Captain Future 05 - Captain Future and the Seven Space Stones (Winter 1941) (2 page)

YEARS ago, Curt’s father, Roger Newton, a brilliant young Earth scientist, had fled to the Moon with his young wife. With them had gone Simon Wright, the Living Brain, who was now one of the Futuremen. They had fled from the plots of Victor Corvo, an unscrupulous schemer who coveted Roger Newton’s scientific secrets.

In the underground laboratory-home they built beneath Tycho crater on the Moon, the refugee scientist and the Brain had labored to create intelligent synthetic life. Two intelligent artificial beings resulted — Grag the metal robot, and Otho the synthetic man. In the same year, Curt was born.

But Victor Corvo had followed them to the Moon. He killed Curt’s parents before he was himself killed by Otho and Grag.

Curt Newton had been reared in the strange home by the Brain, the robot and the synthetic android. The Brain, mightiest scientist of the System then, had developed Curt into a scientific genius who eventually surpassed his teacher. Grag the robot, strongest of all beings, fostered Curt’s physical strength. And Otho the android, swiftest and most cunning of all in the System, had taught Curt skill and quickness.

When Curt reached manhood, the career of Captain Future really began. A man who sought to use science for criminal purposes had slain Curt’s parents. Curt decided to use his own unparalleled education and abilities in a relentless crusade against all such men. He devoted himself to fighting for the System peoples against those who would thwart their future. That was why he had taken the name of Captain Future.

With the Brain, robot and android who had been his tutors and guardians, Curt Newton had taken to the space-ways in bitter conflict against the forces of evil. Whenever danger to the System arose, the President of the System Government would call Captain Future by a beacon of blazing light on Earth’s north pole.

Curt Newton thought of the struggle and danger that had taken him and the Futuremen to every world of the System. He listened as the raucous barker finished his imaginative spiel.

“As for the Futuremen you’ve heard about, the Living Brain was the first of them. He was once Simon Wright, a great Earth scientist. He was near death when he had his brain taken from his dying body and placed in a special serum-case. There it still lives and thinks and experiments, even though he has no body.”

“Well, he got that right, anyway,” Curt said to Joan.

“The second Futureman was the big metal robot. Grag is stronger than anyone ever heard of and intelligent, too. He could tear anyone of you to pieces.”

“Good thing Grag isn’t here to hear it or there’d be no living with him,” muttered Otho. He brightened up eagerly as the barker went on.

“As for the third Futureman, the one they call an android —”

“He’ll probably spin a lot of crazy stuff about my wonderful feats,” Otho whispered with assumed nonchalance.

“He’s the poorest of the lot. He’s a sort of synthetic dummy that the others take along.”

CURT burst into a roar of laughter. Otho, green eyes blazing with fury, uttered a hissing exclamation of rage.

“A dummy? I’ll break his neck!”

“Cut your rockets, Otho,” Curt ordered, still laughing as he held the angry android. “Be glad Grag didn’t hear that.”

“Now I’ll show you mementoes of Captain Future’s great cases, folks, in these exhibits,” the barker was saying. “There are souvenirs of his fight against the Space Emperor on Jupiter, of his struggle against Doctor Zarro out there on Pluto, and —”

“Come on, we don’t want to see a lot of fake souvenirs,” Curt said, taking Joan’s arm. “We’d better leave while we can still restrain Otho from murder.”

The android had not lost his fury when they reached the bright, crowded midway. To placate him, Curt pointed to a big group of metal pavilions over which flared a bright diffraction sign.

INTERPLANETARY CIRCUS — LAST WEEK ON EARTH

“Come on, Otho — maybe the circus will console you,” Curt suggested.

But Otho was still fuming as they approached the pavilions. “Let’s go in and see the freaks,” Curt invited.

The side-show was an ingeniously compact auditorium, containing metal benches and a stage. Under soft krypton lights, one of the “Nine World Wonders” was performing.

“The Chameleon Man!” an Earthling master of ceremonies was chanting. “Watch him change, folks. Watch him!”

