Childhood's End (16 page)

"Nearly there,".said the pilot. "You'll be able to see the lab in a minute."

They were travelling slowly above a spur of rock jutting out from the base of the mountain. The plain beneath was now coming into view: Jan guessed that they were not more than a few hundred metres above the sea-bed. Then he saw, a kilometre or so ahead, a cluster of spheres standing on tripod legs, and joined together by connecting tubes. It looked exactly like the tanks of some chemical plant, and indeed was designed on the same basic principles. The only difference was that here the pressures which had to be resisted were outside, not within.

"What's that?" gasped Jan suddenly. He pointed a shaky

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finger towards -the nearest sphere. The curious pattern of lines on its surftce had resolved itself into a network of giant tentacles. As the submarine came closer, he could see that they ended in a great, pulpy bag, from which peered a pair of enormous eyes.

"That," said the pilot indifferently, "is probably Lucifer. Someone's been feeding him again." He threw a switch and leaned over the control desk.

"S.2 calling Lab. I'm connecting up. Will you shoo away your pet?"

The reply came promptly.

"Lab to S.2. O.K.-go ahead and make contact. Lucey will get out of the way."

The curving metal walls began to fill the screen. Jan caught a last glimpse of a giant, sucker-studded arm whipping away at their approach. Then there was a dull clang, and a series of scratching noises as the clamps sought for their locking points on the submarine's smooth, oval hull. In a few minutes the vessel was pressed tightly against the wall of the base, the two entrance ports had locked together, and were moving forward through the hull of the submarine at the end of a giant hollow screw. Then came the "pressure equalized" signal, the batches unsealed, and the way into Deep Sea Lab One was open.

Jan found Professor Sullivan in a small, untidy room that seemed to combine the attributes of office, workshop and laboratory. He was peeping through a microscope into what looked like a small bomb. Presumably it was a pressure-capsule containing some specimen of deep-sea life, still swimming happily around under its normal tons-to-the-square-centimetre conditions.

'Well," said Sullivan, dragging himself away from the eyepiece. "How's Rupert? And what can we do for you?"

"Rupert's fine," replied Jan. "He sends his best wishes, and says he'd love to visit you if it weren't for his claustrophobia."

"Then he'd certainly feel a little unhappy down here, with five kilometres of water on top of him. Doesn't it worry you, by the way?"

Jan shrugged his shoulders.

"No more than being in a stratoliner. If anything went wrong, the result would be the same in either case."

"That's the sensible approach, but it's surprising how few

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people see it that way." Sullivan toyed with the controls of his microscope, then shot Jan an inquisitive glance.

"I'll be very glad to show you around," he said, "but I must confess I was a little surprised when Rupert passed on your

request. I couldn't understand why one of you spacehounds~.

should be interested in our work. Aren't you going in the wrong direction?" He gave a chuckle of amusement. "Personally, I've never seen why you were in such a hurry to get~ out there. It will be centuries before we've got everything ln~ the oceans nicely charted and pigeonholed."

Jan took a deep breath. He was glad that Sullivan had .~, broached the subject himself; fbr it made his task that much easier. Despite the ichthyologist's jest, they had a great deal in common. It should not be too hard to build a bridge, to enlist Sullivan's sympathy and aid. He was a man of imagination, or he would never have invaded this underwater world. But Jan would have to be cautious, for the request he was going to make was, to say the least of it, somewhat unconventional.

There was one fact that gave him confidence. Even if Sullivan refused to co-operate, he would certainly keep Jan's secret. And here in this quiet little office on thc bed of the Pacific, there seemed no danger that the Overlords-whatever strange powers they possessed-would be able to listen to their conversation.

"Professor Sullivan," he began, "if you were interested in the ocean, but the Overlords refused to let you go near it, how would you feel?"

"Exceedingly annoyed, no doubt."

"I'm sure you would. And suppose, one day, you had a chance of achieving your goal, without them knowing, what would you do? Would you take the opportunity?"

Sullivan never hesitated.

