conference room within the outer perimeter of the dome.

  "Even here we are interrupted!" Parvu sighed.

  Erika tagged along behind him, but stayed back, knowing that the communication could as well be from Parvu's family. They passed through the doors into the outer lab area, and Parvu accepted the call over the big screens.

  The image focused, startling Erika as she recognized the caller. They had had little contact with the woman directly, merely transmitting progress reports on schedule. Erika had an uneasy feeling. It was the Director of the United Space Agency, Celeste McConnell.

  Hovering off to the side, making sure she did not intrude upon Parvu's conversation, Erika listened as McConnell described the Daedalus construction and what had happened there. Erika and Parvu had been so wrapped up in their work with the prototypes that sometimes they ignored the newsnets for days on end.

  McConnell showed images of the alien nanotech assemblers, more sophisticated than Parvu's wildest dreams. Erika took a step backward, stunned; she could see Parvu struggling to contain his astonishment. All of a sudden, the major progress they had just made in the NIL seemed utterly trivial. They had been knocked down to the lowest rung of a new ladder.

  McConnell paused a long time after her last sentence. Parvu, polite as always, waited for her to continue. Erika knew the director had reached her important point.

  McConnell folded her hands. "Dr. Parvu, I need you up on the Moon. You are not only one of the foremost experts in nanotechnology, but you are also the only one with any practical experience. This is not a theoretical problem.

  I need you to figure out this mystery for us."

  Parvu held up his hands as if to ward off shock. Erika frowned.

  Jordan, going away? What would happen to her? What would happen to their work down here, the prototypes? What if Parvu left and they put -- who? --

  Taylor in charge? McConnell certainly wouldn't let him run the NIL, would she?

  This couldn't be happening....

  Parvu recovered from his shock before McConnell could say anything else. "I am afraid that is most impossible, Madame Director. I am old, and I can be of better assistance if I remain here to give advice, okay?"

  "Dr. Parvu, we have no other choice. None of the other nanotech researchers have the hands-on experience you do. They have dealt with theories, nothing more. I must insist." Her voice sounded a bit sharper.

  "I'm afraid you do not understand -- "

  "I'm afraid that you don't understand, Dr. Parvu. There's more to this than you leaving your research down in Antarctica. Sixty people on the Moon may lose their lives. And the next fatality may be our entire space program."

  Parvu stood silent for a long time. McConnell pulled her lips tight, giving time for him to answer. She folded her arms and waited.

  Finally, Parvu opened his mouth. "You do have another choice, to tell you the truth." He reached out and took Erika's wrist, pulling her into view.

  McConnell's eyes widened.

  Erika felt her breath grow short, her face redden.

  Parvu continued. "Why not take my colleague, Dr. Erika Trace? I have complete faith in her abilities. She has just as much practical experience as I do, and a bit more imagination. And she is physically fit."

  "I appreciate your suggestion, Dr. Parvu, and no offense to you, Ms.

  Tra
ce, but frankly..." she spread her hands wide, "we need an internationally recognized expert -- "

  "Erika has published more papers than I in this area, Ms. Director!"

  Parvu drew himself upright.

  Erika couldn't say a thing for a moment. This was worse than she had feared. She did not want to leave the NIL. Was this supposed to be an honor?

  She supposed so, but right now it sounded like a punishment.

  Parvu patted her on the wrist. "We will discuss this further between ourselves, Director. Thank you for the intriguing information about the Moon.

  We will review it in more detail, okay?" His words picked up speed, as if he knew Erika was trying to gather her arguments. "I will be back in touch shortly." He signed off.

  Erika turned on him, balling her fists. "Thanks for making up my mind for me! You all can't just send me away! My place is here. We've got work to do."

  Parvu looked at her mildly and indicated the image of the Daedalus construction, which he had frozen in a separate window on the screen. "Don't you believe we can learn more from studying that than from any number of years spent here?"

  "That's not the point. I don't want to go."

  "You are being silly, Erika. With an opportunity like this, you will be the most respected and most envied nanotechnology researcher in the world." He sounded stern and paternal, not at all like her own father, who would have laughed in disbelief at the thought of his daughter being the only person in the world qualified for an important job. He softened his voice. "Besides, it is time, perhaps, for you to leave the nest."

  "Sounds like you're trying to get rid of me!" Even back in Albuquerque he had pestered her with questions of why she had no boyfriend, why she did not go to movies, why she had no social life. Taking it upon himself, Parvu had dragged her off to dinners, forced her to go out to places normally frequented by people her own age -- which meant that he himself looked hopelessly out of place.

  "Oh, Erika! It is for your own good." Parvu turned away, the matter finished.

  Erika did not answer, but instead walked out through the double doors to her own quarters. Their open caviar lay on the table; several crackers had spilled out of the package. She hoped he would feed them to the three lab rats.