by Various
When the Moon Turned Green
_By Hal K. Wells_
_The monster whirled to confront Dixon._]
[Sidenote: Outside his laboratory Bruce Dixon finds a world of livingdead men--and above, in the sky, shines a weird green moon.]
It was nearly midnight when Bruce Dixon finished his labors andwearily rose from before the work-bench of his lonely mountainlaboratory, located in an abandoned mine working in Southern Arizona.
He looked like some weirdly garbed monk of the Middle Ages as hestretched his tall, lithe figure. His head was completely swathed in ahood of lead-cloth, broken only by twin eyeholes of green glass. Thehood merged into a long-sleeved tunic of the same fabric, whilelead-cloth gauntlets covered his hands.
The lead-cloth costume was demanded by Dixon's work with radiumcompounds. The result of that work lay before him on the bench--atiny lead capsule containing a pinhead lump of a substance which Dixonbelieved would utterly dwarf earth's most powerful explosives in itscataclysmic power.
So engrossed had Dixon been in the final stages of his work that forthe last seventy-two hours he had literally lived there in hislaboratory. It remained now only for him to step outside and test theeffect of the little contact grenade, and at the same time get a badlyneeded taste of fresh air.
He set the safety catch on the little bomb and slipped it into hispocket. As he started for the door he threw back his hood, revealingthe ruggedly good-looking face of a young man in the early thirties,with lines of weariness now etched deeply into the clean-cut features.
* * * * *
The moment that Dixon entered the short winding tunnel that led to theouter air he was vaguely aware that something was wrong. There was astrange and intangibly sinister quality in the moonlight that streameddimly into the winding passage. Even the cool night air itself seemedcharged with a subtle aura of brooding evil.
Dixon reached the entrance and stepped out into the full radiance ofthe moonlight. He stopped abruptly and stared around him in utteramazement.
High in the eastern sky there rode the disc of a full moon, but it wasa moon weirdly different from any that Dixon had ever seen before.This moon was a deep and baleful green; was glowing with a starkmalignant fire like that which lurks in the blazing heart of a giantemerald! Bathed in the glow of the intense green rays, the desolatemountain landscape shone with a new and eery beauty.
Dixon took a dazed step forward. His foot thudded softly into a smallfeathered body there in the sparse grass, and he stooped to pick itup. It was a crested quail, with every muscle as stonily rigid asthough the bird had been dead for hours. Yet Dixon, to his surprise,felt the slow faint beat of a pulse still in the tiny body.
Then a dim group of unfamiliar objects down in the shadows of a smallgully in front of him caught Dixon's eye. Tucking the body of thequail inside his tunic for later examination, he hurried down into thegully. A moment later he was standing by what had been the night campof a prospector.
The prospector was still there, his rigid figure wrapped in a blanket,and his wide-open eyes staring sightlessly at the malignant green moonin the sky above. Dixon knelt to examine the stricken man's body. Itshowed the same mysterious condition as that of the quail, rigidlystiff in every muscle, yet with the slow pulse and respiration of lifestill faintly present.
* * * * *
Dixon found the prospector's horse and burro sprawled on the groundhalf a dozen yards away, both animals frozen in the same bafflingcondition of living death. Dixon's brain reeled as he tried to fathomthe incredible calamity that had apparently overwhelmed the worldwhile he had been hidden away in his subterranean laboratory. Then anew and terrible thought assailed him.
If the grim effect of the baleful green rays was universal in itsextent, what then of old Emil Crawford and his niece, Ruth Lawton?Crawford, an inventor like Dixon, had his laboratory in a valley somefive miles away.
An abrupt chill went over Dixon's heart at the thought of RuthLawton's vivid Titian-haired beauty being forever stilled in the gripof that eery living death. He and Ruth had loved each other eversince they had first met.
Dixon broke into a run as he headed for a nearby ridge that looked outover the valley. His pulse hammered with unusual violence as hescrambled up the steep incline, and his muscles seemed to be tiringwith strange rapidity. He had a vague feeling that the rays of thatmalignant green moon were beating directly into his brain, cloudinghis thoughts and draining his physical strength.
Gaining the crest of the ridge, he stopped aghast as he looked downthe valley toward Emil Crawford's place. Near the site of Crawford'slaboratory home was an unearthly pyrotechnic display such as Dixon hadnever seen before. An area several hundred yards in diameter seemedone vivid welter of pulsing colors, with flashing lances of every huecrisscrossing in and through a great central cloud of ever-changingopalescence like a fiery aurora borealis gone mad.
* * * * *
Dixon fought back the ever-increasing lethargy that was benumbing hisbrain, and groped dazedly for a key to this new riddle. Was it someweird and colossal experiment of Emil Crawford's that was causing thegreen rays of death from a transformed moon, an experiment the earthlybase of which was amid the seething play of blazing colors down therein the valley?
The theory seemed hardly a plausible one. As far as Dixon knew,Crawford's work had been confined almost entirely to a form ofradio-propelled projectile for use in war-time against maraudingplanes.
Dixon shook his head forcibly in a vain effort to clear the stuporthat was sweeping over him. It was strange how the vivid rays of thatmalevolent green moon seemed to sear insidiously into one's brain,stifling thought as a swamp fog stifles the sunlight.
