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Aliens (Version 2) - Murray Leinster · Science Fiction Book Collection

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  Speaker 1: Part one of The Aliens. This is a LibriVox recording.
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  Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
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  Speaker 1: information nor to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Read
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  Speaker 1: by Phil Schennebert The Aliens by Murray Leinster. This story
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  Speaker 1: was first published in Astounding Science Fiction August nineteen fifty nine,
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  Speaker 1: Part one. At zero four hours ten minutes ship time,
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  Speaker 1: the Nicola was well inside the Thetagisol solar system. She
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  Speaker 1: had previously secured excellent evidence that this was not the
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  Speaker 1: home of the Plumy civilization. There was no tuned radiation,
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  Speaker 1: there was no evidence of interplanetary travel. Rockets would be
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  Speaker 1: more than obvious, and a magnetronic drive had a highly
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  Speaker 1: characteristic radiation pattern, so the real purpose of the nicolasvvoyage
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  Speaker 1: would not be accomplished here. She wouldn't find out where
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  Speaker 1: the Plumies came from. There might, though, be one or
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  Speaker 1: more of those singular, conical, hollow topped cairns sheltering silicon
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  Speaker 1: bronze plates, which constituted the evidence that Plumies existed. The
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  Speaker 1: Nicola went sunward toward the inner planets to see such
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  Speaker 1: cairns had been found on conspicuous landmarks on oxygen type
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  Speaker 1: planets over a range of some twelve hundred light years.
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  Speaker 1: By the vegetation about them, some were nearly a century
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  Speaker 1: old on the same evidence. Others had been erected only
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  Speaker 1: months or weeks or even days before a human space
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  Speaker 1: survey ship arrived to discover them, and the situation was unpromising.
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  Speaker 1: It wasn't likely that the galaxy was big enough to
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  Speaker 1: hold two races of rational beings capable of space travel.
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  Speaker 1: Back on ancient Earth, a planet had been too small
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  Speaker 1: to hold two races with two us and fire. Historically,
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  Speaker 1: that problem was settled when Homo sapiens exterminated Homo Nedelandis.
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  Speaker 1: It appeared that the same situation had arisen in space.
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  Speaker 1: There were humans and there were plumies. Both had interstellar
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  Speaker 1: ships to humans. The fact was alarming. The need for
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  Speaker 1: knowledge and the danger that plumies might know more first
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  Speaker 1: and thereby be able to exterminate humanity was appalling. Therefore,
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  Speaker 1: the Niccola she drove on sonward. She had left one
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  Speaker 1: frozen outer planet far behind. She had crossed the orbits
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  Speaker 1: of three others. The last of these was a gas
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  Speaker 1: giant with innumerable moonlets revolving about it. It was now
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  Speaker 1: some thirty millions of miles back and twenty to one side.
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  Speaker 1: The sun ahead flared and flamed in emptiness against that
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  Speaker 1: expanse ants of tented stars. John Baird worked steadily in
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  Speaker 1: the Nicola's radar room. He was one of those who
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  Speaker 1: hoped that the Plumis would not prove to be the
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  Speaker 1: natural enemies of mankind. Now it looked like this ship
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  Speaker 1: wouldn't find out in this solar system. There were plenty
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  Speaker 1: of other ships on the hunt. From here on it
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  Speaker 1: looked like routine to the next unvisited family of planets.
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  Speaker 1: But meanwhile he worked opposite him, Diane Holt worked as steadily,
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  Speaker 1: her dark head bent intently over a radar graft information.
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  Speaker 1: The immediate job was the completion of a map of
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: the meteor swarms following cometary orbits about this sun. They
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  Speaker 1: interlaced emptiness with hazards to navigation, and nobody would try
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  Speaker 1: to drive through a solar system without such a map.
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  Speaker 1: Elsewhere in the ship, everything was normal. The engine room
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  Speaker 1: was a place of ste illness and peace, save for
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  Speaker 1: the almost inaudible hum of the drive. Running at about
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  Speaker 1: half a million goss flux density. The skipper did whatever
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  Speaker 1: skippers do when they are invisible to their subordinates. The
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  Speaker 1: weapons officer Taine fought appropriate thoughts. In the navigation room.
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  Speaker 1: The second officer conscientiously glanced at each separate instrument at
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  Speaker 1: least once in each five minutes, and then carefully surveyed
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  Speaker 1: all the screens showing space outside the ship. These stewards
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  Speaker 1: disposed of the debris of the last meal and began
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  Speaker 1: to get ready for the next. In the crew's quarters,
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  Speaker 1: those of duty read or worked at scrimshaw, or simply
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  Speaker 1: and contentedly loafed. Diane handed over the transparent radiograph to
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  Speaker 1: be fitted into the three dimensional map in the making.
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  Speaker 1: There's a lump of stuff here, she said, interestedly. It
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  Speaker 1: could be the comet that once followed this orbit, now
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  Speaker 1: so old it's lost all its gases, and isn't a
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  Speaker 1: comet any longer. At this instant, which was zero four
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  Speaker 1: hours twenty five minutes ship time, the alarm bell rang.
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  Speaker 1: It clanged stridently over Baird's head. Repeater gong sounded all
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  Speaker 1: throughout the ship, and there was a scurrying and a
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  Speaker 1: closing of doors. The alarm gong could mean only one thing.
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  Speaker 1: It made one's breath come faster, or one's hair stand
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  Speaker 1: on end, according to temperament. The skipper's face appeared on
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  Speaker 1: the direct line screen from the navigation room. Plummis, he
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  Speaker 1: demanded harshly, mister Baird, Plummis. Baird's hands were already flipping
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  Speaker 1: switches and plugging the radar room apparatus into a new setup.
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  Speaker 1: There's the contact, sir, he said curtly. No, there was
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  Speaker 1: a contact. It's broken now. Something detected us. We picked
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  Speaker 1: up a radar pulse on the word one meant much.
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  Speaker 1: A radar system that could get adequate information from a
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  Speaker 1: single pulse was not the work of amateurs. It was
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  Speaker 1: the product of a very highly developed technology. Setting all
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  Speaker 1: equipment to full globular scanning, Baird felt a certain crawling
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  Speaker 1: sensation at the back of his neck. He'd been mapping
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  Speaker 1: within a narrow range above and below the line of
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  Speaker 1: this system's eclipse. A lot could have happened outside the
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  Speaker 1: area he'd had under long distance scanning. But seconds passed
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  Speaker 1: they seemed like years. The all globe scanning covered every
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  Speaker 1: direction out from the Nacola. Nothing appeared which had not
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  Speaker 1: been reported before. The gas giant planet far behind and
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  Speaker 1: the only inner one on this side of the sun,
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  Speaker 1: would return their poses only after minutes. Meanwhile, the radars
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  Speaker 1: reported faithfully, but they only repeated previous reports. No new
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  Speaker 1: object within half a million miles, said Baird, after a
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  Speaker 1: suitable interval. Presently, he added, nothing new within three quarter
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  Speaker 1: a million miles. Then nothing new within a million miles,
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  Speaker 1: the skipper said bitingly. Then you'd better check on objects
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  Speaker 1: that are not new. He turned aside, and his voice
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  Speaker 1: came more faintly as he spoke into another microphone. Mister Taine,
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  Speaker 1: arm all rockets and have your tube crew stand by
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  Speaker 1: in combat readiness engine room, prepare drive for emergency maneuvers,
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  Speaker 1: damage control parties, put on pressure suits and take combat
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  Speaker 1: posts with equipment. His voice rose again in volume. Mister Baird,
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  Speaker 1: how about observed objects, Dane murmured. Baird said, briefly, only
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  Speaker 1: one suspicious object, sir, and that shouldn't be suspicious. We
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  Speaker 1: are sending an information beam at something we classed as
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  Speaker 1: a burned out comet. Posts going out now, Sir Dane
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  Speaker 1: had the distant information transmitter aimed at what she said
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  Speaker 1: might be a dead comet. Baird pressed the button. An
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  Speaker 1: extraordinary complex of information seeking frequencies and forms sprang into
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  Speaker 1: being and leaped across emptiness. There were microwaves of strictly
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  Speaker 1: standard amplitude for measurement standards. There were frequencies of other
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  Speaker 1: values which would be selectively absorbed by this material, and
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  Speaker 1: that there were laterally and circularly polarized beams. When they
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  Speaker 1: bounced back, they would bring a surprising amount of information
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  Speaker 1: they returned. They did bring back news. The thing that
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  Speaker 1: had registered as a larger lump in a meteor swarm
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  Speaker 1: was not a meteor or at all. It returned four
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  Speaker 1: different frequencies with a relative intensity pattern which said that
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  Speaker 1: they'd been reflected by bronze, probably silicon bronze. The polarized
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  Speaker 1: beams came back depolarized, of course, but with phase changes
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  Speaker 1: which said the reflector had a rounded regular form. There
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  Speaker 1: was a smooth hull of silicon bronze out yonder there
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  Speaker 1: was other data. It will be a plumy ship, Sir,
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  Speaker 1: said Baird, very subtily at a guess. They picked up
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  Speaker 1: our mapping beam and shot a single pulse at us
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  Speaker 1: to find out who and what we were for another guests.
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  Speaker 1: By now they've picked up and analyzed our information beam
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  Speaker 1: and know what we found out about them?
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  Speaker 2: The skipper scowled.
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  Speaker 1: How many of them? He demanded, Have we run into
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  Speaker 1: a fleet? I'll check, sir, said Baird. We picked up
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  Speaker 1: no tuned radiation from outer space, sir. But it could
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  Speaker 1: be that they picked us up when when we came
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  Speaker 1: out of overdrive and stopped all their transmissions until they
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  Speaker 1: had us in a trap. Find out how many there are?
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  Speaker 1: Barked the skipper, make it quick, report additional data. Instantly
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  Speaker 1: his screen clicked off. Diane, more than a little pail,
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  Speaker 1: worked swiftly to plug the radar room equipment into a
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  Speaker 1: highly specialized pattern. The Niccola was very well equipped radar wise.
