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Jeevishly away.
"I suppose you could say, a distant cousin," VISAR replied in his head.
"Mainly locally autonomous, but when it gets hit with something like that, it
checks back with me."
After some initial socializing, the conversation got down to the business at
hand. The first thing that Sonnebrandt and Chien wanted to hear was Hunt's
account of the encounter with his alter ego in his own words. It was one of
the few occasions when Hunt regretted not availing himself of the option to
keep a recorded log of his phone exchanges in the way many people did. Maybe
it had something to do with his English upbringing, but it always seemed to
him to smack of lawsuit phobia, security paranoia, and other practices of the
neurotic society now fading into history. It was persistently rumored that the
communications companies still kept copies of everything that flowed through
their channels anyway, but requests from the top levels of UNSA, stressing the
importance of the matter, had produced only apologetic denials and assurance
that the claim was an urban legend from way back that just wouldn't die. He
went through what had been said during the exchange and all the analyses that
had been repeated since, and gave his reasons for believing that the device
had been an unmanned relay injected into orbit. His tea and snack arrived
while he was talking.
"The analogy with the Dirac sea is interesting," Chien said when Hunt had
finished. He had reiterated in his communications with Sonnebrandt the point
he had made with Caldwell, and Sonnebrandt had passed it on to Chien.
"Propagation in the manner of the Jevlenese processing matrix very well could
explain pair production and annihilation." The same thought had occurred to
Hunt and Sonnebrandt.
"What do we know about the actual propagation mechanics?" Chien asked. "Can we
say anything yet about the kind of physics involved? What is it that actually
switches 'states'?"
"I've got a hunch that it results from a longitudinal mode of what we observe
as electromagnetic radiation," Sonnebrandt said. "I've been playing around
with the possible implications. I think this might be it." Hunt and Chien were
aware that the standard forms of Maxwell's equations only yielded a transverse
vibration. They described electric and magnetic fields varying in a direction
perpendicular to the direction of the wave's motion, like waves traveling
along a jiggled rope, or a cork bobbing up and down as a water wave passes by.
There was nothing comparable to waves of alternating compression and
rarefaction in the direction of propagation, as occurs with sound, for
example.
"Would that mean we're talking about a comparable velocity, too?" Hunt asked.
Sonnebrandt shook his head. "Not necessarily. The velocity constant c comes
out of the differential equations that apply to the kind of changing universe
that we perceive. Longitudinal propagation would involve a different set of
magnitudes entirely. The same underlying matrix, but completely different
physics in the way that water can carry both sound waves and surface waves.
But they're totally different phenomena." Hunt nodded. It was about what he'd
told Caldwell.
"What about these 'convergences' that this other version of you mentioned?"
Chien asked. "They sounded important. Have you been able to make anything more
of what he meant?"
"Not really," Hunt confessed. "At first I wondered if it was a reference to
this line of thinking that we're talking about here matrix
propagation converging with the h-space approach that the Thuriens have been
experimenting with, but that seems too vague. We pretty well know that much
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already. As you just said, it sounds like something more important."
"I thought it might have referred to some kind of mathematical convergence,
but I've found nothing that it could apply to," Sonnebrandt said.
"VISAR went through the equations that Josef sent, too," Hunt told both of
them. "It couldn't come up with anything either." Sonnebrandt shrugged in a
way that said he could add nothing to that.
"Then let's hope more turns up when we get together with the Thuriens," Chien
concluded.
Hunt finished his snack and wiped his mouth with a napkin. "Tell me more about
this project you've got going with them out in the desert in Xinjiang," he
said to Chien. He knew that the object was to set up an experimental tap into
the Thurien h-space power grid with a view to later extending its availability
on Earth. Misgivings had been voiced in some quarters about the economic
implications.
"Perhaps the simplest thing would be for you to come and visit us and see it
for yourself when we get back," Chien suggested.
"I'd like to," Hunt said. In fact, he had been thinking of trying to arrange
just that. "What are the prospects of it coming into general use in the
foreseeable future?" he asked. "Seriously. I've heard a lot of worried talk
about it."
Chien smiled faintly in a distant kind of way that seemed very wise and
worldly. "Worried talk in America?"
"Well, yes, sure. . . ."
"It will happen, Dr. Hunt. You can't turn the clock back. We will soon be
immersed in an economy of universal abundance. It will be the end of the line
for capitalism, which functions on the basis of manipulated scarcity. But it
was inevitable eventually, even without the Thuriens. The world will just have
to learn and get used to new ways of thinking a little sooner than they
otherwise would have."
Hunt finished the last of his tea while he thought about that. It wasn't the
first time he'd heard such sentiments expressed, but he wasn't sure if this
would be the time to go into it with someone he hardly knew yet. He decided to
keep things on the light side for now. "You should talk to Chris Danchekker's
cousin," he said, indicating the table where Mildred was sitting. "From what
he's told me, it sounds as if you'd have a lot in common there."
Chien straightened up in her seat. "Yes, I must do that. I haven't met them
yet." She dropped her voice to a whisper. "I've been racing through one of her
books since I learned she was coming with us. The one about how brainwashed
and conditioned to political ideology professionals in corporations are. Very
interesting and insightful. Have you read it?"
Hunt shook his head. "I'm afraid not. Come on over. I'll introduce you."
"Would you excuse me?" Chien said to Sonnebrandt.
"I'll be right back," Hunt told him.
"Of course. We'll talk more later." Sonnebrandt rose again as Chien got up to
go with Hunt. Hunt wondered if this was going to be a permanent thing. As they
moved away, Sonnebrandt beckoned Vercingetorix over and ordered another beer.
"And one for me," Hunt called back.
Hunt introduced Chien and told Mildred she was a fan. Mildred seemed delighted
and flattered. Danchekker and the two Thuriens responded with appropriate
pleasantries.
"Duncan and Sandy went off to explore the ship just before you came in,"
Danchekker told Hunt. Duncan and Sandy had been dating cozily since their
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