Death’s Dimensions a psychotic space opera

by Victor Koman

  Virgil read and saw how the Brennen Trust played an integral part in the war.

  Just a month after his last update to Virgil, the Earth tried to seize Bernal Brennen. He moved the entire habitat from Lagrange Point 5 to the Belt and began long negotiations with the Autarchists. He thought he could end the war by giving the Belters a cheap method of shipping the Earthlings what they needed. The cost of teleporting freight in unmanned, computerized craft dropped to a point of positive return on expenditures and the resumption of trade. The war very nearly ended.

  You didn’t figure on Mankind’s stupidest blunder, though.

  Virgil requeued the vid of the anti-matter bombing of Ceres Beta: a sneak attack launched by a secret arm of the Recidivists; an automated slaughter that-once dispatched-could not be stopped.

  Sprawling over nearly ten degrees of the Asteroid Belt, the mining civilization defied visualization from anywhere nearby. Like viewing the Milky Way galaxy, anyone inside the huge chunk of space called Ceres Beta saw only a field of bright lights: habitats, factories, smelters, farms. Only from outside could its true shape and size be appreciated.

  It was from a distance, then-from Mars-that the destruction of Ceres Beta was both visible and comprehensible. The vid shot from a telescope on Phobos showed simultaneous white dots that waxed and waned almost as one, forming a false star cluster that flared and cooled within moments.

  Signaling a schematic of the bomb prototype, captured years later, Virgil marvelled at the efficient way General Cosmos had used Earth’s last kilogram of anti-matter. The attack, code-named Operation Slow Lightning, consisted of a thousand tiny spacecraft, each carrying one gram of anti-hydrogen, each payload the size of a fist. Launched by laser from Earth orbit, the minuscule armada drifted for years, incapable of being recalled even after the resumption of trade. The Terran government denied responsibility for the bombing, but someone had to have authorized the use of the anti-matter. On that, the Terran history books were universally mute.

  The small rocket flares were hidden from Belter view by the bombs’ laser parasols, painted black on the fore end for further camouflage. The strike was coordinated by one tiny automated command ship that trailed on the same slow Hohmann S-curve orbit as the bombs. No one detected a small, slow-moving, widely dispersed swarm of two-kilogram masses in the midst of the asteroid belt.

  Each bomb found its target and destroyed it with brutal simplicity. It drifted toward a Bernal habitat or farm or a factory, hit the side, and shattered. That in itself would generally not have damaged the heavy plating typical of Belter construction. When the bomb broke apart, though, the magnetic field suspending the anti-hydrogen collapsed; the resulting impact of anti-matter with matter released enough energy to blast unsealable ruptures through the structures.

  Millions died of decompression, or of suffocation, or of wounds from the explosions, or of starvation from the famine that followed. Billions of auros worth of equipment, livestock, and homes were laid waste. Even so, the decimation of Ceres Beta hardly crippled the widely spread, vastly decentralized network of habitats.

  The Autarchists’ retaliation for the slaughter was swift and stunning.

  Using the Valliardi Transfer, the Belter government first attempted to send manned warships into Earth orbit. Half the troops died of suicide after experiencing the transfer’s death illusion. Using the Transfer to retreat finished off the rest. Then some bright boy came up with the idea-after stealing plans to Circus Galacticus-of transferring pellets of ordinary matter to the surface of the planet. Then anti-matter pellets, more easily manufactured in deep space than on Earth, were found to provide an even greater blast.

  Tens of billions died in the first, last, and only Valli carpet-bombing of Earth. The horrifically massive retaliation against the crowded planet left Earth a steaming ruin and broke the spirit of the Autarchy. Half out of sickened remorse, half out of revulsion at the idea of further war, the remaining Belters abandoned their government and their homespace, splitting up into small family units to head for trans-Jovian realms. Some fled far enough to mine comets in the frigid Öort layer. Most used ordinary fusion power. Others desperately dared to use the Valliardi Transfer; most of them were never heard from again.