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  Speaker 1: She'd been a Type G eight survey ship, and on
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  Speaker 1: her last stay in Port, she'd been rebuilt especially to
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  Speaker 1: hunt for and make contact with plumies since the discovery
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  Speaker 1: of their existence. That was the most urgent business of
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  Speaker 1: the space survey. It might well be the most important
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  Speaker 1: business of the human race, on which its survival or
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  Speaker 1: destruction would depend. Other remodeled ships had gone out before
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  Speaker 1: than Nicola, and others would follow until the problem was solved. Meanwhile,
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  Speaker 1: the Nicolas twenty four rocket tubes and stepped up drive
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  Speaker 1: and computer type radio system equipped her for plummy hunting
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  Speaker 1: as well as any human ship could be. Still, if
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  Speaker 1: she had been lured deep into the home system of
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  Speaker 1: the Plumies, the prospects were not good. The new set
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  Speaker 1: up began its operation instantly the last contact closed. The
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  Speaker 1: three dimensional maps served as a matrix to control it.
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  Speaker 1: The information beam projector swung and flung out its bundle
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  Speaker 1: of oscillations. It swung and flashed, and swung and flashed.
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  Speaker 1: It had to examine every relatively nearby object for a
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  Speaker 1: constitution of silicon bronze and a rounded shape. The nearest
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  Speaker 1: objects had to be examined first. Speed was essential, but
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  Speaker 1: three dimensional scanning takes time, even at some hundreds of
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  Speaker 1: pulses permitted. Nevertheless, the information came in no other silicon
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  Speaker 1: bronze object within a quarter million miles, within a half million,
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  Speaker 1: a million, a million and a half two million. Baird
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  Speaker 1: called the navigation room looks like a single Plumy.
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  Speaker 2: Ship, Sir.
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  Speaker 1: He reported, at least there's one ship which is nearest
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  Speaker 1: by a very long way. Ah, grunted the skipper. Then
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  Speaker 1: we'll pay him a visit. Keep an open line, mister, Baird.
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  Speaker 1: His voice changed, mister Taine, report here at wants to
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  Speaker 1: plan tactics. Baird shook his head to himself. The Nicola's
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  Speaker 1: orders were to make contact without discovery, if such a
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  Speaker 1: thing were possible. The ideal would be a Plumy ship
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  Speaker 1: or the Plumy civilization itself located and subject to complete
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  Speaker 1: and overwhelming envelopment by human ships before the Plumies knew
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  Speaker 1: they'd been discovered, and this would be the human ideal.
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  Speaker 1: Because humans have always had to consider that a stranger
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  Speaker 1: might be hostile until he had proven otherwise. Such a
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  Speaker 1: viewpoint would not be optimism but caution. Yet caution was necessary.
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  Speaker 1: It was because the survey brass felt the need to
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  Speaker 1: prepare for every unfavorable eventuality that Taine had been chosen
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  Speaker 1: as weapons officer of the Niccola. His choice had been
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  Speaker 1: deliberate because he was a xenophobe. He had been a
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  Speaker 1: problem personality all his life. He had a seemingly congenital
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  Speaker 1: fear and hatred of strangers, which in mild cases is
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  Speaker 1: common enough, but Taine could not be cured without a
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  Speaker 1: complete breakdown of personality. He could not serve on a
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  Speaker 1: ship with a multi racial crew, because he was invincibly
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  Speaker 1: suspicious of and hostile too all but his own small breed.
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  Speaker 1: Yet he seemed ideal for weapons officer on the Nicola,
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  Speaker 1: provided he never commanded the ship, because if the Plumies
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  Speaker 1: were hostile, a well adjusted normal man would never think
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  Speaker 1: as much like them as a tain he was capable
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  Speaker 1: of the kind of thinking Plumies my practice if they
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  Speaker 1: were xenophobes themselves. But to Baird, so extreme a precaution
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  Speaker 1: as a known psychopathic condition in an officer was less
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  Speaker 1: than wholly justified. It was by no means certain that
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  Speaker 1: the Plumies would instinctively be hostile. Suspicious, yes, cautious certainly.
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  Speaker 1: But the only fact known about the Plumy civilization came
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  Speaker 1: from the currents and silicon bronze inscribed tablets they left
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  Speaker 1: on oxygen type worlds over a twelve hundred light year
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  Speaker 1: range in space, And the only thing to be deuced
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  Speaker 1: about the Plumies themselves came from the decorative formalized symbols
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  Speaker 1: like feathery plumes, which were found on all their bronze tablets.
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  Speaker 1: The name Plumies came from that symbol. Now, though Taine
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  Speaker 1: was called to the navigation room to confer on tactics.
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  Speaker 1: The Nicola swerved and drove toward the object Baird identified
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  Speaker 1: as a plumy ship. This was at zero five hours
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  Speaker 1: ten minute ship time. The human ship had a definite
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  Speaker 1: velocity sunward. Of course, the plummy ship had been concealed
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  Speaker 1: by the meteor swarm of a totally unknown comet. It
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  Speaker 1: was an excellent way to avoid observation. On the other hand,
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  Speaker 1: the Niccola had been mapping, which was bound to attract attention.
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  Speaker 1: Now each ship knew of the other's existence. Since the
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  Speaker 1: Niccola had been detected, she had to carry out orders
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  Speaker 1: and attempt a contact to gather information. Baird verified that
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  Speaker 1: the Niccola's course was exact for interception at her full
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  Speaker 1: drive speed. He said, in a flat voice, I wonder
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  Speaker 1: how the plumies will interpret this change. Of course, they
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  Speaker 1: know we're aware they're not a meteorite, but charging at
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  Speaker 1: them without even trying to communicate could look ominous. We
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  Speaker 1: could be stupid or too arrogant to think of anything
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  Speaker 1: but a fight. He pressed the skipper's call and said evenly, Sir,
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  Speaker 1: I requests permission to attempt to communicate with the plumy ship.
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  Speaker 1: We're ordered to try to make friends if we know
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  Speaker 1: we've been spotted. Taine had evidently just reached the navigation room.
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  Speaker 1: His voice snapped from the speaker. I advise against that, sir.
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  Speaker 1: No use letting them guess our level of technology, Baird
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  Speaker 1: said coldly. They've a good idea already. We beamed them
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  Speaker 1: for data. There was silence, with only the very faint
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  Speaker 1: humming sound, which was natural in the ship in motion.
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  Speaker 1: It would be deadly to the nerves if there were
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  Speaker 1: absolute silence, The skipper grumbled. Request the Senate hewvice. Damn it,
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  Speaker 1: mister Baird. You might wait for orders, but I was
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  Speaker 1: about to ask you to try to make contacts through signals.
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  Speaker 2: Do so.
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  Speaker 1: His speaker clicked off. Bear said, it's in our lapse, Diane,
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  Speaker 1: and yet we have to follow orders. Send the first roll.
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  Speaker 1: Diane had a tape threaded into a transmitterom It began
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  Speaker 1: to unroll through a pickup head. She put on headphones.
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  Speaker 1: The tape began to transmit toward the plumin Back at base.
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  Speaker 1: It had been reasoned that a pattern of clickings, plainly
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  Speaker 1: artificial and plainly stating facts known to both races would
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  Speaker 1: be the most reasonable way to attempt to open contact.
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  Speaker 1: The tape sent a series of cardinal numbers one to five,
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  Speaker 1: then an addition table from one plus one to five
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  Speaker 1: plus five, then a multiplication table up to five times five.
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  Speaker 1: It was not startlingly intellectual information to be set out
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  Speaker 1: in tiny clicks ranging up and down the radio spectrum,
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  Speaker 1: but it was orders Baird set with compressed lips. Dane
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  Speaker 1: listened for a repetition of any of the transmitted signals
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  Speaker 1: sent back by the plumy. The speakers about the radar
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  Speaker 1: room murmured the orders given through all the ship. Radar
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  Speaker 1: had to be informed of all orders at activity so
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: it could check their results outside the ship. So Baird
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  Speaker 1: heard the orders for the engine room to be sealed
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  Speaker 1: up and the duty horse to get into pressure suits encased.
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  Speaker 1: The Nicola fought and was hulled. Damage control parties reported
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  Speaker 1: themselves on post in suits with equipment ready. Then Tane's
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  Speaker 1: voice snapped, rocket crows arm even number rockets with chemical
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: explosive warheads, leave odd numbered rockets armed with atomics.
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  Speaker 2: Report back.
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  Speaker 1: Dane strained her ears for a possible retransmission of the
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  Speaker 1: Nicola's signals, which would indicate the plumine's willingness to try conversation,
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  Speaker 1: but she suddenly raised her hand and pointed to the
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  Speaker 1: radar graph instrument. It repeated the position of dots, which
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: were stray meteoric matter in the space between worlds. In
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: this system, what had been a spot the Plumy ship
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  Speaker 1: was now a line of dots. Baird pressed the button
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  Speaker 1: radar reporting. He said, curtly, the plummy ship is heading
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  Speaker 1: for us. I'll have relative velocity in ten seconds. He
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: heard the skipper swear. Ten seconds later, the Doppler measurement
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: became possible. It said the Plumy plunged toward the Nicola
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  Speaker 1: at miles per second. In half a minute, it was
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: tens of miles per second. There was no retransmission of signals.
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: The Plumy ship had found itself discovered. Apparently, it considered
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: itself attacked. It flung itself into a headlong dash for
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: the Niccola. Time passed interminable time. The sun flared and
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: flamed and writhed in emptiness. The great gas giant planet
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: rolled through space in splendid state, its moonlit, spinning gracefully
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: about its spoke the oxygen atmosphere planet to sunward was
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: visible only as a crescent, but the motlings on its
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: lighted part changed as it revolved, seas and islands and continents,
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: receiving the sunlight as it turned. Meteor swarms, so dense
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: in appearance on a radar screen yet so tenuous in reality,
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: floated in their appointed orbits with a seeming vast leisure.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: The feel of slowness was actually the result of distance.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: Men have always acted upon things close by. Battles have
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: always been fought with an eye range, anyhow, But it
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: was actually zero six hours thirty five minutes ship time
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: before the two spacecraft sighted in each other, more than
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: two hours after they plunged toward a rendezvous. The Plumy
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  Speaker 1: ship was a bright golden dot. At first, it decelerated swiftly.
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  Speaker 1: In minutes it was a rounded end on disc. Then
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  Speaker 1: it swerved lightly and presented an elliptical broadside to the Niccola.
