The Golden Age Of Science Fiction Vol Ii Part 52

The score of members of the crew, bronzed s.p.a.ce-sailors out of every port in the solar system, had listened mutely. Now, one of them, a tall tube-man, stepped forward a little.

"Just what is this dead-area, sir?" he asked. "I've heard of it, but as this is my first outer-planet voyage, I know nothing about it."

"I'll admit I know little more," said Liggett, "save that a good many disabled s.h.i.+ps have drifted into it and have never come out."

"The dead area," Crain told them, "is a region of s.p.a.ce ninety thousand miles across within Neptune's...o...b..t, in which the ordinary gravitational attractions of the solar system are dead. This is because in that region the pulls of the sun and the outer planets exactly balance each other. Because of that, anything in the dead-area, will stay in there until time ends, unless it has power of its own. Many wrecked s.p.a.ce-s.h.i.+ps have drifted into it at one time or another, none ever emerging; and it's believed that there is a great ma.s.s of wrecks somewhere in the area, drawn and held together by mutual attraction."

"And we're drifting in to join them," Kent said. "Some prospect!"

"Then there's really no chance for us?" asked Liggett keenly.

Captain Crain thought. "As I see it, very little," he admitted. "If our auxiliary radio can reach some nearby s.h.i.+p before the Pallas enters the dead-area, we'll have a chance. But it seems a remote one."

He addressed himself to the men: "I have laid the situation frankly before you because I consider you ent.i.tled to the truth. You must remember, however, that while there is life there is hope.

"There will be no change in s.h.i.+p routine, and the customary watches will be kept. Half-rations of food and water will be the rule from now on, though. That is all."

As the men moved silently off, the captain looked after them with something of pride.

"They're taking it like men," he told Kent and Liggett. "It's a pity there's no way out for them and us."

"If the Pallas does enter the dead-area and join the wreck-pack," Liggett said, "how long will we be able to live?"

"Probably for some months on our present condensed air and food supplies," Crain answered. "I would prefer, myself, a quicker end."

"So would I," said Kent. "Well, there's nothing left but to pray for some kind of s.h.i.+p to cross our path in the next day or two."

Kent's prayers were not answered in the next s.h.i.+p-day, nor in the next. For, though one of the Pallas' radio-operators was constantly at the instruments under Captain Crain's orders, the weak calls of the auxiliary set raised no response.

Had they been on the Venus or Mars run, Kent told himself, there would be some chance, but out here in the vast s.p.a.ces, between the outer planets, s.h.i.+ps were fewer and farther between. The big, cigar-shaped freighter drifted helplessly on in a broad curve toward the dreaded area, the green light-speck of Neptune swinging to their left.

On the third s.h.i.+p-day Kent and Captain Crain stood in the pilot-house behind Liggett, who sat at the now useless rocket-tube controls. Their eyes were on the big gla.s.s screen of the gravograph. The black dot on it that represented their s.h.i.+p was crawling steadily toward the bright red circle that stood for the dead-area....

They watched silently until the dot had crawled over the circle's red line, heading toward its center.

"Well, we're in at last," Kent commented. "There seems to be no change in anything, either."

Crain pointed to the instrument-panel. "Look at the gravitometers."

Kent did. "All dead! No gravitational pull from any direction--no, that one shows a slight attraction from ahead!"

"Then gravitational attraction of some sort does exist in the dead-area after all!" Liggett exclaimed.

"You don't understand," said Crain. "That attraction from ahead is the pull of the wreck-pack at the dead-area's center."

"And it's pulling the Pallas toward it?" Kent exclaimed.

Crain nodded. "We'll probably reach the wreck-pack in two more s.h.i.+p-days."

The next two s.h.i.+p-days seemed to Kent drawn out endlessly. A moody silence had grown upon the officers and men of the s.h.i.+p. All seemed oppressed by the strange forces of fate that had seized the s.h.i.+p and were carrying it, smoothly and soundlessly, into this region of irrevocable doom.

