Again Atlan

by Perry Rhodan

  I tightened my grip of my energy-weapon as I got over my first shock.

  "Come on," the oversize mouse chirped in a shrill voice. "You can wait here forever. He visited the girl and whispered into her ear that he's going to the farm of his new friend in the jungle. That's how little the local Security Service know their business. They ought to jump into the nearest lake."

  Rhodan emerged somewhat hesitantly from behind the low storage shed. His face showed no expression. Only the tiny wrinkles around his eyes seemed to be deeper. He walked so closely past me that I was afraid he would discover me.

  The little wise-guy bared a big incisor, causing a colonel of the Security Service to drop his chin in trepidation.

  A young lieutenant who apparently had never before met Pucky sputtered in an exasperating coughing spell.

  The glinting incisor of the little squirt disappeared behind his wrinkled nose. "You screwballs!" he squeaked with utter disrespect. "Why didn't you call me sooner? You knew I was here on Venus. Why didn't you arrest him on the spot when he received that letter from Viesspahn?"

  Rhodan frowned ominously and the colonel suddenly looked very awkward as he stood there in great embarrassment.

  "Well, why didn't you?" the Chief of the Solar Imperium repeated the question of his odd friend.

  "Sir, please keep in mind that everybody on the Gloria had an impeccable record. The man who purported to be Hinrich Volkmar was X-rayed twice on Earth."

  "But you should've known that the girl asked her half-brother to meet the Arkonide after his arrival. This fact was established beyond doubt by our telepathic mind readers. It should've been obvious that you take him into custody as soon as he got that letter from Viesspahn in the immigration camp."

  "We couldn't be sure," the perspiring colonel replied. "The fugitive showed the letter to a Security Service sergeant and the message was completely innocuous. As I said before, the man was..."

  "...already twice examined!" Rhodan broke in sarcastically. "A fine job you did, I must say!"

  "Sir, I was on the verge of nabbing him after his meeting with Viesspahn in the museum!"

  The ridiculous little shrimp laughed, loud and shrill. Suddenly he spun around on his short hindlegs and shrieked sharply: "Who thinks I'm a ridiculous little shrimp? Which one of you is it?"

  His question startled me and I quickly restored my monoscreen which I had neglected to keep up for a fraction of a second due to my fleeting amusement. That big mouse was a telepath as well! He must have pried into the mind of Marlis after I had left her.

  The young lieutenant was suddenly catapulted high into the air. The little furball laughed hilariously as he watched the officer screaming in horror. "I'll drop you head first into the morass if you don't apologize," Pucky shouted.

  "Cut it out at once!" Rhodan commanded gruffly. The big mouse in uniform pulled in its neck under his icy stare. The lieutenant landed roughly on the rotor hub of the helicopter parked nearby.

  Rhodan lost no more time. "Colonel, find out at once whom the fugitive has befriended in the pioneer camp. Order everybody to remain at the camp. Those who have already been assigned to their farms by the government are to be visited by special search commandos. That'll be all for now. Call the helicopter down!"

  Rhodan tapped his cap with his fingers, adjusted his belt with the heavy energy-beamer and walked stiffly to the little landing pad. I felt the deepest admiration for him. He was a tough opponent.

  "Sir, what do you want me to do about Viesspahn?" Rhodan answered without looking back. His voice almost exploded with anger. "Can't you figure that out by yourself, Colonel? Leave him alone, understand! You got me all wrong if you think he'll still try to get in touch with Viesspahn. You don't know this man!

  Rhodan turned around on his heel. "I've fought this man in a desperate battle and I had to strain every fiber in my body to the limit in order to defeat him. Don't think for a moment he's an idiot!"

  I was so deeply shaken and confused by his words that I couldn't think clearly. I came close to switching off my deflector screen and surrendering myself to Rhodan.

  I controlled my emotions at the last moment and stared with burning eyes at my determined adversary. Why didn't I shoot at him? It would have been easy for me to escape in the nearby jungle.

