The Spheres of Heaven

37: UNFINISHED BUSINESS

Stars.

There were stars again, glittering hard-edged points of brilliance in a black sky.

They shone in through every port in their thousands. And nothing inside the Mood Indigo competed with their remote luminance; because every form of internal power, including lighting, had failed. The inside of a ship should never be silent. Now this one lacked even the purr of air circulators.

“It happened in the final split-second,” Bony said. He was over at the main systems panel, flipping switches and examining displays. “Dead, dead, dead. Not a thing’s working.” He turned on the tiny lamp on his suit helmet. “No wonder, every level is down to zero. But we were lucky. The other ship hit us just as we were going into the Link. It sucked us dry, but it didn’t have time to dump in resonant energy. A few seconds more and we’d have been blown apart.”

“Can you do anything about it?” Chan was still adjusting to the idea that they were alive — not just alive, but in a universe showing familiar constellations. The Link exit point must be within a lightyear of Sol. Without any form of power, though, they could not signal for help. And without help their survival might not continue for long.

“Oh, I can fix it,” Bony said. “We still have generator capacity, and lots of fuel. A few replacement parts here, a little bypass work there. I’ll do lights and air first. Everything else will come back on-line in a few hours and we can tell people where we are. One thing about Friday Indigo, he bought only the best.”

Bony spoke confidently, but Chan noticed a curious chill in his voice. He glanced around the cabin. It was hard to make out the faces behind the visors, but everyone was unnaturally quiet. They were not babbling like a group which had just escaped death by the narrowest of margins. Deb would not even look in his direction. Only Elke Siry was her usual self — and the Angel, of course, remained unreadable at the best of times.

“Are you feeling all right?” Chan said. “Was anyone hurt during the transition?”

Shaking heads. But still the coldness, and a long perplexing silence, until at last Tully O’Toole said, “We may all be feeling fine, but we left Chris and Tarb behind.”

Danny Casement added at once, “Not just Chrissie and Tarbush, either. What about Dag Korin, and Vow-of-Silence, and Eager Seeker? I know they weren’t members of our original team, but we shouldn’t have deserted them to the Malacostracans.”

“Not even Friday Indigo,” Bony added. “I admit I hated him, because of the way he treated Liddy. And I know that the Angel says there’s some sort of Mallie inside him, so he isn’t human any more. But we shouldn’t have left him with them. It was wrong.”

“And if we had saved him from them,” Liddy said, “maybe something could have been done to help him.”

“That may well be so.” Gressel spoke up unexpectedly. Unlike anyone else on board, the Angel sounded positively cheerful. “Most of Friday Indigo’s original brain still exists. Possibly it can be restored to permit independent thought. To the extent, of course, that any human is capable of such. You cannot make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.”

Chan wished that Dag Korin were on board, to say Or get sense from an overgrown artichoke. Suddenly, he felt immensely weary. He leaned back in the control chair. “We didn’t desert Chrissie and the Tarb, or Eager Seeker and Vow-of-Silence. We didn’t even desert Friday Indigo. I mean, it looked like we did, but we really didn’t. As for Dag Korin …”

“The General was on the Malacostracan ship,” Deb said. “The one that entered the Link ahead of us. I know you wanted to be on it instead of him, Chan. But we did desert Tarbush and Chrissie. We left them behind on Limbo. You can’t deny that.”

“I don’t. But I spoke to them before we left, and it’s not the way it seems. As for Dag Korin, we didn’t have much choice. The Mallies wanted to be taken through to our universe, and that was the last place we wanted them.” Chan turned to Elke Siry. “You know the multiverse a lot better than I do. Would you explain that part of it, and I’ll do the rest?”

“Well.” Elke bit her lower lip and looked at Tully for support. He nodded encouragingly. “Well, I guess so. It starts because the multiverse exists on many different levels. We’re back in our own original level now, and Limbo is in a different one. The levels differ in the total mass-energy associated with them. The way that I like to think of it, a higher total mass-energy corresponds to a higher frequency of that universe’s spacetime, exactly the way that a higher frequency implies a higher energy in electromagnetic radiation. Higher frequency means a higher clock rate. So if you know the mass-energy of a level of the multiverse, you can use it to calculate rates for the passage of time.”

“Elke,” Tully said gently. “Time is passing right here, and you’re not at all clear. I can’t speak for the others but I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“I do,” said Bony. “Or I think I do. Elke, are you saying that a clock can run at a different rate in every multiverse?”

