Flare

by Roger Zelazny

  When the counter clicked through his mark, the screen whited out, saturated with brilliance. He ran the sequence again, trying to freeze it at the exact second, hoping to catch the opening frames of the bridge's collapse. But the action was too quick, the burst of energy too complete and consuming.

  Freede played his second disk, reading in the x-ray range, 10 Angstroms. The same dull round, perhaps showing even fewer features. And, at the mark, the same drenching flash.

  For an instant, the doctor worried that the blast might have damaged the short-frequency observing heads, which were all located outside the insulating shell of Hyperion's thick hull. Then Freede remembered where he himself had been observing at the instant the flare had flashed past the ship.

  Across the screen's bottom, the computer calculated the intensity of emission—at these frequencies, measured in Roentgens—for any point selected on the monitor's face. The cursor happened to be blinking somewhere near the center of the screen. He didn't bother to move it, because the burst of radiation was so uniform. The callout showed 2,100 Roentgens, which was three times the human-lethal dose in rems.

  Now, Freede thought almost giddily, he would have a chance to test firsthand, as a scientist, the radiation-shielding effects of two layers of thermal-tolerant glass, a smear of freon gel, and a pastiche of interlocking liquid crystals. Then he thought that perhaps Gyeli, working down in the Hydroponics Section, had been better protected by the ship's mass.

  As these realizations rushed in on him, Freede quickly accepted that he had no time for morbid thoughts. There was simply too much to do.

  First, he should warn someone. Warn the Earth. Warn the Moon. Warn the colonies exposed throughout the system. It was still early for his regularly scheduled transmission but, if he called on several bands, someone might be listening. Freede powered up his communications console.

  SQUAWK!

  The speaker warbled and spat. It took him a few seconds to figure out that this was a residue of the flare's energy, howling down into the meter-range wavelengths, where his comm frequencies operated.

  Orbiting at the approximate distance of Mercury from the sun, about three light-minutes out, Hyperion was now on the backside of the wave representing the flare's disruptions. Freede and Gyeli were separated from Earth, the Moon, and all humankind by its blast of electromagnetic energy. That wavefront would reach the first of the inhabited satellite posts in about five minutes. Anything he could tell the listeners after that time would sound like a postmortem.

  Freede tried anyway. He gathered his thoughts into a concise description of what he had observed, punctuated with such readings as his equipment had made, and broadcast them into the growling static. It was a scientist's first report of a mammoth solar flare, the like of which the sun had not produced in more than eighty years, or possibly never before.

  Maybe someone would hear this message. Maybe the doubters, the people who wanted to delay any renewal of the sun's variability, would now understand, and accept, and begin to take sensible precautions.

  Because the electromagnetic wavefront wasn't the flare's only consequence. Coming behind that lightspeed surge of energy, a storm of charged particles—protons and helium nuclei expelled when the gas prominence blew apart—was moving outward at more than 1,400 kilometers per second. Their scattered charges would play havoc with the Earth's and Moon's magnetic fields. The ion storm would induce huge, false voltages in any unshielded electronics, overloading and burning out circuits. And in this case "unshielded" meant most of the spaceborne equipment now in service throughout the solar system. Anything that might withstand that first electromagnetic pulse, which was coming at the human worlds five minutes from now, would surely flare up and die in the magnetic storm following it. Including most of Hyperion's electronics.

  Thump!

  Thump!

  Bump!

  Thud!

  Aboard Hyperion, March 21, 18:57 UT

  Dr. Hannibal Freede pulled himself down the ship's nullgee man way, flinging himself through the turns and overreaching his handholds. The result was a bruising freefall, bouncing him like a tennis ball off the hard, aluminum-hexacomb bulkheads. He barely registered the pain.

  "Gyeli!" Freede called, from the hatchway into Hydroponics.

  "What now?" Angelika looked up from her work, a scrub brush in one hand, a lattice of fine wires in the other, and clouds of fine bubbles floating around her arms.