  Earthlings seized the Belt, but refused to call themselves Belters: when they encountered them, Terrans destroyed Belters. The Belters, for the most part, did not fight back. Some, maddened by the Transfer, accepted such retribution gladly. Others, shamed by the carnage conducted in their names by the Autarchy, accepted death with fatalistic relief. They knew Man was destined to leave Earth someday, but they never imagined that it would be in the manner of the living abandoning a corpse.

  Virgil grew ill experiencing the last half-century of blood-drenched history. All dead. Only a few billion people on Earth now, picking through the ruins. They’ll be dead soon, too. Not enough energy. The remaining satellites can’t provide enough power. Most of the receiving stations were wiped out in the Burning.

  Goodbye Earth. Goodbye Wizard, who vanished with Bernal Brennen a day after positron flowers bloomed. Goodbye Pusher, Shaker, Mentalsickmakers. Goodbye Marsface. Goodbye, all you others. Did the blasts kill you? The photon flux and gamma radiation? The famine and plague and systemic breakdown of a planet once stuffed to bursting? Or was it merely Time that took you, the Time that I’ve avoided, the ticking of a clock I’ve jumped away from? Nightsheet keeps the watchworks running, but I’ve stolen my time card.

  No one left.

  Except the Mad Wizard. And Nightsheet. And Master Snoop. And…

  Delia. Virgil stared at the ceiling, thinking. I can feel him inside, the dead man. He squirms to hide but he’s waiting, just as I wait when he takes over. Neither of us knows the other’s plans. He might even be working for Master Snoop. Right inside me. Watching.

  He began to sweat. He tugged at the restrains that held him in a prisoner’s embrace. Listening. Recording everything in my own brain. Making reports while I’m out.

  He kicked feebly at the leg binders. Ready to rise up any time and take over. Something thumped dully far away. Ready to break in. He’s knocking, he’s screaming.

  Sirens wailed. Jord Baker craned his neck to look around. Something thumped again. Vane entered the room and unstrapped him.

  “We’re under attack. A dozen Valli ships have us surrounded. Get out!” Baker stood, tried to get his bearings, then followed Vane.

  “Where to?” He tugged at his hospital robe, trying to keep up with Vane’s pace.

  “We’re taking a tram to the core shelters-” Vane stopped speaking and listened as he ran. A voice thundered around them. Commander Powell’s voice issued from every loud-speaker in the corridor.

  “Battle lasers damaged! Ships holding their position. Angling mass drivers for-” Powell’s voice died. As they ran into the sunlight, the grinding sound of machinery slowing to a stand-still filled the air. Vane stopped.

  “They’ve hit our power relays. Forget the tram.”

  “How about batteries?” Baker asked.

  Vane resumed a slow, even pace, “Should’ve come on already. That spot up there”-he pointed to a cylinder at the habitat’s axis-“has auxiliary power for the combat station, but they must have hit the batteries, too. They mean business. Looks ’zif we walk.”

  Baker followed the Pharmaceutic and craned his head around to observe all of the vast globe that enveloped him. All the way up and over him, life apparently continued as usual on the inside of the sphere. Sunlight shone crisply through the mirror arrays to illuminate the farmland lining three-fourths of the habitat. A lot of the hectarage, though, either lay fallow or appeared to be overgrown with vines and tumbleweeds. Baker estimated from this that Fadeaway supported less than a hundredth the population it was designed for. The air was warm and dry, sure signs of climate control problems that could not be fixed by simple realignment of the solar mirrors. Fadeaway was slowly dying-had been dying for years-and the old soldiers were dying with it.
Vane strode briskly toward the axis of the sphere. Since the hospital sector already rested halfway up the side of the sphere, the climb was steep but the climbing easy.

  “How did you like the history lesson?” Vane asked.

  “What history lesson?”

  Vane’s even stride broke for only an instant, then resumed. He said, “Jord Baker again, eh?”

  Baker stopped, then nodded and resumed his ascent. “I’m getting sick of this. I want a way out.”

  “Out of Fadeaway?”

  “Out of sharing someone else’s body. I’m only vaguely aware of events when Kinney’s in command. I don’t like that feeling of helplessness.”

  “It’s Kinney’s body. Can you presume to claim squatter’s rights?”

