A sophisticated, spherical airship hovered just above it. Below, on the roof of one of the buildings, three men dressed in drab, grey overalls, their eyes protected by dark goggles, were supervising the loading of several boxes into the hull of the ship via a tractor beam.
After the boxes were loaded, one of the men spoke into a communication device attached to his wrist:
“Survey Team 1 to Oxus, do you copy?” he asked.
“I hear you, ST-1,” answered a man’s voice. “What’s up?”
“These are all the samples from our survey of this region, Monsieur De Soto,” said the first man. “Everything checks out fine.”
“Good. Koynos will be pleased. So far, everything’s gone very smoothly. Keep up the good work, ST-1. Oxus over and out.”
The airship gained altitude, then made a sharp turn and zoomed away towards the north.
Inside the east wing of the desert base was a vast laboratory, cluttered with scientific devices and bathed in orange light. There, Claude Marécourt was working on the prototype of a new matter-to-anti-matter converter powered by heliose, that strange mineral found only on Rhea.
Claude had been the youngest experimental physicist to ever have been hired by CERN in Geneva. Then, soon afterward—only three years prior—he had been invited to meet a man named Koynos in an expensive restaurant in Nyon. Curious, Claude had accepted the invitation.
Koynos was a tall, pale, muscular man with blonde hair and blue eyes. He seemed strangely ageless, and could have been anywhere between the ages of 30 and 50. He had been direct, not waiting for coffee and liqueur before discussing the reason for his invitation.
“I represent an organization of scientists and explorers known as the New Fifteen,” he had told Claude. “I’m looking for a physicist like you.”
“I already have a job,” Claude had replied.
“On Earth, yes,” had said Koynos, smiling. “The job I’m offering to you is located much further away…”
Thus young Claude Marécourt had learned of the existence of the wandering planetoid known as Rhea, which had been first visited in 1935 by that prodigious French adventurer Leo Saint-Clair, sometimes known as the Nyctalope.
“Although I never met Monsieur Saint-Clair myself,” commented Claude, “I know he once rescued my grandfather during World War II…6 How can he still be alive? He must be incredibly old…”
Koynos had only smiled mysteriously, and gone on to explain that the Nyctalope had once had his heart replaced by a synthetic organ that had possibly granted him an extended lifespan beyond that of ordinary mortals. But no one seemed exactly sure of the reasons for his seeming agelessness. There were conflicting stories. In any event, Leo Saint-Clair had secretly returned to Rhea during the darkest days of World War II, when he had feared the world might fall beneath the Nazi heel, in order to establish a small but permanent and peaceful human settlement.
It was to Rhea that Koynos proposed to take Claude.
“But Rhea must be almost out of the Solar System by now,” had objected Claude. “How can we possibly go there? We don’t have that kind of technology…”
“On the contrary, we do—I mean, the New Fifteen have a craft capable of reaching Rhea in just under a year.”
“But no human science can…”
“Did I say it was based on human science?” Koynos had replied.
That, of course, had clinched the deal. A young genius like Claude Marécourt could hardly pass up the opportunity to travel to the outer regions of the Solar System and explore a strange, new world.
After Claude had joined the New Fifteen, who were headquartered nearby in the Swiss Alps, Koynos had told the young scientist that they theorized that Rhea was an artificial world, a giant spacecraft built by a mysterious race whose descendents had devolved into the gorilla-like Nocturnals and the bat-like Diurnals that Leo Saint-Clair had met during his first journey.
The goal of the New Fifteen was to uncovber its secrets, and, for that, they needed the help of an anti-matter specialist like Claude Marécourt.
Eighteen months later, the New Fifteen’s ship, a complex, spherical contraption christened the Oxus by Koynos, reached Rhea.
The crew was comprised of the fifteen leaders of the organization—Claude had been given the number Nine; Koynos was, of course, Number One. They had been extremely careful, so they were not detected by Olbansville, the Nyctalope’s human settlement located in the Southern hemisphere near the Equator, named after the French scientist who had designed the first ship to travel to Rhea in 1935.
Their mission, as defined by Koynos, was to survey the planet and discover its scientific mysteries, especially the secret of its propulsion, atmospheric field and the radiant energies which kept the planetoid alternatively bathed in day and night in an 18-hour day circadian pattern.
Half of the crew, led by Frederic de Soto (Number Two), had gone out to explore Rhea in powerful, tank-like vehicles, while the other, supervised by Dr. Eva Steilman (Number Five), worked on scientific missions. Koynos, too, had gone out, for his own purposes—no one knew exactly where.
During the journey, Claude had often wondered who Koynos really was, and what his ultimate goals were. That he was human, there was no doubt in his mind—but he also seemed more than human, different from the rest of the crew, who were, in every respect, ordinary geniuses, if one could say such a thing. Piercing together various bits of water-cooler gossip, the young physicist had gathered that everyone on board, like himself, was somehow connected to the mysterious Nyctalope who had saved his grandfather’s life. But why?—he still had no idea.
Koynos and his secrets remained as obscure eighteen months later, as they had been the first time Claude had met the man in Nyon.
Inside his laboratory in the desert base, Claude was putting the finishing touches to his converter.
