Much of the atomic energy generated in the chambers had to be fed back into them as electric voltage, to continue the process. But there was enough surplus to eject streams of protons at high speed from the inertrum rocket-tubes, propelling the ship.
John Thorn cut in all stern tubes. The little ship jerked forward with the deafening roar of the blast.
"Check the aura-chart,” he ordered Sual Av. “See if we're losing those cruisers."
The Venusian snapped on their ship's aura. The “aura” was a field of electromagnetic vibrations radiated for a million miles in all directions by a projector in the ship. The vibrations were reflected back by any object within that radius of space, and automatically plotted and recorded on the aura-chart.
The chart was a sphere of pale light, poised above the window. At the center of the luminous sphere was a black dot representing their ship. Off to right and left of the black dot moved two red sparks, cutting in obliquely toward them as all advanced.
"They're close—no more than a quarter of a million miles,” reported Sual Av.
"The Zone isn't much farther than that ahead,” Thorn declared.
"But there's a big meteor swarm in the Zone directly ahead of us!” Gunner Welk exclaimed. “We can't run into that!"
In the fore of the aura-chart sphere glimmered a cloud of very tiny crimson flecks, whirling, seething. It was the edge of a great cloud of meteors at the lip of the Zone, stretching across a million miles of space in front of their fleeing little ship.
Thorn could see the swarm in black space ahead. Not the myriad meteors themselves, but a constant winking and flashing of tiny flares, where meteors in the whirling storm of stone struck and fused every few minutes.
"Rantal reporting!” rapped the audio speaker. “Planeteers are now keeping their lead on us, and running straight on toward the Zone."
"Keep after them!” ordered the Commander's grim voice. “Swarm six-sixty-two is just ahead of them and they won't dare enter that. We'll have them boxed."
"You heard, boys,” said John Thorn tightly. “There's just one thing to do—run the swarm."
"Let her go!” grinned Sual Av. “It takes more than a few meteors to stop the Planeteers."
"One thing sure,” said Gunner grimly. “If we do run it safely, we'll lose those cruisers. They won't dare follow."
John Thorn knew the peril into which their little ship was roaring. The chance of their winning through that vast, whirling stone-storm was less than one in two.
But the naval cruisers would not follow them in there, he was sure. And if he could run the swarm, he would be well inside the Zone and could turn and run counter-sunwise toward the asteroid Turkoon without fear of further pursuit.
"Here goes!” Sual Av breathed, as the aura-chart showed their ship approaching the edge of the great swarm.
The chart showed the two converging cruisers making a frantic effort to head them off. But it was too late. Already, in the chart, the Planeteers’ ship was entering the swarm.
Thorn looked forth tensely through the window. The aura was useless, now that they were actually in the swarm. His only chance now was in the quickness of his eyes and hands.
Space outside the window still looked empty, for the density of even the densest meteor swarm is not high. But Thorn could glimpse all around them the quick red glows, quickly fading and re-appearing, of meteors colliding and fusing.
A jagged black oblong mass turning over slowly, expanded with lightning speed in front of him. His hand smashed a starboard-tube firing key, and the little ship lurched wildly aside from the oncoming monster.
A moment later, two smaller black masses passed some distance on the right, revolving around each other. Then there was a rattle, as of hail, as tiny particles struck the ship walls.
Scree-e-e! The tiny scream of air escaping through a pierced wall reached their ears with startling suddenness.
"Hull punctured!” rasped Thorn, without turning.
"I'll get it!” panted Sual Av, grabbing up the electro-fusing kit and darting toward the tiny hole in the wall.
"Better get our space-suits on,” Thorn continued rapidly without turning his head. “We may get holed again."
Gunner Welk hastily hauled in the suits from a cabinet amidships. The Mercurian took over for a moment while Thorn struggled into the suit and glassite helmet, and then Thorn went back to his tense watch while his two comrades donned their suits.
A soundless flash of red light burgeoned on the left in space, faded, and then blazed up again and veered toward the ship as a third meteor struck the two that had just collided.
