by Earl
Carver whistled. “I’ll say you didn’t tell me the whole story. In fact, only half. This complicates matters considerably. What of the Earth-people who have wandered into their spot?”
“Poor devils!” It was Tyson who spoke, somberly. “Having to live, on and on, as slaves of the demon-people. Suicide is probably the way out for many of them.”
“The demon-people, I take it, are bitter enemies of mankind?” Carver suggested.
“They are different in all ways,” informed Val Marmax. “Their forms, minds, aims, science—everything. If they once had the chance to invade Earth, through their Spot, they would trample down civilization ruthlessly. We must be careful, in our work on Spot-penetration, that they don’t steal the secret. I have this laboratory protected from their astral-spying, however, and we can safely go on.”
Carver wanted to ask more questions, still quite hazy about the enemy, but Val Marmax waved an impatient hand. “I will tell you more some other time. Right now”—his eyes were charged with exultant hope—“you must show me how to build a simple magnetic circuit. From that I’ll learn about this unbelievable phenomenon—one that has somehow escaped all the science of Atlantis!”
Carver was already rolling up his sleeves. “Where’s some copper wire?” He smiled whimsically at the thought that he was going to show a twelve thousand year old scientist, who could blow mountains to atoms, how to make a magnetic needle twist like a live thing.
The following week in his new, strange world, was a busy one for Barry Carver. He spent long hours with Val Marmax, imparting to the scientist all he knew about magnetism. The Atlantide caught on quickly. His trained mind leaped the gaps of understanding at an accelerated pace. In a week, Val Marmax had learned as much about magnetism as it had taken Earth science a century to uncover. Carver was already out of his depth, but continued to help, as laboratory assistant.
CARVER had less time than he wished to spend with Helene and Tyson. The girl particularly. In his eyes, she grew more lovely every day. And for that reason, Carver was almost rude to Queen Elsha, who dropped in the laboratory at almost any odd hour. Carver, alert, began to wonder what game she was playing. She was not the sort to do things aimlessly.
On the third day, she ran across the annoyance of Val Marmax, intent and nervous as he was in his work.
“Elsha, may I ask you to leave?”
She drew herself up haughtily, heavy-lidded eyes insulted. “You forget I am a Queen, Val Marmax!” she purred dangerously.
“Were a queen,” reminded the Atlantide tactlessly. “And never mine anyway.”
Carver saw her quick, humiliated flush, and had an inkling of her feelings. He almost pitied her. Once proud queen of a great people, in a glorious era, and now a common member of a democratic society, surrounded by an indulgent pretense of her former royal authority. It must hurt—especially through twelve thousand years of memory.
Perhaps she saw the sympathy in his face. She turned to him. “I’ll leave. But will you dine with me, tonight. Barry Carver? Sometimes I am so—alone.”
At the point of refusing, Carver fell under the hypnosis of her eyes. They were pleading. He was surprised to hear himself say “yes.”
She swept her cloak about her glorious figure and left.
Val Marmax shook his head. “She’s a queer case,” he confided. “She saw much of the destruction of her land, Mu. She almost lost her mind. For a year, in Shorraine, she brooded and even tried suicide. But she came out of it, and since then has created a new empire—of lovers. She has had the pick of men, from the lowest to the high.”
Carver glimpsed a dreamy look in the scientist’s eye, but said nothing, smiling to himself. The things of Shorraine. if ever the world heard about them, would fill many libraries.
Ushered into the queen’s presence that evening, Carver’s heart beat faster. She was a dream of brunette beauty, clothed in sheer robes, with soft, strategically placed lights to bring out her loveliest Charms. Almost, he retreated.
But again a subtle magnetism gripped him. Perfume mounted headily to his intoxicated mind.
She told him of Mu as they ate, a heavenly land in a golden era. It was a spell of enchantment, with her low, husky voice lulling his senses. A rich, synthetic wine more delectable than any he had ever tasted in Earth, did more to confuse him till he had forgotten all but her witching presence. Dimly, in the back of his mind, he thought of her past, her real age, but it was a lost voice.
