by Perry Rhodan
Perry Rhodan
The Third Power #20
The Thrall of Hypno
THE WORLD IN PERIL!
As if from the entrails of Hell itself an evil Mastermind materializes:
MONTERNY!
A super-hypnotist who enslaves the minds and bodies of his own band of mutants and sets them against Perry and his futuremen in a war of wills for the highest stake of all–
THE FUTURE OF THIS PLANET EARTH!
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THE THRALL OF HYPNO
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1/ CAPTIVE MINDS
Mars.
An uninhabited planet. At least, no intelligent life was indigenous to this world. A primitive vegetation clung precariously to life there in the low-lying belts and on the flat slopes of the hills. Insects and small mammals lived in the deserts. But none of these were a danger to man.
Something on Mars, however, seemingly was.
All tracks appeared to lead to the Red Planet. All tracks of the criminal mastermind, Monterny. The Supermutant. The Mutant Master.
Piloting the Good Hope VII, Major Deringhouse of the New Power stared down through narrowed eyes at the endless red desert crisscrossed by wide green belts at curiously regular intervals. Nothing—no trace of the elusive enemy. And so, sighing, the major altered the course of his spaceship so that it soared upward till Mars diminished to a reddish globe sinking into the depths of space.
The spherical spaceship shot past Phobos, moon of Mars, out into the interplanetary void.
At incredible speed, Deringhouse raced toward his prearranged destination in the 200-foot diameter ship. The crew of fifteen were almost lost inside the great vessel of the void yet no more men were needed to operate the rocket for virtually every operation was performed automatically.
In the big berths of the giant ship was room for ten of the newest space-interceptors, each carrying three men and capable of light-speed. It was to a rendezvous with these ten interceptors that Deringhouse sped.
The major wasn't at all certain that he would find the menacing Supermutant on Mars. Although his trail seemed to lead to the Red Planet, the Solar system was wide and deep and there were still many unexplored planets where one could find refuge and dig in comfortably with the aid of adequate technical equipment. There was no compelling reason why it had to be Mars.
Deringhouse watched the disappearing planet on the rear viewscreen. The commander was alone in the control cabin of his spaceship and had a little time to spare. In ten minutes automatic deceleration would take effect and guide the ship to the proper co-ordinates. Perhaps the interceptors were already there, waiting for him, but for understandable reasons they preferred not to communicate by radio.
The major fell to musing. The Supermutant—'the most dangerous man in the Solar system!' How exaggerated that sounded. But Deringhouse knew the description was not stretching the truth. Clifford Monterny was in fact a mutant extraordinary. Son of a formerly well-known scientist who had been caught in the radiation of an atomic reactor gone wild, the father's genetic constitution had been altered so that when Clifford was born he was not as other children. Although his difference was not at once apparent, bit by bit his unusual abilities began to make themselves manifest. He was a hypno and suggestor whose Svengali power held in thrall anyone he chose, had he met them but once, though they might be on the other side of the globe. When these abilities were finally augmented by telepathy, his three supranormal gifts, native intelligence and fortune inherited from his father gained him access to the most influential circles.
Physically, Monterny was not a very prepossessing personality. His puffy face and premature baldness didn't help much to entice people to crave his company. Perhaps these conditions contributed to the forming of his character.
Clifford Monterny was a mutant and he knew that more mutants existed on Earth. Perry Rhodan even commanded a Mutant Corps that enabled him to create his own autonomous country. Why should he idly stand by while others acted?
His talents made it possible for him to find thirteen mutants and to bring them under his mental control. With them he opened his campaign against his greatest adversary, against Perry Rhodan.
Major Deringhouse grinned broadly. He stretched his long body and yawned heartily.
Well, here the clever Supermutant had committed a blunder. It wasn't that easy to outsmart Perry Rhodan, especially if he attempted to beat him with his own weapons.
