by Earl
“That stuff?” scoffed the prospector “Naw. So much gold was found on other planets that the price went way down. This is the big find I made!” He held up a lump of dull yellow ore.
“Fool’s gold!” said Jon in recognition. “Copper pyrites!”
“Right,” nodded the eager prospector. “And as you know, copper today is one of the most valuable metals because little of it was found on other worlds. I’ve got a fortune here in fool’s gold!”
“That really is a funny reversal of history,” Jon mused. “In the Old West, many a prospector went mad when he found out the sack of yellow metal he brought in was only fool’s gold. Today, fool’s gold is priceless.”
But Jon’s attention had wandered too much and suddenly harsh words sounded, “Now you grab sky, Space Copper!” Desert Dan had slipped a secret gun from his shirt, and it was pointed directly at Jon! Jon had no chance to turn and fire. Gloating, Desert Dan began squeezing the trigger to shoot Jon down in cold blood.
“Comet!” barked Jon. “Run that man down!” Obedient to the human voice, the great six-legged horse sprang forward.
With a hoarse cry of fright, Desert Dan staggered out of the way and fell. Jon was on him in a flash, knocking him cold.
“This all is a mite different from the Old West of Earth!” Jon said, patting Comet affectionately. “And since you understand every word I say . . . thanks, Comet!”
THE CRIME GENIE
It was night in Marsopolis, the capital city of Mars. Overhead shone the two moons, Phobos and Deimos. All was quiet as Lieutenant Jon Jarl of the Space Patrol softly approached the door of and old ramshackle house on the outskirts of town. He took a deep breath. The end of a long trail.
Jon pulled out his ray gun and kicked open the door. Within, a short man with a shrewd, intelligent face spun about in surprise.
“Reach,” commanded Jon. “Got you at last. Science Slade! You led me a merry chase from planet to planet, following your series of robberies. And always pulling your scientific tricks, which made you the most cunning criminal known today.”
Slade recovered quickly from his surprise. He sneered. “But like a faithful bloodhound, you kept on my trail. And now you’ve got me, haven’t you? Always get your man, don’t you, space copper?”
Jon frowned, a bit worriedly. His tone was sarcastic. And instead of being dismayed, Science Slade seemed quite at ease, as though he expected to escape But how could he? Jon could see he had no gun. Yet why was he grinning?
“Ready for the handcuffs?” Jon said, taking them out.
“Sure, if you can put them on me,” said Slade mockingly. He waved around. “By the way, you’ll notice this old dump is outfitted as my laboratory. I’ve been hiding out here for a month, before you tracked me down. And I’ve been working on something very special.”
“Skip it,” snapped Jon. “Just hold out your hands for the cuffs, chum.” Jon strode forward warily.
“I’ve been working on this belt,” said Slade. It was a strange-looking belt around his middle with several studs on it. Slade pressed one just as Jon came up, and Jon gasped.
Slade suddenly began to expand before his eyes. His body bulged out in all directions, and became huge and strangely distorted. And when Jon tried to grab his wrist, he met nothing solid. It was exactly like trying to grab . . .
“Smoke!” chortled Slade himself. “I’ve just turned into smoke! That’s my new scientific trick. In more scientific terms, this belt gives off an anti-molecular adhesion ray. Thus, the molecules of my body, instead of sticking, together as a solid, have turned into a gaseous smoke. Why don’t you grab me, copper? Why don’t you put the handcuffs on me?”
Jon grabbed wildly, feeling like a fool. His hands met nothing solid. He could no more seize Slade now than he could a cloud or puff of steam. Panting, Jon fell back and aimed his ray gun. “I’m going to shoot,” he warned.
“Go ahead,” laughed Slade. “See what happens.”
That was the most bewildering thing of all, as Jon shot. His ray only went through the smoky form, meeting nothing solid, and burned holes in the wall beyond. Slade, in his smoke-form, could not be shot or killed!
Jon stared helplessly. The criminal’s body had now expanded into a giant bulging form twenty feet high, towering high over Jon.
“Remember the old Arabian Night’s tale of the genie in the bottle?” chortled Slade. “That’s what I am now—a modern genie! I’m made of vagrant smoke. You can’t grab me or shoot me. I’m utterly safe now from capture or jail!”
