by Bob Shaw
"We're talking science now, Corey," Hepworth said calmly, kindly and with more than a hint of condescension. "Sooner or later you'll have to start dealing in the facts of the situation."
"Facts! I'll give you facts! Those are not real worlds-only God can create real worlds – and there are no cities. Every single soul we left behind has been claimed by the Evil One. They are all dead!"
Voorsanger shifted uneasily. "Just a minute, Corey. I'd like to hear what–"
"That man speaks for the Devil," Montane cut in, voice rising in pitch. "I'm warning you, Ropp, if you listen to him you will put your own immortal soul at risk."
"But if there's a chance that my wife is still alive!" Voorsanger paused, looking oddly shamefaced but stubborn, and when he spoke again he avoided Montane's gaze. "If there is any chance at all that Greta is still alive … and that all the others might still be alive … is it not our duty to turn back and try to find them?"
"But you saw what happened out there!" Montane's voice was cracking, becoming an articulated shriek. "How can you even–?"
He stopped speaking, mouth and eyes widening in shock. He clapped his right hand to his chest and at the same time pressed the left to his back in a sudden twisting movement, almost as if he had been transfixed by an invisible blade. His tongue flickered for a moment, snake-like, depositing saliva on each side of his chin. Affleck, who had been standing by the ladder, darted to Montane's side and lowered him into his seat.
"See what you done!" Affleck growled, switching a baleful stare between Voorsanger and Hepworth. "If Corey dies…"
"I'm not going to die, Nibs – it's all right." Montane took several deep breaths and, unexpectedly, produced a weak smile. "There's nothing for you to be alarmed about."
"Corey, you ought to lie down."
Montane squeezed Affleck's arm. "Just let me sit here, my good friend. I'm going to be fine, you'll see."
Affleck nodded uncertainly and backed away to his post by the ladder.
"I must apologise for my little display," Montane said, addressing the others, and now, in contrast to his previous hysteria, sounding gentle and reasonable. "I accused Scott of blasphemy, but I was the real blasphemer. I presumed to make myself the channel for God's divine wrath, and He sent me a little reminder that pride is a mortal sin."
The clichés are just the same, Nicklin thought in dismay, his mind diverted from external wonders, but this has to be a different man.
"Doctor Harding is with us," Voorsanger said. "I think I should ask him to come up here and–"
"Thank you, Ropp, but I assure you I am in no need of medical attention." Montane's eyes were bright and humorous as he looked at Hepworth. "Go on with what you were saying, Scott. I want to hear the scientist's view of the Devil's handiwork."
"It was all a bit speculative," Hepworth said, obviously in some doubt about the effects his words might have on Montane's state of mind.
"Don't be so modest! You were doing a wonderful job – laying down scientific laws that both Our Lord and the Devil have to obey. Go on with it, Scott – I really am interested." Montane, becoming aware of the saliva on his chin, drew the back of his sleeve across it, momentarily dragging his mouth out of shape.
The action was so atypical of the normally fastidious preacher that Nicklin felt a twinge of unease. Corey, are you in there? he thought. Or have we a stranger in our midst?
"All right, let's try to be as rational and unemotional as we possibly can," Hepworth said in a subdued voice which hinted that he too could be concerned about Montane's mental well-being. "Corey believes that Orbitsville was dissolved by the … um … Devil for the sole purpose of wiping out humanity, and I'm going to refer to that as the Malign Hypothesis. I disagree with him, so I'm going to champion the opposite point of view – the Benign Hypothesis.
"I have little doubt that the spheres we can see on our screens – all 650 million of them – are not 'real' planets in the normal astronomical sense. I would say that they are hollow shells, just as Orbitsville was a hollow shell; and I would say that their gravity is generated by the shell material, just as Orbitsville's gravity was generated."
"You're assuming that they have gravity in the first place," Montane cut in.
Hepworth nodded soberly. "That's right, Corey – I'm making that assumption."
"Just checking, just being scientific." Montane gave the others a conspiratorial grin which made Nicklin want to cringe away from him.
