Chapter 31: Chapter 32 ICARUS Hello, World

“It’s beautiful, Ship,” Icarus said as he stood on the bridge of his spacecraft marvelling at the rings he had created.

Ship had manoeuvred their spaceship a good two light seconds away from Titan. They positioned themselves on top of the gas giant so they could see the rings of Titan all at once. It filled the whole window of the bridge.

“It looks kind of like a spinning top,” Icarus said as he took in the full beauty of the rings. At this distance the features and rocks of the rings blurred into each other and the connecting wires that were strung all over the planet weren’t visible.

In the centre was the massive gas giant. It was mostly a grey-blue colour with orange swirls which were storms moving around it. All the dust and rocks and asteroids blurred into one another. Compared to the planet Titan, the rings had no thickness at all; at this distance they looked as thin as a sheet of paper. The rings were slightly transparent too, enabling Icarus to see stars behind them.  

Icarus thought about how small he really was as it was the first time he had truly realised how large the rings of Titan were.

They were still moving away from the rings, but Icarus was ready to take it all in. “Okay, Ship, turn it on.”

A few seconds later, colours erupted from the rings, shimmers of violet and turquoise flashing on different sections producing a spectacle of colours. With a slightly transparent texture, the rings looked like nothing he had ever seen before. Because there wasn’t any atmosphere for the light to bounce off, the whole thing looked unnatural.

Icarus’s mind struggled with the fact that from a distance it looked like light should be bouncing off the gas giant. But it wasn’t. He was in awe of what he was looking at. “Imagine having a rave with this as the view,” he mused as he thought about how powerful he was. Did he really just light up an entire ring?

The resources it took to create this view were enormous. And he just did it for fun.

“Ship, when we seed the world down there, we need to take a group of humans up to see this. We need to throw a party with this as the view.”

Icarus thought for a few seconds. “Do you think we could simulate what it’s like to be high?”

Ship looked at him. “Icarus.”

“I’m only asking for a friend,” Icarus laughed. He thought about his university days. Those festivals were tame events compared to the light show he was looking at now.

“Okay, let’s do stage two.” Icarus clicked his fingers. The playback speed changed and time started to speed up.

The rings in front of him seemed to be spinning faster; lights started moving around the ring and they began to merge together.  

Icarus increased his playback speed more. The strobe lights of the rings started to form words.

He read the words out loud. “Hello, World.”

He laughed. “Not as beautiful. But worth it.”

Ship interrupted Icarus with some good news. “We just completed the Starnet connection that Trillion sent through. It seems to be working. I’ve spoken to her Lex.”

“What!” Icarus yelled. “Put them through. I thought Starnet was a joke.”

Icarus heard an odd ringing sound through the speakers, followed by Trillion’s voice.

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“Hello.”

“Is this a joke? It’s gotta be a joke!” Icarus exclaimed.

“It’s no joke.”

Icarus was surprised to hear Atlas’s voice.

“Wait, who else is there? Angelique?” Icarus asked excitedly.

There was a slight pause before Atlas replied. “We haven’t made contact with her yet. Her ship flew in the opposite direction after me so I couldn’t predict her end point. Unlike you two.”  

So many other questions flew through Icarus’s mind. “How does this work? Have any of you encountered aliens? Hold on – how is this not breaking causality? This should be breaking causality.”

Attempting to answer his own questions, Icarus threw a screen into the air. He asked Lex to collect information on Atlas and Trillion’s location.

“What’s causality?” Trillion asked through the speaker.

Icarus scrolled through the data from Lex as he answered. “Information can’t travel faster than the speed of light. Or at least it shouldn’t be able to ¼ Basically, it can lead to some strange paradoxes. Like speaking to your past. Or worse, you could stop someone from doing something they’ve already done.”

Atlas teleported onto Icarus’s bridge, grinning from ear to ear. “You’re talking about the grandfather paradox?”

“Yes, exactly. We should test this. Between the three of us. I think we could see if we can break causality,” Icarus said.

“Enough about causality,” Trillion laughed.  “Just wait and see – communication isn’t the only thing we can do with this system.”

Trillion teleported onto the bridge. She ran over and gave Icarus a massive hug. As she held him she said, “Enough about causality. How are you?” She stepped back, looking him up and down. “I thought you were joking when you said you wanted to become a cartoon.”  

Icarus laughed and pulled Trillion in for another hug. “Why haven’t I missed you both until now? I find that odd.”

“I said the same thing,” Trillion remarked as she let go of Icarus. “I think that was one of the changes made to us when we got uploaded. Anyway, there’s something I want to show you.”

Icarus looked at Trillion and Atlas. “I don’t think you could show me anything better than seeing you two.”

“How about an alien?”

Icarus’s jaw dropped. “What? Why didn’t you tell me that? Well, what are you waiting for? Show me!”

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