Cycle of Stars Read online

  Not far from the entrance he ran across a peculiar looking boulder. It was about three feet in diameter and appeared to be slightly ovoid in shape with a top indentation that was filled with mine dust. He ran his hand across the side of the boulder and was surprised to find that beneath the accumulated dust and debris was a surface smooth to the touch. Not like a rocky surface at all. He was just about to call out to the Lieutenant when he heard the shouting outside the cave and the detonation of munitions.

  Running to the front of the cave he viewed the chaos outside but before he could react he felt a punch to his chest and the air forced from him. He was thrown twenty feet back into the cave and landed unconscious.

  By the time Jomo awoke from his coma, the little skirmish had been over for a month. The Union had retreated when met with force and a quiet but tense peace had ensued. Jomo learned from his wife that his men had rescued him from the cave and fought their way out of the kill zone. They continued to struggle through increasingly high mountains and jungle until they made it to Union territory. They were the only five that came back and they were placed under strictest secrecy because the Union government didn't want the country to know about the extent of the expedition and its losses.

  Tulu and Bikila visited Jomo at the hospital. They gave him the real story of the incident and that even though they had tried they had been unable to find anyone from the battalion except themselves and the two others from the squad that had made it out with them. Released from the hospital, Jomo knew that he would never again fight for the Union government.

  Over the next several weeks Jomo thought of nothing but all the lost lives and how many of those men and women he had known personally. And how they had all died for nothing. All lost for no reason.

  It was then that Jomo remembered the large smooth rock he had encountered in the cave. He wondered. Could it have been something important? Could it have been a large container of some kind of processed rare-earths? The reason they had gone there in the first place. If he could get that object maybe all those men and women would not have died in vain.

  He resisted his conclusions for several days but the sense of loss was too great. Eventually, he knew he had to do something.

  He got together with the other survivors and they talked it over. Tulu was in for anything Jomo wanted. Bikila felt like Jomo, something should be done to remember the dead. The other two men weren't interested in putting their lives in danger again so they wished the three the best of luck as they left.

  “Okay it's settled then,” said Jomo. “We go in and get that object, whatever it is out. When we get back with it we will dedicate it to those that didn't come back with us. That should give them some of the recognition they deserve.”

  Tulu and Bikila shook their heads in the affirmative.

  9

  The crew of the freightliner Star Hopper hadn't been as lucky as many other ships that had dropped out of the wormhole dimension when their drives failed. The crew of the Star Hopper had found themselves light-years from the nearest known star system.

  Once recovered from the initial shock Captain Deak Parsons had worked hard to keep the crew's spirits up. He had made sure that the crew followed a routine and kept up with the maintenance. Their downtime was kept to a minimum except once a week when the Captain held a social at which he would answer questions.

  “Captain I have a question.” said one of the crew. “It's my understanding that we are continuing on our original course. Is that right? And why?”

  “Well, my thinking Mr. Mann is that if someone figures out what has happened with the drive and develops a workaround we'll be near our last known contact point and be heading in the direction of our last known destination. It should make it easier to find us if someone comes searching.”

  “Do you really think that's possible Captain?” asked another. “ I mean someone figuring out what happened to the drive?”

  “I have no doubt it is possible Ms. Jacobson. It's just a question of when and I want to be easy to find when they do figure it out.”

  “Captain I have a question?”

  “Yes Dr. Means?”

  “With the food growing deck, we are able to resupply almost indefinitely our food requirements. Our recycling facilities are almost perfect, so water and air should not be a concern. But I have a limited supply of anti-rads, I would say no more than three months are left. After that our high level of exposure to radiation will lead to increased cancer risks. Is there anything we can do about this?”

  Means should have known better than to bring this up in an open forum.

  “I would say that perhaps you can look into ways to extend the supply without increasing our risk greatly. If you can stretch it a couple of months I think we should be safe by then. Okay, that will be it for tonight everyone.”

  After the meeting, the Captain was speaking with his First Officer.

  “Look Joe,” said the Captain. “I didn't expect Dr. Means to be so indiscreet. The officers and others in positions of authority have to set the example. And the example should not be one of despair or hopelessness. I want you to reiterate this to all the officers and especially those like Dr. Means who engender respect among the crew.”

  As weeks stretched into months little deprivations became sources of aggravation to the crew. Even though they could grow and replenish basic food some things were in limited supply. When the coffee ran out the crew's collective resolve seemed to break. There were more arguments and even physical altercations breaking out. The Captain knew he needed to get a handle on the situation.

  “Dixon,” said the Captain to his First Officer, Joe Dixon. “Let's go to the cargo hold and see what we have.”

  “Captain, we would be breaking our agreements with the customers.”

  “Dixon we ain't got any customers and we soon aren't going to have any ship if we don't come up with something to mollify this crew.”

