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Jim Baen’s Universe

Page 6

by Edited by Eric Flint


  “Y’know, Ralph, you ha­ven’t chan­ged.”

  “Poorer, is all.”

  “Hey, no­ne of us went in­to this to get rich.”

  “Tenure wo­uld be ni­ce.”

  “Damn right, buddy.” Andy clap­ped him on the sho­ul­der. “I’m go­ing up for it this win­ter, y’know.”

  He hadn’t, but co­ve­red with, “Well de­ser­ved. I’m su­re you’ll get it,” and co­uldn’t re­sist ad­ding, “Har­vard’s a to­ugh sell, tho­ugh. Carl Sa­gan didn’t ma­ke it the­re.”

  “Really?” Andy frow­ned, then co­ve­red with, “So, uh, you think we sho­uld call it the Rif­le?”

  “The Bul­let,” Ralph sa­id aga­in. “It’s su­re go­ing fast, and we don’t re­al­ly know it’s a ne­ut­ron star.”

  “Hey, it’s a long way off, hard to di­ag­no­se.”

  “Maybe it’s dis­tant, I kin­da won­der-“

  “And it fits the ot­her pa­ra­me­ters.”

  “Except you co­uldn’t find a pul­se, so may­be it’s not a pul­sar.”

  “Gotta be,” Andy sa­id ca­su­al­ly, and so­me­one in­ter­rup­ted with a po­int Ralph co­uldn’t he­ar and Andy’s ga­ze shif­ted to in­c­lu­de the crowd aga­in. That ga­ve Ralph a chan­ce to think whi­le Andy wor­ked the ro­om.

  There we­re ne­arly a tho­usand pul­sars now known, ro­ta­ting ne­ut­ron stars that flas­hed the­ir lig­h­t­ho­use be­ams ac­ross the ga­laxy. So­me spun a tho­usand ti­mes in a se­cond, ot­hers we­re old and slow, all swe­eping the­ir be­ams out as they ro­ta­ted. All such col­lap­sed stars told the­ir long ta­le of grin­ding de­cay; the slo­wer we­re ol­der. So­me we­re ej­ec­ted af­ter the­ir birth in bright, flashy su­per­no­vas-squ­as­hed by ca­tas­t­rop­hic com­p­res­si­on in nuc­le­ar fi­re, all in a few mi­nu­tes.

  Here in Bri­an­con, Ralph ref­lec­ted, the­ir com­pany of smart, chat­te­ring chim­pan­ze­es - all evol­ved long af­ter go­od ol’ G369.23-0.82 had emer­ged from its stel­lar pla­cen­ta-raptly stu­di­ed the cor­p­ses of gre­at ca­la­mi­ti­es, the mur­der of stars by re­mor­se­less gra­vity.

  Not that the­ir pri­ma­te eyes wo­uld ever wit­ness the­se obj­ects di­rectly. They ac­tu­al­ly saw, with the­ir fo­ot­ball-fi­eld si­zed dis­hes, the bril­li­ant emis­si­ons of fe­ve­red elec­t­rons, swir­ling in ce­les­ti­al con­cert aro­und mag­ne­tic fi­elds. Clo­uds of elec­t­rons cru­ised ne­ar the spe­ed of light it­self, squ­e­ezing out the­ir wa­ves-bra­ying to the who­le uni­ver­se that they we­re ali­ve and po­wer­ful and wan­ted ever­yo­ne to know it. Pas­sing ga­udy ad­ver­ti­se­ments, they we­re, re­al­ly, for the vast po­wers wrec­king si­lent vi­olen­ces in the slum­be­ring night ski­es.

  “We’re out of its be­am, that’s got to be the an­s­wer,” Andy sa­id, tur­ning back to Ralph and ta­king up the­ir con­ver­sa­ti­on aga­in, his smi­le get­ting a lit­tle mo­re ri­gid. “Not po­in­ted at us.”

  Ralph blin­ked, ta­ken una­wa­re; he had be­en va­gu­ely mu­sing. “Uh, I’m thin­king may­be we sho­uld con­si­der every pos­si­bi­lity, is all.” May­be he had ta­ken one glass too many of the Vin Lo­cal.

  “What el­se co­uld it be?” Andy pres­sed his ca­se, vo­ice tig­h­te­ning. “It’s com­pact, mo­ving fast, bright at the le­ading ed­ge, lu­mi­no­sity dri­ven by its bow shock. A ne­ut­ron star, char­ging on out of the ga­laxy.”

  “If it’s as far away as we think. What if it isn’t?”

