Nemesis

28. Takeoff

Officially, it had a very elaborate name, but it was spoken of as Station Four by those few Earthpeople who had occasion to mention it. From the name it was at once apparent there had been three such objects earlier - none of which were any longer in use, having been cannibalized, in point of fact. There was also a Station Five that had never been finished and had become derelict.

It is doubtful if the vast majority of Earth's population ever thought of the existence of Station Four, which drifted slowly around Earth in an orbit well beyond that of the Moon.

The early stations had been Earth's launching pads for the construction of the first Settlements, and then, when the Settlers themselves took over the job of building Settlements, Station Four was used for Earth's flights to Mars.

One such Martian flight was all that took place, however, for it turned out that the Settlers were far better suited, psychologically, to long flights (living, as they did in worlds that were large enclosed spaceships), and Earth left it to them with a sigh of relief.

Station Four was now rarely used for any purpose and was maintained only as Earth's foothold in space, as a symbol that the Settlers were not the sole owners of the vastness beyond Earth's atmosphere.

But now Station Four had a use.

A large cargo ship had lumbered out in its direction, carrying with it the rumor (among the Settlements) that another attempt - the first in the twenty-third century - would be made to place an Earth team on Mars. Some said it was merely for exploration, some for the establishment of an Earth colony on Mars in order to bypass the few Settlements in orbit around the planet; and some for the purpose, eventually, of establishing an outpost on some sizable asteroid that no Settlement had yet claimed.

What the ship actually carried in its cargo hold was the Superluminal and the crew that was to propel her to the stars.

Tessa Wendel, even though she had been planetbound for eight years, took the space experience calmly, as any Settler by birth would naturally do. Spaceships were far more like Settlements in principle than they were like the planet Earth. And because of that, Crile Fisher, though he had been on many a spaceflight before, was a bit uneasy.

This time something more than the unnaturalness of space contributed to the tension onboard the cargo ship. Fisher said, ‘I can't endure the waiting, Tessa. It's taken us years to reach this point and the Superluminal is ready and we still wait.’

Wendel regarded him thoughtfully. She had never intended to get this involved with him. She had wanted moments of relaxation to rest a mind overcome with the complexity of the project, so that it might return to work refreshed and keener. That was what she had intended; what she had ended up with was something much more.

Now she found herself helplessly tied to him, so that his problems had become hers. The years of his waiting would surely come to nothing, and she worried about the despair that would follow his inevitable disappointment. She had tried to dash cold water on his dreams judiciously, tried to cool down his overheated anticipation of a reunion with his daughter, but she had not succeeded. If anything, over this past year, he had grown more optimistic about the possibility for no obvious reason - at least, none he would explain to her.

Tessa was finally satisfied (and relieved) that it was not his wife Crile was looking for, but only his daughter. To be sure, she had never understood this longing for a daughter he had last seen as an infant, but he had volunteered no explanation and she had not wanted to probe the matter. What was the use? She was certain that his daughter was not alive, that nothing on Rotor was alive. If Rotor was there near the Neighbor Star, it was a giant tomb drifting in space, wandering for ever - and undetectable except by incredible coincidence. Crile Fisher would have to be kept steady and functioning once that inevitable prospect became clearly apparent reality.

Tessa said cajolingly, ‘There's only a two-month wait left - at most. Since we've waited for years, another two months won't hurt.’

‘It's the waiting for years that makes even two months more unbearable,’ muttered Fisher.

‘Tell yourself otherwise, Crile,’ said Wendel. ‘Learn to bow to necessity. The Global Congress simply won't allow us to go any sooner. The Settlements have their eyes on us, and there's no way of being sure that they all accept the notion that we're heading for Mars. It would be strange if they did, considering Earth's poor record in space. If we do nothing for two months, they will assume we're having trouble - something they would readily believe, and find satisfaction in - and withdraw their attention.’

Fisher shook his head angrily. ‘Who cares if they know what we're doing? We'll be off and gone and they won't duplicate Superluminal flight for years - and by that time we'll have a fleet of Superluminal vessels and be moving rapidly forward toward opening up the Galaxy.’

‘Don't take that for granted. It's easier to imitate and overtake than it is to originate. And Earth's government, considering its dismal record in space after the Settlements reached maturity, is obviously anxious to establish unmistakable priority for psychological reasons.’ She shrugged. ‘Besides, we need the time to carry out more tests on the Superluminal under low-gravity conditions.’

