To the Galactic Rim: The John Grimes Saga (2 page)

The ship lifted, and below her the Earth was now a great sphere, three-quarters in darkness, the line of the terminator drawn across land masses, cloud formations and oceans. City lights twinkled in the gloom like star clusters, like nebulae. In a quiet voice an officer was calling readings from the radar altimeter.

To the throbbing of the Inertial Drive was added the humming, shrilling to a whine, of the directional gyroscopes as the ship turned about her short axis hunting the target star. The pseudo-gravity of centrifugal force was at an odd angle to that of acceleration—and the resultant was at an odder angle still. Grimes began to feel sick—and was actually thankful that the Captain had made him put his pipe out. Alarm bells sounded, and then somebody was saying over the intercom. “Prepare for acceleration. Prepare for acceleration. Listen for the countdown.”

The countdown. Part of the long tradition of space travel, a hangover from the days of the first, unreliable rockets. Spaceships still used rockets—but only as auxiliaries, as a means of delivering thrust in a hurry, of building up acceleration in a short time.

At the word
Zero!
the Inertial Drive was cut and, simultaneously, the Reaction Drive flared into violent life. The giant hand of acceleration bore down heavily upon all in the ship—then, suddenly, at a curt order from the Captain, lifted.

Grimes became aware of a thin, high keening, the song of the ever-precessing gyroscopes of the Mannschenn Drive. He knew the theory of it—as what spaceman did not?—although the mathematics of it were beyond the comprehension of all but a handful of men and women. He knew what was happening, knew that the ship, now that speed had been built up, was, as one of his instructors had put it, going ahead in space and astern in time. He felt, as he had been told that he would feel, the uncanny sensation of
déjà vu,
and watched the outlines of the control room and of every person and instrument in the compartment shift and shimmer, the colors sagging down the spectrum.

Ahead, the stars were pulsating spirals of opalescence, astern, Earth and Moon were frighteningly distorted, uncanny compromises between the sphere and the tesseract. But this was no more than the merest subliminal glimpse; in the twinkling of an eye the Home Planet and her daughter were no more than dust motes whirling down the dark dimensions.

The Captain lit a fresh cigar. “Mr. Kennedy,” he said, “you may set normal Deep Space watches.” He turned to Grimes. His full beard almost hid his expression, that of one performing a social duty with no enthusiasm. “Will you join me in my day cabin, Ensign?”

“It will be my pleasure, sir,” lied Grimes.

3

HANDLING HIS BIG BODY
with easy grace in the Free Fall conditions, the Captain led the way from the control room. Grimes followed slowly and clumsily, but with a feeling of great thankfulness that after his training cruise he was no longer subject to spacesickness. There were drugs, of course, and passengers used them, but a spaceman was expected to be independent of pharmaceutical aids. Even so, the absence of any proper “up” or “down” bothered him more than he cared to admit.

The shipmaster slid open the door to his accommodation, motioned to Grimes to enter, murmuring sardonically, “Now you see how the poor live.” The so-called poor, thought Grimes, didn’t do at all badly. This Deep Space sitting room was considerably larger than the day cabin of the Survey Service cruiser’s Captain had been. True, it was also shabbier—but it was far more comfortable. Its decorations would never have been approved aboard a warship, were obviously the private property of the Master. There were a full dozen holograms on the bulkhead, all of them widely differing but all of them covering the same subject matter. Not that the subject matter was covered.

“My harem,” grunted the Captain. “That one there, the redhead, I met on Caribbea. Quite a stopover that was. The green-haired wench—and you can see that it’s not a dye job, although I’ve often wondered why women can’t be
thorough—
isn’t human, of course. But indubitably humanoid, and indubitably mammalian. Belongs to Brrrooonooorrrooo—one of the worlds of the Shaara Empire. The local Queen Mother offered to sell Lalia—that’s her name—to me for a case of Scotch. And I was tempted . . .” He sighed. “But you Service Survey types aren’t the only ones who have to live by Regulations.”

Grimes said nothing, tried to hide his interest in the art gallery.

“But take a pew, Ensign. Spit on the mat and call the cat a bastard—this is Liberty Hall.”

