1/ TO BETRAY EARTH!

 

A BAD DREAM. Tossing and turning in his sleep, Gunther Chellish began to perspire. Finally he sat bolt upright, eyes wide open.

And stared straight into a gun muzzle.

At first he thought it was part of his nightmare but then his eyes adjusted themselves to the dimness of the cabin and he could see the reality behind the pistol barrel. It was a huge hairy hand that firmly grasped the butt-end of the weapon and the hand was attached to an arm that, from Chellish’s perspective, seemed to rise to a towering height. There it joined a shoulder that seemed to belong to a professional wrestler.

The nocturnal intruder’s face was barely visible in the diffused residual light from the night lamp but judging from the breadth of the shoulders, Chellish knew they could only belong to Roane—Oliver Roane, one of the settlers who had recently been taken over into the Fleet. Chellish wondered what Roane could be thinking of. To break into a Gazelle like this in the middle of the night and startle the only man on board out of his sleep with a pointed pistol was not something that anyone would do if he were just kidding around.

But before Chellish could complete his train of thought, Roane spoke to him gruffly. "Come on, on your feet—make it snappy! And don’t try anything cute. You probably know I can handle a gun—right?"

 

* * * *

 

The Terrania Daily News, published under auspices of the Ministry of Public Information and Opinion, ran the following press release under dateline of 3 Oct. 2042:

On Myrtha 7, latest base of the Terranian spacefleet, three deserters have succeeded in making their escape on board a Gazelle type long-range reconnaissance spaceship. Their course is currently unknown but extensive search activity is in progress.

In addition to the deserters it is probable that 1st Lt. Chellish is also on board the scoutship. Chellish gained recent public notice in connection with repelling the encroachments of a humanoid race from Myrtha 12. It is presumed that he has been forced to pilot the hijacked flier.

Fleet authorities have attached no especial significance to the incident, since neither the data memory of the Gazelle nor 1st Lt. Chellish nor the three deserters are in possession of any important defence information.

 

* * * *

 

Yes, Chellish knew Roane could handle a gun. Squinting upward at the man, he slipped a leg over the edge of the low-lying bunk. Drowsily he placed his feet on the deck as though preparing to stand up. He moved and acted with the slow clumsiness of one who had not yet collected his wits about him. So his big-shouldered opponent was taken by surprise when he suddenly came up from the floor like an arrow. His left shoulder struck Roane’s gun hand and Roane shouted a curse as he lost his grip on the pistol.

At the sound of the gun clattering across the deck, Chellish knew half the battle was won. In comparison to Roane he was a weakling but Roane was caught off guard and Chellish had the hard training of the Fleet behind him. He shot his hand forward and clipped his assailant across the throat, causing him to stagger back gurgling in pain. He followed swiftly as Roane crashed backwards against the bulkhead. With a flying leap, he rammed him heavily in the stomach.

He heard Roane let out a grunt of pain and saw him topple over to his left. Chellish stood there breathlessly, waiting to see whether Roane was really out or if he was playing a trick. But before he could determine which, something exploded in his brain with a flash of unexpected violence.

He didn’t even know it when he crashed to the deck.

 

* * * *

 

As he came to again he heard somebody groan: "The crazy fool!" Even though a sharp, humming headache impaired his thinking at the moment, he knew that he himself was being referred to.

The voice he had heard was Roane’s but now a second voice answered: "It would have been a mess if I hadn’t been close by. I hope he comes to. We can’t hang around here till broad daylight. In another hour and a half at the most the sun will be up."

So that’s how it was, thought Chellish. While he was taking care of Roane, an accomplice had sneaked up on him from behind. Who could this one be, anyway? He thought he had heard the voice before but he couldn’t associate it with the face it belonged to.

So he opened his eyes and the first person he saw was Oliver Roane, who was standing with his back toward him. He himself was lying on his bunk again. The second man could not be seen because Roane’s broad figure was blocking the way. Meanwhile, somebody had turned the lights on full. Chellish risked looking about, observing that the cabin was still all in one piece. Therefore, Roane and his companion had not come here to steal anything.

