Space Gypsies

Начало книги

The Marintha was three months and four landings away from Earth when it became necessary to change the fuel-ingot in her drive. It had been necessary twice before on this journey. It was routine. It was so normal an operation that only Howell, who owned the space-yacht and acted as skipper, and Ketch in the engine room, were involved. Howell’s part in it was simply to bring the yacht out of overdrive—the state of being in a self-created cocoon of stressed space in which the normal properties of space went haywire. The speed of light, for example, depended on the power of the unit that stretched the nothingness about the Marintha. The increase of mass with velocity was reversed. When Howell threw the switch to end these conditions, the Marintha would break out from the totally opaque and non-reflecting overdrive field. She would find herself somewhere in between-the-stars. It was extremely unlikely that there’d be a solar system within light-years.

Читать дальше →