Lucky Starr and the Moons of Jupiter Isaac Asimov

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NOW HEAR THIS...

The change came over Lucky. His dark brown eyes turned hard. Every muscle of Lucky's tall body seemed tense.

"Commander Donahue," Lucky said, "I am responsible omy to the head of the Council of Science and to the President of the Solar Federation of Worlds. I outrank you and yon will .be bound by my decisions and orders.

"The warning yon have just given me is evidence of your own incompetence. You are obviously not In control of your men and not fit to command men. Now hear this: I will land on Jupiter Nine and I will conduct my Investigations. I will handle your men if yon cannot.''

He paused while the other gasped. "Do you understand, Commander?"

By Isaac Aslmov

Published by Ballantine Books:

THE CLASSIC FOUNDATION SERIES: Foundation

Foundation and Empire Second Foundation Foundation's Edge

THE GALACTIC EMPIRE HOVELS; The Stars, Like Dust The Currents Of Space Pebble In The Sky

THE CAVES OF STEEL

THE NAKED SUN

I, ROBOT

THE WINDS OF CHANGE

THE LUCKY STARR ADVENTURES: David Starr—Space Ranger Lucky Starr and the Pirates of the Asteroids Lucky Starr and the Oceans of Venus Lucky Starr and the Big Sun of Mercury Lucky Starr and the Moons of Jupiter Lucky Starr and the Rings of Saturn

LUCKY STARR AND THE

MOONS OF

JUPITER

Isaac Asimov

A Del Rey Book

BALLANTINE BOOKS · MEW YORK

writing as Paul French

VL: 7 + up RLL: IL: 8 + up

A Del Rey Book

Published by Ballantine Books

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Catiada Limited, Toronto.

All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

ISBN 0-345-31623-1

This edition published by arrangement with Doubleday and Company, Inc.

Manufactured in the United States of America First Ballantine Books Edition: August 1984 Cover art by David B. Mattingly

CONTENTS

1 Trouble on Jupiter Nine 9

2 The Commander Is Angry 19

3 The Agrav Corridor 29

4 Initiation! 41

5 Needle-Guns and Neighbors 51

6 Death Enters the Game 63

7 A Robot Enters the Game 73

8 Blindness 83

9 The Agrav Ship 93

10 In the Vitals of the Ship 103

11 Down the Line of Moons 113

12 The Skies and Snows of Io 123

13 Fall! 135

14 Jupiter Close-up 145

15 Traitor! 157

16 Robot! 167

Preface

Back in the 1950s, I wrote a series of six derring-do novels about David "Lucky" Starr and his battles against malefactors within the Solar System. Each of the six took place in a different region of the system and in each case I made use of the astronomical facts—as they were then known.

Now more than a quarter-century later, these novels are being published in new editions; but what a quarter-century it has been! More has been learned about the worlds of our Solar System in this last quarter-century than in all the thousands of years that went before.

LUCKY STARR: AND THE MOONS OF JUPITER was written in 1956. In late 1973, however, the Jupiter-probe, Pioneer X, passed by Jupiter and recorded an enormous magnetic field containing dense concentrations of charged particles. The large satellites of Jupiter are buried in that field and the intensity of radiation would certainly make it difficult or even impossible for manned ships to maneuver in their neighborhood.

Lucky's trip through the satellite system would have to be adjusted to take the intense radiation into account if I were writing the book today. And in 1974, a 13th satellite of Jupiter, was discovered, a very small one only a few miles across, with an orbit quite similar to that of Jupiter-IX. I'd have mentioned it if I were doing the book now.

I hope my Gentle Readers enjoy the book anyway, as an adventure story, but please don't forget that the advance of science can outdate even the most conscientious science-fiction writer and that my astronomical descriptions are no longer accurate in all respects.

isaac asimov

Trouble on Jupiter Nine

Jupiter was almost a perfect circle of creamy light, half the apparent diameter of the moon as seen from Earth, but only one seventh as brightly lit because of its great distance from the sun. Even so, it was a beautiful and impressive sight.

Lucky Starr gazed at it thoughtfully. The lights in the control room were out and Jupiter was centered on the visiplate, its dim light making Lucky and his companion something more than mere shadows. Lucky said, "If Jupiter were hollow, Bigman, you could dump thirteen hundred planets the size of Earth into it and still not quite fill it up. It weighs more than all the other planets put together."

John Bigman Jones, who allowed no one to call him anything but Bigman, and who was five feet two inches tall if he stretched a little, disapproved of anything that was big, except Lucky. He said, "And what good is all of it? No one can land on it. No one can come near it."

"We'll never land on it, perhaps," said Lucky, "but we'll be coming close to it once the Agrav ships are developed."

"With the Sirians on the job," said Bigman, scowling in the gloom, "it's going to take ms to make sure that happens."

"Well, Bigman, we'll see."

Bigman pounded his small right fist into the open palm of his other hand. "Sands of Mars, Lucky, how long do we have to wait here?"

They were in Lucky's ship, the Shooting Starr, which was in an orbit about Jupiter, having matched velocities with Jupiter Nine, the giant planet's outermost satellite of any size.

That satellite hung stationary a thousand miles away. Officially, its name was Adrastea, but except for the largest and closest, Jupiter's satellites were more popularly known by numbers. Jupiter Nine was only eighty-nine miles in diameter, merely an asteroid, really, but it looked larger than distant Jupiter, fifteen million miles away. The satellite was a craggy rock, gray and forbidding in the sun's weak light, and scarcely worth interest. Both Lucky and Bigman had seen a hundred such sights in the asteroid belt.

In one way, however, it was different. Under its skin a thousand men and billions of dollars labored to produce ships that would be immune to the effects of gravity.

Nevertheless, Lucky preferred watching Jupiter. Even at its present distance from the ship (actually three fifths of the distance of Venus from Earth at then closest approach), Jupiter showed a disc large enough to reveal its colored zones to the naked eye. They showed in fault pink and greenish-blue, as though a child had dipped Ms fingers in a watery paint and trailed them across Jupiter's image.

Lucky almost forgot the deadliness of Jupiter in its beauty. Bigman had to repeat his question in a louder voice.

"Hey, Lucky, how long do we have to wait here?"

"You know the answer to that, Bigman. Until Commander Donahue comes to pick us up."

"I know that part. What I want to know is why we have to wait for him."

"Because he's asked us to."

"Oh, he has. Who does the cobber think he is?"

"The head of the Agrav project," Lucky said patiently.

"You don't have to do what he says, you know, even if he is."

Bigman had a sharp and deep realization of Lucky's powers. As full member of the Council of Science, that selfless and brilliant organization that fought the enemies of Earth within and without the solar system, Lucky Starr could write his own ticket even against the most high-ranking.

But Lucky was not quite ready to do that. Jupiter was a known danger, a planet of poison and unbearable gravity; but the situation on Jupiter Nine was more dangerous still because the exact points of danger were unknown—and until Lucky could know a bit more, he was picking his way forward carefully.

"Be patient, Bigman," he said.

Bigman grumbled and flipped the lights on. "We're not staring at Jupiter all day, are we?"

He walked over to the small Venusian creature bobbing up and down in its enclosed water-filled cage in the corner of the pilot room. He peered fondly down at it, his wide mouth grinning with pleasure. The

V-frog always had that effect on Bigman, or indeed, on anyone.

The V-frog was a native of the Venusian oceans,* a tiny thing that seemed, at times, all eyes and feet. Its body was green and froglike and but six inches long. His twa big eyes protruded like gleaming blackberries, and its sharp, strongly curved beak opened and closed at irregular intervals. At the moment its six legs were retracted, so that the V-frog hugged the bottom of its cage, but when Bigman tapped the top cover, they unfolded like a carpenter's rule and became stilts. ^

It was an ugly little thing but Bigman loved it when he was near it. He couldn't help it. Anyone else would feel the same. The V-frog saw to that.

Carefully Bigman checked the carbon-dioxide cylinder that kept the V-frog's water well saturated and healthful and made sure that the water temperature in the cage was at ninety-five. (The warm oceans of Venus were bathed by and saturated with an atmosphere of nitrogen and carbon dioxide. Free oxygen, nonexistent on Venus except in the man-made domed cities at the bottom of its ocean shallows, would have been most uncomfortable for the V-frog.)

Bigman said, "Do you think the weed supply is enough?" and as though the V-frog heard the remark, its beak snipped a green tendril off the native Venusian weed that spread through the cage, and chewed slowly.

Lucky said, "It will hold till we land on Jupiter Nine," and then both men looked up sharply as the receiving signal sounded its unmistakable rasp.

A stern, aging face was centered on the visiplate

* See Lucky Starr and the Oceans of Venus.

after Lucky's fingers had quickly made the necessary adjustments.

"Donahue at this end," said a voice briskly.

"Yes, Commander," said Lucky. "We've been waiting for you."

"Clear locks for tube attachment, then."

On the commander's face, written in an expression as clear as though it consisted of letters the size of Class I meteors, was worry—trouble and worry.

Lucky had grown accustomed to just that expression on men's faces in these past weeks. On Chief Councilman Hector Conway's for instance. To the chief councilman, Lucky was almost a son and the older man felt no need to assume any pretense of confidence.

Conway's rosy face, usually amiable and self-assured under its crown of pure white hair, was set in a troubled frown. ''I've been waiting for a chance to talk to you for months."

'Trouble?" Lucky asked quietly. He had just returned from Mercury less than a month earlier, and the intervening time had been spent in his New York apartment. "I didn't get any calls from you."

"You earned your vacation," Conway said gruffly. "I wish I could afford to let it continue longer."

"Just what is it, Uncle Hector?"

The chief councilman's old eyes stared firmly into those of the tall, lithe youngster before him and seemed to find comfort in those calm, brown ones. "Sirius!" he said.

Lucky felt a stir of excitement within him. Was it the great enemy at last?

It had been centuries since the pioneering expedi-

tions from Earth had colonized the planets of the nearer stars. New societies had grown up on those worlds outside the solar system. Independent societies that scarcely remembered their Earthly origin.

The Sirian planets formed the oldest and strongest of those societies. The society had grown up on new worlds where an advanced science was brought to bear on untapped resources. It was no secret that the Sirianss strong in the belief that they represented the best of mankind, looked forward to the time when they might rule all men everywhere; and that they considered Earth, the old mother world, their greatest enemy.

In the past they had done what they could to support the enemies of Earth at home* but never yet had they felt quite strong enough to risk open war.

But now?

"What' s this about Sinus?" asked Lucky.

Conway leaned back. His fingers drummed lightly on the table. He said, "Sirius grows stronger each year. We know that But their worlds are underpopulated; they have only a few millions. We still have more human beings in our solar system than exist in all the galaxy besides. We have more ships and more scientists; we still have the edge. But, by Space, we won't keep that edge if things keep on as they've been going."

"In what way?"

"The Sirians are finding out things. The Council has definite evidence that Sirius is completely up-to-date on our Agrav research."

"What!" Lucky was startled. There were few things more top-secret than the Agrav project. One of the reasons actual construction had been confined to one of the outer satellites of Jupiter had been for the sake

* See Lucky Starr and the Pirates of the Asteroids.

of better security. "Great Galaxy, how has that happened?"

Conway smiled bitterly. "That is indeed the question. How has that happened? All sorts of material are leaking out to them, and we don't know how. The Agrav data is most critical. We've tried to stop it. There isn't a man on the project that hasn't been thoroughly checked for loyalty. There isn't a precaution we haven't taken. Yet material still leaks. We've planted false data and that's gone out. We know it has from our own Intelligence information. We've planted data in such ways that it couldn't go out, and yet it has."

"How do you mean couldn't go out?"

"We scattered it so that no one man—in fact, no half dozen men—could possibly be aware of it all. Yet it went. It would mean that a number of men would have to be co-operating in espionage and that's just unbelievable."

"Or that some one man has access everywhere," said Lucky.

"Which is just as impossible. It must be something new, Lucky. Do you see the implication? If Sirius has learned a new way of picking our brains, we're no longer safe. We could never organize a defense against them. We could never make plans against them."

