by J. T. Wilson
“Have your firing line shoot, Larkins!” Bedford exclaimed.
“Can’t. Our chaps are in their line of fire.”
“Well they aren’t in mine!” On the elevated deck of the flyer Bedford had a clear shot at the red Selenites still climbing over the top of the rocky hill and began firing. His hand shook with reaction and several of his shots went wide of their mark, but the creatures were so closely packed that three or four rounds hit, and brought down two of them. Larkins began firing as well as Bedford paused to reload his revolver.
One or two of the Marines on the slope scrambled to the side or leaped down ahead of the Selenite charge, but the others disappeared under the wave of giant insects.
“Now, Larkins, for God’s sake fire!” Bedford shouted.
“You heard the lieutenant,” the colour sergeant called out from below. “Fire!”
Nine rifles barked almost as one, gore and pieces of carapace flew from the charging creatures, who shuddered from the impact of powerful rifle rounds, and the front line of red insects collapsed in a twitching, bleeding heap. More Selenites swarmed over the pile from behind but a second volley followed almost immediately, then another, and another, until the black powder smoke from the rifles all but blocked Bedford’s view of the hill.
“Cease firing,” Larkins ordered.
“Look to your front!” the colour sergeant ordered. “Even numbers, charge your magazines.”
As the smoke drifted away, Bedford saw the slope of the hill carpeted with dead and dying red Selenites, well over a score of them. Two of the creatures, apparently unharmed, disappeared over the crest of the rock outcropping,
“Larkins, I’d like to know where those fugitives are heading,” Bedford said.
“Right. Colour Sergeant, two men to that crest and observe the enemy movement,” Larkins shouted over the railing and the colour sergeant sent two privates bounding up the low hill, leaping over the still-twitching bodies of Selenites. He led the rest of the section forward more slowly, checking for surviving Marines under the carpet of Selenite dead and dispatching wounded Selenites with occasional rifle shots or sword-bayonet thrusts.
Bedford watched it dully, his mind momentarily numb with reaction to the battle which had started so suddenly, become hellishly violent, and then abruptly ended. It already seemed dream-like in his memory. He reloaded his revolver just to give himself something to do, so he would not look like a man stunned, although he very nearly was.
Larkins climbed down from the flyer to speak with two dishevelled Marines, one of them wounded, who escaped the massacre on the rock hill. Everyone seemed to have something constructive to do but Bedford. He shook himself to dispel the shroud of lethargy and followed Larkins down the boulder, then climbed the rocky hill past the Marines at their grisly work.
“Very well done, men,” he said as he passed them and several of them nodded grimly. He joined the two Marines stationary on the crest. The empty ground before them stretched toward the cavern wall four or five hundred yards away. “Any sign of them, men?”
“Don’t know as you can see it, sir, but there’s a black shadow to the right of that big boulder, about fifty yards out,” one of the privates said.
“The one as looks like a terrier,” the other one inserted.
“Well, I don’t see no terrier in it,” the first one said, “but it’s big and sort of squarish. See it, sir?”
“Right there?” Bedford asked and pointed.
“That’s it, sir. Saw one of them going down into that shadow beside it as we crested the hill. I’m betting it’s a tunnel of some sort.”
“What are your names?”
“I’m Williams and he’s Heighway, sir.”
“Williams, Heighway, good job spotting the tunnel, and that was a nice piece of work down below. Stay alert,” Bedford said. He started back down the hill but as he passed the work party he paused to watch them carefully check a fallen Marine for signs of life, without success. The twin chevrons on the bloody sleeve made him a corporal. What was this corporal’s name? Bixby. “I am sorry for your losses, men,” said Bedford, and then he finished climbing down.
Colonel Harrison stood with Larkins and Lieutenant Booth, and Bedford recalled he had not seen Harrison during the fight,
“How many men lost, Major?” Bedford asked as soon as he joined the group.
“Was that Corporal Bixby up there?” Larkins asked. “Thought so. The only casualties were in Bixby’s Three Section. Bixby himself and one other man dead, Higgins has a nasty wound in his leg, and Sutcliffe over there broke his arm falling down the hill.”