Monterny had left his mutants in the lurch and fled with a stolen spaceship. And now Major Deringhouse was hunting for the fugitive on orders from Perry Rhodan. The search had already lasted four weeks—without the slightest success.
He looked once more at the observation screen. Mars had become a bright star that shimmered like a reddish eye in the eternal night. The two moons were no longer visible. Deringhouse sighed and turned his attention to the forward observation screen. As radio communications were only advisable in case of emergency, he depended solely on optical sensors for his contact with the ten interceptors.
Deringhouse worried that Perry Rhodan wouldn't be very happy with the result of his mission to date. It was just as well that Rhodan was so busy on Terra that he didn't have time to bother him. Maybe he would get lucky and...
A bright flash distracted him from his speculations. His skilled hands quickly manipulated the controls of the optical sensor. The three-dimensional picture of empty space vanished from the screen, black and white blotches swirled around, arranged themselves and became a new picture. There were fewer stars in view. No other change except the flashes. They were closer and clearer. And so it remained. One of the interceptors had arrived.
Half an hour later nine of the smaller spaceships had returned into the gigantic hull of Good Hope VII. Deringhouse called their commanders to the Command center and asked for their reports. "Lieutenant Hill, you were assigned to observe sector BNZ. What have you noticed?"
A young man wearing the uniform of the New Power stepped forward and saluted smartly. His eager face did not conceal his disappointment. "Commander of interceptor Z-VII-1, Lieutenant Hill. We observed nothing unusual, sir. We patrolled the sector as ordered with special attention to radio signals. None were received. Same negative results from optical sensors. That's all, sir."
"Commander Z-VII-7, Captain Berner. I've nothing irregular to report. We passed a shower of meteors at safe distance."
The other reports revealed just as little. When the commander of the ninth interceptor finished his statement, Deringhouse glanced at the observation screen, shaking his head. "What's keeping Z-VII-3?" he asked. "It should've been back long ago."
He received no answer. The Z-VII-3 was missing and never heard from again.
• • •
Sergeant Raab was terribly bored. These endless patrol flights got on his nerves since they had already gone on for four weeks. Who knew where that infamous Supermutant was hiding or whether he still existed. Every corner on Mars had been investigated and the two little moons had not been overlooked, nor had they failed to methodically patrol the interplanetary space between Mars and the asteroid belt. Nowhere was anything discovered.
Today's assignment led the craft back once again to the close proximity of the red planet. A landing had not been scheduled. Lieutenant Yomo, the Japanese commander of the Z-VII-3, shared his Sergeant's lack if interest and the third man of the team, Cadet Fowler, apparently chose not to express the same feelings, being the lowest-ranking member of the crew.
"How about Deimos?" Raab growled, looking at the irregular mass of rocks. "It's impossible for a ship to hide there and if I correctly remember the information we were given, the Sup
ermutant still has got two of the interceptors he stole from Rhodan."
"I quite agree with you, sergeant," Yomo admitted. He was one of those officers who considered the opinions of his subordinates. "Nevertheless we'll have to investigate it. Orders seldom seem to make sense. Cadet Fowler, circle Deimos at a safe distance. Sergeant Raab, you watch the surface of the moon while I take care of the optical sensor so that we won't miss anything."
If Lieutenant Yomo had taken his duties a little more seriously, he would have lived an hour later. But how was he to know? No one else had been able to foresee it.
That Deimos was empty was plain to see after they had passed only three times around it. The rugged rocks on the dwarf of a moon without atmosphere threw sharply contrasting shadows despite the fact that the Sun was far away and gave little light or warmth. The almost ten-mile-big heap of rocks orbited around Mars in about thirty hours at a distance of approximately 12,000 miles.
Sergeant Raab shook his head and finally said: "It's no use holding a six-day race here all by ourselves. We'll never catch up with ourselves anyway. Not even a mouse could hide down there on that desolate rock."
"I'm with you," Lieutenant Yomo assented. "Cadet Fowler, change your course to Phobos."