Then Dixon suddenly froze into stark immobility, staring with startledeyes at the base of a rocky crag thirty yards away. Something waslurking there in the green-black shadows--a great sprawling blackshape of abysmal horror, with a single flaming opalescent eye fixedunwinkingly upon Dixon.
The next moment the vivid moon was suddenly obscured by drifting wispsof cloud. As the green light blurred to an emerald haze, the creatureunder the crag came slithering out toward Dixon.
He had a vague glimpse of a monster such as one should see only innightmares--a huge loathesome spider-form with a bloated body as longas that of a man, and great sprawling legs that sent it half a dozenyards nearer Dixon in one effortless leap.
* * * * *
The onslaught proved too much for Dixon's morale, half-dazed as he wasby the green moon's paralyzing rays. With a low inarticulate cry ofterror, he turned and ran, straining every muscle in a futile effortto distance the frightful thing that inexorably kept pace in theshadowy emerald gloom behind him.
Dixon's strength faded rapidly after his first wild sprint. Fiftyyards more, and his faltering muscles failed him utterly. The dreadrays of that grim green moon sapped his last faint powers ofresistance. He staggered on for a few more painful steps then sprawledhelplessly to the ground. His brain hovered momentarily upon the vergeof complete unconsciousness.
Then he was suddenly aware of a fluttering struggle, inside his tunicwhere he had placed the body of the quail. A moment later and the birdwriggled free. It promptly spread its wings and flew away, apparentlyas vibrantly alive as before the mysterious paralysis had strickenit.
The incident brought a faint surge of hope to Dixon as he dimlyrealized the answer to at least part of the green moon's riddle. Thebird had recovered after being shielded in the lead-cloth of histunic. That could only mean one thing--the menace of those green moonrays must in some unknown way be radioactive. If Dixon could only getthe lead-cloth hood over his own head again he also might cheat thegreen doom.
He fumbled at the garment with fingers that seemed as stiff as woodenblocks. There was a long moment of agony when he feared that hiseffort had come too late. Then the hood finally slipped over his headjust as utter
oblivion claimed him.
* * * * *
Dixon came abruptly back to life with the dimly remembered echo of awoman's scream still ringing in his ears. For a moment he thought thathe was awakening on his cot back in the laboratory after an unusuallyvivid and weird nightmare. Then the garish green moonlight around himbrought swift realization that the incredible happenings of the nightwere grim reality.
The clouds were gone from the moon, leaving his surroundings againclearly outlined in the flood of green light. Dixon lifted his headand cautiously searched the scene, but he could see no trace of thegreat spider-form that had pursued him.
Wondering curiously why the creature had abandoned the chase at themoment when victory was within its grasp, Dixon rose lithely to hisfeet. The protecting hood had brought a quick and complete recoveryfrom the devastating effects of the green moon's rays. His muscleswere again supple, and his brain once more functioned with clearness.
Then abruptly Dixon's blood froze as the sound of a woman's screamcame again. The cry was that of a woman in the last extremity ofterror, and Dixon knew with a terrible certainty that that woman wasRuth Lawton!
He raced toward the small ridge of rocks from behind which the soundhad apparently come. A moment later he reached the scene, and stoppedhorror-stricken.
Three figures were there in a small rock-walled clearing. One was oldEmil Crawford, sprawled unconscious on his side, the soft glow of asmall white globe in a strange head-piece atop his gray hair shiningeerily in the green moonlight.
Near Crawford's body loomed the giant spider-creature, and clutchedfirmly in the great claspers just under the monster's terrible fangedmouth was the slender body of Ruth Lawton. Merciful unconsciousnesshad apparently overwhelmed the girl now, for she lay supinely in thedread embrace, with eyes closed and lips silent.
* * * * *
As the monster dropped the girl's body to the ground and whirled toconfront Dixon, for the first time he had a clear view of the thing inall its horror.
He shuddered in uncontrollable nausea. The incredible size of thecreature was repellent enough, but it was the grisly head of themonstrosity that struck the final note of horror. That head was morethan half human!
The fangs and other mouth parts were those of a giant tarantula, butthese merged directly into the mutilated but unmistakable head of aman--with an aquiline nose, staring eyes, and a touseled mop of dirtybrown hair. Resting on top of the head was a metallic head-piecesimilar to the one worn by Emil Crawford, but the small globe in thisone blazed with a fiery opalescence.
The creature crouched lower, with its legs twitching in obviouspreparation for a spring. Dixon looked wildly about him for a possibleweapon, but saw nothing. Then he suddenly remembered the little leadgrenade in his pocket. The cataclysmic power of that little bombshould be more than a match for even this monster.
His fingers closed over the grenade just as the great spider'stwitching legs straightened in a mighty effort that sent it hurtlingthrough the air straight toward him.
Dixon dodged to one side with a swiftness that caused the monster tomiss by a good yard. Dixon raced a dozen paces farther away, thenwhirled to face the great spider. The creature's legs began scuttlingwarily forward. It was to be no wild leap through the air this time,but a swift rush over the ground that Dixon would be powerless toevade.
Releasing the safety catch of the grenade, Dixon hurled the tinymissile straight at the rock floor just under the feet of that vastmisshapen creature. There was a vivid flash of blinding blue flame,then a terrific report. Dazed by the concussion, but unhurt, Dixoncautiously went over to investigate the result of the explosion.
