The Stars Are Ours! a-1 Read online

  “Where’s Dessie?”

  “Nordis’ little girl? She’s with my daughter-and my wife-they’re already under.”

  “Under what?”

  “In cold sleep. Most of the gang are now. Just a few of us still loading. Then Kimber, Kordov and I. We’ll ride out until Kimber is sure of the course before we stow away. All the rest of you—”

  “Will be packed away before the take-off. Saves wear and tear on bodies and nerves under acceleration,” cut in Kimher from the doorway. He nodded over the medico’s shoulder at Dard. “Glad to have you aboard, kid. Promise you- no forced landings on this voyage. You’re to be sealed up in crew’s quarters-so you’ll wake early to see the new world!” And with that he was gone again.

  Maybe it was the capsule acting now, maybe it was just that last reassurance from a man he had come to trust wholeheartedly, but Dard was warm and relaxed. To wake and see a new world!

  Santee went away with Lui Skort, and Dard was alone. The noise in the corridor died away. At last he heard a warning bell. And a moment later the pound of heavy feet in a hurry roused him. The haste of that spoke of trouble, and with the support of the wall he got up to look out. Kimber was coming down a spiral stairway, the center core of the ship. In his hand was one of the snubnosed ray guns Sach had had. He passed Dard without a word.

  Bracing his hands against the wall of the corridor, Dard shuffled along in his wake. Then he was peering out of an airlock to see the pilot squatting on the ramp. It was black night out-most of the flares had gone out.

  Dard listened. He could hear at intervals the blast of the burper. The Peacemen were still doggedly attacking the cleft barrier. But what had Kimber come to guard and why? Have some important possessions been left in the caverns. Dard slumped against the lock and watched lights spark to life in the mouth of the tunnel. A man came out running, covering the ground to the foot of the ship’s ramp in ground-eating leaps. He dashed by Kimber, and Dard had just time enough to get back as Santee burst in.

  “Get going!” The big man bore him along to the corridor and Kimber joined them. He touched some control and the hatch-lock was sealed.

  Santee, panting, grinned. “Nice neat job, if I do say so myself,” he reported. “The space warp’s off an’ the final charge is set for forty minutes from now. We’ll blast before that?”

  “Yes. Better get along both of you. Lui’s waiting and we don’t want to scrape a couple of acceleration cases off the floor later,” returned Kimber.

  With the aid of the other two Dard pulled his tired body up the stair, past various landing stages where sealed doors fronted them. Kordov’s broad face appeared at last, surveying them anxiously, and it was he who lifted Dard up the last three steps. Kimber left them-climbing on through an opening above into the control chamber. He did not glance back or say any goodbyes.

  “In here- ” Kordov thrust them ahead of him.

  Dard, brought face to face with what that cabin contained, knew a sudden repulsion. Those boxes, shelved in a metal rack they too closely resembled coffins! And the rack was full except for the bottommost box which awaited open on the floor.

  Kordov pointed to it. “That’s for you, Santee-built for a big boy. You’re lighter, Dard. We’ll fit you in on top over on the other side.”

  A second rack stood against the farther wall with four more of the coffins ready and waiting. Dard shivered, but it was not only imagination-disturbed nerves which roughened his skin, there was a chill in the air-coming from the open boxes.

  Kordov explained. “You go to sleep and then you freeze.”

  Santee chuckled. “Just so you thaw us out again, Tas. I ain’t aimin’ to spend the rest of my life an icicle, so you brainy boys can prove somethin’ or other. Now what do we do climb in?”

  “Strip first,” ordered the First Scientist. “And then you get a couple of shots.”

  He pulled along a small rolling tray-table on which were laid a series of hypodermics. Carefully he selected two, one filled with a red brown liquid, the other with a colorless substance.

  As Dard fumbled at the fastenings of the torn uniform he still wore, Santee asked a question for them both.

  “An’ how do we wake up when the right time comes?

  Got any alarms set in these contraptions?”

