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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3b9e836 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #64175 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/64175) diff --git a/old/64175-0.txt b/old/64175-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 1c44d33..0000000 --- a/old/64175-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,1123 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Distress Signal, by Ross Rocklynne - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Distress Signal - -Author: Ross Rocklynne - -Release Date: December 30, 2020 [eBook #64175] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DISTRESS SIGNAL *** - - - - - DISTRESS SIGNAL - - By ROSS ROCKLYNNE - - Marooned! On the cold satellite of a dying sun, - light-years away from home.... For Rex there - was only one escape. But Carl called it murder! - - [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from - Planet Stories Spring 1947. - Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that - the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] - - -The years passed relentlessly, ticked off--one, two three, four--by the -big lone planet Worta as it moved with ponderous sureness around the -dying red star. Sometimes, in the first year after they were marooned, -the two runaway boys, Carl Wyant and Rex Oberling, crawled from the -grottoes, chambers and labyrinthine tunnels which the Wortans had -driven deep beneath the planet's crust, and with a chill lonesomeness -looked out into the vastness of space where the stars brooded. One of -those stars, thirty-five light-years away, was Sol, around which swung -the planet Earth! They could not think of Earth without a brightness -coming to their eyes. - -Sometimes the younger boy, then seventeen, would whisper, "I wish we'd -never left home, Carl." - -And Carl would say, "But we left. So let's take our medicine like men." - -Yes, their leaving home, leaving their parents, their friends, their -whole world, could not be changed. Yet it seemed to them that their -punishment was out of all proportion to their crime. Thinking back on -it, Carl Wyant no longer remembered the petty grievance against his -parents which made him decide to run away. - -Mainly, of course, it had been because his father dropped his keys to -the interstellar space-ship he had recently requisitioned from the -Space Council. Both Carl and his buddy, Rex, the young fellow who lived -next door and belonged to the same Scout Troop, had been caught up with -the idea of visiting the stars, without parental supervision. To visit -the stars! That was a thrilling thought. - -At first they planned to be gone a month. But after landing on one -of the Centaurian planets, four and a half light-years away, the -tremendous excitement that gripped them burned away thoughts of their -parents, who must certainly be suffering agonies because of their -disappearance. Beyond Centauri were other stars--and others beyond -_them_. - -They never tired as the sub-etheric warp hurled them through the dark -reaches of infinity at several times light-speed. For the first time, -they were living. - -By this time, the alarm had gone throughout the known universe. Two -boys on the loose. Carl, an expert at Morse Code, deciphered the wild -dit-dit-da's. - -"Boy, are they looking for us!" - -Rex's deep chest came out. "We'll be pretty famous when we get back, I -guess." The thought pleased him. "Those smart alecs that always picked -on me at school will change their tune." - -"Ah, Rex, nobody ever picked on you." Carl was slimmer than Rex, though -a year older. He added, "All you had to do was join in the fun and -you'd have got along swell." - -A dangerous flush crept up from Rex's thick, powerful neck. "I say they -picked on me." - -Carl said hastily, "Okay, okay." He dropped the subject. Sometimes Rex -could be pretty touchy. But he was handy to have around and most of the -time was a good guy. Both fellows had studied celestial navigation and -mechanics, but Rex had it all over Carl when it came to handling the -small ship, so Carl let him take the controls most of the time. - - * * * * * - -Suddenly the ship had gone haywire. Neither Carl nor Rex was technician -enough to understand that the etheric warp engines had been overdriven. -The engines, down to the last accumulator cell, exploded with a mighty, -tearing roar that blew gaping holes in bulkheads, deck-plates, and -overheads. Carl was knocked out, but Rex held on. - -He crash-landed the ship--on Worta, the lone planet of the unlisted, -dying red star. The ship landed in a snow-bank, and the heat of the -landing turned tons of snow into steaming, boiling water. By the time -they had inventoried the situation, there was a smooth lake of ice -around them and the ship was frozen in up to the edge of the airlocks. - -Rex said shakily, "We'll have to use the auxiliary engines." - -Which was a bit optimistic. The auxiliaries weren't etheric warpers. -They were rocket engines. The fuel a ship like this carried would -take it a few billion miles, but what was that in the vastness of -interstellar space, with the nearest solar system two light-years away? - -Carl's long slim fingers bit mercilessly into the palms of his hands. -His voice was a thin cry of protest, drifting out over the sterile -vistas of Worta, the ice planet. - -"Rex, we're done for. We can't get back. We're marooned." - -They were marooned, but not done for. The Wortans found them one day -and took them to their city a thousand feet under the planet. These -Wortans, the few of them that remained, were quiet, kindly people. Ages -ago, they had fought their last retreat from the bitter surface cold. -They had dug beneath the crust. They were savages now, their former -mighty civilization forgotten, and were unlearned, save in agriculture -and the skillful breeding of such fur-and-meat-producing animals as the -_col_, the _friga_, the _hask-nor_. And, since they were human in form, -themselves, they accepted these strangers that came among them. - -They never came to the surface of Worta, but that unexplainable sense -of theirs which enabled them to perceive disharmony, much as one -flinches at a sour discord, brought them up to investigate. - -Carl was grateful to them for their simple wisdom, their understanding. -From the first, however, Rex was a "sour chord" among them. An inner -conceit, perhaps growing out of a race consciousness, painted him with -an unmasked hostility. - -But it was all of a year after their arrival before M'hort, chief of -the Wortans, revealed his feelings to Carl. He drew Carl into his -_meegan_--his rock-dwelling--one day. M'hort was tall as Carl, but his -eyes were faceted and insect-like, great horny reptilian lumps stood -out on his bony-joints, and his smoothly-scaled skin reflected the -eternal fluorescence of this underground land like a polished mirror. - -Carl's smile was rueful when M'hort explained about Rex. "Rex never was -one to get along with people. He told me you people don't like him." - -"How sad!" said M'hort. - -"He's never stopped dreaming that we might get back to Earth." - -"If only," said M'hort, "he would join us at our festivals as you do! -If only he would laugh when we gather for meals! But, ah, he will do -none of these things. Many times he sits in his _meegan_ and broods. -You say he insists there is a way to return to your planet?" - -Carl was embarrassed for his friend. "When we first landed," he -explained, "Rex thought that somehow we could use the auxiliaries." - -"Ah, yes," said M'hort, trying hard to understand these things which -were strange to him. "The auxiliaries." - -"You see, we can manufacture unlimited quantities of rocket fuel with -the fuel-generator that most ships carry. It's a catalytic process, -the raw material being any fairly dense rock. - -"The auxiliaries were a sort of obsession with Rex. I couldn't control -him. In the few days before you found us, he manufactured seven or -eight tons of merbohydrate. He filled the ship full. I let him have his -way. We lifted the ship and left Worta. Rex was certain we could find -another planet and get back to Earth by a stepping-stone method." - -"Ah, but there are no other planets near enough," said M'hort, -recalling this fact which Carl had previously taught him. - -"Within light-years. As I say, I let Rex have his way until half the -fuel was used up. Then I had to fight him." - -Carl looked ashamedly at his fists. "I knocked him out as we came back -to Worta. But somehow he never gave up the idea that we could use the -auxiliaries somehow." - -"How very sad! And you say there is little chance of the Earth people -coming for you?" - -"Very little. Worta and its sun aren't even entered in the _Star -Catalogue_. It's an unlisted system, although the Stellar Survey -Institution has been working like crazy the past hundred years to -survey the whole works." - -M'hort touched the boy's hand sympathetically. "Someday they will come -for you! But, in the meantime, it would be wonderful if your friend saw -the futility of his ways." - - * * * * * - -During the first year of their stay on Worta, Rex stayed close to Carl, -confiding in him, making those trips to the surface of the snowed-under -world. Then he took to wandering the great winding corridors and -chambers and dead underground cities of Worta alone. Carl would have -liked to explore with him, for there was an unending fascination in -this dying civilization. Once upon a time the Wortans had been great. -The quaint webbed architecture of the spired and domed buildings, the -delicate traceries, on the walls and the sculptured figures standing -in the squares--these were a timeless wonder. But Rex didn't want Carl -along, for Rex had closed up clam-like, his broad, square face held a -sullen fanaticism, and Carl knew he had his mind set on escape. - -Carl went to Rex's _meegan_ and sat on his spider-silk chair and whiled -away the time by reading a scroll from the Wortan library until Rex -should return. Both Carl and Rex had learned the complex language, the -reading, the writing, the speaking of it, though Carl was much the more -proficient. - -Rex came in silently, a big man-size fellow with pale, beardless -cheeks, dressed Indian-like in the thin, cured leather of the _col_. -His moccasins padded and Carl looked up from the scroll with a start. - -Rex said shortly, "Hello, Carl." He threw himself on the pile of -sleeping-furs in the corner, locked his hands behind his head and -stared straight up at the fluorescent ceiling with hard, unblinking -eyes. - -Carl uncomfortably put the scroll away. "Rex, I want to have a talk -with you." - -"Shoot," said Rex. - -"You're not making it very easy for yourself, Rex." - -"Oh! You're going to start moralizing again!" - -"I wouldn't call it moralizing. I'm getting fed up with the way you -act, if you want it straight. The Wortans are swell people and I get -along with them fine. But it's just as if I was marooned alone. What I -mean is, I don't have anybody to talk to." - -Rex's lips curled in a half-smile. "Maybe you haven't treated me -half-decent, either, if you want to know it." - -"_I_ haven't!" - -"Nope. You want to stick here the rest of your life in these crummy, -cold, underground rat-holes. No soap. I'm going to get back to Earth -somehow." - -"The auxiliaries," Carl said sarcastically. - -Rex came to his knees with a violent motion, eyes burning. "Don't talk -to me like that, Carl! I've got a way to get out of here." - -"Yeah?" Carl refused to be intimidated. "How's the master-mind going to -work it?" - -Rex paused and then said slowly, "I'm going to create a distress -signal." - -"Distress sig--" Carl stiffened incredulously. "Rex, you're nuts!" - -Rex smiled a slow, secret, satisfied smile. "I don't think so. 'Member -when we were scouts? 'Member that time we got lost in the Big Neck -Valley? We burned green wood and got a smoky fire started and used a -blanket to send up a smoky SOS signal. We knew the rest of the troop -was somewhere near and would see the signal. They came and got us. - -"Well, this is the same thing. We're lost. This solar system never has -been discovered, but we both know we're still in the known universe. -All around us, maybe no more than fifty or sixty light-days off, are -traffic lanes. Passenger ships, freighters. Then there's the SSI. It -has ships everywhere. I figure if we send out a distress signal they're -bound to see it over the sub-etheric, fifth-order ray detector. They'll -see that signal as soon as I get started." - -Carl was quiet. He was worried. This was a turn of affairs he hadn't -expected. He remembered how fixed Rex's mind was on the subject of -escape. Too fixed. Almost fanaticism. He hoped with all his heart Rex -wasn't sick. Yet that the kid should kneel there, with that brightness -in his eyes, and suggest sending up a distress signal which was to be -sent across billions of miles of space-- - -"All right, Rex," he said gently. "I'm listening. You're to send up a -distress signal and attract the attention of a Stellar Survey ship." - -A derisive smile grew on Rex's lips. "You're listening," he scoffed. -"Liar. You think I'm bats. But I'll show you." - -He lay down again and turned his face to the wall and shortly Carl -heard his deep breathing. Carl left. - -That was in the second year. But another year passed. Carl found -himself growing up. He had the shoulders of a man, and he could look -back with a whimsical ruefulness on the immaturity which had led him -and Rex to run away from home like callow ten-year-olds. - -Carl longed for Earth, no less than Rex. Unlike Rex, he subdued the -longing, but whenever his lonesome thoughts threatened to engulf him he -diverted himself by climbing the thousand feet to the planet's surface. -It was on such a voyage that he found the space-ship gone. - -Carl and Rex had agreed to leave the ship on an eminence, so that if -anybody did come they would see the ship and investigate. But the ship -was undeniably gone, and Carl knew Rex had taken it. - -He stood on the icy mesa where they had parked it, and Carl looked out -on the drear vastness of Worta with sick eyes. He refused to believe -Rex had gone away and left him. He stayed there for hours, waiting, -then reluctantly went back into the bowels of Worta. - -Rex showed up for the evening meal, though, taking his place at the -great long _yee_--the festival table--where the forty-odd Wortans who -remained had their meals. After the meal, Carl cornered him. - -Rex twisted away from Carl's detaining hand. "I've got a right to take -a ride if I want to, haven't I?" - -Carl felt guilty at having even asked, the way Rex put it. Rex did have -that right. Carl let it slide. But the frequent disappearance of the -ship troubled him increasingly. Every time he stood hip-deep in snow on -the upper world and saw the ship was gone, a chill worked through his -heart. He would find himself looking into the lowering dark sky at the -impersonal stars. Fastening his gaze on the dying red star around which -Worta revolved. It was not a large sun. In another million years it -would burn out. Then Worta would truly be dead. - - * * * * * - -He was convinced there was more to Rex's use of the ship than the -loneliness of a nineteen-year-old wanting to take a ride. Rex had a -purpose. Yet he let it slide until the end of the fourth year. Then his -interference was not his doing. He was wandering far underground when a -runner came panting up. - -"M'hort must see you in his _meegan_," the runner panted. - -Carl went at once, heart constricted. Nothing ever happened in these -underground caves. Whatever M'hort wanted to see him about was urgent. - -M'hort met him at the entrance and gripped his arm. His eyes bored into -Carl's. "I sense that something is wrong, friend Carl," he said. "It is -a great terror in my breast. It is about Rex, of course. I see--I see a -great flame. Now tell me what you know!" - -Carl blurted out the story. "He's making plenty long trips someplace," -he said huskily. "He's been caving in a big hillside of rock these past -couple years. Making merbohydrate." - -M'hort's fear showed in his eyes. "There is no place for him to visit?" - -"Not a planetary body within countless billions of miles." - -M'hort paced. "We should not have this trouble," he said fretfully. "I -am most annoyed with Rex. Look at us of Worta. Do we not know we are -doomed, that the unhealthful conditions beneath Worta are producing a -sterility that will soon destroy us as if we had never been? Yet we are -gay and take what there is of life. Why must Rex make us all unhappy? -And I feel he is planning--something that can never be undone." - -He hesitated. "Carl, this merbohydrate--it is dangerous?" - -Carl laughed. "Just about the peppiest explosion known to the human -race." He touched M'hort's arm. "I'll find out what he's planning." - -Carl went straight to the surface and stood in the cave opening, his -breath hanging in puffy clouds of white. Rex was at that moment letting -down the ship's gangplank. He wheeled the fuel-generator out on its -short tripod. - -All day Carl watched as Rex set "pills" of merbohydrate into the