"To proceed," Hepworth said, "the Benign Hypothesis actually requires us to regard those artificial planets as being as durable as the 'real' variety, perhaps more so. We should also think of them as being ideal cradles for intelligent life – custom-designed, if you like, for our needs."
Nicklin tried to make the imaginative leap, and failed. "You're getting away from me, Scott," he said. "How … how can you possibly justify that?"
"It's implicit in the theory, Jim. It's implicit in the fact that the conditions in Orbitsville itself were so exactly what were needed for the human race to thrive and flourish. How often have we heard Corey advance the same argument, that it was no coincidence that Orbitsville drew us into it – like wasps being lured into a jar of honey?"
"You can't fall back on – " Nicklin glanced at Montane's avid, watchful face. "Are we talking science or religion?"
"Science, Jim. Science! Though I don't mind telling you I would love it if some kind of devil or demon or imp or fucking familiar were to materialise in here at this very moment." Hepworth palmed his brow. "I'd be more than happy – believe this – I'd be more than happy to sell my immortal soul for a bottle of gin. Or even a glass!"
"What about this hypothesis?" Nicklin said, beginning to feel impatient.
"As I said, there is every evidence of design. Look at the green lines. They weakened building materials, remember. I would say that was a warning for us to keep off them – because they were dangerous boundaries." Hepworth glanced at the awesome image on the main screen. "I wouldn't mind betting that all that was achieved without the loss of one human life. I know how preposterous that sounds, but for beings who have total control of every geometry, every dimension – possibly including time – it could be done."
Montane snickered. "When does the Good Fairy appear?"
Hepworth inclined his head thoughtfully, half-smiling. "That's as good a name as any for the entity who is in control out there. It fits in well with the name of the hypothesis. I like it, Corey – Good Fairy! Yes, I like it."
"You could abbreviate that a bit," Nicklin said, feeling slightly awkward, like a reticent person who has been forced into a public debate. He and the others had just witnessed the most stupendous event imaginable, and it seemed inappropriate for them to be engaging in a quiet philosophical discussion so soon afterwards.
"You mean God?" Hepworth blinked his disagreement. "It's hardly His style is it?"
"All right, can you tell us who the Good Fairy is, and what she's up to?"
"The Good Fairy is the entity who designed and constructed Orbitsville in the first place. She must be as far ahead of us in evolutionary terms as we are ahead of amoebae."
"I could have said something like that," Nicklin protested. "Scott, I hate to say this – but your theory doesn't seem to take us very far."
"Mr Hepworth, could I ask you about the benign part of it," Voorsanger said, his narrow face pale and intent. "What makes you think that my … that everybody we left behind is still alive?"
"Occam's razor. You don't do all that … you don't go to all the trouble of creating two-thirds of a billion new homes for privileged customers and then allow the customers to die. It simply wouldn't be logical."
"Logical! Oh dear, oh dear! Logical!" Montane leaned far back in his seat and smiled at the ceiling.
Nicklin noticed, with a return of his uneasiness, that the smile seemed to be off centre. An obscure heavy-dictionary term flickered in his mind – plaice-mouthed – together with a horror vision of Montane's facial tissue
s having turned into an inelastic dough, allowing his mouth to be permanently dragged out of place when he wiped it .Are we all going mad? Has the encounter with the Good Fairy been too much for us?
"I want to believe you, Mr Hepworth," Voorsanger said, his eyes fixed on Hepworth's face, pleading. "Do you think we could find the right … planet?"
"I don't see why not." Hepworth's grandiloquent manner was returning. "If Orbitsville's equatorial material has remained at an equivalent position in the world cloud – and it seems only logical that it should – then–"
"For Christ's sake, Scott," Nicklin cut in, raising his voice. "Don't get carried away! I can hear the wheels going round in your head. You're adding bits and pieces to your so-called theory as you go along."
