“But that's preposterous!” Sutter protested. “That jewel is harmless. We'll open another receptacle, revive another Martian.”
“We'll do nothing of the kind,'' Frome snapped. “Preposterous or not, this demands a full investigation. When the first Martian we find commits suicide as soon as we awaken him, I'm going to know why he did it before we awaken another one. Sutter, you and Orsatti pick up his body. We'll take it to the ship, make a complete report to our main base, and ask that a large expedition be sent here. Angus, you lead the way. Sparks, you follow him. I'll bring up the rear.”
He jerked the pistol from its holster. The click as he slipped a cartridge into the chamber was loud in the silent vault. Overruling Sutter's objections, he ordered them from the vault. They obeyed him. As he walked up the incline, he picked up the jewel and swiftly thrust it into his knapsak. He closed the door of the cavern as they left.
In the minds of each of them was a single question: Why did the Martian commit suicide? Why had that jewel scared him so badly? Was death, silent and invisible, here in this haunted city? Had the Martians fled from death?
When tfrey reached the ship they found that death was there ahead of them. They found Shorty Adams curled up under the water cooler in his own galley.
He was dead.
Ill
Sparks found him, and called the others. Frome got there first. His examination of the body was swift, but thorough. “This happened almost as soon as we left the ship. There is no wound on his body, no sign to show the cause of death.
But his face is stamped with the same agony that was on the faces of the first three.”
Methodically he began to search the galley. From an open bin he pulled another jewel.
Frome’s face seemed to freeze. He was still wearing the heavy gloves that are standard equipment in the open of Mars. Handling the jewel gingerly, he raised it up to the level of his eyes, squinted at it. Shaking his head, he said, "I can't tell whether it is the same one we brought into the ship last night."
“Do you think, while we were at dinner, Adams slipped into the other room and stole it?” Sutter asked.
“That is not true,” said Mcllrath flatly.
“How do you know it isn’t. It could be true.”
“I knew Adams,” the old Scot said. “He was no thief.”
“But how did it get out of the ship, or where was it hidden? Are you suggesting it moved of its own accord?” Sutter persisted
“Enough,” Frome interrupted decisively. “Something killed him. I am not prepared to say this jewel was responsible for his death. I’m not prepared to say it wasn’t. But I am saying this: Were going to our main base immediately, where complete laboratory facilities are available, and were going to find out what these damned things really are. Angus, prepare your engines for an immediate take-off. Sparks,” he barked, “warm up your transmitter and make contact with our main base immediately. Report that we are coming in. Get moving.”
Sparks was already racing toward the bow of the ship. As he slid into the seat before the transmitter, he saw, out of the comer of his eyes, the body of the dead Martian where Sutter and Orsatti had dropped it when they entered the ship. The dagger was still sticking from his throat.
The sight sent a touch of eerie chill up his spine. If he had needed anything to remind him that some incredible form of death lurked very near, the sight of the dagger protruding from the Martian provided it.
He snapped the switches, reached automatically for the microphone. When no transformer hum came he snapped the switches again. He was still working with them when Frome entered the room.
“I regret to report,” he said, “that our transmitter is dead. The power seems to have failed.”
Frome stopped in midstride. He would have halted like that if somebody had suddenly pulled a gun on him. “Whats that?”
As Sparks repeated the words, Sutter and Orsatti entered the room.
“But the power for our radio transmitter is drawn from our main engines,” Frome whispered. Then he spun on his heel, brushed past Orsatti and Sutter, and was gone.
“Whats going on?” Orsatti asked bewilderedly.
“I have a hunch I know,” Sparks answered. He pounded after the captain. When he reached the engine room he needed only a glance to see that his worst fear had come true.
"But the engines can’t be dead,” Frome was saying vehemently. “They cant be. It's impossible for uranium fission engines to fail.”
“I know it's impossible,” the old engineer replied stubbornly, “but I'm telling you its happened anyhow.”
