The Molten Bullet by Anthony Rud Read online

  of right ascension. Careening along through cross the orbit of Polyphemus. This gigantic space at its terrific pace, the comet-asteroid asteroid-comet, which for many centuries had should have reached this exact point at 10 P.

  come near—dangerously near—the Solar M. sharp, Greenwich Observatory time. Again System, once each eighty-three years, now

  Ammerton looked through the eyepiece of the was out of sight from any save the very largest telescope before getting ready to take the

  modern telescopes on Earth. It may have been photograph.

  causing the jitters just then, to the ice-blooded An awed exclamation burst from his

  inhabitants of far-away Uranus, if any.

  throat. Polyphemus was not there!

  Ammerton’s keen observer’s brain,

  (I hasten to make plain that this was

  still not addled as were his emotions, caught not Becker’s fault. That scoundrel was lying and fastened to a strange thing. There was

  low and waiting for a good opportunity, which something peculiar and disturbing about the he did not suspect had arrived. Ammerton had asteroid-comet, showing out there against the told him nothing of the blood-chilling

  blue-black of interstellar space as a faint discovery.) streak of orange fire.

  With the big telescope sweeping back

  Polyphemus had a kink in his tail!

  to the comet-asteroid’s position of the

  In plain words, his tail should have

  previous night preliminary to some sleuthing been slightly curved, if he were pursuing his of the star spaces, Ammerton was shocked to ordinary course. Instead, there was a wide

  discover Polyphemus almost exactly where it bend in it! That meant trouble.

  had been the night before!

  Ammerton instantly realized the

  Realize what that meant! The tail had

  possibilities. They were so monstrous that the grown appreciably shorter. Polyphemus had

  thought acted like an ice-pack on his fevered changed direction sharply, and now was

  head. The distortion of the tail meant that headed directly toward Earth, at an

  somehow and sometime the asteroid-comet approximate speed of 3300 miles a minute!

  had abruptly changed course!

  As a possible result, he might hit and

  OF course, whatever it was that had shooed it explode one of the planet members. Or from its normal orbit, might have slowed it another catastrophe, thought Ammerton with

  somewhat, or vastly increased this usual

  horror, might lose Earth its sun—letting all speed. Time alone could tell. But Ammerton

  inhabitants of that planet freeze to death in a was never to know, nor anyone else on Earth, few hours. Or it might even head Earth why Polyphemus had changed its course so straight into the sun, to be swallowed up in amazingly. No one could suspect that it was boiling, molten oblivion!

  because the asteroid-comet was a mass of

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  highly magnetic iron, attracted to Earth’s iron Is A Nut, And Here Is Proof!

  core!

  Other astronomers, boiling over with

  However, unless something

  indignation at Ammerton’s previous mistake, intervened, or the speed of Earth was did not even wait until their smaller telescopes sufficient to outstrip Polyphemus, this unholy could pick up Polyphemus. They howled.

  game of celestial tag was bound to end in

  They jeered. They demanded that alienists be blazing catastrophe!

  called to consider Ammerton’s case, and that The mass of Polyphemus, which was

  immediately Sandraes himself and the trustees indeed a super-comet, was approximately of the observatory, get together and discharge seven times greater than that of Earth’s the crazy man.

  moon—or about one-twelfth the mass of Earth Through it all for nearly a week, a

  itself! When and if these two bodies collided, pale-faced man with set jaw, glued his eye to it would create such intense heat that both the telescope and watched the onrushing

  would be utterly consumed, and the resultant doom. He had every calculation made. He

  gases blown away into furthest space!

  knew the day, hour and second when

  Naturally there could be no survivors

  Polyphemus would reach the outer limits of

  on Earth, unless some of them came forward

  Earth’s atmosphere—and then the fractional

  with a space ship at the last minute, and second later which would be the time of actual succeeded in navigating away to some other

  impact. Gripped by gravity, the speed of

  planet. If that happened, of course, the Polyphemus would increase terrifically, along refugees would have been most welcome at the last. It would probably reach the among us on Mars.

  awesome velocity of 5000 miles a second!

  Chances, however, of any group of

  Èarth had twenty-nine more days to live,

  Earthmen inventing and actually building such according to Ammerton.

  a ship in the short space of a few weeks—the Àll of a sudden the derisive clacking of onyx time which would intervene before a upon porphyry, the braying of human asses, collision—were naturally very small.

  and the skirl of jeering bagpipes come to an However, on the fourth morning, after

  end. A few of the learned doctors tired of their three nights of intensive study, Albert Einstein fun, and turned to peer through their own little Ammerton announced to the reporters of a

  lensed barrels. Might just as well see what large daily newspaper that Polyphemus had

  might have caused poor Ammerton’s delusion.

  gone wild, left its recognized orbit, and now

  `Then came a brief, appalling message out of was running amok to collide with Earth!

