The Devil's Mirror (17 page)

‘But not like this. A beautiful girl one second, a monster the next...’ He shuddered.

Stark said, ‘Par for the course. When you’ve been ploughing space as long as I have, you’ll stop being surprised at the disguises these critters can get into. The one out there had a special knack for assuming the shape of the opposite sex of any species that crosses its path. If we were girls, it would have changed into a Greek god without benefit of fig-leaf. If we were, say, tomcats, it would have become a momcat. Don’t let it throw you. Just thank your Probe for letting you see beyond the sugar-coating.’ Stark made a notation on the clipboard and Croydon drove the ship up and away, into space, towards the next satellite on their schedule.

When Moon Ten began to fill their viewplate, they donned their suits again—in advance of landing, to save time. Croydon brought the ship down with a sharp roll that threw them to the deck.

‘You all right, Stark?’

‘Sure. It’ll take more than a bumpy landing to kill me off. How are you?’

‘Dented my helmet, but I’m fine.’

‘Then let’s go.’

Croydon stepped out first. Moon Ten was a rocky world punctuated infrequently with scraggly trees. From behind one of these, a swarm of black, furry, spidery creatures as large as fists skittered out and crawled on their legs. Revolted, he brushed them off with quick panicky strokes and reached for his blaster.

But LOVE! sang Stark’s Probe, and he said, ‘Hold off. They’re friendly little beggars. What do you want to blast them for?’

‘Friendly?’ Croydon played with the button of his Probe. ‘I’m not getting a thing from them, Stark. My Probe’s dead.’

‘Must have damaged it when you bumped your head. Don’t worry about it. Mine’s OK. That’s the great thing about these Probes, kid—they don’t just see through beauty, they see through ugliness, too. In the old days, we would have blasted these critters just because of their crawly looks. Ugliness is only skin deep, sometimes.’

The spiders followed them like faithful dogs, crooning LOVE! as they trod the hard rock of Moon Ten. Stark chiselled a piece of the rock and dropped it in his sample case. Immediately, his helmet-phones began to cluck like laying hens. A hoarse cry burst from his lips.

‘What is it?’ asked Croydon.

‘My sample case is going crazy. This hunk of gravel is
hot
, boy! Radioactive as hell.’

‘That’s great!’

‘I’ll say it’s great! If the rest of the moon is even
half
as hot as this, it’s worth billions!’ His voice dropped to a whisper. ‘And it’s ours.’

Croydon said, ‘This news will go over big with the Colonial Bureau.’

Stark snorted. ‘The Colonial Bureau! That’s not what I mean when I say
ours
. I mean you and me, Croydon. Think of it: a moon worth billions of dollars and it’s ours—if we play our cards right.’

‘How?’

‘First thing we do is to list this moon along with those having hostile inhabitants. We say nothing about these cheerful little spiders. And we say nothing about the radioactive deposits. Absolutely nothing.’

‘Why? We can enter a claim to the moon when we make our report...’

‘Yeah? And have them up the ante because it’s hot? Or tie it up with red tape? Or pull some legal shenanigans to grab it as government property? Not on your life!’

‘But, Stark—’

‘Listen, kid. I’ve been blazing space trails for a long time and I’ve seen the Bureau pull some pretty fancy tricks. Take my word for it. The less they know, the better. If we keep quiet about the ore and scare settlers away with stories of malignant life—why, we’ll be able to get this hunk of gravel for a song!’

‘We can’t do that.’

‘Oh,’ groaned Stark, ‘don’t get idealistic on me. Don’t tell me you’re in this stinking job just for the fun of it, or the lousy paycheck. Grow up! We’re the first to really
see
new planets, the first to find out which are good and which are garbage. Well, it’s been a long time coming—thirty years—but it’s come at last and I’m not going to let it slip away. Understand?’

‘Sure. But count me out, Stark.’

‘What the hell do you mean?’

LOVE! the spiders sincerely chorused.

‘I mean my report is going to be as full as I can make it. Friendly spiders, radioactive ore, the works. Maybe that makes me a dumb yokel, but I’m sorry. I happen to think this is an important job.’

Stark’s voice roared over the helmet-phones. ‘I have to pass up the chance of a lifetime because of a harebrained kid—’ His voice stopped abruptly.

From a branch above them, a long black snake uncoiled lazily and blinked at them with ruby eyes.

Stark’s hand moved to his blaster as Croydon asked, ‘Is it friendly?’

