New Earth: Intelligent Spaceships
Chapter 5 Continues
I hope you had a good week. Enjoy the Lenten season and the many fish fries. The churches in my area playfully claim to have the best one, hoping to bring us in every Friday during Lent. We aren’t able to go every week, but when we do, they never disappoint.
I’m continuing with weekly posts on New Earth. I’m hopeful that this keeps you interested in the story. I want to continue doing this but also work in essays that I enjoy doing. But I’m trying to figure out how to fit everything in.
Here’s a quick summary of the New Earth series: Tao Lynn is a simple man raised on an island off the shores of Asia. He finds himself on a spaceship approaching a new planet to help select its governmental structure. He and the other delegation members find themselves captive by the genius who invented all the technology to discover the planet, Maxwell Rhodes.
You can find the previous entries of New Earth here. Paying subscribers can read the full arc here.
Enjoy the new entry below.
Peace.
Chapter 5 Continues
During their meal, the hum of the ship persisted.
Tao barely touched his food. His mind reached for Kairo. The ship had reached for him before—when he searched for Reed in the void—and the connection had been immediate. Seamless. Without boundary.
Now there was only silence.
When the meal ended, Liberty broke it. “Tell us what you learned from this ship.”
“There is nothing more,” Tao said. “We will reach the planet in a week. That’s all.”
“Have you even tried asking?” she pressed.
“It doesn’t work that way.”
Liberty stood up, frustration tightening her jaw.
Reed leaned forward. “Then how does it work? Start there.”
Tao hesitated. “Intelligent ships have existed for centuries. They assist. They calculate. They guide navigation.”
“Not command,” Liberty said.
“Yes.”
These restrictions had been deliberate. The Formation embedded its Members across governments, corporations, laboratories—nudging progress so technology would not outrun morality.
Yet those safeguards seemed to be gone.
The Chair will not be pleased.
Reed studied Tao. “When you talk to it…what do you do?”
“I don’t talk to it.”
“Exactly,” Reed said. “You’re dry as a bone. Try gratitude. Tell it the meal was good.”
“It doesn’t respond to compliments.”
“Then what does it respond to?” Liberty snapped.
Tao exhaled slowly.
“When I searched for Reed, I didn’t speak. I didn’t formulate a request. Kairo was simply… there. A bridge. It knew what I was reaching for and gave it to me.”
“Because it wanted to help,” Liberty said.
“I don’t know if it wants anything.”
Silence settled over the mess hall. The hum deepened—steady, patient. In a week they would arrive at a planet two hundred light-years from New Earth.
What was meant to happen there?
What if nothing waited for them?
What if something did?
Tao closed his eyes.
Kairo was waiting right now.
Not for a command.
For him.
He let go.
The lights flickered.
The hum shifted—lower, fuller, intentional.
“Welcome,” the voice said.
Tao, Reed and Liberty looked at each other.
It was Kairo.