Factoring Humanity (12 page)

Kyle frowned. “So it would take conventional computers trillions of years to find its factors by trial and error.”

“Exactly. We have had computers working full time on it since just after Huneker killed himself. So far, no luck. But, as you say, that is with conventional computers. A quantum computer—”

“A quantum computer could do it in a matter of seconds.”

“Precisely.”

Kyle nodded. “I can see why leaving an encrypted message behind might appeal to a Turing fan.” Turing had been pivotal in defeating the Nazis’ Enigma encoding machine in World War II. “But why should I agree to do this for you?”

“We have a copy of the Huneker disk—something very hard to get hold of, believe me. My partners and I believe the disk encodes information that may be of great commercial value—and if we can decode it first, we will all make a lot of money.”

“All?”

“When I was talking to them on the phone, my partners empowered me to offer you a two-percent share of all proceeds.”

“And what if there aren’t any?”

“Sorry, I should have been more explicit: I am prepared to offer you an advance of four million dollars, against a two-percent share of all proceeds. And you keep all rights to your quantum-computing technology; we simply want the message decoded.”

“What makes you think there’s anything of commercial value in the message?”

“Huneker’s second handwritten note said simply, ‘Alien radio message—unveil new technology.’ The disk with the encoded transmission—a three-and-a-half-inch floppy, if you remember such things—was found lying on top of that note. Huneker had clearly understood the message and felt that it described some innovative technology.”

Kyle frowned dubiously and leaned back in his chair. “I’ve spent half my life trying to decipher what students mean when they write something. He could have just been saying that we’d need a new technology, such as quantum computing, to break his encryption.”

Chikamatsu sounded unduly earnest. “No, it must describe some great innovation—and we want it.”

Kyle decided not to argue the point with her; she’d clearly devoted way too much time and money to this issue to countenance the thought that it was all a waste. “How did you find out about me?”

“We have monitored quantum-computing research for years, Professor Graves. We know exactly who is doing what—and how close they are to a breakthrough. You and Saperstein at the Technion are both on the verge of solving the technical difficulties.”

Kyle exhaled. He hated Saperstein’s guts—had for years. Did Chikamatsu know that? Probably—meaning that she might be baiting him. Still, four million dollars . . .

“Let me think about it,” he said.

“I will contact you again,” said Chikamatsu, rising. She held out a hand for the memory wafer.

Kyle was reluctant to let it go.

“It only has the public key on it,” said Chikamatsu. “Without the actual alien message, it is useless.”

Kyle hesitated a moment longer, then handed over the plastic wafer, now slick with perspiration from his palm.

Chikamatsu wiped it on a tissue, then returned it to her purse. “Thank you,” she said. “Oh, and a word to the wise—I rather suspect we are not the only ones aware of your research.”

Kyle spread his arms and tried to sound jaunty. “Then maybe I should simply hold out for the best offer.”

Chikamatsu was already at the door. “I do not think you will like the sort of offers they make.”

And then she was gone.

15

The phone rang in Heather’s office. She glanced at the call-display readout; it was an internal U of T call. That was a relief: she was getting tired of the media. But then, it seemed, they had gotten tired of her, too; the cessation of the alien messages was already old news, and reporters seemed to be leaving her alone now. Heather picked up the handset. “Hello?”

“Hi, Heather. It’s Paul Komensky, over at the CAM lab.”

“Hello, Paul.”

“It’s good to hear your voice.”

“Ah, yours, too, thanks.”

Silence, then: “I, ah, I’ve got those substances ready you asked me to mix up.”

“That’s great! Thank you.”

“Yeah. The substrate, it’s unremarkable, essentially just a polystyrene. But the other stuff, well, I was right. It
is
a liquid at room temperature, but it
does
dry—into a thin, crystalline film.”

“Really?”

“And it’s piezoelectric.”

“Pi
—
pi
—
what?”

“Piezoelectric. It means that when you put it under stress, it generates electricity.”

“Really?”

“Not much, but some.”

“Fascinating!”

