Space 1999 #10 - Phoenix Of Megaron

by John Rankine

  They followed the road, walking five metres to the left of it on soft sand, black shadows, hardly visible to each other. They had the tactical advantage of the light. The reduced glow from Caster was ahead of them and behind the Megaronians. Koenig reckoned that somewhere up the road there would have to be a picket. It might be an unlikely route, but no commander would ignore it completely. They would be off the road and in cover. It was all a question of who saw whom.

  They had levelled with the crest of a gradual rise. Koenig, in the lead, was bent double, to minimise his silhouette against the sky, when the whole of the farm spread lit up like a stadium. Tylon, impatient with the negative response, had tried again. This time, he had gotten Zarah, who sounded breathless, but willing to cooperate.

  There was no need to say it. The Alphan party dropped flat to the sand and crawled the ten metres needed to take them below the top and into the reverse slope. Except for the farm spread itself, which had been dug out to a level, the whole area was crossed by parallel dunes, starting close together and steep near the sea, and gradually smoothing out towards the plain around Caster. At the bottom of the one they were in, they could stand erect and still be screened from the control centre, but at any second a Megaronian could appear on either side. There was no cover.

  They had to try. Koenig set a punishing pace, with the drag of the sand holding them back like a sequence in a half-remembered nightmare. From somewhere near the coast, a thin, high whistle shrilled. It was answered by another from way behind them and a third, very much nearer, on their side of the farm. Koenig stopped. Lasers ready, he and Carter covered two arcs. From over the ridge, between them and the sea, there was the chink of metal as somebody hit the stock of a carbine against a clip case. Straining to hear, it was just possible to pick up the scuff of feet as the hidden patrol took off in a dash to surround the farm.

  Koenig pointed ahead. For a time, at least, they could afford to walk. Earth’s diminishing moon was like a talisman bringing them luck. He could imagine the duty crew in Main Mission watching Megaron. While it was still there in vision, they were somehow part of it. When it finally disappeared, it would be like a door closed on the major part of their lives.

  He took them on for the best part of a kilometre before he stopped again. Carter said, ‘When they draw blank, they’ll know we slipped through the net. They’ll know we can’t get far on foot. I’d say they’ll whistle up some cars and do an air search.’

  Rhoda put an arm round his waist and leaned her dark head on his shoulder. She said, ‘If we reach the trees, they won’t be able to do that. But walking overland is dangerous even in daylight. Karl says there are pockets of poisoned soil even on the peninsula.’

  The valley they were in had narrowed and deepened. Koenig went up the side on hands and knees to take a look at the topography. He could pick out glints of water in the sea. The farm-spread complex was out of sight, except for the top floor of the control block and one tall lighting gantry. It was still brilliantly lit. If anything, their line of march had taken them nearer to Caster, which was not good. The dark mass of the forested strip was between them and the Outfarers. Distances on land were deceptive. It had not seemed too far by sea, going in straight lines. In his mind, he had been making for Car Thirty-nine. It was still the best bet. But it was all of four kilometres to the nearest edge of the trees. He noticed the flask hanging at his belt and remembered that it was enough to blow the mission, if they were caught. He said, ‘Empty the flasks. It’s a straight dash for the tree line. But with the luck we’re having, it should be in the bag.’

  Helena Russell thought privately that only an optimist could see it that way. Moving through unfamiliar country, one jump ahead of the posse, with a doubtful welcome at the far end was no way to spend the small hours of a new day. She kept it to herself and fell in behind the leader as Koenig fixed a line by a star cluster and led off across the dunes.

  It was a half hour by his time disk, before Koenig called another halt. Progress was slower than he had hoped. A lot of urge had been used up in simply taking them up and down the slopes of fine sand. Sweat and grit, working inside the suits, was rubbing them raw. With or without a pursuit force, it was going to be a physical-endurance marathon. He could not understand why the search had not widened out from the farm. By this time, Mestor, if he was in charge of the operation, must be convinced that the Alphans were outside the fence and since they had not returned to the strike craft, they would have to be on the ground between the farm and their home base.

