E. E. Doc Smith - Lensman 3 - Galactic Patrol

GALACTIC PATROL

Fist serialized in "ASTOUNDING," Sep '37 - Feb '38;

First book, Fantasy Press hardbound, 1950;

BY E. E. "DOC" SMITH

CHAPTER 1

Graduation

Dominating twice a hundred square miles of campus, parade-ground, Airport, and

spaceport, a ninety-story edifice of chromium and glass sparkled dazzlingly in

the bright

sunlight of a June morning. This monumental pile was Wentworth Hall, in which

the

Tellurian candidates for the Lens of the Galactic Patrol live and move and have

their

being. One wing of its topmost floor seethed with tense activity, for that wing

was the

habitat of the lordly FiveYear Men, this was Graduation Day, and in a few

minutes

Class Five was due to report in Room A.

Room A, the private office of the Commandant himself, the dreadful lair

into

which an undergraduate was summoned only to disappear from the Hall and from the

Cadet Corps, the portentous chamber into which each year the handful of

graduates

marched and from which they emerged, each man in some subtle fashion changed.

In their cubicles of steel the graduates scanned each other narrowly,

making

sure that no wrinkle or speck of dust marred the space-black and silver

perfection of the

dress uniform of the Patrol, that not even the tiniest spot of tarnish or

dullness violated

the glittering golden meteors upon their collars or the resplendently polished

ray-pistols

and other equipment at their belts. The microscopic mutual inspection over, the

kit-

boxes were snapped shut and racked, and the embryonic Lensmen made their way out

into the assembly hall.

In the wardroom Kimball Kinnison, Captain of the Class by virtue of

graduating at

its head, and his three lieutenants, Clifford Maitland, Raoul LaForge, and Widel

Holmberg, had inspected each other minutely and were now simply awaiting, in

ever-

increasing tension, the zero minute.

"Now, fellows, remember that drop!" the young Captain jerked out. "We're

dropping the shaft free, at higher velocity and in tighter formation than any

class ever

tried before. If anybody hashes the formation – our last show and with the whole

Corps

looking on . . . . ."

"Don't worry about the drop, Kim," advised Maitland. "All three platoons

will take

that like clockwork. What's got me all of a dither is what is really going to

happen in

Room A."

"Uh-huh!" exclaimed LaForge and Holmberg as one, and

"You can play that across the board for the whole Class," Kinnison agreed.

"Well, we'll soon know – it's time to get going," and the four officers stepped

out into the

assembly hall, the Class springing to attention at their approach.

Kinnison, now all brisk Captain, stared along the mathematically exact

lines and

snapped.

"Report!"

"Class Five present in full, sir!" The sergeant-major touched a stud at his

belt and

all vast Wentworth Hall fairly trembled under the impact of an all-pervading,

lilting,

throbbing melody as the world's finest military band crashed into "Our Patrol."

"Squads left-March !" Although no possible human voice could have been

heard

in that gale of soul-stirring sound and although Kinnison's lips scarcely moved,

his

command was carried to the very bones of those for whom it was intended – and to

no

one else-by the tight-beam ultra-communicators strapped upon their chests.

"Close

formation - forward - March !"

In perfect alignment and cadence the little column marched down the hall.

In

their path yawned the shaft – a vertical pit some twenty feet square extending

from

main floor to roof of the Hall, more than a thousand sheer feet of unobstructed

air,

cleared now of all traffic by flaring red lights. Five left heels clicked

sharply,

simultaneously upon the lip of the stupendous abyss. Five right legs swept out

into

emptiness. Five right hands snapped to belts and five bodies, rigidly erect,

arrowed

downward at such an appalling velocity that to unpractised vision they simply

vanished.

Six-tenths of a second later, precisely upon a beat of the stirring march,

those

ten heels struck the main floor of Wentworth Hall, but not with a click.

Dropping with a

velocity of almost two thousand feet per second though they were at the instant

of

impact, yet those five husky bodies came from full speed to an instantaneous,

shockless, effortless halt at contact, for the drop had been made under complete

neutralization of inertia – "free," in space parlance. Inertia restored, the

march was

resumed -- or rather continued -- in perfect time with the band. Five left feet

swung out,

and as the right toes left the floor the second rank, with only bare inches to

spare,

plunged down into the space its predecessor had occupied a moment before.

