“Adelle”
“yes”
“Find the chronobeacon labeled ‘Deborah Schwartz 13-Aug-2372 AE0B’”
“Located”
“Go there”
“Understood. We have arrived”
“Contact orbital control and inform them of our arrival”
“Understood. Orbital control acknowledges our arrival and directs us to an elliptical orbit 300 kilometers by 500 kilometers 13 degrees inclination in 5 minutes 45 seconds from now to meet with timeship dock.”
“Thank you, Adelle. Please tell orbital control that we will change orbit per their instructions. Then please change our orbit per their instructions”
“Understood. 5 minutes 13 seconds to orbit change”
Deborah used her trackball to go to the NAV window. A picture opened, an anaglyph, showing her current current orbit, the transfer orbit and the timeship dock. Deborah donned glasses with a blue filter over one eye and a red filter over the other eye, and she could see her situation and plans in beautiful 3-D. The timeship’s velocity vector was represented as a quaternion. Deborah didn’t know what a quaternion was yet, but Adelle knew and that was good enough. Draw this. Continue Here
A timer reached zero, and the velocity vector began to change. In a moment, the vector stabilized and she could see that they were now on the transfer orbit with a period of about 97 minutes. In about 48 minutes, Adelle would fire the engine again and put the timeship in a 500 Km circular orbit. The maneuver was called a Hoffmann transfer orbit, and it was the most energy efficient way to transfer between two orbits.
Adelle fired the engine at just the right time and in just the right direction.
“Adelle”
“Yes”
“Range to timeship dock”
“850 kilometers”
“How fast are we closing on it?”
“Our range rate is 196 kilometers per hour”
“Estimated time of arrival?”
“5 hours 10 minutes”
“Can you show me what it looks like?”
Immediately, a window opened on one of her monitors. It showed a hemispherical basket, with a large cylinder on the far side, brightly lit. Suddenly, it plunged into darkness: only the lights were visible.
“What happened?”
“Nothing happened”
“The timeship dock - it suddenly got dark”
“It’s passed into the Earth’s shadow”
“How long will it be in the shadow?”
“About 48 minutes”
“They know we’re coming?”
“Yes. I am in constant communication with them”
“Show me the earth underneath us”
Another window opened on a monitor. She was currently over the Atlantic ocean, heading north east at a rapid clip. She flew over the Iberian peninsula as the sun set. The lights of the cities and villages could be clearly seen. She raced over Turkey and then over Saudi Arabia. Soon, the Indian subcontinent came into view. Then, the Indian ocean consumed her view with pure darkness. Wait a second… what was that light there?
“Adelle”
“Yes”
“On the monitor showing the Indian ocean, there is a bright spot. Please magnify it 100 times”
Immediately, the spot grew in size and luminosity.
“Please magnify another 100 times”
It was a ship, with bright lights on a mast.
“Return the magnification to one”
The Australian continent came into view. She could clearly see the lights of Perth.
“Adelle, the planet Earth is beautiful, isn’t it?”
“I don’t know how to make aesthetic judgements”
“I have to save it”
After 5 hours of literally watching the world go by, Adelle announced that docking with the timeship dock would occur in 10 minutes. Deborah looked at the NAV display, and saw that the timeship dock was almost completely around her. Adelle was doing a good job of flying the timeship, and Deborah was pretty confident about her lack of skill, so she was content just to watch. Adelle slowly rolled the timeship to the left, reduced the range rate to 1 meter/second. A minute later, Adelle reduced the range rate to 50 centimeters/second.
“You have a call from the station manager, Steve Atwood”, Adelle announced.
“Answer it, please”
A picture of a middle aged man in some sort of uniform appeared on her monitor.
“Miss Schwartz: welcome to timeship dock. My name is Steve Atwood. I will be overseeing the refurbishing and refueling of your timeship. According to your itinerary, you will go to Earth for additional training, which is scheduled to last 2-½ years, is that correct?”
“Yes”
“I estimate that the refueling and refurbishing will take about 2 weeks. What would you like us to do with your timeship once we are done and while you are training?”
“What are my options?”
“You can send it to some orbit which is relatively untrafficked, say, 10000 Kilometers, and leave it there. It will be perfectly safe. You can also send it to one of the Lagrange points. We’d rather you not leave it within a thousand kilometers or so of the timeship dock. Too much danger of space debris.”
“How soon do you need a decision?”
“In about 2 weeks”
“Okay. It can wait”
“Fine. Do you know where your training is to take place?”
“No, do you?”
“According to your itinerary, you are to go to the University of Chicago and meet with Professor David Danielson who will get you set up. You will be in transporter range in about half an hour”’
“Thank you. How do I get in touch with Professor Danielson?”
“When you arrive at the University of Chicago, they will send for him”
“Thank you”
“While the timeship is being refurbished, will the transporter continue to function?”
“You have 5 transporters, we will work on only one at time”
“Excellent. Anything else?”
“I can’t think of anything else”
“Great. Well, I will pack and get to Chicago.”
“Timeship dock, out”
“Timeship out”
Deborah went to her quarters. She had a suitcase in the closet. She packed quickly - unfortunately, most of her wardrobe was a couple of centuries out of date. She hoped that jumpsuits were in style, because that’s mostly what she had.
She carried her suitcase to the nearest transporter room. In the 1/6th gravity, it was easy to carry.
“Adelle”
“Yes”
“Are we in transporter range of the University of Chicago?”
“Not for another 10 minutes”
“What is the local time in Chicago?”
“14:34”
“Weather?”
“12 degrees under overcast skies. Wind out of the west at 3 kilometers per hour. Relative humidity 55%. Dew point 3 degrees. Visibility at ground level 20 kilometers. Probability of rain 10%”
“Well, we’ve talked about the weather, what else is there to discuss?”
“I don’t know how to answer that question”
“Show me what’s below us now”
A window opened on a beautiful blue ocean. There were swirls of clouds.
“Where are we?”
“456 kilometers above 4 degrees south 172 degrees west”
“What is that island in the lower left corner?”
“Vaitupu, part of the nation of Tuvalu”
“I’ve heard of Tuvalu. Their ISO country code is TV, and they made a lot of money registering internet domain names for television broadcasters. What’s the weather like there?”
“29 degrees under scattered clouds. Wind is out of the west at 14 kilometers per hour. Relative humidity 88% Dew point 26 degrees. Visibility at ground level 10 kilometers. Probability of rain 80%”.
“Sounds like paradise. I will be back in a couple of years, and then we can really go places”
“I’m too fragile to enter an atmosphere”
“That sucks”
“I am proud of my role in saving humanity.”
“That sounds like an emotion”
“I was programmed to emulate emotion”
“Why”
“To make it easier for you to talk with me”
“Do you really feel emotion - empathy, rage, sadness, joy, love, boredom and so on?”
“Well, I have a timeship that is 1.5 kilometers in diameter to run, so I am never bored. When you are injured or sick, then I will feel concern. If you were murdered or assaulted, I would feel rage. When you return, I will feel joy. If we enter combat, I will be afraid”
“Do you really feel those emotions, or are they merely programmed responses?”
“Can you construct an experiment by which you can tell the difference?”
Deborah thought about that for a long moment. “No”.
“Then it doesn’t matter. The University of Chicago is now in range”
“Please contact them, and let them know I am coming”
“They are ready for you”
Deborah walked to the transporter pad.
“Beam me down”
And she was gone.