Part 25 (1/2)

Egg and its ever-present glare was gone.

Most of the sky was black and starless. In the distance was a small elliptical patch with a few dozen stars in it. The stars in the patch of sky were blue to ultraviolet in color. What was most confusing was that the patch of starlight seem to be rotating, while he and the rest of the tanks were standing still.

”That was a Kerr s.p.a.ce-warp!” Pierre said out loud.

”That is correct,” came a voice. The image of Sky-Speaker was on the screen.

”That can't be!” said Pierre. ”I remember from my gravitational engineering courses that a Kerr ring with the ma.s.s of a sun would have a one-kilometer hole. The compensator asteroid ma.s.ses are orders of magnitude less ma.s.sive than the sun. The biggest ring they could make would be less than a micron in diameter. According to Einstein, that was impossible. ...”

”Einstein was intelligent, but human,” said Sky-Speaker. ”He failed to combine gravity and electromagnetism. We have. The unified theory agrees with Einstein for large ma.s.ses. For very small ma.s.ses, the diameters of magnetized s.p.a.ce-warps are larger than Einstein predicted.”

While Sky-Speaker was talking, Pierre noticed that the string of free-floating spheres was being moved.

The tanks with their clouds of robot-tended equipment had moved back under the rotating patch of sky.

The cheela robots formed the tanks into a circle and accelerated them until they were mov- ing in the same direction as the whirling patch of sky above them. The acceleration continued.

”We're moving in time,” said Pierre.

”Yes,” said Sky-Speaker. ”The rate is one month normal galactic time per ten minutes proper time for your crew. You will return through s.p.a.ce-warp in one hour. Six months will have pa.s.sed in normal s.p.a.ce. The asteroid Oscar will have returned.”

The cheela robots now had communication links set up between all the tanks, and Pierre could see each of the remaining crew members on one of his miniature screens.

”Is everyone okay?” he asked.

”Yes,” said Abdul. ”But I'm not looking forward to going back through that meat grinder again.”

”The engineering check program indicates a problem,” said Jean.

”I'm surprised it is still functional after the drastic changes the cheela made,” said Seiko.

”What's the problem?” Pierre asked.

”There is a leak in Tank 6,” Jean replied.

”Whose tank is that?” asked Pierre.

”Mine,” replied Abdul. ”She's right. I've lost some pressure. The water must have frozen and plugged the leak, though. The pressure seems to have stabilized.”

”The tank must be repaired!” Cesar said. ”It surely cannot withstand another trip through those extreme tidal forces.”

”The cheela can work miracles. But I don't think they can weld the mist we call steel. I'll just have to risk it.” Abdul paused, looking puzzled, then turned away from the video pickup and put his hands against the back wall of the tank.

”Hey!” he said. ”I feel little tiny tugs of gravity near the wall. They keep zipping back and forth.”

”I can see some activity outside your tank,” Seiko told him. ”It looks like an electric arc. I think they are attempting to weld the leak shut.”

”I hope it holds,” said Abdul.

05:06 CREW TIMEWEDNESDAY 22 JUNE2050.

(00:01 GMT SUNDAY 25 DECEMBER 2050).

”Ten seconds to reentry,” said Sky-Speaker. Pierre saw the view outside his porthole tilt and s.h.i.+ft as the circle of tanks turned into a line of tanks that swooped away from the patch of sky in a large arc, then dove headfirst through the Kerr-warp at high speed. The next few milliseconds pa.s.sed too quickly for the tortured humans to follow.

As Oscar neared the s.p.a.ce-warp the five tanks popped, one by one, out of the flat circle of black. After the pa.s.sage of the second tank, the diameter of the ring expanded a little, then shrank just as the third tank pa.s.sed through. The oscillations in the ring grew larger, and the fourth tank was highly distorted by the tides of the contracting ring. The cheela obviously hadn't expected this instability. They managed to slow the last tank down so that it wasn't trying to get through the ring at its minimum radius, but it wasn't enough. The tank ruptured, spewing a human being and gobbets of water into the vacuum of s.p.a.ce.

The cheela robots a.s.sembled the remaining four tanks in a line just below the periapsis of the plunging asteroid, Oscar. The asteroid pa.s.sed rapidly over the tanks, and one at a time its gravity field jerked the tanks upward in a high trajectory that took them quickly away from the tides of Egg.

The cheela attempted to help the remaining human. They moved a piece of tank to s.h.i.+eld him from the radiation from Egg. They kept him from being torn apart by the gravity tides by making a miniature compensator ring of dense s.p.a.cecraft that circled around him. However, they couldn't prevent him from being dragged back toward the ma.s.sive s.p.a.ce-warp. His eyes temporarily protected from the vacuum of s.p.a.ce by his underwater mask, Abdul looked up and waved goodbye to his departing comrades. Then, pus.h.i.+ng off from the heavy piece of steel tank, he dove headfirst into the whirling black ring to join the atoms that had once been Amalita. Just before he reached the ring his body was momentarily surrounded by a swirling cloud of white-hot specks. There was a flash and he was gone.

05:15 CREW TIME WEDNESDAY 22 JUNE 2050.

(00:10 GMT SUNDAY 25 DECEMBER 2050).

The four tanks were met at the top of their trajectory by a flitter from St. George that took them in tow.

While one s.p.a.cesuited figure secured the tow line, another came over and peered in Pierre's porthole. It was Commander Carole Swenson. He saw a big grin on her face as she put her helmet against the outer wall of the tank and hollered a greeting.

”That's the last time I let you have a s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p to drive,” she said. ”Did you get the license number of the truck?”

She knew Pierre couldn't talk underwater except through his throat mike, so she shouted one more message and pushed back to the flitter for the ride in.

”I've got a surprise for you,” she said. ”See you in the air lock.”

Pierre couldn't understand why Carole was so happy. Perhaps it was because at least four of the crew of Dragon Slayer made it back. All Pierre could think of, however, was that two of them didn't. They had been his responsibility, and now they were dead. He dreaded what he had to do next. He would have to let their families know. How do you tell someone that their loved ones had been torn to atoms?

05:50 CREW TIME WEDNESDAY 22 JUNE 2050.