The Chameleon Man was an ordinary-looking, blue-skinned, lanky Saturnian. But when he moved in front of a green square of the vari-colored curtain, his skin abruptly changed to an exactly matching shade of green. He moved before a red part of the curtain, and at once his skin turned red.

“How in the world does he do that?” Joan wondered.

Curt had quickly fathomed the secret.

“He’s being subjected to a ray that can alter skin pigmentation swiftly, just as actinic rays burn a white skin brown. His skin has been chemically prepared.”

The Chameleon Man was replaced by a peaked-headed, cadaverous gray Neptunian, who possessed enormous, round, cuplike ears.

“The Hearer can hear a leaf fall from a tree ten miles away,” boasted the showman. “Whisper to your neighbor, as low as you can, and he’ll tell you just what you said.”

Various members of the audience tried it and were amazed to find that the Hearer could detect each almost inaudible sound.

“His ears have been enlarged and made supersensitive by some surgical process, Chief,” Otho declared.

Curt nodded. “Must be, though it would take a master physiologist to do it.”

“And now, before the main show begins in the circus, we present our greatest act,” the stagemaster was announcing. “You have all heard of the scientific powers of the ancient Martians, the mighty dynasties that perished long before any Earthman ever traveled space. You’re going to see a man who has discovered the great secrets of those ancient wonder-workers. The Magician of Mars!”

“The prize faker of all,” jeered Otho.

Future stiffened as a man came out on the stage, holding two cumbersome, puzzling instruments in his hands. He had the red skin of a Martian but Earthly black hair, black, intelligent eyes that surveyed his audience with veiled scorn, and smooth, handsome features.

“Why, that’s Doctor Ul Quorn!” Curt exclaimed.

“Ul Quorn?” Joan repeated. “Who is he?”

“He was as brilliant a scientist as the nine worlds possessed,” Curt said thoughtfully. “He’s half Earthman, a quarter Martian, a quarter Venusian. He had a high post at the Institute of Interplanetary Science before certain rather ghastly experiments of his were discovered, which got him a year in Cerberus prison and made him an outcast among all decent scientists. I’m sorry to see as brilliant a man as Quorn doing cheap scientific fakery in an outfit like this. I suppose it’s the only way he can live, though.”

“Look at what he’s doing!” Otho blurted.

An attendant had brought out a small Earth rodent, a furry, frightened little animal. Ul Quorn placed it on a suspended metal plate and aimed one of his instruments at it. The animal suddenly fell through the solid metal! Quorn passed the plate around to show it was perfectly solid.

“Imps of space, this Quorn has something!” Otho swore. “That’s the same dematerialization effect the old Jovians had mastered, that gave us so much trouble in the Jupiter case.”

“Yes,” Curt frowned. “Archaeologists believe the Jovians picked it up, like a lot of their old science, from the ancient Martians.”

“Is it possible that this man has really uncovered the long-lost science of the Martians?” Joan asked.

“I wish I knew,” Captain Future muttered. “Look at that.”

Ul Quorn, his handsome face expressionless as ever, had taken a seedling and was subjecting it to pulsating flashes of green light. Instantly the seedling swelled to a sapling, then to a large, rootless tree. A cry of wonder came from the audience.

“That’s no illusion,” Curt stated. “It’s the old Martian ‘accelerated growth’ technique. Quorn really has found something!”

Otho had been staring hard at the face of the magician.

“There’s something uncannily familiar about this Quorn’s face,” he said. “Somehow, even though I never saw him before, I feel that I’ve met him — and that we weren’t friends.”

Joan suddenly straightened. Curt’s quick ears caught the buzz from the tiny instrument in her pocket, a pocket televisor such as every agent of the Planet Police carried. She bent her head. Curt heard the metallic voice from the little televisor.

“Agent Randall? Police Headquarters speaking. You knew Professor Kenneth Lester, the archaeologist?”

“Yes, I met him on Jupiter,” Joan whispered into the minute transmitter. “He was involved in the Space Emperor case.”