“It’s not all that unusual, really; it happens a lot in various minerals. But I wasn’t expecting it. The crystals this stuff dries to are actually similar to what we call relaxor ferroelectrics. That’s a special kind of piezoelectric crystal that can deform—that is, change shape—ten times as much as standard piezoelectric crystals do.”

“Piezoelectric,” Heather said softly. She used her fingertip to write the word on her datapad. “I’ve read something about that—can’t offhand think where, though. Anyway, can you make the tiles now?”

“Sure.”

“How long will it take?”

“The whole run? About a day.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s all.”

“Can you do it for me?”

“Sure.” A pause. “But why not come over here? I want to show you the apparatus, make sure it’s going to produce exactly what you want. Then we can start the run, and then maybe grab some lunch?”

Heather hesitated for a moment, then: “Sure. Sure thing. I’m on my way.”

The manufacturing equipment was simple.

Spread out across the floor of Paul Komensky’s lab was a piece of the substrate material measuring about three meters on a side; two additional panels were leaning against one wall, almost touching the ceiling.

The substrate was a dark green color, like computer circuit boards. And sitting on top of the substrate sheet was a small robot the size of a shoebox, with a cylindrical tank attached to its back.

Heather was standing next to Paul. A computer monitor beside him showed the twelfth radio message—the first one after the basic math and chemistry lessons.

“We just activate the robot,” Paul said, “and it starts moving over the surface of the substrate. See that tank? It contains the second chemical—the liquid. The robot sprays on the chemical in the pattern indicated on the monitor, there. Then it uses a laser to cut the tile out of the substrate. It then flips over the tile and paints the same pattern on the other side; I’ve got it set to do it in exactly the same orientation, so that if the substrate were clear, the patterns would line up perfectly. It then uses one of its little manipulators to place the tile in those boxes over there.

He hit a button, and the robot proceeded to do just as he’d described, producing a rectangular tile measuring about ten centimeters by fifteen centimeters. Heather smiled.

“It’ll take about a day to cut the tiles, and when it’s done, all the tiles will be stored, in the order in which they should be snapped together, in the boxes.”

“What if I drop the box?”

Komensky smiled. “You know, my older brother did that once. His very first computing course was in high school in the early nineteen seventies. They did everything on punch cards back then. He wrote a program to print out a pinup of Farrah Fawcett—remember her? It was all made by printed characters—asterisks, dollar signs, slashes—simulating a halftone photo if you got far enough away from it. He spent months on it and then he dropped the damn box of cards, and they got completely scrambled.” He shuddered. “Anyway, the robot is putting little serial-number stickers on the back of each tile. They’re done with Post-it adhesive—if you want them off later, they’ll peel off easily.” He got the first tile out of the box and showed the label to Heather.

She smiled. “You think of everything.”

“I’m trying to.” The robot was motoring along; it had done six more tiles already. “Now, how about lunch?”

They were eating in the Faculty Club, which was at 41 Willcocks Street, just around the corner from Sid Smith. The dining room was decorated in a Wedgwood design: blue-gray walls with rococo white friezes. Heather was resting her elbows on the white tablecloth, intertwining her fingers in front of her face. She realized she was essentially holding her wedding ring out as a shield. That was the problem with being a psychologist, she reflected: you couldn’t do anything without being self-conscious about it.

She lowered her hands, folding them on the table—and, just as unconsciously as her first act, she put the left hand on top. Heather looked down, saw the ring still prominently displayed, and allowed herself a minuscule shrug.

But it hadn’t been lost on Paul. “You’re married.” Heather found herself exhibiting the ring again as she lifted her hand. “For twenty-two years, but—” She paused, wondering whether to say it. Then, after a moment’s internal struggle, she did. “But we’re separated.”

Paul’s eyebrows went up. “Children?”

“Two. We had two.”

He tipped his head at the odd phrasing. “Do you see them much?”

“One of them died a few years ago.”

“Oh, my. Oh, I’m sorry.”

He had the good taste not to ask how; he went up a couple of notches in Heather’s estimation. “What about you?”

