The Black Star Passes

by Jr. John W. Campbell

  I

  The Terrestrian and Venerian governments had met in conference, a grim,businesslike discussion with few wasted words. Obviously, this was to bea war of science, a war on a scale never before known on either world.Agreements were immediately drawn up between the two worlds for aconcerted, cooperative effort. A fleet of new and vastly more powerfulships must be constructed--but first they must have a complete report onthe huge invading craft that had fallen in western Canada, and on Venus,for they might conceivably make their secrets their own.

  They called for the scientists whose work had made possible theirsuccessful resistance of the marauders: Arcot, Morey and Wade. Theyfound them working in the Arcot Laboratories.

  "Wade," called Arcot tensely as he snapped the switch of thetelevisophone, "bring Morey and meet me at the machine on the roof atonce. That was a call from Washington. I'll explain as soon as you getthere."

  On the roof Arcot opened the hangar doors, and entered thefive-passenger molecular motion ship inside. Its sleek, streamlinedsides spoke of power and speed. This was a special research model,designed for their experiments, and carrying mechanisms not found incommercial crafts. Among these were automatic controls still in thelaboratory stage, but permitting higher speed, for no human being couldcontrol the ship as accurately as these.

  It took the trio a little less than a quarter of an hour to make the5,000 mile trip from New York to the battlefield of Canada. As they spedthrough the air, Arcot told them what had transpired. The three werepassed through the lines at once, and they settled to the ground besideone of the huge ships that lay half buried in the ground. The force ofthe impact had splashed the solid soil as a stone will splash soft mud,and around the ship there was a massive ridge of earth. Arcot looked atthe titanic proportions of this ship from space, and turned to hisfriends:

  "We can investigate that wreck on foot, but I think it'll be far moresensible to see what we can do with the car. This monster is certainly amile or more long, and we'd spend more time in walking than ininvestigation. I suggest, we see if there isn't room for the car inside.This beats even those huge Kaxorian planes for size." Arcot paused, thengrinned. "I sure would have liked to mix in the fight they must have hadhere--nice little things to play with, aren't they?"

  "It would make a nice toy," agreed Wade as he looked at the rows ofwicked-looking projectors along the sides of the metal hull, "and Iwonder if there might not be some of the crew alive in there? If thereare, the size of the ship would prevent their showing themselves veryquickly, and since they can't move the ship, it seems to me that they'lllet us know shortly that they're around. Probably, with the enginesstopped, their main weapons are useless, but they would doubtless havesome sort of guns. I'm highly in favor of using the car. We carry amolecular director ray, so if the way is blocked, we can make a newone."

  Wade's attention was caught by a sudden flare of light a few milesacross the plain. "Look over there--that ship is still flaming--reddish,but almost colorless. Looks like a gas flame, with a bit of calcium init. Almost as if the air in the ship were combustible. If we should doany exploring in this baby, I suggest we use altitude suits--they can'tdo any harm in any case."

  Three or four of the great wrecks, spread over a wide area, were burningnow, hurling forth long tongues of colorless, intensely hot flame.Several of the ships had been only slightly damaged; one had beenbrought down by a beam that had torn free the entire tail of the ship,leaving the bow in good condition. Apparently this machine had notfallen far; perhaps the pilot had retained partial control of the ship,his power failing when he was only a comparatively short distance fromEarth. This was rather well to one side of the plain, however, and theydecided to investigate it later.

  The ship nearest them had crashed nose first, the point being crushedand shattered. Arcot maneuvered his craft cautiously toward the greathole at the nose of the ship, and they entered the mighty vessel slowly,a powerful spotlight illuminating the interior. Tremendous girders,twisted and broken by the force of impact, thrust up about them. It soonbecame evident that there was little to fear from any living enemies,and they proceeded more rapidly. Certainly no creature could live afterthe shock that had broken these huge girders! Several times metal beamsblocked their path, and they were forced to use the molecular directorray to bend them out of the way.

