Islands of Space by Jr. John W. Campbell (ebook reader for comics .TXT) 📕

that the current kept on flowing. They even managed to get six hundred amperes through a piece of lead wire no bigger than a pencil lead.

"I don't know why they didn't go on from there, but they didn't. Possibly it was because they didn't have the insulation necessary to keep down the corona effect; in a high-density current, the electrons tend to push each other sideways out of the wire.

"At any rate, I tried it, using lux metal as an insulator around the wire."

"Hold it!" Fuller interrupted. "What, may I ask, is lux metal?"

"That was Wade's idea," Arcot grinned. "You remember those two substances we found in the Nigran ships during the war?"

"Sure," said Fuller. "One was transparent and the other was a perfect reflector. You said they were made of light—photons so greatly condensed that they were held together by their gravitational fields."

"Right. We called them light-metal. But Wade said that was too confusing. With a specific gravity of 103.5, light-metal was certainly not a light metal! So Wade coined a couple of words. Lux is the Latin for light, so he named the transparent one lux and the reflecting one relux."

"It sounds peculiar," Fuller observed, "but so does every coined word when you first hear it. Go on with your story."

Arcot relit his pipe and went on. "I put a current of ten thousand amps through a little piece of lead wire, and that gave me a current density of 1010 amps per square inch.

"Then I started jacking up the voltage, and modified the thing with a double-polarity field somewhat similar to the molecular motion field except that it works on a sub-nucleonic level. As a result, about half of the lead fed into the chamber became contraterrene lead! The atoms just turned themselves inside out, so to speak, giving us an atom with positrons circling a negatively charged nucleus. It even gave the neutrons a reverse spin, converting them into anti-neutrons.

"Result: total annihilation of matter! When the contraterrene lead atoms met the terrene lead atoms, mutual annihilation resulted, giving us pure energy.

"Some of this power can be bled off to power the mechanism itself; the rest is useful energy. We've got all the power we need—power, literally by the ton."

Fuller said nothing; he just looked dazed. He was well beginning to believe that these three men could do the impossible and do it to order.

"The second thing," Arcot continued, "was, as I said, a way to store the energy so that it could be released as rapidly or as slowly as we needed it.

"That was Morey's baby. He figured it would be possible to use the space-strain apparatus to store energy. It's an old method; induction coils, condensers, and even gravity itself are storing energy by straining space. But with Morey's apparatus we could store a lot more.

"A torus-shaped induction coil encloses all its magnetic field within it; the torus, or 'doughnut' coil, has a perfectly enclosed magnetic field. We built an enclosed coil, using Morey's principle, and expected to store a few watts of power in it to see how long we could hold it.

"Unfortunately, we made the mistake of connecting it to the city power lines, and it cost us a hundred and fifty dollars at a quarter of a cent per kilowatt hour. We blew fuses all over the place. After that, we used the relux plate generator.

"At any rate, the gadget can store power and plenty of it, and it can put it out the same way."

Arcot knocked the ashes out of his pipe and smiled at Fuller. "Those are the essentials of what we have to offer. We give you the job of figuring out the stresses and strains involved. We want a ship with a cruising radius of a thousand million light years."

"Yes, sir! Right away, sir! Do you want a gross or only a dozen?" Fuller asked sarcastically. "You sure believe in big orders! And whence cometh the cold cash for this lovely dream of yours?"

"That," said Morey darkly, "is where the trouble comes in. We have to convince Dad. As President of Transcontinental Airways, he's my boss, but the trouble is, he's also my father. When he hears that I want to go gallivanting off all over the Universe with you guys, he is very likely to turn thumbs down on the whole deal. Besides, Arcot's dad has a lot of influence around here, too, and I have a healthy hunch he won't like the idea, either."

"I rather fear he won't," agreed Arcot gloomily.

A silence hung over the room that felt almost as heavy as the pall of pipe smoke the air conditioners were trying frantically to disperse.

The elder Mr. Morey had full control of their finances. A ship that would cost easily hundreds of millions of dollars was well beyond anything the four men could get by themselves. Their inventions were the property of Transcontinental, but even if they had not been, not one of the four men would think of selling them to another company.

Finally, Wade said: "I think we'll stand a much better chance if we show them a big, spectacular exhibition; something really impressive. We'll point out all the advantages and uses of the apparatus. Then we'll show them complete plans for the ship. They might consent."

"They might," replied Morey smiling. "It's worth a try, anyway. And let's get out of the city to do it. We can go up to my place in Vermont. We can use the lab up there for all we need. We've got everything worked out, so there's no need to stay here.

"Besides, I've got a lake up there in which we can indulge in a little atavism to the fish stage of evolution."

"Good enough," Arcot agreed, grinning broadly. "And we'll need that lake, too. Here in the city it's only eighty-five because the aircars are soaking up heat for their molecular drive, but out in the country it'll be in the nineties."

"To the mountains, then! Let's pack up!"

II

The many books and papers they had collected were hastily put into the briefcases, and the four men took the elevator to the landing area on the roof.

"We'll take my car," Morey said. "The rest of you can just leave yours here. They'll be safe for a few days."

They all piled in as Morey slid into the driver's seat and turned on the power.

