Captain Future 05 - Captain Future and the Seven Space Stones (Winter 1941) (6 page)

“Otho just wants to start a new game because he’s losing this one,” Grag accused. “I’ve taken nearly all the tricks so far.”

“Sure, robots always make good players,” Otho sneered. “I’ll tell you what I’ll do, Grag, if you’re so confident. I’ll play you for real stakes. I’ll put up my best proton pistol.”

“And what do you want me to put up?” Grag asked.

Otho pointed to the corner of the cabin, where Grag’s bearlike pet was gnawing idly at a stanchion. The moon-pup did not breathe air and was capable of eating metal or mineral, but the impervious metal of the stanchion was resisting his teeth. “You put up Eek,” Otho said.

GRAG rose to his feet indignantly. “It’s just a plot of yours to get my pet! You’d cheat to get him, and then toss him out into space because you hate the poor little fellow.”

“Poor little fellow?” cried Otho. “That little beast is the curse of this outfit! I’m damned if I’ll put up any longer —”

“We’re nearing Venus,” Curt Newton interrupted. “Put away that darned game and quit bickering.”

They followed Curt back into the control room, Grag picking up Eek and protectively fondling him. Captain Future unlocked the automatic pilot and took the controls. He tested the braking rockets by depressing the throttles. The
Comet
shook to the roar and jerk of the blast. Venus was a glowing white half-moon in the heavens ahead. Curt sent the
Comet
curving around in a spiral toward the dark side of the planet.

“Better if we reach Venusopolis at night,” he mused. “We’ll be able to visit the Museum secretly.”

Soon the
Comet
was screaming down through the clouds into the clear, moonless Venusian night. Curt’s instruments had not misled him. Below stretched Venusopolis, sprawling between the dark inland marshes and the tossing Western Sea.

“The Interplanetary Circus is here already,” Otho said, pointing to a spread of colored lights just east of the city.

“I knew Quorn would be here,” Future said confidently. “But there’s nothing to worry about, with Ezra and Joan guarding the space stone in the museum.”

He cut the rockets to a purring hum, and the
Comet
glided lower over the coastline toward the lighted city. Venusopolis was a community of graceful white structures, interlaced with the dark gardens of the esthetic Venusians. He headed for an oblong, many-pillared structure that he knew was the State Museum of Venus. Quietly he brought the ship down into the groves around it.

“Come on,” he whispered. “Bring along Simon, Grag.”

They emerged into the balmy Venusian darkness, heavy with the smell of rank vegetation drifting from the marshes. At the entrance to the great museum, a guard challenged them. But he awedly admitted them when Captain Future showed his ring.

“Marshal Gurney and Miss Randall are waiting for you in the Room of Jewels.”

Curt nodded and led the way through the silent, dim halls and corridors. They entered a brilliantly lighted room containing glassite cases of rare planetary gems. Old Ezra Gurney and Joan Randall rose eagerly from chairs to greet them. The veteran had his atom pistol in his hand.

“The space stone’s safe?” Curt asked quickly.

“Quorn hasn’t had a chance to get it,” Joan said. “It’s in there.”

She pointed to a big metal safe against a side of the room. Ezra Gurney limped to it and unlocked the door.

“Nobody’s been near this safe since we got here,” he stated flatly. “And we were here a couple of hours before Quorn reached Venus with that circus.”

“Good,” Curt replied. “First thing I want to do is activate the jewel into transmitting its part of Thuro Thuun’s formula and make sure the stone’s safe with me. Then we’re going to set a neat little trap for Doctor Quorn when he comes for it.”

Ezra stopped pawing in the safe. He whipped around, his face stupefied.

“Why, the stone is
gone!”
he cried.

“It can’t be!” Joan protested. “One of us was watching that safe every minute. Its door was never opened!”

BUT search soon disclosed that the space stone had somehow been taken. Otho gave a hissing oath.

“Fire-imps of Jupiter, Quorn beat us to it! But how?”

“I tell you, the safe wasn’t opened,” Joan insisted.

“Of course it wasn’t opened,” Future said angrily. “Quorn got the stone without having to open the safe. Why couldn’t I have suspected it? It’s obvious enough.”

