John Though's blog

The Challenger’s FTL engines had done their job. They were now inactive and venting the massive amount of heat they had produced as a by-product of the jump. The retro-thrusters had now switched on and were gently reducing the forward momentum of the ship. In the cockpit, Dr Ana Smith leaned back slightly to compensate for the inertia. She remembered being scared before the first jump, despite her detailed understanding of the workings of a FTL engine. Theory could never prepare one for dealing with the primordial fear of death after all. But after a thousand jumps over the course of a month, it felt just as commonplace as starting her car on Earth.

She waited patiently for the ship to come to a complete stop. Ideally, FTL engines produced no residual velocity after their use. They simply jumped a ship from point A to point B. But Humanity was still new to these engines and some inefficiencies were inevitable. Besides, the bigger problem to solve was the very limited range of the FTL engines. The maximum jump distance they could achieve was limited by the heat produced by the engines and the burst of energy required to power them. Their present journey had taken close to a month and a thousand jumps. And considering the fact that they only had three months’ worth of supplies on the ship, two-thirds of their available operational time would be spent travelling to and from their destination.

But the mission was worth it. This was Humanity’s first foray into intergalactic space and Ana was lucky enough to have been chosen as the Science Officer for the mission. No amount of inconvenience from the adolescent FTL engines could dampen her pride. To her left, the leader of the mission, Capt. John James thumbed the knob that activated the specially built Gamma ray scanners to scan their surroundings for Baryonic clouds of matter. But the scanner found nothing. For a minute, it seemed like Humanity had sent a state-of-the-art spaceship halfway to the milky way’s closest neighbour only to find nothing but empty space.

But Ana was far more optimistic. She was a scientist. She would have celebrated if an unusual looking space rock had hit the viewport in front of them! Ana asked the captain to switch to the laser sensors. He complied and they saw the virtual representation of the scanner’s beam move across the cockpit’s viewport as it started scanning their surroundings. The system tracked matter in its surroundings by firing a high-powered laser into it. Whenever the laser encountered matter, even gaseous matter spread out sparsely over the vast vacuum of intergalactic space, it would be at least partially reflected. The receiver on board the ship would then use the time taken for the reflection to be visible to calculate the distance to the found matter.

But something was wrong. The reflection was too bright. It almost looked like the laser was igniting something. The captain increased the reverse thrusters to make sure they didn’t hit…whatever they were on course to hit. The laser continued its dance across the viewport, creating dazzling lines of radiant white luminescence across their fields of view. All three crewmembers stood mesmerized by the display long after the ship had fully stopped, now only a Kilometre away from the cloud of unidentified matter. It seemed they had found their Dark Matter, whatever it was.

*

Ana watched from the cockpit as the captain and her other crew mate, Lt. Generic Name spacewalked their way to the wall of undefined matter that stood between them and the rest of the universe. Alone in the dark and cavernous spaceship for the first time since the start of their journey, she could not help but feel a little apprehensive. Her crewmates were gliding their way towards a wall of mystery matter which did not in any way resemble their theoretical expectation of dark matter. Selfishly, the first thought that came into her mind was how she would make her way back home if something did happen to her crewmates. She knew enough about the ship to pilot it back home. All three of them did. This scenario had been an integral part of their training and the appropriate procedures, which involved saving the ship and everyone on board at the expense of anyone caught outside, had been drilled into them repeatedly. Remembering this part of her training eased her guilt a little. Maybe the reason why this was her first thought was because she had been explicitly trained to think this way.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the captain’s voice coming over the radio. The suit readings showed her that they were only a hundred metres away from the wall.

“We are on final approach to the site. Cannot make out any detail yet, “said the captain over the radio. After a few seconds of silence, he continued,” the wall seems to be shimmering. I think the wall is moving. “

She leaned in closer to the screen, squinting her eyes at the live feed for clarity. She was about five centimetres away from the screen when the captain yelled. Ana jumped backwards in shock at the sound and felt her throat constrict. Before she could take a breath and clear her throat, the lieutenant echoed his commanding officer’s yell, startling her even further. She managed to choke out a request for a status report but it was a minute before the captain replied.

“It’s not a wall. They are moving. They look like jellyfish. “

She could see that now. Whatever they were, they were almost completely transparent except for a few small milky spots, making it hard to identify their shape and size. But just then, the lieutenant moved past the captain and the beam of his flashlight contrasted against the latter’s and highlighted a specimen.

It looked amoeboid in nature. A circular organism with a flat front. It looked like a transparent red blood cell. It was still hard to make out the finer details of the organism due to its transparency but the basic shape was clear. Most of the movement of the creature came from the edges of its body, which seemed to be shimmering. Especially when one of the torches shone directly on them.

Ana stared open-mouthed at the screen. Life, and specifically life of such variety, was something she had never imagined she would find in space. Although she was not one for sensationalism, she would have been less surprised to see little grey aliens than a bunch of microbial looking organisms. Consequently, she stood slack-jawed and uncertain about what to do next.

There could be no doubt that it was alive. The organism looked like an image from a microbiology text book enlarged and brought to life. Of course, it was far from micro, and seemed to be close to fifty centimetres in width and of an unknown, visually indeterminate thickness. It was also surrounded by multitudes of its kind. The living wall of organisms covered the entire viewport of the ship and seemed to extend out into infinity.

The two spacewalkers floated around indecisively, unsure of what to do in this unforeseen scenario. Ana tried to help but no command escaped her lips when she opened them. She was an astrophysicist, not a biologist! She had no knowledge of the protocols involved in interacting with alien micro… macro-organisms. The spacewalkers ultimately decided to setup their cameras close to the wall and made their way back to discuss their next course of action.

They had come looking for dark matter in a quest to explain why the universe seemed to be expanding faster than they had expected. Instead, they had somehow found life in the cold vacuum of space.

*

A few days later, the airlock opened once again to deposit the two spacewalkers and their cargo into space. Back in the ship, Ana reflected on their solitude. She had always known that they would be alone on their journey, of course. But her situation had been infinitely more bearable when she was only faced with the prospect of studying inanimate matter. But present circumstances had given her pause and had left her floating in her own personal abyss of intellectual insecurity within the literal abyss that was outer space. She was especially ashamed of her hesitation yesterday. To compensate for her inadequacy and to make up for lost time, she had sent the spacewalkers out with all the instruments they had available.

The captain and lieutenant floated in front of the closest specimen of the organisms as they waited for their equipment to reach them. Every now and then, a single organism, or cell or whatever this was, would break formation and isolate itself. This was temporary and all such specimens of the cell/organism/creature would eventually rejoin the wall. All except for this particular specimen, which would have the honour of being their test subject.

The lieutenant gently pushed the ultrasound scope towards the organism. They had tried their laser sensors but those still refused to give out proper measurements because of the creature’s transparency. This scope was the only option they had to map the topography of the creature. Fortunately, the device was state of the art and had been designed to precisely manoeuvre and land on asteroids. It made its measured way towards the organism and attached its sensors to surface. The process took only a few milliseconds and at the end, they had a complete internal map of the organism.

Back on the ship, Ana looked at the 3d model of the organism’s internals. They still couldn’t tell if it was a single celled or multi-cellular organism. They would have to get samples for that. But they now knew that the creature was mostly filled with a clear gel-like substance. There were also some small spherical shapes floating with the gel. These were opaquer than the gel and likely had some greater purpose in the functioning of the organism considering their physical differences. The flat faces of the organism were completely smooth. Whereas all around the perimeter of its circular disc, were tiny noodle-like tentacles. Their purpose was yet unknown, but they knew from their surveillance that the shimmering generated by the creatures was due to the movement of these filaments.

