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🟡 Out of the Iron Womb! (Full Audiobook) | Poul William Anderson · Classic Science Fiction Audiobooks: Free Public Domain Sci-Fi Stories

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  Speaker 1: Section one of Out of the Iron Womb. This is
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  Speaker 1: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
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  Speaker 1: Recording by Paul Harvey. Out of the Iron Womb by
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  Speaker 1: Paul Anderson, Section one. Behind a pale Venusian mask lay
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  Speaker 1: hidden the arch humanist, the anti tech killer, one of
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  Speaker 1: those who needlessly had strewn malone blood across the heavens,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: from Saturn to the Sun. Now on distant Trojan asteroids,
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: the rendezvous for death was plainly marked. The most dangerous
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: is not the outlawed murderer who only slays men, but
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: the rebellious philosopher, for he destroys worlds darkness and the
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  Speaker 1: chill glitter of stars. Beau Johnson crouched on a whirling
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  Speaker 1: speck of stone and waited for the man who was
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  Speaker 1: coming to kill him. There was no horizon. The flying
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: mountain on which he stood was too small. At his
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  Speaker 1: back rose a cliff of jagged rock, losing its own
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  Speaker 1: blackness in the loom of shadows. Its teeth ate raggedly
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: across the milky way. Before him, a tumbled, igneous wilderness
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  Speaker 1: slanted crazily off, with one long, thin crag sticking into
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  Speaker 1: the sky like a grotesque bow spirit. There was no
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  Speaker 1: sound except the thudding of his own heart, the harsh
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  Speaker 1: rasp of his own breath, locked inside the stinking metal
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  Speaker 1: skin of his suit. Otherwise, no air, no heat, no
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  Speaker 1: water or life or work of man. Only a granite
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  Speaker 1: nakedness spinning through space, out beyond Mars, stooping awkward in
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  Speaker 1: the clumsy armor. He put the transparent plastic of his
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: helmet to the ground. It's cold bitted him. Even through
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: the insulating material. He might be able to hear the
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: footsteps of his murderer, conducted through the ground. Stillness answered him.
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  Speaker 1: He gulped a heavy lungful of tainted air and rose.
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  Speaker 1: The other might be miles away yet, or perhaps very close.
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  Speaker 1: Cat footing too softly to set up vibrations. A man
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: could do that when gravity was feeble enough. The stars
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  Speaker 1: blazed with a cruel, wintry brilliance over him, around him,
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  Speaker 1: light years to fall through emptiness before he reached one.
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  Speaker 1: He had been alone among them before, he had almost
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  Speaker 1: thought them friends. Sometimes on a long watch, a man
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: found himself talking to vaga or Spike or dear old Beetlejuice,
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  Speaker 1: murmuring what was in him, as if the remote sun
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  Speaker 1: could understand. But they didn't care. He saw that now
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  Speaker 1: of them he did not exist, and they would shine
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  Speaker 1: carelessly long after he was gone. And tonight he had
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: never felt so alone as now, when another man that
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  Speaker 1: was on the asteroid with him hunting him down. Bo
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: Johnson looked at the wrench in his hand. It was
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  Speaker 1: long and massive. It would have been heavy on Earth,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: but it was hardly enough to unscrew the stars and
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  Speaker 1: reset the machinery of a universe gone awry. He smiled
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: stiffly at the thought. He wanted to laugh too, but
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  Speaker 1: checked himself for fear he wouldn't be able to stop
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: Lad's face that he told himself, you're scared, You're scared, sweatless,
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  Speaker 1: he wondered if he had spoken it aloud. There was
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  Speaker 1: plenty of room on the asteroid, at least two hundred
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  Speaker 1: square miles, probably more if he allowed for the rough surface.
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  Speaker 1: He could skulk around tide and suffocate when his tank
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  Speaker 1: air gave out. He had to be a hunter two
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: and tracked down the other man before he died, And
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: if he found his enemy, he would probably die anyway.
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: He looked about him. Nothing, no sound, no movement, nothing
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  Speaker 1: but the streaming of the constellations as the asteroid spun.
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  Speaker 1: Nothing had ever moved here since the beginning of time,
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  Speaker 1: when molteness congealed into death, not till men came and
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: haunted each other. Slowly, he forced himself to move. The
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  Speaker 1: thrust of his foot sent him up, looping over the cliff,
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  Speaker 1: to drift down like a dead leaf in Earth's October.
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  Speaker 1: Souit equipment and his own body all together weighed only
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  Speaker 1: a couple of pounds. Here it was ghostly, this soundless
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  Speaker 1: progress over fields which had never known life. It was
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  Speaker 1: like being dead already. Bo Johnson's tongue was dry and
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  Speaker 1: thick in his mouth. He wanted to find his enemy
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  Speaker 1: and give up by existence, at whatever price it would command.
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  Speaker 1: But he couldn't do that, even if the other man
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  Speaker 1: let him do it, which was doubtful. He couldn't. Johnny
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  Speaker 1: Malone was dead. Maybe that was what had started at all,
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: the death of Johnny Malone. There are numerous reasons for
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: basing on the Trojan asteroids, but the main one could
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: be given in a single word. Stability. They stay put
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  Speaker 1: in Jupiter's orbit about sixty degrees ahead and behind, with
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  Speaker 1: only minor oscillations. Space ships need not waste fuel coming
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  Speaker 1: up to a body which has been perturbed a goodly
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  Speaker 1: distance from where was supposed to be. The trailing group
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: is the jumping off place for Transjovian planets, the leading
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: group for the inner worlds. That way, their own revolution
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: about the Sun gives the departing ship a welcome boost
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: while minimizing the effects of Jupiter's drag. Moreover, being dense clusters,
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: they have attracted swarms of miners, so that Achilles, among
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: the leaders and petroclists, and the trailers have a permanent
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: boomtown atmosphere, even though spaceship and equipment represent a large investment.
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  Speaker 1: This is one of the last strongholds of genuinely private enterprise.
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  Speaker 1: The prospector, the mine owner, the rock hount, dreaming of
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  Speaker 1: the day when his stake is big enough for him
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  Speaker 1: to start out on his own. A race of individualists,
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  Speaker 1: rough and noisy and jealous, but living under iron rules
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  Speaker 1: of hospitality and rescue. The last chance on Achilles has
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  Speaker 1: another name, which simply sticks and r in the official one,
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  Speaker 1: even for that planetoid. It is a rowdy bar where
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  Speaker 1: guardsmen come in trios. Janni Malone liked it and talked
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: bo Johnson into going there for a final spree before
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: Chekhov and departure. Nothing to compare, he insisted, every place
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  Speaker 1: else is getting two fan tangling civilized except Venus, and
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: I don't enjoy Venus. Johnny was from Luna City, himself,
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  Speaker 1: a small dark man with the quick, nervous movements and
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  Speaker 1: dipped accent of that roaring commercial metropolis. He affected the
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  Speaker 1: latest styles, brilliant colors and the flowing tunic and slacks.
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  Speaker 1: A beret cocked on his sleek head, but somehow he
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  Speaker 1: didn't grate on Bou. They had been partners for several
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  Speaker 1: years now. They pushed through a milling crowd at the
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  Speaker 1: bar rock hounds who watched one of Achilles three live
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  Speaker 1: adisiasts with hungry eyes, and by some miracle found an
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  Speaker 1: empty booth. Bau squeezed his bulk into one side of
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  Speaker 1: the cubicle, while Johnny, squinting through a reeking smoke haze
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  Speaker 1: dial drinks. Bau was larger and heavier than most spacemen.
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  Speaker 1: He'd never have gotten his certificate before the ion drive
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  Speaker 1: came in and was usually content to let others talk
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  Speaker 1: while he listened. A placid, blonde giant with amiable blue
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  Speaker 1: eyes and a battered brown face, he did not consider
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  Speaker 1: himself bright and always wanted to learn. Johnny gulped his
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  Speaker 1: drink and winced whiskey. They call it yet water, synthetic
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: alcohol and a dash of caramel. They have the galta
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  Speaker 1: label whiskey and charge for Everything's expensive here, said Bou mildly.
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  Speaker 1: That's why so few RockHounds get rich. They make a
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  Speaker 1: lot of money, but they have to spend it just
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  Speaker 1: as fast to stay alive. Yeah, yeah, I wish they'd
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  Speaker 1: spend some of it on us. Johnny grinned and fed
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: the dispenser another coin. It muttered to itself and slid
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  Speaker 1: forth a tray with a glass. Come on, drink up, man.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: It's a long way home, and we've got to fortify
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  Speaker 1: ourselves for the trip. A bottle, a battle, and a
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: wench is what I need most, especially the wench, because
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: I don't think the eminent doctor McKittrick is going to
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  Speaker 1: be interested in sociability. In it's close quarters aboard the dog,
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  Speaker 1: Bow kept on sipping slowly Johnny, he said, raising his
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  Speaker 1: voice to cut through the din. You're an educated man.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: I never could figure out why you want to talk
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  Speaker 1: like a jumper, because I am one at heart. Look, Bau,
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  Speaker 1: why don't you get over that inferiority complex of yours.