“I’ve got to remember that this is an entirely new design,” the young physicist muttered. “I hope the crystal lattice will hold up under the stress. If something was to go wrong... No, better to not even think about that…”
Entirely focused on his work, Claude failed to notice a tiny red insect which had been fluttering around the room, and which had just landed on the physicist’s sleeve. From there, the insect jumped onto the converter.
Had Claude been able to examine it with one of his instruments, he would have discovered that the creature was not entirely natural, but was made up of several bionic parts.
As Claude pulled a particle projector down from the ceiling, the fake insect crawled inside the converter through a small opening. Once inside, the strange beast unfolded and began to transform into a sinister-looking device, which clamped itself onto the lattice’s central connector.
“I’ll plug in the particle projector and give it a dry run,” said Claude, starting the device.
A beam radiated from it and hit the lens of the converter, which immediately began emitting a strange sound, then exploded with a silent flash of white light.
As the converter began to melt and turn into a spiky, gooey black mass, a small energy bubble created by the explosion raced from the machine to the floor through a series of cables. All of this was unseen by Claude, who was not hurt, but still blinded by the explosion.
Had the young physicist been able to follow the tiny energy bubble, he would have seen it race from circuit to circuit, run through memory chips and power lines, deeper and deeper inside the complex network of technical wonders that was the secret core of the wondrous artificial world, Rhea.
The bubble finally reached a small, golden sphere at the center of a huge shaft, connected on four sides by complex, mechanical arms.
It triggered a series of short circuits as it traveled along one of the arms, which, upon its contact, also transformed into the same black, thorny substance as Claude’s converter.
Finally, when the bubble hit the gold sphere, it cracked—but did not shatter.
Then, there was silence at the heart of Rhea.
>
Meanwhile, much farther away in the desert, a tank-like vehicle was rushing towards a destination known only to its driver. Inside, at the commands, sitting in a large, pod-chair, was Koynos himself, clad in soft leather, wearing an aviator’s helmet. His blue eyes were attentively watching a series of instruments mounted in front of him, while his pale, elongated hands, were gripping the steering-wheel.
Suddenly, a voice came cracking out of a loudspeaker:
“De Soto to Koynos. Come in, Number One! It’s an emergency!”
Koynos flicked a switch.
“Koynos here. I hear you, Frederic.”
Aboard the Oxus, Frederic de Soto emitted a sigh of relief. He, too, knew nothing of Koynos’ true purposes, but he was all too aware that the fate of their expedition depended on their mysterious leader.
De Soto, a brilliant engineer who had made his fortune in South America, had initially joined the New Fifteen, motivated by the vague desire to meet and possibly harm Leo Saint-Clair, whose family had been feuding with his for centuries. Unlike Claude Marécourt, he knew what few people in the world were aware of: that the Nyctalope was still alive and well, having barely aged since he had destroyed his great-grandfather Dominique de Soto a.k.a. Gorillard, in 1930. But that was ancient business. Frederic had soon forgotten his plans for revenge, and thrown himself whole-heartedly into the Rhea mission.
“Koynos, at last!” he said, barely hiding his concern. “I was afraid you wouldn’t answer.”
“Secrecy is vital to our mission, Number Two,” replied Koynos. “Why are you breaking radio silence and risking detection by Olbansville?”
“It’s that business with the new converter. I’m afraid it’s turned out badly.”
“What happened?”
“There was a particle explosion at the base.”
Koynos experienced a shock. This was entirely unforeseen and could change everything.
“What caused it?” he asked.
“It seems that Number Nine, I mean, Claude Marécourt, was involved. If you remember, I advised against recruiting someone so young and inexperienced...”
“And I disagreed,” said Koynos sharply. De Soto’s tendency to always throw blame on others was a constant irritant to him. “What measures have you taken?”
“We’ve tried to cloak the explosion, but it’s bound to have been detected by the scientists at Olbansville.”
Koynos’ fist hit the armrest.
“Damn! The Nyctalope is going to learn we’ve infiltrated his private little world before we’ve had time to complete our survey. Find out exactly what happened and report to me asap, Number Two. Koynos over and out.”
In his anger, Koynos had blurted a crucial fact that had not escaped Frederic de Soto’s notice.
“The Nyctalope is returning to Rhea?!”
Chapter II
The Nyctalope Is Back
In the Southern Hemisphere of Rhea, close to the equator, virtually at the same spot where the Olb-I had landed in 1935, stood Olbansville.
The somewhat pretentious name really applied only to a settlement of about fifty white buildings, made of glass and concrete, which had been built by Pierre Saint-Clair, the Nyctalope’s own son, according to designs inspired by the great French architect Le Corbusier. Today, they looked somewhat dated, like the “City of the Year 2000” as imagined in the 1950s, which is when Olbansville had been built.
Its inhabitants were aware that they were special: they were the first pioneers of the Human Race to leave the boundaries of the Solar System and travel to the stars.
