Latest / X Minus One | Old Time Radio / X Minus One - "Soldier Boy" (Old Time Radio, 1956)

Transcript

X Minus One - "Soldier Boy" (Old Time Radio, 1956) · X Minus One | Old Time Radio

0:00
Speaker 1: Centuries of peace have left humanity's military neglected and socially scorned.
0:05
Speaker 1: On a remote colony world, Captain Dillon arrives with a warning.
0:09
Speaker 1: An unidentified alien force is advancing through the outer worlds,
0:13
Speaker 1: while scarce evacuation resources and colonists' attachment to their hard-won
0:17
Speaker 1: home complicate every decision. From NBC's X-Minus One, this is
0:23
Speaker 1: Soldier Boy, Episode 71. First broadcast October 17th, 1956. Adapted
0:30
Speaker 1: by Ernest Kenoy from a story by Michael Schara. Daniel
0:34
Speaker 1: Sutter directed with Larry Haynes, Ralph Bell, Alan Hewitt, and
0:38
Speaker 1: Bob Hastings among the cast. And now, our story begins.
0:46
Speaker 2: Countdown for blastoff. X minus 5, 4, 3, 2, X
0:48
Speaker 2: minus 1, fire.
1:21
Speaker 3: From the far horizons of the unknown come transcribed tales
1:24
Speaker 3: of new dimensions in time and space. These are stories
1:29
Speaker 3: of the future, adventures in which you'll live in a
1:32
Speaker 3: million could-be years on a thousand maybe worlds. The National
1:36
Speaker 3: Broadcasting Company, in cooperation with Galaxy Science Fiction Magazine, presents.
1:41
Speaker 2: X minus 1.
1:56
Speaker 3: Tonight's story, Soldier Boy by Michael Scherer. There is a
2:12
Speaker 3: Scandinavian legend. In the Northland deep in a great cave
2:17
Speaker 3: by an ever-burning fire, the warrior sleeps. For this is
2:21
Speaker 3: the resting time, the time of peace. and so shall
2:26
Speaker 3: it be for a thousand years. And yet we shall
2:29
Speaker 3: summon him again, my children, when we are sore in need.
2:34
Speaker 3: And out of the north he will come, and again
2:37
Speaker 3: and again, each time we call, out of the dark
2:41
Speaker 3: and the cold, with the fire in his hand, he
2:44
Speaker 3: will come.
2:51
Speaker 4: I was off duty when the call came to report
2:54
Speaker 4: I was off duty and out of uniform. As a
2:56
Speaker 4: matter of fact, I was in a bar, drunk. Basio
2:59
Speaker 4: had just spilled a beer over me.
3:02
Speaker 5: I cussed him out, and when I looked up, there
3:04
Speaker 5: was a shore patrol standing over me.
3:07
Speaker 6: Captain Dillon?
3:08
Speaker 5: Well, where did they find you, Buster?
3:10
Speaker 4: Did you flunk out of high school or get into
3:12
Speaker 4: a fight with your father and run away from home?
3:15
Speaker 6: Captain Dillon, I have a message for you.
3:16
Speaker 5: Well, well, well.
3:18
Speaker 4: Look, Basio, this is humanity's finest. He has joined the
3:22
Speaker 4: service to protect home and hearth against the savage aliens.
3:26
Speaker 2: Touching, Dillon, touching.
3:28
Speaker 6: Are you Lieutenant Basio? I have a message for you, too.
3:31
Speaker 5: Have a drink.
3:31
Speaker 6: No, thank you, sir.
3:33
Speaker 2: Well.
3:34
Speaker 4: Listen to that, sir, Bossio. This kid has got morale.
3:39
Speaker 4: It's a fact, Dylan. He's crawling with it. Sure, I
3:42
Speaker 4: haven't heard morale like that since the Second Martian Revolt
3:45
Speaker 4: in 23. Boy, don't you know that the armed service
3:48
Speaker 4: is a scrap heap?
3:50
Speaker 6: Do not use the best iron to make nails or
3:53
Speaker 6: the best men to make soldiers. Old Chinese proverb.
3:56
Speaker 4: I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier. Ancient
3:59
Speaker 4: folk song.
4:00
Speaker 6: Please, Captain, Lieutenant, I'm just doing what they told me to.
4:03
Speaker 6: I'm supposed to tell you to report to division headquarters.
4:06
Speaker 5: Uh-huh.
4:07
Speaker 4: And they told you to try every bar on the
4:08
Speaker 4: strip and you'd be sure to run into us, huh?
4:11
Speaker 6: Yes, sir.
4:12
Speaker 5: Those were Colonel Swift's orders. A good commander.
4:15
Speaker 4: He knows the whereabouts of his troops. All right, Bossio,
4:19
Speaker 4: drink up. Let's go.
