The Metal Moon Read online

  CHAPTER IV

  The Monstrosities

  "He's coming out of it. Hand me the water, Lents."

  Sine awoke to see Kass bending over him. He felt weak and languid, andthe memory of recent events was returning only slowly. He looked around,saw that he was lying in a chamber about fifteen feet square, evidentlyhewn out of solid rock.

  "Are you all right, Sine? Answer me, boy!" Kass' bald head gleamed inthe yellowish light of a single emanation tablet on the ceiling.

  "I'm all right. Where are we?"

  "Under the sea. Some hidden city of the Second Race--those that werebanished. We are prisoners, but honored prisoners it seems."

  Sine passed his hand over his eyes.

  "How did we get here?"

  "Some kind of emanation of theirs--the brightening of that light, Iguess. It had a paralyzing effect. I know I froze where I stood, unableto move a step. And I was protected by the hull. Same with Lents. Butyou had your head out of the port--caught the full effect. It laid youout cold."

  "They boarded us then," the fat man supplied.

  "As easy as that! Simply boarded us, herded me and Lents into their ownship, which is just as suitable for navigating in water as in air. Asfor you, they had to carry you."

  "Better tell him what to expect," Lents suggested.

  Kass explained, with considerable scientific interest:

  "The First Race was not so far wrong in calling them 'terrible people.'They are, a race of monstrosities. Men with four or six arms, men withhair like fur all over their bodies. With heads ten times too large.With boneless tentacles instead of limbs. With scales instead of skin.Quite horrible. And yet, most of them are highly intelligent, withnormal human emotions, and painfully conscious of their deformities."

  "I don't quite understand." Sine was flexing his muscles, sitting upwith the support of one elbow. He saw he was lying on a pallet of driedsea weed. "What caused these abnormalities?"

  "Well, you know--" Lents was speaking judiciously. "You know all aboutthe mutations produced by X-rays in the biological laboratories?"

  "Of course!" For approximately a million years these actions of X-rayshad been understood--their ability to bring about extraordinarymutations in the life-germ, whether animal or vegetable--theacceleration of natural evolution a millionfold. "But you don't mean tosay the First Race deliberately brought about these mutations in theMugs?"

  "Not deliberately. But they permitted it with utter callousness. Youknow those hydrogen integrators we saw at a distance in the dark half ofThe Bubble. Those things are the source of most of the power used by theJovians. But the generators have a mighty dangerous by-product--thecosmic ray series, for instance, a particularly destructive band belowthe X-ray spectrum too."

  Sine nodded comprehension, his eyes hardening as he thought of thegrotesque, distorted wreck of humanity who was Proserpina's father. Amere whim of fortune that he had not been condemned to that hell beforeshe was born, or she might have been one of those unfortunatemutations--

  Might yet become one! Not only could the rays deform the offspring. Theycould distort the full-grown, normal body. Sine felt increasinglydismayed as he thought of this immature, quiet-eyed girl, this waif ofan alien world. He experienced a recurrence of the indignation he hadpreviously felt. This selfish, superior First Race! Condemning theweaker people to torture and death so they could enjoy a littleparadise! The Pleasure Bubble they called it. Sphere of the Damned wasbetter! For the unfortunate consigned to the dark hemisphere wascondemned to an inferno that surpassed the Ancient's most perfervidimagination.

  "I wish we could save Proserpina!"

  The words were out before Sine knew it. Kass stopped in the middle of asentence and lifted a quizzical eyebrow.

  "Oh, get the romantic ideas out of your heads!" Sine snapped. "You knowshe's just a kid. I couldn't take care of her if we did take her back toEarth. But I'd like to take her out of The Bubble!"

  Lents pulled at his toga thoughtfully. It was dirty, still wet, andsmelled not too pleasantly.

  "I could take care of her," he said slowly, and his deep bass voice wasa little wistful. "My wife would be glad--we're getting old, and nochildren--"

  "We-ell," Kass submitted practically. "I'd like to take her away, andher poor old daddy too--or is he old? But what's the use of discussingall that? Here we are prisoners, and she's a prisoner of the First Race,and we shall never see her again. Or the good old Earth either," headded sadly.