  As always, Freede's breath caught when he came upon his wife's beauty unawares. She had long, golden hair that was now tied in a single long braid and protected from the flying liquid with a length of red cloth. The hair, pulling back from her pale face, gently drew her features up, accenting the curve of her dark brows, the line of her elliptical eyelids, the shelf of her sharp cheekbones, the angles of her long jaw and pointed chin. Angelika's aristocratic, Eurasian features always stopped his heart

  The weightless lift of microgravity did nothing to harm her figure either. Under the work smock, her heavy breasts shifted slowly, regally with each breath. Her long, slender limbs—strong with the exercise she took on the springmill every day—moved easily at the task of shoving the filter screens around the cabin. She touched one toe here against the wall, bumped one buttock there against the floor, her long body swinging their mass with a nudge and a swing.

  "What?" Gyeli asked again.

  "We have to prepare the ship for maneuvering. Leave those for now—they'll fell flat when the acceleration hits. But you have to get, oh, dishes, loose equipment, breakable stuff, anything heavy, under wraps."

  "Maneuvering?" She stared at him as if he were speaking Greek. "When is this? And why?"

  "The when is less than twelve hours. Six, if we want to be prudent about it There's been a flare, a large one—"

  "Oh, good! Then your theories about renewed solar activity were right all along. You should be—"

  "Yes, the spot was active, all right," Freede said, dismissing his own greatest achievement, the crowning observation of his scientific career. "And now we are in great danger, my dear.

  "The electromagnetic burst has already passed us—as soon as I detected it, in fact," he explained. "But in a minimum of six hours, at this distance, an ion storm is going to traverse this area. The ship's controls were simply not designed to withstand so immense a flux. That's my fault, of course, for not being resolute in my theories and so more conservative in my preparations. But now, at this close range, if we don't start firing on a vector to take us home, even our shielded circuits may burn out. Then we'll never leave this orbit."

  "I understand, dear," Gyeli said, after a frown of sober concentration. "Don't worry. I know what to strap down and what to let go crash. You work with the ram engine. It will take, um—how long to build up internal velocities?"

  "Four hours. But then, as soon as that gas wave hits, we'll be feeding it an enriched stream."

  "A squeaker for timing. What's the chance that an overpressure will snuff the burn?"

  "Unknown," he admitted, "but we don't have a second alternative."

  "You're right, of course. And we're years early for the rendezvous. Are you going to radio McSartin, Vrain and ask them to send the probe ahead of us?"

  Freede considered the suggestion. "I think not. We're in a blackout right now… and after the e-mag wave hits Earth, there will be too much confusion for anyone to think clearly about our problems. I've sent a general warning, of course, but they will get it too late, if at all."

  "Of course. So, are we simply going to drift beyond Jupiter, Han? We have supplies, but—"

  "I'm going to try to work out, and then lock in, the firing for a high-energy trajectory that should put us in a much wider solar orbit The ship will end up somewhere near the Earth-Moon system. There will be risks...."

  "As you say, we have no alternatives."

  "It'll get you most of the way home, my dear. And then, when the dust has settled, one of the El shuttles will be—"

  "What
do you mean, 'me,' Han? You'll get us both home, won't you?" She smiled at him.

  "Slip of the tongue, Gel. Sorry."

  "Of course, dear." She moved close to him in freefall, passed an arm around his neck, and kissed him squarely on the mouth. It was a long, warm kiss.

  Freede's heart raced.

  "Now, on your way to that engine." Gyeli spun him around and shoved him toward the hatch. "I'll make shipshape down here."

  Chapter 9

  Electromagnetic Fields

  Leap

  Bound

  Stumble

  Fall

  Tranquility Shores, Luna Colony, March 21,18:52 UT

  "Look at me, Miss Tochman!"

