Captain Future 08 - The Lost World of Time (Fall 1941) (14 page)

"But even at that speed, it would take you nearly twenty years to reach Sirius!" objected the Brain. "How could all your people live so long on that little moon in the dark cold of interstellar space?"

Darmur turned his tired eyes on the questioner.

"Our people would be sleeping during that time. We know a way to cause complete suspension of animation by a freezing of the atoms of the body. The whole population would lie in artificially induced sleep in the protected subterranean chambers, except the few required to pilot the moon."

The old Katainian shrugged his shoulders wearily.

"But all that long toil of preparation has proved useless. The quantity of uranium needed to release sufficient atomic energy to tear Yugra from this System is enormous. I had been confident that we could amass enough uranium by sending prospecting expeditions to the other planets."

"But when you sent them, they found there wasn't sufficient procurable uranium in the System," Curt Newton finished for him.

Darmur nodded heavily. "Aye, that is what they found. Uranium is not a plentiful element, at best. And it constantly grows less in quantity as time passes, since it constantly disintegrates by radioactive decay into other elements, the final end-product being lead. There is much more uranium in the System now than there will be in your time, a hundred million years from now. Even so, there isn't enough for my purposes."

He made a defeated gesture.

"There might be enough if we could get all that lies at the molten cores of the planets, but that would be impossible. There's not nearly enough of the element in deposits that could be reached. The expeditions we sent out prospected every planet, every possible source."

Jhulun spoke quietly to the Futuremen.

"I was leading such an expedition when the Martians captured us. They held us for hostages, since they have heard rumors of Zikal's plan to destroy them and are worried."

"Aye, and now Zikal's hideous scheme will receive the Council's approval at tomorrow's fateful meeting," said Darmur somberly, "It is all because there isn't enough uranium to operate my migration plan. You know now why my first question was whether you could synthesize uranium. That was my one hope. That is why I sent out the time message in a call for help. I had hoped that future science would be able to synthesize uranium artificially."

CAPTAIN FUTURE shook his head slowly, "It just can't be done," he declared. "Uranium is the heaviest and most complex of all the elements and it's inherently unstable. To force together hundreds of protons, electrons and other particles into that unstable pattern is beyond the power of any science."

"And since only uranium contains enough stored power to propel a body of Yugra's mass, the whole thing is hopeless," Darmur added hopelessly. "Tomorrow's meeting of the Council will indeed be a fateful one. When I confess defeat, the Councilors must approve Zikal's plan to murder all the Martian people and take their world."

"Say, I just thought of something!" Otho exclaimed. "Zikal's plan can't go through. There are Martians in our own future age and there wouldn't be any if they are all murdered now."

Curt looked at the android witheringly.

"Your reasoning is cockeyed. If the present Martian race is all killed now and the Katainians take their place, the Katainians will be the ancestors of the Martians of our time."

"Well, it was just an idea," grumbled Otho. "I'm going out to get some air. You great minds can figure it out. Want to come, Ahla?"

The pretty Earthgirl rose eagerly and accompanied the restless android from the room. The others sat in dull despair, thinking frantically. Grag's booming voice broke the silence.

"Couldn't we use the time-thrusting force somehow to transport all the Katainians to a future age?"

"Couldn't be done," rasped the Brain. "It would take far too long to build enough time-force generators to use on this whole race. Remember how long it took us to build just one? And even if you could send the Katainians into the future, where would they live? Their own world would be gone. Mars, a desert world, couldn't support them. The gravitation of the other planets would still be too great for them to live upon."

Captain Future had paid little heed to them. He had been staring at the wall with narrowed eyes, his mind racing with the impact of a new idea.

"Darmur, I've just thought of a way in which we might get enough uranium for your plan," he said tensely. "It came from what you mentioned about uranium disintegrating, growing less all the time. I —"

At that moment came a startling interruption from the moonlit garden outside the window. It was a loud exclamation in Otho's voice.

"Who the devil are you? What are you doing here?"

CURT and the others spun toward the window. Just outside it, Otho and Ahla were confronting a dark-faced young Katainian who held in his hand a glass tube mounted on a gunlike stock. The Katainian whirled in panic as Otho spoke, and fired a brilliant beam at pointblank range. Simultaneously, with a cry of alarm, Ahla thrust Otho aside. The thin beam struck the Earthgirl's chest. She collapsed without a sound.

Curt Newton was on his feet with his proton pistol out, plunging for the window. He was already too late. With a terrible, hissing cry of rage, Otho had leaped at the panicky spy.

The android's super-swift lunge carried him past the spy's deadly beam. The weapon fell from the Katainian's hand as Otho's fingers gripped his throat. When Curt reached them, the android had forced the spy down upon his knees and was squeezing his neck in a death-grip.

"Otho, wait, don't kill him!" Curt yelled. "We've got to find out who sent him —"

His exclamations had no effect. This was one time in which the android was beyond hearing Future's command. Otho's green eyes were blazing with superhuman rage.

Even as Curt Newton reached their side, the spy's neck gave way. The man sank in a lifeless heap. Otho turned, wild and dazed, toward the others who were now bending over Ahla's still form.

One glance at the Earthgirl was enough. The deadly beam had driven directly through her heart.

"She pushed me aside," Otho muttered blindly. "She sensed the danger and wanted me to be safe."

For the first time in his life, Captain Future saw a glimmer of tears in Otho's green eyes.

Darmur and his son had been examining the dead spy.

"One of Zikal's men," said the old scientist in a low voice to Curt. "I think Zikal sent him here to kill you men from the future, but we can prove nothing."

