by Jerry
The ship responded instantly. Norton watched in helpless horror, as the Murian whirled their plane through the sky. And realized that they were losing speed. He knew the Murian was aware of that fact also. He could only wait and wonder at what his companion had in mind.
Now they were going so slowly that the pursuing ship overshot theirs. The other turned back, went up a few hundred yards, so as to get the proper altitude, then screamed down in a power dive. And the Murian turned the nose of their ship up to meet the enemy!
NORTON’S mouth opened in an involuntary shout. But the sound died before he could utter it. He saw the cold look of utter indifference on the Murian’s face as he set his plane into the path of destruction. Then Norton looked up and saw the terror-stricken countenance of the pilot of the oncoming plane. Saw the man make a last, frenzied move to escape his doom. He almost succeeded. At the last second, the other ship skidded from their path. But not quite far enough. They struck and rammed half-way into the belly of the larger ship. And a whirling, flame-drenched mass twisted lazily earthward.
A vast blinding light swept the vision from Norton’s eyes. First, thunder had boomed in the cabin, then the light. He became a match caught in a whirlwind. The column of metal to which his chair was attached, broke off at the base. His unconscious body swept forward against the strap and broke it as if it were a piece of string. Somehow, he was sent skidding along the floor and in between two supporting beams. And there his body lodged, while the entwined shapes fell to earth.
The flaming wreckage struck the ground in a final burst of flame. And immediately fell to bits, the torn and burning bits scattering far and wide. And one of those bits of wreckage was the cabin in which Norton and his friend had been entombed.
“Nor-ton. Nor-ton.”
He heard his name called, the voice seeming to come from a long distance. Stiffly, his head turned to the sound. He opened his eyes and was surprised that he could see.
“Nor-ton. Nor-ton.”
Again the voice came, this time in weaker accents.
Norton rolled over onto his belly. Slowly, one knee came up, then the other. He rested in that position for an instant. Then he placed his hands, knuckles down to the ground and brought his legs up to a crouching position. And straightened upright.
He looked about him with pain-clouded vision. A few feet away was the twisted shape of something which had once been a human figure. Now it was like a rag-doll, torn by the hands of a willful child. The sound he had heard came from the doll-shape.
“Nor-ton.”
He forced his legs to move, although he could not feel anything. The doll-shape kept fading from view and returning, like a mirage seen through delirium filled eyes. The voice too, was now near, now distant. But something commanded him to move to the horror which was there.
He stood above the torn and grotesquely twisted shape of the Murian. Or rather he swayed in a kind of drugged stupor. But now his eyes were clear. He wished they weren’t. It was not right that man should see another man who was alive and looked like the Murian. For the Murian was alive!
It was incredible.
His completely nude body looked as if a thousand knives had been put to work on him. His right arm hung by a sliver of bone and torn flesh, to his armpit. Something had gouged out his left eye and the socket, bloody and oozing slime, had an air of raffish ribaldry. A whole section of skin had been torn away from the jawbone exposing the gums all the way to where they ended below the ear. Only there was no ear.
And this travesty of life lived!
Norton dropped to one knee beside it. The sounds it was making were barely discernible.
“Nor-ton! Nor-ton!”
“Yes,” Norton breathed huskily.
The twisted body on the ground writhed in torturing pain. A high, keening sound came from the torn mouth. Norton’s flesh crawled as the sound tore through his very vitals. Then he said:
“It’s Norton. I’m here, beside you.”
HE COULDN’T understand how that mouth, those hideous lips could conceive and give event to articulate sounds. Yet in an instant, in answer to his words, the Murian’s good eye opened and focused in a terrible, concentrated look on Norton’s face.
“Dy-ing. Dy-ing,” the voice whispered. “Got to—to do—something. My boy—in there.” The voice became a shriek! A terrible, pain-filled cry for the right to live a little while longer. “Got to—get him!”
“Easy man,” Norton commanded. Gently, his hand came down and pressed the other, who had by some means of sheer will power, risen half way erect, back to the ground.
The Murian was too weak to struggle. Already the thread of life was raveling at a pace too swift for repair. Norton realized it as well as the other.
Once again the man on the ground displayed that tremendous and aweinspiring will.
“Norton,” he said, and his voice was strangely alive, “promise me—that you’ll try to get to the boy. Don’t let any-thing happen to him. Don’t . . . let . . . anyth . . .”
There was no more—of man or words.
Norton stumbled erect once again. He brushed the hot wetness from his eyes. Across the rubble strewn ground a group of men came running in his direction. In the lead was the slender, but no longer dapper figure of Colonel Conners. And behind him a few feet was Witson.
They were a tight-lipped, vengeful group around the body of the dead Murian.
“My God!” Witson burst out. “We didn’t expect to see either of you alive.”
“Guess I’m too tough to die,” Norton said. “Got caught between two support beams and I guess they absorbed the shock of the fall. He lived for a short while. And now we have, or rather I have, a promise to keep.”
He told them the Murian’s last words.
“It’s our promise, too,” Conners said.