  Gina Tochman checked the communications band on her left wrist. The ninth diode was lit. She glanced up, looking for the figure with the big, square "9" on its jumper. There she or he was, about twenty meters away, doing a somersault across the field of gray sand. Gina made a quick scan of the names and numbers written on the cuff of her own jumper. The ninth was Perry Leekman.

  She dialed in the appropriate comm channel. "Nice going, Mr. Leekman!" she called.

  The Moon Walkers were playing around her like children, as always. Since they had arrived at the resort, with its invigorating one-sixth gravity, these people had been confined in underground corridors and smallish rooms. One good jump anywhere in the complex—or even a careless move, like getting up too fast from a chair—would crack their skulls on the overhead. So the moment they got outside, away from the low ceilings, they went wild.

  Of course, there was always the Bounce Tube. This was an abandoned pressure tank, four meters in diameter and thirty-five deep, dug down below the West Mall. Some enterprising facilities manager had fitted the space with wall padding, a trampoline bottom, and piped-in white music. For fifty neumarks an hour, hyperactive children and athletic adults could exercise their muscles and try beating the Tube's jump record, or fall on their butts trying. The current top was twenty-seven meters, sixty-one centis, set by Gina herself during the one time she'd used the Tube, which was the only time she'd had fifty neu to spree.

  Moon Walk was cheaper.

  Number 5 bounced past her, doing a kangaroo hop. From the way that person—checked out as Mrs. Katajoosian—was covering ground and leading with her helmet, Gina Tochman felt a warning was required.

  "Watch out, Ms. Kay!" she called over Channel 5.

  "What I do wrong?" the woman asked quickly in a lilting accent that Gina thought might be some variety of Turkic overlaid on Russian.

  "Nothing yet. But that's not a crash helmet you're wearing. And those are rocks in front of you."

  "Oh! Oh!" The woman looked over her shoulder, turning herself around in midair. "And how is I stop?"

  “Just quit bouncing."

  "But my legs do not stop!" she called, landing and instantly rebounding on her short legs.

  "Then sit down!"

  The plump woman pulled up her heels and crash-landed from a height of three meters. "Ooof!" Gina knew Mrs. Katajoosian was over a soft patch of dust, and not gravel or hard plaque. She picked herself up and rubbed her backside.

  "You be careful now," Gina called, and spread her attention among the rest of her charges.

  She dialed in Channel 12. "Mr. Carlin?"

  This figure was nowhere in sight, which meant he might be behind a rock or have wandered off into a ray's depression. That was a potential problem, because these radios were mostly line-of-sight, without a lot of scatter. The resort had never bought a long-range repeater at forty-nine to fifty-one megahertz for its suit communications. Well, the man wouldn't be hard to find, not in the full glare of lunar noon. And maybe he had just gone back into the garage.

  "Mr. Car—"

  Brazz-ZAPP!

  The noise coming from Tochman's earbuds was like getting slapped on both sides of her head at once.

  Bark-bargle-bong.

  Either the noise was fading, or her hearing had suffered some kind of permanent damage. Gina's ears felt numb and wet—she wondered if that was blood.

  Brizzle-drizzle-BOOP!

  Dead silence.

  No, there was still a pearly ringing in her ears, like bell voices, with an underlying crackle of static. Loud static, she decided, from the way it wormed itself through her temporary deafness.

  She clicked through the comm channels, trying to find one that wasn't affected by the malfunction.

  "What—!"

  Hummm!

  "—that's a—"

  "—I can't—"

  Humm!

  "—hurts—"

  Hum!

  "—my ears!"

  All the channels were either dead or drowning in the same ragged static. On the live ones, the excited voices of her Moon Walkers came as a bare whisper under the noise. But Gina was sure that, instead of whispering, they were all screaming by now, because the same punishing burst must have flared up in each headset.

  This sort of malfunction was very unusual. In the past she might have had one or two radios go out on her, but never the whole group all at once like this.

  Gina Tochman turned to the command channel and overrode them. "Now listen to me, folks! Stay right where you are, please. Stop moving and give me your attention, please."