4:20
Speaker 5: Duty calls.
4:31
Speaker 4: The garrison town was wide open. The street was lined
4:35
Speaker 4: with saloons, gambling houses, and whatever. They cleaned up this
4:39
Speaker 4: sort of thing on Earth and every colony in the
4:41
Speaker 4: solar system and beyond, but they let them stay near
4:44
Speaker 4: the Army bases, mostly... because they knew there'd been 500
4:47
Speaker 4: years of peace, and the men that sifted down into
4:50
Speaker 4: the army were not quite the best adjusted of human beings.
4:54
Speaker 4: The drinkers, the gamblers, the men who were destructive in
4:56
Speaker 4: a hundred different quietly degrading ways wore the uniform of
4:59
Speaker 4: the defense command. The uniform that was usually creased and
5:03
Speaker 4: just a little dirty. I know because I'm a veteran
5:07
Speaker 4: of 20 years of it. Not a veteran of any
5:09
Speaker 4: wars or any fighting except in some saloon on payday,
5:13
Speaker 4: but a survivor of garrison life of chasing smugglers and
5:16
Speaker 4: rally catch them. The colonel was fat and sweaty, and
5:20
Speaker 4: as a gesture to military discipline, he chased a frowsy
5:23
Speaker 4: blonde out of the office before he spoke to us.
5:26
Speaker 5: Sit down, Dillon. Have you ever heard of Lupus 5?
5:31
Speaker 4: No.
5:32
Speaker 7: It's out on the rim on a 360 vertical sector.
5:35
Speaker 2: They were wiped out a year ago.
5:36
Speaker 5: Disease?
5:37
Speaker 6: Aliens.
5:38
Speaker 7: A mail ship found it. By the time they called
5:41
Speaker 7: the army in, almost six months had gone by. There
5:43
Speaker 7: were 70 columns. 31 were dead. The rest were missing.
5:46
Speaker 7: All the technical equipment, all radios, guns, machines, even books
5:49
Speaker 7: were gone. The rest of the place was burned over.
5:52
Speaker 7: Only one of the men found something in the ash.
5:55
Speaker 7: As you know, every colony is equipped with a detonator
5:57
Speaker 7: in a main building. And a cobalt bomb buried right
6:00
Speaker 7: in the middle because it's a lot more important to
6:02
Speaker 7: blow a whole village and let some hostile alien learn
6:04
Speaker 7: vital technical facts about human technology and body chemistry.
6:08
Speaker 5: Why didn't the bomb blow at Lupus 5?
6:11
Speaker 6: Because the wire was cut.
6:12
Speaker 7: At the heart of the camp, under 12 inches of earth,
6:15
Speaker 7: somebody dug it up and cut it.
6:17
Speaker 6: Who? I don't know.
6:19
Speaker 7: Dylan, we're pulling back, evacuating the Rim colonies. There's nothing
6:22
Speaker 7: else to do.
6:23
Speaker 5: No defense possible?
6:25
Speaker 6: After 500 years of peace?
6:28
Speaker 5: Look at you, Dylan.
6:29
Speaker 7: Look at me. And the rest of the army is
6:32
Speaker 7: about the same. We're pulling out.
6:34
Speaker 5: They're not going to like that out at the Rim colonies.
6:37
Speaker 7: If they don't like it, they can wait and be
6:38
Speaker 7: burned by the aliens. We can't protect them. You'll report
6:42
Speaker 7: to the 38th Sector. You'll have ten planets on your
6:45
Speaker 7: route to warn and evacuate. Try and stay sober.
6:48
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'll try. That's all.
6:50
Speaker 6: Get out of here.
6:51
Speaker 7: And, uh, send Kitty back in on your way out.
7:08
Speaker 4: We cleaned up three planets, delivered the dispatches from headquarters,
7:11
Speaker 4: and tried to find out if they had anything worth
7:13
Speaker 4: drinking in the colonies.
7:14
Speaker 5: Usually they didn't.
7:15
Speaker 4: And we were stuck with something that Bossio made out
7:18
Speaker 4: of high-thrust fuel with a little lemon juice and oil
7:20
Speaker 4: of wintergreen for flavoring. We headed out for number four.
7:29
Speaker 6: Hey, uh, Dylan.
7:30
Speaker 5: What?
7:31
Speaker 6: You want another belt?
7:32
Speaker 5: No, not now.
7:33
Speaker 4: I gotta feed orbits into this fool computer.
7:35
Speaker 5: Light up. Come on. There she goes.
7:43
Speaker 6: You know, it's funny.
7:45
Speaker 5: What?
7:46
Speaker 7: Life.
7:47
Speaker 4: You're a 90-proof philosopher, Bossio.
