by OMNICAdmin
Thrilling Wonder Stories, December 1937
HAT it was Ronnie Iverness who the landing on the asteroid, he was kicked found the devilish Red Shards was a
around by the whole outfit.
T trick of chance. He was not even a Then fortune seemed to smile on the legitimate member of the Farnsworth youthful culprit.
Expedition to airless Ceres. He was just a
“He’s a game little imp,” Professor
freckle faced twelve-year-old with nerve Farnsworth said to Dave Iverness, when the enough to stow away on their ship, the two were alone in the specimen room. “Maybe Antares. Dave Iverness, the pilot, happened to it would be the right thing to ease up on the
be his brother.
hazing, and to give him a bit of freedom, eh?
Ronnie was dragged out of his hiding
So far he hasn’t even been out of the ship.”
place two days after the Antares left Earth. For Dave, big and bronzed, chuckled
the balance of the trip, and for a while after
softly.
Thrilling Wonder Stories
2
“Sure,” he replied. “Ronnie’s taken his
cleft in the rusty ground. The other members
medicine like a man, and he’s regular. Not a
of the party were straggled out ahead of him
troublemaker, either. He’s just so doggoned
now; for he hadn’t been able to move quite as
interested in space ships and other worlds that
fast as they in his ill-fitting space armor.
he can’t help himself sometimes!”
Master Iverness was called from the
THE cleft offered no unusual promise. The
rocket compartment where Hansen, the men had ignored it. Nevertheless, youthful engineer, was keeping him needlessly busy
whim sent Ronnie hopping to its brink. Thick
polishing metal. Presently, though he was gloom enveloped its depths. But close to the expecting anything but favors, he found torn lip of the cleft there were curious, broken himself provided with a regulation space suit.
fragments lying in the dust. They were flat and
When his good fortune was explained to him,
flaky, like pieces of shattered, red glass. As
he was too flabbergasted to say much, but his
any adult would have done, Ronnie stooped
eyes became very large, indeed.
and picked one of them up. Inside the thin,
“G-gosh! Thanks!” was about all he
translucent texture of the shard, there
could stammer just then.
slumbered a deep, bloody glow.
The space suit was many sizes too big
Ronnie wanted to yell out about his
for him. The vast, bloated legs of the find to his brother up ahead; but something contraption made walking, and even standing,
unfathomable restrained him. No physical
somewhat difficult for the boy, for he found it
circumstance should have prevented him from
necessary to keep his feet spread wide apart.
doing this, for his oxygen helmet, and the
But Ronnie was quite willing to undergo oxygen helmets of all the other space suits physical discomfort for the thrills of belonging to the expedition, were equipped exploration.
with radio receivers and transmitters.
With Farnsworth’s full permission, he
Nevertheless, for some eerie and
left the ship, along with six men, Dave unknown reason, Ronnie held his tongue. It Iverness among them. The group moved off
was as though, somewhere, beyond and yet
toward the near horizon, and presently entered
within himself, a hidden entity was
a jagged gorge that looked like the burrow of
considering the situation cautiously, in an
an angry Titan. Their purpose now, and in fact
effort to determine the very best way to cope
the entire purpose of the Farnsworth with it, with the least chance of making a Expedition, was to collect mineral samples for
mistake.
the Smithsonian Institute.
Master Iverness did not quite realize
For five hours the kid was in his glory,
this at once, however. His own feelings were
while he and his companions bounded and
strange. He stood for a long moment, the red
clambered over the rough, mysterious shard clutched in his gloved hand, his brows, landscape, where shadows were as sharp and
his lips, and his freckled nose puckered in
black as the fangs of fiends. The massiveness
vague puzzlement. During that moment a
and clumsiness of Ronnie’s attire was largely
subtle web of intangible but very real power
made up for by the fact that the gravity of tiny
ensnared his faculties. Ancient Ceres, barren,
Ceres was very slight.
burnt out, and seemingly lifeless, still
Nothing special happened until the harbored magic of which man had no inkling.
