Rivets and Sprockets

by Alexander Key

  “Eh? Once, did you say?”

  “Yes, sir. I told Ilium what we’d found, and he was quite excited—especially when I mentioned the make-believe sun and the robot birds.”

  “Robot birds!”

  “Yes, sir,” Sprockets replied solemnly. “All the birds are robot birds. I can tell that without even using my special perceptors. Ilium says it’s given him the answer to the riddle of the Martian canals, which have been puzzling the purple people for a million years.”

  “Yes? Yes? The answer to the riddle?” The doctor was suddenly trembling with excitement. “What is it, Sprockets?”

  “He did not tell me, sir. He said he was sure the answer would be evident when we had explored further.”

  “Then let’s get going!” the doctor cried impatiently. “What in the world are we waiting for?”

  “Your nap, sir. You always take a nap after eating.”

  “But I don’t want a nap!” the doctor burst out. “Don’t you realize how much exploring we have to do?”

  “Certainly, sir. Ilium says we must find the power source before we can find the Something, and that might take hours. It’s getting dark here, sir, and you’ve had a long, hard day—and it’s nearly Jim’s bedtime. I promised Mrs. Bailey I’d see that you both got your rest; she wants you to be wide-eyed and bushy-tailed before you ever get near that Something.”

  They were interrupted by Jim, who came running with a small object in his hand. It was a strange red-and-gold bird, cunningly made of metal. “Hey, Daddy, look! Did you know that these birds are robot birds?” he asked.

  “I’ve just been made aware of it,” said Dr. Bailey. “And I must caution you to put it back exactly were you found it.”

  “Aw, Daddy, I want it! Why can’t I keep it?”

  “Because it undoubtedly belongs to the Something. Bless me, I hope he doesn’t mind the fruit we took.” Dr. Bailey peered uneasily around, and rubbed his eyes when he realized that imitation stars were now glittering where the imitation sun had shone. The singing of the robot birds had quieted, and from them came only drowsy bell-like notes that made the doctor yawn.

  “Why, it’s night already,” he said. “And we didn’t bring a flashlight! I guess we’ll have to take our naps, after all. Keep guard, Sprockets. Wake me the instant you see or hear anything suspicious.”

  8

  They Unravel Riddles

  Jim and his father picked a mound of soft, reddish grass under a tree, and lay down to rest. Presently the doctor’s long steady snores could be heard above the clatter of the brook. Jim didn’t snore, but he muttered and tossed—as naturally he would after eating so many plapples.

  Carefully Sprockets circled the glade. Though he discovered much that made him blink, he was relieved when his instinct button found none of it immediately worrisome. Finally he sat down to watch and wait.

  He wished the doctor hadn’t ordered him to keep guard, for this would have been a good time to recharge. Not that he needed it yet, but something told him that he might not have a chance to do it later.

  Over his radio he could hear Ilium and Leli singing. They were eagerly searching for the power source, which lay somewhere in a vast tangle of passages connecting dozens of curious workshops, all automatic. As time passed, Sprockets began to wonder if the purple people ever took naps. They seemed tireless, and skipped about so quickly, that Rivets had trouble keeping up with them.

  He was about to call Rivets, and ask if his battery was getting low, when his attention was taken by an odd sound in the distance.

  It was a very faint beep-beep-beep.

  For a moment he thought it might be one of the drowsy robot birds, far on the other side of the glade. The sound came again, louder and closer: Beep-beep-beep!

  Sprockets jumped up. Before he could call out or take a step, there was a low hum and whirring, and something unseen rushed below the hillock of trees beyond him. From it came a loud, angry Beep! B-e-e-p! B-E-E-P! Then, with a quick hum and whir, it was gone.

  The racket brought Jim and the doctor to their feet.

  Jim was instantly wide awake. “W-what in the walloping doodads was that?”

  “Great gracious!” muttered the doctor, still a bit foggy. “Who—what—why—”

  “I was unable to see it,” said Sprockets. “But something came and went, very loud and fast.”

  “Bless me! Could it have been the Something?”

