The standard edition of the complete
psychological works of Sigmund Freud Vol 21 1927
1931 The future of an illusion Civilization and
its discontents and other works Sigmund Freud
download pdf
https://ebookultra.com/download/the-standard-edition-of-the-complete-
psychological-works-of-sigmund-freud-vol-21-1927-1931-the-future-of-an-
illusion-civilization-and-its-discontents-and-other-works-sigmund-freud/
Discover thousands of ebooks and textbooks at ebookultra.com
download your favorites today!
Here are some recommended products for you. Click the link to
download, or explore more at ebookultra.com
The standard edition of the complete psychological works
of Sigmund Freud Vol 13 Totem and taboo and other works
1913 1914 Sigmund Freud
https://ebookultra.com/download/the-standard-edition-of-the-complete-
psychological-works-of-sigmund-freud-vol-13-totem-and-taboo-and-other-
works-1913-1914-sigmund-freud/
The standard edition of the complete psychological works
of Sigmund Freud Vol 23 Moses and monotheism An outline of
psycho analysis and other works 1937 1939 Sigmund Freud
https://ebookultra.com/download/the-standard-edition-of-the-complete-
psychological-works-of-sigmund-freud-vol-23-moses-and-monotheism-an-
outline-of-psycho-analysis-and-other-works-1937-1939-sigmund-freud/
The standard edition of the complete psychological works
of Sigmund Freud Vol 20 1925 1926 An autobiographical
study Inhibitions symptoms and anxiety Lay analysis and
other works Sigmund Freud
https://ebookultra.com/download/the-standard-edition-of-the-complete-
psychological-works-of-sigmund-freud-vol-20-1925-1926-an-
autobiographical-study-inhibitions-symptoms-and-anxiety-lay-analysis-
and-other-works-sigmund-freud/
The standard edition of the complete psychological works
of Sigmund Freud Vol 8 Jokes and their relation to the
uncoscious Sigmund Freud
https://ebookultra.com/download/the-standard-edition-of-the-complete-
psychological-works-of-sigmund-freud-vol-8-jokes-and-their-relation-
to-the-uncoscious-sigmund-freud/
The standard edition of the complete psychological works
of Sigmund Freud Vol 14 On the history of the psycho
analytic movement Papers on metapsychology and other works
1914 1916 Sigmund Freud
https://ebookultra.com/download/the-standard-edition-of-the-complete-
psychological-works-of-sigmund-freud-vol-14-on-the-history-of-the-
psycho-analytic-movement-papers-on-metapsychology-and-other-
works-1914-1916-sigmund-freud/
The standard edition of the complete psychological works
of Sigmund Freud Vol 10 Two case histories Little Hans and
the Rat Man 1909 Sigmund Freud
https://ebookultra.com/download/the-standard-edition-of-the-complete-
psychological-works-of-sigmund-freud-vol-10-two-case-histories-little-
hans-and-the-rat-man-1909-sigmund-freud/
The standard edition of the complete psychological works
of Sigmund Freud Vol I 1886 1899 Pre psycho analytic
publications and unpublished drafts ed assistant Angela
Richards Sigmund Schlomo Freud
https://ebookultra.com/download/the-standard-edition-of-the-complete-
psychological-works-of-sigmund-freud-vol-i-1886-1899-pre-psycho-
analytic-publications-and-unpublished-drafts-ed-assistant-angela-
richards-sigmund-schlomo-freud/
Norbert Elias and Sigmund Freud The Psychoanalytic
Foundations of the Civilizing Process 1st Edition Oliveira
Costa
https://ebookultra.com/download/norbert-elias-and-sigmund-freud-the-
psychoanalytic-foundations-of-the-civilizing-process-1st-edition-
oliveira-costa/
A dark trace Sigmund Freud on the sense of guilt First
English Edition Westerink
https://ebookultra.com/download/a-dark-trace-sigmund-freud-on-the-
sense-of-guilt-first-english-edition-westerink/
The standard edition of the complete psychological works
of Sigmund Freud Vol 21 1927 1931 The future of an
illusion Civilization and its discontents and other works
Sigmund Freud Digital Instant Download
Author(s): Sigmund Freud; James Strachey; Alan Tyson; Alix Strachey; Anna
Freud
ISBN(s): 9780099426769, 0099426765
File Details: PDF, 19.04 MB
Year: 2001
Language: english
Random documents with unrelated
content Scribd suggests to you:
The Project Gutenberg eBook of Message from
Venus
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States
and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no
restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it
under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this
ebook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the
United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where
you are located before using this eBook.
