Captain Future 12 - Planets in Peril (Fall 1942)

by Edmond Hamilton

  "I am right here beside you, Lacq."

  Lacq looked wildly around. There was absolutely nobody in sight in the vast, silent amphitheater.

  "You can't see me," Curt Newton's desperate thought reached his mind. "I'm one of the Unbodied now."

  LACQ felt a freezing horror.

  "Gods, did the Council condemn you and your comrades —"

  "Yes, they imprisoned us all among the Unbodied," Curt's thought answered. "I've been nearly crazy. I 'saw' you enter this hall, but couldn't reach you telepathically, because I could not project a strong enough electrical thought-vibration to affect your mind.

  "I was hoping that you'd turn on that telep-transmitter," Curt continued. "Grag had described the instruments to me. I knew that since it was an apparatus designed to receive and amplify faint, distant telepathic messages it would amplify my own faint call so you could hear."

  "Kaffr, this is ghastly!” Lacq answered wildly. "What shall we do?"

  "You still believe I'm Kaffr?" Curt asked him.

  "Of course I do!" Lacq replied with utter faith.

  "Then you must help me and my comrades escape from the doom of the Unbodied."

  "But how?" Lacq asked bewilderedly. "I know nothing about the way in which men are made Unbodied, or returned to normal."

  "I'll try to direct you," came Curt's thought. "Pick up the telep-transmitter, first. You'll have to carry it with you, for only through it can I maintain this mental contact with you."

  Lacq shakenly picked up the compact instrument. Curt Newton gave him quick orders.

  "You must go down to the vault of the Unbodied, where our bodies and the machine that transformed us are. It is on the lowest under-level."

  Like a man moving in an unreal dream, Lacq left the silent Council Hall and went stealthily through the corridors to the stair. Following Curt's continuing directions he went down level after level of the stairs. More than once Curt gave quick mental warning of guards or other persons ahead of him.

  Finally, Lacq stood in the gloomy shadows of the lowest level. Facing him was the massive door of the vault of the Unbodied.

  "This door is locked, Kaffr," he reported dismayedly. "And I do not know the combination."

  "Neither do I, but I think I can find it out," Curt replied. "In this phantom state, I can pass through solid matter. I think I can penetrate the secret of the lock by entering and examining it."

  Lacq waited tensely. It seemed nightmarish to think that Kaffr was close beside him, as an invisible, immaterial photon-being who was able to pass into the solid matter of the lock and examine its interior.

  After what seemed a long time, Curt's mental voice reached him again through the telep-transmitter.

  "I think I've figured the combination, now. Here are the figures."

  Lacq mentally noted them down. Then he pressed the studs of the lock in that order. With a click, the massive door swung open! Lacq felt a surge of rising hope as he entered the gloomy, shadowy vault.

  He looked around in awe. Near him loomed a squat, baffling complex machine. Beyond it towered tiers of glass coffins, each of which contained a lifeless man or woman.

  The Unbodied! The bodies in those coffins were mere frozen husks from which the living mind had been expelled to roam in a new, immaterial photon-body like a homeless ghost.

  "You will find my own body in a coffin on the last tier," came Curt's direction. "Put it on the top of the machine."

  Lacq found the coffin in which the waxen-faced, lifeless figure of the red-haired planeteer lay motionless. Chilled by the uncanniness of the whole proceeding, he placed Curt's body atop the machine.

  "Now what shall I do?" he asked into the telep-transmitter. "I don't know how to operate this mechanism."

  "Neither do I," came Curt's mental answer. "I shall have to examine its design, to figure out how it can be used to draw the mind back from a photon-pattern into the brain."

  There was another wait for Lacq, much longer than before. It seemed to him that the whole attempt was hopeless. How could anyone penetrate the secret of this ancient machine? Not even the Tarasts who now used it knew its principle — they merely operated it by tradition.

  Perhaps Kaffr could solve a scientific mystery that was beyond anybody else? Lacq's faith in the greatness of his hero kept hope alive in him during that long, torturing wait.

