World Beneath Ice. John Russell Fearn

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СКАЧАТЬ The Golden Amazon Returns, which concerned itself with V-2 attack and atomic power, as it well might be in the future, the superwoman seemed to settle down into a routine job; namely, the advancement of Earth’s scientific culture on the one hand, and the routing of menaces, physical and scientific, on the other. She changed her tactics also—realizing she was biting off too much in trying to rule the world, she instead decided to fight on the side of the law. She became a kind of super female Robin Hood with scientific trimmings, outwitting every kind of public menace, from shady financiers to master-scientists.

      With this novel came the beginnings of space travel, which were carried a stage further in The Golden Amazon’s Triumph, wherein the conquest of Venus was attempted, to a great extent successfully. Much business was left unfinished, however, and a Venusian menace returned in The Amazon’s Diamond Quest, said menace being effectually routed this time. In fact, it was not the main plot; this consisted of the discovery of a cavern of pure diamonds (created by volcanic action), which the Amazon had to protect from thieves both Venusian and Earthly. In her travels she routed the Chameleon Men of Venus—who could assume any form at will—which made her job difficult—and turned over the diamond cavern to the Earth authorities.

      Now that Venus is safely in the bag and a Space Line established (not by the Amazon, who is a lone wolf, but by her friends of the early days), the Amazon can apparently relax somewhat. But she finds that the menace of the earlier stories, Carl Mueller, had a daughter who, now grown up, proves as big a nuisance as her father. So in The Amazon Strikes Again, the Amazon sets off to deal with this scientific young woman, and her adventures carry her from a subtropical basin at the South Pole to the planet Venus once again, in the course of which the Earth is in danger of destruction from synthetically created tornadoes. Here on Venus, the menace angle is finished completely, and Venus is out of the picture—now a safe colony of Earth.

      In Twin Of The Amazon, pursuing her ideal to make the whole solar system one Union of the Universe, the Amazon next set out to conquer Mars—with a race of 5,000 highly-scientific Martians—to bring the apparently empty planet next in line as an Earth colony. But the Martians have similar aspirations for the Earth. The upshot is—after the Amazon is duplicated by the Martian Controllix and the Earth nearly brought to ruin because of it—that the last of the Martian armadas are tricked by the Amazon into being hurled into the sun. This leaves Mars as an empty world to be taken over.

      But the atomic power motors of the space machines which have been flung into the sun have a detrimental effect on the sun itself. This is the main theme of Conquest Of The Amazon. In this yarn the Amazon—with a new character, Abna of Atlantis—fights this time to restore the monarch of the heavens to his former glory, and at the same time has to live down the blame for causing this trouble....

      And so it goes on—Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto—and beyond. With a woman like the Amazon anything can—and probably will—happen!”

      * * * *

      It can be seen, therefore, that Fearn’s ‘origin story’ of the Golden Amazon was conceived, and actually set, during the Second World War. Subsequent novels were written during the war and the immediate postwar period, and projected their stories only a few decades into the future. They anticipated, in fictional form, the advent of space travel. Space travel was not developed by America and the Russians, but by the Golden Amazon and her friends—and enemies. Whilst his fictional conquest of space diverged greatly from the later reality, Fearn clearly foresaw that the space age was coming quickly, and would be directly based on the German terror weapon, the V-2 rocket projectile. (In Fearn’s second Amazon novel, the first expedition to the moon was accomplished by ex-Nazi scientists using advanced V-rockets!)

      In common with contemporary science fiction writers, Fearn operated on a canvas that was astronomically correct in terms of the knowledge of the 1940s. He could not be wiser than his time, however, so Venus was like the earth of millions of years ago, and the atmosphere of Mars was thin, but still breathable. Although these theories were already under challenge, science fiction authors deliberately used them in order to make their stories more exciting.

      So, as the novels continued, there were voyages to an inhabited Venus and Mars, but sensing that his series had ‘legs’ and would therefore soon become dated, Fearn decided to move it in a radical new direction. He very astutely realised that to keep ahead of reality he needed to move the Amazon further into the future—and into the outer solar system, and thence to the stars. So with the seventh novel, he introduced a new main character, Abna of Atlantis—someone as equally intelligent and even stronger than herself.

      Fearn’s strategy was a great success, and the Amazon novels retained their popularity, ending only with Fearn’s tragically early death in 1960, after he had written a further twenty Amazon novels, and made preliminary notes for his next (which I myself would later write).

      This new Borgo series will be reprinting all twenty-one of these later novels by Fearn, beginning with the seventh novel in the original series. First published in 1949 as Conquest of the Amazon, I have edited it slightly as World Beneath Ice (The Golden Amazon Saga #1), so that it can be read and enjoyed by new readers who may be totally unfamiliar with what had gone before.

      It is my hope that this new series may create many more “fans of the Amazon.” Meanwhile, any reader interested in seeking out the earlier six Golden Amazon novels will find that they are readily available on the internet, in numerous earlier paperback and hardcover editions.

      CHAPTER ONE

      INTO THE SUN

      Hour after hour the woman sat tirelessly at the controls of her spaceship, the Ultra, unable to trust the plan she had in mind to the automatic pilot. With ever-mounting velocity, followed faithfully by the pursuing alien spacecraft she had earlier attacked—and thereby provoked into following her—she streaked in the direction of Mercury’s orbit. Mercury—a far-flung erratic little world, a withered walnut of a planet, scorched on his sunward side so that metals boiled.

      The woman’s attention was not concentrated on little Mercury away to her left in the void, however. Instead, she dropped a layer of dark shields over the outlook ports, and through them looked at the awe-inspiring majesty of the sun, lord of the solar system. With every second that passed the Ultra was speeding nearer to him, his brilliance becoming gradually so intense that she had to pile up more layers of darkening glass to ease her aching eyes.

      Through hours that seemed endless, she still sped on, keeping a wary eye on the instruments that registered the power of solar drag. Here, increasingly near the lord of light, space itself was slightly buckled out of true by the vast gravitational strains. The Ultra was inside the orbit of Mercury and still hurtling onwards, the shields over the ports now so dense that they were several inches thick; yet even at this, the intolerable sea of flame raging ahead made the woman fear that her sight would be permanently impaired. Yet, on the other hand, she dared not take her gaze away from that cauldron of fluid energies: upon it depended the success of her plan.

      Solar prominences reached out unfathomably into space: the corona filled all the void behind, that mighty searing circle sweeping ever nearer— Then, as the instruments showed that the deadline had been reached, she swung the Ultra violently sideways, and with a terrific burst of power swept diagonally to her former course, the sun to one side of her instead of straight ahead.

      According to the gauges, she had just crossed the divisional margin of safety between outer space and the gravitational field of the sun. Of necessity she gave the atomic power plant every vestige of energy in a desperate bid to tear free of the sun’s inexorable grip and fight back into the region where his influence would progressively weaken.

      Then, with a numbed feeling of horror, she began to wonder if she had left things until too late. She was not making any headway. СКАЧАТЬ