The Death of the Universe: Hard Science Fiction (Big Rip Book 1) Read online

  The Death of the Universe

  Hard Science Fiction

  Brandon Q. Morris

  Contents

  The Death of the Universe

  Author's Note

  Also by Brandon Q. Morris

  A Guided Tour of the Universe

  Glossary of Acronyms

  Metric to English Conversions

  The Death of the Universe

  Cycle YA7.3, K2-288Bb

  “Breakfast, John!”

  Kepler lifted his head. This butler annoyed him.

  “Johannes! How many times do I have to tell you?”

  “Excuse me, Jo... hannes.” The butler pronounced the name with an English ‘J.’ Incorrectly.

  Kepler sighed. “Think of it as a ‘Y.’ Yohannes.”

  “Wy-o-hannes.”

  “Never mind. Just call me Kepler.”

  He got up from the seat in which he had spent the night in sleep mode. He imagined fresh coffee and croissants.

  “Very well,” said the butler, “I’ll call you Kepler.”

  The butler bowed flawlessly, as far as Kepler could tell, and led him into the neighboring room. Where did Zhenyi ever get this antiquated model? He estimated its age to be at least two kilocycles. Old-world butlers had come into fashion again then for a short time. He had externalized his memories of that year on Terra, so he couldn’t remember any other details. But this butler could be several mega-years old. Who knew these days? Kepler wondered whether he should ask him, but that seemed somehow improper. The butler was a machine, but he played his role so believably that Kepler felt a certain respect for him.

  “Please excuse me, venerable Kepler,” said the butler, “for not meeting your language requirements. My vocalization memory is no longer as flexible since the last mega-flare from K2-288B.”

  “Why haven’t you repaired it?”

  “It wasn’t a priority.”

  Of course, Kepler thought. How long had Zhenyi been underway? The butler hadn’t had anything to do for a few cycles, until Kepler’s arrival on K2-288Bb.

  “Your breakfast,” said the butler, pointing at the table.

  The table looked like it was made of wood. It was an exceptional imitation. You could almost smell the scent of the hardwood. The room was bathed in atmospheric light. The walls glowed a warm yellow. On the far side a fire blazed in a fireplace. Kepler went around the table. The fire radiated heat. Flames licked around the logs. Such excellent work! Zhenyi had always had a penchant for luxury. These weren’t algorithms at work. The hologram had to have been designed by a human. There were only two holographic masters capable of something like this.

  Kepler knelt in front of the fireplace. The master must have left his signature behind somewhere. Maybe he’d recognize it. He stretched out his hand to lift up the uppermost log. “Ouch!” Kepler cried out in shock, pulling back his hand. Either the hologram had no safety circuit or... “Butler, what’s wrong with this hologram?”

  Kepler looked at the hand he had held in the flames. Two large blisters were forming on the skin, white in the middle and pink around the edges. He activated the pain sensors that had automatically switched themselves off, appreciating the pain. The wounds burned like hell. He concentrated his perception on them. This was life. It wasn’t so easy to be in touch with it anymore.

  “The fireplace is not a hologram,” said the butler. “The wood comes from Terra.”

  Was that something resembling pride in his voice? If he hadn’t misheard, then this butler couldn’t be a level 1 AI, as prescribed for ordinary servants. That would fit with Zhenyi. She liked pushing boundaries. But what had the butler just said? Kepler swung around to face the flames again.

  Real wood was burning in this fireplace! Kepler couldn’t believe it. Doubtless Zhenyi knew what she was doing. She was burning biomass, organically grown! There had been no forests on Terra for a long time now. The last tree had been incinerated when the sun had expanded into a red giant, mega-cycles ago. Or was the butler lying to him? Level 1 AIs couldn’t lie, and neither could a level 2, if Zhenyi had upgraded him illegally.

  Kepler stood up. He breathed deeply, then turned back to the table. Was the food also biologically generated? Nothing here would surprise him now.

