Chapter X
IMPROVEMENTS AND CALCULATIONS
"It is still incredible. But you have done it. It is certainlysuccessful!" said the Talsonian scientist with conviction.
Arcot shook his head. "Far from it--we have not realized a thousandthpart of the tremendous possibilities of this invention. We must work andcalculate and then invent.
"Think of the possibilities as a shield--naturally if we can make thematter we should be able to control its properties in any way we like.We should be able to make it opaque, transparent, or any color." Arcotwas speaking to Morey now. "Do you remember, when we were caught in thatcosmic ray field in space when we first left this universe, that I saidthat I had an idea for energy so vast that it would be impossible todescribe its awful power?[1] I mentioned that I would attempt toliberate it if ever there was need? The need exists. I want to find thatsecret."
[Footnote 1: Islands of Space.]
Stel Felso Theu was looking out through the window at a group of menexcitedly beckoning. He called the attention of the others to them, andhimself went out. Arcot and Wade joined him in a moment.
"They tell me that Fellsheh, well to the poleward of here has used fourof its eight shots. They are still being attacked," explained theTalsonian gravely.
"Well, get in," snapped Arcot as he ran back to the ship. Stel Felsohastily followed, and the _Ancient Mariner_ shot into the air, anddarted away, poleward, to the Talsonian's directions. The ground fledbehind them at a speed that made the scientist grip the hand-rail with atenseness that showed his nervousness.
As they approached, a tremendous concussion and a great gout of light inthe sky informed them of the early demise of several Thessians. But areal fleet was clustered about the city. Arcot approached low, and wasable to get quite close before detection. His ray screen was up andMorey had charged the artificial matter apparatus, small as it was, foroperation. He created a ball of substance outside the _Ancient Mariner_,and thrust it toward the nearest Thessian, just as a molecular hit the_Ancient Mariner'_s ray screen.
The artificial matter instantly exploded with terrific violence,slightly denting the tremendously strong lux metal walls. The pressureof the light was so great that the inner relux walls were dented inward.The ground below was suddenly, instantaneously fused.
"Lord--they won't pass a ray screen, obviously," Morey muttered, pickinghimself from where he had fallen.
"Hey--easy there. You blinked off the ray screen, and our relux isseriously weakened," called Arcot, a note of worry in his voice.
"No artificial matter with the ray screen up. I'll use the magnet,"called Morey.
He quickly shut off the apparatus, and went to the huge magnet control.The power room was crowded, and now that the battle was raging in truth,with three ships attacking simultaneously, even the enormous powercapacity of the ship's generators was not sufficient, and the storagecoils had been thrown into the operation. Morey looked at theinstruments a moment. They were all up to capacity, save the ammeterfrom the coils. That wasn't registering yet. Suddenly it flicked, andthe other instrument dropped to zero. They were in artificial space.
"Come here, will you, Morey," called Arcot. In a moment Morey joined hismuch worried friend.
"That artificial matter control won't work through ray screens. TheThessians never had to protect against moleculars here, and didn't havethem up--hence the destruction wrought. We can't take our screen down,and we can't use our most deadly weapon with it up. If we had a bigoutfit, we might throw a screen around the whole ship, and sail rightin. But we haven't.
"We can't stand ten seconds against that fleet. I'm going to find theirbase, and make them yell for help." Arcot snapped a tiny switch onenotch further for the barest instant, then snapped it back. They wereseveral millions miles from the planet. "Quicker," he explained, "tosimply follow those ships back home--go back in time."
With the telectroscope, he took views at various distances, thus quicklytracing them back to their base at the pole of the planet. InstantlyArcot shot down, reaching the pole in less than a second, by carefullymaneuvering of the space device.
A gigantic dome of polished relux rose from rocky, icy plains. The thingwas nearly half a mile high, a mighty rounded roof that covered an areaalmost three-quarters of a mile in diameter. Titanic--that was the onlyword that described it. About it there was the peculiar shimmer of amolecular ray screen.
Morey darted to the power room and set his apparatus into operation. Hecreated a ball of matter outside the ship and hurled it instantly at thefort. It exploded with a terrific concussion as it hit the wall of theray screen. Almost instantly a second one followed. The concussion wasterrifically violent, the ground about was fused, and the ray screen wasopened for a moment. Arcot threw all his moleculars on the screen, asMorey sent bomb after bomb at it. The coils supplied the energy, crackedthe rock beneath. Each energy release disrupted the ray-screen for amoment, and the concentrated fury of the molecular beams poured throughthe opened screen, and struck the relux behind. It glowed opalescent nowin a spot twenty feet across. But the relux was tremendously thick.Thirty bombs Morey hurled, while they held their position withoutdifficulty, pouring their bombs and rays at the fort.
