Emprise (21 page)

“The day of nations is passing. We can no longer afford to hold as our highest value allegiance to the place where we were born. We must ally ourselves instead with the species to which we were born,” said Tai Chen. “Regrettably Gu Qingfen could not accept this truth.”

But that did not soothe the many Hindus whose long-simmering antipathy to China was set boiling. Tensions soared along the intermittent and mountainous border between India and China, and when word came that Chinese nationals using the road south from Saitula through Bharat had been attacked, Rashuri had heard enough.

“The scurrilous attack on me by an unbalanced gunman was not an attack on India,” he said in a surprise address to that nation’s populace. “It was an attack on the Pangaean Consortium, and so an attack on the future. Some have chosen to believe otherwise, and to misguidedly try to reclaim lost honor with violence against the innocent.

“I denounce and renounce such actions.

“This incident has prompted me to now take an action I have long contemplated. Effective today I have dissolved the government, called for new elections, and resigned my position as Prime Minister of India.

“I do this with not inconsiderable regret, for I have been honored to serve in this post for nineteen years. You have celebrated with me the birth of my son and mourned with me the death of my wife. And together we have faced many challenges both from within and without.

“But tomorrow calls, and I must answer while I am still able. I am proud that my nation, guided by the wisdom of five thousand years, played a central role in the founding of the Pangaean Consortium. And it is to the success of that enterprise that I now commit myself fully.”

Rashuri sprang another surprise at a PSM held the day of his release from the hospital. He was brought into the room in a wheelchair to the applause of his eleven division heads; for the occasion, those from the remote centers had flown in to be there in person. With a helping hand from Montpelier, the Chairman acknowledged the applause by coming to his feet and standing stiffly at the head of the table.

“Thank you all,” he said, waving them to their seats with his one functional hand. “As you know, the first test of the full-scale Star Rise drive is scheduled for the first of next week. As you are probably aware, the fallout from recent events has mended some of the fences between the factions contending for control of that project.

“For a time, Cooke will not speak against us, nor will Tai Chen. Eddington continues to preach his MuMan gospel, but his backers’ interests are largely congruent with our own. It is time for us to regain the focus for ourselves. It is time for the Consortium to again set the agenda.

“For this reason, I have decided to move the Consortium’s operational headquarters to Assembly Station. With the termination of Gauntlet and major structural work on Star Rise nearing completion, there is presently sufficient room for myself and my immediate staff. Eventually all divisions with global responsibility will relocate to an expanded facility there.

“I intend to be at Assembly Station in time for the tests of the Star Rise drive. On my arrival we will hold ceremonies renaming Assembly Station. Its new name shall be Unity.

“And there I will remain. I do not intend to return to Earth until my ashes are ready to be swept away by the Ganges.”

Both of Rashuri’s decisions caught the cresting wave of sympathy and outrage and were carried forward swiftly. Instead of anger at his desertion, the people of India took pride in Rashuri’s “promotion” as symbolized by the move to Unity. To more than a few, by surviving the attack, Rashuri proved he had been rightly and prophetically named: Devaraja, the god-king.

Elsewhere, the resignation removed a lingering doubt in some quarters about conflict of interest, though most of the world barely took notice. But the new status of Assembly Station was another matter. Convex panels installed on Unity made it blaze brighter than Venus with reflected light; a new, slightly lower orbit carried it around the globe in stately fashion.

For thousands of years, wondering humans had looked to the skies as the home of powerful but unknowable gods. The sight of Unity moving among the stars tapped that fundamental mysticism, and that connection personalized the Pangaean Consortium in a way that a village NET station or a parasite eradication program never could. Though Rashuri was in fact farther away and less accessible at Unity than he had been in Delhi, the reverse seemed true.

A place is real only to those who have seen it. Delhi was real to millions. But in a very short time. Unity became real to billions. That light in the sky was where The Chairman lived and looked out for the people of Earth. Only children expressed the thought so simply, but few were untouched by it on some level.