So what else could be the reason?

Gunther Chellish thought back in time. A few weeks ago after the ‘Whistler Adventure’ had been wound up, Lt.-Col. Sikerman had landed with three cruisers of the spacefleet on Myrtha 7, otherwise known as Grautier. The 8000 settlers who had been deported here from Earth were informed that for certain vital reasons Myrtha 7 would henceforth be a support base for the Terranian spacefleet. The settlers had been sentenced to exile by Earthly civilian courts because of revolutionary activities but now they were set free to establish themselves anew on Venus, in the direct vicinity of Earth. Most of them had accepted the offer and had actually been brought to Venus, 6000 light-years away. Only about 1000 of them had remained behind, being especially selected as people who had most likely gotten over their earlier discontent with the Administrator’s regime. These people had been taken over into the spacefleet service. In fact, the swearing-in ceremony had only taken place a few days ago.

Some months before, 1st Lt. Chellish had landed here on Grautier under the command of Capt. Blailey in order to watch the development of the immigrant colony, and now he had taken command of this Gazelle. At present, Blailey commanded a semi-squadron of the space reconnaissance ships, and all of them were stationed here.

The ships’ crews were in the habit of spending the night in the newly-constructed troop barracks. However, a ship the size of a Gazelle required one man to sleep on board. Chellish thought bitterly now of this arrangement as he tried to figure out who could help him in his present predicament. Of course the barracks were close enough to the ships so that the personnel could reach them in a matter of moments, and if he could give out an alarm he would be saved. The only difficulty was that Roane and his companion, whoever he might be, would not give him any opportunity for sounding an alarm.

He rolled onto his side and the noise apprised Roane of the fact that his victim had regained his senses. As he turned toward him, Chellish caught a quick look at the other man. It was Suttney. Chellish knew that Suttney belonged to a group of men who had sought to stir up trouble among the settlers some months before, under a leader named Hollander. Hollander had been sentenced to death. Deprived of their leader, the members of his band had rejoined the settler community.

Suttney’s presence here gave a new aspect to the situation. Chellish knew that he couldn’t expect much good from a former associate of Hollander because he himself had taken a significant part in the chase after Hollander and his men.

Roane had long since retrieved his gun, which he now held in his hand. When he saw that Chellish had his eyes open he aimed the weapon at him and sneered. "I’ll pay you back for getting smart—but not now. There’s plenty of time for that."

Chellish raised up on his elbows. "Didn’t you take an oath a few days ago?" he asked, while wondering how his roaring head could stand the additional thunder of his voice. "So you’re subject to martial law. If you’re caught you’ll probably be shot by a firing squad."

Oliver Roane wasn’t the quick-thinking type who always had a pat answer for every occasion. He was a muscle man and when he recognized Suttney he wondered why it had been left to Roane to take care of him.

Now Suttney stepped nearer into plain view. "We don’t intend to get caught, because you’re going to help us!" he said.

"And then what happens?" asked Chellish wonderingly.

"I don’t think we have to blab our plans out to you," Suttney answered coldly. "The main thing that you have to do is follow what we tell you. Anything else will get you into trouble." He watched Chellish as if to detect the impact of his words on him. Then he made an imperious gesture. "Get up and come along with us!"

Chellish saw no way out but to follow instructions. He got to his feet and cursed the pain in his head. Meanwhile, Suttney had opened the cabin’s sliding door and stepped out into the corridor. Chellish followed him and behind him came Roane with levelled pistol.

Suttney went to the control room. Chellish saw at first glance that without exception all the main systems on board the Gazelle had been turned on. It dawned on him what Roane and Suttney expected of him but he couldn’t yet make rhyme nor reason out of their possible objective.

Suttney stopped beside the pilot’s seat. "By now you may have figured out what we need from you," he said. "You’re going to lift this ship into outer space. That’s all we want you to do for now."

"You don’t say!" sneered Chellish defiantly. "Is that all…!"

Suttney nodded gravely. "For the time being, yes."

"I wouldn’t think of it!" retorted Chellish angrily.

