"Those little purple men. They're making faces at me."
He said, "Shoo! Go away, little purple men!" and they disappeared.
"You," he said, "sure collected yourself a snootful last night."
"Who?" I demanded, holding the top of my head on. "Me? I don't know
what you're talking about. Can I help it if I was suddenly taken sick?"
"You were suddenly taken," he chortled, "drunk! I thought I'd die when
you picked Cap Bowman up piggy-back and started sliding down banisters
with him. You said you were a space vacuole looking for some place
to happen. And when you told the crowd about the time you swiped the
skipper's winter drawers and ran 'em up the flagpole--"
"Did I," I shuddered, "tell them that?"
"You sure did. You also had a lot to say about some girl at Mars
Central spaceport. You said you called her 'Ginger,' because she was a
snap--"
"Go 'way!" I moaned. "Go 'way and let me explode in peace."
Evans grinned. "No can do, Sparks. Bowman sent me down to get you. All
brevetmen are to report to the control turret immediately. So grab some
breakfast, and--"
"Don't!" I howled.
* * * * *
But I had some breakfast while I dressed: an aspirin, a cup of coffee,
and two more aspirins. And I finally reached the control turret of our
space-going scow, there to find my shipmates standing around looking
very what-the-hell? The skipper scowled at me as I wobbled in.
"Well! So you made it? Darby, there's limits to everything, and you
exceeded 'em last night--"
"Look, Skipper," I said, "I can explain everything. It was this way--"
"Best man!" he snorted. "If you was the best man at that weddin', I'm
a grampus' tonsils. You was a disgrace to yourself, the _Pegasus_, an'
mankind in general--Ah! The top of the mornin' to you, son."
Enter the bridegroom, Johnny Larkin, preceded by a sheepish grin. He
said, "Good morning, folks. Lovely day, isn't it?" Then, to the Old
Man, curiously, "I thought they were Earthdocking us for three weeks,
Skipper? Why the conference?"
"Your guess is as good as mine. I got a call from G. H. Q. first thing
this mornin'. All leaves to be cancelled, they said. We're to have a
visitor in a few--There! That must be him now."
It was. Colonel Ira Brophy, one of the igbay otshays of the IPS, the
corporation that pays us our monthly insufficient. He bustled in all
grins, grunts and glamor, pump-handled the skipper and beamed on us
like an overgrown sunbeam.
"A fine looking body of men, Captain Bowman! Yup, yup! And believe me,
sir, the IPS is justly proud of this ship and its officers. Yup!"
At my side, Johnny Larkin muttered something that sounded like "--donae
ferentes--" But Captain Bowman fell for it, hook, line and sinker. He
said, "Thank you, Colonel. And we, in turn, are proud to be privileged
to do our little part for the Corporation. Any thing, any time--that's
the way we feel about it--"
Brophy pounced gleefully.
"Wonderful, Captain! Marvelous! Yup, yup, yup! I told my associates
that would be your attitude. 'The men of the _Pegasus_,' I told them,
'will be delighted to undertake this mission. Even though it may mean
the curtailment of a certain amount of personal liberty and pleasure--'"
Bowman's chin hit his wishbone. A pint-sized Aurora Borealis played
over his gills. "M-mission?" he gargled.
"Yes, Captain. It is my pleasure to inform you that to the _Pegasus_
has been allotted the honor of investigating our recent cosmic visitor,
Caltech VI. Yup, yup!
"You will be equipped with motion-picture, meteorological and
analytical devices, and will lift gravs at 19.03 Solar Constant Time
tomorrow. I need not assure you that with you go the best wishes of our
great organization--"
I didn't hear the rest. I was too busy stifling an impulse to wham
Brophy over the conk with a blunt instrument. I glimpsed the pans of
Larkin, Evans, Weir, and the rest of the boys, and knew I wasn't alone
in my reaction.
This was a hellbuster of an assignment! Caltech VI was the latest
addition to Sol's family, a space-wandering planet that, from
God-knows-where, had recently swum within the gravitational attraction
of our sun--and taken up residence between Mars and the asteroids.
From the beginning it had been a trouble-maker. I needn't tell even the
ground-grippingest Earthlubber of you that the solar system is weighed
on such a hair-trigger balance that any considerable outside influence
will throw it haywire. Caltech VI--named after the old, 200-inch
platter that had spotted it--had raised a terrific rumpus settling into
an orbit. It had caused howling storms on Mars, ionic disturbances on
mighty Jupiter, and blasted a half hundred planetoids clear out of
existence.
