On the Trail of the Space Pirates

by Carey Rockwell

  CHAPTER 9

  "That's the story, sir," said Strong to Commander Walters, after theSolar Guard captain had related the information he had wormed out of thebartender at the Spacelanes Bar and the news Roger and Astro hadbrought.

  "All right, Steve," nodded the commander. "I'll have the man picked upright away and psychographed. Meantime, you go on to Venus and seeNicholas Shinny."

  "Very well, sir," said Strong. "End transmission!"

  "End transmission," acknowledged Walters. Strong flipped the switch andthe teleceiver screen darkened.

  Fifteen minutes later, the _Dog Star_ blasted off from Mars, heading forVenus.

  During the trip back to the young planet that was rapidly growing into amajor industrial center rivaling Earth, Strong received a report fromSpace Academy that the bartender had been picked up. His name was JosephPrice, and after questioning him under truth serum, Solar Guard securityofficers found the man's mind to be so filled with criminal plots andcounter-plots, it would take several weeks for the psychograph analystto learn the name of the man he claimed would know the whereabouts ofWallace. This was disappointing news for Strong, especially since thereport included news of a second, third, and fourth strike by Wallaceand Simms on spaceships near the asteroid belt.

  Reaching the starting place of their adventure, Venusport and the SolarExposition, Strong and the three cadets went immediately to a smallsuburban section of the great city and the home of Nicholas Shinny.

  Shinny lived comfortably in a small house made of Titan crystal,enjoying himself during the day catching Venusian fatfish and watchingthe stereos at night. Once an enlisted spaceman, he had been retiredwith full pension and was living in ease and comfort. When Strong andthe three cadets arrived at the elderly spaceman's house, they found himbusy teaching a young Venusian wolfhound puppy how to retrieve.

  "Well, blast my jets!" cried the old man. "If it ain't Tommy, Roger, andthe big fella, Astro! And Captain Strong!"

  "Hello, Nick!" said Strong with a smile. "You're a sight for space-blindeyes!"

  "Heh-heh-heh," cackled Shinny, his merry eyes twinkling against his deepspace tan. "It's mighty good to see you boys. Come on in the house. Igot a mess of fatfish just pulled out of the stream and some of the mostdelicious biscuits you ever had in your life!"

  "Well, thanks, Nick," hesitated the captain. "But we're in--"

  "Can't be in too much of a hurry to eat," snapped the old man with agrin. "Anything you got to say is better said when you got a bellyful ofMolly's cookin'."

  "Molly!" cried Tom. "But, Mr. Shinny--"

  "When--" gulped Astro, "when did you--"

  "Hey! Hold on!" cried the old spaceman. "Just damp your tubes there,youngsters! You're way off course. Molly ain't nothing but an electroniccook I got installed in the kitchen. She cooks better'n anyspace-brained woman and she never opens her mouth to give me any sass!"

  The four spacemen laughed at Shinny's obvious indignation.

  "Now come on!" he growled. "Let's eat. I'm hungry!"

  Refusing to allow them to get near Molly, Shinny began pushing food intoslots, compartments, turning on switches and punching buttons. In thecozy living room, Strong relaxed while the three cadets played with theVenusian wolfhound. Finally Shinny announced dinner and they fell towith gusto. There wasn't much talk during the course of the meal. Strongand the boys felt that Shinny would let them know when he was ready.

  Finally the meal was over. Shinny sprawled in his chair, lit his pipe,then looked at his guests, his eyes twinkling. "All right, me friends, Ithink you've held back long enough. Let's have it."

  Strong immediately told the old spaceman the entire story, from Wallaceand Simms' false concession at the exposition to the present.

  "You see, Nick," he concluded, "with an adjustable light-key enablingthem to open any lock in the solar system, nothing is safe. Personally,I think it's only because they haven't a larger or faster ship andaren't better armed that they haven't tried more daring piracy. They'llreach that point soon, though. They've already robbed four ships forarms alone."

  "I'll do anything I can to help you, Captain," said Shinny. "What is ityou want to know?"

  "We suspect that Wallace has a secret hide-out in the asteroid belt,"said Strong. "Since you once prospected the asteroids with him I thoughtyou might know where the hide-out is."

  Shinny grew reflective and knocked the ashes out of his pipe before heanswered. "That was a long time ago, Captain. More'n ten years. And GusWallace was a real square spaceman then. He didn't turn bad until afterwe split up and he met that other feller."

  "What other fellow?" asked Strong.

  Skinny paused. There was a hard glint in his eyes. "Bull Coxine!" Hespat the name out as though it had left a bad taste in his mouth.

  "Coxine!" exclaimed Strong.

