The Black Star Passes
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John W Campbell >> The Black Star Passes
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Abruptly the three became aware of a rapidly solidifying cloud before
them. The interference of the beam Morey was sending had begun breaking
down the molecular oscillation that permitted the light to pass freely
through the pirate's craft. Suddenly there was a circle of blue light
about the shadow form, and a moment later the ionized air relapsed into
normal condition as the pirate's apparatus broke down under the strain.
At once Morey shut off his apparatus, convinced by the sudden change
that the pirate's apparatus had blown out. He glanced up quickly as
Arcot called to him, "Morey--look at him go!"
Too late. Already the plane had shot off with terrific speed. It had
flashed up and to their left, at a rate of climb that seemed
unbelievable--except that the long trail of flaming gas told the story!
The plane was propelled by rockets! The terrific acceleration carried it
out of their range of vision in an instant, and as Arcot swung the ship
to bring him again within sight of the windows, they gasped, for already
he was many miles away.
There was a terrific wrench as Arcot threw on all the power he dared,
then quickly leveled the machine, following the pirate at lightning
speed. He increased the acceleration further as the men grew accustomed
to the force that weighed them down. Ahead of them the pirate was racing
along, but quickly now they were overhauling him, for his machine had
wings of a sort! They produced a tremendous amount of head resistance at
their present velocity, for already the needle of the radio speedometer
had moved over to one mile a second. They were following the fleet plane
ahead at the rate of 3600 miles an hour. The roar of the air outside was
a tremendous wave of sound, yet to them, protected by the vacuum of the
double walls, it was detectable only by the vibration of the car.
Rapidly the pirate's lead was cut down. It seemed but a moment before he
would be within range of their machine gun. Suddenly he nosed down and
shot for the ground, ten miles below, in a power dive. Instantly Arcot
swung his machine in a loop that held him close to the tail of the
pirate. The swift maneuvers at this speed were a terrific strain on both
men and machines--the acceleration seemed crushing them with the weight
of four men, as Arcot followed the pirate in a wide loop to the right
that ended in a straight climb, the rocket ship standing on its tail,
the rocket blast roaring out behind a stream of fire a half mile long.
The pirate was climbing at a speed that would have distanced any other
machine the world had ever seen, but the tenacious opponent behind him
clung ever tighter to the tiny darting thing. He had released great
clouds of his animation suspending gas. To his utter surprise, the ship
behind him had driven right through it, entirely unaffected! He, who
knew most about the gas, had been unable to devise a material to stop
it, a mask or a tank to store it, yet in some way these men had
succeeded! And that hurtling, bullet-shaped machine behind! Like some
miniature airship it was, but with a speed and an acceleration that put
even his ship to shame! It could twist, turn, dive, rise and shoot off
on the straight-away with more flashing speed than anything aloft. Time
and again he tried complicated maneuvers that strained him to the
utmost, yet that machine always followed after him!
There was one more thing to do. In outer space his rockets would support
him. In a straight climb he shot up to the blazing sun above, out into
space, while the sky around him grew black, and the stars shone in
solemn splendor around him. But he had eyes for only one thing, the
shining car that was rising with more than equal speed behind him. He
knew he must be climbing over two thousand miles an hour, yet the
tracker came ever closer. Just out of sighting range for the machine gun
now ... in a moment ... but, she was faltering!
The men in the machine behind sat white-lipped, tense, as the whirling
shocks of sudden turns at terrific speed twisted the gyroscopic seats
around like peas in a rolling ball. Up, down, left, right, the darting
machine ahead was twisting with unbelievable speed. Then suddenly the
nose was pointed for the zenith again, and with a great column of flame
shooting out behind him, he was heading straight toward space!
"If he gets there, I lose him, Morey!" said Arcot. The terrific
acceleration of the climb seemed to press them to their seats with a
deadly weight. It was labor to talk--but still the car ahead shot
on--slowly they seemed to be overhauling him. Now that the velocities
were perforce lowered by the effects of gravity, and the air resistance
of the atmosphere was well nigh gone, only the acceleration that the
human body could stand was considered. The man ahead was pushing his
plane ahead with an acceleration that would have killed many men!
