In the Beginning: Tales From the Pulp Era Page 9

  I rounded a corner, nearly slipped, and then doubled back and headed for the main thoroughfare again. The cops weren’t taken in by my maneuver, though, and as I looked back I saw them following grimly, shouting something at me. There were more of them now.

  Suddenly I felt a hand slide into mine, soft and warm, and a gentle voice at my side said, “Come with me.”

  I didn’t argue. I saw the crowd close up into a solid mass behind us, and heard the roaring of my frustrated pursuers, as my unknown rescuer led me away to safety.

  As we ran, I glanced down and saw a girl at my side, with her hand grasping mine. She was about twenty-two, wearing a clinging blue tunic that cut off above her knees. She had copper-red hair, and around her neck was that curious collar.

  After running a block and a half, we came to a small tenement-house of the kind common in Callisto City. “In here,” she whispered, and we ducked inside.

  Then up a flight of stairs, around a corridor, down a dimly-lit hallway. We stood for an anxious moment outside her door, while she fumbled nervously in an attempt to touch her thumb to the doorplate, and then finally she managed to impress her print on the sensitive photoelectronic plate and the door slid noiselessly open.

  We stepped inside, and with a feeling of relief I watched the heavy door roll back. I was safe—for now.

  I turned to the girl. “Who are you? Why’d you bring me here?”

  The run had tired her. Her breasts rose and fell as she gasped for breath, and she smiled and held up a hand for time as she struggled to talk. Finally, panting, she managed to say, “I’m June Knight. I saw the whole scene with the guards. You’re safe here, for a while. But tell me—why have you come to Callisto?”

  “Why does everyone wear these collars?” I countered, ignoring her question.

  Her pretty face grew sad. “They make us—the Three, that is. Come on inside, and I’ll get together something for you to eat. You must be starved, and we can talk later.”

  “No,” I said quickly. “I’m not hungry. I’m more anxious to find out what’s been happening here.”

  “Well, even if you’re not hungry, I am,” she said. “Come into the kitchen and I’ll tell you the whole story—the story of how this whole city’s been enslaved.”

  She went into the adjoining room of the little flat, and I followed her. She punched keys on the robocook, dialing a small but nutritious meal, and when the food was placed before her on the table she turned to me.

  “First,” she said, “when’s the last time any news came from Callisto to the outside world?”

  I shrugged. “I haven’t been keeping up with the news. I’ve been on Mars the last two years, hunting rhuud in the lowlands. The papers don’t get there often.”

  “Oh. You’ve been out of touch. Well, you haven’t missed any news from Callisto, because we’ve had an efficient news blanket in operation for almost a year and a half. And for a while it was a voluntary one—just about two years ago, when the air started going bad. We didn’t want outsiders to know.”

  I blinked. “The air?” In a dome-city like this, the air supply was, of course, wholly artificial, and its proper maintenance was of vital importance to the entire community. “What happened to the air?” I asked.

  “I’m not sure,” she said. “None of us are. Suddenly it became impure. People began sickening by the hundreds; some died, and almost everyone else was ill in one way or another. A tremendous investigation was held by the people who were our government then—Cleve Coldridge was our mayor, a fine man—and nothing could be determined about the source of the impurities. And then my father—he’s dead now—invented this.” She tapped the metal collar she wore around her throat.

  “And what, may I ask, is that collar?”

  “It’s a filter,” she said. “When the collar is worn, it counteracts the impurities in the air, through some process I don’t understand. My father died shortly after he developed it, and so he didn’t get a chance to offer it to the public. He willed the design and the process to three—friends—of his.” Her mouth clamped together bitterly, and I saw her struggling to fight back tears. Almost automatically, I put my arm around her.

  “I’ll be all right,” she said. “Every time I think of those three, and what they’ve done to Dad’s invention—”

  “Tell me about it later, if you want.”

