by Perry Rhodan
SNAKE ATTACK! THE GREATEST Kidnap Caper of All Time! 10,000 Terrans kidnapped! Is Akon behind it?
This is a challenge for Division 3 and once again the agents of the Secret Organization are called into action, action calling for the greatest diplomacy, a mantle of invisibility and a devil-may-care approach to danger.
For, make no mistake about it, danger abides on every side on the planet Passa, scene of mysterious happenings. A strange plan is required when the intrepid Terrans meet–
Perry Rhodan
Posbis #98
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THE IDOL FROM PASSA
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1/ THE SKIN GAME ISN'T A JOKE
Ayaa-Oooy, thou art the Glorious One, praised be Thy Name! We bow to the will of Ayaa-Oooy the Magnificent...
• • •
For Andy Lever the greatest adventure of his life had become a reality. He had finally left the Earth and now he was on a far distant planet. He was actually living on a world that was unutterably alien.
As he looked about him in the jungle clearing he realized that the strange hour of twilight had come. The land lay in multi-colored shadows and was silent except for the small mysterious sounds he was fond of listening to because they helped to accentuate his awareness of adventure. This time of evening was the period between red sunset and blue dawn—a 1-hour span during which the red sun went down in the West and the blue sun came up in the East. The heavens seemed to shimmer in overtones of reddish brown and violet hues, reflecting weirdly in the glass forest around him as in some psychedelic kaleidoscope.
He was vague distracted by the unexplained presence of a single tree in the clearing where not a tree had been standing several hours ago. But now there it was, more than 15 feet tall and with a trunk that appeared to taper to narrower proportions as it neared the ground.
Then it passed from his mind for the moment and he thought of other things. In the alien twilight the small house appeared to have changed into a tremendous dark shape that pressed itself against the warm earth and seemed ready to spring upon its prey. Andy often marveled at the strange impressions he received from this dwelling, which was his house and should have filled him with a sense of peace and security. At this peculiar time of evening it filled him with a presentiment that was less definable. But then he would tell himself, as he did now, that after all the house could only reflect his own temperament, which was characterized by a restless zeal for action. No, the house was alright—it was he himself who responded to the changing moods of his weird environment.
A small bright spark of light flashed against the brown-violet sky. Andy watched it go as it sped heavenward and increased in brilliance. It finally dwindled away until it blinked out like an extinguished star. Then belatedly the far thunder of a starting spaceship rolled across the land. Andy took a deep breath, sensing the heavy scent of the jungle, while he thought of the city of Modessa where the great spaceport was located. He was satisfied with the place where he was, 1,500 km removed from Modessa. Others called him a fool but he preferred to be a fool rather than live in one of the great cities where one did not get the feeling of being on an alien world.
All of which brought his thoughts back to the happenings of the day—or rather, to what had failed to happen. The Evergreens, as the natives were called, had not appeared; they had not delivered their usual quota of skins. Only eight of them had come to the shedding center where ordinarily 10 times that number showed up each day. Not that it made any difference to Andy. The Passa Skin Co. paid him a fixed salary for his half-day work. He was paid whether the Evergreens supplied any skins or not. So he wasn't bothered about it personally—he merely wondered about it.
Finally his attention turned again to the tree which hadn't been there two hours ago. He walked over closer to it but in the gathering darkness he couldn't see it too clearly. He refrained from touching it, however, because he knew what had happened to inexperienced people who had grabbed hold of things without knowing for sure that they were not dangerous. Actually he didn't doubt that on Passa it was possible for a thick, branchless tree to grow to a height of 15 feet within a time-span of two hours. Stranger things than that had happened here. But he still wanted to know what this was all about.
He turned around to get a lamp from the house. And that was the moment when the tree began to move. It simply bent over toward him. Andy heard a sound above him and whirled about swiftly but it was of no use. The thing he had assumed to be a tree swatted him, knocking him down, and then it pressed him against the ground.