The spacewalkers had now begun the second phase of their trip. Getting tissue samples from the creatures. There were a few problems they had needed to consider before taking this step. Not the least of which was the question of sentience. If the creatures were sentient, sticking a big needle into their flesh would likely not make them happy.

They had discussed the question of sentience before, but the captain was still not convinced. He hailed the lieutenant and motioned him to wait while he talked to Ana.

Back in the cockpit, Ana was a little surprised when the captain’s voice came over the radio. “Doctor, are you sure there is no chance that these creatures are sentient, “he asked.

Ana had debated this question internally for hours. She had questioned herself thoroughly enough to the point that she had condensed her ideas into bullet points. She relayed these points to the captain.

“First of all, I didn’t say that it was impossible that these creatures could be sentient. Only that it was unlikely. As for my reasons for thinking so, consider the following points. “

“Point number one, “she continued while pointlessly holding up a single finger for the benefit of the empty cockpit, “these creatures do not show any outward signs of intelligence nor have they reacted to our presence so far. “

“Neither do most teenagers, “rebutted the captain.

Ana hissed at the interruption, but also could not help but see his point. She continued,

“Point two. They do not seem to communicate or interact with each other. We rarely see them move towards or away from each other. They seem to behave more like a colony in that respect. “

“Neither do most of my neighbours in my apartment building. I’ve lived there for three years and I still don’t know most of their names. “

Ana grumbled at the further interruption, but she could again see the validity of his point. She moved on to the third and most significant point.

“Point three. They do not seem to be violent. “

“Hmm… Alright, that is pretty inhuman. Ok, so they are probably not sentient. But even if they are just animals, they are still not going to appreciate us sticking big painful looking needles into them. “

“What are your worried about? Your suits can withstand explosions without failing. It can take whatever these creatures can throw at you, “replied Ana consolingly.

The captain knew all that. He was after all, more familiar with the suit systems than Ana. But ultimately, it would not be her sticking the needle in. So, despite her reassurances, he was still not sure what they were doing was particularly safe.

That was why the captain wasn’t too surprised when a burst of electricity arced out of the creature and hit the lieutenant’s spacesuit the moment his needle penetrated it. He was surprised by the mode of response though. He had simply expected the creature to try and sting his companion with its tentacles and maybe float away. He was still comparing the creature to a jellyfish in his mind. Still, electricity was an odd choice. And not very effective considering that the creature had been eviscerated by it. Or by the needle itself, the captain was not too sure. Pools of gel were now floating away from the mess that had so recently been a living space creature. It was while he was thus contemplating the fragility of life that he realized he had spent thirty seconds floating still instead of trying to help his companion. He cursed himself and made his way to the immobile spacesuit of the lieutenant.

He approached the still spacesuit of the lieutenant and peered into the visor. The first thing he looked at was the reboot light on the visor screen. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw it flashing steadily. The suit was fine and would reboot safely within a few seconds. He looked up to see the lieutenant looking at him with a sheepish smile on his face. They could not communicate via the radio while the lieutenant’s suit was unpowered but they did not have to. They had been in worse situations before and soon, this incident would be nothing more than a funny memory.

But back in the ship, Ana was chewing her fingernails in panic. She had not been in worse situations and she definitely would not be laughing at this memory anytime soon. It was her idea to biopsy the creatures and her guilt was not letting her ignore that. She could see from the life support monitor in the cockpit that the lieutenant’s suit was rebooting safely but that wasn’t enough to calm her.

She anxiously hailed the captain and asked, “Come in, captain. Is he ok? Please tell me that there was no damage. “

“Oh yeah, he’s fine. Suit protected him from the shock. There, it has even finished rebooting. Say hi to the doctor, lieutenant. “

“Hi to the doctor, doctor, “joked the lieutenant reassuringly.

“Alright, that’s enough probing for today. Please come back immediately so we can give you a check-up, “demanded Ana anxiously.

“Well, “said the captain, “since it does not look like we can get any tissue samples with these instruments, we might as well. Come on, lieutenant, we’ll make sure you get a medal for this when we get back home. “

*

After their humiliating defeat by a space blob, the three crew members of the USC Challenger sat in their canteen, eating their high-tech dried rations and taking comfort in the fact that the space jellies likely never got to eat something so delicious. The lieutenant had been scanned by the medical drone and was declared unchanged and unharmed. But their problems still remained. They needed a way to get tissue samples of the creatures to figure out their nature. From their surveillance footage, they had seen that the creature had disintegrated when punctured, likely due to explosive decompression from its internal pressure. If they wanted to safely extract samples from the creatures, they would need to get them inside the ship’s atmosphere before trying again.

A few days later, the spacewalkers emerged for round two against the blobs. They had modified a cargo container by replacing one of its sides with a polymer window to act as an observation port. They had also attached thrusters to the corners to help guide the container towards the creatures and capture a specimen. The container was also electrically shielded to prevent any damage in case its occupant decided to shock it like before. They headed towards the closest isolated specimen they could find and began the procedure. The captain aimed his targeting tool at the creature’s centre and waited patiently while the container obeyed his order. It fixed its orientation and moved forwards, swallowing the creature inside its open doors. The two spacewalkers took a minute to congratulate themselves on the successful expedition, left the container behind and made their way back. The container itself made the journey back to the ship as slowly as possible, a precaution to make sure the creature didn’t bump into its sides too violently.

The container finally reached the ship after seventeen hours in transit to cover a distance of two kilometres, making it the third best delivery service in the known galaxy. But whatever temporary joy the crewmates felt at this faster than expected delivery soon vanished when they found that the container had returned empty. Making it only the seventh best delivery service in the known galaxy. Upon further inspection, they found that the creature had not vanished, but rather, had turned into a small puddle at the bottom of the container. Ok, sixth best.

“Why did it die this time, “asked the irate captain who was really beginning to get tired of these creatures and their shenanigans.

 “I don’t know! It’s turned into a paste. It looks like it fell off a tall… oh… gravity… of course, “realized Ana.

“What?” asked the captain.

“The ship has gravity. The creatures are floating in near zero gravity. And they don’t seem very dense. I think what happened to this creature is exactly what would happen to us if we dived into the Mariana’s trench. Gravity pulled it to the ground and crushed the poor thing. “

There was a minute of silence while they both contemplated the ooze that was the last remnant of an extraordinary living creature. The captain broke the silence.

“Man, I hope they were not sentient. Or we are screwed!”

“Indeed, it would be a shame to come this far only to bring death on a seemingly peaceful species. “

“I meant we have no guns on this ship. Or smallpox. “

Ana didn’t know how to respond to this, so she gave him a look and walked away.

The captain stayed back and decided to check on the goo. He donned his hazard suit and started pressurising the container. But as he stood there watching the container fill with air, he saw the ooze start to boil but before he could do anything, it had completely vaporized.

“Goddamnit, what sort of sciency-wiency bullshit was that! And right after I spent twenty minutes getting into the damn suit. “

He sealed the doors of the container and walked away grumbling to himself.

*

“You know, “remarked the lieutenant as Ana made preparations for the next round of capture the creature, “when I was a young boy, we had a powerful senator visit our small town. It seemed like the biggest event in our town’s history at the time. I remember my brother John being unable to sleep from the excitement of it all. And yet, it seems like we are jumping through far more hoops for this space bug than for the senator. “

“Well firstly, the space bug isn’t a chronic liar and is therefore more deserving of our attention. Secondly, did you just say that your brother is named John?”

“Well, it’s certainly lying to us about wanting to be alive. And yes, my brother is named John. “

“Then why on earth are you named Generic?”

