The Web Between the Worlds

by Charles Sheffield

  “Suppose we don’t use rockets at all,” he said. “Rockets are like ferry-boats, taking materials and people up and down. Suppose that instead of ferry-boats we were to build a bridge to space. The idea is simple enough: we take a cable, tethered to a point of the Earth’s surface, somewhere on the equator. It extends vertically upwards, all the way up to synchronous orbit, where we are now, and on beyond it. At the far end, we have some kind of ballast weight. See the picture? The whole thing hangs there in equilibrium, with the downward forces from all the length of cable below geosynchronous altitude just balancing the outward forces from centrifugal acceleration. The ballast weight wants to fly outward, but the cable prevents that, and the outward tension on the cable is just balanced by the force on the tether point, down on the surface. The whole assembly rotates, at exactly the same speed as the Earth. Like this.”

  Regulo pressed another key. The rotating Earth-Moon system now showed a long cable, extending up from the surface of the Earth and rotating steadily with it.

  Rob stared at the display, thoughtfully, head to one side and hand rubbing at his black beard. He had not bothered to remove the eleven-day growth before he and Corrie left Suget Jangal. “It sounds nice. But I don’t see how it could work. Every element on that cable wants to move in a different orbit. Every part of it wants to move around the Earth at a different speed.”

  “Quite true.” Regulo sounded confident, and it was clear that he was enjoying himself. “Elements of the cable want to move at different speeds — but they can’t. The tension in the cable prevents that from happening. There’s no difference between this situation and a stone swinging around on the end of a rope.”

  He reached again to the side of the desk and picked up another listing. “Look, Rob, this isn’t something I’ve just now dreamed up. You can find references to it in the literature — as an idea, not as an engineering reality — over ninety years ago. The first suggestions for a system like this one go back to the 1960’s, maybe even farther. All the orbital mechanics were studied back then. This is a list of some of the references. I told you, I’ve known about the idea and wanted to build it for over forty years. The thing that always held me back was the problem of materials. We never had anything strong enough to support the cable’s own weight, never mind carry other materials up and down. I’ve been watching the progress in materials science, year after year, looking for something like that article I just showed you. Finally, it came.”

  Regulo again picked up the abstract that he and Rob had been reading earlier. He tapped the page with a thin finger. “There’s a crucial point about this that you might have missed on a quick read through. These doped silicon whiskers for cable-making can be produced cheaply, and that’s the key to everything. They’re even less expensive than the graphite ones.”

  Rob was still staring at the image on the display screen. His eyes were blank as he performed rapid mental calculations. “Regulo, that thing would have to be at least seventy thousand kilometers long, just to keep the ballast weight to a reasonable value. My God, what a project — and I thought the Tasmanian Bridge might be the biggest job I’d ever see.”

  Regulo watched approvingly as Rob’s absorption in the display before him increased. “You see now why I’m interested in the Spider,” he said. “You know, I noticed at once when you patented the Spider, three years ago. I thought it was just the thing we’d need if I ever got the chance to build this one. We tried to duplicate the idea for ourselves, thinking we might find a way around your patents once we understood the process. We never came close. That’s when I realized the two of us ought to be talking. It’s one of my basic principles, hire anybody who does something that I can’t. As for your estimate of seventy thousand kilometers…”

  He leaned forward and again pressed a key on the control board. The display remained in position, but an additional message appeared at the foot of the screen: CABLE DESIGN LENGTH: ONE HUNDRED AND FIVE THOUSAND KILOMETERS.

  “What would it mass to give a reasonable transportation capability?” Rob emerged from a fury of introspective calculation. “Where would you get the materials to make it? Where would you get the power to run it? And where would you assemble it? — I can see problems in that, even now. And I don’t see how you’d get the permits that would let you put it together and bring it down to Earth.” He shook his head. “Regulo, it’s fascinating, but I have so many questions about it that I don’t know where to begin.”

