A man was standing on tiptoes, reaching above his head with a shard of rock, scratching at something gray on the cliff face. A piece of it came away and he jammed it into his mouth and began chewing noisily.
This was most interesting. Even more interesting was the fact that he was bright red. His only garment a pair of ancient faded trousers with most of the legs torn off. There was obviously a hole in the seat of these ragged shorts because his red tail emerged from them.
That was when he saw us. Turned in an instant and gaped open a damp mouth with broken black teeth—then hurled the piece of rock in our direction. We ducked as the stone clattered into the stone wall close by. In that instant he was gone, swarming up the sloping cliff face with amazing agility, vanishing over the rim above.
“Red …” Sybil said.
“Very red. Did you notice the little red horns on his forehead?”
“Hard to miss. Shall we go see what he was doing?”
“Doing—and eating.”
I picked up a sharp fragment of stone and went over to the spot where he had been working. There was a gray and rubbery looking growth protruding from a crevice in the canyon wall. I was taller than our rosy friend and could easily reach it; sliced and chopped at it until a piece fell free.
“What is it?” Sybil asked.
“No idea. Vegetable not animal I imagine. And we did see him chewing it. Want a bite?”
“I wouldn’t think of depriving you.”
It tasted very gray and slimy, and was very, very chewy. With all the taste and texture of a plastic bag. But it was wet. I swallowed and a piece went down. And stayed down. My stomach rumbled a long complaint.
“Try some,” I said. “It’s pretty foul but it has water in it and maybe some food value.” I tore off a chunk and held it out. Very suspiciously she put it into her mouth. I looked up—jumped and grabbed her and pushed her aside.
A boulder thudded into the spot where we had been standing.
“Angry at losing his dinner,” I said. “Let’s move out away from the rocks, where we can see what’s happening.”
We had a quick glimpse of him climbing higher still and finally moving out of sight.
“You stay here,” I said. “Keep an eye out for Big Red. I’ll get more of this gunge.”
The sun did not seem to be appreciably higher in the sky when we had finished our meal. Stomachs full enough, and thirst slaked for the moment, we rested in the shade because the day was growing measurably warmer.
“Not good, but filling,” Sybil said, working with her fingernail to dislodge a gristly bit that had lodged between her teeth. When it came free she looked at it disparagingly, then dropped it to the ground. “Any idea what we do next?”
“Put our brains into gear for starters. Since we woke up in this place we have been stumbling from one near-disaster to another. Let’s check off what we know.”
“Firstly,” she said, “we’ve gone to Slakey’s version of Hell. We’ll call it that until we learn better. We are in another place—on another planet—or we have gone mad.”
“I can’t accept that last. We are someplace else. We know that machines are involved in this—because they were carefully destroyed in the building on Lussuoso. Angelina was sent someplace from that temple. We were sent someplace from the one on Vulkann. We know that for certain—and we know something even more important. A return trip is possible. You went to Heaven and came back. And we must consider the possibility that Angelina could have come here before us.”
“Which means that we need some intelligence—in the military use of the word.”
“You bet. Which in turn means we have to find Big Red with the horns and tail and find out all that he knows. About Angelina, about this place, how he—and we—got here. And how we are going to leave …”
A sound intruded, a soft, shuffling sound that grew slowly louder. Coming up the canyon floor towards us. Then we could hear the susurration of muttered voices.
“People—” I said as our recently departed devilish friend walked into view. He was followed by a small group of companions, at least twelve of them. Men and women. All bright red. All carrying sharp rocks. I had never seen any of them before—and one glance told me that Angelina was not in this motley crowd. They stopped when they saw us—then started forward when their leader waved them on.
“You can flee, should you wish, but we’ll come after you. Run or stay, it makes no difference.” He shook the rock at us.
“We are going to kill you. Kill you and eat you.
“Hell is a very hungry place.”
CHAPTER 7
I HELD MY HAND UP to them, palm out, the universal sign of peace. Maybe. “Wait,” I said. “If you attack us we will be forced to defend ourselves. And we are very dangerous. You will all be hurt, killed if you dare resist us. We are not normal humans but are ruthless killers …”
“Dinner!” Red Leader foamed. “Kill!”
I cupped my raised hand, raised the other in defense-offense position, balanced forward on the balls of my feet.
Sybil was at my side, hands held in the same way. “You didn’t mean that about killing them—did you?”
“No—but I want them afraid so we can finish this quickly. Now!”
We screamed loudly in unison and attacked. Big Red shrieked and dropped his weapon when I chopped his wrist with the edge of my hand, following through with stiff fingertips into his solar plexus. Went on without stopping and kicked the legs out from under the two people behind him.
I was aware that Sybil had moved to the side to take her antagonists off guard and off balance. Two sharp kidney punches sent two women screaming to the ground.
The stone swung down and I went under it and hit the wielder on the side of the neck, stepped aside as he fell.
A few more brisk blows and it was all over. The ground was covered with writhing, moaning, red figures. A hand reached out for a rock and I stepped on the wrist. That was the last resistance.
“They are a sorry and feeble lot,” Sybil said, dusting of her hands disgustedly.
