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  Rhodan waited until Col. Derringer stopped speaking, then said: "Rhodan here, aboard the Lotus. What is it, Colonel?"

  There was no reply forthcoming for a few seconds. This was not because of any time lapse required for the waves to cross the 50 or 60 million miles to Mars and return, for hypercom transmissions were instantaneous. Rather, Derringer was astounded to have received an answer so quickly. Finally he spoke, tersely and precisely: "I'm greatly relieved, sir! What is your position?"

  "Just outside the Asteroids."

  "Good! Turn around and land on Mars."

  "Why?"

  "Did you order the mutant Gregor Tropnow to pick up Thora here?"

  Rhodan went pale and tried to hold himself steady by gripping the table with his free hand. His lips compressed into a thin line and, when he at length opened his mouth, he found he could speak only reluctantly and with difficulty. "No, Colonel. My wife was to have remained on Mars until her vacation was over. What happened?"

  "I'm sorry, sir, but there's strong reason to believe that your wife has been abducted. Mr. Bell was of that opinion, too, when I contacted him. Some hours ago the mutant Tropnow landed here, claiming he had been given orders to pick up Thora. He said an unexpected situation had arisen in Terrania, requiring her presence there Thora left Mars exactly two hours ago."

  Rhodan appeared to be in perfect control of himself now. His voice betrayed no excitement but he was still pale. "Why did you wait so long before investigating?"

  Col. Derringer hesitated for a moment. "Who could have suspected that Thora was being kidnapped? Members of the Mutant Corps have always been above suspicion."

  That was true. It suddenly became clear to Rhodan that no man could be absolutely trustworthy—somewhere, hidden in the most remote corner of every heart, was at least the germ of betrayal. Or was he deceiving himself—after all, wasn't he the one who had planted the seeds of treason in Tropnow when he denied him the cell-renewal on the planet Wanderer?

  "Listen to me, Derringer," Rhodan said. "I'm not coming to Mars. I know where they're taking Thora. Make further inquiries on Mars and let me know when you find out what ship they used."

  "They used a Gazelle-type scout, sir," Derringer answered quickly. "That we know already."

  "Good—that's something to go on, at least!" Rhodan commented. "Stay in touch with Reginald Bell: he has a direct connection with me and will keep me posted. And one other thing, Colonel—I hold you entirely blameless in this affair."

  Relief was clearly audible from the other end. "Thank you, sir. I only did my duty..."

  "Even that can be a mistake sometimes. Carry on Colonel."

  The connection was broken off.

  His hands trembling, the communications officer switched off the hypercom and looked at Rhodan uncertainly. His lips moved as though he wanted to say something but evidently his courage had failed him.

  Rhodan, who knew the man's thoughts better than if he had read them, rested his hand on the officer's shoulders. "Thanks, friend," he said, "but the dirty trick these characters pulled won't do them any good. It will only increase their punishment when they're caught. Nothing's going to happen to Thora."

  Nothing's going to happen to Thora!

  While he walked back to the control central, memories and emotions shot through his mind like electronic flashes. He loved Thora now as much as he did the day he met her—even if, on that long-ago day, he had not realized it was love which drew him to the strange woman whose home was not the Earth. He, the relative immortal—104 years old and still looking 40—he loved the Arkonide woman to whom immortality had been denied. True, the life-prolonging elixir purloined from the Aras continued to hold off the effects of aging but for how much longer...?

  And now the traitors wanted to take Thora away from him!

  Correction:

  They had taken her away from him!

  As he stepped into the control central a second later, Noir came towards him. The telepath was already aware of what had happened, thanks both to his ability in reading minds and to the fact the intercom had broadcast the conversation into the control room.

  "The lousy traitors!" Noir exclaimed. "We'll show them—"

  "Let it go, Noir!" Rhodan said. "Nobody's going to escape what they deserve. Up to now I've always been able to respect my opponents because they usually fought with honest and honorable weapons. But to abduct a woman in order to extort what they want out of her husband—I can't think of anything lower than that. Only a degenerate could have come up with such a scheme."

