Nomad (1944)

by Wesley Long; George O. Smith

  “That I can do.”

  “We know that. But there is another reason for our request. One day you will know about it. It has to do with our decision concerning alliance with Sol’s family.” Guy considered. “Soon?”

  “It will be some time.”

  Again that unwillingness to discuss the future. Guy thought it over and decided that this was something beyond him. He, too, let the matter drop for the present and took a new subject.

  “Charalas, this sun of yours. It is not a true sun.”

  “No,” laughed Charalas. “It is not.”

  “Nor is it anything like a true sun. Matter is stable stuff only under certain limits. If that size were truly solar matter, it would necessarily be so dense that space would be warped in around it so tight that nothing could emerge— radiation, I mean. To the observer, it would not exist. That is axiomatic. If a bit of solar matter of that size were isolated, it would merely expand and cool in a matter of hours—if it were solar-core matter it would probably be curtains for anything that tried to live in the neighborhood. Matter of that size is stable only at reasonable temperatures. I don’t know the limits, but I’d guess that three or four thousand degrees Kelvin would be tops. Oh, I forgot the opposite end; the very high temperature white dwarf might be that size—but it would warp space as I said before and thus do no good. Therefore a true sun of that size and mass is impossible.

  “Another thing, Charalas. We are close to Sol. A light-week or less. That would have been seen . . . should have been seen by our observatories. Why haven’t they seen it?”

  “Our shield,” explained Charalas, “explains both. You see, Guy, in order that a planet may wander space, some means of solar effect must be maintained. As you say, nothing practical can be found in nature. Our planet drive is poorly controlled. We can not maneuver Ertene as you would a spaceship. It requires great power to even shift the course of Ertene by so much as a few degrees. We’ve taken luck as a course through the galaxy and have visited only those stars that have lain along our course. Trying to swing anything of solar mass • would be impossible. Ertene would merely leave the sun; the sun would not answer Ertene’s gravitational pull.

  “But this is trivial. Obviously we have no real sun. But we needed one.” Charalas smiled shyly. “At this point I must sound braggart,” he said, “but it was an ancestor of mine—Timalas—who brought Ertene her sun.”

  “Great sounding guy,” commented the Terran.

  “He was. Ertene left the parent sun with only the light-shield. The light-shield, Guy, is a screen of energy that permits radiation to pass inwardly but not outwardly. Thus we collect the radiation of all the stars and lose but a minute quantity of the input from losses. That kept Ertene warm during those first years of our wandering.

  “It also presented Ertene with a serious problem. The entire sky was faintly luminous. It was neither night nor day at any place on Ertene, but a half-light all the time. Disconcerting and entirely alien to the human animal. Evolutionary strains might have appeared to accept this strange condition, but Timalas decided that Intis, the lesser moon, would serve as a sun. He converted the screen slightly, distorting it so that the focal point for incoming radiation was at Intis. The lesser moon became incandescent, -eventually, and serves As Ertene’s sun. It is synthetic. The other radiations that prove useful to growing things and to man hut which are not visible are emitted right from the inner surface of the light-shield itself. Intis serves as the source of light and most of the heat. It is a natural effect, giving us beautiful sunrises and peaceful sunsets. The radiation that causes growth and healthful effects is ever-present, because of the screen. Some heat, too, for that is included in the beneficial radiation. But the visible spectrum is directed at Intis along with a great quantity of the heat rays. Intis is small, Guy, and it is also beneficial that the re-radiation from Intis that misses Ertene and falls on the screen is converted also. Much of Ertene’s power is derived from the screen itself—a back-energy collected from the screen generator.”

  “So the effective sun is the result of an energy shield? And this same shield prevents any radiation from leaving this region. I can see why we haven’t seen Ertene.

  You can’t see something that doesn’t radiate. But what about occupation?”