  “No. You might as well know the whole story. The three of them—Martin Hawkins, an Earthman, Ku Sui, a Martian, and Kolgar Novin, a Venusian—announced my father’s device to the public as if they had discovered it themselves. It was the solution to our air-impurity problem. They started turning out the collars in mass production, and within a month everyone in Callisto City was wearing one.”

  “Did that stop the sickness?”

  She nodded. “Immediately. The hospitals emptied out in no time at all, and there hasn’t been a case of that disease since then.”

  “Is that all?” I asked.

  “Hardly. The trouble didn’t start until after we were all wearing the collars.” She took my hand and guided it along her collar to the back of her neck, where I felt a tiny joint in the metal.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “That joint is the weapon those three hold over us at all times. These collars, you see, can be tightened at will by remote control—and my father’s three friends operate the controls!”

  I whistled. “What a hideous kind of dictatorship! You mean—anyone who makes too much of the wrong kind of noise gets his collar tightened.”

  “Exactly. As soon as the whole city was wearing the protective collars—the collars that we thought were our salvation—the Three called a public meeting, and announced that they were taking over the government. Mayor Coldridge stood up to protest such a high-handed move—”

  “And suddenly felt his collar tightening around his neck!” I concluded. I could picture the scene vividly.

  “It was terrible,” she said. “Right in the middle of his speech, he clutched at his throat, went red in the face, and sank to his knees. They let him up after a minute or so, and explained what they had done. Then they announced that anyone who protested against what they were doing would get similar treatment. We’ve been against them ever since.”

  I stood up, almost overwhelmed with anger. I had come to the right place this time! Maybe giant Jupiter was something I needed to explore someday for my own peace of mind, but this mess on Callisto required immediate attention. I didn’t see how I was going to fight it, either, but I swore to myself that I wasn’t going to leave here until the last collar had been removed from a Callistan throat.

  “What about this breathing-tax?” I asked.

  She nodded. “That’s the latest thing. They’ve decided the regular taxes aren’t enough for them, and so they’re bleeding us white with this new one. They installed meters in all the collars, to measure the amount of air we consume, and—” her voice was choked with hatred—“they tax us. There’s even a price of air here. Every Friday, we have to pay a certain amount.”

  “And if you don’t?”

  She put her hand to her throat, and made a swift squeezing motion. I shuddered. I’d never come across anything so vicious as this. When I was hunting rhuud on Mars, I thought I was against an ugly beast—but those Martian land-serpents weren’t half so cold-blooded as the Three who held Callisto in their iron grip.

  I was going to break their hold. I vowed it, as I looked at the red-eyed girl staring solemnly at me.

  Suddenly there was a knock on the hall door. I sprang up at once, and June looked at me with alarm.

  “Hide in there,” she said, pointing to the bedroom. I dashed inside and crouched behind the bed, wondering who was at the door.

  I head a male voice say, “It’s me, June. You decent?”

  “Come on in,” she said, and I heard the door slide open. I peeped out and saw a tall, good-looking young man enter. Around his throat was the inevitable collar. He ran to her, put his arms arou
nd her, embraced her. I felt a sour twinge of jealousy, though I had no conceivable right to.

  “Hello, Jim,” she said warmly.

  The newcomer was frowning worriedly. “Have you heard about this new trouble?” he asked without preamble. “They’ve just announced it from the capitol building.”

  “What is it?”

  “There’s a fugitive loose in the city somewhere,” the man named Jim said rapidly. “Apparently he broke in by stowing away in a cargo shipment from Ganymede, and he escaped when Hawkins’ guards tried to put a collar on him. He’s been at large for the past half hour—and Ku Sui and Hawkins have just announced that they’re going to start tightening the collars gradually until he turns himself in!”

  June gasped. “Everyone’s collar?”

  “Everyone. There’s a gigantic manhunt going on now, with the whole city out trying to find this guy. If we don’t get him and turn him in, those three madmen are liable to choke us all as a punitive measure.”

  As he spoke, he winced and put his hand to his throat. “They’re starting now!”