“Hmm, oh, me and my brothers are triplets. And I was the youngest one. And it is almost impossible to come up with three names at once.”

At first the claim sounded ridiculous. Then Ana tried to disprove it and only managed to come up with John and Jack.

The lieutenant continued, “You know, you are first person to ask me how I got my name. I never get to tell that story. “

Ana gave him a look and continued with her work. The space bugs were indeed turning out to be bad house guests. They would need to make sure the next one would not perish the moment it entered the Challenger. Their plan was to turn off the gravity to a single module of the ship, the research module to be specific, by stopping its spin. The ship had been designed with multiple rings of modules so that their gravity and life support systems could be individually controlled in emergencies. They would also cool the air in the observation room within the research module to make sure the creature didn’t evaporate or boil due to the heat.

The latter was already done and Ana was working on setting up the former. The captain was currently preparing the space suits that all three crewmates would be wearing this time. When that was done and they were ready, they would try the experiment again. Ana grumbled as she unlocked the controls for the centrifuge and enabled the override function for later. She was an Astro-physicist, not a biologist. She did not have enough experience with the protocols for studying new species and was displeased with how badly she was doing. Her failure at her task had even robbed her of some of the excitement she would normally have felt upon such a discovery. How on earth was she struggling with this when even a simple plant nerd could do it!

Just as she finished changing the gravity settings, the captain came in and informed her that the suits were ready. Once again, the two men would go to retrieve the creature, but this time Ana would also be using a space suit to observe it in the cold, zero-gravity observation room.

*

It took a day to get the next specimen into the observation room. As she stood waiting outside the observation room for the airlock to safely open, she looked at the creature floating placidly within its container. Their surveillance cameras had recorded the motion of some solitary specimens that had previously separated from the group as they made their way back to the wall. They clearly had methods of locomotion, but the crew had been unable to figure out what that was. The airlock finished cycling and let her into the atmosphere-free room. Up close, the resemblance to jellyfish was even more striking. Although they were not shaped like classic jellyfishes, they did have the ethereal, weightless aspect that one would associate with their terrestrial lookalikes. They even seemed to glow a little, although that was likely due to the lighting of the room.

In such close proximity to alien life, Ana could not help but be lost in a sense of wonder. Although biology was not her passion, she could still appreciate the gravity of their situation. Perhaps, if they were not so short on time, she could have spent a few days spacewalking near the wall and just observing these ethereal creatures in their natural habitat. She had always been interested in deep sea diving back on Earth, and this was a significantly more exciting prospect than the already magnificent endless vistas at the depths of Earth’s oceans. But her duty came first. She would have to be as clinical as she could to make sure they captured all the information they could about these creatures. But she could not help but feel a sense of lost opportunity. It was unlikely, considering the nature of their discovery, that she would be back here again. As a child, she had dreamed of visiting the endless abyss of space, and floating peacefully in its all-encompassing embrace. But here she was, so many decades later, staying within the ship and focusing on her work while eternity stretched its inviting hands towards her. Whatever happened, she grimly promised herself, she would go on a spacewalk. No matter how unnecessary.  

Laying her daydreams to a rest, she turned up the lights within the room to laboratory levels and began her experiments. Ana knew that the creature was incredibly fragile and prone to evisceration. She had consequently decided to start her experimentation by performing all of the non-invasive tests she could think of before she even considered probing the creature with her needle. Unable to resist the thought, she started wondering if the creature had an anus. Then she wondered why that was her first thought in this situation. Maybe there was truth to the legends of alien encounters involving probing that were so prevalent on Earth. Maybe it was impossible for a sentient being to leave an unviolated anus to its own devices.

The first test she ran was an electrical activity test using the remote Electrographs that had been installed in the ship to monitor the crew’s well-being. It was designed to be used on Human brains to monitor their activity but it would have to do for now. Most of the equipment she would be using in her experiments would be similarly designed for use on Humans. Since their mission was to monitor inanimate matter, they hadn’t brought the complex devices required to research organic matter with them. They had to make do with what they had. The device in question was easy enough to use and just involved pointing at the subject and clicking a button to generate a visualization of the electrical activity within it. She did just that and was greeted with a subdued light show.

Faint electrical impulses cycled all throughout the creature, especially in the transparent gel section that made up most of the creature. Swirls and wisps of light danced across the Electrograph screen in a mesmerizing display that reminded her of some bioluminescent deep-sea creatures back on Earth. As she watched the signals, she realized that electrical activity in some regions of the creature was actually stronger than the electrical impulses produced by the Human brain. She wondered why these signals were so strong. One possible reason for this could be that the creature was actually intelligent. But the creature exhibited none of the other characteristics of intelligence. It was hard to believe that creatures that lived in an endless colony in space and exhibited no complex activity other than floating aimlessly could be capable of intelligence. But it couldn’t be fully ignored. After all, they could be the space equivalent of Human teenagers.

As she continued looking at the screen though, a pattern began to emerge. She had seen eddy currents like these before. She spent a few minutes straining her mind until the realization finally hit her. They looked like the currents that were produced in metals when they were hit with radiation. She could tell from experience that these eddies were much bigger than the ones produced in metals, but the similarity was still very striking.

Her pulse quickened with the thrill of discovery as she contemplated the source of energy these creatures could use. This far out in space, far away from any major sources of heat or chemicals, the only abundant source of energy was cosmic radiation.

Was this it then. Had she actually managed to find her dark matter. She had come all this way for one primary reason. To figure out why the universe seemed to be expanding too quickly. Humanity’s observations of distant galaxies had revealed that distant stars and galaxies were moving away too fast from each other. But this was at odds with the rate of expansion of space that was observed by other experimental means. This question had troubled her and her peers for a long time.

But as she now realized, the apparent speeds of distant galaxies had been calculated by measuring the distance of these objects from the Earth. Which in turn was calculated using the intensity of radiation and light received from these bodies on Earth. But what if the radiation had been partially absorbed by these creatures on its way to the planet. What if light from these stars and galaxies had been refracted by them or even blocked by the translucent spheres that floated within these creatures. That could also lead to the drop in intensity and brightness that was currently attributed to dark matter.

She was beginning to get excited now and started pacing the room. At least she thought she was, for she was too deep in thought to realize that she was actually floating in the observation room. But she didn’t care as her mind raced towards the possibilities. Sure, it was not ideal that the solution would turn out to be biological instead of cold-soft matter, but it was still an amazing discovery. So amazing that she could even tolerate having to interact with a plant nerd when they further explored this species. She could almost smell the Nobel prizes.

But when her helmet hit the top of the observation room, she was figuratively brought back down to Earth. She realized that she had been floating vacantly in mid space, talking to herself and looking like an idiot. She turned around towards the airlock to see the lieutenant staring slack-jawed at her with befuddlement through the viewing port. She quickly corrected her orientation and continued with her task.

IF her theory was correct, and she had realized just how big of an IF that was when she managed to control her imagination, she would still need to measure it. She would have to prove that these creatures absorbed radiation and light. To do that, she would need to find a way to quantify the amount or portion of radiation that this creature could absorb. And if she could figure that out, it would also likely prove that these creatures were feeding on the cosmic radiation of the universe. What else was there to feed on in the vast abyss of space?

But the problem she would face presented itself almost immediately as she looked out of the observation window present in the room. From the observation room, she had a view of the massive wall of life that stretched out and blocked their progress further into the depths of space. And although they hadn’t been able to measure the thickness of said wall, they could tell just from visual observation that it was quite thick. Who knew how many organisms thick it was? If it was only a few dozen specimens thick, that was fine. But if there were thousands of them stretched out in front of them, it would mean that each individual only absorbed a very small amount of radiation and light. An amount that she was not sure she could accurately measure with the equipment she had available.

