Rebels of the Red Planet
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Nuwell Eli sat with Placer Viceroy, director of the Canfell HydroponicFarm, in its large underground dining room, eating lunch. This meal wasnot the tasteless, gelatin-like food that was fed to the Jellies andToughs and sold on the Martian market. It was a meal of thick, juicysteaks from the dome farms around Hesperidum and vegetables from thegardens inside the Mars City dome.
"We've been here better than a week, and she's still stubborn," Nuwellsaid morosely. "Surely she has the intelligence to realize howridiculous and impractical is her sudden conversion to a lost rebelcause. I'm half convinced that this Kensington fellow put her under somesort of a hypnotic spell."
"You've been very gentle in your methods of conversion," said Placer."It isn't like you, Nuwell. If you want quick results, we could turn herover to the Toughs for a while."
"No, I don't want her hurt. I love the woman and intend to marry her.The whippings and humiliations are as far as I'm willing to go."
"A peculiar sort of love, if you don't mind my saying so," remarkedPlacer.
Nuwell stared at him coldly.
"I do mind your saying so," he said. "My personal emotions are notsubject to your interpretation. But Martian wives are expected to obeytheir husbands with deference and, by Saturn, I'm going to break her ofthat liberal terrestrial training!"
"You'd have the legal right to take the steps necessary for that, if shewere married to you," Placer pointed out.
"But the little fool refuses to marry me now!" exclaimed Nuwell inexasperation. "If she hadn't refused, do you think I'd have brought herhere? But I couldn't take her to one of the cities, except as a prisonerto be tried for sedition and treason, as long as she expresses thisviolent and open support of the rebel cause. Whether you consider itlove or not, I want the woman for myself. I don't want her imprisoned orexecuted."
"Perhaps if she were presented with that alternative, she'd be morereasonable about it," murmured Placer.
"Don't you think I've threatened her with it? She just says that she'drather die or go to prison than go back on her convictions and knuckleunder to me. If she could only forget that she'd ever met that manKensington!"
"Well, as for that, it might not be so hard to arrange," suggestedPlacer quietly.
Nuwell stared at him.
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"You're not familiar with the details of our work here, are you,Nuwell?"
"I thought I was, pretty well. But what you just said doesn't strike achord."
"As you know, the Toughs and Jellies are originally criminals andvagabonds you have smuggled to us for experimental purposes. One majoreffect of our initial glandular experiments with them, which makes theminto Toughs and Jellies, is that they lose all memory of their past."
"I don't want a flabby woman, like a Jelly!" exclaimed Nuwell with ashudder.
"I think we could eliminate the memory, permanently, without anyphysical changes at all," said Placer. "There are some pretty goodscientists here. I expect the operation would cut down her thinkingability pretty heavily, though. I think it would still be slightlyhigher than that of the Jellies, but you couldn't ever expect her againto get above the intellectual level of a child of six or eightterrestrial years."
"I don't care anything about an intelligent woman," answered Nuwellruthlessly. "If she weren't so proud of her intelligence now, I wouldn'thave so much trouble with her. I want her as a beautiful woman, which isall a woman has a right to expect from a man, and if she were lessintelligent and more tractable I might be able to train her to becomethe sort of wife a man of my profession and position requires."
Placer speared a bite of steak, casually, with his fork.
"Any time you say the word," he said carelessly.
"I'll give her the rest of today," said Nuwell with decision. "I'll workher over again with the whip this afternoon, and if she doesn't breakI'll tell her what she can expect. Then, if that doesn't do the trick,I'll turn her over to you the first thing tomorrow."
"Tonight would be better," suggested Placer. "The initial surgery takesonly about thirty minutes, and she'd do better to rest a night afterthat. It alone will remove a great deal of her volitional power. Theentire series of operations will require about three days."
"Tonight it is, then," said Nuwell, "if she doesn't break thisafternoon."
Maya sat in her locked room, her tunic and trousers covering the redwelts on her back and legs. The tasteless gelatin which had been heronly food since their arrival almost gagged her with every spoonful, butshe had eaten all her lunch. She needed all the strength she could getto maintain her defiance.