Slowly the acceleration of the machine was falling. Arcot pushed the
control over to the last ampere, and felt the slight surge, as greater
power rushed through the coils momentarily. Soon this was gone too, as
the generator behind faltered. The driving power of the atmospheric heat
was gone. More than sixty miles below them they could see the Earth as a
greenish brown surface, slightly convex, and far to the east they could
distinguish a silvery line of water! But they had no eyes but for the
column of shooting flame that represented the fleeing raider! Out in
airless space now, he was safe from them. They could not follow. Arcot
turned the plane once more, parallel to the Earth, watching the plane
above through the roof window. Slowly the machine sank to the fifty-mile
level, where there was just sufficient air to maintain it in efficient
operation.
"Well, he beat us! But there is only one thing for us to do. He must
hang there on his rockets till we leave, and we can hang here
indefinitely, if we can only keep this cabin decently warm. He has no
air to cool him, and he has the sun to warm him. The only thing that is
worrying him right now is the heat of his rockets. But he can throw most
of that out with the gases. Lord, that's some machine! But eventually
his rockets will give out, and down he will come, so we'll just hang
here beneath him and--whoa--not so fast--he isn't going to stay there,
it seems; he is angling his ship off a bit, and shooting along, so that,
besides, holding himself up, he is making a little forward progress.
We'll have to follow! He's going to do some speeding, it seems! Well, we
can keep up with him, at our level."
"Dick, no plane ever made before would have stood the terrific pulls and
yanks that his plane got. He was steering and twisting on the standard
type air rudders, and what strains he had! The unique type of plane must
be extremely strong. I never saw one shaped like his before, though--it
is the obvious shape at that! It was just a huge triangular arrowhead!
Did you ever see one like it?"
"Something like it, yes, and so have you. Don't you recognize that as
the development of the old paper gliders you used to throw around as a
kid? It has the same shape, the triangular wings with the point in the
lead, except that he undoubtedly had a slight curve to the wings to
increase the efficiency. Something like the flying wings of fifty years
ago. I hope that man is only a kleptomaniac, because he can be cured of
that, and I may then have a new laboratory partner. He has some
exceedingly intelligent ideas!
"He's an ingenious man, but I wish he didn't store quite so much fuel
in his rocket tubes! It's unbearably cold in here, and I can't sacrifice
any power just for comfort. The rocket ship up there seems to be getting
more and more acceleration in the level. He has me dropping steadily to
get air to run the generator. He is going fast enough!"
They followed beneath the pirate, faster and faster as the rockets of
the ship began to push it forward more and more.
"Dick, why is it he didn't use all his rockets at first instead of
gradually increasing the power this way?"
"If you were operating the ship, Morey, you'd understand. Look at the
speedometer a moment and see if you can figure it out."
"Hmmm--4.5 miles per second--buzzing right along--but I don't see what
that--good Lord! We never will get him at this rate! How do you expect
to get him?"
"I have no idea--yet. But you missed the important point. He is going
4.5 miles a second. When he reaches 5 miles a second he will never come
down from his hundred and fifty mile high perch! He will establish an
orbit! He has so much centrifugal force already that he has very little
weight. We are staying right beneath him, so we don't have much either.
Well, there he goes in a last spurt. We are falling behind pretty
fast--there we are catching up now--no--we are just holding parallel!
He's done it! Look!"
Arcot pulled out his watch and let go of it. It floated motionless in
the air for a moment, then slowly drifted back toward the rear of the
room. "I am using a bit of acceleration--a bit more than we need to
maintain our speed. We are up high enough to make the air resistance
almost nothing, even at this velocity, but we still require some power.
I don't know--"
There was a low buzz, repeated twice. Instantly Morey turned the dials
of the radio receiving set--again the call signal sounded. In a moment a
voice came in--low, but distinct. The power seemed fading rapidly.
"I'm Wade--the Pirate--help if you can. Can you get outside the
atmosphere? Exceed orbital speed and fall out? Am in an orbit and can't
get out. Fuel reserve gage stuck, and used all my rockets. No more
power. Can not slow down and fall. I am running out of compressed air
and the generator for this set is going--will take animation suspending
gas--will you be able to reach me before entering night?"
"Quick, Morey--answer that we will."
"We will try, Pirate--think we can make it!"
