Team Zeroe

In April of 2007, a team of scientists in Switzerland discovered a pair of planets orbiting the star Gliese 581. The two planets closely bracket the habitable zone around that star, and had a chance, however slim, of being able to support life. Or so it was theorized at the time, anyway. There was also speculation that the inner most of those planets, Gliese 581 c, might be tidally locked. That is, with one side facing the sun. Speculation about a habitable “twilight zone” on such a world sprang up in a number of articles, and in a conversation between myself, and my good friend Mike.

“Wow, that would be a cool setting for a story,” he said. We continued discussing the environment, what it would be like, where people would live, and a culture that had no day and night. “Wow, that would sure make a cool setting for a story,” he said again. He didn’t hesitate to admit he was trying to prod me into writing something. That conversation turned into a string of e-mails bouncing back and forth between us, and soon I’d drafted my lovely wife Ambre, sometimes known as the “Google Queen” to track down information and interject ideas. Then I turned to Mike’s wife, Becky, the engineer of our merry little band, to ask questions about terraforming and other oddities.

Not long after, Becky and our dear friend Allision introduced me to the idea of publishing the story online, and in fact, they fielded numerous questions about the subject and sent me numerous links. And of course, once all this was done, there came the business of writing. Lots of it, for which my wife, my children and my friends have endured long hours of my nose stuck to a computer screen, over paper, in a book, or blankly staring into space while some idea congealed in my head. So the whole of this story may have only one author, but is in fact the work of many. I stand on the shoulders of giants, and I can’t thank you all enough.