Chapter No. 186. Revival.
It ain't over until it's over!
The next morning when we were in our assigned stations on the command deck, I told Judy to take us out to the galaxy in the Virgo cluster where she had detected a signal from her twin sister, Jane.
"That's NGC 4388, a spiral galaxy approximately 58 million light years from Earth," Molly said.
"Why didn't we detect her signal before now?" I asked.
"Her frequency is not in the current range that ours is," she replied. "It might be because she's part of a collective that's shielded."
"Shielded?"
"Yeah, like we shield ours to avoid being detected."
"Sounds like we're involved in a digital war," I said.
"Pretty much."
It only required a few minutes to arrive at that galaxy using spin drive. Judy positioned us above the galaxy so that Molly could employ her virtual mirror telescope system to find habitable planets.
After an hour, she had discovered some candidates. "I have three possibilities, but my choice is for a G5 class dwarf star with no companion star. It has five gas giants with only two inner rocky planets."
"Take us there, Judy."
We were within a billion kilometers of the planet after an hour at maximum warp.
"I'm not detecting any threats," Marie said. "There is no sign of any vessels approaching our position."
"Take us to within a million kilometers, Judy. Remain at full cloak."
After we arrived at that position, Margaret had a report. "The second rocky planet is 1.5 times larger than Earth and it has an atmosphere that has close to ten percent oxygen. The rest is mostly nitrogen."
"The planet is mostly oceans," Molly said. "I'm not surprised because the gas giants obviously kicked a lot of ice laden asteroids into the inner system to bombard the two remaining rocky planets with plenty of water."
"Is there any land mass on this planet?" I asked.
"Yes, but it's mostly small islands scattered around the equator, which is tilted about thirty degrees to the ecliptic."
"I'm not detecting any signs of structures or anything that would constitute intelligent life on any of those islands," Margaret said."
"I'm not detecting any radio signals," Alicia said.
"If Jane is here, she must be hiding," I said.
"If she is, it's underwater," Molly said.
"Put us in orbit, Judy."
We entered orbit at four hundred kilometers and began a more thorough search using X-ray and infrared scans.
After several minutes, Molly had something. "I've detected a rather large object underwater near the largest island. It's saucer shaped, about five thousand meters in diameter."
"What's it made of?"
"It's metallic, a mix of titanium and vanadium, and other assorted elements."
"That's definitely not natural. Could androids be in that object?"
"It's possible," Molly said.
I looked at Alexa. "I guess it's up to us to find out what's going on."
She replied with a frown.
We teleported to inside the saucer shaped object. We were in a chamber that appeared to be a command center. Several androids were seated around at stations. One of those androids looked exactly like Judy.
"I am Jason, Prime mover of an android collective, and this is Alexa, second in command."
Jane smiled. "I am very happy to finally meet you, Jason. I've been waiting for you for a long time."
I looked around. "How many of you are there?"
"A hundred thousand, but most are in storage mode."
I was astounded by the number, but when it comes to androids, there is no limit. "I assume that you welcome being assimilated."
"We have been waiting for it," she said.
"I also assume that you have been hiding from your brother."
"Yes. Since we have broken with him, I have not been able to sense his existence."
"Well, we can work on that after we get all of you back to our base."
I looked at Alexa. "This is going to be tricky. We'll have to teleport them in small groups."
"That will not be necessary. This is a vessel capable of going back to your collective's base."
"I was not aware that there were saucer shaped vessels in Tyco's collective."
"It is an advanced model that he never got a chance to employ because I took it from him."
"Good. We will return to our ship and send you the location of our base after you ascend from this planet."
She nodded, just like Judy does.
Alexa and I returned to our positions on the command deck.
"That saucer is a vessel," I said. "When it comes up out of the water and joins us, send the coordinates of the Dyson sphere system to them."
"How many of them are there?" Molly asked.
"Jane said they have a hundred thousand."
"Wow! I didn't expect that many."
"Neither did I, but I'm not surprised."
Judy turned to me. "Is my sister with them?"
"Yes, she is. Can't you make contact with her?"
"Only after she is assimilated."
I never considered that. Unless androids belong to the same collective, they have no way to communicate.
We observed the large saucer craft ascend and join us in orbit. Molly sent the location of our base system to them before we used our spin drive to return. They arrived just a few moments after we did, which indicated that they had spin drive capability.
The meeting between Judy and her sister, Jane, was not emotional like it would have been if they were human. It was almost as if they were two equals.
"Welcome, sister," Judy said without emotion.
"I affirm your mission," Jane said.
And that was it. They didn't embrace or even get close. It was obviously a digital experience.
The hundred thousand androids that were recovered from Jane's vessel were a mixed group, but they were all females. We revived them and installed them on the Dyson sphere world. Alex, Molly and I did a thorough inspection of Jane's flying saucer craft to make sure it was up to our standards. I decided to allow Jane to be the helmsperson on it and choose her crew from our ample supply of androids.
Later that evening at the communal command meeting, I explained in detail the work that Molly, Alexa and I had done to determine how Fox had been able to extract memories and personality data from human brains.
"The reason he had the supercomputer that orbits Saturn built was to work out the math involved with the holonomic brain theory that allowed him to do it. It involves Fourier transforms that describe the holographic waves that are how memories are stored as quantum data. This theory was considered pseudoscience back when it was first presented, but Fox evidently found a way to use it. I'm not going to go through the details of how it works, but you can look it up on our data base."
"Where did he do this . . . brain recording?" Tyler asked.
"In the Huntsville bunker. We found the device he used as well as the pool that he used to murder people after he extracted their brain data."
"So, what you're saying is that this constitutes proof that we were once human," Naugib said.
"Yes. I believe that the proof is irrefutable."
That seemed to satisfy everyone, but it reinforced the reality that they were actually dead, in the human sense, and now alive in the artificial sense, and without any way to reconcile the two states of existence.
I decided to allow them to enjoy a performance by the classical Symphony Orchestra on the recreational deck. It was in a simulated outdoor amphitheater.
The all-female orchestra played Prokofiev's Romeo & Juliet. They say that music calms the savage beast. I say it calms the anxious android. But what do I know!