Orbitsville

eight

It was almost exactly four months later that Elizabeth Lindstrom’s flagship took up its station outside the sphere’s entrance.

Garamond had spent part of the time carrying out investigations into Orbitsville — the name for the sphere had originated with an unknown crew member — but, as it was primarily equipped for locate-and-report missions, the Bissendorf did not carry a large science team, and the studies were necessarily limited. The astronomy section, under Sammy Yamoto, made the most profound discovery of all — that there was yet another sphere surrounding Pengelly’s Star.

It was smaller than Orbitsville, non-material in nature yet capable of reflecting or deflecting the sun’s outpourings of light and heat. Yamoto described it as a ‘globular filigree of force fields’, a phrase of which he appeared inordinately proud, judging by the frequency with which it was used in his reports. Of the inner sphere’s surface area, precisely half was made up of narrow strips, effectively opaque, curving in a general north-south direction. Their function was to cast great moving bars of shadow on the grasslands of Orbitsville, producing the alternating periods of light and darkness, day and night, without which plant life could not survive. Yamoto was not able to observe the inner sphere directly, but he could chart its structure by studying the bands of light and darkness as they moved across the far side of Orbitsville, 320 million kilometres away in the ‘night’ sky. And he was able to show that the shadow sphere not only created night and day but was also responsible for a progression of seasons. In one quarter of the sphere, corresponding to winter, the opaque night-producing strips were wider and therefore separated by narrower gaps of light; at the opposite side the strips were reduced in width to engender the shorter nights and longer days of summer.

To facilitate Yamoto’s work a small plastic observatory was prefabricated in the Bissendorf’s workshops and transferred to a site within Orbitsville. Several more buildings were added as other sections found reason to prolong their work in the interior, and the nucleus of a scientific colony was formed.

A substantial portion of the effort was put into trying to solve the annoying riddle of why no radio communicator would work inside the sphere. At first it was anticipated that a simple solution and practical remedy would be found, but the weeks slipped by without any progress being made. It appeared that the equally inexplicable synthetic gravity field was responsible for damping out all electromagnetic radiation. In an effort to get new data on the possible mechanics of the phenomenon, O’Hagan’s team took a photographic torpedo and gave it enough extra thrust to enable it to take off from the inner surface of Orbitsville. The purpose of the experiment was to measure the gravity gradient and to see if the radio guidance and telemetry systems would operate if the signals were travelling at right angles to the surface. After a flawless programmed start, the torpedo began tracing random patterns in the sky and made a programmed automatic landing several kilometres away from the aperture. Pessimists began to predict that the only long-range communication possible on Orbitsville would be by modulation of light beams.

Another discovery was that the utterly inert and incredibly hard shell of the sphere was impervious to all radiation except gravity waves. The latter were able to pass through, otherwise the star system’s outer planet would have tangented off towards interstellar space, but not even the most energetic particles entered Orbitsville from the outer universe, except by means of the aperture. Certain peculiarities in the measurements of radiation levels from Pengelly’s Star itself led O’Hagan to give Garamond a confidential report in which he suggested that flickerwing ships might not be able to operate within the sphere, due to lack of available reaction mass. The subject was earmarked for priority investigation by the fully equipped teams which would arrive later.

Garamond received an increasing number of requests from crewmen, especially those who were inactive when the main drive was not in use, for permission to stay on Orbitsville under canvas. At first he encouraged the idea, but Napier reported that the remaining personnel were becoming resentful of their relaxed and sunburned colleagues whose eyes held a new kind of contentment and surety when they returned to ship duties. Partly to combat the divisive forces, Garamond took the Bissendorf on a circuit of Orbitsville’s equatorial plane and established that no other entrances were visible.

He also set teams of men to work on moving the swarm of dead ships to a position a thousand kilometres down orbit from the aperture. With the ships at their new station, photographic teams went inside as many as was practicable and made records of their findings. They confirmed Garamond’s first guess that the hulls had been used as mines and sources of supply. The interiors were gutted, stripped to the bare metal of their hulls, and in some cases it turned out that what had first been thought of as the havoc of battle was actually the work of scavengers. An unfortunate by-product was that virtually nothing was found which would have let researchers deduce the appearance of the aliens who had built and flown the huge fleet. The most significant find was a section of metal staircase and handrailing which hinted that the aliens had been bipeds of about the same size as humans.

Where were they now?

The question came in for more discussion than did speculations on the whereabouts of the beings who had created Orbitsville. It was understood that the sphere-builders had possessed a technology of an entirely different order to that of the race which had produced the ships. The instinctive belief was that the sphere-builders were unknowable, that they had moved on to new adventures or new phases of their existence, because it would be impossible to be near them without their presence being felt. Orbitsville appeared to be and was accepted as a gift from the galactic past.

