A forgotten computer, in an abandoned room, received a string of digits from one of the other terminals. It sent a different string of digits to another terminal, and then waited. The stream of data returned, exactly the same. The computer closed a circuit, and on the outer casing of one of its output terminals, a small green light began to flash, in synch with a barely audible beep.
As the stream of data going into the control computer altered, the computer sent out more data, and closed other switches.
Gradually, imperceptibly, the beeping noise grew louder. It continued to grow louder for four days, and continued to be ignored until 11.43 hrs September 24th 2157, when ensign Joel Morgan, trainee computer systems technician at the Earth Defence Administration monitoring station in Texas, USA, ran an errand for his CiC, Commander Gillingham, to fetch fresh beakers of water, from a hallway water dispenser.
When ensign Morgan heard the faint bip...bip...bip.. it didn't occur to him that it would be coming from the old DSLR project room, since that door had been locked at least since he'd been there, and no-one ever went in or out of the room.
The DSLR was the brain-child of Dr. Lewis McEwan, self styled pioneer in what he called: "Contact Science." A firm believer in the existence of other life in the universe, he designed, and managed to get funding for, the Deep Scan Light Relay, which monitored the outer edges of the solar system for two things. Firstly, as McEwan was expected an alien visitation at any time, he believed that forewarning would give them the opportunity to prepare the best reception possible for the interstellar visitors. Being ill-prepared, he said, was the surest way to create a misunderstanding. Secondly, there was a danger from meteorite collision, which had been a long neglected danger to humanity.
Eventually, the funding was pulled for the DSLR, but not before the Texan project room was built and equipped. All they'd needed to do was find a way to test it. The reason the EDA gave for withdrawing funding was because they saw no logic in providing long-term staff for a project that was rarely going to give and results. Furthermore, since neither the Earth, or the Lunar and Martian colonies, or the Venusian orbital platforms had any systems which had confirmed or denied the existence of other life in the galaxy, it seemed precipitant to maintain a system to wait for them to appear.
Furthermore still, since the EarthShield project had by then been finished and tested, the meteorite threat was no longer a consideration, as the EarthShield had been (albeit theoretically) proven to withstand the impact of any of the catalogued asteroids in the solar system. This caused something of a stir among the off-world colonies, who were suddenly awakened to the fact that they didn't have a planetary shielding system, and were therefore vulnerable to meteor collision. As the EDA was still unofficially the figurehead of the Council of Human Worlds, despite all the changes since independence, it became inundated with requests for grants for shielding projects. As the requests were dealt with in order of distance from Earth (another strong point of contention among the off-world colonies), the MoonShield project got underway quite quickly, but has still not been completed. The other off-world colonies are still waiting for the paperwork to clear.
Dr. McEwan insisted that the DSLR would detect larger meteors that fell into the solar system from outside, but the EDA's decision was final, with the only allowance that the monitoring equipment in the Texan Monitoring station would be kept running.
Having investigated the water dispenser for some minutes, and still not found any reason why the beeping noise would be coming from the machine, Joel Morgan turned his attention to the pair of double doors.
He peered through the glass into the dark room. It was difficult to see anything, because the lights were off, naturally, but the darkness did enable Joel to see, quite clearly, the steady, rhythmic pulse of a green light in the far corner of the room. It was in synch with the beeping noise.
The young officer tapped the communication badge on his wrist, and spoke into it, "Ensign Morgan to Commander Gillingham."
He paused, and after a second or two a voice came through: "What're you doing fetching that water, boy? You drownin' in it?"
"Negative, Sir," Joel replied, "but I have encountered a possible computer malfunction in the old Deep Scan room."
"I see. Another one of those tasks that make it a joy to be a Commander in Chief." There was a small ripple of laughter from the background, which Joel could just about hear through his comm.
"So," continued Gillingham, in his thick, indeterminate Southern States drawl, "what manner of malfunction is it, Ensign?"
"I can't tell, sir. The room is locked."
"Well then how is this malfunction manifestin' itself to you?" Gillingham asked this slowly, and it was clear he had become quickly exasperated. Joel thought he heard a quiet curse on the end of the Commander's last question.
"I can see a flashing green light, sir."
"I see."
There was a silence, which quite unnerved Morgan, as he expected the irritated CiC to explode any moment. He was a fairly good-humoured fellow, but some days he just seemed to fly off at the slightest provocation. It was shaping up to be one of those days.
