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               THE MONSTER THAT THREATENED THE UNIVERSE

                         By R. R. WINTERBOTHAM

             From Chaos a space-consuming creature reached
             slimy tentacles toward trembling planets. And
             no man of the old fighting breed remained on
           effete Earth to battle the invulnerable monster.

           [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
                      Planet Stories Spring 1941.
         Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
         the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]


Limio hugged the dying fires of Chaos. He was not cold, for the fires
that burned in the center of the cold star were not dead, only dying.
But they were the source of life to the monster who lived in the depths
of a black hole of space.

The Black Hole, about thirty degrees from the solar quadrant in the
terrestrial galaxy, was not dark, but twilight to Limio, whose eyes
were sensitive to infra-red radiation. These eyes, hundreds of them
floating on huge cranial bumps that dotted the thousands of miles of
his massive body, caught the ruddy glow of a rocket ship entering The
Black Hole.

Limio grunted. These iron creatures were hard to crack, but inside
their hulls were juicy tidbits of carbon and oxygen in various
combinations. It had seemed to Limio that these tasty morsels were
alive; that they might even possess intelligence. Of course, it would
be hard to conceive of anything so small having much intelligence, but
Limio had run across strange things in the universe in his millions of
years of existence.

Limio had come to Chaos a single spore. He had grown into a slimy,
reptilian, nauseating mass, the supreme hideosity in a warp of
creation. His body lacked form, except as a tenuous syrupy blanket
covering a fourth of the surface of Chaos. Here and there in the
skin of this monster were toothed craters ready to devour any carbon
molecule that might fall from space. Food was not important to Limio,
for it only made him grow. The energy of the inner fires of Chaos
supplied the needs of his existence. He ate simply to destroy, for
Limio wanted no competitive form of life on Chaos. Competition might
mean death and Limio loved his immortality.

The rocket ship drew nearer. Limio saw that it had guns. Limio knew
these guns. Once before he had met a rocket ship equipped with neutron
blasters. Limio had received a hole in his body that had taken a
century to heal. Limio had been unprepared then, but this time he was
ready.

He tapped the inner fires of energy. A warm glow softened his body. The
network of nerves that formed his brain threw out a web of magnetic
energy. The toothed craters in his skin yawned expectantly.

The intelligence behind the controls of the ship spotted Chaos. It
circled the dying sun. Searchlights stabbed downward toward the
surface. Limio's sensitive nerves tingled as radio energy lashed out
rhythmically from the craft. It was signaling, probably.

Suddenly from the surface of the star a long, tenuous arm shot out. It
was fifty miles long and five miles in diameter. It leaped from the
surface with mile a second velocity, aiming a blow at the space ship
that could have pounded it to junk, had it landed.

But the pilot saw the blow and dodged out of the way. The tentacle
snapped back. Again Limio tingled with radio energy. His brain caught
the rhythm and deciphered the thought:

"It is a living world. It seems to be a vicious animal. Just now it
attacked--"

"And I will attack again!" whispered Limio's brain in the same magnetic
rhythm of the impulses that flowed from the ship.

Again the arm shot out toward the ship's hull. Once more the alert
pilot dodged in time.

"Who are you?" asked the space ship, in the rhythm Limio had begun to
understand.

"I am Limio," replied the monster. "Who are you, metal monster?"

"This ship is the _Burnt Atom_, from earth in the solar system."

"I have never heard of the solar system, but I have seen others like
you in my time. I have never had trouble destroying one of your kind.
Go away. Leave me alone, or I shall kill you."

"That is not our policy. We are men. We have principles. Our principles
demand that you be destroyed as a menace to space navigation."

"Why?"

"Because you interfere with progress. We know now why ships that enter
The Black Hole never return. We intend to put an end to this wanton and
useless destruction."

"If you do not go away, I will kill you," said Limio. "But if you
creatures who call yourselves men leave me alone, I will leave you
alone."

"We can't leave you alone because your principles are not the same as
ours. You stand in the way of progress. You are hideous. You are a
monster. You must be destroyed."

