"(novel) (ebook) - Perry Rhodan 0042 - (34) SOS Spaceship Titan" - читать интересную книгу автора (Perry Rhodan)

"Well?" asked Rhodan, and waited for Khrest's answer.
Khrest turned his eyes from the screen back to Rhodan, not able to suppress a trace of admiration. "Your suspicion was right, Perry. This Machine, the Lord of the Arkonide Empire, seems to mistrust you."
"And it will distrust us even more when the three spacers have to report that they've lost the Ganymede after the first hyperjump. The memory banks tell the Positronicon what I have proven once before-that we can execute transitions that escape its coordinate scanners. Khrest, I don't want to risk a fight with the reigning robot brain. Discretion is the better part of valour, at least until Col. Freyt returns with his thousand specialists and a jumbo-sized hypertran compensator for the Titan. Then I'll be ready to take up again the conversation with your robot, and not before. For that reason we shall leave Tagnor, too. Agreed, Reggy?"
Bell had taken another look at the great command centre, with a nostalgic appreciation of the good old Stardust II. The cockpit there had been a harmoniously constructed unit which could be handled in emergencies by two or three men. But to attempt to control this command centre with three men would be sheer madness-a guaranteed fiasco.
"Reg," Perry called to his friend a second time. "I'm asking you if you agree we should whoosh off."
It was unusual procedure for Perry but so was the situation with the gigantic Titan. The colossal spherical spacer was understaffed and whatever potential was contained in the ship could hardly be put in operation with their skeleton crew.
Bell was considering this when he answered, "Sure, I agree-but even if I'm accused of grousing I still don't like that corner of the universe we've chosen to hide in. I have a hunch about it but don't ask me why...!"