  Baker rubbed at his nose with Virgil’s fingers, then reached out for the railing that stretched up the side of the sphere until it became a ladder. He turned his gaze on Vane for a moment, then continued looking ahead.

  “I think, therefore I’m not dead yet. If Kinney can evict me, let him try. I’ve got a plan of my own.” Something puttered behind them like a broken fan. Baker looked around. From the center of the sphere flew two men, each wearing a small hydrogen-powered jet. Flying on a vector that reduced their velocity tangential to the axis-thus negating the pseudo-gravity imparted by the sphere’s spin-they flew as fast as they could for the terrace nearest Vane and Baker.

  At the last conceivable instant, they threw their engines into reverse and decelerated until they struck the wall of the terrace. One man rolled with the motion until he came up standing, the other touched lightly with his hands and walked like an unsupported wheelbarrow until he had absorbed all his momentum and converted it to the spin of the sphere at that latitude. All these maneuvers were performed reflexively, learned through years of living in the habitat. Baker, Earth born and raised, marveled at the pair’s agility with the jet-packs. No longer weightless, the men stood and dusted themselves off.

  The first man handed Vane and Baker communications head-sets, saying, “The enemy’s knocked out all power except for ComStat.” He jerked a thumb toward the Command Battle Station at the central core. “We can’t fight them until they board.”

  Donning the headset, Baker heard the voice of Commander Powell speaking with crisp, calm timbre.

  “-pretty good. Mass drivers inoperative. Cut section five-oh-two. Still hanging in there. Monitor all bands.” The voice paused. One of the fliers ran to a door in the side of the terrace and disappeared.

  “Where to now?” Baker asked his companion. “Keep climbing?” Which way is the shuttle? This pole or the other?

  “Hang on a minute,” the other flier said. “Let Lance get back here.” He hunkered down and crouched to stare into the distance. He spoke into the headset mouthpiece.

  “I see it. Next to the Tyler farm. Probably panel one-twenty-thirty west by eighty-four-forty-five north. I’d say a two meter breach.”

  Baker followed the man’s gaze. Far above them and slightly spinward, on the other side of the axis, a small cloud eddied around one of the huge windows that admitted sunlight from the mirrors outside. A section of wall tumbled from a terrace above and vanished into the cloud. He wondered how long it would take for such a blasthole to vent the sphere’s air into space. Before he could even guess, a voice buzzed in his ear.

  “Vane. Lieutenant Williams says you’ve got Kinney. How is he?”

  Vane frowned for a second, then answered, “Fine. Only he’s Jord Baker again. Why-”

  “We got a message from the approaching attack vessel.

  They’ll trade our lives and Fadeaway for him.”

  Chapter Ten

  23 May, 2163

  Baker watched Vane and listened silently to the conversation with Commander Powell. Lieutenant Williams emerged from the terrace with two more flying harnesses, which he handed to Vane and Baker.

  “Do you scan, Derek?” Powell asked.

  “Yessir.” Vane struggled with the harness, then zipped it up and jumped up and down twice. Williams helped Baker into his. The harness consisted of a firm fiberglass corset similar to those of recreational jet packs on Earth. The stiff rigging from shoulder to buttocks prevented side-to-side hip movement that could lead to a shifting center of thrust and wild gyrations. The rocket gymbals could be controlled either by a powerglove or by remote, eliminating the need for bulky armatures and a separate mounting for the exhaust nozzles.

  “They wanted his ship, too,” Powell continued, “but they’re out of deals on that account. Seems the ship took it upon itself to transfer out when the other ships transferred in.”

  “Shall I escort Baker to the airlock?” the Pharmaceutic asked.

  “Negative. They don’t plan to let us live. Nobody sends a destroyer class ship at fifty gees to pick up a prisoner. Especially when they know he can survive a transfer. They’d just pop in, grab him and take him back in one of those fighters.”

  “Why didn’t the destroyer transfer out here?”

  “Derek-I don’t know.” His tone of voice altered to that of a commander of men and he said, “Attention all hands. Scramble Red. Don pressure suits and weaponry from nearest available lockers. Power’s off, so go to any battle station, even if it’s not yours. Stand by for further orders. ETA for destroyer is approximately Twenty-One Thirty. Stay at condition Red until further notice.” His voice softened a bit, as though he were speaking only to Vane and Baker. “Get Baker to ComStat, Derek.”