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  Speaker 1: The Nicola was in full deceleration too.
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  Speaker 2: By then.
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  Speaker 1: The two ships came very nearly to a stop with
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  Speaker 1: relation to each other, when they were hardly twenty miles apart,
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  Speaker 1: which meant great daring on both sides. Baird heard the
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: skipper grumbling damned cocky, he roared, suddenly missed the baird.
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  Speaker 1: How have you made out in communication with him? Not
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: at all, sir, said Baird grimly. They don't reply. He
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: knew from Diane's expression that there was no sound in
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: the headphones except the frying noise all main sequence stars
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: give out, and the infrequent thumping noises that come from
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: gas giant planets lower atmospheres, and the Djanski radiation hiss
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: which comes from everywhere.
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  Speaker 2: The skipper swore.
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  Speaker 1: The plumy ship lay broadside to less than a score
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  Speaker 1: of miles away. It shone in the sunlight. It acted
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: with extraordinary confidence. It was as if it dared the
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  Speaker 1: Niccola to open fire. Tane's voice came out of a speaker,
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  Speaker 1: harsh and angry. Even numbered Tubes prepared a fire on command.
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  Speaker 1: Nothing happened. The two ships floated sunward together, neither reproaching
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: nor retreating. But with every second the need for action
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  Speaker 1: of some sort increased. Mister Baird barked the skipper. This
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: is ridiculous. There must be some way to communicate. We
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: can't sit here glaring at each other forever. Raise them,
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: get some sort of acknowledgment. I'm trying, said Baird bitterly,
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: according to orders, but he disagreed with those orders. It
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: was official theory that arithmetic values repeated in proper order
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: would be the way to open conversation. The assumption was
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: that any rational creature would grasp the idea that orderly
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: signals were rational attempts to open communication. But it had
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: occurred to Baird that a plumy might not see this point.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: Perception of order is not necessarily perception of information. In fact,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: quite the contrary. A message is a disturbance of order.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: A microphone does not transmit a message when it sends
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: an unvarying tone. A message has to be unpredictable, or
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: it conveys no message. Orderly clicks, even if overheard, might
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: seem to plumies the result of methodically operating machinery. A
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: race capable of interstellar flight was not likely to be
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: interested or thrilled by exercise as a human child goes
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: through in kindergarten. They simply wouldn't seem meaningful at all.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: But before he could ask permission to attempt to make
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: talk in a more sophisticated fashion, voices exclaimed all over
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: the ship. They came borringly to the loudspeakers, Well, that
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: what's he do? Spending light from every place where there
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: was a vision plate on the niccola. Men watched the
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: plumy ship and babbled. This was at O six hours
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: fifty minutes ship time. End of Part one, Part two
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: of the Aliens by Murray Leinster. This LibriVox recording is
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: in the public domain. Part two The Elliptical an object
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: darted into swift and eccentric motion. Lacking an object of
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: known size for comparison, there was no scale. The golden
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: ship might have been the size of an autumn leaf,
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: and in fact its maneuvers suggested the heedless tumblings and
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: scurrying of falling foliage. It fluttered in swift turns and
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: somersaults and spinnings. There were weavings, like the purposeful feints
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: of boxers not yet come to battle. There were indescribably
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: graceful swoops and loops, and curving dashes, like some preposterous
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: dance in emptiness. Taine's voice crashed out of a speaker
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: all even numbered rockets. He barked fire. The skipper roared
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: a countermand but too late the crunching, grunting sounds of
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: rockets leaving their launching tubes came before his first syllable
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: was complete. Then there was silence while the skipper gathered
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: breath for a masterpiece of profanity. But Taine snapped that
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: dance was a sneak up. The plummy came four miles
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: nearer while we watched. Baird jerked his eyes from watching
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: the Plummy. He looked at the master radar. It was
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: faintly blurred with the fading lines of past the gyrations.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: But the golden ship was much nearer than Nicola than
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: it had been radar reporting, said Baird, sickishly. Mister Taine
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: is correct. The plummy ship did approach us.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: While it danced.
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: Taine's voice snarled, reload even numbers with chemical explosive warheads,
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: then remove atomics from odd numbers and replaced with chemicals.
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: The range is too short for atomics. Baird felt curiously
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: divided in his own mind. He disliked Tayne very much.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: Taine was arrogant and suspicious and intolerant. Even on the Niccola.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Batain had been right twice. Now the plumy ship had
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: crept closer by pure trickery, and it was right to
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: remove atomic warheads from the rockets. They had a pure
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: blast radius of ten miles to destroy the Plumy ship
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: within twice. That would endanger the Niccola and leave nothing
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: of the Plumy to examine afterward. The Plumy ship must
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: have seen the rocket flares, but it continued to dance,
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: coming nearer and ever nearer in seemingly heedless and purposeless
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: plungings and spinnings in star speckled space. But suddenly there
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: were racing, rushing trails of swirling vapor. Half the Nicola's
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: port broadside bunged toward the Golden Ship. The fraction of
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: a second later, the starboard half dozen chemical explosive rockets
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: swung furiously around the ship's hull and streaked after their brothers.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: They moved and utterly silent straight lined, ravening ferocity toward
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: their target. Baird thought irrelevantly of the vapor trails of
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: an atmosphere liner in the planet's upper air. The ruled
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: line straightness of the first six rockets course abruptly broke.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: One of them veered crazily out of control. It shifted
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: to an almost right angled course. A second swung wildly
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: to the left, A third, and fourth, and fifth, the
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: sixth of the first line rockets made a great sweeping
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: turn and came hurtling back toward the Niccola. It was
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: like a nightmare. Lunatic, erratic lines of sunlit vapor yielded
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: before the background of all the stars in creation. Then
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: the second half dozen rockets broke ranks, as insanely and
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: irremediably as the first Tane's voice screamed out of a speaker,
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: hysterical with fury. Detonate, Detonate. They've taken over the rockets
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: and are throwing them back at us. Detonate all rockets.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: The heavens seemed streaked and laced with lines of expanding smoke.
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: But now one plunging line erupted at its tip, A
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: swelling globe of smoke marked its end. Another blew up,
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: and another. The Nicola's rockets faithfully blew themselves to bits
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: on command from the Nicola's own weapons control. There was
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: nothing else to be done with them. They'd been taken
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: over in flight, they'd been turned and headed back toward
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: their source. They'd have blasted the Nicola to bits, but
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: for their premature explosions. There was a peculiar, stunned hush
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: all through the niccola. The only sound that came out
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: of any speaker in the radar room was Tane's voice,
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: high pitched and raging, mouthing unspeakable hatred for the plumies,
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: whom no human being had yet seen. Baird sat tents
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: in the frustrated and liberid composure of the man who
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: can only be of use while he is sitting still
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: and keeping his head. The vision screen was now a
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: blur of writhing mist, lighted by the sun and tornat
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: by emptiness. There was luminosity where the ships had encountered
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: each other. It was sunshine upon thin smoke. It was
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: like the insanely enlarging head of a newborn comet, whose
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: tail would be formed presently by light pressure. The plummy
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: ship was almost invisible behind the unsubstantial stuff, But Baird
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: regarded his radar screens. Microwaves penetrated the mists of rapidly
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: ionizing gases radar to navigation. He said, sharply, the plummy
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: ship is still approaching dancing as before. The skippers said,
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: with the enormous calm, any other Plumy ships, mister Baird,
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: Diane interposed, no sign anywhere I've been watching. This seems
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: to be the only ship within radar range. We've time
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: to settle with it, then said the skipper, mister Tayane.
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: The Plumy ship is still approaching. Baird found himself hating
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: the Plumies. It was not only that human kind was
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: showing up rather badly at the moment.
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: It was that the.
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: Plumy ship had refused contact and forced a fight. It
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: was that if the Niccolo were destroyed, the Plumy would
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: carry news of the existence of humanity and of the
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: tactic which worked to defeat them. The Plumies could prepare
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: an irresistible fleet. Humanity could be doomed. But he overheard
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: himself saying bitterly, I wish I'd known this was coming, Diane,
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't have resolved to be strictly official, only until
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: we got back to base. Her eyes widened, she looked startled,
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: then she softened. If you mean that, I wish so too.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: It looks like they've got us, he admitted, unhappily. If
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: they can take our rockets away from us. Then his
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: voice stopped. He said, hold everything and pressed the navigation
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: room button. He snapped bread or to navigation. It appears
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: to take the Plumies several seconds to take over a rocket.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: They have to aim something a presser or a tractor
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: being most likely, and pick off each rocket separately. Nearly
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: forty seconds was consumed in taking over all twelve of
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: our rockets. At shorter range, with less time available, a
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: rocket might get through. The skipper, swore briefly, then, mister Taine,
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: when the Plumies are near enough, our rockets may strike
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: before they can be taken over. You follow. Baird heard
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: Tane's shrill voiced acknowledgment in the form of practically chattered
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: orders to his rocket two cruise. Baird listened, checking the
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: orders against what the situation was as the radar saw it.
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: Haines's voice was almost unhuman, so filled with frantic rage
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: that it cracked as he spoke. But the problem at
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: hand was the fulfillment of all his psychopathic urges. He
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: commanded the starboard side rocket battery to await special orders. Meanwhile,
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: the port side battery would fire two rockets on wildly
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: divergent courses, curving to join at the Plumy ship they'd
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: be seized. They were to be detonated, and another port
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: side rocket fired instantly, followed by a second hidden in
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: the rocket tail. The first would leave behind, then the
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: starboard side. I'm afraid Taine's our only chance, said Baird reluctantly.
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: If he wins, we'll have time to talk as other
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: people do who like each other. If it doesn't work,
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: Diane said quietly, anyhow, I'm glad you wanted me to know.
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: I wanted you to two. She smiled at him yearningly.
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: There was the crump, crump of two rockets going out together.
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: Then the radar told what happened. The plummy ship was
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: no more than six miles away, dancing somehow deftly in
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: the light of a yellow sun, with all the cosmost
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: spread out as shining pin points of colored light behind it.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: The radar reported the dash and the death of the
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: two rockets after their struggle with invisible things.
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: That gripped them.
