Echoes of an Alien Sky Read Online Free
taught a course in nuclear generating at the National Engineering College in Beaconcliff years ago. You're from one of the places that's lucky enough to have a coast."
"The part that isn't swamp, anyway," Yorim agreed. "I captained the college first-league longball team at Beaconcliff. That was where I took electrogravitics."
"I'm well aware of your qualifications in electrogravitics," Casselo went on. "You wouldn't be here now if they weren't exceptional. We'll have to show you the Explorer 6 's polarizing system while you're up here. Maybe after lunch, while Master Reen is talking administrative matters with the Director."
"I'd be interested to see it. If it's no imposition."
"None at all. A pleasure."
Casselo was referring to the layers of "hi-polar" material built into the floors of Venusian spacecraft and orbiting platforms. Gravity emerged as a residual effect of the electrical nature of matter. Although atoms were neutral as a whole, they deformed under stress to form electrostatic dipoles, in which the charges were not distributed uniformly but concentrated in distinct regions. Within a system of atomic dipoles—for instance, a piece of ordinary matter—the like parts repelled and the unlike parts attracted, but arranging themselves in such a way that the two effects didn't quite cancel. The mutual attraction ended up slightly greater than the mutual repulsion. Very slightly. The resultant force was forty orders of magnitude smaller than the unneutralized electrical force between the same particles. The effect was self-reinforcing, yielding a force that intensified with the amount of material present—in other words, its mass. On the basis of that principle, another branch of the same technology that had yielded electrical space propulsion had developed, enabling such forces to be induced artificially.
" Explorer has a free-fall gym here as well," Cassello informed them. "The G-polarizers switched off." He looked back at Yorim. "Perhaps you'd like to see that too?"
"Yes, I would," Yorim said. "We've seen videos of it. There wasn't room for anything like that on the ship. It looks like fun."
"Well, we'll see what we can do," Casselo promised.
Terran spacecraft and orbiting stations had been free-fall gyms everywhere, Kyal reflected. Sometimes it had taken months for them to recover normal muscle tone and bone strength after extended tours. They must have been a tough bunch.
"You don't waste very much time," Yorim commented to Casselo.
"Wasting time would be robbing the old man who will one day have my name." Casselo said.
Kyal smiled. "I see that my father wasn't the only philosopher."
Casselo thought about it for a second or two. "I don't know about that," he said finally. "Now is the only time in which anything gets done. Everything else is either already done, not done, or yet to do."
A philosopher and yet a pragmatist, Kyal thought to himself. He had the feeling they would all get along just fine.
CHAPTER THREE
The office of Filaeyus Sherven, Scientific Director of the Earth Exploration Expedition, was located on the highest of several administrative decks contained in a prominent superstructure on the main section of Explorer 6 , termed the Directorate. Kyal's first impressions on being shown in after he had left Yorim and Casselo to go their own way were more of a control room—which, he supposed, in many ways it was. The walls in front and to the right of the immense concave desk seemed to consist mainly of panels and screens, with the section of the right-hand wall immediately opposite the desk opening through as an arch to a small private conference area. The wall along the left side was practically all glass. Beyond it was the Earth and its moon partly obscured behind, both half-lit, and a starfield of density and brilliance that after twelve weeks in space were now familiar. In the foreground, a craft that looked like a surface shuttle had just detached from the docking port
"The part that isn't swamp, anyway," Yorim agreed. "I captained the college first-league longball team at Beaconcliff. That was where I took electrogravitics."
"I'm well aware of your qualifications in electrogravitics," Casselo went on. "You wouldn't be here now if they weren't exceptional. We'll have to show you the Explorer 6 's polarizing system while you're up here. Maybe after lunch, while Master Reen is talking administrative matters with the Director."
"I'd be interested to see it. If it's no imposition."
"None at all. A pleasure."
Casselo was referring to the layers of "hi-polar" material built into the floors of Venusian spacecraft and orbiting platforms. Gravity emerged as a residual effect of the electrical nature of matter. Although atoms were neutral as a whole, they deformed under stress to form electrostatic dipoles, in which the charges were not distributed uniformly but concentrated in distinct regions. Within a system of atomic dipoles—for instance, a piece of ordinary matter—the like parts repelled and the unlike parts attracted, but arranging themselves in such a way that the two effects didn't quite cancel. The mutual attraction ended up slightly greater than the mutual repulsion. Very slightly. The resultant force was forty orders of magnitude smaller than the unneutralized electrical force between the same particles. The effect was self-reinforcing, yielding a force that intensified with the amount of material present—in other words, its mass. On the basis of that principle, another branch of the same technology that had yielded electrical space propulsion had developed, enabling such forces to be induced artificially.
" Explorer has a free-fall gym here as well," Cassello informed them. "The G-polarizers switched off." He looked back at Yorim. "Perhaps you'd like to see that too?"
"Yes, I would," Yorim said. "We've seen videos of it. There wasn't room for anything like that on the ship. It looks like fun."
"Well, we'll see what we can do," Casselo promised.
Terran spacecraft and orbiting stations had been free-fall gyms everywhere, Kyal reflected. Sometimes it had taken months for them to recover normal muscle tone and bone strength after extended tours. They must have been a tough bunch.
"You don't waste very much time," Yorim commented to Casselo.
"Wasting time would be robbing the old man who will one day have my name." Casselo said.
Kyal smiled. "I see that my father wasn't the only philosopher."
Casselo thought about it for a second or two. "I don't know about that," he said finally. "Now is the only time in which anything gets done. Everything else is either already done, not done, or yet to do."
A philosopher and yet a pragmatist, Kyal thought to himself. He had the feeling they would all get along just fine.
CHAPTER THREE
The office of Filaeyus Sherven, Scientific Director of the Earth Exploration Expedition, was located on the highest of several administrative decks contained in a prominent superstructure on the main section of Explorer 6 , termed the Directorate. Kyal's first impressions on being shown in after he had left Yorim and Casselo to go their own way were more of a control room—which, he supposed, in many ways it was. The walls in front and to the right of the immense concave desk seemed to consist mainly of panels and screens, with the section of the right-hand wall immediately opposite the desk opening through as an arch to a small private conference area. The wall along the left side was practically all glass. Beyond it was the Earth and its moon partly obscured behind, both half-lit, and a starfield of density and brilliance that after twelve weeks in space were now familiar. In the foreground, a craft that looked like a surface shuttle had just detached from the docking port
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