Chapter 29: Chapter 30 ATLAS Speaking with Aliens

“In theory, this should work,” Atlas said. His hand hovered over a button on his keyboard. He was talking with Trillion through the speakers.  

“Let’s hope. Wait. Could we break anything?”

“No. This code should just increase the bandwidth to the Starnet.”

Atlas could feel the excitement at the thought. Instantaneous communication meant galaxy-wide civilisations were now possible. Technology advancements on any of the colonies could now disseminate straightaway to all the others – no longer were advancements limited by slow light speed.

To a simulation like him, it meant he could travel the universe instantaneously. At least if this worked. If his planned improvements did increase the bandwidth of the Starnet.

Atlas pressed the launch button.

Nothing happened. Well, nothing he could see.

“I guess I was expecting something to happen, Ship, but it’s just data transfer speeds. Has our connection bandwidth changed?”

Ship nodded. “We are now recording a 3,000 terabyte connection.”

Atlas nearly fell off his chair. The data transfer speeds were enormous. “Wow, I don’t think we had a bandwidth on Mars that size.”

“I modelled the system off data link between Earth and the moon. I guess that connection was designed to manage millions of people communicating at once. We only have a connection between two people.”

Atlas stood up. “Okay, I’m coming over.”

Increased data speeds was one thing, but what he really wanted to test was whether he could use that speed to jump into Trillion’s spacecraft. If he could do that, it would change everything.

Atlas pressed another button on his computer.

In an instant he disappeared, then reappeared on Trillion’s ship.

Trillion was standing on the bridge grinning from ear to ear. She launched herself at him. Atlas opened his arms and embraced her. They squeezed each other tighter, neither wanting to let go.

“I thought I’d never see any of you again, let alone hug you,” Trillion said.

“Me neither.”

Atlas grabbed Trillion’s hand and held it up. “I can’t believe I’m touching you!” He could see tears in Trillion’s eyes.

It was an emotional time for both of them. He started to cry too. “Trillion, there are moments of pure joy in life, and this is one of them.”

“I agree – I didn’t know I could be this happy.”

“You know why we don’t get lonely?” Atlas asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Haven’t you noticed that along this journey you haven’t missed any other human? It’s because of the changes made to our brain scan.”

“Are these changes permanent? I can’t imagine a world where I didn’t want my children.”

“It’s designed to fade once our ‘children’ are born.”

Trillion pulled two chairs over and poured herself and Atlas a glass of red wine. They discussed what becoming a simulated human had cost them. How they had both changed. They wondered if they could redo the events of the night when they left. Would they still agree to head out on this adventure?

It was clear to them both why the change was necessary when they were uploaded. It was a lonely journey through space. However, they didn’t feel lonely. Neither could see the perspective outside of what they were currently feeling – they could only see the excitement and passion for creating a colony.

Atlas was the first to change the subject. “I’m keen to see this alien.” He walked over to the window. Outside, he saw it. It was huge. Its body easily reached a good 30 metres high. The large, bulbous creature was around 100 metres away from the ship, but Atlas could see it clearly. It wasn’t moving. Its skin wasn’t changing either. It wasn’t doing anything. “And it just waits there for you to speak with it?” he asked.

“Yes. I’m almost positive it’s a robot because it doesn’t get bored. It can talk with Lex for hours and hours, running through the same scenario again and again.”

Atlas bit his lip, curiosity starting to get the better of him. “Let me have a go. Do you have any ANTs out there? I’d love to take a closer look.”

Atlas watched as Trillion threw a small piece of paper into the air. It unfolded and turned into a large screen. He could tell she was showing off.

On the screen was the live-streamed image of the ANTs near the alien. Atlas took a few steps closer to the screen. The skin of the creature was textured and dimpled.

“We call them the Dottiens,” Trillion said.

“Does it eat?”

Trillion shrugged.

“And it hasn’t bothered you again since initially trapping you here?”

Trillion nodded.

Atlas could feel his brain ticking over. “Trillion, can you get your Lex to send mine everything it’s tried? I’m keen to see what I can do.” Atlas mind was thinking through ideas. “I’ll be back,” he said, as he teleported out to his own ship.

He was back in his office. “Ship, can you print out everything Trillion has collected about the Dottiens?”

The printer sprang to life. He walked over to the printer in his room and started pulling the piece of paper out. He combed through page after page, looking for any clue as to how they might communicate. He had countless questions, such as what sort of language did they speak?

“What has Trillion’s Lex tried already?” he asked, rummaging through the papers. “Can you print those out next?”

 

 

It had been hours. Atlas hunched over the papers, reading everything he could find. It was strange. Lex and the Dottien could speak – at least Trillion’s Lex thought they were communicating. Then all of a sudden, neither of them would understand the other.

So Trillion’s Lex would start again, testing projecting different colours on the screen to try and decode the Dottiens’ language.

The pattern happened again and again, each time taking Lex just as long to decode the language.

“Ship, am I understanding this correctly?” Atlas asked, raising his head from the papers. “Trillion’s Lex is managing to communicate with the Dottien, but then after a while they can’t communicate any longer?”

“That’s what he is saying. Or maybe Lex is wrong, and it could never actually communicate with the alien.”

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It didn’t make sense. Atlas was so confused. He was determined to get to the bottom of this. He teleported back to Trillion’s bridge.

She wasn’t there.

“Trillion?”

