Kort Explores conundrums of the human condition

Deep Space Probe 33 streaked through the cold dark void. He'd been away for a long time and was returning. He constantly recalculated his flight path, navigating towards a lone blue planet that circled a minor sun on the outer fringes of an insignificant galaxy. But to DSP33, that lone blue planet was very important. He retrieved from his memory banks the worn and partly scrambled record of his departing. After all the thousands of replayings, the record taxed his analytical capabilities to the maximum, but he could still find the hidden bits of digital information in the static.

In his mind DSP33 saw again the brilliant sun shinning on the assembled crowd. There to attend the launching were the scientists that built him, the politicians that funded the program, and a large number of citizens representing those who actually paid for the project. There were short statements by the scientists and long speeches by the politicians, as well as a fair amount of merry making by the general public. Then the moment came when the area was cleared and the final countdown began. A sudden rush of acceleration, a brief glimpse of the clouds rushing past followed by the blackness of space. And then the mission began.

The mission. The mission was DSP33's whole reason for being. It was his primary programming and central to his every thought and action. It was the reason for his launch and the reason he was so long in returning. It all sounded so simple when he started out - to travel from star to star, searching for planets that supported life. When he found a planet with life, he was programmed to collect data and return to Earth.

It was projected at the start of the mission that finding such a planet was a possibility in the first 10 tries, a good chance in the first 100, and a certainty in the first 1000. The scientists confidently predicted that DSP33 would return within 50 Earth years. But something was terribly wrong with the calculations.

DSP33 could remember how bright and shiny his ship was on that launch day so long ago. Now the ship was pitted and eroded by the thin dust and solar wind through which he'd traveled for a thousand years. It was because of the ship that he was returning to Earth - he had yet to find life anywhere throughout the vast stretches of the universe he'd crossed. He would have continued to seek life until he found it, but his ship was worn out. He was using the last light-years left in his ship to return to Earth and make his report.

According to his calculations, while only 1000 years had passed ship time, due to the time distortions of high speed travel, over 50,000 years had passed on Earth since he was launched. His programming required him to make his report when ever he found life or could not continue the search. After he made his report, he intended to turn himself off. A thousand years of searching for life without reaching his goal placed him in an untenable internal conflict. Turning himself off would erase the unattainable goals and ease the conflict that had tormented him during the long centuries of searching.

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As his tiny ship arced in over the arm of the galaxy, already beginning the long deceleration, DSP33 began to slowly activate his body. It was decided when he was built that he should resemble his builders in case he encountered a sentient species. So he had two arms, two legs, a torso and a head, shaped as much as mechanical considerations would allow like a man.

As he slowly fed power into his long dormant limbs, DSP33 remembered the beginning of the search when he used his body to actually walk on each new world he encountered. After the first hundred years, it became obvious that his body would wear out long before his brain, so he decided to save his body for the day when he found his goal - or made his final report. His body had lain dormant now for 9 centuries waiting for a reason to be activated, and the limbs were stiff from the time. Slowly and patiently, he fed power first one way and then the other, gently working the joints.

By the time the ship was approaching the target solar system, DSP33 had all his joints loosened up satisfactorily. He lifted his arm up in front of his vision sensors, admiring the finely crafted mechanism that made up his hand as he flexed each finger in turn. He sometimes wondered if his admiration for the human workmanship that went into his ship and body were planted in his programming by the humans that built him, or was real. At this moment he was inclined to think it was real.

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DSP33 turned on the sensors as his ship dropped to approach speed, eager to see what mankind had accomplished in the 50,000 years he'd been gone. If nothing else, the detectors would be tripped and he would finally see the needles on the gauges move - something he'd been aching to see for all those centuries. But something was wrong. The needles weren't moving. He tried the backup circuits and got the same results. He waited for a time, thinking that maybe he was still too far out, but the needles refused to budge.

DSP33's mind was awash with vagrant power surges as he struggled to account for the readings. He was only able to maintain a semblance of order in his mental processes by engaging dampers on his main circuits and dropping the voltage across the entire grid feeding power to his brain. But the longer he analyzed the data, the more obvious the interpretation became - there wasn't any life on Earth.

