The sun rose swiftly above the curved horizon into the hard black sky. Shuttle Gamma, engines off, coasted to meet it, and the light gleamed from the vast bulk of Pod 6, on whose back the shuttle was perched like a small fly on a large sausage. Engines fired again briefly and the shuttle shifted orbit slightly, bearing its enormous load closer to the target, which now reflected the sunlight as a glittering point. Very soon it grew into a body with dimensions and features.
‘There she is, ladies and gentlemen.’ Second Lieutenant Andreas dal’Nostra took his hands from the controls for a moment and centred the forward camera to project an image on to the screens of his five passengers. The image grew in size and clarity as the shuttle grew closer. Imagine an arrow, long and silver, with bulbous head and elaborate tail. To the slender shaft attach a number of thick torpedo-shaped pods, and this will resemble the image that was growing on the screens.
‘Your new home, friends – Diana, huntress of the stars. We’ll be moving into position soon’
The arrow was in fact nearly three kilometres long – the European States’ first interstellar exploration and colonisation ramship Diana. Four pods had already been attached, and the fifth was in the process of being secured. Pod 6, the last, was in the care of shuttle Gamma. Shuttle Beta released its hold on Pod 5 and moved away. Andreas began to manipulate his controls to manoeuvre the shuttle and pod combination parallel to the great mother ship. He felt strongly his youth and the degree of responsibility that had been placed on him, mainly because of his piloting skill.
His superior officer, Commander Alicia Melenna, was strapped into the seat beside him but had taken no active part in the shuttle’s operation since the launch by the Kilimanjaro Catapult. Andreas was glad of her silent display of confidence in him as he began the tricky series of adjustments which would bring the pod sliding gently into its proper place alongside the central shaft of the starship.
Positioning jets fired on the pod’s bulk as the subtle ballet of space rendezvous continued. Andreas merged his identity with the ship and the guidance computer became almost an extension of his own brain. He felt it was his own body drifting into position in the holding clamps which locked the pod firmly to the side of Diana. With final contact the pod became part of the starship and the shuttle disengaged from its back, its ferry job done. A touch on the control jets and the little ship glided forward along the length of the pod towards its docking position just below the bulge of the starship’s head, the crew and command module.
Over the intercom came the message: ‘Welcome to Diana. Please would all crew and passengers report to the main assembly hall when docking procedures have been completed.’
The difficulties began for the passengers when they unstrapped and floated weightless into the air. Helped and steered by crewmen, they were moved through the airlock into the main ship and along the corridors to the assembly hall.
Once the shuttle’s systems were closed down and all was secure, Andreas unstrapped and headed himself with economical movements along the colony ship’s corridors to the main hall. It was already full of floating bodies, most of whom were tumbling aimlessly. But as he entered, he felt a very slight pull and the mass of figures gradually moved towards the floor and began to arrange themselves into the seats there. The ship’s engine had been started at minimal thrust to provide a modicum of pseudo-gravity. Andreas’ weight increased to about one-tenth normal and he quickly found a seat. Next to him sat a young man, a colonist, who smiled in welcome.
‘Hello. I’m Carolus Samalto – you were flying our shuttle just now, weren’t you?’
‘That’s right – Second Lieutenant Andreas dal’Nostra. You must be one of the colony leaders of Pod 6, in that case’
Carolus gave a shrug. ‘It’s my father who’s got the political muscle, not me. That’s him over there – the one with the white hair and bushy moustache’
Andreas saw a big man with an air of authority sitting four seats away and talking in a low tone to another colony leader. He recognised the family resemblance to his new acquaintance, but before they could continue the conversation they were distracted by the captain’s arrival. He came on to a raised platform at one end of the room and sat down, flanked by his three commanders. Captain Cesar Nolton was a mild-looking man, short in stature but determined in his personality. As he began to speak, the colonists and crew crowding the hall fell silent to listen.
