by Alex Raymond
Prince Barin flushed. “You’re calling me a fool, Zarkov?”
“Not a fool. An optimist. A thin line separates the two.” Zarkov wheeled on Hamf. “Who are these undesirables, Hamf?”
Hamf’s tiny mouth pursed. “We don’t really know, Dr. Zackov. We’ve kept tabs on all of Ming’s state troops. This is apparently a new division. We don’t know where it comes from. Nor do we know who heads it up.”
“That’s important?” asked Zarkov.
“Yes. Because we know where every one of Ming’s generals is stationed right now. If this force is preparing for an assault, we’d like to know who heads it. Then we could analyze its modus operandi.”
Zarkov nodded. “Got you. You get back to central intelligence and keep on the laserphone, Hamf. Prince Barin wants you to concentrate on that report and find out if there’s even a glimmer of truth in it. Ming would try to throw the capital in an uproar on a day set aside for a celebration like this one, wouldn’t he?”
Hamf nodded sadly.
“Now get moving,” snapped Zarkov.
Hamf left the throne room.
Prince Barin shook his head. “Zarkov, you’re something else again. Why do you think this piece of intelligence is accurate?”
“Obviously that something is keeping Flash and Dale out there in the forest.”
“You mean you think they’ve stumbled across that concentration of unknown troops? Is that it?”
“How can I know for sure?” Zarkov yelled, striding up and down furiously, flailing his arms in the air and making the celluloceram floor shake with the tread of his boots. “It’s a possibility, anyway.”
“The minute you see anything out of the ordinary, call me by ship’s laserphone.” Prince Barin watched Zarkov alertly.
Zarkov halted, face to face with the prince.
“Right, then,” he said, made an about-face, and bounded across the throne room to the door.
All Arboria lay below him as he rose in the airscout through the immense oaks and larches that grew around the forest kingdom’s capital. Zarkov looked down once and saw the palace pass by beneath him.
He pressed the retrorocket activator, jockeyed the controls, set the course computer for point between the spaceport-Arboria superway and the Mingo-Arboria border, and leaned back in the plyoform seat, arms folded across his broad chest.
“It’s doing beautifully,” he said to himself, scanning the dials and digital readout ports that cluttered the console in front of him. “I’m glad I simplified the design of the board. It’s maddening to have to read fifty-two dials all at once; forty-five isn’t so bad at all.”
The airscout mounted the heavens, heading in a direction away from Arboria. The last Zarkov saw of the city was the spire of the House of Meditation as it vanished to the rear of the city.
The dense primeval forest of Mongo stretched out far below him.
Zarkov picked up the laserphone, punched out the call numbers of the spaceport, and was immediately in touch with the spaceport commissioner.
“Any news of Flash Gordon?” Zarkov boomed out.
“Nay, sire,” said the voice of the commissioner. “But then, there isn’t much traffic today. Holiday and all that”
“Roger,” said Zarkov, remembering his flyboy days in England on Earth.
The airscout passed over the thin winding thread that was the superway. Zarkov flicked the switch to manual control and took the wheel in his hands. He watched through the bubbleglass and followed the thin white line through the jungle around it.
He could see nothing at all.
“Calling zee five six, zee five six,” a voice said on the laserphone.
Zarkov lifted the laserphone. “Zarkov.”
“Report from the border,” said the voice of Hamf. “My agent found a corpse in the woods. Dead for several hours. One of our agents. Vanished two years ago. He’d been”—Hamf choked—“he’d been surgically debrained, Zarkov. Total massive frontal lobotomy. Evidence of electrode implants in his skull.”
Zarkov swallowed. “Good god, Hamf!”
“Something’s out there, Zarkov. Something evil.”
“I’ll find it,” Zarkov promised.
He hung up the laserphone.
A sudden tremor made the airscout buck slightly in the air. Zarkov glanced at the dials. The needles were all bouncing, the digital numbers flying around in a mad whirl.
