Part 11

Thompson grinned. "You won't. You never will. No Terran ever will. We'll all go on just the same as we were, apparently. It is a Terran characteristic that a personal change always seems to be an opposite change in the rest. We'll all go on as we are and the rest of the Galaxy will appear to get stupider. The change is and has been--and will continue--to be gradual enough so that you will believe that you've always been possessed of a near-perfect memory. But play chess with your pals, and you find that you are still even because the other guy can lay just as complicated traps as you can with your increased ability to reason. But you see, it is like that old analogy. If the entire Galaxy and everything in it were increased by one hundred times, you would not be able to detect the change. That's because your yardstick changes, too."

"Relativity, speaking," grinned Lane.

"Classification: Pune. Definition: Pun that needs an oxygen tent. Or better, the perpetrator a half-hour immersion in liquid helium." He looked around and saw Stellor Downing, leaning against the door with a half-amused expression on his face. "Hello, Stellor."

"Howdedo. A nice job of selling you did on Vorgan."

"Yeah, and a nice pinch he put me in."

"Maybe you shouldn't have niggled him so far."

"I was a little rough on him," agreed Billy. "But I pushed him right to the limit of my safety. I applied all the traffic will bear. I had to, to show my boldness and to intrigue his fancy, since I knew that in all their victorious twenty thousand years of conquest they had never hit a race that stood up and told him off, face to face."

"You knew what you were doing, as usual," admitted Downing. "But I came to tell you that Hendricks has the tripod beam and the associated junk is set up and ready for the job of jerking the guts out of VanMaanen's Star."

* * * * *

It was not too impressive on the surface. Brimstone was cold and forbidding and airless, the only planet to the runaway star known as VanMaanen's Star. A useless system save for experiments of this nature, but excellently adapted for such.

The solar intake beams were operating efficiently. The torrents of power they would drag out of the star and use to develop the unthinkable pressures necessary to move the core of the star would come into the acceptor tubes. Foot-thick superconductors connected the intake beams to those to be used for the tearing process. And these superconductors were maintained at the temperature of liquid helium by a liquid-cooling system. Liquid helium needed no circulation, since its heat-conducting properties were such that no local heating in a bath of liquid helium is possible. Normal evaporation from the open bath at one side kept the system cold, all the way through to the superconductors.

"Good thing they don't have to use switches or breakers, otherwise I don't know how they'd handle the energy," said Lane. "A sort of grid-controlled intake--swell stuff. Well, fellers, let's get in the control room and see what gives."

Hendricks handed Billy a small chromium-plated case the size of a cigarette pack.

"We're putting personnel snatchers on all of us. If this blows--in fact if the whole planet blows, we all end up a couple of thousand miles in space, all canned up in incompressible spheres. Safety first, I say."

"That's how you saved the gang in the earthquake experiment, isn't it?"

"Uh-huh," admitted Hendricks.

"Well, let's take off. We've got everything nailed down tight."

Hendricks advanced the power. The meters read up, and the anchoring tractors moved slightly in their gimbals and became immobile. The projectors forming the tripod of inflexible beams took up all the remaining slack in the beam system. Not one piece of unprotected matter was left to form a weak link. Beams of sheer energy, efficient to within a fraction of a percent of the ideal one hundred percent, linked the beams invisibly. A system of inflexible energy, driven and maintained by the energy output of a star--driven to rip the core out of the star itself.

The beams thickened as the automatic control advanced in timed steps. Evaporation from the lake of liquid helium increased as the superconductors warmed slightly from the terrible load.

A wrenching--_feeling_--came to them.

A meter indicated that one of the beams--the sphere beam clutching a five thousand mile sphere of stellar center--indicated a movement of point one seven four inches.

* * * * *

The automatic controller went up another stepless interval, and the wrenched--_feeling_--increased.

Through the viewport, the small flaming disk of VanMaanen's Star blazed at them. It looked as though it were quite ignorant of the cosmic forces that were tearing at its vitals. There was an air of saucy disregard in its placid, immobile brightness.

The pressure increased.

"At this point we jerked up a slab of Brimstone's hard crust," remarked Hendricks.

But Brimstone was not in the link. Brimstone was not even present. The inflexible tripod of energy would scorn to move with the planet. The control room and the main development housing connected to the high base of the projector network were depending upon the invisible tripod of energy, deep in space. Brimstone was a large moon, a gibbous last quarter, out through one side window.

The automatic control went higher. And as the pressure increased between the limbs of the tripod, even so increased the power intake from the star itself.

Did a star have within it enough energy to cause its own destruction?

They did not find out.

The _feeling_ of a wrenching increased, and then leaped into full being. Nausea, sheer instantaneous torture, a pulsed wave of pain, a shattering sensation of intolerable noise, a blinding light that came though the eyes were closed.

But these things were merely the physical and mental effects caused by--

By what?

