 The Good Neighbors by Edgar Pangborn, read by Bologna Times. You can't blame an alien for a little inconvenience, as long as he makes up for it. The ship was sited a few times, briefly and without a good fix. It was spherical, the estimated diameter about 27 miles, and was in an orbit approximately 3400 miles from the surface of the earth. No one observed the escape from it. The ship itself occasioned some excitement, but back there, at the tattered end of the 20th century, what was one visiting spaceship, more or less? Others had appeared before, and gone away, discouraged, or just not bothering. Three-dimensional TV was coming out of the experimental stage. Soon, anyone could have Dora the Doll, or the grandson of Tarzan, smack in his own living room. Besides, it was a hot summer. The first knowledge of the escape came when the region of Seattle suffered an eclipse of the sun, which was not an eclipse, but a near-shadow, which was not a shadow, but a thing. The darkness drifted out of the northern Pacific. It generated thunder, without lightning, and without rain. When it had moved eastward and the hot sun reappeared, when followed, a moderate gale. The coast was battered by sudden high waves, then hushed in a bewilderment of fog. Before that appearance, radar had gone crazy for an hour. The atmosphere buzzed with aircraft. They went up in readiness to shoot, but after the first sighting, reports only a few miles offshore. That order was vehemently canceled. Someone in charge must have had a grain of sense. The thing was not a plane, rocket, or missile. It was an animal. If you shoot an animal that resembles an inflated gas bag with wings, and the wings spread happens to be something over four miles, tip to tip, and the carcass drops on a city, it's not nice for the city. The Office of Continental Defense deplored the lack of precedent. But actually none was needed. You just don't drop four miles of dead or dying alien flesh on Seattle, or any other part of a swarming homeland. You wait till it flies out over the ocean, if it will, the most commodious ocean in reach. It, or rather she, didn't go back over the Pacific, perhaps because of the prevailing westerlies. After the Seattle incident, she climbed to a great altitude above the Rockies, apparently using an updraft with very little wing motion. There was no means of calculating her weight, or mass, or buoyancy. Dead or injured, Drift might have carried her anywhere within one or two hundred miles. Then she seemed to be following the line of the Platte and the Missouri. By the end of the day, she was circling interminably over the huge complex of St. Louis, hopelessly crying. She had a head drawn back most of the time into the bloated mass of the body, but thrusting forward now and then on a short neck, not more than three hundred feet in length. When she did that, the blunt, turtle-like head could be observed, the gaping, toothless, suffering mouth from which the thunder came, and the soft shining purple eyes that searched the ground but found nothing answering her need. The skin color was mud-brown, with some dull iridescence and many peculiar marks resembling wheels or blisters. Along the belly, some observers saw half a mile of paired protuberances that looked like teats. She was unquestionably the equivalent of a vertebrate. Two web-footed legs were drawn up close against the cigar-shaped body. The vast, rather narrow, inflated wings could not have been held or moved in flight without a strong internal skeleton and musculature. Theorists later argued that she must have come from a planet with a high proportion of water surface, a planet possibly larger than Earth, though of about the same mass and with a similar atmosphere. She could rise in Earth's air. And before each thunderous lament she was seen to breathe, it was assumed that the immense air sacs within her body were inflated or partly inflated when she left the ship, possibly with some gas lighter than nitrogen. Since it was inconceivable that a vertebrate organism could have survived entry into atmosphere from an orbit 3400 miles up, it was necessary to believe that the ship had briefly descended, unobserved, and by unknown means, probably on Earth's night side. Later on the ship did descend as far as atmosphere for a moment. St. Louis was partly evacuated. There is no reliable estimate of the loss of life and property from panic and accident on the jammed roads and rail lines. 1500 dead. 7400 injured is the conservative figure. After a night and day she abandoned that area, flying heavily eastward. The droning and swooping gnats of aircraft plainly distressed her. At first she had only tried to avoid them, but now and then during her eastward flight from St. Louis she made short desperate rushes against them, without skill or much sign of intelligence, screaming from a wide open mouth that could have swallowed a four-engine bomber. Two aircraft were lost over Cincinnati by collision with each other and trying to get out of her way. Pilots were then ordered to keep a distance of not less than 10 miles until such time as she reached the Atlantic, if she did, when she could safely be shot down. She studied Chicago for a day. By that time civil defense was better prepared. About a million residents had already fled to open country before she came, and the loss of life was proportionately smaller. She moved on. We have no clue to the reason why great cities should have attracted her, though apparently they did. She was hungry, perhaps, or seeking help, or merely drawn in animal curiosity by the endless motion of the cities and the strangeness. It has even been suggested that the lifeforms of her homeland, her masters, resembled humanity. She moved eastward and religious organizations united to pray that she would come down on one of the lakes where she could safely be destroyed. She didn't. She approached Pittsburgh, choked and screamed and flew high, and soared in weary circles over buffalo for a day and a night. Some pilots who had followed the flight from the west coast claimed that the vast lamentation of her voice was growing fainter and horser while she was drifting along the line of the Mohawk Valley. She turned south, following the Hudson at no great height. Sometimes she appeared to be choking, the labored inhalations harsh and prolonged, like a cloud in agony. When she was over Westchester, headquarters tripled the swarm of interceptors and observation planes. Squadrons from Connecticut and southern New Jersey deployed to form a monstrous funnel, the small end before her, the large end pointing out to open sea. Heavy bombers closed in above, laying a smoke screen at ten thousand feet to discourage her from rising. The ground shook with a drone of jets, and with her crying. Multitudes had abandoned the metropolitan area, other multitudes trusted to the subways, to the narrow street canyons, and to the strength of concrete and steel. Others climbed to a thousand high places and watched, trusting the laws of chance. She passed over Manhattan in the evening, between 8.14 and 8.27, July 16, 1976, at an altitude of about two thousand feet. She swerved away from the aircraft that blanketed Long Island and the sound, swerved again as the southern group buzzed her instead of giving way. She made no attempt to rise into the sun-crimsoned terror of drifting smoke. The plan was intelligent. It should have worked, but for one fighter pilot who jumped the gun. He said later that he himself couldn't understand what happened. It was court-martial testimony, but his reputation had been good. He was Bill Green, William Hammond Green of New London, Connecticut, flying a one-man jet fighter, well aware of the strictest orders not to attack until the target had moved at least ten miles east of Sandy Hook. He said he certainly had no previous intention to violate orders. It was something that just happened in his mind, a sort of mental sneeze. His squadron was approaching Rockaway, the flying creature about three miles ahead of him and half a mile down. He was aware of saying out loud to nobody, well, she's too big. Then he was darting out of formation, diving on her, giving her one rocket burst and reeling off to the south at 840 miles per hour. He never did locate or rejoin his squadron, but he made it somehow back to his home field. He climbed out of the cockpit, they say, and fell flat on his face. It seems likely that his shot missed the animal's head and tore through some part