4.3
24 December
St. Joseph of Cupertino Monastery
South Polar Mineral Territories
Lunar Surface
His Holiness Pope Dave, PP.
00120 Via del Pellegrino
Città del Vaticano
La Terra
CC: Father Bertram Meagher
St. Benedict’s Monastery
1012 Monastery Rd.
Snowmass, CO, USA
Earth
Dear Dave,
Being aware that I have made strange and costly requests of thee in the past, I fear thou wilt, upon seeing my letterhead, roll thine eyes and sigh, and wonder what now, what next from this most annoying of thy remaining monks? On Christmas Eve, no less! And the contents of this letter will, I fear, not disappoint, for I’ve received an Invitation, the exact nature of which I am not sure, for it accompanies a nondisclosure agreement I have not signed (and, I think, cannot sign) without a co-signature representing the highest approval our Church can grant. Namely, yours. With me so far?
The invitation comes encryption-stamped via the internal blockchain of Renz Ventures, and bears the return address of ESL1 Shade Station. Yes, I know: the place where wanton women allegedly barter themselves into haremic servitude for a chance to live and work in space, although I hear and suspect that’s not entirely true. Not a promising beginning, you may think, and I daresay I cannot disagree, for the letter purports to be from Igbal Renz himself. Yes, I know: the skinflint profiteer whose past ravings about extracorporeal Beings are indelibly tied to his consumption of illicit substances. One mightn’t be surprised if you stop reading at this point, and want nothing further to do with this matter, and if so, I do truly understand, for our Church can accomplish nothing without reputation, hard-won and easily tarnished. But I beseech you: hear me out, for you have not yet heard the strangest part, nor the most wonderful.
The NDA is also encryption-stamped, and appears to be what practitioners refer to as a “living contract,” incapable of alteration and enforced by an indelible linkage of accounts. I am no expert in these matters, for the contract is legalese rendered as formal source code, and quite impenetrable to casual inspection. Nor dare I consult such experts without authorization, for reasons obvious enough, but it appears that any breach of the nondisclosure, detected by the aforementioned code, is automatically enforced by a vast transfer of funds and, I think, generation of a secured debt contract to cover any shortage. Serious business, you’ll agree, and one cannot help but wonder what wonders merit such strong concealment.
The letter itself is brief:
Dear Brother Michael: In recognition of your impressive role in settlement of space, and your unique education and leanings, you are cordially invited to serve as chaplain and spiritual advisor to ninety-nine persons onboard a research mission. Mission will last two years, during which at least some passengers will hibernate at least part of the time. There will be danger. There will be discovery. I realize you’re a busy man with obligations, and I wouldn’t ask you if I did not think you’d allured [sic] by the prospect. Please sign attached NDA for details.
***
This by itself is intriguing sufficient to tie my dentate gyrus in knots, for that’s the part of the brain that governs curiosity—itself a part of the hungry hungry hippocampus, which governs memory. I pressed so hard for a Lunar monastery for the simple reason that I thought it best for the Church to play a role in this frontier, as it did in the frontiers of yore, and also best for humanity to be so guided. Better than an endless Godless blundering from one destination to another, yes? And for a man so widely thought immoral, or amoral, to come to us for guidance (or at least the outward appearance of guidance) is quite exactly the hoped-for effect. We, in a word, matter.
I do have obligations, to you and my Brothers and to the green shoots of Lunar habitation, and I’ll confess that any acceptance of this invitation would vex me considerable, so I will suggest that it needn’t be me, per se, who’d fulfill the contract if accepted. But whatever may or may not be going on here, is it not better that it go with the help of our beloved Church? You begin to see, I hope, why I dare once again to disturb your many labours and entreat your brief attention.
If I may, Your Holiness, speculate on the matter a bit, I will note in more than passing that ESL1 is in possession of enough antimatter to power a spaceship to quite tremendous speeds. Two years is not enough time to reach a neighbor star, nor even a fraction of the distance thereto. And yet, such a span is quite oversufficient to reach any known point within the solar system, and so I conclude that the expedition is to some extrasolar place or object or event or substance known only to Renz and his people. I have conferred, briefly and vaguely, with Brothers Giancarlo Marino and Ovid Šćekić (either or both of whom you may recall as former Vatican astronomers) about the possibilities, and they have said there might be a brown dwarf out there, or an icy or gassy planet of considerable size, that’s nevertheless difficult to detect by conventional astronomic observation. Do either of these possibilities merit such cloak, dagger, and cypher? When further pressed, both Brothers became more curious than I cared to entertain, and so I withdrew from said discussion. Suffice to say, it’s not merely my own imagination that’s beggared by the prospect.
Perhaps what Renz proposes is merely a shakedown cruise for a ship with longer destinations in mind at some future point. Indeed, humanity did not settle the Moon the first time one of its rockets burned a parabola that tall! No, there were missions upon missions, carefully expanding our reach. Mars is a bit of an anomaly in that regard, for the only shakedown cruises H.S.F. Concordia will enjoy will be jaunts—first partially loaded and then fully laden with slumbering contest winners—within cislunar space itself. Tooling ’round the Moon and buzzing the Esley Shade are no real practice for the much longer and more velocitous journey to Mars. And yet, to burn sufficient to reach that planet, one might as well go the distance, for it’s only a few months additional.
On a journey to the stars this would not be the case, for that transit needs decades, or more than decades. Are we even one-tenth ready for such a venture? I can scarce believe it a possibility, for we haven’t even watched the mistakes of Antilympus, to learn us what’s what! And so, yes, a shakedown cruise is certainly in order, though it cost a pile of antimatter worth more than all the gold there ever was. (Sell gold, by the way, Your Holy; its recent price drops are nothing compared to what’s in store, as Orlov Petrochemical inches toward producing that substance as well. The Church’s holdings of bullion and coin, saving of course the priceless relics, will do more good converted to quick cash than hoarded ’neath the floorboards!) And yet, were mere shakedown the goal of said mission, why bring along eight dozen and three frozen researchers, and a spiritual advisor besides?
No, it must be bigger than that. It must be big indeed, this extrasolar whatsis, and two humble servants of our beloved Church—being your own self, and mine—are offered to be let in on the secret. It might be a tame black hole, Dave. It might be little green men!
An RSVP appears mandatory; the robe will not open, so to speak, until the invitation is accepted. And so if this be a bluff, the cost of calling it is high. If it be something true and wonderful strange, as it certainly appears, then the cost of folding our hand may be higher still. If we are made in God’s image, then surely the curiosity that bit Eden’s apple is merely (and wonderfully) His savoring, through us, the sweet agony of not being omniscient. To quote my American granddad, it sounds like hobo hootenanny, and I think it would be disappointing to disappoint the cosmic consciousness by missing the boat.
Are there potentially unsavory entanglements and conflicts of interest lurking in the wings here? Assuredly, yes. Is there a possibility of bodily or reputational harm? I’m quite certain there is, or are. Is it the opportunity of a hundred frozen lifetimes? Igbal Renz certainly seems to think so, and I will opine, sir, that he is no easy man to impress. I have prayed for guidance to Our Father Who Art, and though I find it quite impossible to distinguish His answers from my own base thoughts, I fortunately know that it’s your counsel and assessment I actually require. Shall we meekly but wisely inherit the world that hangs above the Earth, or shall we boldly and perhaps foolishly carry forward, premature and all that, into the darkness beyond? Your thoughts on the matter are humbly (and, I confess, impatiently) awaited.
Yours,
Brother Michael Jablonski de la Lune