There had been no grinding crash. There had been no failure of the beams.

Yet the meters read zero. Both intake and output. Test power and operation perfect registered on the string of indicators.

Nothing wrong--

--but the flaming disk of VanMaanen's Star was gone.

Something had failed, but it hadn't been the equipment.

Something had failed, but it hadn't been the star.

And the station and the control room was drifting aimlessly in space. Inspection showed that no star was close enough to be VanMaanen's Star. There were no stars within a couple of light-years from them. Above their heads, the projectors were idling in their slack gimbals, the tie-beams were off. The solar intake beams were taking in no power. The lake of helium, a twenty-foot open bath on the roof of the housing, was lying quiescent.

The entire assembly and assemblage was as it had been before the initial surge of power, excepting that Brimstone and his bright primary were nowhere to be seen.

XIX.

"Well, what happened?" asked Lane.

"You tell me," Downing said.

"Obviously something gave--but quick," remarked Billy. "The question is: What could give?"

"The star didn't. We weren't on the planet. Whatever gave--we are a long way from where we started, at any rate." Hendricks scratched his head in puzzlement. "You don't suppose we have gone and warped ourselves right out of space, do you?"

"That sounds like a comic book plot. I'm not taking any odds-on bets, though. Have you got an air condenser and a resistance-capacity bridge? Not the kind that compares a standard condenser against the unknown in terms of the resistance ratio arms, but one of the cheap varieties that merely compares the resistance ratio arms against the ratio of resistance versus capacitive reactance."

"Uh-huh."

"Is it calibrated to within an inch of its eyebrows?"

"Yup."

"Well, the dielectric constant of space is calculable. Measure up your air condenser and see if it comes out even. Get the boys to measure the radiation resistance of this space. It should be three hundred and seventy-seven ohms. That is--if we are still in our original space. Also you might get the standing wave ratio on some of the microwave transmission lines. They depend upon the characteristic impedances of space, the permeability and dielectric constant."

"O.K.," smiled Hendricks.

"Why the smile, Jim?"

"I was merely recalling a story like this. The hero proved it by determining that Planck's Constant was not the same as back at home. I was wondering how we'd measure it."

"How did they do it?"

"They didn't say."

"Good thing. Well, I like my method better. By measuring the capacity of an air dielectric condenser, the dielectric constant of space will be evident--but only if it is measured on the resistance type of bridge. Comparing it to a standard condenser would result in both of them shifting at the same time. Whereas the resistance of a metal wouldn't change. That does not depend upon the vector analysis factors of space, whereas capacitive reactance does."

"We might measure the speed of light, too."

"Not until we get this barge to a planet so we can get a decent base line."

"We're not ill-equipped as all that," objected Hendricks. "This barge, as you call it, is fully equipped with drivers."

"Why didn't the snatchers work when we took out after the devil?" asked Lane.

"Nothing blew, in the first place," said Thompson. "And in the second place, if we've warped ourselves out of our original space, the snatchers might have had a tough time focusing on something heading out of space through a warp in the continuum."

"Spectral lines do not mean anything in particular," said Downing, who had been peering through a solar spectrometer at some of the nearer stars. "More proof."

* * * * *

"Well, sure. Among items like having a different set of elements and physical laws, the impedance of space is all tied up in the speed of light, wave length, is a function of that, and so forth. Show me one item lying in the field pertaining to the angular vector-pattern of this space that agrees with that back home and the rest will probably match too, and we'll be back home but displaced by God-knows-what."

"Ralph Welles claims that the radiation resistance of space is about two hundred and seventeen ohms," reported Hendricks. "And Al Forbes reports that the dielectric constant of space here is about twenty micromicrofarads per meter less than back home. And the boys in the microwave group claim that the quarterwave stubs in their pet transmission line demand a new fundamental frequency of operation. O.K., fellows. We started to bust up a sun and busted ourselves right out of space and into another. Well, let's find a nice solid planet somewhere and get there so we have solar power. Then we can start thinking of ways to get back."

"So we couldn't pull the insides out of a sun, even using the sun's own stellar atom factory for power," smiled Thompson, "but we did manage to pull ourselves right out of space. Sort of a case of the sun pulling first, I guess."

"Yeah," agreed Lane plaintively. "But how many different spaces are there in the cosmos?"

"Probably an infinite number infinitesimally separated," answered Downing.

"In which case," returned Lane, "how many spaces did we skip between back home and right here?"

"I doubt that the separation between different space continuums is infinitesimally small," objected Hendricks. "More like a matter of a sort of quanta-separation. If the separation were not reasonably large, the energy necessary to break through would not be so great. I predict that we are in the space next door to our own."

"And if we take hold of another sun and pull--do we go one more space away or back again?"

"I dunno. There isn't a space-theorist among us. I'll tell you one thing, though. By the time we pull ourselves back and forth a few times, we'll know which valve to hold down in order to drive up instead of down."