of her left wing. She spun to the left, rose perhaps a thousand feet, facing the city, side slipped, recovered herself, and fought for altitude. She could not gain it. In the effort, she collided with two of the following planes. One of them smashed into her right side, behind the wing. The other flipped end over end across her back, like a swatted dragonfly. It dropped clear and made a mess on Bedlow's Island. She too was falling, in a long slant, silent now, but still living. After the impact, her body thrashed desolately on the wreckage between Lexington and Seventh Avenues, her right wing churning, then only trailing in the East River, her left wing a crumpled, slowly deflating mass concealing Times Square, Herald Square, and the Garment District. At the close of the struggle, her neck extended, her turtle beak grasping the top of Radio City. She was still trying to pull herself up, as the buoyant gases hissed and bubbled away through the gushing holes in her side. Radio City collapsed with her. For a long while, after the roar of descending rubble and her own roaring had ceased, there was no human noise except a melancholy thunder of the planes. The Apology came early next morning. The spaceship was observed to descend to the outer limits of the atmosphere very briefly. A capsule was released, with a parachute timed to open at forty thousand feet, and come down quite neatly in Scarsdale. Parachute, capsule, and timing device were of good workmanship. The communication engraved on a plaque of metal, which still defies analysis, was a hasty job. The English, slightly odd, was some evidence of an incomplete understanding of the situation. That the visitors were themselves aware of these deficiencies is indicated by the text of the message itself. Most sadly regret inexcusable escape of livestock. While pitting same, one of our children monkeyed, spelling, with airlock, will not happen again. Regret also imperfect grasp of language. Learn through what you term television, etc. Animal not dangerous, but observe some accidental damage caused, therefore hasten to enclose reimbursement, having taken liberty of studying your highly ingenious methods of exchange. Hope same will be adequate, having estimated deplorable inconvenience to best of ability. Regret exceedingly impossibility of communicating further as pressure of time and prior obligations forbids. Please accept heartfelt apologies and assurances of continuing esteem. The reimbursement was, in fact, properly enclosed with the plaque, and may be seen by the public in the rotunda of the restoration of Radio City. Though technically counterfeit, it looks like perfectly good money, except that Mr. Lincoln is missing one of his wrinkles, and the words, Five dollars are upside down. End of The Good Neighbors by Edgar Pangborn. In the Avoo Observatory by H. G. Wells. The Observatory at Avoo in Borneo stands on the spur of the mountain. To the north rises the old crater, black at night against the unfathomable blue of the sky. From the little circular building with its mushroom dome, the slopes plunge steeply downward into the black mysteries of the tropical region. The slopes plunge steeply downward into the black mysteries of the tropical forest beneath. The little house in which the observer and his assistant live is about fifty yards from the observatory, and beyond this are the huts of their native attendance. Thaddey, the chief observer, was down with a slight fever. His assistant, Woodhouse, paused for a moment in silent contemplation of the tropical night before commencing his solitary vigil. The night was very still. Now and then voices and laughter came from the native huts, or the cry of some strange animal was heard from the midst of the mystery of the forest. Nocturnal insects appeared in ghostly fashion out of the darkness and fluttered round his light. He thought, perhaps, of all the possibilities of discovery that still lay in the black tangle beneath him. For to the naturalist the virgin forests of Borneo are still a wonderland full of strange questions and half-suspected discoveries. Woodhouse carried a small lantern in his hand, and its yellow glow contrasted vividly with the infinite series of tints between lavender blue and black in which the landscape was painted. His hands and feet were smeared with ointment against the attacks of the mosquitoes. Even in these days of celestial photography work done in a purely temporary erection and with only the most primitive appliances in addition to the telescope still involves a very large amount of cramped and motionless watch. He sighed as he thought of the physical fatigues before him, stretched himself, and entered the observatory. The reader is probably familiar with the structure of an ordinary astronomical observatory. The building is usually cylindrical in shape with a very light hemispherical roof capable of being turned round from the interior. The telescope is supported upon a stone pillar in the center, and a clockwork arrangement compensates for the Earth's rotation and allows a star once found to be continuously observed. Besides this there is a compact tracer of wheels and screws about its point of support by which the astronomer adjusts it. There is, of course, a slit in the movable roof which follows the eye of the telescope in its survey of the heavens. The observer sits or lies on a sloping wooden arrangement which he can wheel to any part of the observatory as the position of the telescope may require. Within it is advisable to have things as dark as possible in order to enhance the brilliance of the stars observed. The lantern flared as Woodhouse entered his circular den, and the general darkness fled into black shadows behind the big machine from which it presently seemed to creep back over the whole place as the light waned. The slit was a profound transparent blue in which six stars shone with tropical brilliance, and their light lay a pallid gleam along the black tube of the instrument. Woodhouse shifted the roof and then proceeded to the telescope, turned first one wheel and then another, the great cylinder slowly swinging into a new position. Then he glanced through the finder. The little companion telescope moved the roof a little more, made some further adjustments, and set the clockwork in motion. He took off his jacket, for the night was very hot, and pushed into position the uncomfortable seat to which he was condemned for the next few hours. Then with a sigh he resigned himself to his watch upon the mysteries of space. There was no sound now in the observatory, and the lantern waned steadily. Outside there was the occasional cry of some animal in alarm or pain or calling to its mate, and the intermittent sounds of the Malay and Dayak servants. Presently one of the men began a queer chanting song in which the others joined at intervals. Thus it would seem that they turned in for the night, for no further sound came from their direction, and the whispering stillness became more and more profound. The clockwork ticked steadily. The shrill hum of a mosquito explored the place, and grew shriller in indignation at Woodhouse's ointment. Then the lantern went out, and all the observatory was black. Woodhouse shifted his position presently, when the slow movement of the telescope had carried it beyond the limits of his comfort. He was watching a little group of stars in the milky way, in one of which his chief had seen or fancied a remarkable color variability. It was not a part of the regular work for which the establishment existed, and for that reason perhaps Woodhouse was deeply interested. He must have forgotten things terrestrial, all his attention was concentrated upon the great blue circle of the telescope field, a circle powdered so it seemed, with an innumerable multitude of stars, and all luminous against the blackness of its setting. As he watched, he seemed to himself to become incorporeal, as if he too were floating in the ether of space. Infinitely remote was the faint red spot he was observing. Suddenly the stars were blotted out, a flash of blackness passed, and they were visible again. Queer, said Woodhouse, must have been a bird. The thing happened again, and immediately after the great tube shivered as though it had been struck. Then the dome of the observatory resounded with a series of thundering blows. The stars seemed to sweep aside as the telescope, which had been undampened, swung round and away from its slit in the roof. Great