The Secret of Saturn’s Rings (19 page)

“It’s rusty and old,” his father said. “It takes a lot of bumping to shake its tired old mechanism enough to start it. I can’t understand what keeps it up at all, considering how crumbly the other machines are from that period—those that weren’t preserved in the end hall.”

As if in answer to his words, a new motion began in the tower. One of the six supporting legs slowly bent and buckled. The round ball which housed the cannon and its robot controls slowly turned as its supports gave way, and part of a side opened up and bent outward. Then the whole thing seemed to twist and, slowly, in the easy gravity of Mimas, fell to the ground, bounced and came to rest, a pile of bent metal, crystalline parts, old plastics, and dust.

They walked over to the pile. Bruce poked his little crowbar into it, shoved a bit. The nose of the atomic cannon came into view—and it was still solid and intact. “Made of diamond,” Bruce said, “just like the golden space-ship’s rocket tubes. It didn’t melt or crack.”

The short, stubby gun barrel seemed to consist of glassy crystal, solid, but cloudy and dull, not like the bright gleaming polished stones of Earth’s jewelry. But it was diamond all right, as the engineer explained to his son. Under heat and stress, diamonds become cloudy but retain their qualities of resistance and hardness.

“We ought to go and look at the wreck,” Bruce said, his curiosity about the gun tower satisfied. “Maybe we can find something we can use.”

They started over to the spot on the plain where the battered half of Jennings’ ship lay. As they walked, Dr. Rhodes remarked, “It may prove lucky for us that the atomic shell that hit their ship was old and weakened by time itself. A real new atomic shell would have blown this whole end of the plain to powder. As it is, the one that hit them had only enough power to shatter half of their ship.”

The plain was strewn with blackened pieces of the ship; bits of wire, twisted insulation, fragments of paper and cloth, and so on. But the rear end of the ship was less damaged than might have been supposed. Badly bent, with cracks along its seams, its tubes were twisted and its wiring tangled and torn.

There was a still hot scar in the plain, where one tube had continued to blast out its jet until the ground it touched had become volcanic lava.

Bruce and his father looked in at the wreck of the rear end. Bruce pointed a finger. “There are some tanks that haven’t cracked open,” he announced.

“Hmmm,” his father expressed thoughtful interest. “Give me a boost, I want to get in there and look at them.”

Bruce helped his father up into the body of the engine room. He watched anxiously as Dr. Rhodes poked around the place. “Anything we can use, Dad?” he finally called.

“Hmmm, yes, I think so, Bruce,” his father replied. “At least three of these fuel tanks are still full and not leaking. Their reserves, I imagine. And—yes, there is a tank of compression gas here as well.”

A hope struck Bruce. “Is there any way we can use those tanks? Maybe we can refuel our space boat, go to some other moon and maybe find a way to keep alive. Perhaps to Titan?”

The gray-haired engineer stood in the wreck and thought a moment. “We could do that now. With this fuel we could get to any of the other moons ill our space boat. But what I am trying to figure out is some way we could use this to get to Hidalgo and Garcia.”

“In the little space boat?” Bruce asked. “I thought it couldn’t get up enough power to break loose of Saturn’s grip.”

“It can’t,” said his father, poking at the bolts that held one of the tanks. “What I had in mind was the big ship in the underground storehouse. The Saturnian ship. I was wondering if it would still work after all these years.”

Bruce climbed up into the wreck and joined his father, who said, “Help unbolt this. We can roll the tank out onto the ground.”

They managed to knock loose the remaining fastenings that held the tank to the bent wall of the wreck. Then they rolled the barrel of fuel to the edge and let it drop. It bounced but did not break. “Those plastic barrels can take a lot of beating,” his father said.

The two jumped down. His father walked around the barrel, deep in thought, then looked up. “I think we ought to take the chance, Bruce. From what I saw of that golden ship down there, I am sure its engines are intact. If the sentinel gun could still get off two shots, and it was relatively unprotected all these millions of years, then that ship’s engines should still be able to blast. The tubes certainly will hold up, being diamond. I imagine the main braces will hold, at least long enough for what we need.”

