by Earl
Welton was there ahead of him. “Good boy, Archie!” he cried hoarsely. “That blast took me out of catalepsy like nobody’s business. And that’s about the end of our sweet little pals.”
Together they stared at the abysmal scene of ruin. A great crater yawned just beyond their ship’s nose. There was no sign of the aliens except for one lone figure that picked itself up a hundred feet away and swayed drunkenly. Then it whirled in its dance of energy absorption, stopped, and scuttled away on its spidery legs as fast as it could go.
“Damn,” swore Osgood. “One got away. That’s bad. He’ll round up some more of his fellows and they’ll start it all over. Well, we have exactly four hundred gallons of neodyne, which is barely enough to blow up about sixty-five thousand more of the blasted animated iron-mongery.”
He idly fingered the starting switch of the engine. “If only this ornery machine would——”
A soft roar answered him. They looked at one another in confoundment. Welton dashed for the controls and tested his levers. In answer, the rear rockets greeted his touch with sulfurous drumming. The ship trembled.
“It works again!” Welton announced with a foolish grin.
Osgood grinned just as foolishly, then kicked the wall. “Wade, the irony of it,” he moaned. “Perhaps it was in working condition all the time we were being dragged willy-nilly over this tin world. One concentrated blast from the nose rockets would have blown our reception committee out of the known universe!”
OSGOOD watched planet X change from a bowl of mud to a ball of slate, then dwindle rapidly. “Whew! When will the walls cool off, I wonder? Going through those lines of magnetic force just about grilled me, no less. Good-by, planet X, and good riddance. Say, Wade m’lad, how do you explain the engine working all of a sudden like that?”
Welton sat happily at the controls. “Archie, it’s simple. I can explain everything. Of course, just my own way of explaining, but it’ll do for you, won’t it? That was a sarcastic grunt, Archie, but I’ll skip it.
“You see, the terrific magnetic field down there is not a simple thing like the pretty lines of force shown by iron filings around a small magnet. Oh, no. It is a vastly complicated thing. It’s built up in concentric cones. Now, at the apex of any cone, there is an area under stupendous strain, for metals. We just happened, by that strange law of chance which more often than not pops up at the wrong time, to land at the exact apex of a cone of magnetic force. Consequently, every bit of metal in the ship, and in the engine, was warped under the strain. Even the most slightly paramagnetic metals w-ere influenced in that titanic, colossal. Gargantuan, etc., magnetic field. Thus friction—magnetic friction—kept the engine’s parts locked rigidly. As soon as our friends had moved us from the spot, the engine must have been in working condition.”
Osgood looked sour.
Welton went on loquaciously. “I can explain several other things, too. Our metal bullets did not harm the metal beings because they did not reach them. You see, the speeding bullet, cutting so many lines of force in its flight at such a great velocity, simply melted from hysteresis. Now the comet-gun and why it failed. The comet-gun shoots out a static charge that shocks the victim’s nervous system. Kills him, much like lightning, except that lightning isn’t a controllable beam. But, of course, our X-ians didn’t have any nervous system. Or if they did, it probably carried twice as many volts as our shock-beam! And thus ends the saga of two intrepid discoverers of planet X.”
“Not quite.” Osgood stared curiously at his companion. “For the first time in history, a person in the cataleptic state failed to obey his self-induced command, when I had to bring you into the ship bodily. What in the blue blazes accounts for that?”
Welton’s eyes grew suddenly bleak. “Archie, I’ll never be able to explain that to you. I don’t know myself, except that maybe an inner force stronger than even that hypnotic command wished me to stay there, and keep on—learning. I was just beginning to be able to talk in their language, in the tongue of the cosmos. In the language of laws, equations, and fundamental expressions. Suddenly I realized I could learn from them the first and last law of the macrocosm—that law behind all laws. I fed the aliens all the mathematics I could think of, hoping to draw it from them. I pumped out Planck’s Constant, Einstein’s Formula, Maxwell’s Equation, the basic charge of the proton—everything. I almost got it, Archie. Almost, but not quite. Perhaps I could never get it. Maybe it is beyond human grasp. Those creatures know a law that would fit the universe like a glove. I almost had it——”
His voice faded away. Welton was deep in some maze of thought. “Knowing it, I might have become a superman, the master of the universe——”
“Then why aren’t they?” queried Osgood crisply.