  “Here,” Williams said, attaching a nylon cord between his waist and Baker’s. “In case you can’t get the hang of it.” He connected a ribbon cable from the control box on his chest to the one on Baker’s. “We’ll fly synched, so just relax and don’t panic.”

  Starting up his engine, Baker wrinkled his nose at the sharp odor of half-burned hydrogen that assaulted his senses for an instant. “Shove off,” the lieutenant said. He and Baker kicked off together.

  Though Earthborn, Baker knew from vacations to resort habitats that the terms “artificial gravity” and “centrifugal force” were both misnomers for what held people, buildings, and loose items to the inside of the Bernal sphere-or any other rotating space station. The spin of the sphere caused everything touching it-including the atmosphere-to move in the direction of the spin, tangential to the axis. Someone standing on the outside of the sphere would be flung into space as if thrown from a slingshot. On the inside, however, such tangential motion met a firm obstacle: the inside surface of the sphere. It was this constant motion outward that caused the illusion of gravity.

  Since it was not gravity, though, actions impossible on a planet were possible on a habitat. Running spinward along a latitude increased one’s tangential velocity, thus increased ones’ “weight.” Running anti-spinward decreased one’s velocity with relation to the sphere and decreased one’s weight. It was difficult to run fast enough to become weightless, generally, because the air mass moved spinward with the habitat and the relative wind one encountered running anti-spinward was enough to blow one back to the deck. That’s where the jet packs proved useful. The constant thrust was enough to combat the wind, allowing the trained pilot to jet from point to point in the sphere as if he were in freefall around Earth.

  Doing so in practice was as difficult as it sounded in theory. If one tried to fly across latitudes, not only did the Coriolis effect throw one off course, but the motion of the habitat in its Earth orbit contributed to further navigational error. Before the war, it was a simple matter to link all the flying harnesses to a central navigational computer.

  “What do you mean, flying linked?” Baker asked over the engines’ whine.

  “NavCom broke down years ago,” Williams shouted. “We all fly by the seat of our pants here-or, more accurately, by the back of our shoulder blades.” He turned the jet up to full power, Baker’s jet mimicking the increase exactly. They flew together with the ribbon cable between them never growing more than moderately taut.

  The shifting
vectors of acceleration and Coriolis effect, imperceptible while walking up toward the axis, played a nauseating trick on Baker’s inner ear as the four men flew toward the battle station suspended in the center of the sphere. He closed his eyes and waited out the feeling.

  You’re a pilot. You’re used to it. You’re just in someone else’s body who isn’t. It’s so strange to close my eyes and be simply a passenger, to let someone else be the pilot.

  “Damage control reports all blast holes sealed,” someone buzzed in his earphone. “Full integrity restored.” He opened his eyes in time to see the cylinder of ComStat fill his vision. They sped through a hatchway and reversed engines.

  “My compliments,” Baker said, about to step out of the harness. Williams nodded, disconnected the rope and wires, and waved his hand.

  “Don’t desuit. Jet packs stay on at battle stations.”

  “Store the fuel bottles in the safety boxes.” Vane took Baker’s and put them with the others in a thick padded box. Baker noticed that the four of them had slowly settled to the alleged floor of the building. He took one step and floated upward. The core rotated with the sphere, so it imparted its own minuscule tangential motion to everything inside, though being in it was as close to being weightless as was humanly perceptible.

  “Baker’s inside, sir,” Vane said into his headpiece.

  “Bring him up,” came the reply.

  “They want you badly, Vir-Jord. They’ve risked a dozen Valli fighters and a deep thrust destroyer.” Powell looked Baker in the eye. Baker nodded while he scanned the room. Viewscrims covered the inside surface of the axis core of ComStat. Down the middle of the shaft hung a non-rotating cylinder composed entirely of computer consoles. A score of men surrounded the cylinder, facing outward, operating the controls that extended around them, watching their viewscrims. Most of the flickering, shifting light in the station issued from the scrims.