Analog Science Fiction and Fact - June 2013

ANALOG
archaic Nihongo—syllables shaped by lips and
tongue gone to dust nine thousand years ago.
It was nothing more than an advertisement for
cosmetics, but still . . . to hear that voice, that
ancient breath, across so many years was like
a miracle. I gasped and hugged Aleá close, the
headphones making the gesture awkward.
But the miracle had soured over the following
weeks, as we realized what a fluke that
first clear signal had been, how filthy and attenuated
most of the data was.
Perhaps the stress of that failure was the reason
Aleá had left. It is certainly the reason I
haven’t returned before this. But in eight years
I haven’t found any other site nearly as promising;
the new detector offers a chance to redeem
my reputation as a researcher, perhaps
even heal the still-raw hole in my self-esteem.
I’ve cashed in every favor I had at the Institute
to get myself selected for this pilot project.
Evon’s harsh voice breaks me out of my
reverie. “Can inspect data?”
I blink. “Excuse me?”
“The data, the artifacts, that you find with
new detector. May I inspect?”
“Certainly not!” The very thought of this
bloodless technician pawing through my artifacts
is an affront. But his startled eyes remind
me there isn’t any technical reason for me to
refuse. “I, uh, it’s . . . it’s too preliminary,” I
prevaricate. “Raw research data is . . . it’s subject
to misinterpretation. You understand.”
“I understand.” His face shows that he understands
all too well.
“So, uh . . . may I use the detector now?”
He gestures to the wall behind which the
device is installed. It is only in my mind, I’m
sure, that a wave of chill air flows from it.
“Certainly,” he says, then grins. “Good hunting!”
I manage, just, to remember to say “thank
you” on my way out. So eager am I to get to
work that I tear the sleeve of my silkfish robe
as I shuck it off. My fingers tremble as I fit the
heavy helmet to my head.
In the helmet’s close dark, I shut my eyes
and hold my breath. I press the activation
stud. After a moment of transition, the site
spreads itself out in my sensorium, so dense
with possible artifacts I practically salivate. I
ready my tools.
My mother has never understood why I
travel to barren, desolate areas of space thou-
sands of years away from Earth to study its history.
Archaeologists, she thinks, unearth physical
artifacts. But those traditionalists in their
heavy shielded suits can do little more than
scrape up shattered, melted fragments—ruined
bits of jetsam they can never even touch
with their own hands, nor display to the public
except behind thick glass stained yellow
with lead. We radioarchaelologists, on the other
hand, can reach across the years to grasp
Earth as it was, alive and buzzing with activity.
With any point in Einstein space just a step
away in Keene space, all we need do is travel
to a place with a clear view of our selected period
of history and bring a good enough detector.
And now, I hope, I have both.
Although the subjects of my work are only
tenuous wisps of radio waves, with the ship’s
help I perceive them as solid objects. Illusions
of weight, color, and texture help my ape-descended
brain distinguish signal from noise,
diamonds from dross. I use metaphors of hammers,
chisels, brushes; I chip and scrape away
at radio noise to reveal fragments of data like
jawbones and potsherds teased from the rock.
Then I fit those fragments together into useful
information.
Most of the artifacts I find were never intended
for public consumption: state secrets
sent along telegraph lines, messages of love
whispered over telephone, continent-wide
patterns of activity revealing hidden geopolitical
strategies. All preserved in time like rose
petals in amber, though fearfully attenuated
and torn by passing stars and veils of dust;
now revealed in vivid detail by the new detector.
My ship-enhanced mind identifies, sifts,
sorts, discards with thunderous speed.
I am entranced, overwhelmed. An unending
feast of data unveils itself: names, dates,
motivations. Details long lost to history. Astonishing
revelation after astonishing revelation.
Within mere hours the answers to some of
my field’s most vexing questions are laid plain
beneath my fingers. The baryonic bomb had
not been launched by either Sina or the Socialist
Republic Union, but by the American
States—a major power in later periods of history,
but isolationist and barely industrialized
during the First and Second Global Wars. Or
so we had thought. There are even tantalizing
hints that the isolationism of the States had
34 DAVID D. LEVINE