The Solar Invasion by Manly Wade Wellman

Book Details

Captain Future, Joan Randall and the Futuremen cruise to a strange world in a different dimension, peopled with weird pallid inhabitants on the quest to find the Moon which was mysteriously plucked from the sky! This full length Captain Future novel by Manly Wade Wellman (1903-1986) is from 1946.

Chapter I – Fugitive Futuremen
Chapter II – Truant Satellite
Chapter III – Grag in Dimension X
Chapter IV – In Pursuit of the Moon
Chapter V – The World-Eaters
Chapter VI – Counter-Espionage
Chapter VII – Luna Gone Crazy
Chapter VIII – N’Rala
Chapter IX – The Devouring Lake
Chapter X – New Dimensions to Conquer
Chapter XI – Oog on the Asteroid
Chapter XII – Space Ambush
Chapter XIII – The Fleets Clash
Chapter XIV – The Lair of the Overlord
Chapter XV – Reunion—and the Overlord
Chapter XVI – The Fate of Universes
Chapter XVII – Cleanup
Chapter XVIII – Bombing a Star
Chapter XIX – Peace on Luna

Manly Wade Wellman (1903–1986) was born in the village of Kamundongo in Portuguese West Africa (now Angola), where his father was stationed as a medical officer. He spoke the native dialect before he learned English, and became an adopted son of a powerful chief whose vision Dr. Wellman restored.

The Solar Invasion has 28 illustrations.

Files:

1. solarInvasion.epub

Excerpt: The Solar Invasion

Chapter I

Fugitive Futuremen

ASTEROID No. 697 is one of the countless worlds explored by Curt Newton—Captain Future to the peoples of the many planets for whom he has waged such brilliant conflict—and, unlike most explorers, about which he has said little to anyone beyond his own circle of strange comrades.

Asteroid No. 697 is not much larger than a flying mountain. Nevertheless it has a freak gravitational power which makes possible the retention of atmosphere and water. Rich green grass and shrubs and trees, myriads of flowers, and delicious fruits, grow there. The grotto in which they now were gathered was an ideal picnic spot. And as a picnic spot it was being used just now by Curt Newton and two companions.

They had come, ostensibly, to collect and examine specimens of edible plants, which early sketchy tests had shown to contain a new quasi-vitamin useful in prolonging life. But there were other reasons for coming to Asteroid No. 697—and for spending some time there. And so they lolled and rested, after the last specimen had been carefully packed and slid into a locker.

Curt, graceful, brawny and a bit more than normal size, knelt before a small fire, grilling a steak. A close-fitting green zipper-suit hugged the powerful muscles of his mighty shoulders and long legs. His red hair, never quite in order, was comfortably rumpled now, and his clear gray eyes were studying his cookery with the attention that he had so often turned upon a cosmic riddle of science, or upon overwhelming enemy odds.

“How can you eat that stuff?” asked Otho, the android, who was sprawling nearby, nibbling a cake of the synthetic chemical which was his favorite nourishment.

Otho, too, was gracefully built and clear-cut of feature. He had been made artificially, of elastic muscles and organs and tissues. His high skull was bald, his complexion rubbery white, and his ironical eyes were green and ironical. Near him played Oog, the fat, doughy little meteor-mimic that was Otho’s cherished pet.

“How can he eat it?” repeated a raspy voice from overhead. “Why, he just puts it in his mouth, chews it and swallows. It’s the least of Captain Future’s problems.”

THAT was Simon Wright, the Brain, speaking. Long ago, on his deathbed, Simon had prevailed on Curt Newton’s father, the brilliant Roger Newton, to transplant his brain into a crystal box, where it would live and function forever in a bath of life-giving serum. Flexible metal stalks bore lens-eyes. On either side of the crystal box was an artificial ear. In front, beneath the eye-stalks, was fixed the Brain’s resonator speech-apparatus. By use of traction-beams, he could move, touch and work as though he had hands and feet.

Curt laughed. He deftly made a steak sandwich, doused it with sauce and relish, and took a grateful mouthful. For all his peerless science and deadly fighting skill, just now, Captain Future was but a healthy, hungry young man.

“Isn’t this cozy and peaceful?” he asked.

“Cozy and peaceful,” repeated the Brain. “That’s just it. Thank the planetary providences that we found out in time. “

“Mmm,” agreed Captain Future through his sandwich. “We cleared off the Moon just in time to miss the big ceremony and decorations. High-flown jabber over interplanetary radio hookups about how great and wonderful and valuable we are, is certainly a horrible ordeal.”

“Why can’t the System Government see that a big ceremony and reception for us would be bad?” inquired Otho. “We do our best work because we’re not too well known by sight. If the whole System saw us on television it would ruin our effectiveness.” He nibbled more chemical-cake. “I’d look silly wearing the System Medal for Distinction.”

“What’s that you’re wearing?” inquired the Brain, dropping down a couple of feet to peer.

Otho glanced down—and gasped. On the chest of his zipper-suit hung a broad, glittering piece of jewelry—a ten-pointed star, inches across, jewelled and enamelled and inscribed in five planetary languages.

“The System Medal!” cried Curt “Otho, I thought you wanted to steer clear of all decorations!”

“Where did it come from?” Otho clawed at the magnificent creation. It dropped from him like a fruit from a tree, bounced on the floor of the grotto, shook itself and flowingly shifted shape—and changed into Oog who stared solemnly at his master. Oog had just been exercising the meteor-mimic faculty of changing himself into anything.

“The little imp!” cried Otho. “He’s beginning to understand our talk. By gosh, he can imitate anything!”

“Amazing,” agreed the Brain. “Well, here we are, anyway, quietly picnicking. No fuss, no decorations!” He closed the jaws of his resonator with an emphatic snap.

“The difficulty is,” resumed Curt, finishing his sandwich, “the Solar System thinks its major troubles are over, and we can think of retiring. It’s my experience that when everything seems smoothest, danger threatens in its most deadly form. I wish President Carthew and his cabinet would realize that.”

“Grag’s back on the Moon,” the Brain reminded him. “Maybe they’ll go there and give him all the glory.”

“Grag—bah!” snorted Otho. “That big heap of junk! Those tin brains of his don’t realize what a bore it would be!”

He broke off, staring at Oog. The meteor-mimic had again melted, stirred his cells, and now stood up in the form of a little metal dwarf, sturdily made, with jointed limbs, bulbous metal head and tiny photo-electric eyes.

“He’s mimicking Grag—except that Grag’s seven feet tall!” cried Otho. “I told you that Oog is getting smart!”

Oog melted himself yet again and shaped his substance into a little square box— transparent, with flexible eye-stalks.

“Now he’s the Brain,” said Curt with a laugh. “He understands a lot, Otho. This last shift means that he agrees with you about his smartness.”

He put out the fire and relaxed against a wall of the grotto.

“We’re out of sight of the Comet, parked out yonder,” he mused. “Even if they signal the Comet, we don’t know it, so our consciences will be free—”

“Look at Oog,” said the Brain suddenly. “He senses something.”

Excerpt From: Manly Wade Wellman. “The Solar Invasion.”