  “Please have a seat,” said the butler, pulling out the only chair.

  Kepler walked around the table and accepted the invitation. The butler pushed the chair in. The wood creaked as he sat down.

  In front of him stood a large plate and a glass. It was a simple drinking glass, transparent, a narrow cylindrical shape holding a colorless liquid. He picked it up and took a sip. It contained cool, clear water with almost no taste. On the plate were mixed vegetables and half a roasted fowl, probably a chicken, but Kepler wasn’t sure. In the last few kilocycles he had nourished himself bio-optimally. The chicken could also be a pigeon or a duck. He could no longer remember the actual size of these terrestrial animals. This knowledge was most likely among the memories he had externalized. It was the only way to stop the memory load over so many megacycles from gradually poisoning his brain.

  He reached for the cutlery. A fork and knife lay on either side of his plate. He carefully sliced off a piece of the animal flesh, pushed it into his mouth, and closed his eyes. It was chicken, there was no mistaking it. He hadn’t forgotten that flavor. He chewed thoroughly and swallowed, then opened his eyes again.

  “This is chicken,” he said.

  “Very good, Johannes,” answered the butler. “You’re the first guest in a long time who’s recognized it.”

  Johannes, again. Oh well, he couldn’t help it. Kepler was amused in spite of himself at the way the butler praised him like one would praise a small child.

  “Is it... from Terra?” he asked.

  The butler smiled. “No. You know yourself that’s not possible.”

  Kepler nodded. Terra had been dead for megacycles. The organic material of the chicken would long since have decomposed. Nanofabricators must have manufactured it here on K2-288Bb.

  “But the wood?”

  “That was a happy coincidence.”

  “Coincidence?”

  “A ninety-niner had a cargo of wood. The ship had made a complete circuit of the Milky Way, but the wood had hardly aged. Zhenyi bought it.”

  That was a more or less believable explanation. At 99 percent of the speed of light, time passes very slowly. But this wood must have enormous value—and his friend was simply burning it?

  “Why doesn’t Zhenyi build something out of it?” he asked.

  “I can’t speak for my owner. But this table is built from the wood. I have instructions to ensure the utmost comfort of the guests.”

  “Thank you, I’m honored,” said Kepler.

  He wouldn’t get any more than that out of the butler. Butler AIs were optimized to evade uncomfortable questions. Instead he concentrated on the food. The chicken was genuinely delicious. The fibers of the meat almost melted on his tongue. The skin was browned and had a pleasant aroma. The combination of vegetables perfectly enhanced the flavor with herbs and sweet notes.

  Kepler pushed back the chair. His plate was empty.

  “It was a real pleasure,” he said.

  The butler bowed, then passed him a moist napkin. Kepler wiped his mouth and hands with it.

  “I didn’t want to bother you while you were eating, but the ninety-niner that you’ve been expecting has announced it will be arriving tomorrow.”

  Finally an end to all the waiting, Kepler thought. He took a deep breath in, then slowly let it out. This body was per
fect, but he had been getting tired of it, especially in the last few days. He didn’t feel at home in it.

  “Thank you very much for the meal,” Kepler said with a faint bow. “I’ll go to my room now.”

  “Of course. I’ll wake you in plenty of time before the ship arrives.”

  Cycle YA7.4, K2-288Bb

  Kepler opened the airlock hatch with a forceful shove. The moisture in the air froze immediately and rose as white vapor. He climbed up the short ladder. By the second step the skin on his hands was already discolored. First it turned white, then gray. Then the skin froze. No wonder, at an exterior temperature of minus 180 degrees. Kepler switched off the pain sensors. He didn’t have time now for ancient biological sensitivities.

  The surface was in perpetual twilight. The planet orbited in a captured rotation around its star, K2-288B, which hung like a dim lamp above him. The disk of the sun was big in the sky, but no longer gave off much heat. Many gigacycles ago this planet must have been in the habitable zone. But now it was dead, and so cold that even the atmosphere had frozen, spread across the surface in a blanket of snow and ice.