  “We don’t know an­y­t­hing el­se that can put out emis­si­ons li­ke that.”

  He co­uld see ne­arby he­ads nod­ding. “We ha­ve to think…” gras­ping for so­met­hing… ”uh, out­si­de the box.” Pro­bably the Vin Lo­cal tal­king.

  Smiling, Andy le­aned clo­se and whis­pe­red thro­ugh his tight, no-do­ubt-so­on-to-be te­nu­red lips, “Ol’ buddy, you ne­ed an idea, to be­at an idea.”

  ****

  Definitely the Vin Lo­cal, yes.

  He awo­ke next mor­ning with a traf­fic ac­ci­dent in­si­de his skull. Only now did he re­mem­ber that he had ex­c­han­ged po­li­te words with Har­kin, the emi­nen­ce gris of the Very Lar­ge Ar­ray, but the­re was no news abo­ut get­ting so­me ob­ser­ving ti­me the­re. And he still had to gi­ve his pa­per.

  It was a botch.

  He had a ga­udy Po­wer­po­int pre­sen­ta­ti­on. And it even ran right on his lap­top, a mi­nor mi­rac­le. But the mul­ti-co­lo­red ra­dio maps and grap­hics fa­iled to con­ce­al a po­verty of ide­as. If they co­uld see a pul­sed emis­si­on from it, they co­uld da­te the age and then lo­ok back along the track of the ru­na­way to see if a su­per­no­va rem­nant was the­re-a shell of ex­pan­ding hot gas, a ce­les­ti­al bull’s eye, con­fir­ming the who­le the­ory.

  He pre­sen­ted his re­sults on go­od ol’ G369.23-0.82. He had de­ta­iled mic­ro­wa­ve maps of it, plenty of cal­cu­la­ti­ons-but Andy had al­re­ady gi­ven his talk, sho­wing that it wasn’t a pul­sar. And G369.23-0.82-Ralph in­sis­ted on cal­ling it the Bul­let, but puz­zled lo­oks told him that no­body much li­ked the co­ina­ge-was the pi­vot of the talk, alas.

  “There are eno­ugh puz­zling as­pects he­re,” he sa­id ga­mely, “to sus­pend jud­g­ment, I think. We ha­ve a ha­bit of clas­sif­ying obj­ects be­ca­use they su­per­fi­ci­al­ly re­sem­b­le ot­hers.”

  The rest was ra­dio maps of va­ri­o­us blobby ra­dio-emit­ting clo­uds he had tho­ught co­uld be ot­her ru­na­ways…but we­ren’t. Using days of ob­ser­ving ti­me at the VLA, and on ot­her dish systems in the Net­her­lands and Bo­log­na, Italy, he had rac­ked up a lot of ti­me.

  And fo­und…not­hing. Su­re, plenty of su­per­no­va rem­nants, so­me shred­ded frag­ments of les­ser ca­tas­t­rop­hes, myste­ri­o­us lef­to­vers fa­ding fast in the ra­dio fre­qu­en­ci­es-but no ru­na­ways with the dis­tin­c­ti­ve ta­ils first fo­und in the fa­mo­us Mo­use. He tri­ed to co­ver the fa­ilu­re by rif­fing thro­ugh qu­ick ima­ges of the­se di­sap­po­in­t­ments, im­p­l­ying wit­ho­ut sa­ying that the­se we­re open pos­si­bi­li­ti­es. The audi­en­ce se­emed to li­ke the swift, co­lor-en­han­ced maps. It was a met­hod his mot­her had ta­ught him whi­le pla­ying brid­ge: fi­nes­se when you don’t ha­ve all the tricks.

  His talk ca­me just be­fo­re lunch and the audi­en­ce lo­oked hungry. He ho­ped he co­uld get away with just a few qu­es­ti­ons. Andy ro­se at the back and as­ked in­no­cently, “So why do you think the, uh, Bul­let is not a ne­ut­ron star?”

  “Where’s the su­per­no­va rem­nant it ca­me from?” Ralph shot back. “The­re’s not­hing at all wit­hin many light ye­ars be­hind it.”

  “It’s fa­ded away, pro­bably,” Andy sa­id.

  A vo­ice from the left, one of the Grand Old Men, sa­id, “Re­mem­ber, the, ah, Bul­let is all the way ac­ross the ga­laxy. An old, fa­int rem­nant it might ha­ve es­ca­ped is hard to see at that dis­tan­ce. And-“a shrewd pur­sing of lips-“did you lo­ok at a suf­fi­ci­ently de­ep sen­si­ti­vity?”