The food cleared away, she sat close beside him on the couch.
“Kiss me!” she commanded softly.
Carver gripped himself. “You’re a queen,” he tried to say casually.
“Not tonight,” she whispered. “Tonight I’m a woman—a lonely one. I—”
Carver, leaning toward the alluring lips, caught something in the corner of his eye. A black something. His confused mind tried to snap alert. That black thing was—danger!
With a cry, he leaped erect and pulled from his belt the hand-projector that would spray high-frequency waves through the room. Val Marmax had given it to him, as a protection against astral visitants. The black, formless shadow, about to envelop his head, quivered and puffed soundlessly into the ceiling, passing through matter as though it didn’t exist.
CARVER snapped off the instrument.
The shadow-things, of all the queer things in Shorr, decidedly appealed to him the least.
Queen Elsha did not seem too disturbed. “It is nothing new,” she said. “Sit down, Barry.”
“No.” The spell had been broken, and Carver realized how close he had been drawn to something unworthy. “I won’t be next on your list, Queen Elsha.”
She flushed angrily. “You think you love that Helene child!” she blazed.
“I’m going to marry her,” said Carver.
“You prefer her to me, wretch?” It was the Queen of Mu talking, imperiously. “She has washed out eyes, skinny limbs, a simpering smile. What can you see in her, fool?”
“Youth,” said Carver, brutally frank, turning to leave. He had one glimpse of her face before he left—a blaze of fury. What was that expression about a woman scorned? Carver laughed, and forgot about the Queen of ancient Mu.
The following day, Tom Tyson brought the news that Carver was to be given an official welcome to Shorraine by its “rulers.”
Carver smiled. “After I’ve been here ten days, picked its number one beauty as my future wife, and started collaboration with its chief scientist!”
“What is time in Shorraine?” murmured Tyson, with a reflective air that betrayed the middle-aged maturity behind his boyish face. “Once, through an error, an Italian of Columbus’ time lived in Shorraine for a century before the Five heard of him. His entrance date, corresponding to ‘birth’ in Shorraine, was never fully settled in the records.”
The headquarters of the Five were contained in the central and highest towers of the city, a combination of palace and business office. Here were hundreds of clerks and administrators, conducting the daily affairs of Shorraine, and its million inhabitants. It was a smooth-running organization, long since brought to perfection, as nearly as man could achieve.
The receiving room of the Five was bare, simple, a symbol of their own cognizance that they did not “rule” Shorraine autocratically. Dressed no different than the rest, the five Atlantides were old, patriarchal in appearance.
Their eyes shone, as Val Marmax’s had, with calm, cool wisdom. They looked at Carver as though weighing him on the spot, as they doubtless had so many others in their long past.
One of them stepped forward.
“Welcome to Shorraine!” he said, in the perfect English Carver had come to expect. But he started a little as the Atlantide thrust out his hand in a gesture that likely had never been known in Atlantis. Carver gripped it warmly. Tyson grinned.
“I taught them that,” he whispered in an aside.
“Since there is no return from Shorraine,” spoke the Atlantide, “you. Barr
y Carver, were a citizen of our city the moment you arrived. As such, you will respect and obey the laws of Shorraine, and the common good. We are not your rulers. We are a living Constitution, never ourselves deciding the application of fundamental articles laid down ten thousand years ago, when this government was founded. You understand?”
IDEALIZING there was no stilted formality in this, Carver nodded and then asked, “What of the first two thousand years?”
“Evolution of government,” smiled the Atlantide, nodding as though commending the question. “During the building of the city, everyone worked with a will, to found a lasting home. Then came the thought of government. In two thousand year’s, many forms were tried. At times”—his eyes grew a little sad—“there was even struggle, revolution. Also, for a century, a despot ruled and there was near chaos. He was assassinated, finally. Anarchy, too, prevailed for a while. But the light shone through, and at last we found the happy combination of personal liberty and communal cooperation that prevails today. It has lasted ten thousand years.”
“Democracy!” stated Carver.