“No other way to handle it. No broken bones that I can see, and no blood.” We picked up the stone weapons and threw them aside. Looked more closely at our battered assailants. They were dressed, if it could be called that, in a tattered and faded collection of clothing fragments. Bits of anatomy, normally concealed, poked out. All of them were bright red with neat little horns and, now flaccid, tails. They drew cravenly aside as I walked between them and picked up their unconscious leader, propped him against the rock wall and waited for him to come around. He groaned and opened his eyes—shrieked and fell over and tried to scrabble away. I straightened him up again.
“Look,” I told him. “All the killing and eating was your idea. We were just defending ourselves. Can we call it quits? Just nod your head, that’s better. I think we started off on the wrong foot so let’s try again. My name is Jim …”
There was a thud and a cry of pain from behind me, proof that Sybil was covering my back.
“My name is … Cuthbert Podpisy, Professor of Comparative Anatomy, University of Wydawnietwo.”
“Please to meet you, Professor. Aren’t you a long way from home?”
He rubbed at his sore midriff, looked up at me with bleary red eyes. And sighed.
“I suppose I am. I haven’t thought about that very much of late. The hunger and thirst tend to dominate one’s consciousness. All we wanted was a bit of protein.” He whimpered a bit, feeling very sorry for himself. “The diet is monotonous and not very filling. Lacks many amino acids I am sure. As well as minerals and vitamins.”
“The gray stuff you were eating off the rock. That’s your diet?”
“The same. It is called colimicon. I don’t know what it means. I was told the word when I first came here.”
“How did you get here?” Sybil asked, coming over to stand beside me—but not taking her eyes off the battered execution squad.
“I have no idea. I wa
s on term leave, I went to this holiday world. To enjoy myself on the Vulkann beaches. It was all very nice and I had a good tan, not red like this, and I was putting on weight from overeating, destroying my liver with over-drinking, you know … . All I can remember is that I went to bed one night—and woke up here.”
“How about the others?”
“The ones I have talked to say just about the same thing. The others are mad, they don’t talk. It seems that the longer you are here … are you going to kill me?”
“Don’t be foolish. I’ve eaten some strange meals in my time but draw the line at professors.”
“You say that now, but—”
“I promise, all right? And speaking of professors—have you ever heard of a Professor Justin Slakey?”
“No. Rings no bells. Mine is a small university.”
“All right. Now tell me about your red relations here. You said that people arrive here. Do any leave?”
“Only as dinner!” He cackled and drooled a bit around his blackened teeth, not as sane as he had first appeared to be. I changed the subject.
“If you are an anatomy professor perhaps you can explain your interesting skin color. Not to mention your little horns and tail.”
He pinched a handful of loose skin at his midriff and blinked at it. “Very interesting,” he said in a distant voice. “I used to study the phenomena, take notes, tried to take notes. Not pigmentation at all. I believe the color change to be due to enhanced capillary growth beneath the skin. Ahh, the tail.” He groped for his and caressed it. “Might be added bones to the coccyx. Not possible, bone growth though, yes, or cartilage …”
I left him mumbling there and waved Sybil to one side where we could keep an eye on the others. Not that they appeared to be any threat. Some were still unconscious while the others sat or lay placidly as though drained of energy. One young man dragged himself to his feet and looked at us with obvious fear. When we did nothing he stumbled away, around the bend in the canyon and out of sight.
“I don’t like this at all,” Sybil said.
“I never liked it—and I like it even less the longer we stay here. These people aren’t natives. They’ve been brought here. Dumped in this place for some unfathomable reason. At least we know who is responsible. We’ve got to find our way back—before we end up like these. Am I beginning to turn red yet?”
“No—but you’re right. We’ve got to resist. But what can we do? Is there any point in going back to Hometown—or to your porcuswine?”
“None that I can think of at the moment …”
The sky darkened for an instant and we staggered, suddenly heavy. The phenomenon passed as quickly as it had begun. Gravity waves? I didn’t let my thoughts dwell on it. What could we possibly do to save ourselves?
“Collect as much of the colimicon as we can carry,” I said firmly. “Food and drink will keep us alive, give us a chance to take the next step … .” Inspiration failed me, but Sybil was thinking too.
“Go back to the cave where we woke up. We were in such bad shape we didn’t search it well. Looking for what—I have no idea.”
“But you have a good idea. Whatever brought us here dumped us on that particular spot. It needs a much closer look.” I pointed to the sprawled, scarlet figures. “What about this lot?”
“There is nothing we can do for them—not now. Perhaps when we get back, get some answers. Maybe then we can do something. They are alive, so at least they know how to survive. And they did try to kill us.”
“Point taken. Let’s get moving.”
We found some more colimicon and pried rubbery chunks from the rock crevasses. They were difficult to carry until Sybil turned her long skirt into a mini by ripping off a great length of the fabric. “And it’s cooler like this,” she said as she neatly knotted our food and drink into a bundle. I took it from her and pointed.
“Lead the way.”
I did not dare think how long the days here were since the sun appeared to be just as high in the sky as it had been when we first saw it. Perhaps the planet did not rotate on its axis at all and this day was a million years long. We plodded on. Back towards the opening in the rocks where this whole depressing action had begun.