In the same instant he received a blow in the most sensitive part of his body—the back of his head, which was still roaring and buzzing. For a few seconds he blacked out and when he came to again he was lying on the deck near the pilot’s seat.

Roane grinned down at him. "There’s more where that came from," he announced.

Chellish suppressed an impulse to leap up and attack Roane because it didn’t make much sense to charge into the muzzle end of a loaded gun.

"Well…?" asked Suttney.

"Are you out of your minds?" yelled Chellish. "Don’t you know what would happen if I took off now? Within 2 or 3 minutes we’d have the whole Grautier Fleet on our necks. Or maybe you were thinking we could stick to regulations and ask for permission to leave?"

But when he got to his feet he saw that Suttney’s attitude had become surly.

"Quit kidding around!" warned the latter. His voice was low but menacing. "You’re fully aware of what this fly-boat can do. You can make an emergency flash takeoff and go into a hypertransition within a minute. Don’t try any fairy tales on me—I know what a Gazelle can do."

Great!—thought Chellish grimly. So Suttney knew what the ship could do, and now he was supposed to make it perform. Lord knew he’d never been a model soldier, because otherwise in all his time of service he would have become a captain or something higher. Nevertheless, this was something Suttney could not force him to do.

He went around to the front of the pilot’s seat and sat down. He felt miserable but not so miserable that he was incapable of putting up some kind of resistance to Suttney’s treachery.

"Give me some coördinates," he said peevishly. "If I’m going to make a hyperjump I have to know where to."

"Not necessary," countered Suttney instantly. "We can work out our plan from any part of the galaxy. Just get going and make sure you don’t come out somewhere in Andromeda."

Gunther Chellish considered this, then nodded. "As you wish. The responsibility for it will be on you."

"That I can handle," Suttney assured him scornfully

Chellish moved slowly then. He reached out his hand to depress a control button but suddenly stopped and groaned, grasping his head. He choked several times as though prepared to throw up, thus gaining time. He took a minute and a half just to make his preliminary checkout, all the while considering a thousand ideas, rejecting them and coming up with 500 new ones. He quickly realized that none of them were worth anything. There wasn’t a single fast play he could make without running a suicidal risk. But once he faced that fact he decided to take the risk anyway.

Everything depended on whether or not Suttney understood the significance of a certain control on the main switchboard. The button bore no decal, nor was it lettered, but it was big and glaring red. Anybody who had even had only one session at the flight console of a Gazelle would know what its function was. It was the ship alarm, and while the spacecraft was still parked on the field it was coupled to the ground installations. The interval between hitting that button and having troops swarming onto the field would be about 20 seconds. It would then be impossible to take off and Suttney and Roane would be caught in their own trap.

Chellish was apprehensive that in such case they might prefer to destroy him and themselves rather than surrender but it was a risk he had to take.

The alarm button was located high up on the switch panel. It had been intentionally installed out of reach of normal movement so that it could not be tripped by accident. To reach it, Chellish had to lean far forward. He did not do this all at once because he knew without looking around that Roane was standing behind him with the pistol aimed at his back. He depressed a series of switch buttons that were located beneath the alarm and which were ineffective temporarily because their respective equipment sections had not yet been turned on. In this process, his hand moved higher on the panel and he was forced to lean forward more.

He didn’t dare look around because in so doing he would alert them to his uncertainty. However he made a pause as though his headache were getting worse, and he listened. Behind him nothing moved. All he could hear was Roane’s heavy breathing.

To gain still more time, he fell back in his chair. Since he had just been working the upper section of the panel it would not seem too conspicuous now if he were to lean far forward again. After taking a deep breath, he did so. At first he activated a few more switches—then his hand leapt forward suddenly.

What happened then came so swiftly that he could not remember later the true sequence of events. A searing hot pain shot through his outstretched hand even before he could reach the alarm button. Then he heard the hissing on a section of the forward bulkhead near the viewscreen and saw that the wall plate began to bubble. A few droplets of molten metal plastic trickled downward but hardened before reaching the control console.