She was in the grip of dull, unrelenting pain, physically andemotionally. Her flesh ached from yesterday's beating, and she was sickat heart at the revelation of Nuwell's essential brutality andcallousness. She had thought him a sensitive and intelligent man, andshe had admired him for this even after some of his exhibitions ofchildish temper had disillusioned her as to the glowing nobility whichshe had at first attributed to him.
She had felt a warm attraction to him and, when she thought Dark wasdead, she had been willing to marry him on the basis, not of thepassionate love she now felt for Dark, but of a mellow tenderness whichshe conceived a sound basis for an understanding life together.
But now! She shuddered at the thought that she might have married him,and perhaps lived all her life with him, thinking him to be gentle andkind. Whatever happened to her, she felt fortunate that this crisis hadbrought to her view the hidden side of him, that heretofore had beenseen only by his partners in political manipulation and by theunfortunate victims of his prosecution.
Her shoulders drooped wearily. She stared across the room. It was asbare as a prison cell, which intrinsically it was.
There was a glass on the washbasin. It was made of heavy metal, with nosharp edges. Did Nuwell think she would commit suicide? Not as long asshe knew Dark was alive!
Her mind touched the glass. It quivered. It tilted and fell to the floorwith a clang.
She looked at it with mild curiosity as it rolled into a corner. Shehadn't done that for a long time, not since she suppressed it because ofNuwell's hatred of witchcraft.
It was telekinesis. She had had the power since she was a child. Itseemed that she remembered using it often, and in rather startling ways,when she was a small child with the Martians. But when she went toEarth, she gradually stopped playing with it, except in small ways whenshe was alone, because it seemed to make her elders very uncomfortable.
Telekinesis was ESP. It did not mean that she had any other ESP powers.But there was her experience in the copter....
Her mind reached out. At once, like a shock, she was in contact withDark. His mind turned to hers at once.
Dark: _Maya! Where are you?_
Maya: _Come into my room, darling. I'm at the Canfell Hydroponic Farm.Are you still at Ultra Vires?_
Dark: _No, I'm in the vats below you. I knew you were here, but I didn'tknow where. I can see your room now, though, and its place in thebuilding._
Maya: _Can you free me?_
Dark: _Not now. There are four Toughs outside your door, guarding it. Ican't attack them without arousing the Masters. Soon, though._
Maya: _I don't know how I'm doing this. I didn't know I had telepathicpowers._
Dark: _A good many people have them, potentially. They don't have tohave been "changed," as I was. But they usually require development._
Maya: _I'm just glad I can, to know that you're here._
Dark: _Maya, why are you in pain?_
Maya: _Nuwell has been whipping me, to try to get me to recant on myexpressions of support for the rebel cause._
There was a white-hot explosion in her brain that almost literallyseared her mind. Staggered at its impact, she recognized it as theexplosion of Dark's sudden anger. Then she was no longer in contact withhim.
A hundred feet away, in another room, Nuwell pulled on a pair of blackgloves and picked up a short, thick-lashed whip. Coil
ing the whip, hestepped out into the corridor, and turned toward Maya's room.
He met Placer, walking in the opposite direction.
"You're going to make your last try, now?" asked Placer.
"Yes," replied Nuwell. "I hope it works. Actually, her spirit and quickwit are among the reasons I like the girl. But I don't intend to bedefied in this."
He proceeded on down the hall.
As he started past the barred gate to one of the ramps leading down intothe vats below, the buzzer beside it sounded. A Jelly was standingbehind the gate, fat, pathetic face pressed against the bars.
Nuwell stopped. No one else was in sight in the corridor.
"What do you want?" he asked the Jelly.
"Master, I seek entry in answer to the summons," replied the Jelly in avoice that quavered with fright.
"What summons?"
"It was ordered that one of us come above and do a task for theMasters," replied the Jelly. "I am one of those who must work today, andI have come in answer to the summons."
Nuwell looked up and down the corridor. He saw no one.
"What sort of task?" he asked, reluctant to accept the responsibility ofadmitting the Jelly.
"I don't know, Master."
"Look," said Nuwell, "I'm not a Master. I don't know anything about thesummons. Someone else will have to let you in."
