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diff --git a/old/64722-0.txt b/old/64722-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index a1058ea..0000000 --- a/old/64722-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,1119 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Alpha Say, Beta Do, by Alfred E. Maxell - -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: Alpha Say, Beta Do - -Author: Alfred E. Maxell - -Release Date: March 06, 2021 [eBook #64722] - -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 ALPHA SAY, BETA DO *** - - - - - Alpha Say, Beta Do - - by ALFRED E. MAXWELL - - Precise Doyle Tindar and prim Kay Kanton - had themselves duplicated, standard practice - for trouble-shooting in space. But the - duplicates fell in love--and what happened - then was neither practice nor standard! - - [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from - Planet Stories Summer 1950. - Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that - the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] - - -Doyle Tindar was awakened by the urgent buzzing of the visor-phone by -his bed. He grumbled, rolled over, glanced at the view-plate and winced -as he saw the fat, grim face of the Control Board Director, Sam Penset. -He sat up, yawned, and snapped the set on. - -"Yeah?" - -"Listen, Tindar," Penset boomed and Tindar turned the volume down. -"We've got a large pile of trouble. No reports from the mines on Bolus -last night. Automatic radio communication absolutely dead. Power -plant may have caught a meteor, but it would have to be a large one. -Telescope won't tell us anything. Get out there, will you?" - -"Say, I'm on vacation, if you don't mind," Tindar said. "What about -Bedding? Or Teppen?" - -"Bedding's on a honeymoon, damn him," Penset growled, "and Teppen's -getting some new teeth planted. It has to be you." - -"Miss Kanton's going out there tomorrow," Tindar insisted, not -relishing a space trip since he was on his first vacation in a year. - -"I've thought of that," Penset boomed back. "She couldn't report fully -on the state of affairs. She's a meter-reader. Strictly a control-room -worker. Nothing to do with the power plant or the actual mines." - -"Okay," Tindar sighed, "I'll get on it. I'll leave Hessing Field this -afternoon. Do I get a bonus?" - -"Yeah, you thief," Penset smiled, "but get duplicated. You'll have -enough work for two men." - -"Okay." - -"And, Tindar--" Penset signaled him to stay on the air--"I've just -thought of something. Miss Kanton had better go to Bolus with you. -Might as well clean up the whole mess at once." - -"Okay," Tindar said, waved and shut the set off. - -He climbed out of bed very slowly and shuffled across the room in a -pair of frayed slippers. He went to the bathroom, mixed and drank -a stimulant to snap him out of his stupor. He lit a cigarette and -rummaged around in his closet until he found his space suit. - -Since Miss Kanton was going to be on the trip with him, the job was -more attractive. He mused about the very nice-looking Miss Kanton for -a moment, then began dressing hurriedly. He'd have to get down to the -duplication labs before the noon rush. - - * * * * * - -Washed, attired in the space suit he wanted his duplicate to wear, -and considerably more awake, Tindar stood before the reception desk -of the Central Commercial Duplication Laboratories of North America -with his governmental certificates of permission for his "duping." The -white-uniformed woman receptionist studied his certificates, handed him -an identification disc and waved him on. She pressed a button on the -desk and the information about him was wired to the other stations. - -An attendant met and ushered him down a long, cool, white corridor -to the section of the building devoted to the duplication of living -matter. Another attendant took him from the first and whisked him up in -an elevator to the floor where, as the somber sign stated, "Duplication -of the Human Being" was carried on. He was directed to a pneumatic -chair in the waiting room and he sat down. - -Tindar had never ceased to wonder at the startling work done in this -massive building, which most people, over the course of the last -hundred years of its use, had come to consider a natural part of the -bustling, scientific worlds. C.D. Labs, holding a benevolent monopoly -on the process, could duplicate anything composed of atoms and smaller -than a three-storied dwelling in a matter of minutes. The products of -such duplication existed only for a period of about eighty hours, but -it had proved to be a tremendously utilitarian device in duplicating -oil and coal for immediate use; in duplicating the bodies of persons -undergoing operations for dissection before