95:, meets secretly with Vice Admiral Sergei Lermontov. Five years earlier, Ramsey's son and wife Barbara Jean disappeared in space on a passenger liner using a new Alderson point. Several ships were sent to investigate, but they too vanished. Recently, Grand Senator Grant, Barbara Jean's father, had disappeared. He was on a frigate, captained by his nephew, that used the point from which ships never returned. Lermontov needs to find Grant, whose political support could prevent severe cuts in the navy's budget.
102:. Due to restrictions, research on black holes has not been conducted, and few people are experts on the subject. Alderson jumps work by jumping to the closest star. If an undetected black hole were between two stars, a ship would arrive near the black hole instead. The missing ships could have been trapped by the black hole's gravity.
109:, with Ward aboard, travels to the black hole and finds several of the missing ships. Many of the crews and passengers of the ships are alive, including the Grants and Ramsey's family. Barbara Jean married Commander James Harriman, who has led the survivors for five years.
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and the survivors to jump out of the system. However, the plan requires a spaceship to go into the black hole. Harriman volunteers and successfully pilots one of the crippled ships into the black hole. The theory works, and the survivors escape to the nearest star.
64:, who jointly control Earth and an interstellar empire. To keep their rule over the world, the CoDominium routinely suppresses all scientific research and development. Scientists are censored, spied upon, and can even be deported off Earth.
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79:, these jumps are limited so a ship can only jump from an Alderson Point, a certain location in space. Ships can only travel from and to these points.
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The short story is set in the late 21st century. In
Pournelle's fictional milieu, this is the era of the CoDominium. The CD is an alliance between the
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The story tells of a CoDominium spaceship sent on a search and rescue mission. However, the mission becomes complicated due to a natural phenomenon.
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75:. Stars generate this force, and a pathway for instantaneous travel can be created between stars. However, like many science fiction
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However, no one knows why ships keep on disappearing. An illegal physicist named Marie Ward provides an explanation: a
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future alternative history, it was originally published in the magazine
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The story title is a reference to a variant of the nursery song "
71:. The Drive allows ships to jump to star systems thanks to a
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Works originally published in Analog
Science Fiction and Fact
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Lermontov and the Grants make other appearances in the
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books, playing important roles throughout the series.
41:issue of March 1973. The story was reprinted in
67:Interstellar travel is possible thanks to the
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112:Ward develops a theory that could allow the
91:, Bartholomew Ramsey, captain of the CDSS
45:, edited by Pournelle and John F. Carr.
194:Fiction about faster-than-light travel
159:Internet Speculative Fiction Database
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43:Warrior: There will be War, Volume V
204:Fiction set on Ceres (dwarf planet)
62:Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
16:1973 short story by Jerry Pournelle
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136:The Bear went over the Mountain
38:Analog Science Fiction and Fact
27:short story by American writer
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199:Fiction about black holes
154:He Fell into a Dark Hole
58:United States of America
21:He Fell into a Dark Hole
157:title listing at the
128:Falkenberg's Legion
184:1973 short stories
189:Fictional empires
174:CoDominium series
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121:Continuity
100:black hole
52:Background
33:CoDominium
60:and the
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89:Ceres
105:The
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