  “Quite possible. But the size of the screen is such that it is of stellar size as seen from stellar distances. It is but a true point in space.” Charalas smiled. “I was about to say a point-source of light similar to a star but the shield is a point-source of no-light, really. Occupation is possible but the probabilities are remote, plus the probability of a repeat, so that the observer would consider the brief occupation of the star anything but an accident to his photographic plate.”

  “Don’t get you on that.”

  “It’s easy, Guy. Take a star-photograph and lay a thin line across it and see how many stars are really covered by this line— which is of the thickness of the stars themselves. Too few for a nonsuspecting observer to tie together into a theory. No, we are safe from detection.”

  “Detection?”

  “Yes. Call it that. Suppose we were to pass through a malignant culture. We did, three generations ago and it was only our shield that saved us from being absorbed into that system. We would have been slaves to that civilization.”

  “I see.”

  “Do you?”

  “Certainly,” said Guy. “You intend to have me present the Solar Government to your leaders. Upon my tale will rest your decision. You will decide whether to join us—or to pass undetected.”

  “I believe you understand,” said Charalas. “So study well and be prepared to draw the most discerning comparisons, for the Council will ask the most delicate questions and you should be able to discuss any phase of Ertene’s social, system and the corresponding Terran system.”

  Mentally, Guy bade good-by to Sol. He applied himself to his Ertinian lessons because he felt that if Sol were lost to him—as it might be—he could at least enter the Ertinian life as an Ertinian.

  III.

  Guy Maynard, the Terran, became steeped in Ertinian lore. He went at it with the same intensity that he went at anything eke, and possibly driven with the heart-chilling thought that he might not be able to convince Ertene that Sol had a place for her. He saw that possibility, and prayed against it, yet he realized that Ertene was a planet of her own mind and that they might decide against alliance. It was a selling job he had to do.

  And if not—

  Guy Maynard would have to remain on Ertene. Therefore in either case it would serve him best to become as Ertinian as possible. He did not believe that they would exile him—that would be dangerous. Nor did he believe that death would accompany his failure to convince Ertene of their place around Sol. The obvious course in case of failure would be to permit him the freedom of the planet; to become in effect, an Ertinian.

  He’d be under watch, of course. Escape would prove dangerous for their integrity. Imprisonment was not impossible, but he hoped that his failure to convince would not be so sorry as to have them suspect him.

  Of course, an opportunity to escape would be taken, unless he gave his word of honor. Yet, he had sworn the oath of an officer in Terra’s space fleet, and that oath compelled him to serve Terra in spite of danger, death, or dishonor to self. He must not give his parole—

  Guy fought himself over that problem for days and days.. It led him in circular thinking, the outlet to which would be evident only when he found out the Ertinian reaction. Too much depended on that trend; there were too many ifs standing between him and any plan for the future.

  He forgot his mental whirl in study. He investigated Ertinian science and tucked a number of items away in his memory. He visited the observatory and after a number of visits he plotted Ertene in the celestial sphere within a few hundred thousand miles. That, too, he filed away in his memory along with the course of the wanderer.

  He learned that his place of convalescence was no hospital,
but Thomakein’s estate. It staggered him. Thomakein was—must be— a veritable dynamo of energetic mentality to have the variety of interests as reflected in the trappings about the estate. The huge library, the observatory, the laboratories. How many of the things he saw and studied were Thomakein’s personal property he would never know; though he did know that some of them came from museums and institutes across the planet.

  He wondered about Thomakein. He had never seen his saviour since his mind had come back. He recalled vague things, but nothing cogent. He asked Charalas about Thomakein.

  “Thomakein’s main problem is Sol,” explained Charalas. “A problem which you have made easy for him. However, he is on the derelict, studying the findings there. A warship is a most interesting museum of the present, you know. Often things of less than perfect operation are there; things that will eventually become perfected and established into private use. It is almost a museum of the future. Thomakein will learn much there and he has been commissioned to remain on the derelict until he has catalogued every item on it.”