"You are unbeauteous yourself, but no doubt you are in your early
stages of development. But I do not kill for esthetic reasons. I simply
want to be left alone. Go away."

"No!" came from the _Burnt Atom_. "There is no room in the universe for
enemies of progress. Besides, our studies reveal that your planet has
rare minerals on its surface."

Limio studied the assertion. It was evident to him that the
intelligence directing the _Burnt Atom_ had room for progress. There
was nothing wrong in wanting to progress, except that rapid progress
was self-evidently a bad policy. Progress was inevitable, according to
Limio's way of looking at things, but it should be avoided, because
progress would seek one out. Limio's ultimate destruction would be due
to progress. He would grow until Chaos was too small to keep his bodily
processes in operation. Limio could not stop growth, because carbon
molecules and spores fell continually on the surface of Chaos. But he
did not invite food to come to his planet. That was why he asked the
men to go away.

"Perhaps your idea of progress is different from mine," Limio said. "To
me, progress is synonymous with growth."

"To us, progress means growth of mind; development of resources;
betterment of human institutions and relationships."

"Then your idea of progress is nothing at all," Limio said. "I have
seen many forms of life, even some of your own forms, and I have never
seen a mind whose growth was not limited by hereditary conditions
which tend to progress in nature's own way; nature alone can develop
resources--you simply take them away from nature; and if human
relations are governed by this philosophy it is better that the human
race does not progress, although it will in spite of itself. Now that
we understand each other, please go away."

In reply the yellow flame of a neutron gun streaked from the _Burnt
Atom_.

But Limio had met men before and he was prepared for the niceties of
their means of destruction. His web-like brain cast off magnetic force
to shield his body. The magnetism swerved the neutrons from their path,
doubled them back on their course until the yellow flame touched the
sides of the space ship itself.

There was a single explosive puff. The darkness of The Black Hole
returned.

       *       *       *       *       *

Commander General Adstrom, president of the terrestrial Congress,
surveyed the two men who stood in front of him. One was an officer in
uniform, while the other was a pale-faced, poorly dressed person.

The commander general addressed the officer.

"Is--is this a--a criminal?" he asked.

The pale-faced young man watched with evident amusement.

"The gland extracts have been most effective during the past ten years,
sir," the officer said. "This is the only law violator we've been able
to find."

Commander General Adstrom shook his head. "We should have known
when to stop with those gland extracts," he declared. "We sought to
destroy criminality and we did. But we also destroyed creativeness,
originality, individuality. I hoped that the gland extract would not
affect everyone. I expected that some individualists would remain and
that we could find him among the criminal classes. But there are no
criminal classes!"

"This man is a criminal. His name is Marmaduke Karns. Perhaps you
remember the trial not long ago. It was quite a sensation."

"Marmaduke Karns? The name is familiar." The commander general
appraised the young man. "What crime did he commit?"

"He synthesized teakwood without a permit, sir."

"I got thirty days, too!" Marmaduke Karns added proudly. "They treated
me royally in jail. It was the first job the jailer has had in ten
years."

"Did you take the gland extract?" Commander General asked.

Marmaduke nodded.

"There's something funny about that, too, sir," the officer
interrupted. "Karns was given a test in jail and the gland extract was
found in his veins, but there also was a trace of another substance. An
antidote, sir!"

Marmaduke's face grew paler. The commander general eyed his prisoner
seriously.

"You know it's a capital offense to take an antidote to the extract?"
the commander general asked.

"I'm standing on my Constitutional rights," Marmaduke said. "I want a
lawyer."

"I didn't know there was an antidote," the commander general said. "It
seems that the antidote probably will be, in your case, a great boon to
the universe. Have you got any more of it?"

"I'm still standing on my Constitutional rights," Marmaduke said. "The
stuff--and I'm not admitting anything--is a secret."

"You can feel perfectly free to talk," the commander general said.
"Nothing you say will go beyond these walls. Furthermore, one
difficulty we are up against is that of finding an executioner, even if
you were convicted and sentenced to death for manufacturing an antidote
to the extract. There's not a human being on earth who would take
another man's life, even legally."

