5.
Gabriel Nguyen sat in his ‘dungeon,’ examining the various computer screens. He didn’t have the data he needed to do his job. Not the one that he had been assigned to the Seeker for at the start of the mission. He was a data analyst.
He was also the finder of new worlds; the man who had identified the signals in the Ku-band coming from planet Totola which had lead the Seeker and it’s crew into the encounter with the Yonohoans and their allies.
He was responsible for the discovery of advanced life forms in the universe. That mankind on Earth was in the minority, as the majority of space was filled with species that were interconnected by vast info-nets which allowed them to communicate with beings sometimes billions of light years away.
And that humans were already among the stars.
Which had led the earthlings to the rediscovery of the universe’s bloody past. The universe was still healing from the birthwaters from which mankind had emerged screaming into the stars from wherever it was that they came from. The liberation wars, the bloody conflict which had lasted tens of thousands of years, continued to shape intergalactic politics.
But he wasn’t thinking about all of that. He was fixated on analyzing data. He was a data analyst and he was doing his job.
Just … differently than what he’d done before.
He was searching for Earth.
He had no idea where his birth planet was in relation to the Yonohoan system. He didn’t have the flightpath which had brought them here, so he couldn’t follow it back to their origin point. Hopefully, nobody else could either. Hopefully, only the secure database which only Captain Anders could decrypt contained the location of Earth.
But people were looking for it, and so Anders had set Gabriel to the task of finding it, using only the data which they had released to the universe, either intentionally or unintentionally.
To start with, he had looked at the photos of the night sky from Earth which he had unintentionally released to the Yonohoans. There were eighteen of them. However, he had quickly deduced that they were worthless.
The issue wasn’t that they didn’t have constellations which were unique and identifiable. It was that space was vast, and stars were separated from each other not in two dimensions but three. The photographs weren’t detailed enough to accurately identify the necessary reference points from which the location of Earth could be triangulated.
Or at least that was his conclusion.
It was also the conclusion of his Yonohoan counterparts, who were openly and independently checking his work. Captain Anders had given them permission to do so on the fear that the Yonohoan public might have access to the unmodified photos, and he was worried that they would utilize the information. He figured that it was better to test the extent of the data breech – which Gabriel was still kicking himself over – and report their success or failure, than it was to simply pretend the breech had not happened.
So the photographs were a dead end. That was a relief.
The second data breech, however, was concerning. The stellar navigation system retained the data on the probes which the Keeper of Dreams had been sent to retrieve. The probes had deliberately burnt out the encrypted data of their first flight from earth in order to obscure their origin point in the event that they were encountered by extraterrestrials. They retained everything after their initial jump, however. It was Gabriel’s task to see if that data could be used to infer their origin point.
He swallowed a drink of water from a squeeze-ball. He missed gravity sometimes, he thought to himself, craving a nice glass of ice water.
The answer to the question “Could the probes be used to find earth” was “Yes, they could.”
It wasn’t easy or intuitive, but there was a definite pattern to the probes. An organized net which was part of the mission design. Alone their flightpaths were meaningless. Together, they painted a clear picture. Factoring in six or more flightpaths was enough to narrow the location of earth down to a local cluster, at least.
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If Gabriel could do that with his meager data analyst skills and software, then there was no question that the unidentified adversary who had hacked the Keeper could do the same.
The Yonohoans could definitely do the same as well, and it was only by their word and sense of honor that they had allowed the Earthlings to continue to maintain their secrets.
He sighed and printed the report showing the region of space which his predictive software put the origin point of the probes, then carried the data with him. He used the communication ‘egg’ to send a brief message to Anders to request a physical meeting. The egg chirped back to meet Anders in the crisis room at his earliest convenience. Gabriel was already heading in that direction, having anticipated the response.
He let himself into the room and nodded at the captain, who was reviewing a report from Sarah on Yonohoan entertainment media. It wasn’t exactly critical data, but her current position as a patient in the care of the Yonohoans meant that reviewing their holographic plays and films and other forms of entertainment was actually conducive to her mental health. Filing a report to her former commander gave her a sense of control and connection to her career, which was now on hold.
And it was useful insight into the culture of Earth’s potential first allies in the stars. You can learn a lot about a culture by the stories they tell their children, Gabriel knew, and he believed that it was primary children’s media which Sarah was consuming.
“Please give me some good news,” Anders said. “I could really use some.”
“The data leek of the pictures from earth are useless. Neither I nor the analysts of the Yonohoans could put them into context, despite the fact that they have much better computers and star charts than we do,” Gabriel said.
Anders breathed a sigh. “I’m sensing a but coming.”
“But the pattern that the scientists back home set the probes on for their data collection have a clear pattern to them. Despite destroying the record of their initial FTL translation, you can triangulate their origin point if you look at six or more data sets in conjunction with each other. Not precisely, but to within a ten light year circle. Which is sufficient to find a planet which is using microwave or radio-wave radiation for communication purposes, as our own experience proves,” Gabriel explained.
“Shit,” Anders said. “You’re sure?”
“I don’t actually know where Earth is, remember?” Gabriel pointed out. “But I’ll just leave my deduction of where the probes came from with you, and you can review that compared to the secured dataset which I’m not cleared to look at due to my previous handling of sensitive information. Honestly, I’m surprised you tapped me for this project.”
“You’re the best analyst we have,” Anders said without looking up as he examined the printouts that Gabriel had floated him.
“That’s my report. Is there anything else you want me to work on, or can I get back to engaging in cultural exchange with the Yonohoans.”
“Once I confirm this data, I will be announcing that we are returning home aboard the Seeker , Gabriel,” Anders said. “I’ve been dicking around too long as it is. However, only volunteers will be joining me in the flight. We’ll be taking the Yonohoan medicine with us, which will hopefully help reduce the damage of the exposure. But we’re heading home, and some of us will be staying behind. I need you to decide which camp you’ll be a part of.”
Gabriel swallowed. “I’ll stay, Captain.”
“I thought you might. Don’t say anything to the other crew. I’ll make an official announcement over the intercom.”
“Yes sir. You know that this will reveal the location of Earth to the Yonohoans, right?”
“I plan to formally reveal the location of Earth to their government and request that they give me two weeks time before following the Seeker according to the laws they’re required to enforce. I will also be formally requesting that they send us a diplomatic delegation.”
“We’ll be officially opening negotiations then,” Gabriel said.
“We don’t really have any other choice except to stay here indefinitely. The breech of the Keeper puts a timer on the equation. If you can identify the location of earth, then we have to assume that our adversary, if they are our adversary, already knows as well.”
“Yes sir. Sounds like a headache. Glad that I’ll be sipping margaritas on the beaches of Planet Totola instead of dealing with interstellar politics,” Gabriel said.
“Try inter-galactic,” Anders said. “We have people from all over the universe who are trying to learn english so that they can negotiate with us for ‘kittens and puppies.’ I have no idea how we’re supposed to ship them live animals, but they’re very enthusiastic about obtaining them. That will be all, Gabriel. Thank you for your report.”
“Yes sir.”
Gabriel turned and left the room.