CHAPTER XXXVI - The Battle in
the Crater
Grantline led us. We held about level. Five hundred
feet beneath us the brigand ship lay, cradled on the rocks. When it was still a
mile away from us I could see all its outline fairly clearly in the dimness.
Its tiny hull-windows were now dark; but the blurred shape of the hull was
visible and above it the rounded cap of dome, with a dim radiance beneath it.
We followed
Grantline's platform. It was rising, drawing the others after it like a tail. I
touched Anita where she lay beside me with her head half in the small hooded
control-bank.
"Going too
high."
She nodded, but
followed the line nevertheless. It was Grantline's command.
I lay crouched,
holding the inner tips of the flexible side-shields. The bottom of the platform
was covered with the insulated fabric. There were two side-shields. They
extended upward some two feet, flexible so that I could hold them out to see
over them, or draw them up and in to cover us.
They afforded a
measure of protection against the hostile rays, though just how much we were
not sure. With the platform level, a bolt from beneath could not harm us unless
it continued for a considerable time. But the platform, except upon direct
flight, was seldom level, for it was a frail, unstable little vehicle! To
handle it was more than a question of the controls. We balanced, and helped to
guide it, with the movement of our bodies—shifting our weight sidewise, or
back, or forward to make it dip as the controls altered the gravity-pull in its
tiny plate-sections.
Like a bird,
wheeling, soaring, swooping. To me, it was a precarious business.
But now we were in straight flight diagonally
upward. The outline of the brigand ship came under us. I crouched tense,
breathless; every moment it seemed that the brigands must discover us and loose
their bolts.
They may have
seen us for some moments before they fired. I peered over the side-shield down
at our mark, then up ahead to get Grantline's firing signal. It seemed long
delayed. We were almost over the ship. An added glow down there must have
warned Grantline that a shot was coming. The tiny red light flared bright on
his platform.
I hissed on our
Benson curve-light radiance. We had been dark, but a soft glow now enveloped
us. Its sheen went down to the ship to reveal us. But its curving path showed
us falsely placed. I saw the little line of platforms ahead of us seem to move
suddenly sidewise.
It was everyone
for himself now; none of us could tell where the other platforms actually were
placed or headed. Anita swooped us sharply down to avoid a possible collision.
"Gregg—?"
"Yes. I'm
aiming."
I was making
ready to drop the little explosive globe-bomb. Our search-light ray at the
camp, answering Grantline's signal, shot down and bathed the ship in a white
glare, revealing it for our aim. Simultaneously the brigand bolts came up at
us.
I held my bomb
out over the shield, calculating the angle to throw it down. The brigand rays
flashed around me. They were horribly close; Miko had understood our sudden
visible shift and aimed, not where we appeared to be, but where we had been a
moment before.
I dropped my bomb hastily at the glowing white
ship. The touch of a hostile ray would have exploded it in my hand. I could see
its blue-sizzling fuse as it fell. I saw the others also dropping from our
nearby platforms. The explosions from them merged in a confusion of the white
glare—and a cloud of black light-mist as the brigands out on the rocks used
their occulting darkness bombs.
We swept past in
a blur of leaping hostile beams. Silent battle of lights! Darkness bombs down
at the ship struggling to bar our camp search-ray. The Benson radiance-rays
from our passing platforms curving down to mingle with the confusion. The
electronic rays sending up their bolts...
Our platforms
dropped some ten dynamitrine bombs in that first passage over the ship. As we
sped by, I dimmed the Benson's radiance. I peered. We had not hit the ship. Or
if we had, the damage was inconclusive. But on the rocks I could see a pile of
ore-carts scattered—broken wreckage, in which the litter of two or three
projectors seemed strewn. And the gruesome deflated forms of several helmeted
figures. Others seemed, to be running, scattering—hiding in the rocks and
pit-holes. Twenty brigands at least were outside the ship. Some were running
over toward the base of our camp-ledge. The darkness bombs were spreading like
a curtain over the valley floor; but it seemed that some of the figures were
dragging their projectors away.
We sailed off
toward the opposite crater-rim. I remember passing over the broken wreckage of
Grantline's little space-ship, the Comet. Miko's bolts momentarily had
vanished. We had hit some of his outside projectors; the others were abandoned,
or being dragged to safer positions.
After a mile we wheeled and went back. I suddenly
realized that only four platforms were in the re-formed line ahead of us. One
was missing! I saw it now, wavering down, close over the ship. A bolt leaped up
diagonally from a distant angle on the rocks and caught the disabled platform.