  His lungs were stinging. He needed to be more careful! Kepler stopped breathing. It would be stupid if this body failed before he had reached the ship. He would wake up in another replacement body, but he would have wasted precious time. He had failed to really appreciate it for so long. Time. If you’re immortal, it doesn’t hold much meaning. But that had changed since he found out that the end was coming.

  Kepler walked across the dry snow, which crunched under his feet with each step. His body conducted the sound, which he otherwise wouldn’t be able to sense with no atmosphere. The soles of his athletic shoes were thin. He put his right hand into his pants pocket. That wasn’t a good idea, because the skin on the back of his hand came away, revealing the gleaming blue metal underneath. It always disgusted him to see his surrogate body in this state.

  The ship came into view. It looked like a huge tin can. It had left its interstellar propulsion system in orbit. For safety reasons it had landed a short distance away from Zhenyi’s home. Humans were infallible, but they hadn’t managed to transfer this quality to the things they built. That was the dilemma of the times—and of past gigacycles. Kepler was frequently preoccupied with these kinds of thoughts. It was a problem that humans shared with the God from the Bible. No creation can be considered perfect if you don’t acknowledge that you’re too stupid to recognize perfection. This led to only two possible conclusions—either there was no God, or God was one of them. For some reason he preferred the second possibility.

  “Hello Kepler,” called the ship’s AI in a female voice. “Nice of you to greet us personally.”

  Us? Had the AI split? That sometimes happened when ships were underway too long, but more commonly on ninety-fivers, where the onboard time went much slower. Interstellar transporters were usually equipped with at least a level 3 AI. They were much more adaptable, but also more sensitive.

  “Well, say something, Kepler,” the AI admonished him. “It’s impolite not to reply.”

  “I was just thinking about the us.”

  “Come on, Kepler, don’t you recognize us?”

  He was confounded. He had never taken an interest in which AIs controlled which ships. He was only concerned with the cargo. What’s up with this AI?

  “Kepler, don’t you remember the Convention at Sagittarius A* at all?”

  A ship’s AI asking him about the Convention, where it had been decided to end the universe? Then it occurred to him. Of course! There were two people who had set themselves up onboard a ninety-niner. The Curies! But were they also using it as a transporter?

  “Marie, Pierre, is that you?”

  “Man, it took long enough for the penny to drop,” said a male voice.

  He recognized Pierre Curie’s voice. He had given a speech at the Convention.

  “Excuse me,” said Kepler. “I hadn’t expected you two to be carrying out transport orders.”

  “It just happened to work out that way. We wanted to speak with you anyway, and this way you pay us for the trip.”

  “I understand. It must have been an enormous coincidence, you seeing my order on HR8799b. Does Zhenyi know about your visit?”

  “We’ve been following you for a while, Kepler. You change systems so often it’s as though you’re on the run. We haven’t yet reached Zhenyi. She must be underway somewhere in the direction of the galactic center.”

  “What was it you wanted from me?” Kepler asked.

  “We’ll explain that over a good red wine. We always have a few bottles in our luggage.”

  “Agreed.”

  A hatch opened in the ship just above the ground. Kepler only noticed because vapor was pouring out of it, tinted red by the sun. He moved closer. Two rectangular objects emerged side by side. They were lying on a thin trestle that had many small, jointed legs. The objects walked their way over to him. The movement looked so absurd—like a cockroach in high heels—that he had to laugh, even though it wasn’t the first time he’d seen it.

  “That’s right, laugh at us,” said Marie Curie.

  The objects walked past him. They seemed to know where the airlock was located. He moved quickly, which was sweaty work in this high gravity, caught up with them, and then walked beside the second one. Without the strange little legs, the things would look like Snow White coffins. They seemed to be made of glass or some other semi-transparent substance. But the material was so milky that the contents couldn’t be made out. Which of the two caskets contained the cargo he had been awaiting for so long?

