like meeting a stranger, a strange stranger. He would be a young-looking man. He would be the son of an impossible new acquaintance - Aylis Mnro. He would be a civilian, yet he would, for all intents, be his superior in rank and the ultimate authority for a fantastic piece of engineering of which Khalanov knew nothing. The list of personal distractions concerning Direk was probably much longer, but Khalanov knew the fate of nearly ten thousand people depended on how well he could get along with the new Direk.
Before he took the next step to the open doorway, Khalanov remembered how intensely curious he was about the theory and the engineering of this massive modification they were about to set in motion, and that was all the motivation he needed to tackle meeting this Direk.
Khalanov walked into the control room of the asteroid-concealed factory and saw the long blond hair of the man seated at the main console. This was Direk? He sighed inaudibly, in his mind, accepting yet another challenge to his own deficient personality. Long hair and beards tended to prejudice military minds against their owners. Did Igor Khalanov feel so thoroughly military that he could let such an attitude interfere with a vital relationship? And this was the son of Aylis Mnro!
The man - Direk - was doing something complicated with the controls of a console while intently watching the large display screen on the wall. Looking to the wall display, Khalanov was disturbed to see a huge piece of machinery descending toward the hull of the Freedom! Khalanov was discomfited, even insulted, that Direk had begun without him.
Direk finally broke his concentration and stood up so quickly he seemed to feel dizzy. Khalanov forgot his irritation, became worried by the clue of Direk being ill, and immediately inquired, "Are you alright, Direk?"
/
Direk took a deep breath and kept a hand on the console for stability until he could respond. He gazed down at the shorter Navy officer - an admiral whose bright blue eyes showed concern for him. Ancient images superimposed themselves on reality, and thoughts of engineering procedure shifted aside. He tried to identify the man who had interrupted his testing of the equipment. "Uncle Iggy?" Direk managed to ask, only sure that it should not be anyone else.
"Yes, it's me!" Igor Khalanov confirmed, still frowning with real concern.
"It is good to see you again," Direk said with automatic Essiin control. He felt weak. "I'm a little out of shape from floating around in a coffin for a few years. I was told we are in a state of war with the regular Navy and must quickly depart from here."
"Correct," Khalanov responded, "but please don't hurt yourself! Without you, we don't have a chance!"
"Pan is not here?" Direk asked. "Has he not remembered his engineering skills?"
"I don't know who that person is!" Khalanov protested. "I know I am supposed to remember who I was, but I do not! I barely understand there was a plan - an ancient plan - to bring all of this about, but I suspect it has not gone the way it should have. We have lost your... copy... who must have known all about this!" Iggy gestured at everything in the control room. "And we had to damage the ship in order to escape from Headquarters dry-dock!" Iggy added.
Direk started to ask the first of many questions Uncle Iggy had raised in his mind but his emotions tried to pump too much meaning into several sharp recollections of Igor Khalanov from as far back as his childhood! It seemed this was a man who was possibly his favorite childhood acquaintance, a man who was like a family member! Direk had to rein himself in, even if he no longer wanted to be Essiin in theory and in practice. He had a vital task to perform, or else he might allow unthinkable danger to occur. He had been told there were thousands of people aboard the Freedom! He had been told the rest of the Union Navy was pursuing them!
"Can you stop that thing!" Uncle Iggy was shouting at Direk.
The loud voice seemed to clear his mind and reset his will. "It will stop automatically," Direk replied factually and calmly.
"What is it?" Iggy asked, obviously irritated with his own ignorance.
"Part of the gate structure," Direk answered. "I call it a field emitter. Because the gate is so large, it has to have many sources to produce the spherical discontinuity."
"I knew it!" Iggy declared. "I knew it had to be a gate! But this... Please give me a quick introduction to your device, Direk! I need to feel a little less useless than I am!"
"You know the ship, sir," Direk protested logically, "and that is at least as critical, but I understand your curiosity."
"Me, too!" a voice called. Direk and Khalanov turned to see a young Asian man standing in the doorway, smiling at them. "You don't recognize me," the man concluded from their stares. "That's alright! I'll just stand here and listen and then remove myself and let you go about your vital business."
