Spiders in Space. Louis Shalako.

Louis Shalako

 

It all started off innocently enough, as such things often do, from a casual remark over a pint down at the old Cock & Bull.

Perhaps it was that third pint, but Harry had gotten this look on his face—Harry often had that look on his face, and this was one of those times.

“Spiders. Spiders writing Shakespeare—in space.”

“Hah. It will never go, old chap.” Hamble made a face. “It’s too obvious—too derivative.”

“Oh, I don’t know.”

Hamble snorted.

“What are you going to do? Gobble down some radioactive psilocybin and write that up?” He shook his head. “Why not monkeys, anyways?”

They’d have a much better chance in his opinion.

“It’s just like you said. It’s a little too derivative.”

“Uh, huh. Why not. It’s a hundred-million dollar grant, after all. Or more.”

The competition would be fierce, and not all of them crackpots, either.

Hamble considered it further.

“All right. We have nothing to lose. Just promise that you will try and keep it short—”

In the end, they had agreed to go with the monkeys.

***

The American Association of Astronautics had been founded by a bunch of major tech-bros in order to do some third-party lobbying on behalf of an entire industry. This was understandable enough, considering their plan to put a gazillion satellites into orbit, not to mention colonizing Mars and eventually, at least to hear them tell it, the very stars; and maybe even Uranus. Their biggest problem in terms of public relations was the prospect of forty launches a day, from each of a hundred-odd sites all across the nation, and as often as not from ecologically-sensitive areas, and just a little too close to suburbia in some cases. The odd rocket blowing up on the pad, or worse, above people’s heads, was only a secondary consideration.

Some genius had suggested a competition, open to all comers—and in their own words, give us your idea, and we will put you into space.

The total pot was two-hundred-fifty billion dollars. Once a year, in what had become an annual media ritual. Literal pocket change, or pulled out from under the cushions of the couch, for what were some fairly major dudes...

The competition involved first, second and third place, with a series of consolation prizes of one hundred million each.

Harry grinned, hunched over the keyboard.

Using existing assets, he figured he could easily do it for a couple of hundred million, three, three and a half at the most.

A few work-from-home engineers and a post office box was all they really needed.

It wasn’t the technical feasibility which worried him—it was the rationale for such an experiment, especially as he was going up against all the best universities, as well as a hundred, a thousand other hopefuls, big defense corporations and even high-school science projects. These were always good for some feel-good publicity, and every year, it seemed an effort had been made to squeeze one or two of the latter into the launch schedule. Calling it pure science, for some future benefit of the human race, (or hetero sapiens, by a recent presidential decree), had been the best he could do, and no one expected the President of the United States to be all that good at Latin anyways. Or even anthropology—

It was all laid out, thirty-one pages, all nicely formatted and with a few artist’s impressions just to bring it to life.

It was all there.

He bit his lip, and hit send.

 

***

 

The International Space Station had its challenges these days, abandoned for some years in fact, but a team of professional astronauts had brought up the original cargoes, first the work-stations, then the feeding and watering apparatus, a few bales of straw for bedding, and then, finally, a half a dozen monkeys, who, in some sense, reflected the challenge of maintaining a number of unsophisticated hominids in Low Earth Orbit when the subjects had limited knowledge and zero understanding of the ethical implications of their existence.

They were, in a sense, colonists—

They would have to be fed and watered, and provided with heat and an atmosphere just like everybody else.

When it came to intellectual stimulation, all that really took was a few pictures of bananas on a screen.

The last flight had brought up Hamble, joining Harry through the hatch and after stowing his gear, they had spent a few hours bringing in priority consumables. After a quick breather, on a word from Harry, he was strapping his backside down for a thorough briefing.

Sooner or later, the ISS must come down, but in the meantime, the human complement were all volunteers and all operations were on their own personal waivers.

He took a good sniff and heaved a deep sigh.

Hamble could smell every person that had ever been up there, and that was just a fact—

“So. Tell me about the spiders.”

 

***

Those are some ugly spiders...

“I’ll get to the spiders in a minute. Suffice it to say, the monkeys haven’t gotten too far along, although they did come up with a pretty good little sonnet just the other day…it was quite romantic. Also, you’re going to be up here for a hundred and seventy days. Try not to masturbate too much; it saps your vitality.”

“Hah.” Hamble’s brow clouded.

