Perry Rhodan - Atlan In Danger Part 7

"Not one word!" Cardif confirmed. "They must have determined by tracking that the fleet of robotships was no longer at the front. But what does that mean, Springer? And why did Arkon demand that the Mounders stop flying security for Archetz? There's some purpose behind it, but what?" He drummed his fingers on the screen. The movement was all that revealed his extreme exasperation. His face remained composed.

Neither c.o.kaze nor his two eldest sons disturbed Cardif, who was deep in thought. Finally the Terran said: I suggest that the c.o.kaz 2 still remain on Archetz but I would like the planetary stations to keep a special watch on the area surrounding the Rusuma System from now on. I know that something dangerous is in the making... but what?"

From two localities far removed from one another the flight of the Druuf scoutship was observed: from the Drusus and from Arkon 3!

The newly developed special tracking device stayed dead on the track of the ship from the other universe. Its linear hyper-propulsion developed emissions like an endlessly long string, by which the course of the s.p.a.cecraft could he followed. The Indian, Rabintorge, whose ingenuity had been responsible for its speedy completion, had once contended that the linear hyper-propulsion would press one of the four constants out of its natural bedding in the time-s.p.a.ce structure and thus trigger off the tracking effect.

This contention was never seriously contradicted. It remained to be seen whether it stood the test of later examinations. The basic requirement was fulfilled, however, namely the availability of an apparatus which enabled them to discover the Druufs when exceeding the speed of light.

Atlan relied on the tiny hyper-transmitter which Tako Kakuta had un.o.btrusively dropped on entering the airlock of the Druuf ship. Every five minutes it beamed an impulse that was picked up by the antennas of the robot computer on Arkon and immediately evaluated by the positronicon. An enormous celestial chart with a light beam thin as a hair drawing nearer to the Rusuma System every five minutes indicated to the Arkonide the unbelievable speed with which the Druuf ship was racing through the universe, accelerating from second to second at that, although the ship had far exceeded the speed of light already.

Rhodan and Atlan were wishing the best for this Druuf ship, aware as they were of all that depended on this reconnaissance flight.

Tako Kakuta, the teleporter, and Dr. Brigonne, the astronaut, wished the same. They were both a.s.signed as astronauts to the s.p.a.cecraft of these monsters. Their task was twofold: to allow the ship to arrive over the planet of Archetz and to remove themselves immediately if the crew should suddenly turn hostile towards them. The latter was Kakuta's job and the small j.a.panese with the childlike face was very exacting about his duty. He did not budge from Dr. Brigonne's side.

Brigonne, on the other hand, had long since stopped worrying whether the Druufs might become a menace. He was in his element and for the first time experiencing a flight faster than speol which produced a transition shock that could be measured but was not felt bodily. Only he did not understand why the Druufs were flying so slowly through hypers.p.a.ce. For thanks to Ellert's information he knew that with linear hyper-propulsion they could reach light-speeds of astronomical proportions.

Once humans were in possession of linear hyperpropulsion there would be no more boundaries to flight into the far reaches of s.p.a.ce and bodily stress would be relegated to history just like those primitive rockets in the museum used by Perry Rhodan and Bell on their first flight to the moon that provoked joking admiration. Or so, at least, Terran scientists thought.

Cheating your way into hypers.p.a.ce in this fashion, without losing sight of the target star, had to seem unreal to any human on his first flight with linear hyper-propulsion. But the experience of seeing the target star coursing toward one and already heading for the next, compelled the belief in faster-than-light flight.

Brigonne was not able to interpret what they were doing. The Druuf s.p.a.ceships, constructions of a different universe, were totally incomprehensible in their technical design. It remained a puzzle to him whether they were cartographically recording the entire route.

Kakuta and Brigonne had quickly become accustomed to the fact that they were twice as fast in their movements as the monsters, who were at a disadvantage in relation to all creatures in this universe because they were bound to their own Druuf time.

The two Terranians communicated over helmet radio. They had not yet thought about whether they were in breathable atmosphere. At that moment the eight Druufs in the ship Central were having some problem. They were grouped around a strange apparatus, flailing their arms wildly. The two pilots were the only ones to remain in their seats but they continually turned their round heads to the side and seemed to be very tense.