Billy nodded. "If, as, and when we get back, let's see if we can devise a method of tilting a hunk of stellar center into this space from there. Better, probably, than just jerking it loose."

"Far better," observed Hendricks dryly. "If we can tilt ourselves into a new space whilst pulling on a stellar core, obviously it is easier to warp something into a new space than it is to rip the innards out of a star."

"Is this the point to suggest that we have a brand new galaxy to work on?" suggested Downing.

"Nope. We'll tell the Loard-vogh about it, though, and they may decide to do something about it."

* * * * *

Perhaps never before has a stranger object traversed interstellar space. Not by a stretch of the imagination could any race have designed a spacecraft resembling the squat housing adorned above with the battery of projectors. In the first place, it was all wrong for spacecraft design, being built to sit flat on a planet where the normal gravitic urge was down--or rather normal to the flat bottom. Spacecraft are tall, ovoid shells that travel vertically, parallel to their long axis, and the decking extends from side to side, at right angles to the ship's course. And the projectors should not be all on one side. That would leave the strange craft at the mercy of an attacking enemy from below. Spacecraft armaments consist of one turret in the top, or nose, one similar turret below, and several at discrete intervals about the center of the ship for side protection.

Of infinitely more trouble than the problem of traversing space in superdrive with an engineering project instead of a spacecraft was the decision of which way to go.

Being lost in the depths of interstellar space without a star map and with no idea of their position, and no one to call for a "fix," there was no way of determining which of the stars were the closer. They all stood there, twinkling against their background of stellar curtain, and one looked as close as the next. Brightness was no criterion. Deneb, four hundred light-years from Terra is brighter than Alpha Centaurus, four light-years away.

Yet, with superdrive, they could cross quite a bit of space in a short time. Hitting it off in any direction might bring them to within deciding distance of a star in a short time or it might be that the course went between stars for many hundred light-years.

It was Hendricks who solved the problem. "Get a hemisphere picture--and we'll superdrive for one hour and take another. Superimposing them one a-top the other should give us a reasonable parallax on the nearer stars. One that we could see with the naked eye."

With the fates obviously laughing up their sleeves, the second plate was never exposed. At fifty-one minutes of superdrive, the stellar detector indicated stellar radiation within one quarter light-year.

Planet-locating plates were exposed as the project swept through the star's neighborhood. There was quite an argument as to which of the seven planets to choose, and for no other reason than sentimental reasons--and the fact that the physical constants were right for them--the group finally fixed their desire on the third planet.

The engineering project started to head for Planet III.

"Better name it, Billy," smiled Hendricks. "You found it."

"I found it? O.K.," grinned Thompson, "we'll call it Eureka."

"Eureka III?"

"Too cumbersome. Since we'll possibly not chart the system let's just call the planet Eureka and forget about the stellar classification."

"Well, Eureka it is."

Jack Rhodes opened the door. "Better call it Money," he suggested.

"Why?"

"Because you fellows are going to find out that it is the hardest thing you've ever tried to hold."

"Huh?" asked Hendricks.

"We're right close and there isn't the faintest shred of gravitic field."

"Oh, no. Newton's Law--"

"Is valid right up to the last decimal place. 'Every object in the universe attracts--' and we just ain't a part of this universe."

"Doesn't seem right."

"May be of exceptionally low density."

"Must be zero then," grinned

Rhodes. "And if so, how does it hold itself together?"

"You answer that--it's your question."

"How long before landing?" asked Hendricks.

"Half hour. Look, chief, d'ye suppose we might find it to be contraterrene matter?"

"Um. What do you think, Billy?"

"If the matter here is the same as the matter back home, we'd have a fifty-fifty chance of it being contraterrene. It might even be something that was neither terrene or contraterrene for all we know."

"Interesting possibility. You mean something that is neutrally charged so far as we're concerned, but which in this universe consists of oppositely charged items?"

Billy nodded. "We'll find out."

"It has atmosphere, and the test shell didn't result in a contraterrene indication," called the pilot of the project.

"An atmosphere of what?"

Rhodes grinned. "God-knows-what," he said. "If Stellor can't make head nor tail out of the spectrograph, the chances are that the atomic stuff here might not jibe with ours at all."

"There is really no reason for our planeting at all," said Billy. "But I'm just curious, that's all."

"We'll be there soon."

* * * * *

The project approached the planet, and was forced to drive all the way. By the time that they had matched the angular velocity of the planet's rotation, the project was inverted with respect to the surface--though to the men it seemed as if they were driving _up_ to a ground-surface. It gave them an eerie feeling.

"I can see myself visiting a psychiatrist by the time we get back," grunted Hendricks. "We're landing--_upward_--and I'm getting the screaming terrors already from that feeling of falling upward into the sky."