“You mean you’re going to stay in that smoke-form the rest of your life?” gasped Jon.
“Don’t be an idiot,” returned Slade’s booming voice. “My belt can also return me to solid form, when needed. So long, copper. Out the window I go!”
The smoky form started to ooze out the open window. Jon rushed and slammed it shut. Slade laughed. “So I’ll ooze out the cracks. You can’t stop smoke, my boy!”
Before Jon’s dazed eyes, the smoky form simply oozed out through the window cracks and took form outside, leering back. “Wait’ll you hear of the robberies I’ll pull now!” were Slade’s parting words. And then, like smoke, his form drifted away into the dark night.
Jon stood stunned. There was no use to follow. How could he chase smoke? Science Slade had once more evaded the law, and was ready to continue his amazing crime career.
The following week, Marsopolis was rocked by a series of amazing robberies. Jon could see how it was worked. In his smoke-form, Slade could easily ooze into any locked place, through tiny holes or cracks. Within, he could resume solid form and steal, with nobody the wiser. It was diabolically simple.
Jon had warned all the local police, and they had prowled the town. But the few times they caught sight of Slade, he was able to assume his smoke-form, and taunt them, and whisk away like a formless shadow. Slade was the criminal who could not be caught!
And then one day, supremely confident of his powers, Slade mailed a mocking challenge to headquarters. “Tonight is the big Planet Ball. Women will be wearing their most valuable jewels. Try to keep me out!” The police took extreme precautions. After the guests had arrived, every door and window was sealed shut. Hermetically sealed. The internal air-conditioning system supplied air within to the guests. But now, not even smoke could ooze into the sealed place.
Jon Jarl was on duty inside, watching the gay party in progress. How could Slade get in, as he boasted? For once he had outsmarted himself—or had he? Jon was worried. Did Slade have some other trick up his sleeve? Could he somehow get in, like a magic genie?
Genie . . . genie . . . the word kept repeating itself in Jon’s mind. And suddenly, remembering the old legend, another phrase popped up—“the genie in the bottle!”
Jon whirled, his eyes scanning the room where the guests sat at tables, eating and drinking. At the far end of the room he saw it happening.
On one table rested several wine bottles. One of the guests uncorked another bottle, but no wine poured out. Instead, black smoke came out, forming the huge genie-form of Science Slade!
“Sizzling planets!” Jon exclaimed, dashing for the far end of the room. “That was his ace in the hole. He compressed himself into a bottle and had himself delivered into the place! Exactly like a genie from a bottle!”
Before Jon reached the spot, Slade had already acted. He pressed his belt stud and quickly resumed solid form, snatching a diamond necklace from the throat of a woman. This he quickly stuffed into a belt pouch where it would stay, even in his smoke form.
“But you’re still trapped!” Jon shouted as he ran. “Now you can’t get out. The place is sealed.”
But Slade was already shooting upward with his ray gun, forming a burned hole in the roof. Then, a touch of his belt stud and he turned to smoke again, just as Jon ran up futilely.
“See?” gloated the smoke-form. “I had it all planned in detail. I shot an escape hole in the roof. Now I just ooze out of it—free!” The smoke-fo
rm wafted upward and began pouring itself out of the hole. But Jon did not wait to watch, helplessly. He was dashing upstairs to the roof himself. He rayed open the sealed skylight and sprang out on the roof, racing to where the smoke-form of the criminal had oozed out and formed.
“Well?” mocked Slade. “And how are you going to stop me here, my stupid friend? Now I just drift away with the breeze.”
Jon was silent, as he hastily pulled a concealed gadget from under his coat. It had a flaring tubular snout and a small motor and a trailing tube. It hummed, as Jon turned it on. He aimed it at the smoke-form.
Slade laughed wildly. “A new kind of gun?” he said. “But you just can’t shoot or harm smoke, you dimwit cop! Don’t you understand?”
“I know I can’t shoot or harm you,” Jon grinned. “This happens to be the latest Smoke Vacuum, for clearing smoke out of rooms. In other words, this is suction!”
Slade gasped, in sudden realization, and tried to move his smoke-form away. But the powerful suction device was already tugging at him, pulling his gaseous body into its tube. Slade was suctioned out of the air swiftly and pumped through the tube. And at the end of the tube, Jon held a bottle.
A moment later, Jon firmly put the cork on the bottle, filled with the compressed smoke-form of Science Slade. He held the bottle up to his eyes, smiling.
“Cramped, Slade?” he said. “But we’ll let you out soon, at Headquarters, in a sealed room, where you’ll be forced to assume solid form. We’ll take your belt away, and then clap you behind bars, once and for all.”
Jon grinned. “Just call me Aladdin.”
JON JARL SAVES 1950
Once a month, it was the duty of Lieutenant Jon Jarl of the Space Patrol to visit Exile Asteroid. It was a tiny asteroid, and only one person lived there, a man called “Hitler” Carson. Jon landed his ship within the plastic dome, and the automatic doors slid shut behind him. Within the dome were breathable air and comfortable living quarters.
A short dark man, dressed in a military uniform, with a brushy mustache and ruthless face came up.
“Hello, Hitler,” Jon said with a grin. “Conquer any new worlds lately?”
Hitler Carson snarled. “Don’t keep rubbing it in,” he barked. “Don’t forget that ten years ago I almost did conquer the whole universe! I, Hitler Carson, very nearly became the dictator of all the planets from Earth to Pluto!”
“Sure, sure,” drawled Jon. “But you were defeated. Then, since capital punishment had been abolished, you could not be executed for your crime, so you were instead exiled to this asteroid, just as Napoleon was exiled to St. Helena.”
“Ah, Napoleon!” breathed Carson, reverently. “There was another great man of history! He, too, almost conquered his world. But Hitler was even greater, and that’s why I took his name for my own!”
Jon stared at the man. His history was strange. He was a megalomaniac, as Napoleon and Hitler had been before him. Ten years ago, he had secretly amassed a giant fleet of space bombers, and an army of fanatics, and had swept out to conquer the solar system. He had very nearly succeeded, bombing occupied world after world, building up his empire, which he planned to rule with an iron hand like Hitler of old. But attacking Earth itself, he had finally met his Waterloo, as the gallant Earth fleets rallied and shattered his mighty armada of space.
Utterly defeated and stripped of all power, Carson had then been exiled to this lonely asteroid, to live the rest of his natural life dreaming of the savage glory that would never be his. Jon visited him once a month, just to make sure he had not escaped, died, or gone mad. But escape was impossible. No ship was allowed for him to use. And none of his former henchmen could ever come to rescue him, for they, too, were all imprisoned for life.
However, to occupy his time, Carson had been allowed a small laboratory to putter around with harmlessly. He had been a good scientist before he had gone out to conquer an empire.
“Let’s check on your lab,” Jon said, striding there. “Just in case you’ve cooked up something you shouldn’t have.” Carson had to be watched like a hawk. A leopard does not change its spots.
“What’s this?” Jon asked, pointing to a new device that had not been there the previous month. It looked like a radio transmitter, but of a odd, unknown design.
Carson struck a pose of pride. “I just invented it. I’m a scientific genius, you know. It’s my Time Radio. It can send radio signals not only through space, but through time!”
“What?” Jon said amazed. “You mean with this radio you can contact the future or past?”
“No, not the future,” said Carson. “Just the past. Listen, as I tune in the year 1950, which is over three hundred years ago!”
He tuned the dials and a strange hum rose from the transmitter. “Hello, 1950! Hello, 1950!” Carson barked into the microphone. “This is Carson calling from 2261 A. D.! Come in, Jaxon Joad!”
Jon waited skeptically. It was impossible.
No voice from the long dead age of the Twentieth century could come back. Carson must have gone mad, toying with the apparatus. It was impossible for someone of 1950 to answer and . . .
Jon jumped. Clear as a bell, a voice came back. “Hello, 2261! This is Jaxon Joad of 1950!”
Carson turned triumphantly to Jon. “See?
I am a genius. I have made contact with the Twentieth century with my time radio!”
“It’s—it’s wonderful!” Jon had to admit. “Projecting your voice three hundred years into the past and getting an answer from that day and age so long ago!” Jon became enthusiastic. “Why, with that, you can get all sorts of direct historical information about their time. Written records are always so incomplete. We can find out all the mysteries and unknown things about their age. For instance, did they have penicillin in 1950?”