Title: Message from Venus
Author: R. R. Winterbotham
Illustrator: Michael Mirando
Release date: March 15, 2021 [eBook #64826]
Most recently updated: October 18, 2024
Language: English
Credits: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MESSAGE FROM
VENUS ***
MESSAGE from VENUS
by R. R. WINTERBOTHAM
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Comet January 41.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
The Venusians had one admirable characteristic. When they set out
to do a thing, nothing could stop them. Captain Paul Bonnet had
said something to this effect to Major Rogers and it made the old
man so angry that he almost court-martialed the youth.
"We're going to stop them!" the major roared.
Captain Bonnet glanced up into the sky, already dark with the
ballooned bodies of the Venusian bipeds. The creatures looked like
huge sausages, except that there was something deadly about them.
On the approaches to Outpost 53, sweating men labored on the
caissons of twelve batteries of Amorg twenty-fives, pouring atomic
destruction into a solidly packed mass of Venusians advancing
through the wire entanglements.
Captain Bonnet nodded to the major. "You're right, sir!" He turned to
the members of his crew who were manning an anti-rocket gun.
"Did you hear that? Knock 'em out of the sky!"
The gun coughed Amorg vapor into the sky. A gaping hole appeared
directly overhead where the bodies of at least a hundred Venusians
were disintegrated. Before the gun could be recharged the hole
disappeared, filled by more bulging Venusians.
Lieutenant Bill Riley wiped the sweat from his face with his soiled
coat sleeve.
"It's like bailing a boat with a sieve!" he said.
Major Rogers looked as though he were going to have apoplexy.
"We'll get 'em," Captain Bonnet announced, winking at his
lieutenant.
Lieutenant Riley grinned. There was a great deal in common
between the captain and the lieutenant, besides the fact that they
were both officers of the same space ship—The Piece of Sky—which
now lay ruined on the landing field, its plates dissolved by acid
poured from the sky by the Venusians.
Both officers were young and husky. Both had seen action on the
Martian canals and this wasn't the first meeting they had had with
Venusians.
"If they had any sense they'd know they were licked," the captain
added, casting his steely blue eyes at the entanglements. The place
was a grisly sight, strewn with parts of thousands of long-bodied
Venusians.
But the captain knew and the lieutenant knew—perhaps even the
major knew—that Outpost 53 was worth any sacrifice the Venusians
were willing to make. If this post were captured, the Venusians could
control their planet again. There were any number of reasons why it
was best that the planet be governed by terrestrials, and not all of
them were commercial. The Venusians were murderous, evil,
destructive creatures who hated every other living thing in the
universe.
Captain Bonnet checked his casualties. Of his crew of sixty, three
were dead and twelve paralyzed by the poisoned darts the
Venusians used. The other forty-five were half dead from
exhaustion. Three days of fighting was about all any man could
stand.
Captain Bonnet's men had been in a more or less exposed position
during the first part of the battle and their casualties had been heavy
while they tried to prevent The Piece of Sky's destruction. But
probably ten percent of the fifteen hundred men who manned
Outpost 53 were out of the action now, the majority of them
suffering temporary paralysis from dart poison. The captain realized
that the attack would continue until the Venusians captured the
post.
The radio power house had been destroyed first of all. Then the
space ship had been wrecked. The outpost was cut off from
communication with the earth. Reinforcements who could attack the
Venusians from above and disperse them would not be due for two
months. If Outpost 53 lasted three weeks, it would mean fighting to
the last man.
