Cosmic Engineers

Chapter Sixteen

The city of the Engineers lay in ruins, but above it, fighting desperately, battling valiantly to hold off the hordes of Hellhounds, the tiny remnant of the Engineer battle fleet still stood between it and complete destruction.

The proud towers were blasted into dust and the roadways and parks were sifted with the white cloud of destruction, the powdered masonry smashed and pulverized to drifting fragments by the disintegrator rays and the atomic bombs. Twisted bits of wreckage littered the chaotic wastes of shattered stone — wreckage of Engineer and Hellhound ships that had met in the shock of battle and plunged in flaming ruin.

Gary glanced skyward anxiously. "I hope they can hold them off," he said, "long enough for the energy to build up.”

Caroline straightened from the bank of instruments mounted upon the roof outside the laboratory.

"It's building up fast," she said. "I'm almost afraid. It might get out of control, you know. But we have to have enough energy to start with. If the first stroke doesn't utterly destroy the Hellhounds, we won't have a second chance.”

Gary's mind ran over the hectic days of work, the mad scramble against time. He remembered once again how Kingsley and Tommy had gone out to the edge of the universe to create a huge bubble of space-time, warping the rim of space into a hump, curving the time-space continuum into a hypersphere that finally closed and divorced itself from the parent body, pinching off like a yeast bud to become an independent universe in the inter-space.

It had taken power to do that, a surging channel of energy that poured out of the magnetic power transmitter, crossing space in a tight beam to be at hand for the making of a new universe. But it had taken even more power to "skin" a hypersphere, to turn it through a theoretical fifth dimension until it was of the stuff that the inter-space was made of — a place where time did not exist, a place whose laws were not the laws of the universe, a mystery region that was astonishingly easy to maneuver through space once it was created. It wasn't a sphere or a hypersphere — it was a strange dimension that apparently did not lend itself to measurement, or to definition, or to identification by any of the normal senses of perception.

But whatever it was, it hung there above the city, although there was no clue to its existence. It couldn't be seen or sensed — just something that had been created from equations supplied by the last man living out his final days on a dying planet, equations that Caroline had scribbled on the back of a crumpled envelope. An envelope, Gary remembered, that had carried an irate letter from a creditor back on Earth who felt that he should have long since been paid. "Too long overdue," the letter had said. Gary grinned, Back on Earth the creditor undoubtedly still was sending him letters pointing out that the account was becoming longer overdue with the passing of each month.

Outside the universe that tiny, created hypersphere was bumping along, creating frictional stress, creating a condition for the creation of the mysterious energy of eternity — an energy that even now was pouring into the universe and being absorbed by the fifth-dimensional frame that poised above the city.

A new, raw energy from a region that had no time, an energy that was at once timeless and formless, but an energy that was capable of being crystallized into any form.

Kingsley was standing beside Gary, his great head bent, staring upward. "An energy field," he said, "and what energy! Like a battery, storing up that energy from interspace. I hope it does what Caroline thinks it will.”

"Don't worry," said Gary. "You saw the mathematics that she brought back.”

"Sure, I saw the mathematics," Kingsley said, "but I couldn't understand them.”

He shook his head inside the helmet.

"What's the universe coming to?" he asked.

Caroline spoke quietly to the Engineer.

"There's plenty of energy now," she said. "You may call them down.”

The Engineer, headphones clamped upon his skull, apparently was giving orders to the Engineer fleet, but the Earthlings couldn't catch his thoughts.

"Watch now," chirped Herb. "This is going to be a sight worth seeing.”

High above the city a ship dropped, flashing downward, like a silver bullet. Another dropped and still another, until the entire Engineer fleet, blackened and ripped and decimated, was in full retreat, flashing back toward the ruined city. And in their wake came the triumphant Hellhounds, a victorious pack in full cry, determined to wipe out the last trace of a hated civilization.

The Engineer had snatched the headphones off, was racing to the set of controls. Gary, glancing from the battle scene above, saw his metal fingers reach out and manipulate controls, saw Caroline pick up an ordinary flashlight.

He knew that the Engineer was shifting the fifth-dimensional mass into a position between them and the screaming fleet of death above them, shifting that field of terrible energy into the Hellhounds' path.