Chellish saw it all in a dreamlike clarity although the murderous pain in his hand was beginning to cloud his consciousness. He realized that Suttney had seen through his ruse and that Roane had shot at his fingers just as he was about to press the alarm button. His discouragement and anger over his misfired strategy were almost more unbearable than the pain of his wounded hand. For a few moments he wavered in a semi-conscious state but Suttney’s sharp voice soon brought him to again.

"That’ll show you we’re playing for keeps, Chellish! So now you get busy and do what we tell You to do!"

Chellish was too broken and weary to offer further resistance. He had run through the flight startups of Gazelles so often that he could have made the control settings in his sleep. In fact it was a good thing he didn’t have to use his brain for it, because his shame and defeat and rage concerning Suttney and Roane crowded out every other thought or emotion.

He brought all the appropriate equipment to a full-power warmup and then sank back with a sigh. He had to admit that his game was up because any Gazelle-type scoutship could easily take off in such a way as to avoid pursuit and get out of gun range in a hurry. Suttney was right: beyond 40 seconds of top acceleration a hypertransition could be risked. And since this particular model was not only equipped with a hyper-compensator but one of the new frequency absorbers as well, it could make a transition without being detected by tracking stations.

So he had lost this round—or had he?

A new idea came to him suddenly. Suttney and maybe even Roane probably knew something about the technical details of a Gazelle—but they certainly couldn’t know very much about galactonautics. They wouldn’t be able to tell what direction he was taking. Perhaps he could jump the ship into a heavily travelled space lane somewhere. Once the space around them was swarming with ships from the fleet it would remain to be seen whether Suttney and Roane would prefer being taken prisoner to being annihilated by heavy disintegrators.

That was it. He knew he could make such a manoeuvre. Among the people who had been transferred recently into the Fleet was only one man who knew something about galactonautics: Ronson Lauer. He was not on board, although in retrospect Chellish would not have put it past the man to have gone along with Suttney and Roane had he been taken into their plans.

But the fact remained that he was not on board now and Chellish was confident he could fool Suttney and Roane any day of the week as far as the course of flight was concerned. This thought gave a new lift to his spirits. He turned around. "Better strap in!" he told them. "I’m taking off."

"What’s the big deal?" asked Suttney wonderingly. "We’re equipped with inertial absorbers. We shouldn’t feel a thing, should we?"

Chellish shrugged. There was no use trying to talk them into anything that would take him out of their sight for even a moment.

He moved the drive control into its first position as a checkout. Although the darkness of night dominated the viewscreen he could see that the Gazelle was responding properly. Then he tensed and threw the flight bar to maximum.

Inside the spacecraft nothing could be felt, but the viewscreen suddenly blazed with the outside glare of light. Their acceleration was such that the collision of air molecules excited the exterior defence screen, causing ionization, and the Gazelle shot upward through the thick atmosphere of the planet, leaving a glowing, fiery contrail behind it. Chellish kept a sharp eye on his instruments. He noted the rapid drop of atmospheric pressure outside and saw that the illuminated velocity indicator had overshot its maximum range. But in that moment the meter switched automatically to a higher scale. Now a new range of speed was involved and the moving indicator started anew from the left but more slowly. Adjacent to the space speedometer, on the right, a small chronometer was ticking off the minus countdown since takeoff. There was also a more complex apparatus that integrated time, speed and acceleration by means of positronicomputation to arrive at the distance covered since takeoff. At the end of 40 seconds the stretch they had put behind them amounted to about 250,000 miles, or slightly more than the distance from Earth to the Moon.

The time had come for the hytrans. Chellish didn’t have time to calculate any exact coördinates for the jump. He merely programmed the propulsion units for a transition of 200 light-years. For the present he didn’t have any idea where they’d come out at but he knew he’d be able to orient himself readily once the ship had returned to normal space.

He announced to Suttney: "I’m going into the jump now."

Then he depressed a control button with a swift motion of his hand and threw them into transition. He sensed the short tug of pain that accompanied dematerialisation and for the fraction of a second he had the impression that someone was holding a hand over his eyes.

