Captain Future 25 - Moon of the Unforgotten (January 1951) (5 page)

Curt felt a great relief, greater than he should have had for the mere saving of a bit of antique science. Again he avoided Otho’s gaze and even more the cold penetrating glance of Simon Wright’s lens-eyes.

He said to Konnur, “It is done then. Waken the sleepers and let them have time to think and choose. I will see that the arrangements are made to trans-ship and settle all those who wish to go.”

He took Ezra by the arm, shaking him from the reverie into which he had sunk again. “Come on,” he said. “We’re finished here for good.”

* * *

They were walking across the spaceport, the six of them, the Futuremen and Joan and Ezra, heading for the ships under the red glow of Jupiter. And Simon Wright said something that had been on his mind to say these days during which Curt had labored to finish the removal of willing exiles to a remote and barren moon.

“Was it out of pity for them, Curtis — or did you wish to live the Second Life again yourself some day?”

Curt answered slowly.

“I’m not sure. It’s too dangerous a thing to meddle with overmuch and yet — much knowledge could be gained that way. If a man could be sure of himself, of his own mind...”

He shook his head and Simon said dryly, “The last thing a man is ever sure of is the strength of his own mind.”

Otho looked up at Grag.

“But you really ought to try it some time, Grag.”

“The Second Life?” rumbled Grag. “Why, now, come to think of it maybe I should.”

“Certainly,” Otho told him. “It would be a fascinating experience to learn how your ancestral pig-iron felt in the forge.”

Grag turned on him. “Listen, android —”

Curt’s voice cut them short and their step quickened as they went on toward the ships.

But Ezra walked last, slowly, the shadow still on his lined old face as he looked back — back to the remembered past, the bright lost days, the forever unforgotten.

THE END

In this department, which is a regular feature of CAPTAIN FUTURE, we acquaint you further with the companions of CAPTAIN FUTURE whom you have met in our complete book-length novels. Here you are told the off-the-record stories of their lives and anecdotes plucked from their careers. Follow this department closely, for it contains many interesting and fascinating facts to supplement those you read in our featured novels.

The Birth of Grag

From the Spring 1943 issue of Captain Future

The Astonishing Facts in the Experiments of Roger Newton and Simon Wright Which Brought a Thinking Robot into Being!

THE tall red-haired man who stood in the center of the moon-laboratory stood back for a moment and surveyed the robot’s body. In the laboratory itself, the humming of atomic motors could be heard, supplying light and heat, purifying the air, making the rockbound retreat livable.

But looking out through the plastex windows, he could see the barren airless landscape of Earth’s satellite, covered with dark and gloomy shadows that offered almost perfect hiding places for the dangerous metal-eating moon-wolves. There, all was cold, silent, almost as empty of life and as dangerous as space itself.

Soon there would be five of them on the Moon, but at the moment there were only four — Roger Newton, the red-haired man himself; his wife, his infant son, Curtis; and Simon Wright, a grizzled old scientist who had been Roger’s friend for years.

Simon was ailing, and already could see death approaching, but he had as yet no suspicion of the strange fate that would eventually be his — to live as a Brain without a body, to exist, and yet to be free of almost all human cares.

Now he was still human, with the thoughts and emotions of a man.

He was the most brilliant scientist that Earth had produced in generations, and at the moment the most excited one. For today was to see the climax of years of careful work.

A METAL BODY IS BUILT

Roger Newton moved toward a speaking tube. “Well, Simon,” he said, “it’s time for our robot to be born.”

A moment later Simon entered the laboratory. The huge room was full of strange instruments and novel forms of apparatus, most of them constructed by Roger and Simon themselves, implements unknown anywhere else on the solar planets or their satellites.

But none was more wonderful than the metal body of the robot, and the matchless mechanism of hydrophilic colloid metal that was to be his brain.

The body lay upon a sturdy table, a suggestion of latent power in the motionless limbs that had been constructed so carefully of specially treated steel. No other robot possessed a body like it, but nonetheless it had taken the scientists little enough time to fabricate.

It was the making of the brain that had delayed the birth of Grag. The plans for it had first been drawn up ten years before by Simon. It had taken a long time for them to come to fruition, but now the task was done, with hundreds of thousands of brain paths carefully traced in the finely divided metal, each path so tiny and delicate as to be invisible, and yet possessed of sufficient strength to control the motions of the mighty monster that would soon come to life.