We started up one of the gravel dunes and I stumbled over a largish fragment, fell forward.
Saw the eruption of fragments from the sudden, small pit, heard the missile ricochet away.
“Move!” I shouted. “Someone’s shooting at us!”
Sybil was running towards some broken boulders as I did a sideways roll and scrambled to my feet. More shots followed us, but a fast-moving target is hard to hit. I slid, gasping, into the lee of a giant boulder, saw that Sybil had reached shelter as well.
“Where’s the sniper?” she called out.
“Top of the slope we were climbing. I had a quick glimpse, just something moving.”
“Any particular color?”
“The local favorite.”
“Next?”
“Get our breath back. Then spread out and hunt the hunter. Sorry but I dropped our supplies. We’ll worry about that later. After we find this redskin. All right with you?”
“Agreed. Whoever it is I want him in front of me rather than behind.”
I made the first rush, slanting across the hill then sheltering behind a boulder. A shot hit the rock, sending fragments clattering; another hit the ground. But even as our ambusher was firing Sybil was running just as I had done.
In rushing spurts we slowly made our way up the hill. Our attacker kept shooting; he appeared to have plenty of ammunition.
We were approaching the summit when I saw him. Big, red, running for better cover, a sack over one shoulder, carrying a long-barreled weapon of some kind. I sprinted in his tracks, going fast. I dived again for the shelter of a boulder when he turned and fired. I saw Sybil angle away around the top of the hill while he blasted shot after shot in my direction.
The end came suddenly. I heard him fire in the other direction; he must have seen her. I put my head down and plowed up the slope as fast I could. There he was a few meters away, turning the gun towards me—when a fast-thrown rock caught him in the back. He squealed, jumped—tried to aim.
And I was on him. Twisting the gun away and kicking him hard in the chest. He shrieked again as he fell; the sack dropped from his shoulder, spilling out shiny tubes.
Sybil stumbled up, as exhausted as I was, and looked down at our fallen adversary. He was fat and he was red, with the now normal horns and tail. But he was very familiar. He scrambled backwards, turned to look for a way to escape and I saw his profile.
“It can’t be! But he looks like—” Sybil finished the sentence for me.
“It could be Slakey!”
“Or Master Fanyimadu or Father Marablis.”
He was that familiar. But of course this could not be. He looked at us with wide eyes, trembling, frightened. Spoke.
“Have we … met before?”
“Perhaps,” I said, “My name is diGriz. Is that familiar?”
“Not really. Any relation to the Grodzynskis?”
“Not to my knowledge. And your name is … ?”
“That’s a good question. It might be—Einstein?” He looked hopeful, then stopped smiling when I shook my head no. “Wrong answer. Do Mitchelsen or Morley sound familiar? Epinard?”
“Yes, those names are familiar,” Sybil said. “They were all physicists. They’re all dead.”
“Physics!” He brightened up at that and pointed in the direction of the bloated sun. “Burning continues always. But the nucleus isn’t stable, you see. The core, a Fermi sphere. Then the nucleus, lithium not stable …”
“Professor …?” I called out.
“Yes? What? But those nuclei simply break up again.”
He closed his eyes and swayed slowly back and forth muttering to himself softly all the time.
“He’s mad,” Sybil said firmly. I nodded agreement.
“Like the others—only more
so. But he’s saying something about physics. And he did respond when I called him professor.”
“There are a lot of professors around.”
“Too true.” I picked up the gun and turned it in my hands. “And where did he get this? It’s in good condition, fires all too well.” I tapped a dial on the butt, fully charged, then pointed to the spilled tubes on the ground. “You recognize the weapon?”
“Of course. Linear accelerator gun. The military calls them Gauss rifles.”
“Exactly. No moving parts, lots of juice in the nuclear battery—with plenty more steel slugs in these tubes. How did it get here? Do you remember what happened to all that gear that I brought with me, mechanical and electronic? None of it would work. We’ve seen no other artifacts—until this.”
Our demonic friend stopped muttering, saw the gun and jumped to grab it. Sybil put out a foot and he sprawled onto his face. I held the gun up so he could see it.
“Professor—where did you get this?”
“Mine. I gave me the …” He looked around bewilderedly. Lay down and closed his eyes and appeared to be asleep.
“Not exactly a bubbling font of information,” Sybil said.
“I think this madness is catching—or grows on you the longer you stay here.”
“Agreed. So let’s go back to the original plan. The cave.”
“The cave.” I retrieved and shouldered the bag, seized up the gun and ammunition. We looked back as we walked but he never stirred.
“Do you get the feeling that the longer we are in Hell the more questions there are to ask—and the fewer answers?” Sybil nodded glum agreement. Then pointed.
“Isn’t that it ahead? The opening in the rocks?”
“Looks like it.”
I felt more depressed than I had ever been before in my life. Which says a lot since I have been in some very depressing situations. This search for the cave was a token gesture born of desperation. If there had been any device, any machine—anything at all in the cave—we would have seen it before we left. This was a dead end.
The Stainless Steel Rat Goes to Hell Page 7