Hepworth wheeled on him and Nicklin saw in his eyes the beginnings of the sudden rage that so often transformed him when his scientific authority was challenged. There was a moment of silent antagonism, then Hepworth's plump face relaxed. He stood up and slowly walked around the control console, taking up a position beside the main screen, like a teacher with a blackboard. The screen was still largely occupied by the image of the single planet.
Hepworth gave Megan Fleischer a perfunctory smile. "Would you please revert to the general view?"
The pilot's hand moved slightly and the planet vanished. The cloud of worlds again dominated the screen, enclosing the sun in a gauzily bejewelled sphere of impossible beauty.
"In your slightly rusticated and untutored way, you were actually making a valid philosophical point," Hepworth said in mild tones, looking directly at Nicklin. "There is a classic test which can be applied to any good scientific theory. You make a prediction based on that theory, and if the prediction comes true the theory is strengthened.
"Would you be more kindly disposed towards my brain-child if we went through that process? If I were to make a prediction, here and now, and if – as some of us might put it – the prophecy were to be fulfilled? Would that bring a smile back to that cherubic countenance of yours?"
"Don't make a banquet of it, Nicklin thought irritably, refusing even to nod.
"Very well," Hepworth went on, an actor enjoying the centre of the stage. "I will now stick my neck out and predict that these worlds … which have just been created by the Good Fairy … all 650 million of them … will soon disappear from our sight."
Fleischer sat up straighter. "How can you say a thing like that?"
The question reverberated in Nicklin's mind as he stared at Hepworth's jowled and silver-stubbled face. The physicist looked more disreputable than ever in his smudged and shoddy clothing. This was the scientist manqué, the man who had allowed gin to leach his brain to the extent that he could flunk on high-school basics, but whose imaginative power seemed to encompass galaxies, universes, infinities.
I'm listening to you, Scott, he thought, all animosity and scepticism gone. Say what you have to say – and I'll believe you.
"It's all built in to the Benign Hypothesis," Hepworth said, indicating the world cloud. "I don't need to tell anybody that these planets are not in orbit around the sun. If the cloud is in rotation, as Orbitsville was, planets in the equatorial band might be in orbit – but I don't think they are. The entire system is impossible in terms of our celestial mechanics. It should fly apart, but it won't, and that is because some force is keeping those planets in place – just as another unknown force kept Orbitsville stable."
Fleischer raised one hand a little, like a student in class. "It seems to me that you're advancing reasons for the planets not to disappear."
"Yes and no. I'm saying that they could remain exactly where they are – if the Good Fairy wanted things to be that way. But – and this is the nub of everything – what would have been the point in dissolving Orbitsville in the first place?" Hepworth spread his hands and looked at each of his listeners in turn.
"Essentially, very little has changed out there. Instead of one huge Orbitsville there are 650 million little ones – turned inside out, of course – but if things stay as they are life will quickly return to normal. The cries of wonder and alarm from ordinary people will soon die down, because that's the way ordinary people are. There will be a few adjustments to make, of course, and the annus mirabilis will excite historians, philosophers and scientific researchers for many centuries to come – but, in essence, everything will be pretty much the same as before."
Hepworth paused, apparently distracted from his grand theme by the discovery that his shirt had crept up over his bulging stomach. He spent a few seconds stuffing it back into his pants before fixing his audience with a sombre gaze.
"So, I put it to you," he said, "what would be the point in leaving all those brand-new planets where they are?"
"Perhaps there isn't any point," Nicklin said. "Perhaps that's just the way it's going to be."
"That's another line of thought – call it the Null Hypothesis – but I don't like it. I don't believe that the Good Fairy squanders her time and energy."
Nicklin found himself floundering in the onrush of new concepts. "All right – where will the planets go? And why will they go?"
"That isn't part of the bet," Hepworth said simply. "I can't explain the wheres and whys – all I'm saying is that the planets will be relocated. They may disappear suddenly, all at once; or the process may be a gradual one. For all we know it has already started–"
"It shouldn't be too hard to find out, provided our old planet-search programme can handle that many points," Fleischer said, beginning to address her main computer. "What we might be able to do is monitor say a one per cent sample, and then…" Her voice faded into an abstracted murmur as she became involved in the mathematics of the self-imposed problem.
