Pulsar Race: A Starship's Mage Universe Novella by Glynn Stewart

Author:Glynn Stewart [Stewart, Glynn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Faolan's Pen Publishing
Published: 2020-09-14T16:00:00+00:00

Twenty-two ships appeared with them on the other side, and Ivan closed his eyes in exhaustion. A moment later, he felt the slight shift as the engines opened up. The switch from one gravity of magical “down” to one gravity of subjective thrust wasn’t subtle, even if the end result was theoretically the same.

He forced himself to open his eyes again and take a drink from the coffee bulb next to him. Every ship was accelerating toward the first beacon, but it was a “mere” hundred and ten thousand kilometers from their position.

The first choice every racer had to make was whether they would accelerate the full distance or slow down as they reached the beacon. It was a gamble, one they’d have to repeat with each beacon.

They had to ping it from within ten thousand kilometers to get the next beacon’s coordinates. If they were at zero relative to the beacon, they could immediately accelerate exactly toward the next beacon. If they were moving at high speed, they’d need to adjust their course—which could easily require them to counter their entire existing velocity.

But if the next beacon was on or close to a straight line past the first, it would give them an advantage over the ships that slowed.

“We’ll hit zero velocity ten thousand kilometers short of the beacon in twenty-seven minutes,” Charpentier told him. “One of the other couriers is pulling seventeen gees. We’ll see whether he flips.”

“Who do you think will get there first?” Ivan asked.

“Mister shuttle racer,” the pilot replied. “He’s piling on fifteen gees, putting him near the top of the pack, but straight-line acceleration is all that toy has. He’ll burn straight for the first one and hope that he gets lucky.

“I could be wrong, of course, but I’m hoping someone gets there first,” he continued. “The course the first guy sets informs everyone else’s choices. We still need to ping the beacon from within ten thousand klicks, but if we have an idea of which beacon he’s headed to…”

“What if they’re giving everyone different beacons?” Ivan asked. The thought made a terrifying amount of sense to him. It would confuse the racers trying to take advantage of someone else’s course—and it would let Aquila lead Restoya off out of sight of everyone else for the ambush Ivan knew was coming.

“They might. It would be against the rules for a legal race, but this isn’t a legal race,” Charpentier admitted. “Would be quite the trick, too. I guess we’ll find out in fifteen minutes or so.”

Ivan nodded and finally let his attention shift from the other ships and the beacon to the real problem. The two pulsars were spectacular, rapidly rotating neutron stars orbiting each other at a distance of a single light-minute.

Even as Ivan looked at them, the screens around him darkened to protect his eyes from the flash as one of the poles swung close enough toward them for the radiation beam to be visible.

He didn’t need to see the data from

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