Macroscope Read online

  “Who touches the match to it?”

  “Ignition is automatic.”

  “Suppose it fizzles?”

  Groton did not reply. The lift stopped, and they traversed the high catwalk leading to the minuscule entrance-port near the top of the rocket.

  Ivo looked down. The concrete launch-pad looked precariously small from this elevation, and the abutting structures were like so many white dominoes. The great torso of Saturn VI seemed to narrow at the base, with a tiny skirt at the ground.

  Ivo found himself gripping the rail, afraid of the narrow height. Groton did not seem to notice.

  “Where are you taking me?” Ivo inquired again as the automatic countdown commenced for takeoff. “Is Brad doing research at an orbiting station?”

  “No.”

  “The moon?”

  “No.”

  “Then where — ?”

  “The macroscope.”

  Of course! That was where Bradley Carpenter would be!

  But the realization triggered another surge of nervousness. Brad would never have summoned him to such a place unless—

  Ignition.

  Ivo thought the rocket would shake itself apart. He thought his eardrums would implode. He thought he was a dry bean rattling loose in a tin can… in a tornado.

  Gradually, through the blast of sound and vertigo, he became aware of the meaning and practice of multiple-gravity acceleration. Now his vision was of a medieval torture chamber: tremendous weights slowly crushing breath and life from the fettered victim. Had he undertaken such stress voluntarily?

  Free-will, where is now thy—

  But he knew that it only hit this level for a few seconds. He hoped he never had occasion to endure the same for minutes. His chest was aching as the load upon it reluctantly decreased; his fight for air had not been figurative.

  Eventually there was free-fall. Then a bone-bruising jar as the lower segment of the rocket was jettisoned, and a resumption of acceleration, this time of bearable force.

  “Hey!” Ivo gasped. “Didn’t you say this was a one-stage item? What are we — ?”

  “I said a one-stage booster. Not the most economical arrangement to achieve escape-velocity, but reliable. Government wanted to standardize on one model, and this was it. Actually, those discarded shells orbit for a considerable period; quite a few have become useful workshops in space, and eventually we’ll run them all down and use the metal for another station. That should make a favorable impression on the taxpayer.” Groton seemed to have no trouble talking against the acceleration.

  How long would the journey take? He decided not to inquire. The macroscope station was known to be five or six light seconds away from Earth — say about a million miles.

  Eventually the second drive terminated and permanent free-fall set in. Groton remained strapped to his couch and fell asleep. Ivo took this as a hint that the remainder of the flight would be long and tedious, since they had nothing to do but ride. He could not even appreciate the view; the single port overlooked nothing but emptiness. He tried to think of it as an evocative withdrawal from Earth, the Ancestral Home, but his imagination failed him this time. He dozed.

  He dreamed of childhood: ten years old in the great city of Macon, population three thousand, three hundred and twenty-three by the latest census, plus a couple thousand blacks. His brother Clifford was eight and baby Gertrude barely two, that summer of ’52; he liked them both, but mostly he played Cotton Merchant with his friend Charley. They would set up as dealers, buying and selling, tunneling their warehouses from the rich red clay sides of the deep gully beside the highway. When the big slow wagons bound for the city passed, he and Charley would jump out and grab away handfuls of the cotton to store in the warehouses. If the slaves tending the wagons noticed, they never said anything, so long as the piracy was minimal.

  Or picking up hickory nuts for pretend-money or jewelry; or searching for arrowheads, or simply fishing. It was fun out of doors. Nature was beautiful even in the winter, but this was summer.

  Sometimes he would wander through the forest, playing his flute, and the neighbors would hear him and just shake their heads and smile, and the slaves would nod with the beat.

  Ivo woke as they docked at the macroscope station. Actually, there had been several sleeps and two meals from tubes, but the unstructured time left nothing worth remembering. The free-fall state, too, had disoriented his perception of the passing hours. His life on Earth seemed at once hours and years distant, another plane of reality or memory.

