by Colin Kapp
Abruptly a voice came over the ship’s communicator. One of the Rhaqui was speaking.
“Marshal Wildheit, I call for a truce. The ship has achieved subspace entry velocity. Delay with the jump could be dangerous to us all. Because of our disagreement, you now hold the flight-bridge where our controls are located. If you’ll return to your cabin, we will return to the flight-bridge to continue safe navigation. In return for this exchange, you’ll have safe passage as an absolute guarantee.”
Wildheit looked at Roamer, and his eyes narrowed with speculation.
“I just wonder if this situation couldn’t be twisted into the answer to our problem.” He reached for the communicator button. “This is Wildheit. I’ve had enough Rhaqui guarantees to last me a lifetime. You may return to the flight-bridge under one condition. I want a serviceable lifecraft commissioned immediately. Your so-called hospitality has become unacceptable. Furthermore if I’m forced to kill any more of the family, you won’t have crew enough left to maintain flight safety. What do you answer?”
“An acceptable compromise, Marshal.” The voice carried obvious tones of relief. “Three million stellars was already little enough compensation for our losses. The lifecraft will be readied at once.”
Roamer and Wildheit returned to the cabin to wait, both now acutely conscious of the great stress that was building in the continuum. The distortion of light had become such that every edge of contrasting illumination and shade now had its own spectral rainbow, and fine print was becoming impossible to read. A kind of static charge was building up on surfaces, so that everything acquired a sort of slippery repulsion from its neighbors; under the deep vibration of the gravitational drive, small objects were beginning to move and slide over surfaces where friction would normally have kept them still. Such was the nature of human engineering that friction was a designed-in essential for holding things together: yet if the present trend continued, even powerfully locked screws and nuts would begin to turn and loosen.
With a realization of the growing perils caused by the upwinding spring of the continuum, Wildheit leaned again to the communicator. “Hurry along with that lifecraft! We wish to be away before you make subspace.”
There was no way he could explain the real reason for his urgency, nor did he attempt to do so. The Rhaqui, used to all the odd phenomena of space, probably attributed the effects to the imminence of some great storm in the regions between the stars. They would be cursing slippery locks, losing tools into cavities with unaccustomed frequency, and blaming the imprecision of their eyesight on alcohol or on some postulated space-vortex through which they might be passing. Only Wildheit and Roamer knew that the point of concern was not while the effect lasted, but the moment when it ceased.
“Marshal, the lifecraft is ready.” The welcome message came at last. “You will find her in the bow tube. We make subspace in seven minutes. Hopefully we shall not meet again.”
“Amen to that,” said Wildheit. “We’re on our way.”
Presumably to avoid the possibility of a further incident, they met none of the gypsies as they journeyed forward to the bow of the ship, where they found evidence of recent work. Great sheets of silver foil indicated where a brand-new lifecraft had been hastily broken out of its encapsulation. Wildheit breathed a prayer of thankfulness. He had been afraid they would be given some fifth-hand salvaged vessel maintained by the customary Rhaqui indolence and prayer. The new vessel, almost certainly looted from a space-wreck, had been activated but was otherwise in the same flawless condition as it was when it had been manufactured. He helped Roamer through the tiny hatch, scanned the blur of the steady-state indicators, and thumbed the ACCEPT switch. With a bellow of compressed gas straining the ancient launch tube, they were ejected into space.
Almost immediately on leaving the parent ship, their vision cleared and the loss of the slippery feeling brought back a comforting familiarity to their tactile senses. Programmed for fast emergency escape, the minute craft maintained a constant acceleration of two gravities until its auxiliary motors were exhausted, then gave the occupants the choice of drifting with the momentum they had already gained or continuing on a lower-powered main drive. Wildheit chose to drift. Other than heading back to Mayo, there was no place the craft could take them at sub-light speeds in less than several lifetimes. Their hopes lay in the fact that they were still in the planetary system of which Mayo was a part and toward which Hover’s rescue ship would be directed.