  "Man," said Arcot as they stopped a moment to clear away a huge memberthat was bent across their path, "but those beams do look as if theywere built permanently! I'd hate to ram into one of them! Look at thatone--if that has anywhere near the strength of steel, just think of theforce it took to bend it!"

  At last they had penetrated to the long tube that led through the lengthof the ship, the communication tube. This admitted the small shipeasily, and they moved swiftly along till they came to what theybelieved to be about the center of the invader. Here Arcot proposed thatthey step out and see what there was to be seen.

  The others agreed, and they at once put on their altitude suits of heavyrubberized canvas, designed to be worn outside the ship when at highaltitude, or even in space. They were supplied with oxygen tanks thatwould keep the wearer alive for about six hours. Unless the atmosphereremaining in the alien ship was excessively corrosive, they would besafe. After a brief discussion, they decided that all would go, for ifthey met opposition, there would be strength in numbers.

  They met their first difficulty in opening the door leading out of thecommunication tube. It was an automatic door, and resisted their everyeffort--until finally they were forced to tear it out with a ray. It wasimpossible to move it in any other way. The door was in what was now thefloor, since the ship seemed to have landed on one side rather than onits keel.

  They let themselves through the narrow opening one at a time, and landedon the sloping wall of the corridor beyond.

  "Lucky this wasn't a big room, or we'd have had a nice drop to the farwall!" commented Wade. The suits were equipped with a thin vibratingdiaphragm that made speech easy, but Wade's voice came through with aqueerly metallic ring.

  Arcot agreed somewhat absently, his attention directed toward theirsurroundings. His hand light pierced the blackness, finally halting at agaping opening, apparently the entrance to a corridor. As they examinedit, they saw that it slanted steeply downward.

  "It seems to be quite a drop," said Wade as he turned his light into it,"but the surface seems to be rather rough. I think we can do it. Inotice that you brought a rope, Morey; I think it'll help. I'll gofirst, unless someone else wants the honor."

  "You go first?" Arcot hesitated briefly. "But I don't know--if we'reall going, I guess you had better, at that. It would take two ordinarymen to lower a big bulk like you. On the other hand, if anybody is goingto stay, you're delegated as elevator boy!

  "Hold everything," continued Arcot. "I have an idea. I think none of uswill need to hold the weight of the others with the rope. Wade, will youget three fairly good-sized pieces of metal, something we can tie a ropeto? I think we can get down here without the help of anyone else. Morey,will you cut the rope in three equal pieces while I help Wade tear loosethat girder?"

  Arcot refused to reveal his idea till his preparations were complete,but worked quickly and efficiently. With the aid of Wade, he soon hadthree short members, and taking the rope that Morey had prepared, hetied lengths of cord to the pieces of metal, leaving twenty foot lengthshanging from each. Now he carefully tested his handiwork to make surethe knots would not slip.

  "Now, let's see what we can do." Arcot put a small loop in one end of acord, thrust his left wrist through this, and grasped the rope firmlywith his hand. Then he drew his ray pistol, and adjusted it carefullyfor direction of action. The trigger gave him control over power.Finally he turned the ray on the block of metal at the other end of therope. At once the metal pulled vigorously, drawing the rope taut, and asArcot increased the power, he was dragged slowly across the floor.

  "Ah--it works." He grinned broadly over his shoulder. "Come on, boys,hitch your wagon
to a star, and we'll go on with the investigation. Thisis a new, double action parachute. It lets you down easy, and pulls youup easier! I think we can go where we want now." After a pause he added,"I don't have to tell you that too much power will be very bad!"

  With Arcot's simple brake, they lowered themselves into the corridorbelow, descending one at a time, to avoid any contact with the ray,since the touch of the beam was fatal.