  “Lone life, isn’t it?” asked Guy.

  “He has friends. Last I heard from him, he had sealed the usable portion of the derelict against the void, and was turning the course to bring it toward Ertene. Eventually the wreck will circle Ertene. Perhaps we may attempt to land it here.” ‘

  “It’ll be a nice museum piece,” said Guy, “but it will not endear you to those of Mars.”

  “I know. Of course if we accept Sol’s offer, we will destroy it completely.”

  “Keep it,” said Guy, shrugging his shoulders. “Ertene will find little in common with Mars. It will be Terra and Ertene; together we will form the nucleus of Solar power.”

  “So?”

  “Naturally. Ertene and Terra are the most alike, even to the flora and fauna.”

  “I see.”

  Charalas let the matter drop as he did before. Guy tried to open the line of thought again, but met with no success. It was not a matter of indifference to Guy’s arguments, but more a complete disinclination to make any sort of statement prior to the decision of the Council of Ertene. Realizing that this decision was one of the single-try variety, Guy studied hard during the next few days. There would be no appeal even though he tried to get another hearing during the rest of his life.

  He wondered how soon it would be.

  Charalas landed on Thomakein’s estate in a small flier and asked Guy if he would like to see the famous Hall of History. They flew a quarter of the way around the planet, and during the trip, Charalas pointed out scenes of interest. It was enlightening to Guy, who hadn’t seen anything beyond a few miles of Thomakein’s estate. There were farms laid out on the production line scale while the cities and towns that housed the farmers were sprawling, rustic villages of simple beauty. The larger cities had evolved from the square-block and rubber-stamp home kind to specialized aggregations in which the central, business sections were close-knit while the residences were widespread and well apart, giving each family adequate breathing room.

  “The railroad,” smiled Charalas, “is still with us. It will never leave, because shipments of heavy machinery of low necessity can be transported cheaper that way. Like the barges that ply the rivers with coal, ore, and grain, they are powered with adaptations of the space drive, but they are none the less barges or trains.”

  “They’ve found that, too,” laughed Guy. “There is little economic value in trying to ship a million tons of coal by flier.”

  “Normally, you should say. The slowest conveyor system is rapid if the conveyor is always filled and the material is not perishable. Coal and ore have been here for eons. Therefore it is no hardship to wait for six weeks while a given ton of ore gets across the continent, provided that the user can remove a ton of ore from the conveying system simultaneously with the placement of another ton that will not get there for six weeks.”

  “Sounds correct, though I’ve never thought of it in that manner,” said Guy thoughtfully. “But that must be why it is done. We hull ore across space untended, and in pre-calculated orbits, picking it up at Terra from Pluto, for instance. The driverless and crewless hull is packed with ore, towed into space by a space tug and set into its orbit, the tug then returning to the shipping area to await the next hull. The hull may take a couple of years to get to Terra, but when it does, it begins to emit a finder-signal and Terran space tugs pick the hull up and lower it to Terra. The hulls are returned with unperishable supplies to the Plutonian miners.”

  “We hadn’t the necessity of applying that thought to space shipping,” answered Charalas. “Tonis, the larger moon, is so close that special shipping methods are not needed. We have but a few colonists there, most of which are members of the laboratory staff.”

  ‘‘You’ve found moon laboratories essential in space work, too?” asked Guy.

  “Naturally. Tonis is airless and upon it is the Ertinian astronomical laboratory.”

  “Moons—even sterile moons—are good for that,” said Guy. “They— Say, Charalas, what is that collection of buildings below here? They look like something extra-special.”

  “They are. That is the place we’re going to see.”

  Charalas put the flier into a steep dive and landed in the open space between the buildings. They entered the long, low building at the end opposite the most ornate building of the seven that surrounded the landing area and Charalas told the receptionist that they were expected.

