Page 10 - Astounding Pulp V2

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10 NEUTRAL VESSEL
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Brand "·as not superstitious. He had
moved swiftly. '".'\t aJjout 160 feet peu no iear of anything in an atmosphere
flfUTRffl VESSEL second. Five Ea1th gravities." or in the far-flung reaches of the heaY-
·
"']\,) eteors don't accc,lerate," :,,[asters
remarked thoughtfully. ··No1· comets, ens. Perhaps his dinne1· hadn ·t agreed
nor anything-·• with him. Maybe he had never gotten
In inferplaneta,:y war, you don't merely attack a neutral
'·Excepting spaceships," Blake n11- quite used to these ultramodern liners
vessel-you can turn if. into a helpless but terrible weapon! ishcd for him. ·· And neither comet nor in which every major mechanism was
spaceship eyer went this iast." automatic, bridge-controlled. He'd come
•·\Vhatcver it is, it's coming this way,~ up -through the ranks. H e"cl been a yard
By Harl Vincent Masters said gloomily. mechanic, rocket man, conditioning en-
'"A pproxi111ately, anyway. But there gineer, chartman, control operator, and
isn't a chance in a million of it hitting skippei· of a slow lunar freight. First
-Illustrated by R. Isip
us. Not ten million."' Blake was struck taking orders, later giving them. Ac-
with a sudden new thought. ···Sa-ay !" customed ior more than twelve years •to
IN the captive military observation into the vernier, his fing_ers on the key• he snorted. '·'vVe're fools to believe this a fell-crew ship, he'd rather bark his
sphere a hundred miles above the outer .board. - it just isn't possible. I'll bet our base orders at a man than_ at a machine-
~loud layer of Venus, Tommy Blake Barney Masters laughed. " Man, you line, for the automatic triangulator, is e\·en though the machine was likely to
idly punched a location spot on the cal- won't need intervals that close for a:ny- be more reliable. You began to ieel like
haywii·e. The other sphere may be
culatmg board. H e was not greatly im- thing that moves." · down or out of whack. 'Ne'll check up a darnn machine yoursel L
pressed by the alam1 indication of this "Never mind." Blake was frowningly with headquarters. H ave to report, any- His eyes swept the thirty-foot cur ve
?Ody's approach. Seven million miles serious. "I will if this thing's travel- of the bridge control board. Four men.
it was off, at the limit of the sensitive ing as fast as I think. I'm setting the way." spaced along its length, their fingers
magnetic pickup system. From its di- calculator for serial subtraction, so yelp Staring at one another with a mixture twinkling over a maze of controls, their
rection, it could hardly be a Martian out the times." ' of hope. awe and incredulity on their eyes alert to the flickering on and off of
battle fleet and·, even if it were, they A pause; Masters eying his stop lean young faces, the two TerrestrQ- varicolored lights before them, were all
would be several days getting here. watch. Then, " Now !" he sang out. Venusian military observers made for that were required for the operation of
P lenty of time. The calculator chuckled and clunked. the radio room. They couldn't possibly every mechanical detail of the t)10usa11d-
. His next check on the object gave · And at each "now" for two solid min- know that some live hours previously, foot eiaht)r-thousand-ton ship! Of
b
him pause. It was an hour later when utes the machine did likewise. out in space- course, there was the maintenance crew.
•
'
h~ glanced casually at the distance-in- "Enough," announced . Blake, tearing The purser and his staff. Cargo wran-
dicator -spot which marked it. It read out the printed tape. . CA PT A J N JEFFERY BRAN D had an un- alers and an army of deckhands. Hun-
5.200,000 miles ! An impossible figure. !ogether they gazed at the figures ; i.n easy feeling. dreds in galleys, dining saloons, cabin
Nothing in the Solar System could travel -umson they whistled their wonderment It wasn't as if the S/Jirit of Terra, had service-all coming under the head
nearly two million miles in an hour. 5,090,005 - 5,084,-355 - 5,078,705 ~ anything to fear in the Earth-Venus steward. But of old-time, hard-bitten
5,073,054-and so ran tlie series down space lane. The mio'htiest liner of the
'' Hey, Masters," he called across the spacemen like himself, there wer~ none.
room. "Come over here and tell me if t~ an end figure of 5,022,181 in miles skies, though nearly ~ 1ew, she was tried Even his first officer, Gary Carlm, had
l'm screwy." distant. _ and pro\'en hy her nine previous jaunts never seen sen ·ice on a full-crew ship.
. Ma_sters' eyes goggled. Blake grabbed across the void. She was unarmed and
"I don't have to come over to tell you Brand paced the bridge, along the desk
that," his pal grinned. But he crossed ~11s slide rule and pencil. "67,824 miles carried no contraband. H er repulsor rim of the control board, a thing he
m two minutes !" he gasped. '· 565 miles screens were ~f ample capacity to ward
to the instrument board. rarely did. The men's eyes never left
a second average. See for yourself." off any stray mines of either com-
"Look here," Blake said excitedly. M~ter~ saw for himself. H e was their instruments and lights, nor their
"See this approach-warning dot ? I get checktng 1t by long division. "565.2," batant she miaht encounler. $he car- finaers the buttons and jacks and levers,
an incredible reading on its velocity. ried proudly tl~e insignia of Earth, which as l,e passed; but he knew his disquie-
he corrected. "And the differences are planet had been steadfastly neutral
Check me, will you ?" tucle was affecting them. Fortunately,
progressively slightly greater. Won- through the two years of bitter warfare
"Did you put the spectroscope on it?" der. what that means ?" between Mars and Venus. Under the he'd soon be relieved by Carlin.
"Sure, but it's too small and too far . B~ake . stared, checking back rapidly terms of treaties never yet dishonored, H e paused at the position-indicating
off No lines. Now, be a good guy m his mmd to the average of 500 1i;iiles she was guaranteed freedom from search panel. -They were j ust under ten mil-
and hold the stop watch while I punch a second}or the first hour. "Why," he lion miles from Venus and approaching
or attack in space, and safe entry ~t the
the calculator. Give me ten-second in- husked, 1t means the thing's accelera.t- designated unblocka<'NI ports. Still the it at the normal coasting rate of 27.6
tervals." Blake squinted purposefully ing. T he slide and indicator of his rule miles per second. A little ov~ four
captain was uneasy.