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: They died when they headed reluctantly back to the niccola
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: and detonated two miles from their parent ship. The skipper's
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: voice came, mister Taine, after your next salvo, I shall
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: head for the plummy at full drive to cut down
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: the distance and the time they have to work in
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: be ready. The rocket tubes went crump, crump again with
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: a fifth of a second interval. The radar showed two
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: two tiny specks speeding through space toward the weaving, shifting speck,
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: which was the Plumy outside in emptiness, there was a
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: filmy haze. It was the rocket fumes and exploding gases,
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: spreading with incredible speed. It was thin as gossamer. The
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: Plumy ship undoubtedly spotted the rockets, but it did not
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: try to turn them. It somehow seized them and deflected
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: them and darted past them toward the Niccola. They see
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: the trick, said Diane, drive throated. If they can get
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: in close enough, they can turn.
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: It against us.
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: There were noises inside the The Cola, now tane fairly
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: howled in order. There were yells of defiance and excitement.
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: There were more of those inadequate noises as rockets went out.
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: Every tube on the starboard side emptied itself in a
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: series of savage grunts, and then Niccola's magnatronic drive roared
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: at full fluxed density. The two ships were less than
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: a mile apart when the Nicola let go her full
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: double broadside of missiles, and then it seemed that the
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: Plumy ship was doomed. There were simply too many rockets
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: to be seized and handled before at least one struck.
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: But there was a new condition. The Plumy ship weaved
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: and dodged its way through them. The new condition was
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: that the rockets were just beginning their run.
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: They had not.
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: Achieved the terrific velocity that would accumulate in ten miles
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: of no gravity. They were new launched, loggy, clumsy, not
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: the streaking, flashing, death and destruction they would become with
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: thirty more seconds of acceleration. So the Plumy ship dodged
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: them with a skill en daring past relief with an
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: incredible agility, It got inside them, nearer to the Niccola
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: than they, and then it hurled itself at the human ships,
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: as if bent upon a suicidal crash which would destroy
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: both ships together. But Baird in the radar room and
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: the skipper and navigation knew that it would plunge brilliantly
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: past at the last instant. And then they knew that
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: it would not, because very suddenly and very abruptly, there
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: was something the matter with the plumy ship. The life
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: went out of it. It ceased to accelerate or decelerate.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: It ceased to steer. It began to turn slowly on
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: an axis somewhere amidships. It snose, swung to one side,
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: with no change in the direction of its motion. It
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: floated onward. It was broadside to its line of travel.
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: It continued to turn. It hurtled stern first toward the Niccola.
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: It did not swer, it did not dance. It was
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: a lifeless hulk, a derelict in space, and it would
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: hit the Niccola amidships, with no possible result but destruction
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: for both vessels. The Nicola's skipper bellowed arders, as if
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: shouting would somehow give them more effect. The magnetotronic drive roared.
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: He demanded a miracle of it, and he almost got one.
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: The drive strained its thrust members, it hopelessly overloaded its coils.
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: The Niccola's cobalt steel hull became more than saturated with
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: the drive field, and it leaped madly upon an invasion course,
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: and it very nearly got away. It was swinging clear
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: when the Plumy ship drifted within fathoms. It was turning
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: aside when the Plumy ship was within yards, and it
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: was almost safe. When the golden hull of the Plumy
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: shadowed now by the Nicola, itself barely scraped a side keel.
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: There was a touch, seemingly deliberate and gentle, but the
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: Nicola shuddered horribly. Then the vision screens flared with such
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: a light as Mike Harald the crack of doom. There
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: was a brightness greater than the brilliance of the sun.
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: And then there was a wrenching, heaving shock. Then there
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: was blackness. Baird was flung across the radar room and
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: Diane cried out, and he careened against the wall and
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: heard glass shatter. He called Diane. He clutched crazily at anything,
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: and called her name again. The Nicolo's internal gravity was
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: cut off, and his head spun, and he heard collision
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: doors closing everywhere, But before they closed completely, he heard
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: the rasping sound of giant arcs leaping in the engine room.
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: Then there was silence. Diane cried Baird fiercely. Diane, I'm here,
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: she panted, I'm dizzy, but I think I'm all right.
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: The battery powered emergency light came on. It was faint,
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: but he saw her clinging to a bank of instruments
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: where she'd been thrown by the collision. He moved to
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: go to her and found himself floating in midair, but
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: he drifted to a side wall and worked his way
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: to her. She clung to him, shivering. I think she said, unsteadily,
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: that we're going to die, aren't we.
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: We'll see, he told her. Hold on to me.
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: Guided by the emergency light, he scrambled to the bank
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: of communicator buttons. What had been the floor was now
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: a side wall. He climbed it and thumbed the navigation
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: room switch. Read our room reporting, he said, curtly, power out,
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: gravity off, no reports from outside from power failure, no
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: great physical damage. He began to hear other voices. There
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: had never been an actual space collision in the memory
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: of man. But reports came crisply, and the cut in
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: speakers in the radar room repeated them. Ship gravity was
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: out all over the ship, emergency lights were functioning, and
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: where all the lights there were, there was a slight,
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: unexplained gravity drift toward what had been the ship's port side,
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: but damage control reported no loss of pressure in the
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: Nicola's inner hull, though four areas between inner and outer
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: hulls had lost air pressure to space. Mister Baird rasped
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: the skipper, we're blind. Forget everything else and give us
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: eyes to see with. We'll try battery power to the
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: vision plates. Baard told Diane. No full resolution, but better
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: than nothing. They worked together feverishly. They were dizzy. Something
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: close to nausea came upon them from pure giddiness. What
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: had been the floor was now a wall, and they
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: had to climb to reach the instruments that had been
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: on a wall, and now we're on the ceiling. But
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: their weight was ounces only. Baird said abruptly, I know
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: what's the matter. We're spinning. The whole ship's spinning. That's
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: why we're giddy, and why we have even a trace
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: of weight. Centrifugal force ready for the current. There was
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: a tiny click and the battery light dimmed, but a
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: vision screen lighted faintly. The stars it showed were moving
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: specks of light. The sun passed deliberately across the screen.
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: Baird switched to other outside scanners. There was power for
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: only one screen at a time, but he saw the
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: starkly impossible. He pressed the navigation room button. Radar room reporting,
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: He said, urgently, the Plumy ship is fast to us,
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: in contact with our hull. Both ships are spinning together.
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: He was trying yet other skins enters as he spoke,
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: and now he said, got it. There were no lines
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: connecting us to the Plumy.
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: But it looks yes.
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: That flash when the ships came together was a flashover
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: of high potential. We're welded to them along twenty feet
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: of our hull. The skipper, damn nation, any sign of
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: intention to board us? Not yet, Sir Taine burst in
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: his voice, high pitched and thick with hatred. Damage control parties, attention,
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: arm yourselves and assemble at starboard airlock. Rocket crews got
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: into suits and prepare to board this plumbing countermined, bellowed
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: the Skipper from the speaker beside Barrett's ear. Those orders
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: are canceled.
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: Damn it.
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: If we were successfully boarded, we blow ourselves the bits.
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: Those are our orders. Do you think the Plumies would
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: let their ship be taken? And wouldn't we blow up
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: with them? Mister Taine, you will take no offensive action
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: without specific orders. Defensive action is another matter, mister Baird.
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: I consider this welding business pure accident. No one would
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: be mad enough to plant it. You watched the plumies
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: and keep me informed. His voice ceased, and Baird had
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: again the frustrating duty of remaining still and keeping his
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: head while other men engaged in physical activity. He helped
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: Diane to a chair which was fastened to the floor,
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: which was now a wall, and she wedged herself fast
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: and began a review of what each of the outside
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: scatters reported. Baird called for more batteries. Power for the
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: radar in visions were more important than anything else. Just
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: then if there were more plumy ships. Electricians half floated
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: half dragged extra batteries to the radar room. Baird hooked
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: them in the universe outside the ship again appeared filled
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: with brilliantly colored dots of light which were stars. More satisfying,
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: the globe scanners again reported no new objects anywhere, nothing
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: new within a quarter million miles. A half million later,
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: Bard reported radar reports no strange objects within a million
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: miles of the Nicola. Sir, except the ship were well
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: did to But you are doing very well. However, microphones
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: say there is movement inside the plummy Diane beckoned for
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: Barret's attention to a screen which Bard had examined before.
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: Now he's stiffened and motioned.
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: For her to report.
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: We've a scanner, Sir, said Diane, which faces what looks
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: like a port in the plummy ship. There's a figure
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: at the port. I can't make out details, but it's
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: making motions facing us. Give me the picture the skipper.
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: Diane obeyed. It was the mirror slip of a switch.
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: Then her eyes went back to the spherical sweep scanners,
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: which reported the bearing and distance to every solid object
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: within their range. She set up two instruments which would
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: measure the angle, bearing and distance of the two planets
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: now on this side of the sun, the gas Giant
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: and the oxygen World to someward. Their arbital speeds and
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: distances were known. The position, course and speed of the
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: Niccola could be computed from any two observations on them.
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: Diane had returned to the utterly necessary routine of the
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: radar room, which was the nerve center of the ship,
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: gathering all information needed for navigation in space. The fact
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: that there had been a collision, that the Nicola's engines
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: were melted to unlovely scrap, that the Plummy ship was
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: now welded irremovably to a side keel, and that a
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: Plumy was signaling to humans while both ships were spinning
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: through space toward an unknown destination. These things did not
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: affect the obligations of the radar room. Baird got other
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: images of the Plumy ship into sharp focus, so near
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: these scanners required adjustment for precision. Take a look at this,
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: he said, riling. She looked the view of the Plumy
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: as welded fast to the Necla. The welding was it
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: self an extraordinary result of the Plumy's battle tactics. Tractor
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: and pressor beams were known to men, of course, but
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: human beings used them only under very special conditions. Their
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: operation involved the building up of terrific static charges. Unless
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: a tractor beam generator could be grounded to the object
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: it was to pull, it tended to emit lightning bolts
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: at unpredictable intervals and in entirely random directions, so men
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: didn't use them. Obviously, the Plumies did. They handled the
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: Nicola's rockets with beams which charged the Golden ship to
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: billions of volts, and when the silicon bronze Plumy ship
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: touched the cobalt steel Nicola, why that charge had to
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: be shared? It must have been the most spectacular of
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: all artificial electric flames. Part of the Nicola's hull was vaporized,
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: and undoubtedly part of the Plumy, but the unvaporized surfaces
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: were molten and in contact, and they stuck for a
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: good twenty feet. The two ships were united by the
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: most perfect of vacuum wells. The wholly dissimilar hulls formed
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: a space catamaran with a sort of valley between their bulks,
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: spinning deliberately as the united ships did. Sometimes the sun
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: shone brightly into that valley, and sometimes it was filled
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: with the blackness of the pit. While Diane looked around,
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: door revolved in the side of the plummy ship. As
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: Diane caught her breath, Baird reported crisply at his first words,
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: Tane burst into raging commands for men to follow him
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: through the Nicola's air luck and fight a boarding party
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: of plummies in empty space. The skipper very savagely ordered
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: him to be quiet into Part two Part three of
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: The Aliens by Murray Leinster. This LibriVox recording is in
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: the public domain. Part three only one figure has come out,
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: reported Baird. The skipper watched on a vision plate, but
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: Baird reported so all that Nicola's company would know. It's small,
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: less than five feet. I'll see better in a moment.