"Hold it, Uncle Hector. Great Galaxy, give yourself a minute. What do you mean when you say they're picking our brains?" Lucky fixed his glance keenly on the older man.

The chief councilman flushed. "Space, Lucky, I'm getting desperate. I can't see how else this can be done. The Sirians must have developed some form of mind reading, of telepathy."

"Why be embarrassed at suggesting that? I suppose

it's possible. We know of one practical means of telepathy at least. The Venusian V-frogs."

"All right," said Conway. "I've thought of that, too, but they don't have Venusian V-frogs. I know what's been going on in V-frog research. It takes thousands of them working in combination to make telepathy possible. To keep thousands of them anywhere but on Venus would be awfully difficult, and easily detectable, too. And without V-frogs, there is no way of managing telepathy."

"No way we've worked out," Lucky said softly, "so far. It is possible that the Sirians are ahead of us in telepathy research."

"Without V-frogs?"

"Even without V-frogs."

"I don't believe it," Conway cried violently. "I can't believe that the Sirians can have solved any problem that has left the Council of Science so completely helpless."

Lucky almost smiled at the older man's pride in the organization, but had to admit that there was something more than merely pride there. The Council of Science represented the greatest collection of intellect the galaxy had ever seen, and for a century not one sizable piece of scientific advance anywhere in the Galaxy had come anywhere but from the Council.

Nevertheless Lucky couldn't resist a small dig. He said, "They're ahead of us in robotics."

"Not really," snapped Conway. "Only in its applications. Earthmen invented the positronic brain that made the modern mechanical man possible. Don't forget that. Earth can take the credit for all the basic developments. It's just that Sinus builds more robots

and," he hesitated, "has perfected some of the engineering details."

"So I found out on Mercury," Lucky said grimly.*

"Yes, I know, Lucky. That was dreadfully close."

"But it's over. Let's consider what's facing us now. The situation is this: Sinus is conducting successful espionage and we can't stop them."

"Yes."

"And the Agrav project is most seriously affected."

"Yes."

"And I suppose, Uncle Hector, that what you want me to do is to go out to Jupiter Nine and see if I can learn something about this."

Conway nodded gloomily. "It's what I'm asking you to do. It's unfair to you. I've gotten into the habit of thinking of you as my ace, my trump card, a man I can give any problem and be sure it will be solved. Yet what can you do here? There's nothing Council hasn't tried and we've located no spy and no method of espionage. What more can we expect of you?"

"Not of myself alone. I'll have help."

"Bigman?" The older man couldn't help smiling.

"Not Bigman alone. Let me ask you a question. To your knowledge, has any information concerning our V-frog research on Venus leaked out to the Sirians?"

"No," said Conway. "None has, to my knowledge."

"Then I'll ask to have a V-frog assigned to me."

"A V-frog! One V-frog?"

"That's right."

"But what good win that do you? The mental field of a single V-frog is terribly weak. You won't be able to read minds."

* See Lucky Starr and the Big Sun of Mercury.

"True, but I might be able to catch whiffs of strong emotion."

Conway said thoughtfully, "You might do that. But what good would that do?"

''I'm not sure yet. Still, it will be an advantage previous investigators haven't had. An unexpected emotional surge on the part of someone there might help me, might give me grounds for suspicion, might point the direction for further investigation. Then, too—"

"Yes?"

"If someone possesses telepathic power, developed either naturally or by use of artificial aids, I might detect something much stronger than just a whiff of emotion. I might detect an actual thought, some distinct thought, before the individual learns enough from my mind to shield his thoughts. You see what I mean?"

"He could detect your emotions, too."

"Theoretically, yes, but I would be listening for emotion, so to speak. He would not."

Conway's eyes brightened. "It's a feeble hope, but, by Space, it's a hope! I'll get you your V-frog . . . But one thing, David," and it was only at moments of deep concern that he used Lucky's real name, the one by which the young councilman had been known all through childhood—"I want you to appreciate the importance of this. If we don't find out what the Sirians are doing, it means they are really ahead of us at last. And that means war can't be delayed much longer. War or peace hangs on this."

"I know," said Lucky softly.

The Commander Is Angry

And so it came about that Lucky Starr, Earthman, and his small friend, Bigman Jones, born and bred on Mars,* traveled beyond the asteroid belt and into the outer reaches of the solar system. And it was for this reason also that a native of Venus, not a man at all, but a small mind-reading and mind-influencing animal, accompanied them.

They hovered, now, a thousand miles above Jupiter Nine and waited as a flexible conveyer tube was made fast between the Shooting Starr and the commander's ship. The tube linked air lock to air lock and formed a passageway which men could use in going from one ship to the other without having to put on a space suit. The air of both ships mingled, and a man used to space, taking advantage of the absence of gravity, could shoot along the tube after a single initial push and guide himself along those places where the tube curved with the gentle adjusting force of a well-placed elbow.

* See David Starr, Space Ranger.

The commander's hands were the first part of him visible at the lock opening. They gripped the lip of the opening and pushed in such a way that the commander himself leapfrogged out and came down in the Shooting Starr's localized artificial gravity field (or pseudo-grav field, as it was usually termed) with scarcely a stagger. It was neatly done, and Bigman, who had high standards indeed for all forms of spacemen's techniques, nodded in approval.

"Good day, Councilman Starr," said Donahue gruffly. It was always a matter of difficulty whether to say "good morning," "good afternoon," or "good evening" in space, where, strictly speaking, there was neither morning, afternoon, nor evening. "Good day" was the neutral term usually adopted by spacemen.

"Good day, Commander," said Lucky. "Are there any difficulties concerning our landing on Jupiter Nine that account for this delay?"

"Difficulties? Well, that's as you look at it." He looked about and sat down on one of the small pilot's stools. 'Tve been in touch with Council headquarters but they say I must treat with you directly, so I'm here."

Commander Donahue was a wiry man, with an air of tension about him. His face was deeply lined, his hair grayish but showing signs of having once been brown. His hands had prominent blue veins along their backs, and he spoke in an explosive fashion, rapping out his phrases in a quick succession of words.

"Treat with me about what, sir?" asked Lucky.

"Just this, Councilman. I want you to return to Earth."

"Why, sir?"

The commander did not look directly at Lucky as he spoke. "We have a morale problem. Our men have been investigated and investigated and investigated. They've all come through clear each time, and each time a new investigation is started. They don't like it and neither would you. They don't like being under continual suspicion. And I'm completely on their side. Our Agrav ship is almost ready and this is not the time for my men to be disturbed. They talk of going on strike."

Lucky said calmly, "Your men may have been cleared but there is still leakage of information."

Donahue shrugged. "Then it must come from elsewhere. It must..." He broke off and a sudden incongruous note of friendliness entered his voice. "What's that?"

Bigman followed his eyes and said at once, "That's our V-frog, Commander, I'm Bigman."

The commander did not acknowledge the introduction. He approached the V-frog instead, staring into the enclosed water-filled cage. "That's a Venus creature, isn't it?"

"That's right," said Bigman.

"I've heard of them. Never saw one, though. Cute little jigger, isn't it?"

Lucky felt a grim amusement. He did not find it strange that in the midst of a most serious discussion the commander should veer off into an absorbed admiration for a small water creature from Venus. The V-frog itself made that inevitable.

The small creature was looking back at Donahue now out of its black eyes, swaying on its extensible legs and clicking its parrot beak gently. In all the known

universe its means of survival was unique. It had no defensive weapons, no armor of any sort. It had no claws or teeth or horns. Its beak might bite, but even that bite could do no harm to any creature larger than itself.

Yet it multiplied freely along the weed-covered surface of the Venusian ocean, and none of the fierce predators of the ocean's deeps disturbed it, simply because the V-frog could control emotion. They instinctively caused all other forms of life to like them, to feel friendly toward them, to have no wish whatever to hurt them. So they survived. They did more than that. They flourished.

Now this particular V-frog was filling Donahue, quite obviously, with a feeling of friendliness, so that the army man pointed a finger at it through the glass of its cage and laughed to see it cock its head and sink down along its collapsing legs, as Donahue moved his finger downward.

"You don't suppose we could get a few of these for Jupiter Nine, do you, Starr?" he asked. "We're great ones for pets here. An animal here and there makes for a breath of home."

"It's not very practical," said Lucky. "V-frogs are difficult to keep. They have to be maintained in a carbon-dioxide-saturated system, you know. Oxygen is mildly poisonous to them. That makes things complicated."

"You mean they can't be kept in an open fish-bowl?"

"They can be at tunes. They're kept so on Venus, where carbon dioxide is dirt cheap and where they can always be turned loose in the ocean if they seem to be unhappy. On a ship, though, or on an airless

world, you don't want to bleed carbon dioxide continuously into the air, so a closed system is best."

"Oh." The commander looked a bit wistful.

"To return to our original subject of discussion," said Lucky briskly, "I must refuse your suggestion that I leave. I have an assignment and I must carry it through."

It seemed to take a few seconds for the commander to emerge from the spell cast by the V-frog. His face darkened. "I'm sure you don't understand the entire situation." He turned suddenly, looking down at Big-man. "Consider your associate, for instance."

The small Martian, with a stiffening of spine, began to redden. "I'm Bigman," he said. "I told you that before."

"Not very big a man, nevertheless," said the commander.

And though Lucky placed a soothing hand on the little fellow's shoulder at once, it didn't help. Bigman cried, "Bigness isn't on the outside, mister. My name is Bigman, and I'm a big man against you or anyone you want to name regardless of what the yardstick says. And if you don't believe it. . ." He was shrugging his left shoulder vigorously. "Let go of me, Lucky, will you? This cobber here..."

"Will you wait just one minute, Bigman?" Lucky urged. "Let's find out what the commander is trying to say."

Donahue had looked startled at Bigman's sudden verbal assault. He said, "I'm sure I meant no harm in my remark. If I've hurt your feelings, I'm sorry."

"My feelings hurt?" said Bigman, his voice squeaking. "Me? Listen, one thing about me, I never lose

my temper and as long as you apologize, we'll forget about it." He hitched at his belt and brought the palms of his hands down with a smart slap against the knee-high orange and vermilion boots that were the heritage of his Martian farm-boy past and without which he would never be seen in public (unless he substituted others with an equally garish color scheme).

"I want to be very plain with you, Councilman," said Donahue, turning to Lucky once more. "I have almost a thousand men here at Jupiter Nine, and they're tough, all of them. They have to be. They're far from home. They do a hard job. They run great risks. They have their own outlook on life now and it's a rough one. For instance, they haze newcomers and not with a light hand, either. Sometimes newcomers can't stand it and go home. Sometimes they're hurt. If they come through, everything's fine."

Lucky said, "Is this officially permitted?"

"No. But it is permitted unofficially. The men have to be kept happy somehow, and we can't afford to alienate them by interfering with their horseplay. Good men are hard to replace out here. Not many people are willing to come to the moons of Jupiter, you know. Then, too, the initiation is helpful in weeding out the misfits. Those that don't pass would probably fail hi other respects eventually. That is why I made mention of your friend."

The commander raised his hands hurriedly. "Now make no mistake. I agree that he is big on the inside and capable and anything else you want. But will he be a match for what lies ahead? Will you, Councilman?"

"You mean the hazing?"

"It will be rough, Councilman," said Donahue. "The men know you are coming. News gets around somehow."

"Yes, I know," murmured Lucky.

The commander scowled. "In any case, they know you are to investigate them and they will feel no kindness toward you. They are in an ugly mood and they will hurt you, Councilman Starr. I am asking you not to land on Jupiter Nine for the project's sake, for my men's sake, and for your own. There you have it as plainly as I can put it."

Bigman stared at the change that came over Lucky. His usual look of calm good nature was gone. His dark brown eyes turned hard, and the straight lines of his lean and handsome face were set in something that Bigman rarely saw there: bitter anger. Every muscle of Lucky's tall body seemed tense.

Lucky said ringingly, "Commander Donahue, I am a member of the Council of Science. I am responsible only to the head of the Council and to the President of the Solar Federation of Worlds. I outrank you and you will be bound by my decisions and orders.

