The Cloud Read online

  THE

  CLOUD

  D.W. PATTERSON

  Copyright © 2017 D.W. Patterson

  All rights reserved

  2nd Edition

  7th Printing - December, 2020

  Cover - Copyright © Future Chron Publishing

  Cover Image – ID 116900694 © Tom Cerny | Dreamstime

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission, except in the case of brief quotations for the purpose of review. For information please contact –

  futurechronpub(at)gmail(dot)com

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and events are products of the author’s imagination and should not be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events and people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  The Cloud (Future Chron Series, #10)

  FOREWORD

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  AFTERWORD

  Next In The Future Chron Universe:

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Sign up for D.W. Patterson's Mailing List

  THE CLOUD

  Cover Image – ID 116900694 © Tom Cerny | Dreamstime

  FOREWORD

  The dates found at the beginning of most chapters do not run sequentially because of the finite speed of light and the vast spatial extent of the Star-Way. The story though hopping from one distant location to another is told in a logical, event-driven order. It is hoped that the non-sequential dating does not cause confusion for the reader.

  Note that if a chapter does not have a date heading that chapter's action occurs at the same time as the previous chapter.

  Also note that the dates are given as SE which stands for Space Era. This dating systems equates to the usual system (either AD or CE) in this story as 358 SE is the same as 2328 AD (or CE). So 358.1 SE is the first month of the year 358 or January, 2328 AD (or CE). 358.12 SE would be the twelfth month of the year 358 or December, 2328 AD (or CE).

  1

  358.1 SE

  A powerful laser beam generated near the sun was focused on a relay station's lens seventy AU distant in the Kuiper Belt. At that relay station, the beam was again focused and sent a further seventy AU to the next relay station which refocused the beam and sent it to the next relay station, this was repeated almost fourteen-hundred times now.

  Caught in that beam huge gossamer-like light-sails along with their payloads would one day be driven to accelerations of one Earth gravity. Eventually, each successive relay station would refocus the beam until other powerful lasers in the Centauri system would decelerate the sail ships the same way. Time of transit would be some two-thousand two-hundred days (five-point eight years, Earth time).

  It was the biggest construction job ever undertaken by the Solar Federation, a loose alliance of the outer planets of the Solar System. A corporation set up by the Federation and based on Earth was directly responsible for building it. The construction of the Star-Way had been underway now for almost a century. And in that time the project had brought life to the outer edges of the Oort Cloud.

  Excess heat from the minuscule amount of light absorbed by the relay station lenses had to be disposed of in some way. Most of this heat was shunted away to a power plant built close by. Although the absorbed heat was only about one part in a million the resulting power generated was large because of the huge power output of the lasers, the power output was in the gigawatt range. The resultant electricity was enough for a city habitat of up to two-hundred fifty-thousand people and their industrial support base.

  But not all relay stations were accompanied by human settlements, most were autonomously run by Ems.

  Ems, emulated human brains running on a computer, were an early form of Artificial Intelligence. The human brain imprinted as an Em could be copied any number of times, a process that was called budding. Budded Ems and the original imprint made up a family. Families sought jobs to pay for the hardware and power they needed. And to bud more Ems.

  So far only one out of every five nodes was accompanied by settlements built by the Corporation. A distance of thirty-two billion miles, about the distance between Jupiter and the Sun, between settlements, meant that they were truly isolated. Even a third-generation fusion ship took over twenty days to travel from one settlement to another. And while still small the total population of the Star-Way amounted to almost four-hundred thousand people.

  Besides the officially sanctioned settlements, around some of the other nodes, independent settlers had gathered in small space habitats. Founded by religious, political, trans-humanist or otherwise marginalized groups they braved one of the remotest corners of space for freedom. These groups ranged in size from a few hundred to a few thousand. The Star-Way Corporation didn't approve of such settlements but didn't have the resources to patrol every node and evict illegal squatters. The Ems of those nodes were allowed to cooperate with the squatters as long as they caused no operational problems.

  Mia Jackson was several kilometers from Beam Relay Station (BRS) Fourteen-Hundred. The big lenses were almost like mirrors at certain angles, six hundred meters across, thin and wispy, they glinted in what light there was this far out. At ninety-eight-thousand AU (over nine trillion miles) from the Sun, there was only starlight and the artificial lights of the work complex. These are what Mia saw reflecting off the lenses occasionally, almost as if they were waving in the breeze but of course there was no breeze.

  Mia was waiting for first light, when the laser light from the last relay station would be refocused to this relay station. Then tests of the focusing capability of this station would be conducted. If everything turned out optimal the crew would start packing for the next build seventy AU further out.

  One-third of the way to the Centauri system, thought Mia. At the pace we're going and maybe with a little speed up, it could be less than a hundred years. I might be around to see it.

