E c tubb, p.12
E C Tubb, page 12
The one chosen will do the job or get shot."
"The bastard!"
"Maybe he is," Carter admitted. "But if any man can get us back home then it's Varl."
* * * *
Machen, in the control room, did not share Carter's confidence. "I don't know where we are," he said to Varl. "This space is alien, there are no points of reference, no signposts. If we emerged into normal space now we could come out in the heart of a sun. We could come out between galaxies and --
" He broke off, staring at Varl's expression. "Something wrong?"
"Between," Varl said. "You said 'between.'"
"So?"
"Think of hyperspace as a skin, something like the rubber of a balloon. One side could be air, the other water. The layer of rubber is hyperspace."
"So?"
"We move from air into rubber with the hydee. Now something pushed us too far and we came out in water. From one side of hyperspace to the other. All we need to do is reverse the process."
"Easy," Machen said. "With a half-wrecked ship and a half-dead crew. And even then we won't know just where we'll emerge."
"But we'll be somewhere." Varl looked at the screens, the enigmatic shapes. 'Keep checking. If any of those things move I want to know about it. Their speed, direction, change of size if any. You know what needs to be done." He slapped Machen on the shoulder. "It's up to you, Piers. You're the only one who can guide us home."
"Maybe -- but I can't provide the legs to get us there."
Only Asner could do that. The engineer sat in a chair, blood staining his lips, Garewell hovering in attendance. Fighting the weakness of his body, Asner directed the work of others. The hydee lay in a tangle of cables, tools, discarded wrappings. The ruined coils lay to one side, and others, shining in pristine perfection, had already been set in place.
"How is it going, Jarl?" Varl asked.
"Better than I'd hoped." Asner drew in his breath, and Garewall stepped forward, the vial in his hand emitting an acrid odor. "No!" Asner waved aside the aide. "No!"
"Let him help." Varl nodded to Garewell. "Give it to him, Singh. Breath deep now, Jarl. Deep."
Suck in the vapors and clear the head and lend strength to the heart and nerves and sinews. Rob the body a little more of its dwindling reserves, but remain alert and active. I need you, man! We all need you!
"We've fixed the rest of the ship as best we can," Varl said. "It's all up to you now. How much longer will it take?"
"Not long. The hard part will be in tuning the coils. Ben will help with that." The engineer glanced to where Lydon stood by his machine. The old man looked ghastly with his sunken cheeks and smudged eyes; like the rest, he was showing the effects of relentless work and little sleep. "Once that's done and the rest assembled we'll be ready to go."
"Fine."
"Of course, where will be another matter," Asner added.
"Earth. Home. Where else?"
"Yes," the engineer said, and coughed and almost choked before managing to swallow the blood which brightened the stains on his lips. "Home," he continued, in a vague tone. "Home is the hunter away from ... from where, Commander? Do we know?"
"Piers is working on it."
"He should talk to Ben. He knows where we are. In Limbo. We're in Limbo. Right, Ben?"
"I think so, yes." Lydon closed his eyes and pinched the top of his nose before opening them again.
"Limbo is a region which supposedly held the souls of the departed. A place between heaven and hell. A region of forgotten things. Of -- "
"Ghosts," Varl snapped. "Forget it. You may be in a hurry to become one, but I'm not. You there!"
he shouted at the men working around the hydee. "Clear the area of that junk. Set out those cables and lay out those tools. Sloppy conditions make for sloppy work. Move!" To Garewell he said in a softer tone, nodding at the engineer, "Take good care of him. I want him to come out of this alive and well.
Understand?"
"Of course, Commander." The aide's voice held a touch of acid. "But the first priority is the hydee.
That above all. Am I correct?"
"Without it none of us will be around to make judgments," Varl said coldly. "Remember that."
Outside the engine room, heading down a passage, he paused to draw in his breath, fighting a sudden giddiness which sent him to lean against a bulkhead. Accumulated fatigue was taking its toll, but they were winning -- in a matter of hours, the _Odile_ would again be a fighting, functional machine.
