by Various
My heart was pounding as my first quick glance took in these details. I saw also that the room had four small oval window openings. They were breast-high above the floor; from the deck below I knew that the angle of vision was such that the men down there could not see into this room except to glimpse its upper portion near the ceiling. And the helio set was banked on a low table near the floor.
In a corner of the room a small ladder led through a ceiling trap to the cubby roof. This upper trap was open. Four feet above the room-roof was the arch of the dome, with the entrance to the upper exit-lock directly above us. The weapons and the belt of bombs were near this ascending ladder, evidently placed here as equipment for use from the top of the dome.
* * *
turned to the solitary duty-man. I must gain his confidence at once. Anita had laid her helmet aside. She spoke first.
"We were with Set Miko," she said smilingly, "in the wreck of the Planetara. You heard of it? We know where the treasure is."
This duty-man was a full seven feet tall, and the most heavy-set Martian I had ever seen. A tremendous, beetling-browed, scowling fellow. He stood with hands on his hips, his leather-garbed legs spread wide; and as I fronted him I felt like a child. He was silent, glaring down at me as I drew his attention from Anita.
"You speak English? We are not skilled with Martian."
I wondered if at the next time of sleep this fellow would be on duty here. I hoped not; it would not be easy to trick him and find an opportunity to flash a signal. But that task was some hours away as yet; I would worry about it when the time came. Just now I was concerned with Miko and his little band, who at any moment might arrive in sight. If we could persuade this scowling duty-man to turn the projector on them....
He answered me in ready English:
"You are the man Gregg Haljan? And this is the sister of George Prince—what do you want up here?"
"I am a navigator. Brotow wants me to pilot the ship when we advance to attack Grantline."
"This is not the control room."
"No, I know it isn't."
I put my helmet carefully on the floor-grid beside Anita's. I straightened to find the brigand gazing at her. He did not speak; he was still scowling. But in the dim blue glow of the cubby I caught the look in his eyes.
* * *
said hastily, "Grantline knows your ship has landed here on Archimedes. His camp is off there on the Mare Imbrium. He sent up a signal—you saw it, didn't you?—just before Miss Prince and I came aboard. He was trying to pretend that he was your Earth-party, Miko and Coniston."
"Why?"
The fellow turned his scowl on me, but Anita brought his gaze back to her. She put in quickly:
"Grantline, as Brother always said, has no great cunning. I believe he's planning now to creep up on us, catch us unaware by pretending that he is Miko."
"If he does that," I said, "we will turn this electronic projector on him and annihilate him. You have its firing mechanism here."
"Who told you so?" he shot at me.
I gestured. "I see it here. It's obvious. I'm skilled at trajectory-firing. If Grantline appears down there now, I'll help you—"
"Is it connected?" Anita demanded boldly.
"Yes," he said. "You have on your Erentz suits: are you going to the dome-roof? Then go."
But that was what we did not want to do. Anita's glance seemed to tell me to let her handle this. I turned toward one of the cubby windows; she said sweetly:
"Are you in charge of this room? Show me how that projector is operated; it will be invincible against the Grantline camp."
"Yes."
* * *
had my back to them for a moment. Through the breast-high oval I could see down across the deck-space and out through the side dome windows. And my heart suddenly leaped into my throat. It seemed that down there in the Earthlit shadows, where the spreading base of the giant crater joined the plains, a light was bobbing. I gazed, stricken. Miko's lights? Was he advancing, preparing to signal? I tried to gauge the distance; it was not over two miles from here.
Or was it not a light at all? With the naked eye, I could not be sure. Perhaps there was a telescopic finder here in the cubby....
I was subconsciously aware of the voices of Anita and the duty-man behind me. Then abruptly I heard Anita's low cry. I whirled around.
The giant Martian had gathered her into his huge arms, his heavy-jowled gray face with a leering grin close to hers!
He saw me coming. He held her with one arm: his other flung at me, caught me, knocked me backward. He rasped:
"Get out of here! Go up to the dome, leave us."
Anita was silently struggling with her little hands at his thick throat. His blow flung me against a settle. But I held my feet. I was partly behind him. I leaped again, and as he tried to disengage himself from Anita to front me, her clutching fingers impeded him.
My bullet projector was in my hand. But in that second as I leaped, I had the sense to realize I should not fire it and with its noise alarm the ship. I grasped its barrel, reached upward and struck with its heavy metal butt. The blow caught the Martian on the skull, and simultaneously my body struck him.
We went down together, falling partly upon Anita. But the giant had not cried out, and as I gripped him now, I felt his body limp. I lay panting. Anita squirmed silently from under us. Blood from the giant's head was welling out, hot and sticky against my face as I lay sprawled on him.
* * *
cast him off. He was dead, his fragile Martian skull split open by my blow.
There had been no alarm. The slight noise we made had not been heard down on the busy deck. Anita and I crouched by the floor. From the deck all this part of the room could not be seen.