"If I'm late, they'll let the Toughs whip me!" wailed the Jellypathetically. "Please let me in, Master!"
Nuwell, the whip coiled in his hand, impatient to get to Maya's room,was moved to pity at the creature's plight. Besides, the Jellies wereharmless, and this one certainly wouldn't be seeking admittance withouthaving been called.
"All right, then," said Nuwell, and flipped the switch.
The bars grated open and the Jelly came into the corridor. But as Nuwellreached out to activate the switch and close the gate, the Jelly, withsurprising agility, slipped between him and the switch.
"What in space?" growled Nuwell. "Get out of the way!"
The Jelly did not move.
"I said get out of the way!" snapped Nuwell, shaking out the whip.
The Jelly cringed and its eyes were terrified, but it still stoodagainst the switch, its huge, translucent body barring Nuwell.
"No, Master," it whimpered. "Don't shut the gate!"
Viciously, Nuwell slashed the whip across its naked shoulders, and theJelly squealed with pain. Nuwell raised the whip again.
But then through the open gate there poured a solid mass of translucentflesh, a horde of naked Jellies. Silently, they tumbled into thecorridor, filling it from wall to wall, and others behind them pushed toenter as they paused.
Wide-eyed, Nuwell stared at them for the briefest of moments. Then hedropped the whip and fled back up the hall, shouting at the top of hisvoice.
The door at the end of the corridor opened as Nuwell neared it, andPlacer appeared in it. He held up a restraining hand.
"Don't make so much noise!" he snapped. "There's a conference going onin there. What's the--"
Voiceless now, Nuwell grasped Placer's arm and pointed, trembling, backdown the corridor.
"What in space?" demanded Placer irritably, peering at the mass ofJellies pouring out of the gate and beginning to move hesitantly alongthe corridor in both directions.
"Jellies!" croaked Nuwell. "The Jellies are loose! They're attackingus!"
"Soft hunks of blubber!" said Placer contemptously. "They can't hurtanybody. I wonder what idiot left that gate open?"
"I did," admitted Nuwell. "I mean, one of them wanted in and I let himin, and then he backed up against the switch so I couldn't close it,until the others came in."
"I don't know what sort of harebrained idea has gotten into their feebleminds," said Placer. "But I can take care of it in short order."
He stepped back into the room, and Nuwell heard him apologizing to theothers for the disturbance. Then Placer reappeared, two whips in hishand, and closed the door behind him. He handed one of the whips toNuwell.
"They're a lot more tractable than that woman of yours," said Placer."Let's go."
Placer moved down the corridor toward the slowly advancing Jellies, andNuwell followed reluctantly, at a respectable distance.
"Get back below!" shouted Placer at the Jellies as he neared them. "Youknow better than to come up here without permission!"
They stopped and milled as he approached them relentlessly, those infront trying to hold back and those behind them pushing them on. Placermoved straight up to them and began slashing right and left with hiswhip.
There was a sudden surge forward of the Jellies and Placer was engulfed.He vanished in a mass of seething, translucent flesh. Nuwell stopped,appalled, and began to edge backward.
There was a flurry of movement in the forefront of the Jellies, andPlacer burst out of the group, his hair awry, his clothing torn, hiswhip gone. He staggered toward Nuwell at a half run.
"Get back to the room!" cried Placer. "I don't know what's stirred themup, but they can't be frightened back with whips!"
The two men ran back down the corridor and burst through the door,startling a conference group of five of the other Masters.
"Heatguns!" snapped Placer. "Something's stirred the Jellies up, andthey're up here causing trouble! I'll turn the Toughs loose on them."
While two of the others hurried out another door for weapons and a thirdbolted the door through which the two men had just come, Placer pickedup a microphone and switched on the amplifier system that covered everyarea of all levels of the Canfell Hydroponic Farm.
Into the microphone, he gave an animal call, a cry that started out on alow crooning note and rose in volume and intensity until it hurt theears. He repeated this three times. Then he set the microphone down andturned back to his colleagues, an expression of satisfaction on hisface.
"That releases the Toughs," he said. "Every Tough in the place is freeto maim or kill any Jelly he sees, without fear of restraint orpunishment. That should bring them to heel pretty quickly!"