* * * * *
One brief glance was enough. The hideous mass of shattered fleshsprawling there on the rocks would never again be a menace. The onlything that had escaped destruction in that shattering blast was thestrange head-piece the thing had worn. Either the small shining globewas practically indestructible, or else it had been spared by some oddfreak of the explosive, for it still blazed in baleful opalescenceatop the shattered head.
Dixon hurried back to where Emil Crawford and Ruth Lawton lay. Thegirl's body was so rigidly inert that Dixon threw back hisencumbering hood and knelt over her for a swift examination. His fearswere quickly realized. Ruth was already a victim of the green moon'sdread paralysis.
"Dixon! Bruce Dixon!"
Dixon turned at the call. Emil Crawford, his face drawn with pain, hadstruggled up on one elbow. The old man was obviously fighting offcomplete collapse by sheer will power.
"Dixon! Replace Ruth's shining head-piece at once!" Crawford gasped."That will make her immune from the Green Death, and then we can--"The old man's voice swiftly faded away into silence as he againfainted.
Dixon hurriedly searched the scene and found Ruth's head-piece on theground where it had apparently fallen in her first struggle with thegiant spider, but the tiny white globe in the device was shattered anddark.
Despair gripped Dixon for a moment. Then he remembered the unbrokenhead-piece of the slain monster. True, the glow of its globe wasopalescent instead of white, but it seemed to offer its wearer thesame immunity to the green moon's rays.
He swiftly retrieved the head-piece from the spider-creature's body,and set the light metal framework in place on Ruth's auburn curls.
* * * * *
Results came with incredible quickness. The rigidity left Ruth's bodyimmediately. Her breath came in fast-quickening gasps, and her eyesfluttered open as Dixon knelt over her.
"It's Bruce, Ruth--Bruce Dixon," he said tenderly. "Don't you know me,dear?"
But there was no trace of recognition in those wide-open blue eyesstaring fixedly up at him. For a moment Ruth lay there with musclesstrangely tense. Then with a lithe strength that was amazing shesuddenly twisted free of the clasp of Dixon's arms and sprang to herfeet.
The next minute Dixon gave ground, and he found himself battling forhis very life. This was not the Ruth Lawton whom he had known andloved. This was a madwoman of savage menace, with soft lips writhingover white teeth in a jungle snarl, and blue eyes that fairlyglittered with unrestrained, insensate hate.
He tried to close with the maddened girl, but instantly regretted hisrashness. Her slender body seemed imbued with the strength of atigress as she sent slim fingers clawing at his throat. He torehimself free just in time. Dazed and shaken, he again gave groundbefore the fury of the girl's attack.
He could not bring himself to the point of actively fighting back, yethe knew that in another moment he would either have to mercilesslybatter his beautiful adversary into helplessness or else be himselfovercome. There was no middle course.
Then old Emil Crawford's voice came again as the old man rallied toconsciousness for another brief moment.
"Bruce, the opal globe is a direct link to those devils themselves!Break it, Bruce, break it--for Ruth's sake as well as your own!"
* * * * *
Crawford had barely finished his gasped warning when Ruth again hurledherself forward upon Dixon with tapering fingers curved like talons asthey sought his throat. Dixon swept her clutching hands aside with adesperate left-handed parry, then snatched wildly at the gleaminghead-piece with his right hand.
The thing came away in his grasp, and in the same swift movement hesavagely smashed it against the rocky wall beside him. Whatever theopalescent globe's eery powers might be, it was not indestructible. Itshattered like a bursting bubble, its fire dying in a tiny cloud ofparticles that shimmered faintly for a moment, then was gone.
Again, the effect upon Ruth was almost instantaneous. Every trace ofher insane fury vanished. She swayed dizzily and would have fallen hadnot Dixon caught her in his arms. For a moment she looked up into hisface with eyes in which recognition now shone unmistakably. Then hereyelids slowly closed, and she again lapsed into unconsciousness.
> Dixon looked over at Emil Crawford, and found that the old man hadagain collapsed. Dixon knew of but one thing to do with the strickenman and girl, and that was to take them to his laboratory. Thelaboratory, apparently insulated by veins of lead ore in the mountainsurrounding it, was the one sure spot of refuge in this weirdnightmare world of paralyzing lunar rays and prowling monsters.
* * * * *
Flinging his tunic over Ruth's head to shield her as much as possiblefrom the moonlight, he carried her to the laboratory, then returnedfor Emil Crawford. Safe within the subterranean retreat with the oldscientist, Dixon removed his encumbering lead costume and began doingwhat he could for the stricken pair.
Ruth was still unconscious, but the cataleptic rigidity was alreadynearly gone from her body, and her breathing was now the deeprespiration of normal sleep.
Emil Crawford's condition was more serious. Not only was the old man'sfrail strength nearly exhausted, but he was also badly wounded. Histhin chest was seared by two great livid areas of burned flesh, thenature of which puzzled Dixon as he began to dress the injuries. Theyseemed of radioactive origin, yet in many ways they were unlike anyradium burns that Dixon had ever seen.
While Dixon was working over him, Crawford stirred weakly and openedhis eyes. He sighed in relief as he recognized his surroundings.
