“Hi, Kim, you old son-of-a-space-flea!” A general yell arose at sight of him, and irrepressible youth rioted, regardless of Regs, in this reunion of old comrades in arms who were yet scarcely more than boys in years.
“His Nibs says for you to call him, Kim, when we’re about an hour out from Prime Base,”
Maitland informed his class-mate irreverently, as the Dauntless neared the Solarian system.
“Plate or Lens?”
“Didn’t say—as you like, I suppose.”
“Plate then, I guess—don’t want to butt in,” and in moments Port Admiral and Gray Lensman were in image face to face.
“How are you making out, Kinnison?” Haynes studied the young man’s face intently, gravely, line by line. Then, via Lens, “We heard about the shows you put on, clear over here on Tellus. A man can’t drink and dope the way you did without suffering consequences. I’ve been wondering if even you can fight it off. How about it? How do you feel now?”
“Some craving, of course,” Kinnison replied, shrugging his shoulders. “That can’t be helped—you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs. However, it’s nothing I can’t lick.
I’ve got it pretty well boiled out of my system already.”
“Mighty glad to hear that, son. Only Ellison and I know who Wild Bill Williams really is.
You had us scared stiff for a while.” Then, speaking aloud: “I would like to have you come to my office as soon as possible.”
“I’ll be there, chief, two minutes after we hit the bumpers,” and he was.
“The admiral busy, Ruby?” he asked, waving an airy salute at the attractive young woman in Haynes’ outer office.
“Go right in, Lensman Kinnison, he’s waiting for you,” and opening the door for him, she stood aside as he strode into the sanctum.
The Port Admiral returned the younger man’s punctilious salute, then the two shook hands warmly before Haynes referred to the third man in the room.
“Navigator Xylpic, this is Lensman Kinnison, Unattached. Sit down, please; this may take some time. Now, Kinnison, I want to tell you that ships have been disappearing, right and left, disappearing without sending out an alarm or leaving a trace. Convoying makes no difference, as the escorts also disappear . . .”
“Any with the new projectors?” Kinnison flashed the question via Lens—this was nothing to talk about aloud.
“No,” came the reassuring thought in reply. “Every one bottled up tight until we find out what it’s all about. Sending out the Dauntless after you was the only exception.”
“Fine. You shouldn’t have taken even that much chance.” This interplay of thought took but an instant; Haynes went on with scarcely a break in his voice: “. . . with no more warning or report than the freighters and liners they are supposed to be protecting. Automatic reporting also fails—the instruments simply stop sending. The first and only sign of light—if it is such a sign; which frankly, I doubt—came shortly before I called you in, when Xylpic here came to me with a tall story.”
Kinnison looked then at the stranger. Pink. Unmistakably a Chickladorian—pink all over.
Bushy hair, triangular eyes, teeth, skin; all that same peculiar color. Not the flush of red blood showing through translucent skin, but opaque pigment; the brick-reddish pink so characteristic of the near-humanity of that planet.
“We have investigated this Xylpic thoroughly,” Haynes went on, discussing the Chickladorian as impersonally as though he were upon his home planet instead of there in the room, listening. “The worst of it is that the man is absolutely honest—or at least, he thinks he is—in telling this yarn. Also, except for this one thing—this obsession, fixed idea, hallucination, call it what you like; it seems incredible that it can be a fact—he not only seems to be, but actually is, sane. Now, Xylpic, tell Kinnison what you told the rest of us. And Kinnison, I hope you can make sense of it— none of the rest of us can.”
“QX Go ahead, I’m listening.” But Kinnison did far more than listen. As the fellow began to talk the Gray Lensman insinuated his mind into that of the Chickladorian. He groped for moments, seeking the wave-length; then he, Kimball Kinnison, was actually re-living with the pink man an experience which harrowed his very soul.
“The second navigator of a Radeligian vessel died in space, and when it landed on Chickladoria I took the berth. About a week out, the whole crew went crazy, all at once. The first I knew of it was when the pilot on duty beside me left his board, picked up a stool, and smashed the automatic recorder. Then he went inert and neutralized all the controls.
“I yelled at him, but he didn’t answer me, and all the men in the control room acted funny. They just milled around like men in a trance. I buzzed the captain, but he didn’t acknowledge either. Then the men around me left the control room and went down the companionway toward the main lock. I was scared—my skin prickled and the hair on the back of my neck stood straight up—but I followed along, quite a ways behind, to see what they were going to do. The captain, all the rest of the officers, and the whole crew joined them in the lock.
Everybody was in an awful hurry to get somewhere.
“I didn’t go any nearer—I wasn’t going to go out into space without a suit on. I went back into the control room to get at a spy-ray, then changed my mind. That was the first place they would come to if they boarded us, as they probably would—other ships had disappeared in space, plenty of them. Instead, I went over to a life-boat and used its spy. And I tell you, sirs, there was nothing there—nothing at all!” The stranger’s voice rose almost to a shriek, his mind quivered in an ecstasy of horror.
“Steady, Xylpic, steady,” the Gray Lensman said, quietingly. “Everything you’ve said so far makes sense. It all fits right into the matrix. Nothing to go off the beam about, at all.”
“What! You believe me!” the Chickladorian stared at Kinnison in amazement, an emotion very evidently shared by the Port Admiral.
“Yes,” the man in gray leather asserted. “Not only that, but I have a very fair idea of what’s coming next. Shoot!”
“The men walked out into space.” The pink man offered this information diffidently, although positively—an oft-repeated but starkly incredible statement. “They did not float outward, sirs, they walked; and they acted as if they were breathing air, not space. And as they walked they sort of faded out; became thin, misty-like. This sounds crazy, sir,” to Kinnison alone, “I thought then maybe I was cuckoo, and everybody around here thinks I am now, too.
Maybe I am nuts, sir—I don’t know.”
“I do. You aren’t.” Kinnison said calmly. “Well, and here comes the worst of it, they walked around just as though they were in a ship, growing fainter all the time. Then some of them lay down and something began to skin one of them—skin him alive, sir—but there was nothing there at all. I ran, then. I got into the fastest lifeboat on the far side and gave her all the oof she’d take. That’s all, sir.”
“Not quite all, Xylpic, unless I’m badly mistaken. Why didn’t you tell the rest of it while you were at it?”
“I didn’t dare to, sir. If I’d told any more they would have known I was crazy instead of just thinking so . . .” He broke off sharply, his voice altering strangely as he went on: “What makes you think there was anything more, sir? Do you . . . ?” The question trailed off into silence.
“I do. If what I think happened really did happen there was more—quite a lot more—and worse. Wasn’t there?”
“I’ll say there was!” The navigator almost exploded in relief. “Or rather, I think now that there was. But I can’t describe any of it very well—everything was getting fainter all the time, and I thought I must be imagining most of it.”
“You weren’t imagining a thing . . .” the Lensman began, only to be interrupted by Haynes.
“Hell’s jingling bells!” that worthy shouted. “If you know what it was, spill it!”
“Think I know, but not quite sure yet—got to check it. Can’t get it from him—he’s told everything he really knows. He didn’t really see anything, it was practically invisible. Even if he had tried to describe the whole performance you. wouldn’t have recognized it. Nobody could have except Worsel and I, and possibly vanBuskirk. I’ll tell you the rest of what actually happened and Xylpic can tell us if it checks.” His features grew taut, his voice became hard and chill. “I saw it done, once. Worse, I heard it. Saw it and heard it, clear and plain. Also, I knew what it was all about, so I can describe it a lot better than Xylpic possibly can.