by Jerry
“How did he do it?”
“Strapped you into your couch face down and locked his legs around it. I didn’t dare apply any g’s. Come on,” he finished, “you’ve managed to upset every timetable in the project. Johnny’s shaking like a leaf, or was when I left him. A bulb of coffee will do us both a world of good.”
“I’m sold,” Mac grunted, zipping up a flight boot. “But there’s something I’d like to do, first chance I get.”
“Which is?”
“Which is jettison every last strip of tape I have in Valier. I tell you, Logan,” he went on as they entered the recreation bar, “you’ll never know how degrading it is to hear useless, insipid information offered to you when you’re in a tight spot, knowing full well the voice is your own!”
THE END
STELLAR VENGEANCE
Frank Freeman
By accident Granger saw the aliens land, so with scientific curiosity he captured one of them. This incident made Earth the scene of a—
“YOU must realize,” squealed the squat, ugly creature in the hastily constructed wooden cage, “that you’re inviting certain destruction by holding me prisoner. I warn you, your time is short.”
Walt Granger stomped over to the enclosure and swung a heavy boot against one of the two-by-fours that stood like a crooked row of sentries, “That’s my worry,” he grunted.
He had stumbled upon the whole business just two hours before, right in the middle of his part of the geoglogic survey that was going on in the rock strewn hills and gullies known on the maps as the Millsport Range. He had seen the ship the moment it left the ground, and a few yards from the burned circle of grass that was still smoldering from the rocket blast, there sat the fat little specimen of life from another world. Granger had caught the thing by surprise and had a rope around its middle before it could scamper into the brush.
“My comrades will return for me,” warned the thing, its yellowish eyes slowly and rhythmically protruding and withdrawing within their sockets. “They’ll have no trouble finding you, and when they do . . .”
“Shut up!” snapped Granger, pulling on his leather jacket. He turned to the cement fireplace and gave the embers a poke with a charred stick, looking around at the cage every few seconds as though he feared leaving his back turned for more than instant.
He looked at his watch. Eight o’clock, and night was fast spreading a blanket of charcoal shadows over the hillsides. He’d wait till morning to move this crazy beast to the next camp six miles away. A night trip might entail chances he wasn’t willing to take.
After a couple of nervous fumbles with a match, he lit a cigarette and glanced uneasily out the one window in the rough cabin. What if the alien, or whatever it was, wasn’t kidding about the danger he was in? What if his buddies did decide to come back before morning with the extermination of a human on their minds? Think of it, Granger, he told himself laconically, you’d be a hero! A nice, cold, dead one. And they’d never find the bunch who’d have knocked him off. He’d be one of those “mysterious deaths” the papers played up.
“Free me immediately!” screeched the angry captive, his head swaying like a balloon on a stick. “You haven’t much time left!”
“You’re a nasty tempered little imp, aren’t you?” growled Granger as he strode across the room and peeked curiously inside the crate.
“I loathe you,” growled the thing. “I have no intentions of deceiving you. This whole situation is simply a matter of pure logic so far as your plight is concerned.”
“You’re forgetting,” said Granger, his voice lacking a certain amount of its previous confidence, “that you’re the one who’s in a mess.”
“Only temporarily, you fool!” raved the creature, jumping frantically up and down. “Look!” he screamed, pointing a tiny hand toward the window over Granger’s left shoulder.
The geologist gasped as he shot a quick glance in the direction of the thing’s outstretched arm. A pale green light had turned the surrounding land and sky into an eerie dawn that extended its weird phosphorescence into the cabin itself. And .two hundred yards from the cabin, in a small area relatively clear of major obstructions, was the same ship he had seen a few hours before.
“They’re here!” shouted the alien. “Let me out!”
Granger slammed shut the door and lifted a massive oak bar into iron brackets on either side. Then he was at the window again. A hatch near the bottom of the craft was open, but there was no sign of movement.