7:49
Speaker 6: Nah. Look, we come down on a planet, nobody talks
7:54
Speaker 6: to us. We can stand out in the landing field
7:57
Speaker 6: in snow or sand or whatever they got on their
7:59
Speaker 6: miserable planet. Nobody wants us.
8:01
Speaker 5: Well, look at you. Can you blame them?
8:03
Speaker 6: No, no, you don't get it. What are we here for?
8:06
Speaker 5: To save them.
8:08
Speaker 6: They shove a firecracker under their tails and get them
8:10
Speaker 6: out while there's still time. What do they call us?
8:13
Speaker 6: Soldier boy. Drunken bum.
8:17
Speaker 2: Now, what do they do that for?
8:21
Speaker 5: Three guesses.
8:23
Speaker 6: Yeah, I like on that last one. They almost mobbed us.
8:26
Speaker 6: Every time we walked out in the street, they looked
8:28
Speaker 6: at us as if these uniforms were some kind of
8:30
Speaker 6: an insult.
8:31
Speaker 5: Well, look up your history, Barcio.
8:33
Speaker 4: There's been too much misery tied up with soldier suits
8:36
Speaker 4: of some kind.
8:36
Speaker 5: It's practically a racial memory. Ah, baloney.
8:41
Speaker 6: They got no call to treat us like we were criminals.
8:43
Speaker 6: They would have shot me down if you hadn't taken
8:45
Speaker 6: off so quick.
8:46
Speaker 5: Yeah, look, look, Basio. If somebody comes and tells you
8:49
Speaker 5: you've got to.
8:49
Speaker 4: Get off the planet that's been home for 20 years
8:51
Speaker 4: and then wrecks their best restaurant in a brawl, what
8:54
Speaker 4: do you expect, a medal?
8:54
Speaker 5: Ah, I guess you're right. Hey, that was some scrap. Yeah.
9:00
Speaker 6: I didn't like the way that stuck-up head waiter called
9:03
Speaker 6: me soldier boy.
9:05
Speaker 2: I'll do it all over again.
9:06
Speaker 5: I know you would. On the next planet, do your
9:08
Speaker 5: drinking on the ship. It's safer all around.
9:09
Speaker 6: Oh, they still got no right to be so stuck up.
9:12
Speaker 6: After all, somebody's got to be in the army.
9:14
Speaker 5: Yeah, I guess so.
9:16
Speaker 4: Well, that's the last orbit. Pass me the bottle. The
9:31
Speaker 4: fourth planet was Norge I. a big green world about
9:35
Speaker 4: 20% cooler than Earth temperate. They'd heard about the evacuation,
9:39
Speaker 4: and when we sent the scout down on the landing field,
9:42
Speaker 4: there was a crowd gathered. When I opened the hatch,
9:44
Speaker 4: I could smell a wet, heavy breeze that meant snow.
9:47
Speaker 4: It was below freezing, and Army-issue cold-weather gear wasn't worth much.
9:53
Speaker 4: I waited out at the edge of the field for
9:55
Speaker 4: 15 minutes, waiting for somebody to take notice of a
9:58
Speaker 4: ship of the United Earth 15.
10:00
Speaker 5: Command. I just stood there in a cold wind with
10:03
Speaker 5: a plank to keep me warm. Finally, somebody came out
10:07
Speaker 5: to talk to me.
10:11
Speaker 2: What do you want?
10:11
Speaker 5: I'm Captain Dillon. I have a message from Fleet Headquarters.
10:14
Speaker 5: Are you in charge here?
10:15
Speaker 2: Nobody's in charge here. If you want a spokesman, I
10:18
Speaker 2: guess I'll do.
10:19
Speaker 8: What is it?
10:20
Speaker 5: I got a dispatch for you from headquarters.
10:22
Speaker 2: I'll look at it later.
10:24
Speaker 5: Is it always this cold?
10:25
Speaker 2: Just time of year.
10:26
Speaker 5: He's a brass monkey. Drink?
10:29
Speaker 2: No, thank you.
10:29
Speaker 5: Mind if I do?
10:31
Speaker 2: No, you have to.
10:35
Speaker 5: I don't suppose you got any decent liquor on this planet?
10:38
Speaker 2: No, we don't have any.
10:39
Speaker 5: Yeah, I forgot. All right, let's get going. We haven't
10:42
Speaker 5: got much time.
10:55
Speaker 4: They had a meeting at the main warehouse. Russell read
10:58
Speaker 4: the dispatch and the order for evacuation. It took them
11:01
Speaker 4: a long time to understand. They took it pretty well,
11:04
Speaker 4: but then these were pioneers.
11:08
Speaker 6: Pioneers.