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  Speaker 1: A man can't run a spaceship without knowing more math
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  Speaker 1: and physical science than the average professor on earth. So
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: you had to work your way through the academy and
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  Speaker 1: never had a chance to fan yourself with a lily
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  Speaker 1: white hand while some but he tootled Mozart through a horn.
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  Speaker 1: So what Johnny's head darted around, bird like, if we
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  Speaker 1: want some women, we'd better make our reservations now. I don't,
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  Speaker 1: Johnny said, bo I'll just nurse a beer. It wasn't
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  Speaker 1: morals so much as fastidiousness. He'd wait till they hit Luna.
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  Speaker 1: Suit yourself if you don't want to uphold the honor
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  Speaker 1: of the Serious Transportation Company, bo chuckled. The company consisted
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  Speaker 1: of a the Serious b her crew, himself and Johnny ce,
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  Speaker 1: a warehouse Berth, and three other part owners back in
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  Speaker 1: Luna City. Not exactly a tramp ship, because because you
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: can't normally stop and the middle of an interplanetary voyage
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  Speaker 1: and had somewhere else, but she went wherever there was
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  Speaker 1: cargo or people to be moved. Her margin of profit
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  Speaker 1: was not great in spite of the charges. For a
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  Speaker 1: space trip is expensive, but in a few more years
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  Speaker 1: they'd be able to buy another ship or two, and
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: eventually Fireball and Triplanetary would be getting some competition. Even
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  Speaker 1: the public lines might have to worry a little. Johnny
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  Speaker 1: put away another couple of shots and rows. Alcohol cost plenty,
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  Speaker 1: but it was also more effective than lo g excuse me,
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  Speaker 1: he said, I see a target. Sure you don't want
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  Speaker 1: me to ask if she has a friend. Bau shook
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  Speaker 1: his head and watched his partner move off swift in
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  Speaker 1: the puny gravity, The Last Chance didn't centrifuge like some
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  Speaker 1: of the Tomicker places downtown. It was hard to push
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  Speaker 1: through the crowd without weight to help, but Johnny faded
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  Speaker 1: along and edged up to the girl with his highest
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  Speaker 1: powered smile. There were several other men standing around her,
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  Speaker 1: but Johnny had the touch. He'd be bringing her back
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  Speaker 1: here in a few minutes. Side feeling a bit lonesome
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: if he wasn't going to make a night of it,
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  Speaker 1: There's no point in drinking heavily. He had to make
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  Speaker 1: the final inspection of the ship tomorrow and grudge the
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  Speaker 1: cost of anti hangover tablets. Besides what he was putting
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: back into the business, he was trying to build a
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  Speaker 1: private hoarde. Someday he'd retire, get married and build a house.
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: He already had the sight picked out on callin overlooking
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  Speaker 1: the sound back on earth Man, but it was a
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: long time since he'd been on Earth. A sharp noise
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: slashed through the haze of talk and music. Bo looked up.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: There was a tall, black haired man, Venusian to judge
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  Speaker 1: by his kilts, arguing with Johnny. His face was ugly
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  Speaker 1: with anger. Johnny made some reply. Bo heaved up his
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  Speaker 1: form and strode toward the discussion, casually picking up anyone
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  Speaker 1: in the way and set in him aside. Johnny liked
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: to fight, but this Venusian was big. As he neared
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  Speaker 1: he caught words, My girl, damn it like hell I am,
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: said the girl. I never saw you before. Run along
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  Speaker 1: and play, son, said Johnny. Or do you want me
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: to change that diaper of yours? That was when it happened.
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: Bau saw the little needler spit from the Venusian's fingers.
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  Speaker 1: Johnny stood there a moment, looking foolishly at the dart
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  Speaker 1: in the stomach. Then his knees buckled and he fell
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: with a nightmare slowness. The Venusian was already on the move.
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  Speaker 1: He sprang straight up, slammed a kick at the wall,
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  Speaker 1: and arked out the door into the dome corridor, beyond
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  Speaker 1: a spaceman that knows how to handle himself in low
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  Speaker 1: g It was the only clear thought which ran in
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  Speaker 1: the sudden storm of Ba's head. The girl screamed, A
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  Speaker 1: man cursed and tried to fill followed the Venusian. He
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  Speaker 1: tangled with another, Get out of my way. A roar lifted,
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  Speaker 1: Someone slugged someone else coolly smashed a bottle against the
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: bar and lifted the jagged edge. There was the noise
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: of a fist meeting flesh. Bau had seen death before.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: That needle wasn't anesthetic, it was poison. He knelt in
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  Speaker 1: the riot with Johnny's body in his arms. End of
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: section one recording by Paul Harvey. Section two of Out
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: of the Iron Womb by Poul Anderson. This LibriVox recording
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Recording by Paul Harvey. Suddenly
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: the world came to an end. There was a sheer
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: drop off onto the next face of the rough cube,
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: which was the asteroid Bowl. Lay on his belly and
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: peered down the cliff. It ran for a couple of
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: miles piles, and beyond it were the deeps of space
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: and the cold stars. He could dimly see the tortured
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: swirl of crystallization patterns in the smooth barreness. No place
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: to hide. His enemy was not there. He turned the
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: thought over in a mind which seemed stiff and slow.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: By crossing that little plain, he was exposing himself to
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: a shot from one of its edges. On the other hand,
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: he could just as well be bushwhacked from a ravine
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: as he jumped over, and this route was the fastest
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: for completing his search scheme. The Great Bear slid into
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: sight down under the world as it turned. It often
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: stood on winter nights back in Sweden and seeing its
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: immense sprawl across the weird flicker of Aurora. But even
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: then he wanted the spaceman's experience of seeing it from above. Well,
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: now he had his wish, and much good it had
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: done him. He went over the edge of the cliff cautiously,
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: for it wouldn't take much of an impetus to throw
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: him off this rock entirely. Then his helpless and soon
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: frozen body would be just another meteor for the next
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: million years. The vague downward sensation of gravity shifted insanely
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: as he moved. He had the feeling that the world
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: was tilting around him. Now it was the precipice, which
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: was a scarred black plain underfoot, reaching to a saw
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: toothed bluff at its farther edge. He moved with flat,
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: low gy bounds. Besides the danger of springing off the
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: asteroid entirely, there was its low acceleration to keep a
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: man near the ground. Jump up a few feet and
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: it would take you a while to fall back. It
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: was utterly silent around him. He had never thought there
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: would be so much stillness. He was half way across
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: when the bullet came. He saw no flash, heard no crack,
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: but suddenly the fissured land before him exploded in a
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: soundless shower of chips. The bullet ricocheted flatly, heading off
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: for outer space. No meteor gravel at bow stood unmoving
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: an instant fighting the impulse to leap away. He was
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: a spaceman, not a rock count. He wasn't used to
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: this environment, and if he jumped high he could be riddled.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: As he fell slowly down again, sweat with cold on
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: his body, he squinted, trying to see where the shot
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: had come from. Suddenly he was zigzagging off across the plain,
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: toward the nearest edge. Another bullet poked the ground near him.
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: The sun rose a tiny, heatless dazzle, blinding in his eyes.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: Fire crashed at his back, Thunder and darkness exploded before him.
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: He lurched forward, driven by the impact. Something was roaring,
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: echoes clamorous in his helmet. He grew dimly aware that
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: it was himself. Then he was falling, whirling down into
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: the black between the stars. There was a knife in
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: his back. It was white hot and twisting between the ribs.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: He stumbled over the edge of the plane and fell,
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: waking when his armor bounced a little against stone. Breath
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: rattled in his throat. As he turned his head. There
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: was a white plume standing over his shoulder, air streaming
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: out through the hole and freezing its moisture. The knife
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: in him was not hot, It was cold, with an
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: ultimate cold around him, whirled in stars, rippled as if
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: seen through heat through fever. He hung on the edge
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: of creation by his finger tips while chaos shouted beneath. Theoretically,
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: one man can run a spaceship, but in practice two
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: or three are required. For non military craft. This is
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: not only an emergency reserve, but a preventive of emergencies,
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: for one man alone might get too tired. At the
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: critical moments, bau knew he wouldn't be allowed to leave
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: Achilles without a certified partner, and unemployed spacemen available for
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: immediate hiring are found once in a Venusian snowfall. Bow
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: didn't care. The first day he had taken Johnny out
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: to Helmet Hill and laid him in the barren ground
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: to wait, unchanging now till judgment day. He felt empty,
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: then drained of grief and hope alike. His main thought
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: a dull dread of having to deal Johnny's father when
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: he reached Luna. He was too slow and clumsy with words.
