GROUND / CH. 29:BUBBLE DENSITY
GROUND RESTORATION
[Heather? It's Maggie.]
[Hi Mags, what's up?]
[I've just been talking to Magdalena and Rachel. Someone cut some bubble dynamics from the basic introduction course, and didn't put it in any other module.]
[Are we talking curiosity or scary?]
[How critical the total density of the bubble is. Rachel remembered being told 'don't ever take much high density cargo, low density is OK, more details next course,' but she now realises she was never told those more details.]
[Yep, that's scary. And Magdalena?]
[Ditto for Magdalena, except she asked her parents at the time and got a quick 'oh that's really important, you mustn't alter the total mass in the bubble by more than about 5 percent.']
[Well done to them.]
[So, if it's OK with you, I'm going to send out a 'all pilots' alert, and then roast some ears at the university. In my book, anyone who doesn't know that shouldn't be piloting a bubble ship. The 'low density' thing is a mistake too. Rachel had the idea she could pretty much fill the ship with anything — living space included — as long as what was in the cargo pod wasn't denser than water.]
[You roast away, Maggie. I'll run a remedial course on what happened and what almost happened to probe two on people here. I think you ought to go in person, Maggs.]
[At my age?]
[You've still got more flight time than lots of recently qualified pilots. Take number five out of it's vacuum chamber.]
[You really think so?]
[It's been there twenty years, Maggie. If we don't end the experiment soon then everyone will have forgotten about it. And young Rachel ought to know how do put one in too. It's only right.]
[OK Heather. Preserving knowledge, shocking the young, and so on.]
[Exactly.]
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RESTORATION
“Rachel, thanks for coming. It's time for you to learn something about bubble ships.”
“Really?”
“Probably. What happened to the first bubble ships, Rachel?”
“Urm, they got retired, didn't they? New designs were made, and they were redundant.”
“New designs were made and the old ones were too flexible. The old designs had all the flexibility of the automatic probes. Fully programmable, in other words.”
“Oh. Sort of like an accident waiting to happen, in the wrong hands?”
“That too. You're still second in charge of the Ground expedition, Rachel, and you're doing important stuff down here. So in my book you shouldn't assume that your association with the programme will ever end. The bubble programme needs an ambassador now more than ever, especially with what Russia are planning. You've heard of that?”
“I've had some discussions with Tsarevich Tibor,” Rachel said, nodding.
“So, I've just agreed with Ursula. You, Albert and I are going to pay a surprise visit to Mars, just as soon as Albert gets here.”
“But, urm, John and Karella have taken the Bubble ship to Mars.”
“That's no problem. You and I need to take a little walk. I guess impact park would be a good place. Oh, and you know that crystal vacuum chamber on my desk that children mustn't touch? Be a dear and bring it will you? Move it very carefully, deliberately and at as constant a velocity as you can, it's got a lot of inertia, for all it doesn't weigh much.”
“Gran, you're not making much sense. How can it have inertia but not weight?”
“Graviton deflector, of course. Oh! Expect some flashes when you move it, there's a range finding laser in there, too.”
“What is it Gran?”
“An old experiment. Almost as old as you are. Probe five, like it says on the lid.”
“You're not trying to tell me you've got a retired bubble ship parked on your desk, surely.”
“No, I've let you work it out.”
“How can I possibly move a ship when it's in bubble space?”
“You move the box. Very smoothly. You hit the forcefield spikes. Bang, you stop, and I hope you didn't break the crystal. The ship notices, the laser range-finder gets triggered, the ship moves to the middle of the box, and so on.”
“Are you saying that forcefield spikes can go through the bubble interface?”
“Yes. Photons can, why shouldn't other things? Normally almost entirely useless, of course. Except when you've got a ship in a box.”
“Does anyone know this stuff, gran?”
“Everyone who did a doctorate in bubble technology.”
“So it's disappearing knowledge?” Rachel asked, “I've seen a lot of retired professors with a doc-B-T, but no one under fifty.”
“That's something you'll need to talk to Atlantis about. Emperor Jake didn't like some of the things we'd got them to do, like number five sitting in its box, or being able to fly in atmospheres. He mandated that no new people join the doc-B-T programme, and ships one to four be programmed to take a pure Boris sun-dive once people had finished their research. Five was in the box, and we said, look, it's not harming anyone or anything there, can we leave it for a decade, a decade and a half at least? Please? Let it finish its research? And he said, 'OK, OK, I'll leave it for my successor to decide.'”
“What was so scary?”
“I think the trigger was when one of his daughters heard about the advances and came up with an idea about using one to do some observations in the sun.”
“But... you can't navigate that close to the sun! And the radiation levels...”
“Yes. But what if you don't need to navigate? It's not like there's much to bump into inside Mercury's orbit except the sun, and it's pretty hard to miss if you can manage to go in a straight line. Why not make the space-time connection sphere a hundred times smaller? You're still a long way from a black hole. And with the interaction sphere smaller, you don't get much radiation in at all. And then if a spike can go through the hole, you can get it to emit any radiation it collects, can't you? Except the antimatter, of course, and you'd want to keep that to recharge the battery.”
Rachel's jaw dropped. “Would it work?”
“How do you get a bubble ship into a box, Rachel? And why might that scare any head of state absolutely stupid?”
“You... you fly the bubble in atmosphere. And you can emit the radiation as light, that's how the range-finders work. Put those together and you've got a perfect assassination tool. You could bubble-drive through someone's head, and fill their brain with radiation as you go past.”