She would ideally have liked to use the stronger and more precise instruments she had back on Earth to measure the amount of radiation these creatures, but those instruments were still back on Earth. This was not by choice, but rather the limitations of their technology. Their ships needed massive engines to perform a warp and on top of that, could only transport relatively small payloads. So, they had left all of their bulky equipment behind and brought only the basic necessities for capture and catalogue operations. This mission had been designed to collect and catalogue samples and bring them back for analysis. But how could she capture one of these creatures and bring it back to Earth when it seemed to collapse under any gravity. She was not even sure if the creature could survive the gravitational force within Earth’s solar system, let alone the gravity on Earth. But this at least, she could find out. The ship’s centrifuge was capable of producing low g-forces by spinning at slower speeds which would allow her test out the creature’s tolerance to gravity. But that experiment would take time to set up, so she decided to get back to taking samples of the creature.

*

Ana had learned from the captain’s experience and was better prepared this time. The observation room was already atmosphere free and shielded from all external radiation. But they still couldn’t pierce the creature’s skin without eviscerating it in a vacuum. To prevent such accidents, they had hooked up the container to a refrigeration system which could pump it full of cold helium, mimicking the temperature of the creature’s ecosystem. The helium was cooled to a temperature of minus two hundred and sixty-five degrees Celsius, which was the lowest temperature their refrigeration equipment could produce. This would prevent the creature from either exploding from decompression or evaporating from the relatively high temperatures of the Human atmosphere. To prevent crushing the creature, the pressure was kept low. About a quarter of the intensity of Earth’s atmosphere. The biopsy would be conducted by a biopsy drone that was already inside the container. She started the process.

She issued the appropriate command to the drone and it quickly moved forward and inserted its needle into the creature. So far so good. It then extracted a sample and retracted the needle without the creature blowing up. So further even better.  But just as she was about to celebrate, she noticed that the creature’s insides were slowly continuing to trickle out of the hole left by the needle. She was starting to take this personally. At this point, she was not sure if these creatures were dying just to piss her off. But thankfully, the biopsy robot had the capability to seal the wound and she commanded it to close the leak.

In the meantime, the tissue sampler that came with the drone was already analysing the samples taken from the creature. It took only a few minutes for the results to be available. The analysis showed that the gel contained no individual cells, ruling out the idea that the creature was multicellular. Instead, it was a hydro-carbon based gel with an incredibly low density and with trace amounts of iron sprinkled throughout. Much to her surprise, the drone also found traces of rudimentary amino acids and some basic proteins within the gel sample. Ana was surprised at the ease with which the drone had been able to identify these chemicals. It sparked an incredible thought within her mind. Her eyes opened wide at the implication but she calmed herself. She would need to analyse further before giving into elation.

But the drone was having much more trouble figuring out the nature of the translucent spots that floated within the gel. For one thing, it had been unable to grab any of the spots in its entirety due to their size and had instead taken small samples from them. These samples simply showed that the spots had a far higher concentration of carbon than the gel around them, but were understandably sparse on further enlightenment. Without extracting one of them whole, Ana knew they would not gain much information on the life processes of these creatures. But it was unlikely that they could do anything of the sort to the cell without killing or at least, severely damaging it. Now that she knew the organisms were single-celled however, she was feeling a lot less awful about that choice. She still didn’t want to needlessly harm the creature so she continued working on her non-invasive tests before deciding on that drastic step.

She finished the biopsy an hour later. Ana was momentarily lost as she tried to figure out her next course of action. She had finished the non-invasive tests and was trying to figure out if she had missed anything before starting the invasive procedures. She looked around to try and stimulate her mind. She looked at the wall of life that she knew stretched out in front of her and withheld from her, the mysteries of the outer universe. She turned around towards the airlock to see the lieutenant staring slack-jawed at her with befuddlement through the viewing port. But none of these sights helped her and she came up blank for now. The wheezing hum of the air conditioning system reminded her that cooling air to such low temperatures was pretty power intensive. She decided to call it a solar day and continue tomorrow after contemplating the problems at hand. They were already ten days into the month-long window they had for their experiments. At the end of the month, they would have to start the long journey back to Earth. She was feeling the pressure of time, but that fact failed to force her mind into activity. Sighing with shame, she reluctantly shut down the experiment and left the room.

*

Later, as the three of them sat in the mess hall, eating a delicious meal of tender ribs and fries, she discussed her progress with her crewmates.

“First of all, “said Ana as she nibbled on a rib-bone that was recently rehydrated from their powdered rations, “we need to figure out how they obtain the energy they need to survive. Next, we need to figure out how they move and how they got here in the first place. Thirdly, we need to figure out how many there are, and especially how thick the wall is. Lastly, and if I were a plant nerd this would likely be my main priority, we need to figure out how they reproduce. Those goddamn perverts! “

“And do you know how we can do any of that?” asked the captain.

“Not yet.”

“Hmm. Well, what do we know about them so far. What do we even call them? “

Ana was surprised that she hadn’t thought of that. She thought for a moment before responding,

“I don’t know. They are clearly unicellular and look similar to and likely function similar to species of amoeba found on planet Earth. But we are in space, not Earth. Which would make it a space amoeba. Maybe we can call it a spac…, a space…, a spaceb…”

The spark of brilliance was at the tip of her tongue and was struggling to break free from shackles of her mind and fulfil its purpose of illuminating the world. But she felt too weak under the weight of the idea’s brilliance to even utter it. But she managed to muster enough of her strength to give utterance to the magical word,

“Spaceba.”

But her moment of aristeia had drained her of her strength and she collapsed where she sat. Her unconscious head lolled forward and landed heavily on the soft tabletop. For a while, no-one spoke. Then the lieutenant let out an appreciative whistle and the captain exclaimed, “Damn, that’s a great name! How on earth did she come up with it so quickly? I cannot believe I was here to witness such a momentous occasion in Human history.”

“Me either! I think she’ll win a Nobel prize for that name. They’ll probably build statues of her, “exclaimed the lieutenant.

The quickly resuscitated her and after congratulating her on her feat of incredible genius, gave her a glass of water to drink. Half an hour later, she was rested and ready to continue her conversation with the captain.

“So, how will figure out what these Spaceba, “here he winked appreciatively at her, “consume? “

Ana accepted the compliment with pride and replied.

“I just had an epiphany regarding that while I was unconscious. We don’t actually need to measure a drop in radiation due to the creature. What we need to track, are changes in the creature itself when we target it with radiation. We have an Electrograph at our disposal. We can monitor electrical activity in the cell before and after impinging it with radiation and monitor the changes produced to prove my hypothesis. “

*

A couple of days of setup and preparation later, the experiment was ready. The ship had a small stockpile of radioactive material which it used as a reaction initiator for its fusion reactor. They had retrieved some of that and placed it in a radiation tight box within the container that housed the specimen. For this phase of the experiment, Ana wouldn’t even have to enter the observation room. With the benefit of his earlier experience configuring the biopsy drone, the lieutenant had managed to configure them to carry out the entire experiment remotely. Plus, the space-suit stank.

From the safety of the window outside the observation room, Ana watched with grateful nostrils as the drone opened the lid of the radioactive container. The box was attached to the floor on the left side of the container with the specimen. As soon as the box opened, the Electrograph lit up like a star. What had been a dull display of light had instantaneously become a bright explosion of electrical activity. The theory was clearly correct, but the speed at which it had been proved left Ana a little surprised. She looked at the captain to gauge his reaction, but he continued to stare unimpressed at the creature. She looked at the lieutenant and found him staring slack-jawed at something through the viewing port with befuddlement. She followed his gaze and uttered a gasp of surprise.