"Good boy, Bruce!" he commended wanly. "We are safe here among theinsulating veins of lead ore in the mountain. This is where Ruth and Iwere trying to come after we escaped from those devils to-night. But,Bruce, how did you guess the radioactive nature of the Green Sicknessin time to avoid falling a victim to it as soon as you left theshelter of your laboratory?"
"My escape was entirely luck," Dixon admitted grimly. "To-night I leftmy laboratory for the first time in three days. I found a world gonemad, with a strange green moon blazing down upon a land of living deadmen, and with marauding monsters hideous enough to have been spawnedin the Pit itself. What in Heaven's name does it all mean?"
* * * * *
"I am afraid that it means the end of the world, Bruce," Crawfordanswered quietly. "It was a little over forty-eight hours ago that theincredible event first happened. Without a moment's warning, _the moonturned green_! Hardly had the world's astronomers had time tospeculate upon this amazing phenomenon before the Green Sicknessstruck--a pestilence of appalling deadliness that swept resistlesslyin the path of those weird green rays. Wherever the green moon shone,every living creature succumbed with ghastly swiftness to thecondition of living death that you have seen.
"Westward with the racing moon sped the Green Sickness, and nothingstayed its attack. The green rays pierced through buildings of wood,stone, and iron as though they did not exist. A doomed world hadneither time nor opportunity to guess that lead was the one armoragainst those dread rays. To-night, Bruce, we are in all probabilitythe only three human beings on this planet who are not slumbering inthe paralytic stupor of the Green Sickness.
"Ruth and I were stricken with the rest of the world," Crawfordcontinued. "We recovered consciousness hours later to find ourselvescaptives in the Earth-camp of the invaders themselves. You probablysaw the display of lights that marks their camp down in the valley amile beyond my place. We have learned since that the space ship of theinvaders dropped silently down into the valley the night before themoon turned green and established the camp as a sort of outpost andobservatory. They left two of their number there as pioneers, then therest of them departed in the space ship for their present post up nearthe moon.
"Ruth and I were revived only that the two invaders in the camp mightquestion us regarding life on this planet. They have a science that isbased upon principles as utterly strange and incomprehensible to us asours probably is to them. They probed my brain with a thought machine.It was an apparatus that worked both ways. What knowledge they gotfrom me I do not know, but I do know that they unwittingly told memuch in the bizarre and incredible mental pictures that the machinecarried from their brains to mine.
* * * * *
"They are refugees. Bruce, from a planet that circled about the starthat we know as Alpha Centauri, a star that is the nearest of all ourstellar neighbors, being only four and a third light years distant.Their home planet was disrupted by a colossal engineering experimentof the Centaurians themselves, the only survivors being a group offifty who escaped in a space ship just before the catastrophe.
"There were no other habitable planets in their own system, so indesperation these refugees sped out across the void to our solarsystem in the hope of finding a new home here. They reconnoitered ourEarth secretly and found it ideal. But first they believed that theymust conquer the life that already held this Earth. To do this, theystruck with the Green Sickness.
"The rays that are turning the moon green emanate from the space shiphovering up there some fifty thousand miles from the moon itself. TheCentaurian's rays, blending with the sunlight striking the disc of thefull moon, are intensified in some unknown way, then reflected acrossthe quarter of a million miles to the Earth, to flood this planet withvirulent radiance.
"The green moonlight is radioactive in nature, and overcomes animallife within a matter of fifteen minutes or less. The rays are mostpowerful when the moon is in the sky, but their effect continues evenafter it has set, because as long as the green moonlight strikes anypart of the Earth's atmosphere the entire atmospheric envelope of theplanet remains charged with the paralyzing radioactive influence.
"Earth's inhabitants are not dead. They are merely stupefied. If thegreen rays were to cease now, most of the victims of the GreenSickness would quickly recover with little permanent injury. But,Bruce, if that evil green moon blazes on for twenty-four hours more,the brain powers of Earth's millions will be forever shattered. Soweakened will they be by then that recovery will be impossible evenwith the rays shut off, and the entire planet will be populated onlyby mindless imbeciles, readily available material for the myriads ofmonstrous hybrids that the invaders will create to serve them.
* * * * *
"To-night you saw the hybrid that the invaders sent to recapture Ruth andme. It was a fit specimen of the grisly magic which those devils fromouter space work with their uncanny surgery and growth-stimulatingradioactive rays. The basic element of that monster was an ordinarytarantula spider, with its growth incredibly increased in a few shorthours of intensive ray treatment in the Centaurian's camp. The half-headgrafted to it was that of a human being. They always graft the braincavity of a mammal to a hybrid--half heads of burros, horses, or evendogs, but preferably those of human beings. I think that they prefer touse as great a brain power as possible.
"The hybrids are controlled through the small opalescent globes ontheir heads, globes that are in direct tune with a huge master globeof opalescent fire in the invaders' camp. When Ruth attacked you afteryou placed the opal head-piece upon her head, she was for the momentmerely another of the invaders' servants blindly obeying the broadcastcommand to kill. The white globes that Ruth and I wore when we escapedfrom the camp were identical with those worn by the invadersthemselves, being nothing more than harmless insulators against theeffect of the green moonlight."