  I saw the lieutenant pointing to a bright-red helicopter. It was Viesspahn's machine. Apparently Rhodan had inquired about it.

  Moments later he climbed into his big military craft. It was the latest type with an impulse propulsion engine and an energy-cannon mounted in the fuselage. I noticed that Rhodan sat down in the pilot seat.

  After he finally took off and disappeared in the misty horizon I dared to leave my hiding place behind the bushes and walked over to the jetcopter. I had accomplished what I had set out to do with my hazardous venture. Rhodan no longer believed that I had any intention of joining Marlis' half-brother

  I paused for a minute at the hatch of the storage compartment and looked across to the tavern. I couldn't see Viesspahn but I heard his raucous laughter.

  I calmly opened the hatch and put my foot on the access ladder. Just when I was about to squeeze myself into the small compartment I heard a noise which sounded like an impulse jet going into a dive.

  The faint whine rapidly grew into a shrill howl. The descending machine must have been close to the sonic barrier.

  Pulling my head back from the storage compartment I looked up to the sky and recognized a flashing object. It roared over the edge of the forest in a daring manoeuvre and pointed its long nose down in a straight course on the spot where I happened to be.

  It was my extra-sense that sent my legs pounding the ground in a wild dash. I ran like never before. With a last desperate leap I tumbled into a ditch with foul-smelling water.

  Simultaneously the horrible growl of the energy-cannon split the air. The whine of the machine which now exceeded the speed of sound was momentarily cut out but I heard the tremendous crash of violently dislodged air masses as they brightly flared up under the infernal heat of the energy beam.

  The unleashed atomic forces smashed 150 feet from me into the ground and made it instantly boil up. Gunter Viesspahn's gaudily colored machine was struck and turned in a split second in an exploding ball of fire. The murky Venus day was suddenly illuminated by the burst of a small sun—the ominous blinding light generated by the energy-cannon.

  I was almost sucked out of my water ditch in the wake of the ship racing over my head. The ground bubbled a mere 30 feet away from me. Rhodan had drawn a straight lava trench through the soil.

  The sound waves rolled in moments later and their roar and thunder created the sensation of the whole planet blowing up. I pressed the palm of my hands against my tortured ears and staggered blindly to the storage shed where I dropped to the ground in utter exhaustion.

  I was close to sobbing but my throat was too choked up. I was in the throes of a senseless rage and would have liked to scream to vent my feeling of abject humiliation.

  Rhodan had departed and then returned to take Viesspahn's machine under fire in cold blood.

  This confounded grey-eyed barbarian had foreseen the possibility that I would have the audacity to renew my former contact. When he earlier berated the hapless colonel, his lacing down was really meant for the ears of the invisible man somewhere in the vicinity.

  Had he waited only half a minute longer with his return I would already have been inside the storage room and couldn't have so instinctively reacted with my instantaneous escape.

  I had to use all my willpower to restrain myself when Rhodan's machine landed again. He jumped out of the cockpit and walked over to the smoldering lump of metal as closely as the heat permitted.

  I was anxious to hear what he had to say. I got up in spite of my reluctance and walked over to him, getting so closely in the way of the settlers running out of the bar that I almost brushed against one of them.

  Gunter Viesspahn stood pale as death before the mighti
est man in the Solar Imperium. The colonel was already at the side of Rhodan.

  "Was this machine yours, Mr. Viesspahn?" the dark-blond giant inquired calmly.

  My 'friend' nodded disconcerted, looking fearfully at the officers of the Security Service.

  "I'm very sorry," Rhodan said tongue in cheek. "A little mishap, you see. I regret I can't give you any explanations. Of course the government will replace your helicopter with a new one. Tell the officer what supplies you had loaded in the vehicle. You'll be completely indemnified within an hour. Take care of this matter, Col. Fasting!"

  Viesspahn smiled uneasily but it seemed to me that he felt greatly relieved.

  Rhodan dismissed him with a gesture and looked again at the burned-out wreck of the copter. "Colonel!"

  The colonel who was already on his way stopped and stood at attention. Rhodan's voice had an extremely impersonal ring.