“Exactly.” Elke nodded toward Chan. “He knew all this, which is why he asked me to do what I did.”

“Which was to seek out the most extreme case she could find,” Chan added. “I had given Elke a task: look for a level of the multiverse where the clock rate is slowest. She found one that she called the Omega level, a place where time runs two thousand times as slow as it does on Limbo. While one day passes in the Omega level of the multiverse, two thousand days — more than six years — go by on Limbo. And time on Limbo runs sixty times as slow again as it does in our own universe. Two months pass here, one day passes there. So when you put those two factors together, if you spend one day on the Omega level three hundred and twenty-eight years go by in our universe. It was my plan to take the Mallies to the Omega level” — he glanced at Deb — “but Dag Korin had other ideas. He went in my place.”

Chan pulled a printed sheet from his pocket and illuminated it with his helmet lamp. “The General seems pretty upbeat about the whole thing. Here’s what he wrote to us: Benjamin Franklin is one of my heroes. He said he wished that he could be pickled in a barrel for a couple of hundred years so that he could see what the world was like when he came out. I feel the same way. And who knows? Maybe that’s what I’ll do. As soon as the Mallie ship emerges on the Omega level, I’ll tell them that I made a minor miscalculation, and we have to go back to Limbo and try again. I don’t think The One will kill me at that point — she will be relying on me. If they make the turnaround at once, say four hours Omega-time, and then they find a way to make an immediate jump through to our own universe — which they’re not about to learn from me, you can be sure of that — you’ll have fifty-plus years to get yourselves ready for their arrival, because time on Limbo runs sixty times as slow as it does on Earth, and the Omega level runs two thousand times slower than Limbo. I reckon that when they get there you should be able to organize a pretty strong welcoming party. But don’t damage the Mallie ship too much, because I plan to be on it. Actually, I suspect that long before I get there, you will have — well, you know my philosophy. I’m going to leave the rest of the thought to you.” Chan folded the letter. “The first time I met Dag Korin, he said that no matter what people tell you about old soldiers fading away, he didn’t want to be like that. He’d rather go down in flames. He also explained to us, several times, his philosophy. Generals and admirals who are lightyears — or universes — away from the battle should not try to control the action. So he won’t tell us what we have to do next. But he hints at it, with his comment that time on Limbo runs sixty times as slow as it does on Earth.”

Deb said suddenly, “You didn’t desert them. You knew we’d be going back. You always intended to go back.”

“Of course.” Chan could sense the tension lessening around the cabin. “Look at it this way. Chrissie and Tarbush have loads of supplies, enough for weeks. Eager Seeker is already living off the land, and Vow-of-Silence can survive for a long time without any food at all. Even if it takes three months to organize a rescue party, that’s only a day and a half on Limbo.”

“It will take less than three months,” the Angel said. “How long, engineer, before this ship has the power to send a signal?”

It took a second for Bony to realize that the Angel must be talking to him. A real engineer at last! “Just a few more minutes. We’re reaching a critical recharge point.”

“Very good. When that happens, we will send our signal. And we will exert our authority, as an Angel of Sellora, to requisition at once another ship; a ship, this time, equipped for a submarine environment and with defenses against Malacostracan attack.”

“Do you want to get back so quickly because you’re worried about Eager Seeker and Vow-of-Silence?” Elke asked. More than anyone else in the cabin she seemed at ease with the Angel.

“Not at all. They are more than able to look after themselves. What interests us — and them — is the further exploration of the multiverse and the potential of anti-gravity; plus, of course, the vast excitement of adding another species to the roster of known intelligences.”

“The bubble people?” Bony said.

“We were thinking more of the Malacostracans.”

“But they’re monsters ,” Bony protested. “Look what they did to Friday Indigo. And they blew our orbiters out of the sky without even waiting to find out what they were. And if we hadn’t escaped into the Link, they’d have destroyed us, too.”

“We see your point, of course, and we find it difficult to dispute.” The Angel’s synthesized voice managed a hint of sly satisfaction. “No such aggressive race should be allowed to mingle with civilized peoples. No one with a history of violence should be part of the community of intelligent beings. No race which has attacked another is worthy of consideration. Such a race should be kept in indefinite quarantine.”

