Читать книгу Lord of Atlantis - John Russell Fearn - Страница 8

CHAPTER TWO

THREAT FROM SPACE

An hour later the Ultra, the huge, super-fast air-and-space machine which the Amazon alone understood in detail, was streaking into the twilight—upward to the stratosphere, thence through successively weakening layers of atmosphere until the machine had plunged through into the void.

It was not a new scene that lay before the girl, or indeed to anybody in these space-conscious days of the late twenty-first century; yet it always had a certain gripping quality. The majestic sun, blinding and intolerable to look upon without intervening purple shields; the drifting hosts of stars and planets; the paler moon, at the first quarter and below the gigantic bulk of Earth, receding now as the Ultra swept onward into the abyss.

Motionless, the Amazon sat at the controls, watching through the observation port for the first sign of that golden circle toward which the instruments told her she was speeding.

She was no longer the scarlet-costumed ruler of Earth, queen of the inner solar system, but a black-suited adventuress, the negativity of her attire relieved only by the solid gold belt about her slender waist, a belt packed with every needful instrument and weapon. Such an attire she always wore when on business bent. In any moment of crisis making demands upon her physique, the close-fitting elastic-glass mesh of which the suit was made gave her absolute freedom. Her golden hair was swept back now from her forehead and held in place by a gleaming band with twin rubies at either end. A stray hair in her way when she needed absolute clarity of vision might prove fatal. To the Amazon no detail was too trivial to be overlooked. She had learned from hard experience the need of precision and deadly accuracy.

When presently the golden circle came into view from the depthless black of infinity, she became more alert, her right hand near enough to the protonic gun to press the switch if any attempt was made to attack her. Nothing happened, however, and she flew steadily on.

When she was 20,000 miles from Earth, she inspected the giant space-globe as she flew the Ultra around it. The mirrors were concave in shape like the reflector of an arc, and she judged them to be twenty feet in diameter and made of some highly polished substance beside which the most brilliant chrome finish would have seemed dull.

That the craft itself was man-made was no longer in doubt. The rivets that held the globe’s two hemispheres together were plainly visible. So were the catwalk ladders and transparent conning towers, behind which she could see dim evidences of people moving—probably watching her Ultra as it cruised around like a wasp, darting, diving, sweeping, taking avoiding action in case of attack.

Then suddenly the Amazon found the Ultra seized in the grip of tremendous magnetic power. Though she exerted all the strength of the atomic plant to break free, she found it impossible. Relentlessly, the Ultra was dragged toward the globe, and finally came to rest anchored against it.

Grim-faced, furious at being beaten, the Amazon switched off the power and looked out of the window. Close to it was the nearest catwalk ladder on the side of the globe, leading up to a closed metal door. Near to the door was a small window through which she could descry the dim outline of a watching face.

She got into a spacesuit and stepped out of the Ultra’s safety lock and onto the vessel’s roof. The slight mass of the Ultra and the much heavier mass of the globe did strange things to her sense of balance. She found herself floating upward with the buoyancy of a feather, her leaded feet kicking in the sheer abyss of space.

Helplessly she turned several somersaults and then with a slight bump she hit the side of the globe. Immediately she caught hold of the ladder rungs, and began to cautiously haul herself up to the metal door. Below her was infinity, depthless, powdered with the sparkling lights of unguessably distant stars. It was a view thar would have affected a normal being from insupportable vertigo—but not the Amazon. In these great wastes of infinity she felt at home.

Reaching the metal door, she hammered upon it with her metal-and-rubber gloved hand, using the other hand to cling to the rail. There was only a moment’s interval, then the door opened and she stepped into the blank darkness of an air-valve chamber, so designed that it refilled with air pressure identical to that beyond the second door.

Accustomed to this normal routine in space, she waited in the darkness; then the second door opened and she stepped into a wide control room, brilliantly lighted by the sunlight blazing through the roof conning tower.

Three men were at an enormous control board, all of them lightly dressed in toga-like costumes. Near the massive power generators was a tall, thin-faced man of uncertain age who was watching her closely.

Unlike the men at the control board, he was fully dressed in a costume that looked like cloth-of-gold, ornamented with numberless emblems and decorations. Then the Amazon switched her attention to the tallest man in the room.

He stood almost seven feet and was scantily clad, his folded arms revealing the rippling health of his bronzed skin and the tremendous development of his muscles. He was handsome beyond the ordinary, with pointed features, a resolute chin, and a shock of golden hair in the waves of which the blazing sun lingered. In spite of herself, the Amazon found her gaze fixed by his reddish-blue eyes.

He smiled at her and she promptly stiffened. Just for a moment she had forgotten she was the Golden Amazon, and had almost become a living, breathing woman. She had only experienced such an emotional upheaval once before, and that had been when she had first met this extraordinarily handsome young man with the frame and features of some mythical Grecian god.

With a quick movement the Amazon unfastened the catch that secured her helmet and tipped the covering back on its hinge to her shoulders. She advanced slowly.

“Abna,” she said quietly. “So I guessed correctly.”

