In the end we made a pact with the Varra. They conveyed us through space, protecting us, as far as they were able, from the Plutonian vampires, though they did not always succeed. Each man who ventured into the void was guarded and guided by a Varra, and therefore many lived who would otherwise have died. No ship went beyond the orbit of Neptune; even that was dangerous. No ship ever landed on Pluto.
Only those guarded by the Varra were permitted to leave Earth. For the rest—space was forbidden.
I
Hijacker from Hell
The Arctic blizzard swept needles of stinging ice against Saul Duncan’s face. Doggedly he plowed on, head lowered, heavy shoulders hunched against the fury of the winds. Once he heard the drone of a heliplane overhead, and flung himself flat till the sound had been swallowed by the gale. Then for a few moments his body refused to obey the grim demands of his mind. Deceptive warmth was stealing over him, inviting him to rest. But that, he knew, meant death then and there.
If he kept going, there was a chance of safety and freedom—not much of a chance, though, for few men ever escaped alive from the Transpolar Penitentiary. Situated within the Arctic Circle, the grim, guarded fortress of stone and metal and tough plastics was safer than Alcatraz had been a century and a half ago. Yet Duncan had escaped. …
His bitter lips twisted in a harsh smile. Escape! Into a polar blizzard—but that was the only possible time when a prisoner could evade the guard planes that patrolled the frigid waste. And Duncan could not have made his escape without aid from outside.
With stiff fingers he fumbled out a compass-like instrument that had been smuggled to him in the penitentiary. The needle held motionless, pointing directly into the teeth of the gale. If he kept on in that direction, sooner or later he would reach Olcott’s plane. But how long it would take he did not know.
Still, even dying in the blizzard was better than another five years in Transpolar—five years that had ravaged and embittered Saul Duncan, hardening his no-longer-youthful face, putting ice into his glance and hatred in his heart. But physically he had thrived. If a prisoner survived the first year at Transpolar, he grew tougher, harder—and more dangerous.
Duncan trudged on, shaking with cold. Ten years for murder—second degree murder. Well, he hadn’t been framed. He’d wanted to kill Moriarty. And he had succeeded, in a moment of blind, crimson rage that had flooded his brain and sent his fist smashing into Moriarty’s face with the impact of a piledriver. The man had put his filthy hands on Andrea. …
Damn him! Even now Duncan’s muscles grew tight at the memory. He recalled how he and Andrea had fought their way up, slum-bred, facing a future of poverty and crime, and how they had seized a chance of escaping from that dark future. It meant arduous work, years of training, for learning to pilot a spaceship is no easy task. But he had done it, and Andrea had been willing to wait, scraping along on just a little more than nothing, in preparation for the day when Duncan could draw the pay of a first-rate pilot.
But Moriarty had been Duncan’s superior officer. And there had been no witnesses except Andrea and Duncan. The verdict was murder, with extenuating circumstances. A recommendation for mercy.
Mercy—ten years in Transpolar, of which Duncan had already served five! Five years of knowing that Andrea, ticketed as a jailbird’s wife, could scarcely earn enough to keep alive. Five years, and there were patches of iron gray along Saul Duncan’s temples.
He had grown bitter. He hated the society that had sent him to a living hell, and when Olcott offered escape. …
At a price, of course. But Duncan was ready to pay that price. His gray eyes were savage as he marched on, staggering sometimes, snow crusting on his lashes so that he could scarcely see.
So well was the plane camouflaged that he almost lurched into the white hull before he realized that he had reached the end of the march. Sudden weakness overtook Duncan, and he found it difficult to move the few steps to the cabin’s door. He pounded on the alloy with fists that had no feeling.
There was a click, and the panel slid open, letting a gust of warm air play about Duncan’s cheeks.
Brent Olcott stood there, tall, dark-haired and arrogantly handsome. He was a big man, like Duncan, but so well proportioned that his movements were tigerishly graceful. His teeth flashed under a well-kept mustache as he extended a hand.
It was impossible to speak above the gale’s shriek. Not till the panel had been shut, cutting off the uproar, did Olcott say tersely, “Glad you made it, Duncan. I didn’t count on a storm like this.”
“I made it. That’s the important part.” It was difficult to articulate with almost frozen lips. Olcott looked at him sharply.
“Frostbite? Can’t have that. Strip down and rub yourself with that.” He nodded toward an auto-refrigerated bucket of chopped ice on a shelf. “If we’re ordered down, I’ve a secret compartment you can slide into. Crowded quarters, but you won’t be found there. Now—” He turned to the controls as Duncan, shivering, peeled off his wet garments.
It was a difficult takeoff, despite the triple-powered motor. Only a gyro-equipped plane could have made it. The ship lurched and rocked dangerously in the blast.
Duncan fought his way beside Olcott. “Got rockets?”
“Auxiliaries, yes. But—”
“They won’t be seen in this storm.”
Olcott spread his hands in a meaning gesture. Few atmosphere pilots could handle the tricky manipulations of rocket-tubes. They were for emergency only, but this, Duncan thought, was an emergency. He thrust Olcott away and slid into the cushioned cradle-chair. His fingers, still stiff, poised over the keys.
Then his old-time skill came back, the intricate series of what were really conditioned reflexes that made a pilot capable of handling a bank of tube