"That makes it worse," Raab groaned. "That miserable dump is even smaller."
"Orders are orders," Yomo replied firmly and turned back to his instruments. "Fowler, change course as directed."
The trim interceptor went off on a tangent and shot straight toward Mars. Phobos was only about 4000 miles away from its planet and completed its path in a few hours. Its trajectory resembled that of an artificial satellite but it was in this respect no different from other moons. Earlier theories to that effect proposed by some scientists on Earth were not confirmed. Phobos was a natural body like Deimos and it proved to be no more interesting for the three on the Z-VII-3.
Nothing.
It had been ever the same for the last four weeks and presumably was to remain the same in the coming four weeks.
Lieutenant Yomo looked at his watch. "We still have time to go quickly around Mars. Although Major Deringhouse is searching the same territory today, I don't think we'll run into him. Better too much than not enough."
The interceptor slipped with drastically throttled speed into the thin atmosphere, sank lower and glided at low altitude across the barren desert.
Sergeant Raab shook his head and said to Cadet Fowler: "It doesn't matter how low we go down, I don't believe we'll find anything. The Supermutant isn't dumb enough to put on an exhibition of his stolen ships for us. If anything, he'll hide out in the asteroid belt. You want to bet?"
"I never bet," Fowler evaded. "But if you like, I'll gladly agree with you."
Raab muttered something incomprehensible and looked at Lieutenant Yomo. The Japanese nodded.
"We'll take one more quick look at those foothills over there. Then it'll be time to start back. Major Deringhouse doesn't like it very much if we're late."
Sergeant Raab began to notice something peculiar going on when the Z-VII-3 crossed the mountain ridge and approached the plateau lying behind it. He felt as if a ring of iron had encircled his forehead and was squeezing it. Something seemed to reach for his brain. Before he was able to grasp what it meant, Yomo shouted: "Helmets! Quick!"
He was still speaking as he pulled out an odd-looking contraption from a compartment and clapped it on his head. It resembled a crash helmet covered with wire mesh. Two little metallic rods were fastened to the frontal side. It was specially constructed to protect the human brain against hypnotic mental vibrations.
After Sergeant Raab donned his helmet he felt immediate relief. The pressure in his head subsided. Cadet Fowler felt exactly the same sensation. But little did they know that this very same fact sealed their fate.
Somewhere under the mesa was the lair of the Supermutant from where he endeavored with his formidable powers to bring the crew of the Z-VII-3 under his hypnotic control. When he failed to accomplish this, due to their precaution of quickly grabbing their helmets and putting them on their heads, he intended to make sure that the three men would never be in a position to betray his hide-out.
It happened instantaneously.
One moment the trim interceptor was floating slowly over the trackless mountains of Mars to detect the cause of the sudden attempt at mind capture—and the next moment the cockpit of the craft exploded in a flaming blast. The atomic terror engulfed the ship with one stroke and swallowed it up. Half molten debris plummeted crazily down and smashed onto the rocks below. A cloud of smoke lazily drifted eastward in the gentle breeze.
And it was all over.
• • •
When the interceptor Z-VII-3 failed to show up at the rendezvous after four hours, Major Deringhouse lost his patience. He asked the commanders of the interceptors once more to come to the Command Center. The customary smile on his lips was gone. His face looked serious and stern.
"Gentlemen, the failure of Lieutenant Yomo to return permits a number of conclusions and we can choose one of them."
The commanders waited tensely. They knew that Deringhouse had no pleasant alternatives to outline for them.
"Z-VII-3 has found the hiding place of the Supermutant and was captured or destroyed in the encounter. If only the first had occurred, we should've received a radio call from him as he was instructed to do. There is also the possibility that Lieutenant has become a victim of a malfunction of his craft. And, thirdly, he could've been hit by a meteor."
