The Fleet of the Springers Read online

  Tiff whirled around and grabbed the mike.

  "Attention! This is an emergency call! K-7 calling all ships of the Terrestrial spacefleet! K-7 calling all ships of the Terrestrial spacefleet!"

  Then he waited quietly for an answer. It came within a few seconds.

  "Solar System to K-7, Commander Nyssen speaking. We'll be right over but first we have to take care of something else."

  Tiff smiled. "O.K. We'll wait for you."

  • • •

  Orlgans trembled with anxiety as he watched the manoeuvre of the attacking ship. Ornafer stared motionlessly at the observation screen.

  "This time they're going to get us," Orlgans gritted his teeth. "They've already bungled enough shots."

  The spherical ship had swooped past the Orla for a second time, fired a series of shots that missed again and turned around once more in a bold manoeuvre for its third approach. This time Orlgans ordered his gunners to return the fire. There could be little hope that the relatively small. cannons of Orla XI could accomplish anything against the strangers but even traders don't want to die without making an attempt to defend themselves.

  • • •

  Rhodan waited impatiently for news from Nyssen and the K-7 but it never came.

  "It's about time we hear from them," Bell grumbled.

  Rhodan glanced at his watch. It was 21:12 hours Terrestrial time. Then he bent over the microphone.

  "Rhodan to McClears. Get ready for a transition! We want to take a look at what's happening!"

  • • •

  21:12 hours Terrestrial time on board the K-7. "The machines are working at 60% of capacity," Hifield stated. Tiff replied: "That's not sufficient for the protective screens." Hifield shrugged his shoulders. "What do you need the defense screens for?

  The Orla is almost 20,000 miles away and quite busy with the Solar System, Nobody is after us.

  Tiff contemplated before replying. "Let's hope it'll stay that way. I just can't imagine that the Springers..."

  A shrill alarm signal cut off his words.

  "Structure-sensor!" one of the cadets shouted. "Hytrans at close distance!"

  Tiff paid scant attention to the report. "It's the Stardust!" he said.

  But the observer set him right: "Thirty unidentifiable objects, distance 18,000 miles, Phi 21, Theta 89, velocity 4800 miles per second, component in our direction 150 miles per second."

  Tiff spun about. "What do they look like?"

  "Cylindrical and long."

  "These are Springer ships!" Tiff shouted. "Build up protective screens!" Hifield answered angrily: "We don't have enough energy yet. The machines are working only at 65%."

  "Attention, we're receiving fire!"

  • • •

  Ornafer was so surprised when the structure-sensor indicated a disturbance that it took him awhile to pass the report on to Orlgans. "Strong transition in the vicinity!" he panted. "That'll be the end of us."

  However, two seconds later Orlgans called out in a thunderous voice: "Our warships have arrived! We're saved!"

  • • •

  The appearance of the 30 alien ships was registered on the Solar System without panic. Nyssen muttered only: "Things are getting serious!"

  Then he instructed the navigator to hold the ship in standby position and to disregard their erstwhile opponent for the time being. The technical control room was ordered to keep the, gravity generator idling. Only then did Nyssen inform the Stardust. As the transition had probably also been observed by the Stardust, he merely gave a description of the alien ships.

  "They very much resemble the vehicle ahead of us. I'd say they belong to the same people, although those 30 ships look a little more compact. They appear to be more dangerous than the crate here."

  He had barely finished his message when the rangefinder registered the energy release—11,000 miles away. Nyssen immediately drew the conclusion that the K-7 had been bombarded. He tried to make contact with the auxiliary ship but failed to reach it. Then he set the Solar System in motion and prepared to attack the hostile formation, regardless of the fact that his adversary was many times stronger.

  • • •

  The first salvo missed the K-7 by a few thousand feet. Tiff returned the fire but the effect left much to be desired. He had too few men and those he had were hardly trained in the operation of the heavy disintegrators, thermo-beamers and neutron guns. Nevertheless, one of the hostile ships was destroyed. The cadets began to cheer but as soon as they opened their mouths the K-7 was struck such a violent blow that the absorbers had barely time to counteract as it was deflected from its course.