"Brigonne, do you know what's going on?" Kakuta asked the astronaut, moving even closer to him so he could teleport himself and the doctor out into s.p.a.ce at the first sign of trouble.

"No idea." Brigonne's voice sounded hoa.r.s.e but Tako Kakuta knew that it was not fear that caused this change. It might be the uncertainty of neither knowing nor understanding anything.

On impulse the teleporter switched on the special Druuf transmitter installed in his s.p.a.cesuit which enabled him to communicate with the monsters. At the same moment he had a Druuf standing before him and over the loudspeaker he heard his words: "Switch off!"

Tako Kakuta did not wait for him to repeat the demand but he stopped to think about it. There was only one explanation for the fact that the Druuf had immediately noticed his switching on the device: they were tracking!

And he thought he knew what they were seeking: the tiny hyper-transmitter in the airlock!

He quickly turned to inform Brigonne but first he turned on the scrambler. Gradually he began to believe in the vast capabilities of these intelligent beings and that they knew exactly what was said between him and Brigonne.

The astronaut quickly recognized the incomprehensible gibberish coming over his helmet microphone and found the appropriate counter-scrambler on the third try.

Brigonne just listened to the beginning. "Kakuta, what can we do to prevent their finding the directional transmitter? We must keep Atlan informed. The boss explicitly repeated that to me!"

Kakuta's childlike face looked at him guilelessly through the faceplate of his helmet. "Would you like to tell me how they are going to find that tiny transmitter in a few seconds, Doctor?"

"Well, what are the Druufs up to now?" Brigonne made no bones about the fact that he was feeling very uneasy.

Three Druufs stalked out of the Central on their clumsy columnar legs but they did not leave empty-handed. All three were carrying heavy apparatuses and it was obvious that they were using them to track a transmitted "Brigonne, how much flight time left?"

"That's asking more than I know because I don't know how high they're going to accelerate."

"But no longer than three hours?" Kakuta hastily asked.

"At our present acceleration, no. By then they would already be on the return flight. I hope we two will be with them," the astronaut pessimistically added.

"Then you distract their attention for 10 seconds. They mustn't notice that I've left Com Central. Can you manage that?"

"What are you up to, Kakuta?"

"Can you manage it, Doctor?" Kakuta's eyes were suddenly flashing.

"Naturally. When I cough you..." This was followed by hefty nodding.

The teleporter saw no other alternative. He had to avert the danger by staking everything on one card. But first Dr. Brigonne had to act swiftly and surely to divert the attention of the suspicious Druufs.

During this period the thread of light on the celestial chart in the dome of the positronic computer continued to move a little bit every five minutes. Atlan, the sole observer-Atlan, fated to remain unaging for 10,000 years, his life full of inconceivably rich experiences-was staring with eyes torn wide open at this gleaming emission line that visibly grew every five minutes.

Converted into astronomical terms it signified that the acceleration of the Druuf scoutship was continuing. Atlan did not sense, however, that in those very minutes the Druuf ship was racing towards disaster.

Dr. Brigonne had to divert the attention of five Druufs. Two of them were seated in the c.u.mbersome pilot seats, the other three were standing in front of some machine, constantly turning around to look at the Terranians.

Tako Kakuta felt the time running out. His opportunity of intervening to change the course of events was limited. The moment had to arrive soon! Why was Dr. Brigonne doing nothing? Why was he just standing around, not moving? Kakuta was very agitated but he mustered the reserves to control himself.

Finally Brigonne went over to the group of three Druufs. He approached them from the side. They seemed to be paying no attention to him-or were they observing him with their eyes on the temples of their bullet heads?

Brigonne switched on the communications device. "Druuf, I must call your attention to an important fact. Here..."

He simply went over to a star map hanging on the wall and pointed at a certain spot. "Here, right by this star cl.u.s.ter, there is... Druufs! It is important! Are you listening?"

And Kakuta heard Dr. Brigonne cough. The signal!

He hyjumped and rematerialised in the airlock containing the hyper-transmitter. When he came out of rematerialisation he was holding a beamer in each hand. His hands were steady as he welded shut the inner bulkhead with thermorays.

The two double welding seams he drew were so exact that they would be the delight of any autogenous welder. From bottom to top and from top to bottom again. He quietly counted to himself in the process: 5... 6... 7... 8!"