11:10
Speaker 4: Before you settle a planet, you boil it and bake
11:12
Speaker 4: it and purge it of possible diseases. Then you step
11:15
Speaker 4: down gingerly and inflate your plastic houses with chardon and
11:18
Speaker 4: then become warm and impregnable.
11:20
Speaker 5: You send your.
11:21
Speaker 4: Machines out to plant and harvest and set up automatic
11:24
Speaker 4: factories to transmute dirt into coffee, and without having lifted
11:28
Speaker 4: a finger, you've braved the wilderness, hewed a home out
11:31
Speaker 4: of living rock, and you're a pioneer.
11:34
Speaker 5: Of course, they were angry, and as usual, they'd take
11:36
Speaker 5: it out on me.
11:41
Speaker 2: Now look here, soldier. This is our planet. This is
11:44
Speaker 2: our home. We demand some protection from the fleet.
11:47
Speaker 4: Paying taxes for all of you all these years, and
11:49
Speaker 4: it's about time you earned your keep.
11:51
Speaker 5: Maybe, Mr. Russell, maybe. But there is no fleet.
11:55
Speaker 4: Now, there are a few hundred half-shot old tubs that
11:57
Speaker 4: were obsolete before you were born, and there are four
11:59
Speaker 4: or five new jobs for the brass and the government,
12:02
Speaker 4: but that's all the fleet there is. Now, look, it's 10.30 now,
12:06
Speaker 4: and those aliens might be coming in at any time,
12:08
Speaker 4: for all we know, so we'd better get going. Lieutenant
12:11
Speaker 4: Passio has gone on to the sister colony at Primate
12:13
Speaker 4: 2 of their system. He'll return to pick me up
12:15
Speaker 4: by nightfall. and I'd been instructed to have you gone
12:18
Speaker 4: by then. I wanted to remind them that nobody wanted
12:32
Speaker 4: the army, that the fleet had grown smaller and smaller,
12:35
Speaker 4: but there wasn't any point to it now. I realized
12:38
Speaker 4: long ago that they were right in a way. I
12:41
Speaker 4: was a big, fat anachronism, a fossil, a hangover from
12:45
Speaker 4: the dark ages. Only, unfortunately, we'd run right into a
12:48
Speaker 4: new Dark Ages that came from somewhere out in the
12:50
Speaker 4: stars and picked off colonies and burned them to a cinder. Well,
12:55
Speaker 4: when they finally left the meeting, I went out to
12:57
Speaker 4: check the bomb. The detonator was in the radio shack.
13:00
Speaker 4: It was a long metal bar with a lock on it.
13:04
Speaker 4: I followed the conduit down the wall till it entered
13:06
Speaker 4: the ground. Then I started to chop at the frozen
13:09
Speaker 4: earth to follow the wire.
13:15
Speaker 2: Uh, Captain Dillon.
13:16
Speaker 4: Yeah?
13:17
Speaker 2: How many people can your ship take?
13:18
Speaker 5: Well, she sleeps two, won't take off with more than ten. Why?
13:21
Speaker 2: We're overloaded.
13:22
Speaker 4: There are 60 of us, and our ship won't take
13:25
Speaker 4: over 40.
13:25
Speaker 2: We came out in groups, so we never thought... You sure?
13:28
Speaker 2: She's only a little ship. She's all we could afford.
13:31
Speaker 4: Well, it looks as if somebody's going to find out
13:33
Speaker 4: firsthand what those aliens look like.
13:35
Speaker 2: It's not very funny.
13:36
Speaker 5: All right, all right.
13:38
Speaker 4: Maybe the colony on two has room. I'll call Bossio
13:41
Speaker 4: and ask.
13:41
Speaker 2: Aren't there any fleet ships within radio distance?
13:43
Speaker 6: Oh, man.
13:44
Speaker 4: Look, the fleet is spread out kind of thin nowadays.
13:50
Speaker 2: What's that?
13:51
Speaker 4: It's your wire from the detonator to the bomb. Somebody
13:55
Speaker 4: dug it up, cut it, and then buried it again
13:57
Speaker 4: and packed it down again real nice. Who?
14:00
Speaker 6: Who?
14:01
Speaker 2: One of us, of course. I know nobody ever liked
14:03
Speaker 2: sitting on a live bomb like this, but I.
14:06
Speaker 5: You mean one of your people?
14:07
Speaker 2: Isn't that obvious?
14:09
Speaker 6: Why?
14:09
Speaker 2: Well, they probably thought it was too dangerous, like most
14:12
Speaker 2: government rules. Maybe one of the kids.
14:14
Speaker 5: No, no, no.
14:15
Speaker 4: There was a bomb wire cut on Lupus 5 just
14:18
Speaker 4: before the alien attack.
