Earth and its colonies on Mars and Venus are ruled by an authoritarian post-World War III world state which plans to take control of a new method of space travel when it has been perfected by a Martian scientist. When they fail to secure the invention, the world state's Coordinator decides to destroy the Mars colony with "radi-germ bombs.
Release date:
March 31, 2014
Publisher:
Gateway
Print pages:
96
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The Cap Kennedy (F.A.T.E.) Series (E.C. Tubb writing as Gregory Kern)
1: Galaxy of the Lost (1973)
2: Slave Ship from Sergan (1973)
3: Monster of Metelaze (1973)
4: Enemy Within the Skull (1974)
5: Jewel of Jarhen (1974)
6: Seetee Alert! (1974)
7: The Gholan Gate (1974)
8: The Eater of Worlds (1974)
9: Earth Enslaved (1974)
10: Planet of Dread (1974)
11: Spawn of Laban (1974)
12: The Genetic Buccaneer (1974)
13: A World Aflame (1974)
14: The Ghosts of Epidoris (1975)
15: Mimics of Dephene (1975)
16: Beyond the Galactic Lens (1975)
17: The Galactiad (1983)
Alien Dust (1955)
Alien Impact (1952)
Journey Into Terror (originally published as Alien Life (1954, rev. 1998))
Atom War on Mars (1952)
Fear of Strangers (first published as C.O.D. – Mars (1968))
Century of the Manikin (1972)
City of No Return (1954)
Death God’s Doom (1999)
Death is a Dream (1967)
Dead Weight (first published as Death Wears a White Face (1979))
Escape into Space (1969)
Footsteps of Angels (2004) (previously unpublished work written c. 1988)
Hell Planet (1954)
Journey to Mars (1954)
Moon Base (1964)
Pandora’s Box (1996) (previously unpublished work written 1954)
Pawn of the Omphalos (1980)
S.T.A.R. Flight (1969)
Stardeath (1983)
Starslave (2010) (previously unpublished work written 1984)
Stellar Assignment (1979)
Temple of Death (1996) (previously unpublished work written 1954)
Fifty Days to Doom (first published as The Extra Man (1954))
The Life-Buyer (1965, 2008)
The Luck Machine (1980)
World in Torment (originally published as The Mutants Rebel (1953))
The Primitive (1977)
The Resurrected Man (1954)
The Sleeping City (1999)
The Space-Born (1956)
The Stellar Legion (1954)
To Dream Again (2011)
Venusian Adventure (1953)
Tide of Death (first published as World at Bay (1954))
E. C. Tubb (writing as Arthur MacLean)
The Possessed (revised version of Touch of Evil (1957))
E. C. Tubb (writing as Brian Shaw)
Argentis (1952)
E. C. Tubb (writing as Carl Maddox)
Menace from the Past (1954)
The Living World (1954)
E. C. Tubb (writing as Charles Grey)
Dynasty of Doom (1953)
The Extra Man (first published as Enterprise 2115 (1954) & then as The
Mechanical Monarch (1958))
I Fight for Mars (1953)
Space Hunger (1953)
The Hand of Havoc (1954)
Secret of the Towers (originally published as The Tormented City (1953))
The Wall (1953)
E. C. Tubb (writing as Gill Hunt)
Planetfall (1951)
E. C. Tubb (writing as King Lang)
Saturn Patrol (1951)
E. C. Tubb (writing as Roy Sheldon)
The Metal Eater (1954)
E. C. Tubb (writing as Volsted Gridban)
The Green Helix (originally published as Alien Universe (1952))
Reverse Universe (1952)
Planetoid Disposals Ltd. (1953)
The Freedom Army (originally published as De Bracy’s Drug (1953))
Fugitive of Time (1953)
Arrest
THEY came for him at dawn, at the time when the tide of life is at its lowest ebb. Four of them, three men and an officer trimly dressed in sombre black, the red piping and shoulder insignia stark against the dull material. Weapons gleamed dully in the indirect lighting.
“Get up!”
John Benson sat up, rubbed the last traces of sleep from his eyes, and squinted at the officer.
“Get up!”
“I heard you the first time,” snapped John. He reached for a cigarette, inhaled, let smoke trickle from his nostrils. “What is the meaning of this intrusion?”
“You are to come with me.”
“Am I? May I remind you that I am your ranking officer, a major in the rocket service. I notice that you are merely a captain.”
The officer shrugged, no trace of emotion disturbing the calm arrogance of his features. “I am of the special branch, and as such your superior rank means less than nothing. Now will you rise and dress, or do I take you as you are?”
For a long moment John stared at him, at the two men beside him, at the third, standing quietly in the half-open doorway. From outside came the murmur of excited voices, as other occupants of the apartment building discussed what was happening. The guard in the doorway made no attempt to hide himself.
John shrugged, crushed out his cigarette, slipped from the rumpled sheets. A hand prevented him from entering the shower. Angrily he knocked it aside, stepped forward, and doubled in sudden agony.
“You will get dressed,” the officer ordered. The pistol with which he had struck John rested easily in his hand.
“I insist that I be allowed to make a visi-call,” gasped John. “Your superiors shall hear of this. It is fantastic. There has been some stupid mistake, a mistake for which you shall pay.”
“Security does not make mistakes,” the officer said coldly. “Get dressed.”
Sullenly John dressed himself, smoothing the fine grey uniform over wide shoulders, setting the peaked military cap rakishly on his crisp blond hair. On his shoulders the comet insignia of a first class pilot twinkled with metallic thread. Automatically he reached for his weapon belt. The officer caught his arm.
“You won’t need that.”
“Am I under arrest?”
“You won’t need your weapon belt, that’s all.”
Angrily John shook off the other’s hand. “I refuse to be disgraced this way. I am an officer, entitled to bear arms. Either I am under arrest, or I insist on wearing my arms. Well?
“You will not wear your arms.”
“Then I am under arrest?”
“Yes.”
For the first time John felt fear.
He sat silent in the car. It slid through the traffic, the turbo-jet whining smoothly, the red headlights flashing a warning to clear the road. Around him, the city stirred, the streets thronged with people. It was shift change, one of the three eight-hour breaks when those coming off shift mingled with those going on. Overhead, the street lights died as the rising sun threw a stronger light over the city. Ahead, the delicate spires of the military academy soared to the skies, their tops bright with the new day.
He didn’t talk. It was a waste of time to question the laconic officer, but within his skull his thoughts raced their busy paths. Why had he been arrested? What would happen to him? Despite his firm knowledge that he was innocent, he felt the stirrings of panic. Security didn’t make mistakes!
He had been bred on that creed. It had grown to be part of him. The essential rightness of the military regime. The flawless logic that had proved that men could not rule themselves. The military were the aristocracy. Security were their guardians. And he was under arrest!
The car slid beneath the high portals of the military academy, braked to a smooth halt. Together they marched across the courtyard, entered a lift, shot a hundred storeys into the heart of the giant building. A man, sitting behind a wide desk, looked up at their approach.
“Captain Martin reporting the arrival of Major John Benson, sir,” the officer saluted, stood at attention.
“Very well,” the man said tiredly. “You may go.”
Martin saluted again, spun on his heel, re-entered the lift. His job was done. What happened to his prisoner he neither knew nor cared. He did as he was told, and others did as he told them. He dismissed the episode from his mind.
“Why am I here?” asked John.
“A moment. The Co-ordinator will see you.” The man closed a circuit. “Major Benson here, sir.”
“Send him in,” snapped the speaker.
“Yes, sir.” He looked at Benson. “The Co-ordinator will see you now. Go through that door.” He bent to study papers littering the wide desk. John hesitated, looked around the deserted room, then pushed open the door.
The room was huge. Full-length windows ran along the entire stretch of one wall, filing cabinets occupied another. A map, glittering with vari-coloured lights reared almost to the high ceiling. Against this immensity the sole occupant seemed trivial, insignificant. Benson knew better.
He let the door swing softly shut behind him.
“Major Benson at your service, sir.” He stood waiting for permission to approach.
The Co-ordinator was an old man. A small, wrinkled, dried up husk of a man. His body was bent, gaunt, twisted, as if from some old crippling injury. He wore a badly-fitting uniform of plain material and his head was an expanse of skin, but Benson didn’t laugh.
Men didn’t laugh at the Co-ordinator! It may have been because of his eyes, great burning orbs of sheer intelligent power. It may have been because of his age, and no man knew just what that was, or it may. . .
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