  “It was a machine,” said Sprockets. “It hummed and whirred.”

  “And it beeped,” said Jim. “It nearly beeped me out of my skin.”

  “Then it couldn’t have been the Something. This will have to be investigated.”

  “I—I’m not investigating any Beeper,” Jim said uneasily. “At least not till I’ve had some breakfast. What time is it, Sprockets?”

  “As nearly as I can calculate,” Sprockets told him, “it’s seventeen minutes to six, underground Martian time. It’s no longer the same as Martian surface time—which naturally has changed through the years. The imitation sun will be up in fourteen minutes.”

  “Impossible!” exclaimed the doctor. “I’ve hardly slept a minute!” The doctor always said this, even after he had napped for hours. “How do you figure this, anyway?”

  “Quite simple, sir. The Martian day is nearly the same length as an Earth day. The imitation sun is made to rise and set exactly like the real sun, and its purpose is to make underground Mars look exactly like surface Mars—I mean, like the surface of Mars used to look.”

  “Eh? But why?”

  “I’m sure, sir, the reason will be evident as soon as we explore ahead. I’ve been talking to Ilium and Leli. They think they are nearing the power source, and they are very anxious to hear what we find.”

  Dr. Bailey was suddenly wide awake, his nose twitching eagerly. Hurriedly he plucked a handful of plapples, stuck one in his mouth, and started across the glade. Jim did likewise.

  The imitation sky was turning pale as they reached a flight of carved stone steps leading down to a path. The glade ended here. But the path and the underground world were just beginning.

  Before them stretched a long valley. The brook went tumbling through it, and was soon lost in groves of trees where robot birds were beginning to sing. On either side of the valley were hundreds of small houses, as bright as frosted cakes. They nestled into the hillsides, one above the other, all the way up to the sky—or what seemed to be the sky.

  Jim stared at it. “Great crickety crimble!” he whispered in an awed voice. “Now I get it. This is where the Martians came to live!”

  The doctor nodded. “Of course! They dug the canals when the seas dried up, and when the air was nearly gone, they came underground.”

  “B-but, Daddy, that was a long, long, long time ago. So long ago that time has rubbed out everything above us that used to be, except the canals. Why does everything down here look so bright and fresh and new? D’you s’pose the Martians are still living here?”

  As he spoke, the imitation sun peeped over the hill, and the valley suddenly awoke. Sprinklers came on, watering trees and flowers. Dozens of bottle-shaped machines scooted from openings under the houses and began scurrying about, planting, picking, mending, cleaning, painting, and putting things in order. All had six rubbery wheels, two pincherlike arms, and wiggling snouts that could do anything from root in the ground to spray fresh plastic on the houses. When they wanted to climb, they merely hummed mysteriously and rose into the air like bees.

  Other than the bottle-shaped workers, and the robot birds, there was no sign of life. Underground Mars seemed to be inhabited only by machines.

  “I’ll be blessed!” the doctor finally exclaimed. “Sprockets, call Ilium and Leli and tell them—”

  “I’m talking to Ilium now,” Sprockets said hastily. “They’ve discovered the power source. It’s a dilly!”

  Ilium, Leli, and Rivets were all talking at once. “There’s not another like it in the Galaxy,” Ilium was singing. And
Rivets was exclaiming: “All red and huge. Must be a mile across, or anyway yards and yards and yards—” and Leli was adding: “A dozen passages meet here, all different colors—and we’ve found the one that leads to the Something! We want you to come here as quickly as you can. It will be much better if we call on the Something together.”

  Sprockets could feel his circuits tingling. “But how can we find you, Leli?”

  “Get on one of the conveyances—be sure it’s a red one—and it will bring you straight here.”

  “There are conveyances?”

  “Of course! Haven’t you seen one yet?”

  “Does it go beep-beep-beep?”

  “No, but we’ve heard something that does. The conveyances are little automatic cars that stop beside you and tinkle. They save a purplish lot of walking. Blue tinklers follow blue passages—red tinklers follow red. Hurry and catch a red tinkler. We are so glowingly, spectrumly excited we can hardly wait!”

