Manly Wade Wellman - Novel 1959

by The Dark Destroyers (v1. 1)

  And his audacious bid for attention and approval was succeeding. Criddle and one or two shouted enthusiastically. Darragh thanked heaven for making him stronger than Lyle, enough stronger to subdue his accuser physically. Others were crying out in favor of Darragh, who decided to clinch matters by thrusting Orrin down from the porch.

  "Take charge of this traitor, some of you," he directed, and two of the biggest men obeyed, almost automatically. They caught Lyle by the arms and held him tight.

  "Now, then," sent on Darragh, "we've got to move fast. We have a trap to set."

  Brenda had come to his elbow, still lugging her books.

  "Mark," she whispered, "you're wonderful. You've simply overpowered everybody."

  "You turned the trick when you came out and spoke for me," he told her. "It was just the right thing at the right time."

  "But how are you going to do this thing?"

  "How am I going to do it?" he echoed, his voice loud again for all to hear. "Listen, those Cold Creatures aren't going to expect any trouble, only what I may cause. They spotted me in your cottage, Brenda; they'll come there for me." He addressed his new allies. "Do you people have any ropes? Bring me the longest, strongest ropes you can find."

  Several of them hurried away to do his bidding. Darragh spared only the briefest of glances, to make sure that Lyle's captors were leading him away. He saw them conducting their captive to one of the cottages—Criddle's cottage, evidently, because Criddle was going along. Then he rushed into the room where he and Brenda had sat, talked of love and rebellion, and come to decisions.

  He looked at the view-panel first. No Cold Creatures idled there. He snatched up his leather clothing from the floor.

  "What's the plan, Mark?" asked Brenda, following him in.

  "Bring me something to stuff these clothes with," he said. "Put the books down on the table. Bring anything. Bedclothes will do."

  "Why?" she asked, but did not wait to hear. She fairly flew into another room, and came back carrying a pillow and some sheets. He took them from her, and quickly padded the empty suit into the semblance of a human body.

  "I don't understand," Brenda was saying.

  "I hope the Cold People won't, either," he returned, and drew his dummy upright against the central pole that supported the roof. "Now, you told me that your roofing is mighty heavy—would collapse without this support."

  "Yes, but. . ."

  "Well fill the buts in later."

  With a napkin he tied the dummy to the pole, then drew its arms aloft and put the gloves on them. He caught up his knife from the table where it had lain, and spiked the arms in place. Finally he arranged the hood as though a head was inside, and stepped back to make a survey. He smiled and nodded in triumph. Thus posed, the stuffed garment was amazingly lifelike,

  "There I am, Brenda," he announced, pointing. "Standing there, in a pose of surrender—the Cold People understood what hands up meant when your folks surrendered to them fifty years ago." He moved back. "Yes. It's a good likeness of me, don't you think? Now, what about those ropes I asked for?"

  He strode back out on the porch. Half a dozen men were making haste toward him, holding out coils of line. Quickly he chose the two strongest pieces, and doubled them for extra strength. Back into the cottage he went.

  "Do you have a window at the side of the cottage?" he asked Brenda. She pointed.

  "There is? Good." He went to it. "Here, you men out there, take one end of this doubled line."

  They did so. He took the other end to the supporting pole and knotted it securely at the bottom.

  "Where's that other cord, Brenda?"

  She gave it to him, and he stood on tiptoe to loop it around the top of the timber and fasten it tightly with' a square knot. He carried the free end to the front window and threw it out into the open. Then he and Brenda walked onto the porch.

  Men and women waited there, eagerly ready for any of Darragh's orders. He walked in among them, choosing one after another of the strongest men until he had eight. Criddle came out of his own cottage and toward Darragh.

  "We've got Lyle cooped up, close against the back wall where he'll be hard to spot from a view-window," he reported. "What's your scheme now?"

  "Let me divide this tug-of-war team I've picked," replied Darragh. "You four, stand by the side window and take hold of the rope that comes out. The other four take charge of the rope through the front window."

  "I get you, boss," said one of the men briskly. "What next?"