  A man entered the room. He looked more like a normal man than might havebeen expected--only his exaggerated dish-face, his bulbous foreheadproclaiming him just another victim of the First Race's industries. Orhis shrill, treble voice as he announced:

  "Gentlemen of Earth, the Manager and his council expect you in theoffice. Follow me." He turned, waited for them to come.

  The Manager's messenger led them up a long, ascending tunnel meagerlylighted at intervals by small emanation tablets. After they had goneperhaps a hundred yards the hewn rock gave way to what was evidently akind of concrete.

  "This part of their city is built above the ocean floor," Kass remarkedquietly. "They brought us in through airlocks. Passages lead to cavesalong the shore where the original refugees holed up. These are mostlytheir children, so marked and deformed even in embryo."

  Their dish-faced guide now stepped aside as they entered a spaciouschamber with a domed ceiling. Here and there it was wet. No doubt abovethere was the sea. Lents made a rapid mental calculation, rumbled intoSine's ear:

  "Can't be so deep. Not over a hundred feet; maybe less. Otherwise thosearches couldn't carry the weight."

  * * * * *

  A hush fell upon the room. The leader of this strange people--the onethey called The Manager, was rising from his seat back of a desk. Hishead was very large, his eyes large, liquid and expressive. A total lackof eyebrows, of hair on his head, gave a mixture of the comical and theobscene to his appearance. But the respect with which his counselors,ranged on either side of him, regarded him, ignored his appearance. Theywere all, without exception, victims of the strange and terriblemutations of type induced by the First Race's callous disregard to thedangers of the rays. All wore loose garments of drab material whichconcealed their deformities to some extent.

  The Manager's large, intense eyes fastened on the Earthmen, and headdressed them:

  "Men of Earth: We have captured you in battle, but we would be friendswith the Old World. Why did you try to fight us?"

  "You were murdering helpless victims," Sine said shortly. "It was notour fight, but we could not stand by and permit such a thing."

  Something like amusement flashed up in The Manager's enormous eyes, soold, weary and wise.

  "So you could not bear to think of an easy death for those of the FirstRace? What think you of their treatment of us?" He raised a scrawnyarm--so thin it suggested a skeleton. "Hunted like beasts--imprisonedand tortured! Are we not human?"

  "You see," Kass interposed diplomatically--"we were their guests. And ina way their quarrel...."

  The Manager cut him short peremptorily:

  "You were their guests! You lolled with them in The Pleasure Bubble, inthe beautiful sun! The sun that most of us have never seen! And down inthe dark half-human beings like yourselves--toiled and slaved at thosedevilish integrators to keep the machinery of pleasure going.

  "You were the guests in the Governor's palace--in the magnificent cityof Rubio, though to you it may seem dismal. But did you think of thepoor slaves, deep underground, in the slimy sewers, in the uranium pits,in the power plants? You basked in luxury with the First Race, and theirfight was your fight--their enemies...."

  He was working himself into a fury, evidently forgetting the originalpurpose of this conference with the prisoners. But one of the counselorsnow approached him, bowed respectfully so that his scaly face washidden. The Manager cut short his tirade.

  "What is it, Gnom?"

  "Isn't The Manager digressing?" Gn
om asked in a hollow voice. "These menof Earth are now our guests. They come at an opportune time--when weshall reap the fruits of our long planning. If we wrest power from theFirst Race, shall we not need the friendship of the Mother Planet? Letthem, then, carry our story to Earth, if it be that we may need theirhelp."

  The Manager stood in thought. At last, coming to a decision, he askedsharply:

  "With whom do you stand, men of Earth? With us or our oppressors?"

  Kass and Lents looked at one another blankly. They started as Sine spokeup sonorously, beside them:

  "Officially, we are supposed to be neutral. But if you attack The Bubbleand rescue the poor devils in the dark hemisphere I'll help!"

  But The Manager shook his enormous head slightly.

  "That we can not do. That satellite is too far out in space. There is noconcealment, and we can not yet fight their patrol ships in space."

  "Listen!" Sine persisted. "There is a man there I know. He's about readyto die, unless he gets away. And he has a girl, a kid of fourteen orfifteen. The rays haven't made a freak out of her yet. I want to saveher. Give me a ship and I'll take her out myself!"

  "That we can not do. Individuals do not count. One, or a hundred, maydie. We can not endanger our plan."

  The counselors had drawn a little away from the Earthmen, unconsciouslysymbolizing their support to The Manager. Again he raised his bony arm.

