Enterprise Stardust

by Karl H Scheer

  He concluded with a shrug of his shoulders, his face drawn in pain. Rhodan looked at him questioningly from behind a masklike smile.

  Bell’s magnetic soles clamped onto the foil beneath their feet. Swaying from side to side, he was struggling to regain his balance. As long as the engines of the Stardust were silent, they were still in zero gravity. It was fascinating to watch him walk, or try to walk. With each step, he would lift his boots up with great difficulty and then let them fall heavily onto the floor. Without a word, Bell plodded heavily across the cabin to Dr. Manoli.

  After a quick check of Manoli’s pulse, he was nodding with relief.

  “He’s okay,” he said briefly. “His pulse is right back again, regular as clockwork.” Moving to Fletcher, he said, “Show me your tongue, Fletch. Go on, open your mouth.” Glistening, livid droplets of blood rolled out. Rhodan had seen enough. This was a matter for Dr. Manoli.

  The commander turned the volume regulator toward the right, and confused noises on the radio finally became clear again. Meanwhile, Dr. Manoli had revived.

  Rhodan heard the low hiss of the hydropneumatic valves. Manoli’s couch changed into a chair. In a moment, he was standing beside Fletcher.

  The men lost time in vain debate. Manoli knew that the commander was only awaiting his professional opinion.

  “It could have been worse,” came his diagnosis. “Luckily, you didn’t bite it through completely. I’ll need ten minutes. Twelve would be better. Is that possible, Perry?”

  “Fair enough. Reg, take the latest values from computer central and transfer them onto magnetic tape. I want a controlled calculation. We’ll postpone everything for twelve minutes. When you’re finished, let me know the result. We should be able to compensate for the loss with about four seconds of full thrust.”

  Some seconds later, Rhodan’s face appeared on the ground station’s giant video screens. Pounder, waiting nervous and restless by the microphone, breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Stardust to Nevada Fields,” Rhodan’s voice rang out loud and strong and completely clear. “Captain Fletcher has sustained slight injury—bit his tongue. Manoli is stopping the bleeding. The wound can be healed quickly with plasma concentrate, if you can permit us a twelve minute delay. Over.”

  Pounder rose to his full height. A glance toward Professor Lehmann said everything that needed saying under the circumstances. The scientist nodded briefly in reply. It was possible. One always made allowance for such eventualities here at Nevada Fields.

  The electronic brain began to work. The corrections were available instants later. These were automatically transmitted to the Stardust by way of special relay transmitters.

  The diagram lit up in front of Reginald Bell. The smaller but highly efficient computers aboard the Stardust itself acknowledged receipt of the signal. A multitude of most carefully calculated previous figures was simultaneously discarded. New data raced into space in the guise of UHF radio impulses. In a moment, a grand plan was overthrown and replaced by entirely new measures.

  Bell’s fingertips tapped the data into the keyboard. Rhodan gave the usual routine report on altitude, radiation, temperature, cabin pressure and the health of his team.

  Manoli had need of only eleven minutes, By then, Fletcher was perfectly all right again. His lacerated tongue had been carefully and almost invisibly mended.

  Fletcher looked around awkwardly, his eyes full of naive embarrassment.

  “This time, try your thumb, chum,” said Rhodan, with a trace of a grin. “It can stand a lot more than your tongue.”

  Their seats tilted back again. Shortly afterward, they heard the roar of that machine whose function they still regarded with mixed emotions. They listened with an amalgam of instinctive fear, expectations of high esteem and a curiosity that gnawed at their nerves.

  It was, of course, the nuclear chemical power plant, which had performed so admirably during the operation of the second stage.

  Once again, there came the rumble and the jolt. This time, however, the G’s increased to only 2.1, causing neither Rhodan nor the others any particular discomfort. On fiery jets of gaseous hydrogen, the Stardust plunged into the vacuum of the universe.

  But now that the initial difficulties of a space launch had been overcome, the real challenges of manned spaceflight became apparent and would have to be mastered.