  "Hit in the engine room!" somebody shouted.

  Sirens screamed and the engine control lamp blinked red. Julian Tifflor sat at the pilot console and gave his instructions calmly, matter-of-factly and resolutely as if he were an experienced commander.

  "Manoeuvrability?" he asked quietly.

  The answer came promptly. "Practically nil! Less than 5%."

  "Battle stations! Continue firing and keep the enemy at bay!"

  "Will do, Tiff!"

  Tiff swiveled around in his chair. "We're getting off!" he suddenly decided.

  Hifield asked: "Who is we? We've got only one destroyer on board and it holds no more than three men."

  Tiff shrugged his shoulders. "It'll have to hold five. The two girls and three men. I suggest Deringhouse be one of the three men."

  "O.K.," Eberhardt replied. "But who are the other two?"

  Tiff was already on the way. "We'll find that out. Come on!"

  They ran to the mess hall. The hard blow from the first hit had thrown Major

  Deringhouse from his cot. He had crawled to the table and tried to pull himself up.

  Tiff assessed the situation. "We're going to get you out, sir!" he said.

  Deringhouse slid down again and waved his hand in a rejecting gesture. "That's completely out of the question," he replied. "I've had time to think about Rhodan's plan. You're on an important mission, Tifflor, and it'll be necessary for you to vanish from the scene. Take the two girls and these two men," he pointed at Eberhardt and Hifield, "with you and don't forget to pick up some weapons. You can use the thermo-guns of the Springers."

  Tiff started to protest but Deringhouse cut him short. "No discussions, Cadet Tifflor! It's an order!"

  Tiff saluted. "Yes, sir!"

  The five subdued Springers lay neatly tied up next to the bulkhead and the thermo-guns wrestled from them were stacked in a comer.

  "Take all five guns," Tiff ordered. "We can't have too many of them."

  Eberhardt and Hifield collected the weapons. Tiff stopped at the door and looked at Deringhouse. "I feel like a..." he began, but Deringhouse interrupted him at once.

  "Shut up, Cadet!" he barked at him, "and get out of here as quick as possible. Try to reach the Stardust but first make contact with the Chief, just in case!"

  Tiff saluted a second time and left. Hifield and Eberhardt followed him. The two girls were picked up at their cabins. Tiff gave his last instructions from the hangar of the destroyer.

  "Hold your fire and try to save your lives!" he directed the cadets. "There are too many of them to win. Don't do anything rash!"

  The two girls had already entered the cockpit. Hifield handed them the weapons. He still held the last gun in his hand when the airlock hatch began to buzz and slowly opened up. Eberhardt stood on the left fin of the machine, staring with open mouth at the hatch and what appeared behind it. "Look out!" he shouted.

  Tiff simply threw himself down and rolled over to Hifield. A shot blasted into the room and Hifield reacted with remarkable agility. He turned on his heels and fired a few rounds against the hatch. A wild scream came from the opening. A tall, broad-shouldered figure staggered in, tried to stay on its feet and finally crashed to the floor. Hasty steps could be heard leaving through the passage outside the hangar.

  Hifield jumped over the wounded Springer and darted toward the doo
r.

  "Stay here!" Tiff shouted. "We don't have time for that."

  Hifield stopped in his tracks and returned. He turned the unconscious Springer on his back. The man had a burned black wound high in his left shoulder. "He'll pull through," Hifield decided laconically.

  Then he jumped on the fin of the destroyer and climbed into the cockpit. Tiff was the last to climb aboard. He squeezed into the pilot seat and made a hasty call to the command center, informing it that one of the two remaining Springers lay badly wounded in the hangar and that the other one had got away.

  Then he commanded: "Secure spacesuits and open the airlock!"

  • • •

  Rhodan received Nyssen's message a few seconds before the transition. He passed it on to McClears and impressed upon the captain: "We'll have to slug it out to rescue the K-7 but let's be careful to disable the hostile ships without destroying them!"

