A Touch of Eternity Read online

  Meanwhile, Fred Harras was operating the hypercom transmitter from the K-7, which had also been brought into normal time. He kept the distress signal going constantly in the forlorn hope that somebody, somewhere, would hear it.

  And meanwhile the meteorologist, Josua, had again taken up guard duty in the area where the Gazelle was assumed to be located—in the other time dimension. It was here that they had entered this world and if there were ever to be an exit from it, it would have to appear in this place. The small light window had disappeared eight days ago. That is, eight days of Earth time. Because in this world the local time-rate would require easily 200 years to equal an Earth day, if the calculations were correct.

  "I've asked him why his companions attacked us," Noir was saying, somewhat pensively. "If I interpret his answering signals right, he's denying the whole thing. He had nothing to do with the attacks."

  "He's lying!" snorted Steiner, observing the strange creature that crouched between them.

  It stood about five feet high and looked something like a giant caterpillar with stubby wings. Close below the insect-like head were two rather delicate grasping appendages, whereas the other limbs could be considered as a means of locomotion.

  "Naturally," Steiner concluded, "he's afraid well hold him responsible for the attack."

  "But perhaps he is speaking the truth," suggested Ragov as he looked beyond the Druuf. "Premature judgments have caused a lot of injustices."

  "There aren't any other intelligent beings on this world." Steiner stuck to his thesis and if Noir hadn't stepped into the argument the whole heated debate between the two scientists would have started up again.

  "Please, gentlemen! Rash judgment is just as damaging as failing to recognize the gravity of a situation. It is true, of course, that these super caterpillars are the only intelligent form of life we've found on this Crystal World but that fact by no means precludes the possibility that other forms exist here. Frankly I find the idea of being attacked merely by these creatures to be a bit strange—especially considering the use of controlled time decelerators that enabled them to make us become visible to their eyes. However it may be, one thing is certain: that is that we are no longer safe here, even though everything moves 72000 times slower than we do."

  Lt. Rous came striding across the plateau and joined them. He wore a deep frown of concern while only granting the Druuf a skeptical side-glance. "We finally assembled the hypercom receiver too," he said. "So far Harras hasn't gotten any answer to his signals. So it seems certain that nobody but ourselves exists in this alien time-plane."

  "Why don't the Druufs pick up our calls?" Steiner wanted to know.

  Rous shrugged. "I thought you might have found the answer by now. Haven't the prisoners given you any information yet? Maybe they use another kind of radio equipment or communication principle."

  "This fellow here is stubborn," grumbled Steiner indignantly. "He maintains that the attack came from another source."

  Noir straightened up slowly. "Do you know what, Lieutenant?" he said as he folded his arms on his chest. "I feel exactly the same as Ragov does, that we're on the wrong track. These beings that we refer to as the Druufs—are not the Druufs at all."

  Rous raised his brows questioningly. Steiner snorted scornfully, while Ragov nodded in agreement.

  Noir continued. "The real intelligences of this time-plane look different. I can't be certain of it but this caterpillar here finally understands what I'm trying to say to it. From its reactions I can conclude with a fair degree of certainty that it's as surprised as we are about the attack. And equally disturbed. Lieutenant, I'm afraid we're wasting our time. We're making the same mistake that alien space travelers would be making if they landed on the Earth and tried to interrogate dogs and cows concerning the political situation on the planet."

  "Hm-m-m..." murmured Rous and began to regard the caterpillar with a somewhat heightened interest. "So what you're saying is, we are threatened by something 'over there'?"

  "That's exactly what I'm saying, sir. And even if time goes slower for the unknown enemy, nevertheless events eventually do take place! I'm convinced they've already regrouped themselves for a new attack against us. Don't forget: one of their seconds is 20 hours to us!"

  "Since we've been in this place then, to their time perception hardly more than 10 seconds have passed," said Rous thinking out loud. "If we also remember that there's already been an attack we have to realize how fast the intelligences of this world can react. Maybe our time-conversion arithmetic isn't entirely precise but there's no doubt that it's approximately correct. So I think on that basis we can expect another attack soon. What can we do to defend ourselves?"