The creature was moving! It had tilted around its lateral axis and seemed to be slowly turning its flat face around towards the source of the radiation. Like a sunflower. The shimmering around its body had also intensified. Ana walked to a nearby console that was displaying a live feed from the biopsy drone and zoomed in to get a better look. The shimmering effect came from the filaments around the sides of the cell which were now fluttering rapidly. There was no air in the container so the motion of the filaments could produce no thrust, and yet the creature moved.

To monitor this recent change, Ana focused the Electrograph on these filaments and found nothing significant. The electric activity in these filaments had changed just like the rest of the creature. On a whim, she decided to switch the device from its Electrograph mode to its Magnetograph mode. Ana looked at the display and let out a squeal of excitement. She zoomed out to get a wider view.

A strong magnetic field now surrounded the creature with the magnetic lines of force emerging from the centre of the cell’s flat face and curving from one face to the other. It looked quite similar to the magnetic field of the planet Earth and it seemed to be used as a mode of locomotion. It was clear the field was used for navigation because as soon as the creature had fully turned its flat face towards the radiation, the filaments slowed their movement and the strength of the magnetic field started falling drastically.

“Hmm, “pondered Ana, “the motion of the filaments seems to control the intensity of the magnetic field around the creature. Most likely, the filaments are electrified and are generating the field in order to turn the creature. The magnetic field is resistant to radiation and moves to an orientation which provides the lowest amount of resistance when a source of radiation in imparted on it. In the cell’s case, the lowest resistance is on the flat face. Causing the cell to rotate in place until its flat face is facing the source. “

“Obviously, “replied the lieutenant unconvincingly.

“Yeees…” continued Ana, “likely an evolutionary adaptation to maximize the amount of energy it can capture. But that only explains how they turn, but not how they move translationally. I wonder if they use some related combination of electricity or magnetism for complex motion. “

“Naturally, “replied the lieutenant even less convincingly this time.

“Clearly some force is keeping them within the wall. The wall is neither collapsing in on itself, nor expanding outwards. “

“Maybe they are attracted to each other at a distance but repel each other when they are close so they don’t crash into each other, “muttered the lieutenant meekly under his breath.

“Wait, what was that, “asked Ana suddenly and loudly as she roughly grabbed the lieutenant by the arm.

“What was what, “exclaimed the startled lieutenant.

“What did you just say, “she asked while shaking him excitedly.

“Umm…Maybe they are attracted to each other…”

“No! Before that?”

“Naturally?”

Ana released the shocked lieutenant and wandered over to the viewport with a blank, faraway look on her face. She mumbled to herself.

“Naturally. Natural forces. Forces in nature. Like ionic forces or, gasp, van der Waals’ forces!”

“Did you just say the word gasp “asked the captain incredulously.

“A van der Waals type interaction could explain why they move the way they do. The electrostatic field generated by the filaments would repel other cells at close ranges since they are all highly positively charged. Which would prevent any two cells from getting too close to each other and ultimately, also prevent the wall from collapsing under its own weight! “

“Did she just say the word gasp, instead of actually gasping, “asked the captain to the lieutenant.

“But what could account for the attractive component of the van der Waals forces that are keeping the cells from drifting apart into space. “

“Don’t magnets facing the same way pull each other closer? That could explain why they always get pulled back towards the group. Also, did you just say the word gasp instead of gasping, “asked the captain.

“That is indeed true. You raise a valid point, “agreed Ana before continuing, “I did say the word gasp instead of gasping. That is quite odd. But we still need to figure out how these cells stick together. Anyway, I don’t think we’ll be able to learn much more today. Shut down the experiment for now. “

She walked towards the exit to leave the room, but just as she reached the door, she realized something. The cells could be using their magnetic fields to create a force of attraction amongst themselves. If they were all feeding from the same source of radiation, then their poles would be aligned. And if any specimen was detached from the group, the positive poles of the larger group would exert an attraction force on the negative poles of the detached specimen. Thereby pulling it back to its original position. She was amazed at the speed with which she had come up with this brilliant idea. She gave herself a self-satisfied congratulatory pat on the back as she exited the room.

*

The spacewalkers once again exited the ship with a cargo container in tow, looking for hot singles in their area.

A single was the term they used to describe a specimen that had drifted away from the group.

They made a beeline towards the specimen they had picked out with their surveillance cameras. A lonely little thing that seemed to be begging for them to stick it in their container. And with no hidden or extra charges.

Because the specimen was far away from the wall, its electrical activity had reduced in intensity. This meant that it held less electrostatic charge on its surface, making it easier to handle. Hence the no extra charges thing.

Anyway, they would use this second slutty specimen to test out their theory about the locomotion of this species.

As they waited for the container to reach them, they both stopped close to the solitary creature and started to observe its movement. As they floated in the abyss of space, with home behind them and a massive wall of life between them and the further unknown, the lieutenant had a thought.

“I wonder if we could squeeze a Trieste drone through the wall? Those things have a range of a few hundred thousand kilometres so we should be able to get pretty far and hopefully, out the other side.”

“No, “replied the captain, “the electromagnetic interference would prevent us from properly guiding the thing. And the last thing we want is to lose a valuable drone to shock damage from these creatures. “

“Right, and I guess the radiation would also interfere with the drone’s autonomous exploration feature. Well, can’t we at least try and find out how wide the wall is? Maybe get the drone to fly alongside the wall to see how far it spreads and how much it curves?”

“That’s a good idea. Let me ask the doc. “He relayed his mate’s idea to the scientist.

“Yes, we could do that but we already know the wall is most likely cylindrical or spherical, “replied Ana while sipping on her herbal tea in the cockpit, “if it wasn’t covering our entire galaxy, we would have seen anomalies in the intensity of radiation across space. Well, it still wouldn’t hurt to confirm though. Alright, get back here with the specimen and we’ll discuss it. “

They acknowledged and continued waiting for the container. It had almost reached them, but in the meantime, the specimen had already observably moved back towards the wall. They had one more objective for their mission. Ana had asked them to take magnetograph measurements from space as the creature made its way back to the wall. When the container arrived, they pulled the magnetograph out of it and started scanning the creature from their position. Once that was done, they quickly captured the specimen and made their way back.

On their way back, they heard Ana’s excited voice over the radio, “I figured out why these specimens are so docile. The cargo containers are electromagnetically insulated, which is preventing any electromagnetic forces from interacting with the creature. That’s why they are so calm in there. “

They acknowledged the discovery and continued back.

*

A rotation of the planet that they had left so far behind later, Ana once again stood alone outside the observation room. The captain and lieutenant were busy working with the drones to map out the curvature of the wall. They would be attaching a laser rangefinder to the drone and flying it as far away as they could to map out the distance from the wall to the ship at multiple points. This would allow them to triangulate the radius of curvature of the wall and figure out if the wall could extend entirely around their galaxy.

She on the other hand, would be studying the interactions between these creatures to understand their locomotion. Both the specimens were now situated in the observation room in separate containers that faced each other.

At her command the doors to the containers opened and weak jets of cold air from recently attached vents pushed each specimen towards the other. But the force was still too much and the creatures were pushed too close to each other. With a large burst of electrostatic energy that saturated her electrograph and damaged its lenses, the specimens pushed each other away with remarkable ferocity until they hit the opposite walls of the containers and evolved from living creatures to inanimate piles of goo. Ana gave both the specimens a look and walked away grumbling.

*

Later in the canteen, as the crew feasted on a four-course meal involving amongst other things, venison, caviar and sushi, they discussed the progress of their individual experiments.