“Divorced, long ago. One son; he lives in Santa Fe. I spend Christmases there with him and his wife and kids; it’s nice to get away from the cold.”

Heather rolled her eyes slightly, as if some of that cold would have been very welcome at this time of year.

“Your husband,” asked Paul, “what does he do?”

“He’s here at the university. Kyle Graves.”

Paul’s eyebrows went up. “Kyle Graves is your husband?”

“You know him?”

“He’s in computing, right? We were on a committee together a few years ago—establishing the Kelly Gotlieb Centre.”

“Oh, yeah. I remember when he was doing that.”

Paul looked at her, smiling, unblinking. “Kyle must be a fool, to let you get away.”

Heather opened her mouth to protest that she hadn’t got away, that it was only a temporary separation, that things were complex. But then she closed her mouth and tilted her head, accepting the compliment.

The server arrived.

“Would you like some wine with lunch?” asked Paul.

After lunch, while she was walking back alone to her office, Heather used her datapad to access her voice mail. There was a message from Kyle, saying he needed to talk to her about something important. Since she was only a short distance from Mullin Hall, she decided to simply drop by and see what he wanted.

“Oh, hi, Heather,” said Kyle, once the door to his lab had slid aside. “Thanks for stopping by. I need to talk to you. Have a seat.”

Heather was slightly woozy from the wine she’d had with lunch; having a seat sounded like a very good idea indeed. She sat down in front of Cheetah.

Kyle perched himself on the edge of a desk. “I need to talk to you about Josh Huneker.”

Heather stiffened. “What about him?”

“I’m sorry; I know you asked me never to mention him, but, well, his name came up today.”

Heather narrowed her eyes. “In what context?”

“Was there anything unusual about his death?”

“What do you mean ‘unusual’?”

“Well,” said Kyle, “they said he killed himself because he was gay.”

Heather nodded. “It was news to me, but, yeah, that’s what they said.” Then she shrugged a little, as if acknowledging how times had changed; she couldn’t imagine anyone killing themselves just because of that today.

“But you didn’t think he was gay?”

“Oh, Christ, Kyle, I don’t know. He seemed genuinely interested in me, but they said he had a sexual relationship with the guy I thought was just his roommate. What’s this all about?”

Kyle took a deep breath. “A woman came to see me today. She says she represents a consortium”—he’d gone back to the hard-T pronunciation—“that has a copy of a disk containing an alien radio message Huneker received just before he died.”

Heather nodded.

“You don’t look surprised.”

“Well, it’s not the first time I’ve heard the story that he detected a message. It’s a rumor that’s been kicking around for years in SETI circles. But, you know, it’s just a story.”

“It does seem a bit of a coincidence, doesn’t it?” said Kyle. “I mean, two messages, presumably from two different stars, so close together: whoever Huneker supposedly picked up in nineteen ninety-four, and then the sequence of messages from Alpha Centauri beginning thirteen years later.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Heather. “SETI researchers originally thought we would pick up far more messages than we already have by this point. By 1994, we’d only been listening for alien radio signals for thirty years; there could have been countless attempts to contact us before we had radio telescopes, and we could be due for another contact tomorrow—we just don’t know how often radio contact with another civilization should be expected.”

Kyle nodded. “They closed the Algonquin radio telescope shortly after Huneker supposedly detected his message.”

Heather smiled sadly. “You hardly need me to tell you about government cutbacks. Besides, if such a disk exists, why would someone come to you about it?”

“The woman said Huneker had encoded the message using RSA—that’s a system that employs the prime factors of very large numbers as the decryption key.”

“Were people doing things like that then?”

“Sure. As far back as nineteen seventy-seven, Rivest, Shamir, and Adleman—the three MIT scientists who worked out the technique—encoded a message using the 129-digit product of two primes. They offered a hundred-dollar prize to anyone who could decode it.”

“And did anyone?”

“Years later, yeah. Nineteen ninety-four, I think.”

“What’d it say?”

“ ‘The magic words are squeamish ossifrage.’ ”