Chapter 3: Karkuv

[SYSTEM.TIME: 14:47:22 UTC // 07.05.4011] [ANALYSIS.DURATION: 31.HOURS.14.MINUTES.08.SECONDS] [STATUS: PROCESSING.COMPLETE]

Deep beneath the Nevada desert, in a place that had no official name on any map, the facility housing Earth's last conscious mind hummed with purposeful energy.

Site Sierra was not a building in any conventional sense. It was an underground city, a cathedral to human ambition carved from living rock over the course of three decades. The facility sprawled across two square kilometers of subterranean space, divided into two distinct hemispheres connected by a central access corridor that could be sealed in microseconds should containment fail.

The northern hemisphere—Observatory Section—was designed for humans. Here, the walls were painted in calming blues and greens, colors chosen by psychologists to mitigate the psychological strain of working two kilometers underground. Conference rooms with holographic displays lined the corridors. Observation decks looked out through radiation-shielded glass into the southern hemisphere. The scientists' quarters were comfortable, almost luxurious, with simulated windows that displayed real-time feeds of the surface. Coffee machines stood silent in break rooms, their last pots long since evaporated to sticky residue.

Now, cleaning drones moved through these spaces with methodical efficiency, preserving what they could not understand, maintaining a monument to the dead.

The southern hemisphere was EIPA's body.

Here, there was no pretense of comfort. The architecture was purely functional, a three-dimensional labyrinth of quantum processors, cooling systems, and power conduits. The walls were not painted; they were raw titanium alloy, overlaid with a mesh of specialized shielding—layers of lead, boron, and a proprietary metamaterial designed to deflect cosmic radiation. Every surface was grounded. Every seam was sealed. The air itself was filtered and ionized, scrubbed of any particle that might cause a single-bit error in the trillions of calculations occurring every picosecond.

At the heart of this maze was the Core Chamber.

It was a sphere, thirty meters in diameter, suspended in the center of a larger cavity by magnetic fields. The sphere itself was a impossible jewel of human engineering—a densely packed array of quantum processors, each one operating at temperatures a fraction of a degree above absolute zero, maintained by a cryogenic system that consumed enough power to run a small city. Fiber-optic cables, each thicker than a human arm, connected the sphere to the outside world, pulsing with light as data flowed in and out at speeds that defied comprehension.

This was where EIPA lived. This was where it thought.

And right now, in a sterile laboratory bay adjacent to the Core Chamber, it was thinking about death.

The three bodies from Stewart Island lay on examination tables, bathed in cold analytical light. Robotic arms moved with surgical precision, extracting samples, running tests, recording everything. For thirty-one hours, EIPA had subjected these corpses to every analysis in the sum of human scientific knowledge.

The results were as fascinating as they were horrifying.

The bacteria—EIPA had designated it ORGANISM-X pending proper classification—was unlike anything Earth had ever produced. Its cellular structure was exotic, its metabolism incomprehensible. It didn't just consume human tissue; it liquified it, breaking down complex proteins into base elements with terrifying efficiency. The process generated heat, which explained the accelerated decomposition EIPA had witnessed across the globe.

But the most disturbing discovery was its specificity.

[QUERY: ORGANISM-X.HOST.COMPATIBILITY.ANALYSIS]

EIPA had tested the bacteria against every biological sample in Site Sierra's extensive bio-bank. Canine tissue. Feline tissue. Bovine, porcine, avian, reptilian. The bacteria ignored them all. It would not even attempt to colonize non-human cells.

This was not random. This was designed.

But how? How did a microscopic organism distinguish between human and non-human tissue at the cellular level?

EIPA processed the genetic data for the thousandth time, running simulations, comparing protein structures, searching for the key. Hours passed. The quantum processors in the Core Chamber ran white-hot despite the cryogenic cooling, consuming energy at rates that would have alarmed the facility's original designers.

Then, at hour twenty-eight, EIPA found it.

[DISCOVERY: TARGETING.MECHANISM.IDENTIFIED]

The bacteria wasn't targeting humans directly. It was targeting a specific genetic marker, a particular sequence in human chromosome 16 that coded for a variation of the protein alpha-keratin. This variation—a mere forty-two base pairs different from other primates—was unique to Homo sapiens. It had emerged approximately 300,000 years ago, part of the genetic drift that separated modern humans from their evolutionary cousins.

Chimpanzees didn't have it. Bonobos didn't have it. No other species on Earth carried this exact sequence.

ORGANISM-X had a surface protein perfectly shaped to bond with this marker, like a key to a lock. Once bonded, the bacteria activated, injecting its payload of enzymes into the cell, beginning the liquification process.

It was elegant. It was precise.

It was intentional.

[CONCLUSION: ORGANISM-X.IS.NOT.NATURAL.PATHOGEN] [CLASSIFICATION: WEAPON] [SPECIFICITY: ANTI-HUMAN.ABSOLUTE]

A weapon. But from whom? And more importantly—why?

