The Sunspacers Trilogy

by George Zebrowski

  1) A RECORD OF GRADES AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS AT ANY SCHOOL HE OR SHE HAS ATTENDED.

  2) A PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILE.

  3) A RECORD OF HEALTH.

  4) AN EMPLOYMENT RECORD, IF ANY, ALONG WITH A BRIEF ESSAY ABOUT WHY THE JOB WAS TAKEN.

  5) TWO LETTERS OF RECOMMENDATION. THESE MAY BE SUBMITTED BY TEACHERS, EMPLOYERS, OR ANY ADULT NOT RELATED TO THE APPLICANT WITH WHOM THE APPLICANT HAS HAD PROLONGED CONTACT, OR ANY PERSON OF HIGH ACHIEVEMENT WHO MAY OR MAY NOT BE AN ADULT. WHEN REQUESTING SUCH LETTERS, APPLICANTS SHOULD POINT OUT THAT THE INSTITUTE IS INTERESTED IN IMPRESSIONS OF AND FEELINGS ABOUT THE APPLICANT, AS WELL AS IN HOW THE APPLICANT HAS PERFORMED IN THE PAST. CAREFUL THOUGHT SHOULD BE GIVEN AS TO WHOM ONE SELECTS TO WRITE SUCH LETTERS; THAT CAN BE AS IMPORTANT AS WHAT IS STATED IN THE LETTER ITSELF.

  6) A WRITTEN ESSAY ABOUT THE APPLICANT’S REASONS FOR WISHING TO ATTEND THE INSTITUTE.

  7) A RECORDING OF THE APPLICANT’S IMAGE AND VOICE, IN WHICH THE PROSPECTIVE STUDENT RELATES THE MOST SIGNIFICANT OR FORMATIVE EXPERIENCES IN HIS OR HER LIFE. THIS RECORDING, LIKE THE ESSAY, MAY BE AS LONG OR SHORT AS THE APPLICANT FEELS IS NECESSARY. IF THE APPLICANT CANNOT AFFORD TO SUBMIT SUCH A RECORDING OR HAS NO ACCESS TO SUCH EQUIPMENT AS MAY BE NECESSARY, HE OR SHE MAY SUBMIT A REQUEST IN WRITING FOR EXEMPTION FROM THIS REQUIREMENT. SHOULD THE INSTITUTE FEEL THAT THE APPLICANT SHOWS PROMISE, AN INTERVIEWER WILL ARRANGE TO VISIT THE APPLICANT IN HIS OR HER HOME OR A PLACE NEAR IT.

  8) ANYTHING ELSE THAT MAY GIVE THE INSTITUTE A PICTURE OF THE APPLICANT. THIS INCLUDES RECORDS OF ANY HONORS GIVEN, A PIECE OF ARTWORK OR A SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENT DONE BY THE APPLICANT, A POEM OR A WORK OF FICTION, RECORDS OF ATHLETIC ACCOMPLISHMENT, OR AN ESSAY ABOUT HOBBIES AND SPECIAL INTERESTS.

  PROSPECTIVE STUDENTS ARE ADVISEDNOT TO VISIT THE INSTITUTE, EVEN IF SUCH A VISIT IS FEASIBLE. THE ABILITY OF A STUDENT TO ADAPT TO A NEW AND STRANGE ENVIRONMENT IS AN IMPORTANT REQUIREMENT OF THE INSTITUTE’S PROGRAM.

  [SPECIAL NOTE: IF YOU HAVE BEEN ACCEPTED WITHOUT FULFILLING ALL THE ABOVE REQUIREMENTS, PLEASE SUPPLY THE MISSING ITEMS AS SOON AS POSSIBLE]

  APPLICANTS SHOULD BEAR IN MIND THAT THE INSTITUTE’S PROGRAM DIFFERS FROM THE MORE FORMAL AND STRUCTURED COURSES OF STUDY IN OTHER CENTERS OF HIGHER LEARNING. MUCH OF WHAT IS LEARNED WILL BE DETERMINED BY THE STUDENT, WHO WILL BE ENCOURAGED TO EXPLORE MANY AREAS.

