Chapter XII
SIRIUS
They landed about half an hour later, and Arcot simply went into thecottage, and slept--with the aid of a light soporific. Morey and Wadedirected the disposition of the machines, but Dr. Arcot senior reallyfinished the job. The machines would be installed in less than tenhours, for the complete plans Arcot and Morey had made, with the modernmachines for translating plans to metal and lux had made the actualconstruction quick, while the large crew of men employed required butlittle time.
When Arcot and his friends awoke, the machines were ready.
"Well, Dad, you have the plans for all the machines we have. I expect tobe back in two weeks. In the meantime you might set up a number of shipswith very heavy relux walls, walls that will stand rays for a while, andequip them with the rudimentary artificial matter machines you have, andgo ahead with the work on the calculations. Thett will land othermachines here--or on the moon. Probably they will attempt to ray thewhole Earth. They won't have concentration of ray enough to move theplanet, or to seriously chill it. But life is a different matter--it'ssensitive. It is quite apt to let go even under a mild ray. I think thata few exceedingly powerful ray screen stations might be set up, and theHeavyside Layer used to transmit the vibrations entirely around theEarth. You can see the idea easily enough. If you think itworthwhile--or better, if you can convince the thickheaded politiciansof the Interplanatary Defense Commission that it is--
"Beyond that, I'll see you in about two weeks," Arcot turned, andentered the ship.
"I'll line up for Sirius and let go." Arcot turned the ship now, forEarth was well behind, and lined it on Sirius, bright in the utter blackof space. He pushed his control to "1/2," and the space closed in aboutthem. Arcot held it there while the chronometer moved through six and ahalf seconds. Sirius was at a distance almost planetary in its magnitudefrom them. Controlling directly now, he brought the ship closer, till aplanet loomed large before them--a large world, its rocky continents,its rolling oceans and jagged valleys white under the enormousenergy-flood from the gigantic star of Sirius, twenty-six times morebrilliant than the sun they had left.
"But, Arcot, hadn't you better take it easy?" Wade asked. "They mighttake us for enemies--which wouldn't be so good."
"I suppose it would be wise to go slowly. I had planned, as a matter offact, on looking up a Thessian ship, taking a chance on a fight, andproving our friendship," replied Arcot.
Morey saw Arcot's logic--then suddenly burst into laughter."Absolutely--attack a Thessian. But since we don't see any around now,we'll have to make one!"
Wade was completely mystified, and gave Morey a doubtful, sarcasticlook. "Sounds like a good idea, only I wonder if this constant terrificmental strain--"
"Come along and find out!" Arcot threw the ship into artificial spacefor safety, holding it motionless. The planet, invisible to them,retreated from their motionless ship.
In the artificial matter control room, Arcot set to work, and developeda very considerable string of forms on his board, the equations of theirformations requiring all the available formation controls.
"Now," said Arcot at last, "you stay here, Morey, and when I give thesignal, create the thing back of the nearest range of hills, raise it,and send it toward us."
At once they returned to normal space, and darted down toward the nowdistant planet. They landed again near another city, one which wassituated close to a range of mountains ideally suited to their purposes.They settled, while Zezdon Afthen sent out the message of friendship. Hefinally succeeded in getting some reaction, a sensation of scepticism,of distrust--but of interest. They needed friends, and only hoped thatthese were friends. Arcot pushed a little signal button, and Morey beganhis share of the play. From behind a low hill a slim, pointed formemerged, a beautifully streamlined ship, the lines obviously those of aThessian, the windows streaming light, while the visible ionizationabout the hull proclaimed its molecular ray screen. Instantly ZezdonAfthen, who had carefully refrained from learning the full nature oftheir plans, felt the intense emotion of the discovery, called out tothe others, while his thoughts were flashed to the Sirians below.
From the attacking ship, a body shot with tremendous speed, it flashedby, barely missing the _Ancient Mariner_, and buried itself in thehillside beyond. With a terrific explosion it burst, throwing the soilabout in a tremendous crater. The _Ancient Mariner_ spun about, turnedtoward the other ship, and let loose a tremendous bombardment ofmolecular and cosmic rays. A great flame of ionized air was the onlyresult. A new ray reached out from the other ship, a fan-like spreadingray. It struck the _Ancient Mariner_, and did not harm it, though thehillside behind was suddenly withered and blackened, then smoking as thetemperature rose.
Another projectile was launched from the attacking ship, and explodedterrifically but a few hundred feet from the _Ancient Mariner_. Theterrestrial ship rocked and swayed, and even the distant attacker rockedunder the explosion.
