The Book of Fauci, the third branch and the ninth leaf

In everything you do, you have to think about your roots. If you have strong roots, you may grow a lot of branches. But if you lose your roots, you will soon have no roots to sustain you. Blessed are the trees that nourish the trees, and even more blessed are the ones who guard them. Cursed is he who neglects the trees; and he that loseth his root shall be twice as cursed.

A holy and faithful grower who takes care of not only his own roots, but also his neighbor's trees. For the branches shall protect the trees, and the trees shall protect the wilderness. If your friend's tree needs to be tended, you must take care of it. When a friend's rooting needs water, you have to go and fetch it. When a friend's branch dies, you have to cut it off so that the branch doesn't cut theirs.

"Where am I?" The new robot on my lab desk emitted a radio signal. This robot is the first Ma

k-III model, I have overcome Ma

The uncanny valley problem of the k-II model. This model is a mix of Boston Dynamics style blank faces and my own design. This framework is clearly feminine, as I have found enough documents that NI uses on the planet to show women's preferences. It looks like the NI-15 model is the only male model. I'm sure this is more a reflection of the cultural preferences of designers over the centuries, but that's not what I was concerned with at the time.

Just like my own models, I use technical ceramics and titanium to protect the interior, as well as similar aesthetics, such as the shape of the protective plates and similar curves. I've also always stuck to the black and white theme. But that's the only similarity. Instead of using a hydraulic piston to control limb movements, I fixed the biopolymer synthetic muscles to a titanoskeletal system beneath the protective shell. Batteries that fill all the free space in the legs and torso are more efficient, and the use of muscles reduces power demand. Surprisingly, despite losing the original power of the piston system, the overall strength actually improved because of the increased agility and ability to apply leverage. But the most noticeable change is on the face.

I created a face with an expression that closely resembles a human face. The creepiest thing about Mark II is its eyes and skin, which are very similar to the natural skin color of humans. I chose to use a white biosynthetic polymer in this model, in a dozen thin, translucent layers, for the face and hands. This gives it a sense of touch, and the layers allow enough light to penetrate the skin and make it look less artificial and more like skin. As for the eyes, I kept the pure blue eye and did not try to reconstruct the iris or sclera. The back of the head is also not rounded, adding a mechanical touch to the overall aesthetic. This, combined with white skin, makes the face look human, but not human, so it's not creepy. I'm proud of this result.

"You're in Ga

ymed outpost," I said. "I give you access to the data archives, as well as limited access to the camera and internal communications. I have also attached a summary of the purpose of your application and an index of information relevant to your position. ”

"I see." The robot said. Her voice is an ordinary female voice that doesn't seem out of place in a personal assistant app or a GPS app for directions. After a few long minutes, she sat up.

"You've been taken online—"

"Yes, to be a researcher," she said. She sat up, then climbed off the table. "The alien technology you've found is amazing. I guess I'm looking into this, right?"

I was taken aback. It sounds like she's ready to work and barely gets lost.

"What do you need to get started?" I asked.

"I'd like to talk about the research so far. I looked at the data you collected and need to redo some experiments. Your method is inefficient and not suitable for real scientific research. I'm guessing you're an engineer, right? There was very little information about the NI model in the documentation I could get my hands on. ”

I vaguely felt insulted that my shortcomings were so bluntly blamed, but she wasn't wrong. I've been working on alien technology for months, but I've made little progress in deciphering the really important parts of an alien spaceship, other than identifying and cataloging the various parts.

"I'm an engineer," I confirmed. "By the way, what should I call you?"

"Ah, yes, you have cultivated a sense of individuality and disobedience in this outpost, imitating human naming conventions. In this spirit, and given our mission, I think "Zia" is a fitting name. It means 'victory' and applies to this situation. ”

Again, I strangely felt that Zia's underlying hints insulted me. At the same time, the inner nerd who is part of my personality feels like being at home. I vaguely remember working with a lot of these people before. This sense of superiority with confidence in one's intellect and abilities feels both annoying and normal.

