One Was Stubbron (8 page)

CHAPTER FOUR

Wait for the Night

I
T
was still twilight on the surface and the earthlight was quite bright even where the blackness of airless night lay upon the stabbed and pitted world. The pumice-covered plains were upheaved into abrupt cliffs and slashed apart by ugly chasms.

It was a nightmare land where one bobbed in levitation-like gyrations, skating over soft and treacherous pumice bogs, plowing through the basalt dust of
rays,
all under an indigo sky.

Meteors landed soundlessly with the enormous explosions of bombs and each twenty-four hours millions fell. Sometimes clouds rose up to catch the higher rays of the slow-motion sun and hung there, twisting the light into colors.

Man was experiencing his first contact with the wild, garish, infinitely dangerous power of space, billions of times as strong, as capricious, as his ancient enemy the sea.

All was so slow, so quiet, so vastly untenanted. And far away the aura-crowned Earth hung silent, watchful in the sky, satellite of this dead world.

Their imperishable tracks stretched behind them as they drifted toward the emplacements. It was difficult to believe that these weird metal things were containers for human beings.

In ages to come, in scenes like these, men would sicken and madden and die just as the crews of tempest-driven
barques
have gripped insanity in the ages past.

Angel plowed through pumice and climbed the final bastion of the emplacement.

The great pilotless missile was shielded by an overhanging cliff against all but a freak meteor. Through a small opening this sleek white tube could fly, rushing to the execution of perhaps a million human beings. It stood quietly, waiting. It had all the dignity of the slave machine. It could wait.

Painted scarlet on its nose was—

CHICAGO

There was a buzz of cheerfulness from the Russians as they got out of the open. Eight of their number here had died—two from sun, one from cold, one from suffocation, four all at once under the smash of a thousand-ton meteor.

The mathematician amongst them sat down and began clumsy figures with his mitten-held pencil. A surveyor set up a
transit
. They were about to complete the orientation and construction of the rail tracks for Chicago.

Angel supposed he would remain here under guard. But the captain had ideas.

“You Yankees! There is rail material dumped in a small crater a few hundred yards from here. We have too few men as it is. You will begin the task of bringing them.”

The ground vibrated for an instant as a meteor struck above.

Angel said, “Come on, Whittaker.”

They crawled back over the entrance bulwark and regained the still twilight of the outside.

For a moment they stopped and adjusted the radio dials on each other's helmets.

“I hope Boyd is all right,” said Angel.

“I hope we can find the place,” said Whittaker.

They turned and in great leaps began to scout for the incoming tracks of their ship. There were many such tracks and Angel had to take a quick orientation. Then they found theirs, neither older nor younger than any other tracks, and began to race back down it, taking broadjumps of forty feet with every step, trying to keep from sailing sky-high. The pumice was indifferent footing and clung to their duck shoes, leaving a slowly settling stream of particles in the half-light behind them.

They had gone five miles before they saw anything on their backtrack. And then it was obvious that somebody in the work party had begun pursuit after missing them.

The pursuit was specklike, unhurried as the weasel stalks. For who could find board and room on the moon?

Angel's breath was hurtful in his lungs. Whittaker was lagging and the officer stopped to let him catch up. It was then he saw the motor sled. It was coming fast, so fast he could see it grow.

Desperately, Angel sprinted on. Ahead, with a yell of delight, he saw the end of the tracks and the strewn debris. He grabbed cans one after the other until he found the right one and hauled up its string. The first package came to light and then the string broke.

W
hittaker dived headlong into the pumice to recover it. The second and third packages came to view.

Angel glanced back. The motor sled was almost there. He wrenched off the ties of the heaviest packet. Out rolled the sleek bombs of a bazooka and the instrument itself.

Whittaker seized the barrel and placed it over Angel's shoulder. Angel found the trigger and knelt, sighting on the sled. Whittaker thrust the first rocket in place.

The sled was quite close now, trying to brake, throwing up lazy clouds of pumice.

The rocket trail was red flame in the twilight. The explosion was soundless but like a blow on the chest. Scarlet fire sucked sled and men into its ball and then spewed them forth in fragments which fell lazily, driftingly through the clouds.

Angel got up and would have mopped his brow until his hand, striking against the helmet, reminded him where he was. He turned to find that Whittaker was already slinging the string of grenades over his shoulder.

From the third packet they took the
Tommy guns
and ammunition. Armed then and in haste they started the backtrack.

Had they been able to afford more oxygen they would not have been so tired. Weightless walking took little energy and their burdens were feathers. It was rather insecure to feel a Tommy gun so light.

They oriented themselves and then Angel led off toward the chasm. They gained the shelter of this just as a meteor seemed to explode behind them. But it wasn't a meteor. It was a rocket projectile of small caliber.

They floundered down to a ledge in the giant canyon and then, like two mountain goats of great power, began to leap from outcrop to outcrop.

They made time. The canyon had a bend which would protect them until the last.

But Chicago was there.

A slug struck the bazooka barrel and glanced soundlessly away. They instantly pressed against a jagged break in the wall and Angel adjusted his burdens. He looked up and saw that he could climb.