"I consider the warning you have just given me to be evidence of your own incompetence. Don't say anything, please; hear me out. You are obviously not in control of your men and not fit to command men. Now hear this: I will land on Jupiter Nine and I will conduct my investigations. I will handle your men if you cannot."

He paused while the other gasped and vainly attempted to find his voice. He rapped out, "Do you understand, Commander?"

Commander Donahue, his face congested almost beyond recognition, managed to grind out, "I will take this up with the Council of Science. No arrogant young whipsnap can talk like that to me, councilman or no councilman. I will match my record as a leader of men against that of anyone in the service. Furthermore, my warning to you will be on record also and if you are hurt on Jupiter Nine, I will run the risk of court-martial gladly. I will do nothing for you. In fact, I hope—I hope they teach you manners, you..."

He was past speech once more. He turned on his heel, toward the open lock, connected still with the space tube to bis own ship. He clambered in, missing a hand hold in his anger and stumbling badly,

Bigman watched with awe as the commander's heels disappeared down the tube. The other's anger had been so intense a thing that the little Martian had seemed to feel it in his own mind as though waves of heat were rolling in upon him.

Bigman said, "Wow, that cobber was really going! You had him rocking."

Lucky nodded. "He was angry. No doubt about it."

Bigman said, "Listen, maybe he's the spy. He'd know the most. He'd have the best chance."

"He'd also be the most thoroughly investigated, so your theory is doubtful. But at least he's helped us out in a little experiment, so when I see him next I will have to apologize."

"Apologize?" Bigman was horrified. It was his firm view that apologies were strictly something that other people had to do. "Why?"

"Come, Bigman, do you suppose I really meant those things I said?"

"You weren't angry?"

"Not really."

"It was an act?"

"You could call it that. I wanted to make him angry, really angry, and 1 succeeded. I could tell that firsthand."

"Firsthand?"

"Couldn't you? Couldn't you feel the anger just pouring out of him all over you?"

"Sands of Mars! The V-frog!"

"Of course. It received the commander's anger and rebroadcast it on to us. I had to know if one V-frog could do it. We tested it back on Earth, but until I tried it under actual field conditions, I wasn't sure. Now I am."

"It broadcast fine."

"I know. So at least it proves we have a weapon, one weapon, after all."

The Agrav Corridor

"Good deal," said Bigman fiercely. "Then we're on our way."

"Hold it," said Lucky at once. "Hold everything, my friend. This is a non-specific weapon. We'll sense strong emotion but we may never sense one that will give us the key to the mystery. It's like having eyes. We may see, but we may not see the right thing, not ever."

"You will," said Bigman confidently.

Dropping down toward Jupiter Nine reminded Bigman very strongly of similar maneuvers in the asteroid belt. As Lucky had explained on the voyage outward, most astronomers considered Jupiter Nine to have been a true asteroid to begin with; a rather large one that had been captured by Jupiter's tremendous gravity field many millions of years previously.

In fact, Jupiter had captured so many asteroids that here, fifteen million miles from the giant planet, there was a kind of miniature asteroid belt belonging to Jupiter alone. The four largest of these asteroid satellites, each from forty to a hundred miles in diameter, were

Jupiter Twelve, Eleven, Eight, and Nine. In addition there were at least a hundred additional satellites of more than a mile in diameter, unnumbered and unregarded. Their orbits had been plotted only in the last ten years when Jupiter Nine was first put to use as an anti-gravity research center, and the necessity of traveling to and from it had made the population of surrounding space important.

The approaching satellite swallowed the sky and became a rough world of peaks and rocky channels, un-softened by any touch of air in the billions of years of its history. Bigman, still thoughtful, said, "Lucky, why in Space do they call this Jupiter Nine, anyway? It isn't the ninth one out from Jupiter according to the Atlas. Jupiter Twelve is a lot closer."

Lucky smiled. "The trouble with you, Bigman, is that you're spoiled. Just because you were born on Mars, you think mankind has been cutting through space ever since creation. Look boy, it's only a matter of a thousand years since mankind invented the first spaceship."

"I know that," said Bigman indignantly. "I'm not ignorant. I've had schooling. Don't go shoving your big brain all over the place."

Lucky's smile expanded, and he rapped Bigman's skull with two knuckles. "Anybody home?"

Bigman's fist whipped toward Lucky's abdomen, but Lucky caught it in midair and held the little fellow motionless.

"If s as simple as this, Bigman. Before space travel was invented, men were restricted to Earth and all they knew about Jupiter was what they could see in a telescope. The satellites are numbered in the order they were discovered, see?"

"Oh," said Bigman, and yanked free. "Poor ancestors!" He laughed, as he always did, at the thought of human beings cooped up on one world, peering out longingly, even as he struggled to free himself from Lucky's grip.

Lucky went on. "The four big satellites of Jupiter are numbered One, Two, Three, and Four, of course, but the numbers are hardly ever used. The names Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto are familiar names. The nearest satellite of all, a small one, is Jupiter Five, while the farther ones have numbers up to Twelve. The ones past Twelve weren't discovered till after space travel was invented and men had reached Mars and the asteroid belt . . . Watch out now. We've got to adjust for landing."

It was amazing, thought Lucky, how you could consider tiny a world eighty-nine miles in diameter as long as you were nowhere near it. Of course, such a world is tiny compared to Jupiter or even to Earth. Place it gently on Earth and its diameter is small enough to allow it to fit within the state of Connecticut without lapping over; and its surface area is less than that of Pennsylvania.

And yet, just the same, when you came to enter the small world, when you found your ship enclosed in a large lock and moved by gigantic grapples (working against a gravitational force of almost zero but against full inertia) into a large cavern capable of holding a hundred ships the size of the Shooting Starr, it no longer seemed so small.

And then when ,you came across a map of Jupiter Nine on the wall of an office and studied the network of

underground caverns and corridors within which a complicated program was being carried out, it began to seem actually large. Both horizontal and vertical projections of the work volume of Jupiter Nine were shown on the map, and though only a small portion of the satellite was being used, Lucky could see that some of the corridors penetrated as much as two miles beneath the surface and that others spread out just under the surface for nearly a hundred miles.

"A tremendous job," he said softly to the lieutenant at his side.

Lieutenant Augustus Nevsky nodded briefly. His uniform was spotless and gleaming. He had a stiff little blond mustache, and his wide-set blue eyes had a habit of staring straight ahead as though he were at perpetual attention.

He said with pride, "We're still growing."

He had introduced himself a quarter of an hour earlier, as Lucky and Bigman had stepped from the ship, as the personal guide assigned them by Commander Donahue.

Lucky said with some amusement, "Guide? Or guardian, Lieutenant? You are armed."

Any trace of feeling was carefully washed out of the other's face. "My arms are regulation for officers on duty, Councilman. You will find you will need a guide here."

But he seemed to relax, and there was ordinary human feeling about him as he listened to the visitors' awed praise of the project. He said, "Of course the absence of any significant gravitational field makes certain engineering tricks feasible that wouldn't work on

Earth. Underground corridors require practically no support."

Lucky nodded, then said, "I understand that the first Agrav ship is about ready for take-off."

The lieutenant said nothing for a moment. His face blanked free, again, of emotion or feeling. Then he said stiffly, "I will show you your quarters first. It can be most easily reached by Agrav, if I can persuade you to use an Agrav cor—"

"Hey, Lucky," called Bigman in sudden excitement. "Look at this."

Lucky turned. It was only a half-grown cat, gray as smoke, with the look of solemn sadness that cats usually have, and a back that arched readily against Bigman's curved fingers. She was purring.

Lucky said, "The commander said they went for pets here. Is this one yours, Lieutenant?"

The officer flushed. "We all have shares in it. There are a few other cats around, too. They come on the supply ships sometimes. We've got some canaries, a parakeet, white mice, goldfish. Things like that. Nothing like your whatever-it-is, though." And his eyes, as they looked quickly at the V-frog's bowl tucked under Lucky's arm, contained a spark of envy.

But Bigman was concentrating on the cat There was no native animal life on Mars and the furry pets of Earth always had the charm of novelty to him.

"He likes me, Lucky."

"It's a she," said the lieutenant, but Bigman paid no attention. The cat, tail hoisted into a stiff vertical with only the tip drooping, walked past him, doubling sharply so as to present first one side, then the other, to Bigman's gentle stroking.

And then the purring stopped, and through Bigman's mind stabbed one pure touch of fevered and hungry desire.

It startled him for a moment, and then he noticed that the cat had stopped purring and was squatting slightly in the tense hunting posture dictated by its millions-of-years-old instincts.

Her green slitted eyes stared directly at the V-frog. But the emotion, so feline in its touch, was gone almost as soon as it had come. The cat padded softly over to the glass container Lucky was holding and stared in curiously, purring with contentment. The cat, too, liked the V-frog. It had to. Lucky said, "You were saying, Lieutenant, we would have to reach our quarters by Agrav. Were you going to explain what that means?"

The lieutenant, who had also been staring fondly at the V-frog, paused to gather his wits before answering. "Yes. It's simple enough. We have artificial gravity fields here on Jupiter Nine as on any asteroid or on any space ship for that matter. They are arranged at each of the main corridors, end to end, so that you can fall the length of them in either direction. It's like dropping straight down a hole on Earth." Lucky nodded. "How fast do you drop?" "Well, that's the point. Ordinarily, gravity pulls constantly and you fall faster and faster..."

"Which is why I ask my question," interposed Lucky dryly.

"But not under Agrav controls. Agrav is really A-grav: no gravity, you see. Agrav can be used to absorb gravitational energy or store it or transfer it. The point is you only fall so fast, you see, and no faster.

With a gravitational field in the other direction, too, you can even slow down. An Agrav corridor with two pseudo-grav fields is very simple and it has been used as a steppingstone to an Agrav ship which works in a single gravitational field. Now Engineers' Quarters, which is where your rooms will be, is only a little over a mile from here and the most direct route is by Corridor A-2. Ready?"

"We will be once you explain how we're to work Agrav."

"That's hardly a problem." Lieutenant Nevsky presented each with a light harness, adjusting them over the shoulders and at the waist, talking rapidly about the controls.

And then he said, "If you'll follow me, gentlemen, the corridor is just a few yards in this direction."

Bigman hesitated at the opening of the corridor. He was not afraid of space in itself, or of drops in themselves. But all his life he had been used to bridging gaps under Martian gravity or less. This time the pseudo-grav field was at full Earth-normal, and under its influence the corridor was a brilliantly lighted hole, plummeting, apparently, straight downward, even though in actuality (Bigman's mind told him) it paralleled the satellite's surface closely.

The lieutenant said, "Now this is the lane for travel in the direction of Engineers' Quarters. If we were to approach from the other side, 'down' would appear to be in the other direction. Or we could make 'up' and 'down' change places by appropriate adjustments of our Agrav controls."

He looked at the expression on Bigman's face and

said, "You'll get the idea as you go along. It becomes second nature after a while."

He stepped into the corridor and didn't drop an inch. It was as though he were standing on an invisible platform.

He said earnestly, "Have you set the dial at zero?''

Bigman did so, and instantly all sensation of gravity vanished. He stepped into the corridor.

Now the lieutenant's hand on the central knob of his own controls turned it sharply, and he sank, gathering speed. Lucky followed him, and Bigman, who would sooner have fallen the length of the corridor under double gravity and been smashed to pulp than fail to do anything Lucky did, took a deep breath and let himself fall.

"Turn back to zero," called the lieutenant, "and you'll be moving at constant velocity. Get the feel of it"

Periodically they approached and passed through luminous green letters that glowed keep to this side, Once there was the flash of a man passing (falling, really) in the other direction. He was moving much more rapidly than they were.

"Are there ever any collisions, Lieutenant?" asked Lucky.

"Not really," said the lieutenant. "The experienced dropper watches for people who might be overtaking him or whom he might be overtaking, and it's easy enough to slow down or speed up. Of course the boys will bump on purpose sometimes. It's a kind of rowdy fun that ends with a broken collarbone sometimes." He looked quickly at Lucky. "Our boys play rough."

Lucky said, "I understand. The commander warned me."