“Because they are slaves of metal. They are like a genius on a deserted island who mentally figures out a way to make gold from cotton, but has no cotton. They know the great law of the cosmos, but can’t apply it in their lack of common, ordinary materials. By the way. Archie, do you know why I think they wanted our ship so badly? Beryllium is sprinkled in their world like salt. Perhaps it is salt to them, as indispensable as salt to us. Our ship may have been just a spice to them. Remember that the cable-thing fastened to our hull with all the earmarks of a greedy animal plumping down on a cake of salt. Or maybe I’m crazy.”
Osgood laughed suddenly. “Wade, if that isn’t a planet because of lack of perturbation, and isn’t likely to be a comet because of its size and mass, what is it? What world have we just been on anyway!”
“It can’t be a planet.” raged Welton, as though lie had been touched off by a hairspring. “Unless all the present-day laws of gravitation—whether Newtonian or later—are mathematical absurdities.” He frowned. “There must be some complicated explanation to it that only the spider chaps back there know——”
FOR FIFTEEN Earth days the Thunderbolt dropped through space. When Ganymede had become a small disc, radio signals began to come through. Osgood transmitted a contact request for MacDuff of Solar Metals Inc., to be relayed via a large station that handled calls from ships. A few hours later MacDuff’s clipped voice answered. He gave a short greeting and stood by for a message.
Osgood reported. “I thought I had great news for you. MacDuff, but I don’t know. The new world would be all metal if it existed. Do you hear me, MacDuff? All metal, from tip to toe. But you see, it doesn’t exist. Welton says it can’t exist or else it would have been discovered long ago by perturbation of Saturn or Uranus. That’s probably over your head, MacDuff. You and Solar Metals Inc. will probably send ships there and dig up a fortune without stopping to realize it doesn’t exist. That’s all. MacDuff. Standing by for your comments.”
Two minutes later. MacDuff’s voice came again, between gusts of laughter. “So that bad you boys worried—no perturbation? Listen carefully. Palomar has just completed a survey of all old star maps and figured it out simply enough. They were able to compute that this planet has an orbit at right angles to the plane of the solar system. Does that help? They have already devised a theory of planet-formations to account for one being there. I’ll meet you at the docks.”
“What are you doing?” asked Osgood curiously, as he turned around.
“Kicking myself. I’m going to spend the next month eating ashes. Naturally. that explains it. With its orbit crossing the plane of the solar system only twice in about forty-five years, and only once in hundreds of revolutions coming near either Saturn or Uranus so——”
Welton groaned miserably, leaving the rest unsaid.
“Buck up,” consoled Osgood. “After all, in calling it planet X, we were dead right. In Roman numerals. ‘X’ means ten, and it is the tenth planet discovered. Of course, if you insist. I’ll help kick you when your leg gets tired.”
THE ANTI-WEAPON
IT came suddenly, but he did not curse his luck. To Dick Elson there was nothing like a good fight—as long as there must be fighting. First the windless, cloudless, s
tratosphere had been of pristine clarity. The war and all its grimy messiness lay far below. Then suddenly, out of nowhere, had appeared three enemy ships with their dragon emblem. They had immediately spread their formation, a pantomime challenge to the lone ship with circle and cross emblem.
“Righto, we fight!” Elson grunted. He shot fuel into his rear rockets and climbed. He must get them one at a time and only speed would do it. At the peak of his climb he jammed the stick back. The little, streamlined ship dipped its nose in a power dive.
Gravity pulled and the rockets pushed. One of the three ships lined up with his nose. At the right moment Elson tripped his gun lever. Out on the prow, the gun spat forth a deadly alpha-charge that ripped into the other ship’s cabin and tore the pilot’s neck half away. Elson’s grim fighting smile was a little sickly as he momentarily saw the gush of blood. Then the shattered ship was out of sight and Elson heard the thrum of an alpha-charge just missing his conning port by a foot.