“Yuck, what a turn of imagination you've got. But yes, you're basically right. The variable size manifold means you can take proper bearings, the spikes mean radiation control, recharging the bubble means you don't even need to worry about losses, but just like a high energy cosmic ray, you're leaving a trail of radioactive particles and Bremsstrahlung radiation behind you.” Seeing Rachel's expression Maggie said “that's the reason reactor pools glow blue: local violation of the speed of light. Jake got worried, and he didn't have his mother's gift to know no one was deranged enough to try to kill someone by flying through their head. Plus of course some idiot in the press was talking about how if only a bubble ship could fly in curves or in the air, you could have hyper-lightspeed transport around the planet, not just hyper-sonic. Fly in curves? Nothing easier. It was getting the
things to fly straight which was the bigger problem. The idiot bit was the thought of trying to come out of bubble space in a built up area. You're talking burst ear-drums and broken windows there, I assure you.”
“So, when we take it up to Impact park, it's not going to suddenly go pop and we step on board with bleeding ears?”
“Not quite. I'll need to convince air traffic control I'm not being funny, and it'll transition about fifty kilometers up.”
“How do you tell it to do that?”
“Pre-programmed response when it notices there's no lid above it. Which is why you really don't want to break the vacuum chamber.”
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RESTORATION
[James, it's Maggie. Who else is in contact with Bubble pilots these days?]
[Ruth, Karella, Zan, Refek and young Sathie.]
[Hmm, and all awake apart from Sathie. Great. Kids, this is Maggie, listen up, lives might depend on it. Some people missed a bit of training and got the wrong summary, it seems. Anyone want a pause to get something to take notes on?]
[Please.] Refek said.
[OK I'll wait.]
[Did someone just ask me if I was awake?] Sathie asked.
[Yes, Sathie. Got something to take notes on?]
[Urm. my pillow doesn't count, does it?]
[No.]
[I've got my wrist unit.] Refek thought.
[Oh, I can use that, can't I? I was thinking paper.]
[You're sleepy, neice.] Karella said.
[Yes.]
[This is mainly for people a long way from home, I'm going to be grounding everyone in the solar system this morning, until I know exactly who's affected. It comes in the category of 'don't kill yourselves and others, pilots, please.']
[Eek. That woke me up.] Sathie said.
[You have our attention, Maggie] James said.
[Right. Someone's been telling trainee pilots don't pack high density cargo in the pods, low density stuff is OK. Sorry, that depends on so many factors, so I'm calling it just plain wrong. What's right is that everyone needs to pay attention to the total mass inside their bubble, the total volume of spacetime inside their bubble, which ought to be written somewhere in the ship documentation if they can't remember, and make sure their total bubble density doesn't stray outside or ideally anywhere near the edges of the range which ought to be shown on their control panel before they confirm bubble space transition. First generation probes can usually adjust it, either there or somewhere else, it all depends who made the probe-ship. This is a case of don't know, or don't understand, don't do it. Too heavy and the BAP won't be strong enough, and they'll overstress the fabric of spacetime and shrink past the Schwartzchild radius. Too light and the BAP will chuck them out of warp, just when everything is geared up for big power drain, and based on test device two's results, end up with some kind of battery controller malfunction and vanish in an antimatter explosion.]
[What's a BAP?] Sathie asked.
[Blackhole Avoiding Pulse. It has to be triggered really soon after main conversion pulse ends, and actually before the bubble is formed, so the Blackhole Avoidance Detector can't measure anything on time. Filling living quarters with extra passengers or mattresses will mean it's too weak just as easily as carrying too much rock. Signs they've got close to danger include fast rotation on bubble exit, excessive drain on antimatter battery, or warning messages about messy transition.]
[So in case of fast rotation, jetison cargo?] Karella asked.
[Certainly don't add more. Excessive drain and messy transition seem to coincide with too light. But basically, in my book, everyone should be doing all the maths. A short cut for a generation two ship: assume the designer allowed a hundred kilos each for each person and their effects, and fifty kilos of food to be replaced by samples. The danger point is varying the total density in the bubble by about ten percent, and that includes the weight of the ship too, which is normally about fifteen hundred kilos, so they're really dicing with death if they're a hundred and seventy five kilos off those estimates.]
[So two fifty kilo girls on a quick trip and no need of food or baggage. Ought to be OK, just.]
[Yes. But if one then leaves her friend behind somewhere, without cargo, and just does a quick jump back to Earth, she might only have a small chance of getting there. Or if she took a kid who only weighs twenty. We do not know, exactly, what on the low density side is dangerous. The robot probes were valuable and we only killed one of them: that was at fifteen percent low. At ten percent low it was a really messy transition. The overweight test results showed that at ten percent over-dense, the minimum interface diameter got really really close to it becoming a black hole. And if someone asks about bouncing back to what it should be, even if it goes under, here's some scary physics: at a black-hole's gravitational slope you're going to get Hawking Radiation greater than the sun's output, and that energy has to come from the bubble drive. It can't cope with that power level for even a femto-second, at which point you're in a collapsed bubble and a genuine evaporating black hole. Basically what I've just told you is the executive summary of a lecture that got skipped. Please pass it on.]
[One question: what constitutes fast rotation?] Zan asked.
[One or two revs a minute is fine. Much faster and they're in the danger zone.]
[Eek. I've got someone to talk to. Gone.]
['Bye Zan. In case others ask, the full version of the lecture used to show some of the graphs from modelling, so they could see what the BAP does, and footage of what happened to the test probe. Any questions?]
There weren't any.
[Thanks Maggie.] James thought, [we'll warn our distant friends and anyone local who's about to transition in-system.]