  "I want everybody else to stand around and be nonchalant, make a screen so that the two rope gangs won't be spotted. Act as if you're just having a gabfest. That's it—some of you at the side and some at the front, but leave the way to the door open. Don't obstruct any Cold Creatures when they go waddling in."

  "But what's your scheme?" asked Criddle again.

  "Ill explain. Come here beside me, Brenda. I see you've got those books. Now, everybody, attentionl"

  Faces turned to him on all sides.

  "That ship that Orrin Lyle sent for will come in and land, and a posse of Cold Creatures will get out and head into Brenda's parlor after me. That's why I made a dummy in there for them to head for. Once they're inside, I'll yell for you to pull. Both teams drag on those ropes, quick and hard. One rope will drag the top of the timber one way, the other rope will drag the bottom of it the other way. And down will come the roof on them. Understand?"

  "Sure," said Criddle. "But they'll leave guards outside here, with their ship."

  "We'll tackle those," said Darragh, "and kill them. Don't stick your eyes out at me—Cold Creatures can be knocked over. I've been doing it myself."

  CHAPTER XI

  They tbied to raise another cheer for Darragh then, but he flourished his arms for silence. "Friends, I appreciate it, but let's be nonchalant. When we've grabbed their ship and sail out of here, I'll lead the cheers myself. But just now . . ."

  "Here it comes!" squalled a woman.

  A great shadow had fallen across the court, a shadow that grew and darkened. Darragh glanced up. An oval ship was lowering itself from above, and it looked like a big one. He glanced around. The villagers, bom and bred in captivity and subjugation, cowered like chickens when a hawk swoops down. Only Brenda stood up straight. Her eyes were on Darragh, happy and trusting.

  "Chins up, all of you!" Darragh rasped out. "Take your places and hang onto the ropes. Brenda, come with me. We'll watch from that cottage just opposite to yours."

  There was an obedient scramble of the rope-handlers into position. Darragh caught Brenda's hand and hustled her across the court and into another cottage. They peered cautiously out as the ship settled down upon the central turf.

  It was fifty feet long, Darragh judged, and perhaps thirty at its largest width. He nodded at Brenda, and patted her shoulder.

  "That's big enough to hold everybody," he whispered.

  "You sound as if we'd already captured it," she said.

  "Do I? Well, maybe I'm counting my chickens before I've got a rooster, but I think we're going to win."

  A hatchway swung open. A Cold Creature shuffled out. Then another and another. There were six of them in all. He saw that they wore their gleaming transparent armor-film, and all of them bore ray-weapons ready in their tentacles.

  They paused together, gesturing snakily as though in consultation. Then one moved to the nose of the ship and stopped there, like a guard. The other five, formed into a close, cautious patrol, humped their way confidentiy toward Brenda's cottage.

  They seemed to take forever to move those few yards. As they approached, the men and women nearest them seemed to shrink away. That was habit, reflected Darragh, but just now it was a good move. It made the community look submissive, awed. Again a pause, while the creatures seemed to study the interior of the cottage through the open door. Quite evidently they were aware of the leather decoy Darragh had set up inside, its arms aloft in token of surrender.

  Again the party moved to t
he doorstep. There, one Cold Creature moved aside, standing like a sentry. The other four heayed themselves up on the porch, and moved one by one into the parlor.

  Even as the last of them moved over the threshold and inside, there was a cry and a flurry at Criddle's cottage. Out sprang Orrin Lyle, and behind him his two guards. Somehow he had broken away. He raced toward the guard at Brenda's door, his hands moving in swift signals as though he tried to warn his allies.

  "Pull!" roared Darragh at the top of his lungs, and himself rushed forth and at the guard left by the ship.

  A dozen great hopping strides brought him across the intervening space before the thing could be aware of him. From behind he struck, and swiftly. Before the guard was aware of his presence and attack, Darragh had clutched its ray-thrower with both his hands and struggled to possess himself of it.