  Rhodan was lulled by the nuclear powered engine’s roar, which had now become an even hum. The void close below the cylindrical stem of the ship held an ice blue incandescence. There, liquid oxygen, heated by atomic power, burst forth with tremendous pressure in the combustion chamber.

  The radioactive elements in the reactor would last for at least a year, but the liquid hydrogen and oxygen had to be handled with greater economy. Their supply was limited. Once the tanks were empty and there was nothing more to be released, even the most efficient power plant was condemned to total impotence.

  Breathing heavily, Rhodan lay resting on his contour couch. While he submitted his short reports to the control center on Earth at carefully timed intervals, he thought fleetingly of the nuclear reactor, so wonderful and yet still so primitive.

  For now, they would still require the intervention of the atomic pile, in order to achieve the necessary thrust. But if they should one day possess a pure nuclear reactor, a mighty engine permitting velocities close to the speed of light...!

  Rhodan moved his lips with effort. He felt like laughing bitterly. Reginald Bell also seemed to occupy himself with similar thoughts. In a moment, he whispered heavily to Rhodan, “Heroes in fiction have it so much easier. They don’t have our problems with sudden acceleration, and they never bite their own tongues! Fletch, how are you? Do you feel all right? It’ll be only a few more minutes. For about five seconds, we may go up as high as 8.4 G’s. Okay?”

  “Okay,” grunted the giant, by way of the intercom system. His breath could be heard rattling in their close headsets. “Everything A-okay. Good lord, we’re on our way! Up, up and away with four men. One of these days I’ll be telling my son all about it. Listening to me, his eyes will be as round and shiny as polished marbles.”

  Fletcher was exhausted. A rugged body and a lot of practice were needed if one wished to speak clearly under the force of two G’s. These men could do it. Only Dr. Manoli ignored the opportunity. Instead, he gave an indication of his emotions with a meek smile.

  Yes, they were on their way. The blast-off was practically behind them now. The cruel but unavoidable stresses were almost over and done with. What still remained was more a matter for reason and instant reflex. They watched Earth recede into the background. Earth, that swollen blue green globe with all its vast array of oceans, continents, and cloud shrouded mountains, not to mention its billions of human inhabitants.

  They could easily experience feelings of godly exaltation and a lofty detachment from Earthbound existence.

  Rhodan alone, his mind ever wary, did not participate in this chaos of sensations. No one saw the sceptical cast to his gray eyes. They were not there yet. Not yet had they landed, and not yet had they begun the voyage home. This enterprise was not just some relatively innocuous circumnavigation of the moon. No, here they were to face an incredibly difficult lunar landing. They were destined to be the first men ever to set foot on the moon.

  CHAPTER THREE

  This time even Perry Rhodan had, been cautious. The counterthrust applied throughout the braking manoeuvre had momentarily increased G pressures to an unnerving degree. The Stardust had fallen into orbit around the moon with a speed of approximately two miles per second. Only then had he given the order to put on spacesuits.

  The men had carried out his instructions without comment. While the Stardust was being drawn into ever-narrowing orbits around Luna, in obedience to the space station’s computerized remote control guidance system, they bad donned the ultramodern protective suits. These garments were relatively light and yet quite monstrous looking, being fully pressurized and hermetica
lly sealed, each with its own power pack, air conditioning, oxygen supply, and so on. The transparent helmets were even bulletproof, made from an artificial alloy as hard as steel.

  Next Rhodan had insisted that they close their helmets. Only the valves on either side remained open, so that the men could still breathe the usual air of the cabin. The built-in aerostat would automatically seal the valves in an instant, should pressure drop below normal.

  Thus had Rhodan done all he could to reduce to a minimum the chances of an accident.

