The 8th Golden Age of Science Fiction MEGAPACK ™: Milton Lesser

by Milton Lesser

  Result? On Pluto Mayhem would slow down. Once he reached Pluto's normal time rate it might take him, say, ten minutes to run—top-speed—from point A to point B, fifteen yards apart. Subjectively, a split-second of time would have gone by in that period.

  Two days would seem like less than an hour, and Mayhem would have no way of judging how much less.

  If he didn't get off Pluto in two days he would die.

  If he didn't land, House Bartock, growing desperate and trying to scare him off or trying to keep control of the hundred girls while he made a desperate and probably futile attempt to repair the damaged Mozart's Lady, might become violent.

  Mayhem called Neptune, and said: "Bartock crash-landed on Pluto, geographical coordinates north latitude thirty-three degrees four minutes, west longitude eighteen degrees even. I'm going down. That's all."

  He didn't wait for an answer.

  He brought the space-bound coffin down a scant three miles from Mozart's Lady. Here, though, the tundra of Pluto was buckled and convoluted, so that two low jagged ranges of snow-clad hills separated the ships.

  Again Mayhem didn't wait. He went outside, took a breath of near-freezing air, and stalked up the first range of hills. He carried a blaster buckled to his belt.

  * * * *

  When he saw the scout-ship come down, Bartock didn't wait either. He might have waited had he known anything about what Pluto did to the time-sense. But he did not know. He only knew, after a quick inspection, that the controls of Mozart's Lady had been so badly damaged that repair was impossible.

  He knew too that the scout-ship had reported his whereabouts. He had, on regaining consciousness, been in time to intercept the radio message. True, it would take any other Neptune-stationed ship close to two weeks to reach Pluto, so Bartock had some temporal leeway. But obviously whoever was pursuing him in the one-man ship had not come down just to sit and wait. He was out there in the snow somewhere. Well, Bartock would go out too, would somehow manage to elude his pursuer, to get behind him, reach the scout-ship and blast off in it. And, in the event that anything went wrong, he would have a hostage.

  He went arearships to select one.

  Went with his desperation shackled by an iron nerve.

  And a blaster in his hand.

  "... very lucky," Matilda Moriarity was saying, trying to keep the despair from her voice. "We have some cuts and bruises, but no serious casualties. Why, we might have all been killed."

  "Lucky, she says! We're marooned here. Marooned—with a killer."

  Before the widow Moriarity could defend her choice of words, if she was going to defend them, House Bartock came into the rear lounge, where the entire symphony and its chaperone was located. They would have locked the door, of course; they had locked it ever since they had learned who Bartock was. But the door, buckled and broken, had been one of the casualties of the crash-landing.

  "You," Bartock said.

  He meant Jane Cummings.

  "Me?"

  "Yes, you. We're going outside."

  "Out—side?"

  "That's what I said. Let's get a move on."

  Jane Cummings didn't move.

  The widow Moriarity came between her and Bartock. "If you must take anyone, take me," she said bravely.

  "The girl."

  Still the widow Moriarity didn't move.

  House Bartock balled his fist and hit her. Three of the girls caught her as she fell. None of them tried to do anything about Bartock, who had levelled his blaster at Jane Cummings.

  Trembling, she went down the companionway with him.

  A fierce cold wind blew as they opened the airlock door.

  * * * *

  It looked like a sea-serpent floundering in the snow.

  Only, it was caught in the act of floundering, like an excellent candid shot of a sea-serpent floundering in snow.

  Its movements were too slow for Mayhem's eyes to register.

  Which meant, he realized gratefully, that he hadn't begun to slow down yet.

  He had to be careful, though. If he were Bartock he would make immediately for the scout-ship. It would be his only hope.

  Realizing this, Mayhem had gone through deep snow for what he judged to be fifteen minutes, until he had reached a spine of rock protruding from the snow. Then he had doubled back, now leaving no footprints, along the spine. He was waiting in the first low range of hills not four hundred yards from the scout-ship, his blaster ready. When Bartock prowled into view, Mayhem would shout a warning. If Bartock didn't heed it, Mayhem would shoot him dead.

  It seemed like an airtight plan.

  And it would have been, except for two things. First, Bartock had a hostage. And second, Pluto-time was beginning to act on Mayhem.

  He realized this when he looked at the sea-serpent again. The long neck moved with agonizing slowness, the great gray green bulk of the monster, sixty feet long, shifted slowly, barely perceptibly, in the snow. Mountains of powdery snow moved and settled. The spade-shaped head pointed at Mayhem. The tongue protruded slowly, hung suspended, forked and hideous, then slowly withdrew.

  The neck moved again, ten feet long, sinuous. And faster.

  Faster? Not really.

  Mayhem was slowing down.

  * * * *

  Then he saw Bartock and the girl.

  They were close together. Bartock held her arm. Walking toward the scout-ship, they were too far away and too close together for Mayhem to fire. Bartock would know this and wouldn't heed any warning.

  So Mayhem didn't give any warning. He left the spine of rock and rushed down through the snow toward the space-bound coffin.

  A low rumble of sound broke the absolute stillness.