A sudden spasm of pain convulsed Crawford's face. Dixon sprang forwardto aid him, but the old man rallied with an effort and weakly wavedDixon back.
"I'm all right, Bruce," he gasped. "My strength is nearly exhausted,that is all. Like a garrulous old fool I've worn myself out talkingabout everything but the one important subject. Bruce, have youdeveloped that new and infinitely powerful explosive you were workingon?"
"Yes," Dixon answered grimly. "I have an explosive right here in thelaboratory that can easily blow the Centaurian's camp completely offthe map."
* * * * *
Crawford shook his head impatiently. "Destroying the camp would do nogood. We must shatter the space ship itself if we are to extinguis
hthose green rays in time to save our world."
"That is impossible if the space ship is hovering up there by themoon!" Dixon protested.
"No, it is not impossible," Crawford answered confidently. "I have aprojectile in my laboratory that will not only hurtle across thatgreat gap with incredible speed, but will also infallibly strike itstarget when it gets there. It is a projectile that is as irresistiblydrawn by radio waves as steel is by a magnet, and it will speed asstraight to the source of those waves as a bit of steel will to themagnet.
"The Centaurians in the space ship," Crawford continued, "are inconstant communication with their camp through radio apparatus muchlike our own. If you can pack a powerful contact charge of yourexplosive in my projectile, I can guarantee that when the projectileis released it will flash out into space and score a direct hitagainst the walls of the space ship."
"I can pack the explosive in the projectile, all right," Dixonanswered grimly. "We will need only a lump the size of an egg, and asmall container of the heavy gas that activates it. The explosiveitself is a radium compound that, when allowed to come in contact withthe activating gas, becomes so unstable that any sharp blow will setit off in an explosion that in a matter of seconds releases theinfinite quantities of energy usually released by radium over a periodof at least twelve hundred years. The cataclysmic force of thatexplosion should be enough to wreck a small planet."
"Good!" Crawford commended weakly. "If you can only strike your blowto-night, Bruce, our world still has a chance. If only you--" The oldman's voice suddenly failed. He sank back in utter collapse, his eyesclosed and his last vestige of strength spent.
* * * * *
Knowing that the old man would probably remain in his sleep ofcomplete exhaustion for hours, Dixon turned his attention to Ruth. Tohis surprise, he found her sitting up, apparently completelyrecovered.
"I'm quite all right again," she said reassuringly. "I've beenlistening to what Uncle told you. Go ahead and prepare your explosive,Bruce. I'll do what I can for Uncle while you're working."
Dixon donned his lead-cloth hood and tunic again and set to work. Tenminutes later he turned to Ruth with a slender foot-long cylinder oflead in his hand.
"Ruth, will this fit your Uncle's projectile?" he asked.
"Easily," she assured him. "But isn't it frightfully dangerous tocarry in that form?"
"No, it's absolutely safe now, and will be safe until this stud isturned, releasing the activating gas from one compartment to minglewith the radium compound in the other section. Then the cylinder willbecome a bomb that any sharp jar will detonate."
"All right, let's go then," Ruth answered. "Have you any more of thoselead clothes that I can wear? I could wear the globe head-piece thatUncle wore, but it would loom up in the dark like a searchlight."
Dixon did not protest Ruth's going with him. There was nothing furtherthat could be done for Emil Crawford for hours and in the hazardoussally to Crawford's laboratory he knew that Ruth's cool courage andquick wits would at least double their chances for success in theirdesperate mission. He provided her with a reserve hood and tunic oflead cloth, then handed her a tiny leaden pellet.
"Keep this for a last resort," he told her. "It's a contact bomb thatbecomes ready to throw when this safety catch is snapped over. I wishwe had a dozen of them, but that's the last capsule I had and there'sno time to prepare more."
He fished a rusty old revolver out of a drawer, and placed it in hispocket. "I'll use this gun for a last resort weapon myself," he said."The action only works about half the time, but it's the only firearmin the place."
* * * * *
The green moon was still high in the sky as Ruth and Dixon emergedfrom the tunnel, but it was already beginning to drop gradually downtoward the west. Dixon wheeled his disreputable flivver out of itsnearby shed. With engine silent they started coasting down the roughwinding road into the valley.
For nearly two miles they wound down the long grade. Then, just asthey reached the valley floor they saw, far up among the rocks to theleft of the road, the thing they had been dreading--the bobbingopalescent globe that marked the presence of one of the Centaurians'hideous hybrids. The shimmering globe paused for a moment, then cameracing down toward them.
The need for secrecy was past. Dixon threw the car in gear andsavagely pulled down the gas lever. With throttle wide open theyhurtled around the perilous curves of the narrow road, but always inthe rocks beside and above them they heard the scuttling progress ofsome huge, many-legged creature that constantly kept pace with them.
They had occasional glimpses of the thing. Its pale jointed body wassome twenty feet in length, and had apparently been developed fromthat of a centipede, with scores of racing legs that carried it withstartling speed over the rocky terrain.
The flivver raced madly on toward the blaze of kaleidoscopic colorsthat marked the Centaurians' camp. Crawford's home loomed up nowbarely a hundred yards ahead.
As though sensing that its quarry was about to escape, the hybridflashed a burst of speed that sent it on by the car for a full fiftyyards, then down into the road directly in front, where it whirled toconfront them. Dixon knew that he could never stop the car in theshort gap separating them from that huge upreared figure, and toattempt swerving from the road upon either side was certain disaster.
