Part 1

THE RED PLANET

Russ Winterbotham

_A Science Fiction Novel_

MONARCH BOOKS, INC.

Derby, Connecticut

Published in August, 1962

Copyright © 1962 by Russ Winterbotham

[Transcriber's Note: Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

_Cover Painting by Ralph Brillhart_

Monarch Books are published by MONARCH BOOKS, INC., Capital Building, Derby, Connecticut, and represent the works of outstanding novelists and writers of non-fiction especially chosen for their literary merit and reading entertainment.

Printed in the United States of America

All Rights Reserved

* * * * *

REVENGE IN AN ALIEN WORLD

When Gail Loring chose Bill Drake to be her husband--in name only--for the duration of the flight to Mars, she didn't know that she had just signed his death warrant.

Jealous Dr. Spartan, leader of the expedition, swore to get revenge and force Gail to share his maniacal plan for power.

Bound together in space, five men and a woman strained against the powerful tug of twisted emotions and secret ambitions.

But all plans were forgotten when they landed on the Red Planet and encountered the Martians--half animal, half vegetable--with acid for blood and radar for sight.

When the Martians launched an assault against the spaceship, linking their electrical energy in an awesome display of power, Spartan realized that this was the perfect moment for personal revenge--and touched off his own diabolical plan of destruction against his fellow crewmen....

* * * * *

_Chapter 1_

I got no sleep that Thursday night. I tossed and dozed and tossed again. Operation Jehad and Willy Zinder were on my mind. Operation Jehad was the designation given to the proposed first manned flight to Mars, and Willy was our last chance to fill the six-man crew.

If Willy didn't make it, Doc Spartan would be fit to be tied in a hangman's knot. More than anything else, he had insisted on a six-man crew and, if he couldn't get six qualified astronauts, including himself, on the Jehad ship, he was as likely as not to postpone the voyage for 26 months, when Mars would be in the right spot again and by which time more men could be trained.

While I rolled and tossed in my bed sheets, Willy Zinder was playing carousel in his Jupiter capsule three hundred miles above old Momma Earth. And I hated to speculate about what had happened to him. When I'd watched him get into the cherry-picker Thursday morning, he'd been a poor, frightened kid. He'd probably been suffering ever since. And now, after this dreadful night, re-entry was staring him in the face.

Feeling scared was natural and nothing to be ashamed of, because we all got butterflies on our first solo orbit. But when I took my ASD tests, I'd managed to keep my teeth from chattering. Willy hadn't and somehow I got the feeling that he was suffering as much as all the rest of us combined. He looked so ready to collapse that I wondered what was holding him up.

Finally I gave up trying to sleep. It was daylight anyhow and I dressed, hurried to a restaurant and had scrambled eggs and coffee. Then I went over to the reservation to see how things were going. Dr. Spartan probably had spent the night there, but the rest of us had knocked off when the midnight operations shift came on duty. If they'd all spent a night like I had, the other members of the Jehad crew would be on hand almost as soon as me.

Besides Spartan, the others were Axel Ludkin, the big Swede from Minnesota; Dr. Warner Joel, who probably would hide his feelings by slapping people on the back and trying to joke about inconsequential things; and Morrie Grover, who was a pink-cheeked kid. We, plus Dr. Lewis Spartan, had already qualified for the first manned trip to Mars.

But plans had been made for six and Willy Zinder was our last candidate. To say we were scraping the bottom of the barrel would be selling Willy short. He was Number 12 out of 100 fine physical and mental specimens who had been selected for astronaut training three years before. Eighty-eight others had been washed out, one way or another, before twelve were fingered for Operation Jehad--so named because Jehad means holy war to Moslems. We were going to Mars, which was named after the Roman war god, so that accounted for the war part of the name, but I don't know what was holy about it except that going to Mars would materialize an ancient dream of man to travel through space to another world.

Willy was as healthy as a mountain and even if he looked scared I could tell he had guts. By the time the lift-off date of the operation got a few months away, Willy had climbed to position Number Six. Two higher numbers had flunked the ASD--Aeronautical Systems Division--tests, Dr. Spartan had said two others wouldn't do--the space boys in Washington took Doc's word as gospel--one had been banged up in a car wreck and was still in the hospital, and the sixth man had undergone an emergency appendectomy which left him too weak to lift off for Mars at the scheduled time.