"Dead!"
"Oh, Gregg—"
It forced our hand. I could not wait now for Miko to come. But I could flash the Earth signal now, and then we would have to make our run to escape.
Abruptly I remembered that light down at the crater-base! I kept Anita out of sight on the floor and went cautiously to a window. The deck was in turmoil with brigands moving about excitedly. Not because of what had happened in our tower signal room; they were unaware of that.
Miko's signals were showing! I could see them now plainly, down at the crater-base. A group of hand-lights and a small waving helio-beam.
And they were being answered from the ship! Potan was on the deck—a babble of voices, above which his rose with roars of command. At one of the dome windows a brigand with a hand search-beam was sending its answering light. And I saw that Potan was working over a deck telescope-finder.
It had all come so suddenly that I was stunned. But I did not wait to read the signals. I swung back at Anita.
"It's Miko! And they are answering him! Get your helmet; I'll try firing the projector."
Or would I instead try to send a brief flash-signal to Earth? There would be no time to do both: we must escape out of here. The route up through the dome was the only feasible one now.
This range mechanism of the projector was reasonably familiar, and I felt that I could operate it. The range-finder and switch were on a ledge at one of the windows. I rushed to it. As I swung the little telescope, training it down on Miko's lights, I could see the huge projector on the deck swinging similarly. Its movement surprised the men who were attending it. One of them called up to me, but I ignored him.
* * *
hen Potan looked up and saw me. He shouted in Martian at the duty-man, whom he doubtless thought was behind me: "Be ready! We may fire on them, whoever they are. I'll give you the word."
The signals were proceeding. It had only been a moment. I caught something like, "Haljan is impostor."
I was aiming the projector. I was aware of Anita at my elbow. I pushed her back.
"Put on your helmet!"
I had the range. I flung the firing switch.
At the deck window the giant projector spat its deadly electronic stream. The men down
there leaped away from it with surprise. I heard Potan's voice, his shout of protest and anger.
But down in the Earthglow at the crater-base, Miko's lights had not vanished! I had missed! An error in the range? Abruptly I knew it was not that. Miko's lights were still there. His signals still coming. And I remarked now a faint distortion about them, the glow of his little group of hand-lights faintly distorted and vaguely shot with a greenish cast. Benson curve-lights! I realized it.
My thoughts whirled in the few seconds while I stood there at the tower window. Miko had feared he might summarily be fired upon. He had gone back to his camp, equipped all his lights with the Benson curve. He was somewhere at the crater-base now. But not where I thought I saw him! The Benson curve-light changed the path of the light-rays traveling from him to me—I could not even approximate his true position!
Anita was plucking at me. "Gregg, come."
"I can't hit him!" I gasped.
Should I try the flash-signal to Earth? Did we dare linger here? I stood another few seconds fascinated at the window. I saw Potan down in the confusion of the deck, training a telescope. He had shouted up violently at his duty-man here not to fire again.
And now he suddenly let out a roar. "I can see them! It's Miko! By the Almighty—his giant stature—Brotow, look! That's not an Earthman!"
He flung aside his little telescope finder. "Disconnect that projector! It's Miko down there! This Haljan is a trickster! Where is he? Braile—Braile, you accursed fool! Are Haljan and the girl up there with you?"
But the duty-man lay weltering in his blood at our feet.
I had dropped back from the window. Anita and I crouched for an instant in confusion, fumbling with our helmets.
The ship rang with the alarm. And amid the turmoil we could hear the shouts of the infuriated brigands swarming up the tower ladder after us!
CHAPTER XXXII
A Speck Amid the Stars
was only inactive a moment. I had thought Anita would have on her helmet. But she was reluctant, or confused.
"Gregg."
"We've got to get out of here! Up through the overhead locks to the dome."
"Yes—" She fumbled with the helmet. Under the floor-grid the climbing men on the ladder were audible. They were already nearing the top. The trap door was closed: Anita and I were crouching on it. There was a thick metal bar set in a depressed groove of the grid. I slid it in place—it would seal the trap for a time, at any rate.
A degree of confidence came to me. We had a few moments before there could be any hand-to-hand conflict. That giant electronic projector would eventually be used against Grantline: it was the brigands' most powerful weapon. Its controls were here—by Heaven, I would smash them! That at least I could do!
I jumped for the window. Miko's signals had stopped, but I caught a glimpse of his distant moving curve-lights.
A flash came up at me, as in the window I became visible to the brigands on the ship's deck. It was a small hand-projector, hastily fired, for it went wide of the window. It was followed by a rain of small beams, but I was warned and I dropped my head beneath the high sill. The rays flashed diagonally upward through the oval opening, hissed against our vaulted roof. The air snapped and tingled with a shower of blue-red sparks, and the acrid odor of the released gases settled down upon me.
* * *
he trajectory controls of the projector were beside me. I seized them, ripped and tore at them. There was a roar down on the deck. The projector had exploded. A man's agonized scream split the confusion of sounds.