  At the same instant, his ears rang with a crash like thunder. The two quartets of big men, heaving on their ropes, had torn that supporting pole free inside, and the roof had fallen with a mighty boom and clatter of tiles. Darragh, wrestling for the ray-weapon, laughed aloud—those four Cold Creatures inside must have been squashed like chipmunks in a deadfall.

  He spared a single glance, to see Lyle run up to the one that had remained outside. That being levelled its own ray-gun. Out gushed cold white fire at Lyle, and he burst into a cloud of foul vapor that thinned away everywhere. Then the rest of the men and women had rushed in from both sides and over the creature like a vengeful wave over a rock.

  After that, Darragh was too busy to watch or listen. The Cold Creature he had grappled was too heavy, had- too many tentacles. He could not wrench its weapon away or bowl it over. Desperately it hunched along toward the open hatch of the ship, dragging him with it. It wanted to get away, signal or bring others.

  "You aren't going anywhere," Darragh vowed through clenched teeth, and suddenly let go the ray-thrower. With both hands he clutched at the thing's armor, gathered two great fistfuls of the fabric. Up he brought a foot, braced it against the rubbery hulk, and flung his weight backward, tugging with every ounce of strength he could summon.

  The tough, flexible substance held for a black half-moment of despair, and he wondered if he could rend it. Then, abruptly, he was falling back full-length upon the grass, his hands still clamped full of the armor fabric.

  He had rent its insulated protection open. His adversary, exposed to the instantiy deadly summer temperature, quivered and swelled—and slackly subsided.

  Darragh struggled to his feet. His head spun with the straining effort he had made, his limbs trembled with the accumulated weariness of all his endeavors, but he was smiling. Brenda, half cheering and half weeping, had come to his side. Still she hugged her precious books against her bosom.

  "Mark, we've won!" she exulted.

  And they had won.

  Through and over the ruins of Brenda's cottage the victorious captive humans swarmed like warrior ants, stamping and clubbing the bulks that feebly twitched there under the weight of tiles and planks. Criddle looked toward the ship, wagged his gray head, and hurried toward Darragh and and Brenda. His hands were laden with ray-weapons taken from the conquered Cold Creatures.

  "Look what we took away from them!" he roared in a fury of proud happiness.

  "Good," said Darragh. "We're going to use those things. I want samples of their insulated armor, too. Did anyone get killed beside Lyle?"

  "Three did. Two women and a man."

  "Oh!" said Brenda miserably. "That's terrible."

  "Terrible," agreed Darragh, "but the rest of us lived through it, and we'd better get out of here."

  "When?" demanded Criddle.

  "Right now, this moment." Darragh raised his voice. "Give me your attention! We're going to leave inside of one hundred and twenty seconds. Run to your homes and pick up tools, books, a littie food—enough for a day's rations. Understand? On the jump, now!"

  They dashed away obediently in every direction, storming into their houses and out again. They gathered at the ship, variously laden. At Darragh's orders they made a double file. Into the ship they marched, like children at a fire drill.

  "Don't touch anything," Darragh warned as he followed them in. The cabin was not too crowded, he thought. Brenda waited for him just inside.

  "Mark, has anybody ever explained to you how wonderful you are?" she gasped at him. "I could kiss you a thousand times."

  "You'll kiss me a hundred thousand times when we get a litde bit of leisure," he told her, and slammed the hatch shut. Its automatic fastenings clamped resoundingly.

  Then he found himself suddenly nervous, daunted. He, who had spoken so confidentiy of flying the aircraft of the Cold People, who had extended his blazing confidence to all these others so that they had risen and overthrown a party of the monsters that had jailed them, found he had a breath's space in which to remember that he had guided but that one small ship. Yes, and he had done that without landing or faking off. But now, all eyes were upon him, expectant, trustful. And the eyes of Brenda Thompson glowed with love and rapt assurance. Darragh stepped to the control assembly, took hold of the bead on the upright arm, and drew it high.

  There was a sharp hum, a swish.

  And they were far, far up into the blue sky.