Scott! cried Woodhouse, what's this? Some huge, vague black shape with a flapping, something like a wing seemed to be struggling in the aperture of the roof. In another moment the slit was clear again, and the luminous haze of the Milky Way shone warm and bright. The interior of the roof was perfectly black, and only a scraping sound marked the whereabouts of the unknown creature. Woodhouse had scrambled from the seat to his feet. He was trembling violently, and in a perspiration with the suddenness of the occurrence. Was the thing whatever it was inside or out? It was big whatever else it might be. Something shot across the skylight and the telescope swayed. He started violently and put his arm up. It was in the observatory then, with him. It was clinging to the roof, apparently. What the devil was it? Could it see him? He stood for perhaps a minute in a state of stupefaction. The beast whatever it was clawed at the interior of the dome, and then something flapped almost into his face, and he saw the momentary gleam of starlight on a skin like oiled leather. His water bottle was knocked off his little table with a smash. The sense of some strange bird creature hovering a few yards from his face in the darkness was indescribably unpleasant to Woodhouse. As his thought returned, he concluded that it must be some night bird or large bat. At any risk he would see what it was, and pulling a match from his pocket, he tried to strike it on the telescope seat. There was a smoking streak of phosphorescent light. The match flared for a moment, and he saw a vast wing sweeping towards him. A gleam of gray-brown fur, and then he was struck in the face, and the match knocked out of his hand. The blow was aimed at his temple, and a claw tore sideways down his cheek. He reeled and fell. He heard the extinguished lantern smash. Another blow followed as he fell. He was partly stunned. He felt his own warm blood stream out upon his face. Instinctively he felt his eyes had been struck out, and turning over on his face to protect them, tried to crawl under the protection of the telescope. He was struck again upon the back, and he heard his jacket rip, and then the thing hit the roof of the observatory. He edged as far back as he could between the wooden seat and the eyepiece of the instrument, and turned his body round so that it was chiefly his feet that were exposed. With these he could at least kick. He was still in a mystified state. The strange beast banged about in the darkness, and presently clung to the telescope, making its sway and the gear rattle. Once it flapped near him, and he kicked out madly and fell to a soft body with his feet. He was horribly scared now. It must be a big thing to swing the telescope like that. He saw for a moment the outline of a head black against the starlight with sharply pointed, upstanding ears, and a crest between them. It seemed to him to be as big as a mastiff's. Then he began to bawl out as loudly as he could for help. At that the thing came down upon him again. As it did so his hand touched something beside him on the floor. He kicked out, and the next moment his ankle was gripped and held by a row of keen teeth. He held again and tried to free his leg by kicking with the other. Then he realized he had the broken water bottle at his hand, and snatching it he struggled into a sitting posture, and feeling in the darkness towards his foot gripped a velvety ear, like the ear of a big cat. He had seized the water bottle by its neck and brought it down with a shivering crash upon the head of the strange beast. He repeated the blow, and then stabbed and jobbed with the jagged end of it in the darkness where he judged the face might be. The small teeth relaxed their hold, and at once Woodhouse pulled his leg free and kicked hard. He felt the sickening feel of fur and bone giving under his foot. There was a tearing bite at his arm, and he struck over it at the face as he judged and hit damp fur. There was a pause, then he heard the sound of claws and the dragging of a heavy body away from him over the observatory floor. Then there was silence, broken only by his own sobbing breath, and a sound like licking. Everything was black except for the parallelogram of the blue skylight with the luminous dust of stars, against which the end of the telescope now appeared in silhouette. He waited, as it seemed, an interminable time. Was the thing coming on again? He felt in his trouser pocket for some matches and found one remaining. He tried to strike this, but the floor was wet and it spat and went out. He cursed. He could not see where the door was situated. In his struggle he had quite lost his bearings. The strange beast, disturbed by the splutter of the match, began to move again. Time, called Woodhouse, with a sudden gleam of mirth, but the thing was not coming at him again. He must have heard it, he thought, with the broken bottle. He felt a dull pain in his ankle. Probably he was bleeding there. He wondered if it would support him if he tried to stand up. The night outside was very still, there was no sound of anyone moving. The sleepy fools had not heard those wings battering upon the dome, nor his shouts. It was no good wasting strength and shouting. The monster flapped its wings and startled him into a defensive attitude. He hit his elbow against the seat and it fell over with a crash. He cursed this, and then he cursed the darkness. Suddenly the oblong patch of starlight seemed to sway to and fro. Was he going to faint? It would never do to faint. He clutched his fists and said his teeth to hold himself together. Where had the door got to? It occurred to him he could get his bearings by the stars visible through the skylight. The patch of stars he saw was in Sagittarius and Southeastward. The door was north or was it north by west. He tried to think. If he could get the door open he might retreat. It might be the thing was wounded. The suspense was beastly. Look here, he said. If you don't come on I shall come at you. Then the thing began clambering up the side of the observatory and he saw its black outline gradually blot out the skylight. Was it in retreat? He forgot about the door and watched as the dome shifted and creaked. Somehow he did not feel very frightened or excited now. He felt a curious sinking sensation inside him. The sharply defined patch of light with the black form moving across it seemed to be growing smaller and smaller. That was curious. He began to feel very thirsty and yet he did not feel inclined to get anything to drink. He seemed to be sliding down a long funnel. He felt a burning sensation in his throat and then he perceived it was broad daylight and that one of the Dyak servants was looking at him with a curious expression. Then there was the top of Thaddee's face, upside down. Funny fellow, Thaddee, to go about like that. Then he grasped the situation better and perceived that his head was on Thaddee's knee and Thaddee was giving him brandy. And then he saw the eyepiece of the telescope with a lot of red smears on it. He began to remember. You've made this observatory into a pretty mess, said Thaddee. The Dyak boy was beating up an egg in brandy. Woodhouse took this and sat up. He felt a sharp twinge of pain. His ankle was tied up. So were his arm and the side of his face. The smashed glass, red-stained, lay about the floor. The telescope seat was overturned. And by the opposite wall was a dark pool. The door was open and he saw the gray summit of the mountain against a brilliant background of the blue sky. Pa! said Woodhouse. Who's been killing calves here? Take me out of it. Then he remembered the thing and the fight he had had with it. What was it, he said to Thaddee. The thing I fought with. You know that best, said Thaddee. But anyhow, don't worry yourself now about it. Have some more to drink. Thaddee, however, was curious enough and it was a hard struggle between duty and inclination to keep Woodhouse quiet until he was decently put away in bed and had slept upon the copious dose of meat extract Thaddee considered advisable. They then talked it over together. It was, said Woodhouse, more like a big bat than anything else in the world. It had sharp short ears and soft fur and its wings were leathery. Its teeth were little but devilish sharp and its jaw could not have been very strong or else it would have bitten through my ankle. It was pretty nearly, said Thaddee. It seemed to me to hit out with its claws pretty freely. That is