  The long hall was excellently illuminated, and on either side of the corridor were murals; great twelve-foot panels of rare color and of photographic detail. Upon close examination they proved to be paintings.

  The first panel showed an impression of the formation of Ertene, along with the other eleven planets of Ertene’s parent sun. It was colorful, and impressionistic in character rather than an attempt to portray the actual cataclysm that formed the planets. The next few panels were of geologic interest, giving the impressions of Ertene through the long, geologic periods. There were dinosaur-picturizations next, and the panels brought them forward in irregular steps through the carboniferous; through the glacial ages; through the dawn ages; and finally into the coming of man to power.

  The next fourteen panels were used in the rise of man on Ertene from the early ages to full, efficient civilization. They were similar to a possible attempt to portray a similar period on Terra, showing wars, life in the cities of power during the community-power ages, and the fall of several powerful cities.

  Then the rise of widespread government came with its more closely-knit society made possible by better means of communication and transportation. This went on and on until the facility of the combining factors made separate governments on Ertene untenable, and there were seven great, fiery panels of mighty, widespread wars.

  “Up to here, it is similar to ours,” commented Guy.

  “And here it changes,” said Charalas. “For the next panels show the impending doom of Ertene’s parent sun. The problem of space had been conquered but the other planets were of little interest to Ertene. We fought about four interplanetary wars as you see here, all against alien races. Then came trouble. The odd chance of a runaway star coming near Ertene did happen, and we faced the decision of living near an unstable sun for centuries, for our astronomers calculated that the two stars would pass close enough to cause upheavals in the suns that would result in instability for thousands, perhaps millions of years.”

  “Instability might not have been so bad,” said Guy thoughtfully, “if it could be predicted. No, I’m not speaking in riddles,” he laughed. “I may sound peculiar, saying that it would be possible to predict instability. But a regular variable of the cepheid type is predictable-instability.”

  “True. But we had no basis for prediction. After all, it would have been taking a chance. Suppose that the instability had caused a nova? Epitaphs are nice but none the less final. We left hundreds of years before the solar proximity. Now we know that we might have su
rvived, but as you know, we can not swerve Ertene’s course readily and though we are slowly turning, the race may have died out and gone for a galactic eon before we could return. Once the race dies out— or the interest in returning to a certain sun back there in the depths of the galaxy dies—we will cease

  to turn. We may fine a haven somewhere, before then.”

  “You were speaking of years,” said Guy. “Was that a loose reference or were you approximating my conception of a year?”

  “A year is a loose term indeed, no matter by whom it is used,” said Charalas. “To you, it is three hundred and sixty-five, and about a quarter, days. A day is one revolution of Terra. From Mars, say, a Terran year is something else entirely. Mars, of course, is not too good an example for its sidereal day is very close to Terra’s. But your Venus, with its eighteen hour day—eighteen Terran hours—sees Terra’s year as four hundred eighty-six, plus, days. On Ertene, we have no year. We had one, once. It was composed of four hundred twelve point seven zero four two two nine three one days, sidereal. Now, our day is different, since the length of the solar day depends upon the progression of the planet about its luminary. Our luminary behaves as a moon with a high ecliptic-angle as I have explained. No, Guy, I have been mentally converting my year to your year, by crude approximation.”

  The next panel was an ornate painting of the Ertinian system, showing—out of scale for artistic purpose—the planets and sun, with Ertene drawing away in a long spiral.

  “For many years we pursued that spiral, withdrawing from the sun by slow degrees. Then we broke free.” Charalas indicated the panel which showed Ertene in the foreground while the clustered system was far behind.

  They passed from panel to panel, all of which were interesting to Guy Maynard. There was a series of the first star contacted by Ertene. It was a small system, cold and forbidding, or hot and equally forbidding. The outer planets were in the grip of frozen air, and the inner planets bubbled in moltenness. “This system was too far out of line to turn. It was our first star, and we might have stayed in youthfulness. Now, we know better.”