Captain Frome faced the tense little group. “Gentlemen,” he said, “I need not remind you that we are face to face with death. Night is coming. We are without power to move the ship or to operate our radio apparatus. There are hundreds of miles of dry, deadly deserts surrounding this city, deserts which we could not hope to cross on foot. We have food and water for two weeks. Unquestionably, when our main base cannot raise us by radio, they will send a rescue ship, but it will be a week before a rescue expedition can reach us. If we are to be numbered among the living when it arrives, the price we will pay for our lives is constant vigilance. Pistols will be issued to all of you. Keep them ready at all times.”
He paused and looked at the engineer. “Angus, you and Sparks will make every effort to determine the cause of our engine failure and to correct it. Sutter, you will do me a great favor if you will take charge of the galley. Orsatti, I would like you to help me.”
“Certainly. What are we to do?”
“We are going to find out what these damned things really are,” Frome answered. He pointed to the two jewels. The biochemist paled.
Working on the engines, it was obvious that the old engineer was trying to conceal his fears. To all questions he returned the same answer, a perturbed shake of the head. “I dinna know, lad. It is as if the uranium has lost its power to explode.”
“But it hasn't been touched. The seals are in place. If anyone had tampered with it, he would have left marks behind him.”
“I know that, lad. And I am remembering that there were no marks on the bodies of the dead men, either.”
“But what could have done it?”
“I dinna know, lad. But we must remember this is Mars. There are strange things here on this planet, things that no man can guess. The Martian committed suicide. That was strange. And those ruby jewels are very strange.”
“But why were our engines stopped? Were we deliberately marooned here?”
“We cannot begin to guess at motivations,” Mcllrath replied uneasily. “This is not Earth. The creatures of this planet may have entirely different reasons for their acts than we have.”
Then the first shot came. Bang, The second one came right behind it.
Somebody was using a gun. His first shot had missed. But he had taken dead aim to make certain the second one did not miss.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Three more shots followed closely on the heels of the second. Whoever was using the gun had missed with the second shot. Now he was emptying the weapon at a charging enemy.
“It’s in the main control room,” Sparks said. “Come on.”
Yanking his pistol from its holster, he raced down the corridor. Mcllrath came right behind him. They almost ran over Sutter as he came out of the galley, a gun in one hand and a kitchen knife in the other. The archaeologist brought up the rear.
Sparks kicked open the door.
Orsatti lay on the floor. Sparks did not need to see the sick agony on his face to know Orsati was probably dead or dying.
Frome was alive. He stood stiffly erect, his feet wide apart, taking aim with his pistol. Flame lanced from the muzzle and the sharp thunder of the shot smashed through the room.
He yanked the trigger again and the hammer clicked on an empty chamber. With a single motion of his arm he threw the weapon at the thing coming at him.
The sight paralyzed the radio operator. What he saw— was impossible
! The thing that moved toward Frome was a two-foot ball of reddish gas. A globe of swirling gas, lit with a baleful red brilliance. The thing glittered with microscopic pinpoints of light. It made a sound as it moved, a high-pitched note like the whine of a distant motor generator.
There were two of the gas balls. One of them was darting toward Frome. The other was down on the floor, on Orsattis body, and the whine coming from it held a gloating note, like a ghoul feeding.
Everything happened in split seconds. The gas ball streaked toward Frome. A thundering explosion smashed Sparks' eardrums. He saw a pistol poked past him and he knew that Mcllrath was firing over his shoulder. He jerked up his own gun and the two pistols spat a salvo.
The gas ball flinched as the bullets hit it, wavered and dodged.
“That’s the medicine,” Sparks shouted. “Hot lead.” He fired again.
