Collected Fiction, page 30
There came a shrill vibration, like the tinkling of countless tiny crystalline bells. Piercingly sweet, it shrilled in my ears, and died away quickly. And suddenly nothing existed but light.
It was as though the shattering of the gem had released a sea of incandescent flame imprisoned within it. The glare of the arc-lights faded beside this flood of silvery radiance that bathed me. The cold glory of Arcturus, the blaze of tropical moonlight, were in the light.
Swiftly it faded and fled away. I felt myself dropping, and pain lanced into my wrenched shoulder as I struck the ground. I heard Ann’s voice.
Dazedly I got up, expecting to see the monster towering above me. But it was gone. In its place, a few feet away, was the barrel-shaped thing I had first seen in the alcove. There was a gaping cavity in the rounded apex where the jewel had been. And, somehow, I sensed that the creature was no longer deadly, no longer a horror.
I saw Ann. She was still holding Keene’s gun, and in her other hand was the key with which she had unlocked the door. She came running toward me, and I went swiftly to meet her.
I took the gun and made sure it was loaded. “Come on,” I said, curtly. “We’re getting out of here.”
ANN’S fingers were gripping my arm tightly as we went through the door, past the prone figure of Keene, and up the stairway. The lever behind the panel was not difficult to operate, and I followed Ann through the opening into the theater. Then I paused, listening.
Ann turned, watching me, a question in her eyes. “What is it, Pete?”
“Listen,” I said. “Get the cans of film from the projection booth. We’ll take them with us and burn them.”
“But—you’re not——”
“I’ll be with you in a minute,” I told her, and swung the panel shut.
I went down the stairs swiftly and very quietly, my gun ready and my ears alert for the low muttering I had heard from below.
Keene was no longer unconscious. He was standing beside the switchboard with his back to me, and over his shoulder I could see the shadow of the monster-god sprawling on the wall, inert and lifeless. Keene was chanting something, in a language I did not know, and his hands were moving in strange gestures.
God knows what unearthly powers Keene had acquired in his search for horror! For as I stood there, watching the patch of blackness on the cave wall, I saw a little shudder rock that barrelshaped shadow of horror, while a single spike abruptly lengthened into a tentacle that groped out furtively and drew back and vanished.
Then I killed Arnold Keene.
HOLLYWOOD ON THE MOON
Drive Along Lunar Boulevard and Dine at the Silver Spacesuit with Tony Quade, Camera Expert for Nine Planets Films, Inc., at the Movie Capital of the Future!
CHAPTER I
FADE IN: Mare Imbrium
MARE IMBRIUM is the most desolate spot on the Moon. It is a bleak, fantastic inferno of jagged rocks and volcanic ash, airless and frigid. The monotony of the scene is broken only by craters of varying sizes, ominous reminders of the meteors that plunge like bullets through the void, a deadly, ever-present menace to the Earthman hardy enough to venture there. Yet in this lunar no-man’s-land two figures in bulky spacesuits were racing desperately toward a high outcropping of stone.
Though apparently nothing pursued them, there was stark horror in the glances they threw over their shoulders. One was a girl, her dark hair a cloudy mass within the transparent helmet. The other was a man whose face was curiously expressionless, and whose movements, somehow, failed to match the animation of the girl’s. Yet when she stumbled and fell he paused and helped her to her feet. About to resume her flight, the girl’s mouth gaped in an open square of terror. She flung up a pointing glove.
The shining thing had sprung into existence without warning. Its brilliance eclipsed the dim globe of the Earth, low on the horizon, and the white splendor of the stars. It seemed to be a gigantic shell of flame, spinning madly in a blaze of glaring colors, the poles of its axis elongated into two thin cords of light that trailed into nothingness. It hesitated, hovering, then dipped as though in mocking salute. It swept down toward the two.
From its flaming core streamers of light flared out, and abruptly the man in the spacesuit was lifted as though by giant, invisible hands. Writhing and twisting, he was pulled closer to the shining thing. The girl made a frantic clutch at her belt and drew a slender tube, but before she could use it the inexplicable power had dragged her feet clear of the ground. She hung for a moment motionless.
From above a beam of light fingered out, but the girl did not glance up. She was staring, horror-stricken, at her companion.