The near-worship did not change Rashuri. But his first glimpse of the Earth from space did. No photo, no film, no first-person account had prepared him. However awesome the sights they portrayed, photos and films were finite: Jupiter reduced to the size of a dinner plate, an entire galaxy contained on a three-metre screen, and both bounded by ordinary reality.

But what Rashuri saw from the windows of the Shuttle II cabin and later from the viewports at Unity was unbounded and all-enveloping. Ordinary reality vanished with disconcerting speed. The spacecraft was a mote on an infinite sea, its hull eggshell-thin—

At that point the doctor assigned to attend Rashuri in-flight read the meaning of the biomonitors and Rashuri’s panicked expression, and redirected the Chairman’s attention inside the cabin.

“It’s a rookie experience—starts with rapture and sometimes turns into a nasty anxiety attack. You’ll get used to it,” the doctor promised.

“I hope not,” Rashuri said, risking a cautious glance at the disk of the Earth sliding beneath them. “I’m afraid you will.” The doctor smiled. “But you never forget the first time.”

Though dwarfed by the unfinished hexagonal framework of Gauntlet B to which it was stiff-tethered, the Star Rise vehicle was still larger than Rashuri had intuitively expected. The sense of scale came not from Gauntlet, now stripped of weapons and dotted with construction pods, but from the one-man, self-contained waldoids which jetted gracefully between it and Star Rise. The waldoids, powered spacesuits which were used for work in a vacuum, were as ticks to a housecat.

Star Rise’s shape, at least, was as expected. A central cylindrical hull, flared at either end by the AVLO projectors, housed the drive. Arrayed perpendicular to the drive hull at ninety-degree intervals were four spokelike instrument spars where, once the tests were complete, the inhabitable modules would be attached. The ship would be set spinning like a child’s jack to provide a half-gravity, and then accelerate along the axis of rotation.

The same day Rashuri arrived at Unity, Star Rise was detached from the construction rig and towed to the test range by a pair of tugs. Rashuri watched the process from Unity with a pair of binoculars, and kept an open line to Driscoll in England, who was watching via the same cameras providing PANCOMNET’s news feed of the test series. Driscoll had objected to the live coverage, but to no avail. Rashuri was willing to take a small risk of public failure in order to focus attention on Star Rise.

After twelve hours of checkout at the launch site, Star Rise was spun up by small thrusters on the instrument spars. It then moved out smartly under the command of its onboard computers. Within minutes, the ship had reached .01c, easily outrunning the upgraded OTV serving as a camera platform. Star Rise continued to accelerate up to .05c, at which point the lengthy deceleration phase began. Within two hours, at Rashuri’s prodding and on the basis of preliminary telemetry, Driscoll pronounced the test a success.

Only Weddell had been forewarned about Rashuri’s plans once that pronouncement was done, and he only so that the necessary arrangements could be made.

“I join with you in celebrating the successful test of the spacecraft which will soon carry our envoys to their historic meeting with the Senders,” Rashuri said in a surprise planetary address. The Chairman himself was able to watch the broadcast in his Unity office; it was (me of several tapes he had taken the precaution of having made before he left Earth.

“Your hard work and support of the Pangaean Consortium has made this day possible. Now I would like to invite you to become involved in a more personal way. The spacecraft that you saw today needs a name.

“Star Rise was the name for our starship project, but was never intended as the name for the ship itself. We need a name that properly embodies all that this ship means to us, that captures the meaning of this moment in our existence. And we look to you to provide that name.

“For the next eight weeks, Channel 22 of the NET will be reserved for submission of your suggestions. I will review them personally and make the final selection. The person who first submits the name which is chosen will be invited to take part in the ceremonies when the envoy ship is launched later this year.”

As the eight-flight test program continued in ciscytherean space, the suggestions pouted in. It was quickly evident that nationalism was not dead: from Germany there were many nominations for Oberth and Von Braun, from China for Wan Hu, from the Russian republics for Tsiolkovsky and Gagarin, from the United North for Goddard, from Italy for Galileo, from Poland for Copernicus. The list of national heroes unrelated to space activities was much longer.

