Stellarium (Origins): A Space-Time Adventure to the Ends of our Universe (8 page)

Image 09
– Orion-II with Valkiria in the background.

(credits and details on the final page)

The green light on the dashboard
lights up. Inside the Orion-II, the three astronauts begin the standard
procedure to pinpoint their location.

It was a euphoric moment; they
had completed the jump on their first try, something which they had yet to do
before. But their euphoria was followed by intense frustration.

They were not near Earth. The
place where they had arrived didn’t look like anything they had every seen
before. There was a bright light all around them, as well as lots of stars and
a few nebulas. From the moment they arrived, they had felt a strong and
constant acceleration. In front of them was a star
—
or
something that, at first glance, looked like a star. It was huge. It was
surrounded by light, but its center was dark. It didn’t give off any heat, but
their measuring instruments detected extremely high radiation levels.

“Allison, how soon will you be
able to tell us where we are?” asked a worried Russell.

“I’m working on it, Russ. I think
I’ll need about twenty more minutes for the computer to finish
cross-referencing the data. But I don’t have a good feeling about that thing in
front of us,” she responded.

“Is that a star?” asked Frank.

“It doesn’t look like a star...
I’m pretty sure it’s a black hole. See, its core is dark. That light around it
isn’t coming from the hole, but rather, it’s moving toward it. It is also being
reflected by that dust spiral, which seems to be moving in the direction of the
hole, as well, allowing us see it,” Allison explained.

“That would explain our
acceleration,” Russell added. “How much longer until you can confirm it?”

“We could be in the middle of a
galaxy. The computer is still cross-referencing data from the telescope, but
I’m thinking that we might be at the center of the Milky Way,” she responded
with a worried tone in her voice, speeding up the image capture process.

“Allison, we have to make the
jump as soon as possible, before we get too far away. We are accelerating
toward the black hole. We’re already quite far away from where we first
arrived, and the longer we wait, the farther away we’ll get. I’m going to
initiate the process,” said Russell.

“But where are we going to end
up?” asked Frank. “If we move around too much, who knows where we’ll arrive
after the jump.”

“Would you rather stay here and
see what happens?” joked Russell.

“I’d rather engage the engines
and move backwards, in an attempt to activate the dark matter accelerators and
create a singularity closer to the place where we arrived,” responded Frank.

“Frank, right now, we only have
half as much fuel as when we left Earth. Even if we were to turn on the engines
and burn up all that fuel, we wouldn’t be able to get back to where we arrived.
We’ve been accelerating for a long time already, and we don’t know how fast
we’ve been going. This singularity’s gravity is huge; we have to make the jump
now,” said Russell in closing.

At that moment, the ship’s body
creaked. A screech reverberated through the ship, as if something were scraping
the outside. It seemed as if something were loose on top of the Orion-II, as if
a piece of metal were bending and squeaking, causing the ship to whisper, and
reminding the crew just how fragile their situation was.

It wasn’t coming from outside,
because sound doesn’t propagate in space. It had to be something that was loose
and rubbing against the ship body, which in turn caused them to hear the noise
inside of the ship.

Frightened, Allison braced
herself. Russell looked around the walls of the Orion-II as the sound got
louder and louder inside. Frank followed the reverberation with his eyes in an
attempt to figure out where that terrifying squeal could be coming from. The
tension inside the ship came to a peak... and was following by silence.

They disregarded the noise for
the time being. Frank frantically checked the systems. Russell had already
activated the jump mechanism and initiated the countdown. Allison began to calm
down, adopting a serene demeanor. Sitting in her seat, pressed firmly against
her seatbelt, she looked out the window of the Orion-II.  The beauty of that
moment was unparalleled. The three astronauts were the only people, up until
that point, to have had the opportunity to see a black hole up close. Neither
Russell nor Frank realized the importance of this moment, as they were both
focused on getting out of there before that thing swallowed them up. Allison,
on the other hand, knew just how valuable what she was witnessing was, causing
her to remain hypnotized and spend those last few minutes in a completely
contemplative state.