Some time one of those rustling death-knots of alpha-charges would not miss him. He knew that—realized it—but yet was not bothered by the thought. Elson was fatalist enough to know his own death must one time come, and realizing that, not worry too much about when it came. Somewhere inside he hated the uncertainty of it, as he hated war. With an honest loathing of war and all its misery, he carried on his share in it because he felt that the peace to come was worth it. Peace was a benefit. For any worthwhile thing some price must be paid. His life and the lives of those others—they were the price that must be paid to win that peace. For—so far as he could see—peace lay only on the other side of victory. Victory for His Side, of course. This risk of a death that must come sooner or later anyway was worth it though, because peace——
The second enemy ship loomed before his sights. He crooked his finger—missed. Again the reptilian, scaly rustle of an alpha-charge blasted past his nose. Then another——
He never knew exactly how it happened after that. He had made a quick recovery, veered, only to have the upper surface of his left wing fold inward He dropped. Another deadly charge ripped through his cabin, from ceiling to floor. All his air went out with a rush.
Huh, they’d got him! Oh. well, fortunes of war. Elson felt Mt. Everest on his chest and Niagara Falls in his ears. Then it became night suddenly, in his mind.
The swift drop of his ship from rarefied atmosphere, to denser strata acted as a bellows on Elson’s constricted lung. He recovered his dazed senses while yet a mile above ground. He saw the earth rushing up at him with frightful speed. A demon wind howled past his cabin. Instinctively, he eased back on the stick and fed fuel to his front rockets. But they were dead. Parachute? No, his speed of descent was so great that the thin silk would rip to tatters.
He tried the only thing left—to ease the plummeting ship into a parallel course without buckling his weakened left wing. Fie pulled steadily at the stick, muscles bunched, forehead leaded with sweat. The bowl of Earth slowly dipped past his nose. He heard a sharp snap outside. The left wing sagged a little more, began to flap like a bird’s wing. Any second now——
But Death was elsewhere, gorged. The wing held by shreds. The ship righted. Elson switched on his motor and kept up the minimum speed to prevent stalling. The propeller droned powerfully and carried him along as he looked for a landing.
He must not look too long. Must take the first reasonable chance. Ironically, he was over a city of ruins, all jagged and torn. No safe landing in its debris. Then, in the heart of it, there was a great cleared space, the former landing field of an airport, miraculously clear.
The little fighting ship, flapping its left wing like a great mechanical eagle, glided down and humped along the concrete runway. Its right wheel struck a chunk of masonry that had been blown from a near-by building in the bombardment. The ship uptailed and Elson slid out of his open cabin door, skidded on his leather-covered back for twenty feet, and then rolled another twenty.
HE GOT UP dizzily, then sat down to contemplate the miracle of being alive. An hour later he felt better, though bruised and shaken. He looked around. The ruined city all about seemed utterly deserted; not a sound came from its battered environs. Alpha-charges, proton-blasts. neutron-beams, deuteron-flames and other agents of demolition had done a thorough job. Undoubtedly, electron-rays had swept the streets and byways to heap up the electrocuted dead.
Elson knew the city—knew where he was. This had been an enemy city, razed by His Side. But they had not succeeded in capturing this salient. He was about thirty miles back from the lines, in enemy territory. He would be shot on sight, when discovered. The Atom War was one stripped of all humaneness; a struggle to the finish between the world divided into two great camps, with fighting going on interminable on a dozen fronts.
Elson’s only chance of life was to get back to his own lines. A thirty-mile jaunt through the thickest of enemy forces was unthinkable. He must repair his ship. He could not signal distress with his radio, for the radio had been directly in the path of the alpha-charge that had brought him down.
He hauled out his tools with a philosophical shrug and went to work on the tattered wing. Its gauze-metal covering was intact on the lower side and would furnish sufficient sustaining surface. The task remained to anchor it more solidly to the fuselage. He tightened struts and did some crude welding of torn connections with rocket fuel. Night descended with the job scarcely begun and Elson slept in the cabin, on its hard, metal floor.