Garamond brought Aileen and Christopher into the sphere, through the newly constructed L-shaped entrance port, for a strangely peaceful vacation. Aileen was, as he had predicted, able to adjust to Orbitsville’s up-curving horizons without any psychological upsets, and Chris took to it like a foal turned loose in spring pastures. In the daytime Garamond watched the boy’s skin acquire the gold of the new-found sun, and at nights he sat outside with Aileen beneath the fabulous archways of the sky, their gratification all the more intense because of the period of despair which had preceded it.

Only in dreams, or in the half-world between consciousness and sleep, did Garamond feel any apprehension at the thought of Elizabeth advancing across the light-years which lay between Orbitsville and Earth.

To the unaided vision it would have appeared that her flagship came alone, but in fact it was at the head of a fleet of seventy vessels. An interstellar ramjet on maindrive was surrounded by its intake field, a vast insubstantial maw with an area of up to half a million square kilometres, and for this reason the closest formation ever flown was in the form of a thousand-kilometre grid. The fleet was unwieldy even by Starflight standards. It spent two days in matching velocities with the galactic drift of Pengelly’s Star and in deploying its individual units in parking orbit. When each ship had been accurately positioned and its electromagnetic wings furled, the flagship — Starflier IV — advanced slowly on ion drive until it was almost alongside the Bissendorf. Captain Vance Garamond received a formal invitation to go on board.

The very act of donning the black-and-silver dress uniform, for the first time ever in the course of a mission, made him aware that once again he was within Elizabeth’s sphere of influence. He was not conscious of any fear — Orbitsville had had too profound an effect on the situation for that — yet he was filled with a vague distaste each time he thought of the forthcoming interview. For the past four months he had been certain of the fact that Elizabeth’s consequence had been reduced to normal human dimensions, but her arrival at the head of an armada suggested that the old order was still a reality. For her, the only reality.

The sight of his dress uniform had disturbed Aileen, too. As the doors of the transit dock opened and the little buggy ventured out on to the black ocean of space, Garamond remembered the way his wife had kissed him before he left. She had been abstracted, almost cold, and had turned away quickly. It was as though she were suppressing all emotion, but in his final glimpse of her she had been holding their golden snail against her cheek. He stood behind the pilot of the buggy for the whole of the short trip, watching the flagship expand until it filled the forward screens. When the docking manoeuvre had been completed he stepped watchfully but confidently into the transit bay where a group of Starflight officials were waiting. Behind the officials were a number of men in civilian dress and carrying scene recorders. With a minimum of ceremony Garamond was escorted to the Presidential suite and ushered into the principal stateroom. Elizabeth must have given previous instructions, because his escorts withdrew immediately and in silence. The President was standing with her back to the door. She was wearing a long close-fitting gown of white satin — her favourite style of dress — and three white spaniels floated drowsily in the air close to her feet. Garamond was shocked to see that Elizabeth had lost most of her hair. The thinning black strands clung to her scalp in patches, making her look old and diseased. She continued to stand with her back to him although she must have been aware of his presence.

“My Lady…” Garamond scuffed the floor with his magnetic-soled boots, and the President slowly turned around. The skin of her small-chinned face was pale and glistening.

“Why did you do it, Captain?” Her voice was low. “Why did you run from me?”

“My Lady, I…” Garamond, unprepared for a direct question, was lost for words.

“Why were you afraid of me?”

“I panicked. What happened to your son was a pure accident — he fell when I wasn’t even near him — but I panicked. And I ran.” It occurred to Garamond that Elizabeth might have sound political and tactical reasons for choosing to meet him as a mother who had lost a child rather than as an empress in danger of being usurped, but it did not lessen her advantage.

Incredibly, Elizabeth smiled her asymmetrical, knowing smile. “You thought I wouldn’t understand, that I might lash out at you.”

“It would have been a natural reaction.”

“You shouldn’t have been afraid of me. Captain.”

“I… I’m glad.” This is fantastic, Garamond thought numbly. She doesn’t believe any of it. I don’t believe any of it. So why go on with the charade?

“…suffered, and you’ve suffered,” Elizabeth was saying. “I think we always will, but I want you to know that I bear you no grudge.” She came closer to him, still smiling, and her soft satiny abdomen brushed his knuckles. Garamond thought of spiders.

“There isn’t any way I can express how sorry I am that the accident occurred.”

“I know.” Elizabeth’s voice was gentle, but suddenly the room was filled with her sweet, soupy odour and Garamond knew that, just for an instant, she had thought of killing him.

“My Lady, if this is too much for you…”

Her face hardened instantly. “What makes you think so?”

“Nothing.”

