Read Online Crystal Soldier by Steve Miller, Sharon Lee - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Steve Miller, Sharon Lee
Tags: Science-Fiction
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were exactly the same age."
The instructors sat as if entranced while Jela paused, picked up his cup, stared into it, trying to put thoughts, feelings, intuitive leaps into something approaching linear.
At last, he sipped his coffee, sighed. Sipped again, and looked at them hard, one after the other.
"The trade patterns were merely an accident of trade and technology; I doubt that they were anything more than a symptom."
He sipped again, still feeling for the proper way to tell it . . .
"Isotopic timonium," he said, at last. "Each of the systems had been sources of an isotopic timonium. The stars were known to retain a fair amount, the planets orbiting them contained some, the gas clouds beyond had it . . . I'm tempted to say a unique isotopic timonium—I can't, not having all the information to hand.
"The pattern I see most fully is that the matter in all of those systems was formed from the same cataclysmic event. They shared birth, perhaps in the intergalactic collision that helped form the Arm. Again, I can't—didn't have time—to do the retrograde orbital analysis, the spectrum comparisons, the motion component cross-sections, the . . . "
He stopped himself. After all, the instructors didn't care what he hadn't done, but what he had.
"Unique isotopic timonium?" the younger instructor murmured. "This despite the distances from each other?"
"It's the pattern behind many of the other patterns," Jela assured him, being confident on that point at least. "I've lately seen literature which indicates that timonium was long considered to be an impossible element, semi-stable despite its atomic number, radiating in an unnatural spectrum . . . all this early conjecture was news to me, since my education was practical rather than creative."
He shrugged.
"I can't guess all of it. But, given a unique proto block or proto cloud formed in part into a galaxy that collided with the one we now inhabit—we speak in billions of years now!—and this timonium, which has all decayed at the same time, so close as if it came from the same furnace."
He sipped the last bit of coffee in his cup, saw the glance between the instructors from beneath hooded eyes.
"The sheriekas ," he murmured, almost as quietly as the younger instructor. "They use timonium as if it were the commonest of metals. If anyone can find it at a distance, they can. If anyone knows how to make it act, or how to act on it at a distance, they can."
A chime then, and the instructors looked to chronographs and hastily rose.
"Destroy your working files," said the elder tutor, "and whatever hard copies you may have made. Eventually, of course, others may see the same thing, assuming they can access the information."
The younger instructor sighed audibly.
"You have—given the information we brought together over our careers—duplicated our thinking. This information has been shared only at the highest levels. Your commanders understand and act upon it; all others ignore it and deny it."
The elder instructor picked up a travel bag and looked pointedly at Jela.
"Do not doubt yourself," he said sternly. "The particular crystal that we protect, that we live within, is in danger. You, Captain, are one of a few who know the depth of the danger, and one of the fewer still who might do something about it. "
Then, with a most unexpected flutter of pilot hand-talk, signaling, most urgent, most urgent, most urgent he continued. "My studies show that there are universes entirely inimical to life. And there are universes not inimical which yet have none . . . ."
From without came the sudden snarl of an air-breathing engine. The speaker lost his train of thought in the noise and looked to his fellow.
A second chime sounded, and amid a checking of pockets and carryabouts the instructors saluted Jela as if he were an admiral, and hurried off.
"Carry on, soldier," the quiet instructor said over his shoulder—and that was the last
The instructors sat as if entranced while Jela paused, picked up his cup, stared into it, trying to put thoughts, feelings, intuitive leaps into something approaching linear.
At last, he sipped his coffee, sighed. Sipped again, and looked at them hard, one after the other.
"The trade patterns were merely an accident of trade and technology; I doubt that they were anything more than a symptom."
He sipped again, still feeling for the proper way to tell it . . .
"Isotopic timonium," he said, at last. "Each of the systems had been sources of an isotopic timonium. The stars were known to retain a fair amount, the planets orbiting them contained some, the gas clouds beyond had it . . . I'm tempted to say a unique isotopic timonium—I can't, not having all the information to hand.
"The pattern I see most fully is that the matter in all of those systems was formed from the same cataclysmic event. They shared birth, perhaps in the intergalactic collision that helped form the Arm. Again, I can't—didn't have time—to do the retrograde orbital analysis, the spectrum comparisons, the motion component cross-sections, the . . . "
He stopped himself. After all, the instructors didn't care what he hadn't done, but what he had.
"Unique isotopic timonium?" the younger instructor murmured. "This despite the distances from each other?"
"It's the pattern behind many of the other patterns," Jela assured him, being confident on that point at least. "I've lately seen literature which indicates that timonium was long considered to be an impossible element, semi-stable despite its atomic number, radiating in an unnatural spectrum . . . all this early conjecture was news to me, since my education was practical rather than creative."
He shrugged.
"I can't guess all of it. But, given a unique proto block or proto cloud formed in part into a galaxy that collided with the one we now inhabit—we speak in billions of years now!—and this timonium, which has all decayed at the same time, so close as if it came from the same furnace."
He sipped the last bit of coffee in his cup, saw the glance between the instructors from beneath hooded eyes.
"The sheriekas ," he murmured, almost as quietly as the younger instructor. "They use timonium as if it were the commonest of metals. If anyone can find it at a distance, they can. If anyone knows how to make it act, or how to act on it at a distance, they can."
A chime then, and the instructors looked to chronographs and hastily rose.
"Destroy your working files," said the elder tutor, "and whatever hard copies you may have made. Eventually, of course, others may see the same thing, assuming they can access the information."
The younger instructor sighed audibly.
"You have—given the information we brought together over our careers—duplicated our thinking. This information has been shared only at the highest levels. Your commanders understand and act upon it; all others ignore it and deny it."
The elder instructor picked up a travel bag and looked pointedly at Jela.
"Do not doubt yourself," he said sternly. "The particular crystal that we protect, that we live within, is in danger. You, Captain, are one of a few who know the depth of the danger, and one of the fewer still who might do something about it. "
Then, with a most unexpected flutter of pilot hand-talk, signaling, most urgent, most urgent, most urgent he continued. "My studies show that there are universes entirely inimical to life. And there are universes not inimical which yet have none . . . ."
From without came the sudden snarl of an air-breathing engine. The speaker lost his train of thought in the noise and looked to his fellow.
A second chime sounded, and amid a checking of pockets and carryabouts the instructors saluted Jela as if he were an admiral, and hurried off.
"Carry on, soldier," the quiet instructor said over his shoulder—and that was the last
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