“Next year Mars will be in the halfway station spot,” Everitt reminded him. “There’ll be plenty of trouble fiying out to Jupiter after you.”
“When we’re holding all the colonies as hostage?” laughed Ropakihn. “Don’t be absurd. They’ll be glad to meet whatever terms we make. Freedom, money, recognition as governors even.”
Everitt said nothing. The scheme was as practicable as it was daring. Such, a weapon as the MS-ray, unknown as yet on the Jovian moons, would spell victory for this handful of insane adventurers. What fantastic rulers for the unlucky settlers!
The air-lock opened and two figures entered—Zeoui and Gorby,_taking off their helmets. The Martian’s chrysanthemum face turned toward Ropakihn.
“Your lieutenant has been explaining to me your stratagem for the invasion and conquest of Jupiter’s satellites,” he volunteered in his precise manner. “Have you accommodations in your ship for a recruit?”
Everitt gasped. Was Zeoui, the pedant, inflamed by dreams of piracy? Ropakihn grinned welcome.
“Certainly we have room, for several recruits. But how about the fuel? You, Martian—what’s your name?”
“Zeoui,” was the reply. “You want fuel? Expediently? Give me two men to help.”
Ropakihn waved forward the two brutal-faced outlaws.
Zeoui led them through the inner door of the office and down the passage toward the fuel-mixing chamber. Everitt watched with rage-darkened face, much to Ropakihn’s amusement.
“Your partner seems to be reasonable,” he commented. “How about you two?”
Everitt shook his head. “You want somebody normal to leaven your crazy crew.” He exulted at the flinch that the word “crazy” wrung from his captors, and went on. “Nothing doing, Ropakihn. If you’re destroying the space station, destroy me with it. You won’t have long to enjoy the sensation.”
Ropakihn turned toward Fortuna, but she shook her head. “It’s unnecessary to ask me,” she said.
The big man chuckled, his gaze feasting on her trim lines which the collapsed space-overall could not disguise. “I’m not asking,” he replied. “You’re coming along—to help shorten the journey . . .” His greedy eyes never left her. “You’ll be queen of my new Jovian empire. . .
Everitt could stand no more. He made a lunge at his towering foe. But the magnetism in his shoes, augmented by the floor’s artificial gravity, slowed his charge for a second. In that second Ropakihn was on guard, fending Jlim off with the rifle barrel across his chest, while Corby and the two others had fallen upon him.
For full half a minute Everitt battled, his angry strength almost a match for his three assailants, but then they forced him down and began to bind his limbs with a belt from his own overall. Fortuna, seeing his defeat, made a dash as if to help him. Ropakihn, laughing, clutched at her, and she swerved away, then ran for the door that led to the hulk’s interior.
A form popped into view on the threshold, barring her retreat. It was Zeoui. A quick clutch with a tentacle-tip, and he had her by the wrist. “Was she endeavoring to depart?” he enunciated dryly.
“She tried to fight,” growled Ropakihn. “I’ll take the fight out of her before we’ve been aboard a quarter of an hour. How’s the fuel job?”
“Going expeditiously,” retorted the Martian. “The assistants you placed at my disposal are supervising the mixing-pumps. May I be assigned others to aid in extending the feed conduits to your vessel?”
“Right.” Ropakihn turned his eyes to his three remaining henchmen. “Corby, stay here to keep an eye on Everitt. You others, on with your helmets and go with Zeoui.”
Zeoui still held Fortuna, who had quieted, but still glared angrily. “It would be well,” he suggested, “to confine this person likewise.”
He himself assisted in tying her arms and ankles. Then he bustled about, helping his two new companions to put on their helmets. Finally he led them out upon the deck.
Time passed. Everitt and Fortuna, helpless in their bonds, lay propped against a bulkhead under Corby’s guard. Ropakihn, lolling on the deck, talked. He throve on his own boasting, telling enthusiastically of his enterprise in planning the theft of the speed-craft with its new ray equipment, his courage and resource in executing that theft, of his daring in conceiving the idea of conquering Jupiter s moons.
