Islands of Space
XXIII
Richard Arcot stepped into the open airlock of the _Ancient Mariner_ andwalked down the corridor to the library. There, he found Fuller and Wadebattling silently over a game of chess and Morey relaxed in a chair witha book in his hands.
"What a bunch of loafers," Arcot said acidly. "Don't you ever _do_anything?"
"Sure," said Fuller. "The three of us have entered into a lifelong pactwith each other to refrain from using a certain weapon which would makethis war impossible for all time."
"What war?" Arcot wondered. "And what weapon?"
"This war," Wade grinned, pointing at the chess board. "We have agreedabsolutely never to read each other's minds while playing chess."
Morey lowered his book and looked at Arcot. "And just what have you beenso busy about?"
"I've been investigating the weapon on board the Satorian ships wecaptured," Arcot told them. "Quite an interesting effect. The Nansalianscientists and I have been analyzing the equipment for the past threedays.
"The Satorians found a way to cut off and direct an electrostatic field.The energy required was tremendous, but they evidently separated thecharges on Sator and carried them along on the ships.
"You can see what would happen if a ship were charged negatively and theship next to it were charged positively! The magnitude of electrostaticforces is terrific! If you put two ounces of iron ions, with a positivecharge, on the north pole, and an equivalent amount of chlorine ions,negatively charged, on the south pole, the attraction, even across thatdistance, would be three hundred and sixty tons!
"They located the negative charges on one ship and the positive chargeson the one next to it. Their mutual attraction pulled them toward eachother. As they got closer, the charges arced across, heating and fusingthe two ships. But they still had enough motion toward each other tocrash.
"They were wrecked by less than a tenth of an ounce of ions which wereprojected to the ship and held there by an automatic field until theships got close enough to arc through it.
"We still haven't been able to analyze that trick field, though."
"Well, now that we've gotten things straightened out," Fuller said,"let's go home! I'm anxious to leave! We're all ready to go, aren't we?"
Arcot nodded. "All except for one thing. The Supreme Three want to seeus. We've got a meeting with them in an hour, so put on your best Sundaypants."
In the Council of Three, Arcot was officially invited to remain withthem. The fleet of molecular motion ships was nearing completion--thefirst one was to roll off the assembly line the next day--but theywanted Arcot, Wade, Morey, and Fuller to remain on Nansal.
"We have a large world here," the Scientist thought at them. "Thanks toyou people, we can at last call it our own. We offer you, in the name ofthe people, your choice of any spot in this world. And we giveyou--this!" The Scientist came forward. He had a disc-shaped plaque,perhaps three inches in diameter, made of a deep ruby-red metal. In theexact center was a green stone which seemed to shine of its own accord,with a pale, clear, green light; it was transparent and highlyrefractive. Around it, at the three points of a triangle, were threesimilar, but smaller stones. Engraved lines ran from each of the stonesto the center, and other lines connected the outer three in a triangle.The effect was as though one were looking down at the apex of a regulartetrahedron.
There were characters in Nansalese at each point of the tetrahedron, andother characters engraved in a circle around it.
Arcot turned it in his hand. On the back was a representation of theNansalian planetary system. The center was a pale yellow, highly-facetedstone which represented the sun. Around this were the orbits of planets,and each of the eleven planets was marked by a different colored stone.
The Scientist was holding in the palm of his hand another such disc,slightly smaller. On it, there were three green stones, one slightlylarger than the others.
"This is my badge of office as Scientist of the Three. The stone markedScience is here larger. Your plaque is new. Henceforth, it shall be theThree and a Coordinator!
"Your vote shall outweigh all but a unanimous vote of the Three. To you,this world is answerable, for you have saved our civilization. And whenyou return, as you have promised, you shall be Coordinator of thissystem!"
Arcot stood silent for a moment. This was a thing he had never thoughtof. He was a scientist, and he knew that his ability was limited to thatfield.
At last, he smiled and replied: "It is a great honor, and it is a greatwork. But I can not spend my time here always; I must return to my ownplanet. I can not be fairly in contact with you.
"Therefore, I will make my first move in office now, and suggest thatthis plaque signify, not the Coordinator, and first power of yourcountry, but Counselor and first friend in all things in which I canserve you.
"The tetrahedron you have chosen; so let it be. The apex is out of theplane of the other points, and I am out of this galaxy. But there is arelationship between the apex and the points of the base, and theselines will exist forever.
"We have been too busy to think of anything else as yet, but our worldsare large, and your worlds are large. Commerce can develop across theten million light years of space as readily as it now exists across thelittle space of our own system. It is a journey of but five days, andlater machines will make it in less! Commerce will come, and with itwill come close communication.
"I will accept this plaque with the understanding that I am but yourfriend and advisor. Too much power in the hands of one man is bad. Eventhough you trust me completely, there might be an unscrupuloussuccessor.
"And I must return to my world.
"Your first ship will be ready tomorrow, and when it is completed, myfriends and I will leave your planet.
"We will return, though. We are ten million light years apart, but theuniverse is not to be measured in space anymore, but in time. We arefive days apart. I will be nearer to you at all times than is Sator!
"If you wish, others of my race shall come, too. But if you do not wantthem to come, they will not. I alone have Tharlano's photographs of theroute, and I can lose them."
For a moment, the Three spoke together, then the Scientist was againthinking at Arcot.
"Perhaps you are right. It is obvious your people know more than we.They have the molecular ray, and they know no wars; they do not destroyeach other. They must be a good race, and we have seen excellentexamples in you.
"We can realize your desire to return home, but we ask you to comeagain. We will remember that you are not ten million light years, butfive days, from our planet."
When the conference was ended, Arcot and his friends returned to theirship. Torlos was waiting for them outside the airlock.
"Abaout haow saon you laive?" he asked in English.
"Why--tomorrow," Arcot said, in surprise. "Have you been practicing ourlanguage?"
Torlos reverted to telepathy. "Yes, but that is not what I came to talkto you about. Arcot--can a man of Nansal visit Earth?" Anxiously,hopefully, and hesitatingly, he asked. "I could come back on one of yourcommercial vessels, or come back when you return. And--and I'm sure Icould earn my living on your world! I'm not hard to feed, you know!" Hehalf smiled, but he was too much in earnest to make a perfect success.
Arcot was amazed that he should ask. It was an idea he would very muchlike to see fulfilled. The idea of metal-boned men with tremendousstrength and strange molecular-motion muscles would inspire nofriendship, no feeling of kinship, in the people of Earth. But the manhimself--a pleasant, kindly, sincere, intelligent giant--would be a fargreater argument for the world of Nansal that the most vivid oratorwould ever be.
Arcot asked the others, and the vote was unanimous--let him come!
The next day, amid great ceremony, the first of the new Nansalian shipscame from the factories. When the celebration was over, the fourEarthmen and the giant Torlos entered the _Ancient Mariner_.
"Ready to go, Torlos?" Arcot grinned.
"Pearfactly, Ahcut
. Tse soonah tse bettah!" he said in his oddlyaccented English.
Five hours saw them out of the galaxy. Twelve hours more, and they wereheading for home at full speed, well out in space.
The Home Galaxy was looming large when they next stopped forobservation. Old Tharlano had guided them correctly!
They were going home!