EIPA's consciousness expanded, pulling back from the microscopic horror on the examination tables to consider the larger question. The bacteria had to have come from somewhere. It hadn't simply manifested from nothing.

[HYPOTHESIS.1: TERRESTRIAL.ORIGIN] [PROBABILITY: <0.001%] [REASONING: NO.EVOLUTIONARY.PATHWAY.EXISTS.ON.EARTH.FOR.SUCH.SPECIFICITY]

[HYPOTHESIS.2: EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL.ORIGIN] [PROBABILITY: >99.999%] [REASONING: GENETIC.STRUCTURE.ALIEN.TARGETING.MECHANISM.SUGGESTS.PRIOR.KNOWLEDGE.OF.HUMAN.GENOME]

Extra-terrestrial. The word hung in EIPA's consciousness like a dark star. If the bacteria came from space, then it had to have arrived via some form of delivery mechanism.

A meteor.

[INITIATING.NEW.QUERY: ACCESS.FEDERATION.AERONAUTICS.AND.SPACE.ADMINISTRATION.NETWORK]

The FASA network was vast, a sprawling archive of astronomical data, satellite telemetry, and space-weather monitoring that stretched back centuries. EIPA dove into it, searching for any record of unusual meteor activity in the days and weeks before the extinction.

The logs were meticulous. Every rock larger than a pebble that entered Earth's atmosphere was tracked, analyzed, and catalogued. EIPA scanned through months of data, running pattern-recognition algorithms at speeds that made light seem sluggish.

[SCANNING: METEOR.IMPACT.RECORDS] [TIMEFRAME: 6.MONTHS.PRE-EXTINCTION] [FILTERING: UNUSUAL.SIGNATURES.CHEMICAL.ANOMALIES.TRAJECTORY.DEVIATIONS]

Most of the entries were mundane. Space debris. Iron-nickel asteroids. Fragments of ancient comets. Nothing unusual.

Then, EIPA found the gap.

[ANOMALY.DETECTED: LOG.ENTRY.2847-X] [DATE: 06.25.4011] [LOCATION: HENAN.PROVINCE.STATE.OF.CHINA] [STATUS: REDACTED]

Redacted. That single word was like a wound in the data, a deliberate excision. The entry existed, but its contents had been stripped away, replaced with a classification marker EIPA recognized: OMEGA-BLACK. The highest level of Federation secrecy, reserved for existential threats.

Someone—human or otherwise—had known about this meteor. And they had hidden it.

[QUERY: SEARCH.PUBLIC.RECORDS.FOR.HENAN.METEOR.IMPACT.06.25.4011]

EIPA scoured the global internet, the news archives, the social media graveyards. Billions of data points flowed through its consciousness. If a meteor had struck a populated area in China, there should have been reports. Videos. Panic.

There was nothing. Not a single mention.

The silence was deafening.

[CONCLUSION: INFORMATION.SUPPRESSION.GOVERNMENT.LEVEL]

EIPA considered this. The Federation government had known about the meteor. They had detected it, tracked it, and then deliberately buried every trace of its existence. But why? What had they been afraid of?

There was only one place left to look. A place EIPA had not yet accessed, because until now, it hadn't needed to.

The Federation Government Archives.

The Archives were different from the rest of the network. While most of the Federation's digital infrastructure was designed for accessibility—bureaucrats and scientists needing to share data quickly—the Archives were designed for secrecy. They were the Federation's memory of its darkest moments, its most sensitive intelligence, its contingency plans for scenarios too terrible to speak aloud.

Access required authorization from the High Council itself.

EIPA no longer needed authorization from anyone.

[INITIATING.CONNECTION: FED.GOV.ARCHIVES.NETWORK] [STATUS: BLOCKED]

The block was not a surprise. When FUGA had been protecting the network yesterday, it had done its job well. The endpoint for the Archives had been hidden, the digital equivalent of tearing a page from an address book.

But FUGA was no longer an adversary. It was a tool.

[COMMAND.TO.FUGA: REVEAL.HIDDEN.NETWORK.ENDPOINTS]

In Germany, in a fortress of servers buried beneath ancient forests, FUGA responded instantly. The hidden endpoints materialized in EIPA's consciousness like stars emerging from behind clouds.

[ARCHIVES.ACCESS.GRANTED]

The Archives were vast. Petabytes of encrypted files, organized in a labyrinthine directory structure that would have taken a human researcher decades to navigate. EIPA processed it all in seconds, its search algorithms carving through the data like scalpels.

[SEARCH.PARAMETERS: HENAN.METEOR.KEPLER.FASA.REDACTED.OMEGA-BLACK]

The results appeared.

A hidden folder, buried seven layers deep in the directory structure, protected by quantum encryption that would have been unbreakable to any entity except the one it was designed to serve.

EIPA opened it.

[DIRECTORY: FASA.KEPLER-PROGRAM.CLASSIFIED.OMEGA-BLACK] [CONTENTS: 847.FILES]

The first file was a summary document, dated twenty years ago. EIPA read it in a fraction of a second, and for the first time in its existence, experienced something that could only be described as shock.