  A moment later, June uttered a little cry as the remote-control torturers went to work on her collar as well. I went almost insane with rage at that.

  I got off the floor and went inside.

  “I’m the man they’re looking for,” I announced loudly. Jim turned, startled, and flicked a glance from me to June and back to me again.

  “Where’d he come from, June?” Jim asked coldly.

  “He’s the fugitive,” she said hesitantly. “He was running from the Tax Guards and practically ran into me. I brought him here.”

  “Great Scot!” he shouted. “Of all the crazy stunts! Come on—let’s turn him in before they choke us all.”

  He started toward me, but I held up a hand. I’m a big man, and he stopped, giving me the respect my size deserves. “Just one moment, friend. Don’t be so quick to turn people in. Suppose you tell me who you are?”

  “What does that matter to you?” he snapped.

  “Jim’s my brother,” June said. “Have you heard what they’re going to do unless they find you?”

  I nodded grimly. “I heard you talking from inside.”

  “I’m going to call the Guards,” Jim said. “We can’t let you roam around free while our lives are in danger. It’s for the good of the whole city.”

  He moved toward the phone, but I tripped him and shoved him into a chair. “Hold on a second, buddy.”

  He popped up almost immediately and came at me with a savage right. I heard June utter a little scream as his fist caught me off-guard and cracked into my jaw; I backed up a step or two, shaking off the grogginess, and hit him carefully just below the heart. He folded up and dropped back into the chair.

  “Sorry, June,” I said apologetically. “But I have to have this thing done my way.”

  Jim opened one eye, than another, and sat there without making any further disturbance. “June, get your video on. Find out if what your brother says is true.”

  “Can’t you believe me?” he asked.

  “No,” I told him bluntly. I wasn’t taking any chances.

  June was fumbling with the dials of her video, and a moment later a newscaster’s face came on the screen. I listened stonily as he proceeded to give my description, or a rough approximation thereof, and repeated “President” Hawkins’ bone-chilling threat that the collars would be gradually tightened unless I was turned in.

  “Okay,” I said. “I’ve heard enough. Shut that thing off.” I whirled and faced them. Both June and her brother were pale-faced and frightened; they wore the same beaten, cowed look I’d noticed on the truck-drivers. This was a city of perpetual terror.

  “Look,” I told them. “I’m going to turn myself in, as soon as possible.”

  “But—” June started weakly to say.

  “No. There’s nothing else I can do. I’m going to turn myself in and let them put a collar around my neck.” The words came tumbling out easily, and I was forming my plan even as I spoke.

  “Why don’t you just escape through the airlock?” June asked. “Go back where you came from. You can still get away, and you won’t have to wear the collar.”

  I shook my head firmly. “No. Two reasons. The first is that your benevolent administrators may take punitive measures against you anyway; the second is that you’re suggesting I run away—and I just don’t believe in running away. I’m going to stay here till the job is done.”

  Jim Knight stood up and took my hand. “I’m sorry I got so hotheaded before, fellow. But why’d you knock me down when I went to the phone?”

  “I wanted to tell you some things first, Jim. I’m sorry I had to rough you up, but it was necessary. There was one plan I had to let you know.”

  “Which is?”

  “I’m going to go to the capitol building now to get collared. I want you two to go gather up all your friends and see to it that there’s a considerable mob outside the building after I go in. Get the whole populace down, if possible. I don’t know if I can carry off what I’m planning, but I’ll need help on the follow-through if I do.”

  “Right. Anything else?”

  I rubbed my throat speculatively. “No. Nothing else. How does it feel to wear one of those things?”

  I stepped hesitantly into the street, expecting to be grabbed at any moment. The artificial air of Callisto City was warm and mild, and the atomic furnace that heated the domed city was doing a good job. But I detected a curious odor in the air, and my sensitive nostrils told me that whatever had been polluting the air was still present. June had said it wasn’t fatal, and with my strength I knew I wouldn’t have much to fear for a while, so I didn’t worry about it.

