Chapter IV

The next day, at Neptune's dawn, Johnny Damokles was led back to his work on the _dynotron_ bomb. Timmy, sleepy-eyed and wavering, followed his captors to a place in the mech lab. He worked quietly for half an hour, then beckoned to his overseer.

"Yes?" hissed the Neptunian.

"I want to see your leader."

"Why?"

"None of your blasted business. Just do what you're told, or be mighty blasted sorry."

The Neptunian scratched an itching neck flange. "All right," he said, "but you'd better have something to make this worth while." He shoved Timmy forward, released a door catch, and led him down the hall. Three staccato raps opened another door, and Timmy again stood in the presence of Neptune's Leader.

"Yes?" the Leader's voice was suave, but flat. "Oh, it's you ... you've something important?"

"I want to work in the photo-lab."

"Something to do with your way of sensitizing impervium?"

"That's right."

"Utterly useless. We've checked the figures of your own labs and find that they are completely accurate. That ship of yours is a freak ... and we can see no reason as to _why_ it works."

"I still have an idea."

The Neptunian glared at him, and again that dead-alive membrane concealed all key to his thoughts. "You're not trying to convince me you're willing to join us, are you?"

"Nope," Timmy's Irish jaw shot out belligerently, "I just figure it'll be easy to escape from there."

A hiss was apparently the Outer-worldian's manner of laughing, for the hiss he emitted was as jovial a sound as Timmy had heard since landing on the planet. "I mean it!" Timmy finished, "and I warn you to watch me."

"Your spirit," the Neptune said, "is admirable." He scrawled a few notes, handed them to Timmy. "Here," he said, "is an order to work in the photo-labs. I shall watch your struggles with great pleasure." His hand closed on Timmy's shoulder and Timmy gritted his teeth, shook his way loose, and walked to the door.

Mockingly, the Leader laughed.

* * * * *

That night, when Timmy returned to their room, he found the little Greek seated, eyes blazing, on the bed. "S'matter, chum?"

"Dam-blasted Shelton Thurner ... chase me all over hell for sky-hook. Don't like it!"

"Forget it. You're tired and so am I. Grab off a mouthful of that synthi-food and let's hit the hay." He turned on the faucet, drew a cup of steaming brew and handed it to the Greek.

"I got the mixture," he whispered between gulps. "Did you get the metal?" The Greek nodded. "Yep," he replied, then in a louder tone. "Let's get to bed, Timmy."

Lights were quickly extinguished, and the two, with much moaning and groaning, crawled under the covers. But tonight there was need for action, not talk. Timmy pushed the blankets up to make a low tent, and handed Johnny a torch he'd stolen. Improvised though it was, their bed made a flawless, light-tight darkroom. Timmy climbed out to make sure no ray escaped, then plunged into bed again.

"The metal!" he grunted. Johnny Damokles handed him a tiny piece of impervium. It was, approximately, three inches square.

"Swell," said Tim. "Now hold this light." He dug deep into his pockets and pulled forth a bottle of stolen liquid. "As nearly as I can tell, this is the same mixture I used in making my other ship." He dipped the square of impervium in it, then waited. Dry at last, he wiped the metal square until it shone, and grinned as the first reactions started. "It works!" he nearly shouted. But that was neither the time nor the place for shouting. "Watch!" he whispered. Taking the torch from Johnny Damokles, he held it close against his treated impervium. The little square darted away so swiftly that it nearly tore loose from his hand. It did pull him a foot or so toward the edge of the bed before he switched off his light. There was no doubt about it. Impervium, when exposed to some unknown Neptunian radiation, underwent an untestable change and behaved precisely as had the metal of his ship.

"Hallelujahs!" burbled Damokles beneath his breath. "Now we fix up dam' fool Shelton Thurners."

"Maybe?" said Tim with unexpected pessimism. "I've stolen enough fluid for feet on that dam' bomb." He paused, "Are you sure the whole thing's impervium?"

"Yep! But how I gonna rub this stuff on ship?"

"Don't rub it. Pour this bottle on a high perpendicular point and let it run down the sides. We'll take a chance that the dim light here on Nep will prevent our process from knocking your bomb over ahead of time."

"Yeah. Then you get more solutions. We pour her on ... an' dam' bomb go sail away fast as hell!"

