Factoring Humanity

It had to be cycling air through — that was the only sensible answer. The aliens surely couldn’t have known what sort of atmosphere humans required.

Heather sagged back as much as the cramped quarters would allow. It was indeed the only sensible answer — but it was also the most depressing one. She laughed at herself. She had indeed thought that maybe, just maybe, the aliens had told her how to build a starship — a starship that would whisk her away from Earth, away from all her troubles, and take her to Alpha Centauri.

But if all it was doing was pumping air in from outside, it wouldn’t make much of a spaceship. She contorted herself inside the hollow cube so that she could get her nose up against the green substrate wall. She could feel the gentle breeze, but the air had no odor at all.

But if not a spaceship, then what? And why the structural-integrity field?

She knew what she had to do. She had to reattach the removed cube while still remaining inside the central hollow. But surely she should tell someone first. Even with her “I’m inside the third cube” note, it could be hours, or days, before someone entered her office. What if she got trapped inside?

She thought about phoning Kyle. But that wouldn’t do.

She didn’t have any grad students of her own during the summer, but there always were a few milling about. She could grab one of them — although then she might have to share some credit with the student when she published her results.

And then, of course, there was the most logical name — the one she knew she’d been deliberately suppressing.

Paul.

She could call him up. He’d doubtless get credit anyway; after all, he’d manufactured the components from which the construct was made, and had helped her assemble them.

Maybe, in its own crazy way, this was a perfectly reasonable excuse to call him. Not that last night had been a date or anything, not that any further contact was required.

She got out of the cubic hollow and crossed over to her desk, stretching as she did so, trying to get a crick out of her neck.

She picked up her handset. “Internal directory: Komensky, Paul.”

There were a few electronic bleeps, then Paul’s voice mail came on. “Hello, this is Professor Paul Komensky, Mechanical Engineering. I can’t come to the phone right now. My office hours for student appointments are — ”

Heather replaced the handset. Her heart was fluttering a bit — she’d wanted to connect with him, yet felt a tinge of relief that she hadn’t.

She felt warm, perhaps even warmer than the bright lights should have made her feel. She looked back at the construct and then over at her computer monitor. The Alien Signal Center Web page hadn’t changed. There must be thousands of researchers working on the problem of what the alien messages had meant now that they were apparently over. She felt sure she had a good jump on everyone else — the lucky coincidence of Kyle having that Dali painting on his wall had let her leap ahead. But how long would it be before someone else built a similar construct?

She hesitated for another full minute, warring with herself.

And then -

And then she walked across the room, hefted the cube she’d removed earlier and brought it closer to the construct. She then got one of the suction-cup handles Paul had given her and placed it over the center of one face of the cube — the face that consisted of two substrate panels sandwiched together. There was a little pump on top of the black plastic handle; she pulled it up and the unit clamped onto the cube. She then tried lifting the cube by the handle. She feared it would fall apart, but the whole thing held together nicely.

After one more moment of hesitation, she tucked herself back into the hollow and then, pulling on the suction-cup handle, she lifted the cube back up into place. It clicked easily into position, locking on.

Heather felt a wave of panic wash over her as she was plunged into darkness.

But it wasn’t total darkness. The piezoelectric paint shone slightly with that same greenish tinge that glow-in-the-dark children’s toys gave off.

She took a deep breath. There was plenty of air, although the close confines did make it seem stuffy. Still, even though she clearly wasn’t going to suffocate in here, she wanted to be sure she could leave the construct whenever she wished. She splayed her hands and used them to try to push out the same cube she’d detached earlier.

Another wave of panic washed over her — the cube didn’t want to give. The structural-integrity field might be sealing her in.

She balled her hands into fists and pounded on the cube again -

— and it popped free, tumbling to the carpeted floor, the face with the suction-cup handle ending up on top.

Heather felt herself grinning sheepishly at her own panic. It probably was a good thing that the construct wasn’t a spaceship — she’d have ended up making first contact with soiled panties.