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“Spi
Giant Sol glowed through the crimson velvet of Proxima; Spi
At last she tore her gaze away. “Enough,” she said. “Come on, Louise; no more of the past.”
“All right, Spi
Spi
…And the brooding globe of Proxima was replaced, abruptly, without any internal feeling of transition, by a new star system. This was another red star — huge, ragged edged — but this time with a companion: a smaller yellow star, a point of light, barely a diameter away from the red globe. The giant was pulled into an elliptical shape by the dwarf companion, and Spi
“…Spi
“Yes, Louise. I’m still here. You’re really showing me the sights, aren’t you?”
“This is Menkent — Gamma Centauri. We’re further through the Centaurus constellation: a hundred and sixty light-years from Sol, already. Menkent used to be a glorious A-class binary… But the photino birds have been at work. Now, one of the companions is going through its giant stage, and the other has already been reduced to a dwarf. Disgusting. Depressing.”
Spi
Yes, Spi
“Don’t you get morbid too,” Spi
“Spi
“Nothing. Sorry, Louise.”
“All right, Spi
Spi
“Now, I know it’s going to be hard, but it will help if you keep in mind an understanding of what you’re going to see. We’re heading out of the Galaxy, at around twenty degrees below the plane of the disc. We’re going to attempt thirty five light-years every jump — and we’ll be trying for a jump every second. At that rate, we should cover the hundred and fifty million light-years to the Attractor in — ”
” — in around fifty days. I know, Louise.”
“I’m in the forest, Spi
“Another pep-talk? I know, Louise. I know.” She sighed. “Louise, you’re a great engineer, and a strong human being. But you’re a damn awful leader.”
“I’m sorry, Spi
“Let’s do it.”
Impulsively, Spi
— and the brooding coupled stars of Menkent were replaced, instantaneously, by another binary pair. This time the stars — twin red giants — seemed more equally matched, and a bridge of cooling, glowing material linked them. A wide, spreading spiral of dim gas was curled tightly around the giants, and -
— before she had time to think about it here was still another binary pair, this time much further from the ship, with a bright, hot blue star traversing the decaying hulk of a dim red giant. She saw how the giant hung behind the blue star like smoke behind a diamond -
— when she was whisked away yet again and now, before her, hung a softly shimmering globe of light: a planetary nebula, she recognized, the expanding corpse of a red giant, blown apart by its bird-induced superwind, but before -
— she could wonder if Sol would one day look like this, the nebula had gone to be replaced by an anonymous, distant star field which -
— vanished, because now she was surrounded by a dim, red smog; she was actually inside a giant star, she realized, inside its cooling outer flesh and -
— that was gone too, replaced by a huge, ragged nebula — a supernova site? — which -
— imploded and -
— a star loomed at her, swollen, ruddy, achingly like Sol, but not Sol, and -
— and — and — andandand —
The stars were a huge, celestial barrage around her head. Beyond the immediate battering of light, the more distant constellations slid across space, elegant, remote, like trees in a forest.
Spi
…And, abruptly as it had begun, the barrage of starfields thi
It’s over.
Spi
She felt herself retreat into the small cosmos of her own body once more, into the recesses of her own head. It’s comfortable in here, she thought groggily. Maybe I should never come out again…
“Spi
Spi
“You did bloody well to withstand that.”
Spi
“Because I didn’t hear you scream. And because my telltales are showing me that you aren’t chewing the inside of your helmet. And — ”
“Louise, I knew what to expect.”
“Maybe. But it was still inhuman. A Xeelee might have enjoyed that ride… People, it seems, need to work on a smaller scale.”
“You’re telling me.”
“…When you’re ready, take a look behind you.”
Spi
She loosened her restraints, carefully, and turned around.
There was a ceiling of light above her. It was an immense plane of curdled smoke: lurid red at its heart and with violent splashes of colors — yellow and orange and blue further out. The plane was foreshortened, so that she stared across ridged lanes of gas toward the bulging, pregnant center. Smoky gas was wrapped around the core in lacy spirals of color.
The plane of light receded, almost imperceptibly slowly, from the ship. The plane was a cathedral roof, and the nightfighter — with its precious burden of people, and all the hopes of humanity — was a fly, diving down and away from that immense surface.
“Louise, it’s beautiful. I had no idea…”
“Do you understand what you’re seeing, Spi
The nightfighter had plunged out of the Galaxy at a point about two-thirds of the way along a radius from the center to the rim. The ship was going to pass under the center of the disc; that bloated bulge of crimson light would look like some celestial chandelier, thousands of light-years across, hanging over her head. Spiral arms — cloudy, streaming — moved serenely over her head. There were blisters of gas sprinkled along the arms, she saw, bubbles of swollen color.