Vulcan's Workshop Part 2

"h.e.l.l's bells!" he yelped. "What goes on here?"

Then he saw Novak--and heard him. Novak was writhing on the ground, begging for death. And the chief guard's dart gun tw.a.n.ged as its needlelike missile sped forth and drove into the sick man's breast where it sang its shrill song of vibratory dissolution.

In the twinkling of an eye where Novak had lain was only the dust of complete disintegration and a few scintillating, dancing light flecks that swiftly snuffed out. A speedy and merciful end.

In the silence that followed, Gannett turned on Kulan. "Why didn't you send for me?" he demanded.

The guard, white with rage, indicated Luke.

"So--the tough guy Fenton again. Can't you handle him?"

Kulan's yellow eyes flashed fire. "Sure I can; I will. But I want your permission, sir. With my hands."

"No,"--flatly. And then Gannett whirled to look over the mess tables, whence a few scattered hisses had arisen.

His gaze was solemn when he returned it to Kulan. Swiftly his black eyes measured the Martian's giant body, and then they swung to Luke. The comparison evidently pleased him, for he changed his mind.

"On second thought, yes," he said to Kulan. "It'll be good for discipline. Only don't disable him; he's too valuable a worker."

Luke concealed his unholy glee; stood glowering savagely. "In fair fight?" he put in.

"In fair fight," sneered Gannett. He took personal charge of Kulan's weapons. "All right, you," he yelled then to the mess, "you can watch this. But if there's a sound or a move from any one of you there'll be the neutro-broadcast and full gravity for an hour for the whole flea-bitten gang of you."

He drew back, motioning Luke and Kulan to an open s.p.a.ce nearby. There was not the slightest doubt in his mind as to the outcome, for the Martian towered over his stocky opponent and was fully fifty pounds heavier. This irregular procedure would put a stop to some of the open homage paid to this reputed tough guy by the prisoners, and to the restlessness among them which his coming had occasioned.

They fought instantly and with silent deadliness of purpose, these two.

Luke drove in two terrible blows to the big Martian's body in the split-second before they closed, breathtaking punches that rocked Kulan yet did not slow him up in the least. And then the tangle of arms and legs and bodies of the two was so swift moving and violent that the watchers could not follow them.

Now they were up, slugging, clinching; now down, rolling over and over, straining and tearing at each other like beasts of the jungle. Once, breaking free, Luke was seen to batter Kulan's face to a b.l.o.o.d.y ma.s.s with swift, hammering fists that thudded too rapidly to count. And then the Martian had flung him to the rocky ground so heavily that it seemed certain the Earthman's end had come. But such was not the case, for there was a flailing scramble and Luke Fenton rose up with the great body of Kulan across his shoulders. He spread his legs wide and heaved mightily.

The Martian guard kicked and squirmed, las.h.i.+ng out with his huge fists at the squarely-built and squarely-planted body of the Earthman below him. But to no avail. Grasping a shoulder and a thigh, Fenton straightened his thick arms and Kulan was hoisted aloft. Amazingly then, the madly struggling guard was flung out and away to land with a sickening thud, smashed and crumpled on the rocks.

Luke stood swaying on those spreadeagled legs and his lungs were near bursting from the exertion in the noxious atmosphere. "There you are, Gannett," he howled through swollen lips. "That fair enough for you?"

In the ominous silence a cracked voice yelped: "Attaboy Fenton!"

Wild disorder followed. Immediately there was the raucous call of the general alarm siren and a flas.h.i.+ng light from the bastion that paled the red mists to a sickly, luminous pink. Full gravity coming down with crus.h.i.+ng force on the hapless prisoners.

Luke, as he was flattened, gasping painfully under the enormous pressure, saw that Gannett and the rest of the guards were not affected by the neutro-broadcast. They stood erect and moved freely among the prisoners who sprawled everywhere in grotesque squashed heaps. Queer.

There was no way of beating the authorities at this game.

Gannett transferred Luke to the dreaded sealed cell in the reduction plant, a room spoken of in hushed whispers by the convicts, and in which it was reported an inmate suffered indescribable tortures for the better part of three weeks. Then he died in horrible misery, for one could not survive longer than that.

Kulan had not been killed. He would recover, but was pretty well smashed up, with a fractured hip and several broken ribs, one of which had punctured a lung. It would be necessary to return him to Mars on the next ethers.h.i.+p, due in two days. Strangely, the news brought Luke no great amount of satisfaction.

When they locked him up in the sealed cell for his first period of labor he saw there was only one other occupant. A tall lanky Earthman with narrow aristocratic features and keen gray eyes. He was perhaps forty-five, slightly stooped, and with thin graying hair. Luke had seen him several times at mess and had contemptuously cla.s.sed him as a highbrow. Fuller, his name was.

This was a small room where several slender chutes brought down tumbling crystals of a silvery salt from somewhere above, emptying it into gla.s.s containers that stood in endless rows in wooden racks. You filled these containers with the salt, then sealed them in lead tubes and packed them for s.h.i.+pment. There was a faint pungent odor in the air of the room, a new smell that widened Luke's nostrils and caught at his throat and lungs.

In this place you were watched by a guard who came regularly each half hour and spied on you through a peephole.

Child's play, the work in the sealed cell. Luke went at it half-heartedly and he spoke no word to Fuller after the heavy door had closed them in. After ten minutes of silence he caught himself watching his companion furtively.

What was there about Fuller that marked him as superior to Luke and the rest of the convicts? A good gust of wind would blow the man away; a woman might easily beat him in a rough and tumble. Yet this man had something which unmistakably proclaimed greatness, the same something that gave authority and power to the smart guys of Earth and Mars.

Brains--book-learning! Luke snorted.

Fuller was looking at him with calmly appraising gaze. Luke scowled darkly, but the keen eyes that measured him did not waver.

"You're a fool, Fenton," came from the thin lips.

"What!" Luke advanced threateningly.

"I repeat: you are a fool." Still the gray eyes were unwavering.

"Why, you--you----" Spasmodically Luke's fingers closed down on the spare shoulder with crus.h.i.+ng force.

By not so much as the flicker of an eyelash did Fuller betray the pain that must have come with that grip. He did not even wince, but swiftly lashed out with a bony fist, raking Luke's cheek with sharp knuckles.

The blow stung, but was utterly futile. With a single cuff Luke could send the man sprawling; with a single wrench of his powerful hands, snap his spine. Yet he did neither, and the impulse to laugh coa.r.s.ely died in his throat. Here was courage of a kind he never had encountered; here a man in whose bright eyes fearlessness and defiance mingled with a cool disdain that brought the first real feeling of inferiority Luke ever had experienced.

He relaxed his grip of Fuller's shoulder and his big hands fell loosely at his sides. It was that action which saved Fenton. He did not know it at the time, nor would he have believed it. But he was to remember many times and finally to realize it, though he never fully understood.

"That's better," breathed Fuller. And the ghost of a smile crinkled the corner of his mouth.

At the old man's warning Luke returned to his own work bench and was industriously engaged when the guard's eye showed at the peephole. Then the eye was gone and he grinned over at Fuller.

"How long you been in here?" he ventured.

"Five days in the sealed cell; ten altogether in the Workshop."

Luke pondered this. "How'd you get in the cell?"

"Same way you did--I struck a guard."

"No!" marveled Luke. "Mean to tell me you----"

"I had a reason to get in here," Fuller broke in mildly.

"You--you _wanted_ to get in?" Luke was incredulous.

"I did."

"My G.o.d, you ain't crazy, are you--wantin' to get yourself killed off quicker?"