Bigman, who had been staring downward through the well-lit tunnel into which he was sinking, cried in sudden exhilaration, "Hey, Lucky, this is fun when you get used to it," and turned his controls into the positive region.

He sank faster, his head moving down to a level with Lucky's feet, then farther down at an increasing rate.

Lieutenant Nevsky cried out in instant alarm, "Stop that, you fool. Turn back into the negatives!"

Lucky called out an imperious, "Bigman, slow down!"

They caught up to him, the lieutenant angrily exclaiming. "Don't ever do that! There are all sort of barriers and partitions along these corridors, and if you don't know your way, you'll be slamming into one just when you think you're safe."

"Here, Bigman," said Lucky. "Hold the V-frog. That will give you some responsibility and make you behave, perhaps,"

"Aw, Lucky," said Bigman, abashed. "I was just kicking my heels a bit. Sands of Mars, Lucky..."

"All right," said Lucky. "No harm done," and Bigman brightened at once.

Bigman looked down again. Falling at a constant rate was not quite the same as free fall in space. In space, nothing seemed to move. A space ship might be traveling at a velocity of hundreds of thousands of miles an hour and there would still be the sensation of motion-lessness all about. The distant stars never moved.

Here, though, the sense of motion was all about. The lights and openings and various attachments that lined the corridor walls flashed past.

In space, one expected that there would be no "up"

and "down," but here there was none either and it seemed wrong. As long as he looked "down" past his feet, it seemed "down" and that was all right. When he looked "up," however, there would be a quick sensation that "up" was really "down," that he was standing head downward falling "up." He looked toward his feet again quickly to get rid of the sensation.

The lieutenant said, "Don't bend too far forward, Bigman. The Agrav works to keep you lined up in the direction of fall, but if you bend over too much, you'll start tumbling."

Bigman straightened.

The lieutenant said, "There's nothing fatal about tumbling. Anyone who's used to Agrav can straighten himself out again. Beginners would find it troublesome, however. We'll decelerate now. Move the dial into the negatives and keep it there. About minus five."

He was slowing as he spoke, moving above them. His feet dangled at Bigman's eye level.

Bigman moved the dial, trying desperately to line himself up with the lieutenant. And as he slowed, "up" and "down" became definite, and in the wrong way. He was standing on his head.

He said, "Hey, the blood's rushing to my head."

The lieutenant said sharply, "There are footholds along the sides of the corridor. Hook one with the toe of your foot as you reach it and let go quickly."

He did so as he said this. His head swung outward, and head and feet reversed position. He continued swinging and stopped himself with a quick hand tap against the wall.

Lucky followed suit, and Bigman, flailing widely with his short legs, managed to catch one of the footholds

at last. He whirled sharply and caught the wall with his elbow just a trifle too hard for comfort but managed to line up properly.

At least he was head-up again. He wasn't falling any more, but rising, as though he had been shot out of a cannon and rising against gravity more and more slowly; but at least he was head-up.

When they were moving at a slow crawl, Bigman, looking uneasily toward his feet, thought: We're going to be falling again. And suddenly the corridor looked like an endlessly deep well and his stomach tightened.

But the lieutenant said, "Adjust to zero," and at once they stopped slowing down. They just moved upward, as though in a smooth, slow elevator, until they reached a cross-level at which the lieutenant, seizing a foothold with one toe, brought himself to a feathery stop.

"Engineers' Quarters, gentlemen," he said.

"And," added Lucky Starr gently, "a reception committee."

For men were waiting for them in the corridor now, fifty of them at least.

Lucky said, "You said they liked to play rough, Lieutenant, and maybe they want to play now."

He stepped firmly out into the corridor. Bigman, nostrils flaring with excitement and grateful to be on the firm pseudo-grav of a solid floor, clutched the V-frog's cage tightly and was at Lucky's heels, facing the waiting men of Jupiter Nine.

Initiation!

Lieutenant Nevsky tried to make his voice crackle with authority as he placed his hand on the butt of his blaster. "What are you men doing here?"

There was a small murmur from the men, but by and large they remained quiet. Eyes turned to the one of them who stood in front, as though they were waiting for him to speak.

The leader of the men was smiling, and his face was crinkled into an expression of apparent good will. His straight hair, parted in the middle, had a light-orange tint to it. His cheekbones were broad and he chewed gum. His clothing was of synthetic fiber, as was true of that of the others, but unlike the others', his shirt and trousers were ornamented with brass buttons that were large and bulky. Four on his shirt front, one each on the two shirt pockets, and four down the side of each pants leg: fourteen altogether. They seemed to serve no purpose; to be only for show.

"All right, Summers," said the lieutenant, turning to this man, "what are the men doing here?"

Summers spoke now in a soft, wheedling voice.

"Well, now, Lieutenant, we thought it would be nice to meet the new man. He'll be seeing a lot of us. He'll be asking questions. Why shouldn't we meet him now?"

He looked at Lucky Starr as he spoke, and for a moment there was a touch of ice in that glance that swallowed up all the show of softness.

The lieutenant said, "You men should be at work."

"Have a heart, Lieutenant," said Summers, chewing even more slowly and leisurely. "We've been working. Now we want to say hello."

The lieutenant was obviously uncertain as to his next move. He looked doubtfully at Lucky.

Lucky said, "Which rooms are to be ours, Lieutenant?"

"Rooms 2A and 2B, sir. To find them—"

''I'l find them. I'm sure one of these men will direct me. And now, Lieutenant Nevsky, that you've directed us to our quarters, I think your assignment is completed. I'll be seeing you again."

"I can't leave!" said Lieutenant Nevsky in a low, appalled whisper.

"I think you can."

"Sure you can, Lieutenant," said Summers, grinning more broadly than ever. "A simple hello won't hurt the boy." There was a snicker of laughter from the men behind him. "And besides, you've been asked to leave."

Bigman approached Lucky and muttered in an urgent whisper. "Lucky, let me give the V-frog to the lieutenant I can't fight and hold it, too."

"You just hold it," said Lucky. "I want it exactly here.... Good day, Lieutenant. Dismissed!"

The lieutenant hesitated, and Lucky said in a tone

that, for all its softness, bit like steel. "That's an order, Lieutenant."

Lieutenant Nevsky's face assumed a soldierly rigidity. He said sharply, "Yes, sir."

Then, surprisingly, he hesitated one further moment and glanced down at the V-frog in the crook of Big-man's arm, as it chewed idly at a fern frond. "Take care of that little thing." He turned and was in the Agrav corridor in two steps, disappearing almost at once in a rush of speed.

Lucky turned to face the men again. He was under no illusions. They were grim-faced and they meant business, but unless he could face them down and prove that he meant business as well, his mission would come to nothing against the rock of their hostility. He would have to win them over somehow.

Summers' smile had become the least bit wolfish. He said, "Well, now, friend, the uniform-boy is gone. We can talk. Fm Red Summers. What's your name?"

Lucky smiled in return. "My name is David Starr. My friend's name is Bigman."

"Seems to me I heard you called Lucky when all that whispering was going on a while back."

"I'm called Lucky by my friends."

"Isn't that nice. Do you want to stay lucky?"

"Do you know a good way?"

"Matter of fact, Lucky Starr, I do." Suddenly his face contorted itself into a bitter scowl. "Get off Jupiter Nine."

There was a hoarse roar of approval from the others, and a few voices took up the cry of "Get off! Get off!"

They crowded closer, but Lucky stood his ground. "I have important reasons to stay on Jupiter Nine."

"In that case, I'm afraid you aren't lucky," said Summers. "You're a greenhorn and you look soft, and soft greenhorns get hurt on Jupiter Nine. We worry about you."

"I think I won't get hurt."

"That's what you think, eh?" said Summers. "Ar-mand, come here."

From the ranks behind him, a huge man stepped forward, round-faced, beefy of build, with large shoulders and a barrel chest. He topped Lucky's six feet one by half a head and looked down at the young councilman with a smile that showed yellowed, wide-spaced teeth.

The men were beginning to take seats on the floor. They shouted to one another with lighthearted cheer, as though they were about to watch a ball game.

One called out, "Hey, Armand, watch out you don't step on the kid!"

Bigman started, and glared furiously in the direction of the voice but could not identify the speaker.

Summers said, "You could still leave, Starr."

Lucky said, "I have no intention of doing so, particularly at a moment when you seem to be planning some sort of entertainment."

"Not for you," said Summers. "Now listen, Starr, we're ready for you. We've been ready since we got word that you were coming. We've had enough of you little tinhorns from Earth and we aren't taking any more. I've got men stationed on various levels. We'll know if the commander tries to interfere, and if he does, then by Jupiter, we're ready to go on strike. Am I right, men?"

"Right!" came back the multiple roar.

"And the commander knows it," said Summers, "and I don't think he'll interfere. So this gives us our chance to give you our initiation and after that I'll ask you again if you want to leave. If you're conscious, that is."

"You're going to a lot of trouble for nothing," said Lucky. "What harm am I doing you?"

"You won't be doing us any," said Summers. "I guarantee that."

Bigman said, in his tense, high-pitched voice, "Look, you cobber, you're talking to a councilman. Have you stopped to figure what happens if you fool with the Council of Science?"

Summers looked at him suddenly, put his fists on his hips, and bent his head back to laugh. "Hey, men, it talks. I was wondering what it was. It looks as though Lucky Snoop has brought along his baby brother for protection."

Bigman went dead-white, but under the cover of the laughter Lucky stooped and spoke through stiff lips. "Your job is to hang on to the V-frog, Bigman. I'll take care of Summers. And, Great Galaxy, Bigman, stop broadcasting anger! I can't get a thing on the V-frog except that."

Bigman swallowed hard twice, three tunes.

Summers said softly, "Now, Councilman Snoop, can you maneuver under Agrav?"

"I just have, Mr. Summers."

"Well, we'll just have to test you and make sure. We can't have anyone around who hasn't learned all the Agrav ropes. It's too dangerous. Right, men?"

"Right!" they roared again.

"Armand here," said Summers, and his hand rested

on one of Armand's huge shoulders, "is our best teacher. You'll know all about Agrav maneuvering when you're through with him. Or you will know if you stay out of his way. I suggest you get out into the Agrav corridor now. Armand will join you."

Lucky said, "If I choose not to go?"

"Then we'll throw you into the corridor anyway and Armand goes after you."

Lucky nodded. "You seem determined. Are there any rules to this lesson I'm going to get?"

There was wild laughter, but Summers held up his arms. "Just keep out of Armand's way, Councilman. That' s the only rule you'll have to remember. We'll be at the lip of the corridor watching. If you try to crawl out of Agrav before you've completed your lesson, we'll throw you back in, and there are men stationed at other levels, watching, and they're ready to do the same."

Bigman cried, "Sands of Mars, your man outweighs Lucky by fifty pounds and he's an expert with Agrav!"

Summers turned on him in mock surprise. "No! I never thought of that. What a shame!" There was laughter from the men. "On your way, Starr. Get into the corridor, Armand. Drag him in if you have to."

"He won't have to," said Lucky. He turned and moved into the open space of the wide Agrav corridor. As his feet drifted out into empty air, his fingers caught gently at the wall, twisting him in a slow, turning motion that he stopped with another touch against the wall. He stood there in midair, facing the men.

There was some murmuring at Lucky's maneuver, and Armand nodded, speaking for the first time in a rolling appreciative bass. "Hey, mister, that's not bad."

Summers, lips suddenly set and with a frown newly

creasing his forehead, struck Armand a sharp blow on the back. "Don't talk, you idiot! Get in after him and give it to him."

Armand moved forward slowly. He said, "Hey, Red, let's not make too much of this."

Summers' face contorted in fury. "Get in there! And you do what I said. I told you what he is. If we don't get rid of him, they'll be sending more." His words were a harsh whisper that didn't carry.

Armand stepped into the corridor and stood face to face with Lucky.

Lucky Starr waited in what was almost absence of mind. He was concentrating on the faint whiffs of emotion brought him by the V-frog. Some he could recognize without difficulty, both as to their nature and their owner. Red Summers was easiest to detect: fear and niggling hate mixed with an undertone of anxious triumph. Armand loosed a small leak of tension. Occasionally there were sharp pinpoints of excitement from one or another, and sometimes Lucky could identify the owner because it coincided with a happy shout or a threatening one. All of it had to be sorted out from the steady trickle of Bigman's anger, of course.

