"Over here," shouted Rambette. "I found the screens."
"Dat's it, Bill," said Bruiser, backing away. "You push — and I'll help Rambette with da screens."
Bill had serious reservations about this recent modification of his careful plan. He was not happy being a steel-girder length away from the killer creature without a lot of firepower backing him up.
The creature, still smoldering and screaming with pain, or bad temper, or both, weaved and dodged like a punch-drunk prizefighter. It slipped around to one side of the girders and almost had Bill by the throat when he spun the forklift hard and blindsided the beast, toppling her to her multiple knees. He slammed into reverse gear and backed off, preparing for another futile attack.
"We got 'em, Bill," shouted Rambette. "Come on!"
He didn't need to be told twice. Bill dropped the girders, hit the throttle with all the weight his elephant foot could manage and went screeching toward the door, crashing through the gear box and laying a smoking track of burning rubber behind him. As he got to the door, he slammed on the brakes, locked the wheels and slid sideways through the opening.
"Did you get your driver's license in a cereal box?" laughed Rambette, stacking grenades in the door opening. Bill and Bruiser frantically loaded the screens on the front of the forklift.
"Here she comes!" cried Rambette, jumping on the back of the forklift with Bruiser. "Hit it!"
Bill grabbed the first forward gear he could find and mashed the throttle again. The monstrous mother alien was almost on them. Rambette sprayed the pile of grenades with her flamethrower and the resulting explosion rocked the corridor and almost lifted the forklift into the air.
"Wow!" cried Bruiser as the dust and forklift settled to the ground. "Dat was close."
"Is the door blocked?" asked Bill, too busy motoring down the corridor to look back at the debris-clogged doorway.
"I hope so," said Rambette. "Can't you go any faster?"
"I'm doing the best — Yow!" Bill cranked the steering wheel hard and with twin bumps ran over two aliens. They were the scuttling kind, and his elephant foot started twitching enthusiastically.
"Look up there!" cried Rambette. "They've broken out of the reactor room."
The area was swarming with orange-furred repellent aliens of all sizes, from the cute little fur-and-feather babies to the Curly-sized stomping uglies. What used to have been the door to the reactor room was a pile of molten slag. Ichor and fur were everywhere as Bill went into a stomach-wrenching four-wheel slide.
"Don't hurt the screens!" cried Rambette, as Bill fought for control of the skidding forklift.
"Yippee!" yelled Bruiser, tossing a grenade into a flock of swarming aliens. "To da left, Rambette! Burn dem!"
A cluster of creatures went up in flames as Rambette sprayed them with liquid fire. It was all pretty revolting. Even as they melted, others scrambled to take their place.
Bruiser threw another grenade and shouted. "Look! Here come da reinforcements!"
"Ours or theirs?" cried Bill hopefully, fighting the wheel.
"Two guesses," Rambette panted gloomily.
The corridor was filled with gnashing and struggling aliens, clawing their way over each other to get to the fleeing forklift and its edible, spawnable passengers. Bruiser shifted to his flamethrower and sprayed them until it ran out of rocket fuel. He used it to club a few of the nearest creatures back and finally threw it in the face of a Curly-sized one.
"I taking yours," he cried, grabbing Bill's weapon and blasting a dozen aliens that were trying to climb aboard. "Da docking tube's over dere! Make it quick!"
Bill skidded around the corner and hit the brakes hard, screeching to a stop by the entrance to the docking tube. While he was unfastening his seat belt, Rambette and Bruiser jumped off.
"We've got all kinds of creeping horrors on the silver screens," cried Rambette. "They're nightmare material for sure!"
About a dozen of the scuttlers were scuttling around on the screens. Bill struggled and danced in circles trying to keep his elephant foot from stomping them, rendering the vitally important screens useless in the process.
"I've got dem!" cried Bruiser happily.
"No grenades!" howled Rambette. "And absolutely no flamethrowers!"
"Just use Slasher," Bruiser slavered happily, grinning and picking them off one by one, using his axe with a surgeon's precision.
"I got this end," said Bill, grabbing the screens. "Bruiser, you take the other. Rambette, cover our retreat."
