The Final Six (The Final Six #1) - Alexandra Monir Page 0,83

I volunteer, curious to try it, and he beckons me over. Once we’re at the center of the ice, he instructs me to hold up one end of the canvas while he grasps the other, and then he grabs the valve with his free hand, feeding bursts of air into the hole in the canvas. A popping sound echoes through the chamber as it slowly inflates.

“It sounds like we’re microwaving popcorn,” I remark, watching as the canvas expands.

Mr. Nolan chuckles. “It sure does. Here, have a go at it.”

He hands me the valve, and as I press the trigger, a surge of air blasts into the canvas with surprising strength. “Nice,” I say, smiling at my handiwork. We now have almost half of a room standing.

The rest of the twelve each take take a turn at the valve, and as I watch the yards of material transforming into a full-size room, I am reminded of what I love about science. From almost nothing, we have created something—something that can support human beings for twenty years. It’s like magic. In fact, sometimes I think that’s exactly what science is: the magic we look for in stories, without realizing that it exists in all the inventions and creations around us.

As the hour draws to a close, we stand back to admire our hundred-square-foot inflated room. It’s hard to believe it used to be just a heap of fabric.

“Would this really shield us from all the elements?” Minka, the finalist from Ukraine, asks as she pokes its soft exterior. “I mean, if we ever experienced on Europa anything like the storms and disasters we’ve had to deal with here on Earth, would this habitat be enough to protect us? It looks so . . . light.”

“The habitat is far more durable than it appears, and these materials were chosen with ultimate protection in mind,” Mr. Nolan assures us. “But remember: the recent destruction of most of our Earth was a man-made tragedy. Right now, Europa is a pure, untamed wilderness of ice that you will need to terraform, make habitable—and then protect. We learned the hard way on Earth that no amount of technology or wealth is worth polluting and destroying our planet over. You can’t afford to make the same mistake on Europa.”

Finally, one of the authority figures here is speaking to something I believe in. Europa shouldn’t be blindly colonized—it needs to be preserved. And if I’m right about Europa’s intelligent life, as I’m certain I am . . . how are we supposed to protect and maintain the purity of this new environment, if the very thing to protect it from just might be us?

Once again, I reach the same conclusion: Earth is where it’s safest—both for us humans, and for Europa’s undiscovered life.

That night, I stare at the flash drive in my hands, knowing that this is the moment. I’ve waited long enough, analyzed and triple-checked every bit of code, and I’ve even covered my tracks by programming my tablet’s IP address to reroute to a fake street address in Texas if traced. There’s nothing left for me to do now but finish the hack.

Of course, even with all my careful planning, the risks remain. If my work isn’t quick and clean, I could compromise Dot—and if Dr. Takumi or General Sokolov senses something amiss with the robot’s systems, they could run a malware scan and find evidence of my tampering. They won’t necessarily know it was me, but as the only engineer here, I am the obvious culprit.

If I get caught, I’ll be thrown in jail for treason, maybe even tried as an adult. But if I don’t attempt this, the world will never know about the extraterrestrials—and we’ll be sending six human lives straight into their path. There is no question what I must do.

I plug the drive into my tablet and enter my algorithm to unlock the AIOS software. It takes longer than I expected, twenty minutes of sweating in front of the screen as I work the code, until finally . . . yes. I cover my mouth with my hand, both thrilled and slightly terrified to see that it worked. My screen fills with Dot’s monitoring signals and functions—the kind of access granted only to ISTC higher-ups. All I have to do now is type in my commands.

I take a moment to consider the best way to receive the data I need from Dot. The easiest method with the least amount of risk would