Curt nodded, looked pityingly down at the white face of the primitive Earthgirl who had come so far across the System to die.

"We can bury her here in the garden," Lureen was saying gently to Otho. "I think she would like that."

Grag dug the deep grave at the garden's end and carefully lowered into it a long chest of silvery metal, into which they had put Ahla's body. As the robot silently refilled the grave, white blossoms drifted onto it from the flowering trees. And then came another dim, quivering groundquake. The low, rumbling thunder was like a distant requiem.

They left Otho brooding there and walked silently back to the mansion. Lureen, crying, fled to her chamber, but old Darmur looked earnestly into Captain Future's somber face.

"Just before that happened" — the old scientist made a mournful gesture toward the garden — "you were saying that you'd thought of a way in which it might be possible to secure enough uranium for the migration plan. What is your idea?"

The old Katainian's tension was apparent. With an effort, Curt forced his thoughts back from the pathetic tragedy.

"Yes, I thought of something that will sound mad to you, but that might just work. You have the figures on the exact amount of uranium needed?"

"In my laboratory," Darmur answered eagerly. "This way."

He led them to a smaller spherical black structure behind the mansion. Its lighted interior was one large room, crowded with the apparatus of Katainian science. A few instruments were unfamiliar, but most Curt recognized. At the center of the room towered an object like a squat telescope, mounted upon gimbals over a complex of multilayered quartz disks. Darmur nodded toward it as he went to his files.

"The achronic beam projector I used to send into the future the message that brought you here."

He brought Captain Future a mass of calculations. Curt sat down with him, the Brain poised beside them. As Darmur explained the figures, Curt asked sharp, brief questions.

"That tells me the quantity of uranium you would need," he said finally, jotting it down. "Now what was the final estimate by your prospecting expeditions of the whole amount of uranium now procurable in the System?"

DARMUR told him. Curt jotted the figure down, also, and then began a series of rapid, complicated calculations. He finally looked up, his eyes far away. "It might just be done," he muttered. Then his jaw tightened. "It's
got
to be done! There's no other possible way to get enough uranium."

The Brain had followed the calculations and even his icy calm was startled by what he guessed of Curt's intention.

"It will be a great risk, lad," Simon warned. "Greater by far than any we have yet dared."

"Captain Future, what is this plan of yours for getting uranium?" old Darmur appealed.

Curt Newton explained briefly. As he did so, a look of wonder and awe came into the old Katainian scientist's eyes.

"Name of the Sacred Star!" he whispered. "You would try
that?"

"I'd try anything before I'd let Zikal and his party murder the whole Martian race," Curt stated. "Hand me those papers and we'll go over my figures again. We've got to have this all prepared to submit to the Council tomorrow."

SINCE dawn thousands of Katainian men and women had been streaming through the streets of the capital, toward the towering black sphere of the Council Hall. From all over the golden world they had come. Those who could not crowd into the great building were packed in the surrounding park in a dense, motionless, silent throng.

Their absolute silence was proof of the terrifying gravity of this hour. The hopes and fears of generations were to come at last to a climax in today's fateful session of the Council. The millions of people of the doomed planet were to learn at last whether desperate urgency must drive them to the slaughter of a fellow-race, or whether they could somehow escape that crime.

The vast amphitheater interior of the Council Hall was gripped by the same taut silence. Far up into the shadows towered the curved tiers of seats, a sea of blurred white faces. Every eye was watching the dais at the front of the great fane. Pure white light from a concealed source beat brilliantly on the dais, but no one yet sat upon it.

Sharp trumpet blasts rang suddenly across the cavernous interior of the hall. Then a deep, amplified voice roared forth. "The Council of Katain!" Down the broad isle toward the dais, in a somberly silent procession came thirty men in the yellow silken robes of state, their faces pale and drawn. Wordlessly they took places on the dais, facing the throng.

"The Chief Councilor!" roared the same powerful, amplified voice.

Stepping forward a little from the others an old, white-haired man stood arrow-straight in his heavy robes. His voice came solemnly.

"People of Katain, for long we have lived in the shadow of a foreknown doom. There is none of us who is not aware that, within eight weeks, our planet will pass into a last conjunction with Jupiter, which will cause its explosion and final destruction. Nothing can save our world itself from that disaster, but we have long searched for a means to save our race.

"Almost two years ago, two of the most renowned scientists of our race, Zikal and Darmur, proposed different plans for the salvation of Katain's millions. To each of them the Council allocated all that was needed to prepare for his plan. It seemed wise, in view of the dreadful nature of the emergency, to prepare both proposals. Then, if one was found impractical, the other could still be used.

"Now the time has come to decide whether the plan of Zikal, or the plan of Darmur shall be followed. The Council will today make that decision. Before making it, however, the two proponents of the different plans will be heard in a final exposition of their proposals."

The Chief Councilor made a gesture. Up onto the dais from the front row of the spectators came Darmur and Zikal. The two men were a contrast — Darmur's gray hair, stooped, aging figure and haggard face against Zikal's stalwart form and massive, confident features.

"Zikal will summarize his proposal first," said the Chief Councilor. "Listen well, people of Katain, and pray to the Sacred Star that we make a wise decision on this fateful day."

Zikal stepped forward. His strong face was serious, confident in expression as his black eyes swept the throng. His voice was firm and strong.

"Katainians, I shall be brief. All of you know the details of my proposal. You realize that it contemplates the immediate elimination of the Martian race, to be followed by a rapid migration of our people to Mars in the great fleet of space ships that has already been built by the Council.