Death Match - Diane Duane [70]
Catie digested that for a moment. “Display the subsidiary instructions being called here,” she said.
A text window opened off to one side, displaying about thirty command lines, one after the other. Catie started to read them.
They were all different versions of the gravitational constant. In some of them the numerical value varied just a little. In some, the variation was huge. What was even stranger was that many of them had an added string of data attached to them, vector specifications, as far as Catie could tell.
She shook her head, perplexed. If I’m reading this right—these instructions, when they’re called, would not only change the force of gravity in a space where they were brought into play, but change the direction in which it was pulling. Even the biggest of the numbers were relatively small. Catie wasn’t sure whether the changes would much affect something as massive as, say, a human being.
But a spatball—
Catie swallowed. George said it. The ball didn’t feel right. It didn’t go where it was supposed to.
And now she abruptly understood why. Because someone, at the right time, was invoking these changed values for the gravitational constant.
That’s—that’s—! The first word that occurred to Catie was illegal, though the word was faintly comical, used in this situation. Nonetheless, it was accurate; Catie was positively indignant at the sheer fraudulence of it. You can’t just change the laws of physics! And Catie couldn’t think of anything more basic to the way that objects in this particular frame of reference would operate.
And it’d be easy to miss. After all, who thinks about the gravitational constant? It’s a constant!
…I’ve got to call Mark!
She checked her watch. It was eight in the morning. Any other time she would have thought “It’s too early.” Now, though, Catie thought, If he’s not up, it’s about time he was! But she wasn’t comfortable about calling him from in here.
“Space,” she said.
“Listening.”
It’s gotten so it feels weird not to be insulted, Catie said, and couldn’t quite repress a smile despite the seriousness of the situation. “Save this configuration for me, voiceprinted again. Then close everything down.”
“Done.” The glowing tower of text vanished.
“Door,” Catie said. Her gateway back to her space appeared before her. She slipped through it, waved it shut.
The first morning sun was glinting through the windows around the top of the reading room dome as Catie made her way back to the Great Hall. “Space!” she said.
“Now what?”
She grinned again. “Get me Mark Gridley, right now. Flag it urgent.”
“Is he even going to be up yet? Growing boys need their rest.” The tone of voice, if not the voice itself, was almost exactly Mark’s.
“Get on it,” Catie said, and picked up from the floor beside the Comfy Chair the piece of paper which stood for the virtmail she had been intending to send James Winters. “And see if James Winters is available, while you’re at it.”
There was a pause. A second later Mark appeared a few feet away.
“Oh, good,” Catie said. “Listen, do you know what I found? There’s—”
But Mark was speaking. “—not available right now, and I’m not sure when I will be. If you’ll leave a message, I’ll get back to you as soon as I’m free.”
Oh, great! Catie thought. It was a recorded message again. It froze in place when it was done, leaving Mark standing there and looking slightly vague. Now what? I can’t tell James Winters about this! I wasn’t even supposed to be in that space!
But then Catie burst out in a sweat. If Net Force wasn’t told about this right away, there was no telling what might happen during the play-offs. It wasn’t just a matter of whether or not South Florida might win or lose. It was a matter of basic fairness, now, to all the other teams as well…. Not to mention not letting the bad guys get away with it!
And I have to talk to him anyway.
No point in putting it off.
Suddenly James Winters was standing there looking at her. “Uh, Mr.