  Still there was no excitement. He knew that a complex chain of maneuvers had been accomplished, and that control had been duly shifted from Ground Control to Station Control, possibly with intermediate Controls between, as though the rocket were the baton in a relay race. But none of that had been evident to the passengers. Even the docking was tame; for all that was visible, they might have been stepping from the subway onto the platform back on Earth. Ivo was disappointed; like any tourist, he thought wryly.

  A space officer wearing UN insignia was on hand to check them in and to supervise the unloading of supplies. The lightness of Ivo’s body attested to his off-planet location; the station’s rotation provided “gravity” via centrifugal force, and this would be the inner ring, with the smallest actual velocity.

  There was no physical inspection or other clearance; the over-thorough processes at Kennedy sufficed, apparently, as well they might. But where was he supposed to go now?

  “Mr. Archer — report to compartment nineteen, starboard, G-norm shell,” the officer said abruptly, making him feel as though he were being inducted into the navy.

  “That’s it,” Groton said. “I’ll drop you off — or would you rather find your own way?”

  “I would rather find my own way.”

  Groton looked at him, surprised, but let him go. “G-norm is level eight,” he said.

  “Section eight. Right.” But of course Groton didn’t get it.

  Ivo dutifully made the traverse, stepping into the lift for the descent to the specified level. The numbers indicating the shells blinked to life as he passed them, very much in the manner of the floors of an apartment building. He fancied that he could feel his weight increase, and that his feet were heavier than his head, specific gravity considered. Did the pull vary that sharply?

  Level Eight ignited its bulb, and he hit the “Stasis” button. The panel slid aside to reveal a compartment even more like a subway stop. Two sets of tracks passed the central shaft, and beside them stood several four-wheeled carts. He determined from the placement of the sidings that the track on his right was for travel forward, in relation to his random orientation, and the one on his left was for motion in the opposite direction. Which was Compartment 19?

  He didn’t let it worry him. He climbed into a cart and secured himself in the sturdy seat, looking for the motor controls. There were none; it was an empty husk, as though it had been jettisoned in orbit. There was a simple mechanical brake set against one wheel.

  Ivo shrugged and released the brake. The cart began to move, angling in to intercept the main track, and he realized that it was gravity-powered. Evidently the track tilted down, or outward, allowing the carts to roll until braked. Beautiful; what better mode of transportation, in a torus where power was probably expensive?

  He saw the numbers now: 96, 95, 94, each no doubt representing an apartment or office. Those on the right were marked P, those on his left S. Port and Starboard, presumably. Starboard being right, he must be heading for the stern.

  Of a torus? Exactly where were bow and stern in a hollow doughnut spinning in space? He must be halfway around it by now, but headed in the proper direction, since the numbers were decreasing.

  Except that the levels were level, while the track was tilted. More precisely, the shells were curved to match the onionlike circumference of the station, while the track had a larger arc. An obtuse arc? Thus he was headed for the right number — but on the wrong level. Already
he was halfway down to the ninth.

  Well, one problem at a time. He had declined Groton’s assistance, and now would muddle through in his own fashion, as was usually the case. One had to live with the liabilities of one’s independence.

  There was a vertical shaft between numbers seventeen and sixteen, and he guided the cart onto the siding by judicious manipulation of the brake. The track became elevated here, neatly slowing the vehicle so that only minimal braking was necessary.

  He was on the eleventh shell. It occurred to him that what he had actually done was to drift from a tight orbit to a looser one, except that he had gained velocity instead of losing it. Or had he? At any rate, he now weighed a little more than normal, if his estimate could be relied upon.

  The shaft was bipart: one side up, the other down. Probably the capsules were looped together, counterbalancing each other, in the interest of further economy of power. He ascended to the eighth level, then walked along the interior mall to apartment Nineteen Starboard.

  The name on the door-panel was BRADLEY CARPENTER, as he had expected. No one else could have prepared the particular summons entrusted to Groton. He slid the section aside and stepped in.