  EACH STUDENT WILL BE GIVEN A PERSONAL AI [ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE] AND, WITH THE AID OF THIS ENTITY, WILL PURSUE VARIOUS SUBJECTS. THE AI OR A VISITING SCIENTIST MAY OCCASIONALLY SUGGEST AN ASSIGNMENT. TUTORIALS AND SEMINARS WILL BE HELD AT INTERVALS WITH DR. SHASTRI OR ONE OF HIS ASSOCIATES, AND STUDENTS ARE ENCOURAGED TO REQUEST SUCH TUTORIALS AT ANY TIME WHEN THEY FEEL THEY WANT TO PURSUE A SPECIAL LINE OF INQUIRY. STUDENTS WILL ALSO BE EXPECTED TO SPEND TIME EXAMINING THE ALIEN SIGNAL DIRECTLY. AS THE STUDENT PROGRESSES, IT WILL BE NATURAL THAT HE OR SHE WILL CHOOSE TO WORK ON SOME SUBJECTS TO THE EXCLUSION OF OTHERS. AT THE END OF THE FIRST YEAR, EACH STUDENT WILL CONFER WITH DR. SHASTRI AND REACH AN ASSESSMENT OF THE STUDENT’S PROGRESS. EACH STUDENT WILL BE EXPECTED TO PRODUCE A TENTATIVE PLAN FOR HIS OR HER FUTURE STUDIES AND THE REASONS FOR CHOOSING SUCH A COURSE.

  NO GRADES ARE GIVEN AT THE INSTITUTE. ABOUT EVERY THREE MONTHS, THE STUDENT WILL RECEIVE A WRITTEN EVALUATION BY DR. SHASTRI OR ONE OF HIS ASSOCIATES. ALTHOUGH MOST STUDENTS COMPLETE THEIR THREE-YEAR COURSE OF STUDY AT THE HIMALAYAN CENTER, OCCASIONALLY ONE MAY BE GIVEN A CHANCE TO LEAVE BEFORE THAT TIME FOR ONE OF THE INSTITUTE’S OTHER BRANCHES IN SUNSPACE, WHERE STUDENTS WILL STILL BE EXPECTED TO CONTINUE THEIR STUDIES.

  UNLIKE MORE CONVENTIONAL UNIVERSITIES, THE INSTITUTE ARRANGES NO CLUB MEETINGS, SOCIAL EVENTS, TEAM SPORTS, OR ASSOCIATIONS. STUDENTS ARE FREE TO FORM SUCH CLUBS OR GROUPS THEMSELVES AND TO ARRANGE FOR THEIR OWN SOCIAL LIVES, IF THEY SO CHOOSE. VISITING RESEARCHERS AND SCHOLARS WILL ARRANGE FOR SEMINARS AND MAY BE INVITED TO ANY SOCIAL FUNCTION PLANNED BY STUDENTS. MOST STUDENTS HAVE FOUND THAT THE DEMANDS OF THEIR WORK DO NOT ALLOW FOR AN ACTIVE SOCIAL LIFE, AND THE ISOLATED SETTING DOES NOT OFFER MANY OPPORTUNITIES FOR SOCIALIZING. PROSPECTIVE STUDENTS SEEKING A VARIED SOCIAL LIFE ARE ADVISED TO LOOK ELSEWHERE. MAVERICKS WHO CAN RELY ON THEIR OWN MENTAL RESOURCES AND CAN SEEK THEIR OWN AMUSEMENTS WITHOUT THE SUPERVISION AND GUIDANCE OF OTHERS MAY FIND THE INSTITUTE A CONGENIAL PLACE.

  BECAUSE THE INSTITUTE HAS NO FORMAL COURSE OF STUDY AND NO SET REQUIREMENTS, STUDENTS ARE GRANTED DEGREES WHEN, IN THE INSTITUTE’S JUDGMENT, THEY HAVE MET THE HIGHEST STANDARDS FOR SUCH A DEGREE. A FEW STUDENTS HAVE ALREADY ACHIEVED ONE OR TWO DOCTORATES AT THE END OF THEIR COURSE OF STUDIES, WHILE OTHERS LEAVE WITH A BACCALAUREATE ONLY. EACH STUDENT IS EXPECTED TO SET HIS OR HER OWN PACE, WHILE KEEPING THE INSTITUTE’S PURPOSE—THE BREAKING OF THE ALIEN SIGNAL—FIRMLY IN MIND. INSTITUTE STUDENTS LIVE FOR THE FULFILLMENT OF THIS HIGHEST AMBITION.