Lieutenant Hill cleared his throat. Deringhouse looked at him questioningly. "Perhaps things aren't as black as they appear," said Hill, "and Lieutenant Yomo has only been delayed. Which sector did he have to patrol today?"
Deringhouse shook his head. "I'm inclined to rule this out. It was Lieutenant Yomo's task to explore Mars and its vicinity. I was there myself with the Good Hope VI but didn't see anything that was suspicious. Since we must assume that the Supermutant has flown to Mars, the absence of Lieutenant Yomo raises extremely grave doubts. I must admit that I'm greatly worried."
"Why don't we take a look ourselves?" somebody asked.
Deringhouse looked in the direction of the speaker. "Isn't that what we've been doing for four weeks?"
"Certainly, Major. But if your first assertion regarding the Z-VII-3 is correct, Lieutenant Yomo must have unearthed something. If the Supermutant is actually on Mars, he is bound to have an adequate refuge. Perhaps Yomo has detected it by accident. We don't know what happened subsequently but we can try to check up on it."
"If I understand you correctly you propose a more intensive inspection of Mars?"
"Right, sir!"
Deringhouse glanced at the other officers. "And what do you think, gentlemen?"
"It sounds like a good idea," commented Captain Berger. "At any rate, it's better than sitting here idly."
Deringhouse deliberated for a few seconds and then the old smile flitted again across his face. "Ready for action in ten minutes! Crews to man interceptors! Ship out at once."
The commanders of the little fighting ships saluted and left the Command Center. Deringhouse watched till they were gone. Then he stopped smiling and sat down in the seat before the controls. He waited five more minutes before he switched on the intercom. Lieutenant Hill reported:
"Hangar one ready. Nine interceptors set for launching."
"All right," Deringhouse replied, glancing at the map of co-ordinates lying before him. "The airlock will be opened in two minutes. Take off at once and stay close to the guppy during flight. Is that clear?"
"Perfectly," Hill acknowledged.
A minute and a half after this short exchange a panel slid back in the hull of the huge spaceship and created an opening. Illuminated by bright lights the little agile interceptors stood on the starting ramps inside the hangars. The first one started to move abruptly and shot with awesome acceleration out into free space. Before it could curve around it was already followed by t
he next one. The entire operation lasted less than two minutes. The light in the hangars went dark and the hatch closed up again. Good Hope VII began to accelerate. The interceptors coordinated their speeds and took the mothership into their midst in an orderly formation. Far out in front of them among the multitudinous swarm of cold shining stars stood a shimmering reddish light—Mars. The polar caps and the web of canals stood clearly out from the monotonous flat desert.
With an expressionless face Major Deringhouse looked at his destination.
He began to sense that a terrible fate was awaiting him.
* * *
The hall was deep below the surface.
The walls consisted of rough-hewn rocks, the ceiling was bare and the floor was covered with a synthetic carpet. Glaring lamps illuminated the room with an unpleasant light. The occupant of the subterranean cavern didn't seem to care much for comfort. One of the naked walls was almost hidden by an array of various technical instruments. Cables and conduits were strung in a tangled mess on the floor and led through a small opening into an adjacent room. The hum of a working reactor could be heard somewhere, otherwise everything was quiet.
The air in the room was good with a typical synthetic freshness similar to that inside a spaceship. High above on the ceiling the whirring of a ventilator was audible.
The unbearable light went out. For a moment it seemed to be pitchdark. Then a picture screen on a wall lit up spreading a cold but mild shine. A table and a control panel became discernible in the semidarkness.
A man was sitting on a chair before the table. He wore a simple dark-grey business suit. His bald and massive skull was shining in the dim light of the picture screen. The puffy face was only vaguely recognizable. He had big cold eyes, ears that were much too small and thick lips that were pressed hard together.
His head sat on a short fat neck. His bulky body rested on a sturdy steel chair that had apparently been removed from a spaceship. He stretched his muscular legs under the table and his chubby hands were lying motionlessly on the table before the controls.