Bedford turned and saw the two wounded Marines sitting beside the wrecked flyer and recognised the man holding his arm and grimacing in pain as the Marine who had killed a Selenite and been knocked over by its dead body. At least he had survived.
“I’ve reassigned the two fit survivors to the other sections,” Larkins added. “What are your orders, sir?”
“Colonel Harrison, I imagine you will be returning to the base.”
“Yes, at once,” Harrison added. “Full alert, you know. Never seen these red buggers before. Damn me if they don’t come on like howling dervishes, don’t they? No howling, of course.”
“I wonder if I could prevail upon you to escort our two wounded back, as well? Your men might help Private Higgins. I think Sutcliffe can make the walk on his own.”
Harrison frowned for a moment, clearly anxious to get back to the security of the base as quickly as possible, but then he nodded. “Gehlot,” he called, “cala!” The private helping the work detail turned and slid down the slope of the hill and came smartly to attention. “We’re back to Otterbein. Give that fellow there a hand. Shall I pass word to your vessel by heliograph, Bedford?”
“Thank you, Colonel, but I do not believe it will be necessary. Private Sutcliffe, once you’re back at the base instruct all coxswains to dog their hatches from the inside and not to open them unless they see an officer outside and no red Selenites. Have one of the cutters take you and Higgins back up to Sovereign. When you arrive inform Lieutenant Blake of the battle here, but he is to take no further action at this time. Then off to sick bay with you. Understood?”
“Sir!”
As Bedford, Larkins, and Booth watched Harrison lead the small party away back around the lake, Larkins spoke. “I take it, then, that we are pressing on.”
“The replica of the aether propeller controls in Borodino identify this as the site used to train at least one red Selenite cutter pilot, perhaps more. Your men spotted the tunnel into which the last of these red Selenites escaped. That must also be how they managed to approach so closely without being seen. I cannot say where the captain and his party are, but this trail is fresh and it leads to the mind behind the attack on Sovereign. It is the only trail we have, and I cannot but think it is part of a larger whole, so follow it we shall.”
“Colour Sergeant!” Larkins called. “Cover those two bodies with stones. We’ll recover them and take them back to Sovereign for proper burial when we return. Then assemble the detail. Lieutenant Booth, take Sergeant Adams and a half-section as skirmishers and lead the column. Pick your own men.”
5.
BEDFORD BROKE his fast, as did the Marines, with ship biscuit and tinned bully beef washed down with cold tea from his canteen. The better part of a day following the faint trail of the red Selenites had produced nothing, and eventually he had called a halt to rest. Four hours sleep was all he allowed, and now he used the time spent eating his unappetising breakfast to consider their options.
He expected that some changes had taken place in lunar politics since his last visit to the world, but he had no idea as to their extent. He had certainly received no insights on that matter from either Colonel Harrison or Director George, both of whom struck him as extremely myopic men, too focused on their own narrow interests to pay much attention to the broader situation. Case in point, the very presence of an aggressive new variety of Sele
nites near the base, and apparently in considerable numbers, had entirely escaped their notice.
Bedford remembered the hospitality of Queen Q’theletockus and her colony, the Esitonina, from his previous visit. His party must have been in or near their range now. When he left Sovereign he had entertained a vague notion of obtaining guidance from her and, if necessary, reinforcements. The attack they suffered at the Russian flyer, however, left him uncertain as to the intentions of Selenites in general. He had cautioned the men not to fire on any Selenites other than the red ones, who had already demonstrated their hostility. But was it not possible that all the Selenites had turned hostile towards the humans, or at least the British, in the seven months since his last visit to Luna?
He knew, of course, that K’chuk and his escort had agreed to accompany Folkard in his pursuit of Grant, but Bedford remained uncertain whether that act meant K’chuk represented the Selenites in general, or if it made him a rogue outsider. Bedford decided against resuming his acquaintance with Q’theletockus, at least for the moment. Foolish trust and hasty manoeuvres were a characteristic of Folkard’s recent actions on Luna, not Bedford’s.