When he could see again, the view on the telescopic screens had changed. The soft-glowing nebulous cloud of distant stars remained the same but the constellations formed by the nearer stars, like great pearls on the shimmering background-these had changed. The hyperjump was a success and from now on nobody on Grautier or anywhere else would know where the stolen Gazelle had disappeared to.

Chellish began to relax but at the same moment he heard Suttney’s obvious question: "Where are we?"

"200 light-years from Grautier," Chellish answered. "That’s all I know."

But soon, he thought, he would find out. And maybe 200 light-years wasn’t far enough for Suttney? Here he might not yet feel safe enough. They would no doubt make a second jump—a longer one—over 6000 light-years for example. And he’d just like to see how these two would be able to tell from his calculations where they would come out at.

Galacto-math is a head-breaker, Suttney, he thought to himself. You don’t understand it, do you? All I have to do is tell you the jump will bring us into the centre of the galaxy and you’ll believe me. But your eyes are going to pop when you see that the sun that’s going to emerge in front of us is our own: Sol!

Suddenly he no longer felt the pains caused by Roane’s blows and the burning of his fingers. He felt strong and ready for action. He wanted to put Suttney where he belonged: A Security jail cell—and the sooner the better.

Then he heard Suttney say: "I think 200 light-years are shaving it a bit too thin. So we’re going to make another jump just to be on the safe side. But before that I want to show you something, just in case you’re playing with any smart ideas."

Chellish looked up in some surprise as Suttney indicated the entrance hatchway to the control room. The door panel was just opening as he looked. He stared, wide-eyed, at the man who appeared there. For a second or two the shock of recognition blanked him out. mentally and when he finally collected himself his mouth was as dry as if he had just spent a day hiking in the desert.

The man who had entered the control room was Ronson Lauer, the one who knew his way around, somewhat, in the field of galactonautics.

 

* * * *

 

The history of the planet Grautier had been short but eventful. In the annals of Terranian space travel this world had appeared for the firstime only slightly more than 2 years before. The transport ship Adventurous had been commissioned to bring the 8000 exiled revolutionaries to Rigel 3 but a mutiny had broken out among the settlers which had resulted in severe damage to the engines, making it necessary to land on the unknown world instead. After the emergency landing the ship itself was nothing but a useless wreck. The crew had been forced to join the settler community on Grautier.

At first the settlers had fallen into conflict with each other. They separated into two rival groups: the True Democrats under Horace O. Mullon and the Nature Philosophers under Walter S. Hollander. It soon became evident that Hollander was striving for sole totalitarian power over the others. In his first attempt he succeeded in driving Mullon and his people against the wall but in his retaliation Mullon was able to retake the town of Greenwich—the only one that had been built to that date—and capture Hollander and his associates. In accordance with the law administered by the People’s Assembly of Greenwich, Hollander was sentenced to death. His companions were sentenced to forced labour but events were soon to intrude which interrupted a full application of the punishment and finally made it impossible.

Mullon and a few companions who had a scientific interest in the planet had discovered meanwhile that Grautier was populated by two remarkable types of organic life: the Mungos, half-intelligent apes who lived high up in the mountains; and the Blue Dwarfs. These latter were wholly non-humanoid creatures that appeared to be bluish blobs of matter but when they occurred in considerable masses they seemed to possess a very significant parapsychic and telekinetic capability. However, Mullon’s effective statesmanship had succeeded in winning the indigenous intelligences over as friends of the settlers.

Finally, calamity descended from an exterior source. In the Myrtha System there were altogether 49 planets of all types and sizes, and among these was a second world that supported intelligent life. This was Myrtha 12, a small, Mars-like planet on which lived humanoid creatures that were strange in form and characteristics. The Whistlers, as the settlers were to call them later, were about 6 feet tall on the average although frightfully thin, and their language was made up of a series of whistles, twitterings and hissings. For this reason they were dubbed Whistlers.