the operation; for creating -microbes of diseases and studying their effects upon the body, after -which they would conveniently disappear, and for duplicating persons -whose talents or brawn were needed briefly for special problems. This -last use had been a great aid to industries by providing living, -breathing, duplicates of specially trained men in times of need; which -times were frequent since the peoples of earth were spread so thinly -over seven planets and thousands of asteroids. - -A nurse came into the waiting room with a glass of brown fluid on -a tray. Tindar, no novice at duplication, smiled at the nurse in -recognition, took the glass and drank it down. It was a sedative that -would put him deeply to sleep in a few minutes, so that he could be -pleasantly oblivious to the slight discomfort of the duplication cell. - -He followed the nurse into the "Dupe" room and ran a familiar eye over -the shining and ponderous equipment. He knew the theory vaguely. Space, -warped, formed positive and negative fields. These fields, subjected to -warping and energy changes, formed nascent matter, unstable and simple. -Warped again, the inchoate matter formed into molecular substances -identical with the pattern electrically projected into it. Whatever -was placed in the primary chamber was pierced back and forth at every -possible angle by a thousand different types of rays and emanations -from the energy sources about the primary chambers. These rays were -then the energy directed into the swirling haze of nascent matter. An -identical object would take form in about five minutes time and the -product's differences from the "pattern object" could not be detected -by the strongest microscope. - -"Simple," the man in the street might say. Tindar, more familiar with -the theory of operation, was also more conscious of the hundreds and -hundreds of years of research upon which the theory was based. He had -always held a tremendous respect for the scientists who fathered the -amazing invention. - -Tindar climbed up onto the pneumatic cot and was slipped into the -primary cylinder. He was slipping slowly into the mist of sleep as the -door of the primary chamber clanked softly behind him. He gazed for a -moment at the thousand lens-eyes on the curving walls about him. The -eyes suddenly shown with all the colors of the spectrum and bathed his -body in a weird and twisted rainbow of heterogeneous rays.... - - * * * * * - -Two Tindars awoke abruptly and sat up on the pneumatic cots. They saw -that the cots had been moved and rested against another in a corner of -the room. They looked at one another. - -"Who's who?" one of them asked. - -"We'll have to wait for the attendants," the other shrugged. It was -odd. That was practically all you ever had to say to yourself. - -Down the hall feet slapped rapidly on the floor and approached the -"Dupe" chamber. A taut-faced attendant looked into the room and waved -at them frantically with a trembling hand. - -"Don't get off your cots, please, sirs," he quavered and was gone. - -The Tindars stared at one another. - -"Something novel," they both said. - -"Listen to the hell they're raising in the other room," one said, -breaking the identity of their thought streams. - -Visor-phones were buzzing; at least a dozen voices were raised in -a furious discussion. Another voice could be heard, pleading and -distraught. More attendants ran up and down the hall before the "Dupe" -chamber. Three uniformed men with faces as white as their uniforms -rushed through the waiting room and faced the Tindars. - -"Dr. Bronsky will be here in a moment, sirs," one of them said. - -"What's the matter?" one of the Tindars asked. - -"Dr. Bronsky will be here presently, sirs," the attendant repeated. - -Dr. Bronsky came into the room with a retinue of flustered assistants. -He nodded to the Tindars and worked his lips around as he waited for a -pale little man to shuffle nervously into the room. - -"Now, Endicott, how did you move the cots around? Try to remember." The -doctor spoke with a fatherly air to the little man. - -"I don't know ... I was thinking of something else," Endicott whined. -"I was polishing the floors. They have to be cleaned by ten o'clock. I -was working with the sterilizer on the floors. I moved the cots to get -them out of my road. I thought they were identified." - -"Thought!" snorted Dr. Bronsky. "Since when does a damned fool think!" - -"I'm sorry, Dr. Bronsky," the little man pleaded. "It's a rule. The -floors have to be cleaned...." - -"It is also a rule--a primary rule, Endicott, that identification of -the 'pattern' is second only to the welfare of the 'pattern'," the -doctor stormed. He gestured wildly in silence for a few minutes, then -burst out