The radio-operators' vain calls had ceased. The Pallas drifted on into the dreaded area like some dumb s.h.i.+p laden with d.a.m.ned souls. It drifted on, Kent told himself, as many a wrecked and disabled s.h.i.+p had done before it, with the ordinary activities and life of the solar system forever behind it, and mystery and death ahead.

It was toward the end of the second of those two s.h.i.+p-days that Liggett's voice came down from the pilot-house: "Wreck-pack in sight ahead!"

"We've arrived, anyway!" Kent cried, as he and Crain hastened up into the pilot house. The crew was running to the deck-windows.

"Right ahead there, about fifteen degrees left," Liggett told Kent and Crain, pointing. "Do you see it?"

Kent stared; nodded. The wreck-pack was a distant, disk-like ma.s.s against the star-flecked heavens, a ma.s.s that glinted here and there in the feeble sunlight of s.p.a.ce. It did not seem large, but, as they drifted steadily closer in the next hours, they saw that in reality the wreck-pack was tremendous, measuring at least fifty miles across.

Its huge ma.s.s was a heterogeneous heap, composed mostly of countless cigar-like s.p.a.ce-s.h.i.+ps in all stages of wreckage. Some appeared smashed almost out of all recognizable shape, while others were, to all appearances unharmed. They floated together in this dense ma.s.s in s.p.a.ce, crowded against one another by their mutual attraction.

There seemed to be among them every type of s.h.i.+p known in the solar system, from small, swift mail-boats to big freighters. And, as they drifted nearer, the three in the pilot-house could see that around and between the s.h.i.+ps of the wreck-pack floated much other matter--fragments of wreckage, meteors, small and large, and s.p.a.ce-debris of every sort.

The Pallas was drifting, not straight toward the wreck-pack, but in a course that promised to take the s.h.i.+p past it.

"We're not heading into the wreck-pack!" Liggett exclaimed. "Maybe we'll drift past it, and on out the dead-area's other side!"

Captain Crain smiled mirthlessly. "You're forgetting your s.p.a.ce-mechanics, Liggett. We will drift along the wreck-pack's edge, and then will curve in and go round it in a closing spiral until we reach its edge."

"Lord, who'd have thought there were so many wrecks here!" Kent marvelled. "There must be thousands of them!"

"They've been collecting here ever since the first interplanetary rocket-s.h.i.+ps went forth," Crain reminded him. "Not only meteor-wrecked s.h.i.+ps, but s.h.i.+ps whose mechanisms went wrong--or that ran out of fuel like ours--or that were captured and sacked, and then set adrift by s.p.a.ce-pirates."

The Pallas by then was drifting along the wreck-pack's rim at a half-mile distance, and Kent's eyes were running over the ma.s.s.

"Some of those s.h.i.+ps look entirely undamaged. Why couldn't we find one that has fuel in its tanks, transfer it to our own tanks, and get away?" he asked.

Crain's eyes lit. "Kent, that's a real chance! There must be some s.h.i.+ps in that pack with fuel in them, and we can use the s.p.a.ce-suits to explore for them!"

"Look, we're beginning to curve in around the pack now!" Liggett exclaimed.

The Pallas, as though loath to pa.s.s the wreck-pack, was curving inward to follow its rim. In the next hours it continued to sail slowly around the great pack, approaching closer and closer to its edge.

In those hours Kent and Crain and all in the s.h.i.+p watched with a fascinated interest that even knowledge of their own peril could not kill. They could see swift-lined pa.s.senger-s.h.i.+ps of the Pluto and Neptune runs shouldering against small s.p.a.ce-yachts with the insignia of Mars or Venus on their bows. Wrecked freighters from Saturn or Earth floated beside rotund grain-boats from Jupiter.

The debris among the pack's wrecks was just as varied, holding fragments of metal, dark meteors of differing size--and many human bodies. Among these were some clad in the insulated s.p.a.ce-suits, with their transparent gla.s.site helmets. Kent wondered what wreck they had abandoned hastily in those suits, only to be swept with it into the dead-area, to die in their suits.

By the end of that s.h.i.+p-day, the Pallas, having floated almost completely around the wreck-pack, finally struck the wrecks at its edge with a jarring shock; then bobbed for a while and lay still. From pilot-house and deck windows the men looked eagerly forth.