First Scion Carl Cooke, Laurence Eddington, and Rashuri himself were singled out for the honor in some numbers, as were Jesus, Gandhi, and George Washington. Those who looked a little deeper into the world’s intellectual traditions came up with such names as Anaxagoras and Kuo Shou-ching. The review committee kept an informal list of more bizarre nominations: one proud Scot wanted the ship named
Cameron of Lochiel
after a seventeenth century chieftain, while several thousand music enthusiasts saw nothing wrong with
Ludwig Van Beethoven
.

But Rashuri and the committee quickly agreed that it would be inappropriate to name the ship after any individual, no matter of what stature or popularity. So more attention was paid to the considerable array of phrases and expressions offered up for consideration.

The most popular language after English was Latin, perhaps because it lent a distinguished air to what were in many cases banal thoughts.
Excelsior
, still higher;
Per Angusta Ad Augusta
, through difficulties to honors; and
Ad Astra Per Aspera
, to the stars by hard ways. But to use a name that nearly everyone would need to have explained to them was also ruled out.

So Rashuri and his committee looked to simpler suggestions which hewed to the same spirit.
Peace. Avatar. Friendship. Open Hand
. There was no shortage of material. By the time the AVLO trials were completed, more than one billion entries had been submitted.

It was while Rashuri was so engaged that Driscoll called to report on the results of the test program. “There’s good news and bad news,” said Driscoll. “The good news is simple. The bad news is complex.”

“Go ahead.”

“As was the case with the prototype, the drive performs more efficiently than predicted. Obviously we don’t yet have the last word on the AVLO phenomenon. But based on the test series, I expect that the ship will be capable of very near to ,80c—or about ten percent faster than we hoped for.”

“Which means that we will be able to meet the Senders even farther out than planned.”

“It would—except we won’t be launching on time.”

“Why not?”

“Because the ship needs to be redesigned. A ship traveling at the velocities this one is capable of needs protection from space debris. The smallest dust mote is a danger at .5c.”

“Surely you anticipated this need.”

“Yes, of course—we were counting on using the pushmi-pullyu to provide that shielding. I was led to believe the gravitational well created by the more powerful drive would be not only steeper but larger. It isn’t so. The outer third of each of the four mods will be exposed.”

“Which is where the bridge and crew quarters are located.”

“Yes. The simplest solution is to redesign the ship—tuck in its elbows, as it were. Instead of perpendicular to the main hull, the modules will have to be reworked so that they can be attached parallel to it.”

“How long will that take?”

Driscoll sighed. “Another sixty days. There are dozens of utility fittings which have to be relocated, along with the access hatches.”

“Still, that doesn’t seem too onerous after all we’ve gone through,” said Rashuri.

“I’m not finished. We will have to eliminate one of the four spoke modules. Because of their profile, only three will fit parallel to the drive hull. I want your permission to delete the MuMan Environmental Chamber.”

“What other alternatives are there?”

“None. You know how we designed it. The Minimal mission requires mod A, the Basic mission A plus B, the Standard mission, both of those plus C. Mod E isn’t required for any of the missions, except in the eyes of the Assembly.”

“It seems to me that eliminating mod C is an option.”

“Then there’d be hardly any point in going. You’d be cutting the complement from twelve to four. The whole mission would be threatened.”

“The scientific mission is not the whole mission,” Rashuri said shortly, “It is not even the most important one. We were prepared to launch a four-man crew, or if the limitations of the drive demanded it, a one-man crew. Isn’t that reflected in your modular design?”

“It is,” Driscoll grumbled.

“And if you have been under the assumption that your division would provide the ship’s entire complement, you have been sadly mistaken. You were commissioned to build a star-ship—not to man it.”

“You can’t design a ship without thinking about the kind of people who will be operating it.”

“And so you have been deeply involved in establishing the selection criteria and qualifications. But the prerogative to choose who will fly Star Rise has remained with my office. As does the prerogative to downgrade the scientific mission. The MuMan chamber stays. The complement is cut to four. You may nominate candidates for one of those positions.”