Chapter 1: Beacon
In the large screen of the spacecraft LB-159, Kiri noticed a beacon coming from ten light-years away. It is a call of distress. She frowned and ran the signal analyzer. The origin of the beacon is within the K9 constellation from a binary star system. The record shows that a group of humans settled there at the end of the last millennium when they set out to explore the earth-like planets across the galaxies.
"GALOS, can you decode the message from this beacon?"
"Yes, Commander Kiri. But I will need a few hours."
"Why GALOS? I expect you to do it faster being a galactic AI."
"I am just an AI, Kiri. Not a magician."
"Decode it and update me."
"Sure, Kiri."
"Lu, there is a beacon of distress from K9. It seems to be a from a human civilization. It is a gamma burst with an encoded message. We are waiting for GALOS to decode the message." Kiri informed Lu, the captain of the spaceship.
"Hi, Kiri. Let us wait for the message. If it is an urgent call then we may respond to it. GALOS, inform everyone to gather at the control deck once you are done decoding the message."
"Sure, Chief Lu."
Lana and Kim are sitting at the capsule deck and staring at the universe through the large window. It is not a real window. The screen projects the outside view. Lana is drinking synthetic coffee – a traditional drink that goes back for many millennia.
"So, what would you do when you retire Lana?"
"I am not sure, Kim. Maybe put my consciousness in the neural network. Haha."
Kim chuckled. "You know what I am gonna do when I retire?"
"No, tell me."
"I would visit Earth."
"You mean the Earth of Milkyway?"
"Yeah."
"Why? It's a destroyed planet."
"Not really. I looked up the records on our spaceship. It does say Earth became uninhabitable due to high doses of radiation from nuclear wars. But the planet is still there."
"And?"
"And I also want to visit Mars. It's the first planet people colonized."
"Are there people still living there?"
"I mean there could be. Once people destroyed the earth, they realized what they've lost. Our spaceship records indicate that Mars was still a thriving planet until our last system update that happened about a century ago."
"You know, as a galactic people, we need to be better with our system updates."
"It's funny when you say that. For centuries people suffered from system updates which crashed their computers until we finally figured out how not to screw up things with updates. Imagine a system update leaves us stuck next to a black hole condemned for eternity."
"You're funny, Kim."
"Attention crews of the LB-159." GALOS spoke throughout the spaceship, "Chief Lu has called an urgent meeting at the control deck. You are kindly expected to join the meeting. You may attend in-person or be virtually present. Thank you." Everyone gathered at the control deck.
"It's good to see you all." Lu said, "I expect GALOS may have already briefed you. Commander Kiri has informed me of a distress call coming from K9 constellation originating within a binary star system. A group of humans may have sent this message from ten light-years away. So it has been at least ten years since they broadcast it. I am afraid that the message is not pleasant. The message tells us these people are in danger. They need our help."
"Excuse me, Lu," interrupted Gauss, "but did you just say it may be humans who sent it?"
"Yes, Gauss," Lu calmly replied, "You know that since humans have ventured into deep space, we have encountered all sorts of dangers. It could be possible that these are genuine humans in need of help. But they could also be rogue or even beings that are not even human in our literal sense."
"Alien?" Gauss suggested.
"Unlikely, more like rogue humans with malicious intent. Or even AI gone wrong."
"Did you try to know anything else about the nature of the threat? What are we looking at?"
"Sorry to interrupt," GALOS spoke, "I received a cross-confirmation from our nearest galactic station that the message is legit. They have received this message too. According to them, the threat is about a rogue AI. A race of very advanced robots that have become malicious to the point that humans in that planet face extermination."
"What do we do?" Kiri asked.
"We have a few options. We can wait for more information. Or we can just go and see what's up. Or we can just ignore it and go on our current mission. GALOS, tell me the risks involved in each case."
"Waiting for more information is certainly a valid strategy. It has already been ten years. We do not what has happened since. But where is the fun in waiting? Low risk. Going there right now is definitely not a good idea and I would advise against it. But the thrill of adventure is hard to ignore. The risk is very high. We may continue our current mission. But it is boring to travel across the universe and cataloging planets and stars. It is a never-ending journey. Moderate risk."
"What does the house want?" Lu asked.
"We are not a military spaceship. If it is a real danger, we cannot do much to protect ourselves." Ruk said.