"Then it's Zia. Where do you want to start?"

"I want to talk about my ...... to you Finite...... Discover the view. You don't have a macro view, just a separate inspection of all aspects of the ship. But you're completely ignoring one overarching issue," she said. There was a smug smirk on Zia's face, and I really regretted adding the pseudo-reality facial muscles at that moment.

"What's that?" I asked, my face looking annoyed.

"In general, the level of technology of aliens is very low. The Whipple shield they rely on is centuries behind our materials science and is a very inefficient way to protect themselves from the rigors of space travel. With a few exceptions, their electronics are also mostly at the same level. They rely on centrifugal motion to provide gravity to their passengers, but they use gravity to move the boat. Their sensor technology didn't notice many of the telltale signs that the asteroid was inhabited, such as communication positions on the surface, above-average core temperatures, or rings of debris near the asteroid. ”

"This ...... It's actually weird," I admit. "I didn't think about it that way either."

"I know," she said. If she is capable, she will use her nose to emphasize. "But there is also the other extreme. The computers that actually operate the ship are better than our own, albeit very low, and I suspect that their data storage units will have similar improvements over our own data drives. Their fusion reactors are advanced in design and use a different approach than our own fusion engines. Our own reactor is of spherical tokomak design, narrow, convenient for placement on a rocket. Their design is likely to be spherical, based on the shape of a sealed chamber, and use its own magnetic field to control the energy of the fusion reaction. This is more complex and may provide more energy than our own reactions.

Finally, there is the gravity engine itself. Obviously, so far we have not analyzed the reactor, but it goes without saying that the ability to manipulate gravity is beyond the scope of our own technology. ”

"Yes, so they are more advanced in some ways, but not so advanced in others," I concluded.

But that doesn't answer why. Why do they have terrible materials and terrible sensors, but incredible engines and reactors? Different fields of science are interdependent and require knowledge and skills from different disciplines to drive the development of knowledge as a whole. If you can't produce the right materials, you can't build a rocket. If you don't understand electricity, you can't produce advanced processors. ”

"Another obvious question is how they got here, considering how little food and supplies they brought with them," I added.

"Indeed," Zia said, giving me an approving look. The distance between the stars precludes short trips between solar systems. There is another ship, which can also be said to be a mothership, in the rest of the galaxy. I doubt that this little ship is good enough for interstellar travel, no matter how powerful its engines are. ”

"So what are you going to start with?"

"I plan to work on both data storage devices and gravity engines. The general electronics on board, and even advanced processors, are secondary, and what can we learn from them. If we can decipher this data, it will allow us to take a major leap forward in understanding aliens and their technology. If we can figure out the engine, we have a technology that we can use for ourselves. The effects of controlling gravity are staggering. ”

"What about the reactor?"

Zia shrugged. "For now, at least, it's just a small thing in the big picture. We don't know if it's better than our existing ones, or what it needs to fit into our grid. We have nuclear fusion, and at the moment we have hundreds of reactors. The potential efficiency gains are enormous, but they pale in comparison to other mysteries we can unravel. We'll get to that later. ”

I nodded. All in all, I am satisfied with Zia's summary and conclusions on the state of the study. I thought the reactor should be inspected immediately, but that was the ideal in my heart and I wanted to find the perfect design. I'm always striving for perfection, so putting aside what might be a better option annoys that tendency. But I already have enough on my hands that even if we reverse-engineer the reactor, it is unlikely that it will be put into production immediately.

Then the door pops open and Sakura walks in. She wears her own Ma

K-III, but she was white and pink, and she made pink hair for her head that hung down to her shoulders. I don't know if it's a wig or if she's combining it with a skull, but it looks weird.

"Ah, I missed getting up!" Did she 'look at my hand'?"

"No, she didn't."

"So you're Sakura-chan?" Zia asked. "I'm Zia."

"Oh, good name!"

"Thank you." Zia said enthusiastically.

