Voyage to Alpha Centauri: A Novel (5 page)

At the moment, the picture was in real proportion, the planet the size of a softball, the moon a shrinking golf ball. Within a few hours, the Earth would be no larger than a bright star, and Mars would appear on the left side of the screen. Then, the optics people would probably magnify the image for a quick fly-by view of the colony.

The crowd thinned a little, and I edged forward into a gap at the front. I watched for a while, enthralled but still disbelieving. When an elbow nudged me pointedly, I looked down to see the face of Xue Ao-li smiling up at me, shaking his head as he used to do at Princeton when we were young and had stumbled together upon some mathematical key that would, we felt sure, unlock further mysteries.

“I read the passenger list, Neil”, he said. “I can’t tell you how happy I was to see you on it.”

“Me too, Ao-li. When I spotted your name, I thought, this is great news; nine years will be sufficient to get reacquainted.”

“I agree. However, I must quibble with you about the time frame, since you seem to posit a one-way ticket. We have, I believe, nineteen years, voyage relativity time, to catch up on our news.”

“You’re right. But we should subtract the year spent on the mystery planet, since we will be somewhat focused on whatever we find there.”

“True. Now, tell me why I know so little about your later life when we spent so much of our youth together.”

“Forgive me, Ao-li, I’ve become the world’s worst correspondent. I did read your article in last month’s
Ion
, but never dreamed you’d be on the ship.”

“Nor I, you. The world’s most famous recluse. Why don’t you answer your mail?”

“I ran out of stamps.”

“Neil, Neil, postage stamps disappeared from Western civilization more than three decades ago.”

“I know. I was preoccupied at the time.”

“Working on something now?”

“Nothing very big. Just tinkering with the Bohr radius, pulling in some new research into adiabatic ionization energy, and other fun topics.”

“That’s fairly common stuff. Taking it to the
n
th?”

“Trying to see if it’s possible. Infinity is alluring, of course. But in my golden years, I’m just having a little playtime. It’s my conjecture that fairly common stuff still has some surprises for us.”

“My sentiments exactly. Otherwise, how are you?”

“Very well, Owly.”

Xue laughed in his discreet manner. The nickname had materialized years ago when side by side we had hammered out the paper that won us the Nobel. His given name, Ao-li, combined with his horned rim glasses, had been too much of a temptation. In combative moments, Xue had called me Nil—for
Nil Carborundum Illegitimi
.

We watched the Earth receding for a time. People around us came and went. No one was saying much.

When the moon was no larger than a white bead, Xue asked, “What would you have done with your life, if you had had the choice? I mean other than what you actually accomplished—which, if I may say so, is not inconsiderable, since we are standing, as we speak, upon one such work.”

I bent my knees in reply and simulated an up-and-down bounce. “This is Nihman’s doing”, I said. “My work was supplementary.”

“Dr. Nihman has given us the ship’s gravity, Neil, but you have given us the voyage itself. And you haven’t answered my question. What, I venture to ask again, would you have done with your life?”

“I don’t know. Haven’t given it much thought.”

“Surely you had dreams. Everyone has them.”

I dropped my eyes. Such questions probe too deeply, though they may appear to be no more than casual pass-by scans.

“A man has only one life”, I said. “But I suppose, if I’d had the time, I would have done a number of things.”

“Such as?”

“I would have liked to play the cello.”

“Mmmm, interesting”, said Xue, with a nod of encouragement.

“What else?”

“Basketball. I always loved basketball. But with my leg. . .”

“Truly amazing. And?”

“I would have traveled.”

“You’re traveling now.”

“I mean on Earth. Climb a high mountain, swim in the ocean, see exotic places.”

“Exotic places?” He spread his arms with a smile, indicating our present surroundings.

“When I was younger, I dreamed of living in a houseboat on Lake Dal in the valley of Kashmir, at the foot of the Himalayas.”

“Intriguing.”

“And you, Owly, what would you have done?”

“I think, dear
Nil
, I would have transformed myself from a physicist into a Shui-mo Master.”

“That’s some kind of martial arts, isn’t it?”

Xue bowed, in mock oriental style, and said in his most artificially polite tone of voice: “No, honored sir; it is freestyle, water-ink painting on silk paper. But to be honest, I would have ignored all the arts on our beloved home planet in exchange for my own personal particle accelerator.”