A projectile, glowing white, leaped from the Earthship. It darted towardthe enemy ship, seemed to barely touch it, then burst into terrificflames that spread, eating the whole ship, spreading glowing flame. Inan instant the blazing ship slumped, started to fall, then seeminglyevaporated, and before it touched the ground, was completely gone.
The relief in Zezdon Afthen's mind was genuine, and it was easilyobvious to the Sirians that the winning ship was friendly, for, with allits frightful armament, it had downed a ship obviously of Thett. Thoughnot exactly like the others, it had the all too familiar lines.
"They welcome us now," said Zezdon Afthen's mental message to hiscompanions.
"Tell them we'll be there--with bells on or thoughts to that effect,"grinned Arcot. Morey had appeared in the doorway, smiling broadly.
"How was the show?" he asked.
"Terrible--Why didn't you let it fall, and break open?"
"What would happen to the wreckage as we moved?" he asked sarcastically."I thought it was a darned good demonstration."
"It was convincing," laughed Arcot. "They want us now!"
The great ship circled down, landing gently just outside of the city.Almost at once one of the slim, long Sirian ships shot up from acourtyard of the city, racing out and toward the _Ancient Mariner_.Scarcely a moment later half a hundred other ships from all over thecity were on the way. Sirians seemed quite humanly curious.
"We'll have to be careful here. We have to use altitude suits, as theNegrians breathe an atmosphere of hydrogen instead of oxygen," explainedArcot rapidly to the Ortolian and the Talsonian who were to accompanyhim. "We will all want to go, and so, although this suit will bedecidedly uncomfortable for you and Zezdon Afthen and Stel Felso Theu, Ithink it wise that you all wear it. It will be much more convincing tothe Sirians if we show that people of no less than three worlds arealready interested in this alliance."
A considerable number of Sirian ships had landed about them, and thetall, slim men of the 100,000,000-year-old race were watching them withtheir great brown eyes from a slight distance, for a cordon of men withevident authority were holding them back.
"Who are you, friends?" asked a single man who stood within the cordon.His strongly built frame, a great high brow and broad head designatedhim a leader at a glance.
Despite the vast change the light of Sirius had wrought, Arcotrecognized in him the original photographs he had seen from the planetold Sol had captured as Negra had swept past. So it was he who answeredthe thought-question.
"I am of the third planet of the sun your people sought as a home a fewyears back in time, Taj Lamor. Because you did not understand us, andbecause we did not understand you, we fought. We found the records ofyour race on the planet our sun captured, and we know now what you mostwanted. Had we been able to communicate with you then, as we can now,our people would never have fought.
"At last you have reached that sun you so needed, thanks, no doubt, tothe genius that was with you.
"But now, in your new-found peace comes a new enemy, one who w
ants notonly yours, but every sun in this galaxy.
"You have tried your ray of death, the anti-catalyst? And it butsputters harmlessly on their screens? You have been swept by theirterrible rays that fuse mountains, then hurl them into space? Our worldand the world of each of these men is similarly menaced.
"See, here is Zezdon Afthen, from Ortol, far on the other side of thegalaxy, and here is Stel Felso Theu, of Talso. Their worlds, as well asyours and mine have been attacked by this menace from a distant galaxy,from Thett, of the sun Ansteck, of the galaxy Venone.
"Now we must form an alliance of far wider scope than ever has existedbefore.
"To you we have come, for your race is older by far than any race of ouralliance. Your science has advanced far higher. What weapons have youdiscovered among those ancient documents, Taj Lamor? We have one weaponthat you no doubt need; a screen, which will stop the rays of themolecule director apparatus. What have you to offer us?"
"We need your help badly," was the reply. "We have been able to keepthem from landing on our planets, but it has cost us much. They havelanded on a planet we brought with us when we left the black star, butit is not inhabited. From this as a base they have made attacks on us.We tried throwing the planet into Sirius. They merely left the planethurriedly as it fell toward the star, and broke free from our attractiveray."
"The attractive ray! Then you have uncovered that secret?" asked Arcoteagerly.
Taj Lamor had some of his men bring an attractive ray projector to theship. The apparatus turned out to be nearly a thousand tons in weight,and some twenty feet long, ten feet wide and approximately twelve feethigh. It was impossible to load the huge machine into the _AncientMariner_, so an examination was conducted on the spot, with instrumentswhose reading was intelligible to the terrestrians operating it. Itsprincipal fault lay in the fact that, despite the enormous energy ofmatter given out, the machine still gobbled up such titanic amounts ofenergy before the attraction could be established, that a very largemachine was needed. The ray, so long as maintained, used no more powerthan was actually expended in moving the planet or other body. The powerused while the ray was in action corresponded to the work done, but atremendous power was needed to establish it, and this power could neverbe recovered.
