“Well, thank goodness for that. We’d given you up as lost.”
“Well, we’re not. We’re all here. Large as life and can’t wait to . . .oh blimey! Hullo, Earth . . . hullo.”
Out of the loudspeaker came the weird, almost musical sounds we had all heard before. The noise sent a cold chill down my spine. I looked at Jet and Mitch who were now almost on the crater’s rim. They were standing, rooted to the ground, watching the dome of the space ship. It was slowly opening.
I fully expected something to come out. What, I hadn’t a clue. A monstrous-looking, semi-human being? Octopus-shaped Martians? How was I to know? I almost trembled for the safety of Jet and Mitch standing out there, without weapons and completely unprotected against whatever might emerge from the strange object they had gone to inspect.
My first reaction was to call Jet and Mitch back. But Jet needed no bidding. He was all for making a strategic retreat, but Mitch had other ideas. “You can go back if you want to,” he said, “but I’m not going. Not yet.”
“Mitch,” I called, “where’s your common sense? Jet, bring him back.”
“Yes, come on, Mitch. I’m ordering you back to the ship.”
“And I’m not going,” he said.
“But Mitch . . .” went on Jet.
“You’re not afraid, are you?” asked the engineer.
“Don’t be absurd. But suppose there’s something in there? Something hostile. How do we defend ourselves? We have no weapons--nothing.”
“Even if we had they probably wouldn’t be any good.”
“That’s all the more reason for caution,” said Jet. “If we stay out here and anything happens to us, what about Lemmy and Doc? How do they get home?”
“I don’t give a darn,” said Mitch obstinately. “I’m going on. I’m going right up to that thing and if nothing comes out I’m going to take a look inside.”
“Oh no you’re not,” said Jet. “It’s too risky.”
And with that, he took Mitch’s arm and tried to pull him back.
“Jet--Mitch,” I called, “for God’s sake, don’t struggle. The suits--you might damage them.”
Mitch laughed triumphantly. “Did you hear that? If you use force you might kill us both. Ha, that’s better,” he said as Jet released his hold; “fighting won’t get us anywhere.”
“Mitch,” said Jet, “what’s got into you?”
“It shouldn’t be hard to figure out,” said the Australian. “For years I’ve worked on our ship--sweating my guts out designing her and building her. And then, when we get here, there’s another one. Completely different, probably holding a lot of secrets about long-distance space travel. And you want me to bypass it. Go back home without so much as taking a look at this one.”
“We’ve photographed it, haven’t we?” said Jet.
“Photographs--what can they tell us? You might as well have photographed the image on the televiewer screen.”
“Mitch,” said Jet resignedly, “what exactly do you want to do?”
Mitch spoke slowly and deliberately. “I want to go up to that thing. To touch it. To walk all round it and examine it.”
“But the top has just opened. Something must have opened it and that something may come out.”
“I’m prepared to risk it. Now do you want to come with me or not?”
Jet hesitated only a moment and then said: “All right.”
“No, Jet, wait!” I called.
By this time Lemmy had given up his attempt to re-contact Control and had come over to my side. “For heaven’s sake, Jet, do as Doc says,” he pleaded.
“Mitch,” said Jet deliberately, “I’ll come as far as the crater’s rim. If you want to go down into it, you go. But don’t leave my sight.”
“All right,” said Mitch. “It’ll be better than nothing.”
“Did you hear that, Doc?” asked Jet.
“Yes,” I replied.
“Then keep your eye on that screen. If you see anything wrong, or anything peculiar that we don’t notice, tell us at once.”
“Yes, Jet.”
“Then come on, Mitch,” he said, “let’s go. But slowly, take your time.”
“Blimey, Doc,” said Lemmy as we watched the two men walking round the edge of the crater to the side where the door had opened. “Why can’t they leave that thing out there alone and let us go home?”
“Quiet, Lemmy,” I told him, “Mitch is going down into the crater now. Hullo, Jet--everything all right?”
