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Title: No war tomorrow
Author: Wallace West
Release Date: April 17, 2023 [eBook #70580]
Language: English
Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NO WAR TOMORROW ***
NO WAR TOMORROW
Feature Novel of Days to Come
By Wallace West
War now would mean the destruction, not merely of
one planet, but all the inhabitable worlds. But
if a satisfactory substitute could be found....
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Science Fiction Quarterly May 1951.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
1
Captain Frank Sage, S.P., shouldered through the double safety doors of
Moon Station Cafe, tossed his gear into a corner and sat down at the
bar.
"'Lo, Tom," he said glumly. "Make it black coffee, ham and eggs and
apple pie."
"You going right out?" Old Tom stopped his eternal polishing of glasses
and gave his bald head a rub with the towel before switching on the hot
plate. "I was hoping you could lay over a day and chew the fat."
"Not this time." Sage swished the coffee in its heavy cup to cool it.
"I'm pushing off soon as they refuel my crate and calibrate the orbit;
I've got troubles."
"Um!" The bartender squinted quizzically at his lean and lanky
customer. "I hear the Big Shots are big-shotting it again on Venus."
"Right! They're getting much too big for their britches these days;
that's why I'm on this cursed jaunt."
"I sort of thought you and the Space Patrol and my gal Sadie had the
Big Shots on the hip up there."
"Sadie!" The captain's voice was bitter as his coffee.
"You kids been fighting again?"
"Fighting _again_! We never stop. If Sadie weren't your daughter,
Tom, and if I weren't so crazy about her...." Frank's dour face lit
up briefly, "... I'd have sewed her in a sack and dumped her into the
Central Sea long ago."
"When she was a kid I often used to think of doing the same thing."
Tom juggled a sizzling order onto a plate and slid it across the bar.
"What's the trouble this time?"
"It's just that United Stars won't use the Patrol to clean the Big
Shots off Venus." The younger man attacked the victuals with a gusto
which belied his mood. "We've got things pretty well under control
at Venusport. The Incor Underground is growing stronger all over
Wildoatia. One more push and...."
"... and Sadie agrees with United Stars?"
"That's right. I don't get it, Tom."
"Look, son." The old man leaned both hamlike hands on the bar and
thrust his face within a few inches of the captain's. "Sadie's a
mighty smart gal. If Wildoatia ever gets cleaned up, the Incors in the
Underground will have to do the job themselves. The Patrol's work is
to police Venusport and see that tender-foot Incors get an even break
until they head into the bush."
"But why, Tom? Confound it...."
"Didn't you learn at school," the bartender interrupted, "that the
state of Wildoatia is the safety valve for United Stars? The people who
go there voluntarily--and the ones who are sent there--don't _want_
to live under a decent government. They're incorrigibles who hate and
abominate a peaceful, well-ordered civilization. They want to sow their
wild oats--to rob, steal, commit murder and do as they damned well
please. Maybe they'll--some of them--become good citizens eventually if
we leave them alone--give them a chance to grow up. The growth of the
Underground suggests that that may happen. On the other hand, if you
use outside force to destroy Wildoatia, you upset the whole apple cart.
Where, let me ask you, do you send the Incorrigibles? If you don't
deport 'em, in no time at all they'd be raising hob on Earth and Mars
the way they did before the Cooperative Commonwealth was set up. That
wouldn't be pretty, would it?"
"Of course Venus is the only place to exile fascists, crooks, and plain
damn fools," Frank agreed as he signalled for his pie, "but why let
them run the whole show up there? Oh, you'll spout that that's their
most fitting punishment ... to have a free rein to chew each other
up. But what if the Big Shots get strong enough to defy United Stars?
You should see them strut and goose step when they visit Venusport.
They may have no space ships, but I tell you they're up to something
devilish."
He shoved his plate away, tossed a five-credit note across the bar and
got up. "It must be about blasting-off time. I'd better be getting
into my strait-jacket."
"You've plenty of time. The mail packet from Mars has to come in before
you can leave. I won't have another customer until then." The bartender
removed his apron. "Come on. I'll walk you around the dome."
* * * * *
As soon as they left the cafe, Frank had the uncomfortable feeling that
he had shrunk to pigmy size. The metal hemisphere which served as way
station for all ships travelling between planets was a quarter of a
mile in diameter. The few grease monkeys moving about its vast floor
were almost lost among landing cradles and other pieces of machinery.
"This certainly is the mountain that labored and brought forth a
mouse," Sage grumbled. "It's been a hundred years since the first trip
was made to the Moon and we're still hanging on here by our eye-lashes.
For every ship that blasts off from Moon Station for Mars or Venus, ten
robot freighters have to stagger up from Earth with fuel and supplies
for it."
"Plutonium's not good enough," agreed Tom, who had flown space
ships in his time. "Fission just can't supply enough power to make
interplanetary travel pay. Fact is, if the Moon weren't here, we'd
still be earthbound."
"Um! Think of all the trade that could go on if ships could carry
worthwhile payloads. I suppose they'd have closed Moon Base long ago,
except for the U 235 which is exported by Wildoatia."
"Oh, I don't know." Old Tom was puffing as he kept up with the younger
man's long strides. "We clear a bit of oricalchum from Mars, tungsten
and commercial diamonds from Earth, plus a fair trade in jewels and
other lightweight luxury items. Tourist traffic is brisk. We manage
here, but we'll never get much farther without a better fuel.... Well,
here comes the mail packet."
A man in a lead-armored suit had run past them and was wigwagging with
a checkered flag. Other men were sweating a twenty-ton cradle into the
middle of the floor. Then the mechanics scuttled for the barriers.
Frank and Tom followed their example. As they watched over the top of a
thick wall surrounding the "field", a shutter in the center of the roof
snapped open. They had a glimpse of the ship cushioning down on her
atomic jets before they ducked out of range of the deadly gamma rays.
"One nice thing about landing where there's no atmosphere," said Frank.
"You don't have to shift to those confounded peroxide jets." He found
that he was shouting, but that his voice sounded far-away and thin.
Even with the comparatively small air loss through the shutter opening,
pressure within the dome was dropping so rapidly that they found it
difficult to breathe. The almost instantaneous loss of air and heat
into the absolute zero vacuum of space caused a snowstorm to swirl
within the dome. Then the rocket blaze died, the packet dropped neatly
into her cradle and the shutter closed.
"Whew! You really take a landing seriously," whistled the S.P. man.
"What if a ship should miss the shutter and come down through another
part of the roof?"
"Don't mention it." Tom's voice was strained.
* * * * *
Frank stepped from behind the barrier to stare at the new arrival. She
was a globe, probably twenty times the size of his one-man ship. She
was painted a dead black on one hemisphere and a blazing white on the
other so her interior temperature could be regulated by rotating the
reflecting and absorbent surfaces toward the sun while in flight. She
evidently had had a brush with a meteor, since one section of her hull
was badly scratched and dented.
The packet's port spun open. An eight-foot Martian in captain's uniform
came tumbling out of it.
"K. M! K. M! K. M!" the Martian was chanting in a magnificent
baritone. His great chest pumping like a bellows and his downy red face
covered with perspiration, he sprinted for the Communications Room.
"Flash for all stations," he was singing as Frank and Tom hurried up
to eavesdrop. "Captain Avron of Packet _Spaceblazer_ reporting. When
I came out from under Suspenso two hours ago an unknown comb-shaped
vessel was pacing the _Spaceblazer_."
"Another ship in your orbit? And pacing a packet?" The K. M. man shook
his head. "That's impossible, Captain."
"Impossible! Impossible!" The Martian hit a High C and fluttered the
stumps of his atrophied wings. "The ship was there! When I signalled
her, she accelerated and disappeared in fifteen minutes."
"Excuse me, captain," frowned the K. M. officer. "It must have been a
meteor. You have the fastest ship in the system, so...."
Frank couldn't hear any more for the man in the lead-covered suit
began bawling through a loudspeaker: "Space Patrol Two-Six ready for
blast-off in ten minutes. Captain Sage on board, please."
"What do you make of that?" Frank asked, as he and Tom trotted toward
the patrol ship.
"Hallucination, probably. Suspenso does strange things to a person
sometimes."
"I don't think so. It fits in with rumors I've been hearing at
Venusport. The Big Shots are up to something."
"Then here's a word of advice, son." Tom laid a hand on the captain's
shoulder as they stopped before his ship. "If that's the way you
feel, stop making these fool junkets to New Washington and spend your
time finding out what Wildoatia's really up to. If any more trips are
absolutely necessary, send Sadie." He smiled crookedly. "Gets sort of
lonesome here, now that my ticker won't let me go spacehopping. I'd
like to see my girl before I turn up my toes." He shook hands briefly
and trudged back toward the cafe, his pudgy shoulders drooping.