But now he was staring into Armand's small eyes and he was aware that the other was bobbing up and down, a few inches either way. Armand's hand fingered his chest control.

Lucky was instantly alert. The other was alternating the gravitational direction, moving the controls this way and that. Was he expecting to confuse Lucky?

Lucky was sharply aware that for all his experience with space he was inexperienced in the type of weight-

lessness brought about by Agrav, for this was a weightlessness that wasn't absolute, as in space, but one that could be changed at will.

And suddenly Armand dropped as though he had stepped through a trap door—except that he dropped upward!

As Armand's large legs moved up past Lucky's head, they parted and came together as if to catch Lucky's head in a vise.

Automatically Lucky's head snapped back, but as it did so, his legs moved forward, his body swinging about its center of gravity, and for a moment, he was off balance and flailing helplessly. A roar of laughter arose from the watching men.

Lucky knew what was wrong. He should have dodged by gravity. If Armand moved up, Lucky should have adjusted controls to move up with him or to race down past him. And now it would take the pull of gravity to straighten him out. At gravity zero, he would tumble indefinitely.

But before bis fingers could touch his controls, Armand was past the top of his rise and was gathering speed downward. As he dropped past Lucky once more, his elbow caught Lucky a sharp jab in the hip. He dropped farther and his thick fingers clutched at Lucky's ankles, carrying him down, down. Armand pulled strongly downward and reached up to seize Lucky's shoulders. His harsh breath stirred Lucky's hair. He said, "You need a lot of training, mister."

Lucky brought up his own arms head-high and broke the other's hold sharply.

Lucky dialed gravity up and helped Ms upward movement by bringing his foot sharply down on the

other's shoulder, accelerating Ms own pace and slowing the other's. To his own senses it now seemed that he was falling head downward and there was a tenseness about that sensation that seemed to be slowing his reactions. Or was it his Agrav controls which were somewhat sluggish? He tested them and lacked the experience to be certain, yet felt that they were.

Armand was on him now, bellowing, thrusting against him, attempting to use his own greater mass of body to maneuver Lucky hard against the wall.

Lucky wriggled his hand toward the controls in order to reverse the direction of gravity. He readied his knees for an upward thrust to coincide and lurch Armand out of position.

But it was Annand's field that shifted first, and it was Lucky who was lurched out of position.

Annand's feet shot backward now, striking the wall of the corridor as it was flashing by and angling the pair, by recoil, against the opposite wall. Lucky struck bruisingly and skidded along it some feet before his ankle caught one of the metal railings and his body swung away and into the open corridor.

Armand whispered hotly in Lucky's ear, "Had enough, mister? Just tell Red you'll leave. I don't want to hurt you bad."

Lucky shook his head. Strange, he thought, that Ar-mand's gravitational field had beaten his own to the shift. He had felt Armand's hand move to the controls and he was certain his own controls had moved first.

Twisting suddenly, Lucky placed his elbow sharply in the pit of Armand's stomach. Armand grunted, and in that split second Lucky got his legs between himself

and the other's and straightened them. The two men flew apart and Lucky was free.

He shot away an instant before Armand returned, and then for the next few minutes Lucky concentrated only on staying away. He was learning the use of the controls and they were sluggish. It was only by skillful use of the footholds along the walls and lightning-like head-to-foot reversals that he managed to avoid Armand.

And then while he was drifting feather-fashion, allowing Armand to shoot past him, he turned his Agrav controls and found no response at all. There was no change in the gravitational field direction; no sudden sensation of accelerating one way or the other.

Instead, Armand was on him again, grunting, and Lucky found himself crashing with stunning force against the corridor wall.

Needle-Guns and Neighbors

Bigman felt fully confident of Lucky's ability to handle any overgrown mass of beef, and though he felt a sharp anger at the unsympathetic crowd, he felt no fear.

Summers had approached the lip of the corridor and so had another, a gangling, dark-complexioned fellow who barked out events as they occurred in a raucous voice, as though it were a flight-polo game on the subetherics.

There were cheers when Armand first slammed Lucky against the corridor wall. Bigman discounted those with contempt. Of course that shouting fool would try to make it look good for his own side. Wait till Lucky got the feel of the Agrav technique; he would cut that Armand guy into ribbons. Bigman was sure of it.

But then when the dark fellow yelled, "Armand has him now in a head lock. He's maneuvering for a second fall; feet against the wall; retract and extend and there's the crash, a beauty!" Bigman felt the beginnings of uneasiness.

He edged close to the corridor himself. No one paid

any attention to him. It was one advantage of his small size. People who didn't know him tended to discount him as a possible danger, to ignore him.

Bigman looked down and saw Lucky pushing away from the wall, Armand drifting nearby, waiting.

"Lucky!" he yelled shrilly. "Stay away!"

His cry was lost in the hubbub, but the dark man's voice as it was lowered in a conversational aside to Red Summers was not. Bigman caught it.

The dark man said, "Give the snoop some power, Red. There won't be any excitement."

And Summers growled in response, "I don't want excitement. I want Armand to finish the job."

Bigman didn't get the significance of the short exchange for a moment, but only for a moment. And then his eyes darted sharply in the direction of Red Summers, whose hands, held closely against his chest, were manipulating some small object Bigman could not identify.

"Sands of Mars!" Bigman cried breathlessly. He sprang back. "You! Summers! You foul-fighting cobber!"

This was another one of those tunes when Bigman was glad he carried a needle-gun even in the face of Lucky's disapproval. Lucky considered it an unreliable weapon, as it was too hard to focus accurately, but Bigman would sooner doubt the fact that he was as tall as any six-footer as doubt his own skill.

When Summers didn't turn at Bigman's shout, Bigman clenched his fist about the weapon (of which only half-inch of snout, narrowing to a needlepoint, showed between the second and third fingers of his right hand) and squeezed just tightly enough to activate it.

Simultaneously there was a flash of light six inches in front of Summers' nose, and a slight pop. It was not very impressive. Only air molecules were being ionized. Summers jumped, however, and panic, transmitted by the V-frog, rose sharply.

"Everybody," called Bigman. "Freeze! Freeze! You split-head, underlipped miseries." Another needle-gun discharge popped the air, this time over Summers' head where all could see it plainly.

Few people might have handled needle-guns, which were expensive and hard to get licenses for, but everybody knew what a needle-gun discharge looked like, if only from subetheric programs, and everyone knew the damage it could do.

It was as though fifty men had stopped breathing. Bigman was bathed in the cold drizzle of human fear from fifty frightened men. He backed against the wall. He said, "Now listen, all of you. How many of you know that this cobber Summers is gimmicking my friend's Agrav controls? This fight is fixed!"

Summers said desperately, through clenched teeth, "You're wrong. You're wrong."

"Am I? You're a brave man, Summers, when you've got fifty against two. Let's see you stay brave against a needle-gun. They're hard to aim, of course, and I might miss."

He clenched his fist again, and this time the pop of the discharge was sharply ear-splitting and the flash dazzled all the spectators but Bigman, who, of them all, was the only one who knew exactly when to close his eyes for a moment.

Summers emitted a strangled yell. He was untouched except that the top button on his shirt was gone.

Bigman said, "Nice aiming if I do say so myself, but I suppose having a run of luck is too much to ask. I'd advise you not to move, Summers. Pretend you're stone, you cobber, because if you do move, I'll miss and feeling a chunk of your skin go will hurt you worse than just losing a button."

Summers closed his eyes. His forehead was glistening with perspiration. Bigman calculated the distance and clenched twice.

Pow! Smack! Two more buttons gone.

"Sands of Mars, my lucky day! Isn't it nice that you've arranged to have no one come around to interfere? Well, one more—for the road."

And this tune Summers yelled in agony. There was a rent in the shirt and reddened skin showed.

"Aw," said Bigman, "not on the nose. Now I'm rattled and I'll probably miss the next by two inches ... Unless you're ready to say something, Summers."

"All right," yelled the other. ''I've fixed it."

Bigman said mildly, "Your man was heavier. Your man had experience and still you couldn't leave it a fair fight. You don't take any chances, do you? Drop what you're holding . . . Don't the rest of you move, though. From here on in, it's a fair fight in the corridor. No one's moving until someone climbs out of the corridor."

He paused and glared as his fist with the needle-gun moved slowly from side to side. "But if it's your ball of gristle that comes back, I'll just be a bit disappointed. And when I'm disappointed, there's no telling what I'll do. I just might be disappointed and mad enough to fire this needle-gun into the crowd, and there isn't a thing in the world any of you can do to stop me from

clenching my fist ten times. So if there are ten of you bored with living, just hope that your boy beats Lucky Starr."

Bigman waited there desperately, his right hand holding the needle-gun, his left arm crooked over the V-frog in its container. He longed to order Summers to bring the two men back, to end the fight, but he dared not risk Lucky's anger. He knew Lucky well enough to know that the fight couldn't be allowed to end by default on Lucky's side.

A figure whizzed past the line of sight, then another. There was a crash as of a body hitting a wall, then a second and a third. Then silence.

A figure drifted back, with a second gripped firmly by one ankle.

The person in control came lightly out into the corridor; the person being held followed and dropped like a sack of sand.

Bigman let out a shout. The man standing was Lucky. His cheek was bruised and he limped, but it was Armand who was unconscious.

They brought Armand back to consciousness with some difficulty. He had a lump on his skull resembling a small grapefruit, and one eye was swollen closed. Though his lower lip was bleeding, he managed a painful smile and said, "By Jupiter, this kid's a wildcat."

He got to his feet and threw his arms about Lucky in a bear hug. "It was like tangling with ten men after he got his bearings. He's all right."

Surprisingly, the men were cheering wildly. The V-frog transmitted relief first, swallowed up at once by excitement.

Armand's smile widened, and he dabbed at the blood with the back of his hand. "This councilman is all right. Anyone who still doesn't like him has to fight me, too. Where's Red?"

But Red Summers was gone. So was the instrument he had dropped at Bigman's order.

Annand said, "Listen, Mr. Starr, I've got to tell you. This wasn't my idea, but Red said we had to get rid of you or you'd make trouble for all of us."

Lucky raised his hand. "That's a mistake. Listen, all of you. There'll be no trouble for any loyal Earthman. I guarantee it. This fight is off the record. It was a bit of excitement, but we can forget it. Next time we meet, we all meet fresh. Nothing's happened. Right?"

They cheered madly and there were shouts of "He's all right" and "Up the Council!"

Lucky was turning to go when Armand said, "Hey, wait." He drew in a vast breath and pointed a thick finger. "What's this?" He was pointing to the V-frog.

"A Venusian animal," said Lucky. "A pet of ours."

"It's cute." The giant simpered down at it. The others crowded close to stare at it and make appreciative comments, to seize Lucky's hand and assure him that they had been on his side all along.

Bigman, outraged at the shoving, finally yelled, "Let's get to quarters, Lucky, or I swear I'll kill a few of these guys."

There was an instant silence and men squeezed back to make a path for Lucky and Bigman.

Lucky winced as Bigman applied cold water to the bruised cheek in the privacy of their quarters.

He said, "Some of the men were saying something about needle-guns in that final crush, but in the confusion I didn't get the story straight. Suppose you tell me, Bigman."

Reluctantly Bigman explained the circumstances.

Lucky said thoughtfully, "I realized that my controls were off, but I assumed mechanical failure particularly since they came back after my second fall. I didn't know you and Red Summers were fighting it out over me."

Bigman grinned. "Space, Lucky, you didn't think I'd let that character pull a trick like that?"

"There might have been some way other than needle-guns."

"Nothing else would have frozen them so," said Bigman, aggrieved. "Did you want me to shake my finger at them and say, 'Naughty, naughty?' Besides, I had to scare the green bejeebies out of them."

"Why?" Lucky said sharply.

"Sands of Mars, Lucky, you spotted the other guy two falls when the fighting was fixed, and I didn't know if you had enough left to make out. I was going to make Summers call the fight off."

