“Continue,” the voice commanded.
“Notification of the blackout was provided to the National Security Council and the President, who initiated a lockdown of the physical facility at AMES and the transfer of key personnel from Keck.”
“What made you so sure?” asked the undisclosed interrogator. “What made you think this was indeed an alien spacecraft?”
“At the initial distance, there was no way of making out any detail on the craft directly. The craft appeared as little more than a blur in a telescope, but the gamma rays told us all we needed to know. Gamma rays are highly energetic particles not associated with comets as they are indicative of subatomic collisions under immense pressure. Gamma rays are normally associated with catastrophic celestial events, like a supernova, an exploding star. To see gamma rays being emitted by something within our solar system was alarming. Spectrometer analysis revealed the presence of hydrogen and helium in the coma, or the head of this supposed comet, while the doppler shift of this light indicated the comet was approaching the solar system at significant speeds.”
“What do you define as a significant speed?”
“Based on our observations,” the Dupree continued, “we estimated the craft’s speed when first detected at 11% of the speed of light.
“This is what confirmed the alien hypothesis for us. The craft’s motion relative to Earth seemed much slower than the doppler effect suggested. What we were seeing was a craft rapidly approaching us, while only drifting slightly to one side as it approached. At first, we’d mistaken that sideways motion as its actual motion, but that was an illusion.
“You must remember, all speed is relative to your vantage-point. If you’re driving down the freeway at 55 miles per hour and another car overtakes you, it may only overtake you at a leisurely pace, perhaps even a walking pace, and yet that car is traveling at 57 miles per hour or 60 miles per hour relative to Earth. In this case, the alien vessel was entering our solar system at a blistering pace, but changes in the doppler shift indicated the craft was slowing, that it was braking.
“By the time the craft reached the orbit of Sedna it was traveling at 5% of the speed of light. Two and a half months later, when it passed Pluto, the craft had slowed to less than 2% of the speed of light, and yet at that speed it would still cover the length of the United States in less than a second.”
The interrogator spoke again, a hint of condescension in his voice. It seemed he already knew the answer to the question he was asking.
“And what caused this gamma radiation? In your opinion, why was this craft giving off this spectacular radiation? Was this display in any way threatening or hostile?”
“Oh, no” Dupree said. “This wasn’t an aggressive act on their part. Space is not empty. Even a seemingly complete vacuum contains a few atoms every cubic meter as well as waves of electromagnetic energy streaming out from the sun. The craft was moving so fast it was colliding with these particles, causing them to fuse. The effect was we saw tremendous amounts of energy being radiated by the vessel as it fired its engines to brake on entering our system. Only the craft was moving so fast it took considerable time to shed that speed. In effect, we saw the tires smoking as it skidded to a stop.”
“And what did NASA make of this?”
“The alien spacecraft was, in effect, using collisions with dust particles, solar winds and wisps of hydrogen to assist in slowing itself, fusing hydrogen into helium in a super-heated plasma out in front of its shield. Think of it like a space capsule returning to Earth with its heat shield glowing white hot from friction with the atmosphere. Essentially, that’s what we were seeing, only at higher speeds than we’ve ever imagined.”
Another voice spoke with almost electronic monotony.
“Question from the floor: Ambassador Hans Jugen, Germany.”
“You described a leading shield on the alien vessel, but the images we now see show no sign of any such shielding. How do you explain that?”
“Good question,” Dr. Dupree replied. “Initially, our view of the object was obscured by the sun, but orbiting telescopes could resolve the basic outline of the craft. The SOHO satellite observing the sun was able to resolve the shield, which appeared broad but thin. As best we understand the physics, it seems the shield was more of a buffer, a temporary sail. We were able to observe the sail unfolding out to a distance of five thousand miles.”
“Five thousand miles,” the ambassador cried. “That’s the distance from Germany to China.”
“Yes,” Dupree said. “As a point of comparison, the sail was roughly the size of the Continental US.”
“But that’s huge. And yet, now, there is no such shield.”
“That’s correct. We theorized that this was an ablative shield, slowing the craft as it approached our sun. Once the craft passed the orbit of Mars, the sail appeared to retract.”
“And that didn’t bother you?”
“No, we saw no cause for panic.”
“You saw no cause for panic,” the ambassador replied, a sense of indignity carrying in his voice. “We’ve seen rioting in Munich, Stuttgart and Bonn. The US embassy in London has been torched. In your homeland, protests have erupted in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, Chicago, New York and Washington DC, and you say there’s no cause for panic? Can you understand that for the majority of mankind, whether this thing fuses hydrogen or looks pretty against the backdrop of the stars is irrelevant? What we need to know is if there is a credible threat against Earth?”
“Mr Ambassador,” the radio crackled. “I will tell you the same message I told President Addison: To the best of our knowledge, the answer is, no, there is no immediate threat. This kind of hysteria is the very reason why the blackout was imposed. I may not agree with the President’s decision to arm the Orion, but I understand why he kept this discovery secret.”
The anger in the ambassador’s voice rose above the unrest in the room.
“You have no right to act on behalf of humanity without the consent of the United Nations. You think you rule the world, that you are best placed to make decisions for the rest of us, but you have no right to represent mankind as a whole.”
An uproar broke through the crowd.
“We thought we were doing what was right. We thought we were doing what was in the best interests of humanity.”
More yelling erupted.
“What would you have done?” asked Dupree, his voice carrying above the confusion simply because of his microphone. He was yelling above the noise. “What could you have done if you’d known? It’s easy to criticize our actions in hindsight, but we did what we thought was best. We had to ensure stability. We wanted to prevent panic. You don’t yell fire in the middle of a crowded movie theatre unless there’s no other alternative. We wanted to avoid inducing fear in the general populous. We wanted to avoid a global meltdown of confidence.”