In the midst of such extreme
tension and rushing around, they both noted how calm Allison seemed to be with
that singularity in front of her. And, so, they were both suddenly overcome
with silence. It was absolute. The image outside of the ship granted them a
total and terrifying peace. The landscape appeared static. The darkness at the
center of the black hole was larger than anything they had ever seen before. It
was impossible to think of it as a spherical figure
—
which
is the traditional way we think about the shape of a black hole
—
because it made any sense of depth perception impossible. Without
the reflection of light, it looked like a huge tunnel.

Their moment of contemplation was
interrupted as Allison checked to see if the cameras were catching everything
going on outside. The digital material on the ship had become more important
than the very astronauts.

The countdown continued, the
gravity around the ship increased, and, a few minutes later, the wormhole would
be created. While Frank and Russell attempted to save the lives of those on
board, Allison started to worry about the data. It would be such a shame, after
witnessing and discovering so much, to not make it home to share all of it with
the world.

The light began to become
distorted. All they could see through the window was a huge blur. The green
light on the accelerator dashboard lit up. They had jumped again. This time,
they didn’t need to check any of the images. It was obvious that they had
successfully jumped. The surroundings visible through the ship’s windows were
completely different from their previous location. The acceleration that they
had felt before, a product of the gravity exerted by the black hole, had
disappeared. Everything was dark. There wasn’t anything outside, not even a
star. Nothing but full and absolute darkness.

They all experienced a feeling of
relief.

Then, the squeaking noise came
back, reverberating inside the ship. The sound of vibrating metal told them
that something had gone wrong on the exterior of the Orion-II... and they
couldn’t ignore it any longer.

Image 10
– Orion-II confronting a black hole.

(credits and details on the final page)

“We have to figure out what’s wrong
with the ship. We can’t jump again until we know what happened,” said Russell
to Frank.

“Okay, here’s our situation: we
escaped from a huge black hole, which might be at the center of a galaxy. And,
although we were able to escape, we sped up a lot while we were there, and
we’ve continued at that speed until now, even if we might not be able to
perceive it. That means that performing another jump could possibly take us to
another, even more bizarre place. And, to make matters worse, we only have
enough energy left for four more jumps. If we assume that we have a 50% chance
of jumping successfully, that’s only two actual jumps. That’s it.”

Russell and Allison looked at
each other as if bored with Frank’s speech.

“And as if that weren’t enough,”
he continued, “we’re apparently, and literally, in the middle of nowhere. If
you look out the window, the only thing you can see is a galaxy on the horizon,
who knows how many light years away from Earth. We’re not even in a galaxy;
we’re in the middle of a void, far away from any star or planet. We won’t be
able to capture any solar energy here, which means we only have eight more
hours before the Orion-II’s systems run out of power and shut down.”

“And don’t forget that there’s
something loose on the outside of the ship that we need to fix,” added Russell,
smiling.

“Yeah, that, too. We have to fix
the ship. It’s as if we were in a tiny boat, in the middle of the ocean, with no
light at all, not even from the stars, with no waves, no form of communication,
and no map! We’re...”

“Frank, calm down,” said Allison,
intervening and putting an end to her colleague’s panic attack. “Based on
similarities with the database, the computer has identified the system we can
see through the window as one of 23 possible galaxies. The closest one to Earth
is about five million light years away. In other words, we’re really far away,
but we may know where we are.”

“How is that supposed to calm me
down?”

“Let me finish,” she continued. “I
think that we’re currently traveling in the opposite direction than before. On
this “other side” of space, we’re moving away from the black hole, so, the next
jump could possibly put us somewhere safer than where we just came from.”

“How do you know that?” asked
Russell.

“I think that black hole, apparently
at center of the galaxy we were just in, is the same black hole at the center
of that galaxy we can see through the window. And given the data I’ve been able
to collect so far, we’re moving away from it. But it’s just a guess,” Allison
responded.

Frank seemed to calm down.
Russell listened attentively to Allison.

“Let’s see what’s going on
outside the ship and fix whatever needs to be fixed. Then, we’ll start up the
accelerators and create a new wormhole, which will take us back to where we
were before, close to the black hole. With any luck, we’ll be far away enough
to activate the engines and steer the ship somewhere else. I can compare the
position of the stars and get us close to our arrival point, where we can
activate the accelerator again and jump back to Draco. Finally, in Draco, we’ll
correct our position, activate the accelerator once more, and return to our
solar system,” said the astronomer in closing.