Their s.h.i.+p floated at the wreck-pack's edge. Directly to its right floated a sleek, s.h.i.+ning Ura.n.u.s-Jupiter pa.s.senger-s.h.i.+p whose bows had been smashed in by a meteor. On their left bobbed an unmarked freighter of the old type with projecting rocket-tubes, apparently intact. Beyond them in the wreck-pack lay another Ura.n.u.s craft, a freighter, and, beyond it, stretched the countless other wrecks.

Captain Crain summoned the crew together again on the middle-deck.

"Men, we've reached the wreck-pack at the dead-area's center, and here we'll stay until the end of time unless we get out under our own power. Mr. Kent has suggested a possible way of doing so, which I consider highly feasible.

"He has suggested that in some of the s.h.i.+ps in the wreck-pack may be found enough fuel to enable us to escape from the dead-area, once it is transferred to this s.h.i.+p. I am going to permit him to explore the wreck-pack with a party in s.p.a.ce suits, and I am asking for volunteers for this service."

The entire crew stepped quickly forward. Crain smiled. "Twelve of you will be enough," he told them. "The eight tube-men and four of the cargo-men will go, therefore, with Mr. Kent and Mr. Liggett as leaders. Mr. Kent, you may address the men if you wish."

"Get down to the lower airlock and into your s.p.a.ce-suits at once, then," Kent told them. "Mr. Liggett, will you supervise that?"

As Liggett and the men trooped down to the airlock, Kent turned back toward his superior.

"There's a very real chance of your becoming lost in this huge wreck-pack, Kent," Crain told him: "so be very careful to keep your bearings at all times. I know I can depend on you."

"I'll do my best," Kent was saying, when Liggett's excited face reappeared suddenly at the stair.

"There are men coming toward the Pallas along the wreck-pack's edge!" he reported--"a half-dozen men in s.p.a.ce-suits!"

"You must be mistaken, Liggett!" exclaimed Crain. "They must be some of the bodies in s.p.a.ce-suits we saw in the pack."

"No, they're living men!" Liggett cried. "They're coming straight toward us--come down and see!"

Crain and Kent followed Liggett quickly down to the airlock room, where the men who had started donning their s.p.a.ce-suits were now peering excitedly from the windows. Crain and Kent looked where Liggett pointed, along the wreck-pack's edge to the s.h.i.+p's right.

Six floating shapes, men in s.p.a.ce-suits, were approaching along the pack's border. They floated smoothly through s.p.a.ce, reaching the wrecked pa.s.senger-s.h.i.+p beside the Pallas. They braced their feet against its side and propelled themselves on through the void like swimmers under water, toward the Pallas.

"They must be survivors from some wreck that drifted in here as we did!" Kent exclaimed. "Maybe they've lived here for months!"

"It's evident that they saw the Pallas drift into the pack, and have come to investigate," Crain estimated. "Open the airlock for them, men, for they'll want to come inside."

Two of the men spun the wheels that slid aside the airlock's outer door. In a moment the half-dozen men outside had reached the s.h.i.+p's side, and had pulled themselves down inside the airlock.

When all were in, the outer door was closed, and air hissed in to fill the lock. The airlock's inner door then slid open and the newcomers stepped into the s.h.i.+p's interior, uns.c.r.e.w.i.n.g their transparent helmets as they did so. For a few moments the visitors silently surveyed their new surroundings.

Their leader was a swarthy individual with sardonic black eyes who, on noticing Crain's captain-insignia, came toward him with outstretched hand. His followers seemed to be cargo-men or deck-men, looking hardly intelligent enough to Kent's eyes to be tube-men.

"Welcome to our city!" their leader exclaimed as he shook Crain's hand. "We saw your s.h.i.+p drift in, but hardly expected to find anyone living in it."

"I'll confess that we're surprised ourselves to find any life here," Crain told him. "You're living on one of the wrecks?"

