Noumenon Read online

  He got the gist, though.

  Reggie was precariously balanced on a wobbly footstool, hanging his recently framed doctoral certificate, when his phone rang. He answered using his implants. When he heard who was on the other end, and why they were calling, he dropped the diploma. Glass shattered. The fragments formed a distinct blast pattern out across his wood-laminate flooring.

  “They awarded me what? My proposal . . . my project? Are you sure? There’s no mistake? Yes, yes, that’s me. Oh my god. I can’t—I mean, thank you. Thank you!”

  After twenty-four weeks, the panel—composed of thousands of professionals from nearly one hundred nations—had voted. Another week and the votes were tallied. The top twelve proposals, one to match each of the twelve convoys, had been chosen.

  And his had claimed a spot. They were going to his star.

  They were going to LQ Pyx.

  Without picking up the glass he dashed for the coat closet and pulled out his jacket. Two more steps brought him to his apartment door, and he was already on the phone before it latched shut behind him.

  It was time for a party. The kind of party he hadn’t thrown since his undergraduate days.

  “C, send a message to the troops: we’re going in!”

  Even PhDs know how to get good and snockered.

  “Come on. Come on, it’s fun.” Reggie entwined his fingers with a young woman’s as he led her out into the night. With his free hand he toyed with the neck of his beer bottle, and his feet took stumbling, giddy steps through the grass. Behind them the party continued to roar.

  One of Reggie’s friends, Miguel, rented a house in the hills not far from campus, and Miguel had agreed to host the shindig. “It’s like your coming-out party,” he said, slapping Reggie on the back. “You know, like they have in the south when girls get their periods.”

  “That’s not what a coming-out party is for,” Reggie said. To be fair, he hadn’t a clue what it was for, but it couldn’t be that. Regardless, he let his friends go around telling everyone he was “coming out.” Somehow they’d found a way to turn the get-together into a celebration and a ribbing all at once.

  Light streamed into the backyard, and music with a heavy bass beat still rocked Reggie’s insides though they’d left the speakers far behind.

  With him was a dark-featured young woman, her hair as wavy and body as curvy as any Grecian goddess’—Abigail, she’d said her name was.

  Abigail. He liked how that sounded. He liked how her hand felt in his.

  He just wasn’t quite sure how her hand had actually found its way into his . . .

  The party was full of people Reggie didn’t know. Friends of friends, relatives of friends, walk-ins who’d come to investigate the noise and mooch some munchies. Abby—wait, no, she said not to call her that—Abigail was a cousin of a friend’s friend, getting her masters in English.

  “What do you study?” she’d asked.

  Oh. Right. Reggie had immediately grabbed her hand and led her out the back door. “I’ll show you.”

  Through the flimsy wire gate, up a steep incline (pausing so she could remove her shoes), around a little rocky outcrop, and they were at the top of a tall hill. The flat little college town spread out below them, and the wonderfully wide sky stretched out above.

  “Lie down,” he said, waving at a comfortable stretch of grass.

  She crossed her arms and gave him a skeptical raise of one eyebrow. “Yeah, right.”

  He was crestfallen, until he realized how he sounded. “Oh my god, no! I’m sorry—not like—sorry—no, look. Like this.” A little tipsy, his flop onto the ground was less than graceful. He stretched out his arms and shivered, as though he’d tucked himself into a comfortable bed. “You can’t see the stars from there,” he said when she leaned over him, hands on her hips.

  Apparently deciding Reggie had no evil intentions, she shrugged and sat down beside him. She craned her neck back, trying to take it all in.

  “This!” he said, reaching upward. “This is what I study.”

  “The stars?”

  “Yes. I’m an astrophysicist.” His tongue stumbled over the ysicist.

  “Oh. It’s your party. Congrats. A Planet United Mission is a big deal.”

  Reggie was half sure she was teasing. Big deal? he thought. Big deal? It’s the biggest deal in the history of big deals.

  It was also a big responsibility. But he didn’t want to think about that right now. Responsibility was not party-talk.

