Read Captain Future 10 - Outlaws of the Moon (Spring 1942) for Free Online Page A

streaking outward through the void with every racket tube thundering. Looking back by means of the telescopic rear view plate, Captain Future glimpsed a little swarm of tiny metal specks that followed them.
    “GHQ Squadron of the Patrol is on our tail,” he muttered. “But they can’t overtake the Comet — it’s the other squadrons that matter.”
    “Where are we going to head for?” Simon Wright asked coolly. “They’ll surely have us cut off from the Moon already.”
     
    CURT nodded tensely. “Yes, the Lunar Squadron will be strung out waiting for us,” he said. “We’ll have to break for outer space. There’s a spot in Mars’ southern desert where we can hole up till the chase dies down. Then we can return and work secretly to uncover Larsen King’s plot.”
    He held the racing ship on a course toward that sector of black space whose brightest star was the red dot of Mars. As time flashed by, a barrage of code signals streamed constantly from the televisor. Then Curt glimpsed a thin swarm of metal specks in space ahead of them. They were fast cruisers, coming on in “space sweep” formation.
    “That’s the Martian and Asteroidal Squadrons coming to meet us!” he exclaimed in dismay. “They’ve got us boxed — we’re cut off from Mars!”
    “Can’t we get away by using the vibration drive?” cried Otho.
    Curt shook his head grimly.
    “It would be suicide to try to use the vibration drive’s speeds inside the System. We’re in a neat trap.”
     

     
Chapter 5: Slow Motion World
     
    THE Futuremen realized the full peril of their position. The Patrol had an efficient system for dealing with space pirates and other fugitives of the void. Its fast code signals could swiftly fling a net of heavily armed cruisers around any sector of space, by gathering together the cruising squadrons of that part of the System.
    That was what had happened now. The Patrol squadrons had rapidly converged from a half-dozen different directions. It was now impossible for the ship of the Futuremen to slip through the tightening net, without discovery.
    Grag uttered an angry bellow.
    “They’ll find it easier to box us than to keep us boxed! We can blast our way through them with the proton-guns.”
    “Calm down,” Captain Future advised curtly. “We’re going to try to get out of this — by skillful maneuvering, if possible. Don’t use those guns.”
    “Even you can’t slip out of this net by clever piloting, Chief,” Grag protested anxiously. “They’re just waiting for us to try to break ahead through them!”
    He pointed agitatedly with his metal arm toward the distant swarm of cruisers ahead. They were coming on in a hemispherical, cuplike formation — the famous “space-sweep” strategy. The GHQ Squadron close behind the Comet was seeking to drive it into that cup.
    Curt Newton grinned tautly.
    “We can’t get through that formation ahead, so we’re going back — right through this squadron behind us.”
    Otho’s jaw dropped.
    “Devils of space! Maybe we could run back through them before they could gun us — they wouldn’t be expecting that!”
    “If we get back through them and give ‘em the slip, where will we head for?” Grag asked. “For Venus?”
    “No, for that’s just what they would expect,” Curt replied. He pointed toward a tiny yellow speck that lay in space far back to the right.
    “We’ll hide out there on Eros till the hunt dies down.”
    “On Eros?” repeated Otho in dismay. “But nobody ever lands on that crazy little asteroid!”
    “That’s just why they won’t think of looking for us there. Eros is our best chance,” declared Captain Future. “Get ready, all of you. I’m going to let those cruisers almost overtake us, and then do a hairpin loop right back through ‘em.”
    The brilliant stars of the abyss looked down upon this racing drama between worlds. The Patrol cruisers, spouting flame from every rocket tube in their sterns, began rapidly to