* * * *

The Titan's proposed 'whoosh-off' did not materialize immediately. A million small trifles that were of great importance to the inhabitants of the planet Zalit kept Perry Rhodan on the ground for a few days.
Nobody talked any more about Zarlt Demesor, the ex-dictator who had lost his life in an attempt to take over the Arkonide Empire. On the other hand, the Mooffs were not only the daily subject of conversation but still caused a constant alert to be maintained. The search for these non-humanoids left no stone unturned.
The Zalites had not quite recovered from the panic caused by these jellyfish-like creatures. The Mooffs were intelligent beings of a non-humanoid race who had evolved in a world with a methane gas atmosphere. At least on Zalit they had lived in high-pressure spherical tanks which were filled with methane. But the question remained, who had brought them to Zalit in the first place?
For Bell there wasn't any doubt on that subject. "Definitely those stellar gypsies," he had declared; "the galactic traders! They offered the Mooffs to the power mad Zarlt. Of course he had no idea that he was only a tool for their purposes and he imported the telepathic monstrosities en masse to Zalit. His dream had been to send an armada of spacers with crews under mental control into a battle of total destruction against Arkon and the robot brain-incidentally, Perry, are the three Mooff specimens on board the Titan completely secured and their security foolproof?"
Perry answered curtly with another question. "Have you ever found anything on board the Titan that wasn't?"
Bell's grin in return meant that no reply was needed. He simply pointed to the centre of the control room. There were still traces of some object, which had been organically fused and inter-blended, with the composition of the Arkonide steel decking. For a moment Perry did a take at him, wonderingly-then remembered the almost hopeless fight that the twin-headed mutant, Ivan Ivanovich Goratschin, had waged with the control automaton here in the command centre.
This control automaton had been the all-powerful tool of the robot brain on Arkon, so powerful that its reach had no limit in the universe. Producing its own energy, built for the sole purpose of executing the orders of the mammoth positronicon, it also had the means of blowing up the Titan if it fell into enemy hands. But Goratschin had brought his unfathomable mental powers to bear on the automaton, causing fusion of enough calcium atoms to destroy it from within.
All this was on Rhodan's mind as signals from the propulsion drive section began to arrive. Micro-speakers rattled sequenced 'All Clear' announcements. Green lights climbed the checkout panels swiftly. In Bell's area it was the same: race of sounds, parity lights, indicator flashes. Only a brain with Arkonide schooling could control the mammoth complex.
A barely perceptible vibration ran through the space giant. The huge sphere, built of Arkon steel and supported by a ring of telescopic struts, seemed to keen toward the jump into outer space. It had the capability of accelerating to the speed of light within 10 minutes.
Eight days prior, the Ganymede had lifted off for Earth. Now in only a few minutes the Titan would leave this world behind.
The power generators began to whine under maximum load. More and more greens and all clears flakked through the countdown system. The force-field projectors signalled their readiness to start up. Also the powerful H-field generators poised themselves in their coils for activation. These served to repeal meteors and other flying debris in spaceflight. If activated here on the ground, they could cut a clean swath through the spaceport for a radius of 7 miles.
Rhodan never ceased to be overwhelmed with admiration for the know-how of the Arkonides. In palmier days what they had accomplished had been incredible. But now they were decadent, having allowed their magnificent galactic empire to degenerate until finally, only 6 years ago, they had accepted the mammoth robot brain as their overlord.
Rhodan knew that the Arkonides' empire of multiple worlds was what might be termed 'ready for plucking', yet he had no visions of coming here as a bloody conqueror to leave behind a trail of ruins and misery. Rather, he would build and create, not with the Arkonides but with Earthlings, with the young and the daring, with his own kind.
His vision of the future was interrupted by the accelerating signal traffic of the countdown process. The ship's master positronicon was in full operation.
"Lift-off commit!"
The X-count dwindled rapidly.
The propulsion units revved up to full power readiness. Breaker banks poised for cut-in.
"X minus Zero... Lift-off!"
A massive sphere almost one mile in diameter, the Titan became weightless and floated upward, retracting its huge multiple struts. The incredible became credible, perforce, because there it was: the most tremendous spaceship in the known universe was rising and gaining speed, until it finally hurtled into space.
The planet fell behind. Space seemed to rush past them, deepening to a well of blackness behind. And in that well the sun Voga appeared like a reddish cyclopean eye, balefully watching their departure. Then came the vaulted splendour of Star Cluster M-13, a bursting pinwheel of coruscating fire to light the demonic abyss.
"What a ship!" sighed Bell. "What a wonder world around us!"
The two Arkonides, Thora and Khrest, stood between the two seats occupied by Rhodan and Bell. They knew these wonders; this had been their home. Thirteen years before, they had left the star cluster of the Empire to explore the galaxies in search of 'Pel', the Planet of Eternal Life. Their journey had ended in disaster on Earth's moon. For 13 years they had been able to observe closely how the people of a 'barbaric' Earth had developed and matured, under the leadership of Perry Rhodan. Earthlings would soon be ready to take over the reins from the Arkonides.
Thora and Khrest were too intellectually sensitive to think of Earthlings as 'Lords of the Universe' but they did believe that the Earthmen would finally achieve domination of the galaxies, where their own people had failed. It was Perry Rhodan who had finally discovered the planet Wanderer, their long-sought World of Eternal Life. Yet, ironically, it had been he and Reginald Bell who were chosen to be treated with the coveted biological cell shower, a rejuvenating process. They would not age for at least another 6 decades. Whereas they, the Arkonides who had researched this ages-old myth of their race, had not been accepted for this special honour. And now here was an Earthman, his life prolonged, in command of the greatest spaceship in the galaxies-an ally of the Arkonide Empire! Thora and Khrest shared these thoughts mutually. They relived in memory the past 13 years in a foreign world, plus their return to Arkon. They had become strangers in their own home world. Instead of Arkonides reigning there, a mammoth robot brain was in charge and revolutionary flare-ups in satellite galaxies were quelled without mercy by robot-manned Arkonide spacers.
"Transition in 12 minutes!" the ship's positronicon announced through all speakers.
The Titan shot through the star cluster at eight-tenths speol (speed of light). The panoramic vid-screen pictured the passing stars, a world of wonder that always fascinated. But on board the Titan there was no room now for romanticists. The nav computation data spilling out of the positronicon became audible. Star Cluster M-13, more than 230 light-years in diameter, was a flight-channel 'freeway system' for the spacers. Within this relatively limited' space, nine-tenths of all Empire space traffic sped from one star to the next. Hyper-transitions were being recorded almost with pulse-beat frequency.
Suddenly Perry Rhodan began cursing under his breath, which didn't happen very often. He had spotted two bogey blips on the observation screen, and in response to his instant keying the console for I.D., electronic symbols marked the screen, showing the blips to be spacers tied to his own trajectory.
His Commander's voice demanded, "Where's that comp data!"
The scan operator returned quickly with: "Approach from Phi 34░, Alpha 18; value 1-0-7; 45 point acceleration; 300 miles per second. Speed oh-point-8 light. Objects: 2. Type: Empire ships. End of read-out."
What happened next had not been programmed. With lightning swiftness, Rhodan switched over to manual flight mode for emergencies. The mighty ship's positronicon seemed to disconnect and fall silent. It was no longer in control of the Titan.
"Okay, my nosey friend," murmured Rhodan, referring to the robot brain on Arkon, "we shall see!" His hand seemed to casually brush across the acceleration adjuster keyboard.
In the same moment the boosters cut in and shoved the Titan to full acceleration, which brought an octave higher pitch to the already whining inertial-thrust absorbers.
Again Rhodan waited for the comp data. He demanded it this time with an exaggerated politeness.
From the speaker came a sound of heavy breathing, then the scan operator's tense voice: "Uh, distance 250,000 miles, sir!"
"Thank you very much," replied Rhodan and added a general comment, both to persons present and over the com system: "Nav computation and scanner section has three delayed-action marks in succession. For the necessary 100% precision, special practice drills will be scheduled in the near future. Gentlemen, I cannot always spare the time to request the comp data readouts. Has it occurred to you that in many vital situations we're going to be faced with we're just not going to keep on top of it unless everybody, and I mean everybody, works with the top level of efficiency!"
The two following Empire spacers, now accurately pinpointed to the coordinate scanners and magnified on the observation screen, appeared to approach even faster than before. Bell grunted his anger, offended by this spying action of the mammoth robot brain on Arkon.
A sparkle appeared in Rhodan's eyes, a rare and winsome gleaming that seemed capable of melting all resistance. Obviously this was aimed at the machine intelligence he was opposing, as though across a game board politely. He didn't mind the distrust of the robot positronicon. After all, he had taken off with the most powerful battle-spacer known. The robot brain had not voluntarily lent him the Titan as his own private taxi. Rhodan had simply appropriated the top-level piece of ordinance, so brand spanking new that it had only passed through a few preliminary flight tests.
Perry knew that no act of human kindness or warm buddy system had caused the positronicon to leave this prize in his hands. A positronicon had no emotions, merely a cold-pulsing sea of tight little logic gates. So home-base had concluded: there was only one crew capable of handling this ship now and that team worked under leadership of this alien, Perry Rhodan.
"What are you dabbling with over there?" asked Bell, slightly confused, as he leaned curiously toward Perry.
"Just running a little test, Reg. Don't look now but our automatic guidance system is still operating, even though I hit the override just prior to making a hyper-transit jump. Now what I'd like to see is how fast it's going to cross-compensate for a series of little 'dabbling' as you call them."
Bell took a deep breath. Thora and Khrest also reacted gravely.