“…Around 1.2 million light years horizontally. The radius of curvature is far shorter along the vertical axis though. Seems to be around half a million light years on that axis. You were right, it looks like the wall is shaped like an ellipsoid, “stated the captain.

“Ellipsoidal on our side, “corrected Ana between mouthfuls of delicious caviar., “since we don’t know how it curves on the other side. “

“Right. What’s this I hear about the specimens dying, “he asked.

“Yeah, the repulsive force at such close range was too much and it splattered them against the walls. But on the bright side, we were able to measure the repulsive force they produced. And I managed to salvage one of the organelles, the uh, milky spots within the cells. “

“Oh yeah, learned anything from them?”
“Not yet, the computer’s analysing it at the moment. “

“Hmm. You want some of this cheesecake, “asked the captain whilst waving a plate full of it.
“No, I think I’ll have some ice-cream. You can toss the leftover cheesecake into the trash. “

“Anyway, once we are done with your present experiment, what will we have left to do? We have less than a week’s worth of time remaining to finish our mission. “

“Well, we’ve mostly figured out the biology of these creatures. But we still don’t know how they evolved or how they reproduce. Although I do have some theories on the latter. “

“Yeah, what’s your theory?”

She had been hoping for a chance to explain her theory and jumped at the opportunity with the relish of one who soon expects to be congratulated on their genius.

“Well, we know that the primary components of these creatures are Hydrogen, Carbon, Oxygen and trace amounts of Iron in that order of abundance. And since these creatures are single-celled, we can assume that they likely reproduce by cell division and duplicate themselves whenever they have acquired enough material for the process. Obviously, free matter is hard to find out here in intergalactic space so reproduction for this species would be a difficult and very slow process. However, there are some sources through which these creatures may get the matter they require. “

“Firstly, cosmic radiation itself contains complex matter like Carbon isotopes and even some Iron. Once these particles impact the creature, the gel within the creature slows them down and strips them of some of their energy. Most particles that make up cosmic rays would likely pass through with only a minor loss of energy. But since complex elements like carbon are relatively heavy, they may be completely stopped and captured by the gel. Which means these creatures could get their constituent materials from the very cosmic radiation that feeds them their energy. “

She paused for a while to let the crew absorb the information. But five minutes later, they still looked just as confused. She decided to continue with the second explanation.

“Now the first method is actually very unlikely to account for all of their matter requirements and I don’t think it sufficiently answers our question. “

Both men groaned loudly. “Well then why did you say it? You’ve confused the hell out of me and given poor Generic a headache, “exclaimed the captain.

“Alright, alright. The second, more likely option. We know from our observations that there are many different types of complex carbon compounds in space as a result of matter ejections from supernovas or other stellar activity. These compounds include Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons and Pseudo carbynes which contain all of the required ingredients that make up these creatures. These compounds could therefore take care of the matter requirements for the reproductive process. As for the energy requirements for the reproductive cycle, they would get that from the cosmic radiation. “

She looked up to see the captain staring at her with his left eye twitching uncontrollably while the lieutenant stared slack-jawed at her with befuddlement on his face.

“I didn’t get any of that, and if you continue explaining things in super complicated ways, I’ll throw you out the airlock, “bluffed the mildly irritated captain.

“Well, you asked, “replied Ana, sulking at the lack of admiration for her intelligence before sighing and continuing, “anyway, those are the best theories I have. And it is unlikely that we will get to verify it. Our surveillance systems have not picked up a single instance of cell division within the observable wall since our arrival. If it does happen, it must happen very rarely and we don’t seem to be lucky. “

“Hmm. At least we are leaving the equipment behind. As long as the cameras continue recording, we should have more footage once we come back. Back to the first question, do you have any idea how these creatures evolved, all the way out here? “

“Yeah, about that. We collected the RNA and amino compounds from these creatures and analysed them earlier, “she paused here out of uncertainty.

“And, “prodded the captain.

“And, it is amazing that they RNA and amino acids in the first place. Our computers had no trouble analysing the compounds and creating RNA graphs. It was as easy as analysing any unknown species from Earth. “

“So, you’re saying that these creatures came from Earth,” asked the captain with piqued curiosity.

“Well, the RNA and compounds are too basic compared to the ones present on Earth. They were most likely created before any life evolved on the planet Earth. They may even be older than the planet itself considering how far out in space they are. “

“Hmm, ok. Can’t we tell the exact age of these creatures using that dating machine we have in storage? “

“No, there is too much ionizing radiation out here. We won’t be able to use the dating machine to tell how old these creatures and the matter inside them are. “

“Oh, that’s what the dating machine is for, “interjected the lieutenant with surprise, before continuing, “well, that’s not what I used it for! “

Ana gave him a look and continued, “So, based on… Wait, how could you have possibly used it for anything else? It’s a simple electronic device which only outputs the age of a specimen! You know what, it doesn’t matter. As I was saying, based on our initial analysis, it seems like these creatures evolved far before life on Earth. “

“Hmm, ok. Are you saying that life on Earth evolved from these creatures? “

“Unlikely. Plus, what I am saying is that I can’t even imagine how life evolved here in the first place. “

“Well, how did life evolve on Earth? “

“Our best theory so far, “reflected Ana, “is that life formed in the primordial sea present on prehistoric Earth. After the Earth had fully formed and cooled down, the planet was covered mostly with a soup of chemical compounds. This period was also home to frequent and violent thunderstorms. The most widely accepted theory for the creation of life is that the lightning striking the soup induced chemical reactions which in turn formed complex compounds. These compounds became more and more complex with repeated interactions with electricity until they eventually began to self-replicate. “

“Ok, so all the nerds agree that we need a soup and electricity to form life, “suggested the captain.

“It’s more elegant than that, but yes, “replied Ana with visible annoyance.

“Well, we know there is lightning in space, “interjected the lieutenant, “we saw some space lightning on our way over here. “

“Yes, but we don’t have any soup, “replied Ana before hiding her face with shame at the stupidity of the sentence.

“Well, there must have been some period of time when there was lots of random matter lying around in space, “asked the captain.

“In intergalactic space, no. As the galaxies formed, they started clearing out the matter close to them. “

She recognized the answer as soon as she spoke, but the captain jumped in before she could continue.

“What about before th…”
“Yes, yes, “she counter interjected with irritation, “after the big bang and before the galaxies formed, there would have been enough matter density in space to produce these creatures. And certainly, enough energy from the big bang to kickstart the evolution process. “

She sighed with frustration. She should not have missed making this connection, especially considering she was an astrophysicist. On their mission, she had somehow done better at the plant nerd stuff than in her own field of expertise. She rescheduled her disappointment and self-blame for another time and continued silently with her train of thought. A few minutes later, she coalesced her ideas and spoke again.

“If the theory is correct, then they would have needed very specific conditions to successfully start the evolution process. Life would likely have started around the edges of the gas clouds that would eventually collapse into galaxies. And because the pre-galactic gas clouds would have been spread too thin to exert enough concentrated gravitational force, the magnetic attraction between the cells would have overpowered the gas cloud’s gravity and held them together, thus preventing them from falling into the collapsing gas and getting crushed. “

She momentarily fell silent as she considered the further implications of this theory. But the lieutenant interrupted her chain of thought with a question.

“Does that mean that such walls could exist around other galaxies as well?”

“Yes, at least some galaxies would have such organisms surrounding them. Most points in the universe would have had similar conditions in the immediate aftermath of the big bang. Therefore, life could have evolved anywhere. In the infinite expanse of space, any set of conditions can repeat any number of times. Therefore, anything’s possible. Clearly!”