rock -face of the snow-shorn, worked-over hill and detonated them. Tons of -chipped rock cascaded toward the mouth of the generator. Rex panted as -he worked with a square-point shovel. The twenty-pound merbohydrate -ingots came rolling out at the rate of one a minute. Rex carried the -ingots into the ship. - -As the red star was about to settle for the night behind the -sharply-silhouetted horizon, Rex wheeled the generator back into the -ship. About that time, Carl panted up the hill to the mesa level. -"Rex!" he called. - -Rex stood scowling near the airlock. Plainly, Carl was not welcome. - -Carl panted, "Going for a ride?" - -Rex's shoulders--broader by far than Carl's--bunched up. He growled, -"Yeah. _I'm taking a ride._" - -"Swell. I'll go with you." - -"Nope." - -"Why not?" - -Rex turned and, with a single motion, jumped to the edge of the -airlock. He jeered, "I don't want any boy scouts along with me this -trip. G'bye!" - -Carl felt a rage he had never really shown Rex. He leaped. All it got -him was a bad fall on the slippery ice underfoot. When he finally got -to his feet, the airlock door was whining shut. A few seconds later, -the ship leaped away, the rocket apertures throwing out their blatting -swords of energy. The ship roared skyward. - -Carl stood looking after it, a wet crawling on his skin. He was -terribly frightened. The worst part of it was, he didn't know what was -frightening him. He turned and started back down the ladders to the -underground city. - -Four years, he thought, as he climbed the ladders down. Four years -we've been here. It seems forever since we ran away that night. And for -two of those years, Rex has been busy with something. Manufacturing -merbohydrate and taking trips out into space. Why? - -_Distress signal!_ - -The two words hit him with smashing impact. He wrapped both hands -around the ladder, to keep himself from falling down the shaft. He -trembled and shook and dizzy spots grew in his eyes. - -He raised his head and shouted, "The fool!" - -The lonesome echoes of his own madness came crashing back at him. He -hugged the ladder and wept. He could not say why he was crying, except -he felt he had been betrayed somehow. He knew he was young, too young -to deal with this tremendous horror Rex was planning. And M'hort had -sensed that horror. - -After awhile, he started climbing up again. There was a flame in his -heart, a heat that rived him, made him something less than human. He -was going to kill Rex if Rex didn't talk, didn't tell him the details -of the plan. As for the main plan, Carl already knew it. - -On the surface, he waited. The sun came up, moved redly toward noon. -The space-ship came back. As Rex appeared in the opening airlock, face -perspiring, lips set with a cruel satisfaction that did not belong to -youth, Carl jumped him. It was over in a moment. Rex lay unconscious. - - * * * * * - -When Rex came to, Carl had the ship in the sky again, driving toward -the dying red sun. He left the controls again, and stood over Rex, who -was rope-bound to a chair. - -"I think," Carl said, his eyes burning, "I've put two and two together -at last. Took me a whale of a long time to do it, too. Now go ahead and -talk." - -Rex's square face was set into a disinterested mold. He looked Carl up -and down, shrugged. "Sure, I'll talk. But it won't do any good, Carl. -It's already fixed. Nothing you can do can change it. And it's funny -you picked out today to check up on me." - -"Just today?" Carl asked hollowly. - -"Just today." Rex spoke so calmly it was as if all the acid bitterness -in him had been alkalized in one moment. For the first time in many -months, he was a kid again, without a secret thought, without an -equivocation on his lips. - -Rex said, "There's two hundred thousand tons of merbohydrates out -there, Carl. It's taken me two years to manufacture the stuff. The most -powerful explosive ever invented. - -"You see, Carl, I wasn't as crazy as you thought when I said I was -going to send up a distress signal. It's a matter of nine or ten hours. -And you can't stop it." - -Carl stood with eyes closed, muscles iron-hard. "Rex," he said, "give -me the position coordinates of that two hundred thousand tons of -merbohydrate." - -Rex gave him the coordinates. Carl set the ship on a slightly different -course. An hour passed. The Wortan sun grew until it was a red globe -glued to space. - -Carl operated the photo-amplifiers, set the telescopic perilens into -position. Space expanded. In the vision plate grew a tiny dot that -seemed to rush rapidly into sight though it was still several hundred -thousand miles away. It resolved itself into detail--countless neatly -stacked and baled ingots of merbohydrate, each bale in turn attached to -another by short lengths of wire. The mass was a thirty-foot cube. - -[Illustration: In the vision plate grew a tiny dot....] - -In the matter of size, it was a speck in space. - -In the matter of explosive potentialities, it was a bomb of untold -violence, falling toward the dying red star. - -Carl got another notch of speed from the ship. He was abruptly aware -that sweat had formed stickily on his body. A blast of furnace heat was -already radiating from the bulkheads. - -Behind him, Rex said derisively, "Save yourself the trouble. You can't -catch up with it. It's inside the boiling zone, you idiot. - -"For two years, Carl, that mass of merbohydrate was on an orbit about -the sun. Every once in a while I'd come out and add more to the main -mass. Today I figured I had enough. I hauled it out of its orbit, took -it as close as I could to the sun. Right smack to the edge of the -boiling zone. Then I gave it a running start and let go. The sun and -the merbohydrate will meet at the convergence of their trajectories." - -"Then what?" - -Rex laughed. "Distress signal!" - - * * * * * - -It was hotter as they moved toward the sun. Carl was sopping. The very -air danced. Under him the chair was beginning to burn him. The cosmic -bomb was a full three hundred thousand miles inside the boiling zone. -Carl could never catch up with it. He wordlessly banked the ship in a -long half-circle that put it a hundred miles inside the boiling zone, -and then on the road out. - -He poured in every ounce of power he could, while thoughts zig-zagged -crazily in his head. He had gone beyond rage. He had ascended the scale -of human emotion and he was numb. - -When the ship was near Worta, he turned on Rex. "What," he said, "do -you expect to gain by this?" - -"Rescue." - -"What about the Wortans?" - -A simmering violence burst in Rex's eyes. His muscles bulged against -his bonds. "The Wortans!" he mimicked. "The Wortans! If you love those -Wortans so much why don't you plan to live with them the rest of your -life? They never did like me, and that goes double." - -Carl said gently, "You don't murder people you don't like." - -"Murder?" the word came sharply. He relaxed. "They don't use their -sun. They won't miss it." - -"How about their planet?" - -Rex looked at him. Then his eyes shifted. He muttered, "The explosion -won't touch Worta. Too far away." - -Carl said, "The explosion will rip that planet crossways and endways. -It'll turn it inside out. It'll tear it up into little pin-size lumps, -roast and boil the lumps, and dissipate the lumps into gases made of -dancing free electrons. That big gob of gas will puff itself out over -a few light-years of space, and that will be the end of Worta. Maybe -you didn't think of that. Or maybe you convinced yourself it wouldn't -happen." - -A trapped expression grew on Rex's face. "It _won't_ happen!" he -shouted. He screamed, "Let me alone! Stop badgering me! You can't -change anything. I didn't know if it'd hurt Worta or not. I didn't -care any more. I came back to Worta to get you, just in case something -happened I didn't figure on. All I cared about was getting home. I want -to go home!" - -He dropped his head, drawing in great tearing sobs, his broad shoulders -quaking. - -Carl said calmly, "Well, we're going back to Worta to get the Wortans." - -Rex raised his head, his face violent with protest. "We haven't got -time." - -"We'll take time." - -Rex cursed him viciously. - -"In the meantime," Carl continued without change of tone, "sit there. -Start thinking. Think about M'hort and the other Wortans. Think of how -they saved our lives and accepted us as if we're part of them. Think of -all the hospitality you accepted at their _yee_." - -Carl's voice was rising. "Think of their dead cities. Think of all the -dead men who built those cities and the artists who made those cities -beautiful with their statues