  It was the monster, and now that his own hearing had slowed down, Mayhem was able to hear the slower cycles of sound. How much time had really passed? He didn't know. How much time did he have left before death came swiftly and suddenly because he had been too long in his temporary body? He didn't know that either. He sprinted toward the scout-ship. At least it felt like he was sprinting. He didn't know how fast he was really moving. But the sea-serpent creature was coming up behind him, faster. No place near what would have been its normal apparent speed, but faster. Mayhem, his breath coming raggedly through his mouth, ran as fast as was feasible.

  So did Bartock and the girl.

  It was Bartock, spotting Mayhem on the run, who fired first. Mayhem fell prone as the raw zing of energy ripped past. The sea-serpent-like-creature behind him bellowed.

  And reared.

  It didn't look like a sea-serpent any longer. It looked like a dinosaur, with huge solid rear limbs, small forelimbs, a great head with an enormous jaw—and speed.

  Now it could really move.

  Subjectively, time seemed normal to Mayhem. Your only basis was subjective: time always seemed normal. But Mayhem knew, as he got up and ran again, that he was now moving slower than the minute hand on a clock. Slower ... as objective time, as measured in the solar system at large, sped by.

  He tripped as the creature came behind him. The only thing he could do was prop up an elbow in the snow and fire. Raw energy ripped off the two tiny forelimbs, but the creature didn't falter. It rushed by Mayhem, almost crushing him with the hind limbs, each of which must have weighed a couple of tons. It lumbered toward Bartock and Jane Cummings.

  Turning and starting to get up, Mayhem fired again.

  His blaster jammed.

  Then the bulk of the monster cut off his view of Bartock, the girl and the scout-ship. He heard the girl scream. He ran toward them.

  Jane Cummings had never been so close to death. She wanted to scream. She thought all at once, hysterically, she was a little girl again. If she screamed maybe the terrible apparition would go away. But it did not go away. It reared up high, as high as a very tall tree, and its fangs were hideous.

  Bartock, who was also frightened, raised his blaster, fired, and missed.

  Then, for an instant, Jane thought she
saw someone running behind the monster. He had a blaster too, and he lifted it. When he fired, there was only a clicking sound. Then he fired again.

  Half the monster's bulk disappeared and it collapsed in the snow.

  That was when Bartock shot the other man.

  Mayhem felt the stab of raw energy in his shoulder. He spun around and fell down, his senses whirling in a vortex of pain. Dimly he was aware of Bartock's boots crunching on the snow.

  They fired simultaneously. Bartock missed.

  And collapsed with a searing hole in his chest. He was dead before he hit the snow.

  The girl went to Mayhem. "Who—who are you?"

  "Got to get you back to the ship. No time to talk. Hurry."

  "But you can't walk like that. You're badly hurt. I'll bring help."

  "... dangerous. I'll take you."

  He'd take her, flirting with death. Because, for all he knew, his time on Pluto, objectively, had already totalled forty-eight hours. If it did, he would never live to get off Pluto. Once his thirty days were up, he would die. Still, there might be danger from other animals between the scout-ship and Mozart's Lady, and he couldn't let the girl go back alone. It was almost ludicrous, since she had to help him to his feet.

  He staggered along with her, knowing he would never make it to Mozart's Lady and back in time. But if he left her, she was probably doomed too. He'd sacrifice his life for hers....

  They went a hundred yards, Mayhem gripping the blaster and advancing by sheer effort of will. Then he smiled, and began to laugh. Jane thought he was hysterical with pain. But he said: "We're a pair of bright ones. The scout-ship."

  Inside, it was very small. They had to lie very close to each other, but they made it. They reached Mozart's Lady.

  Mayhem didn't wait to say good-bye. With what strength remained to him, he almost flung the girl from the scout-ship. The pain in his shoulder was very bad, but that wasn't what worried him. What worried him was the roaring in his ears, the vertigo, the mental confusion as his elan drifted, its thirty days up, toward death.

  He saw the girl enter Mozart's Lady. He blasted off, and when the space-bound coffin pierced Pluto's heavyside layer, he called the Hub.

  The voice answered him as if it were mere miles away, and not halfway across a galaxy: "Good Lord, man. You had us worried! You have about ten seconds. Ten seconds more and you would have been dead."

  Mayhem was too tired to care. Then he felt a wrenching pain, and all at once his elan floated, serene, peaceful, in limbo. He had been plucked from the dying body barely in time, to fight mankind's lone battle against the stars again, wherever he was needed ... out beyond Pluto.

  Forever? It wasn't impossible.

  Table of Contents

  COPYRIGHT INFO

  A NOTE FROM THE PUBLISHER

  The MEGAPACK™ Ebook Series

  BLACK EYES AND THE DAILY GRIND

  THE DICTATOR

  PRISON OF A BILLION YEARS

  THE GRAVEYARD OF SPACE

  SUMMER SNOW STORM

  MY SHIPMATE — COLUMBUS

  EARTHSMITH

  VOYAGE TO ETERNITY

  HOME IS WHERE YOU LEFT IT

  THE ONE AND THE MANY

  QUEST OF THE GOLDEN APE

  A PLACE IN THE SUN

  THINK YOURSELF TO DEATH

  WORLD BEYOND PLUTO