  The Stardust was flying with stern forward, permitting the jets to bring their thrust against the direction of flight. The trajectory of orbit was from pole to pole; consequently, when the ship sank beyond the line of sight in its path across the other side of the moon, it disappeared from within range of remote control, since radio signals from the ground stations on Earth could no longer reach the Stardust. Once the ship was within the shadow of the moon, therefore, the autopilot on board the rocket assumed control of their flight, which would lead, after a fifth ellipse, to a landing on the lunar surface.

  The braking process continued as the fifth orbit began. On the visible face of Earth’s only satellite, the sun had risen on one of the long lunar days. Six percent of the opposite hemisphere already lay in deepest darkness.

  Only on the radar screen could a clear picture of the torn surface be obtained. The dark side of the moon was in all ways indistinguishable from the familiar bright side, but this had long been known. The moon held no more mystery in that respect.

  Once again they emerged from the cone of darkness in the wake of the moon. Their altitude was approximately fifty-five miles, their velocity reduced by brief braking counterthrusts to a speed of 1.4 miles per second.

  The autopilot announced with a shrill whistle that the powerful directional beam from the space station had locked onto the ship again, and the central computers aboard the Stardust received new instructions in the form of the latest calculations.

  The rocket was visible on the screen as a green dot floating along one of the prescribed lines representing the landing orbit. The end of this line was close to the lunar south pole, just beyond the Newcomb crater. A red circle indicated the landing site, a flat, apparently rock strewn surface that offered the safest place to set down the rocket.

  The crew could hear the voice of the project chief as clearly as they heard the autopilot registering the guidance impulses. There were short intervals between the reports, for ultrawaves, though travelling at the speed of light, still needed some time to span the tremendous distance.

  Still flying at relatively high speed, the Stardust arrived above the western “shore” of the Mare Nubium. Immediately ahead, the big Walter crater appeared. It was not very far from the landing site.

  “Ground control, General Pounder speaking.” The voice came over the loudspeaker amid the crackling of static. “You will reach the turning point in seventy-two seconds. We will time the impulse taking into consideration the distance the radio waves will have to cover. We’re switching off, in the meantime, in order to avoid any disturbances. We have you clear on our radar screens. Reception is very good; hardly any interference. Primary remote control autopilot starting operations. We’ll set you down safely. Begin release of your landing supports. Contact me immediately upon landing. Until you touch down on the moon, we wish you all the luck.”

  Rhodan pulled a lever. The four telescoping landing supports of the Stardust thrust out, moving away from the ship’s hull at an angle of forty-five degrees. The hydraulic system extended the long tubular structures farther and farther outward. At the outermost end of each, there unfolded a flat contact disk with a surface area of four square yards.

  When the critical point in orbit had been reached, the Stardust was still on the flight line. They had compensated for even the smallest deviations in course.

  “Everything ready?” Bell’s voice sounded strained. “Contact. Forward.” He could hear the heavy breathing of the other men. Almost everything hinged on this moment when their future hung in the balance.

  Suddenly, without prior warning, a sound shrieked out of the autopilot monitor. The impulse had arrived, punctual to a split second.

  The engines roared in a brief but violent counterthrust that decreased the remaining speed of the ship by another fifty percent, and subjected the men to a force of twelve G’s.

  When this had passed, an interval for the correction of previous calculations took place. Lungs heaving, they began to breathe again. At the next braking thrust would come the sixty degree rotation in orbit. Then the retro rockets would have to be positioned exactly perpendicular to the lunar surface.

  Following these operations, the ship would hover above the point of landing and descend on its own exhaust with a speed of twelve feet per second.

  Lighting quick, the various data raced through Rhodan’s head. All had sounded so simple, so infallible. But now that he lay in this fragile structure, his mind seized the problems and perils with utmost piercing clarity.

  The Stardust began its descent in a flat parabola. When the gravitational pull of the moon had grown strongly apparent, it was high time for the turnabout manoeuvre, when the jets from the combustion chamber would have to be turned from their horizontal position and aimed at the ground.

  “Three seconds to go,” called Bell in a choked voice. “Two … one … contact!”

