As March Hare came closer to Goal Star, Tinhead gave more and better information. The system contained two gas giants, but the smaller was far to port of the ship's course, and maybe not massive enough for its needs. Whereas Jumbo, the one first spotted, was only slightly to starboard and now well on the far side of its primary. "So we can pass the
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star if we like," said Katmai Delarov, "and have a chance for some kind of look at the inner planets, before deciding whether to orbit Jumbo or not."
Accordingly, there were two opportunities that could be taken, to stop in this system, before Lisele's own suggestion might be considered.
She made a mental shrug. Because now that she thought about it, Lisele wasn't all that enthusiastic about riding freeze for a long time, and no guarantees. Maybe waking up to a future in which she knew no one but her shipmates?
So, reconsidering, she said, "That's good. The more choices we have, the better."
Running deceleration as hard as the Cube would give it without alarm-noted protests, March Hare slowed into Goal Star's reach of space. On this side of the system no large planets appeared; Jumbo and Junior now rode the far quadrants.
So for a time, noting only cosmic debris of little importance, Lisele and her captain waited. Until closer approach might tell them something about the two inner, smaller, detected planets.
One was too far out to be habitable; well, Tinhead had already indicated as much. The other, though: Sitdown, they'd called it, possibly hoping the naming would influence its characteristics. But as yet, even hi-mag didn't show enough detail to call it livable or not. Another day or two might tell. Leaving watch-duty, Lisele wished the waiting could be over.
Waking up, she felt good. She showered, then checked the mirror to see how she looked. Not too bad; some of her hair was nearing a centimeter in length while other parts were barely poking through, but in another month the differences wouldn't show, to speak of. And meanwhile only she and the captain and Darwin Pope, who was only beginning to sprout at all, were around to notice. So, good enough. When the rest of the crew was roused, the three now awake would, by comparison, look perfect!
She reported to Control, hoping for new data. There wasn't much. Nearest approach to the possibly-habitable world Sitdown was nearly a standard day away. And that would be a mere fly-by, anyway. Jumbo, where March Hare might grab orbit, was some days farther.
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Lisele sighed. Tregare had told her how military life was: all "Hurry up and wait!" And though this situation wasn't exactly military, she began to see what her father had meant.
Cranking up hi-mag she looked at Sitdown again, and spotted new detail. Definitely not a Venus-type world, cooking under miles of CO2. For now, clearer as the moments passed, Lisele saw swirls of color! Cloud masses, as on Earth? Surface features, even? She couldn╒t be sure. But she checked to be sure the monitor was still taping this view.
And consulted Tinhead again. Yes, the nearest approach still checked at slightly under a third of a million kilos-about the distance from Earth to Luna. At that point they should get a pretty good idea of conditions on Sitdown; from here, though, the temperature readings weren't steady enough to tell much.
The next day, as March Hare closed on Sitdown, all three persons sat in Control. Running the past few days' tapes at fast speed, compressing hours to minutes, Delarov said, "You can see the overall rotation, this way. Some of my figures aren't too accurate yet, because we don't have enough of an observational baseline. But if you're interested. . ."
Lisele was, and Pope also, so the captain went on, "Axial tilt looks to be slightly more than a radian."
Pope nodded. "Interesting. In other words, by definition the planet has no such things as Temperate Zones."
Puzzled, Lisele said, "Why not?" Instead of answering, he asked her to define the term. All right: the tropic zone was the belt where sometimes the sun could shine straight down; the frigid zones were where there could be one or more full days of light or darkness. "And Temperate's everything in between.'
Except for combat and navigational sims, the Hare's Tinhead wasn't much for screen graphics. But with a little mild-voiced cursing, Pope punched up a line drawing: a circle representing a planet, with lines showing its axis, equator, and its light and dark sides. Then, slowly, he tilted axis and equator. "So you see, when tilt reaches pi-over-four radians- half a right angle-tropics and frigid zones meet; the temperate zone disappears."
"And when it's more, like this world?"
"Then the extremes overlap, giving two belts that in
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Earth terms can be tropic or frigid, with temperate periods in between." He waved off further questions. "No, I haven't calculated the ratio of these stages for this planet. If you like, I'll save this program and you can check it for yourself."
Lisele nodded, and Delarov, looking bemused, continued. "Goal Star's mass and luminosity are less than Sol's but Sitdown's orbit is smaller than Earth's, so maybe those things will even out. I rough-guess a year of three hundred Earth
days, but Sitdown's own day is something like thirty hours. I-"
Lisele's comm-panel beeped, and showed a blinking light. She looked, unbelieving. On one of the aud-vid channels, used for offship communication, a signal was showing.
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Screen and speakers, when she brought them on line, gave only rapidly shifting patterns of varying pulses. She twiddled sync frequencies; no luck. While Delarov and Pope watched but said nothing, Lisele put Tinhead to sampling input.
No results there, either, so it wasn't computer code. She squinted at the screen: the stuff was too slow for video signal. So what was it?
"Try digitalized voice. Ships don't use it much now, but they did for a time."
Until the captain spoke, Lisele hadn't realized she was making her guesses out loud. "Oh, sure," and now, cutting the screen, she set Tinhead to identifying-decoding-the possible modulation pattern. Whoops and squawks came from the speaker-then, click-ridden and barely intelligible, a voice.
"-months now, ship's time, and damn all, we're stuck! The Drive-" A burst of static hash. "-to fix it with. Bad landing; green pilot, with all the good ones dead."
Sometimes the words came clearly, then voice quality would drop and meaning vanish. "Black, dirty mutiny!. . . left Earth in New Year Ten, thirteenth ship'out from Earth. . . to
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carry UET's emblem. . . did a lot of joking about our number, some better-natured than others. . . two fine planets, coordinates in our log and we'll share finders' bonus with any ship that-"
"That's a tape," Lisele said. "Can't be live voice."
"It's neither," said Delarov. "New Year Ten, he said. That's at least a century ago. Even allowing for t/t0 during the ship's time it took them to get here, that recording can't be less than fifty years old." The captain shook her head. "It's a disk; tapes don't hold up that long. And even so, it's badly deteriorated. Perhaps with computer enhancement. . ."
The voice quality improved. "-farther out than anyone before, yes. Everybody saw the orders before we signed, though, and nobody asked for transfers. After the second new world we found . . . the lower ratings complaining . . . the unrateds, they always bitch, so why should we-"
Pope began to say something, but again the voice came up. "-the officers, and us Chief Ratings; we didn╒t worry. I was in Comm . . . turned out, Navigation was where we needed-"
Partly it made sense, but not enough. "-mutiny, details are in the log. Crew, over a hundred, only forty-three lived to reach-"
The signal's energy was dropping; Lisele boosted her input level. "This hellhole! Animals here are poison . . . two unrateds dead that way. If the meat tank had failed-"
"Incompatible amino acids, possibly," said Darwin Pope. "Or poisonous trace elements in deadly quantities. Bad luck; most colony worlds have had better."
"-except for the purple ones. But even the harmless plants are only good for calories and no... better than nothing . . . climate's fierce . . . way the poles tilt; I'm not sure. . . see when you get here."
A pause came; the channel spouted noise without message. Then, with an abrupt surge, the voice came in. "To any ship passing. . . signal range. Acting Captain Orval Sprague, speaking for the General Pattern , . . down on the only habitable planet, if you call it that. . . best guess is groundside date New Year Sixty. We've been here about six months, ship's time, and damn all, we're stuck! The Drive's down, and no spare nodes-or enough extra facet plugs to fix the ones we have. We-"
Lisele punched for Stop. "It's repeating now."
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