Before the third shot had left his gun, he knew the weapon was useless. The gas ball flinched as the slugs hit it, but they passed through it unimpeded. It struck Frome on the chest, clung to him like a leech. His hands jerked up to tear it away, but as it touched him his whole body seemed to be paralyzed, and his arms fell limply. A look of startled agony writhed over his face. His eyes popped open in sudden horror. He screamed and slumped to the floor.
As he fell, he saw the radio operator standing the the doorway.
“Close that door,” he gasped. “Barricade yourself behind it.”
Sparks did not move to obey him.
“Save yourselves,” the weak words came. “Never mind us. We’re done for.” The voice found strength in some hidden sources and Captain Frome rasped out his final command. “That’s an order. Obey it.”
He was the captain. His authority was final.
“Obey it, hell!” Sparks snarled. He leaped into the room, Mcllrath and Sutter right behind him.
What happened next was always afterward a blur in Sparks’ mind. As a boy he had fought bumblebees in the meadows of Earth. This was something like fighting bumblebees, except that this bee was deadly. Slapping, slugging at the reddish mass of gas on Frome’s chest, they tried to tear it loose. To touch it sent jarring needles of pain up their arms. Their hand smashed through it. It swirled and reformed.
But when the fight was over, Captain Frome was on one side of the door and a reddish mass of gas was singing angrily on the other.
And Sparks was turning back to the door. When he came out the second time, he had Orsatti’s body in his arms. He had enough strength left to lay the biochemist down. Then his legs buckled under him and he collapsed.
IV
When he recovered consciousness the old engineer was dribbling whiskey into his mouth. He tried to sit up but Mcllrath pushed him back.
“Lie still, lad, until ye get your strength back.”
“But those gas balls.”
"Lie still and I'll tell you what weve decided about them.”
"But where are they?”
"Forward in the control room whining to each other. Captain Frome thinks he has found out what they are.”
"Captain Frome? How is he?”
"Weak as a kitten, but we think he’ll live. He says the gas balls came from the ruby jewels, that while he and Orsatti were working with the crystals they suddenly turned to gas right before their eyes—”
"But that’s impossible.”
The old Scot shook his head. "Captain Frome says the gas balls and the crystals are two different forms of the same life species. He thinks they are similar to the cocoon and the butterfly that we know back on Earth. The crystal is the cocoon stage. The ball of gas is the butterfly stage. He says he thinks they live on radiant energy, and that they attack our engines and us for the same reason.”
“But—” Sparks choked off his protest. Frome was a thoroughly capable physicist. And he was not given to idle statements. If he made a statement, he had a good reason to back it up. “What connection is there between our engines and us?”
“There is this connection, lad. The source of power in our engines is the radioactivity of the uranium atom. The source of the energy that keeps the human heart beating is the element potassium, which is slightly radioactive. If you removed the uranium from our engines, they won’t generate power. If you remove the potassium from our bodies, our heart stops beating.”
“But the uranium was not removed from our engines, and the bodies of the dead men show no marks of any kind. How was the potassium removed without leaving a mark?” “It is not the uranium or the potassium that is removed. Captain Frome says these gas balls live on the radioactive emanations, the alpha beta, and gamma rays, discharged by these elements, leaving them inert. Just as a leech sucks blood, they suck the radioactive discharges. Are you feeling better now, lad?”
Sparks sat up. A wave of dizziness sent his head spinning, but he forced himself to his feet and walked over to where Captain Frome lay on the floor. Frome's eyes were closed and he was breathing in slow, gasping sobs.
Sutter was bening over Frome. “His heart is barely beating,” the archaeologist said. “Those damned things almost sucked the life out of him.”
Sparks said nothing. He walked to the nearest port and looked out. Swift dusk was falling over Mars. Sharp shadows were creeping over the city. Blobs of darkness were huddling behind the buildings. Night was coming over this city where for centuries red death had patiently waited for the last of the Martians to awaken.
