Captain Future nodded thoughtfully. “I believe you’ve got something, Joan. The conspirators may be using this madman, who can go in among the Roons unharmed, to arouse them.”
“And because Joan and Ezra got too interested in Crazy Jonny, the order went out to get rid of them,”! exclaimed Otho.
“It all adds up,” said Captain Future. “And it means that things are near a crisis. Crazy Jonny has been sent in to the Roons again. And you heard what Ka Thaar said — that by tomorrow night, Jonny would have the Roons ready for final action.”
“Then the madman is on his way now to stir up the Roons to a final attack on the colony — an attack that’ll mean secession,” cried Ezra.
Joan Randall paled. “Curt, we’ve got to stop that somehow or our whole mission is failure.”
“Grag and Doctor Carlin ought to be near the big Roon village by now,” suggested Otho hopefully. “Maybe they can halt Crazy Jonny.”
Curt Newton shook his head. “No, they don’t even know about Jonny. And their errand was simply to find the Crypt of the Old Ones. That madman is our job. But we don’t even know the location of the Roon village he’s going to.”
Otho’s eyes flashed. “We don’t know, but there’s somebody here who should know. That Venusian Quord!”
Newton had almost forgotten the Venusian guard whom they had temporarily got rid of so they might talk.
“Quord must be one of Harmer’s trusted men, left here to guard the arsenal,” he muttered. “He must have information that would help us. We’ll have to squeeze it out of him. The main thing, the all-important thing right now, is to keep Crazy Jonny from unloosing another Roon attack. If we can learn enough to do that, then we can turn and hunt down Lu Suur.”
“Listen! I hear Quord coming back now,” whispered Otho.
CAPTAIN FUTURE gave directions in a few swift words. A moment later, the stocky Venusian entered the hut. It proved absurdly easy. Quord had not the least suspicion when. “Li Sharn” approached him. In a flash, Otho had snatched the Venusian’s atom-pistol from his holster and was jamming it against the man’s ribs.
“Back against the wall, Quord,” hissed Otho. “Ezra, tie him up.”
Before Quord realized what was happening, he had been disarmed and bound hand and foot. Then he recovered from his bewilderment.
“Then you and Cain have turned traitor?” he bellowed at Otho. “What are you — spies of the Patrol?”
Captain Future let him think so. “Quord, you’re going to tell us what you know,” he said grimly. “Who is behind Jed Harmer’s plot?”
Quord’s lips tightened. “I’ll tell you nothing.”
For hours, Curt Newton and Otho tried by threats and reasoning to open the Venusian’s lips. Their efforts were unavailing. Morning came and they had still learned nothing.
“The rest of you go out and leave him to me,” Otho said darkly. “I know a few old Martian tortures that will make him talk.”
“You know better than that,” snapped Newton. He had a sudden thought. “But maybe you’re right, in a way.”
“You wouldn’t really torture the man?” Joan said incredulously.
“Not physically,” Curt Newton answered. “But I have an idea. Cut his bonds, Otho.”
Captain Future drew his atom-pistol and covered Quord with it as the Venusian was cut loose. The captive stood up, rubbing his arms.
Newton motioned toward the door. “Outside,” he ordered. “We’re going a little way down the valley.”
A little fearfully and puzzledly, Quord stepped out into the morning glare of the great red sun. Newton followed him closely, his atom-pistol raised, the others coming after them.
Quord moved down the Valley of Dream Flowers through the hot, brilliant glare until a clump of the tall, poisonous flowers was just ahead. The Venusian started to detour around the flowers.
“No — walk right up to those flowers!” Curt Newton barked.
Quord turned, protesting in horror. “But that drugged perfume of the flowers will get me if I do!”
“Exactly,” said Captain Future grimly. “And you wouldn’t like to lie for an endless-seeming period tortured by ghastly dreams, would you?”
He had seen enough of the Valley of Dream Flowers to realize that Quord deeply dreaded the torment of timeless nightmares experienced by anyone who fell prey to the poisonous breath of the great blooms.