After his first trip to Rhea, Leo Saint-Clair had left the Olb-I in a secret base, hidden under the Moroccan desert, which had been built in the heady days of the CID. When his beloved France had lost World War II, and the Nazi menace looked like it might well prove unstoppable and conquer the world, the Nyctalope had made the fateful decision to preserve the values of Eternal France and, at the same time, embark on an ambitious plan of truly cosmic proportions.
The French Martian Colony had been a tragic failure, but Rhea would prove a far more hospitable home—and vehicle! For with it, or rather on it, it was possible to travel to other stars and spread the Human Race throughout the galaxy!
Thanks to the resources of Free France in North Africa, three more spaceships had been built according to Leo’s exacting specifications: the Olb-II, III and IV. Then, the Nyctalope had personally selected the future colonizers of Outer Space. They included his faithful Vito and Socca, of course, Véronique d’Olbans and their son, Marc—her father had passed away only a few months before the fateful journey—several members of the De Ciserat family, Pierre, Saint-Clair, his oldest son, still fresh from serving under General De Gaulle, Toru Mitang, the son of his friend Gnô, as well as their wives and children, and other scientists and explorers, all chosen for their bravery and ideals.
In 1941, the colonists had reached Rhea, which was then located near the Asteroid belt. By unanimous decision, their first settlement had been named Olbansville, after Leo had modestly rejected the name of Saintclairville proposed by his friends.
Relations were quickly established with both races of Nocturnals and Diurnals, favorably predisposed towards the French, and research had begun into the mysteries of Rhea’s propulsion, towards the goal of cutting down the time it would take to cross the great distances between the stars. Everyone knew that this would be a project that would take several generations.
The Nyctalope had returned to Earth—alone—in the Olb-I, while Rhea pursued its journey towards the outer planets of the Solar System.
Seventy years passed; then in 2011, Leo Saint-Clair received a telepathic SOS from Rhea. The mental call was brief, but indisputable. It emanated from Akira Mitang who, no doubt, was a descendant of his old friend, and had cultivated the same psychic powers that Leo and Gnô had acquired in Tibet so long before.
The Nyctalope had not expected to hear from Rhea ever again. He alone knew that he had had to return to Earth to protect his homeworld from the one threat that could not be defeated by any other earthly inhabitant:
The Martians.
Only Leo Saint-Clair knew, from personal experience, that Mars was an inconceivable threat, a permanent danger waiting to devour Humanity. As the one who had awakened the Martian menace, it was his duty to protect Earth from it.
At the time he received the psychic SOS from Rhea, he had, in fact, just vanquished another Martian threat, at great emotional cost to himself.7
As he recovered, he had begun a romance with a young woman named Gisèle d’Holbach. In her late twenties, she had striking blue eyes and black hair cut in a short “bob.” She was his liaison with the department of French Intelligence, which occasionally employed his services.
Leo had no need of money or a secret identity; however, for convenience and courtesy, the French Government periodically issued him a new set of papers, every time moving his birth date forward in order to hide his agelessness. He was now a comfortable, perennial 44.
Leo continued to serve his beloved France every time they asked him to perform a mission. His secret was known to only a handful of officials—not even the President knew of the “forever man” in the service of his nation—and that was fine with Leo. For his part, he had told no one about the Rhea colony. Those who knew were long since dead and Leo had not deemed it wise to bring new parties into his confidence.
After Leo received the SOS from Akira Mitang, he knew he had no choice but to travel to Rhea. His own private research enabled him to boost the speed of the original Olb-I, which remained safely hidden under Morocco’s desert sands; but he knew it would still take him more than two years to reach the planetoid for, according to his calculations, Rhea was approaching the outermost fringes of the Solar System.
As for what awaited him there, and the likelihood of his return, it was impossible to speculate.
It was also impossible to disappear without a trace and leave France—Earth—unguarded. Reluctantly, L
eo had been forced to share his secret with Auguste Pichenet, the Head of the French Intelligence Service which employed him. Pichenet had listened, managing to not look incredulous—he was gifted with a vivid imagination, which was rare in the military—and had given Leo his blessings, but had insisted he take Gisèle with him.
At first, Leo had argued, but he had quickly seen the wisdom of the request: who would want to spend two years alone in a spaceship? He had occasionally thought of proposing to Gisèle, thus making her his sixth wife, and the trip might be just the opportunity he needed to decide whether he wanted to take his relationship with the young woman to the next level.
After almost 30 months of travel, the Olb-I at last was orbiting around Rhea.
In Olbansville, in the building that served as transmission center and control tower, a radar operator sat behind a console. Behind him stood a short, rotund Japanese man with remarkably piercing dark eyes. He was dressed in black slacks, white shirt, and wore a tricolor sash around his belt, proclaiming him to be the Mayor of Olbansville.
“I’ve just spotted the Olb-I entering orbit, Monsieur le Maire,” said the operator, pointing to a blip on his screen
“Thank you, Monsieur Pilou,” replied Akira Mitang. Then, grabbing a microphone and clearing his throat, he announced over the P.A. system: “All stations, please stand by for a priority one communication. This is your Mayor, Akira Mitang, speaking. The Nyctalope is back. The heads of all families should report to the Landing Pad immediately. Repeat: the Nyctalope is back!”
The Return of the Nyctalope Page 21