Zarkov gripped the wheel, trying to steady the airscout.
“What’s going on?” he muttered.
The airscout lurched and descended rapidly.
It was hurtling down on its side like a dead thing.
Zarkov fought the wheel. The flailing syndrome!
No response.
Tiny yellow puffs of smoke curled out of the end of the console. Zarkov could smell burning plyoplast.
The hydrogen fission cell must be out of control! If it burned through the lead sheathe, he’d be radiated.
The airscout turned over on its back, as if sensing its own imminent death.
Zarkov slammed against the ceiling. The airscout flipped back again. Then, with a tremendous crash, it hit.
CHAPTER 10
“Well, here we are,” said Kial, “but where are we?”
Lari shook his head. “Don’t ask me, Kial.”
“I’m not, stupid! I’m just saying it.”
“Then say what you mean,” Lari retorted.
They were in a part of the forest kingdom that resembled every other part. There were primitive palm trees, giant cinnamon ferns, arrested conifers, and strange creeping vines that twisted among all the other growth.
“Where’s the superway?” Lari asked suddenly.
“Dummy, that’s what I’ve been trying to figure out for five minutes.”
They had come through time and space as soon as they had activated their belt packs. However, in their haste to remove themselves from the vicinity of the Spaceport Inn, Kial had apparently miscalculated slightly either on their timing or on their siting. Whatever, they were now in a part of the forest kingdom that did not remotely resemble any part that they had seen before.
“Can’t we get back to the Tempendulum by setting our time packs?” Lari asked tremulously.
“No! We’d get back to the proper time, but we’d be no nearer the Tempendulum. I marked my digital grids correctly. Something has probably gone wrong with the space pack. It’s off.”
“What do we do now?” Lari asked timidly.
“How do I know?” Kial asked growlingly.
“You’re supposed to know. You’re smarter.”
“Who says?”
“You always say.”
“Then it’s true.” Kial shook his head. “Well, we could always walk in a straight line. Eventually we’d cross the superway.” He snapped his fingers as his eyes lighted up. “That’s it?”
“What? Walk forever?”
“No! We described a straight line across the forest kingdom from east to west. Since the superway from the spaceport to Arboria proper runs north and south, we’re bound to intersect the superway somewhere.”
“But how do we do it without walking?”
“With our space-travel packs, dummy. Now, look, we’ll set our grids to a point one mile to the east of us. We make that flight, check out the area, and then go another mile east.”
“But what if the superway lies to the west?”
“When we get to the end of the forest, we’ll come back, dummy.”
“It seems—”
“Set your grids, and shut up!”
They found the superway in thirty-five minutes. In the middle of the pavement, they looked up and down and wondered exactly where they were in relation to Flash and Dale.
“Well,” said Kial decisively, “let’s go south. Then, if we don’t find the wrecked jetcar, we’ll come back the other way.”
“All right,” said Lari. “I’m tired, though, Kial. Have you got anything to eat or drink?”
“You sh
ould have filled up on steaming mead last night instead of all that hanky-panky,” snorted Kial. “I’ve got a kelp energy bar, if you’re interested.”
“I’d eat anything,” said Lari. “Even an algae sand on rye.”
They munched on the kelp energy bars and then began the hopscotching pattern down the superway.
Suddenly Kial held up his hand. “Shh!”
“What is it?” Lari asked softly.
“Quiet! I can’t hear if you talk.”
“Why didn’t you tell me not to, then?”
They listened.
Trees seemed to be crashing to the ground in the distance. There was a great deal of shuddering of the earth’s surface under the superway. Then there was an ominous silence.
“What made that noise?” Lari asked, his face covered with perspiration.
“How do I know?” snapped Kial. “But we’ve got to find out.”
“I make it on a direct line south,” Lari said nervously, glancing at his digital grid setting.
“Me too,” said Kial. “Let’s go.”
Huey activated the space packs and faded in on a stretch of superway some distance away.
