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Highwayman of the Void
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In: Science-Fiction & Fantasy·Novels
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #63189.
The opening · free to read
By DIRK WYLIE
Ironic destiny had brought outlaw Steve Nolan across the star lanes to icy Pluto and tangled his life again with the man he had sworn to kill. Once more he was trapped in a maze of Galactic intrigue that reached far back into his past--and forward to his death.
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories Fall 1944. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Steve Nolan was three years dead, pyro-burned in the black space off Luna when a prison break failed. But Nolan had a job to do. Nolan came back.
Where the Avalon Trail bends across Annihilation Range, a thousand icy miles from Pluto's northern stem, Nolan stopped and closed the intake valve of his helmet. Count five seconds, and he unhooked the exhausted tank of oxygen; count ten more and it was spinning away, end over end over Pluto's frozen surface, and a new tank was already in place. He slipped the pressure valve and inhaled deeply of the new air.
He'd come ten miles by the phosphorescent figures on the nightstone markers beside the trail. Fifteen more miles to go.
His cold black eyes stared absently at the east, where the pseudo-life of the great Plutonian crystals rolled in a shifting, tinkling sea. He noted the water-avid crystals, and noted the three crablike crawlers that munched a solitary clump of metallic grass. You don't walk, talk and breathe after a Tri-planet Lawman has declared you dead unless you note everything around you and react to what may be dangerous.
But he was looking beyond the familiar Plutonian drear, to the eastern horizon where faint lights gleamed in the dark. That was Port Avalon. That was where Steve Nolan was bound.
Woller was in Avalon. The Alan Woller who had made him an outlaw, roaming the star trails from Pluto to the Satellites, never daring to return to the inner worlds where Tri-planet kept order.
There was a slow pulse mounting in Nolan's throat as he walked on, savagely kicking a crab-shelled crawler from his path. He'd seen the newssheet, months old, in a rickety old port on one of the Satellites--Io? Ganymede?--when he was down to forty credits and a friendly bartender. It hadn't been much of an item. The kind a country editor throws into his finance column when he unexpectedly loses an ad and has to fill space.
"The new shipping company, which expects to do much for improving commercial relations with the outer planets, is headed by Alan Woller, formerly with the Interplanetary Telenews Company. Woller is remembered as the prosecution's star witness in the trial of Steve Nolan, the Junta agent indicted for treason three years ago. Nolan, sentenced to life imprisonment in Luna Cave, was killed while attempting to escape.
"The new company is capitalized at over a billion dollars, and has already taken options on bases in...."
The drink had drained out of Steve Nolan when he saw that. And the bartender had been too friendly for his own good. He'd been a soft touch for five hundred credits.
That had been rocket fare to Pluto for Nolan.
He felt the drumming with the soles of his feet, a hard, grinding sensation against his metal boots. He jumped off the trail quickly and whirled to watch for the approaching skid.
It was moving slowly, chugging along on a single jet.
Clogged feeders, Nolan thought as he felt the uneven vibrations. If he doesn't watch out he'll have a backblast.
The skid faltered past him, no faster than he could run. He looked away from the incandescent flare of the one tail jet, then that stopped too. Tall as a man, a dozen feet long, the skid lay waiting on the trail.
Waiting for Steve Nolan?
Anything was better than walking. Nolan walked up to the skid, not fast, and kicked solidly at the entrance. It slid open with a creaking noise and he was in the tank, sealing the outer door behind him.
The inner door didn't open. A female voice from a speaker said, "Who are you?"
Steve waited till he saw the pressure and temperature gauges shoot up to normal, then swung open his faceplate. "Matthews is the name," he lied easily, out of three long years of practice. "I thought you were waiting for me. Say the word and I'll get out again if I was wrong."
"Oh, no." The girl's voice hesitated a second. "What are you doing out here?"
"I'm on my way to Avalon, out of Aylette. A skid bus took me across the Ice Plains, then I caught a lift on a prospector's skid. He turned off ten miles back and I decided to walk the rest of the way."
"Do you know anything about skids? Mine isn't working very well. I'll pay you if you can--"
"I'm not a mechanic," Nolan said wearily.
"Oh. Then you can't fix it."
"I didn't say that. You can't pay me for it. I'll take a lift to Avalon, though."
"A lift? But I don't know you from Adam."
Nolan sighed. "Lady, I don't know you either. Believe me, all I want is a ride. It'll take me four hours to walk to Avalon. I can't spare the time if I can help it." He waited a second. No answer. He shrugged and finished his speech. "I'll make you a proposition. Let me in and I'll fix your jets. We'll be in Avalon in twenty minutes, I'll get out and we'll never see each other again. Don't let me in and I'll tear these ignition wires right out of the lock. Then we'll both hitchhike."
The girl's voice came with controlled anger. "You win," she said. "Come in." There was a soft click, and the inner door yielded under Nolan's hand. He stepped in.
"No hard feelings," he said mildly. "I really wanted the ride. One thing you might remember in the future, though--there are no ignition wires in an air lock."
She was pretty, she was small, she was blue-eyed and brunette. But she didn't say a word to him. She kept to her seat at the controls, watching him lift the top off the distributing chamber, prod around in the gummy mess inside for a second, then replace it and nod.
"You can start it up now, lady," he said. He glanced over her shoulder through the plastic panel, to where Avalon's lights were glowing. Where Woller was. "And the quicker," he said, "the better."
The girl looked at him curiously but said nothing. She turned and fingered the controls. The song of power that came out of the skid's jets brought a quick, slight smile to her lips. Nolan caught a glimpse of her eyes reflected back at him from the plastic panel. Appreciative eyes.
He averted his look. Would there be another time when he could meet the gaze of a decent girl and answer it?
When Woller's dead, his subconscious answered him. Until then you're not a man, Nolan. You're a weapon!
The skid was climbing, hugging the side of one of the vast foothills to Annihilation Range itself, a hundred-foot chasm on one side and the cliff on the other. Nolan watched the girl's hands for a sharp second, then relaxed. She knew what she was doing. Unerringly the skid split the center of the trail, following its many turns as though on a track. But--
A sudden high sound escaped her lips. Her foot trod hard on the back-jet pedal. The skid slewed crazily, its side crunching against the cliff as it halted.
"What the--" snarled Nolan, hand leaping to the concealed pyro he wore under his shirt. Then he saw.
Ahead of them was an immense rounded bulk, dome-shaped, black as the frozen night. A crawler ... but what a crawler! Its horny shell was half again the height of a man, filling the trail from cliff to chasm brink. There was no passing that beast. No wonder there had been no traffic from Avalon!
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