The Black Star Passes
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John W Campbell >> The Black Star Passes
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"Why," answered Arcot smiling, "you haven't stated the terms correctly.
Actually, I have a fully equipped lab to putter around in, all the time
I want for my own amusement, and all the money I want. What more could I
ask?"
"I suppose that's all true--but you draw only about six thousand a year
for personal expenses--a good clerk could get that--and you, admittedly
the most brilliant physicist of the Earth, are satisfied! I don't feel
we're paying you properly!"
Arcot's expression became suddenly serious. "You can repay me this
time," he said, "for this latest discovery has made a new thing
possible. I've always wanted to be able to visit other planets--as has
many a scientist for the last three centuries. This machine has made it
possible. If you are willing--we could start by the spring of 2117. I'm
quite serious about this. With your permission, I want to start work on
the first interplanetary ship. I'll need Fuller's help, of course. The
proposition will be expensive, and that's where I must ask you to help
me. I think, however, that it may be a paying proposition, at that, for
there will certainly be something of commercial value on the other
planets."
They had walked out to the shed where Arcot's private molecular motion
car stood, the first machine ever built that used the heat of the sun to
drive it. Thoughtfully the president of the great Transcontinental Lines
looked at it. It was small compared with the great machine that had just
brought them east, but of the same swift type. It was a thing of
graceful beauty even on the ground, its long curving streamlines giving
it wonderful symmetry. They stood in thoughtful silence for a
minute--the young men eager to hear the verdict of their prospective
backer. Morey, always rather slow of speech, took an unusually long
time to answer.
"If it were only money you asked for, Arcot, I'd gladly give you double
the sum, but that isn't the case. I know perfectly well that if you do
go, my son will go with you, and Fuller and Wade will naturally go too."
He looked at each in turn. "Each of you has come to mean a lot to me.
You and Fuller have known Bob since college days. I've known Wade only
three months, but every day I grow to like him more. There's no denying
the fact that any such trip is a terrifically dangerous proposition. But
if you were lost, there would be more than my personal loss. We would
lose some of the most brilliant men on Earth. You, for instance, are
conceded as being the world's most brilliant physicist; Fuller is one of
the greatest designing engineers; Wade is rapidly rising into prominence
as a chemist and as a physicist; and my son is certainly a good
mathematician."
He paused, frowning, weighing the situation. "But you men should know
how to get out of scrapes just that much better. Certainly there are few
men on Earth who would not be willing to back such a group of men--or
any one of you, for that matter! I'll back your trip!" His words became
more facetious. "I know that Arcot and you, Bob, can handle a gun fairly
well, I don't know so much about Wade and Fuller. What experience have
you two had?"
Fuller shook his head. "I think I'll fit best in the galley on the trip,
Mr. Morey. I've done the cooking on a number of camping trips, and food
is an important factor in the success of any expedition. I can shoot a
bit, too."
Wade spoke rather hesitantly. "I come from the west, and have had a good
bit of fun with a gun in the Rockies; there are still some mountain
lions and some deer there, you know. I also have a sneaking acquaintance
with the new gun, which Arcot developed in connection with his molecular
motion. But there is so little you know about me--and most of it bad--I
don't see how I really get in on this opportunity--but," he added
hastily, "I certainly don't intend to keep the old boy knocking--I'm
with you, since I'm invited!"
Arcot smiled. "Then you'll definitely support us?"
"Yes, I will," replied Morey, Senior, seriously, "for I think it's worth
doing."
The four young men climbed into the ship, to start for their apartment.
Arcot was piloting, and under his sure touch the ship sped out into the
cold night air, then up through the atmosphere, till they hung poised at
a height of fifty miles on the upper edge of the airy blanket. They
looked out in silent thought at the magnificent blazing stars of space.
Here, where the dust-laden air could no longer mask their true colors,
the stars shone unwinkingly, steadily, and in a glory that earth-bound
men had never seen before. They shone in a wonderous riot of color, as
varied and as beautiful as the display of colored floodlights in some
great city. They were tiny pinpoints of radiance, red, green, orange,
and yellow, shining with intense brilliance.
Slowly Arcot let the machine settle to the blazing city miles below.