  “Noumenon is gonna be the greatest mission ever.” He’d meant to say something a little more profound, but his brain was floating in a beer haze. He reached for his drink, but couldn’t find the bottle. He’d set it down somewhere between here and the house.

  “Noumenon?” she pressed.

  “They said I could name the mission whatever I wanted.” He wrinkled his nose, trying to chase a scratch. “Nostromo was already taken, and I’m pretty sure it’s doomed, so . . .”

  She punched him lightly in the arm for the joke. “So you picked Noumenon? Why? What is that? Sounds like one of Achilles’ lovers—you know, Agamemnon, Patroclus, Noumenon . . .”

  “Agamemnon and Achilles weren’t—”

  She winked at him and he blushed. She was joking right back.

  “Oh. A—A noumenon is a thing which is, is real, but unmeasurable—the flip side of phenomenon. A phenomenon can be touched, tested, while a noumenon . . .” He wasn’t sure if he was explaining this right. For a moment he wished for sobriety. “What is a thought? What is a value, or a moral? These things exist, they’re real, but the thing itself can’t be directly measured.”

  “But how does that relate to your mission?”

  “The convoy’s gonna go to this star, see. Variable star, which is a phenomenon. A thing to poke and prod and study. But for me, it will always be unknowable. It’s real, but unreachable. That doesn’t make it a literal noumenon, but it . . . it feels fitting to me. There are things I can never know, things humanity can never know—or, hell, maybe I’m wrong and nothing is unknowable, nothing unmeasurable. But that just means the noumenal world is fleeting, a vast frontier.”

  She nodded to herself. “Noumenon. Okay. I think I like it.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good, because I already sent in the paperwork, and I’m pretty sure it’s too late to change it.”

  She giggled and inched closer to him. “What do you love about them?” she asked quietly. He looked over just as a light breeze whipped her hair across her face and she tucked it back.

  “Who?”

  She laughed louder. “The stars.”

  He thought about it for a moment. “They’re pretty. Hold on, let me finish.” He held up a finger to stave off further snickering. “Pretty, but dangerous. Powerful. And . . . strange. They’re mysterious to me. They’re like lighthouses. Each one is different, and each is sometimes the only part of a system we can see.”

  “Lighthouses,” she murmured. “I like that.”

  “I wanted to be an astronaut. Still do.” He hadn’t admitted that since his undergrad days. It was a private dream, and he hadn’t told anyone in a long time for fear of seeming childish. But now . . . “To go into space—to see Earth as just another twinkling dot. If this dot can contain so much, but seem from afar like all the others—what else is out there?”

  “You’re a king of infinite space,” she said wistfully.

  He grinned, though he didn’t understand. “What?”

  “It’s from Hamlet. Your world could be the size of a walnut, but your mind gives you infinite space to explore. You’re here on Earth, but the universe is your playground.”

  He liked the idea. It was a comforting concept. He pulled his phone out of his trouser pocket. “C? Make me a note: read Hamlet again. All the way through this time.”

  She laughed once more, and Reggie was sure he’d found his favorite sound in all the world.

  February 5,-28 LD

/>   2097 CE

  . . . Convoy Seven has been assigned the mission designated Noumenon, the express purpose of which is to visit the star LQ Pyx, determine the cause of its variable output, conduct in-depth proximity research for two decades, and return home to educate earthbound researchers with regard to its origin, scientific significance, and viability as a resource . . .

  The sweet smell of buttercream frosting mixed with the pungent scent of black coffee. Under the fluorescent lights of the campus meeting hall, toasts were made and welcomes were given. It was supposed to be a party—the first time all of Reggie’s team members were together in the same place—but he wanted nothing more than to get down to business.

  His team consisted of a baker’s dozen head thinkers, each in charge of a subteam—people Reggie had never counted on meeting—who would really make the work come together.

  Now his team leaders were all here, in person. They represented five countries, and two thirds of them were still jetlagged. They only had a few short days together before everyone was expected back at their respective posts and day jobs, so a party—even one as casual as this—felt like an unnecessary drain on their scant resources.