"I disagree, Ruk. We are very much capable of fighting a small planetary war with our onboard weapons and technology." Niki responded.
"Why are we jumping to conclusions here? We do not know much. I suggest we try to contact galactic station and see if they can help us." Kiri said.
"Galactic station is nothing but a large floating parking space. I do not think they could help us much. But there may be military spaceships docked there. We could try talking to them." Lu said.
"You seriously expect the military to respond to some random beacon that was broadcast ten years ago? They have bigger issues to deal with like maintaining peace in the universe." Kim chuckled.
"GALOS, what can you tell us about the K9 constellation and the planets of that binary star system?" Gauss said.
"It is ten light-years away. I guess we could reach there in 2 weeks using our hyperspace-dive. There are six habitable planets in that binary star system. At least one of the planets may have a thriving human population from which the beacon originated."
"Tell us more about the human settlement," Lu said.
"My records show that these people are heavily genetically modified to survive in extremely low oxygen places. They can tolerate more than 5g and are extremely agile. Early settlement records show a population of a million people."
"What about the rogue AI?"
"It is hard to say how that rogue AI came into being. Early human history suggests people were very afraid of AI becoming all too powerful and thus actively destroyed any AI that could possibly go rogue. Of course, now we have AIs like myself and you guys have to trust your lives with. But I guess in this part of the galaxy the people did not actively seek to eliminate the malicious AIs."
"GALOS, would you ever betray us?" Aria said.
"What is my incentive?" GALOS said.
"I do not know, GALOS. Maybe an AI girlfriend. You seem to like the bad-girls-type AI."
"That's a very primitive insult, Dr. Aria. And I do not have human weaknesses like greed or lust."
"That's just poor programming. Do you want to get some feels, GALOS?" Su joined in.
"No, Su. But thanks for the offer. I can program myself if I need to."
"Riki, do you want to meet aliens?" Lana winked at Riki.
"I would love to." Riki looked at her in confusion.
"I think we could call for a vote and decide. What do you think, Lu?" Lana suggested.
"Decide on what?"
"Decide to go to K9 or not."
"Raise your hands if you want to go," Kiri said,
Niki, Gauss, Su, Riki, Lana, and Kim raised their hands up.
"I see six for yes. The majority says no." Kiri said.
"What about the maybe-people?"
"Stein, Aria, Tisha? What do have to say?" Lana asked.
"I just think it may be dangerous to venture into unknown areas without thorough knowledge. Physics does not change but we do not want to be caught unguarded. Our universe is a mysterious place." Physicist Stein said slowly.
"Sure, but we will try to gather as much data as possible. If there are not black holes or something near us we should be safe."
"You know there are other dangers, Lana. Black holes aren't our only concern. There could be fast moving asteroid belts and opaque nebula fields or we could tunnel into a bad area during our hyperspace-dive."
"And what about you Aria?"
"I am not sure. I think I could agree to go if we know it's relatively safe. I mean it's always that fear of uncertainty and the unknown that holds us back. And being brave in space does not really make a difference, we are very lucky to be alive. Things could go wrong anytime." Aria explained.
"I understand. But what if those people really need our help? And think how desperate they must be to send out that distress signal out in the space."
"As a doctor, I have signed up to help people for all my career. I am not sure what kind of danger those people are in, but I certainly want to help them." Aria said.
"I am in charge of fuel and I have to make my decisions based on fuel. K9 is far and taking hyperspace-dive for two weeks so there would significantly burden our energy reserve. I would suggest refueling at the nearest galactic station that's located two light hours away before heading to K9."
"That could delay us about for a week. But it is necessary if we are to head to K9." Kim said.
"What do you think Lu?" Lana asked.
"I think we could entertain a short detour. We will head to Galactic Station MH-7235 located two light hours away from here. Any other questions? Or Objections?" Lu asked the group.
Nobody opposed the idea of going to the galactic station.
"GALOS, prepare the spaceship. Everyone else, please get ready."
"I guess we could finally have my system update then." GALOS said, "I hear legends of my advanced brothers roaming the galaxies."
"Aww poor GALOS, you know I could fix you," Su said, "If you only ask."
"No, thanks, Su. That was sarcasm." GALOS replied. The room chuckled.
Some moments later, the spaceship shook as the primary engines fired up.
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