OUTPOST ON IO
By LEIGH BRACKETT
In a crystalline death lay the only
release for those prisoners of that
Ionian hell-outpost. Yet MacVickers
and the men had to escape—for to
remain meant the conquering of the
Solar System by the inhuman Europans.
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories Winter 1942.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
MacVickers stopped at the brink of the dark round shaft.
It was cold, and he was stark naked except for the silver collar weldedaround his neck. But it was more than cold that made him shiver andclamp his long bony jaw.
He didn't know what the shaft was for, or where it led. But he had asudden feeling that once he went down he was down for good.
The small, round metal platform rocked uneasily under his feet. Beyondthe railing, as far as MacVickers could see to the short curve of Io'shorizon, there was mud. Thin, slimy blue-green mud.
The shaft went down under the mud. MacVickers looked at it. He lickeddry lips, and his grey-green eyes, narrow and hot in his gaunt darkface, flashed a desperate look at the small flyer from which he hadjust been taken.
It bobbed on the heaving mud, mocking him. The eight-foot Europan guardstanding between it and MacVickers made a slow weaving motion with histentacles.
MacVickers studied the Europan with the hating eyes of a wolf ina trap. His smooth black body had a dull sheen of red under theJupiter-light. There was no back nor front to him, no face. Only thefour long rubbery legs, the roundish body, and the tentacles in awaving crown above.
MacVickers bared white, uneven teeth. His big bony fists clenched. Hetook one step toward the Europan.
A tentacle flicked out, daintily, and touched the silver collar at theEarthman's throat. Raw electric current, generated in the Europan'sbody, struck into him, a shuddering, blinding agony surging down hisspine.
He stumbled backward, and his foot went off into emptiness. He twistedblindly, catching the opposite side of the shaft, and hung there,groping with his foot for the ladder rungs, cursing in a harsh,toneless voice.
The tentacle struck out again, with swift, exquisite skill. Three timeslike a red-hot lash across his face, and twice, harder, across hishands. Then it touched the collar again.
The tentacle reached out again, with swift exquisiteskill. Raw agony filling his body, MacVickers retched and fellbackward.
MacVickers retched and let go. He fell jarringly down the ladder,managed to break his fall onto the metal floor below, and crouchedthere, sick and furious and afraid.
The hatch cover clanged down over him like the falling hammer of doom.
MacVickers dropped into a circular room thirty feet across, floored andwalled with metal and badly lighted. The roof was of thick glassiteplates. Through them, very clearly, MacVickers could see four Europanguards, watching.
"They're always there," said the Venusian softly. "You'll come to lovethem, stranger."
There were men standing around the ladder foot, thirteen of them, withthe Venusian. Earthmen, Martians, Venusians, pale, stark naked