Pucky sprang first into a number of the smaller robotships but could detect no trace of the phantoms there, he decided quickly to go to Iltu. He had picked up her thought trace and was able to teleport directly to her. The fight with the shadow people on the main robotship had just ended.

"They’re all gone now, Pucky," chirped Iltu wearily. She was still perched on Borovski’s arm. "We drove some of them away and killed the rest."

The Major briefed Pucky also and didn’t forget to point out that without Iltu’s courageous help it might not have gone so well. He repeatedly praised the "young" mousebeaver girl and petted her silky fur. Which of course was very pleasing to Iltu. She cuddled comfortably in the crook of Borovski’s arm and winked contentedly at Pucky.

"We had 3 casualties," the major concluded. ‘They’ve already been taken to the launch lock. As Iltu says, the ship has been cleared of the enemy. She can’t detect any more of their impulses."

"Neither can I," Pucky confirmed. He then reported how he had helped Lt. Germa to bring back the Gazelle. "They’re over on board the Caesar." He paused, apparently recalling something else. "Incidentally, something isn’t right over there—on the ship itself."

Borovski nodded. "Iltu found the crew in the Control Central unconscious. Were you there too?"

"Yes but I didn’t stay there long." Pucky pointed to the flight consoles. "Couldn’t we get this crate into action? The viewscreens and so forth … ?"

Borovski beckoned several officers to him. "Man the stations. Turn-on the defence screens and test-run the engines. Please hurry it up!"

Within 2 minutes the viewscreens flashed to life. Seep inside the vast warship the main equipment began to vibrate, finally responding to human commands instead of being dependent upon lifeless data pulses from the robot Regent.

Someone called out from the Com Room . "We have contact with the Ironduke, sir. The Administrator!"

Borovski moved so quickly that Iltu might have fallen if she had not clung desperately to his sleeve. Pucky waddled slowly after him, thought better of it and turned back to the main room.

The mousebeaver tensely watched the viewscreens. A premonition of disaster had seized him. The Caesar remained unchanged in the same position. The movements of the other robotships indicated to him that they had been properly taken over and were now under control of the special commando teams.

The Caesar was his main interest at the moment.

Suddenly Pucky was startled to see a tiny figure land on the hull of the mighty ship. It was a man in a spacesuit. Concentrating on the weak thought impulses from that direction, he discovered that it was Gork. So he, too, had gotten to safety. But then he saw him enter one of the empty hangars, which was ironical. He would have saved time if he had gone to the one where Germa was.

He ignored Gork for the time being and sought to pick up other thought streams from that direction. But nobody appeared to be thinking on board the Caesar, the operation there were too many thought streams impinging on his consciousness—more than 20,000 at least.

He could hear Borovski’s calm voice in the adjacent room as he reported to Rhodan. There were pauses while the Major also listened to the orders coming through.

Pucky looked at the screens again and stiffened in alarm. The Caesar was moving! It picked up speed, suddenly hurtling past the robot formation and receding. As he watched, it dwindled away into the starless abyss beyond. Seconds later it was a tiny speck of light in the distance and then it was gone.

Pucky made a short teleport jump into the Com Room—and there was Rhodan looking down at him from the hypercom screen. Without bothering about Borovski he interrupted with a shrill cry. "Perry—they’ve stolen the Caesar. I’ll try to overtake them—but we need you fast!"

He swiftly closed his space helmet and then vanished, leaving Borovski, Rhodan and everybody else in considerable confusion.

When he materialized he was in the empty void. Once more he experienced the lonely feeling of being in an infinite gulf without any point of reference, struggling to orient himself. He could only do that if he could pick up thought impulses from the Caesar—but the only one there who could think was Sgt. Gork. Lt. Germa and his 3 men sat under the energy screen of their Gazelle and were isolated. Pucky desperately applied his esp, faculties to locate Gork but in vain.

Then, not 10 meters from him, a figure appeared out of nowhere. It happened with no warning shimmer because here there was no air.

