by Hal Annas
“Everything indicates,” he added, “your mother thought she was performing a service. And she was doing it at great risk to herself. She should be awarded a medal. But for Dynell the charges would be dropped and she would be welcomed by the millions on Earth who adore her.”
“Is she safe? Is she well?”
He glanced about casually. “I’m not supposed to pass on information, but I don’t see what harm can come of my telling you she was in splendid health at last report. She was urgently warning those in the vicinity of her imprisonment to move away before Rahn Buskner came.”
“She knew he would come?”
“She never doubted it, but it’s believed she stopped him from laying waste other cities and persuaded him to take her home to Unor.”
“Is he doing that?”
Again Darby glanced about, “They were last reported far out from Earth on a course that would enable them to join forces with the third armada.”
“And Moxol?”
He was even more hesitant. “The reports are already aboard,” he said. “I suppose it can do no harm. It’s true that he maneuvered rings around the SYZ and Earth fleets in the SYZ System. They could never predict his next move. When they thought he was coming out to fight he would strike a planet, and when they thought he was moving on another planet he would appear on their flank or rear, with that deceptive lateral motion, strike and vanish.”
“Where is he now?”
“His movements are hard to track, but last reports placed him in a position where he could turn to join Rahn Buskner or move in this direction. We fear the latter. It means—” He broke off abruptly.
“It means,” Aline finished for him, “that you retook these planets here so that no threat would be behind you when you faced him.” Her tone was bitter. “And you’ll fight until one or both are dead.”
Getting the words out steadied her. The bitterness had been there eating away at her insides. It had made her tremble. Giving voice to it helped. But it didn’t alter that dead feeling of hopelessness.
He led her to the table, placed her on his right. The others remained standing until they had seated themselves.
A heavyset, gray man he had pointed out as Commander Dynell rose at the other end of the table and lifted his glass. “I have saved good news for this occasion,” he said. “The bulk of the Earth fleet, held in reserve between this system and SYZ, was released yesterday, when success attended our efforts here, and is now about to intercept Rahn Buskner.” He lifted his glass high. “To the crushing of Buskner’s butchers to the last ship. To the conviction and hanging of that vicious traitor Aleta Winrow.”
A hand touched Aline’s arm; a whisper sounded in her ear. “You don’t have to drink to that.” Aloud, the SYZ commander said, “Out of courtesy to my guest, Miss Du David, who is not drinking, I shall refrain from joining you ladies and gentlemen.”
She noticed that Lon-den and Acra-non also refrained.
The food was served, strange and delectable dishes from Delos, from Earth, from planets toward Andromeda. Under other circumstances she would’ve been delighted. Now it seemed there was nothing but bitterness.
She said, “Isn’t there some hope for peace?”
The man on her right replied glibly, “Just as soon as we rid the galaxy of Novakkans.”
From her other side: “The Council of Councils wants peace. The populace of Earth and Delos want it. The fighting is holding up our colonizing toward Andromeda. There is hardly anyone who doesn’t want peace,” The voice was lowered. “But Dynell won’t be satisfied until your mother stands trial for treason.”
“But mother is innocent—”
“They need a scapegoat. They want somebody to pay for their blundering of years ago.”
All eyes turned toward the entranceway. An officer stood there with a memorandum in his hand. “Report from Relay, sir,” he said.
Dynell raised his voice. “You know better than to interrupt us here. Make your report later and then report for discipline.”
“Yes, sir, but the report is for Commander Darby, and it’s urgent.”
“Make your report,” Darby said.
“Yes, sir. We’ve had trouble keeping track of Moxol’s movement, as you know, but at last we’ve got him pinpointed.”
“Go on,” Dynell roared. “Don’t just stand there. Give us the location and we’ll start ships out after him and his murderers.”
“Yes, sir. But it may not be necessary, sir. He’s coming this way.”
“Where is he?” Dynell thundered, coming to his feet.
“He’s already struck the outer planets, sir, and I have to report he’s overrunning them in less than half the time it took us, even with the aid of our garrisons. He’s joined with the third armada and is moving in this direction so rapidly that we may expect to be locked in a death grip before daylight.”
There was a long moment of tense silence, then Aline spoke, “Can you get me a visicom channel to Moxol? I’m his sister. I can make him see that this must stop.”
Dynell’s voice was loud and harsh. “If that woman is sister to that murderer she doesn’t belong at this table. She belongs in irons.”
Darby came to his feet. His voice was quiet but firm. “It is necessary for me to inform you, Commander Dynell, that we are aboard an SYZ ship and I am in command. Miss Du David and those with her are my guests. It is possible she can aid us in putting an end to bloodshed.” He turned to the officer in the doorway. “Order Relay to make every effort to clear a channel to the commander of the unfriendly armada advancing on us. Expedite it with these key words: ‘Will Moxol speak with his sister Aline du David?’ Have Relay put it through, monitored, to our communication room.”
The officer departed. Aline was hurried along to the communication room, pushed close to a large screen. Darby said, “Let him see you first.”