and paints. Then think how you will have -destroyed all that." - -Rex said nothing. Color was flooding from his face, his lips thinning -until they formed one pale slash across his face. Carl looked at him -with wordless contempt, then swung about to maneuver the ship for the -final thousand miles to a landing. - -A gong sounded from the instrument board. - - * * * * * - -It came so suddenly that Carl jumped halfway from the bucket-seat. He -gripped the edge of the board, eyes forced open so wide they hurt. He -waiting, knowing he had misheard. The gong came again. - -Behind him, Rex made an insane gurgling noise. "They've come! They've -come!" - -Carl's hands were shaking violently as he adjusted the teleview, -snapped in the audio. In the teleview gray clouds formed, took on -shape, and that shape became the head and shoulders of a man in the -trim, pale blue uniform of the Stellar Survey Institution. - -Small muscles around the man's eyes and mouth contracted as he saw -Carl. He frowned. He said, "You are Carl Wyant and Rex Oberling?" - -"Yes, sir," Carl said humbly. - -"You will stay where you are. We will pick you up in seven hours. You -may consider that a command." - -"Yes, sir," replied Carl. "But we can't obey it. I'd advise you, sir, -not to come within ten billion miles of the dwarf-red star. It's a -potential super-nova. We will meet you at--" - -The officer's glance sharpened. "You're talking nonsense. Why is -Oberling bound in that chair?" - -Carl said wearily, "It's a long story, sir. May I ask your present -position?" - -The Stellar Survey man's image grew a little in the plate as he leaned -forward, as if to get a better look at Carl's face. He drew back. He -said, "We are at present roughly twenty-two light-days distant, viewing -you by instantaneous fifth-order reception." - -"That's even better than ten billion miles, sir. If you stay where you -are and keep your beam on, we can signal you when we get a billion -miles from Worta. Then you can come forward and pick us up." - -Before the officer could say what was starting on his lips, Carl banged -his hand excitedly on the instrument board and shouted hysterically, -"I'm warning you, sir. I'm warning you!" - -The man looked unsettled. His glance wavered. "Very well, Wyant. It's -a strange proceeding, but I trust you. We will expect you." The screen -blanked. - -Fifteen minutes later Carl landed the ship. He got up stiffly. Rex sat -motionless, eyes turned straight ahead, unblinking, unseeing. - -"I'm leaving you here until I get the Wortans," Carl told him. "Don't -try anything silly." - -Rex moved his head until his eyes rested on Carl's. He said quietly, -"Carl, for your own good, don't bother. Do you think for a minute the -Wortans are going to leave their planet at this stage of the game? -They're done for anyway. You wouldn't expect a bunch of corpses to get -out of their coffins and try a different coffin, would you? That's the -way it is with the Wortans." - -When Carl said nothing, Rex said, in that same quiet voice, "Carl, I -_know_." - -Carl turned uncertainly away, moved to the instrument board. His own -voice sounded far away. "I'll convince them," he said. "I'll bring them -back. They've _got_ to come." - -Carl took all the keys out of the instrument board. Without the keys, -the ship was inoperable. He left the ship, stumbled as in a dream -across the dreary wastes of lifeless snow. Then, as the cold struck -deep at his lungs, his thoughts clarified, and he went with quick, -driven panic. - -How soon the merbohydrate would strike the red star he had no idea. -But it would be soon. He made a break-neck descent. He burst into that -small section of one of the underground cities where the Wortans lived, -went straight to the _meegan_ of M'hort. - -He told M'hort the whole story. - -M'hort sat cross-legged. A resigned sadness lidded his eyes. Carl knew -his answer. He dropped to his knees. "No! You can't speak for the rest -of your people. They want to live. And the Wortans can still be great. -Why--why, we'll give you a planet in our own system!" - -M'hort smiled as if at a secret, foolish thought, his eyes averted. -Then he arose and drew Carl up with him. His eyes glittered with the -reflected fluorescence of the underground. Carl was held rigid. - -M'hort said, "You are youth, and you answer as youth would answer. I am -age, Carl, and I answer as only age can answer. We will stay. - -"What is there to fear? What is there to grieve for? It is a great -providence that sent you here to us. You see! Soon we would all have -died, but lingeringly. Now there is glory to dying, for there will be -no ugly pain. And we will not be unknown to the other peoples of the -universe, Carl, for you will carry our immortality." - -"That," said Carl, bitterly, "is a hell of an immortality." - -M'hort laughed. "It is better than we expected. Now go." - -And Carl went, blindly. - -He reached the ship in less than an hour. He entered, dogged the -airlocks shut, went slowly toward the transparent door of the control -room. He threw open the door and stood looking at the empty chair and -the tattered strands of rope which had held Rex. He was drained of -emotion, though, and he leaned weakly against the door jamb. Finally he -moved, left the ship, and spent another hour looking for Rex. - -He didn't find him. Rex had consciously obscured his tracks. He went -back to the ship, smiling without mirth. That was funny. Rex drove -himself crazy figuring out a way to get back to Earth for four years. -Then he backed out. He had chosen the same path as the Wortans, and -maybe for as good a reason.... - - * * * * * - -He drove straight away from the dying red sun. A billion miles out, he -was picked up by the stately ship of the Stellar Survey. He was ushered -into the presence of the officer who had appeared in the teleview -plate. That individual was cold in his welcome. - -"You've cost the tax-payers a mint of money," he growled. "They've had -ships on the lookout for you for four years. Where's the other young -fellow?" - -Carl told the story while the officer slowly tensed. Then he looked -annoyed. "It seems a little extreme for Oberling to have committed -suicide." - -"Maybe, sir. Except that one doesn't go around destroying solar systems -without a good reason. If you hadn't shown up when you did--" - -"There would have been a good reason?" The officer sat silent. "Yes, -I suppose so. A classical bit of irony, that. Destroying a sun to -attract rescuers--then the rescuers spoil the drama of it by showing up -ahead of time. And the funny part of it is that it would have worked." - -He seemed to recollect. He hastily snapped in the teleview, motioned -Carl to come around to his side of the desk. - -"Chances are," the officer said, consulting some figures, "We'll see a -merry hell-fire in the next few minutes." - -Ten minutes later, the red star exploded. - -It cracked into three separate pieces. They held that position, each -section racing from red to violet. That changed blindingly to magnesium -white. The glare smashed at the eyeballs. The three pieces in turn -shattered each other as they puffed up. Then the whole spurted into -a violence that lighted all the black sky with recurring, silently -throbbing sheets of shattering luminescence. - -The stars were blotted out in that primeval surf of untamed energy. - -The planet Worta was caught, flamed in glory for the small part of a -second. - -The big space-ship trembled in every beam and partition as the -wave-front of exploding light reached it. - -_Distress signal!_ - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DISTRESS SIGNAL *** - -***** This file should be named 64175-0.txt or 64175-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - https://www.gutenberg.org/6/4/1/7/64175/ - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Distress Signal</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Ross Rocklynne</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: December 30, 2020 [eBook #64175]</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net</div> - -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DISTRESS SIGNAL ***</div> - -<div class="titlepage"> - -<h1>DISTRESS SIGNAL</h1> - -<h2>By ROSS ROCKLYNNE</h2> - -<p>Marooned! On the cold satellite of a dying sun,<br /> -light-years away from home.... For Rex there<br /> -was only one escape. But Carl called it murder!</p> - -<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br /> -Planet Stories Spring 1947.