"You got it, Trooper," said Rambette, spraying the anteroom with her flamethrower.
Bill lifted his end and led Bruiser up the tube. Rambette tossed a few good-luck grenades to make sure they weren't being followed, while Bruiser leaned out and sprayed the tube ahead with his flamethrower to clear the way. Larry opened the door when they arrived and slammed it tight behind them. The whole crew was gathered in hopeful anticipation.
"Bad out dere," said Bruiser, soot-faced and sweaty. "But we do wotta Trooper gotta do."
"Grammatically unsound but commendable," said Christianson. "But we have been suffering too, you know. The latrines are backed up again."
"The screens!" cried Uhuru. "About twenty minutes work and we can get out of here. Come on, Larry. Give me a hand."
"I got the autopilot working," said Curly as Larry and Uhuru hauled the screens away. "At least I think it's working. It probably is. Maybe. Maybe not."
"Ichor flashbacks," whispered Captain Blight. "Sometimes he gets confused."
"It should be okay," said Curly. "It'll take us straight to Beta Draconis. Or maybe it'll drop us into a dark star somewhere. But, gee, all a guy can do is try."
"I'm most interested in the alien situation," said Caine. "What did you discover?"
"You were right about the mother," gasped Bill, slumping exhaustedly to the floor. "We met her."
"Wonderful!" cried Caine. "And you lived to tell me about it. This is fantastic news. My report will be acclaimed on every inhabited planet. I'm back to my future as a renowned scientist. What did she look like?"
"Real big," said Bruiser.
"Could you possibly quantify that in some detail?" asked Caine. "Real big is hardly scientific. How big is big? Did anyone take measurements?"
"Ugly, too," said Rambette. "Ugliest alien I've ever seen."
"Could you possibly define that with just a little more objectivity?" moaned Caine. "I don't believe I can use the word ugly in my paper."
"Dangerous," said Bill. "A hard-shelled, multi-legged horror dripping ichor and orange fur all over the place."
"Did you kill it?" asked Curly anxiously. "Or will I have to worry about it and maybe mess up the autopilot?"
"It didn't look too good the last time I saw it," said Bill, stretching the truth elastically.
"I really must have more concrete details for my report," said Caine. "Didn't anybody take measurements?"
"Will you bowb off," suggested Bill. "We'll catch you up later. If we want to. Let's get the ship out of here first."
"There is one small problem," said Tootsie hesitantly. "It's your dog, Barfer."
"Hey," said Bill. "Where is he? I don't know why, but for some reason I miss the smelly brute."
"Well, he missed you too," said Tootsie. "He really whined and fussed when you went out after the screens."
"That's my good dog for you," said Bill. "He knows how much I like him."
"He's gone," moaned Tootsie. "Gone."
"What?" shrieked Bill. "Is he in the okra room?"
"He's in the communication station, Bill," said Curly. "He got by Larry just after you left, and went down the docking tube. He's out there all alone with all those horrible ichor zombies. Yow!"
"The poor dog's helpless," moaned Tootsie. "You can't seriously be thinking of leaving him behind."
"I'm thinking," said Bill. "Don't rush me. I'm thinking."
"He depends on you," said Captain Blight. "Only the lowest form of life would turn hi
s back on a friend."
"That dog loves you," said Rambette. "What are you going to do?"
"Fifteen minutes to liftoff," said Uhuru through the intercom. "If anybody's got anything else to do, they better do it quickly."
Bill sighed emphatically and took Moe's flamethrower.
CHAPTER 17
"I'll need some more grenades," groaned Bill, shaking his head at the sheer stupidity of what he was about to do.
"Take my mama's knife," offered Rambette, suddenly all heart. "It's always been real lucky for me."
"This might help, too," said Curly, holding out a box covered with flickering lights.
"What is it?" asked Bill.
"It's a tracking device," said Caine. "I hope. I designed it myself, and Curly built it out of some kitchen utensils and a couple of old transistors."
"How does it work?"
