To Save the Sun

by Ben Bova

  "Oh. I… I'm fine." The young man, his face pale and anemic-looking from cryosleep, reached a hand to steady her. "I was dizzy for a moment, that's all. Hungry, I guess."

  The Ensign smiled in understanding. "I know what you mean, ma'am," he replied brightly. "I haven't been able to stay away from the mess since I got out of the tank myself. You sure you'll be okay?"

  "Really, I'll be fine." She gave him a reassuring smile and thanked him for his concern, then watched as he headed in the opposite direction.

  It was probably just as well that he brought me back to reality, she told herself. The Javas who awaited her would not be the same man who lived in the memory of a night she'd left more than forty years earlier. But it wasn't fair; from her perspective, taking cryosleep and the near-relativistic speeds the Levant traveled into account, it seemed as if only two years had elapsed. And yet, she knew better. For him, four full decades had passed.

  Four decades.

  She put the thought out of her mind, reminding herself that even now the Emperor would be so intimately involved in the final setup for the physical test of her theories that he couldn't spend idle time wondering about her even if he wanted to.

  The test, while simple in nature, involved many critical aspects other than the application of her equations. There was the tuned pair of singularities, for example. Rice's files had indicated that they had already been prepared and were being held in stasis, and that would occupy many of both the Imperial and Sarpan scientists.

  There was also the coordination of the ships. It was critical that each be in place at precisely the correct distance, at the exact moment required, when the singularities were inserted into the artificial stars created for the test. Adela had no doubts, however, about Fain's abilities in that regard. From the reports that awaited her when she woke up, she'd learned that Fain had become one of her project's staunchest supporters, and had taken it upon himself to learn a great deal of the scientific principles involved in the effort.

  And then there were the two artificial stars themselves. The test was being undertaken on a scale that would make the parts involved seem almost microscopic compared to a real sun. It was not normally possible to create a G-2 star of the size needed for the test, and keep it functioning at the reduced size for very long, of course: The stable, sustained reaction needed to simulate a star would quickly dissipate in space. Utilizing the marvelous shield technology of the Sarpan, however, a star could be created and contained—a "bottled beam" was what some of the younger researchers had jokingly dubbed it—for the amount of time required for the test. Once the test was concluded, the test site would be evacuated and quarantined and the two mini-stars and the tiny singularities they contained would be allowed to dissipate once the timed shield generators expired.

  But for now, the formation and containment of the two test stars was critical, and Javas would be in constant realtime link with Bomeer and Fain to ensure that everything was going properly—

  Adela stopped dead in the corridor.

  The shield containments for the mini-stars were powerful; they needed to be to contain the fury of the constant fusion reactions occurring within them. But the test that was about to take place was based on her old equations, and the singularities being used, as she'd just recalculated back in her cabin, were too big. Had the increased energy levels that would be released by the breeder star during this test been taken into consideration?

  She spun about and started jogging back toward her stateroom, her mind racing. I've got to look at the values for the shielding for the mini-stars, she thought desperately. She overtook the ensign she'd chatted with moments earlier, and he started to say something to her, but she quickly left him puzzled as she rounded the corner and increased her pace to a full run. One point nine one… almost double the amount of energy they're expecting. Surely they've recalibrated the shielding. But then—if they hadn't set up a new model—reconfigured with the new values, as she had done—they might not even be aware of how much greater the release would be.

  "System!" she shouted the moment she burst into her cabin. She had already pulled the handheld from its belt pouch and had flipped the cover open. "Redisplay most recently viewed file! Cursor on and feed the statistics to my handheld." She had changed the values for almost everything in the new model to achieve an energy transfer ratio of one to one. The one thing she hadn't needed to alter was the value of the shielding containing the two mini-stars; they were the same as the values intended for the test that would begin soon.

  The playback started immediately, and she stabbed the light pen at the image the moment the two stars and their associated readouts were added to the display, the numbers she highlighted going directly to the unit in her hand. She turned away from the image and tapped frantically at the keypad, ignoring the playback as it continued unheeded behind her.

  In her haste, she hit several wrong keys, causing the handheld to beep angrily at her. Adela closed her eyes tightly and forced herself to breathe more slowly. She swallowed drily and entered the required commands again, more carefully this time. It took a few seconds to get it right, and then another moment for the value she was looking for to appear in the unit's tiny readout. She gazed at it for only a split second, then, muttering fearfully under her breath, cleared the machine and ran the same commands over the figures again, being extremely careful to hit just the right keys. Again, the same value as before appeared in the readout.

