The Garden - Melissa Scott [72]
achieve more than molecular resolution. And that meant that the beam couldn't handle living matter- or at least, she added silently, not and keep it living. Of course, it would work perfectly well on the inert matter of the walls and floors, but to use it for that, essentially opening and closing doors-the Kirse would have to draw on the power of a core tap to be able to use their transporter so extravagantly.
"Originally," Silver-Hammer said, "before Thilo, that is, the beam would only reconstitute the matter that now makes up the walls. And break it down, too, of course." She paused. "It would break down almost anything, actually, but would only re-create certain compounds."
"Which you then used in the walls?" Torres asked. In spite of herself, she felt a slight chill at the thought of experimenting with the Kirse proto-transporter- no, not a transporter, she corrected herself, the thing must have functioned like the destructor ray of bad fiction-imagining the experimental mass disappearing never to return. "You must have had a tremendous energy release, if you couldn't reconstruct the material."
Silver-Hammer nodded. "It feeds back into the beam, and then into the system. It's highly efficient."
And highly dangerous, Torres thought, and eyed the forcefield enclosing the machine with new respect. The amount of energy released in such a transaction was enormous; for the system-and presumably that was the hardware as well as the fields and software- to absorb it as controlled feedback was an amazing feat of engineering. It was also something no Federation engineer or scientist would ever be prepared to tolerate the consequences of a system failure would be disastrously high. Of course, she hadn't seen any other Kirse in the area-maybe that was the function
of the canyonlike hallway, she thought, to keep outsiders at a safe distance in case of trouble. "Your forcefields must be very efficient, too," she said, and Silver-Hammer gave an almost shy smile.
"You mean if the transporter fails?"
"I mean to keep it from failing," Torres answered.
"All of this complex can be isolated if necessary," Silver-Hammer answered. "Forcefields are set to seal the corridors-which are isolated anyway, both by double-thick walls and simple distance-or if the forcefields are the problem, the transporter will be used to block the tunnels physically. If there's enough, I can fill the corridor outside meters-thick with solid stone, enough to contain and smother any reaction."
"Killing you or any other operator," Torres said. "Is there always someone on duty, then?"
"Oh, no." Silver-Hammer shook her head for emphasis. "Everything is on a-what Thilo named a deadman switch. If there is a certain pattern of failure, then the safeties are engaged and the section is sealed."
"I see." Torres suppressed the desire to shake her head in disapproval-the deadman switch was the only sensible idea in the lot; everything else was either ridiculously overpowered, like the original transporter, or depended on the willingness of the Kirse to sacrifice themselves to save the rest of their people- and glanced again at her tricorder. "Now I'll need to take a look at the control system."
"Of course." Silver-Hammer held out her hand. A gleaming disk, bright as a mirror, bright as silver, was cupped in her palm, and Torres reached for it. Her fingers slipped on ridged scars, a bezel of flesh holding the control centered in the Kirse's palm. For an instant, Torres didn't realize what she was touching, but then she understood, and removed her hand as
though she'd been burned. The control was somehow embedded in Silver-Hammer's hand-like