"O.K.--power about gone--"
The last of his power had failed! The pirate was marooned in space! They
had seen his rockets go out, leaving the exhaust tube glowing for a
moment before it, too, was dark, and only the sun shining on the silvery
ship made it visible.
"We have to hurry if we want to do anything before he reaches night!
Radio the San Francisco fields that we will be coming in soon, and we
need a large electro-magnet--one designed to work on about 500 volts
D.C., and some good sized storage cells; how many will have to be
decided later, depending on the room we will have for them. I'll start
decelerating now so we can make the turn and circle back. We are
somewhere west of Hawaii, I believe, but we ought to be able to do the
trick if we use all the power we can."
Morey at once set to work with the radio set to raise San Francisco
airport. He was soon in communication with them, and told them that he
would be there in about an hour. They promised all the necessary
materials; also that they would get ready to receive the pirate once he
was finally brought in to them.
It was nearer an hour and a quarter later that the machine fell to the
great San Francisco landing field, where the mechanics at once set to
work bolting a huge electro-magnet on the landing skids on the bottom of
the machine. The most serious problem was connecting the terminals
electrically without making holes in the hull of the ship. Finally one
terminal was grounded, and the radio aerial used as the other. Fuller
was left behind on this trip, and a large number of cells were installed
in every possible position. In the power room, a hastily arranged motor
generator set was arranged, making it possible to run the entire ship
from the batteries. Scarcely had these been battened down to prevent
sliding under the accelerations necessary, than Arcot and Morey were
off. The entire operation had required but fifteen minutes.
"How are you going to catch him, Arcot?"
"I'll overtake him going west. If I went the other way I'd meet him
going at over 10 miles a second in relation to his machine. He had the
right idea. He told me to fall out to him at a greater than orbital
speed. I will go just within the Earth's atmosphere till I get just
under him, holding myself in the air by means of a downward acceleration
on the part of the regular lifting power units. I am going to try to
reach eight miles a second. We will be overhauling him at three a
second, and the ship will slow down to the right speed while falling out
to him. We must reach him before he gets into the shadow of the Earth,
though, for if he reaches 'night' he will be without heat, and he'll die
of cold. I think we can reach him, Dick!"
"I hope so. Those spare cells are all right, aren't they? We'll need
them! If they don't function when we get out there, we'll fall clear off
into space! At eight miles a second, we would leave Earth forever!"
The ship was accelerating steadily at the highest value the men aboard
could stand. The needle of the speedometer crept steadily across the
dial. They were flying at a height of forty miles that they might have
enough air and still not be too greatly hindered by air resistance. The
black sky above them was spotted with points of glowing light, the
blazing stars of space. But as they flew along, the sensation of weight
was lost; they had reached orbital speed, and as the car steadily
increased its velocity, there came a strange sensation! The Earth loomed
gigantic above them! Below them shone the sun! The direction of up and
down was changed by the terrific speed! The needle of the speedometer
was wavering at 7.8 miles a second. Now it held steady!
"I thought you were going to take it up to eight miles a second, Dick?"
"Air resistance is too great! I'll have to go higher!"
At a height of fifty miles they continued at 8.1 miles a second. It
seemed hours before they reached the spot where the pirate's machine
should be flying directly above them, and they searched the black sky
for some sign of the shining dot of light. With the aid of field glasses
they found it, far ahead, and nearly one hundred miles above.
"Well, here we go! I'm going to fall up the hundred miles or so, till
we're right in his path; the work done against gravity will slow us down
a little, so I'll have to use the power units somewhat. Did you notice
what I did to them?"
"Yes, they're painted a dull black. What's the idea?"
"We'll have no air from which to get heat for power out here, so we'll
have to depend on the sunlight they can absorb. I'm using it now to slow
us down as much as possible."
At last the tiny silver dot had grown till it became recognizable as the
pirate plane. They were drawing up to it now, slowly, but steadily. At
last the little machine was directly beneath them, and a scant hundred
yards away. They had long since been forced to run the machine on the
storage batteries, and now they applied a little power to the vertical
power units. Sluggishly, as they absorbed the sun's heat, the machine
was forced lower, nearer to the machine below. At last a scant ten feet
separated them.
"All right, Morey."
There was a snap, as the temporary switch was closed, and the current
surged into the big magnet on the keel. At once they felt the ship jump
a little under the impulse of the magnet's pull on the smaller machine.