The Rhaqui ship had no such hopes of continued existence. As they watched, the ship appeared to become less distinct, as if the stress in the continuum was enfolding it in a bubble with a refractive index different from that of normal space. The system was unstable, and the bubble pulsed and heaved and threatened to rupture. The heaving atmosphere of distorted physical effects of which the bubble was composed grew constantly more dense. Wildheit’s mind was stretched to its limits trying to imagine what physical reality must now be like for the Rhaqui contained in this miniature, distorted universe.
The bubble burst. For an instant the ship appeared intact, then abruptly foreshortened as if it had tangled with relativity by attempting to ram the light-barrier instead of jumping it. The release of energy produced a blaze of radiation which raised the ship’s hull to an immediate incandescence and raised a wave of warning alarms on the lifecraft’s safety monitors. Then abruptly the situation was reversed. With a temperature rapidly falling to the wrong side of absolute zero, and an energy-vacuum which thirsted for every quantum of radiation available from space, the transient fireball that had been the ship dwindled to a dark nothingness to become the progenitor of an invisibly small black hole.
After a while, Wildheit turned on the lifecraft’s beacons and began to explore FTL transmissions hoping to gain the attention of a relay station. Roamer continued to stare fixedly at the point where the gypsy ship had once existed. She had postulated the use of the Chaos Weapon as being an act of desperation. As an attempt, it had failed. Now it was up to herself and Wildheit to justify the pitch of the desperation itself. Roamer thought she was going to like the stars.
EIGHT
AFTER seventeen hours, Wildheit’s screens identified not one but two approaching spacecraft. Both were traveling at sub-light speeds, and the farthest one was only just within scanner range. The nearer vessel, though smaller, was certainly moving faster. It appeared probable Hover had somehow managed to direct a scout-ship into the area in advance of a Space-force cruiser, and neither vessel had known that another was on the same rescue mission. Because of the urgent demand for cruiser participation to counter the alien breakthrough, Wildheit considered he had sufficient justification to ask Coul for a communion with Hover. Coul unwillingly agreed.
“How’re your legs, Cass?”
“Fine, Jym, fine! They’ve already started having to cut the toenails. And the muscle exercises in the culture medium are a sight you would not believe. You know, those legs are beautiful! I’m going to hate walking on them in case I spoil them.”
“Hmm! They’re going to have to invent a new psychological term to cover deviants who fall in love with their own legs. But it wasn’t legs I called you about, Cass. Since I last reported, we managed to get off-world in a Rhaqui tramp. Currently we’re adrift in a lifecraft somewhere in the outer limits of the Mayo system. Can you contact your boys and have them look for us in space and not on Mayo? And we don’t need the cruiser.”
“Understood, Jym. Estimated arrival time for the patrol-ship is about three days. Sorry, but that’s the best we can do.”
“Say that again, Cass—slowly.”
“Three days is the best we can do. There’s nothing closer to you than that.”
“Which is odd, because I’ve got two birds on the scanner right now. Both must have been within a single subspace jump.”
“Then they aren’t Federation ships.” Hover was suddenly serious. “Are you broadcasting a distress signal?”
“No. Only the beacon. Why?�
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“It just crossed my mind that a couple of alien stragglers might have outflanked the Space Force counter-strike. Watch yourself, Jym! If there’s any doubt of identity keep all your power levels low as possible and try to sit it out unnoticed. Without the beacon you’ve a good chance of being mistaken for a piece of space debris. We’ll get a cruiser to you as fast as possible.”
“Check! Cutting beacon now. I’ll keep the FTL transmission channel open just so we’ll know when the cruiser gets into the sector.”
“While we’ve got contact, here’s another item which can’t go out over FTL transmission. You remember I thought there was a link between the group who ran into the trigger at Edel and Saraya himself. I struck a dead end trying to trace the men, so I tried investigating Saraya instead. Guess what—Saraya’s home planet has no existence either. He’s another one out of the void with no recorded past.”
