Escaping the Cradle

by Karen Page

Part 15

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Part 15
DATE:FC+42

"The Prime Minster rang last night," said Becky as she sat down in the lab.

"That's nice," said Liam as if Becky got calls from the Prime Minister every other day. He'd not looking up from the checks he was performing. "What did she want? Another lift to the alien council?"

"No, she started asking about the ship's power but was called away."

"There was something on the news about a Pakistan general who was attempting to launch a nuclear missile," said Jessica. "Perhaps it was that."

"I didn't hear about that," frowned Liam, looking up.

"Perhaps it was just the American news that had it. No idea."

"You still watch American news?" asked Becky.

Jessica shrugged. "I watch a bit of both. It's hard to let go when you've lived it for so long. It's no longer being reported, just rumours on message boards. It must have either been nothing, or something so major that nobody wants to cause a panic."

Becky's phone rang, and she saw the phone number was the same as the previous night. "I think this is the return call," she said and rushed up the stairs to have the call in private.

"Hello again," said Becky when connected to the Prime Minister. She'd received the call at 9am precisely.

"I'm sorry our conversation got disrupted last night."

"If what isn't being reported is true, you had much larger issues to deal with," said Becky, wanting to see how she reacted. Was it nothing or something major.

In some respects, the Prime Minister wasn't surprised that Becky knew more about last nights events. The internet had some wild speculation, but with no real substance apart from the NBC report, there was nothing much to go on. There was nothing in the mainstream media.

"I could do without fun like that. Anyway, why I was ringing was about your ship and the power plant. Is the power as unique as the drive?"

Becky smiled. "Yes. The ship needed its own power plant and needed to fit in the space we had. It couldn't be a battery as it would just deplete."

"An application for grid connectivity is in the system. Tell me what you can create, and what timescale."

"The technology is proved. However, implementing on the grid isn't easy. There are rules to keep the grid stable. It needs to be controllable and be able to be turned off if there isn't enough demand to keep up the grid frequency."

"Could it replace a power station?"

"Yes and no. It can supplement what you have but it isn't for everything. It produces DC and not AC. It doesn't produce inertia."

"You've lost me."

"I'm not the best person to talk to about it and certainly not to explain. Just that traditional power stations such as nuclear, gas, coal and hydroelectric are all based on something driving a turbine. That rotational inertia helps smooth out frequency fluctuations, which keeps the supply stable. Without that stability, the whole national grid can wobble, and nobody wants their lights flickering. This power generation is more like a solar farm, or a battery. The current produced is different. It would need to go via an inverter to convert it to AC and then a transformer to step up the voltage for transmission into the grid."

"Okay," said Georgina, scribbling some notes onto her tablet.

"The biggest new electricity demands are the huge data centres. They are used to taking Direct Current from backup batteries. It might be an easier process to build for them. Take the load off the grid. We plan to supplement the grid, which is why we made the request. I'm surprised you would get involved though."

"I've other decisions to make, and I got thinking. Your discussions with data centres are your business, and I'm sure you will get good business advice from your financial backer. In the meantime, I will leave you to go through the hoops for energy connection. There is still a backlog, so it won't be quick."

Becky nodded and then realised this wasn't a video call. "We're aware, that is why we put in the application now. We would be good to go whenever but we know there will be vetting required since the design is different. Our kit doesn't take much space, but the inverters and transformers are major items."

"Thank you. You've given me a lot to think about."

Becky said quickly, before the call could be terminated, "Prime Minister, I have a question for you, if I may."

"Sure. Ask away."

"You had some meetings at the UN with several members of the Rohastin Council. I wondered if any of it was in Hytuna that was translated into English or any other language. You were given a document for us which detailed connecting to their communications, but some of the words we can't translate. I was hoping that they might have used non-Primer words that were translated."

"Ah, I see," said Georgina. "That's a good thought. We have a team in the Foreign Office that is dealing with such matters. I will get them onto this. It is something that should be released for everyone. The more Hytuna we all know, the better."

"How are you getting on with learning it."

"Not too bad. I was able to have a simple conversation with Vers'am in it, but I've got a long way to go. It doesn't seem to have a lot of the idiosyncrasies that English does."

* * *

When Becky walked back into the main lab, everyone looked up at her.

"That was the Prime Minister," said Becky as she joined Liam, Jessica and Henry for the next test.

"So, what did she want?" asked Liam.

"She was asking more about the power. I know the plan was to commercialise it, but she seemed more interested than I thought. I mean, wouldn't this conversation normally be with NESO, or one of the parliamentary under-secretaries? Why is the PM asking these questions?"

"She is the only one who knows of us. Anyway, I bet that nuclear power station is delayed again," laughed Henry.

"We can't replace that," said Becky, horrified.

"Well, we could but it would be crazy. We're not geared up for that size of deployment."

"We won't be geared up for anything if we spend all our time on this communication problem," said Becky.

"We did some tests locally, which worked," said Jessica. "This is proving things to the factory. It's no longer just the network layer which we had to rebuild the architecture on for the return data. It also now has standard messaging going across it. I think this is good work for so little time."

