Voyage to Alpha Centauri: A Novel by Michael D. O'Brien Read Free Book Online Page A

confines.
       •   A, B, C, D are each 12 feet high from floor to ceiling, for a total of 48 feet. Add to this the floor thicknesses of 2 feet each, and we get a total of 56 feet. Let’s call it 60.
       •   Bottom level—P (Propulsion), H (Holds), and M (Maintenance)—is not accessible by A-to-D passengers. In the Manual’s diagrams of the ship (illustrations, not engineer’s blueprints), these departments are represented as positioned on the same floor, which would be about 80 feet high. Housed on this level are anti-matter / fusion engines, gravity apparatus, recycling plants, atmosphere control (oxygen regeneration and purification), and other basic services, including our stores of food, and the four ship-to-planet shuttle-craft, as well as wheeled and hover vehicles for planetary exploration.
    Day 18 :
    I stopped a young fellow outside my door today, as he went past, guiding a soundless suction cleaner along the hallway.
    “Who takes out the garbage?” I asked him.
    “No one, sir. Everything gets reprocessed.”
    “Everything? Even the toilets and kitchen slops?”
    “Uh-huh. We’ve got a pretty good separation plant in the basement.”
    “Really?” I said. “Are you saying that the water in my taps may have been passed through, er, other systems?”
    “Yup.”
    “What about dust? Do you have uses for it?”
    “Yup.”
    “Composting in the gardens?”
    “Some of it. After separation, the organic goes to biology for a look-see, and then to the garden people. Non-organic goes downstairs. But I’m not sure what they do with that stuff.”
    Downstairs, I suspect, is the anti-matter department. It’s interesting to know that even microscopic non-organics do something useful. As for the organics, well, there must be a lot of it lying about the place. For example, there is a vacuum bath available at the physical exercise centers. You stand naked for five minutes in a warm, windy suction chamber, and everything not rightly clinging to you is whisked away to become something else. Dandruff becomes part of a ripe tomato. Having your entire body vacuum cleaned is exhilarating—it always makes me laugh—and it’s faster than a shower, with less waste of water. Of course, we’re encouraged to shower too, for social reasons. Nothing is really wasted. Ingenious, but a little disturbing.
    Day 24 :
    Throughout my life, I have tried to limit e-mail and voice mail. I have disciplined myself to check it only once a week. Interestingly, it is more than three weeks since I last felt the urge to check. The max gives me total service that accesses Earth as well as the all-ship’s communication system. This morning, I opened up my inbox and found several hundred messages waiting for me. It took a day to wade through them all. There was nothing really personal, nothing that needed a reply, just official “bon voyages” from all manner of institutes and space agencies and publishers with contract offers. The only message that edged in the direction of intimacy was one from the president of the Association of Cactus Growers of America, who said that the gang in Santa Fe would really miss me, and could I please bring them back an “alien prickly pear”, if I should find any on that planet. I sent back a one-line message promising I’d keep my eyes open.
    Day 25 :
    There are scads of public lectures scheduled for anyone interested in hearing them. These can be attended in the privacy of one’s room by keying in the event via the max . Alternatively, one may be physically present in the theater where lectures are delivered. We have so many experts on board it’s unlikely that topics will be exhausted.
    A social animator invited the five Nobel guys to give the inaugural lectures. We are a dry, dusty lot, but our fields and our prizes will probably draw a few people. The first, mine, is tomorrow night.
    Day 26 :
    Close to two hundred people showed up, filling the theater. Since I am an old hand at guest