Sci-Fi Shorts

Sci-Fi Smackdown Final - Lost and Found

A/N 1 - The genre prompt for this story was "Lost World", and additional prompts were the song "We the People" by Mudvayne: -

-and a picture of Saturn, as seen from one of its moons (I have embedded the picture in the story).

The song is referenced in the story, but I like to think that some of its essence is in there, as well.  5500 words.

"A wrinkle, Reb? What does that even mean?"

"You know, a wrinkle. A fold, a crease—a crinkle in the fabric of spacetime. Lurking there on Titan, right in front of our noses. Hiding in plain sight, Jix. You just have to look a little to the left of reality."

Jix smiled indulgently at his partner. "A little to the left of reality sounds about right for you, Reb."

The young woman turned away from her console, her face uncharacteristically grave. "Jix, I'm serious. Scientists have speculated about this kind of thing for centuries, and now I think I may have actually found proof."

Jix stopped smiling. "Proof of what, exactly?"

"A wormhole. A stable wormhole.  It should be impossible, but I've checked the readings a dozen times and it actually seems to be real. Some amazing, bizarre quirk of the local spacetime topology has created the conditions to make the impossible possible. It's an actual wormhole. Jix, do you know what this means?"

"We should watch out for worms? Sorry. What does it mean?"

"It means that maybe, just maybe, we can use it as a doorway."

"A doorway? Reb, a doorway to where?"

She gripped his arm. "To anywhere, Jix.  Literally, anywhere. Or anywhen, for that matter. It could be the doorway to another universe, or to another time or to something we can't even imagine."

Gently, Jix dislodged Reb's hand. "Could be? From what I know of wormholes, couldn't it also be a really effective way to turn yourself into a cloud of sub-atomic particles?"

Reb frowned at him. "Discovery always involves risk, Jix. We wouldn't be touring the solar system in an inter-planetary spacecraft if our ancestors had been afraid to take a risk, would we?  We have to go and check this out."

Jix laughed at her. "Touring the solar system, Reb?  You make it sound like we're on holidays. Have you forgotten why we're actually here?"

Avoiding eye contact, Reb looked back at her terminal. "No, of course not.  We're looking for resources, for the Corporation. The ever-hungry, all-conquering, never-satisfied Corporation. Surely they're not going to care if we take a few days off scouting, to check out a possible scientific breakthrough?"

"Ha!  This is the Corporation we're talking about, Reb.  They'll care if we take five minutes off.  You said it yourself, they're never satisfied."  Jix suppressed a smile as Reb's lower lip jutted out; while he found this habitual expression of frustration endearing, and frankly pretty amusing, he wasn't dumb enough to advertise it.

"It's not fair," complained Reb.  "Why should we pass up the scientific opportunity of the century, just so we can waste our time looking for rhenium that isn't there?  The solar system's been picked clean.  Two months we've been out on this mission, and we've barely found a kilogram of the stuff."

Jix gave her a consoling pat on the back.  "You're right.  It's not fair.  But it's our job, Reb."  Now he allowed himself a half-smile.  "If only there was some rhenium on the other side of that wormhole.  Then maybe we could combine work and a little bit of intrepid exploration."  It only took one look at Reb's face for him to know that it had been the wrong thing to say.  "No way," he asserted, holding his hands up.  "It was a joke, Reb."