  “Excellent!” The other man nodded his gnarled head. As much as his ruined face could show anything, it displayed deep satisfaction. “You’re interested. I was quite sure you would be, once you heard about it. As for your questions, I could probably answer most of them now, but I suggest we do things a little differently. I propose that you go back down to Earth, think about this for a while, read the references, and make your own first shot at an engineering design. If you’re anything like me, you’ll want to do your own design anyway, no matter what anybody else says.”

  Rob smiled ruefully. Regulo had put his finger on a key point of the Merlin engineering philosophy — don’t accept a design unless you’ve been over it for yourself. He nodded agreement.

  “I thought that might get to you,” said Regulo happily. “Take a look at the design of the Spider, too, and see if it can be speeded up, the way we talked about. You ought to think in terms of a hundred thousand kilometers of cable — see now why I need a capacity of at least two hundred kilometers a day? I’d be happier if you could even double that. And take a look at the old reports on the dynamics of the bridge. You’ll see that it’s often called a skyhook, although to me it always seems more like a beanstalk.” He laughed. “Up from the surface of the Earth, to a new land at the top of it — surely that’s a beanstalk, if ever I heard of one. Pity your name isn’t Jack.”

  Regulo reached over and switched off the display. “Come back and see me when you’ve had a chance to get your head around some kind of design and installation plan, and let’s fight it out between the two of us. I’ll warn you, I have my own ideas, and I’ve been thinking about all this for an awful long time. You’ll have to come up with something at least as good, and convince me of it. Of course, I don’t know the real potential of the Spider, and you do, so that gives you one advantage.”

  He rose stiffly from his chair, movements labored and clumsy even in the low gravity of the station. “We’ve done enough for the moment. Damn it, I don’t have the stamina I need. Fifty years ago I never got tired, now I’m tired before we even begin. Go on and get Cornelia for me, would you? Tell her that we’re done here, and you’re ready to go back down again. Unless there are other things that you think we have to settle now? Any money questions, for instance — we haven’t even mentioned those.”

  Rob shook his head. “Let me convince myself that your beanstalk is feasible. We’ll have plenty of time to talk contracts after that.” He looked curiously into Regulo’s pale eyes. “I do have one question. If I take over the engineering, what will your role be? You started it, and I’m sure you’ll want to be involved.”

  “Me?” The old man chuckled gruffly. “Why, if you’re going to be Jack for the beanstalk, then I suppose that I ought to be cast as the Ogre. I’ve got the looks for it, you’ll have to admit. But if you mean what I’ll be doing to help, I’ll tell you in detail next time. Don’t worry, there’s plenty of work for two. For one thing, there’s the whole question of the financing. We haven’t talked cost, but believe me it will be more than you can easily imagine — luckily I have access to that much, and maybe a bit more. I’ve been making an awful lot of money, for an awful long time, and I don’t have many good ways to spend it. Then there’s materials. It will take more than you’ll easily get from Earth to build the beanstalk, and I’ll show you where it will all come from. You tell me where you want to construct it, and how, and I’ll get you the makings.”

  He moved slowly to the door of the study and slid it open, leaning his weight against it. R
ob could see more clearly how wasted the old man’s frame had become, with his clothing hanging loosely on his stooped shoulders.

  “Down the corridor to the end, then turn right,” said Regulo. “You ought to find Cornelia in the next room along. Tell Joseph Morel — he’ll be there with her — that we’re done, and say I want to talk to him now.” He took a deep breath. “By God, Merlin, I’ve enjoyed this talk. More than anything else in months. Have a look at the design, then I’ll expect to see you again.”

  “Here?”

  Regulo shook his head slowly. “I don’t think so. This place doesn’t have the facilities we need. Come on out to Atlantis. I’ll show you around, and you’ll get an idea what a good place to live looks like. Cornelia can make all the arrangements to get you there.”

  He took Rob’s hand as though to shake it, then lifted it higher and held it in both of his. He examined it curiously, turning it over and studying the nails, fingers and palms. “Remarkable,” he said at last. “It even feels right. It’s at body temperature, or close to it, and the texture could pass for skin. How sensitive are the fingers?”

