Destroyer of Worlds Read Free Page B

The voice itself, booming, sepulchral, grated on ears and nerves and sent little chills running up his spine. A voice augmented by the use of subsonics, he guessed, bolstered by a selection of vibratory frequencies designed to activate the fear-centres of the brain.
    Turning he whispered, ‘Claire —’
    ‘Hush!’ Her tone was savage. ‘Listen, Carl. Listen!’
    The ghost again.
    ‘O Hamlet! What a falling-off was there;
    From me, whose love was of that dignity
    That it went hand in hand even with the vow
    I made to her in marriage; and to decline
    Upon a wretch whose natural gifts were poor
    To those of mine!’
    Claire was entranced as were all in the auditorium. Glancing around Maddox could see the rapt faces and unwinking eyes, feeling the strained tension as if it were a tangible thing, almost tasting the sheer concentration directed at the stage. They were enamoured, entrapped, caught in the illusion of the play. Sonia Bowman could have received no better accolade. From the stage the eerie voice continued, lifting, throbbing, demanding full attention. A grim voice, chill in its condemnation, ruthlessly twisting a nature already warped. The hand of the dead reaching out to ruin the lives of those left behind.
    ‘Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother’s hand,
    Of life, or crown, of queen, at once dispatched,
    Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
    Unhousel’d, disappointed, unanel’d,
    No reckoning made, but sent to my account
    With all my imperfections on my head;
    O, horrible! O, horrible!
    Move not ahead on this thy present path to ruin,
    But retreat! Withdraw! Return!
    Yield unto the necessity of the time,
    Go! Leave! Move not into peril!
    Turn back! Back! Back!’
    Words never written by the Bard and which never should have been uttered in such a context. Maddox felt Claire stiffen at his side, heard the sudden hum from the audience. Some, a very few, unfamiliar with the play had spotted nothing amiss. Others had.
    ‘Those words!’ Claire looked at Maddox. ‘They don’t belong. Carl, what is Eric playing at?’
    ‘Maybe the ghost got out of hand?’ Maddox glanced at the stage. ‘Look! It’s changing!’
    The scabrous image of rotting shroud and leprous flesh dissolved into something tall and regal. One arm lifted and the face, wreathed by a full, white beard, tilted, illuminated by an inward light.
    ‘Halt! Take warning! You are about to enter a region of space containing extreme danger. Retreat while you are able. Nothing but fear and destruction lies ahead. You will know only devastation and death. Retreat! Return! Withdraw! You have been warned!’
    The figure swelled, dissolving, emitting a wave of almost tangible dread, an emotion which caused men to cry out and women to scream as they cowered in their seats hiding their eyes, their ears.
    Victims of the panic which ruled the entire ship.

CHAPTER 2
    Professor Eric Manton was an old man who had lost his wife at an early age. Thereafter he had completely immersed himself in his scientific career and research and, so some hinted, had robbed himself of all human emotion. A lie as Maddox well knew, the tragedy had simply driven Manton to become one of the Space Fleet’s greatest scientists, but brilliant as he was, he now found himself baffled.
    ‘I don’t understand it, Carl. All the scanners report only negative results. There was certainly no massive electromagnetic energy field which affected our life-support systems. If the evidence wasn’t against it, I’d say that it was the result of a simple mass-hysteria caused by a careless use of sonic stimulators.’
    ‘And it isn’t?’
    ‘No, Carl.’ Manton shook his head to emphasise the point. ‘Their range was strictly limited. In any case the projection would never have been able to penetrate the metal bulkheads surrounding the auditorium and, as we know, the panic was one which encompassed the ship.’
    ‘Claire?’
    ‘It was a feeling, Carl,’ she reported. ‘A wave of sudden,