As the Navy airship Peregrine sped through the night to reach the barren spot over the Pacific Ocean from which the hostile alien spacecraft were appearing, the civilized nations of the earth — now suddenly and warily united in the face a common threat — eagerly awaited any news of what the ship might find there, the reporter typed on the same battered Remington that had ground out his award-winning dispatches from the Pacific island campaigns during World War II. Armed with only their wits and the tools they had on hand, the ship’s doughty crew and passengers arrived at the designated spot prepared to improvise a defense against the alien invasion.

Trained and equipped to track lurking submarines, the men of the Peregrine felt themselves prepared for a hunt — a slow, patient game of chess played in three dimensions against an invisible opponent. As it turned out, they did not have to wait long before their adversary made its next move . . .

* * *

Captain Rick Darrow shook his head and smiled. Lieutenant Don Stewart was asleep in the Peregrine’s right-hand co-pilot seat next to him, his feet resting atop the instrument panel, his arms folded over his zipped-up nylon flight jacket. The baseball cap pulled down over his face muffled his snoring, which was barely audible above the humming of the ship’s two engines.

“Stew?” Darrow nudged the sleeping officer. “Stew! It’s dawn.” He shook Stewart’s shoulder a little harder.

“Wha . . . ?” Stewart bolted upright, his cap falling into his lap as his legs swung down. “I’m awake. I’m awake.” He looked anxiously through the windows. “Have we spotted anything?”

“Relax, Stew. Everything’s fine. It’ just about sunup. TIme to change the watch.”

Stewart put his cap back on and unzipped his jacket. “Good, good. I was just resting my eyes.”

“Very good, lieutenant.”

“Why don’t you hit the rack for a while, Skip? I’m ready to take over.” Stewart took the controls in his hands. “We’ll just keep circling this spot looking for anything unusual, until HQ tells us otherwise. Besides, we’ve been here on station a whole day and there hasn’t been a single radar blip the whole time. We’re the only ones for five hundred miles in every direction. And that includes up.”

“Sounds good.” Darrow stretched as he stood up and yawned. “I could sure use some shut-eye. I’ll see if Sparks has anything to report. He’s been working on the radar all night to tweak its range.” He patted Stewart on the shoulder and stepped into the radio compartment behind the cockpit.

Darrow did a double-take at the sight of Sparks O’Casey and young Miss Abbot sitting close together, speaking intently. He was about to bark a reprimand when he caught their conversation.

“So if you open up the timing gates on the capacitors, you should theoretically be able to boost the range of the radar signal,” Miss Abbot said.

“That’s right,” Sparks replied. “Basically the thyratron acts as a gas on/off switch that . . . oh, good morning, Skipper. Uh, I mean Captain Darrow, sir.”

“Morning, Sparks, Miss Abbot,” said Darrow, tipping his cap at the young lady, who scooted self-consciously away from the blushing electronics specialist. “Taking Miss Abbot in hand, are you, Sparks?”

“No, sir! I was . . . ”

“Relax, Sparks. I understand that Miss Abbot is quite an expert on radar technology. We’re going to need all the help we can get. Miss Abbot, did you know that Sparks here is the best electronics man in airships?”

Miss Abbot glanced coyly at Sparks. “No, Captain, I didn’t.”

“Don’t let him fool you, miss. Last year we were on exercise off the coast of Washington, zeroing in on two submarines, when suddenly, zap,” Darrow snapped his fingers, “just like that, the radar shorts out. Electricity arcing everywhere.”

Miss Abbot stared wide-eyed at the two men. “What happened?”

“The wave guide for the radar set sprang a leak,” Sparks said. “It needs to stay pressurized in order to work.”

“Problem is, we don’t have any replacement parts. So our hero here, without a moment’s hesitation, grabs a life vest and a knife, cuts out a nice round gasket, opens up the radar set, and wiggles it into place. A few minutes later, the set is up and running again, Sparks picks up the submarines again, steers me in for the kill, and we win the exercise. Got a commendation from the admiral too.”

“That’s exciting!” Miss Abbot said. “Did you have to recalibrate the set using the tunable resonant cavity?”

