Its journey through the cold, black, liquid vastness lasted ten centuries. The time attenuator kept time’s passage the same for both it and the homeworld.
Mankind, its creator, patiently waited its return. They did so via proxy through the few people in each generation, the priests chosen from among them, who kept the memory and the wait alive. Though it was not a god, and they did not consider it so, they nonetheless prayed to it almost with as much conviction as if had been a deity, rather than a mere idol to their hopes for salvation and a fulfilling of their destiny.
It glided past the outer planets of our system, an ephemeral specter returning to the land of the living, smoothly arcing into the finest orbit ever a ship did see. The dark, flawless hull of the ship reflected the kiss of sunlight as if some unseen hand had burnished and waxed her fittingly for a homecoming. The anti-impact shielding had worked as intended and kept the itinerant dust particles encountered from marring its seeming perfectness.
For a thousand years the ship explored the Universe searching out any evidence of life. Life. Oh, how it beckoned thee, imploring hands and outstretched arms. A sea of stardust and a solar wind to sail upon. For every barren rock upon an airless sea there would be islands and natives and the perfume of strange flowers to soothe the weary brow, and sun or suns to darken the skin, and moon or moons to elicit tears and smiles and interlaced hands. A heart full of memories, riding low on the returning waves.
At speeds incomprehensible except as numbers having exceedingly large exponents, it scoured the cosmos looking for anything living—anything at all. And anything would do, be it thinking beings likes themselves, plant, animal, or the simplest microbe. Or best of all, a fertile place not yet blessed with life but waiting the fecund footstep of Man.
Guiding the ship and its myriad sensing equipment was an all-knowing computer; their best scientists knew early on that only a computer could have survived the destructive accelerations and velocities and the maddening loneliness, let alone processed the unimaginably large amounts of data collected. The builders had done well, so well that the computer had early in its journey become a sentient being, one not to ultimately rebel against its creators but to share with them the desperation of its mission.
Remarkably, it pondered the same questions as its makers and those who’d come before them, men who’d thought of life and God and the purpose of it all. Unlike human philosophers, the computer had access to all the knowledge of the Universe—and the luxury of more than ten lifetimes in which to think—for it had seen all and been everywhere and learned much. But it had learned that some things are better left to ignorance.
The computer came to experience loneliness and it longed for the company of humans, and understood these feelings as well as any creature of flesh and blood. Once finished it hastened back home with the longing of one who’s endured great and horrible things, and lived to return…and tell. Such things make you return as a stranger, forever and ever.
The original mission was never forgotten by the machine. But it also pondered other questions. What it discovered made the computer sad, more so because it came back compelled to share these with its brethren and wondered what effect this would have on the inhabitants of Earth. Would the profoundness of it all change their lives for better or worse?
Thousands of years ago mankind began reaching outwards toward the stars. They found many planets which appeared suitable for colonization, though no evidence of life was found. These planets possessed proper climate, soil conditions, water, sunlight, and every other conceivable factor within acceptable ranges. Yet the best of their efforts failed to produce any crops. Science was unable to determine why the crops would not grow. They tried bringing soil directly from Earth, but it, too, remained barren and yielded not a single living thing. It shocked them to find that anything living, including humans, were unable to reproduce or grow—except on Earth. And they could not, despite the best of their minds, figure out why.
Every planet they found, no matter how seemingly fertile, remained uninhabitable. Only imported food allowed humans to visit, but only for brief scientific purposes, as colonization efforts were eventually abandoned.
After much exploration and failure by manned ships, the ultimate sojourner was built. Created to travel the entire Universe investigating for any sign of life. Men believed that once a catalog of planets already supporting life was made, colonization could then be planned and made successful. Further efforts at manned space travel were suspended until the return of this vessel. Rather than blindly sending ships on futile attempts to settle sterile planets, resources could be directed on those where life already existed. For a millennium mankind turned inwards and focused exclusively on the daily affairs to which men have always attended.
But the priests remembered. Waited.
So, the great ship raced throughout the entirety of space, directing its intricate detection devices everywhere and at everything; at frozen balls of gas, at planets molten with iron, at ones awash in warm chemical-rich oceans where lightening roared from moisture-laden clouds to infuse tremendous energy into seemingly fertile soup. The empty abyss surrounding and always just a step ahead of the expanding Universe was reached, and the computer confirmed the ache of nothingness beyond.
Once orbit was secure back at Earth, the computer established contact with the creators. They were very excited about the ship’s return and gathered in their Great Hall of Knowledge. The chief of the scientists asked the computer if it had found that which was sought. They had to ask twice, thinking the computer did not hear them the first time.
“No,” replied the computer, with a surprisingly mournful voice. “I have explored it all and there is nothing. No life, not even a single virus cell, exists anywhere but here.”
This stunned the scientists. It was not conceivable that there was only life in this one place. Why, in the almost measureless space, containing trillions of planets, there had to be life elsewhere! The calculations had clearly shown this must be true. My God, they thought, what does this mean? The computer continued:
“There is no life anywhere in the Universe but here on Earth. Nor can any other place support or create life but here. No other place in the cosmos contains the necessary spark of life. What that spark is cannot be determined, even with the capabilities you have given me.
“I have also been to the edge of existence and found there is no God. You are all alone in infinite eternity. You have nothing but this place and each other.”
And deep within its circuits something occurred which the makers would’ve thought impossible—the computer cried.
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