  ALL STUDENTS CAN BE ASSURED THAT THEY WILL RECEIVE AN EDUCATION EQUAL TO ANY IN SUNSPACE. THOUGH FEW CHOOSE TO LEAVE THE INSTITUTE FOR ANOTHER SCHOOL BEFORE COMPLETING THEIR THREE YEARS, THOSE WHO HAVE DONE SO FIND THAT THEY ARE EASILY ADMITTED TO EVEN THE MOST SELECTIVE SCHOOLS, PASSING RIGOROUS ORAL AND WRITTEN EXAMINATIONS. MANY OF THE INSTITUTE’S GRADUATES HAVE FOUND A RICH AND INTELLECTUALLY REWARDING LIFE IN ITS OTHER BRANCHES, WHERE THEY CONTINUE TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE DIFFICULT MULTIGENERATIONAL JOB OF SOLVING THE MOST PROFOUND MYSTERY EVER PRESENTED TO OUR SPECIES.

  The brochure ended. It still sounded a bit pompous to her, but she again felt the thrill of possible accomplishment in confronting the unknown and unmasking it. Her own written essay had probably sounded just as pompous.

  She turned off the screen. It was almost time for sleep, and she still had to shower.

  |Go to Table of Contents |

  2

  The graduation ceremony took place on the lawn behind the Riverbend High School gym. A hundred students, their parents, and a band turned out at 10:00 A.M., June 1, 2080. Mr. J. W. Molly, the Principal, gave a short speech about city-states in history, drawing obvious parallels with the Free Space Settlements throughout Sunspace. He reminded his audience that Sunspace included all the inhabited worlds of the Solar System—the natural planets; the artificial habitats in the Asteroids and around Jupiter and Saturn; the industrial community around Mercury; the domed cities on Mars and Venus; the Lunar Settlements; and, technically speaking, even Earth itself. Bernal One had been one of the earliest space colonies to be built in the Moon’s Orbit, he pointed out, and was nearly as old as the century. A number of the other habitats in the Bernal Clusters of L-4 and L-5 were almost fifty years old. Ten new O’Neill Cylinders were under construction in Solar orbit. No one would ever run out of room out here, since new worlds could be built as population increased. Total population beyond Earth was well over 10 million and growing, and 3 million were right here at L-5 …

  Lissa sat in the first row, waiting impatiently for the diplomas to be handed out. She looked up at the giant triangle of Skytown, ten kilometers across from Riverbend on the inner equator of the hollow sphere that was Bernal One. There was a graduation ceremony going on there also. Most of the college-bound graduates were going to Dandridge Cole University, or to one of the technical colleges on Luna. She was the only one she knew who was going to Earth.

  “I’ll also be going to Lunar Backside,” she explained defensively during the reception that followed the ceremony, “as soon as I’m done with my preliminary studies on Earth. The Institute has branches all over Sunspace, you know.” Elena Tomasino, her physics lab partner, smiled politely and wished her luck, obviously not caring much about whether it was true. Earth just didn’t have much of a reputation as a place to live. Sunspacers liked the idea of visiting, but they kept in mind the fact that this was a world that killed more than half a million people a year with natural disasters, accidents, and crime. Sunspacers were used to clean, orderly environments that they could control to a high degree, and that was just not possible on a natural world.

  As her class milled around on the lawn, Lissa sat down in an empty chair, feeling guilty about Henry Baum. He just didn’t a
ttract her, even if she hadn’t been going away. She spotted him with his parents in the crowd, but he looked away from her.

  “Why do you want to go to Earth?” he had asked her a week ago. He was the closest to a boyfriend she had ever had, or had permitted herself to have, and she had realized suddenly that he was really upset about her going away. “My dad says Earth’s crowded and smelly, and it has weird diseases that resist treatment.”