about as much as I know about the beast. Our conversation was intimate, so to speak, and yet not confidential. The Dyak chaps talk about a big collugo, a clang-oo-tang, whatever that might be. It does not often attack man, but I suppose you made it nervous. They say there is a big collugo and a little collugo and is something else that sounds like gobble. They all fly about at night. For my own part I know there are flying foxes and flying lemurs about here, but they are none of them very big beasts. There are more things in heaven and earth, said Woodhouse, and Thaddee groaned at the quotation. And more particularly in the force of Borneo than are dreamt of in our philosophies. On the whole, if the Borneo fauna is going to disgorge any more of its novelties upon me, I should prefer that it did so when I was not occupied in the Observatory at night and alone. End of The Avoo Observatory by H. G. Wells Read for LibriVox.org by Nacelle Droll Postmark Ganymede by Robert Silverberg This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Postmark Ganymede by Robert Silverberg Consider the poor mailman of the future. To sleet and snow and dead of night, things that must not keep him from his appointed rounds will be added sub-zero void, meteors, and planets that won't stay put. Maybe he'll decide that for six cents an ounce it just ain't worth it. I'm washed up, Preston growled bitterly. They made a postman out of me, a postman. He crumpled the assignment memo into a small hard ball and hurled it at the bristly image of himself in the bar-mirror. He hadn't shaved in three days, which was how long it had been since he had been notified of his removal from Space Patrol's service and his transfer to postal delivery. Suddenly Preston felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up and saw a man in the trim grey of a patrolman's uniform. What do you want, Dawes? Chief's been looking for you, Preston. It's time for you to get going on your run. Preston scarled. Time to go deliver the mail, eh? He spat. Don't they have anything better to do with good spacemen than to make letter-carriers out of them? The other man shook his head. You won't get anywhere grousing about it, Preston. Your papers don't specify which branch you're assigned to, and if they want to make you carry the mail, that's it. His voice became suddenly gentle. Come on, praise. One last drink, and then let's go. You don't want a spoiler-good record, do you? No, Preston said reflectively. He got his drink and stood up. Okay, I'm ready. Neither snow nor rain shall stay me from my appointed rounds or however the damn thing goes. That's a smart attitude, Preston. Come on, I'll walk you over to administration. Savagely Preston ripped away the hand that the other had put around his shoulders. I can get there myself. At least give me credit for that. Okay, doors said shrugging. Well, good luck, Preston. Yeah, thanks. Thanks real lots. He pushed his way past the man in space-graze and shouldered past a couple of barflies as he left. He pushed open the door of the bar and stood outside for a moment. It was near midnight and the sky of a known spaceport was bright with stars. Preston's trained eye picked out Mars' Jupiter Uranus. There they were, waiting. But he would spend the rest of his days ferrying letters on the Ganymede run. He sucked in the cold night air of summertime Alaska and squared his shoulders. Two hours later Preston sat at the controls of a one-man patrol ship just as he had in the old days. Only the control panel was bare where the firing studs for the heavy guns was found in regular patrol ships. And in the cargo hold, instead of crates of spare ammo, there were three bulging sacks of mail destined for the colony on Ganymede. Slight difference, Preston thought, as he set up his blasting pattern. OK, Preston, came the voice from the tower. You've got clearance. Cheers, Preston said, and yanked the blast lever. The ship jolted upward, and for a second he felt a little of the old thrill—until he remembered. He took the ship out in space, saw the blackness in the view-plate, the radio crackled. Come in, postal ship. Come in, postal ship. I'm in, what do you want? We're your convoy, a hard voice said. Patrol ship 08756 Lieutenant Mellow's above you. Down at three o'clock, patrol ship 10732, Lieutenant Gunderson, will take you through the pirate belt. Preston felt his face go hot with shame. Mellow was Gunderson. They would stick two of his old side-kicks on the job of guarding him. Please acknowledge, Mellow said. Preston paused then. Postal ship 1872 Lieutenant Preston aboard, I acknowledge message. There was a stunned silence. Preston, howl Preston? The one and only, Preston said. What are you doing on a postal ship? Mellow was asked. Why don't you ask the chief that? He's the one who yanked me out of the patrol and put me here. Can you beat that, Gunderson asked incredulously, howl Preston on a postal ship? Yeah, incredible, isn't it? Preston lost bitterly. You can't believe your ears. Well, you better believe it, because here I am. Must be some clerical error, Gunderson said. Let's change the subject, Preston snapped. There was silent for a few moments as the three ships, two armed, one loaded with mail for Ganymede, stripped away from earth. Manipulating his controls with the ease of long experience, Preston guided the ship smoothly toward the gleaming bulk of far-off Jupiter. Even at this distance he could see five or six bright pips surrounding the huge planet. There was Callisto and, ah, there was Ganymede. He made computations, checked his controls, figured orbits, anything to keep from having to talk to his two ex-patrol mates, or from having to think about the humiliating job he was on, anything to... Pirates moving up at two o'clock. Preston came awake. He picked off the location of the pirate ships, there were two of them coming up out of the asteroid belt, small, deadly, compact, they orbited towards him. He pounded the instrument panel in impotent rage looking for the guns that weren't there. Don't worry, Prez, came Mellow's voice. We'll take care of them for you. Thanks, Preston said bitterly. He watched as the pirate ships approached, longing to trade places with the men in the patrol ships above and below him. Suddenly a bright spear of flame lashed out across space in the hull of Gunderson's ship-clothed cherry red. I'm OK, Gunderson reported immediately. Screens took the charge. Preston gripped his controls and threw the ship into a plunging dive that dropped it back behind the protection of both patrol ships. He saw Gunderson and Mellow's convert on one of the pirates. Two blue beams licked out and the pirate ship exploded. But then the second pirate swooped down in an unexpected dive. Look out! Preston yelled helplessly, but it was too late. Beams ripped into the hull of Mellow's ship and a dark fissure line opened down the side of the ship. Preston smashed his hand against the control panel, better to dine an honest dogfight than to live this way. It was one against one now. Gunderson against the pirate. Preston dropped back again to take advantage of the patrol ship's protection. I'm going to try a diversionary tactic, Gunderson said on untappable tight beam. Get ready to cut under and streak for Ganymede with all you've got. Check. Preston watched as the tactic got underway. Gunderson's ship travelled in a long looping spiral that drew the pirate into the upper quadrant of space. His path free, Preston guided his ship under the other two and towards unobstructed freedom. As he looked back he saw Gunderson steaming for the pirate on a shore collision orbit. He turned away. The score was two patrolmen dead, two ships wrecked, but the males would get through. Shaking his head, Preston leaned forward over his control board and headed on toward Ganymede. The blue-white frozen moon hung beneath him. Preston snapped on the radio. Ganymede colony, come in please, this is your postal ship. The words tasted sour in his mouth. There was silence for a second. Come in, Ganymede, Preston repeated impatiently, and then the sound of a distress signal cut across his audio pickup. It was coming on wide beam from the satellite below, and they had cut out all receiving facilities in an attempt to step up their transmitter. Preston reached for the wide beam stud, Preston. Okay, I pick up your signal, Ganymede, come in now. This is Ganymede, a tense voice said. We've got trouble down here, who are you? Mail-ship, Preston