He switched to a lower magnification, so that he could see the entire disk of the planet, now a leprous, mottled grey. After a few more minutes of incredulity, he saw what was really happening; but he could still scarcely believe it.
Jupiter was not moving from its immemorial orbit, but it was doing something almost as impossible. It was shrinking – so swiftly that its edge was creeping across the field even as he focused upon it. At the same time the planet was brightening, from its dull grey to a pearly white. Surely, it was more brilliant than it had ever been in the long years that Man had observed it; the reflected light of the Sun could not possibly – At that moment, Sasha suddenly realized what was happening, though not why, and sounded the general alarm.
When Floyd reached the observation lounge, less than thirty seconds later, his first impression was of the blinding glare pouring through the windows, painting ovals of light on the walls. They were so dazzling that he had to avert his eyes; not even the Sun could produce such brilliance.
Floyd was so astonished that for a moment he did not associate the glare with Jupiter; the first thought that flashed through his mind was: Supernova! He dismissed that explanation almost as soon as it occurred to him; even the Sun's next-door neighbour, Alpha Centauri, could not have matched the awesome display in any conceivable explosion
The light suddenly dimmed; Sasha had operated the external sun shields. Now it was possible to look directly at the source, and to see that it was a mere pinpoint – just another star, showing no dimensions at all. This could have nothing to do with Jupiter; when Floyd had looked at the planet only a few minutes ago, it had been four times larger than the distant, shrunken sun.
It was well that Sasha had lowered the shields. A moment later, that tiny star exploded – so that even through the dark filters it was impossible to watch with the naked eye. But the final orgasm of light lasted only a brief fraction of a second; then Jupiter – or what had been Jupiter – was expanding once again.
It continued to expand, until it was far larger than it had been before the transformation. Soon the sphere of light was fading rapidly, down to merely solar brilliance; and presently Floyd could see that it was actually a hollow shell, for the central star was still clearly visible at its heart.
He did a quick mental calculation. The ship was more than one light-minute from Jupiter, yet that expanding shell – now turning into a bright-edged ring – already covered a quarter of the sky. That meant it was coming toward them at – My God! – nearly half the speed of light. Within minutes, it would engulf the ship.
Until then, no one had spoken a word since Sasha's first announcement. Some dangers are so spectacular and so much beyond normal experience that the mind refuses to accept them as real, and watches the approach of doom without any sense of apprehension. The man who looks at the onrushing tidal wave, the descending avalanche, or the spinning funnel of the tornado, yet makes no attempt to flee, is not necessarily paralysed with fright or resigned to an unavoidable fate. He may simply be unable to believe that the message of his eyes concerns him personally. It is all happening to somebody else.
As might have been expected, Tanya was the first to break the spell, with a series of orders that brought Vasili and Floyd hurrying to the bridge.
'What do we do now?' she asked, when they had assembled.
We certainly can't run away, thought Floyd. But perhaps we can improve the odds.
'The'ship's broadside on,' he said. 'Shouldn't we turn away from that thing so we're a smaller target? And get as much of our mass as we can between it and us, to act as a radiation shield?'
Vasili's fingers were already flying over the controls.
'You're right, Woody – though it's already too late as far as any gammas and X rays are concerned. But there may be slower neutrons and alphas and heaven knows what else still on the way.'
The patterns of light began to slide down the walls as the ship turned ponderously on its axis. Presently they vanished completely; Leonov was now oriented so that virtually all its mass lay between the fragile human cargo and the approaching shell of radiation.
Will we actually feel the shock wave, wondered Floyd, or will the expanding gases be too tenuous to have any physical effect by the time they reach us? Seen from the external cameras, the ring of fire now almost encircled the sky. But it was fading rapidly; some of the brighter stars could even be seen shining through it. We're going to live, thought Floyd. We've witnessed the destruction of the greatest of planets – and we've survived.
And presently the cameras showed nothing except stars – even if one was a million times brighter than all the others. The bubble of fire blown by Jupiter had swept harmlessly past them, impressive though it had been. At their distance from the source, only the ship's instruments had recorded its passing.
Slowly, the tension aboard relaxed. As always happens in such circumstances, people started to laugh and to make silly jokes. Floyd scarcely heard them; despite his relief at still being alive, he felt a sense of sadness.
Something great and wonderful had been destroyed. Jupiter, with all its beauty and grandeur and now never-to-be-solved mysteries, had ceased to exist. The father of all the gods had been struck down in his prime.
Yet there was another way of looking at the situation. They had lost Jupiter: What had they gained in its place?
Tanya, judging her moment nicely, rapped for attention.
'Vasili – any damage?'
'Nothing serious – one camera burned out. All radiation meters still well above normal, but none near danger limits.'
'Katerina – check the total dosage we've received. It looks as if we were lucky, unless there are more surprises. We certainly owe a vote of thanks to Bowman – and to you, Heywood. Do you have any idea what happened?'
'Only that Jupiter's turned into a sun.'
'I always thought it was much too small for that. Didn't someone once call Jupiter "the sun that failed"?'