  At last Curt Newton's thought came again to him from the telep-transmitter.

  "I believe that now I understand the operation of this machine. Put the glass helmet on the head of my body, and then reverse the two upper switches."

  Lacq obeyed. Then came the crucial order.

  "Now turn the lower rheostat handle slowly toward the left, stopping at the tenth notch."

  The young Tarast did so. As he moved the lever, the machine began to hum with power. White radiance streamed now from the copper bulb and hit Curt's head. Soon, Curt Newton's lifeless body began to stir!

  Curt opened his eyes. Then with Lacq's help he staggered off the top of the machine.

  "God, what an experience!" Captain Future said hoarsely.

  CURT was shaken as he had never been before. He only now realized the awful mental strain he had undergone during the time in which he had been one of the ghastly Unbodied.

  He steadied in a minute, and grasped Lacq's hand.

  "You have saved us, Lacq. And you've saved the one chance still left for your people."

  Lacq's eyes shone with the emotion that he felt at this high praise from Kaffr. He helped Curt transfer Otho's limp body to the machine.

  Otho leaped up with a yell when the re-transformation had been effected.

  "Devils of space, did I dream all that or was I really a phantom? Chief, I seemed to be a cursed ghost —"

  Curt hastily checked his babbling, and put him to work restoring their comrades. Grag and Simon and Gerdek and Shiri, one by one, woke to life as their disembodied electric mind-webs were drawn back out of the phantom photon-patterns into their own proper bodies.

  The horror of the experience was stamped on the faces of all the humans. But it could not erase from Captain Future's mind one paramount consideration.

  "Do you know whether Vostol has departed on his mission?" he cried to Lacq.

  "I do not know what mission to which you refer," Lacq answered puzzledly. "But I saw Vostol leave hours ago, in a star-cruiser that was marked for some reason with a silver circle."

  "He's gone!" groaned Curt to the others. "He's already on his way to Thool to conclude the treaty with the Cold Ones."

  Gerdek's pale face was tragic.

  "There is no more hope, then. For as soon as Vostol reports the signing of the treaty, my people will carry out the self-sterilization that means the end of our race."

  Shiri was sobbing. Lacq's face was aghast as he began to realize the significance of Vostol's departure.

  "We're not beaten yet," Captain Future gritted. His gray eyes flared with indomitable resolution. "There's still a chance, if we can get to Thool and find Zuur's secret before Vostol concludes the treaty."

  "But we can't go to Thool now," Lacq said despairingly. "Since the Council has condemned you, Kaffr, they'll never agree to your leading a force of Tarast star-cruisers to attack Thool."

  "I know that," Curt said grimly. "It means that we'll have to go without any Tarast fleet. We'll have to get to Thool on our own."

  Lacq was stunned.

  "You mean — just the seven of us to attempt to reach Thool in your ship and find the secret? But that's impossible!"

  OTHO shrugged coolly.

  "We Futuremen have done a few things before this that people thought could not be done."

  "But you can never do this!" Lacq burst. "Thool is far across this universe and there are whole networks of the Cold Ones' patrols to block the way. We'd never be able to get through!"

  "And even if we did," Gerdek said hopelessly, "what could our little band hope to do at Thool? That mysterious world is the very citadel and co
re of the Cold Ones' power. How much chance would we have of searching out Zuur's ancient secrets before we were captured?"

  "I've an idea that might possibly get us through the Cold Ones' patrols," Curt rapped. "When we got to Thool, we'd have to take our chances. It's risky, I know. But it's the only chance we have left. Are you with me?"

  Gerdek's face suddenly flamed.

  "Of course! I think it means our death, but I'd rather die out there fighting a last fight for my people, than to stay here and be thrust back into the Unbodied."

  Lacq's eyes too were glistening.

  "Kaffr, I'd follow you anywhere!"

  "Then we must reach the Comet and start at once," Curt said coolly. "At all costs, we must get to Thool before Vostol."

  Shiri had donned the black robe that had been torn from her when she was thrust into the Unbodied. Lacq took the arm of the trembling girl as their little band moved rapidly up the shadowy stairs.