<br /> -Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br /> -the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> - -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>The years passed relentlessly, ticked off—one, two three, four—by the -big lone planet Worta as it moved with ponderous sureness around the -dying red star. Sometimes, in the first year after they were marooned, -the two runaway boys, Carl Wyant and Rex Oberling, crawled from the -grottoes, chambers and labyrinthine tunnels which the Wortans had -driven deep beneath the planet's crust, and with a chill lonesomeness -looked out into the vastness of space where the stars brooded. One of -those stars, thirty-five light-years away, was Sol, around which swung -the planet Earth! They could not think of Earth without a brightness -coming to their eyes.</p> - -<p>Sometimes the younger boy, then seventeen, would whisper, "I wish we'd -never left home, Carl."</p> - -<p>And Carl would say, "But we left. So let's take our medicine like men."</p> - -<p>Yes, their leaving home, leaving their parents, their friends, their -whole world, could not be changed. Yet it seemed to them that their -punishment was out of all proportion to their crime. Thinking back on -it, Carl Wyant no longer remembered the petty grievance against his -parents which made him decide to run away.</p> - -<p>Mainly, of course, it had been because his father dropped his keys to -the interstellar space-ship he had recently requisitioned from the -Space Council. Both Carl and his buddy, Rex, the young fellow who lived -next door and belonged to the same Scout Troop, had been caught up with -the idea of visiting the stars, without parental supervision. To visit -the stars! That was a thrilling thought.</p> - -<p>At first they planned to be gone a month. But after landing on one -of the Centaurian planets, four and a half light-years away, the -tremendous excitement that gripped them burned away thoughts of their -parents, who must certainly be suffering agonies because of their -disappearance. Beyond Centauri were other stars—and others beyond -<i>them</i>.</p> - -<p>They never tired as the sub-etheric warp hurled them through the dark -reaches of infinity at several times light-speed. For the first time, -they were living.</p> - -<p>By this time, the alarm had gone throughout the known universe. Two -boys on the loose. Carl, an expert at Morse Code, deciphered the wild -dit-dit-da's.</p> - -<p>"Boy, are they looking for us!"</p> - -<p>Rex's deep chest came out. "We'll be pretty famous when we get back, I -guess." The thought pleased him. "Those smart alecs that always picked -on me at school will change their tune."</p> - -<p>"Ah, Rex, nobody ever picked on you." Carl was slimmer than Rex, though -a year older. He added, "All you had to do was join in the fun and -you'd have got along swell."</p> - -<p>A dangerous flush crept up from Rex's thick, powerful neck. "I say they -picked on me."</p> - -<p>Carl said hastily, "Okay, okay." He dropped the subject. Sometimes Rex -could be pretty touchy. But he was handy to have around and most of the -time was a good guy. Both fellows had studied celestial navigation and -mechanics, but Rex had it all over Carl when it came to handling the -small ship, so Carl let him take the controls most of the time.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Suddenly the ship had gone haywire. Neither Carl nor Rex was technician -enough to understand that the etheric warp engines had been overdriven. -The engines, down to the last accumulator cell, exploded with a mighty, -tearing roar that blew gaping holes in bulkheads, deck-plates, and -overheads. Carl was knocked out, but Rex held on.</p> - -<p>He crash-landed the ship—on Worta, the lone planet of the unlisted, -dying red star. The ship landed in a snow-bank, and the heat of the -landing turned tons of snow into steaming, boiling water. By the time -they had inventoried the situation, there was a smooth lake of ice -around them and the ship was frozen in up to the edge of the airlocks.</p> - -<p>Rex said shakily, "We'll have to use the auxiliary engines."</p> - -<p>Which was a bit optimistic. The auxiliaries weren't etheric warpers. -They were rocket engines. The fuel a ship like this carried would -take it a few billion miles, but what was that in the vastness of -interstellar space, with the nearest solar system two light-years away?</p> - -<p>Carl's long slim fingers bit mercilessly into the palms of his hands. -His voice was a thin cry of protest, drifting out over the sterile -vistas of Worta, the ice planet.</p> - -<p>"Rex, we're done for. We can't get back. We're marooned."</p> - -<p>They were marooned, but not done for. The Wortans found them one day -and took them to their city a thousand feet under the planet. These -Wortans, the few of them that remained, were quiet, kindly people. Ages -ago, they had fought their last retreat from the bitter surface cold. -They had dug beneath the crust. They were savages now, their former -mighty civilization forgotten, and were unlearned, save in agriculture -and the skillful breeding of such fur-and-meat-producing animals as the -<i>col</i>, the <i>friga</i>, the <i>hask-nor</i>. And, since they were human in form, -themselves, they accepted these strangers that came among them.</p> - -<p>They never came to the surface of Worta, but that unexplainable sense -of theirs which enabled them to perceive disharmony, much as one -flinches at a sour discord, brought them up to investigate.</p> - -<p>Carl was grateful to them for their simple wisdom, their understanding. -From the first, however, Rex was a "sour chord" among them. An inner -conceit, perhaps growing out of a race consciousness, painted him with -an unmasked hostility.</p> - -<p>But it was all of a year after their arrival before M'hort, chief of -the Wortans, revealed his feelings to Carl. He drew Carl into his -<i>meegan</i>—his rock-dwelling—one day. M'hort was tall as Carl, but his -eyes were faceted and insect-like, great horny reptilian lumps stood -out on his bony-joints, and his smoothly-scaled skin reflected the -eternal fluorescence of this underground land like a polished mirror.</p> - -<p>Carl's smile was rueful when M'hort explained about Rex. "Rex never was -one to get along with people. He told me you people don't like him."</p> - -<p>"How sad!" said M'hort.</p> - -<p>"He's never stopped dreaming that we might get back to Earth."</p> - -<p>"If only," said M'hort, "he would join us at our festivals as you do! -If only he would laugh when we gather for meals! But, ah, he will do -none of these things. Many times he sits in his <i>meegan</i> and broods. -You say he insists there is a way to return to your planet?"</p> - -<p>Carl was embarrassed for his friend. "When we first landed," he -explained, "Rex thought that somehow we could use the auxiliaries."</p> - -<p>"Ah, yes," said M'hort, trying hard to understand these things which -were strange to him. "The auxiliaries."</p> - -<p>"You see, we can manufacture unlimited quantities of rocket fuel with -the fuel-generator that most ships carry. It's a catalytic process, -the raw material being any fairly dense rock.</p> - -<p>"The auxiliaries were a sort of obsession with Rex. I couldn't control -him. In the few days before you found us, he manufactured seven or -eight tons of merbohydrate. He filled the ship full. I let him have his -way. We lifted the ship and left Worta. Rex was certain we could find -another planet and get back to Earth by a stepping-stone method."</p> - -<p>"Ah, but there are no other planets near enough," said M'hort, -recalling this fact which Carl had previously taught him.</p> - -<p>"Within light-years. As I say, I let Rex have his way until half the -fuel was used up. Then I had to fight him."</p> - -<p>Carl looked ashamedly at his fists. "I knocked him out as we came back -to Worta. But somehow he never gave up the idea that we could use the -auxiliaries somehow."</p> - -<p>"How very sad! And you say there is little chance of the Earth people -coming for you?"</p> - -<p>"Very little. Worta and its sun aren't even entered in the <i>Star -Catalogue</i>. It's an unlisted system, although the Stellar Survey -Institution has been working like crazy the past hundred years to -survey the whole works."</p> - -<p>M'hort touched the boy's hand sympathetically. "Someday they will come -for you! But, in the meantime, it would be wonderful if your friend saw -the futility of his ways."