by E. C. Tubb
It took a moment for it to register, for the incredible to be absorbed and, when it did, his reaction was immediate.
‘Impossible!’
‘The records—’
‘Must be wrong. That Eagle was manoeuvered, the engines cut, the course corrected, the beacon activated—it’s all on the record.’
‘There are two records, John. If you accept one you must accept both. According to the biological data it was impossible for Alan to have handled the ship. He was unconscious.’ Helena fed the other disc into the machine and, even though he was not a doctor, Koenig could read the evidence presented to his eyes. The heartbeat, the respiration, the encephalogram—all were those of a man in a quiescent condition.
‘An apparent paradox, John,’ said Helena quietly. ‘Alan was unconscious and couldn’t have handled the Eagle, but the ship was manoeuvered, as we know; therefore Alan couldn’t have been unconscious.’ Pausing she added, bleakly, ‘Or something took over his body and used it as if it had been a puppet.’
The inevitable conclusion once the validity of the records was accepted.
Koenig said, ‘There was nothing out there—we scanned.’
‘Before the blast, yes, but after?’ Helena met his eyes. ‘And, whatever it was, John, is still showing its presence. Alan woke in a hallucinary state. He mentioned a name, Arra, he thought that I was someone else. John, you can’t—’
The buzz of Koenig’s commlock gave her no chance to end what she was about to say. Morrow’s face on the screen was strained, incredulous.
‘Commander! There’s an alien vessel in space between us and the planet. It appeared from nowhere—and it’s huge!’
CHAPTER FOUR
There was a shimmer about it, a subtle blend of moving radiance, lines which dissolved one into the other, curves, planes, surfaces which defied easy description. A fabrication which followed laws of other magnitudes, obeyed the dictates of a science based on novel premises. But Morrow had been right in one thing—it was tremendous.
Koenig tried to measure it against the graduated lines on the screens, frowning when the selected points refused to remain in place, the apparent size of the mysterious vessel altering as he watched.
‘David?’
‘The computer is baffled, Commander,’ admitted Kano. ‘From the evidence the ship is either flickering from one point to another at incredible speed or it is actually pulsating in size.’
The answer Koenig had expected. Sandra Benes was no more helpful.
‘Readings are negative, Commander. Any forces involved are either so well screened that they do not radiate on detectable frequencies or the ship is using a type of power of which we have no knowledge.’
‘And the planet?’
‘The sensors are picking up information now that the plasmic cloud has dispersed. There are evidences of life.’
‘Atmosphere?’
‘Breathable.’
Which meant that the detected life would be based on a familiar pattern of oxygen-carbon metabolisms. Plants, animals, perhaps even humans following a recognizable development. Koenig moved restlessly about Main Mission, conscious of a nagging doubt. Too many things were wrong; the sudden appearance of the planet, the traces of apparent life and the mysterious ship itself. A ship which had made no attempt to communicate and had answered none of their transmissions. A vessel which, perhaps by accident, had come to rest close to the point at which the nuclear charges had to be placed.
‘I’m going to investigate,’ said Koenig. ‘Get me an Eagle, Paul. No crew.’
‘You’re going out there alone?’ Bergman shook his head, frowning. I don’t like it, John. Too much could happen.’
‘And would a larger crew make any difference?’ Koenig turned to Morrow. ‘Make that an armed Eagle, Paul. Atomic torpedoes fitted with both direct contact and proximity fuses. Victor, you continue with Operation Shockwave. No matter what happens to me continue on schedule. Now, Paul, where’s that Eagle?’
They watched him rise from the pad, the Eagle tiny against the orb of the mysterious planet, dwarfed by the tremendous bulk of the alien ship. Morrow, monitoring the Eagle, gave a running commentary.
‘All systems go and in the green. Commander, you’d best cut velocity now.’ He frowned as he watched his instruments. ‘Commander?’
‘No response,’ said Koenig. ‘Check all functions for circuit failure. I’m switching to secondary controls.’ Lamps flashed on the monitoring panels. ‘Useless. There seems to be some kind of attractive field drawing me towards the alien. I can’t alter course. I can’t slow. I can’t even fire the torpedoes. Victor, the base is yours. Good luck.’
