Vernor Vinge - Tatja Grimm's World

A perfectly ordinary doorway was set between two of the windows. It swung open and a heavily clothed figure stepped inside. Though Doomsday born, the fellow swayed drunkenly, gasping for breath. He shut the door and sagged against the wall. Exterior maintenance must have been a killing job.

Inside the dome, a slow fan shuffled at the air. Dead air must be exhausted, and the “perfume of life” be kept properly concentrated. Thus the interior was not partitioned into rooms; the entire dome was visible at a glance. Here there was none of the ornament they had seen at O’rmouth, where there were laymen to be impressed. The floor was divided into sectors. Several were empty, reserved for the newly arrived equipment. Others were piled high with supplies, oxygen tanks, and astronomical equipment.

At the center stood the reason for it all: the High Eye itself. The telescope was the largest in the world; even if it hadn't been set at the top of the world, it would have inspired awe. The sixty-inch mirror was hidden in a plastic and ceramic webbing that extended fifty feet into the air to support the secondary mirror, which was huge in its own right. The secondary sent incoming light back slantwise to picture-making machines next to the main mirror. The entire structure could be turned to follow any point in the sky. Doo’d’en claimed that twenty-five thousand ounces of iron had gone into the steel for the bearings that supported it. No religious ornamentation was necessary to make it seem marvelous.

For a few moments Svir was absorbed by things he’d dreamed of all his life, but thought he’d never see.

Tatja’s voice came sharp, tense. “Move into the room slowly. Set down your equipment and line up against the wall.” She was facing into the tunnel, her crossbow aimed at the entrance. Jolle was inspecting the astronomers, in particular the fellow who had just come through the outside door.

From the tunnel came a puzzled question. It was Haarm Wechsler. “You refer to the Doomsday porters, of course.”

Tatja replied, “I mean everyone. There is a saboteur in the party and we intended to find him.” Jolle turned to face the tunnel; where he was standing, he could cover both the Doomsday astronomers and the visitors. Svir raised his bow and flicked off the safety. There was one in particular…

Crown’s Men and Celestial Servants stumbled into the light; many were too tired to care what was happening. They came through too fast. Tatja told them to come through in single file, but it was impossible to obey. Most of the carts were drawn by two or three men, and people inevitably walked in clusters behind the aerators. The carts were parked in a ragged formation. Then the visitors stood against the wall, in a single rank. The astronomers remained at the center of the room, their self-righteous anger changing to puzzlement. Why were lowlanders and Servants treated alike? Everyone was beginning to realize there was more here than a fickle queen’s whimsy.

Now every face was visible. Nowhere did Svir see that friendly, wrinkled one from the tunnel. Tatja glanced at Jolle. The alien shook his head slightly.

“I don’t think so,” he said quietly. Then, sharply, to the astronomers, “Where does that staircase lead?” He gestured with his bow. Stairs? Svir realized that what he had mistaken for an unevenness in the floor was something more. And the hole had been lost from view when the main party came into the dome. “Living quarters, may it please Your Most Illustrious Lordship.” Jolle ignored the sarcasm. “Is there any way from those quarters to the outside?”

“No. The only other entrance is by the Number Three Aerator.” Jolle stared at the speaker for several seconds. It seemed to Svir he was considering whether to chase into the basement for Profirio. That would decide things once and for all, but the other might be planning some special ambush. Since he was trapped, it might be best to leave him there.

Jolle glanced at Tatja, and she said opaquely, “No, that would be—wrong.” She turned back to the Crown’s Men and Celestial Servants. “It is my command that you remove yourselves below. Take two extra oxygen tanks.”

The Servants shuffled toward the dark stairway. Several of the crown’s generals stood their ground, and Minister Wechsler voiced their feelings. “Marget, you overstep yourself. The Crown’s subjects deserve your confidence. Your liaison with this fellow,” he waved at Jolle, “is—”

“Haarm, you’re in a bind you don’t understand. Get below or I’ll cut you to pieces.” She raised her crossbow.

The crown’s officers motioned their men toward the stairs. In three minutes they were all below. Tatja walked to the hole and shut the trap. She rolled one of the supply carts over the door. It might still be possible to open the trap from below, but it could not be done with stealth. She did the same at the other stairway, then walked slowly around the edge of the dome.

Jolle said, “We want you to do two things tonight, Svir. Be prepared to shoot any saboteur .” He accented the word so that Svir knew he meant one particular saboteur. “And help assemble the equipment.” He waved at the carts full of picture-making and analysis equipment.

The second job occupied Svir’s time for the next four hours. Even though Jolle and Tatja supervised, and even though the astronomers knew their equipment much better than he, there was plenty for him to do. The Doomsday picture-makers required large quantities of mixed reagents. The optical equipment was both bulky and delicate. At times the astronomers seemed to forget they were working under duress. Then Svir would notice eyes straying to the crossbow slung at his shoulder. These priests were revealing secrets they had sworn to guard forever. If they could think of a way to trick the queen’s gunmen below O’rmouth, they wouldn’t hesitate to kill him.

The sun set. Outside, the snow went from yellow to orange to red, and the red became deeper and deeper. Svir remembered seeing that red from many miles away, from far down by the Picchiu River… so many days ago, when there was still a reason, beyond revenge, for living. The thought almost drove him back into the world of what-might-have-been.

Then the stars came out. This side of the world had a sky much clearer and darker than anywhere beneath Seraph; except when in eclipse, the sister planet dimmed the fainter stars to invisibility. But here, thirty thousand feet above the sea and the mists, the stars were still brighter. They were so bright the snows glittered faintly beneath their brilliance. The wind turbine was shut down. Convection currents around the outside pipes would degrade the seeing. Besides—said the Doomsday archobserver—the building’s reservoirs now held enough hot water to support operations through the night. The Eye’s lid was pulled back, and aerators were opened full.

Jolle gave the astronomers an area one degree by twenty and specified a search pattern. He was looking for a new object of sixteenth magnitude. Jolle knew the orbital elements of his craft to several digits, but three quarters after having been marooned, he could know the position only approximately. Fortunately, the search area would be visible through most of the night. They would take dozens of pictures and compare them with the Doo’d’en archives brought from O’rmouth.

The Doomsdaymen moved surely about the dome, a tribute to their fanatic regard for their profession. Strange reddish light came from pillars scattered about the room. Another Doo’d’en secret. Svir reached up, touched one of the pillars. The glowing surface was flat, warm. The Doomsdaymen had something that glowed when differentially heated? That might explain their use of hot water.

Finally, the first picture plate was put in the optics beside the main mirror. The clockwork in the base of the instrument was wound, the Eye was aimed, and the exposure began. It would take half an hour for the plate to collect enough light to reveal objects of the sixteenth magnitude. Here was the prime advantage of the Doomsday technique over the greentint method used on the Tarulle Barge. Time exposures were nearly impossible with greentint.