It fell, whirling, glowing red—disappeared into the blur of darkness like a bit
of heated metal plunged into water.
One out of six of
our platforms already lost! Three men of our little force gone!
But Grantline led
us desperately back. Anita caught his signal to break our line. The five
platforms scattered, dipping and wheeling like frightened birds—blurring
shapes, shifting unnaturally in flight as the Benson curve-angles were altered.
Anita now took
our platform in a long swoop downward. Her tense, murmured voice sounded in my
ears:
"Hold off:
I'll take us low."
A melee. Passing
platform shapes. The darting bolts, crossing like ancient rapiers. Falling blue
points of fuse-lights as we threw our bombs.
Down in a swoop.
Then rising. Away, and then back. This silent warfare of lights! It seemed that
around me must be bursting a pandemonium of sound. Yet I heard nothing. Silent,
blurred melee, infinitely frightening. A bolt struck us, clung for an instant;
but we weathered it. The light was blinding. Through my gloves I could feel the
tingle of the over-charged shield as it caught and absorbed the hostile
bombardment. Under me the platform seemed heated. My little Erentz motors ran
with ragged pulse. I got too much oxygen; my head roared with it. Spots danced
before my closed eyes. Then not enough oxygen. I was dully smothering...
Then the bolt was
gone. I found us soaring upward, horribly tilted. I shifted over.
"Anita!
Anita, dear!"
"Yes. Gregg.
All right."
The melee went on. The brigand ship and all its
vicinity was enveloped in darkness-mist now—a turgid sable curtain, made more
dense by the dissipating heavy fumes of our exploding bombs which settled low
over the ship and the rocks nearby. The search-light from our camp strove
futilely to penetrate the cloud.
Our platforms
were separated. One went by high over us; I saw another dart close beneath my
shield.
"God,
Anita!"
"Too close!
I did not mean that—I didn't see it."
Almost a
collision.
"Oh, Gregg,
haven't we broken the ship's dome yet?"
It seemed not. I
had dropped nearly all my bombs. This could not go on much longer. Had it been
only five minutes? Only that? Reason told me so, yet it seemed an eternity of
horror.
Another swoop. My
last bomb. Anita had brought us into position to fling it. But I could not. A
bolt stabbed up from the gloom and caught us. We huddled, pulling the shields
up and over us.
Blurred darkness
again. Too much to the side now. I had to wait while Anita swung us back. Then
we seemed too high.
We swooped. But
not too low! Down in the darkness-mist we would immediately have lost
direction, and crashed.
I waited with my
last bomb. The other platforms were occasionally dropping them: I had been too
hasty, too prodigal.
Had we broken the
ship's dome with a direct hit? It seemed not.
The brigands were occasionally sending up
catapulted light-flares. They came from positions on the rocks outside the
ship. They mounted in lazy curves and burst over us. The concealing darkness,
broken only by the flares of our explosions, enveloped the enemy. Our camp
search-light was still struggling with it. But overhead, where the few little
platforms were circling and swooping, the flares gave an almost continuous
glare. It was dazzling, blinding. Even through the smoked pane which I adjusted
to my visor I could not stand it.
But there were
thoughts of comparative dimness. In a patch where the Earthlight struck through
the darkness of the rocks, I saw another of our fallen platforms! Snap and
Venza! Dear God...
It was not they,
but three figures of our men. One was dead. Two had survived the fall. They
stood up, staggering. And in that instant, before the turgid black curtain
closed over them, I saw two brigands come rushing. Their hand projectors
stabbed at close range. Our men crumpled and fell.
And now I saw why
probably we had never yet hit the ship.
Its outline was
revealed. "Now, Gregg—can you fling it from here?"
We were in
position again. I flung my last missile, watched its light as it dropped. On
the dome-roof two of Miko's men were crouching. My bomb was truly aimed—perhaps
one of the few in all our bombardment which would have landed directly on the
dome-roof. But the waiting marksmen fired at it with short-range heat
projectors and exploded it harmlessly while it was still above them.
We swung up and
away. I saw, high above us, Grantline's platform, recognizing its red signal
light. There seemed a lull. The enemy fire had died down to only a very
occasional bolt. In the confusion of my whirling impressions I wondered if Miko
were in distress? Not that! We had not hit his ship; perhaps we had done little
damage indeed! It was we who were in distress. Two of our platforms had
fallen—two out of six. Or more, of which I did not know.
