by Harl Vincent
HELPLESS IN SPACE
Randall stopped short and Captain Stark stared. They both felt a steady throbbing in the berylumin floor of the ethership’s navigating cabin. It was an alien pulsation, a steady beat of uniform pattern and intensity.
Captain Stark’s face showed alarm and puzzlement. “What is it, Randall?”
“Whatever it is, it’s coming from outside the ship,” he muttered, busying himself with the glittering array of instruments.
The Captain fidgeted and chewed his mustache as Randall worked.
He finally looked up from the instruments, his face expressionless. “We’ve been caught up by a cosmic ray stream fifteen hundred miles wide. Its hold is unbreakable. We’ll just have to let it take us where it will.”
“Impossible!” the Captain roared. “We must be able to pull out.” He stomped to the engine room optophone and bellowed, “Maximum acceleration on neutrino power! No rocket ignition until ordered.”
Randall froze. “I warn you,” he blurted, “don’t waste any rocket fuel. We’ll need it for landing—somewhere.”
THE DOOMSDAY PLANET
HARL VINCENT
an original novel
A TOWER BOOK
THE DOOMSDAY PLANET
Copyright © 1966 by Harl Vincent
All characters and situations in this book are fictitious.
A TOWER BOOK
Tower Publications, Inc.
185 Madison Avenue
New York, New York
All Rights Reserved
Printed in U.S.A.
CHAPTER ONE
Later on, Jack Donley was to remember this night’s performance by Doris Bright with a strange feeling of awe. Her haunting songs and the feeling with which she put them across had proved to be prophetic. She seemed to him a personification of his fiancee, Mera, who had been lost in space with the Saturnia.
Donley was on the Meteoric because she was the first ethership since the ill-fated Saturnia to take the outside route from Earth’s lunar station to Mars. He had watched several months for just such a scheduled voyage, having had vivid recurrent premonitions that he would thus learn what had happened to his betrothed. He’d never believed her dead.
Tire beautiful singer was abroad for a quite different reason. She was vacation-honeymooning with lief new husband, Fred Underwood. Since there was apparent a growing nervousness among the few passengers, Doris had volunteered*to entertain them on this the second night out from Luna.
Jal Tarjen, a big bronzed Martian, sat alongside Underwood who, naturally, was closest to the rostrum where his bride was to perform. Behind them was Miss Barrett, an unobtrusive New England spinster on her first interplanetary voyage. There were two very young girls, beyond doubt sisters, possibly twins. Phil Carter, the talkative New Yorker, who had hinted that he owned a significant portion of the Meteoric’s cargo, was trying without success to stay away from Lantag, a good-natured but blundering Lunarian who showed signs of mild intoxication. Davidson and Brand, two young computer programmers on vacation, were with Doctor Randall, whose reputation had been earned in his many years of space technology experience. Randall’s, presence on the ethership was a thorn in the side of the irascible Captain Stark, who leaned against the berylumin wall at the back of the music room, smoking quietly. He had learned that Randall was aboard by order of the World Space Authority and this bothered him. He was a tough space veteran and he didn’t need an official monitor…even in the unfamiliarity of the outside route!
Several passengers had been taken with space sickness and were in their cabins, which accounted for the slim audience. The crew, those on watch, were at their stations in force. The Meteoric drove on her course.
Donley closed his eyes as the clear sweet voice mingled with the electronic orchestrium organ filling the cabin with magic melody. He closed his eyes to the beauty of this golden haired girl who made him think so much of Mera.
When the last triumphant crescendo ended with a crash of jubilant chords, there was complete silence. Then the applause broke out from the small company of listeners, perhaps too loud and too long.
Miss Bright seemed to sense the anxiety. Rising from the console and silencing the acclaim she questioned Captain Stark. “Captain, would you kindly tell us what the outside route is and why we are taking it?”
With extremely poor grace, the Captain growled, “Doctor Randall can explain better than I,” and stalked from the room.
Doris looked stunned for only a second; then her smile returned. “Sony, Doctor Randall,” she murmured. “Do you mind taking over?”
Randall unlimbered his lanky frame and jackknifed to his feet. “Don’t mind at all,” he drawled. He angled to the dais on which the console was installed and faced the mike. Scratching his bald pate, he began, “Folks, the outside route is merely one that is out and away from the ecliptic, which is the plane of Earth’s orbit. The orbital planes of our other planets vary only a few degrees from the ecliptic, so most space travel is within these planes and timed to the positions of the bodies. But occasionally there are space storms or other hazards in the usual lanes and then the outside route is preferred, as is now the case. This is just an outer lane, parallel to the ecliptic at a distance of about ten million miles, a longer way but considered safer than the regular routes. It’s as simple as that.”
A multiple sigh of relief went up from the little assemblage as Randall bowed and returned to his seat. Then a ripple of applause.
Doris caressed the keys of the console and a noble melody rolled from the organ. Her listeners sat spellbound, none more so than Donley. Again his eyes were closed and again his heart leaped with hope. More than ever he was convinced that he would find Mera—alive.
