The Cradle was the starting point of the strange alien race that had colonised the galaxy while Man was still a cell floating in a warm primeval sea, From here must have surged the expanding tide of life that had built the enigmatic ruins, the constructions of rare and priceless materials. Beings who had left their mark for the new and curious race of Man to stare at, and to wonder at the mystery of the Cradle-the golden hoard of undreamed wealth for the first men to discover it. To Rex Tendris and his two friends came the coordinates that could lead them to the legendary treasure. They set out on a voyage to find it-but it was a voyage into hell!
Release date:
December 30, 2013
Publisher:
Gateway
Print pages:
91
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It was silent within the ship, silent that is but for the steady, half-heard drone of the ultrasonics stemming from the hyper-drive. They quivered through the metal of the hull, echoed in ghost-whispers from the air, hung like inaudible shrieks as they rasped at nerve and sinew, jarred bone and flesh, sent ripples of irritation racing over tender skin.
It was a sound that could lead to insanity. It was a vibration that plucked at the surface of the helpless brain, bursting tiny capillaries, mottling cheeks and eyes with thin red lines, and causing hands to quiver and tremble; with raw emotion.
It was a sound that spacemen had grown to hate, then to dread, finally to accept with the deep fatalism engendered by the cold and distant stars, the swirling grey mist of hyperspace, and the realization that Man was bit a speck of life crawling on a mote of dust.
But it was a sound that men shouldn’t have to bear alone.
Rex Tendris was alone!
He sat in the padded control seat before the ranked dials of the instrument panel and scared at the swirling grey mist pressing against the view-plate of the visi-screen,
A tall man with the slender build and lightning-fast reflexes of a natural athlete. Black hair swept back from a high forehead, and his cold grey eyes stared from either side of a hooked nose. His mouth was a thin gash over a firm jaw, cruel looking and yet with a tracery of lines at their corners betraying an innate good humour. His hands were slim and with surprisingly delicate fingers, and he radiated the intense and burning vitality of the born adventurer.
He glanced once at the swinging hand of a chronometer, frowned, then reached for the controls. Before he could grasp them the thin shrilling of the ultrasonic vibration deepened, tore for a moment at the delicate membranes of nose and ears, then the ship seemed to lurch, to twist, to move in alien dimensions and impossible configurations.
Strain gripped him, a savage, stomach-wrenching sensation of terrible stress, then it had passed and stars glittered from the visi-screen where grey mist had swirled a moment before
Stars and something else!
A planet loomed large and menacing just before the ship. A cloud-wreathed world, its surface splotched with brown and green, blue and white, jungled, mountained, and near. Far too near!
Rex grunted and reached for the controls, a thin film of sweat glistening on his high forehead as he moved with smooth efficiency. Fire spat from the steering-tubes, long blue-white fingers of ionic flame, slamming him against the worn padding of the control chair, and veering the ship from its head-on collision path with the nearing bulk of the planet.
Thunder echoed through the vessel. The roar of the pitted tubes transmitted through the hull and the internal structure. Plates creaked beneath the strain, and a thin rill of blood ran from his bitten lips.
Still the ship plummeted towards the too-near world!
Again he moved the controls, and gyros whined as they spun the vessel on its short axis. Flame lanced from the main drive, and the abrupt conflict of forces drove him still deeper within the padding of the chair. He gasped, fighting the acceleration pressure piling weight on his chest and stomach, and watched the rear-view screen with glazing eyes.
Incredibly it seemed the ship was winning the struggle.
Long minutes passed, minutes in which were balanced the forces of nature against the power of pitted rocket tubes and human stamina. Sound began to whisper around the ship, a thin high-pitched whine, a faint drone, the sound of riven atmosphere heating the outer hull to red heat with the friction of its passing. It increased, became a shrieking roar, a deafening whistle, then it died, and slowly Rex reached for the controls.