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: Sunlight smote down into the valley between the ships. It's
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: wearing a pressure suit. It seems to be the same
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: material as the ship. It walks on two legs, as
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: we do. It has two arms or something very similar.
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: The helmet of the suit is very high. It looks
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: like the armor Knights used to fight in. It's making
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: its way to our airlock. It does not use magnetic
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: soul's shoes. It's holding on the lines threaded along the
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: other ship's hull. The skipper said curtly, mister Baird, I
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: hadn't noticed the absence of magnetic shoes. You seem to
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: have an eye for important items. Report to the airlock
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: in person. Leave Lieutenant Holt to keep an eye on
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: outside objects quickly, mister Baird. Baird laid his hand on
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: Diane's shoulder. She smiled at him. I'll watch, she promised.
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: He went out of the radar room, walking on what
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: had been a side wall. The giddiness and dizziness of
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: continued rotation was growing less now he was getting used
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: to it. But the Nicola seems strange indeed, with the
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: standard up and down and earth gravity replaced by a
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: vertical which was all askew, and a weight of ounces
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: instead of one hundred and seventy pounds. He reached the
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: airlock just as the skipper arrived. There were others there,
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: armed and in pressure suits. The skipper glared about him.
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: I am in command here, he said, very grimly. Indeed,
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: mister Kane has a special function. But I am in command.
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: We and the creatures on the Poluvi ship are in
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: a very serious fix. One of them apparently means to
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: come on board. There will be no hostility, no sneering,
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: no threatening gestures. This is a parley. You will be careful,
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: but you will not be trigger happy. He glared around again.
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: Just as the metallic rapping came upon the Nicola's airlock door.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: The skipper nodded let him in the lock. Mister Baird.
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: Baird obeyed the humming of the unlocking system sounded. There
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: were clankings. The outer airlock closed. There was a faint
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: whistling as air went in. The skipper nodded again. Baird
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: opened the inner door. It was zero eight hours ten
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: minutes ship time. The Plumy stepped confidently out into the
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: top sea turvy corridors of the Niccola. He was about
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: the size of a ten year old human boy, and
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: features which were definitely not grotesque showed through the clear
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: plastic of his helmet. His pressure suit was engineering wise
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: a very clean job. His whole appearance was prepossessing. When
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: he spoke, very clear and quite high sounds soprano sounds
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: came from a small speaker unit at his shoulder for
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: us to talk, said the skipper. Heavily is pure nonsense,
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: But I take it you so thing to say. The
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: Plumy gazed about with an air of lively curiosity. Then
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: he drew out a flat pad with a white surface
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: and sketched swiftly. He offered it to the Nicolas skipper.
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: We want this on a record, he growled, staring about.
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: Diane's voice said capably from a speaker somewhere nearby, Sir,
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: there's a scanner for inspection of objects brought aboard. Hold
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: the plate flat and I'll have a photograph, right, the
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: skipper said curtly to the plummy, you've drawn our two
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: ships linked as they are. What have you to say
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: about it? He handed back the plate. The plumy pressed
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: a stud and it was blank again. He sketched and
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: offered it once more. Hmm, said the skipper, You can't use.
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: Your drive while we're glued.
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: Together a well, the plumy reached up and added lines
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: to the drawing, so rumbled the skipper, inspecting the additions.
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: You say it's up to us to use our drive
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: for both ships, he growled approvingly. You consider there's a truce.
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: You must because we're both in the same fix, and
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: not a nice one either. True enough, we can't fight
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: each other without committing suicide now, but we haven't any
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: drive left.
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: We're a derelict.
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: How am I going to say that? If I decide to?
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: Baird could see the lines on the plate from the
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: angle at which the skipper held it. He said, sir,
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: we've been mapping up in the radar room. Those last
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: lines are map coordinates. A separate sketch, Sir, I think
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: he's saying that the two ships together are on a
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: falling course toward the Sun, that we have to do
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: something or both vessels will fall into it. We should
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: be able to check this, sir Ah, growled the skipper.
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: That's all we need, absolutely all we need to come here,
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: get it into a crazy fight, have our drive melt
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: to scrap, get crazily welded to a Plumy ship, and
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: then for both of us.
• 55:08
  Speaker 2: To fry together.
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: We don't need anything more than that. Lan's voice came
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: on the speaker. Sir, the last radar fixes on the
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: planet in range gave us a course directly toward the Sun.
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: I'll repeat the observations.
• 55:24
  Speaker 2: The skipper growled.
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: Tane thrust himself forward. He snarled, why doesn't this plumy
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: take off its helmet? It lands on oxygen planets? Does
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: it think it's too.
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: Good to breathe our air?
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: Baird caught the Plumy's eye. He made a gesture suggesting
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: the removal of the space helmet. The Plumy gestured in
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: return to a tiny vent in the suit. He opened
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: something and gas whistled out. He cut it off. The
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: question of why he did not open or remove his helmet,
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: was answered. The atmosphere he breathed would not do men
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: any good, nor would theirs do him any good either.
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: Taine said suspiciously, how do we know he's breathing the
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: stuff he let out? Then this creature is in human.
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: It's got no right to attack humans. Now it's trying
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: to trick us. His voice changed to a snarl. We
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: better wring its neck. Teach, it's kind of lesson, the
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: skipper roared at him. Be quiet. Our ship is a wreck.
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: We have to consider the facts. We and these plumies
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: are in a fix together, and we have to get
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: out of it before we start to teach anybody anything.
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: He declared at Tane. Then he said heavily, mister Barrett,
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: you seem to notice things. Take this plumy over the ship.
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: Show him our drive melted it down, so he'll realize
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: we can't possibly tow his ship into an orbit. He
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: knows that we're armed and that we can't handle our
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: warheads at this range, so we can't fool each other.
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: We might as well be frank, but you will take
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: full note of his reactions.
• 57:06
  Speaker 2: Mister Baird.
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: Baird advanced, and the skipper made a gesture. The Plumy
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: recorded Baird with interested eyes, and Baird led the way
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: for a tour of the niccola. It was confusing even
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: to him, with the right hand converted to up and
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: left hand to down and sideways now almost vertical. On
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: the way, the Plummy made more clear flute like sounds
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: and more gestures. Baird answered our gravity pull was that weight,
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: he explained, and things fell so fast. He grasped a
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: hand rail and demonstrated the speed with which things fell
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: in normal ship gravity. He used a pocket communicator for
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: the falling weight. It was singularly easy to say some things,
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: even highly technical ones, because that it be what the
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: Plumy would want to know, But quite commonplace things would
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: be very difficult to convey. Diane's voice came out of
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: the communicator. There are no novelties outside, she said quietly.
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: It looks like this is the only Plumy ship anywhere around.
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: It could have been exploring like us. Maybe it was
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: looking for the people who put up space survey markers. Maybe,
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: agreed Baird, using the communicator. Is that stuff about falling
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: into the sun? Correct, it seems so, said Diane composedly.
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: I'm checking again. So far the best course I can
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: get means we grazed the Sun's photosphere in fourteen days
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: six hours, allowing for acceleration by the Sun's gravity. And
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: you and I, said Baird Riley, have been acting as
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: professional associates. Only when don't say it, said Diane shakily.
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: It's terrible. He put the communicator back in his pocket.
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: The plumy had watched him. He had a peculiarly gallant air,
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: this small figure in golden space armor with its high
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: crested helmet. They reached the engine room and there was
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: the giant drive shaft of the Niccola, once wrapped with
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: yor thick coils, which could induce an incredible density of
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: magnetic flux in the metal. Even the return magnetic field
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: through the ship's coboat steel hull was many times higher
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: than saturation. Now the coils were sagging, mostly melted. There
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: were places where re solidified metal smoked noisomely against non
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: metallic floor or wall covering. Engineers labored dockedly in the
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: trivial gravity to clean up the mess. It's past repair,
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: said Baird to the ship's first engineer. It's junk said
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: that individual dourly give us six months and a place
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: to set up a wire drawing mill and an insulation synthesizer,
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: and we could rebuild it. But nothing less will be
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: any good. The Flumy stared at the He examined the
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: shaft from every angle. He inspected the melted and partly
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: melted and merely burned out sections of the drive coils.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: He was plainly unable to understand in any fashion the
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: principle of the magnetronic drive. Baird was tempted to try
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: to explain, because there was surely no secret about a
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: ship drive. But he could imagine no diagrams are gestures
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: which would convey the theory of what happened in cobalt
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: steel when it was magnetized beyond one hundred thousand gauss
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: flux density. And without that theory one simply couldn't explain
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: a magnetronic drive. They left the engine room, They visited
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: the rocket batteries. The generator room was burned out, like
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: the drive, by the inconceivable lightning bolt which had passed
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: between the ships on contact. The Plumy was again puzzled.
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: Baird made it clear that the generator room supplied electric
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: current for the ship's normal lighting system and services. The
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: Plumy could go grasp that idea. They examined the crew's
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: quarters in the mess room, and the Plumy walked confidently
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: among the members of the human crew, who a little
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: while since had tried so painstakingly to destroy his vessel.
