Space 1999 #10 - Phoenix Of Megaron Read online

  WARRING MUTANTS!

  A lush, green planet beckons from Main Mission Control's star-scanning screen . . . and to the homeless Alphans, it looks like Earth. But descent reveals a wasteland of towering, silent cities, mute testimony to an atomic holocaust!

  Two pockets of civilization survive: the drug-controlled inhabitants of Caster, and the freedom-loving people of Hyria. Soon the Alphans find themselves caught in the treacherous quicksands of civil war, their only allies a beautiful Hyrian with golden-brown eyes and an ancient man, last custodian of the old wisdom.

  Koenig slid down the Command Cabin emergency chute and came down ankle deep in the warm sand of Megaron. From every angle there was a black, uniformed figure walking forward, closing in a circle. Koenig addressed himself to the burly character who seemed to be the leader.

  "We are from Moonbase Alpha. We come in peace—but we were forced to defend ourselves. We are seeking a place to live."

  The leader's eyes had a blank, fanatical look; probably he listened closely only to himself.

  He said, "You have killed many of my people. You will stand trial. Spadec will decide what is to be done with you!"

  Books in the Space: 1999 Series

  Breakaway

  Moon Odyssey

  The Space Guardians

  Collision Course

  Lunar Attack

  Astral Quest

  Alien Seed

  Android Planet

  Rogue Planet

  Phoenix of Megaron

  Published by POCKET BOOKS

  PHOENIX OF MEGARON

  Futura Publications edition published 1976

  POCKET BOOK edition published November, 1976

  This POCKET BOOK edition includes every word contained in the original edition. It is printed from brand-new plates made from completely reset, clear, easy-to-read type. POCKET BOOK editions are published by POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc., 630 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10020. Trademarks registered in the United States and other countries.

  Standard Book Number: 671-80764-1.

  This POCKET BOOK edition is published by arrangement with Futura Publications Limited. Series format and television play scripts copyright, ©, 1975, by ITC—Incorporated Television Company Limited. This novelization copyright, ©, 1976, by John Rankine. All rights reserved. This book, or portions thereof, may not be reproduced by any means without permission of the original publisher: Futura Publications Limited, 49 Poland Street, London, England.

  Printed in the U.S.A.

  CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  CHAPTER ONE

  No one coming out to Moonbase Alpha on a routine duty stint could have imagined that they were stepping from the Eagle shuttle onto the surface of a nuclear bomb, primed and ready to go.

  The great, sprawling base, with its complement of over three hundred hand-picked specialists, was a well-found ship. Except for the view of a stark moonscape from the direct-vision ports, the personnel could forget they were out on a fragile limb, with only the hurrying Eagles to link them to Earth Planet.

  When the mass of nuclear waste, dumped in the disposal pits, hit a threshold and erupted in a savage discharge, the link was snapped. Earth’s ancient partner was booted out of orbit and sent naked and alone on an interstellar odyssey, where the strange was commonplace and the writ of Earth-based logic no longer ran.

  Commander John Koenig found himself captain of a rudderless hulk. They were adrift in a wilderness beyond the grasp of imagination. But against all reason, he held doggedly to the conviction that, somewhere, there was a planetfall waiting to be made. Somewhere, he would bring his people to a new Earth.

  Moontime, it was sixteen hundred hours on the nose. John Koenig sat in his command office and drummed on his desk top with a stylus. Of all the times of the Moon day, it was the one for nostalgia. By the calendar, though it meant nothing to the stark, changeless moonscape, it was late November. He remembered how it would be in northern cities on Earth Planet. Street lights in a magenta glow, before the tubes warmed to full daylight simulation; houses and stores already lit. It had always seemed a magical time, when a turn of the next corner would start something new and unexpected.

  He left his desk and walked over to the direct-vision port, a tall, powerful figure, hawk faced, black hair cropped neatly. The unexpected was out there, all right. If the long journey had taught anything, it was that fact was a stranger animal than fiction. Any one of the myriad stars, scattered like jewels on a velvet cloth, might hold a people whose life style was on the outer edge of credibility.