  Those three—” Kordov indicated the three lower coffins on the far rack, “are especially fitted. Arranged to waken those inside, Kimber, Lui, and me, when the ship signals that it has reached the end of the course set, which will be when the instruments raise a sun enough like Sol to nourish earth-type planets. We feed that into her robot controls once we are free in space. During the voyage she may vary the pattern-to make evasion of meteors or for other reasons. But she will always come back on the set course, If we are close to a solar system when we are awakened, and Kimber has done everything possible to assure that, then we shall arouse any others needed to bring the ship down. Most of you won’t be awakened until after we land-there isn’t enough room.”

  Kordov shrugged, “Who knows? No man has yet pioneered into the galaxy. It may be for generations.”

  Santee rolled his discarded clothing into a ball and waited stoically for Kordov to give him the shots. Then with a wave of one big fist he climbed into the coffin and lay down. Kordov made adjustments at either end. Icy air welled up in a freezing puff. Santee’s eyes closed as the First Scientist moved the lid into place before setting the three dials on the side Their pointers swung until the needles came to rest at the far end. Kordov pushed the box back onto the rack.

  “Now for you,” he turned to Dard.

  The top box lowered itself on two long arms from the top of the other rack. Dard discarded his last piece of clothing with a vast reluctance. Sure, he could understand the theory of this-what his brother had worked out for them. But the reality-to be frozen within a box-to go sightlessly, helplessly into the void-perhaps never to awake! “With his teeth set hard he fought back the panic those thoughts churned up in him. And he was fighting so hard that the prick of the first injection came as a shock. He started, only to have Kordov’s hand close as a vise upon his upper arm and hold him steady for the second.

  “That’s all—in with you now, son. See you in another world.”

  Kordov was laughing, but Dard’s weak answering smile as he settled himself in the coffin had no humor in it. Because Kordov could be so very right. The cover was going on, he had an insane desire to scream out that he wasn’t going to be shut in this way-that he wanted out, not only of the box, but of the whole crazy venture. But the lid was on now. It was cold—so cold—dark-cold. This was space as man had always believed it would be—cold and dark-eternal cold and dark—without end.

  Book Two

  ASTRA

  1. AWAKENING

  IT WAS WARM and there was a light, striking redly through Dard’s closed eyelids. The warmth was good, but he wanted to twist his head away from the demands of that light. To move— but movement required an effort he had not yet the strength to make. It would be better to slip back into the pleasant darkness—to sleep…

  A sharp stab of pain shook him out of that floating ease. Dard made a great effort and forced his eyelids up. Cloudy masses of color moved above him, sometimes changing position in quick jerks which removed them entirely from his area of vision. The cloudiness slowly disappeared and lines tightened, drew together. A face-vaguely familiar-hands which descended to his level of sight.

  He became aware of the hands moving across his body and another prick of pain followed. There was sound-staccato bursts. Talking-talking-Dard willed his mouth to open, his tongue to move. But obedience came with agonizing slowness, as if those particular motions had not been made for a long, long time. How long? Long-? He began to remember, and his hands turned to feel for the confines of the coffin. But they met no barrier-he was no longer imprisoned in that box!

  “Drink up, kid—”

  The words sorted themselves into coherent speech as he sucked on t
he tube which had been placed in his mouth. The drink was hot, warmth tingling inside him as well as without, driving the chill which had immobilized his muscles. Strangely he was drowsy again and this time the hands did not work to keep him conscious.

  “That’s right. Take it easy—we’ll be seeing you…”

  That reassurance carried into sleep with him. It held through to his second awakening. This time he raised himself up and looked around. He had been stretched on a soft thick pad on the floor of the oddest room he had ever seen. Half lying in a cushioned chair swung on webbing was a dark-haired man, intent upon a wide screen set in the wall before him.

  There were two more such seats, each before a board of controls. And Dard saw three more such floor mats as the one he rested upon, each equipped with a set of straps and buckles. He drew his feet up under him to sit cross-legged, while he studied the cabin and put together bits of recollection.

