David Brin - Glory Season

Had the first officer mentioned it having to do with the rads? Did Thalla and the other prisoners break out? The possibility gladdened Maia, but in a dry and hopeless way, for anything that made the pirates upstairs more desperate only provoked more dire threat down here.

Maia suppressed her worries as she let the navigator help her toward glimpses of starlight. For a moment, it made a fine illusion. As if the screen were just a great big opening in the wall, she wished. Leading straight into a winter night.

On arriving at the doorway, she and her companion cried out at the same time, in joyful recognition. Before them, splayed across a twinkling firmament like a great blot, lay the multitendriled nebulosity known as the Claw. It grew smaller, incrementally, until familiar patterns of stars crowded in along each side.

“Took you long enough!” Leie chided as they approached. “Look, I just can’t get it any closer than this.”

Maia glanced at the tiny window and saw that the display was greatly changed. The numbers to the right of each letter “E” were much closer to zero.

A≤Q☼ –94E–1 13E+0 –69E+1

“It is a coordinate system!” the navigator cried. “And it’s got to be centered on Stratos. Can’t you get them any smaller?”

Leie snapped, “If you’re so smart, you try it!”

“Good idea, Leie.” Maia nodded. “He’s worked with tools like this all his life. Go ahead,” she told the young man, who frowned uncertainly as he took over Leie’s position. Maia’s sister stretched, trying to stand up straight. “Careful, vril,” she said. “It’s touchy as a—”

She yelped as the scene shifted abruptly. The simulated image of the dark nebula swarmed forward, engulfed the scene in blackness, and then swept aside in a blur that made both twins briefly dizzy. The numbers on the display increased. Leie laughed derisively, as the young man grimaced. “It’s a little balky,” he commented. Then he bent closer, concentrating. “I always find I can prevent the wheels jerkin’ if I twist a little while I turn. Cuts down on the backlash.”

Numbers stopped growing and reversed. The constellations, which had started to warp from altered perspective, gradually resumed forms Maia knew. The Claw nebula passed again, taking up its familiar position.

Then, from the left, an object entered the view so huge and radiant the whole room lit up. “It’s our sun!” the navigator called. A moment later, he gasped as another, smaller entity merged from the right. Its sharp, biting hue of blue-tinged white stabbed Maia’s eyes, triggering a tingle that flowed straight down her spine. The effect was doubtless minor next to what it did to the young lieutenant. He staggered, shading his eyes with one hand, and softly moaned. “Wengel Star!”

The light spread past them, through the open door and into the hall. There was no uproar, so perhaps no one consciously noticed. Still, Maia wondered if remnant traces of wintry male indecision washed away under that shine, to be replaced by a hormonal certitude of summer. Conceivably, the stream would energize the men for what was to come.

Maia watched the sextant’s diminutive display whirl rapidly as the navigator moved back and forth among the three controls.

A≤Q☼ –42E–0 17E –0 –12E–0

“We’re gettin’ close to the limit of what I can manage,” he grunted, concentrating on the glowing digits. Suddenly, the sextant emitted an unexpected sound, an audible click. The tiny numbers froze in place and the window winked.

A≤Q☼ 10E–0 10E–0 –10E–0

The midget number display went blank for an instant. When it lit again, the old symbols were replaced by a new set…

P(R☼ –1103.095 SIDEREAL.

“What does it mean—?” Leie began, only to be cut off as the navigator shouted. “Hey! Something’s changed in the controls, too!”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean the response is different. I touch ’em, and the stars barely budge now. Watch.” He pushed one of the knurled wheels, and the constellations moved, but only slightly. A minute earlier, such a turn would have sent them reeling across the galaxy. Maia looked down at the sextant screen, and saw that the new reading was utterly unchanged. Realization came in a flash.

“I get it!” she cried. “It’s a test!”

“A what?”

Maia spread her arms. “A test. You have to pass each phase to get to the next. First we had to figure out how to turn the machine on. Then how to find a model universe inside the huge Life game. Next step was to find our own solar system. Now we must figure out how to maneuver within the system.” She didn’t add that these were all skills currently rare on Stratos. At any point they might run into a barrier beyond their meager abilities.

The navigator was breathing hard, despite the hand he kept upraised to block the cutting light of Wengel Star. “Well … in that case,” he said. “The next stage oughta be easy. We both know these stars. It’s Farsun time right now. Midwinter. So Wengel’s on the opposite side of the sun from where we want to be.” He started to bend over the sextant again.

“Let me,” Maia said, realizing the light had him distracted. He stepped back to give her access to the controls. Maia took her little astronomical tool in hand and made a few tentative turns. The sun’s tiny blue-white companion slipped aside, vanishing over the screen boundary. The young man breathed a ragged sigh, half regretful, half relieved.

They commenced a steep dive straight toward the larger, familiar fireball, which loomed outward in a rush, its reddish surface growing in both apparent size and mottled minutia with each passing second. A thrill coursed Maia’s body as a sense of swooping motion overcame her.

Imagined heat flushed her cheek as the sun blazed by to the right, seemingly close enough to reach out and touch. Leie gasped.

In an instant it was gone, vanished “behind” them. At nearest passage, Maia had noticed that the level of detail seemed washed out, as if the simulation was never meant to represent every flicker in the star’s chromosphere. That fit with her best guess, that the universe within the wall computer wasn’t a perfect copy of reality.

Close enough, though. As if suddenly unleashed, constellations burst forth across the simulated heavens. Hello, friends, Maia greeted them. While seeking the known patterns of winter, she kept watch for the blue glitter of a planet, her homeworld. Soon all star positions were proper. She slowed, circled, and performed a spiral sweep. But however she hunted, no blue marble swam into view. “I don’t get it. Stratos should be somewhere about here.”

They stared together at the empty patch of sky. Maia dimly heard a messenger come and mutter to Leie that the tense status quo was holding in the hallway, but signs of bustling activity at the far end were making the men nervous and worried. Clearly, something was going to happen, soon.

Meanwhile Maia struggled with frustration and pride. Once upon a time, at least some folk on her world had felt comfortable enough with spaceflight to simulate it, use it in games and tests. Probably, now and then, they even ventured out—at least in order to remain able. It meant that Lysos never insisted that her heirs stay forever grounded. That must have been a later innovation.

The navigator, too, seemed puzzled, thwarted. Then, suddenly, he pointed. “There! A planet!” He frowned. “But that’s not Stratos. It’s Demeter.”

Maia saw he was correct. The gas giant was a familiar sight, dominant member of the planetary system. “It’s Demeter, all right. Sitting smack dab in the middle of the Fishtail. Oh, Lysos,” she groaned.