  “I used all the ob­ser­ving ti­me I had,” Ralph an­s­we­red, jum­ping his Po­wer­po­int sli­des back to a mot­tled fi­eld vi­ew-ran­dom flecks, no struc­tu­re ob­vi­o­us. “The re­gi­on in the far wa­ke of the Bul­let is con­fu­si­on li­mi­ted.”

  Astronomers des­c­ri­bed a no­isy bac­k­g­ro­und with that term, me­aning that they co­uld not tell sig­nal from no­ise. But as he fi­el­ded a few mo­re qu­ick qu­es­ti­ons he tho­ught that may­be the jar­gon was mo­re right than they knew. Con­fu­si­on li­mi­ted what they co­uld know, ta­king the­ir mayfly snap­s­hots.

  Then Andy sto­od aga­in and po­ked away at de­ta­ils of the da­ta, a bit of tit for tat, and fi­nis­hing with a jibe: “I don’t un­der­s­tand yo­ur re­mark abo­ut not jum­ping to clas­sify obj­ects just be­ca­u
se they su­per­fi­ci­al­ly re­sem­b­le ot­her ones.”

  He re­al­ly had no go­od re­ason, but he grin­ned and de­ci­ded to joke his way thro­ugh. “Well, the Bul­let do­esn’t ha­ve the ske­wed sha­pe of the Duck…”-which was anot­her oddly sha­ped pul­sar wa­ke, lop­si­ded fuzz left be­hind by a yo­ung pul­sar Andy had dis­co­ve­red two ye­ars ago. “Astro­no­mers for­get that the pub­lic li­kes des­c­rip­ti­ve terms. They’re easi­er to re­mem­ber than, say, G369.23-0.82.” So­me la­ug­h­ter. “So I think it’s im­por­tant to ke­ep our op­ti­ons open. And not suc­cumb to the swe­et tem­p­ta­ti­on to go sen­sa­ti­onal, y’know-“ He drew a de­ep bre­ath and slip­ped in­to a fal­set­to trill he had prac­ti­ced in his ro­om. “ Ru­na­way star! High spe­eds! It will es­ca­pe our ga­laxy en­ti­rely!”

  - and it got a re­al la­ugh.

  Andy’s mo­uth twis­ted so­urly and, too la­te, Ralph re­mem­be­red that Andy had be­en in­ter­vi­ewed by so­me flak and then fe­atu­red in the su­per­mar­ket tab­lo­id Na­ti­onal En­qu­irer, with wi­de-eyed he­ad­li­nes not much dif­fe­rent.

  Oops.

  ****

  Irene had be­en a hit at Bri­an­con, tho­ugh she was a bit too swift for so­me of his col­le­agu­es. She was ko­oky, or as so­me wo­uld say, an­no­ying. But at her si­de he felt he had fully snap­ped to at­ten­ti­on. So­me­ti­mes, she ma­de it hard to con­cen­t­ra­te; but he did. When he got back to UCI the­re was te­ac­hing to catch up on, stu­dents to co­ach, and many ide­as to try out. He set­tled in.

  Some tho­ught that the­re we­re only two kinds of sci­en­ce: stamp col­lec­ting and physics. Er­nest Rut­her­ford had sa­id that, but then, he al­so tho­ught the ato­mic nuc­le­us had no prac­ti­cal uses.

  Most sci­en­ti­fic work be­gan with ca­ta­logs. Only la­ter did the fi­ne dis­tin­c­ti­ons co­me to sug­gest gre­ater, lo­oming laws. New­ton bro­ught Ga­li­leo’s stir­rings in­to dif­fe­ren­ti­al laws, us­he­ring forth the mo­dern world.

  Astronomers we­re fa­ted to mostly do as­t­ro-bo­tany, fin­ding va­ri­eti­es of de­ep spa­ce obj­ects, fra­ming them in­to ca­te­go­ri­es, ho­ping to see if they had a com­mon ca­use. Stamp col­lec­ting.

  Once the the­ory boys de­ci­ded, back in the 1970s, that pul­sars we­re ro­ta­ting ne­ut­ron stars, they lar­gely lost in­te­rest and mo­ved on­to qu­asars and jets and then to gam­ma-ray bur­s­ters, to dark energy- an on­ward mar­c­hing thro­ugh the bo­tany, to find the mo­re ba­sic physics. Ralph didn’t mind the­ir blit­he inat­ten­ti­on. He li­ked the de­tec­ti­ve story as­pects, al­ways ali­ve to the chan­ce that just be­ca­use things lo­oked si­mi­lar didn’t me­an they had to be the sa­me.

