After a few hours of free time for everyone to get baths and otherwise relax, Ilika called them all back to the table. Rini stepped out of the galley were he had been putting the last few scraps into a small cooking pot.
Ilika looked around at his crew, all of them wondering what was next. “In some ways, you guys were handicapped because you’d never experienced air travel, never seen a space ship, and you knew nothing of ion propulsion and anti-mass drives.”
They accepted their humble origins with nods and sheepish grins.
“In others ways, the fact that you’re from a simple world with little energy and power, but what the wind and muscles can provide, means you can easily avoid a trap that people from advanced planets usually fall into.”
“Power always goes to people’s heads,” Boro declared with a shrug.
Ilika nodded. “On most planets like yours, there are solid or liquid deposits of concentrated energy deep in the ground. As soon as people find them, they go crazy building cities, having babies, and making all kinds of machines to make life easy. It lasts for a century or two, then the energy starts running out.”
“What do they do then?” Sata asked.
“It’s often quite ugly. They’ve usually multiplied their population by eight or more. When the energy runs out, most of those people . . .” He paused to swallow the lump in his throat.
The other crew members nodded understanding.
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“Those who are left are accustomed to very easy lives, and suddenly have to be farmers and laborers again, tilling the fields by hand, or at best, with animals.”
Boro blinked several times. “I can’t feel too sorry for them. Every gift has to run out someday. Anyone but a child knows that.”
Ilika sighed. “Yes, but before that happens, they get some very strange ideas about the universe, and some very unhealthy attitudes. They start thinking they can have anything they want, go anywhere, just because they desire it.”
Mati laughed out loud. “They should trying having a bad knee and a crutch! I get to go where Tera, Manessa, or Rini wants to take me, and that’s about it.”
Ilika nodded with understanding. “During their time of plentiful energy, they start dreaming of going to the stars. They invent countless ships, few of which can ever be built, and imagine engines that can take them wherever they want to go at the touch of a button.”
Boro frowned and shook his head slowly. “I’m new at this space travel stuff, but even I know it doesn’t work like that.”
“After centuries of trying,” Ilika continued, “if and only if they’ve saved some of the energy pockets on their planet, they learn how to carefully poke around their solar systems. But they still dream of the stars, and still imagine engines that can take them anywhere.”
“You told us before that the end of the solar system is the limit,” Kibi said,
“but you never said why.”
“The stars are far apart for a reason. Between the stars lie vast stretches of dark interstellar space. No ship made by mortal hands can cross those distances. No mortal mind or body can survive the journey. Manessa could do it, just as she could wait in the ice on Sonmatia Seven for thousands of years if necessary. But when she arrived at Satamia Star Station, the nearest outpost of Nebador, we would all be long dead.”
The others nodded thoughtfully, remembering their recent preparations for exactly that.
“The universe is structured that way so that immature people will stay in their . . . what do you call it when a mother fences off part of the house for a
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child?”
“Play pen,” Sata informed. “Mine was in the kitchen by the wood box.”
Ilika smiled at his twelve-year-old navigator.
“So . . .” Boro pondered aloud. “This is where the star drive comes in, right?”
“Yes . . . the star drive. It is completely different from all the other engines. It uses no fuel, and has no moving parts. It does not make us go anywhere.”
Puzzled looks greeted Ilika all around the table.
“People who are intoxicated with energy and power dream of flying to the stars as an act of will. Their make-believe ships and imaginary engines make them cross the vast distances between the stars, just because they want to.
“The real star drive, on the other hand, does the only thing that allows a flesh-and-blood person to make that journey. It asks the powers of the universe to move us from one place to another.”
Silence lingered as all his crew members tried to absorb what Ilika was saying.
“Does it ask . . . Melorania?” Kibi inquired with a very confused expression.
“No. The universe powers that the star drive contacts are far greater. But I assure you, if Melorania doesn’t want us going somewhere, we’d have to get out and walk.”
Nervous laughter circled the table. Several of them glanced at the large display over Kibi’s station, currently showing stars in the vacuum of space.
Mati’s face revealed a question forming. “Um . . . how does Manessa fit into all this?”
“The star drive is part of Manessa. She sends a complete description of where we are, where we need to go, and why. Since I’m a new captain, and you’re a new crew, every star drive request will be checked carefully by Melorania. But as Sata found out back on your southern ice continent, she usually decides things very quickly. Later on, when we’re all highly tested and deeply trusted, our requests will happen instantly, unless Melorania or someone else in charge thinks of a good reason to delay.”
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Boro took a slow, deep breath. “Wow. That really is . . . a different kind of engine.”
“And that means,” Rini began with a straight face, “we can’t do stupid things with the star drive.”
Ilika’s eyes grew large. “I hope we never do stupid things with any of our engines!”
Mati snickered. “He means . . . you know . . . have fun.”
Ilika smiled. “Having fun is okay, sometimes, even with the star drive.”
Rini nodded and looked content.
“So, jumping between solar systems with the star drive is gonna be easy!”
Boro proclaimed. When the captain didn’t immediately agree, the excitement drained from Boro’s face. “Right . . . Ilika?”