“I’m glad to see you again, Vi,” he responded in his pleasant baritone and he came over to her.

“I cannot say that I can return the compliment,” she said.

He considered her. “I suppose it is you this time?” he asked drily. “Not a synthetic model, like the one you foisted on me when we left Mercury?”

“I explained that.” The girl swung on him, her violet eyes bright with scorn. “You must have got my communication through the image, explaining my reasons for parting company with you.”

“Yes. I got them. But you don’t suppose that two such as us—both scientists—could remain parted forever, do you? My first thought when I returned home to Jupiter was to come back and make you realise how mistaken you had been about me.”

“You chose a very spectacular method! I hope you feel satisfied, now that you have created a world-wide earthquake, brought Mu from the depths, and drowned thousands of innocent people in tidal waves.”

“That,” the Atlantean giant said quietly, “is unfortunate. I hardly thought resurrecting Mu would have caused such chaos.” He changed the subject abruptly and motioned to the tall, saturnine being with the decorations on his golden raiment.

“This is His Excellency Sefner Quorne,” he introduced. “He is my chief adviser. Formerly, he held that position with my father who was, as you may remember, the ruling dignitary of our small race of 3,000 males. Now, unhappily, my father has passed on, and I have taken his place as the ruler of the surviving Atlanteans.”

The Amazon nodded but did not say anything. Sefner Quorne bowed toward her with solemn dignity and then straightened again, his heliotrope-coloured eyes watching her with an intensity she did not like.

“Don’t you think it’s time you explained what this is all about, Abna?” she asked curtly. “You seem to forget that I am the ruler of Earth, and that what happens to Earth people is very much my business. I don’t intend to tolerate your having this monstrous vessel of yours here, causing havoc whenever the mood seizes you. What do you intend doing next—take over Atlantis?”

“Why not? It has been drawn from the depths by the simple process of degravitation. A neutralizing beam was directed from this space-globe, which negated gravity around the area of Mu and caused that continent to rise, with Atlantis intact upon it, still sealed as it was at the time of the Deluge. The next step is to destroy the sealing dome that surrounds it. Then we shall come to Earth and restore the scientific amenities of the city.”

“I won’t allow it!” the Amazon snapped. “It’s tantamount to invasion!”

“Maybe, but don’t forget we have four-dimensional weapons and you have not. They can strike you down before you can deal with them.”

The Amazon was silent. She knew Abna spoke the truth. Four-dimensional science was an art the Atlanteans thoroughly understood.

“Of course,” Abna added, with a reassuring smile, “you have synthesis, and that is a secret we have yet to master.”

The Amazon flashed a glance at him. “You don’t intend to let me forget that, do you?”

“No reason why I should, is there? I was merely intimating that with synthesis you could put legions of zombies against me and create them as fast as I could destroy them. You might even beat me that way, by sheer weight of numbers.”

The Amazon smiled faintly. “As for your race mastering synthesis, you will never learn that secret from me. I haven’t forgotten that was one of the reasons you tried to trick me into marriage the last time.”

Abna tightened his lips. “There was no trickery intended. The only trickery came from you, when you ran out on me on Mercury!”

There was a grim, smouldering silence for a moment; then Sefner Quorne came forward quietly. For the first time he spoke, in a richly mellow voice. “Perhaps, highness, this is an opportune moment to suggest a little refreshment for Miss Brant?”

Abna said, “Yes, excellency. See to it, will you?” The adviser withdrew and Abna continued:

“Have a seat, Vi. Let me have your suit.”

She hesitated and then unfastened the clamps that caused the rubber-and-metal sheathing to fall away from her in slack folds. Abna took it and laid it on one side, following her thereafter to the table.

“Now,” he said, seating himself comfortably, “let’s talk like civilized people. You’re far too nice a girl to be spitting brimstone with every word you utter.”

The Amazon half opened her mouth to say something and then thought better of it.

Before Abna could speak again, the adviser returned, motioning to two servants to lay out the meal. When he was satisfied that everything was as it should be, he retired to a distance and remained watchful.

“I’m not particularly impressed by your adviser,” the Amazon commented.

“Quorne?” Abna smiled a little. “Oh, he’s all right, Vi. A bit tight-lipped but extremely efficient. I don’t know what I’d do without him.”

He began the task of serving the rich, exquisitely cooked food. “The issue,” he said, when the meal was under way, “is quite simple, Vi. Either you marry me, or I shall have to perform the painful task of obliterating these Earth people whom you cherish so much.”

She stared at him for a moment and then went on eating as she thought the statement over. “How do you mean, obliterate them?” she questioned.

“You have seen the sixteen mirrors which ring this space-globe? They are so devised that they can bring the sun’s rays into one focus from sixteen different points. Imagine those sixteen reflected rays concentrated into a single burning beam! A whole city could be destroyed in a matter of minutes by concentrated sunlight. It is just the little boy with the magnifying glass on a gigantic, scientific scale.”