The tunnel they had followed down from the vicinity of the wrecked flyer broadened out into a cavern below, and Lieutenant Booth and his three skirmishers had led the way, carefully checking for signs of Selenite traffic. The passage showed considerable evidence of use, including discarded leathery husks of some sort of fungus, apparently the inedible remains of meals. They also found a crumpled piece of paper with writing on it, but the letters were in the Cyrillic alphabet and indecipherable to anyone in Bedford’s command. In places the rock floor had been filled in with gravel to make the passage easier, in others long dripstones had been broken off to make the passage less hazardous and had been neatly stacked to the side. For hours the party had made their way from one roughly spherical cavern to another, through tunnels and fissures made passable by alien hands.
Bedford had been in many caverns on Earth, but the lunar caverns were little like them. Terrestrial caverns were formed by the passage of water through rock, wearing away the less resistant material and leaving twisting passages which followed the geological seams. Lunar caverns had apparently been formed by trapped gas in cooling molten rock, frozen bubbles inside a now-cold world, hence their spherical shape. Thousands of years had altered them, of course. Large parts of cavern roofs had fallen, partially filling in and levelling the bottom. Water passed through seams and fissures in the rock, wore wider passages, and left the familiar spear-like dripstones: stalactites hanging from the ceilings and stalagmites reaching up from the floor to meet them.
“Very well,” he called, seeing the men finishing the last mouthfuls of their meal, “we’ll bury these ration tins under some rocks and be on our way. Lieutenant Booth, your lead.”
“Sir.”
An hour later Bedford slid two yards down a smooth rock surface, slick with mud, and then helped Larkins who followed him. They climbed up and over a large fallen stone dripstone column to make room for the Marines following. Bedford puffed a bit in the thinner lunar atmosphere, but the passage would have been much more tiring had it not been for the reduced gravity. Booth and his skirmishers were no longer in sight, having rounded a bend in the passage. Bedford heard a voice cry out in alarm up ahead—and then a shot!
“Hold your fire! Hold your fire!” Bedford heard Lieutenant Booth call out.
Bedford and Larkins hurried forward, drawing their revolvers as they went. They rounded the bend and saw Sergeant Adams holding his own rifle and that of another Marine, the unarmed Marine clearly beside himself with fright, and Booth, his arms outstretched and hands empty, trying to reassure a half-dozen Selenites, all of them having risen up on their hind legs in alarm.
“Ah, Lieutenant Bedford! Glad you’re here, sir,” Booth said. “These are some of the non-red ones you said not to harm. I hope you’re right, sir; they look about ready to eat me!”
6.
ANNABELLE AND K’chuk huddled close to each other and clung to the raft. Seaman Henry lay protectively on the other side of her but propriety kept him from actually touching her. A raft was their only practical option, and in two hours they had fashioned one large enough to support all of their weight. They had gathered a supply of edible mushrooms as well, as all of them began to feel pangs of hunger. Annabelle’s leg kept her from helping with the heavy construction so she built a fire near the shore and roasted mushrooms for the others. A thick mushroom stew would have warmed them as well as filled their bellies, but they had no cook pot.
Now they floated down the river. At first their progress had been maddeningly slow, but then the river’s velocity increased dramatically as the canyon walls drew closer together. White caps covered the river’s surface and the raft threw a fine spray of icy water over the passengers as it bit through the wave crests. Now, hours later, they still bobbed and foamed and shivered through the frigid, choppy water. Charles steered them clear of hazards by means of a long sweep lashed to the back of the raft, but Annabelle could tell that even he tired. As warm and comforting as K’chuk’s flank was, she crawled back to the coxswain. A larger wave broke over the raft and soaked both of them, and Annabelle pushed wet tangled hair back out of her eyes before she spoke.
“Mister Charles, we must put in somewhere and rest. You cannot keep this up, and if you falter we are all lost.”
“I can go a while longer,” he answered over the roar of the river.