  So he prow­led thro­ugh all the da­ta he had, com­pa­ring with ot­her maps he had got­ten at Bri­an­con. The­re we­re plenty of long tra­ils in the sky, jets ga­lo­re-but no new can­di­da­tes for ru­na­way ne­ut­ron stars. So he had to go back to the Bul­let to ma­ke prog­ress. For that he ne­eded mo­re ob­ser­ving ti­me.

  ****

  For him and Ire­ne, a go­od da­te had lar­ge por­ti­ons of ho­nesty and al­co­hol. The­ir first night out af­ter the French trip he ca­me ar­med with at­ten­ti­on span and ap­pe­ti­te. He kept an open mind to chick flic­ks-ren­ted and ha­uled back to her pla­ce, ide­al­ly-and even to res­ta­urants that pla­yed soft ro­man­tic bac­k­g­ro­und mu­sic, which of­ten did the sa­me job as well as a chick flick.

  He had re­tur­ned to news, both go­od and bad. The de­par­t­ment wasn’t in­te­res­ted in de­la­ying his te­nu­re de­ci­si­on, as he had fle­etingly as­ked (Ire­ne’s sug­ges­ti­on) be­fo­re le­aving. But: Har­kin had rus­t­led up so­me ob­ser­ving ti­me for him on the VLA. “Wed­ges, in bet­we­en the big runs,” he told Ire­ne.

  “Can you get much with just sli­ces of ti­me?”

  “In as­t­ro­nomy, lo­oking hard and long is best. Choppy and short can do the sa­me job, if you’re lucky.”

  It was over a we­ekend, too, so he wo­uld not ha­ve to get so­me­one to co­ver his clas­ses.

  So he was de­fi­ni­tely up when they got to the res­ta­urant. He al­ways enj­oyed squ­iring Ire­ne aro­und, se­e­ing ot­her guys’ eye­bal­ls fol­low them to the­ir tab­le-and tel­ling her abo­ut it. She al­ways got a ro­und-eyed, ra­ised eyeb­row flash out of that. Plus, they both got to lo­ok at each ot­her and eat. And if things went right this night, to­ward the des­sert it might be li­ke that sce­ne in the Tom Jones mo­vie.

  They or­de­red: her, the ca­ra­me­li­zed duck bre­asts, and for him, ten­der La­tin chic­ken with plan­ta­ins. “A yummy start,” she sa­id, eye­ing the up­s­ca­le pat­rons. The Gol­den Co­ast abo­un­ded with Mas­ters of the Uni­ver­se, with ex­cel­lently cut ha­ir and bo­di­es that we­re slim, ca­su­al­ly ele­gant, ca­re­ful­ly mus­c­led (don’t want to lo­ok li­ke a la­bo­rer), the wo­men run­ning from pla­ti­num blon­de thro­ugh straw­ber­ry. “Ummm, qu­ite so­ig­ne’, Ire­ne jud­ged, trying out her new French vo­ca­bu­lary.

  Ralph sen­sed so­me ten­si­on in her, so he to­ok his ti­me, glan­cing aro­und at the no­isy crowd. They car­ri­ed them­sel­ves with that lo­ok not so much of ener­ge­tic yo­uth but rat­her of ex­pert ma­in­te­nan­ce, li­ke a Rolls with the oil re­li­gi­o­usly chan­ged every 1500 mi­les. Wal­king in the­ir wa­ke ma­de most wor­king stiffs fe­el just a to­uch shabby.

  He sa­id, “Li­vin’ ex­t­ra-lar­ge in OC,” with a ru­eful smi­le, and won­de­red if she saw this, the Ame­ri­can Dre­am Ex­t­re­me, as he did. They li­ved among dun-co­lo­red hills co­ve­red by pse­udo-Spa­nish stuc­co splen­dor, McMan­si­ons spraw­led ac­ross tiny lots. “Afflu­en­za,” so­me­one had cal­led it, a di­se­ase of al­ways wan­ting mo­re: the lo­cal ref­ra­in was ‘It’s all abo­ut you,’ whe­re the ho­mes aro­und yac­ht-rin­ged har­bors and co­ves sho­ne li­ke fi­lig­ree aro­und a gem­s­to­ne. He res­pec­ted pe­op­le li­ke her, in bu­si­ness, as the dri­vers who cre­ated the we­alth that ma­de his work pos­sib­le. But just to­day he had drop­ped her at the Mer­ce­des de­aler­s­hip to pick up her con­ver­tib­le, in for an oil chan­ge. Pa­using, he saw that the pla­ce of­fe­red free drop-in car was­hes, and whi­le you wa­ited with yo­ur cin­na­mon-top­ped de­caf cap­puc­ci­no you co­uld get a ma­ni­cu­re, or el­se work on yo­ur put­ting at a gre­en aro­und the back. Be­ing an aca­de­mic sci­en­tist aro­und he­re felt li­ke be­ing the po­or co­untry co­usin.