There wasn't time now to train more men for the job, which meant that Willy _had_ to pass and Doc Spartan was enough of a perfectionist to insist that Willy get as thorough a testing as the others of the crew.

Sure, there were other astronauts. There were ten or twelve working on other projects, but the plasma space engine isn't an ordinary spaceship that anybody can take on a 150,000,000-mile round trip without rigorous training.

I reached the gate that separated spacemen from mere Earthlings and flashed my badge on the security guard.

"William Drake," he said, grinning. "Sure hope you have luck today, Mr. Drake."

"Thanks," I said. "How's Zinder doing?"

"Very well, the last I heard. The boys coming off the last Operations shift said he'd handled everything pretty well."

I went through the gate. Almost anybody can get through this one, but there are other security officers, at other gates further on down, to keep the place from being overrun by tourists, newspaper guys and people looking for rest rooms. How far you got depended on the color of your badge. Mine was blue, for the wild blue yonder, and I could walk right into Dr. Spartan's office with it, provided I had business there. And I wouldn't dare call on Dr. Spartan unless I did have it. He could eat a man out better than acid.

Finally I reached the bunker. I glanced into the room filled with the Operations staff which was keeping track of Willy--communicating with him, tabulating his heartbeats, respiration and maybe his thoughts--and checking the behavior of his capsule. I wasn't interested in them. I went to the end of the hall, flashed my badge again, and entered the room reserved for the panel that was going to pass or flunk Willy Zinder.

Doc Spartan was the man in charge. He was the leader of our little group, but that was no break for Willy Zinder. Doc Spartan was an old space hand. He'd been to the moon and he had conducted the trial flight of the plasma engine. First, last and middle, he was a perfectionist. I hated him, so did everyone else, but there was one thing that we all could say: if Doc stamped you okay, you were as good as he expected to find. And there was another thing that could be said: Doc Spartan made a top sergeant of the Marine Corps look like Peter Pan.

He was there, along with three other men who looked as if they'd been without sleep for a week. Maybe they'd taken a few naps during the twenty-four hours, but it didn't show. They were red-eyed, their hair was uncombed and they each showed a day's growth of beard. Although the room was air-conditioned, they looked sweaty and hot. Mugs full of black coffee were on their desks and there were bread crusts and half-eaten sandwiches on trays nearby.

Axel Ludson stood back against the rear wall. Like me, he had nothing to do but watch and he had probably hurried over after eating breakfast, just as I had, in order to be on hand when Willy made his re-entry.

Axel was a big, raw-boned Swede, which is a description you could give of a large portion of the male population of his home town in Minnesota. He had light brown hair, blue eyes and a long straight nose. His jaw looked big and solid enough to crush concrete. He winked at me and I walked over to him.

"Willy is doing fine," he said, which was an accolade. Axel made his words count. "Doc has thrown everything at him but a flock of asteroids and Willy hasn't missed a pitch."

"Good!" I said. "Where is Willy now?"

Axel nodded toward a screen on the left wall. On it was projected a portion of a globe showing Northern Siberia. A little spot of light showed up in the middle of it.

"In thirty minutes he'll begin his last orbit."

"How did he do on the emergencies?" I asked.

Axel grinned. "He acted like they were the real thing."

The space capsule carrying Willy was the old-fashioned type, with room enough for only one man. However, it had special controls which made its manual operation similar to that used on the plasma craft. Throughout the flight, Willy was in charge of the operation. Without warning, certain simulated emergencies were signaled to instruments aboard the capsule and Willy was expected to meet them.

Although space flight sounds dangerous, most of it isn't because space is more empty than anything most of us ever saw. The only critical times are usually at the lift-off, the re-entry and the landing. However, other emergencies can arise. The worst would be the sudden appearance of a large meteor, meaning a pebble a quarter of an inch in diameter or bigger. Since about 95 per cent of the meteors in space are less than that size, chances of meeting one, even on a trip lasting two-and-a-half years, are remote. But it could happen.

