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

years, but five days, from our planet."

When the conference was ended, Arcot and his friends returned to their ship. 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 our language?"

Torlos reverted to telepathy. "Yes, but that is not what I came to talk to you about. Arcot—can a man of Nansal visit Earth?" Anxiously, hopefully, and hesitatingly, he asked. "I could come back on one of your commercial vessels, or come back when you return. And—and I'm sure I could earn my living on your world! I'm not hard to feed, you know!" He half 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 much like to see fulfilled. The idea of metal-boned men with tremendous strength and strange molecular-motion muscles would inspire no friendship, no feeling of kinship, in the people of Earth. But the man himself—a pleasant, kindly, sincere, intelligent giant—would be a far greater argument for the world of Nansal that the most vivid orator would 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 ships came from the factories. When the celebration was over, the four Earthmen and the giant Torlos entered the Ancient Mariner.

"Ready to go, Torlos?" Arcot grinned.

"Pearfactly, Ahcut. Tse soonah tse bettah!" he said in his oddly accented English.

Five hours saw them out of the galaxy. Twelve hours more, and they were heading for home at full speed, well out in space.

The Home Galaxy was looming large when they next stopped for observation. Old Tharlano had guided them correctly!

They were going home!

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ISLANDS
OF
SPACE

"John Campbell's book was written as a sequel to The Black Star Passes ... and believe me, it was a world-beater in those days.

"Arcot, Wade, Morey, and their computer, Fuller, put together a ship which will travel faster than light ... they give us what may have been the first space-warp drive. The concept was simple; to make it plausible wasn't—unless you were John Campbell.

"With this out-of-space drive they hightail it among the stars. They locate the fugitive planets of the Black Star ... find a frozen cemetery-world of a lost race ... then head out for another galaxy ... and wind up in a knock-down-drag-out interplanetary war in the other galaxy."

—P. Schuyler Miller, Astounding Science Fiction

Transcriber notes:

page 006 - Corrected spelling of millenia to millennia
page 007 - Corrected intergraph to integraph to be consistent w/ other instance - 1st paragraph (Google shows intergraph to be a company and integraph to be a calculator)
page 009 - Added a single ' that was dropped in the 3rd paragragh before ... brilliant mathematical assistant
page 013 - Corrected spelling of whench to whence
page 027 - Corrected spelling of withing to within, 6th paragraph
page 028 - Missing word - replaced "energy the strain" with "energy in the strain" - 6th paragraph
page 029 - Corrected spelling of Flourine to Fluorine
page 030 - Italicized "Ancient Mariner" on the first line of Ch. IV to be consistent with the dozens of other instances
page 032 - Corrected spelling of flourine to fluorine - 2nd paragraph
page 032 - Corrected spelling of flurocarbon to fluorocarbon - 2nd paragraph
page 037 - Corrected typo of 'that that' to 'than that' - 6th paragraph
page 052 - Corrected spelling of paralax to parallax - 5nd paragraph
page 059 - Corrected spelling of millenia to millennia - 3rd paragraph
page 074 - Corrected typo of 'ro' to 'to' in 1st line of 8th paragraph
page 085 - Corrected spelling of airly to airily
page 098 - Corrected typo of 'as' to 'was' - 1st line of the 7 paragraph
page 116 - Corrected typo of turned to turn - paragraph 10
page 117 - Corrected typo of builder to boulder - paragraph 6
page 118 - Corrected typo of seen to seem - paragraph 7
page 119 - Corrected typo of 'a known' to 'an unknown' - last paragraph
page 126 - Corrected typo of Earthmen to Earthman - paragraph 3
page 142 - Corrected typo of might to mighty - paragraph 7
page 143 - Corrected typo of opporutnity to opportunity - paragraph 6
page 145 - Corrected typo of mightest to mightiest - first paragraph
page 152 - Corrected typo of parelying to parleying - last paragraph
page 155 - Corrected typo of eloguently to eloquently - 3rd paragraph
page 161 - Corrected typo of could to would - 7th paragraph
page 164 - Corrected typo of communicaton to communication - paragraph 6
page 173 - Corrected typo of Astonomer to Astronomer - paragraph 7
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End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Islands of Space, by John W Campbell