I saw one rising off to the side of us. Grantline
was over us. Well, we were at least three. And then I saw the fourth.
"Grantline
is calling us up, Gregg."
"Yes."
Grantline's
signal-light was summoning us from the attack. He was a thousand or two
thousand feet above.
I was suddenly
shocked with horror. The search-ray from our camp abruptly vanished! Anita
wheeled us to face the distant ledge. The camp-lights showed, and over one of
the buildings was a distress light!
Had the crack in
our front wall broken, threatening explosion of all the buildings? The wild
thoughts swept me. But it was not that. I could see light-stabs from the cliff
outside the main building. Miko had dared to send some of his men to attack our
almost abandoned camp!
Grantline
realized it. His red helmet-light semaphored the command to follow him. His
platform soared away, heading for the camp, with the other two behind him.
Anita lifted us
to follow. But I checked her.
"No! Off to
the right, across the valley."
"But
Gregg!"
"Do as I
say, Anita."
She swung us
diagonally away from both the camp and the brigand ship. I prayed that we might
not be noticed by the brigands.
"Anita,
listen: I've an idea!"
The attack on the
brigand ship was over. It lay enveloped in the darkness of the powder-gas cloud
and its own darkness bombs. But it was uninjured.
Miko had answered
us with our own tactics. He had practically unmanned the ship, no doubt, and
had sent his men to our buildings. The fight had shifted. But I was now without
ammunition, save for two or three small bullet projectors.
Of what use for
our platform to rush back? Miko expected that. His attack on the camp was
undoubtedly made just for that purpose.
"Anita, if
we can get down on the rocks somewhere near the ship, and creep up on it
unobserved in that blackness..."
I might be able to open its manual hull-lock, rip
it open and let the air out. If I could get into its pressure chamber and
unseal the inner slide...
"It would
wreck the ship, Anita, exhaust all its air. Shall we try it?"
"Whatever
you say, Gregg."
We seemed to be
unobserved. We skimmed close to the valley floor, a mile from the ship. We
headed slowly toward it, sailing low over the rocks.
Then we landed,
left the platform.
"Let me go
first, Anita."
I held a bullet
projector. With slow, cautious leaps, we advanced. Anita was behind me. I had
wanted to leave her with the platform, but she would not stay. And to be with
me seemed at least equally safe.
The rocks were
deserted. I thought there was very little chance that any of the enemy would
lurk here. We clambered over the pitted, scarred surface. The higher crags,
etched with Earthlight, stood like sentinels in the gloom.
The brigand ship
with its surrounding darkness was not far from us. Then we entered the cloud.
No one was out
here. We passed the wreckage of broken projectors, and gruesome, shattered
human forms.
We prowled
closer. The hull of the ship loomed ahead of us. All dark.
We came at last
close against the sleek metal hull-side, slid along it toward where I was sure
the manual-porte was located.
Abruptly I
realized that Anita was not behind me! Then I saw her at a little distance,
struggling in the grip of a giant helmeted figure! The brigand lifted her—turned,
and, carrying her, ran the other way!
I did not dare
fire. I bounded after them along the hull-side, around under the curve of the
pointed bow, down along the other side.
I had mistaken
the hull-porte location. It was here. The running, bounding figure reached it,
slid the panel. I was only fifty feet away—not much more than a single leap. I
saw Anita being shoved into the pressure lock. The Martian flung himself after
her.
I fired at him,
but missed. I came with a rush. And as I reached the porte it slid closed in my
face, barring me!
CHAPTER XXXVII - In the Pressure Lock.
With puny fists I pounded the panel. A small pane
in it was transparent. Within the lock I could see the blurred figures of Anita
and her captor—and, it seemed, another figure. The lock was some ten feet
square, with a low ceiling. It glowed with a dim tube-light.
I pounded,
thumped with futile, silent blows. The mechanism was here to open this manual;
but it was now clasped from within and would not operate.
A few seconds
only, while I stood there in a panic of confusion, raging to get in. This
disaster had come so suddenly! I did not plan; I had no thought save to batter
my way in and rescue Anita. I recall that I beat on the glassite pane with my
bullet projector until the weapon was bent and useless; and I flung it with a
wild, despairing rage at my feet.
They were letting
the ship's air-pressure into this lock. Soon they would open the inner panel,
step into the secondary chamber—and in a moment more would be within the ship's
hull corridor. Anita, lost to me!