  This could not be anything but the control cabin of the star ship. He was awake-had been aroused-which meant -! His hand went to his mouth in an involuntary gesture. Now he wanted to see what was on that screen his cabin companion watched. He must see!

  But his body moved so slowly. Rusty joints-slack muscles. Why-he creaked! Hands and eyes told him that he was clothed. Though the cloth of the breeches and blouse was sleek and smooth, like no other fabric he had ever seen, colored in a mixture of brown and green. He put out the feet in their queer soft boots and inched forward to grab at the nearest swinging chair.

  The watcher turned his head and smiled. It was Kimber -the same Kimber he had last seen on his way to this cabin on the night the voyage had begun. How long ago had that been?

  “Greetings!” The pilot pointed to the chair beside his own. “Sit down—you haven’t got your ship’s legs yet. Did you have good dreams?”

  Dard moved his tongue experimentally. “Can’t remember any,” the words came out easily now-at least his voice hadn’t rusted away, “Where are we?”

  Kimber chuckled. “Space only knows. But we’re near enough to a reasonable goal for the old girl to awake Kordov and me. Then we added you to the company-and will probably bring around a couple more before we land. See?”

  On the screen three specks of light dotted the dark glass.

  “That’s it, a new solar system, m’boy! Luck-Lord, Luck’s ridden on our rockets most of the way. That"-Kimber pointed to the largest of the dots-"that is a yellow sun, approximate temperature 11,000 degrees, approximate size-same as Sol. In fact, it could be Sol’s twin brother. And being Sol’s twin we can hope that one of its three planets is enough like Terra to make us welcome.”

  “Three planets-I only see two.”

  “Other’s behind Sol II now. We’ve seen her-in fact Tas and I have had a week to chart this system since the ship controls roused us. Give us another day and we shall pick out the world we want and land the ship—”

  Three worlds-and a yellow sun. Dard wished that he knew more, that his education was better than a collection of scraps and patches. Back on earth under Pax it was a feat to be able to read and write-he had entertained some pride in his learning. But now-he felt that to be nothing at all!

  “Why did you waken me?” he asked. “I can’t help with the ship. You said that Kordov and you—” He was trying to remember. There had been a third man to be aroused early-

  Kimber’s attention was again given to the screen. Now he answered quickly:

  “You were available and you can help Kordov. Lui didn’t make it.”

  Lui Skort-that young medico who had been so enthusiastic about Lars’ drug! He bad been that third man.

  “What- what happened?”

  “We can’t tell now. All of this-the ship, her course, the freeze boxes were constructed on hope alone. We had no way of testing anything properly. The ship awakened Kordov and me. But Lui—”

  “How long have we been cruising in deep space?”

  “At least three hundred years-maybe more. Time in space may be different from planet time. That is one of the points scientists have argued about. We have no accurate way of telling.”

  “Was it only Lui’s box that failed?”

  Kimber’s face was grim now as it had been on that night they fought their way back to the Cleft.

  “Until we land and start to rouse the whole company we can not tell. The freeze boxes must not be opened until their occupants are ready for revival. And the ship is too small to do that before landing—”

  Coffins! Coffins were what they resembled, and coffins they might he for the whole inert cargo the star ship carried! Perhaps the three of them were the only survivors.

  “We can hope for a high percentage of survivals,” Kimber continued. “Lui’s box had the special controls-that may have been the trouble, But out of four, three ff us are all right. Kordov—”

  “Yes- and what does Kordov do?” asked the hearty voice behind them.

  The stocky First Scientist elbowed his way between the two swinging seats and handed the occupant of each a round plastic bulb from which a tube projected. He cradled a third in his own hand as he settled in the other chair.

  “Kordov,” he answered his own question, “continues to see after your puny bodies, my friends. And you should be glad of his personal interest in them. You will now consume what you hold in your paws and be thankful!” He inserted the bulb tube in his mouth and took a smacking suck.