The men of Mars had not taken refuge in frozen sleep to escape a drought cycle. They had fled from a deadly enemy. The Martian had committed suicide when he saw that jewel glittering the sunlight at the entrance to the cavern. He had known what it was. He had preferred to die by his own hand rather than face a more agonizing death.
A movement in the shadows caught his eye. He looked again, to make certain he had not been mistaken. Then he saw what it was—a ball of red gas drifting along a foot or so above the sand. It came out of the shadow and moved directly toward the ship.
Another dead butterfly had emerged, another cocoon had burst.
But they were safe. The stout steel hull of the ship would protect them until a rescue expedition could arrive. They had plenty of food and water. Even if a thousand cocoons released their drifting death, they could not get through the walls of the ship.
Someone breathed heavily behind him. Turning, Sparks saw Angus looking out over his shoulder. The old engineer squinted at the drifting ball of gas. “Another one? I was afraid there would be others. Those two behind that door in the control room have been squealing as if they were calling to others of their kind.”
“Do you think they can call others?”
“I dinna know, lad. Back on Earth the moths do it and I doubt if yon red devil came here because of idly curiosity.”
The radio operator followed the red monstrosity as it drifted out of sight. He shivered, and said, “Well, were safe here.”
“About that, I dinna know either,” Mcllrath answered, shaking his head.
It was not so much what he said but the way he said it that sent a sudden chill to the radio operator's heart. But Angus refused to answer his questions. Instead the engineer led him down the corridor to the control room. The door was still blocked. It was a stout sheet of aluminum alloy.
Putty had been plastered around the cracks.
"While you were still unconscious,” Mcllrath explained, "those devils began to ooze through the cracks between the edges of the door and the facing. We stopped them up with a bit of putty, but—”
"But whatl” Sparks exploded. "You surely don't think they can come through that door?”
"I think they can't, lad,” the old Scot answered, *but I remember that door the Martians built to seal their cavern. It was at least a foot thick. But the outer surface was pitted with holes that were almost six inches deep, as if something had tried to eat its way through the barrier, and had failed. It wasn't rust, either, for in this cursed dry desert metal will scarcely rust. So something else must have eaten th
ose holes in that door, and the only thing that could have done—”
He broke off to stare in slowly mounting horror at the door they were facing. At the same instant Sparks saw what was happening.
A tiny smudge had appeared on the gray surface. It looked a little like a drop of acid. It was about the size of a dime, and it was growing in size. As it grew it turned distinctly reddish.
"They are eating their way through the door!” Sparks whispered. He started to slap at the reddish spot but Mcllrath knocked his hand away. The engineer seized a wad of putty from the floor and slapped it over the spot. It ceased growing. On the other side of the door an angry whine sounded. "Damn you,” he grunted. "That stops you this time.”
"Yes, but for how long?” Sparks whispered.
Mcllrath didn't answer.
Sutter came running through the corridor. “I just wanted to tell you,” he panted. “There are a lot of those things outside. They re doing something to the glass in the portholes, and—”
They didn't wait for him 16 finish but raced back to the stern of the ship. A glance showed that the archaeologist was right. Dozens of blobs of glistening gas floated over the ship. A few were clamped over the glass of the ports. Under the action of some acid they secreted, it was flaking away.
Nobody said anything, but each knew that doom was coming toward them. Slowly but surely the glass in the ports would be disintegrated. If they closed the ports with metal, the monstrosities would eat through the metal. There was no place in the ship that promised safety, with the possible exception of the cook’s galley, which was in the heart of the ship and protected by metal barriers on all side. In time even those barriers would fall.
“There’s got to be some way to whip those devils,” Sparks grated.
Sutter was twitching as if he had the palsy.
Only the old engineer was calm and he spread his hands in a hopeless gesture. “Yes, lad, there probably is. But guns didn’t work—”
“Sparks,” a weak voice whispered. The radio operator jerked around to see who was calling him. He saw Captain Frome. The captain had spoken. "What’s happening?”
Adventures on Other Planets Page 26