"That would have been bad, Bigman. We would have gained nothing. There would have been men convinced the cry of 'foul' was an unsportsmanlike fake."

"I knew you'd figure that, but I was nervous."

"No need to be. After my controls started responding properly, things went fairly well. Armand was certain he had me, and when he found there was still fight in me, the fight seemed to go out of him. That happens sometimes with people who have never had to lose.

When they don't win at once, it confuses them, and they don't win at all."

"Yes, Lucky," said Bigman, grinning.

Lucky was silent for a minute or two, then he said, "I don't like that 'Yes, Lucky.' What did you do?"

"Well—" Bigman applied the final touch of flesh tint to hide the bruise and stepped back to consider his handiwork critically—"I couldn't help but hope that you'd win, now could I?"

"No, I suppose not."

"And I told everyone in that place that if Armand won, I would shoot as many of them as I could."

"You weren't serious."

"Maybe I was. Anyway, they thought I was; they were sure I was after they saw me needle four buttons off that cobber's shirt. So there were fifty guys there, even including Summers, who were sweating themselves blind hoping you would win and Armand lose."

Lucky said, "So that's it."

"Well, I couldn't help it if the V-frog was there and transmitted all those thoughts to you too, could I?"

"So all the fight went out of Armand because his mind was blanketed with wishes he would lose." Lucky looked chagrined.

"Remember, Lucky. Two foul falls. It wasn't a fair fight."

"Yes, I know. Well, maybe I needed the help at that."

The door signal flashed at that moment, and Lucky raised his eyebrows. "Who's this, I wonder?" He pressed the button that retracted the door into its slot.

A chunky man, with thinning hair and china-blue

eyes that stared at them unblinkingly, stood in the doorway. In one hand he held an oddly shaped piece of gleaming metal, which his limber fingers turned end for end. Occasionally the piece ducked between fingers, traveling from thumb to pinkie and back as though it had a life of its own. Bigman found himself watching it, fascinated.

The man said, "My name is Harry Norrich. I'm your next-door neighbor."

"Good day," said Lucky.

"You're Lucky Starr and Bigman Jones, aren't you? Would you care to come to my place a few minutes? Visit a bit, have a drink?"

"That's kind of you," said Lucky. "We'll be glad to join you."

Norrich turned somewhat stiffly and led the way down the corridor to the next door. One hand touched the corridor wall occasionally. Lucky and Bigman followed, the latter holding the V-frog.

"Won't you come in, gentlemen?" He stood aside to let them enter. "Please sit down. I've heard a great deal about you already."

"Like what?" asked Bigman.

"Like Lucky's fight with Big Armand and Bigman's marksmanship with a needle-gun. It's all over the place. I doubt there's anyone on Jupiter Nine who won't hear of it by morning. It's one of the reasons I asked you in. I wanted to talk to you about it."

He poured a reddish liquor carefully into two small glasses and offered them. For a moment Lucky put his hand some three inches to one side of the glass, waited without result, then reached over and took it from Norrich's hand. Lucky put the drink to one side.

"What's that on your worktable?" asked Bigman.

Norrich's room, in addition to the usual furnishings, had something that looked like a worktable running the length of one wall with a bench before it. On the work-table was a series of metal gimmicks spread out loosely, and in the center was an odd structure, six inches high and very uneven hi outline.

"This thing?" Norrich's hand slid delicately along the surface of the table and came to rest on the structure. "It's a threedee."

"A what?"

"A three-dimensional jigsaw. The Japanese had them for thousands of years, but they've never caught on elsewhere. They're puzzles, made up of a number of pieces that fit together to form some sort of structure. This one, for instance, will be the model of an Agrav generator when it's finished. I designed and made this puzzle myself."

He lifted the piece of metal he was holding and placed it carefully in a little slot in the structure. The piece slid in smoothly and held in place.

"Now you take another piece." His left hand moved gently over the structure, while his right felt among the loose pieces, came up with one, and moved it into place.

Bigman, fascinated, moved forward, then jumped back at a sudden animal howl from beneath the table.

A dog came squirming out from beneath the table and put its forefeet on the bench. It was a large German shepherd dog and it stood now looking mildly at Bigman.

Bigman said nervously, "Here, now, I stepped on it by accident."

"It's only Mutt," said Norrich. "He won't hurt anyone without better cause than being stepped on. He's my dog. He's my eyes."

"Your eyes?"

Lucky said softly, "Mr. Norrich is blind, Bigman."

Death Enters the Game

Bigman shrank back. "I'm sorry."

"No need to be sorry," Norrich said cheerfully. "I'm used to it and I can get along. I'm holding a master technician's rank and I'm in charge of constructing experimental jigs. I don't need anyone to help me, either, any more than I need help in my threedees."

"I imagine the threedees offer good exercise," said Lucky.

Bigman said, "You mean you can put those things together without even being able to see them? Sands of Mars!"

"It's not as hard as you might think. I've been practicing for years and I make them myself so I know the tricks of them. Here, Bigman, here's a simple one. It's just an egg shape. Can you take it apart?"

Bigman received the light-alloy ovoid and turned it in his hands, looking over the pieces that fit together smoothly and neatly.

"In fact," Norrich went on, "the only thing I really need Mutt for is to take me along the corridors." He leaned down to scratch the dog behind one ear, and

6364

the dog permitted it, opening his mouth wide in a sleepy yawn, showing large white fangs and a length of pink lolling tongue. Lucky could feel the warm thickness of Norrich's affection for the dog pour out via the V-frog.

"I can't use the Agrav corridors," Norrich said, "since I'd have no way of telling when to decelerate, so I have to walk through ordinary corridors and Mutt guides me. It makes for the long way around, but it's good exercise, and with all the walking Mutt and I know Jupiter Nine better than anybody, don't we, Mutt? ... Have you got it yet, Bigman?"

"No," said Bigman. "It's all one piece."

"Not really. Here, give it to me."

Bigman handed it over, and Norrich's skinful fingers flew over the surface. "See this little square bit here? You push it and it goes in a bit. Grab the part that comes out the other end, give it half a turn clockwise, and it pulls out altogether. See? Now the rest conies apart easily. This, then this, then this, and so on. Lin© up the pieces in order as they come out; there are only eight of them; then put them back in reverse order. Put the key piece in last, and it will lock everything into place."

Bigman stared dubiously at the individual pieces and bent close over them.

Lucky said, "I believe you wanted to discuss the reception committee I met up with when I arrived, Mr. Norrich. You said you wanted to talk about my fight with Armand."

"Yes, Councilman, yes. I wanted you to understand. I've been here on Jupiter Nine since Agrav project started and I know the men. Some leave when their hitch is up, some stay on, greenhorns join up; but

they're all the same in one way. They're very insecure."

"Why?"

"For several reasons. In the first place, there is danger involved in the project. We've had dozens of accidents and lost hundreds of men. I lost my eyes five years ago and I was fortunate in a way. I might have died. Secondly, the men are isolated from friends and family while they're here. Really isolated."

Lucky said, "I imagine there are some people who enjoy the isolation."

He smiled grimly as he said that. It was no secret that men who in one way or another had gotten entangled with the law sometimes managed to find work on some of the pioneer worlds. People were always needed to work under domes in artificial atmospheres with pseu-do-grav fields, and those who volunteered were usually not asked too many questions. Nor was there anything very wrong with that. Such volunteers aided Earth and its people under difficult conditions, and that, in a way, was a payment for misdeeds.

Norrich nodded at Lucky's words. "I see you're not naive about it and I'm glad. Leaving the officers and the professional engineers to one side, I imagine a good half of the men here have criminal records on Earth, and most of the rest might have such records if the police knew everything. I doubt that one in five gives his real name. Anyway, you see where tension comes in when investigator after investigator arrives. You're all looking for Sirian spies; we know that; but each man thinks that maybe his own particular trouble will come out and he'll be dragged back to jail on Earth. They all want to go back to Earth, but they want to go back anonymously, not at the other end of a set of wrist

locks. That's why Red Summers could rouse them so."

"And is Summers something special that he takes the lead? A particularly bad record on Earth?"

Bigman looked up briefly from his threedee to say bitterly, "Murder, maybe?"

"No," said Norrich with instant energy. "You've got to understand about Summers. He's had an unfortunate life: broken home, no real parents. He got into the wrong crowds. He's been in prison, yes, for being involved in some minor rackets. If he'd stayed on Earth, his life would have been one long waste. But he's come to Jupiter Nine. He's made a new life here. He came out as a common laborer and he educated himself. He's learned low-grav construction engineering, force-field mechanics, and Agrav techniques. He's been promoted to a responsible position and has done wonderful work. He's respectable, admired, well liked. He's found out what it is to have honor and position and he dreads nothing more than the thought of going back to Earth and his old life."

"Sure, he hates it so much," said Bigman, "that he tried to kill Lucky by gimmicking the fight."

"Yes," said Norrich, frowning, "I heard he was using a sub-phase oscillator to kill the councilman's control response. That was stupid of him, but he was in panic. Look, fundamentally the man is goodhearted. When my old Mutt died—"

"Your old Mutt?" asked Lucky.

"I had a Seeing Eye dog before this one which I also called Mutt. It died in a force-field short circuit that killed two men besides. He shouldn't have been there, but sometimes a dog will wander off on his own adventures. This one does, too, when I'm not using him,

but he always comes back." He leaned down to slap his dog's flank lightly, and Mutt closed one eye and thumped his tail against the floor.

"Anyway, after old Mutt died, it looked for a while as though I mightn't get another and I would have to be sent home. I'm no use here without one. Seeing Eye dogs are in short supply; there are waiting lists. The administration here at Jupiter Nine didn't want to pull any strings because they weren't anxious to publicize the fact that they were employing a blind man as construction engineer. The economy bloc in Congress is always waiting for something like that to make bad publicity out of. So it was Summers who came through. He used some contacts he had on Earth and got me Mutt here. It wasn't exactly legal, it was even what you might call the black market, but Summers risked his position here to do a friend a favor and I owe him a great deal. I'm hoping you'll remember Summers can do and has done things like that and that you'll go easy on him for his actions earlier today."

Lucky said, "I'm not taking any action against him. I had no intention of doing so even before our conversation. Still, I'm sure that Summers' real name and record are known to the Council and I'll be checking on the facts."

Norrich flushed, "By all means, do so. You'll find he's not so bad."

"I hope so. But tell me something. Through all that has just taken place, there was no attempt on the part of the project administration to interfere. Do you find this strange?"

Norrich laughed shortly. "Not at all. I don't think Commander Donahue would have cared much if you'd

been killed, except for the trouble it would have taken to hush it up. He's got bigger troubles on his mind than you or your investigation."

"Bigger troubles?"

"Sure. The head of this project is changed every year; army policy of rotation. Donahue is the sixth boss we've had and far and away the best. I've got to say that. He's cut through red tape and he hasn't tried to make an army camp out of the project. He's given the men leeway and let them raise a bit of cain now and then so he's gotten results. Now the first Agrav ship will be ready to take off any time. Some say it's a matter of days."

"That soon?"

"Could be. But the point is that Commander Donahue is due to be relieved in less than a month. A delay now could mean that the launching of the Agrav ship won't take place until Donahue's successor comes in. Donahue's successor would get to ride in it, have the fame, go down in the history books, and Donahue would miss out."

"No wonder he didn't want you on Jupiter Nine," Bigman said hotly. "No wonder he didn't want you, Lucky."

Lucky shrugged. "Don't waste temper, Bigman."

But Bigman said, "The dirty cobber! Sirius can gobble up Earth for all he cares as long as he can get to ride his miserable ship." He lifted a clenched fist, and there was a muted growl from Mutt.

Norrich said sharply, "What are you doing, Bigman?"

"What?" Bigman was genuinely astonished. "I'm not doing a thing."

"Are you making a threatening gesture?"

Bigman lowered his arm quickly. "Not really."

"You've got to be careful around Mutt. He's been trained to take care of me. . . . Look, I'll show you. Just step toward me and make believe you're going to throw a punch at me."

