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by Vaughan Stanger
Science Fiction, 5 pages.
Originally Published in Futures in Nature Physics, 2008
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Perhaps it was inevitable that our robotic proxies would start sending us spam. Even so, for the Interplanetary Internet to succumb to a virus just as Civilisation received a coup-de-grace from the biological variety constitutes an irony of astronomical proportions.
Clare Tomblin’s penultimate email explained how we got into this mess.
To keep my mind off things, I’ve done some digging. It looks like some nameless Agency twonk decided to upgrade the operating system of every unmanned spacecraft “out there”. Sadly, it looks like our “friend” forgot to patch the security holes.
I hope the bastard suffered!
Now I’ll have to figure out how to protect your array.
Much love.
Clare
Like a handful of other Moon and Mars personnel, Clare and I elected not to board the evacuation flights. Neither of us had loved ones to bury back on Earth, nor did we plan to experience the ghastly, lung-melting death that the Chester Virus inflicted on 99.9% of humanity. The view of Earth’s night-side through the Shackleton Base telescope confirmed that the remaining 0.1% won’t be enough to keep the lights burning.
Strangely, most of those who stayed behind waited no more than a day or two before clambering into their spacesuits. Seems they wanted one last view of Mother Earth before cracking their helmet seals.
But for Clare and me, isolation worked wonders. The irreducible time lag provided the perfect catalyst for long-distance love. Trouble was, by last Saturday night our relationship had become hamstrung by denial-of-service attacks.
I’d spent eight hours tinkering with the CO2 scrubbers when I realised I hadn’t heard the chimes from my PC heralding Clare’s Midnight Kiss. That got my attention, albeit belatedly, because she’d never forgotten before, not since we became an ‘item’.
‘Midnight Kiss’ as in an email containing romantic small talk; not a video clip of her pouting lips or, God forbid, a VR feely. Wisely, we’d agreed to practice safe text rather than endure the frustrations induced by more intimate forms of communication.
I checked my Inbox but found nothing. In contrast, my spam folder contained hundreds of new arrivals, mostly of the ‘make her squeal’ variety. Despite these unwanted reminders that I would never meet Clare in the flesh, I couldn’t bring myself to empty the folder. Perhaps my subconscious had decided that any message was better than none.
Naturally enough, I sent Clare an email. After four hours without getting a reply, I followed up with another email... and another.
Lucky Num -- [End of Preview.]