Delta Pavonis by John Maddox Roberts, Eric Kotani Page B

"I won't argue with that. I'll bet most of our prison guards couldn't stand much of this." Dierdre wasn't about to ask what that meant.
    Sims began to emerge from the pool. "Hey, mind if I join . . ."
    Hannie's fist caught him squarely in the sternum, pitching him back to land in the water with a mighty splash. "This is woman talk. Space out."
    "What I'm hoping," Dierdre said, ignoring the interruption, "is that what the aliens left behind is some sort of interstellar transport system. Think of it!" She grew enthusiastic as she warmed to the subject. "Right now, with our best drive system and human life expectancy nearing the two-century mark, you can't reasonably expect to visit more than ten or fifteen systems in your lifetime. Less than that if you're going to do in-depth exploring when you get there. So much is wasted in transit time. With an instantaneous transport, we could visit dozens, maybe hundreds!"
    "Don't get your hopes up," Govinda cautioned. "Lots of people thought the Rhea Objects would give us superluminal travel, but they didn't. Superluminal commo, sure, but only for electromagnetic signals, not matter."
    "Besides," Hannie added, "we're pretty sure the aliens used ships. Sieglinde was positive the Rhea Objects were power packs for a space vessel."
    "Maybe the receiver terminal has to go ahead first, through conventional space," Dierdre hazarded.
    "Then why wasn't one ever found in Sol System?" Govinda asked.
    "We never explored much of that system," Dierdre said. "Hell, there was lots of Earth that never got explored. A facility as small as that one in there could be lost for thousands of years near a major city. Out in the other planets, the moons, the Belt, it could stay lost for millions of years." It was, she thought, a hell of a conversation for three wet people to be having while pounding laundry on flat rocks.
    "We keep talking like there's just one race of aliens," Hannie pointed out. "Maybe the ones who made the transporter aren't even connected with the ones that left the Rhea Objects behind."
    "Yeah!" Govinda said. "Wouldn't that be great? I mean, the philosophical implications get bigger all the time! Maybe the galaxy's crawling with intelligent life! If that's the case, how long before we run into it?"
    "It might already have happened," Dierdre said. "The Delta Pav expedition was just one of dozens. I'd like for us to be the first, naturally."
    "Damn!" Hannie said, resting her chin on her knuckles in the classic Le Penseur pose. "I hadn't thought of that. There's Einsteinian time-dilation complications here. When we finally get together again and compare notes, how are we going to figure out who was first to do anything? Beyond a solely local basis, I mean, like exploring this planet."
    It was, Dierdre thought, a typical explorer's worry. Pure knowledge be damned, everybody wanted to be first . "We do have superluminal commo," she said.
    "That's no good," Govinda said. "Some of the expeditions went out before it was perfected, and others refused to use it because they wanted to cut ties totally. Besides, even when you're talking to someone over SL commo, elapsed subjective time since the last communication can vary tremendously."
    "Not much sense speculating," Hannie sighed. "The big brains will be down here soon. They'll shove us aside, confer, study. Maybe in a couple of years we'll hear their tentative conclusions."
    "Sure," Dierdre said, slapping her pants against a rock. "But I like to speculate."
    By midafternoon, Forrest was ready to experiment with the transporter. "I'll go first," he said. Fumiyo, Schubert, Dierdre and Lefevre were in the transporter room. Others crowded the hall outside. "I'll stay long enough to confirm if it's the same arctic location Jamail went to, then I come right back. If I don't return, absolutely nobody follows me. From what Jamail says, it's not a dangerous environment, so a rescue attempt would be pointless. If I don't return, it'll mean I ended up