Iltu!

"Are you out of your mind!" he yelled instinctively although it wasn’t necessary. Iltu could understand him without the need for words.

"I followed you. Maybe you can use my help."

Pucky gasped, beside himself. "Help?! When I myself don’t know what I should do?"

Iltu flailed her arms but didn’t come any closer. "Let’s get out of here—why not jump to the Caesar?"

Pucky answered her heatedly. "Where are you going to jump to when you can’t locate it? I’ve been trying all this time to find Gork but the donk is blanked out mentally or something. He has to be on the ship! Wherever he is, that’s where the Caesar is."

Through her faceplate he could see her faint smile.

"Gork is in the Control Central—been there for quite awhile. He keeps talking to Col. Sukril but Sukril has no thought patterns just now. When he answers, I can’t pick up his words."

Pucky gasped again in his irritation. "You say you have Gork? Wait—I’m coming over there to you. Then you make the jump and take me with you."

He knew there was no more time to attempt his own tracking. If Iltu had contact that was enough. This little mousebeaver gal was not to be underestimated.

With a short transition he was next to her. He grasped he hand tightly in both of his. "Jump!" he said quickly.

She jumped.

Meanwhile the Caesar had travelled more than 100,000 km but with Pucky’s reinforcement Iltu made it. In the fraction of a single second the 2 mousebeavers covered the incredible gap and materialized exactly at the source of Gork’s mental emanations.

In the Control Central.

In a glance Pucky grasped the situation. It wasn’t the first time that men had been taken over by extraterrestrial influences and forced to obey an alien will although the methods varied. What was going on here was certainly new but the result was the same.

It was in that moment that Gork activated the energy screens. He was not yet aware of the mousebeavers but they knew that he did it consciously if against his will. He had to do it if he didn’t want to betray the fact that his will was still his own. He had delayed the action —fortunately just long enough.

Pucky had not let go of Iltu’s hand. He teleported into the hangar, where he knew Germa was located. Iltu came with him. He only let go of her after they had both arrived safely.

The Gazelle was still in the same place. Meanwhile the hangar had automatically filled up with air again and the small scoutship’s energy dome shimmered strangely in the dim illumination.

Pucky signalled with both arms and the screen disappeared. Moments later he and Iltu were on board and were received by Germa and his friends with great relief.

"I was really afraid!" admitted the lieutenant unabashedly. "What the devil’s going on? Where’s the crew? When the Caesar got underway again I was on the verge of leaving the Gazelle and reporting back to the Commander. I assumed that everything was OK. But then I got this funny feeling again—like a warning."

"It’s a good thing you listened to your instincts," said Pucky. "It would have gone badly for you if you had left the Gazelle. The Caesar has been taken over by the spooks!"

Lt. Germa stared at Pucky in horrified alarm. "What are you saying! The shadow people? Here—on board the Caesar?"

"Yes but they’re being extra careful. So far I haven’t been able to trace their thoughts. Maybe they can shield their minds."

"And the crew? Is it … ?"

"No, not dead, merely unconscious. Of course some of the officers and the Commander are conscious in a way but they are under the influence of the phantoms. They were used so that the ship could take off and be captured."

"How is it possible?" Germa was not to be pacified. Brado, Hansen and Lester stood facing the mousebeavers in helpless perplexity. On their faces were expressions of incipient panic. "What are we going to do?"

Meanwhile Pucky had taken off his helmet, following Iltu’s example. "Just now I can’t answer either of those questions." he said. "The robotships are alright—they’ve been taken over. Rhodan has been alerted. He’ll come and get us. If I only knew how to stop the Caesar in the meantime! Pretty soon she’s going to reach light-speed and more. If we can’t get to the communications gear, nobody will be able to track us or find us."

"What’s wrong with the com equipment here on the Gazelle?"

Pucky looked surprised for the moment. "That’s right—I didn’t think of that. But we need a good outside antenna. Without that there can be no signal tracking."