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: His empforting hand would only break the old man's back.
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: Old Malone had given six sons to space. Johnny was
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: the last from Saturn to the Sun. His blood was
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: strewn for nothing. It hardly seemed to matter when the
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Guard's Office reported itself unable to find the murderer. A
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: single Venusian should have been easy to trace on Achilles,
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: but he seemed to have vanished completely. Bau returned to
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: the transient quarters and dialed Valeria Mekittrick. She looked impatiently
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: at him out of the screen. Well, she said, what's
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: the matter? I thought we were blasting today, hadn't you heard,
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: asked Beau. He found it hard to believe she could
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: be ignorant here where everybody's life was known to everybody else.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Johnny's dead. We can't leave. Oh h, I'm sorry. He
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: was such a nice little man. I've been in the
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: lab all the time packing my things and didn't know.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: A frown crossed her clear brow. But you've got to
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: get me back. I've engaged passage to Luna with you. Your
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: ticket will be refunded, of course, said Beau heavily. But
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: you aren't certified, and the serious as licensed for no
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: less than two operators. Well, damn, there won't be another
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: berth for weeks, and I've got to get home. Can't
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: you find somebody? Bau shrugged, not caring much. I'll circulate
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: an ad if you want, but do so, please let
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: me know. She switched off bo sat for a moment
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: thinking about her. Valeria mc kittrick was worth considering. She
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: wasn't beautiful in any conventional sense, but she was tall
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: and well built. There were good lines in the strong,
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: high boned face, and her hair was a cataract of
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: spectacular red and brains too. You didn't get to be
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: a physicist with the Union's radiation labs for nothing. He
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: knew she was still young, and that she had been
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: on Achilles for about a year working on some special
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: project and was now ready to go home. She was
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: human enough, had been to most of the officer's parties
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: and danced and laughed and flirted mildly. But even the
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: dullest Rowount gossip knew she was too lost in her
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: work to do more. Out here, a woman was rare,
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: and a virtuous woman unheard of. As a result, unknown
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: to herself, doctor mckittrick's fame had spread through more thousands
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: of people and millions of miles than her professional achievements
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: were ever likely to reach. Since coming here on commission
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: from the lunar lab to bring her home. Bo Johnson
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: had given her an occasional wistful thought. He liked intelligent women,
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: and he was getting tired of rootlessness. But of course
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: it would be a catastrophe if he fell in love
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: with her, because she wouldn't look twice at a big,
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: dumb slob like him. He had sweated out a couple
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: of similar affairs in the past and didn't want to
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: go through another. He placed his ad on the radio
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: news circuit and then went out to get drunk. It
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: was all he could do for Johnny. Now drank him
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: a final wassail. Already his friend was cold under the stars.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: In the course of the evening, he found himself weeping.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: He woke up many hours later. Achilles ran on Earth time,
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: but did not rotate on it officially. It was late
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: at night. Actually, the shrunken sun was high over the domes.
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: The man in the upper bunk said there was a
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: message for him. He was to call one Einer Lane
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: guard at the Comet Hotel. Soonest the Comet any one
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: who could afford a room to himself here rather than
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: a kip in the public barracks was well fueled. Bow
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: swallowed a tablet and made his way to the busy
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: and dialed the Roebou clerk summoned Languard down to the desk.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: It was a lean, muscular face under close crop brown
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: hair which appeared in the screen. Languard was a tall
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: and supple man, somehow neat even without clothes. Johnson said, Beau,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: sorry to get you up, but I understood. Oh, yes,
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: are you looking for a spaceman. I heard your ad
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: and I'm available. Bau felt his mouth gape open. Ha
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: I never thought we're both lucky, I guess Ludguard chuckled.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: His English had only the slightest trace of accent, less
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: than Bau's. I thought I was stashed here too for
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: the next several months. Ah, does a qualified spaceman happen
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: to be marooned? I'm with Fireball. It was on the
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: Drake heard of what happened to her. Bou nodded, For
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: every spaceman knows exactly what every spaceship is doing at
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: any given time. The Drake had come to Achilles to
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: pick up a cargo of refined thorium for Earth. While
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: she lay in orbit, she had somehow lost a few
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: hundred pounds of reaction mass water from a cracked gasket.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Why the accident should have occurred? Nobody knew spacemen were
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: not careless about inspections, and what reason would anyone have
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: for sabotage. The event had taken place about a month ago,
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: when the serious was already en route here. Bau had
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: heard of it in the course of shop talk. I
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: thought she went back anyway, he said, Langard nodded she did.
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: It was the usual question of economics, you know what
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: refined fuel water costs in the belt. Also, the delay
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: while we got it would have carried Earth and Achilles
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: past optimum position, which would make the trip home that
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: much more expensive. Since we had one more man aboard
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: than really required, it was cheaper to leave him behind it.
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: The difference in mass would make up for the fuel loss.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: I volunteered, even suggested the idea, because well, it happened
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: during my watch, and even if nobody blamed me, I
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: couldn't help feeling guilty. Bou understood that kind of loyalty.
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: You couldn't travel space without men who had it. The
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: company beamed a message, I'd stay here till their schedule
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: permitted an undermanned ship to come by, but that wouldn't
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: be for many months, went on longuard. I can't see
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: sitting on this lump that long without so much as
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: a chance a planet fall. Bonus. If you'll take me on,
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: I'm sure the company will agree. I'll get a message
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: to them on the beam right away. Take us a
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: while to get back, warned Bow. We're going to stop
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: off at another asteroid to pick up some automatic equipment
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: and won't go into hyperbolic orbit till after that, about
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: six weeks from here to Earth. All told, I can't
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: six months here, Languard laughed. It emphasized the bright charm
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: of his manner. Sun blaze. I'll work for free. No
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: need to bring your papers over tomorrow. Huh. The certificate
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: and record were perfectly in order, showing inner Languard to
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: be a space tech one sea elt with the eight
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: years experience, qualified as engineer, astronaut, pilot and any other
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: of the thousand professions which have run into one. They
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: registered articles and shook hands on it. Call me Beau.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: It really is my name, Swedish. Another square head, eh,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: grinnled Languard. I'm from South America myself. Notice a year's
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: gap here, said Beau, pointing to the service record on Venus.
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: Oh yes, I had some fool idea about settling, but
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: soon learned better. I tried to fall. But when you
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: have to carve your own land out of howling desert, well,
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: let's start some math, shall we. They were lucky not
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: having to wait their turn at the station computer. No
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: other ship was leaving immediately. They fed at the data
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: and requirements and got back columns of numbers, fuel requirements,
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: acceleration times, orbital elements. The figure always had to be modified.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: No trip ever turned out just as predicted, but that
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: could be done when needed with a slipstick and the
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: little ship's calculator. Bow went to his share of the job, doggedly,
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: checking and rechecking before giving the problem to the machine.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: Languard breezed through it and spent his time while waiting
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: for Bow and swapping dirty limericks with the tech. He
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: had some good ones. The serious was loaded, inspected, and cleared.
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: A scooter brought her three passengers up to her own orbit.
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: They embarked, settled down, and waited at the proper time.
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: Acceleration jammed them back in a thunder of rockets. Bou
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: relaxed against the thrust, thinking of Achilles falling away behind him.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: So long, he whispered, So long Johnny end of section
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: two recording by Paul Harvey. Section three of Out of
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: the Iron Womb by Paul Anderson. This LibriVox recording is
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: in the public domain. Recording by Paul Harvey. In another minute,
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: he would be knotted and screaming from the bends, and
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: a couple of minutes later he would be dead. Bou
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: clamped his teeth together as if he would grip consciousness
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: in his jaws. His hands felt cold and heavy, the
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: hands of the stranger. As he fumbled for the supply pouch,
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: it seemed to recede from him, down a hollow, infinite
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: corridor where echoes talked in a language he did not know. Damn,
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: he gasped, Damn, damn, damn, damn. He got the pouch
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: open somehow, The stars wheeled around him. There were stars
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: buzzing in his head, like cold white fireflies, buzzing and
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: buzzing in the enormous, ringing emptiness of his skull. Pain
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: jagged through him. He felt his ear drums popping as
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: pressure dropped. The plastic patch stuck to his metal gauntlet.
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: He peeled it off, trying not to howl. With the
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: fury ripping in his nerves. His body was slow, inert
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: a thing to fight. There was no more feeling in
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: his back. Was he dead already? Redness flamed before his eyes,
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: red like valerious hair blowing across the stars. It was
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: sheer reflex which brought his arm around to slap the
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: patch over the hole in his suit. The adhesive gripped,
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: drying fast in the sucking vacuum. The patch bellied out
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: from internal air pressure, straining to break loose and kill him.