“Up to now it is.”
“How about you, Mitch?” I asked.
“I’m not dead yet,” he replied. “Walking across the crater floor now.”
I could just see the top of his head as he descended the wall. Within a minute or two he was close enough to the strange craft to run his gloved hand over her. “Hm,” I heard him say, “she seems to be made of metal all right.”
“What kind of metal?” asked Jet.
“Wouldn’t like to say. Looks like aluminium but I don’t suppose it is.”
Mitch lifted his foot and gave the wall a solid kick. As he did so a hollow, metallic boom came out of the intercom speaker.
“And darned solid, too,” said Mitch
“Hey,” called Jet, “do that again.”
“Do what?”
“Kick it.”
Mitch kicked it.
“Did you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
“Your kick. I heard it.”
“Impossible,” said Mitch. “You can’t hear any noise up here. No atmosphere for sound waves to travel in. Besides, you’ve got your helmet on.”
“I didn’t hear it direct,” said Jet, “I heard it through my radio. Doc, Lemmy, did you hear it?”
“Yes, Jet,” I told him, “we did.”
“Do it again, Mitch,” said Jet.
Mitch kicked the thing for the third time. “Ha,” he said, “heard it myself then. It definitely came through the radio.” “But how could it?” asked Lemmy.
“There’s only one explanation,” said Jet. “That thing itself or something inside it is a radio; a transmitter of some kind. It transmitted Mitch’s kicks and our sets picked them up.”
“Hey, Jet,” said Mitch, “I’m going to walk round this thing.”
“No,” I begged him, “it will take you out of range of the televiewer.”
“Oh, it won’t take a couple of minutes,” he said, “I’ll keep talking, so you’ll know I’m still here.”
“No, Mitch,” said Jet.
He ignored the order. “Here I go, walking round.”
“Mitch, will you listen to me?”
“Now on the western side. No different here and no way in from this side either that I can see.”
Mitch was completely lost to view by this time. “Now on the southern side. Hey . . .”
“What is it?” said Jet anxiously.
“There’s one thing about this ship that’s the same as ours.” “What’s that?” asked Jet.
“A retractable ladder, and right now the rungs are extended. It’s almost like an invitation to go in.”
“Never mind that,” said Jet, “keep walking. Just go round.”
Mitch didn’t reply. The next moment his head appeared over the side of the ship near the door. Jet saw him.
“For God’s sake, be careful, Mitch--what are you doing?”
“Just taking a look at things, that’s all. Don’t think there’s anything here to be scared of. Say, I can see right down into this thing now--right down into the cabin.”
Jet’s curiosity overcame his caution. “What’s in there?” he said.
“Nothing,” said Mitch slowly.
“Are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure. Just a circular cabin, flat floor, plain walls and a ladder leading out of it. I’m going in.” “Oh no,” said Lemmy.
We looked at each other helplessly as we heard Mitch’s footsteps descending the ladder inside, echoing over our personal rad
ios.
“Well,” he said suddenly, “I’m in, and it’s not so empty as I thought.”
“How do you mean?” asked Jet.
“Well, the walls seem to be made of octagonal-shaped panels, and there are two rows of buttons at the top of one of them.”
“Leave them alone, don’t touch them.” “I’m not that crazy. Beats me where the crew can be-- if it ever had a crew.”
“How else could it get here?” “Could be remote controlled.”
“Yes, I suppose it could, but who by and where from?”
“Search me. Meanwhile I think I’ll search this cabin. Perhaps this is just the airlock or something and the crew’s quarters are further inside. Maybe under the floor.”
If Mitch said anything more we didn’t hear it, because at that moment everything was drowned by the space ‘music’ we had heard so often before. Lemmy grew more agitated than ever. “Oh no, Doc,” he said, “listen; it’s here again.”
“Jet--Jet,” I called. But he couldn’t have heard us for he made no reply. As always when this weird music was around, parts of the ship ceased to function.