‘There's never any end to tests, is there?’

‘Don't be impatient. This is so new and untried a technique, and so unlike anything humanity has ever had, that it is all too easy to think of new tests, especially since we are a little uncertain as to the manner in which moving into and out of hyperspace is affected by the level of intensity of a gravitational field. Seriously, Crile, you can't blame us for beingcautious. After all, as recently as a decade ago, superluminal flight was considered theoretically impossible.’

‘Even caution can be overdone.’

‘Possibly. Eventually, I will decide that we've done all we can reasonably be expected to do, and then we'll take off. I promise you, Crile, we won't wait unreasonably. I won't overdo caution.’

‘I hope not.’

Wendel looked at him doubtfully. She had to ask. She said, ‘You know, Crile, you're not yourself lately. For the last two months you've seemed to be burning up with impatience. For a while there you had cooled down, and then you suddenly gained excitement again. Has something happened that I don't know about?’

Fisher calmed suddenly. ‘Nothing's happened. What can possibly have happened?’

To Wendel, it seemed he had calmed down too quickly, had wrenched himself into a most suspicious affectation of normality. She said, ‘I'm asking you what can possibly have happened. I've tried to warn you, Crile, that we are not likely to find Rotor a functioning world, or find it at all. We will not find your - we are not likely to find any of its inhabitants alive.’ She waited through his stubborn silence, then said, ‘Haven't I warned you of that - possibility?’

‘Often,’ said Fisher.

‘Yet you sound, now, as though you can hardly wait for what is sure to be a happy reunion. It is dangerous to have hopes that are not likely to be fulfilled, to pin everything upon them. What has suddenly produced this new attitude? Have you been talking to someone who was unjustifiably optimistic?’

Fisher flushed. ‘Why do I have to have been talking to someone? Why couldn't I have come to an independent conclusion concerning this, or any other matter? Just because I don't understand the theoretical physics that you do understand doesn't mean I'm subnormal or brainless.’

Wendel said, ‘No, Crile. I never thought anything of the sort about you, nor did I mean to imply it. Tell me what you think about Rotor.’

‘Nothing terribly deep or subtle. It just seemed to me that there was nothing in empty space that is very likely to have destroyed Rotor. It's easy to say that there might only be the dead hulk of a Settlement at Rotor, if it reached the Neighbor Star at all, but what is it that would have destroyed them either on the way or once they were there? I defy you to give me a specific scenario of destruction - collisions - alien intelligences - whatever.’

Wendel said earnestly, ‘Crile, I can't. I have no mystical visions of something having happened. It's just hyper-assistance itself. It's a tricky technique, Crile. Take my word for it. It doesn't use either space or hyperspace in a steady way, but skids along at the interface, wobbling to one side or another for short periods, and moving from space to hyperspace and then from hyperspace back to space several times a minute, perhaps. The passage from one to the other may therefore have taken place a million times or more in the course of the trip from here to the Neighbor Star.’

‘And so?’

‘And so, it happens that the transition is far more dangerous than is level flight in either space or hyper-space. I don't know how thoroughly the Rotorians had established hyperspatial theory, but the chances are that they had done so in only a rudimentary fashion, or they would have surely developed true superluminal flight. In our project, which has worked out hyperspatial theory in great detail, we've managed to establish the effect on material objects of passing from space to hyperspace and vice versa.

‘If an object is a point, there is no strain on it during the transition. If an object is not a point, however - if it is an extended bit of matter, as any ship would be - then there is always a finite period of time during which part of it is in space and part is in hyperspace. This creates a strain - the amount of strain depending on the size of the object, its physical makeup, its speed of transition, and so on. Even for an object the size of Rotor, the danger involved in a single transition - or a dozen, for that matter - is so small that it can reasonably be ignored.

‘When the Superluminal will travel, superluminously, to the Neighbor Star, we are liable to make a dozen transitions, or possibly only as few as two. The flight will be a safe one. In a flight with hyper-assistance only, on the other hand, there may be a million transitions in the course of the same trip, you see, and the chances of fatal strain mount up.’

Fisher looked appalled. ‘Is the chance of fatal strain certain?’

‘No, nothing is certain. It's a statistical matter. A ship might undergo a million transitions - or a billion - with nothing happening. It might be destroyed, on the other hand, on the very first transition. The chances, however, increase rapidly with the number of transitions.