“It is nearest to that in your time,” agreed the Atlantide. “But—superior.” Carver couldn’t doubt that, of a form of government that had been matured four thousand years before the Egyptians on Earth had broken away from tribal rule. He realized that if the Spot were conquered, one of Shorraine’s most magnificent contributions to Earth civilization would be a perfected model of government, tried by the fire and sword of time. And without dictatorship!
“And now,” the Atlantide resumed, “we have been informed of your work with Val Marmax.” His grave eyes shone eagerly. “We hope you succeed in penetrating the Spot. In that event, perhaps many of our citizens will prefer to go back to Earth. But some will remain, and there will be intercourse between Shorraine and Earth. We have long awaited the day.”
Carver looked at their five faces.
“I think we will succeed. Val Marmax is hopeful.” He paused. “There is a great war out there, today, as you must know. Would Shorraine help the side of the Allied Democracies, against the threat of dictatorship?”
“The People’s Council would decide.” The Atlantide’s voice was non-committal, but Carver read much in their glances at one another. “When the Spot is definitely penetrated, a Council will instantly be called. If our intervention in the war is voted upon, the details of ships and armament will immediately be settled.”
“Good enough.” said Carver.
On the way to Val Marmax’s laboratory, in their ship. Carver thought again of the Japanese force he had spied striking into vulnerable Allied territory.
“How soon could Shorraine,” he asked, “send out an aerial force?”
“Quicker than you think,” Tyson spoke excitedly. “I’ve been thinking it over a lot, since you and Val got together. There are at least ten thousand light, fast ships. Mounted with the beam-gun, they’d be a match for ten times their number of Earth ships—at least the World War kind. Top-speed, 500 miles an hour. Can turn on a dime, with gravity-brakes. Beam’s range—a mile. Power-source, one cabbagesized atomic-motor. Fuel, one hatful of sand, lasting 48 hours. How does that stack up with your modern ships?”
“Okay,” asserted Carver. “But I’d need more. You can’t stop an army with that. You need bombs to blow up and cut off all ground lines of communication and reinforcement.”
“All right. How about one thousand ships, big ones, used around here for hauling building material. They could carry all the bombs you could load on the deck. Atomic-bombs—one would make a mountain fold up!”
CARVER grunted in approval. “But how long to turn out all that? The Jap army I want to stop, if possible, will smash through in three weeks.”
“Robot machinery,” reminded Tyson. “Overnight, practically.” His eyes glistened. “Boy, the chance to bring a few more Boches down! You have more than Boches in this war, but the enemy’s the enemy. I’ll finish up where I left off in the last war.”
“If we get through the Spot.” Carver was suddenly pessimistic. Perhaps the Spot was impenetrable, and all his hopes built on sand. Was it possible for his simple suggestion of magnetism to unlock the door to Earth, when Shorraine’s super-science had battered against it in vain for twelve thousand years? It almost seemed too much to hope for.
It was just a week after Carver’s first visit with Val Marmax that the scientist set up his experimental apparatus within the Spot. The giant gates of Shorraine were open. Tyson and Helene were there, and Proxides was on guard against beasts, but no others. The general populace had not been informed. Some few watched, idly, from the nearer avenues and windows, unaware of the importance of what they saw.
Carver had helped set up the tripod, upholding the apparatus. A small, powerful electromagnet, keynote of the instrument, hummed as Val Marmax sent power hissing through it from a nearby atomic-generator. The scientist indicated the slow twist of a magnetic needle.
“When it points straight out toward Earth, the way should be open.” He washed his hands in the air nervously. “Anything thrust through the magnetic field should reverse the spin of its electrons—enter the normal Earth dimension. Ishtu be kind!”
Finally the needle pointed quiveringly straight through the Spot, like the finger of Fate. The machine sang as its energies battled the strange time-stricture. The space through the field-coils of the magnet turned from blue to soft yellow. The glare of the Sahara? Carver crossed his fingers in hope.
Val Marmax, drawing a breath, tossed a ring of metal through the magnet, out toward the mirage of Earth. They ran to the other side. The ring was not there! The Atlantide lighted a peculiar handflash in whose circle of strange rays the sands of Earth stood out clearly. He played the ultra-light around till suddenly the metal ring leaped into sight.
