9
Schar’s World
Imagine a vast and glittering ocean seen from a great height. It stretches to the clear curved limit of every angle of horizon,
the sun burning on a
billion tiny wavelets. Now imagine a smooth blanket of cloud above the ocean, a shell of black velvet
suspended high above the water and also
extending to the horizon, but keep the sparkle of the sea despite the lack of sun.
Add to the cloud many sharp and tiny lights, scattered on the
base of the inky overcast like glinting eyes: singly, in pairs,
or in larger groups, each positioned far, far away from any other set.
That is the view a ship has in hyperspace as it flies like a microscopic insect, free between the energy grid and real space.
The small, sharp lights on the undersurface of the cloud cover are stars; the waves on the sea are the irregularities of the
Grid on which a
ship traveling in hyperspace finds traction with its engine fields, while that sparkle is its source of energy.
The Grid and the plain of real space
are curved, rather like the ocean and the cloud would be round a planet, but less so.
Black holes show as thin and twisting waterspouts from
clouds to sea; supernovae as long lightning flashes in the overcast.
Rocks, moons, planets, Orbitals, even Rings and Spheres, hardly show at
all…
The two “Killer" class Rapid Offensive Units
Trade Surplus
and
Revisionist
raced through the hyperspace, flashing underneath the web of
real space like slim and glittering fish in a deep, still pond.
They wove past systems and stars, keeping deep beneath the empty spaces where
they were least likely to be traced.
Their engines were each a focus of energy almost beyond imagining, packing sufficient power within their two hundred meters
to equal
perhaps one percent of the energy produced by a small sun, flinging the two vessels across the four-dimensional void
at an equivalent speed in
real space of rather less than ten light-years per hour. At the time, this was considered particularly
fast.
They sensed the Glittercliff and Sullen Gulf ahead. They twisted their headlong rush to angle them deep inside the war zone,
aiming
themselves at the system which contained Schar’s World.
Far in the distance, they could see the group of black holes which had created the Gulf. Those flutes of plunging energy had
passed through
the area millennia before, clearing a space of consumed stars behind them, creating an artificial galactic
arm as they headed in a long spiral
closer toward the center of the slowly spinning island of stars and nebulae that was the
galaxy.
The group of black holes was commonly known as the Forest, so closely were they grouped, and the two speeding Culture craft
had
instructions to try to force their way between those twisted, lethal trunks, if they were seen and pursued. The Culture’s
field management was
considered superior to the Idirans’, so it was thought they would have a better chance of getting through,
and any chasing craft might even
break off rather than risk tangling with the Forest. It was a terrible risk even to contemplate,
but the two ROUs were precious; the Culture had
not yet built many, and everything possible had to be done to make sure that
the craft got back safely or, if the worst came to the worst, were
destroyed utterly.
They encountered no hostile ships. They flashed across the inward face of the Quiet Barrier in seconds and delivered their
prescribed
loads in two short bursts, then twisted once and tore away at maximum speed, out through the thinning stars and
past the Glittercliff, into the
empty skies of the Sullen Gulf.
They registered hostile craft stationed near the Schar’s World system starting off in pursuit, but they had been seen too
late, and they
quickly outdistanced the probing beams of track lasers. They set course for the far side of the Gulf, their
strange mission completed. The Minds
on board, and the small crew of humans each vessel carried (who were there more because
they wanted to be than for their utility), hadn’t been
told why they were blasting empty space with expensive warheads, shooting
off CREWSs at each other’s target drones, dumping clouds of
CAM and ordinary gas and releasing odd little unpowered signaling
ships which were little more than unmanned shuttles packed with
broadcasting equipment. The entire effect of this operation
would be to produce a few spectacular flashes and flares and a scattering of
radiation shells and wide-band signals before
the Idirans cleared up the debris and blasted or captured the signal craft.
They had been asked to risk their lives on some damn-fool panic mission which seemed designed to convince nobody in particular
that
there had been a space battle in the middle of nowhere when there hadn’t. And they had done it!
What was the Culture coming to. The Idirans seemed to relish suicide missions. You could easily form the impression that they
considered
being asked to carry out any other sort something of an insult. But the
Culture.
Where even in the war forces “discipline" was regarded as a
taboo word, where people always wanted to know
why
this and
why
that.
Things had come to a pretty pass indeed.
The two ships raced across the Gulf, arguing. On board, heated discussions were taking place between members of their crews.
* * *
It took twenty-one days for the
Clear Air Turbulence
to make the journey from Vavatch to Schar’s World.
Wubslin had spent the time carrying out what repairs he could to the craft, but what the ship needed was another thorough
overhaul. While
structurally it was still sound, and life support functioned nearly normally, it had suffered a general degradation
of its systems, though no
catastrophic failures. The warp units ran a little more raggedly than before, the fusion motors
were not up to sustained use in an atmosphere—
they would get them down to and up from Schar’s World, but not provide much
more in-air flying time—and the vessel’s sensors had been
reduced in numbers and efficiency to a level not far above operational
minimum.
They had still escaped lightly, Horza thought.