The Golden Age of Science Fiction Novels Vol 05

by Anthology

  They had walked out to the shed where Arcot's private molecular motion car stood, the first machine ever built that used the heat of the sun to drive it. Thoughtfully the president of the great Transcontinental Lines looked at it. It was small compared with the great machine that had just brought them east, but of the same swift type. It was a thing of graceful beauty even on the ground, its long curving streamlines giving it wonderful symmetry. They stood in thoughtful silence for a minute--the young men eager to hear the verdict of their prospective backer. Morey, always rather slow of speech, took an unusually long time to answer.

  "If it were only money you asked for, Arcot, I'd gladly give you double the sum, but that isn't the case. I know perfectly well that if you do go, my son will go with you, and Fuller and Wade will naturally go too." He looked at each in turn. "Each of you has come to mean a lot to me. You and Fuller have known Bob since college days. I've known Wade only three months, but every day I grow to like him more. There's no denying the fact that any such trip is a terrifically dangerous proposition. But if you were lost, there would be more than my personal loss. We would lose some of the most brilliant men on Earth. You, for instance, are conceded as being the world's most brilliant physicist; Fuller is one of the greatest designing engineers; Wade is rapidly rising into prominence as a chemist and as a physicist; and my son is certainly a good mathematician."

  He paused, frowning, weighing the situation. "But you men should know how to get out of scrapes just that much better. Certainly there are few men on Earth who would not be willing to back such a group of men--or any one of you, for that matter! I'll back your trip!" His words became more facetious. "I know that Arcot and you, Bob, can handle a gun fairly well, I don't know so much about Wade and Fuller. What experience have you two had?"

  Fuller shook his head. "I think I'll fit best in the galley on the trip, Mr. Morey. I've done the cooking on a number of camping trips, and food is an important factor in the success of any expedition. I can shoot a bit, too."

  Wade spoke rather hesitantly. "I come from the west, and have had a good bit of fun with a gun in the Rockies; there are still some mountain lions and some deer there, you know. I also have a sneaking acquaintance with the new gun, which Arcot developed in connection with his molecular motion. But there is so little you know about me--and most of it bad--I don't see how I really get in on this opportunity--but," he added hastily, "I certainly don't intend to keep the old boy knocking--I'm with you, since I'm invited!"

  Arcot smiled. "Then you'll definitely support us?"

  "Yes, I will," replied Morey, Senior, seriously, "for I think it's worth doing."

  The four young men climbed into the ship, to start for their apartment. Arcot was piloting, and under his sure touch the ship sped out into the cold night air, then up through the atmosphere, till they hung poised at a height of fifty miles on the upper edge of the airy blanket. They looked out in silent thought at the magnificent blazing stars of space. Here, where the dust-laden air could no longer mask their true colors, the stars shone unwinkingly, steadily, and in a glory that earth-bound men had never seen before. They shone in a wonderous riot of color, as varied and as beautiful as the display of colored floodlights in some great city. They were tiny pinpoints of radiance, red, green, orange, and yellow, shining with intense brilliance.

  Slowly Arcot let the machine settle to the blazing city miles below.

  "I love to come out here and look at those cold, pinpoint lights; they seem to draw me--the lure of other worlds. I've always had a sense of unfulfilled longing--the desire to go out there--and it's always been so hopeless. Now--I'll be out there by next spring!" Arcot paused and looked up at the mighty field of stars that arched over his head to be lost on either horizon. A wonderful night!

  "Where shall we go first, Dick?" asked Wade softly as he gazed out at the far-off suns of space, his voice unconsciously hushed by the grandeur of the spectacle.

  "I've thought of that for the last four months, and now that we are definitely going to go, we'll have to make a decision. Actually, it won't be too hard to decide. Of course we can't leave the solar system. And the outer planets are so far away that I think we had better wait till later trips. That leaves the choice really between Mars, Venus, and Mercury. Mercury isn't practical since it's so close to the sun. We know a fair bit about Mars from telescopic observation, while Venus, wrapped in perpetual cloud, is a mystery. What do you vote?"

  "Well," said Morey, "it seems to me it's more fun to explore a completely unknown planet than one that can be observed telescopically. I vote Venus." Each of the others agreed with Morey that Venus was the logical choice.

  By this time the machine had sunk to the roof of their apartment, and the men disembarked and entered. The next day they were to start the actual work of designing the space ship.

  II

  "When we start this work," Arcot began next morning, "we obviously want to design the ship for the conditions we expect to meet, and for maximum convenience and safety. I believe I've thought about this trip longer than the rest of you, so I'll present my ideas first.

  "We don't actually know anything about conditions on Venus, since no one has actually been there. Venus is probably a younger planet than Earth. It's far nearer the sun than we are, and it gets twice the heat we do. In the long-gone time when the planets were cooling I believe Venus required far longer than Earth, for the inpouring heat would retard its cooling. The surface temperature is probably about 150 degrees Fahrenheit.