  "Sir?" the colonel asked.

  "Please have the wreck thoroughly examined by scientific experts as soon as it cools down. Its possible you'll find the remains of a humanoid being inside. I wish to be informed of your investigation's result at once. Thank you!"

  He left after reassuring the bewildered Viesspahn again that he would receive a brand new machine in an hour.

  I stood in the open terrain, trembling all over like a leaf. Rhodan's back appeared in the luminous sight of my gun. I only had to squeeze the trigger to do to him what he had tried to inflict on me.

  However I let the heavy weapon in my hand sink down. I felt unable to shoot him in the back.

  I ran back to the storage shed with wide leaps. The settlers were talking excitedly. Nobody knew what was behind the mysterious events. Only Gunter Viesspahn had an inkling but he preferred to keep his mouth shut.

  I watched Rhodan getting in his machine again. But this time he did not take the pilot seat

  This barbarian had no compunctions about destroying a perfectly good aircraft if he considered it a tactical necessity. He didn't even know for certain whether I was inside the ship or not and he had therefore given me time to get aboard the helicopter.

  He had thought of all eventualities and had taken a calculated risk rather than staying on the safe side.

  I could have kicked myself because of my nearly fatal mistake. I should have noticed that Rhodan left one of his men behind in the tavern.

  Of course that officer must have had orders to keep everybody off the landing pad. Rhodan wanted to have a free firezone. I was the only target he was interested in.

  I had a great deal of trouble regaining my badly shaken composure.

  This tall barbarian could have been only a few hours on Venus and he had already given me more trouble than the entire Venusian Security Service in six days of Terra-time. Now the game would get rough. This man was too smart and methodical to slip up in his decisions. I could be sure of that.

  • • •

  After one hour and 15 minutes a new aircraft landed on the pad near the tavern. Rhodan had kept his word. It was remarkable how quickly he could act even here on the threshold of the wilderness.

  The pilot was none other than that abominable big mouse. He looked preposterous in his uniform which had a hole cut out to allow his broad beavertail to touch the ground. Now his head was enclosed in a radio-helmet under which the grinning incisor protruded from his pointed snout.

  The three-foot high pipsqueak planted himself before the smirking Viesspahn and lectured the black beard in a high-pitched voice about his duties and rights as a settler.

  Although I must have known deep inside me that my ire against the uniformed creature was unjustified, I was seized by the most repulsive feelings against this ludicrous brat who was even more alien to the Solar system than myself. How could he behave so presumptuously in this world?

  In blind fury I picked up a half-rotten piece of wood and hurled it with all my might against the snout of the little braggart.

  By the ancient gods of Terra—I shouldn't have done it! My wrath quickly evaporated after my ill-conceived pitch. I took to my heels and was lucky that the enraged mouse was unable to see me or spot me by telepathy.

  What he did to the innocent pioneers was downright awful. This creature from another world had fantastic telekinetic powers. He managed to throw the wildly screaming colonists into a swampy pond and to send them flying to the highest treetops of the jungle.

  Then the little beast rolled on the concrete landing pad bursting with frenetic laughter in a way no other intelligent being in the Galaxy would have done.

  Only Viesspahn was spared his scandalous treatment since the little monster apparently knew that he was not the culprit who had thrown the piece of wood at him. At least I found out what to expect from Rhodan's 'friend'.

  Dumbfounded, Viesspahn bowed as the little squirt vanished from the scene as if he had never been there after shouting: "I'll show you guys! You've seen nothing yet!"

  I saw Viesspahn gathering up his stuff. The vehicle destroyed by Rhodan had been empty.

  I walked calmly to the new aircraft and when Viesspahn took off in haste I was already on the seat behind him. I had the feeling that Rhodan would not attack us a second time.

  I surmised that he was busy mobilizing a few more mutants from his secret corps. But who of these people could be dangerous to me? Telepaths were no threat to me and therefore didn't faze me; this much had already become obvious. Who else could Rhodan use to detect me when I had the protection of my thought-screen and light-deflector?