If Asner did not die.
If nothing came from this alien space to halt the work on the outside.
Varl turned, feeling the hard coolness of metal against his cheek, maintaining the contact as he waited for the giddiness to pass. Tiny voices like the distant hum of bees echoed in his ear.
"...said we'd never get back home. The odds are against it. I must have been crazy to have volunteered in the first place."
"You wanted to be close to Van, and I can't blame you. That is a special kind of man."
"That's what I thought. Now I'm not so sure. He wants too much and..."
The voices died as Varl lifted his head. Gloria Arle's arm was bandaged to her shoulder; Fleur Brandt had three broken ribs and a burn the size of a saucer on her back. Like others, they were walking wounded.
Varl entered a newly sealed compartment. He had thought the room was empty, but Ivan Yegorovich lay there on his back, his head resting in Rachel Sheim's lap. She caressed his hair with long, loving strokes; the torn skin of her hand glistened with transparent dressings.
"Commander?" She did not move, her hand continuing its caress.
"Nothing. Just checking. I thought this place was empty." He looked at Ivan, at the bandaged face, the slits giving vision. Once that face had been handsome. "Next time use a cabin."
He moved on, pausing to check the registers set against the bulkheads, the lights, the emergency sealing compounds. Something flashed in the air as he entered the passage holding Erica's cabin -- a brief
glitter gone as soon as seen.
The glitter reappeared -- as it vanished, he heard the scream.
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*CHAPTER 19*
ERICA reared from her bunk as Varl burst into her cabin. She was nude; the sheet fell, exposing the smooth expanse of shoulders and arms, the swell of breasts, the roseate circles embracing her nipples.
"Kurt!" Shock made her voice shrill. "What in hell is that?"
It came again, a raw sound of absolute terror, harsh, grating, a sound torn from a human throat. The alarm blared. Varl swore, reached for the intercom, slammed his hand on the button.
"Cut the alarm! Cut it, damn you!"
The alarm died and the screaming died with it to leave a relative silence broken only by the sound of startled voices. Then, like the grate of a nail on slate, came a thin, keening moan.
"God!" Erica was standing, oblivious to her nakedness. "Kurt -- "
"I thought it was you." Relief made him abrupt. "Listen!" He held up a hand for silence. "Down the passage. Get Stacey!"
He turned back to the intercom as she snatched up a sheet and ran from the cabin. "Why the alarm?
Report!" he snapped.
"Trouble on the outside," Machen replied from the control room. "A worker called for help, then the transmission was broken. I checked the area but couldn't find him. No visual trace."
"Could he have drifted from the hull?"
"If he had, why no call for help? He had a radio. And I couldn't see him."
If he was gone he could be found; suited, he was in no immediate danger. "Anything else?" Varl drew in a breath at the negative report. "Keep alert. Find that man if you can, but don't sound the alarm unless we're attacked." As he raced down the passage the keening grew louder. The sound seemed to come from the compartment where he had left the lovers. Sam Mboto turned from the door as Varl approached. "It's stuck," he said. "Maybe if we hit it together?"
"Stand back." Varl lifted his foot and slammed his boot against the door. At the third kick the door yielded. He stepped inside, then turned, fighting his desire to retch.
"Back!" He saw Mboto's dark face, the wide eyes of Gloria Arle, others. "All of you -- back!"
The order was too late. Carter had joined the crowd and vomited, staining his chin and the front of his blouse. Gloria lay in a slumped heap where she had fallen in a faint.
"Back," Varl said again. "Disperse. Spread out, you fools! Do you all want to end like this?"
"Commander! What -- "
"I gave you an order!" Varl's anger was genuine. "This isn't a show. Get back to your station, you damned ghouls. Move!"
Only when they were gone did he turn to look at what lay on the floor.
Ivan Yegorovich was dead. Nothing could live with its body ripped open, intestines exposed, the heart, lungs, liver, spleen, all laid out in a ghastly symmetry. He had to be dead.