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: He made a good impression these little guys, said a
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: crewman to Baird, admiringly. They got something they can handle
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: a ship. I bet they can almost make that ship
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: of their's plate checkers close to it, agreed Baird. He
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: realized something. He pulled the communicator from his pocket. Diane
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: contact the skipper. He wanted observations. Here's one. The Plumy
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: acts like soldiers used to act in ancient days when
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: they wore armor, and we have the same reaction. They
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: will fight like the devil, but during a truce they'll
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: be friendly, admiring each other with scrappers, but ready to
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: fight as hard as ever when the truce is over.
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: We have the same reaction, and tell the skipper, I've
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: an idea that it's a part of their civilization. Maybe
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: it's a necessary part of any civilization. Tell him, I
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: guess that there may be necessarily parallel evolution of attitudes
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: among rational races, as there are parallel evolutions of eyes
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: and legs and wings and fins among all animals everywhere.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: If I'm right, somebody from this ship will be invited
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: to tour the plumy. It's only a guess, but tell
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: him immediately, said Diane. The Plumy followed gallantly as Baird
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: made a steep climb up what once was the floor
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: of a corridor. Then Tayane stepped out before them, his
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: eyes burned, giving him a clear picture. Eh, he rasped,
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: letting him spy out everything. Baird pressed the communicator call
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: for the radar room and said coldly, I'm obeying orders. Look, Taine,
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: you were picked your job because you were a xenophobe.
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: It helps in your proper functioning. But this plumy is
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: here under a flag of truce. Flag of truce, snarled, Taine,
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: it's vermin, it's not human. I'll if you move one
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: inch nearer him, said Baird gently, Just one inch. The
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: skipper's voice fellowed through the general call speakers all.
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: Over the ship.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: Mister Tayne, you will go to your quarters under arrest,
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: mister Baird burn him down if he hesitates. Then there
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: was a rushing and scrambling. Figures appeared and were all about.
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: They were members of the Nicholas crew, sent by the skipper.
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: They regarded the Plumy with detachment but pain with wary expectancy.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: Tayne turned purple with fury. He shouted, he raged, He
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: called Baird in the other's plumy lovers and vermin worshippers,
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: out his foulnesses at them, but he did not attack.
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: When still shouting, he went away. Baird said apologetically to
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: the Plumy, he says, xenophobe. He has a pathological hatred
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: of strangers, even of strangeness. We have him on board,
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: because then he stopped. The Plumy wouldn't understand, of course,
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: but its eyes took on a curious look. It was
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: almost as if looking at Baird, they twinkled. Baird took
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: him back to the skipper. He's got the picture, sir,
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: he reported. The Plumy pulled out his sketch plate.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 2: He drew on it.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: He offered it. The skipper said, heavily. You guess right,
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: mister Baird. He suggests that someone from this ship go
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: on board the plummy vessel. He's drawn two pressure suited
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: figures going in their airlock. One's larger than the other.
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: Will you go, truly? Said Baird, Then he added thoughtfully,
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: but I'd better carry a portable scanner, sir. It should
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: work perfectly well through a bronze hole. Sir. The skipper
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: nodded and began to sketch a diagram which would amount
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: to an acceptance of the Plumy's invitation. This was at
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: zero seven hours forty minutes ship time. Outside the sedately
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: rotating metal hulls, the one a polished blue silver and
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: the other a glittering golden bronze, the cosmos continued to
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: be as always. The haze from explosive fumes and rocket
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 1: fuel was perhaps a little thinner the brighter stars shown
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: through it. The gas giant planet outward from the sun
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: was a perceptible disk instead of a diffuse glow. The
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: oxygen planet to sunward showed again as a lighted crescent. Presently, Baird,
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: in a human spacesuit, accompanied the Plumy into the nicola's
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: airlock and out to emptiness. His magnetic soled shoes clung
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: to the Niccola's cobalt steel skin fastened to his shoulder.
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: There was a tiny scanner and microphone which would relay
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: everything he saw and heard back to the radar room
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: and to Diane. She watched tensely as he went inside
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: the plummy ship. Other screens relay the image and his
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: voice to other places on the Niccola. He was gone
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: a long time. From the beginning. Of course, there were surprises.
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: When the plummy escort removed his helmet on his own ship.
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: The reason for the helmet's high crest was apparent. He
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: had a high crest of what looked remarkably like feathers,
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: and it was not artificial.
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 2: It grew there.
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: The reason for conventionalized plumes on bronze survey plates was clear.
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: It was exactly like the reason for human features or
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: figures as decorative additions to the inscriptions on space survey
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: marker plates. Even the Plumis' hands had odd crestlets which
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: stood out when he bent his fingers. The other plumies
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: were no less graceful and no less colorful. They had
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: equally clear soprano voices. They were equally miniature, and so
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: devoid of apparent menace. But there were also technical surprises.
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: Baird was taken immediately to the plummy ship's engine room,
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: and Diane heard the sharp intake of breath with which
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: he appeared to recognize as working principle. There were plummy
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: engineers working feverishly at it, attempting to discover something to repair,
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: but they found nothing. The plumy drive simply would not work.
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: They took Baird through the ship's entire fabric, and their purpose,
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: when it became clear, was startling. The plummy ship had
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: no rocket tubes. It had no beam projectors except small
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: sized objects which must be they're projectives of tractor and
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: presser beams. They were elaborately grounded to the ship's substance,
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: but they were not originally designed for ultra heavy service.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: They hadn't and couldn't, have the enormous capacity Baird had expected.
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 2: He was astounded.
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: When he returned to the Nicola. He went instantly to
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: the radar room to make sure that pictures taken through
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: his scanner had turned out well, and there was Diane.
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: But the skipper's voice boomed at him from the wall.
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: Mister bird, what have you to add to the information
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: you sent back? Three items, sir, said Baird. He drew
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: a deep breath for the first, Sir. The plummy ship
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: is unarmed. They've tractor and presser beams for handling material.
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: They probably used them to build their cairns, but they
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: weren't meant for weapons. The plummies, Sir, hadn't a thing
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: to fight with. When they drove for us after we'd
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: detected them, the skipper blinked hard. Are you sure of that,
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: mister Baird, Yes, Sir, said Baird, uncomfortably. The plumy ship
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: is an exploring ship, a survey ship, Sir. You saw
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: their mapping equipment, But when they spotted us and we
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: spotted them, they bluffed. When we fired rockets at them,
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: they turned them back with tractor and pressor beams. They
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: drove for us, Sir, to try to destroy us with
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: our own bombs because they didn't have any of their own.
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: The skipper's mouth opened and closed. Another item, Sir, said Baird,
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: more uncomfortably. Still, they don't use iron or steel. Every
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: metal object I saw was either a bronze or a
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: light metal. I suspect some of their equipments made of potassium,
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: and I'm fairly sure they use sodium in place of aluminum.
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: Their atmosphere is quite different from ours. Obviously, they'd use
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: bronze for their ship's hull because they could venture into
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: an oxygen atmosphere in a bronze ship. A sodium hulled
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: ship would be lighter, but it would burn in oxygen
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: where there was moisture. The skipper blinked. But they couldn't
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: drive in a non magnetic hull, he protested. A ship
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 1: has to be magnetic to drive, Sir said barred, his
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: voice still shaken. They don't use a magnetronic drive. I
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: once saw a picture of the drive they use in
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: a stereo on the history of space travel. The principle's
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: very old. We've practically forgotten it. Into Part three, Part
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: four of The Aliens by Marie Leinster. This libri vox
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain.
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 2: Part four.
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: It's a Dierock pusher drive, sir. Among us humans. It
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: came right after rockets. The planets of Saul were first
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: reached by ships using direct pushers. But he paused, they
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: won't operate in a magnetic field above seventy goths, Sir.
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: It's a static charge reaction, sir. And in a magnetic
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: field it simply stops working. The Skipper regarded Baird unwinkingly
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: for a long time. I think you're telling me, he
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: said at long last, that the Plumies drive would work
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 1: if they were cut free of the Niccola. Yes, sir,
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 1: said Baird. Their engineers were opening up the drive elements
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: and checking them and then closing them up again. They
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: couldn't seem to find anything wrong. I don't think they
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: know what the trouble is. It's the Niccola's magnetic field.
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 1: I think it was our field that caused the collision,
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: by stopping their drive and killing all their controls when
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: they came close enough. Did you tell them, demanded the skipper.
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: There was no easy way to tell them by diagrams.
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: Sir Taine's voice cut in. It was feverish, it was strident,
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: it was triumphant. Sir. The Nicola is effectively erec and unrepaarable,
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 1: but the Plumy ship is operable if cut loose. As
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 1: weapons officer, I intend to take the Plumy ship, let
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 1: out its air, fill its tanks with our air, start
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: up its drive, and turn it over to you for navigation.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 2: Back to base.
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: Baared raged, but he said coldly. We are a long
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: way from home, mister Tayne, and the deer rock pusher
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: drive is slow. If we headed back to base in
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: the Plumy ship with its deer rock pusher, we'd all
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: be dead of old age before we go on halfway.
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: But unless we take it, raged, Tane, we hit this
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: son in fourteen days, we don't have to die now.
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 1: We can land on the oxygen planet up ahead. We've
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: only to kill these vermin and take their ship and
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: we'll live. Diane's voice said dispassionately. Report a Plumy in
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 1: a pressure suit has just come out of their airlock.
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 1: It's carrying a parcel toward our airlock. Tane snarled instantly.
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: They'll sneak something and then a cola to blast it,
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 1: and then cut free and go away. The skipper said,
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: very grimly, mister Taine, credit me with minimum brains. There
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: is no way the Plumies can take this ship without
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 1: an atomic bomb exploding.
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 2: To destroy both ships.
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: You should know it. Then he snapped airlock area, listen
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: for a knock and let in the Plumy or the
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: parcel he leaves. There was silence. Baird said very quietly.
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: I doubt they think it possible to cut the ship's apart.
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: A torch is no good on thix silicon bronze. It
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: conducts heat too well, and they don't you steal. They
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: probably haven't a cutting torch at all. From the radar room,
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: he watched the Plumy place an object in the airlock
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: and withdraw. He watched from a scanner inside the ship
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: if someone brought in what the Plumy had left. An
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: electronics man bustled forward. He looked it over quickly. It
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: was complex, but his examinations suddenly seemed satisfying to him.
