Studies Show Parents Should Start When Kids Are Two
CHURCHES SPLIT OVER CLONING ISSUE
First Human Clones to Appear in Germany
Do They Have Souls?
VIRGIN APPARITION CLAIMED IN DUST CLOUDS
Mary’s Likeness Reported 6000 Light-Years Away
Telescopic Images from Ballinger Cloud
MOVEMENT TO BAN ALCOHOL GAINS STRENGTH
Prohibition Again?
POPULATION GAINS CONTINUE FOR CENTRAL
AND MOUNTAIN STATES
People Feel Safer Away from Coastlines, Quake Zones
Trend Expected to Continue
Kansas Now Has More People Than Florida
NEW FOREST FIRES IN COLORADO
Long Dry Spell Creates Hazard
Campers Asked to Exercise Caution
TANAKA LANDS IN KENTUCKY AFTER 16 DAYS
Completes Round-the-World Hot-Air Balloon Flight
Misses Record by Seven Minutes
chapter 19
ALIOTH IS A white class-AO sun. Its formal name is Epsilon Ursae Majoris. Eighty-one light-years from Arlington, it didn’t exactly equate to going deep, but it was far enough. And they’d be within striking distance of help should something go wrong.
Alioth is about four times as wide as Sol, and more than a hundred times brighter. It’s large for a class-A, and consequently has been burning hydrogen at an accelerated rate. It is now near the end of that phase of its existence, and will soon enter its helium-burning phase. For that reason it had been visited several times by Academy ships studying the decline of class-A stars.
Seventeen worlds orbit Alioth, one of which, Seabright, is unique in that it’s the only known planet entirely covered by water. It’s perfectly located in the middle of the biozone, but it has produced not so much as a single living cell.
The recently discovered companion star is a dull class-G orbiting at a range of almost a light-year.
AS THEY CAME out of jump status, Klaxons sounded. Collision alert. Matt barked a goddam and froze while Phyl activated the ship’s defensive systems and fired a series of particle beams at something.
“Rock,” she said.
It exploded directly ahead and to starboard. The detectors should have picked it up and canceled the jump. “They may not be properly correlated with the new system,” said Jon. “I hadn’t thought about that.”
“Nice reflexes, Phyl,” said Matt. He was embarrassed.
“That’s what you can expect with a top-of-the-line model.”
Antonio had urged that Jon should be first to speak on arrival, and that he think of something historic to say, a timeless remark that would not only play well during the newsbreaks, but that people would always remember as signaling the first shining moments of the real interstellar age. But that moment had also been blown away by Phyl’s particle beams. “I don’t think the profanity works,” he said over the allcom. “Can we just rewrite the moment?”
“Not without breaking the law,” said Matt. “It went into the log.”
“So we’ve got goddam as our giant leap comment?”
“I’m sorry, Antonio.”
He shook his head. “Make your apology to history, compagno.”
A BLINDING SUN dominated the sky. Matt activated the viewport filters. They helped.
“Too close,” said Rudy. “It’s not as precise as a Hazeltine.”
Jon apologized and said he’d figure it out in time. They told him it didn’t really matter, not now. “Time to make it official,” said Rudy. He climbed out of his chair and disappeared in back. He returned a minute later, brandishing glasses and a bottle of French champagne.
They recorded the TOA, 1723 hours ship time. Transit time, five hours, thirty-five minutes, seventeen seconds. Matt printed a copy of the log entry, along with his unfortunate remark, and they all signed it. Jon Silvestri. Priscilla Hutchins. Rudy Golombeck. Antonio Giannotti. Matthew Darwin.
“So now that we’re here,” said Antonio, “what’s next?”
“I take it we’re not very close to Seabright,” Hutch said.
Matt shook his head. “I doubt it.” She smiled back at him, two pilots exchanging an unspoken understanding. It’s big out here. Brand-new propulsion system. Lucky we got close to the star at all.
It was good to be back. Matt gazed out at the stars, thinking how there was no career like it. “Phyl,” he said, “how far are we from Seabright?”
“Two hundred thirty-six million kilometers, Matt. Ten days by standard drive.”
“Can’t we do better than that?” asked Antonio, with a smile.
“I think it might be possible.” Matt grinned.
“I’ve never seen Seabright,” said Antonio.
Despite his claims, Matt doubted Antonio had seen much of anything out of the ordinary. The journalists had usually traveled the standard routes. They were rarely found with the exploration missions.
Jon nodded. “Doesn’t seem as if we should come all the way out here and not see the sights.” He glanced at Matt. “Why don’t we take a look?”
“Sure.” Matt nodded. “Okay by me. We’ll have to kick the pony a bit to recharge. Figure a half hour. I’ll let you know when we’re ready.”
HUTCH SPENT THE time thinking what it would mean if the Locarno could be made to work with real precision. Travel across the solar system in seconds. She wondered if there might be a groundside application? Climb onto a train in Boston and step off an eye blink later in Los Angeles. Or Honolulu. Possibly even private vehicles doing the same thing? She wasn’t sure she’d want to live in such a world. She liked riding the glide trains, liked cruising through the skies over DC. The whole point of travel was, after all, the ride and not the destination. Like people’s lives.
She was engaged in a conversation with Antonio about the state of the world, and the tendency of the general public to pay little attention until conditions deteriorated severely, when Matt announced they were ready to make their jump.
Jon had replaced her up front, tinkering with the settings. “I don’t want to go in too close,” he said. “We can’t trust the mass detector.”
That sounded a little too casual for Hutch. She’d have felt more comfortable if she were at the controls.
Matt’s voice came over the allcom. “Buckle in.”
She activated her harness. Antonio’s belt locked him down.
“Ten seconds,” said Matt.
Antonio’s eyes slid shut. He seemed to be somewhere else. “Go, baby,” he said.
She closed her own eyes, felt a momentary tug in her belly, saw the glare of light against her eyelids dim and come up again.
“That’s it,” said Matt. He couldn’t avoid a snicker. They all laughed. “We’ve arrived.”
Hutch shook her head. It just didn’t feel right. A jump that had lasted a fraction of a second.
Antonio was looking up at the display. “Are we done? Is it okay to release this thing?” He didn’t like the restraints.
“One moment,” said Phyl. “Measuring.”
Whatever happened today, it was coming. Near-instantaneous travel would hit in the next generation, or somewhere close down the road. It struck her that the metaphor would itself become obsolete. People living perhaps in the next century would have no concept of road. Or maybe it would survive as a referent to spiritual journeys. It was a sad idea. She wondered whether the fears about a singularity waiting at a given point in scientific research, when too many breakthroughs came together, might not have some validity. Not in the classical sense that here was a rise of the machines or some such wild-eyed notion, but simply that maybe you reached a point where the downside of each technological advance outweighed the advantage. Where the price was too high. Where people fell in love with avatars instead of each other. But no one could stop progress, no matter how much damage it did, because it had become a kind of religion.