  The Voyager tapes had given chapter and verse for that. Golden ant men on Chrysaor. Reptilean killers on the dying world of Scotia. Urbane, silvery, mandarin types on Fingalna. They were well off the track for all those worlds. But the iron laws of probability dictated that there would be others like them.

  The scale was too vast. Still vaguely restless, he shoved down a stud on his console and the screen that divided him from Main Mission rolled silently aside. The senior operations team was at the end of the first dog watch and ready to stand down. Paul Morrow, Main Mission controller, was taking his deputy through the log. Sandra Benes, systems analyst and communications expert, moved elegantly aside to allow Leanne to take the desk. A sleek, dark head and a spectacular fair one were leaned together in a tableau. Alan Carter had already vacated the Eagle Command desk and was talking to Kano, whose relief at the computer spread was overdue.

  Koenig felt the contrast. Outside, the scale was too inhuman to grasp. Inside, it was too small. For all the purposeful work that went on and kept life going on Alpha, they were only going through the motions of living. They needed a break. Most of all, they needed space, elbow room, somewhere to go when the watch went below.

  Quietly, he closed the screen and used his commlock to open the hatch. Locked in their private conversations, Main Mission staff hardly noticed him as he strode through and went on into one of the main throughways of the sprawling complex. Still thoughtful, he reckoned there was the loneliness of the trackless outback where the Moon was a rambling dust mote, and there was the loneliness that every man carried round in his own head. Each living thing was an atoll and few craft beat a path over the reefs.

  Victor Bergman, scientific adviser to the Base, lifted his head from a littered workbench as Koenig came through the hatch of his projects lab. Balding and grizzled, with the high dome forehead of a thinker, he seemed to suffer less than most from the long constraint of life in Alpha. One lab was much like another to him and he reckoned he could shake a catalyptic concept out of the woodwork as well there as anywhere. But he was glad to see the top hand. His lined face split into a characteristic grin.

  ‘John. Social call or business?’

  ‘Does it make a difference?’

  Bergman slid away a panel in the front of his workbench and pulled out a long-necked bottle and a couple of glasses. ‘Hydroponics have been working on a liqueur for special occasions. They sent a sample for official approval.’

  ‘Let’s say “social,” then.’

  ‘I’m glad you said that. This is the time of day when alcohol fortifies the mind.’

  Koenig took a cautious sip. The hydroponics team were enthusiasts, but asbestos throated to the last man. This time, they had a winner. Golden in the beaker, it was smooth as silk with a lingering afterglow.

  ‘Is it safe to ask what they put in it?’

  ‘All g
ood stuff. Sugar. Honey simulate, citric acid, cold tea, mace, cloves, ginger, yeast, raisins. It’s all on the manifest.’

  Koenig sat on the bench and considered his friend. ‘You keep on an even keel, Victor. What’s the secret?’

  ‘There’s always work to do.’

  ‘A therapy in itself.’

  ‘So they say. You should know. You work harder than anybody on this base.’

  ‘What’s the current project?’

  ‘Small stuff. I’m supposing that a first problem, when we find a planet, will be a power supply. We can’t use the Eagles forever. I’ve been thinking about the scale of operations. I believe we should stay small. Small communities. Most of the ills on Earth Planet came from too many people in units that were too big.’

  ‘It’ll be many generations before we have a population problem.’

  ‘True, but we should lay down the guidelines from the beginning. We should go for methods and equipment that leave room for human creativity.’

  ‘Labour-intensive industry, not overmuch mechanisation?’

  ‘It’s right, when you think about it.’

  ‘How do you ever get the sort of productive know-how that could mount a space programme?’

  ‘You have to decide whether a space programme is all that vital.’

  ‘Now, that’s something I never expected to hear from a professor of astrophysics.’

