Science fiction; Space ships -- Fiction; Space warfare -- Fiction
In the projector, where they were joined by Rovol, Orlon, and several
others of the various "Firsts" of Norlamin, they flashed out to the
flying torpedo, and Seaton grinned at Crane as their fifth-order carrier
beam went through the far-flung detector screens of the Fenachrone
without setting up the slightest reaction. In the wake of that speeding
messenger they flew through a warm, foggy, dense atmosphere, through a
receiving trap in the wall of a gigantic conical structure, and on into
the telegraph room. They saw the operator remove spools of tape from the
torpedo and attach them to a magnetic sender--heard him speak.
"Pardon, your majesty--we have just received a first-degree emergency
torpedo from flagship Y427W of fleet 42. In readiness."
"Put it on, here in the council chamber," a deep voice snapped.
"If he's broadcasting it, we're in for a spell of hunting," Seaton
remarked. "Nope, he's putting it on a tight beam--that's fine, we can
chase it up," and with a narrow detector beam he traced the invisible
transmission beam into the council room.
"'Sfunny. This place seems awfully familiar--I'd swear I'd seen it
before, lots of times--seems like I've been in it, more than once,"
Seaton remarked, puzzled, as he looked around the somber room, with its
dull, paneled metal walls covered with charts, maps, screens, and
speakers; and with its low, massive furniture. "Oh, sure, I'm familiar
with it from studying the brain of that Fenachrone captain. Well, while
His Nibs is absorbing the bad news, we'll go over this once more. You,
Carfon, having the biggest voice of any of us ever heard uttering
intelligible language, are to give the speech. You know about what to
say. When I say 'go ahead' do your stuff. Now, everybody else, listen.
While he's talking I've got to have audio waves heterodyned both ways in
the circuit, and they'll be able to hear any noise any of us make--so
all of us except Carfon want to keep absolutely quiet, no matter what
happens or what we see. As soon as he's done I'll cut off the audio
sending and say something to let you all know we're off the air. Got
it?"
"One point has occurred to me about handling the warning," boomed
Carfon. "If it should be delivered from apparently empty air, directly
at those we wish to address, it would give the enemy an insight into our
methods, which might be undesirable."
"H--m--m. Never thought of that ... it sure would, and it would be
undesirable," agreed Seaton. "Let's see ... we can get away from that by
broadcasting it. They have a very complete system of speakers, but no
matter how many private-band speakers a man may have, he always has one
on the general wave, which is used for very important announcements of
wide interest. I'll broadcast you on that wave, so that every
general-wave speaker on the planet will be energized. That way, it'll
look as if we're shooting from a distance. You might talk accordingly."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account