He took the only remaining chance. With throttle wide open he sent thelittle car hurtling straight for the giant centipede. He threw hisbody in front of Ruth, to shield her as much as possible, just as theysmashed squarely into the hybrid.
The impact was too much for even that monstrous figure. It was hurledbodily from the road to crash upon the jagged rocks at the bottom of athirty-foot gully. There it sprawled in a broken mass, too hopelesslyshattered to ever rise again.
The flivver skidded momentarily, then crumpled to a full stop againstthe rocks at the side of the road. Dixon and Ruth scrambled from thewreckage and raced for Crawford's home, scarcely fifty yards ahead.
* * * * *
They entered the laboratory and Ruth went directly over to where theradio-projectile rested in a wall-rack. Dixon took the gleamingcylinder down to examine it. Tapering to a rounded point at the frontend, it was nearly a yard long and about five inches in diameter.
"The mechanism inside the projectile is turned off now, of course,"Ruth said. "If it were turned on, the projectile would have been onits way to the space ship long ago, for the radio waves are as stronghere as at the Centaurians' camp."
The girl pointed to a small metal stud in the nose of the projectile.
"When that is snapped over, it makes the contact that sets themagnetizing mechanism into action," she explained. "Then theprojectile will go hurtling directly for the source of any radio waveswithin range. I don't know the nature of its mechanism. Uncle merelytold me that it is the application of an entirely new principle ofelectricity."
Dixon laid the long projectile down on the work-bench, and beganpacking his lead cylinder of explosive inside it. He had to releasethe lead cylinder's safety catch before closing the projectile, whichmade his work a thrillingly precarious one, for any sharp blow nowwould detonate the unstable mixture of gas and radium compound in onecataclysmic explosion.
He sighed in relief as he finally straightened up with the completedprojectile held carefully in both hands.
"All we have to do now, Ruth," he said, "is step out from under thisroof and snap that energizing stud. Then this little package ofdestruction will be on its way to our Centaurian friends up there bythat pestilential green moon."
* * * * *
Ruth stepped ahead to open the door for him. With the end of theirtask so near at hand, both forgot to be cautious.
Ruth threw the door open and took one step outside, then suddenlyscreamed in terror as her shoulders were encircled by a longsnake-like object that came whipping down from some vast somethingthat had
been lurking just outside. Dixon tried to dodge back, but toolate. Another great hairy tentacle came lashing around his shoulders,pinning his arms tightly and jerking him out of the doorway.
He had a swift vague glimpse of a hybrid looming there in the greenmoonlight--a tarantula hybrid that in size and horror dwarfed any ofthe frightful products of Centaurian science that he had yet seen.
Before Dixon had time to note any of the details of his assailantanother tentacle curled around him, tearing the projectile from hisgrasp. Then he was irresistibly drawn up toward that grisly head whereRuth's body was also suspended in one of the powerful tentacles. Thenext moment, bearing its burdens with amazing ease, the giant hybridstarted off.
Dixon tried with all his strength to squirm free enough to get a handupon the revolver in his pocket, but the constricting tentacle did notgive for even an inch. The only result of his effort was to twist hishood to one side, leaving him as effectually blindfolded as though hishead were in a sack.
Long minutes of swaying, pitching motion followed as the hybrid spedover the rocky ridges and gullies. It finally came to a halt, and foranother minute or so Dixon was held there motionless in mid-air, dimlyconscious of a subdued hum of activity all about him. Then he wasgently lowered to the ground again.
While one tentacle still held him securely, another tore away his hoodand tunic. Almost immediately the hood was replaced by one of theprotective white globe devices. Dixon blinked for a moment inhalf-blinded bewilderment as he got his first glimpse of theEarth-camp of the Centaurians.
* * * * *
The place, located on the smooth rock floor of a large natural basin,seemed a veritable cauldron of seething colors which rippled andblended in a dazzling maze of unearthly splendor. But Dixon forgoteverything else in that weird camp as his startled gaze fell upon thecreature standing directly in front of him.
He knew instinctively that the thing must be one of the AlphaCentaurians, for in its alien grotesqueness the figure was utterlydissimilar to anything ever seen upon Earth before.
Life upon the shattered planet of that far distant sun had apparentlysprung from sources both crustacean and reptilian. The Centaurianstood barely five feet in height. Its bulky, box-like body wascompletely covered with a chitinous armor that gleamed pale yellowishgreen.
Two short powerful legs, scaled like those of a lizard, ended in feetthat resembled degenerated talons. Two pairs of slender arms emanatedfrom the creature's shoulders, with their many-jointed flexible lengthending in delicate three-pronged hands.
The scaly hairless head beneath the Centaurian's white globe devicebore a face that was blankly hideous. Two great lidless eyes, devoidof both pupils and whites, stared unblinkingly at Dixon like twinblobs of red-black jelly. A toothless loose-lipped mouth slaveredbeneath.
Dixon averted his gaze from the horror of that fearful alien face, andlooked anxiously around for Ruth. He saw her almost at once, over athis right. She was tethered by a light metallic rope that ran from herwaist to one of the metal beams supporting the great shimmering ballof opalescent fire which formed the central control of the hybrids.