  Europe:

  The scientist, though knowing now

  well enough what would be said of him in

  `Dr. Luigi Genetti of the Cisalpine

  astronomical circles, thought it his sacred duty Observatory says Ammerton may be right!

  to warn the world. He himself had ceased to Polyphemus headed straight for Earth!

  matter.

  The reporters spread themselves, and

  In Sydney they saw it. In Moscow. At

  their city editor cooperated. Am-merton’s Cape Town. At Buenos Aires. At Edmonton.

  story was rendered with all due solemnity—if In the course of five or six more days they all you were not capable of reading between the could make out Polyphemus. Give them

  lines. It was a derisive masterpiece. While another week, and they would be able to

  seeming to kowtow as usual to the sage of

  discern a small, glowing sun all by itself in a Sandraes, it really said in substance, This Guy blank portion of the heavens, using only their

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  naked eyes!

  let us say, to cause a perceptible jar. Or

  perhaps it would go unnoted, like that big

  BY the time that week was out increasing

  meteor which fell in Arizona a few thousand crowds were gathering to stay up all night and years ago.

  stare at Polyphemus. There was an

  But Hans Becker, try as he did, could

  undercurrent of mild excitement. Fear? Not a not believe his own words of assurance. For bit! Too many bearded wiseacres clad in untold centuries the comet-asteroid nightgowns had climbed to the tops of Polyphemus had been a flaming bulk of neighboring hills, and there waited for the end molten metal and gases, careening through

  of the world. The great Earth public was space. Why should it be consumed in the few enjoying a new kind of show, but it was not in seconds—or split part of a second—it would

  the least disturbed. Not yet, that is—

  take to traverse the atmosphere of the ear
th?

  The days and nights passed. Of course

  Answer:

  it

  wouldn’t!

  long ago the comet-asteroid had completely

  In his palsied fright, Becker forgot all

  tucked in his fiery shirt-tail; or rather, because about the throw-switch on his desk, and its of the sun’s position directly beyond Earth, it effect upon the big telescope. What a little was streaming directly behind him, and matter this thing, and Ammerton’s disgrace, therefore could not be seen from Earth. Dr.

  seemed now! Ransacking his desk, gathering

  Graham of Lick Observatory now calculated

  items he meant to take with him to a deep

  that his speed had increased to 13,700 miles a cellar or vault somewhere, Becker

  minute!

  accidentally upset one of his desk telephones, It was when he read this frightened

  and did not bother to put it back on its cradle.

  report that Hans Becker realized the truth. A The speaker-transmitter bumped

  few hasty observations of his own convinced against the throw-switch, and closed the

  him that destruction of the earth, with circuit. Becker went in haste, not knowing and everything upon it, loomed. And Becker, like not caring.

  many another treacherous scoundrel and

  Ammerton came into the observatory a

  egomaniac, feared hurt and death to himself half hour later, and went to the telescope. No with an intensity of wild, shuddering horror. It longer was it possible to get anything save could not be! It could not! It—

  boiling, seething chaos by training the big He had to catch a grip on himself, for

  instrument upon Polyphemus; but the

  just then a surging horde of reporters came astronomer had some by-product observations rushing to him, demanding his views on the

  and calculations he wished to make. When,

  all-important thing. Did Earth have any however, he attempted to train the telescope, chance to escape?

  he found it cock-eyed!

  Controlling his shivering, Becker

  From that to a discovery of Becker’s

  pooh-poohed the idea of world destruction.

  apparatus and the subordinate’s treachery, was Certainly Polyphemus was coming. But after

  a short matter. Ammerton traced the wires to all, what was the usual fate of a meteor (he the switch on the desk, and found out exactly knew, of course, this was no meteor!) which how the thing had been worked to make him

  rushed into the rim of Earth’s atmosphere?

  go haywire on those first calculations

  In practically all cases, the friction set

  published before the scorn and derision of the up caused it to be consumed utterly! In this entire scientific world.

  case it just might be that a fragment would succeed in reaching Earth’s surface; enough, SO—he had been wrong after all— and it had

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  been his trusted helper who had betrayed him!

  panic-stricken about the streets. No one-could From that moment Ammerton, deprived of

  give any information, or cared to try. Most everything, he had loved and valued in the

  thinking men had provisioned deep cellars,

  world of men and women, forgot the hoping against hope that disintegration of the impending cataclysm, except insofar as it comet-asteroid would occur, and that limited his time now to a few days: Before, somehow Earth would survive—with perhaps

  that space of life was ended, he meant to find only a few days of excessive heat.

