Vassily was not in a bad mood, as it happens, when the door alarm sounded. He walks over there and clicks it open. And smiles.
“Anja! Hi!”
“What is this music?”
“David Bowie. Ashes to Ashes. Late twentieth century. Do you like it?”
“Erm. I don’t know. Maybe it’s an acquired taste.”
“Anyway, sorry. Come in.” With a glance up and down the corridor as she enters.
The door slides shut behind her. He beckons her to one side of the room then puts his finger to his mouth.
“I’m glad you came. I’ve got something to show you.”
She looks a little startled and a little confused. Very cute, he thinks.
“You know they have listening devices in our rooms, don’t you?”
“I’m not sure I believe you. I was given to believe respecting people’s private spaces was important. For our wellbeing, I mean.”
“That’s only for married couples. Besides, I can prove it. I found their listening device.”
“Where is it?”
“Over there,” he pointed, “right next to that speaker.”
“Very clever.”
“You’re not the only one who’s been studying twentieth century espionage you know.”
“So you are a subversive, then?”
“If I was, would you tell anyone?”
Anja sighed. It didn’t take her long to decide. She shook her head. “No. Of course I wouldn’t. But I would want to understand why.”
“That’s what I have to show you. Come.”
He gestured her over towards the kitchenette and lifted up his floor panel and removed its contents. It was an old magnetic tape. Anja knew what it was. All Archivists did.
She looked up at him questioningly.
“I presume you’ve discovered by now that the interview recording with Katrina was cut off?”
“Yes. She wanted to tell them something off the record.”
Vassily waved the tape around and smiled. “From one of the Vatican expeditions.”
Her mouth opened wide. Even more cute, he thought. “But it was off the record!”
“Katrina was an exceptional spy, remember. She wore a concealed listening device of her own. She clearly thought it important to record what she said. For the people of the future. For us.”
“You’ve already listened to it.”
He nodded. “I’ll play it to you. Then you’ll understand.”
The hidden compartment beneath the floor panel also contained a small tape player, as well as a surprisingly well-preserved photograph. A beautiful young woman with raven-black hair and Celtic good looks.
“That’s her?”
“Yes. Looks a lot like you, I think?”
“And my great-grandmother.”
“Maybe it runs in the family.”
She didn’t have time to follow up on that strange remark before he’d placed the machine on the floor, slotted the tape inside and pressed play.
With her eyes as wide as you would expect, she watched in anticipation of the machine as he smiled at her again.
“The reason I know about the Wow! message is because it was my species who sent it.”
“You really are going for the insanity defence aren’t you?”
“Shut up Andrew! What species?”
“Don’t tell me you believe her! She could say anything she likes. Where’s the proof?”
“I performed a miracle a few days ago in the sanatorium to gain the Pope’s trust.”
“We only have your word for that.”
“Well, yes. Unfortunately the Church doesn’t tend to publicise these things until after the saint’s death.”
“Saint Katrina? That’s the biggest load of -”
Amanda stops him. “Don’t you need two miracles to be a saint?”
“I did the first one when I was a baby. I only found out when I arrived here. It’s the reason I was never excommunicated.”
“Do we really have to listen to this?” Andrew again.
“You didn’t answer my question. What species?”
“Eyani. We’re a leonine lifeform, originally from Sirius.”
“Not lizards then? Like in V?” Andrew tries another insult.
“No. And we didn’t appreciate that blatant species-ist propaganda. Fascist is the last thing we are.”
“So what’s your Wow! message about then?”
“It was intended as a response to your Voyager 1 probe, which I analysed in a different lifetime. This is a human body, by the way, I’ve incarnated here. I hope that answers your next question, Andrew?”
Andrew doesn’t answer. Because that was his next question.
“Does telepathy count as proof?”
Still no answer.
“What’s the matter? Cat got your tongue?”
“Katrina. I’m sure Andrew’s quite sorry for any insult. Aren’t you?”
Pause. Then he sounds sheepish. “Sure. Sorry.”
“Apology accepted. I’m fairly certain SETI have covered up the ETI origin of our message, however.”
“How?”
“By falsifying the metadata by one hour so the numbers don’t add up. They’ve tried to say it was received an hour later. But given how superior our technology is, we wouldn’t make such a silly mistake.”
“You’re saying this is evidence for time travel?”
“Yes. But not undeniable evidence. The only other possible option is that we mind-controlled NASA engineers so the Voyager would be launched at the correct time. We were not, though, I can assure you, responsible for the four-day delay with that launch.”
“Does your message contain knowledge of the future, Katrina?”
“Yes. It does contain the musical gift as well though. We were giving you a chance. Accepting the reality of the message also means having to accept the fact that we know all about your species, given that we made use of your own dating system to provide the metadata, which means we are conducting constant surveillance to monitor your progress and gauge the threat level. This also means the message did not originate hundreds of light years away, but was inserted directly into their computer by quantum teleportation.”