There was no need for questions. As one, the group turned and followed the two men in the lead. Their steps were in the direction of the Duro house, gleaming in the light of the midday sun. They saw, when they came within a hundred yards of it that it was completely surrounded by the General’s men. The dead and the not-dead. It was an almost even division. Jetto and his crew were exacting a fearful payment.
Norton brought them to a halt. A plan had formed in his brain, a plan which had to do with the undoing of Jetto.
“Conners,” his voice was terse. “Get to the General and have him order a retreat.”
“Are you nuts?” said Conners in horror.
“Do as I say,” Norton demanded.
The heat rose in Conners’ face at the preemptory command. His throat worked. Words, angry ones, bubbled on his lips. And Witson spilled oil on the troubled waters.
“Softly, gentlemen. No time for quarrels. I think Norton has something in mind, Conners. Am I right, Dale?” Witson said.
“You are,” Norton said tersely. “Get to the General and have him do as I suggested. Then bring him to me and I’ll explain.”
Conners went in person. Soon the signal mirrors flashed their messages to all parts of the battleground. And weary, battle-grimed men lifted their tired bodies from the earth, and moved to the rear. The flashes from the pear-shaped house continued to follow until the last of them was out of range. The dead looked like petrified, blackened sections of trees.
“Well, Norton,” Sanders asked. “What’s on your mind?”
“Just this, General. I know how we can beat them. And I think it’s going to be the only way. Because it’s obvious that Jetto and his pals have thought about every possibility or rather every probability in their defense. Including that of having to fight at night.”
“You’re not saying anything, so far, Norton. It was my thought that we might be able to starve them into submission.”
“If they wait to be starved. But they won’t! This Jetto lad, is one smart cookie. He’s thought of the same thing. And going that presumption one better I’d say that he also has a way out. I think I know what he has in mind.
“
That freighter out there! He can get all of his men into it. And what’s to prevent us from stopping him. Once he’s in there, well, he’s gone. And he’ll be back. When he comes the second time, he’ll make sure that he won’t fail then.”
“Wait a second!” Sanders objected. “We can stop that. These guns of yours have a longer range than any of his. We can blanket the ground from the house to the freighter with our fire. Hell! Let’em run the gauntlet. I hope they try what you think.”
“Something, and all I can say is that it’s intuition, tells me that our idea isn’t going to pan out. So I’m offering an alternative. Give me fifty men. And let me do it my way—in conjunction with yours.”
“We-ll All right. Mind telling me what it’s all about?”
Norton had in mind to tell from the very beginning. A certain stubbornness in his makeup changed his mind. Instead, he said:
“Men! I want fifty volunteers. And remember, we don’t have a chance if we’re caught.”
It looked like every man there threw his hand upward. Norton picked them at random. Conners and the jovial West were among them. Motioning with his head for them to follow, Norton started for the steep-sided valley wall.
“Ugh!” West repressed a shudder of repugnance with an effort. They had come across the first of those who had been caught in the maddening rays. To Witson and Norton the distorted, naked bodies were a familiar, but still horrible sight. But to the rest of the men, who, because they lived on the west coast, had the good fortune to have been missed, they were the most terrifying things they had ever seen. Many of them had been a little skeptical of the stories they had heard.
“That’s why we’ve got to succeed,” Norton said.
A QUARTER-MILE from the edge of the cliff was a small, wooded section of land. It was within the security of the trees it contained that they had tethered their horses. Norton said:
“Before I tell you what’s on my mind, does anyone have any idea how long it would take to reach the overhang of rock above the freighter?”
Conners’ eyes narrowed in speculation. “H’m,” he said slowly. “I’d say . . . about twenty miles.”
“Three hours, on horseback?” Norton asked.
“About.”
“Good!” Norton said. “Here’s my angle. In about three hours, it’ll get dark. Dark enough, at least, to hide our movements, in case any of those in the house should be curious about our disappearance. I noticed that there were any number of cowboys among those who made up some of the party. And, I suppose from habit, they brought their lariats along. There’s a sixty or seventy foot drop from the top of the cliff to the roof of the freighter. And if any of you remember, the door from which we flew the small plane is still open.”
For the first time, Conners displayed enthusiasm.
“I get it!” he shouted. “We use the lariats as ladders. Get into the freighter and hide. Then when that gang reach it . . .”
“We’ve got the jump on them!” Norton completed what Conners was about to say.
“So what are we waiting for?” West queried.
The sun was setting when they arrived on the narrow strip of ground which fronted the lip of the overhang. The sky was a blaze of color such as Norton had never seen. It was as if the Universe itself was giving them, in the display of its awe-inspiring beauty, a benedicton and a blessing.
They slipped from their horses and inched their way forward to the edge of the cliff. Below, the whole of the valley was to be seen. A thin, far-spread circle of men, lay on the valley floor. Sanders’ men, waiting for the sun to set. The Duro house seemed emptied of life. But they knew it was an illusion which would be dispelled at the slightest movement from those encircling it.
The flashing, scintillating colors faded into the blue-black of night. And fifty men retreated from the edge and went back to their mounts. A dozen lariats were taken from the pommels of as many horses. Two of the lariats were tied together to make a continuous rope, a hundred feet long. Then they made two of these ropes fast to each horn on the saddle. So that in the end, there were three horses having two sets of the rope ladders. And once more they made their way to the edge of the cliff.