‘I suspect, then, that Rotor embarked on its trip understanding very little about the dangers of transition. Had they known more, they would never have left. There is a very good chance, then, that they experienced some sort of strain that might have been weak enough to allow them to “limp” to the Neighbor Star or one that was strong enough to blow them completely out of existence. Therefore, we might find a hulk, or we might find nothing at all.’

‘Or we might find a Settlement that has survived,’ said Fisher rebelliously.

‘Admitted,’ said Wendel. ‘Or we might ourselves be strained against the odds, be destroyed, and, for that reason, find nothing. I ask you not to be prepared for certainties but for probabilities. And remember that those who think about the matter, without some accurate knowledge of hyperspatial theory, are not likely to come to reasonable conclusions.’

Fisher fell into a profound and clearly depressed silence, while Wendel watched him uneasily.

Tessa Wendel found Station Four a weird environment. It was as though someone had built a small Settlement, but fitted it out to be a combination of nothing more than a laboratory, an observatory, and a launching platform. It had no farms, no homes, none of the appurtenances of a Settlement, however small. It was not even equipped with a spin that would set up an adequate pseudo-gravitational field.

It was, in fact, nothing but a spaceship with acromegaly. It was clear that, although it could be permanently occupied, provided there was a continuous drizzle of food, air and water supplies (there was some recycling, but it wasn't efficient), no single individual could remain there for very long.

Crile Fisher made the wry comment that Station Four was like an old-fashioned space station from the early days of the Space Age that had unaccountably survived into the twenty-third century.

In one respect, though, it was unique. It presented a panoramic view of the Earth-Moon system. From the Settlements that orbited Earth, the two bodies could rarely be seen in their true relationship. From Station Four, however, Earth and Moon were never more than fifteen degrees apart, and as Station Four revolved around the center of gravity of that system (roughly equivalent to revolving about the Earth), the changing pattern of the two worlds, both in position and phase, and the changing size of the Moon (depending on whether it was on the Station's own side of Earth, or on the opposite side) was a never-ending wonder.

The Sun was blocked out automatically by the Artec device (Wendel had to ask to find out that that stood for ‘Artificial Eclipse’ device) and only when the Sun moved too near either Earth or Moon in the station's sky was the view spoiled.

Wendel's Settlement background showed up now, for she enjoyed watching the Earth-Moon interplay, mostly (she explained) because it made it clear she was no longer on Earth.

She said as much to Fisher, who smiled dourly. He had noticed her quick glance to right and left as she said it.

He said, ‘I see you don't mind telling me that, even though I'm an Earthman and might resent it. But, never fear, I won't pass it along.’

‘I'd trust you with anything, Crile.’ She smiled at him happily. He had changed considerably since that crucial conversation when they had first reached Station Four. He was somber, yes, but sooner that than the feverish expectation of what could not be.

He said, ‘Do you really think they resent your being a Settler at this stage of the game?’

‘Of course they do. They never forget. They're as narrow-minded as I am, and I never forget they're Earthpeople.’

‘You obviously forget I'm an Earthman.’

‘That's because you're Crile, and fall into no category other than Crile. And I'm Tessa. And that ends it.’

Fisher said thoughtfully, ‘Does it ever bother you, Tessa, that you have worked out superluminal flight for Earth, rather than for your own Settlement, Adelia?’

‘But I haven't done it for Earth, and I wouldn't have done it for Adelia in other circumstances. In both cases, I'm doing it for myself. I had a problem to solve, and I completed the job successfully. Now I'm going down in history as the inventor of superluminal flight and that's what I've done for myself. And it may sound pretentious, but I'm doing it for humanity, too. It doesn't matter on which world the discovery is made, you know. Some person or persons on Rotor invented hyper-assistance, but we have it now and so do all the Settlements. In the end, the Settlements will all have superluminal flight, too. Wherever an advance takes place, ultimately all humanity is helped.’

‘Earth needs it more than the Settlements do, though.’

‘You mean because of the approach of the Neighbor Star, which the Settlements can easily evade by leaving, if necessary, but which Earth can't. Well, I'll leave that as a problem for Earth's leaders. I've supplied the tool and they can work out methods for using it to their best advantage.’

Crile said, ‘I understand we're taking off tomorrow.’

‘Yes, finally. They'll be taking holographic recordings and give us the full treatment. There's no way of telling, though, when they'll be able to release them to the general public and the Settlements.’