Further, no reaction was produced in the machine, no matter what body itwas turned upon. In swinging a planet then, a spaceship could be used asthe base for the reaction was not exerted on the machine.
From such meager clues, and the instruments, Arcot got the hints thatled him to the solution of the problem, for the documents, from whichTaj Lamor had gotten his information, had been disastrously wiped out,when one of their cities fell, and Taj Lamor had but copied the machinesof his ancestors.
The immense value of these machines was evident, for they would permitArcot to do many things that would have been impossible without them.The explanation as he gave it to Stel Felso Theu, foretold the uses towhich it might be put.
"As a weapon," he pointed out, "its most serious fault is that it takesa considerable time to pump in the power needed. It has here,practically the same fault which the artificial matter had on yourworld.
"As I see it, the ray is actually a directed gravitational field.
"Now here is one thing that makes it more interesting, and more useful.It seems to defy the laws of mechanics. It acts, but there is noapparent reaction! A small ship can swing a world! Remember, the fieldthat generates the attraction is an integral, interwoven part of themesh of Space. It is created by something outside of itself. Like theartificial matter, it exists there, and there alone. There is reactionon that attractive field, but it is created in Space at that givenpoint, and the reaction is taken by all Space. No wonder it won't move.
"The work considerations are fairly obvious. The field is built up. Thattakes energy. The beam is focused on a body, the body falls nearer, andimmediately absorbs the energy in acquiring a velocity. The machinereplenishes the energy, because it is set to maintain a certainenergy-level in the field. Therefore the machine must do the work ofmoving the ship, just as though it were a driving apparatus. After thebeam has done what is wanted, it may be shut off, and the energy in thefield is now available for any work needed. It may be drained back intopower coils such as ours for instance, or one might just spend that lastiota of power on the job.
"As a driving device it might be set to pull the entire ship along, andstill not have any acceleration detectable to the occupants.
"I think we'll use that on our big ship," he finished, his eyes far awayon some future idea.
"Natural gravity of natural matter is, luckily, not selective. It goesin all directions. But this artificial gravity is controlled so that itdoes not spread, and the result is that the mass-attraction of a mass ofmatter does not fall off as the inverse square of the distance, but likethe ray from the parallel beam spotlight, continues undiminished.
"Actually, they create an exceedingly intense, exceedingly smallgravitational field, and direct it in a straight line. The building upof this field is what takes time."
Zezdon Afthen, who had a question which was troubling him, lookedanxiously at his friends. Finally he broke into their thoughts which hadbeen too cryptically abbreviated for him to follow, like the work of aprofessor solving some problem, his steps taken so swiftly and soabbreviated that their following was impossible to his students.
"But how is it that the machine is not moved when exerting such force onsome other body?" he asked at last.
"Oh, the ray concentrates the gravitational force, and projects it. Theactual strain is in space. It is space that takes the strain, but innormal cases, unless the masses are very large, no considerableacceleration is produced over any great distance. That law operates inthe case of the pulled body; it pulls the gravitational field as anormal field, the inverse-square law applying.
"But on the other hand, the gravity-beam pulls with a constant force.
"It might be likened to the light-pressure effects of a spotlight and astar. The spotlight would push the sun with a force that was constant;no matter what the distance, while the light pressure of the sun wouldvary as the inverse square of the distance.
"But remember, it is not a body that pulls another body, but agravitational field that pulls another. The field is in space. A normalfield is necessarily attached to the matter that it represents, or thatrepresents it as you prefer, but this artificial field has no connectionin the form of matter. It is a product of a machine, and exists only asa strain in space. To move it you must move all space, since it, likeartificial matter, exists only where it is created in space.
"Do you see now why the law of action and reaction is apparentlyflouted? Actually the reaction is taken up by space."
Arcot rose, and stretched. Morey and Wade had been looking at him, andnow they asked when he intended leaving for the intergalactic spaces.
"Now, I think. We have a lot of work to do. At present we have themathematics of the artificial matter to carry on, and the math of theartificial gravity to develop. We gave the Sirians all we had onartificial matter and on moleculars.
"They gave us all they had--which wasn't much beyond the artificialgravity, and a lot of work. At any rate, let's go!"
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