Rank after rank landed and marched away with machinelike precision. The

dread

door of Room A opened automatically at the approach of the cadets and closed

behind

them.

"Column right -- March!" Kinnison commanded inaudibly, and the Class obeyed

in clockwork perfection. "Column left -- March! Squad right -- March! Company --

Halt!

Salute!"

In company front, in a huge, square room devoid of furniture, the Class

faced the

Ogre -- Lieutenant-Marshal Fritz von Hohendorff, Commandant of Cadets. Martinet,

tyrant, dictator -- he was known throughout the System as the embodiment of

soullessness, and, insofar as he had ever been known to show emotion or feeling

before any undergraduate, he seemed to glory in his repute of being the most

pitilessly

rigid disciplinarian that Earth had ever known. His thick, white hair was

roached fiercely

upward into a stiff pompadour. His left eye was artificial and his face bore

dozens of

tiny, threadlike scars, for not even the marvelous plastic surgery of that age

could repair

entirely the ravages of space-combat. Also, his right leg and left arm, although

practically normal to all outward seeming, were in reality largely products of

science and

art instead of nature.

Kinnison faced, then, this reconstructed potentate, saluted crisply, and

snapped.

"Sir, Class Five reports to the Commandant."

"Take your post, sir." The veteran saluted as punctiliously, and as he did

so a

semi-circular desk rose around him from the floor -- a desk whose most striking

feature

was an intricate mechanism surrounding a splint-like form.

"Number One, Kimball Kinnison !" von Hohendorff barked. "Front and center -

-

March ! . . . . . The oath, sir."

"Before the Omnipotent Witness I promise never to lower the standard of the

Galactic Patrol," Kinnison said reverently, and, baring his arm, thrust it into

the hollow

form.

From a small container labelled "#1, Kimball Kinnison," the Commandant

shook

out what was apparently an ornament -- a lenticular jewel fabricated of hundreds

of tiny,

dead-white gems. Taking it up with a pair of insulated forceps he touched it

momentarily to the bronzed skin of the arm before him, and at that fleeting

contact a

flash as of many-colored fire swept over the stones. Satisfied, he dropped the

jewel into

a recess provided for it in the mechanism, which at once burst into activity.

The forearm was wrapped in thick insulation, molds and shields snapped into

place, and there flared out an instantly-suppressed flash of brilliance

intolerable. Then

the molds fell apart, the insulation was removed, and there was revealed the

LENS.

Clasped to Kinnison's brawny wrist by a bracelet of imperishable, almost

unbreakable,

metal in which it was imbedded it shone in all its lambent splendor – no longer

a whitely

inert piece of jewelry, but a lenticular polychrome of writhing, almost fluid

radiance

which proclaimed to all observers in symbols of ever-changing flame that here

was a

Lensman of the GALACTIC PATROL.

In similar fashion each man of the Class was invested with the symbol of

his

rank. Then the stern-faced Commandant touched a button and from the bare metal

floor there arose deeply-upholstered chairs, one for each graduate.

"Fall out," he commanded, then smiled almost boyishly -- the first

intimation any

of the Class ever had that the hard-boiled old tyrant could smile -- and went on

in a

strangely altered voice.

"Sit down men, and smoke up. We have an hour in which to talk things over,

and

now I can tell you what it is all about. Each of you will find his favorite

refreshment in the

arm of his chair.

"No, there's no catch to it," he continued in answer to amazedly doubtful

stares,

and lighted a huge black cigar of Venerian tobacco as he spoke. "You are Lensmen

now. Of course you have yet to go through the formalities of Commencement, but

they

don't count. Each of you really graduated when his Lens came to life.

"We know your individual preferences, and each of you has his favorite

weed,

from Tilotson' s Pittsburgh stogies up to Snowden's Alsakanite cigarettes --

even though

Alsakan is just about as far away from here as a planet can be and still lie

within the

galaxy.

"We also know that you are all immune to the lure of noxious drugs. If you

were

not, you would not be here today. So smoke up and break up -- ask any questions

you

care to, and I will try to answer them. Nothing is barred now

this room is shielded against any spy-ray or communicator beam operable

upon

any known frequency."

