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Back The Skies of Pern
Chapters (64)
  1. Other titles by Anne McCaffreyPublished by Ballantine Books:
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Dedication
  5. Contents
  6. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  7. INTRODUCTION
  8. PROLOGUE
  9. At a Gather—6.15.30
  10. Part 1
  11. Turnover at Landing—1.1.31 Present Pass Aivas—Aivas Adjusted Turn 2553
  12. Benden Weyr—1.1.31
  13. Southern Hold—1.1.31
  14. Healer Hall—1.1.31
  15. Back at Landing—1.2.31
  16. Fort Hold—late night—1.1.31
  17. Fort Hold Runner Station—1.2.31
  18. Keroon Printer Hall—1.3.31
  19. Benden Weyr—midday—1.3.31
  20. Monaco Bay Weyr—five days later—1.8.31
  21. Part 2
  22. Ruatha Hold—local time 12:04 in the morning—1.9.31
  23. Telgar Weyr—local time 4:04 in the morning—1.9.31
  24. Benden Weyr—local time 6:04 in the morning—1.9.31
  25. Harper Hall—local time 1:00 in the morning—1.9.31
  26. Landing—local time 10:12 mid-morning—1.9.31
  27. In the Conference Room at Landing—1.9.31
  28. Monaco Weyr—10:22 in the morning—Timing it
  29. In the Conference Room at Landing—local time 1:10–1.9.31
  30. Sunrise Cliff Seahold—timed-back
  31. In the Conference Room—local time 2:12 at Landing—1.9.31
  32. Back at Landing—local time—3:40
  33. Harper Hall—5:00 in the morning, and Southern Hold—2:00 in the morning–1.9.31
  34. Landing—late afternoon—1.9.31
  35. Same time at Keroon Printer Hall—local time 11:15—1.9.31
  36. Later, on an unusually bright evening at Landing, Sunrise Cliff, and Honshu Hold—1.9.31
  37. Part 3
  38. Honshu—1.10.31
  39. Circle Runner Station—1.18.31
  40. Harper Hall
  41. Benden Weyr—
  42. Benini Hold—east Monaco and Honshu—1.20.31
  43. Harper Hall—1.28.31
  44. Honshu Hold—2.1.31
  45. Fort Hold—2.13.31
  46. Printer Hall at Wide Bay—same night
  47. Honshu Hold—2.9.31
  48. Night at Wide Bay—2.9.31
  49. Ruatha Hold—late evening—2.9.31
  50. Core Hold—two days before Council Meeting—2.26.31
  51. Part 4
  52. Honshu Weyrhold—2.26–27.31
  53. Council Meeting at Telgar Hold—3.1.31
  54. Honshu Weyrhold—3.01.31
  55. Interim at Benden and elsewhere
  56. Honshu Weyrhold—time passing slowly
  57. Landing—3.21.31
  58. Honshu Weyrhold—3.21.31
  59. Southern Hold—3.23.31
  60. Honshu Weyrhold—3.27.31
  61. Benden Weyr—3.27.31
  62. Cove Hold—same day, same approximate time
  63. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  64. What’s next onyour reading list?

A new message imposed itself prominently: 120 seconds to perigee—105 seconds to impact.

The monitor altered abruptly, darkening, and F’lessan saw the line on the sidebar that indicated Yoko was displaying a constructed image, made up of the optical, infrared, microwave, and other print capabilities that Erragon had once tried to describe to F’lessan. The nucleus of the comet looked suddenly darker but the reduction of the glare relieved his eyes. Ominously the message now read 60 seconds to atmosphere.

Another read 20 seconds to impact, Angle 12° : magnitude of dust trail –9.

People splayed fingers in front of their eyes. The glare-reduced optical version saved them from the splintering whiteness that erupted, which the monitor hastily continued to reduce. A screen flicked to a new image—identified as “synthetic radar”—as Yoko attempted to see through the clouds.

Twenty seconds couldn’t have elapsed, F’lessan thought and then realized that Yoko was slightly behind in its reporting. Where had it impacted? The island chain or the sea?

No one spoke. All seemed to be holding their breath. The silence was broken by printers churning out reams of hard copy that fell unnoticed into baskets or spilled to the floor. As the comet was spilling its substance onto the sea? Flaming molten debris down on the nearest Ring islands?

Even the image on the screen seemed to recoil from the incredible brightness. Squinting through his fingers, F’lessan saw the radar image showing the surface topography—and a series of rings on the ocean. Waves traveled outward from the impact point, immediately followed by a much higher fountain of water as the sea fell back into the impact crater. Then he had the distinct impression of a wall moving out with astonishing speed and saw a column of red-brown steam spreading down to the sea, with black bits whirling up and out, and then vast billows rushing out from it across the sea.

Still the silence in the Interface office was broken only by machines doing what they were programmed to do: disgorge columns of figures. The human observers struggled to absorb what they had just seen, were still witnessing as retinal afterimages: the creation of a storm of staggering proportions, blossoming up and outward. Steam, gas vapor, and whatever the head of the fireball had been composed of were part of the storm. The fireball had extinguished itself and then hit the sea, F’lessan repeated, making his mind believe what his eyes had seen: it made a hole that made a wave, which fell back, and sent up a fountain of water. Abruptly the data on the screen changed.

Impactor Summary

Probable cometary origin

Impact velocity 58.51km/sec

Dimensions 597 times 361 times 452 meter ellipsoid

Volume 51 million cubic meters

Average Density 0.33 (+ –0.11)

Total Mass 17 million tons

Derived Impact Energy 29.7 Exajoules

Explosive Equivalent 7.4 gigatons

15° northern latitude, 12° east longitude.

“It came down in the sea!” Stinar’s sigh of relief held a triumphant note.