'That's true,' said Vasili, 'Jupiter is too small for fusion to start – unaided.'
'You mean, we've just seen an example of astronomical engineering?'
'Undoubtedly. Now we know what Zagadka was up to.'
'How did it do the trick? If you were given the contract, Vasili, how would you ignite Jupiter?'
Vasili thought for a minute, then shrugged wryly. 'I'm only a theoretical astronomer – I don't have much experience in this line of business. But let's see... Well, if I'm not allowed to add about ten Jupiter masses, or change the gravitational constant, I suppose I'll have to make the planet denser – hmm, that's an idea...'
His voice trailed off into silence; everyone waited patiently, eyes flickering from time to time to the viewing screens.
The star that had been Jupiter seemed to have settled down after its explosive birth; it was now a dazzling point of light, almost equal to the real Sun in apparent brilliance.
'I'm just thinking out loud – but it might be done this way. Jupiter is – was – mostly hydrogen. If a large percentage could be converted into much denser material – who knows, even neutron matter? – that would drop down to the core. Maybe that's what the billions of Zagadkas were doing with all the gas they were sucking in. Nucleosynthesis – building up higher elements from pure hydrogen. That would be a trick worth knowing! No more shortage of any metal – gold as cheap as aluminium!'
'But how would that explain what happened?' asked Tanya.
'When the core became dense enough, Jupiter would collapse – probably in a matter of seconds. The temperature would rise high enough to start fusion. Oh, I can see a dozen objections – how would they get past the iron minimum; what about radiative transfer; Chandrasekhar's limit. Never mind. This theory will do to start with; I'll work out the details later. Or I'll think of a better one.'
'I'm sure you will, Vasili,' Floyd agreed. 'But there's a more important question. Why did they do it?'
'A warning?' ventured Katerina over the ship's intercom.
&nb
sp; 'Against what?'
'We'll find that out later.'
'I don't suppose,' said Zenia diffidently, 'that it was an accident?'
That brought the discussion to a dead halt for several seconds.
'What a terrifying idea!' said Floyd. 'But I think we can rule it out. If that was the case, there'd have been no warn – Perhaps. If you start a forest fire because you've been careless, at least you do your best to warn everyone.'
'And there's another thing we'll probably never know,' lamented Vasili. 'I always hoped Carl Sagan would be right, and there'd be life on Jupiter.'
'Our probes never saw any.'
'What chance did they have? Would you find any life on Earth, if you looked at a few hectares of the Sahara or the Antarctic? That's about all we ever did on Jupiter.'
'Hey!' said Brailovsky. 'What about Discovery – and Hal?' Sasha switched on the long-range receiver and started to search on the beacon frequency. There was no trace of a signal.
After a while, he announced to the silently waiting group:
'Discovery's gone.'
No one looked at Dr Chandra; but there were a few muted words of sympathy, as if in consolation to a father who had just lost a son.
But Hal had one last surprise for them.
53 – A Gift of Worlds
The radio message beamed to Earth must have left Discovery only minutes before the blast of radiation engulfed the ship. It was in plain text and merely repeated over and over again:
ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS – EXCEPT EUROPA.
ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE.
There were about a hundred repetitions; then the letters became garbled, and the transmission ceased.
'I begin to understand,' said Floyd, when the message had been relayed by an awed and anxious Mission Control.
'That's quite a parting present – a new sun, and the planets around it.'
'But why only three?' asked Tanya.
'Let's not be greedy,' Floyd replied. 'I can think of one very good reason. We know there's life on Europa. Bowman – or his friends, whoever they may be – want us to leave it alone.'
'That makes good sense in another way,' said Vasili. 'I've been doing some calculations. Assuming that Sol 2 has settled down and will continue to radiate at its present level, Europa should have a nice tropical climate – when the ice has melted. Which it's doing pretty quickly right now.'
'What about the other moons?'
'Ganymede will be quite pleasant – the dayside will be temperate. Callisto will be very cold; though if there's much outgassing, the new atmosphere may make it habitable. But Io will be even worse than it is now, I expect.'
'No great loss. It was hell even before this happened.'
'Don't write off Io,' said Curnow. 'I know a lot of Texarab oilmen who'd love to tackle it, just on general principles. There must be something valuable, in a place as nasty as that. And by the way, I've just had a rather disturbing thought.'
'Anything that disturbs you must be serious,' said Vasili. 'What is it?'
'Why did Hal send that message to Earth, and not to us? We were much closer.'
There was a rather long silence; then Floyd said thoughtfully: 'I see what you mean. Perhaps he wanted to make certain it was received on Earth.'
'But he knew we would relay it – oh!' Tanya's eyes widened, as if she had just become aware of something unpleasant.
'You've lost me,' complained Vasili.
'I think this is what Walter's driving at,' said Floyd. 'It's all very well to feel grateful to Bowman – or whatever gave that warning. But that's all they did. We could still have been killed.'
'But we weren't,' answered Tanya. 'We saved ourselves – by our own efforts. And perhaps that was the whole idea. If we hadn't – we wouldn't have been worth saving. You know, survival of the fittest. Darwinian selection. Eliminating the genes for stupidity.'