  He wat­c­hed her exa­mi­ne all the flat­wa­re and po­lish it with her nap­kin. This was not ro­uti­ne; she was not a con­t­rol fre­ak who ob­ses­sed over the or­ga­ni­za­ti­on of her en­ti­re li­fe, or who kept co­lor-co­ded fi­les, tho­ugh, yes, she was a bu­si­ness MBA.

  “That was a fun trip,” Ire­ne sa­id in the pen­si­ve to­nes that me­ant she was be­ing dip­lo­ma­tic. “Ah… do you want to hang out with tho­se pe­op­le all yo­ur li­fe?”

  “They’re pretty sop­his­ti­ca­ted, I think,” he sa­id de­fen­si­vely, won­de­ring whe­re she was go­ing with this.

  “They- how to put this ple­asan­t­ly?-work too damn hard.”

  “Scientists do.”

  “Business types, too-but they don’t talk abo­ut not­hing el­se.”

  “It was a spe­ci­alist’s con­fe­ren­ce. That’s all they ha­ve in com­mon.”

  “That, and be­ing out­ra­ge­o­usly horny.”

  He grin­ned. “You ne­ver tho­ught that was a flaw be­fo­re.”

  “I ke­ep re­mem­be­ring the M.I.T guy who be­li­eved he co­uld wow me with-“ she ma­de the qu­ote marks with her fin­gers-“ a ‘me­anin­g­ful con­ver­sa­ti­on’ that in­c­lu­ded qu­oting The Sim­p­sons, gan­g­s­ta flicks, and so­me mo­vie tri­logy.”

  “That was Tol­ke­in.”

&n
bsp; “Elves with swords. I tho­ught you guys we­re sci­en­tists.”

  “We ha­ve…hob­bi­es.”

  “Obsessions, se­ems li­ke.”

  “Our work in­c­lu­ded?”

  She spre­ad her hands. “I res­pect that you’re de­eply in­vol­ved in as­t­ro­nomy, su­re.” She rol­led her eyes. “But it pays so lit­tle! And you’re he­aded in­to a to­ugh te­nu­re de­ci­si­on. Af­ter all the­se ye­ars!”

  “Careers ta­ke ti­me.”

  “Lives do, too. Re­call what to­day is?”

  He kept his fa­ce im­pas­si­ve, the only su­re way to not get the de­er-in-he­ad­lights ex­p­res­si­on he was pro­ne to. “Uh, no…”

  “Six months ago.”

  “Oh, yes. We we­re go­ing to dis­cuss mar­ri­age aga­in.”

  Her eyes glin­ted. “And you’ve be­en hi­ding be­hind yo­ur work…aga­in.”

  “Hey, that’s not fa­ir-“

  “I’m not wa­iting fo­re­ver.”

  “I’m in a crunch he­re. Re­la­ti­on­s­hips don’t ha­ve a

  ‘sell- by’ da­te stam­ped on them-”

  “Time wa­its for no man. I don’t eit­her.”

  Bottom li­ne ti­me, then. He as­ked firmly, “So in­s­te­ad I sho­uld…?”

  She han­ded him a bu­si­ness card.

  “I sho­uld ha­ve known.”

  “Herb Lin­z­fi­eld. Gi­ve him a call.”

  “What in­du­ce­ment do I ha­ve?” He grin­ned to co­ver his con­cern.

  She an­s­we­red ob­li­qu­ely by or­de­ring des­sert, with a si­de­ways glan­ce and flic­ke­ring lit­tle smi­le on her big, rich lips. On to Tom Jones.

  ****

  To get to the VLA from UC Ir­vi­ne me­ans flying out of John Way­ne air­port-the­re’s a hu­ge, lo­oming bron­ze sta­tue of him in cow­boy duds that so­me­how cap­tu­res the ga­it-and thro­ugh Pho­enix to Al­bu­qu­er­que. Ralph did this with legs jam­med up so he co­uldn’t open his lap­top, co­ur­tesy of So­ut­h­west Air­li­nes-and then dro­ve a Bud­get ren­tal west thro­ugh So­cor­ro.

 

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