The plasma ship was equipped with meteor bumpers which would vaporize anything smaller than a quarter of an inch. Larger ones might puncture the sides, but even then there was patching fluid in the walls of the craft which would prevent too much air loss. A tremendously large meteor can be detected by radar and avoided. Willy'd had to make the right maneuver to avoid such a meteor.

Radiation in space also poses some problems. Space travel requires high speed, and astronauts can pass through a radiation belt in so short a time that the exposure isn't harmful. But a very large cloud might pose problems and Willy would have to meet such an emergency by determining the size of the cloud and the best way to pierce it.

Another hazard could be faulty astrogation. On a 75,000,000-mile trip--the distance we were to travel to reach Mars--a small error at the start might put the ship too far from Mars to be caught by the planet's gravity at the end of the voyage. Willy had to make observations throughout the test flight and go through operations necessary to correct his trajectory. There might be other minor emergencies, such as failure of equipment and instruments, but Willy had demonstrated his ability to cope with them in tests conducted on the ground.

Dr. Warner Joel entered the room. A few months ago he had been overweight, but stringent diet had cut his weight down enough to allow him to qualify for our crew. He was a short, stocky man, with a smooth face and nervous manner. However, his knowledge of geology had made him almost indispensable. Rarely do you find a man with his experience in this particular field who can also qualify for the stringencies of space flight.

There was one thing against Joel that I was determined to overlook and this was his rather ingratiating manner, his eagerness to appear to be more than he was, and his intense desire to win favor from Dr. Spartan.

As he entered he hailed everyone in a loud voice, speaking to no one in particular. And no one in particular answered. Ignoring the rebuff, and with a strict eye to protocol, he walked over to the control board where Dr. Spartan was seated.

"Great show, Doctor! Brilliant show!" Joel exclaimed, extending his hand as if he were congratulating a playwright on opening night.

Spartan, his dark eyes glued to the instruments in front of him, ignored Joel.

"Yes, sir!" the geologist continued, putting his hand in his coat pocket, probably to give it warmth after Spartan's coolness. "We've got a good man in Willy Zinder. I always did say this boy was a sleeper. Better than a lot of men in our group, in fact."

Axel nudged me in the ribs and, as I turned, he winked one of his ice-blue eyes. "Meaning me or you, Bill?"

"You, you big Swede," I said, winking back. "But my opinion puts Willy several notches above Joel, too."

Axel chuckled softly.

"I won't worry with Willy Zinder on the crew," Joel was saying loudly. "No, sir--"

"Why don't you sit down?" snarled Spartan, still not turning his head. "You drive me crazy."

"Uh--ah--why yes, of course! I didn't realize--"

"Then do it!" snapped Spartan.

Joel almost stumbled as he backed away. Now, as he spotted Axel and me, he decided we were appropriate sympathizers. He walked over to us and said, "He's understandably touchy."

"I never pet rattlesnakes," said Axel.

Willy's voice, surprisingly cheerful, came over the loud-speaker. He was A-okay and was passing over the North Pole for the fifteenth time.

Communications responded and wished him good luck.

Dr. Spartan nodded. Then he turned his head and called out: "Miss Loring!"

I turned my head. I hadn't seen Gail Loring when I entered the room. She must have been in Operations and had entered through the door in the other end of the room. Now I saw her fine-featured face as she replied, "Yes, Dr. Spartan?"

"Come here!"

She came over to his control board briskly, holding her head high, paying no attention to anyone but Dr. Spartan. She was all business.

It was a pitiful waste, because she was an attractive girl and so untouchable. She wasn't beautiful in the sense that a stage or screen star is. She was good-looking, the kind of girl who wore well. Without lace or fancy trimmings, she was solid, durable, functional--and feminine, in spite of herself. She'd made a successful landing on the moon and had accompanied Dr. Spartan on the trial flight of the plasma ship. Now she was preparing for some other project--only the NASA knew what it was.