There were about 3 billion Whistlers living on their world, and since living space had become a problem and they possessed the requisite technology to do something about it, they had taken a look around in their immediate environment and had come to Grautier. The 8000 settlers were subjugated. They were not sufficiently equipped to defend themselves against the Whistlers. They were forced to till the soil with the help of machines the conquerors had brought with them, and they had to plant and harvest prescribed quotas of various types of grain. The Whistler ship departed from Grautier, leaving behind them a guard force of 200 in order to supervise the progress of the work. One of Hollander’s former followers, a man named Pashen, had aligned himself with the usurpers for the purpose of personal advantage.

Gunther Chellish was a crew member of a Gazelle that had been sent to Grautier by Perry Rhodan for the purpose of secret observation, and his party had hidden Out in the mountains. But even before the death of Hollander he had allied himself with the regular settlers, of course without revealing his true identity for the time being. So it was that he had discovered that the Whistlers' agricultural machines were powered by small nuclear reactors. He dissembled several of the reactors and reconstructed an atomic bomb with the fissionable material. The 200 alien sentinels were overpowered and 4 months later when the Whistler ship returned it perished in the fireball of the ignited bomb.

Meanwhile, Chellish had finally revealed his identity, and he told the settlers he had no doubt that sooner or later a whole Whistler fighting force would visit Grautier and take over if the settlers did not take action to prevent it. The Adventurous was equipped with an auxiliary spacecraft that had scraped through the crash-landing without too much damage. Since it was fully capable of a 500 light-year range, it was made flightworthy again. A commando group of 13 men took off for Myrtha 12, where they played the role of a legation from a distant planet named Aurigel. Chellish, who was a part of this expedition, managed to drop certain ominous hints which quickly led the Whistlers to believe that the Aurigel people were planning to attack Myrtha 12 and overthrow them. So the Whistlers’ attention was attracted to this alleged new danger and for the moment Grautier was forgotten. Chellish’s plan seemed to be succeeding but at the last moment a series of unfortunate incidents enabled the enemy to see through their subterfuge. He and his companions were arrested and would have been executed had it not been for a last minute miracle.

The miracle appeared in the form of 3 cruisers of the Terranian spacefleet under command of Lt.-Col. Sikerman. Terranian scientists had discovered the fact that in the course of the next 10 months there would be another one of the strange overlaps of two time planes, this time in the Myrtha area. Such phenomena had occurred initially in the year 2040 in the Mirsal System and had posed a very serious problem for Perry Rhodan. The situation called for turning Grautier into a fleet base where preparations would have to be made for making a large-scale penetration into the alien time plane.

Sikerman had arrived well-informed concerning the political situation in the Myrtha System. He knew that he could not proceed with his base construction in an orderly fashion until he had first pumped some sense into the Whistlers. He accomplished this through an impressive demonstration of Terranian power, which resulted in the release of Chellish and his companions and their return to Grautier again. Thus a local threat was eliminated but now Grautier was no longer an independent colony. Terra had taken it over.

During the following weeks, Grautier was a scene of unprecedented activity. Entire transport fleets brought in the material necessary for building the military base. A legal commission appeared also, through whose auspices the settlers were offered a chance to build a new home on Venus, which was much closer to Earth. Those people who were judged to have taken a direct part in the various criminal activities of Hollander—among whom was Pashen in particular—were recaptured and brought to trial. The evacuation of the remaining settlers was taken care of in a matter of a few days. Those people who had been mere ‘fellow travellers’ with the Hollander factions were allowed to go unpunished.

About 1000 people who had once called themselves the Free Settlers Anti-Socialist Party had remained behind on Grautier. A plan developed whereby those among them who had special training or ability would be taken over into the fleet. The settlers were in agreement with this and the rest was a mere matter of formal processing. In this manner the new fleet base had been able to provide itself with operating personnel.

Ultimately Perry Rhodan himself put in an appearance on Grautier in order to satisfy himself that the work was progressing properly. Almost over night Grautier had become one of the most important bases in the galaxy. From here the decisive blow against the Druufs was to be launched. The Druufs were the alien race from the other time plane who had taken advantage of the creeping dimensional overlap in order to carry out their depredations throughout the reaches of the galaxy. Whatever had happened previously on Grautier was forgotten. The Whistlers, who had feared the 8000 settlers more than the plague or the giant grey beasts from whom the planet had gotten its name, faded into relative obscurity.