Chan cleared his throat. “Well, actually, speaking on behalf of all of us …”

“The issue of quarantine will be the subject of discussion on a different occasion. We will say, however, that your actions on Limbo prove to us that humans are acceptable and even necessary participants in many Stellar Group affairs. The question to be resolved now is the composition of the group returning to Limbo.”

“Why, it will be us ,” Deb said. She glanced around at the others. “Won’t it? We started as a team, we’ll return as a team.”

“There are those present who may question that assumption.” The Angel turned, clumsily, so that its speech center pointed toward Chan Dalton. “We sense that you wish to offer thoughts on the subject.”

Chan shook his head and did not speak.

“Chan?” Deb said.

Danny Casement added, “You’re the one who brought us here. You organized the whole thing.”

“I did.” Chan looked not at Danny, but at Deb. “I dragged you here, but I think that was my mistake. I know we haven’t deserted Chrissie and the others. Someone will go back for them. But I don’t think we’re qualified to do it.”

“Of course we’re qualified!” Danny looked shell-shocked. “We’re the team, the original can-do kids. You always told us that.”

“I know what I said. We’re the team, the best there is. We’re up to anything that the starways can throw at us.” Chan stared around at the bewildered faces. “I believed all that myself. But just look at my miserable performance since we started. I brought you through the Link entry point without knowing where we were going. When we arrived, I didn’t know where we were. We escaped to our own universe — but only because this ship happened to be available. We left our own ship and half of our party behind. We’ve been like a bunch of children, meddling in affairs too complex for us. And all the special skills, the ones that I thought made us a perfect mix, what did we do with them? Deb is a weapons master, and she didn’t use any weapons” — Deb seemed ready to speak, then closed her mouth — “Chrissie couldn’t find uses for her magic. Tully didn’t talk to any aliens, nor did Tarbush. Danny was a wasted talent. The only one who had to do a good job was Bony, and that was because we messed up in every other way. As for me, I didn’t do one thing right. So let me ask you, are we qualified to go back to Limbo? Are we qualified to go anywhere ? Shouldn’t we leave it to people who know what they are doing?”

Deb Bisson moved to Chan’s side and took his hands in hers. She did not speak, and the reply, when it came, was from an unexpected source.

“Of course you are not qualified.” The Angel’s tone was chiding. “Faced with unknown dangers, no organism is qualified. It cannot assure its own survival, still less can it guarantee the rescue and safety of others. At most, an intelligent being can seek to minimize risks. However, your team is more qualified than anyone else. You performed vastly better than a team of Tinkers and Pipe-Rillas. Better, even, than an Angel of Sellora. And you did all this, without ever resorting to violence. We ask you — we implore you — to take your team again to Limbo.”

As the Angel paused, a buzzer sounded through the cabin of the Mood Indigo.

“Critical recharge point, all systems,” Bony said. “Nearly there. Wait for it.”

The lights came on, dim at first but brightening. An air circulator gave its preliminary moan. The display screens came alive, and from the control audio a puzzled human voice said, “Mood Indigo? This is the Tortugas access node. Is that the Mood Indigo ? We are receiving your signal and ship ID, but we show you as lost from the system a year ago.”

“A year!” Liddy exclaimed. “A whole year?”

“Something we have to get used to,” Chan said slowly. “With the multiverse, time is really relative.” He turned to Gressel. “I hear your request. But there’s another human expression I’ve never heard from any Angel: Put your money where your mouth is.”

“We have no mouth. However, we are familiar with the saying.”

“Then act on it. You beg us to return to Limbo. If we went, would you come with us?”

“Why, no. Certainly not.”

“If we accept, will you come with us?”

“We? The Angel, Gressel? Why do you even suggest such a thing?”

“Because you are one reason for our survival. We need you. Even without a pooling of minds, a team of Stellar Group members is stronger than any individual species.”

“But there is danger on Limbo. We avoid danger.”

“So do we. For us, you are part of that avoidance. You speak of civilized peoples. Does a civilized being consider its own survival more important than the survival of other intelligent beings?’

“It should not.”

“Then if we return to Limbo, will you come with us?”

Gressel gave a very human sigh. “For us to entertain such a suggestion should itself be unthinkable. Look homeward, Angel. We ought to return at once to Sellora. However, we suspect that human insanity may be contagious.”

The Angel turned to Bony. “Allow us to use your communications system. Where ignorance is bliss, ’tis folly to be wise. We are ready to begin.”