"Now we'll get ready to take that battleship." DuQuesne turned to his
aid as the _Violet_ disappeared from their sight. "Your suggestion that
one of the crew of this ship could have gone space-crazy was sound, and
I have planned our approach to the mother ship on that basis.
"We must wear Fenachrone space suits for three reasons: First, because
it is the only possible way to make us look even remotely like them,
and we shall have to stand a casual inspection. Second, because it
is general orders that all Fenachrone soldiers must wear suits while
at their posts in space. Third, because we shall have lost most of
our air. You can wear one of their suits without any difficulty--the
surplus circumference will not trouble you very much. I, on the
contrary, cannot even get into one, since they're almost a foot too
short.
"I must have a suit on, though, before we board the battleship; so I
shall wear my own, with one of theirs over it--with the feet cut off
so that I can get it on. Since I shall not be able to stand up or to
move around without giving everything away because of my length, I'll
have to be unconscious and folded up so that my height will not be too
apparent, and you will have to be the star performer during the first
act.
"But this detailed instruction by word of mouth takes altogether too
much time. Put on this headset and I'll shoot you the whole scheme,
together with whatever additional Fenachrone knowledge you will need to
put the act across."
A brief exchange of thoughts and of ideas followed. Then, every detail
made clear, the two Terrestrials donned the space suits of the very
short, but enormously wide and thick, monstrosities in semihuman form
who were so bigotedly working toward their day of universal conquest.
DuQuesne picked up in his doubly mailed hands a massive bar of metal.
"Ready, Doll? When I swing this we cross the Rubicon."
"It's all right by me. All or nothing--shoot the works!"
DuQuesne swung his mighty bludgeon aloft, and as it descended the
telemental recorder sprang into a shower of shattered tubes, flying
coils, and broken insulation. The visiray apparatus went next, followed
in swift succession by the superficial air controls, the map cases, and
practically everything else that was breakable; until it was clear to
even the most casual observer that a madman had in truth wrought his
frenzied will throughout the room. One final swing wrecked the controls
of the airlocks, and the atmosphere within the vessel began to whistle
out into the vacuum of space through the broken bleeder tubes.
"All right, Doll, do your stuff!" DuQuesne directed crisply, and threw
himself headlong into a corner, falling into an inert, grotesque huddle.
Loring, now impersonating the dead commanding officer of the scout
ship, sat down at the manual sender, which had not been seriously
damaged, and in true Fenachrone fashion laid a beam to the mother ship.
"Scout ship _K3296_, Sublieutenant Grenimar commanding, sending
emergency distress message," he tapped out fluently. "Am not using
telemental recorder, as required by regulations, because nearly all
instruments wrecked. Private 244C14, on watch, suddenly seized with
space insanity, smashed air valves, instruments, and controls. Opened
lock and leaped out into space. I was awake and got into suit before
my room lost pressure. My other man, 397B42, was unconscious when I
reached him, but believe I got him into his suit soon enough so that
his life can be saved by prompt aid. 244C14 of course dead, but I
recovered his body as per general orders and am saving it so that
brain lesions may be studied by College of Science. Repaired this
manual sender and have ship under partial control. Am coming toward
you, decelerating to stop in fifteen minutes. Suggest you handle this
ship with beam when approach as I have no fine controls. Signing
off--_K3296_."
"Superdreadnought _Z12Q_, acknowledging emergency distress message of
scout ship _K3296_," came almost instant answer. "Will meet you and
handle you as suggested. Signing off--_Z12Q_."
Rapidly the two ships of space drew together; the patrol boat now
stationary with respect to the planet, the huge battleship decelerating
at maximum. Three enormous beams reached out and, held at prow,
mid-section, and stern, the tiny flier was drawn rapidly but carefully
against the towering side of her mother ship. The double suction seals
engaged and locked; the massive doors began to open.
* * * * *
Now came the most crucial point of DuQuesne's whole scheme. For that
warship carried a complement of nearly a hundred men, and ten or a
dozen of them--the lock commander, surgeons and orderlies certainly,
and possibly a corps of mechanics as well--would be massed in the
airlock room behind those slowly opening barriers. But in that scheme's
very audacity lay its great strength--its almost complete assurance
of success. For what Fenachrone, with the inborn superiority complex
that was his heritage, would even dream that two members of any alien
race would have the sheer, brazen effrontery to dare to attack,
empty-handed, a full-manned Class Z superdreadnought, one of the most
formidable structures that had ever lifted its stupendous mass into the
ether?
But DuQuesne so dared. Direct action had always been his forte.
Apparently impossible odds had never daunted him. He had always planned
his coups carefully, then followed those plans coldly and ruthlessly
to their logical and successful conclusions. Two men could do this job
very nicely, and would so do it. DuQuesne had chosen Loring with care.
Therefore he lay at ease in his armor in front of the slowly opening
portal, calmly certain that the iron nerves of his assassin aid would
not weaken for even the instant necessary to disrupt his carefully laid
plan.
As soon as the doors had opened sufficiently to permit ingress, Loring
went through them slowly, carrying the supposedly unconscious man
with care. But once inside the opaque walls of the lock room, that
slowness became activity incarnate. DuQuesne sprang instantly to his
full height, and before the clustered officers could even perceive that
anything was amiss, four sure hands had trained upon them the deadliest
hand weapons known to the superlative science of their own race.
Since DuQuesne was overlooking no opportunity of acquiring knowledge,
the heads were spared; but as the four furious blasts of vibratory
energy tore through those massive bodies, making of their every
internal organ a mass of disorganized protoplasmic pulp, every
Fenachrone in the room fell lifeless to the floor before he could move
a hand in self-defense.