  “Breathe, my boy. Relax. Give them all a chance to unwind before you throw new loads on their backs,” said Dr. McCloud. He’d retired after convincing the dean to hire Reggie, but had returned to share in this meeting of the minds.

  “But we don’t have much time. And teleconferencing is a bitch.”

  “Oh, I know, I know.” A sly grin crossed McCloud’s lips, an expression akin to one Reggie had seen many times during his graduate work.

  “What?” he asked cautiously. “That look used to mean all-nighters.”

  “No, no. I’m—you’re going to make an old fool say it, aren’t you?”

  “Say what?”

  “That I’m proud of you, Reggie. You’re so sure, so focused. You’ve gained so much confidence since that day I soiled your pants for you.”

  “Some people need a slap in the face—apparently I needed a lap full of beer.”

  “I don’t think that little incident is what did it.”

  “Then what?”

  McCloud threw out his arms toward a comely Greek woman headed their way. “Confidence, thy name is Abigail Marinos.”

  “Leonard.” She smiled warmly and accepted his hug. “I’m so glad you could make it.”

  “What, and miss our boy in action? Not in the cards. He won’t shake me till I’m a stiff.”

  She laughed. “I hope not. I’ll be right back, Reggie. I have to go check on a group of students.”

  “Afraid they’ll start tearing out pages for paper airplane material?” McCloud asked, clearly delighted by the idea.

  “More afraid they’re all chatting on their implants instead of focusing on the assigned chapters. I swear—they adore pontificating about how much they love books, but most of them haven’t read squat.”

  McCloud slapped Reggie on the back. “Knew plenty of those in my day.”

  “What? I was a great student!”

  McCloud laughed. Abigail leaned in and kissed Reggie. “Well, I know you’re great,” she said, then promptly left the room.

  “Have you proposed to her yet? I’m not getting any younger, and I’d like to dance with her at your wedding before I die. Consider it a last request.”

  Reggie patted McCloud’s tweed-covered shoulder. “Oh, you’ll be around for plenty more than that. She and I have talked about it—getting married. For a long time I was afraid to broach the subject.”

  “Why was that?”

  Reggie gestured around.

  “Because of the project? I’ve heard a lot of lame excuses for a man keeping his emotions all knotted up in his bowels—”

  With a light touch on the arm, Reggie interrupted him. “Because of the possibility. You know, that I might . . .”

  “That they might put you onboard.”

  “Exactly.”

  Laughter erupted in a corner of the room, pulling them from that somber thought, and they both looked over to see Donald Matheson—the mission expert on social systems—doing a drunken chicken dance on one of the flimsy folding tables. His blue shirttails dangled freely from his trousers, and he made a strange sort of beak-like gesture around his overtly-large and very Roman nose.

  “He’s going to hurt himself,” Reggie mumbled, moving in the direction of the ruckus.

  McCloud stopped him. “You reap what you sow. Adults are the same as children—let them touch the stove once and they won’t touch it again. You were explaining why you haven’t driven off the cliff of marital bliss just yet.” Reggie tried, halfheartedly, to pull away, but the professor’s grip was firm. “Someone will catch him if he falls, Reggie. Damn it, I don’t get to see you that often these days, Straifer. Speak.”

  Reggie shifted restlessly on his toes and shoved his hands in his pockets. “I asked years ago if she could come. The consortium made it clear that no nonessential personnel would be allowed. If I were to go, she couldn’t.” McCloud nodded; Reggie continued. “And it’s not like I’d be a soldier going off to war, with some slim chance of returning. It would be the end.”

  “So, what was your plan? To break up? ‘Nice knowing you, kid, but duty calls’?”

  McCloud tried to catch his eye, but Reggie avoided the stare. “Something like that. Hell, most relationships can’t survive being separated by state lines. You think one could stand up against AUs of disconnection with no chance of reunion?”

  “So you didn’t talk about marriage because you were afraid of making a commitment to a relationship that might become intangible.”

