"Mystery of the Jupiter Man"
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dochermes"Mystery of the Jupiter Man"
9/11/1943
I.
Kelly found herself in a position to get an interview with the Jupiter Man purely by chance.
She had been strolling about Times Square on her lunch break from the offices of THE MESSENGER, enjoying a sunny September afternoon. The lack of good-looking men her own age on the streets still gave her a vague melancholy. She was getting used to it. Her report about the suspicious fire on the Lower East Side had only made the second page but it did have her byline, which was always a help. War news from the Pacific had been monopolizing the front page for some time now. Her Green Devil activities had unhappily been slow for a while. Kelly was honest enough with herself to admit she missed the adrenalin as much as the chance to fight crime and espionage for altruistic reasons.
At twenty-three, Kelly O'Connor was young and zestful enough to dismiss the chance of being killed or worse in her crusade. A natural redhead with green eyes and an upturned nose, she was also tall and slim. In her new off-white dress with a faint lilac pattern, a brown leather handbag slung over one shoulder and a soft cloche hat tilted to one side, she knew she looked great and was enjoying the admiring looks she caught from men and women alike. The clacking of her heels on the pavement slowed as she realized it was time to swing around back for the office and survive another four hours in a city room filled with the pounding of battered typewriters and ten men smoking cigarettes as if they had a daily quota to use up.
Now she was on a side street between 48th and 49th. As she passed the windows of WEISSMAN JEWELERS, where she had spent more than a few wistful minutes gazing at the glitter on display, her pulse suddenly sped up. This was a one-way street. The black 1940 DeSoto rolling her way came to a stop that was way too sudden. She froze in a combination of fear and excitement. Two men with bandannas tied around their lower faces leaped from the big car and ran into the jewelry store, each gripping a 45 Colt automatic. The driver stayed in the car and revved the motor.
While everyone else either strood frozen at the sight or made quick tracks away from the scene, Kelly was annoyed that she could do nothing. Her Green Devil outfit was hidden in her apartment and she was not wearing the lighter emergency costume she sometimes had on if expecting trouble. To be frank, it was simply too uncomfortable to spend a hot day with an extra layer under her regular clothing, leaving her itchy and sweaty. Even if she had been carrying it with her, there was no place to change. By the time she got into her suit, the robbery would be over anyway. Drat the luck. She took in details of the DeSoto and noticed that the license plates had been obscured with pieces of tape that could quickly torn off after the getaway.
It was infuriating, so much so that she didn't even consider how she was placing herself in danger by staying close to an armed robbery. A second later, both gunmen came running out, each with a canvas bag of loot. No shots had been heard. One of the thugs gave Kelly a cold hostile stare but then hopped back in the car anyway. She realized glumly that with their unremarkable suits and fedoras, the kerchiefs over their faces meant she could not even give a useful description.
Then, out of the corner of her eye, she spotted movement on the roof of the five-story building.
A masked man in a dark Royal blue outfit jumped down to land in front of the car as easily as if stepping off the curb. Kelly took in impressions instantly. He was a big guy, well over six feet tall and built like a circus strongman. Like a performer also, his tights showed every well-ddefined muscle clearly. He was wearing polished black boots, a white belt and cuffs, and had on a helmet with a raised crest like something out of the science fiction pulps. On each shoulder was a white crescent of stiff leather. The Jupiter Man.
As everyone on the scene watched, Jupiter Man crouched, shoved his hands under the front bumper and straightened up to flip the heavy auto over onto its side. The crowd broke into confused conversation, with a few screams of uncertainty. Stepping toward the rear of the DeSoto, the masked man casually tore the rear door off and tossed it away to crash up the street with the tinkle of breaking glass. A gun went off without seeming to hit anything, the Jupiter Man leaned into the interior and then a few sharp thumping noises indicated what happened to the robbers.
Not quite realizing the boldness of her actions, the young redhead had been edging closer and had gotten within arm's reach of the strange man. As he swiveled in surprise toward her, only his lower face beneath the nose was left exposed by the blue helmet to show a wide jaw. He smiled at her with a flash of white teeth. On the front of his shirt was a light blue circle with a red spot off-center. Jupiter, all right.
"My name is Kelly O'Connor, I'm a reporter for THE NEW YORK MESSENGER," she said, not noticing that her voice cracked as she spoke. "Um, the public would like very much to know more about you and how you can... well, do these things."
From within the helmet, deepset brown eyes regarded her. She did not feel any uneasiness at that gaze, because the smile seemed natural and friendly. "All right, miss," he replied in a pleasant baritone with a faint accent. "Meet me here at midnight. Don't tell anyone." Then he took three running steps and leaped up back on to the roof where he had been standing. It seemed effortless, as if he could have reached much greater heights without difficulty. There was a glimpse of him hurtling over to the next building, then he was gone.
Shaking her head, feeling breathless, Kelly took off at a sprint toward the corner of 48th. She knew there was a drug store there with a phone booth. Behind her, she heard sirens but that hardly registered. She raced into the drug store, past the soda counter and dropped down on the seat in the booth. From her handbag, she snatched a handful of change and dialed a number she knew better than the one at her boarding house. "City desk. Yeah. Hi, Lemister. Of course it's Kelly. Grab your pad and start writing, get this all down. We need to make the afternoon edition. I just now saw the Jupiter Man in action, close up..."
II
The rest of that day had been a whirlwind of rewrites for the evening edition, envious phone calls from other journalists and questioning by the police. At least the managing editor had been supportive enough to sit next to her and stand up against the gruff officers for an hour before they went about their business. Frazzled and worn out by five o'clock, Kelly had taken the subway to the exit nearest her boarding house in Queens. After getting there in time to dig into the pot roast dinner, she had retired to her rooms and slept with the deep soundness of exhaustion until ten-thirty. Kelly groggily woke to a stuffy dark room and a quiet house, shook her head and grinned at her plans for the night.
The fact that the other boarders were elderly and that Mr and Mrs Hooper themselves were pushing sixty meant that most nights everyone was snoring in their pillows well before midnight. This suited Kelly's nocturnal activities perfectly. Moving silently through the gloom, the redhead quickly stripped down to a bra and step-ins, then grabbed the clothing she had laid out that morning in case an opportunity for the Green Devil to appear presented herself.
In a box locked in the trunk of her roadster outside the window, the regular Green Devil costume waited. That was the crash helmet with the short curved horns, the leather jacket with its white trident symbol on the back, the snug denim pants and riding boots. That was meant for cases where she expected lots of action and wanted some protection in falls and scrapes, not to mention possible fists to her head.
Tonight, she would be going out first at her normal civilian self. Kelly wriggled into a snug bodyshirt of dark green silk and tights of the same material. Across the back of the shirt, she had boldly silkscreened a white outline of a pitchfork.The legs of the tights had been fitted so they could be folded up above her knees. In her handbag, she stowed a pair of dark slippers. Into a hidden lining which she had painstakingly sewn into the handbag herself went a pair of wrist-length leather gloves that were suspiciously heavy.
After all this, she put on her regular garb. A pleated black skirt, long-sleeved white blouse and lightweight bolero jacket, as well as sensible pumps she sometimes wore to the office when she expected a particularly long day. Kelly's biggest regret was that she couldn't wear stockings in this get-up. But it was night and maybe no one would notice her bare legs or, considering how hard stockings were becoming to find lately with the silk rationing, few would comment anyway.
Stopping to brush her thick brick-red hair out by her dresser, still without turning on a light, Kelly could barely repress a triumphant laugh. This was what she lived for. Over the past few years, earlier mystery men like Mark Drum and Dr Vitarius had been supplanted by a crop of more flamboyant vigilantes who wore bright masquerade costumes. The Sceptre, the Red Blur, Archangel. The newspapers had begun calling these crime-fighters by a new word, 'super-heroes,' and the Green Devil was happy to be one of them.
Standing motionless with her head cocked, Kelly strained her ears but heard nothing. Not even Clyde's radio upstairs with his damned CAPTAIN AMNESIA program. It seemed safe to move. Keeping quiet as possible, she raised her window wide, poked her head out and found no one was in sight before sliding out into the alley. This set-up had been a major reason she had moved to this boarding house, despite having to pay more than at her previous digs. Except when a patron of the tavern next door stumbled back here to relieve himself, the dead-end alley was a perfect place to park her roadster. And it allowed her to enter and leave the boarding house without being seen. She grabbed a set of license plates from the trunk and quickly wired them over her genuine plates. The bogus ones, which she had swiped from a junkyard, did not match each other but that would only make it harder for anyone to track the Green Devil. Satisfied no one was had seen her yet, Kelly scrambled in behind the wheel and eased out the Ford Deluxe out onto the street. Now for the historic meeting of two daredevils of the night as she drove to her rendezvous with the Jupiter Man.
III.
There was almost no traffic at night because of the OPA's rationing. Kelly herself could only manage driving because she had twice helped out the Archangel with his pilots in their new-fangled helicopters or 'true gyros.' Without saying anything to her about it, the notorious air pirates had snuck into the alley one freezing cold night and put brand new tires on her little red roadster, as well as leaving several jerrycans of gas, more precious than liquid gold at that point. A few months later, another supply of fuel had been somehow been left in cans in her back seat. Grateful as she was, Kelly had no way of contacting the airmen and only hoped they needed her assistance again so she could express her gratitude. Being only human, the redhead had wished a few times that the Archangels might leave her a nice steak or some butter as well, but no such luck.
Also, there was always the risk of a black-out being called. If the siren went off and she was caught cruising home with her headlights off, it meant a hefty fine or maybe even some jail time if she mouthed off to the air raid warden. But she took worse risks than that all the time without losing any sleep.
Reaching Tenth Avenue without encountering any troublesome patrol cars, she eased over to the curb and hopped out with her handbag slung over one shoulder. A few pedestrians were trudging up and down the streets, but the theatres and bars and nightclubs were all a few blocks over into Times Square so this area was quiet. Kelly became more somber as she remembered how packed the streets used to be at night. But then, most of the men between say seventen and almost fifty were away. Women were holding down full time jobs for the first time while grandparents watched the kids. Six day weeks and double shifts were common. Everyone was busier than they had been a year or two earlier.
Closing her roadster door, she tried to brighten up. She herself was doing her part. Working for the MESSENGER, she exposed criminal rackets including black marketers and smugglers. As the Green Devil, using her unexplained gift to deflect bullets with a sweep of her hand, she had actually broken up two Axis espionage groups and caught the Japanese lady spy Sakura, 'the Cherry Blossom,' as well as dangerous nuts like Baron Shogren and that guy with the amnesia serum, she forgot his name. Over the last twelve months, she had even met mystery men like Mark Drum and Archangel and been accepted by them as a peer. She wasn't an idler.
Now for the Jupiter Man. She had been thinking over what little was known about him. He had been sighted a dozen times in the past two months, always in Manhattan. Mostly he stepped in to stop crimes of violence.. three robberies like the one at the jewelry store today, a vicious beating by two goons of a man who owed money, a shady character who was in the process of dragging a woman into an alley. The Jupiter Man intervened with overwhelming strength. Bullets apparently glanced off him without doing any harm, but his plan cloth outfit had no signs of any armor plate under it.
Only once had he explained himself. Making sure that the woman who had been nearly molested was recovering her nerve, he told her that he had come to Earth from the planet Jupiter, where the heavier gravity gave him superhuman strength and near invulnerability on this world. She had been too shaken to speak further and he ran off as bystanders came near to help. Not much to go on, Kelly thought glumly. Maybe she could charm a real interview out of the big galoot.
As she neared the jewelry store, she stopped short. A massive form stepped out from a darkened doorway between shops. With a better look at him, she guessed his height at six feet six and a weight of maybe two hundred fifty pounds if that bulk was all muscle as it seemed. He was bundled in a tan trenchcoat with the collar up and an old slouch hat pulled down to shadow as much of his face as possible. "Ah, Miss O'Connor?"
"Yeah, and I'm glad you showed up," she replied in not as breezy a tone as she had hoped to muster. "I've been hearing about you all day. Listen. The city is buzzing with wild rumors and gossip about you, not all of it flattering. In fact, there's a lot of slanderous conjecture about you."
"That does not affect my work," he said, smiling easily at her green eyes.
"Oh, I think it might. I think you should straighten out some of the wrong ideas the great unwashed public is forming about you. You don't want to be misunderstood, do you? Maybe taken for a villain?"
"That's true." He tilted the slouch hat back slightly to reveal he was still wearing the dark blue helmet which concealed most of his face. "There's a little all-night bistro around the corner. Perhaps over some coffee, I can fill you in."
Kelly was having the damndest time trying to place his accent. Highland Scots, maybe? There was that burr when he formed Rs. "That would suit me down to my toes, Mr Jupiter Man. Say, don't you have a shorter handle I could use? Mike or Steve, something like that?"
"Let me consider that." The masked man offered his arm, which she accepted as a courtesy and they headed over toward Eighth Avenue. Always one to trust her instincts about people, Kelly did not feel uncomfortable this close to a man who could bend a steel girder with his bare hands and who ignored bullets. She felt he was basically a decent Joe, maybe even a bit too formal. They entered the NIGHT TRAIN cafe, with its windows which ran the width of the side facing the street. It was almost deserted, with only two men muttered at each other in a corner table.
Tugging his hat down as far as he could, the Jupiter Man handed her a few dollars. "Perhaps you would order, miss? I wish to keep a low profile."
"You bet, how do you guzzle your java?"
"Black is fine, thank you." The strange vigilante went back to a booth on the opposite end and squeezed in behind the table so he was facing the door, tightening his trench coat around himself. When Kelly strolled over carrying two white cups on their saucers, she slid in to face him with a grin she could not repress.
"This place still gets the straight dope most of the time," she chuckled. "They haven't started cutting the coffee with chicory or ground up bark or whatever some joints are peddling."
The strange man took a good sip without commenting on its taste. From within the holes of that helmet, sober brown eyes scrutinized her. "You are a reporter, Miss O'Connor. Should I assume every word I speak will on the stands tomorrow?"
"Heck yeah, that's the idea isn't it? BUT! If you insist, I can pinky swear to keep some scoop confidential.. if it involves the war effort or the safety of your family or something."
"I have no family," he said almost in a whisper. "No other of my race is still alive. We were an ancient civilization with a science advanced beyond yours. Sadly, we were not any wiser. We possessed weapons incalculably more devastating than any you possess. In a war must like what your kind is enduring now, we destroyed ourselves. City after city was pulvcerized, artificial plagues were unleashed, the slaughter has escaped our control and was a mad force unto itself."
For some reason she could put a finger on, Kelly's deeply ingrained skepticism boiled up. She kept her face politely interested. "But you survived!"
"Yes. I was a scientist. When the winds of war were beginning to blow, I hurried frantically to finish my rocketship in time. It was an experimental model. There was only room for one occupant. As my city burned and the ceiling of my lab collapsed in huge chunks, I fired up the atomic engines and blasted off... barely in time."
"And you landed... where?"
"In Lake Michigan, I'm afraid. My ship sank immediately and there's not much hope of retrieving it. Wearing this protective flightsuit and a few items in a satchel, I found that my new strength made swimming to shore easy enough. Hiding by day, stealing some clothes from a washline, I made my way to a town and met some of the locals."
"Speaking English? What a convenient coincidence," she could not help observing.
"We have been listening to radio waves from your planet for Earth," he responded. "Our experts deciphered your languages and began to understand your world's predicament from the news programs." The Jupiter Man finished his coffee and let out a sigh. "Personally, I enjoyed your comedian Stewie Blaze. His puns amused me."
Kelly O'Connor looked down at her own cup as if surprised it was empty. "Do go on. Did you counterfeit a wad of American greenbacks to make things easier here?"
"No, no, I had brought some gems with me. A handful of diamonds, emeralds, opals. The dealer in the pawn shop thought they looked unusual but he gave me enough money for some of them that I could afford a bus ticket."
"To New York City, of course!" Kelly butted in. "Of course. Where else where a strange visitor from another planet head?"
Surprisingly, the Jupiter Man was not annoyed but amused somehow. "Miss O'Connor, do you find my life risible?"
"Sorry, pal," she managed to say while sitting up and pulling a respectful expression. "It's that goshawful Irish sense of humor a'mine. We always laugh at the wrong times even when not in our cups."
"Hmmmm...."
"Seriously, please go on. I learned in school Jupiter is the biggest of the nine planets. So its gravity is much stronger than Earth's and you're so strong and tough here because you're used weighing a ton back in your home town."
"Yes," replied the mystery man with an odd conspiratorial tone as if they were sharing something beneath the conversation. "Not only that, but the peculiar oxygen-rich atmosphere of your world enhanced my senses, my vision and my hearing. I found my abilities were beyond those of normal men."
"It's sure lucky you weren't an Earthman fleeing to Jupiter instead, right? You'd be squashed flat, crawling around like a pancake..."
The Jupiter Man pushed back his chair and rose sharply to his feet. "I think I may have made a mistake opening up to you, miss. Good night." But Kelly leaped up as well and placed a slim hand on his sleeve, squeezing to detain him and incidentally feeling muscles which resembled carved marble in that arm.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Geez, I don't wanna blow this! Come on, be a sport. I saw what you can do today, I know you're more than a regular Homo Sapiens like the rest of us poor schlubs. Give me a break."
"Very well. Let's walk for a bit." He adjusted the slouch hat again before heading toward the door. "I'll answer some questions if you can keep the insolence to a minimum."
"Not a problem," she hastened to assure him as they stepped out into the night. Kelly felt bold enough to slip her arm through his as they walked and the strange man did not object. "Let's get back on track, you know? You're putting your abilities to good use fighting crime. Why not offer yourself to the War Department? I'd love to see you in the newsreels parachuting into Berlin or Tokio!"
"It is against my code of honor to kill," the Jupiter Man said simply.
"Oh. Yeah, I get that. Umm, what else? You don't wear that mask all the time, I bet."
"I mutst ask you not to reveal the following, Kelly. Do you promise?"
"Absolutely," she said at once, unbelievably pleased he had used her first name. "I swear, I won't mention to ANYone what you say next."
"Often, I walk in civilian clothes, unmasked, even working at a mundane job so I might come to understand you Earthpeople better. To be honest, I have come to enjoy my... my secret identity. I have developed friendships and perhaps the beginning of a romance, and that is unexpected."
Kelly squeezed his arm harder, even though it was like squeezing a statue's arm. "Oh, I love that. You're as human as any guy. Maybe if I get to know you better, I might share a little secret with you. Listen. How would you like to meet Mark Drum? The Sting? Maybe the Sceptre, she's my favorite costumed vigilante."
"Really? How do you know these secretive people?"
"Here's the deal, I happen to be none other than..."
But that was the last she said. They were passing a parked Heron, with its windows left open a crack. A gush of white fumes under pressure roared out to engulf them, clinging to them, making the world dim to grey and then black. Kelly's last thought was that she had been getting awful careless to be ready to reveal her biggest secret.
V.
Was it New Year's morning again, she thought murkily through the worst nausea she could remember. For some idiotic reason, she and Jim had been alternating champagne and gin at the party. They had been debating whether pigs were smarter than horses and then she had told him they would find out when they got married and started a farm...
No. Kelly's head cleared enough to remember that she and her new friend had been gassed. Yes. Sprayed from that car, it must have been like the ether they used in hospitals. She felt too sick to worry about who had captured them or why. Her head ached so much she was afraid to open her eyes but they squeezed open a slit and seemed to be okay.
She was lying on a rough wooden table in a sort of laboratory equipped with dozens of electrical apparatus that meant nothing to her. One counter was stocked with rows of glass tubes filled with a rainbow of colored fluids. On top of a bunsen burner, a beaker of liquid bubbled away merrily. The who place stank of ammonia and vinegar, this did not help her upset stomach.
Eventually, the young reporter dared to raise her head and see what was going on. She was still fully dressed, which was a relief as it meant gangsters or spies or whatever had not been fooling around with her while she was unconscious. Nor was she tied up. She tried propping herself up on her elbows but did not feel enthusiastic about any sudden exertion. Throwing up still seemed imminently possible.
Across the lab, a middle-aged man in a white smock eased up off a stool where he had been writing in a ledger. Aside from the shape of his head, he was nothing remarkable but his head was enough. It stretched up with a forehead twice the normal height and the frontal lobes bulged outward in an expanse of bare skin under a hairline that had been left behind. The man gave her a disapproving look as he closed the ledger and placed it on the counter next to him.
"Finally," he said in a smooth, cultured voice that she found a bit pretentious. "I was going to administer a stimulant so I can get you out of the way and return to my work. Pay attention. I will use small words and speak slowly so your feeble mind can understand."
"Sorry I was born with a normal skull," she retorted. Kelly had managed to sit up. She was feeling a little better but still not ready to try anything acrobatic. "Ever think of wearing a hat?"
"My advanced cranium is my own doing," he said without seeming offended. "One of my earliest hormone experiments. It gave me the capacity for further research. When my intellect increased beyond the limits of an IQ test to measure, I went beyond Professor Herbert Lewis Sinclair to become... Cogitus!"
"Whoop De Doo," Kelly observed. "A geezer named Baron Shogren mentioned you. You're one of his community of crackpots doing Mad Science, he spoke highly of you. Can I get a glass of water?"
"Naturally, your handbag was searched and you were examined during your period of unconsciousness. Kelly Marie O'Connor. I actually have read some of your accounts of what became of Shogren and of Perlman with his Trimethlyabromine. Aside from your unbearably gauche prose style..."
"No need to get personal."
"...You apparently managed to detail the events with accuracy. During your examination, I discovered the garish costume you are wearing under your clothing and I found the mask and gloves in your handbag." He folded thin arms over a bony chest and studied her. "The Green Devil, of course, one of that insufferable clique of amateurs dressing up and interfering in others' affairs."
"You mean, brave patriotic men and women fighting crime and smashing saboteurs!" she offered, wondering if she could stand yet.
"Flatter yourself if you will," Cogitus said as he went back to drop down on the stool with a sigh. Bracing one elbow on the counter, he rested one cheek against a palm to help support that oversized head. "I have finished blood work on samples taken from you, and results are within average limits. Your heartrate, blood pressure and oxygen levels are normal. You are a healthy young woman in adequate athletic condition but there is nothing superhuman about you that I can find."
"Well, thanks for the check-up, doc. I'll make an appointment with your nurse to come back in six months." Taking a chance on falling, Kelly swung her legs around so she was sitting up on the edge of the table. "I'll see myself out."
Cogitus showed emotion for the first time, a mocking smile that only turned up his mouth while not affecting his cold eyes at all. "Your companion is a different matter altogether. After all, he stopped three of my agents from robbing that jewelry store. I need those funds to continue my experiments."
That stopped her. A half-formed plan of trying to find a door and get out of this madhouse fizzled out in her mind. Kelly followed Cogitus' line of sight and gasped as she saw Jupiter Man stretched out on a table like hers. His crested helmet had been removed to show a face that was rugged rather than matinee idol handsome, with thick brown hair worn a bit long for current styles. The massive chest rose and fell slowly but evenly.
"I see you are concerned with his well-being," the deformed genius told her. "He has twice been given a stronger dose of my knock-out gas than that which you received and signs indicate he is about revive again. I don't know how to restrain him other than administering further anesthetics."
"He's a tough cookie, all right," she admitted.
"Studying that man will provide great breakthroughs for me. Vivisection may be necessary, but so far I have not even been able to break his skin enough to draw blood. His muscles and bones are much denser than any human's could be, his lung capacity draws in more air than any human could, his heart sounds like a bass drum through a stethoscope. To get hair samples for spectroscopic analysis, I used wire cutters!"
"That Jupiter malarkey is on the level, then?" she asked, forgetting the situation for the moment.
"Please! You cannot be THAT uninformed, young woman. Perhaps the average citizen thinks of the other planets as being habitable by our species, but the leading minds in astronomy know better. Jupiter is a gas giant without a solid surface, its atmosphere is composed of methane and ammonia. No living creature, even that brute over there, could survive for an instant being near Jupiter. That man is not a Jovian, you uneducated plebian."
"I'm getting used to your insults," she said, daring to stand up while keeping one hand on the table for support. Kelly suppressed a belch that tasted of chemicals. "My Aunt Eunice always talked to me that way. You seem like a smart fella, if that Jupiter Man isn't what he says he is, then how do you explain him? I saw him flip a car over and pull its door off the ways you'd yank a wrapper off a Christmas present. Bullets don't even tickle him. If he's an Earth specimen, I have to say the Army could use a few of him."
Nearby, the Jupiter Man groaned and raised one knee, but was not awake yet. Still fixing a venomous gaze on the big man, Cogitus went on, "I believe you touched the fringes of the Midnight War, miss?"
"Well, yeah. Mark Drum mentioned that phrase. He told me a little about the adjacent realms and the nonhuman Cousins of Men, but to be honest I just blew it off as crazy stuff you'd read in ASTONISHING WONDER TALES, you know? I thought it was silly."
"And yet... I have heard that you encountered a Dartha here, in this mundane metropolis. A Kje in fact."
Noticing that this Cogitus seemed unaware of her recovery, Kelly took a half step away from the examining tables, hands slightly away from her sides. She felt she should be able to walk a little without falling on her face. To keep his attention, she continued, "Oh, THAT bird! I'll tell the world he was weird. Skin white as fresh milk, hair like straight cotton, and worst of all pointed ears! Ears like I don't know, an elf or something!"
The huge-headed mastermind nodded slowly, "What else seemed worth noticing?"
"He did magic. Not stage tricks like a rabbit from a hat but real no-fooling Black Magic. I saw him blast a man into a skeleton by just pointing at him. I saw him open a kind of window in thin air and speak to the crook we saw inside it. I get dizzy remembering that stuff. I was lucky he hadn't noticed me hiding in the shadows and I scampered out of there like a chipmunk."
"That shows prudence not cowardice, child. Delzanar Kje could have kept your bloody shreds alive for weeks with his tortures. So, you have seen there are other Races in the world other than mere Humans."
Kelly O'Connor had not at all forgotten she was a captive of this twisted maniac. But, in her experience, keeping the bad guys talking often provided a chance to escape. "And there was something else. I never told anyone about it. This doof over in Brooklyn tried to shoot me when I found him going through a dead man's pockets on a side street. He had two fangs like a rattlesnake and brother, I'll say they rattled me all right."
"One of the Snake men, beyond doubt. How interesting. What happened next?"
"He... missed. I ducked around a corner running and he didn't chase me," she lied. Kelly wasn't sure if this Cogitus duck knew about her Green Devil trick of deflecting bullets or fists with a sweep of her bare hand. Maybe it would help to tell him about it, in case it might keep her around to be studied instead of simply having her killed. She needed a second to think about her best option.
"Your voice lacks conviction," the freakish scientist admitted. "Be that as it may. I believe this brute who calls himself Jupiter Man is in fact a Melgar from Androval. They are half Human and half Eldarin, marked by a robust physiology. However, he is remarkable even for a Melgar." Cogitus returned to resting his head on an upturned palm, evidently suffering discomfort from leaving it unsupported too long. "I believe I possess as a specimen none other than their champion Sulak."
"SULAK?!" bellowed an outraged voice. "By Cirkoth, I'll make you wish you only had Sulak to deal with. This is Galvan you have offended!"
IV.
The massive examining table exploded against the wall where Cogitus had been standing, shattering into jagged shards of oak and flinging broken glassware in all directions. Only luck kept the deformed experimenter from being instantly flattened into a shapeless pulp by that table. Even before his prisoner had roared that warning, Cogitus was fortuitously slipping down off that stool and bending to pick up a slim walking stick lying on the floor. The table rushed over him with only a few inches to spare.
To give him credit, Cogitus reacted as quickly as if he had been expecting that attack. His mind worked with the alertness he had claimed. One bony hand dipped into a pocket of his lab coat and whipped back up with what looked like a modified water pistol. In the instant before the enraged Jupiter Man could reach him, that weapon sprayed a pressurized stream of the pungent liquid which vaporized in mid-air to engulf the strange man in a cloud of the anesthetic gas.
"Tichenor! Whitey! Come here at once!" As two more of the mobsters in their padded-shoulder suits hurried in through the lab door, Cogitus pointed at Kelly. "Exterminate her at once. I must prepare more sedative for the Melgar, that dose won't hold him for long."
Facing the gunmen as they swung their pistols up, Kelly saw no trace of weakness or compassion in their surly features. They had all the signs of experienced killers to whom murder was nothing special. But she felt nearly back to normal herself and there was a corresponding lack of fear on her delicate features. The redheaded journalist braced her feet at shoulder width and held up her open hands in front of her, palms. "Lay off, cousins," she said. "I've got a trick you're not going to enjoy."
"Shame to plug a dish like this," said Whitey, whose nickname came from his pale blond hair. His loud hound's tooth jacket added to his visual distinctiveness. "Them gams! That keister! But orders are orders."
Both men took only perfunctory aim at that range, snapping off their shots simultaneously. In the enclosed space, those gunshots were deafening. Tichenor and Whitey lurched, grabbed at their chests as they dropped their guns from senseless hands, sank to their knees and then toppling over. Kelly O'Connor lowered her hands slightly from where they had whirled faster than her conscious control could explain. Her palms didn't even sting.
Grinning at the horrified expression on Cogitus, Kelly gave vent to a sharp laugh. "Your big old dome didn't calculate on that, did it? Hee hee." Seeing the scientist eye a fallen 45, she plunged forward and snatched it up. "Oh no, you keep your little mitts off this smoke wagon. Hey, Jupiter Man, are you going to be okay over there?"
A fit of coughing answered her. Catching his breath after the gas cleared, the costumed man made a few attempts to speak before finally croaking, "You're the Green Devil? Of course. That's what you were about to tell me earlier."
Fixing a bead on Cogitus, using a two-handed marksman's grip on the automatic which was a bit large for her hands to use well, Kelly shrugged off the question. "What was all that about the Melgar and Androval and your real name being Galvan? I knew all along the whole Jupiter gobbledegook smelled fishy."
"It was a colorful explanation for my prowess," the Melgar said. He lowered the crested helmet over his head and adjusted it into place. "No more unlikely than the Red Blur's claim of being hit by twin lightning strikes. My people don't want their existence known to the Humans."
"Allow me to offer a proposition," Cogitus ventured. "The unauthorized vigilante known as the Green Devil is wanted by the police as a suspect in several unresolved crimes including murder, arson and dealing with foreign agents. Even if you are not ultimately prosecuted, Miss O'Connor, once exposed your career in journalism is at an end."
"Aw, clam up," she replied, waggling the barrel. "A lead pill or two will settle your hash and you won't be singing any songs about who I am."
"Oh, please." The giant-headed man smirked. "Give me some credit as a judge of character. You could no more shoot me in cold blood than you could solve the SUNDAY TIMES crossword puzzle without help."
"That hurt my feelings. Well, it's true. Both parts," she admitted, "But even so... Jupes, what about you? You want to fold this guy up so he fits in my handbag and we can chuck him in the East River?"
The imposing figure in the flamboyant costume placed both fists on hips. "I rather think he can be put to better use. Dr Vitarius has been known to keep dangerous prisoners in his mountain stronghold somewhere out in the Rockies. He's certainly the intellectual equal of this unsightly person. I believe we will turn this Cogitus over to Vitarius, perhaps to spend the war working on developments that will benefit the Allies."
To their surprise, Cogitus seemed pleased. Under the abnormal bulging brow, his eyes eased up from their tense squint. "Working with Vitarius would be no hardship. He is an Alchemist of great learning. It certainly is preferable to sudden execution."
Seeing that the imposing bulk of Galvan was within reach of their enemy and she could lower the gun, Kelly stepped over and plopped down unceremoniously on the stool. "Whew. My knees got a little wobbly after all that jazz. I guess this is your call, Jupiter Man or whatever I call you. How do we handle this gig?"
The costumed man was smiling again. He raised an approving finger at her. "You have spirit, little one. You Humans never cease to amaze me. We will bind and gag this man before delivering him to Dr Vitarius' building in this city. You drive a convertible, I believe?"
"You speaketh buckets," she responded. "We can squeeze all three of us in my ragtop. First, I need to wipe my prints off this shooter before ditching it. The boys in blue will find those two gorillers dead with bullets from their own gats in them like they ventilated each other. Of course, the angles of fire won't make any sense but then they're also going to be trying to puzzle who smashed that table against the wall. Aw hell, I'm too tired to worry about it. Let's make tracks, Jupes."
10/16/2019
9/11/1943
I.
Kelly found herself in a position to get an interview with the Jupiter Man purely by chance.
She had been strolling about Times Square on her lunch break from the offices of THE MESSENGER, enjoying a sunny September afternoon. The lack of good-looking men her own age on the streets still gave her a vague melancholy. She was getting used to it. Her report about the suspicious fire on the Lower East Side had only made the second page but it did have her byline, which was always a help. War news from the Pacific had been monopolizing the front page for some time now. Her Green Devil activities had unhappily been slow for a while. Kelly was honest enough with herself to admit she missed the adrenalin as much as the chance to fight crime and espionage for altruistic reasons.
At twenty-three, Kelly O'Connor was young and zestful enough to dismiss the chance of being killed or worse in her crusade. A natural redhead with green eyes and an upturned nose, she was also tall and slim. In her new off-white dress with a faint lilac pattern, a brown leather handbag slung over one shoulder and a soft cloche hat tilted to one side, she knew she looked great and was enjoying the admiring looks she caught from men and women alike. The clacking of her heels on the pavement slowed as she realized it was time to swing around back for the office and survive another four hours in a city room filled with the pounding of battered typewriters and ten men smoking cigarettes as if they had a daily quota to use up.
Now she was on a side street between 48th and 49th. As she passed the windows of WEISSMAN JEWELERS, where she had spent more than a few wistful minutes gazing at the glitter on display, her pulse suddenly sped up. This was a one-way street. The black 1940 DeSoto rolling her way came to a stop that was way too sudden. She froze in a combination of fear and excitement. Two men with bandannas tied around their lower faces leaped from the big car and ran into the jewelry store, each gripping a 45 Colt automatic. The driver stayed in the car and revved the motor.
While everyone else either strood frozen at the sight or made quick tracks away from the scene, Kelly was annoyed that she could do nothing. Her Green Devil outfit was hidden in her apartment and she was not wearing the lighter emergency costume she sometimes had on if expecting trouble. To be frank, it was simply too uncomfortable to spend a hot day with an extra layer under her regular clothing, leaving her itchy and sweaty. Even if she had been carrying it with her, there was no place to change. By the time she got into her suit, the robbery would be over anyway. Drat the luck. She took in details of the DeSoto and noticed that the license plates had been obscured with pieces of tape that could quickly torn off after the getaway.
It was infuriating, so much so that she didn't even consider how she was placing herself in danger by staying close to an armed robbery. A second later, both gunmen came running out, each with a canvas bag of loot. No shots had been heard. One of the thugs gave Kelly a cold hostile stare but then hopped back in the car anyway. She realized glumly that with their unremarkable suits and fedoras, the kerchiefs over their faces meant she could not even give a useful description.
Then, out of the corner of her eye, she spotted movement on the roof of the five-story building.
A masked man in a dark Royal blue outfit jumped down to land in front of the car as easily as if stepping off the curb. Kelly took in impressions instantly. He was a big guy, well over six feet tall and built like a circus strongman. Like a performer also, his tights showed every well-ddefined muscle clearly. He was wearing polished black boots, a white belt and cuffs, and had on a helmet with a raised crest like something out of the science fiction pulps. On each shoulder was a white crescent of stiff leather. The Jupiter Man.
As everyone on the scene watched, Jupiter Man crouched, shoved his hands under the front bumper and straightened up to flip the heavy auto over onto its side. The crowd broke into confused conversation, with a few screams of uncertainty. Stepping toward the rear of the DeSoto, the masked man casually tore the rear door off and tossed it away to crash up the street with the tinkle of breaking glass. A gun went off without seeming to hit anything, the Jupiter Man leaned into the interior and then a few sharp thumping noises indicated what happened to the robbers.
Not quite realizing the boldness of her actions, the young redhead had been edging closer and had gotten within arm's reach of the strange man. As he swiveled in surprise toward her, only his lower face beneath the nose was left exposed by the blue helmet to show a wide jaw. He smiled at her with a flash of white teeth. On the front of his shirt was a light blue circle with a red spot off-center. Jupiter, all right.
"My name is Kelly O'Connor, I'm a reporter for THE NEW YORK MESSENGER," she said, not noticing that her voice cracked as she spoke. "Um, the public would like very much to know more about you and how you can... well, do these things."
From within the helmet, deepset brown eyes regarded her. She did not feel any uneasiness at that gaze, because the smile seemed natural and friendly. "All right, miss," he replied in a pleasant baritone with a faint accent. "Meet me here at midnight. Don't tell anyone." Then he took three running steps and leaped up back on to the roof where he had been standing. It seemed effortless, as if he could have reached much greater heights without difficulty. There was a glimpse of him hurtling over to the next building, then he was gone.
Shaking her head, feeling breathless, Kelly took off at a sprint toward the corner of 48th. She knew there was a drug store there with a phone booth. Behind her, she heard sirens but that hardly registered. She raced into the drug store, past the soda counter and dropped down on the seat in the booth. From her handbag, she snatched a handful of change and dialed a number she knew better than the one at her boarding house. "City desk. Yeah. Hi, Lemister. Of course it's Kelly. Grab your pad and start writing, get this all down. We need to make the afternoon edition. I just now saw the Jupiter Man in action, close up..."
II
The rest of that day had been a whirlwind of rewrites for the evening edition, envious phone calls from other journalists and questioning by the police. At least the managing editor had been supportive enough to sit next to her and stand up against the gruff officers for an hour before they went about their business. Frazzled and worn out by five o'clock, Kelly had taken the subway to the exit nearest her boarding house in Queens. After getting there in time to dig into the pot roast dinner, she had retired to her rooms and slept with the deep soundness of exhaustion until ten-thirty. Kelly groggily woke to a stuffy dark room and a quiet house, shook her head and grinned at her plans for the night.
The fact that the other boarders were elderly and that Mr and Mrs Hooper themselves were pushing sixty meant that most nights everyone was snoring in their pillows well before midnight. This suited Kelly's nocturnal activities perfectly. Moving silently through the gloom, the redhead quickly stripped down to a bra and step-ins, then grabbed the clothing she had laid out that morning in case an opportunity for the Green Devil to appear presented herself.
In a box locked in the trunk of her roadster outside the window, the regular Green Devil costume waited. That was the crash helmet with the short curved horns, the leather jacket with its white trident symbol on the back, the snug denim pants and riding boots. That was meant for cases where she expected lots of action and wanted some protection in falls and scrapes, not to mention possible fists to her head.
Tonight, she would be going out first at her normal civilian self. Kelly wriggled into a snug bodyshirt of dark green silk and tights of the same material. Across the back of the shirt, she had boldly silkscreened a white outline of a pitchfork.The legs of the tights had been fitted so they could be folded up above her knees. In her handbag, she stowed a pair of dark slippers. Into a hidden lining which she had painstakingly sewn into the handbag herself went a pair of wrist-length leather gloves that were suspiciously heavy.
After all this, she put on her regular garb. A pleated black skirt, long-sleeved white blouse and lightweight bolero jacket, as well as sensible pumps she sometimes wore to the office when she expected a particularly long day. Kelly's biggest regret was that she couldn't wear stockings in this get-up. But it was night and maybe no one would notice her bare legs or, considering how hard stockings were becoming to find lately with the silk rationing, few would comment anyway.
Stopping to brush her thick brick-red hair out by her dresser, still without turning on a light, Kelly could barely repress a triumphant laugh. This was what she lived for. Over the past few years, earlier mystery men like Mark Drum and Dr Vitarius had been supplanted by a crop of more flamboyant vigilantes who wore bright masquerade costumes. The Sceptre, the Red Blur, Archangel. The newspapers had begun calling these crime-fighters by a new word, 'super-heroes,' and the Green Devil was happy to be one of them.
Standing motionless with her head cocked, Kelly strained her ears but heard nothing. Not even Clyde's radio upstairs with his damned CAPTAIN AMNESIA program. It seemed safe to move. Keeping quiet as possible, she raised her window wide, poked her head out and found no one was in sight before sliding out into the alley. This set-up had been a major reason she had moved to this boarding house, despite having to pay more than at her previous digs. Except when a patron of the tavern next door stumbled back here to relieve himself, the dead-end alley was a perfect place to park her roadster. And it allowed her to enter and leave the boarding house without being seen. She grabbed a set of license plates from the trunk and quickly wired them over her genuine plates. The bogus ones, which she had swiped from a junkyard, did not match each other but that would only make it harder for anyone to track the Green Devil. Satisfied no one was had seen her yet, Kelly scrambled in behind the wheel and eased out the Ford Deluxe out onto the street. Now for the historic meeting of two daredevils of the night as she drove to her rendezvous with the Jupiter Man.
III.
There was almost no traffic at night because of the OPA's rationing. Kelly herself could only manage driving because she had twice helped out the Archangel with his pilots in their new-fangled helicopters or 'true gyros.' Without saying anything to her about it, the notorious air pirates had snuck into the alley one freezing cold night and put brand new tires on her little red roadster, as well as leaving several jerrycans of gas, more precious than liquid gold at that point. A few months later, another supply of fuel had been somehow been left in cans in her back seat. Grateful as she was, Kelly had no way of contacting the airmen and only hoped they needed her assistance again so she could express her gratitude. Being only human, the redhead had wished a few times that the Archangels might leave her a nice steak or some butter as well, but no such luck.
Also, there was always the risk of a black-out being called. If the siren went off and she was caught cruising home with her headlights off, it meant a hefty fine or maybe even some jail time if she mouthed off to the air raid warden. But she took worse risks than that all the time without losing any sleep.
Reaching Tenth Avenue without encountering any troublesome patrol cars, she eased over to the curb and hopped out with her handbag slung over one shoulder. A few pedestrians were trudging up and down the streets, but the theatres and bars and nightclubs were all a few blocks over into Times Square so this area was quiet. Kelly became more somber as she remembered how packed the streets used to be at night. But then, most of the men between say seventen and almost fifty were away. Women were holding down full time jobs for the first time while grandparents watched the kids. Six day weeks and double shifts were common. Everyone was busier than they had been a year or two earlier.
Closing her roadster door, she tried to brighten up. She herself was doing her part. Working for the MESSENGER, she exposed criminal rackets including black marketers and smugglers. As the Green Devil, using her unexplained gift to deflect bullets with a sweep of her hand, she had actually broken up two Axis espionage groups and caught the Japanese lady spy Sakura, 'the Cherry Blossom,' as well as dangerous nuts like Baron Shogren and that guy with the amnesia serum, she forgot his name. Over the last twelve months, she had even met mystery men like Mark Drum and Archangel and been accepted by them as a peer. She wasn't an idler.
Now for the Jupiter Man. She had been thinking over what little was known about him. He had been sighted a dozen times in the past two months, always in Manhattan. Mostly he stepped in to stop crimes of violence.. three robberies like the one at the jewelry store today, a vicious beating by two goons of a man who owed money, a shady character who was in the process of dragging a woman into an alley. The Jupiter Man intervened with overwhelming strength. Bullets apparently glanced off him without doing any harm, but his plan cloth outfit had no signs of any armor plate under it.
Only once had he explained himself. Making sure that the woman who had been nearly molested was recovering her nerve, he told her that he had come to Earth from the planet Jupiter, where the heavier gravity gave him superhuman strength and near invulnerability on this world. She had been too shaken to speak further and he ran off as bystanders came near to help. Not much to go on, Kelly thought glumly. Maybe she could charm a real interview out of the big galoot.
As she neared the jewelry store, she stopped short. A massive form stepped out from a darkened doorway between shops. With a better look at him, she guessed his height at six feet six and a weight of maybe two hundred fifty pounds if that bulk was all muscle as it seemed. He was bundled in a tan trenchcoat with the collar up and an old slouch hat pulled down to shadow as much of his face as possible. "Ah, Miss O'Connor?"
"Yeah, and I'm glad you showed up," she replied in not as breezy a tone as she had hoped to muster. "I've been hearing about you all day. Listen. The city is buzzing with wild rumors and gossip about you, not all of it flattering. In fact, there's a lot of slanderous conjecture about you."
"That does not affect my work," he said, smiling easily at her green eyes.
"Oh, I think it might. I think you should straighten out some of the wrong ideas the great unwashed public is forming about you. You don't want to be misunderstood, do you? Maybe taken for a villain?"
"That's true." He tilted the slouch hat back slightly to reveal he was still wearing the dark blue helmet which concealed most of his face. "There's a little all-night bistro around the corner. Perhaps over some coffee, I can fill you in."
Kelly was having the damndest time trying to place his accent. Highland Scots, maybe? There was that burr when he formed Rs. "That would suit me down to my toes, Mr Jupiter Man. Say, don't you have a shorter handle I could use? Mike or Steve, something like that?"
"Let me consider that." The masked man offered his arm, which she accepted as a courtesy and they headed over toward Eighth Avenue. Always one to trust her instincts about people, Kelly did not feel uncomfortable this close to a man who could bend a steel girder with his bare hands and who ignored bullets. She felt he was basically a decent Joe, maybe even a bit too formal. They entered the NIGHT TRAIN cafe, with its windows which ran the width of the side facing the street. It was almost deserted, with only two men muttered at each other in a corner table.
Tugging his hat down as far as he could, the Jupiter Man handed her a few dollars. "Perhaps you would order, miss? I wish to keep a low profile."
"You bet, how do you guzzle your java?"
"Black is fine, thank you." The strange vigilante went back to a booth on the opposite end and squeezed in behind the table so he was facing the door, tightening his trench coat around himself. When Kelly strolled over carrying two white cups on their saucers, she slid in to face him with a grin she could not repress.
"This place still gets the straight dope most of the time," she chuckled. "They haven't started cutting the coffee with chicory or ground up bark or whatever some joints are peddling."
The strange man took a good sip without commenting on its taste. From within the holes of that helmet, sober brown eyes scrutinized her. "You are a reporter, Miss O'Connor. Should I assume every word I speak will on the stands tomorrow?"
"Heck yeah, that's the idea isn't it? BUT! If you insist, I can pinky swear to keep some scoop confidential.. if it involves the war effort or the safety of your family or something."
"I have no family," he said almost in a whisper. "No other of my race is still alive. We were an ancient civilization with a science advanced beyond yours. Sadly, we were not any wiser. We possessed weapons incalculably more devastating than any you possess. In a war must like what your kind is enduring now, we destroyed ourselves. City after city was pulvcerized, artificial plagues were unleashed, the slaughter has escaped our control and was a mad force unto itself."
For some reason she could put a finger on, Kelly's deeply ingrained skepticism boiled up. She kept her face politely interested. "But you survived!"
"Yes. I was a scientist. When the winds of war were beginning to blow, I hurried frantically to finish my rocketship in time. It was an experimental model. There was only room for one occupant. As my city burned and the ceiling of my lab collapsed in huge chunks, I fired up the atomic engines and blasted off... barely in time."
"And you landed... where?"
"In Lake Michigan, I'm afraid. My ship sank immediately and there's not much hope of retrieving it. Wearing this protective flightsuit and a few items in a satchel, I found that my new strength made swimming to shore easy enough. Hiding by day, stealing some clothes from a washline, I made my way to a town and met some of the locals."
"Speaking English? What a convenient coincidence," she could not help observing.
"We have been listening to radio waves from your planet for Earth," he responded. "Our experts deciphered your languages and began to understand your world's predicament from the news programs." The Jupiter Man finished his coffee and let out a sigh. "Personally, I enjoyed your comedian Stewie Blaze. His puns amused me."
Kelly O'Connor looked down at her own cup as if surprised it was empty. "Do go on. Did you counterfeit a wad of American greenbacks to make things easier here?"
"No, no, I had brought some gems with me. A handful of diamonds, emeralds, opals. The dealer in the pawn shop thought they looked unusual but he gave me enough money for some of them that I could afford a bus ticket."
"To New York City, of course!" Kelly butted in. "Of course. Where else where a strange visitor from another planet head?"
Surprisingly, the Jupiter Man was not annoyed but amused somehow. "Miss O'Connor, do you find my life risible?"
"Sorry, pal," she managed to say while sitting up and pulling a respectful expression. "It's that goshawful Irish sense of humor a'mine. We always laugh at the wrong times even when not in our cups."
"Hmmmm...."
"Seriously, please go on. I learned in school Jupiter is the biggest of the nine planets. So its gravity is much stronger than Earth's and you're so strong and tough here because you're used weighing a ton back in your home town."
"Yes," replied the mystery man with an odd conspiratorial tone as if they were sharing something beneath the conversation. "Not only that, but the peculiar oxygen-rich atmosphere of your world enhanced my senses, my vision and my hearing. I found my abilities were beyond those of normal men."
"It's sure lucky you weren't an Earthman fleeing to Jupiter instead, right? You'd be squashed flat, crawling around like a pancake..."
The Jupiter Man pushed back his chair and rose sharply to his feet. "I think I may have made a mistake opening up to you, miss. Good night." But Kelly leaped up as well and placed a slim hand on his sleeve, squeezing to detain him and incidentally feeling muscles which resembled carved marble in that arm.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Geez, I don't wanna blow this! Come on, be a sport. I saw what you can do today, I know you're more than a regular Homo Sapiens like the rest of us poor schlubs. Give me a break."
"Very well. Let's walk for a bit." He adjusted the slouch hat again before heading toward the door. "I'll answer some questions if you can keep the insolence to a minimum."
"Not a problem," she hastened to assure him as they stepped out into the night. Kelly felt bold enough to slip her arm through his as they walked and the strange man did not object. "Let's get back on track, you know? You're putting your abilities to good use fighting crime. Why not offer yourself to the War Department? I'd love to see you in the newsreels parachuting into Berlin or Tokio!"
"It is against my code of honor to kill," the Jupiter Man said simply.
"Oh. Yeah, I get that. Umm, what else? You don't wear that mask all the time, I bet."
"I mutst ask you not to reveal the following, Kelly. Do you promise?"
"Absolutely," she said at once, unbelievably pleased he had used her first name. "I swear, I won't mention to ANYone what you say next."
"Often, I walk in civilian clothes, unmasked, even working at a mundane job so I might come to understand you Earthpeople better. To be honest, I have come to enjoy my... my secret identity. I have developed friendships and perhaps the beginning of a romance, and that is unexpected."
Kelly squeezed his arm harder, even though it was like squeezing a statue's arm. "Oh, I love that. You're as human as any guy. Maybe if I get to know you better, I might share a little secret with you. Listen. How would you like to meet Mark Drum? The Sting? Maybe the Sceptre, she's my favorite costumed vigilante."
"Really? How do you know these secretive people?"
"Here's the deal, I happen to be none other than..."
But that was the last she said. They were passing a parked Heron, with its windows left open a crack. A gush of white fumes under pressure roared out to engulf them, clinging to them, making the world dim to grey and then black. Kelly's last thought was that she had been getting awful careless to be ready to reveal her biggest secret.
V.
Was it New Year's morning again, she thought murkily through the worst nausea she could remember. For some idiotic reason, she and Jim had been alternating champagne and gin at the party. They had been debating whether pigs were smarter than horses and then she had told him they would find out when they got married and started a farm...
No. Kelly's head cleared enough to remember that she and her new friend had been gassed. Yes. Sprayed from that car, it must have been like the ether they used in hospitals. She felt too sick to worry about who had captured them or why. Her head ached so much she was afraid to open her eyes but they squeezed open a slit and seemed to be okay.
She was lying on a rough wooden table in a sort of laboratory equipped with dozens of electrical apparatus that meant nothing to her. One counter was stocked with rows of glass tubes filled with a rainbow of colored fluids. On top of a bunsen burner, a beaker of liquid bubbled away merrily. The who place stank of ammonia and vinegar, this did not help her upset stomach.
Eventually, the young reporter dared to raise her head and see what was going on. She was still fully dressed, which was a relief as it meant gangsters or spies or whatever had not been fooling around with her while she was unconscious. Nor was she tied up. She tried propping herself up on her elbows but did not feel enthusiastic about any sudden exertion. Throwing up still seemed imminently possible.
Across the lab, a middle-aged man in a white smock eased up off a stool where he had been writing in a ledger. Aside from the shape of his head, he was nothing remarkable but his head was enough. It stretched up with a forehead twice the normal height and the frontal lobes bulged outward in an expanse of bare skin under a hairline that had been left behind. The man gave her a disapproving look as he closed the ledger and placed it on the counter next to him.
"Finally," he said in a smooth, cultured voice that she found a bit pretentious. "I was going to administer a stimulant so I can get you out of the way and return to my work. Pay attention. I will use small words and speak slowly so your feeble mind can understand."
"Sorry I was born with a normal skull," she retorted. Kelly had managed to sit up. She was feeling a little better but still not ready to try anything acrobatic. "Ever think of wearing a hat?"
"My advanced cranium is my own doing," he said without seeming offended. "One of my earliest hormone experiments. It gave me the capacity for further research. When my intellect increased beyond the limits of an IQ test to measure, I went beyond Professor Herbert Lewis Sinclair to become... Cogitus!"
"Whoop De Doo," Kelly observed. "A geezer named Baron Shogren mentioned you. You're one of his community of crackpots doing Mad Science, he spoke highly of you. Can I get a glass of water?"
"Naturally, your handbag was searched and you were examined during your period of unconsciousness. Kelly Marie O'Connor. I actually have read some of your accounts of what became of Shogren and of Perlman with his Trimethlyabromine. Aside from your unbearably gauche prose style..."
"No need to get personal."
"...You apparently managed to detail the events with accuracy. During your examination, I discovered the garish costume you are wearing under your clothing and I found the mask and gloves in your handbag." He folded thin arms over a bony chest and studied her. "The Green Devil, of course, one of that insufferable clique of amateurs dressing up and interfering in others' affairs."
"You mean, brave patriotic men and women fighting crime and smashing saboteurs!" she offered, wondering if she could stand yet.
"Flatter yourself if you will," Cogitus said as he went back to drop down on the stool with a sigh. Bracing one elbow on the counter, he rested one cheek against a palm to help support that oversized head. "I have finished blood work on samples taken from you, and results are within average limits. Your heartrate, blood pressure and oxygen levels are normal. You are a healthy young woman in adequate athletic condition but there is nothing superhuman about you that I can find."
"Well, thanks for the check-up, doc. I'll make an appointment with your nurse to come back in six months." Taking a chance on falling, Kelly swung her legs around so she was sitting up on the edge of the table. "I'll see myself out."
Cogitus showed emotion for the first time, a mocking smile that only turned up his mouth while not affecting his cold eyes at all. "Your companion is a different matter altogether. After all, he stopped three of my agents from robbing that jewelry store. I need those funds to continue my experiments."
That stopped her. A half-formed plan of trying to find a door and get out of this madhouse fizzled out in her mind. Kelly followed Cogitus' line of sight and gasped as she saw Jupiter Man stretched out on a table like hers. His crested helmet had been removed to show a face that was rugged rather than matinee idol handsome, with thick brown hair worn a bit long for current styles. The massive chest rose and fell slowly but evenly.
"I see you are concerned with his well-being," the deformed genius told her. "He has twice been given a stronger dose of my knock-out gas than that which you received and signs indicate he is about revive again. I don't know how to restrain him other than administering further anesthetics."
"He's a tough cookie, all right," she admitted.
"Studying that man will provide great breakthroughs for me. Vivisection may be necessary, but so far I have not even been able to break his skin enough to draw blood. His muscles and bones are much denser than any human's could be, his lung capacity draws in more air than any human could, his heart sounds like a bass drum through a stethoscope. To get hair samples for spectroscopic analysis, I used wire cutters!"
"That Jupiter malarkey is on the level, then?" she asked, forgetting the situation for the moment.
"Please! You cannot be THAT uninformed, young woman. Perhaps the average citizen thinks of the other planets as being habitable by our species, but the leading minds in astronomy know better. Jupiter is a gas giant without a solid surface, its atmosphere is composed of methane and ammonia. No living creature, even that brute over there, could survive for an instant being near Jupiter. That man is not a Jovian, you uneducated plebian."
"I'm getting used to your insults," she said, daring to stand up while keeping one hand on the table for support. Kelly suppressed a belch that tasted of chemicals. "My Aunt Eunice always talked to me that way. You seem like a smart fella, if that Jupiter Man isn't what he says he is, then how do you explain him? I saw him flip a car over and pull its door off the ways you'd yank a wrapper off a Christmas present. Bullets don't even tickle him. If he's an Earth specimen, I have to say the Army could use a few of him."
Nearby, the Jupiter Man groaned and raised one knee, but was not awake yet. Still fixing a venomous gaze on the big man, Cogitus went on, "I believe you touched the fringes of the Midnight War, miss?"
"Well, yeah. Mark Drum mentioned that phrase. He told me a little about the adjacent realms and the nonhuman Cousins of Men, but to be honest I just blew it off as crazy stuff you'd read in ASTONISHING WONDER TALES, you know? I thought it was silly."
"And yet... I have heard that you encountered a Dartha here, in this mundane metropolis. A Kje in fact."
Noticing that this Cogitus seemed unaware of her recovery, Kelly took a half step away from the examining tables, hands slightly away from her sides. She felt she should be able to walk a little without falling on her face. To keep his attention, she continued, "Oh, THAT bird! I'll tell the world he was weird. Skin white as fresh milk, hair like straight cotton, and worst of all pointed ears! Ears like I don't know, an elf or something!"
The huge-headed mastermind nodded slowly, "What else seemed worth noticing?"
"He did magic. Not stage tricks like a rabbit from a hat but real no-fooling Black Magic. I saw him blast a man into a skeleton by just pointing at him. I saw him open a kind of window in thin air and speak to the crook we saw inside it. I get dizzy remembering that stuff. I was lucky he hadn't noticed me hiding in the shadows and I scampered out of there like a chipmunk."
"That shows prudence not cowardice, child. Delzanar Kje could have kept your bloody shreds alive for weeks with his tortures. So, you have seen there are other Races in the world other than mere Humans."
Kelly O'Connor had not at all forgotten she was a captive of this twisted maniac. But, in her experience, keeping the bad guys talking often provided a chance to escape. "And there was something else. I never told anyone about it. This doof over in Brooklyn tried to shoot me when I found him going through a dead man's pockets on a side street. He had two fangs like a rattlesnake and brother, I'll say they rattled me all right."
"One of the Snake men, beyond doubt. How interesting. What happened next?"
"He... missed. I ducked around a corner running and he didn't chase me," she lied. Kelly wasn't sure if this Cogitus duck knew about her Green Devil trick of deflecting bullets or fists with a sweep of her bare hand. Maybe it would help to tell him about it, in case it might keep her around to be studied instead of simply having her killed. She needed a second to think about her best option.
"Your voice lacks conviction," the freakish scientist admitted. "Be that as it may. I believe this brute who calls himself Jupiter Man is in fact a Melgar from Androval. They are half Human and half Eldarin, marked by a robust physiology. However, he is remarkable even for a Melgar." Cogitus returned to resting his head on an upturned palm, evidently suffering discomfort from leaving it unsupported too long. "I believe I possess as a specimen none other than their champion Sulak."
"SULAK?!" bellowed an outraged voice. "By Cirkoth, I'll make you wish you only had Sulak to deal with. This is Galvan you have offended!"
IV.
The massive examining table exploded against the wall where Cogitus had been standing, shattering into jagged shards of oak and flinging broken glassware in all directions. Only luck kept the deformed experimenter from being instantly flattened into a shapeless pulp by that table. Even before his prisoner had roared that warning, Cogitus was fortuitously slipping down off that stool and bending to pick up a slim walking stick lying on the floor. The table rushed over him with only a few inches to spare.
To give him credit, Cogitus reacted as quickly as if he had been expecting that attack. His mind worked with the alertness he had claimed. One bony hand dipped into a pocket of his lab coat and whipped back up with what looked like a modified water pistol. In the instant before the enraged Jupiter Man could reach him, that weapon sprayed a pressurized stream of the pungent liquid which vaporized in mid-air to engulf the strange man in a cloud of the anesthetic gas.
"Tichenor! Whitey! Come here at once!" As two more of the mobsters in their padded-shoulder suits hurried in through the lab door, Cogitus pointed at Kelly. "Exterminate her at once. I must prepare more sedative for the Melgar, that dose won't hold him for long."
Facing the gunmen as they swung their pistols up, Kelly saw no trace of weakness or compassion in their surly features. They had all the signs of experienced killers to whom murder was nothing special. But she felt nearly back to normal herself and there was a corresponding lack of fear on her delicate features. The redheaded journalist braced her feet at shoulder width and held up her open hands in front of her, palms. "Lay off, cousins," she said. "I've got a trick you're not going to enjoy."
"Shame to plug a dish like this," said Whitey, whose nickname came from his pale blond hair. His loud hound's tooth jacket added to his visual distinctiveness. "Them gams! That keister! But orders are orders."
Both men took only perfunctory aim at that range, snapping off their shots simultaneously. In the enclosed space, those gunshots were deafening. Tichenor and Whitey lurched, grabbed at their chests as they dropped their guns from senseless hands, sank to their knees and then toppling over. Kelly O'Connor lowered her hands slightly from where they had whirled faster than her conscious control could explain. Her palms didn't even sting.
Grinning at the horrified expression on Cogitus, Kelly gave vent to a sharp laugh. "Your big old dome didn't calculate on that, did it? Hee hee." Seeing the scientist eye a fallen 45, she plunged forward and snatched it up. "Oh no, you keep your little mitts off this smoke wagon. Hey, Jupiter Man, are you going to be okay over there?"
A fit of coughing answered her. Catching his breath after the gas cleared, the costumed man made a few attempts to speak before finally croaking, "You're the Green Devil? Of course. That's what you were about to tell me earlier."
Fixing a bead on Cogitus, using a two-handed marksman's grip on the automatic which was a bit large for her hands to use well, Kelly shrugged off the question. "What was all that about the Melgar and Androval and your real name being Galvan? I knew all along the whole Jupiter gobbledegook smelled fishy."
"It was a colorful explanation for my prowess," the Melgar said. He lowered the crested helmet over his head and adjusted it into place. "No more unlikely than the Red Blur's claim of being hit by twin lightning strikes. My people don't want their existence known to the Humans."
"Allow me to offer a proposition," Cogitus ventured. "The unauthorized vigilante known as the Green Devil is wanted by the police as a suspect in several unresolved crimes including murder, arson and dealing with foreign agents. Even if you are not ultimately prosecuted, Miss O'Connor, once exposed your career in journalism is at an end."
"Aw, clam up," she replied, waggling the barrel. "A lead pill or two will settle your hash and you won't be singing any songs about who I am."
"Oh, please." The giant-headed man smirked. "Give me some credit as a judge of character. You could no more shoot me in cold blood than you could solve the SUNDAY TIMES crossword puzzle without help."
"That hurt my feelings. Well, it's true. Both parts," she admitted, "But even so... Jupes, what about you? You want to fold this guy up so he fits in my handbag and we can chuck him in the East River?"
The imposing figure in the flamboyant costume placed both fists on hips. "I rather think he can be put to better use. Dr Vitarius has been known to keep dangerous prisoners in his mountain stronghold somewhere out in the Rockies. He's certainly the intellectual equal of this unsightly person. I believe we will turn this Cogitus over to Vitarius, perhaps to spend the war working on developments that will benefit the Allies."
To their surprise, Cogitus seemed pleased. Under the abnormal bulging brow, his eyes eased up from their tense squint. "Working with Vitarius would be no hardship. He is an Alchemist of great learning. It certainly is preferable to sudden execution."
Seeing that the imposing bulk of Galvan was within reach of their enemy and she could lower the gun, Kelly stepped over and plopped down unceremoniously on the stool. "Whew. My knees got a little wobbly after all that jazz. I guess this is your call, Jupiter Man or whatever I call you. How do we handle this gig?"
The costumed man was smiling again. He raised an approving finger at her. "You have spirit, little one. You Humans never cease to amaze me. We will bind and gag this man before delivering him to Dr Vitarius' building in this city. You drive a convertible, I believe?"
"You speaketh buckets," she responded. "We can squeeze all three of us in my ragtop. First, I need to wipe my prints off this shooter before ditching it. The boys in blue will find those two gorillers dead with bullets from their own gats in them like they ventilated each other. Of course, the angles of fire won't make any sense but then they're also going to be trying to puzzle who smashed that table against the wall. Aw hell, I'm too tired to worry about it. Let's make tracks, Jupes."
10/16/2019