“Sounds like a good plan.” said
Russell. “But we’ll have to get really lucky. So far, we haven’t been able to
pinpoint our location in space and thus jump back to the place we came from
even once. With this plan, we have to assume that the next three jumps would be
different.”

“We also have to assume that the
damage to the exterior of the ship isn’t anything serious, nothing that could
compromise the structure,” Frank added.

“Exactly. But the only thing that
really worries me,” continued Russell, “is that we need three jumps for this
plan to work. We have enough energy for four, but we know that half of those
are going to fail... and that only leaves us with enough energy for two actual
jumps, as Frank said earlier.”

“We have to try,” she insisted.

At that moment, once more, a loud
creak echoed inside the capsule. It wasn’t a random sound; it was heard at
regular intervals. Russell was convinced that something was loose and exposed
on the outside of the ship.

After discussing the problem,
Frank started to put on his suit for an EVA (extra vehicular activity). Russell
helped him get dressed. Allison also started putting her suit on.

Before opening the door, Frank
checked the radiation levels. They were at the high end of the scale. He
calculated that he would only be able to stay exposed to that space radiation for
fifteen minutes at the most before his suit would start to break down.

By that point, Russell was
dressed, as well. He wouldn’t exit the ship, but he needed to be in his suit
for when Frank left, which would cause the capsule to become depressurized.

And so they opened the door.
Frank quickly threw himself out of the ship. As the door closed, Allison
secured him to the side with cables.

The door closed and the interior
pressure returned to standard levels. Frank was so rushed to get out of the
ship as fast as possible and keep the Orion-II’s interior pressure from
decreasing too much that he let go and started floating through the empty space
around him.

For a few seconds, Frank found
himself adrift. He was totally free in space, spinning around out of control.
He watched the Orion-II get farther and farther away, before he finally felt a
firm jolt. Fortunately, he was tied to the ship. With his left arm, Frank
grabbed the cable and started to pull, gradually bringing himself closer to the
ship.

Both Russell as Allison watched
and spoke with their colleague through the ship’s cameras and radio. They were
surprised that Frank had let go of the ship and, for a few seconds, floated
freely through space.

Outside, the lone astronaut
climbed toward the top of the Orion-II. He stopped for a moment to observe his
surroundings. There was nothing but complete and utter darkness. The only
reason he was able to see the ship was because its external lights were turned
on. There weren’t even any stars in the space around him. However, right past
that space was the spectacular image of a giant galaxy which covered the
scenery. It looked like a painting, in which the immense and empty space was
only there to highlight the beauty of that view.

Frank paused for a second and
turned his head. He spent a few moments observing the richness of that view, so
splendid and fascinating.

He reached the top of the
Orion-II, took one look at the casing, and saw that it was the worst-case
scenario. Not only had the fragment that had crashed into the ship in Draco
created a small hole in the upper part of the body of the ship; it had also
caused one of the three main parachutes, designed to open during landing, to
come loose.

By the time they had arrived near
the black hole, before jumping to their current location, the parachute had
unrolled even more. The acceleration caused by the gravity of that singularity
had caused the parachute to open up, so much so that it had gotten caught on
one of the rings.

Frank analyzed the situation.
First of all, he would need to free the part of the parachute that was trapped
in the ring. However, in order to reach that spot, he would have to detach
himself from the cable that secured him to the Orion-II and throw himself
toward the part of the structure where the parachute was stuck.

“You can do it! You can do it!”
the astronaut repeated to himself. Slowly, with his right hand, he unfastened
his safety cable and attached it to the body of the ship. By doing that, he was
able to get as close as possible to the point he would jump from. The ring,
which encircled the ship, was about 50 feet away. It would be a long jump. He
would have to line up perfectly before pushing off, because if he missed the
target and went through the ring, he would end up floating in space, this time
without a cable to keep him latched onto the ship.

“What are you doing, Frank? How’s
it going out there? We can’t see you,” said Russell.

“Hold on a second,” Frank
responded.