Lieutenant Riley reached into his bag between coughs of the Amorg
gun. He brought out a slender bottle and pulled the cork. He pressed
the bottle into Captain Bonnet's hand.
"Martian Zingo," the lieutenant said. "A friend of mine gave it to me
for a little service in the Canal campaign on Mars. I've been saving it
for a special occasion and it looks like this is it. Here's to our short
and merry lives, Captain!"
Night brought some relief, although the poisoned darts still rained on
the outpost and the ground was lighted with flashes of the atom
guns.
Major Rogers, his face drawn with weariness, stomped to the
spacemen's battery.
"We've got to get a man through to earth, Captain," the major said.
"Can't your ship be fixed?"
"We've got to get a ship through to earth, Captain," the Major said.
"Can't your ship be fixed?" The Captain shook his head slowly.
The captain shook his head. "No, sir."
"Doesn't your ship carry a lifeboat?"
"It does, but you couldn't make the earth in that—and survive. The
lifeboat carries just enough fuel to land on a planet. That fuel would
be used on the takeoff."
"But if you got off Venus and aimed the boat toward the earth,
nothing would keep it from getting there, would it?"
"No, I suppose not, sir."
"Then we've got to do it. Yes, yes, I know. It's suicide. But it's
suicide not to try it. We simply must get a message through to the
earth. We'll ask for volunteers."
"No need of that, Major," the captain said. "I'll make the trip."
"One man couldn't do it," broke in Lieutenant Riley. "I'm going
along."
"You know what it means?" the captain asked his friend.
"Any spaceman knows what a forty-five million mile trip in a lifeboat
means, you mug," the lieutenant replied. "But I'd rather die quickly
in a crash landing than to face what the Venusians probably have
thought up for us when they whittle us down to their size."
"By gad! You're both heroes."
"Umph!" said Captain Bonnet, who had been a hero before.
"What's that?"
"I was about to say: we'd better get started. It's getting late."
"Good! Take a detail to your ship and get the lifeboat ready. Then
you and the lieutenant get some rest. I'll call you in an hour for the
takeoff."
The Piece of Sky's lifeboat was scarcely one hundred feet in length.
It was powered by fourteen rocket valves, fed from detachable fuel
containers, so arranged that as fast as a fuel drum was emptied it
could be dropped from the rocket. The ship was streamlined from
the nose to tail, but it was flattened on the bottom, so that either of
two possible types of landing maneuvers could be attempted.
Attempted was the correct word, for lifeboats of space ships were
never the last word in navigable machines. They were to be used
only as a last resort under desperate circumstances. No lifeboat had
ever been built as a machine for lengthy interplanetary travel. But
the universe is foolproof to a certain extent. Any piece of matter is
sure to obey the laws of the universe. Captain Bonnet supposed that
if the lifeboat succeeded in taking off, and if it were put on the right
orbit, it could reach the earth in time to send reinforcements back to
Venus.
As Captain Paul Bonnet and Lieutenant Bill Riley took their places in
the ship, Major Rogers explained that the craft had been equipped
with a small parachute to be used just before the lifeboat crashed in
dropping a message to authorities that Outpost 53 had been
attacked and that reinforcements were needed.
"After you drop the message, you men are on your own," the major
explained.
"You mean we're to try to get out of it, if we can?" asked Captain
Bonnet dryly. "Humph!"
A few minutes later the lifeboat's rockets roared and the craft soared
upward through Venusian clouds to deliver a message to Terra.
Captain Bonnet watched the rockets drain the fuel tank on the
takeoff. His gravity gauge told him that he was going to make it.
Once beyond Venus and nosed toward the earth, which was
approaching conjunction, no more fuel would be needed. The ship
would be seized by terrestrial gravity and brought home. There
would be a period of uncomfortable warmth as the sides of the ship
became red hot in the earth's atmosphere. A few moments of frantic
work dropping the parachute over some populous region of the
earth, and then a crash that would mean the end.