His most recent conquest had been a pretty little blonde of indeterminate gender orientation, with corn silk hair that had, in the end, gotten caught up in his teeth.

“A hundred seventy days, cooped up with half a dozen monkeys…and how many spiders did you say?”

“Well, it’s not that bad. We have to keep our eyes on the goal, after all, which is whatever cash is left over after all of this. And then there’s our memoirs, late-night talk shows, obscure podcasts, merchandising, and the like.” He glanced at his notes. “…so. In order to avoid explosive decompression, the bananas had to have an atmosphere at sufficient pressure to be transported into orbit. This is how the original spiders, or a bunch of eggs maybe, got up here. They seem to be doing very well, once the first few generations hatched out, and it’s all very exciting…somehow they survived all physical checks and routine irradiation, stuff like that…” He’d been thinking about that irradiation, and the micro-gravity, and perhaps some unique genetic expression in a novel environment.

People thought that evolution took a hundred million years, the very same people who had added five or six inches of height and a hundred pounds of average body weight in a single century.

It wasn’t always like that—the Galapagos finches, for example.

The monkeys, born on Earth, had been thoroughly screened and no surprises there.

Hamble considered it.

“The PETL people are all over it.”

“The what?”

“People for the Ethical Treatment of Literature.”

“…ah.”

“…why can’t we just get AI to do it, that’s what they’re saying…”

“Because that would be too easy—and it wouldn’t get us a few hundred million for this bullshit either. It would also defeat the whole purpose of the experiment. Which is to get a few hundred million for this experiment, but enough said about that…”

“If it wasn’t for bad news, we wouldn’t have too much news at all.”

“Hmn. Speaking of bad news, in compartment eleven, there’s a big, fat marmot that likes to eat rocks. No idea where he came from…that being said, we’re not here for science, so much as to generate controversy.” This was the old Russian module, which had leaked like a sieve.

Repairs had been carried out with brushes and crazy glue, and it was said the crew had been high for days due to the fumes…

Hamble stared, mouth open.

“Ah—a what?”

“A big, fat marmot that likes to eat rocks. My current theory is that it was some kind of unofficial mascot from a previous mission. When they returned, of course they had no idea of what to do with it. Figured it would just die or whatever, but, by this time, it was such an influencer, a real internet sensation, that some folks founded a foundation, and decided to feed the thing as long as it lived…” It was just one more payload, at so many dollars a kilo. “His name is Peter and the kids just love him.”

“And where in the heck did the rocks come from?”

“Ah. Gifts from adoring fans, just raising awareness of the need to send rocks or something. Some little place in southern Illinois. Ineffectual do-gooders, if you can believe it.”

“Oh, Darwin.”

“We only did so much research, right, and this was one of those popular middle-school projects. Miss Hillman’s grade-seven class of 2034, somewhere in Illinois, all those bright and shiny little-kid faces. The judges went for that one like fruit-flies on a baby’s blanket.” In that sense, an unforeseen circumstance.

 

***

 

Harry consulted his notes again.

“Okay. One more thing.”

“What’s that?” As if that weren’t enough.

“The spiders have come up with something resembling a short passage of Nietzsche infused with subtle undertones of Kafka. And I mean new material, and not just some egghead rehash…in spite of all those legs, plus the mandibles, all them freaking eyes, spiders really don’t type all that much faster than monkeys. Also, the caps-lock appears to be stuck on. It may be a while before we get much more on that one…”

Argh.

He looked up.

“So. I guess it’s about time we had a look at those spiders.”

***

“Ah! Ah! Ah!”

Hamble recoiled from the small view-panel on the hatch. The common, yellow house spider, Cheiracanthium, hundreds of them, had grown impressively large, their abdomens now as big as a tomato…

“I did say it was interesting.”

“Ah! Ah! No…no.”

“Yes.” Harry uttered a long, deep sigh. “Come on, Buddy. They’re beautiful spiders. It’s only a hundred seventy days…we might even learn something from it.”

“I want to go home.” Oh, Mother, how he wanted to go home—

But those spiders were effing big.

Hamble had a thought. He turned to look at Harry.

“How in the hell are you feeding them things, anyways?”

“Oh. Very, very carefully.” With a twist of the crank of the hatch, and one good, quick shove, Hamble was in there and it was time to kill the microphone and the cameras for a while.

So far, so good.

And—

Tomorrow was another day.

 

END

 

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