‘It can't be till after our return,’ said Fisher. ‘There'd be no sense in putting them on display if they can't be certain we'll ever come back. It's going to be an agonizing wait for them, too, since they'll have no contact with us at all. When the astronauts first landed on the Moon, they were in touch with the Earth all the way.’

‘True,’ said Wendel, ‘but when Columbus sailed off into the Atlantic, the Spanish monarchs never heard from him again till he returned seven months later.’

Fisher said, ‘Earth, now, has far more at stake than Spain had seven and a half centuries ago. It is really a great pity we can't have superluminal communication, since we have superluminal flight.’

‘I think so, too. As does Koropatsky, who has been hammering at me to work out telecommunication. But, as I told him, I am not a marvelous supernatural force who can crank out everything anyone needs. It is one thing to push mass through hyperspace and quite another to push some sort of radiation through hyperspace. They follow different rules even in ordinary space so that Maxwell didn't work out his electromagnetic equations until two centuries after Newton worked out his gravitational equation. Well, mass and radiation follow different rules in hyperspace, too, and the rules for radiation still defeat us. Someday we'll work out superluminal communication, but we haven't yet.’

‘It's too bad,’ said Fisher thoughtfully. ‘It's possible that without superluminal communication, superluminal flight won't be practical.’

‘Why not?’

‘The lack of superluminal communication cuts the umbilical cord. Could Settlements live far from Earth - far from the rest of humanity - and survive?’

Wendel frowned. ‘What's this new line of philosophy you've begun to track down?’

‘Just a thought. Being a Settler, Tessa, and being accustomed to it, it may not occur to you that living on a Settlement is not truly natural to human beings.’

‘Really? It never seemed unnatural to me.’

‘That's because you weren't really living on one. You were living in a whole system of Settlements among which one was a large planet with billions of people on it. Might not the Rotorians, once they reached the Neighbor Star, find that living on an isolated Settlement was unsatisfactory? In that case, they would surely return to Earth, but they haven't. Might that not be because they have found a planet to live on?’

‘A habitable planet circling a red dwarf star? Most unlikely.’

‘Nature has a way of fooling us and upsetting supposed certainties. Suppose there is a habitable planet there. Shouldn't it be carefully studied?’

Wendel said, ‘Ah, I'm beginning to get what you're driving at. You feel that the ship may come to the Neighbor Star, and find that there is some sort of planet there. We would then make a note of it, decide from a distance that it is uninhabited, and go on about our task of further exploration. You would want us to land and make a much more thorough search, so that we can at least try to find your daughter. But what if our neuronic detector finds no trace of intelligence anywhere within any planetary system the Neighbor Star may have? Must we still search the individual planets?’

Fisher hesitated. ‘Yes. If they show any signs of being habitable, we must study them, it seems to me. We must know all we can about any such planet. We may have to begin evacuating Earth soon, and we must know where to take our people. It's all very well for you to overlook that, since Settlements can just drift off without the necessity of evacua-’

‘Crile! Don't start treating me as the enemy! Don't start suddenly thinking of me as a Settler. I'm Tessa. If there is a planet, we'll investigate it as much as we can, I promise you. But if there is and if the Rotorians are occupying it, then- Well, you spent some years on Rotor, Crile. You must know Janus Pitt.’

‘I know of him. I never met him, but my wi - my ex-wife worked with him. According to her, he was a very capable man, very intelligent, very forceful.’

‘Very forceful. We knew of him on other Settlements, too. And we were not generally fond of him. If it was his plan to find a place for Rotor that was hidden from the rest of humanity, he could do no better than to go to the Neighbor Star, since it was so close and since its existence was not known by anyone outside Rotor at the time. And if, for any reason, he wanted a system all to himself, he would, being Janus Pitt, fear the possibility of being followed and having his monopoly upset. If he happened to find a useful planet that could be used by Rotor, he would be even more resentful of intrusion.’

‘What are you getting at?’ asked Fisher, who looked perturbed, as though he knew what she was getting at.

‘Why, tomorrow we take off, and in not too long a time, we'll be at the Neighbor Star. And if it does have a planet, as you seem to think it might, and if we find the Rotorians are occupying it, it's not going to be a matter of just going down to the surface and saying, “Hello! Surprise!” I'm afraid that at the first sight of us, he would give us his version of a “Hello” and blast us into oblivion.’