For half a second Andy was paralyzed with fear. Then he began to struggle wildly against the weight of the thing but the smooth surface of the 'tree' offered him no place to get a grip on it. He slipped down under it and the tree redoubled its pressure on him as though his resistance had goaded it into further aggression.
Andy couldn't breathe anymore. A fiery barrage of small, painful prodding drummed against his ribs and there was a wild roaring in his ears. He suddenly realized that he'd never be able to free himself from this murderous pressure. And all at once he knew what it was that was lying on top of him and that nothing could withstand such a massive force.
He began to cry out but there was no one there to hear him. As he began to lose consciousness, oblivion seemed to rush upon him in blinding streaks of lightning and crackling fireworks.
• • •
Nike Quinto stared suddenly as though he had been struck dumb. He stood there as if he were having a stroke and probably he would have been the first to assert that the shock was too much for his heart.
Which wouldn't have been far from the truth. Col. Quinto was a chubby little man with a slightly bloated-looking and perpetually flushed face which always exhibited a few drops of perspiration even in the coolest part of the year. Above his puffy lips was a small nose under a pair of deep-set eyes topped by a narrow space of forehead that was sparsely obscured by a scraggle of colorless blond hair. The colonel had never been one to inspire anyone's congenial response at first sight. To those who did not know him he was strictly anti-simpatico.
Ron Landry and Larry Randall waited until the security door behind them had closed. Then they saluted with a military preciseness that was a strange contrast to their summery and very casual civilian attire.
When he spoke, Nike Quinto seemed to fairly wheeze and shriek in an unpleasantly high tone of voice. "Ye gods! I told them to send me two of the best men we had and look what they come up with! I ask you—is the whole world trying to make sure I'll have a heart attack? What am I supposed to do with the likes of you?! Oh well, you're here now, so sit down. Have you listened to the tapes yet? Glord, do you think we have all day? Say something: yes or no?"
"Yes," Ron Landry answered calmly.
"Yes what!"
"Yes sir—we have listened to the tapes."
"Aha! And so?"
Ron Landry cleared his throat and stole a glance at Larry sitting next to him but the latter made no response. Nike Quinto was standing behind his desk as if ready to pounce upon his answer.
"We can't be sure, sir," Ron began cautiously, "but it looks as if somebody were playing a bad joke."
For a moment it appeared as though Nike Quinto were going to hit the ceiling. At least he looked up at it as he bent back his head and ran his hands through his hair. He sighed almost piteously as if the last hope of the world had fled from him.
But finally he vented his spleen: "Jokes, he says! Somebody playing a bad joke—on me? Landry, you're a nail in my coffin! It seems you can't say a word without sending my blood-pressure up another 10 centimeters!" He removed his hands from his head and glared. "Do you rea
lly think that anyone would dare to play jokes on me?"
Ron Landry was thinking that he knew of at least two people who would like to try but of course whether or not they might succeed was another question. So he answered: "Sir, please keep in mind the purpose of this division. This organization has been created for a specific area of assignments. Forgive my stupidity... but I can't for the life of me figure out what two special agents have to do with a jungle planet where the natives have merely started to turn in four or five skins a day instead of a normal quota of 80. I—"
"They've ceased delivering entirely," snapped Quinto. "That's the latest report."
Ron Landry waved his hand in a deprecating gesture. "So great! They've stopped supplying skins. What are the skins for? Perfume? Aromatic hides and leathers? Can you build a spaceship with them? Can they be used to power an energy cannon? No. Are they a source of exotic drugs or medicines? No. So riddle me this: why should we concern ourselves over such fid-fad?"