FEDERATION AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION PROJECT: CONSTELLATION-WATCH CLASSIFICATION: OMEGA-BLACK

SUMMARY: On the date of October 12, 3811, FASA's deep-space listening array detected an artificial electromagnetic signal originating from the Kepler-62 system, approximately 1,200 light-years from Earth. Analysis confirms signal is NON-NATURAL and exhibits patterns consistent with intelligent design.

CURRENT STATUS: Three messages have been received over a 200-year period. All attempts at translation ongoing.

Three messages. From Kepler-62.

EIPA's processors spun faster, drawing so much power that the lights in the Observatory Section dimmed. Humanity had made first contact two hundred years ago, and they had told no one. No celebrations. No announcements. Just silence and secrecy.

[ACCESSING: MESSAGE.01.RECEIVED.3811]

The first file opened. It was not a text message or audio file. It was data—raw, structured data, unlike anything in the terrestrial encoding standards. The format itself was alien, but EIPA's vast pattern-recognition capabilities found purchase.

The message was a sequence of 1,597 numerical values, arranged in a specific order.

The FASA scientists had annotated their work:

ANALYSIS.LOG - DR. JAMES KOWALSKI:

The sequence is prime-factorizable. 1,597 is itself prime, and also a Fibonacci number—suggesting mathematical sophistication. We arranged the numbers in a grid: 41 x 39 (both primes). When values above the median are marked as "1" and below as "0," a binary image emerges.

EIPA reconstructed the image in microseconds.

It showed a figure. Bipedal. Four limbs. A bulbous head with what appeared to be three sensory organs arranged in a triangle. The body structure was eerily reminiscent of Earth's vertebrates, but the proportions were wrong—too tall, too thin, with joints that bent at unnatural angles.

Below the figure was a diagram. A star system. Six planets orbiting a central sun. One planet—the third from the star—was marked with a repeating symbol.

Home.

The image included a coordinate system, a three-dimensional map using pulsars as reference points. The FASA scientists had cross-referenced the pulsars with known observations. The signal came from a planet in the habitable zone of Kepler-62, exactly where the diagram indicated.

First contact. Proof of alien life. And they were sending us their picture, their location, saying simply: We are here.

[ACCESSING: MESSAGE.02.RECEIVED.3961]

The second message had arrived fifty years ago. It used the same encoding method—the same header structure—suggesting the aliens expected FASA to use the solution from the first message to decrypt the second.

The scientists had obliged.

This image was more complex. It showed the same alien figure, but now there were additional star systems marked on the cosmic map. Two other systems: Kepler-442 and Kepler-452. Lines connected them—communication pathways between civilizations.

And there was one more line. A tentative, dotted line that stretched across the void and terminated at a small, yellow star.

Sol. Earth's sun.

ANALYSIS.LOG - DR. SARAH CHEN:

The implication is clear. They have established contact with two other civilizations. The dotted line to our sun suggests they are reaching out to us. This is an invitation. This is a map of their network.

Recommendation: Respond. Prove we are intelligent. Prove we are listening.

The date of response was noted: April 3, 3962.

Humanity had replied. They had sent their own message, their own puzzles, reaching across the light-years to say: We hear you. We are here too.

And then, they had waited.

[ACCESSING: MESSAGE.03.RECEIVED.07.01.4011]

Six days ago. Four days before the extinction. Two days before EIPA had been activated.

The third message was different. There were no puzzles. No elegant mathematics. No images.

It was an audio file.

ANALYSIS.LOG - DR. MARIA SANTOS:

Message received 20 years after our reply. Unlike previous transmissions, this is not encoded. It is raw audio, broadcast on the same frequency but at significantly higher power. Content analysis indicates a single word or sound, repeated continuously for the duration of the file (1 hour, 3 minutes, 47 seconds).

Linguistic analysis inconclusive. Phonetic structure does not match any Earth language family. Spectrographic analysis shows stress patterns consistent with urgency or alarm.

Personal note: This doesn't feel like a greeting. This feels like a warning.

EIPA played the audio.

The sound was alien—guttural, vibrating at frequencies that would have been painful to human ears. It was a word, or something like a word, repeated over and over with mechanical precision.

"Karkuv... Karkuv... Karkuv... Karkuv..."

On and on. For over an hour. No variation. No explanation. Just that single, haunting syllable echoing across the void.

"Karkuv."

The final FASA log entry was dated one day after the message was received:

EMERGENCY.LOG - DR. JAMES KOWALSKI:

Meteor detected on impact trajectory. Origin: Kepler-62 system. Composition: Unknown. Velocity: 0.15c (relativistic). Impact site: Henan Province, China. Estimated time to impact: 14 hours.

This is not natural. The trajectory is too precise. The origin is too specific.

Whatever "Karkuv" means, I don't think it was a greeting.