  They reached the ground level of the Hall of Suns without detection. But the guards at the entrance turned to shout an alarm when they saw the party. Grag's great fists stunned the men into silence before they could give the alarm or use their weapons.

  Night lay over Bebemos now. The streets of the hothouse city were almost deserted. Gerdek led his band by little-used ways to the main gate of the city. They emerged into the freezing air outside the domed metropolis, and ran at once toward the Comet.

  A few seconds later, the Comet rose steeply from the spaceport and shot up through the light of the red moons into the void. Almost at once it was out of sight, racing out into the darkness of the dying universe on its desperate flight toward distant, mysterious Thool.

  Chapter 15: Graveyard of Suns

  OUT from the cluster of dying suns that was the last stronghold of the Tarast race, there stretched the awesome darkness of a blacked-out universe. Only a few scattered red sparks of faraway, perishing stars broke the boundless gloom. Everywhere else reigned the brooding blackness.

  The Comet seemed to hesitate in dread as it emerged from the cluster into this vast realm of death and night. Curt Newton was at the controls, and he brought the little ship gradually to a halt. It floated motionless in space.

  "Why are we stopping here?" Gerdek cried worriedly. "Cold One patrols may run upon us at any moment."

  "That's why I'm stopping for a moment — so we'll have a better chance of getting through those patrols," Curt replied, getting out of his pilot's chair. "You remember I said I had an idea that might do it."

  "What's your idea, Chief?" Otho asked alertly.

  "The Cold Ones," Captain Future reminded him, "gave Vostol's ship a safe-conduct to Thool. They ordered him to paint a silver circle on its side, and said their patrols would be instructed to allow such a ship to pass. Well, we're going to mark the Comet in the same way."

  "Jumping sun-imps, I get it!” Otho exclaimed excitedly. "The Cold One patrols will think this is Vostol's ship, and let us by."

  "But Vostol's ship is ahead of us, Kaffr," Lacq protested. "The patrols will have already seen it pass, and will know we're a fake."

  "We’ll curve out on a different course to Thool than the direct course Vostol will be taking," Captain Future explained. "By not following him directly, there's less chance of our being sighted by any enemy patrols that have already seen his ship."

  "But it will take us longer to reach Thool by an indirect route," Shiri said worriedly. "Vostol will get there long before we do."

  "Not if we snap into it and quit talking," Curt declared impatiently. "Grag, get a can of liquid chromium while I get into my space-suit."

  Presently Curt Newton, in his protective suit, and Grag went out through the ship's air-lock door and hastily began the task. Their magnetized shoes held them to the Comet, as they rapidly painted a shining circle in liquefied chromium upon each side of the ship.

  Curt clambered back inside with the robot, and quickly divested himself of the protective suit.

  "That should get us through any patrols that haven't already seen Vostol pass. Now let's get out of here."

  He took the pilot's chair again. Once more the small ship leaped forward in space. Curt turned the full power of the high-speed vibration-drive generators into the drive-ring at the stern.

  The Comet built up velocity with incredibly rapid acceleration. Only the cushioning protective stasis, which Curt had learned was also standard equipment in the Tarast and Cold One ships, enabled their bodies to withstand the acceleration. They were soon traveling faster than light itself, yet still the space-speed needle crept across the dial.

  Captain Future laid the course at Gerdek's directions. The world Thool lay many light-years across this universe. Curt learned its exact coordinates, then plotted their course to take them in a broad outward curve to the distant capital of the Cold Ones.

  Racing, rushing, humming through the vast void at ever-increasing speed flashed the Comet. Its occupants seemed hurtling into a chartless darkness. There was no gleam of stars or nebulae to serve as sky-marks. There was almost nothing except the somber blackness.

  "At last," said the Brain in satisfaction, "I'll have opportunity to take some data on the exact dimensions of this spherical universe."

  And Simon, in whose chill, strange mind scientific considerations were almost always paramount, applied himself to the battery of powerful telescopic and other instruments back in the ship's main cabin.