"Now ensign," came Gillingham's voice eventually, "what did they teach you at the academy?"
"Computer Systems Analysis, Sir."
"And in all your time there, did you ever chance to see a malfunction light?"
"Yes Sir."
"Did you ever see a green malfunction light, son?"
Joel hesitated. "Negative, Sir."
"Did you, Greg? George? Bill?"
There was an amused chorus of "no"'s in the background.
"Well now," came Gillingham, directly at Morgan again, "it seems I can't find anybody who's ever seen a green malfunction light? Do you know why that might be, son?"
"Because malfunction lights are green. Sir!" Joel barked in military fashion, in an attempt to restore some dignity.
"Give the boy a cigar, someone. Oh and Joel?"
"Yes, Sir?"
"Do you know which poor bastard gets to investigate this little green light?"
"Err.." Joel knew a prompt answer was needed, but the truth seemed far too glib, and one of Gillingham's hates was a glib junior officer. In the end, he ran out of options. "You, Sir."
There was a pause that seemed, to Morgan, a lifetime, but which was eventually broken by Gillingham.
"Yep. Me." Gillingham's tone relaxed a little. "Now, son, I don't want you to worry about this, it's good that you brought this to my attention, and I want you to forget all about reporting it as a malfunction. Any junior officer could have interpreted that as a malfunction light. Okay?"
"Yes, Sir!"
"Now I want you to be clear on this, because I can tell you're the type that gonna be kept awake by this, for fear of nightmares about court-martials. Hell, yo're probably even standing to attention while you're talking on the comm."
Joel found that he was and tried to relax his stance, but he was far too tense and nervous to move a muscle. He could probably have forced a salute in Gillingham walked down the corridor right now.
"Let me give you some advice, son," the Commander went on, "if ever they give you a post where you're CiC of anything, you must work harder than you've ever worked, y'know why?"
"No, sir."
"Because then they'll promote your ass out of it quickly, and then you won't have to deal with this kind of crap, y'hear?"
"Err.. yes, Sir."
"Good. I'll be there in a minute. CiC out." Gillingham tapped his wrist comm. and looked at the other officers seated around the desk. He rolled his eyes.
"I'm still waiting for my promotion out," he groaned, and the others laughed.
It took a little while to get into the DSLR room, even after Gillingham arrived on the scene, and determined that it was, in fact, necessary to enter the room, and investigate the green light. This was because the only person who held a key was the building supervisor, currently at the other end of the base.
A jeep was dispatched to bring him immediately to the West Wing, whereupon he told Gillingham that he didn't have a key, and could have saved them time if he had been better briefed over the comm.
Gillingham sighed, as he hadn't the energy for rage. It was 112 degrees outside, and the base air-conditioning was broken down. He found it intensely annoying that a man who was little more than a janitor used phrases like "better briefed," as if he was on some sort of military commission. In fact, he was almost a civilian. The only reason he had clearance for any of the base's main building was because someone had to do the maintenance.
"So why don't you have the key anymore?"
"You remember last year, we held a drill to test the base's security, and you had cadets infiltrating the building to steal things?"
Gillingham nodded.
"And one of the cadets stole my keys, and then lost them. Don't you remember, sir, you had him disciplined for carelessness?"
"Yes, I remember," snapped the Commander, who was started to think less about the task in the hand, and more about how hot his uniform was starting to feel. He remember that that had been a hot day too. Another joyous drill which he, as CiC, had been obliged to oversee.
"Surely," persisted Gillingham, "you have had your keys replaced since the drill last year."
"Yes sir, I sent off to the EDA, and they sent me a new batch of keys, but there was a funny thing. You wanna hear the funny thing, Commander, Sir?"
"What - funny - thing?" monotoned the CiC.
"There was no replacement for the DSLR room. There was this letter, see, and it said there wasn't likely to be a staff for the DS project in the foreseeable future, so I wouldn't need a key."
After this Gillingham set about finding a Guard trained in counter-security, and eventually found one who was capable of picking the lock. Eventually, Gillingham, Morgan, the Supervisor, and the other people in the crowd which had gathered, much to Gillingham's irritation, entered the abandoned Deep Scan Light Relay project room.
It took five minutes investigation of the various terminals before Gillingham dismissed the assembled company, returned to his office, and placed a high-security coded channel call to EDA headquarters.