  They suited up in minimal support suits since the journey to the cargo pods was down the enclosed spine of the ship which had radiation protection. They left the crew wheel and worked their way to the first cargo hold attached alongside the ship. Each hold had a number of shipping containers inside that were marked by customer and destination. The Captain knew the weight, the keep requirements and the destination of the contents but what was inside was known only to the buyer and seller. That is until the Captain entered the first cargo hold and opened the front of one of the containers.

  “Let's see what's in this one,” he said.

  At first it wasn't obvious what they were looking at but eventually they saw that the container was full of square crates. They would have to pull one out and open it. Even in zero gravity the mass in the crate, because of the inertia it presented to the two men, must have been a couple hundred pounds. Finally, they had it wrestled out of the container and tied down to the floor.

  “Dixon look for something to open this crate.”

  Dixon rummaged around in the lockers on the wall and found a long iron with a flat end.

  “Looks like we could use this Captain.”

  The Captain took the tool from Dixon and planting his feet into the hold straps on the floor proceeded to pry the top off the crate. Under the top was a thick layer of anti-radiation gel packaging.

  “That's strange,” said the Captain. “They're using the same gel that the habitats use to block radiation except they are using it as a packaging material.”

  He removed all the packaging from the top and the sides of the object and attempted to lift it. It was stuck.

  “Give me a hand Joe.”

  Dixon moved to the other side of the crate and found some floor straps to get a foothold before proceeding to pull on that side of the object.

  Suddenly the object popped out of the crate heading for the ceiling. The two men tried to push away from the crate. The Captain looked up and was almost blinded by light as the object hit the ceiling and a pulse-like an electromagnetic discharge resulted. In t
he thin atmosphere of the cargo container, the light spread out from the object in a kind of halo effect.

  “What in hell was that?” shouted Dixon.

  “I don't know but let's get back to the crew wheel. I want the Doc to check us. That seemed like a radiation burst to me.”

  Neither man saw the wood turned globe settle back down into the crate after rebounding from the ceiling.

  “You both seem okay to me,” said Dr. Means.

  “No radiation?” asked Captain Parsons.

  “No none. Other than the whole body scan I just gave you.”

  “Well that makes it even more of a mystery.”

  “I'm a doctor Deak, not a physicist.”

  “I know thanks Doc.”

  A call came across the Captain's Emmie.

  “Captain this is Rodriguez. I think you should come see this.”

  “Okay Rodriguez I'll be right there.”

  “I wonder what's up,” said Dixon.

  “I don't know I haven't heard anything from drive operations since their last report confirming the drive was still dead. And it's not time for their next report.”

  10

  Ally had come through with the telemetry data and much more. Her uncle Frank had taken Dag in and had proven to be more than a hospitable host. Frank had made him feel welcome and safe and showed an interest in his research even though he didn't have the background to always understand.

  Relieved, Dag was able to continue his research. Ally's uncle assured him that he was not imposing upon his generosity, indeed he considered Dag to be something of a refugee since he was forced to stay in the Dnoces System against his will.

  Frank had made dinner one evening for Ally with Dag sitting in. As they sat down Ally asked Dag how his research was going.

  “Well today I was able to finish some preliminary computation and while I still think that an error in calculation caused the test's failure I've realized that there is not much room for error. The energy delivered to the target area has to be exact so as not to cause a failure in the underlying spin foam.

  “As you know Miss according to quantum gravity the geometry of spacetime at the most fundamental level is a spin network made up of interlinking loops of gravitational force. The area of these loops and the node volume where they interlink are both quantized. This quantization affects the way a region of spacetime absorbs energy. It absorbs energy in discrete steps instead of continuously. This puts a great deal of pressure on the source of energy to supply the correct amount because one or two energy steps too much at the micro-level might lead to disaster at the macro-level. This energy sensitivity of spacetime is such that I think it's going to be almost impossible to deliver the right amount of energy without pushing the region over the edge into a breakdown of spacetime or a collapse into a black hole.”

  “So its a question of having fine control over the process?” asked Frank.

  “Yes sir. I just don't know if we can build such a system.”

  “Don't worry about the engineering Dag. Just get me the specifications I'll need to build it,” said Ally.

  “You sure Miss?”

  “Yeah, as I said it's an engineering problem.”

  “You always come through Miss. I'll get them to you as soon as possible.”

  It was a couple of days before Dag got the information Ally needed.

  Once she had the specifications Ally began designing the electronics that would control the amount of energy pumped by the drive into an area. She knew the key to its safe use was getting the necessary feedback from the area being targeted.

  Then Ally got the idea of using miniature Casimir devices* which the ship would deploy almost as confetti in the target area. These would relay the state of the vacuum back to the ship. As the target area energized it would become more and more active with virtual particles. The Casimir devices were sensitive to measuring that kind of activity. They had been used ever since the wormhole drive was developed to monitor such effects.