The screen lit up and gradually the view cleared. In the background were green-tinged giants working over machines. Visible beyond them were visicoms bringing in views of the smoking surface of a planet. In the foreground Moxol was bending over instruments, making calculations. Without looking up, he snapped, “Have the lower formation reverse direction and strike on a tangent. They’re expecting to be hit from the other side.” A Novakkan passed the order on in code.
Aline had been holding her breath. She seemed to be right in Moxol’s presence. In her own body she could feel the tension of the life and death decision he had just made. His name came out in a stifled cry:
“Moxol!”
He looked up. His olive features were lined with fatigue, his reddish brown eyes were bright.
“I’m on an SYZ warship,” she said. He stared straight at her, his voice low, tense, dynamic. “They will give you safe conduct to a neutral planet,” he said. “Or I will shackle ten thousand of their own to the hulls of my ships and carry them into space.”
The Novakkans behind him went on working, separating reports, graphing the action below.
Moxol lifted his eyes and looked beyond her at the uniformed men. Again his voice was restrained, but powerful in its dynamic vibrancy. “If any harm befalls my sister not a single Earth-man will escape alive from this system.”
“But Moxol,” she cried, “they’re not harming me. There’s been enough killing. It’s time to make peace. It can be done, I know it can if you and these men will sit down and talk terms.”
Darby pressed close against her, said, “She’s right, Moxol. We can reach terms. I’m not yet empowered to act for the Council, but I know they’d go a long way to achieve an honorable peace.” Dynell’s loud voice broke in, “Surrender that traitor. And—”
“This is not the moment to dictate terms,” Darby interrupted. Again to Moxol: “My officers and I will meet you aboard a neutral ship, your sister’s cruiser, try to reach terms, and I will make a full and unbiased report to the Council.”
Moxol weighed that briefly and said, “Rahn Buskner already has Aleta safe, but he will i
nsist that the charges against her be dropped and that she be received anywhere in the galaxy as the queen she is. It is possible we can come to terms. But my raiders are in action. I must clear all channels and communicate with Rahn Buskner. You’ll receive word within two hours where to meet me. In the cruiser.”
“I,” Dynell roared, “will not be a party to this—unless they first agree to surrender that traitor and withdraw their forces from his area of the galaxy.”
Darby made no effort to quiet him. The screen had gone dark.
Dynell continued to protest. Lon-den stepped close to him, said, “I can demonstrate why you must make peace. If you will accompany us to the cruiser I will show you weapons that will make yours seem like toys.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ABOARD the cruiser Lon-den said, “I am not precisely aware of how much energy is required to destroy a warship.”
A young Earth officer volunteered the information: “A heavy unit can withstand a direct hit by hydrogen atomics. It will be blown out of its course but comparably undamaged, its firepower in no way impaired. Only a direct hit, or a series of indirect hits, by photonics will destroy it. I’m alluding to photonics of the mass and power another warship or a heavy ground battery is capable of delivering.”
“Then it would seem impossible that this cruiser could destroy a warship?”
Smiles spread. The officer spoke quickly, “A single battery aboard a warship will weigh more than this cruiser. It could not deliver a broadside hot enough to warm the food required to feed the crew of a warship.”
Lon-den turned to Darby. “More than a score of wrecked raiders and warships are on the plain. Are they of any value?”
“Not even for scrap,” Darby replied. “When photonics hit them squarely they’re done for.”
“Will you move out the undamaged ships, and men?”
“This is a trick,” Dynell growled. “That man is a dangerous alien aiding the Novakkans.”
“But an unfriendly armada is moving on us,” Darby said. “I don’t want my ships caught sitting. I’m ordering them aloft.” He turned to an aide. “Clear the plain of all ships and personnel. Let no person approach nearer than thirty miles.
A float appeared outside the cruiser, deposited a courier. Admitted to their presence, the courier reported, “At mid-twilight you are requested to take the cruiser straight up, away from the dead star, and using this planet as a basis, proceed until you achieve a seventy-degree angle the hypotenuse of which extends to the yellow star. Moxol will come aboard at the point.”
Dynell again protested. Aside, Darby told Aline that he was certain he could reach satisfactory terms, but was equally certain Dynell would spike any agreement. He hoped that Lon-den’s demonstration would be impressive, because everything depended on converting the Earth fleet commander.
The plain was cleared of all but wreckage. The twisted bulks of ships were scattered for miles. Rough computations established that five thousand heavy photonic charges had been expended in reducing the ships to their present condition.
Lon-den addressed Dynell. “Will you calculate the range and align the batteries of this cruiser?”
Dynell snorted, “I doubt if they will even reach that far.” His calculations were hasty and a trifle inaccurate. Acra-non started to correct them, but Lon-den waved him aside. “Close enough,” he said, “Everyone will please put on shields.”
Dynell made no protest about this.
The glare of photonic energy going out often hurt the eyes.
“This is what you may face,” Lon-den said, “if you do not make peace.” His fingers swept like light across the row of keys that actuated the batteries.
As she watched, Aline saw, not the glare of photonic energy, but thin coalescing streams of blue stretching outward from the cruiser. They struck a little to the left of the center of the plain. They seemed to halt there until their ends broke free from the cruiser and, as rubber, leaped to join them.
