Starman's Quest Part 1

Starman's Quest.

by Robert Silverberg.

_Prologue_

The Lexman s.p.a.cedrive was only the second most important theoretical accomplishment of the exciting years at the dawn of the s.p.a.ce Age, yet it changed all human history and forever altered the pattern of sociocultural development on Earth.

Yet it was only the _second_ most important discovery.

The Cavour Hyperdrive unquestionably would have held first rank in any historical a.s.sessment, had the Cavour Hyperdrive ever reached practical use. The Lexman s.p.a.cedrive allows mankind to reach Alpha Centauri, the closest star with habitable planets, in approximately four and a half years. The Cavour Hyperdrive--if it ever really existed--would have brought Alpha C within virtual instantaneous access.

But James Hudson Cavour had been one of those tragic men whose personalities negate the value of their work. A solitary, cantankerous, opinionated individual--a crank, in short--he withdrew from humanity to develop the hypers.p.a.ce drive, announcing at periodic intervals that he was approaching success.

A final enigmatic bulletin in the year 2570 indicated to some that Cavour had achieved his goal or was on the verge of achieving it; others, less sympathetic, interpreted his last message as a madman's wild boast. It made little difference which interpretation was accepted.

James Hudson Cavour was never heard from again.

A hard core of pa.s.sionate believers insisted that he _had_ developed a faster-than-light drive, that he had succeeded in giving mankind an instantaneous approach to the stars. But they, like Cavour himself, were laughed down, and the stars remained distant.

Distant--but not unreachable. The Lexman s.p.a.cedrive saw to that.

Lexman and his a.s.sociates had developed their ionic drive in 2337, after decades of research. It permitted man to approach, but not to exceed, the theoretical limiting velocity of the universe: the speed of light.

s.h.i.+ps powered by the Lexman s.p.a.cedrive could travel at speeds just slightly less than the top velocity of 186,000 miles per second. For the first time, the stars were within man's grasp.

The trip was slow. Even at such fantastic velocities as the Lexman s.p.a.cedrive allowed, it took nine years for a s.h.i.+p to reach even the nearest of stars, stop, and return; a distant star such as Bellatrix required a journey lasting two hundred fifteen years each way. But even this was an improvement over the relatively crude s.p.a.cedrives then in use, which made a journey from Earth to Pluto last for many months and one to the stars almost unthinkable.

The Lexman s.p.a.cedrive worked many changes. It gave man the stars. It brought strange creatures to Earth, strange products, strange languages.

But one necessary factor was involved in slower-than-light interstellar travel, one which the Cavour drive would have averted: the Fitzgerald Contraction. Time aboard the great stars.h.i.+ps that lanced through the void was contracted; the nine-year trip to Alpha Centauri and back seemed to last only six weeks to the men on the s.h.i.+p, thanks to the strange mathematical effects of interstellar travel at high--but not infinite--speeds.

The results were curious, and in some cases tragic. A crew that had aged only six weeks would return to find that Earth had grown nine years older. Customs had changed; new slang words made language unintelligible.

The inevitable development was the rise of a guild of s.p.a.cers, men who spent their lives flas.h.i.+ng between the suns of the universe and who had little or nothing to do with the planet-bound Earthers left behind.

s.p.a.cer and Earther, held apart forever by the inexorable mathematics of the Fitzgerald Contraction, came to regard each other with a bitter sort of distaste.

The centuries pa.s.sed--and the changes worked by the coming of the Lexman s.p.a.cedrive became more p.r.o.nounced. Only a faster-than-light s.p.a.cedrive could break down the ever-widening gulf between Earther and s.p.a.cer--and the faster-than-light drive remained as unattainable a dream as it had been in the days of James Hudson Cavour.

--_Sociocultural Dynamics_ Leonid Hallman London, 3876

_Chapter One_

The sound of the morning alarm rang out, four loud hard clear gong-clangs, and all over the great stars.h.i.+p _Valhalla_ the men of the Crew rolled out of their bunks to begin another day. The great s.h.i.+p had travelled silently through the endless night of s.p.a.ce while they slept, bringing them closer and closer to the mother world, Earth. The _Valhalla_ was on the return leg of a journey to Alpha Centauri.

