уBroadened spectrum lines mean a quickly rotating star,ф said Maclaren. уSince the ship was not approaching in the equatorial plane, we missed the full Doppler effect, but we might have stopped to think. And tripled lines mean a Zeeman splitting.ф
уAh.ф Nakamura sucked in a hiss of air. уMagnetism?ф
уThe most powerful bloody magnetic field ever noticed
around any heavenly body,ф said Maclaren. уJudging from the readings I get here, the polar field is . . . ph, I canтt say yet. Five, six, seven thousand gaussўsomewhere on that order of magnitude. Fantastic! Solтs field is only fifty-three gauss. They donтt ever go much above two thousand. Except here.ф
He rubbed his chin. уBlackett effect,ф he went on. The steadiness of his words was a faintly pleasing surprise to him. уMagnetic field is directly related to angular velocity. The reason no live sun has a field like this dead thing here is that it would have to rotate too fast. Couldnтt take the strain; it would go whoomp and scatter pieces of star from hell to tiffin.ф An odd, perverse comfort in speaking lightly: a lie to oneself, persuading the subconscious mind that its companions were not doomed men and a black sun, but an amorous girl waiting for the next jest in a Citadel tavern. уAs this star collapsed on itself, after burning out, it had to spin faster, dт you see? Conservation of angular momentum. It seems to have had an unusual amount to start with, of course, but the rotational speed is chiefly a result of its degenerate state. And that same superdensity allows it to twirl with such indecent haste. You might say the bursting strength is immensely greater.ф
уYes,ф said Nakamura. уI see.ф
уIтve been making some estimates,ф said Maclaren. уIt didnтt actually take a very strong field to wreck us. We could easily have been protected against it. Any ion-drive craft going close to a planet isўa counter-magnetic circuit with a feedback loop
ўelementary. But naturally, these big ships were not meant to land anywhere. They would certainly never approach a live sun this close, and the possibility of this black dwarf having such a vicious magnetism . . . well, no one ever thought of it.ф
He shrugged. уFigure it out yourself, Captain Nakamura. The old H, r, v formula. A proton traveling at three-fourths c down a hundred-meter tube is deflected one centimeter by a field of seven one-hundredths gauss. We entered such a field at a million kilometers out, more or less. A tenuous but extremely energetic stream of ionized gas hit the outermost accelerator ring. I make the temperature equivalent of that velocity to be something like three million million degrees Absolute, if I remember the value of the gas constant correctly.
The closer to the star we got, the stronger field we were in, so the farther up the ions struck.
уOf course,ф finished Maclaren in a tired voice, уall these quantities are just estimates, using simple algebra. Since we slanted across the magnetic field, youтd need a vectoral differential equation to describe exactly what happened. You might find occasion to change my figures by a factor of five or six. But I think I have the general idea.ф
уYes-s-s,ф said Nakamura, уI think you do.ф
They hung side by side in dimness and looked out at the eyehurting bright stars.
уDo you know,ф said Maclaren, уthere is one sin which is punished with unfailing certainty, and must therefore be the deadliest sin in all time. Stupidity.ф
уI am not so sure.ф Nakamuraтs reply jarred him a little, by its sober literal-mindedness. уI have known many . . . well, shall I call them unintellectual people . . . who lived happy and useful lives.ф
уI wasnтt referring to that kind of stupidity.ф Maclaren went through the motions of a chuckle. уI meant our own kind. Yours and mine. We bear the guilt, you know. We should have stopped and thought the situation over before rushing in. I did want to approach more slowly, measuring as we went, and you overruled me.ф
уI am ashamed,ф said Nakamura. He bent his face toward his hands.
уNo, let me finish. I should have come here with a wellthought-out program in mind. I gave you no valid reasons not to establish a close-in orbit at once. My only grumble was that you wouldnтt allow me time to take observations as we went toward the star. You were perfectly justified, on the basis of the information available to youўOh, the devils take it! I bring this up only so youтll know what topics to avoid with our shipmatesўwho must also bear some of the blame for not thinkingўbecause we canтt afford quarrels.ф Maclaren felt his cheeks crease in a sort of grin. уI have no interest in the guilt question anyway. My problem is strictly pragmatic: I want out of here!ф
Ryerson emerged from the living-quarter screen. Maclaren saw him first as a shadow. Then the young face came so near
that he could see the eyes unnaturally bright and the lips shaking.
уWhat have you found, Dave?ф The question ripped from him before he thought.
Ryerson looked away from them both. Thickly: уWe canтt do it. There arenтt enough replacement parts to make a f-f-functioning . . . a webўwe canтt.ф
уI knew that,ф said Nakamura. уOf course. But we have instruments and machine tools. There is bar metal in the hold, which we can shape to our needs. The only problem isўф
уIs where to get four kilos of pure germanium!ф Ryerson screamed it. The walls sneered at him with echoes. уDown on that star, maybe?ф
IX.