“Still trying to catch those little things that buzz around faster than lightspeed?”

“I would like to. Alas, no one has ten billion
Uni
to lend me for the proper butterfly net.”

“Or to grant you”, said I, with a shake of the head. “Perhaps they don’t really understand the benefits to be derived from producing a black hole right here on Earth.”

“I think you mean to say right
there
on Earth.”

“Yes, right there.”

We returned to gazing out the window.

“Alas, indeed, Ao-li, you soar, but you remain established, standing firm.”

(Note to future archivists, if there be any, ages and ages hence: The Mandarin root for his given name is
Ao
, to soar or to roam, and
li
, to stand or establish. As you can see, such a name readily lends itself to various interpretations. Between me and my old colleague, there was much wild and friendly jousting.)

“Make no oxymorons, Neil, nor any of your Fermi jokes, or I will strike you with a martial art.”

“All right. A truce, then.”

“A felicitous truce.”

We grinned and returned to our last view of a blue pearl floating in the infinite sea.

“She dwindles and dwindles”, Xue said, in a reflective tone.

“Good-bye, O fairest world, good-bye”, I soliloquized. “O blue gem in the heavens, where mankind dwells in love, and no man’s hand is lifted against another, and the gifted realize their every dream, and all things sing, and the light grows gold when the bells ring.”

“Good poetry needn’t rhyme”, said Xue. “Besides, you shouldn’t tell lies.”

“Lies? No, I was just dreaming.”

Day 7
:

I have spent two days exploring the ship from bow to stern, crow’s nest to bilge tanks, so to speak. Actually, I don’t have security clearance for the top and bottom levels.

There are six decks. Four of these, Concourses A through D, are accessible to everyone on board. Above the topmost public deck, A, there is the flight deck KC (
Kosmos
Command), which houses the control centers and crew quarters. Below D is the propulsion department and other services, recycling, atmosphere, electronics control, storage holds, gravity generators, etc. Titled PHM. Ordinary folk can’t get down that far without knowing a code for the elevators or emergency exits. Emergencies? And where, precisely, would we exit to in an emergency?

There is a vast cafeteria on every concourse, A through D. Each has its industry-size kitchen and a battalion of cooks. Here, all meals are self-serve from a buffet, and free of charge. If one prefers to dine out and be served by a waiter, each concourse offers a large “restaurant”, artfully designed for a feeling of intimacy, with decor and food expressing European, Asian, African, and Indian themes, respectively.

Bistros and theme-pubs abound. On deck D, there’s a pub devoted to British “fish and chips”, which are served in facsimile newspaper cones from the early twenty-first century, just for added effect. There’s an eternal line to get in. On deck C, there’s a single smallish cafe where you can order American-style hamburgers and fries. There’s always a line here too, despite the sad fact that the “meat” has never trotted about on four legs. It’s protein of some kind but manages nevertheless to sizzle and make the last remaining carnivores in the known universe (myself included) water at the mouth.

Let it be noted that at every feeding place throughout the ship, all such traditional animal-source foods are ersatz, usually vegetable protein genetically altered for maximum nourishment, chemically enhanced for flavor. Most other items in our diet are also simulations. Only in the specialty restaurants is it possible to order authentic natural food, mainly grain-base, as well as a few beverages such as tea and coffee and select wines (astronomical prices). Such real items are a minority on the menu, and there is no guarantee that they will remain available throughout the voyage. Hydroponics, however, promises an unceasing supply of salads.

Note to self: You ain’t rich, buddy, so do try to stick to the mega cafeterias and carry your own tray. Bistros, cafes, and the aforementioned fancy restaurants offer food and drink that must be paid for by the individual. We all have a “bank account”, containing whatever credits we imported personally to the ship from our home accounts, combined with the
Uni
-credits allotted to everyone on board. Of course, all earthly monetary systems are contractual agreements about what a currency is worth, what it will buy. The truth is, nothing is produced on board. Nothing is really bought and sold, just the rearranging of materials to create illusions of semi-independence. Maybe somewhere among the passengers an enterprising soul is whittling a penny whistle with a pocketknife, and he might barter it for something he desires. The marketplaces echo with emptiness, haunted by ghosts. In fact, there are no marketplaces whatsoever. The only real estate is one’s personal room, and according to ship’s rules, these cannot be swapped. I wonder why not. What’s to stop us? Later in the voyage, I might try to break the rules, just for fun.