The engineer took a deep breath
and pushed off. In an instant, he was floating in space. As he got closer to
his target, he stretched out his arms, finally reaching the ring. He grabbed on
to the metallic structure with one hand, then immediately removed the part of
the parachute stuck on the ring. “Okay, getting back is going to be easier,” he
repeated to himself.

Frank wouldn’t need to jump again
to get back to the main module of the Orion-II. He was now holding onto the
parachute, which was attached to the ship. So, by pulling on the parachute, he
was able to use it as a guide to get back, which made for a much less risky
situation. He was sweating, in part because of the intense radiation around
him, and in part because of the stress of that moment. His breathing was rapid,
as was his heartbeat.

“Guys, things look ugly up here.
Do you want to hear the good news or the bad news first?” he asked.

“What was it, Frank? How’s the
ship?”

“The good news is that it’s easy
to fix. I had a little adventure, but I was already able to free one part. Now,
I just have to remove a few screws and the loose piece will no longer be
attached to the ship.  I’m doing that right now.”

“So, what’s the bad news?” asked
Allison.

“The loose piece is one of our
reentry parachutes... one of the main parachutes,” he responded.

Russell stared at Allison. They
knew they were in serious trouble now. Even if they were able to get back to
where they started, they wouldn’t be able to get to Earth.

“Frank, you only have two more
minutes,” said Russell, “you have to hurry.”

“I’m almost done.”

“Frank, just one minute left!”

“I’m going,” he said. “I’m coming
down right now. Allison, can you open the door?”

Allison quickly unlocked the
latches and opened the door to the spacecraft.

“Congratulations, Frank! You’re
officially the first human to walk through space millions of light years away
from Earth,” said Allison, trying to calm the tension.

She helped Frank get back inside
the capsule. After they closed the door and the pressure returned to normal,
they all started to take off their suits.

Russell and Allison notice that
Frank looks tired, sweaty, and out of breath. He takes a sip of water and a
deep breath, trying to calm down. Russell asks if he’s okay, and the engineer
nods. He then tells his colleagues in detail about everything that happened.

Russell goes back to the
discussion of what they should do next, putting everyone on the same page:

“Okay, even if we were able to
successfully follow through with Allison’s plan, we wouldn’t be able to
reenter. The ship has three parachutes, but we’ve lost one of those. There’s no
way to reenter with just two parachutes, not to mention the fact that there are
probably other defects that could keep those two from opening.”

After a brief moment of silence,
Frank checked the computer and told Russell that he could now initiate the jump
sequence. He did so immediately, and the countdown from ten began again.

“If we get lucky and manage to
return to our solar system, we’ll have to travel to the Space Station. There’s
no way for us to reenter. We’ll have to go to the station and then wait for
NASA to come rescue us,” Russell informed his colleagues.

“That makes sense,” said Frank.
“There’s an Orion mounted on the ISS in case of an eventual evacuation. We
could use that to get back.”

“Yeah, that’s what I was
thinking. But the people at NASA are the ones who will decide what we have to
do. The lesser of two evils, being at the space station would be like being at
home,” said the commander.

Once again, silence took hold of
the ship. They all counted down to the jump. Russell pensively looked out onto
the horizon. He knew without a doubt that the challenge he faced in that moment
was the greatest of his career up until that point. In fact, it was the
greatest challenge any astronaut had ever faced.

He knew that he had been chosen
for this mission precisely because of his ability to find solutions to
unexpected problems, such as being hit by an asteroid fragment. Russell was
fast enough to configure the ship’s automatic stabilization feature before
losing consciousness when it began to spin. Now, he would have to find a way to
get the ship back to Earth. He would have to bring his crew home alive.

The team on the Orion-II
experienced a number of emotions: Allison was concerned about losing the huge
amount of data and images that they had captured; for her, “not going back”
wasn’t an option.

Frank worried about his family,
but the possibility that he might not be able to tell his children about this
adventure and the marvelous things he had seen, or that he might simply never
see them again, was something he avoided even thinking about.

Russell, in turn, felt pressured
to find a way to get back. The experienced pilot wasn’t worried about what
science would miss out on, or about the family members that he would leave
behind—though he didn’t have many—but he was concerned with finishing the
mission successfully and bringing everyone home alive.