Bob Shaw - The Ceres Solution

That proviso, as far as Hargate was concerned, was a bonus rather than a penalty. Foerster had carefully avoided promising too much, but it seemed there was a strong likelihood that residence in the 0.3G suite would increase Hargate’s life expectancy by at least a factor of three. The new prospect of an entire decade of life stretching out before him was a fantastic luxury, but it would have lost some of its savour had there been nothing to do other than take medical tests and in between times stare at blank walls. In weightless conditions, though, he would be almost as mobile as an able-bodied person, every bit as capable of earning a living, of paying his way. And he had a craving, more insistent than that of any drug addict, for the blessed knowledge that he was putting more into the system than he was taking out.

Independence, here I come! The thought ran through Hargate’s mind like a fugue, partially inuring him to the final indignities that Earth had to offer. He had wheeled out on to the concrete apron forty minutes earlier, part of a mixed payload of passengers and cargo that the orbital flier was due to carry aloft. The hump-backed craft, with canopies and hatches upraised like wing casings, resembled a huge red-and-white insect which had been captured by ants. It lay brooding on its booster platform, every detail highlighted by the intense Florida sun, sweating oil and water and other fluids Hargate was unable to identify.

The men carrying out the loading operation were KSC ground crew, not airline staff, and Hargate sensed they had divided the payload into three categories, with a descending order of priority—equipment packages, people who could walk, and people who could not walk. As the sole representative of the third cateory, he had sat morosely, his lungs labouring with the hot and humid air of the Cape, while the equipment had been loaded and secured, while seats had been custom fitted in the remaining floor areas, and while the walking passengers had been shepherded up the long ramp and installed in their places.

Sensitive to the curious scrutinies of nearby workers, Hargate kept his eyes on the flat, steamy horizons of the Florida water-world and tried to think thoughts appropriate to his last minutes on Earth. The task proved to be beyond his capabilities. He was too hot and too tired, and—above all—he now had to acknowledge that he was deeply afraid of the journey that lay ahead. It had been easy to be nonchalant in Foerster’s office and during the subsequent three weeks of preparation for the flight, but now the future and the present had somehow drawn together, and the reality of his situation was daunting, overwhelming. He, who had never flown in a plane, who could not even walk, was proposing to venture into the black, alien and hostile infinity which waited beyond the atmosphere. The notion was preposterous, something he had been tricked into, and nobody could really blame him if—even at this late stage—he were to let his commonsense reassert itself.

“Sorry about the delay, Mr Hargate.” The young supervisor who approached him was carrying a clipboard and had symmetrical sweat patches on his blue shirt, like the markings of a badger. “I expect you’re pretty tired waiting.”

“It’s all right,” Hargate said, choosing a degree of sarcasm he knew would go unnoticed. “I’ve been taking things easy.”

“That’s just great.” The supervisor frowned as he inspected Hargate’s wheelchair. “What sort of batteries do you have in there?”

“I don’t know. Battery-type batteries.”

“Did anybody fit you out with zero-G units, Mr Hargate? We don’t want blobs of electrolyte floating around the cabin when you’re in free fall.”

Hargate shook his head. “These are my regulars.”

The supervisor’s lips moved silently as he jotted something down on his board. “They’ve gotta come out. I’ll notify Aristotle and they’ll have a new set ready when you get up there. Okay?”

Hargate, who had been praying that he would be allowed to drive his chair up the ramp, digested the knowledge that he would have to be carried on to the flier like a babe-in-arms. For an instant he was tempted to engage the chair’s drive and flee in search of a hiding place, then it came to him that he would be doing the opposite of escaping. As long as he remained on Earth, within the grip of his home planet’s gravity, other people would have to carry him—physically sometimes, metaphorically every minute of every day—until the end of his life.

“It won’t take long to strip the batteries out,” the supervisor went on. “In the meantime, we’ll get you into the ship, Mr Hargate. One of the men will carry you—if you don’t mind.”

“So be it,” Hargate said ungraciously. “But just make sure the guy who carries me is straight—I don’t want anybody having a free grope.”

Finally, it was time for the transfer to Earth.

High Instructor Tabalth walked with Gretana to the circular courtyard at the heart of the building which had been her home for almost fifty days. The noontime heat had collected there like an invisible fluid in a dish, imparting a drowsiness to the atmosphere, causing the blue patterns of the central mosaic to ripple slightly as though under a film of water. All sounds were strangely muted. Gretana could feel the multiplicity of major skord-lines converging at the spot, interfering with the normal properties of space and time.

“As you know,” Tabalth said, his eyes fixed on her face with an unfocused quality which suggested he was not really seeing her, “we make the transfer to Earth in two stages. The first will take you to the Bureau’s Field Station 23, which is the control point for our Earth programme.

“As is usual where the subject race has shown an interest in space exploration, the station is not located in the home system. It’s only twenty light years away, however, on a planet of the G-type sun catalogued on Earth as 82 Eridani. We like 82 Eridani because it is part of a web of stable skord-lines giving us eight major nodes on Earth’s principal land masses.”

Gretana delved into her newly-implanted memories and nodded confirmation that Tabalth’s subject matter was familiar to her.

“I hope this is an auspicious day for you,” Tabalth said, sounding polite rather than sincere.

Gretana nodded. “I have the fifth planet.”

Tabalth held still for a second, attuning himself, then glanced towards the east to where the fifth planet, Nuce, was invisibly lifting above the horizon. “You are fortunate.”

“I know.” Gretana spoke without much conviction, wondering how she would be able to regulate her daily life once she had left the comforting matrix of planetary influences which permeated the home system. “The time is right.”

“In that case—fair seasons!” Tabalth stepped back, taking himself outside the perimeter of the radial mosaic design, and by implication urging Gretana to proceed to its centre.

“Fair seasons!” Not allowing herself to hesitate, she walked to the mid-point of the courtyard, already assembling Station 23’s spatial address on an imagined screen. The key equation was more complex than those she had used all her adult life, but she held it easily enough. She raised her right hand and traced the appropriate three-dimensional mnemo-curve, specifying the target’s unique relationship with her present location. Once again she felt the subtle and ineffable loosening that always preceded an internodal leap. She closed her eyes in the final transcendental instant of concentration and the bulk of the planet beneath her feet seemed to stir, just once, like some vast slumbering animal disturbed by a dream.

Gretana opened her eyes to a night-time world in which faint stars scarcely penetrated barriers of radiance thrown up by encirclements of floodlights and brilliantly illuminated buildings.