"His Brother's Weeper"

by Robert Silverberg

Form: Novelette

Year: 1959

ID: 440

Publication history:

• 1959: Fantastic Universe March 1959, Magazine
• 1966: Needle in a Timestack [1st Version], Ballantine Mass market paperback, 190 pp.
• 1967: Needle in a Timestack [1st Version], Sphere Mass market paperback, 190 pp.
• 1970: Needle in a Timestack [1st Version], Ballantine Mass market paperback, 1970 pp.
• 1979: Needle in a Timestack [2nd Version], Sphere Mass market paperback, 149 pp.
• 1985: Needle in a Timestack [2nd Version], Ace Mass market paperback, ISBN 0-441-56872-6, 180 pp.

Comments:

Peter Martlett travels to the distant colony on Marathon to settle his deceased brother's affairs. But among the loose ends left after the accident are two fiancees. Interstellar travel in this story involves one of the goofiest schemes I've ever encountered. You go to a Deserialization facility, where they prepare you for your journey by removing you temporarily from contact with your temporal axis and—for convenience of storage—somewhat compressing you along the three spatial axes. Then they put you into a little box and ship you to your destination, which may take hundreds of years objective time. Then you are Reserialized, restoring you to full size and on your temporal axis at a point only seconds after you left... In essence, faster than light travel is accomplished by a combination of slower than light ships and time travel.

Other resources:

[None on record]