9
The bridge was not what I expected, not that I had any idea what to expect. As with everything else, my assumptions were based on old movie tropes. The real thing was both overwhelming and surprisingly empty; no captain’s chair, no workstations manned by busy people doing busy things in front of monitors filled with indecipherable technical gibberish.
What it did have was Sven sitting in another one of those contoured acceleration couches, in front of a semicircular panel that constantly changed presentations in response to his hand movements. Behind him was a row of similar couches, which Bjorn pointed me toward.
The ‘overwhelming’ part was the holographic display in front of us. It was a three-dimensional map of space that filled the forward half of the control room, so clear and detailed that it seemed like the ship had been laid open to the void. Text in their language scrolled down one side of the floating display, which I presumed was important information about whatever we would be doing. A lime green ribbon arced across the space ahead, pointing toward a bright bluish-white star.
Sven gestured toward the ribbon. “This the path we’ll follow to our first destination. Your astronomers call it Beta Orionis, popularly known as Rigel.” He tapped at the panel and the display zoomed in on our destination.
I gulped, forcing down my astonishment. It felt like if I took a step forward, I’d tumble off into space. “Rigel. It’s . . . big.”
“It is a blue giant, approximately twenty times larger in diameter than your sun. There is a Union transit station in orbit at the edge of the system. That is where you’ll go through initial processing.”
“How far away is it?”
“Eight hundred sixty light-years. Our travel time will be slightly more than two days, by your reckoning.”
I grasped enough to know that was a lot of distance to cover in two days. “Pretty sure we touched on this before, but I don’t think you answered me. Isn’t it impossible to travel faster than light?”
“It is. Again, your Einstein was correct in that it would require an infinite amount of energy. It would also violate causality.” He must have recognized my deer-in-the-headlights look. “Put simply, cause and effect would have to be reversed. That cannot happen.”
It wasn’t clear to me that he meant reversing causality was impossible, or that it was just a horrendously bad idea. “How does this work, then? Warping space, like we did to get here?”
“That is the preferred method. We are in essence reducing the relative distance between ourselves and Rigel down to something we can easily traverse. There is another method, best described as trans-dimensional jumping. It is technically feasible, but is not yet sanctioned by the Union transport ministry.”
That sounded interesting, whatever “trans-dimensional jumping” entailed. That it wasn’t officially sanctioned made it sound a little reckless and therefore probably quite effective, enough to make the big shots uncomfortable. As my mind wandered to whatever unsavory elements in the Union might take advantage of this, Sven’s console began flashing and he turned to give it his attention. “Excellent,” he said. “We have received our route clearance to Rigel.” He gestured for me to sit in the acceleration couch behind him. “Please settle into the gel cushion. We will be underway shortly.”
It wasn’t a long wait. That same barely perceptible vibration I had felt in their shuttle began to course through the ship, jiggling my insides like driving over a rumble strip on the highway. Another wave of nausea and confusion began to wash over me like before. Whatever that funky gravity ball was doing, its effects were much more pronounced now.
The stars ahead appeared to move toward us, though not all at once. This wasn’t like jumping to hyperspace in the Millennium Falcon, it was more like riding waves on a surfboard. Space itself seemed to swell and fold up ahead of us, distorting the foreground like ripples on a pond. If the universe was an ocean, it was as if they’d dropped a giant rock into the middle of it and we were following it down through the concentric waves spreading in our wake.
“Are we actually moving stars out of our way? Wouldn’t that be a problem for whatever might be there?”
Sven was focused on driving, so Bjorn explained. “Not at all,” he said with some amusement. “You are correct, moving stars would be very bad indeed. Those are gravity waves, moving ahead of us like the bow waves a ship would create on the ocean.” He pointed at the virtual windshield. “The effect is concentrated enough to bend the light we see from the stars ahead.”
I was relieved that we weren’t moving stars out of our way, but now I was concerned with my own corner of the celestial neighborhood. “What about nearby planets? Wouldn’t this move them around somehow?”
“It would perturb their orbits if we were to pass close enough. Our wake field eventually negates the bow wave, but we do have to plan our routes carefully.”
As he spoke, I tried to imagine a ship on the ocean. It kind of, sort of made sense that way, but thinking of space as having structure threatened to break my brain. I had never considered that “vacuum” was not the same thing as “empty.”
Bjorn kept talking. “Our local gravity field contracts the space ahead of us and expands it behind, until it reaches equilibrium in our wake. Our trajectory had to be cleared with Union transit control before we could depart, specifically to protect any celestial bodies near our path.”
“Galactic traffic cops,” I said. Every answer led to yet another question. If they had to request clearance, that meant the transmission would’ve traveled immense distances. I knew enough to understand that radio signals or whatever they used couldn’t be instantaneous, and it seemed doubtful there was a Union control tower hidden somewhere nearby. “How do you communicate across that kind of distance? Wouldn’t it take years to get an answer?”
“Do you recall what I said about your species’ understanding of ‘quantum’ physics? We utilize a property your scientists call ‘entanglement’ to communicate beyond light-wave range. Entangled particles can be manipulated, so that inducing change in one creates the opposite action in its ‘companion’ particle, regardless of their separation. This makes it possible to communicate across interstellar distances, though it is limited to discrete messages using predetermined phrases.”
I understood his use of ‘particles’ had to mean stuff at the atomic, maybe even subatomic, level. Entangled atoms—probably the wrong way to picture it, but it was all I had—could be separated by immense distance, and tweaking one had a mirror effect on the other. How did they know which ones were ‘entangled’ in the first place?