Thorn frantically swung the ship upward. The fusing, swiftly-cooling mass passed close underneath.
Another mass of bullet-like particles struck the racing ship. Air screeched out through new holes, and the airgauge on the panel started flashing a warning red light as pressure diminished. Sual Av was working hastily with the fusing kit to close the new hull-punctures.
Thorn glimpsed a peculiar gleaming meteor directly ahead, coming dead on at the ship. He had plenty of time to curve the ship aside. But as he did so—
"Above you!” yelled Gunner Welk wildly.
Thorn looked up, just glimpsed the huge, ponderous mass thundering down on the ship from above-a tiny planetoid, black and jagged and massive, spinning on its axis as it bore noiselessly down on them.
Thorn's hand on the keys blasted the ship to starboard with the speed of light. But he knew, even as he acted, that he was too late. He could not quite get clear.
There came a grinding shock, a scream of riven metal. He and Gunner Welk were thrown crazily together at a side of the control-room. His head rang inside his helmet.
He scrambled up, clutching a stanchion. There was a dead, unusual silence. He looked back into the stern of the ship, past Sual Av, who was scrambling unsteadily to their side.
"'We're wrecked!” Thorn exclaimed, his heart plummeting.
The little planetoid had crumpled up the whole stern half of the ship like cardboard. The air inside it was gone. The crumpled little craft was drifting silently in space, revolving slowly around the jagged planetoid that had been its Nemesis.
"Hell!” swore Gunner Welk, his voice coming to the other two in their helmets through the short-range audio with which all space-suits were equipped. “We were almost through, too!"
"What do we do now?” Sual Ay asked, his green eyes perplexedly staring through the glassite of his helmet.
Thorn shrugged heavily. “I don't know. I was a fool to try to run the swarm. But it looked like our best chance."
"It was,” said the big Mercurian loyally. “Even though we didn't quite make it."
"We've got to get out of here somehow to Turkoon, that pirate asteroid,” Thorn said. “We can't just cling to this wreck until the oxygen in our suit tanks gives out."
He examined the audio and other instruments. All wrecked by the shock. “I suppose we're lucky to escape with our lives. But we've merely postponed death if we can't get away from here."
Sual Av peered out through the cracked window, into the black abyss in which they were floating. The Venusian stiffened as he glimpsed something beyond the jagged, spinning planetoid about which their wreck was revolving.
"John, a ship is running up along the edge of the swarm!” he exclaimed. “I can see its lights!"
Thorn and the Mercurian leaped to the window. They stared at the little blob of light, coming slowly closer.
"If it's one of those cruisers that pursued us, we're done for,” said Gunner Welk tautly.
"It's not!” cried Thorn suddenly. “It's a pirate ship!"
CHAPTER IV
Pirate Princess
They saw the distant ship coast the edge of the vast meteor swarm for some minutes and then come to a halt in space, with a prolonged flash of its bow rocket-tubes halting it.
A moment later a cracked, shrill voice sounded from the little audiospeakers inside their helmets.
&nb
sp; "Ahoy, Planeteers! Are any of you alive in that wreck?"
Thorn answered instantly. “We're all alive—John Thorn speaking."
"I figgered it'd take more than, a meteor-swarm to finish you three,” retorted the cracked voice, chuckling.
"Who's speaking? What ship is that?” Thorn demanded.
"Cautious, ain't ye?” said the shrill voice, with a cackle of mirth. “I don't blame you’ seeing how you boys was chased. But you needn't worry-this ain't no naval cruiser. We're Companions of Space. Want to come aboard?"
"Companions of Space? Pirates, eh?” Thorn said. “Yes, we'll come aboard."
"Figgered you would,” cackled the other. “We'll stand by, and you can come across with your impellers."
Thorn switched off his suit-audio and spoke to his two companions, clutching their arms to conduct his voice to them.
"Cut your audios and listen,” he said tautly. “These pirates may plan some kind of treachery, but I don't think so. This looks like our chance to get to their base at Turkoon. But if we get there, don't mention Erebus or the radite, whatever you do,
"We understand,” Gunner Welk muttered.