  “Right. It wouldn’t be fair to either of us. Especially her. She’d be here, going about life just the same, but without me. Without someone. I didn’t want to rob her of the chance to have a real partner, you know? To be bound and loyal to a ghost, when there are so many flesh-and-blood possibilities . . .”

  “But now you’ve talked about it. What changed? You decided to stay?”

  Reggie smiled. “The decision was made for me. The consortium knows how it wants to populate the convoys, and I’m not on the list.”

  “Ah. So now you’ll finally pop the question.”

  “Yeah. And I know she’ll say yes. I just have to find the right ring and the right time.”

  “Oh, don’t give me that. Now that you’ve made your choice, the right time is always now. After all, I’m not the only one that time’s pushing along. If you want to get her pregnant you’ll have to do it soon.”

  Reggie frowned—he was amused, but Heaven forbid McCloud know that. “You’re toeing the line there, professor.”

  “I’m not anyone’s professor anymore. Just some old blowhard tossing his BS at a wall, hoping some will stick. Let’s grab some of that cake, get a good sugar-high going, and talk to some of your colleagues here, eh? I know you’re champing at the bit. And look, Mr. Matheson is still with us—all in one piece.”

  A few minutes later Reggie had the team gathered round. On a party napkin he drew a quick diagram while speaking through a mouthful of cake. He had C operating on his tablet, and it was synched with a wall screen. “There are going to be nine ships—is that correct?”

  “That is correct, sir,” said C, bringing up proposed concept sketches for some, and a few basic schematics for those that were already rolling on production lines.

  “Thanks, but I was asking Nakamura.”

  Nakamura Akane, head of the specialty-ship design team, nodded concisely. Her eyes were a dark brown-and-gold under harshly cropped black bangs. Her expression carried the utmost seriousness, and her powerful, pointed movements were what Reggie might have expected from a strapping Russian man, not a petite Japanese women.

  Matheson pointed flippantly at the tablet. “You still have an IPA? I thought those things were extinct. Nobody likes them. Too chatty.”

  “Its name is C—it’s not a beer,” Reggie said. “And I like it. It’s been wi
th me a long time. Keeps me on schedule, and keeps me company in the lab.”

  “No picking on my lad for his choice of friends,” McCloud said.

  “Can we get back to the ships?” asked Dr. Sachta Dhiri in her heavy, bubbling accent. Her focus was observational tactics and strategy. She was a plump woman, and wore a well-loved green-and-gold salwar kameez; the long tunic and billowing trousers were faded from many years of washing. “What on Earth—pardon the expression—is the use of nine? They’d need shuttles to travel to and from. Think of the extra fuel that would require. Not to mention the wear and tear accrued. Isn’t it more practical to put everything into one ship?”

  “No,” Matheson said plainly.

  “Care to elaborate?”

  “We on the design teams think each research division could use its own ship,” Akane jumped in. “And then there are the supplies. It’s not practical to make each ship entirely self-sustaining, what with the number of crew members the consortium wants the convoys to consist of: sixty to one hundred thousand. So, while some food and water, etcetera, will be kept aboard each ship, the majority of the supplies will have to be stored and maintained separately. Otherwise we’d need ships larger than we can currently build.”

  “One hundred thou . . . That’s—that’s over a million people. Twelve convoys and a million people,” Dr. Dhiri said. “They want to send one million people into space? Where are they going to find that many volunteers—expert volunteers? Do they want to send as many of our scientists, engineers, and thinkers off-world as they can, and hope everyone else picks up the slack?”

  Reggie and Akane shared a look. “I know,” said Reggie, lapping at a smear of buttercream at the corner of his mouth. “I thought it sounded crazy, too. Before I talked to Matheson and learned exactly what the consortium has in mind.”

  All eyes turned to Matheson. He sobered up quickly. “Um, yeah. My preproject research focused on social stability in isolated societies. And what’s more isolated than a bunch of self-contained space cans, am I right? Obviously there are thousands of factors that go into societal consistency, but one is size. Size in terms of both population and area. If you have too many people in a small area, you get claustrophobic reactions. Too few people in too large an area and you get subgroups, like rival tribes.