  ‘Where did it get Earth Planet in the end? Or ourselves, for that matter. Earth was choking itself with atomic waste. It doesn’t solve any human problems.’

  ‘You’re not saying there were no human problems in the early days, when the only nut grew on a tree? As I recall, Cain was beating Abel over the head, when there was freehold land for the asking and no taxes.’

  Bergman shifted his ground, relishing the argument and putting forward another pet theory. ‘Work has to be seen to have an end product. Things can get too impersonal. Organisations can get too big. What could you reckon was the ideal size for a city?’

  ‘It needs to be big enough to afford some public architecture. Big enough to give protection, fall-back benefits, culture, choices. You could make a list. At least a hundred thousand, I’d say.’

  ‘I think you’d be close at that.’

  Koenig sipped his drink. Bergman set up an open-topped canister, cleared a litter of gear from the workbench and switched on a miniature fan.

  Koenig said, ‘No problem, then. How long before an Alphan colony hits a hundred thousand?’

  ‘But the foundations have to be right. As the sapling is bent, so will the tree grow.’

  ‘I can’t disagree with that. What’s the model?’

  ‘A Yen Tornado Tower. It’s an old idea that Grumman Aerospace worked on. It was never taken up as it should have been. It could generate a million watts from a turbine only two metres across. All for free.’

  ‘Given a prevailing wind.’

  ‘Wrong. It doesn’t matter which way the wind blows. Watch.’

  Bergman threw a switch. There was a subdued hum from his canister and a spread of small telltales lit up. He shifted the fan, taking it round three hundred and sixty degrees, so that it blew on the device from every direction. As he moved around, slits opened in succession to take in the airstream. There was no loss of power.

  ‘That’s very smart, Victor. How does it work?’

  ‘There’s a turbine on a vertical axis at the bottom. Open top, as you see. Wind blows in through an open vane, spirals to the centre and creates a vortex. Pressure at the centre is reduced. There’s a big pressure gradient between the centre and the top airstream flowing over. Air gets sucked in from ducts below the turbine blades.’

  ‘An updated windmill?’

  ‘Easier to build than a conventional windmill; smaller, more efficient power conversion. Easy to build. Easy to service.’

  ‘One for every homestead?’

  ‘Why not?’

  Koenig thought about it. Windmills could be serviced by a village craftsman. Turbines and generators needed a back-up supply chain. Not as complex, however, as the atomic power plant that kept Alpha’s life-support systems at the bubble. It was good intermediate technology. Both men were absorbed in the discussion and the communications post buzzed twice before Koenig surfaced.

  It was Leanne, trying to copy Sandra’s precise, unhurried manner, but unable to keep excitement out of her voice. ‘Main Mission calling Commander Koenig.’

  ‘Koenig.’

  ‘It’s a contact, Commander.’

  ‘Don’t let it go away. I’ll be there. Alert executive personnel.’

  Victor Bergman switched off his demonstration. They looked at each other across the bench. It was all beginning again.

  Koenig said; ‘Keep your fingers crossed, Victor. In twelve months, we could be looking for a draughty corner for one of your towers.’

  There was a full set of Alphan top brass to see Sandra Benes make a final, delicate tuning ploy and drop a small blue and white sphere on the centre of the big screen.

  Helena Russell, executive of medical services on Alpha and Koenig’s apple, turned quickly from a monitor spread. ‘Definite life signs, John. Too early to be sure, but I’d say on a human scale.’

  There was more encouragement from Kano’s computer. He tore a print out from the outfall and handed it to Bergman. ‘Looks good, Professor.’

  All eyes were on the expert as he scanned down the list and made a racing summary. He said slowly, ‘This must be one of the best prospects we’ve had, John.’

  There was a reservation and Koenig was on to it. ‘But there’s something you’re not sure of . . .’

