Deathworld

The first book of a trilogy, Deathworld (written by Harry Harrison, originally published in 1960 as a serialized series in Astounding Science Fiction) is the story of Jason dinAlt, a professional gambler who is asked by Kerk to gamble and win a very large sum of money. Eventually Jason travels to Kerk's home planet, Pyrrus, and finds that it is the most dangerous place he has been to in his life.

## Plot Summary

Jason dinAlt, a professional gambler is on the planet Cassylia when he meets Kerk, the ambassador from Pyrrus who provides a large sum of money and asks him to risk it to win a gargantuan sum. Jason has some *psi* abilbity which he can use to control the games in his favor, but, it comes and goes beyond his control. After winning the needed sum, and Cassyia tries to capture Jason and Kerk to get their money back, Jason on a whim decides to accompany Kerk back to Pyrrus. Pyrrus is a planet with a gravity of 2*g*, an axial tilt of 42° causing a very severe climate, and has the most dangerous lifeforms Jason has ever met, virtually all of them are almost instantly lethal to humans, and all evolve so quickly that even or short trips away from Pyrrus, all need to be retrained before going back outdoors. Pyrrus was formed after several supernovae allowing a core with higher than normal concentrations of heavy metals and some radioisotopes. Local volcanism brings these materials to the surface making this a desirable mining center.

Because of these conditions, the mining and the struggle against the environment and lifeforms takes a severe toll on the colonists of the mining city and the population has been steadily decreasing over the previous three hundred years or so from an original 55,000 to just over 30,000.

Jason never really acclimated to the planet and turns his attention to the plight of the locals and how to help them deal with it, perhaps to improve conditions. Finding scant records of the past, and what he finds indicates that the lifeforms weren't so dangerous in the distant past, he tries to figure out the reason for the fight against humans.

After a month or two, Jason leaves the city and discovers other humans known to the city dwellers as the 'grubbers' who seem to live in harmony with the local life and has taken up farming, but, has no access to technology or contact with off-planet. The grubbers hate the city dwellers, or the 'junkmen' as they call them.

Studying the grubbers and how they interact with the native lifeforms, he also notices that some of the grubbers have some *psi* ability and can control them with this thought ability. Approaching the city from the outside, he can sense, with his *psi,* that the lifeforms around the city just SCREAM with *psi* to KILL THE ENEMY, i.e. the humans. It seems to be a coordinated effort subconsciously against the city.

Jason builds a *psi* detector to see if he can determine where this *psi* control comes from and determines that it is from an island offshore. Using the spaceship, he wants to go there to see if he can communicate with them, but Kerk and the city go there to destroy them. The island is destroyed by a nuclear weapon launched from the ship, but, the city is attacked worse than ever before and Kerk blames Jason and attempts to kill him, Jason escapes in an escape pod, but, Kerk shoots him down. Jason crash lands in a swamp.

Escaping injured, from the pod, Jason starts to walk, trying to locate the grubbers. Some wild beasts try to take Jason and he runs out of ammunition in his gun before shooting all of them. The grubbers later find him unconscious. Taking him back with them, he is nursed back to health.

Later he and some of the junkmen break into the city and take over the spaceship and threaten to destroy it if they don't talk. Kerk allows the talks to begin. A grubber demonstrates with one of the most dangerous animals of the city border that if the animal is not hungry or is attacked that it won't attack a human. Jason demonstrates that he can do this, too. Then the city's science directors tries this, too, with success.

Jason then convinces the junkmen and grubbers alike that a select number of grubbers will live with some of the junkman and they can learn from each other in cooperation and share technology and goods. In return, the grubbers will have access to travel with the junkmen with the planet's only spaceship so that they can have access to the rest of the galaxy. Eventually, the city will fall, but, some of the junkman will learn to live with the planet and the grubbers will have access to the outside; the result will be that there will be no junkmen and grubbers, only Pyrrans.

Perhaps, some of the Pyrrans will use their combined skills and move on to other planets.

## Characters

Brucco, Pyrran junkman, science director, head of the adaptation clinic on Pyrrus.

Grif, Pyrran junkman, an eight-year old Pyrran assigned as bodyguard to Jason.

Ellus, Arms dealer on Cassylia.

Hananas, grubber who could predict earthquakes.

Har Palo, one of the original colonists; he maintained the theory that local volcanism kept the ground around the city warmer and will improve crop yield.

Jason dinAlt, professional gambler, protaginist of the Deathworld series.

Kerk Pyhrrus, Leader of the city dwellers (junkmen) of Pyhrrus, Ambassador to at least seven planets.

Kurkowski, Captain of *S.T. Pollux Victory*, the transport ship that brought the original 55,000 colonists to Pyrrus from Setani.

Krannon, junkman who was the trader with the grubbers.

Meta, junkman (or is it junkwoman?), pilot of Pyrran spaceship.

Mervv, junkman.

Naxa, grubber, talker.

Har Palo, one of the group travelling to Pyrrus aboard the *S.T. Pollux Victory*.

Poli, permanently disabled junkman, keeper of the technical library in the city on Pyrrus.

Rhes, leader of the grubbers of Pyrrus, befriended Jason dinAlt.

Skop, junkman of Pyrrus.

Teca, junkman and biologist on Pyrrus.

Wain, Vice President of the bank on Cassylia.

Welf, last surviving son of Kerk.

## Locations

Bessos, natural satellite of Pyrrus.

Cassylia, gambling planet in the same system as Darkhan.

Darkhan, planet in the same star system as Cassylia.

Pyrrus, home planet of Kerk, Meta, and the other Pyrrans, junkmen and grubbers.

Samas, one of the two natural satellites of Pyrrus.

Setani, home planet from which the Pyrrans came aboard the Stellar Transport *Pollux Victory*.