Frank climbed into his tiny cabin, dogged the port shut behind him,
lashed himself into the anti-shock hammock, shook three Suspenso
tablets out of their bottle and signalled for blast-off. Inwardly he
fumed because ships could not carry enough air, water and food to
allow their crews to remain conscious during a month-long trip. If any
strange vessel showed up, he wanted to see it. Finally he broke one of
the big pills in two and dropped half of it back into the bottle before
gagging over the rest of the bitter dose.
The drug took effect more slowly than usual. Dimly, he felt the pain of
the grinding acceleration as the rockets blazed. Before he drifted into
suspended animation he saw the silvery Dome plummeting away from him
until it assumed perspective in the center of Copernicus Crater.
"Defenseless," he mumbled as his mind clouded. "Moon Station absolutely
defense...."
2
"... less," he gasped, regaining consciousness with a spine-shattering
start and with the conviction that someone had played a dirty trick
on him while he slept. That was always Suspenso's after-effect, along
with a ravening hunger and thirst. Sage reached for the canned tomatoes
which spacemen favor in getting their starving, dehydrated bodies
back to normal. Then he recalled the comb-shaped vessel and squinted
blearily through the blister above his hammock. The black sky was empty
of everything except gigantic sun, unwinking stars and the blank and
shining disc of Venus.
"Guess they ... don't bother with ... small fry," he croaked, opening
the can. After finishing its contents he loosened the hammock straps,
dragged himself to the control board and cut the atomic drive. The
pile could not be damped, and the fantastically high temperatures at
which it operated safely in open space would vaporize the ship as soon
as it struck atmosphere. Like it or not, he would have to jockey to a
landing by means of a reserve tank of feeble hydrogen peroxide fuel.
Twelve hours later, after circling Venus three times to cut down his
speed, Frank knifed into the planet's opaque cloud blanket and settled,
with hardly a jar, on the Venusport field. As he clambered to the soggy
ground he caught sight of Sadie Thompson racing through the mists to be
the first to greet him.
"The same old Sadie," he chuckled when she was in his arms, alternately
purring and biting like a kitten. "Still wearing just as few clothes
as the law allows and still breaking regulations. Don't you know you
shouldn't run out on the field like this? At least you've picked up a
few pounds since the first time I came to Wildoatia."
"Uh huh. Gottum dimples now." She exhibited a few. "Like?"
"Like!" He proved it, until she had to draw away to catch her breath.
"What did Great White Father in New Washington say?" She lit a damp
cigarette after several tries and dangled it expertly from a scarlet
upper lip.
"Great White Father say keepum shirt on," he grinned a bit ruefully as
he tried to match her mood.
"I told you." She tossed back her red curls, hugged herself and did a
dance step. "You just listen to your Sadie and you'll save yourself a
lot of spacehopping."
"Now look here! Is that the way to greet a returning prodigal? You keep
a civil tongue in your head, my girl, or I'll take the flat of me hand
to you."
"Yah! Sorehead! You'll have to catch me first." And she was off across
the field with Frank in pursuit. Venusport officials tore up their
speeches of welcome and shook their heads in despair.
* * * * *
Sadie was in a much more subdued mood that night as they ate scamour
steaks and drank sparkling traskette at Venusport's best cafe. She
listened without a single wisecrack as he told how United Stars
executives had insisted that no drastic action be taken against the Big
Shots. But she leaned forward intently as he described the arrival of
the mail packet at Moon Station.
"Why, if what that captain said is true," she gasped, "it means
somebody has invented a ship that can make interplanetary hops in three
or four days."
"It means more than that, my sweet. (Here. Have some more steak;
you can still put on a pound or two.) It means a new fuel has been
found which will permit trips to the outer planets, make Moon Station
obsolete and open up untold trade possibilities."
"Uh huh!" Her blue eyes opened wide and she reached across the table to
grip his wrist. "It also may mean the end of all of us."
"Nonsense. They said that about the first fission bomb."
"And they were nine-tenths right, as you'll admit if you remember the
history of the Atomic War. But this may be far worse. Look, let's
figure it out. Remember what those bombs did to the cities of Earth.
Well, they were loaded with Plutonium, the stuff we now use for rocket
fuel.
"But Plutonium furnishes just enough power to lift a ship, its pilot,
one or two passengers, and a few pounds of pay load from Venus or Mars
to the Earth. A ship escaping from the stronger gravity of Earth can
only limp as far as Moon Station without refueling. Do you follow me?"
"So far." Frank finished his traskette and motioned the waiter to bring
more. "Go on."
"So if somebody has built a ship ten or fifteen times larger and faster
than ours, it means...?"
"... that he has found out how to destroy atomic nuclei instead of
merely splitting them by stripping off the electrons. In other words,
he is possessed of a source of practically limitless power."
"Right." She patted his hand. "And now we come to the 64-credit
question: Who is that somebody?"
"Well, he couldn't be a good citizen of United Stars. In that case he
would have turned over his discovery to the Commonwealth at once. It's
too hot for one man to handle."
"So he must be either an Incor or a Big Shot! Please pass those
credits, Frank."
"Not yet, my pet. He must be a Big Shot, and only a Big Shot. No Incor
could get his hands on enough fissionable material to conduct the
necessary research. Only the Big Shots could do that."
"The credits are yours. Now ... what can we do about it?"
Frank twirled his empty glass and stared out at the lights of rainswept
Venusport. He was fond of the little place and the thought that it
stood in the shadow of disaster made him feel ill. When he and Sadie
had helped the Underground to take over the town five years before,
it had been a dripping pesthole where arriving Incors were robbed of
credits and equipment, then shipped off to virtual slavery in Big Shot
uranium mines. Now it was a U.S. outpost, clean, rebuilt and thriving.
* * * * *
Adventurous youths who elected to leave the well-ordered societies of
Earth or Mars to sow their wild oats under conditions of untrammelled
freedom on Venus were well protected while passing through the port.
Even criminals and other anti-social exiles were entitled to a stiff S.
P. indoctrination course in the weird geography and topsy-turvy customs
of their new planet. One and all were guaranteed free return trips to
their homes whenever they gave proof that they had reformed.
"I suppose this means another war," Frank said at last. "And if it
comes it really will smash everything beyond repair."
"Maybe not." Sadie thrust out her dimpled chin.
"You mean the Big Shots will give up their discovery without a battle?"
"Not a chance."
"If I know them, they'll try to use it to set up a tri-planetary
dictatorship."
"Oh, be your age, Frank! Dictatorships are out of date. They won't
work; never have worked for more than a few years. You won't catch
up-to-the-minute Big Shots betting on a horse that Hitler, and
Mussolini, Stalin, and all the others rode to death."
"Then what?" He was beginning to be angry, as he often did when Sadie
disagreed with him.
"They'll plan to use the invention as a lever which will allow them to
return to positions of power in United Stars. Think what that would
mean to them in terms of graft and legalized robbery. They'd be sitting
pretty in the middle of everything once more, instead of being tucked
away on the fringe of civilization."
"The United Stars would never agree to that; it would mean war."
"I doubt it." The girl picked the strawberry out of her traskette glass
and chewed it thoughtfully. "Both Wildoatia and United Stars know that
another war is impossible. Say that on Monday the Big Shots wrecked
every city on Earth and Mars with a new type of bomb. A month from
Monday our V-60's would hit Wildoatia and wipe it off the map. No bomb
of any kind could destroy our V-60 dumps without setting off a chain
reaction...."
"... which would reduce Earth to a cinder," he snapped.
"A chain reaction wouldn't stop there. It might turn the whole solar
system into a Nova ... just one big ball of atomic fire. Nuh uh, my
friend! The Big Shots know they couldn't escape a chain reaction ...
and they like to live as well as anybody else does."
"What's your solution, Sadie?" Frank stared at her with a sort of
wonder. She looked so much like a little girl, despite the gown which
she might about as well not have been wearing.
"We've got to beat the Big Shots at their own game; we've got to
invent a substitute for war."
"A substitute for _war_!" His respect turned to disgust. "You're nuts;
there ain't no such animal."
"Sez you!" As always, when under the strain of great excitement, she
dropped into the half-gangster, half-western argot which she had picked
up while fighting in the Underground. "Listen, wise guy. I'll bet you
five grand I can cook up a substitute the Big Shots will fall for like
a ton of bricks."
