Flash Gordon

by Arthur Byron Cover

  Aura watched with interest the other two Earthlings, Dale and Zarkov, as they stood on a level above their companion’s path, flanked by two lamellar-clad soldiers, behind unbreakable, soundproof glass. She could not restrain a smile as the Earth woman became hysterical, displaying an unseemly weakness, and beat her ineffectual fists upon the glass until she collapsed on the floor, her body racked by the force of her sobbing. The scientist, for the most part, concealed his fear and pain; awkwardly, he knelt and picked her up. He embraced her, caressing her hair, as she sobbed on his chest.

  Aura looked at her father. “Look!” she said to him. “Water is leaking from her eyes! Is that what they call tears?”

  “It’s a sign of their weakness,” replied Ming. She understood a fraction of the thrill of victory illuminating Ming’s existence.

  Ming would not have felt so satisfied if his science had permitted him to peer into Flash’s heart.

  Other than his being extremely distraught at the sight of Dale’s overpowering grief for him, Flash was a man at peace with the universe. His only regrets were the deeds he had not accomplished, the love he had not fulfilled, the life he had wasted. Yet these debt’s did not seem significant in the wake of what he had accomplished and the love he had experienced. In fact, he was filled with the joys of love and happiness of life. Glad that he had lived, he faced the end without fear. He could not even find it in his heart to hate Ming. Though he would not have helped the son-of-a-bitch if he had seen him with a broken leg lying over a track with a pneumatic vehicle rapidly approaching, his heart remained free of the evil seeds of hatred.

  The doors to the chamber opened.

  A slow drumbeat began.

  Unseen by all, Ming’s excitement caused him to grasp Aura’s hand.

  The guards escorted Flash into the chamber. They strapped his chest and legs into the chair, freed him of the cuffs, and tied down his arms. They lowered a black hood over his face and then quickly exited.

  A doctor with brown hair entered the chamber. He injected a fluid into Flash’s arm and said, “This will help you on your way.” He turned and left.

  As the door closed, a hunchbacked dwarf walked from the wings and aimed a device which emanated a red ray, causing the molecules of the door and the chamber proper to travel across the crack and bind themselves together, creating an impervious seal.

  As the dwarf scurried back into the wings, Klytus walked out, holding a black handkerchief. He stopped beside the chamber, then looked at Ming.

  Ming nodded. Klytus dropped the handkerchief.

  A technician offstage pushed buttons and pulled levers.

  A purple vapor totally obscured Flash. The people of the court applauded politely, and Aura felt a funny little tingling throughout her entire body.

  Ming, on the other hand, threw back his head and laughed. Flash Gordon was dead!

  8

  Crashing on Arboria

  THE inscription on the brass plate read:

  FLASH GORDON, EARTHLING.

  EXECUTED FOR DEFIANCE OF

  MING THE MERCILESS.

  The black glass coffin containing the corpse had been paraded by soldiers throughout the Mongian city, serving the citizenry an example of what happened to those who defied Ming’s rule. There was no indication of how the citizenry reacted to this; no one dared speak, not to his mate or to his closest friends or to his family, for no one was to be trusted and Ming rewarded his spies well. But Klytus’s underground network, which kept tabs on every event or word which might be of interest to the regime, knew this: While individuals had not taken a stand on the context of Gordon’s speech to the court, they had not been reluctant to report its occurrence. The information banks of Klytus’s computers contained the names and serial numbers of those who had inadvertently reported to spies.

  The coffin rested on a metal stand in a small room near the stoves where the Mongian dead were cremated. Here the nobles and their families said farewell to their loved ones. A hunchbacked dwarf wiped the glass coffin clean of fingerprints with a handkerchief; he paid more attention to his reflection in the shiny dark panels of the wall than he did to his work. (In his strata of society, he was regarded as a handsome devil; all the available female hunchbacked dwarfs were warm for his form.) Consequently, he was quite surprised when Aura, daughter to Ming the Merciless, wearing tight red trousers and a complimentary red tunic, entered the private room. She brought with her the brown-haired doctor.

  Aura snapped her fingers several times. “Get out, get out, get out!” She tossed a clothing bag on the coffin. Then she clapped her hands as if she was speaking to a disobedient pet.