HATE! Stark felt the snake’s malignancy roll over him in waves. He delved into its mind and felt the joy it took in the crushing power of its mighty body. But he conquered the terror in his voice and replied, ‘Sure. Like a kitten. It wants to be stroked, don’t you, Pussycat?’

Croydon laughed with relief and stroked the black, glittering length of the creature’s body.

Stark walked backward, slowly, the frisky spiders making way for him with sighs of unselfish LOVE! He watched the snake wrap itself around Croydon...

‘Stark—is it all right? It’s just a form of caress, isn’t it?’

‘Sure.’

‘But it’s—rather tight.’

‘Just a hug. It adores you.’

‘Maybe it doesn’t know its own strength. Maybe you ought to scare it away with your blaster.’

‘No, it might get frightened and squeeze too hard.’ Croydon’s voice rose suddenly in mortal fear: ‘Blast it. Stark!’

‘Sure.’

‘
Stark!
’

Croydon’s screams rasped in the helmet-phones. Stark waited until his body hung limp and broken in the snake’s coils. Then he blasted. The snake uncoiled, dropped Croydon, then slid to the ground and died beside him.

Stark acted quickly. He dragged Croydon’s body towards the ship, ignoring the scampering spiders that swarmed playfully around his legs, sending warm waves of LOVE! over him.

He pulled the corpse into the ship and sealed the airlock. A few spiders followed him in and inspected the ship with childlike curiosity.

Stark let them rub against his legs while he wrote on the clipboard: ‘Moon Ten infested with malignant life akin to Terran boa-constrictor. John Croydon killed by same in line of duty. Soil hard, rocky, unsuitable for—’

The clipboard fell from his hand. He felt a sharp pain in his ankles. Looking down, he saw two of the spiders had cut through his suit and punctured his skin. LOVE! LOVE! He reached for his blaster, but hesitated. He could not kill them without blasting his own legs.

Now horror shook him. Two more of the friendly creatures had jumped to his wrists, another to his throat.
My blood
, he realised:
they’re sucking my blood
...

He yelled. A flood of LOVE! answered him. He tried to brush them off, but they clung tenaciously, their furry bodies swelling with his blood.

He grew dizzy and his thoughts went in circles of panic: ‘But... I Probed their minds... they’re benevolent... they can’t act like this... it’s not possible...’

Too late, he realised what form of disguise the friendly spiders used... not a pretty façade to hide their physical ugliness... nothing to deceive the eye... but something better, something Probe-proof, something to deceive the human heart... a masquerade of worship... a psychic smoke-screen of LOVE! LOVE! LOVE! that camouflaged the hunger beneath...

Stark’s mind fogged. He sank weakly to the deck.

LOVE! KISS! LOVE! DOGGY! LOVE! TEDDY BEAR! LOVE! CHRISTMAS TREE! LOVE! CHICKEN SOUP! LOVE! MAMA! LOVE! TITTY! LOVE! LOVE! LOVE! LOVE! LOVE!...

Stark slid into a warm sweet milky pool of death.

The Editor,

The Planetary Evening Post,

Level 78,

Building K-6 (Old Section),

New York, New York (Zip Code: AAB/001425786-C)

Dear Sir,

Your letter was most appreciated, but I am very sorry you did not like
Vixen of Venus.
Too melodramatic, you say, and today’s readers will have nothing to do with melodrama.

But, my dear sir, life itself is flagrantly melodramatic! The lady I described in
Vixen of Venus
is an almost literal transcription of an actual lady I encountered there in my travels, However, that is water under the bridge, as you ‘Earthworms’ say (ha ha, no offence).

My purpose in writing to you again is to sketch briefly an article I would like to do for you. It is completely factual, though I fear it may strike you as extravagant. A deep-dyed villain figures prominently in the piece: also a fair maiden in distress; not to mention a righteous, retribution-dealing father right out of the admirable Victor Hugo of your own culture. And yes, I’m afraid there will even be a tricky twist ending.

If you have read this far, perhaps you will read further. The proposed article, which we might call
The Star of Orim,
concerns a series of fascinating events that occurred in my own galaxy, 75/890 (I trust you have no editorial taboo against foreign settings). The chronicle begins on the planet Orim, and our antagonist, the Sargian warlord Zoonbarolarrio Feng, accompanied by a beautiful young lady who hates him (it would be well to establish this immediately) are discovered in a magnificent Orimese palace. To point up their relationship, we might have them leaving a bedroom together. They make an oddly contrasted pair as they walk through the high-ceilinged, luxurious rooms of the palace. Feng is an enormous man—massive and powerful, with thick black hair and beard; his eyes are like an eagle’s and his nose is a formidable promontory that looks well on the coins that bear his likeness. In his black tunic, red robe and hip-high boots of shining xhulq, he is indeed an imposing figure. The girl is his complete opposite: she is small and slight, with fair skin and with hair red-gold as a dying sun (I’m sorry, but there
is
hair like that, you know, especially among the Orimese). Her young body is covered only by the most gauze-like pale rosy silk, cut in a pattern that leaves much of her smooth skin exposed. Her small bare feet whisper on the marble floor.