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: Bau's mind wavered back toward life. He opened the valves
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: wide on his tanks, and his thermostatic capacitors pumped heat
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: back into him. For a long time, he lay there,
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: only lungs and heart had motion. His throat fell withered
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: and flayed, but the rasp of air through it was
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: like being born again. Borne spewed out of an iron
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: womb into a hollowness of stars and cold, to lie
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: on naked rock while the enemy hunted him. Bow shuddered
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: and wanted to scream again. Slowly he groped back toward awareness,
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: his frost bitten back tingled as it warmed up again.
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: Soon it would be a fire. He could feel a
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: hot trickling of blood, but it was along his right side.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: The bullet must have spent most of its force punching
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: through the armor, carrying off the inside. Scratched his ribs
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: and fallen dead. Next time he probably wouldn't be so lucky.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: A magnetic driven thirty caliber slug would go through a helmet,
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: splashing brains as it passed. He turned his head, feeling
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: a great weariness, and looked at the gages. This had
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: cost him a lot of air. There was only about
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: three hours worth left. Languard could kill him simply by waiting.
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: It would be easy to die. He lay on his back,
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: staring up at the stars and the spilling cloudy glory
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: of the Milky Way. A warmth was creeping back into
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: numbed hands and feet. Soon he would be warm all
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: over and sleepy. His eyelids felt heavy, strange that they
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: should be so heavy on an asteroid. He wanted terribly
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: to sleep. There wasn't much room in the serious The
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: only privacy was gained by drawing curtains across your bunk.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: Men without psych training could get to hate each other
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: on a voyage, Bau wondered if he would reach Luna,
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: Hating Einer Languard. The man was competent, a willing worker,
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: tempering his cheerfulness with tact, always immaculate in the neat
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: blue and white of the fireball line, which made Bau
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: feel doubly sloppy in his own old gray coverall he
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: was a fine conversationalist, with an enormous stock of reminiscence
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: and ideas, witty above a certain passion of belief. It
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: seemed as if he and Valeria were always talking, animated
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: voices like a sound of life over the mechanical ship murmurs,
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: while Beau sat dumbly in the corner, wishing he could
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: think of something to say. The trouble was, in spite
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: of all his efforts, he was doing a cometary dive
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: into another bad case of one sided love. When she
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: spoke in that husky voice of hers, gray gleam of
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: eyes under hair that floated, flaming and null g the
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: beauty he saw in her was like pain, and she
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: was always around. It couldn't be helped. Once they had
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: gone into free fall. He could only polish so much
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: metal and tinker with so many appliances. After that, they
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: were crowded together in a long waiting And why were
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: you all alone in the belt, asked Lugard, In spite
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: of all the romantic stories about the wild free life
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: of the rock count, it's the dullest place in the system.
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: Not to me, she smiled. I was working. There were
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: experiments to be done, factors to be measured. Away from
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: solar radiation. There are always ions around inside the orbit
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: of Mars to jumble up a delicate apparatus. Bosat quiet,
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: trying to keep his eyes off her. She looked good
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: in shorts and half cape. Too good. It's something to
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: do with power beaming, isn't it. Languard's handsome face creased
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: in a frown. Afraid, I don't quite understand. They've been
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: beaming power on the planets for a long time now,
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: so they have, She nodded. What we're after is an
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: interplanetary power beam. Then we've got it. She gestured to
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: the baggage rack and a thick trunk full of papers
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: she had put there. That's it, the basic circuits, factors
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: and constants. Any competent engineer could draw up a design
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: from them. HM. Precision work, EH, Obviously, it was hard
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: enough to do on say Earth. You need a really
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: beam and just the right frequencies, a feedback signal to
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: direct each beam at the desired outlet relay stations. Oh yes,
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: it was a ten year research project before they could
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: even think about building an interplanetary beam has all those
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: problems plus a number of its own. You have to
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: get the dispersion down to a figure so low it
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: hardly seems possible. You can't use feedback because of the
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: time lag, so the beams have to be aimed exactly right,
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: and the planets are always moving that miles per second.
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: An error of one degree would throw your beam almost
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: two million miles off and crossing one AU. And besides
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: being so precise, the beam has to carry a begawatt
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: at least to be worth the trouble. The problem looked
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: insoluble till someone in the Order of Planetary Engineers came
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: up with an idea for a trick control circuit hooked
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: into a special computer. My lab's been working together with
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: the Order on it, and I was making certain final
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: determinations for them. It's finished now, twelve years of work
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: and we're done, she laughed, except for building the stations
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: and getting the bugs out. Languard cocked an oddly sardonic brow.
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: And what do you hope for from it? He asked,
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: What of the psychotexts decided to do with this thing?
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: Isn't it obvious? She cried? Power nuclear fuel is getting
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: scarcer every day, and civilization is finished if we can't
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: find another energy source. The sun is pouring out more
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: than we'll ever need, but sheer distance dilutes it below
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: a useful level by the time it gets to Venus.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: We'll build stations on the hot side of Mercury. Orbital
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: stations can relay. We can get the beam as far
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: out as Mars without too much dispersion. It'll bring down
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: the rising price of atomic energy, which is making all
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: other prices rise, and stretch our supply of fissionables for
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: centuries more. No more fuel worries, No more Martians freezing
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: to death because a converter fails. No more clan feuds
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: on Venus starting over uranium beds. The excited flush on
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: her cheeks was lovely to look at. Longuard shook his head.
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: There was a sadness in his smile. You're a true
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: child of the New Enlightenment, he said, Reason will solve everything.
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: Science will find a cure for all our ills, give
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: man a cheap energy source and leave him forever happy.
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: It won't work, you know, something like anger crossed her eyes.
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: What are you, she asked, A humanist, Yes, said Languard quietly.
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: Both started. He'd known about the anti psychotech movement which
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: was growing on Earth, seen a few of its adherents,
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: But I never thought a spaceman would be a humanist,
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: he stammered. Languard shrugged wryly. Don't be afraid. I don't
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: eat babies. I don't even get hysterics in an argument.
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: All I've done is used the scientific method, observing the
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: world without preconceptions, and learned by it that the scientific
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: method doesn't have all the answers. Instead, said Valerius scornfully,
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: we should all go back to church and pray for
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: what we want, rather than working for it. Not at all,
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: said Lugard mildly. The New Enlightenment is or was, because
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: it's dying, a very natural state of mind. Here Earth
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: had come out of the world wars racked and ruined,
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: starving and chaotic, and all because of unbridled ideology. So
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: the physical scientists produced goods and machines and conquered the planets.
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: The biologists found new food sources and new cures for disease.
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: The psychotechs built up their knowledge to a point where
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: the socioeconomic unity could really be planned, and the plan worked.
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: Man was unified. The war had sunk into an occasional
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: small police action. People were eating and had comfort and
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: security all through applied working science. Naturally, they came to
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: believe reason would solve their remaining problems. But this faith
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: in reason was itself an emotional reaction from the preceding
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: age of unreason. Well, we've had a century of enlightenment now,
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: and it has created its own troubles which it cannot solve.
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: No age can handle the difficulty it raises for itself.
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: That's left to the next era. Their practice problems arising.
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: No matter how desperately the psychotechts work, they aren't succeeding
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: with them. What problems? Asked Beau, feeling a little bewildered man,
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: Don't you ever see a newscast challenged languard? The Second
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: Industrial Revolution, millions of people thrown out of work by
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: the new automata. They aren't going hungry but they are
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: displaced and bitter. The economic center of Earth is shifting
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: to Asia, the political power with it, and hundreds of
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: millions of Asians are skeptical aboard this antiseptic new order.
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: The West has been bringing them cultural resistance, and not
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: all the psychotechnic propaganda in the system can shake it off.
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: The men of Mars, Venus, the Belt, the Jovian moons
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: are developing their own civilizations, inevitably in alien environments, their
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: own ways of life and thinking, which just don't fit
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: into the neat scheme of an Earth dominated Solar union.
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: The psychotechts themselves are being driven to Olgarctic on constitutional acts.
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: They have no choice, but it's making them enemies. And
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: then there's the normal human energy and drive. Men can
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: only be safe and sane and secure for so long,
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: then he reacts. This New Enlightenment is really a decadent age,
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: a period where an exhausted civilization has been resting under
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: a holy status quo. It can't last. Man always wants
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: something new. You humanists talk a lot about man's right
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: to variability, said Valeria. If you really carry off that revolution,
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: your writings advocate, you'll just trade one power group for
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: another and more fanatic, less lawful than the present one.
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: Not necessarily, said Languard. After all, that union will probably
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: break up, can't last forever. All we want to do
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: is hasten the day because we feel that it's outlived
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: its usefulness. Bau shook his head. I can't see it,
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: he said heavily. I just can't see it. All those people,
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: the Lunarites, the violent clansmen on Venus, the stiff correct Martians,
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: the asteroid rock hounds, even though the mysterious Jovians, they
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: all came from Earth. It was Earth's help that made
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: their planet's habitable. We're all men, all one race a fiction,
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: said Lunguard. The human race is a fiction. There are
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: only small groups with their own conflicting interests. And if
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: those conflicts are allowed to break into war, said Valeria,
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: do you know what a lithium bomb can do? There
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: was a reckless gleam in Lnguard's eyes. If a period
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: of interplanetary wars is necessary, let's get it over with,
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: he answered. Enough men will survive to build something better.