  The dwarf was so shocked at her unexpected appearance that he did not know which supplication to perform first; he merely bowed twice as he hurried out. Aura slammed the door behind him.

  The doctor was late middle-aged; he was pockmarked but comely; his body was soft, but that was to be expected of a man of science. He wore a white smock. Around his neck hung a Mongian stethoscope, which basically consisted of two flexible rubber tubes attached to a living bug with forty-eight squirming, thin legs. He set his medicine bag on top of the coffin.

  “No!” exclaimed Aura, taking both the medicine bag and the clothing, placing them on the floor. Avoiding the doctor as he attempted to capture her in a mad embrace, she opened the coffin lid with a red beam that emanated from her ring. She stared boldly at Flash’s body, covered with a black shroud. “Hurry!” she said.

  Pursing his lips, the doctor took a loaded injection gun from the medicine bag. “Do you realize what happens to me if I’m found out?”

  “You won’t be,” said Aura automatically. A pause. “I swear,” she added just as automatically.

  “I’m a fool for you, Aura.”

  Laughing, Aura pulled the shroud away; with a trembling hand, she walked her fingers down his body.

  The doctor fired the injection into Flash’s arm. He casually tossed the gun back into the bag, then applied the stethoscope to Flash’s chest. The creature, sensing blood, sent several legs deep into the skin. While the legs absorbed the fresh blood the creature needed to survive, its body mysteriously communicated the sounds of the heartbeat via the rubber tubing. The creature would not harm Flash, though it would leave a temporary mark somewhat resembling a hickey. The doctor nodded. “There we are. I think he’ll be just fine.” He yanked at the stethoscope. The creature was reluctant to release Flash. The doctor pulled four times before the creature relinquished its hold with a loud pop. “Think it’s time to get a younger one,” the doctor mumbled. He looked at Aura; anticipation gleamed in his eyes. “Sybaria again? Same place, next weekend?”

  Aura stifled a yawn. “I can hardly wait.”

  Before she could resist, the doctor grabbed her by the nape of the neck, pulled her over the corner of the coffin, and kissed her passionately, his tongue practically caressing her esophagus. When he released her, she finally remembered why she liked him, and it definitely had nothing to do with his personality. Grinning like a maniac, the doctor retrieved his bag and left her, as she had instructed and as his fear of exposure demanded.

  Aura looked at Flash. Her eyelids fluttered. She kissed him. Her fingers dug into his scalp as if they could take root there. When she had finished indulging herself, Flash whispered, “Where am I?”

  She placed her hands behind her back. “You’ve risen from the dead. I saved you.”

  Flash pushed himself into a sitting position. “My God! How?”

  “By magic, of course. With a kiss.”

  “You’re a brave woman. After an eight-hour sleep, my breath alone could stun Ming at fifty yards. Where’s Dale and Zarkov?”

  “Don’t worry about them; they’re safe for now.” She began pulling the clothing from the bag. “Well, I hate to do this, but I have to cover you up.”

  “What?” Flash fingered his leather briefs. He grimaced.

  “Quickly, before the other dwarfs come to cremate you. Put on this uni
form.”

  Flash hesitated, staring at her and then at the clothing.

  “Oh, you’re such a child,” said Aura. “All right. I won’t look.”

  She turned around and folded her arms across her stomach. The uniform she had given Flash consisted of a red leather jacket with golden insignia, a red T-shirt, black trousers, and black leather boots. She watched him dress in the reflection on the wall in front of her. Poking her cheek with her tongue, she nodded. “I like you a lot. You know that, don’t you?”

  Aura escorted Flash to a conveyer belt in a seemingly endless tunnel with walls that were white, smooth, and curved. They were forced to crouch because the conveyer belt took them past many soundproof windows which, Aura explained, enabled her father to inspect the labs quickly and, to some degree, surreptitiously. Aura made Flash uncomfortable for many reasons, not the least of which was her insistence on crouching close to him. The scent of her perfume intoxicated his brain; he felt dizzy, he needed someone to support him, his legs were falling asleep and he swayed from side to side, but he was afraid to touch her. He resented her because he could not think of Dale while her obvious appetite tempted him.

  Unfortunately, he was unable to distract himself by looking into the labs. The possibility of exposure was too great. In addition, he was not certain he wanted to know exactly what was transpiring below him.

