Jeff Sutton (2 page)

Sleep
didn't come easy. At Gotch's orders he had turned in early, at the unheard hour
of seven. Getting to sleep was another matter. It's strange, he thought, he
didn't have any of the feelings Doc Weldon, the psychiatrist, had warned him of.
He wasn't nervous, wasn't afraid. Yet before another sun had set he'd be
driving the Aztec up from earth, into the loneliness of space, to a bleak
crater named Arzachel. He would face the dangers of intense cosmic radiation,
chance meteor swarms, and human errors in calculation which could spell
disaster. It would be the first step in the world race for control of the Solar
System—a crucial race with the small nations of the world watching for the
winner. Watching and waiting to see which way to lean.

He was already cut off from mankind,
imprisoned in a small room with the momentous zero
hour
drawing steadily nearer. Strange, he thought, there had been a time when his
career had seemed ended, washed up, finished, the magic of the stratosphere
behind him for good. Sure, he'd resigned from the Air Force at his own free
will, even if his C. O. had made the pointed suggestion.
Because
he hadn't blindly followed orders.
Because he'd
believed in making his own decisions when the chips were down.
"Lack of
esprit
de corps,"
his
C. O. had termed it.

He'd
been surprised that night—it was .over a year ago now—that Colonel Gotch had
contacted him.
(Just when he was wondering where he might get
a job.
He hadn't liked the prosaic prospects of pushing passengers
around the country in some jet job.) Sure, he'd jumped at the offer. But the
question had never left his mind.
Why
had Gotch selected him?
The Aztec, a silver needle plunging through
space followed by her drones, all in his tender care.
He was planning the step-by-step procedure
of take-off when sleep came.

CHAPTER 2

Crag woke
with a start, sensing he was not alone. The
sound came again—a key being fitted into a lock. He started from bed as the
door swung open.

"Easy.
It's me—Gotch." Crag relaxed. A square solid figure took form.

"Don't turn on the
light."

"Okay. What
gives?"

"One moment."
Gotch turned back toward the door and
beckoned. Another figure glided into the room—a shadow in the dim light Crag
caught the glint of a uniform. Air Force officer, he thought

Gotch said crisply;
"Out of bed."

He
climbed out, standing alongside the bed in his shorts, wondering at the
Colonel's cloak-and-dagger approach.

"Okay, Major, it's
your turn," Gotch said.

The
newcomer—Crag saw he was a major—methodically stripped down to' his shorts and
got into bed without a word. Crag grinned, wondering how the Major liked his
part in Step One. It was scarcely a lead role.

Gotch
cut into his thoughts. "Get dressed." He indicated the Major's
uniform. Crag donned the garments silendy. When he had finished the Colonel
walked around him in the dark, studying him from all angles.

"Seems
to fit very well," he said finally. "All right, let's go"

Crag
followed him from the room wondering what the unknown Major must be thinking.
He wanted to ask about his double but refrained. Long ago he had learned there
was
a time to talk, and a time to keep quiet. This was the
quiet time. At the outer door four soldiers sprang from the darkness and boxed
them in. A chauffeur jumped from a waiting car and opened the rear door. At the
last moment Crag stepped aside and made a mock bow.

"After
you, Colonel."
His voice held a touch of sarcasm.

Gotch
grunted and climbed into the rear seat and he followed. The chauffeur blinked
his lights' twice before starting the engine. Somewhere ahead a car pulled
away from the curb. They followed, leaving the four soldiers behind. Crag
twisted his body and looked curiously out the rear window. Another car
dogged,
their wake. Precautions, always precautions-, he
thought. Gotch had entered with an Air Force officer and had ostensibly left
with one; ergo, it must be the same officer. He chuckled, thujking he had more
doubles than a movie star.

They
sped through the night with the escorts fore and aft. Cotch was a silent
hulking form on the seat, beside him. It's his zero hour, too, Crag thought.
The Colonel had tossed the dice. Now he was waiting for their fall, with his
career in the pot. After a while Cotch said conversationally:

"You'll
report in at Albrook, Major. I imagine you'll be getting in a bit of flying
from here on out."

Talking
for the chauffeur's benefit, Crag thought. Good Lord, did every move have to be
cloak and dagger? Aloud he said:

"Be good to get back in the air again.
Perhaps anti-sub patrol, eh?"
"Very
likely."

They
fell silent again. The car slammed west on Highway 80, leaving the silver
rocket farther behind with every mile. Where to and what next? He gave up
trying to figure the Colonel's strategy. One thing he was sure of. The
hard-faced man next to him knew exactly what he was doing. If it was secret
agent stuff, then that's the way it had to be played.

He
leaned back and thought of the task ahead—the rocket he had lived with for over
a year. Now the marriage would be consummated. Every detail of the Aztec was
vivid in his mind. Like the three great motors tucked triangularly between her
tail fins, each a tank equipped with a flaring nozzle to feed in hot gases
under pressure. He pictured the fuel tanks just forward of the engines; the way
the fuels were mixed, vaporized, forced into the fireports where they would
ignite and react explosively, generating the enormous volumes of flaming hot
gas to drive out through the jet tubes and provide the tremendous thrust needed
to boost her into the skies. Between the engines and fuel tanks was a maze of
machinery—fuel lines, speed controllers, electric motors.