  Right now there were only two beams on their way to BRS fourteen-hundred. Beams were always used in pairs and on opposing lenses to prevent a turning force on the framework that held the lens. Eventually, for redundancy three beams each way would be used for a total of six. The beam from the Sun had been refocused by multiple lenses into multiple beams until the thirteen-hundred and ninety-eight relay station, just over nineteen hours ago, had refocused the beams toward the thirteen-hundred ninety-ninth relay station which would refocus the beams again and send them on to number fourteen-hundred where they would arrive in nine and a half hours.

  Which was now, the beams of light hit the lenses. The powerful beam which had been generated from a stationary platform near old Sol was a deep violet, as the wavelength of the beam was close to the ultraviolet. Beyond the relay station, Mia could see small particles dancing in the beams. Some were being accelerated out of the beam's path while others were disappearing as they were vaporized by a portion of the thousand-trillion watts generated by the lasers. This was another advantage of the Star-Way, the sweeping and vaporizing of particles cleared the path for the light sails.

  The refocused beams looked good and Mia smiled as she had over a hundred times before at each startup.

  Then one of the beams "blinked".

  2

  Chris Martin had followed his family out into the relative emptiness of the Star-Way. The Martins, the Romeros, the Vegas and sixty other families had banded together to make the journey from Star-Way Corporation's Rutland settlement to the last unsettled node. Combining resour
ces, they had contracted a heavy-lift fusion ship, essentially a space tug, to move their space hab and old second-generation fusion ship. After three and one-half years they were nearly at the end of their journey, BRS fourteen-hundred. They would be in on the ground floor of the development that would follow the establishment of the relay station.

  Chris had been twenty-six when they began, he was now over twenty-nine years old. Chris was responsible for the computer systems on-board the habitat and fusion ship. Making sure nothing happened to the hardware hosting the family of Ems that kept the rotating habitat in trim and drove the fusion ship when it was in use. It was an important responsibility and Chris took it seriously.

  The Martin's habitat, which they and the other settlers named New Start, was a wheel-cylinder-wheel arrangement. The wheels at each end were fourteen-hundred feet in diameter and seventy feet wide. The resulting floor area was over two-million square feet. Spinning at just under two revolutions a minute provided a centrifugal force and resulting artificial gravity of nine-tenths that of Earth. Protection from radiation was provided by several feet of a moist gel substance engineered by the Ems and placed along the walls of the outer hull.

  The central cylinder between the two wheels was some two-hundred-fifty feet in diameter and two-hundred feet in length. It didn't have the same astounding view that the large open ones at Corporation settlements had but it did have an internal scaffolding that held plants and grew them using aeroponics, a method of growing plants that exposed their roots to the air and misted them in water and nutrients. This form of gardening was one-hundred thirty times more efficient than open sky farming back on Earth.

  The cylinder provided a mere six million square feet, half for growing, half for storage. It also spun at two revolutions per second but because of the smaller diameter only provided an artificial gravity equivalent to that of Earth's moon. The cylinder's outer walls were lined with the same gel-like material as the wheels to provide radiation protection.

  The wheels themselves were honeycombed with rooms. Private apartments, workrooms, storage areas and larger workout and assembly areas. Only in the middle at the rotational axis could one move between wheels and the cylinder. The habitat was very utilitarian, practical and relatively cheap. Still, it was three and a half years in a spinning tin can as Chris' sister Ana Sofia often said.

  Chris wondered if she truly realized that they might be spending the rest of their lives in that “spinning tin can”.

  “Chris,” said his dad, Frank Martin. “The Captain of the tug has informed me that he is ready to begin maneuvering to decelerate. He will be decoupling the docking harness and bringing the tug around to the opposite end for slowing the assembly. You need to get on board our fusion ship, undock and bring it around to re-dock where the tug is vacating.”

  “Okay dad, I'm on my way.”

  Chris didn't even take a co-pilot with him to the ship, Last Chance since it was a simple matter to undock, run down the length of the cylinder and re-dock. He should be finished and back inside the New Start before the slow, ponderous tug was even in position at the other end.

  Chris drifted down the center access way to the docking area which didn't rotate with the rest of the habitat. Boarding the ship Chris called on the ship's Em, Chance.

  “Chance,” said Chris. “Power up. Prepare to undock. I will take control of the ship and move it to the other end of the habitat.”

  “Yes Chris.”

  The spaceship was in motion before Chris sat down in the Captain's seat. Although the Em was perfectly capable of the maneuver, Chris took the controls and continued backing the ship away from the docking mechanism. Vectoring to the left and lifting the nose Chris soon had the ship drifting down the top side of the cylindrical habitat which he inspected as he went.

  Looking to his right Chris saw the space tug giving wide berth to the habitat as it maneuvered to the opposite end. As he watched, the tug lit up in a dazzling purple light that swept from stern to bow. As fast as it had appeared the light disappeared. Chris was blinded a moment.

