Discovery (standard:science fiction, 2623 words) [2/8] show all parts
Author: Goreripper	Added: Nov 04 2000	Views/Reads: 3218/1955	Part vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
The crew and researchers aboard the Discovery are crushed then elated by what they find after they emerge from cryogenic suspension in a far distant solar system.

The inhabitants of the Discovery began to come slowly to life as it
reached the outer regions of that far distant galaxy, and one of the 
first to awaken had been Professor Neffergi. He took a team immediately 
to the central recording core to analyse the data the ship had been 
collecting throughout its incredible journey, and as a part of that 
team I was one of the first to uncover a terrible revelation. The 
stream of transmissions which had been so strong and vital, so alive 
and noisy like a young river, had ceased so utterly not even a ghost 
remained to even suggest it had ever existed! 

Like the other young scientists on the Professor's team that day, I was
devastated. What could it mean? At some time during our suspension, had 
our ship drifted from its course? A thorough checking of all systems 
quickly told us this was not so, for the Discovery had locked onto an 
unshakeable trajectory early in its mission, an unerring course. The 
origin of the signals had been targeted exactly, and nothing short of 
complete system shutdown--which would have killed us all--could have 
diverted it. We were not drifting aimlessly in space. The Discovery was 
still following the beam, though where that beam was, what had become 
of it, we could not ascertain. Certainly the trackers and recorders had 
not failed. It was clear the beam had. At some time in the ten years of 
our suspension, our ancient civilisation had simply stopped sending 
signals. Receivers were picking up others, from many different points, 
but the computers had only begun to collect these within the last year 
or so: the oldest of them could not have been broadcast more than 
10,000 years ago. That in itself is an incredibly long time, but our 
previous beacon had come to us from a time infinitely older than that, 
and it was that source, and not these relative infants, that we had 
come so far to trace. 

Later that day, Professor Neffergi confirmed for us what we already
suspected. The signs were clear. We were going to this place now not as 
anthropologists and diplomats, wide-eyed into a realm of living wonder 
beyond our ken, but as archaeologists-even palaeontologists--to study a 
race long dead. For after most of our team had retired from the central 
core heartbroken, he had stayed back and traced the computer banks to 
the time the signal had been lost, and his findings were tragic beyond 
all tragedy. The beam had begun to wane almost as soon as we had 
entered suspension. A few months later it had ceased altogether. 
Whatever had been the source of our guiding transmissions, it had died 
thousands of years ago. 

A civilisation had grown, waxed to a height of technology at least
matching our own and then, perhaps slowly or perhaps of a sudden, had 
been obliterated. It was not what we had hoped for, but it was probably 
what we should have expected, especially for a civilisation as archaic 
as this one. Life on our own planet, and others we had discovered, had 
followed the same cyclical paths of rise and fall. Cosmic calamity, 
war, pestilence, plague, the constant erosion of time itself... all 
worked to bring down what once was great and flourishing. One day in 
the far future even our own vast and mighty empire will almost 
certainly be little more than handfuls of dust on the blade of some 
archaeologist's shovel. There was nothing for it now but to wait for 
the signals to be dissected and translated into the original sounds and 
images they had been; perhaps then we would learn what fate had 
befallen these immeasurably ancient people and their world. 

Our mood then was bleak, but it did not last. The expected thrill of
studying and learning from a hyper advanced living people was in a 
short time replaced by the possibility of rediscovering a lost one, one 
from which we would still almost certainly learn a great deal. Indeed 
the simple fact that such a people had even existed so far into 
antiquity had already challenged our ideas of how long life had existed 
in the universe. It had definitely told us that our own time on our 
planet was nothing short of insignificant in comparison. 

As the weeks went on and we drew nearer our goal, new questions
constantly arose which tantalised us to the point of near impatience. 
How old could we expect this planet to be? What would it be like, and 
would there be any life still there, perhaps some vestigial bastard 
race which had long ago after some astronomical disaster lost the 
technologies they once had? What traces would remain of such a 
civilisation? With the knowledge we had gleaned from the visuals we had 
seen of what this world was like, could we expect any traces at all 
after 100,000 years? Would we find a world completely covered in 


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