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RESTORATION, IMPACT PARK
“Hello, air traffic control. I'm Maggie Durrel, professor-emeritus of the Bubble Research programme, and Queen Heather's just told me to end a twenty year old experiment and collect the data before everyone who remembers it goes senile or dies. I'm in Restoration, in the middle of Impact Park, and I can't see any air traffic very close, but I'm wondering if there's anything between me and fifty kilometers up, and if it'd be OK to land a bubble ship in the park on full automatic.”
“Err, where's the bubble ship now?”
“In one sense, right in front of me. More accurately its in a bubble of space-time currently anchored to the rest of the universe at a point inside a vacuum chamber we've just brought with us. No one wanted ear drums to burst or anyone to get otherwise hurt, so it was pre-programmed to warp to 50 kilometers altitude and then descend to it's launch point, at an acceleration of half a G relative to freefall and a maximum speed of two hundred meters a second. I'm afraid I can't change those parameters without getting on board, which I can't do.”
“Erm, I'm afraid I'll need some kind of confirmation.”
“That's fine. I don't know how extensive or accessible your records are, but you might find that you have a record from twenty or twenty five years ago, urm, just after the
death of empress Karella Farseer of Atlantis, relating to Bubble Research Ship Five, nickname 'Jumping Jack Flash' landing in Restoration. That's the vessel I'm talking about. There might even be a provisional departure plan registered. I seem to remember something about temporary landing permission needing a departure plan.”
“Thank you. And the name was Professor Maggie Durrel?”
“Emeritus these days. Yes, of the Space folding research programme which turned into the Bubble Research Programme. If it's any help, Dr Rachel Ngbila, my granddaughter, is here with me.”
“I might need to speak to her for confirmation. Erm, oh, I'll need pilot's license information...”
“Should be on record, maybe under my maiden name, Smith.”
“I'll go and look up some records, maam. Can you hold the line?”
“Certainly.”
“And based on what I've just learned there may have been a fundamental gap in bubble ship pilot training for the past decade or so, so I'm on my way to Mars to find out when the course changes happened and ban the affected youngsters from engaging bubble drive, subject to further training.”
“Would that affect traffic to or from Earth, maam?”
“Yes. Rach, when did Magdalena train?”
“2356, I think.” Rachel replied.
“I believe most but not all bubble pilots trained after 2356 will need remedial education. The cut-off date may need adjusting. Inbound journeys should not be affected unless anomalous behaviour has been detected at bubble transition. Outbound journies should be checked with the competent pilot certification authority. Which at the moment is probably me.”
“Professor, you are saying the competent authority is not competent?” another voice asked.
Maggie guessed it was the office supervisor. “I am going to Mars to find out. Under the laws of Atlantis I have the authority and responsibility to determine who is competent to teach a subject that I basically wrote the book on. A basic safety component was moved from one course, but it seems it was not included in the later course, although students that were told it would be. So, unless they did extra research or listened to a colleague who did, they don't know how wrong the quick summary they were given is.”
“Could you give a simple, accurate, summary of the problem?”
“Don't overload a Bubble ship, and don't underload it either. Overload and you could end up in a black hole, under-load and a power-burst meant to correct that problem can overcorrect and you could end up in a common or garden antimatter explosion.”
“Thank you, professor, that was clear. Can I refer any irate pilots who get told they're not clear to fly to you?”
“Certainly. Calming down stroppy children is one of a grandma's main roles in life. The entirely safe tolerances are plus or minus five percent total mass, expressed as an average density within the bubble, relative to a number that has been programmed into the bubble drive.”
“And that number is fixed?”
“It depends. It need not be, different builders had different thoughts on the matter in the first generation probe-ships. The second generation ones all used the same estimate of how much pilots and cargo would weigh. The only third generation ship built so far, Mick's ship, weighed itself, which is entirely the right thing to do, shame he left the pilot seat while under thrust and knocked himself out.”
“And the ship you're going to be launching is a first generation?”
“The ship I'm going to be launching is Bubble Research Ship five. Not the dumbed down interplanetary probe ship version.”
“Ah, sorry, professor.”
“I'm not saying it's prettier, but its certainly more flexible.”
“Yes. Urm, I understand you told my colleague it was going to use bubble drive in atmosphere.”
“Yes, that's one of its tricks. The very best executive desk toy you can imagine. That's what my daughter used to call it, anyway. I resoundingly told her off for calling it a toy.”
“But you kept it on your desk?”
“Certainly. You wouldn't want it in the living room, the kids might try to play shake the spaceship, which would have made a mess of the experiment.”
“Sorry for keeping you talking, professor. Your airspace is clear to thirty kilometers radius for the next quarter of an hour, so you are free to urm, unpack your ship. I assume you'll be filing a departure plan in due course?”
“Yes. I'll need to access the experiment logs and check it's all OK, but I expect to be in contact in an hour or two.”
“Thank you professor.”
“Thank you.” Maggie ended the call.
“Long conversation,” Rachel observed.
“Yes, but you have permission to open the air valve. Expect quite a lot of range finder activity when you do.”
Rachel did as instructed, heard the hiss of high speed air entering a vacuum. Maggie was right, the range finder seemed to be in over-drive compared to earlier. After a few seconds the hissing sound stopped.
“OK, now making sure you're not leaning over the box, slide the lid off. I recommend you look up as you do.”
“Is it dangerous?”
“No, it's rather pretty. Even better at night, of course,” Maggie said.
“Surely it's not going to be visible at that distance?”
“No. But you're going to be looking up at a suddenly evacuated and ionised pillar of air. A bit like your own personal lightning bolt. And when it pops out of the bubble the spikes are going to be visible, I expect. Maybe I should have warned air traffic control about that. Go on, pull the lid, girl.”