“In fact, “she continued, “it’s even possible that most galaxies have such barriers around them. But we have no way of knowing without looking from the other side of the wall. Our current equipment will not help us here. “

She tried to go back to her contemplations again but was once more interrupted by the lieutenant.

“But don’t all galaxies move through space? What’s to stop our galaxy from tearing through the wall? It’s not like these creatures can move very fast. “

“True, and I was just thinking about that. You see, galaxies move because space is expanding and not because they are producing any thrust. Think of the universe like a balloon. If you draw a map on a half-inflated balloon and then blow more air into it, all the features of the map will move away from each other in all directions. Likewise, each point in space is expanding in each direction uniformly. “

“Ah, “interjected the lieutenant, “so if everything is moving away from each other, then the wall will expand outwards just as uniformly as galaxy. But if the wall is expanding, wouldn’t it become too thin eventually, since these cells don’t seem to reproduce very quickly? “

“It is possible, yes. The wall may have been much thicker when it formed and may have significantly slimmed down since then. But unfortunately for us, it could still be dangerously thick for us to get through. Even if we jump with the ship, there is no guarantee that we will end up on the other side of the wall. We may just end up inside it and destroy the ship from the electric discharges of these creatures. “

“Right, do we have any way to prove this theory,” asked the captain.

“Not without jumping the ship towards the wall, and I’ve already told you that would be a bad idea. “

“No, I meant the theory about their emergence and evolution. “

“Oh… Not that I can think of. We would need to try and find some part of these creatures that isn’t contaminated by cosmic radiation to try and figure out their age. Even that doesn’t guarantee accurate timescales since the specimen we end up using could just be a later reproduction of the original. “

“Ok, if we can’t prove anything, and only have theories about these creatures, then what CAN we do?”

Ana smiled coyly before replying, “I can work my magic. “

“What, “exclaimed the confused captain.

“I mean, “elaborated Ana when her glibness failed to make her look cool, “I can figure out where these creatures fit within our present understanding of space. And how they impact our understanding of space as a whole. “

“Ok, I understand. “

“You see, “continued Ana while disregarding the captain’s understanding, “we came here to prove or disprove the hypothesis of dark matter. We theorized that dark matter was causing the universe to expand faster than expected. Our dark matter turned out to be something completely different. But this version of dark matter is still most likely responsible for the abnormal rate of observed universal expansion. It is either legitimately causing the universe to expand faster than expected, or it is tricking us into thinking that the universe is expanding faster than normal. Either way, we have a lot to learn from these creatures. “

“Yes, I realize wh…”

“You see, we astrophysicists have been trying to decipher the mysteries of the universe ever since Humanity first looked up at the stars. “

She was beginning to wax poetic and the captain knew how hard it would be to stop her if she picked up momentum. He anxiously tried to interject again, “I underst…”

“But this journey hasn’t been easy. We are here as a result of the culmination of all of Humanity’s greatest ideas and discoveries. All of our planet’s collective efforts have played at least a small part in bringing us to this momentous occasion in Human history. “

The captain sighed, “I really wish you wouldn’t make me do this. “

“Yes, my friends, we do very much stand on the shoulders of giants as we stretch our fingers towards the cold unknown of deep space. I feel comforted knowing that even though we were separated by millennia, my thoughts flow in unison with Aristotle who no doubt sat silently staring and wondering at the mysteries that the great unknown held in store for him. Such magn…”

The captain had had enough and interjected with the kill-phrase, “Biologist is a real science, unlike astrophysics. “

The intake of breath Ana took upon hearing the statement seemed to evacuate half the atmosphere in the canteen. The lieutenant looked at the captain with absolute terror in his eyes while the captain braced for impact.

Twenty-seven minutes later, the captain was beginning to wonder if this way of stopping Ana’s soliloquies was actually more efficient than the alternative. She was showing no signs of stopping and seemed to be getting shriller by the minute. The lieutenant was slumped over the table with his head in his hands and was mumbling to himself. He was very close to breaking himself and desperately looked for an opportunity to pacify the situation. He seized his opportunity the next time Ana stopped to breathe and jumped in with an apology, “Look, I’m sorry I said that but you left me no choice. We have very limited time left on our mission and we can’t spend hours monologuing about Humanity’s desire for answers and greatness. “
Ana used what remaining breath she had to make one final point, “How dare you! I’m a proud space sniffer, not a filthy fruit fluffer. “

With that, she stood up, gave him a look and left the room.  The captain sighed and tried to speak to the lieutenant, who was staring back at him with the anger of a collateral damagee. “Let’s start the pre-flight checks now, “he asked meekly, “We don’t want to delay that. “

The lieutenant just shook his head accusingly and left the room.

*

Ana seriously contemplated restarting the centrifuge at full speed without warning to scare her crewmates but decided against it. The material damage would be too high, and it could even damage the engine. The latter wasn’t particularly hard to do since 98% of the ship was the engine and one couldn’t throw a fork in a random direction without hitting some part of the engine.

She ignored her intrusive thoughts and restarted the centrifuge at its lowest setting. The centrifuge started to spin up and… instantly crushed the latest specimen under observation. She sighed. After further introspection, she decided the moment called for it and followed up the sigh with a nasty look.

The centrifuge was nowhere near accurate enough to tell her the exact magnitude of gravitational force at which the creature had collapsed. But the centrifuge had a minimum speed of 0.3 RPMs which roughly translated to an acceleration of 0.1 meters per second squared. The best-case scenario would be that the creature could sustain a maximum of just under 0.1 meters per seconds squared of gravitational acceleration. But judging by their luck so far, the actual number it could sustain was probably lower. Which meant it would not survive the gravitational forces of the sun within their solar system, especially not anywhere close to planet Earth. On the bright side however, the next experiment would be far more pleasant for her. Mainly because it would allow her to take a space-walk. She was pleased when she remembered this and left the observation room in good spirits.

*

The next day, Ana and the lieutenant made their way to the wall. This time, the captain would remain behind and observe. She had taken space-walks before, but never this deep in space. Very few people had. The childish excitement was still tempered by the unconscious fear of the unknown and unexperienced that thousands of years of evolution had hard wired into Human brains. But she would not let fear stop her from fulfilling her dream at this stage. She boldly stepped out of the airlock with pride and a resolute look on her face.

They had sent their equipment ahead of them this time and were now making their way to the cargo containers. The containers held all of the imaging machines they had brought with them on the mission. She would use them to get whatever immediate results she could, and then leave the rest behind so they could autonomously collect information.

The two spacewalkers reached their equipment and Ana began setting them up. She would have liked to enjoy the vistas first, but she was not one to shirk her duties. She would enjoy the view once the job was done. A couple of hours later, when she was mostly done with her work, the lieutenant drifted into her view. He had decided to explore the wall by himself and had apparently satisfied his curiosity.

“Hey doc, “he enquired, “what are you up to now. “

“Setting up some telescopes to measure thermal and cosmic radiation from the wall. We’ll use it to…” she drifted off mid-sentence, distracted by the complicated machinery she was installing. The lieutenant understood and floated away. He moved towards the equipment that had already been setup and tried to decipher their purpose. When that turned out to be boring, he floated around aimlessly, while looking at the wall. It really was quite beautiful, even to his non-nerd eyes. Combined with the absolute peace that zero-gravity afforded, the subdued shimmer of the wall almost lulled him to sleep. From his half-closed eyes, the wall resembled a collection of stars that appeared to be transmitting some secret code through their blinking.