Astronomers agreed the newcomer could not last very long. A couple
thousand years at the most. Inevitably it would be torn to pieces by
the titanic tug-o'-war eternally waged by Jupiter and the Sun. But in
the meantime, according to the Fraunhofer analysis, there were valuable
ores on the interloper. Somebody, the first person or group, who set
claim-stakes on Caltech's soil, would clean up big.
Fine, hush? Swell! I should have been joyful at the prospect of
dipping into this celestial gravy, eh? But maybe I forgot to mention
that already three expeditions had gone out from Earth and one from
Venus. All of them had reported successful landings on the planet,
then--silence!
Cap Bowman had gathered up his scattered wits, now, and began
volleying protests like a skeet-chucker.
"But, Colonel!" he howled, "The _Pegasus_ isn't good enough for that
sort of job. We're a freighter! Our plates are worn, our hypatomics
old-fashioned--"
"Yup," said Brophy agreeably. "We know. But your space record is
enviable. You have served the Corporation faithfully and well--"
What he meant was, we could be spared. Johnny Larkin said wryly, "I
should think those would be arguments for _not_ sending the _Pegasus_."
Brophy glowered at him from behind glinting pince-nez. "And who might
this be?"
The skipper said nervously, "Lt. Larkin, sir. My First Mate." He added
proudly, "Him an' my daughter had a military weddin' last night."
"That's too bad, Captain," harumphed Brophy. "But to return to the
subject--"
"Military!" bellowed the skipper. "Not 'shotgun!'" Then a sudden idea
struck him; he adopted a wheedling tone. "Look Colonel--if we gotta go,
we gotta go. But I c'n excuse Lt. Larkin from duty, can't I? After all,
he's on his furlough. This is his honeymoon--"
Brophy shook his head decisively.
"I'm sorry, Captain. All furloughs are cancelled. All men must report
for duty on this special assignment. I might add, though, that if
your venture is successful, the Corporation will fittingly reward all
participants--"
"An' if it ain't?" asked the Old Man.
"They'll bury us," I piped up, "by remote control. With honors. See you
later, boys. I've got to see a carpenter about a coffin." And I left.
* * * * *
So that was that. You don't argue with the I. P. S. The next day found
the _Pegasus_ loaded to the gunwales with all sorts of equipment.
Cameras, spectroscopes, interferometers, gadgets and junk, the very
names of most of which were just so much Sanskrit to me. That's where
Johnny Larkin came in. He was not only our First Mate; he was our
technological expert.
But the Corporation also had the almighty viscera to fill one
freight hold with cargo! "Concentrate of zymase," said the lading
superintendent. "For deposit at Mars Central on the return trip. Get a
receipt from the Medical Officer, Captain."
"What's his name?" demanded the skipper gloomily. "Saint Peter?
Oh, hello, son. Sorry I couldn't get you out of this mess. Where's
Lorraine?"
"That's all right," said Larkin. "Maybe everything will be all right.
She's home. She wanted to come along but I wouldn't let her. Space is
no place for a woman."
Bowman growled, "This is a hell of a honeymoon for you, boy! An' for
her, too. Well, we might as well lift gravs. Sparks, get clearance from
the port."
I said, "Aye, sir!" and did. At 19.03 on the nose we blasted
hell-for-Thursday out of Long Island Port, for'rd tubes pointed at a
mysterious new dot in the heavens that had already killed more men than
a Central American rebellion.
That was at 19.03. At 22.00 sharp, Slops boomed the gong for the late
watch mess. And at 22.07, the door of the mess hall opened and in
walked--Lorraine Larkin, _nee_ Bowman!
* * * * *
Cap Bowman had a mouthful of tomato juice when he laid eyes on her. Two
seconds later, his mouth was open in a roar and the tablecloth had a
mouthful of tomato juice.
"Lorraine! What in the name of the seven sacred satellites are _you_
doing aboard? Don't you know--?"
"Now, Daddy!" She smiled, and my heart did tricks. You've never been
smiled at till you've been out in front of one of those extra-special
de luxe Lorraine Larkin jobs. She was sugar and spice and everything
nice, and don't some guys have all the luck? "Now, Daddy, remember your
blood pressure."
"Blood pressure be damned!" frothed Bowman. "You git right off'n this
barge an' go back to Earth where you belong!"