The brain had been placed in a temporary case of strong steel. Now Simon, with more caution than if he had been handling a new born babe, lifted it out and inserted it into the cavity prepared for it within the robot’s head.

Here it would be protected by the strongest metal yet known — magnasteel, beside which ordinary steel had the strength of wet paper. There was one more task to do, the connecting of numerous brain endings with the metal spinal cord.

CONNECTING THE BRAIN

Simon’s skilled hands worked quickly, while Roger Newton handled the bank of electrical instruments that sent a pulsing current through the newly made joints.

It was necessary to fuse each joint thoroughly and at the same time avoid overheating. In a half hour Simon was finished, and stepped back to examine his handiwork.

The robot was ready. Simon and Roger exchanged glances, and Roger pushed a switch toward his elderly colleague.

“You bring him to life, Simon,” he said. “He’s really your baby.”

He could see the veins throbbing in Simon’s temple as the elderly scientist’s hand moved toward the switch. Emotion was a thing that had for years seemed utterly alien to Simon’s nature, but now a feeling of excitement, almost of fear, seemed to pervade his every fiber.

What if somewhere he had made a tiny mistake, if the robot did not come to life, or if he came to life, and failed to possess the qualities for which Simon had toiled so painfully? Simon’s fingers pressed down on the tiny knob of plastic.

The robot’s photoelectric eyes suddenly glowed with light.

“Stand up,” ordered Simon, and Grag arose as readily as if he had been following orders for years.

“I obey, Master,” he said in a deep mechanical voice.

There was a gleam of triumph in Simon’s eyes. Years of effort had been crowned with success. The robot was alive, and acting exactly as he should act.

PERIL IN THE LUCENITE PIT

It required several days before he and Roger realized that something was wrong. Neither scientist could put his finger on the thing that aroused his uneasiness, but they both felt it. Grag obeyed orders well — perhaps even too well. But it seemed absurd to find a reason for complaint in that.

Then there came the day when Roger Newton discovered the rare mineral in one of the moon craters. Simon, working in the laboratory, heard his excited voice through the audiophone the two scientists always wore when one or both of them worked afield from the main home.

“Come quickly, Simon, I’ve discovered a large deposit of lucenite!”

Pausing only to slip on a space helmet and to bark a curt order to Grag to follow, Simon hastened out of the laboratory. He found Roger gazing in triumph at a deposit of pinkish-gray mineral that spread over a patch of several square yards.

Within the patch, Roger had been digging, and although he was now a dozen feet beneath the surface, the end of the lucenite was not yet in sight.

“Here it is, Simon, enough to supply us for years! Now we’ll no longer have to import rare metals from Earth!”

Simon’s eyes showed his pleasure. “It’ll save us valuable time,” he said. And then he looked around quickly. A slight noise, transmitted through the ground, had reached his ears.

A pack of moon-wolves was approaching. The giant, long-fanged beasts, their grayish metallic bodies gleaming, had scented food. They preferred to eat metal, but in case of need would devour anything living that came their way. And neither Roger nor Simon had remembered to bring weapons.

Simon’s lips tightened. “You run for it, Roger,” he said. “I’ll try to hold them off.”

Roger shook his head as he hefted the pick he had been working with.

Simon persisted, “You’ve got your wife to live for — and Curt. I’m an old man. I’m going soon, anyhow.”

“We’ll run together — if Grag can hold them off,” decided Newton.

GRAG’S FIRST TRIAL

Together they stared at the giant robot, who was regarding the approaching and snarling beasts with great interest. “We’ve made him strong enough,” admitted Simon. “If only he has enough intelligence —”

Roger spoke directly to the robot. “Grag, we are returning to the laboratory. Do not let the moon-wolves follow us. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Master,” boomed Grag. “I shall obey.”

They watched Grag move slowly toward the approaching monsters. Then, without further delay, they turned and ran.

They were not followed. Evidently Grag was not finding it as difficult as they had feared to fight off the moon-wolves. Simon dashed into the moon-laboratory and immediately made for the cupboard where several atom-guns were stored.

They were weapons of especially large caliber, and projected beams that would drill through a moon-wolf as easily as an ordinary beam would drill through a man. They had been constructed especially for that purpose.