Here, too, Germa had a solution. "We’ll tie the equipment to the outer hull of the Caesar. That will make an excellent antenna. Now what about Col. Sukril? We can’t just leave him in the power of the aliens. Who knows how long he can stand it?"

"Pucky!" It was Iltu, who had not taken part in the conversation. Instead she had been listening inwardly. "I’m getting Gork’s thoughts. He’s trying to figure how he can overcome Sukril and Henderson without harming them. I hope he doesn’t try anything foolish!"

"That youngster isn’t so dumb," muttered Pucky grimly but then added: "How is he planning to do it?"

He followed Iltu’s example and concentrated for awhile on Gork’s thoughts. Then he explained what was happening to Germa. "He wants to knock out Sukril—also Henderson—and then he hopes to bring the Caesar back to its starting point. I still think he’s about to make a mistake. Those phantoms are here on board. Hm-m … One other thing, Germa: do you have any weapons, like hand beamers?"

"Sure, I’ve got a whole cabinet full of them. But you’re not saying you’re going to—?"

"What else? How else can you bushwhack those spooks? Iltu and I can tell they’re here even though they’ve been trying to conceal themselves. But first let’s connect that antenna: Who’s the radio tech?"

"Lt. Hansen knows enough about it—Lester and Brado, too."

While the 3 men worked, Pucky stood guard, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t actually detect any of the enemy nearby. On her part, Iltu kept in contact with Gork, who was still desperately seeking a way to overcome the hypnotized officers in the Control Central. It seemed that the hidden ones still thought that he was under their general influence.

"I wonder if the propulsion system can be knocked out," said Germa suddenly. "Even if we make contact with Rhodan he won’t be able to help us if the Caesar is inside the Kalup absorption field—and that’s where she’ll be if she goes into linear drive."

"The absorption held, hm-m … " thought Pucky aloud. "If it collapsed the Caesar would automatically come back under the speed of light. Also if the defence screens broke down. Yup, that would be one way. Just cripple the absorption held and everything would be kosh. But it won’t do to just shut it off. We’d have to damage the generating equipment so that it couldn’t be fixed so easily. Those spooks mustn’t have any chance to escape. I’m half convinced they want the secret of linear spacedrive—otherwise they wouldn’t have swiped the Caesar."

Sgt. Brado came into the Gazelle’s control room. "Antenna’s ready, sir," he told Lt. Germa. "let’s hope it works. We’ve shot another one outside the defence screens."

"OK, get going! Hypercom the Ironduke—non-directional. Maybe they’ll hear us!"

Pucky left this task to Germa and his men. He took Iltu to one side. "Listen, Iltu, we have to do something about Gork. The poor guy is in a heck of a fix. He still doesn’t know how close we are to him and he might do something stupid. We’ll take the paralysis beamer with us and try to put Sukril and the other officers out of the action. We’ll take the energy guns with us, too, in case we come up against the spooks."

Dispensing with teleportation they went on foot toward the Control Central. It wasn’t until they were in the main corridor that they picked up their first weak thought patterns from the aliens. They were coming closer at a steady and menacing pace.

"Watch out!" whispered Iltu, raising her weapon. "They’re waiting for us." The fur on the back of her neck bristled as she pointed ahead into the curved passage. "They are there—but why don’t they fire at us?"

Pucky had also raised his weapon. "I don’t know—they may have something else in mind. Remember the other crewmen. Maybe they want to take the Caesar together with its entire crew. They’re not killing anybody anymore."

"What are we waiting for? Come on—let’s fire at them! If we don’t they’ll also try to bring us under control!"

Their 2 energy beams crossed at a point 5 meters ahead. Immediately it became unbearably hot in the corridor but a vague shadow appeared where the beams were intersecting. Seconds later it vanished.

"2 weapons aren’t enough," grumbled Pucky. "But at least we can hold them off. Let’s keep going—to the Control Central. Now we know anyway that they’re aware of us."