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>During the first year of their stay on Worta, Rex stayed close to Carl, -confiding in him, making those trips to the surface of the snowed-under -world. Then he took to wandering the great winding corridors and -chambers and dead underground cities of Worta alone. Carl would have -liked to explore with him, for there was an unending fascination in -this dying civilization. Once upon a time the Wortans had been great. -The quaint webbed architecture of the spired and domed buildings, the -delicate traceries, on the walls and the sculptured figures standing -in the squares—these were a timeless wonder. But Rex didn't want Carl -along, for Rex had closed up clam-like, his broad, square face held a -sullen fanaticism, and Carl knew he had his mind set on escape.</p> - -<p>Carl went to Rex's <i>meegan</i> and sat on his spider-silk chair and whiled -away the time by reading a scroll from the Wortan library until Rex -should return. Both Carl and Rex had learned the complex language, the -reading, the writing, the speaking of it, though Carl was much the more -proficient.</p> - -<p>Rex came in silently, a big man-size fellow with pale, beardless -cheeks, dressed Indian-like in the thin, cured leather of the <i>col</i>. -His moccasins padded and Carl looked up from the scroll with a start.</p> - -<p>Rex said shortly, "Hello, Carl." He threw himself on the pile of -sleeping-furs in the corner, locked his hands behind his head and -stared straight up at the fluorescent ceiling with hard, unblinking -eyes.</p> - -<p>Carl uncomfortably put the scroll away. "Rex, I want to have a talk -with you."</p> - -<p>"Shoot," said Rex.</p> - -<p>"You're not making it very easy for yourself, Rex."</p> - -<p>"Oh! You're going to start moralizing again!"</p> - -<p>"I wouldn't call it moralizing. I'm getting fed up with the way you -act, if you want it straight. The Wortans are swell people and I get -along with them fine. But it's just as if I was marooned alone. What I -mean is, I don't have anybody to talk to."</p> - -<p>Rex's lips curled in a half-smile. "Maybe you haven't treated me -half-decent, either, if you want to know it."</p> - -<p>"<i>I</i> haven't!"</p> - -<p>"Nope. You want to stick here the rest of your life in these crummy, -cold, underground rat-holes. No soap. I'm going to get back to Earth -somehow."</p> - -<p>"The auxiliaries," Carl said sarcastically.</p> - -<p>Rex came to his knees with a violent motion, eyes burning. "Don't talk -to me like that, Carl! I've got a way to get out of here."</p> - -<p>"Yeah?" Carl refused to be intimidated. "How's the master-mind going to -work it?"</p> - -<p>Rex paused and then said slowly, "I'm going to create a distress -signal."</p> - -<p>"Distress sig—" Carl stiffened incredulously. "Rex, you're nuts!"</p> - -<p>Rex smiled a slow, secret, satisfied smile. "I don't think so. 'Member -when we were scouts? 'Member that time we got lost in the Big Neck -Valley? We burned green wood and got a smoky fire started and used a -blanket to send up a smoky SOS signal. We knew the rest of the troop -was somewhere near and would see the signal. They came and got us.</p> - -<p>"Well, this is the same thing. We're lost. This solar system never has -been discovered, but we both know we're still in the known universe. -All around us, maybe no more than fifty or sixty light-days off, are -traffic lanes. Passenger ships, freighters. Then there's the SSI. It -has ships everywhere. I figure if we send out a distress signal they're -bound to see it over the sub-etheric, fifth-order ray detector. They'll -see that signal as soon as I get started."</p> - -<p>Carl was quiet. He was worried. This was a turn of affairs he hadn't -expected. He remembered how fixed Rex's mind was on the subject of -escape. Too fixed. Almost fanaticism. He hoped with all his heart Rex -wasn't sick. Yet that the kid should kneel there, with that brightness -in his eyes, and suggest sending up a distress signal which was to be -sent across billions of miles of space—</p> - -<p>"All right, Rex," he said gently. "I'm listening. You're to send up a -distress signal and attract the attention of a Stellar Survey ship."</p> - -<p>A derisive smile grew on Rex's lips. "You're listening," he scoffed. -"Liar. You think I'm bats. But I'll show you."</p> - -<p>He lay down again and turned his face to the wall and shortly Carl -heard his deep breathing. Carl left.</p> - -<p>That was in the second year. But another year passed. Carl found -himself growing up. He had the shoulders of a man, and he could look -back with a whimsical ruefulness on the immaturity which had led him -and Rex to run away from home like callow ten-year-olds.</p> - -<p>Carl longed for Earth, no less than Rex. Unlike Rex, he subdued the -longing, but whenever his lonesome thoughts threatened to engulf him he -diverted himself by climbing the thousand feet to the planet's surface. -It was on such a voyage that he found the space-ship gone.</p> - -<p>Carl and Rex had agreed to leave the ship on an eminence, so that if -anybody did come they would see the ship and investigate. But the ship -was undeniably gone, and Carl knew Rex had taken it.</p> - -<p>He stood on the icy mesa where they had parked it, and Carl looked out -on the drear vastness of Worta with sick eyes. He refused to believe -Rex had gone away and left him. He stayed there for hours, waiting, -then reluctantly went back into the bowels of Worta.</p> - -<p>Rex showed up for the evening meal, though, taking his place at the -great long <i>yee</i>—the festival table—where the forty-odd Wortans who -remained had their meals. After the meal, Carl cornered him.</p> - -<p>Rex twisted away from Carl's detaining hand. "I've got a right to take -a ride if I want to, haven't I?"</p> - -<p>Carl felt guilty at having even asked, the way Rex put it. Rex did have -that right. Carl let it slide. But the frequent disappearance of the -ship troubled him increasingly. Every time he stood hip-deep in snow on -the upper world and saw the ship was gone, a chill worked through his -heart. He would find himself looking into the lowering dark sky at the -impersonal stars. Fastening his gaze on the dying red star around which -Worta revolved. It was not a large sun. In another million years it -would burn out. Then Worta would truly be dead.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He was convinced there was more to Rex's use of the ship than the -loneliness of a nineteen-year-old wanting to take a ride. Rex had a -purpose. Yet he let it slide until the end of the fourth year. Then his -interference was not his doing. He was wandering far underground when a -runner came panting up.</p> - -<p>"M'hort must see you in his <i>meegan</i>," the runner panted.</p> - -<p>Carl went at once, heart constricted. Nothing ever happened in these -underground caves. Whatever M'hort wanted to see him about was urgent.</p> - -<p>M'hort met him at the entrance and gripped his arm. His eyes bored into -Carl's. "I sense that something is wrong, friend Carl," he said. "It is -a great terror in my breast. It is about Rex, of course. I see—I see a -great flame. Now tell me what you know!"</p> - -<p>Carl blurted out the story. "He's making plenty long trips someplace," -he said huskily. "He's been caving in a big hillside of rock these past -couple years. Making merbohydrate."</p> - -<p>M'hort's fear showed in his eyes. "There is no place for him to visit?"</p> - -<p>"Not a planetary body within countless billions of miles."</p> - -<p>M'hort paced. "We should not have this trouble," he said fretfully. "I -am most annoyed with Rex. Look at us of Worta. Do we not know we are -doomed, that the unhealthful conditions beneath Worta are producing a -sterility that will soon destroy us as if we had never been? Yet we are -gay and take what there is of life. Why must Rex make us all unhappy? -And I feel he is planning—something that can never be undone."</p> - -<p>He hesitated. "Carl, this merbohydrate—it is dangerous?"</p> - -<p>Carl laughed. "Just about the peppiest explosion known to the human -race." He touched M'hort's arm. "I'll find out what he's planning."</p> - -<p>Carl went straight to the surface and stood in the cave opening, his -breath hanging in puffy clouds of white. Rex was at that moment letting -down the ship's gangplank. He wheeled the fuel-generator out on its -short tripod.</p> - -<p>All day Carl watched as Rex set "pills" of merbohydrate into the rock -face of the snow-shorn, worked-over hill and detonated them. Tons of -chipped rock cascaded toward the mouth of the generator. Rex panted as -he worked with a square-point shovel. The twenty-pound merbohydrate -ingots came rolling out at the rate of one a minute. Rex carried the -ingots into the ship.