At length the audience gave out with a standing ovation such as this music room had never witnessed. Doris herself was so moved by the demonstration that she could scarcely utter the words of thanks that trembled on her lips. Silently, thoughtfully, the audience broke up and went their ways until only Randall, Donley, and the two programmers remained.
“You know something,” Randall said softly, “there was a power here that can not be explained fully. A glorious voice, sure, but a power that came from inside and seemed almost put there by an outside force of infinite capability. A controlling mind.”
“A deity, you mean?” There was a hint of youthful scorn in young Davidson’s question.
“Call it what you will.” Randall’s words were thoughtful, measured. “There must be a super-intelligence; this universe of ours didn’t just happen. There is too much ordered uniformity, cyclic natural phenomena. It couldn’t have merely happened that way.” He sort of glared at his listeners as if daring them to deny his hypothesis.
“Something like a digital computer,” said Brand without conviction. “You store certain things in its memory and its various outputs can perform the duties assigned. And there had to be a ‘you’ to program these activities.”
“We-ell, not exactly,” said Randall, “but the analogy will serve, in want of a better one. What has impressed me over the years is the correlation of natural phenomena that betokens the existence of a lone controlling force. An all-encompassing mind or intelligence, let us say, or perhaps we may even conceive of our expanding universe as an enormous organism of which our solar system is but an atom and our Milky Way only a molecule.”
“Sun spots come and go in regular cycles, don’t they?” Donley asked.
“Yes and there are tides in the sun itself, corresponding to the movements of the planets. Even hard winters and extra hot summers on earth occur in more or less uniform cycles. Our regular periods of sleep…”
Randall stopped short and the others stared. For there abruptly came a steady throbbing in the berylu
min floor that supported them. An alien pulsation, a steady beat of uniform pattern and intensity. Pulses, beats, in pairs—not quite equal in intensity. Lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub …
“Like a human heart beat,” gasped Davidson. This was an awesome demonstration—of something.
“Well, certainly there’s no pump on board that could set up such a vibration,” drawled Randall. “It would have to be a reciprocating type and ours are all centrifugal.”
Despite his athletic background, Jack Donley had an insatiable thirst for knowledge. He grasped and retained it with amazing facility, whether scientific, philosophical, political or what have you. “Could the pulse come from outside the ship?” he asked Randall, finger on chin.
“It could.” Randall mused as he listened and the rest held their breath. Then, slipping to his knees, he touched his fingertips delicately to the floor to better sense the periodicity. “If it does come from outside it would demonstrate the sort of thing I’ve been talking about, a new and different stellar or nebular throb. What it means—”
Captain Stark burst into the room, red-faced with alarm and puzzlement. He stopped short, seemed to get hold of himself with an effort and, instead of the anticipated tirade, let out with: “What goes on, Randall? Can you find out?”
Randall chuckled inwardly. “I’ll try,” he agreed, marveling that none of the passengers had panicked.
Donley trailed Doctor Randall and the captain; he didn’t intend to miss anything.
In the navigating cabin, Randall busied himself at once with the glittering array of mechanisms that Donley could make neither head nor tail of. Electronic gadgets, optical instruments, a complicated but compact computer. Captain Stark fidgeted and chewed his mustache as Randall worked. The throb was less noticeable here—lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub—but persistently present.
Finally Randall had the answers. “Captain,” he said, “we’ve been caught up by a cosmic ray stream fifteen hundred miles wide. Its hold is unbreakable, far in excess of the Meteoric’s total power to pull out. We’ll just have to let it take us where it will.”
The Captain stood rigid. “How far are we off course?” he demanded with rising inflection.
“Half a million miles,” Randall told him.
“Impossible!” the Captain roared. “We must be able to pull out of this ray stream or whatever it is you call it!” He stomped to the engine room optophone and bellowed, “Maximum acceleration on neutrino drive! No rocket,ignition until so ordered.”
Randall stopped in his tracks. “I warn you,” he said, “Don’t waste any rocket fuel. You’ll need it for landing—somewhere.”
Captain Stark harrumped and repeated his order to the engine room. Donley quickly followed Randall out into the corridor. As the full force of rapidly increasing acceleration took hold, they clung to the handrails in order to make even halting progress toward the main saloon. By now the passengers surely would be congregated there.
The ship lurched in an effort to angle out of the ray stream. “He’ll never learn!” Randall grunted. “Or maybe he will—the hard way.”
The throb was in the floor, the walls, in the very air they were breathing. Lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub, endlessly, monotonously. But the ship’s internal gravity compensators had taken hold and the process of walking was again normal.
All twenty of the Meteoric’s passengers were now in the main saloon as Donley had anticipated. The few who had been confined to their cabins with space sickness were in recoil seats; most of the others gathered in small groups, talking, obviously trying to keep themselves in hand. The large congregation made the vibration a little less noticeable, but certainly they had felt the lurching and the pull of increased acceleration and were starting to become fearful.
Randall nudged him and whispered, “Say something to them.” He had seen that Donley liked people, that people liked and trusted him, that he was exceptionally endowed with the quality of leadership.