They did not have far to go. Almost soundlessly the hatch door slid to one side. Sgt. Gork was still sitting before the controls of the defence screens. He was not yet aware of the 2 mousebeavers. His brain was too busy with a number of wild plans which he was rejecting as fast as they occurred to him.

Col. Sukril turned around slowly. A chill ran through Pucky when he looked into his empty and lifeless-seeming eyes. They were the eyes of a zombie or a corpse. Without any sign of recognition, Sukril raised his weapon and aimed at him. His finger tightened on the trigger.

Pucky exerted his telekinetic powers. Cautiously his mental force stream grasped the raygun and removed it from the Commander’s fingers. After floating away from him, Pucky released the weapon and it dropped to the floor. Capt. Henderson was not armed.

The sound of the falling weapon caused Gork to turn around. He was nonplussed when he saw Pucky and Iltu. It was as if he could not believe his eyes.

"Relax, Gork, it’s us alright. Stay seated there and turn off the defence screens. Hey, Sukril—can you hear me?"

The Commander stared at Pucky, still giving no sign of recognition. Then his head sank suddenly and he slumped in his seat, completely unconscious. The phantoms had simply "turned off". Also in that moment, Capt. Henderson slumped into the same state.

"Pucky!" called Gork. "The defence screens! They can’t be turned off!"

Pucky spun around to look at him but finally nodded. "I thought as much! They’re blocked. Same as in Germa’s Gazelle. Well, then maybe the only way out is to disable the absorption field setup. Iltu, you stay here with Gork. If the spooks come in here—shoot! I’ll be back as soon as possible."

There was hardly any ship-type better known to Pucky than a superbattleship. Once on Zalit he had spent days with one of the crews in operations drills. On board the Caesar, while training Iltu, he had also gone through every room via teleportation. So he naturally knew where the main power and machine rooms were. He didn’t know too much about the technical aspects but what he knew was enough. This wasn’t the firstime he’d been called upon to cripple a large propulsion system.

Meanwhile the Caesar had been racing toward its unknown destination at many times the speed of light. Second by second its velocity increased. In the time it would take to breathe in and out, the ship covered many millions of kilometres. Soon that would increase to billions of kilometres—perhaps light years.

While Pucky was cautiously approaching the machinery section of the giant ship, with his parafaculties sharply tuned to weak thought emanations from the invisible enemy, Iltu and Sgt. Gork did not remain idle.

"Do you believe," said Gork, "that they can just take over an unconscious person and make them move as they will them to? Wouldn’t they have to slip themselves into such a person’s body?"

"We don’t know, Gork," answered Iltu. She was constantly on the alert and was doing 2 things at once. She was mentally following Pucky and was also keeping her senses open to any signs of the shadow people. "But one thing I do know: we have to find a way of bringing the men out of their state of unconsciousness.

Gork nodded eagerly. "Maybe we should try bringing a medico around first. The ship’s clinic! I knew something about that kind of thing because we all had to go through a course on the subject. Shall I go and see what I can do?"

Iltu shook her head. "We have to stay together because one weapon isn’t enough to handle those phantoms. Take my hand. I know where the hospital section is. Maybe we’ll find something." She telepathed to Pucky to brief him on what they were intending to do.

It took her 3 jumps to find her objective. The hospital personnel were still lying or sitting where they had been at the moment of the attack. One of the doctors had collapsed in front of a medicine cabinet. He had evidently softened his fall by supporting himself against the cabinet, which stood wide open. Hundreds of hypodermic ampoules, medicine packets and bottles were standing there, row upon row.

Gork let loose of Iltu’s hand and approached the cabinet. "If I only knew what to use," he mumbled as he carefully inspected the supplies. "Something to increase the circulation maybe?"

"Don’t ask me about it," chirped Iltu in a shrill voice, looking about her searchingly. "I don’t understand anything about this kind of thing."

"But you can surely make an injection?"

"I think so," she nodded uncertainly. "If you show me how."