"And we had to alter how the tunnel worked," reminded Liam. "It can't just open and close like we had for transitioning an object. We can keep a communication tunnel open for five minutes and have tracking to seamlessly open another tunnel to keep the conversation flowing."

"What if there are multiple conversations? Will those open independent tunnels?" asked Becky, suddenly thinking of that.

"No," smiled Jessica. "They will all go through the same connection."

"Aurora 2 is nearly ready," said Henry. "If this test works, then we build the communication equipment into her."

"The sooner we come up with a name, the better," said Becky. "She is nothing like Aurora and needs her own name."

"Enterprise?" suggested Jessica, with a small grin.

"NO!" shouted Liam and Becky at the same time.

"And not The Millennium Falcon, or Spacey McShipface either," added Henry.

"What about Eos?" mused Jessica. "Eos was the Greek goddess of dawn, where Aurora was the Roman goddess of dawn."

There was silence and they all looked at Becky, who nodded. "I like it. Eos it is. Now let's get this communication working and we can send this as our first message."

"Evan says they are ready," said Liam, looking at the messages on his phone. "Let's try."

Becky, Liam, Henry and Jessica were at the Lab in the old Anchor pub. Evan had gone down to the factory and was with Sam having setup the test at that side.

The screen on the workbench next to them had a monitor showing their side of the connection. Becky opened up the app on her laptop and made the connection to the test machine at the other side. In just over a second, they saw on the monitor the network interface connect and a response path return. A standard Earth TCP/IP network had been extended via an interdimensional tunnel.

Becky saw the audio connection open, and with a twist of history said, "Mr Watson, come here – I want to see you."

Evan at the other end laughed. "No Mr Watson here, but I like your sense of history."

Becky then did a remote desktop across the network and was soon viewing the contents of the test computer.

"It seems responsive," she said.

Liam shrugged and Evan at the other side said, "In essence it's like the two ends are a few millimetres apart. It should be responsive. The latency will be low. This is using a 100 Gbps transceiver so I wouldn't think bandwidth will be an issue for us."

"Let's run some more tests. Try to find limits. This is a very simple first test where we are in a stable position relative to each other. We need to do orbital tests, tests around another planet and further away. We are going to need to track location very precisely if we are going to direct end-to-end connections."

"At the moment we are doing this because we want a route back," pondered Sam. "Earth rotates, so it makes any direct connection problematic. When we went to the alien council, our starting position was in orbit, so we didn't have to worry about a rotating Earth. Perhaps we need a space-based gateway. The location of that will be relative to Earth, not within a rotating Earth."

"I've no idea how we'll do a satellite," said Liam. "That really isn't our thing."

"It's mine," reminded Jessica. "I have some money from the previous company I worked for. Would that be a conflict of interest if I set up my own company?"

"If that is the way you want to do it, we could do a licensing agreement," said Becky. "Or if you want it to be a subdivision of Star Bright, then that is also good. Have a think, and we can discuss with our other partner."

Jessica paused for a few seconds, trying to think who Becky might mean. "Laura?"

"Yes."

"Okay, I'll have a think about it."

"You are probably right though. We are just testing the theory, so we can work out how to connect to the alien system. But we do need something more productised. I'm sure there will be a lot of data going through it."

"More than you probably think. Even for Earth communication it is quicker than transatlantic links. Think how much something like UK to Australia is, or America to India. There is a lot of cable connecting the world, but there are some companies, such as stock market traders, that getting data even a little bit quicker can be worth millions, if not more."

"Would Eos be able to drop a satellite?" asked Jessica.

"Eos?" asked Evan, sounding confused. "Ah, the Greek goddess of Dawn. Nice. In theory, but we shouldn't need to. Why don't we extend what we did for the early tests. If we put the satellite in a container, we could open the tunnel and place it straight to orbit. The container would have to be bigger, but the principle is the same. The would be no vibration that you get for a launch. A much bigger success rate. You know, like we did with the ping pong balls, and the teddy."

"You're going to put rockets out of business."

"The best part is no part," said Henry, parroting a space CEO. "No ship is the best ship."

Becky paused and sighed. They kept coming across areas where the invention would mean existing companies no longer existed. They weren't the first invention to change society and probably not the most radical, but it was there. Personal Computers had meant typists, manual recordkeeping etc had disappeared. Development of vehicles had led to the demise of horsedrawn carriages. The horse population in America reduced by 90%. Jobs such as blacksmiths and stable hands were no longer needed. What would this do to not just jobs, but the way people lived and believed.

"Are you okay?" Liam asked Becky.

"Yes," Becky replied, getting out of her thoughts. "Just another industry we're going to impact. Thousands out of jobs."

"Things change, they always do," said Jessica. "You can't look back with rose tinted glasses. Hopefully the change will be for the best. It will change how communication occurs. It will change the space industry. But space flight is hard and dangerous. If this keeps people safe, so much the better."

"But the jobs!"

"Space jobs have always changed. Look how the monolithic companies were swept aside as new more nimble ones came in. An industry that had mostly been the purview of government funding suddenly became a private industry. Costs came down and older companies that didn't change with the times went under. The same happened with aeroplane companies. The companies that are around now aren't the same ones when we were younger."

