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Tesseract, v. 2, issue 1, January 1937
7
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tesseract 7 [but] this is the planetoid Denzil mentioned, though at present it's nearer surface is in shadow. Our ultra-beam operators are photographing it through the dark portion on the umbra for the cube city he mentioned. I knew Denzil, sir, -know him well. We were in the Space-Guard training base on Earch together." Gorvor swallowed a huskiness which had crept into his voice. Commander Rasmon noting the strained sound , glanced up. Gorvor was white-faced and staring downward with a set countenance. "His messages stopped coming?" queried the Commander. "Yes," answered Gorvor, squinting his eyes to hide the intense feeling in them. "I'm afraid- old Denz - they got him!" His last words were hardly more than a whisper yet they were livid with emotion. "I'd like to make a request, sir. I want to man the forward projector cubicle when- when we go down on them!" Commander Rasmon gripped Gorvor's silver-clad arm tautly, expressing thereby something which words could not. "I understand." He said simply, "I think we all feel it, too. We owe them a lot. But you shall have your wish, and there is not a better man for it. Denzil was all metalmesh, and a yard wide, but he played too close to the hilt. I wish we had more men like him!" The signals came through then, the ultra [vi] photographers having discovered the cubicle city, well within the dark shadow of night on the pirate planetoid. Commander Rasmon gave crisp orders to shoot through an attempt to contact by radio, a preliminary communication. Rasmon stood, a tall yet compact figure his eyes glinting from a set face. Strangely enough, his eyes sought the outer space, past the glassite shield. He stared at the other fourteen wheeling ships, at the degravite shutters which surrounded the exteriors of the vessels in serried ranks, which would presently concentrate the perpendicular pressure of their vanes on the planet below. Gravity would increase, multiply again and again in that rapid plummeting drop. Space-guns would puke flames and thunder, invisible forces would clash, and there would be some of the faces he would not see afterward. Yet it was all a part of the grim, desparate game; the struggle for justice and protection for the Earth-man the entire Solar System over. His eyes sought the prows of the space-ships, beneath the transparent space-windows which afforded brief glimpses of the alert, militant profiles of the pilots. It was the insignia that caught his eye - the great polished metallic emblem flaunted proudly so that all space might see. The Rocket-And-Shooting-Star! It stood for the rights of terrestrials, and its banners had been emblazoned across the frontiers of alien space by zooming, plunging vessels at whose controls sat men who didn't fear death; upon whose lithe shoulders the silvery uniforms would set jauntily until the last one zoomed out to that Greater Universe beyond all space and matter. "Okay, sir," interrupted Gorvor, from the radio-phone. "They've shot through the contact. Someone's answering back from the pirate city, and they're connecting through directly to the big spark. Ah!" A small telescreen flickered into being, and as their eyes grew accustomed to the vivid illumination, they found themselves staring directly into the features of the man most feared throughout the space-lanes. "Krag Gifford!" ejaculated Commander Rasmon, his lips hardening. The face was smiling at them, immobile and composed, and only the sardonic lines etched in the corners of that unruffled mask hinted a the barbarous inner nature. "Commander Rasmon, I understand," said Gifford with a mocking smile. "This is quite a pleasure, Commander. I wasn't expecting you." "No time for foolery, Gifford," snapped Rasmon tersely. "We've cornered you at last. You may surrender now; otherwise no quarter will be given. It's the end of your flight, Falcon. It isn't a mere question of fighting our spaceships. It's the Space-Guard! We're on your trail, and we'll never let up. Other squadrons will be tailing us, so that if we fail, others will succeed, and that flow of space cruisers will never cease, until you are either captured or die in a spacial grave." The Falcon might not have heard, for all the attention he gave to the ultimatum. His manner was deliberately taunting, calculatingly irritating. "One thing you have never seriously considered, Rasmon," he said amiably. "They call me the Falcon, the Master of the Space-lanes. I don't know whether
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tesseract 7 [but] this is the planetoid Denzil mentioned, though at present it's nearer surface is in shadow. Our ultra-beam operators are photographing it through the dark portion on the umbra for the cube city he mentioned. I knew Denzil, sir, -know him well. We were in the Space-Guard training base on Earch together." Gorvor swallowed a huskiness which had crept into his voice. Commander Rasmon noting the strained sound , glanced up. Gorvor was white-faced and staring downward with a set countenance. "His messages stopped coming?" queried the Commander. "Yes," answered Gorvor, squinting his eyes to hide the intense feeling in them. "I'm afraid- old Denz - they got him!" His last words were hardly more than a whisper yet they were livid with emotion. "I'd like to make a request, sir. I want to man the forward projector cubicle when- when we go down on them!" Commander Rasmon gripped Gorvor's silver-clad arm tautly, expressing thereby something which words could not. "I understand." He said simply, "I think we all feel it, too. We owe them a lot. But you shall have your wish, and there is not a better man for it. Denzil was all metalmesh, and a yard wide, but he played too close to the hilt. I wish we had more men like him!" The signals came through then, the ultra [vi] photographers having discovered the cubicle city, well within the dark shadow of night on the pirate planetoid. Commander Rasmon gave crisp orders to shoot through an attempt to contact by radio, a preliminary communication. Rasmon stood, a tall yet compact figure his eyes glinting from a set face. Strangely enough, his eyes sought the outer space, past the glassite shield. He stared at the other fourteen wheeling ships, at the degravite shutters which surrounded the exteriors of the vessels in serried ranks, which would presently concentrate the perpendicular pressure of their vanes on the planet below. Gravity would increase, multiply again and again in that rapid plummeting drop. Space-guns would puke flames and thunder, invisible forces would clash, and there would be some of the faces he would not see afterward. Yet it was all a part of the grim, desparate game; the struggle for justice and protection for the Earth-man the entire Solar System over. His eyes sought the prows of the space-ships, beneath the transparent space-windows which afforded brief glimpses of the alert, militant profiles of the pilots. It was the insignia that caught his eye - the great polished metallic emblem flaunted proudly so that all space might see. The Rocket-And-Shooting-Star! It stood for the rights of terrestrials, and its banners had been emblazoned across the frontiers of alien space by zooming, plunging vessels at whose controls sat men who didn't fear death; upon whose lithe shoulders the silvery uniforms would set jauntily until the last one zoomed out to that Greater Universe beyond all space and matter. "Okay, sir," interrupted Gorvor, from the radio-phone. "They've shot through the contact. Someone's answering back from the pirate city, and they're connecting through directly to the big spark. Ah!" A small telescreen flickered into being, and as their eyes grew accustomed to the vivid illumination, they found themselves staring directly into the features of the man most feared throughout the space-lanes. "Krag Gifford!" ejaculated Commander Rasmon, his lips hardening. The face was smiling at them, immobile and composed, and only the sardonic lines etched in the corners of that unruffled mask hinted a the barbarous inner nature. "Commander Rasmon, I understand," said Gifford with a mocking smile. "This is quite a pleasure, Commander. I wasn't expecting you." "No time for foolery, Gifford," snapped Rasmon tersely. "We've cornered you at last. You may surrender now; otherwise no quarter will be given. It's the end of your flight, Falcon. It isn't a mere question of fighting our spaceships. It's the Space-Guard! We're on your trail, and we'll never let up. Other squadrons will be tailing us, so that if we fail, others will succeed, and that flow of space cruisers will never cease, until you are either captured or die in a spacial grave." The Falcon might not have heard, for all the attention he gave to the ultimatum. His manner was deliberately taunting, calculatingly irritating. "One thing you have never seriously considered, Rasmon," he said amiably. "They call me the Falcon, the Master of the Space-lanes. I don't know whether
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