The darkness below seemed impenetrable. There was no moon. With a suddenness that took their breaths away, a half dozen lights stabbed forth from the pear-shaped house. At first they were broad beams of white light. Then the beams broadened until they covered the entire valley floor with their glow. It was the strangest thing. They could see the upper half of the Duro house. But from where the lights began, nothing was to be seen, below them.
“Imagine,” Norton said in tones of awe, “what it’s like looking into that glow. I knew Jetto had something up his sleeve. Why—he’s got Sanders stumped! Sanders’ men can only fire blindly into the direction of the house.”
“Best get started, then, Dale,” Witson said in reminder.
THREE men were delegated to stand by the horses to see to it that they didn’t move during the ticklish business of the descent. One by one, they began the slow climb downward into the darkness at the edge of the huge shape below. Norton, West and Conners led the way, each down the respective rope he had chosen.
It was an odd thing, that the blinding glare of the lights ended at the very edge of the freighter. And a lucky thing, also. For when Norton and the rest reached bottom, they could not see into that whiteness. They waited in silent impatience for the last to slide down. Then, when they had all assembled, Norton led them around to where the door in the belly of the freighter still was open. Like ghosts, they stole within the semi-dark confines.
The center door was closed, just as it had been when they left. And the lights were still on in the center corridor.
“A dozen of you men take positions flanking the door,” Norton said. “And you, sergeant,” to one of the noncommissioned men, “close that switch. When you hear them enter, wait for all of them to come through, then snap it on! And let them have it!”
“What about us, Dale?” Witson asked.
“They’ve got to come up this main corridor to get to the pilot’s cabin,” he said in answer. “See those ports set in the wall alongside. One of us will keep watch. When the lights go on, we’ll come charging out, shooting as we come. From then on, it’ll be every man for himself.”
“Suits me,” West said almost gayly, as if it was the very thing he had been waiting for.
They moved to their designated spots with a stealth which in any other circumstances would have been almost funny. For as yet there wasn’t anything to have made them careful. Yet that is the nature of men engaged in a hazardous undertaking. Silence and stealth walk hand in hand.
The pilot’s cabin was in darkness. Witson moved immediately to one of the ports. Norton, the last through the door, had left it open a few inches. Enough so there wouldn’t be any time lost in getting through when the attack came. The main corridor was now in complete darkness.
They hadn’t long to wait.
It came so suddenly in fact that it took them by surprise. One second there was darkness. The next, there was bright lights and explosive sounds.
“Here they come!” Witson shouted.
Norton flung the door wide and with yelling throats, the men leaped through. The sergeant had done his work well. He had waited until the door had closed on the last of the Murians, before turning on the lights. The surprise was complete. But only for an instant.
For the first time there was hand to hand battle. For one of the Murians had rapped out, even as some had started to use the blast guns:
“No! Too close for them!”
The same thing held for the Earthmen. Several had let go with their weapons and were horrified to see that not only were the Murians in the path of the sound destroyed, but those who were beyond them also.
Norton recognized the situation for its worth. And felt a glow of satisfaction. At long last, he was going to feel that he had the tangible in his grasp.
They were almost evenly m
atched in manpower. Perhaps there were ten or so more of the Murians. It was as if madness possessed them. Forgotten were the weapons they bore. Each in his own way, by the strength of his arms, tried to tear the breath from the throats of his enemy. And where the arms weren’t enough, then teeth and knees were brought to use.
It was man against man.
NO IT was animal against animal.
For the sounds which came from their throats were not those of humans. Gutteral, bestial, their voices filled the corridor with inhuman sounds.
The men behind Norton, under the leadership of the two Colonels, fell into an instinctive military pattern. Both West and Conners had seen that confusion was the result of their strategem in ambushing the Murians. So they let Norton and several of the others charge in headlong attack. But they held the rest of the men back until they saw which way would be the best to attack. Then they came in in two columns, splitting the ranks of the Murians.
Norton leaped into the fray with a great bellow of delight. Ever loving a fight, he was not the one to ask the odds. Or inquire as to the chance for survival.
A lithe warrior, whose face was alight with the flame of anger, was the first to meet the pile-driving fists of the Earthman. Norton’s fists pounded a quick tattoo against his chin and jaw, sending the other reeling. Norton leered and followed up. And the Murian brought his hand up in a blow, which had Norton not parried, would have meant death. For the other had pulled a knife from his belt. Norton took the hand captive for an instant, and twisted viciously. The knife clattered to the floor. Then he whirled the Murian around and clamped a full Nelson on him. There was an instant’s strain and the Murian went limp. But first there had been the cracking sound of bone breaking.
He released him in time to meet the challenge of three who came charging in to the rescue of their comrade. There was no time for fancy fist work. It was hit and duck, hit and duck. But there were three. And he had to make his blows count. One went down, quickly. But the others came in for more. And before he could twist away from their arms, they had him, one around his waist and the other from behind.