When Worlds Collide (When Worlds Collide 1)

When Hendron reached the first deck of passengers’ quarters, he found them standing together comparing notes on the sensations of space-flying. Many of them were rubbing stiff arms and legs. Two or three, including Eliot James, were still lying on the padded deck in obvious discomfort. They had turned on the lights, apparently more interested in their own condition than in the astounding vista of the Earth below. Tony had just opened the doors of the larder and was on the point of distributing sandwiches.

Hendron brought the shabby Duquesne into their midst.

“I’d like to present my friend Professor Pierre Duquesne of the French Academy, a last-minute arrival. I assure you that except for its monotony, the trip will offer you no further great discomfort until we reach Bronson Beta, when we shall be under the necessity of repeating approximately the same maneuver. I want to call your attention to the following phenomena: In something less than an hour we are going to turn the periscope on France in an effort to observe the departure of the French equivalent of our ships. We are at the moment engaged in trying to locate our second Ark, which took its course at a distance from us to avoid any chance of collision, and being between us and the sun, is now temporarily lost in the glare of the sun.

“I will have the sun thrown on the screen at intervals, as some of the phenomena are extremely spectacular. At about mid-point of our voyage we will concentrate our attention on the collision between the Earth and Bronson Alpha. I think at this point I may express my satisfaction in the behavior of the Ark. As you all are aware, we have escaped from the earth. We are still well within the field of its gravitational control, in the sense that if our propellent forces ceased, we undoubtedly would fall back upon the earth; but the pull of gravity is constantly weakening. It diminishes, as most of you know, not directly in relation to the distance, but in relation to the square of the distance. It is the great lessening of the pull of gravity which has ended our extreme distress.

“Except for the small chance of striking an astrolite, we are quite safe and will continue so for some time. When we approach Bronson Beta, our situation will, of course, become more difficult. You will please excuse me now, as I wish to convey the same information to the passengers on the deck above.”

Hendron departed, and his feet disappeared through the opening in the ceiling which contained the spiral staircase.

Duquesne immediately made himself the center of attention, praising alternately Hendron’s ship and his own prowess in completing the journey from France. The reaction from the initial strain of the voyage took, in him, the form of saluting, shouting, joking with the men and flirting with the women.

Tony saw to the distribution of food and water. The ship rushed through the void so steadily that cups of milk, which Eve held to the lips of the children, scarcely spilled over. The passengers, having eaten a little, found that they could move from floor to floor without great trouble, and several became garrulous. The ship was s

pinning very slowly, exposing one side after the other to the sun, and this served to equalize the temperature, which was fiery hot on the sun-side, deadly cold on the other.

Fans distributed the air inside the ship. Outside, there was vacuum against which the airlocks were sealed. The air of the ship, breathed and “restored,” was not actually fresh, although chemically it was perfectly breathable. The soft roar of the rocket propulsion-tubes fuddled the senses. There was no sensation of external time, no appreciation of traveling from morn to night. The sun glared in a black sky studded with brilliant stars.… The sun showed its corona, its mighty, fiery prominences, its huge leaping tongues of flame.

To the right of the sun, the great glowing crescents of Bronson Alpha and Bronson Beta loomed larger and larger.

Eve sat with Tony as a periscope turned on them and displayed them on the screen. They could plainly see that Bronson Alpha was below and approaching the earth; Bronson Beta, slowly turning, was higher and much nearer the ship.

“Do you see their relation?” she asked.

“Between the Bronson Bodies?” said Tony. “Aren’t they nearer together than they have ever been before?”

“Much nearer; and as Father—and Professor Bronson—calculated. Bronson Beta, being much the smaller and lighter, was revolving about Bronson Alpha. The orbit was not a circle; it was a very long ellipse. Sometimes, therefore, this brought Bronson Beta much closer to Alpha than at other times. When they went around the sun, the enormous force of the sun’s attraction further distorted the orbit, and Bronson Beta probably is nearer Alpha now than it ever was before. Also, notice it is at the point in its orbit which is most favorable for us.”

“You mean for our landing on it?” asked Tony.

“For that; and especially is it favorable to us, after we land—if we do,” amended Eve; and she gathered the children to her. She sat between them, an arm about each, gazing at the screen.

“You see, the sun had not surely ‘captured’ Bronson Beta and Bronson Alpha. They had arrived from some incalculable distance and they have rounded the sun, but, without further interference than the sun’s attraction, they would retreat again and perhaps never reappear; they would not join the family of familiar planets circling the sun.

“But on the course toward the sun, Alpha destroyed the moon, as we know, and this had an effect upon both Alpha and Bronson Beta, controlled by Alpha. And now something even more profound is going to happen. Alpha will have contact with the world. That will destroy the earth and will send Bronson Alpha off in another path—perhaps will will prove to be a very long ellipse, but more probably it will be a hyperbola. No one can quite calculate that; but one almost certain effect of the catastrophe is that it will break Bronson Beta away from the dominating control of Bronson Alpha and leave Beta subject to the sun. That will provide a much more satisfactory orbit for us about our sun.”

“Us?” echoed Tony.

“Us—if we get there,” said Eve; and she bent and kissed the children. “What purpose could there be in all that”—she nodded to the screen when she straightened—“if some of us aren’t to get there? We see God not only sending us that world, Tony,”—she spoke a little impatiently—“but arranging for us an orbit for it about the sun which will let us live.”

“Do you know the Wonder Clock?” Danny, the little boy, looked up and demanded. “Do you know Peterkin and the li’l Gray Hare?”

“Certainly,” said Eve. “Once there was a giant—”

At the end of the hour all the lights in the passenger quarters were turned out, and the Earth was again flashed on the screen. Its diminution in size was already startling; and the remains of Europe, stranded in a new ocean, looked like a child’s model flour-and-water map.

Duquesne lay on his back on deck and stared up at the scenery. He gave an informal lecture as he looked. “As we are flinging ourselves away from the Earth below, we are putting distance between ourselves and a number of prize fools. These fellows are my best friends. You will pick out faintly the map of Europe. Directly south of those shadows which were once the British Isles, you see the configuration of the Alps. In the center of the western range are the fools of whom I spoke. At any moment now, providing we are able to see anything at all, we shall witness their effort at departure. They built a ship not dissimilar to this, but unfortunately relying upon another construction than that valuable little metal discovered by Mr.—whatever his name is. I have told them they shall melt. I hope that we shall be able to see the joke of that fusion.”

Duquesne glanced again at his watch, and looked up at the screen on which, like a stereopticon picture, hung the Earth. Suddenly he sat bolt upright. “Did I not tell you?”

A point of light showed suddenly in the spot he had designated. It was very bright, and as a second passed, it appeared to extend so that it stood away from the Earth like a white-hot needle. Tony and Eve and many others glanced at Duquesne.

But Duquesne was not laughing as he had promised. Instead he sat with his head bent back, his hands doubled into fists which pounded his knees, while in an outpouring of French he cajoled and pleaded frantically with that distant streak of fire.

The seconds passed slowly. Every one under the glass screen realized that here, perhaps, would be companions for them after they had reached Bronson Beta. Since they had just undergone the experience which they knew the Frenchmen were suffering in their catapulted departure from the Alps, they watched gravely and breathlessly. Only the rocket trail of the ship could be seen, as the ship itself was too small and too far away to be visible.

Duquesne was standing. He suddenly seemed conscious of those around him. “They go, they go, they go, they go! Maybe they have solved this problem. Maybe they will be with us.”