Nike Quinto sat down with emphasis. His twisted grin was a mixture of anger and malice. "I can't take this standing up or it'll be the end of me! It's too much for my circulation. For the sake of survival I'll have to contain myself in spite of you, Landry. For you I suppose the world depends on spaceships, cannons and miracle drugs, right? You don't seem to be concerned with the fact that Terra is engaged in a bitter economic struggle with the Springers, who think Divine Providence created commerce just for them. It makes no difference to you that mysterious things are happening on a world that's supposed to be Terra's exclusive trade territory—that revenues there have suddenly dropped to zero. And just what is that revenue? Pretty smelling hides? Spaceships? No. Cannons? No. Nor any drugs either. Of course we're not concerned that Terrans have settled there—or are we? What? 14 million of them? Gee whiz now, we hadn't thought of that! What? And 10,000 of them have either been killed or have vanished in the glass forests under mysterious circumstances? Oh well, why bother? You can't make anything out of dead settlers either, can you? No spaceships, no cannons..."
Landry had straightened up in his chair. "We knew nothing about that, sir!" he blurted out. "That was not on the tapes!"
Quinto waved him to silence. "Exactly. That's why I've called you here. Now I want you to go into the next room and listen to what you are told there. You will take careful note of everything and then tomorrow morning early at 7:48 Terrania time you will take passage on the scheduled passenger freighter of the Passa Line—is that clear?"
Ron and Larry got up. They didn't see Quinto touch a control button on his desk but the door to the next room was already standing open when they turned toward it. When they entered they saw a room dimly illuminated by a reddish light. They also saw a row of comfortable upholstered chairs and the familiar large screens of the hypno-projectors.
"By the way," Quinto called after them, "do you have any idea of what the annual revenue from Passa has been so far?"
Ron stopped and turned to look back at him. "No sir," he answered.
"Oh you don't, eh—well then I'll tell you: 15 billion Solars. That, my friend, is enough to build 10 heavy cruisers for the Fleet!"
• • •
Passa was a world in the double-star system of Antares, the ninth planet as counted outward in the normal sequence from the center. It was a warm oxygen world, somewhat larger than Earth yet with a lighter gravitation. The native intelligences on Passa were strictly non-humanoid and the first Terrans who saw them had experienced a shock of terror in spite of the weapons they carried. For the aborigines of Passa were nothing more nor less than four-limbed serpents which measured on the average between 15 and 18 feet in length. They were not only different from Earthly serpents in the matter of intelligence but also in their method of locomotion, since they walked upright. That is, they didn't actually walk but managed instead to support themselves on their supple and powerful tails and to move forward in a kind of hopping fashion which was nevertheless somehow elegant—and very swift. Their limbs served merely as a means of grasping things and maintaining their balance. Their serpentine bodies ended at the top in a round worm-like head containing a number of orifices whose various functions only a galacto-biologist could make any sense out of. The Terran settlers had taken possession of this Paradise world with enthusiasm and they had named the serpent inhabitants Evergreens because of the prominent green coloration of their skins.
Not only were the Evergreens the native intelligences of Passa, they were also the suppliers of that trade commodity which had made the planet so economically important to the Earth: Passa Pelts, the Antares bonanza. This was owing to the fact that the Evergreens had one ancient biological function in common with other serpent types: they shed their skins periodically. The mechanism and frequency of this moulting process or shedding was something unheard of even among the experts. The fact remained, however, that the Evergreens were able to produce an astonishing quantity of skins.
These 'Passa pelts' exuded a marvelously pleasant aroma and could easily be processed for almost any type of application as hides or leatherwork. On Terra and Arkon, products made of Passa leather were in a higher price bracket than their equivalent weight in gold. The most exclusive women's salons counted Passa perfumes among their most exotic and expensive specialties.
The Springers, those restless nomadic offshoot of the Arkonides who roamed the galaxy in their clan-ships, lived only for trading and were convinced that commerce on an interstellar scale was their own exclusive prerogative. Of course it had not taken them long to get wind of the gold mine that the Terrans had discovered on Passa but when they attempted to muscle in on the business the Terra Fleet's Passa Task Force quickly showed them where the lines of demarcation were and they informed them that no Springer would be welcome on Passa unless by very special invitation.