said, from earth, what's going on? There was the sound of voices whispering somewhere near the microphone. Finally, hello, mail-ship. Yep, you're going to have to turn back to earth, fellow, you can't land here. It's rough on us missing a mail-trip, but— Preston said impatiently, why can't I land? What the devil's going on down there? We've been invaded, the tired voice said. The colony's been completely surrounded by ice worms. Ice worms? The local native life, the colonist explained, they're about thirty feet long, a foot wide, and mostly mouth. There's a ring of them about a hundred yards wide surrounding the dome. They can't get in and we can't get out, and we can't figure out any possible approach for you. Pretty, Preston said, but why didn't the things bother you while you were building the dome? Apparently they have a very long hibernation cycle. We've only been here two years, you know. The ice worms must all have been asleep when we came, but they came swarming out of the ice by the hundreds last month. How come earth doesn't know? The antenna for our long-range transmitter was outside the dome. One of the worms came by and chewed the antenna right off. All we've got left is this short-range thing we're using, and it's no good more than ten thousand miles from here. You're the first one who's been this close since it happened. I get it. Preston closed his eyes for a second, trying to think things out. The colony was under blockade by hostile alien life, therefore making it impossible for him to deliver the mail. OK, if he'd been a regular member of the postal service, he'd have given it up as a bad job and gone back to earth to report the difficulty. But I'm not going back. I'll be the best damn mailman they've got. Give me a landing-orbit anyway, Ganymede. But you can't come down. How will you leave your ship? Don't worry about that, Preston said calmly. We have to worry. We don't dare open the dome with those creatures outside. You can't come down, postal ship. You want your mail, or don't you? The colonist paused. Well, OK then, Preston said. Shut up and give me landing-coordinates. There was a pause, and then the figures started coming over. Preston dotted them down on a scratchpad. OK, I've got them. Now sit tight and wait. He glanced contemptuously at the three mail-pouches behind him, grinned, and started setting up the orbit. Mailman, am I? I'll show them. He brought the postal ship down with all the skill of his years in the patrol, spiralling in around the big satellite of Jupiter as cautiously and as precisely as if he was zeroing in on a pirate lair in the asteroid belt. In its own way, this was as dangerous, perhaps even more so. Preston guided the ship into an ever-narrowing orbit, which he stabilized about a hundred miles over the surface of Ganymede. As his ship swung around the moon's poles in its tight orbit, he began to figure some fuel computations. His scratchpad began to fill with notations. Fuel storage, escape velocity, margin of error, safety factor. Finally, he looked up. He had computed exactly how much spare fuel he had, how much he could afford to waste. It was a small figure, too small perhaps. He turned on the radio. Ganymede? Where are you, postal ship? I'm in a tight orbit about a hundred miles up, Preston said. Give me the figures on the circumference of your dome, Ganymede. Seven miles, the colonist said. What are you planning to do? Preston didn't answer. He broke contact and scribbled some more figures. Seven miles of ice-worms, eh? That was too much to handle. He'd planned on dropping flaming fuel on them and burning them out, but he couldn't do it that way. He'd have to try a different tactic. Down below he could see the blue-white ammonia ice that was the frozen atmosphere of Ganymede. Shimmering gently amid the whiteness was the transparent yellow of the dome beneath whose curved walls lived the Ganymede colony. Even forewarned, Preston shuddered, surrounding the dome was a living writhing belt of giant worms. Lovely, he said, just lovely. Getting up he clambered over the mail-sacks and headed toward the rear of the ship, hunting for the auxiliary fuel-tanks. Working rapidly he lugged one out and strapped it into an empty gun turret, making sure he could get it loose again when he'd need it. He wiped away sweat and checked the angle at which the fuel-tank would face the ground when he came down for a landing. Satisfied, he knocked a hole in the side of the fuel-tank. Okay, Ganymede, he radioed, I'm coming down. He blasted loose from the tight orbit and rocked the ship down on manual. The forbidding surface of Ganymede grew closer and closer, now he could see the ice-worms plainly. Hidious, thick creatures lying coiled in masses around the dome. Preston checked his space suit, making sure it was sealed. The instruments told him he was a bear ten miles above Ganymede now. One more swing around the pole should do it. He peered out as the dome came below, and once again snapped on the radio. I'm going to come down and burn a path through those worms of yours. Watch me carefully, and jump to it when you see me land. I want that airlock open or else. But no buts. He was right overhead now. Just one ordinary type gun would solve the whole problem, he thought, but postal ships didn't have guns, they weren't supposed to need them. He centered the ship as well as he could on the dome below and threw it into automatic pilot. Jumping from the control panel he ran back toward the gun turret and slammed shut the Plexilite screen. Its outer wall opened and the fuel tank went tumbling outward and down. He returned to his control panel seat and looked at the view-screen. He smiled. The fuel tank was lying near the dome, right in the middle of the nest of ice-worms. The fuel was leaking from the puncture. The ice-worms rised in from all sides. Now, Preston said grimly. The ship brought down jets blasting. The fire licked out, heated the ground, melted snow, ignited the fuel tank. A gigantic flame blazed up reflected harshly off the snows of Ganymede. And the mindless ice-worms came, marching toward the fire, being consumed as still others devoured the bodies of the dead and dying. Preston looked away and concentrated on the business of finding a place to land the ship. The holocaust still raged as he leapt down from the catwalk of the ship, clutching one of the heavy male sacks and struggled through the melting snows to the airlock. He grinned. The airlock was open. Arms grabbed him, pulled him through. Someone opened his helmet. Great job, bozeman! There are two more male sacks, Preston said, get men out after them. The man in charge gestured to two young colonists who donned spaceships and dashed through the airlock. Preston watched as they raced to the ship, climbed in, and returned a few moments later with the male sacks. If God had all, Preston said, I'm checking out. I'll get word to the patrol to get here and clean up that mess for you. How can we thank you? the official-looking man asked. No need to, Preston said casually. I had to get that male down here some way, didn't I? He turned away, smiling to himself. Maybe the chief had known what he was doing when he took an experienced patrolman and dumped him into postal. Delivering the male to Ganymede had been more hazardous than fighting off half a dozen space pirates. I guess I was wrong, Preston thought. This is no snap job for old men. Preoccupied he started out through the airlock. The man in charge caught his arm. Say, we don't even know your name. Here you're a hero, and... Hero? Preston shrugged. All I did was deliver the male. It's all in a day's work, you know. The male's got to get through. End of Postmark Ganymede by Robert Silverberg Toy Shop by Harry Harrison This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Albatross Toy Shop by Harry Harrison Because there were few adults in the crowd and Colonel Biff Horton stood over six feet tall he could see every detail of the demonstration. The children and most of the parents gaped in wide-eyed wonder. Biff Horton was too sophisticated to be awed. He stayed on, because he wanted to find out what the trick was that made the gadget work. It's only explained right here in your instruction book, the demonstrator said, holding up a garishly printed booklet, opened to a four-colour diagram. You all know how magnets pick things up, and I bet you even know that the Earth itself is one great big magnet. That's why compasses always point