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 1: But a grayish vapor developed, and he sniffed and wrinkled
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 1: his nose. He picked up a communicator, Sir, they've sent
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: us a power generator. Some of its parts are going
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: bad in our atmosphere, sir, but this looks to me
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: like a hell of a good idea for a generator.
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: I never saw anything like it, but it's good. You
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: can set it for any voltage and it'll turn out
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: plenty juice. Put it in helium, snapped the skipper. He
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 1: won't break down in that. Then see how it serves.
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 1: In the radar room, Baird drew a deep breath. He
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: went carefully to each of the screens and every radar.
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 1: Diane saw what he was about and checked with him.
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: They met at the middle of the radar room. Everything's
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: checked out, said Baird gravely. There's nothing else around. There's
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 1: nothing we can be called on to do before something happens,
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 1: so we can act like people. Diane smiled, very faintly.
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 1: Not like people, just like us, she said, wistfully. Don't
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: you want to tell me something, something you intended to
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 1: tell me only after we got back to base.
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 2: He did.
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: He told it to her, And there was also something
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 1: she had not intended to tell him at all unless
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: he told her first.
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 2: She said it. Now.
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 1: They felt that such sayings were of the greatest possible importance,
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: clung together saying them again, and it seemed wholly monstrous
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: that two people who cared so desperately had wasted so
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: much time acting like professional associates explorer ship officers when
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 1: things like this were to be said. As they talked
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: incoherently or were even more eloquently silent, the ship's ordinary
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: lights came on. The battery lamp went on. We've got
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 1: to switch back to ship's circuit, said Baird reluctantly. They
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: separated and restored the operating circuits to normal. We've got
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: fourteen days, he added, and so much time to be
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: on duty, and we've lost a lifetime to live in
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: fourteen days, Diane, she flushed vividly. So Baird said, very
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: politely into the microphone to the navigation room, Sir, Lieutenant
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: Holt and myself would like to speak directly to you
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: in the navigation room, may we, why not, growled the skipper.
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 1: You've noticed that the plumy generator is given the whole
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 1: ship lights and services.
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 2: Yes, sir, said Baird. We'll be there right away. They
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 2: heard the.
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: Skipper's grunt as they hurried through the door. A moment later,
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: the ship's normal gravity returned also through the plummy generator.
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: Up was up again, and down was down, and the
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 1: corridors and cabins of the Niccola were brightly illuminated. Had
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: the ship been other than an engineless wreck falling through
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty million miles of emptiness into the
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: flaming photosphere of a sun, everything would have seemed quite normal,
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: including the errand Baird and Diane were upon, and the
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 1: fact that they held hands self consciously as they went
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 1: about it. They skirted the bulkhead of the main air tank.
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: They headed along the broader corridor, which went past the
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: indented inner door of the airlock. They had reached that
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 1: indentation when Baird saw that the inner airlock door was closing.
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 1: He saw a human pressure suit past its edge.
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 2: He saw the.
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: Corner of some object that had been put down on
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: the airlock floor. Baird shouted and rushed toward the lock.
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: He seized the inner handle and tried to force open
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 1: the door again so that no one inside could emerge
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 1: into the emptiness without He failed. He wrenched frantically at
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 1: the controls of the outer door. It suddenly swung freely.
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 1: The outer door had been put on manual it could be,
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 1: and was being opened from inside. Tell the skipper, raged Baird.
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: Taine's taking something out. He tore open a pressure suit
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 1: cupboard in the wall beside the lock door. He'll make
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 1: the plumies thinke it's a return gift for the generator.
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: He eeled into the pressure suit and zipped it up
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: to his neck. A man's crazy. He thinks we can
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: take their ship and stay.
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 2: Alive for a while. Damn it, our.
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: Air would ruin half their equipment. Tell the skipper to
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: send help. He wrenched at the door again, jamming down
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 1: his helmet with one hand, and this time the control worked.
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: Tane most probably had forgotten that the inner control was
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: disengaged only when the manual was actively in use. The
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 1: hand raced away, panting. Beard swore bitterly at the slowness
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 1: of the outer doors closing. He was tearing at the
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 1: interer door long before he could be opened. He flung
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: himself in and dragged it shut, and struck the emergency
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 1: air release, which bled the airlock into space for speed
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 1: of operation.
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 2: He thrust out the.
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: Outer door and plunged through. His momentum carried him almost
• 1:19:41
  Speaker 1: too far. He fell, and only the magnetic soles of
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 1: his shoes enabled him to check himself. He was in
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: that singular valley between the two ships, where their hulls
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 1: were impregnably welded fast round huled plumy ship and ganoid
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: shaped niccola. They stuck immovably together, as if they had
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 1: been that way since time began. Where the sky appeared
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: above Baird's head, the stars moved in stately procession across
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: the valley roof. He heard a metallic rapping through the
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 1: fabric of his space armor. Then sunlight glittered and the
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: valley filled with a fierce glare, and a man in
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: a human spacesuit stood on the Niccola's plating, opposite the
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 1: plumy airlock. He held a bulky object under his arm.
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: With his other garnlet, he rapped again. You fool, shouted Baird.
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: Stop that we couldn't use their ship anyhow. His space
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 1: phone had turned on with the air supply. Tane's voice snarled.
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 2: We'll try. You'll keep back.
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 1: They are not human, But Baird ran toward him. The
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 1: sensation of running upon magnetic soled shoes was unearthly. It
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: was like trying to run on fly paper or bird lime.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: But in addition, there was no gravity here and no
• 1:21:07
  Speaker 1: sense of balance, and there was the feeling of perpetual fall.
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: There could be no science nor any skill in an
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 1: encounter under such conditions. Baird partly ran and partly staggered,
• 1:21:20
  Speaker 1: and partly skatered to where Tane faced him. Snarling. He
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 1: threw himself at the other men, and then the sun
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 1: vanished behind the bronze ship's hull, and only stars moved
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: visibly in all the universe, but the sound of his
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 1: impact was loud in Baird's ears. Inside the suit, there
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 1: was a slightly different sound when his armor struck Taines
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 1: and when it struck the heavier metal of the two
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: ships he fought, but the suits were intended to be
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: defense against greater stresses than human blows could offer. In
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: the darkness, it was like two blind folded men fighting
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 1: each other while encased in pillows. Then the sun returned,
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 1: floating sedately above the valley, and Baird could see his enemy.
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: He saw too, that the Plumy airlock was now open,
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: and that a small, erect and somehow jaunty figure in
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: golden space armor stood in the opening and watched gravely
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 1: as the two men fought. Tayne cursed, panting with hysterical hate.
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 1: He flung himself at Bird, and Bird toppled because he'd
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: put one foot past the welded boundary between the Nicola's
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: cobalt steel and the Plumy ship's bronze. One foot held
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: to nothing. And that was a ghastly sensation, because if
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 1: Taine only rugged his other foot free and heaved, why
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 1: then Baird would go floating away from the rotating now
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: twined ships, floating further and further away forever.
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 2: But darkness fell.
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 1: Then he scrambled back to the Nicola's hull, as a
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: disorderly parade of stars went by above him. He pentently
• 1:23:03
  Speaker 1: waited fresh attack. He felt something, and it was the
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 1: object Taine had meant to offer as a return present
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 1: to the Plumies. It was unquestionably explosive, either booby trapped
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: or time to explode inside the bloomy ship. Now it
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 1: rocked gently, gripped by the magnetism of the steel. The
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: sun appeared again, and Taine was yards away, crawling and
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: fumbling for Baird. Then he saw him and rose and rushed,
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: and the clankings of his shoe soles were loud. Baird
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: flung himself attain in a savage tackle. He struck Tane's
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: legs a glancing blow, and the cobalt steel held his
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 1: armor fast. But Taine careened and bounced against the round
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 1: bronze wall of the Plumy and bounced again. Then he
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 1: screamed because he was floating slowly out to emptiness, his
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 1: arms and legs jerking spasmodically while he shrieked. The Plumy
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 1: in the airlock stepped out, he trailed a cord behind him.
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 1: He leaped briskly toward nothingness. There came a quick darkness
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 1: once more, and Baird struggled erect despite the adhesiveness of
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 1: the Nacola's hull. When he was fully upright, sick with
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 1: horror at what had come about, there was sunlight yet again,
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 1: and men were coming out of the Niccola's airlock, and
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 1: the plummy who leaped for space was pulling himself back
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 1: to his own ship again. He had a loop of
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: cord twisted around Taine's leg, but Taine screamed and screamed
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 1: inside his spacesuit. It was odd that one could recognize
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 1: the skipper even inside space armor, but Baard felt sick.
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: He saw Taine received still screaming, and carried into the lock.
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 1: The skipper growled an infuriated demand for details. His space
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 1: phone had come on too, when his air supply began.
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: Baird explained, his teeth chattering. Hah, grunted the skipper, Taine
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: was a mistake. He shouldn't ever have left ground. When
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 1: a man's potty in one fashion, there'll be cracks in
• 1:25:15
  Speaker 1: him all over.
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 2: What's this?
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 1: The Plumy in the golden armor very soberly offered the
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 1: skipper the object Taine had meant to introduce into the
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 1: Plumy ship.
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 2: Baird said desperately that.
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 1: He'd fought against it because he believed it a booby
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: trap to kill the Plumies, so men could take their
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: ship and fill it with air and cut it free
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 1: and then make a landing somewhere. Damned foolishness, rumble the skipper.
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 1: Their ship had begun to crumble with our air in
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 1: it if it held to a landing. Then he considered
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: the object. He'd accepted it from the Plumy. It could
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 1: have been a rocket warhead enclosed in some container that
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 1: would detonate it if opened, or there might be a
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 1: timing device. The skipper grunted.
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 2: He heaved its skyward.
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 1: The misshapen object went floating away toward emptiness. Sunlight smote
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 1: harshly upon it. Don't want it back in then the
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: color growled the skipper, but just to make sure, he
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 1: fumbled a hand weapon out of his belt. He raised it,
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 1: and its spurted flame very tiny blue white sparks, each
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 1: one indicating a pellet of metal flung away at high velocity.
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 1: One of them struck the shining retreating container. It exploded
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 1: with a monstrous soundless violence. It had been a rocket's warhead.
