Authors: E. E. 'Doc' Smith
Seaton stared into number one visiplate, manipulating levers and dials as he drove the
Skylark
hither and yon, dodging frantically while the automatic focusing devices remained centered upon the enemy and the enormous generators continued to pour forth their deadly frequencies. The bars glowed more fiercely as they were advanced to full working load – the stranger was one blaze of incandescent ionization, but she still fought on; and Seaton noticed that the pyrometers recording the temperature of the shell were mounting rapidly, in spite of the refrigerators.
‘Dunark, put everything you’ve got onto one spot – right on the end of his – nose!’
As the first shell struck the mark Seaton concentrated every force at his command upon the designated point. The air in the
Skylark
crackled and hissed and intense violet flames leaped from the bars as they were driven almost to the point of disruption. From the forward end of the strange craft there erupted prominence after prominence of searing, unbearable flame as the terrific charges of explosive copper struck the mark and exploded, liberating instantaneously their millions of millions of kilowatt-hours of energy. Each prominence enveloped all three of the fighting vessels and extended for hundreds of miles out into space – but still the enemy warship continued to hurl forth solid and vibratory destruction.
A brilliant orange light flared upon the panel, and Seaton gasped as he swung his visiplate upon his defenses, which he had
supposed impregnable. His outer screen was already down, although its mighty copper generator was exerting its utmost power. Black areas had already appeared and were spreading rapidly where there should have been only incandescent radiance; and the inner screen was even now radiating far into the ultra-violet and was certainly doomed. Knowing as he did the stupendous power driving those screens, he knew that there were superhuman and inconceivable forces being directed against them, and his right hand flashed to the switch controlling the zone of force. Fast as he was, much happened in the mere moment that passed before his flying hand could close the switch. In the last infinitesimal instant of time before the zone closed in, a gaping hole appeared in the incandescence of the inner screen, and a small portion of a bar of energy so stupendous as to be palpable struck, like a tangible projectile, the exposed flank of the
Skylark
. Instantly the refractory arenak turned an intense, dazzling white and more than a foot of the forty-eight-inch skin of the vessel melted away like snow before an oxy-acetylene flame, melting and flying away in molten globules and sparkling gases – the refrigerating coils lining the hull were useless against the concentrated energy of that titanic thrust. As Seaton shut off his power intense darkness and utter silence closed in, and he snapped on the lights.
‘They take one trick!’ he blazed, his eyes almost emitting sparks, and leaped for the generators. He had forgotten the effects of the zone of force, however, and only sprawled grotesquely in the air until he floated within reach of a line.
‘Hold everything, Dick!’ Crane snapped, as Seaton bent over one of the bars. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘I’m going to put as many heavy bars in these generators as they’ll stand and go out and get that bird. We can’t lick him with Osnomian beams or with our explosive copper, but I can carve that sausage into slices with a zone of force, and I’m going to do it.’
‘Steady, old man – take it easy. I see your point, but remember that you must release the zone of force before you can use it as a weapon. Furthermore, you must discover his exact location, and must get close enough to him to use the zone as a weapon, all without its protection. Can those screens be made sufficiently powerful to withstand the beam they employed last, even for a second?’
‘Hm … in … m. Never thought of that, Mart,’ Seaton replied, the fire dying out of his eyes. ‘Wonder how long the battle lasted?’
‘Eight and two-tenths seconds, from first to last, but they had had that heavy ray in action only a fraction of one second when you cut in the zone of force. Either they underestimated our strength at first, or else it required about eight seconds to tune in their heavy generators – probably the former.’
‘But we’ve got to do something, man! We can’t just sit here and twiddle our thumbs!’
‘Why, and why not? That course seems eminently wise and
proper. In fact, at the present time, thumb-twiddling seems to me to be distinctly indicated.’
‘Oh, you’re full of little red ants! We can’t do a thing with that zone on – and you say just sit here. Suppose they know all about that zone of force? Suppose they can crack it? Suppose they ram us?’