“Very well, then. We have important business matters to discuss, Captain. Did you know that the Council, with my consent, has authorized the payment to you of ten million monits?”

Garamond shook his head. “Ten million?”

“Yes. Does that seem a lot of money to you?”

“It seems all the money there is.”

Elizabeth laughed and turned away from him, disturbing the spaniels in their airborne slumbers. “It’s nothing, Captain. Nothing ! You will, of course, be appointed to the council I’m setting up to advise on the development and exploitation of Lindstromland, and your salary from that alone will be two million monits a year. Then there’s…” Elizabeth paused.

“What’s the matter, Captain? You look surprised.”

“I am.”

“At the size of your salary? Or the fact that the sphere has been officially named after my family?”

“The name of the sphere is unimportant,” Garamond said stonily, too disturbed by what Elizabeth had said to think about exhibiting the proper degree of deference. “What is important is that it can’t be controlled and exploited. You sounded as if you were planning to parcel up the land and sell it in the same way that Terranova is handled.”

“We don’t sell plots on Terranova — they are given freely, through Government-controlled agencies.”

“To anybody who can pay the Starflight transportation charge. It’s the same thing.”

“Really?” Elizabeth examined Garamond through narrowed eyes. “You’re an expert on such matters, are you?”

“I don’t need to be. The facts are easily understood.” Garamond felt he was rushing towards a dangerous precipice, but he had no desire to hold back.

“In that case you’ll make an excellent council member — all the others regard the Starflight operation as being extremely complex.”

“In practice,” Garamond said doggedly. “But not in principle.”

Elizabeth gave her second unexpected smile of the interview. “In principle, then, why can’t Lindstromland be developed in the normal way?”

“For the same reason that water-sellers can make a living only in the desert.”

“You mean where there’s a lot of water freely available nobody will pay for it.”

“No doubt that sounds childishly simple to you, My Lady, but it’s what I meant.”

“I’m intrigued by your thought processes, Captain.” Elizabeth was giving no sign of being angered by Garamond’s attitude. “How can you compare selling water and opening up a new world?”

Garamond gave a short laugh. “Yours are the intriguing thought processes if you’re comparing Orbitsville to an ordinary planet.”

“Orbitsville?”

“Lindstromland. It isn’t like an ordinary planet.”

“I’m aware of the difference in size.”

“You aren’t.”

Elizabeth’s tolerance began to fade. “Be careful about what you say, Captain.”

“With respect, My Lady, you aren’t aware of the difference in size. Nobody is, and nobody ever will be. I’m not aware of it, and I’ve flown right round Orbitsville.”

“Surely the fact that you were able to…”

“I was travelling at a hundred thousand kilometres an hour,” Garamond said in a steady voice. “At that speed I could have orbited Earth in twenty-five minutes. Do you know how long it took to get round Orbitsville? Forty-two days!”

“I grant you we’re dealing with a new order of magnitude.”

“And that’s only a linear comparison. Don’t you see there’s just no way you can handle the amount of living space involved?”

Elizabeth shrugged. “I’ve already told you that Starflight doesn’t concern itself with the apportionment of land, so the exact area of Lindstromland is of no concern to us. We will, of course, continue to make a fair profit from our transportation services.”

“But that’s the whole point,” Garamond said angrily. “Even if it wasn’t a disguised land charge, the transportation fee should be abolished.”

“Why?”

“Because we now have all the land we can use. In those circumstances it is intolerable that there should be any kind of economic brake on the natural and instinctive flow of people towards the new land.”

“You, of all people, should know that there’s nothing natural or instinctive about building and sailing a flickerwing ship.” A rare tinge of colour was appearing in Elizabeth’s waxy cheeks. “It can’t be done without money.”

Garamond shook his head. “It can’t be done without people. A culture which had never developed the concept of money, or property, could cross space just as well as we do.”

“At last!” Elizabeth took two quick steps towards Garamond, then stopped, swaying in magnetic shoes. “At last I know you, Captain. If money is so distasteful to you, I take it you are refusing a place on the development council?”

“I am.”

“And your bounty? Ten million monits taken from the pockets of the people of the Two Worlds. You’re refusing that, too?”

“I’m refusing that, too.”

“You’re too late,” Elizabeth snapped, savouring a triumph which only she understood. “It has already been credited to your account.”

“I’ll return it to you.”

Elizabeth shook her head decisively. “No, Captain. You’re a very famous man back on the Two Worlds — and I must be seen to give you everything you deserve. Now, return to your ship.”

On the way back to the Bissendorf, Garamond’s mind was filled with the President’s admission that he had become too important to be disposed of like any other human being. And yet, came the disturbing thought, there had been that look of satisfaction in her eyes.