Half an hour was gone before he wearied at the sound of his voice. Breaking his stream of self-praise then, he moved to a port and looked out.
“Where’s Zeoui?” he demanded, half aloud. “I don’t see him or the others. They must be in the cruiser itself.”
Again he studied the deck outside. “They’ve got the pipe drawn out to the ship,” he continued after a moment, “but it’s limp—there can’t be a very big stream of fuel. Probably none at all.”
Swinging around, he glared at the prisoners and at Corby. “Say,” he blustered at the universe in general, “are those lazy limpets soldiering on their mixing jobs? I’ll show them how!” He started to tramp across the floor, but the loud clang of his magnetized boots halted him. Lifting one foot, then the other, he pulled the metal footgear away. “No need for them to know I’m coming,” he commented. “Corby, you’re in charge until I get back.”
He was gone into the inner passage. Corby, his slow mind groping after the reason for his chief’s ire, took a step as if to follow, then stared stupidly in Ropakihn’s wake. For the moment he was not watching Everitt or Fortuna.
Everitt felt a tug at his bonds. A hand was freeing him— Fortuna’s hand. She had won loose! He wasted no time in pondering now, but as his own arms felt the strap draw away, sprang to his feet,
Corby heard the motion and turned, but before he lifted his ray-tube Everitt’s hard fist connected with the loose-hung jaw. The hunchback went hurtling backward, his skull ringing on the floor before his weapon fell with a shattering sound. He lay still.
Everitt caught up the ray-tube, saw that it was jammed, and dropped it with an exclamation of impatience. From the desk he seized his helmet.
“What are you going to do?” he asked Fortuna breathlessly, sitting up to untie her ankles.
“Stay where you are,” he cautioned her hastily. “Leave your feet tied and your hands behind you. Then Ropakihn and his men will think you’re still helpless, and leave you alone for a minute.” He poised the helmet above his head. “I’m making a dash for the ship outside. Zeoui and his playmates may not recognize me at once. If I get in among them and smash them, I’ll have the MS-ray. Give me a moment to learn how to work it, and it’ll be our saving.”
Clamping his helmet in place, he stepped to the inner lock- panel. Behind him rose the panicky roar of Ropakihn, hurrying back from his inspection. The bellowed words penetrated even the helmet-glass.
“Corby!” the giant was shouting. “Look alive! The fuel- mixer went wrong somehow—liquid oxygen escaped, and both the boys are frozen stiff as boards!”
He came into view, and saw Everitt.
“You loose?” he bawled, but his erstwhile captive was into the air-lock, then through it and upon the deck.
No motion, no life met Everitt’s eyes outside. The outlaw ship was where it had been, half the radius of the deck away, and to it extended the jointed metal pipe that carried fuel.
Ropakihn was right, no liquid was coursing through that flaccid conduit. Everitt started at a half-run for the cruiser.
But a savage voice rang in his earphones: “Stand still, or I’ll plug you!”
Everitt whirled around. Ropakihn had come out, helmet hastily donned and rifle poised. His huge body almost fell at the outer threshold of the lock, and only a clutch at a port- rim saved it.
The outlaw, in his haste to pursue, had left off his magnetic boots. Outside the hulk he had only the tiny gravity-pull of the deck to govern him, and his huge body weighed but a few ounces. An unconsidered touch of toe-pressure was enough to unbalance him, even hurl him clear of the deck.
“Take off your shoes and throw them to me!" he ye
lled at Everitt.
The smaller man stood still, making no motion to obey.
Ropakihn’s beaked face darkened with rage. “Off with them, or—”
Steadying himself with his left hand on the port-rim, Ropakihn pointed his rifle with the other. Everitt ducked out of the line of fire, himself slipping to one knee. At once Ropakihn floundered forward and upon him, clutching one foot and fairly ripping the shoe from it. “I’ll do the walking, you do the stumbling,” he taunted.