  A young man turned at the sound: tall, brown of hair and eye, muscularly handsome. Sharp intelligence animated his features. “Ivo!”

  “Brad!” They leaped to embrace each other, punching arms and tousling hair in a fury of reacquaintance, two subtly similar adolescents roughhousing companionably. Then both sobered into young adults.

  “God, I’m glad you could make it,” Brad said, hooking up a hammock and flopping into it. He indicated another for the guest. “Just seeing you brings back my boyhood.”

  “How could I help it? You sent your boar oinking after me,” Ivo complained cheerfully. It was good to postpone the serious ramifications for a while. He set up the hammock and got the swing of it.

  “All part of the trade, swine.” Both laughed.

  “But I have one crucially important question—”

  “To wit: which way is Stern?”

  Ivo nodded. “That is the question.”

  “I’m surprised at you, den brother. Haven’t you learned yet that your stern is behind your stem?”

  “My mind is insufficiently pornographic to make that association.”

  “Take your bow. It’s inevitable.”

  Ivo smiled amiably, realizing that it was his turn to miss a pun of some sort. He would catch on in due course.

  Brad bounced to his feet. “Come on — have to show you the femme. Business before pleasure.”

  “Femme?” Ivo followed him into the hall, somewhat bewildered still.

  Brad halted him momentarily outside the girl’s room. “She has a certified IQ of one fifty-five. I told her I was one sixty, okay?”

  “Is that the proper mentality for liaison?”

  “I’m infatuated with her. What do you expect me to do, humble clay that I am?”

  Ivo shrugged. “Clay with the feet of a god.”

  Brad smiled knowingly and touched the bell. In a moment the panel slid aside, inviting entry.

  Here the furnishings were distinctively feminine. Frilly curtains decorated the air-conditioning vents, and the walls were pastel pink. Brushes and creams lined the surface of the standard desk, and a mirror hung behind it to convert the whole into something like a vanity.

  Here, Ivo thought, was the residence of someone who wanted the entire station to know there was a Lady present. Someone who wasn’t certain of herself, otherwise?

  How many women were here aboard the macroscope station? What was their status, whatever their official capacity? There was something ambivalent about Brad’s attitude toward this one.

  She appeared from the adjoining compartment She stood a trifle above medium height, slender of neck, waist, ankle; statuesque of hip and bosom. A starlet type, Ivo thought, embarrassed for Brad’s superficiality. Her hair was shoulder-length and quite red, and her eyes as she looked up were contrastingly blue.

  “Afra, this is Ivo Archer, my old friend from the neighboring project.”

  Ivo grinned, feeling awkward for no reason he could say. What was this piece, to him?

  “Ivo, this is Afra Glynn Summerfield.”

  She smiled. Sunrise over the marsh.

  Brad went on talking, but Ivo did not hear the words. In a single photographic flash the whole of her had been imprinted upon his ambition.

  Afra Glynn Summerfield: prior impressions, prior liaisons — these were nothing. She wore a dress of slightly archaic flavor, with silvery highlights, and her shoes were white slippers.

  The lines of her:

  Inward and outward to northward and southward the beach-lines linger and curl.

  As a silver-wrought garment that clings to and follows the firm sweet limbs of a girl.

  Afra: inward and outward, firm sweet limbs, hair the color of the Georgia sunset. Glynn: silver-wrought friend of his friend. Summerfield: his fancy lingered and curled.

  Afra Glynn Summerfield: at this glance, beloved of Ivo.

  He had thought himself practical about romance, with disciplined dreams. He had accepted the fact that love was not feasible for a person in his unique situation.

  Feasibility had been preempted by reality.

  “Hey, moonstruck — wake up!” Brad exclaimed cheerfully. “She hits everyone like that, the first time. Must be that polished-copper hair she flaunts.” He turned to Afra. “I’d better get him out of here till he recovers. He gets tongue-tied around beautiful girls. See you in an hour, okay?”

  She nodded and breathed him a kiss.