At 8 he was finished. He wheeled around. He still had two seconds left. The two thermo-beamers hissed into action and he drew a double seam across one third of the line represented by the seam of the sliding outer airlock door.

The metal, molten centimetres deep, slowly hardened as Tako Kakuta, protected by a softly humming transformer, reappeared in Com Central.

Dr. Brigonne was still standing in front of the star map, attempting to convince the Druufs of the danger presented by a super strong rotating magnetic field lying exactly in the ship's course.

"Then don't listen..." the teleporter heard him say over helmet radio after Brigonne knew that the mutant had returned. "Then don't..." and he wordlessly walked away, switching off the communications device.

"Another 10 minutes," Perry Rhodan said in a whisper to Bell, without moving his eyes from the special tracking device, "then they will be over Archetz. I wish those 10 minutes were already over!"

He, too, had no idea of what was transpiring within the Druuf scoutship. The monsters had thrown Dr. Brigonne and Tako Kakuta in irons; they had also said why they took that action, abandoning their callous silence the moment they ascertained that airlock 3 had been mysteriously blocked from both sides.

"Only you could have deposited the transmitter there! Why?"

Tako Kakuta replied ice-coldly: "Which transmitter? Show it to us!" Anyone can make a.s.sertions!"

The 3-meters-tall Commander remained silent but the two Druufs a.s.signed to guarding the Terranians with their unfamiliar but menacing weapons said plenty.

Brigonne and Tako Kakuta ceased protesting. They were apparently resigned to their fate. And the Druuf ship continued to streak towards the Springer planet Archetz!

The alien ship had long since disappeared mysteriously from the Rusuma System and the check stations installed on the 16 other planets had withdrawn the alert as Patriarch c.o.kaze and Thomas Cardif were still staring at each other mutely.

c.o.kaze finally broke the silence. He slowly stood up, p.r.o.nouncing Thomas Cardif's name like a curse as he said: "Suddenly you believe everything! Even the ridiculous threats by that ridiculous Admiral!"

Cardif demonstrated the courage of his convictions as he answered: "That Admiral is not so ridiculous, c.o.kaze. He is one of the old Arkonides."

"Are you trying to tell me that he is over 10,000 years old, Cardif?"

Cardif refused to discuss this, waving it aside. I have discovered something, Patriarch."

c.o.kaze listened intently, unable to read Cardif's face. "What, Cardif?"

"Revolutions can only be carried out successfully with the power of the state, not against it!"

c.o.kaze stared at the young man as if he were seeing a ghost. He was not willing to accept what he had just heard. Fear and anger were awakened in him. They, the Galactic Traders, had staked everything. The Aras, the Ekhonides and the other great nations had joined their plan and now this young upstart Terran, who had been the true driving force behind the revolutionary movement, claimed: revolutions can only be successful allied with the power of the state, not against it!" "Cardif, is this what your ridiculous Admiral accomplished with his call? Do I remember correctly having heard from your mouth about all the miraculous things one learned at the Solar s.p.a.ce Academy? What is left of all that now? The remnants of a Terran, inwardly trembling with fear."

"Oh, yes... Solar s.p.a.ce Academy!" Cardif smiled wanly while calmly regarding the furious Patriarch. "That's where I acquired my present ability to realize that we have lost. Yes, we have lost! Right now Rhodan and Atlan are playing their main trump card! Springer, do you still refuse to realize what the appearance of that Druuf ship signifies? Have you forgotten Atlan's threat to withdraw his robot fleet from the front? Have you forgotten why the Mounders are no longer flying around Archetz and what they reported? Don't you want to remember what I demanded and said after the talk with the Mounder, Onkto? I demanded that the planetary check stations be instructed to observe the universe very sharply and I commented that there were some dangerous developments somewhere, asking myself as well as you: but what are they?"

"And what would you now like to know, you super smart Terran?" c.o.kaze scoffed at him but the sarcasm did not sound genuine.

"Nothing. But I am afraid of something. I am afraid that Atlan has opened a hole in the front to give maybe 10 or 20,000 Druuf ships the opportunity to fly through... to star cl.u.s.ter M-13 and ravage us like vandals."

"And we all fell for a fool like you, a poor imitation of Perry Rhodan? At least Perry Rhodan has cla.s.s. But you...?"

