Eric frank russell pdf

And she wasn't really expecting to fall in love with a plus barbarian known to cosmopolitan galactics as the Butcher of Komarr. Download or read online Somewhere a Voice written by Eric Frank Russell, published by Unknown which was released on Get Somewhere a Voice Books now! Soon he was a prisoner of the Zangastans - and filled with a determination to get back to Earth just as soon as.

During the prolonged war between Earth and Sirius, Earth agent James Mowry is surgically altered to resemble a Sirian, trained in the arts of espionage, subversion, and propaganda, and sent to infiltrate and weaken the Sirian Combine. In this enthralling Cold War thriller, a scientist at a government research facility has suddenly recalled a gruesome crime he committed years before and takes flight — with a military intelligence agent hot on his trail.

Download or read online Three to Conquer written by Eric Frank Russell, published by Vintage which was released on Get Three to Conquer Books now! Presents a collection of five novels, including "Wasp" and "Sinister Barrier," and three short stories.

Get Darker Tides Books now! Download or read online Dreadful Sanctuary written by Eric Frank Russell, published by Unknown which was released on The patrol remained strung across the road, guns held ready.

Half an hour crawled by without anything happening. They fell into lugubrious silence, watching the town, licking their lips and thinking. They had plenty to think about. A town—any town of human occupation—had desirable features not found elsewhere in the cosmos. Lights, company, freedom, laughter, all the makings of life. And one can go hungry too long. Eventually a large coach came from the outskirts, hit the high road, came bowling toward them. A long, shiny, streamlined job, it rolled on twenty balls in two rows of ten, gave forth a whine similar to but louder than that of its predecessor, but had no visible fans.

It was loaded with people. Make way! One of them is going to chat or I leave the service. The coach lost pace, stopped with its bonnet a yard from the waiting file. Its driver peered out the side of his cab. Other faces snooped farther back. He had a blue jowl, a broken nose, cauliflower ears, looked the sort who usually drives with others in hot and vengeful pursuit.

He was conscious of Gleed and the patrol watching, listening, and probably grinning inside themselves. There was also the load of gaping passengers. He wore thick-lensed glasses that gave him eyes like poached eggs.

Moreover, he was adorned with a high hat candy-striped in white and pink. Get out of that cab. Bidworthy beckoned to his nearest six men. Tearing open the cab door, they grabbed. If they had expected the victim to put up a futile fight against heavy odds, they were disappointed. He made no attempt to resist. They got him, lugged together, and he yielded with good grace, his body leaning sidewise and coming halfway out of the door. Let me see. Nobody budged.

They studied him silently and with varied expressions, not one of which did anything to help his ego. The fat man with the candy-striped hat mooned at him sardonically. Bidworthy decided that he did not like the fat man and that a stiff course of military calisthenics might thin him down a bit. Whichever you prefer. Make up your minds.

He shifted in his seat to the accompaniment of metallic clanking noises. Bidworthy did as suggested, leaning through the doors to have a gander.

Then he got right into the vehicle, went its full length and studied each passenger. His florid features were two shades darker when he came out and spoke to Sergeant Gleed.

Every one of them. I always wonder why—but now I know. Either we must find the keys or get tools and cut them loose. Colonel Shelton arrived, walked once slowly and officiously around the outside of the coach, examining its construction and its occupants.

He flinched at the striped hat whose owner leered at him through the glass. Then he came over to the disgruntled group. His expression was cold as he returned his attention to the driver. With that enigmatic remark, he let his machine roll forward. The patrol parted to make room. The coach built up its whine to top note, sped down the road, diminished into the distance. That will probably mean new tactics.

So far, the patrol has achieved nothing. It is wasting its time. March the men back to the ship, sergeant major. The conference lasted well into the night and halfway through the following morning.

During these argumentative hours various oddments of traffic, mostly vehicular, passed along the road, but nothing paused to view the monster spaceship, nobody approached for a friendly word with its crew.