“Yes, I dare say you can. But what if, when you can no longer carry on, there are no convenient landing places? What if we suddenly come to a particularly dangerous and difficult stretch of the river just as your arms begins to fail you? I beseech you to look for a landing place now, while you have the remaining reserves of strength to pilot us there.”
Charles did not meet her eyes. He studied the river ahead of them, corrected to the side for a few seconds, then back as they slid past a nearly submerged boulder. Finally he nodded. “Very well. I see an island ahead with vegetation. We will land and make camp there.”
7.
THE CORRUPTED scientist noted agitation among the red Selenites. A group with such meagre material effects could hardly be said to be packing up in the conventional sense; still, there was an air of finality in the way that they conducted their business in the underground cavern in which they had chosen to dwell.
Their very presence here was his doing. Humans, he had found, were simply too difficult to manage: their minds too susceptible to radical ideas such as free will. It was clear that the human race no longer knew what was best for it, while the Selenites ordered around by pacifistic fools such as K’chuk were simply too soft. Meeting this group had changed his opinion on the warlike potential of the Selenites, and he had used every resource at his disposal to transport them across the Great Gorge.
Time, however, could not be said to be on their side; already he was aware that the Heart was calling his enemies ever closer. His diversion against the British ship in the Gorge had failed. The British had sent troops anyway, and his attempt at an ambush against them had failed as well, had cost him more warriors than he could afford to lose. Perhaps he should have spent less time preparing for this task, and simply struck immediately, but how was he to know Sovereign would return at the worst possible moment? An attack a month ago—a week ago—would almost certainly have succeeded. Now, nothing was certain. Time to trust his fate to audacity.
He was certain that he would be reacquainted with an old enemy: if he knew his old rival the way that he believed that he did, he could almost guarantee his presence. Those imbeciles were completely unaware that their all-conquering ambition and their brazen arrogance made them as hated here as on Earth and on any other planet they had landed on. It would be impossibly dangerous for them to couple that lust for power with the incalculable depths of knowledge that the Heart contained. It was imperative, then, that his group, however modest in size and intellect, reach the Heart’s ce
ntre before his enemy did.
The Heart was his, and these creatures would keep him safe as he reached it.
Chapter Six
“A City of Light and Science”
1.
(1880)
“AN INVENTOR’s work is never done, Annabelle,” said Cyrus Grant as he rushed around his workshop looking for some mysterious cog, lever or pulley. “You can build all the things in your imagination but all of a sudden, there are more things in your imagination! More things to build and to design. Why, there must be a hundred ideas in my head right now and only time in my life to create ten, at most!”
Grant was attempting to answer a question common to uncles faced with a ten-year-old: why? In this instance, why invent? Such a question had no easy answer. For Grant, inventing was fundamental to his very existence: Annabelle may as well have asked him why breathe?
“You know that even now there are men in space, Annabelle? What an age we live in! Man taking flight towards the stars! Someday soon…” here he lowered his voice confidentially, “I, too, will be joining those men.”
“You, Uncle Cyrus?”
“Certainly. You didn’t think that the United States of America would be big enough to hold Cyrus Grant, did you? That I would be satisfied creating contraptions to amuse the local ranchers and prevent their dogies being rustled? Nothing of the sort! Space is the ultimate goal, Annabelle, and space is where I shall be!”
Annabelle looked nervous. “But, Uncle, what about the space aliens?”
“What are they, compared to the fat rancher with his complaints about wolves thinning his herd and chatter about breeding seasons? I dare say that an alien race would be less intimidating than Ron Bradshaw and his ignoramus ranch-hands. My ultimate dream, Annabelle, and one which I feel will be achievable in your lifetime, is as follows. I dream of a city where the intelligent are not viewed with a detached amusement but are venerated as indispensable pillars of the community. A city where the thrill of discovery is not crushed by government greed or capitalist interest, or adapted into weaponry! A city of illuminated minds. In short, I dream of a city of science and light. If I have to leave this country or even this planet to achieve this destiny, I swear that I will do it!”