Steve’s shorts: A Long Way from Home…
A Long Way from Home
Copyright 2018, Steven M. Moore
Part One
Kris knew something was wrong when the starship Alcibiades reentered ordinary space. Kerouac took longer than normal to tell her where they were. Usually the AI’s announcement was almost instantaneous and a formality because the starship was where it was supposed to be. The AI calculated and monitored the quantum histories through the multiverses followed by the stardrive discovered centuries earlier.
This time Kris held her breath during the delay. She broke out in a cold sweat. Starships still disappeared, never to be heard from again. On the very first test of the stardrive, the mixed crew of Humans and Rangers and the test ship became a topological nightmare.
But I’m still alive, she thought. She brought up the starfield on her screen. But where are we?
As if it had read her mind, Kerouac spoke. “I’m having trouble determining our exact position, Kris. Preliminary estimates indicate we’re in the Large Magellanic Cloud near the east end of the bar closest to the home galaxy.”
Kris gasped. “That can’t be!”
“Calculations continue as I try to make my estimates more precise.”
Kris now cursed. She’d have to wake the captain.
***
“I’m trying hard to convince myself my XO and AI haven’t become simultaneously insane,” said Halbek, the Tali who captained the starship Alcibiades. “I don’t recognize anything on that screen. Are you certain, Kerouac?”
“It’s a matter of perspective,” said the AI. “We never see the Cloud from within.” He swung the view past the end of the central bar and beyond, focusing on the large galaxy that filled most of the screen with its telescopic image. “We’re looking across more than 50 kiloparsecs or 163 thousand light-years to the Milky Way Galaxy. The bar in the Cloud is slightly distorted so that both ends are closer to home than the middle, so we’re not that bad off.”
“Not that bad off?” the captain said. “Is that black humor on your part, you chaotic bunch of quantum circuitry?”
“Insults aren’t advisable in this situation,” said the AI. “And there’s nothing chaotic about my circuity. I calculate that your next question will be something like ‘How can this happen?’ with a 63% probability. Here’s my answer to that question: paths in string space between multiverses are chaotic. No matter how precise my calculations are, there’s a small chance for a disastrous targeting error. That’s chaos theory at work on the quantum level, everyone, and it applies to old-fashioned Newtonian mechanics as well. In the case of directing a stardrive to go where we want it to go, which, I will remind you, biological beings are incapable of doing, the complications can lead to much more chaos. To put a fine point on it, I’m surprised it hasn’t occurred before, losing starships within the Local Group.”
“It probably has,” said Kris. “Ships infrequently go missing. Maybe all the way to Andromeda?”
“Correction then: there’s no record of it happening before because there’s no one who has returned to create the record.”
“Will that be our fate?”
“Possibly. The Cloud isn’t a bad place to be. There are probably lots of star systems around with E-type planets, just like the home galaxy. When the Cloud was discovered by the Persian astronomer Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi Shirazi, he rather admired it, according to my historical records. Amerigo Vespucci rather enjoyed viewing it too. He was a member of a family who were patrons of Renaissance painters, and I believe two continents on Earth were named after him for his map-making abilities. As for the contents of the Cloud, the stars—”
“Cut the history lesson,” said Halbek. “Can we return home?”
“Unknown,” said the AI. “Reaching the Cloud’s edge might not be a problem. Crossing that 50 kiloparsec gap to our home galaxy is probably impossible, but if anyone can find a way to do it, I can. Parallel calculations are going on right now.”
“We might want to do what Kerouac has suggested,” Kris told Halbek. “At least, find a star system with an E-type planet where we can replenish our supplies. Whatever solution Kerouac comes up with will certainly take several jumps back into normal space to adjust our aim for the Milky Way’s edge.”
“Which we could hardly make out right now,” the captain said with a growl, “if it weren’t for the telescopes.”
***
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