In a moment the little plane had drifted up to the now idle magnet,
touched it and was about to bounce off, when Morey again snapped the
switch shut and the two machines were locked firmly together!
"I've got him, Dick!" Morey exclaimed. "Now slow down till it falls.
Then we can go and wait for it. Being a glider, it ought to be quite
manageable!"
Now the energy of the power units on the roof of the machine began to
slow down the two machines, the magnet grinding slightly as the momentum
of the plane was thrust upon it. They watched the speedometer drop. The
speed was sinking very slowly, for the area of the absorbing fins was
not designed to absorb the sun's heat directly, and was very
inefficient. The sun was indeed sinking below their horizon; they were
just beginning to watch that curious phenomenon of seeing dawn backward,
when they first struck air dense enough to operate the power units
noticeably. Quickly the power was applied till the machines sank rapidly
to the warmer levels, the only governing factor being the tendency of
the glider to break loose from the grip of the magnet.
At fifty miles the generator was started, and the heaters in the car at
once became more active. There was no heat in the car below, but that
was unavoidable. They would try to bring it down to warm levels quickly.
"Whew, I'm glad we reached the air again, Dick. I didn't tell you
sooner, for it wouldn't have done any good, but that battery was about
gone! We had something like twenty amp-hours left! I'm giving the
recharge generator all she will take. We seem to have plenty of power
now."
"I knew the cells were low, but I had no idea they were as low as that!
I noticed that the magnet was weakening, but thought it was due to the
added air strain. I am going to put the thing into a nose dive and let
the glider go down itself. I know it would land correctly if it had a
chance. I am going to follow it, of course, and since we are over the
middle of Siberia we'd better start back."
The return trip was necessarily in the lower level of the atmosphere,
that the glider might be kept reasonably warm. At a height of but two
miles, in the turbulent atmosphere, the glider was brought slowly home.
It took them nearly twenty hours to go the short distance of twelve
thousand miles to San Francisco, the two men taking turns at the
controls. The air resistance of the glider forced them to go slowly;
they could not average much better than six hundred an hour despite the
fact that the speed of either machine alone was over twelve hundred
miles an hour.
At last the great skyscrapers of San Francisco appeared on their
horizon, and thousands of private planes started out to meet them.
Frantically Arcot warned them away, lest the air blast from their props
tear the glider from the magnet. At last, however, the Air Guard was
able to force them to a safe distance and clear a lane through one of
the lower levels of the city traffic. The great field of the
Transcontinental lines was packed with excited men and women, waiting to
catch a glimpse of two of the greatest things the country had heard of
in the century--Arcot's molecular motion machine and the Air Pirate!
The landing was made safely in the circle of Air Guardsmen. There was a
small hospital plane standing beside it in a moment, and as Arcot's ship
released it, and then hung motionless, soundless above it, the people
watched it in wonder and excitement. They wanted to see Arcot perform;
they clamored to see the wonderful powers of this ship in operation. Air
Guardsmen who had witnessed the flying game of tag between these two
super-air machines had told of it through the press and over the radio.
* * * * *
Two weeks later, Arcot stepped into the office of Mr. Morey, senior.
"Busy?"
"Come on in; you know I'm busy--but not _too_ busy for you. What's on
your mind?"
"Wade--the pirate."
"Oh--hmm. I saw the reports on his lab out on the Rockies, and also the
psychomedical reports on him. And most particularly, I saw the request
for his employment you sent through channels. What's your opinion on
him? You talked with him."
Arcot frowned slightly. "When I talked to him he was still two different
identities dancing around in one body. Dr. Ridgely says the problem's
settling down; I believe him. Ridgely's no more of a fool in his line
than you and Dad are in your own lines, and Ridgely's business is
healing mental wounds. We agreed some while back that the Pirate must be
insane, even before we met him.
"We also agreed that he had a tremendously competent and creative mind.
As a personality in civilization, he'd evidently slipped several cogs.
Ridgely says that is reparable.
"You know, Newton was off the beam for about two years. Faraday was in a
complete breakdown for nearly five years--and after his breakdown, came
back to do some monumental work.
"And those men didn't have the help of modern psychomedical techniques.
"I think we'd be grade A fools ourselves to pass up the chance to get
Wade's help. The man--insane or not--figured out a way of stabilizing
and storing atomic hydrogen for his rockets. If he could do that in the
shape he was then in...!