Grimes pulled himself to one of the comfortable chairs, strapped himself in. He said lamely, “I don’t see any cat, sir.”

“A figure of speech,” growled the Captain, seating himself next to what looked like a drink cabinet. “Well, Mr. Grimes, your Commandant at the Academy, Commodore Bradshaw, is an old friend and shipmate of mine. He said that you were a very promising young officer”—like a balloon in a comic strip the unspoken words, “God knows why,” hung between them—“and asked me to keep an eye on you. But I have already gained the impression that there is very little that a mere merchant skipper such as myself will be able to teach you.”

Grimes looked at the bulky figure seated opposite him, at the radiation-darkened skin of the face above the black, silver-streaked beard, at the fiercely jutting nose, at the faded but bright and intelligent blue eyes, the eyes that were regarding him with more than a hint of amused contempt. He blushed miserably as he recalled his brash, “I know, sir,” in this man’s own control room. He said, with an effort, “This is my first Deep Space voyage, sir.”

“I know.” Surprisingly the Captain chuckled—and as though to celebrate this minor scoring over his guest opened the liquor cabinet. “Pity to have to suck this excellent Manzanila out of a bulb—but that’s one of the hardships of Free Fall. Here!” He tossed a little pear-shaped container to Grimes, kept one for himself. “Your health, Ensign!”

“And yours, sir.”

The wine was too dry for Grimes’ taste, but he made a pretense of enjoying it. He was thankful that he was not asked to have a second drink. Meanwhile, his host had pulled a typewritten sheet from a drawer of his desk and was looking at it. “Let me see, now . . . You’re in cabin 15, on D Deck. You’ll be able to find your own way down, won’t you?”

Grimes said that he would and unbuckled his lapstrap. It was obvious that the party was over.

“Good. Now, as an officer of the Survey Service you have the freedom of the control room and the engine rooms. . . .”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Just don’t abuse the privilege, that’s all.”

After that,
thought Grimes,
I’m not likely to take advantage of it, let alone abuse it.
He let himself float up from his chair, said, “Thank you, sir.” (For the drink, or for the admonition? What did it matter?) “I’ll be getting down to my cabin, sir. I’ve some unpacking to do.”

“As you please, Mr. Grimes.”

The Captain, his social duty discharged, had obviously lost interest in his guest. Grimes let himself out of the cabin and made his way, not without difficulty, to the door in the axial shaft. He was surprised at the extent to which one not very large drink had interfered with the control of his body in Free Fall. Emerging from the elevator cage on D Deck he stumbled, literally, into the purser. “Let go of me,” she ordered, “or I shall holler rape!”

That,
he thought,
is all I need to make this trip a really happy one.

She disengaged herself, moved back from him, her slim, sandaled feet, magnetically shod, maintaining contact with the steel decking, but gracefully, with a dancing motion. She laughed. “I take it that you’ve just come from a home truth session with B.B.”

“B.B.?”

“The Bearded Bastard. But don’t take it too much to heart. He’s that way with
all
junior officers. The fact that you’re Survey Service is only incidental.”

“Thank you for telling me.”

“His trouble,” she went on. “His
real
trouble is that he’s painfully shy.”

He’s not the only one,
thought Grimes, looking at the girl. She seemed even more attractive than on the occasion of their first meeting. She had changed into shorts-and-shirt shipboard uniform—and she was one of the rare women who could wear such a rig without looking lumpy and clumpy. There was no cap now to hide her hair—smooth, lustrous, with coppery glints, with a straight white part bisecting the crown of her finely shaped head.

She was well aware of his scrutiny. She said, “You must excuse me, Ensign. I have to look after the other customers. They aren’t seasoned spacemen like you.”

Suddenly bold, he said, “But before you go, what is your name?”

She smiled dazzlingly. “You’ll find a list of all ship’s personnel posted in your cabin. I’m included.” Then she was gone, gliding rapidly around the curve of the alleyway.

He looked at the numbers over the cabin doors, outboard from the axial shaft, making a full circuit of that hollow pillar before he realized that this was only the inner ring, that he would have to follow one of the radial alleyways to reach his own accommodation. He finally found No. 15 and let himself in.

