The World At The End Of Time Part 18

There was silence for a moment. Then Mirian put in, "We saw Ark Ark when we were outside. Only it was near the fireball, so we couldn't get a really good look at it." when we were outside. Only it was near the fireball, so we couldn't get a really good look at it."

Viktor saw that everyone looked a little embarra.s.sed when Mirian mentioned the fireball. Yet the man had brought it up; it was as good a chance as any to probe. "About that fireball," he began.

Conversation stopped. Everyone's eyes were on him, and every mouth was closed. Even Mirian was looking suspiciously at him.

The h.e.l.l with them, Viktor thought. "I know what that fireball is," he announced. "It's a foreshortened view of the universe. Somehow, I don't know how, we've been accelerated so fast that we're catching up with all the light from everywhere."

Silence. No response at all. Then Mirian swallowed and said, "Maybe we should be getting back to work, Viktor."

But the woman across the table reached out to touch his arm. "What are you telling us, Viktor?" she asked. "How could that happen?"

"I don't have the faintest idea," he said bitterly. "Something is pulling us. Or pus.h.i.+ng us, maybe, but I don't know any forces that could do that. Anyway our planet, and the sun, and all the other planets around it, and a few other stars are all being pulled along very fast by something." something."

"What do you mean, 'something'? Do you mean by G.o.d?" the woman asked, crossing herself. "Freddy didn't say anything about that!"

"No, not G.o.d," Viktor said hastily. "It doesn't have anything to do with G.o.d, of course. It's some natural force, probably-or, well-" He stopped, angry at these people and even more at himself.

He hadn't stopped in time. "Are you saying the Great Transporter isn't G.o.d?" the woman demanded. An old man down the table stood up, his white mustaches quivering.

"I don't like this kind of talk!" he announced. "I'm going back to work!"

And Mirian, glowering as he led Viktor away from the table, warned, "You have to watch what you say, man! I'm as tolerant as the next fellow, you know that-but you don't want a charge of heresy and corruption of faith, do you?"

This day, Viktor thought gloomily, was not going well at all.

It did not occur to him that it was capable of getting a lot worse.

He was hunched over the keyboard when Tortee came back to her room. He cleared the screen quickly, but not quickly enough: She had caught a glimpse of the spectral a.n.a.lysis display. "What's that, Viktor?" she demanded ominously. "Have you finished the repair plans?"

"Almost done, Tortee," he said with a false smile, keeping his anger inside. "I'll have them for you this afternoon."

"I want them now! now! I've got a meeting with the Four-Power Repair Committee, and I need to show them what has to be done to the I've got a meeting with the Four-Power Repair Committee, and I need to show them what has to be done to the Ark. Ark. What've you been doing? No," she said forcefully as he opened his mouth, "I want to know what you were What've you been doing? No," she said forcefully as he opened his mouth, "I want to know what you were really really doing. Show me that screen again!" doing. Show me that screen again!"

"But, really, Tortee," he began, and then knew it was no use. Sullenly he keyed in the file name and watched as the d.a.m.ning spectrum flashed on the board.

The old woman might have been a religious bigot, but she was not a scientific fool. She recognized the patterns at once. "You're checking spectra," she announced, "and I can guess what that's a spectrum of. Viktor, I don't know what to do with you. You've been openly talking religious error-" He started to speak again, startled, but she overrode him. "Don't deny it! Do you think people don't report to me? Half a dozen people heard you in the dining hall today! And you're wasting working time with your immoral habits. I can't put up with this. Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

"I'm only trying to find out the truth about what's going on!" Viktor cried hotly.

"The truth," truth," Tortee said icily, "has long since been revealed to us. Blessed Freddy set it down for all to see in His Third Testament, and that's the only truth that matters. I forbid you ever to speak of this subject again." He was astonished to see that she was really angry. Her pudgy face was squeezed into a scowl. "Don't try my patience too far, Viktor! I don't want to have to punish you. You wouldn't like it." She stared at him for a moment, then added as an afterthought, "You can forget about using my room for your personal pleasure again, too. Now get out of here! You and Mirian are wanted at the shuttle. They're almost ready to fuel up for the first repair crew." Tortee said icily, "has long since been revealed to us. Blessed Freddy set it down for all to see in His Third Testament, and that's the only truth that matters. I forbid you ever to speak of this subject again." He was astonished to see that she was really angry. Her pudgy face was squeezed into a scowl. "Don't try my patience too far, Viktor! I don't want to have to punish you. You wouldn't like it." She stared at him for a moment, then added as an afterthought, "You can forget about using my room for your personal pleasure again, too. Now get out of here! You and Mirian are wanted at the shuttle. They're almost ready to fuel up for the first repair crew."