“Lester has just been murdered in his study at the Institute. Since you knew him personally, you may be able to help in the investigation. I know you’re on detached service, but will you help anyway?”

“Of course,” Joan agreed swiftly. “I’ll be at the Institute in twenty minutes.”

She raised her eyes to Curt and Otho. Curt looked grim.

“I’ll go with you,” he said tersely.

“But this is your vacation —” she protested.

“Lester and I became friends in that Jupiter case,” Captain Future reminded her. “If I can, I’d like to see his murderer brought to justice...”

TWENTY minutes later, Curt and Otho followed Joan into the softly lit, crowded study of the murdered archaeologist. A dark-uniformed officer of the Planet Police barred the way to the two men.

“You may be with Miss Randall, but you can’t enter,” he said stiffly. “Only members of the police are allowed.”

Curt wordlessly took a large, curious ring from inside his belt. Around its glowing sun-jewel, nine planet-jewels revolved slowly.

“Captain Future!” gasped the officer. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. Go right in —”

Inside, Curt saw Halk Anders, the bulldog-faced commander of the police, and Marshal Ezra Gurney, whose seamed old face lighted up at sight of him.

“Future!” the veteran cried. “Danged glad you’re here! But I thought you was on vacation way outside the System.”

“No, Ezra. I’ve been right here on Earth. I heard about Lester just now and came with Joan.”

“Captain Future, working on a mere murder?” asked the commander.

“Lester was my friend,” Curt repeated grimly. “You remember him, don’t you, Ezra?”

Ezra nodded. “Fine young fellow, and now look at him.”

Curt Newton turned. On the floor lay the horror that had been Kenneth Lester. It was a boiling mass of corruption — a body whose tissues sought to devour each other.

“Most hideous thing I ever saw,” came the commander’s thick voice. “What could do a thing like this?”

“I don’t know just what was used to do it, but I know what it is,” Curt Newton replied somberly. “The ancient Martian ‘life disintegrator’ destroys the cooperation of the body’s cells. They no longer work together, but seek to devour each other. How it was done isn’t known. It was a secret of ancient Martian science.” He was looking at Otho as he spoke.

He saw in the android’s narrowed green eyes the same speculation he had in mind.

“Ancient Martian science?” Otho hissed. “There’s something damned queer about this coincidence — if it is one.”

BACK at the Interplanetary Circus, the big show was about to begin, and Ul Quorn, the “Magician of Mars,” performed his last feat of scientific legerdemain. A roar of applause burst from the audience. Then they began drifting toward the main pavilion, from which music blared.

Ul Quorn watched them from the wings. There was contempt in his keen black eyes as he turned to the girl who had come quietly to his side. “Performing tricks for gaping fools!” he gritted. “Degrading my knowledge to provide entertainment for stupid crowds!”

“It will not be for much longer, Master,” said the girl in her soft, slurring Martian speech.

She was pure Martian — and pure danger. There was an indolent, mocking beauty in her perfect features, yet worry was apparent in her gaze as she anxiously watched Ul Quorn’s handsome, brooding face.

“Yes, N’rala, it won’t go on much longer,” he replied thoughtfully. “And this freak-show of mine was the best stratagem to raise funds and provide a cover for our activities. But when I have all the space stones —”

He was interrupted by the blue-skinned Saturnian who was called the Chameleon Man. “They are waiting in your pavilion, Master,” the freak whispered.

The cadaverous Neptunian called the Hearer also approached.

“Master, there is something you should know.”

“Later,” Quorn said impatiently. “Come, N’rala.”

The Martian girl glided after Quorn to his private dressing room. Three Martians were waiting in it. They were queer-looking men, hollow-eyed, tense. They sprang up as Quorn and N’rala entered.

“Greetings, Sons of the Two Moons, said Quorn formally.

“To you, too, Son of the Two Moons, greetings,” answered the oldest of the three. Ul Quorn sat down, but his black eyes were angry as he spoke to the oldest Martian.