Empire Part 31

Craven didn't make a try at Neptune. The planet was far away when they intersected its...o...b..t ... furthermore, a wall of darkness had closed in about the s.h.i.+ps. They were going three times as fast as light and the speed was still accelerating!

Hour after hour, day after day, the _Invincible_ and its trailing captive sped doggedly outward into s.p.a.ce. Out into the absolute wastes of interstellar s.p.a.ce, where the stars were flecks of light, like tiny eyes watching from very far away.

Russ lounged in the control chair and stared out the vision plate. There was nothing to see, nothing to do. There hadn't been anything to see or do for days. The controls were locked at maximum and the engines still hammered their roaring song of speed and power. Before them stretched an empty gulf that probably never before had been traversed by any intelligence, certainly not by man.

Out into the mystery of interstellar s.p.a.ce. Only it didn't seem mysterious. It was very commonplace and ordinary, almost monotonous.

Russ gripped his pipe and chuckled.

There had been a day when men had maintained one couldn't go faster than light. Also, men had claimed that it would be impossible to force nature to give up the secret of material energy. But here they were, speeding along faster than light, their engines roaring with the power of material energy.

They were plowing a new s.p.a.ce road, staking out a new path across the deserts of s.p.a.ce, pioneering far beyond the 'last frontier.'

Greg's steps sounded across the room. "We've gone a long way, Russ.

Maybe we better begin to slow down a bit."

"Yes," agreed Russ. He leaned forward and grasped the controls. "We'll slow down now," he said.

Sudden silence smote the s.h.i.+p. Their ears, accustomed for days to the throaty roarings of the engines, rang with the torture of no sound.

Long minutes and then new sounds began to be heard ... the soft humming of the single engine that provided power for the interior apparatus and the maintenance of the outer screens.

"Soon as we slow down below the speed of light," said Greg, "we'll throw the televisor on Craven's s.h.i.+p and learn what we can about his apparatus. No use trying it now, for we couldn't use it, because we're in the same s.p.a.ce condition it uses in normal operation."

"In fact," laughed Russ, "we can't do much of anything except move.

Energies simply can't pa.s.s through this s.p.a.ce we're in. We're marooned."

Greg sat down in a chair, gazed solemnly at Russ.

"Just what was our top speed?" he demanded.

Russ grinned. "Ten thousand times the speed of light," he said.

Greg whistled soundlessly. "A long way from home."

Far away, the stars were tiny pinpoints, like little crystals s.h.i.+ning by the reflection of a light. Pinpoints of light and s.h.i.+mmering ma.s.ses of lacy silver ... star dust that seemed ghostly and strange, but was in reality the ma.s.sing of many million mighty stars. And great empty black s.p.a.ces where there was not a single light, where the dark went on and on and did not stop.

Greg exhaled his breath softly. "Well, we're here."

"Wherever that might be," amended Russ.

There were no familiar constellations, not a single familiar star. Every sign post of the s.p.a.ce they had known was wiped out.

"There really aren't any brilliant stars," said Russ. "None at all. We must be in a sort of hole in s.p.a.ce, a place that's relatively empty of any stars."

Greg nodded soberly. "Good thing we have those mechanical shadows.

Without them we'd never find our way back home. But we have several that will lead us back."

Outside the vision panel, they could see Craven's s.h.i.+p. Freed now of the s.p.a.ce field, it was floating slowly, still under the grip of the momentum they had built up in their dash across s.p.a.ce. It was so close that they could see the lettering across its bow.

"So they call it the _Interplanetarian_," said Russ.

Greg nodded. "Guess it's about time we talk to them. I'm afraid they're getting pretty nervous."

"Do you have any idea where we are?" demanded Ludwig Stutsman.

Craven shook his head. "No more idea than you have. Manning snaked us across billions of miles, clear out of the Solar System into interstellar s.p.a.ce. Take a look at those stars and you get some idea."

Spencer Chambers stroked his gray mustache, asked calmly: "What do you figure our chances are of getting back?"

"That's something we'll know more about later," said Craven. "Doesn't look too bright right now. I'm not worrying about that. What I'm wondering about is what Manning and Page are going to do now that they have us out here."

"I thought you'd be," said a voice that came out of clear air.

They stared at the place from which the voice had seemed to come. There was a slight refraction in the air; then, swiftly, a man took shape. It was Manning. He stood before them, smiling.

"h.e.l.lo, Manning," said Craven. "I figured you'd pay us a call when you got around to it."

"Look here," snarled Stutsman, but he stopped when Chambers' hand fell upon his shoulder, gripped it hard.

"Got plenty of air?" asked Greg.

"Air? Sure. Atmosphere machines working perfectly," Craven replied.

"Fine," said Greg. "How about food and water? Plenty of both?"

"Plenty," said Craven.

"Look here, Manning," broke in Chambers, "where's all this questioning leading? What have you got up your sleeve?"

"Just wanted to be sure," Greg told him. "Would hate to have you fellows starve on me, or go thirsty. Wouldn't want to come back and find you all dead."

"Come back?" asked Chambers wonderingly. "I'm afraid I don't understand.

Is this a joke of some sort?"

"No joke," said Greg grimly. "I thought you might have guessed. I'm going to leave you here."

"Leave us here?" roared Stutsman.

"Keep your s.h.i.+rt on," snapped Greg. "Just for a while, until we can go back to the Solar System and finish a little job we're doing. Then we'll come back and get you."

Craven grimaced. "I thought it would be something like that." He squinted at Manning through the thick lenses. "You never miss a bet, do you?"

Greg laughed. "I try not to."