Then they began expanding outward. It happened in seconds, but always she would remember it as though it had taken hours. The center glowed brighter than a star, blinding in its brilliance even through shields. The blue ring went on out and out, the brilliant center swelling and following it until it seemed nothing but a thread around a miniature sun.
It vanished and then she watched the implosion that followed. She saw objects miles away snatched toward that center.
Seconds later the concussion rolled over the cruiser. It rocked as in the midst of a photonic explosion. Part of the ledge overhead smashed down on it.
The airlock was not completely closed and the sound that reached them left them deaf for nearly a minute.
And then, as the air cleared, they saw that not a single scrap of twisted wreckage was left on the plain. More than a score of ships had vanished as if they had never existed.
As the others stood in awe, Dynell whipped out his raygun and levelled it at Lon-den’s heart. “That alien,” he said, as. he pressed the trigger, “is too dangerous to live.”
Too numb to utter a sound, Aline watched the godlike creature sink slowly. Over his heart was a blackened spot. The beam had gone clear through.
As she sank beside him, she heard Dynell snarl, “And I will not allow others to betray Earth. I’m putting you, Darby, in irons. I myself will meet Moxol and take him prisoner.”
Lon-den’s pulses were stilled; his breathing stopped. He had looked a god in life. Now he was just another corpse of the war.
Tears started in Aline’s eyes. She blinked them back. Her features went tight. Her jaw set firmly. Something of Moxol’s fierce intensity shone out of her eyes. She rose slowly.
With her back to the others, she lifted her skirt, brought out her raygun. Turning slowly, she reversed it, extended it toward Dynell. “Lest you think that I, too, am too dangerous to live.”
As his hand reached to close about, it, she quickly faced away. She was hardly aware of the flash that followed. Her eyes were closed. She didn’t want to look again at Lon-den in death. She wanted to remember him as he had lived.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
DARBY said, “It took some doing, but I’m at last empowered by the Council to make peace. The terms have already been stated. The pact will be drawn up here in the neutral Eg System when Rahn Buskner and emissaries from Earth arrive. Are you happy about it?” Aline pressed close. “Very,” she said. “Both sides are to help in reconstruction on the Eg planets. The Novakkans are to substitute trading for raiding. Poetic, eh? How does it sound?”
“Wonderful.”
“And Earth is to return to them the Lexn System and receive charts of thousands of energy fields, along with information about their discoveries on remote planets. Culture will advance centuries overnight.”
Aline waited. He was thoughtful, frowning. Finally he said, “What did you do with that gun you carried?”
“Gave it to Acra-non. I’m also going to give him the cruiser.”
“Hm—m! It’s yours, of course, to do with as you please. But scientists want to examine it, to learn why it won’t repeat its performance of yesterday, now that your friend is dead.”
“It’s my mother’s and her message advised me to part with it.”
“And speaking of yesterday,” he went on, “it’s strange about Dynell. He wasn’t the type to commit suicide. But all of us saw it. And it wiped out the opposition to peace. I guess his mind suddenly broke when he realized he had killed your friend.”
Friend? The word sounded strange to Aline. She remembered the rites in the big marble hall. Tears started in her eyes, but she blinked them back, pressed closer to Darby.
There would be other rites on Delos, this time sealing a contract she could wholeheartedly fulfill.
END OF BOOK TWO
Did you miss Book One of “Reckoning From Eternity” of which the book you have just read is one of three? Well, don’t let it annoy you—just send 10¢ to cover the cost of handling, postage and an envelope to Ray Pa
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«««
Learn what happened to Moxol, the son of Rahn Buskner and Aleta Winrow, when he found a witch named Eleva on a Mallikan pleasure ship, and while the red Blood dripped from his blade, heard from her lips o prophecy that was to be fulfilled to the letter, as he became the scourge of the Universe, and known as Moxol the Murderer:
“Within seven hundred days your name will crackle across the galaxy. It will be written in blood. On planets unnumbered you will be hated, feared, and the price on your head will be so great it will give courage to the faintest of heart. Everywhere you turn your life will be sought. By the sign of three stars your destiny will be entwined.
“The yellow star is a woman, tall, stately, fair, a queen. Men have died because of her, and because of her the galaxy will be divided. At the head of an armada stretching from star to star Moxol the Murderer will prevail.
“The red star is a girl, slender, sensitive, auburn of hair, blue of eyes. From another era she will coax life and weapons of unlimited power. She will cast her lot with that of a man accepted as a god, whose power is greater than an armada. She will bring peace, but it is only a lull . . . for there is yet the dark star.
“The dark star is the spirit of life and mystery in a dark sultry girl, soon to become a woman of bewitching charm and power to move men. Her net is spread over Moxol the Murderer, and the spell that she will cast will unleash the furies of hell. It will be she who opens the gate to another era and all the terrors of mortal and immortal creation from
INFINITY TO INFINITY!
DON’T MISS IT! The Third Book in a New Era of Science Fiction. The final novelette in Hal Annas’ tremendous trilogy. On Sale January 24.