‘I shall take up your objections in order,’ Crane had lighted a cigarette and was smoking meditatively. ‘First, they may or may not know about it. At present, that point is immaterial. Second, whether or not they know about it, it is almost a certainty that they cannot crack it. It has been up for more than three minutes, and they undoubtedly concentrated everything possible upon us during that time. It is still standing. I really expected it to go down in the first few seconds, but now that it has held this long it will, in all probability, continue to hold indefinitely. Third, they most certainly will not ram us, for several reasons. They probably have encountered few, if any, foreign vessels able to stand against them for a minute, and will act accordingly. Then, too, it is probably safe to assume that their vessel is damaged, to some slight extent at least; for I do not believe that any possible armament could withstand the forces we directed against them and escape entirely unscathed. Finally, if they ram us, what would happen? Would we feel the shock? That barrier in the ether seems impervious, and if so, it could not transmit a blow. I do not see exactly how it would affect the ship dealing the blow. You are the one who works out the new problems in unexplored mathematics – some time you must take a few months off and work it out.’
‘Yeah, it’d take that long, too, I guess – but you’re right, he can’t hurt us. That’s using the brain, Mart! I was going off half-cocked again, damn it! I’ll pipe down, and we’ll go into a huddle.’
Seaton noticed that Dorothy’s face was white and that she was fighting for self-control. Drawing himself over to her, he picked her up in a tight embrace.
‘Cheer up, Red-Top! This man’s war ain’t started yet!’
‘Not started? What do you mean? Haven’t you and Martin just been admitting to each other that you can’t do anything? Doesn’t that mean that we are beaten?’
‘Beaten! Us? How do you get that way? Not on your sweet young life!’ he ejaculated, and the surprise on his face was so manifest that she recovered instantly. ‘We’ve just dug a hole and pulled the hole in after us, that’s all! When we get everything
doped
out to suit us we’ll snap out of it and that bird’ll think he’s been petting a wildcat!’
‘Mart, you’re the thinking end of this partnership,’ he continued thoughtfully. ‘You’ve got the analytical mind and the judicial disposition, and can think circles around me. From what little you’ve seen of those folks tell me who, what, and where they are. I’m getting the germ of an idea, and maybe
we can make it work.’
‘I will try it.’ Crane paused. ‘They are, of course, neither from the Earth nor from Osnome. It is also evident that they are familiar with atomic energy. Their vessels are not propelled as ours are – they have so perfected that force that it acts upon every particle of the structure and its contents …’
‘How do you figure that?’ blurted Seaton.
‘Because of the acceleration they can stand. Nothing even semi-human, and probably nothing living, could endure it otherwise. Right?’
‘Yeah – I never thought of that.’
‘Furthermore, they are far from home, for if they were from anywhere nearby, the Osnomians would probably have known of them – particularly since it is evident from the size of the vessel that space travel is not a recent development with them, as it is with us. Since the green system is close to the center of the galaxy, it seems reasonable, as a working hypothesis, to assume that they are from some system far from the center, perhaps close to the outer edge. They are very evidently of a high degree of intelligence. They are also highly treacherous and merciless …’
‘Why?’ asked Dorothy, who was listening eagerly.
‘I deduce those characteristics from their unprovoked attack upon peaceful ships, vastly smaller and supposedly of inferior armament; and also from the nature of that attack. This vessel is probably a scout or an exploring ship, since it is apparently alone. It is not altogether beyond the bounds of reason to imagine it upon a voyage of discovery, in search of new planets to be subjugated and colonized …’
‘That’s a sweet picture of our future neighbors – but I guess you’re hitting the nail on the head, at that.’
‘If these deductions are anywhere nearly correct they are terrible neighbors. For my next point, are we justified in assuming that they do or do not know about the zone of force?’ That’s a hard one. Knowing what they evidently do know, it’s hard to see how they could have missed it. And yet, if they had known about it for a long time, wouldn’t they be able to get through it? Of course it may be a real and total barrier in the ether – in that case they’d know that they couldn’t do a thing as long as we keep it on. Take your choice, but I believe that they know about it, and know more than we do – that it is a total barrier set up in the ether.’