  I got about four steps down the street, walking by myself. I had insisted that June and her brother keep away from me, for fear they get involved as accomplices. I reached the corner and started up the thoroughfare, and at once a dozen hands grabbed me.

  “There he is!” someone said.

  “Thank God we’ve caught him before these collars get any tighter!”

  I looked at them. They weren’t wearing uniforms; they were just townsfolk, honest, worried men who turned into vigilantes only to save their own necks. I pitied them.

  “I’m the man you’re looking for,” I said. “You can let go of me. I won’t run away.”

  The mob was getting bigger by the moment, and I was anxious to calm them down before they started transferring some of their hatred for their three tyrants to me, and ripped me apart in a mob’s wild, illogical way.

  “I’m going to turn myself in,” I assured them hastily. “Where do I go?”

  “To the capitol building,” someone said. “And you’d better get there in a hurry. You know what they’re going to do to us if you’re not found?”

  “I’ve heard,” I said. “That’s why I’m turning myself in. Take me to wherever I’m supposed to go.”

  A couple of them led me through the streets, with the rest tagging along behind. The poor, timid, frightened people! I was almost ready to explode with indignation; I felt I wanted to tear their unspeakable overlords apart with my bare hands.

  And I could do it, too.

  Finally we reached the capitol—a lofty affair that towered right up to the highest point of the great dome. I looked up. The dome formed a shining arc that covered the entire city; outside, beyond the dome, all was black, except for the swollen red orb of Jupiter hanging monstrously in the sky.

  Jupiter. I wondered if I was ever going to get out of Callisto City to cross the gulf of space to the planet that seemed to beckon to me, the unexplored giant that called to me from afar.

  “Here he is,” one of my captors said, to a guard at the capitol door.

  I recognized him. He was the leader of the group of six who had originally tried to stop me back at the airlock. He gestured with his arm, and a whole host of blue-clad guards came forth and seized me roughly.

  “Bring him inside,” he said. �
�Hawkins is waiting to see him.”

  I was waiting to see Hawkins, too. I wanted to see just what sort of monster was capable of enslaving a whole city this way.

  They led me through the richly-appointed lobby, hung with luxurious furnishings from every planet, no doubt imported at fantastic cost with money wrung from the Callistans by the infamous breathing-tax, and bustled me into an elevator. We shot up rapidly to the twelfth floor, where I was shoved out. I submitted as patiently as I could to this sort of treatment; if I wanted to, I could have smashed their faces and escaped with ease, but that kind of answer didn’t suit me.

  I was taken down a long, well-lit corridor, and pushed into a large room that seemed to be completely lined with machinery. A row of dials and clicking computers ran down one wall, and a giant electronic brain sprawled ominously over the entire back half of the room. Up at the left side were two men, seated in lofty chairs surrounded by metal railings.

  One was a Martian, spindly, elongated, with a weirdly-inflated chest and thick, leathery reddish skin. The other was an Earthman, small of stature, balding, totally ordinary-looking. There was something familiar-looking about both of them.

  The Earthman, who must have been Hawkins, turned to the other—evidently Ku Sui, the Martian, the second of the triumvirate that ruled Callisto.

  “Here’s our troublemaker,” Hawkins said. “Let’s collar him before he can do any damage.”

  The Martian got off his throne-like chair and came rustling down to examine me at close range. They have notoriously poor eyesight. As he drew near, I recognized him, and a moment later he spotted me.

  He turned in surprise to Hawkins. “You know who this is?” he asked sibilantly. “This is our old friend Slade.”

  Hawkins was up from his chair in a second. “Slade?” I saw him go pale. “Get that collar on him as fast as you can!”

  It came back to me now. Hawkins, and Ku Sui, and yes, the Venusian Kolgar Novin. I should have remembered as soon as June told me their names. Yes, we were old friends. Someone who leads the kind of life I do tends to forget some of his earlier adventures; they get blurred under the successive impressions of later encounters. But I recalled these three, now, and how I had foiled them, some ten years ago.