again. "Get out! I will not have asses in my ward! Get out! -You're fired!" - -The little man shuffled abjectly out. One Tindar turned to Dr. Bronsky. - -"What's the fury about?" he asked. - -The doctor gestured the rest of his assistants and attendants out and -closed the door. He worked his lips nervously for a few seconds. - -"An unprecedented occurrence has blackened the record of Commercial -Duplication. You shall have a perfect right to sue, but I'm sure that -President Histar will settle satisfactorily with you out of court." He -paused as if it were painful to go on. "That attendant--that double, -double damned fool has mixed you up before you were stamped. One minute -the controller is out of the room and he does it! We have no means in -our power now to tell which of you is the duplicate and which is the -original. We have one hope. Perhaps one of you woke up before you were -removed from the chambers? Perhaps one of you remembers which chamber -he was in?" - -"The last thing I recall is dozing off in the primary," one Tindar said. - -"Same here," the other said. - -"This is indeed regrettable!" boomed the doctor. "It's unheard of!" - -"It's not that serious, doctor," one of the Tindars said. "We can still -do our work. One of us shall disappear on the way back, that's all. The -only inconvenience shall be having to bring the duplicate part of the -way back." - -"But who shall be your pilot?" the doctor mused, "if on the way back -the one piloting the ship were to disappear...." - -"We have another person with us," a Tindar said. "I think that -everything will be quite all right." - -"Well, we shall see. Apologies will be made to your corporation and -a settlement of some kind, of course," Dr. Bronsky shrugged. "There -is extremely little else that we can do. Until one of you dissipates, -I suggest that you--" he indicated one Tindar--"be Alpha Tindar, and -you--" he indicated the other--"be Beta Tindar. It might simplify -matters." - -The doctor himself checked them out at the desk and followed them to -the door full of regrets at the event. - - * * * * * - -Alpha and Beta Tindar ate a hearty meal at a cafe, then phoned Miss -Kanton and felt better seeing her face in the view-plate. It was a nice -face, a bit solemn, but nice. She had brown eyes and a burnt-honey mass -of hair. They found that she was already out of the Dupe Labs and was -waiting for them. - -An electric car whisked to the place where Miss Kanton stayed. They -liked Miss Kanton, but her coolness and aloofness they did not like. -She was a woman technician, a capable intelligent young woman who, the -Tindars privately thought, could be an extremely nice person to have -around if she would cease playing the part of the scientist for a few -minutes. Her smile, her figure, her face all checked perfectly. But her -mind was as sexless as an adding machine that had been left out in the -snow. - -She came down the walk towards the car with her dupe, each with a -brief-case under one arm. The Tindars glanced simultaneously at her -ankles, but found them covered by the leather boots of her space suit. - -"This is my dupe," Miss Kanton said as she came up to the car, -indicating her duplicate who had a white top to her suit collar. - -"Hello, muscles!" greeted the dupe of Miss Kanton. "Call me Kay, will -you?" - -Miss Kanton looked startled and the two Tindars quietly gulped a -greeting. - -"I'm afraid I have a rather wild replica of myself," Miss Kanton said -with surprise. "I'm glad she's only good for eighty hours. But she -could ruin my reputation in thirty seconds." - -"Quit worrying about your reputation," scolded the merry dupe. "Get -those meter-readings out of your mind and think more about these two -exciting hunks of masculinity here in the car." - -"Katherine!" Miss Kanton shrieked. "I will not tolerate any such -inopportune mouthing. Behave yourself!" - -"It's just your inner self speaking, sister," the dupe replied with a -chuckle. - -"Katherine!" Miss Kanton gasped. "Mr. Tindar, you will ignore this, -please?" - -Miss Kanton and her dupe climbed into the car and Alpha Tindar pressed -a button, sending them purring quietly down the street towards the -rocket port. - -"Which of you is the dupe?" Miss Kanton asked. - -"We don't know," the Tindars answered. - -"What!" - -Together Alpha and Beta explained the unusual situation. Miss Kanton -was shocked by the freak accident, but she smiled. Her dupe laughed and -quickly sobered. - -"Hell!" she said, "If I knew which was the dupe we could have a -wonderful eighty hours!" - -The quartet arrived at Hessing Field a few minutes later and Alpha -Tindar went into the Rocket Dispatcher's office to check on the ship. -He came back and threw his hands up in the air. - -"Another