14:19
Speaker 2: Maybe an animal?
14:20
Speaker 5: No, no animal did that. Some coincidence, huh?
14:24
Speaker 4: The wire at Lupus 5 was cut just about before
14:27
Speaker 4: an alien attack. Now this one was cut too, newly cut.
14:32
Speaker 4: So something knew enough about this cat to know that
14:35
Speaker 4: a bomb was buried here and also to know why
14:37
Speaker 4: it Something didn't want the camp destroyed, so it came
14:41
Speaker 4: into the middle, traced the wire, dug it up and
14:43
Speaker 4: cut it, and then walked right out of here.
14:45
Speaker 2: What did we do?
14:47
Speaker 5: That's how you're done. Try not to scare them.
14:49
Speaker 4: I'll be with you as soon as I splice this wire.
15:02
Speaker 4: I spliced the wire, went back into the radio shack
15:04
Speaker 4: and pulled out my pistol. I checked it and primed
15:07
Speaker 4: it and tried to remember the last time I'd fired it.
15:10
Speaker 4: The snow began falling near noon. By one o'clock, the
15:14
Speaker 4: visibility was down to zero.
15:16
Speaker 5: I tried to contact Bossio to tell him to hurry.
15:18
Speaker 5: He didn't answer. I figured he was probably drunk or
15:21
Speaker 5: sleeping it off. I suppose I should.
15:24
Speaker 4: Have been out organizing some kind of defense, inspiring everybody
15:27
Speaker 4: with grim, lantern-jawed courage. But as a matter of fact,
15:30
Speaker 4: my jaw is somewhat slack, and I'm not strong on courage.
15:35
Speaker 4: So I took a belt and a bottle and considered things.
15:39
Speaker 4: The tension was beginning to get me. After 20 years
15:42
Speaker 4: of hanging around and playing like the town drunk, a
15:44
Speaker 4: man can't be expected to rush out and plug the
15:46
Speaker 4: breach just like that. You have to work up to
15:48
Speaker 4: these things gradually. I suppose there was something to me originally,
15:53
Speaker 4: but I lost it. I lost it in 20 years
15:56
Speaker 4: of idiotic garrison spit and polish, in saloons and the
15:59
Speaker 4: icy looks and choice words that civilians save for peacetime soldiers.
16:05
Speaker 4: I had half the bottle killed when Russell came back
16:07
Speaker 4: to see me.
16:10
Speaker 2: Captain, I just can't make any sense of this.
16:13
Speaker 6: Who cut that wire?
16:14
Speaker 5: Well, as far as I can figure, an alien cut it.
16:17
Speaker 4: No, there haven't been any aliens or any peculiar animals
16:19
Speaker 4: near this camp. We've got planet-wide radar, and there have
16:22
Speaker 4: been no unidentified ships since the first landing a year ago.
16:25
Speaker 6: One of us must have done it. It's the only
16:27
Speaker 6: possible explanation.
16:29
Speaker 5: You mean a traitor?
16:30
Speaker 2: Or a dupe.
16:32
Speaker 4: Maybe the aliens can exert some kind of telepathic control.
16:36
Speaker 5: I can't see it.
16:38
Speaker 4: If they're able to control one, why not all and
16:40
Speaker 4: save half the box? Now, look, is there any animal
16:42
Speaker 4: that ever comes near here that's.
16:44
Speaker 5: As large as a dog?
16:45
Speaker 2: Well, there's a biggle.
16:47
Speaker 4: It's like a monkey with four legs. We shoot them
16:49
Speaker 4: now and then when they get into the crops. We're
16:52
Speaker 4: going to post sentries. Do you want to place them? Well,
16:55
Speaker 4: you know this site better than I do. Post them
16:56
Speaker 4: in a ring within calling distance.
16:58
Speaker 2: Dylan, what are they like, the aliens?
17:01
Speaker 5: Do you know?
17:02
Speaker 4: No, I don't think anybody does. We don't know what
17:05
Speaker 4: they look like, what they think like, or where they
17:06
Speaker 4: come from.
17:07
Speaker 2: Do you think they've landed yet?
17:09
Speaker 5: Don't know. With this snow coming down, they could be
17:12
Speaker 5: out there in the woods right now, and we'd never know.
17:20
Speaker 8: Planet Director 7396 recording progress report on attack day. Physical
17:26
Speaker 8: situation excellent. Headquarters bunker 10 feet underground. Electrical heating apparatus
17:32
Speaker 8: running smoothly. View screens operating. Human colonists' activity not according
17:39
Speaker 8: to pattern. Eight humans have taken up watch positions on
17:43
Speaker 8: the perimeter of the colony. Original plan was for attack
17:46
Speaker 8: at night. The presence of Earth vessel dictates change in plans.