  CURT NEWTON remained in the pilot's chair, anxiously scanning the detectors that might at any moment give warning of the approach of Cold One craft. These vast reaches were crisscrossed by the enemy's patrol and traffic routes, he knew. He hoped fervently that his stratagem would get them through to Thool.

  "But the time is short — so short," Curt murmured forebodingly to himself. "It won't take Vostol long, to conclude that treaty."

  The Brain came into the control room then, to report the results of his investigation to Captain Future.

  "Lad, I've made an approximate appraisal of the dimensions of this spherical universe. It is more than two billion light-years in diameter, many times larger than our own. And it's still rapidly expanding."

  "I do not understand that," said Lacq hesitatingly. "Does our universe really expand?"

  The Brain explained briefly.

  "The diameter of a tri-dimensional spherical universe depends directly upon the amount of matter in it. For matter tends to warp space in a closed circle around it, by the Einstein gravitation effect. The more matter there is, the more space is warped inward and so the smaller its diameter.

  "As a universe grows old and its suns melt into free radiation, there is less and less matter in it. Consequently, the gravitational warp of space is weaker. Thus the curved space of that universe continually expands. It expands until it reaches a critical point, at which the continuum of space can no longer stand the strain. At that point, the bubble of curved space bursts and collapses into a much smaller sphere."

  "And that is when our own universe will begin to be reborn, is it not?" cried Gerdek eagerly.

  "Yes, it is so," agreed the Brain. "The sudden collapse of the spherical universe, into a much smaller sphere, causes the welter of free radiation in it to be transformed slowly back into solid matter."

  "But I don't see how radiation could be turned back into matter," Lacq frowned puzzledly.

  "It's quite simple," Simon answered a bit irritably. "The sudden compression of that vast amount of electric radiation into a much smaller enclosure crowds that welter of force into whirling maelstroms. Those whirls of energy coagulate particles of electric force, or electrons. These join into atoms of dust, which in time gather in nebulae that spawn new stars."

  "To think of our own universe being revivified by new suns and worlds like that!" exulted Lacq. "How soon will it happen?"

  "It will happen very soon, by my calculations," the Brain said. "I estimate that within five thousand years, this universe's expansion will reach the critical point. It will then
collapse and slowly be reborn."

  "Five thousand years!" repeated Lacq, dismayed. "You call that very soon?"

  "It's only a moment in cosmic time," put in Captain Future. "That's what Simon meant."

  Lacq's face fell.

  "I had hoped that I myself would live to see it happen. But it makes no difference. Our descendants will see it."

  "If we have any descendants," Gerdek reminded him soberly. "That's why we must keep the Tarast race alive at any cost. If it can hold out on our last worlds till that future day of rebirth, its glory will live again. When that day comes —"

  A bell ringing sharply from the instrument panel interrupted. Curt Newton's eyes flew to the panel. The needle of one of the detectors was bobbing nervously.

  "Two objects approaching us from the left quarter!" Captain Future exclaimed. "They must be Cold One patrol craft!"

  HARDLY had Curt spoken, when out of the black vault of space on their left came rushing the two craft his instruments had detected.

  Their identity could not be doubted. They were long black space-sleds, open except for a low wall around their decks. Heavy atom-shell guns were mounted on swivels at prow and stern. And the decks were occupied by the hideous, bony white figures of Cold Ones.

  Otho had jumped to the proton gun.

  "I can blast 'em before they know what's hit them, Chief!"

  "No, don't — there must be others about and the alarm would go out," cautioned Curt. "We'll gamble on our stratagem getting us by."

  A blinker was flashing from the prow of one of the approaching space-sleds, in long and short flashes.

  "It's in the universal code — they're asking us to verify our identity," said Gerdek quickly.

  Curt handed him a torchlight.

  "Signal back that this is the ship of Vostol, on his way as ambassador to Thool."

  Gerdek obeyed. The two Cold One patrol craft, satisfied by the answer and the sign painted on the Comet, turned back out into space.

  "So far, so good," rumbled Grag. "It looks as though your trick will take us through, Chief."