Voorsanger glanced apprehensively at Montane before fixing his gaze on Hepworth. "All this is enough to start me questioning the whole purpose of this flight."
Hepworth nodded. "Are you saying we should go back?"
"I suppose…" Voorsanger glanced again at Montane and his face suddenly hardened. "Yes, that's what I'm saying."
"How about you, Jim?"
"How would I know?" Nicklin said, unable to suppress the feeling that it was monstrously unfair to ask him for a judgement on such a vast issue and with so little hard evidence available. "Besides, we're talking like a management committee again."
"All right, we'll ask the boss." Hepworth looked at Montane. "How about it, Corey?"
"You fools!" Still grinning, Montane continued to stare at the ceiling. "You poor fools!"
"I don't think Corey is quite ready to give us a considered opinion." Hepworth gave Affleck a meaningful look. "Nibs, why don't you see if you can find Doctor Harding and bring him up here? I think it would be for the best…"
Affleck shuffled his feet, looking tortured, then stepped on to the ladder and sank out of view.
Hepworth returned his attention to Nicklin. "How about it, Jim?
"How about you?" Nicklin said, putting off any kind of decision. "What do you say?"
Hepworth gave him a strange little smile. "It's a tough one – especially without suitable lubrication. There's so much to find out about this universe. I'd like to go on, and at the same time I'd like to go back."
"That's a lot of help," Nicklin said. "It seems to me that as you started the–"
"Gentlemen!" Megan Fleischer cut in. "Allow me to make up your minds for you – we have to turn back."
"At least there's no equivocation there," Hepworth said coldly. "Would you mind telling us how you arrived at such a firm conclusion?"
"I don't mind at all." Fleischer smiled in a way that signalled her dislike for the physicist. "This ship isn't fit to carry out an interstellar flight."
"What?" Hepworth's belligerence was immediate. "What are you talking about, woman?"
"I'm talking about the drive, man. We're losing the left intake field."
"Nonsense!"
Hepworth leaned over the control console, staring down at the field distributio
n display. Nicklin followed his line of sight and saw that the glowing butterfly had become noticeably asymmetric. He watched in chill fascination as, in the space of only a few seconds, the left wing – changing shape all the while – shrank to a writhing speck and finally blinked out of existence. In the same moment he felt a queasy upsurge in his stomach which told him the ship's acceleration had been sharply reduced. There followed a ringing silence which was broken by Fleischer.
"As commander of this vessel," she announced in clear, precise tones, "I have decided to abort the flight."
"You stupid bitch!" Hepworth shouted.
He turned and ran to the ladder, reaching it in two grotesque low-gravity bounds, and lowered himself through the deck opening. Several seconds went by before it dawned on Nicklin that Hepworth was on his way to the engine cylinders. Gripped by a sense of unreality, he stood up and looked at the others half-expecting to receive some guidance as to what he should do next. Fleischer and Voorsanger gave him blank stares; Montane continued to grin wetly at the ceiling.
Nicklin loped past them and sprang on to the ladder. He went down it in the normal manner for a short distance, then realised that the quickest way to proceed in the low-gravity conditions was by a controlled fall. He curled his fingers loosely on the stringers, took his feet off the rungs and allowed himself to drop.
The fall was gentle and easily controllable by tightening his grip. Far below him he could hear Hepworth bellowing at people using the ladder to get out of his way. On almost all the decks that Nicklin passed there were children to applaud his unorthodox descent. Some adults eyed him with less enthusiasm, and he knew they were experiencing the qualms that travellers had always felt on noticing a disturbance in shipboard routine. It occurred to him that they would feel considerably worse when they learned what the disturbance was all about. The future of the New Eden express was being threatened from without and within.
He caught up with Hepworth on 14 Deck, the first on which there was access to the engine cylinders. Hepworth had already tapped his authorisation code into the lock and was dragging the shielded door open.