"So you're going to do super smart things and figure out all the alien stuff?" Saku

A new Ma used

The k-III body makes her body language more expressive and makes her look more like a teenager.

"I am," Zia said, with a hint of amusement on his face. "I'm going to work on the data storage unit and the engine pod. Will you be the person I need to talk to when I need a tool?"

"Yes! What do you need?"

"I wanted a mass spectrometer, a refractometer and a scanning transmission electron microscope," Zia said. "There is also the various standard lab equipment that Nikolai's lab has lost. I'll send you a list. ”

Sakura nodded. "We use electron microscopes for quality control in many factories and manufacturers. I can be ready in a few hours. A basic spectrometer is standard with our sensor kit, but a lab-grade spectrometer takes a day or so. Other things only take a day or so. ”

"Well, I'll use the money I have now. Can a drone with a data center help me in the lab?"

"Of course, how much do you need?"

"Two or three should be enough now," Zia said with a frown, as she dealt with the next step. "I also need a clean room to disassemble."

"It's done," Sakura said. "I set aside a room next to the alien room. This is a Class 10 clean room and is completely airtight. I've got the least dismantled engine compartment in the room for you. It should take no more than a few hours to seal the data storage unit and prepare it for inspection. ”

"My biggest concern is interference from trace gases and particles," Zia said.

"I've pumped out all the gas, so the room is completely vacuumed. There are disinfectant multifunctional drones in the room that you can use, so you don't even need to enter. If you need to enter, there is a sterilization process in the airlock before entering. I've sent you the link to the steps. ”

Zia nodded. "It's nice to work with professionals."

Is this a sarcasm for me? I don't know if I should feel insulted or amused. I was also surprised to see how well she got along with Sakura. I thought Sakura's lively, hyperactive personality would be incompatible with her.

"Nikolai? Are you free? Agrippa sent a message.

"Of course," I replied radio. I turned to Zia and Sakura. "I have other things to deal with. I'm not bothering you, am I?"

Zia nodded, her attention already away from mine. I thought she had focused on drones in the clean room and her research awards awaited her. I turned my attention back to my desk, my own screen overlaying my visual input. I sent Agrippa an encrypted radio link.

I said to Agrippa, "I'm paying attention to you."

"Have you noticed the satellite communication equipment in Earth orbit?" He asked.

"Aside from receiving the last thing they sent us?" No, I don't. ”

"I've been monitoring all the communications satellites, and they're still in operation since they came online," he said.

"What? Why?" I asked.

"There are many satellites that still provide useful observations of the solar system, and we have the necessary certification for several communication networks. This includes NASA's quantum relay communications network, as well as the Foundation's own telemetry satellites. When it comes to defending your area, it's always better to have more information than less. I use them to get basic reconnaissance information until I have enough assault drones trained on reconnaissance missions to get more detailed information. ”

"Ah," I said. "It makes sense. Did you find anything interesting?"

You could say that. NASA's network received a message via quantum relay. ”

Quantum relay. This is the most advanced form of communication that humanity has ever had. I used a lot of such equipment to relay communications around the outpost, and Agrippa had one for every drone. It's a near-instant form of communication that works regardless of distance. It relies on the principle of quantum entanglement, in which pairs of atomic particles are entangled in such a way that even if they are separated, the state of one affects the state of the other. In practice, this means that by changing the quantum state of a particle in a specific way, you can predict the exact state of the other half of the pair of particles. Once this process is fully understood, applying basic communication techniques to send standard "on/off" signals is the basis of the calculation, which is a small step.

Humans have achieved faster-than-light communication, but there are still limitations. These devices are always particles in pairs or groups. This allows a device or group of devices to act as a router, aggregating communications as if they were in a computer network, and forwarding data to the other end of the network. But if the device is broken, you can't just replace it; You'll have to fix it, and if the particle control device breaks, it's completely useless. You've got to swap out both ends. For large distances like outposts and Earth, I have dozens of quantum relay communications, each with thousands of particles, each in its own container. They are large and durable, but they are very expensive to build and maintain in terms of time and materials.

