by Harl Vincent
seemed that it massaged his cheeks and raised theshort hairs at the nape of his neck and on his forearms as if they wereelectrified. Those vibrations Detis had told them about were actively atwork.
The gravity was even less than on Mars, though slightly greater thanthat of Europa. Mado was entirely at ease, and the Europans would not bebothered by the slight change in their weight. But Carr would have totake it easy, as he'd done ever since leaving Earth. His muscles weretoo powerful for his body on these smaller worlds, though this was amighty advantage if he took care not to over-exert.
A melodious whistling note rose high somewhere in the depths of theforest and trailed off into eery silence. The sky was overcast with grayclouds and the light was poor, of little more than twilight intensity onTerra, this being partly due to the masking of the sun by the clouds andpartly to their tremendous distance from that radiant body. Odd that itwas not colder, he thought. Probably those vibratory radiations ofSaturn's rings had something to do with the temperature in addition totheir other effects.
Detis was on his knees, examining a queer specimen of purplish mosswhich had drawn his eye. The eternal scientist in the man could not bedowned. Mado had come out armed with one of the bulky kalbitetorpedo-projectors and was looking around belligerently.
Ora drew herself erect and took a deep breath as soon as her feettouched the ground, her eyes bright and her cheeks flushed withexcitement. "Oh, Carr," she breathed, "it's marvelous; anhonest-to-goodness virgin forest. We've neither of us ever seen one, youknow. Aren't you thrilled?"
"We-e-ll," he admitted, "I've always looked forward to wandering in justsuch places. But, with you along, and thinking of those barbarians wesaw--"
"Silly. I'm as capable as any of you. And, even if I couldn't look outfor myself, I know that you will be at my side." She pursed her lips andtossed back her head provocatively.
What was a man to do?
* * * * *
A deep-toned booming note came then from the hills, commencing like thewarning siren of a space liner approaching its berth and swelling to abombilation of ear-shattering sound that set the steel of the _Nomad's_hull vibrating and their very flesh and bones a-tingle. Then it diedaway as had the bird note which was the first sound of this world togreet them.
"Jupiter! What's that?" Mado unslung his torpedo-projector.
As if in answer to his startled question, a weird object drifted overthe treetops and poised directly above them, about fifty feet up. Anegg-shaped thing, six or seven feet in length, and seemingly made ofwhite metal. It swayed there gently, without visible means of support,and they could make out a transparent disk on its side, back of whichthere was a human head with eyes that regarded them curiously.
Mado raised his torpedo tube and took aim.
"Hold it!" Carr warned him. "This fellow's no savage. Probably he's oneof those who tried to break our fall. Friendly, perhaps."
Two more of the ovoids drifted in from the woods and joined the firstone, all three settling a few feet lower and their occupants staringintently at the intruders.
"I'll get the psycho-ray apparatus," Detis said excitedly. "We may beable to get thought contact with them." He dived through the _Nomad's_entrance-manhole as he spoke.
"Nothing so frightening about these creatures," Ora murmured, her eyesreproaching Carr. "Why, they seem anxious to know that _we_ are notenemies."
And, indeed, this seemed to be the case, for the strange ovoids waftedstill lower, dropping until a faint humming of the internal gravitymechanism came to their ears. These were a highly developed people ofscientific attainment; civilized beings. But Mado kept firm hold of historpedo tube, and Carr fingered the ray pistol at his belt.
The booming note from the hills came then, frightfully near this time,and the three ovoids moved with sudden roaring of their motors,literally hurling themselves skyward. But the menace they sought toescape was real, and not to be outdone in speed. A vast black somethingwhirred out from beyond the treetops and flung itself upon them.
"A pterodactyl!" Mado gasped. "One of the prehistoric monsters ofTerra!"
"Carr, there are men riding it!" Ora exclaimed. "Red men!"