This did not affect Thomas Cardif, who coldly replied: I know when I have lost the match and I have the courage to see the consequences. c.o.kaze, if you want to survive I can give you one piece of advice: leave Archetz at once with the c.o.kaz 2. Report your arrival on Aralon. That'll make a good impression. Wait there for the next few days. I don't have any more to tell you."

"And what are you intending to do, Terran? Do you want to leave for Earth?"

Almost simultaneously he countered: I will cruise around on one of the cylindrical ships you will leave here on t.i.ton. Otherwise your departure for Aralon might look like an escape. You will have to expose 4 or 5 of your ships to the danger of destruction."

"Do you realize that your skill at drawing a beamer with lightning speed will not help you one iota right now? One move and I will shoot you with my impulse beamer!"

"c.o.kaze, you should really take a course at the Solar s.p.a.ce Academy. Pity that you are too old for that! And too dumb!"

One hour later c.o.kaze took off for Aralon in the c.o.kaz 2, first taking leave of Thomas Cardif. "You are a weird partner!" were his last words. He left a thoughtful Terran behind.

Cardif boarded the c.o.kaz 214, which along with three other ships belonging to the mighty Springer clan was docked at the northern edge of the s.p.a.ceport of t.i.ton.

He sensed that he was about to lose the match against Perry Rhodan. He had already accepted the defeat but his hatred towards his father burned with unchanging intensity in his heart.

He was sitting in his cabin on the c.o.kaz 214, his head supported by his hands, thinking: it is worth dying in order to destroy you!

7/ HISTORIC ANNOUNCEMENT FROM ARKON.

For one second Perry Rhodan thought he was gazing into an abyss.

Harno was floating near him, his tele-vision enabling Rhodan to see into the command room of the Druuf scoutship, which had just returned from hypers.p.a.ce and with incredible delay was homing in on the flagship of its fleet.

The flight to Archetz, had taken the scoutship several hours, while the entire return flight after curving around the Springer planet had only been a matter of seconds. Bell, at the special tracking device, had hardly found the time to report its arrival as Harno produced a picture of the Druuf Com Central, showing Rhodan that Brigonne and Kakuta were being guarded by two armed monsters. At the same time the spherical creature informed Rhodan of the thoughts troubling the astronaut and the teleporter.

The tiny hyper-transmitter planted by Kakuta in the airlock of the Druuf scoutship was threatening to transform the entire tactical manoeuvre into a catastrophe for the Drusus.

Deep in his mind he could hear Harno saying: "The commander of the scoutship is just reporting to the Chief of Fleet. He is almost only talking about the station they tracked to airlock 3, which they could not get open."

An idea flashed through Rhodan's head. Pucky was needed! He called for Pucky over intercom: "Don't lose a second, Pucky!"

Rhodan was stared at from all sides. No one could remember ever having seen the boss this excited.

Pucky was standing in front of the boss. The mousebeaver broke a taboo, employing his telepathy to read Rhodan's thoughts.

"Sure, Perry! But in which depot do I find this rhythmal5?"

With one flick Rhodan opened intercom channels to all rooms of the Drusus. "Rhodan here! Calling all depots! Immediate report! Which depot contains rhythmal5? Top urgency!"

Rhythmal5 was a crystal complex which had been developed by the Arkonides and which, once loaded, emitted a weak impulse in a 5-minute rhythm for years at a time. They did not fully understand how it worked. At first glance it could be taken for a hypertransmission tracking tone.

"Sir," a depot supervisor reported, "rhythmal5 is stored in depot 123."

Pucky had already teleported out of Com Central and was standing in depot 123. They were still searching for it with the aid of a small positronicon.

"Let's have that stuff!" the mousebeaver squeaked. "Don't forget to load it... and do you have any adhesive substance that can't be destroyed by s.p.a.ce chill? Let's have it, too... p.r.o.nto! It's do or die!"

The small computer located the rhythmal5. The directional finder homed in on it.

"That little crystal over there!" Pucky commanded. The intercom loudspeaker was blaring as the mousebeaver issued instructions on loading the crystal.

"Where's that adhesive?" Pucky attempted to shout but his squeaky voice did not make it. Something resembling putty was pressed into his paw.

"Ready, lieutenant!" someone called.

The lieutenant was Pucky and he was flattered to be addressed with his officer's rank by men he did not know.