DIY History | Transcribe | Hevelin Fanzines | Dawn, whole no. 5, August 1949

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Dawn, whole no. 5, August 1949

Page 10

QUEENS OF SPACE
By
Basil Wells

Rex Bolton awoke abruptly, and groaned as once again awareness of his strange situation in time flooded over him.
Something had happened to the pleasure spacer. It had been the sudden application of the breaking jets that had aroused him, and now he was conscious of excited voices in the neighboring corridors.

A tousled silken mop of golden hair thrust into the cabin's oval port and then the dainty pink and white body of its owner Bint Chedo, followed. Bint Chedo occupied the next cabin, but never before in the forty hours Bolton had been abord the LUHAUBA, had he seen Chedo other than polished, powdered and exotically swathed in the clinging synthasilk of the Fiftieth Century.

New Chedo's unpainted full lips trembled as he hitched the gauzy night robe of peacock blue about his slender body.

"Pirates!" he gasped, one soft white hand pressed to hisforehead. "We are outnumbered and our commander has yielded her command with out a battle".

He swayed, clinging to the poor support of a gaudy hanging some former passenger had taped to the soft-hued grayness of the cabin's wall.

"They'll carry some of us off and possibly most of our women will be killed!" 

Chedo's sobbing infuriated Bolton 
He sprang from the soft sleeping platform and jerked on the hatefully sleek flaring trunks of pale blue a and the ruffled brassiere-like golden upper garment the ship's robot had laid out for him. He snapped his head spitefully to clear the long shoulder-length blackness of his unfamiliar curls from his eyes.

"Be a man," he snapped, wincing at the softness of his new body's tones. "Cryingwill get us nowhere. Hide your valuables, dress, and we'll go to the main cabin.

Chedo's sobs redoubled and Bolton disgustedly stepped past him into the corridor leading toward the garishly decorated main salon of the great pleasure spacer. He increased the length of his strange body's natural mincing stride as he walked. No better sign of the growing sloth and decadence of this Fiftieth Century civilization was there than this piratical attack.  

Back in his own century, the Twenty-First, the alert members of Earth's Space Patrol had kept the space lanes free of such vermin. But now, with man's conquest of the nearby systems complete and a universal language and code of almost-feudal customs, adopted a remarkable deterioration in law enforcement and communications was taking place. The all-powerful union of solar governments was split into a thousand quarreling petty factions, dueling idly by any means short of warfare. 

In the main salon a compact knot of hard-faced pirates, dull black cases strapped over their space suits and paralysis gas nozzles in their space-mittened grip, fronted the pale-faced crew and sword-grit passengers. Only a few of the men, clinging together and frightened had come to join their braver women.

"Orderyour men to come from th their cabins," at least twenty men, and all your valuables."

Her face, revealed now by the flung-black helmet, was bold and hawkish, the close-cropped hair a shade between brown and black.

The women shifted uneasily. There were at least a hundred of them and it galled that a mere handful of outlaw women could thus capture their soft-fleshed men and take their wealth. One of them, tall, well-muscled and bronzed, her small breast and lithe torso encased in a simple brown sheath of leathery materials, stepped out.

"I am Mari Druan," she said, her deep voice somehow thrilling to the listening Bolton,"one of the passengers. I would challenge your best swordsman to battle--and should I win, our men to be spared."

The outlaw spokeman shook her head regretfully it seemed.

My orders are to capture the ship and loot as I have said." She waved her paralysis hose nozzle warningly. "Unless your men are produced at once I must use this.

Mari Druan stepped back among her sisters and the pleasure spacer's captain sent four of the crew scurrying along the corridors. The balance of the women she herded into a smaller cabin, and posted guards.

Saving...

QUEENS OF SPACE By Basil Wells Rex Bolton awoke abruptly, and groaned as once again awareness of his strange situation in time flooded over him. Something had happened to the pleasure spacer. It had been the sudden application of the breaking jets that had aroused him, and now he was conscious of excited voices in the neighboring corridors. A tousled silken mop of golden hair thrust into the cabin's oval port and then the dainty pink and white body of its owner Bint Chedo, followed. Bint Chedo occupied the next cabin, but never before in the forty hours Bolton had been abord the LUHAUBA, had he seen Chedo other than polished, powdered and exotically swathed in the clinging synthasilk of the Fiftieth Century. New Chedo's unpainted full lips trembled as he hitched the gauzy night robe of peacock blue about his slender body. "Pirates!" he gasped, one soft white hand pressed to hisforehead. "We are outnumbered and our commander has yielded her command with out a battle". He swayed, clinging to the poor support of a gaudy hanging some former passenger had taped to the soft-hued grayness of the cabin's wall. "They'll carry some of us off and possibly most of our women will be killed!" Chedo's sobbing infuriated Bolton He sprang from the soft sleeping platform and jerked on the hatefully sleek flaring trunks of pale blue a and the ruffled brassiere-like golden upper garment the ship's robot had laid out for him. He snapped his head spitefully to clear the long shoulder-length blackness of his unfamiliar curls from his eyes. "Be a man," he snapped, wincing at the softness of his new body's tones. "Cryingwill get us nowhere. Hide your valuables, dress, and we'll go to the main cabin. Chedo's sobs redoubled and Bolton disgustedly stepped past him into the corridor leading toward the garishly decorated main salon of the great pleasure spacer. He increased the length of his strange body's natural mincing stride as he walked. No better sign of the growing sloth and decadence of this Fiftieth Century civilization was there than this piratical attack. Back in his own century, the Twenty-First, the alert members of Earth's Space Patrol had kept the space lanes free of such vermin. But now, with man's conquest of the nearby systems complete and a universal language and code of almost-feudal customs, adopted a remarkable deterioration in law enforcement and communications was taking place. The all-powerful union of solar governments was split into a thousand quarreling petty factions, dueling idly by any means short of warfare. In the main salon a compact knot of hard-faced pirates, dull black cases strapped over their space suits and paralysis gas nozzles in their space-mittened grip, fronted the pale-faced crew and sword-grit passengers. Only a few of the men, clinging together and frightened had come to join their braver women. "Orderyour men to come from th their cabins," at least twenty men, and all your valuables." Her face, revealed now by the flung-black helmet, was bold and hawkish, the close-cropped hair a shade between brown and black. The women shifted uneasily. There were at least a hundred of them and it galled that a mere handful of outlaw women could thus capture their soft-fleshed men and take their wealth. One of them, tall, well-muscled and bronzed, her small breast and lithe torso encased in a simple brown sheath of leathery materials, stepped out. "I am Mari Druan," she said, her deep voice somehow thrilling to the listening Bolton,"one of the passengers. I would challenge your best swordsman to battle--and should I win, our men to be spared." The outlaw spokeman shook her head regretfully it seemed. My orders are to capture the ship and loot as I have said." She waved her paralysis hose nozzle warningly. "Unless your men are produced at once I must use this. Mari Druan stepped back among her sisters and the pleasure spacer's captain sent four of the crew scurrying along the corridors. The balance of the women she herded into a smaller cabin, and posted guards.