Skylark Three

Visit

ning attentively. Richard Seaton strode up and down the room before his friend, his unruly brown hair on end, spe

ll, for that matter. By its very nature it is impenetrable to any form of matter, however applied; and this calc here," slapping viciously the sheaf of papers containing his calculations, "shows that it must also be opaque to any wave whatever, propagated through air or through ether, clear down to cosmic rays. Behind it, we would be blind and helpless, so we can't use it at all. It drives me frantic! Think of a barri

ow, even better than I do, that you are playing with the most concentrated essence of

t stool," kicking the unoffending bit of furniture half-way across the

ore your calculations, comprehensive though they are, cannot predict the effect upon them of your zone of force. Suppose that that zone actually does set up a barrier in the ether, so that it nullifies gravitation, magnetism, and all allied phenomena; so that the power-bars, the attractors and re

irty-nine degrees-away from the perpendicular. I couldn't shoot off on a tangent, as some of these hot-heads have been claiming. Inertia would make me keep pace, approximately, with the e

Crane smiled. "

is slide-rule, a twenty-inch trigonometrical duplex. "You'll concede that it is allowable to neglect the radial c

ignore th

m-m-m-m-one point oh three five. Then point oh three five times thirty-two hundred. Hundred and twelve miles first hour. Velocity constant with respect to sun, accelerated respecting point of departure. Ouch! You win, Mart-I'd kinda step out! Well, how about this, then? I'll put on a vacuum suit

ns possible, of velocity, of acceleration, of inertia. He already knew we

he admitted finally, "and we really should

Yell for the girls, will you? They'd break us off at the an

around each other-Dorothy Seaton, her gorgeous auburn hair framing v

her coat more closely about her. "This must be

wonder what they are going to do

ca, braced by steel netting and equipped with air-tanks and heaters, rendered its wearer independent of outside conditions of temperature and pressure. Outside this suit he wore a heavy harness of leather, buckled about his body, shoulders, and legs, attached

owing that he could not hear her voice, she turned to Crane. "What are you letting tha

Seaton had snapped the r

ne of force. Mart wouldn't let me turn it on, unless I g

zone of force, anyw

ere bombarding them with a certain kind of a wave-length. He finally figured out the exact ray that did it, and found out that if it is made strongly enough, it acts as if a repeller and attractor were working together-only so much stronger that nothing can get through the bound

nished the final adjustments and moved toward them. A saf

th. After a moment the globe disappeared and Seaton was again seen. He was now standing upon a hemispherical mass of earth. He darted back toward the group upon the ground, while the mass of earth fell with a crash a quarter of

ng with it. Gravitation won't work through it-bars won't-nothing will. And dark? Dar

dark!" exclaimed Dorothy. "We s

rd absolute silence for the first time in my life. I never imagi

ked as she retreated toward Cr

e spot from which he had taken off, where no

face was perfectly smooth, with not even the slightest roughness or irregularity visible. Even the smallest loose grains of sand ha

at sure w

ht of an enormous ray-generator which had automatically aligned itself upon the distant point of liberation of intra-atomic energy which had caused the alarm to sound. One hand upon

out to get you, Dot-and this time I'm not just going to warm him up and scare him away, as I did last time. This time that misguided mutt's g

built of transparent arenak, like the 'Kondal.' Even th

n't believe that DuQuesne would be fool enough to tackle us again in the same way-but I'm

ls they recognized Dunark, Kofedix of Kondal, at the controls, and saw Sitar, his beautiful young queen, lying in one of the seats near t

struggled, his green skin paling to a yellowish t

ad and one over Sitar's, pressed a button to open on

Dorothy in dismay. "They'll freeze to dea

either-I doubt if Dunark can, for long," and Seaton

Sitar collapsed upon the frozen ground. Trying to help her, half-kneeling over her, Dunark struggled, his green skin paling to a yellowish ti

crisply. "Hop in, girls-we've got to take

applied one notch of power and the huge vessel leaped upward. Miles of altitude were gained b

ravitation here is approximatel

remark that we'd better undress as far as the law allows-perhaps farther. I never did li

ly restored, and the three women

ve you, I shall never dare try to visit you again. I have never been able to understand why you Terrestrials wear what you call 'clothes,' nor why yo

. "All depends on where you were raised. We like it that way, and Osnome gives us the pip. But you poor fish," turning

calculate your actual Fahrenheit degrees into our loro ... but that figures only forty-seven and, while very cold, we could

ned, but hardly ever beforehand-so I guess I can't blame you much, at that. But what I want to know is, how'd you get here? It

h in Seaton's own characteristic careless fashion. Only when thinking deeply or discussing abstruse matter did Seaton employ the carefully selected and precise phrasing, which he knew so well how to use.