Surprisingly enough, I'd found out in the three or four times we'd met that she had a pleasant disposition, in spite of her businesslike manner. She liked to laugh and she was intelligent, which of course she'd have to be as a woman astronaut. Up to the time I'd met her informally, I'd classified her as a female Dr. Spartan.

"Please take over the control panel for a few minutes," Spartan said. "I'm going to get some breakfast before the re-entry."

"Certainly, Doctor," she said. "Any special orders?"

"None," he said. "Operations has alerted the Navy carrier and it is in position to pick up Zinder after the re-entry, on his next orbit. All you have to do is be ready to switch over to ground control in the event of an emergency."

I felt Axel's elbow shudder against my arm. Resorting to ground control would wash Willy Zinder off the project because it was his job to handle the capsule from beginning to end of his flight. Only during the lift-off and re-entry was there automatic operation--Willy had to take over again after re-entry.

Dr. Spartan rose and Gail took his seat. She glued her eyes on the instruments with all the instinct of a good pointer flushing a covey of quail.

I watched her. Even in slacks she looked good; a statement I could make about no other women I've ever seen. She wore no make-up, except lipstick, and that didn't hurt her. She had brown hair cut close, almost mannish style, and still she looked like a woman.

The disappointing thing about her was that she would not allow a man to become part of her life. Not that she was cold. No one could tell me that a woman who tried so hard to forget she was feminine had nothing to forget. It was simply that men were "out" until she'd got enough of her career.

I turned my head and noticed that young Morrie Grover had come in and was too busy watching Gail Loring to take much interest in what was going on in space.

Morrie was the fifth man in our crew--Willy was qualifying as sixth. Morrie was the youngest of our group, being a couple of years my junior by the calendar. Actually I felt at least ten years older because Morrie was one of those eager young lads who keep too busy learning about the universe to understand what is going on in this world. No doubt he'd grow up a lot on the Martian adventure. The fact that he was looking hungrily at Gail didn't mean his thoughts were grown up. High school boys have the same thoughts.

He watched her until he decided, apparently, that she was less likely to move than the faces on Mt. Rushmore, then he took off his glasses, began rubbing them with a clean white handkerchief and squinted at me.

"Hello, Bill," he said condescendingly. "Is Willy on his last lap yet?"

"He will be in about two minutes," I said, glancing at the clock on the wall. I could have told him about the map and explained that he could see for himself, but that would have been rude. I would have to live with this guy for thirty months and it was best that I learn to get along with him.

Dr. Spartan came in again, carrying a bacon-and-egg sandwich in his left hand.

"Hello, Doctor Spartan," said Morrie.

"Wmpf!" replied Spartan, chomping on the sandwich. He didn't even give Morrie a glance.

Morrie looked shook up.

"Don't mind him, kid," said Axel. "He hates everybody. Especially today."

Morrie did not reply. He blew heavily on his glasses, wiped off the moisture with his handkerchief and held them up to the light. He squinted, nodded with satisfaction and put them on his nose. Then he turned to resume watching Gail Loring.

Though Dr. Spartan had taken a position behind Gail so that he blocked the view, Morrie wasn't going to miss the pleasure of ogling the prettiest girl astronaut in the world. He moved over to the left for an unobstructed view. Realizing there would be about ninety idle minutes to kill, I moved to the right, deciding that I could get even more pleasure out of watching her than Morrie could.

Axel and Dr. Joel remained where they were, Axel watching the little light on the screen map and Dr. Joel bobbing his head, smiling and waving at everyone who looked in his direction.

Gail turned her head and looked up at Dr. Spartan. "You want to take over now, Dr. Spartan?" she asked.

"Go ahead," said Spartan. "I haven't finished breakfast, my dear."

She turned her head in a businesslike manner and glanced at the clock, then at the instrument panel. Finally she picked up the microphone and held it to her lips. She waited a moment, still watching the instrument panel.

"Last orbit!" she said. Her words were echoed by the speaker in the room. "We'll start our countdown for re-entry five minutes before you've completed the turn, Zinder. At zero, set the automatic control to take over."

"A-okay," said Willy's voice. He spoke calmly. Apparently he was no longer frightened.

"Remember," she said, "precisely at zero."