The other nodded. "Yes, on the Martian Queen, a quarter-mile along the pack's edge. It was a Saturn-Neptune pa.s.senger s.h.i.+p, and about a month ago we were at this cursed dead-area's edge, when half our rocket-tubes exploded. Eighteen of us escaped the explosion, the s.h.i.+p's walls still being tight; and we drifted into the pack here, and have been living here ever since."

"My name's Krell," he added, "and I was a tube-man on the s.h.i.+p. I and another of the tube-men, named Jandron, were the highest in rank left, all the officers and other tube-men having been killed, so we took charge and have been keeping order."

"What about your pa.s.sengers?" Liggett asked.

"All killed but one," Krell answered. "When the tubes let go they smashed up the whole lower two decks."

Crain briefly explained to him the Pallas' predicament. "Mr. Kent and Mr. Liggett were on the point of starting a search of the wreck-pack for fuel when you arrived," he said, "With enough fuel we can get clear of the dead-area."

Krell's eyes lit up. "That would mean a getaway for all of us! It surely ought to be possible!"

"Do you know whether there are any s.h.i.+ps in the pack with fuel in their tanks?" Kent asked. Krell shook his head.

"We've searched through the wreck-pack a good bit, but never bothered about fuel, it being no good to us. But there ought to be some, at least: there's enough wrecks in this cursed place to make it possible to find almost anything.

"You'd better not start exploring, though," he added, "without some of us along as guides, for I'm here to tell you that you can lose yourself in this wreck-pack without knowing it. If you wait until to-morrow, I'll come over myself and go with you."

"I think that would be wise," Crain said to Kent. "There is plenty of time."

"Time is the one thing there's plenty of in this d.a.m.ned place," Krell agreed. "We'll be getting back to the Martian Queen now and give the good news to Jandron and the rest."

"Wouldn't mind if Liggett and I came along, would you?" Kent asked. "I'd like to see how your s.h.i.+p's fixed--that is, if it's all right with you, sir," he added to his superior.

Crain nodded. "All right if you don't stay long," he said. But, to Kent's surprise Krell seemed reluctant to endorse his proposal.

"I guess it'll be all right," he said slowly, "though there's nothing much on the Martian Queen to see."

Krell and his followers replaced their helmets and returned into the airlock. Liggett followed them, and, as Kent struggled hastily into a s.p.a.ce-suit, he found Captain Crain at his side.

"Kent, look sharp when you get over on that s.h.i.+p," Crain told him. "I don't like the look of this Krell, and his story about all the officers being killed in the explosion sounds fishy to me."

"To me, too," Kent agreed. "But Liggett and I will have the suit-phones in our s.p.a.ce-suits and can call you from there in case of need."

Crain nodded, and Kent with s.p.a.ce-suit on and transparent helmet screwed tight, stepped into the airlock with the rest. The airlock's inner door closed, the outer one opened, and as the air puffed out into s.p.a.ce, Kent and Krell and Liggett leapt out into the void, the others following.

It was no novelty to Kent to float in a s.p.a.ce-suit in the empty void. He and the others now floated as smoothly as though under water toward a wrecked liner at the Pallas' right. They reached it, pulled themselves around it, and, with feet braced against its side, propelled themselves on through s.p.a.ce along the border of the wreck-pack.

They pa.s.sed a half-dozen wrecks thus, before coming to the Martian Queen. It was a silvery, glistening s.h.i.+p whose stern and lower walls were bulging and strained, but not cracked. Kent told himself that Krell had spoken truth about the exploding rocket-tubes, at least.

They struck the Martian Queen's side and entered the upper-airlock open for them. Once through the airlock they found themselves on the s.h.i.+p's upper-deck. And when Kent and Liggett removed their helmets with the others they found a full dozen men confronting them, a brutal-faced group who exhibited some surprise at sight of them.

Foremost among them stood a tall, heavy individual who regarded Kent and Liggett with the cold, suspicious eyes of an animal.

"My comrade and fellow-ruler here, Wald Jandron," said Krell. To Jandron he explained rapidly. "The whole crew of the Pallas is alive, and they say if they can find fuel in the wreck-pack their s.h.i.+p can get out of here."

"Good," grunted Jandron. "The sooner they can do it, the better it will be for us."