The Door Through Space

By Marion Zimmer Bradley

This is a classic science fiction novel by Marion Zimmer Bradley. This work tells the story of the Terran Empire and their quest to maintain a peaceful rule. However, on the planet Wolf something is afoot. They enlist the services of Race Cargill of the Terran Secret Service, and he goes undercover on Wolf to find the source of the problem. His mission doesn't go as planned and he becomes involved in a blood feud, but this leads him to the secret of THE DOOR THROUGH SPACE.
This work is part of our Vintage Sci-Fi Classics Series, a series in which we are republishing some of the best stories in the genre by some of its most acclaimed authors, such as Isaac Asimov, Harry Harrison, and Robert Sheckley. Each publication is complete with a short introduction to the history of science fiction.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Vintage Sci-Fi Classics
• Release date: Mar 16, 2018
• ISBN: 9781528781756

Marion Zimmer Bradley

Marion Zimmer Bradley is the creator of the popular Darkover universe, as well as the critically acclaimed author of the bestselling ‘The Mists of Avalon’ and its sequel, ‘The Forest House’. She lives in Berkeley, California.

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THE DOOR

THROUGH SPACE

BY

MARION ZIMMER BRADLEY

Copyright © 2017 Read Books Ltd.

This book is copyright and may not be

reproduced or copied in any way without

the express permission of the publisher in writing

Contents

An Introduction to the History of Science Fiction

Author’s Note: —

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

An Introduction to the

History of Science Fiction

The origins of the literary genre of science fiction continue to be hotly debated. Some scholars cite recognisable themes as appearing in the first known work of recorded literature, the Epic of Gilgamesh, (2000 BCE). Science fiction writer, Pierre Versins (1923-2001), argues that this ancient Sumerian epic poem should be included in the genre due to how it deals with the subjects of human reason and the quest for immortality. It also contains a flood scene that can be seen as resembling apocalyptic science fiction. However, other experts in the field prefer to limit the genre’s scope to the period following the Scientific Revolution in the 17th century, claiming that it was only possible to write science fiction once certain major discoveries in astronomy, mathematics, and physics had been made. Wherever we decide to put the pin in the timeline, it is clear that many of the tropes of what is generally considered to be science fiction have sparked the imagination since the early days of literature.

One such theme is that of the space ship. A form of this kind of technology can be found in the Hindu epic poetry of India. In the Ramayana (5th to 4th century BCE) Amazing machines called Vimana travel into space, underwater, and even have advanced weaponry that can destroy cities. Time travel was also foreshadowed in such works as Mahabharatha (8th and 9th centuries BCE) in which a king travels to heaven and on his return finds that many ages have passed in his absence.

The Syrian-Greek writer Lucian (c. CE 125–after CE 180) uses the themes of space travel and alien races to act as mechanisms of satire in True History to make comment on the use of exaggeration within travel literature and debates. These themes are however mainly utilised for comic effect, and as Bryan Reardon, a translator of Lucian comments, it is an account of a fantastic journey – to the moon, the underworld, the belly of a whale, and so forth. It is not really science fiction, although it has sometimes been called that; there is no ‘science’ in it.

Some elements of the genre can also be identified within One Thousand and One Nights (Arabian Nights) (8th-10th century CE) where themes of cosmic travel and immortality appear. Combine this with first millennia tales from Japan, such as Nihongi (720 CE) in which a young fisherman visits an undersea kingdom, staying for three days, only to return home to find himself three hundred years in the future, and it is easy to see that many literary cultures developed themes of what could be called proto-science fiction.

In the 16th century humanist thinker Thomas More (1478-1535) wrote Utopia (1516) in which he describes a fictional island with a perfect society that he uses to espouse his views on political philosophy. This tale gave the name to the Utopia motif that became a theme in sci-fi writing and together with its antithesis, ‘dystopia’, is still used widely in the genre – most notably in George Orwell’s classic work Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949).

The 17th and 18th centuries brought with them the ‘Age of Reason’, and a new found interest in scientific discoveries spawned fiction that more closely resembles modern science fiction. Johannes Kepler’s Somnium (The Dream 1634) about a voyage to the moon, is a notable example of this, with influential figures such as Carl Sagan and Isaac Asimov citing it as the first true work in the genre. Other works from this era with recognisable tropes are Shakespeare’s The Tempest (1610-11) containing a prototype for the ‘mad scientist story’, Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (1726) with its descriptions of alien cultures, and Louis-Sébastien Mercier’s L’An 2440 (1771) which gives a predictive account of life in the 25th century.

Some authors, such as Brian Aldiss (born 1925) in his book Billion Year Spree (1973), claim that Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein (1918) is actually the first seminal work to which the label SF can be logically attached. Although generally found under the heading ‘Gothic Horror’, its use of futuristic technology and its exploration of the human condition from an outsider’s viewpoint, find it blurring the lines between the genres.

The late 19th century saw the arrival of two undeniably classic authors of sci-fi, Jules Verne (1828-1905) and H. G. Wells (1866-1946). The former produced popular scientific romances such as Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1864) and Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1869). These classic tales of adventure captured the public imagination and brought him great commercial success, making him what L. Sprague de Camp called the world’s first full-time science fiction novelist. As opposed to Verne’s romantic adventures, Wells tended to use the mechanisms of the genre to provide himself with tools for making social commentary and rarely delved into the hard science of the technology he created. For example, in his classic tale The Time Machine (1895) the technicalities of the machine itself are largely glossed over in favour of the didactic points on English society he intends to make. The difference between these two giants of the genre typifies a debate that continues to this day about how to strike the right balance between exciting story telling and a social message. This time period also found several other notable writers dipping into the genre, with authors such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930), Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936), and Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935), also making valuable contributions.

