Mutiny in the Void
By CHARLES R. TANNER
Manool's plan for breaking the mutiny
on the Berenice was simplicity itself.
He utterly destroyed the plants that
furnished oxygen for the entire ship.
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories Fall 1943.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
The tank-room of the rocket-ship Berenice, where the big tanks of water-weed were kept, was so spick and span that a man needed little psychology to realize that its manager was a dapper, finicky, careful little man. The room's lights were bright and efficient, the water in the tanks fresh and clean, and there were no decaying fronds of vegetation among the thousands of stems of water-weed which, floating about in the tank, absorbed the carbon dioxide which was pumped through the water, and gave back a constant stream of tiny bubbles of oxygen.
For this "farm," as the tank-room was called, was the oxygen-producer for the rocket, and under the expert care of Manool Sarouk, the "farmer," it kept the air as fresh and wholesome as the air of Earth. Manool was proud of his work, and of the way he handled it, just as he was proud of his appearance, and the way he kept that.
But at the moment thoughts of pride and satisfaction were furthest from Manool Sarouk's mind. He had just opened the door of the tank-room and entered, and on his face were written terror and anxiety, and written in unmistakable characters.
For Manool had just been an unconscious eavesdropper on a conversation—a conversation between Gilligan, the tall, cadaverous "mate" of the ship, and one of the fuel-wrestlers. Manool didn't know the name of the wrestler, for most of the crew were new men, picked by Gilligan on this, his second trip with the Berenice.