It silenced the brigands on the deck. Under our floor-grid those on the ladder had been pounding at the trap-door. They stopped, evidently to see what had happened. The bombardment of our windows ceased momentarily.
I cautiously peered out the window again. In the wreck of the projector three men were lying. One of them was screaming horribly. The dome-side was damaged. Potan and other men were frantically investigating to see if the ship's air were hissing out.
A triumph swept me. They had not found me so meek and inoffensive as they might have thought!
Anita clutched at me. She still had not donned her helmet.
"Put it on!"
"But Gregg—"
"Put it on!"
"I—I don't want to put it on until you put yours on."
"I've smashed the projector! We've stopped them coming up for a while."
But they were still on the ladder under our floor. They heard our voices; they began thumping again. Then pounding. They seemed now to have some heavy implement. They rammed with it against the trap.
But the floor seemed holding. The square of metal grid trembled, yielded a little. But it was good for a few minutes longer.
I called down, "The first one who comes through will be shot." My words mingled with their oaths. There was a moment's pause, then the ramming went on. The dying man on the deck was still screaming.
* * *
whispered, "I'll try an Earth-signal."
She nodded. Pale, tense, but calm. "Yes, Gregg. And I was thinking—"
"It won't take a minute. Have your helmet ready."
"I was thinking—"
She hurried across the room. I swung on the Botz signaling apparatus. It was connected. Within a moment I had it humming. The fluorescent tubes lighted with their lurid glare; they painted purple the body of the giant duty-man who lay sprawled at my feet. I drew on all the ship's power. The tube-lights in the room quivered and went dim.
I would have to hurry. Potan could shut this off from the main hull control room. I could see, through the room's upper trap, the primary sending mirror mounted in the peak of the dome. It was quivering, radiant with its light-energy. I sent the flash.
The flattened, past-full Earth was up there. I knew that the western hemisphere faced the Moon at this hour. I flashed in English, with the open Universal Earth-code:
"Help! Grantline."
And again: "Send help! Archimedes region near Apennines. Attacked by brigands. Send help at once! Grantline!"
If only it would be received! I flung off the current. Anita stood watching me intently. "Gregg, look!"
She had taken some of the glass globe-bombs which lay by the foot of the ascending ladder. She held some of them now.
"Gregg. I threw some."
* * *
t the window we gazed down. The globes she flung had shattered on the deck. They were occulting darkness bombs.[5]
[5] Filled with an odorless, harmless gas, these bombs were used in warfare, taking the place of the old-fashioned smoke screens. The diffusing gas was of such a nature that, when released, it absorbed within itself all the color inherent to the light-rays striking it, thus creating a temporary darkness.
Through the blackness of the deck, the shouts of the brigands came up. They were stumbling about. But the ramming of our trap went on, and I saw that it was beginning to yield. One corner of it was bent up.
"We've got to go, Anita!"
"Yes."
From out of the darkness which hung like a shroud over the deck an occasional flash came up, unaimed—wide of our windows. But the darkness was dissipating. I could see now the dim glow of the deck lights, blurred as through a heavy fog.
I dropped another of the bombs.
"Put on your helmet."
"Yes—yes, I will. You put on yours."
We had them adjusted in a moment. Our Erentz motors were pumping.
I gripped her. "Put out your helmet-light."
She extinguished it. I handed her my bullet projector.
"Hold it a moment. I'm going to take that belt of bombs."
The trap-door was all but broken under the ramming blows of the men on the ladder. I leaped over the body of the duty-man, seized the belt of bombs and strapped it about my waist.
Anita stood with me.
"Give me the projector."
She handed it to me. The trap-door burst upward! A man's head and shoulders appeared. I fired a bullet int
o him—the little leaden pellet singing down through the yellow powder-flash that spat from the projector's muzzle.
* * *
he brigand screamed, and dropped back out of sight. There was confusion at the ladder-top. I flung a bomb at the broken trap. A tiny heat-ray came wavering up through the opening, but went wide of us.
The instrument room was in darkness. I clung to Anita.
"Hold on to me! You go first—here is the ladder."
We found it in the blackness, mounted it and went through the cubby's roof-trap.
I took a hasty look and dropped another bomb beside us. The four-foot space up here between the cubby roof and the overhead dome went black. We were momentarily concealed.
Anita located the manual levers of the lock-entrance.
"Here, Gregg."
I shoved at them. Fear leaped in me that they would not operate. But they swung. The tiny porte opened wide to receive us. We clambered into the small air-chamber; the door slid closed, just as a flash from below struck at it. The brigands had seen our little cloud of darkness and were firing up through it.
We were through the locks in a moment, out on the open dome-top. A sleek, rounded spread of glassite, with broad aluminite girders. There were cross-ribs which gave us footing, and occasional projections—streamline fin-tips, the casings of the upper rudder shafts, and the upstanding stubby funnels into which the helicopters were folded.