</p> - -<p>As the red star was about to settle for the night behind the -sharply-silhouetted horizon, Rex wheeled the generator back into the -ship. About that time, Carl panted up the hill to the mesa level. -"Rex!" he called.</p> - -<p>Rex stood scowling near the airlock. Plainly, Carl was not welcome.</p> - -<p>Carl panted, "Going for a ride?"</p> - -<p>Rex's shoulders—broader by far than Carl's—bunched up. He growled, -"Yeah. <i>I'm taking a ride.</i>"</p> - -<p>"Swell. I'll go with you."</p> - -<p>"Nope."</p> - -<p>"Why not?"</p> - -<p>Rex turned and, with a single motion, jumped to the edge of the -airlock. He jeered, "I don't want any boy scouts along with me this -trip. G'bye!"</p> - -<p>Carl felt a rage he had never really shown Rex. He leaped. All it got -him was a bad fall on the slippery ice underfoot. When he finally got -to his feet, the airlock door was whining shut. A few seconds later, -the ship leaped away, the rocket apertures throwing out their blatting -swords of energy. The ship roared skyward.</p> - -<p>Carl stood looking after it, a wet crawling on his skin. He was -terribly frightened. The worst part of it was, he didn't know what was -frightening him. He turned and started back down the ladders to the -underground city.</p> - -<p>Four years, he thought, as he climbed the ladders down. Four years -we've been here. It seems forever since we ran away that night. And for -two of those years, Rex has been busy with something. Manufacturing -merbohydrate and taking trips out into space. Why?</p> - -<p><i>Distress signal!</i></p> - -<p>The two words hit him with smashing impact. He wrapped both hands -around the ladder, to keep himself from falling down the shaft. He -trembled and shook and dizzy spots grew in his eyes.</p> - -<p>He raised his head and shouted, "The fool!"</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus2.jpg" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>The lonesome echoes of his own madness came crashing back at him. He -hugged the ladder and wept. He could not say why he was crying, except -he felt he had been betrayed somehow. He knew he was young, too young -to deal with this tremendous horror Rex was planning. And M'hort had -sensed that horror.</p> - -<p>After awhile, he started climbing up again. There was a flame in his -heart, a heat that rived him, made him something less than human. He -was going to kill Rex if Rex didn't talk, didn't tell him the details -of the plan. As for the main plan, Carl already knew it.</p> - -<p>On the surface, he waited. The sun came up, moved redly toward noon. -The space-ship came back. As Rex appeared in the opening airlock, face -perspiring, lips set with a cruel satisfaction that did not belong to -youth, Carl jumped him. It was over in a moment. Rex lay unconscious.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>When Rex came to, Carl had the ship in the sky again, driving toward -the dying red sun. He left the controls again, and stood over Rex, who -was rope-bound to a chair.</p> - -<p>"I think," Carl said, his eyes burning, "I've put two and two together -at last. Took me a whale of a long time to do it, too. Now go ahead and -talk."</p> - -<p>Rex's square face was set into a disinterested mold. He looked Carl up -and down, shrugged. "Sure, I'll talk. But it won't do any good, Carl. -It's already fixed. Nothing you can do can change it. And it's funny -you picked out today to check up on me."</p> - -<p>"Just today?" Carl asked hollowly.</p> - -<p>"Just today." Rex spoke so calmly it was as if all the acid bitterness -in him had been alkalized in one moment. For the first time in many -months, he was a kid again, without a secret thought, without an -equivocation on his lips.</p> - -<p>Rex said, "There's two hundred thousand tons of merbohydrates out -there, Carl. It's taken me two years to manufacture the stuff. The most -powerful explosive ever invented.</p> - -<p>"You see, Carl, I wasn't as crazy as you thought when I said I was -going to send up a distress signal. It's a matter of nine or ten hours. -And you can't stop it."</p> - -<p>Carl stood with eyes closed, muscles iron-hard. "Rex," he said, "give -me the position coordinates of that two hundred thousand tons of -merbohydrate."</p> - -<p>Rex gave him the coordinates. Carl set the ship on a slightly different -course. An hour passed. The Wortan sun grew until it was a red globe -glued to space.</p> - -<p>Carl operated the photo-amplifiers, set the telescopic perilens into -position. Space expanded. In the vision plate grew a tiny dot that -seemed to rush rapidly into sight though it was still several hundred -thousand miles away. It resolved itself into detail—countless neatly -stacked and baled ingots of merbohydrate, each bale in turn attached to -another by short lengths of wire. The mass was a thirty-foot cube.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus1.jpg" alt=""/> - <div class="caption"> - <p>In the vision plate grew a tiny dot....</p> - </div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>In the matter of size, it was a speck in space.</p> - -<p>In the matter of explosive potentialities, it was a bomb of untold -violence, falling toward the dying red star.</p> - -<p>Carl got another notch of speed from the ship. He was abruptly aware -that sweat had formed stickily on his body. A blast of furnace heat was -already radiating from the bulkheads.</p> - -<p>Behind him, Rex said derisively, "Save yourself the trouble. You can't -catch up with it. It's inside the boiling zone, you idiot.</p> - -<p>"For two years, Carl, that mass of merbohydrate was on an orbit about -the sun. Every once in a while I'd come out and add more to the main -mass. Today I figured I had enough. I hauled it out of its orbit, took -it as close as I could to the sun. Right smack to the edge of the -boiling zone. Then I gave it a running start and let go. The sun and -the merbohydrate will meet at the convergence of their trajectories."</p> - -<p>"Then what?"</p> - -<p>Rex laughed. "Distress signal!"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>It was hotter as they moved toward the sun. Carl was sopping. The very -air danced. Under him the chair was beginning to burn him. The cosmic -bomb was a full three hundred thousand miles inside the boiling zone. -Carl could never catch up with it. He wordlessly banked the ship in a -long half-circle that put it a hundred miles inside the boiling zone, -and then on the road out.</p> - -<p>He poured in every ounce of power he could, while thoughts zig-zagged -crazily in his head. He had gone beyond rage. He had ascended the scale -of human emotion and he was numb.</p> - -<p>When the ship was near Worta, he turned on Rex. "What," he said, "do -you expect to gain by this?"</p> - -<p>"Rescue."</p> - -<p>"What about the Wortans?"</p> - -<p>A simmering violence burst in Rex's eyes. His muscles bulged against -his bonds. "The Wortans!" he mimicked. "The Wortans! If you love those -Wortans so much why don't you plan to live with them the rest of your -life? They never did like me, and that goes double."</p> - -<p>Carl said gently, "You don't murder people you don't like."</p> - -<p>"Murder?" the word came sharply. He relaxed. "They don't use their -sun. They won't miss it."</p> - -<p>"How about their planet?"</p> - -<p>Rex looked at him. Then his eyes shifted. He muttered, "The explosion -won't touch Worta. Too far away."</p> - -<p>Carl said, "The explosion will rip that planet crossways and endways. -It'll turn it inside out. It'll tear it up into little pin-size lumps, -roast and boil the lumps, and dissipate the lumps into gases made of -dancing free electrons. That big gob of gas will puff itself out over -a few light-years of space, and that will be the end of Worta. Maybe -you didn't think of that. Or maybe you convinced yourself it wouldn't -happen."</p> - -<p>A trapped expression grew on Rex's face. "It <i>won't</i> happen!" he -shouted. He screamed, "Let me alone! Stop badgering me! You can't -change anything. I didn't know if it'd hurt Worta or not. I didn't -care any more. I came back to Worta to get you, just in case something -happened I didn't figure on. All I cared about was getting home. I want -to go home!"</p> - -<p>He dropped his head, drawing in great tearing sobs, his broad shoulders -quaking.</p> - -<p>Carl said calmly, "Well, we're going back to Worta to get the Wortans."</p> - -<p>Rex raised his head, his face violent with protest. "We haven't got -time."</p> - -<p>"We'll take time."</p> - -<p>Rex cursed him viciously.</p> - -<p>"In the meantime," Carl continued without change of tone, "sit there. -Start thinking. Think about M'hort and the other Wortans. Think of how -they saved our lives and accepted us as if we're part of them. Think of -all the hospitality you accepted at their <i>yee</i>."