  Shortly thereafter the two ships vanished from their positions without a trace and went into hyperspace. Two light-years away they emerged again at a distance of three astronomical units from the orange-colored sun of the twin system.

  21:17 hours Terrestrial time. The battle began.

  • • •

  In the military spacefleet of the Springers the 'group' was the smallest independent unit. A group consisted of 25 to 35 ships and was under the command of a man whose rank was equivalent to that of a captain on Earth.

  Captain Harlgas had been closer with his group to System Beta-Albireo than all the other units of the Springer fleet when Ornafer broadcast his desperate call for help into space by hyperwave on a special frequency.

  Harlgas had acted without delay.

  A few seconds after finishing his transition he had formed a clear impression of the situation. Orla XI, which had been in distress, was now fleeing the system at high velocity. Not far from it was an unfriendly ship of Arkonide design. A little farther away was a third vehicle which looked so small and harmless that Harlgas believed it could be attacked without risk.

  When one of his ships was turned into dust, he realized his mistake. Harlgas laughed terribly as the loss was reported to him. A few seconds later his guns scored a hit and made the little ship inoperable. Harlgas ceased fire and waited to see what the enemy would do next. At the same time he kept watching the far bigger ship which had been waiting inactively at a distance of 12,000 miles and now suddenly resumed speed. He concluded at once that the adversary was going over to the attack and he formed a defensive position with his own ships.

  He would have felt better if he had known what kind of an enemy he was facing. A short talk with Orlgans had warned him that the ships—though apparently of Arkonide origin as he could see for himself—were most certainly not manned by Arkonides.

  Harlgas didn't know what to expect and to complicate the situation, an observer reported that a tiny craft had left the badly damaged unmanoeuvrable ship. Harlgas instructed two of his ships to follow the little craft. The other 27 remained in their assigned positions and Harlgas admonished them not to underestimate the antagonist roaring toward them. His warning soon turned out to be well justified, as the attacking ship unleashed its initial salvo from a distance much greater than a Springer captain would have dared to fire, with the result that two of Harlgas' ships were immediately burned to ashes.

  • • •

  The destroyer finally got off to a good start and shot out into space. Tiff accelerated only moderately.

  "Where to?" Hifield asked.

  "Deringhouse said to get in touch with Rhodan," Tiff replied. "Although I've really no idea where Rhodan might be, but..."

  "...but if Deringhouse says so," Hifield interrupted, you believe it's gospel, don't you?"

  Tiff remained calm. "Not quite," he rebutted. "But Deringhouse knows what he's talking about."

  They were packed tightly in the little cockpit. There were only three seats and the girls had to sit on Eberhardt's and Hifield's laps. Because of the threatening dangers the spacesuits remained closed and communication took place through the transceivers in the helmets

  Tiff could hear Felicita crying softly. He wanted to boost her courage, when suddenly the picture on the sensor screen showed some motion. The sensor had been following the hostile fleet and depicted it as a swarm of motionless points. But now two points detached themselves from the swarm and began to move toward the center of the screen.

  Tiff changed his course and accelerated rapidly. "Looks like well be busy," he said tersely. "They're chasing us!"

  • • •

  "Take care of the K-7, Nyssen!" Rhodan ordered. "Take them back on board!"

  The Solar System shot away in the direction of the K-7. The Stardust kept on its course toward the hostile fleet. The fleet stood about 6000 miles behind the Solar System, whose crew now knew that reinforcement had arrived.

  "Don't get too close, McClears!" Rhodan called. "They probably can beat us at close range."

  The gas clouds from the Springer ships demolished by the disintegrator still floated in space. Two seconds after Nyssen had opened fire the Stardust and the Terra had shown up from hyperspace.

  Rhodan kept following his plan. From the beginning, since the day when Julian Tifflor was told to fly to New York to report to Homer G. Adams, Rhodan had had no other intention than to apprehend the aliens. He had no interest in exterminating his adversary by killing all his men. He wanted to know with whom dealt. With this in mind the two ships approached their targets while Terra went to the aid of the K-7.

