The Days of Peleg by Jon Saboe Page A

confusing collection of wheels, cogs, and ratchets. Several levels of meshing gears—each seemingly connected to at least three others—were attached to spindles which had smaller gears attached to them. Small bushings connected to the outside of the box, corresponding to the centers of the moving arrows. Thaxad closed the lid, reconnecting the crank.
    Slowly it dawned on Peleg what this contraption was. He recognized planetary symbols—rendered in Minoan, and sidereal time markers. The front was a basic lunar calendar which also indicated the phases and relative position of the sun in degrees. He saw that he could turn the crank to set them to their current date, and when he did, the arrows in back showed the relative location of the other planets—also in degrees! The tiny, internal circle showed fine-tuning in minutes.
    He began to see how he could make use of this device. It would reduce his chart reading and computation to one-sixth the time! He hefted the box in his own hands, and mentally compared the dials with his current plottings. There were no discrepancies.
    He was almost speechless. “I have heard of such things, but I assumed they only existed in Heaven’s Gate. And never this small! I didn’t expect to ever witness one, let alone use it.”
    Thaxad almost smiled and said, “Get comfortable with this. It is very reliable—I configured it myself.” He pointed inside the box, raising an eyebrow. “Differential gears.” He almost smiled again, then looked back to Peleg. “It will be accurate for at least the next seven hundred years.”
    Peleg shook his head. This would give him visual and numeric representations of all the necessary celestial objects. It was almost like cheating. Instead of comparing columns of numbers, then performing hours of calculations, all he had to do was adjust the settings of this wonderful ‘planetarium-in-a-box’.
    The great Mentor and chemist had nodded, then turned to leave. “No more complaining,” he admonished over his shoulder as he ducked to exit the room.
    As the door closed, Peleg had thought, He may have just saved our lives .
     
    Land was becoming a thing of memory. It had already been two months since they had left the last island. He had kept his new sextant (pentant?) in the sunlight as requested, assuming that expansion from the heat was important to its function. That evening, as he measured the distance between Inana , the evening star, and the horizon, he discovered the true reason for Thaxad’s admonition.
    Some of the markings and dial indicators were glowing. Apparently, they were inscribed with a special paint that collected the sunlight during the day, and then re-emitted it when it was dark. Peleg was familiar with bioluminescence. It was often used as a light source—especially for underwater exploring. It had some commercial applications, too, like in the glowing sign above BubusSunu’s back home. But this was different. These markings were made with a substance that was certainly non-biological, but could be recharged by the sun.
    Thaxad later said that it was a “composite of radium salts and phosphor” or something like that.
    He now spent his days straining his eyes for signs of anything besides water and sometimes noticed smudges of dark clouds on the northern horizon. Although most were storm clouds, he suspected that many were volcanic emissions from lands that were far beyond their mission. Such clouds occasionally blew in from the northwest back home, and the only indication of their volcanic nature was the fine particles that dusted everything left in their wake. He hoped the resulting clouds and waves would not trouble the Kibrat Erbettim .
    The last twelve days had been completely overcast, so the Urbat lumbered blindly in an easterly direction, completely at the mercy of their compass. Since no expeditions had ever traveled this far to the east, the difference between magnetic and absolute north (magnetic variation) was