  "There is little land, probably, for with the cloud-mass covering Venus as it does, it's logical to visualize tremendous seas. What life has developed must be largely aquatic, and the land is probably far behind us in evolution. Of course, Venus is the planet of mystery--we don't know; we can only guess. But we do know what things we are going to need to cross space.

  "Obviously, the main driving force will be the power units. These will get their energy from the rays of the sun by absorbing them in copper discs about twelve feet in diameter--the ship will have to be more of a disc than a cylinder. I think a ship a hundred and eighty feet long, fifty feet wide, and twenty feet deep will be about the best dimensions. The power units will be strung along the top of the ship in double rows--one down each side of the hull. In the middle will be a series of fused quartz windows, opening into a large room just under the outer shell. We'll obviously need some source of power to activate the power tubes that run the molecular motion power units. We'll have a generator run by molecular motion power units in here, absorbing its heat from the atmosphere in this room. The air will be heated by the rays of the sun, of course, and in this way we'll get all our power from the sun itself.

  "Since this absorption of energy might result in making the ship too cool, due to the radiation of the side away from the sun, we'll polish it, and thus reduce the unlighted side's radiation.

  "The power units will not be able to steer us in space, due to their position, and those on the sides, which will steer us in the atmosphere by the usual method, will be unable to get the sun's power; they'll be shaded. For steering in space, we'll use atomic hydrogen rockets, storing the atomic gas by the Wade method in tanks in the hold. We'll also have a battery down there for starting the generator and for emergencies.

  "For protection against meteors, we'll use radar. If anything comes within a dozen miles of us, the radar unit covering that sector will at once set automatic machinery in operation, and the rockets will shoot the ship out of the path of the meteor."

  All that day Arcot and the others discussed the various pieces of apparatus they would need, and toward evening Fuller began to draw rough sketches of the different mechanisms that had been agreed upon.

  The next day, by late afternoon, they had planned the rough details of the ship and had begun the greater task of calculating the stresses and the power factors.

  "We won't need any tremendous strength for the ship while it is in space," Arcot commented, "for then there will be little str
ain on it. It will be weightless from the start, and the gentle acceleration will not strain it in the least, but we must have strength, so that it can maneuver in the atmosphere.

  "We'll leave Earth by centrifugal force, for I can make much better speed in the atmosphere where there is plenty of power to draw on; outside I must depend solely on sunlight. We'll circle the Earth, forming an orbit just within the atmosphere, at five miles a second. We'll gradually increase the speed to about ten miles a second, at which point the ship would normally fly off into space under its own centrifugal force. With the power units we'll prevent its release until the proper moment. When we release it, it will be entirely free of Earth, and no more work will be needed to overcome Earth's pull."

  The planning continued with exasperating slowness. The details of the work were complex, for all the machines were totally new. Several weeks passed before even the power units could be ordered and the first work on the ship started. After that orders for materials left the office daily. Still, it was late in November before the last order was sent out.

  Now they must begin work on other phases of the expedition--food supplies and the standard parts of the equipment.

  In the interval Arcot had decided to make a special ventilated suit for use on Venus. This was to make use of a small molecular motion director apparatus to cool the air, and blow it through the suit. The apparatus consisted of a small compressed air-driven generator and a power tube bank that could be carried on the back.

  "Arcot," Wade said when he saw the apparatus completed and the testing machine ready, "I've just noticed how similar this is to the portable invisibility apparatus I developed as the Pirate. I wonder if it might not be handy at times to be invisible--we could incorporate that with a slight change. It wouldn't add more than five pounds, and those tubes you are using I'm sure are easily strong enough to carry the extra load."

  "Great idea, Wade," said Arcot. "It might be very useful if we met hostile natives. The disappearance stunt might make us gods or something to primitive beings. And now that you mention it, I think we can install the apparatus in the ship. It will require almost no power, and might save our lives some time."

  The work went forward steadily at the great Transcontinental Shops where the space ship was being built. Its construction was being kept as much of a secret as possible, for Arcot feared the interference of the crowds that would be sure to collect if the facts were known, and since the shops directly joined the airfield, it meant that there would be helicopters buzzing about the Transatlantic and Transcontinental planes.

  The work to be done required the most careful manipulation and workmanship, for one defect could mean death. They calculated six weeks for the trip, and in the time before they could reach either planet, much might happen to a crippled ship.

  To the men who were making the trip, the waiting seemed most exasperating, and they spent the days before they could begin the installation of the electrical apparatus in purchasing the necessary standard equipment; the standard coils, tubes, condensers, the canned food supplies, clothes, everything that they could imagine as of possible utility. They were making the ship with a great deal of empty storage space, for Arcot hoped the trip would be a financial success, particularly supplying much-needed metals. Many vital elements were already excessively scarce, and no satisfactory substitutes had been found.