Looking up, and not leaning over the top, Rachel pulled. There was a blue-white flash, a very faint crack, and then a light that went from blue-white to yellow to orange to white. From ground level it looked no brighter than a firework, but she imagined it was quite bright to any pilots in the area.
Maggie's wrist unit rang.
“Yes” she said, “The flash was sort of expected, sorry. But I was expecting barely visible red, not bright blue-white. I'll have to check the logs to see if I moan at the Mer about the vacuum vessel they made me, or at children who might have fiddled with the air-inlet valve. Please apologise to any dazzled pilots. And identify it to any one who thinks it's a UFO.”
Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
Just over two minutes after Rachel had removed the lid, Maggie said, “Am I imagining it, or can I see it?”
“I think I can, gran. A silver ball, is that right?”
“More of an ellipsoid. It's made of crystal. I don't remember a reflective coating. Oh, maybe its forcefield is on. Let's wait and see. And move over there, a bit, we don't want to have it land on us.”
It didn't take long, but long enough for a few passers-by to stop and gawk.
“What is it?” One was brave enough to ask.
“The last of its kind, a Bubble Research Ship, made before any of the interplanetary probe ships.” Maggie said.
“Who's on board?” someone else asked.
“No one, yet. It's landing on automatic.”
“Why does it say 'Jumping Jack Flash' on it?”
“Someone thought it was a good description. It's just coming down from its jump. Did you see the flash?”
“I did. Where did it jump from”
“That vacuum-chamber. Hopefully it's got some interesting data from the experiment it's been running in there for the past twenty odd years.”
“It's been in that box for twenty years?”
“Yes. Excuse me, after all these years, I'm a bit impatient to see the results.”
“I hope you remember the entry code,” Rachel said to Heather as they reached the ship.
“That's the other reason for the name of the song,” Heather replied. Typing in 'All right now'. “Stand back, and let it air out for a bit.” She hit enter.
The door opened, and Rachel could see rows and rows of controls and indicators. “Wow.”
“Bit different inside to a probe ship?”
“Very. But I've seen photos of this haven't I?”
“Of course. Your mum's been on it. And named it, actually. Give her a ring.”
Rachel did as requested. “Hi Mum. Gran thought you'd like to see this view.”
Hannah Ngbila looked at the picture. “Jack Flash is back? Oh wow! Mum! Why didn't you tell me?”
“I forgot you named it, love. I've got to go to Mars. Heather told me to get it out of its box, so we came right here.”
“Can I come and have a look round for old time's sake?”
“If you like. We're in Impact park.”
“If I like? If I like what sort of silly question is that? That's practically my teenage home you're looking at there, Rachel.”
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[Maggie, this is Zan. Probe 2T20 last span out at over one rev per second, They've just jetisoned some thirty-five kilos of sparkling water. Co-pillot doesn't really like still, apparently. They've just worked out that — with some guesses — they were at an estimate of 174 kilos above standard estimate before they jettisonned stuff.]
[Praise God they weren't any heavier!]
[Indeed. But the bad news is neither recognised what I passed on from you and they trained about a decade ago. They knew there was a problem if they overloaded the cargo pods, but had guessed it was something about them being nearer the edge of the bubble. ]
[Thanks, Zan. I'm going to hit the big red button then. That's scary.]
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SPACE
“Mars approach this is Professor Maggie Durrell on Bubble Research Ship Five, coming to see if the Bubble Pilot Training school is fit for purpose. OK if I scare the living daylights out of them for old time's sake? It is a bit urgent, and I'd like to make a point.”
“Could you expand on that, probe five, and give your full designation?”
“Mars approach, I do know the difference between a Bubble probe and a Bubble Research Ship. This is Bubble Research Ship number five, nicknamed Jumping Jack Flash. Have you got anyone there with a long memory?”
An older voice came on the radio “Jumping Jack Flash, this is Mars approach supervisor, no lower than a kilometer please, you don't want to break any domes. And give me a minute to make some calls.”
“Thanks, Mars approach. Did you get the recertification note?”
“It just hit my desk, professor. Scary.”
“Even more than you know, Mars approach.”
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MARS UNIVERSITY
Every screamer near the campus gave a strange series of notes. Some who recognised the chords gave whoops of delight, some ran to look at a patch of sky, above the Bubble Labs. One frantically began rummaging through old research notes for their half-forgotten research proposals. The message on the screamers said “BRS-5 'Jumping Jack Flash' incoming. Expect flash and bang.” Karella Margaret James merely smiled. Then she thought better and got up, yelling “That means cover your ears, people, and look above the Bubble lab building. The last of the old Bubble Research Ships is out of it's retirement and about to to an in-atmosphere transition. It might be loud, and it might be bright. But it's not a sight to be missed.”
One of the younger researchers in her lab, expressed her confusion. “You can't fly through atmosphere!”
“Jumping Jack Flash can. That's how it got its name,” Karella said.
A few moments later, there was indeed a flash, followed by a crack like close thunder. “Expect reverberations, people.” Karella said, reading a message on her wrist unit. “Professor Maggie Durrel has just suspended everyone's Bubble pilot licence and the right of the pilot training institute to issue them.”
“What? Why? Why would she do that?”
“Because to her mind as well as mine, corners were getting cut and she's not convinced we're not going to end up in an evaporating black hole. Who's had rotation on bubble exit?”
“Doesn't everyone?” someone asked.
“No,” Karella replied.
“I've had it on the way home far more often than the way out,” another pilot replied.
“Exactly. So, probably we're all going to get a half-day workshop on getting back to our loved-ones in one piece, rather than lighting up the sky with subatomic particles,” Karella said.
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BUBBLE PILOT TRAINING CENTRE, 11 AM.