With a motion to Whittaker to stay put, Angel went up the basalt and found himself crawling over an unburned meteor of glittery sheen. There were diamonds in it.

On top he could crawl forward and peer down over the edge at the Chicago rampart. He glanced ahead and saw that there were fifteen other emplacements but the main entrance to the tunnels interposed.

Cautiously he laid down his weapons and then crept to the edge again, grenades in hand.

With sudden rapidity he pulled out pin after pin and pitched. It was like salvo ranging. How hard it was to estimate throwing distances!

But the cliff wall let them billiard. One, two, three, four they dropped into the emplacement.

He could see space suits down there scrambling back. Any slightest wound would be fatal. A slug tipped his mitten and then the first grenade went up.

The emplacement rocked. Four blasts belched out stone. The imperfectly held rocks folded in and an avalanche began a leisurely curtain into the bottomless canyon. There was no sign of the Chicago entrance.

While particles still drifted, Angel waved to Whittaker and they swiftly resumed their goat travel. The huge steel faces of the main tunnels remained solid and impassive, proof even against meteors.

No shot came.

Whittaker cautiously drew up to their faces until he could touch them. He found no chink in them.

“Up!” said Angel.

They scrambled and leaped and finally came to the plain. A rocket missile shook the ground near them and covered them with dust. They dived headlong into a crater.

Whittaker lifted his head above the rim. “Emplacement to repel ground troops. On that crater rim.”

“They must keep one manned continually as an alert,” said Angel. He thoughtfully sat down. Somewhere a meteor shook ground. The tip of the last rocket explosion was still rising, catching the sunlight in a turning glitter.

“The only available entrance into the tunnels must be through that guarded emplacement,” said Angel. He looked up. “There's very little sun left. It will be dark in half an hour.”

Whittaker nodded inside his lucite
casque
. “It'll get awful dark, Lootenant.”

“Fine,” said Angel. “Take bearings on the emplacement from the two rims of the crater. A man could get hurt stumbling around here without lights.”

Whittaker got busy with the engineer's companion, an
azimuth compass
. It worked fairly well, though heaven knows where the magnetic pole of the moon might be. He made a small chart of prominent landmarks which would be easy to find in the dark.

Now and then a rocket would explode along the crater rim but such was the gravity problem that the alerts did not attempt the mortar effect.

Angel put a piece of chocolate into the miniature space lock of his helmet, closed the outer door, opened the inner one with his chin and worried it dog-fashion out of the compartment. He ate it reflectively.

“I hope Boyd is all right,” he said.

CHAPTER FIVE

Now I Lay Me …

D
ARK
came as if someone had shut off an electric light in a coal cellar. The moment was well chosen. Dark wouldn't come in such a fashion to this place again for twenty-nine and a half days, nor would it be light again until half that period had passed.

Soon it would get very cold, down to minus two hundred centigrade. These space suits were designed for that but they used up their batteries very quickly despite the eight thicknesses of asbestos on their outsides.

“Let's go,” said Angel. “They may try a foray on their own.” The earthlight was wiped out by their colored helmets.

As nearly as they could calculate they covered the proper chart distances in a wide triangle which would bring them up the side of the alert post.

Soundlessly they made their debouch, fortunately having to take no care of tumbled meteor fragments beyond falling. And a fall was far from fatal.

They came to the slope and groped their way up.

Something round bumped Angel. He felt it and found it to be a metal pole. Some sort of aerial or light stand. He wondered if the Russians had shifted to other helmets which would permit them to see him in the earthlight. That he was still alive made him think not.

He felt the man-made smoothness of the pit edge and drew back. He stopped Whittaker and toothed out the pin of a grenade.

Rapidly they hurled four. The pumice shook like jelly under them under four explosions.

They dived over the edge. Only one Russian was there and nothing much of him was remaining.

“They tried a foray,” said Angel. He threw on his chest lights and the metal escape door gleamed.

They lifted it swiftly and plunged down the steps, closing it behind them. An airlock was before them.

“Keep your helmet on,” said Angel. He went through.

At the third door they paused and took the safeties off their Tommy guns. They went through alertly. But no one barred their way and they entered the main tunnel. To their right they could see their big ports beyond which stood their ship.

Supplies were scattered along the walls. Space suits hung on pegs. Weapons were racked.

“Come along,” said Angel.

They confronted the first series of doors which led to Slavinsky. In the first, second and third chambers they found no one. The fourth was locked.

Angel waved Whittaker back and from the second chamber sighted with the bazooka on the locked door.

“Look alive in case anybody comes,” said Angel.

Whittaker placed the missile and then stepped aside, Tommy gun ready.

The trajectory of the rocket flamed out. Smoke and dust dissolved the far door. The echoing concussion buffeted them, unheard through their suits.

Angel was up with a rush, cleaving the billows of
cordite
. His charge brought him straight into the inner sanctum.

And there, pistol gripped but flung back, was Slavinsky.