“I’m in my room. I’ll be out in a sec,” came her voice from the speakers.

A few moments later, she teleported in and floated in the air, arms and legs crossed in a yoga pose.

“Question, Trillion. I still don’t quite understand the alien. Can I clarify a few things?”

He watched as Trillion nodded and floated back towards the ground. A wine reappeared in her hand, followed by a chair which she settled into.

Atlas held up a piece of paper. “In the most basic sense, the Dottiens communicate with colours?”

“Yes, as far as we can tell. I think purple is some kind of threat, but I have no idea what any of the other colours mean.”

“Okay, and this is what happens every time.” Atlas began recapping what he had seen from the data Trillion provided. “Each time Lex manages to communicate with it in a very simplistic way, he figures out that ‘red’ means ‘yes’ and ‘blue’ means ‘no’?”

“Yes. Well, a particular pattern on its skin means ‘yes’. But you could simplify it to that. Yes.”

“Now, this is the part that I don’t understand.” Atlas pointed to his piece of paper. “After a little while ‘red’ no longer means ‘yes’. It might now mean ¼” Atlas was struggling to come up with an example fast enough. “¼ ‘dog’ ,for example,” he managed to say. “After a while ‘red’ becomes ‘dog’ and no longer means ‘yes’.”

 “Hm, that’s exactly what happens. After some time, everything Lex thought he knew about the Dottien changes.”

“Do you know why?”

“No, but it’s not like we have a complete understanding of the alien. It’s like we’re communicating at the level you might communicate with a small child. We can’t have a proper conversation. Each time we manage to create a shared group of words or concepts, boom! Somehow the language changes to something else.”

Atlas bit his lip hard. “I’ll be back again.”

He teleported out.

Something wasn’t adding up. He thought about the problem again.

Atlas looked at the orb in the corner. “Lex, can you run through the footage? Then tell me, if you were trying to communicate with the Dottien, would you come to the same conclusion as Trillion’s Lex did?”

While waiting for the results of Lex’s finding, he started reviewing footage himself. He sat down at his computer and brought up a clip from one of the ‘training sessions’ where Lex and the Dottien were collecting data to understand each other’s language.

On his screen were two videos playing simultaneously. One showed a large screen projecting colours and shades at the Dottien, while the other showed the Dottien’s full body.

It was beautiful. Waves of colours flowed from one side of the alien to the other. Then like a calm lake with several pebbles thrown into it, bursts of colour appeared on the Dottien. It was mesmerising.  

It reminded Atlas of the electronics stores in the early days, when they would play a demo of the holographic projector. It was always something super bright and beautiful.

I can’t believe I’m looking at true alien life, Atlas thought.

“Ship, what does the word ‘alien’ mean?”

“It means different. Unfamiliar.”

Atlas clicked the replay button. He pressed the ‘plus’ sign and zoomed in on the alien’s skin. He watched as the same video he had just seen played again. But this time from a zoomed-in section of the Dottien’s skin. From this angle, the section of skin took up the whole screen. He watched as waves of colour flowed through the screen randomly, almost resembling a screensaver.

He leaned in, squinting to focus on the details. He slowed the video down. Waves of colour travelled through the screen, and the texture of the Dottien’s skin moved from bumpy to smooth to bumpy, little dimples of the skin expanding and contracting.

It reminded him of an octopus – the way it could change the colour and texture of its skin to match its environment. He’d seen a nature programme once, where an octopus blended in with a rocky ground by transforming its skin through colour and texture changes to mimic real rocks.

Atlas looked up from his computer. “Ship, was Lex using a screen the whole time to communicate with the Dottien?”

“Yes. They originally just had coloured lights, but when they realised they needed more colours, they replaced it with a large screen.”

Everything was starting to click into place. “I think I understand it now. Ship, can you ask Trillion to come over here?”

Atlas turned back to his screen, but before he could close the video, Trillion appeared in his office.

“Took you long enough,” she said as she entered the room.

She folded her arms, taking in the confused look on Atlas’s face. “I invited you into my spacecraft. You pulled all the data we had on the alien. And you still didn’t invite me onto your ship. I want to see your world.”

Atlas turned bright red. He felt like such an idiot. “I’m so sorry, Trillion. It’s been so long since I’ve seen another human. I think I’m just used to ordering Lex and Ship around.”

Trillion smiled and began to laugh. “I’m only joking. But you still have to show me your planet.”

Atlas relaxed. He knew before this journey he could become obsessed with things. After years of being completely alone, he assumed he must have become worse. “Before I show you my world, I want to show you what I think is the problem with communicating with the Dottiens.”

Trillion scanned the room, Atlas could tell she was looking for a place to sit. She couldn’t find one. So she jumped into the air, folded her legs and just floated.

Atlas raised an index finger. “I think there is one major factor we are missing with the Dottiens.”

Trillion nodded encouragingly.

“They can’t understand us.”

Trillion raised her eyebrows in confusion.

“Basically ¼” Atlas pointed to one of the screens in his office, “¼ it’s all about fidelity. We can’t communicate with these Dottiens because they can’t understand our screens.”

Atlas could see that Trillion was beginning to understand the problem.  

“I’m going to start ¼ with your permission?”

Trillion nodded, so Atlas continued. “I’m going to move a hapticgraphic projector outside. If we can build a replica of the Dottien, we’ll be able to communicate using the full richness of the alien language.”

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