Captain Future 07 - The Magician of Mars (Summer 1941) by Edmond Hamilton Page A

ever get it out? I just can’t understand it.”
    “How did the ship that rescued Ul Quorn get in and out of Cerberus prison?” Captain Future countered meaningly. “It was this same little ship, built here by Skal Kar and stolen by N’Rala. A ship capable of shifting across the fifth-dimensional gulf into the co-existing universe!”
    “Jumping jungle-cats of Jupiter!” gasped Otho. “Then that is the secret of Ul Quorn’s power to vanish and reappear at will?”
    “I still don’t understand how it’s possible, Chief,” said Crag.
    “It’s simple enough, Grag,” the red-haired planeteer told him. “That other universe of space and stars is co-existent with our own universe of space and stars, but doesn’t impinge on ours because they’re separated by the fifth-dimensional abyss. But Skal Kar’s ship could cross that abyss into the other universe. N’Rala, after she killed Skal Kar, simply shifted the little ship into the other universe, traveled a short distance in the space of that other universe, and then shifted back and reappeared at a different location which was in our own universe.”
    “Aye, lad, there’s no doubt in my mind now that that’s it,” rasped the hovering Brain. “The Martian girl must have cajoled Skal Kar into showing her how his apparatus worked before she killed him.”
    “But how can we catch Ul Quorn when he has this power to flee into the other universe?” cried Otho anxiously.
    “We can’t follow him into the other universe — unless we have a ship with the same power,” Captain Future admitted.
     
    HE STARTED a close search of the deserted laboratory. The atomic tools in it were of the highly ingenious type used for space-ship manufacture. With them one man could easily construct a small ship.
    Curt peered into two big, empty lead bins. He fingered a trace of shining blue powder that still remained in them.
    “Radite,” he said shortly. “The most powerful cyclotron-fuel known. He’d need such super-power to actuate his dimension-shifting ship.”
    “Aye, and that’s probably why he had his laboratory here on Uranus’ moon,” said the Brain keenly. “Radite is only found on Uranus.”
    Curt searched Skal Kar’s papers, hunting for the plans and diagrams of the murdered scientist’s dimension-shifting craft. But the papers had been ransacked, and all plans were missing.
    “Here’s Skal Kar’s diary!” Grag boomed suddenly. “I found it among the books over there.”
     
    CAPTAIN FUTURE eagerly inspected the diary. He was disappointed that it contained no scientific notes or plans about Skal Kar’s ship. But he found one entry revealing, and read it aloud.
     
    Began actual work on the ship today. If this small model craft succeeds in entering the co-existent universe, I’ll be able to build a larger ship of greater cruising radius. Then at last I’ll be able to seek in that other universe for the great treasure that Harris Haines saw there. And I’ll succeed in getting that treasure, where Haines failed!
     
    Curt looked up, his eyes gleaming. “So when Harris Haines went back into the other universe, it was to get some great treasure he’d seen there?” he muttered. “And he never came back. But Skal Kar knew about it from Haines’ papers, and was planning to go after it himself.”
    “But Quorn had Skal Kar killed, and now has his and Harris Haines’ secret papers!” Otho burst out. “And I’ll bet a planet that —”
    “That Ul Quorn’s planning to go after that mysterious treasure in the other universe himself!” Captain Future finished. “Of course! He —”
    Grag suddenly interrupted. His sensitive microphone-ears had detected a distant sound.
    “I hear a ship landing outside!” he cried.
    Like a flying shadow, Captain Future darted to the door with the others close behind him.
    He flung open the door, then uttered a cry.
    “Quorn’s ship!”
    A small, sleek-lined space ship had landed softly close beside the Comet in