  "Up above there our ships are destroying every city of the First Race onthe planet. Our power-beams for the glowing ships are encircling Jupiterin a network of red and death--death to the oppressors! The PleasureBubble's turn will come. And when it is dashed down, master and slavemust die together. To save the slaves might let some of the mastersescape."

  "Gentlemen!" Kass was trying to smooth over the situation, "We have beensent here on a voyage of discovery, not of war. We regret your troubleshere--but we can take no part in them. Our attitude is friendly to...."

  "No! Damned if I will!" Sine shouldered his iron-hard body through theclose-packed counselors, so that he stood directly before The Manager,who did not shrink from the formidable young man. "If you murder thosepoor Mugs in the black hemisphere, I'm your enemy from now on!"

  "And I!" The words boomed and reverberated in the vaulted chamber, andLents moved his bulky body beside Sine.

  "And I too!" Kass' naked, skinny torso glistened with sweat. "The FirstRace may be murderers, but they're magnificent murderers. They wouldn'tforget their friends!"

  The Manager's large, liquid eyes seemed suddenly filmed over. He jerkedhis enormous head sharply, snapped:

  "We waste time. Put these meddlers out through the locks, that they mayfeed the fish."

  * * * * *

  But Gnom again interposed.

  "If The Manager will permit--there is much water on Earth. They may knowhow to swim--might go to the top and escape--"

  "True, Gnom. I have a truly great brain, as all the oppressed admit, butdetails escape me. Call one of the watch, put them to death first."

  Gnom turned, looked into one of the larger passages that centered onthat room. He turned his blank, scaly face.

  "The watch is not here!"

  "Perhaps he was called. See!"

  But before Gnom could execute the order a commotion arose in thepassage. A voice called from outside:

  "Officer of the hour prays audience with The Manager."

  "Enter."

  An officer with an extreme hunchback dashed in, bowed low before TheManager.

  "It is the end!" he gasped. "They watched our glowing ships plunge underthe water, and they are setting bombing rockets for this area. The firstranging shots have already been fired. Listen!"

  After a few moments there came a dull thud, as though a blow had beenstruck against the ceiling. A pendent drop of water fell. The Manager'shairless face became bleak.

  "I made great plans, great inventions--forgot a simple detail!" Heslumped as he stood, a mixture of the absurd and the tragic. Themutation that had made a brilliant mind had nevertheless left itincomplete, and none had realized it until in this extremity. Again camethat dull shock, and this time it seemed a little stronger.

  The Manager shook off his apathy. His great eyes burned with livid fire,as he called:

  "Officer of the watch. Take these prisoners to the locks. Kill them andput them out."

  "I obey!" The officer, squat, with enormous torso, pointed a small wand,pointed with a tiny spot of that peculiar pulsating pink light,threateningly. Stolidly he herded them through a broad corridor. Now andthen they passed inhabitants of this submarine city, nightmarish,pitiable creatures, now disturbed, dreading death. Sine wonderedvaguely that they should cling to such an unhappy existence.

  He was recalled to their own predicament when a metal gate, closed by ascrew-wheel, loomed up in the poor light. The inside lock! The guardmotioned them ahead, stood between them and the passage. He fumbled athis belt, ignoring the dull hammerblows of explosions transmitted by thewater. He seized Kass by the throat, prepared to plunge the knife intohis body.

  Sine leaped past, crooked his arm around the man's thick neck, attemptedto break his neck. But a giant arm threw him off easily. He fell to thefloor. Like an echo came the concussion of another explosion.

  The guard, without trace of ill-humor, turned his attention to Sine. Hepointed the little wand at him, and the light glowed brighter. Sine feltagain that torturing paralysis. His senses were leaving him. The pinklight was throbbing, expanding....

  He wondered why the stones of the passage should be pushing in, spurtingwater. The pink light faded. Tepid water struck him, stinging likeneedles. There was a roaring, blackness. A fat arm hooked around hiswaist--Lents', no doubt. He felt himself borne along in a swirl ofwater, strangling, fighting blindly. There was another terrificexplosion shock, an interminable climbing struggle. Then his head brokewater and he breathed air again. Lents came up beside him, puffing andblowing, and after a long wait--so long that they despaired, Kass cameweakly to the surface.