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: This age has gotten stale. It's petrifying. There have been
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: plenty of shake ups in history. The Fall of Rome,
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: the Reformation, the Napoleonic Wars, the World wars. It's been
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: man's way of progressing. I don't know about all those,
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: said Bo slowly. I just know I wouldn't want to
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: live through such a time. You're soft, said Lugard. Down
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: underneath your soft, he laughed disarmingly. Ah, pardon me. I
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: didn't mean anything personal. I'll never convince you, and you'll
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: never convince me, so let's keep it friendly. I hope
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: you'll have some free time on Luna Valeria. I know
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: a little grille where they serve the best scyntho stakes
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: in the system. All right, she smiled, it's a date.
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: Boul mumbled some excuse and went aft. He was still
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: calling her doctor mc kittrick. End of section three recording
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: by Paul Harvey. Section four of Out of the Iron
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: Womb by Paul Andersen. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: public domain. Recording by Paul Harvey. You can't just lie
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: here and let him come kill you. There was a
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: picture behind his eyes. He didn't know if it was
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: a dream or a long buried memory. He stood under
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: an aspen which quivered and rustled as if it laughed
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: to itself, softly, softly, when the wind embraced it. And
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: the wind was blowing up a red granite slope wild
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: in sult from the sound, and there were towering clouds
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: lifting over Denmark to the west. The sunlight rained and
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: streamed through aspen leaves broken, shaken, falling in spatters against
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: the earth, and he Bo Johnson laughed with the wind
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: and the tree and the far watery glitter of the sound.
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: He opened his eyes wearily like an old man. Orion
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: was marching past, and there was a blaze on crags
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: five miles off, which told of the rising sun. The
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: asteroid spun swiftly. He had been here for many of
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: its days now, and each day it burdened him like
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: a year. Got to get out of here, he knew.
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: He sat up, pain tearing along his furrowed breast. Somehow
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: he had kept the wrench with him. He stared at
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: it in a dull wonder. Where to go, where to hide?
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: What to do? Thirst nagged him. Slowly, he uncoiled the
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: tube which led from the electrically heated canteen welded to
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: his suit, screwed its end into the helmet nipple thumbed
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: down the clamp, which closed it and sucked hard. It
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: helped a little. He dragged himself to his feet and
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: stood swaying. Only the near weightlessness kept him erect. Turning
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: his head in its transparent cage, he saw the sun
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: rise and bright spots dance before him. When he looked away,
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: his vision cleared, but for a moment he thought the
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: shadow lifting over a nearby ridge was a wisp of unconsciousness.
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: Then he made out the bulky, black painted edge of it,
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: gigantic against the milky way, and it was lung Guard,
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: moving unhurriedly up to kill him. A dark laughter was
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: in his radio earphones. Take it easy, bau, I'll be
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: there in a minute. He backed away, his heart a
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: sudden thunder, looking for a place to hide. Down. Get down,
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: and don't stand where he can see you. He crouched
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: as much as the armor would allow and broke into
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: to a bounding run. A slug spat broken stone near
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: his feet. The powdery dust hung for minutes before settling.
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: Breath rattled in his throat. He saw the lip of
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: a meteoric crater and dove. Crouching there, he heard Lunguard's
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: voice again, You're somewhere nearer. Why not come out and
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: finish it now? The radio was non directional, so he
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: snapped back a gun against a monkey wrench. Lungguard's coolness
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: broke a little. There was almost a puzzled note. I
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: hate to do this. Why why can't you be reasonable?
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: I don't want to kill you. The trouble, said Bo harshly,
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: is that I want to kill you. Behold the man
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: of the New Enlightenment. Bau could imagine Lunguard's grin. It
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: would be tight, and there would be sweat on the
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: lean face, but the amusement was genuine. Didn't you believe,
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: sweet reasonable could solve everything? This is only the beginning, Beau,
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: just a small preliminary hint that the age of reason
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: is dying. I've already converted you to my way of
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: thinking by the very fact your fighting me. Why not
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: admit it. Beau shook his head futile gesture, looked in
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: darkness where he lay. There was a frosty blaze of stars.
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: When he looked up, it was more than himself and
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: Johnny Malone, more even than the principle of the thing
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: and the catastrophe to all men, which Luanguard's victory meant
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: there was something deep and primitive which would not let
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: him surrender. Even in the teeth of annihilation. Valeria's image
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: swayed before him. Languard was moving around, peering over the
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: shadowy tumble of blackened rock in search of any trace.
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: There was a magnetic rifle in his hands. Beau strained
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: his health to the crater floor, trying to hear ground vibrations,
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: but there was nothing. He didn't know where Languard was,
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: only that he was very near. Blindly, he bundled his
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: legs and sprang out of the pit. They found the
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: asteroid where Valeria had left her recording instruments. It was
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: a tiny, drifting fragment of a world which had never
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: been borne, turning endlessly between the constellations. The Serious moored
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: fast with grapples, and Valeria donned a spacesuit and went
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: out to get her apparatus. Languard accompanied her, as there
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: was only work for two. Bow stayed behind. He slumped
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: for a while in the pilot chair, letting his mind
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: pace through a circle of futility. Valeria, Valeria, Valeria, Oh,
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: strong and fair and never to be forgotten. Would he
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: ever see her again after they made Luna. This won't do,
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: he told himself, Dully, I should at least keep busy.
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: Thank God for work. He wasn't much of a thinker,
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: he knew that, but he had cleverness in his hands.
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: It was satisfying to watch a machine come right under
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: his tools. Working, he could see the falseness of Languard's philosophy.
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: The man could quote history all he wanted. We've a
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: glittering circle of logic around Bow's awkward brain, but it
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: didn't change facts. Maybe the century was headed for trouble.
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: Maybe psychotechnic government was only another human self limitation and
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: should be changed for something else. Nevertheless, the truth remained
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: that most men were workers who wished no more than
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: peace in which to create as best they could. All
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: the high ideals in the universe weren't worth breaking the
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: union for and smashing the work of human hands in
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: the single burst of annihilating flame. I can feel it
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: down inside me, but why can't I say it? He
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: got up and went over to the baggage rack, remembering
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: that lung Guard had dozens of book reels along in
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: the reading, it would help him not to think about
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: what he could not have on a planet, Bou would
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: not have dreamed of helping himself without asking first. But
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: custom is different in space, where there is no privacy,
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: and men must be a unit if they are to survive.
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: He was faintly surprised to see that Lunguard's personal suitcase
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: was locked, but it would be ours, probably before the
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: owner got back. Dismantling a recorder set up took time,
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: a long time in which to talk and laugh with Valeria,
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: and the chill spatial radiance her hair would be like
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: frosty fire. Casually, Bo stooped across to languard sack Hammick
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: and took his key off the hook. He opened the
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: suitcase and lifted out some of the reels in search
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: of a promising title. Underneath them wore neatly folded clothes,
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: fireball uniforms and fancy dressed pajamas. A tartan edge stuck
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: out from below, and Bow lifted a coat to see
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: what clan that was probably a souvenir of languards Venusian stay.
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: Next to the kilt was a box, which he recognized.
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: L masks came in such boxes. How the idea came
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: to him? He did not know. He stood there for minutes,
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: looking at the box without seeing it. The ship was
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: very quiet around him. He had a sudden feeling that
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: the walls were closing in. When he opened the box,
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: his hand shook, and there was sweat trickling along his ribs.
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: The mask was of the latest type, meant to fit
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: over the head, snug around the cheeks and mouth and jaws.
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: It was like a second skin, reflecting expression not to
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: be told from a real face. Bau saw the craggy
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: nose and the shock of dark hair limp now, But
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: suddenly he was back on Achilles, with riot roaring around him,
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: and Johnny Malone's body in his arms. No wonder they
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: never found that Venusian there never was any. Bo felt
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: a dim shock when he looked at the chronometer. Only
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: five minutes had gone by while he stood there. Only
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: five minutes to turn the cosmos inside out, very slowly
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: and carefully. He repacked the suitcase and put it in
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: the rack, and sat down to think what to do,
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: accused Lunguard to his face. Now the man undoubtedly carried
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: that needler, and there was valaria to think of a
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: ricocheting dart, a scrap on her. No, it took Bow
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: a long time to decide. His brain seemed viscous. When
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: he looked out of a port to the indifferent stars,
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: he shuddered. They came back, shedding their spacesuits in the airlock.