dilemma!" he exclaimed. "No four-seaters. Just those damned -two-seaters. We'll have to take two of them." - -"Well, get a couple of Armstrongs," Beta said. "They're about the best." - -"I'll take a Boison, myself," Miss Kanton said. "Armstrongs have a -shimmy when they're a couple of years old." - -"The strong-willed woman scientist!" her dupe sneered. "Armstrongs are -the better ships." - -"Katherine!" Miss Kanton ejaculated. "I'll have you dissipated if you -continue this! I shall not tolerate much more!" - -"You haven't time, granny," her dupe replied blithely. - -The field pilots jetted the small two-seater ships out onto the field -and into the launching cradles. When they were readied and equipped, -the pilots signaled the Tindars and the Kantons. - -"Beta, you and Miss Kanton's dupe take one," Alpha Tindar said. -"Miss Kanton will drive me in the other. If there is a preliminary -dissipation of one of us, no one will be hurt that way." - -Beta nodded and Miss Kanton's dupe grabbed his hand and ran for one of -the ships. - -"I honestly believe she's been drinking," Miss Kanton murmured, -watching her duplicate laughing as Beta helped her into the ship. - -Alpha walked in a slow and stately manner to the other ship and opened -the air-lock for the girl. - -The ships flashed jets out of their rear tubes and rose slowly from -the ground cradles. A thunderous roar sent them both soaring into the -stratosphere, where the ships veered together and rocketed out of sight -towards the band of transplanted asteroids that swung in an orbit -around the earth two hundred thousand miles beyond the moon. - -Alpha Tindar settled himself deeper into the tight, sponge spring chair -by Miss Kanton's side and watched with admiration the magnificent -piloting job his "atomic brother" was doing. The other ship was keeping -exactly abreast of Miss Kanton who was setting the pace. - -Tindar was falling asleep when Miss Kanton switched on the intership -radio. She called the other ship over the phones and all that came in -answer were giggles. Miss Kanton quietly replaced the microphone and -stared straight ahead on her course with a slightly red face. - - * * * * * - -Twenty hours later they were circling Bolus preparatory to landing. As -was the policy when dropping down upon open land, they switched on the -anti-gravity fields, blasted themselves to a dead stop and sank slowly -down onto the furrowed land of the asteroid mine. - -The ships thumped down within three hundred feet of one another. Miss -Kanton hurriedly snapped on her oxygen helmet, and Alpha followed her -through the air-lock. Instead of going towards the control tower, which -rose from the blue land like a pale yellow candle, Miss Kanton ran -to the other ship and pounded on the door until Beta Tindar and the -girl-dupe opened it and stepped out. - -"What have you been doing, Katherine?" Miss Kanton asked over the -helmet radio. - -"Telling secrets to each other, granny," the dupe laughed. Alpha Tindar -was a trifle envious of the smile on Beta's face. - -Miss Kanton flushed and turned away towards the Central Tower. The -other three caught up with her and four abreast they walked lightly -over the rough plain. Through the thin atmosphere and over the helmet -phones they heard the crashing drone of the mine in operation. To -the Tindars it did not sound right. There was too much noise. The -robot-diggers and refiners were supposedly working far below the ground. - -Ahead of them, over the close horizon, sprang a great, looming metal -shape that filled the air with the roar of its engines. It rushed -towards them with a flat, toothed platform lowered slightly into the -ground. The platform was nearly twenty feet in length, with a thousand -metal claws above it hungrily scooping the soil up into the black maw -of the storage bin that swelled from it like a monstrous belly. - -"It's a digger!" Alpha cried. "Get out of the way!" - -In the weak gravity they were able to move by bounds out of the path -of the mining machine. It roared past them, tearing up the ground in a -dumb frenzy. - -"The ships!" Miss Kanton shouted, screaming above the roar of the -Digger. - -[Illustration: _"There goes our ship!" Kay screamed._] - -"Too late!" Beta gasped. "It has one!" - -There was a crashing clank and the cry of twisted steel as the machine -grabbed the small rocket ship up and crushed it in its jaws. The ship -vanished into the bulging bin that followed the mouth on swiftly -spinning wheels. The digger growled over the other horizon, leaving in -its wake a shallow, wide furrow. - -"I'll get the other ship to safety!" Alpha cried and ran towards it. - -"What are the Diggers doing on the surface?" Miss Kanton asked Beta. -"They're supposed to be underground." - -"Something