  Next to the personnel airlock, another much bigger hatchway had opened. In the center of it was a platform. The two caskets positioned themselves on it and traveled downwards. Kepler climbed down the ladder into the airlock. He had to wait for it to fill with air. He scratched impatiently at the dead skin on his hand. He should leave it alone, but his excitement was building.

  Finally, the door opened. He started breathing again. The air was so warm and moist it made him feel sick. Why hadn’t he noticed that before? The butler beckoned him and led him into the living room. The table was no longer there. The two caskets stood in its place. He arrived just in time to see the left-hand casket open with a squelching sound.

  A fit-looking, naked, male torso rose up out of it. The skin was almost without pigment. There was no hair on its head. The creature looked around, then pulled a tube out of its forearm and removed the sensors stuck to its chest. It cleared its throat, but didn’t say anything. Then it supported itself on the edge of the casket and stood up, while the little, thin legs of the casket bent at the knees. Its lower half was also naked. There were no genitalia, or at least none that Kepler could make out. He had never seen the Curies like this. He blushed involuntarily. A primitive reaction, he thought. But they could have said something if my presence bothered them.

  The creature climbed skillfully out of the casket. It was slightly smaller than he was. Kepler tried to compare his memories of Pierre Curie with the image of this naked being, but couldn’t. Hadn’t the Curies participated at the Convention in another body? He couldn’t remember anymore.

  “First of all we’ll take a shower,” said the Curies in Pierre’s voice. “And you’ll obviously need some time to unpack your consignment.”

  Kepler had to tear his eyes away from the naked form that Pierre and Marie Curie shared. It made absolute sense economically. They only needed to maintain one body. But he wouldn’t have been able to do it. Another voice in your head—that must be horrible. The Curies had been a couple for gigacycles, but that time surely hadn’t gone by without conflict. And if they had an argument neither would be able to leave the star system to temporarily escape the other!

  The door closed loudly. He was alone. Kepler went and stood beside the second casket. A delicate moment lay ahead of him. How long had he been waiting now to be reunited? He had reached K2-228Bb at the speed of light. He always used a laser
transfer when he traveled, even though it was very expensive. But that meant he had to wait longer at the destination, because only the data containing his consciousness could be moved at light speed, not his physical body.

  He operated two old-fashioned levers mounted one on either side of the casket. Then the lid rose and he was looking himself in the face. It seemed wrong, as though left and right had been reversed, but that was how it should appear to him, as this wasn’t a mirror image but the original. Before him lay Johannes Kepler, or to be precise, his flesh shell, cloned however many times from his own cells. He had chosen the name himself, ages ago. It was his body and therefore himself. Like most humans, he found it difficult to live outside his shell for long periods, as unsuitable as it may be for survival in space. And now he’d been stuck far too long in this robot.

  “Butler, please prepare the transfer,” he said.

  “Of course, Johannes.” He pronounced the ‘J’ correctly. Had he finally repaired his vocalizer?

  A door opened to his left. The butler came in with a couple of cables. Kepler opened his shirt.

  “We need to repair those hands,” said the butler. “Did you go outside without a suit?”

  Kepler nodded.

  “You realize that it will mean your death after the transfer?”

  “Of course. This isn’t my first time.”

  “Good. I’m obliged to point that out to you. It’s protocol.”

  The butler attached sensors to Kepler’s chest and temples. Then he guided a cable into his ear. It tickled. The butler then connected the cables to the body in the casket. “That’s it,” he said. “You can start the transfer.”

  “Thank you,” Kepler replied.

  The butler left. Kepler deactivated the robot’s skeletal system so it wouldn’t collapse and be damaged. Then he summoned the body’s vital signs into his field of vision. The body temperature was 32 degrees, the heart was beating once per minute. Going in would be uncomfortable. There was a reason the Curies preferred traveling in their shared body.