Chapter 5. The Uncompromising Facts.

As the ship approached Earth, everyone remained focused on the main display, which displayed a planet like the Earth they left, but there were several things that were not right.

"What the hell!" Carl exclaimed. "Where are the satellites and the space station?"

"I'm not seeing any cities on the continents," Alice said. "It looks like a pristine planet never touched by humans."

"Maybe this is prehistoric Earth," Hilary suggested.

"That's not consistent with the shapes of the continents," Charles pointed out. "The great lakes were only created after the last ice age, roughly ten to twelve thousand years ago."

"This doesn't make sense," Dave said. "We've only been away from Earth for eleven months. There's no way it changed in that short time frame."

"Obviously, it's the result of the blackout," Vicky said.

"Right!" Charles said. "Somehow, the blackout event changed everything."

"It appears that this version of Earth has limited vegetation, but no signs of animal life," Hilary said.

"We'll have to send probes down to verify that," Charles said. "We can also get a readout on the atmosphere, radiation and life signs." He activated two probes and allowed the computer system to program them for a trip down to the planet.

"Look at how much ice there is at the two poles," Vicky said. "That's more like it was back in the early twentieth century."

"It's almost too pristine," Hilary commented.

After the two probes had arrived near the surface, they began to stream back data.

"Only 3.6 percent oxygen," Carl said. "That's weird."

"There's no way we could live down there," Charles pointed out. "We need at least eighteen percent."

"Much of the oxygen on the Earth we came from was produced by the oceans," Alice said. "That would suggest that there's not much in the way of sea life on this Earth."

"We were only away from Earth for sixteen months," Dave said. "It's hard to believe that something could change Earth that radically in that short of time."

"Look at the Moon!" Hilary said. "It looks like it got splashed with whatever hit Earth."

"Yeah," Alice said. "Maybe this was some sort of collision."

"A collision on Earth would show," Charles retorted. "Maybe the moon was in the energy blast that hit Earth."

"That would have been one hell of a blast," Carl said.

Charles swallowed hard before he replied. "This sort of radical change suggests something more than a simple event. This is something more fundamental, a change on a cosmic scale."

"What do you mean?" Dave asked, his brow furled with concern.

"The only possible explanation is that we're no longer in our universe."

Janet was the first to reply. "Are you suggesting that this is a different universe in a multiverse?"

"I can't see any other way to explain it. I hated String Theory when I was at the University, but it did propose the multiverse theory."

"Why would there be a universe that has a solar system just like ours except for this difference," Carl said, pointing to the display of Earth. "It's too unbelievably consequential to be like this."

"I agree, but I can't imagine any other explanation, other than we're all hallucinating or we're on quaaludes."

That resulted in a protracted quiet period, one in which everyone was trying to get their heads around the obvious incongruity of their situation.

"So, what are we going to do now?" Alice asked, her pretty face twisted with disgust. "We're alive in a universe that doesn't like us."

"Are we stuck with living on this vessel?" Hilary asked.

"It's our only option right now," Charles said. "We should be able to survive on this vessel for as long as we live. There's only nine of us on a vessel that was designed to hold thirty-six. The probes have tested the water in the great lakes, and its pure fresh water with no signs of chemical pollution. The robotic farmers can maintain our food supply indefinitely, and we engineers should be able to maintain the ship's systems."

"Yes, but what are we going to do, just hang out here without anything to do?"

Charles suppressed a smile. "Oh, I think there's lots of things for you to do. This vessel has the equipment and the information we need to determine how we got into this situation, and if we could figure it out, we might be able to go back to our universe."

"We're not scientists," she retorted. "They included us in this crew for our entertainment value, not our scientific attributes."

"And yet, you've shown that you are effective scientists. What Space Command did is irrelevant now. They don't exist in this universe, but we do."

"Ok, since you seem to be the only one who thinks we're worth something, I vote to promote you to leader of this ship of lost-in-space fools. Tell us what we can do to get out of this mess."

"I second your promotion," Carl said. "Let's get started on figuring it out."

The rest of the crew enthusiastically expressed their approval.

"We'll do whatever you want," Dave said.

Charles suppressed a smirk. "I'm not really qualified to be a leader. However, I do have some ideas that we could employ. If we were bumped into a different universe, the first thing we need to do is determine how that's even possible. One possible way is to obtain a cosmic microwave background and compare it to the one that's on record. Another thing we could do is determine the cosmological constant for this universe. These are things you astrophysicists can do because you have the instruments and the knowledge to do that."

Hilary presented a determined facial expression that hinted of tease. "So, what are you guys going to do?"

"We're going to try to measure the physical constants of this universe, which is not going to be easy because there are no instruments to do it."

"What would that provide?"

"The multiverse theory suggests that universes could exist with different physical constants."

"How could we be alive in a universe like that?"

Charles shrugged. "I don't know. That's what we might be able to find out."

Hilary sighed. "That's nuts!"

No one could dispute her claim.

"I will join you," Dave told Charles. "I'm also an engineer who would love to figure out how to measure cosmological constants."

Charles chuckled. "We are the ones who do the impossible tasks that no one in their right minds would do."

"That's the mantra of engineers," Carl added.

They laughed.

Everyone went back to their quarters until the communal supper, which is held in a separate larger chamber. The robots act as cooks and servers, something that Space Command designed to avoid any possible need for cooks-and-bottle-washer crew members.

"Space Command must have programmed these robots to cook like experienced chefs," Alice said, holding up her fork with noodles hanging off it. "This is delicious."

"I'm not surprised," Judy said. "They obviously wanted the command staff to enjoy the best of life." Her expression changed to one with a hint of subtle amusement when she turned to Charles. "Are you aware of the fact that your fabulous quarters contains a chamber with a rather elaborate swimming pool. I don't know about your wardrobe assignment, but ours have no swimsuits."

Charles remained stoic with only a hint of a smirk. "I wasn't aware of that. Maybe they did that to store more water."

"Ha!" Judy retorted. "They were more interested in observing larger square centimeters of bare skin!"

"Spoken like a true scientist," Charles exclaimed with an appropriate grin.

They laughed again. but this time with more giggles.