is all wrong," Beta said. "The Controls are obviously -scrambled. Radio guides the diggers, keeps them underground until -they're full, then lets them come up to empty." - -"Do you think you can fix it?" Miss Kanton's dupe asked. - -"If it's external trouble, yes," Beta said. "But if it's inside the -seals, we'd never be able to get at it. Everything is sealed against -tampering. The controls are in vaults. How they ever got scrambled, I -can't imagine." - -"No wonder there weren't any radio reports," Miss Kanton said. "This -place is a madhouse! Look, here comes another one!" - -Another Digger appeared on the horizon but it was far to one side, a -moving shape against the stars. - -"We'd better get into the control tower," Beta said. "It's probably the -only safe place on this rock." - -They were illuminated momentarily by the blasting jet of the ship as -it arced upwards from the uneven ground. As they hurried towards the -tower, the ship blasted past them and whistled to a halt near the door -of the tower. - -The quartet gathered together near the door and watched with amazement -as six more of the huge diggers appeared, grunting and rooting at the -soil like mammoth pigs. Two crashed together with a terrific clank of -metal and their wheels dug up the ground as they hung locked together, -whirring thunderously. - -The four went into the tower, down the metal corridors to the elevator -which took them to the floor with the control boards. Beta pressed a -combination on the buttons of the door which shut off the room with the -central boards. The door whined slowly open. - -"The door's warped," Alpha observed. "There must have been an explosion -inside." - -They entered the room and at first nothing seemed wrong. The great -metal vault in the center of the room seemed intact, the walls were -whole. Beta walked around the vault, which rose like a fat column from -the metal floor to the ceiling. Alpha came to his side when he heard -him exclaim. - -"Look at the wall," Beta said. - - * * * * * - -There was a hole the size of a basketball in one side of the wall. The -metal about it was melted, bulging out in a fringe around the hole -and running down the wall to the floor. Alpha traced the probable -trajectory of the missile which had made the hole and found another -hole, much smaller, on the face of the vault. The walls of the vault -were buckled slightly inward. - -The two Tindars stared from one hold to the other in amazement. The -Kantons came to their side. - -"No meteor did that!" Miss Kanton's dupe said. - -"It's hardly possible, unless ..." Beta paused. "Power was packed into -it, whatever it was!" - -"It penetrated three feet of tension steel at the very least," Alpha -said. "Nothing as small as this meteor seems to me could have done -that." - -"Unless ..." Beta paused again. "The momentum is what counted. Suppose -that the mass was terrific, the speed equally terrific?" - -Alpha and Beta snapped their fingers at the same instant. -"Neutronium!" they said. - -"We've found several bits of it already in space," Alpha added. -"Terrific mass. That's the only possible solution." - -"A piece of neutronium, of high velocity, accelerated by the gravity of -Bolus, plus opposite velocities. That would have done it," Miss Kanton -said. - -They were speaking quickly, their keen minds suddenly tearing the veil -from the problem with a scientific hunger. - -"That's that, then," Alpha sighed as if it had been too easy. - -"Wrong," Miss Kanton's dupe interposed. "Look at these meters!" - -The other three went to her side. The meters were jumping crazily from -maximum to minimum, their needles bent and twisted. Another type was -rapidly clicking off numerals on its way down to zero. Miss Kanton -tapped it. - -"That's the fuel tanks," she said. - -"They're draining somewhere!" Alpha said. - -"Down, naturally!" the girl-dupe said. "The engine room covers the -whole underground floor! If--" - -"If the sparks from the engines touch that fuel--!" Beta cried. He -turned to the door and ran from the room with the others on his heels. - -The elevator dropped them to the lower floor. The corridor was filled -knee-deep with a pale, bluish fluid--explosive fuel! It poured like a -blue waterfall down the steps leading to the engines. Alpha opened the -doors of the elevator and the syrupy liquid flooded in upon him. He -waded into it and to the steps where he stumbled to the lower floor. -The others were right behind him. - -"What about friction?" Miss Kanton asked, conscious of the metal studs -of her suit clicking against each other. - -"Have to chance it," Beta snapped. - -They went into the engine room, wading carefully through the azure -fluid. In the main room they saw the fuel slowly creeping up the