“Like what?”
“They’re on the point of becoming panicky. Keep them in line.”
Jack Donley moved to the forward bulkhead rail. He raised his voice and immediately everyone listened, even Lantag, who had been roaming about with a vacuous grin and dreamy eyes. “Folks,” said Jack, “Doctor Randall and I’ve talked with the captain about our situation and to reassure you all I’ll go get him to explain it himself. Sit tight now.” He ducked out the door and those whose voices had been rising quieted down. Donley’s confident air had impressed them.
Donley was almost as good as his word, being back in a few minutes, not with the captain but with the stiffly uniformed steward, who had been primed with swift words and a twenty-credit note.
“There’s nothing to cause alarm,” the steward averred. “This ship has every safety device known and was, WSA inspected before we blasted off. Captain Stark is at the controls or he’d tell you himself. He’s now maneuvering us out of the energy stream into which we were drawn and there may be more lurching of the vessel. So it will be safest if you all take to the recoil seats for a time. You’ll be advised when all’s clear.”
A few hand-claps speeded his departure and those who had not already done so now made for the deeply cushioned seats and strapped themselves in. Donley was here, there, and everywhere, trying to impart confidence, giving help when needed.
Happily, there was no great confusion or display of fear. But as conversation died down to an occasional whisper, the throb from space became more noticeable. Lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub.
Inexplicable. Ominous. Yet deceptively lulling.
CHAPTER TWO
Donley had been questioning Randall.
“Yes, it’s quite likely the Saturnia was caught up in this same ray stream,” Randall was saying, “but this doesn’t help us any.”
“It does me. You may think I’m bats, but I’ve heard this same throb in my dreams of Mera. Whether asleep or daydreaming;”
“No, you’re not crazy. The close bond between you and Mera set up a telepathic rapport. You’re probably gifted with ESP.”
Donley didn’t laugh. “So you see I’ve been expecting something unusual. We won’t be able to pull out of it, will we?”
“I’m sure we’ll not. But what’s that got to do with it?”
“We’ll land where the Saturnia did, won’t we?”
“Probably so.”
“That’s why I booked passage on this ship.”
“You do have ESP.” Randall eyed him speculatively. “But do you really think you’ll find your Mera—alive?”
“I do. I tell you I’ve seen her in bizarre surroundings. Scared and lonely.” Donley suddenly plunged into memories of Mera, of their love. He had to find her, he thought desperately.
The computer shows, we haven’t changed the situation at all. We are in full grip of this energy stream, going the way it determines.”
Randall picked up the tape that was coiling from the logging typewriter and nodded agreement. “Each burst of acceleration and each try at breaking out of the stream has failed, immediate return to the speed and direction of the ray stream following.”
“I don’t believe it,” the captain stated less confidently. “My control instruments indicated one-g and two-g decreases as well as directional changes.” He cut back the rocket motor throttles nevertheless.
“Same as shown on the tape,” Randall agreed, “but for seconds only, then back to the original.”
“I’m sick,” Captain Stark averred, turning from the console. He looked it. His color was ghastly and his hands shook. So did his head. Mr. Standish was at his side in an instant, feeling for his pulse.
“He is sick,” he finally pronounced.
As he spoke, Stark crumpled and slipped to the floor. Donley arrived on the scene and helped Standish pick up the man and carry him from the cabin—to get him in his own bed.
Randall was at the electronic feelers and the optical instruments, as busy as the proverbial bee. He checked and rechecked to make certain
he had not erred. And then he looked up into the concerned faces of Donley and Standish.
“How’s the captain?” he asked.
A puzzled frown wrinkled Standish’s brow. “He’s slipped into a deep sleep. Not quite a natural one, yet I know he’s had no drug.”
Meanwhile, Randall had been learning something he didn’t believe at first so was now rechecking. Directly ahead in their enforced orbital course, there appeared to be an object of planetary size and conformation. They were rushing toward it at the speed imposed upon them by the ray stream. It was difficult to determine as yet how long it was to be until the two bodies met, but meet they must as things were now progressing.
He looked up at last from the electronic feeler screen and said to nobody in particular: “It’s there all right. And we’ll soon have to negotiate a landing.”
“What’s there?” Donley demanded.
“A planet or large asteroid. On dead center in the ray stream. We can’t miss it.”
“You mean we’ll collide with it?” asked Standish. “Not necessarily. If the captain hasn’t ran our fuel too low, we can land—I think.”
Excitedly, Donley exclaimed. “It’s where the Saturnia landed, I’m sure of it.”
Donley closed his eyes and became aware of the lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub pulsation that was faintly manifest here in the control center. It lulled him into an indescribable feeling of lassitude and lack of concern. He shook his head to clear it and his eyes popped open.
The steward appeared at the door, visibly agitated. “Mister Standish,” he told the mate, “some of the passengers are acting oddly and some seem to be overcome. There’s a lot of restlessness among them.” Donley was first out the door and clattering along the passage to the main saloon.