"Some sort of game, I suppose," he jeered as he picked up the check.
"Game, my eye!" Seeing his bewilderment, she leaned forward and nibbled
his ear. "I'll give you just one tip. If an atom bomb explodes, where's
the only place it can't do any serious damage?"
"Why ... why. Holy cats. Maybe you've got something there!"
"I've got everything." She rose lithely as if to prove it. "Come on,
let's hit the hay; we're going into Wildoatia as Incors tomorrow."
"But the Space Patrol has the authority to inspect every Big Shot mine
and factory. Why should we go incognito?"
"Because I like to stay alive, chump," she answered, slipping her hand
under his arm.
3
As a slow lightening of the cloud blanket indicated dawn, Sadie and
Frank took places among some fifty Incors who were heading out from
Venusport into Wildoatia. Like the others, they were dressed in heavy
coveralls. Each carried a Tommygun, a knapsack stuffed with food and
necessities, and a money belt containing the five thousand gold dollars
without which no man or woman was allowed to cross the last frontier.
The Incors were a wild lot; mostly young, high-spirited or spoiled
people who rebelled at the strict moral standards of United Stars. In
spite of themselves, both Frank and the girl felt strongly drawn to
this group. They felt no sympathy for a scattering of older Incors
whose hardbitten faces indicated that they had run afoul of U.S. law
and were being "shipped over", the only major punishment permitted
within the solar system.
"Say, chum." A beetlebrowed youth sidled over to Sadie as they left the
port and plunged into the sweating jungle. "Do you reckon it's as tough
in Wildoatia as they make out in that indoctrination course?"
"It's plenty tough," she answered out of the corner of her mouth.
"Been there before?"
"What's it to you?" As he started to protest she added: "The first law
of Wildoatia is not to ask personal questions."
"Watch him," the girl whispered to Frank as Beetlebrow retreated. "I
smell Pumper."
"Oh, he's just a dumb kid."
"Mebbe so. Mebbe so. Watch him anyway."
It was a dismal trip. The eternal drizzle soaked them to the skin;
a few hardy jitbugs chewed at them. From time to time bloodsucking
plant-animals along the muddy trail snaked out prehensile branches.
Then there was much swearing and hacking with machetes until the
white-faced victims freed themselves.
The skylarking with which the Incors had celebrated their departure
from Venusport dwindled and died. In fact, it became evident as the day
progressed that Beetlebrow, at least, was losing his nerve. He snarled
curses on the journey; he buttonholed lagging companions and muttered
about the advisability of returning to Venusport. He yelled like a
frightened child when branches reached for him. Only when more hardy
travellers threatened to kick him out of the group did he subside.
"That kid's a menace," Frank groaned at last; "he'll wreck the morale
of all of us."
"I'll bet he's doing it deliberately." Sadie squashed a jitbug which
had chewed its way through the mosquito netting draped from her helmet.
"A Pumper. No doubt of it."
* * * * *
Things came to a head when camp was made for the night on a high and
relatively uninfested ridge. There Beetlebrow grew suddenly brave and
argued against Sadie's proposal that sentries be posted.
"There ain't no danger," he whined. "Scamours don't climb this high. We
all ought to get a good night's sleep so we'll be on our toes when we
get to Nirvana tomorrow."
When Sadie's counsel prevailed, the fellow picked up his blankets and
stalked into the darkness to sleep by himself.
"I agree with you," said Frank when he and Sadie were rolled snugly
in their waterproofs near a smudge. (It held off the humming army of
jitbugs which had arrived with darkness.)
"Um." She wriggled into a more comfortable position on the sodden
ground. "I told the sentries to keep an eye on him.
"Say," he continued softly, "on your idea for a war substitute.... Why
not break down and explain it to me?"
"Haven't explained it to myself yet," she yawned. "That professor who
named me Sadie Thompson when we were concentrated once ... because it
rains all the time here, you know ... he told me about how, in the
Middle Ages, when two armies were too well matched to fight, each would
select its best knight to represent it. Now what did he call 'em?"
"Champions?" Frank rose on one elbow.
"That's it. So the champions would ... joust, was it? And the army
whose Champ won would be declared the victor."
"Do you think either the U.S. or the B.S. would agree to any such
harebrained scheme as that?"
"They would if they had to."
"But the Big Shots glory in having no sense of honor. Under their crazy
code, they'd be bound to doublecross us if they lost."
"But they couldn't lose, could they? Not if they've learned how to
disintegrate atoms." Her voice sounded far away.
"I don't get you. What's the use of our side putting up a champion if
he's sure to lose?"
"I didn't say our side would lose. Or did I?" She yawned again. "I'm
dog-tired and all mixed up. Haven't taken a hike like this since we
marched on Venusport. Kiss me goodnight. Beetlebrow says we have to be
on our toes in the morning."
Frank lay awake a long time, listening to jungle sounds and struggling
over her paradox. He dozed off to be jerked awake by a burst of
gunfire. It was from the sentries; their quick action alone saved the
little party as a horde of wild-eyed, ragged savages poured up the
ridge toward them in the dawnlight.
Sadie was out of her blankets and yelling orders even as she knuckled
the sleep from her eyes.
"Take cover," she shouted. "Spread out. 'Ware grenades. Hold your
fire." She spoke with the authority of a girl who had grown up as a
jungle outlaw. As the others jumped to obey, Frank crawled through the
biteweed to see whether their defense circle was complete. He found it
so, except where the ridge ended in a steep declivity.
"Fire," screamed their self-appointed commander as the gaunt figures
of their attackers loomed through the fog. A storm of Tommygun bullets
sent the enemy flying, except for a dozen who lay writhing.
"They're poor devils of Incors who've been waylaid and robbed by some
Big Shot patrol," Sadie explained grimly as the shooting died. "They'll
come again; they've either got to make another stake, let themselves be
concentrated, or starve."
It was at this moment that Beetlebrow went mad. Throwing away his gun,
he began running along the edge of the cliff, waving his arms and
alternately shouting curses at the enemy and screaming for mercy.
Without a second's hesitation, Sadie swung her weapon and pressed the
trigger. Beetlebrow went over the cliff.
"My Gawd! What did you do that for?" Frank looked at her aghast.
"I think he was signaling for an attack up the cliff. Get a detail
deployed over there fast."
"Why, the kid cracked up!"
"In that case he didn't belong in Wildoatia and I did him a service.
Quick! That detail!"
Surely enough, when they reached the clifftop they found twenty of the
frowsy enemy toiling up toward them. This time their fire did real
execution; the few survivors fled like lost souls.
* * * * *
Mindful that they must reach Nirvana before nightfall if they expected
to enter its wall, the Incors, who had survived the battle with hardly
a scratch, packed knapsacks and plunged again down the trail. Once they
detoured a heavily-guarded convoy of ore trucks enroute to Venusport.
Once their enemies of the morning tried another ambush. Nevertheless
they made good progress and caught sight of the mist-shrouded
battlements of their destination while it was still light. Here Sadie
called a halt.
"Fellow Incors," she cried as she leaped onto a rock, "you're entering
Wildoatia proper. From now on each one of us is on his own. You all
know the laws here: Might makes right; dog eat dog; devil take the
hindmost. No cooperation; no partnerships; no friendships. Even
hand-shaking is illegal. If you are robbed or cheated, don't go running
to the police. They'll laugh at you. Maybe they'll slap you in a
concentration camp where you'll work a year to pay your fine.
"You get only three breaks in Wildoatia. If anyone swipes your gun,
he has to leave a shooting iron of some kind in exchange. If you're
arrested and escape, you can't be picked up again on the same charge
after five hours have passed. And if you manage to beg, borrow, earn
or steal a million bucks, you automatically become a Big Shot with all
rights, privileges and immunities."
"Wait a minute, Miss." The speaker was rawboned and bowlegged, as
though from riding herd on some far-away cattle ranch. "Ain't they no
way a feller can get help if he finds himself in a jam?"
"There are two ways. First, you can return to Venusport and promise the
S.P. that you'll go straight." She bit her lip and hesitated. "Maybe I
shouldn't tell you the other way this early in the game, but I will. If
you've got the guts, you can join the Underground. Then you'll have a
sporting chance of getting to civilization."
"The Underground," sang out a downy youth from Mars. "The
indoctrinators said you can get shot just for joining it."
"That's right. I said you had to have guts.... Well, good luck, folks.
You've made a good start; only one group of Incors out of three ever
gets to Nirvana without being hi-jacked. Let's go." She jumped from her
perch and stalked off toward the town which rose, like a scene from
fairyland, before them.