Lucky said, "That's not necessary. We understand—"

"Please," said Norrich. "There's no danger. I'll stop Mutt in time. As a matter of fact, it's good practice for him. Everyone on the project is so careful of me that I swear I don't know if he remembers his training. Go ahead, Bigman."

Bigman stepped forward and raised his arm halfheartedly. At once Mutt's ears flattened, his eyes slitted, his fangs stood sharply revealed, his leg muscles tensed for a spring, and a harsh growl issued from the recesses of his throat.

Bigman drew back hastily, and Norrich said, "Down, Mutt!" The dog subsided. Lucky could sense, clearly, the gathering and relaxation of tension in Bigman's mind and the fond triumph in Norrich's.

Norrish said, "How are you doing with the threedee egg, Bigman?"

The little Martian, in exasperation, said, "I've given up. I've got two pieces put together and that's all I can do."

Norrich laughed. "Just a matter of practice, that's all. Look."

He took the two pieces out of Bigman's hand and said, "No wonder. You've got these together wrong. He flipped one piece end for end, brought the two together again, added another piece and another until he

held seven pieces in the shape of a loose ovoid with a hole through it. He picked up the eighth and key piece, slipped it in, gave it a half turn counterclockwise, pushed it the rest of the way, and said, "Finished."

He tossed the completed egg into the air and caught it, while Bigman watched in chagrin.

Lucky got to his feet. "Well, Mr. Norrich, we'll be seeing you again. I'll remember your remarks about Summers and the rest. Thank you for the drink." It still rested untouched on the desk.

"Nice to have met you," said Norrich, rising and shaking hands.

It was some time before Lucky could fall asleep. He lay in the darkness of his room hundreds of feet below the surface of Jupiter Nine, listening to Bigman's soft snoring in the adjoining room, and thought of the events of the day. Over and over them he went.

He was bothered! Something had happened that shouldn't have; or something had not happened that should have.

But he was weary and everything was a bit unreal and twisted in the half-world of half-sleep. Something hovered at the edge of awareness. He clutched at it, but it slipped away.

And when morning came there was nothing left of it.

Bigman called out to Lucky from his own room as Lucky was drying himself under the soft jets of warm air after his shower.

The little Martian yelled, "Hey, Lucky, I've recharged the V-frog's carbon-dioxide supply and dumped in more weed. You'll be taking it down to our meeting with that blasted commander, won't you?"

"We certainly will, Bigman."

"It's all set then. How about letting me tell the commander what I think of him?"

"Now, Bigman."

"Nuts! It's me for the shower now."

Like all men of the solar system brought up on planets other than Earth, Bigman reveled in water when he could get at it, and a shower for him was a leisurely, loving experience. Lucky braced himself for a session of the tenor caterwauling that Bigman called singing.

The intercom sounded after Bigman was well launched into some dubious fragment of melody that sounded piercingly off-key and just as Lucky completed dressing.

Lucky stepped to it and activated reception. "Starr speaking."

"Starr!" Commander Donahue's lined face showed in the visi-panel. His lips were narrow and compressed and his whole expression was one of antagonism as he gazed at Lucky. "I have heard some story of a fight between yourself and one of our workers."

"Yes?"

"I see you have not been hurt."

Lucky smiled. "All's well."

"You'll remember I warned you."

"I am making no complaints."

"Since you aren't, and in the interest of the project, I would like to ask if you plan making any report concerning it."

"Unless it turns out to have some direct bearing on the problem which concerns me here, the incident will never be mentioned by me."

"Good!" Donahue looked suddenly relieved. "I won-

der if I could extend that attitude to our meeting this morning. Our meeting might be taped for confidential records and I would prefer—"

"There will be no need to discuss the matter, Commander."

"Very good!" The commander relaxed into what was almost cordiality. "I'll be seeing you in an hour then."

Lucky was dimly aware that Bigman's shower had stopped and that his singing had subsided to a humming. Now the humming stopped, too, and there was a moment of silence.

Lucky said into the transmitter, "Yes, Commander, good—" when Bigman exploded into a wild, near-incoherent shout,

"Lucky!"

Lucky was on his feet with smooth speed and at the door connecting the two rooms in two strides.

But Bigman was in the doorway before him, eyes big with horror. "Lucky! The V-frog! It's dead! It's been killed!"

A Robot Enters the Game

The V-frog's plastic cage was shattered and shriveled, and the floor was wet with its watery contents. The V-frog, half covered with the fronds it fed upon, was quite, quite dead.

Now that it was dead and unable to control emotion, Lucky could look at it without the enforced fondness that he, as well as all others that came within its radius of influence, had felt. He felt anger, however—mostly at himself for having allowed himself to be overreached.

Bigman, fresh from his shower, with only his shorts on, clenched and unclenched his fists. "It's my fault, Lucky. It's all my fault. I was yelling so loud in the shower I never heard anyone come in."

The phrase "come in" was not quite appropriate. The killer had not simply come in; he had burnt his way in. The lock controls were fused and melted away with what had obviously been an energy projector of fairly large caliber.

Lucky stepped back to the interphone. "Commander Donahue?"

"Yes, what happened? Is anything wrong?" "I'll see you in an hour." He broke connections and returned to the grieving Bigman. He said somberly, "It's my fault, Bigman. Uncle Hector said the Sirians had not yet discovered the facts concerning the emotional powers of the V-frog, and I accepted that too thoroughly. If I had been a little less optimistic about Sirian ignorance, neither one of us would ever have left that little creature out of our sight for a second."

Lieutenant Nevsky called for them, standing at attention as Lucky and Bigman left their quarters.

He said in a low voice, "I am glad, sir, that you were unharmed in yesterday's encounter. I would not have left you, sir, had you not strictly ordered me to."

"Forget it, Lieutenant," Lucky said absently. His mind kept returning to that moment just before sleep the preceding night when, for a brief instant, a thought had hovered at the outskirts of consciousness, then vanished. But it would not come now, and finally Lucky's mind sped to other matters.

They had entered the Agrav corridor now, and this time it seemed crowded with men, streaming accurately and unconcernedly in both directions. There was a "beginning of the work day" atmosphere all about. Though men worked underground here and there was no day or night, yet the old twenty-four-hour schedule held. Mankind brought the familiar rotation of the Earth to all the worlds on which he lived. And though men might work in shifts the clock round, the largest number always worked on the "day shift" from nine to five, Solar Standard Time.

It was nearly nine now, and there was a bustle

through the Agrav corridors as men traveled to the work posts. There was a feel of "morning" almost as strong as though there were a sun low in the eastern sky and dew on the grass.

Two men were sitting at the table when Lucky and Bigman entered the conference room. One was Commander Donahue, whose face bore the appearance of a carefully controlled tension. The commander rose and coldly introduced the other: James Panner, the chief engineer and civilian head of the project. Panner was a stocky man with a swarthy face, dark deep-set eyes, and a bull neck. He wore a dark shirt open at the collar and without insignia of any sort.

Lieutenant Nevsky saluted and retired. Commander Donahue watched the door close and said, "Since that leaves the four of us, let's get to business."

"The four of us and a cat," said Lucky, stroking a small creature that hitched its forepaws on the table and stared at him solemnly. "This isn't the same cat I saw yesterday, is it?"

The commander frowned. "Perhaps. Perhaps not. We have a number of cats on the satellite. However, I presume we're not here to discuss pets."

Lucky said, "On the contrary, Commander, I think it will do as a topic of conversation to begin with and I chose it deliberately. Do you remember my own pet, sir?"

"Your little Venusian creature?" said the commander with sudden warmth. "I remember it. It was—" He stopped in confusion as though wondering, in the V-frog's absence, what the reason for his enthusiasm concerning it might be.

"The little Venusian creature," said Lucky, "had peculiar abilities. It could detect emotion. It could transmit emotion. It could even impose emotion."

The commander's eyes opened wide, but Panner said in a husky voice, "I once heard a rumor to that effect, Councilman. I laughed."

"You needn't have. It is true. In fact, Commander Donahue, my purpose in asking for this interview was to make arrangements to have every man on the project interviewed by me in the presence of the V-frog. I wanted an emotional analysis."

The commander still seemed half stunned. "What would that prove?"

"Perhaps nothing. Still, I meant to try it."

Panner intervened. "Meant to try it? You use the past tense, Councilman Starr."

Lucky stared solemnly at the two project officials. "My V-frog is dead."

Bigman said furiously, "Killed this morning."

The commander said, "Who killed it?"

"We don't know, Commander."

The commander sat back in his chair. "Then your little investigation is over, I suppose, till the animal can be replaced."

Lucky said, "There will be no waiting. The mere fact of the V-frog's death has told me a great deal, and the matter becomes much more serious."

"What do you mean?"

All stared. Even Bigman looked up at Lucky in profound surprise.

Lucky said, "I told you that the V-frog has the capacity to impose emotion. You yourself, Commander Donahue, experienced that. Do you recall your feelings

when you saw the V-frog on my ship yesterday? You were under considerable strain, yet when you saw the V-frog— Do you remember your feelings, sir?"

"I was rather taken with the creature," the commander faltered.

"Can you think why, as you look back at the moment now?"

"No, come to think of it. Ugly creature."

"Yet you liked it. You couldn't help yourself. Could you have harmed it?"

"I suppose not."

"I'm certain you couldn't. No one with emotions could have. Yet someone did. Someone killed it."

Panner said, "Do you intend to explain the paradox?"

"Easily explained. No one with emotions, A robot, however, does not have emotions. Suppose that somewhere on Jupiter Nine there is a robot, a mechanical man, in the perfect form of a human being?"

"You mean a humanoid?" exploded Commander Donahue. "Impossible. Such things exist only in fairy tales."

Lucky said, "I think, Commander, you are not aware of how skillful the Sirians are in the manufacture of robots. I think they might be able to use some man on Jupiter Nine, some thoroughly loyal man, as model; build a robot in his shape and substitute it for him. Such a humanoid robot could have special senses that would enable it to be the perfect spy. It might, for instance, be able to see in the dark or sense things through thicknesses of matter. It would certainly be able to transmit information through the subether by some built-in device."

The commander shook his head. "Ridiculous. A man

could easily have killed the V-frog. A desperate man frightened to an extreme might have overcome this— this mental influence the animal exerted. Have you thought of that?"

"Yes, I have," said Lucky. "But why should a man be so desperate, why so wild to kill a harmless V-frog? The most obvious reason is that the V-frog represented a desperate danger, that it was not harmless at all. The only danger a V-frog might have to the killer would involve the animal's capacity to detect and transmit the killer's emotions. Suppose those emotions would be an immediate giveaway to the fact that the killer was a spy?"

"How could it be?" Panner asked.

Lucky turned to look at him. "What if our killer had no emotions at all? Wouldn't a man without emotions be revealed at once as a robot? ... Or take it another way altogether. Why kill only the V-frog? Having gotten into our rooms, having risked so much, having found one of us in the shower and one at the intercom and both unsuspecting and unready, why did not the killer kill us instead of the V-frog? For that matter, why not kill us and the V-frog?"

"No time, probably," said the commander.

"There's another and more plausible reason," said Lucky. "Do you know the Three Laws of Robotics, the rules of behavior that all robots are built to follow?"

"I know them generally," the commander said. "I can't quote them."

"I can," said Lucky, "and with your permission I will, so that I may make a point. The First Law is this: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. The

Second Law is: A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. The Third Law is: A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law."

Panner nodded. "All right, Councilman, what does that prove?"

"A robot can be ordered to kill the V-frog, which is an animal. It will risk its existence, since self-preservation is only Third Law, to obey orders, which is Second Law. But it cannot be ordered to kill Bigman or myself, since we are humans, and First Law takes precedence over all. A human spy would have killed us and the V-frog; a robot spy would have killed only the V-frog. It all points to the same thing, Commander."

The commander considered that for long minutes, sitting motionless, the lines on his tired face grooving deeper. Then he said, "What do you propose to do? X-ray every man on the project?"

"No," said Lucky at once. "It's not that simple. Successful espionage is going on elsewhere than here. If there is a humanoid robot here, there are probably others elsewhere. It would be well to catch as many of the humanoids as possible; all of them if we can. If we act too eagerly and openly to catch the one under our hands, the others may be snatched away for use at another time."