He didn’t answer her but kept on rummaging through the cabinet. Finally he held one of the bottles in his hand to study it more closely.

Gork read the label carefully. "I think this is it. Adrenalin serum KHS-stimulant. We always used this for fainting cases. Let’s try it. Where the heck are the hypodermics? Ah , here … !" He extracted a flat case from a lower shelf. "It’s quite simple. You only have to hold the point against a vein and press the button here. I’ll fill this one. The medicine is transferred through the skin under pressure and it goes right into the blood stream. That’s all there is to it. One filling is enough for 20 injections. Do you think you can do it?"

Iltu nodded silently. Gork filled one of the transparent high-pressure hypo-guns. "Let’s check it out first. Here—this attendant. I’ll do it to show you. Now watch …"

Iltu watched tensely as the sergeant placed the instrument and pressed the release. There was nothing to see except that the colourless liquid in the glass tube went down a notch on the scale.

Gork straightened up with a sigh. "If it works we won’t know for at the most 5 minutes or so. We have to wait before we do any more."

Iltu used the waiting period to get in touch with Pucky. "How far along are you, Pucky?"

"Don’t bother me now, Iltu. I think I’ve located the machinery I’m looking for. Its controls are blocked like everything else. The Kalup just keeps on working. If I can’t get rid of the obstruction, nothing’s going to stop it. How is it with you?"

"Nothing’s happened so far."

Pucky did not continue the telepathic conversation. Iltu still kept a loose contact with him while giving her major attention to the dim and distant thought impulses of the shadow people. They had not tried to make any further attacks. Perhaps they assumed that these 3 conscious beings on board were not a threat to them.

Gork suddenly leaned over the attendant again. "He’s moving—just look at that!" He seemed to be surprised at the success of his medical experiment but he was still more pleased when the man sat up and looked at him questioningly.

"What happened? I—I felt so lousy all of a sudden."

"How do you feel now?"

"Thanks—OK now I guess." He looked around then at the other unconscious men. "Glord—what hit us!"

"They all got the same," said Gork, avoiding the details. "I have to know if you’re back in shape again. Get on your feet. Do you know your medicine? I mean, could you take the place of a doctor—at least in theory?"

Sure! Why would I be stationed here if I couldn’t? Why do you ask?"

Gork showed the attendant the adrenalin bottle. "You familiar with this? That’s what I injected you with. Was I right?"

The attendant read the label. "Exactly right. Why?"

Gork turned and filled 2 more hypo-guns, one for Iltu and one for the attendant. "OK, get to work! Wake everybody up—and then let those phantoms try attacking us again! They’ll be in for a surprise."

Within half an hour the entire staff of the clinic was equipped with hypo-guns and energy weapons. They deployed out through the ship in groups so that they could defend themselves against any ambush by the aliens. But no ambush came. Thus they were able to continue undisturbed while they resuscitated the entire crew of the Caesar.

Iltu went with Gork to the Control Central and woke up Col. Sukril as well as Henderson and the other officers. Two minutes later, 1st Officer Maj. Brokov rushed into the room. It seemed that the rescue work had succeeded and that the Caesar was saved. However it was quickly discovered that such was not the case.

"When Col. Sukril ordered the course changed, the ship did not respond. It seemed as if all the controls were blocked. With ever-increasing acceleration the Caesar continued to race through the intergalactic gulf toward the distant nebula. One glance at the instruments revealed that they were already travelling at 10,000 times the speed of light. With each passing second, this velocity was increasing. One light-year in less than an hour! Soon it would be a lyr every 30 minutes—then one every minute.

The great milky Way behind them didn’t change visibly because they were too close to it and still relatively too slow.

Col. Sukril turned and saw Iltu. "Now listen, Lt. Puck … !"

"I am Iltu, Commander!"

For a moment Sukril was confused but then recovered irritably. "We ought to be able to tell you two apart. Alright, then where is your friend Pucky?"

