The Nuclear Fortress, page 5
That is – specially for the Marshals in short – all the locators, radars of the enemy aim nothing, find nothing, minimum cosine, pi, hypotenuse, logarithm trum-puru-rum, that is for up to half an hour. And again enemy missiles are not launched, they do not start and are sent back to the regular adjustments. Bomb-carriers... “Technician, come up here! Why, tram-pam-pa, the engine is not coughing and puffing? Where did you look? Take screwdrivers, wrenches in your mouth and open the cover, forward, on the double!” In short, all defense and attack features of all electrical and mechanical devices slightly more complex than a steam engine are fully suppressed. Neutralized.
As for the tactics and strategies, it is important that the action is finite from the time point of view. That is after chik-bryk-tam-taram time, the logarithm functions restore and the enemy is again intact and sound. And that means...
That's right, dear Sirs Marshals, after the artificial evoking of the MM cataclysm, we should immediately and decisively strike another blow at the enemy, and it should be destroying, victorious, crushing, smashing and the most important and...
And now we have Uksun-Boo, a pilot of the non-series hypersonic craft, on the offensive end. The charge for the MM – Magnet Massaraksh – is in his capsule. The nuclear bomb-carrier squadron under Thrice Major Tavasa-Pi is on hand.
*
14.
It is difficult to understand how many Uncle Darest's ideas went slantwise or were not shaped up at all. Let some biographers deal with that. Sure thing, that will happen in future, when all the interesting documents are no longer marked secret. However, there were three whales, on which the reputation of the resourceful and smart businessman Darest-Khi rested. There really were strategic nuclear-driven bomb-carriers, there was the super-high and super-speed hypersonic missile-aircraft and finally these was the giga-powerful, thermonuclear super-explosion at ultra altitude in the vicinity of the World Light.
Someone somewhere did sweat over the first, the second and the third before that. But mostly everything was limited to some theories and calculations. At best, there were small models. No one treated any of the ideas seriously, no one financed them. And surely no one tried to make a super-deadly mixture out of those ideas. So, it seems that Uncle Darest-Khi was a genius. From the point of view of some pacifists he was an evil genius, but that's the matter of taste.
It may well be that not the whole Uncle's combination took shape at once. One cannot rule out that it was because he was insuring himself against failure that he staked on several horses. Well, and after all the undertakings turned out to be successful, it came to his mind that he should make one monster-idea out of them. And certainly there was a long fight in the beginning.
First, the fight for resources. In order to build hypersonic toys, a whole pile of very valuable resources is required. Damn heaps of titanium only. A lot of money is required. And foreign currency in this case. As ill luck would have it, titanium was not extracted in the Kingdom of Noyui at all. No one needed that damned titanium. And all of a sudden they are asking, “Could you give us some titanium, about twenty or thirty tons, or even better one or two hundreds at once?” But Uncle Darest did not wear his trousers through in prestigious colleges and at banquets organized by industrialists after that in vain. Interested people were found, and the money was collected. Well, and now some designer-developer, unknown until then and looked upon only as some unpleasant dandruff carrier, was to be given a departmental institution. It was required to force it out somehow. With such a background it was much easier to find some anti-dandruff shampoo and teach the inventor to wash his head at least sometimes. But Darest-Khi was walking the corridors of His Majesty's Royal Academy not in vain, wasn't he? An institute was found as well as a laboratory and the best tube for the glider's models. Sure thing, some of the less efficient directors of the institution had to be dismissed. Probably Uncle had something to do with it. He could whisper something alarming in the ear of some acquaintance from the department of the “overseers over the inside”, responsible for inappropriate expenditures, and the deal was made. In about a month you have the institute without a director, and without an experimental task worthy of a good institution.
Uncle Darest worked along approximately the same lines when dealing with the other matters.
*
15.
God damn! The World Light, be a witness, this is really a historical moment. The four giant bomb-carriers are crossing the border of the Northern Empire. Everyone is shaking in his shoes. Probably the one most shaking is the first navigator Redesya-Chi. He did that one hundred times in the course of Headquarters training on the map, and that is really happening now. And it seems that navigator Banjolu-Su is also shaking. Sometime ago his shift ended and his partner replaced him and he himself sat behind the front machine-gun. His task was to navigate the Princess Cardo above the ocean. He managed to do it. Thank the World Light, the navigation gyroscopes did nor die, and the compasses only shook once when the pilot of the attached hypersonic craft did his business somewhere above the Empire. Banjolu will certainly have some more things to do if they go back. They have to go back along the long arc over the ocean.
Everyone is alert. Those who have to manage machine-guns look at the screens continuously. In contrast to visual aiming of weapons when you are sitting in the “bubble” on top, here you do not have to turn your neck all the time, watching the sky. The camera connected to the sight does it itself, the selsyns react to the tiniest movement of the multi-position control knob. But the picture contrast on the black-and-white screen is worse than in the real world. Because of that some imperial interceptor can get fairly close undetected. This is the problem. According to the intelligence data, the Empire has some suspended missiles now.
