by Don Wilcox
“—stands before you this punto to ask the permission of the Carnage Ring and the Draz-Kang population to deal with each of these six prisoners—her own prisoners by every right—in whatever manner she desires.”
The speaker bowed and retired, and the multitude responded with a terrific ovation. Then the people began to leap to their feet, shouting, waving, stomping. Vida the Beautiful stepped forth, extended her arms. The mob silenced.
“Your cheering,” the girl spoke into the microphone, “indicates that you are willing to grant my request. (Another outburst of cheer.) It is with extreme pleasure that I choose my method of dealing with these six guests from the White Comet Union. Let me first review their crimes, as proved to the satisfaction of the Carnage Ring. These four—”
She pointed to the four prisoners who sat to the right of Theban.
“These four were White Comet officers who sought my friendship and begged my confidences so that they could gain valuable information to be used in their war against the Draz-Kangs. Fortunately I was able to bring on a sight-seeing tour to the dead crater, where they have since remained to enjoy our scenery.”
These words brought a wave of laughter and applause,
“This man,” she pointed to Theban, “has been responsible for driving us and our fellow Draz-Kangs out of our strongholds, one after another. When I have dealt with this man, we will be through with one of our most dangerous enemies. And this man—”
She pointed to Ilando.
“This man is one of the most dangerous persons I have ever encountered. He pretended to be a convert to our cause; but upon the first occasion that he was put to a test, he resorted to deceit and trickery to betray us.
“And now for my plan of punishment—”
The multitude waited breathlessly, expectantly.
“I have decided to mete out to all six the same treatment.”
An impressive silence. The eyes of the audience glowed with bloodthirsty eagerness.
“I have decided to give all six a chance to live—”
A low sullen groan of disappointed Draz-Kangs rolled throughout the underground world.
“—a chance to live—a chance to escape—by climbing over the crater wall!”
A wild joyous uproar rocked the caverns as the crowds leaped to their feet, shouting, laughing like demons, letting themselves go in a torrent of fiendish jubilation.
It was a three-mile trek across the yellow swamp to the point where such crater-climbings were held. Most of the Draz-Kangs wore wide flat swamp shoes. The Carnage Ring and some of the dignitaries, including Vida, were conveyed in swamp sleds. The guards marched, and before them marched the six prisoners.
“She’s got some plan,” Ilando kept whispering to Theban all along the way. “She and I are going to run out on this party somehow. We’ve pledged to each other—you don’t believe me, Theban. Just wait, you’ll see!”
Theban kept consulting his watch. Now and then he turned his head for a quick backward glance. The mountains gave him his bearings. He knew he was being taken to a point diametrically opposite the spot where he had made his tests.
The point, when it was reached, proved to be a sharply inclined gash that cut back through the vertical two-hundred-foot wall. From all outward appearances it could easily be ascended.
The crowd divided into two long lines that crowded thickly toward the crater walls and heaped upward on the lower rocks that bordered the lower end of the ascent. As the moment for action drew near, the multitude set up an excited rhythmic clamor that was to continue throughout the executions.
The six prisoners, closely inclosed by guards, took their positions in a row twenty-five or thirty yards from the foot of the incline.
Vida stood near them. She was to have the honor of giving the orders. Back of her were the fifteen members of the Carnage Ring, stationed on a slight angle so that they could witness the races to advantage.
“Number one, step forth,” Vida ordered. A prisoner stepped forth. The guards aimed their flame guns, pulled the triggers. The flames hissed against the ground in a semicircle back of his feet.
“Go!” Vida called.
The prisoner raced up the mountainside.
Theban stole a glance at his watch. His heart leaped. By a stroke of luck—according to Theban’s calculations—the first prisoner would cut through the invisible gate if he didn’t slack his speed—
Prisoner number one fell lifeless, rolled down a few paces, came to rest against a jutting rock.
“Number two!” Vida called out against the wild blood-thirsty uproar. “Go!”
Number two ran like a deer. Fifty or sixty feet upward he tried to angle off on an odd course, but white ropes of flame shot past him on either side, like railings, to hold him to the path.
Death caught him—at the same elevation where it had struck the first prisoner—and he slipped into a ravine, lay there with one arm sticking up in the air.
“Vidal” Ilando called in a voiceless whisper. Shaking, bloodless, he edged toward her. “Vida, your plan—”
Vida’s eyes flicked toward Ilando, she gave him a slight wave of the hand that was meant to reassure him; at the same time a hint of mocking sarcasm touched her lips.
Ilando’s eyes danced with mad terror. He thought he saw prisoner number three try to exchange a sign with Vida. Prisoner number three got the same trifling wave of reassurance that he had got.
Then prisoner number three raced up the ascent and fell limp like a shot dog, and the crowd screamed with delight.
Ilando turned to Theban, caught a glimpse of the watch.
“You know this deal, Theban!” Ilando’s breath hissed.
“I don’t know anything!” Theban retorted.
“You do. For God’s sake, don’t let me down—”
“I’ve never let you down—”
“Then tell me when to run, dammit, you’ve got to—”
“My turn comes ahead of yours,” Theban muttered. “You’ll see me die, just like the others—”
“You know the secret. You’ll get through. Signal to me from the top!”