Arcot threw the ship into space, moved, and reappeared suddenly nearlythree hundred yards further on. A snap of the eyes, and he saw that thefleet was approaching now. He went again into space, and retreated.Discretion was the better part of valor. But his plan had worked.
He waited half an hour, and returned. From a distance the telectroscopetold him that one lone ship was patrolling outside the fort. He movedtoward it, creeping up behind the icy mountains. His magnetic beamreached out. The ship lurched and fell. The magnetic beam reached outtoward the fort, from which a molecular ray had flashed already, tearingup the icy waste which had concealed him. The ray-screen stopped it,while again Morey turned the magnetic beam on--this time against thefort. The ray remained on! Arcot retreated hastily.
"They found the secret, all right. No use, Morey, come on up," calledthe pilot. "They evidently put magnetic shielding around the apparatus.That means the magnetic beam is no good to us any more. They willcertainly warn every other base, and have them install similarprotection."
"Why didn't you try the magnetic ray on our first attack?" asked ZezdonAfthen.
"If it had worked, their sending apparatus would have been destroyed,and no message could have been sent to call their attackers offFellsheh. By forcing them to recall their fleet I got results I couldn'tget by attacking the fleet," Arcot said.
"I think there is little more I can do here, Stel Felso Theu. I willtake you to Shesto, and there make final arrangements till my return,with apparatus capable of overthrowing your enemies. If you wish toaccompany me--you may." He glanced around at the others of his party."And our next move will be to return to Earth with what we have. Then wewill investigate the Sirian planets, and learn anything they may have ofinterest, thence--to the real outer space, the utter void ofintergalactic space, and an attempt to learn the secret of that enormouspower."
They returned to Shesto, and there Arcot arranged that the onlygenerator they could spare, the one already in their possession, mightbe used till other terrestrian ships could bring more. They left forEarth. Hour after hour they fled through the void, till at last old Solwas growing swiftly ahead of them, and finally Earth itself was large onthe screens. They changed to a straight molecular drive, and dropped tothe Vermont field from which they had taken off.
During the long voyage, Morey and Arcot had both spent much of the timeworking on the time-distortion field, which would give them a tremendouscontrol over time, either speeding or slowing their time rateenormously. At last, this finished, they had worked on the artificialmatter theory, to the point where they could control the shape of thematter perfectly, though as yet they could not control its exact nature.The possibility of such control was, however, definitely proven by theresults the machines had given them. Arcot had been more immediate
lyinterested in the control of form. He could control the nature as toopacity or transparency to all vibrations that normal matter is opaqueor transparent to. Light would pass, or not as he chose, but cosmics hecould not stop nor would radio or moleculars be stopped by any presentshield he could make.
They had signaled, as soon as they slowed outside the atmosphere, andwhen they settled to the field, Arcot's father and a number of veryimportant scientists had already arrived.
Arcot senior greeted his son very warmly, but he was tremendouslyworried, as his son soon saw.
"What's happened, Dad--won't they believe your statements?"
"They doubted when I went to Luna for a session with the InterplanetaryCouncil, but before they could say much, they had plenty of proof of mystatements," the older man answered. "News came that a fleet ofPlanetary Guard ships had been wiped out by a fleet of ships from outerspace. They were huge things--nearly half a mile in length. The Guardships went up to them--fifty of them--and tried to signal for aconference. The white ship was instantly wiped out--we don't know how.They didn't have ray screens, but that wasn't it. Whatever itwas--slightly luminous ray in space--it simply released the energy ofthe lux metal and relux of the ship. Being composed of light energysimply bound by photonic attraction, it let go with terrible energy.They can do it almost instantly from a distance. The other Guards atonce let loose with all their moleculars and cosmics. The enemy shuntedoff the moleculars, and wiped out the Guard almost instantly.
"Of course, I could explain the screen, but not the detonation ray. I aminclined to believe from other casualties that the destruction, thoughreported as an instantaneous explosion, was not that. Other ships havebeen destroyed, and they seemed to catch fire, and burn, but withterrific speed, more like gun powder than coal. It seems to start aspreading decomposition, the ship lasts perhaps ten minutes. If it wentinstantly, the shock of such a tremendous energy release would disruptthe planet.