"I love to come out here and look at those cold, pinpoint lights; they
seem to draw me--the lure of other worlds. I've always had a sense of
unfulfilled longing--the desire to go out there--and it's always been so
hopeless. Now--I'll be out there by next spring!" Arcot paused and
looked up at the mighty field of stars that arched over his head to be
lost on either horizon. A wonderful night!
"Where shall we go first, Dick?" asked Wade softly as he gazed out at
the far-off suns of space, his voice unconsciously hushed by the
grandeur of the spectacle.
"I've thought of that for the last four months, and now that we are
definitely going to go, we'll have to make a decision. Actually, it
won't be too hard to decide. Of course we can't leave the solar system.
And the outer planets are so far away that I think we had better wait
till later trips. That leaves the choice really between Mars, Venus, and
Mercury. Mercury isn't practical since it's so close to the sun. We know
a fair bit about Mars from telescopic observation, while Venus, wrapped
in perpetual cloud, is a mystery. What do you vote?"
"Well," said Morey, "it seems to me it's more fun to explore a
completely unknown planet than one that can be observed telescopically.
I vote Venus." Each of the others agreed with Morey that Venus was the
logical choice.
By this time the machine had sunk to the roof of their apartment, and
the men disembarked and entered. The next day they were to start the
actual work of designing the space ship.
II
"When we start this work," Arcot began next morning, "we obviously want
to design the ship for the conditions we expect to meet, and for maximum
convenience and safety. I believe I've thought about this trip longer
than the rest of you, so I'll present my ideas first.
"We don't actually _know_ anything about conditions on Venus, since no
one has actually been there. Venus is probably a younger planet than
Earth. It's far nearer the sun than we are, and it gets twice the heat
we do. In the long-gone time when the planets were cooling I believe
Venus required far longer than Earth, for the inpouring heat would
retard its cooling. The surface temperature is probably about 150
degrees Fahrenheit.
"There is little land, probably, for with the cloud-mass covering Venus
as it does, it's logical to visualize tremendous seas. What life has
developed must be largely aquatic, and the land is probably far behind
us in evolution. Of course, Venus is the planet of mystery--we don't
know; we can only guess. But we do know what things we are going to need
to cross space.
"Obviously, the main driving force will be the power units. These will
get their energy from the rays of the sun by absorbing them in copper
discs about twelve feet in diameter--the ship will have to be more of a
disc than a cylinder. I think a ship a hundred and eighty feet long,
fifty feet wide, and twenty feet deep will be about the best dimensions.
The power units will be strung along the top of the ship in double
rows--one down each side of the hull. In the middle will be a series of
fused quartz windows, opening into a large room just under the outer
shell. We'll obviously need some source of power to activate the power
tubes that run the molecular motion power units. We'll have a generator
run by molecular motion power units in here, absorbing its heat from the
atmosphere in this room. The air will be heated by the rays of the sun,
of course, and in this way we'll get all our power from the sun itself.
"Since this absorption of energy might result in making the ship too
cool, due to the radiation of the side away from the sun, we'll polish
it, and thus reduce the unlighted side's radiation.
"The power units will not be able to steer us in space, due to their
position, and those on the sides, which will steer us in the atmosphere
by the usual method, will be unable to get the sun's power; they'll be
shaded. For steering in space, we'll use atomic hydrogen rockets,
storing the atomic gas by the Wade method in tanks in the hold. We'll
also have a battery down there for starting the generator and for
emergencies.
"For protection against meteors, we'll use radar. If anything comes
within a dozen miles of us, the radar unit covering that sector will at
once set automatic machinery in operation, and the rockets will shoot
the ship out of the path of the meteor."
All that day Arcot and the others discussed the various pieces of
apparatus they would need, and toward evening Fuller began to draw rough
sketches of the different mechanisms that had been agreed upon.
The next day, by late afternoon, they had planned the rough details of
the ship and had begun the greater task of calculating the stresses and
the power factors.
"We won't need any tremendous strength for the ship while it is in
space," Arcot commented, "for then there will be little strain on it.
It will be weightless from the start, and the gentle acceleration will
not strain it in the least, but we must have strength, so that it can
maneuver in the atmosphere.