"It's cold out there," said Lorraine. "Remember? And besides, this _is_
where I belong--isn't it, honey?"
She looked at Johnny Larkin, who was suddenly having trouble with his
epi-brothers, dermis and glottis. The first was scarlet, the second was
charging up and down in his throat like a berserk elevator. He managed
to get a few words out.
"You," he gulped, "shouldn't be here!"
"And where else would a girl be," demanded Lorraine coolly, "than at
her husband's side? Especially on her honeymoon?" She plumped herself
down beside him. "Bring one more plate, Slops. There's company for
dinner."
The skipper rose.
"Enough," he declared, "is too much. I wasn't hot on this trip from
the start. Now I'm an Eskimo. Sparks, take a message to Long Island
Spaceport. Tell 'em--"
"Tell them," interrupted Lorraine Larkin, "that the captain and crew of
the _Pegasus_ are on their way to find out what happened to those other
poor fellows who tried to land on Caltech VI. And tell them we _will_
find out, because we're the toughest, smartest, space-lickingest gang
of etherhounds who ever lifted gravs. And there's nothing between here
and Procyon that can scare us. Mmmm! What delicious soup--"
That stopped them. That stopped them cold. Bowman looked thoughtful,
one gnarled hand caressed his jowls. Larkin stopped trying to talk, a
curious look came into his eyes. Tom Anderson's shoulders stiffened;
old MacPhee, the Chief Engineer, dragged out a filthy, oil-smeared
handkerchief, blew his nose viciously and said, "Grrrumph!"
Me, I was stunned speechless, too. Oh, not because she had reminded
me we had a moral obligation to find out what had happened to the
previous explorers. It wasn't that she'd roused in me any latent spark
of pride in the _Pegasus_, either. What got me was her calling the soup
'delicious'! Good golly, that stuff? Delicious?
* * * * *
So we went on, and Lorraine Larkin went with us. I don't have to tell
you about the trip; you can get that from the log book. It was sixteen
days to the Mars ecliptic, but Mars wasn't there, of course.
It was sky-hooting along four weeks to sta-board. Little things
happened, none important. The outstanding thing about the trip was the
dopey way our one time sane and sensible first mate, Johnny Larkin, was
behaving.
He had apparently reconciled himself to the idea of Lorraine's being
with us. Reconciled? Whoops! He was closer to his bride than twelve
o'clock sharp. Everywhere you saw Lorraine, there was Johnny, and vice
versa.
Then we hit the highroad between Mars and the asteroids, the great open
spaces in which Caltech had taken squatters' rights. Bob Weir punched
keys on the astrocalculator and figured it would take us a week and a
half to reach our destination. I wasn't sure I could last that long.
For why? One guess. Lt. and Mrs. J. Larkin. Their billing and cooing
was enough to make a Martian canal-pussie blush green. Every time you
saw Johnny he was playing octopus with Lorraine's hand. He had dawn and
soft breezes in his eyes when he looked at her, and the glances she
heaved back weren't exactly typhoons at midnight.
The worst part is, they didn't seem to have a bit of shame! They didn't
care whether anybody saw them acting like melted cheese sandwiches or
not. And oh! what they said! He called her "Lovums"; she called him
"Cutsie," which was all wrong, "Bugsie," which was one hundred per cent
right, and a lot of other names too nauseating to mention.
But somehow we survived. And finally came the time when the skipper
came busting into my turret and bawled, "Git y'r feet off'n the desk,
Sparks. Take a message to--"
"I know," I told him. "I already sent it. To Joe Marlowe at Lunar III.
Caltech VI is oh-oh under the nose. The _Pegasus_ is preparing to land,
and the situation is--"
"Ain't you the smart little numbskull?" snorted the skipper. "Remind me
to use your brain for mattress stuffin'. No, dimwit, we ain't landin'.
I ain't goin' to set down on this here outlaw planet till I learn what
I'm landin' on. The _Pegasus_ ain't goin' to be number four on the
missin' list." He beamed complacently. "Me, I'm smart, I am."
* * * * *
Well, so is sunburn. But who loves it. Anyway, I said, "Well, if we're
not going to land on Caltech, what's that big thing looming in the
visiplate? Green cheese?"
Bowman took one squint through the perilens and let loose a howl that
frightened its own echoes. "He's landin'! The damn fool's settin' us
down!"
He made a dive for the door. I grabbed his flying coat-tails long
enough to squawk, "Who?" and the answer came Dopplering back, "Larkin!