He had always been fascinated by space, although he had no desire to learn the science behind it. Knowledge, he believed, ruined one’s appreciation of natural beauty. He was perfectly happy looking at the randomly blinking stars and wondering if they were trying to send him a message. To know that they were not, he thought, would only ruin their magic. Besides, knowledge only seemed to complicate things. After all, he was perfectly happy floating though space looking at the beauty of creation while Ana was bent over and worrying over her machinery. Answers, he knew from his observations, were like a packet of chips. You could never have just one, and if you gave into its pursuit, it would just end up leaving an unhappy mess.

He spent the next hour casually floating through space and taking in as much of the view as he could. After all, he wouldn’t be coming back for a very long time. He stopped when Ana called him over the intercom and asked for help with the clean-up. He started loading the remaining debris back into the containers before sending them back to the ship. The doctor was still focussing on some equipment and he asked her its purpose.

“Oh, it’s a refraction meter. These will track the changes in position of specific stars and hopefully help us triangulate their real positions in space. This will allow us to measure the thickness of the wall. “
“I thought that was impossible to do from this side of the wall? “

 “It won’t be precise of course, but we can still get some estimates. We have a theoretical value for spatial expansion at this location. We can use that and compare it with how fast different stars at different angles from this point seem to be expanding. This will give us a very rough estimate of the thickness of the wall. Of course, it will take months for the experiment to conclude, but it should provide valuable information for the next expedition. “

“Hmm, that’s nice. Anything else we can figure out while we are here? “
“I’ve also setup radiographs which will use the results from the previous experiment to measure the amount of radiation these creatures consume. It will use a triangulation method similar to the refraction meter to measure the differences in cosmic radiation coming from different points of the wall towards the equipment. It will then use our rough estimates of wall thickness to calculate the rate at which the wall absorbs radiation. “

“Oh, that’s pretty cool. You know, I just noticed how many empty containers we’ve been sending back to the ship. “
“Yeah, their cargo will be floating here for the foreseeable future. “
“Don’t you think we could use the empty containers to collect some specimens and take them back? “
“Well, solar gravity would kill them you know. “
“Yeah, but we don’t have to take them all the way back. We could just dump them out of the ship right before our penultimate jump and mark their location. Then, we could more easily transport biologists, I mean, plant-nerds to observe them. “

“Hmm, “said Ana with an appreciative smile, “they might not be able to survive in interstellar space but it’s worth a shot. And if needed, we could leave some fissile material in their containers as food for them while we go back to Earth. Hmm, yeah, we could try that. That’s a good idea. “

“Well, if we are done here, let’s get back to the ship and reprogram the containers. “

With that, they left their silent mechanical observers to their tasks in the cold vacuum of space and went back to the warmth of the spaceship.

*

The containers had done their job and were making their slow way back to the ship. They would be leaving for Earth tomorrow and had managed to finish all the pre-flight checks before time. A fact they were celebrating in the canteen. The captain had just pulled out the freeze-dried champagne powder and he was preparing to pour it into their glasses. He waited patiently for the drone carrying roast turkey to place its load on the table before overflowing the cups of his crew with delicious, decades-aged wine.

After they raised a toast to their mission and as they were tucking in into the delicious feast laid out before them, the lieutenant asked Ana a question that had been intriguing him for a while.

“Hey doc, what do you think are the odds that life on Earth evolved from these creatures? You said they were older than life on Earth, so could they be the source of life on Earth?”

Ana swallowed the oyster she was eating before she replied, “I’ve actually devoted a lot of thought to this idea since we tested their tissue samples. It is certainly possible, although unlikely. You’ve seen how fragile they are and it is implausible that they could survive the Earth’s atmosphere or gravity at any point in the development of Earth. However, the RNA and chemical makeup is still a close but primitive relative of those found on Earth so we can’t rule it out. At the very least, even if these creatures got instantly crushed when they entered proto-Earth’s gravitational pull, their constituent compounds could still have ended up on the planet. And since life starts with such compounds, the remains of these creatures could have kickstarted life on Earth. The very beginning of the circle of life, if you think about it. “

“But then again, “she continued more pragmatically, “it could just be coincidence. Life could have evolved in space and on Earth independently of each other and at different times. Since the laws of physics are universal, there is no reason to think that life in any part of the galaxy wouldn’t be similar to ours. It is certainly possible that all life across the universe is carbon based. There is no reason for it not to be. After all, carbon is a very versatile and stable element and well suited for organic purposes. “

The thought gave her pause and she spent the remainder of her dinner in a reverie. Despite her pragmatic and analytic nature, her early childhood dream of finding advanced and brilliant alien civilizations in outer space had never really vanished. And although she told herself otherwise, if she ever did meet a sentient alien species, she would be very disappointed if they were exactly like Humans in character. But the more she thought about it, the more likely the scenario seemed. After all, the needs of life were the same across the universe. Even here, way out in intergalactic space, the only thing these creatures cared for was sustenance, safety and self-replication. Just like all other single-celled organisms on Earth. So why should sentient creatures be any different. She wondered if Humanity would ever meet an advanced alien species and be surprised by how similar both their cultures were. Only to then start a war over something mundane like the colour of their toes, added Ana as a bitter afterthought.

After dinner, they toasted their mission again and retired to their respective quarters. Despite having finished all the flight checks already, the crew had decided to wait and leave at the predetermined time so that Ana could use the day to think of any last-minute experiments to conduct on the creatures. They had decided that fifteen hours ago. But Ana’s mind remained blank. Despite her intellect and the large number of unanswered questions, she simply couldn’t think of anything else to do with the creatures that could help answer those questions. The combined weight of space travel and learning an entirely new and thoroughly conflicting discipline had exhausted her faculties. And at this, the penultimate day of her mission, her brain seemed to have finally had enough and was refusing to co-operate.

Ana sighed as she lay in her bed trying to force her mind to remember if she had forgotten anything important. But the combination of the ultra-luxurious, double-thick, king-sized bed and the monotonous hum of the spacecraft’s internal mechanism dragged her unresisting mind into the darkest but safest depths of sleep.

It was mid-Earth-morning when she woke up and realized it was only four hours to the launch. She cursed herself for falling asleep and made her drowsy way to find her crewmates. She found them in the canteen having coffee.

“I think I overslept. “
“Huh, “said the captain, “we thought you were out experimenting. Anyway, have some coffee. “
“I just wasted ten hours on useless sleep and you want me to sit down and have coffee? How can you be so nonchalant about this? “
“Easily. Because I really don’t give a shit. In four hours, we will be heading back and I won’t have to worry about this silly alien shit. “

This elicited a chuckle from Ana and she accepted the coffee.

“Besides, “continued the captain, “if anybody asks us, we’ll tell them you were busy working instead of goofing off. “

“Well, how very kind of you, “replied Ana sarcastically before sipping her coffee. But she did sit down. The observation window in the canteen was clear and through it, she could see a rotating view of deep space. It was beautiful. It was everything she had hoped for. As she sat there, she realized how little time she had spent just looking at the view around her. She had been too focussed on her uncertain work to actually enjoy the raw beauty of the universe, especially considering how scenic this part of the universe was. She decided that it would indeed be better to amend that and spend the rest of her time taking in the sights.

They spent the next three hours in silence, each observing and contemplating the majesty of space in their own way. It was the most peace they had since the start of the mission and would be a cherished memory long after the mission had ended.

When it was time to start the first jump, they walked to the bridge and took their places. Ana looked back wistfully at the shimmering wall as her crewmates turned the ship around towards the Earth and initiated the FTL engines. At least they would be taking some souvenirs back with them. It was at that moment, just as the FTL engines were preparing to launch, that Ana remembered something. FTL engines produced a weak gravity field every time they fired, negligible to the Humans and machinery on board, but to the creatures…

“Oh, c’mon! Fuck these goddamn space bu… “Just then, the engines fired and the ship jumped through space.

*