  "Dear God," she whispered, feeling her throat tighten. She sank back against the arm of the chair, letting the handheld fall clattering, forgotten, to the floor.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Javas, Emperor of the Hundred Worlds, sat in the holograph viewing chamber that was the very heart of his personal quarters on Luna. His father had enjoyed a similar chamber on Corinth and had often programmed it to display a peaceful Earth forest, spending many long hours there strolling through the projected greenery. Javas had never realized it while his father was alive—he had, he admitted regretfully, never even been interested in how his father had lived during those earlier years—but recognized now that the forest being displayed was the backwoods that surrounded Woodsgate. The file for the display was in the Imperial computer, and Javas had literally stumbled upon it years after Emperor Nicholas' death.

  The sounds of birds and the creaking of the tall trees in the wind above his head filled the chamber and he looked up, squinting when the branches parted enough to allow a shaft of holographic sunshine to pour through the leaves. There was a soft thump to his left that caught his attention and he turned in time to see an acorn roll beneath a pile of leaves. He looked up for the source of the acorn and met the eyes of the gray squirrel that had let it slip from its paws.

  The file had been enhanced, he noticed: There were trees and wildflowers here that had never seen a misty Kentucky morning, but it was all so very real. The sound of the boughs rustling overhead, the scent of dry leaves beneath his feet, everything. For some reason, Javas felt very close to his father right now; closer than he'd felt in years.

  I wish you were here today, Father, he reflected. A major part of your dream will come true today.

  Emperor Nicholas had been right all along. In the many years that had passed since his father had sent him to Luna, officially putting the project in motion, so much of what he'd predicted had come to pass. Technology had been reborn. The worlds had drawn closer together in pursuit of his joint goal than they had been in centuries. The Empire's strength had grown, and that strength was respected by the Sarpan, ushering in a new era of peace and cooperation with the aliens.

  Even the test that was about to take place was a sign of their progress. Although flawed, it illustrated better than anything else the advancements they had made, and the results would point out the exact areas that needed to be reworked. And he was certain that Adela would have no trouble, once she was home and in realtime contact with the test site, reconfiguring the equations to their best advantage.
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  Adela…

  There was a beeping, more felt through the integrator than heard, that told him the tachyon link had been established with the wide-scan array set up for viewing the test.

  Javas took one last look around him at the forest, inhaled one last time the cool fragrant air, then silently ordered the holographic file canceled and stored. The empty chamber appeared in its place—stark, barren, metallic—and he walked to the single plush chair that had been placed here for this event. The forest scent still lingered, but the recirculating fans were already venting the pleasant aroma out of the chamber.

  He received notification that the link was ready and reclined in the chair as another silent command through the integrator plunged the chamber into sudden darkness.

  The room had transformed into deep space itself. Nearly in front of him the artificial mini-star that would represent Sol in the test glowed fiercely. Above and to his right, and graphically farther away than its counterpart, another yellow star shone brightly. The intense light of the two miniature suns washed out nearly everything else in the image, and the sheer brilliance was almost too much for him; he was forced to shield his eyes with a raised arm until he could issue a command for the projection to be dimmed.

  The level of brightness dropped immediately to a more comfortable setting, and allowed him to see everything with a much greater degree of detail, with a unique perspective of the test site not seen in nature. The view had been "constructed" by taking tachyon signals from two different vantage points and computer-blending them into a single vista, overlaying the images to give a picture that, while not to exact scale as far as the distances between the two stars were concerned, nevertheless allowed him to take in everything at once.

  Javas was also aware, now that he could view the image without squinting, that there was much more to be seen. He could not quite tell on the farther star, but on the nearer of the pair he could see the Sarpan shielding itself, arranged around the miniature thousand-kilometer-wide sun like concentric soap bubbles nestled one inside the other. It was the inner layers of shielding, he realized from the scientific briefings, that kept the reactions contained at the right levels to simulate Earth's G-2 star.

  The shield generator ships were visible, already arranged in the distinctive pyramid shape, and were in the process of emplacing the positive singularity in the right orbit for insertion. The singularity itself was much too small to be seen, but the pale blue sphere of its shield indicated its location in the exact center of the pyramid. As the pyramid swept across the face of the Sol mini-star, the Sarpan ships were silhouetted against the bright, roiling surface.

  He knew that Adela would view the playback of the event in this very room when she returned in a few days, and the grandeur of what he observed now would be in no way diminished by the fact that it would be a recording. But he couldn't help wishing that she were beside him now, watching this with him.

  "All goes well," Oidar told his sons.

  The holographic image of the Sarpan pond had been partially removed, although the projected trees mingling with the real plants lining the water's edge still gave the impression more of a natural body of water than an artificial construct. Above them, where the projection of the twin suns had been, an image was forming that gave them an outside view of what was taking place ten thousand kilometers from the Flisth.