17:51
Speaker 8: The humans move quickly. They might be gone by nightfall.
17:54
Speaker 8: It will be necessary to disable their ship. Proceeding on
17:58
Speaker 8: this alternate plan.
18:07
Speaker 4: At noon, Russell reported that Planet Two didn't answer his call.
18:11
Speaker 4: Basio might be drunk, but the colony on Two wouldn't be.
18:15
Speaker 4: If there was no answer, it was because they were dead.
18:18
Speaker 4: The people were quiet and frightened. Some of the women
18:20
Speaker 4: were beginning to cry. They brought me coffee now. It
18:25
Speaker 4: had begun to dawn on the women that they might
18:27
Speaker 4: be leaving without their husbands or sons. They had their
18:31
Speaker 4: ships stripped down and they were loading. The ones that
18:33
Speaker 4: were going stood outside and stripped.
18:35
Speaker 5: Off their clothes.
18:36
Speaker 4: Cold weather gear of 40 people weighed enough to get
18:39
Speaker 4: a few more on board. In the end, the ship
18:41
Speaker 4: took 46 people. When they were all loaded and they
18:44
Speaker 4: cleared the landing field and the hatches closed. You could
18:47
Speaker 4: hear the generators surge for a lift. But then there
18:51
Speaker 4: was a sharp burning smell and she never got off
18:53
Speaker 4: the ground.
18:56
Speaker 6: Dylan.
18:56
Speaker 5: Over here under the tree. What happened?
18:58
Speaker 2: The lining's burned out. She's being repaired.
19:00
Speaker 5: How long will it take to fix?
19:01
Speaker 2: Four or five hours.
19:02
Speaker 5: It'll be dark by then. It seems like they want
19:05
Speaker 5: to wait till the dark.
19:07
Speaker 2: Probably aren't many of them.
19:08
Speaker 4: Might mean that, or maybe they see better at night,
19:10
Speaker 4: or maybe they move slow. You got any idea how
19:13
Speaker 4: they got to the ship?
19:14
Speaker 6: No.
19:15
Speaker 4: You know, I've been in the army 20 years. This
19:18
Speaker 4: is the first time I was ever in a fight.
19:20
Speaker 4: I never shot at anybody. I always figured I'd be afraid.
19:23
Speaker 4: But there doesn't seem to be any sense in being afraid.
19:27
Speaker 4: There's nothing to do but wait until night comes. I
19:39
Speaker 4: sat there thinking of Basio.
19:41
Speaker 5: He was dead.
19:42
Speaker 4: There wasn't much doubt of that. Probably died dead drunk
19:46
Speaker 4: and not giving a solitary hoot. I stared out into
19:49
Speaker 4: the snow and thought the same thought over and over.
19:52
Speaker 5: Basio was dead. Basio was dead.
19:56
Speaker 4: In all this dog-eared, ape-run universe, he was about the
19:59
Speaker 4: only friend I had, and so naturally he was dead.
20:02
Speaker 5: Dead because he tried to come out here to help
20:04
Speaker 5: these people.
20:06
Speaker 4: People who cursed him and called him a drunk, which
20:08
Speaker 4: he was, and a brawler, which he was when somebody
20:11
Speaker 4: crossed him.
20:12
Speaker 5: But he was the one who came to help.
20:15
Speaker 4: And in short time, I'd be staying behind so that
20:18
Speaker 4: some colonist could jam himself aboard my ship and lift
20:21
Speaker 4: out to safety. And I'd die to save somebody I
20:25
Speaker 4: didn't even know. Somebody who 24 hours before would be ashamed.
20:29
Speaker 5: To be found in my company.
20:32
Speaker 4: They come to an army for help too late. An
20:35
Speaker 4: army like me, sodden and not knowing whether they can
20:38
Speaker 4: fight or not.
20:41
Speaker 6: Dillon.
20:41
Speaker 5: What?
20:42
Speaker 2: Over there, at the edge of the woods. Something moving.
20:45
Speaker 6: You can see it through the snow.
20:46
Speaker 5: Look out. How far do you make it to that tree?
20:49
Speaker 2: About 50 yards.
20:49
Speaker 5: 50 yards.
20:50
Speaker 6: There it is, do you see?
20:51
Speaker 4: By the bush.
20:52
Speaker 5: 50 yards, no wind, half charge. I have a feeling
20:55
Speaker 5: I'm forgetting something. Well, here goes.
20:58
Speaker 6: You got it!
20:58
Speaker 3: Get down.
20:59
Speaker 5: Maybe more of them. Wait and see.
21:00
Speaker 2: I saw it clear when it jumped. It was one
21:02
Speaker 2: of those monkeys.
21:02
Speaker 6: Maybe.
21:03
Speaker 5: We'll see.