fat -legs of the whirring engines towards the network of sparks that could -be seen through the ventilator grills. - -"Isn't there any way to shut them off?" Miss Kanton gasped. - -Alpha shook his head grimly. - -"No. All controls are sealed. Can only be manipulated by Cooperation -Engineers," he said. - -"Six inches more," Miss Kanton said, looking at the fuel flowing -beneath the engine. - -"We'd best get out of here fast!" Alpha said. "In ten minutes the -Corporation is out one asteroid." - -They were running up the stairs, pushing into the elevator. Beta shoved -the door slowly against the pressure of the blue syrup. He shot the car -back to the ground level. Here there was no sign of the fuel which was -pouring down a stairs around a turn in the corridor. They ran down the -hall to the door, the Tindars each gripping the arm of a Kanton. - -"Wait!" Miss Kanton was crying, "wait! The ship. We've only got one! -We can only take two persons back. And you ... which of you...." She -stopped, aghast and panting, looking from Alpha to Beta. - -The Tindars stiffened and gasped as the full implication of what she -meant hit them. - -"Take the ship!" Miss Kanton was sobbing. "Both of you! Go on!" - -"Don't be foolish!" Beta snapped. "Get into the ship and get the jets -warm. We'll be there in a minute." - -"But if you get the wrong one?" Miss Kanton said, trembling. - -"The right one will be left back here," Alpha snapped. "Now get into -the ship. We've only got a few minutes!" - -Miss Kanton turned and ran. She climbed into the two-seater and jetted -the rockets. As the tubes roared out a tongue of flame, over the -horizon came a Digger, eating the soil, dashing towards the control -tower. - -"We both might be able to get into the ship...." Beta said. - -"No. The seats are tailor-made. We'd never cram into them together," -Alpha said. They stood looking at one another, wasting valuable seconds -in their consternation. The Digger was looming larger and larger, -roaring in a straight line for the control tower. - -"Oh, Doyle...." Miss Kanton's dupe said, tears in her eyes. - -"Shut up!" Alpha snapped. He whirled towards the thunder of the -Digger. It was very near, swerving, slowly turning away from the -control with a ponderous gyration. - -"It's going to hit!" Alpha cried, leaping back. - -The edge of the huge metal mouth struck the corner of the control -tower, shaking the entire building and sending an avalanche of concrete -down from the facade. Alpha was struck by pieces of the debris as he -bounded away from the door of the building. The debris piled into the -doorway, jamming it. Beta's head rose over the pile. - -"Beat it!" he screamed, "I'll never get past that Digger!" - -Alpha ran towards the ship and climbed into it. Crazy thoughts ran -through his head as he squeezed himself into the seat. It was a one to -one bet. A fifty-fifty chance. Better than some odds he had had. It was -a decent gamble, but the stakes.... - -He sealed the door and Miss Kanton sent the rocket spiraling up into -the clear sky. She drew out of the range of the imminent explosion and -circled the little asteroid, waiting. - - * * * * * - -Inside the control tower, Beta brushed the dust of the wreckage from -him and hurried down the corridor, pulling the girl-dupe by the arm. - -"What are you doing? What if you're the real one? Oh, Doyle...." she -moaned irrationally. - -Beta went back to the engine room. He waded through the fuel with the -girl-dupe behind him. - -"We have another bet, just in case," Beta said. "Those hoses...." He -pointed at the wall above the humming engines. - -The dupe's eyes brightened. - -"If only we have time!" she said. "I'll get them. It's dangerous up -there. You might be electrocuted. It doesn't matter with myself." - -Beta started to protest, then he saw the logic of the girl's -suggestion. He nodded curtly, and helped her climb upon the engine. She -teetered precariously, slipping on the slime of the fuel which was on -her feet. - -She reached up and twisted the nozzle of a hose, unscrewing it from -the engine. Her face was twisted awry with effort, her slim body bent -in straining against the stubborn threads. It loosened and she dropped -it down to Beta who was standing in the swirling blue fluid, waiting. - -He snatched it up. - -"Get the others, quick!" he shouted, watching with horrified -fascination as the fuel crept up to meet the network of sparks. - -The girl struggled silently. Beta could hear her quick breathing in his -head phones. The engines whirred, the sparks flashing down towards the -explosive fluid. - -She dropped another of the hoses to Beta. The third one was free and -in his hands when she began working on the fourth. She slipped; the -sparks danced up, touching the