His eyes were distended hideously. All over his spacesuit a dim, lambent radiance seemed to play. Then, abruptly, fire spouted from the neckband of his suit. A flower of flame blossomed where his helmet had been. Instinct with a weird and terrible beauty, it flamed up into a tapering spire—elongated and stretched, until a lambent thread stretched out toward the spinning thing of light.
And from every joint in the spacesuit—wrists and feet and waist—streamers blazed out, gleaming traceries that united and reached out avid fingers toward the whirling blaze.
From the tube in the girl’s gloved hand a thin, bluish beam sprang. But already her suit was glowing ominously as she was drawn inexorably closer. Her face was drained of blood, contorted in an agony of fear him,” said Anthony Quade sleepily. “Take it over, Peters. The, chief’s buzzing me.”
Tony Quade, turning from a camera in the transparent nose of the space ship, cast a last glance at the scene below, vividly distinct in the searchlight’s beam. Valyne Ross was a good stunt girl. There wasn’t a star on the payroll of Nine Planets Films, Inc., who would risk her skin on this side of the Moon, but the job had to be done, and Quade knew Valyne would do it. Quade had a trick of knowing such things. That was why, when Nine Planets wanted special effects that entailed plenty of risk, they hired Quade for the job.
And Space Bandit heeded Quade. It was the biggest picture on Nine Planets’ schedule this year, and they had already expended a fantastic sum on its. production. Van Zorn, the chief, would get it back, of course, provided Quade did his job well. Space Bandit would be, big box-office on its special effects—and Tony Quade, with his picked band of film experts, was the only man who was able enough and courageous enough to tackle the assignment. On a contingent basis at that.
Gaunt, hollow-cheeked Peters slipped into Quade’s seat before the telephoto-lensed camera, and began to manipulate the keyboard, occasionally pausing to peer through a finder. On other levels various members of the crew were busy operating lights and cameras.
Tony Quade went through a door, stooping slightly to avoid bumping his head, and arranged his large, bigboned body in a chair before the televisor. For a second he contemplatively-eyed the peroxided blonde who was gazing out at him and murmuring, “Mr. Quade, plee-uz Mr. Quade, plee-uz!” He flipped over a switch.
Immediately a gigantic eye appeared on the screen and a hoarse voice was heard growling curses.
“Hello, Chief,” Quade said tentatively. Apparently Von Zorn was in a bad humor.
The eye withdrew and gave place to a small, simian face with a toothbrush mustache and a crop of bristling, wiry hair. Snapping black eyes regarded Quade menacingly.
“The deadline on your special effects for Space Bandit is November ninth. You haven’t by any chance forgotten that, Quade?” Von Zorn inquired with feigned politeness.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” Quade said, relieved. “I’ll have the stuff for you by then. There’s plenty of time. You’re not worrying already, are you?”
“You’ll be the one to do the worrying,” Von Zorn observed. “Unless you turn in a satisfactory film, you don’t get paid. I don’t give a hoot in Mercury about that. But unfortunately we’ve advertised Space Bandit so big that unless you deliver the goods, it won’t draw flies.”
“Okay.” Quade nodded. “I’m shooting the last of the Mare Imbrium sequence now, and it’s coming along fine. The work on Eros will be finished pretty soon, and we can blow a hole in that asteroid big enough to give you a super-colossal spectacle.”
“Gregg did your calculations, didn’t he? Well, he made a big mistake somewhere. You can’t use Eros!”
QUADE’S eyes changed. He leaned forward.
“What the devil! I’ve rented the asteroid for a month—my claim’s perfectly good. There’s no intelligent life there above the eighth level. In fact, there’s no life at—”
“I know,” Von Zorn said unpleasantly. “I’ve read the law. All matter in the Solar System is the property of the Earth Government, and can be rented or purchased from it, unless already inhabited by life above the eighth level of intelligence—which is about that of Gregg. Lord knows how it happened. He should have checked and double-checked his figures.”
Quade restrained himself with an effort.
“Would you mind telling me just why I can’t use Eros?” he inquired.
“Because it’s heading into an ether eddy. And you know what that means. Extinction. Blotto. Your polar city isn’t half built, and It’ll take ten days to complete it. And the ether eddy will reach Eros’ orbit in a week.”