Darrow chuckled. “I’ll leave you two kids alone, then.” Before he stepped into the next compartment, he glanced back and saw Sparks and Miss Abbot leaning in close to the radar equipment. Darrow shook his head. “Kids today,” he muttered with a smile. “Spend all their time staring at screens.”

* * *

Darrow climbed the ladder to the upper deck and made his way to the tiny wardroom in the back, where he knocked on the sliding door. “It’s Captain Darrow.”

“Come in, Captain,” called Dr. Abbott from the other side. Darrow slid the door open and stepped inside.

“Good morning, Doctor. I hope you slept well.” Dr. Abbot was seated at the table, assembling some of the gear that she and her daughter had brought with them. Darrow noted that she had let her hair down, and that it descended in luxurious dark waves below her shoulders.

“You’re staring, Captain.”

“At your equipment.” Abbot raised an eyebrow. “Your gear. That stuff.” Darrow thrust his finger toward the table, on which sat a partially-assembled device involving transparent domes and slender silver antennas wired to a small oscilloscope.

“This is a prototype gravitational fluctuation detector, Captain. The only one of its kind in the entire world. My life’s work, really.”

“What does it do?”

“It detects fluctuations in gravity.”

“Very funny, Doctor. I figured that part out for myself.”

“I doubt I could explain it to you.”

“You’re a lousy teacher?”

“It’s the student I’m worried about.”

Darrow shrugged. “Don’t worry about me, Doc. Top of my class in airships.”

Abbot’s eyes twinkled. “Oh, I see. A lot of advanced physics in your school, was there?”

Darrow pointed up. “The gas compartment above us contains one million and eleven thousand cubic feet of helium, providing a gross lift of sixty-six thousand, eight hundred pounds, assuming standard conditions of fifty-nine degrees Fahrenheit at ninety-four percent gas purity and ninety-seven percent inflation. Further assuming a two-hundred and eighty pound loss in static lift due to humidity and a superheat of . . .”

“I love it when a man in uniform talks science to me, Captain.”

“You going to tell me how that thing works, Doc?”

“Maybe tonight, when I’m done assembling it, you can come by for a demonstration.”

Darrow nodded. “Sure, we can turn the lights down low, open a nice bottle of wine . . .”

“Do you flirt with all your guests, Captain?”

“Just the ones with great equipment. What’s in that other suitcase?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?”

Darrow reached playfully for the case on the floor next to Abbot, who slapped his wrist. “Hands off, Captain.”

“Is that an order?”

“Until further notice.”

Darrow was about to riposte when a breathless crewman leaned in. “Sorry to interrupt, Skipper, but Sparks says you’d better come quick.”

Darrow looked at Abbot, who was already sliding out from behind the table. “We’re on our way.”

The crewman stood aside for Darrow and Abbot as they slid down the ladder and ran forward to Sparks’ station. Miss Abbot was standing behind Sparks, who was staring intently at the radar screen, one hand twiddling knobs, the other pressing his bulky headset tighter. The scope was filled with bright swirling patterns, completely blocking the appearance of ordinary targets.

“They’re jamming us, Skipper.”

“Who’s jamming us?”

Sparks shrugged. “I don’t know. But whoever it is, they’re close. Really close. They almost blew out the detector crystal.”

“Skipper! You’d better see this!” Stewart called from the cockpit. Darrow and the two Abbots ran forward. The cockpit was filled with bright light, overpowering the morning sun still low on the horizon.

“What the devil is it?” Darrow asked as he slid into the pilot’s seat next to Stewart.

“I don’t know, Skip. It started just a second ago.”

“Look at that!” Miss Abbot shrieked, pointing to a sudden movement outside the right window. Everyone turned to look as four silvery flying saucers descended from above, bobbing gently as if on strings, and turned toward them. Each saucer had a single dome on top and three identical domes underneath, all emitting a pulsating white glow in unison. As the objects approached, a whistling sound could be heard rising and falling in time with the light pulses.

“It would appear that our visitors have arrived,” Dr. Abbot said, failing to keep her voice from quavering.

* * *

Will the crew of the Peregrine be able to defend themselves against a flying saucer attack? What do the invaders want? Why are they here? And can Captain Darrow stop them? At least one of these questions will be answered in the next exciting chapter of The Terror from the Other Dimension!

Categorised as: The Terror from the Other Dimension!

Comments are disabled on this post