Facing certain death and yet he was still able to think of others, of the welfare of his command. Then, as the Eagle seemed about to crash into the shimmering hull, Morrow shouted at what he saw.
‘The hull! It’s opening!’
An orifice suddenly gaped in the alien vessel directly before the Eagle, to swallow it, to close after it as if the thing had been a fish gulping an insect.
On the monitoring panel every light went dark.
The hum was low, like the maintained note of an organ in some vast cathedral, a thing more felt than heard. It tingled the soles of Koenig’s feet, the tips of his fingers, caused vibrations to come from the catches of the restraints as he released them. Rising from his chair he stared at the screens, finding them, dark. Operating the controls brought no response. The Eagle was apparently dead and it was a miracle that he was alive.
He spun as the air-lock suddenly opened. Armed, he entered the vestibule, waited, stared at a wall which appeared beyond the outer port. The air was breathable. The wall, silver in colour, held a circular door. It opened as he neared it.
The chamber was vast, that he could sense, but he knew it without direct evidence of his eyes or mind. The configurations baffled logical assessment and he found it best not to look too long or to stare too hard. Shadows drifted like skeins of ebon smoke dotted with pearls, interspersed with broken rainbows, writhing into new and ever more fantastic configurations.
‘Welcome, John Koenig!’
The voice was deeply musical, perfectly enunciated, and yet he knew that it came from no normal throat. Here was a communication of minds needing none of the vibratory devices of tongue and throat, lips and air.
‘Where are you?’
‘Look and you shall see.’
Darkness moved, took form and substance, became the tall, imperious figure of a woman veiled, gloved, strange.
‘Who are you?’
‘I am Arra, Queen of Atheria, the planet which has terrified you and your people.’
‘Arra?’ Koenig frowned, remembering Carter, what Helena had said.
‘Your pilot has mentioned me, that I know. It was necessary that he should be helped. But we met only in the realm of the mind, John Koenig.’
‘You know my name?’
‘I know all about you from the moment of your birth. Your race from the moment of its creation. We of Atheria have waited for you for millions of years, for long millennia while events took their courses and our destinies became as one. Now the cosmic scheme nears completion. Can you even begin to understand?’
‘No,’ said Koenig flatly. ‘Our moon was blasted from its orbit by an accident. No one could have foreseen that.’
The laugher was music, rippling, gushing like water over crystal stones. Elfin bells tintinnabulating through perfumed air.
‘Oh, poor John Koenig. How you fail to grasp the scheme of things. Can you consider the universe as a living cell under the microscope of a scientist? The galaxy as one of the chromosomes which make up that cell? Your solar system as one of the genes which form that chromosome? If so, John Koenig, how small does that make you?’
‘Small,’ admitted Koenig. ‘But I exist.’
‘You do! Yes, you do!’ The voice was a paen of gladness. ‘And how magnificent is the part you play. Our worlds have met in the body of time and sp
ace and, having met, that to which I belong will . . . mutate. It will change, alter, take on a different form and meaning. You and I are vital droplets in the tremendous pattern of existence, fragments of the Master Plan. Within hours our destiny will have been achieved!’
Words which by their nature were limited to crude analogies, but Koenig could grasp what lay beneath them, the concepts the labels embraced. He thought of a spermatozoa, conscious of nothing but the need to survive, fighting, travelling relatively vast distances, coming to rest—and giving stimulus to the birth of a new life; a bacteria, a virus, a minute spore—all unaware of what their presence at the right time and place could do. If such things had consciousness of an individual life what would they think at being told the importance of what they did?
‘Think of it, John Koenig,’ Arra continued. The gene of which I and my people are a part will mutate into a higher plane of existence. Once changed we shall continue immutable for all eternity. To dissolve, perhaps, to disperse, to seed new stars, new galaxies—but basically never changing as the particle of an atom never changes.’
‘And us?’
