The Mistress of Space-Time (The Stasis Stories #7) by Laurence Dahners

Author:Laurence Dahners [Dahners, Laurence]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-10-12T05:00:00+00:00

***

Fighting against the strangling sensation that she needed results now, Zaii methodically followed another of the glass channels that originated from the laser-like structures in Eridani ships. The limited time she likely had at the EG made her fret that each new effort might end in another blind alley and be her last. The likelihood of that possibility seemed especially high this time in view of the fact that the purpose of the lasers remained unknown despite the number of previous researchers who’d investigated them.

They called the devices “laser-like,” because their construction, though somewhat different from human lasers, was sufficiently similar that they could generate coherent light when fed the right power. The problem was that no one knew what kinds of currents the Eridanis fed them or whether they lased in response when the Eridanis used them. Nor what purpose they served the Eridanis. The fact that they didn’t have a known purpose made them obvious candidates for the aliens’ jump system but, of course, no one knew that for sure. When Terran researchers fed them currents that caused them to emit coherent light, rather than emitting a beam capable of transmitting energy or information, the light went into irregularly shaped masses of glass covering the emission ends of the lasers. The radiated light traveled out through the glass in an apparently random fashion. Though it seemed as if the glass network was something like a fiberoptic system, trying to send information through it would be almost impossible because there were so many reflective paths through the irregularly formed glass that any message would arrive in a jumble. This was especially true because there were many “laser-like” devices emitting light into the large network of glass, mostly around the periphery of the ship.

If there were any receiving photocells or similar devices, ones that could accept signals from the glass network, so far no one had found them. Though they might’ve been missed if they were very small, the Eridanis didn’t seem to have any other microelectronics, so…?

Zaii swore and set down her cutter. She’d just followed yet another of the glass channels to the outer hull of the ship. As with the others she’d studied, the glass then bonded solidly to the hull material.

The hull material itself was interesting. Rather than metal, it consisted of a repeating polymer, similar to but stronger than Kevlar. As opposed to Kevlar, in addition to Kevlar’s high tensile strength, the polymer had significant compressive strength. It was stronger but lighter than aluminum and would’ve generated a lot of materials science interest back before the impossibly strong yet completely weightless vacuum-Stade became available.

Zaii stared at the shiny cut surface of the hull material while her mind wandered. Suddenly she leaned forward to focus in on the material. Getting up she found a magnifier and returned to study the cut surface. There’s a complex layered coating on the inner and outer surfaces of the hull material! she realized. The coating seemed to glisten a bit.

Could the hull material have optical properties? she wondered.

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