'And probably won't be around in a year', thought Becky. Well not in their current format.

"Okay, back to the tests. We have it working on a planet where the two locations aren't moving. Can we try from Aurora?"

"Sure. James is standing by. With the way the tests are going on Eos, it might be one of the final flights of Aurora. You are a fixed point from us. So, we will instigate the call."

"How long before you're ready?"

"Thirty minutes," responded Evan.

"Excellent. It'll give me chance to setup monitoring from here."

They cut the connection and Becky brought up the ship telemetry.

"Would the connection sustain while going through the tunnel?" Jessica thought aloud.

"I doubt it," responded Liam. "The tunnel for communication will break as we won't be there anymore. The return communication won't follow us as we move."

"Even if it is with the ship?" she continued.

Liam paused and furrowed his brow as he thought. "You're thinking it might get dragged through too?"

Jessica shrugged. "Everything else does. Why wouldn't that?"

"The tunnel from the Aurora to base is a quandary. While traversing the tunnel, I don't know if that connection would stay open. A tunnel within a tunnel. We don't understand enough about it yet. The return tunnel from base to Aurora will probably not stay open. The opening is to a specific place in space. That place will no longer be there."

"A test to setup later," said Becky. "It might answer a few questions."

"How are you keeping track of where everything is?" asked Ashleigh.

Becky smiled, seeing her girlfriend coming in with mugs of tea and coffee. When Ashleigh saw the smile, her heart picked up and she almost dropped the tray. That smile was something she'd noticed a few times recently, and it reminded her of the proposal.

"We know our solar system quite well. We know the orbits of the planets around the sun, and the rotation of each moon around the planets. No matter where we are in the solar system, we know where the factory is. This isn't new. JPL were creating ephemerides since the 1960s. That is tables where celestial object will be, not just their current location, but were they will be in the future. These are used in their space missions so they could always know where Earth is, to send back results."

"What about beyond our solar system?"

"Gaia mission spent years plotting stars and their motions. That's why we knew what star we were going to. We don't have orbits for planets. Just as cartographers created maps on Earth, there will be people mapping other star systems. We are at the cusp for new adventurers."

"But only you create the craft."

"For now. We're still getting the bugs out of the systems. Aurora is to prove the technology. Eos will be our first generation. We don't want people using it in space when they won't know where to go, or how to communicate."

"I think a lot just want it for quick transport around Earth," said Ashleigh. "I'd love a retrofit module in the car so I can go on holiday without hours on a plane."

"Strange you say that," said Liam. "Becky said the same last week. But you're out of luck at the moment as it would make it too heavy for the tyres. We could make the EV battery a lot nicer, but we can only do so much."

"Our job is the ship," said Becky, pointing to the telemetry screen. "And Evan should be ready soon for that test."

Indeed, they'd watched Aurora being prepared, the systems powered up.

"We're ready for launch," said James over the internal system. "We're just going to go into orbit. I hear there are teams of people with telescopes, looking in the night sky for us or aliens."

"You'll make their day, or night if seen. Telemetry shows all green. Go when ready."

James pressed the button, and the interdimensional tunnel took them into orbit over Australia."

"There are really people watching out for Aurora?" asked Jessica.

"Oh yes," said Liam. "It's quite a thing. There's a reddit group for them. Nobody has seen anything yet. Probably because we've not been doing close orbit work recently."

Jessica took out her phone and found it. She was going to bounce through her old company's satellite system to mask her location but thought better of it. Instead, she decide to just watch to see if someone reported a sighting.

"We have a network connection," suddenly said Becky and a second later the phone app was ringing on her laptop.

"Are you receiving us?" asked Evan.

"Yes," replied Becky. "You sound clear. Like you were next to us."

Becky sent a ping through the connected network. It was just as quick as when they'd been in the factory. Fantastic.

"We'll move out towards Mars and do another test," said Evan.

"Okay, but give it a few minutes. Jessica is monitoring that reddit group. It might be fun to see if they spot you."

"Sure," laughed Evan. "I don't want to spoil any one's fun."

"We've got two sightings," shrieked Jessica with excitement.

"Any pictures yet."

"Not yet. I'm sure there will be, as others are saying no pic not happened ... and there is a pic and coordinates."

Liam glanced across and looked at the telemetry screen. The coordinates matched.

"Wow, I've never had internet in space as quick as this," said James. "We've got it open and watching here. We'll hang around for ten minutes. Someone else has spotted us. This is quite fun."

After relaxing and letting people gawp at them through telescopes, they eventually decided to move on. They had tests to do.

"We're going to drop this link. It's been good to do a longer test to see how the connection stayed up. It's doing really well. Next stop Mars. That currently doesn't allow real-time communication using traditional methods. It should be great to see how this new setup works."

James had mostly stayed in the pilot seat. He was enjoying looking out at the stars. It reminded him of his free time on the space station where he was able to look out and admire the vast openness of space.

He spotted a movement out of the corner of his eye and looked across.

"We've lost connection back to base," stated Evan.

"Alien ship," James called out.