THEN he saw one of them, an exact duplicate of his captive, running from bush to bush about fifty feet from the ship. A few steps behind him was another. Two more nearby scrambled over an immense boulder and scurried into the brush. Another five were emerging, like a patrol of midgets, from a ravine to the north of the cabin.
“Be sensible, you idiot!” snarled the thing in the crate. “I’m giving you this final chance. Unlock this contrivance, and all will be well with vou. I’ll speak on your behalf.”
“So you can lead your buddies right back here? Sure,” said Granger, “that’s all I’d have to do to finish myself off in a real hurry.”
“Do as I say!” yelled the alien. “For your own sake!”
“Look,” panted Granger, “I know I was crazy to fool with you in the first place, but now that yoipre here and they’re outside, you’re staying, see?”
He reached under the lumpy pile of cotton that served as a mattress and pulled out his .30-30 rifle. Little Boy Blue and his pop gun, he thought. He grabbed a handful of cartridges from a box under the bed and began jamming them into the magazine.
“That will be of no use, my friend,” droned a hollow voice behind him.
Granger spun himself around just as a pane of glass in the window flew to pieces under the impact of a short, shiny gun barrel. A perfect reproduction of the face of the creature in the cage centered itself in the jagged frame of the broken window and gave him the shadow of a smile that was closer to a victorious leer.
“Put down your weapon,” the newcomer ordered coldly.
Get that rifle up fast, Granger commanded himself.
“I repeat,” said the face at the window. “Lower your weapon.”
They’ll let you have it anyway, Granger thought grimly. He slowly curled his finger around the trigger and started to move when he was jarred off his feet by a roaring blast that ripped the door from its hinges and sent it crashing against the rear wall of the cabin.
Outside the ruined entrance stood a group of aliens all armed. Fearfully, he looked to the window, but their leader was gone. In a second he appeared at the door, moved inside the cabin, and Granger automatically stepped back, his hazy mind calculating roughly the few feet of escape route remaining to him. In a moment he was there, his back flattened against the cabin wall.
The short creature kept coming on, its murky orbs fixed on Granger’s white, drawn countenance. Then it stopped its advance.
“So you have one of our people,” it said in a voice that twanged like piano wire.
Granger tried once in vain for his voice, then gave up. He stared over the head of his foe at the silent assembly outside the cabin, then at the thing in the packing crate. It was sitting there, quiet, immobile, but intently watching the scene between the earthman and his visitor.
“You are holding one of us captive,” the commander remarked. “This is a most unfortunate situation, indeed.” The small figure stepped aside quickly and waved an arm.
Granger, perspiration trickling down his face, watched a score of glistening weapons raised and pointed inside the cabin. For a second he looked directly at the menacing horde. Then his eyes saw nothing. A blazing flash of white light burst forth from the doorway, and it was all over.
Granger forced open his aching eyes and squinted in the direction of the fiery blast, but the doorway was empty. The commander was still there, though, walking slowly to the door.
Why am I alive? Granger asked himself incredulously. Or am I dead? He bumped hi
s fist against his forehead once or twice and gave his head a vigorous shake. Suddenly, he turned his gaze to the cage. But he saw nothing that resembled the rebuilt packing crate; only a mound of ashes and twisted spikes. In the center of the heap, like a fat, dwarfish king astride his fallen kingdom, was the charred, blackened shell of the grotesque creature that had once occupied the wooden cell.
Then he moved cautiously toward the door and stared, speechless, at the leader of the expedition.
“We shall depart now,” said the being. “Thank you for helping us.”
* * *
Not much later, across the silent reaches of space, a communications operator on another planet looked up from his receiving equipment and handed his superior a message just transmitted from a ship leaving the planet Earth: RETURN MISSION SUCCESSFUL. DESERTER LOCATED AND EXECUTED.
THE BRAIN SINNER
Alan E. Nourse
An invisible network of human minds lay across the country, delicately tuned, waiting breathlessly for the first spark of contact from the unknown . . . from the unpredictable telepathic Alien.