  "We are faster than they are," said Steiner. "We'll dodge them."

  "The relative speed of sound in this time-plane amounts to about one foot per minute," Rous reminded him, "but we know that if they use a protective energy field they can achieve their own light-speed even within the atmosphere—and that's 2.5 miles per second, which is pretty fast even for us. So eluding anything at that speed isn't exactly playing games. One of these times the enemy may surprise us."

  Before anybody could give a reply Rous' radio receiver buzzed on his armband. The tiny apparatuses kept everyone in touch with each other. He touched a button and spoke into the mini-mike: "Who's that?"

  "Josua!" The African's voice came from about 60 miles away. "The light window—it's back again! But..."

  It came to Rous like a thunderbolt. For a brief instant everything swam before his eyes and his hands groped for support. "What?" he called, flabbergasted. "The energy-ring is there again?"

  "Yes—but it's bigger! At least 200 yards in diameter!"

  Rous turned to Steiner, Ragov and Noir. "Quick! Back to the K-7 on the double! Into your Arkonide suits! We're flying to Josua at once!" Then he spoke again into the tiny microphone. "We're coming right away, Josua! Keep on reporting and I'll keep the receiver open!"

  Rous' mind raced. It was out of the question to try using the K-7 because it had not yet been converted back to normal time. With its present unimaginable mass it was subject to the natural laws of the alien time-plane and thus was as good as immovable.

  There was no alternative but to bring the crew separately to the life saving light-ring with the help of the Arkonide battle-suits. However, in order to insure that the energy-ring generator would continue to function...

  Rous' thought train came to a jarring halt.

  What had Josua said?

  Two hundred yards in diameter...?

  Only now did Rous begin to comprehend that something of colossal import had occurred. This certainly wasn't the old generator that was creating an exit opening for them but an entirely new one. The old light window had only been a few yards in diameter. Bewildered but with hopes soaring, he stumbled after Steiner, Ragov and Noir, who were running toward the K-7. He didn't notice that the giant caterpillar followed him with a smooth, gliding movement.

  Moreover he was distracted by Josua. The other's voice was not coming in with much volume but it nevertheless emerged clearly enough from the mini-speaker in Rous' armband radio:

  "...incredible...! A spherical ship—it can't be anything else—it's ploughing through the window! It's coming to a halt—altitude around 1000 feet!"

  Rous almost collapsed.

  A spherical ship!

  That could only be Rhodan! He was overwhelmed with joy. Rhodan had not left them in the lurch!

  As fast as he could, he raced to the nearby rocks where Harras had assembled his radio station. The technician had already been picking up Josua's transmissions. The latter's face was on the screen when Rous arrived.

  "Normal transmission!" Rous shouted to him. "Call Rhodan! Simultaneous reception!"

  Meanwhile, Steiner and Ragov reached the K-7 and alerted the unsuspecting crew. Seconds later everything was a turmoil.

  Noir relaxed somewhat. He knew that it wasn't a matter of seconds now. Why should he rush
just because everybody else was? Without pushing himself he went to the cages where they kept the Druufs. Altogether there were five specimens which were no longer in their own time ratio and now lived at the same biological rate as the humans. And of course their movements were correspondingly as fast.

  Druufs...?

  All of a sudden Noir was sure that these caterpillars were not the actual rulers of this alien dimension. Their overall reactions pointed to this fact unmistakably. Their comportment did not resemble that of intelligent beings who were the lords of a universe. These creatures here acted and carried on like a subordinate species. Servants or slaves, perhaps, but not rulers.

  Rous sprang to aid Harras as the receiver began to operate. The loudspeaker interrupted its monotonous hum and then everybody on the plateau heard the blaring voice which at this moment seemed to be the voice of salvation.