One of the white globe devices had been placed upon Ruth's head andshe was apparently unhurt, for she pluckily flashed a reassuring smileat Dixon.
* * * * *
Directly in front of Dixon and some forty yards away there was a largepen-like enclosure, with vari-colored shafts of radiance from banks ofprojectors constantly sweeping through it. Dixon drew in his breathsharply as he saw the frightful life lying dormant in that pen. It wasa solid mass of hybrids--great loathesome figures fashioned from ascore of different worms, insects, and spiders. The globes upon thegruesome mammalian half-heads were still dark and unfired withopalescence.
The invaders had apparently raided most of the surrounding country inobtaining those grafted half-heads. Near where Dixon stood there was atragic little pile of articles taken from the Centaurians'victims--prospectors' picks, shovels, axes, and other tools.
Over to the left of the dormant hybrids stood the second AlphaCentaurian, curiously examining Dixon's projectile. The creatureapparently suspected the deadly nature of the gleaming cylinder for itsoon laid it carefully down and packed cushions of soft fabric aroundit to shield it from any possible shock.
Then at an unspoken command from the first Centaurian the great hybridwhirled Dixon around to face a small enclosure just behind him inwhich were located banks of control panels and other apparatus. One ofthe pieces of mechanism, with a regularly spaced stream of sparkssnapping between two terminals, was apparently a radio receiverautomatically recording the broadcast from the space ship. Dixon wasunable to even guess the nature of the remaining apparatus.
"Bruce, be careful!" Ruth called in despairing warning. "He is goingto put the thought-reading machine on your brain. Then he'll learnwhat the projectile is for, and everything will be lost!"
* * * * *
Dixon's mind raced with lightning speed in the face of this newdanger. He stealthily slipped a hand over the revolver in his pocket.There was one vulnerable spot in the great hybrid holding him, andthat was the opalescent globe on the creature's head. If he could onlysmash that globe with one well-directed shot, he might be able toelude the Centaurians for the precious minute necessary to send theprojectile on its deadly journey.
The hybrid began maneuvering Dixon toward the instrument enclosure.For a fleeting second the grip of the tentacles upon his shouldersloosened slightly. Dixon took instant advantage of it. Twistinghimself free from the loosened tentacle in one mighty effort, hewhirled and fired pointblank at the opalescent globe on the headlooming above him.
The bullet smashed accurately home, shattering the globe like abursting bubble. The great hybrid collapsed with startling suddenness,its life force instantly extinguished as the globe burst.
Dixon leaped to one side and swung the gun into line with theCentaurian's hideous face. He pulled the trigger--but there was noresponse. The rusty old firearm had hopelessly jammed.
Dixon savagely flung the revolver at the Centaurian. The creaturetried to dodge, but the heavy gun struck its body a glancing blow.There was a slight spurt of body fluid as the chitinous armor waspartly broken.
Dixon's heart leaped exultantly. No wonder these creatures had tocreate hybrids to fight for them. Their own bodies were as vulnerableas that of a soft-shelled crab!
The Centaurian quickly drew a slender tube of dark green from ascabbard in its belt. Dixon dodged back, looking wildly about him fora weapon. There was an ax in the pile only a few yards away. Dixonsnatched the ax up, and whirled to give battle.
* * * * *
The other Centaurian had come hurrying over now to aid its mate. Dixonwas effectually barred from attempting any progress toward theprojectile by the two grotesque creatures as they stood alertly therebeside each other with their green tubes menacing him. Dixon waitedtensely at bay, remembering those searing radium burns upon EmilCrawford's body.
Then the first Centaurian abruptly leveled a second and smaller tubeupon Dixon. A burst of yellow light flashed toward him, enveloping himin a cloud of pale radiance before he could dodge.
There was a faint plop as the protecting white globe upon his head wasshattered. The yellow radiance swiftly faded, leaving Dixon unhurt,but he realized that the first round in the battle had been wondecisively by the Centaurians. His only chance now, was to end thebattle before the paralyzing rays of the green moon sapped hisstrength.
He warily advanced upon the Centaurians. Their green tubes swung intoline and twin bolts of violet flame flashed toward him. He dodged, andthe bolts missed by inches. Then Dixon nearly fell as his foot strucka bundle of cloth on the ground.
The next moment he snatched the bundle up with a cry of triumph. Itwas his lead-cloth tunic, torn and useless as a garment, butinvaluable as a shield against the searing effects of those bolts ofradioac
tive flame. He hurriedly wrapped the fabric in a rough bundlearound his left forearm. The next time the tubes' violet flamesflashed toward him he thrust his rude shield squarely into their path.There was a light tingling shock, and that was all. The bolts did notsear through.
With new confidence, Dixon boldly charged the two Centaurians. A weirdbattle ensued in the garishly lighted arena.
The effective range of the violet flashes was only about ten feet, andDixon's muscular agility was far superior to that of his antagonists.By constant whirling and dodging he was able to either catch theviolet bolts upon his shielded arm or else dodge them entirely.
Yet, in spite of the Centaurians' clumsy slowness, they maneuveredwith a cool strategy that constantly kept the Earth man's superiorstrength at bay. Always as Dixon tried to close with one of them hewas forced to retreat when a flanking attack from the other threatenedhis unprotected back. And always the Centaurians maneuvered to barDixon from attempting any dash toward the projectile.