  About ten of the twenty-odd figures within her sight, scattered in pairs and singles across the rock garden, froze like statues. The rest continued walking straight ahead or gamboling about. So either their radios were dead, or her own wasn't sending on that channel, or those people just didn't want to be bothered right now.

  But some of the stationary Moon Walkers had actually turned toward Gina. It couldn't be the sound of her voice, because the earbuds in these suits were monophonic and directionless. Still, she found the reaction encouraging. It meant those people had been keeping an eye on her—or on her suit with its square red "0" slashed through to indicate a numeral—all along. Caution in a strange environment was the sign of a survivor type.

  "We've had a minor radio malfunction," Gina said. "It seems to affect every channel. I can hear most of you, but I don't know if you can hear me. Obviously, not everyone can. So, if someone is not standing still and listening to this announcement, that indicates a problem with his or her radio. Would you now please wave at these people who are near you, or get their attention somehow, because they are in great danger."

  Across the field, the people who were standing by went after the walkers and the jumpers. They grabbed at arms or waved their own in front of the bubble helmets, until finally the area within Tochman's sight was filled with clumps of idle, shuffling people.

  "Thank you," she said, still on the command channel. "What I want to do first is a roll call. When I say your name, you should both answer on your suit mike and raise your hand. Then we'll know what the damage is. Okay?" She clicked to Channel 1. "Mr. Eiders?"

  The man, who was ten meters off and looking straight at her, shot up his whole arm like a child answering in school. "What I want to know," he said petulantly, under the residual static, "is if you're going to take this off our guaranteed walk time."

  Gina ignored him, dialing in Channel 2. "Ms. Fischer?”

  The woman, standing right beside her, raised her hand. "Right here, dear."

  And so it went. Twenty-two calls. Twelve verbal replies—along with a few complaints, some anger, and a little mild hysteria—and for two more a show of hands only. The rest, with totally dead radios, Gina counted by a clumsy form of pantomime.

  But she couldn't find Mr. Carlin.

  "All right, folks." Gina went back on command. "Everyone is accounted for except Number 12, Mr. Stephano Carlin. What I want you to do—without leaving your spot—is look around and see if you can spot anyone with a twelve on his chest. Look carefully, especially you people on the edges of the group. Will you do that now, please?"

  Across the field, the fourteen figures with working radios spun on their heels like bulky tops in their padded suits. One person fell dow
n and quickly righted herself.

  "If you see him," Tochman prompted, "then call to me or wave."

  No one responded. A few of the figures shrugged.

  "Okay, folks, we've got a problem. One of our Walkers is in trouble. So I have to start a search for him. But first I'm going to lead you in. I want you all to start walking directly toward me. If someone near you is mute, please take him or her by the arm—"

  "Are we going to get a refund or not?" Eiders broke in on his own channel.

  "Yes, sir," she promised. But she used his Channel 1 in private mode; she could see no sense in running up costs.

  The other people started to come toward her at a slow walk, with no one running or bounding along. The spirit had all gone out of them.

  Choof!

  Chug!

  Chug!

  Chug!

  Equipment Garage, Tranquility Shores, March 21, 19:09 UT

  When the doorseals tightened and the ambient built up, Gina Tochman's pressure suit became less of an itch. She immediately shucked the thermal jumper and began clawing at the snaps of her helmet bubble—then thought better of it. She would be going right out again with the search party, wouldn't she?

  As soon as the meter set into the far wall showed a pressure of at least ninety-five millibars, the manway from the Maintenance Office popped opened, and Sylvia Peers burst in among the Moon Walkers wearing her bright civies and a pair of corridor slippers. She kept her distance from the tourists, whose jumpers had picked up a coating of fine dust during their tumbles; on contact with the dry air it acquired a high static charge and would leap onto her clean clothing. Then Syls spotted Tochman and made a beeline for her.