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: Frost whitened the armor. As moisture condensed on chilled surfaces,
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: the metal seemed to breathe cold. Valeria went efficiently to work,
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: stowing the boxed instruments as carefully as if they were
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: her children. There was a laughter on her lips, which
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: turned Bo's heart around inside him. Languard leaned over the
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: tiny desk where he sat. What you doing, he asked,
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: recalculate in our orbit to Luna, said Bo, I want
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: to go slow for a few million miles before going
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: up to hyperbolic speed. Why it, Lad, dazed to the
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: trip and the fuel. I'm I'm afraid we might borrow
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: urge into Swarm seven seventy. It's supposed to be near
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: here now, and the positions of those things are never
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: known for sure. Perturbations. Bo's mouth felt dry. You've got
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: a mega mile of safety margin, or your orbit would
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: never have been approved, argued Luguard. Hell, damn it I'm
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: the captain, yelled Bo. All right, all right, take it easy.
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: Skipper Landguard shot to Humor's glance at Valeria. I certainly
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: don't mind a few extra days in the present company.
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: She smiled at him. Bo felt ill. His excuse was thin.
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: If Laneguard thought to check the effemers, it would fall
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: to ruin. But he couldn't tell the real reason. An
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: iron drive ship does not need to drift along the
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: economical homean a orbit of the big freighters. It can
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: build up such furious speed that the Sun will swing
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: it a long a hyperbola rather than in ellipse, and
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: can still break that speed near its destination. But the
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: critical stage of acceleration has to be just right, or
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: there will not be enough fuel to stop completely. The
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: ship will be pulled into a cometary orbit and run helpless,
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: the crew probably starving before a rescue vessel can locate them.
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: Bow dared not risk the trouble exploding at full drive.
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: He would drift along, capture and bind Luenguard at the
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: first chance, and then head for Earth. He could handle
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: the serious alone, even if it was illegal. He could
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: not handle her if he had to fight simultaneously. His
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: knuckles were white on the controls as he loosened the
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: grapples and nudged away from the asteroid with a whisper
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: of power. After a few minutes of low acceleration, he
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: cut the rockets, check position of velocity, and nodded on orbit.
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: He said, mechanically, it's return to cook. I Ironer Luguard
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: swooped easily through the air into the cubby hole, which
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: served for a galley. Cooking in free fall is an
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: art which not all spacemen master, but he could. His
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: meals were even good. Beau felt a helpless kind of
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: rage at his own clumsy efforts. He crouched in mid air,
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: dark of mind, a leg hooked around a stanchion to
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: keep from drifting. When someone touched him, his heart jumped
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: and he whirled around. What's the matter, Bow asked Feleria,
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: you look like doomsday? I I He gulped noisily and
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: twisted his mouth into a smile, just feeling a little off.
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: It's more than that. I think her eyes were grave.
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: You'd seemed so unhappy the whole trip. Is there anything
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: I can do to help? Thanks, doctor mc kittrick, but
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: don't be so formal. She said, almost wistfully. I don't bite.
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: Too many men think I do. Can't we be friends
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: with a thick headed clinker like me? His whisper was raw.
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: Don't be silly. It takes brains to be a spaceman.
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: I like a man who knows when to be quiet.
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: She lowered her eyes. The lashes were long and sooty black.
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: There's something solid about you, something so few people seem
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: to have these days. I wish you wouldn't go feeling
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: so inferior. At any other time it would have been
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: a sunburst in him. Now he thought of death and
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: mumbled something and looked away. A hurt expression crossed her face.
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: I won't bother you, she said gently, and moved off.
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: The thing was to fall on Languard while he slept.
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: The radar alarm buzzed during a dinner in which Lunnguard's
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: flow of talk had battered vainly against silence and finally
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: given up. Bow vaulted over to the control panel and checked.
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: No red light glowed, and the autopilot wasn't whipping them
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: out of danger, so they weren't on a collision course.
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: But the object was getting close. Bow calculated it was
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: an asteroid on an orbit almost parallel to their own
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: relative speed only a few feet per second, it would
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: come within ten miles or so. In the magnifying periscope,
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: it showed as a jagged, dark cube, turned around itself
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: and flashing hard glints of sunlight off mica beds, perhaps
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: six miles square, all crags and cracks and fracture faces,
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: heatless and lifeless and kindless. End of section four recording
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: by Paul Harvey. Section five of Out of the Iron
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: Womb by Paul Andersen. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: public domain. Recording by Paul Harvey. Languard yawned elaborately after dinner. Excuse,
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: he said, unless somebody's for chess. His hopeful glance met
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: the grimness of Beau and the odd sadness of Valeria,
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: and he shrugged. All right, then pleasant dreams. After ten
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: minutes now Bowen coiled himself. Valeria, he whispered, as if
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: the name were holy. Yes, she arched her eyebrows expectantly.
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: I can't stop to explain. Now I've got to do
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: something dangerous. Get back aft of the gyro housing What
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: get back? Command? Blazed frantically in him and stay there
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: whatever happens. Something like fear flickered in her eyes. It
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: was a very long way to human help. Then she nodded, puzzled,
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: but with an obedience which held gallantry, and slipped out
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: of sight behind the steel pillar. Bou launched himself across
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: the room in a single nullgy bound. One hand ripped
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: aside lung Guard's curtain. The other got him by the throat.
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: What the hell? Lnguard exploded into life. His fist crashed
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: against Bo's cheek. Bow held on with one hand and
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: slugged with the other. Knuckles bounced on rubbery muscle. Luanngguard's
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: arm snaked for the tunic, stretched on his bunk wall.
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: His body came lithely out of the sack. Bow snatched
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: for that wrist. Lung Guard's free hand came around, edged
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: out to slam him in the larynx. Pain ripped through bow,
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: he let go and sailed across the room. Lane Guard
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: was pulling out his needler. Bou hit the opposite wall
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: and rebounded, not for the armed man but for the
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: control panel. Languard spat a dart at him. It burst
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: on the viewport over his shoulder and Beau caught the
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: acrid whiff of poison. Then the converter was roaring to
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: life and whining. Gyros spun the ship around. Languard was
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: hurled across the room. He collected himself catlike, grabbed a stanchion,
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: and raised the gun again. I've got the drop, he said.
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: Get away from there, or you're a dead man. It
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: was as if some one else had seized Ba's body.
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: Decision was like lightning through him. He had tried to
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: capture Languard and failed, and Venom crouched at his back.
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: But the ship was pointed for the asteroid now where
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: it hung gloomily a dozen miles off, and the rockets
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: were ready to spew. If he shoot me, said Beau,
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: I'll live just long enough to pour on the juice.
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: We'll hit the rock and scatter from hell to breakfast.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: Valeria emerged Lungguard swung the needler to cover her. Stay
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: where you are, he rapped. What's happening, she said fearfully,
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: I don't know, said Languard. Bow's gone crazy. Attacked me.
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: Wrath boiled black in the pilot. He snarled, you killed
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: my partner. You must have been fixing to kill us two.
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: What do you mean, whispered Valeria. How should I know,
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: said Lunguard. He jumped his orbit. That's all. Look Bow,
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: be reasonable, get away from that panel. Look in a
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: suit case, Valeria bou forced the words out of a
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: taunted throat. A Venusian shot, my partner. You'll find his
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: face and his clothes in Languard's things. I'd know that
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: face in the middle of the sun. She hung for
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: a long while, not moving. Beau couldn't see her. His
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: eyes were nailed to the asteroid, keeping the ship's nose
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: pointed at it. Is that true, Einer, she asked Finally, no,
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: he said, of course not. I do have Venusian clothes
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: and a mask. But then why are you keeping me
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: covered too? Languard didn't answer it once. The only noise
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: was the murmur of machinery and the dense breathing of
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: three pairs of lungs. Then his laugh jarred forth. All right,
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: he said, I had meant it to come yet, or
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: to come this way. But all right, why did you
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: kill Johnny? Tears stung Bow's eyes. He never hurt you,
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: it was necessary. Languard's mouth twitched. But you see, we
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: knew you were going to Achilles to pick up Valeria
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: and her data. We needed to get a man aboard
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: your ship to take over. When her orbit brought her
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: close to our asteroid base, you force my hand. I
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: wasn't going to capture you for days, yet I sabotaged
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: the Drake's fuel tanks to get myself stranded there, and
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: shot your friend to get his berth. I'm sorry, why
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: horror rode Valeria's voice. I'm a humanist. I've never made
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: a secret of that. What our secret is is that
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: some of us aren't content just to talk revolution. We
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: want to give this rotten over mechanized society the shove
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 1: that will bring on its end. We've built up a
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: small force, not much as yet, not enough to accomplish
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: anything lasting. But if we had a solar power beam,
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: it would make a big difference. It could be adapted
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: to direct military uses as well as supplying energy to
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: our machines. A lens effect, a concentration of solar radiation
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: strong enough to burn well. Seems worth trying. And what
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: do you intend for us? You'll have to be kept
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: prisoners for a while, of course, said Lugard. It won't
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: be onerous. We aren't beasts, no, said Beau, just murderers.