The space-crazy idiot!"
I moved, too. Sheer suction pulled me along as we hit the ramp, charged
through the corridors, scrambled up the Jacob's-ladder and bore down
on the control room. At the door I managed to pant, "Who--who's in
there with him?"
"Who do you think?"
"That's what I thought. What is this? A spaceship or a mushroom?"
Then we were inside, and it was just like I thought it would be. Larkin
was seated in the pilot's chair, pushing the buttons that eased the
_Pegasus_ to terra firma, and hovering over him like a halo around a
saint's occipital was his ever-loving bride.
Bowman screamed, "Larkin! Wait!" and Lorraine turned, smiling.
"Isn't he clever, Daddy? He's the best pilot in the whole, wide
universe--aren't you, peachie?"
"Now, sweet--" protested Johnny modestly.
"Wait!" squalled the skipper. "Wait!"
"Weight, sir?" said Johnny, lifting out of his daze for a moment. "Aye,
sir. If you think best--" And he punched the grav plugs. My knees
buckled suddenly as the plates took hold. Bowman stumbled; Lorraine
gasped. Over the intercommunicating audio came voices, a dozen irate
queries from various parts of the ship. Bowman spoke with an effort.
"Not _weight_, you double-blasted lunatic! _Wait!_ Till we see what
we're gettin' into--"
But he spoke too late. The grip of the grav plates had done it. Our
nose jets spluttered, the ship lurched and slithered, there came a
sharp bump, surprisingly yielding and bouncy considering the speed at
which we had grounded, and--here we were. On Caltech. Motionless, after
weeks of travel.
No, not motionless! For then I felt it. Bowman and Larkin felt it. A
squidgy sort of sinking sensation, a sort of wobbling insecurity, as
though the ground were opening to let us drop through. The skipper, an
incredible mauve color, roared, "Lift 'er up, Johnny! We're gettin'
into something!"
Larkin made desperate passes at the control board. The rockets flared
and hissed, turning the control room into a bedlam. But nothing
happened. I saw why. I yelled,
"We ain't getting--we've got! Look!"
They all stared, like me, at the quartzite forward panes. Blue sky
should have been visible through them, warm sunlight should have been
flooding the turret. The terrain of Caltech should have stretched
before our gaze. But guess again. All we could see was a gooey splatter
of _stuff_ oozing up the sides of the _Pegasus_. A strange, viscous,
colorless matter that surged up and about our ship with weird,
tentacular writhings. It covered the entire pane, gulped and burbled
sloppily as it engulfed the top of the ship. We continued to experience
that sinking feeling--
"Sweet whispering stars!" gasped the skipper. "Am I off my gravs? Do
you see what I see? The ground melted an' come up an' et us!"
And I knew, suddenly, what had happened to those who had landed before
us on mysterious Caltech. Like us they had been swallowed beneath the
soggy, flypaper crust of the alien planet.
* * * * *
Well, everything happened at once, then. I guess I'm just a bug-pounder
at heart, after all. My first thought was composed of dots and dashes.
I made a bee-line for the radio room, powered the tubes and began
CQ-ing up and down the wavelengths like a longhair at the Steinway.
Which was just so much wasted time. I couldn't draw a hum out of the
audio. Even the more delicate earphones failed to bring in the powerful
Mars-Ceres beam. And if I couldn't get a message in, it's a damn sure
thing I couldn't get one out. My transmission was blanked out.
So I hung a sign on my door, OUT TO LUNCH, and went back to the control
turret. It looked like the bleacher entrance to Terra Stadium on the
opening day of the Interplanetary Series. Everybody and his brother was
there. Officers, engineers, blasters, stewards. Even Slops had come up,
armed with a rolling pin, to find out what had happened.
As I entered, Johnny Larkin was turning off the hypatomic power,
swiveling around to face the skipper.
"No go, Captain. I've tried anti-grav, neg potential and reverse
rockets. We can't get loose. We seem to be in something akin to
quicksand. Every move we make digs us in a little deeper."
Bowman growled savagely, "If you hadda used common sense instead
o' makin' billy-doos with y'r eyes--but this ain't no time to talk
about truffles. What do you think? Is this here planet somethin' like
Jupiter? Low specific, so we keep fallin' toward the center?"
Johnny said, "I don't believe so. The material about us is peculiar. It
seems to be organic. And it has a certain type of inherent energy--"
"Energy?" I yelled. "Hey, then maybe our Ampie can eat us out of here?