  Sprockets turned quickly to the doctor. “Sir, Ilium and Leli are practically at the door of the Something, and they want us to join them immediately. Leli says that we can reach them easily by catching a red tinkler.”

  “And what is a red tinkler?”

  Sprockets hastily explained about tinklers. “We should find one down the valley, sir. They seem to be waiting by every passage.”

  “I’ll ride in anything that doesn’t beep,” said Jim.

  They hurried down into the valley, searching for a tinkler. One of the little bottle-shaped workers skittered respectfully out of their way, and went humming up the side of a house with a sponge in its wiggling snoot. No one saw the tinkler until it drew up beside them, its tiny bell tinkling invitingly.

  It was shaped like a long peapod, and made of shiny plastic like the houses. There were four seats in it. It floated a foot above the ground on nothing at all—probably, thought Sprockets, on an invisible power wave sent out from the power source.

  “Hey,” said Jim, “this tinkler’s black. We’re supposed to catch a red one—but I don’t see one anywhere.”

  “Maybe we’d better ride in this till we find a red one,” said the doctor. “It might save time.”

  Something told Sprockets that a black tinkler was definitely not the one they should take. But the doctor and Jim were already trying to wedge themselves aboard, and the tinkler was tinkling impatiently and beginning to move. Sprockets leaped inside, and the tinkler shot away so fast they were almost jerked from their narrow seats.

  “W-wow! W-where are we going?” Jim cried, as the houses streaked past in a blur and everything suddenly darkened around them.

  “We’re in a tunnel now,” Sprockets said uneasily. “A black tunnel. I think we’ve taken the wrong tinkler.”

  “We’ve got to stop it!” cried the doctor. “Quick, how do you stop it, Sprockets?”

  “You’re supposed to push a button in front of the seat,” said Sprockets. “But there’s no button here.”

  “T-there are no b-buttons anywhere!” Jim panted. “If we can’t stop it, we’d better jump!”

  “No!” cried Sprockets. “We’re going fifty miles an hour. Don’t you dare jump till I can slow it someway.”

  Sprockets’ metal fingers tore frantically at the strip of plastic under his feet. There must be wires, or possibly power tubes, somewhere in the tinkler that he could loosen.

  As he struggled he was aware of areas of color flashing past, and realized they must be lighted passages crossing their route. The strip of plastic began to bend. Suddenly it snapped. Sprockets called out: “Turn on your force globes! Get ready to jump when I slow it!” The force globes should help cushion their fall.

  His exploring hands touched metal. Instantly a horrid jolt went through him. Sparks flashed. Green fires danced around him, and his circuits began to heat so quickly that it was all he could do to gasp, “It’s slowing—jump as soon as you can—”

  A robot must protect his master even though it completely sizzles his circuits. Poor Sprockets knew he was bound to be sizzled in a matter of seconds, but he tightened his fingers and managed to hang on until he saw the doctor and Jim leap to safety. Then he blanked out.

  When Sprockets was able to blink his eye lights again, the tinkler had stopped and everything was still black around him. He wondered what had stopped the tinkler, and discovered that the piece of metal he’d been holding had finally come loose. And just in time, he thought, or a little robot named Sprockets Bailey would have been melted to an unrecognizable lump, right in the middle of black nowhere.

  He sat up weakly, and realized that the buttons he’d been using had automatically clicked off when his circuits started to sizzle. He turned on his radio button—and immediately flicked it off again with a yelp. “O-o-o-oh! My poor blistering circuits,” he moaned.

  It would be impossible to use any of his buttons until he cooled. Without the help of his buttons, matters could be difficult.

  But his positronic clock was still working, and he was surprised to find that only a half hour had passed since the doctor and Jim had leaped to safety. They couldn’t be too far away.

  Slowly, stiffly, he got out of the black tinkler and turned around, expecting to see only blackness ahead. Instead, the passage was clearly lighted with a soft green glow.