There war a brief and rather uncomfortable silence, then Kinnison

suggested,

diffidently.

"Might it not be best, sir, to tell us all about it, from the ground up? I

imagine that

most of us are in too much of a daze to ask intelligent questions."

"Perhaps. While some of you undoubtedly have your suspicions, I will begin

by

telling you what is behind what you have been put through during the last five,

yearn.

Feel perfectly free to break in with questions at any time. You know that every

year one

million eighteen-year-old boys of Earth are chosen as cadets by competitive

examinations. You know that during the first year, before any of them see

Wentworth

Hall, that number shrinks to less than fifty thousand. You know that by

Graduation Day

there are only approximately one hundred left in the class. Now I am allowed to

tell you

that you graduates are those who have come with flying colors through the most

brutally rigid, the moat fiendishly thorough process of elimination that it has

been

possible to develop.

"Every than who can be made to reveal any real weakness is dropped. Most of

these are dismissed from the Patrol. There are many splendid men, however, who,

for

some reason not involving moral turpitude, are not quite what a Lensman must be.

These men make up our organization, from grease-monkeys up to the highest

commissioned officers below the rank of Lensman. This explains what you already

know -- that the Galactic Patrol is the finest body of intelligent beings yet to

serve under

one banner.

"Of the million who started, you few are left. As must every being who has

ever

worn or who ever will wear the Lens, each of you has proven repeatedly, to the

cold

verge of death itself, that he is in every respect worthy to wear it. For

instance, Kinnison

here once had a highly adventurous interview with a lady of Aldebaran II and her

friends. He did not know that we knew all about it, but we did

Kinnison's very ears burned scarlet, but the Commandant went imperturbably

on.

"So it was with Voelker and the hypnotist of Karalon, with LaForge and the

bentlam-eaters, with Flewelling when the Ganymede-Venus thionite smugglers tried

to

bribe him with ten million in gold . . . . .

"Good Heavens, Commandant!" broke in one outraged youth. "Do you -- did you

-- know everything that happened?"

"Not quite everything, perhaps, but it is my business to know enough. No

man

who can be cracked has ever worn, or ever will wear, the . Lens.. And none of

you need

be ashamed, for you have passed every test. Those who did not pass them were

those

who were dropped.

"Nor is it any disgrace to have been dismissed from the Cadet Corps. The

million

who started with you were the pick of the planet, yet we knew in advance that of

that

selected million scarcely one in ten thousand would measure up in every

essential.

Therefore it would be manifestly unfair to stigmatize the rest of them because

they were

not born with that extra something, that ultimate quality of fiber which does,

and of

necessity must, characterize the wearers of the Lens. For that reason not even

the man

himself knows why he was dismissed, and no one save those who wear the Lens

knows why they were selected -- and a Lensman does not talk.

"It is necessary to consider the history and background of the Patrol in

order to

bring out clearly the necessity for such care in the selection of its personnel.

You are all

familiar with it, but probably very few of you have thought of it in that

connection. The

Patrol is of course an outgrowth of the old Planetary Police systems, and, until

its

development, law enforcement always lagged behind law violation. Thus, in the

old

days following the invention of the automobile, state troopers could not cross

state

lines. Then when the National Police finally took charge, they could not follow

the

rocket-equipped criminals across the national boundaries.

"Still later, when interplanetary flight became a commonplace, the

Planetary

Police were at the same old disadvantage. They had no authority off their own

worlds,

while the public enemies flitted unhampered from planet to planet. And finally,

with the

invention of the inertialess drive and the consequent traffic between theworlds

of many

solar systems, crime became so rampant, so utterly uncontrollable, that it

threatened

the very foundations of Civilization. A man could perpetrate any crime

imaginable

without fear of consequences, for in an hour he could be so far away from the

scene as

to be completely beyond the reach of the law.

"And helping powerfully toward utter chaos were the new vices which were

spreading from world to world, among others the taking of new and horrible

drugs.

Thionite, for instance, occurring only upon Trenco, a drug as much deadlier than

heroin

as that compound is than coffee, and which even now commands such a fabulous

price

than a man can carry a fortune in one hollow boot-heel.