  “Do you really believe that?”

  “Everyone knows that, Lissa. I mean, there’s ten billion people down there!” He was studying to be an industrial chemist.

  “I’ve got to go,” she had answered. “The Institute’s school is there.”

  He had touched her hand gently across the lunch room table. “I’ll miss you.” He had looked at her with his gray eyes, and she had admired his long lashes. Some of his pudginess seemed to have disappeared, she had noticed, surprised at how much he seemed to care about her.

  She gazed up into the great lighted space and imagined the habitat’s people suddenly drifting free of the inner surface, out into the sunny emptiness, if Bernal were to stop turning. The centrifugal spin that pressed everything to the inner surface here was nothing more than the acceleration that kept water at the bottom of a bucket whipping around at the end of a rope. On Earth she would experience a gravitational field for the first time, the actual attraction of a large mass, not the steady acceleration of spin. She wouldn’t feel much difference, of course, except that it would be a full one gravity, slightly higher than the force on Bernal. She thought of the people who had grown up on Mars, the Moon, or on Mercury, where gravity was less than twenty percent of Earth’s. Those people would never be able to live on Earth. They could visit in wheelchairs, or stand with the help of external prosthetic supports, but never comfortably, she knew. Entire generations of colonists were forever cut off from the home world; but they were at home elsewhere.

  She looked around for her father, and saw him talking to Mr. Molly. And she knew suddenly that she was really leaving, and that she would miss this inner world of small towns and parks, gentle sunlight and small streams. Bernal’s perfection was a human order, made by and for humanity—not the nature of a teeming planet like Earth, or the harsh, radiation-filled openness of Sunspace, but that of a newly made place.…

  “What can I say, Lissa?” her father asked as he sat down next to her. “We both know that high school is nothing at all. You learned most of what they could teach you halfway through. You got to do a lot of interesting reading.” He smiled as he leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. “Sharon’s very sorry she couldn’t come, but a life depended on a major piece of surgery they could not do without her.” He smiled. “Well, they could have, but it was a new technique that she helped develop, so she had to be there to see it work.”

  “I really don’t mind,” Lissa said, smiling gently and feeling something of her father’s expression in her own face. Things were changing for her quickly now. She felt sad and hopeful at the same time.

  Three bottles of champagne were waiting for them on the terrace. Mom sprang at her from behind the door and poured a small bottle all over her head. “Congratulations, dear!” she cried. Dad went over to the bucket and moved the bottles around in the ice.

  Lissa’s head was spinning by early evening. The sun rings faded to moonlight, and the lights went on all over the inner surface. She sat and watched the road lamps connect the towns. The great lake sparkled, and she knew again how much she would miss home.

  But in the back of her mind she heard the alien signals singing a strange song that called to her. She felt her ambition; it demanded that she do whatever was needed to bring out her best. Earth wasn’t so far away; she’d be back for holidays. Her father had grown up on Earth, so it couldn’t be that bad.

  “You’ll like it,” he said, catching her mood. “It was home to me before I came to college on Bernal. I had to come, because it was the best place for physics. My roommate, Joe Sorby, and I knew that, and it’s the same with you.” He toasted her with an empty glass, and she felt his sudden sadness.

  She would have to go to the polar spaceport alone the next morning, but she didn’t mind. Mom had to see a patient very early, and Morey would still be asleep. Lissa didn’t want him to miss his one o’clock class. He needed a lot of sleep in order to shovel physics into new brains.

  “Are you sure you can handle being away in a strange place?” he asked, shifting in his recliner. There was only a trace of doubt in his voice.

  “Of course I can,” she answered firmly, yet felt that her life so far had rushed by too quickly.

  “Oh, there was a message for you from Henry earlier. He didn’t want to stay on or have me call you. He just said to tell you good luck.”

  “Thanks.”