  Incredulously, Sprockets looked back in the direction the tinkler was pointed. There everything was black again. He jerked around and walked a few steps forward. He was astounded to discover that the passage was always black in one direction, and always green in the other.

  “My goodness!” he exclaimed, blinking worriedly. “Why must this be so confusing?”

  Without the help of his cerebration button, it took poor Sprockets’ overheated brain nine full seconds to figure out the reason for the reversible colors, which he decided all the passages must have. This was so you couldn’t get lost in the tangle of Martian passages. If you started out for a pink destination, the way would always be pink till you got there. If you had to return to a yellow place, the right direction would always be yellow.

  He could imagine all sorts of interesting places where the different colors might lead, but he refused to think about the black passage. Some things, he decided, are much better unthought.

  Thankful that he was not color-blind, Sprockets began trudging back toward the valley as fast as his aching legs could carry him. Each step sent a jolt through his quivering circuits, and he wished he could be safely home, so Mrs. Bailey could put an ice pack on his head.

  What could have happened to Jim and the doctor? There was no sign of them as far down the green passage as he could see. Presently he reached the first cross passage, and paused a moment to study it. It had a blue glow on the right, but the glow changed to red when he looked to the left. The power source itself was red—and Leli had said to take a red tinkler to reach it.

  Sprockets hesitated. Could the doctor have turned left here to search for Ilium and Leli?

  His hand crept to his radio button. “Turn it on,” he told himself. “Go on—you’ve just got to!”

  But he didn’t turn it on. A sudden sound in the distance made him stiffen with alarm.

  Beep! Beep-beep! Beep! B-e-e-e-p!

  The Beeper was coming straight toward him, fast.

  9

  They Are Abbled and Plated

  Sprockets flattened against the wall of the black passage. The Beeper rushed humming up to the cross passageway, and stopped short with a questioning beep. It was a jointed beetlelike machine on ten rubbery wheels, larger than a tinkler. It looked extremely fierce with its single eye, and its wide upcurving scoop, like a snout in front.

  The eye turned this way and that, glaring. The scoop swung that way and this, as if horribly eager to scoop something. Sprockets remained motionless, not daring to budge a cog. He hoped the Beeper didn’t have hearing, for surely it would notice his ticking. Suddenly, with a loud whir, the Beeper spun around and looked back down the length of the green passage. It beeped
angrily as if it had missed seeing and scooping whatever it was after, spun about again, and charged noisily past into the blackness.

  Instantly Sprockets darted around the corner into the red passage, and began to run. His circuits were cooler now, and he should have been able to run like a flash, but his feet dragged strangely and it was all he could do to trot. “Oh, dear me,” he said plaintively, “what can be wrong? My battery can’t be down already.”

  But it was his battery, and no question about it. The black tinkler must have drained it in some way. He would have thought the awful shock it gave him would have had the opposite effect. Maybe Martian power worked backward.

  He had only a minute or two left to find a safe spot where he could lie down and recharge. And there wasn’t a hiding place in sight.

  At that moment he heard the Beeper returning.

  “Oh, goodness, goodness,” Sprockets moaned, “I’m going to be scooped for sure this time. This is what happened to the doctor and Jim. They must have been scooped too.”

  Beeping furiously, the Beeper whirled around the corner into the red passage and rushed upon him, its scoop working eagerly. Sprockets tried to run. He could not. His dragging feet stumbled, and he fell against the side of the passage. His hands beat desperately against the hard stone as if he would somehow force an opening where there was none.

  Miraculously, a section of the stone wall slid aside, just as the rock door of the air lock had done when Rivets had knocked politely upon it.

  Sprockets tottered through the opening, too weak to feel any surprise. The section of stone slid quickly back in place, shutting out the angry beeping in the passage.

  Around him now was more noise, and a great deal of movement. Things hummed, whirled, clanged, and thumped. Other things hissed, buzzed, rang, and went ratty-tat-tat. Something snatched at him, and he was lifted up and carried away.

  Oh, mercy me! thought Sprockets. Out of the frying pan, into the fire.…