21:12
Speaker 4: I waited ten minutes and then I ran over it.
21:14
Speaker 4: Whatever it was was gone, almost all of it. My
21:17
Speaker 4: bolt had taken a paw and taken a clean off.
21:20
Speaker 4: I picked it up, but there was no blood. The
21:22
Speaker 4: skin was real and furry, all right, but the bone
21:25
Speaker 4: was steel and the muscles were springs.
21:27
Speaker 5: It wasn't any four-legged monkey. It was a robot.
21:38
Speaker 8: Planet Director 7396 recording progress report on attack day. Due
21:43
Speaker 8: to component tube failure, small robot unit out of control.
21:48
Speaker 8: Wandered towards settlement. Took calculated risk with poor seeing due
21:52
Speaker 8: to snow that humans would overlook it and still think
21:55
Speaker 8: of it as an animal. Even firing with ports open.
21:58
Speaker 8: But a part of the robot is missing and the
22:00
Speaker 8: humans have found it. There will be no chance to
22:02
Speaker 8: disable the smaller ship now. In order to carry out
22:06
Speaker 8: total destruction, the settlement will have to be detonated. The
22:09
Speaker 8: settlement will have to be bombed from previously planted locations.
22:13
Speaker 8: I will have to leave control bunker for a more
22:14
Speaker 8: distant position as soon as protective armor is put on.
22:18
Speaker 8: I will proceed to carry out this plan. I realize
22:22
Speaker 8: this is not the ideal operation. It is more disciplined
22:25
Speaker 8: to capture humans and their equipment undamaged, but total destruction
22:29
Speaker 8: is necessary. For further operations, recommend duplication of essential controls
22:34
Speaker 8: on robots. The procedure of planting them on worlds before
22:37
Speaker 8: colonization by humans in the shape of local animals demands
22:41
Speaker 8: perfect operation when attack day arrives, or the resident director
22:44
Speaker 8: planted at the same time on each world will be
22:47
Speaker 8: unable to carry through attack plans.
22:49
Speaker 2: Now leaving bunker.
23:00
Speaker 4: That's how they got the ship, all right. Probably slipped
23:02
Speaker 4: a wiggle through the aft port and left it in
23:04
Speaker 4: there to foul the lining.
23:07
Speaker 5: What else they've got? Probably all kinds of things. Must
23:10
Speaker 5: have been some kind of lizard that went under and
23:12
Speaker 5: cut the wire.
23:13
Speaker 4: A spicer lizard. They can burrow underground. And we've got
23:16
Speaker 4: a bat that could do aerial reconnaissance for them. They
23:19
Speaker 4: know everything about you, and we don't know anything about them.
23:21
Speaker 4: They're probably sitting out there right now, swarming behind those trees,
23:24
Speaker 4: waiting for it to get nice and dark. All right,
23:28
Speaker 4: you better get back to the others and tell them
23:29
Speaker 4: I'll stay here.
23:30
Speaker 6: Why?
23:31
Speaker 5: Because we only need one.
23:33
Speaker 4: If we could just get one back to a lab,
23:35
Speaker 4: we'd have some clue to what they are. We can't
23:37
Speaker 4: just cut and run. We've got to make a stand.
23:39
Speaker 4: I didn't think the Army made stands. I thought they
23:41
Speaker 4: just pulled out. Yeah, I suppose so. An Army does
23:44
Speaker 4: what it has to, and ours is weak and filled
23:46
Speaker 4: with men like me. But even so, there comes a
23:48
Speaker 4: time when you have to make a stand. I stayed
24:09
Speaker 4: out there in the snow. I wasn't thinking very calmly.
24:12
Speaker 4: It was too cold. But it was probably just as well.
24:17
Speaker 4: I put in about ten minutes being afraid of whatever
24:20
Speaker 4: it was that.
24:20
Speaker 5: Was behind those trees. What I needed was luck. Just good,
24:25
Speaker 5: plain old luck.
24:27
Speaker 4: I didn't know where they were or how many there
24:28
Speaker 4: were or what kind, so I needed luck.
24:32
Speaker 5: I started to inch forward in the snow.
24:34
Speaker 4: There was nothing but quiet in the trees. I got
24:40
Speaker 4: past the first trunk. My elbow hit a rock and
24:43
Speaker 4: it hurt. My feet were cold. And then I heard
24:47
Speaker 4: a noise.
24:48
Speaker 5: The thing was moving down the left side of a
24:50
Speaker 5: gorge up ahead. I got up on my knees.
24:53
Speaker 4: I blew on my fingers. I threw the charge level
24:55
Speaker 4: on my pistol over the floor. It was a great
24:58
Speaker 4: black lump on a platform. The platform had legs and
25:02
Speaker 4: was plodding up a path that came right past me.