The strange inhabitants of this world seemed to be afflicted with a peculiar form of mental blindness, unable to see a thing until it was thrust into their faces and then surveying it squint-eyed. One passer-by in midmorning was a truck whining on two dozen rubber balls and loaded with girls wearing colorful head-scarves.

The girls were singing something about one little kiss before we part, dear. Half a dozen troops lounging near the gangway came eagerly to life, waved, whistled and yoohooed. The effort was wasted, for the singing continued without break or pause and nobody waved back. Inside, the top brass sat around a horseshoe table in the chartroom near the bow and debated the situation. Most of them were content to repeat with extra emphasis what they had said the previous evening, there being no new points to bring up.

But what about others? I feel it in my bones that at sometime or other these people have fallen foul of one or more vessels calling unofficially and have been leery of spaceships ever since. Or they were swindled by some unscrupulous fleet of traders. Some may have the techniques but not the facilities, of which they need plenty. The only other ships in existence are eighty or ninety antiquated rocket jobs bought at scrap price by the Epsilon system for haulage work between their fourteen closely-planned planets.

A Blieder-job takes so much that a would-be pirate has to become a billionaire to become a pirate. There was a mortician wearing odd shoes, one brown, one yellow. Our minds are now enriched by the thought that an anonymous individual may be presented with a futile object for an indefinable purpose when he reaches his unknown destination.

A capitol is big by the standards of its own administrative area. It has certain physical features lending it importance above the average. It should be easily visible from the air. They reveal nothing resembling a superior city. The naked eye sees more. We have got four lifeboats capable of scouring the place from pole to pole. Why not use them? They are ordinary, old-style rocket jobs, for emergencies only. You could not make efficient ground-survey at any speed in excess of four hundred miles per hour.

But the smallest Blieder engine has an Earth mass of more than three hundred tons—far too much for little boats. Within ten minutes Harrison appeared. He had walked fast three-quarters of a mile from the Blieder room. He was thin and wiry, with dark, monkeylike eyes, and a pair of ears that cut out the pedaling with the wind behind him.

The ambassador examined him curiously, much as a zoologist would inspect a pink giraffe. Return as quickly as you can and bring me the reply.

Strong stuff. Venusian cognac or something equally potent. Pedaling briskly down the road, Tenth Engineer Harrison reached the first street on either side of which were small detached houses with neat gardens front and back. A plump, amiable looking woman was clipping a hedge halfway along. He pulled up near to her, politely touched his cap. She half-turned, gave him no more than a casual glance, pointed her clipping-shears southward. First on the right, second on the left. He moved on, hearing the snip - snip resume behind him.

First on the right. He curved around a long, low, rubber-balled truck parked by the corner. Second on the left. Three children pointed at him and yelled shrill warnings that his back wheel was going round. He found the delicatessen, propped a pedal on the curb, gave his machine a reassuring pat before he went inside and had a look at Jeff. There was plenty to see. Jeff had four chins, a twenty-two-inch neck, and a paunch that stuck out half a yard.

An ordinary mortal could have got into either leg of his pants without taking off a diving suit. He weighed at least three hundred and undoubtedly was the biggest man in town. Usually I avoid that sort—but every man to his taste. I ought to have guessed it in the first place. I must be slow on the uptake today. The machine was still there. You mean you planted an ob on someone? Obediently, Harrison went behind the counter, paused to give his bicycle a reassuring nod, trailed the other through a passage and into a yard.

Jeff Baines pointed to a stack of cases. Stack the empties outside. Please yourself whether you do it or not. Left by himself, Harrison scratched his ears and thought it over. Somewhere, he felt, there was an obscure sort of gag. A candidate named Harrison was being tempted to qualify for his sucker certificate.

But if the play was beneficial to its organizer it might be worth learning because the trick could then be passed on. One must speculate in order to accumulate. So he dealt with the cases as required. It took him twenty minutes of brisk work, after which he returned to the shop. All I have to do is get rid of the ob. Why use a long word when a short one is good enough? An obligation is an ob. I shift it this way: Seth Warburton, next door but one, has got half a dozen of my obs saddled on him.

