The commissioner leaned forward. “When’s it going to get there?”
“We don’t know yet. Hartigan forgot to tell us when. We’re waiting to hear now.”
“How many people you have out there?” asked Hutch.
He consulted a display. “Thirty-three. We can put eleven of them on the Lin-Kao. But that’s all we have.” He looked away. “Wait a minute. We’re getting something now.”
Charlie relayed it for them. It was the man by the viewport again. Presumably Hartigan. “I’m going to start moving people over to the Surveyor,” he said. “The Lin-Kao will have time to make two flights. So I can get most of them off that way.”
The Surveyor was an historic ship, now maintained at Arcturus as a museum. It was, with luck, a day and a half away from the Galactic. “So we’ve got at least three days,” said Hutch.
Capella V struck her as an odd location for a vacation site. It would be about five days’ travel time from Earth, a bit far, she thought. She recalled that there’d originally been talk of constructing it at Romulus/Remus in the Vega system.
In any case the Salvator was in position to help. “Good thing,” Peter said when she contacted him. “Union doesn’t have anything ready to go.”
“That can’t be right,” said Hutch.
“It’s true. The place is empty. Usually we have seven or eight ships in port. I’ve called around. There are a couple coming in, but nothing close enough that they can help.”
“And nothing that can be diverted?”
“Negative.”
VALYA WAS FORTUITOUSLY on her way to the same Surveyor museum at Arcturus. She might even be there already. Hutch punched the ship’s name and location into her databank and transmitted to Asquith’s screen. He saw it, and nodded. “Charlie,” he said, “the Salvator is in range. You want us to send it over?”
“How many can they take on board?” asked Dryden.
Asquith looked toward Hutch. Silently, she said seven.
“Seven,” he said.
“Okay. Yes. Please do. I appreciate this, Michael.”
Asquith’s demeanor had changed. He’d begun to enjoy himself, playing the man of action. “Okay, Hutch,” he said. “Get in touch with Valya and get them started.”
An hour later, toward the end of the evening, she got still another call from the commissioner. “It’ll hit Thursday morning,” he said. “We’ve got almost five days.”
More like four and a half. “When Thursday morning?”
“Around ten, our time.”
The Salvator would have to make two flights. There’d be time, but not much to spare.
Do we have an obligation to protect a living world from arbitrary attacks? Probably not. What moral or legal code is applicable? Certainly none that I know of. Do we risk embroiling ourselves in a confrontation with a species whose capabilities may be far greater than our own? It would seem so. It forces us to the conclusion that the prudent action is to stand aside. Let the gremlins do what they want, while we collect as much information about them as we can.
But another question remains to be asked: If we allow these intruders to inflict heavy damage on a biosystem for no definable reason, to kill off whole species, will that not say a great deal about who we really are? And what matters to us? How would that match up with our image of ourselves? Would we be prepared to live with it?
— Charles Dryden, interview on the Black Cat Network, Saturday, April 25
MOTION TO MOVE HELLFIRE TRIAL QUASHED
Sikonis: Defendant Can Get Fair Trial in Derby
NEAR-MISS ASTEROID SPOTTED 80 YEARS AGO
Research Shows They Thought It Might Hit Earth
Warning Promulgated, Then Forgotten
“It Couldn’t Happen Today,” Says White House
chapter 27
The invention of the printing press probably marks the beginning of the decline of civilization. Once you have it, science follows close behind. Next thing you know the idiots have better weaponry. Then atom bombs. Meantime, social organization becomes increasingly dependent on technology, which becomes increasingly vulnerable to error or sabotage. If we can judge by our own experience, it looks as if you get the printing press, then about a thousand years. After that it’s back to the trees.
— Gregory MacAllister, “Fire in the Night”
Three brilliant stars illuminate Earth’s northern skies: Vega, Capella, and the brightest, Arcturus. It is the most distant of the three, thirty-seven light-years from Sol, an orange class-K giant. It became famous when its light was used to open the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair. That light had left the star only a few years after the time of the previous Chicago World’s Fair in 1893. It is bright and it is big: 113 times as luminous as the sun. Twenty-six times as wide. It has exhausted its supply of hydrogen and is burning helium.
Its name comes from the Greek word arktos, for bear. Surface temperature is just under 4,300 degrees Kelvin. Evidence suggests that Arcturus originated in a small galaxy that merged with the Milky Way approximately seven billion years ago. Its planetary system consists of two gas giants and a terrestrial. The terrestrial lies in the center of the biozone. It has oceans and all the ingredients for life, but like so many other places, it remains barren.
That there are only three worlds lends credence to the galactic exchange theory. Also present in the system, and popular with Blue Tour travelers, was the Surveyor Historical Site.
More than a half century earlier, Emil Hightower, captain of the Surveyor, his three-person crew, and a team of researchers, had been in the act of departing the area when an engine blew. The ship quickly lost life support. Hightower ordered everyone off while he sent out a distress call to the Chan Ho Park, with whom they were working in tandem. (At that time, the policy was that ships always operated in pairs in case of just such an emergency.) All except Hightower survived.
The Surveyor was heavily damaged and could not be salvaged. It had drifted through the system more than thirty years, until the Hightower Commission formed and arranged to have it moved into a stable solar orbit, where it was restored and converted into a museum. It served as one of the highlights of the Blue Tour.
MacAllister would just as soon have skipped the museum and proceeded directly to Capella, where they were scheduled to spend a night at the Galactic. He had grown bored and was anxious to get home.
But Amy wanted to see the Surveyor. So, of course, that’s what they would do. The ship was a bona fide piece of history, and he could not justify making a fuss.
Eric was beginning to seem listless also. Maybe he missed the office. Or his rousing social life. “I don’t know what it is,” he confessed to MacAllister. “When I came, I thought I was going to be able to do something. Maybe help roll out the monitors. Stand watch. Do something.” He tried to laugh it away. “But everything’s automated. The ship watches for the moonriders. The ship serves the meals. The ship turns out the lights at night. If somebody gets blown through an airlock, I assume the ship will manage the rescue. There’s really not much for us to do except ride along.
“You’re lucky, Mac. You have stuff to write. The AIs can’t help. You have to do it. Even Amy: She wants to fly one of these things, so she’s getting a feel for it. Me, I’m just hanging around.”
As are we all, thought MacAllister. He wondered what Eric had hoped for in his life. What had his early dreams been? He doubted they’d had much to do with hawking for the Academy.