was possible to determine which of the high-Irani areas
would have been on the day side and hence wiped out
immediately. On the night side, however, there were
three notable zones where the minority language was
spoken, and in any of these such a gene-type as they had
found in Kolb’s leg might have occurred.
With this as a basis, it was then necessary to compute
whether one or two or all three stood a chance of get-
ting people from their homes to the nearest spaceport be-
fore the planet turned far enough on its axis to expose
the rising ships to the nova. Only those which had been
able to keep in shadow of the planet for several million
miles had escaped the storm of radiation.
One of the key zones had been in darkness for a full
seven hours; the other two, for a mere half of that.
Settling on that as the most likely course of events, the
team instructing the computers then had to work out
what trajectory ships would have followed to remain in
shadow if they had stayed till the last moment picking
up refugees; if they had left with an hour to spare, or
two hours, and so on, backward through the Zarathus-
tran night. And from these hypothetical lines of flight,
they attempted to calculate where they would have
wound up.
The process went smoothly for a while; several pos-
sible courses were at once ruled out because the Corps
had explored the volume of space through which they
led, to the extreme range any ship could have covered
with its passengers in a fit state to endure a landing. Af-
ter that, though, it was like plodding through heavy fog
and deep mud.
Maddalena complied vidth Langenschmidt’s request to
hear the local news bulletins about the conference; they
were platitudinous, merely giving extracts from pious
speeches interlarded with praise for Quist’s and Cyclops’s
noble compassion towards the ZRP’s. Listening, she was
reminded of what Langenschmidt had said last night,
when he asked if it was too soon to re-question her on
her attitude towards the non-interference policy.
She was no longer sure what her attitude was. And to
find this reaction in heiself so soon after her arrival here
was disturbing.
She was glad to lose herself again in the complexities
of interstellar course-plotting, and was deep in what ap-
peared to be a promising assumption when an argent
message came through to the computing room for her:
would she go see the commandant at once?
Reluctantly she complied, framing a jocular complaint
to utter when she saw Langenschmidt. It died on her
lips. One glance told her he had been badly shocked by
something.
“Gus!” she exclaimed. “You look as though you’ve
)ust heard this sun is going nova too!”
“Next best thing,” grated Langenschmidt. “At any
rate, it’s having the same effectwe’re compelled to
evacuate.”
“What?”
“Sit down and I’ll play you back a recording of the
news. I couldn’t trust myself to repeat it coherently.” He
slammed switches on the desk at which he sat, and a
screen lit. Maddalena moved numbly to a seat from
which she could see it properly.
At first there was only a blur, with an automatic
voice-over signal identifying the time of reception and
dating it on the basic Corps scale; then the blurring
faded, and a harsh incisive voice with a Cyclops accent
rang out.
“Personal and official from Alura Quist to the Com-
mandant, Corps Galactica Repair, Refit and Recreation
Base, Cyclops. Alura Quist!”
A face appeared on the screen. Maddalena studied it
with interest; this was the first time she had seen the fa-
mous Quist, who had for so many years been undisputed
arbiter of this planet’s fate. She saw a pretty blonde
woman whose best attempts to stand off the effects of
age had not entirely succeeded.
“Commandant, you will learn from the appended
recording of my address to the Conference on Non-in-
terference with Zarathustra Refugee Planets at which I
am currently- presiding what it is that you are required
to do. I only wish to add that action is to fae taken forth-
with to implement the decision of the government of my