The early 20th century saw a critical period in the history of science fiction with the birth of the pulp magazines Amazing stories, Weird Tales, Astounding Stories, and Wonder Stories, among others. It was the work of Hugo Gernsback (1884-1967), writer and editor, in setting up Amazing Stories in 1926 that really spearheaded the movement. He encouraged his authors to produce stories of scientific realism intended to both entertain and inform their readership. This publishing of magazines solely devoted to the genre led to the birth of the ‘Golden Age of Science Fiction’ in the 1940s and 1950s. Under the editorship of John W. Campbell Jr. Astounding Science Fiction had a stable of pioneering authors such as Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988), Isaac Asimov (1920-1992), and Arthur C. Clarke (1917-2008). It was characterised by hard science fiction stories that celebrated scientific achievement and progress. This format of short story magazines was continued with publications such as Astounding stories and Galaxy, and still continues today with magazines such as Asimov’s Science Fiction and Strange Horizons.

The second half of the 20th century saw sci-fi becoming evermore mainstream and accepted as a reputable literary genre. Work’s such as Frank Herbert’s (1920-1986) Dune (1965), with its complex interweaving of future galaxies, political intrigue, and religion, did much to raise its respectability. It was during the 1960s that a new movement appeared. Dubbed ‘The New Wave’ it stretched the genre, approaching topics such as sexuality and contemporary political issues, as in J. G. Ballard’s (1930-2009) cautionary tales of future societies. It was this movement that inspired the change in direction of science fiction in the film industry, where it started exploring worrisome futures like those portrayed in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and A Clockwork Orange (1971).

Following on from ‘The New Wave’ was ‘Cyberpunk’ with authors such as William Gibson (born 1948) focussing on themes of an imagined underworld of the future and the ‘punks’ that inhabited it.

All of these developments of have given modern science fiction a diverse canon from which to draw. At the beginning of the 21st century, the genre shows no sign of disappearing, and the popularity of both novels and short story magazines online is a testament to its enduring appeal.

This work is part of our Vintage Sci-Fi Classics Series, a series in which we are republishing some of the best stories in the genre by some of its most acclaimed authors. Enjoy.

... across half a Galaxy, the Terran Empire maintains its sovereignty with the consent of the governed. It is a peaceful reign, held by compact and not by conquest. Again and again, when rebellion threatens the Terran Peace, the natives of the rebellious world have turned against their own people and sided with the men of Terra; not from fear, but from a sense of dedication.

There has never been open war. The battle for these worlds is fought in the minds of a few men who stand between worlds; bound to one world by interest, loyalties and allegiance; bound to the other by love.

Such a world is Wolf. Such a man was Race Cargill of the Terran Secret Service.

Author’s Note:—

I’ve always wanted to write. But not until I discovered the old pulp science-fantasy magazines, at the age of sixteen, did this general desire become a specific urge to write science-fantasy adventures.

I took a lot of detours on the way. I discovered s-f in its golden age: the age of Kuttner, C. L. Moore, Leigh Brackett, Ed Hamilton and Jack Vance. But while I was still collecting rejection slips for my early efforts, the fashion changed. Adventures on faraway worlds and strange dimensions went out of fashion, and the new look in science-fiction—emphasis on the science—came in.

So my first stories were straight science-fiction, and I’m not trying to put down that kind of story. It has its place. By and large, the kind of science-fiction which makes tomorrow’s headlines as near as this morning’s coffee, has enlarged popular awareness of the modern, miraculous world of science we live in. It has helped generations of young people feel at ease with a rapidly changing world.

But fashions change, old loves return, and now that Sputniks clutter up the sky with new and unfamiliar moons, the readers of science-fiction are willing to wait for tomorrow to read tomorrow’s headlines. Once again, I think, there is a place, a wish, a need and hunger for the wonder and color of the world way out. The world beyond the stars. The world we won’t live to see. That is why I wrote THE DOOR THROUGH SPACE.

—Marion Zimmer Bradley

CHAPTER ONE

Beyond the spaceport gates, the men of the Kharsa were hunting down a thief. I heard the shrill cries, the pad-padding of feet in strides just a little too long and loping to be human, raising echoes all down the dark and dusty streets leading up to the main square.

But the square itself lay empty in the crimson noon of Wolf. Overhead the dim red ember of Phi Coronis, Wolf’s old and dying sun, gave out a pale and heatless light. The pair of Spaceforce guards at the gates, wearing the black leathers of the Terran Empire, shockers holstered at their belts, were drowsing under the arched gateway where the star-and-rocket emblem proclaimed the domain of Terra. One of them, a snub-nosed youngster only a few weeks out from Earth, cocked an inquisitive ear at the cries and scuffling feet, then jerked his head at me.

Hey, Cargill, you can talk their lingo. What’s going on out there?

I stepped out past the gateway to listen. There was still no one to be seen in the square. It lay white and windswept, a barricade of emptiness; to one side the spaceport and the white skyscraper of the Terran Headquarters, and at the other side, the clutter of low buildings, the street-shrine, the little spaceport cafe smelling of coffee and jaco, and the dark opening mouths of streets that rambled down into the Kharsa—the old town, the native quarter. But I was alone in the square with the shrill cries—closer now, raising echoes from the enclosing walls—and the loping of many feet down one of the dirty streets.

Then I saw him running, dodging, a hail of stones flying round his head; someone or something small and cloaked and agile. Behind him the still-faceless mob howled and threw stones. I could not yet understand the cries; but they were out for blood, and I knew it.

I said briefly, Trouble coming, just before the mob spilled out into the square. The fleeing dwarf stared about wildly for an instant, his head jerking from side to side so rapidly that it