"Thus the Triplanetary Patrol and the Galactic Patrol came into being. The

first

was a pitiful enough organization. It was handicapped from without by politics

and

politicians, and honey-combed from within by the usual small but utterly

poisonous

percentage of the unfit -- grafters, corruptionists, bribe-takers, and out-and-

out

criminals. It was hampered by the fact that there was then no emblem or

credential

which could not be counterfeited -- no one could tell with certainty that the

man in

uniform was a Patrolman and not a criminal in disguise.

"As everyone knows, Virgil Samms, then Head of the Triplanetary Patrol,

became First Lensman Samms and founded our Galactic Patrol. The Lens, which,

being proof against counterfeiting or even imitation, makes identification of

Lensmen

automatic and positive, was what made our Patrol possible. Having the Lens, it

was

easy to weed out the few unfit. Standards of entrance were raised ever higher,

and

when it had been proved beyond 'question that every Lensman was in fact

incorruptible,

the Galactic Council was given more and ever more authority. More and ever more

solar systems, having developed Lensmen of their own, voted to join Civilization

and

sought representation on the Galactic Council, even though such a course meant

giving

up much of their systemic sovereignty.

"Now the power of the Council and its Patrol is practically absolute. Our

armament and equipment are the ultimate, we can follow the law-breaker wherever

he

may go. Furthermore, any Lensman can commandeer any material or assistance,

wherever and whenever required, upon any planet of any solar system adherent to

Civilization, and the Lens is so respected throughout the galaxy that any wearer

of it

may be called upon at any time to be judge, jury, and executioner. Wherever he

goes,

upon, in, or through any land, water, air, or apace anywhere within the confines

of our

Island Universe, his word is LAW.

"That explains what you have been forced to undergo. The only excuse for

its

severity is that it produces results -- no wearer of the Lens has ever disgraced

it.

"Now as to the Lens itself. Like every one else, you have known of it ever

since

you could talk, but you know nothing of its origin or its nature. Now that you

are

Lensmen, I can tell you what little I know about it. Questions?"

"We have all wondered about the Lens, sir, of course," Maitland ventured.

"The

outlaws apparently keep up with us in science. I have always supposed that what

science can build, science can duplicate. Surely more than one Lens has fallen

into the

hands of the outlaws?"

"If it had been a scientific invention or discovery it would have been

duplicated

long ago," the Commandant made surprising answer. "It is, however, not

essentially

scientific in nature. It is almost entirely philosophical, and was developed for

us by the

Arisians.

"Yes, each of you was sent to Arisia quite recently," von Hohendorff went

on, as

the newly commissioned officers stared, dumbfounded, at him and at each other.

"What

did you think of them, Murphy?"

"At first, sir, I thought that they were some new kind of dragon, but

dragons with

brains that you could actually feel. I was glad to get away, sir. They fairly

gave me the

creeps, even though I never did see one of them so much as move.,,

"They are a peculiar race," the Commandant went on. "Instead of being

mankind's worst enemies, as is generally believed, they are the sine qua non of

our

Patrol and of Civilization. I cannot understand them, I do not know of anyone

who can.

They gave us the Lens, yet Lensmen must not reveal that fact to any others. They

make a Lens to fit each candidate, yet no two candidates, apparently, have ever

seen

the same things there, nor is it believed that anyone has ever seen them as they

really

are. To all except Lensmen they seem to be completely anti-social, and even

those who

become Lensmen go to Arisia only once in their lives. They seem -- although I

caution

you that this seeming may contain no more of reality than the physical shapes

you

thought you saw -- to be supremely, indifferent to all material things.

"For more generations than you can understand they have devoted themselves

to thinking, mainly of the essence of life. They say that they know scarcely

anything

fundamental concerning it, but even so they know more about it than does any

other

known race. While ordinarily they will have no intercourse whatever with

outsiders, they

did consent to help the Patrol, for the good of all intelligence.

