The latest issue of Nature includes a research paper that discusses a group of seven exoplanets orbiting a low-mass star called TRAPPIST-1. These worlds are similar in size to Earth and are in positions that could, potentially, allow water in some form to exist on them. And in a first for Futures, this week’s story takes its inspiration from this very discovery. Written by Swiss author Laurence Suhner, The terminator takes a look at these brave new worlds. Laurence is the author of QuanTika, a trilogy that stages the encounter between humans and an ancient stellar civilization, which has left mysterious remnants on a frozen telluric exoplanet. Here, she offers an insight into her creative process — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing The terminator: from science to imagination

For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to tell stories, in the form of illustrations, short stories or novels. However, not just any stories. Stories about space. Stories about time. Stories about space-time. Stories that would lead my characters to the ends of the known Universe and make them live cosmological adventures.

I don’t know where this inclination for science, this fascination for the Universe and its mysteries, whether cosmic or subatomic, comes from. But the fact is that these stories have never ceased to stir my imagination.

Humankind has always been in awe of natural phenomena, before attempting to explain them, whether through faith or reason. Knowledge consists of a succession of leaps towards a fleeting unknown, perpetually filled with new sources of astonishment. An endless process, a race towards what we believe to be truth and knowledge. Yet, newer, often more astonishing mysteries, are eager to unseat our initial explanations. The conclusion of the story always slips away from us, withdraws, plays with our intelligence and our perceptions.

This perpetual quest is what constantly inspires me in my science-fiction writing. My characters are always researchers. But, above all, they are real human beings with dreams and emotions — like the woman depicted in The terminator.

Where does this desire to portray scientists come from? Perhaps from the many journeys made by my father when I was a child. Every time he came home, he would tell me anecdotes set in the scientific laboratories he visited. He also brought me back strange and exotic objects that stimulated my imagination. Or perhaps it was my grandfather’s ‘fault’. He worked at the SIP, the Physics Instruments Society, in Geneva, and was the first to tell me about particles and quantum physics. I just don’t know.

Still, as a result, I hesitated for a long time between studying fine arts or physics at university. I finally opted for an intermediate solution: archaeology.

Now, for ten years, I have been reconciling my early passion for art, literature and science — more precisely physics, astroparticle physics and astrophysics — through my short stories and my hard science-fiction series QuanTika, which is based on current research in these fields.

Working with scientists is essential for me. I need to constantly question myself about our origins, our existence as human beings lost in a vast universe of matter and energy, as living beings born out of stellar chemistry.

That’s why I immediately agreed to write a short story about the TRAPPIST-1 system. Integrating advanced research into my texts allows me to talk about science while keeping the sense of wonder and awe intact. This is one of the main advantages of science fiction.

This genre allows me to create vertiginous universes where we ponder and dream about the very nature of the world.

Futures this week welcomes back an old friend in the shape of S R Algernon and his story In Cygnus and in Hell. Regular readers will know that S R Algernon has penned several tales for Futures over the years covering topics as diverse as war, phlogiston and Christmas. Here, he gives a brief insight into what inspired his latest piece — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing In Cygnus and in Hell

I wrote In Cygnus and in Hell very recently, but it’s inspiration goes back a long way. For the past several years, I have been working on novels set on an exoplanet in a trinary star system with an eccentric orbit. At WorldCon last year, it occurred to me that I should find a real exoplanet meeting those specifications, so I looked online and found 16 Cygni Bb. It was a bit more extreme than I had initially envisioned, but it served my story arc well. I decided to inaugurate the new approach to the novels by writing a story set at the birthplace of the colonial venture, with a first-generation colonist as the main character. Why would she decide to leave Earth behind? That question seemed to have more weight this year. It seems to me that there is a sense of the world being at a crossroads, with so many of us seeking refuge from an uncertain future.

In uncertain times, we look for heroes and symbols. We build walls and we seek safe spaces. The swan reminded me of the fairy tale of the ugly duckling. When we feel weak and forgotten, we long for a simpler past or familiar faces. Sometimes, we turn against people who don’t fit with our view of the world. As we grow up, we see more of the world’s complexity and we try to stand on our own two feet. We have to somehow decide when to let go of a comforting illusion and when to fight tooth and nail to turn it into reality.

The phrase ‘In Cygnus and in Hell’ captured that duality for me. In the cosmos and in our human relationships, there will always the potential for hardship. There will be births. There will be tragedies. Our response to the challenges of the early twenty-first century will set the stage for humanity’s expansion. Will the first interstellar travellers look back on us with reverence or pity? Will they take those first steps in desperation or in hope?