"I'd say we'd be smart to keep the competition in the family."
Mr. Morey leaned back in his chair and smiled up at Arcot. "You've got a
good case there. I'll buy it. When Dr. Ridgely says Wade's got those
slipped cogs replaced--offer him a job in your lab staff.
"I'm a bit older than you are; you've grown up in a world where the
psychomedical techniques really work. When I was growing up,
psychomedical techniques were strictly rule of thumb--and the doctors
were all thumbs." Mr. Morey sighed. Then, "In this matter, I think your
judgment is better than mine."
"I'll see him again, and offer him the job. I'm pretty sure he'll take
it, as I said. I have a suspicion that, within six months, he'll be a
lot saner than most people around. The ordinary man doesn't realize what
a job of rechecking present techniques can do--and Wade is, naturally,
getting a very thorough overhaul.
"Somewhat like a man going in for treatment of a broken arm; in any
decent hospital they'll also check for any other medical problems, and
he'll come out healthier than if he had never had the broken arm.
"Wade seems to have had a mind that made friends with molecules, and
talked their language. After Ridgely shows him how to make friends with
people--I think he'll be quite a man on our team!"
BOOK TWO
SOLARITE
I
The lights of great Transcontinental Airport were blazing in cheering
splendor. Out there in the center of the broad field a dozen men were
silhouetted in the white brilliance, looking up at the sky, where the
stars winked cold and clear on the jet background of the frosty night. A
slim crescent of moon gleamed in the west, a sickle of light that in no
way dimmed the cold flame of the brilliant stars.
One point of light now moved across the motionless field of far-off
suns, flashing toward the airport in a long, swift curve. The men on the
field murmured and pointed up at it as it swept low over the blazing
lights of New York. Lower it swooped, the towering city behind it. Half
a mile into the air the buildings rose in shining glory of colored tile
that shone brightly in the sweeping play of floodlights.
One of them picked out the descending machine, and it suddenly leaped
out of the darkness as a shining, streamlined cylinder, a cylinder with
a great halo of blue fire, as the beam of the searchlight set it off
from the jet black night.
In moments the ship was vast before the eyes of the waiting men; it had
landed gently on the field, was floating smoothly, gracefully toward
them.
Twenty-four men climbed from the great ship, shivering in the icy blast
that swept across the field, spoke a moment with the group awaiting
their arrival, then climbed quickly into the grateful warmth of a field
car. In a moment they were speeding toward the lights of the field
house, half a mile off.
Behind them the huge ship leaped into the sky, then suddenly pointed its
nose up at an angle of thirty degrees and shot high into the air at an
unbelievable speed. In an instant it was gone.
At the field house the party broke up almost immediately.
"We want to thank you, Mr. Morey, for your demonstration of the new ship
tonight, and you, Dr. Arcot, for answering our many questions about it.
I am sure we all appreciate the kindness you have shown the press." The
reporters filed out quickly, anxious to get the news into the morning
editions, for it was after one o'clock now. Each received a small slip
of paper from the attendant standing at the exit, the official statement
of the company. At last all had left but the six men who were
responsible for the new machine.
This night had witnessed the official demonstration of the first of the
Arcot-Morey molecular motion ships. Small as she was, compared to those
that were to come, yet she could carry over three thousand passengers,
as many as could any existing winged plane, and her speed was immensely
greater. The trip from the west coast to the eastern had been made in
less than one hour. At a speed close to one mile a second the great ship
had shot through the thin air, twenty-five miles above the Earth.
In this vessel a huge bar of metal could be affected by an
ultra-high-frequency generator. When so affected, its molecules all
moved forward, taking the ship with them. Thus, a molecular motion drive
vessel could, theoretically, approach the velocity of light as a limit.
"Arcot," said Morey, Senior, after the pressmen had left the room, "as
president of this company I certainly want to thank you for the
tremendous thing you have given us to use. You have 'sold' us this
machine--but how can we repay you? Before this, time and time again,
you have sold us your inventions, the ideas that have made it possible
for Transcontinental to attain its present high position in world
transportation. All you have ever accepted is the laboratory you use,
its upkeep, and a small annual income. What can we do to show our
appreciation this time?"
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