  He gave them two minutes and stood up. There was no word spoken. What could not be altered had to be endured. There was a change in the ground. It was flatter and stonier. They could make better time. Eyes well adjusted to the starlight, they could see the black blur of the tree line all the time as a visible goal. For two kilometres, they pressed on. There was another change. Wind-borne seed from the forest was working to reclothe the man-made desert and small clumps of stunted trees were struggling for a foothold. It was an encouragement, but before they could take much pleasure in it, there was a setback.

  Koenig had seen a dark line crossing the landscape even from the last dune and had not been able to decide what it might be. They were a hundred metres from it when Rhoda suddenly said, ‘Oh, no!’

  It was enough to halt the column. Koenig said, ‘What is it?’

  She said, ‘I should have remembered. There’s a deep fault running across. It runs all the way down to the sea. We can only cross it on the beach or way up beyond Caster.’

  Koenig could have said: ‘Now you tell me!’ Instead, he nodded. ‘It would have still been there, whether you remembered or not. We had to come this way. Let’s take a look.’

  When they reached the edge, it was clear enough that Rhoda was right. The land had slipped along a pressure line and pulled apart for ten metres. Depth was lost in darkness and the sides were sheer. The far side was higher than where they stood and it was the dark face of the rock that had looked like a black line.

  Without hesitation, Koenig set off along the edge towards the sea. It was still the right direction. Ten minutes later, he stopped again and knelt down to consider a striking piece of botanical enterprise. A metre below the rim, a run of topsoil had lodged itself in a fissure and spilled out on a narrow ledge. A tree had found enough food and shelter to get itself established. The trunk had grown out and then made a ninety-degree switch to take itself up into the light.

  Lying flat and leaning over, he used his laser for a slicing cut that filled the air with resinous wood smoke. Still upright, the tree dropped, until the severed trunk hit the ledge. Slowly and then gathering speed, the tip tilted away in an arc and thumped down on the far side. The foot lifted and then settled back. The noise, after the silence, was startling and Koenig knew it would carry a long way. Any advantage would have to be exploited quickly.

  He dropped down to the ledge and tried to move the tree. It was solid. Faces in a row looking down at him were sober and considering. It was good thinking in a theoretical sense, but another turn of the screw on a bad night. Waiting would not improve it. He said, ‘I’ll give you a call when I’m over. Keep it going as fast as you like.’

  There was no big problem. Given more time, he would have trimmed a few branches, but in a half minute he was stepping on solid rock and calling for Helena to follow. He handed her out and waited for Rhoda. On the higher ground, it was easier to look across at the distant farm spread. Pencils of light were crisscrossing outside the fights of the complex itself. The search party had finally gotten itself airborne.

  Rhoda arrived and knelt down to look anxiously along the trunk for Carter. As soon as he came through the foliage, they all took a hand to heave on the tip and walk it round until they could dump the tree into the cleft.

  Flying low, with searchlights boring down to the ground, the cars were working out towards them in a methodical pattern of search. Koenig pushed up the pace to a jog trot. Every hundred metres the cover wa
s improving. By the time the first pair of cars had reached the fissure, they were in bush thick enough to slow them to a walk. Still getting glimpses of his star cluster, he changed direction and they picked their way through the forest towards the sea.

  Progress was impossible to judge. Underfoot, tree roots and thick ferns made every step a hazard. They went on, because there was nothing else to do and nowhere else to go. Occasionally, the lights of a searching car would cut a swathe through the darkness and they froze against tree trunks until it had gone.

  Rhoda, weakened by her spell in Caster, was reeling like a drunk, forcing herself to go on, but too stupid with tiredness to protect herself. She was walking into more trees than she missed. Alan Carter caught her on a rebound and put her over his shoulder in a fireman’s lift.

  There had been no cars overhead for a good five minutes and Helena said, ‘Can we believe it? Have they given up?’