Each man had gone over the details of what he was to do. Each man
had told himself that there was no end to this trip except death, yet
each man hoped that in some way he could avoid the final disaster.
If there were only some way a space ship could be landed without
fuel!
"It's no use," Captain Bonnet said. "Up to the end of the Twentieth
Century, when all problems dealing with space navigation were
worked out, excepting space flight itself, all of the experts agreed
that there was no practical way of landing a space ship. It wasn't
until the Twenty-first Century that the spiral landing orbit was
discovered and it took another century to discover the Rippler force
method of landing a ship intact."
"At least the Rippler method's out," Lieutenant Riley said dryly.
"We'd have to have fifty gallons of fuel to land a fourteen-valve
lifeboat on its rocket jets."
"Even the spiral landing orbit would require twenty-five gallons,"
Captain Bonnet pointed out. "Both methods are out. We've got about
two gallons of rocket fuel in the tank and we'll need most of it in the
cooling system to keep us from burning up until we can drop the
message."
Hours ticked swiftly away as the space ship moved closer to the
earth. The craft had reached the middle of its course, where
terrestrial and Venusian gravities neutralized, with speed to spare.
From now on it would accelerate slowly under the pull of the earth's
attraction and it could be expected to enter the earth's atmosphere
at a speed greater than 200 miles a second. The entire trip from
Venus to the earth would take about 72 hours. The job of
decelerating from 200 miles a second to less than ten would be
taken care of in the 1,000 miles of atmosphere lying above the
earth. It could be accomplished with no more discomfort than a
passenger in a car experiences in a sudden stop. But the last ten
miles per second deceleration would mean the overcoming of the
force of gravity itself.
Captain Bonnet considered the danger of the moon interfering with
the ship's flight to earth. He discovered, to his relief, that the moon
was out of the way, on the opposite side of the earth. At least he
would not have to use precious fuel to keep the craft from landing
on the moon.
He checked the cooling apparatus. It seemed in perfect working
condition and should keep the two passengers from roasting alive
until the ship crashed. At least this was a comfort.
Lieutenant Riley, who had been sleeping, opened his eyes.
"Say, Paul, I've an idea!"
"Yeah? Spill it."
"Why couldn't we keep the ship in an orbit outside the earth's
atmosphere until it is sighted by telescope?"
"There are two pretty good reasons for that," Paul Bonnet replied.
"In the first place we'll be going too fast. If we tried to get into an
orbit we'd sail right out again. To become a satellite of the earth—
and I suppose that's what you're thinking of—we'd have to slow
ourselves down to exactly the right speed necessary to overcome
the earth's gravity. That would be hard to do with the instruments
on this lifeboat, even if we had the fuel necessary to brake. In the
second place, if we got close enough to the earth to be seen by a
telescope, our orbital speed would be too fast for any 'scope to keep
us in focus. We'd be mistaken on photographs for a meteor."
"I guess we're up against it, eh Paul?"
"I've been thinking," Captain Bonnet said.
"What's this, a joke?"
"There's one plan that might work—a suicide plan. But even that
might be spoiled by an accident."
"If there's a chance we ought to take it."
"The message goes overboard first," the captain said. "After that we
save ourselves. I've been studying the charts and I know just where
we ought to land—that is in which hemisphere."
"Yeah? Which?"
"We're going to land somewhere in the Pacific."
"That's a nice thought. Who's going to pick up our message in the
middle of the Pacific?"
"That's what gave me the idea of our suicide plan," Captain Bonnet
said. "In order to drop the message over a city, we've got to float
around the earth until we get near one...."
Captain Bonnet began to explain his idea. The ship was going to hit
the earth's atmosphere at a terrific pace. The deceleration would be
pretty stiff—might be fatal—unless it were done gradually, but
spacemen had learned the trick of pancaking a flat-bottomed craft
on top of the atmosphere, then diving; pancaking again, diving
again, until the deceleration was accomplished.