“Thanks for telling me,” Quade said, and shut off the televisor. He sat silent, regarding his large, capable hands. He had built up a fortune with them, and now, at one stroke, he was losing it. For he had staked almost everything he owned on this enterprise.
Quade looked up as Peters came in. “The shooting’s done, Tony,” the gaunt man said. “We’re taking Valyne and the robot aboard now. It looks pretty good.”
“Okay,” Quade grunted. “No more shots today. Tell the pilot to head for Hollywood on the Moon. Muy pronto!”
Frowning, Quade went into the ship’s transparent nose. He stood there silent, watching the silvery-gray surface of Mare Imbrium race past below. As the ship’s speed increased the Apennines became visible towering against the sky-speckled sky to the north, but the gigantic range was soon left behind. They fled over the crater of Herodotus and sped on, while the Earth sank lower and lower and at last dropped beneath the horizon.
The Moon is egg-shaped. The larger part is turned perpetually toward the Earth, but the smaller end is scooped out into a vast crater, whence volcanic activity in some long past eon had blown a fragment as large as the asteroid Vesta. Within this great hollow is an atmosphere, life, great buildings and studios—Hollywood on the Moon!
A little thrill shook Quade as the ship sped over the Great Rim and he saw beneath him the film capital. He could never become quite used to this tremendous city, rising from an arid and inhospitable world. And, because films were the breath of life to Quade, he felt oddly cold at the thought of going broke and dropping out of the life of the picture metropolis. For in Hollywood on the Moon there is no place for the weakling. It is run through a combination of power, graft, and efficiency, but there is no room for incompetents.
The city of terraces and towers and wide streets was the most healthful in the Solar System because of the artificial atmosphere, germ-free and automatically purified, kept on the Moon by an electro-magnetic gravity field created by gigantic machines in the caverns beneath the surface.
The air-blanket shields Hollywood on the Moon from the blazing rays, of the Sun, protects it from the chill of frigid space, aided by huge plates that broadcast radiant heat. It is the dream of every girl’s life to drive along Lunar Boulevard and dance at the Silver Spacesuit. A dream one girl in a hundred thousand ever realizes.
Quade called Peters. The gauntfaced camera expert came into the ship’s nose, scratching a gray-stubbled cheek. He cast a quick glance down at the sunlit city.
“NICE to be back, but—there’s trouble, Tony, isn’t there? What’s happened?”
Swiftly Quade told him. Peters whistled.
“Well, what can we do?”
“Use Ganymede.”
“Jupiter’s moon? It’s too far.”
“No, you sap, the asteroid Ganymede. It’ll be at perihelion in a few days, and that’ll bring it within the orbit of Mars, close enough for us. We can’t use Eros, because after the ether eddy hits it there won’t be any Eros. But we’ll put up a set at Ganymede’s pole and film the explosion there. It’ll be a rush job, but we can make it before the deadline.”
“What about property rights?” Peters asked.
“I want you to attend to that. I’m going to get my own cruiser refueled and head for Ganymede to look things over. You rent Gariymere for a month, and—yeah, better get an option, too. If we kick it out of its orbit, we can just take up the option and we’ll be safe—it’ll be our own property then. Order the Eros crew over to Ganymede right away, and tell ’em to get started building the set. You finish the Mare Imbrium scenes, and then follow. We’ll need all the help we can get.”
“Oke,” Peters assented, as the ship grounded with a jar. “Where are you off to now?”
“I,” said Quade grimly, “am going to find Gregg.”
Gregg was at the Silver Spacesuit, his round, fat face ludicrously disconsolate beneath his glistening bald dome. When he saw Quade he looked as though he was going to cry.
“Oh, don’t take it so hard,” Quade growled, sliding into a cushioned chair at Gregg’s side. “I’m not going to fire you, though you know dam well you deserve it. What happened?”
“It was my fault, Tony,” Gregg said in a choked voice. “You don’t know how sorry I am. I know what it means to you. I’ve been nearly crazy for the last few weeks.”
“Eh?” Quade stared, and then glanced up as a waitress glided up in her tiny gilded autocar. “I’m not hungry, thanks. Oh—wait a minute. Yes, I am. I’ve got a long ride ahead. Double order ham and eggs.”