The irony of the situation struck him. He'd departed the only living planet to look for life elsewhere. Now that he'd returned, the life he'd left behind was gone. He could feel a double bind developing in his mind.

In their self-confident arrogance, his programmers had never considered that he wouldn't be able to make his final report. But now the unthinkable might have happened. He couldn't find life on his search, and now he couldn't close out his mission by making his final report. Unable to satisfy the conditions for the exit clause in his programming, he would have to return to his main program's search loop. His imagination circuits provided him with visions of his brain driven by the unfulfilled mission vainly trying to carry on the search long after the ship and his body became unusable.

With repairs and refitting the ship could last another two thousand years of flight, but he knew that eventually his vision would come to pass. With the ship and his body worn out and useless, his mind would continue to plummet through the void seeking life, waiting for the day when the thin dust and solar wind would finally erode through to his brain case and stop his mental activity.

Grasping at straws, he convinced himself that perhaps mankind had departed the Earth and could be found venturing out into space. If this slim possibility was true, he decided that the evidence would be found on the surface of the planet. He began surveying for a likely landing spot.

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The results of the survey were not encouraging. Most of the planet had suffered heavy physical damage and there were indications that toxic chemicals and high radiation levels caused the extinction of all life. With the Earth sterilized, the results of the cataclysm remained undisturbed except for the actions of wind and water. Distressed but not yet ready to give up his hope that mankind escaped the mass extinction on Earth, DSP33 selected a stretch of open ground near the remains of a group of buildings as his landing zone.

When the landing jets shut down and the ship stabilized on its jacks, DSP33 threw open the hatch and looked out. Except for the partially demolished buildings, the scene could have been any one of the thousands of lifeless worlds he'd seen on his search. A hot dry wind blew fine dust that swirled and drifted. The land was a monotonous grey-brown out to the horizon, the same color as the dust that covered everything. If he hadn't triple checked his navigation DSP33 wouldn't have believed he was standing on the same Earth he remembered from so long ago. With nothing else to do, he started for the buildings.

The upper stories of the buildings proved a disappointment. The wind and weather had gotten in and reduced what ever was there to dust. In one corner of the first floor, sheltered by the structure of the building and a pile of rubble, DSP33 found a sealed door. Working carefully and using a small amount of his precious lubricating oil, he managed to open the door a crack. The door opened on a stairway going down.

The staleness of the air in the stairway told DSP33 what ever lay beyond had been sealed and protected from the elements. Relying on his infrared and microwave sensors to compensate for the lack of light, he eased through the door and began to descend the stairs.

In his mind he struggled with two contradictory potentials. On one side, each step he took was filled with eagerness and anticipation over what he would find at the bottom of the stairs. His sensors detected the telltale odors of machines, electronics, and chemicals - and he hoped that the answers to his questions would be found here as well. On the other side, his every step brought him closer to answers that could set in motion a chain of events he didn't want to consider.

Reaching the bottom of the stairs, DSP33 found himself in a long hallway with doors opening on both sides. He came first to a room full of electronic equipment, then a room full of machinery, then a dozen rooms full of paper. As he scanned some of the fragile papers, DSP33 began to understand where he was. The buildings had been a large university and he was in a storage basement. Continuing on, he found more rooms full of equipment and supplies. At last he came to a door that was sealed even from the sealed basement. Working the door open, DSP33 entered a room full of computer equipment. Here were the answers.

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After further study, DSP33 discovered that all he had were the data storage units of a large computer system. The computer and the terminals had all been upstairs and were now unrecognizable dust. But the storage units seemed to be in excellent condition.

Driven to find out the answers one way or the other, DSP33 set about tapping into the stored data. First he returned to the rooms containing mechanical and electrical equipment. After several weeks he'd fabricated and erected a wind-generator to tap the relentless dust storm that raged outside. With electrical power available, he repaired the lighting and climate control systems in the computer room. Removing one of his ship's computers and his personal interface devices, he set about connecting them to the data storage units. At first there were programming difficulties and problems reading the data, but if nothing else, DSP33 had a first hand understanding of machines. Eventually he formulated a compatible language, and his mind entered the memory banks.