  Becker, who had gone from the observatory,

  Becker certainly had sought one of

  and even from the secluded hamlet at the foot these holes. Ammerton grimly made the

  of the mountain. Becker had taken the train for rounds, hoping he could be in time.

  New York City. Ammerton did the same. He

  Mounting terror reached its icy,

  was out to wreak vengeance upon the constricting fingers to clutch the heart’s and scheming rat.

  brains of all careless mankind. Business

  Then those last four days of fiery stopped. Ships put into port and were terror. That is, from dawn to dusk the sky was immediately deserted. Trains, city subways, practically as usual, save for a gathering heat airplanes—everything quit. Power was turned haze. Polyphemus came always in the off. Gas plants ceased operations, and storage direction of the night side of the earth, as far tanks of gasoline, oil and other inflammables, as North America was concerned.

  were emptied.

  At night, however—if you could call it

  Frenzied throngs rushed about the

  night—a full third of the sky was filled by the streets of cities, like ants caught upon a hot glowing, rushing monster! It gave far more

  plate. The arrogant New York multi-

  light than ten suns. And perhaps the most

  millionaire, Augustus Blick, who

  horrible part of it all was that, employing plain manufactured motor cars, was caught, crushed smoked glasses, any inhabitant of the world and trampled to death by the maddened mob

  could watch Polyphemus actually roiling and besieging the largest cathedral in New York, boiling and growing in size!

  attempting to get inside to repent their sins.

  With a loaded pistol in his pocket,

  In all the world only a few real saints

  Ammerton was on the trail of his quarry.

  and Ammerton went about uncaring. And

  Haste was important now; and in these days of Ammerton really did care, not for catastrophe, mounting horror, few people paid attention to but for completing one private affair before it others. Each man was searching his own soul came. Even Polyphemus paled before the star for hope, and most were finding only the

  of his destiny. If he found Becker now, what rusted tin cans, worn-out auto tires, and empty did it matter that the end of the world arrived bottles of past excesses. Ammerton managed, ten minutes later?

  as time grew terribly short, to learn that

  Becker for some reason had left New York

  THAT final night the entire heaven was sealed City, (it was his fear of the falling from horizon to horizon by the glaring, molten skyscrapers) and had gone out to a place bulk of the monster of doom. Heat outdoors called Port Washington on the shore of Long became too intense for humans. The ground

  Island.

  began to smoke. Pitchy trees in the forests But even finding one man in that large

  suddenly burst into flames. Buildings of frame a place, was a hard task. Ammerton started a construction began to scorch and blister.

  systematic search, since it appeared that Everywhere men took their families into Becker was unknown to the crowds running

  cellars and holes in the ground, into mines.

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  Then by word of mouth the dreadful

  automatic pistol.

  last-minute news was passed: Two more

  “Don’t!” shrieked the Judas.

  hours, and Polyphemus hits the outer rim of

  “You betrayed me, and made me the

  the Earth’s atmosphere! Then we will know!

  scorn of the world!” said Ammerton, calm and Ammerton, making a final dash across

  implacable now. “So, the world’s

  the street of liquefied asphalt paving, realized vengeance—”

  that when he had searched this block of

  His words were lost in the sudden,

  buildings, in which a bank was situated, he screaming awfulness high above. The heat of was through. Even with every protection, he the earth’s surface, as its atmosphere was

  could not venture outdoors in the remaining consumed like a flimsy curtain, suddenly

  moments—if any did remain—without mounted to millions of degrees! The bank shriveling up and burning
to a cinder.

  building, like all other excrescences on Earth’s

  “Just let me see him! Just let me see

  surface, suddenly became molten over their

  him once!” he repeated over and over in half heads. The surface too—even before the

  imprecation, half prayer.

  actual impact—

  One hour, fifty-nine minutes and fifty-

  But just as he himself dissolved into a

  one seconds of the period of grace had sped, wisp of smoke and nothingness, Ammerton

  when Ammerton at last succeeded in bribing

  squeezed the trigger of his pistol. Flame

  his way into the crowded subterranean bank

  spurted, meeting greater flame in mid-air.

  vault. The place was jammed with sweating

  The bullet never reached its mark, for

  humanity, lighted only by a few candles, and the mark had gone. The vault, along with the filled with the fearful din of frenzied sinners planet Earth, melted, became gas, exploded—

  on their knees.

  all in a trice. The cupro-nickel slug from the Becker was there. He was on his gun melted in flight and disappeared.

  knees, arms wildly waving.

  But Ammerton, dissolving into fires

  But that moment he saw Ammerton

  hotter even than the imagined hell of his

  pushing through the crowd, advancing, his

  forefathers, believed in dying that he had

  face a mask of grim vengeance, to level an

  avenged the wrong.