  “Where are you taking me?” he asked, hoping they would leave this tunnel soon.

  “To the moon Arboria.”

  “Arboria? I don’t want to go to any moon. I’ve got to rescue my friends and save the Earth.”

  “Isn’t it pretty risky telling that to Ming’s daughter?”

  “Wasn’t rescuing me a pretty rash thing to do just for a thrill?” When he realized that Aura’s only reply would be a provocative smile, he asked, “What’s in Arboria?”

  “People who’ll help you.”

  “Why?”

  “Prince Barin does anything I ask.”

  I doubt it, Flash thought.

  “Trust me,” she said with all the sincerity she could muster. In Flash’s opinion, it wasn’t quite enough.

  Flash caught a glimpse of a cylindrical machine through one of the soundproof windows. The machine made him curious. He chided himself for being too cowardly to have peeked into the labs before. What he saw caused him to grip Aura’s shoulder and squeeze hard.

  “You’re hurting me,” she said, not without some approval, as she removed his hand.

  But Flash paid no attention to her. In the lab below, Zarkov lay strapped to a table, the tip of the cylindrical machine less than a yard from his nose. Green discharges of radiation danced between circular metal bands surrounding the lower third of the machine. With Zarkov were Ming, Klytus, a technician, and a busty woman who seemed to have a position of authority, if the manner in which she slapped her whip against her tight leather trousers was any indication. Though a large woman of an imposing height, she had a figure a Buddhist monk could not help but notice. Frozen with horror, Flash did not attempt to conceal himself as they passed by.

  “It’s nothing,” said Aura, pulling him down. “They’re just conditioning him to our climate.”

  “Right! You actually expect me to believe that!” replied Flash as he struggled to keep Zarkov in view as long as possible.

  “Keep out of sight! Do you want us both killed?”

  Knowing she was correct and resenting her all the more for it, Flash grabbed her by the arms; he restrained himself from shaking her. “Don’t you understand? I’ve got to help him.”

  “There’s nothing you can do for him now. You’ve got to go to Arboria. What’s so important about saving him anyway?”

  Flash released her, glared at her. “Life is pretty cheap to you people, isn’t it?”

  “He is only a common scientist, no one to be truly concerned about.”

  ‘Let me tell you something about us Earthlings, Aura. Zarkov may be a weird bozo, he may have brought Dale and me here against our will, totally wrecking our lives, but his heart’s in the right place and he did what he thought he had to do. I have to stand by him because he’s my friend. With the exception of saving Dale and the Earth and a few other matters I can’t think of at the moment, saving Zarkov is the most important thing in the universe to me. You understand?”

  Aura pursed her lips. “I must think about it.” Suddenly she smiled and her eyes glowed. “Have I told you I like you a lot?”

  “Do your worst, friends!” proclaimed Zarkov. “Someday I’ll see if you can take it as well as you dish it out!”

  Briskly slapping her whip on her calf, Kala leaned over and inundated the scientist with her hot breath. “I sincerely doubt it,” she said in a sultry voice. “And rest assured, we shall do our worst.” Kala had an oval face with classic bone structure, which she deliberately accentuated by concealing all her hair beneath her ornate gold headdress (Zarkov suspected she was merely bald). Her glittering black blouse had loose, slashed sleeves. Over it she wore a vestlike lamellar structure with wide gold borders that rose in curved peaks on her shoulders. In the black middle of the lamellar was a circular gold insignia. The leather of her knee-length black boots had been treated in a manner identical to the leather of the tassels creating the whip at the ferrule of a narrow black cudgel.

  “Please, Kala, we should derive no personal pleasure in our work,” said Klytus, concealing his hands in his sleeves.

  “I realize that is your goal,” said Kala harshly.

  Why is she so hostile to him? thought Zarkov.

  “But there are others who believe finding pleasure in one’s work is a virtue,” she continued.

  “And what possible pleasure could there be in reprogramming this Earthling?” asked Klytus.

  “The pleasure of serving Ming and the state of Mongo for one,” replied Kala, boldly exhibiting the note of triumph in her voice.

  Klytus remained silent. Ming covered his mouth with his black glove. Seeing this, Zarkov scowled. Why would Ming suppress his unholy mirth about those two, why would he permit them to use his name openly in a petty disagreement unless . . .