The last of the Engineer fleet had reached the city, was shrieking down between the shattered towers, as if fleeing for its very life.

And only a few miles above them, in what amounted to a mass formation, the Hellhound fleet was plunging down, guns silent now, protective screens still up, grim and ghastly ships running their quarry to the ground.

Gary's body tensed as he saw Caroline's arm swing up, clutching the tiny flashlight, pointing it at the on-driving fleet.

He saw the flash of light burn upward, pale in the light of the sinking suns — a tiny, feeble, ineffective beam of light stabbing at the oncoming ships. Like taking a swipe at a grizzly bear with a pancake turner.

And then the heavens seemed to blaze with light and a streamer of blue-white intensity whipped out toward the ships. Protective screens flared briefly and then exploded into a million flashing sparks. For the space of one split second, before he could get his hand up to shield his eyes against the inferno in the sky, Gary saw the gaunt black skeletons of the Hellhound ships, writhing and disappearing in the surging blast of energy that tore at them and twisted them and finally, in the snapping of one's finger, utterly destroyed them.

The sky was empty, as empty as if there had never been a Hellhound ship.

There was no sign of the fifth-dimensional mass, no hint of ship or gun — just the blue of the sky, ashing into violet as the three suns swung below the far-off horizon.

"Well," said Herb, and Gary could hear his voice sobbing with excitement, "that's the end of the Hellhounds.”

Yes, that was the end of the Hellhounds, thought Gary. There was nothing in the universe that could stand before such a blast of energy. When the light, the tiny, feeble beam from the ridiculous little flash had struck the energy field, the energy, that timeless, formless stuff, had suddenly crystallized, had taken on the form of the energy that it had encountered.

And in a burst of light it had struck at the Hellhounds, struck with terrible effectiveness — with entire lack of mercy, had wiped them out in the winking of one's eye.

He tried to imagine that blast of light moving out into the universe. It would travel for years, would flash its merciless way for many thousands of light-years. In time its energy would wane, would slowly dissipate, would lose some of its power in the vast spaces of intergalactic space. And perhaps the day would come when all its energy would be gone. But meanwhile nothing could stand in its way, nothing could resist it. In years to come great suns might explode into invisible gas as the frightful beam of power reached them and annihilated them and then passed on. And some astronomer, catching the phenomena in his lens, would speculate upon just what had happened.

He turned slowly around and faced Caroline. "How does it feel," he asked, "to win a war?”

The face she turned to him was strained and worn. "Don't say that to me,”

she said. "I had to do it. They were a terrible race, but they were alive — and there is so little life in this universe.”

"You need some sleep," he said.

He saw the tragic lines of her mouth.

"There is no sleep," she said. "No rest at all. We have just started. We have to save the universe. We have to create more and more of the fifth-dimensional frameworks, many of them and larger. To absorb the energy when the universes meet.”

Gary started. He had forgotten the approaching universe. So absorbed had they become in ending the Hellhound attack that the edge of the real and greater danger had been dulled.

But now, brought back to it, he realized the job they faced.

He spun on the Engineer. "How much longer?" he asked. "How much longer have we?”

"Very little time," said the Engineer. "Very little. I fear that energy may flood in upon us at any time.”

"That energy," said Kingsley, a fanatical flame in his eyes. "Think of what could be done with it. We could set up a huge framework of fifth-dimensional space, use it as an absorber, a battery. We could send energy almost anywhere throughout the universe. A central universal power plant.”

"First," declared Tommy, "you'd have to control it, be able to direct it in a tight beam.”

"First," insisted Caroline, "we have to do something about this other universe.”

"Wait a second," said Gary. "We've forgotten something. We asked those people in the other universe to come over and help us, but we don't need them now.”

He looked at the Engineer. "Have you heard from them?" he asked.

"Yes," said the Engineer. "I have heard from them. They still want to come.”

"They still want to come?" Astonishment rang in Gary's voice. "Why should they want to come?”

"They want to emigrate to our universe," said the Engineer. "And I have agreed to allow them to do so.”