“Look!” cried Lari.
“I see it,” Kial muttered between clenched teeth. “Come on. Get out that blaster pistol you took from the jetcar. I’ve got Flash Gordon’s.”
They moved cautiously down the superway.
In the distance a purple iridescent creature that resembled a giant aphid stood in the middle of the superway and watched them approach.
“It’s some kind of insect from Mongo’s past,” explained Kial.
“What kind?” Lari wanted to know.
“I’m no biologist,” Kial retorted.
Lari halted.
Kial halted.
“It’s watching us,” Lari said. “Now it’s moving toward us, Kial!”
“Get your blaster pistol ready, dummy,” Kial said impatiently. “We’ll both take him simultaneously.” Kial shook with anxiety and fear.
The purple monster’s eyes were focused directly on Kial and Lari. Suddenly it hunched forward and glided over the superway toward them. As it moved it exuded a glistening web of purple spoor. It moved quite rapidly.
Lari’s hand trembled as he lifted the blaster pistol and pointed it at the enormous insect. Suddenly he cried out, “Kial! By the side of the superway. It’s—it’s Flash Gordon and Dale Arden!”
Kial stared past the advancing purple aphid. He could see the two human beings frozen in a large blob of purple jelly.
“By the orange moon of Mongo!” gulped Kial “I don’t believe it! This monster must have frozen them into eternity.”
“Then we can go home. Flash Gordon is dead and we’re safe at last”
Kial shook from head to foot. “Hold it, dummy! We don’t know that for sure.” He swallowed hard. “Maybe it’s a trick.”
“What trick?” Lari yelped. “Let’s set our time packs, hit the Tempendulum, and get back to Ming XIII.”
The purple aphid was rapidly closing the distance between them.
“Fire, dummy!” screamed Kial. “We’ve got to do this thing in, no matter what.”
“Oh, yeah,” said Lari, and squeezed the grip of the blaster.
The ray missed the monster and disintegrated a stand of club moss. By the time Lari had compensated for this angle of fire, Kial’s ray was focused on the purple monster.
There was a high-pitched screech that offended Kial’s ears, and the purple creature froze in its tracks on the superway and stared in astonishment at the blaster pistol in Kial’s hands.
Lari’s ray centered on the creature’s chest? Neck? Head? Thorax?
“Keep firing!” cried Kial.
Slowly the purple monster swelled and swelled, like an overinflated balloon.
“It’s getting bigger,” cried Kial. “What can we do? It’s apparently feeding on the energy from the blaster pistol.”
Lari’s face was white. “Kial, I can’t turn the blaster off. It’s eating up the ray. It’s keeping me from turning it off!”
The high-pitched screaming laughter erupted again, louder this time, making the air reverberate.
“Let’s get out of here,” Kial screamed and turned to run.
Lari fought for control of the blaster pistol, which seemed to be controlled by the giant aphid. He could not move the blaster at all. The purple creature swayed toward him, hovered over him, looked directly at him.
Lari could hear Kial crash through the undergrowth, small sounds of utter despair issuing from his throat.
Lari watched the purple monster in front of him, his eyes bulging from their sockets.
Then the aphid thrust forward its head on its neck, its offensive oral cavity opened, and a gelatinous blob of purple jelly spewed forth toward him.
The gelatinous spittle touched him.
Lari recoiled, turned, and ran.
The jellied substance ran over him and covered him as he froze in his tracks.
He could not move.
The jellied effluence pressed in on him, crushing the breath out of his body.
The forest turned purple around him.
CHAPTER 11
In the dull glow that illuminated the inside of the air-scout, Zarkov saw only the instrument panel and his immediate surroundings in the cockpit.
“I’ve been out cold,” he announced. “Didn’t the airscout turn turtle?”
He glanced around.
Yes. He knew it had turned over, but now it was right-side-up again.
“My gyroscopic restabilizer,” he said proudly. “I forgot I’d invented it. It turned the airscout right-side-up after it crashed. It works!”