His surmise proved correct. Quord, confronted by the thing he feared most, lost all his defiance. Even in the hot blaze of the glaring red sun, he seemed to shiver.
“Don’t make me do that,” he said hoarsely. “The dream-flowers nearly got me once before, and it was horrible. I’ll — I’ll tell you anything I can.”
“Under what identity Lu Suur is masquerading?”
“Lu Suur?” Quord looked blank. “I never heard of him.”
“You know who the man is that’s behind Harmer and the whole secession conspiracy. Who is it?” snapped Newton.
“I don’t know!” exclaimed the Venusian. “Harmer and Ka Thaar never told that to any of us.”
Captain Future was inclined to believe the man spoke truth. It was not unreasonable to suppose the secret had been closely kept.
He took another tack. “You do know about Crazy Jonny, though? Harmer and the rest have been using him to incite the Roons, haven’t they?”
Quord nodded. “Yes. The Roons have always had a superstitious veneration for Crazy Jonny. The tribesmen think he’s sacred to the Old Ones.”
Joan uttered an exclamation. “Why should they think that?”
“From what I heard, it’s because Jonny years ago lost his wits when attacked by night-dragons,” was the answer. “The Roons believe the night-dragons are the messengers of the Old Ones. That’s why they’ve reverenced Jonny — they think the mark of the Old Ones is on him.”
“How do they use him?” asked Captain Future.
“Crazy Jonny was somehow influenced by them,” Quord continued. “They sent him to the big Roon village which lies where the Yellow River flows into the southern ocean, to tell the Roons that there was danger of the Old Ones awakening. He showed the Roons that the Crypt of the Old Ones was already opening.”
“Where is this Crypt?” Captain Future interrupted to demand.
THE Venusian shook his head. “I don’t know. But I do know that Ka Thaar and his crew have tampered with the Crypt so it would look as though it is opening.”
“It must be near the Roon village if the tribesmen could see it,” muttered Curt Newton. “Go ahead, Quord.”
“That’s about all I can tell you,” Quord declared. “You see, I was left here to guard the arsenal and —
At that moment, a sudden inexplicable dizziness swept Captain Future. He staggered, fighting that unexpected weakness.
And as he staggered, Quord snatched at the atom-pistol in his hand!
“Look out, chief!” yelled Otho, whipping out his own weapon.
Quord was tearing the weapon away from Newton, and Otho could not shoot because Captain Future was between him and the Venusian.
Newton rallied his dizzied faculties to avert the tragedy. Quord already had the butt of the gun and his finger was tightening on its trigger. Dazedly, Captain Future lunged forward, twisting the Venusian’s arm around at the moment he pulled trigger.
There was a scorching blast almost in Newton’s face, a scream of agony, and Newton went reeling backward. Quord had taken the pistol-blast in his own face and was falling in a scorched, dead heap.
“Chief, are you hurt?” cried Otho, bending over Newton. “What happened?”
“I don’t know — I suddenly got dizzy,” Curt Newton muttered. “Maybe we were too near the dream-flowers.”
“Dream-flowers nothing — it was the sun hit you!” Ezra Gurney declared. “You came out without your helmet. I’ll get it for you.”
Sudden understanding came to Captain Future. When he had marched Quord out of the hut, he had been so intent that he
had not stopped to put on his sun-helmet as the others had done. The fierce, scorching blaze of monster Arkar was overpowering for any unprotected Earthman. It hadn’t bothered Quord because Venusians were accustomed to powerful actinic radiation on their own planet, and did not need to wear sun-helmets on Roo.
Captain Future remembered something else, too. “What a fool I’ve been! All this time we’ve been hunting Lu Suur, I had the clue to his identity right in front of my eyes!”
“Curt, you mean that you know now who Lu Suur is?” cried Joan, astonished.
“I’m sure of it. This touch of sun that hit me without bothering Quord has made me see what I was blind to before,” Newton declared. “But Lu Suur is not the most immediate problem now. The most urgent necessity is to prevent the Roons from making a final big attack on the colony, for if they do, secession is inevitable. Crazy Jonny has been sent in there to stir up the Roons to a final pitch of superstitious fanaticism.”
