I was Only Trying to Help, End

I Was Only Trying to Help, End

By NYSwede

Wes had just finished his story; nothing was left out: his ex-wife, his daughter, his life, and his goals. He was about to tell her his plan for their future.

Estelle was quiet...

Wes wasn't sure if quiet was good.

Wes started to say, "Honey, I think..."

"No, just no!" Estelle was ready...

"I did the math a hundred times; I knew we should have all been killed; why, why would you lie to me? How could you so convincingly lie to me? So what happens now? I disappear in a tragic accident? A falling moon rock kills me?"

"Please listen."

"No, it's your turn to listen. We have worked our asses off for two years to make this happen; why are you telling me this now?"

"Because..."

Estelle held up her hand, and Wes knew not to say anything else.

"I have trusted you with my heart and every fiber of my being; I am going to grow old watching you, basically, not age at all. Why would you think that was something I would do? Why would anyone, including you, want a relationship like that, knowing how it would end?"

"I have a..."

Estelle held up her hand again.

"We're looking at a trip that will be at least four lightyears each way, and I'll more than likely die an old lady on the way back... why would I do that?"

Wes didn't speak.

"Do you even have a plan and idea? Are your friends going to offer some miraculous solution? I still can't imagine what you were thinking?'

Wes didn't speak until Estelle lowered her hand.

"First, we should skip Proxima Centauri; it's a little over four light years away, and the exoplanet, while in the inhabitable zone, and doesn't look promising. So eight or nine light years, assuming the speed of light, to say we were there doesn't make any sense."

"That's my point exactly. I'll be old or dead, and you'll be a few years older."

"Let me explain... We know that cryo sleep isn't a real option as it kills the body under the assumption that we will have the technology to resurrect someone who has been dead and frozen for years...

There are two options: we travel faster than light speed... using a term they used in TV science fiction, Warp 4, or a hundred times the speed of light, or we find a way to slow down your metabolism and aging using advanced hibernation."

"Advanced hibernation?"

"Yes, there are small rodents in the UK that can hibernate for months, even though their normal life span is only a couple of years; and snails, using a combination of hibernation and aestivation... hibernation in the winter, and aestivation during extreme heat or arid periods... live for years beyond their normal life expectancy."

"Aestivation?"

"Typically, snails live a couple of years, but using a combination of those two deep sleep ways of hypermetabolic rate reduction, snails can live up to 25 years."

"That's extending their lives by ten times..."

"Exactly, I have had a team working on synthesizing the hormone that allows them to do that. The experiments with rodents went so well that we jumped to small primates and then used them to save the life of a gorilla that needed emergency surgery but was allergic to sedatives. It was fully documented but not published because we jumped a few clinical trial steps to get there, and I want the paper to be perfect when it's finally published."

"That still makes it a pretty long trip."

"Long is a relative term; you're assuming we can only travel at 186,000 miles per second; what about... 3 or 4 times that? What if we could travel at those speeds? Then, how far could we go using aestivation combined with four times the spread of light?"

"Oh my God, you're thinking of Kepler-452b!!"

"It's far, like 1800 light-years far... but yes, that's what I'm thinking. It's more likely to have water, true it's larger than earth, but closer in form to earth's make up... it's not just a rock in another solar system like Proxima Centauri."

"How could that even be possible?"

"Let's see if we can make five times the speed of light, it will take 360 light years, then using aestivation, extending your life expectancy by ten times, you'd age 36 years, or maybe a little more assuming you have wake periods during the trip."

"Oh My God!! It is possible... but can we go that fast?"

"I believe we may be able to do more than that. I've been looking at increasing power to the vortex by converting to solar power, which will be unlimited once we're in the vacuum of space."

"What do you mean, converting to solar?"

"As you know, the drive is an ionic vortex; what if we converted it to a photon vortex? Then we're traveling with an unlimited power... the ambient light in the universe."

Estelle took a deep breath and came back down to earth...

"Well, this is fun to think about and even consider, but is spending 360 years sleeping worth it? Think of all we'd be missing: what earth will be like in 360 years, not 720 years, if we return immediately. Would our trip offer any benefit to mankind?"