"You press the button like this," explained Curly, leaning over and pushing a green button on the side of the box. "It's set up to respond to all life-forms, but I have a subprogram in it that directs it specifically to okra-smelling life-forms. Right now it's set at maximum range. All these little dots down here are us. That green dot way over there is Barfer."
"What are all those dots?" Bill asked.
"Aliens," admitted Caine.
"There sure are a lot of them," said Bill with shivering trepidation. "And most of them are between me and Barfer."
"It can beep, too, if you want," said Curly proudly, quickly moving on. "But there's so many aliens out there it'd be beeping all the time. I'm not sure I like that."
"It's been super nice knowing you, Bill," said Tootsie, giving him a hug. "I just want to tell you I think what you're doing is real noble and unselfish — I feel like crying — even if it is incredibly stupid and probably the last thing you'll ever do. Few things are as beautiful as the love between a boy and his dog."
"You don't want maybe take Slasher, do you?" asked Bruiser. "It maybe slow you down and da aliens would eat you. But I guess I gotta make offer, even if don't much want to."
"That's okay, Bruiser," said Bill. "I guess I ought to travel light and fast."
"You're right about the fast part," said Christianson. "We're kind of anxious to get out of here."
"Take the CB radio, too," said Caine, clipping it to Bill's belt. "That way you can give us good, reliable firsthand descriptions of your close encounters for my report. And if you have any last words, we'll be able to get them down just the way they came out of your dying mouth."
"That's real considerate of you," snarled Bill, checking the fuel level on his flamethrower and wanting to try it out on Caine.
"I'll name my next hybrid okra variety after your memory," said Captain Blight. "Abelmoschus heroicus billus. That has a nice ring to it, don't you think?"
"I have to get moving," Bill said, stepping back into the docking tube and firing a couple blasts into the darkness ahead just for good luck.
The anteroom, having taken a good many licks recently, was a pile of smoldering rubble. Parts of dead aliens and ruined spacesuits lay scattered among the scorched debris like joint butts after a party. Most importantly, nothing was moving. Bill adjusted the tracker's range so that he was at one end of the screen and the green dot that was Barfer was at the other. Depressingly, there were far too many alien dots in between.
Bill eased up to the entrance to the main corridor and took a quick and careful peek down the hall. There were too many aliens scrambling around that alley of damnation to count, too many to take out with anything short of a tank loaded with tactical nukes. There had to be another way around.
The air ducts! Bill blessed the unforeseen foresight of the nameless engineer who had designed such handy tunnels so cleverly connecting all parts of the station. He made a pile of broken spacesuits and climbed up to the nearest vent, prying the cover off and pulling himself up with difficulty.
Right away Bill discovered a couple of problems. The air ducts were too damned small and he could barely squeeze through them. Turning around would be impossible once he got started. He now cursed the bowbing engineer who didn't design them a little bigger so a man could sneak around in comfort. There were also no signs to tell him where he was, so he would have to depend on Curly's tracker and his own innate sense of direction to get around. Neither, he realized, was all that dependable.
It was a twisty little maze, and all the side branches looked alike. Bill pulled himself along in what he hoped was a direction that might be roughly parallel to the main corridor. He had a real depressed feeling from the tracking device that Barfer might be in the alien-infested reactor room. There was nothing to do but keep moving and adjust his position by the dots on the box.
Twice he crawled down blind alleys and had to struggle backwards to the last branch. He decided that if he ever had a chance to design air ducts, not only would he make them large enough to walk comfortably through, he'd make sure they were well lit, clearly marked with road maps, and had an occasional water fountain. The darkness of the tunnels was broken only by the light spilling through the occasional vent, one of which lay directly ahead.
He crept slowly and quietly up to the vent and peered down. The good news was that he was directly over the corridor. The bad news was that there were, if possible, even more screeching loathsome aliens crammed into it than before. Way too many of them were the larger-than-Curly variety who could reach the ceiling vent with no difficulty if they so desired. Bill shuddered at his close proximity to the horrible creatures, and tried to convince himself that they couldn't see him and if he didn't breathe or let his heart beat too loud he'd probably be okay.
"How's it going, Bill?" shrieked the radio at full volume. "Uhuru here."