"We'll leave Earth by centrifugal force, for I can make much better
speed in the atmosphere where there is plenty of power to draw on;
outside I must depend solely on sunlight. We'll circle the Earth,
forming an orbit just within the atmosphere, at five miles a second.
We'll gradually increase the speed to about ten miles a second, at which
point the ship would normally fly off into space under its own
centrifugal force. With the power units we'll prevent its release until
the proper moment. When we release it, it will be entirely free of
Earth, and no more work will be needed to overcome Earth's pull."
The planning continued with exasperating slowness. The details of the
work were complex, for all the machines were totally new. Several weeks
passed before even the power units could be ordered and the first work
on the ship started. After that orders for materials left the office
daily. Still, it was late in November before the last order was sent
out.
Now they must begin work on other phases of the expedition--food
supplies and the standard parts of the equipment.
In the interval Arcot had decided to make a special ventilated suit for
use on Venus. This was to make use of a small molecular motion director
apparatus to cool the air, and blow it through the suit. The apparatus
consisted of a small compressed air-driven generator and a power tube
bank that could be carried on the back.
"Arcot," Wade said when he saw the apparatus completed and the testing
machine ready, "I've just noticed how similar this is to the portable
invisibility apparatus I developed as the Pirate. I wonder if it might
not be handy at times to be invisible--we could incorporate that with a
slight change. It wouldn't add more than five pounds, and those tubes
you are using I'm sure are easily strong enough to carry the extra
load."
"Great idea, Wade," said Arcot. "It might be very useful if we met
hostile natives. The disappearance stunt might make us gods or something
to primitive beings. And now that you mention it, I think we can install
the apparatus in the ship. It will require almost no power, and might
save our lives some time."
The work went forward steadily at the great Transcontinental Shops where
the space ship was being built. Its construction was being kept as much
of a secret as possible, for Arcot feared the interference of the crowds
that would be sure to collect if the facts were known, and since the
shops directly joined the airfield, it meant that there would be
helicopters buzzing about the Transatlantic and Transcontinental planes.
The work to be done required the most careful manipulation and
workmanship, for one defect could mean death. They calculated six weeks
for the trip, and in the time before they could reach either planet,
much might happen to a crippled ship.
To the men who were making the trip, the waiting seemed most
exasperating, and they spent the days before they could begin the
installation of the electrical apparatus in purchasing the necessary
standard equipment; the standard coils, tubes, condensers, the canned
food supplies, clothes, everything that they could imagine as of
possible utility. They were making the ship with a great deal of empty
storage space, for Arcot hoped the trip would be a financial success,
particularly supplying much-needed metals. Many vital elements were
already excessively scarce, and no satisfactory substitutes had been
found.
On the outward trip some of this space would be filled with the many
things they would consume en route. In addition they were carrying a
great many spare parts, spare tubes, spare power units, spare
condensers--a thousand and one odd parts. Arcot intended that they
should be able to make an entire new power switchboard and motion
director unit if anything should go wrong, and he certainly had all the
apparatus.
At last came the day when the final connection had been soldered, and
the last joint welded. The atomic hydrogen tanks were full, and under
the ship's own power the oxygen tanks were filled and the batteries
charged. They were ready for a test flight!
The great ship rested on the floor of the shed now, awaiting the start.
"Oh fellows--come here a minute!" Arcot called to the other members of
the party. "I want to show you something."
The three walked quickly to the bow where Arcot stood, and following the
line of his vision, looked in wonder to see that everything was right.
They watched curiously as he drew from his coat a large glass bottle,
tightly sealed.
"What's that for?" asked Wade curiously.
"We're about to start on the first cruise, and I've been wondering if it
isn't time we gave the ship a name."
"Great--I'd been thinking of that too--what are we going to name her?"
"Well," said Arcot, "I had been thinking of Alexander--he longed for
other worlds to conquer!"
"Not bad," Morey commented. "I have been thinking of naming it too--I
guess we all have--but I was thinking of Santa Maria--the first ship to
discover the New World."
"I was thinking more of its home," said Wade. "How about calling it
Terrestrian?"
"Well--it's your turn, Fuller--you designed it. What do you suggest for
your masterpiece?" asked Arcot.