There are a lot of civilizing elements, such as the numerous artworks along the hallways, affixed to interior walls in recessed alcoves. Apparently, there are two libraries and a single film theater on every concourse. Also, every floor has a DEC (digital environmental chamber). I’ve never submitted myself to one of these, not even the big omni-sensory in Santa Fe, where for a thousand
Uni
s you can spend three hours floating in the total illusion of a sandy beach in Florida, or an autumn walk through the Vermont woods, or scuba-diving in the Pacific, or relaxing in a Tokyo sushi-bordello, etc., etc.

I might try out the DEC experience later in the voyage, but for now I prefer reality—or as close as one can get to it in our flying city. At ship’s midpoint, there is an atrium that creates a canyon soaring from its base on level D to its transparent polyplast ceiling above A. Visible through this layer is a blue “sky”, across which puffs of “cloud” occasionally wander. The arboretum is rooted on the atrium’s floor. I estimate the entire space to be about 150 feet wide by 400 feet long, a kind of central park with walkways and trickling brooks. Only certain kinds of South American trees reach as high as B, since all trees are young, though by the end of the voyage, they will have grown much higher. The air is sweet with increased oxygen and the natural scents of real leaves, bark, seeds. Perpetual birdsong fills the air (artificial sounds, which I suspect will become quite irritating with the passage of time). The purpose of this atrium is not scientific; it is aesthetics and consolation for the potentially claustrophobic—which is all of us.

As I said, the ship is 60 meters from bottom to top—approximately 180 feet, a small apartment building. (Excuse me, while I interject at this point: I have always appreciated universal
unimetric
in my work. However, I loathe the way it has become an offense to use the older measurements such as Imperial Yankee. I think I’ll just revert to the latter whenever I feel like it. A human foot [my good one, anyway] is a handy measuring stick. Pardon my mixed metaphors.)

Doing a little computation combined with guesswork, and factoring in a floor thickness of two feet, I came up with these estimates:

   •   Topmost deck, KC, is probably 20 to 24 feet high. There may be subsidiary decks within its confines.

   •   A, B, C, D are each 12 feet high from floor to ceiling, for a total of 48 feet. Add to this the floor thicknesses of 2 feet each, and we get a total of 56 feet. Let’s call it 60.

   •   Bottom level—P (Propulsion), H (Holds), and M (Maintenance)—is not accessible by A-to-D passengers. In the Manual’s diagrams of the ship (illustrations, not engineer’s blueprints), these departments are represented as positioned on the same floor, which would be about 80 feet high. Housed on this level are anti-matter / fusion engines, gravity apparatus, recycling plants, atmosphere control (oxygen regeneration and purification), and other basic services, including our stores of food, and the four ship-to-planet shuttle-craft, as well as wheeled and hover vehicles for planetary exploration.

Day 18
:

I stopped a young fellow outside my door today, as he went past, guiding a soundless suction cleaner along the hallway.

“Who takes out the garbage?” I asked him.

“No one, sir. Everything gets reprocessed.”

“Everything? Even the toilets and kitchen slops?”

“Uh-huh. We’ve got a pretty good separation plant in the basement.”

“Really?” I said. “Are you saying that the water in my taps may have been passed through, er, other systems?”

“Yup.”

“What about dust? Do you have uses for it?”

“Yup.”

“Composting in the gardens?”

“Some of it. After separation, the organic goes to biology for a look-see, and then to the garden people. Non-organic goes downstairs. But I’m not sure what they do with that stuff.”

Downstairs, I suspect, is the anti-matter department. It’s interesting to know that even microscopic non-organics do something useful. As for the organics, well, there must be a lot of it lying about the place. For example, there is a vacuum bath available at the physical exercise centers. You stand naked for five minutes in a warm, windy suction chamber, and everything not rightly clinging to you is whisked away to become something else. Dandruff becomes part of a ripe tomato. Having your entire body vacuum cleaned is exhilarating—it always makes me laugh—and it’s faster than a shower, with less waste of water. Of course, we’re encouraged to shower too, for social reasons. Nothing is really wasted. Ingenious, but a little disturbing.