"At any rate, the great fleet separated, twelve went to the North Poleof Earth, twelve to the south, and similarly twelve to each pole ofVenus. Then one of them turned, and went back to wherever it had comefrom, to report. Just turned and vanished. Similarly one from Venusturned and vanished. That leaves twelve at each of the four poles, for,as I said, there were an even fifty.
"They all followed the same tactics on landing, so I'll simply tell whathappened in Attica. In the North they had to pick one of the islands abit to the south of the pole. They melted about a hundred square milesof ice to find one.
"The ships arranged themselves in a circle around the place, andliterally hundreds of men poured out of each and fell to work. In ashort time, they had set up a number of machines, the parts coming fromthe ships. These machines at once set to work, and they built up a reluxwall. That wall was at least six feet thick; the floor was lined withthick relux as well as the roof, which is simply a continuation of thewall in a perfect dome. They had so many machines working on it, thatwithin twenty-four hours they had it finished.
"We attacked twice, once in practically our entire force, with someray-shield machines. The result was disastrous. The second attack wasmade with ray shielded machines only, and little damage was done toeither side, though the enemy were somewhat impeded by masses of icehurled into their position. Their relux disintegration ray wasconspicuous by its absence.
"Yesterday--and it seems a lot longer than that, son--they started itagain. They'd been unloading it from the ship evidently. We had hadray-shielded machines out, but they simply melted. They went down, andEarth retreated. They're in their fortress now. We don't know how tofight them. Now, for God's sake, tell us you have learned of someweapon, son!"
The older man's face was lined. His iron gray head showed his fatiguedue to hours of concentration on his work.
"Some," replied Arcot briefly. He glanced around. Other men had arrived,men whom he met in his work. But there were Venerians here, too, intheir protective suits, insulated against the cold of Earth, and againstits atmosphere.
"First, though, gentlemen, allow me to introduce Stel Felso Theu of theplanet Talso, one of our allies in this struggle, and Zezdon Afthen andFentes of Ortol, one of our other allies.
"As to progress, I can say only that it is in a more or less rudimentarystage. We have the basis for great progress, a weapon of inestimablevalue--but it is only the basis. It must be worked out. I am leavingwith you today the completed calculations and equations of the timefield, the system used by the Thessian invaders in propelling theirships at a speed greater than that of light. Also, the uncompletedcalculations in regard to another matter, a weapon which our ally,Talso, has given us, in exchange for the aid we gave in allowing themthe use of one of our generators. Unfortunately the ship could not sparemore than the single generator. I strongly advise rushing a number ofgenerators to Talso in intergalactic freighters. They badly needpower--power of respectable dimensions.
"I have stopped on Earth only temporarily, and I want to leave as soonas possible. I intend, however, to attempt an attack on the Arctic baseof the Thessians, in strong hopes that they have not armored against oneweapon that the _Ancient Mariner_ carries--though I sadly fear that oldEarth herself has played us false here. I hope to use the magnetic beam,but Earth's polar magnetism may have forced them to armor, and they mayhave sufficiently heavy material to block the effects."
Morey already had a ground crew servicing the ship. He gave designs tomachinists on hand to make special control panels for the largeartificial matter machines. Arcot and Wade got some badly neededequipment.
In six hours, Arcot had announced himself ready, and a squadron ofPlanetary Guard ships were ready to accompany the refitted _AncientMariner_.
They approached the pole cautiously, and were rewarded by the hiss androar of ice melting into water which burst into steam under a ray. Itwas coming from an outpost of the camp, a tiny dome under a great massof ice. But the dome was of relux. A molecular reached down from a Guardship--and the Guard ship crumbled suddenly as dozens of moleculars fromthe points hit it.
"They know how to fight this kind of a war. That's their biggestadvantage," muttered Arcot. Wade merely swore.
"Ray screens, no moleculars!" snapped Arcot into the transmitter. He wasnot their leader, but they saw his wisdom, and the squadron commanderrepeated the advice as an order. In the meantime, another ship hadfallen. The dome had its screen up, allowing the multitudes of hiddenstations outside to fight for it.