His first action was to inspect the framed notices on the bulkhead.

I.S.S.
Delta Orionis,
he read.

Captain J. Craven, O.G.S., S.S.R.

So the Old Man held a Reserve commission. And the Order of the Golden Star was awarded for something more than good attendance.

Mr. P. Kennedy, Chief Officer.

He ignored the other names on the list while he searched for one he wanted. Ah, here it was.

Miss Jane Pentecost, Purser.

He repeated the name to himself, thinking that, despite the old play on words, this Jane was not plain. (But Janes rarely are.)
Jane Pentecost . . .
Then, feeling that he should be showing some professional interest, he acquainted himself with the names of the other members of the ship’s crew. He was intrigued by the manning scale, amazed that such a large vessel, relatively speaking, could be run by such a small number of people. But this was not a warship; there were no weapons to be manned, there would never be the need to put a landing party ashore on the surface of a hostile planet. The Merchant Service could afford to automate, to employ machinery in lieu of ratings. The Survey Service could not.

Virtuously he studied the notices dealing with emergency procedures, ship’s routine, recreational facilities and all the rest of it, examined with care the detailed plan of the ship. Attached to this was a card, signed by the Master, requesting passengers to refrain, as much as possible, from using the elevator in the axial shaft, going on to say that it was essential, for the good of their physical health, that they miss no opportunity for taking exercise. (In a naval vessel, thought Grimes, with a slight sneer, that would not be a request—it would be an order. And, in any case, there would be compulsory calisthenics for all hands.)

He studied the plan again and toyed with the idea of visiting the bar before dinner. He decided against it; he was still feeling the effects of the drink that the Captain had given him. So, to pass the time, he unpacked slowly and carefully, methodically stowing his effects in the drawers under the bunk. Then, but not without reluctance, he changed from his uniform into his one formal civilian suit. One of the officer-instructors at the Academy had advised this. “Always wear civvies when you’re traveling as passenger. If you’re in uniform, some old duck’s sure to take you for one of the ship’s officers and ask you all sorts of technical questions to which you don’t know the answers.”

While he was adjusting his frilled cravat in front of the mirror the sonorous notes of a gong boomed from the intercom.

4

THE DINING SALOON
was much more ornate than the gunroom of that training cruiser had been, and more ornate than her wardroom. The essentials were the same, of course, as they are in any ship—tables and chairs secured to the deck, each seat fitted with its strap so that the comforting pressure of buttocks on padding could give an illusion of gravity. Each table was covered with a gaily colored cloth—but beneath the fabric there was the inevitable stainless steel to which the stainless steel service would be held by its own magnetic fields. But what impressed Grimes was the care that had been taken, the ingenuity that had been exercised to make this compartment look like anything but part of a ship.

The great circular pillar of the axial shaft was camouflaged by trelliswork, and the trelliswork itself almost hidden by the luxuriance of some broad-level climbing plant that he could not identify. Smaller pillars were similarly covered, and there was a further efflorescence of living decoration all around the circular outer wall—the wall that must be the inner skin of the ship. And there were windows in this wall. No, Grimes decided, not windows, but holograms. The glowing, three dimensional pictures presented and maintained the illusion that this was a hall set in the middle of some great park. But on what world? Grimes could not say. Trees, bushes and flowers were unfamiliar, and the color of the sky subtly strange.

He looked around him at his fellow diners, at the dozen passengers and the ship’s officers, most of whom were already seated. The officers were in neat undress uniform. About half the male passengers were, like himself, formally attired; the others were sloppy in shorts and shirts. But this was the first night out and some laxity was allowable. The women, however, all seemed to have decided to outshine the glowing flowers that flamed outside the windows that were not windows.

There was the Captain, unmistakable with his beard and the shimmering rainbow of ribbons on the left breast of his blouse. There were the passengers at his table—the men inclined to portliness and pomposity, their women sleek and slim and expensive looking. Grimes was relieved to see that there was no vacant place—and yet, at the same time, rather hurt. He knew that he was only an Ensign, a one-ringer, and a very new Ensign at that—but, after all, the Survey Service was the Survey Service.