Ending communion, Wildheit began to reduce the power levels in the lifecraft, leaving only the life-support systems ticking over. Regretfully he finally took the scanner out of circuit in case the pulsed microbeam of the scan betrayed their presence to a potential enemy. In doing so, he lost his view of the two ships approaching the system and had no means of ascertaining whether their coming was a accidental or purposeful. Soon only the rasp of sub-etheric noise from Mayo’s sun coming in on the open FTL receiver channel disturbed the muted ship noises.
Roamer finally broke the near-silence. “Coul’s very ancient, isn’t he?”
“I’ve no idea. He’s said to be immortal—but I suppose even immortality is relative.”
“I’ve been reading his Chaos patterns. Did you know his traces go right back to before the Big Bang which began the universe?”
“I find it difficult to believe anything existed before the universe began.”
“Before the Big Bang there was another universe,” she said factually.
“How could you possibly know that?”
“Because I can read back to its patterns. In this universe entropy increases with time. In that universe it decreased. Our universe expands—theirs contracted. That’s what created the singularity which caused the Big Bang.”
“Cosmology was never my strong point,” said Wildheit, distracted.
Lack of information about the approaching ships was an irritation and a danger. If the vessels’ approach was casual, Wildheit considered the lifecraft had sufficient power to move into an orbital path that would keep Mayo’s sun between them and the newcomers; for this, however, he needed information on their approach paths in order to make the necessary calculations. He decided to risk the scanner for a couple of seconds to see if the intruders’ courses showed any sign of intent. What the scan showed him was that his attempt at passive concealment had been a waste of time. The smaller ship was on an intercept course with the lifecraft, and the larger, though still many hours out, was undoubtedly tracking the smaller. Nothing about the returning signals gave him any clues as to their identity.
“Looks as if we can expect company,” he said to Roamer, trying to keep the manifold implications of the phrase out of his voice. He checked his weapons’ belt, but knew that in the lifecraft they were at such a disadvantage as to be virtually helpless. If the approaching craft were alien, they were already as good as dead.
Since there was no longer any point in keeping the scanner switched off, he watched the approach of the smaller ship with some trepidation. The expertise of the pilot was such that in a single maneuver he checked velocity and so accurately matched the lifecraft’s speed and direction that the two ships soon hung relatively motionless at about a hundred meters separation.
When the vessel entered optical range, Wildheit had been using the limited lens system of the lifecraft to try and establish its identity. Though small by space standards, it was immense in comparison to the tiny lifecraft. It had a very strange design, being more squat and angular than any the marshal had ever before seen. As with the drive mechanisms of completely unfamiliar pattern, so with the formidable armed blisters, whose sinister muzzles protruding from the pods suggested devices of great power yet of unguessable range and effect. Since by training and profession the marshal’s knowledge of galactic weaponry was necessarily nearly complete, his inability to identify these wicked-looking tubes and projectors gave him the feeling of a cold lump of iron forming in his stomach. There were no emblems or identifying symbols on the scarred hull, and the only thing that eased the marshal’s growing fears was the fact that his close-range observations had suggested the curious vessel to be of human design and construction.
Roamer, viewing the vessel intently, gave a little gasp.
“What do you read in her, little frog?” asked Wildheit.
“That ship—is very old. Its patterns go a long way back in time.”
“Not before the Big Bang, I hope.” He was gently teasing.
“No. Six—seven thousand years.”
“I think we’re going to have to have you recalibrated. All history of man in space doesn’t go back much beyond two thousand years.”
“I know that. I can’t explain about the ship, but what I tell you is true.”
The hiatus since the ship had come to rest tended to confirm Wildheit’s notion that this vessel was not an alien ship which would have carried out an immediate extermination run. Then the FTL communicator channel broke into life.