4
Nirvana had once been the main pleasure city of Wildoatia while
Venusport had been its administrative center. Since the latter had
been taken over by United Stars, Nirvana had also become the Big Shot
capital. But it still retained its synthetic medieval grandeur. On a
mountain top which pierced the planet's lower cloud layers, it rose,
tier on tier of marble castles, twisting streets and crenelated walls,
until it disappeared in the distance, like a dream of old Spain.
They were welcomed like heroes into Valhalla when they reached the
frowning wall, with its moat and torchlit portcullis. Trumpets sang
from a dozen towers; the drawbridge came down with a roar. Out marched
a guard of honor in shining armor, preceded by a bevy of houris in
diaphanous robes, or better. The latter strewed orchids along the
pathway before throwing themselves into the arms of the newcomers.
There were even handsome youths to greet the women in the party.
"Poppycock right out of the telies," whispered Sadie. "But it wows 'em
every time. It got me too, the first time I came.... Thought I was
entering heaven."
A dark-eyed beauty in cellophane danced up and presented them with
goblets of traskette. Sadie pretended to drain hers, but slopped most
of the heady stuff on the cobblestones. Frank followed her example; the
other arrivals, their misgivings forgotten, drank the liquor to the
lees.
After another flourish of trumpets, a jolly fat man, dressed like the
king of Mardi Gras, hurried across the drawbridge, arms outstretched.
"Welcome to Wildoatia," he boomed. "Who are the leaders of your party?
I have a special welcome for them."
The cowboy opened his mouth but closed it when Frank kicked his shins.
There was a long silence.
"Splendid! Splendid," bellowed the fat man at last. "You have no
leaders. That's as it should be in Wildoatia, where every man is a king
and every woman a queen." As houris threw garlands around the necks of
the newcomers he continued: "Tonight Nirvana is yours. You are honored
guests of the city. Not one penny can you spend. Come, follow me to the
City Hall. We must check your passports. A mere formality, of course."
"Of course!" sneered Sadie in a whisper.
"After that," this strange glad-hander rambled on, "you must taste the
unparalleled joys of Nirvana, the jewel among all the cities of the
universe. You may bathe in scented waters; you may dine on the best
foods and drink the finest wines. Later you will want to play games of
chance or dally with the maiden or youth of your choice...." He paused
to mop his brow.
"... and wake up tomorrow with a dark brown taste to find that your
friend has stolen your money belt," Sadie crooned in Frank's ear.
"Then, ho, for a concentration camp for a long term at hard labor if
you dare make a complaint."
"Come one; come all!" Their host pranced away. The houris urged the
Incors across the drawbridge in his wake.
"Do exactly as I do," whispered Sadie after they had progressed for
several blocks up a flag-draped boulevard. "We've got to make our
get-away."
"But aren't we...?" Despite himself, Frank was a bit carried away by
the pomp and circumstance of the martial music and the gaily-dressed,
cheering throngs which lined the way. "I never had a chance...."
"I do believe, Frank," the girl teased him, "that if you had made your
pile when you first came to Wildoatia you'd be a Big Shot today. Well,
you'll have no chance to taste the fleshpots and I'm the only houri
you're going to have any traffic with tonight. Besides, we wouldn't
stand a chance of escaping recognition in the police lineup at City
Hall.... Now!"
* * * * *
She hurled herself into the crowd lining the street, sprinted for an
alley with the patrolman at her heels. They plunged into darkness just
as a burst of gunfire sent splinters flying about their heads.
[Illustration: Sadie hurled herself into the crowd, as a patrolman
looked up, with gun raised.]
"That was close," gasped the girl. "The Shots certainly have their
guard up these days." She seized Frank's hand and raced with him along
a narrow way which was slippery with garbage and rank with stenches.
"Here we are. Sharp right.... Now left.... Last time I came through
here I had a broken arm. But you should have seen the Concentrator who
gave it to me.... Wup! This is the place." She dived into a tumbledown
liquor store.
"Sadie Thompson," she snapped at the blinking proprietor; "we're
tailed."
The fellow jerked a thumb toward a curtain at the back of the shop.
They ducked behind the cloth, plunged down a flight of stairs and
landed, plop, in a sewer.
Wading against a flood of filth, beating off tarks which squeaked
and slavered at them, they advanced blindly. A quarter of a mile
"up-stream" they found a door marked by a phosphorescent glow.
They dragged themselves through it and into an empty chamber which bore
the word, _Baths_, on an inner door.
After scrubbing some of the sewage off each other and changing to clean
overalls, which they found in a locker, Sadie pressed a concealed
button in a series of dots and dashes.
A door opened in the wall, revealing a corridor hewn out of rock. They
went through it until they reached a room occupied by a man with one
arm and a hideously disfigured face.
"Jack!" cried the girl. "I hoped you'd be on duty. This is Captain
Sage; you've heard of him. The Shots are tearing the town apart to find
us. Can you put us up for the night?" As the one-armed man nodded she
rattled on: "We hear the Shots have something better than Plutonium."
Again the nod.
"Know where their labs are located?"
Jack picked up a pencil, wrote a sentence and handed her the pad.
"Somewhere under the Polar Sea?" Sadie frowned. "Not much chance of
hitting a hideout like that with a V-60. How far along are they?"
"One ship finished and given a trial run," wrote the cripple. "The
Underground managed to get 542 on board but I haven't received any
information for weeks."
"How about her speed?" Frank put in.
"Last report from 542 said she travels at One Gravity acceleration,"
was the scribbled reply.
"One G?" The spaceman wanted to laugh but dared not because of that
scarred, impassive face. "Why that's only a little more than 32 feet
per second. My patrol ship can hit ten G's."
"You got me wrong," came the answer. "One G is only 16.1 feet for the
first second, but after that, the speed of the new ship increases
steadily at the rate of 32.2 feet per second."
"Wow! I see what you mean." Frank did some quick calculation. "She
can reach Earth in three days or so. Our ships have to take more than
a month for the same run because they hit maximum speed soon after
blast-off and coast the rest of the way to save fuel."
"And since the new ship has some sort of super-fuel, there need be no
limit to her size," Sadie exclaimed. "She can carry plenty of food,
air and water, so crews can remain conscious at all times. Crews can
move about on shipboard as comfortably as they do on the ground because
her constant acceleration--or deceleration after she reaches turnover
point--will act as a substitute for gravity. This is big, Frank. Bigger
than we thought."
"Man can reach for the stars," wrote Jack.
"Or finally blow himself to smithereens." This from Frank. "The Shots
have us licked this time if we don't stop them quick."
"Can we raid that lab?" asked the girl.
"Not a chance." The pencil raced. "Only a tark could get into it."
"Then we'll have to fish a tark out of some sewer." Sadie thought
deeply for a moment, then slapped her round thigh. "Not a bad idea at
that!... Well, Jack, how about a place to sleep?"
They spent the night in an air-conditioned subterranean chamber. Jack
had beautifully forged passports ready for them when they awoke. After
bidding him goodby they mounted endless stairs to emerge at last onto a
busy street.
* * * * *
Even in the pearly daylight--Venusians seldom see their monstrous sun,
and then only with regret--they found that the city had lost none of
its brittle charm ... its hectic Coney Island dash.
Incors by the score already were entering its blatant palaces, intent
on squandering their last few silver dollars or gold nuggets in an
effort to forget their grinding, hopeless toil in mine or jungle.
Others, better dressed and cockier, evidently had made a stake. They
were going to the dens, usually to gamble away their winnings, but once
in a while to pyramid them into the coveted million which meant freedom
and a proud place in Wildoatian society.
A few Big Shots were drifting into the more expensive and exotic
pleasure haunts, there to lord it over lesser men, take their pick of
lesser women and indulge every whim their jaded fancies could invent.
Roaming the streets at random, the interlopers looked from blossoming
terraces over breathtaking vistas; smiled at roving mountebanks and
accepted flowers tossed by pretty girls.
"The place has a certain charm," Frank said grudgingly.
"Think so?" She led him into a street where glittering cafes--one was
frankly called "The Clip Joint"--dope dens, telie theaters, circuses
and houses of assignation rubbed elbows like thievish brothers.
Within a few minutes they saw an Incor in ragged coveralls stumble
out of a "gambling salon", place an automatic to his head and blow
his brains out. Later a blonde in sequin harness stepped behind her
companion and slipped a stiletto between his plump shoulders. In both
cases nearby policemen made no move to interfere. Instead, they blew
piping whistles which brought street cleaners on the run to clear away
the mess.
