The Sentinel - Arthur C. Clarke [118]
Nine, actually. But one thing led to another . . .
THE LOCALE IS OCEANA (“SHAANA”), an Earth-type planet 50 light-years, and 500 years of voyage time, from the solar system, colonized 2,000 years earlier in the first wave of interstellar exploration. There is very little land; continents still lie 100 million years in the future, and there is still much tectonic activity. The largest island is about the size of Hawaii, and very similar to Hawaii in climate and culture.
Over the centuries the islanders—attractive, slightly feckless—have developed a stable, conservative society, largely based on intermediate technology. They still have access to all man’s accumulated knowledge, but they have added little to it. Their boats, aircraft, and cars are built to last a lifetime, and they never throw anything away they can use again. Since there is no other habitable planet in the system, they have no spaceships, but they can still launch the (rather primitive) satellites essential for their scattered islands’ communications and meteorological services.
Though they have had no physical contact with outsiders for centuries, they still inject their records and news, such as it is, into the local stellar network. The current update is long overdue, partly because of a mounting power crisis.
The Shaanans get most of their electrical power from OTEC (Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion), which employs the temperature difference between the warm surface water and the very cold water several kilometers down. (The first Earth-based OTEC factory began operating in Hawaii in 1979.) For some unknown reason, several of the factories have failed, apparently owing to damage at the deep end. Typically the Shaanans don’t have the submersibles needed to investigate at such depths; they are still arguing about what to do next.
Our protagonists on Shaana are a young couple, Loren (a marine engineer; marine engineering on Shaana is one of the most important professions) and Marissa. Their placid lives are disrupted by the arrival of the first ship from Earth in many centuries—and the last one that will ever be.
Five hundred years earlier the sun went nova. There was just sufficient warning to seek out the population and evacuate the survivors in hyper-ships, each carrying one million sleepers, along with records of all mankind’s treasures and knowledge, as well as gene banks of the main plants and animals.
Argo barely escaped in time. She left before preparations for the centuries-long journey were quite complete. She carries spectacular views of the destruction of the solar system, recorded by cameras on Earth and some other planets: Jupiter boiling, Saturn’s rings collapsing, the sun finally devouring its children, but, most poignant of all, unbearably moving scenes of the last moments of beloved earthscapes and artifacts (e.g., the Taj Mahal, St. Peter’s, the Pyramids, etc., melting down).
Because there is appreciable erosion from interstellar dust at one tenth the speed of light, Argo travels behind a huge ablation shield, formed of ice. This is now too thin for the voyage to continue; hence the stop at Oceana to build a new shield. About 100 of the ship’s engineers have been revived for this task, among them Falcon.
During the decades of deceleration Argo has been studying the Shaanans’ radio transmissions and has a very good idea of the local culture. But so far there has been no attempt at contact, because of the long-established policy of noninterference. There is much debate aboard Argo about this, especially now that it is in orbit and the beauty of the planet below is clearly visible. Falcon spends hours scanning the islands through the ship’s telescopes, vividly reminded of the world he has lost forever.
Contact is finally made, with the inevitable enthusiasms and frictions. The voyagers have power, knowledge, determination, but they are slowly seduced by the beauty of Oceana—such a contrast to Argo’s sterile corridors—and become appalled by the lonely centuries of travel that still lie ahead. The Shaanans