Everitt lay still beneath the outlaw, but not in submission. He was analyzing the situation—so logical, though he had never thought of it before. Inside the hulk you had weight and never stopped to realize that out here you needed magnets to hold you down lest—
Ropakihn had tucked his rifle under an elbow and was pulling off the. other shoe. That vast mass of flesh, sprawling upon Everitt, was no heavier than a silk handkerchief. Even as the second shoe fell to the deck, Everitt summoned his strength and surged upward, thrusting his enemy along and traveling with him. Next instant they floundered in emptiness, the deck dropping from beneath them as if snatched by the hand of a prank-playing Titan.
They wrestled wildly in space, weightless as swimmers and clumsy as dreamers. It was like a dream at that, a horrible nightmare in which one strikes or grapples but encounters no resistance. Arms around Ropakihn’s body, Everitt stared over the crag of the giant’s shoulder at Space Station No. 1—dwindling, falling down and away, shrinking to a lump-centered shield on a starry curtain of black. The very heave of Everitt’s body had been enough to send them both flying like stones from a sling, unfettered by gravity, unimpeded by air, hundreds of yards, a mile.
They wrenched and tore at each other’s throats for a time, baffled by the folds of fabric. Then Ropakihn, letting go, struck Everitt clumsily on the breast-bone. The buffet dashed them violently apart.
Everitt saw the jetty sky and its stars whirl, saw the disk that was the station whip from underfoot to overhead, then back out of sight to appear underfoot again. He was somersaulting in space. Ropakihn, too, was flying backward, head over heels over head, shrinking to the apparent size of a squirming doll.
Everitt gave vent to a hysterical laugh over their ridiculous plight. Strong as lions but light as feathers they were losing themselves in nothingness by their own undirectible exertions. Even now they had no power to come together or to return to the deck after they had left. He had a mental picture of himself falling to an orbit, circling the man-made planetoid like a satellite. Ropakihn, caught in another orbit, might make the same circuit at a slower or faster pace. Drawing into conjunction, perhaps they would be close enough to resume hostilities.
Everitt laughed again more wildly.
A shout assailed his earphones. Ropakihn, far away, was doing something with the rifle. Yes, firing it, not at Everitt, but into space behind himself. Flash after flash of detonation and Ropakihn seemed to grow in size.
Oh, that was it. The weapon carried explosive charges and its recoil, though barely enough to stir a proper weight, could propel the few ounces that its operator scaled just now. The rocket was definitely approaching. He grew bigger, bigger, like a rubber figure swelling with gas.
Now he was aiming the gun at Everitt, firing once. The bullet missed, and the recoil slowed Ropakihn. Again they collided and grappled.
The smaller, more agile Everitt managed to seize and clamp his enemy’s massive rifle arm. Ropakihn tried to shove him loose, but Everitt wrung the wrist he held with desperate vigor. He heard the giant’s involuntary grunt of pain, saw the huge, mittened hand sag open. The weapon swam slowly out of it.
Darting out his own hand, Everitt clutched the receding barrel. He had no time to find trigger or grip, but struck as with a club.
The shock of the blow, falling on Ropakihn’s shoulder, almost drove them apart again, but they clung somehow as the giant tried to snatch back his rifle. Everitt threw his legs up and forward, clamping them around his foe’s great waist as around a wild horse. He took a rib-buckling punch over the heart, but next moment had struck once more with the rifle-butt, this time full on the front of Ropakihn’s helmet.
The clouded glass splintered, and suddenly the outlaw’s red visage showed plain and monstrous in the unfiltered sunlight. A breath’s space, then the red turned blue, the great mouth gaped after the fleeting air. Bulging eyes fixed Everitt with dire hate and abruptly fell blank and dull as pebbles. The blueness deserted the face in turn, and went tallow-pale. The heaving cask-like body between Everitt’s clamping knees gave a final convulsive shudder and relaxed.
Everitt had won.
He did not feel elated, only weary. Kicking loose from the senseless, dying Ropakihn, he stared frantically around to locate the station. It was behind his shoulder. Pointing the rifle into space before him, he fired it again and again. The recoil made itself felt. Again and again he fired.