y we have come. We are in most desperate need of two things which you alone can supply-salt, and that strange metal, 'X'. Salt I k

ver, we've got close to half a ton of the

that would be less than half enough. We must have at

you going to plate a fl

r of some ten thousand square miles-in fact, th

hey wiped out our grand fleet in one brief engagement, and it was only the Kondal and a few more like her that enabled us to keep them from crossing the ocean. Even with our full force of these vessels, we cannot defeat them. Our regular Kondalian weapons were useless. We shot explosive copper charges against them of such size as t

ted till now, the

the vessels will not be able to land upon Osnome, but will be drawn aside and be lost, if not actually drawn into the vast central sun. Although it may not have occurred to you, a little reflection will show that the inhabitants of all the central planets, such as Osnome, must perforce be absolutely ignorant of astronomy, and of all the wonders of outer space. Before your coming we knew nothing beyond our own solar system, and very little of that. We

ut astronomy than a pig does a

ur Earthly astronomers would not help us a great deal, since we are so far removed from you in space. You, however, h

he motions, and I studied some Celestial Mechanics. I'm awfully weak

at their rocket-ships can be launched only at one particularly favorable time; for there are ma

ipated as much resistance as we could offer with space-ships and intra-atomic energy. At any rate, they have apparently saved enough of that material to enable them to hold out until the next conjunction-I cannot think of a

nction is allowed to occur?'" inter

ers to throw the switches at precisely the right moment. We have calculated the exact times, places, and magnitudes of the forces to be used. We shall throw the sixth planet some distance out of its orbit, and force the first satellite of the seventh planet clear out of that planet's influence. The two bodies whose motions we have thus changed will collide i

to destroy it with an

sufficient violence to destroy all life upon the planet would disturb its motion sufficiently to endanger the entire system. The way we have in mind will simply allow the planet and one sate

the engineering features of the project; Crane's first thought was of the mathematics involved i

s outrageous-it's unthinkable-it's-it's-it's simply too h

n of a whole planet-of an entire world-with all its i

laze. But before he could say

this is a real he-war; a brand totally unknown on our Earth. It isn't a question of whether or not to destroy a population-the only question is which population is to be destroyed. One of them's got to go. Remember those folks go into a war thoroughly, and there isn't a thought, even remotely resembling our conception of mercy in any of their minds on either side. If Dunark's plans go through th

d and closed her mouth twic

. Would they kill them all, Dick?

Mardonalians, in forty hours. Kondal would go the same way. Don't kid yourself, Dimples-don't be a child. War up there is no species of pink tea, believe me-half of

nom

ed silent for some time, the

eggy-we both fee

destroyed-but the other is so-such a-well, such an

'll do my da-to help find it," he promised. "The ayes have it

iling under false colors, I must tell you that, wearer of the seven disks though you are, Overlord of Osnome though you are, my brain

e. "Why not? Fair enough! Anybody would

pply of platinu

some. I want some of your textbooks on electricity and s

box of radium, a few small bags of gems of various kinds, and some of our fabrics, Sitar thought your Karfed

it, and anything else you think you'd like. Well, ga

we will each want compasses on it, for future use. While we are loading, I should like to begin remodeling our instruments; to make them something like these; with Dun

lligently, it certainly would be a winner as a defense. We couldn't hurt anybody through it, of course, but if we should happen to be getting licked anywh

n you, Dicky," Dorothy smiled at Crane. "Do you th

ven if we never find any other use for the zone of force,

a regular Safety-First Simon myself, since they

system which only those wonder instrument-makers, the Osnomians, could have devised. The new object-compasses were housed in arenak cases after setting, and the housings were then exhausted to the highest attainable vacuum. Oscillation was set up

reely more than a thousand hours on the primary impulse, as against a few minute

red Seaton, enthusiastically. "That compass is as far ahead

avy rapid-firers, mounted in spherical bearings in the walls-were aimed and fired by remote control, from the board. He had devised full automatic steering controls; and meters and recorders for acceleration, velocit

certainly can't call this thing a periscope-it's no more a periscope than I am a polyp. When you look through this plate, it's better than looking out of a window-it

nglish ... Seeing-plate? Or

a look if you want to see a se

d. The vessel had disappeared-he was look

t seems as though nothing intervenes between the eye and the object. You perfected all these things since we left Osnome, Du

st features of all the systems tried. It will not be necessary for you to copy them. I brought along two complete duplicate sets for the Skylark, as well as a dozen or so of the c

Seaton spo

f you, Dunark, and we

lms on your Croix de Gu

seat near the wall. "If we're going

warm, she will be all right for the short time we must stay here," Dunark answere

like your Earth a bit, but I can stand it a little wh

-so you'll stay put, horizontal. We've got men enough around the shop to eat this cargo in three hours, let alone unload it. While they unload and load you up, we'll install the zone apparatus, put a compass on you, put one of yo