But why did the heart still beat? The lungs still move? And what, in God's name, whimpered from beneath the bandage covering the face?
Varl moved without conscious thought, covering the distance between himself and the thing on the floor, stooping to kneel, his hand lifted, stiffened into a blunted ax which he slammed against the throat, the nerves, the vulnerable areas beneath the ears. He gave it a dozen savage impacts, each of which would have killed.
As he rose, hand numb, the whimpering no longer stirred the bandage.
But the keening remained.
"Rachel! Rachel, it's over now. It's all over. What happened?"
She sat on her haunches apparently unharmed, but made no effort to answer. Instead she rocked from side to side, keening without pause as if she had been turned into a mechanical doll.
"God!" Stacey had arrived, Erica at his side. He glanced at the mess on the floor, at the blood dappling Varl's hand, then at the girl. "Leave this to me."
He delved into his bag, then moved softly toward her, crooning, one hand extended, the bright metal of a hypodermic catching and reflecting the light. As she saw it the keening faltered and she drew herself back over the floor.
"I've got to know what happened," Varl said.
"She's in shock."
"I've still got to know. It's important."
Stacey hesitated, then changed the hypodermic for a spray. Again he advanced toward the girl, crooning, his hands weaving, making little circles.
"Look at me, Rachel. Look at my hands. Aren't they pretty? Much better than that bad dream.
That's all it was, Rachel. Just a dream. Why don't you tell me about it?"
The spray hissed a puff of vapor toward the pale face, the empty, vacuous eyes.
"Just a dream, Rachel. You frightened Ivan, but he's safe. He's here with me now. See?" More vapor wreathed her lips and nostrils. "Tell him about the dream. Tell him. Tell him. Tell him about the dream."
The spray filled the air before her face with its medicinal vapor. As she breathed, the keening stopped. Abruptly she giggled.
"Bright," she said. "So bright. It came and went and came again. We watched it. It grew and changed and -- " She broke off, quivering. "It touched Ivan. Touched him and -- oh, God! God!"
Stacey used the hypodermic to kill her screams. The girl slumped, unconscious. "That's all you're going to get. I hope you think it was worth it."
"It was."
"Yes." Stacey looked at Varl's hand. "I guess it was. And I guess you did what had to be done. Let me take a look at that."
"It'll keep."
"Maybe. Or you could have cracked a bone. Broken one, even. Let me look." He pursed his lips as Varl extended his hand. "Nothing serious. I'll give you some pills to ease the pain."
"It doesn't hurt."
"I wasn't talking about the hand." Stacey looked at the shambles on the floor. "But I guess you're right. What the hell happened to him?"
"I'd hoped the girl could tell us."
"She did. As much as she ever will. Try to force her to remember and she'll do her best to escape.
She'll go back in time to when she was a child and find more problems waiting for her. In the end she'll be catatonic and lie curled up like a fetus."
"But you can help her, Hans," Erica said. "You can do that."
"I'll do my best, but I'm not God. Miracles don't come easy." He looked at Varl. "Anything else before I take her to her cabin?"
"I want a report on the body."
"An autopsy? What good will that do? He's dead and -- " Stacey broke off. "No, we don't know how he died. I can guess what killed him but not how he got into the condition he's in. I'll have to work in here, though. Once he's moved the evidence will be lost."
Varl left, going to the shower, stripping, and standing in the cubicle as hard-driven sprays drove icy whips against his skin. The water stimulated the flow of blood and, together with drugs, banished most of his fatigue. He needed to be alert -- to be otherwise in space was tantamount to suicide.
As Max Ovidio had found.
Ovidio had been the man outside, as Carter explained.
"I left him to clean up. Just a few minor details on the new installations. He said he could manage on his own, and I knew he was a good worker so I left him to it."
"Alone in space?"
"That's right, Commander." Carter was blunt. "It's against normal practice, but we aren't exactly operating according to the book. My air was running low, there was work one man could finish, so I left Max to it while I came inside."
"To desuit?"