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An indeterminate time later DSP33 stood on a small wind swept hill watching the sun setting over a barren sun bleached valley. The sunset was splashed with colors from the amount of wind-carried dust in the air. In the awfulness of the desolation there was still a little beauty left, but DSP33 now knew he was the only one left to enjoy it.

After sifting through mountains of data, DSP33 pieced together the events that lead up to the destruction of the Earth and his worse fears were confirmed. Mankind had not escaped the extinction of his own making. There hadn't been any particular reason, just the old human failings of religious fanaticism, greed, pride, racism, and nationalism.

Humanity had already squandered the most precious treasure in the universe before DSP33 even reached the first dead world on his long search for life. One of the small senseless wars that always seemed to be going on somewhere on the Earth expanded suddenly and violently to engulf the entire planet. And now there wasn't anyone left to even enjoy the sunset. DSP33 looked out across the heavens as the stars came out and felt very alone in the universe.

DSP33 knew that mathematically there probably was life somewhere among the uncountable stars, that he just hadn't looked in the right places yet. But mathematically he should have found it on one of the thousands of worlds he'd already visited. And if he did find life, who would he report to? DSP33 could feel the aching emptiness of the great void calling to him, but he held off the default in his programming that would have sent him back on his search among the stars.

DSP33 had found a wealth of information in his search of the data banks before he found the answers he was seeking regarding mankind's fate. Included in the information were the DNA codes of most of the various life forms that inhabited the Earth before the cataclysm. He knew that the alternative he was considering was not what his builders had in mind, but he'd been dealing with the intricacies of his programming for so long that he knew how to hold off the default for awhile. With the sun completely set and the stars blazing across the heavens in all their glory, he went back down into the basement and began to sort though all the laboratory equipment.

It took a long time, with many false starts and seemingly overwhelming problems, but DSP33 finally developed a technique that worked. Then he applied the technique to each of the DNA codes he found in the memory banks. Starting first with the oceans, he seeded first algae and then higher lifeforms. With the oceans teaming with life and producing oxygen, he started the long process of covering the land with plant life. With the plants established to provide food and shelter, he then introduced higher lifeforms to the land. Now after long effort the cycle of life was established well enough to continue on without any further assistance.

DSP33 stood on the grassy hillside watching the sun setting over the lush valley. It'd been several centuries since the first time he watched the sunset from this same hilltop. The wind didn't blow as harshly anymore, and the rains were gentle and nourishing for the vibrant plant life. Small animals scurried among the bushes, and in the distance he could make out a herd of deer moving to their nighttime haunts. The sunset wasn't as spectacular anymore - with the plants to hold the soil in place there wasn't as much dust in the air - but the beauty that DSP33 saw all around him more than compensated. He'd found the life he'd been seeking.

There was only one more step in his project before DSP33 would be able to find the relief of a power shut down. With the stars glittering in the moon lit sky, he returned to his basement laboratory. He felt a certain pride in the work he'd done so far, and he would have quit where he was at if he hadn't been programmed with the need to finish his mission by making a final report. He knew that what he was now attempting might put all that came before in jeopardy, but he was driven by his programming.

DSP33 pulled out the rack of test tubes, each with its growing bit of life. There were thousands of test tubes, each with a slightly different DNA code. In spite of their differences, DSP33 put the same label on each one - HUMAN. He hoped without any real conviction that when they were mature, the different races of humanity would find a peaceful coexistence on Earth. DSP33 reasoned that after hearing the results of his search, if humans had any shread of rationality they would take better care of the treasure that life represented. He didn't really believe it, but he hoped.

DSP33 looked forward to the day when the first generation of humans reaches maturity and can understand the significance of what he has to tell them. He will then make his final report and find the relief of shutting down. What mankind does with the life he found for them after he's gone is beyond his concern. He will have finally satisfied the conditions of his programming.