  The scene that lay before them was one of colossal destruction. They hadevidently stumbled upon the engine room. They could not hope toilluminate its vast expanse with their little hand lights, but theycould gain some idea of its magnitude, and of its original layout. Thefloor, now tilted at a steep angle, was torn up in many places, showinggreat, massive beams, buckled and twisted like so many wires, while theheavy floor plates were crumpled like so much foil. Everywhere the roomseemed covered with a film of white silvery metal; it was silver, theydecided after a brief examination, spattered broadcast over the walls ofthe room.

  Suddenly Morey pointed ceilingward with his light. "That's where thesilver came from!" he exclaimed. A network of heavy bars ran across theroof, great bars of solid silver fully three feet thick. In one sectiongaped a ragged hole, suggesting the work of a disintegration ray, a holethat went into the metal roof above, one which had plainly been fused,as had the great silver bars.

  Arcot looked in wonder at the heavy metal bars. "Lord--bus bars threefeet thick! What engines they must have! Look at the way those wereblown out! They were short circuited by the crash, just before thegenerator went out, and they were volatilized! Some juice!"

  With the aid of their improvised elevators, the three men attempted toexplore the tremendous chamber. They had scarcely begun, when Wadeexclaimed:

  "Bodies!"

  They crowded around his gruesome find and caught their first glimpse ofthe invaders from space. Anatomical details could not be distinguishedsince the bodies had been caught under a rain of crushing beams, butthey saw that they were not too different from both Terrestrians andVenerians--though their blood seemed strangely pallid, and their skinwas of a ghastly whiteness. Evidently they had been assembled before anunfamiliar sort of instrument panel when catastrophe struck; Moreyindicated the dials and keys.

  "Nice to know what you're fighting," Arcot observed. "I've a hunch thatwe'll see some of these critters alive--but not in this ship!"

  They turned away and resumed their examination of the shatteredmechanisms.

  A careful examination was impossible; they were wrecks, but Arcot didsee that they seemed mainly to be giant electrical machines of standardtypes, though on a gargantuan scale. There were titanic masses ofwrecked metal, iron and silver, for with these men silver seemed toreplace copper, though nothing could replace iron and its magnetic uses.

  "They are just electrical machines, I guess," said Arcot at last. "Butwhat size! Have you seen anything really revolutionary, Wade?"

  Wade frowned and answered. "There are just two things that bother me.Come here." As Arcot jumped over, nearly suspended by his ray pistol,Wade directed his light on a small machine that had fallen in betweenthe cracks in the giant mass of broken generators. It was a littlething, apparently housed in a glass case. There was only one objectionto that assumption. The base of a large generator lay on it, metal fullytwo feet thick, and that metal was cracked where it rested on the case,and the case, made of material an inch and a half thick, was not dented!

  "Whewww--that's a nice kind of glass to have!" Morey commented. "I'dlike to have a specimen for examination. Oh--I wonder--yes, it must be!There's a window in the side up there toward what was the bow thatseemed to me to be the same stuff. It's buried about three feet in solidearth, so I imagine it must be."

  The three made their way at once to where they had seen the window. Theframe appeared to be steel, or some such alloy, and it was twisted andbent under the blow, for this was evidently the outer wall, and theimpact of landing had flattened the rounded side. But that "glass"window was quite undisturbed! There was, as a further proof, a largegranite boulder lying against it on the outside--or what had been aboulder, though it had been shattered by the impact.

  "Say--that's some building material!" Arcot indicated the transparentsheet. "Just look at that granite rock--smashed into sand! Yet thewindow isn't even scratched! Look how the frame that held it istorn--just torn, not broken. I wonder if we can tear it loosealtogether?" He stepped forward, raising his pistol. There was a thud ashis metal bar crashed down when the ray was shut off. Then, as theothers got out of the way, he stepped toward the window and directed hisbeam toward it. Gradually he increased the power, till suddenly therewas a rending crash, and they saw only a leaping column of earth andsand and broken granite flying up through the hole in the steel shell.There was a sudden violent crash, then a moment later a second equallyviolent crash as the window, having flown up to the ceiling, camethumping back to the floor.