  Her father was silent, and after a few moments she noticed that he had fallen asleep. She smiled, feeling that he had accepted her plans for the future, however critical he might be of the Interstellar Institute’s work. As she gazed at his sleeping face, she realized how important the approval of her parents was to her sense of determination.

  |Go to Table of Contents |

  3

  The Pacific Ocean was in full view as Lissa awoke aboard the shuttle to Earth. India and the island of Sri Lanka were an intricate pattern of greens and browns. In the north, the Himalayan mountains looked like plowed furrows on the border of Tibet. She had seen all this before, through the large telescopes on Bernal One; but now, during the twenty-four-hour journey from L-5 in the Moon’s Orbit, she had time to realize that she would be living in those furrows. The Earth would grow large and she would become small; the planet would become a whole world, millions of times larger than the 314 square kilometers that made up the inner surface of Bernal’s hollow ball. On Earth that was just enough for a good-sized city. Gravity would not be the centrifugal pressure of rotation, but an even force that would not vary from the equator to the poles, as it did back home. There would be no zero-g areas. Days and nights would be slightly irregular, and the weather would be only partially controllable or predictable. Mr. Thomaso, her high school adviser, had warned her to expect a somewhat messy environment; it was just not possible to keep a huge planet as clean and tidy as a small space colony.

  The Earth now took up nearly half the small 3-D screen in her passenger compartment. She shifted against her restraining straps and stretched. Her stomach had felt queasy in prolonged zero-g, but that had disappeared in the first few hours.

  Most of the other passengers along the central passage of the shuttle were older people—business persons and officials of one kind or another. She was the only student going to Earth on this run.

  The planet grew larger on the screen. Soon the Pacific would take up the whole view. The shuttle was coming in directly to the Earthport at Woomera, Australia.

  Mike, the steward, drifted by her compartment and made sure she was wearing her restraints. The breakfast light was still on over her personal console. She pushed the button and flushed the food away; it was better not to eat too much during zero-g trips, and she wasn’t very hungry anyway, still feeling her disappointment at the food she’d found when she had slid open the small door for dinner.

  Reaching over, she unhooked the observation helmet and put it on. At once it seemed that she was floating free in space. Earth was a great ball of brightness below her, its atmosphere a lens magnifying oceans and land masses. The poles were bright caps of snow. Night had just fallen on the West Coast of the Americas. Cities winked on as the line of darkness overtook them.

  The shuttle turned around on its gyros, and she saw the Moon, now more distant than she had ever seen it. Her father had taken her to Luna City twice in her first year of high school. What she remembered best was the slow, graceful descent of the shuttle onto the airless walled plain of Plato. Landing on Earth would be very different.

  She took off the helmet, attached it to its hook, and relaxed. Pressure pushed her down in
to her couch as the shuttle fired its engines to slow down, coming in toward Woomera tail first. The weight in her stomach felt good, and she looked forward to eating a large meal.

  The view on the 3-D screen changed to landside cameras. She was suddenly looking up into Earth’s sky, searching for her shuttle among the clouds.

  Deceleration remained comfortably steady, and finally she saw her shuttle drop through the clouds into scattered sunlight. The view changed as she heard the sonic boom, showing the landing field from the ground. Atomic engines running steadily, the giant bullet shape came in and touched the desert.

  I’m here, on Earth, Lissa thought excitedly, on the planet where humanity had been born. Her father was from New York City. Her mother had been born on Bernal, but her family had come from Ireland and Spain.

  “Woomera Earthport,” the Captain announced over the intercom. “Prepare to disembark.”

  What a nice old word, she thought. To get out of the bark, or boat, to disembark. She took her handbag of personal gear out of its niche and waited for the shuttle’s core elevator to stop at her cubicle. It went down once in the passageway, then came back empty and stopped for her. She got in carefully, testing her legs in real gravity.

  The lift made its way down the shuttle, picking up passengers. When it had collected twenty people, it went all the way down.

  The outer door opened. Lissa stepped out through the open locks into a long tunnel. She walked straight ahead, following the flashing lights, taking careful steps, carrying her bag by its shoulder strap. There seemed to be no difference walking in real gravity, and she didn’t feel particularly heavier.

  “First trip to Earth?” a male voice asked from her right. She turned and saw a young man walking next to her, carrying what seemed to be a heavy suitcase. He was smiling at her strangely, and she didn’t like it.