Escape to Venus Read online

  Perry Rhodan

  The Third Power #15

  Escape To Venus

  Impetuous Thora, beauteous woman from distant Arkon, breaks the bonds of Earth and, with a robot as her only companion, rockets toward Venus as he first step toward returning home to he native world.

  But she reckons without SBX...and her plans are wrecked. She finds to her dismay that she has fled the frying pan, only to land in the fire of the volcanic primeval planet that is Venus, a dangerous dinosaurian world where giant slugy ugly snail-worms creep and frail flesh crawls and winged terrordactyls swoop in the long long night.

  This is the stirring story of--

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  Escape to Venus

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  1/ HELL WORLD

  Three metal monsters.

  Three silvery, glittering bodies of metal reared up from the soil of Asia towards the eternally blue sky of the great continent. Their conical noses seemed to sniff toward the stars.

  On the exterior, the spaceships resembled the first rockets that flew from the Earth to the Moon, initiating a new era for mankind. But the resemblance was strictly external.

  Internally, the ships were equipped with far ranging ray cannons and machines to throw up energy screens around them, protective barriers impenetrable by any power on Earth. These were the latest type of 'destroyer,' craft built on an enlarged scale with a complement of three men and capable of light speed.

  Constructed in the space complex of the New Power, the three destroyers were the first of their kind and so far had been test flown only once. No defects or malfunctions had been discovered so mass production of the new model was scheduled for the near future in the largest spaceship construction center in the world.

  Lonely lay the spacious test terrain of the New Power under the broiling heat of the afternoon sun. In the distance soared the skyscrapers of Terrania, formerly known as Galacto-City, the future capital of a united world. To the left was the spacecraft plant, a vast complex of long halls, immense hangars and a variety of domed buildings.

  Guards patrolled the immediate area around the three new destroyers. Mechanically, and at regular intervals, they performed their duties, looking neither to right nor to left, as if they realized how senseless their task must be: for no one could possibly advance undetected to this point. No unauthorized person was to be found anywhere throughout the entire area of the plant—the electronically controlled cordon saw to that.

  The guards did not wear uniforms; instead, garments of a strange-looking metallic material that shone like silver in the sun. Their ever alert eyes were not organic, they were crystal lenses. For these were no ordinary human beings: they were robots.

  Theirs was a single command: to guard the ships. This they did without emotion. When ordered to watch for some one who could not possibly appear here, no one could have told whether there was any sensation of amazement or not in their positronic brains.

  To the right, as far as the horizon, extended the mirror-like expanse of the Goshun salt lake. From this side there was the least potential threat of intruders for the lake lay within the cordoned-off area.

  And still, this calm was deceptive.

  While all mankind was preparing to celebrate an important anniversary of man's first flight to the Moon, and hardly a soul was not glued to TV to watch the festivities, one person had decided to no longer place faith in certain promises. The time had come for action!

  A car was approaching the test area from the south.

  The smooth road was almost free of dust. The vehicle whizzed along the deserted road, never slowing down, not even when the first electronic barrier came into sight. The electronic sensors checked out the vehicle and its occupants—and let them pass.

  The second and third electronic checkpoints reacted in a similar manner.

  The car, a smart-looking sports model, drove straight toward the three rockets and then began to decrease its speed. Two of the robot guards had changed the course of their mechanical rounds and advanced toward the car. Their left arms were held at a strange angle but nobody could have recognized the rayguns hidden inside. The least impulse would be sufficient to transform these apparently harmless metal creatures into energy-spewing death-dealing machines.

  But that impulse failed to materialize.

  The electronic sensors probed the brain pattern of the human being that had stepped out of the vehicle and it was checked out as 'approved,' as it possessed all the necessary required qualifications. The two robots lowered their arms and permitted the person to pass. With a sarcastic smile, the stranger walked past the automatons, then stopped a few yards farther away, seemingly undecided.

  There they were, the three small model spaceships, ready to start. Their height of 30 yards made them appear quite huge, judged by terrestrial standards. Their interior harbored tremendous energy reservoirs and fantastic engines designed by non-human brains. With these ships it was possible to traverse the solar system within the span of a few hours and, if one so desired, one could reach the nearest star in 4½ years.

  The robots resumed their interrupted patrols. The stranger's brain pattern spelt no danger, according to their programmed instructions, so the unidentified one was permitted to pass; indeed, allowed to do much more without releasing danger impulses in their positronic brains.

  The tall stranger stood for quite a while in the solitude of the desert and contemplated the three spacecraft. The well-fitting uniform brought out the stranger's slender figure and at closer examination it became evident that this was a female figure. A big cap hid the long, light-colored hair that shone almost white in the bright sun. The reddish eyes revealed determination—as well as a trace of sadness.

  The woman threw a last glance at everything around her—the nearby salt lake, the vast aircraft plant and the distant city of Terrania—before she slowly started to move in the direction of the nearest of the three spaceships.