“How could he get the stone without opening the safe?” Joan asked bewilderedly.

“Don’t you remember how he made a small animal pass through solid metal? He speeded up its body’s atoms so it would interpenetrate ordinary matter. That’s how Quorn got this space stone. He simply dematerialized one of his freaks, sent him into the safe to rematerialize in there, grab the jewel, dematerialize again, and walk out through the metal.”

“But you can see a dematerialized man,” protested Ezra. “I remember that from our case on Jupiter. We didn’t see anyone entering the safe at all.”

“Quorn would send him through the wall of the room and the back of the safe so you couldn’t see,” Curt explained.

“Outwitted!” Otho yelled furiously. “This Quorn’s a devil!”

“I warned you he was a cunning, highly intelligent scientist,” Curt reminded. “But I forgot my own warning.”

“It’s not your fault,” Joan argued. “You couldn’t know the jewel would be in a safe like this. It’s all my fault.”

“Self-accusation won’t help now,” cut in the Brain’s rasping voice. “We must plot our course of action.”

“Why not let me go out to the Circus, find Quorn, break him in half, and take the space-stones?” Grag boomed.

“Attractive, but impractical, Grag,” Curt said. “Quorn will have his four gems cunningly hidden, and he’ll be on guard against any sudden attack we might make on him. Since we still have no real proof against him, we’d be breaking Interplanetary Law ourselves by attacking him.”

“We’re surely not going to give up and let him get away with Thuro Thuun’s secret!” exploded Otho.

Curt’s tanned face hardened, and his gray eyes grew bleak. For one of the few times in his career, he felt almost inferior to a brilliant mixed-breed scientist against whom he had matched himself. And Captain Future didn’t like that feeling.

“No, we’re not going to give up,” he gritted. “It’s going to take time and effort, but I have a plan. We’re sure Quorn has the four space stones and that he’s after the other three. But we haven’t proof yet. He’s traveling with his freaks so he can use the circus as a blind for his activities. We must watch him if we’re to checkmate his scheme and prove his guilt.

“So the Futuremen are going to join that circus. We’ll be able to stick to Quorn till we find out where he has the stolen space stones, and can prevent him from getting the others. It’s the only way we can watch him all the time, without arousing his suspicion.”

“JOIN the circus as performers?”
Otho blurted. “How can we get away with it? I don’t get your wave at all, Chief.”

“Everyone would recognize us as the Futuremen,” Grag boomed.

“We’ll be in disguise, you blockheads,” Curt retorted. “Otho can easily disguise himself as the ‘Ultra-acrobat’ from Ganymede, or something. We’ll dummy up Grag with some artificial rubberoid flesh to make him look wholly human, and he can be the ‘Strong Man of Space.’ We’ll hide the Brain inside a phony-looking machine and call it the Thinking Machine. As for me, I’ll join as a wild animal tamer — Kovo, the Venusian swamp man, and his performing marsh tigers.”

“Marsh tigers?” repeated Ezra Gurney, his faded eyes widening. “Hell, nobody in the System can tame marsh tigers. They’re the most ferocious, vicious, dangerous critters in the nine worlds.”

“I can tame them.” Curt grinned. “After Otho’s helped me bring them back alive.”

“It’s more than likely you’ll bring Otho back dead,” bleated the android. Curt ignored him.

“First thing is to fix up the disguises for Grag and Simon. We others will join the circus separately, to avoid arousing any suspicion.”

Curt and the Futuremen, with Ezra and Joan Randall, went back to the
Comet.
There Otho, the master of disguise, rapidly concocted a mass of rubberoid flesh. While it was still warm, he smoothly applied it to Grag’s giant metal body except the eyes and mouth. When the rubberoid cooled, it became firm, pink and elastic as real flesh. Otho put dark spectacles over Grag’s shining photo-electric eyes, and then regarded him with satisfaction.

“You look almost human now, Grag,” he said.

“What do you mean — almost?” roared Grag. “I
am
human, a lot more than you, you miserable son of a laboratory retort!”