Deftly he spun the ship, scanning the blurred surface of the planet as he sped high above through the upper limits of the atmosphere. A city flicked beneath him, then a mass of jungle, a range of towering mountains their peaks tipped and white with snow. A sea followed, a vast expanse of sullen yellow water dotted with islands and broken by the half-seen shapes of impossible creatures. More jungle, the city, the mountains, the sea, the jungle again, and once more the sprawled pre-cast buildings of the city.
He smiled as he checked his chronometer and gently began firing the braking rockets of the speeding ship. Fire spouted before him, the blue-white exhaust of the ionic discharge spearing through the humid air like a solid lance of energy. The ship slowed, fell towards the surface as it tried to stabilise its orbit, then dropped still lower as it lost yet more speed.
Soon he was hovering high above the city.
The landing field lay to one side, a great scar hacked out of the soft green of the jungle, the dirt seared and fused to a glassy-like surface by the exhausts of countless rocket ships. The high white tower of the Administration building reared just within the high wire-mesh fence surrounding the area, and the low shapes of repair sheds sprawled in a ragged ring close to the fence.
Deftly he lowered his ship, riding down balanced on a pencil of name, the gyros shrilling as they struggled to maintain perfect balance. The radio crackled into life while he was still a mile from the surface, and irritably he closed the circuit.
“Yes?”
“Give identification and reason for landing.” The curt voice had a cold, official quality about it that made the young adventurer draw back his teeth in silent anger.
“Rex Tendris. Independent trader. Landing for the Auctions.”
“Wait for clearance,” snapped the voice. “You should have asked permission to land before entering atmosphere.”
“I can’t wait!” Rex glanced at his instruments then at the swelling view of the landing field. “I’m low on fuel and operating single handed. I’ll argue about it after I’ve set down, but I can’t wait.”
“You will go into orbit and wait for clearance.” The official voice repeated coldly. “I am not interested in your personal problems.”
“Listen,” said Rex tensely. “Either I land now, or I hover directly above the Admin building. When I run out of fuel, say in ten seconds from now, you can blame yourself for what will happen. I might add that this vessel weighs two hundred tons Earth weight, it won’t leave much of your building.”
“Land then,” snapped the voice. “You will answer for this later.”
Rex grinned and opened the circuit, then concentrated on the delicate task of landing the unstable ship.
They were waiting for him when he left the airlock.
The two guards fell in beside him, and the young officer reached for the flare-gun belted at his waist. Rex stepped back, his grey eves hard and cold as he dropped one hand to the butt of his weapon.
“Am I under arrest?”
The officer shrugged.
“My orders were to escort you to the Admin building.”
“Then why disarm me?”
“It isn’t usual for spaceship captains to appear before the Tribunal armed.”
“I see.” He hesitated a moment, then shrugged. “Very well, but I want it back.”
The officer smiled as he accepted the heavy pistol and slipped it within his belt. He snapped sharp orders to the waiting guards, and together the four of them strode across the flame-scorched dirt of the landing field towards the high white tower at the edge of the field.
The guards left them at the entrance, and the young officer smiled in a friendly fashion at the tall adventurer as they waited in a vestibule.
“Don’t worry much about it, you happened to tread on the wrong set of toes, the worst they can do is to slap a fine on you.”
“You’re right,” said Rex grimly. “That’s the worst they can do.”
He didn’t bother to explain the remark.
A buzzer hummed, and the young officer jerked his head. “That’s for us. Ready?”
Rex nodded, and together they entered the cool, air-conditioned interior of the pastel-tinted office. Three men sat behind a wide desk and stared at them as they entered. The officer stepped back, and Rex found himself standing alone in the centre of a soft carpet staring at the hard eyes of the Tribunal.
“Complaint,” said the one on the left, a little rat-faced man who had the appearance of one who had studied too deeply, too long.
“This man landed without permission, refused to orbit his ship while waiting for clearance, . . .
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