But one man aboard the stars.h.i.+p had not waited for the morning alarm.

For Alan Donnell the day had begun several hours before. Restless, unable to sleep, he had quietly slipped from his cabin in the fore section, where the unmarried Crewmen lived, and had headed forward to the main viewscreen, in order to stare at the green planet growing steadily larger just ahead.

He stood with his arms folded, a tall red-headed figure, long-legged, a little on the thin side. Today was his seventeenth birthday.

Alan adjusted the fine controls on the viewscreen and brought Earth into sharper focus. He tried to pick out the continents on the planet below, struggling to remember his old history lessons. Tutor Henrich would not be proud of him, he thought.

_That's South America down there_, he decided, after rejecting the notion that it might be Africa. They had pretty much the same shape, and it was so hard to remember what Earth's continents looked like when there were so many other worlds. _But that's South America. And so that's North America just above it. The place where I was born._

Then the 0800 alarm went off, the four commanding gongs that Alan always heard as _It's! Time! Wake! Up!_ The stars.h.i.+p began to stir into life.

As Alan drew out his Tally and prepared to click off the start of a new day, he felt a strong hand firmly grasp his shoulder.

"Morning, son."

Alan turned from the viewscreen. He saw the tall, gaunt figure of his father standing behind him. His father--and the _Valhalla's_ captain.

"Good rising, Captain."

Captain Donnell eyed him curiously. "You've been up a while, Alan. I can tell. Is there something wrong?"

"Just not sleepy, that's all," Alan said.

"You look troubled about something."

"No, Dad--I'm not," he lied. To cover his confusion he turned his attention to the little plastic gadget he held in his hand--the Tally.

He punched the stud; the register whirred and came to life.

He watched as the reading changed. The black-on-yellow dials slid forward from _Year 16 Day 365_ to _Year 17 Day 1_.

As the numbers dropped into place his father said, "It's your birthday, is it? Let it be a happy one!"

"Thanks, Dad. You know, it'll feel fine to have a birthday on Earth!"

The Captain nodded. "It's always good to come home, even if we'll have to leave again soon. And this will be the first time you've celebrated your birthday on your native world in--three hundred years, Alan."

Grinning, Alan thought, _Three hundred? No, not really._ Out loud he said, "You know that's not right, Dad. Not three hundred years. Just seventeen." He looked out at the slowly-spinning green globe of Earth.

"When on Earth, do as the Earthers do," the Captain said. "That's an old proverb of that planet out there. The main vault of the computer files says you were born in 3576, unless I forget. And if you ask any Earther what year this is he'll tell you it's 3876. 3576-3876--that's three hundred years, no?" His eyes twinkled.

"Stop playing games with me, Dad." Alan held forth his Tally. "It doesn't matter what the computer files say. Right here it says _Year 17 Day 1_, and that's what I'm going by. Who cares what year it is on Earth? _This_ is my world!"

"I know, Alan."

Together they moved away from the viewscreen; it was time for breakfast, and the second gongs were sounding. "I'm just teasing, son. But that's the sort of thing you'll be up against if you leave the Starmen's Enclave--the way your brother did."

Alan frowned and his stomach went cold. He wished the unpleasant topic of his brother had not come up. "You think there's any chance Steve will come back, this time down? Will we be in port long enough for him to find us?"

Captain Donnell's face clouded. "We're going to be on Earth for almost a week," he said in a suddenly harsh voice. "That's ample time for Steve to rejoin us, if he cares to. But I don't imagine he'll care to. And I don't know if I want very much to have him back."

He paused outside the handsomely-panelled door of his private cabin, one hand on the thumb-plate that controlled entrance. His lips were set in a tight thin line. "And remember this, Alan," he said. "Steve's not your twin brother any more. You're only seventeen, and he's almost twenty-six. He'll never be your twin again."