"I was thinking also of its home--the home it will never leave. I like
to think that we might find people on Venus, and I would like to have a
name on it that might be translatable into more friendly and less
foreign terms--why not call it Solarite?"
"Solarite--a member of the solar system--it will be that, always. It
will be a world unto itself when it makes its trips--it will take up an
orbit about the sun--a true member of the solar system. I like it!"
Arcot turned to the others. "How about it?" It was agreed upon
unanimously.
"But I'm still curious about that glass bottle, so carefully sealed."
Morey commented with a puzzled smile. "What's in it? Some kind of gas?"
"Wrong--no gas--practically nothing at all, in fact. What more
appropriate for christening a space ship than a bottle of hard vacuum?
"We can't have a pretty girl christen this ship, that's sure. A flying
bachelor's apartment christened by a mere woman? Never! We will have the
foreman of the works here do that. Since we can't have the ship slide
down the ways or anything, we will get inside and move it when he
smashes the bottle. But in the meantime, let's have a symbol set in
contrasting metal on the bow. We can have a blazing sun, with nine
planets circling it, the Earth indicated conspicuously; and below it the
word SOLARITE."
III
It was shortly after noon when the newly christened _Solarite_ left on
its first trip into space. The sun was a great ball of fire low in the
west when they returned, dropping plummet-like from the depths of space,
the rush of the air about the hull, a long scream that mounted from a
half-heard sound in the outer limits of the Earth's atmosphere, to a
roar of tortured air as the ship dropped swiftly to the field and shot
into the hanger. Instantly the crew darted to the side of the great
cylinder as the door of the ship opened.
Fuller appeared in the opening, and at the first glimpse of his face,
the hanger crew knew something was wrong. "Hey, Jackson," Fuller called,
"get the field doctor--Arcot had a little accident out there in space!"
In moments the man designated returned with the doctor, leading him
swiftly down the long metal corridor of the _Solarite_ to Arcot's room
aboard.
There was a mean-looking cut in Arcot's scalp, but a quick, sure
examination by the doctor revealed that there appeared to be no serious
injury. He had been knocked unconscious by the blow that made the cut,
and he had not yet recovered his senses.
"How did this happen?" asked the doctor as he bathed the cut and deftly
bandaged it.
Morey explained: "There's a device aboard whose job it is to get us out
of the way of stray meteors, and it works automatically. Arcot and I
were just changing places at the controls. While neither of us was
strapped into our seats, a meteor came within range and the rocket tubes
shot the car out of the way. We both went tumbling head over heels and
Arcot landed on his ear. I was luckier, and was able to break my fall
with my hands, but it was a mean fall--at our speed we had about double
weight, so, though it was only about seven feet, we might as well have
fallen fourteen. We took turns piloting the ship, and Arcot was about to
bring us back when that shock just about shook us all over the ship. We
will have to make some changes. It does its job--but we need warning
enough to grab hold."
The doctor was through now, and he began to revive his patient. In a
moment he stirred and raised his hand to feel the sore spot. In ten
minutes he was conversing with his friends, apparently none the worse
except for a very severe headache. The doctor gave him a mild opiate,
and sent him to bed to sleep off the effects of the blow.
* * * * *
With the ship fully equipped, tested and checked in every possible way,
the time for leaving was set for the following Saturday, three days off.
Great supplies of stores had to be carried aboard in the meantime. Care
had to be exercised in this work, lest the cargo slip free under varying
acceleration of the _Solarite_, and batter itself to bits, or even wreck
some vital part of the ship. At noon on the day chosen, the first ship
ever to leave the bounds of the Earth's gravity was ready to start!
Gently the heavily laden _Solarite_ rose from the hangar floor, and
slowly floated out into the bright sunshine of the early February day.
Beside it rode the little ship that Arcot had first built, piloted by
the father of the inventor. With him rode the elder Morey and a dozen
newsmen. The little ship was badly crowded now as they rose slowly, high
into the upper reaches of the Earth's atmosphere. The sky about them
was growing dark--they were going into space!
At last they reached the absolute ceiling of the smaller ship, and it
hung there while the _Solarite_ went a few miles higher; then slowly,
but ever faster and faster they were plunging ahead, gathering speed.