Personally, I hope we can acknowledge our fears and our disagreements without letting them define us or drag us down into unwinnable conflicts. I don’t believe in eternal victories, in angels or devils. I believe that we can draw upon the strengths of our species — its capacity for reason, empathy and communication — to find a way forward that leaves room for all of us. If we can rise above our fear and wounded pride, I believe that in time we can find common ground. Then, maybe, we can turn Earth back into a paradise and set out together towards the stars.

Other Futures stories by S R Algernon

A time for peace | Planetary defences | Cargo cult | A pocket full of phlogiston | The chains of plenty | Asymmetrical warfare | In a new light | One slow step for man | Genius loci | Legacy admissions

This week, Futures is delighted to welcome David Gullen with his story Fermi’s zookeepers. David is an award-winning writer based in south London, and you can find out more about his activities at his website or by following him on Twitter. Here, he reveals the origins of his latest tale — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing Fermi’s zookeepers

Ideas often come out of the blue, or in this case out of the black. November last year, I took part in a two-day Starship Engineer workshop run by I4IS, the Initiative for Interstellar Studies. We were a mixed bunch, as someone who trained as a botanist and works in an archaic part of IT, I thought I was one of the least relevantly qualified people there.

It didn’t really matter. When you’re designing a generation starship there’s plenty of things to think about apart from building the vehicle and engines or worrying about fuel mass and Tsiolkovsky’s rocket equation. As an intellectual exercise, starship design really does have something for everyone, every area of expertise and experience. If human beings are going to visit other star systems travelling at sub-light speeds, many things beyond simple engineering need to be taken into account. It’s not too much of an exaggeration to say everything needs to be considered. Think about it. It’s fun, and rather brilliant.

Of course, you could just send a robot. I4IS has its origins in the British Interplanetary Society (BIS), Back in 1975 the BIS ran Project Daedalus, the first (and possibly still the only) comprehensive engineering study of a starship design based on current-at-the-time technology.

Daedalus showed how phenomenally difficult it is to build a starship, what vast resources are required, the daunting challenges of interstellar distances and relativity. 54,000 tonnes of engine and fuel were needed to deliver 450 tonnes of payload after a 46-year journey at 12% the speed of light. These days interstellar probe designs are much smaller. Yuri Milner’s Project Starshot aims to send a fleet of 1,000 light-propelled micro ships each weighing just a few grams. The technology is there — almost. In both cases these probes are single-use fly-bys. Despite the differences in scale there are similar problems with data transmission and guidance.

At the end of the first day we went to the pub. The whole event had been energizing and stimulating, our minds buzzed with the complexities and challenges of starships and the thrill of possibilities. Would there ever be a crewed flight to another star? When this might be? And what about Fermi’s paradox: why is there no sign of intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe? I wondered what an alien civilization might think of 1,000 probes whipping through their system at 100 million miles an hour.

Ideas come out of the blue: when I’m walking, working in the garden, or having a good conversation. I thought what a tragedy it would be if we sent a probe like Daedalus roaring through space on a quest for life and our aim was a fraction off.

Some ideas work better when you stand them on their head. My next thought was: what if someone had done that to us?

This week Futures goes hunting for The last passenger pigeon in the company of Joy Kennedy-O’Neill. An English teacher at a college on the Texas Gulf Coast, Joy has written a number of stories and more details on her activities can be found at her website. Here, she discusses the inspiration behind her latest tale — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing The last passenger pigeon

North American passenger pigeons once flew in the millions, in such numbers that they blotted out the sun, taking hours to pass overhead. The last one died in captivity in 1914. Christopher Cokinos wrote a lovely, haunting book on extinct bird species called Hope is the Thing With Feathers. I spoke with him at a nature writing conference sponsored by the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment. He said writing that book had saddened him beyond belief. To distract himself, he had gone on an Antarctic expedition, looking for rare meteorites in the white expanses of snow.

That encounter stayed with me — writers and artists, lost things and the art of looking. In the 1990s, I explored caves with a local speleological society. We often ran into birders as we hiked the woods and hills. Literally. The birders were heads up, the cavers were heads down. On one occasion I walked right into a fellow looking for a golden-cheeked warbler, and we had an entanglement of binoculars, notebooks, a clinometer and compasses. But we understood each other.

And yet … what happens if we’re too late? Or when there have been generations of loss, looking, imitation, and loss again?