E-Book, Englisch, 126 Seiten
Reihe: Classics To Go
E-Book, Englisch, 126 Seiten
Reihe: Classics To Go
ISBN: 978-3-9874467-3-3
Verlag: OTB eBook publishing
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet/DL/kein Kopierschutz
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Weitere Infos & Material
Mind Stealers of Pluto
Ron Barnard had stuck his nose into one news
story too many. It had started with a lovely
girl, a wily Chinese and a drug ring that
circled the System. Now it was ending for
him in a rogue spaceship—his epitaph a
rocket's red stream across the starways. Ron Barnard leaned unhappily on Quong Kee's bar and looked over the worst dive on Mars. This hell hole of Quong Kee's was no fit place even for a newspaperman looking for a story on the dope ring that was haunting the outer planets. The habitues were cut-throats, fugitives from Earth and the space police. To say nothing of the neoin fiends. The two unshaven men hunched at a corner table, for instance. He eyed them in contempt. They were far gone in their addiction to the drug, and he would put no crime past them. They probably would murder their grandmothers for a gram of neoin. The two persons in question straightened as if a gun had been fired. They faced the bar, and their questing eyes found Barnard. One of them, teeth bared and hands bent into claws, started to move toward the reporter. "What did you think?" the man demanded. Barnard dropped a coin on the bar and tried to walk carelessly to the door. He wanted no fights with a neoin-filled madman. Silently he cursed himself for forgetting the extra sensory powers imparted by the drug. But the men had seemed too far gone to use their ESP. The man charged across the room. Barnard saw that escape was out and resigned himself to a fight. He waited for the wild lunge, sidestepped and shot in a right that sent the addict reeling back. A few customers watched with mild interest. But this was routine at Quong Kee's—nobody would interfere. Sullenly, the man glared at him, as if gathering courage for another charge. Barnard knew that actually the irresponsible creature was working himself up to a murderous pitch. Now he felt the waves of fury beating at his mind. He waited, tense and ready. From the corner of his vision he saw the drapes that cut off the back room come apart, and a figure hurrying out. A slender figure in faded coveralls. Then he looked again. It was a woman—a slender pale girl who clicked somehow in his memory. He had seen her around Kainor, this port city of Mars, several times in the past few days. Watching her, he almost missed the onslaught of the neoin fiend. The fury of the charge backed him to the wall and he lashed out desperately against the claws and knees of the man. His head jammed against the wall and crimson streaks exploded before him. He jabbed with aching arms, trying to push the madman off. Dimly, he saw the girl trying to whisper something in the fiend's ear. The man broke off clawing suddenly, a look of surprise on his twisted face. Barnard watched weakly as he backed off a few steps to listen to what the girl was whispering. Then the man glared with sullen respect at Barnard for a few seconds and went back to his friend. The girl turned swiftly and started back for the drapes. Barnard caught her arm. "Miss—" He stared at her. It was his first good look, and he wondered where she had found the courage to interfere with a raging neoin fiend. If that man had turned on her—! She wasn't beautiful—she looked as if she hadn't slept much lately. If somebody could put a few pounds on her in the right places—and a smile on her face— "Thanks," he said, puffing. "I was in a spot—you can't hurt those lads when they're hopped. What did you tell him, anyway?" She shrank back a little. Strangely, he felt that the fear in her eyes was more of him than of the cut-throats in Quong Kee's. Her face acquired a faint touch of color. "I told him," she said, "that I'd take away his neoin ration card." She pulled loose and disappeared into the other room. Barnard stared at the drapes and grinned a little at the evasive answer. What had she told the fiend? If he knew, it might help him to get some news. And what was she doing here in this dive—he'd swear she wasn't the type! He thought of the boss back on Earth thundering through the news room as Barnard's meager despatches dribbled through. But Hell! He'd done all any human could possibly do! He'd spoken with officials and spacemen and scientists, poked his skinny nose into dens like this where a man risked his life if he so much as thought out of line. He'd even bought some of the drug from the peddlers who operated almost openly, and he'd cultivated them, but they were only tools. The higher-ups might have been invisible for all anybody knew about them. Nobody even knew where the drug came from. But