  Koenig called a halt to consider it. Carter stood Rhoda against a tree. She was asleep on her feet. He said, ‘I doubt it, Commander. My guess is that they’ll be lined up on the other side of the forest, waiting for us to show.’

  Koenig said, ‘You could be right at that. When we reach the car, we’ll float her out and get well away from land before we take her up.’

  He moved them out to more open ground at the edge of the wood. Carter’s analysis was standing up. There was no car in sight. They had checked to that point and moved over. It was easier to cover the ground and they could measure progress with sight and sound of the sea. The last hundred metres of beach was wide open with no scattered cover and they kept close to the tree line, walking in the bed of a shallow gulley, ankle deep in brackish water that drained from the forest. There was only one sure way of finding the car from the land. They would have to wade out round the point and check along the shore for recognition marks.

  For that matter, it was a relief to slip into the water and take the weight off their feet. Koenig stood waist deep, cupped his hands and rinsed the sweat and sand off his face. The action cleared his head. He was in danger of thinking the end game would be too easy. For that matter, there was no guarantee that Car Thirty-nine had not already been found.

  There had been erosion on the coast. Some trees now had their roots in water at some stages of the tide. There was a powerful bouquet of rotting vegetation and they were disturbing clouds of small midges that settled on any patch of open skin. As they rounded a rocky spur, Koenig held up his hand. For a brief count, he believed the car had slipped her moorings and was drifting out to sea. Then he could make out two shadowy figures through the plexiglass. She was an active unit of the task force doing a quiet survey of the coastline.

  There was movement, but it was desperately slow. The Megaronian car was bows on to the beach, making leeway towards the farm. How far they would go before they used power to back off or take up a new station was anybody’s guess. Koenig gave them fifty metres, ducked under a floating log and went on slowly. Five minutes later, they were standing beside the hull of Car Thirty-nine.

  Carter took the co-pilot seat and switched on the communications net. Somebody would be master minding the operation and might have information to give. It was Mestor himself in mid-speech and what he was saying related to another action. Since he was spending the night on a duty stint, he had extended his brief. The Outfarers were taking another hammering.

  ‘. . . Spadec directive Ninety-five . . . Squadron Three turn over the estuary and take the seaward side. Maximum penetration into the living quarters. Use incendiary charges. Re-form at three four nine eight seven zero. Make your own way to Security Headquarters and stand down.’

  There had been more. From close at hand, there was the beat of a motor starting up and a beam of light swept briefly across the sea. The car on watch had taken off, no doubt summoned to share in the strike. Rhoda, who had been lying full length in the rumble, sat up and said, ‘That is terrible. They are determined to destroy our homes. Where shall we go? If they carry on in this way, the Outfarers are finished. We cannot fight Spadec.’

  Bitterly, John Koenig assessed his own share. He had jumped in with both feet. Theoretically, what the Alphans had done was right. But was that always enough? He had stirred up a hornets’ nest and the Outfarers were on the receiving end of a punitive reprisal they had not invited. He could only hope that alarm systems would stand up and the Outfarers would get themselves to a safe place. He said, shortly, ‘Cast off. We’ll go out to sea. Make a detour. Come in across the estuary.’

  Car Thirty-nine slipped out of cover, ghosted out, rose to zero height and fled away across the wine-dark sea. When they turned to follow the coast, they could see the twisted ruin of the tower city bathed in a ruby glow. Mestor’s strike had already had its effect. Smoke and flame were licking out from the lower floor.

  When Koenig brought the car down in the estuary, close to the site of the strike craft entry lock, Mestor’s force had gone. The fire at the lowest level of the tower city had either burned out or had been put out. Higher levels were still flaming like a gigantic torch and charred debris was falling from a great height to shatter on the paved surrounds or plummet into the sea.

  Koenig said, ‘Use the strike craft frequency, Alan. See if you can talk to Victor.’

  Carter was less than a minute setting it up. Then he was speaking on the net with Rhoda leaning over the squab and breathing emotionally down his neck. ‘Resurge. Strike craft calling Outfarers. Come in, Outfarers.’