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 1: There could have been only one reason for it to
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 1: be introduced into a plumy ship. Baird ceased to be
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 1: shaking instead, he was ashamed. The skipper growled inarticulately. He
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 1: looked at the plumy again, standing in the golden ship's air.
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 2: Luck we'll go back, mister Baird.
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 1: What you've done won't save our lives, and nobody will
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 1: ever know you did it, but I think well of you.
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 2: Come along.
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 1: This was eleven hours, five minutes ship time. A good
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 1: half hour later, the Skipper's voice bellowed from the speakers
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 1: all over the nicola. His heavy, jowled features stared doggedly
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 1: out of screens wherever men were on duty or at ease.
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 1: Hear this, He said, forbiddingly. We have checked our course
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 1: and speed.
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 2: We have verified that there is.
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: No possible jewelry rig for our engines that could get
• 1:27:40
  Speaker 1: us into any sort of orbit, let alone land us
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 1: on the only planet in this system.
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 2: With air we could breathe.
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 1: It is officially certain that in thirteen days, nine hours
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 1: from now, the Nicola will be so close to the
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 1: sun that her hull will melt down, which would be
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 1: no loss to us, because we'll be dead then still
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 1: going on into the sun to be vaporized with the ship.
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 1: There is nothing to be done about it. We can
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 1: do nothing to save our own lives. He glared out
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 1: of each and every one of the screens wherever there
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 1: were men to see him, but he rumbled. The Plumies can.
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 2: Get away if we help them.
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 1: They have no cutting torches we have. We can cut
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 1: their ship free. They can repair their drive, but it's
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 1: most likely it'll operate perfectly when they're a mile on
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 1: the Nicola's magnetic field. They can't help us, but we
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 1: can help them, and sooner or later, some plumy ship
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 1: is going to encounter some other human ship. If we
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 1: cut these Plumies loose, they'll report what we did. When
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: they meet other men, they'll be cagey because they'll remember Tane,
• 1:28:55
  Speaker 1: but they'll know they can make friends because we did
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 1: them a favor. When we nothing to gain by it.
• 1:29:02
  Speaker 1: I can offer no reward, but I asked for volunteers
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 1: to go outside and cut the plumy ship loose. So
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: the Plumies can go home in safety instead of on
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 1: into the sun with us. He glared and cut off
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 1: the image. Diane held tightly to Barrett's hand in the
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 1: radar room, he said evenly. They'll be volunteers. The Plumies
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 1: are pretty sporting characters, putting up a fight with an
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: unarmed ship, and so on. If there aren't enough other volunteers,
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 1: the Skipper and I will cut them free by ourselves,
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 1: Diane said, dry throated.
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 2: I'll help so I.
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 1: Can be with you. We've got so little time. I'll
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 1: ask the Skipper as soon as the plumy ship's free, Yes,
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 1: said Diane, and she pressed her face against his shoulder
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 1: and wept. This was at zero one hours, twenty minutes
• 1:29:59
  Speaker 1: of ship time. At zero three hours, even there was
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: peculiar activity in the valley between the welded ships. There
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 1: were men in space armour working cutting torches, where for
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 1: twenty feet the two ships were solidly attached. Blue white
• 1:30:15
  Speaker 1: flames bored savagely into solid metal, and melted copper gave
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 1: off strangely colored clouds of vapor, which emptiness whisked away
• 1:30:24
  Speaker 1: to nothing, and molten iron and cobalt made equally lurid
• 1:30:28
  Speaker 1: clouds of other colors. There were Plumies in the airlock
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 1: watching at zero three hours forty minutes ship time. All
• 1:30:38
  Speaker 1: the men but one drew back. They went inside the Niccola.
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 1: Only one man remained, cutting at the last sliver of
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 1: metal that held.
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 2: The two ships together.
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: It ported The Plumy ship swept swiftly away, moved by
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 1: the centrifugal force of the rotary motion that joined vessels
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 1: had possessed and windled. It was a half mile away.
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 1: A mile the last man on the outside of the
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 1: Niccola's hull, thriftily, brought the torch to the airlock and
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: came in. Suddenly, the distant golden hull came to life.
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: It steadied, It ceased to spin, however slowly it darted ahead,
• 1:31:21
  Speaker 1: it checked, It swung to the right and left, and
• 1:31:24
  Speaker 1: up and down. It was alive again. In the radar room,
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: Diane walked into Baird's arms and said, shakily, now we
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 1: we have almost fourteen days. Wait, he commanded. When the
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: Plumies understood what we were doing and why they drew diagrams,
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 1: They hadn't thought of cutting free out in space without
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: the spinning saws they used to cut bronze with. But
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: they asked for a scanner and a screen. They checked
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 1: on its use. I want to see.
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 2: He flipped on.
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 1: The screen and there was instantly a plumy looking eagerly
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 1: out of it for some sign of communication established. There
• 1:32:07
  Speaker 1: were soprano sounds, and he waved a hand for attention.
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: Then he zestfully held up one diagram after another. Baird
• 1:32:16
  Speaker 1: drew a deep breath, a very deep breath. He pressed
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 1: the navigation room call. The skipper looked dourly at him. Well,
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 1: said the skipper, forbiddingly, sir, said Baird, very quietly. Indeed,
• 1:32:34
  Speaker 1: the plumies are talking by diagram over. The communicator said.
• 1:32:38
  Speaker 1: We gave them their drive works. They were as well
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: off as they ever were, and they've been modifying their
• 1:32:46
  Speaker 1: tractor beams, stepping them up to higher power. What of it,
• 1:32:51
  Speaker 1: demanded the skipper, rumbling. They believe, said Baird, that they
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 1: can handle the Niccola with their beefed up tractor beams.
• 1:33:00
  Speaker 2: He wetted his lips. They're going to tow us to.
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 1: The oxygen planet ahead, sir, They're going to set us
• 1:33:07
  Speaker 1: down on it. They'll help us find the metals. We
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 1: need to build the tools to repair the nicola, sir.
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: You see the reasoning, Sir, We turn them loose to
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 1: improve the chance of friendly contact when another human ship
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 1: runs into them. They want us to carry back to
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 1: be proof that plums and men can be friends. It
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 1: seems that they like us, sir. He stopped for a moment,
• 1:33:33
  Speaker 1: then he went on reasonably, And besides that, it'll be
• 1:33:37
  Speaker 1: one hell of a fine business proposition. We never bother
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 1: with hydrogen methane planets. They've minerals and chemicals we haven't got.
• 1:33:46
  Speaker 1: But even the stones of a methane hydrogen planet are
• 1:33:49
  Speaker 1: ready to combine with the oxygen we need to breathe.
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 1: We can't carry or keep enough oxygen for real work.
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 1: The same thing's true with them on an oxygen planet.
• 1:34:00
  Speaker 1: We can't work on each other's planets, but we can
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 1: do fine business in each other's minerals and chemicals from
• 1:34:07
  Speaker 1: those planets. I've got a feeling, sir, that the plumy
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 1: carns are location notices, markers set up over ore deposits
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: they can find but can't hope to work. Yet they
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 1: claim against today when their scientists find a way to
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 1: make them worth owning. I'm willing to bet, sir that
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 1: if we explored hydrogen planets as thoroughly as oxygen ones,
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: we'd find carns on their type planets that they haven't
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: colonized yet. The skipper stared, his mouth dropped open, and
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 1: I think, sir, said Baird, that until they detected us,
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 1: they thought they were the only intelligent race in the galaxy.
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: They were upset to discover suddenly that they were not.
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 1: And at first they had no idea what we'd be like.
• 1:34:54
  Speaker 1: But I'm guessing now, sir, that they're figuring out on
• 1:34:57
  Speaker 1: what chemicals and start swapping with us. Then he added,
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: when you think of it, sir, probably the first metal
• 1:35:04
  Speaker 1: they ever used was aluminum, where our ancestors used copper,
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 1: and they had a delirium age next instead of iron.
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 1: And right now, Sir, is probably as expensive for them
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 1: to refine iron as it is for us to handle
• 1:35:18
  Speaker 1: titanium and belarium and osmium, which are duck soup for them.
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 1: Our two cultures are to thrive as long as we're friends, Sir.
• 1:35:27
  Speaker 1: They know it already, and we'll find out in a hurry.
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 1: The skipper's mouth moved it closed and then dropped open again.
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 1: The search for the plumies had been made because it
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 1: looked like they had to be fought, But Baird had
• 1:35:44
  Speaker 1: just pointed out some extremely common sense items which changed
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 1: the situation entirely, and there was evidence that the plummy
• 1:35:52
  Speaker 1: saw the situation the new way. The skipper felt such
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 1: enormous relief that his manner changed. He displayed what was
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 1: almost effusive cordiality for the skipper. He cleared his throat. Uh,
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 1: very good, mister Baird, he said, formidably. And of course,
• 1:36:12
  Speaker 1: with time and air and metals, we can.
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 2: Rebuild our drive.
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 1: For that matter, we could rebuild in Nicola. I'll notify
• 1:36:21
  Speaker 1: the ship's company, mister Baird.
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 2: Very good.
• 1:36:24
  Speaker 1: He moved to use another microphone. Then he checked himself.
• 1:36:29
  Speaker 1: Your expression is odd, mister Baird. Did you wish to
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 1: say something more? Yes, sir, said Baird. He held Diane's
• 1:36:38
  Speaker 1: hand fast. It'll be months before we get back to port, sir,
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: and it's normally against regulations, but under the circumstances, would
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: you mind as skipper marrying Lieutenant Holton me The skipper snorted,
• 1:36:54
  Speaker 1: Then he said, almost almost amiably, hmmm, you've both done
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 1: very well, mister Baird. Yes, come to the navigation room
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 1: and we'll get it over with, say ten minutes from now.
• 1:37:09
  Speaker 1: Baird grinned at Diane. Her eyes shone a little. That
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: was at zero four hours ten minutes ship time.
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 2: It was exactly twelve.
• 1:37:19
  Speaker 1: Hours since the alarm bell rang. End of Part four,
• 1:37:25
  Speaker 1: End of the Aliens by Murray Leinster, the story recorded
• 1:37:31
  Speaker 1: by Phil shaneverein December twenty twenty one