After that, developments proceeded peacefully on the peltrich planet. Instruments were developed which could translate the vowel-saturated language of the Evergreens into English, and vice-versa. The Evergreens were then persuaded to gather at designated collection points when they shed their skins and by this means a daily average quota of the pelts was obtained. When they moulted, the Evergreens hung by their tails from the trees. By a process of shaking their bodies strenuously they would slip their old skins down over their heads. The Terrans made sure that there were enough suitable trees for the purpose at every collection point and they paid the Evergreens for their services in trade commodities which were considered by the serpents to be useful to them.
For a period of some years this operation had continued smoothly. The Terrans had expanded their settlements on Passa without crowding the Evergreens. In fact there was no problem in this regard because the serpent people lived in their glass forests, so-called. Such forests consisted of thickets of bamboo-like growths which were hard as glass and branchless, with transparent trunks reaching as high as 150 feet or more. On the other hand the settlers preferred the more pleasant regions of grass plains or the banks of the broad rivers and the more inhabitable coastal areas. They hardly had any contacts to speak of with the Evergreens, other than at the pelt collection points. Although their language could be understood, the serpent people seemed to be a bit wary or skittish about revealing too much concerning their lives in the remoteness of the glass forests. So it was that the Terrans did not know much more about their 'fellow lodgers' on Passa, other than the fact that they shed their skins for them. The harmonious situation on Passa was based more on a separation of the social orders rather than on a loose system of integration.
Within very recent times, however, this harmony had been disturbed. No one knew how or why. The Evergreens failed to appear anymore at the collection points. The supply of pelts had been cut off almost abruptly. A few settlers living far from the cities had been found dead near their houses. A large number of other settlers were missing. Also almost all the men were now missing who had attempted to go into the glass forests to procure what was not being brought to the 'market pla
ce'. The few who were able to return alive had not penetrated very deeply into the forest fastness. They had returned because they had not found anything or because they had taken insufficient provisions along or because it was too great an effort—or for all such various and sundry reasons.
It was to be assumed that the Springers had their hands in what was going on. Nobody else would have had a reason to offer opposition to the comparatively sparse human population of Passa. Even though Passa yielded an annual revenue of 15 billion Solars, certainly no enemy could hope to strike a deadly blow at the Solar Imperium by eliminating the business or even provide a major irritant through such an action. On the other hand it could be argued that even the Springers were not interested in getting at Terra in this manner—other than indirectly for the time being, since that would go hand in hand with their Ultimate goal. In their case it was much more a matter of simply wanting to rake in the profits for themselves.
However well grounded this suspicion was, it failed to solve the mystery. How would the Springers have managed to influence the serpent people? How could they even get to Passa past the patrol cordons of the Terra Fleet? It would be impossible for them to land on Passa with a whole fleet of their own. The most that might have slipped through the gaps in the Terra patrol line would have been one or two smaller spacecraft. How could such a small force manage to persuade the indigenous inhabitants of such a large world to become bitter enemies of people with whom they had cooperated so well up tin now?
This was the major question and a great many things depended upon finding an answer in time—perhaps even the very existence of the Passa colony itself.
• • •
It was to this extent that Maj. Landry and Capt. Randall were informed on the morning of 7 October 2102, when they boarded the passenger freighter Laramie which was bound for Passa. They did not travel incognito by any means. Everyone on Terra as well as many intelligences outside the Solar Imperium knew the operations of Intercosmic Social Welfare and Development. It would seem understandable that this institution should be sending a pair of observers to Passa for, in the terminology of the Colonial Ministry, Passa was by no means a fully developed colony. However, nobody realized that this same institution contained a certain Division 3, whose interests lay anywhere but in the realm of offering economic assistance to underdeveloped colonies. Nor did they know that Ron Landry and Larry Randall were commissioned officers in the Military.