Each holding a pair of the guns, Simon and Roger retraced their steps. As they came within sight of the snarling beasts, Roger stared in bewilderment.

“Where is he?”

Grag was nowhere to be seen. Nevertheless, the beasts had remained in the same spot where the men had left them, and were quarreling over something that lay on the ground.

“It’s Grag’s brain-case,” suddenly cried Simon hoarsely. “The magnasteel has resisted their teeth! But they’ve eaten the rest of him!”

He plunged toward the animals with a shout of rage, both guns blasting. A pair of moon-wolves fell, but another trio came leaping toward him. One howled soundlessly while still in the air, then fell motionless as an atom-ray blasted him. The others came on.

Roger fired quickly, and the leading beast fell just as his teeth closed over Simon’s leg. The other moon-wolf hesitated, turned to run, and snarled one last time in defiance at the deadly beam which penetrated his body.

Of the entire pack, only one of the creatures succeeded in gaining the nearby shadows safely.

THE MYSTERY OF GRAG’S DEFEAT

Simon’s leg was torn and bleeding, but he evidently felt no pain. He picked up Grag’s brain-case, his own face white. As they were to discover later, Grag’s brain was functioning inside it as well as ever. But of Grag’s enormously powerful body there was not a trace. The beasts, in their lust for metal, had devoured it all.

“He didn’t put up a struggle!” exclaimed Roger in amazement.

“He just let them eat his body.” Simon’s face was working with emotion. “Roger, I’ve made a terrible mistake. This robot is worthless. I may as well throw this brain away and start all over again... except that I won’t live long enough to complete another one.”

“All you need do is make a slight change,” suggested Roger.

“It’ll require more than that. I made the mistake, Roger, of distrusting our robot, and therefore made him too obedient. It’s impossible to go over each of those brain-paths again, and alter that. He’ll be like this as long as he lives.”

Roger was silent. Then he spoke as if to himself. “All we need do is supply him with a few reflexes that will take the place of an instinct of self-preservation. If we succeed in that, he’ll continue to obey us just as he’s done — and he’ll resist the will of any one else.”

Simon scowled. “It isn’t so easy to supply only the reflexes we want, and nothing else.”

“You are forgetting the lucenite,” replied Roger.

There was a startled look on Simon’s face. “The lucenite! Of course! We can immerse the brain in a suitable solution, subject it to lucenite radiations, and only those ions will penetrate that are sufficiently hydrophilic! And then, if we send a few telepathic currents through the solution —”

“It won’t take long.”

“A matter of weeks. To work,” said Simon grimly. “My time is short.”

THE NEW GRAG

Rebuilding Grag’s body took just as long a time as making the alterations in his brain. Then, once more Simon pressed the life-giving switch, once more the inanimate metal became a living robot. Observing Grag casually, the two scientists could detect no change in him. Had the treatment of his brain produced any effect?

It was a day later that they had the answer. Simon barked out an order, received no reply, and looked around. Grag had disappeared. He was not in the moon-laboratory, and no one had seen him go.

“He
is
different,” observed Simon. “In his previous existence he never went away without receiving a specific order to do so.”

“I wonder where he is,” said Roger.

“Someplace where those moon-wolves can get at him, I suppose. Did he take an atom-gun along?”

All the atom-guns were still in the laboratory. Simon and Roger exchanged gloomy glances. If the same thing happened this time that had happened before, they would know that the robot was not worth saving.

The hours passed slowly, and within the laboratory there grew a feeling of tenseness and of irritation. Grag had not only left without receiving orders to leave, but he had done worse than that. By omitting to perform the tasks that the two scientists had counted on his performing, he had disarranged the laboratory’s work.

It was more than six hours before Grag returned. When he came, he was dragging the dead bodies of half a dozen moon-wolves behind him.

“Where have you been?” asked Simon coldly.

“Out killing these beasts,” boomed Grag. “I heard you talking, Master, and I realized they were pests. So I figured I’d go hunting and get rid of a bunch of them. Just to make things safer around here.”

Roger smiled. Grag might be a trifle difficult to control in the future, but there was no doubt about his intelligence.

“Did it take you all this time to kill a half dozen?” asked Simon.

“I killed about fifty,” growled the robot. “I just didn’t want to take the trouble to bring them all back. First it was easy, because they scented me, and came running. After a time, when the others saw what happened to the first batch, I had to go look for them.”