He peered out through the forward porthole directly over the instrument console, but saw nothing. It was too dark and murky outside.
“It’s not night. What happened? Did I land in the trees?”
He got up and peered closer through the porthole. It was at that moment that he heard the gurgling.
“I must have lost some brake fluid,” he muttered, turning and glancing down at the deck of the airscout. “Hmm, I don’t remember that half inch of water on the deck.”
Then he realized that the gurgling was a continuous sound now, rising steadily in pitch.
Startled, he stared at the porthole and reached up to flick on the exodermal spotlight mounted on the prow of the airscout.
“As I feared,” he said heavily, wiping the perspiration from his forehead. “Fish. Mammals. A string of algae. And some floating plankton. I’m in the water.” He gave his beard a furious tug. “And sinking fast, too, if I’m not mistaken.”
Zarkov stirred restlessly in the pilot seat. “Must have landed in one of those confounded swamps that dot the forest kingdom. Hit with a splash, but I was out cold. And by the looks of things, I’m sinking straight to the bottom!”
The gurgling rose in pitch and volume.
Zarkov felt his plyoboots suddenly fill with water as the incoming flood spilled over the tops. He lifted his feet and shook them.
“Never thought about landing in the water,” he said thoughtfully. “Should have, though. Those early Earth astronauts always landed in the ocean. No way to get down gently in those days. Damn! I should have checked out those air-vent valves. I thought they were a-okay.”
Zarkov moved the exodermal spotlight back and forth in the water. He saw the submarine life move upward as the airscout plummeted toward the bottom of the pond.
“Hmm. I could blow the oxygen capsule to equalize the air pressure against the water pressure, but I’d give myself the bends or worse.” He shook his head. “Besides, I know I couldn’t get enough oxygen into the airscout to equalize its weight and send it to the top.”
Zarkov stroked his beard slowly.
The water was up to his waist now. And still the airscout sank further and further through the strange underwater world outside. Zarkov saw several starfish, and a deep-sea decapod with a quite lifelike face see
med to grin at him.
He shook his head musingly. He was getting hyperventilated because of the increase in air pressure in the airscout. The area in which the air was now compressed was equal to about half the interior of the airscout . . . Zarkov felt the pressure and the heat generated by the compression.
As he frowned thoughtfully, the airscout slammed to a stop and a great cloud of mud and slime rose before his eyes, obscuring the exodermal spotlight for a long moment.
The airscout sank a little further in the black muck and came to a teetering rest.
The spotlight penetrated the murk, which gradually settled. Zarkov saw that the mud came about to eye level.
“The damned thing is stuck and stuck good,” he said matter-of-factly. “What do I do now?”
He reached into his pocket for a neuropill and swallowed it. He chewed thoughtfully.
“Bah! The damned things are supposed to calm you down. I’m not calm. I’m scared.” He blew air out of his cheeks and fidgeted nervously in the seat. “You’re a scientist, Zarkov, damn it! Why can’t you think of something?”
The hatch? The hatch opened at the bottom and side of the airscout. If it opened at the dorsal, or top portion of the airscout, he could flip the dogs and escape with the bubble of air still inside the interior.
But with the hatch on the ventral surface, or bottom, he would have to blast out the carbon cartridges and take a chance on reaching the surface of the pond without any air bubble to protect him.
The water frothed up around his neck. He began to feel the intense pressure of both air and water against his body.
“I’ve got to do something—fast.”
He fumbled with his flying gear and touched the backpack which contained his pop-out chute, his energy rations, and his spare blaster pistol. At least he had that! He slipped the blaster pistol into his waist belt and looked at the rations in the backpack. They were dry; the pack was wrapped securely in waterproof plyowrap.
Plyowrap! It was the most versatile of Mongo’s all-purpose sheeting. Transparent, airtight, watertight, and unbreakable, it was self-sealing with a permanent bond when heated.
