'We'll continue on Einstein Drive for the next four weeks. In case any of you intend to get a last look at Earth as we blast off, please be informed now that there are no vision outlets or pickups anywhere in the ship but in the main control cabin. The reason for this is simple: any kind of porthole constitutes a structural weakness in the hull, and since better than 99% of the trip is going to be spent in nospace, where there's nothing to see anyway, the designing engineers have eliminated the visual outlets.
'Let me ask you now simply to relax, lie back, and get to know your neighbour. Blastoff time is thirty-five minutes from now. Thank you.'
The speaker clicked off.
Nolan murmured, 'Too bad about that business of no vision outlets. I would have liked to get a last look at the Earth on the way out.'
'Maybe it's better this way,' Dawes said.
'Yeah,' Nolan agreed after a pause. 'You may be right there.'
They fell silent. Dawes fumbled with the straps of his protective cradle; they locked into each other in an intricate way, but he solved it after a few moments of tentative fumbling, and by the time the crewman entered the compartment to check, Dawes was completely strapped down.
Minutes ticked away. Dawes tried to freeze in his mind the image of the moon full in the night sky, the Big Dipper, the belt of Orion. Less than ten minutes remained now.
He tried to picture the layout of the ship. At the very top, at the rounded nose, the control cabin and crew quarters were probably located. Then, he thought, below that were the two male dormitories, one on each side of the ship. Then the central lounge, and below that the two female dorms. In the rear, the other lounge, and the galley. And behind them, the rocket combustion chambers and the mysterious compartment housing the Einstein Drive.
He knew very little about the Einstein Drive. Only that its core was a thermonuclear generator that, by establishing a controlled field of greater than solar intensity, creased a stress-pattern in the fabric of space. And that the ship would nose through the stress-pattern like a seal gliding through a cleft in the Arctic ice, and the ship would enter the realm termed nospace.
And then? Somehow, travelling faster than the normal universe's limiting velocity, that of light, the Gegenschein would breast the gulf of light-years and emerge from nospace in the vicinity of Vega, to make a landing on Osiris by conventional chemical-rocket propulsion.
He frowned. He understood the principles only vaguely; hardly anyone really knew what happened when the Einstein generator went into action. All that counted was the result: and it worked. Without the development of the drive, in the late years of the twenty-first century, there would have been no expansion into the universe by Earthmen, no colony worlds, no selection. Perhaps a ship or two might have been dispatched to Alpha Centauri, taking twelve years for the journey and return, or perhaps an immense vessel would have been sent starward to house several generations on a century-long flight to the stars.
Now, ships flitted from Earth to Vega in four weeks.
And Terran colonies dotted the skies.
Dawes forced himself to relax. Somewhere above him, he knew, the countdown was in its final minutes. The field was clear; soon, with a mighty splash of radiance against the already seared soil, the Gegenschein would rear skyward.
'Stand by for blastoff,' the voice of Captain McKenzie warned suddenly.
Far beneath him, Dawes sensed the rumbling of the giant rocket engines. There was a thunderous roar; a massive fist pushed down, against his chest, as the ship lifted.
His heart pounded furiously under the strain of acceleration. He closed his eyes.
He felt the pang of separation. His last bond with Earth, the bond of gravity, had been severed.
CHAPTER NINE
Dawes had never known four weeks could move so slowly.
The novelty of being spaceborne wore off almost at the beginning. In nospace, there was no sense of motion, no rocket vibration, no feeling of acceleration. The ship hung motionless. And the hundred passengers, crammed mercilessly into their tiny vessel, began to feel like prisoners in a large cell.
During that first week, the hundred colonists concentrated on getting to know each other - but in a distant, guarded way, as if each had something to hide from all the others, that something being his inmost self. After a week, Dawes knew the names of almost all of his fellow selectees, but he knew little else about them. Each of the hundred cloaked himself in his private tragedy and made little effort to form friendships.
There were exceptions. Phil Haas, the West Coast lawyer who had left wife and children behind, circulated among the entire group, making friends, talking to people, encouraging them, soothing them. Mary Elliot, the plump, motherly woman who was the oldest of all the hundred selectees at thirty-nine, did the same. And soon it became evident that Haas would be an ideal Colony Director, with Mary Elliot as his wife.
The ship was cramped. There was hardly any room in the sleeping quarters except for sleeping; the lounges aft were small and low of ceiling, while the galley just barely held all of them at table. The narrow companionways that ran the length of the ship would pass two abreast, no more. There was little in the way of recreation aboard ship: a few books, a few music-tapes, nightly film showings. Most of the books and music and films were stowed away in the cargo hold with the other possessions of the colony-to-be.
As 'day' dragged into 'day' and week into week, Dawes found himself going stale with the monotony and constant discomfort. He counted days, then hours, until landing. He slept as much as he could, sometimes fifteen and sixteen hours a day, until he could sleep no more.
Little cliques were forming aboard the ship as the weeks passed. Groups of six or eight took shape: people from the same geographical area, or people of the same general age and intelligence groups, who saw something to share in their common misfortune. Dawes joined none of these groups. He was the youngest member of the colony, at twenty - by some fluke of the computer, none of the other men was less than twenty-five, and most were in their early thirties - and he stood to one side, unable to mingle at ease with the older people. Many of them had lost wives, families, homes that had been built and furnished with care and expense, jobs that had cost them outlay of energy and vigorous exertion. He felt guilty, in a way, that he had lost nothing more serious than his education and his chosen profession. Conscious that the other selectees were adults and he himself something less than that, though more than a boy, Dawes established and observed the gulf between them, and made few friends.
In the third week an election was held. Phil Haas was chosen Colony Director, running unopposed. He announced that he would serve for one year and then would hold new elections. The colonists assembled, granted him the right to rule by decree until a constitution could be adopted, and some sort of colonial council established.
Dawes wondered about the unanimity of the election.
Certainly their were other men among the fifty who yearned for power. Why had they kept politely silent while Haas was being acclaimed? Men like Dave Matthews, Lee Donaldson: strong men, capable men, outspoken men. Perhaps they were just biding their time, Dawes thought. Waiting, letting Haas handle the difficult task of getting the colony in motion, then making their bids.
Dawes shrugged. He had no interest in playing politics. He kept to himself, intending to do his job as a colonist as best he could, without looking for trouble.
Let others fight among themselves for responsibilities; he was content to drift passively along. After all, he thought, he hadn't asked to be sent here. Nor was he going to ask for any great share in the responsibilities.