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: Save the dramatic, snapped Lungard. I have the gun. Get
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: away from those controls. Ba shook his head. There was
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: a wild hammering in his breast, but his voice surprised
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: him with steadiness. No, I've got the upper hand. I
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: can kill you if you move yell if he tries anything.
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: Valeria Lunguard's eyes challenged her. Do you want to die?
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: He asked her head lifted No, she said, but I'm
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: not afraid to go ahead. If you must bow, it's
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: all right. Bou felt cold. He knew he wouldn't. He
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: was bluffing in the final showdown. He could not crash her.
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: He had seen too many withered, space drained mummies in
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: his time. But maybe Lunguard didn't realize that. Give up,
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: he said, you can't gain a damn thing. I'm not
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: going to see a billion people burned alive just to
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: save our necks. Make a bargain for your life, no,
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: said Longuard, with the curious gentleness. I have my own
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: brand of honor. I'm not going to surrender to you.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: You can't sit there forever im pass. The ship floated
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: through eternal silence while they waited. All right, said Beau,
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: I'll fight you for the powerbam ha, how's that I
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: can throw this ship into orbit around the asteroid. We
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: can go down there and settle the thing between us.
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: The winner can jump up here again with the help
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: of a jet of tinked air. The lump hasn't got
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: much gravity. Languard hesitated. And how do I know you'll
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: keep your end of the bargain? He asked. You could
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: let me go through the airlock, then close it and
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: blast off. Bau had had some such thought, but he
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: might have known it wouldn't work. What do you suggest,
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: he countered, never taking his eyes off the planetoid. Remember,
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: I don't trust you either, Luguard laughed, suddenly, a hard
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: yelping bark. I know, Valeria, go aft and remove all
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: the control rod lengths and spars, bring them back here.
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: I'll go out first, taking half of them with me,
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: and Bau can follow with the other half. He'll have
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: to I No, I won't, she whispered. I can't let
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: you go ahead and do it, said Beau. He felt
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: a sudden, vast weariness. It's the only way, and we
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: can break this dead luck. She wept as she went
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: toward the engine room. Luguard's thought was good. Without linked
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 1: control rods, the converter couldn't operate five minutes. It would
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: flare up and melt itself and kill every one aboard,
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: and a flood of radiation. Whoever won the duel could
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: quickly reinstall the necessary parts. There was a waiting silence.
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: At last, Languard said, almost abstractly, home, gang, d'y you
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: know what that means, Bau, No, you ought to. It
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: was a custom of our ancestors back in the early
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: Middle Ages, the Viking time. Two men would go off
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: to a little island, a home to settle their differences.
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: The one would come back, I never thought, and it
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: could happen out here, he chuckled, bleakly. Valkyries and space suits.
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: The girl came back with the Lynx tied and two bundles.
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: Languard counted them and nodded, all right. He seemed strangely calm.
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: An easy assurance lay over him like armor. Bau's fear
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: was cold in his belly, and Valeria wept still with
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: a helpless horror. The pilot used a safe two minutes
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: of low blast to edge up to the asteroid. I'll
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: go into the airlock and put on my spacesuit, said Languard.
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: Then I'll jump down and you can put the ship
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: in orbit. Don't try anything while I'm changing, because I'll
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: keep this needle or handy. It won't work against a
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: space suit, said bow Lugard laughed. I know, he said.
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: He kissed his hand to Valeria and backed into the
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: lock chamber. The outer valve closed behind him. Bow Valeria
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: grabbed the pilot by the shoulders, and he looked around
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: into her face. You can't go out there. I won't
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: let you. I if I don't, he said tonelessly. We'll
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 1: orbit around here till we starve. But you could be killed.
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: I hope not for your sake. Mostly I hope not,
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: he said awkwardly. But he won't have any more weapon
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: than me. Just a monkey wrench. There was a metal
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: tube welded to the leg of each suit for holding tools. Wrenches,
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: the most commonly used it were simply left there as
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: a rule. I'm bigger than he is. But she laid
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: her head on his breast and shuddered with crying. He
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: tried to comfort her. All right, he said, at last,
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: all right, luenguard must be through. I'd better get started.
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: Leave him, she blazed, His air won't last many hours.
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: We can wait, and when he's seen he's been tricked.
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: You think he won't wreck those links? No, there's no
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: way out. It was as if all his life he
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: had walked on a road which had no turnings, which
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: led inevitably to this moment. He made some careful calculations
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 1: from the instrument readings physical constance of the asteroid, and
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: used another minute's maneuvering to assume orbital velocity. Alarm lights
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: blinked angry eyes at him. The converter was heating up.
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 1: No more traveling till the lynks were restored. Bow floated
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 1: from his chair toward the lock. Good By, Valeria, he said,
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: feeling the bloodless weakness of words. I hope it won't
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: be for long. She threw her arms about him and
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: kissed him. The taste of tears was still on his
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: lips when he had dogged down his helmet, opening the
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: outer valve, he moved forth, magnetic boots clamping to the hull.
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: A gulf of stars yawned around him, a cloudy halo
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: about his head. The stillness was smothering. When he was
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: over the asteroid, he gaged his position with the practiced
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 1: eye and jumped, free falling. He thought mostly of Valeria.
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: As he landed, he looked round. No sign of Languard.
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: The man could be anywhere in these square miles of
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: cosmic wreckage. He spoke tentatively into his radio in case
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: Languard should be within the horizon. Hello, are you there? Yes,
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: I'm coming. There was a sharp, cruel note of laughter.
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: Sorry to play this dirty, but there are bigger issues
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: at stake than you are me. I've kept a rifle
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: in my tool tube all the time just in case. Goodbye, Bau.
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: A slug smashed into the pinnacle behind him. Bow turned
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: and ran. End of section five recording by Paul Harvey.
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: Section six of Out of the Iron Womb by Paul Anderson.
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: Paul Harvey. As he rose over the lip of the crater,
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 1: his head swung, seeking his enemy. There it was almost
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: a reflex which brought his arm back and sent the
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: wrench hurtling across the few yards between Before it had struck.
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: Bow's feet lashed against the pit edge and the kick
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 1: harked him toward Luguard. Spacemen have to be good at
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: throwing things. The wrench hit the lifted rifle, and a
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 1: soundless shiver of metal tore it loose from an insecure
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 1: gauntleted grasp and sent its spinning into shadow. Luan Guard yelled,
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 1: spun on his heel, and dove after it. Then the
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: flying body of Beau Johnson struck him. Even in low
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: g matter has all its inertia. The impact rang and
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 1: boomed within their armor. They swayed and fell to the ground,
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 1: locking arms and hammering feudally at helmets. Rolling over, Bow
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 1: got on top. His hands closed on Languard's throat where
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: the throat should have been, but plastic and alloy held fast.
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: Instinct had betrayed him. Lane Guard snarled, doubled his legs,
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: and kicked. Bau was sent staggering back. Languard crawled erect
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 1: and turned to look for the rifle. Beau couldn't see
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: it either in the near solid blackness where no light fell,
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: but his wrench lay as a dark gleam. He sprang
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: for that, closed a hand on it, bounced up and
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: rushed at Luanguard. A swing shocked his own muscles with
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: its force, and luann Guard lurched. Bau moved in on him.
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: Lunguard reached into his tool tube and drew out his
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: own wrench. He circled his panting horse and Beau's eer wounds.
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: This is the way it was supposed to be, said Bou.
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 1: He jumped in his weapon, whirling down to shiver again
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: on the other helmet. Languard shook a dazed head, encountered
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: the impact roared and echoed in Bou's helmet and into
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 1: his skull. He smashed heavily. Lun Guard lifted wrench, parried
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 1: the blow. It slid off like a fencer. Languard's snake
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: to shaft in, and the reverberations were deafening. Beau braced
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: himself and smote with all his power. The hit sank
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: back through iron and alloy, into his own bones. Languard
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: staggered a little, hunched himself, and struck in return. They
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: stood with feet braced apart, trading fury a metal rain
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: on shivering plastic. The stuff was almost unbreakable, but not quite,
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 1: not for long. When such violence dimmed on it, Beau
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: felt a lifting, wild glee, something savage he had never known.
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 1: Before leaped up in him, and he bellowed he was stronger,
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: he could hit harder. Languard's helmet would break first. The
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: humanist retreated, using his wrench like a sword, stopping the
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: force of blows without trying to deal more of his own.