Byuros-Ut has to distribute his attention between finding the target on the screen and dealing with his radio. He screws the verniers extremely carefully, then he presses the key and studies other ranges. He has two radios only and his task is not to miss the moment when some imperial station starts chirping again. There are only cracklings in his ear-phones now. It seems that the “white” natural noise is slightly unusual today. But that's hardly surprising! According to Uncle Darest, and some abstruse theories it turns out that after exploding a nuclear bomb in the vicinity of the World Light some electric arc is to form in the inner space of the World Sphere. Like a cord but not from the usual cable material. And it seems that this cord can “live” for several years. The man can really create some curious things.
OK, watching some electric arcs World Sphere long is the business of the egg-headed. It is much more important for Byuros and the rest of the crew that the Magnet Massaraksh existing for several fractions of a second should burn to Hell all the vacuum tubes of all locators, radars and antiaircraft missiles. Well, and fighter aircrafts as well certainly.
There are still four bomb-carriers. The Princess which launched the hypersonic rocket aircraft is now flying without the service load. Really, it was possible to let it go wherever it chooses, to its native lands. However, staying with the group, it does two useful things at once. First, three extra machine-guns won't be extra at all when fighting back imperial fighter aircrafts and interceptor aircrafts. Second, when they start attacking the group, they will have one target more. How are they to know which of the bomb-carriers is empty of its load already? And consequently the chances to survive for the rest increase exactly one fourth. That's just a simple horror of arithmetic.
That's it – the Arithmetic of Death!
*
16.
There were certainly a lot of difficulties on the way. Some upstart professor from the neighbouring department or academic circles tried to criticize something. Like it is irrational. Aircrafts without hypersonic barriers can successfully... Then it somehow turned out that the professor was canceled his access to the secret themes, transferred to working out something simple. Frying pans with special coating, for example, or a more convenient vacuum cleaner bag. There were difficulties.
They were understandable in case of aircrafts with nuclear engines. In the end even some Baron living in the state of constant hangover after court balls for many years will understand that there is nothing unusual. The reactor is present. It's perfectly clear to everyone that it produces heat. Heat can always be made into electricity. And electric power will turn the propellers of a bomb-carrier. What is so special here? The reactor is a heavy thing, isn't it, Mr. Academician? And is the generator not a light thing either? Aren't you sitting too long on the council of His Majesty's Academy, Mr. Academician? Isn't it high time for your honoured retirement? Or to work as an inspector supervising special schools for morons after nuclear attacks in the colony of Small Noyui? It has not come to your mind that the liner does not need any fuel now and consequently the reactor will pull the bomb-carrier up without rhyme or reason!
The most difficult were certainly the super-blasts up there. That’s the secrets of special importance. But if you really load a super-charge into a missile and explode it at the very heaving motion of the take-off, then massaraksh knows what will come out of it. If you judge by calculations, the effect will be so strong that they will see it on the other side of the continent stretching from the south to the north. What should one do? Sure thing, some bespectacled guys from the cautious ones hooked to that idea at once. Well, those small fries honourably present at the meeting will be quickly ridden of their wings by Uncle's friend Duke Kudado-Ge — one, two cuts by cutting pliers and it's over.
“Keep quiet, be frightened, the egg-headed! Do you understand the theoretical formulae written across the whole blackboard, do you or don't you? Should I grab you by my Duke's hand and trace them with your noses along the blackboard for you to smell some chalk? I am a Duke who was brought up by governesses in mini-skirts – and even I understand that there is such a thing as modeling. Explode something small. Then calculate what will happen if the thing is big. What roost was the time allocated for you, humbuggers, from the royal resource on the Big Computing Machine? So do calculate. And if some lookouts notice something on their sensors in the neighbouring countries, it's not your fish's business to talk to the neighbours. There are diplomatic corps subordinate to His Majesty. They will be given the task. And if some magnetic anomalies come up, it's just a phenomenon. Incomprehensible, unclear, aperiodic phenomenon of the World Light. And if you mumble something even once here against the formulae, then you will go at once... Did you serve in the Army, the egg-headed? Ah, you did not serve! You were exempt because of your academic business and condition of your health? So you are deserters, massaraksh! I'll send you, massaraksh, to do your duty to the Motherland. You will shove the coloured chalks up your asses and will go to do your military duty to the border of the Kalmius-Khangi colony. By the way, it's still radioactive. You will make some field tests while you are at it!.. Eh... What is our next item on the agenda, Mr. Chairman?.. That's fine, let's discuss...”
In short, there were difficulties, but Uncle Darest-Khi always had the necessary connections. When it was required, they worked one hundred per cent. And with every new success, there were more and more of these connections.
*
17.