"Oh he’s trying to knock out the propulsion system."

Sukril turned blue. "He’s doing what?! Knock out the—has he lost his mind?"

Now Iltu revealed that she had absorbed some of Pucky’s personality. Her self-confidence had grown considerably and she also knew that without her and Pucky the situation here might be much worse. "For your information, sir, Pucky has not lost his mind! Do you happen to have a better idea? How is Rhodan ever going to catch up to us if we keep on shooting away from the galaxy at top speed?"

Sukril’s normal colour gradually returned. Maj. Brokov grinned, not envying his superior for this unanswerable rebuff.

Sukril gasped. "Rhodan?"

Iltu nodded triumphantly. "that’s right—who else?" Didn’t you inform him about the aliens?"

Sukril turned back to stare at his useless instruments and controls. "I contacted him, yes, but he doesn’t know our present position. You in the Com Room—what about the transmitter?"

"Forget that," said Iltu. "How are you going to transmit anything when you can’t shut off the screens? Anyway, Lt Germa is already trying to contact Rhodan or at least to send out a tracer signal. We’ve shot an antenna line through the outer defence screen so that the transmission wouldn’t be blocked. If that doesn’t work … "

Sukril regarded Iltu with a more kindly expression. "Don’t be angry if I’ve underestimated you, Iltu. But is Pucky really doing the right thing, trying to knock out the Kalup? Without the absorption field and the screens we’d be defenceless … "

"The aliens aren’t threatening us from outside—only here on the inside. Wait—I think Pucky has located the obstruction. Yes, he has! It won’t take long now!"

But it took 2 full hours while the wandering resuscitation crews were attacked three times by the aliens, of whom two were killed. At least they assumed that the phantoms were killed because as they faded from view they went through all the symptoms of dying.

Then without any warning the Caesar suddenly dropped back into the normal Einstein universe. The tremendous shock of slowing down was not too great because the inertial absorbers hadn’t been cut off. Nevertheless a sensible jolt ran through the ship as if it had suffered an explosion somewhere in its depths.

At the same time Pucky appeared in the Control Central. He looked exhausted. Without paying any attention to those present in the room he waddled directly to the nearest cushioned seat and jump into it. With a satisfied sigh he closed his eyes and comfortably stretched his limbs.

For a moment Col. Sukril was transfixed by astonishment and disbelief but the shameless grin of his First Officer reminded him of the regulation discipline that was expected on board every ship of the Terran spacefleet. "Lt. Puck! Might we be informed of where you’ve been all this time? What happened to the propulsion system?"

Pucky didn’t so much as raise an eyelid. "Ask Iltu—she’s got all the latest poop. Good night!"

Sukril gave a masterful demonstration of self-control. His hands trembled slightly but otherwise he suppressed his agitation. "I want the report from you, Lt. Puck!"

Pucky finally opened his eyes and looked at the commander. Then he slipped out of the chair obediently. With dignified gravity he strutted straight across the room, drew himself up before Sukril and even attempted to keep his bowed little legs straighter than usual. With his right hand he almost executed a perfect salute. "Propulsion put out of commission, sir! Absorption field and screens down, sir! And now if you don’t watch out and let me do my esp in peace, you and your whole crew will soon be sleeping again as you were before. Good night, sir!" Having said his speech, he marched right back to his chair. He sprang into it and promptly closed his eyes again.

Col. Sukril didn’t move. Finally, after almost 10 seconds of tense expectancy, he spoke. "Major, see to it that Pucky is not disturbed. Keep all weapons ready. Iltu, you warn us if the aliens try another attack. We can’t do anything else except wait for Rhodan or the robotships. Is the crew alerted and in shape?"

"They’re briefed and ready, sir," said Brokov.

In his chair, Pucky still had his eyes closed but he suddenly called out: "Watch out—! I’ve picked them up! They’re trying another attack! Two of them are entering now. Even if you wreck the place—fire! Get going—what are you waiting for? Shoot!"