‘You shall continue. Your search will go on. Perhaps even you too will be changed—but the thing you intend, the explosion you plan, that must not take place.’
‘Operation Shockwave?’
‘Delicate forces are involved and those devices must not be used. This I must beg of you, John Koenig. This is why you are here with me at this moment. I can use no aggression to enforce my request. I must not use it. The contact which is to come, which has been destined for eons, has to be pure.’
Koenig said, unsteadily, ‘You are asking me to do nothing. To believe you implicitly.’
‘Yes.’
‘I am not alone. There are others who may have different ideas.’
‘But you are in command. You must do as I ask, John Koenig, and do it before it is too late. Already those you have left are thinking of attacking my vessel. Attacking, destroying, fighting—the rule of the savage which has no place at this time. I depend on you to fulfill the destiny of my world.’
And to believe, to have faith, to sit and wait and watch as a planet grew huge in the sky. To trust an alien entity. To persuade others to do the same.
‘An hallucination.’ Helena was emphatic. ‘John, it could have been nothing else. First Alan and now you.’
‘And the vessel we saw? Was that an hallucination?’ Koenig moved impatiently from the group which had greeted him: Helena, Bergman, Mathias. They followed him into Main Mission where Morrow turned and smiled at him from where he sat before his console.
‘Glad you made it back, Commander. When that ship swallowed you I would have taken bets that you were dead.’ He sobered a little. ‘Did you mean what you said about aborting Operation Shockwave?’
Koenig had called a halt to the plan the moment he had left the alien vessel. It had vanished now, disappearing as quickly as it had come, not even the enigmatic shape remaining as weight to back his arguments.
‘Yes.’
‘John, you can’t do that.’ Bergman said. ‘That planet will collide with us within a few hours. Shockwave is our only hope of survival and—’
‘I have made my decision, Victor.’
‘Decision? Don’t you mean delusion, John? This alien you claim you saw and spoke with—why only you? Why not communicate with us all—if aborting the operation is so important then why not explain why? We have the right to know. It is our lives which are involved.’
‘Can’t you trust me, Victor?’ Koenig turned to Helena. ‘Can’t you?’
‘In everything else, John, yes, but it is my opinion that you aren’t normal. Delayed shock from radiation exposure could have caused these hallucinations. That woman you claim that you saw. Can you honestly say that you know what she looks like?’
‘No.’ He met her eyes, turned to see others, met them in turn. ‘I think I saw what she wanted me to see. Perhaps her real shape is something so alien it is beyond comprehension, but that is not important. I am talking of her mind. There was truth in it and hope and a great happiness. And there was worry and concern. A thing is to happen and it must take place in a certain way. Operation Shockwave may or may not work as we hope, but the energies released would be fatal to the event. I say we should abort the project.’
‘And throw away our only chance of survival?’ Bergman was stubborn. ‘John, I’ve been over the figures a hundred times. It may not work as we hope, that I admit, but unless we try, that planet will squash us as we would crash an egg beneath a hammer.’
‘Perhaps.’
‘How can you doubt? The instruments—’
‘You talk of hallucinations,’ snapped Koenig. ‘A nice, easy, convenient explanation for any unusual mental state you are not familiar with. But what if the patient saw exactly what he described? What if he lived in a world of visual reality and you did not? Alan was affected, but Arra saved his life. I can’t forget that if you can. She saved his life!’
‘We have no proof of that,’ said Helena sharply. ‘We have only your word.’
‘And Alan’s.’
‘He is—’
‘I know’, interrupted Koenig bitterly. ‘He’s crazy. Hallucinated. Deluded. He believes in a ghost—something you can’t see. Well, can you see gravity? Magnetism? Ultra-violet light? Radio waves? Is a man mad because he believes those things really exist?’
‘John,’ said Bergman. ‘Time is running out. We must get ready to detonate the charges.’
‘No. We must trust Arra.’
‘I disagree!’