north. Well, the Atomic Wonder Space Wave Tapper hangs onto those space waves, invisibly all about us and even going right through us are the magnetic waves of the Earth. The Atomic Wonder rides those waves just the way a ship rides the waves in the ocean. Now watch. Every eye was on him as he put the gaudy model rocket ship on top of the table and stepped back. It was made of stamped metal and seemed as incapable of flying as a can of ham, but very much resembled. Neither wings, propellers nor jets broke through the painted surface. It rested on three rubber wheels and coming out through the bottom was a double strand of thin, insulated wire. This white wire ran across the top of the black table and terminated in a control box in the demonstrator's hand. An indicator light, a switch and a knob appeared to be the only controls. They turned on the power switch, sending a surge of current to the wave receptors, he said. The switch clicked and the light blinked on and off with a steady pulse. Then the man began to slowly turn the knob. A careful touch on the wave generator is necessary as we are dealing with the powers of the whole world here. The concerted ah, swept through the crowd as the space wave tapper shivered a bit. Then rose slowly into the air. The demonstrator stepped back and the toy rose higher and higher, bobbing gently on the invisible waves of magnetic force that supported it. Ever so slowly the powers reduced and it settled back to the table. Only $17.95, the young man said, putting a large price sign on the table, for the complete set of the atomic wonder, the space tapper control box, battery and instruction book. At the appearance of the price card the crowd broke up noisily and the children rushed away towards the operating model trains. The demonstrator's words were lost in their noisy passage and after a moment he sank into a gloomy silence. He put the control box down, yawned and sat on the edge of the table. Colonel Horton was the only one left after the crowd had moved on. Could you tell me how this thing works? The Colonel asked, coming forward. The demonstrator brightened up and picked up one of the toys. Well, if you look here sir, he opened the hinge top. You will see the space wave coils at each end of the ship. With a pencil he pointed out the odd shaped plastic forms about an inch in diameter that had been wound, apparently at random, with a few turns of copper wire. Except for these coils the interior of the model was empty. The coils were wired together and other wires ran through the hole in the bottom of the control box. Biff Horton turned a very quizzical eye on the gadget and upon the demonstrator who completely ignored this sign of disbelief. Inside the control box is the battery, the young man said snapping it open and pointing to an ordinary flashlight battery. The current goes through the power switch and power light to the wave generator. What you mean to say, Biff broken, is that the juice from this 15 cent battery goes through this cheap rear stack to those meaningless coils in the model and absolutely nothing happens. Now, now tell me what really flies the thing. If I'm going to drop 18 bucks for six bits worth of tin, I want to know what I'm getting. The demonstrator flushed. I'm sorry sir, he stammered. I wasn't trying to hide anything. Like any magic trick this one can't really be demonstrated until it has been purchased. He leaned forward and whispered confidentially. I'll tell you what I'll do, though. This thing is way overpriced and hasn't been moving at all. The manager said I could let them go at three dollars if I could find any takers. If you want to buy it for that price. Sold, my boy, the colonel said, slamming three bills down on the table. I'll give that much for it no matter how it works. The boys in the shop will get a kick out of it. He tapped the winged rocket on his chest. Now, really what holds it up? The demonstrator looked around carefully, then pointed. Strings, he said. Or rather, a black thread. It runs from the top of the model through a tiny loop in the ceiling and back down to my hand, tied to this ring on my finger. When I back up, the model rises. It's as simple as that. All good illusions are simple. The colonel grunted, tracing the black thread with his eye. As long as there is plenty of flim flam to distract the viewer. If you don't have a black table, a black cloth will do, the young man said. And the arch of a doorway is a good sight. Just see that the room in back is dark. Wrap it up, my boy. I wasn't born yesterday. I'm an old hand at this kind of thing. Biff Horton sprang it at the next Thursday night poker party. The gang were all missile men and they cheered and jeered as he hammed up the introduction. Let me copy the diagram, Biff. I could use some of those magnetic waves in the new bird. Those flashlight batteries are cheaper than locks. This is the thing of the future. Only Teddy Cane caught wise as the flight began. He was an amateur magician and spotted the gimmick at once. He kept silent with professional courtesy and smiled ironically as the rest of the bunch grew silent one by one. The colonel was a good showman and he had set the scene well. He almost had them believing in the space wave tap of before he was through. When the model had landed and he had switched it off, he couldn't stop them from crowding around the table. A thread! One of the engineers shouted almost with relief and they all laughed along with him. Too bad, the head project physicist said. I was hoping that the little space wave tapping could help us out. Let me try a flight with it. Teddy Cane first, Biff announced. He spotted it while you were all watching the flashing lights. Only he didn't say anything. Cane slipped the ring with the black thread over his finger and started to step back. You have to turn the switch on first, Biff said. I know, Cane smiled, but that's part of the illusion, the spiel and the misdirection. I'm going to try this cold first so I can get it moving up and down smoothly and then go through it with the whole works. He moved his hand back smoothly in a professional manner that drew no attention to it. The model lifted from the table then crashed back down. The thread broke, Cane said. You jerked it instead of pulling smoothly, Biff said and knotted the broken thread. Here, let me show you how to do it. The thread broke again when Biff tried it, which got a good laugh that made his collar a little warm. Someone mentioned the poker game. This was the only time that poker was mentioned or even remembered that night. Because very soon after this, they found that the thread would lift the model only when the switch was on and two and a half volts throwing through the joke coils. With the current turned off, the model was too heavy to lift. The thread broke every time. I still think it's a screwy idea, the young man said, one week getting fallen arches demonstrating those toy ships for every brat within a thousand miles, then selling the thing for three bucks when they must have cost at least $100 a piece to make. But you did sell the ten of them to the people who would be interested, the older man asked. I think so. I caught a few Air Force officers and a Colonel in Missiles one day. Then there was one official I remembered from the Bureau of Standards. Luckily he didn't recognise me. Then those two professors you spotted from the University. Then the problem is out of our hands and into theirs. All we have to do now is sit back and wait for results. What results? These people weren't interested when we were hammering on their doors with the proof. We've painted the coils and can prove to anyone that there is a reduction in weight around them when they are operating. But a small reduction. And we don't know what's causing it. No one can be interested in a thing like that. Fractional weight decrease in a clumsy model, certainly not enough to lift the weight of the generator. No one wrapped up in massive fuel consumption, tons of lift and such, is going to have time to worry about a crackpot who thinks he has found a minor slip in Newton's laws. You think they will now? The young man asked, cracking his knuckles impatiently. I know they will. The tensile strength of that thread is correctly adjusted to the weight of the model. The thread will break if you try to lift the model with it. Yet you can lift the model after a small increment of its weight has been removed by the coils. This is going to bug those men. Nobody is going to ask them to solve the problem or concern themselves with it. But it will nag at them because they know that this effect can't possibly exist. They'll see at once that the magnetic wave theory is nonsense. Or perhaps true. We don't know. But they will all be thinking about it and worrying about it. Someone is going to experiment in his basement, just as a hobby of course, to find the cause of the error. And he, or someone else, is going to find out what makes those coils work. Or maybe a way to improve them. And we have the patents. Correct. They will be doing the research that will take them out of the massiveless propulsion business and into the field of pure spaceflight. And in doing so, they will be making us rich. Whenever the time comes to manufacture, the young man said cynically, We'll all be rich, son, the old man said patting him on the shoulder. Believe me, you're not going to recognise this old world ten years from now. End of Toy Shop by Harry Harrison. Recording by Albatross. Manchester United Kingdom. May 2009. Vital Ingredient by Gerald Vance. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by James Christopher. Vital Ingredient by Gerald Vance. Champ, what's with you lately? Benny asked the question as they lay on the beach. Nothing, Frankie answered. Just fight night miseries, I guess. No, it ain't Frankie. It's something else. You losing confidence in milk? That it? Can't you hold it one more time? You guys only need tonight and you got it. One more to make ten-time defenders. The first in the game, Frankie. We won the last two on points, Benny. Points. And I'm better than that. I keep waiting and waiting for my heels to set, for milk to send it up my legs and back and let fly. But he won't do it, Benny. Look, Champ, milk knows what he's doing. He's sending you right. You think maybe you know as much as milk? Maybe I do, Benny. Maybe I do. Benny didn't have the answer to this heresy. By law, this was Frankie's last fight as a fighter. If he won this one and became a ten-time defender, he would have his pick of the youngsters at the boxing college. Just as Melt had chosen him fifteen years before. For fifteen years, he'd never thrown a punch of his own in a fight ring. Maybe because it was his last fight in the ring he felt the way he did today. He understood, of course, why fighters were mentally controlled by proved veterans. By the time a fighter had any real experience in know-how in the old days, his body was shot. Now, the best bodies and the best brains were teamed by mental control. Benny had an answer now. Champ, I think it's a good thing this is your last fight. You know too much. After this one, you'll have a good, strong boy of your own, and you can try some of the stuff you've been learning. Milk knows you're no kid anymore. That's why he has to be careful with you. I still have it, Benny. My speed, my punch, my timing. All good. There were a dozen times in those last two fights I could have crossed the right and gone home early. Two times, Frankie. Just two times. And then, late in the fight. Milk didn't think you had it. And I don't think you did, either. Milk, Frankie's master control, came down to the beach and strolled over to join them. Milk had been a five-time defender in the welter division before his fights ran out. Now he was skinny and 60. His was the mind that had directed every punch Frankie had ever thrown. He studied the figure of Frankie lying on the sand. The 200-pound fighting machine was 30 years old. Milk won it when he compared it to that of the 22-year-old slugger they would have to meet in a few hours. Benny said hi and ambled off. Well, boy, this one means a lot to both of us, Milk said. Sure was all Frankie can answer. For you, the first ten-time defender the heavyweight division has ever produced. For me, the haul of boxing fame. You went that pretty bad, don't you, Milk? Yeah, I guess I do, Frankie, but not bad enough to win it the wrong way. Frankie's head jerked up. What do you mean, the wrong way? Milk scowled and looked as though he wished he hadn't said that. He turned his head and stared hard at his fighter. There's something we may be ought to have talked about, Frankie. What's that? Milk struggled for words. It's just, oh, hell, forget it. Just forget I said anything. You figure we win tonight? I think maybe we will. You don't seem very sure. On points, huh? Yeah, maybe on points. Milk turned his eyes back on Frankie's eager face. Frankie boy, there's something about being a ten-time defender that's, well, different. Milk took a deep breath and was evidently ready to tell Frankie exactly what he meant. But Frankie broke in. His voice low and tense. Milk, yes? When I get in there tonight, turn me loose. Milk was startled at the words. Release control? Yeah, sure. I think I can take Nappy Gordon on my own. Nappy can stick his fist through a brick wall all night long. And Pac Monroe knows all there is to know and some he makes up himself. They'd be a tough pair to beat. Our big ace is that they have to beat us. We got the nine times. I can take him, Milt. There was a strange light in Milt's eyes. He did not speak, and Frankie went on. Just one round, Milt. If I slip, you can grab control again. You just want to try at it, huh? There seemed to be disappointment in Milt's voice. Something Frankie couldn't understand. Milt seemed suddenly nervous, ill at ease. But Frankie was too eager to give it much attention. How about it, Milt, huh? Milt had been squatting on the sand. He got to his feet and looked out across the water. All right. Maybe we'll try it. He seemed sad as he walked away. Frankie, occupied with his own elation, didn't notice. In the studio dressing room a few hours later, Milt and Frankie were warming up. Frankie and the practice ring, and Milt perched on a high chair just outside the ropes. Everything was just as it would be in the fight. Three minutes work, one minute rest. Frankie noticed how slowly and carefully Milt was working him, and how he watched the clock. Frankie had nothing to do now but watch, as a spectator would. Watch as Milt moved him around. Milt could control every muscle, every move and every reflex of his body. It had taken them five years to perfect this routine. That was a training period at the College of Boxing, and was prescribed by law. In their first fight they had been at their peak. Frankie was Milt's second boy, and Milt knew boxing as only a champion welter with 30 years experience could know it. For 15 years he had watched and studied while a good veteran had directed his body. And for another 15 years he had been the guiding brain to a fine middleweight. As a welterweight, Milt had learned to depend on speed and quick hands. In Frankie he had found the dream of every welter, a punch. Frankie's body could really deliver the power. At first it had been the heavy hitting that had won the fights. Lately, Milt relied more and more on the speed and deception he had developed in Frankie. Frankie felt the control ease out, and he knew the warm up was over. He slipped on his robe, and he had no want to join the others in the TV studio. There would be no crowd, just the cameras, the crews and officials. The fight would be televised in 3D and filmed in slow motion. If a decision were needed to determine the winner, it would be given only after a careful study had been made of the films. There was little to be done in the studio, and Milt had timed Frankie's warm up right to the minute. The fighters and their controllers took their positions. The controllers seated in high chairs on opposite sides of the ring. The fighters in opposite corners. As the warning buzzer sounded, Frankie felt Milt take control. This one he would watch closely. At the bell, Frankie rose and moved out slowly. He noticed how relaxed, almost limp Milt was keeping him. There was only a little more effort used than in the pre-fight warm up. His left hand had extra speed, but only enough power to command respect. The pattern was just about as he expected. As the fight went along, the left would add up the points. But his thoughts were centered on a single question. How is it going to be my own? In the early rounds, he was amazed that the extreme caution Milt was employing. Nappy Gordon's face was beginning to redden from the continual massage of Frankie's brisk left and occasional right. But Frankie felt that his own face must be getting flushed with eagerness, the glory of going in and