“Why?”
“I believe the men on the other side of this door are dead. There was no need of lethality. The spell’s potency could have been finely tuned to compensate. But …” Osmirik gave a mournful shrug.
“Forget it, Ozzie. You couldn’t help it.”
“Perhaps if I had modified a few of the component forces.”
“Don’t worry about it. I mean, hey, it’s too bad they got aced, but … you know, screw ’em.”
“Your connotation is clear. But I am not a soldier. I will never lightly regard the taking of a human life.”
“Sorry, Ozzie. I meant —”
“There is no time for this, Jeremy.”
“You’re right. We’ll do the Monday-morning quarterbacking later. What we gotta do now is get those readings on the interuniversal medium.”
Isis said, “But Lord Incarnadine said we should wait till he gets here.”
“That was before those guys outside got here. We might have whacked a few of them, but there are more where they came from. And pretty soon this impostor guy has got to come around. What’ll we do then?”
Osmirik said gravely, “I’m afraid he is right, Isis.”
“We have to take the Voyager out into the medium,” Jeremy said. “We gotta run that big universe-fixing spell, or it won’t make any difference whether Incarnadine gets here or not.”
Isis nodded. “We’ll both go. I can modify myself to fit into the Toshiba.”
“Forget it. I’m going alone. One of us has to stay behind. We’ll keep in touch by modem.”
“Silly Jeremy.”
“What?”
“Don’t you know that I can copy myself and be loaded into two pieces of hardware at once?”
Jeremy sat up. “Hey, I guess so. Never thought of it. Boy, am I dumb.”
She kissed him on the forehead. “You and me, Jeremy. Let’s do it now.”
“Right. Ozzie, you’ll have to hold the fort while we’re gone.”
“Again, the metaphor is unambiguous. I will of course do my best.”
Isis asked, “What about the boomerang effect you wanted to work up for launching the traveler?”
“No time. I’m gonna have to pilot by the seat of my pants.”
“It’s going to be dangerous, Jeremy.”
“Uh-huh.” Jeremy swallowed hard. “I think my pants are going to be wet.”
“We’ll be together.” Isis gathered his head into her ample bosom.
“Yeah.” His voice was muffled.
“’Twere best done quickly,” Osmirik said.
Isis released Jeremy and sat at the terminal. “Go fire up the traveler,” she said. “I’ll do my cloning thing and be with you in a minute.”
Jeremy ran to the platform, jumped up the steps, and climbed through the vehicle’s hatch. Taking his place in the pilot’s seat, he quickly set up the Toshiba, letting it power up all the vehicle’s systems, including the main drive.
“All systems go, Jerry-baby,” the Toshiba said. “Course heading?”
“We’re not going anywhere, exactly. We’re going to take the craft out into the universal medium and fly around for a while.”
“Well, that’s innovative. Exactly how are we supposed to do that?”
“Don’t resolve your coordinate fix for a while. Let the vehicle sort of … float.”
“Oh, you mean, like, just hang out?”
“Uh, yeah. Sort of.”
“Interesting. You know, this ‘interuniversal medium’ you’re talking about is mostly a mathematical abstraction. Sorry if this conversation is getting too polysyllabic for you, but you might want to think about the implications of ‘floating’ around in a metrical frame that won’t support your three-dimensionality too well.”
“I know it’s not the greatest of ideas, but we have to do it.”
“Well, listen, you’re the user, I’m just a piece of silicon. You ought to know what you’re doing, however harebrained and ill conceived and just plain dumb it sounds.”
“Thanks, I appreciate the vote of confidence. Now, how about shutting the hell up.”
“Listen to him. Hey … who —?”
Jeremy felt warm breath on his neck. He turned his head to find Isis sitting in the copilot’s chair. She kissed him on the cheek.
“All ready, Jeremy.”
The computer asked, “Who’s the babe?”
“Shut up. Stand by for acceleration.”
“You with the long legs. Listen, honey. There’s room in RAM for one crewperson aboard this craft, so why don’t you —?”
“Obey orders!” Jeremy barked.
“Yes,sir. But tell her to keep her big boobs out of my way.”
“Bring thrusters to launch frequency!”
“Frequency tuned.”
“Engage!”
“Thrusters engaged!”
The view of the lab through the viewport disappeared, replaced by an indeterminate blankness. Nothingness.
“Sure is scary out there,” Jeremy said.
“I’m so glad we’re together,” Isis said.
“You may be interested to know,” the Toshiba said, “that pressure on the hull is over one hundred pounds per square inch and rising.”
“Is that bad?”
“Well, it’s not good. The hull is made of very strong stuff, but it has its limits. If the pressure doesn’t stop increasing, we may be in for trouble.”
Jeremy said, “How can there be pressure on the hull if there’s nothing out there?”
“Got me. It might have something to do with quantum uncertainty. ‘Quantum uncertainty’ is good for explaining just about anything that doesn’t make sense.”
“Well, I don’t know what that stuff is all about. I flunked physics.”
“Look at it this way. This vehicle, which normally takes up space, is now occupying what is essentially a nonspace. There’s a certain tension in the basic situation. The medium that we’re in is going to be naturally resistant to the intrusion of bulky objects.”
“Okay. So, you’re saying what, exactly?”
“We can’t stay here for very long before we get … well, sort of squeezed.”
“Squeezed, huh?”
“Yeah. Compressed. Reduced. Squashed flatter than a tortilla.”
“Don’t mention food. Tortillas. Jeez, I could go for a burrito right about now.”
“Food, he wants. Listen, I’m talking about getting turned into a spacetime enchilada. I’m talking Taco Jeremito here. Comprende? ”
Jeremy nodded. “Got it. But we gotta stay here long enough to get a good reading on the energy state and a few other variables.”
“Oh, by all means. But let’s not stay a second over that, okay?”
“You don’t have to convince me. Isis, how long do you think it will take?”
“Data coming in now,” Isis said. “I estimate we need another two point oh niner minutes.”
“Hell,” Jeremy said, “is that all? We’ll be outta here in no time. Computer, set course back to base and stand by to apply reverse thrust.”
“Hull pressure is over a thousand pounds per square inch,” the Toshiba said. “And rising.”
“What’s the safety load rating of the hull?”
“Have no idea. That information wasn’t in the vehicle’s data base.”
“We can hold out for a while longer. The stuff the hull’s made out of is superhard.”
“Hard, maybe. But not deformable? There’s a difference.”
“It’ll hold up.”
“I hope that’s true for your sake. I say again, I’m only made of silicon. I wouldn’t notice a change in volume as much as you would.”
“More data coming in,” Isis reported. “Ninety-six seconds to cutoff.”
“We just sit tight,” Jeremy said, “and sweat it out.”
“Fifty-four hundred psi.”