The outer panel
suddenly opened! I had lunged against it with my shoulder; the giant figure
inside slid it. I was taken by surprise! I half-fell inward.
Huge arms went
around me. The goggled face of the helmet peered into mine.
"So it is
you, Haljan! I thought I recognized that little device over your
helmet-bracket. And there is my little Anita, come back to me again!"
Miko!
This was he. His great bloated arms encircling me,
bending me backward, holding me almost helpless. I saw over his shoulder that
Anita was clutched in the grip of another helmeted figure. No giant, but tall
for an Earthman—almost as tall as myself. Then the tube-light in the room
illumined the visor. I saw the face, recognized it. Moa!
I gasped,
"So—I've—got you, Miko—"
"Got me!
You're a fool to the last, Gregg Haljan! A fool to the last! But you were
always a fool."
I could scarcely
move in his grip. My arms were pinned. As he slowly bent me backward, I wound
my legs around one of his; it was as unyielding as a steel pillar. He had
closed the outer panel; the air-pressure in the lock was rising. I could feel
it against my suit.
My helmeted head
was being forced backward; Miko's left arm held me. In his gloved right hand as
it came slowly up over my throat I saw a knife-blade, its naked, sharpened
metal glistening blue-white in the light from overhead.
I seized his
wrist. But my puny strength could not hold him. The knife, against all my
efforts, came slowly down.
A moment of this
slow deadly combat—the end of everything for me.
I was aware of
the helmeted figure of Moa casting off Anita—and then the two girls leaping
together upon Miko. It threw him off his balance, and my hanging weight made
him topple forward. He took a step to recover himself; his hand with the knife
was flung up with an instinctive, involuntary balancing gesture. And as it came
swiftly down again, I forced the knife-blade to graze his throat. Its point
caught in the fabric of his suit.
His startled oath
jangled in my ears. The girls were clawing at him; we were all four scrambling,
swaying. With despairing strength I twisted at his waist. The knife went into
his throat. I plunged it deeper.
His suit went flabby. He crumpled over me and fell,
knocking me to the floor. His voice, with the horrible gurgling rasp of death
in it, rattled my ear-grids.
"Not such a
fool—are you, Haljan—"
Moa's helmeted
head was close over us. I saw that she had seized the knife, jerked it from her
brother's throat. She leaped backward, waving it.
I twisted from
under Miko's inert, lifeless body. As I got to my feet, Anita flung herself to
shield me. Moa was across the lock, backed up against its wall. The knife in her
hand went up. She stood for the briefest instant regarding Anita and me holding
each other. I thought that she was about to leap upon us; but before I could
move, the knife came down and plunged into her breast. She fell forward, her
grotesque helmet striking the floor-grid almost at my feet.
"Gregg!"
"She's
dead."
"No! She
moved! Get her helmet off! There's enough air here."
My helmet
pressure-indicator was faintly buzzing to show that a safe pressure was in the
room. I shut off Moa's Erentz motors, unfastened her helmet, raised it off. We
gently turned her body. She lay with closed eyes, her pallid face blue-cast
from the light in the lock.
With our own
helmets off, we knelt over her.
"Oh. Gregg,
is she dead?"
"No. Not
quite—but dying."
"Oh Gregg, I
don't want her to die! She was trying to help you there at the last."
She opened her
eyes; the film of death was glazing them. But she saw me, recognized me.
"Gregg—"
"Yes, Moa,
I'm here."
Her livid lips were faintly drawn in a smile.
"I'm—so glad—you took the helmets off, Gregg. I'm—going—you know."
"No!"
"Going—back
to Mars—to rest with the fire-makers—where I came from. I was thinking—maybe
you would kiss me, Gregg—?"
Anita gently
pushed me down. I pressed the white, faintly smiling lips with mine. She
sighed, and it ended with a rattle in her throat.
"Thank
you—Gregg—closer—I can't talk so loudly—"
One of her gloved
hands struggled to touch me, but she had no strength and it fell back. Her
words were the faintest of whispers:
"There was
no use living—without your love. But I want you to see—now—that a Martian girl
can—die with a smile—"
Her eyelids
fluttered down: it seemed that she sighed and then was not breathing. But on
her livid face the faint smile still lingered to show me how a Martian girl
could die.
We had forgotten
for the moment where we were. As I glanced up I saw that through the inner
panel, past the secondary lock, the ship's hull-corridor was visible, and along
its length a group of Martians were advancing! They saw us, and came running.
"Anita!
Look! We've got to get out of here!"
The secondary
lock was open to the corridor. We jammed on our helmets. The unhelmeted
brigands by then were fumbling at the inner panel. I pulled at the lever of the
outer panel. The brigands were hurrying, thinking they could be in time to stop
me. One of the more cautious fumbled with a helmet.
"Anita, run!
Try and keep your feet."
I slid the outer
panel and pushed at Anita. Simultaneously the brigands opened the inner porte.
The air came with
a tempestuous rush. A blast through the inner porte—through the little
pressure-lock—a wild rush out to the airless Moon. All the air in the ship
madly rushing to escape...
Like feathers we
were blown with it. I recall an impression of the hurtling brigand figures and
swift-flying rocks under me. A silent crash as I struck.
Then soundless,
empty blackness.
CHAPTER XXXVIII - Triumph!
Is he conscious? We'd better take him back, get his
helmet off."
"It's over.
We can get back now. Venza, dear, we've won—it's over."
"He hears
us!"
"Gregg!"
"He hears
us—he's all right!"
I opened my eyes.
I lay on the rocks. Over my helmet other helmets were peering, and faint,
familiar voices mingled with the roaring in my ears.
"—back to
the camp and get his helmet off."
"Are his
motors smooth? Keep them right, Snap—he must have good air."
I seemed unhurt.
But Anita...
She was here.
"Gregg, dear one!"
Anita safe! All
four of us here on the Earthlit rocks, close outside the brigand ship.
"Anita!"
She held me,
lifted me. I was uninjured. I could stand; I staggered up and stood swaying.
The brigand ship, a hundred feet away, loomed dark and silent, a lifeless bulk,
already empty of air, drained in that mad blast outward. Like the wreck of the
Planetara—a dead, pulseless hulk already.
We four stood
together, triumphant. The battle was over. The brigands were worsted, almost
the last man of them dead or dying. No more than ten or fifteen had been
available for that final assault upon the camp buildings. Miko's last strategy.
I think perhaps he had intended, with his few remaining men, to take the ship
and make away, deserting his fellows.
All on the ship,
caught unhelmeted by the explosion, were dead long since.
I stood listening
to Snap's triumphant account. It had not been difficult for the flying
platforms to hunt down the attacking brigands on the open rocks. We had only
lost one more platform.
Human hearts beat
sometimes with very selfish emotions. It was a triumphant ending for us, and we
hardly gave a thought that half of Grantline's little group had perished.
We huddled on
Snap's platform. It rose, lurching drunkenly, barely carrying us.
And as we headed
for the Grantline buildings, where still the rift in the wall had not quite
broken, there came the final triumph. Miko had been aware of it, and knew he
had lost. Grantline's search-light leaped upward, swept the sky, caught its
sought-for object—a huge silver cylinder, bathed brightly in the white search-beam
glare.
The police-ship
from Earth!
CHAPTER XXXIX - My Exit
My narrative lies now in this permanently recorded
form before you, and I prepare my exit bow with the humble hope that I may have
given you pleasure. If so, I do beg you to tell me of it. There are some who
already have flashed their approval of my discs; I thank them most earnestly
and gratefully.
My errors of
recording unquestionably are many; and for them I ask your indulgence. There
have been, I can readily see, errors of omission. I have not mentioned, for
instance, the final rescue of the Planetara's marooned passengers on the
asteroid. You will bear with me, since the disc-space has its technical
limitations, that such omissions have been unavoidable.
Since the passage
of the Earth-law by the Federated Board of Education, forcing narrative fiction
to cling so closely to sworn facts of actual happening, I need offer no
assurance of the truth of my narrative. My witnesses have filed their
corroborating declarations. Indeed, the Planetara's wreck and the brigands'
attack upon the Moon-treasure were given the widest news-casters' publicity, as
you all know. Yet I, who was unwittingly involved in those stirring events, may
have added a more personal note, making the scenes more vivid to your
imagination. I have tried to do that. I do hope that in some measure you will
think I have succeeded.
There are many
foolish girls now who say that they would like to know Gregg Haljan. They
doubtless would be very disappointed. I really crave no more publicity. And the
girls of all the Universe have no charm for me. There is only one, for me—an
Earth-girl.
I think that life
has very beautifully endowed me with its blessings.