Palos of the Dog Star Pack
Page 7
3. BEYOND THE MOON
And now the Dog Star called. Croft had proved his ability to projecthis conscious self beyond earth's attraction and return. And, havingproved that, the old lure of the star he had watched when a student inthe Indian mountains came back with a double strength. No longer wasit an occasional prompting. Rather it was a never-ceasing urge whichnagged him night and day.
He yielded at last. But remembering his return from his firstexperiment, he arranged for the next with due care. In order that Mrs.Goss might not become alarmed by seeing his body entranced, hearranged for her to take a holiday with a married daughter in anotherpart of the state, telling her simply that he himself expected to beabsent from his home for an indefinite time and would summon her uponhis return.
He knew the woman well enough to be sure she would spread the word ofhis coming absence, and so felt assured that his body would remainundisturbed during the period of his venture into universal space.
Having seen the old woman depart, he entered the library, drew downall the blinds, and stretched himself on the couch. Fixing his mind onSirius to the exclusion of everything else, he threw off the bonds ofthe flesh.
Yet here, as it chanced, even Croft made a well-nigh fatal mistake. Itwas toward Sirius he had willed himself in his thoughts, and Sirius isa sun. As a result, he realized none too soon that he was floating inthe actual nebula surrounding the flaming orb itself.
Directly beneath him, as it appeared, the Dog Star rolled, a mass ofelectric fire. Mountains of flame ran darting off into space in alldirections. Between them the whole surface of the sun boiled andbubbled and seethed like a world-wide cauldron. Not for a moment wasthere any rest upon that surface toward which he was sinking withincredible speed. Every atom of the monster sun was in motion, evershifting, ever changing yet always the same. It quivered and billowedand shook. Flames of every conceivable color radiated from it in wavesof awful heat. Vast explosions recurred again and again on the everheaving surface. What seemed unthinkable hurricanes rushed into thevoids created by the exploding gases.
In this maelstrom of titanic forces Croft found himself caught. Noteven the wonderful force his spirit had attained could overcome thesun's power of repulsion. His progress stayed, he hung above themolten globe beneath him, imprisoned, unable to extricate himself fromhis position, buffeted, swirled about and swayed by the irresistibleforces which warred around him in a never-ceasing tumult such as hehad never conceived.
Something like a vague question as to his fate rather than any fearassailed him, something like a blind wonder. The force which held himwas one beyond his experience or knowledge. He knew that a truespirit, a pure ego, could not wholly perish, yet now he asked himselfwhat would be the effect of close proximity to such an enormous centerof elemental activity upon an ego not wholly sublimated, such as his.
His will power actually faltered, staggered. For the time being helost his ability to choose his course. He had willed himself here, andhere he was, but he found himself unable to will himself back oranywhere else, in fact. The sensation crept through his soul that hewas a plaything of fate, a mad ego which had ventured too far, daredtoo much, sought to learn those things possibly forbidden, hencecaught in a net of universal law, woven about him by his own madthirst for knowledge--a spirit doomed by its own daring to an eternityof something closely approaching the orthodox hell.
* * * * *
Through eons of time, as it seemed to him, he hung above that blazingorb, surrounded by seething gases which dimmed but did not whollyobscure his vision. Then a change began taking place. A great spot ofdarkness appeared on the pulsing body of the sun. It widened swiftly.About it the fiery elements of molten mass seemed to center their mainendeavor. Vast streamers of flaming gas leaped and darted about itsspreading center. It stretched and spread.
To Croft's fascinated vision it showed a mighty, funnel-like chasm,reaching down for thousands of miles into the very heart of theirsolar mass. And suddenly he knew that once more he was sinking, wasbeing drawn down, down, to be engulfed in that terrible throat of theterrifying funnel, swept and sucked down like a bit of driftwood intothe maw of a whirlpool, powerless to resist.
Down he sank, down, between walls of living fire which swirled abouthim with an inconceivable velocity of revolution. The vapors whichclosed about him seemed to stifle even his spirit senses. Down, down,how far he had no conception. He had lost all control, all consciouspower to judge of time or distance. Yet he was able still to see. Andso at last he sensed that the fiery walls were coming swiftlytogether.