“Good morning, director,” Maggie said, “You know my granddaughter, Rachel, I know. This is Albert, who's just along for the ride, really.”
“I assume there is a reason for the visit, not to mention the urm... suspension notice, professor.”
“Yes, Director. You have not been in your post very long, I know. Therefore, I believe it is not in any way your fault. But there have, it seems, been some changes to the training programme that a were not one hundred percent thought through, or if they were thought through, they were not implemented well. And those changes were made far earlier than I thought this morning, even, when Queen Heather told me to get number five out of its box. I'm bound by law to ensure that, as long as I live, every pilot is fully trained and aware of the risks of bubble travel. Fundamentally, they are not at the moment. So if there's any failing, then ultimately the failing is mine. I take it there are no staff here with a Doc B-Tech?”
“No professor. That's been the case for a very long time, on hearing about your visit and seeing the notice, I did a check of the staff lists. The last Doc-BT staff member left the staff fifteen years ago.”
“Hmm. Director, I would like to see a detailed syllabus for everything related to Bubble-Ship theory and practice, past exam questions for the last two sessions, along with marking schemes, and for all teaching staff to sit an impromptu exam, so that I can assess exactly the state of the training programme.”
“All teaching staff?”
“I think so, yes. We might as well be comprehensive, mightn't we? And I don't want anyone losing sleep over this, so can we say this afternoon at 2pm?”
“Some of our staff are not on site at the moment, professor,” the director said.
“Then can you give me an annotated staff list, marked with units normally taught, and units they'd expect to be asked to teach or assist on if the main lecturer was ill, and units they might get roped in for if there was some kind of infection going through the staff and they'd had it and recovered?”
“Urm, yes, of course.”
“Great. If you can work on those things, then I'll get down to writing an exam paper.”
“May I inform the staff about what the problem is?”
“I don't think so, director. I'd like to get as close a picture to the situation yesterday morning as I can.”
“What happened yesterday morning?”
“Not much of relevance, except that I didn't know there was a problem. Oh, since there won't be any teaching, why don't we include the students in the exam too?”
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BUBBLE PILOT TRAINING CENTRE, 2PM
“Hello, staff and students!” Maggie said. “My name is Maggie Durrell, it's a long time since I've been here, but I used to be director here, and as the first director of this school I have the rather terrible legal responsibility of making sure no one dies from not knowing enough about Bubble Ships. Since I'm making some of up this up on the spot, this exam should not be expected to check every aspect of your knowledge, and has no relation to anyone's future employment, final grades, or anything like that. What it is intended to do is help me understand where there might be gaps in the curriculum, or gaps in the knowledge of the teaching staff. Students, I hope you'll find the exercise enjoyable. I mean that. Bubble ships are fascinating but deadly things, and I hope you're here because you want to get out there and discover stuff and do so safely.
"What I'm going to do is throw questions at you, verbally. Your role is to take notes if you want to, and then write the answers on the bits of coloured paper in front of you. My willing assistants will then collect the bits of paper and we'll go on to the next question. You'll see that students have green paper and staff have pink. That's because there are more students than staff, there were only two colours in the stores, and there was more green.
"Question one: Bubble probe 1R3 has four bedrooms, six beds, beautiful delta-shaped fixed wings and submarine-metal underwater drive coils. Bubble probe 1T4 has forcefield wings and a very large refrigerator. What feature do they share which would make either of them suitable to take a party of six well-built merfolk on a fishing trip to Earth? Hold up your answer sheets when you've finished.”
After the sheets had been collected, Maggie went on to the next question. “Two, recently, a bubble probe exited warp with a spin rate of about one revolution per second. Once the pilot has got the spin under control, and cleaned up any vomit, etcetera, if needed, is there any specific action that he should do, or should not do?
“Question three. True or false, the BAP is triggered by the BAD.
“Question four. True or false: A BAD problem is fatal.
“Question five part A: What would happen if the BAP was too weak, part B:too strong?
“Question six: What sort of samples can you carry where and why?
“Question seven: You entered bubble space and the probe gave a warning about a slow or messy transition. Should this affect any of your decisions during your warp flight? Does it affect your subsequent actions after exiting bubble space? If so, how?
“Question eight. Mick Karella John hit his head after setting his ship to thrust towards the planet Ground at one gee. List the things that he got wrong, indicating what was (A) totally wrong and (B) a mistake that contributed to his crash and (C) what lessons should be learned, (D) How different would history be if he hadn't?
“Question nine. A) Explain why you can't fly a Bubble probe in atmosphere, and make some guesses about how the Bubble Research Ship I came in might be able too. B): Then explain why those modifications might be very useful. C): guess why your bubble probes do not incorporate that technology.
“Question ten. What theory was automatic probe two testing when it suffered an antimatter explosion?
“Question eleven: Fifteen years ago a new generation of ships was defined, as those which automatically measure their lift-off mass. Explain why this is a good idea, and why it took so long for someone to build one.
“Question twelve: List all the steps you should take if the BAD throws you out of bubble. For extra merit, indicate the correct order.
“Question thirteen: who has the authority to cancel a trip or cut it short?
“Question fourteen: who has the authority to decide a trip absolutely must be extended?
“Question fifteen: you have a vague feeling that something is not right about a bubble jump you're
about to do. Your researcher has been delaying the departure to gather just one more sample but is now happy
and is pressing to get home for his mother's birthday. What is the correct response? “Question sixteen. Hopefully you answered the previous one 'pray for certainty and contact from home and wait.' When you're contacted after two days of your researcher driving you to distraction, what do you tell the gifted person, and ask them to do?”