They all looked at their captain and teacher. He appeared worried.
Kibi poked at him. “Spill.”
Ilika took a deep breath. “To jump between the stars, Manessa . . . and all of us . . . must pass through a reality state where space . . . and time . . . don’t exist.” He looked around at his crew and saw mostly blank faces. Rini appeared curious, but clueless.
“That spaceless, timeless reality state has some rather . . . um . . .
unpleasant effects on anyone who isn’t . . . prepared.”
Kibi swallowed. “What kind of . . . effects?”
“It . . . um . . . tends to make them go . . . insane.”
“Oh,” Sata said, her eyes shifting back and forth as if looking for a way out.
“But you guys are about as prepared as any new crew can be,” Ilika continued. “You’ve practiced clearing your minds in meditation. That’s the key to visiting non-spatial, non-temporal reality states. If you don’t have expectations of finding space and time dimensions to relate to, you won’t be bothered by the lack of them.”
His crew started to breathe again.
“And you’ve had the extra preparation of preparing to die on Sonmatia Seven. That helps because the experience of star transit, if it can be compared to anything, is most similar to . . . you know . . . dying.”
“So the sisters at the monastery,” Rini began with sudden realization,
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“would be right at home with it!”
Ilika smiled. “They’d be better prepared than anyone else on Sonmatia Three.”
“What would happen to the high priest?” Boro asked, squinting.
Ilika laughed and shook his head. “It wouldn’t be pretty!”
“But what about passengers?” Kibi asked with concern. “Can I only have passengers who know how to meditate?”
“No. There are those in Nebador who have the power to shield others from the effects of the star drive. One of them will come along any time you have passengers who aren’t Nebador Services people.”
Kibi nodded, for the moment satisfied.
“Actually, neither Manessa, nor any other ship, would ever cause anyone to go insane in star transit. The drive will simply not engage until everyone is prepared, or shielded.”
“That’s good!” Mati burst out. “I couldn’t imagine Manessa hurting anyone on purpose.”
“Thank you, Mati,” the ship said.
“You’re welcome, Manessa. So . . . when do we go? I think there’s a healer I want to talk to at Satamia Star Station.”
Everyone else chuckled.
Ilika looked around. “I need to spend about half an hour with each of you, going over your responsibilities before and after star transit. Most crews like to get their ship clean and tidy first, whenever they have time, because star transit is sort of like . . . well, dying and coming back to life. Also, we need to be well-nourished, but not have too much in our stomachs, especially the first time . . .”
“Yeah,” Boro agreed, “if it’s anything like flying the first time.”
Kibi and Mati both nodded.
Ilika smiled. “So let’s get Rini’s soup finished, have our last meal in your home solar system . . .”
“And that’s the last meal we’re gonna get out of these cupboards!” Kibi declared.
“I’ll help with the soup!” Sata volunteered.
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“Everyone, tidy your cabins when you’re free,” Kibi requested, “and I’ll do the common areas.”
“Mati,” Ilika began, standing up, “let’s go down to your station and talk about piloting during star transit . . .”
Deep Learning Notes
The situation Ilika described when people on a planet discover “deposits of concentrated energy deep in the ground” is, of course, taken directly from the situation on Earth right now. It started in about the year 1700 with coal, increased greatly in about 1900 with crude oil, and was supplemented by uranium in about 1950. Today, we are just passing the peak of usage of all three because of dwindling reserves, pollution, or both.
Since any creature, animal or plant, always maximizes its population within the resources it has, it tends to “overshoot” the carrying capacity of its environment. The population soon crashes back to a point lower than it began, because the process tends to damage the environment. Before we discovered coal, oil, and uranium, the human population of the Earth was fairly stable at about 500 million (one half billion). Today it is passing 7
billion.
Our fantasy of exploring the universe at will is expressed most clearly, of course, in the Science Fiction genre, but glimpses of it can be seen in every other genre, and in every aspect of life.
The idea that the universe is purposefully designed, so that mortal races can only explore their home solar systems, is a theological concept, not a scientific concept. From this follows the notion that whoever decided this (deity, by whatever title or name) can also make exceptions. A thread of evidence and opinion, subtle and rarely talked-about, runs through our stories and histories that very occasionally an individual is chosen for direct service to deity. They tend to mysteriously “disappear” from human society, and so become lost in
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the statistics about people who are abducted and presumably murdered, but no remains are ever found.
The idea that a deeply-trusted servant of deity can exercise fantastic powers, seeming at will, but can only do so as long as they carefully follow certain rules (and never use the powers selfishly), is another theme that pops up all through history and literature.
What qualities of “space dimensions” are we used to that cause us to be disoriented in space when they are absent? Hint: we know many of these visually, some by touch/feel, and even some by sound.
What qualities of “time dimensions” are we used to that cause us to be disoriented in time when they are absent? Hint: we usually know these through rhythm, such as the timing of syllables in a spoken sentence, or the wing-beats of a bird.
What are the usual physiological (health) effects of disorientation in space or time?
Why would Ilika speculate that the high priest (in the capital city of the little kingdom on Sonmatia Three) would not do well in star transit?