It could have been worse, Viktor thought sourly. Reesa was right. He had gone farther with Tortee-well, with all these superst.i.tion-ridden, mule-stubborn people-than was sensible.

For that matter, sending him out to the freezer complex was punishment in itself. It was late. There was little chance they would be able to get back before dark, and no one wanted to be outside when even the feeble heat of sun and star burst were gone.

Mirian did his best to hurry the workers at the liquid-gas plant along. It wasn't hard to do, because the fuel detail wanted to be back by nightfall, too. Working at top speed, he and Viktor checked the fuel manifests, inspected the tanks' seals, and agreed that it was all in order. But the haste was all in vain, because then they were shunted over to the cryonics caves to wait. Their four-power escort hadn't shown up on time.

"Oh, h.e.l.l," Mirian groaned, pulling unhappily at his beard. "We'll never get back before dark."

"I'm sorry, Mirian," Viktor said. "I think I got Tortee mad at me."

"You think think you did! Oh, Viktor, just shut up. Every time you open your mouth you make more trouble!" And he slumped down against a wall and closed his eyes, refusing to speak. you did! Oh, Viktor, just shut up. Every time you open your mouth you make more trouble!" And he slumped down against a wall and closed his eyes, refusing to speak.

Absently Viktor strolled around the chilly cave, glancing at the tunnels that led off from the central chamber. Inside each tunnel was row on row of capsules. Each one held a human body-convicted "criminals" mostly-with crosses for the Greats and the Reforms, crescents for the Moslems, and five-pointed stars for the Peeps. Those were the fruits of overload, Viktor knew, and dourly thought that the chances were good that he would be joining them if he didn't learn to keep his mouth shut.

By the time the escort arrived Viktor had made up his mind. He would never say a blasphemous word again. He would follow Reesa's example. He would do his best to please Tortee and to make her hopeless plan work.

He couldn't wait to see Reesa to tell her about his resolve.

It was almost dark by the time the two of them and their escort were stumbling through the freezing gale back to the dwelling tunnels. The fireball "universe" had already set, and the sun was nearly at the horizon; it was definitely getting too cold to be out of doors.

Mirian glanced at Viktor, then made a gesture of reconciliation. He pointed to the horizon. There was Mayflower, Mayflower, a hand's-span north of the setting sun. The old s.h.i.+p was just beginning to climb up the sky from the west in its hundred-minute orbit, with a hand's-span north of the setting sun. The old s.h.i.+p was just beginning to climb up the sky from the west in its hundred-minute orbit, with Ark Ark still out of sight below and behind it. still out of sight below and behind it.

Mirian put his head next to Viktor's and bawled, over the noise of the wind, "It won't be so bad, Viktor. Once they get the repairs going Tortee will be easier to get along with, you'll see."

"I hope so," Viktor shouted back, and bent his head, squinting against the cold as he trudged along. Easier to get along with! That wouldn't be hard, he thought resentfully. He slipped on a slanting block of ice, cursed, caught himself- And heard a strange moaning sound from Mirian.

Viktor looked up quickly. Out of the corner of his eye he caught a quick flicker of light. Startled, he stared up. It was Mayflower, Mayflower, suddenly s.h.i.+ning bright, almost as suddenly darkening again. suddenly s.h.i.+ning bright, almost as suddenly darkening again.

"What is it, Mirian?" he cried.

But Mirian didn't know. No one knew, until they had toiled back inside the tunnels again and the word from Tortee's instruments had spread like wildfire.

The sudden brightening of Mayflower Mayflower had been only reflected light from another, hidden source. And that source- had been only reflected light from another, hidden source. And that source- It had been the worst disaster imaginable.

Ark had blown up. had blown up.

Fortunately for the people on Newmanhome, Ark Ark had still been below the horizon when it happened. It wasn't a chemical explosion that had blasted the old s.h.i.+p into ions, not even a nuke: it was the annihilation of matter and antimatter, pounds of ma.s.s converted into energy in the twinkling of an eye, in accordance with the old formula: had still been below the horizon when it happened. It wasn't a chemical explosion that had blasted the old s.h.i.+p into ions, not even a nuke: it was the annihilation of matter and antimatter, pounds of ma.s.s converted into energy in the twinkling of an eye, in accordance with the old formula: e = mc e = mc2. That hemisphere directly under Ark had received a sudden flood of radiation like an instant flare from the heart of a star. That hemisphere directly under Ark had received a sudden flood of radiation like an instant flare from the heart of a star.