  "Degenerate or not, I'd like to wring his neck!" chimed in Pucky, who had not stirred from his couch. "He won't get away from us!"

  Rhodan turned to Markus. "When will the transition take place?"

  "Barring any change in plans, it's set to go in exactly two minutes and 40 seconds." Markus hesitated briefly, then asked: "Will we maintain the same course and coordinates, sir?"

  "Our destination is still Volat," said Rhodan. "Tropnow was the kidnapper and Fellmer Lloyd spotted him on Volat. So if we want to get there before it's too late, we don't have any time to lose."

  "As for me, the sooner I can get my paws on Tropnow, the better I'll like it!" growled Pucky from his corner.

  Rhodan did not respond. He sat silently in his seat once more and, lips tightly pressed together, stared at the videoscreens.

  He was in that pose when the stars disappeared and the terrifying emptiness of Hyperspace took their place. Hyperspace—that realm in which neither time nor space exist...

  2/ A PAL FOR PUCKY

  Of the six planets that orbited the star Heperais, only the second one, Volat, was, inhabited. More than 4000 light-years from Earth, the planet belonged to the Arkonide Imperium and was ranked as one of the most important trade outposts for spacefaring intelligences in that sector.

  The Arkonide empire was ruled by a robot: a mammoth positronic Brain. Its interests were looked after on Volat by the Arkonide administrator residing in Kuklon, the capital city and site of the planet's largest spaceport,

  Volat was about the size of the planet Mars and had a gravitation somewhat weaker than Earth's. Because of its hot, tropical climate, the world was covered for the most part by forest and jungle.

  When the Lotus came out of transition, she was coming into the Heperais system at the speed of light. The structural compensator aboard had assured that no one had registered the ship's rematerialization. Being spotted now was unlikely but even if the ship were noticed it would be assumed to be one of the many commercial vessels approaching or leaving Volat

  The communications station aboard the Lotus stood ready to receive but nothing came in to indicate that Fellmer Lloyd was in his small, Gazelle-like craft, attempting to contact them. The mutant would certainly assume that Capt. Markus and the Lotus were circling the Heperais system, standing by to serve as a relay station.

  But nothing was heard from Fellmer Lloyd.

  Rhodan seethed with restlessness, "Get the Gazelle five ready to go," he told Markus, signaling Noir and Pucky to come along. "It's time to move out."

  "I don't think I could have stood that couch much longer," said the mouse-beaver, slipping to the floor and hopping towards the door. "It's as hard as an ironing board."

  Noir had other things on his mind. "What if the Gazelle is seen landing?"

  Rhodan answered him before turning to Markus. "We're not going to land in the middle of downtown Kuklon, you know, but in an uninhabited area on the main continent. We don't know where Lloyd is now but we're all telepaths: one of us will find him."

  And then to Markus, Rhodan said: "You'll maintain a stable orbit, Captain. Two light-years from Volat should be enough. Broadcast a tracking signal once every 22 hours, lasting a minute. We don't know what the situation will be when we return to the ship, so I think this cautionary measure is a good idea."'

  "Very well, sir," said Markus. "What should I do if your Gazelle is attacked?"

  Rhodan smiled. "Do nothi
ng, Captain. Nothing at all. Understand?"

  Markus understood but his astonishment at the order was obvious. Rhodan felt obligated to give an explanation: "If we're attacked and our opponent is superior, we'll surrender. That, too, often leads to accomplishing a goal."

  Then Rhodan followed Noir, who was already on way to the hangar. Pucky had decided to save wear and tear on his short legs and stood waiting for them by the Gazelle's open hatch.

  This excellent scout-craft was shaped like a discus more than 100 feet in diameter. Its engines were normally capable of leaps through hyperspace covering as many as 500 light-years and the weaponry on board was enough to inflict serious damage on even a cruiser the size of the Lotus. Last but hardly least, the Gazelle's special equipment included generators producing artificial gravity fields which compensated for the effects of rapid acceleration and deceleration.

  "What are we waiting for?" demanded the mouse-beaver, teleporting himself up into the Gazelle's airlock. "Every second is precious if we want to get hold of those criminals!"