THE ship skimmed down like a shadow from the outer atmosphere and settled gently and silently in the tangled underbrush of the hill that overlooked the bend in the broad river. There was a hiss of scorched leaves, and tire piping of a small, trapped animal. Then there was silence.
Higher up, the sunlight was bright over the horizon; here the shadows had lengthened and it was quite dark. Far across the hills a dog howled mournfully; night birds made small rustling sounds through the scrub and. underbrush. The alien waited, tensely, listening, waiting with his mind open for any flicker of surprise or wonder, waiting for a whisper of fear or recognition to slip into his mind from the dark hills around the ship. He waited and waited.
Then he gave a satisfied grunt. Foolish of him to worry. All possible care had been taken to avoid any kind of alarm. He had landed unseen from Io.
The alien stretched bade against the couch, allowing his long, tight muscles to relax, as he sent inquiring feelers of thought out from the ship, probing gently and tentatively, for signs of the psi-presence. The landing, after all, had been assumed. Already the natives had convinced themselves that ships such as his were a delusion. Such simple creatures, to disregard the evidence of their own senses! There should be no problem here when the invasion began, with the preliminary studies already completed, the disguising techniques almost perfected. A primitive world, indeed, but a world with psi-presence already developing—a possible flaw in the forthcoming silent conquest.
For psi-presence could detect other psi-presence, always, anywhere, despite any disguise. The alien knew that. It was the one universal denominator in all the centuries of conquest and enslavement in his people’s history. Before they could come, they must know the strength of the psi-presence on this world.
The alien moved, finally, beginning his preparations. In the center of the cabin an image flickered, swarming flecks of light and shadow that filled out a three-dimensional form, complete and detailed. The alien sat back and studied it through hooded yellow eyes—carefully, oh so carefully, for there must be no mistake, not here, not now. The scouts had come and gone, bringing back the data and specimens of the man-things necessary for a satisfactory disguise. Now the alien stared at the image, regarding the bone structure and muscle contour critically. Then, slowly, he began work with the plastiflesh, modelling the sharp angles of his members into neat curves, skillfully laying folds of skin, molding muscle bulges and jointed fingers, always studying the strange, clumsy image that flickered before him.
It was the image of a man. That was what they called themselves. There were many of them, and somewhere among them there was psi-presence, feeble and underdeveloped, but, there somewhere. He eyed the image again, and pressed a stud on the control panel, and another image met his eyes, an electronic reflection of himself. He studied it, and carefully superimposed the two, adding contour here and there, yellow eyes seeking out imperfections as he worked.
There must be no mistake. Failure would mean disgrace and death, horrible, writhing death by dissociation and burning, neuron by neuron. He knew. He had officiated at, executions before; delightful experiences, but not to be trifled with. He stared at the image again and then at himself.
THE skin tone was wrong. The yellow came through too clearly in places, and in this strange culture that color was reported to carry unpleasant connotations. He worked pale, sickly-pink stuff into his soft, wrinkle-free skin, then molded out the cheeks and forehead. Hair would be a problem, of course, but then there would be many small imperfections. He smiled grimly to himself. There were other ways of masking imperfections.
At last he was satisfied. There was no way to bring the normal reddish color into the pale green lips; there was no way to satisfactorily prepare the myriad wrinkles and creases that crossed the skin of the man-things, but with a little skillful application of projection techniques it did not matter.
The alien struggled into the tight, restricting clothes that lay in a bundle, carefully folded and pressed, at his feet. The hard, board-like shoes cut at his ankles, and the hairy stuff of the red-and-white checked shirt made him writhe in discomfort, but once outside the ship he was glad for the warmth. He stepped out onto the ground, and listened again carefully. Then he made certain arrangements with wires, and threw a switch on a small black case near the air lock, and began marching down the hill away from the ship.
He would no longer need the ship. Not now.