There was nothing living on that part of Newmanhome. That was fortunate. For, of course, anything that had been alive in the face of that terrible blast would have stopped living at once.

The skeleton crew on Mayflower Mayflower were less fortunate. Even through the thick skin of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p, they had received more radiation than the human body was meant to experience in a lifetime. were less fortunate. Even through the thick skin of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p, they had received more radiation than the human body was meant to experience in a lifetime.

And Tortee was weeping hysterically in her room. She refused to see Viktor at all. She let Mirian in for only a moment, and when he came out he was looking very grave.

"It's over," Mirian told Viktor mournfully. "If we don't have Ark Ark we don't have a working drive. We can't build a rocket s.h.i.+p big enough to attack the planet." we don't have a working drive. We can't build a rocket s.h.i.+p big enough to attack the planet."

"No, of course not," Viktor agreed, dazed, wis.h.i.+ng Reesa were there. "What happened?"

"Aw, who knows?" Mirian said despondently. "Tortee thinks it was the Peeps. She thinks they were so set on getting microwave power that they started fooling around with the drive-to keep us from using it again, you know? And it just went off." He stopped for a moment, gazing at Viktor with an ambiguous expression. Then he said, "I've been thinking, Viktor. You've had a pretty good run for your money."

Viktor blinked, not seeing the connection. "I have?"

"I mean," Mirian explained, "you were born on Earth. Earth. Good Freddy, Viktor, that makes you just about the oldest person in the world." Good Freddy, Viktor, that makes you just about the oldest person in the world."

"I guess it does," Viktor said grudgingly. That was an interesting thought, but not the kind that reconciled you to anything.

"So when the council decides . . ." Mirian left it hanging there. Victor looked at him in puzzlement.

"What is there to decide? You said yourself, the project's over."

"I don't mean the project, I mean about you, Viktor. Tortee won't stand up for you anymore, not after this. Not after-well, you know," he said awkwardly, "we're always pressed for living s.p.a.ce here."

"What are you talking about?" Viktor demanded, losing patience. "Are you saying I have to go live with the Peeps or something, like Reesa?"

"Oh, no, not with the Peeps. And I suppose they might keep Reesa on. But you, Viktor-well," he said fairly, "it's not like death. death. We don't We don't kill kill people. That's against the Commandments. And, who knows, somebody, sometime-there's always the chance that someday someone will thaw you out of the freezer." people. That's against the Commandments. And, who knows, somebody, sometime-there's always the chance that someday someone will thaw you out of the freezer."

CHAPTER 19.

By the time Wan-To had worn out his hundredth star he began to get uneasy again. It wasn't that he was fearing attack from his long-gone siblings, for that had not happened in many hundreds of billions of years. He certainly wasn't worrying about the matter-creatures his long-forgotten Matter-Copy Number Five had reported. No, what was bothering Wan-To was that he couldn't help noticing that his neighborhood was going downhill.

It was no longer a prime, desirable place to be. Most of the stars in this galaxy of his were aging, and everything was getting rather shabby.

Of course, with four hundred billion stars to choose from, he wasn't really out out of living s.p.a.ce. There were even a few late-generation stars of his favorite kind, type G-like Earth's long-gone sun, for Wan-To's taste in stars was very like that of the human race, in many ways. When the one he was in was showing signs of bloat, since he definitely didn't want to sit through the transformation to red giant again, he picked out the best of the available Gs and made the move. of living s.p.a.ce. There were even a few late-generation stars of his favorite kind, type G-like Earth's long-gone sun, for Wan-To's taste in stars was very like that of the human race, in many ways. When the one he was in was showing signs of bloat, since he definitely didn't want to sit through the transformation to red giant again, he picked out the best of the available Gs and made the move.

His latest home was a G0, a good, clean star. It was brighter and bigger than most, though Wan-To found after he had moved in that it had a faintly annoying taste of metals-naturally enough, since it had been formed out of gas clouds that had already been through a star or two.

