each of them was bored and restless. And when they learned that two ships would be arriving at Sector Headquarters within one S-space day of each other, one bound for Earth directly, and the other proceeding there via Paradise, they had split into two groups. Kallen wanted to visit the investigating group of Immortals orbiting Paradise, while Lum and Rosanne were curious to take a trip down to the surface of the planet itself. The computer had contained a brief description of events that led to the extinction of the colony on Paradise, but as Lum had pointed out, that stark recitation of facts was unsatisfying. A healthy, thriving population of over a million humans had died in a few days, with no written or natural record to show how or why. If it could happen so easily on Paradise, why couldn’t it happen on Pentecost, or anywhere else?
Since the whole detour would amount to no more than a week of S-space travel, Elissa, Peron and Sy had taken the ship direct to Sol. Kallen, Rosanne, and Lum went to Paradise; And as Lum had cheerfully pointed out as they were leaving, they would never be more than an S-day apart through radio communications. They could talk to each other any time. Except that their ship’s equipment seemed to be in continuous higher priority use…
Now, Peron at least was regretting their decision to separate. And Sy was looking unusually thoughtful and withdrawn, even for him.
“Perhaps I have everything backwards,” he said at last. “When I said that I wanted to visit the galactic center, I assumed that it would be the place to find new mysteries. Maybe not. Perhaps the true unknown is elsewhere. Should I be looking at nothing, at the regions between the galaxies?”
He stood up abruptly and followed Olivia Ferranti out of the control chamber, leaving Peron and Elissa looking at each other uncertainly.
“More questions,” said Elissa.
“I know. And nobody willing to provide us with answers. I’ll tell you the biggest mystery of all. The society of Immortals has a complicated structure. They have the network of ships linking all the inhabited worlds, they have an elaborate recruiting system to bring people like us into S-space, and they have definite rules for encounters with other societies — even human ones. Lord knows what they’d do if they met aliens who were obviously intelligent and lived close to stars. But with all that, we never seem to get any closer to the Immortals who are in charge of the whole organization.”
“Maybe their society doesn’t operate like that — perhaps it’s a true democracy.” “I don’t believe it.” Peron leaned across and put his arm around Elissa’s shoulders. “Just think about it for a minute. Somebody has to develop rules and procedures. Somebody has to monitor them. Somebody has to arrange for food supplies, and energy, and travel, and construction. You have to have leaders. Without that you don’t have democracy — you have anarchy, and complete chaos. Where is their Government?”
Elissa was absently rubbing the back of Peron’s right hand, as it lay across her shoulder. “Didn’t we conclude that it’s on Earth, or at least in orbit somewhere in the Sol system?”
“We did. But I don’t believe it any more. I told Olivia Ferranti that we want to meet the leaders of the Immortals. She won’t talk about that, but she insists we’ll really enjoy the visit to Earth. How could she possibly say that, if we might be heading for a confrontation there?”
Elissa shook her head. She did not speak, and after a couple of minutes moved out of Peron’s embrace and quietly left the control cabin.
Peron was left alone, gloomily staring out into the pearly blankness of the S-space sky. It felt like only weeks since he was walking through the sticky marshes of Glug, or contemplating the dangers of a landing on Whirlygig. To him, and to Sy and Elissa, it was weeks.
But back on Pentecost, new generations of contestants had won and lost at Planetfest. By now, Peron’s name, along with Kallen, Lum, and the others, was no more than a footnote in an ancient record book. And Wilmer, or some newly trained Immortal, would be down on the planet’s surface, observing the new contestants and reporting back on their behavior.
And everyone they had known on Pentecost, except for Wilmer, was now long dead. Peron wondered about the great centuries-long project to reclaim the southern marshes of Turcanta Province. Was that finished now, with real-life agricultural developments replacing the futuristic artists’ drawings that had illustrated a geography lesson when he was back in school? And what other planet-shaping projects had been developed since then?
He and Elissa had talked of their decision, and there were no regrets. With what they had learned, there could have been no turning back to a planet-bound “normal” life on Pentecost. The idea of visiting Earth had filled them all with energy and enthusiasm; and he and Elissa were ridiculously happy together. And yet…
Peron had a premonition of other travels and troubles ahead, before the true secret of the Immortals was revealed.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The deceleration phase of an interstellar journey is normally passed in cold sleep. While the human passengers are unconscious, on-board computers perform the task of matching velocity and position with the target. They awaken the sleepers only upon final arrival.
The alternatives to cold sleep are limited: a move to normal space, followed by full consciousness during lengthy deceleration and final maneuvers; or an immobilized and dizzying ride in S-space. Neither is recommended.… Without discussion, Sy had chosen cold sleep during their approach to Sol. He was planning on using suspended animation techniques extensively in his future travels, and he was keen to gain more experience with them as soon as possible. Peron and Elissa had far more difficulty making a decision. After dreaming for so long of a return to Sol and to Earth, the idea that they would close their eyes, then suddenly find themselves there, was not at all attractive. It missed the whole point of the trip. Earth was a legend, and every experience connected with it should be savored. They had studied the Solar System during the journey from Sector Headquarters, and now they wanted to witness the whole approach. But that meant over a month of subjective travel time during deceleration, or a nauseating hour of slowing and orbit adjustment, tightly strapped in and unable to move a muscle…
They had discussed it over and over, and at last made their decision. Now they lay side by side, tightly cocooned in restraining nets. As a special favor, Olivia Ferranti had placed screen displays so that Peron and Elissa would have frequency-adjusted views both ahead of and behind the ship as it neared Sol. They had entered the nets before deceleration began, when they were still nearly fifty billion kilometers from Sol and the Sun was nothing more than an exceptionally bright star on the displays.
At first, they both felt that all their studies would be wasted. The Sun had grown steadily bigger and more brilliant, gyrating across the sky as their trajectory responded to the System-wide navigation control system. But it looked disappointingly like any other star. In the last five minutes of travel they caught a glimpse of Saturn, and had one snapshot look at the ring structure; but it was a long way off, and there was little detail to be seen of surface or satellites. All the other planets remained invisible.
They could not talk to each other, but they independently decided that the nausea and discomfort were definitely not worth it. Until, quite suddenly, Earth showed in the screen off to one side. The planet rapidly swung to loom directly ahead for the last stages of their approach.
And their sufferings were suddenly of no consequence.
They had been conditioned by the ship’s stored viewing tapes to expect a blue-green clouded marble and attendant moon, hanging isolated in space. Instead, the whole sphere of Earth shone girdled by a necklace of bright points of light, whirling around the central orb like an electron cloud about the central nucleus. There were so many of them that they created the illusion of a bright, continuous cloud, a glittering halo about the planet’s equator. As they watched, smaller units darted like fireflies between Earth and the orbiting structures.
Space stations. They were at all heights, some almost grazing the atmosphere, an entire dense ring at synchronous altitude, others wandering out beyond the Moon. And to be visible from this distance, many of them must be kilometers across. Peron and Elissa were looking at the result of twenty-five thousand years of continuous development of Earth orbit. The asteroid-moving and mining operations that began at the dawn of Earth’s space age had yielded a rich harvest. Before Peron and Elissa had more than a minute or two to absorb the scene, they were homing in on one of the larger structures. It was in synchronous orbit, hovering above a great landmass