He didn’t dream. Those who dreamed during the Atom War went insane.
In the crisp, glowing dawn, Elson decided he was hungry and thirsty—particularly the latter. He started out on a foraging jaunt. He put his slim, black alpha-pistol in his coat pocket within easy reach, and headed for the nearest unblocked street. As he went down the littered avenue, he stared about curiously. He had never before been in a city after its destruction and found it awesome, frightening. He resolutely avoided looking at the queer huddles of charred putrescence he passed. His nose wrinkled. He began to wonder if he was really hungry. But he was thirsty.
He turned at the next block, to keep near the airport field. He jerked his pistol out suddenly. A slinking, wild-haired figure darted from a near-by doorway and scampered ratlike behind the ruins of a stone building that lay half over the street. Elson did not shoot. Evidently the creature—from the look on its face—was a halt-mad scavenger whose mind had been blasted by the bombardment, though his body had escaped. Perhaps he had lost all his loved ones—seen them die before his. eyes. All razed cities contained these scuttling, mindless beings, grubbing among its ruins for food.
The question was—where would food be found? Perishables were long gone, of course. Canned and stored supplies were always stripped from a city by whatever army occupied it immediately after it had ceased burning and crumbling. Elson had an idea when he saw what the wild man had dropped—a can of tomatoes. He turned to the doorway from which he had run. The sign—scorched by some livid flame—barely revealed that this had been a restaurant.
A nauseating stench came from the glassless showfront, nor did it look inviting inside. But Elson went in holding his nose. He ran to the back, where the kitchen had been, and sought the pantry. Sure enough—in here was a nice supply of canned foods that the foraging army had missed or not bothered with in lieu of larger supplies.
ELSON gathered an armful of cans without discrimination and staggered out the back, since that was nearest. Out in a comparatively sweet-smelling alley, he examined his stores and pounced eagerly on the three cans of tomato juice. Kicking the tops in with his booted heel, he drank gratefully.
“Never knew this stuff could be so damned good!” he commented aloud as he gulped down the last can. Then he dropped the empty tin with a clatter. The noise seemed to roll endlessly in the general stillness. Silence again. Suddenly he stiffened at a slight scraping sound, jerked out his gun, crouching for instant movement. Then he gasped and felt a little foolish. Peering at him from behind a heap of s
hattered brick was a girl, her large blue eyes staring from him to the heap of cans and back again.
Elson stood for a moment, stunned at the incongruous picture of beauty in the background of the ugly, battered city. Finely molded features framed by a cascade of honey-colored hair gazed at him quizzically. The misfit men’s clothing—boots, cavalry pants, leather jacket—could not fully hide young, feminine curves. Suddenly the pert nose wrinkled and the girl was laughing softly. Elson felt more foolish.
Somehow, the first thing he thought of saying was, “Say, it’s dangerous for a girl like you to be wandering around alone in this jungle. There’s wild men around who——” He stopped, confused.
“I have a gun,” said the girl, patting her hip pocket. “I take it out when I think I’m in danger.”
“Thanks for the compliment,” retorted Elson. “I’m Dick Elson, of the Other Side to you. You’re a citizen of this city, I suppose. We’re enemies. You’d better go your way, and I’ll go mine.
I’m repairing my ship at——” He bit off his words. No use revealing everything.
“My name is Lorna Davidson,” vouchsafed the girl. “And I’m hungry. I’ve been looking around for food, for myself and my father.” Her eyes were again on the cans at Elson’s feet. He saw that she didn’t look too well fed.
“Here,” said Elson gruffly, “take this stuff—all you can carry. I can get more, in there. You——”
He sprang forward as the girl turned pale and swayed. She was in his arms only a moment, then struggled erect. “It’s nothing,” she murmured. “Just the air and—and——” She was sobbing suddenly, on his shoulder.
When she had recovered, Elson said, “I’m taking you home to your father. But first, something to pep you up.” He crushed in the top of a can of diced fruit with the butt of his pistol, handed it to her. She turned away to hide the fact that she was wolfing it down.