wherever it originated, it was swiftly corrupting Mars and Venus, as well as the Jovian system and the asteroid belt. When small quantities appeared on Earth, the powers-that-be of the System News Service smelled news. Ron Barnard, star reporter who had unveiled many a scandal in gay twenty-third century New York, was sent to investigate. And Ron Barnard stood in Mars' wildest dive, scratching his head and staring after a frightened, pretty girl. "That's my sister," said a childish voice beside him. Barnard stared at the big man beside him. The man was a splendid physical specimen, but his face— It was the face of a mindless idiot. Barnard felt repelled. The man's features were not idiotic; they should have been those of an intelligent person. But the eyes changed everything. They were blank and somehow—soulless. Barnard shrank automatically away from the apelike creature. Then he understood what the idiot had said. "Your sister!" He stared unbelievingly. The gray haired shambling being gurgled, childlike. "My sister—Gail." Barnard felt a curious shame in finding a human being in such a state, talking like a baby. But maybe he could learn something. He dug into his pocket, thrust a coin into the idiot's palm. "What does your sister do? Does she maybe sell little packages of gray powder to people?" The creature looked naively at him. "Gail don't like the gray powder. She says I must never eat the gray powder. Do you want some? Lots of mans here sells some." Barnard thought. He had seen that girl before. A hunch began to grow in him. "What's your name?" he asked. "George Melvin," the idiot said. "George!" It was Gail Melvin's voice. Barnard saw her in the doorway of Quong Kee's back room. George went dutifully to her, clutching the coin Barnard had handed him. The girl took his hand and pulled him inside. Barnard regarded the doorway sourly. He looked around Quong Kee's, caught the glance of the maniac who had attacked him. He took his coat and airpac and left hastily. At the communications center he sent another despatch. Nothing much to report, and he knew the boss wouldn't like it. The System News Service firmly believed that scoops grew on Martian trees and Ron Barnard was expected to pick out a nice one to feed the hungry public. Jingling the change in his pocket, he sensed something wrong, and pulled out the coins for a look. His lucky coin was missing—a rare twentieth century Buffalo nickel. He had given it to the half wit. He fingered the bruises the neoin fiend had made on his face and grinned humorlessly. The coin hadn't brought him much luck. He was going into his hotel when he sighted George Melvin shambling down the street. He paused, waiting for the half-wit to reach him. It was cold, and he wanted to get inside, but leads were scarce. He fell into step beside George. "Hello, George," he said. "Where do you and Gail live?" The half wit looked innocently at him. His airpac was strapped around the collar of his coat. Evidently Gail did not consider him intelligent enough even to breathe properly on Mars! Barnard squeezed his own airpac in an automatic motion. Oxygen on Mars was just short of enough for humans. A man would sooner be minus his pants than his airpac, though Martian-born humans needed them only at time of exertion. "We live in Chicago." "Yes—that's on Earth. But where do you stay on Mars?" "In Chicago on Mars, too." Barnard looked suspiciously at him. But the vacuous expression certainly was not feigned; George Melvin's eyes were less intelligent than a fish's. "Do you stay at Quong Kee's?" the reporter tried. "Sometimes. At night we go back to Chicago. Where do you stay?" "In the fog, most of the time." Barnard tried another line. "Where's Gail now?" "In jail." George Melvin said it without changing his tone or his expression. Barnard seized his coat front and stared into the dull eyes. "In jail? George, what happened? Who arrested her? Why?" "A man came. A man with a star on his hat—" "The Space Police!" Barnard released the half-wit. He stared happily toward the gray building of the Space Police. This was something—he felt the hunch too strongly to have any doubt. The story was going to break! The Space Police were relatively new, and it behooved them to be good to the press, for there was still much opposition to their existence. He hesitated a moment, thinking of the lack of enthusiasm with which Commander John Lansfer had received him. But Lansfer would let him in on the story, or there'd be some hot articles in the newspapers of the System News Service. He pushed another coin into George Melvin's paw. "George, go back to Quong Kee's and wait until I come. Do you understand? I'm going to find out about Gail." Watching the half-wit disappear, he felt a pang where his conscience should have been. Somehow he didn't like the idea of Gail Melvin as a part of this...