Little annoyances like that weren't really important. But the star wasn't ideal, either, and Wan-To didn't see why he should be uncomfortable in his own home. He thought about alternatives. He always had the option of moving into a different stellar type, of course-say, an elderly K, or even a little red M. He knew Ms well; that was the kind of star in which Wan-To, long since, had installed his childish companions. He had certainly done that for the children's own good (because those stars were really long-lived and stable), but it was also, to be perfectly truthful, partly for Wan-To's own sake, because those smaller stars gave the children less energy to support their constant babble.

That was what was wrong with the long-lived stars, right there. They had less energy. energy.

That ruled them out for Wan-To, who couldn't see why he should cut back on his own life-style, no matter what. But he could see, not very far ahead, a time when there just wouldn't be any new G-type stars left.

After some thought, the solution occurred to Wan-To. It was simple enough once he had thought of it.

If this galaxy, and most of the others, had grown past the age of frequent star formation by natural processes, why should that be a problem? There was always Wan-To, with his mastery of un unnatural processes, to help things along!

So he found a nice, clean gas cloud out in the galactic halo and set to work. It was simple enough. All he had to do was prod at it with a flux of gravitons, graviphotons, and graviscalars, judiciously applied in all the right places, to speed its condensation. Then he blew up a few heavy stars nearby, timing their rhythmic pulses to encourage some of the gas-cloud material to fall together in stars. He knew exactly what to do. After all, he had seen it happen often enough over the last billions of years! Once you got a density wave going, with a radiative-shock compression factor of a hundred to one or so, the gas clouds couldn't help becoming stars.

True, it would take some millions of years for them to settle down, but he had lots of time. True, he had to deplete the energies of many thousands of otherwise healthy nearby stars to get the process going . . . but what were a few thousand unimportant stars to Wan-To?

Whatever else he did, Wan-To was always careful to keep an eye on the galaxy he had left behind him-the old Milky Way, which he had fled when it turned into a battleground. He wondered if any of his colleagues had survived. He had spotted the star he had escaped from early in his observations-it had been no more than a ruin by then, its greenish planetary nebula already breaking up into wisps of meaningless gas, its helium-burning sh.e.l.l detached from the carbon and oxygen core, the core itself now no more than a white dwarf with a density of tons per cubic inch.

It looked like an abandoned home, and it was. No one could possibly have moved into that after he left, Wan-To was sure. Pretty sure. But he kept an eye on it, and on all the other stars that he suspected might once have sheltered one of his kind.

They were all ruins now, too. Possibly his siblings had all killed each other off? Possibly Mromm had been the last there was, and Wan-To needn't have run away after all?

"Possibly" wasn't good enough. Whatever else Wan-To did, he was never going back to that that galaxy. galaxy.

But was that enough? Was staying away from the compet.i.tors he knew about going keep him safe from possible unknown others?

Wan-To wasn't a bit sure of that. It struck him as a wonder that he had never met another like himself, apart from the copies he had made. That seemed statistically improbable to him. In this old universe, how could he be the only one? the only one? If natural forces had accidentally brought his unfortunate progenitor to life way back in the universe's infancy-when it was no more than four or five billion years old, imagine!-didn't it stand to reason that that accident might have been repeated somewhere since then? If natural forces had accidentally brought his unfortunate progenitor to life way back in the universe's infancy-when it was no more than four or five billion years old, imagine!-didn't it stand to reason that that accident might have been repeated somewhere since then?

But no other ever showed up . . . and, on balance, that was fine with Wan-To.

Wan-To had pretty much accepted the fact that he would be alone for all of that remaining long eternity that stretched ahead-not counting, of course, the sweet but boring babble of the children.

He didn't like the loneliness, though. He wished he were wise enough to create equals who could not ever become compet.i.tors. He was almost sure that there ought to be a way to do it. But he didn't know the way, and he refused to take the chance.

Of course, it never occurred to Wan-To that these solid-matter pests who kept developing every few hundred million years or so could be company. company. They were simply too far beneath him. (Imagine a human being buddying up with a spirochete!) They were simply too far beneath him. (Imagine a human being buddying up with a spirochete!) They were interesting, after a fas.h.i.+on. It entertained Wan-To to see how "matter-life" kept trying to amount to something, eon after eon, on this planet or that.

