enormousness swell before her. Those wheels were four hundred meters across, their toroidal rims ten meters thick, each spoke a six-meter tube. They counterrotated almost one hundred meters apart. The accelerator extended 40 meters, the mast a full kilometer. Other starcraft had similar lines, but none were like unto this.
Envoy
bore a quantum gate with capacity to give a gamma, a relativistic mass-length-time factor, of a full five thousand. She must carry everything that ten humans and their machines might imaginably need on a journey into the totally unknown.
Not yet had she embarked on it. This was a one-month shakedown cruise within the Solar System. The zero-zero drive would not awaken. Nothing about the ship required testing. Robots had done that, over and over, and all flaws were mended. The crew were testing themselves.
Kilbirnie peered at viewscreens and instruments. Subtler clues flowed into her through the bioelectronic circuits. Almost, she
was
the spaceboat. The ship waxed as if toppling upon her. The axial cylinder filled her vision, a curving cliff of sheening metal plated on composite whose strength approached the ultimate. Turrets, bays, dishes, tracks, ports, hatches, the whole complexity leaped forth athwart shadows. It was the outer hull, fifty meters in diameter. The inner hull projected slightly at either end, twenty meters wide, encased there in sleeves that held the magnetic bearings of the wheels. Kilbirnie was overtaking from aft, as doctrine required. No person was in that wheel, only machinery, supplies, and equipment awaiting whatever hour they would be wanted.
Time! Her fingers commanded full thrust. Deceleration crammed her back into the recoil chair. Blood thundered in her ears, red rags flew across her sight. The brief savagery ended and she floated weightless in her harness. She had not set those vectors. Living nerves, muscles, brains were too slow, too limited. Yet hers was the mind that directed the robotics that animated them. “Ki-ai!” she shouted, and spun
Herald
around.
The next maneuver was actually trickier, but did not rouse the same exuberance. Having matched velocities just as she came even with her dock, half a kilometer off, she boosteddelicately inward. The dock extended arms, caught hold, swung the boat parallel to the ship, drew her in, and made her fast.
Kilbirnie sat still, letting her heartbeat quiet down. The comscreen lighted. Captain Nansen’s image looked grimly out. “Pilot Kilbirnie,” he said, “that approach was total recklessness. You left no margin of safety.”
She pressed for transmission. “Och,
Herald
and I knew what we were doing,” she replied.
He glared at her. Blood still atingle flushed a narrow face with strong bones, straight nose, broad mouth, and blue eyes under thick black brows, framed in light brown hair bobbed below the ears. Coverall-clad, her body was rangy to the point of leanness. It was thirty-three years old, but Tau Ceti had added twenty-five to its calendar.
“You endangered your boat, the ship, the whole mission,” he snapped.
Lajos Ruszek broke in, though he didn’t bother with splicing to video. His vessel,
Courier
, sister to
Herald
, had barely come into naked-eye view, a blunt bullet tiny among stars. “Captain, I gave her leave to do it,” he said. “I knew she could. We’ve maneuvered enough together, we two.”
“Why did you?” Nansen demanded of Kilbirnie.
“Not to show off or experiment, sir,” she explained, slightly chastened. “That would have been foul, taking unnecessary chances. It was to practice. We’ve unco short time left for reinforcing our skills. Then we’re off on the big jump and can’t again for a year. Who kens what we’ll meet at the far end? Lajos and I had better be well drilled.”
“Pilot’s judgment, Captain,” Ruszek reminded.
Nansen relaxed a little. “Very well,” he said. “I withdraw the reprimand. But do not repeat this or anything like it, either of
Envoy
bore a quantum gate with capacity to give a gamma, a relativistic mass-length-time factor, of a full five thousand. She must carry everything that ten humans and their machines might imaginably need on a journey into the totally unknown.
Not yet had she embarked on it. This was a one-month shakedown cruise within the Solar System. The zero-zero drive would not awaken. Nothing about the ship required testing. Robots had done that, over and over, and all flaws were mended. The crew were testing themselves.
Kilbirnie peered at viewscreens and instruments. Subtler clues flowed into her through the bioelectronic circuits. Almost, she
was
the spaceboat. The ship waxed as if toppling upon her. The axial cylinder filled her vision, a curving cliff of sheening metal plated on composite whose strength approached the ultimate. Turrets, bays, dishes, tracks, ports, hatches, the whole complexity leaped forth athwart shadows. It was the outer hull, fifty meters in diameter. The inner hull projected slightly at either end, twenty meters wide, encased there in sleeves that held the magnetic bearings of the wheels. Kilbirnie was overtaking from aft, as doctrine required. No person was in that wheel, only machinery, supplies, and equipment awaiting whatever hour they would be wanted.
Time! Her fingers commanded full thrust. Deceleration crammed her back into the recoil chair. Blood thundered in her ears, red rags flew across her sight. The brief savagery ended and she floated weightless in her harness. She had not set those vectors. Living nerves, muscles, brains were too slow, too limited. Yet hers was the mind that directed the robotics that animated them. “Ki-ai!” she shouted, and spun
Herald
around.
The next maneuver was actually trickier, but did not rouse the same exuberance. Having matched velocities just as she came even with her dock, half a kilometer off, she boosteddelicately inward. The dock extended arms, caught hold, swung the boat parallel to the ship, drew her in, and made her fast.
Kilbirnie sat still, letting her heartbeat quiet down. The comscreen lighted. Captain Nansen’s image looked grimly out. “Pilot Kilbirnie,” he said, “that approach was total recklessness. You left no margin of safety.”
She pressed for transmission. “Och,
Herald
and I knew what we were doing,” she replied.
He glared at her. Blood still atingle flushed a narrow face with strong bones, straight nose, broad mouth, and blue eyes under thick black brows, framed in light brown hair bobbed below the ears. Coverall-clad, her body was rangy to the point of leanness. It was thirty-three years old, but Tau Ceti had added twenty-five to its calendar.
“You endangered your boat, the ship, the whole mission,” he snapped.
Lajos Ruszek broke in, though he didn’t bother with splicing to video. His vessel,
Courier
, sister to
Herald
, had barely come into naked-eye view, a blunt bullet tiny among stars. “Captain, I gave her leave to do it,” he said. “I knew she could. We’ve maneuvered enough together, we two.”
“Why did you?” Nansen demanded of Kilbirnie.
“Not to show off or experiment, sir,” she explained, slightly chastened. “That would have been foul, taking unnecessary chances. It was to practice. We’ve unco short time left for reinforcing our skills. Then we’re off on the big jump and can’t again for a year. Who kens what we’ll meet at the far end? Lajos and I had better be well drilled.”
“Pilot’s judgment, Captain,” Ruszek reminded.
Nansen relaxed a little. “Very well,” he said. “I withdraw the reprimand. But do not repeat this or anything like it, either of
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