“Survivors on lifecraft—we are applying tractors. Prepare to be hauled in.” The voice was human and the language pure Delta Intergalactic.
Wildheit leaped for the communicator. “Who are you? Please identify yourselves.”
“Time for questions later, friend. We intend to leave this system fast, and you’re coming with us. Now prepare!”
The warning came a fraction of a second too late. The savage grasp of tractor beams caught the lifecraft in a gravitational clamp which spun the vessel sharply through ninety degrees to match the beam’s orientation. So sharp was this maneuver that Wildheit was thrown against the communications rack and hit his head on a projection with a force that stunned him momentarily. He recovered a few moments later with blood streaming down his temple to find the lifecraft hurtling into the maw of the strange ship’s craft-lock.
The whole operation had been rapidly executed. Before the lifecraft had even come to rest on the ramp, the spacelock doors closed behind them, and the strong song of some unknown drive immediately began to thrust the host-ship on its way. They had to wait through a long acceleration period before the lock finally was filled with air and they could leave their little ship.
The man with brown coveralls who came into the lock to receive them had a weapon in his hand, and a strange glint of amusement in his eyes as they climbed out.
“Well, what have we here? A space-marshal and a thin chicken. Curious what things one nets in space! Drop all your armaments, Marshal, nice and slowly. On this ship there’s no way you can win an argument.”
After a swift look at the man’s face, Wildheit did as he was told. He was familiar with the expressions of professional survivors. A second man came to the hatch and led the way into the ship, the armed man following. The second man also betrayed the same killer instincts.
Although he was familiar with most types of spacecraft built in the galaxy, Wildheit found the vessel as different internally as he found it strange externally. While all the craftsmanship was identifiably human work, the actual design was the product of a school with no obvious roots or connections with those known to Wildheit. Familiar though the functions of many of the instruments seemed, the mechanisms and technology were strange. Only occasional items appeared to be of contemporary manufacture. Among these was a Chaos detector and a computing assembly similar to the units Wildheit had seen at ChaosCenter.
They were led into a cabin paneled with genuine wood. At a desk sat a third man in brown coveralls, with a fourth and fifth standing to each side of him. The seated man eyed them with the same interested amusement as had his
companion.
“A space-marshal, eh? Pieces begin to fit. I take it that Saraya’s behind this somewhere?”
“You know Saraya?” asked Wildheit.
“You might say we’ve been acquainted for quite a long time.” The speaker shot an amused glance at his companions. “Saraya never learns.”
“Who are you?”
“Names? I am Kasdeya. The one with the gun on your spine is Jequn, and your guide through the ship was Asbeel. On my right stands Gadreel, with whom I advise you not to pick a quarrel; and on my left meet Penemue, who you would be unwise to challenge intellectually. We five are what I think you would call adventurers, perhaps even renegades. Don’t underestimate our desperation or our willingness to kill.”
“I’m already acquainted with the look in the eyes of the damned.”
“Good! We’ve achieved a point of understanding. But now you have the advantage of us, Marshal. Who are you, and what were you doing in a lifecraft on the edge of the galaxy?”
“I’m Space-Marshal Jym Wildheit, presently on Federation business.”
“What business?”
“You don’t expect me to answer that?”
“Without duress, probably not.” Kasdeya’s amused eyes circled his companions. “Not that we shy from refined violence if the need arises. But if I’ve the smell of this aright, we’ve more to gain by cooperation than by coercion. I’m going to throw out a few questions to see if we’ve a common interest. Those you don’t answer we may extract from you the hard way later—depending on our need and our humor.”
“That’s a Federation capital offense.”
“Don’t make me laugh! We don’t care a damn for your stupid laws. The whole Federation’s a structure of no consequence. It’s a mere flea in the hairs of the rabid dog whose tail we’re twisting. Our enemies would make your enemies seem like bosom friends by comparison. Let me make one point very clear to you, Marshal. In the game you’ve somehow entered, you’re so far out of your class you might as well never have been born.”