  • • •

  The situation became more and more confusing for Captain Harlgas.

  The structure-sensor showed such a strong reaction to the transition that he believed for a moment that the instrument was out of order. Yet the other ships in his group indicated the same magnitude and he soon received the report that two more units had appeared behind the attacking ship, one of them a veritable giant with a tonnage equal to all the ships of his own fleet combined.

  Harlgas: ordered retreat. The Springer group started to move away, to leave the system like Orla XI. He chose not to go into transition since two of his ships had gone after the tiny craft that had left the first of the ships. Harlgas was aware that his men alone out there would fall easy prey to the enemy when they lost contact with his group.

  • • •

  The speed of the little destroyer was almost equal to that of the Springer ships, which were gradually getting closer. Tiff assigned duties. Hifield watched the sensor screen over Felicita's shoulder and reported as soon as a change occurred. Eberhardt operated the cannon. This was rather difficult considering he had to reach around Mildred Orsons for each manipulation. Mildred tried to facilitate his job but there was no room for dodging.

  The distance to the nearer of the Springer ships was still about 5000 miles. The range for well-aimed shots from their disintegrator and neutron-beamer was only about 3500 miles. The question was whether or not their foes had more efficient guns. Tiff decided to take advantage of the greater manoeuvrability of his small craft. "Change course!" he said succinctly.

  Then he pulled the destroyer around, straining the thrust neutralizer to the limit of its capacity. At the same moment Hifield shouted: "The Stardust and Terra!"

  The destroyer was not equipped with a structure sensor. Hifield had located both ships by direct sighting on the observation screen. Tiff tried from the side to get a glimpse of which way the ships were heading. He could see that the Stardust and the Terra proceeded toward the enemy's fleet and that the Springers were beating a retreat. He also observed that the Solar System split off from the others and sped toward the K-7.

  "Damn it!" Hifield muttered under his breath. "We should've stayed on board. It would have been a lot safer."

  "Nobody could have known that," Tiff rebuked him.

  The two Springer ships behind the destroyer were not adversely affected by Tiff's evasion attempt. They simply followed the curve steered by the little machine with greater m
obility than Tiff had expected.

  "I've got them so beautifully on target," Eberhardt sighed. "If they'd only come a little closer."

  Tiff did some figuring. On the present course the destroyer would race past the blue satellite of the central star at a distance of about 10 astronomical units and after that the flight would go on for eternities unless the pursuer or the pursued exhausted his energy reserve. Tiff had little doubt that—if that were to occur—it would first happen to the little destroyer.

  Tiff made a quick decision and in the style of a commander who doesn't owe any explanation to his subalterns he declared: "We're going to let them catch up with us now. Watch out, Eberhardt!"

  He heard Eberhardt take a deep breath. Then came the answer: "O.K. Let 'em come!"

  Tiff decelerated as fast as his craft would permit. Within two minutes the small machine had lost half its speed. It was obvious that their pursuers were not prepared to cope with such an unexpected manoeuvre. At the same rate as the destroyer slowed down, the two cylindrical ships kept rushing closer.

  "Three point nine!" Hifield called out.

  Eberhardt sweated it out at the control panel of the two heavy cannons.

  Felicita became so excited that she forgot to cry.

  "Three point seven!"

  "Attention, Eberhardt!"

  "I'm ready," Eberhardt replied.

  The two enemy ships started to brake.

  "Three point six!"

  "Don't be surprised if we have to perform some rough dodging after the first shot," Tiff warned. "I'll try to stay within the range of our neutralizer but I can't promise I can do it. So better brace yourselves for some hard shocks."

  Nobody answered. A few seconds later Hifield shouted triumphantly: "Three and a half!"

  "Fire!"

  With wide eyes Eberhardt stared at the thin line of light in the center of his target screen and blasted the first disintegrator shot away with a loud cry.