  It was the third destroyer C, or D3 for short. The entrance hatch of D3 was closed but there was a small metal ladder leading up to it. One of the robots was standing at the foot of this ladder. He did not move as the woman came closer and then stopped in front of him. The robot's left arm hung down his side without moving. There was a blank stare in his crystal lenses.

  "Proceed to your station, R-17," said the woman in a harsh-sounding unknown language after she had quickly read the robot's name on a small sign on his chest. "We are starting a test flight." The robot remained motionless.

  "There is no command for such a test flight," he answered in the same language. The woman reacted with a gesture of displeasure. "I am issuing the command now, I, Thora of Arkon." R-17 still did not react in the desired manner.

  "Rhodan's order supersedes yours, Thora." Angry sparks glittered in the woman's eyes. Fiery flashes seemed to dart from her red pupils toward the resistant robot.

  "Perry Rhodan is a Terranian, R-17, and I am an Arkonide. My command is higher than that of Rhodan, the earthling."

  "Also higher than that of Khrest?" She hesitated for a moment, then threw her head back indignantly. "Khrest is under Rhodan's influence—he doesn't count any longer, why are you asking?"

  "Because Khrest has ordered that we should obey all commands coming from Rhodan whatever they might be. Therefore we cannot act against his orders. That is logical, isn't it?"

  The woman thought for a moment, then slowly nodded her head. "Yes, that sounds quite logical. Do you always react according to logical principles, R-17?"

  "My existence is based on logic."

  "Good," said the woman and regarded his almost human features with a pensive expression in her eyes.

  "Then
will you answer some questions I have?"

  "With pleasure, Thora of Arkon."

  "Did Perry Rhodan specifically forbid another test flight with D3?"

  "No."

  "Furthermore, has he forbidden that I undertake such a test flight?"

  "No."

  "Would you therefore be acting against Rhodan's orders if you were to fly this ship to Venus, for instance?"

  "Conditionally, it seems No."

  "Well, then," Thora breathed a sigh of relief. It follows that you are not breaking any rules if you do as I say."

  R-17's features almost seemed to express some doubt. "But I did not receive any orders from Rhodan for this flight."

  "Is that necessary?" Thora appeared very astonished. "After all you are receiving such an order from myself now. And you were not forbidden to receive orders from me—or am I wrong?"

  "No."

  Thora smiled. Her smile had no effect on the robot's psycho-regions, only the compelling logic of her question affected him.

  "No, it is not forbidden to receive any orders from you."

  "Alright, we can start then!"

  R-17 was still hesitating. As far as it was possible for him at all, he did not seem to feel too happy with his existence. But he could not find any logical counter argument to blandly refuse Thora's request. This woman was a member of the race that had created him, while Rhodan was merely an inhabitant of this planet by the name of Terra—although he was a particularly outstanding specimen of that race. Thora was much closer to R-17 than Rhodan, although he had been forced to obey him as a result of conditioning received at the hands of Khrest. He would never disregard this command to obey him. He would be incapable of doing so without bringing about a disastrous short circuit in his system.

  On the other hand, if he were to obey Thora he would not act directly against Rhodan's orders; ergo, he was not exposing himself to any danger.

  He nodded his head in a human-like gesture. "Yes, we can start. My orders were not to permit any strangers to approach this ship. Thora of Arkon, however, is no stranger."

  "Fine. Let's not waste any time. Set course for the planet Venus as fast as you can manage. I want to test how fast we can reach our second base in this solar system in case of emergency."

  She was waiting impatiently as the robot rather clumsily climbed up the ladder and opened the entrance hatch. Not until he had disappeared in the airlock did she follow him up into the ship. The robot pushed a button and the heavy outside hatch fell shut. The anti-grav elevator brought Thora and R-17 within a few seconds up to the destroyer's nose, where the command center was located.

  They sat down in the movable seats. While the robot was calculating the course, the engines began to warm up. Somewhere in the interior of D3 the reactor began to work, producing the incredible amounts of energy needed to lift the ship off the ground against the gravitational pull, then hurtle it through space with the speed of light. The artificial grav-fields were switched on automatically to neutralize any G-forces. The entire complicated mechanism of an unimaginable technology was set in motion.

  Thora was waiting. She knew she had accomplished her aim. It would be just a few more minutes, then she would watch this hated planet sink away like a blue sphere in the ocean of infinity. Venus would be only a stopover, for it would be sheer madness to try reaching her home planet, more than 30-thousand light-years away, with a ship limited to the speed of light. But on Venus there was a hyperwave sender and it would certainly not be too difficult to call one of the Arkonide space cruisers to come to her rescue.

  R-17 motioned to her. "All ready for takeoff. Observe the videoscreen to acquaint yourself with the capacities of D3. Rhodan has strictly forbidden maximum speed; this is permitted only in case of an emergency. Still, we'll reach Venus in about one hour and a half. Venus is now on the other side of the sun."

  "Distance?"

  R-17 answered immediately: "143 million miles."

  "Our top permissible speed?"

  "75% that of light."

  She did not reply and waited. R-17 seized a lever and pulled it downwards. Nothing seemed to happen but the image on the videoscreen underwent rapid changes.