  A few weeks and Ally was ready to test but they would need major support to retrofit a jump-ship and run the test. It was uncle Frank that suggested they approach the local offices of Jump-Ships Corporation.

  “I see,” said Hikam Assefa manager of the local subsidiary of Jump-Ships. “Well we do have one ship here. It would be worth it if we could contact corporate again. As you might expect we have been out of contact with them since the failure of the drive. But I'll have to consult with the captain of the ship before I commit to such a test. I mean the results of the last test weren't particularly promising.”

  Assefa noticed the look on Ally's face.

  “Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. Well then let me get back to you.”

  It was a few days later when Dag heard from Jump-Ships. The captain of the fusion ship wanted to meet and discuss the test.

  Ally and Dag met Gebre Tessa the ship's captain.

  “Can either of you tell me what went wrong with the last test?” asked the Captain.

  “Sir,” said Dag. “We believe that an error in calculation led to the drive putting more energy than necessary into that region of space and then when they attempted to open a wormhole mouth, which put in even more energy, a miniature black hole occurred which when it exploded completely obliterated the ship.”

  “Okay. And why would this new test be any different?”

  “Because sir, Ally has created a feedback system that monitors the target region and will let us know its condition. I expect that a repetition of the failure mode of the last test would be highly unlikely.”

  “But possible?”

  “Yes sir that failure or some new failure mode is not without question. I can't give you a complete guarantee.”

  The Captain seemed to think a minute.

  “Well, I can guarantee you one thing Dr. Mach. If we don't do something the future will be darker than the past.”

  Dag reached to shake the Captain's proffered hand.

  Retrofitting the ship was all about changing out electronic units and upgrading the isotopic energy reservoir. Ally and a couple of the ship's engineers had the changes installed and functionally tested in a week. Plans were made for a test cruise.

  “I think with your experience as a fusion engineer Dr. Mekur and with Dr. Mach handling the drive all we will need for a test run is a navigator who can also handle the helm. Now I know you can't maintain the engines during the boost phase Dr. Mekur by yourself. So Dr. Mach and I will have to share watch with you.”

  “Sounds good to me Captain,” said Ally.

  Dag agreed.

  “Good we'll plan on leaving tomorrow.”

  The next day the Jump-Ship Two left the port of Kabania and Ally soon had the fusion engines providing maximum acceleration to the target area. Four fourteen days the engines were kept at full throttle either accelerating the ship or decelerating the ship. It was a full-time job for the four and arrival at the target area seemed like something of a success.

  Once decelerated the crew wheel was spun up and the Captain called a meeting.

  “I suggest we take the rest of the day off and start the test tomorrow. I will radio the office and let them know the plan. So everyone relax and get some rest.”

  Before Dag shut down for the night he was thinking.

  Well if it does fail as dramatically as the last time I guess I won't have any worries. But what if it just fails and we have to go back? What will I do then? I'm pretty sure my career as a physicist would be over. Two such high profile failures don't make for a good resume.

  It was highly unusual for him not to be able to suspend but he finally cleared his thoughts and shutdown.

  Dag saw Ally in the ship's coffee shop the next morning.

  “How are you?” asked Ally.

  “Fine Miss.”

  “You up for the test today?” asked the Captain.

  “Yes sir I wouldn't want to wait another day to find out.”

  “Alright, I'm going to contro
l to get things started. You all join us when you're ready.”

  The Captain and navigator left the room.

  “You sure you're okay Dag?”

  “Yes Miss, whether it works or not I will find a way to take care of myself I've done it before.”

  “You mean you're physics career is at risk?”

  “If it's not a success Miss I will never work again as a physicist.”

  “You think so?”

  “I know so. For one thing, there is no other university in the Dnoces System to apply for a position. And if the test doesn't work where else can I go?”

  “I hadn't thought about it that way.”

  Ally was quiet a moment as she finished her coffee.

  “Well let's get this over with,” she said.

  Now that the fusion engines were offline Ally was observing the feedback from the Casimir confetti. The ship had deposited hundreds of the sensors and then slowly backed away from the area.

  “Beginning pre-heat,” said Dag.

  “Understood,” said the Captain.

  If Ally's electronics worked properly the wormhole drive would dump just enough energy into the target area to raise the production of wormhole mouths so that it could then latch on to one and pump enough exotic energy into the mouth to enlarge it to macro size.

  “Okay that's it for preheat,” said Dag. “Starting the drive.”

  The view out the front of the ship seemed to shimmer. A point of light, not too bright, emerged and grew directly ahead. To the crew of the Jump-Ship Two, the wormhole mouth looked more like a bubble in space. Around the bubble seemed to spin the stars as streaks, eventually the innermost streaks formed a halo. Further out from the mouth the streaks formed shortened arcs until far away they became dots again. This was the gravitational lensing effect long known to astronomers.