CHAPTER TWO

BACK TO THE ASTEROIDS

It was toward Juno that the sleek black and silver Federation spacer set its hurtling course and the trip would take seven full days—a trip that would take the ship a few million miles out of its way, but regulations could be stretched at times.

Although Pete Mason was thoroughly familiar with the processes involved, the romanticism in his nature caused him at times to react with wonder. A tiny dot of metal called a spaceship finding with unerring accuracy one small asteroid out of 250 million others. Of course, there were far more asteroids than that out in the vast reaches called the “void”; the total number could only be roughly estimated. But that figure roughly totaled the number that were large enough to be mined, a half-mile or more in diameter.

Juno was 127 miles in diameter, a huge world when compared to the average asteroid, and returning for Pete was somewhat like going back into the cold and darkness, because it got only about twenty-five percent of the light and heat the sun delivered on Mars.

But the asteroids were his home. He’d been born in the spaces of the Belt on the battered old Windjammer. An eight-jet space-freighter, it was of a slow, lumbering duck-like class, but ideally suited for mining, in that its hold was shaped like the belly of a bloated whale. The Windjammer’s class could carry enough high-grade ore to make prospecting a potentially profitable operation.

Pete did not remember his mother. She’d died a year after he was born, his father turning resolutely from his grief in the interests of the son his lovely young wife had left him.

Stubbornly refusing to allow a separation, Joe Mason had spurned the offers of Earthside relatives and had taken on a nurse—sixth generation Martian—ancient and wrinkled, but marvelously wise and gentle, who was a mother to Pete until she, too, passed on during his eighth year.

From that time on he and his father had been very close. Side by side they combed the Belt for minerals and led the wild, free life of the space miner.

And Pete knew the Belt as his home. This identifying term actually meant the comparatively small cluster of asteroids that one ship was capable of covering. The Belts, in reality, covered the vast patterns that the asteroids—the sands on the deserts of space—formed. Although they were incredibly wide and un-chartable in their entirety, there were predictable patterns in the formation and movements of the clusters that made up the belts. It was on these movements and patterns that the space miners depended in their operations.

But Joe Mason had vowed his son would never become an “ignorant rock-crusher.” Education was the ticket and Pete was going to get it till it ran out his ears!

So when Pete, at twelve, had absorbed the Elementaries, the fundamental education that was channeled by radio to asteroid children, his father enrolled him in a specialized preparatory school on Parma, the largest of the planetoids in the Belt. It was there that Pete decided on archeology as a profession, thus making a course at New Portland imperative.

But now that phase of his education had been cut short by tragedy, and he was on his way back to Juno, the Mason home base.

The Federation ship Harlem was a comfortable, even an exciting spacer to ride, but Pete still counted the hours of passage. Even more so because of the disquieting news he’d received from Juno. His father had been injured when a load of shale was dumped on him, and very lucky because he was in not too bad shape. But shale just didn’t get dumped on people. Mining didn’t work that way. The implication was sinister.

Pete talked to his father over radiophone his second day out—after he’d gotten the radiographed word. But the conversation hadn’t been reassuring. In fact, it had been most frustrating because his father had not explained anything and brushed off Pete’s questions. His gravel-voiced greeting was reassuring.

“Pete! Will you get the thunder back here and start running things? These idiots won’t let me out of bed.”

“Dad. That load of shale—”

“The blasted crew is deserting.”

“But—”

The radio man, Paul Ames, was sitting by in the cabin. He was a clean-cut earthman fresh out of Federated Space Communication School and he and Pete had gotten on well. Ames, interested and friendly, said, “Fie sounds in pretty good shape.”

The voice out of space crackled over the receiver. “Who’s that loud-mouth cutting in? Speak up, Pete?”

“I’m here, Dad. Are you sure you’re as well as you claim?”

“Who’d you say it was?”

“Paul Ames. The radio man. A friend of mine.”

“All right, if he’s a friend, tell him to get a little speed out of that Federated pickle jar. You’re needed here. I’ve got five claims staked, and I just got word that the Snapdragon is nosing around in that area.”

“You mean Rachel Barry’s ship?”

“Yes, Rachel Barry’s ship,” Joe Mason mimicked angrily. “What other Snapdragon prowls the Belt trying to steal from honest miners?”

“Somebody ought to do something about those pirates!”

“I’ll blamed well do something when I get out of this plaster box they put me in! I’ll spread that flying junk yard all over the Belt. But in the meantime, you get back here and hold the line!”

“I’m coming as fast as I can, Dad. Now you take it easy and get plenty of rest—hear me?”

“Quit wasting words! I don’t have to pay space-phone rates to get advice like that. You just get here!” After the disconnect, Pete dropped weakly into a chair.

There was a lull in reception, and Paul Ames had some time to bat the breeze. “That stuff about pirating—I thought the Federation Authority arm had things under control out there.”

