Star Ship on Saddle Mountain by Richard Ackley Page A

mild
quick impulse from Dondee that said: the
Commanding Navigator.
The alien captain of the ship, much larger and
taller than the other men Charlie had seen, also saw them now. He
put out a hand, bringing the lift back up to their tier. As the
panel slid open smoothly he stepped out, a flashing twinkle in his
large green eyes.
"The son of the Primate, Dondee," Charlie felt the
Captain's impulse, "should not find it so easy to bump into corners
on a cornerless discus star ship. The impossible, however, seems to
have occurred."
Dondee's hand went to his eye as he understood
the
captain's meaning.
"It's a 'shiner,' Sir! That's Arizona, for a
coagulation."
"An Arizona shiner," mused the Commander, glancing
again at Charlie, as he caught his guilty impulse. "I suppose you,
young man, will no doubt find corners on our Barrier World, on
which to secure what we term a coag."
"Yes sir!" Charlie said. As he replied, he couldn't
help noticing that the Commander's features were much like
Earthmen's. His and the other alien men too, for their faces,
though somewhat longer, were also oval. But the flagship's
Commander, as Charlie noticed now, had a face very much like a
friend of Uncle John's, back in Parker. There wasn't so much
difference, after all, in human features.
With the pleasant thought of the Commander's
resemblance to his own people, Charlie let the thoughts in his mind
flow freely to and fro, with Dondee, as they went into the top
control dome.
"Dondee, that big glass deal there—the one like a
giant round gold fish bowl. What is it?"
"Oh," came the alien boy's impulse reply, as they
stopped. "That is the D2O reserve, Charles. For the journey."
"D2O?" Charlie repeated.
"Yes. As your world no doubt knows, it's one and
one tenth heavier than the ordinary elements."
"It looks like," Charlie said, "well, like plain
old water, Dondee."
"That is just what it is, Charles. It's the
combination deuterium and oxygen, and what I believe your world
people term 'heavy water.'"
"Oh—that," Charlie said. "I didn't know this
flagship used fission power, Dondee. You said it ran on the Magno
Lanes."
"It does. The D2O is only the emergency reserve,
and for getting up the centrifugal force needed to nullify the
gravitational force field, both for arrival or blast off from a
solid surface. Such as for your world, Charles, or even my
own."
    Charlie placed his hands lightly
on either side of the large crystalline ball, his nose pressed
against its side, as he looked into the magnified distortions of
the light beams slanting down through the fluid. For a moment, as
he looked, his thoughts raced back a million miles and more to a
small secret spot on a distant world. And in that moment,
remembering the time he had stared down, into the cool clear sunlit
depths of the icy Colorado, from a boulder at the curve in the
shore, Charlie asked himself the hazy, unformed t h o u g h t . .
. What am I doing here, this far from
home?
But even on that mental journey, Charlie was not
wholly alone, nor unaware of the nearness of his alien friend,
whose smiling face even now looked at him through the globe from
the other side—the great green eyes with their golden circled pupil
coloring all the water. Charlie raised his face. For, even on this
small personal journey into the past he had known, he had not been
alone. And as he resented the thought, he realized that Dondee had
felt his impulse, and the smile left his face as he realized he had
not been wanted on that special momentary journey. But Charlie
changed the subject, for he didn't want to hurt Dondee's feelings,
his only alien friend.
"If only that Star Project is completed soon,"
replied the alien boy, not hearing Charlie's words, "then the
Barrier World will have the secret too—" Dondee suddenly
stopped,
and Charlie could see that he was very
uncomfortable about
something.
"Just what is that Star Project, Dondee?"
From the paleness of the alien boy's face, he knew
he was afraid to tell him, and that