"Arghh!" whispered Bill, scrambling away from the vent and turning down the volume.
"Are you still alive, Bill? If so, Caine is right here with his notebook, ready for your observations. Got anything to tell him?"
"Tell him he can stuff his notebook!" Bill whispered hoarsely. "This place is crawling with aliens."
"He wants to know if you've got an exact count," said Uhuru. "He says 'crawling' isn't exact enough."
"Look, Uhuru," whispered Bill, pulling himself frantically in what he hoped was the direction of the reactor room. "I'm fighting for my life here. I don't really have time for idle chatter."
"Well, aren't we testy today," sniffed Uhuru. "Then for your information, if you care to know, the ship is almost ready to go. We can wait for you, but not too long. Once we start the countdown, there's no turning back. If you get killed, let us know and we won't bother to wait."
"I'll do that all right," Bill snarled, angrily snapping the radio off.
He hoped none of the aliens had heard the noise. There was no way of turning around to check behind him. The tracker just showed a whole bunch of dots all around him, undoubtedly the aliens in the corridor. At least he hoped that's what they were. He tried to ignore the fact that two of the dots seemed to be following his exact path.
An exhausting and terrifyingly unmeasurable time later, after more twists and turns, Bill was certain they were following him. They must be in the air duct, right behind. And gaining! Bill crawled faster, and in doing so bumped the wall and managed to turn on the beeper function of the box. His heart sank lower with each beep, until it lodged somewhere between his groin and his kneecap, but he didn't dare stop moving long enough to figure out how to turn it off.
The beeps came faster and faster, increasing in volume and frequency with each passing second. He drew his knife, knowing full well there wasn't enough room to use it. The beeps ran together and the dots merged. Something touched his foot.
"Yeow!" yeowed Bill. "Yeow!"
"Keep it down," whispered Rambette. "You want the aliens to know where we are?"
"Rambette!" whispered Bill. "Is that really you? I'm glad to see you even if I can't see you. I can't turn around in here."
"You're not the only one, buster," gasped Rambette. "Bru
iser's right behind me. I feel like a slice of ham in a sandwich. On top of that, Bruiser keeps bumping me with Slasher."
"Ain't my fault," susurrated Bruiser. "I'm jammed in like cork."
"Why'd you come?" asked Bill. "This is a suicide mission if I ever saw one."
"Well, let's just say I'm looking after my mama's knife," whispered Rambette. "My heart would break if I lost it."
"I wanna lob more of Uhuru's grenades," snarled Bruiser. "Real great, kill aliens."
"I think Barfer is in the reactor room," whispered Bill.
"We figured as much," muttered Rambette. "Turn right at the next junction. I checked a map of this place before we started out. It's not far."
Bill started crawling again. After he turned right he could see the light of a vent a short distance ahead. When he got there, he looked down. Barfer was at bay in the middle of the room, surrounded by a circle of Curly-sized aliens. Although they stayed a respectable distance from his snapping jaws they writhed and clawed at him. It was only a matter of time before one of them connected. The rest of the ichor-encrusted room was thick with creatures slithering and scuttling everywhere.
"Here's the plan," whispered Rambette. "You go on past the vent. I'll take the screen out and jam it in the corner, tying this rope to it. Bruiser and I'll go down first and create a diversion. You follow us and grab the dog. Then we make our escape. Got it?"
"What's a diversion? If mean fight I love diversion," chuckled Bruiser. "Let's go!"
Rambette secured the rope and she and Bruiser slid down it, flamethrowers blasting and grenades flying. As diversions went, this one was right up there in the gold-star range. Aliens were crackling and popping and screaming and flying apart. As Bill slid down, he appreciated the carnage and the fact that Bruiser and Rambette had managed to leave the dog intact.
"Woof!" barked Barfer, plowing through the circle of aliens toward Bill. "Woof, woof!"
"Dey got me!" cried Bruiser, as a slimeball alien wrapped its repulsive arms around him and pushed him into the control board. "Help!"
Barfer sprang into action, leaping on the alien and tearing its throat out.
On the Planet of Zombie Vampires Page 13