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hence our near perfect existence today. FTLT is still our most important scientific endeavor today, and we manage to increase our maximum speed by a few decimal places every decade, but, without some type of major breakthrough, we will not be traveling to the stars in the near future. I believe there was a feeling among the scientific community that some extraterrestrial, super-intelligent civilization would visit us and show us the way to the stars. This is fairly unrealistic, as the only evidence we have of extraterrestrial life are fossils of one-celled animals that once existed on Mars. Maybe if there are other civilizations in the galaxy, they have run into the same problem we have: the FTLT barrier."

  “We have mapped the universe to a resolution of a tenth of a light year out to a billion light years, and slightly less accurately out to the universe’s edge at 13.5 billion light years. We know the location of every Earth-type planet in our galaxy. We’ve sent messages to all of them, but, of course, most of them won’t be receiving anything for another few thousand years. Anyway, we can’t get there in our lifetimes or maybe even mankind’s lifetime.”

  "Now we come to the last question: where do we go from here? Humans have always striven to attain or overcome something since their first steps on the savannas of Africa. Today there is only one major barrier to overcome. As you may have surmised from my presentation, I believe that FTLT is the only hope for maintaining the drive that seems to be so important to human development. All our resources should be devoted to this project.”

  “The leading causes of death in our perfect world are old age, suicide, and accidents. And let’s be honest, most of the accidental deaths are really suicides made to look accidental or at least attempts to do something exciting with the understanding that death is a strong possibility. Humans have a drive to achieve, to explore, to test their abilities, to push the boundaries of knowledge, and to pass on to their successors a legacy. This drive no longer has a direction. FTLT or something similar should be the goal toward which humans strive next.”

  “End of presentation.”

  Roger commanded, "Matilda, stop presentation and leave displays on. Lights to 50 percent."

  Dr. Samuel U.Y. Kaddy from the Bureau of Scientific Adjustment spoke up, "The fifteen science projects that were listed hold considerable promise for mankind, including the transporter, gravity wave propulsion, and the transmutation of elements. Don't you believe these have potential?"

  "I am not saying these aren't good projects, but let me show you what I mean using your examples,” Roger responded. “The transporter has been on the verge of operation for 75 years. Even if it were successful, it would only speed up travel within the S-system, since you have to have a transmitter and receiver in place. Also, the possibility of genetic damage is so great, no one is going to want to use it except to transport goods.”

  “The gravity wave propulsion is a good idea, since it is cheap and makes us less dependent on the sun for energy. However, it has a theoretical limit of less than a tenth of the speed of light. Even if it proves feasible, it won’t get us to the stars. As for transmutation, there are currently no shortages of raw materials that would make transmutation necessary or profitable. Therefore, none of these ideas has the potential for putting the kind of excitement and risk back into the sciences that we last saw during the early days of S-system colonization. Mankind needs a goal; a goal like the exploration and colonization of the galaxy, of the universe."

  Dr. Kaddy spoke up again, “I thought that the leading scientists have concluded that FTLT, much like time travel, is not theoretically possible.”

  “It’s true that time travel is not possible, and it probably true that FTLT is also not possible, but I’m using the term FTLT in a general sense,” Roger responded. “It is theoretically possible to travel to other parts of the universe by warping the time/space continuum, or by creating wormholes, or by some mechanism that we have not imagined yet. In such a case, one would not have to travel faster than light to reach a system thousands, or even millions, of light years away.”

  The discussion went on for another two hours, mainly with each person present supporting his or her pet project. The allocations for the fiscal years 2201 through 2210 were the last order of business for the committee. When the voting was finished, most of the project budgets remained the same except that the FTLT budget was increased by 10%, and the brain communications project was cut back to a purely maintenance budget. "This committee meeting is adjourned. I will see everyone in three months for the review,” Chairman Gradstien said. Turning toward Roger, "Good job."

  "Thanks, Mr. Chairman."