So I get rid of mine to you and relieve him of one of his to me by sending you around for a meal. Slightly dazed, he wandered out, stood by the bicycle and again eyed the paper. Bum, it said. He could think of several on the ship who would have exploded with wrath over that. His attention drifted to the second shop farther along. Inside there was a long counter, some steam and a clatter of crockery. He chose a seat at a marble-topped table occupied by a gray-eyed brunette.

He sought around for something else to say and at that point a thin-featured man in a white coat dumped before him a plate loaded with fried chicken and three kinds of unfamiliar vegetables. The sight unnerved him. There were no knives and forks on the ship.

You take what you get. You should have put that to him instead of waiting for fate and complaining afterward. Are you a stranger here? He nodded, his mouth full of chicken. Why, you look almost human. He chewed, swallowed, looked around. The white-coated man came up. The coffee came in a pint-sized mug. All I want is some information. Just tell me where I can put my finger on the ripest cheese in the locality.

He carried on with his own meal, finished it, lay back expansively. Just tell me where I can find an official, any official! His mind side-slipped and did a couple of spins.

It took him quite a while to reassemble his thoughts and try another tack. What would you do? He returned to the counter with the air of one who has no time to waste on half-wits.

Quick, tell me where I can find the depot. The fire depot was a big place holding four telescopic ladders, a spray tower and two multiple pumps, all motorized on the usual array of fat rubber balls. Inside, Harrison came face to face with a small man wearing immense plus fours. By this time prepared for that sort of thing, Harrison spoke as one would to a child. Somebody bosses it.

Somebody organizes the shebang, fills forms, presses buttons, recommends promotions, kicks the shiftless, takes all the credit, transfers all the blame and generally lords it around. How can they be? A shrill bell clamored, cutting off the sentence. Twenty men appeared as if by magic, boarded a ladder and a multi-pump, roared into the street. Apart from these, they plumbed the depths of sartorial iniquity.

The man with the plus fours, who had gained the pump in one bold leap, was whirled out standing between a fat firefighter wearing a rainbow-hued cummerbund and a thin one sporting a canary yellow kilt. A latecomer decorated with earrings shaped like little bells hotly pursued the pump, snatched at its tailboard, missed, disconsolately watched the outfit disappear from sight.

He mooched back, swinging his helmet in one hand. A big brewery. You can see for yourself. Harrison rubbed his cranium to assist the circulation of blood through the brain.

What is money? He tried another angle. Where in this world do you come from? They look ahead, just in case, see? That stops us overdoing it and making hogs of ourselves. There was a five per cent strain of Martian. That was a devil of a long time back. And you nosey pokes are Antigands. He tossed his helmet to one side, spat on the floor. His Excellency pinned him with an authoritative optic. How many are coming and at what time?

What am I to make of that? He sat down, smacked his forehead several times. I can imagine it. I would expect it of you. Night will be upon us pretty soon. Tell us what happened in complete detail. That way, we may be able to dig some sense out of it. You can talk with them from now to doomsday, even get real friendly and enjoy the conversation—without either side knowing what the other is jawing about.

He turned to Captain Grayder. What do you make of all this twaddle, if anything? In other words, welcome! The language remains fluent, retains enough surface similarities to conceal deeper changes, but meanings have been altered, concepts discarded, new ones substituted, thought-forms re-angled—and, of course, there is the inevitable impact of locally developed slang.

Sounds downright insulting. Obviously it has some sort of connection with these obs they keep batting around. He hesitated, saw they were waiting for him, plunged boldly on.

We chatted a bit. She said it was initial-slang. What does it mean? He made a couple of meaningless gestures, turned a florid face on Captain Grayder. Does anyone on this vessel own a slingshot? Postponed until early morning, the next conference was relatively short and sweet. His Excellency took a seat, harumphed, straightened his vest, frowned around the table.

