Captain Future 06 - Star Trail to Glory (Spring 1941) (4 page)

The electroscopic finder was a massive cylindrical instrument whose conical lenses were mounted on the surface of the Moon. Curt turned on the instrument, and touched a screw that swung the lenses. His eyes were glued on the sensitive gages and indicators. The finder could locate the position and trail of any nearby space ship.

It was sensitive to the ionized atomic rocket blasts of a ship.

"This shows the
Comet
heading away from the Moon!" Curt cried. "It's going in the general direction of Venus!"

"Then Otho's been overpowered by someone who has captured the
Comet
and is making off with it, lad," rasped the Brain, cool as always. "And we've no ship to follow in."

Curt immediately jumped back to the televisor.

"I'm going to call Planet Police headquarters on Earth and have them rush a ship here to us." But when he turned on the televisor again, a deafening sputtering came from it, through which no signal could be heard. "That's not static. Someone has deliberately jammed the ether around the Moon. The same ones who took the
Comet
did it to prevent our calling Earth. They've marooned us here so we can't follow them or answer the President's summons!"

FUTURE could act in an emergency with unparalleled speed, but he never did things in a blind, heedless rush, no matter how grave the peril. Always his powerful mind rapidly assessed the situation, decided upon the most logical course of action, before he acted. He stood now, his fists clenched, his handsome face hard and grim. A stranger would have thought him speechless with wrath at the theft of the
Comet.

But the Brain knew from long experience that Curt was examining every factor of the situation in his lightning way.

Then Captain Future sprang toward a tall electrical cabinet in a corner of the laboratory. Its face was bewilderingly covered with dials.

"Whoever took the
Comet
dropped an electro-magnetic generator somewhere on the Moon, to keep the ether jammed," Curt rapped out. "If we can locate it and destroy it, we can get a message through. Call Grag."

The Brain, using his newly acquired magnetic beams for propulsion, went flying out of the laboratory and through the rock tunnels in search of the robot.

He found Grag sulking with Eek in a supply room. "Trouble, Grag," rasped Simon. In a few words he explained. Grag jumped up and hastily followed the flying Brain back to the laboratory. Captain Future was turning from the cabinet of sensitive electrical instruments, his gray eyes narrowed.

"They're clever, Simon," he gritted. "They didn't drop their ether-jammer on the Moon where we could find and destroy it. They attached a small rocket-motor to it and left it circling the Moon at a high altitude, where we can't reach it."

"Isn't there some way we can get at the thing and shut it off?" Grag boomed anxiously. "Maybe we could build a little rocket."

"That would take us days," Curt retorted. "And in the meantime the President's calling for us, the
Comet
is being taken and we don't know what's happened to Otho. We must do something quickly to get a call through to Earth, but I don't know what —"

"Lad, listen!” interrupted the Brain. "You're forgetting my new powers of flight! I could reach that ether-jammer and shut it off."

"I must be space-struck not to have thought of that!" Curt Newton cried. "Wait, Simon. I'll locate the thing as accurately as I can and give you directional readings."

Using the sensitive instruments in the tall cabinet, Captain Future plotted the course and position of the ether-jamming generator that had been left circling the Moon. He told the Brain the readings. Then they hurried to the air-lock which led out to the surface of the Moon. Curt paused inside the lock to pull on his space-suit, first buckling on his flat gray tool-belt and proton pistol. Grag, who did not breathe, needed no space-suit, nor did Simon.

The three comrades went up through the air-lock and emerged onto the lunar surface. They stood on the glaring plain at the bottom of Tycho. The horizon all around them was walled by the fanglike crater peaks that were silhouetted against the black, airless sky.

"Be careful, Simon," warned Curt. "Remember, you mustn't lose control of your beams or you'll hurtle out into space."

The Brain could hear despite the vacuum, for Curt was touching him.

"Wait here," Simon answered. "I'll soon be back."

THE Brain jetted a powerful magnetic beam downward. It sent him flying upward with amazing speed. The floor of the crater dropped rapidly, and Captain Future and Grag became two pygmies. Simon was now so high that he could look far across the parched surface of the Moon. Off to the horizons stretched the desolate plains, studded here and there with enormous circular craters whose jagged walls rose like giant fortresses. In the black sky overhead bulked the green Earth and the blazing Sun.

The Brain remembered the directional readings Curt had given him. He had already reached the correct height, four miles above the Moon. After hanging in space while he mentally computed the other directionals against the time element, the Brain began to rocket northwestward. He had a cold, utter confidence in the correctness of his calculations. A man might have doubted, but not the Brain. He lived for science and was a master of every branch of it, second only to Curt.

"There it is," Simon told himself a few minutes later. "Now to shut the thing off."

A small black rocket was approaching him, flying around the Moon by an occasional blast of its tubes. It was only a few feet long, the type of rocket used for sending small objects in space. The Brain guessed that the ether-jamming generator was inside the rocket.

"Have to board the thing, I suppose," he thought dubiously.

He drove himself abreast of the rocket, flying beside it in space. Gradually the Brain closed in on it, until he was only inches away. Maintaining his position relative to the rocket, Simon jetted two thin blue beams at the side of the rocket. It took him a moment to open the door there. Inside the hollow cylinder he glimpsed a squat little generator. A flick of his beams shut it off. Another movement stopped the automatic fire-control of the rocket itself, and it dropped toward the lunar plain.

The Brain glided back down toward Tycho in a long, thrilling swoop that brought him to the side of Curt and Grag in moments.

"It's done," he reported. "They had taken a televisor generator, set it to emit a continuous untuned wave, and put it inside a message-rocket. The rocket was adjusted to keep circling the Moon."