"You have agreed?" rumbled Kingsley. "And since when has this universe been in the market for immigrants? We don't know what kind of people they are.

They might be dangerous. They may want to destroy the present life within the universe.”

"There is plenty of room for them," said the Engineer, and if possible, his voice seemed colder and more impersonal than ever. "There is room to spare.

We have over fifty billion galaxies — and more than fifty billion stars in each galaxy. Only one out of every ten thousand of the stars has a solar system, that is true, of course… but only one out of every hundred solar systems has life. And if we need more solar systems we can manufacture them. With the power of the dimension of eternity at our command, we can move stars, we can hurl them together to make solar systems. With this power we can reshape the universe, mold it to our needs.”

The idea impacted with stunning force on Gary's brain. They could reshape the universe! Working with the raw materials at hand, with the almost infinite power at their command, they could alter the course of stars, could realign the galaxies, could manufacture planets, set up a well coordinated plan to offset entropy, the tendency to run down, the tendency to go amuck. His mind groped futilely at the ideas, pawing them over and over, but back of it all was a curtain of wonderment and awe. And through his brain sang a subtle warning… a persistent little warning that hammered at his thoughts. Mankind itself wasn't ready for such power, couldn't use it intelligently, perhaps would destroy the universe with it.

Was there any other entity in the universe qualified to use it? Would it be wise to place such power in the hands of any entity?

"But why," Caroline was asking, "do they want to come?”

"Because," said the Engineer, "we are going to destroy their universe to save ours.”

It was as if a bombshell had been dropped among them. Silence clapped down.

Gary felt Caroline's hand creep into his. He held it tight.

"But why destroy their universe?" shouted Tommy. "We have the means at hand to save them both. All we have to do is create more of those five-dimensional screens to absorb the energy.”

"No," said the Engineer, "we cannot do it. Given time, we could. But there is so little time, not nearly enough. The energy would overwhelm us once it came. It would take so many screens and we have so little time.”

His thoughts cut off and Gary heard the shuffle of Kingsley's feet.

"These other beings," the Engineer went on, "know that their universe has very little longer to exist in any event. It has almost reached the end of its time. It soon will die the heat death. Throughout its space, matter and energy are being swiftly distributed. Soon the day will arrive when it will be equally distributed, when the heat, the energy, the mass throughout the universe will be spread so thin that it scarcely exists.”

Gary sucked in his breath. "Like a watch running down," he said.

"You're right," said Kingsley. "Like a watch that has run down. That is what will happen to our universe in time.”

"Not," said Gary, "if we have the energy from interspace at our command.”

"Already," said the Engineer, "only one corner of this other universe is still suitable for life… the area that is facing us. Into that corner all life has been driven and now it has been, or is being, assembled to transfer itself to our universe.”

"But," asked Herb, "just how are they going to get here?”

"They will use a time warp," said the Engineer. "They will bud out from their universe, but in doing so they will distort the time factor in the walls of their hypersphere — a distortion that will send them ahead in time, will push their little universe closer to us than to their universe.

Our gravity will grasp their hypersphere and draw it in.”

"But that," protested Gary, "will produce more energy. Their little universe will be destroyed.”

"No," declared the Engineer, "because they will merge their space-time continuum with the continuum of our universe as soon as the two come together. They will immediately become a part of our universe.”

"You told them how to create a hypersphere?" asked Herb.

"I did," said the Engineer. "And it will save the people of that other universe. They had tried many things, had worked out theories and new branches of mathematics in their efforts to escape. They discovered many things that we do not know, but they never thought of budding out from their universe. They apparently are a mechanistic people, a people very much like we Engineers. They seem to have lost that vital spark of imagination with which your people are so well supplied.”

"My Lord," said Gary, "think of it! Imagination saving the people of another universe. The imagination of a little third-rate race that hasn't even started really using its imagination yet.”

"You are right," declared the Engineer, "and in the aeons to come that imagination will make your race the masters of the entire universe.”

"Prophesy," said Gary.

"I know," said the Engineer.

"There's just one thing," said Herb. "How is that other universe going to be destroyed?”

"We are going to destroy it," said the Engineer, "in exactly the same way we destroyed the Hellhounds.”