“I’m through with Simon,” Captain Future interrupted quietly.

Curt had quickly constructed a small mechanism that looked like a rather phony machine, with arms, dials and blinking lights on the front of its cylindrical case. Small wheels stood beneath it. Captain Future put the Brain’s square case inside the cylindrical one, made necessary connections, and then closed the cover.

“Hides you completely, Simon,” he said. “You can still see through those concealed openings, and listen and speak. Also, I’ve made it possible for you to roll from place to place or use those flexible arms on the side of the case, whenever you wish.”

“That’s something new — Simon with a body,” said Otho.

“I don’t want a body,” rasped the Brain. “It distracts the thought processes. But I’ll try it this time.”

Curt gave Grag full instructions.

“I understand, Master,” boomed the disguised robot, who now looked like a giant man. “I’m to call myself the Strong Man of Space, and say this Thinking Machine is a fake device I picked up, and get into the circus. But I’m not to know you or Otho when you appear.”

“That’s it,” Curt replied. “You’d better get started now.”

Obediently Grag picked up the apparently absurd Thinking Machine that hid the Brain, and disappeared into the darkness.

“Now for the marsh tigers.” Curt turned to Otho. “We’ll run inland in the
Comet
to the Great South Marsh. We’ll find plenty of ‘em there.”

“Too cursed plenty to suit me,” growled Otho as he took the controls. “But I suppose a fellow can die only once.”

“What can Ezra and I do to help, Captain Future?” Joan Randall asked.

“I want the two of you to stay with the
Comet,
and trail the circus from a safe distance. You’ll be in close touch then if I need the ship. You know how to operate it, Ezra.”

“Sure, but it’s a very tricky craft to handle,” drawled the veteran of space. “Touch a throttle, and you’re out of the System.”

An hour later, Otho brought the
Comet
down on a muddy hummock in the dark, vast Great South Marsh. Curt had been tinkering with a tiny instrument. He held the dumbbell-shaped mechanism in his hand as he and the android opened the door.

“Where’s your proton gun, Chief?” Otho asked.

“I’m not going to use any, Otho,” Curt replied calmly.

Otho recoiled. “Hunting marsh tigers without a gun! Oh, well, why not? We’re tired of living, anyway.”

They stepped out into darkness and oozy muck. Instantly, from the black swamp an enormous, green-eyed bulk charged, screaming. It was a marsh tiger, a scaled, black creature with four thick legs that were armed with razor talons. Its hideous snouted head was distorted by a gaping mouth bristling with great fangs.

A glimpse of that hideous maw as it bore down on them sent Curt and Otho leaping into the muck to avoid its rush. It thundered past, then turned with appalling speed to rush them again.

“I knew it!” Otho yelled, drawing his proton pistol. “We’re sunk!”

“Don’t fire, Otho!” Curt ordered.

He was aiming his small, dumbbell-shaped instrument at the marsh tiger. The instrument buzzed thinly as he pressed its button. The marsh tiger stopped. It made no threatening move when Curt boldly advanced and patted its scaly head.

“Devils of space!” gasped Otho. “How in the Sun’s name —”

“Simple.” Curt grinned. “This instrument is a ‘will-dampener,’ which Simon and I worked out a good while ago. It radiates a force that neutralizes almost completely the neuronic currents in this beast’s brain-cells, makes him stupid and docile as a lamb. We’ll collect a half-dozen of them in the same way.”

“All right,” said Otho uncertainly. “But all hell’s going to break loose if your ‘lambs’ suddenly recover.”

GRAG the robot, disguised as an Earthman of colossal stature, strode heavily through the dark streets of Venusopolis. In his enormous hand he carried the cylindrical Thinking Machine that hid the Brain. “The Interplanetary Circus is out by the spaceport, so I think this street will take us there,” boomed the robot.

“Not so loud, Grag!” cautioned the metallic voice of the Brain. “Are you sure you know your part?”

“Sure, I’ll be the Strong Man just like Master taught me,” Grag answered. “Only I hate to leave Eek in the
Comet.”

“Ezra and Joan will take care of him,” Simon assured him.