“Is there enough fuel here for a ship that size?” asked Bruce. “And then don’t forget the ship’s not airtight any longer. Its port windows have vanished into dust.”

“That doesn’t matter so much—its not being airtight I mean,” his father answered. “We’ll keep our space suits on. As for the fuel, there is enough here for us to make a rendezvous with Hidalgo, I’m certain of that”

“So what are we waiting for, Dad?” asked Bruce impatiently. “Let’s get this fuel over and load the ship. We can’t have too much time left!”

His father agreed. Getting back into the wreck, they unbolted and rolled onto the plain the remaining two tanks of fuel and the gas cylinder. They added a number of other parts, pieces of wiring, coils, and other parts that were intact in the ruin.

Bruce then went back across the plain in a fast lope to their space boat. Getting in, he jetted it off and rolled it on its big wheels under light blast to the wreck.

He and his father then heaved the big fuel tanks on top of the little rocket boat and tied them on with rope. When the little craft was fully loaded, it seemed buried under the bulky containers, but by gently and cautiously operating its jets, Bruce managed to keep it upright and rolling on its wheels toward the pit that led to the underground storehouse. There they faced the problem of getting the fuel and parts into the cavern and to the end where the ancient space ship rested.

They knocked off their task to return to their tent, refresh themselves, pack what was essential, and renew their strength.

They left the tent up and their notes about their discoveries lying in plain sight on the low table in the middle. Should they fail to return to Earth, whoever next came to Mimas would find their evidence. Uneasily Bruce wondered whether that might not be in millions of more years—if Terraluna exploded Earth’s moon before they could be stopped.

Back at the pit, they rigged up ropes and let the barrels and equipment down carefully. What would have taken a crew of men and machines to do on Earth, two men could do here, so light was the weight on this tiny moon.

Reluctantly Bruce realized they would have to abandon the space boat. He took what he could from it and added it to the pile at the base of the pit— which also included the food and radio that Jennings had left them.

Now father and son climbed down, and made their way over the pile to the short hallway leading to the caverns. They rolled the barrels of fuel before them into the outer cavern. Painstakingly they transferred the rest of the equipment. Though it was nearly weightless, it nevertheless took work to move it and the job was tiring.

Bruce had an inspiration at that point. He went on ahead past the coffins and into the end hall. There he poked among the mysterious machines on exhibit until he found one that rested on a fiat platform with rollers. This he was able to push back through the cavern to where their stuff was waiting. All this time Bruce was hoping uneasily that no second robot watchman would come to life and find them, but apparently one such was all that the ancient moon-creatures had left.

The machine which Bruce had found was some kind of complicated sorting device, resting on a wide, flat platform. Reluctantly Bruce and his father broke away the gears and parts from their base and so made a roller carriage on which they piled the tanks and equipment. This made the job of moving it up to the space ship a mere matter of pushing, and they managed that without further strain.

When they finally reached the base of the launching rack on which the golden ship rested, they faced the problem of making the ship workable. Dr. Rhodes went into the ship and probed around its engines.

“I think I have the hang of this now," he called to Bruce finally. “Essentially this operates in the same way our Earth space ships work. There are some connections here that are different, but I’m not going to alter them. I think we can fuel her. Can you manage to get one of those tanks up here?”

That was easier asked than done, but by means of a hastily rigged hose they transferred the first fuel tank to the ship. Dr. Rhodes maneuvered it into feeding position, opened the cocks, and attached it to the feed chamber on the golden ship. As Bruce watched he could see the points of resemblance. Although built by creatures that did not resemble human beings, and on a world whose culture could have had little in common with mankind’s ways, still the laws of science and mechanics are such that the same type of work must be done in basically tire same manner.

Once they had accomplished this first connection, the rest seemed to follow in order. Between Bruce and his father, with Bruce doing most of the hard work because of his youth and greater strength, they loaded the millions-year-old ship.

The fuel tanks were all in place. Dr. Rhodes had rigged up and patched the ancient rocket feed system, determined the use of all the old parts, however oddly shaped, and adapted them to his own use. An emergency set of controls had been rigged with coils of wire and spare space-suit batteries, so that the ship could be directed from a point near the nose of the craft.

