Pan Satyrus

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

The space capsule was ready; slowly the elevator rose in the gantry, and Pan and his group crossed the platform. Below them the liquid fuel seethed and steamed. There were no newsreel and television cameras present.

It was a much smaller ship than the ill-named one in which Pan Satyrus had made a wrong-way flight. And the rocket that was to send it aloft was a much smaller one; it had not cost more than the annual income of a small city.

Pan Satyrus managed to walk to his seat with dignity; but just before they strapped him in, he scratched his head with his hind foot. Then he was strapped down, and his helmet put on his head — he already had his space suit on — and the microphone adjusted in front of his mouth. His old spaceship had not had a mike.

"Testing," he said. "Can you hear me? I'd like Radioman Bronstein on one of the radio transmitters, please. Happy, can you handle a NASA set?"

"Any radio in the world," Happy said.

"Then, good. Ready for blast-off, gentlemen."

They backed away. The capsule was sealed, and all the men went back on the gantry, and the gantry was wheeled away from the rocket. General Maguire tapped on an intercom. "Condition go, go all the way," he said, happily.

No one else was very happy. As they took up their posts in the observation room, with Happy replacing the regular radio operator, they were very silent.

The count from three hundred down to zero seemed to race.

Then the rocket was off, and the stages were falling away, and the little capsule was flying in free orbit.

"He didn't turn this one," Dr. Bedoian said.

"He's learned you can't tamper with the U.SA.," General Maguire said.

Happy said, "Message from spaceship. Quote: All okay for first orbit. Can see Africa. Unquote. Pan, how's she look? Quote: Better than Florida. Unquote."

"Half of Africa is Communist," General Maguire said.

They drank coffee. They ate doughnuts. They scanned data from the various tracking stations, and results gotten by feeding the data into electric brains with cute names.

"Well under the speed of light," the professor said.

General Maguire said, "Ha!"

Mr. MacMahon put the lighted end of his cigarette in his mouth. "Damn," he said.

About an hour after takeoff, Happy said, "Spaceship coming back into my range, gentlemen. Message from spaceship. Quote: Stepping on the gas, Happy. Unquote. Add to message. Quote: Tell Ape to keep his shoes shined. Unquote."

"There's a tracking ship out in the Atlantic," the professor said. He mopped at his face with a dripping handkerchief.

"I read the spaceship, faint but clear," Happy said. "Quote: Wasn't that juke joint a… Message does not end. Only chatter."

"Let me hear," Dr. Bedoian said. He grabbed an earphone. "Gibberish," he said. "Pure chimpanzee chatter." He handed the earphone to the Senior Medical Officer, who nodded, gravely.

"Message from tracking ship," one of the radio monitors said. "Spaceship directly overhead."

Then: "From electric brain IDIOSYNC," one of the other monitors said. "Spaceship exceeded speed of light for last thousand miles."

"By God," the professor said. "By God."

"Which god?" Dr. Bedoian said, though he said it very softly. "Pan or Jehovah?"

"Message from Tracking Station Fernando Po," one of the radioman said, and there was silence in the room. "Spaceship is coming down. Re-entering atmosphere. He's ditched."

Happy took off his headphones and stood up, walked over to join Ape. "Duty ended," he said.

"Fernando Po reports it can hear gibbering and splashing. Spaceship has ditched successfully," a radioman said.

"Tracking ship confirms," another answered him.

Dr. Bedoian joined Ape and Happy. Nobody was paying any attention to them. They went out, leaving the scientist and the military and the security to find out what they already knew.

Happy settled the white cap he had so often lent to Pan. "He ditched off Africa, where he could swim ashore," he said.

"To the closed, deciduous tropical forest," Dr. Bedoian said. He wasn't a military man; he didn't mind crying in public.

Ape tried to grin. "Them big shots'll find bilge in that spaceship. Just bilge."

"He went the right way this time, and faster than light," Happy said. "He got over being devoluted."

"Retrogressed," Dr. Bedoian said, automatically.

Master Chief Torpedoman Ape Bates cleared his. throat. "Ain't there a word like degenerated?" he asked.