"Smart thinking on their part," Curt admitted. "Come on. We'll get a call through now to Earth."

They returned hastily into the Moon laboratory. Captain Future set their powerful televisor transmitter to the official wave of the Planet Police.

"Calling Planet Police headquarters on Earth!" he said.

The face of a uniformed Police officer appeared in the view screen. He looked startled.

"Captain Future!" he exclaimed.

He disappeared and in a moment appeared a face that the Futuremen knew well. It was the grizzled visage of old Ezra Gurney.

"What the devil?" gasped Ezra. "I thought you'd be blasting for Earth in the
Comet
by now. Didn't you see the North Pole signal?"

"The
Comet's
been stolen," Curt explained. "Get here in the fastest Planet Patrol cruiser you've got, Ezra."

"Sure will!" cried the veteran. "But the
Comet
stolen? Devils of space, I can't understand it!"

IT WAS hours later before the fast cruiser arrived. During that time, Captain Future and the Brain had rechecked the course of the stolen
Comet
by the electroscopic finder. It was still heading for Venus. Curt, Grag and the Brain were waiting on the surface of the lunar crater when the fast Patrol cruiser roared down to a landing. It was one of the few times any outside ship had ever landed upon this barren world which all the System knew was Captain Future's domain.

Curt hurried into the ship, the Brain gliding beside him. Grag followed, with his moon-pup perched on his shoulder, Ezra Gurney was waiting, his faded blue eyes still bewildered as Captain Future took off his space-suit.

"Order your crew to blast for Venus full speed, Ezra," Curt requested.

Unquestioningly the veteran marshal gave the order. The cruiser roared up from the Moon into space and curved around till its bow pointed at the white, gleaming speck of Venus.

"Now tell me how Cap'n Future's ship is stolen right under his nose," Ezra demanded.

"Yes, and where's Otho?" asked a girl's vibrant voice.

Curt Newton turned. Beside him stood a dark, pretty Earthgirl in mannish jacket and space-slacks, her brown eyes kindling with excitement. It was Joan Randall, secret agent of the Planet Police, who had worked with Captain Future in the past.

"I might have known that you would be in on this business," Captain Future declared. "You're always on deck when there's trouble."

Ezra grinned widely. "Sure, she got herself put on detached service so she could bother us men when we had work to do. Do you think I could keep her from coming along when I got your call? Not a chance!"

"It's the only chance I ever get to see you," Joan said calmly to Curt. "You've never been polite enough to invite me up to that Moon-home of yours. And while it's not much of a romance to go charging all over the System with you, it's better than none at all."

"Romance?" Curt retorted. "You're just excitement-crazy. If you weren't so darned good at Police work, I'd have kicked you out into space long ago."

"Don't believe him, Ezra," said Joan. "It's just a front he puts up. I'll bet he spends all his time on the Moon thinking of me."

"Listen, we've got things a danged sight more important to think of right now," Ezra Gurney protested. "Cap'n Future, who took the
Comet?"

"I wish I knew," Curt said bitterly. He told of what had happened. "We have only that last interrupted call from Otho about a strange force hitting him, and the fact that they've taken the stolen ship to Venus."

Ezra smacked his knee with his bony hand.

"By the ice-fiends of Pluto, it all ties up together! Cap'n Future, your ship's been stolen by the same mysterious crowd that's hijacked hundreds of new space ships lately from the Rocketeers who were testin' them. That's what the President was callin' you about."

"Hundreds of space ships stolen?" Curt's brows knit. "How were they taken?"

"Same way as the
Comet
was snatched from Otho, it seems," Ezra replied. "A queer weapon of some kind hit the Rocketeers pilotin' them and they woke up in space. The ships were gone, we don't know where. And maybe you don't think those space ship magnates on Mercury are goin' crazy! I was there investigatin' and I couldn't learn anything, so I blasted back to Earth and had the President call you."

The Brain's voice broke the momentary silence that ensued. Simon Wright had poised behind Curt, listening until now.

"Then the same criminals who have been — stealing ships from the Rocketeers also took the
Comet"
he rasped. "They must have intended not merely to steal our ship but to get you, Curtis. They'd figure that we'd all be in our ship, on our way to answer the President's call."

"I believe you're right, Simon," Curt muttered thoughtfully. "But what's the purpose of the organization behind all this? And what's this mysterious weapon they use to overcome pilots inside their ships?"

EZRA GURNEY and Joan had for the first time noticed that the Brain was poising in mid-air on his beams, between Curt and Grag.

"Why, Simon can move now!" Ezra exclaimed.

Curt explained briefly about Simon Wright's new equipment. Then Captain Future continued:

"You were right in having the President call me, Ezra. These space ship thefts are serious. The ring that's pulling them apparently possesses secret new scientific powers against which ordinary precautions are useless. We'll have to fight that outfit. But first we're following this trail to Venus. It's vital that we regain possession of the
Comet
and rescue Otho, if he's still alive. This trail is also our best lead to the space ship hijacking ring. They must have a secret base on Venus."

"How're you goin' to find it if they have?" Ezra demanded. "They got a big start on us and we can't well comb all of Venus."

"I brought along an electroscope," Curt replied, showing the compact instrument under his arm. "Simon and I can use it to spot their space-trail by the ionized rocket blast, if we're lucky."

"I know you can do wonders with them electroscopes of yours, Cap'n Future," Ezra scoffed. "But plenty of ships call at Venus all the time. How in space can you spot the
Comet's
trail among 'em all?"

"The
Comet,"
Curt reminded, "is a unique ship. Its cyclotrons produce an atomic discharge unlike any other. We'll know its ionized rocket-trail, if we find it."