Worlds in Chaos (67 page)

Keene clipped to an anchor line on the wall and stretched out to rest, tired of following it all. Or was it the carbon dioxide level? He looked around the cabin and yawned. Most of the others were settling down except Dash, who was busy with his narrative, and Cavan and Alicia up front, talking in low voices. . . . And an irritating clanging that he’d just noticed.

It stopped for a few seconds, then started again.

“Is that you, Legermount?” Keene grumbled irritably. “Stop rattling the cage. We’re trying to settle down.”

“It’s not him this time. He’s out of it,” Reynolds’s voice mumbled.

“Then what?” Keene straightened away from the wall, alert suddenly.

Colby turned and showed his empty palms. “It’s not me.” Joe looked up from something he had been fiddling with close to one of the lights and shook his head.

It came again:
Clang, clang, clang
. . . .
Clang, clang, clang
. . . .

Keene’s head jerked around sharply. There was nobody in the direction that it was coming from. . . . Just the entry hatch. His and Joe’s eyes met for a second.

“
Oh my God!
” Joe whispered. He tore free from his anchor line and hurled himself forward to the flight deck section with Keene following.

“Hallelujah!” Reynolds murmured.

Cavan and Alicia were already moving out of the crew positions to make room. Joe’s trembling fingers raced over the touchpad to activate the imagers; Keene powered up the controls for the external cameras. A screen came to life showing a drifting starfield as the shuttle turned. Keene rotated the camera outward to get the view abeam of the ship. And, slowly, the most beautiful sight he had ever seen moved into the frame: one of the
Osiris
’s surface landers riding parallel perhaps half a mile off.

“
It’s them! They’re here! That’s them banging on the door!
” he heard himself shouting. Joe brought up the lights. Within seconds, everyone in the cabin was shouting and hugging, laughing and crying. Keene grabbed one of the rifles, which for some reason they had brought aboard, and hauled himself into the entry space behind the hatch.
Thunk, thunk, thunk.

Joe had a camera trained along the outside of the shuttle’s hull. Two figures in bulky, Kronian-style suits were outside the hatch, one poised to beat the surface again with a metal hand tool, the other holding the end of some kind of tube pressed to the hull. Keene beat against the ribbed inner surface of the door again.
Thunk, thunk, thunk.
On the screen, the figure with the tube started making excited gestures and pointing at the ship. The other leaned forward.

Clang, clang, clang
sounded from outside the hatch.

Keene responded deliriously.
Thunk, thunk, thunk . . . thunk, thunk, thunk . . . thunk, thunk, thunk
. . .

The lander moved in to make a docking connection, and the fourteen exhausted survivors from the shuttle were transferred over. The two Kronians who had come across were Sariena and Thorel, the engineer from the
Osiris
’s crew. Sariena had wanted to be one of the first to greet them if they were found.

Kronia was sending all the help that could be mobilized. In the meantime, the
Osiris
had been searching the vicinity for days. A number of other ships from Earth had also managed to get away, and the
Osiris
had collected a full complement to take back. The shuttle that Keene had been hoping to organize when last heard of was the last it could afford to wait for. Idorf had been ready to give up, but Gallian wouldn’t hear of it.

Events after the launch of the Boxcar from Vandenberg had been as Keene deduced. A second, mysterious ship had inserted itself ahead of the Boxcar as it closed, transmitting fake signals claiming to be the Boxcar pursued by a would-be attacker attempting to use it as a shield. Keene’s on-the-spot guess of which one to fire on had been correct. On a sadder note, after all the heroic effort that had been put in, the second Boxcar sent up from Vandenberg later had never been seen. Just one more tragedy among the billions.

Thirty minutes later, the Kronian vessel detached and drew away under a mild nudge from an auxiliary thruster. On a screen inside, Keene looked at the empty, silent hulk turning slowly in the sunlight, presenting on its side the last, scarred rendering he would probably ever see of the Amspace Corporation logo.

The lander’s main engine fired, and the craft pulled away into a curve that would take it to the waiting
Osiris
.

FURTHER READING

The scientific ideas in this book are based largely on the work of Immanuel Velikovsky (1895–1979). Many readers of the hardback have asked where they might learn more on this background, or catastrophist views in general. The following sources would provide some good starting material.

(1) Immanuel Velikovsky’s three major works:

Worlds in Collision,
1950, ISBN 1199848743.

The book that started the whole controversy, identifying the comet of the Exodus as Venus, originating from Jupiter.

Ages in Chaos,
1952,
ISBN 0385048971.

Reexamining ancient history in the light of catastrophic events.

Earth in Upheaval
, 1955, ISBN 0385041136.

The evidence written into the Earth’s geological and biological records.

(2) Carl Sagan and Immanuel Velikovsky
,

by Charles Ginenthal, 1995, ISBN 9781561840755.

Over 400 pages presenting findings from space missions and other sources that are consistent with Velikovsky’s claims, while contradicting the experts who vilified him.

(3) Velikovsky and Establishment Science
,

by Lewis M. Greenberg and Warner B. Sizemore,

eds. ISBN 0917994035.

A comprehensive rejoinder to the publication
Scientists Confront Velikovsky
, which followed the 1974 AAAS conference. What really went on, earning Velikovsky a standing ovation that the media didn’t mention.

(4)
The Velikovskian

A journal dedicated to studies of the evidence for global catastrophes in human times, along with such related issues as the ancient historic record, evolution and extinction, the dynamics of the Solar System, methods of chronology and dating. Normally 4 issues per year of typically 100-120 pp. each, with occasional special-topic issues. Editor-in-Chief: Charles Ginenthal.

Some titles include:

“Comparing Magnetic Fields: Neptune and Uranus,” by Charles Ginenthal

“Velikovsky’s ‘The Dark Age of Greece,’ ” by Clark Whelton

“Puzzles of Prehistory,” by Roger W. Wescott

“Revisiting Venus’s Heat,” by George R. Talbott

“The Emerging Revision of Ancient History: Recent Research,” by Martin Sieff

“The Origin of Craters on the Moon and Large Lunar Boulders,” by Charles Ginenthal

“Thales: The First Astronomer,” by William Mullen

“Ocean Sediments, Circimpolar Muck, Erratics, Buried Forests, and Loess as Evidence of Global Floods,” by Charles Ginenthal

“Phobos and Deimos,” by Lynn R. Rose

“Shattering the Myths of Darwinism,” by Richard Milton

“The Relevance of the Velikovsky Scenario to the Homeric Question,” by Hugo Meynell

Send inquiries to:

Charles Ginenthal

IVY Press Books

65-35 108th St, Suite D-15

Forest Hills, NY 11375

718-897-2403

Web:
http://www.velikovskian.com/

(5)
Aeon

A journal of myth, science, and ancient history, frequently exploring theories of different early Solar System configurations.

Send inquiries to:

Ev Cochrane

PO Box 1092

Ames, IA 50014

Web:
http://www.aeonjournal.com/

E-mail: [email protected]

(6) Society for Interdisciplinary Studies

Biannual catastrophist journal providing articles and papers on a wide range of related topics, books sources and reviews, and digest of Internet coverage.

Send inquiries to:

The Membership Secretary

Society for Interdisciplinary Studies

45 Mary’s Mead

Hazlemere

High Wycombe

Bucks, HP15 7DS, UK

Web:
http://www.sis-group.org.uk/

(7) The Immanuel Velikovsky Archive

Archive of Velikovsky’s unpublished works.

Web:
http://www.varchive.org/

E-mail: [email protected]

THE LEGEND THAT WAS EARTH

PROLOGUE