Timmy grinned. "Not quite, pal," he said, "I'm figuring on something just a little more effective." He took a piece of paper and made a few hasty sketches. Johnny Damokles watched with interest. Then he broke into a smile.

"I see," nodded the Greek. "She are just like story I tell you about old Greek king."

"Exactly.... And now, let me have time enough to get rid of our scrap of test metal and we'll turn in."

"No," protested Damokles. "Give me this piece impervium. I got good idea. Secret."

Timmy, without further question, handed Johnny the bit of treated impervium and added to it his bottle of stolen liquid. "Good night, chum," he mumbled, and rolled over to sleep.

* * * * *

Ten days and ten nights passed in that way. Each night Timmy had another flask of his sensitizer to give Johnny. And each night Damokles reported another successful application of the fluid. Miraculous that the two of them could so successfully hoodwink their captors? Yes. But then the Neptunians thought of the two as members of a lesser race, and gave them almost complete freedom of movement ... within limits. Timmy blessed the arrogance from which this stemmed. From the photo-labs he stole his sensitizer. In the mech labs he succeeded in removing and assembling certain vital cogs and rheostats. Put together they would give him control of Neptune's gigantic _dynotron_ bomb. And Timmy Gordon was the man to put any machinery together. He did it on the tenth day. That same day, he stole a length of steel chain and a sharpened metal hook. Why he stole them, Timmy Gordon didn't know. But Damokles had asked him to, and he'd given his promise.

"Here you are," he said when he reached their room that night. He slipped the hook and chain to Johnny beneath the covers of their bed. "Goin' fishin' with it, chum?"

"You bet your dam' boots. I catch fat fish, too."

Timmy smiled. Then, quietly, he showed Johnny Damokles the piece of apparatus he'd constructed. It looked somewhat like the primitive 20th Century radio sets one saw in museums, but its purpose, as Tim explained, was more important. Compact, weighing no more than fifty or sixty grams, it gave him complete radio control of anything treated with his sensitizing fluid. What was more important, it took its power from almost any faint source of light, and should be effective up to two or three thousand miles.

"She work?" asked Damokles.

"She will if static doesn't cut me out too much."

"Dam' good," grunted the Greek. "Now we show them dam-blast Neptuners what good Old Greek History are."

"Correct, chum. When will the bomb be ready?"

"She are ready now."

"Swell! I might as well blast her off."

"No!" Johnny Damokles' tone was urgent, pleading. "You wait ... do him tomorrow when Neptune fellers can see."

Morning dawned with its usual dim lessening of the Neptunian murk. A methane breeze rolled down from some distant mountain range and swirled in noxious vapors across the plain. Two Neptunian guardsmen saw a flicker of movement in a nearby sandheap and cut loose with the fullest fury of their heat-grids. There was a crackle. An unassimilated tribesman rolled over, kicked a spurred foot in the air, arched his haunches and died.

The little tragedy, repeated time and again on that ruthless planet, was no more than window-dressing for more significant events. The crackling, burning grids were crackling arcs of doom. Like Gabriel's trumpet, they served to awaken Tim and Johnny Damokles.

"What's dam' noise?" grunted the Greek.

"Target practice." Timmy was about to deliver further comments, but a rap at the door cut him loose. "Come in!" he barked. The door opened. The Leader entered.

"Ahhhh. Good morning, my dear guests." He rubbed his hands in a gesture that grated scales together. "We've a special _treat_ for you this morning. And perhaps, since you've displayed certain interests in _history_, you'd enjoy sharing in the history of the future."

"Would we?" queried Timmy.

"Belligerence is an ill-fitting trait of yours, Mister Gordon," said the Neptunian. "An inadequate one, I'll add."

"We're wasting time," interrupted Tim. "Get on with it!"

"Impetuous? You've a right to be. Get into your space suits and come outside. We're launching a special present for the Jovian System ... and feel that you gentlemen would enjoy it."

"I know," muttered Timmy.

"Of course, you do." The Leader was grinning as he spoke. "We've given your companion full opportunity to tell you about it. But come along ... unless you prefer a few rather ... delicate ... adjustments of the nervous system."

Johnny Damokles laughed. But beyond that, neither he nor Tim had anything further to say. They climbed into their space clothes and followed the Leader out into the Neptunian twilight.