SQUARE and inhuman in a spacesuit, Sverdlov led the way through the engineroom air lock. When Ryerson,
following, stepped forth onto the shipтs hull, there was a moment outside existence.
He snatched for his breath. Alien suns went streaming past his head. Otherwise he knew only blackness, touched by meaningless dull splashes. He clawed after anything real. The motion tore him loose and he went spinning outward toward the dead star. But he felt it just as a tide of nausea, his ears roared at him, the scrambled darks and gleams made a wheel with himself crucified at the hub. He was never sure if he screamed.
The lifeline jerked him to a halt. He rebounded, more slowly. Sverdlovтs sardonic voice struck his earphones: уDonтt be so jumpy next time, Earthling,ф and there was a sense of direction as the Krasnan began to reel him in.
Suddenly Ryerson made out a pattern. The circle of shadow before him was the hull. The metallic shimmers projecting from it . . . oh, yes, one of the auxiliary tank attachments. The mass-ratio needed to reach one-half c with an exhaust velocity of three-fourths c is 4.35ўrelativistic formulas apply rather than the simple Newtonian exponentialўand this must be squared for deceleration. The Cross had left Sol with a tank of mercury on either side, feeding into the fuel deck.
Much later, the empty containers had been knocked down into parts of the aircraft now stowed inboard.
Ryerson pulled his mind back from the smugness of engineering data. Beyond the hull, and around it, behind him, for X billion light-years on all sides, lay the stars. The nearer ones flashed and glittered and stabbed his eyes, uncountably many. The outlines they scrawled were not those Ryerson remembered from Earth: even the recognizable constellations, like Sagittarius, were distorted, and he felt that as a somehow ghastly thing, as if it were his wifeтs face which had melted and run. The farther stars blent into the Milky Way, a single clotted swoop around the sky, the coldest color in all reality. And yet farther away, beyond a million light-years, you could see more sunsўa few billion at a time, formed into the tiny blue-white coils of other galaxies.
Impact jarred Ryersonтs feet. He stood erect, his bootsoles holding him by a weak stickiness to the plastic hull. There was just enough rotation to make the sky move slowly past his gaze. It created a dim sense of hanging head down; he thought of ghosts come back to the world like squeaking bats. His eyes sought Sverdlovтs vague, armored shape. It was so solid and ugly a form that he could have wept his gratitude.
уAll right,ф grunted the Krasnan. уLetтs go.ф
THEY moved precariously around the curve of the ship. The long thin frame-sections lashed across their backs vibrated to their cautious footfalls. When they reached the lattice jutting from the stern, Sverdlov halted. уShow you a trick,ф he said. уLight doesnтt diffuse in vacuum, makes it hard to see an object in the round, so-ф He squeezed a small plastic bag with one gauntleted hand. His flashbeam snapped on, to glow through a fine mist in front of him. уItтs a heavy organic liquid. Forms droplets which hang around for hours before dissipating. Now, what dт you think of the transceiver web?ф
Ryerson stooped awkwardly, scrambled about peering for several minutes, and finally answered: уIt bears out what you reported. I think all this can be repaired. But weтll have to take most of the parts inboard, perhaps melt them downўre-machine them, at least. And weтll need wholly new sections to
replace what boiled away. Have we enough bar metal for that?ф
уGuess so. Then what?ф
уThenўф Ryerson felt sweat form beneath his armpits and break off in little globs. уYou understand I am a graviticist, not a mattercasting engineer. A physicist would not be the best possible man to design a bridge; likewise, thereтs much Iтll have to teach myself, to carry this out. But I can use the operating manual, and calculate a lot of quantities afresh, and
well . . . I think I could recreate a functioning web. The tuning will be strictly cut-and-try: you have to have exact resonance to get any effect at all, and the handbook assumes that such components as the distortion oscillator will have precise, standardized dimensions and crystal structure. Since they wonтtўwe have not the facilities to control it, even if I could remember what the quantities areўwell, once weтve rebuilt what looks like a workable web, Iтll have to try out different combinations of settings, perhaps for weeks, until
well, Sol or Centauri or . . . or any of the stations, even another spaceship . . . resonatesўф
уAre you related to a Professor Broussard of Lomonosov Academy?ф interrupted the other man.
уWhy, no. Whatўф
уYou lecture just like he used to. I am not interested in the theory and practice of mattercasting. I want to know, can we get home?ф
Ryerson clenched a fist. He was glad that helmets and darkness hid their two faces. уYes,ф he said. уIf all goes well. And if we can find four kilos of germanium.ф
уWhat do you want that for?ф Sverdlov asked.
уDo you see those thick junction points in the web? They are, uh, you might call them giant transistors. Half the lattice is gone: there, the germanium was simply whiffed away. I do know the crystallo-chemical structure involved. And we can get the other elements needed by cannibalizing, and there is an alloying unit aboard which could be adapted to manufacture the transistors themselves. But we donтt have four spare kilos of germanium aboard.ф