“I would to God I could!”
“Look!”
The crowd broke out in a pandemonium of agonized wails and boos. The mass of bodies weaved and the hundreds of arms pointed. Prisoner number jour was running through!
All the way he ran—on and on—to the very top of the ascent. The guards shot their flame guns at his heels—at his body—but he dropped into a nook of protecting earth, rolled his burning clothes in the soil, made a swift leap over the final mound and was gone.
Suddenly the noise of the crowd leaped into the high shrill pitch of screaming and shrieking. Vida was no longer at her post.
Vida was on her way toward the ascent of death. Vida the Beautiful, Vida the heroine of the Draz-Kangs, was riding up the incline—in the arms of prisoner number six—Ilando Ken.
Vida was screaming and fighting, dui Ilando Ken clutched her with steel muscles that wouldn’t let go. Up—up—running—faster-faster—
The flame guns shot white hot ropes on either side of him. Ilando Ken crushed the girl closer within the protection of his arms, fought to keep her out of the flames that began to engulf his own clothes—
It happened as instantaneously as it had happened each time before. The two bodies simply fell limp.
Both bodies rolled down toward a ravine at one side of the ascent; and as they rolled, the flames that had threatened them were extinguished. Abruptly the body of Ilando stopped. The form of the girl came to rest across the young guardsman’s outstretched arm.
A long period of confusion followed. Theban was too much stunned to know just what had happened. He had dazedly looked on while some Draz-Kang officials had recovered the body of Vida the Beautiful; he vaguely realized that they had dragged her down the incline a short distance by means of ropes, that they had borne her to the edge of the crowd . . .
But now his senses sharpened to brittle edges
. The Carnage Ring’s voices were shouting in harsh bitter tones, and the crowd was coming to order.
“The least we can do for Vida,” the spokesman shouted, “is to finish up this ordeal—as she herself would have finished it.”
There was a silencing moment. Theban felt the hundreds of eyes turn toward him. The guards ushered him out in front of their line and made ready with their flame guns.
“Go!” the spokesman cried.
Theban obeyed. He moved at a slow pace—as slowly as the flame guns would let him. They did not hurry him. Nor did the crowds clamor for a faster race. Their hilarious mood had fallen with the fall of Vida.
Theban stalked on. The death level, he knew, was only a few paces ahead of him. He glanced at his watch. A thousand thoughts raced through his mind—his meeting with Ilando—the lame old Marshal up on the planet Frigio—the black dye on Ilando’s hands—the deserters whom he, Theban, had sent to the firing squad—
He glanced at the watch again.
Those endless decis that he and the mountaineer had spent experimenting with the wheel of death were all lost now. His mind was only a welter of confused figures. The mountaineer had been right about it—there was no infallible regularity to the death spokes—Three more steps would bring him to the fatal level. He drew a deep breath as if to make a dash for it. Then, instead, he stopped.
He stopped, bent down and picked up the limp body of Ilando Ken, placed it upon his shoulder. With calm dignity he walked upward into the realm of death—
Above the rising chatter of impatient onlookers he heard the distant clap of thunder. Perhaps it would be the last sound—
But he was already within the range of the death beams—he was still alive—he still had a chance—
Like something out of a cannon he flew up the hillside—up—up—
At least he had lived long enough to hear a second clap of thunder—and a third—
He was almost through the danger zone. The flame guns were not chasing him. Why not?
He shuffled the body of Ilando for a better grip, bounded upward with all his strength—upward—upward—he was out of it!
Never did he look back until he had crossed the last summit of the ascent over the crater’s edge. Then, when no flame guns had yet splashed fire at him, he laid the body of Ilando Ken down tenderly, crept back to the edge—and stared!
The crowd was not watching him. It had turned with one accord to view the approaching storm. But the storm was not coming out of a cloud—
It was coming out of a space ship—a huge, slow-cruising white boat bearing the insignia of a white comet on a blue diamond. And the thunder that Theban had heard was being dropped from that boat in the form of explosive bombs,
Where was the tower that had sent out the death beams? It was gone. No wonder Theban had passed safely through the Crater Killer . . .
Before darkness, a small plane swooped down to pick up Theban and the bodies he was guarding. As he soared aloft, he caught a bird’s eye view of the scattered groups of Draz-Kangs fleeing over the mountain tops.
“Wonder where they’ll go now?” Theban asked.
“From what I know of them mountains, they’ll come right back to their crater,” said a familiar voice; and Theban turned to see his old friend the mountaineer blinking gently from the rear cabin seat.
“They’ll come back to surrender,” the purgier at the controls declared. “We’ve plugged the entrance to their nest, and we’ve got troops coming in by planes yet tonight to round them up. The real job was cracking that deathtrap. But between your mountaineer friend’s message and your writing in the swamp we knew exactly what to do—and more important, what not to do.”
“Then you read my writing?” Theban asked. “I had a wonderful time wallowing around in that yellow mud.”
“Look down,” said the pilot. “You can see the fancy job of lettering you did.”