They each got a torch-like metal impeller from a locker, and then wrenched open the door amidships.
Bracing his feet’ against its edge, John Thorn leaped out into the abyss.
He shot floatingly away from the wreck. As his momentum faded and he began to float back toward the wreck, Thorn switched on the impeller in his hand. The blast from it kicked his space-suited figure on through space.
Sual Av and the big Mercurian were following closely. The three progressed thus, with frequent flashes from their impellers thrusting them on toward the distant waiting pirate ship.
Bright stars gleamed like millions of watching eyes all around Thorn. He glimpsed the ominous red flash of colliding meteors, nearby. He had to turn constantly to make sure that they were moving toward the waiting craft. Soon they were very close to it, moving faster, now that its slight gravitational field drew them.
Thorn eyed the long, grim ship that floated here in space just outside the edge of the vast swarm. He judged that it had once been a Neptunian or Uranian naval cruiser-the design one adapted to great distances, and ominous muzzles of atom-guns peering forth along its sides spoke of heavy armament.
The Planeteers bumped the side of the vessel. They scrambled along it and into the waiting open air-lock.
* * * *
A minute later they were inside, unscrewing their helmets and gazing about a lighted metal chamber. A half-dozen armed men were here, and one of them came forward to the three.
"So you're the famous Three Planeteers, eh?” he asked in the same cracked, quavering voice they had previously heard.
The speaker was an old, snow-haired Martian, his thin figure stooped, his red face incredibly wrinkled with age, his faded, rheumy eyes peering at them shortsightedly. He wore two atom-pistols in his belt, and was chewing rial leaf whose green juice he spat occasionally into a floor receptacle.
"Curse me if it doesn't do me good to look at you,” quavered the oldster, his oath making astounding contrast with his cracked voice and senile appearance. “Aye, it warms my heart to look at men the like of which I was myself, in the old days."
"Who are you?” Thorn asked steadily. “How did you happen along to pick us up?"
"As for who I am, the name is Stilicho Keene. Ever hear of it?” the old pirate answered shrilly.
"Stilicho Keene?” repeated Sual Av incredulously. “The notorious pirate of forty years ago?)
"The same,” answered the old Martian complacently. “Aye, long before you Planeteers was ever born, I was one of the leaders of the Companions of Space, back in the days when there were men in space and not the kind of milksops I have to give orders to now."
"You still haven't told us how you happened to be near to pick us up,” Thorn reminded.
Stilicho Keene turned his rheumy eyes on the young earthman. He chuckled as he spat rial juice.
"Sharp and curious, ain't ye? Well, I'd expect it of you. I was the same at your age, smart and quick and bold. But you were asking how we happened along. Well, this is the Venture, and we've been to Jupiter on a little errand for Princess Lana. Coming back, we heard the audio-calls of them cruisers chasing you Planeteers.
"We heard them give up the chase after you ducked into that meteor swarm. So I gave order to lay a course near the swarm, hoping we might meet you-and then we sighted your wreck. It looks like you'll have to go on to Turkoon with us now."
The old pirate continued admiringly, “I've heard a lot of you lads and the fine things you've done. The time you raided the governor's office at Titan and stole all that platinum, and the time you three alone held up that big Martian liner and robbed all the passengers of their valuables."
The old pirate could not know, Thorn thought grimly, that that raid on Titan had been really to secure League naval secrets and the platinum a mere blind, or that the hold-up of the Martian liner had had as its real objective the securing of a valuable new atom-gun drawing among the effects of a Jovian engineer.
"So when we get to Turkoon,” old Stilicho Keene was continuing eagerly, “maybe you Planeteers would think of joining up with us Companions, eh? It would be good to have some real men with us again, men such as I used to rocket with when I was young."
John Thorn's pulses leaped at the offer. But he kept his excitement hidden, and frowned a little.
"The Three Planeteers join an outfit led by a girl?” he returned a little disdainfully.,
"You wait till you meet this girl,” the old Martian told him. “You'll find she's a real leader, is Lana Cain."