Yet it kind of made sense. A Navy veteran I’d known in college had once told me how submarines could receive messages deep underwater from an ultra-low-frequency transmitter, but everything had to be reduced to three-letter codes. Then I thought of something else. “It’s like Morse code.”
I’d said it more for myself, but Bjorn had heard me and looked puzzled. After a moment’s thought, there was a delighted glint in his lustrous eyes. His dimwitted student had stumbled onto a revelation. “That is, in fact, a quite appropriate comparison.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised. If they’d been watching us since before World War II, they’d have been exposed to our antiquated methods. I was just happy to have made the connection. This “babe in the woods” feeling was not something I was used to, nor comfortable with. It was a relief to think I might actually be up to the task ahead.
I nodded to myself, satisfied with my tenuous grasp of what we were doing. It didn’t mean I was out of questions; far from it. When so much information comes at you that fast, sometimes you have to take a breather and file some things away for later. I settled into my gel cushion to absorb what I’d learned, demonstrated in real time as space itself continually folded up ahead of us and fell away behind.
Once the Solar System was well behind us, our acceleration slowed to where it was safe to get out of the gel chairs and move about. That was a relief, as I couldn’t imagine spending the whole trip confined to a couch, no matter how comfy it was. While Sven continued to monitor our progress, Bjorn showed me around the rest of the ship. The tour consisted mostly of his telling me which spaces were strictly off-limits, with a promise to show me more later. They couldn’t trust me around certain equipment yet, and I was fine with that. It wouldn’t do for the new girl to accidentally break something important or open a hatch into space.
My room aboard their ship was comfortably familiar, though it shouldn’t have been surprising that beings so similar to humans would require a place to sit down and a bed to sleep in. It was another lesson in alien biology: every living species had its own unique metabolic cycle, which meant their bodies eventually needed rest to regenerate.
The room was small, about the size of a decent walk-in closet. A bed was recessed into one wall, and another one of the gel couches was mounted to the floor. Bjorn tapped on a nearby panel and a small table extended from the wall.
He tapped at the crystal slate that had held my contract. “There. Your crystal is now connected to our ship’s network. I’ve loaded it with a primer on the Galactic Union, including descriptions of each member race with basic physiology and information on their home systems. There is also a summary of Union ordinances with which you will need to become familiar.”
“So I don’t unwittingly break the law?”
“In so many words, yes. As a newly authorized resident you will be accorded a certain latitude; however, you will be expected to fully comply if you decide to remain.”
Play by the rules and you stay in the club. I got that part. I swiped my thumb across the slate. The words seemed to float within its glass. In that respect, it worked a lot like my phone. I pinched at it, trying to zoom in on the fine print to no avail. “It’s awfully small type,” I said to Bjorn. “Is there an easier way to read this?”
“It is responsive to your touch, perhaps not in ways you are accustomed to.” He leaned across and placed his hand on the slate, then drew it up quickly as if he were pulling the words themselves out of the page. All of a sudden its text was floating in the air above the crystal, as big as a TV screen.
“Okay,” I stammered. “That’s, uh, much better.” Once again, I was gaping at it like a moron.
He gave me another one of his patient smiles. “It is a simple holographic projection. Most of our interfaces work the same way. You will find it to be intuitive, much like your touch-screen devices.” He gestured at the floating display. “Place your hands on opposite corners, as if you’re holding it. Then move them apart.”
I did as he said, and the page expanded or shrank in response to my motions, like pinching the text on a tablet. I decided on a little experiment and pulled my hands together, then swept them down. Sure enough, the page shrank to nothing and reappeared on the slate. I mimicked his motions to open it up, and once again the holographic text floated in the air in front of me. I made a swiping motion and it turned the page, like an e-reader would. “I think I’ve got it. Just show me how to not accidentally delete anything important.”
“Not possible,” he assured me. “Think of this reader as you would one of your physical books. You can’t change anything, accidentally or otherwise.”
I presumed they’d set it up that way to keep me from doing exactly that. I leaned back in the gel couch and swiped through more pages of Union ordinances. “There’s a lot to take in. Do I have to read through all this before we get to the next stop?”
“It will facilitate your entry processing if you have a basic understanding of our civilization. We wished to give you a ‘head start,’ as you might say.”
Bjorn was awfully accommodating, but then that was part of an Emissary’s job. “Guess I’ve got some homework ahead of me.”
He nodded. “I shall leave you to your studies, then.” He motioned to another holographic panel embedded by the door, which gave off a pale orange glow. “You may use this to contact me directly if you require any assistance.” With that, he bowed slightly and left me alone.
There I sat, in a room so sparsely appointed that you could be forgiven for mistaking it for a prison cell. I got up and swiped at the door to make sure it would open. Nope, not a prison. But man, was it empty.
I studied the bare walls, wondering if they worked like the ones in the shuttle. I walked up to the paneling between my bed and desk and pressed against it. Sure enough, another of their holographic projections opened up, filling the empty space with . . . empty space.
Like their shuttle, and their control room, it was as if a window had opened up to the outside. I stared into the black. Distant stars seemed to move past as if along the crest of a wave, and I remembered what they said about gravity bending light.
It was too much to absorb, and far too easy to become lost in such an incredible sight. There was work to do, and sightseeing threatened to be a crippling distraction. Maybe I could save it for bedtime, which by my watch would be coming in a few hours. I tried the same crushing motion with my hands that had compressed the other hologram, and it disappeared.
I turned back to my homework. It was going to be a long night.