"Charm!" snorted Sadie. "Yes, in Nirvana you can do anything you
please ... except look crosswise at a Big Shot, or go broke."
"Where are you taking me, anyway?" Sage tried to forget the things he
had just seen.
"To the City Hall to look up an old friend of ours."
"A Big Shot?"
"I'll say; we made him one of the biggest."
"You mean...." He fished back into those hectic days when he first had
come to Venus and when Sadie was the firebrand of the Underground. "You
mean Mike, the stupid little doublecrossing tark who betrayed Venusport
to us in exchange for the location of the uranium mother lode?"
"The same; he's now commandant of Nirvana."
"He'll have us shot."
"No he won't--not if we make it worth his while. Besides, I still have
the safe conduct he gave me to show his gratitude."
"Look, Sadie my girl!" He dragged her down on an iridescent bench
beside a fountain of scented rainbows. "Ever since I got back I've been
trailing you around like a puppydog. I don't like it. Are we partners
or am I just a stooge? What's up your sleeve?"
"I'm simply working on the theory that history repeats itself," she
chuckled, rumpling his hair. "Ancestors of the Big Shots lost the First
World War, the Second World War and the Atomic War. Each time they were
a hundred times better prepared than the decent folks who opposed them.
Now, teacher, tell me why they lost."
"Because ..." he fumbled. "I guess it was because they had no honor;
they doublecrossed themselves into defeat."
"Right. They're atavars ... throw-backs to the age of tooth and claw.
Some of them happen to be geniuses, though. That's one of the reasons
why we try not to kill 'em any more. We send 'em here to blow off
steam, bust atoms if they can, and possibly see the error of their
ways. The reason we dare do that is because they can't see any farther
than their own noses; they take the cash and let the credit go, as old
Omar put it."
"A comforting theory," he jeered. "If it's true, why don't we just sit
back and take it easy?"
"Because such people have to be whittled down to size occasionally.
They serve a useful purpose in society but they can't be allowed to get
out of hand again."
"You win. But you still haven't told me what you want with Mike."
"I'm going to take him in hand," she laughed, and dodged into a crowd
of tipsy merrymakers as he reached for her.
5
They took a compressed air car to the City Hall, a vision in black
marble which towered at the very top of the mountain. Sadie's crumpled
safe conduct got them past guard after frowning guard, but they saw
several less fortunate citizens being booted down the wide steps.
They were escorted into a 100-foot-long chamber. At the end of it, a
colorless man in a colorful uniform was almost hidden behind a desk
three sizes too large for him. It was Mike, all right, but a Mike
considerably changed by his success. That is, he no longer sniggered
sadistically; he frowned sadistically. He still gnawed the knuckle of
his left forefinger, however, with the same nervous gesture he had used
when he had been bodyguard to the brutal boss of Dead Man's Delta.
"Well?" he barked when their guards had placed the visitors before his
chromium and plastic throne.
"Well yourself," the patrolman snapped. "Send your gorillas away."
Mike gnawed in indecision, then gave the order.
"So you found you couldn't get out of Nirvana and have come in to give
yourselves up," said the commandant when they were alone. "That was a
dirty trick you played on me yesterday.... Scared the new Incors half
to death. If you had come as members of the Space Patrol, I'd have
given you every honor. As it is, I'm entitled to concentrate you under
the law. Which camp do you pick?"
"We'll take the one under the Polar Sea." Sadie lit a cigarette and
tossed the match on the inch-thick rug.
Mike jumped, then blew up, dropping his pseudo-cultured tone for
gangsterese. "Snoopin' again," he shrieked. "I'll have you rubbed out.
Youse guys ain't gonna...."
"Mustn't say 'youse guys', Mike," Sadie spoke as to a child. "You're
commandant now."
To Frank's amazement, Mike's fury collapsed like a pricked balloon.
"You haven't a thing on me," he mumbled, sinking back on his throne. "I
ain't gonna ... I won't talk."
"Nobody asked you to," said Frank. "This is just a personal call ...
for old time's sake. We were wondering how you are making out with your
mother lode."
"It ... it's still producing ninety per cent of the U 235 on Venus."
Mike stared at them like a sick calf. "Only...."
"Only the new engine they've developed up north doesn't need U 235. A
hunk of rock will serve it just as well for fuel. Right?"
"That's about it." The little man licked dry lips. "I'm ruined; you
devils know it damned well."
"Going to take it lying down?" jibed Sadie.
"Aw, cut it out, will you? What can I do about it? Kingfish Uranium
has dropped from 240 to 23-1/4 on the big board since the rumors got
around. I'm washed up; one of these days the Directors will remember
I'm here and kick me out among the Incors."
"Look, Mike," said Frank. "The Space Patrol likes you. You've played
ball with us before. We really want to help."
"Ain't nothin'.... I mean there's nothing you can do." That knuckle was
taking punishment again.
"We got you out of a hole once, didn't we?"
"You sure did and I sure appreciates it." A faint light of hope dawned
in those frightened, beady eyes.
"We can do it again," the captain went on. "But first we want to ask
you one question: Do you think the Shots can take over the system with
their new weapon?"
"Naw." The narrow shoulders sagged. "Everybody knows we'll be blown to
bits if we try that. But we _gotta_ try. Ain't no future for a man in
this gawdforsaken hole. Some of the other Directors, they're rarin'
to go, no matter what happens. Me, all I want is to live a while." He
shook his balding head. "I don't even like commandanting any more ...
don't get any fun outa it. Why, just yesterday I broke an Incor on the
rack and, would you believe it, I didn't get any kick at all; I must be
gettin' old." He seemed ready to cry.
"That's tough, Mike." Sadie was all sympathy. "But I have a plan
to prevent any real trouble. It'll make you the biggest Shot on Venus,
too ... for a consideration, of course."
"Yeah?" He leaned forward greedily. "Shoot."
* * * * *
The girl outlined her idea for a war substitute.
"You got somethin' there," he agreed doubtfully when she had finished,
"but I don't get this champeen stuff. Ain't no Big Shot gonna risk his
life in an evenly-matched duel."
"Oh, I didn't mean that at all. I meant something like matching your
new ship against the Space Patrol out where nobody but the crews could
get hurt."
"Say!" Mike sucked through his yellow teeth. "That's not bad at all.
If we win we'd have a monopoly on space travel ... a chance to get off
this dinky planet and do some business. If we lose, I reckon we'll have
to surrender our new discovery to United Stars--but otherwise we won't
be much worse off than now.... But what do I get outa the deal?"
"Why, you sell it to the Directors while we get New Washington to
agree. If it goes through, it will get the Shots out of an impossible
situation, no matter who wins. The least they can do is make you
chairman of the board. Then you won't have to worry about Kingfish U."
"The present board chairman hates my guts. He won't go for any plan I
suggest. Besides...." He looked at them through slitted lids, "what's
that 'consideration' you mentioned?"
"You'll have to get one or both of us on board that ship. Frank is
an astrogator, so he should qualify. I can pinch hit as a nurse,
entertainer or even a cook."
"Not on your life; I ain't gonna doublecross my pals."
"You made out all right when you doublecrossed them before."
"Nope." Mike thrust out his weak chin. "They'd rub me out."
"Okay. But being rubbed out is better than rotting by inches when our
V-60's begin to drop. You won't look pretty, Mike, when your nose and
ears fall off; when your flesh starts peeling from your bones because
of the gamma rays. Then, there's that palace of yours ... and your
harem."
"Oh stop it, Sadie. Stop it! You win!" His knuckle was bleeding by now.
"How about dropping out to the palace tonight? The chairman is coming
over. I'll try to sell your plan to him. You won't hold it against me,
will you, if he doesn't buy?"
"He'll buy ... one way or another," the girl said grimly.
"Swell." The commandant jumped up with a lightning-like change of mood.
"Let's go, then. The little women will be waitin' for me."
* * * * *
After they were aboard his shiny black plane Mike asked jovially: "What
kinda entertainment would you like tonight? I been tinkerin' with some
of Nero's old stunts.... Incors to the scamours and stuff like that....
Not bad for a change."
"A little too close to home right now." Frank shuddered.
"How about a scamour hunt, then, before dinner? There's scads of them
critters around the palace. They keep me fresh out of slaves."
"Swell." There was nothing Frank wanted less than a brush with those
gobbling reptiles, but he knew Mike needed gentle handling if he were
to go through with his bargain.
"Like it?" beamed the little Big Shot as they landed on the roof of a
rococco monstrosity which must have cost millions.
"Gorgeous!" beamed his guests.
