Arcot looked at the star in the great window him. "We'll want to another G-0 sun, naturally, but I don't think we ought to go directly from here. If we did, we'd have to do a of to to this star. I we go to the of this galaxy, taking pictures on the way out, so that any can come in directly. It'll only take a hours."
"I think you're right," Morey. "Besides, that will give us a choice of to our next G-0 from. Let's going."
Arcot moved the red switch, and the ship away at speed. They the green image of the white and then up and again as they the light that had left it five centuries before.
They stopped and took more so that the path be marked. They stopped every light century until they a point where the star was a point, almost in the of around it.
Then out to the of the they went, out toward their own universe.
"Arcot," Morey called, "let's go out, say one light years into space, at an to this galaxy, and see if we can on one plate. It will make them easier."
"Good idea. We can out and in one day—and this 'time' won't count on Earth, anyway." Since they would travel in the space-strain all the time, it would not count as Earth time.
Arcot pushed the red all the way forward, and the ship to move at its top of twenty-four light years second. The hours heavily, as they had when they were in, and Arcot alone on watch while the others to their rooms for some sleep, their in the bunks.
It was hours later when Morey with a of trouble. He looked at the on the wall—he had slept twelve hours! They had gone the light year mark! It didn't matter, it that something had to Arcot.
Something had. Arcot was asleep in the middle of the library—exactly in the middle, in the room ten from each wall.
Morey called out to him, and Arcot with a start. "A you make," said Morey caustically. "Can't keep when all you have to do is here and see that we don't into anything. We've gone more than our light years already, and we're still going strong. Come on—snap out of it!"
"I'm sorry—I apologize—I know I shouldn't have slept, but it was so perfectly here for your deep-toned, that I couldn't help it," Arcot. "Get me from here and we'll stop."
"Get you down, nothing!" Morey snapped. "You right there while I call the others and we decide what's to be done with a sleeping sentry."
Morey and left to wake the others.
He had Wade and told him what had happened, and they were on their way to wake up Fuller, when the air of the ship around them! The space was changing! They were out of hyperspace!
In amazement, Morey and Wade looked at each other. They that Arcot was still in the middle of the room, but—
"Hold on, you apes! We're around!" came Arcot's voice, full of mirth.
Suddenly they were against the of the ship under four of acceleration! Unable to walk, they only toward the room, calling to Arcot to off the power.
When Morey had left him in the library, Arcot had it was high time he got to the floor. Quickly, he looked around for a means of doing so. Near him, in the air, was the book he had been reading, but it was out of reach. He had taken off his when he started to read, so the Fuller method was out. It hopeless.
Then, suddenly, came the inspiration! Quickly, he off his shirt and it in the air. He a of about two a second—not very fast, but fast enough. By the time he had put his shirt on, he had the wall.
After that, it was easy to shoot himself over to the door, out into the and into the room without being by Morey, who was in Wade's room.
Just as Wade and Morey the to the room, Arcot it was time to the power off. Both of the men, under more than eight hundred of weight, were weightless. All the of their powerful were in them against the wall.
The were loud, but they to an to know how in the Arcot had managed to off center.
"Why, that was easy," he said airily. "I just on a little power; I under the of the weight and then it was easy to to the room."
"Come on," Wade demanded. "The truth! How did you here?"
"Why, I just pushed myself here."
"Yes; no doubt. But how did you of anything to push?"
"I just took a of air and it away and the wall."
"Oh, of course—and how did you the air?"
"I just took some air and it away and the wall."
Which was all they learn. Arcot was going to keep his secret, it seemed.
"At any rate," Arcot continued, "I am in the room, where I belong, and you are not in the where you belong. Now out of my territory!"
Morey pushed himself to the observatory, and after a minutes, his voice came over the intercom. "Let's move on a more, Arcot. We still can't on the same plate. Let's go on for another hour and take our pictures from that point."
Fuller had and come in in the meantime, and he wanted to know why they didn't take some pictures from this spot.
"No point in it," said Morey. "We have the ones we took in; what we want is a wide-angle shot."
Arcot on the space-strain drive once more, and they on at top speed.
They were all in the room, the and joking—principally the latter—when it happened. One they were moving smoothly, along. The next instant, the ship as though it had been violently! The air was a of sparks, and there came the crash of the that was their main power fuse. Simultaneously, they were with force; the that them in place with the strain, and the men weak and faint.
Consciousness nearly left them; they had been in a dozen places by the sparks.
Then it was over. Except that the ships no longer them, the Ancient Mariner unchanged. Around them, they see the of the galaxies.
"Brother! We came near something!" Arcot cried. "It may be a star! Take a look around, quick!"
But the dark of space empty around them as they through space. Then Arcot off the lights of the room, and in a moment his had to the lights.
It was ahead of them. It was a red glow, so it was visible. Arcot it was a star.
"There it is, Morey!" he said. "A star, directly ahead of us! Good God, how close are we?"