“Question seventeen: Write down these numbers: Combined cargo pods have volume three hundred litres and contain fifty kilos of plants. Total ship volume one hundred cubic metres, the crew has a mass of one hundred and eighty kilos, personal effects are another two hundred kilos, food is forty-five kilos. The plants die without a regular wash of local water, and the researcher has got fifty liters of that. Bubble volume: 300 cubic metres. The pilot is feeling uneasy, you as a staff member at the school here have been asked to check. Is there anything with this plan that worries you? What else would you want to know? Who might you ask?
“Question eighteen: Here is a typical confirmation display with, as you see, the headings blanked out. Not everything on here is required by law. By law, what parameters must a Bubble Probe display as part of the bubble transition confirmation display? Explain why each required one is significant.
“Question nineteen. Would you like tea, coffee or something else?
“Question twenty, hands up who would like a break before I start reading out some of the best answers, by which I mean either the most correct or most humorous?”
The school director got to his feet, and said “Professor, I was not able to answer all those questions. Not by a long shot. Will you also give us the
ideal answers?”
“Mr Director, I'm a firm believer in self-directed study.
What I'd like to suggest is that I give a little presentation after tea and coffee, and then let you all loose on the library. Maybe that way you'll discover more gaps in the syllabus.”
----------------------------------------
MARS
[Heather? Me again.]
[Hi, Mags. What's up?]
[Teaching staff unanimously ignorant about the BAP. I've done some research, they're all either unconnected to the bubble programme, but say with flight training in Earth planes, or are ex-researchers from the days when researchers didn't ever pilot. Pilot candidates didn't interview well or can't teach, and so retire into things like growing veggies, turn into forcefield scientists, go on lecture tours, take up politics, that sort of thing. ]
[Hmm. Why didn't the pilots interview well?]
[I guess they weren't impressed by what the pilot school's become. The kids aren't allowed to touch the 'valuable exhibits in the museum'.]
[You mean the semi-retired probe ships?]
[Exactly.]
[That's crazy. Where else do the kids sit to watch the films?]
[Glad you agree. It seems they don't watch the films. I will be... talking to the director.]
[Good.]
----------------------------------------
BUBBLE RESEARCH FACILITY.
“Right young people.” Maggie said to the assembled crowd. “Have you finished your drinks? We're going to watch an old film or two. I assume it's still available next door. If it's not then I'll send upstairs for a copy. Come on, all of you.”
“The Bubble Research Facility's museum?” One of the students asked, surprised.
“In the historic ship hanger, yes. I saw no one's moved the old probes ships very far, so I presume no one's glitched the film archives either.”
“The curator's not going to like that.”
“Hmm. Then I'm going talk to the 'curator'. Feel free to wait at the door.”
Maggie confidently walked through the doors. The place had a dead feel to it, like people rarely dared to enter. Maggie stroked the nose-probe of 1R3, a sleek delta-wing ship that just looked like it was yearning to break free of space-time. It wasn't very practical but it was beautiful.
“Do you have a viewing permit?” a bored-looking cleaner asked.
“A viewing permit? No. It's been quite a while since this gorgeous one viewed much I expect. How often do the Boris projectors get cleaned these days?”
“I don't know who you think you are, but this is a private museum, viewing is by permit only. You need to talk to the front desk to arrange one.”
“What petty minded bureaucrat came up with that idea? Get whoever can rescind it down here really soon, because I'm teaching a class in here in about five minutes, or so help me I'm flying these beauties outside where they belong.”
“Leave now, or I will have to call security.”
“Call for whoever makes the rules round here.” Maggie said, opening the maintenance port on 1R3's nose, and looking at the status indicator.
“Sloppy, very sloppy. Are you supposed to be looking after these beauties? This says the auxiliary fusion supply is almost entirely out! It can't have had a top up in a decade! Disgusting! I bet you've never even been taught how to de-dust the Boris projectors, have you? How is it supposed to be flight-ready if it's not maintained?”
“Flight ready! It's a museum piece!”
“I am professor Maggie Durrel of the Bubble Research Group. The BRF is supposed to be maintaining these ships in a flight-ready condition in case of emergency. Failure to maintain the ships in flight-ready condition is a breach of the BRF's charter. Get me the director of the Bubble Research Facility down here now, or I will be talking to the Mer ambassador and the High Council of Atlantis about a willful breach of the treaty establishing the BRF. I am not joking. At any moment there might be a partial failure of a probe ship and these ships are supposed to be capable of rescue operations.”
Spluttering the man went into his office to call for security guards, and, just in case the elderly woman was speaking the truth, request the director come.
[Heather, the research group have locked away the ships, called it a private museum — I expect they're charging an admission fee or something, and worse they are not flight-ready. 1R3 hasn't had a drink in a decade, for instance; I've not checked any others yet. How under heaven did things get so bad?]
[My guess is it was killing off the bubble research ships. They're just doing modelling these days, Maggie. They had to get a test pilot out of retirement to certify Sathie's ship. Think what that means.]
[We let too many second gen ships get made, didn't we?] Maggie thought, [Is Sathie going to make number two? If Russia want to make Celestia class bubble ships then we'll need some experienced test pilots.]
[Yes. It's quite scary, isn't it? ]
[Dear Lord, the waste! I'm at, 1T4 Heather, it's alert light was on so I came to have a look. It is entirely out of hydrogen, and has been drawing on the antimatter battery. The log shows it's been that way for over three years. Hmm. Last service fifteen years ago signed off by Grumpy George. I bet the viewing permit thing was to stop him moaning.]
[Good guy, George.]
[I'm going to think to him.] Maggie thought.