25:06
Speaker 4: It hadn't seen me yet, but it would. There were
25:09
Speaker 4: five of those little monkeys skipping on before it, acting
25:11
Speaker 4: as eyes. Then one of them spotted me and started running.
25:15
Speaker 4: My first shot took the monkey in the head, and
25:16
Speaker 4: then I aimed for the lump on the platform.
25:32
Speaker 5: They got one.
25:32
Speaker 4: Blast off before I hit anything vital. It burned across
25:35
Speaker 4: my shoulder, my shirt charred. It felt as if I'd
25:37
Speaker 4: been hit in the arm with an axe. Nothing else moved.
25:42
Speaker 4: The monkeys were stiff like statues in the platforms on
25:45
Speaker 4: its side. Through a hole in the black lump, something
25:49
Speaker 4: gray and soft was oozing out. I looked around and
25:53
Speaker 4: saw the robots frozen, and I realized I'd got them.
25:57
Speaker 4: I'd hit the guide, the alien who was directing the robots.
26:01
Speaker 4: I kicked at it with my foot. It was too
26:04
Speaker 4: big and heavy to carry. I'd have to send someone
26:06
Speaker 4: back for it. But I wanted to take something, so
26:09
Speaker 4: I grabbed one of the monkeys by his stiff, jutting
26:11
Speaker 4: arm and began to drag it back to the village.
26:19
Speaker 4: We put the alien in a freeze tank and shipped
26:21
Speaker 4: it back to Earth. They learned a lot in the lab,
26:25
Speaker 4: but out there in the colony, we learned a lot more.
26:28
Speaker 4: we learned that man wasn't born to live out his
26:30
Speaker 4: days at home by the fire. In the wee black
26:33
Speaker 4: corner of space which man had taken for his own,
26:36
Speaker 4: other men were learning. And the snow fell in the
26:39
Speaker 4: planet's world, and when it was spring, where I had fought,
26:43
Speaker 4: men were already leaping back out to the stars.
26:52
Speaker 3: You have just heard X-1 presented by the National Broadcasting
26:55
Speaker 3: Company in cooperation with Galaxy Science Fiction Magazine, which this
27:00
Speaker 3: month features The Native Problem by Robert Sheckley, in which
27:04
Speaker 3: a misfit discovers that there is not plenty of room
27:06
Speaker 3: in space for his kind, that in fact there is
27:09
Speaker 3: less room in space for him than anywhere else. Galaxy Magazine,
27:15
Speaker 3: on your newsstand today. Tonight by transcription, X-1 has brought
27:19
Speaker 3: you Soldier Boy. A story from the pages of Galaxy
27:23
Speaker 3: written by Michael Schera and adapted for radio by Ernest Canoy.
27:27
Speaker 5: Featured in the cast were Larry.
27:28
Speaker 3: Haynes as Dylan, Ralph Bell as Basio, Alan Hewitt as Russell,
27:33
Speaker 3: Bob Hastings as the shore patrolman, Wendell Holmes as the colonel,
27:37
Speaker 3: and Kermit Murdoch as the alien.
27:40
Speaker 2: Your narrator was Floyd Mack. This is Fred Collins speaking.
27:43
Speaker 3: X-1 was directed by Daniel Sutter and is an NBC
27:47
Speaker 3: Radio Network production.
28:03
Speaker 5: Thank you.
28:48
Speaker 3: Now Groucho can be heard on Saturdays, and he's on
28:50
Speaker 3: at a time when every member of the family, from
28:52
Speaker 3: junior to grandpa, can join in the laughter that goes
28:55
Speaker 3: with each question and answer session. A new day, a
28:58
Speaker 3: new hour, but the very same fun and good times
29:01
Speaker 3: that have made Groucho and You Bet Your Life so
29:03
Speaker 3: popular throughout the years. Have you ever met a hamburger
29:07
Speaker 3: king or an earthworm farmer or a famous beauty contest winner? Well,
29:11
Speaker 3: these are some of those who have appeared as Groucho's guests.
29:15
Speaker 3: Who will be his guests tomorrow? Well, that's a secret,
29:17
Speaker 3: but you can bet your life they'll be full of
29:19
Speaker 3: fun and surprises. Have you ever heard Groucho sing his
29:22
Speaker 3: classic Captain Spalding or throw a romantic line at a
29:26
Speaker 3: pretty girl? Well, listen in and you'll find out. Hear
29:30
Speaker 3: music in the Morgan Manor, Russ Morgan, live weekday mornings
29:34
Speaker 3: on NBC Bandstand.
29:42
Speaker 1: You have heard X-1 Soldier Boy. Good night from the
29:45
Speaker 1: far edge of settled space.