‘Ladies and gentlemen – fellow crewmen and colony leaders – Diana has now left her parking orbit and is moving out from Earth at minimum power. Shortly we will increase thrust to one gravity and head for our first target star. It will take about one year for the ship to achieve close to the speed of light. The time to the first target is not precisely predictable, but should be of the order of ten years. During that period the crew will be on duty in rotation. We have three shifts each of 50 individuals, and each shift will spend six months on duty followed by a year in deep-sleep, except for times when we are exploring planetary systems. Then all the crew will be active.
‘The colonists in this room are the elected leaders of the six million colonists on board. The others are in deep-sleep in their pods, and will remain so until landed on their destination planet. After this briefing I suggest that the rest of you return to your pods and enter your own deep-sleep chambers. You will be awoken when a suitable planet is found for your pod, and I will ask you to decide whether or not you want to be landed on its surface. If you do so decide, then the rest of your colony group will be awoken in stages after landing.
‘I have asked our Science Officer, Professor William Hertberg, to say something about this ship and about our journey before the briefing ends. He was Professor of Theoretical Astronautics at Cambridge University before volunteering for this trip. Professor Hertberg.’
Captain Nolton sat down and the Science Officer rose to his feet. He pressed a button and a picture appeared on the large screen behind him – a diagram of the ship, shaped something like a long-shafted arrow, with thick cylinders bundled about its centre.
‘Fellow adventurers, this is a diagram of our ship, Diana. She is an interstellar ramjet, the biggest and fastest yet built. The propulsion unit is a thermonuclear engine located here, at the rear, and capable of almost total conversion of matter to energy. It is fed with hydrogen fuel, either from the ship’s own storage tanks or, when her speed is high enough, scooped up from interstellar space. To collect this material vast electro-magnetic fields are used, generated here in the ship’s nose, ahead of the crew area here. In normal forward flight these fields channel the fuel into the ship like so, down through the central column and into the engine.
‘However, when we are at the mid-point of our journey to a new star we must begin to decelerate to reach our destination with a small residual velocity. To do this the ship has to be turned so that the engine faces forward. During this manoeuvre the scoop-fields act as a shield, protecting us from the lethal effects of the interstellar material moving at near light-speed. After turn-around the scoop-fields again funnel the hydrogen into the ship to fuel the engine, which is now in the lead. Are there any questions?’
No-one spoke for a moment, and then one of the colonists raised a hand. ‘I believe we can’t travel faster than light, isn’t that so?’
‘So Einstein said, back in the 20th century. And most scientists since then have accepted his relativity theory. Certainly, subatomic particles accelerated in the laboratory are unable to exceed the speed of light. But who knows what a massive spaceship will do close to light-speed? If Sigourski and Velichev’s theories are right – but I won’t go into them now. Let’s just say that perhaps we can travel faster than light, and maybe we can’t. That’s why I’ve come on this trip – to find out.
‘We shall be in touch with Earth through our maser communication system, and will monitor the time dilation effect that way, and be able to see if relativity theory applies to masses of this size. The Chinese and Americans have sent out interstellar ships already, but their accelerations are very low compared to ours. It will be a long time before they reach light-speed.’
‘Thank you, Professor Hertberg’ said the captain, rising to his feet, ‘I would now like to call this briefing to a close. We will be building up to full acceleration over the next few hours, and I suggest that the colonists return to their pods and enter deep-sleep as soon as they can. The crew may disperse to their duties or recreation. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen.’
The captain and commander left, and the hall filled with the murmur of general conversation. People stood up, and it was noticeable that their weight had increased significantly. Andreas turned to the young colonist at his side: ‘Care to come to my room for a quick drink before you hit the big sleep, Carolus?’
Carolus glanced at his father, who had already moved off with a group of other colonists, walking cautiously in the reduced gravity. ‘I don’t see why not. I’d like to stay awake a little longer and a drink sounds good’
The two young men made a contrasting pair as they left the hall and took the left up into the heart of the crew quarters. Andreas was slim with brown skin and black hair, and an indefinable air of reserve and maturity despite his age of barely 19 years. Carolus was big-framed and fair, and his nature was clearly extroverted and slightly boisterous. The two walked along one of the ship’s radial corridors until they reached Andreas’ room. Inside it was not spacious. A bunk took up one wall, a storage cupboard another, a very small shower/toilet a third, and the fourth wall was occupied by what seemed to be a large grey coffin – the suspended animation chamber.
