The Other Side of Nowhere
- Автор: Лейнстер Мюррей
- Год: 1964
- Язык: английский
- Год: Berkley Medallion
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «The Other Side of Nowhere». Краткое содержание книги:
For centuries space travelers had dreaded a place they called the Other Side of Nowhere — a place in the universe where up was down, where right was wrong, and where all direction was lost...
To save the RIM STAR Braden had to bring the ship to the place of nightmare, the Other Side of Nowhere...
"Oh! Mr. Braden!" The voice expressed infinite relief. "I'm so glad you answered! There's the devil to pay, Mr. Braden! I'm afraid you believe I was mixed up in it. Terrible things have happened, sir!"
"So I've noticed," said Braden.
"The crew has mutinied, sir! They've armed themselves somehow, and... I don't know what their plan is, sir, but it's terrible!"
A pause.
"I'm afraid they're searching for me, sir! To kill me! I'm hiding at the moment, but I don't know what to do! May I speak to the captain, sir?"
Braden waited an instant. Then he said:
"He's not available."
It could mean that the skipper was not in the control-room. It could also mean that he was dead. Braden would have answered just that way, with just such a pause, in either event, or if he'd gone to the control-room and found it empty. The answer was designed to give no information whatever - not even that one of the steward's men lay dead at Braden's feet with his head at an impossible angle.
The steward's voice acquired just the right touch of the frantic.
"But what shall I do, sir? I need someone to tell me what to do!"
"I can't give you any orders," said Braden curtly.
He flipped the switch to end the talk. Seconds later the intercom buzzed again. He did not answer. The steward wanted information and he hadn't gotten it. He should be greatly disturbed. He had no working hidden microphone in the control-room now. The skipper had tom it out. Its absence must appall him.
Braden made a gesture of pure rage. The control-room was important. From it all manner of dials and indicators reported innumerable facts about the ship's condition, and switches and levers directed innumerable operations. Fires could be fought from it. The air-supply to any compartment could be adjusted or shut off. The temperature, the gravity, the corridor lights, the holds - even compartment doors could be closed simultaneously all over the giant ship. But he could use none of these in the absence of the skipper and in ignorance of the skipper's plans.
There was no word or sign from him. Braden became half-mad with impatience. There should be action, now!
Then there was a sound in the corridor and he plunged to the door, his blaster ready. It was the skipper.
He came out of the door to his quarters and stumbled into the control-room. His face was gray. He seemed to have shrunk. In a bare ghost of his former rumbling voice he said dully:
"Dog the door shut, Mr. Braden. I must have some time. That devil... that devil knew! Ah- h-h! He knew! He's been laughing in his sleeve all the time I've been pampering him - toadying to him - in the hope of having him get his fellow pirates aboard and in my trap! Shut the door!"
Braden said urgently:
"I can see down the corridor, sir, when it's open. We'll have warning if they intend to try anything against us."
"No.... They've heavy-duty rifles now! Dog the door shut! I'd a hinged plate in my cabin, Mr. Braden. There's a way - between the ship's inner and outer skins - to where I had the... bomb that was to make it certain they couldn't win. I thought only I knew it. But that devil found it! And I had... weapons there too. It was in my mind... Close and dog the door, Mr. Braden!" Then, ahnost hysterically, "Make sure the door hasn't been tampered with! Make sure it can be locked!"
Braden made certain that the door would stay fastened against any attempt to open it. The skipper was working frantically to loosen the lever that would release emergency air into the ship in case of an air leak. It could be worked by hand because in such a case only hand- operated controls would work. He got the lever clear. It was immediately evident that it was not only a control lever but could serve as a wrench. He fitted it to the end of a bolt in the wall under the CO2 repeaters. He heaved on it, panting.
"I had a bomb there, Mr. Braden! So they couldn't win! So they couldn't win! So the ship would be blown to atoms if I didn't press a certain button within twenty-four hours of the last signal. And that devil found it! He cut the detonator to little bits! Now nothing will set it off!"
The bolt squeaked and yielded a quarter of a turn.
"I'd thought of everything!" panted the skipper, still heaving on the wrench. "It was... it was perfect! I... even had weapons there in case I had to hunt down any of them who wriggled out of my main trap! Heavy-duty rifles, Mr. Braden! I didn't want to use them. Quick death... ah, they deserve so much more than that! But I was ready even to kill them quickly if I had to! I'd save the ship if I could..." he heaved again... "even if I had to kill them quickly...."
The bolt moved again. Braden, close by the door, said harshly:
"I hear movement in the corridor."
"No matter. It will take time for them to break in."
Something crashed against the door. There was no summons to surrender - mockery as such a summons would be. The crash came again and the door shook. The skipper heaved on the long-handled wrench once more. The bolt turned.
"In here," panted the skipper, "... place to carry money... jewelry... such stuff." He heaved again. "I always hoped... to find the Melpomene's crew. So I... put things here. After... I found the steward I... prepared - I thought - more adequately.... Damn him! But this was... from before his time."
He turned and grimaced at Braden. Bending down, he began to loosen the bolt with his fingers.
"Sporting rifles in here," he wheezed. "Ultra-high voltage. Special license. Shipped for a hunter who was killed by some beast before they arrived. They'll stop any beast! It's a pity... it's a great pity to kill these devils so quickly!"
He stood up. He pulled and a plate swung out, the CO2 repeaters swinging with it. There was a space behind it. It was a perfect hiding place for treasure or weapons which someone might be tempted to steal if they were put in any of the ship's holds.
Then the skipper gave an inarticulate cry. There were grease marks on the floor of the closet. There had been weapons there. The partial outline of a blaster was marked in grease on the floor-plate. The skipper cried out in horror and grief and rage.
The cabinet, the closet, the place for storing treasure or weapons, was empty.
There was a harsh rasp beyond the door. Then the smell of burned paint and hot metal. A point on the metal door of the control-room turned dull-red, then glowed cherry-red. The former crew of the Melpomene had abandoned trickery as a means of destroying the skipper and everyone else in authority, for they'd run into trouble when they tried it. So now they had resorted to undiluted, ravening, arbitrary force.
With heavy-duty weapons they could melt down the door if they chose. They did choose. And four men who could play the enormous energies of heavy weapons before them could not be faced, not even for the half-second needed to fire a blaster at them.
An incandescent spot appeared on the steel door and melted through. There was a shower of coruscating sparks. The hole widened... extended. Two blast-rifles were working on it. Two more spots glowed red.
This was a strictly workmanlike preliminary to the destruction of Braden and the skipper.
Another hole melted through.
Chapter 6
Braden pulled down a lever on the control-room wall. It was about a quarter-inch thick and as long as his hand. It was one of hundreds of similar levers arranged in rows in a four-foot- square section of the wall. They were the levers that controlled the fire-fighting fog apparatus in the corridors and compartments of the ship. This one turned on the fog just outside the control-room door.