Mission to Minerva

CHAPTER TEN

The venue for dinner was a semi-garden setting of flowers and shrubs, glazed on two sides to look out among the city's heights, which incorporated high-level urban rivers and waterfalls shaped by invisible contours of force. Only the seven Terrans were present, the Thuriens having withdrawn for the evening to leave them some time to themselves. Since this was Thurien, the fare was vegetarian-but delicious. Meat-eating was unknown among Ganymeans, since land carnivores had never evolved on early Minerva. Apparently there were Jevlenese-run places in Thurios that catered to the tastes of visitors of their own kind, but the group from Earth hadn't considered it an especially important matter. The most talkative was Mildred, still enthralled by her recent experiences.

"Do you have any idea how many light-years Christian and Victor and I traveled today?" she said to the others at the table. "VISAR told me it took in a sizeable part of our region of the Galaxy. Yet I feel as fresh as a spring morning in the Alps. And nobody even had to pack a bag! it really is amazing. Can you imagine what it would be like if this kind of thing was extended one day to include the whole Multiverse-you know, all these other realities that I keep hearing about? We'd be able to travel around in history-even all the ones that never happened… Well, they do happen, if I understand it all correctly, but not where we are. Is that it?… Oh, you know what I mean."

"Connecting all the VISARs together," Duncan said in a slow voice. He stared at her, obviously fascinated by the thought. It evidently hadn't occurred to him before. As the junior element of the team, he and Sandy had been delegated the chore of organizing the work space that the Terran group would be using. Things there were going smoothly, which didn't leave much to report, and they were happy to leave the talking to others. Sonnebrandt and Chien were strangely quiet, and Hunt thought he detected some strain between them. Danchekker was absorbed in investigating the Thurien organic preparations. Hunt stared at Mildred, his mind boggling at what she had just said. It hadn't occurred to him either.

She went on, "But the part about it that I don't buy, I'm afraid, is this business about every one of these little jiggly… what do you call them? The changes that can go one way or another."

"Quantum events?" Hunt supplied.

"Yes. I just can't accept that they lead to every reality that could possibly exist. Every combination that all the atoms that make up the universe could conceivably create. That's how you're saying it is, isn't it?"

"It's what the mathematics says," Hunt replied, treating it cautiously. He didn't want to get in a situation of having to contradict.

"Well, I'm not a mathematician," Mildred declared. "So I don't have to believe it,"

Danchekker eyed her curiously for a moment, seemingly thought better of getting involved, and returned his attention to dissecting a bulbous curiosity garnished with a yellow sauce, vaguely suggestive of a purple artichoke. Hunt smiled. "Numbers that are totally beyond anything you can grasp are just something you learn to live with after a while in this business," he told Mildred.

She shook her head. "It's not the numbers. It's the believability. You're telling me that every universe that could possibly physically happen does happen somewhere. But I don't believe it. I don't believe that a universe exists in which, say, my books are printed with all the pages blank, and they're stocked on shelves, and customers buy them. You see what I mean?" She looked around the table, inviting anyone to comment. Nobody did. "Your mathematics might say there's nothing to stop quantum… jiggles from making atoms come together to make a universe like that, but I don't believe it will happen. It just doesn't make any sense. The people in it would never behave that way."

Hunt stared at her while he thought to compose a reply… but then found that he couldn't compose one. She'd obviously missed a point somewhere… but he was unable to pinpoint exactly what. He needed time to think about this, he realized.

"But I've listened to too much of all this today," Mildred went on. "It was fascinating to meet some of the Ganymeans from the Shapieron, but I didn't understand a lot of what you were saying with them either. The most interesting for me were that couple, right at the beginning, in that upside-down superbowl in Vranix. Philosophers and artists," she said, addressing the ones around her who hadn't been there. "They've retired to live on an incredible world of rain forests and mountains that we also saw. They want to discover their inner nature. It seems that Thuriens see that as the main purpose in life. I've always thought it."

Hunt smiled again, amused at Mildred's flights of imagination. "It wasn't a couple," he reminded her. "Just Wyarel. He was waiting for his wife to show up."

Mildred gave him a reproachful look. "What are you taking about, Victor? They were both there. Asayi was charming. Surely you couldn't forget that gold and lilac gown that she was wearing. It was gorgeous!"

Hunt hesitated, not sure how to handle this. The evening seemed determined to get him into an argument over something. "I'm sorry, but you must have made this up somehow. Wyarel was alone at Vranix… He was still waiting for Asayi when we left."

"Victor, I don't understand…"

"Cousin Mildred is correct, Vic," Danchekker said quietly. "We talked with both of them. You complimented Asayi on the gown yourself." He was giving Hunt a worried look, but at the same time shook his head almost imperceptibly, indicating that it was not something to make an issue of now. Hunt sat back in his chair and finished the rest of his meal in relative silence. He was as sure of himself as he had been that morning when Mildred and Danchekker called him at the Multiporter, insisting that he had agreed to accompany them.

"VISAR, you handle all the neural traffic involved in these situations," Hunt said. He had brooded for some time after getting back to his room at the Waldorf, then told VISAR of the problem. It was still troubling him. "Do you keep records of what takes place? That would be the way to resolve something like this."

"No, I don't," VISAR replied. "The purpose is purely to provide a communications medium between users."

Hunt had been fairly sure that was the case. It was more a way of broaching the subject. "But could you, if a user asked? Suppose I wanted you to keep a log of everything you channel into my datastream?"

"That would necessarily involve other users, too," VISAR pointed out.

"Does that mean you couldn't?"