"Of course. And argue later."

Right into my hsnds~ thought Jan. He can't retreat now- unless he's afraid of the Overlords. And I doubt if Sullivan is afraid of anything. He leaned forward across the cluttered table and prepared to present his case.

Professor Sullivan was no fool. Before Jan could speak, his lips twisted into a sardonic smile.

"So that's the game, is it?" he said slowly. "Very, very Interesting! Now you go right ahead and tell me why I should help you-"

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12

earlier age would have regarded Professor Suffivan as an

expensive luxury. His operations cost as much as a small war:

indeed, he could be likened to a general conducting a perpetual campaign against an enemy who never relaxed. Professor Sullivan's enemy waS the sea, and it fought him with weapons of cold and darkness-and, above all, pressure. In his turn, he countered his adversary with intelligence and engineering skill. He bad won many victories, but the sea was patient: it could wait. One day, Sullivan knew, he would make a mistake.

At least he had the consolation of knowing that he could never drown. It would be far too quick for that

He had refused to commit himself one way or the other when Jan made his request, but he knew what his answer was going to be. Here was the opportunity for a most interesting experiment. It was a pity that he would never know the result; still, that happened often enough in scientific research, and he had initiatedother programmes thatwould take decades to complete.

Professor Sullivan was a brave and an intelligent man, but looking back on his career he was conscious of the fact that it had not brought him the sort of fame that sends a scientist's name safely down all the centuries. Here was a chance, totally unexpected and all the more attractive for that, of really establishing himself in the history books. It was not an ambition he would ever have admitted to anybody-and, to do him justice, he would still have helped Jan even if his part in the plot remained forever secret

As for Jan, he was now having second thoughts. The momentum of his original discovery had carried him thus far almost without effort. He had made his investigations, but had taken no active steps to turn his dream into reality. In $ few days, however, he must make his choice. If Professor Sullivan agreed to co-operate, there was no way in which he could retreat. He must face the future he had chosen, with all its Implications.

What finally decided him was the thought that, If he neglected this incredible opportunity, he would never forgive himself. All the rest of his life would be spent in vain regrets- and nothing could be worse than that.

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Sullivan's answer reached him a few hours later, and he knew that the die was cast. Slowly, because there was still plenty of time, he began to put his affairs in order.

"Dear Maia [the letter began]. This is going to be-to put it mildly-rather a surprise for you. When you get this letter, I shall no longer be on Earth. By that I don't mean that I shall have gone to theMoon, as many others have done. No: I shall be on my way to the home of the Overlords. I shall be the ~rst man ever to leave the Solar System.

"I am giving this letter to the friend who is helping me: he will hold it until he knows that my plan has succeeded-in its first phase, at least-and that it is too late for the Overlords to interfere. I shall be so far away, and travelling at such a speed, that I doubt if any recall message can overtake me. Even if it could, it seems most unlikely that the ship would be able to put back to Earth. And I very much doubt if I'm all that important, anyway.

"First, let me explain what led to this. You know that I've always been interested in spaceflight, and have always felt frustrated because we've never been allowed to go to the other planets, or to learn anything about the civilization of the Overlords. If they had never intervened, we might have reached Mars and Venus by now. I admit that it is equally probable that we would have destroyed ourselves with coli~alt bombs and the other global weapons the twentieth century was developing. Yet sometimes I wish we could have had a chance of standing on our own feet.

"Probably the Overlords have their reasons for keeping us in the nursery, and probably they are excellent reasons. But even if! knew what they were, I doubt if it would make much difference to my own feelings-or my actions.

"Everything really began at that party of Rupert's. (He doesn't know about this, by the way, though he put me on the right track.) You remember that silly séance he arranged and how it ended when that girl-I forget her name-fainted? I'd asked what star the Overlords came from, and tne reply was 'NGS 549672.' I'd not expected any answer, and had treated the whole business as a joke until then. But when I realized that this was a number in a star catalogue, I decided to look into it. I found that the star was in the constellation Carina- 106

and one of the few facts that we do know about the Overlords is that they come from that dire~*ion.