Theban gazed down and saw the irregular lines of black water across one side of the yellow floor. The letters were badly twisted but still legible. They spelled the words, “DON’T LAND. DROP BOMBS” And there was a small signature: the figure of the white comet surrounded by a diamond.
Theban drew a long breath, rubbed his hand wearily across his stubble.
“What were you saying about the young guardsman,” the pilot asked, “the one you took to be your assistant?”
“I simply said that he died while doing an important service for the White Comet Union,” Theban said quietly. “I hated to lose him . . . And still—well, he was afflicted with a strange malady—a partial blindness of a sort. Life would always have been pretty unbearable for him. And as I said, he died most heroically.”
There was a little silence. The plane sped toward the Bronze Planet capital.
“Say,” the mountaineer spoke up with good humored cackle. “I wonder if maybe I’m the only one of me in history. Huh?”
“The only one of you?” Theban echoed.
“Yes sir, see this badge they give me for meritorious service? I got that for chasing rabbits. You think that ever happened before? I doubt it.”
[*] For the sake of uniformity, all the planets of the White Comet Union employ the same time system based upon the punto, or rotation time of the Planet Bronze. Hence, the punto corresponds to the Earth’s day; the decipunto, or simply decitenth of a punto is the major division of time within a Bronze day, corresponding roughly to our hour though somewhat longer. Other units of time follow in regular metric order. Thus, the centi-millipunto is a very brief unit of time, a hundred-thousandth part of a punto, or approximately equal to our second. The audible ticking of Theban Hyko’s watch coincided with the passing of successive centi-millipuntos.
BATTERING RAMS OF SPACE
First published in Amazing Stories, February 1941
Like hellish demons these ships roared out of space to blanker Earth with fiery gas; and the lives of millions depended on Lester Allison, June O’Neil, and the battering rams!
CHAPTER I
“Until these stone walls crumble away,” the beautiful girl in Lester Allison’s arms breathed.
The torchlights glowed upon the red rock walls and shone in June O’Neill’s face. The devotion in her dark eyes was the very heart of Lester Allison’s new-found world.
“We’ll be married this very hour,” said Allison softly.
Together they had braved death in these underground chasms of Mercury. Allison had undergone the fatal ritual of the Floating Chop, outwitted his would-be executors and come out alive. Together he and June O’Neill had survived the devastations of Mercury’s strange war.
Now the Mercurians were all gone. The slate of the former civilization had been wiped clean. A new civilization waited to be born.
They wended their way down the hewn-stone staircase. Their brief neat-fitting garments of red and white metallic mesh swished slightly as they walked. They would find Smitt and Mary and the three other couples at once. It would be a five-couple wedding—a simple declaration of vows, each in the presence of the others.
A dull roar sounded from far up the space ship runway, and Allison and June looked at each other and smiled. It seemed humorous, somehow, for the empty robot ship which had been transporting the freed Earth slaves back home, to roll back into port for its final load. The final load—the five couples—would never go back. They had decided to remain on Mercury.
“We’ve found our own little corner of the universe,” June mused. “We’ll let the rest of the worlds go by.”
Allison’s smile vanished and his strong face showed a flicker of worry. The roar of the approaching ship had an unfamiliar ring.
Perhaps it needed overhauling. Perhaps—
But in another minute, it would roll into view in the spacious red-walled cavern known as the Red Suburb. Allison and June strolled on.
The robot ship had taken all the other survivors of the Mercury slave raids back to the earth. These five couples had been chosen by Allison for the final load
. He had chosen with care. And then, as he had hoped and planned, they had made the momentous decision: they would forsake the earth in favor of these deep rich caverns of Mercury.
Not only had nature favored these caverns. By a curious twist of fortune a genius of science, recently deceased, had established what was perhaps the world’s most unique laboratory here. Allison and his little party had inherited it. And the secrets that went with it. And the amazingly facile machines that rolled out and fashioned the marvelous and inexhaustible red and black metals.
Already Allison and the other four men, all of them mechanically minded, had delved into the laboratory mysteries and gone to work on blueprints of their own.
“Listen!” Allison stopped short. “That roar—”
June paled. “That can’t be our robot ship!”
The torches along the runway flickered, deep shadows on the high red walls wavered. The low-roaring ship rolled into view.
It was a huge silvery fighting ship with an ominous-looking gun poised over its nose—a stranger!
“To the shadows!” Allison gasped, seizing June by the hand.
“Through the shadows they ran. They fled over the dark upper paths toward the red metal door of the laboratory stronghold. The four other couples raced in and the heavy door closed.
“That’s no Earth ship!” someone gasped.
It was well known that the earth hadn’t got far in its attempts to build space ships. The robot ship, built in this very laboratory, was far superior to any Earth-made product.
But this big silvery newcomer was the grandest thing Allison or any of the others had ever seen. And the most terrible. Its huge spotlight roved over the cavern walls curiously. The ten onlookers shrank back from the laboratory window, even though they were well concealed by a camouflage of filigreed rock and many yards of distance.
“I don’t like the look of that gun,” said Smitt.
The silvery space ship came to a stop, then began slowly turning around in its tracks.