“And that fanaticism will boil over into attack when Ka Thaar and his crew use some device to make it seem that the Crypt of the Old Ones is opening, that the Old Ones are awaking!” exclaimed Joan.
Newton nodded grimly. “That’s the setup, and we’ve got to work fast to smash it. Which means we’ve got to get to the Roon village. The Crypt must be near there. If the Roons can see it, as I said, Ka Thaar and the others will be going there.”
Ezra looked dubious. “Then we’ve got a long way to go through the jungle. Accordin’ to Quord, the big Roon village lies where Yellow River flows into the Austral Ocean. That’s plenty far away.”
“And we haven’t got the Comet or any way to call Simon to bring it,” groaned Otho. “It’ll be a two-days’ march on foot, in these jungles.”
“No, I’ve a better idea than that,” contradicted Captain Future. “Before we start, though, we’re going to take time to disable all the atom-guns stored in that arsenal. Harmer’s not going to use them.”
Hastily, they sabotaged the cases of heavy atom-guns by removing the tiny injector-tube from each, and throwing it into the stream that ran down the center of the Valley of Dream Flowers.
When they started, Newton steered a course through the jungle due west.
“But the Roon village must be almost straight south!” Otho protested.
“We’ll make faster time by going this way,” Captain Future answered.
They had to follow the windings of “shuffler” trails through the thick crimson forest. The trails led them finally to the shores of Yellow River.
The tawny flood, rolling turbidly through the wild red jungles of Roo on its way to the great southern ocean, was a majestic sight.
“This is our quickest way to the Roons,” Newton declared. “A raft will take us down this stream far faster than we can march in the jungle.”
Their atom-pistols quickly felled and stripped tall feather-trees. These were rolled into a quiet eddy and bound strongly with vines.
Soon after midday, the raft was pushed out into the current. Under the scorching blaze of red Arkar, it bore them with dangerous rapidity southward through the wild jungles of the forbidding world.
Chapter 14: Dragon Sacrifice
ON THE preceding night, Philip Carlin and Grag had remained frozen with astonishment as they gazed forth from their hiding place at the amazing scene ahead.
They had dragged Gaa down with them into the concealment of the bush-orchids. Though his hands were bound and his mouth gagged, their captive Roon guide made fierce efforts to escape.
“It’s the Roon village,” whispered Carlin, staring. “But what in the world are those tribesmen doing?”
“It’s a ritual of some kind,” muttered Grag. “Hear that drum?”
Carlin’s eyes swept the unearthly scene. They were crouching at the very edge of the jungle. Before them in the thin starlight lay a crescent-shaped area of open ground.
The curved side of this bow-shaped plain was bounded by the dark jungle in which they crouched. Its straight side was the brink of a long cliff beyond which glimmered the vast, heaving expanse of the mysterious Austral Ocean. Just to their right, there yawned a deep canyon in which the wide Yellow River flowed out into the sea.
To their left along the curve of the crescent lay the big Roon village. The low, thatched huts of the red tribesmen had been built back under the trees, for concealment and shelter. Out in the open in front of the village were now gathered thousands of the Roons.
“But what are they doing?” whispered Philip Carlin. “They look as though they were waiting.”
The Roons were all facing southward, toward the cliff-edge and the glimmering ocean over which Black Moon was rising.
A massive drum that hung in a framework in front of the jungle village was being sounded at regular intervals by two Roons who beat upon it with heavy clubs.
Boom — boom! The drum-beats rolled out like low thunder, echoing out over the cliff and the restless, starlighted ocean.
Philip Carlin’s bewildered gaze fastened upon an even more puzzling feature. Near the mouth of the river, the cliff jutted out in a bold, narrow promontory whose surface was a hundred feet above the sea.
Upon this promontory, he made out the shapes of several animals — a small “shuffler” and two jungle-deer and other beasts he could not identify. These animals were living, but were tightly tied to stakes set in the rock.
Boom — boom! Black Moon was rising higher above the sea, its shadowed, mottled face seeming to stare down at the weird scene.
“I don’t know just what this is all about but I do know it’s creepy,” muttered Grag. “Eek is scared to death.”