They watched the radio speedometer creep up--1-2-3-4-5-6--steadily it
rose as the acceleration pressed them hard against the back of the
seats--8-9--still it rose as the hum of the generator became a low
snarl--10-11-12--they were rocketing at twelve miles a second, the
tenuous air about the ship shrieking in a thin scream of protest as it
parted on the streamlined bow.
Slowly the speed rose--reached fifteen miles a second. The sun's pull
became steadily more powerful; they were falling toward the fiery
sphere, away from the Earth. A microphone recessed in the outer wall
brought them the fading whisper of air from outside. Arcot shouted a
sudden warning:
"Hold on--we're going to lose all weight--out into space!"
There was a click, and the angry snarl of the overworked generator died
in an instant as the thudding relays cut it out of the circuit.
Simultaneously the air scoop which had carried air to the generator
switched off, transferring to solar heat as a source of power. They
seemed to be falling with terrific and ever-increasing speed. They
looked down--saw the Earth shrinking visibly as they shot away at more
than five miles a second; they were traveling fifteen miles a second
ahead and five a second straight up.
The men watched with intensest interest as the heavens opened up before
them--they could see stars now a scant degree from the sun itself, for
no air diffused its blinding glory. The heat of the rays seemed to burn
them; there was a prickling pleasantness to it now, as they looked at
the mighty sea of flame through smoked glasses. The vast arms of the
corona reached out like the tentacles of some fiery octopus through
thousands of miles of space--huge arms of flaming gas that writhed out
as though to reach and drag back the whirling planets to the parent
body. All about the mighty sphere, stretching far into space, a wan glow
seemed to ebb and flow, a kaleidoscope of swiftly changing color. It was
the zodiacal light, an aurora borealis on a scale inconceivable!
Arcot worked rapidly with the controls, the absence of weight that gave
that continued sense of an unending fall, aiding him and his assistants
in their rapid setting of the controls.
At last the work was done and the ship flashed on its way under the
control of the instruments that would guide it across all the millions
of miles of space and land it on Venus with unerring certainty. The
photo-electric telescopic eye watched the planet constantly, keeping the
ship surely and accurately on the course that would get them to the
distant planet in the shortest possible time.
Work thereafter became routine requiring a minimum of effort, and the
men could rest and use their time to observe the beauties of the skies
as no man had ever seen them during all the billions of years of time
that this solar system has existed. The lack of atmosphere made it
possible to use a power of magnification that no terrestrial telescope
may use. The blurred outlines produced by the shifting air prohibits
magnifications of more than a few hundred diameters, but here in space
they could use the greatest power of their telescope. With it they could
look at Mars and see it more clearly than any other man had ever seen
it, despite the fact that it was now over two hundred million miles
away.
But though they spent much time taking photographs of the planets and of
the moon, and in making spectrum analyses of the sun, time passed very
slowly. Day after day they saw measured on the clocks, but they stayed
awake, finding they needed little sleep, for they wasted no physical
energy. Their weightlessness eliminated fatigue. However, they
determined that during the twelve hours before reaching Venus they must
be thoroughly alert, so they tried to sleep in pairs. Arcot and Morey
were the first to seek slumber--but Morpheus seemed to be a mundane god,
for he did not reward them. At last it became necessary for them to
take a mild opiate, for their muscles refused to permit their tired
brains to sleep. It was twelve hours later when they awoke, to relieve
Wade and Fuller.
They spent most of the twelve hours of their routine watch in playing
games of chess. There was little to be done. The silver globe before
them seemed unchanging, for they were still so far away it seemed little
larger than the moon does when seen from Earth.
But at last it was time for the effects of the mild drug to wear off,
and for Wade and Fuller to awaken from their sleep.
"Morey--I've an idea!" There was an expression of perfect innocence on
Arcot's face--but a twinkle of humor in his eyes. "I wonder if it might
not be interesting to observe the reactions of a man waking suddenly
from sleep to find himself alone in space?" He stared thoughtfully at
the control that would make the ship perfectly transparent, perfectly
invisible.
"I wonder if it would?" said Morey grasping Arcot's idea. "What do you
say we try it?" Arcot turned the little switch--and where there had been
the ship, it was no more--it was gone!
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