trying to do it by himself, of beating Pop Monroe without Milt's help. He wondered if Milt would have to clamp on the controls again. He sure hoped not, but there wasn't anything to really worry about. Milt could beat Pop Monroe, and he wouldn't let Frankie take a beating by himself. Frankie's attention was caught by some odd thoughts in Milt's mind. Milt didn't seem to be sending them, yet they were clear and direct. You really think you got it, boy? That vital ingredient? What are you talking about? Huh? Me? Oh, nothing. Take it easy. But Milt's thoughts were troubled. When are you going to let me go? I said, take it easy. We'll see. The sixth round came, and Frankie felt no weariness. Milt was working him like he was made of fragile glass. Nor was Nappy tiring so far as he could notice. Pop Monroe was trying for just one solid blow to slow down the champ. So far, nothing even jarring had come close to landing. In the seventh, Frankie noticed a little desperation in Monroe's tactics. To win now, Monroe and Gordon needed a knockout. Frankie had only to stay on his feet to be home safe. But when was Milt going to let him go? Milt had turned in a masterpiece of defensive fighting. The left had deadly accuracy, and now the openings were truck-sized, as Monroe had come to ignore the light tattoo of the champ's punches. Milt withdrew the control in the middle of the seventh round. It hit Frankie like a dash of cold water, the exultation of being on his own. He looked over at Milt, perched rope high in his control chair at ringside. Milt was looking at him, his face tight and grim, almost hostile. Frankie circled warily, a touch of panic coming unbidden. What to do? He had known it would be quite like this. He tried to remember how it was, how it felt to move in the various ways Milt always sent him. Funny how you could forget such things. The left hook, the jab, how did they go? A pile driver came from somewhere and almost tore his head off his shoulders. He was looking up at the ceiling. He rolled his eyes and saw Pop Monroe's face, smiling a little, but also puzzled. Even with his brain groggy, Frankie knew why. He had stepped wide open in Nappy's looping right and Pop couldn't figure Milt doing a thing like that. Pop looked over at Milt, Frankie followed Pop's eyes and saw the look Milt returned. Then the spark of understanding that passed between them. Odd, Frankie thought, what understanding could there be? He was aware of the word seven filling the studio as the loudspeaker blared the count. He was up at nine. Nappy swarmed in now. Frankie felt the pain of hard solid blows on his body as he tried to tie up this dynamo Pop Monroe was releasing on him. He couldn't stop it, dodge it, or hide from it. But finally he got away from it, staggering. Nappy came at him fast and the left jab Frankie sent out to put him off his balance didn't even slow the fury a bit. Frankie took to the ropes to make Nappy shorten his punches. It helped some, but not enough. No man could take the jolting effect of those ripping punches and keep his feet under him. Frankie didn't. He was down when the bell ended round nine. In his corner the seconds worked quickly. He looked at Milt and saw a deadpan expression. Milt wasn't sending him anything. Punishing him, of course. Frankie took it meekly, ashamed of himself. Milt would take over again when the bell sounded. Frankie knew that he couldn't stay away from Nappy for another round. Nobody could. Those smelled a knockout and Frankie was never fast enough to run away from the burst of viciousness that would come over him in the form of Nappy Gordon. No, Milt would take over. At the bell Frankie moved out fast, waiting for the familiar feel of Milt expertly manipulating his arms and legs and body, sending out the jabs and punches, weaving him in and out. But Milt didn't take over and Pop sent Nappy in with a piledriver right that smashed Frankie to the floor. Frankie rolled over on his knees and shook his head groggily, trying to understand. Why hadn't Milt taken over? What was Milt trying to do to him? Milt's cold face waved in the focus before Frankie's blinking eyes. What was Milt trying to do? Frankie heard the tolling count. Six, seven, eight. Milt wasn't even going to help him up. Sick and bewildered, Frankie struggled to his feet. Nappy came driving in. Frankie backpedaled and took the vicious right cross while rolling away. Thus he avoided being knocked out and was only floored for another eight count. Milt, Milt for God's sake. The round was over. Frankie staggered sick to his corner and slumped down. The handlers worked him over. He looked at Milt. But Milt neither sent nor returned his gaze. Milt sat looking grimly off into space and seemed older and wearier than time itself. Then Frankie knew. Milt had sold him out. The shocking truth stunned him even more than Nappy's punches. Milt had sold him out. There had been rare cases of such things when money meant more than honor to a veteran. But Milt. Numbed, Frankie pondered the ghastly thought. After all, Milt was old. Old men needed money for their later years. But how could he? How could he do it? Suddenly Frankie hated. He hated Nappy and Pop and every one of the millions of people looking silently on around the world. But most of all, he hated Milt. It was a weird sickening thing, that hatred, but only a mentally sickening thing. Physically, it seemed to make Frankie stronger. Because when the bell rang, he got up and walked into a straight right. It didn't hurt at all. He realized he was on the floor. The gong was sounding. He was getting up. Moving in again. There was blood. A ringing in his head. But above all, a rage to kill. To kill. He remember going down several times and getting up. Not caring how he had swung under Milt's control. Only wanting to use his fist. To kill the thing weaving in front of him. Nappy. A grinning, weaving, lethal ghost. He felt the pain in his right fist. And saw Nappy go down. He saw Pop's face go gray as though the old man himself had felt the force of a blow. Saw Nappy climb a wreck slowly. He grinned through blood. Frankie, ghost catcher. He had to get him. He was happy. Happy with a new fierceness he had never known before. The lust of battle was strong within him. And when Pop weaved Nappy desperately, Frankie laughed, waited, measured Nappy. And smashed him down with a single jarring right. The bell tolled ten. Pop got weirdly off his stool and walked away. Frankie strode grimly to his corner, ignored Milt, moved into the dressing room. He knew Milt would come and he waited for him, sitting there coldly on the edge of the table. Milt walked in the door and stood quietly. You sold me out, Frankie said. There was open pride in Milt's eyes. Sure. You had to think that. What do you mean think? You didn't pick me up when Pop flapped me. I saw the look between you and Pop. Sure. Milt's eyes were still proud. I wanted to know. That's how I wanted it. Milt, why did you do it? I didn't do it. I just had to make you think I did. In God's name, why? Because I'm sentimental, maybe. But I've always had my own ideas about the kind of fighter who should be a ten-time winner. All my life I've kept remembering the old greats. Dempsey, Sullivan, Corbett. The man who did it on their own. And I wanted you to get it right, on your own. Like a real champion. Frankie was confused. I wanted to go on my own. Why didn't you tell me then? Then you'd have lost. You'd have gone down whimpering and moaning. You see, Frankie, all those old fighters had a vital ingredient. The thing it takes to make a champion. Courage. And you didn't think I had it? Sure I did. But the killer instinct is dead in fighters today. And it has to be ignited. It needs a trigger. So that was what I gave you. A trigger. Frankie understood. You wanted me to get mad. To do it, you had to get mad. At me. You're not conditioned to get mad at Nappy or Pop. It's not the way we fight now. It had to be me. I had to make you hate me. Frankie marveled. So when Pop looked at you, he knew. Frankie was off the table. His arms around Milt. I'm so ashamed. Milt grinned. No, you're not. You're happier than you ever were in your life. You're a real champion. Great feeling, isn't it? Now you know how they felt in the old days. Frankie was crying. You are damn right. Thanks. Milt looked years younger. Don't mention it. Champ. The End. End of Vital Ingredient by Gerald Vance. Recording by James Christopher. JX Christopher at Yahoo.com.