  There was no reply. Helena said, ‘Could it be that they suspect a trap? Or are they all dead?’

  Carter called again. ‘Resurge. Do you read me? Come in, Outfarers.’

  Rhoda said, ‘Professor Bergman would recognise your voice. But perhaps he is not there. Let me try.’

  Even through the filter of the electronic gear, there would be no mistaking the vibrations of her warm, brown tones. She said, ‘Resurge. We are back. All safe. But what has happened to you? Karl, it’s me, Rhoda. Please answer.’

  This time, there was progress. But it was not Karl’s voice. She said, ‘It’s Melanion. It’s my father.’

  He sounded less than pleased. ‘Resurge. We hear you. So you have returned. Look around you. Can you expect a welcome? Can we allow you to put more lives at risk? You must wait until we decide what is to be done.’

  There was enough truth in it to be uncomfortable. But Koenig could see the faces of his companions in the glow of the burning tower. They had run a taut mission and soldiered on without complaint. There was nothing wrong with the theory that had set them to work. Their success had gone sour, but it was a calculated risk. They deserved better than a brush-off. He said harshly, ‘Commander Koenig. Let me speak with Professor Bergman.’

  ‘That is not possible. I will remind you that you are not our commander. We listened too readily to your dangerous advice. You must now wait until we have made our decisions. Out.’

  Koenig shoved the handset back in its clip and flipped switches along the instrument spread to lift Car Thirty-nine out of the sea. He circled the tower. There was not much left to burn in the gaunt upper floors. Already the flames were less and would die of their own accord. The structure had taken a greater hammering in the past and had settled to a monolithic stability that would not be challenged now. All the loose material that was being shaken out was coming down on the seaward face from the angle of tilt. On the land side, there was no immediate danger. He took the car down and landed on the terrace.

  It was clear that some auto sprinkler device had gone into action on the first floor. Halfway up the ramp, they met a thick tide of grey sludge. The first floor was ankle deep in globules of grey foam. The air was acrid with the stench of burning. It would be a long time before it was habitable again.

  Helena said, ‘On Alpha we had deep shelters to use in emergency. That’s where they’ll be. They’ll all have gone underground.’

  Rhoda said, ‘The dock area. There’s nowhere else that I know about.’
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  Koenig turned on his heel. There was no point in looking further in the living quarters. When they reached the massive concrete seal, it was shut. There was safety enough behind it. Only an atomic strike would breach that barrier. But it moved easily enough on its counterweights and gave them access to the long quay and the mute stranded freighter, which gave silent testimony to the long-gone aggro of another people in another time.

  Even now, after all the years, the tiny remnant of the Megaronian people were still at it. There was another feature, as old as time. All along the quayside, the Outfarers’ community was spread out in little family groups, with their bundles of belongings arranged around them to mark out a piece of territory in the confusion. It was a refugee camp.

  Some had already settled down to sleep. Others were still standing about, unable to come to terms with the spin of the wheel that had brought their settled routine to a jarring full stop. They watched the Alphans pass. Bewilderment and hostility were equally evident, but they made no open move against them.

  Farther on, as they turned into the strike-craft base, there was more evidence that hard decisions had been made and a new line taken. The defence corps was all present and under arms. But command of it had clearly passed to the bearded Golgos. Hung around with sidearms and carrying a machine pistol on a shoulder strap, he was conducting some kind of kangaroo court. Those being brought for trial were isolated in a group on the slipway, as though already part way out of the community home. Two men with machine pistols at the ready were on guard to keep them there. The rest were sitting or leaning on the gravity conveyor, listening to the new top hand.

  There were five for the pogrom. Karl had his arm round Gelanor’s shoulders and was doing his best to comfort her. Victor Bergman was leaning on the wall, arms folded, genial ape’s face sombre and thoughtful. The other two were Hepa and Urion—the two councillors of the platform party who had voted for the Alphans and had, seemingly, refused to change their view.