(PSP #25) Fantastic Universe Super Pack #2: ISBN: 978-1-5154-0-654-9
(PSP #26) Fantastic Universe Super Pack #3: ISBN: 978-1-5154-0-655-6
(PSP #27) Imagination Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-1-089-8
(PSP #28) Planet Stories Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-1-125-3
(PSP #29) Worlds of If Super Pack #1: ISBN: 978-1-5154-1-148-2
(PSP #30) Worlds of If Super Pack #2: ISBN: 978-1-5154-1-182-6
(PSP #31) Worlds of If Super Pack #3: ISBN: 978-1-5154-1-234-2
(PSP #32) The Dragon Super Pack: 978-1-5154-1-124-6
(PSP #33) Fritz Leiber Super Pack #1: ISBN: 978-1-5154-1-847-4
(PSP #34) Wizard of Oz Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-1-872-6
(PSP #35) The Vampire Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-3-954-7
(PSP #36) The Doctor Dolittle Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-4-296-7
(PSP #37) Charles Boardman Hawes Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-4-384-1
(PSP #38) The Edgar Wallace Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-4-387-2
(PSP #39) Inspector Gabriel Hanaud Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-4-385-8
(PSP #40) Tarzan Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-4497-8
(PSP #41) Algis Budry Super Pack: ISBN: 978-1-5154-4496-1
(PSP #42) Max Brand Western Super Pack: ISBN 978-1-63384-841-2
Acknowledgments
“Doorstep” by Keith Laumer originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, February 1961.
“The Chasers” by Daniel F. Galouye originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, February 1961.
“Blueblood” by Jim Harmon originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, December 1960.
“Bad Memory” by Patrick Fahy originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, December 1960.
“Beach Scene” by Marshall King originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, October 1960.
“The Reluctant Heroes” by Frank M. Robinson originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, January 1951.
“Kreativity for Kats” by Fritz Leiber originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, April 1961.
“Perfect Answer” by L. J. Stecher, Jr. originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, June 1958.
Dumbwaiter” by James Stamers originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, February 1960.
“The Ignoble Savages” by Evelyn E. Smith originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, March 1957.
“Angel’s Egg” by Edgar Pangborn originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, June 1951.
“Survival Type” by J.F. Bone originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, March 1957.
“Misbegotten Missionary” by Isaac Asimov originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, November 1950.
“The Business, as Usual” by Jack Sharkey originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, August 1960.
“No Substitutions” by Jim Harmon originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, November 1958.
“Prime Difference” by Alan E. Nourse originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, June 1957.
“Delay in Transit” by F. L. Wallace originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, September 1952.
“My Lady Greensleeves” by Frederik Pohl originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, February 1957.
“A Little Journey” by Ray Bradbury originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, August 1951.
“Med Ship Man” by Murray Leinster originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, October 1963.
“Spoken for” by William Morrison originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, July 1955.
“A Pail of Air” by Fritz Leiber originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, December 1951.
“Contagion” by Katherine MacLean originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, October 1950.
“Pen Pal” by Milton Lesser originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, July 1951.
“Delayed Action” by Charles Vincent de Vet originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, September 1953.
“... and it Comes out Here” by Lester del Rey originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, February 1951.
The Old Die Rich by H. L. Gold originally appeared in Galaxy Magazine, March 1953.
Doorstep
By Keith Laumer
The general was bucking for his other star—and this miserable contraption bucked right back!
*
Steadying his elbow on the kitchen table serving as desk, Brigadier General Straut leveled his binoculars and stared out through the second-floor window of the farmhouse at the bulky object lying canted at the edge of the wood lot. He watched the figures moving over and around the gray mass, then flipped the lever on the field telephone at his elbow.
“How are your boys doing, Major?”
“General, since that box this morning—”
“I know all about the box, Bill. So does Washington by now. What have you got that’s new?”
“Sir, I haven’t got anything to report yet. I have four crews on it, and she still looks impervious as hell.”
“Still getting the sounds from inside?”
“Intermittently, General.”
“I’m giving you one more hour, Major. I want that thing cracked.”
The general dropped the phone back on its cradle and peeled the cellophane from a cigar absently. He had moved fast, he reflected, after the State Police notified him at nine forty-one last night. He had his men on the spot, the area evacuated of civilians, and a preliminary report on its way to Washington by midnight. At two thirty-six, they had discovered the four-inch cube lying on the ground fifteen feet from the huge object—missile, capsule, bomb—whatever it was. But now—several hours later—nothing new.
The field phone jangled. Straut grabbed it up.
“General, we’ve discovered a thin spot up on the top side. All we can tell so far is that the wall thickness falls off there....”
“All right. Keep after it, Bill.”
This was more like it. If Brigadier General Straut could have this thing wrapped up by the time Washington awoke to the fact that it was something big—well, he’d been waiting a long time for that second star. This was his chance, and he would damn well make the most of it.
*
He looked across the field at the thing. It was half in and half out of the woods, flat-sided, round-ended, featureless. Maybe he should go over and give it a closer look personally. He might spot something the others were missing. It might blow them all to kingdom come any second; but what the hell, he had earned his star on sheer guts in Normandy. He still had ‘em.
He keyed the phone. “I’m coming down, Bill,” he told the Major.