Science Fiction Books

It was Orley Mattup's killing of the old lab technician that really made us hate him. Mattup was a guard at the reactor installation at Bayless, Kentucky, where my friend Danny Hern and I were part of the staff when the Outsiders took everything over. In what god-forsaken mountain hole they had found Mattup, and how they got him to sell out to them, I don't know. He was an authentic human,... more...

He hadn't gotten any work done that morning. He'd spent most of the time pacing the floor of his small back office, and the rest of it at the window—hands clasped behind his somewhat bowed back—staring up into the cloudless sky. At ten-forty, the intercom buzzed. He snapped the switch. "Yes?" "I've got those figures, Mr. Lake. We have nine—" "Maybe you'd... more...

Martha Dane paused, looking up at the purple-tinged copper sky. The wind had shifted since noon, while she had been inside, and the dust storm that was sweeping the high deserts to the east was now blowing out over Syrtis. The sun, magnified by the haze, was a gorgeous magenta ball, as large as the sun of Terra, at which she could look directly. Tonight, some of that dust would come sifting down from... more...

Chapter 1 "Are we rising again?" "No. On the contrary." "Are we descending?" "Worse than that, captain! we are falling!" "For Heaven's sake heave out the ballast!" "There! the last sack is empty!" "Does the balloon rise?" "No!" "I hear a noise like the dashing of waves. The sea is below the car! It cannot be more than 500 feet... more...

ROSA ALCHEMICA. I It is now more than ten years since I met, for the last time, Michael Robartes, and for the first time and the last time his friends and fellow students; and witnessed his and their tragic end, and endured those strange experiences, which have changed me so that my writings have grown less popular and less intelligible, and driven me almost to the verge of taking the habit of St.... more...

"All passengers, " All the high-fidelity speakers of the starship Procyon spoke as one, in the skillfully-modulated voice of the trained announcer. "This is the fourth and last cautionary announcement. Any who are not seated will seat themselves at once. Prepare for take-off acceleration of one and one-half gravities; that is, everyone will weigh one-half again as much as his normal Earth... more...

Bart Neely was fighting the hypo. They'd slipped that over on him. Now he had to struggle to keep his brain ready for plan B. The alternate plan. He nodded feebly at his reflection in the mirror over the white enamel dresser. This throat-trouble wasn't going to lick him. He lay back on the cool white pillow. Medical men always thought theirs was the final answer; well, psychologists like... more...

he game was stud. There were seven at the table, which makes for good poker. Outside of Nick, who banked the game, nobody looked familiar. They all had the beat look of compulsive gamblers, fogged over by their individual attempts at a poker face. They were a cagey-looking lot. Only one of them was within ten years of my age. "Just in case, gamblers," the young one said. I looked up from... more...

he rugged little stellar scout ship flared down to the surface of Kappa Orionis VII about a mile from the aboriginal village. The pilot, Lieutenant Eric Haruhiku, scorched an open field, but pointed out to Louis Mayne that he had been careful to disturb neither woodland nor shoreline. "The Kappans are touchy about those, Judge," he explained, "They fish a lot, as you'd guess from all... more...

CHAPTER I. BESIDE STILL WATERS. The youth in the multi-coloured blazer laughed. “You’d have to come and be a nurse,” he suggested. “Oh, I’d go as a drummer-boy. I’d look fine in uniform, wouldn’t I?” the waitress simpered in return. Dennis Burnham swallowed his liqueur in one savage gulp, pushed back his chair, and rose from the table. “Silly young ass,” he said, in a voice loud... more...