Alan Foster: Dark Star

Waste it, and want not, Doolittle thought—the motto of the scientists who had proposed and organized the Dark Star mission and its objectives.

So now they would commence operations to quietly eliminate a world in a soundless, overwhelming explosion bigger than any ever seen on Earth, thereby rendering the system safe for Mom, Apple Pie, and another four or five billion of the social insect called man. A voice sounded in his earphones.

“What’d you say, Pinback?” he mumbled in reply.

“ Goggle, freep, tweep .”

He spoke into the mike again. “What was that? I still can’t understand you.” Might as well be nice to poor Pinback. After all, he tried his best to do a sergeant’s job.

Pinback was always trying. That was one of his problems. At times he reminded Doolittle just a bit too much of the unctuous young officer who had delivered the message from Earth base.

One of these days Corporal Boiler was going to…

Pinback shoved the mike aside and leaned over. “I said, I’m trying to reach Talby. Something’s wrong with the damned intercom. If you’re not going to talk to me, then I’m going to work, I need a last-minute diameter approximation. Do you expect me to figure that my self?”

“Calm down, Pinback. There’s something wrong with everything on this ship.” He flicked a fingertip on his own mike. “Talby, Talby, this is Dooiittle, do you read me? Answer me, Talby… wake up, man.”

Eleven, twelve, thirteen, wonder what I’ve seen…

Three blue-white suns, just above the plane of the ecliptic. He jotted them down in his mental catalog. Odd to see three of the same magnitude grouped so closely together. Another interesting surprise.

Exactly how many stars were now included in his private collection he didn’t know. There were at least several thousand. He would know better if he entered them formally in the ship’s scientific records—something he adamantly refused to do.

Doolittle had bugged him about it when be found out what the astronomer was doing—or rather, wasn’t doing. But Talby’s smile had defeated him. You couldn’t reduce a star to an abstract figure, Talby had patiently tried to explain. It was demeaning, both to the man and to the star. Doolittle gave up after a while.

Talby touched controls, and the observation chair swerved another ninety degrees, tilted forward. Maybe he could convince Doolittle to rotate the ship again, so that he could see the other half of the heavens for a while. Doolittle never understood these requests. He insisted that after a while all stars looked the same: uniform, ugly little fireflies glaring in the night-space. Talby couldn’t make him see. Poor Doolittle.

Poor Talby.

Something buzzed insistently in his head. At first he thought it might be another of his headaches. In a way, it was.

“Talby, Talby, this is Doolittle. Can you read me? Acknowledge, Talby.”

The corporal blinked, forced himself out of the real universe and back into the irritating dreamworld of reality… the triangular dreamworld of the Dark Star .

“Oh, yes, Doolittle. Yes, I read you. What is it?”

Doolittle continued to manipulate the instruments in front of him as he spoke to Talby. The astronomer was beginning to worry him. No, no… that wasn’t quite right. Talby had been worrying him for some time now. He always meant to do something about it, but there were so many other things to worry about, so many other tasks he was responsible for now.

Not that Talby had ever done anything to threaten the safety of the ship—quite the contrary. He was efficient in his duties to the point of abnormality. But it bothered Doolittle that the astronomer spent so much time in the observation dome. It bothered Doolittle that Talby didn’t eat his meals with the rest of them. It bothered Doolittle that Talby never joined them for their admittedly deadly dull group recreation periods.

But mostly it bothered Doolittle because Talby seemed so friggin’ happy

“Uh, Lieutenant Doolittle?” He blinked, glanced irritably at Pinback.

“I’m okay, Pinback. Hello, Talby? We need a diameter approximation here.”

“Roger, Doolittle,” responded Talby, prompt, efficient. “Have it in a minute.”

“Talby, were you counting again?”

“I’m always counting, Lieutenant You know that.” A pause. Then, “Point zero niner five—no special setting required. Too bad it’s a bummer.”

“Yeah,” said Doolittle curtly. “Thanks, Talby.”

Doolittle would have liked to hate Talby. For his happiness, for his easy efficiency, for the way he stood the agony of the voyage. But he couldn’t. Talby was one of them. Talby was human in a way the frog-faced messager from Earth never could be.

Pinback again. “I need a GHF reading on the gravity correction.”

“I’ll check it,” Doolittle replied.

“I’ll have a By SA plus one, Boiler.”

Doolittle almost smiled. They were operating loose, easy now. The supersmooth crew of the Dark Star was doing what it had been trained for. Each man became an integral part of the unit, each subordinating his personal opinions, desires, and feelings to the overriding demands of the mission.

It was rather like making love. They could even think about that now without breaking down, when functioning as a team. Even think about se— No, no, that was one thought he still had to suppress. The psychometricians had felt they’d compensated adequately for that, but ever since the auto-erogenizer had broken down…

He checked a gauge

“Yeah, Doolittle.”

“Your GHF reading is minus fifteen.”

“Okay.” Pinback did things with the controls at his station, frowned slightly.

“Doolittle?”

“Yeah.”

“I need a,” he hesitated, checked the readout, “a computer indication on a fail-safe mark.”

“Roger, Pinback.”

“Boiler, can you set me up with some overdrive figures?”

“Ninety-seven million less eight corrected for expected time critical mass.”

“That checks out here.” The sergeant nodded. “I have a drive reading of seven thou.”

“No conflict. Systematization keyed and ready,” Boiler replied easily.

Odd, Doolittle reflected, how harmonious Pinback and Boiler could be when operating together for the good of the mission. Maybe if all mankind could be involved in some similar, single project, where each needed the aid of his neighbor, they could function together like the sergeant and corporal.

It was only in the off moments—which meant all the time they weren’t actively engaged in running the ship—that animosity flared between the two.

And himself, he was forced to add. Pinback could put him off his mettle any time he opened his mouth. It wasn’t that the sergeant was trying to be obnoxious; he just couldn’t help himself.

Strange how the psyche boys could place Pinback in the crew with him and Boiler and Powell. That produced a click in his mind and brought back unpleasant thoughts which he quickly shoved aside. It bothered him that he’d forgotten again.

All the more reason to drive themselves, loose the last of the bombs, and start on their way home.

“I read that quantum increase of seven,” Pinback was saying.

“Pinback, I have that computer reading. It’s, nine-five-seven-seven. Repeat, nine-five-seven-seven.”

“Time to start talking,” Boiler observed. The three men leaned back in their lounges. There was a hum in the control room. “Bomb-bay systems operation confirmed.”

Two panels slid apart in the belly of the white arrow head that was the Dark Star . A long tube lowered from it. Attached to its end was a thick disk holding a long, rectangular box-shape. The box-shape had the number 19 painted on its sides