Read Online Glory's People by Alfred Coppel - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Alfred Coppel
Tags: Science-Fiction
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his subordinates, Higashi Ichiro seemed suddenly to be caught up in an invisible tornado of force. An ordinary bad-tempered, arm-waving tirade typical of his age and class changed violently into a spastic, wrenching dance. His right arm was flung about with such ferocity that the crew of MD-23 heard the ulna crack like a dry twig. Angry words were supplanted by a scream of anguish as his inner organs were squeezed and torn with ripping force. Blood spewed from his open mouth and his blinded eyes extruded from their sockets as the internal pressure in his skull was doubled, then doubled again. In the microgravity, his grotesque dance was executed with such ferocity that he left a thick, bloody smear on the overhead before being flung into space through an inexplicably twisted bulkhead.
The crewmen of MD-23 had only moments to take in the horror of Ichiro Higashi’s destruction before the tensions twisting the small spacecraft ripped it apart, spilling the crew, unarmored, into space.
Though there was no human eye nearby to see it happen, the wreckage of MD-23 spun into a tight orbit around a darkness that was blacker than black, a tiny Gateway into the Near Away.
It was never so near, nor so far away.
On the island of Kai, in a planetary observatory atop a mountain called Suribachi, a Junior Astronomer stared in disbelief at a monitor as Planet Yamato’s largest telescope recorded the destruction of MD-23 and the death of its crew.
7. Shock Waves
Aboard Glory the destruction of the MD-23 was captured by a surveillance camera atop the port mizzenmast. This camera, ordinarily used to monitor the condition of the upper five kilometers of the spar, was activated by the FTL flash of tachyon power released across the Tau Ceti Star System by the forcible opening of the Gateway from the Near Away.
When inertial-mass-depletion-powered Yamatan craft transited between the Near Away and normal space, their size and low power created openings that were small, less than a thousand meters in diameter, and the Gateways were not held open for any measurable time. But the disturbance caused by the Gateway that devoured MD-23 was emotionally familiar to Glory ’s crew members, who’d encountered it before in the Ross Stars.
Glory ’s monkeys, confined for refurbishment and safety while in orbit around Planet Yamato, were frantically disturbed by the power of the distant Gateway’s forcible distortion of normal space.
In the battle Glory had fought in the Ross System, a monkey had been slaughtered by a soldier of the boarding party from Ross 248 Beta. Now, months of shiptime later, the monkeys were still deeply disturbed by what had happened. Since Glory ’s commissioning in orbit around Earth’s Moon, no cyberbeast had ever died, and any who met with an accident had been swiftly repaired. Death is a human concept. The chimp-descended monkeys had been shocked by the demise of one of their number. The cats knew this. Their closeness to the human syndics had given them a grasp of what it meant to cease living. But neither Mira nor any of the other members of the pride had yet conveyed to the Starmen the import of what had happened to the monkeys at Ross 248.
Glory ’s mainframe had detected both the anxiety and fear the monkeys were feeling. Yet sophisticated as it was, Glory 's computer was still only a machine. It had taken no action about the monkeys so long as they performed their duties safely and correctly. Now the impulse that swept through Near Space from the Gateway that had opened across the system agitated the monkeys. Glory tranquilized the small cyberbeasts and saved the information in memory, but she did not alert the syndics, being fully occupied with more serious possible danger to the ship.
Dietr Krieg, even though the least empathic of the Starmen, nevertheless was able to recognize the emotional signature of the wave of rage that swept across the inner Tau Ceti System. The Cybersurgeon felt the
The crewmen of MD-23 had only moments to take in the horror of Ichiro Higashi’s destruction before the tensions twisting the small spacecraft ripped it apart, spilling the crew, unarmored, into space.
Though there was no human eye nearby to see it happen, the wreckage of MD-23 spun into a tight orbit around a darkness that was blacker than black, a tiny Gateway into the Near Away.
It was never so near, nor so far away.
On the island of Kai, in a planetary observatory atop a mountain called Suribachi, a Junior Astronomer stared in disbelief at a monitor as Planet Yamato’s largest telescope recorded the destruction of MD-23 and the death of its crew.
7. Shock Waves
Aboard Glory the destruction of the MD-23 was captured by a surveillance camera atop the port mizzenmast. This camera, ordinarily used to monitor the condition of the upper five kilometers of the spar, was activated by the FTL flash of tachyon power released across the Tau Ceti Star System by the forcible opening of the Gateway from the Near Away.
When inertial-mass-depletion-powered Yamatan craft transited between the Near Away and normal space, their size and low power created openings that were small, less than a thousand meters in diameter, and the Gateways were not held open for any measurable time. But the disturbance caused by the Gateway that devoured MD-23 was emotionally familiar to Glory ’s crew members, who’d encountered it before in the Ross Stars.
Glory ’s monkeys, confined for refurbishment and safety while in orbit around Planet Yamato, were frantically disturbed by the power of the distant Gateway’s forcible distortion of normal space.
In the battle Glory had fought in the Ross System, a monkey had been slaughtered by a soldier of the boarding party from Ross 248 Beta. Now, months of shiptime later, the monkeys were still deeply disturbed by what had happened. Since Glory ’s commissioning in orbit around Earth’s Moon, no cyberbeast had ever died, and any who met with an accident had been swiftly repaired. Death is a human concept. The chimp-descended monkeys had been shocked by the demise of one of their number. The cats knew this. Their closeness to the human syndics had given them a grasp of what it meant to cease living. But neither Mira nor any of the other members of the pride had yet conveyed to the Starmen the import of what had happened to the monkeys at Ross 248.
Glory ’s mainframe had detected both the anxiety and fear the monkeys were feeling. Yet sophisticated as it was, Glory 's computer was still only a machine. It had taken no action about the monkeys so long as they performed their duties safely and correctly. Now the impulse that swept through Near Space from the Gateway that had opened across the system agitated the monkeys. Glory tranquilized the small cyberbeasts and saved the information in memory, but she did not alert the syndics, being fully occupied with more serious possible danger to the ship.
Dietr Krieg, even though the least empathic of the Starmen, nevertheless was able to recognize the emotional signature of the wave of rage that swept across the inner Tau Ceti System. The Cybersurgeon felt the
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