  D3 lifted off without using the pulse-drive power unit. The antigrav projectors nullified the gravitational pull of Earth, and repelling force-fields moved the now weightless mass of the spaceship.

  The ground fell away suddenly from underneath the ship. Buildings, roads, rivers, mountains and deserts seemed to fly rapidly and evenly from all sides toward the center of the starting point, and the field of vision expanded until the entire terrain suddenly dropped away and was replaced by a dark-violet area.

  The universe!

  In less than 10 seconds the destroyer had rammed through Earth's atmosphere and was now unrelentingly racing through space.

  For a moment, Thora thought she recognized a flashing point in the right corner of the observation screen; but almost before she became consciously aware of it, the light point had disappeared again. Then she noticed the sun, nearly straight ahead in the rocket's line of flight, its brightness considerably reduced by dark filters.

  Earth assumed the shape of a globe that rotated peacefully in the starry sky, becoming smaller and smaller until it was nothing but a brightly shining heavenly body.

  Thora sighed. She glanced in the direction of the robot pilot.

  R-17 returned her glance. "A fine ship," he said with appreciation.

  "True, a fine ship, but not good enough for what I have in mind, R-17."

  The robot did not ask any questions. Silently he set the course, made adjustments and calculated.

  The sun seemed to be threateningly close.

  For quite some time the manned space station had been revolving around the Earth. Together with two other space stations, it maintained a worldwide television network. The three stations were circling at the exact altitude where the speed of their orbit equaled that of Earth's rotation, in this manner constantly over the same spot on the world's surface.

  Radio operator Adams was fully aware of his responsibility as he established communication with the two other stations in order to begin the broadcast of 'TerraTelevision.'

  It was 10 years to the day since the venture into space had started under the command of the then totally unknown Major Perry Rhodan. The Stardust had landed on the Moon, found there the wrecked remnants of an Arkonide space expedition whose female commander Thora together with the leading scientist Khrest accompanied the successful space mission back to Earth. This had been the beginning of a new era, reflected Adams.

  Station II confirmed establishment of contact and within a few seconds the other space station followed suit. Adams now called Earth. The big broadcast center in Terrania answered. Now the worldwide broadcast could begin.

  Radio operator Adams leaned back comfortably in his chair. There was not much more for him to do; the rest would follow automatically. Still, he wanted to make sure he didn't miss this historic occasion. Perry Rhodan in person was scheduled to address mankind.

  On the monitor a whirling star cluster appeared which soon changed into the familiar picture of the Milky Way, slowly rotating against the dark background of infinity. This was the TV identification of Terrania, the capital of the New Power.

  Now the face of a man appeared on the monitor screen. It was a lean well-cut face. Its deep lines, especially around the mouth, made the man look older than he actually might be.

  "This is Colonel Michael Freyt speaking from Terrania. On the occasion of our 10th national space holiday, I present to you Perry Rhodan, president of the New Power and friend of the Arkonides."

  The man's image vanished from the screen and was replaced by another face. A clicking noise could be heard as the simultan-translator installations were switched on. Perry Rhodan's words would be translated into all languages of the world as quickly as spoken.

  How strange, thought Adams, this similarity between Freyt's and Rhodan's features. They
might almost be mistaken for brothers. The same lean figure, the same steel-grey eyes and the sharp lines around nose and mouth. Even the identical, purposeful glance! But Rhodan is the younger of the two—or could I be mistaken? He ought to be more than 45 by now, still he doesn't look a day over 38. Sure would like to know how he manages to keep young like that! That uniform suits him to a T. Must be about 10 years since he exchanged the uniform of an American test pilot for it. What a wild story that was way back...

  But fortunately, Adams had to miss the beginning of Rhodan's speech. The shrill sound of an alarm bell rang throughout the space station and startled him from his reminiscing. He jumped up and rushed to the door.

  An alarm signal on the space station always meant danger.

  But they were lucky this time. The man on guard duty had observed an unidentified flying object on the radar screen. This UFO had raced close by the station with tremendous speed and had disappeared in the direction of the Moon. Evidently it had come from Earth.

  "From Earth?" wondered Adams. He sounded very doubtful. "Have you checked this out with Terrania?"

  "Not yet."

  "Get it! Pronto, old man!" recommended Adams and comforted himself with the thought that the most interesting talks usually start out with boring introductory remarks. He would probably not miss too much if he would first wait for the answer from Terrania.

  Terrania reported almost immediately: "No spaceship has taken off from here. We need further data from you."

  Further data! That was a tall order! The spaceship, assuming even that the UFO had been a spaceship, had whizzed by so incredibly fast that very little had been observed about it. Perhaps the continuously running film camera might supply some more information. The film had just emerged from the developer.

  The picture showed a ship about 30-yards long with a rather narrow diameter. Something like a torpedo. Velocity: could not be exactly determined but certainly in excess of 60 miles/sec².

  Adams shook his head as he heard his colleagues send these data back to the control station on Earth. Assuming that such a ship really did exist, then it must have come from Perry Rhodan's secret aircraft installations about which so little was known. Unless one believed the rumors...