  Contact followed. With it came such an incredible screeching and howling that it seemed as though a 1,000 kilowatt broadcast station were standing beside the rocket, beaming its full energy directly at them.

  The sounds broke out of the control loudspeakers in a veritable flood. Deafening noise and ultrasonic whistling assaulted the ears of the startled men. For a fraction of a second, Reginald Bell looked totally devoid of sensibility, his broad face contorted in a grimace full of pain and panic.

  Rhodan had stopped short, completely immobile. When he had overcome his initial surprise, however, he reacted with astonishing swiftness. His right hand slammed down on the emergency lever. Magnetic straps closed shut to imprison the men in their seats.

  No one could avoid hearing the shrill warning signal from the autopilot. The Stardust’s electronic brain reported the disturbance. Flickering lamps gave proof that the impulse they had expected for the turnabout manoeuvre had not got through to them from the ground station. Even though the computer was denied the power of independent judgment, it had stated, with instantaneous reckoning, that this was cause for utmost alarm.

  The diagrams were already lit up, having appeared automatically and without error. Reg glanced at them.

  “Deviation!” he shouted, with a stampede of feelings. “No ignition impulse. We’re falling beyond the landing site. Interference is preventing reception of the remote control signals! Where are these things coming from? They’re only on our frequency. Perry!”

  Rhodan abandoned any lengthy reflection. The surface of the moon, brightly illuminated by the rising sun, sped toward them. He did whatever a commander could, in such an instance.

  With breathtaking speed, in an automatic reflex he switched off the main circuit built into the arm rest. The Stardust was thus beyond the range of the Earthbound remote control system.

  An infernal caterwaul of the control instruments was cut off instantly, as if it had never existed.

  A bell began to ring, and then a voice boomed through the cabin. It was the autopilot, speaking with a soulless voice prerecorded on tape.

  “Central computer directing autopilot landing. Calculations are in progress. Completion. Landing initiated. Emergency signal QQRXQ has been sent with maximum intensity, via channel sixteen. Landing proceeding.”

  This was the message some technician had recorded on tape before the blast-off. He had neglected to mention that these cheerful plans for landing starkly ignored all safety measures.

  Bringing the helpless ship down at all costs, regardless of consequences, was nothing short of an act of des
peration. An impromptu resumption of the flight at this stage was impossible. The ground was already too near, the velocity of fall had increased to more than 1.2 miles per second and the necessary rotation would take too long. It was an emergency. It made no difference whether, under the flame fountains of the Stardust’s exhaust, there lay the charity of a flat plain or the cruel promise of a crater with its razor-edged eggshell jaws.

  The engine howled. The rocket was violently whipped about by the realigned steering jets and brought abruptly into a vertical position. It fell with its face heavenward, its sharp nose pointed now into the dark and star-laden sky.

  Whining gyros took over the stabilizing manoeuvres. Someone shouted; no one knew who.

  Rhodan no longer gave commands or issued instructions. It would have been senseless. There was nothing anyone could do for the necessary calculations and manipulations could be executed only by the computers. In such circumstances, a human brain was condemned to failure.

  The men’s eyes were fixed on the video screens. The exterior observation cameras disclosed the jagged walls of a crater. They were blinded by the most intense white heat below them, wherein was concentrated all the force and fury of the rocket’s thrust.

  Bell shouted something in the nature of a helpless croak. With the pressure of 18 G’s, it was remarkable that he could still squeeze anything out of his throat.

  Next they heard a roar and muffled explosions. Another jolt pressed them back into their couches. Several fittings broke loose with a loud clatter as the hull seemed to split in two. There followed, immediately afterward, a period of rattling and vibration. Yet before these ceased entirely, there suddenly came utter calm. A green lamp grew bright above Perry Rhodan. It no longer flickered but shone steadily.

  The absolute silence was torn by shrill, hysterical laughter.

  “Captain Fletcher!”

  Rhodan’s voice, though not loud, was as sharp as a knife. The cackling broke off with a piercing and unpleasant whine.