Andreas waved Carolus to sit on the bed and sat himself on the coffin. He took a bottle and two beakers from a cupboard.
‘I doubt you’ve ever tasted this’ he said, ‘Spaceman’s Ruin – distilled from our hydroponic yeast. It’s an acquired taste.’ He poured out two measures and Carolus sipped his cautiously.
‘I can see why. Thank God I’m not a spaceman. I hope we can find ourselves a decent planet and put down some vineyards. I don’t relish having to drink this stuff all my life.’
‘I hope so too. Here’s to your planet – wherever it is’
They drank. Carolus pointed to the wall above Andreas’ head. Magnetic clamps held a long straight sword in a dark scabbard, with a plain cross-shaped hilt.
‘What’s a spacemen doing with a sword on a voyage like this?’ he asked. Andreas laughed.
‘It’s my father’s sword, and his before him, and so forth. He gave it to me before I set out, and said he wouldn’t be seeing me again. It’s a family heirloom, if you like.’
‘What will you do?’ asked Carolus, ‘Will you settle with us if we find a good planet? I think I should like you to join our colony.’
Andreas shook his head slowly. ‘No, I don’t think I’m the settling kind. I intend to return to Earth with the ship – after we’ve found six nice planets for you colonists.’
Carolus smiled at him. ‘I’ll ask you again when we’ve found our planet – you’ll be tired of space by then. But I suppose I’d better get back to the pod now, or father’ll send out a search party.’
They left the crew section and took the lift downwards through the central shaft. Weight was appreciable now and the ship was accelerating at about half a gravity. A side corridor led through to the nose of Pod 6, and in a small chamber there were arrayed five of the gey coffins. Carolus’ father and the other three colony leaders waited there. Carolus apologised for his lateness and introduced Andreas. Mr Samalto Senior greeted him politely, but it was obvious that his mind was on the coming period of deep-sleep. Who knew how long it would last, or where he would awaken? He lifted the lid of his coffin and turned to Andreas. ‘Farewell. I hope that when we meet again our goal will have been reached.’
‘I trust so, sir. Until we do meet again, farewell.’
The lid closed and the indicators on the chamber showed the start of the suspended animation process. In two minutes he would be without motion or any vital process, yet be able to be recalled to life with no changes having taken place, however many yeas had intervened. The other four colonists climbed into their coffins. Carolus grinned at Andreas: ‘How old are you, Andreas?’
’19, 20 next birthday’ he replied.
‘I’m 25, but when I awake you’ll be older than me. And wiser too, I hope. Good-bye.’ And he closed the lid. Andreas turned and left the chamber.
*******
Over the next few days Andreas found himself quite busy. The whole crew was engaged in testing systems and ensuring that all was in order for the long journey. Andreas was quite familiar with Diana – he had travelled with her on the trial flight to Jupiter and taken part in the test pod landings in the Mediterranean. But the start of this flight, to unknown space for an unpredictable length of time, gave him a strange feeling deep in his psyche. The ship itself sometimes felt like a weird whimsical contraption flung together by fools and crewed by madmen. He plunged into his routine tasks with greater determination.
Diana passed the orbit of Saturn, still accelerating at one gravity, and fell on outwards towards the stars. One the ship was readied for the long trip, two-thirds of the crew entered deep-sleep. A Shift, which included Andreas, settled into six months of routine vigilance. The orbit of Pluto was passed and the Solar System could be regarded as left behind. The scoop-shields were pulling in all the fuel that Diana’s voracious fusion engine needed and her speed was building up. Captain Nolton remained active – he had no intention of hibernating at any time, unlike his crew.