"Hmm--something to remember when terrestrians have to retire to forts.They will, too, before this war is over. That way the main fort doesn'thave to lower its ray screen to fight," commented Arcot. He was watchingintensely as a tiny ship swung away from one of the larger machines, anda tremendously powerful molecular started biting at the fort's rayscreen. The ship seemed nothing but a flying ray projector, which waswhat it was.
As they had hoped, the deadly new ray stabbed out from somewhere on theside of the fort. It was not within the fort.
"Which means," pointed out Morey, "that they can't make stuff to standthat. Probably the projector would be vulnerable."
But a barrage of heat rays which immediately followed had no apparenteffect. The little radio-controlled molecular beam projector lay on therock under the melted ice, blazing incandescent with the rapidlyreleased energy of the relux.
"Now to try the real test we came here for," Morey clambered back to thepower room, and turned on the controls of the magnetic beam. The shipwas aligned, and then he threw the last switch. The great mass of themachine jerked violently, and plunged forward as the beam attracted themagnetic core of the Earth.
Morey could not see it, but almost instantly the shimmer of themolecular screen on the fort died out. The deadly ray sprang out fromthe Thessian projector--and went dead. Frantically the Thessians triedweapon after weapon, and found them dead almost as soon as they wereturned on--which was the natural result in the terrific magnetic field.
And these men had iron bones, their very bones were attracted
by thebeam; they plunged upward toward the ship as the beam touched them, but,accustomed to the enormous gravitation accelerations of an enormousworld, most of them were not killed.
"Ah--!" exclaimed Arcot. He picked up the transmitter and spoke again tothe Squadron Commander. "Squadron Commander Tharnton, what reluxthickness does your ship carry?"
"Inch and a quarter," replied the surprised voice of the commander.
"Any of the other ships carry heavier?"
"Yes, the special solar investigator carries five inches. What shall wedo?"
"Tell him to lower his screen, and let loose at once on all operatingforts. His relux will stand for the time needed to shut them down fortheir own screens, unless some genius decides to fight it out. As soonas the other ships can lower their screens, tell them to do so, and tellthem to join in. I'll be able to help then. My relux has been burned,and I'm afraid to lower the screen. It's mighty thin already."
The squadron commander was smiling joyously as he relayed the advice asa command.
Almost at once a single ship, blunt, an almost perfect cylinder, loweredits screen. In an instant the opalescence of the transformation showedon it, but its dozen ray projectors were at work. Fort after fort glowedopalescent, then flashed into protective ionization of screening.Quickly other ships lowered their screens, and joined in. In a momentmore, the forts had been forced to raise their screens for protection.
A disc of artificial matter ten feet across suddenly appeared beside the_Ancient Mariner_. It advanced with terrific speed, struck the greatdome of the fort, and the dome caved, bent in, bent still more--butwould not puncture. The disc retreated, became a sharp cone, and drovein again. This time the point smashed through the relux, and made asmall hole. The cone seemed to change gradually, melting into a cylinderof twenty foot diameter, and the hole simply expanded. It continued toexpand as the cylinder became a huge disc, a hundred feet across, set inthe wall.
Suddenly it simply dissolved. There was a terrific roar, and a mightycolumn of white rushed out of the gaping hole. Figures of Thessianscaught by the terrific current came rocketing out. The inside was atlast visible. The terrific pressure was hurling the outside line ofships about like thistledown. The _Ancient Mariner_ reeled back underthe tremendous blast of expanding gas. The snow that fell to the boilingwater below was not water, _in toto_; some was carbon dioxide--and someoxygen chilled in the expansion of the gas. It was snowing within thedome. The falling forms of Thessians were robbed of the life-giving airpressure to which they were accustomed. But all this was visible for butan instant.
Then a small, thin sheet of artificial matter formed beside the fort,and advanced on the dome. Like a knife cutting open an orange, it simplywent around the dome's edge, the great dome lifted like the lid of ateapot under the enormous gas pressure remaining--then dropped under itsown weight.
The artificial matter was again a huge disc. It settled over the exactcenter of the dome--and went down. The dome caved in. It was crushedunder a load utterly inestimable. Then the great disc, like somemonstrous tamper, tamped the entire works of the Thessians into thebed-rock of the island. Every ship, every miniature fort, every man wascaught under it--and annihilated.
The disc dissolved. A terrific barrage of heat beams played over theisland, and the rock melted, flowed over the ruins, and left only thespumes of steam from the Arctic ice rising from a red-hot: mass of rock,contained a boiling pool.
The Battle of the Arctic was done.
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