An impasse and one which had to be quickly resolved. Koenig glanced around Main Mission, noting the positions of the personnel. Sandra and Morrow were at their stations, Kano by the computer, a scatter of others watching but taking no active part. Mathias had ordered two security men into the chamber, attendants summoned in case of violent behaviour, both, armed with stun-guns. If he should order them into action what would Bergman decide?
He would side with them, Koenig guessed, and so would Helena. Their motives would be of the best, neither had any doubt but that he, like Carter, was suffering from radiation-induced hallucinations. But if he was now defied his authority would be lost and, once gone, it could never be wholly regained.
And, if the others used force to abrogate his command, it would be mutiny. Something he could never forgive or forget.
Koenig said, casually, ‘Time to detonation, Paul?’
‘Readings, Sandra?’
‘Six minutes, Commander.’
She, like the others, relaxed as she answered. ‘As before, sir.’
‘Fluctuation?’
‘None.’
‘I see.’ Koenig nodded at the answer, then moved towards his office. ‘That should give you cause for thought, Victor. While you’re pondering on the significance of the lack of fluctuation I’m going to get a drink.’
A rare bottle was kept in the lower drawer of his desk, as the professor knew. A small laser pistol was clipped above it, which was Koenig’s secret. He loosened it, helped himself to a drink, turned to face Main Mission as Morrow checked the time.
‘Three minutes.’
‘Arm the trigger.’ Koenig set down his glass and, laser hidden at his side, moved towards the console. As Morrow completed the operation he lifted the weapon. ‘Now get up and move to the far side of the room, Paul. Move!’
‘John!’
‘Shut up, Victor! I know what I’m doing. You two security men—outside. Move!’
One made the mistake of going for his stun-gun. His arm fell, smoke rising from a neat hole in his sleeve.
‘Attend him, Mathias.’ Koenig gestured with the gun. ‘All of you, and that includes you, Helena, all of you stand well clear. Time, David?’
‘One minute.’ Kano was sweating. ‘Commander, for God’s sake—’
‘It’s too late!’
There was nothing to do but wait now. To rush Koenig, to chance the laser, to ove
rpower him would take too much time. In the screens the huge expanse of the approaching planet seemed to writhe like the surface of a tormented sea. It filled the space windows, bathing Main Mission in a cold, lambent glow, accentuating features and deepening eyes so that, like waxen images they stood, waiting. They were as flies watching the fall of the hammer which would pulp their lives, their world.
Insects on the face of creation.
Something flickered.
A flash of light, a momentary darkness, light again, a blur of nights and days, the flash and whirl of an illuminated, spinning wheel, a stroboscope.
A jerk.
Nothing.
Nothing but a tiny orb far in the distance.
‘It’s gone!’ Morrow’s yell held an hysterical relief. ‘The planet’s gone!’
‘But how?’ Bergman stared up and around, incredulous. ‘We saw it, the instruments registered it, and yet it’s vanished.’
Moved, passed on, transmuted into something new and strange, lifted by the catalytic influence of Alpha into another type of material. Motes passing in the infinity of the universe. Minute scraps of life interacting and fulfilling an unknown destiny.
Arra had known—and Koenig had believed.
Helena came to him, resting her hand on his arm, her eyes filled with regret.
‘John, I’m sorry. I should have trusted you, but I didn’t know.’
‘You did right, Helena. You operated on the basis of known data.’ Koenig looked at the gun and slipped it out of sight. ‘But Victor should have guessed.’
‘Guessed what?’ Bergman had heard. His face cleared as he realized what he had missed. ‘Of course, John. The instruments. They should have fluctuated as we approached but they didn’t. And all the time I thought you were deluded by an alien who had taken over and conditioned your mind.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Helena. ‘What had the instruments to do with it?’
‘If a man can be deluded into believing lies then so can a machine. If eyes can see what isn’t there then instruments can register false data—if you have the science needed to accomplish it. Don’t you understand, Helena? The original explosion when we destroyed the asteroid weakened the fabric of space and something came through from a different dimension. A living thing which saved Alan’s life. A creature about to metamorphosize into something else as a caterpillar changes into a moth.’