  Rising perpendicularly as though snatched up by a cosmic fishing line, the craft had negotiated that chimneylike tube without mishap. Luck, butt luck, Darragh told himself, it must be that there's Something somewhere rooting for me. And they were soaring upward as though falling into space. He carefully lowered the up-bead, flattened out the course, and advanced the forward bead. A glance out of the viewport gave him his bearings, high above a smudgy-seeming landscape on which the dome shelter made a litde half-egg of substance beside a lake like a sheet of greeny-silver plastic. Fiddling with the beads, he managed a great turning sweep to southward.

  "They're coming out after us," Criddle yelled, looking from another port.

  "But we've got a head start," grunted Darragh, and again moved the forward bead. He felt the whole fabric of the ship buzz as it gathered' speed, and pushed the bead out until they seemed to snap through the upper air.

  Already the dome from which they had fled was out of sight. The craft that had risen from hatchways to pursue were specks afar on their backward trail.

  "They won't catch us," said Darragh—to himself as much as to anybody. "Sit down, folks. Relax. We're going home down south. Isn't there a song about that, or wasn't there one in the old free days?"

  "How about the new free days?" Criddle asked him. "Listen here, Captain—Commander, whatever we're to call you

  "Try my name," invited Darragh. "It's Mark." He looked at Brenda beside him, grimaced and winked. She winked back.

  "I'm just beginning to feel free," Criddle was saying. "I don't know how to describe freedom, but it's—well, there's a sort of loose, easy feeling about it."

  The others all began to jabber at once. Brenda leaned close to make herself heard.

  "They won't catch us, that's true," she said. "Where away now?"

  "Down south, fust as I told Criddle. Down to the headquarters of the army of reconquest, that sent me up here."

  "Are there any more men like you down there, Mark?"

  He winked at her again. "Why? Looking for someone to trade me in on? Sure there are more like me. Thousands. I'm run of the mill down on the Orinoco."

  "You're not run of the mill here," said Criddle behind them. "You're boss of the bunch here."

  "That's right," nodded Brenda. "Boss of the bunch."

  He took one hand from the controls and put his arm around her. "How about you? Am I boss of you?"

  "I'm at your orders, King Mark," she assured him.

  "Then give me the first of those hundred thousand kisses."

  She gave it to "him. The others laughed and applauded.

  "And now," he said, "pay attention here. I want to teach you how to fly this ship."

  She moved closer to the cont
rols and put her hands on them.

  "Remember, Brenda," he said suddenly, "we were talking about mosquitoes back yonder. How we wished there were mosquitoes to devil the Cold People."

  "Yes. We said something like that."

  "I know about those mosquitoes now."

  "What mosquitoes, Mark?"

  "You're one," he told her, "and I'm another. Every human being is going to be a mosquito. Now pay attention to what makes us buzz."

  CHAPTER XII

  Megan, that swarthy-jowled leader of a jungle tribe, years before had made his followers build a village to serve as a market center for farmers, gardeners, cattle herders and gatherers of wild rubber. It was a focus of trade, gossip and importance, which importance reflected on Megan. He enjoyed the importance, and tried his best to deserve it. One of his practices was to maintain a lookout patrol on hills north of his settlement, with orders to watch for smoke signals from other villages and otherwise keep their fellows informed.

  That lookout patrol was horrified, on a bright September noon, to see a sizable airship of the Cold People shoving above the northward horizon and swooping toward them.

  They were more horrified still to see the craft settle down toward a wooded valley close to their observation point. All of them fled like rabbits toward the village, save a single shaky volunteer who waited until the last moment to watch the progress of the menace.

  Megan heard the breathless report, and instantly told his drummers to pound their instruments for assembly. He shouted for his people to gather their cows and goats—the pigs might not retreat fast enough—pack up their most valuable portable possessions and follow him to deep-grown cover. As men and women scurried to obey this order, the last lingerer on the observation hill came running in.

  "It's all right," he managed to wheeze out. "I guess it is."

  "What are you guessing about?" roared Megan.

  "Well, that thing landed in the trees down in the valley, and I got up my nerve to sneak close." The lookout saw a water-gourd, and drank thirstily from it. "Out came people."