[Good idea. He probably knows what's up. Expect an ear-ful, though.] Maggie smiled. Grumpy George could always find something to complain about, always.
[George, it's Maggie Durrel, kicking up a stink in the historic ship hanger. 1T4's alert light was on and I see from the logs they've not let you near it in a decade. What's happened here?]
[I heard Jack Flash was back, didn't know you had the gift though. That new?]
[I got it after my kids left home, so not very recent, they tell me.]
[They've ruined it Maggie, accountants and managers and policies and petty bureaucrats. They also told me I'd be out of my job if I kept 'messsing with the exhibits' and then banned everyone. I tried to get in touch with Heather but her number'd changed.]
[Probably something to do with being queen.]
[That's what I figured. Never did think of you. You know they've gone and put an office in the airlock? I almost quit over that one. But I just keep dreaming that one day Jack Flash would be back and the glory days'd come again. ]
[Jack Flash is back. I'm back, and I'm going to kick up a stink. I've got a full class of staff and students I want to show the probe-2 death sequence to. Pilot training's totally forgotten about the BAP, can you imagine? I've got one teacher next door who didn't say the BAP is controlled by the BAD, and she teaches biological safety, not flight.]
[What do they teach then? That's just so basic! I didn't know the rot had gone that far. That's criminal!]
[It is. And putting an office in the airlock is breaching a Mer treaty. Those ships need to be flight-ready in case a rescue mission is called for.]
[Now why didn't I think of that? I get so worried about the little things I forget the big ones. ]
[Don't kick yourself too hard George. Just get down here and give these beauties some care and attention.]
[My pleasure!]
Maggie thought for a couple of seconds, and decided that she couldn't remember enough of the treaty to quote it correctly. She looked for people who were the ambassador of Atlantis. His name was William. [Your Excellency, I am academician Maggie Sarah John, and entreat your help on a sad matter.]
[I greet you, blessed academician.]
[A treaty must be kept, because it is an oath between peoples. I am sad to say that I have just learned that the Bubble Research Facility, during the passage of years and by ignorance or thoughtlesness has made itself shark and sharkfood: the semi-retired probe-Ships are not flight ready, and instead are treated as museum artefacts. An office has even been built in their airlock, how then can they fly to rescue those in need as the treaty requires? But my memory of the wording of the treaty is not perfect. Could you please provide me with the text of the treaty, and so help me educate these foolish sharks?]
[I knew there were problems and complaints about management, but did not know there was a treaty! I am embarrassed, academician! Can you tell me of it?]
[The Bubble Research Group was established under treaty. The Bubble Research Group was split into the Research Facility, the Exoplanet Research Group and the pilot training school, which represent the different aspects of the treaty-established Bubble Research Group, and their charters are basically addendums to the treaty. The charter of the Research Facility says roughly speaking that they will look after retired vehicles in case they are needed to mount a rescue, the Expolanet Research Group's says they will feed their flight data to the Bubble Reseach Facility, and so on. The three sibling organisations together are the Bubble Research Group, and so must be operated under the treaty. This is why the charters were agreed to by all treaty partners.]
[So the Research Group cannot decide the ships are now museum pieces.]
[No. Not without a full agreement from the signatory nations and the rest of the Research Group, which would include myself, Heather, and everyone else with a Doctorate in Bubble Technology. We reluctantly agreed to Emperor Kristoph's strongly stated demand to retire the early Bubble Research Ships, but with all due respect to his Imperial Majesty, I believe his demand was made on a mistaken and emotional basis, and not very well considered.]
[Yes, and you've reopened that issue.]
[Queen Heather Spacefolder instructed me to, and the experiment it was conducting had run a decade longer than originally planned. I needed to get here quickly, and she felt it was past time that the experiment ended. ]
[I see. And would you be able to comment on what made you feel you needed to come?]
[I believed, when I left home, that a stupid oversight had been made, which could be quickly and easily solved with an in-person visit. Now... I have just given the staff and students what I used to give students as an encouraging, light hearted mid-term test. There is a single teacher who achieved a passing grade, a co-pilot from when I taught the course. She is not teaching bubble safety. In other words, the kindergarten children are being taught water safety by people who cannot tell the difference between a dolphin and a shark.]
[That is a strong accusation, academician.]
[It is a reflection of a sad situation that has arisen because when I specified the course syllabus I assumed bubble safety would be taught by people with a Doc. B-T, or at least by fully trained, experienced pilots, so why specify what's blindingly obvious? But it seems I need to. Ah progress... someone with businessman written all over him approaches. I'd much rather talk to a scientist.]
[I'll send you the texts, academician.]
[Thank you, ambassador.]
“Good afternoon,” Maggie said. “I don't suppose you could give me permission to fulfill my duty as named Trainer in Chief of bubble pilots? Oh, and give Grumpy George permission to care for these beauties like they need, as he is Shipkeeper in Chief? This little red flashing light, for instance, means that something is seriously wrong. It's actually entirely out of fusion fuel and is consuming its antimatter stocks. That'll be a real disaster if it's needed for a rescue mission.”
“Madam,” the official said, “this is the private museum of the Bubble Research Faculty, and these museum pieces are no longer functional. As director I must ask you to leave.”
“I see. I must have missed that memo. Not to mention the treaty modification, and the howls of protest from the Exoplanet Research Group that you were planning to scrap their rescue ships. I was under the strong impression that your charter states that these reserve bubble craft were being maintained in flight-ready state by the Bubble Research Facility for experimental purposes and as rescue vehicles, and that under the terms of the treaty any Bubble Craft that has been fully retired from service must have all secrets of the Deep removed. This one, for instance, has been saying please refill fusion supplies urgently for years, so I'm quite sure that its secrets remain undisturbed.”
