Equation of Doom Read online

  EQUATION OF DOOM

  by

  GERALD VANCE

  "Your name ith Jathon Ramthey?" the Port Security Officer lispedpolitely.

  Jason Ramsey, who wore the uniform of Interstellar Transfer Service andwas the only Earthman in the Service here on Irwadi, smiled and said:"Take three guesses. You know darn well I'm Ramsey." He was a big maneven by Earth standards, which meant he towered over the Irwadian'sgreen, scaly head. He was fair of skin and had hair the color of copper.It was rumored on Irwadi and elsewhere that he couldn't return to Earthbecause of some crime he had committed.

  "Alwayth the chip on the shoulder," the Port Security Officer said."Won't you Earthmen ever learn?" The splay-tongued reptile-humanoids ofIrwadi always spoke Interstellar _Coine_ with a pronounced lisp whichRamsey found annoying, especially since it went so well with theofficious and underhanded behavior for which the Irwadians were famousthe galaxy over.

  "Get to the point," Ramsey said harshly. "I have a ship to take throughhyper-space."

  "No. You have no ship."

  "No? Then what's this?" His irritation mounting, Ramsey pulled out theInterstellar Transfer Service authorization form and showed it to theSecurity Officer. "A tip-sheet for the weightless races at FomalhautVI?"

  The Security Officer said: "Ha, ha, ha." He could not laugh; he merelyuttered the phonetic equivalent of laughter. On harsh Irwadi, laughterwould have been a cultural anomaly. "You make joketh. Well,nevertheleth, you have no ship." He expanded his scaly green barrelchest and declaimed: "At 0400 hours thith morning, the government ofIrwadi hath planetarithed the Irwadi Tranthfer Thervith."

  * * * * *

  "Planetarized the Transfer Service!" gasped Ramsey in surprise. He knewthe Irwadians had been contemplating the move in theory for many years,but he also knew that transferring a starship from normal space throughhyper-space back to normal space again was a tremendously difficult andtechnical task. He doubted if half a dozen Irwadians had mastered it,yet the Irwadi branch of Interstellar Transfer Service was made up ofseventy-five hyper-space pilots of divers planetalities.

  "Ecthactly," said the Security Officer, as amused as an Irwadian couldbe by the amazement in Ramsey's frank green eyes. "Tho if you willkindly thurrender your permit?"

  "Let's see it in writing, huh?"

  The Security Officer complied. Ramsey read the official document,scowled, and handed over his Irwadi pilot license. "What about the_Polaris_?" he wanted to know. The _Polaris_ was a Centaurian ship he'dbeen scheduled to take through hyper-space on the run from Irwadi toCentauri III.

  "Temporarily grounded, captain. Or should I thay, ecth-captain?"

  "Temporarily my foot," said Ramsey. "It'll be months before youIrwadians can get even a fraction of the ships into hyper. You must beout of your minds."

  "Our problem, captain. Not yourth."

  That was true enough. Ramsey shrugged.

  "Your problem," the Security Officer went on blandly, "will be to find ameanth of thelf-thupport until you and all other ecthra-planetarieth canbe removed from Irwadi. We owe you ecthra-planetarieth nothing. Ethpectno charity from uth."

  Ramsey shrugged. Like all extra-planetaries on a bleak, friendless worldlike Irwadi, he'd regularly gambled away and drank away his monthlypaycheck in the interstellar settlement which the Irwadians hadestablished in the Old Quarter of Irwadi City. But last month he'dmanaged to come out even at the gaming tables, so he had a few hundredcredits to his name. That would be enough, he told himself, to tide himover until Interstellar Transfer Service came to the rescue of itsstranded pilots.

  Ramsey went up the gangway and got his gear from the _Polaris_. When hereturned down the gangway, the late afternoon wind was blowing acrossthe spacefield tarmac, a wet, bone-chilling wind which only thereptile-humanoid Irwadians didn't seem to mind.

  Ramsey fastened the toggles of his cold-weather cape, put his head downand hunched his shoulders, and walked into the teeth of the wind. He didnot look back at the _Polaris_, marooned indefinitely on Irwadi despiteanything the Centaurian owners or anyone else for that matter could doabout it.