  "This is light cruiser Sherbourne —Commander Perry Rhodan! We've received your signals. Track our bearings now and beam in—keep on transmitting to us!"

  With a shout of joy, Harras hugged Lt. Rous and slapped him on the shoulder. More than a week of uncanny experiences and frustrating waiting was over with. Soon they would no longer be prisoners of time but would be able to return to their own normal universe.

  Rous turned to Steiner as the latter came running up from the K-7.

  "What happens now, Lieutenant?" asked the physicist. "Do we have to put on the suits or should we wait till they find us? Maybe we should make our position known to them or give them a signal..."

  "Harras is on it already with the transmitter," Rous assured him. "You'd better get busy with Noir and Ragov, collecting the prisoners. We'll take them with us. Our telepaths will soon worm the secret out of them as to who the attackers were. We have to leave the K-7 behind. When Rhodan gets here we won't have any time to lose!"

  Steiner started to laugh. Rous figured it was nothing more than a reaction of sudden relief, a release from the terrible tensions of the past week in which they had been time prisoners.

  "Not lose any time!" Steiner blurted out in an uncontrolled fit of amusement. "Which time and whose time, Lieutenant?"

  Rous gave a slight smile and refrained from answering. The truth was, he wasn't sure he could answer the question...

  • • •

  At the same second that the Sherbourne broke through the barrier gate into the other time-plane, Rhodan knew that he had lost communication with the Drusus . Bell's face had blanked out on the screen as though it had never been there. The radio signals went dead. The sky itself changed. It became red with a tinge of violet.

  Immediately Rhodan heard garbled words in English. With a quick movement he adjusted the receiver dial and was able to make out the distress signal of the lost expedition. He breathed a sigh of relief. Lt. Rous and his men were still alive after all!

  He answered quickly in order to establish communications. Then when the signal-tracer indicated the direction, the Sherbourne continued its journey.

  During these first exciting moments, Pucky sat on the couch and used his ESP in a search for stray thought-waves. Since distance was no obstacle it was not surprising that he was soon making announcements in his high-pitched voice. "Everything's OK with Lt. Rous, considering the situation, I guess—and that goes for the other members of the expedition. I also can't see that the K-7 crew has suffered any damages, and besides—"

  Rhodan had only been listening with half an ear but suddenly something struck home. He interrupted Pucky abruptly: "What's that you say? The crew of the K-7? What do you mean? The K-7 was lost more than a year ago."

  Pucky straightened up, losing some of his languid composure. "Lt. Rous has found the K-7 and its crew and a method was discovered by Ragov or Steiner that made it possible to bring them from the alien time-rate to the normal time-rate. As far as I've been able to read in their minds, seven months ago when they were brought out of the alien time-rate their first encounter with the Timeless Ones had happened almost four months prior—and yet for them the elapsed time was two minutes."

  Sikerman muttered without enthusiasm: "I'm afraid we're in no position to define the laws that govern the corresponding time-rate differentials. Maybe we are already subject to some decisive real time slippages."

  "Don't anticipate trouble like that!" complained Rhodan almost beseechingly. "Take a course from your new bearings and land in the area where Lt. Rous is located. Pucky, you keep scanning the thoughts of our castaways so that we'll have as much of their story behind us as we can by the time we get there—it saves time and that's our main objective now. I'm afraid we're not going to have a second to lose—if we don't want Bell out there to die of impatience from waiting for us!"

  They understood immediately what he meant and knew how serious he was when he said it. If only two minutes were equivalent to more than three months on the outside, what would happen now if they were to spend a matter of hours in this dimension? But they already knew that there was no yardstick for measuring the time lapse here; only experience could give the answer.

  Come what might, however, they were here.

  Rhodan looked below at the rigid plain and the crystalline glitter of the rivers with their waves frozen in time. Ahead on the horizon it must be raining but hours and days would pass before the raindrops reached the ground, so slowly were they falling. By a rough estimate, maybe half a foot per hour.

