Jon took his seat at the controls. Someone handed him a cup of coffee, and the room quieted. Rudy moved back out of the way. The displays activated, and they had views of the Bay 4 launch doors from several angles. Orbiting telescopes had also been included in the mix. If everything went as planned, they’d have visual coverage until the moment the Happy Times made its jump. That part had been easier to arrange than he’d expected. The Locarno experiment commanded a fair amount of interest.

The station director wandered in, saw Rudy, came over, and shook his hand. “Good luck,” she said.

Across the room, Hutch caught his eyes. Here we go.

The media people were speaking into their microphones, watching the countdown, trying to convey the tension of the moment. A few technicians stood out in the passageway. Margo Dee, who looked gorgeous, gave him a thumbs-up. Big moment for the Foundation.

Two minutes.

The room fell silent, save for a few whispers.

Once Jon hit the button, everything would be automatic.

Rudy couldn’t remember the last time he’d tried prayer. His parents had been staunch Presbyterians, but it had never really taken with him. Nevertheless, he found himself speaking to Someone, delivering one of those if-you-are-there pleas. If he’d ever wanted anything in his life to succeed, this was it.

Fifty seconds.

The Happy Times was considerably larger than the Preston, and much bulkier. Designed to accommodate lots of cargo. It wasn’t the vehicle he would have chosen for something like this. Its main engines were outsize, the hull still carried the faded logo of Orbital Transport (which they hadn’t gotten around to removing), and external latches provided additional hauling capability.

He’d have liked something a bit more photogenic.

The final moments went to zero. Jon leaned forward and pushed the button.

NOTHING HAPPENED.

The Happy Times stayed firmly attached to its dock. Rudy glanced over at Hutch. She smiled. Be patient.

He turned back to the ship. Still nothing.

The launch doors began to open, and the umbilicals floated away. The ship edged away from the dock. Its maneuvering thrusters activated, and it started to turn on its axis. Big lumbering thing that it was, it moved with surprising grace. He watched with a sense of pride.

The picture on the displays changed. They were looking down on Union from God knew where. The ship moved deliberately out through the launch doors. Its tubes lit up, and it began to accelerate. A few people applauded. Premature. Way too early.

It dwindled quickly to a star. Then it was gone.

“Okay, folks,” said Rudy. “Nothing more will happen for the next forty minutes or so. Break time.”

Journalists closed in on him and on Jon. Mostly they wanted him to speculate, to talk about the implications of a ship that could travel to Pluto in six seconds. He tried to explain that wasn’t really what happened, that the device folded space, that the ship passed through the folds. But, of course, nobody could visualize that, so the reporters made faces and asked whether he couldn’t explain it in plain English, and he had to say he couldn’t because the words don’t exist, and anyhow he couldn’t really visualize it himself. Nobody could.

“If it works, will we be going to the Cauldron?”

It was the popular term for the Mordecai Zone, the cloud cluster RVP66119.

Thought to be the source of the omegas.

If there had ever been a question whether the lethal clouds were a natural phenomenon, it had surely been answered, at least in Rudy’s mind, when the courses of hundreds of the objects had been traced back to that single narrow place near the galactic core. The Cauldron. The Devil’s Cookpot. The site from which countless omegas were dispatched to attack civilizations wherever found.

Well, that wasn’t exactly right. They attacked geometric structures, artificial designs that incorporated right angles. But the effect was the same. There were some who thought civilizations were not deliberately targeted. That they just happened to get in the way. Hutch was among those who subscribed to that notion. But if indeed it was sheer indifference, that somehow suggested even a deeper level of evil at work.

The Cauldron was symbolic of an ultimate malice, a demonic manufacturing plant, a factory that poured forth unimaginable destruction down the ages. And across the light-years. Those who maintained it was a conscious diabolical force, and they were many, seemed even to Rudy to have at least half of the truth.

The project had been led by Edmund Mordecai, and the area had been named for him. The Mordecai Zone. But most people knew it only as the Cauldron.

We knew precisely where it was, fifty-seven light-years out from the core, a pinpoint in orbit around the massive black hole at the center of the galaxy. But it was shrouded by vast clouds of dust and hydrogen, so no one had ever seen it.

Rudy had known the question was coming. “We’re taking this one step at a time,” he said. “Let’s confirm that the system works first. Then we can talk about mission profiles.” He liked the sound of that. Mission profiles.

Hutch was surrounded, too. She’d been out of the business a long time now, a former pilot herself during the glory days, but they hadn’t forgotten her.

“Rudy.” Jani Kloefmann from Norway at Night. “Tell us about the AI. Are you really worried about hurting the hardware?”

“Just a precaution,” he said. “In case the test goes wrong, it would be one less thing we’d lose.”

“AIs aren’t expensive,” Jani said.

“This one is. She’s had special training.” The question was inevitable, and he’d come prepared. He opened a briefcase and removed a black box. “We asked Doris what she wanted, and she said she’d prefer to stay here and talk with the people from the media.” He raised his voice a notch. “Say hello, Doris.”

“Good morning, Jani.” She had a cool, professional voice. “And be assured, I’m quite happy to stay here and keep my feet on the ground.”

“‘Your feet?’” said Jani.

“Sorry about that, Jani. But people tend to get the point when I use metaphors.”

Rudy wasn’t worried about the Voice of Truth and its allies. He was enough of a politician to know that virtually the entire planet agreed that AIs were people.

A HALF DOZEN telescopes, four in orbit and two mounted on the station, had picked up the big cargo ship and were tracking it. Rudy wandered through the room, talking with reporters, shaking hands with the politicians, thanking the board members for their support. Through it all, it was impossible not to watch the clock.

He was surprised at how effectively Jon handled the media. He moved easily among them, telling jokes on himself, obviously enjoying being the center of attention. There was none of the exaggeration or self-importance or condescension that was so common with inexperienced people thrust into the spotlight.

He relaxed, and watched the Happy Times, barely visible now, a dull star off to one side of the moon. The minutes slipped easily away. A countdown clock ticked off the time remaining as the Locarno charged. Then, precisely on schedule, the ready lamp lit up. All systems were go.

Moments later, the star blinked out, the ship vanished from the screens. Rudy walked over and shook Jon’s hand.

If you watched a vessel making its jump with the Hazeltine system, you saw it gradually turn transparent and fade from view. The process took only a few seconds, but the transition was visible. It had not been like that on this occasion. The Happy Times had simply disappeared from sight.

Rudy inhaled twice, held his left wrist out so he could see his watch, and counted off six seconds. Then he allowed himself to look hopeful. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “if everything has gone as intended, the test vehicle has just jumped back into normal space, but it is out in Pluto’s neighborhood. It should now be starting a transmission to us. That transmission doesn’t have the benefit of Jon’s drive, so it will need about six hours to get here. It should arrive this evening at approximately 7:04. That could go a few minutes either way. There’s some imprecision in our ability to gauge exactly how far a jump will take a Locarno-equipped vessel. In any case, we’ll be back here tonight listening to the radio. I hope you’ll all join us.”