* * * * *
It was true; the pteranodon, a horrid bat-like thing with a wing-spreadof fully twenty feet, carried three of the bronzed savages clinging to asort of harness that encircled its body just back of the crested head.The huge flying reptile whistled raucously as it flew and one of thesavages was whirling a sling which held a stone as large as his ownhead. They watched in amazement as the swift aerial steed flapped itsway after the rising ovoids. And then the savage let loose an end of histhong and released its missile, which crashed full against thetransparent disk of an ovoid and tore its way through.
The damaged ovoid careened violently and then fell end over end,crashing in the forest. With a bellow of fury, Mado fired with thekalbite tube at his hip. There was the twang of the propelling ray, andthe slender arrow-like torpedo sped forth on its message of death,singing spitefully as it cleaved the air of Titan.
It was a fair hit, catching the pteranodon just ahead of its trailinglegs and exploding with the characteristic screaming roar of the deadlykalbite. The monstrous reptile and its crew of barbarians vanished in ablaze that lighted the clouds above them and brought a babble of excitedshoutings from the depths of the forest on all sides. They weresurrounded by the uncivilized ones of Titan! And those of the ovoids hadrun off at the first sign of danger.
The din from the forest was augmented by the whistlings of a secondpteranodon which darted after the remaining ovoids, following swiftly asthese retreated with ludicrous, wabbling haste.
* * * * *
Ora screamed and struck out at something with her fist. A naked arm hadreached out from the underbrush and grasped her wrist. Carr wheeled andhis ray pistol spat crackling flame. The savage, an undersized red manwith an enormous head, rose unsteadily from his hiding place, a look ofterrible hate in his contorted features. Then, like a punctured balloon,his body collapsed into the nothingness of complete disintegration.
"Back, back to the _Nomad_!" Carr roared, dragging Ora with him andleveling his pistol at a group of the bronze brutes who rushed into thespace where the vessel lay amongst the trees.
Mado was busy with his torpedo tube and a vast explosion shook theground beneath them as a trio of the savages were blasted out ofexistence. A great tree toppled and crashed across the nose of the_Nomad_, its roots ripped from the soil by the concussion.
Ora had whipped out her own pistol and was firing as they fell back.Game kid, she was! Carr gloated as he saw she was making each shot tell.But this couldn't last; there were hundreds of them now, long-armed andbig-headed red devils swarming in from every direction. Carr dodged nonetoo quickly to save his skull from a swift-flung stone, which clangedagainst the _Nomad's_ hull. There was a perfect hail of the missilesnow: one struck his left arm a numbing blow, and he heard a sickeningthud and Ora's moan as she was hit. And there were winged darts, fromblow-guns.
A dusky moon-face leered into his own, horribly close, and he yelled hisrage as he drove it back with a swift uppercut. But the horde of savagescame on in ever increasing numbers and with renewed vigor.
"Quick--inside!" Carr hissed in Ora's ear as his fingers found the rimof the manhole. He'd have her safely within in a moment.
Detis clambered out with the thought machine in his arms, and a singingdart from one of the blow-guns pierced him through and through. A lookof astonishment spread over his kindly features, and he fell forward,dying.
And then Carr looked up into a grinning face behind a huge club that wasswinging downward. He threw up his arm to break the force of the blow,but the club fell too swiftly; the enormous weight of it crashed down onhis skull, and he knew no more.
* * * * *
When he awakened it was to stare for a dazed moment into a pair of blueeyes that lo
oked down upon him in a place of dim light and stuffyatmosphere. The eyes were only vaguely familiar in his befuddled memory.Beautiful eyes, though, and incredibly dear....
"Ora!" he exclaimed, in wondering remembrance, trying to sit up as hegrasped her hand.
"Hush!" she warned him, placing a finger-tip to his lips. "Be quiet nowand perhaps they'll leave us alone for a while."
"They! Did they capture us?" he whispered. "Are you hurt?"
"We're prisoners, all right, excepting poor father. But they didn't harm_me_ much, outside of the rough handling."
"The devils. What of Detis?" He was growing stronger by the minute andnow saw that they were in an open-mouthed cave and that Mado was sittinghunched dejectedly in a corner, his massive shoulders drooping and hisproud head bowed on his