  Pucky's anger towards the two betrayers seemed to be boundless. Ever since they had abducted Thora, he had not taken the trouble to consider their motives any more closely. In his mind the single act of kidnapping Thora had already convicted them.

  Rhodan gave the officers of the Lotus some further instructions, boarded the Gazelle just after Noir and Pucky. The hatch closed automatically behind them with a muffled, hollow clang.

  Ten seconds later the discus-shaped craft left the spherical cruiser and raced towards the distant planet at a constant speed. The Lotus left its previous course and headed toward the position in space Rhodan had directed. From there it would enter into the prescribed orbit.

  Rhodan sat at the Gazelle's controls; Noir, sitting next to him, was waiting, his hands resting on the switches that could activate the ship's defenses within seconds. Pucky remained idle; he sat in front of the communications system but it had not been turned on.

  Volat drew ever closer and finally it was time to brake the Gazelle's speed-of-light approach.

  Beneath them the planet revolved sluggishly in the glare of its sun. Soon Kuklon itself came into view, on the vidscreen a clearly defined welter of tall buildings and elevated transport-skyways. Nearby lay the broad expanse of the spaceport, studded with the spacecraft of all manner of intelligent races. Concentrated here in the city and spaceport was virtually all of the planet's civilized life, unaffected and influenced by the indigenous natives who lived in the vast forests and on the high plateaus.

  The natives hunted and, to some extent, farmed. What did they care for the Arkonides, Springers and other races who had made their planet into an outpost of the legendary Imperium? Nothing—as long as the invaders only left them alone!

  Rhodan allowed the Gazelle five to wheel about and came in towards Volat's nightside. The Gazelle approached closer and closer until Rhodan was flying it along just above the treetops. The forests were almost endless, broken only by the great seas. Broad river valleys indicated a plentiful supply of water below and Rhodan noticed on the infra-red screen that the slopes showed signs of cultivation.

  "It will be dark in an hour in Kuklon," Noir said. "We'll have to wait until then before we can land."

  "We'll land even before that," Rhodan answered, letting the ship drop even farther. "Fellmer Lloyd must be down there somewhere, not far from the capital city." He turned to lucky. "Have you picked up any impulses from him yet?"

  The mouse-beaver shook his head wordlessly.

  They glided now over a broad rocky plateau but even the infra-red screen showed no further details. Either the plateau was uninhabited or the Volatians had camouflaged their dwellings well.

  Then Rhodan made his fateful mistake: he switched off the protective energy-field which was designed to deflect meteors in deep space. The field also warded of the shots and energy beams from enemy ships.

  The attack that followed was so sudden and so surprising that no counteraction could be taken before the Gazelle had already suffered too much damage to stay aloft.

  A greenish-blue tentacle of energy shot out of nowhere and struck the Gazelle's flattened nose. The shock nearly threw Rhodan out of his seat, knocked Noir to the floor and sent lucky sliding across the cabin.

  The ship began to drop.

  A second burst went past them and blasted a burning hole in the forest expanse below.

  "Hold on!" Rhodan shouted and grabbed the controls.

  The Gazelle was gliding a bit to the side, heading for the trees not far beneath it. The ship no longer responded to the steering controls but it could be braked somewhat so the imminent crash would not be as disastrous as otherwise.

  "Those were Springers!" Pucky murmured angrily, eavesdropping telepathically on the crew of the enemy ship. "Our old friends, the Galactic Traders! But they have no idea who we are—they're just acting on orders from someone else!"

  "Try to pick up more of their thoughts!" Rhodan called back. "We'll hit the ground in 10 second—as soon as we touch down, make for the hatch and get out of the ship!"

  The next 10 seconds were almost an eternity.

  Then the splintering of branches and the bursting crash of the ship's impact itself resounded over the loudspeakers, picked up by the exterior microphones. A jolt slammed through the Gazelle's crippled body, sweeping all loose objects from their places.

  Rhodan threw himself to the floor a moment before the crash and landed on all fours. He slid slowly across the control room and came to a stop, directly behind the pilots' seats. His numbness did not last long. He stood up with a groan and said hoarsely: "Quick! Before they come back and finish us off!"