sallying band had almost completed their
Presently Ronnie felt a peculiar
circuitous return to the Antares. Then Ronnie tingling sensation in the hand which held the
noticed something off to his right. It was a
glassy fragment. The sensation warned him
Red Shards on Ceres
3
that the piece of red mineral was probably not
Perhaps this was just a coincidence; but then
entirely safe to hold onto. But when he again, perhaps, it was not, for there were decided to drop the thing, he was surprised
fourteen men in the Farnsworth Expedition.
and frightened to discover that his fingers did
Now he proceeded toward the ridge,
not respond to his will!
his movements entirely beyond his control. He
Just then he heard his brother’s voice
crossed the ridge and descended into the little
shouting in his earphones: “Hurry up, Ronnie!
valley where the Antares rested. With a
Where are you anyway?”
cunning not his own he scanned the group of
The kid really wanted to answer his
men beside the ship. The entire company—
brother this time, for he was badly scared. He
fourteen—was in sight. Those who had not
wanted to forget everything that had just gone afield were busy excavating a shallow pit happened, and go bounding over the ridge
in the hard crust of Ceres, their purpose being
which now hid his companions and the space
to obtain samples of the minerals beneath the
ship from view. Words formed in his mind
surface.
automatically, but there they stayed! They
Ronnie’s actions, now that he had an
couldn’t get past his tongue and vocal cords!
audience, were deceptively normal.
It was the same with his sturdy legs.
“Hey!” he shouted. “Everybody! I
They refused to obey the commands of his
found something!”
brain! It was as though somebody else had
The men turned to look at him as he
suddenly taken possession of his entire body!
bounded clumsily into their midst.
And Ronnie, with a youngster’s quick
intuition, knew that the wicked red shard he
questioned.
clutched and couldn’t let go of was somehow
“I’ve got some red stuff, like pieces of
responsible.
glass!” Ronnie’s voice piped. “I found ’em
This knowledge did him no good, over the ridge. Look!”
however.
He held up the fragment which his
Now he spoke, and though the words
right hand clutched in a viselike grip.
were undoubtedly copied from his memory in
Dave Iverness scrutinized his kid
some manner, still he had no wilful part in
brother closely. He saw that the youngster’s
their utterance. Their tone was cunningly face was pale behind the glass front of his calm.
oxygen helmet; but this might only be the
“Be with you in a minute, Dave,” he
natural result of excitement.
said into his microphone. “Just wait up for
“Let’s have a look at the thing,” Dave
me.”
Iverness invited, extending his hand.
Then, impelled once more by a weird
“No!” Ronnie’s guiding entity replied.
and irresistible impulse which seemed to “This one’s mine! But I’ve got a lot of other originate in the substanceless ether pieces in my pouch. One for everybody.
surrounding Ceres, he selected more of the
Wait!”
shards from the ground about him with his
It was a bad moment for Ronnie
free hand, and stuffed them into the pouch that
Iverness. He alone had an idea of what was
was part of his equipment.
about to happen; but in spite of his
tremendous inner struggle, he could not so
THOUGH he did not realize it, he now had
much as give a tiny squeak of warning. His
fourteen of the mysterious fragments, besides
will was an impotent nothing imprisoned in a
the one which he held tightly in his right hand.
body not his own.
Thrilling Wonder Stories
4
As though he were watching the human marionette to respond to the silent actions of another person, he saw himself commands of the hidden unknown. While the remove the baleful shards from his pouch, and
others waited stiffly, he entered the Antares
pass them around, one to each of his and proceeded to the radio room. There he companions, Dave and Professor Farnsworth
sent out a call to Earth in code:
among them.
What followed was as strange as the
Marvelous discovery on Ceres. Organize large
dark wisdom that produced it. A subtle spell
expedition and dispatch to Ceres at once. Arnold
Farnsworth.
of unearthly wizardry conquered the men as
easily as it had conquered the boy. By the time
He learned then that not only his body,
that each individual knew that all was not
but his memory as well, was a slave to the
well, it was too late. Fingers clutched the
unknown. The glassy red fragment he held
shards in grips that no human will could was not merely a receiver of commands. It break. The channels between brain and muscle
could be used to probe his mentality as well.
were seemingly severed, and something Else the message in English could never have invisible and intangible assumed complete been composed.
control.