“What’s quantum teleportation?”
“You really want me to explain that?”
“Yes, I really do.”
“It simply makes use of entangled particles and action at a distance. Designate an attribute of one particle, like spin up, as a one and spin down as zero, switch the spin of the particle meaning its partner’s spin instantly has to mirror it, thus effectively transferring the information from one place to another.”
“That would be pretty useful in our business.” Andrew was a lot more conciliatory now.
“GCHQ will get there eventually. Not before the Chinese, though.”
“What do you know about the future, Katrina?”
“That would take a very long time to answer.”
“Start with your Wow! message.”
“The message was not solely contained in the six-digit alphanumeric sequence. That was just channel two. There was information in the other channels as well. Channel four in particular. If you look at the printout you can see the sequence 61-2411-4344. Adding 61 to 2411 gives you 2472, which is another harmonious number, as is 4344. But that middle number, 2411, refers to November 2024. That’s how long you have to avert a catastrophe. Specifically, our intervention, to protect every civilisation in our sector from the threat of you.”
“What intervention?”
“That hasn’t been decided yet. It depends on you. A magnetic pole shift perhaps, an axis tilt, maybe an asteroid or comet knocking your moon out of orbit. That kind of thing.”
“Couldn’t we just nuke the asteroid?” Andrew asks, quite innocently.
“I would strongly advise against that. You’ll just break it into fragments raining down on the planet. Each of which would be far worse than any of your nuclear weapons.”
“So what can we do to stop this?”
“Aside from getting on the path to utopia?”
“What else? I suppose dropping all the charges against you would be non-negotiable?”
“That’s your choice. And I’m not really here to negotiate. Besides, I’ll take my chances with the jury. I’ll just explain my motivations to them, the fact that everything I did was justified. You know that yourself, Amanda. Operation Game Theory saved the entire service, and will undoubtedly have prevented false flag terrorist attacks against innocent people in Britain in the future.”
“You know this from the future, I presume?”
“Yes. One possible future. Terrorists crashing planes into skyscrapers, controlled demolitions, bombs planted under tube trains etc. Do you agree with me, about Game Theory?”
“Yes. Yes, of course I do. Believe me I’d rather none of this had to happen.”
“Well that makes two of us.”
“So what can we do?”
“If the truth about the Wow! message was made public, whether I’m involved or not, in other words – genuine contact, then humanity’s entire attitude would change forever. It would force them to look at themselves. The people would demand their leaders actually fix every problem you have. That means utopia. Ironically, it’s precisely the opposite of what your dystopian leaders want. They would be exposed as unnecessary. Humanity would no longer tolerate inequality, conflict, poverty, pollution, would they? That’s why the enemy has to prevent the knowledge of contact and the zoo hypothesis at all costs. Which is why they would infiltrate and control SETI itself, to ensure that it never succeeds.”
“Do you know that for sure?”
“It’s an educated guess. Either that or when they were finally confronted with the reality of our message they got scared of the implications. They incorrectly assumed it would create a mass panic and the entire structure of world society would collapse. There’s a certain truth in that, of course, but it would only be a temporary adjustment period. The dystopians would simply have to get used to the knowledge that there’s always a bigger fish.”
“And the same goes for the world’s religions.”
“Agreed. The people would likewise no longer tolerate dogmatic, discriminatory ideologies that serve only to enslave. It would be liberating for those with the courage to accept the truth. They alone would be deemed worthy of survival. Humanity would be forced to reconsider its place in the wider scheme of things. And in a very different way. No place for an anthropocentric God in our universe, I can tell you that much.”
“Is there a God?”
“Every universe has an intelligence behind it. In fact, in a way it is an intelligence, a living creature. Same goes for planets and stars. In our case, it’s female. Of fire elemental origin. The closest approximation to the sound of her name would be something like ‘Shayner’. At least, that’s what our philosophers say. They also say this universe is the inside of a hypermassive black hole.”
“And this God -”
“Goddess.”
“Goddess, knows everything that goes on, does she?”
“Do you know everything that is happening inside your own body? What all those little cells are doing?”
“So that’s a no, then?”
“Correct.”
“So she won’t mind your species wiping out other species with asteroids?”
“God delegates.”
“Is that supposed to be funny?”
“I didn’t mean it to be. But we would simply be acting like a part of her immune system. If your species does survive to enter the very long spacefaring phase of evolution, then perhaps one day you too will be called upon to carry out similar interventions.”
“Do you want us to survive?”
Katrina pauses before answering that question. And then shrugs a little. “I haven’t decided yet.”
“It all depends on us, then?”