"Uncle Phuti," Direk said quietly. "You are welcome to stay. Please, come in."
"Phuti Mende?" Khalanov queried, as though disbelieving.
"You don't seem to remember me personally, Iggy," Phuti Mende said, stepping into the control room and looking at Khalanov, "but maybe Direk does."
"No, I don't remember you," Khalanov replied. "I'm supposed to have an auxiliary memory but it seems to have malfunctioned. It seems incredible that I once knew you and Aylis Mnro - and Alexandros Gerakis!"
Phuti Mende offered his hand to Khalanov and the two shook, then Phuti did the same with Direk. Mende looked up at the tall Direk and scrutinized him with an amused smile.
"Not at all what I remember so far," Mende said of Direk, "but my auxiliary memory has only just come awake. And it's throwing lightning bolts at me! Please, don't let things get out hand and delay your work! My only good excuse for being here is that I also have an urgent job to do and I thought I should know something about this thing you are doing."
"What do you have to do?" Khalanov asked Mende.
"We have a ship full of mostly Malay-culture people needing to come aboard our ship and get settled in," Mende explained. "They can't get their drive repaired soon enough to avoid the Navy pursuit. I might need to explain to them something of what we are doing here. If that wouldn't be a breach of security."
"We are changing the Freedom's mode of operation," Direk began. "It will use a gate to jump to another location. What you see in the display are the components of a gate that we are about to attach to the hull of the Freedom."
"And you know this will work?" Khalanov queried doubtfully.
"No, but these same components, in a different configuration, did allow Commodore Keshona to send her three ships directly to Rhyandh, so we know the principle is correct. How this will work as the engine of a jumpship is what we will discover."
"A jumpship?" Phuti asked. "What is that?"
"Something Zakiya discovered more than two centuries ago, when the Titanic disappeared," Direk answered. "We have an enemy that uses such ships, but they are much smaller than the Freedom."
"We are about to jump through a gate?" Phuti said, sounding shocked.
"We are going to become a gate that jumps through itself," Direk said. "That is what jumpships are. They create a spherical shell of discontinuity around themselves which in some way neutralizes positional certainty and allows a small nudge of force to translate them to another location in an instant. I don't have a theory adequate to explain why this happens. Pan and I merely saw that it was possible and we experimented until we found a way to duplicate the effect."
"But that is approximately what starlight drive does," Khalanov proposed. "The difference is that starlight drive doesn't get total closure of the envelope, retaining the heading notch which, in a sense, is a flaw in the envelope, but it allows control and provides propulsion. How do you control your destination, Direk?"
"There may also be a flaw in the gate shell," Direk said. "I liken it to the quantum loop appended to every atomic particle. The gate shell may mimic a kind of atomic particle, producing a nearly infinitely-long quantum loop. By varying the strength of the field emitters we set a bias that describes the destination of the jump."
Iggy and Phuti l
ooked at each other, mirroring their expressions of helpless wonder.
"I must leave!" Phuti announced. "It is wonderful beyond words to see you both again! Maybe the shock will eventually wear off! Maybe my auxiliary memory will eventually be tamed!" He turned and fled the control room.
"Doctor Mende!" a female voice called from the hallway outside the control room. A woman in a dark blue captain's uniform appeared in the doorway. It was Jamie.
Direk controlled himself as his eyes caught Jamie's and they connected with the impact of a laser beam. The connection broke almost instantly, leaving a feeling of sadness. Jamie rushed past the doorway to catch Phuti Mende, her voice unsteady as she called after him. "Wait for me, sir, or you may get lost!"
Khalanov watched the first field emitter reach its destination near a tuning pylon on the hull of the Freedom, then he turned to see Direk staring at nothing. "Auxiliary memory?" he asked Direk. "I've heard Zakiya complain about its disruptions."
Direk shook himself, figuratively and physically. "Yes, that and more. You mentioned the other copy. They told me he died. How?"
"How many copies did you have, Direk?"
"There were four of us. The copy you knew, who helped you build the Freedom. How did he die?"
"I don't know," Khalanov replied. "Zakiya is withholding the details but I know it was bad. She and Sammy were covered in his blood. I try not to think about it!