The City And The Stars - Arthur C. Clarke [93]
‘What are you thinking now?’ asked Hilvar.
‘It’s just occurred to me—perhaps I am Yarlan Zey. It’s perfectly possible. He may have fed his personality into the Memory Banks, relying on it to break the mould of Diaspar before it was too firmly established. One day I must discover what happened to those earlier Uniques; that may help to fill in the gaps in the picture.’
‘And Yarlan Zey—or whoever it was—also instructed the Central Computer to give special assistance to the Uniques, whenever they were created,’ mused Hilvar, following up this line of logic.
‘That’s right. The ironic thing is that I could have got all the information I needed direct from the Central Computer without any assistance from poor Khedron. It would have told me more than it ever told him. But there’s no doubt that he saved me a good deal of time, and taught me much that I could never have learned by myself.’
‘I think your theory covers all the known facts,’ said Hilvar cautiously. ‘Unfortunately, it still leaves wide open the biggest problem of all—the original purpose of Diaspar. Why did your people try to pretend that the outer world didn’t exist? That’s a question I’d like to see answered.’
‘It’s a question I intend to answer,’ replied Alvin. ‘But I don’t know when—or how.’
So they argued and dreamed, while hour by hour the Seven Suns drifted apart until they had filled that strange tunnel of night in which the ship was riding. Then, one by one, the six outer stars vanished at the brink of darkness and at last only the Central Sun was left. Though it could no longer be fully in their space, it still shone with the pearly light that marked it out from all other stars. Minute by minute its brilliance in creased, until presently it was no longer a point but a tiny disc. And now the disc was beginning to expand before them——
There was the briefest of warnings: for a moment, a deep, bell-like note vibrated through the room. Alvin clenched the arms of his chair, though it was a futile enough gesture.
Once again the great generators exploded into life, and with an abruptness that was almost blinding, the stars reappeared. The ship had dropped back into space, back into the universe of suns and planets, the natural world where nothing could move more swiftly than light.
They were already within the system of the Seven Suns, for the great ring of coloured globes now dominated the sky. And what a sky it was! All the stars they had known, all the familiar constellations, had gone. The Milky Way was no longer a faint band of mist far to one side of the heavens; they were now at the centre of creation, and its great circle divided the universe in twain.
The ship was still moving very swiftly towards the Central Sun, and the six remaining stars of the system were coloured beacons ranged around the sky. Not far from the nearest of them were the tiny sparks of circling planets, worlds that must have been an enormous size to be visible over such a distance.
The cause of the Central Sun’s nacreous light was now clearly visible. The great star was shrouded in an envelope of gas which softened its radiation and gave it its characteristic colour. The surrounding nebula could only be seen indirectly, and it was twisted into strange shapes that eluded the eye. But it was there, and the longer one stared the more extensive it seemed to be.
‘Well, Alvin,’ said Hilvar, ‘we have a good many worlds to take our choice from. Or do you hope to explore them all?’
‘It’s lucky that won’t be necessary,’ admitted Alvin. ‘If we can make contact anywhere, we’ll get the information we need. The logical thing would be to head for the largest planet of the Central Sun.’
‘Unless it’s too large. Some planets, I’ve heard, were so big that human life could not exist on them—men would be crushed under their own weight.’
‘I doubt