"And Demarzule is going to show us the way to the Dragboran weapon!"
said Underwood fiercely.
_CHAPTER ELEVEN_
The course was changed so that the flight of the _Lavoisier_ paralleled
that of the Terrestrian fleet. The acceleration was increased to a
twenty per cent overload of the inertia units, making it necessary for
each man to use a small carrier unit against his own increased weight.
Still the fleet crept up, lessening the distance between them, but
Underwood felt confident that the distance between their parallel
courses was great enough to prevent detection by any means the
fleet could mount.
There was new life in the ship as the working and sleeping periods
passed rapidly. It was easier to concentrate on their work now that
everyone felt he was heading toward a definite goal--they dared not
doubt that that goal would yield what they hoped from it.
Under Phyfe's direction, daily classes in Sirenian culture were held.
Every fact of existence they tried to view from the Sirenian viewpoint
and anticipate its semantic significance to that ancient conquering
race.
The trip was estimated at approximately three months. A little
impromptu party was held when the fleet passed them near the halfway
mark. From then on it was a desperate race to see that the other ships
didn't get out of range of the instruments of the _Lavoisier_.
* * * * *
In the last week of the third month, a sudden, sharp deceleration
was observed in the ships of the battle fleet. Underwood alerted his
entire crew. If their deductions had been right, they were within a few
hundred thousand light years of the Dragboran world.
As the _Lavoisier_ braked some of its tremendous velocity by the
opening of the entropy dissipators, the fleet appeared heading for a
small galaxy with a group of yellow stars near its outer rim.
Underwood allowed their ship to close somewhat the enormous gap between
them and the enemy, but he wanted to maintain a reasonable distance,
for the fleet would certainly begin to sweep-search the skies of the
alien planet when they arrived and found the _Lavoisier_ had not landed.
The fleet was finally observed to close in upon one of the yellow suns
which had a system of five planets. It was the fourth planet toward
which the fleet drove. Underwood watched six of the twenty ships land
upon it.
"Let's line up behind one of the other planets," he instructed Dawson.
"The second appears closest. Then we can swing over and come in behind
the moon of number four. We'll probably land on that moon and look the
fleet over before deciding our next action."
The only disadvantage in the maneuver was that they could not keep a
sufficiently close check on the fleet. They came out of the shadow of
the planet for two hours and then were eclipsed by the moon of the
fourth planet. During that interval they were in the light of the sun,
and they saw no evidence of the fleet at all. The photographers busied
themselves with taking pictures of the Dragboran world.
Like the second planet, the moon appeared to be a barren sphere at
first glance, but as they approached and moved farther around its
six-thousand-mile circumference, they found an area of lush vegetation
occupying about an eighth of the surface.
It was the night side at the moment of their approach. No sign of
habitation was apparent, though Underwood thought for an instant he
glimpsed a smoke column spiraling upward in the night as they dropped
to the surface. Then it was gone, and he was not sure that he had
really seen anything.
The _Lavoisier_ came to rest on the grassy floor of a clearing in the
vegetated corner of the otherwise barren world.
At that instant Mason came into the control room. "I don't know what
you expect to find on that planet down there," he said. He handed a
batch of photos to Underwood. "We must have pulled a boner somewhere."