  Closing his eyes a few seconds he looked again in the tug's direction. He could see escaping gas or smoke or fluids of some kind aft. The bow of the tug was dipping as it began to pivot downwards. The engines appeared dead, the tug adrift without attitude control.

  The pivot became worse, the tug looked like a head down whale adrift. Whatever was escaping from the rear section was accelerating the pivot. The spin became more complex as the material escaping was off center and created another spin axis around the spine of the ship. Fortunately, the motion was taking the tug away from the habitat.

  That's when Chris saw the escape pods. He began maneuvering the Last Chance towards the pods.

  “Chance, prepare to pick up escape pods.”

  “Roger.”

  Each pod had the universal docking collar with which all spaceships were outfitted. The pods were maneuverable and as Chris closed on the first he saw it maneuvering towards the docking mechanism of the Last Chance.

  Chris was busy for an hour picking up survivors from the tug which had continued its spin and continued drifting away from the habitat. So there was no immediate danger to the settlers.

  3

  352.4 SE

  Samuel S. Hampton had been CEO of the Star-Way Corporation for five years now. It was not an easy corporation to manage. Spread out across ninety-eight thousand AU, that is if the latest node had been established successfully which Samuel wouldn't know for some time. Communications with the farthest end of the Star-Way now took a year and a half. And if you wanted a response, that would take another year and a half.

  Samuel wondered, How do you manage something like that?

  Then he answered himself, you don't.

  Samuel had brought distributed management ideas to the Corporation when he was appointed CEO. Decision making became more local, almost all decisions important in running the Star-Way had devolved to the branch offices and field managers. At first, Corporate was unwilling to relinquish tight control over decisions. But eventually, they had to, as it took too long to make even the simplest decisions and distribute them across the Star-Way.

  For instance, how do you choose field managers? How do you interview someone a year and a half distant, by slow-motion conferencing?

  To keep the project going, decisions had to be made in at most days, not years. So now branch offices did much of the staffing and most of the operating decisions were made on-site.

  The branch offices were located at settlements. Each branch was responsible for two relay stations before the settlement and two after. A territory of two-hundred eighty AU patrolled by a third generation fusion ship that took over two weeks travel time, end to end.

  But if communications problems were daunting, actually sending or receiving any material from the frontier settlements along the Star-Way was an even more daunting task. Communications were almost instantaneous compared to the time required to physically ship freight or people to or from the settlements with fusion ships. And it would remain that way until the other end of the Star-Way in the Centauri system was operational and the returning beams provided a way to decelerate the sail ships.

  While each settlement saw to it that it was self-sufficient as far as water and foodstuffs were concerned there was still much material that was required to outfit and keep a settlement running that had to be acquired from the outside. And when the settlement needed something the time it took to get the item depended on how far away the shipper was from that settlement. In the worst case, say from Earth to the settlement being constructed at relay station fourteen-hundred, it could take over fifteen years for a shipment to be delivered by third generation fusion ship!

  This was unacceptable so settlements became warehouses or specialized manufacturing centers. It was unusual for a settlement to have to go much further than the four nearest settlements to purchase needed supplies. Goods could be shipped across those four settlements in as little as thr
ee months. And with four settlements behind and four settlements in front meeting almost any need was practically guaranteed. So settlements had established quite a trading economy among themselves.

  To coordinate this economy the Corporation took a small transaction fee for each trade. It also provided continuing management and representation on Earth where the settlements were registered.

  Samuel was pleased with all he had accomplished in the past five years. There was much to do to make the structure more efficient but he had made a good start. Without his reconsideration of the management structure he was sure the Corporation would be struggling to survive by now instead of running a surplus on the fees from the settlements.

  The only problems left seem manageable.

  His personal-assistant, an ANI (Artificial Narrow Intelligence) device, usually called an Annie, alarmed. There was a message from security. It seemed there was some kind of disturbance at relay station thirteen-hundred ninety-five and its settlement. The message had been sent from the previous settlement, it was over a year and a half old. More information would follow.

  Great. I don't even know what is happening out at the latest relay station build and now this at thirteen-nine-five. This is the kind of thing that keeps me up at night.

  4

  358.1 SE

  Mia was using her Annie to communicate from the company's fusion ship to her team around the relay site, inquiring as to what could have caused the beam phenomena she had observed.

  The most compelling explanation seemed to be that the beam had intercepted a comet or asteroid momentarily as it moved in and out of the beam's path. Comets and asteroids were still plentiful even this far out in the Oort Cloud. But no one could say for sure.

  Even with the best technology available it was impossible to detect across seventy AU all the debris that might lie in that direction. Most objects were just too small to be noticed. So it was more speculation than fact that Mia received as she queried her team as to what had caused the "blink".