Under the pressure of events, no one had taken special pains to reexamine the present political convictions of the new fleet recruits. It had been all of two years now since they had been sentenced to exile because of their revolutionary agitations, underground conspiracies and similar crimes, back on the Earth. Of course most of them had perceived the error of their ways, above all, Horace O. Mullon. But there were some who still clung to the old ideas, in particular the former followers of Walter S. Hollander.

Their transfer into the fleet had been as smooth and uneventful as that of any of the others. But once they found themselves wearing their official uniforms they were. convinced the time had finally come to put their plans into operation.

 

* * * *

 

The takeoff of the Gazelle triggered a major alert. Capt. Blailey’s semi-squadron and all available space cruisers announced themselves ready for action within a few minutes of the alarm. However their flight readiness was of little use as long as nobody knew where the surprise fugitive had gone.

Perry Rhodan appeared in the provisional Ground Control Central at the spaceport. The C.O. on duty was a young captain who saluted and began to launch into a long-winded explanation. Rhodan waved him off gently, telling him that he was already informed of the situation.

"I take it you haven’t mustered out all hands for roll call?" he asked, finally.

"No sir," replied the captain. "I haven’t gotten to that yet."

"Good. Then do it now. We have to know who has absconded with the Gazelle. By the way: who had duty on board the scoutship?"

"First Lt. Chellish, sir."

"I presume there’s been no signal from the Gazelle so far?"

"No sir."

Rhodan frowned pensively. First Lt. Chellish… He had a clear recollection of the reports from his immediate superior, Capt. Blailey, which had been submitted concerning him during the original mission on Grautier. Chellish was a go-getter and somewhat of a daredevil although still a practical and rational type. He was one of those in whom there were unsuspected reserves of mental and physical strength—which had gone so long unnoticed that he had developed the habit of depending solely on himself. As former exile Horace O. Mullon had expressed it, Chellish had ‘saved Grautier from the Whistlers single-handedly.’ Chellish was 31 years old. A man of his capability should have become a captain by now or even a staff officer. Rhodan had considered the case to be curious and important enough to look personally into his personnel dossier. There he had found a series of complaints from his former commanding officers, which referred to a ‘pronounced’ over confidence if not conceit. This meant that he had consistently failed to suppress his own ideas if he thought they were better than those of his superiors. Rhodan was familiar with many such cases. The ‘pronounced over-confidence’ was not always the villain in such situations. In Chellish’s case it was to be noted that Capt. Blailey had not shown the slightest indication to register any complaints concerning him in any sense of the word. Obviously Blailey and Chellish were of a mutually harmonious temperament.

No, Chellish was not the type of man who would hijack a Gazelle. He must have been forced to do it, or else he was dead!

Still deep in thought, Perry Rhodan left Ground Control and returned to the low, rambling building that was Sikerman’s residence and where a few rooms had been allotted to himself. Sikerman was in his office with Reginald Bell. The great viewscreen over the tremendous desk revealed a shimmering bright grey raster, which meant that it was ready at any moment to go into action and establish a visual connection between Sikerman’s office and any other important point in the galaxy.

Bell jumped to his feet as Rhodan entered the room. Sikerman was about to get up also but Rhodan signalled him to remain seated.

"Still nothing new," he said calmly. "So far all we know is that the Gazelle has disappeared. Other than that, nothing: not where, why or who. In regard to the who, though, we’ll soon find out. Ground Central is making a full roll call."

As though this were a cue, the viewscreen brightened to reveal the head and shoulders of a young lieutenant. He raised a hand in greeting. "Lt. Radcliffe. A general roll call has been ordered by Top Command. I must ask you to identify yourselves."

Sikerman answered with a sarcastic smile: "Lt.-Col. Sikerman, Commander-in-Chief of the base."