Carson nodded. “I already found that out. They did. But they didn’t have our wonder drug—saturnicillin, which we found on Saturn. So I sent him the formula!”
“Great!” Jon said. “In other words, in exchange for historical information they give us, we can in turn tell them of our advanced discoveries and inventions, thus helping the Twentieth century civilization to progress!”
Jon hesitated, but then stuck out his hand. “Shake, Carson,” he said earnestly. “You may have been a ruthless would-be dictator before, but now you’ve actually done a good thing. Maybe it partly atones for your former evil career. Shake!”
But suddenly, Jon turned, as something caught the corner of his eye. It was a big blueprint on a table nearby, and Jon instantly recognized it for the complete data on the greatest of all Twenty-third century war weapons—the Cosmic Bomb! Suspicion flashed into Jon’s mind, and at the same moment, the voice of the man from 1950 once more came from the radio. Carson darted to turn it off, but Jon caught his wrist, and listened.
“Well, Carson,” came the ancient voice of Jaxon Joad of 1950, “Let’s get on with that new weapon, eh? Send me the rest of the data on your Cosmic Bomb. Then I’ll secretly manufacture it and sweep out and conquer the world, back here in 1950.”
Jon did not have to hear any more. “So that’s it!” he roared at Carson. “Instead of trying to help the Twentieth century, you’re going to plunge it into a bloody war of conquest!”
The last exclamation was not out of Jon’s throat when a metal bar descended on his head. Jon had not seen it concealed behind Carson’s back. Jon’s mind went black, and when he awoke, minutes later, he was firmly bound hand and foot, with Carson leering over him.
“No,” grated Carson, “I won’t attempt now to fly away in your ship and escape my exile. It would be hopeless. The Space Patrol would spot me and eventually chase me down and drag me back. I know that it’s utterly hopeless for me to try once more to conquer the universe, here in 2261!”
His eyes lit up with savage triumph now. “But I can help conquer the world of 1950 now, with my time radio! Isn’t it clever? I’ll give the Cosmic Bomb to Jaxon Joad, in 1950. With that terrifically powerful weapon,
the hydrogen-bomb is a mere firecracker. Joad can conquer the whole world of 1950. He’ll become their dictator. He’ll succeed where Napoleon and Hitler failed. And through him, I will be the real dictator of 1950, conquering a world!”
Jon groaned. It was fantastic and diabolical. Carson had given up all hope of becoming dictator in 2261. But working with Jaxon Joad through the time radio, Carson would succeed in conquering the world of 1950! For the rest of his life, then, Carson could bask in the glory of his stooge—Jaxon Joad, Supreme Dictator of Earth; of 1950!
“Yes,” gloated Carson. “It will be great fun helping Jaxon Joad conquer the Earth of his time. And best of all, there’s no danger to me. I’ll just sit here like a master chessplayer and use the people of 1950 as my pawns and change their whole history! What could be sweeter than that?”
Carson turned and began barking in his microphone. “All right, Joad, listen carefully. To make the Cosmic Bomb, in the third stage, use this formula and . . .”
On and on his voice droned, giving the vital data to the would-be dictator of 1950. And Jon was helpless to stop him. Once Carson finished giving his data, no power in the universe could change things and save the world of 1950. There would be a holocaustic war, and overnight, Jaxon Joad would smash all opposition and rule the world. Jon groaned again, in agony. He could only sit and watch this hideous deed take place before his eyes and ears.
Suddenly, Jon’s eyes widened. A few feet away was the power cable feeding current to the radio. It was not insulated! Jon slowly, noiselessly, inched his way over, bound though he was hand and foot. It was agonizingly slow progress. If only Carson would not turn around and see . . .
“Do or die!” Jon thought, and he touched his ropes to the cable.
There was a flash. Jon’s whole body knotted as electrical current jolted him. Sizzling, the rope burst apart. Jon tore himself loose from the strands as Carson turned in alarm, swinging his metal club again. But Jon ducked and then rose from the floor with an uppercut that flung Carson halfway across the room.