The anchoring tractors worked exactly as he wished. Focused, they worked even from the other-space, though when unfocused they could not be used either into or out of it He wrote, at some length. Then he took a half-dozen small objects and focused material-handler tractor beams on them—small beams. He turned the tractor-power away down and then took them out of the ship despite the reduced-power tractor's pull.
He wedged them in place so they could not fly back to the ship until released but so that they would fly back to the ship, even into the dark universe, when set free. Then he was ready. He and his two followers went outside. Rod looked up to the port through which Kit regarded him anxiously. He waved his hand.
There was a puff of air. The Stellaris—was not. There was only emptiness where she had been. She was in another cosmos, in another set of dimensions, as far removed from this planet's surface as the farthest island universe.
Yet if any of the small objects arranged for the purpose were released it would be drawn to the ship and through the forcefield and into the open air-lock in the fraction of a second, implying a removal of no more than yards.
Rod started off for the big building in which he'd found the television sets and the isotopic generator and the huge mass of plastic which was a vacuum tube in its functioning. On the way he spoke crisply.
"We had a space-ship turn something on us that was pretty bad. It lasted only the fraction of a second, so it didn't kill us. Here something deadly hit It didn't break plastic or metal or stone but it crumbled ceramic insulators to powder. Got any idea what it could be?"
The painter, knitting his brows, said, "You can break china when plastic only bounces. What they got? Something that smacks hard?"
"They didn't push down the buildings," Rod pointed out "A bunch of little blows, like a compressed-air drill, will cut through stone that a straight push or a rotary drill won't handle. My guess is they had a sort of pressor-beam, only instead of pushing steadily it hit hard and fast—and often. Vibration."
The electrician said, demurring, "Y'd get an awful kick-back from a pressor-beam that went off an' on like that!"
"Suppose," said Rod, "in between it was a tractor? Suppose they had a beam that changed from a pressor to a tractor a hundred times a second—two hundred thousand? What then?"
The three men took half a dozen steps toward the hall of the machines and television sets. Then the electrician grunted.
"Mmmh! You could fix the tensor-plate to be a chopper! Migawd, yeah! Say! I could fix one o' them!"
"We're going to," said Rod curtly. "We're going to use something the people that built this city made. My guess is that it'll handle a few hundred million kilowatts. And I know a power-unit that'll give it that much power—for awhile. We're going to work like hades!"
In his mind there was a feeling of terrible urgency. There were looters in some other city of this same planet. That meant there was a pyramid-ship here too. It might be the plan of the space-murderers to loot one city of this planet at a time. It was much more likely that there would be cargoships coming to load up with the booty of their crime at as many cities as possible.
They'd have waited until they felt it safe to loot—but once they began they would not want the looting to spread over a term of years. After all, the jungle would begin to creep into the dead cities. Since there were already looters in one city there should be others on the way.
The electrician set about gathering the material for his coils and plates, cutting away freely at bus-bars and cables of solid silver to supply his needs. With power such as Rod had spoken of no mere wire would serve as conductors. He cut and tugged and tugged and cut.
Rod and the painter went out to hunt for a vehicle that could be made to run. When they found one not outwardly wrecked Rod had to sweat over it to discover how it ran. It stirred feebly—and that was all. They tried a second and its power was dead.
It was not until they came upon one which had apparently waited for its owners or passengers beneath an overhanging arch—so that it was protected from rain—that the queer vehicle moved briskly. Then they had to learn to guide it.
But they were back and trundling into the great hall before the electrician had begun to shape those illogical and superficially insane twistings of metal which ordinarily are hidden by weather-proof housings and careful range-limiters, in the tractor and pressor-beams of commerce.
He stopped to help Rod make sure of the cutting-off of the isotopic generator and then the two of them hacked at heavy leads and struggled with the massive bus-bars they would require. The painter judgmatically contrived a way to load the big block of plastic—which was a vacuum tube—on the vehicle. Then Rod and the electrician mounted their coils about the "tube" in its exotic placing.
"I've got a hunch," said Rod suddenly. "This is our mount! We'll run it up to the pyramid, cut in and connect the leads with the power-unit there. And then—"
The electrician swung around suddenly. "Yeah!" he said, blankly. "Then! Lookaheah! This thing ain't got any guides! I got her hooked to squeal up to the bloopin' point an' with enough power in her there ain't goin' to be anything in who knows how far ain't goin' to hot up! Where're we goin' to be when you turn her on?"
"On the ship," said Rod, "and in the dark universe. We'll be safe there. I've got an idea how bad this is going to be!"
He worked on, grimly. Hours passed. Sweat covered him. The electrician mopped his forehead from time to time. The painter helped awkwardly, obeying orders. The feeling of tenseness grew greater and greater in Rod's mind. It was unreasonable but it was overpowering. It was a hunch so strong that at last he dared not wait longer.
"We get going," he said brittlely. "I'd like to file it down a little more but we can't risk it Come along!"
He started the little vehicle. He ran it slowly out of the building, then faster and ever faster to the square where the Stellaris had landed. He backed it to the base of the pyramid—which was so much like that one on Calypso—save that the bas-reliefs pictured another race than the human—and stopped the vehicle.
He ran across the square to where he had wedged certain small objects in place. He scribbled a note to Kit on a scrap of paper as he ran. The paper was the order removing him from authority over the Stellaris. With an almost hysterical sensation of urgency he jammed the note into the little object, which pulled and tugged to escape from his hand.
He released it.
It flashed through the air—and vanished. It had been drawn through the force-field which cut off all the rest of the universe of stars from the Stellaris. It had, unquestionably, gone into other-space and clanked loudly in the open air-lock door of the space-ship.
And Rod stood wrestling with his illogical impatience while seconds ticked away, more seconds and more—but he had given strict orders that when a noise of an arriving object sounded in the air-lock, the outer door was to be closed and the object examined for a note before any action was taken.
Then—there was the Stellaris before him, come out of another set of dimensions and another universe to obey his orders.
He rushed into the air-lock, shaking with the feeling of imminent need. "A torch!" he commanded feverishly. "A cutting-torch! Make it quick! Speed! For the love of—"
He took the tiny, deadly instrument and raced back with it. He began fiercely to cut through the plating of the pyramid which was intended to kill any who opened it in the obvious way and signal the tampering to a race of killers. The metal smoked and a thin line of parting showed. He cut through swiftly, counting somehow upon the inner identity of this pyramid to the other he had opened.