This method of deceleration usually was accomplished with some
use of rockets and it led to the old time spiral landing orbit. The
atmosphere was the chief brake and the rockets were used to
maneuver the craft into dives and pancakes. A first class cooling
system was needed, of course, to carry off the heat of atmospheric
friction, but the lifeboat was equipped with a cooling system and
there was nothing to worry about from this source.
But the lifeboat had little fuel. Captain Bonnet, however, had flown
airplanes. He knew that braking could be accomplished without fuel
if the flat-bottomed ship were used as a plane. He planned to use
airplane tactics to slow the ship down to a speed closely
approximating the escape velocity of the earth—6.9 miles a second.
This would enable the ship to soar over the earth until it was over a
good sized city, where the message from Outpost 53 would be
dropped.
"But if we land at that speed—and gravity will see to it we don't hit
much slower—we'll be buried deep in the ground. Even if we hit the
ocean, the deceleration will kill us—"
"Would it? There have been records of meteors striking the ground
so lightly they did little more than raise a cloud of dust."
"We're not a meteor."
"We're practically a meteor and there's one chance in a million that
we can duplicate what a meteor can do, Bill. It's our only chance."
"What do you want me to do?"
Rocket engineers in developing machines for space travel had found
speed the foremost bugaboo. It was the speed a rocket had to attain
to leave terrestrial gravity that balked engineers. There also was
man's instinctive fear of going fast, in spite of the assurances of
science that speed, in itself, was harmless. It was acceleration and
deceleration that killed people.
One might travel seven miles a second indefinitely and suffer no ill
effects, once he got going that rate of speed. However, one might
die quickly while attaining it. Drugs enabled spacemen to withstand
several gravities of acceleration or deceleration without fatal effects
and there were a few of these pills aboard. But any speed change
greater than nine or ten gravities would be dangerous under any
conditions.
The craft neared the earth. Already the travelers could make out the
dim outlines of the continental areas.
The gravity gauge registered the earth's pull strongly and Captain
Bonnet calculated that they were nearing the outer limits of the
atmosphere. He twisted a valve a fraction of a turn.
From a steering jet, a tiny needle of flame shot into the ether. From
another jet, a second flame glowed for an instant. The space ship
turned, wheeling the onrushing earth out of line with the lifeboat's
prow. Now the huge, radiant ball peeked into the craft through the
glass window in the floor, but the ship's direction of travel continued
toward it as before.
Captain Bonnet shut off the valves, conserving every ounce of rocket
fuel that remained in the tanks. Lieutenant Riley started the cooling
mechanism and for an instant the craft became uncomfortably cold.
This discomfort lasted only a few minutes, however, for the craft
soon began to strike the first atoms of the atmosphere and its sides
began to glow with heat. The space ship was fast becoming a
meteor flashing into the atmosphere of the earth.
There was a sudden jerk. Once more Bonnet twisted the valve,
nosing the streamlined craft downward slightly to allow these atoms
of air to strike the sides less forcefully. There was danger of a
blackout if the deceleration were too fast.
The ship dived forward and Bonnet used more precious fuel to turn
it broadside again. The craft slowed, this time not so violently.
The atoms of the atmosphere were audible now as whistling
screams as the ship spiraled one thousand miles above the earth.
Captain Bonnet watched the air speed indicator. For a long time it
stood at twenty miles a second—the highest speed it would register.
Then it began to slow: nineteen, fifteen, twelve, nine, seven miles a
second.
Instead of decreasing the speed further, he nosed the craft down.
The speed increased slightly, and then, like an airplane in flight, he
brought the craft slowly broadside by degrees. The effect of the slow
turn was to catch the atoms on the flat bottom so that the
downward rush was transformed into a horizontal rush. The craft
was speeding in an orbit parallel to the surface of the earth. Captain
Bonnet had brought the space ship out of a tail spin.
Instantly he shut off the fuel valves, leaving the remainder of the
fuel available for the cooling apparatus.
Lieutenant Riley looked wide-eyed at the hemisphere beneath the
craft.