"What you're suffering from is the shattering of your basic faith in the solidity of solid ground," remarked Billy. "Well, the project will land upside down, and we'll take hold tight with the anchor-projectors. Long enough, at least, to scrape a sample off of Eureka, here, to take back and analyze."

"If this whole space is made of the same stuff, I can see a minor industry springing up, gathering metal and stuff for gravity-proof gadgets."

"Wonder--probably good for something. Well, we're as close as we can go, all of us standing with our heads pointing at the planet and held to the floor of our project by centrifugal force caused by the planet's rotation. We won't stay long. None of us can stand the mental strain of looking out of the window and seeing solid ground a few feet above our heads and a million million miles of sky to fall down into if we step out of the door. _Brrrrr._"

"Close the sun proof shutters and don't look," suggested Billy. "I'm taking a nice large bromide to chill off a few screaming nerves and then I am going out and take me a shovelful of that dirt and rock up there. Gosh, it's going to feel funny digging _down_ something that wants to rise. Let's make it quick."

Billy emerged from the lock completely clad in spacesuit. He took air samples, and then, with the catch-knob between his shoulder blades firmly in the focal sphere of a tractor-pressor beam, Billy was shoved up to the surface of the planet. Reaching up over his head, Billy pulled down a few stones and dropped them upward into the bucket he held inverted. They fell upward to the surface of the planet, and the bucket was held by their weight.

They never did know whether there were any Eurekans, but if there were, and the Terrans were watched, it was a strange sight they saw. A sixty-foot rectangular building of steel, one story high, resting upside down with the planet-side to the sky. Projectors dug into the ground, pulled by the anchoring tractors that pulled the upside-down building even tighter to their planet.

From a spacedoor, a pale green beam was fastened to the knob on the creature's back. He was head down, suspended on the beam, and carrying a bucket that must have been filled with antigravity material for the bail was free and the bucket actually hung upward!

The creature was lowered, still head down, to the surface of Eureka. He reached down below his head and lifted a few stones, dropping them into the bucket, which he held right-side up. Naturally the bucket dropped properly enough to the ground.

Working by digging down, Billy filled the bucket and was returned down to the door.

"Cut 'em!" he said hoarsely.

They cut the anchors and the project was thrown from the surface of Eureka by centrifugal force. And as they left Eureka, and headed for the Sun, they held a council and decided that another attempt--blind though it would be--to warp space would be in order.

XX.

"Get every recording gadget we've got on the thing," said Billy. "Maybe we can find out something that will give us a directional trend. And anybody who thinks he won't be struck by lightning if he makes a prayer, go to it. We could use a bit of Divine Assistance."

The detectors were set up and the recorders started. The tripod of anchors set themselves in the star's core. The solar intake beams worked well and the torrents of power increased as the automatic control slid up the scale.

"The stuff may be different," observed Hendricks, "but we can still get power from their stars."

"Darned good thing, too," said Thompson. "I don't know how else we'd swing it."

Again came that feeling of wrenching. And it increased as before.

"Does it feel left-handed or right-handed?" asked Lane nervously.

"I don't know and if I did I wouldn't remember which way it was the last time," grumbled Downing.

And then the warp formed, and there was the impression, just before it snapped-quick, that the stars in that universe were flowing like spots on a watery surface.

And they emerged into a space completely devoid of anything. Not a star, not a speckle in the complete sphere of utter blackness.

"Obviously went the other way again," grunted Lane.

Jack Rhodes looked up from his calculations. "We had a fifty-fifty chance, according to the Law of Probabilities. But tossing one head does not make the next toss any better than fifty-fifty chance for tails. In fact," mused Rhodes, "tossing a hundred coins may bring you forty heads and sixty tails--plus or minus ten percent of the true chance. Tossing a thousand coins may give you four hundred seventy against five hundred thirty--a three percent error. But though the latter is more to the true division, the numerical deviation from zero is only ten in the first case but thirty in the second."

"I hate mathematicians," grunted Downing. "They're all pessimists. So the longer we try the more distant we get, huh?"

"Unless we can get something to upset the Law of Probability."

"And," added Hendricks sourly, "something to pull against. This universe is completely devoid of anything material."

"Let's put that as a matter of our being able to detect it at present. It might be teeming with suns indigenous to this universe and completely invisible to us."

"We're wasting time," said Thompson. "What's with the detectors and recorders?"

"About the only thing I can determine from here is a definite lengthening of the wave length that the puller-sphere propagates on."

"Huh?" asked Billy.

"Definitely."

"When did it lengthen?"

"Its wave length increased on an exponential curve to the time of warp--"

"Well, now we know--I think--how to get back."

"How?"

"Instead of pulling, we'll push."

* * * * *

Hendricks shook his head. "I think I get you, but I'm not too certain. Has to do with the wave length-propagation factor, hasn't it?"