The underbrush grew thicker, and he fought his way through the scrub until he reached a roadway. It was not paved. A flicker of sour amusement swept through the alien’s mind. They had been afraid that these simple creatures might try to oppose them! Yet the scouts had said that far to the East were great stone and steel cities—the places-of-madness, the scout had said. Perhaps. But here there was no stone and steel, only dust, and the ruts of wagon wheels, and a howling dog somewhere over the hill.
The alien trudged on for almost an hour, trying to acclimate his legs to the fierce tug of gravity that pulled at him. And then lie stopped short and listened.
He heard them, then, in the depths of his mind, somewhere on the other side of the hill. His eyes narrowed. No psi-presence there, but two of the man-things, beyond doubt. Other whispers, too dull, stupid, vagrant whispers flickering through his mind. Lower life forms, no doubt. Possibly a farm with work animals. The scouts had said there were such. He turned off the road and almost cried out when the sharp barbs of a fence cut through his tender skin.
A trickle of green dripped down his arm, until he rubbed a poultice across it, and it became smooth and sickly-pink again. With a vicious jerk he pulled the fence out, post and all, and left it on the ground, moving through the woods toward the sounds he had heard.
Soon the woods ended and he saw the dwelling across a broad clearing. Black dirt lay open in the moonlight. He started across. There was light inside the dwelling, and the dull, babbling flow of uncontrolled man-thought struck his mind like a vapor. There were other buildings, too, dark buildings, and one tall one that had a spoked wheel on top, and creaked and rustled in the darkness.
He had almost reached the dwelling when a small, four-legged creature jumped up in the darkness, crying out at him in a horrible discordant barrage. The creature came running swiftly, and the alien’s mind caught the sharp whine of fear and hate emanating from tire thing. It stopped before him, baring its fangs and snarling.
The alien lashed his foot out savagely; it crunched into flesh and bone, and the creature lay flopping helplessly, spurting dark wet stuff, its cry cut off in midyelp. The alien stepped onto the porch as the door opened suddenly, framing a tall, thin man-thing in a box of yellow light. “Brownie?” he called. “Come here, Brownie! What’s the matter—” His words trailed off when he saw the alien. “Who
are you?”
“A traveller,” said the alien, his voice grating harshly in the darkness. “I need lodging
and food—”
The farmer’s eyes narrowed suspiciously as he peered from the doorway. “Come closer, let me get a look at you,” he said.
The alien stepped closer, concentrating all his psi-faculties on the farmer’s mind, blurring his perception of the minute imperfections of his disguise. It required all his power; he had none left to probe the farmer’s mind, and he waited, trembling. That could come later.
The farmer blinked, and nodded, finally. “All right,” he said. “We’ve got some food on the stove. Come on in.”
II
SENATORIAL Councilman Benjamin Towne slammed his cane down on the floor with a snarl, and eased himself back down in his seat, staring angrily around the small Federal Security Commission anteroom. The American Council attaché standing near the door retrieved the cane, handing it to the Councilman with a polite murmur. Instantly he regretted his action when Towne began slapping the cane against his palm, short stacatto slaps that rang out ominously in the small room.
The Councilman was not in the habit of waiting. He did not like it in the least, and made no effort to conceal his feelings. His little-green cat eyes roved around the room in sharp disapproval, resting momentarily on the neat autodesk, on the cool grey walls, on the vaguely disturbing water-color on the wall—one of those sickening Psi-High experimentals that the snob critics all claimed to be so wonderful. The Councilman growled and blinked at the morning sunlight streaming through the muted glass panels of the northeast wall. Far below, the second morning rush hour traffic buzzed through the city with frantic nervousness.
The Councilman tapped his cane on the floor, glancing up at his attaché. “That Sanders girl,” he snapped. “Give me her file again.”
The Council attaché opened a large briefcase, and produced a thick bundle of papers in a manilla folder. Towne took them and glanced through the papers, lighting one of his long, green-tipped cigarettes from a ruby-studded lighter. “How about Dr. Abrams? Was he questioned?”