That little critter can gobble its way through an H-layer. This dish of
planetary junket--"
Larkin glanced up sharply. "And just how would you plan to get the
Ampie out of the ship, Sparks?"
"Why, through the lug-sail vent, of course."
"No. Don't try that. I have a feeling--"
He stopped. He didn't say what his feeling was. To tell you the truth,
the sharpness of his tone made me just a little bit sore. After all,
I'm not the dumbest guy afloat in space. I said stiffly, "Then what do
we do to get out of here? Or are we number four on the flit parade?"
Johnny swallowed hard. He said, "I'm the tech man on this freighter.
All of you clear out of here. I'll find some way--"
His words dwindled into silence. Lorraine looked at him proudly, patted
his cheek. She said, "That's right, Cuddlums. You'll get us out, won't
you?"
The skipper said, "Gug!" The crowd broke up and began drifting away.
Johnny started fussing with instruments and gadgets. Lorraine soothed
his brow by tying strands of his hair into lovers'-knots. I got sick at
the stomach looking at them after a while, so I left. Cap Bowman beat
me to the bar by three drinks--
* * * * *
It must have been an hour later that we felt it. A jarring _whoomp_
beneath our keel. The upset-tummy-in-an-elevator sensation stopped.
Bowman looked at me and said, "Larkin? He done somethin', maybe?" and
we went back to the bridge.
Larkin had not caused the settling, but he was beaming triumphantly
anyway. As we charged in, demanding information, he said, "Why, it's
very simple. We have finally come to rest on the surface of Caltech."
"Sue me if I'm wrong," said the skipper, "but somehow I got the
impression we landed on this overgrowed custard an hour an' a half ago?
Or what's that I see out the ports? A bowl of taffy?"
"No, skipper. We didn't land on the surface before. We landed on a
particular kind of matter which is, so far as I have been able to
figure out, allied with the peculiar life-form inhabiting this planet."
"Life-form? You mean that stuff's alive?"
"Not exactly. That's the point I haven't been able to solve yet. I've
made a careful analysis of the stuff. It seems to be a highly complex
carbohydrate. Its formula is C6--"
"This ain't no time," I broke in, "to discuss mal-demer. What I want
to know is, do we or don't we try my idea about putting out the Ampie?
Johnny, maybe--"
"No!" he said.
"Well, why not? What have we got to lose?"
"No!" he said again. Oh, all right. I guess he was preoccupied and
didn't mean to be curt. But his tone rekindled my anger, and I didn't
feel any better when Lorraine said, "Please, Sparks, don't bother
Johnny when he's trying to figure this out. Go ahead, sugar-plum."
So sugar-plum went ahead, and I stalked out of the room. I went to my
own turret and tried to read a magazine, but I couldn't get interested
in the hokey adventures of a Patrolman on Io when I was buried alive in
cosmic goo myself. So I fiddled with the dials again for a while. No
soap. So pretty soon I got up and looked in my auxiliary cabinet. My
Ampie was curled in inside, pale blue and shot full of tiny red sparks,
sucking contentedly on an old-flashlight battery. I put on my rubber
gloves. I went down to the engine loft.
Ampies live on energy. And Larkin had said the gelatinous mass
engulfing us was at least partially composed of energy. Which made what
I did seem, to me, quite logical. I pressed the button that extends the
lug-sails of a freighter, heard the machinery creak into motion, lifted
my Ampie out of its lead-foil container, and shoved it through the
widening vent. Then I waited for things to happen.
* * * * *
They did happen! But not what I had expected. I had expected to see the
Ampie gnaw a hole through that dough like a St. Bernard working out on
a T-bone, rare. But instead, the Ampie touched one shimmering feeler to
the mass of gray matter, hummed, sparked, and rolled backward across
the room!
I said, "Aw, damn! He was right!" and started to close the lug-vent.
But--
It wouldn't close! Because the writhing stickiness was welling into the
ship with incredible, fluid swiftness. A heavy, saccharine stench was
in the air. Gray streamers fingered toward me. I yelped, slammed tight
the engine loft door, and raced for the control turret.
In the middle of the control turret I waited for my breath to catch up
with me. Larkin spoke subconsciously from the depths of a deep ponder.
"Shh!" he said.
"Shh!" repeated Lorraine. "He's thinking."
"Then tell him to think about pancakes!" I howled. "Because there's a
shipful of gray molasses following me up the corridor!"