  Col. Sikerman's voice penetrated the brooding silence. "The instruments show a heavy loading of the energy screens. What can that be?"

  With a swift glance Rhodan scanned the meters. Each indicator's reading remained firmly in his almost photographic mind, which was the reason he was able to find an answer in a very few seconds. "Air resistance, Sikerman! Everything here is subject to the natural laws governing this alien time-plane and that includes the atmosphere. In a relative sense we're ploughing through the air at maybe 10,000 times the speed of sound. Without a defense screen we'd be incandescent, maybe melting by now. Anyway, you can slow your speed, Colonel. We ought to be there soon."

  The tracer signals became stronger. Then, moments later, Rhodan discovered the K-7, which rested motionlessly on a high plateau. Tiny figures ran back and forth—the members of the lost Time Expedition and also the crew of the auxiliary flier that had previously disappeared on Mirsal.

  Moments later, Lt. Rous and Rhodan stood facing each other. "I'm happy to have found you, Lieutenant. However, we don't have any time to lose. Save your report for later. I learned the essentials through Pucky and my telepath, Marshall, so I'm fairly well informed. Order the crew of the K-7 to board the Sherbourne. What's with the prisoners? They look like caterpillars."

  "We named them Druufs because their cries sounded at first like a muffled druuuf when they were stretched out by their own time-rate. At first we assumed they were the leading intelligences of this alien time-plane but in the meantime Noir has come up with another theory: he thinks they're either the slaves or the servants of the actual rulers here."

  "So the Druufs aren't really the Druufs," observed Rhodan with a fleeting smile. "I only hope that one day we'll get to know the real Druufs." He did not suspect how close that day was.

  "At any moment we can expect an attack from their side," Rous stated pointedly. "The Druufs have had enough time to prepare for it since we struck back at them a few days ago and destroyed their time-delay equipment."

  "Time-delay...?" queried Rhodan softly.

  "Yes, because you know in their eyes we are invisible," Rous explained quickly. "Our movements are so fast that they can't be perceived by them. So they mounted 10 cameras in a small aircraft of some kind and were able to detect us. They ran the film or vidtapes super fast and then slowed them down in stages. In the 10th camera they were able to see us as we really are. A pretty smart idea, you'll have to admit."

  "We could reverse that process and do the same thing but it would be more difficult from a time standpoint," replied Rhodan with a thoughtful smile. "Are you
saying that by using one of their time-delay setups they may be able to launch another attack?"

  "I'm sure of it," Rous confirmed.

  Suddenly there was a distraction by a crowd and hubbub centering around the Druuf cages. Somebody shouted something but neither Rous nor Rhodan could make it out.

  "See to it that we can take off in 10 minutes," said Rhodan. "I don't want to lose any more time than that."

  As Rous moved away, Rhodan turned his attention again to the cages which were also to go on board the Sherbourne . Actually he should have realized that Pucky would make good use of his remaining time in the alien dimension, even though he had not been given any specific order to do so.

  The mouse-beaver had discovered the captive caterpillar creatures immediately and had established a telepathic contact with them. Of course it wasn't possible for him to convey his actual thoughts and wishes to the Druufs but he could clearly and plainly read what the creatures were thinking.

  And what they thought was very informative indeed.

  Pucky crouched in front of the cage and listened—until the men came to take the cages into the Sherbourne.

  "You shouldn't lock them up," said Pucky indignantly as he hopped about excitedly. "They are harmless and aren't dangerous in any way. The rulers of this strange dimension have misused them. The rulers are not the ones you're calling the Druufs."

  There was some astonished reaction to this. Ragov joined Pucky and was engaged in several minutes of whispered conversation with him. What he learned served to confirm his own suspicions. The caterpillars were merely a race of workers under the Druufs.

  Pucky was pacified when Ragov assured him that the caterpillars would be treated properly. Until the Sherbourne took off there were still a good five minutes in which the mouse-beaver intended to make further good use of his time. He teleported himself to the nearby cliffs to investigate the caves there.