That implies an education and resultant outlook inimical to ourselves. But it served to show that he was among those present and paying attention.

A motorized job would save him a lot of sweat. It is overdue for motorizing, so to speak. Moreover, some of them have a vested interest in keeping things as they are. His authoritative stare went round the table, daring one of them to remark that this might be as good a reason as any. They were too disciplined to fall into that trap. None offered comment, so he went on.

Captain Grayder stood up, a big, leather-bound book in his hands. It looks as if the next move is going to be imposed upon us.

Space lawyers, every one of them. Sometimes I think they know too much. Grayder opened the book. On a nonhostile world, they serve on a peace-footing. Throw it out of the port. Stick it into the disintegrator. Get rid of it any way you like—and forget it. The same applies to all troops, officials and civilian passengers aboard a space-traversing vessel, whether in flight or grounded—regardless of rank or authority they are subordinate to the captain or his nominee.

I cannot help it—regulations are regulations. And the men know it! They will then make approach to me in proper manner to which I cannot object. They will request the first mate to submit their leave-roster for my approval. We ought to get contacts by the dozens. If the men want to go out, the circumstances deprive me of power to prevent them. Only one thing can give me the power.

Then push him out of the lock. Physical violence. All according to the book. Before the other could think up a reply complimentary to his kind without contradicting the ambassador, a knock came at the door.

First Mate Morgan entered, saluted smartly, offered Captain Grayder a sheet of paper. Four hundred twenty men hit the town in the early afternoon. They advanced upon it in the usual manner of men overdue for the bright lights, that is to say, eagerly, expectantly, in buddy-bunches of two, three, six or ten. Gleed attached himself to Harrison. They were two odd rankers, Gleed being the only sergeant on leave, Harrison the only tenth engineer.

They were also the only two fish out of water since both were in civilian clothes and Gleed missed his uniform while Harrison felt naked without his bicycle.

On all other trips the boys ran up against the same problem—what to use for money. They had to go forth like a battalion of Santa Clauses, loaded up with anything that might serve for barter. This time, he talks about credits. I know—I was holding it. He ceased talking, turned to watch a tall, lithe blonde striding past. Harrison pulled at his arm. His breathing was labored and wheezy.

You could get all you want right now by taking on a load of obs to be killed sometime in the future as and when the chances come along. Gleed leaned on the counter and gazed absently at a large can of pork. But you folk are going to have a tough time beating us off. He turned to Harrison. Grayder might be sufficiently overcome by the importance thereof to increase the take to five thousand credits. Any Gand would give it you for the asking. Like to know why? A one-way weapon is impossible.

His imaginary five thousand credits shrank to five, thence to none. Swiveling heavily on his stool, Jeff reached to the wall, removed a small, shiny plaque from its hook, passed it across the counter. It was nothing more than an oblong strip of substance resembling ivory. One side was polished and bare. The other bore three letters deeply engraved in bold style: F—I. It has become a worldwide motto. What a weapon! Baines seemed highly satisfied about something. Any guy can talk out the back of his neck.

How about backing up your talk? He favored the onlooking Harrison with a fat, significant wink. His jaw dropped, he took the plaque from his pocket, stared at it as if seeing it for the first time. Resenting that remark, Gleed held his hand out to Harrison. He stood there a moment, his optics slightly glassy while his brain performed several loops. You were a bit slow on the uptake. I gotta think. I gotta think some place quiet. There was a tiny park with seats and lawns and flowers and a little fountain around which a small bunch of children were playing.

Choosing a place facing a colorful carpet of exotic un-Terran blooms, they sat and brooded a while. Images Donate icon An illustration of a heart shape Donate Ellipses icon An illustration of text ellipses. EMBED for wordpress. Want more? Advanced embedding details, examples, and help! Topics Science Fiction Collection opensource. There are no reviews yet. Be the first one to write a review.