  Rob flexed them, then held both his hands out in front of him. “Better than human. I can feel a hair under a sheet of paper, or the year on a coin.”

  “And strength?”

  “They’ll do. They’re probably twice as strong as my own would have been.”

  “Aye.” Regulo rubbed his thumb thoughtfully along the back of Rob’s hand. “Quite a job they did, all things considered. Frostbite, wasn’t it? I’m surprised they didn’t re-grow them.”

  “They couldn’t. I’m one of the unlucky two percent that can’t regenerate.” Rob met Regulo’s bright eyes. “How did you know about the frostbite?”

  “The same way I knew that your hands were artificial.” Regulo was unabashed. “Didn’t you think I would do a thorough background check, before I ever asked Cornelia to contact you? I’m like you, I want to know who I’ll be working with. Don’t worry, though, I’m not one to pry into private affairs. I was interested in those hands as a first-rate piece of precision engineering, that’s all. How long did it take the cyber crew to get the settings right?”

  “Too long.” Rob grimaced at the memory. “I had the final pair fitted eight years ago, on my nineteenth birthday. They decided that I’d finished growing by then. But I had twelve temporary sets as I was getting bigger.”

  Regulo was nodding his head sympathetically. “There must have been one hell of a lot of operations. I’ve had my share, and more, so I have some idea what you’ve been through.” He lifted his head as though to say more, then appeared to change his mind.

  “Sixty-two operations, according to the hospital records,” Rob said after a moment’s silence. “Of course, I was too young to remember anything about the first few. Anyway, I only bother to count the ones where they actually fitted new hands. They could use anesthetics for all the others, because they didn’t need to play games to get exact nerve connections.”

  Regulo looked suddenly upset by the subject of their conversation. He nodded, patted Rob lightly on the shoulder, and went slowly back into the big office.

  Rob stood alone in the corridor, wondering if he was reading expressions from Regulo’s scarred face that had never been there.

  In the room along the corridor, Rob found Corrie deep in conversation with a burly, florid-faced man in a white tunic. He was standing in profile, showing blond hair cut close to his scalp above a bulging forehead and a sharp, jutting nose. Rob noticed the thickness of the shoulders and the depth of the heavy chest. The man was talking to Corrie in a soft voice and she seemed to be listening avidly to his words. As Rob entered the room, the talk ceased abruptly. There was a sudden awkward silence.

  “All right, Corrie,” Rob said at last, when neither of the others seemed inclined to speak. “Regulo and I are all finished. We can take the Tug back to Earth.” He turned to the man. “You must be Joseph Morel. If you’re finished here, Regulo said he would like to have a word with you.”

  The other man turned a pair of cold gray eyes towards Rob and bowed slightly, with a curiously dated and formal movement from the hips. “My apologies that I did not introduce myself when you entered. Cornelia and I had become engrossed in our discussion, to the point where I forgot the common civilities. I am Joseph Morel, as you surmised. We have never met, but many years ago I knew your father, Gregor.” He smiled. “You have something of the same cast of features.”

  Merlin looked at Joseph Morel with increased interest. The scars were there, at temple and neck, the sure evidence of a rejuvenation treatment. Assuming it had been done once only, that would make Morel about sixty years old — slightly younger than Gregor Merlin would have been by now.

  “At Göttingen,” went on Morel. “We were students together. I was sorry to hear about his unfortunate accident.”

  The three of them began to walk back towards Regulo’s office. “He was a scientist of great promise,” Morel continued. He shook his head sadly. “I regret that he did not live to achieve his full potential.”

  He glanced sideways at Rob. “I understand from Darius Regulo that you have inherited his talents, although you choose to apply yourself to a different field of endeavor. Regulo has a high regard for your abilities.”

  He nodded briefly and stepped through into the study, leaving Rob and Corrie to continue along the corridor towards the Tug. Inside the room, Regulo had again switched on the big display, showing Moon, Earth and skyhook in an endless complex pattern of rotation. Morel walked over to the big desk and stood directly in front of it.