Feng is in a good mood. As they walk, he chatters amiably in his rumbling basso. ‘Conquering your planet has been rich in rewards. Not only do I capture the most gifted scientist in the galaxy, but I find that he has an extremely beautiful daughter. A double prize!’ This speech is reconstructed, and if the exposition is too crude for you, I can smooth it over in the finish.

As they approach the laboratory, they are saluted by two slender officers in the skin-tight black uniform of Feng’s personal guard. One of them opens the door. Feng and the girl enter a huge room of glass and metal where a small forge glows and platoons of test-tubes and retorts bubble and hiss. At the end of a long aisle, a grey-haired man sits on a high stool and looks at a gleaming metal star in his hand.

Feng walks up to him and the girl follows. The black-bearded conqueror greets the scientist with condescending joviality. ‘Good evening, Torak,’ he booms. ‘What have you there?’

The old man ignores Feng, looks past him at the girl. ‘Vola,’ he whispers gently. ‘Vola, my child.’

The girl’s voice is faint and husky. ‘You look tired, Father. You work too hard.’

‘You, my dear—how are you?’

She lowers her eyes. ‘I’m all right. Don’t worry about me.’

Feng laughs. ‘That’s right. Don’t worry about her. She’s in good hands!’

Does Torak lose your sympathy, dear sir, because he allows his daughter’s virgin virtue to be rent asunder by this brute, impaled on the insatiable sabre of his lechery? You must, then, be made aware, that prior to her ravishment Torak had watched, with taped-open eyes, and unedited ten-hour educational film, in living colour, three dimensions and deafening stereophonic sound, of the legendary Six Hundred Sacred Tortures of Sarg, the featured roles played not by professional actresses but, at the tops of their voices, by the late lamented lovely, young, naked, pink, virgin daughters of other scientists of other planets. Do you continue to wonder why he permits Feng to plunder his daughter’s beautiful body and his own brilliant mind?

Feng gets straight to business. ‘Now then, Torak,’ he bellows. ‘I demand an answer! How soon will the project be finished?’

‘It
is
finished, my lord,’ Torak answers in a lifeless tone, and holds up the flat piece of metal cut in the form of a tour-pointed star.

‘This—’ asks Feng, ‘this is it? The new metal?’

“The new metal. The invincible metal. Yes, this is it.’ Feng chuckles. ‘I see you’ve made it into the shape of the Star of Orim, the symbol of your people. A very clever comment, Torak—but your rebel’s propaganda is wasted on me, I fear. Here, let me have that.’ He snatches the metal star from Torak’s hand. ‘I shall notify my entire staff to assemble here immediately. The tests will begin at once.’

‘Tests?’

‘Of course,’ Feng smiles. ‘You didn’t think I would take your word for it, did you? Why, for all I know, this shiny new stuff of yours might collapse like tinfoil in a baby’s fist. Nothing would please you more, would it?’ He laughs again. ‘No, my friend. I am not such a fool. I have not conquered almost the entire galaxy to be finally outwitted by a rebel scientist. This metal shall be thoroughly tested, I assure you. And my own scientists shall conduct the tests.’ Feng’s eyes grow suddenly sharper. ‘If it is all you claim it to be, then the last stronghold in the galaxy shall yield before me—the planet Klor!’

Now, somewhere in through here we will have to sandwich the information that, for years, Feng had been looking forward to the day when the whole galaxy would be his. Slowly, planet by planet, he saw his dream coming true, but always the planet Klor resisted his mighty navies. Perhaps in a footnote we can remind your readers that Klor is a world almost completely under water: most of its people are fish-like depth creatures. And Feng’s engineers had despaired of building amphibious ships versatile enough to fling themselves from the base-planet, Sarg, across the black emptiness of outer space, and down into the watery depths of Klor. Such ships would have had to be made of metal as light as spaceship alloy and yet as pressure-resistant as a bathysphere. Moreover, it would have had to be resistant to heat and cold and radiation. But back to our scene in the laboratory: