TARNISHED UTOPIA (Sci-Fi Classic). Malcolm Jameson

approach as many small domes.

      "Grand Central Station," explained the aged headman. "The huge interplanetary liners take off and arrive here — the gravity is so much less than on Earth. Passengers from Earth come over on small ferries like this one. Freighters have a port of their own, near the mining and smelter craters, and the Space Fleet uses the Military Base in Proclus, where the Academy and the Grand Arsenal are."

      His words were cut short as they were hurled against the glassine visiport by the sudden increment of deceleration. For a moment Winchester was too dazed to see anything clearly. When he looked again, the prison van was gliding to a smooth stop not far from a grim, gray dome. At once, one of the awkward, high-wheeled buggies slid out of a portal in the dome's side and rolled toward them.

      "A ground tender," grunted the old man. "Saves putting everybody in space-suits. There's no air out there."

      In a moment two guards came in, ray-guns drawn and in hand.

      "Fall in, slaves," one cried. "About face! March."

      In double rank the condemned slaves shambled ahead into a corridor, turned a corner and went through the ship's lateral spacelock. Coupled to it was a bridge leading to the wheeled tenders. Winchester and the aged patriarch brought up the rear, doors clanged behind them. The tender lurched and rumbled off, its wheels bumping grittily over the irregular crater bottom.

      Winchester cast a look about the chamber he was now in. It was cubical, all steel. There was no opening whatever, except the now closed outer door by which they had come in, though there were small lenses set in the plating of the polished wall opposite. These were probably peepholes through which the prisoners could be watched or counted. There could be no escape.

      The van jolted on, then stopped jerkily. The clang of interlocking metal broke the silence. Then the door slid back again, revealing a short, arched corridor, lined with guards.

      "Single file, swine," bawled the nearest trooper. "When you come to the sacred mark in the pavement kneel and show your marks."

      The leading peasant shuffled forward, his shoulders stooped and his dull gaze fixed on the pavement a yard ahead of him, as was required of slaves. The rest of the poor wrecks followed. As they reached the place where a golden sunburst was embedded in the concrete floor, each paused and made a kow-tow, while a policeman noted the symbols on his back and checked them against his list.

      "Hey!" yelled the recorder, on examining the third one. "Whoever put this guy's marks on did a sloppy job. Touch 'em up — make the figures more distinct."

      The entire line was halted while the wretch was dragged out and strapped, moaning, to a crosslike structure of steel in a niche. He faced the wall while the guards brought up a machine mounted on a rolling tripod. The policeman consulted the record, set certain knobs, and focused. He tripped a switch and lavender fire flashed out of the brander, retracing the faded distinguishing numerals.

      The man screamed once, then dangled helplessly in his bonds. Winchester saw and sickened. He had no brand as yet. If he was to escape, it was now or never.

      He waited until it came his turn to kneel and bump his face to the sunburst set in the floor. Until that instant he had imitated the slovenly, hopeless shamble of the beaten slaves ahead of him. But out of the corner of his eye he had stolen glimpses of the guards about him. They were lolling contemptuously against the wall, serene in the belief that these trapped creatures were so spineless that they could be trusted to follow the routine like blind sheep.

      Allan Winchester went into action like a springing leopard. He jerked up his head, saw at one swift glance that he was on the threshold of a vast circular open space on the order of an ancient coliseum. Groups of gray-clad slaves huddled in spots on the sands of its floor. Many doors led off it, and only a few were visibly guarded.

      Winchester sprang sideward, snatching the weapon from the surprised hand of the guard that stood nearest to him. With a bound he leaped past and into the arena, then turned sharply and ran along one of its curving walls.

      Shouts rose behind him, as the startled guards comprehended that a slave had been so audacious as to break out of line, snatch a gun and run away. Winchester heard the faint spatting of deadly rays. Violet streaks of light hurtled past him and ricocheted from the stones ahead, leaving mushy-looking incandescent spots wherever they hit.

      He ducked low and dodged into the first door he came to. An astonished guard, who had been sitting on a stool just inside the arch, half rose, only to be butted sprawling as Winchester, still charging head down, collided full force with him.

      Winchester staggered five strides beyond, then recovered his balance and sprinted on. He barely made the turn ahead, when once more the hissing streams of electronic fire came lashing after him. Before him lay a maze of twisting passages, along which were closed doors. He dared not stop to test any, but dodged onward, ever turning just ahead of the hot fire of his pursuers.

      Gongs began to ring and sirens wail. A new guard jumped out into the passage dead ahead of him and leveled a weapon.

      Winchester checked his headlong flight and slid to a stop, jerking to one side, just as the guard pulled his trigger. A flash, much like that of a single bolt of lightning, flared through the spot he had just side-stepped, spent itself against the wall at the far end of the corridor with a spatter of blinding light and an ear-splitting crash. Fervently hoping that pressure on the trigger was all he needed, Winchester lifted his own weapon and pointed it at his adversary. He squeezed.

      Involuntarily he closed his eyes, for the effect was blinding, almost stunning. He blinked them open. There was nothing ahead of him, except a wreath of acrid smoke and the charred stumps of two shins sticking up out of a pair of boots. The rest of the guard had disintegrated!

      Winchester shuddered and ran on, clinging lovingly to his weapon. It gave him an assurance he had not had before. He turned more corners but though the gongs kept on clanging, no one else appeared to halt him. Finally, winded and panting, he stopped to take stock. He realized suddenly that for some seconds now there had been no avenging pursuers behind him. That realization, instead of being cheering, somehow seemed ominous.

      The gongs that had been ringing abruptly ceased. A new set of a different tone clanged twice, then went silent. Down the corridor a red lamp in a socket blazed up, winked twice and went out. Winchester did not know what these new signals signified, but he took the first turn and began to run again.

      Then violent and numbing pain seized him. He gasped out one strangled moan and fell. Then he knew he was lying there rigid, struck down by the same sort of force that had laid him low when he met the first policeman. He was paralyzed. Helpless. He listened, expecting to hear onrushing guards. But to his ears there came no sound.

      He was down, frozen, pinned no doubt by an ambush ray. Perhaps no one would ever come. Why should they? What worse could they do to him?