legs of her suit. The lower part of her -suit burst into flame, soaked as it was with the fuel. She watched the -flames, her face blanched white, as they ate into her suit. - -"Katherine!" Beta gasped. This was no duplicate, he thought -frantically; this was Katherine, blazing, burning. She would die; -he knew that. If she fell back into the fuel, both of them died. He -started climbing the engine, reaching for the girl as she hung onto the -hose, her gloved hands frozen to it in a rigid grip. - -"No!" she screamed. There was a plea, in the voice that stopped Beta, -brought him back to sanity. He dropped to the floor, watching her.... - - * * * * * - -In the ship that circled the asteroid, there was silence. Alpha sat in -the seat by Miss Kanton, a hand gripping his knee, feeling it, waiting -for it to disappear beneath his fingers--watching his fingers, lest -they disappear if he looked away. - -Miss Kanton was frozen in her seat, gripping the guide-triangle until -her knuckles were white spots on her hand. She looked straight ahead, -afraid to look at Alpha. - -They circled the asteroid; again and again they rounded it. - -"They must have stalled the blast," Alpha said hoarsely. "They can't -stop it. They must have put it off someway." - -His words echoed within the ship above the buzzing of the rockets. -Miss Kanton said nothing. Her lips moved slightly, but no sound came. - -She turned to speak to Alpha, conquering her emotion, bright tears in -her eyes. - -The seat beside her was empty, except for a crumpled space suit that -slithered to the steel deck before her dilating eyes. - -Miss Kanton's hand went to her face. She screamed. It was one, brief -cry of utter horror. - - * * * * * - -In the engine room Beta labored. The hoses were sucking at the fluid. -The hoses were there actually to suck away the gaseous waste of the -engines. Now they were sucking away the fuel with thirsty, slurping -sounds, pouring it out onto the soil outside the tower. - -The fuel was sinking slowly, drawing away from the sparks in the -engines. The girl was nowhere around. Near the fat legs bracing the -engines from the floor, the transparent sphere of a space helmet -swirled and rocked with the motion of the fuel. It was the only proof -that the girl had ever existed; the sole thing about her that had been -real. - -Beta watched the hoses and studied the transparent sphere that was -floating towards him, drawn by the suction of the wide mouths of the -hoses. - -"You were a great girl, Katherine," he said. He sighed. He felt -weariness growing inside of him. - -The fuel coming down the steps into the engine room was a mere trickle. -The tanks above were drained. The level of the fluid was dropping down -towards his ankles. - -Beta walked carefully through the fuel to the steps. He looked back, -watching the hoses. Confident that they could do the job, he mounted -the stairs and reached the long corridor to the rubble-blocked doorway. -He left wet, oily prints behind him as he walked. He entered the radio -communication room. - -The dials of the radio glowed warmly before him. He adjusted the -frequency to that of the ship of Miss Kanton. - -He helloed for five minutes before Miss Kanton's voice came in answer. -He told her that everything was all right. She sobbed for a long time. -Then she told him that he was the real one. He felt a faint qualm of -belated fear that was over-ridden by his weariness. - -"You are a great girl, Katherine," he said. "You hung onto the hose, -burning, wrapping yourself around it so that you wouldn't fall into the -fuel. It's one of the greatest things I've seen. You smiled when you -were disappearing. You knew that everything was all right then." - -The girl on the radio was still sobbing. He told her to land. He walked -out of the room into the corridor and pushed his way through the hole -above the rubble pile. He saw that the Diggers were still racing around -on the horizon. - -The little ship came spurting into sight under full speed. It swooped -recklessly within feet of the ground before the anti-gravity field -crackled on and lowered it gently. A slim figure bounded out of the -ship and came running towards him. He ran to meet it. - -He grabbed it up into his arms and stood on the weird plain holding it -to him. Together, they walked to the ship and climbed into it. There -was a flash, a roar, and the ship shot up into the clear stars. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALPHA SAY, BETA DO *** - -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. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following -the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use -of the Project Gutenberg trademark. 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