  ‘I’ll come to that. On the credit side, we have a troposphere with a breathable atmosphere, four parts inert gas and one part oxygen. There’s a protective ozone layer about thirty kilometres up. Soaks up radiation. Progressive thinning of atmosphere density to six hundred kilometres. Layered like Earth Planet. Conditions would be roughly similar. Thirty percent land masses. Seventy percent oceans. There’s every chance evolution might follow the same pattern, give or take a few variations. Gravity at sea level within half a percent of Earth’s, so the biological scale would be the same.’

  Koenig said, ‘That’s the good news. What’s the reservation?’

  ‘As I see it, we take a tangential course at the extreme limit of the gravisphere. It’s a question of whether we go close enough to get a reconnaissance team down and back and then mount Operation Exodus.’

  Koenig reckoned bitterly that it figured. The odds against pulling an Earth type planet out of the cosmic hat were mind bending. The odds against finding such a one on a convenient course, so that they could investigate it at leisure and then step over to it from their life raft, were too high to calculate. He said, ‘Work on it, Victor. Command conference in one hour. We’ll look at every fact we can stack together. Try to raise them, Sandra. If there’s a high-level culture over there, somebody will be looking at us. Let’s have no mistakes about intentions.’

  Sandra said, ‘Check, Commander,’ and swivelled away to get on with it. As Koenig left the floor for his command office, her message was already on the way.

  ‘This is Moonbase Alpha. We come in peace, seeking your help. We have travelled from the planet Earth. We seek a place to live.’

  She stopped and keyed in a prepared transmission from Computer. If the receiving station was equipped to handle it, there were data in a mathematical form which would build up a stylised picture of a man and a woman and a potted history of human evolution.

  On the big screen, the blue and white planet was unchanged. If there was anybody at home, they were not answering the bell. But, on the credit side, there was no strike force arrowing out to defend its corner of space. Sandra started over: ‘This is Moonbase Alpha. We come in peace . . .’

  When Koenig assembled his senior executives round the conference table in the command office, there was still no response. Helena Russell could confirm life signs and pinpo
int them to three widely separated areas, but whoever was down there, looking up at their sky, was making no sign.

  Koenig said, ‘I don’t have to tell you what the chances are of finding this kind of planet. Helena confirms that there’s everything we need to support life. But before we get too steamed up about it, we’ll hear Victor.’

  Victor Bergman was not looking too happy. He had no relish for being the one with the knocking copy. He shuffled his papers and ran his fingers through his thinning hair. He said, ‘I confirm Doctor Russell’s report. This planet is the best yet, but unfortunately we pass at extreme Eagle range. There would be time for an Eagle to get there, make one, single orbit, make a selected planetfall for one hour and get back. After that, no dice. If we waited for a reconnaissance Eagle to bring back data, the time for decision would be past. We can send an Eagle, on a tight time schedule, and I’d say it might be worthwhile. For one thing, hydroponics could use some fresh, vigorous plant strains for protein synthesis. That and other sampling data would pay for a visit. But on the main count, I don’t see how we can mount Operation Exodus in the time.’

  Paul Morrow said, ‘We have a lot of data and it all looks good. We could decide on that. Operation Exodus could be a reconnaissance in strength.’

  It was faster than Koenig wanted to go. He said, ‘There’s no denying the temptation to pack up and move out. God knows, it’s what we all want. But not at any price. If we keep our nerve, we have a guaranteed life here for many years yet. To some extent, we can afford to choose. We shouldn’t throw it away on a blind chance—’

  Impulsively, Alan Carter broke in: ‘Not blind, Commander. We know a lot about the planet and it’s all good.’

  Koenig was not to be stampeded. He said, ‘You know and I know, Alan, that what looks good from Main Mission can turn sour on the ground. I could not authorise Operation Exodus without a surface reconnaissance. The question is, how detailed should that reconnaissance be? Professor Bergman gives us one orbit. Perhaps ten hours, overall. Suppose we used all that time for a landing, close to a centre of population? It’s possible we could make contact and come to a decision. Operation Exodus could be ready to go. Instead of the Eagle making the return trip, the Eagle fleet would be on the move and part way home.’