A full minute elapsed before he approached the deck of the little island in space. His sense of direction changed—the station was no longer before or behind, but beneath. He glanced upward once. Afar he saw the silhouette of Ropakihn, quite motionless and limp in the sky. Then he drifted down like a leaf from a tree. An overalled figure dashed across the deck-plates to meet him.
“An outstanding exhibition of valor and physical prowess, Ev!”
No mistaking that affected voice. It was the traitor Zeoui. Did he think to mock and sneer? Everitt clutched his rifle to fire. But the Martian stood still beneath him, holding up something. A weapon? Everitt s magnetic shoes!
Zeoui was trying to help him then! Puzzled, unable to comprehend the Martian’s sudden change of front, still Everitt held his fire as he floated slowly down.
A moment later the Terrestrial had landed, and Zeoui was steadying him with a careful tentacle.
“Once more assume your metal footgear,” came the dry accents of advice. “As I have already observed, it was a splendid and satisfactory encounter, not lacking in scientific interest. I dared hope that, when I left Miss Fortunas encircling cords somewhat loose, she would find opportunity to set you at liberty.”
Everitt was beginning to realize. “The other outlaws—” he began.
“They have been dealt with decisively,” Zeoui reassured him. “I profited by the patent stupidity of the first contingent in the mixing-shop. Catching them off guard, I released upon them a flood of liquid oxygen. The sudden drop in temperature accomplished their demise.
“The others, who accompanied me out here, suffocated for want of air. I, affecting to assist them in donning their helmets, fastened only half the clamps. The air gradually but completely departed.”
“And Corby?” asked Everitt. “The man I knocked out?”
“The charming and capable young object of your admiration, Miss Fortuna Sidney, has locked him up.”
Once more in the office together, Zeoui, Everitt and Fortuna seated themselves around the desk. From the ventilator of the locker-closet where the madman Corby was imprisoned came the occasional grumpy pleas for freedom.
“And in that manner,” the Martian finished his story, “I found it extremely simple. So simple, in truth, that Ropakihn, who considered himself the only astute person in the situation, was disposed to trust me. My pretense at helping to capture Miss Fortuna clinched it. Thereafter he thought nothing of counter-treachery on my part, but allowed me to conduct his unfortunate lunatic associates to their destruction.”
Everitt made a rueful grimace. “You had me fooled, too,” he confessed humbly.
Again Corby pleaded from his prison: “Who shut me up here? What happened?5'
“He seems dazed by Ev’s blow," explained Fortuna. “Claims not to remember coming here, or anything about Ropakihn’s attempt."
Zeoui nodded sagely. “Such mental derangements fre~ quently follow head injuries,” he said weightily. “Perhaps he is only feigning amnesia, to obtain mercy. In that case, however, he would not dare amend my report to the police ship."
“Police ship?" gasped Everitt. “Is one coming?"
“I took opportunity to broadcast an emergency message with the radio in the war-craft. Immediately thereafter I was in receipt of a reply from a patrol ship. At the request of Director-General Sidney himself—he was aboard—I told the story."
“He must have been furious at me," cried Fortuna.
“Let me amend my statement," went on Zeoui. “I told only a portion of the story. I led them to believe that the theft and flight were Ropakihn’s idea exclusively, and that the outlaws kidnaped Miss Fortuna from her school on Earth. The director-general expressed great satisfaction in your activities, Ev, and intimated that he would release you from exile. He will also cease his objections to your marriage—"
“Zeoui, you flower-faced sap!" exploded Everitt. “You've given me all the credit."
Again Zeoui nodded gravely.
“But what about you?" Fortuna demanded.
“Yes, you’re screwier than Ropakihn’s whole mob put together,” Everitt chimed in. “If you take no credit, they’ll keep you on duty here."
The Martian nodded.
“That is eminently correct.” Both Everitt and Fortuna could have sworn that the petals of Zeoufs weird visage were wreathed into something like a grin of satisfaction. “To be sure I shall remain on duty here. I enjoy it.”
Manly Wade Wellman - Novella Page 2