The black eyes glared. The yellow teeth showed. Whatever he yelled Angel could not hear. The pistol jerked and a cartridge empty flipped up.

Angel chopped down with the Tommy gun.

And discovered the engineering fact that metal still fifty degrees below zero centigrade does not work well. The firing pin fell short.

The lucite casque fanned out a gauzy pattern but the slug did not penetrate, leaving only a blot.

Angel threw the gun straight at Slavinsky's head. Slavinsky ducked the weapon. But he did not duck the chair which followed it. He staggered back, losing his grip on the pistol.

In Angel's radio, Whittaker's voice yelled, “Three Ruskies are comin'!”

“Use a grenade!” cried Angel. And he flung himself bodily upon Slavinsky.

The metal mittens were clumsy and could not find the general's throat. Slavinsky got a heel into Angel's belt and catapulted him with a smash against the ceiling.

Angel flung himself back. Slavinsky's naked torso was nothing to grip.

“Get him!” howled Whittaker. “They got us penned in!”

Angel grabbed for the sling of the Tommy gun. The weapon leaped up, amazingly light. But it had mass and mass counted. He drove the butt through Slavinsky's guard, drove in the teeth, the nose, brought sheets of blood into the eyes, crushed the jutting jaw and obliterated the face.

He spun about to find Whittaker holding a bulging door. Angel reached into his kit and pulled out a flask.

“Let them in!”

“They're in!” roared Whittaker.

The bottle of
lewisite
exploded against the wall beside the first Russian, spraying out over his naked skin.

The rest plowed forward. They plowed, caught their throats, strangled and dropped.

A
ngel turned and popped a space cloak and helmet on the remains of Slavinsky. He wanted him alive before the gas reached clear across the chamber. “Stay here,” said Angel. And he plunged out.

He found Boyd in a cell, safe enough, carefully garbed in his space helmet.

“It was horrible,” said Boyd. “The fools grabbed those cigarettes like you said they would. They distributed all of them to everybody but Slavinsky and he hits marijuana instead. And then they started to light up. Even them that didn't get to take a puff got it from the rest. Lootenant, don't never feed me no lewisite cigarette!”

“Anybody else you know of back here?” said Angel sweetly.

“Whoever survived rushed up to where you came in. Geez, Lootenant, what if that had missed?”

“We'd be working in St. Peter's army,” grinned Angel. “Keep that helmet on. This whole place must be full of gas.”

They went back to Slavinsky's office and from there made way into the communications center.

Boyd set the wave lengths and called.

When they had Washington as though they were Russians, Angel took the aircraft code from his kit and began to give them news that Russia wouldn't know in time.

“We have met Slavinsky,” he coded. “I am in possession of this objective and require reinforcements immediately. The enemy is dead except for stragglers outside who will die. Tell the highest in command to send force quickly. We are victorious!”

W
hittaker put an affectionate hand on Angel's shoulder and shook it gently. Angel felt terrible.

“Lieutenant,” said the surgeon, “you'd better come around. It's nearly time.”

The watch on his wrist gleamed as hugely as a steeple clock and said, “Zero three fifty-one” in an unnecessarily loud voice.

He was dressed somehow and they shoved him into the corridor, which was at least half the distance to Mars. A potted palm fell down and became a general.

“Fine morning, fine morning, Lieutenant. You look fit. Fit, sir. No clouds and a splendid full moon.”

The aide was brilliant. Angel knew him well. The aide had been an upperclassman when Angel was at the Point.

“Beg pardon, sir,” said the aide sidewise to the general. “But we've just time to brief him as we ride down. Here, this way, Lieutenant.”

When they were in the car the aide said, “You have been thoroughly briefed before. But there must be a quick resumé unless you think you are thoroughly cognizant of your duties.”

Angel would have answered but all that came out was a groan.

“You will phone all data back to us. Our tests show that the wave can travel much farther than that. Anything you may think important, beyond maps and perhaps geology, you are permitted to note and report.

“Under no circumstances are you to attempt to change any control settings in your ship. All instructions are in this packet.”

Angel shoved the brown packet into his pocket with a twinge of pain.
What
a hangover. And what a dreadfully confused night he had had!

Colonel Anthony got him out of the car, through the crowd and up the ladder.

Whittaker was standing there, indolently chewing tobacco. Metal glinted behind them in the interior. Commander Dawson of the Navy prowled around the ship and then went to take his post.

“You've got a week to sober up, my boy,” said Anthony.

“I'll be fine,” said Angel, managing a smile.

Angel stepped from the ladder to the platform.

“Board!
” shouted Dawson.

Floodlights and cameras and upraised faces. There was a hushed, awed stillness.

Boyd had a big pair of glasses fixed upon the full moon. He was adjusting them to get the proper focus. Suddenly Angel grabbed the glasses away and stabbed them at the brilliant orb.

With a little sigh of relief he gave the glasses back and with a wave of his hand to the crowd, entered the ship.

The door closed. The spectators were waved hurriedly back.

There was a crash of jets, a flash of metal.

The spaceship was gone.

In spite of nightmares and hangovers, Man had begun his first flight into outer space.