The Jupiter Plague

The Jovian stopped moving and the eyestalks withdrew until the head was just wrinkled slits again. “You shall… must shall*… complete the wires…”

“After I get it.”

“Complete…”

“After!”

His shout echoed away down the metal compartment and was followed by silence. They stared at each other, man and alien, or more correctly alien and alien — for this is what they were to each other. Alien, meaning different, alien meaning unknown. They faced each other in silent communication for the choice had been clearly stated by both of them and there was nothing more to be said until one or the other of them decided to act.

“Sam…” Yasumura started forward, but General Burke’s fingers clamped onto his arm and whipped him back.

“Let him be,” the general muttered. “He’s laid it out clear and simple and I’m glad he did it because I don’t know if I would have had the guts to.”

“After!” Sam shouted into the silence and raised his gun again toward the cables, over half of which had been cut by the last burst.

The Jovian slid sideways and vanished from the screen.

“What is it up to?” Yasumura asked as he rubbed away some of the sweat that was dripping into his eyes.

“I don’t know,” Sam said grimly, “but I’m going to hurry it up.”

He held his hand out to the general who reluctantly passed back the gun. Sam fired a short burst that cut two more of the electric cables. An instant later there was a booming that jarred the wall above the phone screen.

“Get back!” Burke shouted and hit Yasumura with his shoulder, knocking him aside.

With a rending screech something came through the solid metal of the wall and crashed to the deck. A screaming of released pressure tore at their ears and from the hole came a jet of frigid gas that filled the space around them with clouds of burning vapor. As they drew back the roaring jet cut off and the vapor swirled and dissipated. They looked down at the foot-long, gray cylinder that had cracked open when it hit the metal flooring, disclosing another cylinder inside made of some mottled and purple substance. This was rotting and falling away as they watched, giving off an intense odor of ammonia that drove them away from it. There was a lemon-yellow layer inside this, then still another — all of them melting and dropping to pieces under the corrosive attack of the earth’s air.

This seething process lasted for almost three minutes and at some moment during this time the Jovian reappeared on the screen but no one noticed it. When the pool of liquid on the floor ceased bubbling there remained only a waxy, translucent cylinder the size of a six-inch length of broomstick. Sam used his gun barrel to roll it from the puddle and bent over to examine it more closely. When it moved he saw that it was hollow with quite thin walls and seemed to be filled with a liquid.

“The talking is will be complete… do the wires correct.

15

“Is it… a cure for the plague?” General Burke asked, staring down at the capsule of liquid. “It could be a trick of some kind—”

“The wires correct…” the flat voice squealed from the speaker.

“I’ll get into that,” Yasumura said, taking out his knife. “What a mess — it’s a good thing that they’re color coded.”

Sam took off his beret and picked up the waxy tube with it. “I hope it’s the cure — but we won’t know until we’ve tried.” He looked down at it, startled. “It’s not cold! Yet it should be frozen solid at the temperature inside that tank. This may be it, Cleaver!”

“Then let’s get it out where it can do some good. I want a phone and I want to know where the elevator is — in that order.”

“Yes, sir, General,” the engineer said, twisting together the ends of a severed wire and reaching for another one. “You’ll find them both down there. Follow the bulkhead that way and out the first door; they’re in the corridor outside. Send someone back to let me know what happens. I’ll stick here and wire up this heavyweight Jovian, then see if I can get him to talk some more.”

General Burke called the phone that was located on the desk nearest to the air lock and after tapping his fingers for an impatient thirty seconds the screen cleared as Lieutenant Haber answered. “Report,” the general snapped.

“Quiet now, sir. The firing stopped some time ago but they have the lights on and the opening ranged and they must have a scope on it. I tried to take a look awhile ago and they almost blew my head off. So far they haven’t tried to get in.”

“Hold there, Haber, and keep under cover. I’ll contact them so we can get out of this ship. It looks as if we may have a cure for the plague but we’re going to have to get to a hospital to prove it.” He rang off before the startled officer could answer. “I’m going up to the control room, Sam. Tell Yasumura that he is to join Haber at the lock as soon as he has finished the wiring job and make him understand that it is important. Then join me in control.”