The Secret of the Ninth Planet by Donald A. Wollheim (large ebook reader TXT) 📖

squinted his eyes against the glare. "Wasn't any eruption around here. Maybe in Ecuador?"

His father shrugged. "Could have been thousands of miles away," was his slow reply. "Volcanic dust travels around the world, just as radioactive dust permeated the atmosphere from atomic testings. They say that the dust from the great Krakatoa explosion remained in the atmosphere for three years before the last of it settled."

When they had finished supper and the Sun was casting its last red rays over the rapidly purpling landscape, Burl got out the expedition radio, set up its antenna, plugged in its compact atomic battery, and tried to get the news from Lima. All he got was static.

He fiddled with the dials for a long time, twisting the antenna, ranging the wavelengths, but there was static everywhere. "Strange," he said to his father, "something's disturbed reception completely."

Pedro Gonzales, their official Peruvian guide, leaned over. "Could be the battery she is broken, eh?"

Burl shook his head. "Not this battery," he said. "It's a brand-new one, a real keen development. And I already checked the wiring. It's some sort of disturbance that's blocking reception. Maybe we're in a dead zone or something."

"Wasn't dead yesterday," said his father. "Maybe that eruption was radioactive."

Burl looked up sharply. "I'll check the Geiger counters, Dad. Something's blocking reception, something strong and powerful to interfere with this set." But when he returned, he had to admit he had found nothing.

When the Sun went down, they retired, for the temperature drops swiftly in the high, thin air of the Andes.

In the rest of the world people watched their color-vision shows without interruption. Reception was good with the Moon base, the space platforms had no difficulty making reports, and the radio news beamed out as usual. In Lima, there was a little static, and direct transmission with Brazil seemed partially disrupted, but that was all.

In the following five days, the Denning expedition had managed the difficult climb over the next range of mountains and had come down in the high plateau valley between. In this same period, the world began to realize that the dimness of the sky was not a temporary phenomenon.

Weather stations noted that the past few days had all been several degrees under the average. Reports had come in that farmers were querying the unusual drop in the temperatures at night. And astronomers, measuring the surface heat of the Sun, came up with strange discrepancies from previous data.

One astronomer communicated with another, and a general exchange of advice began. In a short while, a communication was laid on the desk of the President of the United States, who scanned it and had it immediately transmitted to the Secretary General of the United Nations. The Secretary General circulated the report among the scientific bureaus of all member nations, and this led in turn to a meeting of the Security Council. This meeting was held in quiet, without benefit of newspaper reporters or audience.

There was no longer any doubt. The radiation of the Sun reaching the face of the Earth had decreased. The facts were indisputable. Where a day should have registered, in some places, at least 90� in the Sun, a reading of only 84� was noted. Measurements definitely showed that the face of the Sun visible to man on Earth had dimmed by just that margin.

This might not prove serious at first, but as the scientists called in by the Security Council pointed out, it promised terrible things as the year went on. A difference of five or ten degrees all over the Earth could mean the ruin of certain crops, it could mean an increase in snowfall and frost that could very rapidly destroy the economies and habitability of many places on the Earth's teeming surface.

"But what," asked the Chairman of the Council, "is causing this decrease in solar energy?"

This the astronomers could not answer. But they pointed to one factor. The reports from the U.S. Moon Base did not agree with the observations from Earth. Moon instruments claimed no decrease whatsoever in the amount of sunlight reaching the arid, airless surface of the Earth's only satellite.

The cause was somewhere on Earth. And the Security Council requested the careful scanning of the Earth from space platforms and the Moon to determine the center of the trouble.

Burl Denning had not found the next valley of much interest, either. Evidence of an Inca road over the mountain had petered out. There were signs there had been human dwellings, but they were not Inca—just reminders of the onetime passage of an unknown band of primitives who had grazed their sheep, built temporary tents, and pulled up stakes perhaps a hundred years before.

So again at night, Burl, his father, and Gonzales took counsel. They were debating which way to proceed next; Mark Denning reasoning that they should go further inland, following tales natives had told; Gonzales urging that they retrack their path and proceed northward toward the regions where Inca ruins abounded.

For the past week Burl had not been able to get radio reception. The static had increased as they had gone eastward over the mountain, but not a word of news or any human voice came through. The Moon was rising on the horizon as Burl sat playing with the antenna. Finally he gave up and switched it off.

The discussion had died away and the three men were quiet. The Indian guides had retired to their own campfire, and one of them had taken out his pipes and was blowing a soft, plaintive tune.

Burl stared at the full Moon in silence, wondering if he would ever have a chance to walk its surface, or if his own future was to lie in probing mankind's past rather than surveying the grounds of his future. As he watched, he thought he saw a faint light among the brightening stars where none had been before.

He squinted, and, sure enough, he saw that one tiny white light was swinging more and more toward the center of the sky. He pointed it out to his father and Gonzales. "Too fast to be a celestial object," he said. "Is it one of the space platforms or a sputnik?"

The two men gazed at it in curiosity. Suddenly it seemed to grow brighter and sharper and to twist toward them in its path.

"Look!" gasped Burl, but the others were already on their feet.

