Wanted—7 Fearless Engineers!, Frederick Orlin Tremaine [best free ebook reader for android txt] 📗

"The worms? It sounds like hundreds of them! We better work fast, or they'll have the whole roof down around our ears."

"No, John. We can't fight them with guns. They have attacked every dome on the planet!"

When full realization came to the big Irishman, he sank slowly into a chair. "Then what? Have you got any plan—or are we helpless?"

"We've got work to do and plenty of it. There's a slight chance of saving the cities. I've already instructed the others."

As the three men raced toward the power plant, Dick explained. John and George were to do the work, while he traveled from dome to dome to make sure the people were prepared, and see that the power plants were used as he intended.

By the time they reached the entrance of the building, John nodded, and Barrow turned back as the other men entered the door. The first dome people that Dick saw were told to remove everyone from the buildings, and gather them in the open spaces of the parks. Leaving no one within any structure!

The expression on his face scared them even more than the pounding of the worms, and they hurried to obey.

Dick jumped into the nearest ground car. He couldn't be bothered traveling on the railroads. This happened to belong to the assistant head of the dome, whom he dispossessed. It jerked crazily across streets and parks, while he learned to handle the controls.

An hour later Dick was back at the powerhouse in the big dome. Every city was ready. In several places the hammering heads had broken through the outer layers, and were banging at the translucent inner ceiling. The creatures had learned how to break through.

The first worm that attacked, while the space ship was away, either took its time or didn't realize what was beneath the heavy metal. These creatures were working in earnest.

Heavy insulated cables ran from the powerhouse to the nearest metal pillars, where McCarthy and Martin were working desperately to fasten them in place. The booming voice of the Irishman had kept the natives back, although they crowded as close as they dared. They were really afraid, when the hammering grew plainer with each passing minute.

When the cables were fastened, John shouted to Dick, who was waiting in the powerhouse. He pulled a heavy switch, at the end of the wires.

The city was suddenly in complete darkness, then it flashed bright again as power flowed back into the thousands of coils in the ceiling material. Twice more it darkened, when the giant switch was thrown, and the lights came on again. This time it stayed bright.

Dick ran to the doorway, and gazed at the dome above. It was silent! The people were frightened, and moved restlessly about. Twice more he turned the power into the metal, and after one long darkened period, the city remained bright. No sound came from the dome! Either the worms were dead—or frightened away!

Within a week the doors to the deserted city were opened, and the earthmen passed through. When they glimpsed the interior, they stopped in consternation, then started to laugh.

Huge worms covered the ground, and smaller editions of the same species, crawled around them. They were using the dome for a hatching place!

They had only entered it to bring forth their young! It was not brains that tempted them to attack the city, but the instinct to find a protected place for their eggs. Since they had broken in, many of the young had hatched, and were crawling around the ground.

Sight of the earthmen seemed to excite their feelings, and several of the creatures started toward them. The men fired carefully, and the forms squirmed on the ground. The ones that came behind stopped, and some of the young tried to feed on the remains of their companions.

The sight was so sickening that the earthmen fired at every living thing they could see. Several of the wounded creatures crawled up the huge pillars, to disappear through the opening above, while the men shot at their disappearing forms. When the last caterpillar lay dead, the entire area appeared like a battlefield.

Three days later the gas had been expelled, and the hole in the dome repaired. The population was returning to their homes, burying the carcasses in the fields. The city was livable again, and they knew electric current would stop any future attack of the strange creatures.

Ten years later, Dick Barrow sat on the balcony before his apartment. His son John, eight years old, was playing with Dick McCarthy. While he watched the boys, his mind swung back to the earth the little group had left so many years before.

For three years they had talked of returning to their home planet, and the evening before the conversation reached a climax. They were starting in two months.

It no longer required years to manufacture fuel for one trip. All machinery was working at top efficiency, and they could turn out enough of the liquid in a month, to drive the ship back and forth several times. Crews of workmen had been trained to care for all mechanical equipment, and there was no longer need for the engineers from the earth.

The day the little party (it now consisted of eighteen with the four children), entered the space ship tears rolled down the cheeks of many of the crowd. The dome people had learned to almost worship these members of an alien race, and thought they would never leave. But when they realized that their leaders were dissatisfied, and wanted to return to their native planet, they aided in every way they knew how.

The ship was out of port for less than a week when the people became restless. They hardly spoke, even at meal time, and for the first time in ten years there were petty quarrels.

When Barrow called them to the main cabin, they came grudgingly, then slowly the expressions changed. Smiles appeared on their faces, and their heads moved with sheepish nods of assent.

"We're fools, and you all know it. We were happy in the domes, happier than we ever were in our lives before. We didn't appreciate it and longed to return to the earth. We wanted to leave, yet had everything there to live for. We had comfort, every pleasure, and more friends than we can possibly have on our own world. I feel ashamed!

"Right now we wish that we were back in our own apartments, and might as well admit it. The earth is not what we want, we want the domes! They are home!!!

"The best thing for us to do, now that we are on the way to the earth, is establish commerce.

"We can create friendship between the planets, but we are natives of Jupiter! Our interests will always be with the dome people. We have almost become part of that race, and they have given us everything in return. They even gave us our freedom when we wanted it. We belong there!"

Ten years more passed, and John Barrow was beginning to help with his father's work. Vacationing in Jupiter's domes had become so popular on the earth that they were building another city to accommodate the tourist trade. It was the third to be added to the original six. Merchant ships were constantly discharging goods from the earth, and carrying back rare metals.

Space ships from the earth, designed after the original Jupiter ship, were searching the little known planets for minerals. Domes were being built on three of the smaller globes, and pioneering humans migrated to new worlds. There was danger, yes, but also fame and fortune for the hardy people who would inhabit them.

The earth had changed a lot, since the visit of the space ship. They had adopted the principle of controlling gravity, and tremendous structures were the result. New buildings were several times as large as the greatest structure of ten years before. Both planets had benefited from the friendship, and both were happier as a result.

As Dick Barrow's mind ran over these facts, he smiled and spoke aloud to himself. "And all of this in twenty years—it seems incredible!"

"What did you say, dear?" asked Dolores.

Dick smiled as he glanced at her. "It's nothing. I was just thinking. Remember the night you fell in front of my table in the hotel? And I thought it was accidental—you scheming gold-digger!"

The ruler of the domes ducked when his wife threw her book—but she didn't throw it very hard.

THE END