He let his mind rove over the rocket thinking
that before many hours had passed he would need every morsel of the knowledge
he had so carefully gathered. Midway where the hull tapered was a joint, the
separation point between the first and second stages. The second stage had one
engine fed by two tanks. The exterior of the second stage was smooth, finless,
for it was designed to operate at the fringe of space where the air molecules
were widely spaced; but it could be steered by small deflectors mounted in its
blast stream.

The
third stage was little more than a space cabin riding between the tapered nose
cone and a single relatively low-thrust engine. Between the engine and tanks
was a maze of turbines, pumps, meters, motors, wires. A generator provided
electricity for the ship's electric and electronic equipment; this in turn was
spun by a turbine driven by the explosive decomposition of hydrogen peroxide.
Forward of this was the Brain, a complex guidance mechanism which monitored
engine performance, kept track of speed, computed course. All that was needed
was the human hand.
His hand.

They
traveled several hours with only occasional words, purring across the flat
sandy wastes at a steady seventy. The cars boxing them in kept at a steady
distance.

Crag
watched the yellow headlights sweep across the sage lining the highway, giving
an odd illusion of movement. Light and shadow danced in eerie patterns. The
chauffeur turned onto a two-lane road heading north. Alpine Base, Crag thought
He had been stationed there several years before. Now it was reputed to be.the
launch site of one of the three drones slated to cross the gulfs of space. The
chauffeur drove past a housing area and turned in the direction he knew the
strip to be.

Somewhere
in the darkness ahead a drone brooded on its pad, one of the children of the
silver missile they'd left behind.
But why the drone?
The question bothered him. They were stopped several times in the next half
mile. Each time

Cotch
gave his name and rank and extended his credentials. Each time they were waved
on by silent sharp-eyed sentries, but only after an exacting scrutiny Crag was
groping for answers when the chauffeur pulled to one side, of the road and
stopped. He leaped out and opened the rear door, standing silently to one
side. When they emerged, he got back into the car and drove away. No word had
been spoken. Figures moved toward them, coming out of the blackness.

"Stand
where you are and be recognized." The figures took shape—soldiers with
leveled rifles. They stood very still until one wearing a captain's bars
approached, flashing a light in their faces.

"Identity?"

Crag's companion extended
his credentials.

"Colonel Michael Gotch," he monotoned.
The Captain turned the light on Cotch's face
to compare it with the picture on the identification card. He paid scant
attention to Crag. Finally he looked up.

"
Proceed
, Sir." It was evident the Colonel's guest was
very much expected.

Cotch
struck off through the darkness with Crag at his heels. The stars shone with
icy brillance. Overhead
An
tares stared down from its
lair in Scorpio, blinking with fearful venom. The smell of sage filled the air,
and some sweet elusive odor Crag couldn't identify.
A warmth
stole upward as the furnace of the desert gave up its
'Stored
heat. He strained his eyes into the darkness;
stars, the black desert and the hulking form of Gotch, moving with certain

steps
.

He
saw the rocket with startling suddenness—a great black silhouette blotting out
a segment of the stars. It stood gigantic, towering,
graceful
,
a taper-nosed monster crouched to spring, its finned haunches squatted against
the launch pad.

They
were stopped, challenged, allowed to proceed. Crag pondered the reason far
their visit to the drone. Gotch, he knew, had a good reason for every move he
made. They drew nearer and he saw that most of the catwalks, guardrails and
metal supports had been removed—a certain sign that the giant before them was
near its zero hour.

Another
sentry gave challenge at the base of the behemoth. Crag whistled to himself.
This one wore the silver leaf of a lieutenant colonel! The ritual of
identification was exacting before the sentry moved aside. A ladder zigzagged
upward through what skeletal framework still remained. Crag lifted his eyes. It
terminated high up, near the nose.

This
was the Aztec! The real Aztec! The truth came in a rush. The huge silver ship
at Burning Sands, which bore the name Aztec, was merely a fake, a subterfuge, a
pawn in the complex game of agents and counter-agents. He knew he was right.

"After
you," Cotch said. He indicated the ladder and stepped aside.

Crag
started up. He paused at the third platform. The floor of the desert was a sea
of darkness. Off in the distance the lights of Alpine Base gleamed, stark
against the night. Cotch reached his level and laid a restraining hand on his
arm.

Crag
turned and waited. The Colonel's massive form was a black shadow interposed
between him and the lights of Alpine Base.

"This is the
Aztec," he said simply.

"So I guessed. And the
silver job at Burning Sands?"

"Drone
Able," Gotch explained. "The deception was necessary—a" part of
the cat and mouse game we've been playing the last couple of decades. We
couldn't take a single chance." Crag remained silent. The Colonel turned
toward the lights of the Base. He had become quiet, reflective. When he spoke,
his voice was soft, almost like a man
tallring
to himself.

"Out there are hundreds of men who have
given a large part of their lives to the dream of space flight
Now
we are at the eve of making that dream live. If we gain
the moon, we gain the planets. That's the destiny of Man. The Aztec is the
first step." He turned back and faced Crag.

"This
is but one base. There are many others. Beyond them are the factories,
laboratories, colleges, scientists and engineers, right down to Joe the
Riveter. Every one of them has had a part in the dream. You're another part,
Adam, but you happen to have the lead role." He swiveled around and looked
silently at the distant lights. The moment was solemn. A slight shiver ran through
Crag's body.