They were toward the red bulk.
"How are we from it?" Fuller asked.
"At least million—" Morey began. Then he looked at the recorded on the detector. "ARCOT! FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE DO SOMETHING! THAT THING IS ONLY A FEW HUNDRED MILES AWAY!"
"There's only one thing to do," Arcot said tightly. "We can to avoid that thing; we haven't got the power. I'm going to try for an around it. We'll toward it and give the ship all the she'll take. There's no time to calculate—I'll just on the speed until we don't into it."
The others, into the chairs, prepared themselves for the to come.
If the Ancient Mariner had toward the star from an distance, Arcot have power to put the ship in a which would have them past the star. But they had come in on the space drive, and had close the had the power from the main coil, and it was not until the space had that they had started to toward the star. Their would not be great to an orbit.
Even now, they would of to into an unless they used the drive.
Arcot toward one of the star, and power into the drive. The ship under an additional five and a of acceleration. Their had been five thousand miles second when they entered hyperspace, and they were adding to their original velocity.
They did not, of course, the of the sun, since they were in free in its field; they only the five and a of the drive. Had they been able to the of the star, they would have been by their own weight.
Their speed was as they nearer to the star, and Arcot was the ship on with all the additional power he get. But he that the only they had was to the ship in a closed around the star, and a closed meant that they would be to the star as a planet! Helpless, for not the power of the Ancient Mariner them to escape!
As the red of the sun toward them, Arcot said: "I think we'll make an orbit, all right, but we're going to be close to the surface of that thing!"
The others were quiet; they Arcot and the star as Arcot movements with the controls, doing all he to them in an that would be safe.
It like an eternity—five and a of the men in their chairs almost as well as the of the that them. When a man than a ton, he doesn't like moving much.
Fuller to Morey out of the of his mouth. "What on Earth—I mean, what in Space is that thing? We're only a hundred miles, you said, so it must be small. How it us around like this?"
"It's a white dwarf—a 'black dwarf', you might say," Morey replied. "As the of such increases, the of the star less and less on its temperature. In a with the of the sun, the temperature is negligible; it's the action of the the electron-nucleon which makes up the star that supreme.
"It's been that if a white dwarf—or a black one—is in mass, it to decrease in after a point is reached. In fact, no cold star can with a than about one and a times the of the sun—as the and the pressure goes up, the star in of the in it. At a little than 1.4 times the of the sun—our sun, I mean: Old Sol—the star would to a point.
"That has almost in this case. The limit is when the star has the of a neutron, and this star hasn't that by a long shot.
"But that star is only kilometers—or less than twenty-five miles in diameter!"
It took nearly two hours of to an which Arcot circular.
And when they did, Wade looked at the sky above them and shouted: "Say, look! What are all those streaks?"
Arcing up from the surface of the red plain them and going over the ship, were of light across the sky. One of them was than the rest, a white streak. The didn't move; they to have been painted on the sky overhead, of light.
"Those," said Arcot, "are the nebulae. That wide is the one we just left. The must be a star.
"They look like we're moving so fast in so small an orbit." He pointed to the red star them. "We're less than twenty miles from the center of that thing! We're almost thirty from its center, or about ten from its surface! But, of it's great mass, our is something terrific!
"We're going around that thing than three hundred times every second; our 'year' is three long! Our is seven hundred thousand second!
"We're moving along at about a of the speed of light!"
"Are we safe in this orbit?" Fuller asked.
"Safe enough," said Arcot bitterly. "So safe that I don't see how we'll free. We can't away with all the power on this ship. We're trapped!
"Well, I'm out from under all that gravity; let's eat and some sleep."
"I don't like sleeping," said Fuller. "You may call this safe, but it would only take an to to the surface of that thing there." He looked at their inert, but powerful enemy now to be their pyre.
"Well," said Arcot, "falling into it and off into space are two you don't have to worry about. If we started toward it, we'd be falling, and our would increase; as a result, we'd right out again. The of the to make us into that sun is appalling! The on us now to about five billion tons, which is by the of our velocity. Any to it would be like trying to a with that much resistance.
"We'd a to make us either into that star—or away from it.
"To escape, we have to this ship out against gravity. That means we'd have to about five of mass. As we out, our weight will decrease as the off, but we would need such of energy that they are conception.
"We have up two of the coils, and are now using another two to them again. We need at least four to spare, and we only started out with twenty. We haven't got fuel to from this star's hold, as the energy of is. Let's eat, and then we can sleep on the problem."
Wade a for them, and they ate in silence, trying to think of some way out of their dilemma. Then they to sleep on the problem, as Arcot had suggested, but it was difficult to relax. They were physically tired; they had gone through such great strains, in the time that they had been maneuvering, that they were very tired.
Under a five times than normal gravity, they had in one-fifth the time they would have at one gravity, but their were still wide awake, trying to think of some way—any way—to away from the dark sun.
But at last sleep came.
