Read Online The Crystal Variation by Steve Miller, Sharon Lee - Free Book Online
Authors: Steve Miller, Sharon Lee
Tags: Fiction, General, Science-Fiction, adventure, Space Opera, Assassins, Liaden Universe (Imaginary Place)
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precisely, but that it would acquire another dimension, a dimension of so little moment that it would take five to ten times the known life of the universe for it to materially affect the spin of something as inconsequential as an electron.
No, the operative phrase, according to the voluble one, as he scribbled on the situation board—“Here! This is the math we have to work from!”—was decrystallization .
The instructor admitted that he had not the final proofs, that the math they were working from was the partial and not yet finished work of a mathematician who had unfortunately come to the notice of those who found his theories and equations anathema. The quiet instructor spoke of the mathematician as one honorably dead in battle, and had turned to inscribe a series of equations that looked remarkably like piloting forms onto the situation board.
“The problem we face,” he murmured, “is that someone—and we must assume that someone equals the Enemy —is experimenting with dismantling the universe.”
It was said so calmly that it was only in retrospect that Jela felt a flicker of dread.
The elder instructor tossed his pen from hand to hand pensively.
“Yes,” he said finally, “that’s a reasonable shorthand for the event, no matter what the full math may describe. It’s rather as if you were able to set up a force field around a courier ship, attach it to a sector of the universe, and transition—forever.”
“Good,” said the younger, finishing up his notations and standing back. “That description allows us to use math that should be very familiar to our student.” He gave Jela an uncomfortably earnest stare before waving toward the situation board. “Let’s suppose, for example, that you wanted to visit the garrison at Vinylhaven . . .”
Unsurprisingly, the math was quite accurate for the mass of the proposed courier ship; the instructor then solved it for a location deep in the heart of the galaxy, on a heading that Jela recognized.
“Now, what we’ll do for this ummm . . . trip . . .” the instructor murmured, as if talking to himself more than his increasingly puzzled student, “is restate the mass of the ship, drop it out of the locus defined by our standard five dimensions and into one defined by nine.”
He did this, Jela checking the new equation on his pad . . .
“Now, the thing is—” the instructor said, suddenly turning away from the board, “—no one really wants to go to Vinylhaven . . .”
Jela had been thinking the same thing himself, Vinylhaven being somewhat too close for comfort to the remains of the ember of a brown giant . . .
“ . . . because,” the instructor continued in his deceptively quiet voice, “it’s not there.”
Jela flat out stared. “ Not there ?” he demanded, wondering now if all of this had been some sort of elaborate hoax to test the gullibility of intransigent Ms. “I’ve been there.”
“Not lately,” the elder instructor said simply. “I have been—or, say, I have attempted to go—within the last two Common Years. It is, as my colleague says, not there. Not the garrison world, not the brown giant. While we can use the coordinates that formerly brought us to Vinylhaven, in fact we can only come to the approximate vicinity, for pretty much everything out that way is gone. The nearest known destination we can raise is the yellow star three light years away, which is still there, though it has gone nova.”
“Our guess,” the younger instructor said seriously, “is that a sphere—and this is a guess; it may well be a more complex shape—approximating three-fourths of a cubic light year was—taken away. I say the space was folded; my associate says the space—actually a small portion of the universe—was decrystallized. Down to the photons and below, there is nothing . We can measure the event—are measuring it—by finding the wave front of light.”
He paused for a moment’s serious study of the situation
No, the operative phrase, according to the voluble one, as he scribbled on the situation board—“Here! This is the math we have to work from!”—was decrystallization .
The instructor admitted that he had not the final proofs, that the math they were working from was the partial and not yet finished work of a mathematician who had unfortunately come to the notice of those who found his theories and equations anathema. The quiet instructor spoke of the mathematician as one honorably dead in battle, and had turned to inscribe a series of equations that looked remarkably like piloting forms onto the situation board.
“The problem we face,” he murmured, “is that someone—and we must assume that someone equals the Enemy —is experimenting with dismantling the universe.”
It was said so calmly that it was only in retrospect that Jela felt a flicker of dread.
The elder instructor tossed his pen from hand to hand pensively.
“Yes,” he said finally, “that’s a reasonable shorthand for the event, no matter what the full math may describe. It’s rather as if you were able to set up a force field around a courier ship, attach it to a sector of the universe, and transition—forever.”
“Good,” said the younger, finishing up his notations and standing back. “That description allows us to use math that should be very familiar to our student.” He gave Jela an uncomfortably earnest stare before waving toward the situation board. “Let’s suppose, for example, that you wanted to visit the garrison at Vinylhaven . . .”
Unsurprisingly, the math was quite accurate for the mass of the proposed courier ship; the instructor then solved it for a location deep in the heart of the galaxy, on a heading that Jela recognized.
“Now, what we’ll do for this ummm . . . trip . . .” the instructor murmured, as if talking to himself more than his increasingly puzzled student, “is restate the mass of the ship, drop it out of the locus defined by our standard five dimensions and into one defined by nine.”
He did this, Jela checking the new equation on his pad . . .
“Now, the thing is—” the instructor said, suddenly turning away from the board, “—no one really wants to go to Vinylhaven . . .”
Jela had been thinking the same thing himself, Vinylhaven being somewhat too close for comfort to the remains of the ember of a brown giant . . .
“ . . . because,” the instructor continued in his deceptively quiet voice, “it’s not there.”
Jela flat out stared. “ Not there ?” he demanded, wondering now if all of this had been some sort of elaborate hoax to test the gullibility of intransigent Ms. “I’ve been there.”
“Not lately,” the elder instructor said simply. “I have been—or, say, I have attempted to go—within the last two Common Years. It is, as my colleague says, not there. Not the garrison world, not the brown giant. While we can use the coordinates that formerly brought us to Vinylhaven, in fact we can only come to the approximate vicinity, for pretty much everything out that way is gone. The nearest known destination we can raise is the yellow star three light years away, which is still there, though it has gone nova.”
“Our guess,” the younger instructor said seriously, “is that a sphere—and this is a guess; it may well be a more complex shape—approximating three-fourths of a cubic light year was—taken away. I say the space was folded; my associate says the space—actually a small portion of the universe—was decrystallized. Down to the photons and below, there is nothing . We can measure the event—are measuring it—by finding the wave front of light.”
He paused for a moment’s serious study of the situation
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