Read Online Fighting Gravity by Leah Petersen - Free Book Online Page B

“Well, I’d like to try this for myself. We’ll have your friend Kirti play for us.”
    He made a small gesture and two of the servants moved away. I stared at him in shock. Now I was very nervous in a different way. This would be a shock for Kirti.
    It wasn’t long before several servants were wheeling a piano into the room and setting it up in front of the head table. The room rang with whispers and the sound of people turning around to see what was going on. A servant approached from the back of the room, leading Kirti, whose face had gone white. She stopped in front of the table and offered a shaky bow and a tremulous, “Your Excellence.”
    “Ms. Sachar, would you play for us, please? Mr. Dawes tells me that your playing is the inspiration for some of his extraordinary insights, and I would like to be inspired myself.”
    If possible, Kirti went whiter. “Of course, Your Excellence. What would you like me to play?”
    “Mr. Dawes says that he’s inspired when you’re not playing from a score. I’d like you to play like that for me.”
    “Yes, Your Excellence,” she said in a whisper. She sat on the bench. I could see that her hands, as she held them over the keys, trembled.
    Her music at first was soft, hesitant. Not the playing, but the intended music. It was easy to see it was a reflection of how she felt.
    And before long I was watching a calm, soothing spring rain. Soon the music changed and I was right up among the turgid, angry clouds of an approaching storm. My mind ran away with the fascinating processes clashing in the heart of those clouds.
    The music climbed and I was above the cloudbank and still rising until I broke free of the planet’s gravity and was out in the void itself. I sighed. This was one of my favorite places to be. All I knew, all that was familiar and ordinary on the ground, was new and full of possibilities here. I watched, floating carefree, as the great forces of the universe gamboled in their never-ending play. Opposing forces kissed and spun away only to come back together again in the dance.
    The music thundered and the dancers stumbled, wobbling to right themselves. I watched as powerful forces gave way to weaker ones, particles of almost no mass at all displaced planetary bodies, and a delicate pattern of neutrino radiation—silver-white strands of celestial silk—overlaid it all.
    I was so caught up in the scene that the crash of applause made me jump. I realized I’d had my eyes closed. I caught a glimpse of the emperor when I opened them and he was watching me, the quirk of a smile on his lips.
    “Thank you, Ms. Sachar,” he said, “that was beautiful.”
    She bowed and returned to her seat. He turned to me. “Well, I confess, Mr. Dawes, while I enjoyed the music, I got no new insights into the workings of the universe. Did you?”
    I shook my head, but to reorganize my thoughts, not as an answer. “Mmmmm. It makes sense if you think about it…there have to be more sources than we’ve detected. Just because we haven’t observed it yet doesn’t mean…” I looked up at him. The look of polite attentiveness slid off his face. When I slowed to a stop he lost control of the laughter he’d been trying to suppress.
    “You’re amazing, Mr. Dawes. You’re going to have to come with me on my tour of the Empire.” My heart stopped. “In two weeks I’m embarking on a year-long tour. I’ve had a lab constructed for myself aboard ship. Not that I’m qualified to make much use of it. I had hoped to find the time to spend the occasional day divining the secrets of the universe. It’s been a lovely delusion, but I know it’s nothing more than a sophisticated shrine to my self-indulgence. It would be such a tragedy to see it go to waste. But with you aboard ship, the lab won’t be wasted at all.”
    My mouth was too dry to speak. I was going into space? For a whole year? To work in a lab built for the emperor himself? I sat in stunned silence. He seemed to be