Reginald Bell snapped, "Vice-Administrator Bell."

Rhodan remained silent.

"And you, sir?" asked the lieutenant, turning to him.

"Rhodan," returned Perry with a smile.

Radcliffe gave them his greeting signal a second time, expressed his thanks and disappeared from the screen.

Rhodan started to chuckle. On the other hand, Sikerman was obviously disconcerted. The incident had not been at all amusing for him. "That young scamp is going to hear from me," he growled angrily. "As far as I personally am concerned he could get by with merely being stupid and not knowing what 2 plus 2 equals—but you, sir—for him to ask you to give your name, that’s going a bit too—"

Rhodan was still chuckling. "Relax, Sikerman. If I were in his place it would have been just as amusing. Besides, you know, he’s right. He has to hear each name. After all, somebody could have replaced me with a robot and he wouldn’t be able to tell it by looking at me. He has to analyse the sound of my voice as a part of a positive I.D."

"Well, anyway…" mumbled Sikerman, apparently running out of rebuttals.

No one said anything as the minutes passed. Perry Rhodan attempted to analyse how the situation might have been changed by the theft of the Gazelle but he failed to even come up with a reasonable assumption. A half hour went by. Then the viewscreen lighted up again, this time revealing the captain in charge of Ground Central.

"We have the results, sir," he announced, addressing Rhodan after a brief greeting. "In addition to 1st Lt. Chellish, who had night duty on board the ship, three others have also disappeared: Oliver Roane, Walter Suttney and Ronson Lauer. All three of these men were among the settlers who were recently taken into the Fleet."

"What data do you have on those three?" asked Rhodan.

"Nothing, sir, other than the fact that they were former followers of Hollander."

Perry Rhodan pondered over this for a moment. Then he thanked the officer and indicated that he had no further instructions for the moment. The viewscreen darkened to its former grey raster of shimmering half-light.

Rhodan stood up and walked a few steps to the window. He stopped there, appearing to gaze silently at the floor. "That puts us in a bind," he said gloomily. "In fact, right into the ringers!"

Reginald Bell watched him with narrowed eyes.

Rhodan continued. "Maj. Ostal’s operation has met with considerable success. As we all know, the Robot Regent on Arkon has placed top priority on one particular objective these past number of years—and that is to discover the galactic position of the Earth. Ostal has succeeded in giving him a false lead. A powerful fleet of robot ships is presently on its way to the planet which was indicated as the Earth by the false coördinates on board Ostal’s ship. It’s a world that lies deep in the interior of the Milky Way. The Regent will eventually find out that we’ve led him on a wild goose chase."

He fell silent, failing to note Sikerman’s astonished expression. The latter was unable to see any connection between Maj. Ostal’s mission and the disappearance of the Gazelle.

"But that’s not the main point," continued Rhodan. "The important thing is that we recognize how badly the Regent is itching to locate the Earth and that he will strike at the first moment he obtains the correct information."

Sikerman could not suppress his curiosity any longer. "Please, sir!" he blurted out as Rhodan made a slight pause. "I can’t see what the hijacking of the Gazelle has to do with the Arkonide robot’s curiosity!"

Rhodan turned and raised his brows at him. "But it’s all quite simple," he answered in some surprise. "You know what kind of men Walt Hollander had around him. All that most of them wanted was to get rich in a hurry and they figured a revolution would be the shortest route. You know there were very few of the Nature Philosophers who were serious about their stated ideals. And those few have long since seen the error of their ways. So the culprits we’re dealing with now are of the first type. They’re looking for the big payoff, nothing else. Can you possibly imagine where?"

Sikerman appeared to be grasping the import of this but before he could answer Rhodan explained it himself:

"1st Lt. Chellish’s Gazelle is the same ship that we sent to Grautier several years ago with the assignment to stand watch over the settlers. Its positronic data bank contains everything that could be of importance to a certain galactic power—namely the true coördinates of the Earth’s position!

"There’s no doubt about it at all. Suttney and his two cohorts are on their way to Arkon to betray the Earth and sell our location to the Robot Regent."