"Well, we're here and we've less than a gallon of fuel," he said.
"What next?"
"Unless there's an accident, we're going to land on an ounce or
two," Captain Bonnet replied. "A meteor doesn't use any fuel, but it
has accidents. That tiny bit of fuel is going to keep us from having
an accident—I hope."
"That fuel is mighty potent," the lieutenant admitted. "It's the most
powerful explosive known. But old Terra's gravity is a pretty big
thing, too."
"For every action there must be a reaction," Captain Bonnet said.
"Strangely, no one ever considered this principle in respect to
coming down, as well as going up."
"Gravity is action and you're the reaction in that case," the lieutenant
observed.
"Not exactly. The escape velocity of the earth is gravity in reverse—if
we can twist our minds around to think of it that way. We
manufacture the escape velocity with our rocket fuel and use it to
neutralize gravity. An object going 6.9 miles a second goes far
enough around the earth in a second that the earth's curvature
doesn't catch up with it, so to speak."
"I hope you're sure of your reactions, although it doesn't make a lot
of difference if we get this message down."
"We're hitting the atmosphere at a speed close to the escape
velocity of the earth. If we were going that speed we'd never get
any closer to the surface. But we're being slowed so that we're
falling—not very fast, but fast enough. Our speed around the earth
is about 6.9 miles a second, minus a few decimals. Our speed
toward the earth isn't very fast—I'd say a few feet a second. Our
only problem now is to stop our forward speed without speeding our
downward speed."
"I don't suppose you're very optimistic about it?" the lieutenant
asked, hopefully.
"No," the captain admitted, "but we can try. You've seen airplanes
land at speeds of one hundred miles an hour or more. That was
their speed forward. Their speed downward was measured in feet
per minute. That's our problem now. We've got to land like an
airplane—make a deadstick landing without crashing."
"Oh we might be able to land, but the minute we touch, some of our
forward speed is going to get us into trouble. Remember, an airplane
has wheels."
Captain Bonnet pointed to a small globe painted with a map of the
world. His finger touched a dot in the South Pacific near the
Antarctic continent at 60 degrees south latitude and 120 degrees
west longitude.
"That's Dougherty Island," he said. "Between that island and San
Francisco are 6,300 miles of empty Pacific ocean. We're going to try
to land near Dougherty Island at a speed so fast we'll barely touch
the surface of the water. But as we touch the water, the frictional
heat of the sides of our space ship will transform the water instantly
into steam. The steam will cushion our ship against shock and
decelerate us rapidly—but not too rapidly for endurance. The stop
will be rough, but we can take it. We ought to be able to stop in
6,300 miles."
"Whew! A steam landing!"
Captain Bonnet kept his hands on the control, ready to use a few
drops of precious fuel to keep the craft in its spiral parallel to the
surface of the earth. The earth seemed to float upward slowly to
meet the space ship.
The interior of the craft grew uncomfortably hot, but the cooling
system worked.
A vast expanse of white appeared directly below the craft. It was the
South Polar ice cap.
"We're over James Ellsworth Land," the captain said, checking his
position. "That's about twenty-three degrees east of the longitude of
Dougherty Island. That's lucky."
"Lucky?" said the lieutenant.
"We can circle the earth once, drop our message over some city and
get back on the right longitude," the captain explained. "It'll take us
about an hour and a half at our present speed to make the
circumnavigation. In that time the earth will turn twenty-two and
one-half degrees beneath us."
The Pacific ocean flashed beneath the craft. The ship struck the
continent on the coast of Mexico and skirted above eastern Texas.
Over Kansas City, Captain Bonnet jerked a lever to release the
message of the beleaguered Venusian garrison.
The lieutenant watched it fall slowly down toward the ground.
Then he groaned.
"We've failed!" he said. "The parachute dropped in the Missouri
river! The last chance to save the garrison is lost!"
Captain Bonnet turned to his companion. "It isn't the last chance—if
our landing works!"