'I've an unpleasant feeling you're right,' said Curnow. 'And if we'd stuck to our launch date, and not used Discovery as a booster, would it, or they, have done anything to save us? That wouldn't have required much extra effort for an intelligence that could blow up Jupiter.'
There was an uneasy silence, broken at last by Heywood Floyd.
'On the whole,' he said, 'I'm very glad that's one question we'll never get answered.'
54 – Between Suns
The Russians, thought Floyd, are going to miss Walter's songs and wisecracks on the way home. After the excitement of the last few days, the long fall Sunward – and Earthward – will seem a monotonous anticlimax. But a monotonous, uneventful trip was what everyone devoutly hoped for.
He was already feeling sleepy, but was still aware of his surroundings and capable of reacting to them. Will I look as dead when I'm in hibernation? he asked himself. It was always disconcerting to look at another person – especially someone very familiar – when he had entered the long sleep.
Perhaps it was too poignant a reminder of one's own mortality.
Curnow was completely out, but Chandra was still awake, though already groggy from the final injection. He was obviously no longer himself, for he seemed quite unperturbed by his own nakedness or Katerina's watchful presence. The gold lingam that was his only article of clothing kept trying to float away from him, until its chain recaptured it.
'Everything going okay, Katerina?' asked Floyd.
'Perfectly. But how I envy you. In twenty minutes, you'll be home.'
'If that's any consolation – how can you be sure we won't have some horrible dreams?'
'No one's ever reported any.'
'Ah – they may forget them when they wake up.'
Katerina, as usual, took him quite seriously. 'Impossible. If there were dreams in hibernation, the EEG records would have revealed them. Okay, Chandra – close your eyes. Ah – there he goes. Now it's your turn, Heywood. The ship will seem very strange without you.'
'Thanks, Katerina... hope you have a nice trip.'
Drowsy though he was, Floyd became aware that Surgeon-Commander Rudenko seemed a little uncertain, even – could it be? – shy. It looked as if she wanted to tell him something, but couldn't make up her mind.
'What is it, Katerina?' he said sleepily.
'I haven't told anyone else yet – but you certainly won't be talking. Here's a little surprise.'
'You'd... better... hurry...'
'Max and Zenia are going to get married.'
'That... is... supposed... to... be... a... surprise?...'
'No. It's just to prepare you. When we get back to Earth, so are Walter and I. What do you think of that?'
Now I understand why you were spending so much time together. Yes, it is indeed a surprise... who would have thought it!
'I'm... very... happy... to... hear...'
Floyd's voice faded out before he could complete the sentence. But he was not yet unconscious, and was still able to focus some of his dissolving intellect on this new situation.
I really don't believe it, he said to himself. Walter will probably change his mind before he wakes up.
And then he had one final thought, just before he went to sleep himself. If Walter does change his mind, he'd better not wake up.
Dr Heywood Floyd thought that was very funny. The rest of the crew often wondered why he was smiling all the way back to Earth.
55 – Lucifer Rising
Fifty times more brilliant than the full Moon, Lucifer had transformed the skies of Earth, virtually banishing night for months at a time. Despite its sinister connotations, the name was inevitable; and indeed 'Light-bringer' had brought evil as well as good. Only the centuries and the millennia would show in which direction the balance tilted.
On the credit side, the end of night had vastly extended the scope of human activity, especially in the less-developed countries. Everywhere, the need for artificial lighting had been substantially reduced, with resulting huge savings in electrical power. It was as if a giant lamp had been hoisted into space, to shine upon half the gl
obe. Even in daytime Lucifer was a dazzling object, casting distinct shadows.
Farmers, mayors; city managers, police, seamen, and almost all those engaged in outdoor activities – especially in remote areas – welcomed Lucifer; it had made their lives much safer and easier. But it was hated by lovers, criminals, naturalists, and astronomers.
The first two groups found their activities seriously restricted, while naturalists were concerned about Lucifer's impact upon animal life. Many nocturnal creatures had been seriously affected, while others had managed to adapt. The Pacific grunion, whose celebrated mating pattern was locked to high tides and moonless nights, was in grave trouble, and seemed to be heading for rapid extinction.
And so, it seemed, were Earth-based astronomers. That was not such a scientific catastrophe as it would once have been, for more than fifty per cent of astronomical research depended upon instruments in space or on the Moon. They could be easily shielded from Lucifer's glare; but terrestrial observatories were seriously inconvenienced by the new sun in what had once been the night sky.
The human race would adapt, as it had done to so many changes in the past. A generation would soon be born that had never known a world without Lucifer; but that brightest of all stars would be an eternal question to every thinking man and woman.
Why had Jupiter been sacrificed – and how long would the new sun radiate? Would it burn out quickly, or would it maintain its power for thousands of years– perhaps for the lifetime of the human race? Above all, why the interdiction upon Europa, a world now as cloud-covered as Venus?
There must be answers to those questions; and Mankind would never be satisfied until it had found them.
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