For it meant the end of all hope.
4/ PUCKYS PERIL; RHODAN’S THREAT
Ivan Ragov shook his head disconcertedly and looked at John Marshall as if the latter had suggested that he jump out of the ship. Noir constrained himself while biding his time. He searched for a reasonable explanation for the fact that the formerly motionless caterpillars were beginning to adapt to the human time-plane.
“There can be no doubt that we are bringing them up to our ratio—and without having to travel at light speed. I can’t explain it but the facts are clear before us. The limbs of the caterpillars are already moving at half normal speed and if the change continues at the same rate, within a half hour their movements will be as fast as ours.”
“We can be happy,” said Noir, “that it isn’t the reverse process.”
Ragov narrowed his eyes. “Would we be able to determine which way it was going?” he asked tensely.
“What?” Noir appeared not to comprehend his meaning.
“I mean,” continued Ragov, “would we be able to tell if the reverse of the process were in effect? Where is the neutrally established reference point to which we may address ourselves?”
Now Noir saw his point, as did Marshall.
“But you aren’t really trying to suggest, Ragov—”
Marshall was not able to finish the sentence because he was interrupted at that moment by the intercom buzzer. Rhodan’s face appeared on the small screen.
“All officers and leading scientists are requested to attend a discussion in the wardroom. We will begin in 10 minutes.”
The screen darkened.
Marshall looked at Ragov. “Well?” He had already perceived the thoughts and suppositions of the Russian. “What do you say to that? It looks as though some others are thinking the same thing.”
Ragov nodded. “In 10 minutes we’ll know.” He took a last look at the captive caterpillars which were coming out of their time stasis at an ever-faster rate, then left the room without another word.
John Marshall followed him slowly.
* * * *
“…thus resulting in the following observations, gentlemen, which lead to an unmistakable conclusion. But this you will see for yourselves.”
Rhodan made a short pause and looked into the faces of his men. The Sherbourne’s officers stood between technicians and mutants. Their faces were grave since they realized that Rhodan wouldn’t call a briefing while they were being chased by the 2 black ships unless he had a good reason.
“Ragov was the first one to discover that the movements of the captured caterpillars were adapting themselves to our rate of time. These movements became accelerated gradually and have already come to within half our normal rate. Further, we had already been forced to recognize the fact that apparently the Druufs were able to see us and follow us in spite of the fact that our movements were 72,000 times faster than theirs. Until now we’ve been racking our brains trying to figure out how they could do it; but now that question doesn’t seem to be so important. When Pucky and Ras were on board the Druuf ship they only found robots there, which also functioned only slightly slower than we in our own time-plane. So there you have another time-rate approximation. However the first definitive disclosure of what’s happening has come from the crash of the other ship and its destruction. Even if we may assume that individual Druufs are able to approach our time-plane with the help of some unknown factor or device, it would nevertheless be absurd to suppose that an entire planet is adapting itself to our ratio, as the ship’s explosion appeared to indicate.”
He paused again, this time for effect. But most of the listeners didn’t dare face the only logical conclusion because it was too fantastic—and too terrible.
But Rhodan was not fond of leaving his friends in the dark. He flipped on the connection with the Command Central. “Sikerman, channel the observation video in here to the wardroom. I’ll use the large intercom screen.”
He waited until the large screen brightened and revealed the slowly passing surface of the Crystal World. Actually the surface was not rolling away under the Sherbourne as imperceptibly as it had done before. The planet’s increased rotational motion was now apparent.
“We have not increased our pace,” said Rhodan calmly. “Our flight shows an apparent increase of speed but it’s due to the time-plane approximation. Col. Sikerman, cut in the magnification now and slow your speed enough so that surface details will be visible. You’ll still have to watch your distance from the pursuing Druuf ships, however.”
The screen’s image blurred momentarily. Then deserts and mountains came into view, moving more slowly across the fluorescent screen. This gave way to a scene that was so surprising that a wave of whisperings ran through the group of watchers.
Previously the Crystal World’s slow rate of existence had caused all motion to be imperceptible. All living creatures had appeared to be rigid and lifeless.
Until now.
There on the screen were hundreds of the caterpillars, crawling or walking about and carrying on their affairs as though they had never existed at a slower rate. There was now not the slightest time difference to be detected.
The onlookers even recognized several inhabitants of Tats-Tor who had lost their own time-rate and had disappeared as a result of the interfacing of the time dimensions. They lived down there on the Crystal World at the same rate of motion and consciousness as the caterpillars—which now included those on board the Sherbourne.
A groan was heard—probably from someone who now comprehended the meaning and purpose of Rhodan’s demonstration.
Ivan Ragov spoke up. “I began to suspect this change when I was investigating the caterpillars in their cages and noticed that their movements were becoming quite perceptible. It is not their plane of time that is adapting to ours but rather our own that has lost its former real-time ratio. We have slowed down. In actuality we are living at a rate here that is 72,000 times slower than that of the people on Earth or the crew of the Drusus. Each second in this state He broke and put his face in his hands.
Rhodan went to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “That’s nothing but a pure hypothesis, Ragov. Nobody knows really what the time-lapse is and we should take pains not to jump to any premature conclusions. At any rate we now know that we are in the other time-plane in the full sense of the word and we can’t dodge the fact that we’ll be lost if we don’t return to our own universe as quickly as possible. But that’s a long way from saying that the men on the Drusus are growing 20 hours older with each passing second here. The relationship between the 2 planes of existence is flexible and not calculable. We don’t know the natural laws existing between them which are the basis of the differentials in effect.”
Khrest, who had been speaking in undertones with Atlan, now came forward. “Is there an explanation for the phenomenon?” he asked.
Rhodan shook his head. “That was the next question, Khrest. Unfortunately, for the time being I have to answer no. Do you have an explanation—or Atlan?”
“We have one,” said Khrest while suppressing an expression of pride. “However, we can’t guarantee that it’s correct. An event of this nature has never happened during the past 10,000 years. It’s completely unique—but so are our technical methods—and the warp-field generator is a case in point. Of course we know that it made it possible for us to penetrate the other time-plane but who would venture to say what effect it may itself be exerting on the function of time here? Nobody! For hours now we’ve been under the influence of the warp-generator’s energy field, which surrounds the entire planet. Also, we have repeatedly flown through the time wall structure, or the time bubble that surrounds the generator like a dark dome. It isn’t possible to break through that wall at ground level but we succeeded in getting through it at higher elevations where it is weaker. Do we know what effect that may have on our own time-lapse rate?”
He was met with silence. Even Rhodan didn’t answer. He began to suspect that Khrest might have solved the puzzle, even though it wasn’t much help to anybody right now. Everybody knew that they were the prisoners of another time… a time-sphere which when embedded in the normal universe gradually broke it up and over-flooded it.
Rhodan asked himself secretly if in the long run such a phenomenon constituted such a terrible misfortune but then he forced himself back to the hard and unrelenting present.
“We shall now attack the Druufs,” he said, and he saw in the hopeful faces of his officers and friends that no one had thought of any other possibility.
Actually, was there any other…?