</p> - -<p>Carl's voice was rising. "Think of their dead cities. Think of all the -dead men who built those cities and the artists who made those cities -beautiful with their statues and paints. Then think how you will have -destroyed all that."</p> - -<p>Rex said nothing. Color was flooding from his face, his lips thinning -until they formed one pale slash across his face. Carl looked at him -with wordless contempt, then swung about to maneuver the ship for the -final thousand miles to a landing.</p> - -<p>A gong sounded from the instrument board.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>It came so suddenly that Carl jumped halfway from the bucket-seat. He -gripped the edge of the board, eyes forced open so wide they hurt. He -waiting, knowing he had misheard. The gong came again.</p> - -<p>Behind him, Rex made an insane gurgling noise. "They've come! They've -come!"</p> - -<p>Carl's hands were shaking violently as he adjusted the teleview, -snapped in the audio. In the teleview gray clouds formed, took on -shape, and that shape became the head and shoulders of a man in the -trim, pale blue uniform of the Stellar Survey Institution.</p> - -<p>Small muscles around the man's eyes and mouth contracted as he saw -Carl. He frowned. He said, "You are Carl Wyant and Rex Oberling?"</p> - -<p>"Yes, sir," Carl said humbly.</p> - -<p>"You will stay where you are. We will pick you up in seven hours. You -may consider that a command."</p> - -<p>"Yes, sir," replied Carl. "But we can't obey it. I'd advise you, sir, -not to come within ten billion miles of the dwarf-red star. It's a -potential super-nova. We will meet you at—"</p> - -<p>The officer's glance sharpened. "You're talking nonsense. Why is -Oberling bound in that chair?"</p> - -<p>Carl said wearily, "It's a long story, sir. May I ask your present -position?"</p> - -<p>The Stellar Survey man's image grew a little in the plate as he leaned -forward, as if to get a better look at Carl's face. He drew back. He -said, "We are at present roughly twenty-two light-days distant, viewing -you by instantaneous fifth-order reception."</p> - -<p>"That's even better than ten billion miles, sir. If you stay where you -are and keep your beam on, we can signal you when we get a billion -miles from Worta. Then you can come forward and pick us up."</p> - -<p>Before the officer could say what was starting on his lips, Carl banged -his hand excitedly on the instrument board and shouted hysterically, -"I'm warning you, sir. I'm warning you!"</p> - -<p>The man looked unsettled. His glance wavered. "Very well, Wyant. It's -a strange proceeding, but I trust you. We will expect you." The screen -blanked.</p> - -<p>Fifteen minutes later Carl landed the ship. He got up stiffly. Rex sat -motionless, eyes turned straight ahead, unblinking, unseeing.</p> - -<p>"I'm leaving you here until I get the Wortans," Carl told him. "Don't -try anything silly."</p> - -<p>Rex moved his head until his eyes rested on Carl's. He said quietly, -"Carl, for your own good, don't bother. Do you think for a minute the -Wortans are going to leave their planet at this stage of the game? -They're done for anyway. You wouldn't expect a bunch of corpses to get -out of their coffins and try a different coffin, would you? That's the -way it is with the Wortans."</p> - -<p>When Carl said nothing, Rex said, in that same quiet voice, "Carl, I -<i>know</i>."</p> - -<p>Carl turned uncertainly away, moved to the instrument board. His own -voice sounded far away. "I'll convince them," he said. "I'll bring them -back. They've <i>got</i> to come."</p> - -<p>Carl took all the keys out of the instrument board. Without the keys, -the ship was inoperable. He left the ship, stumbled as in a dream -across the dreary wastes of lifeless snow. Then, as the cold struck -deep at his lungs, his thoughts clarified, and he went with quick, -driven panic.</p> - -<p>How soon the merbohydrate would strike the red star he had no idea. -But it would be soon. He made a break-neck descent. He burst into that -small section of one of the underground cities where the Wortans lived, -went straight to the <i>meegan</i> of M'hort.</p> - -<p>He told M'hort the whole story.</p> - -<p>M'hort sat cross-legged. A resigned sadness lidded his eyes. Carl knew -his answer. He dropped to his knees. "No! You can't speak for the rest -of your people. They want to live. And the Wortans can still be great. -Why—why, we'll give you a planet in our own system!"</p> - -<p>M'hort smiled as if at a secret, foolish thought, his eyes averted. -Then he arose and drew Carl up with him. His eyes glittered with the -reflected fluorescence of the underground. Carl was held rigid.</p> - -<p>M'hort said, "You are youth, and you answer as youth would answer. I am -age, Carl, and I answer as only age can answer. We will stay.</p> - -<p>"What is there to fear? What is there to grieve for? It is a great -providence that sent you here to us. You see! Soon we would all have -died, but lingeringly. Now there is glory to dying, for there will be -no ugly pain. And we will not be unknown to the other peoples of the -universe, Carl, for you will carry our immortality."</p> - -<p>"That," said Carl, bitterly, "is a hell of an immortality."</p> - -<p>M'hort laughed. "It is better than we expected. Now go."</p> - -<p>And Carl went, blindly.</p> - -<p>He reached the ship in less than an hour. He entered, dogged the -airlocks shut, went slowly toward the transparent door of the control -room. He threw open the door and stood looking at the empty chair and -the tattered strands of rope which had held Rex. He was drained of -emotion, though, and he leaned weakly against the door jamb. Finally he -moved, left the ship, and spent another hour looking for Rex.</p> - -<p>He didn't find him. Rex had consciously obscured his tracks. He went -back to the ship, smiling without mirth. That was funny. Rex drove -himself crazy figuring out a way to get back to Earth for four years. -Then he backed out. He had chosen the same path as the Wortans, and -maybe for as good a reason....</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He drove straight away from the dying red sun. A billion miles out, he -was picked up by the stately ship of the Stellar Survey. He was ushered -into the presence of the officer who had appeared in the teleview -plate. That individual was cold in his welcome.</p> - -<p>"You've cost the tax-payers a mint of money," he growled. "They've had -ships on the lookout for you for four years. Where's the other young -fellow?"</p> - -<p>Carl told the story while the officer slowly tensed. Then he looked -annoyed. "It seems a little extreme for Oberling to have committed -suicide."</p> - -<p>"Maybe, sir. Except that one doesn't go around destroying solar systems -without a good reason. If you hadn't shown up when you did—"</p> - -<p>"There would have been a good reason?" The officer sat silent. "Yes, -I suppose so. A classical bit of irony, that. Destroying a sun to -attract rescuers—then the rescuers spoil the drama of it by showing up -ahead of time. And the funny part of it is that it would have worked."</p> - -<p>He seemed to recollect. He hastily snapped in the teleview, motioned -Carl to come around to his side of the desk.</p> - -<p>"Chances are," the officer said, consulting some figures, "We'll see a -merry hell-fire in the next few minutes."</p> - -<p>Ten minutes later, the red star exploded.</p> - -<p>It cracked into three separate pieces. They held that position, each -section racing from red to violet. That changed blindingly to magnesium -white. The glare smashed at the eyeballs. The three pieces in turn -shattered each other as they puffed up. Then the whole spurted into -a violence that lighted all the black sky with recurring, silently -throbbing sheets of shattering luminescence.</p> - -<p>The stars were blotted out in that primeval surf of untamed energy.</p> - -<p>The planet Worta was caught, flamed in glory for the small part of a -second.</p> - -<p>The big space-ship trembled in every beam and partition as the -wave-front of exploding light reached it.</p> - -<p><i>Distress signal!</i></p> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DISTRESS SIGNAL ***</div> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>This file should be named 64175-h.htm or 64175-h.zip</div> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in https://www.gutenberg.org/6/4/1/7/64175/</div> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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