“Policies change, Madam.”
“Treaties too. If all parties agree to the change. As a signatory to the treaty modification known as this Institute's Charter, I have not been consulted over such a change. I have just been in conversation with His excellency the ambassador of Atlantis, and a copy of the relevant treaty will be here soon. I expect with some Mer warriors.
“Madam, you have no right to barge in here and issue veiled threats like this.”
“Sir, you and your forebears have never had the right to remove these rescue vehicles from active service, or to declare them off-limits to any member of the Bubble Research Group, including trainee pilots. I am sorry that no one thought to contact me, Heather, or anyone else, but the time has come to rectify mistakes, not cast blame. Let me put it simply, sir, if the organisation you are running is not fulfilling the charter obligations of the Bubble Research Facillty, then it is not the Bubble Research Facility, and should not be occupying these buildings or using the facilities granted to the Bubble Research Facility.”
“Maggie, have I ever said I love you?” Grumpy George said, from the doorway.
“Yes, George. The answer is still no. Now, as academician and professor responsible under the charter for training pilots, I require that at least one of these vessels be readied for flight as soon as possible. So unless you've died or assigned a replacement acceptable to all parties under the charter, please fulfill your charter duties and maintain these beauties.”
“Certainly academician,” George said. “Will you be requiring any particular vehicle?”
“I'd love it to be 1R3, but any with an adjustable TBD, big enough, and which is flight worthy.”
“George, if you take one step towards any of these museum pieces, then that's it, you're jobless and officeless.”
Maggie looked at George, who rolled his eyes and bowed to her. He'd vaguely remembered something really important on his way down, and Maggie calling him Shipkeeper in Chief made him pretty sure he couldn't be fired.
“Director, George might get a stipend from your budget, but he is a not your employee. You cannot fire him, deprive him of office space or do anything at all to him except call him names, any more than you can to me or Heather Spacefolder. George is an emeritus member of the Bubble Research Group, with more right to be here than you. As he's Shipkeeper in Chief, you're breaking the treaty keeping him out of here.”
“Maggie, can I borrow Jack Flash for a little experiment?”
“Depends. Not if you're thinking of flying through the sun. You know thatwas too risky. Nor through Halley's comet. We don't go breaking known astronomical objects.”
“She's so strict. I love her,” Grumpy George declared to the world.
“Stop it George, you don't love me, you love Jack Flash.”
“Drat, she sees right through me,” George said.
“Research proposal on my desk when you're ready. Which is to say once these babies are spic and span.”
“Where's your desk?”
“I'll let you know. It was only meant to be a day's visit. Didn't the school ask you to teach Bubble Safety, George?”
“Only half-heartedly. They didn't like the way I moaned about their precious schedule. No time for the films. Crazy.” George said, expertly topping up the water in 1T4.
“Film time will be in five minutes.”
“Probe two goes pop?”
“First the pre-BAP modelling. They don't watch that either.”
“Poor kids. They need to have some of us old fogies come over for a chat, don't they?”
“Certainly. That got cut off the schedule, too?”
“Sure been a while since I last got invited to a party.”
“Probably because you're Grumpy, George.”
“Man's got to live up to his name.”
“While I am director here, there will be no films shown in this museum,” the director said, emerging from the office with a piece of old paper, “And it was designated a museum by the Bubble Research Group. See!”
“Oh?” Maggie asked, looking at the paper. “George, why did you write 'Do not disturb museum exhibit' on BRG headed paper and stamp it with urm, a stamp that says urm,” She looked at the cuniform writing. ” 'Space Folding Research Group Party Fund 2300?' It is your writing, isn “t it?”
“Let me see that. Oh! That's Tom's writing. His sign, too! I wondered what'd happened to that! He used to prop it up next to his head when he needed a nap. And of course he always slept on 1S8, claimed it was more comfy than his bed back home.”
“And Tom was in charge of the ships while you were on Earth, and died in charge of them?”
“He was, yes. And yes, I stayed there three years after that, looking after my Mum. And you know the then-director died in the same crawler accident that killed Tom.”
“You state this is a joke?” the director asked
“BRG letterhead from, hmm 2330, rubber stamped with a stamp that stopped being valid in 2321, and dated Martian Independance day? How many clues do you want? I don't know, Maggie! Young people today, they can't read cuniform, it's not even in Mer, just English spelt in cuniform!”
“Pilots can, George. They need to, or they can't fly the ships. Directors don't need to fly ships.”
“Didn't we used to have a rule that everyone had to read it?”
“Yes, George, for about two minutes. Then we very quickly decided that teaching it to the cleaners was more than a bit stupid.”
“Oh yes!”
“But there is a rule that all secrets of the near deep get written in Modern Mer, secrets of the chasms in middle Mer and medium stuff in old Mer, and non-sensitive stuff in modern land-folk languages. So why is the date in a confusing mix of old Mer script and English?”
“Because it was a joke, Maggie. No one was supposed to take it seriously.”
“Ha Ha, very funny. If it's an in-joke write it all in something outsiders can't read. Now get these ships back in order, and arrange for the airlock to be usable, politely.”
“Yes, Mum.”
“I'm not your mum, or I'd box your ears for being a party to this treaty breaking. Mr director, would you like to reconsider your decision to take that joke at face value, and the policies it has led to.”
“I would like to study the documents you have referred to.”
“I believe the Mer will be supplying a copy soon, I also believe it is time my lecture began. None of this is classified, director, so I would like to ask you to watch, and learn how utterly important this research facility is. The traditional seating for watching the films is from in or on the bubble ships. They are not fragile as long as no one sticks gum on an emitter array.”