  Ivo trailed him back into the hall, hardly aware. He was shy with girls, but this was of a different magnitude. Never before had he been so utterly devastated.

  “Come on. The ’scope will settle your stomach.”

  Somehow they were already on the first level. They donned light pressure-suits and entered what Ivo took to be an airlock. It was a tall cylinder less than four feet in diameter set pointing toward the center of the doughnut, but at an angle, and it terminated in a bubblelike ceiling.

  Brad touched buttons, and the air about them was drawn off and replaced by a yellowish fog. “Now stand firm and clench your gloves together, like this,” Brad said, demonstrating. “Make sure your balance is good, and hold your elbows out, but tense, as though you expect to be hanging from them. Let out half your breath and hold it, and don’t panic. Okay?” His voice was distorted by the sealed helmets.

  Ivo obeyed, knowing that his friend never gave irrelevant instructions. Brad drew out a transparent tube with a filter on one end and poked a tiny sphere into it. He screwed a springy bulb to the filter-end.

  “Pea-shooter,” he explained. “I am young at heart.” He aimed the tube directly up and squeezed the bulb sharply.

  Ivo saw the streak as the shot went up. Then he was launched into space, somersaulting uncontrollably. The giant torus of the station careened about him, a faceless mouth, the monster bands of its segment-junctures reminding him of the vertical cracks in parched, pursed lips.

  A hand caught his foot and steadied him. “You didn’t listen,” Brad said reprovingly, straight-faced within the bubble-helmet. “I told you to watch your balance.” His voice seemed to come from the depths, now conducted only via the physical contact between them.

  “I didn’t listen,” Ivo agreed ruefully. He looked about and found that they were flying toward the center of the station: the fifty-foot metallic ball guyed by nylon wires extending to the inner rim of the torus. He and Brad were still rotating slowly, some of his motion having been imparted to his friend, but in free-fall this was inconvenient rather than distressing. He had to keep adjusting in order to keep his gaze on the destination.

  “Don’t tell me, let me guess,” Ivo said when it was clear that Brad was not going to explain. “You popped a — a bubble, and the atmospheric pressure squirted us out. Since your airgun-spacelock is aimed at the center—”

&n
bsp; “I see you have recovered a wit or two. Actually, I was showing off a little; that isn’t exactly the approved technique. Wastes gas and is dangerous for the inexperienced, to name a couple of objections. We’re supposed to wait for the catapult. Nobody does, of course. Even so, you’re wrong about the aim. The tube is tilted to compensate for angular momentum; otherwise we’d miss the target every time because of the spin of the torus. Apart from all that, your guess was fair.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Now watch your footing as we land.” Brad removed his hand, nudging the foot just enough to counter the remaining spin and send Ivo slightly ahead, and he fell upright toward the dark surface of the artificial planetoid.

  He saw now that the guys were actually light chains. They merely anchored the mass in place, so that arrivals and departures such as theirs did not jog it out of alignment. Each hooked to a traveling roller magnetically attached, so that the rotation of the doughnut imparted no spin to the ball.

  “This is the macroscope proper?” he inquired before remembering that his voice would not carry through the vacuum, now that contact was gone. Obviously it was the ’scope, painstakingly isolated from unwanted motions and intrusions. He had no doubt that their approach was being observed, or that it had been cleared well in advance.

  The macroscope was the most expensive, important device ever put into space by man. The project had been financed and staffed internationally as research in the public interest: meaning that while no single government had cared to expend such considerable resources on such a farfetched speculation, none could afford to leave the potential benefits entirely to others.

  Compromise had accomplished mighty things. The macroscope was functioning, and each participant was entitled to a share of its use proportionate to the investment, and a similar weighted share of all information obtained. That was most of what Ivo knew about it; exactly what hours fell to whom was classified information. Much of the result was general: details of astronomic research that had the astronomers gaping. The scope, it seemed, ground out exceeding fine pictures. Much was concealed from the common man, but the awe this instrument nevertheless inspired was universal.