II.
Barely a month after his graduation, even before he had entirely completed the postgraduate tours of duty mentioned by Von Hohendorff, Kinnison was summoned to Prime Base by no less a personage than Port Admiral Haynes himself. There, in the admiral's private aëro, whose flaring lights cleared a path as though by magic through the swarming traffic, the novice and the veteran flew slowly over the vast establishment of the base.
Shops and factories, citylike barracks, landing fields stretching beyond the far horizon; flying craft ranging from tiny, one-man helicopters through small and large scouts, patrol ships and cruisers up to the immense, globular superdreadnaughts of space—all these were observed and commented upon. Finally, the aëro landed beside a long, comparatively low building—a structure heavily guarded, inside the base although it was—within which Kinnison saw a thing that fairly snatched away his breath.
A space ship it was—but what a ship! In bulk it was vastly larger even than the superdreadnaughts of the patrol; but, unlike them, it was, in shape, a perfect teardrop, streamlined to the ultimate possible degree.[1]
"What do you think of her?" the port admiral asked.
"Think of her!" The young officer gulped twice before he attained coherence. "I can't put it in words, sir; but some day, if I live long enough and develop enough force, I hope to command a ship like that."
"Sooner than you think, Kinnison," Haynes told him, flatly. "You are in command of her beginning to-morrow morning."
"Huh? Me?" Kinnison exclaimed, but sobered quickly. "Oh, I see, sir. It takes ten years of proved accomplishment to rate command of a first-class enforcement vessel, and I have no rating at all. You have already intimated that this ship is experimental. There is, then, something about her that is new and untried, and so dangerous that you do not want to risk an experienced commander in her. I am to give her a work-out, and if I can bring her back in one piece I turn her over to her real captain. But that's all right with me, admiral—thanks a lot for picking me out. What a chance! What a chance!" Kinnison's eye gleamed at the prospect of even a brief command of such a creation.
"Right—and wrong," the old admiral made surprising answer. "It is true that she is new, untried, and dangerous, so much so that we are unwilling to give her to any of our present captains. No, she is not really new, either. Rather, her basic idea is so old that it has been abandoned for centuries. She uses explosives, of a type that cannot be tried out fully except in actual combat. Her primary weapon is what we have called the 'Q-gun.' The propellent is heptadetonite; the shell carries a charge of twenty metric tons of duodecaplylatomate."
"But, sir——" Kinnison began.