Mike's harem, twenty beauties of every race, color and state of
deshabille, was waiting for them. Squealing with synthetic glee,
the girls bore them on embroidered litters to their quarters. These
resembled glorified hotel suites replete with gold-plated bathrooms,
priceless tapestries and uncomfortable furniture.
"What awful taste the beast has," laughed Sadie as she dunked her
long-legged body in a scented and mirrored pool. "And to think I once
wanted to be a Big Shot ... wanted to be one so desperately that I
tried to rob a joint like this."
"What happened?" He was eyeing her appreciatively.
"Oh I was caught, of course. They slapped me in a concentration camp.
See that scar? It's a burn I got in the uranium mines. That's where I
joined the Underground."
"Funny place to have a scar," he grinned. "Get out of that pool and
help me put on this cursed armor.... Are all their palaces like this
one?"
"Worse!" She dripped water down his back. "Huge, gloomy holes where
bored gangsters try to pretend they're having a wonderful time. The Big
Shots are just Incors who made their pile and are out to show off like
wicked children. Well, tonight let's pretend we're wicked children too."
"That shouldn't be hard for you." He helped the girl don her own light
armor. "Sometimes I think you're a potential Big Shot still, at heart."
They entered the palace donjon to find Mike chatting uncomfortably with
Hirokima Schmidzu, chairman of the Wildoatian board.
"So pleased," hissed the yellow man after introductions were completed.
"Have been hearing about your plan."
"Like it?" Sadie sounded unutterably bored as she surveyed her shining
self in a mirror.
"Regrettably not." Schmidzu was not in the least bored as he undressed
her with his slant eyes. "There is no substitute for honorable war."
"Too bad." The girl turned to Mike. "When do we start?"
In the dripping twilight ... that hour before ravening jitbugs make
outdoor life impossible ... the scamour hunters poured out of the gates
and into the softly-breathing jungle. Machetes in hand and Tommyguns
slung across their shoulders, about a dozen of the commandant's guests
spread out and moved forward warily. The chairman attached himself to
Sadie and Frank as they advanced.
Mike's gardeners had done a fair job of weeding out the most dangerous
plant-animals from the grounds. Nevertheless, their way was made
dangerous by roots which snaked out to grasp their ankles and by
sucker-lined branches which whipped at their throats.
They had progressed only a few hundred yards when Frank came upon a
panting slave girl entangled in a mass of carnivorous vines. While the
Japanese hissed disapproval, he defied the immutable laws of Wildoatia
by cutting her free. She stared at him as if he had committed a crime
and fled without a word of thanks.
"It is, shall we say, bad taste, to help Incors in distress," Schmidzu
expostulated.
"You'd talk differently if you were in a jam," flashed Sadie.
"Beg to differ. I would never be in what you call a jam. See." He held
out two gold-encrusted blades. "These Samurai swords. My honorable
grandsire used them to defend Tokyo in second World War. Gods protect
me through them."
They neglected to point out that Tokyo had not been defended.
* * * * *
By now, Mike's beaters had driven several scamours out of the lower
swamps. They heard the piteous "Gobble, gobble, gobble" of Wildoatia's
most dangerous reptile not far ahead. Rifles crashed to the right.
Someone screamed in the middle distance. Then a dead-grey head, with
eyes big as saucers, swayed out of the muck directly in their path!
Frank and Sadie fired together. The nauseating head jerked back, then
flicked forward on a scaly body equipped with a score of yardlong legs.
The thing embraced the girl lovingly. Taloned feet clawed at her armor.
A spiked tail wrapped about her in coil after slow coil.
"Gobble," moaned the scamour, showing its teeth in a wide smile before
they sought the girl's throat.
Frank sprang forward, swinging his machete with both hands.
"Beg to state," hissed Schmidzu, "laws of Wildoatia forbid aid to
another. Regret I must report this."
"Report and be damned," snarled Frank. Green ichor spurted under his
blows but the creature seemed not to notice. Sadie was frantically
squeezing the monster's throat to no avail. It forced its triangular
snout forward, inch by inch.
Bracing himself with feet wide apart, the spaceman put all his strength
into a blow aimed just below that horny carapace. The blade struck
home this time, sheering through flinty scales to the backbone. The
scamour's head fell backward and its coils loosened as it wailed like a
hurt child.
Another wail made Frank whirl. The board chairman had been attacked
by the creature's mate. Samurai swords sheared off several of the
creature's legs but proved pitifully inadequate in the hands of the
little Japanese. Instinctively the captain sprang to the rescue. Sadie,
white and shaken though she was, gripped his arm with fingers of steel.
"No!" she gasped. "No Frank! You mustn't."
"You help girl," screamed Schmidzu, struggling futilely. "You help me,
I not report, please!"
Frank did his best to respond, but Sadie clung to him until the scamour
dragged its suffocating victim out of sight.
"It was our only chance," the girl wept as they chopped off the first
scamour's head and turned back toward the palace with their trophy.
"That rat would have had us concentrated; you know it as well as I do."
"Yes," he agreed bitterly, "but it still was a foul thing to do."
Their spirits revived somewhat when they discovered that three other
hunters were missing ... and unmourned ... while the rest had returned
empty-handed.
"Nothing to it," Sadie assured their cheering admirers when they
reentered the keep. "We wanted to bring in another head, but the jits
were getting bad." She limped off to have her bruises dressed.
* * * * *
They dined on scamour steaks again that night. They drank explosive
gurka. They flirted outrageously with members of Mike's court. They
watched the unbelievably lovely gyrations of two Martian flying girls
who had been smuggled into Wildoatia at the risk of an interstellar
incident.
Sadie told riproaring stories of the days when she was one of the
toughest of the Incors. Then they danced square dances and sang cowboy
ballads of Earth's old West which were the current rage. Finally they
stumbled off to bed after having given Nirvana's commandant one of the
pleasantest evenings of his misspent life.
Mike appeared while they were still asleep the next morning and
reported that he had wangled them berths on the new ship.
"Took some pull," he boasted. "Ain't ten men in Wildoatia as could have
did it. Wouldn't have had a chance if Schmidzu hadn't gone and got
himself killed." He winked and added, "You'll have to have your faces
and fingerprints changed a bit, though. Captain Hans will check your
records seven ways from Sunday."
"Give Frank a pug nose like mine," Sadie directed when a plastic
surgeon appeared in answer to Mike's summons. "And how about making him
cross-eyed, too?"
"How about making her tongue-tied?" Frank retorted.
After much argument they compromised by altering the shape of Frank's
mouth, slanting his eyebrows and pushing back his hairline. Sadie
acquired a classic Greek profile; her freckles were eliminated and her
hair became glossy black. Skin grafts were implanted on each of their
fingertips.
"That should serve unless somebody examines your retina patterns," said
the surgeon two days later. "Your features can be changed back, in
time, but your fingerprints are permanently altered."
"Did I ever love _that_?" sighed Sadie when Frank's bandages were
removed at last.
"You could get a job in Hollywood," he admitted grudgingly as he
studied her in turn. "But confound it, I liked those freckles!"
They had kept the air waves to Venusport humming during their
confinement. There was the usual red tape to break, of course, but news
of the power source was so menacing that New Washington finally agreed
to the plan for a sub rosa test of strength--the Space Patrol against
the Big Shot ship at a spot somewhere between the orbits of Earth and
Venus.
"Now it's up to us," said Sadie as they packed for their trip north.
"How does it feel to have your head in a lion's mouth?"
"What if we can't accomplish anything when we get on board?"
"Then we're not the hellraisers we think we are.... Of course S.P.
can't lick 'em. It'll have to find a way of getting the drop on 'em....
Don't worry. It will only make you lose the rest of your hair."
* * * * *
Mike accompanied them on the supply plane which bore them toward the
Pole. He was in a bad mood. "I shouldn't ought have done it," he
groaned. "If they's been a leak.... If Hans gets suspicious about you
two, we'll be burned down. Only thing in our favor is that they're
desperately short of men up there."
The ship's ports were blacked out as she approached her destination.
They had no chance to determine the route. Finally they knew that
they had landed on water, but when they emerged that they were in a
pressurized hangar which had submerged into a huge chamber drilled in
solid rock.
"Shots?" barked Hans, surveying the prospective recruits when Mike
ushered them into the scientist's severely plain office.
"No." The commandant squirmed. "They're Incors, but they'd sell their
souls to make a stake."
"Incors! Always Incors!" The unhealed radium burn which covered the
whole side of the huge man's face flamed an angry red. "I need some
people up here that I can half-way trust. All these Incors you've been
sending me are dangerous. Already I've smashed two of their plans to
steal or smash the ship. What's the matter with you Shots? Yellow?"