  * * * * *

  The Irwadi Security Officer, whose name was Chind Ramar, walked up thegangway and ordered the ship's Centaurian first officer to assemble hiscrew and passengers. Chind Ramar allowed himself the rare luxury of afleeting smile. He could imagine this scene being duplicated on fiftyships here on his native planet today, fifty outworld ships which had nobusiness at all on Irwadi. Of course, Irwadi was an importantplanet-of-call in the Galactic Federation because the vital metaltitanium was found as abundantly in Irwadian soil as aluminum is foundin the soil of an Earth-style planet. Titanium, in alloy with steel andmanganese, was the only element which could withstand the tremendousheat generated in the drive-chambers of interstellar ships duringtransfer. In the future, Chind Ramar told himself with a kind of coldpride, only Irwadian pilots, piloting Irwadian ships throughhyper-space, would bring titanium to the waiting galaxy. At Irwadiprices.

  With great relish, Chind Ramar announced the facts of planetarizationand told the Centaurians and their passengers that they would bestranded for an indefinite period on Irwadi. Amazement, anger, bluster,debate, and finally resignation--the reactions were the expected ones,in the expected order. It was easy, Chind Ramar thought, with all butthe interstellar soldiers of fortune like Jason Ramsey. Ramsey, ofcourse, would need watching. As for these others....

  One of the others, an Earthgirl whose beauty was entirely missed byChind Ramar, left the _Polaris_ in a hurry. She either had no luggage orleft her luggage aboard. Jason Ramsey, she thought. She had read ChindRamar's mind; a feat growing less rare although by no means common yetamong the offspring of those who had spent a great deal of timebombarded by cosmic radiation between the stars. She hurried through thechilling wind toward the Old Quarter of Irwadi City. Panic, she thought.You've got to avoid panic. If you panic, you're finished....

  * * * * *

  "So that's about the size of it," Ramsey finished.

  Stu Englander nodded. Like Ramsey he was a hyper-space pilot, butalthough he had an Earth-style name and had been born of Earth parents,he was not an Earthman. He had been born on Capella VII, and had spentmost of his life on that tropical planet. The result was not an uncommonone for outworlders who spent any amount of time on Irwadi: StuEnglander had a nagging bronchial condition which had kept him off thepilot-bridge for some months now.

  Englander nodded again, dourly. He was a short, very slender man a fewyears older than Ramsey, who was thirty-one. He said: "That ties it. AndI mean ties it, brother. You're looking at the brokest Capellan-earthmanwho ever got himself stuck on an outworld."

  "You mean it?"

  "Dead broke, Jase."

  "What about Sally and the kids?"

  Englander had an Arcturan-earthian wife and twin boys four years old. "Idon't know what about Sally and the kids," he told Ramsey glumly. "Iguess I'll go over to the New Quarter and try to get some kind of ajob."

  "They wouldn't hire an outworlder to shine their shoes with his ownspit, Stu. They have got the planetarization bug, and they've got itbad."

  Sally Englander called from the kitchen of the small flat: "Will Jase bestaying for supper?"

  Englander stared at Ramsey, who shook his head. "Not today, Sally,"Englander said, looking at Ramsey gratefully.

  "Listen," Ramsey lied, "I've been lucky as all get out the last coupleof months."

  "You old pro!" grinned Englander.

  "So I've got a few hundred credits just burning a hole in my pocket,"Ramsey went on. "How's about taking them?"

  "But I haven't the slightest idea when I could pay back."

&nbs
p; "I didn't say anything about paying me back."

  "I couldn't accept charity, Jase."

  "O.K. Pay me back when you get a chance. There are plenty of hyper-spacejobs waiting for us all over the galaxy, you know that."

  "Yeah, all we have to do is get off Irwadi and go after them. But theIrwadians are keeping us right here."

  "Sure, but it won't last. Not when the folks back in Capella and Deneband Sol System hear about it."

  "Six months," said Englander bleakly. "It'll take at least that long."

  "Six months I can wait. What d'you say?"

  Englander coughed wrackingly, his