“It all depends on you, yes.”
Click. Recording ends.
Both Anja and Vassily are silent for a while. Anja doesn’t really know what to say. Or think. Or feel. Vassily doesn’t want to interrupt her mindfulness. It’s a lot to take in, after all.
Finally she does say something. “It was a lot more than just an asteroid, then.”
Vassily can only return a sad smile. “I think everyone would’ve preferred an asteroid. Or Halley’s Comet, maybe. That number 61 in the Wow! signal – 2061 was when the comet was due to return. Or 24.11 and 43.44 could’ve been the new position of the north pole after an axis tilt.”
“Maybe these aliens were hedging their bets.”
“Keeping their options open, you mean?”
“Yes. Like she said, it would depend on how things were by 2024.”
“And as Archivists, we know how dystopian it was by then more than anyone else does. How they allowed that virus to spread and mutate, for example. And when all that was done, they went back to warring.”
“And we are still like that now, aren’t we?” She looks up at him.
“In our organisation’s opinion, yes.”
She sighs. “The Other aren’t going to stop until that does, are they?”
“That’s also our opinion. That’s why we need to make all this public. Everyone needs to know the truth.”
She emits a little ironic laugh. “And the truth will make you free.”
This is the point when the door alarm sounds again.
They both, predictably, look startled at each other, then at the door, then back again.
“I’ll put everything back. If they ask, pretend we were acting on impure thoughts. That one always works.”
Vassily hurriedly shoved everything back into his hidden compartment whilst Anja ruffled up her hair a little. She suddenly decided that pretending to act on impure thoughts with Vassily wouldn’t be difficult in the slightest.
And so Vassily opened the door.
To be greeted by Security Master Cato’s cold ironic smile. He shifts his head a little and looks behind him.
“Well done, Mistress Anja. Coming straight here to see your co-conspirator, just as we expected you would.”
“You provoked it, by asking about him,” Anja realised.
Sardonic smile. Cato brushes past Vassily, followed by four burly Security men.
“That’s a bit harsh for a few impure thoughts.”
“Vassily I didn’t mean to lead them here, I swear.”
He smiles at her. “I know you didn’t.” Then turns to Cato. “There’s nothing untoward going on here, Master Cato. Just a few impure thoughts.”
Cato ignores him and strides directly to his hidden compartment. “I think this,” he says, prising it up and removing the incriminating evidence, “constitutes a little bit more than impure thoughts, wouldn’t you say?”
Now Vassily looks shocked. But defeated. “How did you know?”
Cato takes out his smartcomm and touches the screen, holds it up so everyone can hear. “I’m glad you came. I’ve got something to show you.” Vassily’s voice, recorded quite clearly.
Cato taps the screen again, sufficient demonstration concluded. “Always use more than one listening device. Let the subject find one of them and be lulled into a false sense of security.”
Vassily stopped looking defeated and instead felt simply affronted and angry, partly with himself for being outwitted by the bad guy.
Like losing a game of chess to a man from the CIA.
“She’s not a subversive, Master Cato. You can leave Anja out of it.”
“She wasn’t a subversive, that much I’ll accept. But she is now.”
Now Anja finds a bit of courage. Also angry and affronted. “You don’t understand. We have to make this public! It’s proof of the alien intervention hypothesis! We know how to make it stop!”
Cato pretends to ignore her and starts pulling out magnetic tape, ripping it apart between his fingers and spewing it over the floor.
“No! You mustn’t! You have to listen to us!”
“Destroyed, just like your missing files, Mistress Lei.”
“You did it! Why?!”
“If the people discovered we have been at war with a hostile alien force for 200 years there would be mass panic. The fabric of society would break down.”
“But they’re not the hostiles! We are!”
“Not from where I’m standing. But soon, Mistress Lei, we shall have the technology to retaliate.”
And now Vassily decides that there’s only one thing for it. Fight their way out. He suddenly drops one unsuspecting Security man with an exceptionally well-timed left jab. He might have gotten lucky with the second had it not been for the sudden electric shock to the back of his neck, sending him unconscious to the floor. The other two quickly flank Anja and hold her fast.
“You know what the penalty for subversion is, don’t you, Mistress Lei?”
“Death by airlock, I presume.”
“Not exactly,” he says. “We will throw you in the airlock, yes, but we won’t open the outer door. We’ll simply disable the shielding there for 24 hours. If you survive, we’ll take that to be God’s will.”
“I think I’d prefer the ducking stool, if it’s all the same to you.”
Cato laughs, glances down at Vassily’s limp body and motions to his guards to pick him up.
Cruel sardonic sneer. Yeah I’m sure you know the type, don’t you reader dear?
“Conscious or unconscious, Mistress Lei, we’ll see if you survive the 24 hours…”