The hypersonic know-how is not just a sneezing and puffing many-propeller bomb-carrier rack at the twelve kilometer altitude. Here acceleration and vibration are such that Uksun-Boo has a feeling that a layer of skin on his back has gotten unglued and comes away from his body for a meter and the one that is in front on his chest is stuck in the gaps between his ribs and even covered each rib separately but in the wrong way. It also seems to him that his brain was pressed out by the inertia to the back part of his scull and packed down there, making it twice or thrice smaller in size. It's no longer a human brain but something small, more like a hen's. However, as ill luck would have it, he still has to think with this compressed mass. His eyes are brought together in a cluster, but he has to follow what the silly arrows show by them, then correlate their indications with something crammed in his head when he ground away at some lessons he took no one remembers when and where. And now he has to strain, overcoming some horrible force beyond one's strength and grab the handles of the levers with his gloved fingers which refuse to obey him. Massaraksh! He also has to steer this bitch which flies at the speed of five or even seven Mach numbers! As if it is that turtle-like bomb-carrier.
Those who launched him stayed in the static of the layer beaten by clouds. They have neither worries, nor troubles there. They can steer their aircrafts quietly, mumble some flaccid reports over the radio, pass some jokes from one head to the other. What else can they do if there is a whole crowd of them in one cabin? But hypersonic pilot Uksun-Boo has no time for talking. Massaraksh and massaraksh again! The egg-headed lazybones still have not managed to create a completely autonomous damned capsule for the set time-limit. Whatever you do, but because of some “cavitations and coriolis effect” it is unable to steer itself to the point in the World Light space calculated by the same egg-headed. Now he has to combine the data obtained with the help of some gyroscopes which miraculously did not stop working because of all the shaking, with the data of the on-board computer, still strangely clicking and demonstrating numbers, and all that in his head.
Uksun-Boo is pressing some keys through his gloves. The consequence of pressing is so well printed in his mind that he can find these keys even in complete darkness if they suddenly stop their illumination by the soldered diodes, or if the lights go out in the whole cabin. He will find and press the keys as well if the cabin miraculously fills with water. There was a time when he worked at that at flight simulators on the far off forever World Sphere.
His body lost all sensations long ago, but he now remembers that small correcting engines are puffing in the supposedly rarefied space on both sides of the capsule. Wheels, wings, ailerons and other toys of the world in which the air is so dense that the wind can be felt easily without any instruments, cannot be applied now. Besides that, because of the monstrous speeds habitual for this world, the time is as if pressed here. The Princess Cardo squadron will steer to the given point massaraksh knows when but pilot Uksun-Boo pressed in his chair is approaching it now.
And so a different combination of keys is required. Now the outside antenna sticking out of the craft's body should come alive and one should hope that it did not break and fall from it because of the traction. As even the vicinity of the World Light is subjected to radio waves. Some coded signal must now wake up the radios of the bomb-carriers, informing them that everything goes according to plan. It may happen that this signal will be intercepted by the imperial lookout services. One cannot rule out that they will be surprised when engaged in triangulation. Because no artificial radio source can be placed so high. However, they won't have much time to be surprised. The hypersonic craft is a too speedy thing. It is now in the very vicinity of the coordinates calculated by the egg-headed wise asses. Uksun-Boo is squeezed by his chair, belts, inertia and World Light knows what but he presses the complex combination of keys on the panel. It is shoved under his subcortex and not written down anywhere. This is the signal for the charge initiation.
“Massaraksh!” that's the word printed in the head of the hypersonic pilot in the last second. Somewhere behind his back – in the next chamber, behind the partition — the pyroshells which caught fire press the pile of polished plutonium pieces into each other. Now this watermelon which looked like a cut into pieces watermelon before is a whole watermelon, continuing to be pressed. Neutrons and nuclei have their pandemonium at the level of one billionth parts of the meter and picoseconds. Then a very-very big “Bang!” occurs.
There are neither the hypersonic capsule, nor its fighting filling any more. There is only the radiation dispersing in circles. There is some reaction of interaction with the World Light going on, calculated and predicted in advance by the egg-headed wise men. And now the MM, that is the Magnet Massaraksh is falling down, to the surface of the World Sphere, to the land of the Northern Empire, in the vicinity of the impregnable Fortress.
Now all the electrically active iron down is doomed.
*
18.
Certainly radioman-machine-gunner Byuros-Ut was luckier than anyone else from the crew. Family ties are family ties. Imagine that “Uncle Darest-Khi” is just “Uncle Darest” for him and he personally explained all the details of the mission to him. One should say that his Uncle took a great risk. What if nephew Byuros suddenly had an idea striking his head and went to report to the “overseer over the inside” attached to the unit in the morning, and say that his relative in his free from service time, in a completely non-secret room, not checked for any “bugs” or other such things, spoke about the super-important state affairs for four hours in a row? What could happen to the Uncle? However, it could be that nothing. With his connections. Well, they could scold him a little, or laugh at him a little. He could have lived with it. Especially since the Uncle has been kowtowing to those in power nearly from the crib. He can swallow insults as cough pills. And as to what could have happened to Byuros, that's the question. It could hardly help him move up through the ranks.
And by the way, from the point of view of the morals, it would have also been bad. Uncle Darest did not talk to him about the military matters only. By the way, he did not do that often: the cases can be counted on the fingers of one hand. But his Uncle helped him several times with his career. Well, his Uncle had his reasons. Most likely, he proceeded from the logic and career ideas. Like what if he were Byuros himself, what would he strive for then? So he helped in approximately that line.