  "You heard me," snorted Shinny. "Bull Coxine and Gus Wallace gottogether after me and Wallace lost our stake hunting for uraniumpitchblende in the asteroids and split up. Next thing I heard, him andCoxine was mixed up in that business up on Ganymede when the CreditExchange was held up."

  Strong's face had turned the color of chalk. "Coxine!" he repeated underhis breath.

  Noticing Strong's reaction to Shinny's statement, Tom asked, "Who isCoxine, Captain Strong?"

  Strong was silent and Shinny turned to the cadets.

  "When your skipper here was a young feller just starting out in theSolar Guard," the old man explained, "he was on a routine flight out toTitan and there was a mutiny. Coxine was the ringleader. The captainjoined up with Coxine after they had put his skipper in the brig. Whenhe had Coxine's confidence, he regained control of the ship and sentCoxine and the others to a prison asteroid. Coxine has hated the captainever since and swore to get him."

  "But how did he pull the holdup on Ganymede, then?" asked Roger.

  "Coxine escaped from the prison asteroid in a jet boat, disguised as aguard," continued Shinny. "Only man ever to escape. He drifted around inthe belt for a while and was picked up by a freighter going to Ganymede.The freighter had been out rocket-hopping among the asteroids,collecting the prospectors' small supplies of uranium and taking thestuff back to Ganymede for refining. Wallace happened to be dead-headingon the freighter. When they got to Ganymede, and Coxine saw all themoney lying around at the Credit Exchange to pay off the prospectors, heconvinced Wallace to go in with him and they robbed the Exchange. Coxinewas caught red-handed, but Wallace got away. In fact, the Solar Guarddidn't know Wallace had anything to do with it. So Coxine was taken backto the prison asteroid, and Wallace has been driftin' around the systemever since."

  "But, Mr. Shinny," asked Astro, "if you knew Wallace was tied up withthe robbery of the Credit Exchange, why didn't you tell the Solar Guardbefore now?"

  "Sonny," sighed Shinny, "most of what I know is space dust and spacegas. But even so, I don't think Commander Walters or Captain Strong, oreven you boys, would think much of me if I went around like an old spacecrawler, blowin' my jets all over the place."

  Strong had listened to Shinny fill in the background of Bull Coxine witha thoughtful look in his eyes. He remembered all too clearly the mutinyon the ship out to Titan. Coxine had been an enlisted Solar Guard pettyofficer aboard the ship. He had made great strides in two years and wasbeing considered as an officer candidate on the very day he tried totake over the ship. When Strong regained control later, he talked toCoxine, trying to find out why he had started the mutiny. But the manhad only cursed him, swearing vengeance. Strong hadn't seen him since.

  "So you think he would know where Wallace and Simms might be hidingout?" Strong asked finally.

  "If anyone does," replied Shinny, "he does. And I'll tell you this,Captain, if you go to talk to him and I figger you will, you'll find hima lot tougher."

  "Will I?"

  "Well, take yourself, for instance. No reflection on you, of course, buttake yourself. You're smart, you're hard, and you got a good mind.You're one of the best spacemen in the deep. Take all that and t
urn itbad. Real bad. Sour it with too many years on a prison asteroid andyou've got a fire-eating rocket buster as tough and as rough as God andsociety can make him!"

  The three cadets gulped and looked at Strong. They saw their skipperclench his teeth and ball his fists into tight knots.

  "I know," said Strong in a hoarse whisper, "but if he knows whereWallace and Simms are, he'll tell me. You can bet your last credit,he'll tell me!"

  Shinny paused reflectively. "I won't bet," he said simply.

  * * * * *

  The air inside the space shack was stale because of a faulty filter inthe oxygen circulator that neither Wallace nor Simms bothered to clean.The two men lazed around in stocking feet and undershirts, listening topopular music coming over the audio receiver on a late pickup from oneof the small Jovian satellite colonies near by.

  "Pour me another cup of coffee, Simms," grunted Wallace.

  The smaller man poured a cup of steaming black liquid and silentlyhanded it over to his companion. They both listened as the music fadedto an end and the voice of the announcer crackled over the loud-speaker.

  "This audiocast has been beamed to space quadrants D through K, as acourtesy to the army of uranium prospectors working the asteroid belt.Hope you've enjoyed it, spacemen, and happy hunting!"

  Wallace reached over and snapped off the receiver. "Thanks, pal." Helaughed. "The hunting's been real good! We've got a full catch!" Thegiant spaceman laughed again.

  "Yeah," agreed Simms. "I just went over the take. We've got enough moneyin that locker"--he indicated a black box on the floor--"to sit back andtake it easy for the rest of our lives."