They rose slowly, looking below them at the traffic of the great city. New York had long since abandoned her rivers as trade routes; they had been covered solidly by steel decks which were used as public landing fields and ground car routes. Around them loomed titanic structures of glistening colored tile. The sunlight reflected brilliantly from them, and the contrasting colors of the buildings seemed to blend together into a great, multicolored painting.

The darting planes, the traffic of commerce down between the great buildings, and the pleasure cars above, combined to give a series of changing, darting shadows that wove a flickering pattern over the city. The long lines of ships coming in from Chicago, London, Buenos Aires and San Francisco, and the constant flow from across the Pole—from Russia, India, and China, were like mighty black serpents that wound their way into the city.

Morey cut into a Northbound traffic level, moved into the high-speed lane, and eased in on the accelerator. He held to the traffic pattern for two hundred and fifty miles, until he was well past Boston, then he turned at the first break and fired the ship toward their goal in Vermont.

Less than forty-five minutes since they had left New York, Morey was dropping the car toward the little mountain lake that offered them a place for seclusion. Gently, he let the ship glide smoothly into the shed where the first molecular motion ship had been built. Arcot jumped out, saying:

"We're here—unload and get going. I think a swim and some sleep is in order before we start work on this ship. We can begin tomorrow." He looked approvingly at the clear blue water of the little lake.

Wade climbed out and pushed Arcot to one side. "All right, out of the way, then, little one, and let a man get going." He headed for the house with the briefcases.

Arcot was six feet two and weighed close to two hundred, but Wade was another two inches taller and weighed a good fifty pounds more. His arms and chest were built on the same general plan as those of a gorilla. He had good reason to call Arcot little.

Morey, though still taller, was not as heavily formed, and weighed only a few pounds more than Arcot, while Fuller was a bit smaller than Arcot.

Due to several factors, the size of the average human being had been steadily increasing for several centuries. Only Wade would have been considered a "big" man by the average person, for the average man was over six feet tall.

They relaxed most of the afternoon, swimming and indulging in a few wrestling matches. At wrestling, Wade consistently proved himself not only built like a gorilla but muscled like one; but Arcot proved that skill was not without merit several times, for he had found that if he could make the match last more than two minutes, Wade's huge muscles would find an insufficient oxygen supply and tire quickly.

That evening, after dinner, Morey engaged Wade in a fierce battle of chess, with Fuller as an interested spectator. Arcot, too, was watching, but he was saying nothing.

After several minutes of uneventful play, Morey stopped suddenly and glared at the board. "Now why'd I make that move? I intended to move my queen over there to check your king on the red diagonal."

"Yeah," replied Wade gloomily, "that's what I wanted you to do. I had a sure checkmate in three moves."

Arcot smiled quietly.

They continued play for several moves, then it was Wade who remarked that something seemed to be influencing his play.

"I had intended to trade queens. I'm glad I didn't, though; I think this leaves me in a better position."

"It sure does," agreed Morey. "I was due to clean up on the queen trade. You surprised me, too; you usually go in for trades. I'm afraid my position is hopeless now."

It was. In the next ten moves, Wade spotted the weak points in every attack Morey made; the attack crumbled disastrously and white was forced to resign, his king in a hopeless position.

Wade rubbed his chin. "You know, Morey, I seemed to know exactly why you made every move, and I saw every possibility involved."

"Yeah—so I noticed," said Morey with a grin.

"Come on, Morey, let's try a game," said Fuller, sliding into the chair Wade had vacated.

Although ordinarily equally matched with Fuller, Morey again went down to disastrous defeat in an amazingly short time. It almost seemed as if Fuller could anticipate every move.

"Brother, am I off form today," he said, rising from the table. "Come on, Arcot—let's see you try Wade."

Arcot sat down, and although he had never played chess as extensively as the others, he proceeded to clean Wade out lock, stock, and barrel.

"Now what's come over you?" asked Morey in astonishment as he saw a very complicated formation working out, a formation he knew was far better than Arcot's usual game. He had just worked it out and felt very proud of it.

Arcot looked at him and smiled. "That's the answer, Morey!"

Morey blinked. "What—what's the answer to what?"

"Yes—I meant it—don't be so surprised—you've seen it done before. I have—no, not under him, but a more experienced teacher. I figured it would come in handy in our explorations."

Morey's face grew more and more astonished as Arcot's strange monologue continued.

Finally, Arcot turned to Wade, who was looking at him and Morey in wide-eyed wonder. And this time, it was Wade who began talking in a monologue.

"You did?" he said in a surprised voice. "When?" There was a long pause, during which Arcot stared at Wade with such intensity that Fuller began to understand what was happening.

"Well," said Wade, "if you've learned the trick so thoroughly, try it out. Let's see you project your thoughts! Go ahead!"

Fuller, now understanding fully what was going on, burst out laughing. "He has been projecting his thoughts! He hasn't said a word to you!" Then he looked at Arcot. "As a matter of fact, you've said so little that I don't know how you pulled this telepathic stunt—though I'm quite convinced that you did."

"I spent three months on Venus a while back," said Arcot, "studying with one of their foremost telepathists. Actually, most of that time was spent on theory; learning how to do it isn't a difficult proposition. It just takes practice.

"The whole secret is that everyone has the power; it's a very ancient power in the human brain, and most of the lower animals possess it to a greater degree than do humans. When Man developed language, it gave his