"Now look here, Hans...."
"Yellow!" Hans whirled from Mike and glared at Frank.
"You're an astrogator, they tell me. We can use you if you're not
lying."
"Dave ..." Frank began.
"That's enough. We don't use last names up here. And you!" His one good
eye examined Sadie as if she were a bug. "Nurse, eh? Know anything
about radiation burns?"
"I was in the uranium mines, sir."
"Good. Your job's to help the doctors keep me on my feet a few months
longer. Haven't time to die just yet."
"How the _Champ_?" Mike changed the unpleasant subject.
"Just back from a swing beyond Jupiter." The big man's face lighted up
for the first time. "What a ship! Had her up to three quarters light
speed. She ran like a dream."
"Three quarters light speed," Frank gasped. "That's around one hundred
and forty thousand miles per second."
"She'd have done better, except that we started having some kind of eye
trouble ... sort of like seeing double. A damned queer feeling, I tell
you. Gives you the screaming meemies.... Well," he came back to normal,
"thanks for bringing me an astrogator, Mike. When do we move?"
"As soon as the Boss sets a date with New Washington."
"I'll be ready." Hans escorted Mike to the door, then growled at the
recruits: "Come along. I'll show you your quarters. You won't need them
much; we work sixteen hour shifts here ... and I mean work!"
* * * * *
Frank spent the next month in a fever of toil. Hans was a slavedriver
who enforced discipline on Shots and Incors alike, even though he had
to break heads to do so. All life in the spacious undersea laboratory
revolved around the thousand-foot-long, comb-shaped vessel which rested
on its cradle beneath a dome reaching almost to the surface of the
ocean. Within her silver skin lay the crooked aspirations of Wildoatia.
"Look at her," the leader crooned on one occasion. (Frank had been
given a clean bill by Security and was being taken on an inspection
trip.) "She'll reach Far Centaurus some day ... but I won't be on her."
He caressed the bulging stern plates. "In here is a standard set of
peroxide jets to take her through atmosphere. I hate the clumsy things.
Wish I had time left to solve that problem of radiating heat from a
compact pile when it's not operating in space.... Look up there!"
They craned their necks, as at a skyscraper. "That battery of rockets
projecting from what is now her side uses the new fuel. She travels
broadside on after blast-off."
They took an elevator to the control room amidships.
"Designed the equipment myself." Hans beamed at the banks of quadrants,
verniers and sky-encompassing viewplates. "Five years of hard work it
took ... to pay off United Stars for this burn!"
They toured the engine room where a compact, heavily shielded pile
stood ready to change tall stacks of pig iron ingots into unlimited
power. Then they inspected the comfortable crew's quarters.
"What about armament, sir," Frank probed at last.
"There are guided missiles which can seek and find targets thousands
of miles away. They can be equipped with either fission or
disintegrating war heads. Both go dead after a certain period; can't
have a disintegrator bumping into some planet and blowing it sky high.
For really high speed operations, guided missiles won't be much good,
of course, except in a stern chance. Then we'll depend mainly on the
mine fields we spread behind us. Come on. Might as well show you the
stuff." He started down an odd companionway which had steps both on one
wall and on the floor. Then he staggered and leaned heavily against a
bulkhead.
"Better go get that cursed nurse," he panted. "This burn...."
Frank found Sadie in the hospital and hurried her toward the ship.
"How long will the Old Man keep going?" he asked.
"A month or so, if he's careful.... I hope the Patrol stalls a bit."
"Then what?" He took a chance on patting her hand.
"We may get our chance. The Second is a dope."
"Have you made any contact with that Underground agent?"
"Not a chance. Hans has spy rays rigged up everywhere."
"Same here. Well, keep your funny chin up, Sadie.... There's your
patient.... And try to get more rest; you look peaked."
They found Hans walking blindly in a circle, gave him a sedative and
helped him back to his room. Then they parted silently with a quick
handclasp.
* * * * *
Frank went back to plotting orbits to every planet and satellite, as
well as perfecting combat maneuvers. His math was rusty, so he spent
long hours at his desk and found little time to make friendships with
his shipmates to be. The other technicians were also a hardworking
lot, far different from the roistering Big Shots who ran the planet.
Hans had handpicked them and they were wise, ambitious and hard ...
driven by a grim selfishness which made the astrogator quail. When, for
self-protection, Sage aped their mannerisms and ways of thinking, he
found himself growing as viciously efficient as a crouching tiger.
The only real acquaintance he made, among that crowd of automatons, was
the foppish son of an Argentine who had escaped from the debacle which
struck his country during the Atomic War. His name was Carlos and he
warmed slightly when he found that Frank had picked up his beloved ...
and outmoded ... Spanish language while working on the Sahara project.
Carlos was second in command and obviously dreamed of supplanting
Hans. He was a complete egomaniac. But Frank could discern no outward
disloyalty to Wildoatia.
Of course the patrolman discussed the details of his work with half a
dozen technicians, but the person he warmed to was one of the few women
in the lab. She was a radar operator who had been cashiered from a mail
packet for some disgraceful episode on Mars. Blonde and good-looking in
a stocky way, she answered to the name of Greta, wore her harness with
an air, swore like a trooper, smoked cigars, drove her subordinates
until they dropped, and worshipped money as her only God. For some
reason she took a fancy to "Dave" and overlooked many of his early
errors while damning others for less serious mistakes.
In other words, Frank found himself getting nowhere with his plan to
sow dissension among the crew. As in early stages of the three great
wars, they were frantically loyal to their brutal ideals and leaders.
If there had been rivalry involved, the spacemen felt he might have
accomplished something. This idea, plus a longing to look at Sadie,
caused him to pay a visit to the director. The latter, now but a bloody
caricature of himself, still maintained his iron rule from a hospital
bed.
"Sir," he proposed, fixing his eyes on the nurse instead of on the
thing propped up in bed, "I've found that the _Champ_ needs another
trial run. Her controls aren't properly calibrated for close work among
the planets."
"The devil you say!" Hans rose painfully on one elbow. "I calibrated
them myself."
"There's an error of half a degree in the...."
"I know, dumbkopf. It won't bother us when we move against those S.
P. tubs. Leave well enough alone; I can't make such a trip again. And
I don't trust a single one of you congenital doublecrossers out of my
sight. Now get back to work. I'm busy." He turned almost blindly to a
mass of bloodstained papers spread over the bed.
6
A week later the word spread like lightning through the lab. Hans had
died, screaming. His screams were not due to pain. (Radiation burns are
almost painless.) They were torn out of him by the knowledge that he
could not live to direct the test of strength with United Stars. The
cream of the jest was that, as the director breathed his last, word was
flashed from Nirvana that the duel would begin "somewhere in space" at
2400 sideral time, July 14--just three days away.
Carlos called a war council immediately after the funeral. Present
were Fritz, previously the second mate; the radiation-scarred chief
engineer; two shifty-eyed deck officers; Greta, and Frank.
"I don't understand these orders," the Spaniard raged, twisting his
moustache as if trying to tear it out by the roots. "They tell me to
blast off at 2400, but they don't name the battle area. This is another
New Washington trick. Do they expect me to search the universe for
those confounded Space Patrol tubs?"
"The S.P. ships have just about enough range to get from the Moon to
Venus, or vice versa," Fritz volunteered. "They carry very little air.
We can cruise around until they exhaust their supplies, then shoot 'em
like ducks." He licked his thick lips.
"I can get a radar fix on them in no time," said Greta from within her
cloud of cigar smoke. "Don't be disturbed, sir." Her eyes were cold.
"Oh!" Carlos struggled to hide his chagrin. "Dismissed. Get the ship
ready for blast-off."
Shortly afterward, loudspeakers blared throughout the lab. Men ran in
all directions. Food and other perishables not already aboard began to
be loaded with hysterical speed.
At midnight on the fourteenth, the _Champ_ nosed her way through the
watertight lock of her caisson, climbed like leviathan through the
miledeep cloud layer of Venus and, dripping water from her splendid
sides, leaped into the ebony sky. On the bridge, Carlos, Fritz, Frank
and Greta crouched over their instruments as the shadowy planet sank
beneath them. Frank's heart was throbbing as he sought wildly for some
method of stopping the invincible monster. He could shoot Carlos....
He could jam the throttle.... He could.... A glance at four robot-like
soldiers who guarded the doors showed him the impossibility of doing
anything whatsoever; he was trapped.