  Oidar did not know that the projection was not as sophisticated as the one the Emperor enjoyed, nor would he have cared if he'd known. It consisted only of the single image of the mini-star representing the humans' home Sun. The other artificial sun, placed for the test at a distance of 900,000 kilometers from this one, was but a bright dot that mingled with the many true stars that swept across the "sky." As the projection became more defined, the little swimmers gathered around Oidar and held onto him, growing still and silent as they watched wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the magnificent spectacle above them. The image now completed, it looked to them like a new night sky, with a strange bright star where their suns had been.

  The insects in the water chamber seemed puzzled by what was happening and buzzed frantically at the unnatural light.

  "All goes well," he said again, even though they would not fully understand speech for many months.

  "And look there. Do you not see the generator ships?" He pointed to the pyramid formed around a pale blue sphere orbiting the glowing orb. "One day, when it comes time, the humans will build much greater generators and learn to pilot them from a distance. But for now, it is we who steer them." Oidar looked down at his children, stroking each of them tenderly with his hands.

  "This is called cooperation," he whispered. "Remember it, for it will be your legacy."

  The holograph frame located at the front of the Port of Kowloon's small lecture room projected two separate images, displayed side by side. One showed the mini-star representing Sol, the other presented the hypothetical G-2 feeder star.

  "They're ready to insert the singularities, Academician," Rice said. He turned away momentarily and spoke softly into the headset he wore, then returned his attention to the images. "I've instructed them to begin with the negative singularity."

  "Why?" Bomeer asked, then added quickly, "Forgive me, I don't mean to sound critical. I'm merely curious as to why the feeder star was chosen first."

  Rice shrugged. "The shielding for the feeder is the more critical of the two, as far as permeability is concerned. If scanning shows a problem with the shielding once the negative singularity has been inserted, we'll stop everything then, before attempting anything with the breeder."

  Bomeer nodded, and regarded the projections.

  The two men watched the image on the right as the pyramid made a gentle spiral around the star, each pass taking it through the outer layers of the shielding and bringing it closer to the surface. Just when it seemed, from the aspect of the holograph, that it would touch the star itself, the pyramid began to expand and flatten into a pattern closer to that of a square with the blue sphere still held equidistant from the four individual generators. The square continued its expansion until the dimensions were greater than the star, all the while still orbiting the glowing orb as a huge flat sheet might circle it.

  As the orbit of the generators altered, the sphere brushed the star at about the same time the four generator ships completed the adjustment to their course that took them in a full orbit around the star. Then, like a hoop being drawn over a floating ball, the ring of generator ships drew the sphere at its center into the star, slowly, slowly, until it finally disappeared into the interior. The ships increased speed, widening their orbit considerably around the star.

  "I'm curious," Bomeer inquired. "How far away can the generator ships get and still maintain their hold on the singularity?"

  "At this scale, with generators rated only for this experiment, they can go about four thousand kilometers out and still maintain the integrity of their lock on the sphere. They'll need to go much farther out when we do this with Sol, of course, and we'll need to increase the size of the generator ships, but that's still very far away. These ships will hold the pattern at a distance of three thousand kilometers."

  As he said this, the four Sarpan generator ships reached their apogee and revolved smoothly around the star, waiting for the next step to begin.

  Supreme Commander Fain was pleased, as he watched the insertion at the feeder star, with how smoothly the operation was going. He was no less gratified at the way the combined efforts of science and military meshed, not to mention the careful cooperation of the crews of the five-man generator ships—or, more accurately, crews consisting of one man and four Sarpan pilots. As much in favor as he was of this joint effort, and as much assimilation time his handpicked officers had experienced, he still could not help the nagging feeling of trepidation going through him now.

  They know their jobs, he admitted inwardly. I could not have chosen better people. Likewise, Fain had been satisfied with the crewmates that the Sarpan capta
in had selected. The two of them had worked carefully with their respective crews and had every right to be proud of them.

  Visible in the viewscreen less than a thousand meters to starboard was the Sarpan flagship. This was the closest the two ships had come to one another during this mission. For reasons of protocol or practicality, the two had been widely separated; but now they floated together—along with the science ship Port of Kowloon—to view the physical test that would signify the end of this mission.

  As he watched the insertion phase beginning at the Sol star, he realized that there were really two tests going on here. One was the research necessary for the success of the project, of course; but the other test was perhaps even more important. The joint mission was a test unto itself, and would prove that the two races could indeed work together.

  Fain's attention remained on the viewscreen, but he couldn't help wondering it the Sarpan captain could feel pride.

  It's nearly over.

  Academician Bomeer stared at the twin displays, and saw that the insertion of the singularity into the Sol star had gone as smoothly as it had on the feeder. He turned to Rice, heard the scientist speaking rapidly into his headset and knew that final readings were being taken of the shields containing the singularities. Once completed, the generator ships would move into final position in preparation for allowing the shields to go permeable and start the wormhole effect that would link the two mini-stars.