"I know," Marmaduke said. "That's why I invented the stuff and took
it. Now I'm in the position of a superman. I've got a monopoly on
originality, individuality and creativeness in the world. If I revealed
my antidote, I'd not have a monopoly."

"We can still put you in jail," the commander general reminded.

"The world would beat a pathway to my cell," Marmaduke replied. "I
wouldn't stay in jail long."

       *       *       *       *       *

Commander General Adstrom was confronted with a serious problem.
Marmaduke Karns represented a one-man revolution that could not be
suppressed. The commander general might call out the army, the navy,
the airforce and the spaceforce, but not a human being would kill
Karns, because the gland extract had made it psychologically impossible
for one human being to kill another. As long as Karns were alive,
whether he be in jail or free, Karns was bound to climb to the top of
the heap.

The commander general played his final trump.

"I plead with you in the name of human progress," he said, "to thrust
aside your personal ambitions and put your self-bestowed gift of
individuality in the service of mankind!"

"When you put it that way," Karns said, "I'd be a heel to refuse."

"Ah!" Commander General Adkins drew a deep sigh.

Briefly he explained his proposition. He told of the radio reports
received from the _Burnt Atom_ indicating that a creature existed in
the middle of The Black Hole that blocked progress in developing Chaos.

"There was an interruption of signals and then silence," Adstrom
continued. "We have not heard from the _Burnt Atom_ since and there's
no doubt that this terrible creature, Limio, destroyed the ship. Now
we human beings have learned a few lessons in our millions of years of
existence. One of them is that a rotten place on the world or in the
universe spreads. We must someday come to death grips with Limio and we
believe we can tackle him better now than later on."

"Why now?"

"At present he is confined to only one planet--or star, for we
believe Chaos is simply a burnt-out star. As he grows he will become
desperate, just as mankind grew desperate when the earth became
overpopulated. Limio, sooner or later, will find a way to move Chaos
out of The Black Hole. By that time he will be large enough to join
other planets to his own. The eventual conclusion will be that Limio
will absorb every atom of carbon in the universe, including the human
race, and the whole universe will be occupied by a single living
creature."

"It sounds rather absurd," Marmaduke said.

"It's not half as absurd as some other theories about the end of the
world and it's just as logical."

"I suppose you want me to destroy this monster?"

"We've tried our best weapons against him and failed to hurt him,"
the commander general pointed out. "You've got to invent a weapon to
conquer Limio. You're the only man in the world with genius enough to
do it."

"May I see the reports from the _Burnt Atom_?"

"The resources of the world are at your command."

"Then I'll take the job," Marmaduke said. "But when I get back, it's
every man for himself. Either you abdicate, or I'll overthrow you."

Commander General Adstrom smiled. "I'll abdicate," he said.

The door of the room opened and a slender figure dressed in slacks
entered.

"Oh, it's you, Sandra!" Commander General Adstrom said. He turned to
Marmaduke. "This is Sandra, my daughter; Sandra, this is Marmaduke
Karns, the world's foremost public enemy."

Sandra stepped forward and took the hand of the prisoner in a friendly
clasp.

"I read about your trial! It was so exciting! I've always wanted to
meet a bad man."

Marmaduke Karns grinned bashfully. "You're Sandra Adstrom! I've had
your pictures from the rotogravure section pasted all over my cell!"

It was Sandra's turn to blush. She noted that if Marmaduke had
more color he wouldn't be so bad looking, even if he were a little
underweight.

"Karns is going to lead an expedition into The Black Hole," Commander
General Adstrom explained. "He's going to invent a weapon to conquer
Limio."

"Oh!" Sandra caught her breath. "How soon?"

"Not for a few weeks," Marmaduke explained. "I've got to invent the
weapon first."

"Oh, then you could drop over to my house for tea," Sandra smiled.
"Some of my friends would like to meet you. Perhaps you could autograph
their copies of the court records of your trial."

Karns quickly accepted the invitation. The officer showed him out of
the room.

The commander general turned to his daughter.

"Nice work, child," he said. "No man will execute Karns, but Limio has
no such limitations. The fool did not even suspect that he was under
a death sentence the minute our scientists found the antidote for the
extract in his veins."

"It seems such a shame, too," Sandra said. "But after all, I suppose
he's a public enemy."

       *       *       *       *       *

Marmaduke, at Sandra's party, strutted like a rooster among a dozen of
her close friends. The sight sickened Sandra, but it made her glad at
the same time. There was not another man in the world with conceit. The
gland extract had eliminated man's worst failing.

When the others left, Sandra turned on her guest of honor.

"I don't think you were very modest," she said. "In old times a
criminal didn't crow about his crimes, he was ashamed. You acted like a
national hero."

"After all, I am, am I not?"

"You didn't need to date up all of my friends!"

A slow smile crept across Marmaduke's face. He looked nicer even than
he had in Commander General Adstrom's office. There was more color in
his cheeks and he had gained weight. There was a trace of devilishness
in his eyes. Somehow, Sandra felt sorry to find it there. She was part
of the plot to bring about this criminal's execution.

"So that's it, is it?" Marmaduke asked.

"What's what?"

"You're jealous!"

"You conceited fool!" Sandra said. She did not appear to be angry, and
in fact she was not, for the gland extract had eliminated anger in her
temperament. She was simply stating facts.

Marmaduke took her in his arms and planted a kiss on her lips. She
tried to break away, but he kissed her again, very firmly. She ceased
resisting and kissed him.

"After all," said Sandra, "you're the only male left in the world who
has the remotest resemblance to what a man should be. I'll have no part
in this thing. You must not go to The Black Hole!"

"If you mean you're afraid your father's plan to use Limio as an
executioner will work, you needn't worry."

"You know--about that?"

"Of course! I knew when I was brought before Old Monkeyface--pardon,
I mean your father--that the antidote in my veins had been discovered
and that I would be sentenced to death. I was curious as to how he was
going to execute me."

"Now you know. You can't kill Limio! The monster is invulnerable."

"Sandra, dear," Marmaduke said, "everyone thinks the gland extract is
foolproof. But look! You're aiding and abetting a criminal, giving me a
chance to escape after warning me that I face death."

"Oh! I'm a criminal, too."

"Yes. It seems as though love is an antidote for a lot of things,
including the extract. Of course, my antidote is not a love potion, but
it works just as well as love to overcome the extract. Now all I have
to do is to meet Limio and show he's not invulnerable. I'll do it, too."

In her mind Sandra doubted, but in her heart she hoped.

The terrestrial Congress, anxious for law enforcement, commandeered a
laboratory for Marmaduke Karns, who intended to use it to construct
a chemical weapon to use against Limio. Marmaduke argued that if the
human race could be completely subdued by a shot or two of extract,
Limio could be made docile. Commander General Adstrom didn't care
whether Karns was successful or not. If successful, Karns would have
won a pardon from his death sentence; if not, the death penalty would
have been carried out and the laws enforced. Adstrom couldn't lose.

The work was completed at last. Tank after tank of liquid was stored
aboard the _Burnt Atom II_, the space ship destined to take Karns into
The Black Hole. The craft was loaded with provisions and fuel and then
it shot into space and beyond the solar system at a speed many times
the velocity of light.

At the edge of The Black Hole, Karns' radio receiver crackled.

"Commander General Adstrom calling!"

This was remarkable. The radio signals had no right to catch up! True,
the signals could be sent through the time dimension and traverse space
at a pace more rapid than light, but this signal from earth shouldn't
have reached Karns for several days.

"Hello, Adstrom!" spoke Karns.

"You're under arrest. Halt. You've kidnaped my daughter!"

"But I haven't got your daughter, sir!" Karns said.

"Oh, yes, you have!"

       *       *       *       *       *

The four words came, not from the receiver, but from the storeroom of
the space ship. There in the doorway stood Sandra.

"Sandra!"

"Aha!" came from Adstrom.

"I hope you don't mind having a stowaway," said Sandra.

"I'm training a battery of neutron guns on your ship," Adstrom called.
"Surrender my daughter or I'll fire."

Karns swung to the microphone. "You won't fire," he said. "You're
primed with too much extract and even if you weren't, you wouldn't want
to destroy your daughter along with the kidnaper." He turned to Sandra.
"There's a lifeboat in the hold. Get in it and take off."

"You're afraid to take me with you! Haven't you faith in your weapon?"

"There's always a certain amount of danger."

"Then I'll share it with you!"

Karns glanced at the pursuing ship. It was overtaking him. He didn't
dare wait. He touched the controls and nosed into The Black Hole. He
flew toward the shadow of the star that was silhouetted in darkness in
the center of the whirlpool of space.

"Limio! Limio!" he called into the radio.

At last a reply came from the monster.

"Go away, earthman. Go away before I kill you."

"There's no reason for me to kill you. Why can't terrestrials and you
get along?"

Limio's answer was simple.

"If I don't kill you, you'll kill me. It's the law of life. I don't
want to be killed, so I kill you."

"If you kill me, my atoms will fall to your planet. You'll absorb them
and grow. Other men will come to avenge my death and you'll kill them.
You will eat their atoms and grow some more. Some day you'll be too big
for Chaos. You'll die. By killing me, you kill yourself."

"If I don't kill you, you'll kill me," Limio repeated.

"You don't trust me, Limio. Listen. I don't come to kill, I came to
bring peace."

"You are a fool, man, but I'm not. Go away, while you are in one piece."

"I offer you a long life and a more exciting one!"

As he spoke Karns glanced behind him. Adstrom's ship was circling
above, ready to dive. It would try to disable _Burnt Atom II_, board
the ship and rescue Sandra, and then leave Karns to Limio's mercy.

"The last earthman to come here talked of progress," Limio said. "You
speak of other gifts. What--"

"Not a gift, Limio, but a price! We terrestrials wish to buy precious
minerals you guard on Chaos."

"What has happened of progress on earth?"

"The minerals represent our ideal of progress."

"Do the minerals make you grow?"

"No, Limio."

"Then there is no progress. Progress is purely a matter of size."

"But even to you, growth means death and destruction. On our planet we
grow in numbers. When the world is overpopulated, enough people die to
leave it under-populated again. The human race, in a sense, is more
immortal than you, Limio."

Karns saw Adstrom's ship in a dive. He jerked the controls and sent his
own craft forward out of the way. The action was mistaken by Limio as
an attack. The huge, fifty-mile tentacle shot out toward the _Burnt
Atom II_. Karns twisted the controls again and dodged, so that the blow
barely missed his ship.

Adstrom, however, was not so lucky. As he attempted to follow Karns'
maneuver, his craft came directly in line with the piston-like plunge
of the tentacle. He swerved his ship, but he swerved too late. The
tentacle caught Adstrom's ship a glancing blow.

The ship bounced upward out of control. But it was caught by the
gravity of Chaos and it tumbled back, like a falling leaf, toward the
surface of the planet.

A roar came from Limio.

Adstrom's ship tumbled close to the ground before the commander fired
the rockets. Even with the fuel blast, he was unsuccessful in keeping
the craft off the ground, but he managed to steer it to a safe landing
on a rocky cliff some distance from the huge body of Limio.

Sandra screamed as she saw a thousand-foot wave of flesh roll across
the rocky planet toward her father.

Karns already was nosing his craft down in a dive.

There were two courses open. He might leave Adstrom to his fate and try
to flee, in which case Limio most certainly would bring him down with
a blow from the tentacle. Or, Karns might try to land, hoping to fool
Limio into thinking he had damaged both craft. Limio might not attack
Karns in belief that Karns was a lame duck.

Karns chose the second course, not only as the safest, but as a means
of bringing Limio under control. Adstrom did not deserve to be rescued,
perhaps, but after all he was Sandra's father.

Besides, it was a battle between a monster and man, and Adstrom was on
Karns' side.

       *       *       *       *       *

The space ship tumbled to the foot of the rocky cliff. As it fell,
Karns gave the tubes just enough fuel to keep the landing bump from
being too severe. As the ship crashed, he opened the cockpit of the
tanks containing the fluid he intended to use upon Limio.

"Follow me, Sandra!" he called, running toward the locks.

They leaped from the craft into an atmosphere surprisingly pleasant
and sweet. It was only slightly frosty, but the terrestrials were well
clad.

They began scrambling up the sides of the cliff. Below they heard the
rumbling of the monster's body.

Limio roared as his processes splashed into the sweet liquid that
washed the gulleys at the foot of the cliff.

Sandra screamed as one of the processes struck a rock a few feet from
her.

"It isn't working!" she cried. "It can't work. The extract simply
prevents crime and individualism. You can't prevent individualism when
there is only one individual in a species; and there can be no crime
without fellow creatures to harm!"

"Hurry, Sandra!" Karns urged. "Save your breath. It wasn't the extract
I gave him, but the antidote!"

A huge tentacle raised above the fleeing pair. Sandra closed her eyes.
She couldn't escape this blow.

The tentacle did not fall. Instead it snapped back to Limio's body,
landing with the crack of a whip.

Suddenly Limio seemed to writhe in pain. Sparks flew from the
rocks. The planet shook as if it was in the throes of dissolution.
Searchlights from Adstrom's craft flickered down into the valley to
reveal a billowing ocean of flesh struggling with itself, fighting
itself.

At the top of the cliff Karns and Sandra paused for breath.

"His mind was in unity, now it is in discord," he said. "His evolution
was different from ours. He grew as one individual, while life on our
planet resolved itself into countless individuals. The antidote served
to separate the individuals of his being for the first time in history.
Every nerve cell in his body now has individuality. Limio is a billion
intellects instead of one."

"In other words, he is crazy!"

"Only in the sense that he is one creature. If we look at him as the
whole creation of a world--many creatures--he is not so crazy. He is
simply conservative. He is bound to progress and that progress is going
to be the kind that lasts, because it was won in a struggle."

"What on earth is progress?" Sandra asked. "It looks to me, if that is
progress, that it's a rather crazy thing--"

"Progress is simply the settlement of a lot of arguments. Every time
we settle one argument we find another and progress goes on. At home,
progress was blocked by the extract, which made all minds in unison,
blocked all argument, ended criminality, made the whole race one
individual. The antidote which I gave myself preserved progress by
allowing one individual, at least, a different viewpoint. I proved my
individuality by getting thrown in jail. You fell in love and became an
individualist by warning me of a plot to kill me. Progress continued
when your father chased me into The Black Hole--"

"Hello! Hello out there! Are you all right?" Adstrom's voice boomed
from the locks of his space ship.

"Perfectly!" Karns replied.

"Ah! A moment ago I wanted to kill you! Now, strangely enough, I feel
very grateful toward you for--er--saving Sandra. You will be pardoned
of all your crimes."

"He didn't kidnap me, Father," Sandra explained as they entered the
ship.

"He has done plenty to the earth! He connected his laboratory with a
food factory so that the antidote he made has been spread all over the
world in food! He's destroyed the unity of the world! He ought to go to
jail, but the jailer's resigned because he had too much to do."

"Marmaduke has brought progress back to the world, Father!"

"Progress! Bah! He's turned the world into a turmoil! The whole
population is fighting. The planet's in an uproar. I'll abdicate rather
than rule the mess. Let Marmaduke try to straighten it out!"

"Sir," Marmaduke said, "it's every man for himself. You've better
qualifications for the office and I can swing some votes your way. You
couldn't swing a barn door mine."

The damaged ship had been repaired. They soared earthward. Limio, too
busy with his own problems, made no move to stop them. In fact, he
might be disturbed enough now to enter into commercial agreement with
other planets--parts of his brain trading with other creatures at the
expense of other parts. Progress, human style, had come to Chaos.