After the first few he had learned that the things usually started as "organisms"-that was not his word, of course, but the concept he had in mind was of creatures that metabolized oxygen and were composed largely of complex carbon compounds, which was pretty much the same thing. Lots of planets developed "organisms," but only a very few permitted their organic life to reach the stage of being able to interfere with the physical world. Sometimes the amusing little things did that very well. Sometimes they did it almost as well as Wan-To himself, for quite often they learned such skills as how to fission uranium and fuse hydrogen, and they very often sooner or later managed to build strange little metallic sh.e.l.ls in which they ventured into s.p.a.ce. A few exceptional races even succeeded in taming the subatomic particles Wan-To himself employed, neutrinos and quarks and graviscalars.

But none of them went beyond that; and none of them stayed at that point.

To Wan-To's surprise, they seemed to be a self-limiting phenomenon.

Wan-To didn't realize that at first. So the first half-dozen times an organic race got that far Wan-To simply gathered his forces and obliterated them, people, planets, star, and all.

Then he got more curious, and thus more daring. He withheld his hand for a while to see what would happen-of course, always poised to destroy them the moment they became a threat, or even became aware of his existence.

What he discovered, perplexingly, was that that point never came. That was a strange and somewhat repellent thing about these little solid-matter creatures: Not long after they became able to wield significant forces, they invariably used them to destroy themselves.

Wan-To thought wryly that they weren't much smarter than his own kind. Not as as smart, in fact. For, of Wan-To's kind, at least Wan-To himself had managed to stay alive, while of all the matter-creatures he had ever heard of or encountered, every one, he thought, was long since extinct. smart, in fact. For, of Wan-To's kind, at least Wan-To himself had managed to stay alive, while of all the matter-creatures he had ever heard of or encountered, every one, he thought, was long since extinct.

In this, of course, he was quite wrong.

The doppel called Five could have corrected Wan-To, if there had been any way left for Five to reach his master.

The doppel was no longer entirely sure that it wanted wanted to reach Wan-To anymore, because it wasn't sure that Wan-To would approve of what it had done. Five hadn't to reach Wan-To anymore, because it wasn't sure that Wan-To would approve of what it had done. Five hadn't disobeyed disobeyed any orders. But it had taken the liberty of trying to guess what Wan-To's orders would have been, if Wan-To had thought to give them, and so, after a long, long time pus.h.i.+ng ever nearer to the speed of light, it had reversed the thrust of its impellers. any orders. But it had taken the liberty of trying to guess what Wan-To's orders would have been, if Wan-To had thought to give them, and so, after a long, long time pus.h.i.+ng ever nearer to the speed of light, it had reversed the thrust of its impellers.

Five, along with all its flock of stars and orbiting bodies, was slowing down.

That was very daring of Five, and Five knew it. Of course, it took as long to slow down as it did to accelerate to that all-but-light velocity in the first place. Five had plenty of time to reconsider its rash action. But Five wasn't built that way. It was built to do only what its master wanted, or what it thought Wan-To wanted.

In that long deceleration Five was aware of the activities of the matter-creatures that had attacked it-or that it had attacked, whichever way one chose to look at it. The things were quiet enough for a while. Then Five noticed that they were putting artifacts into s.p.a.ce again. None of the things came very near Nebo, so it didn't have to take any action. Actually, it saw with interest, most of the artifacts seemed to head out farther into the solar system. That was fine with Five. Let them do what they liked around the brown dwarf, as long as they didn't come near Nebo.

And then, when the deceleration had slowed enough so that the great light flare that had been all the light of the universe should have resolved itself into a surrounding sphere of stars and galaxies again . . . it didn't. didn't.

Five was filled with what a human would have described as terror. Things were not the way they should be! The universe had become very strange!

The doppel thought long and hard, and saw only one way out for it.

First it summoned up all its strength to create a flood of low-energy, high-velocity tachyons. It impressed on them a message, keyed to Wan-To's own preferred tachyon band. It shut down almost all of its equipment to divert the energies left into broadcasting that message, over and over.

Five had no idea whether Wan-To would ever receive that last somber message. It was not even sure that Wan-To still existed anywhere, and certainly Five didn't have even a hint of a clue as to where that "anywhere" in this suddenly immensely scattered universe might be.

Then Five did the only thing left for it to do.

If Five could not serve Wan-To, there was no reason for it to exist any longer. Maybe, even, if it had served Wan-To badly (as it feared), it no longer deserved deserved to exist. to exist.

So when all its acc.u.mulated energy had been used up and its last message had gone out, Five, in its equivalent of an agony of shame, performed its equivalent of ritual suicide. It shut itself off.