‘I agree with you, and we shall proceed upon that assumption. They know, then, that neither they nor we can do anything as long as we maintain the zone – that it is a stalemate. They also know that it takes an enormous amount of power to keep the zone in place. Now we have gone as far as we can go upon the meager data we have – considerably farther than we really are justified in going. We must now try to come to some conclusion concerning their present activities. If our ideas as to their natures
are even approximately correct they are waiting, probably fairly close at hand, until we shall be compelled to release the zone, no matter how long that period of waiting shall be. They know, of course, from our small size, that we cannot carry enough copper to maintain it indefinitely, as they could. Does that sound reasonable?’
‘I check you to nineteen decimal places, Mart, and from your ideas I’m getting surer and surer that we can pull their corks. I can get into action in a hurry when I have to, and my idea now is to wait until they relax a trifle, and then slip a fast one over on them. One more bubble out of the old think-tank and I’ll let you off for the day. At what time will their vigilance be at lowest ebb? That’s a poser, I’ll admit, but the answer to it may answer everything – the first shot will, of course, be the best chance we’ll ever have.’
‘Yes, we should succeed in the first, attempt. We have very little information to guide us in answering that question.’ He studied the problem for many minutes before he resumed. ‘I should say that for a time they would keep all their rays and other weapons in action against the zone of force, expecting us to release it immediately. Then, knowing that they were wasting power uselessly, they would cease attacking, but would be very watchful, with every eye fastened upon us and with every weapon ready for instant use. After this period of vigilance regular ship’s routine would be resumed. Half the force, probably, would go off duty – for, if they are even remotely like any organic beings with which we are familiar, they require sleep or its equivalent at intervals. The men on duty – the normal force, that is – would be doubly careful for a time. Then habit will assert itself, if we have done nothing to create suspicion, and their watchfulness will relax to the point of ordinary careful observation. Toward the end of their watch, because of the strain of the battle and because of the unusually long period of duty, they will become careless, and their vigilance will be considerably below normal. But the exact time of all these things depends entirely upon their conception of time, concerning which we have no information whatever. Though it is purely a speculation, based upon Earthly and Osnomian experience, should say that after about twelve or thirteen hours would come the time for us to make the attack.’
‘That’s good enough for me. Fine, Mart, and thanks. You’ve probably saved the lives of the party. We will now sleep for eleven or twelve hours.’
‘Sleep, Dick! How could you?’ Dorothy exclaimed.
The next twelve hours dragged with terrible slowness. Sleep
was impossible and eating was difficult, even though all knew that they would have need of the full measure of their strength. Seaton set up various combinations of switching devices connected to electrical timers, and spent hours trying, with all his marvelous quickness of muscular control, to cut shorter and ever shorter the time between the opening and the closing of the switch. At last he arranged a powerful electro-magnetic device so that one impulse would both open and close the switch, with an open period of one thousandth of a second. Only then was he satisfied.
‘A thousandth is enough to give us a look around, due to persistence of vision; and it is short enough so that they won’t see it unless they have a recording observer on us. Even if they still have beams on us they can’t possibly neutralize our screens in that short an exposure. All right, gang? We’ll take five visiplates and cover the sphere. If any of you get a glimpse of him, mark the exact spot and outline on the glass. All set?’
He pressed the button. The stars flashed in the black void for an instant, then were again shut out.
‘Here he is, Dick!’ shrieked Margaret. ‘Right here – he covered almost half the visiplate!’
She outlined for him, as nearly as she could, the exact position of the object she had seen, and he calculated rapidly.
‘Fine business!’ he exulted. ‘He’s within half a mile of us, three-quarters on – perfect! I thought he’d be so far away that I’d have to take photographs to locate him. He hasn’t a single beam on us, either. That bird’s goose is cooked right now, folks, unless every man on watch has his hand right on the controls of a generator and can get into action in less than a quarter of a second! Hang on, people – I’m going to step on the gas!’