  “I gather from Merlin’s comments to me that you intend to proceed,” he said stiffly. “May I remind you again that Caliban has suggested — three times — that a relationship with Merlin is undesirable? Perhaps even dangerous.”

  Regulo grunted. He was leaning back in his chair, gazing vacantly at the animated display against its dark-blue background. “I hear you, Joseph. I heard you last time.” He swivelled in his chair towards the man standing before him. “And I know exactly what Caliban said. But I don’t have your faith in that damned oracle, and I really need Merlin and the Spider. What makes you so sure that you’re interpreting Caliban correctly? You keep telling me that his outputs are always ambiguous. Are you sure that they are really warnings to us?”

  Morel pursed his lips. They were full and very red, framing a small, prim mouth. “It should not be necessary for me to reiterate this. You know as well as I do that the outputs are difficult to interpret. That is no reflection on their validity. For all that we know, most of Caliban’s messages originate with Sycorax, since all the displays and transformations of his messages are created there. All this is irrelevant. There has been a warning, which you seem to ignore. Yet you have given me no compelling reason for Merlin’s involvement in the activities of Regulo Enterprises. You have not convinced me that you need Merlin at all.”

  Regulo nodded. “And I don’t think I’ll try,” he said brusquely. “Look, Joseph, you concentrate on your work, and let me worry about the general development of Regulo Enterprises. You don’t understand the space transportation business, but I’m telling you, we must have the skyhook. If we don’t build a beanstalk, somebody else will — and once one is working, the number of rocket launches will drop to zero. That’s the source of more than half our income. Don’t you think that the United Space Federation would just love a chance to cut us down to size? The only way we can beat their bureaucracy is to keep one step ahead of them technically, so all the new restrictions they put on us are never quite enough to bring us down. If you want the resources to keep your experiments going, then remember that we all need the beanstalk.”

  Morel’s face had flushed slightly while Regulo was talking, bringing a patch of bright red to each prominent cheekbone. “So we need to build the skyhook,” he said sullenly. “I will grant that. However, you have not convinced me that we need Merlin. Presumably Sala Keino is still on your payroll?”r />
  “He is. And we’ll be using him. But the beanstalk needs the Spider, and the only way we’ll get that is through Rob Merlin.” Regulo stood up, switched off the display, and came slowly around the desk to stand at Morel’s side. He put a hand gently on the other man’s heavy shoulder. “What’s the problem, Joseph? You sound almost as though you are afraid of Merlin.”

  “I am.” Morel turned to face Regulo, his face still reflecting his discontent. “I am the one who performed the background check on him, remember? He is a most dangerous combination: intelligent, and as obsessive as you once he begins to pursue something. What sort of lunatic will climb K-2 for sport, alone and with a minimum of oxygen equipment?”

  “He has an advantage for climbing. Those artificial hands can hold on to anything.”

  “Let us not be ridiculous, Regulo.” Morel’s tone was biting. “Since when did you become an expert on prosthetics? I know the subject far better than you. I assure you, regardless of what Merlin chooses to tell you about those hands — and regardless of what he believes about them — they are no stronger than flesh and blood, and they are certainly less sensitive in their touch. He has grown used to their presence, but they could have been at best no more than a marginal aid. They are not the reason that he was able to climb that mountain. There is only one valid reason: he succeeded because he is a madman. I would not choose to have that mania focused in my direction, the way it was concentrated on the summit of that peak.”

  “All right, Joseph.” Regulo held up his hand to stem the rush of words. “I hear you, and I appreciate your concern. Will you take my word for it, if I tell you that your worry is unnecessary? You’ve seen Merlin. You’ve had the chance to read that face and those eyes, but perhaps you don’t know how to. I do, because I’ve seen that expression before. Rob Merlin is all engineer, with little time for anything else. Once we get moving on the beanstalk he’ll have his hands — real or artificial — too full to worry about anything connected with your work. Ten years from now, he might be a different man, but at the moment his concerns will all be with his projects — and you have no idea how focused that will make him. I know it, because I’ve been there myself.”