The girl looked shocked, and made a feeble attempt to suggest Moontruffle salad instead, but Quade waved her away and turned back to Gregg.
“Now what the devil is this all about?”
“It’s my daughter,” Gregg said, scrubbing at his plump cheeks. “I know it’s nothing to you, but it’s the reason I made such an awful mistake and overlooked that other eddy. I’ve been worrying about my daughter, been half crazy. She’s movie-struck, Tony—you know.”
Quade nodded. “What’d she do? Stowaway on a Moon ship?”
Gregg nodded miserably.
“Her mother wrote me that she’d left a note and was coming to Hollywood on the Moon to get in pictures. You know what that means!”
Yes, Quade knew. He’d never approved of the law that the film magnates had had passed through pulling political strings. Yet he could understand their attitude. In the early days the glamour of Hollywood on the Moon had called girls from all over the world—Europe, Asia, America, Australia—and a veritable flood of eager applicants had poured in, smothering the Moon city until regular work had been impossible.
IN ancient times, when Hollywood had been a tiny town on the shore of the Pacific Ocean, it had been easy for disappointed would-be stars to return home or find jobs.
But the Moon is 239,000 miles away from the Earth, and it had cost the studios a fortune when in desperation they had herded the movie-struck girls together and shipped them back home.
They couldn’t be allowed to stay. There wasn’t room. And now the penalty for Moon-stowaways was a fine of fifteen thousand dollars, or fifteen years’ imprisonment.
“I haven’t got the money, of course,” Gregg said. “And, worse, I can’t find Kathleen. She’s afraid of the police, I’ll bet, and hasn’t dared get in touch with me. Or something may have happened to her.”
“For Pete’s sake,” Quade said. “Why didn’t you tell me this weeks ago? I’d have paid the fine, and you could have sent the kid back home with a good spanking.”
“You were on location. I didn’t have a chance, Besides, I couldn’t let you pay, Tony.”
“Rats! I’ll—uh—I guess I can’t pay anyway, Gregg! I’ve got all my dough tied up in this job, and if it flops—I won’t have a split penny.” Quade’s face fell. “No use trying to pull any wires, either. I’m persona non grata on the Moon unless I bring back the bacon.”
“And it’s my fault. Blast it, Tony, I feel like jumping off the Rim.”
“Shut up,” Quade said affectionately. “You lop-eared idiot! Everybody makes mistakes, and you couldn’t help it anyway. I’m heading for Ganymade, and we’ll have everything sewed up in a week. If you find your kid, keep her under cover until I get back.”
“Okay,” Gregg said, getting up. “That’s why I came here. I thought she might have a job as waitress, somehow. But I guess not. Well—good luck.”
Quade grinned reassuringly at him and attacked his ham and eggs. Presently the lights were dimmed, and a crimson spot outlined the shimmering, silver-clad figure of a girl who hung apparently suspended in empty air in the center of the dining room. Warm, throbbing music pulsed out, and the girl’s throaty, languorous voice began to sing:
Give me a ship to roam the lone starways,
Out around Venus I’ll follow the far ways,
But my heart will turn home
“Hello, sap!”
Quade looked up. It was Sandra Steele. He grimaced and returned to his meal.
SANDRA STEELE was the ultimate product of Hollywood on the Moon.
Her skin was a lifeless white, almost luminous, and her eyes, originally brown, had been tattooed a startling shade of violet. Her hair was a silvery web that floated, unbound, about her shoulders.
“On your way, pig,” Quade grunted. “I don’t want your autograph.”
No screen star likes to be called a pig—a synonym for chorus girl. Sandra’s blue-nailed, slender fingers twitched visibly, but she restrained herself.
“You filthy little swine,” she observed softly. “Just watch how fast I’ll break you now I’m in with Von Zorn. I’ve had enough of your impudence.”
Quade drank some water and blinked sleepily. However, he knew Sandra was a dangerous enemy. If it hadn’t meant losing all self-respect, he’d have made a different answer when she had first invited him to become what amounted to her gigolo. He had said no, and told her a few unpleasant truths, hoping they’d be good for her soul.