“Grag, listen!”
Between the thundering notes of the drum, Carlin’s ears had caught a faraway rustling in the sky.
It was the thresh of great, flapping wings. He looked upward. “Night-dragons!”
The Roons were hastily drawing back beneath the shelter of the trees at their village, from which they continued to watch intently.
Two great, flapping black shapes came gliding swiftly down from the southern sky, silhouetted against Black Moon. And there were others of the dreaded creatures up there, wheeling and descending.
The sky seemed alive with threshing wings. The drum boomed frantically. And then Carlin saw a horde of the winged terrors swoop down upon the animals tethered on the top of the little promontory.
Fangs and claws of the night-dragons flashed as they ripped and tore their helpless prey. Grunts, squeals and screams came hideously through the starlight.
“Grag, I believe we’re seeing a propitiatory sacrifice to the Old Ones!” exclaimed Carlin, shakenly. “What makes you think that?”
“I’ve heard that the Roons consider the night-dragons to be the messengers of the Old Ones,” said the botanist. “It’s clear that they make regular offerings to them, using that big drum to call the flying reptiles.”
The drum had stopped. The night-dragons were rising lazily into the starlight and flapping away. Only fragments of flesh and bones remained on the promontory.
Carlin’s mind was racing. Captain Future had sent him and Grag to learn the location of the Crypt of the Old Ones. Here was a clue.
“Is it possible that the Crypt we’re looking for is in that promontory above the ocean?” he whispered. “If it is —”
A harsh, shrill voice suddenly spoke loudly behind them in the darkness. “What are you doing here?”
They swung around, thunderstruck. A man had come up the trail through the jungle behind them, and was standing over them.
IT WAS a gaunt, unshaven Earthman in battered sun-helmet, his eyes glaring strangely at them in the shadows.
“Crazy Jonny!” exclaimed Carlin, stupefied by the madman’s appearance.
“Carlin, the Roon’s getting away!” cried Grag.
Gaa, their captive, instantly had seized his opportunity. As his two captors momentarily forgot him in their surprise at the madman’s appearance, Gaa scrambled up and ran out th
rough the starlight.
He was running directly toward the distant village. Though his hands were bound and he was gagged, he was already a hundred yards away.
“I’ll get him!” Grag cried, starting forward.
“Too late — they’ve seen him!” yelled Carlin. “We’ve got to run for it!” Yells of excitement had come from the Roons of the village, and dozens of warriors were dashing out toward the stumbling Gaa.
Carlin grabbed the madman’s arm. “Back along the trail quick, Grag! Come on, Jonny!”
Crazy Jonny tore away from his grasp. “Let me go! I bring a warning to the Roons!”
Perceiving that the mad Earthman would struggle rather than accompany them, Carlin abandoned the attempt and plunged back along the trail with Grag.
The jungle was weird in the darkness. They heard one loud explosion of yells behind them, and then an uncanny silence.
“They’re coming after us, never fear,” rumbled Grag furiously as he ran with Eek clinging scaredly to his shoulder. “I wish to space I had my hands on that cursed Gaa for one minute.”
“Grag, we can’t outdistance these tribesmen in the jungle,” panted Philip Carlin. “We’ve got to hide, or — listen!”
Swift, stealthy rustlings were all about them in the jungle. The Roons could move like shadows in the dense forest. They were closing around the two.
Carlin clutched his atom-pistol tightly as he ran, ready to fire at the first dart that whistled toward them. But no darts were shot. Catastrophe came in a different form.
Pounding along the dim trail, Grag suddenly tripped and fell with a resounding crash that sent Eek flying catapulted into the brush. At almost the same moment, Carlin’s ankles hit the tough vine that had been stretched across the trail, and he fell across the robot.
Before either of them could rise, yelling tribesmen piled upon them. Nets of tough vine ropes, strong as steel cables, wrapped around them clingingly. As they floundered in the meshes, thicker and even stronger vine ropes were quickly trussed around them in many thicknesses.
Captain Future 18 - Red Sun of Danger (Spring 1945) Page 11
