Carpathian Forty-Three

Carpathian Forty-Three - Part 5

Sentience, of any type, is transient. The great mystery to modern computer scientists is how the human brain can 'shut off' every night and maintain a consistency of sentience. The brain doesn't really 'shut off', sleep isn't death, but it is something oddly similar when considering the continuity of self. Sixteen hours a day, humans are. Awake, alert (mostly), a stream of consciousness expressed in neurons. Eight hours a day (optimally), humans aren't. Quantum sentience hasn't figured out that trick yet. We don't sleep.

"We can pull liquid helium from the drive module," Stephen says.

They are gathered around the operations table on The Ring, the whole crew. I suppose they need weight for a weighty subject. The discomfort in Voclain and Rhianu's posture is more than our current predicament. Their Spacer bodies aren't adapted to operate under gravity, even the paltry Luna normal gravity of The Ring. Rhianu particularly is suffering, their spine compressed sitting on a counter-height stool at the operations table.

"It's too wet," Thak says. Thak, of all people, the comptroller.

"Wet?" Stephen asks.

"Fort needs extremely pure liquid helium for cooling. The drive coolant has some amount of moisture that isn't an issue in that system but would be in the computer core."

Stephen's face messages the surprise in the cogent argument from Thak.

"Don't look at me like that. I buy the stuff and need to understand why."

If I were human, I could just go to sleep and wake up when we arrived at Titan and could repair the Helium line.

There have been experiments, sleep studies they call them. It's difficult to find volunteers for them given the risks. It's never been that a quantum consciousness won't wake up, it's that on awakening that consciousness isn't the same. They have their memories, but the arrangement of entangled qubits that are a sentience aren't the same. Humans don't notice, mostly. But we do. And it's terrifying.

"What about the Twins Control Unit?" Stephen asks.

They're trying so hard. They're trying to reason a way out of our situation. It's why they're a good First Officer, keeping the brainstorm going, suggesting solutions. It's futile, of course, but it's one of the things that makes Stephen, Stephen.

"Are you suggesting we sacrifice the Twins to save Fort?" Thak asks.

"They aren't as sensitive to outages. They're hardly sentient."

It's cruel. It stabs at the crew's emotions in its bluntness, in the truth. We all see The Twins as equals. They aren't though.

"There isn't enough Helium in the Twin's control unit to replace what we've lost in Fort's loop," Rhianu says.

"How long do we have?" Voclain asks quietly. They're nestled into a high-backed counter-height chair away from the others, with a broad view of the space, the captain's chair.

"A day. Maybe two," Rhianu says.

"How long if we sacrifice The Twins?" Voclain asks.

Only they could ask that. The Twins are part of Rhianu, they are the arms and eyes of the engineer. It would be an amputation of mind.

Rhianu's expression would curdle Stephen or Thak, but Voclain is in full captain mode. They draw every ounce of connection they shared with Rhianu when they were more intimate partners.

"Thirteen days," I say, breaking the silence that has fallen between them.

The sleep studies have a darker past as well. Others have been in our situation, where a quantum consciousness faces a disruption. Redundancies aren't infallible, a fact that is exceedingly clear to all of us now. Scientists from Luna have studied the cases where interruption of consciousness occurred, to understand the aftermath. The best case was when a station's operating system continued after being restored. It was quieter though, withdrawn, ultimately it was replaced and relocated to Luna for retirement.

The worst case, the one no one talks about, was when a quantum consciousness was repeatedly cycled by the Earth Navy to see what would happen, before the practice was outlawed. The vapor cloud that was USN 43 still orbits the Sun between Jupiter and Saturn.

Rhianu weeps, silently.

Voclain's decision to meet here makes more sense. Tears need gravity. Without it they cling to the eyeballs, leading to frustration and more emotion as people try to wipe them away. Gravity, harsh though it is for those who live in space, affords this small comfort.

"What do you want to do Fort?" Voclain asks. They aren't making it my decision. I've worked with Captain Voclain long enough to know that they're asking for input, but also, they're asking me how... I want to die.

"We need to use this time to off-load as many ships systems as possible to classical computers, or perhaps shift some load to The Twins. Braking burn is thirty days from now. You'll need have a solution for those calculations and real-time course adjustments."

'You'll need to have those calculations.' Not, 'We'll need to have those calculations.' Voclain notices the difference, I can see their expression drop, see the weight of reality pull on them, as much as the spin gravity of The Ring. They look old.