"Then what do you propose doing?"

"To work slowly. Once you suspect a robot, there are ways of making it give itself away without its being aware of it. And I don't start completely from scratch. For instance, Commander, I know you are not a robot,

since I detected emotion in you yesterday. In fact, I deliberately induced anger in you to test my V-frog, and for that I ask your pardon."

Donahue's face had gone mauve. "I, a robot?"

"As I said, I used you only to test my V-frog."

Panner said dryly, "You have no reason to feel sure about me, Councilman. I never faced your V-frog."

"That is right," said Lucky. "You are not cleared yet. Remove your shirt."

"What!" cried Panner indignantly. "Why?"

Lucky said mildly, "You have just been cleared. A robot would have had to obey that order."

The commander's fist banged down on his desk. "Stop it! This ends right here. I will not have you testing or annoying my men in any way. I have a job to do on this satellite, Councilman Starr; I have an Agrav ship to get into space, and I'm getting it into space. My men have been investigated and they're clear. Your story about a robot is flimsy, and I'm not going along with it.

"I told you yesterday, Starr, that I didn't want you on this satellite disturbing my men and wrecking their morale. You saw fit yesterday to address me in insulting fashion. You say now it was just to test your animal, which makes it no less insulting. For that reason, I feel no need to co-operate with you and I am not doing so. Let me tell you exactly what I have done.

"I've cut off all communication with Earth. I've put Jupiter Nine under emergency orders. I have the powers of a military dictator now. Do you understand?"

Lucky's eyes narrowed a trifle. "As councilman of the Council of Science, I outrank you."

"How do you intend to enforce your rank? My men

will obey me and they have their orders. You will be restrained forcibly if you try in any way, by word or deed, to interfere with my orders."

"And what are your orders?"

"Tomorrow," said Commander Donahue, "at 6 p.m., Solar Standard Time, the first functioning Agrav ship in existence will make its first flight from Jupiter Nine to Jupiter One, the satellite lo. After we're back— after we're back, Councilman Starr, and not one hour sooner—you may conduct your investigation. And if you then want to get in touch with Earth and arrange court-martial proceedings, I will be ready for you."

Commander Donahue stared firmly at Lucky Starr.

Lucky said to Panner, "Is the ship ready?"

PFanner said, "I think so."

Donahue said scornfully. "We leave tomorrow. Well, Councilman Starr, do you go along with me or will I have to have you arrested?"

The silence that followed was a tense one. Bigman virtually held his breath. The commander's hands were clenching and unclenching, and his nose was white and pinched. Panner slowly fumbled a stick of gum out of his shirt pocket, stripped it of its plastofoil coating with one hand, and crumpled it into his mouth.

And then Lucky clasped his hands loosely, sat back in his chair, and said, "I'll be glad to co-operate with you, Commander."

Blindness

Bigman was at once outraged. "Lucky! Are you going to let him stop the investigation just like that?"

Lucky said, "Not exactly, Bigman. We'll be on board the Agrav ship and we'll continue it there."

"No sir," the commander said flatly, "You will not be on board. Don't think that for an instant."

Lucky said, "Who will be on board, Commander? Yourself, I presume?"

"Myself. Also Panner, as chief engineer. Two of my officers, five other engineers, and five ordinary crewmen. All these were chosen some time ago. Myself and Panner, as responsible heads of the project; the five engineers to handle the ship itself; the remainder in return for their services to the project."

Lucky said thoughtfully, "What type of service?"

Panner interrupted to say, "The best example of what the commander is talking about is Harry Norrich, who—"

Bigman stiffened in surprise. "You mean the blind fellow?"

Panner said, "You know him then?"

"We met him last evening," said Lucky.

"Well," said Panner, "Norrich was here at the very beginning of the project. He lost his sight when he threw himself between two contacts to keep a force field from buckling. He was in the hospital five months and his eyes were the one part of him that couldn't be restored. By his act of bravery, he kept the satellite from having a chunk the size of a mountain blown out of it. He saved the lives of two hundred people and he saved the project, since a major accident at the beginning might have made it impossible to get further appropriations out of Congress. That sort of thing is what earns one the honor of a place on the maiden voyage of the Agrav ship."

"It's a shame he won't be able to see Jupiter up close," said Bigman. Then, his eyes narrowing, "How'll he get around on board ship?"

Panner said, "We'll be taking Mutt, Fm sure. He's a well-behaved dog."

"That's all I want to know then," said Bigman heatedly. "If you cobbers can take a dog, you can take Lucky and me."

Commander Donahue was looking at his wristwatch impatiently. Now he put the palms of his hands flat on the table; and made as though to rise. "We have finished our business then, gentlemen."

"Not quite," Lucky said. "There's one little point to be cleared up. Bigman puts it crudely, but he's quite right. He and I will be on the Agrav ship when it leaves."

"No," said Commander Donahue. "Impossible."

"Is the added mass of two individuals too great for the ship to handle?"

Panner laughed. "We could move a mountain."

"Do you lack room then?"

The commander stared at Lucky in hard displeasure. "I will not give any reason. You are not being taken only because it is my decision that you not be taken. Is that clear?"

There was a glint of satisfaction in his eyes, and Lucky did not find it hard to guess that he was squaring accounts for the tongue-lashing Lucky had given him aboard the Lucky Starr.

Lucky said quietly, "You had better take us, Commander."

Donahue smiled sardonically. "Why? Am I to be relieved of duty at the orders of the Council of Science? You won't be able to communicate with Earth till I return, and after that they can relieve me of duty if they wish."

"I don't think you've thought it through, Commander," said Lucky. "They might relieve you of duty retroactive to this moment. In fact, I assure you they will do so. As far as the government records are concerned, then, it will appear that Agrav ship made its first flight not under your command but under the command, officially, of your successor, whoever he might be. The records of the trip might even be adjusted to show, officially, that you were not on board."

Commander Donahue went white. He rose and for a moment seemed on the point of throwing himself bodily at Lucky.

Lucky said, "Your decision, Commander?"

Donahue's voice was most unnatural when it finally came. "You may come."

Lucky spent the remainder of the day in the record rooms, studying the files on various men employed on the project, while Bigman, under Panner's guidance, was taken from laboratory to laboratory and through tremendous testing rooms.

It was only after the evening meal when they returned to quarters that they had a chance to be alone together. Lucky's silence then was not extraordinary, since the young councilman was never talkative at the best of times, but there was a small crease between his eyes that Bigman recognized as a sure sign of concern.

Bigman said, "We aren't making any progress, are we, Lucky?"

Lucky shook his head, "Nothing startling, I'll admit:"

He had brought a book-film with him from the project's library, and Bigman caught a flash of its title: Advanced Robotics. Methodically Lucky threaded the beginnings of the film through the viewer.

Bigman stirred restlessly. "Are you going to be all tied up with that film, Lucky?"

"I'm afraid so, Bigman."

"Do you mind then if I visit Norrich next door for company?"

"Go ahead." Lucky had the viewer over his eyes and he was leaning back, his arms crossed loosely across his chest.

Bigman closed the door and remained standing just outside for a moment, a little nervous. He should discuss this with Lucky first, he knew he should, and yet the temptation...

He told himself: I'm not going to do anything. I'll just check something. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong and why bother Lucky? But if it checks out, then I'll really have something to tell him.

The door opened at once when he rang, and there was Norrich, blind eyes fixed in the direction of the doorway, seated before a desk on which a checkerboard design carried odd figures.

He said, "Yes?"

"This is Bigman," said the little Martian.

"Bigman! Come in. Sit down. Is Councilman Starr with you?"

The door closed again, and Bigman looked about in the brightly lit room. His mouth tightened. "He's busy. But as for me, I'm filled up on Agrav today. Dr. Panner took me all over, only I don't understand a thing of it hardly."

Norrich smiled. "You're not exactly in a minority, but if you ignore the mathematics, some of it isn't too hard to understand."

"No? Mind explaining it then?" Bigman sat down in a large chair and bent to look under Norrich's workbench. Mutt lay there with his head between his fore-paws and one eye brightly fixed on Bigman.

(Keep him talking, thought Bigman. Keep him talking till I find a hole, or make one.)

"Look here," Norrich said. He held up one of the round counters he had been holding. "Gravity is a form of energy. An object- such as this piece I'm holding which is under the influence of a gravitational field but is not allowed to move is said to have potential energy. If I were to release the piece, that potential energy would be converted to motion—or kinetic energy, as it

is called. Since it continues under the influence of the gravitational field as it falls, it falls faster and faster and faster." He dropped the counter at this point, and it fell.

"Until, splash," said Bigman. The counter hit the floor and rolled.

Norrich bent as though to retrieve it and then said, "Would you get it for me, Bigman? I'm not sure where it rolled."

Bigman suppressed his disappointment. He picked it up and returned it.

Norrich said, "Now until recently that was the only thing that could be done with potential energy: it could be converted into kinetic energy. Of course the kinetic energy could be used further. For instance, the falling water of Niagara Falls could be used to form electricity, but that's a different thing. In space, gravity results in motion and that ends it.

"Consider the Jovian system of moons. We're at Jupiter Nine, way out. Fifteen million miles out. With respect to Jupiter, we've got a tremendous quantity of potential energy. If we try to travel to Jupiter One, the satellite Io, which is only 285,000 miles from Jupiter, we are in a way, falling all those millions of miles. We pick up tremendous speeds which we must continually counteract by pushing in the opposite direction with a hyperatomic motor. It takes enormous energy. Then, if we miss our mark by a bit, we're in constant danger of continuing to fall, in which case there's only one place to go, and that's Jupiter—and Jupiter is instant death. Then, even if we land safely on lo, there's the problem of getting back to Jupiter Nine, which means

lifting ourselves all those millions of miles against Jupiter's gravity. The amount of energy required to maneuver among Jupiter's moons is just prohibitive."

"And Agrav?" asked Bigman.

"Ah! Now that's a different thing. Once you use an Agrav converter, potential energy can be converted into forms of energy other than kinetic energy. In the Agrav corridor, for instance, the force of gravity in one direction is used to charge the gravitational field in the other direction as you fall. People falling in one direction provide the energy for people falling in the other. By bleeding off the energy that way, you yourself, while falling, need never speed up. You can fall at any velocity less than the natural falling velocity. You see?"

Bigman wasn't quite sure he did but he said, "Go on."

"In space it's different. There's no second gravitational field to shift the energy to. Instead, it is con-, verted to hyperatomic field energy and stored so. By doing this, a space ship can drop from Jupiter Nine to Io at any speed less than the natural falling speed without having to use any energy to decelerate. Virtually no energy is expended except in the final adjustment to Io's orbital speed. And safety is complete, since the ship is always under perfect control. Jupiter's gravity could be completely blanketed, if necessary.

"Going back to Jupiter Nine still requires energy. There is no getting around that. But now you can use the energy you had previously stored in the hyperatomic field condenser to get you back. The energy of Jupiter's own gravitational field is used to kick you back."

Bigman said, "It sounds good." He squirmed in his

seat. He wasn't getting anywhere. Suddenly he said, "What's that you're fooling with on your desk?"

"Chess," said Norrich. "Do you play?"

"A little," Bigman confessed. "Lucky taught me, but it's no fun playing with him. He always wins." Then he asked, offhand, "How can you play chess?"

"You mean because I'm blind?"

"Uh—"

"It's all right. I'm not sensitive about being blind. ... It's easy enough to explain. This board is magnetized and the pieces are made of a light magnetic alloy so that they stick where they're put and don't go tumbling if I move my arm about carelessly. Here, try it, Bigman."

Bigman reached for one of the pieces. It came up as though stuck in syrup for a quarter of an inch or so, then was free.

"And you see," said Norrich, "they're not ordinary chess pieces."

"More like checkers," grunted Bigman.

"Again so I don't knock them over. They're not completely flat, though. They've got raised designs which I can identify easily enough by touch and which resemble the ordinary pieces closely enough so that other people can learn them in a moment and play with me. See for yourself."

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