“What about Mitch inside that thing?” said Lemmy fearfully. “What’s happening to him?”
I called him. “Hullo, Mitch--hullo. Can you hear me? Hullo.” But, as with Jet, I got no answer. I could see Jet standing near the crater, looking up towards the cabin of the ship. He was waving his arms as if trying to communicate something to us. Then he moved closer to the rim and slowly and carefully began to descend its wall. As suddenly as it had begun, the noise stopped. Hoping the radio would be working again I gave Mitch another call.
I got no reply but discovered that Jet at least could hear me for he, too, was now trying to contact Mitch. “Hullo, Mitch, are you all right? Can you hear us?”
“Why on earth did he have to go in that thing?” said Lemmy.
“And why doesn’t he answer us?” I asked.
“Hullo, Mitch,” said Jet once again.
“Hullo, Jet, what’s the panic?” Mitch replied.
“Didn’t you hear us calling you?” said Jet. “Didn’t you hear that music?” put in Lemmy. Mitch’s voice sounded strange, as though he were speaking from a long distance. “It’s nothing to be scared of.”
“Eh?” said Lemmy.
“I said it’s nothing to be scared of.”
“That’s what I thought you said.”
“None of us is going to be hurt. This ship is just different from ours, that’s all. Run on an entirely different principle.”
“Mitch,” said Jet, “what on earth are you talking about?”
“It’s all so simple.”
“Mitch, either come out of there or I’ll come in myself and pull you out.”
“No, Jet, don’t,” said Lemmy.
“That would be asking for trouble,” said Mitch firmly.
“What do you mean?”
“Stay where you are. Don’t attempt to move any closer.”
“What’s gotten into him, Jet?” I said.
“I don’t know, Doc,” came Jet’s worried reply. “Is the recorder going?”
“Of course it is.”.
“Then watch it closely. Make sure you take down every word he says.”
Mitch’s voice continued. “This ship is from another world. Millions of miles away. Hundreds of light years. It’s from the other side of the universe.”
“But that’s impossible,” said Jet. “For anything to travel that far would take thousands of years.”
“Television would seem impossible to an ancient Egyptian.”
“I’m not an ancient Egyptian,” said Jet angrily.
“You’re right. Prehistoric man would be a better description.”
“Mitch, what’s the matter with you?”
“Time, that’s the secret. Journeys through time. Leave here--whoosh. Next moment you pop up a thousand years from now, or back a couple of thousand.”
“Mitch, for heaven’s sake, what’s this all about?”
“Can you explain a geometrical problem to a monkey? You’ll just have to take my word for it.”
“He’s crackers,” said Lemmy. “Whatever happened to him in there has sent him clean off his rocker.”
“Mitch,” said Jet firmly, “listen to me.”
“No, you listen to me. What are you doing here? Where are you from?”
“Doc,” Jet appealed, “what can we do?”
“Keep talking to him, Jet,” I said. “Keep talking-- humour him.”
“Well,” came Mitch’s voice, “are you going to answer my question?”
“We’re from the Earth,” said Jet as pleasantly as he could, “but you know that.”
“At first we thought you might be, then we decided you must be from some other planet.”
“Huh?”
“Is that a surprise? That there are other people in the Universe besides yourself.”
“Well, I suppose it’s possible.”
“Possible? Life is universal. It crops up wherever it’s given the slightest chance. Did you think your tiny planet was unique? There are millions of stars and planetary systems. Millions of planets teeming with life.”
“He must be crackers,” broke in Lemmy.
“Quiet,” I said, “he can hear every word you say.”
“You find all this hard to believe, don’t you?”
“It’s not that, Mitch,” said Jet, “but this is so unlike you.”
“Now you’re beginning to understand.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Why do you interrupt the peace of your sister planet? What is your business here?”
“Oh, surveying, photographing, the establishment of a lunar base--in time.”
“Not in time, Jet. You haven’t conquered that yet.”