"I'd been cooped up for ten hours straight." A statement, not an excuse. "I'd just finished dressing after the shower when I heard the scream. The rest you know."
"The scream -- was Ovidio still outside then?"
"I guess he must have been." Outside but missing.
"Nothing new to report," Machen told Varl. "I've scanned the surrounding area without success. He must have drifted away from the ship, but if so he gained fantastic velocity to get out of range so fast.
Enough to kill him, I'd say."
"Tell me about his last call. Did he say what was wrong?"
"No. Not in specific terms. He just mentioned something about things not being right." Machen fell silent for a moment then, "I think I have it. It went: 'Hey, something weird's happening out here. It's crazy.
I'm getting out of here. Help, come and get me!"'
"Is that all?"
"As far as I can remember. He started to say something else, but then the transmission ended and I sounded the alarm. Just when Rachel screamed, I guess. A hell of a coincidence."
Varl turned to Carter. "I'm going outside to look for Ovidio. Suit up and come with me. I want to know where you left him."
They dressed in the vestibule; Varl taking time to check the suits, each rechecking the other. Carter shook his head as Varl pulled communication wire from its reel.
"We won't need that, Commander. The radios are working."
"You used them with Ovidio?"
"Sure, and at times I wished they were still busted. Max liked to sing, but he had a lousy voice. Do you think we'll find him?"
"Maybe." Varl snapped on his line, then checked the laser in the holster at his side. Carried on the other hip was the snout-barreled reaction pistol. Ovidio had carried one -- why had he not used it to move back to the ship if his line had broken and he had drifted? "All set?"
Carter nodded and led the way into the lock. Air dropped as the pumps evacuated the chamber; the outer door opened as a green light flashed. He stepped out, snapped the end of his line to a ringbolt set in the hull, and made room for Varl to follow.
"There!" Carter pointed to where a gun rested in bleak nakedness on the hull. "I left him over there."
Varl walked to the emplacement, magnetic boots rasping over the plates.
"Reitsch was with me at first," Carter explained. "He went back inside when Max came out to relieve him. We completed the installation at the stern and moved up to this one. I checked what had to be done and left him to it. He could have gone back inside the gunner's lock had the inner port been operational."
Stooping, Varl lifted the door of the port beside the gun and saw nothing inside the vestibule beneath. Rising, he looked around again, seeing nothing but the scarred hull painted with the reflected hues of alien space.
On all sides, the enigmatic shapes seemed larger, closer than before.
"I'm going up," Varl said. "Check my line."
He dropped, flexing his knees, straightening them with a jerk which tore free the grip of his boots.
The ship fell away from him as he rose, the line snaking to where Carter had it running through his hands.
In a minute Carter joined him.
"Check the bow," Varl ordered, and fired his reaction pistol to send him wheeling on the end of his line toward the stern. Below him, he could see the gaping vents of the rockets; he fired again to bring them close. Each vent was large enough to hold the body of a man, but all were empty.
Rising again to the full extent of his line, he heard Carter's voice.
"Commander!" Carter was shocked, incredulous. "For God's sake -- look!"
They had found Ovidio. Drifting high, Varl looked down.
The hull was marked with the grotesque parody of a giant cartoon. The suited figure of a man lay, flattened and expanded, from bow to stern in a paper-thin layer like a coat of paint.
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*CHAPTER 20*
VARL's thoughts were like bubbles rising in a sparkling wine, streaming up to burst and form small craters ringed with tiny fountains; each burst was a question.
How had Ovidio died? What could take a man and smear him out in a thin, even layer on the curved surface of a ship? What could spread a man like warm butter beneath a knife -- and all in an instant of time?
Varl turned, restless, in the darkened privacy of his cabin. He had finally yielded to sleep too long denied, but his slumber was broken by a stream of mental images.
What had killed Ovidio? Yegorovich? Cole and the others who had vanished? What had driven Rachel insane?
He turned again and saw monsters sitting, watching, waiting to reach out and take the _Odile_ and crush it and squeeze it into a battered container filled with bloody pulp.
And after the _Odile?_