* * * * *
The minutes passed, and Dixon felt his strength rapidly ebbing, bothfrom his herculean exertions and from the paralyzing rays of the greenmoon beating down upon his unprotected head. As his speed of footlessened the Centaurians began inexorably pressing their advantage.
Dixon was no longer escaping unscathed. In spite of his franticefforts to dodge, twice the violet bolts grazed his body in searingflashes of exquisite agony.
His muscles stiffened still more in the attack of the Green Sickness.Desperately dodging a Centaurian bolt, he stumbled and nearly fell. Ashe staggered to regain his balance, one of his antagonists scrambledto the coveted position behind him.
It was only Ruth's scream of warning that galvanized Dixon's numbedbrain into action in time to meet the imminent peril.
In one mighty effort he flung his ax at the Centaurian in front ofhim. The heavy blade cut deep into the thinly armored body. Mortallywounded, the creature collapsed.
Dixon whirled and flung up his shielded left arm just in time tointercept the violet bolt of the other Centaurian. Warily backingaway, Dixon succeeded in retrieving his ax from beside the twitchingbody of the fallen invader.
Then, with the heavy weapon again in his hand, he remorselesslycharged his remaining foe. The Centaurian's tube flashed in averitable hail of hurtling violet bolts, but Dixon caught the flashesupon his shield and closed grimly in.
One final leap brought him to close quarters. The heavy ax whistledthrough the air in a single mighty stroke that cleft the Centaurian'sfrail body nearly in two.
Then Ruth's excited scream came again. "Bruce--the other one! Get itquick!"
* * * * *
Dixon turned. The wounded invader, taking advantage of theirpreoccupation in the final struggle with its mate, had dragged itscrippled body over to the instrument enclosure. Dixon staggered towardit as fast as his half-paralyzed muscles would permit.
He was just too late. The Centaurian jerked a lever home a fraction ofa second before Dixon's smashing ax forever ended his activities. Thelever's action upon the pen of inert hybrids was immediate.
The sweeping lances of light vanished in a brief sheet of vivid flamewhich kindled the dark globes on the hybrids' gruesome heads to steadyopalescence--and the dread horde came to life! Sprawling from the pen,they came scuttling toward Dixon in a surging flood--a scene out of anightmare.
Dixon faced the oncoming horde in numb despair, knowing that hisnearly-paralyzed body had no chance in flight. Then, just as thehybrids were nearly upon him, he heard Ruth's encouraging voice again.
"There's still one chance left, Bruce," she cried, "and I'll take it!"
Dixon turned. Ruth had in her hand the tiny contact grenade he hadgiven her for a last emergency. She snapped the safety catch on thelittle bomb, then hurled it squarely at the giant opalescent globelooming close beside her.
There was a terrific explosion and the great globe shattered to atoms.Apparently stunned by the concussion but otherwise unhurt, Ruth wasflung clear of the wreckage.
With the shattering of the central globe the strange life force of thehybrid horde vanished instantly and completely. Midway in their rushthey sprawled inert and dead, with their outstretched legs so close toDixon that he had to step over one or two to get clear.
* * * * *
Dixon's brain reeled in the reaction of relief from the horde'shideous menace. Then he grimly fought to clear his fast-numbing senseslong enough for the one final task that he knew must still be done.
The projectile, cushioned as it was, had escaped detonation in theblast. He had only to stagger across the twenty yards separating himfrom it, then release the stud that would send it flashing out intospace.
But his last shred of reserve strength had nearly been sapped now bythe insidious rays of that malevolent green moon. Even as he startedtoward the projectile, he staggered and fell. Unable to drag himselfto his feet again, he began grimly crawling with arms and legs asstiff and dead as that much stone.
Only ten more yards to go now. And now only five. Grimly, doggedly,with senses reeling and muscles nearly dead, the last survivor of adying planet fought desperately on under the malignant rays of thevivid green moon!
One last sprawling convulsive effort--and Dixon had the projectile inhis hands. His stiff fingers fumbled agonizingly with the activatingstud. Then abruptly the stud snapped home. With a crescendo whistle ofsundered air the projectile flashed upward into the western sky.
Dixon collapsed upon his back, his dimming eyes fixed upon the grimgreen moon. Minutes that seemed eternities dragged slowly by. Then hisheart leaped in sudden hope. Had there really glowed a small bluespark up there beside the green moon--a spark marking the mightyexplosion of the radium bomb against the Centaurians' space ship?
A fraction of a second later, and doubt became glorious certainty. Thevivid green of the moonlight vanished. The silvery white sheen of anormal moon again shone serenely up there in the western sky!
With the extinguishing of the dread green rays, new strength surgedswiftly through Dixon's tired body. He arose and hurried over to whereRuth lay limp and still near the wreckage of the great globe. Heworked over her for many anxious minutes before the normal flush ofhealth returned to her white cheeks and her eyes slowly opened.
Then he took Ruth into his arms and for a long minute the two silentlydrank in the beauty of that radiant silver moon above them, whiletheir hearts thrilled with a realization of the glorious miracle ofawakening life that they knew must already be beginning to rejuvenatea stricken world.