"Thus, each being about to graduate into Lensmanship is sent to Arisia,

where a

Lens is built to match his individual life force. While no mind other than that

of an

Arisian can understand its operation, thinking of your Lens as being

synchronized with,

or in exact resonance with, your own vital principle or ego will give you a

rough idea of

it. The Lens is not really alive, as we understand the term. It is, however,

endowed with

a sort of pseudo-life, by virtue of which it gives off its strong,

characteristically changing

light as long as it is in metal-to-flesh circuit with the living mentality for

which it was

designed. Also by virtue of that pseudo-life, it acts as a telepath through

which you may

converse with other intelligences, even though they may possess no organs of

speech

or of hearing.

"The Lens cannot be removed by anyone except its wearer without

dismemberment, it glows as long as its rightful owner wears it, it ceases to

glow in the

instant of its owner's death and disintegrates shortly thereafter. Also -- and

here is the

thing that renders completely impossible the impersonation of a Lensman – not

only

does the Lens not glow if worn by an importer, but if a Lensman be taken alive

and his

Lens removed, that Lens kills in a apace of seconds any living being who

attempts to

wear it. As long as it glows -- as long as it is in circuit with its living

owner -- it is

harmless, but in the dark condition its pseudo-life interferes so strongly with

any life to

which it is not attuned that that life is destroyed forthwith."

A brief silence fell, during which the young men absorbed the stunning

import of

what their Commandant had been saying. More, there was striking into each young

consciousness a realization of the stark heroism of the grand old Lensman before

them,

a man of such fiber that although physically incapacitated and long past the

retirement

age, he had conquered his human emotions sufficiently to accept deliberately his

ogre's

role because in that way he could best further the progress of his Patron

"I have scarcely broken the ground," von Hohendorff continued. "I have

merely

given you an introduction to your new status. During the next few weeks, before

you are

assigned to duty, other officers will make clear to you the many things about

which you

are still in the dark. Our time is growing short, but we perhaps have time for

one more

question."

"Not a question, sir, but something more important," Kinnison spoke up. "I

speak

for the Class when I say that we have misjudged you grievously, and we wish to

apologize.""I thank you sincerely for the thought, although it is unnecessary.

You could

not have thought otherwise of me than as you did. It is not a pleasant task that

we old

men have, that of weeding out those who do not measure up. But We are too old

for

active duty in space -- we no longer have the instantaneous nervous responses

that are

for that duty imperative -- so we do what we can. However, the work has its

brighter

side, since each year there are about a hundred found worthy of the Lens. This,

my one

hour with the graduates, more than makes up for the year that precedes it, and

the

other oldsters have somewhat similar compensations.

"In conclusion, you are now able to understand what kind of mentalities

fill our

ranks. You know that any creature wearing the Lens is in every sense a Lensman,

whether he be human or, hailing from some strange and distant planet, a

monstrosity of

a shape you have as yet not even imagined. Whatever his form, you may rest

assured

that he has been tested even as you have been, that he is as worthy of trust as

are you

yourselves. My last word is this -- Lensmen die, but they do not fold up,

individuals

come and go, but the Galactic Patrol goes on!"

Then, again all martinet.

"Class Five, attention!" he barked. "Report upon the stage of the main

auditorium!"

The Class, again a rigidly military unit, marched out of Room A and down

the

long corridor toward the great theater in which, before the massed Cadet Corps

and a

throng of civilians, they were formally to be graduated.

And as they marched along the graduates realized in what way the wearers of

the Lens who emerged from Room A were different from the candidates who had

entered. it such a short time before. They had gone in as boys, nervous,

apprehensive,

and still somewhat unsure of themselves, in spite of their survival through the

five long

years of grueling tests which now lay behind them They emerged from Room A as

men,

men knowing for the first time the real meaning of the physical and mental

tortures they

had undergone, men able to wield justly the vast powers whose scope and scale

they

could even now but dimly comprehend.

CHAPTER 2

In Command

Barely a month after his graduation, even before he had entirely completed the

post-

graduate 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 aero, whose flaring lights cut a right-of-way through the swarming

traffic, the

novice and the veteran flew slowly over the vast establishment of the Base.

Shops and factories, city-like 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 aero landed

beside

a long, comparatively low building – a structure heavily guarded, inside 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.

"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 tomorrow 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 vessel, and I

have no

rating at all. You have already intimated that this ship is experimental. There

is, then,

E. E. Doc Smith - Lensman 3 - Galactic Patrol

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