"Now I don't pretend to understand how that information reached us, or where it originated. Did someone read Rashaverak's mind? Even if they had, it's hardly likely that he would have known the reference number of his sun in one of our catalogues. It's a complete mystery, and I leave it to people like Rupert to solve-if they can! I'm just content to take the information, and to act on it.

"We know a lot now, through our observation of their departure, about the speed of the Overlord ships. They leave the Solar System under such tremendous accelerations that they approach the velocity of light in less than an hour. That means that the Overlords must possess some kind of propulsive system that acts equally on every atom of their ships, so that anything aboard won't be crushed instantly. I wonder why they employ such colossal accelerations, when they've got all space to play with and could take their time picking up speed?

My theory is that they can somehow tap the energy fields round the stars, and so have to do their starting and stopping while they're fairly close to a sun. But that's all by the way....

"The important fact was that I knew how far they had to travel, and therefore how long the journey took. NGS 549672 is forty light-years from Earth. The Overlords ships reach more than ninety-nine per cent of the speed of light, so the trip must last forty years of our dine. Our time: that's the crux of the matter.

"Now as you may have beard, strange things happen as one approaches the speed of light. Time itself begins to flow at a different rate-to pass more slowly, so that what would be months on Earth would be no more than days on the ships of the Overlords. The effect is quite fundamental: it was discovered by the great Einstein more than a hundred years ago.

"I have made calculations based on what we know about the Stardrive, and using the firmly-established results of Relativity theory. From the viewpoint of the passengers on one of the Overlord ships, the journey to NGS 549672 will last not more than two months-even thou~h by Earth's reckoning forty years will have passed. I know this seems a paradox, and if it's any consolation it's puzzled the world's best brains ever since Einstein announced it.

"Perhaps this example will show you the sort of thing that

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can happen, and will give you a clearer picture of the situation. If the Overlords send me straight back to Earth, I shall arrive home having aged only four months. But on Earth itself; eighty years will have passed. So you understand, Maia, that whatever happens, this is goodbye.

"I have few ties binding me here, as you know well enough,

so I can leave with a clear conscience. I've not told mother yet:

she would get hysterical, and I couldn't face that. It's better this way. Though I've tried to make allowances, ever since father died-oh, there's no point now in going into all that again!

"I've terminated my studies and told the authorities that, for family reasons, I'm moving to Europe. Everything has been settled and there should be nothing for you to worry about.

"By this time, you may imagine that I'm crazy, since it seems impossible for anyone to get into one of the Overlord ships. But I've found a way. It doesn't happen very often, and after this it may never happen again, for I'm sure Karellen never makes the same mistake twice. Do you know the legend of the Wooden Horse, that got the Greek soldiers into Troy? But there's a story from the Old Testament that's an even closer parallel... ."

"You'll certainly be much more comfortable than Jonah," said Sullivan. "There is no evidence that he was provided with electric light or sanitation. But you'll need a lot of. provisions, and I see you're taking oxygen. Can you take enough for a two month'! voyage in such a small space?".

He stubbed his finger on the careful sketches which Jan had laid on the table. The microscope acted as a paper weight at one end, the skull of some improbable fish held down the other.

"I hope the oxygen isn't necessary," said Jan. 'We know that they can breathe our atmosphere, but they don't seem to like it very much and I might not be able to manage theirs at all. As for the supply situation, using narcosamine solves that. It's perfectly safe. When we're under way, I'll take a shot that will knock me out for six weeks, plus or minus a few days. P11 be nearly there by then. Actually, it wasn't the food and xygen that was worrying me, so much as the boredom."

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Professor Sullivan nodded thoughtfully.

"Yes, narcosamine is safe enough, and can be calibrated fairly accurately. But mind you've got plenty of food handy- you'll be ravening when you wake up, and as weak as a kitten. Suppose you starved to death because you hadn't the strength to use a can-opener?"