“I hope,” she said. “But I’m getting to a point where too many people are dying doing what they want.”
“Hutch, I’m sorry. For him. For you. For all of us.”
“I know.” Her voice was softer.
“The only thing I’m not sorry about is that I came. I’m glad to have been here for all this.”
“Experience of a lifetime.”
“Yes. And it’s been good to see you again.”
“Thanks, Tor.”
She was having trouble keeping her voice steady. Priscilla Hutchins wasn’t such a tough babe after all. “I wish things could have turned out differently, though.”
“Me too,” she said. “I have to go. Got a few things to take care of.”
“Okay.”
“Once you make the jump, you should be in hyperspace a little less than three days. Assuming the same technology. You know all that.”
“Yes. I know.”
“It’ll be easier to get around, because you won’t have to deal with the acceleration. But once you get where you’re going, expect some maneuvering.”
“Okay.”
“I won’t be able to talk to you while you’re in the sack.”
“The sack?”
“In hyperspace.” She never missed a beat. “After you come out on the other side, it’ll probably take us a while to find you.”
“Okay.”
“Maybe a couple of days. Maybe even a little longer. Solar systems tend to be big.”
“Take your time. I’m not going anyplace.”
“You’re a sweetheart, Tor.” And she signed off.
You’re a sweetheart. It was the best he seemed able to get.
HE REFILLED HIS air tanks and went for a walk, leaning against the acceleration. He knew the routine on superluminals. They accelerated for forty minutes or so, then the second set of engines would come on. You could always tell them because they had a whiny sound that you could hear throughout the ship. This thing had been running for almost three hours. Why hadn’t it jumped?
He went down a passageway he hadn’t seen before, and he didn’t bother to give it a designation. He opened several empty chambers before finding himself in another hologram. He was on a strip of beach, with sunlight bright on the surf. But everything was frozen. Unlike the images he’d seen elsewhere on the ship, this was a still.
The usual observers’ chairs were there, six to a side. He lowered himself into one.
A vaguely humanoid creature was seated on the sand. It wore no clothing that he could see, but it held a book open in long bronze triple-jointed fingers. Its eyes were gold, and it appeared to be distracted by the volume. It had perhaps just begun to grasp something. Some salient point.
Mountains rose off to his left, and a large structure with towers and catwalks, the whole lined with flags. It looked like the sort of place you took the kids when you were in a resort. Well out, on the horizon, a ship of uncertain design was passing.
He had no idea what significance to draw from the scene. But he watched, glad to be in such peaceful surroundings. When he closed his eyes, he imagined he could hear the surf.
Chapter 28
“TOR?”
Hutch fed the signal into the console, waited for Bill to enhance.
“Sorry,” he said. “There’s not enough.”
She nodded and sank back into her chair.
“He can probably still hear you, though.”
“Tor,” she said, “we’re not receiving you anymore. The range has opened up too much.” The chindi moved smoothly across the overhead screen, a flattened asteroid with a long fiery jet at its rear. “You’ll be losing our signal, too, shortly, if you haven’t already. Just get through the next few days. We’ll be on the other side as quickly as we can.”
“That thing can really gallop,” said Bill. “It’s still pulling ahead of us.”
Even though it was hauling so much mass. “Any change in trajectory?”
“No. It is apparently headed for 97.”
RK335197 was a white class-F, about the dimensions of Procyon. No one had ever been there. It was known to have a planetary system with at least two gas giants, one roughly thirty times the mass of Jupiter. No pictures of either were on file. Seen from Gemini, it was an ordinary star, almost lost in those glittering skies.
“Hutch, the chindi is projecting a gravity field in front.”
“Maybe that explains how you get all that mass moving forward without burning unconscionable amounts of fuel.”
“Yes. It’s falling.”
“What’s the strength of the gravity field?”
“I would estimate it at.7 Earth standard.”
“It’s enough.” Experimenters at home had worked with similar technology. But it was a solution without a problem. Ordinary fusion engines had proved themselves quite capable of reaching jump mode.
Hutch remained on the bridge and watched the range between the two vessels widen. Alyx was sleeping off her painkillers, but Nick stayed with her, holding up both ends of the conversation with his customary reassuring tone. When you were with Nick, you always knew things would turn out okay.
“The chindi,” said Bill, “is approaching jump velocity.”
“Okay.”
“Six minutes.”
Assuming the calculations and estimates were correct.
“We’ll be making our own jump in nineteen minutes.”
She opened a channel and gave Tor the time sequence, hoping he could hear her. She longed for a response, to be reassured that everything was okay. Just to hear his voice, to know that he was properly braced somewhere so he didn’t fall on his head when the chindi went into the sack.
Bill put up pictures of what he thought the 97 worlds would look like. One contrasted Jupiter with the supergiant, a marble against a bowling ball.
Another depicted the bowling ball’s orbit, a wild ellipse that ran through the outer atmosphere of the sun. “Eventually,” said Bill, “it’ll fall in.”
That was encouraging news. It suggested a reason for the chindi’s interest and seemed to confirm the probable destination. “How long’s eventually?” she asked.
“We lack precise figures, Hutch, but the best estimate puts it between 17 and 20 million years.”
“Oh.”
“That must be it, then,” said Nick, with a grin, seeing her face change.
“Error factor of 5 percent.”
“Thanks, Bill.”
“It’s quite all right, Hutch. I’m happy to help.”
Nick leaned forward expectantly.
“One minute,” said Bill.
The big thrusters continued to fire. She thought about Tor lost and alone somewhere in there. Hutch couldn’t entirely put her resentment behind her. And yet it occurred to her that, had Tor hung back and let George and Alyx go over alone, she’d have thought less of him.
SHE WAITED FROM moment to moment to see the chindi vanish in a spray of light.
But it didn’t happen.
“It may be any of a number of things,” said Bill. “All that mass. Different engine architecture. Possibly even a non-Hazeltine jump mode.”
It kept accelerating.
“Do you think it refuels at every stop?” asked Nick.
Hutch didn’t know. She had no experience with anything remotely this massive.
“I hope,” Nick said, “that the thing stops long enough for us to catch it when it gets to 97.”
Bill came back on-screen. “They are still accelerating. Constant rate. Memphis jump in twelve minutes. Proceed?”