  Dard discovered that he had to drink the same warm salty stuff that had been given to him on his first awakening. And it satisfied him completely. But he only took one.experimental drag before he demanded:

  “I heard about Lui. How many others?”

  Tas Kordov wiped his mouth with the back of his square hand.

  “That we can not tell. We dare not investigate the boxes too closely until a landing has been made. Yes; all of us want an answer to that question, young man. How many-? We can hope that most came through. I propose to open two more from the crews’ quarters-there are men in them whose skills we need. But-for the rest-their slumbers must continue until we have the new world to offer them. And that too,” he waved at the visa-screen,” presents problems. We have found the proper sort of sun. But remember Sol had nine planets, on only one of which mankind could live at ease: Here are three planets-perhaps a Mars, a Venus, a Mercury, and no Terra. Which one do you think we should try, Sim?”

  The pilot drank before he replied. “Judging by the charted orbits, I’ll settle for the middle one. It’s closer to Sol II than Terra was to Sol I, hut it has the nearest approach to a Terran orbit.”

  “I don’t knew anything about astronomy,” Dard ventured.”You expect this sun to produce an earth-type planet because it is a ’yellow’ one, but if one of those three worlds is another Terra-what about intelligent life on it? Couldn’t the same general conditions have produced the same type of dominant life form?”

  Kordov leaned forward, disturbing the precarious balance of his swinging seat.

  “Intelligent life-maybe. Humanoid of Man-only perhaps. If on one planet the primate is the ruling form, on another it may be the insect or the carnivora.”

  “Don’t forget this!” Kimber held up one hand and flexed its fingers in front of the screen. “Man’s hand helped to make him the ruling form. Suppose you had only-say, a cat’s paw. Even if intelligence went with it, and I defy anyone to tell me that a cat is not an intelligent creature; its brains may work in a different pattern, perhaps, but no one who has lived with one can deny that it can alter its environment to suit its convenience, in spite of the general stupidity of the human beings that it must deal with and through. But if we had been born with paws instead of hands-no matter what super brains we had, could we have produced tools, or other artifacts? Primates on Terra had hands. And they used them to pull themselves up to a material civilization, just as they used monkey chatter and worse than monkey manners to break up what they themselves had created. No, if we had not possessed hands we would have achieved nothing.”
r />   “Very well,” Kordov returned, “I grant you the advantage of hands. But I still say that some ruling species other than primates might well have developed under slightly different conditions. All history, both man-made and physical, is conditioned by ’ifs’. Suppose your super cats have learned to use their paws and are awaiting us. But this is romancing,” he laughed. “Let us hope that what lies there is a world upon which intelligent life has never come into existence at all. If we are lucky—”

  Kimber scowled at the screen. “Luck has ridden on our jets all the way. Sometimes I wonder if we have been a little too lucky and there’s a rather nasty pay-off waiting for us right at the end of this voyage. But we can at least choose our landing place and I intend to set us down as far from any signs of civilization-if there is a civilization-as I can. Say in a desert or—”

  “We shall leave the selection of the spot to you, Sim. And now, Dard, if you have finished your meal, you will please come with me. There is work to be done.”

  Dard’s attempt to get to his feet unbalanced him and he would have fallen had it not been for the First Scientist.

  “These cabins have some gravity,” Kordov explained.”But not as much as we knew on Terra. Hold on and move slowly until you learn how to keep your feet.”

  Dard did as he advised, clutching at the chairs and anything within reach until he came to the round opening of the door. Beyond that was a much smaller cabin with two built-in bunks and a series of supply cupboards.

  “This is pilot’s quarters during an interplanetary run.” Kordov crossed to the center of the room where a well-shaped opening gave access to the ship below. “Come on down—”

  Dard gingerly descended the steep stair, coming into the section where he had been stored away for the cold sleep. And Kordov was going into that very cabin. The three boxes on the far rack were open. On the other rack the coffins were solidly white as if they had been carved from virgin snow.