It had gone through the Spot safely. It rested now in the time-dimension of Earth.
Val Marmax stood motionlessly, then, staring as though he couldn’t believe. Carver wondered what his thoughts must be, he who had striven ceaselessly for twelve millennia to accomplish this miracle. The scientist turned suddenly, to look at Shorraine. It was the glance of a man who sees release from an age-long prison.
Tyson broke the silence.
“If that space was big enough, I’d crawl through right now!” he threatened.
Carver swept Helene Ward into his arms. “You’re going to get your church wedding, darling!” he declared. “Any church you want—on Earth!”
“On Earth!” echoed the girl happily.
“I suppose I should wish you two every happiness?”
THEY turned, startled. It was Queen Elsha. They hadn’t seen her come up, from the shadow of the wall. She gazed at them a queer mockery in her eyes, as though they were children who amused her. Apparently, Carver thought, she bore him no animosity for their last meeting.
“Thanks, Queen Elsha,” Carver acknowledged, but realized that she had not actually given the wish.
Her dark eyes turned interestedly on Val Marmax’s Spot-penetration apparatus. “The way is open—to earth!” she murmured. “At last!”
And this sentiment came in a rising murmur that wafted from the towering city at their backs. Up on the wall, Proxides had yelled into his televisor. With the swiftness of light, the news went around the city. Faces began to peer from all windows, roofs, from ships that darted gracefully near. A city of immortals raised its voice in thanks, to a hundred different gods, that the adamant walls of the prison of time had fallen.
Val Marmax gripped Carver’s hand.
“You showed me the way,” he said with frank honesty. “It is done. The time-warp can be simply negotiated back to Earth.”
“I want ships to go through the warp,” said Carver, practically.
“Armed ships, to help my side in the war—our side. Can you build some kind of large magnet for that purpose?”
“No, there is a better way,” returned the scientist thoughtfully. “I’ll have individual units made,
spraying out the magnetic force, to be mounted at each ship’s prow. They will sail right through the Spot, then, into the Earth dimension.”
“Good!” Carver was jubilant. “But work fast. A fleet of ships must leave within two weeks. Every minute counts!”
The scientist smiled. “I have lived for twelve thousand years. Now, suddenly, every minute counts! It is as though Fate’s threads had all suddenly gnarled. Strange! But I’ll work out the individual units tonight,” he promised. He went on a bit pridefully. “Your science gave me the key I needed, but I will in one night work out what any of your scientists would take a year to devise.”
“Can I help?” offered Carver.
“No, but I think Helene can. She knows shorthand. She has helped me before. I’ll dictate all data, specifications, and plans for their manufacture to her. Tomorrow, the factories will begin turning them out.”
Carver suddenly whirled, jerking out his high-frequency pistol. He sprayed its forces over the Spot apparatus. A black shadow that had been slinking around its contours swirled off into the sky.
“An astral spy!” exclaimed Val Marmax. “The demon-people are trying to steal the secret. We must be on guard. My laboratory is protected from them. But tomorrow, when we begin manufacture of the units, we will have to guard the factories.” His face was pale. “Better that we never had found the way than that the demon-people should invade Earth!”
Barry Carver spent a busy evening.
First he went to the Five, informed them of the experiment’s success, and asked for the Council on war. They readily agreed to call it the following day. Then, with Tyson, he had written down tentative plans for a war fleet, to be presented to the Council. When Tyson left, Carver called the laboratory. Helene’s sweet face ghosted into the visi-screen.
“Busy, darling?”
“Yes, but happy!”
“I keep worrying about those damned black shadow-things,” Carver muttered. “Are you sure you’re safe there?”
“Perfectly!” assured the girl, half chidingly. “Val Marmax has taken the added precaution of having his whole laboratory surrounded by guards armed with beam-guns, in case the demon-people tried to spy around in person. Now don’t worry, and get some sleep. You’ve been driving yourself too much all week.”