Andreas too found the idea of deep-sleep unappealing. The prospect of the voyage ahead excited him, and he did not want to lose a minute in pseudo-death. He said as mch to James Brady, the lean cynical second-in-command of A Shift. Brady laughed at him.
‘You’ll soon change your mind! This trip is going to be 99% sheer boredom enlivened only by periods of utter chaos. You’re a lot better off asleep. And what’ll happen to you if you don’t hibernate? You’ll just be extremely old before the end of the journey. It’s going to take about 10 years to get to Star Target A, and we probably won’t find any decent planets there. You’ll be old and senile before we find anything worth finding. I, on the other hand, will remain young and in full possession of my faculties – and my attractiveness to the opposite sex!’
Andreas grinned, but said nothing in reply while he worked on replacing a circuit board in shuttle Gamma’s communications system.
‘There, that’s done’ he reported, ‘Everything checks out now. Say, James, if you feel like that about it, how come you’re on this trip? It doesn’t really sound as if your heart’s in it.’
‘If you mean I’m not a starry-eyed idealist like you, conquering space for the greater glory of the human race and the subjugation of the three-legged wombats of Shitball IV, then you’re right. But there’s nothing on Earth for me now – just millions of boring moronic people doing boring moronic things. I want to be different, to make a name for myself. So this trip is really just for the greater glory of Lieutenant James Brady.’
‘I hope it works out for you then. It sounds like you know what you want, but I’m not sure I know what I want to get out of this voyage.’
‘Let’s stop philosophising. We’ve finished here now. Fancy a swim?’
The two men left the shuttle and re-entered the main ship. Going up five floors in the left they came to the recreation room, with the swimming pool set into the floor at one end. When the ship was not accelerating a plastic cover automatically came over water to stop it floating about the room in big globules. They both stripped off and dived in. Brady did a racing stroke to the far end and Andreas followed more slowly. James smiled at him and then indicated a pair of female crew members who had just come in and were undressing to enter the pool.
‘Now there’s something to take your mind off metaphysics for a while, Andreas my son. Let’s go and say hello to them.’
Without waiting for an answer he swam down to the other end of the pool, leaving Andreas floating by himself. Very soon the sounds of laughter and splashing could be heard from the far end. Another figure dived in and swam up towards Andreas. A young woman’s face broke the surface near him.
‘Hello’ she said, ‘It’s getting very crowded down there.’
Andreas recognised Mary Upbinder, the Assistant Science Officer. He smiled at her.
‘Yes, I think James is trying to make some new friends. Have you managed to escape from Professor Hertberg?’
‘For a moment. It’s getting very feverish in our lab. I tried to persuade the professor to come for a swim, but he wouldn’t leave the instruments. So I sneaked away by myself.’
‘How are the measurements looking? Are we going to be able to travel faster than light-speed?’
‘I’m not sure, but he’s getting pretty excited about things. It’s fascinating, and I’m really lucky to be able to make this trip with him.’
‘I don’t know a lot about the science behind all this, but I’d like to learn more. Would you and the professor mind if I came and had a look in your lab some time? I’d like to find out more about your work.’
‘Mind? He’d love it. He likes to explain all his theories to anyone who’ll listen. And we could do with a hand in calibrating our instruments. So come along anytime you’ve nothing better to do.’
‘Thanks, I will’ promised Andreas.
‘Great. Race you to the other end.’
The next few minutes were spent in some energetic swimming. Andreas found Mary was a faster swimmer, but he did his best to keep up. When finally the two of them climbed out of the pool and stood together on the side he found Brady’s quizzical eye looking up at him from the water. Brady winked, and Andreas blushed slightly. He became conscious of Mary’s presence beside him, naked and dripping. He went and found a couple of towels, and handed one to her. As they dried and dressed he asked her ‘Will you join me in something to eat now, and perhaps I could visit the lab afterwards?’
‘Sure’ she said, ‘Let’s go’
When they reached the lab Mary introduced him to the professor, who regarded him amiably and began to explain the purpose of some of the apparatus. A computer screen showed two lines, one red and one green, almost overlapping.