For a wild instant he conceived himself engulfed. Then he knew that hewas being thrown out and upward again with terrific force, literallycrowded forth with the out-rushing gases between the collapsing walls,and hurled again into space.
Darkness came down, a darkness so deep it seemed a thousand suns mightnot pierce it through with their rays. Sirius, the great sun, seemedblotted out. He was seized by a sense of falling through that Stygianshroud. In which direction he knew not, or why or how. He knew onlythat his ego over which he had lost control was swirling in vastspirals down and down through an endless void to an endless fate--thathe who had come so confidently forth to explore the universal secretshad become a waif in the uncharted immensity of the eternal universe.
The sensation went on and on. So much he knew. Still he was conscious.The thought came to him that this was his punishment for daring toknow. Still conscious, he must be still bound by natural law. Had hebroken that law and been cast into utter darkness, to remain foreverconscious of his fate? Yet if so, where was he falling, where was heto wander, and for how long? His senses reeled.
By degrees, however, he fought back to some measure of control. Hisvery necessity prompted the attempt. And by degrees there came to hima sense of not being any longer alone. In the almost palpable darknessit seemed that other shapes and forms, whose warp and woof wasdarkness also, floated and writhed about him as he fell.
They thrust against him; they gibbered soundlessly at him. Theytaunted him as he passed. And yet their very presence helped him inthe end. He called his own knowledge to his assistance. He recognizedthese shapes of terror as those elementals of which occult teachingspoke, things which roamed in the darkness, which had as yet neverbeen able to reach out and gain a soul for themselves.
With understanding came again the power of independent action.Unknowing whither, Croft willed himself out of their midst to somespot unnamed, where he might gain a spiritual moment of rest--to thenearest bit of matter afloat in the universal void. Abruptly he becameaware of the near presence of some solid substance, the sense offalling ended, and he knew that his will had found expression in fact.
Yet wherever it was he had landed, the region was dead. Like the moon,it was wholly devoid of moisture or atmosphere. The presence of solidmatter, however, gave him back a still further sense of control.Though he was still enveloped in darkness, he reasoned that if thiswas a planet and possessed of a sun in its system, its farther sidemust be bathed in light. Reason also told him that in all probabilityhe was still within the system of Sirius despite the seemingly endlessdistance he had come.
Exerting his will, he passed over the darkened face and emerged on theother side in the midst of a ghostly light. At once he becameconscious of his surroundings, of a valley and encircling loftymountains. From the sides of the latter came the peculiar light.Examination showed Croft that it was given off by some substance whichglowed with a phosphorescence sufficient to cast faint shadows of therocks which strewed the dead and silent waste.
Not knowing where he was, loath to dare again the void, hardly knowingwhether to will himself back to earth or remain and abide the issue ofhis own adventure, Croft waited, debating the question, until atlength the top of a mountain lighted as if from a rising sun. Inside afew moments the valley was bathed in light; he saw the great sunSirius wheel up the morning sky.
Peace came into his soul. He was still a conscious
ego, still acreature in the universe of light. He gazed about. Close to the lineof the horizon, and shining with what was plainly reflected light, hesaw the vast outlines of another planet he had failed to note untilnow.
He understood. This was the major planet, surely one of the Dog Star'spack; and he had alighted on one of its moons. All desire to remainthere left him. He was tired of dead worlds, of bottomless voids.
As before on the moon itself, he felt a resurgent desire to bathe inan atmosphere of life. By now, fairly himself again, the wish wasfather to the fact. Summoning his will, he made the final step of hisjourney, as it was to prove, and found himself standing on a world notso vastly different from his own.
* * * * *
He stood on the side of a mountain in the midst of an almost tropicvegetation. Giant trees were about him, giant ferns sprouted from thesoil. But here, as on earth, the color of the leaves was green.Through a break in the forest he gazed across a vast, wide-flung plainthrough which a mighty river made its way.