Read Online Bowl of Heaven by Gregory Benford and Larry Niven - Free Book Online
Authors: Gregory Benford and Larry Niven
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ridge around the Knothole. Engineered current-carrying circuits, bigger than continents? Something had to make the magnetic fields that shaped plasma from the sun, fields that were also pushing against their ship now with a fierce, blinding gale. Something huge.
“No trouble decelerating now,” she said matter-of-factly, to calm the others. She need not turn to look at them; she could smell their fear. They swam upstream against the jet. Now the magnetic braking was worse than anything Seeker had ever been designed for. The ship popped and groaned. The bowl came rushing at them. Deep bass notes rang through the ship, vibrating Beth’s couch, rattling everything.…
Focus. She flew through the bowl’s exhaust Knothole, hugging the edge to avoid cremation. A noose of magnetic fields at the Knothole boundary tightened the jet like water in a constriction. Flow velocity rose against the ship. Running creases crossed the shock waves they rode. She saw the bowl was thicker at the Knothole than elsewhere—to carry bigger stresses? And eerie lightning played along the Knothole rim.
She dispatched an AI to map the Knothole magnetic geometry and in seconds a color-coded 3-D map unfurled on a screen. “The noose we’re going through is bounded by dipolar fields,” she said abstractly. “And the dipoles are kept in line with another field, perpendicular to the dipoles—so the magnetic stresses can’t reconnect and die. Neat.”
Murmurs from behind her egged her on. Analysis, tension-relieving talk, cheers—all just a chorus she ignored.
“Plus, ladies and gentlemen, it’s radioactive as hell around here,” Beth said, adding brightly, “but an interstellar surfboard—that’s us—is designed for that.”
They slammed ahead, losing speed. She surged forward in her harness, adjusted, and surged again. Surfing the big one. Ride of a lifetime. If you survive …
The prow tried to fight sideways but she jockeyed it back. Again. And again. Each time she got the feel of it better. Offhand she noticed she was drenched in sweat. No wonder I can’t smell their fear anymore.…
She caught a glimmer refracted through the streaming plasma ahead, a small sphere wobbling toward them—Wickramsingh’s Star. The bowl flattened, became the sidewise horizon. The ship howled with its labors.
For Beth, time ceased to mean anything. She countered every veer and vortex, kept them straight, swore, blinked back sweat—and they were through.
The sky opened. Abruptly they were rising above a silvery plain. The jet hammered at them still. “Wonderful!” Cliff choked out, still hanging forward in his harness. Hollow cheers, ragged. They were rising above a vast white plain, but slower, slower—and then they turned again.
“Getting out of the jet,” Beth said, as if passing the butter. If they stayed in the jet, they’d be slowed further, back through the Knothole and out again.
“We’re taking a lot of ohmic heating in the skin,” Abduss said, voice tight with worry.
“I can barely hold the vector,” Mayra said calmly. Cliff knew by now the subtle tones of tension in her voice.
The white-hot jet plume thinned, then seemed to veer aside. Rough turbulence struck, slamming them around in their couches, bringing fresh metal shrieks from the ship.
“Out!” Mayra shouted. “We’re out.”
“I’d say we’re in,” Redwing said.
They cheered and all eyes were on the screens. Now they could see the inside of the bowl … and it was a vast sheeted plain brimming with light. They rose swiftly, peeling off from the jet to the side, plasma falling behind, vistas clearing. Again there curved away over the misty distance great longitude and latitude grids in sleek, silvered sections the size of worlds. The sections had boundaries, thin dark lines, demarking different curvatures of a greater mirror—and from that their eyes told them that these were all focused far away.
Silence. In a whisper Abduss said, “Mirrors …
“No trouble decelerating now,” she said matter-of-factly, to calm the others. She need not turn to look at them; she could smell their fear. They swam upstream against the jet. Now the magnetic braking was worse than anything Seeker had ever been designed for. The ship popped and groaned. The bowl came rushing at them. Deep bass notes rang through the ship, vibrating Beth’s couch, rattling everything.…
Focus. She flew through the bowl’s exhaust Knothole, hugging the edge to avoid cremation. A noose of magnetic fields at the Knothole boundary tightened the jet like water in a constriction. Flow velocity rose against the ship. Running creases crossed the shock waves they rode. She saw the bowl was thicker at the Knothole than elsewhere—to carry bigger stresses? And eerie lightning played along the Knothole rim.
She dispatched an AI to map the Knothole magnetic geometry and in seconds a color-coded 3-D map unfurled on a screen. “The noose we’re going through is bounded by dipolar fields,” she said abstractly. “And the dipoles are kept in line with another field, perpendicular to the dipoles—so the magnetic stresses can’t reconnect and die. Neat.”
Murmurs from behind her egged her on. Analysis, tension-relieving talk, cheers—all just a chorus she ignored.
“Plus, ladies and gentlemen, it’s radioactive as hell around here,” Beth said, adding brightly, “but an interstellar surfboard—that’s us—is designed for that.”
They slammed ahead, losing speed. She surged forward in her harness, adjusted, and surged again. Surfing the big one. Ride of a lifetime. If you survive …
The prow tried to fight sideways but she jockeyed it back. Again. And again. Each time she got the feel of it better. Offhand she noticed she was drenched in sweat. No wonder I can’t smell their fear anymore.…
She caught a glimmer refracted through the streaming plasma ahead, a small sphere wobbling toward them—Wickramsingh’s Star. The bowl flattened, became the sidewise horizon. The ship howled with its labors.
For Beth, time ceased to mean anything. She countered every veer and vortex, kept them straight, swore, blinked back sweat—and they were through.
The sky opened. Abruptly they were rising above a silvery plain. The jet hammered at them still. “Wonderful!” Cliff choked out, still hanging forward in his harness. Hollow cheers, ragged. They were rising above a vast white plain, but slower, slower—and then they turned again.
“Getting out of the jet,” Beth said, as if passing the butter. If they stayed in the jet, they’d be slowed further, back through the Knothole and out again.
“We’re taking a lot of ohmic heating in the skin,” Abduss said, voice tight with worry.
“I can barely hold the vector,” Mayra said calmly. Cliff knew by now the subtle tones of tension in her voice.
The white-hot jet plume thinned, then seemed to veer aside. Rough turbulence struck, slamming them around in their couches, bringing fresh metal shrieks from the ship.
“Out!” Mayra shouted. “We’re out.”
“I’d say we’re in,” Redwing said.
They cheered and all eyes were on the screens. Now they could see the inside of the bowl … and it was a vast sheeted plain brimming with light. They rose swiftly, peeling off from the jet to the side, plasma falling behind, vistas clearing. Again there curved away over the misty distance great longitude and latitude grids in sleek, silvered sections the size of worlds. The sections had boundaries, thin dark lines, demarking different curvatures of a greater mirror—and from that their eyes told them that these were all focused far away.
Silence. In a whisper Abduss said, “Mirrors …
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