  "Yeah?" snarled Wallace. "You mean sitting in the sun on a crummylakeside, watching the birds and bees?"

  "Gus," asked Simms thoughtfully, "you got any idea how much fun we canbuy with the credits in that box?"

  "Yeah, I have!" sneered Wallace, "and I know what a thousand times thatmuch will buy too!"

  Suddenly Simms turned and looked his partner in the eye. "What do yousay we quit now, Gus? I mean it. We got plenty."

  "You sound like you been exposed to too many cosmic rays!" said Wallace,tapping his head with one finger. "We've got the biggest secret in thesystem, the adjustable light-key plus an airtight hide-out, and you wantto quit!"

  "It ain't that," whined Simms. "It's the other deal. I don't mind goingout and blasting a few freighters, but to try to--"

  "Lissen," interrupted Wallace, "I'd rather try it and take the lickingif we mess it up, than not try it and take that licking. I know whichside of the space lane I'd better be on when the time comes!"

  Simms hesitated and then sighed, "Yeah, I guess you're right."

  "Come on. Let's listen to that story spool again."

  "Oh, no," moaned Simms. "I know that spool by heart! We've heard it atleast fifty times!"

  "One slip-up," said Wallace, sticking his finger in Simms' face, "justone slip-up and we're finished! We've got to be sure!"

  With a reluctant shrug of his shoulders, Simms poured another cup ofcoffee and sat on the side of his bunk while Wallace inserted the storyspool in the audio playback.

  They settled themselves and listened as a deep voice began to speak in aloud whisper.

  "... The operation will take place on the night of October twenty-ninthat exactly twenty-one hundred hours. You will make your approach fromsection eleven, M quadrant--"

  Simms jumped up abruptly and switched off the playback. Turning toWallace, he pleaded, "I can't listen to it again! I know it by heart.Instructions on how to get to the time capsule; instructions on what totake, and how to build an adjustable light-key after we get the plans;instructions on how to hijack the first ship and what to take. Orders,information, instructions! I'm sick of listening. If you want to, goahead, but I'm going to work on the ship!"

  "O.K., O.K.," said Wallace, getting up. "Don't blow your jets. I hatethe thing as much as you do. Wait a minute and I'll go with you."

  The two men began climbing into space suits. In a few minutes they weredressed in black plastic suits with small round clear plastic helmets.They stepped into the air lock on one side of the room and closed aheavy door. Wallace adjusted the valve in the chamber and watched theneedle drop until it showed zero.

  "O.K.," said Wallace over his helmet spacephones. "All the air's out.Open the outer lock."

  Simms cranked the heavy handle, and the door in the opposite wall of thechamber slowly swung open. They stepped out into the airless black voidof space and onto the surface of an asteroid, drifting in the thickestpart of the belt. Surrounding the asteroid were countless smallersecondary satellites circling the mother body like a wide curvingblanket. The mother body was perfectly hidden from outside observation.It made a perfect base of operations for the two space pirates.

  The freighter that they had used at the concession at the SolarExposition and later to make their escape was a far different ship fromthe one now resting on the asteroid. Two powerful three-inch atomicblasters could be seen sticking out of the forward part of the ship. Andnear the stern, two gaping holes showed the emplacements for twoadditional guns not yet installed.

  The two men walked over to the ship, and while Wallace entered the ship,Simms picked up a cutting torch and ignited it, preparing to finish thetwo holes in the stern.

  When Wallace reappeared, he was carrying a coil of wire with a doubleplug to attach to the spacephones inside their helmets. He jammed theplug into Simms' helmet and then into his own. Simms' eyes lit up withsurprise as he heard....

  "...This is a general emergency announcement from Solar Guardheadquarters. Squadrons A and B of the Marsopolis garrison will proceedto space quadrants W, sections forty-one to fifty. It is believed thatGus Wallace and Luther Simms are in that vicinity. Approach withcaution, they are armed with atomic blasters and are believed to bepsychologically unable to surrender. It is believed they will resistarrest...."

  The voice repeated the announcement and added a general call for themen, if they were listening, to surrender. Wallace pulled out the twoplugs and grinned at Simms.

  "Picked it up on the teleceiver inside the ship. Thought you might liketo know how safe we are here."

  Simms grinned back, "And how far off the track they are. Where is thatspace quadrant they think we're in?"

  "Out past Saturn," said Wallace with a grin. "With the Mars garrisonchasing us at one end of the system, we'll hit them on the other and begone before they know what happened!"

  Simms patted the barrel of the nearest atomic blaster. "And, spaceman,we're going to hit them hard!"