  As everyone started to leave the conference room, Sandra walked up close to Roger and whispered, "Bastard," just loud enough for him to hear it.

  "Matilda, did you hear that?" Roger said with mock indignation.

  "Yes, I did. She knows you very well. I guess she expected more from someone with whom she had sex."

  “Silly girl.”

  When Roger got back to his office, Jack J.K.L. Fannell was sitting in his desk chair. Roger asked, "Did you follow the meeting?"

  "Every word—except for those times I dozed off. Are you sleeping with someone on the FTLT project?"

  "Hey, I was dead serious about the FTLT project."

  "Yeh, right. What do you want to do for lunch?"

  "Let's have lunch here, and I’ll show you a few things that I left out of the presentation."

  "Sure, if you buy."

  "Okay. Matilda, lunch sequence 22."

  "Sonya, lunch sequence 35 and put it on Roger's bill," Jack stated in a clear voice.

  After a few minutes, the light on the delivery door in Roger’s office turned on. The two men retrieved their lunches from the slot and sat down at the desk to eat.

  Roger snapped, "I see you got the simul-steak, the most expensive meal in the machine."

  "You're so cheap, I have to take advantage of these rare opportunities. Now what did you want to show me?"

  "I’ll show you the presentation called 'What's wrong with this picture?' Matilda, run presentation AA88 and show on office display 1." One wall lit up and showed a number of statistics.

  "Jack, do you know what the most common cause of death in the S-system is today? This is a quiz, because I mentioned it in my presentation."

  "Must’ve been while I was dozing. Old age, I assume. I've never checked. What else is there? There were no killer diseases, and there were safety measures everywhere."

  "Suicide. It’s by far the largest cause of death in the S-system. And the government classifies most suicides as accidents, so the numbers were even worse than the statistics say."

  "Well it shouldn't surprise me, considering how most of the people we know talk about it. And look at Steve. I am not sure if he slammed into that mountain by accident or on purpose. I know he talked about it often enough. Great exit though. I think they only found a few teeth and some blood spatters. But I thought that was just in our diminishing circle of friends."

  "Nope, it's an S-system-wide trend: the Earth, Mars, the moon, stations all over the S-system."

  "I know you were waiting for this question, so here it is: And why is that, Roger?"

  "You saw parts of the presentation. What are we, as scientists and engineers, working toward? To spend five years of our life working our collective butts off to increase a spaceship's speed by 0.001 percent more toward the speed of light? What is there to do that's new? We can go anywhere in the S-system right now. Why do you think that every time they ask for recruits to go on one of these trips to some distant star system they have so many applicants? Because people want to explore, they want to discover new things, they want to develop new ideas. Humankind needs an obstacle and a goal."

  "I thought FTLT was the obstacle and travel to the stars the goal. And, if you feel this way, why didn't you go on one of those stellar voyages?"

  "To answer your last question first, not one mission
has returned since the first one was sent over a hundred years ago, and why would I want to spend decades in a spaceship when I can't stand to take a trip to Mars. As to your former question, it was the goal, but there is not going to be any breakthrough. We have spent trillions of credits on the project and yet we’re no closer than we were 75 years ago. Most scientists say that the FTLT barrier is theoretically impossible to break. And I have to admit that I agree. This means that we are trapped within our own solar system, and we are running out of things to do."

  "The presentation sounded more positive than you do."

  "That's called politics, and what were we going to spend money on anyway, finding new cures to diseases that don't exist anymore?"

  "Hey what about arts and entertainment? That has creativity associated with it."

  "Let me show you something. Pick three aspects of something you would like to see in a show."

  "Okay.” Jack thinks for a moment and said, "How about masturbation, comedy, and New York City."

  "Matilda, do a search of all movies, shows… anything that has these three themes in them."

  "Any particular time period or medium?"

  "All animated visual medium since the mid-twentieth century, including two and three dimensional, holographic, interactive, and thorophotic."

  "I have located 102,577 items that fit that criterion. Do you want me to display them?"

  "No thanks.