"I'm not permitted to. It would require a change of standards and operating directives from the Thurien authorities who decide those things. And a change like that would not be approved easily-if it were ever approved at all." In a mild dig at Terran history that it apparently couldn't resist, VISAR added, "Thuriens don't have a background of obsession with surveillance and keeping tabs on each other."

"Even if the other parties were to agree?"

"It would get impossibly complicated," VISAR said. "Every user wanting to come into the circuit would have to be informed. And for Thuriens something like that would take a lot of explaining. They look at life very differently."

Hunt sighed. "Okay, it was just a thought. Forget it for now." He lay back along the couch where he had been pondering and stared up at the ceiling. It was ornately molded, fashioned from a material that generated light internally, either uniformly diffuse or concentrated in whatever places were desired. Something very strange was going on. He felt confused and disturbed. As disturbed as Josef and Chien had seemed earlier at dinner, from the moment they sat down.

He checked the time. It was just after midnight. "VISAR. Can you connect me to Josef?"

An avco frame opened up in Hunt's visual field a moment later, showing Sonnebrandt's head and shoulders. "Hi, Vic. What's up?"

"Are you doing anything right now? There's something I'd like to talk about."

"Sure, no problem. Do you want to meet in the Pit Stop? Or you could come here for a drink. I was just getting ready to turn in."

"No, it's okay. I'll come there. See you in a couple of minutes."

Hunt arrived to find Sonnebrandt in house robe and slippers, with a squat, long-necked bottle and two glasses waiting on the table in the lounge section of the suite. "So what is it, an insomnia problem now?" he greeted as Hunt sat down. "I've probably had too much going around inside my head, too."

"Cheers." Hunt examined his glass after Sonnebrandt had poured. "What is it?"

"Some kind of wine the Jevlenese drink, that's stocked here. A bit like hock."

"Not bad."

Sonnebrandt indicated the direction of the door with a motion of his head. "I was talking to a couple of the Estonians earlier in the Pit Stop. I never realized before that Ganymeans can't sing."

"Their vocal apparatus is totally different," Hunt said. "It restricts them to that guttural speech that we have trouble reproducing." The voices that VISAR manufactured when it translated were synthesized to sound normal both ways. "And you're right. It doesn't give them a range that would permit song."

"Our choral music awes them. The Estonians are a huge sensation. Did you know?"

"I haven't really been following that side of things much."

"I thought it was strange… not the physiological thing; but that Thuriens should be so surprised. I mean, they've had the Jevlenese around for long enough. They're human."

Hunt shrugged. "Then I can only guess that maybe the Jevlenese aren't so musical. Come to think of it, I didn't see much sign of it when I was there."

"Maybe." Sonnebrandt settled himself back and regarded Hunt over the rim of his glass. "But anyway… So what is it that's so urgent that it can't wait until a more civilized hour of the morning?"

"It's not so much that it's urgent, Josef. But possibly personal. I thought that a little privacy might be in order."

"Oh. Now you have got me intrigued. Please go on."

Hunt had been trying to think of the best way to approach this, but he still found the situation awkward. "Look, first, don't think I'm trying to pry, or that I have any interest in what might be your own personal business. My questions may sound a bit odd, but there's a good reason for asking them."

Sonnebrandt eyed him uncertainly. "Yes…?"

"At dinner earlier tonight, you and Chien…" Hunt gestured briefly. "I couldn't help noticing that there seemed to be, oh… for want of a better word, something a little strained. A bit of edginess; not a lot of talking. Know what I mean?" He waited. Sonnebrandt stared into his glass without responding. Hunt read it as he'd feared-a tacit way of telling him as politely as possible to mind his own business. "Okay, look, I said at the beginning that if I've gone and trodden into something personal that's going on-"

Sonnebrandt cut him off with a short laugh. "You mean with me and Chien? Oh, come on, Vic. I've only known her face-to-face as long as you have, and it isn't as if we've exactly had nothing else to be concerning ourselves with." He took a quick drink. "Mind you, I wouldn't say no, to be honest. She has this magnificently 'spiritual' quality about her, don't you think? A lesson to the women of the world on how grace and attractiveness should improve with the years. At least, that was how I thought until today."

"You went very quiet when I mentioned it. I thought maybe you were offended."

"Hah." Sonnebrandt wrinkled his nose and thought for a few seconds. "A little silly, rather than offended, if you really want to know," he said finally.

"To do with why you had second thoughts about Chien?"

"Well, yes, if you want the truth."

Hunt knew then that his hunch had been right. "Let me guess," he said. "Something so stupid that it should hardly have been worth mentioning. Yet you found yourselves contradicting each other vehemently, like kids. Something that you knew you were right about, and which should have been easily resolved. But she insisted on making an issue of it and wouldn't back down."

Sonnebrandt's eyes widened in surprise. "That's it, exactly! How did you know?"

"I'll tell you in a second. So what happened."

"Earlier in the day, when we were at the Multiporter, we found ourselves arguing about things all the time-as you said, stupid little things. She'd tell me I was repeating something that I knew I hadn't said; or insist that she'd said things that she never had. Another time, she started to explain what had been happening for the last ten minutes, as if I'd been away, when I was there all the time. Anyone can make mistakes, of course. But when someone that you'd think would know that doesn't seem able to admit it… well, after a while, it gets to you."

"I know. Annoying, isn't it."

Sonnebrandt seemed about to go on, then checked himself as he saw the pointed look on Hunt's face. "Are you telling me it's been happening with you too?" He stopped and thought back. "Oh, of course! That business with Chris and Mildred over dinner about the Thurien couple."

Hunt nodded slowly. "I've known Chris Danchekker for years. He can be a bit cantankerous at times, but this isn't at all like himself. There's something very odd going on around here, Josef. It's affecting all of us, not just Chris. And just at this moment, I have no idea what it is."