The light plunged down. There was a sudden outburst of yellow flame that caused the three to duck instinctively, and brought the Indians to their feet with yells. The glare brightened until they could see that something was just above them. The fire vanished as swiftly as it came, but a white spot of light remained.

"It's a parachute!" Burl shouted. "It's a rocket or something, braking to a stop above us, and coming down by parachute!"

In the pale light of the full Moon they saw that something metallic and glistening hung from the white mushroom of a parachute. There was a clanging sound as it hit the rocky earth with a soft, sighing whoosh. The cloth of the parachute settled.

They ran across the dry stone of the valley floor, but Burl's long, athletic legs outdistanced the others. He reached it first.

It was a cylinder of metal, about three feet long and a foot in diameter.

"It's the nose of a message missile—dropped from a guided missile," Burl announced. "And—look!" He dramatically pointed the beam of his flashlight upon its side.

There, written in black, heat-resistant paint, were the words: To the Denning Andes Expedition, from U.S. Air Force Base, California Region. By Guided Missile Post by Moon Base control, Ptolomaeus Crater. Official. Open Without Delay.

Chapter 2.
The Valley of Stolen Sunlight

For a moment all three were silent with amazement. "From California—and Moon Base—for us?" gasped Burl, finally. "But why? What can they want of us?"

His father frowned. "Only way to find out is to open it and see." He squatted down to study the cylinder closer. Burl pointed a finger at the nose.

"Looks like a crack there. Maybe it unscrews. Let's lift it."

It was not as heavy as it had appeared, for, like all rocket missiles, it was made of the light but tough alloys that were necessary to conserve weight-lift costs and fuel reserves. They stood it upright and tried to turn the top. After a little resistance, it unscrewed slowly. Inside, they found a rolled document bearing the seal of the United States Air Force.

Burl took it out, and unfolded it with unsteady hands. His father read over his shoulder.

Gonzales poked at the empty cylinder, impatiently. Finally, he burst out, "What does it say? What do they want?"

Burl turned to him. "It's unbelievable! It's—it's just so darned surprising! The dimness of the days, the drop in temperature—it wasn't just around here! It was all over the world!"

Quickly, he went on to tell the Peruvian what they had just learned. The communication was from the U.S. Space Commission and it had been directed on its flight from California by the Moon Base, because only from the satellite could the exact location of the Dennings be spotted. It seemed that the Dennings were the only scientifically trained personnel close to the point on Earth where the disturbance originated. This also accounted for the blanketing of radio waves in their vicinity. Several airplanes had tried to locate them, but strange disturbances in the ether and atmosphere had made it impossible to establish contact. Also, the back reaches of the Andes were poorly mapped and treacherous in air currents, even in normal times.

"During the last week, a certain fraction of the Sun's light and energy reaching the Earth has been diverted. It has been bent or focused in much the same way that a lens bends light rays—and the point to which it has been directed is a spot only seven miles from here! Over that last mountain range," said Burl, pointing.

Gonzales followed his finger. "Just over the mountains lies the source of the trouble," said Burl excitedly. "And we're the nearest to it. They want us to go over there, see what it is, stop it, or report back. It took the telescopes in Moon Base to locate us and to track the center of the trouble!"

Mark Denning pursed his lips. "We'll have to start tomorrow, and we'll have to go fast. A loss of light and heat, however slight, could have very serious effects on life if continued too long. We can make it by tomorrow night, if we start early and leave the Indians and pack animals behind."

The other two nodded. Mark looked at them in the half-light of the Moon. "You'll have to stay with the equipment, Pedro, otherwise the Indians might abandon it. Burl and I will start out at dawn."

Gonzales agreed and the three made their way back to the camp. At the first sign of light breaking in the morning horizon, Burl and his father started off. They carried only enough equipment for survival, plus the additional items that might be needed for the emergency ahead.

The trek over the mountains was a hard one, the path narrow, steep, sometimes nonexistent. There were few signs of Indians or animals, and it was plain that few ever traveled over this range. The air was cold and thin, vegetation sparse and hardy. All around them was the cold blue of the sky—a shade darker than usual—and the gaunt peaks of ancient mountains. The Inca kings may have claimed the land here, but even their hardy legions had never conquered these lonely and hostile sky domains.

Panting and weary with hours of climbing, Burl and his father made a quick lunch in a sheltered jumble of rock near the top. Then, shouldering their packs again, they trudged on. At last they reached a point where the view of the other side spread out before them—a breathtakingly clear vision of the little valley below.

As they looked down, the air seemed to shimmer and vibrate. Burl rubbed his eyes. "It hurts," he said.

His father squinted. "There's a powerful vibrational effect. It may be a very dangerous concentration of the invisible rays of the Sun as well as of light."

Once Burl had gotten used to the odd visual effect, which was like gazing into the twisting heat rays rising from an overheated oven, he saw that there was a small flat region between the mountains. And in the center of this valley was a large black structure of some sort. The twisting effect of the light around it made it impossible to tell more.

"That's it," said Burl. His father nodded, shifted the pack to ease his shoulders, unstrapped the hunting rifle slung over his back, and carefully checked its loads.

Burl saw what his father was doing and suddenly understood the danger. What could be doing a thing like this? What but something not of this Earth?