  I was in no position to answer this question as I didn't know what other aces Rhodan had up his sleeve.

  Now I rued again the fact that I had failed to get rid of him when I had the chance to shoot him. How would I ever make it to the Arkon system? It didn't make much sense. Was he a deadly enemy of my beloved land or not?

  8/ SECRET MENTOR OF MANKIND

  The storm seemed to drive the beasts crazy. Two mountains of flesh and bones as big and strong as trees had come five minutes ago out of the primordial forest to perform a strange dance on Viesspahn's carefully cultivated fields.

  They were two sprinter dragon-lizards, as they were called on Venus. Their shape roughly resembled a Terrestrial kangaroo but their long-stretched flat-snouted skulls reached 100 feet high through the hazy air.

  These sprinter-lizards were the most ferocious denizens of the untamed jungle. Their horny Armor was as much as 18" thick in some places. They could move at terrifying speed and before man arrived on Venus they were the uncontested rulers of the planet.

  A trampler in wild flight had first appeared on the scene before them. That 4-legged vegetarian' had devastated Viesspahn fields in a few moments. Wherever it had put down its colossal footprints it left deep muddy troughs.

  When the sprinter-dragons reached the broad clearing at the precipitous banks of the Hondo River they suddenly gave up chasing the trampler.

  They stood for several minutes upright to their full lengths high above the river before they began their dance.

  Viesspahn had rushed to the control station of the newfangled farm in the jungle. He was busy calling back his remote-controlled robot tractors before the beasts discovered and destroyed them.

  I could hear him swearing like a trooper in the power station where I had sought refuge. For the last three days I had been on his farm without him knowing anything about it. I had no intention of disclosing my whereabouts to him as he was much too unreliable. In time, however, he was bound to start wondering about his diminishing supply of victuals. By that time I would have to find a solution.

  A 500-amp fuse blew behind me, it was in the circuit of the southern high-tension fence which proved to be an ineffective obstacle in the path of the trampler as it broke through.

  The red control lamps blinked faster and faster until their light became steady. Three times the switch of the automatic fuse was thrown back into contact position and it flipped three times out again with a loud crack. The circuit was shorted out and the h
igh-tension screen no longer functioned.

  Viesspahn cursed with increased passion. I retreated to the isolation chamber of the power station where I could hear the transformer bank of the energy reactor hum behind a heavy steel door.

  Viesspahn was equipped with a modem type of fusion breeder putting out a maximum of 1000 kilowatt-hours which was sufficient to supply his power requirements for the farm. The multi-purpose tractors drew their energy from a separate power source.

  I looked out of the control station through the armorplast panes which were as thick as the width of my hand.

  The storm had reached its peak in a few seconds. I knew that the long night of Venus was just beginning and that we would be immersed in total darkness for a period of 12 Terrestrial days. Now the planet's rotation approached the tempestuous twilight zone which was neither light nor dark and which was long extended due to the slow rotation.

  As the night slowly fell, a storm blew up and it rained buckets. Yet the sudden drop in temperature brought no relief.

  Viesspahn's epithets were drowned out by the howling hurricane but he seemed to be successful in bringing back his valuable machines to the subterranean bunkers.

  I began to feel very uncomfortable in the narrow confines of the isolation chamber which was built into the base of a rugged tower. Such towers had been installed on all Venusian farms. They were topped by transparent armorplast domes which provided an excellent view of the cultivated fields and the nearby living quarters.

  These constructions were an absolute must on the second Solar planet because they alone were adequate to repulse the gigantic animals as soon as they emerged from the jungle.

  The twilight zone was particularly notorious. The abrupt change of climate seemed to provoke a state of frenzy in the saurians. They became even more vicious, surpassing the bounds of their habitual aggression.

  The bearded farmer scurried past my temporary hideout. I instinctively sought cover when his fist hit the lever of the little energy-cannon which was swivel-mounted in the transparent cupola. A special government license was mandatory for the possession and operation of such heavy weapons. They were provided only for stationary positions and were regularly checked by inspectors from Port Venus.