  On the outward trip some of this space would be filled with the many things they would consume en route. In addition they were carrying a great many spare parts, spare tubes, spare power units, spare condensers--a thousand and one odd parts. Arcot intended that they should be able to make an entire new power switchboard and motion director unit if anything should go wrong, and he certainly had all the apparatus.

  At last came the day when the final connection had been soldered, and the last joint welded. The atomic hydrogen tanks were full, and under the ship's own power the oxygen tanks were filled and the batteries charged. They were ready for a test flight!

  The great ship rested on the floor of the shed now, awaiting the start.

  "Oh fellows--come here a minute!" Arcot called to the other members of the party. "I want to show you something."

  The three walked quickly to the bow where Arcot stood, and following the line of his vision, looked in wonder to see that everything was right. They watched curiously as he drew from his coat a large glass bottle, tightly sealed.

  "What's that for?" asked Wade curiously.

  "We're about to start on the first cruise, and I've been wondering if it isn't time we gave the ship a name."

  "Great--I'd been thinking of that too--what are we going to name her?"

  "Well," said Arcot, "I had been thinking of Alexander--he longed for other worlds to conquer!"

  "Not bad," Morey commented. "I have been thinking of naming it too--I guess we all have--but I was thinking of Santa Maria--the first ship to discover the New World."

  "I was thinking more of its home," said Wade. "How about calling it Terrestrian?"

  "Well--it's your turn, Fuller--you designed it. What do you suggest for your masterpiece?" asked Arcot.

  "I was thinking also of its home--the home it will never leave. I like to think that we might find people on Venus, and I would like to have a name on it that might be translatable into more friendly and less foreign terms--why not call it Solarite?"

  "Solarite--a member of the solar system--it will be that, always. It will be a world unto itself when it makes its trips--it will take up an orbit about the sun--a true member of the solar system. I like it!" Arcot turned to the others. "How about it?" It was agreed upon unanimously.

  "But I'm still curious about that glass bottle, so carefully sealed." Morey commented with a puzzled smile. "What's in it? Some kind of gas?"

  "Wrong--no gas--practically nothing at all, in fact. What more appropriate for christening a space ship than a bottle of hard vacuum?

  "We can't have a pretty girl christen this ship, that's sure. A flying bachelor's apartment christened by a mere woman? Never! We will have the foreman of the works here do that. Since we can't have the ship slide down the ways or anything, we will get inside and move it when he smashes the bottle. But in the meantime, let's have a symbol set in contrasting metal on the bow. We can have a blazing sun, with nine planets circling it, the Earth indicated conspicuously; and below it the word SOLARITE."

  III

  It was shortly after noon when the newly christened Solarite left on its first trip into space. The sun was a great ball of fire low in the west when they returned, dropping plummet-like from the depths of space, the rush of the air about the hull, a long scream that mounted from a half-heard sound in the outer limits of the Earth's atmosphere, to a roar of tortured air as the ship dropped swiftly to the field and shot into the hanger. Instantly the crew darted to the side of the great cylinder as the door of the ship opened.

  Fuller appeared in the opening, and at the first glimpse of his face, the hanger crew knew something was wrong. "Hey, Jackson," Fuller called, "get the field doctor--Arcot had a little accident out there in space!" In moments the man designated returned with the doctor, leading him swiftly down the long metal corridor of the Solarite to Arcot's room aboard.

  There was a mean-looking cut in Arcot's scalp, but a quick, sure examination by the doctor revealed that there appeared to be no serious injury. He had been knocked unconscious by the blow that made the cut, and he had not yet recovered his senses.

  "How did this happen?" asked the doctor as he bathed the cut and deftly bandaged it.

  Morey explained: "There's a device aboard whose job it is to get us out of the way of stray meteors, and it works automatically. Arcot and I were just changing places at the controls. While neither of us was strapped into our seats, a meteor came within range and the rocket tubes shot the car out of the way. We both went tumbling head over heels and Arcot landed on his ear. I was luckier, and was able to break my fall with my hands, but it was a mean fall--at our speed we had abo
ut double weight, so, though it was only about seven feet, we might as well have fallen fourteen. We took turns piloting the ship, and Arcot was about to bring us back when that shock just about shook us all over the ship. We will have to make some changes. It does its job--but we need warning enough to grab hold."

  The doctor was through now, and he began to revive his patient. In a moment he stirred and raised his hand to feel the sore spot. In ten minutes he was conversing with his friends, apparently none the worse except for a very severe headache. The doctor gave him a mild opiate, and sent him to bed to sleep off the effects of the blow.

  * * * * *

  With the ship fully equipped, tested and checked in every possible way, the time for leaving was set for the following Saturday, three days off. Great supplies of stores had to be carried aboard in the meantime. Care had to be exercised in this work, lest the cargo slip free under varying acceleration of the Solarite, and batter itself to bits, or even wreck some vital part of the ship. At noon on the day chosen, the first ship ever to leave the bounds of the Earth's gravity was ready to start!