  That brought Noir back to himself. He had been thrown sideways out of his seat and had struck his head hard against a metal cowling. A thin trickle of blood ran down his forehead but he seemed to have no serious wounds.

  Pucky had come out of the wreck in the best shape: he was no longer even in the control central. He had teleported himself outside just before the Gazelle had crashed. Having had no time to take Noir and Rhodan along, he stood alone some 50 yards away as the spaceship smashed through the trees and into the ground. Hardly had the ship stopped moving when Pucky sprang to the outer hatch, opened it and went on to open the inner airlock door.

  "Anything broken?" Rhodan asked Noir in the control central. Outside in the corridor was a noise: that would be Pucky. "Does it hurt?"

  "Only in my head," Noir moaned, clutching his forehead. "I think I broke some of the instruments when I hit them."

  "That isn't important anymore," said Rhodan consolingly. Then he saw the mouse-beaver by the open hatchway. "We're going to have to make a run for it—we've got to get out of here as fast as we can!"

  The two men stumbled through the narrow corridor and reached the outside hatch 10 seconds later they were running with Pucky into the dense jungle, not even pausing to look behind them.

  The approach of the destroyer was audible enough and carried more meaning than any words could express.

  Then the brilliant flash of an explosion blinded the fugitives, and the ensuing shockwave threw them to the ground. Rhodan took time to turn his head. A shadow blocked out the stars. The alien ship could not be made out clearly but it had to be larger than the Gazelle. The unknown enemies aboard it had no trouble spotting Rhodan's craft with their tracking equipment. Now spotlights leaped through the darkness and caught the wreck in their glare.

  Rhodan, Noir and lucky slipped deeper into the shadows.

  And then the attackers did something very stupid: they destroyed the wreck with an impulse beam that left it a molten mass of metal within seconds.

  Rhodan breathed easier. "We've been lucky. I was afraid they'd search our ship from top to bottom. They possibly would have found clues aboard that would have stunned an intelligent enemy. Well, Yatuhin and Tropnow won't have played their trump card yet—and no one will know that the Earth still exists. At least that's what I'm hoping."
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  "And nobody knows Rhodan has landed on Volat," murmured Noir without any false pathos. "And, of course, nobody knows that Pucky, the fierce warrior, is here, too," he added, with a quick glance at the mouse-beaver.

  Rhodan did not reply. He looked at the glowing wreck and saw its reddish reflection of the dully shining underbelly of the unknown ship. He tried to make out the crew's thought-impulses and thereby learn something of their further intentions but he was not successful. Perhaps Pucky had had more luck.

  But the mouse-beaver shook his head "Springers, like I said. They were recruited by an unknown person and sent out after us from their headquarters—wherever that might be. Their warning system must have picked us up while we were still in space."

  "They're well organized," Rhodan observed. "Do you think the two rebel mutants are behind this?"

  "Who else could it be?"

  Rhodan looked up again into the starry night. Here the sky looked much different than it did on Earth, which was located on the edge of the galaxy. Volat was closer to the center and the number of stars in its heavens was unimaginably greater. A solid white band of stars ran clear across the sky, throwing passing clouds into bold relief.

  The alien ship had disappeared—vanished as though it had never existed. It had carried out its mission and now it was returning to its unknown base of operations.

  Rhodan nodded grimly. "They'll pay for destroying the Gazelle—scouts like that don't come cheap!"

  Noir stood up. "Now what? The city must still be hundreds of miles away. And this jungle..."

  "We still have Pucky," said Rhodan quietly, also getting up. There was nothing around them but the stillness of night and the rustling of branches in the wind. "Pucky can bring us one by one into the city, should that seem necessary. However, I don't think it would be a good idea to pop up again very soon. Our enemies should think we're all dead."

  "But the jungle!" Noir pointed out. "I don't find it at all inviting. Who knows what dangers are waiting for us in there?"

  "The information we have on Volat states that there aren't many beasts of prey in the forests," said Rhodan "There's only one real enemy for us here: the band of rebels. They'll be coming after us once they find out we're still alive."