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: His left hand fumbled it aside. Bau hardly noticed he
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: was pushing in hewing, hewing again. The shrunken sun rose
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: to flash hard light off its club. Luanengguard grinned, his face,
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: barely visible as highlight and shadow behind the plastic. His
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 1: raised tuol turned one hit. It slipped along his arm
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: to wrap his flank. Bou twisted his arm around, beat
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 1: the other wrench aside for a moment, and landed a
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: crack like a thunderbolt. Then Languard had his drinking hose free,
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: pointing in his left hand. He thumbed down the clamp,
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: exposing water at fifty degrees to naked space. It rushed forth,
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: driven by its own vapor pressure, a stream like a
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 1: lance in the wan sunshine. When it hit Bou's helmet,
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: most of it boiled off, cooling the rest, which froze instantly.
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: Blindness clamped down on Bou. He leaped away, cursing. The
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: front of his helmet so frosted he could not see
• 1:19:08
  Speaker 1: before him. Lunguard bounced around, playing the hose on him.
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 1: Through the rhyme coat, Bau could make out only a grayness.
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 1: He pawed at it, trying to wipe it off, knowing
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 1: that Lunguard was using this captured minute to look for
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 1: the rifle. As he got some of the ice loose,
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: he heard a sharp yell of victory. Found turning, he
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 1: ran again over that ridge. Down on your belly. A
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: slug pocked the stone above him. Rolling over, he got
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 1: to his feet and bounded off toward a steep rise,
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: still wiping blindness off his helmet, but he could not
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 1: wipe the bitter vomit taste of defeat out of his mouth.
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: His breathing was a file that raked in his throat.
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: Heart and lungs were ready to tear loose, and there
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: was a cold knot and his guts. Fleeing up the high,
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 1: ragged slope, he sobbed out his rage in himself and
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: his own stupidity. At the top of the hill, he
• 1:20:09
  Speaker 1: threw himself to the ground and looked down again over
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 1: the low wall of basalt. It was hard to see
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: if anything moved down in that valley of night. Then
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: the sun threw a broken gleam of polished metal the
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: rifle barrel, and he saw Einer Languard walking around looking
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 1: for him. The voice came dim in his earphones. Why
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: don't you give up, Bou, I tell you, I don't
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 1: want to kill you. Yeah, Bo panted wearily. I'm sure
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 1: well you can never tell, said Lungard mildly. It would
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 1: be rather a nuisance to have to keep not only
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 1: the fair valeria, but you tied up all the way
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 1: to base. Still, if you'll surrender by the time I've
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 1: counted ten, Look here, said Bow desperately. I've got half
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 1: the lynx. If you don't give up, I'll hammer them
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 1: all flat and let you starve and valeria. The voice
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 1: jeered at him. He knew his secret was read. I
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 1: shouldn't have let you bluff me in the first place.
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: It won't happen a second time, all right, one, two three.
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 1: Bow could get off this asteroid with no more than
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 1: the power of his own legs. A few jets from
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 1: the emergency blow valve at the bottom of an air
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 1: tank would correct his flight as needed to bring him
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 1: back to the Sirius. He wanted to get up there
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 1: and inside warm walls and take Valeria in his hands
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: and never let her go again. He wanted to live.
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 1: Six seven eight. He looked at his gages. A lot
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: of oxy helium mixture was gone from the tanks, but
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: they were big, and there were still several atmospheres pressure
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 1: in each, a couple of hours life if he didn't
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 1: exert himself too much. They screwed directly into valves in
• 1:22:05
  Speaker 1: the back of his armor, and ten, all right, Beau
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: Languard started moving up the slope, light and graceful as
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: a bird. It was wide and open, no place to
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 1: hide and sneak up behind him. Figures reeled through Bau's mind,
• 1:22:22
  Speaker 1: senselessly massive, the asteroid effect of radius escape velocity only
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: a few feet per second, and he was already on
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: one of the highest points brains. He thought, with a
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 1: shattering sorrow. A lot of good mind have done me.
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 1: He prepared to back down the other side of the hill,
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 1: run as well as he could, as long as he could,
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 1: until a bullet splashed his blood or suffocation thickened it.
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 1: But I want to fight, he thought, through a gulp
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 1: of tears. I want to stand up and fight. Orbital
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 1: velocity equals escape velocity divided by the square root of two.
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: For a moment, he lay there, rigid and his eyes
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 1: stared at death walking up the slope, but did not
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 1: see it. Then, in a crazy blur of motion, he
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 1: brought his wrench around, closed it on a nut at
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: one side, and turned the right hand air tank unscrewed easily.
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 1: He held it in his hands a three foot cylinder, blind,
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: while calculation raced through his head. What would the centrifugal
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 1: and coriolis forces be? It was the roughest sort of estimate.
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: He had neither time nor data. But Languard was taking
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 1: it easy, stopping to examine each patch of shadow thrown
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: by some gaunt craig, each meteor scar where a man
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 1: might hide. It would take him several minutes to reach
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 1: the hilltop. Bow clutched the loosened tank in his arms,
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 1: throwing one leg around it to make sure, and faced
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 1: away from lunguard. He hefted himself as if his body
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 1: were a machine he must use. Then carefully he jumped
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 1: off the top of the hill. It was birdlike, dream like,
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 1: Thus to soar, noiseless over iron desolation. The sun fell
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 1: behind him. A spear head pinnacle clawed after his feet.
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 1: The Southern Cross flamed in his eyes downward. Get rid
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 1: of that downward component of velocity, he twisted the tank,
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 1: pointing it toward the surface, and cautiously opened the blow
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 1: velve with his free hand. Only a moment's exhaust everything
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 1: gaged by eye. Did he have an orbit? Now? The
• 1:24:41
  Speaker 1: ground dropped sharply off to infinity, and he saw stars
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 1: under the keel of the world. He was still going
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: out away. Maybe he had miscalculated his jump, exceeded escape
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 1: velocity after all, and was headed for a long, cold
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 1: spin toward Jupiter. It would take all his compressed air
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 1: to correct such a mistake. Sweat prickled in his armpits.
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 1: He locked his teeth and refused to open the velve again.
• 1:25:11
  Speaker 1: It was like endless falling, but he couldn't yet be
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 1: sure if the fall was toward the asteroid or the stars.
• 1:25:18
  Speaker 1: The rock spun past him, another face came into view. Yes,
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 1: by all idiot gods, its gravity was pulling him around.
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: He skimmed low over the bleakness of it, seeing darkness
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: and starlit death sliding beneath him. Another crag loomed suddenly
• 1:25:38
  Speaker 1: in his path, and he wondered, in a harsh clutch
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 1: of fear, if he was going to crash. Then it
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: ghosted by a foot from his flying body. He thought
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: he could almost sense the chill of it. He was
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 1: a moon, now, a satellite, skimming low over the airless
• 1:25:55
  Speaker 1: surface of his own midget world. The fracture plane where
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 1: Languard had shot at him went by, and he braced
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 1: himself up around the tiny planet. And there was the
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: hill he had left stark against Sagittarius. He saw Languard
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 1: standing on its heights, and looking the way he had gone. Carefully,
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 1: he aimed the tank and gave himself another small blast
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 1: to correct his path. There was no noise to betray him.
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 1: The asteroid was a grave where all sound was long
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 1: buried and frozen. He flattened, holding his body parallel to
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: the tank in his arms. One hand still gripped the wrench,
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: the other reached to open the blow valve wide. The
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 1: surge almost tore him loose. He had a creening, lunatic
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 1: moment of flight, in which the roar of the escaping
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 1: gas boiled through his armor, and he clung like a
• 1:26:53
  Speaker 1: troll to a runaway witch's broom. The sun was blinding
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 1: on one side of him. He struck Languard with an
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 1: impact of velocity and inertia, which sent him spinning down
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 1: the hill. Bou hit the ground, recoiled, and sprang after
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 1: his enemy. Languard was still rolling as Bou approached. He
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 1: came to a halt, lifted his rifle dazedly, and had
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 1: it knocked loose with the single blow of the wrench.
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 1: Languard crawled to his feet while Bou picked up the
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 1: rifle and threw it off the asteroid. Why did you
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 1: do that, I don't know, said Bo. I should just
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 1: shoot you down, but I want you to surrender. Languard
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: drew his wrench. No, he said, all right, said Bo.
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 1: It won't take long. When he got up to the
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 1: Sirius using a Tankluenguard would never need Valeria had armed
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 1: herself with the kitchen knife. It wouldn't have done much good,
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 1: he said. When he came through the airlock, she fell
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 1: into his arms, sobbing. He tried to comfort her. It's
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: all over all taken care of. We can go home now.
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 1: He himself was badly in need of consolation. The Inquiry
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 1: on Earth would clear him, of course, but he would
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 1: always have to live with the memory of a man
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 1: stretched dead under a wintry sky. He went aft and
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 1: replaced the lynx. When he came back, Valeria had recovered herself.
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: But as she watched his methodical preparations and listened to
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 1: what he had to tell, there was that in her
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 1: eyes which he hardly dared believe. Not him, Not a
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: big dumb slob like him. End of Section six recording
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 1: by Paul Harvey and of Out of the Iron Bomb
• 1:28:46
  Speaker 1: by Paul Anderson