The ship had no inner compartments. It was all one big shell, and Bruce and his father climbed up and down the various struts and catwalks like a pair of monkeys. The nose of the craft was solid and thick. The portholes had evidently been set at the side, where now were gaping holes. The Rhodeses had rigged up a small platform up there behind the nose, so they could observe where they were heading and could control the unshielded engines in the rear.

The lack of shields bothered the old engineer, until he realized that the ancient builders had apparently so arranged their tanks and controls that the rays from any exposed atomic energy were directed away from the interior of the ship. As Dr. Rhodes explained, it was a definite improvement on the Earth ships and one that could be used in the future.

“Is everything all set?” asked Dr. Rhodes formally for the last time.

Bruce braced himself, his feet swinging over a girder, his back against a stanchion. He glanced below him into the depths of the ship. He noted the various bundles of stores he had tied on to likely places among the catwalks and mysterious cupboards of the old ship. Far below he saw the exposed tanks, the gleaming surface of the great diamond rocket tubes and a spider web of new wiring.

He glanced at his father, who was squatting cross-legged behind the great curving golden front of the bullet-like nose, holding in his lap a series of keys and switches rigged on a board, penciled markings noting the various connections.

Bruce felt his space helmet and suit, and all was shipshape.

“O.K.?” his father asked again.

“Ready!” Bruce called. His father nodded, seemed to hesitate an instant, then flicked a switch on his board.

The ship vibrated as the gyroscopic wheel in the center started to turn, sped faster. This was the gear that would keep the ship stable, controllable. In this old craft, that wheel was mounted on the central beam that ran from nose to tail of the craft. Whatever had motivated the wheel in the original machinery was unidentifiable. Instead, it was running now on the power from one of their batteries.

A thought struck Bruce now, one that he had overlooked in the stress and strain of loading. He called to his father, “What about the roof of the cavern above us? Can we crash through it?”

His father replied over the steadily increasing hum of the gyro, “There’s nothing we can do about that. I have gone on the hope that the ancient moon-men realized that too and that the roof at this point is very thin and made to be broken out of. I’m turning on the jets in eight more seconds. Hold tight!”

Bruce clung to his girder, counted eight under his breath. His father threw a second switch. There was a rumble, and the ship shook. Blasts of fumes came welling out from the base of the ship. It rocked from side to side, fighting against the momentum of the central gyroscope.

For an instant Bruce thought the take-off would be a failure. The ship seemed unable to budge. Then his father rapidly threw three more switches in succession. There was a tremendous uproar and a terrific jolt. The ship seemed to plunge upward, and Bruce felt himself jammed against the bare metal frames.

There was a rending crash, felt through the frame of the ship, as the nose tore into the top of the cavern. Then the ship ripped through and burst out into the blackness of the void that began at the very surface of airless Mimas.

Below, Bruce caught a glimpse through a hole in the side. He saw the rocky plain diminish, caught a fleeting look at the little tent standing lonely on it. Saw a crater-like hole where their golden ship had torn out from beneath, and then the scene dwindled and was lost in the hemisphere of the little moon as they moved faster and faster away from Saturn, away into the blackness of interplanetary space.

His father was crouched over the board, watching the flickering dials that gauged their flow. Finally he looked up, craned his neck to look out in front of them through the hole in the side of the ship.

“Were at full blast, Bruce,” he said finally. “Are you all right?”

“Sure, Dad,” said Bruce. He gazed down into the interior of the ship, saw the flare and painful brightness of the rocket jets reflecting violently from the bare metal framework of the ship’s interior. A golden glow seemed to be seeping in through the gaps in the ship’s sides. Bruce glanced outside, saw that it was the great sphere of Saturn shining through their hollow and airless vessel.

Onward they moved, and to Bruce the great sphere of the ringed planet seemed to decrease in size ever so slowly. Unasked, he loosed himself from his perch, let himself down to the rear of the ship. He moved carefully from catwalk to stanchion, hanging on to the strange thin bars and trapezes on which the ancient Saturnians had moved. He tested each connection as he went, checking their installations.