"A-okay."

Gail put the microphone back on its hook. She watched the instruments. Suddenly she tensed. Her voice rose as she spoke to Dr. Spartan.

"Doctor, look!"

She gestured excitedly at the panel.

"Good God in heaven!" Spartan reached out, snatched up the microphone. "Zinder! Zinder, you fool! What have you done? Are you crazy?"

"Hey!" Willy's cry was full of fear, but he was not speaking to Dr. Spartan. He was yelling to no one. "Help me! I'm accelerating--decelerating! Something's gone haywire! I'm starting to re-enter--"

The voice broke off as a crash came from the speaker.

"He hit something!" somebody yelled.

"Hell, he probably fell to the floor," said Axel. "He wouldn't have his harness on now."

"He cut in the automatic," Spartan said. "Did you tell him this was the last lap, Miss Loring?"

"Oh, no, Doctor! I told him it was the next to last!"

"He must have misunderstood."

I squirmed to catch a glimpse of the instrument panel, but Spartan's bulk hid it from my eyes. Willy should have known he had another lap to go. There was a clock in front of him. I shifted my position. I could see Gail's hands flying to this button and that as if she were trying desperately to check the fall with the ground controls. But she must have known it was useless to try. Once the re-entry cycle is started, nothing can shut it off till the parachute opens in the earth's atmosphere. Willy Zinder was being returned to a world unready for his arrival.

"Willy! Willy! Please answer!" Gail screamed above the excited voices in the room.

No reply came from the speaker.

Then the intercom from Operations cut in. "The medical section says Zinder may have been injured by sudden deceleration," said the voice. "His heart action is very weak."

"Oh, dear God!" moaned Gail Loring. "It's all my fault!"

_Chapter 2_

Ordinary human reflexes, which respond to tangible, near-at-hand crises, were woefully inadequate for the dozen or so men and women in that room. What could anyone do to save Willy Zinder, so far away that he could only be detected by instruments, and whose future and very existence depended upon electronic gadgets which went about their task more cold-bloodedly even than Dr. Spartan?

In fact, Spartan himself seemed to lose his poise for a moment. He appeared to freeze as he stood directly behind Gail, staring at the dials that told what was happening to Willy. At last he seemed to see her hands, fluttering aimlessly from button to switch. He reached out, swept them away.

"Stop it!" he said hoarsely. "Nothing you can do will stop the automatic action of the capsule now!"

Gail seemed to wilt. Spartan released her hands and she sat there helplessly. Behind her Spartan looked like some kind of understudy of Satan, his black beard, dark eyes and sharp features blending into the illusion. He was tall and gaunt to begin with--now he looked taller and more gaunt. Was it a suspicion of a smile that I saw on his face for a brief, fleeting instant? But surely he didn't want Willy to fail. He had a greater stake in this operation than any of us. For him it would mean immortality as the leader of the first manned flight to Mars.

Again the fleeting smile. I tried to tell myself that it was the result of nervousness. I'd often seen men under stress grinning like fools, because laughter is an emotional reflex. But I'd never suspected Spartan of having emotions before. He'd had a wealth of experience and had seen men die in space.

For ten years he'd been one of the top astronauts of the nation--ever since he had risen to fame as the genius who had developed a certain method of converting nuclear energy directly into electricity. In those days he'd been a poorly paid instructor at some obscure mid-western college. Now he was famous as a spaceman, and wealthy from his discoveries.

His apparent nervousness lasted only an instant. Then he became his cold self again. Not that it served to reassure anybody--we all knew that northeast of where we stood, far out over the Atlantic, Willy's capsule was screaming into the atmosphere. It mattered little that the parachutes were open, since the men who had been watching the instruments recording Willy's heartbeat said he had been hurt badly.

There was no button to push, no knob to turn, no switch to flip which would make everything A-okay. And there certainly was no magic wand to break the evil enchantment of the moment.

The loud-speaker squawked out a report from the Navy carrier. Its helicopters were airborne, attempting to reach the place where Willy would come down, but they were hundreds of miles west--at the place where Willy would have come down after his next lap, not this one.