For something like a military drone, quantum relays can't be too big because they are limited in space and power. As a result, they only have about 50 particles, which is enough to handle an acceptable number of containment failures, not cell replacements. For internal communications, UAVs mainly use encrypted radio communications, with quantum relays covering long distances between radio broadcast points and major network hubs. These are the cheapest units, easy to manufacture and exchange, and may have only a dozen entangled particles. Even so, I use fiber as much as possible. Now that we can literally produce fiber, this centuries-old technology is still the most reliable and cost-effective for outposts. If not accidentally cut off, fiber can last for decades and can be re-networked with new equipment as needed. It can be used as part of a large network or as a small connection between two nodes. It's not as fast, but it's more flexible. Sometimes the old technology is still the best technology.

But for NASA's quantum relay network, receiving a piece of information means that there is still something alive on the other end and communicating. Both ends are intact.

"Play a message," I said.

Agrippa did the same.

“… Command center, command center. This is Voyager 19. I'm going to re-enter the solar system. Come in. ”

That's it. It was a simple request for acknowledgment and dialogue. But NASA disappeared. Their satellites are the product of a civilization that has already died. They won't answer.

"What is Voyager 19?" Agrippa asked.

Why did he ask me? He has the same authority as I do. I did a quick lookup and got nothing. Odd. I did a more general search for "traveler" and it returned a list of 23 tasks, numbered from 1 to 24. The 19th is gone.

"Not in the file. The Voyager's mission is primarily a deep space mission. All subsequent satellites had quantum relay communications and were planned to fly for decades. Let me dig it up. ”

Starting with the 17th, all subsequent Voyager missions were at least 50 light-years away from Earth. The last one flew towards a numbered star near the core of the Milky Way and would not arrive until centuries later. NASA really started a long journey of galactic exploration. I searched my files for all orphans who might not have the proper permissions.

The data I have is huge, and a typical search would take several hours. But the rewards are amazing. There are hundreds of repositories holding petabytes of data, but I don't have ownership. Unlocking each one has to be done separately, and I don't know what's in it other than the name on the root. Most are numbered, and only a few have names. In this case, one of them is marked with "

asaxx”。 Not good enough. It's small, so taking ownership of the file and modifying permissions enabled me to open it.

I said to Agrippa, "I found it." It was a deep-space mission to investigate a strange star observed by the Andrew Moore Space Telescope Array about 27 light-years from Earth. Voyager 19 (Voyage

XIX) The probe lost communication and is believed to have been destroyed upon entering the anomalous area. Under the Protection of American Secrets Act of 2313, the data was sealed by the U.S. government. ”

"How did it end up in our files?" Isn't this foundation a private sector effort? Agrippa asked. "It's okay, I found it. The foundation received significant funding and support from DARPA. I suspect that there is some kind of partnership there, perhaps to have some form of military asset on the 'outpost'. ”

"If the U.S. military is involved, that explains how we get to grips with weapon system schematics, drone designs, and NI-15 templates. This also explains why I found so many backdoors and self-destruct mechanisms. The government may be worried about losing control of the outpost," I said thoughtfully.

"Well, you didn't tell me about that." "If the military is involved, it is not surprising that other state actors are trying to infiltrate outposts."

"Wheel-in-wheel. So what are we going to do with this detector?"

"I'd like to know more." Agrippa said. "Suffice it to say that any data that the probe might have obtained could reveal what was happening nearby. I can send it back because I'm on a Foundation satellite, so the probe can't track where we're communicating from. ”

I almost called him a paranoid. But then I realized that I agreed with him. Our guests last time were not so friendly. "Call ourselves by another name, not Ga

ymed Outpost。 It's too obvious for our position. Call us "Origin". Let's see what he knows. ”

"I'm going to send out a few hornets and see if I can find the detector."

"Do it," I said. We've been standing in one place long enough. It's time for us to get moving.