Dropping his weapons, DuQuesne wrenched off his helmet, while Loring
with deft hands bared the head of the senior officer of the group upon
the floor. Headsets flashed out--were clamped into place--dials were
set--the scientist shot power into the tubes, transferring to his own
brain an entire section of the dead brain before him.
[Illustration: _DuQuesne clamped the headset into place, shot power
into it and transferred to his own brain an entire section of the brain
of the dead Fenachrone._]
His senses reeled under the shock, but he recovered quickly, and even
as he threw off the phones Loring slammed down over his head the helmet
of the Fenachrone. DuQuesne was now commander of the airlocks, and the
break in communication had been of such short duration that not the
slightest suspicion had been aroused. He snapped out mental orders to
the distant power room, the side of the vessel opened, and the scout
ship was drawn within.
"All tight, sir," he reported to the captain, and the _Z12Q_ began to
retrace her path in space.
DuQuesne's first objective had been attained without untoward incident.
The second objective, the control room, might present more difficulty,
since its occupants would be scattered. However, to neutralize this
difficulty, the Earthly attackers could work with bare hands and thus
with the weapons with which both were thoroughly familiar. Removing
their gauntlets, the two men ran lightly toward that holy of Fenachrone
holies, the control room. Its door was guarded, but DuQuesne had known
that it would be--wherefore the guards went down before they could
voice a challenge. The door crashed open and four heavy, long-barreled
automatics began to vomit forth a leaden storm of death. Those pistols
were gripped in accustomed and steady hands; those hands in turn were
actuated by the ruthless brains of heartless, conscienceless, and
merciless killers.
* * * * *
His second and major objective gained, DuQuesne proceeded at once to
consolidate his position. Pausing only to learn from the brain of the
dead captain the exact technique of procedure, he summoned into the
sanctum, one at a time, every member of the gigantic vessel's crew. Man
after man they came, in answer to the summons of their all-powerful
captain--and man after man they died.
"Take the educator and get some of their surgeon's skill," DuQuesne
directed curtly, after the last member of the crew had been accounted
for. "Take off the heads and put them where they'll keep. Throw the
rest of the rubbish out. Never mind about this captain--I want to study
him."
Then, while Loring busied himself at his grisly task, DuQuesne sat at
the captain's bench, read the captain's brains, and sent in to general
headquarters the regular routine reports of the vessel.
"All cleaned up. Now what?" Loring was as spick-and-span, as calmly
unruffled, as though he were reporting in one of the private rooms of
the Perkins Café. "Start back to the Earth?"
"Not yet." Even though DuQuesne had captured his battleship, thereby
performing the almost impossible, he was not yet content. "There are a
lot of things to learn here yet, and I think that we had better stay
here as long as possible and learn them; provided we can do so without
incurring any extra risks. As far as actual flight goes, two men can
handle this ship as well as a hundred, since her machinery is all
automatic. Therefore we can run away any time.
"We could not fight, however, as it takes about thirty men to handle
her weapons. But fighting would do no good, anyway, because they could
outnumber us a hundred to one in a few hours. All of which means that
if we go out beyond the detector screens we will not be able to come
back--we had better stay here, so as to be able to take advantage of
any favorable developments."
He fell silent, frowningly concentrated upon some problem obscure to
his companion. At last he went to the main control panel and busied
himself with a device of photo cells, coils, and kino bulbs; whereupon
Loring set about preparing a long-delayed meal.
"It's all hot, chief--come and get it," the aid invited, when he saw
that his superior's immediate task was done. "What's the idea? Didn't
they have enough controls there already?"
"The idea is, Doll, not to take any unnecessary chances. Ah, this
goulash hits the spot!" DuQuesne ate appreciatively for a few minutes
in silence, then went on: "Three things may happen to interfere
with the continuation of our search for knowledge. First, since we
are now in command of a Fenachrone mother ship, I have to report to
headquarters on the telemental recorder, and they may catch me in a
slip any minute, which will mean a massed attack. Second, the enemy
may break through the Fenachrone defenses and precipitate a general
engagement. Third, there is still the bare possibility of that cosmic
explosion I told you about.
"In that connection, it is quite obvious that an atomic explosion
wave of that type would be propagated with the velocity of light.
Therefore, even though our ship could run away from it, since we have
an acceleration of five times that velocity, yet we could not see
that such an explosion had occurred until the wave-front reached us.
Then, of course, it would be too late to do anything about it, because
what an atomic explosion wave would do to the dense material of this
battleship would be simply nobody's business.
"We might get away if one of us had his hands actually on the controls
and had his eyes and his brain right on the job, but that is altogether
too much to expect of flesh and blood. No brain can be maintained at
its highest pitch for any length of time."
"So what?" Loring said laconically. If the chief was not worried about
these things, the henchman would not be worried, either.
"So I rigged up a detector that is both automatic and instantaneous.
At the first touch of any unusual vibration it will throw in the full
space drive and will shoot us directly away from the point of the
disturbance. Now we shall be absolutely safe, no matter what happens.
"We are safe from any possible attack; neither the Fenachrone nor our
common enemy, whoever they are, can harm us. We are safe even from the
atomic explosion of the entire planet. We shall stay here until we get
everything that we want. Then we shall go back to the Green System. We
shall find Seaton."
His entire being grew grim and implacable, his voice became harder and
colder even than its hard and cold wont. "We shall blow him clear out
of the ether. The world--yes, whatever I want of the Galaxy--shall be
_mine_!"