Treachery in Outer Space, Carey Rockwell [most difficult books to read .txt] 📗

but this was the first time the sirens howled a real warning of danger and death.

Strong raced back to the control tower of the spaceport in a jet car and burst into the room where the captain was still asleep on the couch. Strong shook him violently.

"Wake up, Joe!" he cried. "Come on. Wake up."

"Uh—ahhh? What's the—?" Howard sat up and blinked his eyes. "Steve, what's going on?"

"The screen at sector twelve has collapsed. How many people are still in there?"

"Collapsed! Sector twelve?" Howard, still groggy with sleep, dumbly repeated what Strong had said.

Strong drew back his hand and slapped him across the face. "Come out of it, Joe!" he barked.

Howard reeled back and then sat up, fully awake.

"What—what did you say?" he stammered.

"Sector twelve has gone," Strong repeated. "How many people are left there?"

"We haven't even begun operations there yet," Howard replied grimly. "How long have I been asleep?"

"A couple of hours."

"Then there's still time."

"What do you mean?"

"Just before I folded, I ordered the evacuation crews to start working on sector eleven. They should be finished now and just about starting on twelve. If they have, we have a good chance of saving everyone."

"Let's go."

The two men raced out of the control tower to the jet car and roared through the desolate streets of the city. All around them commandeered jet cars raced toward the critical area. Commander Walters stood in the middle of an intersection on the main road to sector twelve, waving his arms and shouting orders to the enlisted guardsmen and volunteer miners that had raced back into the city to help. On the sidewalk, enlisted guardsmen handed out extra oxygen masks to the men who would search the area for anyone who might not have gotten out before the screen exploded. The main evacuation force that had been under Howard's supervision had already moved in but there was still a large area to cover.

"We'll split up into six sections!" roared Walters, standing on top of a jet car. "Go down every street and alley, and make a house-to-house search. Cover every square inch of the sector. If we lose one life, we will have failed. Move out!"

With Strong, Kit, Howard, Walters, and other officers of the Solar Guard in the lead, the grim lines of men separated into smaller groups and started their march through the deserted city. The swirling gas already was down to within a hundred feet of the street level. When it dropped to the surface, each man knew there would be little hope for anyone remaining alive without oxygen masks.

Every room of every house and building was searched, as over all, the deadly swirling gas dropped lower and lower and the pressure of the oxygen was dissipated.

Once, Strong broke open the door to a cheap rooming house and raced through it searching each room. He found no one, but something made him go back through the first-floor rooms again. Under a bed in a room at the end of the hall he found a young boy huddled with his dog, wide-eyed with fear. Such incidents were repeated over and over as the searchers came upon sleeping miners, sick mothers and children, elderly couples that were unable to move. Each time they were taken outside to a jet car where masks were strapped over their faces, and then driven to the spaceport. And, all the while, the deadly methane ammonia gas dropped lower and lower until it was within ten feet of the ground.

There were only a few buildings left to search now. The lines of the men had reached the open grassy areas surrounding the city proper, and as they collected in groups and exchanged information, Walters gathered them together.

"You've done a fine job, all of you," he said. "I don't think there's a living thing left in this entire sector. All volunteers and the first four squads of enlisted guardsmen and second detachment of Space Marines return to the spaceport and prepare to abandon Titan. Give all the aid to the officer in charge that you can. Again, I want to thank you for your help."

As the group of men broke up and began drifting away, Walters hurried over to Strong and Kit Barnard. "Steve," he said, "I want you to supervise the evacuation at the spaceport. Since this screen has blown up, those poor people are frightened out of their wits. And they have a right to be. If a major screen blew instead of a small one, we really would be in trouble."

"Very well, sir," replied Strong. "Come on, Kit, you might as well blast off with a load of children."

"Sure thing."

"Just a minute," Walters interrupted. "I would consider it a service, Kit, if you would send your young assistant back with your ship and you stick around until we get all the people safely off."

"Anything I can do to help, sir," replied Kit.

At that moment a tall enlisted spaceman walked up to Walters and saluted sharply. Walters noticed the stripes on his sleeve and his young-looking face. He couldn't remember ever seeing such a young master sergeant.

"Captain Howard asked me to make my report to you, sir," said the guardsman.

