Chapter 16: Home Again

They were getting very near their own time, Arcot felt. Indeed, they must already exist on Earth. “One thing that puzzles me,” he commented, “is what would happen if we were to go down now, and see ourselves.”

“Either we can’t or we don’t want to do it,” pointed out Morey, “because we didn’t.”

“I think the answer is that nothing can exist two times at the same time-rate,” said Arcot. “As long as we were in a different time-rate we could exist at two times. When we tried to exist simultaneously, we could not, and we were forced to slip through time to a time wherein we either did not exist or wherein we had not yet been. Since we were nearer the time when we last existed in normal time, than we were to the time of our birth, we went to the time we left. I suspect that we will find we have just left Earth. Shall we investigate?”

“Absolutely, Arcot, and here’s hoping we didn’t overshoot the mark by much.” As Morey intimated, had they gone much beyond the time they left Earth, they might find conditions very serious, indeed. But now they went at once toward Earth on the time control. As they neared, they looked anxiously for signs of the invasion. Arcot spotted the only evident signs, however; two large spheres, tiny points in appearance on the telectroscope screen, were circling Earth, one at about 1,000 miles, moving from east to west, the other about 1,200 miles moving from north to south.

“It seems the enemy have retreated to space to do their fighting. I wonder how long we were away.”

As they swept down at a speed greater than light, they were invisible till Arcot slowed down near the atmosphere. Instantly half a dozen fast ships darted toward them, but the ship was very evidently unlike the Thessian ships, and no attack was made. First the occupants would have an opportunity to prove their friendliness.

“Terrestrians Arcot, Morey and Wade reporting back from exploration in space, with two friends. All have been on Earth with us previously,” said Arcot into the radio vision apparatus.

“Very well, Dr. Arcot. You are going to New York or Vermont?” asked the Patrol commander.

“Vermont.”

“Yes, Sir. I’ll see that you aren’t stopped again.”

And, thanks to the message thus sent ahead, they were not, and in less than half an hour they landed once more in Vermont, on the field from which they had started.

The group of scientists who had been here on their last call had gone, which seemed natural enough to them, who had been working for three months in the interval of their trip, but to Dr. Arcot senior, as he saw them, it was a misfortune.

“Now I never will get straight all you’ll have ready, and I didn’t expect you back till next week. The men have all gone back to their laboratories, since that permits of better work on the part of each, but we can call them here in half an hour. I’m sure they’ll want to come. What did you learn, Son, or haven’t you done any calculating on your data as yet?”

“We learned plenty, and I feel quite sure that a hint of what we have would bring all those learning-hounds around us pretty quickly, Dad,” laughed Arcot junior, “and believe it or not, we’ve been calculating on this stuff for three months since we left yesterday!”

“What!”

“Yes, it’s true! We were on our time field, and turned on the space control--and a Thessian ship picked that moment to run into us. We cut the ship in half as neatly as you please, but it threw us eighty thousand years into the past. We have been coasting through time on retarded rate while Earth caught up with itself, so to speak. In the meantime--three months in a day!

“But don’t call those men. Let them come to the appointment, while we do some work, and we have plenty of work to do, I assure you. We have a list of things to order from the standard supply houses, and I think you better get them for us, Dad.” Arcot’s manner became serious now. “We haven’t gotten our Government Expense Research Cards yet, and you have. Order the stuff, and get it out here, while we get ready for it. Honestly, I believe that a few ships such as this apparatus will permit, will be enough in themselves to do the job. It really is a pity that the other men didn’t have the opportunity we had for crowding much work into little time!

“But then, I wouldn’t want to take that road to concentration again myself!

“Have the enemy amused you in my absence? Come on, let’s sit down in the house instead of standing here in the sun.”

They started toward the house, as Arcot senior explained what had happened in the short time they had been away.

“There is a friend of yours here, whom you haven’t seen in some time, Son. He came with some allies.”

As they entered the house, they could hear the boards creak under some heavy weight that moved across the floor, soundlessly and light of motion in itself. A shadow fell across the hall floor, and in the doorway a tremendously powerfully-built figure stood.

He seemed to overflow the doorway, nearly six and a half feet tall, and fully as wide as the door. His rugged, bronzed face was smiling pleasantly, and his deep-set eyes seemed to flash; a living force flowed from them.

“Torlos! By the Nine Planets! Torlos of Nansal! Say, I didn’t expect you here, and I will not put my hand in that meatgrinder of yours,” grinned Arcot happily, as Torlos stretched forth a friendly, but quite too powerful hand.