He could guess, too, the sinister
Nevertheless, the activity of each purpose of the radiogram. More human beings human brain went on unhampered. Thoughts
were wanted here on Ceres. As slaves? For
of fear and dread and wonder were not food? Only time would tell.
checked. The men were scientists; this being
Unable to resist the guiding
so, each of them tried to construct a theory
compulsion that gripped him, he left the
which might explain the weird miracle. All of
Antares and joined his company. Then the trek them must have arrived at approximately the
toward some cryptic destination began. In
same conclusions.
single file the fifteen members of the
The shards were composed of a expedition marched back over the ridge. No material which acted as the receiver for some
one spoke. No one could speak. Minds still
eerie neuronic control, perhaps propagated could function; but they were as impotent as if through space by a form of etheric impulse.
sealed in blocks of metal.
These impulses, when received, acted upon
The party reached the cleft that Ronnie
nerve tissue, probably first contacting the had discovered. They clambered down into its nerves of the fingers that held the shards, and
gloomy shadows. There was a rough-cut
traveling thence to the spinal cords and brains
tunnel there, leading steeply down toward the
of each individual. The strength of the bowels of Ceres. They began their descent.
impulses was sufficient to dominate
In a matter of minutes complete
completely the normal neuronic messages by
darkness enveloped them. But presently this
which a man guides the movements of his
was relieved a little by light which luminous
body.
lumps of radioactive ore in the walls of the
passage emitted.
CLEARLY, what had happened was the work
For weary hours the descent continued.
of an intelligent agent with a definite purpose.
Slight though the gravity of the asteroid was,
The red fragments must have been planted
still the task of clambering down a passage in
beside the cleft in the hope that they would
many places almost vertical, made serious
trap unsuspecting space wanderers.
inroads on the energies of the adventurers.
Professor Farnsworth was now the first
Red Shards on Ceres
5
Professor Farnsworth felt the effect most, for
than the first. The air throbbed with the
he was old. Yet he could not stop to rest. The
smooth vibration of colossal, gleaming
insidious power that had mastered him forced
engines. Molten metal hissed and cascaded
him on as no lash could ever have done.
from vast retorts. Cereans were everywhere,
At last a huge metal door was reached.
engaged in intricate work which only a high
Ponderously it opened to admit the men. They
order of intelligence could have directed. Each
entered a narrow chamber which must have
of them wore a harness richly decorated with
had the function of an airlock, for in its the mysterious Red Shards.
opposite wall there was a second door, similar
They glanced briefly at the Earthmen.
to the first, which had now closed.
Their curiosity seemed small; but in their cold,
The second portal swung inward. lidless eyes there was a promise of death, or Brilliant light, like that of the sun, stabbed by
worse.
as it moved. Automatically the members of
Ronnie and Dave Iverness walked
the Farnsworth Expedition entered the behind Professor Farnsworth, who was close tremendous cavern beyond it.
to the head of the column. Like the r
est of the
Far up toward its roof an incandescent
group, they could not converse, they could not
sphere shone brilliantly, giving abundant even turn their eyes to look at each other.
artificial light to this strange place. The floor
Their muscles could only do what the guiding
of the cavern was covered with odd, luxuriant
force that held them prisoner directed.
vegetation, planted in orderly plots. This was
But their minds worked unhampered.
farm land, then, buried within the heart of
Dave Iverness was still trying to devise some
dead Ceres.
plan for escape, though he could see how
And now the men saw what manner of
hopeless their position was. Even if the spell
creatures inhabited this artificial world. From
which had enslaved them could be broken,
out of the shadows of spidery, grotesque trees,
there were still the Cereans.
loaded with green fruit, came a group of furry,
Ronnie was scared. What had
spheroidal monsters with thick legs and happened was his fault, he was sure. If he had delicate, tentacular arms. Their mouths were
not found the shards, all would have been
toothless orifices in their globular bodies. well. But this feeling of responsibility must Their eyes, set close to their mouths, were
have sharpened his wits. The kid was made of
cruel and keen. That intelligence looked out
that kind of stuff.
through those orbs could not be questioned.
Professor Farnsworth felt weak and
Each creature wore a harness faint after the exertion of the long descent.
decorated with fragments of the red substance
Specks of color flitted before his gaze. But the
which had been the undoing of the Earthmen,