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There it is. Target identified.
The Earthlings call it the Great Barrier Reef, their largest living structure. Nearly as big as Germany (350,000 km²) and stretching 2300 kilometres on Australia’s northeast coast.
From up here in space, it is beautiful. A lacy network of winding ribbons and wispy threads dotted with deep-water channels and nearly 900 small, scattered cays. A sprawling tapestry of colours: turquoises, blues and jades from shallow waters running over 2900 individual reefs; chalky whites from calcium-rich colonies and coral bleaching; browns and greens from the sediment stirred by swirling tides; all set against the rich navy blue of the Coral Sea. Like a strand of jewels draped along a pointing finger.
I should explain. I am Photon KX1492: Codename--Moonbeam. This is my report on Operation Genesis.
It has been a long and arduous journey, one that began at the sun. Like most photons, I was born deep in its core thousands of years ago, the product of nuclear fusion. I have no mass; I was just a little bundle of energy on a random walk, bouncing chaotically around the vast layers of dense plasma which forms the sun’s radiative zone. Countless times I was emitted up to the convective zone—a broth of boiling, plasma—and was lifted towards the surface, only to be cooled and reabsorbed. Finally, I made it to the outer atmosphere by dodging the magnetic disturbances of the photosphere and avoiding the explosive eruptions in the chromosphere.
It was while I was suffering the immense heat of the corona, the sun’s outermost layer, that I was selected for this mission and joined my squadron. I had always known I was an elementary particle, but I also discovered I was a quantum of light. As such, I possess all the wavelengths of the visible spectrum together with a generous protective layer of infrared and an unusually thick seam of ultraviolet. It would seem I would need both on my mission to Earth.
I couldn’t wait to start but first we had needed a time when the sun was unlikely to emit a burst of radiation (flare) or huge bubbles of charged particles threaded with magnetic field lines (Coronal Mass Ejection); either could be extremely dangerous to us. Then we had to wait for conditions to be in alignment—something to do with the orbits of the earth and the Moon, the Moon’s own shadow phase, and its twist and nod and roll. Apparently, we required full Moon at perigee: when the whole face of the Moon is illuminated and the earth and the Moon are at their closest point. To be honest, it was a bit beyond me.
Finally, we were set free to enjoy the excitement, the utter joy of speeding through the vast vacuum of space unheeded by gravity. Space weather was set fair with no solar storms expected. The gusty solar wind and its magnetic fields are always there--you cannot miss over a million tonnes of supersonic charged particles travelling at 300 miles per second--so we tucked on the edge of the phalanx and went along for the ride.
Soon we located the Sun-Earth line and headed earthwards. Thankfully, I saw little to thwart us; there are harrowing tales of whole battalions blocked by asteroids or lost to strange Earthling devices. That’s not to say it was easy; we suffered constant abrasion from interplanetary dust, the rocky material left by passing comets and asteroids, and had to battle through a bombardment of deep-space cosmic rays on our passage through the inner solar system.
But before I knew it, we had reached Lagrange Point 1(L1), the place which offers a clear uninterrupted view of the sun, and I couldn’t resist a wistful glance back at home. Photons are so fast we had travelled roughly 148 million kilometres to L1 in just over 8 minutes. Planet Earth lay ahead, a vibrant blue and white orb about the size of a grapefruit viewed from here, suspended in the void and shrouded by a thin cotton-wool atmosphere. However, we were focussed on the giant, dusty mirror that is the Moon. Precise timing would be critical to dictate our angle of collision with its bleak, pock-marked face. Only 1 in 10 photons are reflected from its surface to Earth and I was sad to see so many colleagues absorbed during the action. Somehow, I survived.
But the worst was to come. At full moon, the earth’s atmosphere is thicker than normal and, almost immediately on entering it, I was battered by air molecules. They gouged me so deeply my infrared was pitted with numerous holes. They snaked through me, sucking out and scattering my blue and violet wavelengths. My energy was severely depleted.
Despite this, I am close now. I must still remain vigilant, avoiding the dull haze of polluted cities and the menacing shadows of mountains and trees. I must watch for potential attack from earthshine--errant sunbeams reflected back from the earth’s surface. But my eyes are constantly drawn down to the reef itself, the aim of our mission. It is a wondrous, mesmerising sight. For on this warm November night, about 130 species of coral will spawn in stunning unison. A natural wonder triggered by our dim blue moonlight.
As I shimmer overhead, I can see sperm erupting from certain reefs, eggs oozing from others, a blizzard of pink and yellow and orange. Some corals are releasing tiny packets of sperms and eggs no bigger than a peppercorn. They are all drifting skyward, fusing, re-forming, amassing into a dense pink cushion of free-swimming larvae that will later settle on the seabed and construct new coral cities.
I know I will be absorbed as I create new life. I only hope the Earthlings have the wisdom to protect and nourish it.
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