‘The red line is our current time dilation factor, obtained from analysis of the maser communication signal from Earth. The green line is the factor calculated from relativity theory.’
‘They don’t quite match’
‘No. It could be instrument error, but I don’t think so. I believe Einstein was wrong, and perhaps we can travel faster than light. Can you program?’
‘Of course’
‘Good. Take that terminal and these notes I’ve written. I need a program to update stellar blueshift factors in real time and correlate the results. Thanks for your help.’
Andreas soon found himself working much harder than he did on duty. After four hours the program was running to the professor’s satisfaction, and he slipped away to get some sleep. Yet he felt fascinated by the lab and the work going on there, and regularly returned to help. As the weeks passed the professor paid less and less attention to the measurements, which were confirming his own ideas, and began to concentrate on his own fairly arcane theoretical work.
Mary and Andreas found themselves handling the collection and correlation of data together. They got to know each other quite well and became good friends. Yet something seemed to stop Andreas from progressing beyond friendship, and sometimes this puzzled him. It seemed like a yearning for something beyond was keeping him from developing normal human relationships.
As the six-month point of the flight approached, his commander Alicia Melenna came to speak to him.
‘It will soon be the end of our shift,’ she said, ‘and time for us to go into deep-sleep for a year. What are you going to do, Andreas? Hibernate with the rest of us, or stay awake with Mary and the professor?’
‘Stay awake’ he replied, ‘In six months we should reach light-speed. I must see if we can pass it.’
‘Very well, Andreas. I can’t complain that you’re neglecting your duty. But be careful – if you don’t hibernate some of the time you’ll become too old to ever see Earth again!’
‘Don’t worry. I just want to see us reach light-speed. Then I’ll sleep, so don’t be concerned about me.’
Andreas kept his word and stayed active when the rest of A Shift retired into deep-sleep and B Shift took over. As the months passed, he spent most of his time in the lab, helping the professor and Mary record and analyse their data.
Earth was far behind. Communications had become impossible, since the signals from Earth were red-shifted so much as to become indecipherable, and by now would be half a year out of date by the time they reached Diana. The ship’s maser transmitter was still sending out a stream of data aimed at the Solar System, hoping that one of the giant orbital receivers would pick it up.
Professor Hertberg and his assistants had moved their operations to the ship’s control room as light-speed approached. They had set up instruments to measure the ship’s speed accurately, and also to correct the monitor screens to allow for the extreme Doppler shift in the light coming from different directions. The Sun, behind, was being seen only in light which had started as high-frequency gamma rays and was now received as low frequency radio waves. On the rear-facing screen it showed as a dull red point. Ahead the effect was reversed, and only to the sides were stars perceived in anything like their natural light.
A digital read-out showed the ship’s speed as a fraction of light-speed. It read 0.9998C when the captain entered the control room to join the three co-workers.
‘How’s it looking?’ he asked.
‘Everything is as I would predict’ answered the professor, ‘Light-speed coming up. No anomalous behaviour on my instruments.’
Commander O’Brien of B Shift had come in with the captain. He cast an eye over the bridge instrument panels and reported ‘Ram field configuration seems nominal. No changes in engine performance. Acceleration 1.012G.’
‘Thanks’ said the captain, ‘Continue acceleration’. The read-out showed 0.9999C when he asked the Science Officer ‘Why do you expect us to be able to exceed light-speed when relativity theory says we can’t?’
‘Briefly, without the maths, because relativity theory is a good approximation for small particles but breaks down for objects of our mass. Do you know that this Universe exists in four, not three, space dimensions? The three-dimensional space we experience is just the skin on an expanding four-dimensional universe. My theories predict that as we approach light-speed we move partly out of ‘normal’ space and virtually skim across the surface of the Universe. Thus the ship is not bound by any limiting speed.’
‘If your theory is right’ said O’Brien.
‘It is – look.’ The read-out had changed to show 1.0000C. The rear-view screen showed a circle of blackness where the Sun had been a faint red star. Diana had passed the speed of light.
Armontiriath 