"Very well, sergeant," said Walters.

The young spaceman made a detailed report of his search through sectors eleven and twelve. While he spoke, Strong kept looking at him, puzzled. When the guardsman had finished, Strong asked, "Don't I know you from somewhere, Sergeant?"

The guardsman smiled. "You sure do, Captain Strong. My name's Morgan, sir. I was a cadet with Tom Corbett and Astro, sir, but I washed out. So I joined the enlisted guard."

"Congratulations, Sergeant," said Walters. "You're the youngest top kick I've ever seen." He turned to Strong. "Apparently we slipped up, Steve, letting this chap get out of the Academy so he could make a name for himself in the enlisted ranks."

"Thank you, sir," replied Morgan, blushing with pride.

"Have you seen the cadets, by any chance, Sergeant?" asked Strong. "They're both here on Titan with me."

"Oh, yes, sir," said Morgan. "I saw them some time ago."

"Where?"

"A few blocks closer to the heart of town," said Morgan, pointing back down the avenue. "We were just starting in on sector eleven and I saw them coming out of a restaurant."

"Funny they haven't returned," commented Walters. "And what would they be doing down there?"

Strong's forehead creased into a frown of worry. "Sir, I wonder if you'd allow me a half hour or so to look for them?" he asked. "If they were anywhere near this section when the screen collapsed, they could have been injured by the sudden release of pressure."

"They had masks, sir," said Morgan. "I gave them a couple myself."

Walters thought a moment. "It's just possible they might have been injured in some way," he mused. "Go ahead, Steve. If you don't find them, and they don't show up at the spaceport, we'll organize a full search."

"Thank you, sir," said Strong. "You come along with me, Sergeant."

Adjusting their oxygen masks, Captain Strong and Sergeant Morgan strode down the street through the swirling mist of deadly methane ammonia to begin their search for Tom and Astro.

CHAPTER 15

"Listen!"

Captain Strong grabbed the young master sergeant by the arm and stood stock-still in the swirling methane ammonia gas, his eyes searching the misty sky.

"What is it, sir?" asked Morgan.

"A spaceship decelerating," said Strong, "coming in for a touchdown!"

"I think I hear it now, sir!" said Morgan.

"Can you figure out where it is? I can't see a blasted thing."

"Sounds to me as though it's to the left, sir."

"O.K., let's go and investigate," said Strong. "There isn't any good reason for a ship coming down in this deadly soup—or in this area."

Walking slowly and cautiously, the two spacemen angled to the left, peering through the clouds of gas that seemed to get thicker as they moved along. The roaring blast of the ship became louder.

Strong put his hand out to stop Morgan. "Let's hold up a minute, Sergeant," he said. "I don't want to get too close until I know what we're facing."

They stood absolutely still, the gas swirling around them in undulating clouds that grew thicker one minute and then thinned out again. As the gas thinned for a few seconds, Strong gasped and pointed.

"Look!" he cried. "By the craters of Luna, it's Brett's ship!"

"Brett?" asked Morgan.

"Charles Brett. He owns that ship. It's the one that won the space race from Earth. Now, what would he be doing landing out here?"

"I think he came down beside that warehouse up ahead, sir," said Morgan, as the gas cloud closed in again, cutting off their view of the actual landing. "It used to be a storehouse for mining gear a couple of years ago, but it's been empty for some time."

"I think we'd better check this, Sergeant," said Strong firmly. "Come on."

Strong started forward, then stopped, as a particularly heavy cloud of the deadly gas swirled around them. The two spacemen clung together blinded by the dense methane ammonia that would kill them in thirty seconds should their oxygen masks fail. In a moment the foggy death thinned out again and they continued toward the warehouse and the sleek black ship behind it.

Tom Corbett and Astro heard the roaring blast of the ship's exhaust. They saw Brett and Miles haul the instruments out of the cavern. They saw; they could hear; but they could not move. For nearly three hours they had remained alone in the cavern, frozen in the exact position they were in when Quent Miles had blasted them with his paralo-ray gun. And then Brett and Miles were standing before them again, Miles covering them with his paralo-ray gun.

"Why should we break our backs loading the ship?" sneered Miles. "Let them carry it out for us."