"Haha, you're doing exactly what I did when I first calculated the possibility, asking if it's worth it and if there's any benefit... Honestly, I don't think so. Sure, the space program of the sixties and up through the moon and Mars landings, advanced electronics, and communication, but did it tangibly help anyone? What if all the money that was spent on going to Mars and exploring near space had been invested in things like waste management, clean energy, education, and better health care?"

Estelle jumped in... "How about food? Creating food equity for everyone on the planet?"

"Exactly. Voyager explored the solar system, and we learned a lot. Now it's on its' way to Proxima Centauri, and it is still over 70,000 years away... and to what end? Will the earth even be here in 70,000 years?"

"So what's the real plan?"

"I think we modify this ship to use the photon vortex drive, program it and equip it with a small robotic crew, and send it to Kepler 452b... Allowing for transmission time lag, in about a thousand years, the earth will know whether or not it's a viable option to sustain life. In the meantime, while we build a dozen photon vortex drives up here, on the moon, and use them to generate clean power... A Chinese company has been trying for decades to set up a ring of solar power cells around the moon's equator. Then convert that power into a 'microwave laser beam' to transmit energy to earth from the "earth facing" side of the moon. We could work with them to generate a lot more clean power and use their transmission system to send it back... it would give the world free power for everyone."

Estelle thought about it...

"I was looking forward to spending some alone time with you in space. Can't we make a ship to explore the solar system together?"

"That's a great idea! I plan for a smaller kind of family ship in my quarters. Do you want to see it?"

They spent a couple of days reviewing the plans, and fooling around, (although not necessarily in that order), before announcing the new plan. A plan that would help the world, the one we have and live in now, rather than reaching for worlds that are too far away for any real exploration or that serve any purpose other than exploration and general knowledge.

After the scientific community's initial disappointment, there was a general agreement that improving life while saving the planet needed to be the priority... while still offering the opportunity to explore the solar system and even the universe.

Five PVG (Photon Vortex Generators) and two PVD (Photon Vortex Drives) were built. The generators began sending free power to Earth the following year. Of course, the companies that owned the distribution capabilities charged their line and maintenance fees, but when those charges kept going up, and when the price of gas soared as people and communities bought more and more electric vehicles,

Estelle thought we needed to intervene...

Using the general concept of wireless electricity by Nikola Tesla to transmit power from the moon, inject the air with electricity by using the natural resonant circuit of the Earth to create standing waves or ambient electrical energy that could be tapped into by a small tuned receiving circuit. The small and affordable power collector made it suitable for any home or small business to have all the free power they needed.

As the collectors were distributed worldwide, the industrialists complained and even started fake news reports that the free power collectors caused cancer. Still, the benefits outweighed the risks, especially since no one believed it.

The industrialists weren't happy with the new world order...

"How dare "they" create a free, direct-to-consumer energy source?"

"It's un-American."

It was amazing; having clean, free energy made people worldwide more mindful of the effects of pollution and the benefits of conservation. For the first time in history, the world's people bypassed the industrialists, which was good for the planet.

As for Estelle and Wes? Their spaceship was all they hoped for... the photon vortex was enclosed in a 10-foot cylinder that went from stem to stern, a rotating "drum" with a one hundred sixty-two foot radius and 300 feet long, revolved around the vortex drive at a pace that approximated earth's gravitational force. The crew's quarters were there, with single and shared spaces. There was a vegetable garden, chicken hatchery and coop, and a rabbit hutch.

There was also a small orchid of dwarf trees in an enclosed greenhouse with seasons so apples and oranges could be grown and harvested.

Each trip required a small crew, but passengers made shorter trips on the second larger PVD craft. Those trips varied; scientists and tourists typically took a month, while Wes and Estelle lived on their ship, flying throughout the solar system, including all eight planets and Pluto. They also explored asteroids and anything new that entered or even came close to our solar system.

They even nudged Apophis a little, changing its' orbit enough so it would never pass dangerously close to Earth again.

Wes and Estelle had a happy life, doing what they loved with visits to Earth now and then. Estelle's "naps" allowed them to have a long, happy life together, appearing to age gracefully.