The craft soared northward into Canada, passing some distance west
of Hudson Bay. It crossed the Arctic sea, reached Siberia and then
zoomed southward, flying dangerously close to the tall peaks of the
Himalayas. Each minute saw it moving closer to the earth.
The craft shot across the Indian Ocean and entered the Antarctic
again. The Antarctic continent was reached near Douglas Island and
it crossed Enderby and Kemp lands toward the pole.
The metal monster was scarcely two thousand feet high as it soared
over the South Pole. The loss of the natural elevation of the polar
plateau left the ship about the same distance above the surface of
the earth as it approached the ocean again.
Captain Bonnet used a few more ounces of fuel to keep the craft in
its course, headed always toward the horizon, which at 1,600 feet
seemed fifty miles away.
Down the craft sank, inch by inch, toward the sea. Suddenly
Lieutenant Riley shouted and pointed:
"Dougherty Island! Over there!"
A black speck rose out of the Pacific dead ahead.
The two men already had slipped into their emergency landing
harness to protect themselves from the deceleration that was bound
to come. They had swallowed pills to protect themselves from the
gravitational pressure and now they felt the drug taking hold of their
systems.
The ship seemed to be sailing parallel to the surface of the sea. The
tops of the waves reached up and touched the bottom of the craft,
and evaporated in a hiss of steam.
Gracefully, like a huge dirigible airship, the lifeboat dipped down. It
shuddered as the disturbed air roared like thunder around it. There
was a tremendous drag and a loud explosion as the ship touched the
water.
Both men pitched forward in their harness.
Captain Bonnet felt the world growing black around him. With
superhuman effort he shook off the threatened blackout and sent
the last drop of fuel into the lower jets to hold the ship one second
more above the waves.
There was a terrific jar. Tons and tons of pressure exerted itself
against the ship and on the men inside. But nothing cracked.
Outside the window, vision was obscured by clouds of swirling vapor.
The craft bounded forward in gigantic, hundred-mile leaps, like a
rock skipping across the surface of a huge pond.
Lieutenant Riley hung limply in his harness, a stream of blood
trickling from his nose. Slowly he opened his eyes.
"We're alive!" he gasped.
Then he fainted again.
The craft slowed down. A startled fishing craft off the Central
American coast almost capsized in the wash of the monster from the
skies.
Ahead of them land reared its head above the horizon. Captain
Bonnet wondered if the ship would stop in time, but he did not
realize how quickly the craft was coming to a standstill. He turned
the rudders and steered for shore. A cry came from Lieutenant Riley.
It was the Golden Gate.
A patrol boat met them in the harbor as the space ship, floating in
boiling water, came to a stop.
Captain Bonnet opened the locks and climbed out on the top of the
craft. He wore an asbestos space suit to protect himself from the
heat of the sides.
"Have you a wireless aboard?" he called to the patrol.
"Of course, captain!" came the reply from the patrol boat, as the
rescuers saw the insignia of rank on Bonnet's clothing.
"Send a message to the nearest interplanetary garrison that
reinforcements are needed at Outpost 53 on Venus. Lieutenant Riley
and myself just came from there—the situation is desperate...."
"You don't mean you came all the way from Venus in a lifeboat?"
"If you're going to waste time asking questions, let us come
aboard," Captain Bonnet said. "But get that message in the air at
Welcome to our website – the ideal destination for book lovers and
knowledge seekers. With a mission to inspire endlessly, we offer a
vast collection of books, ranging from classic literary works to
specialized publications, self-development books, and children's
literature. Each book is a new journey of discovery, expanding
knowledge and enriching the soul of the reade
Our website is not just a platform for buying books, but a bridge
connecting readers to the timeless values of culture and wisdom. With
an elegant, user-friendly interface and an intelligent search system,
we are committed to providing a quick and convenient shopping
experience. Additionally, our special promotions and home delivery
services ensure that you save time and fully enjoy the joy of reading.
Let us accompany you on the journey of exploring knowledge and
personal growth!
ebookultra.com