Pete settled back into his chair and extended his long legs. He felt comfortable with Paul Ames and enjoyed talking with him.

“The main force against lawlessness is the Mining Brotherhood, with the Federation backing it up.”

Paul Ames frowned thoughtfully. “That’s strange. The books I read called that outfit a vigilante organization. It said they had a way of taking the law into their own hands. The Federation didn’t care too much for them.”

“You must have read an old book. They were a vigilante group in the beginning and they were pretty rough. I know, because my father is one of them. There was no law and order in the Belt then, and each man had to protect his own.”

“An operation like that usually ends up with a group of strong men shouldering out the weak.”

“Not necessarily. Of course, in the beginning it took a strong man to protect his own claim. That changed, though. The Mining Brotherhood isn’t against anybody prospecting the Belt and staking claims.”

“What are they against?”

“Piracy. Claim jumping. They can come in swinging if it’s necessary, but as I said, things have changed. They don’t make and enforce their own law. Sometimes they hold the line until the Federation can get into action, but they’re no lynch mob.”

“From what I’ve heard—”

“Of course,” Pete added quickly, “it’s no tea party we’re running out there. Some tough characters have come and gone in space mining and some of those left are still tough enough to defend their own property.”

“So they’re against piracy.”

“They fight bleeding, too.”

“What does that mean?”

“It’s not actually against the law, but it’s against our law. It means taking the top off a strike—skimming off pure ore when it’s found and leaving deposits that take work and effort to get out.”

“It would seem to me that the asteroids ought to be loaded with ore you could lift off with no work.”

“That’s not necessarily true. There are limits to everything. The Brotherhood doesn’t believe in grubbing poor ore, and resents lazy operators who don’t like to use machinery and leave rich deposits because mining them would take a little work. We call that bleeding. It’s not illegal or criminal. You might call it a gray area of conduct. Not exactly black.”

“But what was that about a pirate ship your father called the Snapdragon? You said it belonged to a Rachel Barry. Are there female pirates in the Belt?”

“Rachel Barry is a specialized case. A real individualist. In a way, you have to admire her.”

“How can you admire a pirate?”

“She can hardly be called that. But she’s got a brother-in-law, Homer, who’s a different proposition. Rachel married Jack Barry, a pretty good man. They had three daughters. Then Jack Barry died a couple of years ago, and everybody expected Rachel to move to one of the planets and go on raising her family. But she didn’t. She’s carrying on out in the Belt. They’ve even got a cat they made a little space suit for. But the miners weren’t able to laugh Rachel off the beltways.”

“She sounds interesting.”

“She is. I’ve never met her, but they say she’s a pretty fiery old gal. She claims she’s got as much right there as anybody else. She embarrassed the miners, I think—a woman doing a man’s work. And I guess she does—well, let’s say she’s in the gray area. And there is her brother-in-law, Homer.”

“She must be quite an embarrassment to the Brotherhood,” Paul Ames said. “Pushing a woman out—a woman raising a family—isn’t good public relations.”

“I’ll grant you that. But we can’t have our claims raided, either.”

Paul Ames yawned, his interest in the Belt miners and their problems beginning to wane. “How do you think your father’s accident will affect your career? You said you were studying to be an archeologist.”

“I don’t know,” Pete said gloomily. “My first obligation is to Dad, of course. If he is permanently laid up, I won’t be going back to school.”

“Were you on a scholarship?”

“No. That’s another thing. My marks weren’t quite high enough, so there’s the money to be considered.”

“I’m sure it will work out all right,” Paul Ames sympathized.

“Of course. At the worst, being an asteroid belt miner is a good life. We work hard, but there’s always the chance of the big strike. Hit the right rock and you can settle down planetside and live like an industrialist.”

Paul Ames eyed his friend keenly. “But you wouldn’t do that, would you?”

“No,” Pete answered slowly. “I guess I wouldn’t.”

“And you wouldn’t get a really big thrill out of striking it rich.”

“It would—”

“It would give you a chance to become an archeologist.”

Before Pete could answer, the Federated Fleet call letters came over the speaker. “The twenty-four-hour newscast from home,” Paul said, coming erect in his chair. He adjusted the dials on the board in front of him.

Pete watched his new-found friend. Home to Paul meant Earth. Conversely, to Pete, Earth meant a faraway planet, important because it was the location of authority for the whole System. The Planetary League had its seat on Earth. The Federation authorities, all the various branches, had primary location on the lush green planet where living conditions were ideal for the human animal and where all space science had been born.

Still, Pete had no great urge to go there. He lived and moved and had his being in the Belt, with Mars as the planet from which he and his kind drew support and maintenance.

Earth, so far as he was concerned, might be an interesting place to visit. But who would want to live there?