“I know! Everybody does. You’ve told me already, and it was unnecessary then.”
Yukiko fought down irritation. The machine was godlike in its power, it could do a million years’ worth of human reasoning in a day, but it had no right to patronize her… It didn’t intend to. It habitually repeated itself to humans because many of them needed that. She eased, let the emotion surge and die like a wave. Calm, she said, “As I understand it, the messages are not about mathematics or physics.”
“They do not appear to be, and it seems implausible that civilizations would spend time and bandwidth exchanging knowledge that all must certainly possess. Perhaps they concern other sciences, such as biology. However, that implies that our understanding of physics is incomplete, that we have not by now delineated every possible kind of biochemistry in the universe. We have no evidence for such an assumption.”
“I know,” Yukiko repeated, but patiently. “And I’ve heard the argument that it can’t be politics or anything like that, when transmission times are in centuries. Do they compare histories, arts, philosophies?”
“Conceivably.”
“I believe that. It would make sense.” Unless organic life withers away. But won’t machine minds also wonder about the ultimate? “I want to master your … analysis. I’m aware I can’t make any contribution, nothing original. Let me follow along, though. Give me the means to think about what you have learned and are learning.”
“That could be done, within limits,” said the gentle voice. “It would require much time and effort on your part. Do you care to explain your reasons?”
Yukiko couldn’t help it, her words trembled. “They, those beings, they must be advanced far beyond us—”
“Not likely, my lady. To the best of present-day knowledge, and it appears seamless, nature sets bounds on technological possibilities; and we have determined what those bounds are.”
“I don’t mean in engineering, I mean in, in understanding, enlightenment.” Inner peace was gone. Her pulse stammered. “You don’t see what I’m talking about. Would anybody nowadays, any human being?” Except Tu Shan and perhaps, if they tried, the rest of our fellowship. We hark back to when people felt these questions were real.
“Your purpose is clear,” said the electronics mildly. “Your concept is not absurd. Quantum mechanics fails at such levels of complexity. Mathematically speaking, chaos sets in, and one must make empirical observations.”
“Yes, yes! We must learn the language and listen to them!”
Did she hear regret within the inexorability? The system could optimize its reactions for her. “My lady, what information we have is totally inadequate. The mathematics leaves no doubt. Unless the character of what we receive changes in fundamental ways, we shall never be able to interpret it for any such subtleties. Be warned, if that is what interests you, studying the material will be an utter waste of your time.”
She had not dared lift hopes too high, but this smashed down upon her.
“Instead, wait,” counselled the system. “Remember, our robotic explorers travel at virtual light speed. They should begin arriving at the nearer sources, to observe and interact, in about a millennium. Perhaps fifteen centuries after that, we will begin to hear from them, and truly begin to learn. You are immortal, my lady. Wait.”
She smothered tears. I am .not a saint. I cannot endure that long while existence has no meaning.
SUDDENLY, WARNINGLESS, the rock gave way under Tersten’s boots. For an instant he seemed frozen, arms flung wide, against an infinity of stars. Then he toppled from sight.
Svoboda, second in file, had time to thump her staff down and squeeze the firing button. Gas jetted white from vents as a piton shot into stone. The barrel locked onto the upper part of the shaft. She clung. The line slammed taut. Even under lunar gravity, that force was brutal. Her soles skidded on a treacherously thin dust layer. Gripping the staff, she kept upright.
Violence ended. Silence pressed on the faint cosmic hiss in her earplugs. She had been yanked forward about two meters. The line continued upslope and over a verge formed when the ledge they had been following went to pieces. It should have been strained tight by Tersten’s weight. She saw with horror that it drooped slack. Had it broken? No, it couldn’t have.