"She's running perfectly, sir," intoned Fritz, his water-blue eyes
fixed on the leaping indicators. "Peroxides working perfectly.
Approaching speed of sound."
"Sonic it is, mister." Carlos' voice shook ever so slightly. As if in
answer, the _Champ_ shook, too, as she hit the turbulence. They clung
to their padded seats for a moment as she rolled and plunged, then
relaxed as the barrier was pierced and the thinning atmosphere whined
more and more faintly along her sides.
"Stratosphere clear," Frank sang out. "On orbit."
"Hard fix on the Moon, sir." This from Greta.
"On orbit. Radar fix on the Moon. Get set for turnover." Carlos slid
the throttle quadrant forward. Bells jangled throughout the hull.
Like a seal the ship obeyed her helm. The bulkhead, on which they
were seated, slowly became the left wall of the control room while
the true floor assumed its rightful place and their chairs swivelled
automatically. Otherwise, except for the shift of stars outside the
ports, they scarcely knew that the _Champ_ had attained broadside-on
position.
"Space drive position," called Fritz. "Cut peroxides."
"Peroxides cut." The commander's hands flew over the controls. "Atomics
warming up."
* * * * *
There was a moment when they were weightless and oddly uncomfortable,
as though falling from a great height. Then they returned to normal
with the first faint pulse of the new drive. Beneath their feet,
translucent ports in the floor turned ruddy, then blazed with an
unholy, growing splendor.
"One microsecond deviation from orbit." This from Frank.
Carlos made a quick adjustment. The telltale on the softly-glowing sky
chart centered itself.
"On orbit," the astrogator amended.
"On orbit it is!" The perspiring Commander smoothed his rumpled hair
and nervously adjusted his moustache. "Take over, mister. We've half an
hour before the tubes are hot enough to start revving up to speed. I
must inspect the ship. Come on, Dave."
They found the decks in shining order, with each crew member standing
stiffly at his post. The only damage from turnover had been a slight
shift in a secondary radar antenna caused by a backdraft from one of
the stern jets.
"Greta and I can fix that, sir," Frank suggested.
The operator appeared, swearing her usual blue streak, after Carlos
called her on the intercom. The profanity still burned Frank's ears
through his helmet mike after they had wriggled into bulky spacesuits,
attached tools to hooks on their belts and clumped to an airlock.
"All right, lubbers," the Amazon snarled through the open face plate of
her helmet at crewmen assigned to operate the door. "Get the lead outa
yer pants. Open 'er up."
With hatred in their eyes, the others leaped to obey. The inner
door clanged shut. As the pressure dropped, their articulated suits
expanded with loud pops. Moments later, the outer door slid away
and they clambered up an iron ladder and onto the hull. Their breath
spurting into space as jets of ice particles, they used magnetized
shoes and gloves to creep like beetles along the smoothly welded plates.
As they worked together at the tedious repair a project began to form
in Frank's mind. Perhaps it was the giddy reeling of the heavens about
the ship. Perhaps the compressed air he breathed was too rich in
oxygen. Whatever the cause, he reached the blinding conclusion that
Greta must be the Underground's Agent 542.
It all fitted together. She had a key position on board; she had been
kind to him. Now they were outside the ship and out of range of the spy
rays. Here was his chance....
"Greta," he whispered through the intercom.
"Yeh?" Her helmet swivelled toward him.
At that moment all hell broke loose!
Up from the Venusian cloud blanket only a few miles below spurted
a shower of golden sparks. All else forgotten, he blinked at them
while his heart began pounding. They could only be ... they were
the little globular ships of the Space Patrol. Travelling at four
or five G's--much faster than the speed which the _Champ_ had yet
attained--they started closing in. Ahead of them, he knew, would be
probing their fission torpedoes.
"Smart!" He heard Greta's voice in his ears. "I've got to hand it to
'em." She started scrabbling toward the airlock, cursing bitterly.
"Not smart enough," he answered, his heart sinking. "The _Champ_ will
accelerate and escape them within a few minutes. Then she'll circle
and...."
"That's what you think, bud. Feel the hull."
* * * * *
Carlos was well aware of the danger, evidently. The great ship strained
and heaved under them. Almost at Frank's feet a plate started its
seams. The truth struck him like a blow. The _Champ_ was not built for
close quarters maneuvering. Her mass was so great ... her skeleton was
relatively so weak ... that she was physically incapable of dodging the
flexible patrol boats. And, since her tubes were still comparatively
cool, she did not have the power to outdistance them.
"Come on S.P. Come on, you sons of guns," he whooped, staggering
to his feet as a torpedo caromed into one of the _Champ's_ jets and
glanced off to explode harmlessly several miles away.
"You stinking Pumper!" He ducked as the words ripped through the phone.
The bullet meant for his brain whined against the side of his helmet.
"Luring me out here when I shoulda been gettin' a fix...."
There was no time to shift his shoes. He flung himself sidewise and
just managed to grab the radar operator's wrist as she fired again.
The gun spiralled into darkness and they were fighting breast to breast.
Greta was strong as an ox; she got a grip on his air hose and wrenched
at the connection. He jammed an elbow into her well padded solar
plexus. As she relaxed with a grunt he reached down and tore her
magnetized boots from the skin of the ship.
"Now, my lady...."
She smashed her helmet down upon his in an effort to break its glass
front and suffocate him. With all his remaining strength he untangled
her arms from his neck and hurled her into space. A scream rattled his
earphones ... died slowly into silence!
Fighting for breath, he clung to the hull and gave his attention to
the battle. A suicide dive by the nearest patrol boat ripped two more
blazing tubes from the _Champ's_ side. A lucky torp struck amidships,
boring completely through the _Champ_ and then driving on for several
miles before exploding.... Those warheads must have deteriorated, he
thought bitterly.
Nevertheless the _Champ_ was hurt, and hurt badly. But she was still
accelerating. And she was beginning to fight back.
A torpedo tube twenty feet away swivelled and belched a wicked fish.
Moments later a patrol ship disappeared in a flash which temporarily
blinded the watcher.
That had been only a fission torp, he knew. But what if that crazy
Carlos decided to chance one of the new disintegrators? A hit on one
of the attackers would destroy the whole fleet. On the other hand,
a miss.... As his sight returned he stared down at Venus in growing
horror. If Hans had been right, a miss would explode the planet and
might make the whole solar system go Nova!
He edged back toward the airlock with frantic, sobbing speed. As he
pounded for attention with a spanner, he looked over his shoulder. The
attackers were nearer, but they seemed to be slowing. Why? What was the
matter with the fools? Then he realized that they were moving as fast
as ever but that the _Champ_ was picking up speed. A few more minutes
and she would be out of range.
The outer door closed behind him at last. Air pressure came up to
normal. Then the inner door opened to admit him into pandemonium.
He flipped open his face plate, but shut it at once. This was the
compartment punctured by the unexploded torp and most of its air was
gone. Men screamed thinly and tore at their throats. Others were
struggling into spacesuits. A handful were trying to patch the leaks.
As he looked, one of the latter was sucked through the rent into space.
Cursing his twenty pound shoes, he pounded toward the control room,
gun in hand. He had to stop Carlos.... Had to.... Had to.... He reeled
through the door at last ... and skidded to a stop!
Fritz stood there, straddling the body of his captain. His smoking
automatic was holding the rattled sentries at bay.
The gun centered on the newcomer's heart.
"I'm Captain Sage, S.P.," Frank yelled. It was a long chance.
"Right!" Fritz shot a charging sentry through the head. The others
turned and fled. "I just stopped Carlos in time. Get over to that
radio. Tell 'em we surrender. And then," he added as an afterthought,
"go back outside and bring Greta in. The _Champ's_ mass has pulled her
back to the hull. Saw her peeking through the blister a minute ago. She
looked about ready to burst a bloodvessel with fury."
* * * * *
They found Sadie holding forth in style when they finally managed to
jockey the crippled ex-_Champ_ back into its caisson. The girl had
broken out cases of traskette and she led the Incors of the lab staff
in making the half-hundred S.P. men welcome when they trooped in,
grinning like the youngsters they were.
"The harder they fall!" she chortled. "Just hit the big fellows before
they get their feet planted, my dad always said."
"But how?... When?..." Frank stared at her blankly.
"I took over this joint soon as we heard the _Champ_ surrendered. Mike
has thrown in the towel. The war's over, so drink hearty. And there are
steaks on the fire."
"Don't drink too hearty." Frank swept her pliant body into his arms,
thankful that it, at least, was familiar. "I don't want to waste a
minute hunting up that plastic surgeon so he can give you back that pug
nose and those freckles."
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