The Codex 97.1.128: Memory of a Hidden World (hard science fiction short story)

Since its first publication in 2025, The Codex 97.1.128 has accumulated more than 1,000 combined views and downloads across its English and French editions, distributed through open-access repositories including Zenodo and Archive.org. A print edition is currently in preparation, and a copy has been deposited with the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) in Paris, where it is available for consultation (ISBN 978-2-9595001-9-0).

EDIT (2025/08/16):
The complete French version (three compiled novels) is available on this link: 
https://zenodo.org/records/16886932
In case you didn’t quite get everything, the analysis of the work: The Codex 97.1.128 is on this link: https://zenodo.org/records/16887445

EDIT (2026/06/08): Audiovisual Development & Pre-production (2026) The universe of The Codex 97.1.128 is currently undergoing visual development and pre-production for a short film adaptation with two 2nd-year Bachelor students in Film, TV, and Audiovisual Production.

EDIT (2026/06/12): Research Continuation Some of the mathematical ideas initially explored through the fictional framework of The Codex 97.1.128 have since been developed further, leading to the filing of a patent application in February 2026.  

Print edition is currently in preparation The print version is rolling out now and will soon hit 40,000 retail outlets across the globe.

Summary:

This is no longer the novel where you become the hero, but the short story where you become a mathematician, a physicist and a geneticist.

The Codex 97.1.128 is a hard science fiction work structured into three novels,  exploring a fascinating hypothesis: what if the genetic code were not merely a blueprint for building life, but also an ancient, universal message? This message, hidden within the human genome by a civilization extinct for millions of years, becomes accessible only through binary conversion and mirror inversion of a specific fragment of the code.

The simple mathematical sequence, 97, 1, 128, points to a real star located in the Carina–Sagittarius galactic arm, at galactic coordinates l = 97°, b = 1°, r = 128 light-years.

An isolated researcher discovers this codon anomaly, where the motif repeats, translates into images, becomes sound, then celestial coordinates, plunging the story into existential vertigo: are we alone, or simply forgotten in a discreet corner of the Milky Way, shielded from sight or chaos?

Warning: this is a work of speculative fiction (hard SF), not a scientific document. However, all mathematical, physical and genetics sections presented within the story are designed to be verifiable and reproducible. Of course, copyright is fully secured :-)

About the Author 

Victoria Kayser-Cuny, a dual citizen of Canada and France (and soon Germany!), is trained in molecular genetics/molecular cytogenetics (post-graduate level), with advanced specializations in paleogenetics, exobiology, bioarchaeology, evolutionary genetics, particle physics, astronomy/astrophysics, primatology and biochemistry  studied across France, Switzerland, Canada, and the United States. 

She has also taught STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and, since 2022, has been writing a newsletter on G.R.AI.N. (Genetics, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and Nanotechnology) on LinkedIn.

She is a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London (whose members once included Charles Darwin), a Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, a Full Member of the Genetics Society of London, and a affiliate member of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

A passionate practitioner of bookbinding and codicology, she has published several articles in French, including: “The Future of Codicology: From 13th-Century Chemists to DNA Fragment Data Storage” (2024, Quebec). Her latest article on the 3D reconstruction of a medieval skull: https://www.gnsi.org/journal-of-nature-science-illustrators-vol-57-no-2-abstracts#gsc.tab=0

She also collects books on mathematics and physics, and, like Michael Faraday, was once a bookbinding apprentice. 

Her interest in writing hard science fiction was sparked by a doctoral seminar at the Institut Pasteur, titled “Introduction to the Relationship Between Science and Society”, where the works of Ursula K. Le Guin were especially highlighted.

Ai Rotciv is simply “Victoria” spelled backwards.

AI in this story

Victoria Kayser-Cuny published her first short story in 1999 in a French tech journal (Le Monde Informatique), exploring speculative themes long before AI became a writing companion for many people. She continues to craft her narratives independently, while occasionally using tools like ChatGPT for light proofreading, just as one might ask a colleague to review a final draft. The core ideas, structure, and writing remain entirely her own.