completely circumstantial report of whose death by cremation he had witnessed such a
few days before.
DuQuesne strolled across the floor of the control room, and in mid-step became
weightless, floating freely in the air. The planet had exploded, and the outermost fringe of
the wave-front of the atomic disintegration, propagated outwardly into spherical space
with the velocity of light, had impinged upon the all-seeing and ever-watchful mechanical
eye which DuQuesne had so carefully installed. But only that outermost fringe, composed
solely of light and ultra-light, had touched that eye. The relay-an electronic beam-had
been deflected instantaneously, demanding of the governors their terrific maximum of
power, away from the doomed world. The governor had responded in a space of time to
be measured only in fractional millionths of a second, and the vessel leaped effortlessly
and almost instantaneously into an acceleration of five light-velocities, urged onward by
the full. power of the space-annihilating drive of the Fenachrone.
The eyes of DuQuesne and Loring had had time really to see nothing whatever. There
was the barest perceptible flash of the intolerable brilliance of an exploding universe,
succeeded in the very instant of its perception-yes, even before its real perception-by the
utter blackness of the complete absence of all light whatever as the space drive
automatically went into action and hurled the great vessel away from the all-destroying
wave-front of the atomic explosion.
As has been said, there were many battleships within the screens of the planet
supporting a horde of scout ships according to Invasion Plan XB218; but of all these
vessels and of all things Fenachrone, only two escaped the incredible violence of the
holocaust. One was the immense space-ship of Ravindau the scientist, which had for
days been hurtling through space upon its way to a far-distant galaxy; the other was the
first-line battleship carrying DuQuesne and his killer aid, which had been snatched from
the very teeth of that indescribable cosmic cataclysm by the instantaneous operation of
DuQuesne s automatic relays.
Everything on or near the planet had of course been destroyed instantly, and even the
fastest battleship, farthest removed from the disintegrating world, was overwhelmed. For
to living eyes, staring however attentively into ordinary visiplates, there had been
practically no warning at all, since the wave-front of atomic disruption was propagated
with the velocity of light and therefore followed very closely indeed behind the narrow
fringe of visible light which heralded its coming.
Even if one of the dazed commanders had known the meaning of the coruscant blaze of
brilliance which was the immediate forerunner of destruction, he would have been
helpless to avert it, for no hands of flesh and blood, human or Fenachrone, could possibly
have thrown switches rapidly enough to have escaped from the advancing wave-front of
disruption; and at the touch of that frightful wave every atom of substance, alike of
vessel, contents, and hellish crew, became resolved into its component electrons and
added its contribution of energy to the stupendous cosmic catastrophe.
Even before his foot had left the floor in free motion, however, DuQuesne realized
exactly what had happened. His keen eyes saw the flash of blinding incandescence
announcing a world’s ending and sent to his keen brain a picture; and in the instant of
perception that brain had analyzed that picture and understood its every implication and
connotation. Therefore he only grinned sardonically at the phenomena which left the
slower-minded Loring dazed and breathless.
He continued to grin as the battleship hurtled onward through the void at a pace beside
which that of any etherborne wave, even that of such a Titanic disturbance as the atomic
explosion of an entire planet, was the veriest crawl.
At last, however Loring comprehended what had happened. “Oh, it exploded, huh?” he
ejaculated.
“It most certainly did.” The scientist’s grin grew diabolical. “My statements to them came
true, even though I did not have anything to do with their fruition. However, these events
prove that caution is all right in its place–it pays big dividends at times. I’m very glad, of
course, that the Fenachrone have been definitely taken out of the picture.”
Utterly callous, DuQuesne neither felt nor expressed the slightest sign of pity for the race
of beings so suddenly snuffed out of existence. “There removal at this time will
undoubtedly save me a lot of trouble later on,” he added, “but the whole thing certainly
gives me furiously to think, as the French say. It was done with a sensitized atomic
copper bomb, of course; but I should like very much to know who did it, and why; and,
above all, how they were able to make the approach ”
“Personally, I still think it was Seaton,” the baby-faced murderer put in calmly. “No
reason for thinking so, except that whenever anything impossible has been pulled off
anywhere that I ever heard of, he was the guy that did it. Call it a hunch, if you want to.”
“It may have been Seaton, of course, even though I can’t really think so.” DuQuesne
frowned blackly in concentration. “It may have been accidental-started by the explosion
of an ammunition dump or something of the kind-but I believe that even less than I do the
other. It couldn’t have been any race of beings from any other planet of this system,
since they are all bare of life, the Fenachrone having killed off all the other races ages
ago and not caring to live on the other planets themselves. No; I still think that it was
some enemy from outer space; although my belief that it could not have been Seaton is
weakening.
“However, with this ship we can probably find out in short order who it was, whether it
was Seaton or any possible outside race. We are far enough away now to be out of
danger from that explosion, so we’ll slow down, circle around, and find out whoever it
was that touched it off.”
He slowed the mad pace of the cruiser until the firmament behind them once more
became visible, to see that the system of the Fenachrone was now illuminated by a
splendid double sun. Sending out a full series of ultra-powered detector screens,
DuQuesne scanned the instruments narrowly. Every meter remained dead, its needle
upon zero; not a sign of radiation could be detected upon any communicator or power
band; the ether was empty for millions upon untold millions of miles. He then put on
power and cruised at higher and higher velocities, describing a series of enormous
looping circles throughout the space surrounding that entire solar system.
Around and around the flaming double sun, rapidly becoming first a double star and then
merely a faint point of light, DuQuesne urged the Fenachrone battleship, but his screens
remained cold and unresponsive. No ship of the void was operating in all that vast volume
of ether; no sign of man or of any of his works was to be found throughout it.
DuQuesne then extended his detectors to the terrific maximum of their unthinkable range,
increased his already frightful acceleration to its absolute limit, and cruised madly onward
in already vast and ever-widening spirals until a grim conclusion forced itself upon his
consciousness. Unwilling though he was to believe it, he was forced finally to recognize
an appalling fact. The enemy, who ever he might have been, must have been operating
from a distance immeasurably greater than any that even DuQuesne’s new-found
knowledge could believe possible; abounding though it was in astounding data concerning
superscientific weapons of destruction.
He again cut their acceleration down to a touring rate, adjusted his automatic alarms and
signals, and turned to Loring, his face grim and hard.
“They must have been farther away than even any of the Fenachrone physicists would
have believed possible,” he stated flatly. “It looks more and more like Seaton-he
probably found some more high-class help somewhere. Temporarily, at least, I am
stumped-but I do not stay stumped long. I shall find him if I have to comb the galaxy, star
by star!”
Thus DuQuesne, not even dreaming what an incredibly inconceivable distance from their
galaxy Seaton was to attain; nor what depths of extradimensional space Seaton was to
traverse before they were again to stand face to facecold black eyes staring straight into
hard and level eyes of gray.
5 THOUGHT-A SIXTH-ORDER WAVE
The mightiest space ship that had ever lifted her stupendous mass from any planet
known to the humanity of this, the First Galaxy, was hurtling onward through the hard
vacuum of intergalactic space. Around the Skylark there was nothing-no stars, no suns,
no meteorites, no smallest particle of cosmic dust. The First Galaxy lay so far behind her
that even its vast lens showed only as a dimly perceptible patch of light in the visiplates.
The Fenachrone space chart placed other galaxies to right of and to left of, above and
below, the flying cruiser; but they were so infinitely distant that their light could scarcely