“So that is your intention!” Anger flamed again in the girl’s eyes. “You would destroy the cities of Earth and resurrect Atlantis with its scientific devices, thereby enforcing a victory for yourself.”

“That is my aim—and why not?” Abna shrugged. “It’s so perfectly logical and therefore should appeal to you. I am still an Earthman at heart, remember, even though I was born on Jupiter. The Atlanteans were Earth people to begin with. I am merely intending to return to the world whence my race sprang. I know that as long as you rule the people of Earth, you will never submit to my control; so the only alternative is to destroy you—or them. I have too much regard for you to ever kill you, so the other way is to leave you with nobody to control, which means obliteration of Earth people, or else complete bondage.”

“I’ll stop you somehow.”

“On the other hand,” he continued, “you have a way out. Compromise by marrying me. Then, together, pooling our respective sciences, we can rule not only the Earth but my own small territory on Jupiter as well. You will add another world to your collection of colonised planets and everybody will be happy.”

“The gain being all to you! You have no real love for me, Abna, even though I was once fool enough to think so. You simply regard me as a woman, and believe thereby that you can bring life once again to your dying race. You believe our offspring could form the basis of a new race.”

“Mighty in strength and in knowledge,” Abna agreed, smiling again. “What is so outlandish about that? We understand each other and can regard the biological implications dispassionately. I admit that is the primary reason for my desiring union with you, but it’s not the only reason. I do love you, Vi, and always shall, even if we have to become sworn enemies through our differing viewpoints. A man who did not love you would never have gone through what I have to keep in contact with you. I would never have sought you out again after that synthesis trick you played on me. In the end, all universal issues come down to that one inescapable factor.”

The Amazon relaxed, her lips tight. In her earlier contact with Abna, she had at times had to fight a similar battle to this, but never before had she so clearly realized that she had two sides to her fantastic character. The hard, cruel shell of a scientific woman which had gained her such tremendous power and eminence was at last desperately at war with the underlying woman, the woman who would not admit, even to herself, that she was becoming weary of her lone path, even a little nauseated at having greater power and intelligence than anybody else on Earth. The one side of her loathed the quiet mastery of Abna of Atlantis; the other side felt a sense of relief that a stronger personality could support her in moments when she was unsure.

“Naturally,” Abna said, “it takes some thinking out—even though I should have imagined that you’d had time enough to consider in these past months. You knew perfectly well that I would return one day, and that union between us is inevitable in the end.”

“I know nothing of the sort,” she responded, without looking at him.

“It is inevitable because there is no room in the immediate solar system for both our sciences—and because we have too much regard for one another to resolve matters by destroying each other. If you have any doubts that I mean what I say, just come and watch this little episode.”

Her meal finished, the Amazon rose and followed him across the control room until they reached an outlook port. Here Earth was in full view, greatly magnified by the lens of which the window itself was composed.

“There,” Abna said, “is the United States. You recognize the outline? And there is England and Federation Europe. That greyness is the Atlantic and the darker grey running across it is newly risen Mu. If it were daylight instead of moonlight you’d see it more clearly. However, it is sufficient for our purpose.”

“What purpose?” the Amazon asked in suspicion.

Abna summoned the adviser. He came forward like a ghost.

“Plan 19,” Abna told him. “Proceed with it.”

Sefner Quorne withdrew and moved over to the men still at the control board. He gave them instructions and then stood watching proceedings, alert for the slightest mistake. The Amazon gave a start as from the floating globe there stabbed a deep, lavender-coloured beam which lost itself in distance as it reached down toward Earth.

“What have you done?” she demanded flashing a glance at Abna’s intently watching face. “Set fire to a city?”

“No, we have— There! See?”

The girl looked at a brief flash of flame. Then the lavender beam faded out and the hum of power from the atomic plant ceased.

“Satisfactory, highness?” Sefner Quorne inquired.

“Entirely,” Abna assented, and to the Amazon he added, “I have destroyed the force-dome existing round Atlantis. That is the first move. I shall next travel to Atlantis and resurrect its scientific weapons. I must go quickly before your Earthly curiosity-mongers start investigating. After that will come the destruction of every city, unless we compromise.”

The girl made a bewildered movement. “Abna, I do not understand you!” she declared. “Whatever I may think of you, I have never considered you a man of violence. I honestly do not believe that you would deliberately kill a whole race of people just to get me. You haven’t the necessary ruthlessness for that!”

“You underrate me,” he replied. “There was a time in the past when you killed thousands to try to master the world: why shouldn’t I perform a similar action for, to me—a far greater prize—to get you?”

The Amazon said nothing and Abna’s reddish eyes regarded her steadily. “One word from you can stop it all, Vi. However,” he added, smiling, “think it over. I shall not go to Earth to deal with Atlantis until tomorrow. In the meantime you are my guest. Excellency!”

Sefner Quorne came over without a sound.

Abna said: “Please see that Miss Brant has the guest suite. And you’ll forgive me, Vi,” he added to her, “if I place a guard outside your door. With you right here in my hands I would be a fool indeed if I gave you any opportunity to escape!”