“How do you mean?” Jet sounded desperate.
“You’ve got a lot to learn. Already you’re tearing your own planet to pieces, destroying it, and now you mean to do the same here. Isn’t that your intention?”
“If there are minerals here of use to us,” said Jet defensively. “I expect other men will come up from Earth and dig them out. If our civilization is to progress we need fuel, metal, radio-active materials and the Moon appears to have great stores of them. Supplies on Earth can’t last forever.”
There was a slight pause before Mitch replied. “One day you will find that they can.” “What?” said Jet.
“Just watch your step, Earthmen. There are things out here on the fringe of space you don’t comprehend, can’t understand, will never understand, that no beings in a three-dimensional world can ever hope to understand.”
‘Three-dimensional? You mean there is another dimension?”
Mitch never replied to the last question. The music came on again and, almost at once, faded out. Before I could open my mouth to call Mitch again, his voice came through the intercommunication speaker.
“I can’t understand it,” he said quite normally now. “I don’t understand it at all.”
“Hello, Mitch. Mitch,” said Jet.
“Hello, Jet,” said Mitch. “It’s no good, it’s beyond me.”
“What is?”
“All these panels and buttons. There don’t seem to be any doors, nothing. If there is a way further into this ship it’s absolutely undetectable.”
“Mitch,” said Jet firmly, “come out of there.”
“Come out?” said Mitch, “but I’ve only just this second got in.”
“Come out? do you hear?”
“But I can’t leave now. Oh!” It was the first time I had ever heard Mitch sound scared. “What’s the matter?”
“I don’t know. But I’m getting out and damn quick.”
“Here he comes, Jet,” I said, as Mitch’s head appeared through the door of the dome.
He was in such a panic that instead of going round and descending by the ladder, he risked his neck and his suit by jumping down into the crater. And then, having land
ed safely, began clambering up the crater’s wall as fast as he could.
“Mitch, be careful,” called Jet, “don’t run.”
He took no notice, but on reaching the rim grabbed Jet’s outstretched hand and pulled himself up to ground level. We could hear Mitch’s breathing as he said, “Good Lord, Jet, that thing’s alive.”
“Alive,” said Jet, “how do you mean?”
“Well, I don’t know. I can’t explain. It began to vibrate.”
“Is that all?”
“It’s enough, isn’t it?”
A movement on the televiewer screen caught my eye. “Look, Mitch,” I cried, “the door--it’s closed.”
“I told you, it’s alive,” he said grimly. “I got out just in time.”
“Let’s get back into Luna,” said Jet, “before we all go crazy.”
Less than ten minutes later they were safely inside. “Now,” said Jet, “let’s get this straight. What were you talking about in that ship, Mitch?”
Mitch looked blank.
“Doc,” said Jet, “you recorded everything, didn’t you?” “Sure, Jet.”
“Then play it back; let Mitch hear it.”
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” said Mitch. “Is this some kind of a joke?”
“Here it comes,” I told him, and as I switched on the recorder Mitch’s voice came out of the loudspeaker.
“Good Lord,” he exclaimed, “is that me?”
“It’s your voice, isn’t it?” asked Jet.
“Yes, but I never said any of those things. I wasn’t in that ship long enough to say the half of that.”
“But you were, Mitch. And the recorder is proof of it.”
“Then let me hear it for myself.”
We all listened intently as the strange conversation unfolded once more. It made no more sense to me than it had done in the first place; to Mitch neither, apparently, for as we reached the end of the piece and I switched off the machine, he passed his hand across his face in bewilderment.
“Well?” asked Jet.
“It’s fantastic,” said Mitch hollowly. “It’s unbelievable. What does it all mean?”
“I wish I knew,” replied Jet. “But that music we’ve been hearing, the failure of the ship to work, and now this must all be connected in some way. It’s as though whoever controls that ship has either been trying to contact us, or put us out of action.”
Journey Into Space Page 11