  After the dust had settled they came forward, looking for the window.They found it, somewhat buried by the rubbish, lying off to one side.Arcot bent down to tilt it and sweep off the dirt; he grasped it withone hand, and pulled. The window remained where it was. He grasped itwith both hands and pulled harder. The window remained where it was.

  "Uh--say, lend a hand will you, Wade." Together the two men pulled, butwithout results. That window was about three feet by two feet by oneinch, making the total volume about one-half a cubic foot, but itcertainly was heavy. They could not begin to move it. An equal volume oflead would have weighed about four hundred pounds, but this wasdecidedly more than four hundred pounds. Indeed, the combined strengthof the three men did not do more than rock it.

  "Well--it certainly is no kind of matter we know of!" observed Morey."Osmium, the heaviest known metal, has a density of twenty-two and ahalf, which would weigh about 730 pounds. I think we could lift that, sothis is heavier than anything we know. At least that's proof of a newsystem. Between Venus and Earth we have found every element that occursin the sun. These people must have come from another star!"

  "Either that," returned Arcot, "or proof of an amazing degree oftechnological advancement. It's only a guess, of course--but I have anidea where this kind of matter exists in the solar system. I think youhave already seen it--in the gaseous state. You remember, of course,that the Kaxorians had great reservoirs for storing light-energy in abound state in their giant planes. They had bound light, light held bythe gravitational attraction for itself, after condensing it in theirapparatus, but they had what amounted to a gas--gaseous light. Nowsuppose that someone makes a light condenser even more powerful than theone the Kaxorians used, a condenser that forces the light so close toitself, increases its density, till the photons hold each otherpermanently, and the substance becomes solid. It will be matter, mattermade of light--light matter--and let us call it a metal. You know thatordinary matter is electricity matter, and electricity matter metalsconduct electricity readily. Now why shouldn't our 'light matter' metalconduct light? It would be a wonderful substance for windows."

  "But now comes the question of moving it," Wade interposed. "We can'tlift it, and we certainly want to examine it. That means we must take itto the laboratory. I believe we're about through here--the place isclearly quite permanently demolished. I think we had better return tothe ship and start to that other machine we saw that didn't appear to beso badly damaged. But--how can we move this?"

  "I think a ray may do the trick." Arcot drew his ray pistol, and steppedback a bit, holding the weapon so the ray would direct the platestraight up. Slowly he applied the power, and as he gradually increasedit, the plate stirred, then moved into the air.

  "It works! Now you can use your pistol, Morey, and direct it toward thecorridor. I'll send it up, and let it fall outside, where we can pick itup later." Morey stepped forward, and while Arcot held it in the airwith his ray, Morey propelled it slowly with his, till it was directlyunder the corridor leading upward. Then Arcot gave a sudden increase inpower, and the plate moved swift
ly upward, sailing out of sight. Arcotshut off his ray, and there came to their ears a sudden crash as theplate fell to the floor above.

  The three men regained their ropes and "double action parachutes" asArcot called them, and floated up to the next floor. Again they startedthe process of moving the plate. All went well till they came to thelittle car itself. They could not use the ray on the car, for fear ofdamaging the machinery. They had to use some purely mechanical method ofhoisting it in.

  Finally they solved the problem by using the molecular director ray toswing a heavy beam into the air, then one man pulled on the far end ofit with a rope, and swung it till it was resting on the door of the shipon one end, and the other rested in a hole they had torn in the liningof the tube.

  Now they maneuvered the heavy plate till it was resting on that beam;then they released the plate, and watched it slide down the incline,shooting through the open doorway of the car. In moments the job wasdone. The plate at last safely stowed, the three men climbed into thecar, and prepared to leave.

  The little machine glided swiftly down the tube through the mighty ship,finally coming out through the opening that had admitted them. They rosequickly into the air, and headed for the headquarters of the governmentships.