  Oh my God! thought Zarkov. She and Klytus must be rivals!

  And Ming had no qualms against seeing Klytus squirm; Zarkov had noticed that during the audience in the palace hall. Their political situation must amuse Ming to no end. But it bodes ill for me.

  Ming paced back and forth in an area where Zarkov could watch him between his feet and the tip of the cylindrical machine. He wore an ebony robe, highlighted and decorated in gold. “As one scientist to another, Doctor, I must tell you something I trust you will find interesting. Due to the curvature of space, time passes very slowly here in the eye of the cosmic whirlpool. Subjectively, it is the same, of course, but objectively, well, you’ve already been away from Earth for many weeks. Periodically, or every thousand years Earth time, I test each civilization our sensors have detected. I create structural disorder in its solar system, causing earthquakes, tidal waves, and unpredictable eclipses. If there is no response to speak of, I judge that system harmless; I spare it. But if the attack is countered in any way whatsoever, I conclude the civilization has reached a dangerous technological level. And then I call upon the vast spiritual resources inside me, my astral self contacts the ineffable oversoul of the universe, and I pervert it to my personal will. I destroy the civilization! I destroy its homeworld—utterly!”

  “My God! I was the one who . . .” said Zarkov.

  Ming smiled, nodding almost imperceptibly. “Yes.”

  “You’re saying it’s my fault Earth is being destroyed!”

  “You penetrate to the essence rather quickly, Doctor. I thought it might amuse you to know this before your mind is gone.” Ming turned to Klytus. “Proceed with it.” With a mock bow in Zarkov’s direction, Ming disappeared from view. Doors hissed open, then closed.

  “What are you going to do to me?” asked the pale scientist. He feared the truth as much as he feared ignora
nce.

  Perhaps there was a faint note of glee in Klytus’s voice as he replied, “We shall empty your mind.”

  Zarkov tensed. He imagined himself sitting up and breaking his bonds with a strength born of adrenaline. But his appraisal of reality promised no hope. “What?” he mumbled, praying he had not heard correctly.

  Kala’s note of glee was anything but faint. “We are going to empty your memory as we might empty your pockets, Doctor.”

  “No! Don’t do that!” Despite the futility of it all, Zarkov struggled mightily against his bonds. “Please, I beg you, my mind is all I have. I’ve spent my life trying to fill it!” When he realized that the obviously unmoved Klytus and Kala perceived him much as the Nazis perceived the prisoners in concentration camps, he became angry and indignant. “All right, I’ve had just about enough of this. Your unoriginal emperor is going to treat Dale like a two-dimensional character in a spicy pulp story. You people execute Flash who was a little stuffy but was definitely a right Joe. Now you’re going to brainwash me! That is the last straw! I’m not going to lie here and take this any longer! And I must say that you Mongians are perhaps the rudest people I’ve ever had the misfortune to encounter!”

  Kala purred, “Yes, Doctor, you are most misfortunate.” Her voice froze him with horror.

  Klytus nodded at the technician. “Begin.”

  The green radiation dancing between the metal bands amplified. A loud crackling like a thousand chitinous shells being crushed underfoot drowned all other noises. A purple ray oozed from the tip of the cylindrical device like an ectoplasm escaping from a mouth; it absorbed Zarkov as he increased his frenzied struggles, it tightened about his skull, it seemed to draw substance from him.

  Klytus and Kala looked to a screen where flashes and flickers from Zarkov’s life passed by like specters reborn. Though the pictures generally regressed toward his childhood, they were intermittently interrupted by sensuous visions of Zarkov’s liason with his second wife, perhaps the high point of his amorous adventures; for in an attempt to draw his attention away from the purely intellectual pursuits which, inevitably, demanded the greatest amount of his time, she led him down a progressively kinkier and kinkier path, eventually giving up in disgust and taking up with an accountant whose desires were as prodigious as her own. It was clear from the visual record unfolding on the screen that Zarkov’s memories of this time took precedence over his childhood impressions. An especially enticing scene from his point of view—involving black stockings, a whip, transvestism, half a lid of marijuana, Volunteers by the Jefferson Airplane, and a rocking horse—was revealed to his torturers just before the purple ray took him back to the womb, whereupon Klytus signaled for the technician to shut off the ray.