Solcintra
In which Cantra takes Tor An on an excursion, Rool Tiazan takes Liad dea’Syl on an excursion, and Arin takes himself on an excursion.
Two things in this chapter caused me to look up from the book and say “Oh!” in that tone of great enlightenment that means my backbrain has just done something clever, like figure out whodunnit before the detective. Neither of them are super-important; I think they struck me because I didn’t notice either of them the first time around (or if I did then, unlike most of the other revelations in this chapter, they didn’t stay with me).
Thing 1: During Master dea’Syl’s conversation with Rool Tiazan, he says the math predicts or prescribes that the new universe they’re planning to escape to will be constantly expanding – unlike the steady state of the universe they’re in now. This is, of course, one of the hints that this duology is not set in our universe, but the thing I realised this time is that it’s also the base explanation for the differences between how interstellar travel works in the duology compared to later. Long-distance navigation through space is bound to be different when space itself behaves differently.
Thing 2: According to the timing mentioned when Cantra is inspecting Salkithin, the ship she inherited from Jela, Salkithin is none other than the ship Commander Ro Gayda mentioned when she recruited Jela way back near the start of Crystal Soldier, the one he was to be made Captain of for its voyage to a then-unnamed place of storage, as the excuse for being detached and placed under Ro Gayda’s command.
And the maintenance crew of Salkithin, getting back to things I did notice the first time around, are – apart from being the crew that Jela commanded on that voyage – the founders of Jela’s Own Troop, of whom we will be hearing more much later. (And they’re not just X Strain; there’s a couple of Ms, a Y, and “Ilneri, who was, as far as Cantra could make it, a natural human”. I don’t know how much that’s going to affect the bodies of Jela’s Own Troop – as I’ve had occasion to comment before, we’ve never been told anything about how the Yxtrang go about making little Yxtrang – but it certainly explains a deal about the shape of the Troop’s minds.)
To finish the chapter off, the event we’ve been waiting for all this time heaves into view on the horizon, as what passes for the leadership of Solcintra at the moment turns to Wellik after their actual leaders do a runner. (It’s possibly my favourite of the Solcintra-as-it-really-was details that, for all the status jockeying and High House politics the Liadens get up to, there’s not a single Clan on Liad that was High House before the Great Migration, because the High Houses all had the resources and the lack of scruple to take off on their own.)
(I wonder what happened to them all.)
(Maybe they got eaten by a giant mutant star goat.)
I just like the enthusiasm of Jela’s Own Troop, and the stories they tell of him.
Maybe the High Houses-that-were are in thrall to Rool Tiazan’s lady’s nasty sister (Simbu’s dominant), who wanted to take over from the Iloheen.
A jailbreak and two field trips – and Liad dea-Syl learns that they really won’t be able to go home again. An insightful comment by Paul regarding the differences in navigating through space between the two universes – the steady state of the home universe and the ever-expanding replacement, which would need a new mathematics descriptic of that state, in the Liaden Universe to which we will be going, which tables are improved later by Aelliana Caylon.
Thing 1: Jolly good catch on that
Thing 2: Salkithin.
I didn’t make the connection until the second time I’d read the book, either. An ah-ha! moment for sure.
I note that because of the discussion between Rool and dea’Syl…which is carried out using the correct terms for where they are and where they’re going…that suddenly we’re back to comparing universe to universe, with “galaxy” never mentioned!
@Paul in the OP: this chapter caused me to look up from the book and say “Oh!” in that tone of great enlightenment that means my backbrain has just done something clever
I'm slow. It wasn't until this 3rd time through that it registered. Cantra is talking to Arin about Uncle, and she makes the reference you know how he is. Arin’s response: “I do indeed,” Arin said, with irony, “know exactly how he is.” (emphasis mine)
The first 2 times through, the idea of the “irony” just went right over my head!
@Arin
And Cantra even adresses Arin as Uncles brother.
@Rool’s age
interesting – that Liad observes “you may dispense with the fiction that I am your elder, as we both realize that I am not. I suspect that your age is some centuries beyond mine…” and Rools respectfully inclining his head.
And yes, the discussion betwenn Rool and Liad is most interesting. And part of it went past me in prior reading.
@decrystallization process
Rool and Liad explain: “… the final decrystallization event … will occur across the affected dimensions and energies simultaneously” … “the act of transitioning will … contain the ships, their contents, and whatever else might be accelerated to transitional velocity …” … “… it furthermore implies that the arrival of the ships, the end of the transition will in effect not be contingent on their relationships before the transition. ”
That gives us a nice explanation why all traveling ship are simultaneously transported out of the old universe, but arrive in the new universe at varying places and times. And why the two Strongline pathfinders Chernak and Stost had a clock ticking down to give them the precise moment in time at which they had to be in space in transition.
@expanding bubble universe
True in several aspects.
I just stumbled over this: https://www.sciencealert.com/existing-string-theory-can-t-explain-why-space-expands-but-this-new-idea-might
So going to an expanding bubble universe might be not as strange as it seemed.
Another aspect: the Liaden universe is expanding book by book and short story by short story. And then filled in with all the fantasy and explanation of all its readers. Just look what we do with this site as well as with the wiki 🙂
And not only expanding but a bubble. Of course – since any story we think up is not the real universe but a bubble of our thoughts.
Do you have any additional interpretations?
@when Salkithin was put to sleep.
And here we get the time for the beginning of Crystal Soldier. 6 common years and a bit ago.
@Othin: not sure where I left a comment about bubble universes, but I think I included a link…or at least a URL for an article about “expanding bubble” as a concept for our universe.