"We'll talk of it when we get to Turkoon,” Thorn told him. “Anyway, we're damned grateful to you for picking us up."
"Aye, you bit off a little more than even you could chew, didn't you, on Earth?” cackled the hoary old sinner. “It warmed my heart to think of it. Kidnapping the Chairman of Earth! Only the Planeteers would have thought of trying that!"
Old Stilicho Keene led the way up through the dusky corridors and catwalks of the ship. The Planeteers shouldered past members of the crew who stared admiringly at them.
These pirates were a motley aggregation from every planet in the system—Martians, Saturnians and Uranians, wicked-looking Earthmen, fighters all, from the look of them.
Thorn and his comrades emerged after old Stilicho Keene into the broad, glassite-fronted control-room.
A surly Jovian stood at the firingkeys, and a nervous, green-faced, hollow-eyed Saturnian at the bank of instruments on the right.
"Get going to Turkoon, Barbo,” ordered the pirate commander.
With roar of stern-tubes pouring forth proton-fire, the heavy cruiser shot forward in space.
John Thorn looked through the broad glassite windows. The Venture was moving counter-sunwise into the very heart of the Zone. Space ahead seemed thick with whirling clouds of light-specks that were meteor swarms, and steady bright sparks that were booming planetoids.
"How the devil do you navigate this damned jungle, anyway?” Gunner Welk asked the old Martian.
Stilicho Keene's wrinkled face grinned. “That's easy. We've got a little projector of vibrations planted on every big asteroid and in all swarms—each projector emitting a wave of a different frequency. We pick up the signals, and they show us just how far and in what direction each swarm and asteroid is, so we can avoid them. just like the lighthouses on the Earth seas, centuries ago."
He added with cunning satisfaction, “The signals don't help naval cruisers or other ships navigate the Zone, because they don't know the frequency-code and can't tell what's meant by the signals they hear.
They've lost so many cruisers trying to get in here that they gave it up as a bad job."
The ship forged on through the wilderness of the Zone, constantly detouring to avoid the many perils to navigation that abounded here. It coasted along vast swarms, cut sharply upward to evade�
� planetoids, slipped close past a small tailless comet that glimmered like a little white ghost sun.
Then John Thorn made out a small green speck in the blackness, toward which the Venture was now heading directly. It widened rapidly into a green disk. His black eyes narrowed.
"That's Turkoon, isn't it?"
"Aye, that's old Turkoon,” quavered Stilicho Keene. “The sweetest, safest, snuggest little harbor in the whole system. Good air and good water, and ringed round with all those swarms and asteroids that keep the prying naval cruisers away. A paradise for us gentlemen of the void. Aye, there it lies, like a pretty emerald in space, just as it lay when I first saw it long ago.
"It's seen a plenty, has old Turkoon. It's seen the bloody days of the old wild corsairs, with the scarred ship's roaring in to it, loaded with ores and jewels and silks and women. It's seen the days of Martin Cain, a generation ago, when full a thousand ships of the Companions put forth to space at one time. It's seen them all come and go—all the great, brave gentlemen of the void, has old Turkoon."
"And now,” Thorn said ironically, “it sees the Companions led by a girl."
"Aye, boy,” shrilled the old pirate, “it sees a girl leading us now. But she's Martin Cain's daughter—as deadly dangerous as ever her sire was. Aye, and as great a leader."
* * * *
The Venture roared closer to the green asteroid and then dropped rapidly toward it, air whistling outside its walls.
"I didn't think an asteroid this small could have an atmosphere,” commented Sual Av, peering downward.
"'It must have unusual mass for its size—probably a core of neutronium or other super-heavy elements,”
Thorn guessed. “Otherwise, the escape of its air molecules would be inevitable, and it wouldn't be able to hold an atmosphere."
"Let's hope that nothing holds us here, once we get what we're after,” muttered Gunner Welk.
Thorn was taut with the same thought. Down in this hell's nest of pirates was a girl with a secret that would save four worlds from conquest—if they could get it from her.
The Worlds of Edmond Hamilton Page 38
