Defy the Worlds (Constellation #2)(45)
“Oh, man. You’re right. Why aren’t they doing that?” Virginia scowls as if the search parties were personally offending her.
“My guess is that they’ve received orders not to. Why they got those orders, and from whom, I can only guess.”
As a rule, Abel tries not to guess without good cause. Assumptions can be useful mental shortcuts, but they can also mask dangerous gaps in logic. Yet he finds it hard to dismiss his set of conclusions:
The anomaly they’ve detected must in fact be a Gate.
This Gate was built as a passageway to another habitable world, space station, or other place where large numbers of humans could live.
Whatever is hidden on the other side of that Gate is something only the powerful know about. Some of those powerful individuals were on the Osiris at the time of its disappearance—Mansfield’s presence alone proves that—but others were not. Some of those left behind must intend to follow the Osiris’s path.
Given the limited investigation, Abel must conclude that whatever fear these shadowy others have for the friends and family who went ahead isn’t as strong as their need to keep the secret.
Humans frequently (and inaccurately) speak of mechs as “cold-blooded,” unable to care. It seems to Abel that humans deserve the term far more. Mechs don’t have the ability to care; humans do, yet often choose not to care at all.
The Persephone remains where it is until the rotation of the planetary system gives the ship an obscured path to approach the hidden Gate. Once they’re within range of the distortion field, Virginia gasps. At first Abel is confused, because he sees nothing but dark, starry sky.
Then he remembers, Distortion fields are made to deceive electronic sensors. Not human eyesight.
Swiftly Abel limits his vision to wholly human frequencies to see what Virginia sees—and there it is.
“We have ourselves a Gate,” she says, “don’t we?”
“Yes.” But this is unlike any other Gate Abel has seen.
Most Gates are massive, built to be nearly indestructible, and they shine like the beacons of power they are. This Gate has been constructed to the same dimensions as any other, but were it not for the telltale shimmer across the center, it would be easy to believe it wasn’t completed. No outer plating is bolted to the inner mechanisms of the Gate for long-term protection. Instead, the panels and circuitry are exposed.
“They haven’t finished it yet,” Virginia suggests.
“Possibly. Or possibly this Gate isn’t meant to last for very long.” When she gives him an alarmed look, he adds, “In relative terms. It would remain operable for fifty to seventy-five years, but that’s still far less time than the other Gates will endure.”
“Why did they waste time building some half-assed Gate? They’re gonna wind up cut off from the rest of the Loop within a couple of generations.”
Abel nods. “I suspect that’s the idea.”
Virginia goes very still as she sees the truth Abel’s understood from his first look at this Gate: Whatever’s on the other side isn’t going to be a permanent addition to the Loop, one of the many possible homes for humanity in the future. Whatever world or station awaits them—it will be open for a select few, for a short time. Then it will be sealed off.
Something very precious lies on the other side of this Gate.
Several minutes pass before either of them speaks again. Once they’re within a few minutes’ travel of this ramshackle Gate, its messy workings beginning to fill the domed viewscreen, Abel says, “I have to make this trip, but you don’t.” Virginia’s argument on Cray was vigorous and heartfelt, but he wouldn’t blame her if she had reconsidered her decision after seeing the scale of the nearby investigation. “If you’d rather I dropped you off near one of the Saturn stations—”
“Forget it.” She shakes her head as if waking herself up and leans over her console with refreshed concentration. “Maybe some people could walk away not knowing what’s on the other side, but me? Virginia loves a mystery. I accept this about myself.”
Abel has learned not to be deceived by her jokes. “You’re a very loyal friend.”
“If you get mushy on me one more time, I swear to you, I’ll reprogram you in your sleep. You’ll be singing ‘God Save the Queen’ every hour on the hour.”
“You’re joking.” He waits for the response, then ventures, “…Aren’t you?”
“Push me and you’ll find out, Robot Boy.”
The hours of their trip are uneventful. Despite this Gate’s strange appearance, their voyage feels exactly the same as it would through any of the other Gates of the Loop. Neither Abel nor Virginia says a word until they finally spot the world on their sensors, and Virginia brings it up on the viewscreen.
“It’s beautiful,” she says as they take in the snowy surface of this unknown planet. Her tone is gentler than usual, softer. “It reminds me a lot of—when I was little, before Cray, sometimes we’d go up north and visit my grandparents way at the top of the Rockies. The snow would be a meter deep all around, as far as you could see.”
Abel has already worked out the planet’s orbit, its likely climate, how the sky would look from its surface. Its fifteen moons will make landing tricky, but the night should be illuminated by reflected light. “This is their summertime.”