Menace Under Marswood

by Sterling E. Lanier

  Grinning over her shoulder, his clear gaze met that of the startled younger man. "Not to worry, boy. She happens to be my daughter. I think I ought to begin worrying about her choice of a man, don't you?"

  Danna pulled loose from Muller and stared at him. "But, but—what do you say? My father was a great warrior of the True People. He was from a foreign clan from far away in the North. When my mother bore me she died, but all have told me this and Thau Lang, he ... "

  Muller smiled but a sadness was mixed with the smile. "I posed as a faraway clansman, my dear. I loved your mother and Thau Lang knew who and what I was. He was her father, after all."

  Danna looked at the colonel and her mouth was soft and her lips just parted. "You speak the truth, I think." She turned to Mohammed Slater and he saw a hint of the tears in the amber eyes as she came to his arms. He stroked the short ruffled mass of her hair and she said into his shoulder, "I am half a Greenie myself and so it is all right." He murmured as he would to a child and held her tighter.

  It was Muller who brought them back to reality. He had been watching the narrow gap of the great metal door and now he spoke. "We will have a long time together to discuss family matters. But first and now—JayBee!"

  The man and the woman drew apart and, at his orders, fell on the door again and pushed it open wider. The dusty corridor led down.

  They watched the walls closely as they went and kept their weapons poised. The very weak line of fluors in the ceiling on that side of the sliding door was enough to follow the trace they sought. It was all gray and extremely gloomy, that untenanted road to nowhere, yet they felt stronger just because they were together.

  Slater's wristchron said they had been on the sepulchral route for about fifteen minutes when Muller, who was leading, held up one hand and pointed—the sloping passage leveled off ahead and another barrier seemed to seal it.

  "This may be it," Muller said quietly. "We'll go down with care and look that door over. I want JayBee and I want that other even more." Slater had no doubt that the "other" his superior meant was not Mohini.

  Chapter Sixteen – The Last of the Best

  THE NEW barrier was quite different from the one they had encountered higher up, just a dull plastic finish with transverse bars of metal cutting across. But Danna pointed to the wall on the left side of the passageway.

  Sure enough, under the dust, there was another small door, just as there had been by the Control Center. And it too had a recessed manual catch.

  Muller released the handle, opened the narrow portal slowly, and beamed his torch into the dark interior. After he had checked the darkness that lay beyond as well as he could, he said, "I'll lead, Slater will bring up the rear. You, daughter, will stay in the center. Watch my light and anything else you can see. I think we're getting close to our quarry and I want to avoid accidents."

  Silently and slowly, they filed into the dark, the colonel's beam providing the only light. The walls and floor were the same dull plasticene as those above, but dustier. They walked for a considerable distance, and all that kept Slater hopeful was the gentle right-hand curve of the walls. It seemed the corridor circled a much larger space, just as had the one above. But no shelves, openings, ports, or lights were apparent on this one. They went for minute after minute until Muller suddenly stopped.

  Ahead of them, the surface of the floor had changed. For a stretch of about thirty feet, it had become a bluish metallic surface, which looked as if it had been oiled. Beyond that as far as the light could show, the old floor wound away into the darkness.

  "What do you think?" Muller asked.

  "I don't know, sir," Slater said. "It looks as if it had just been cleaned."

  "I don't like it," Danna said.

  "I don't like that smooth bit at all."

  The colonel looked reflective as he mulled over the situation. Finally he spoke. "I think we have to try it. Going back gets us nowhere, and we are sure JayBee came this way. He must have guessed we'd follow even if he hasn't yet been alerted about the troops Scott is landing up above. If we try to force the big door back there and he is inside it, he'll be waiting for us. I'm afraid we'll have to look for another entry—hell, there has to be a reason for this thing we're in to keep going on."

  Muller walked carefully out on the metal surface and the others kept him covered from behind. Nothing at all happened. The floor was quite solid. He turned and waved the other two on after him, and soon all three were standing on the dust-free surface. Muller was only a yard or so from the other side when the floor tilted sideways.

  Danna screamed once. The two officers remained mute, but in that blinding moment when the footing suddenly vanished, Slater just braced himself for sudden death. The result of the fall was certainly sudden but it was not death.

  Almost as quickly as the foothold had vanished, another hard surface took its place beneath them. Without any real impact, the three bodies jumbled together and all three continued downward together, but this time on a sharp slant. They slid, with increasing rapidity, down a long and very slick tube.

  Even as he twisted and writhed, trying to find a foothold or a hand grip somewhere, Slater was, in another part of his mind, reasoning. Was it for them, this collapsing floor trap, or for others? When had it been set first, and by whom! And as his mind raced, he managed to get Danna's arm out of one eye and Muller's heel out of his left armpit. But that was all, and still the fall went on, on and down.

  Unexpectedly they fell to a stop, all three in one tangled mass, but quite unhurt and on some soft surface that had cushioned their arrival. The long slide down that corkscrew chute and its sudden end had done them no harm at all.

  As they freed themselves from the tangle of their own bodies, Slater felt heavy plastic under his groping hands. A large mat lay beneath them, and he could stand on it even though his knees shook. But no sooner was he erect than he was half blinded.

  Trying to focus through aching eyes, he watched as one wall of the pit began to move upward. And strong light flooded under it. The illumination grew stronger as the curved surface rose above their heads, and to add to the confusion, there were shouts, raucous laughter, and catcalls.

  "Look at the Greenies! All in a cage! Burn 'em down, JayBee—fry 'em to a crisp like they did us." Finally Slater's eyes were beginning to adjust to the intense light.

  He, Danna, and Muller were in a nearly circular space with a padded floor. A row of massive bars rose higher than his head from floor to the roof of the aperture. Outside the bars, which he immediately realized were not close enough to stop his passage, was the enemy.

  None was close but all were within easy distance. A mob of the new clan giants in the usual uniform danced and waved along one side of a huge subterranean chamber. Vivid blue fluor tubes blazed on the arched ceiling above the giants. On a platform at the far end of the domed cellar, JayBee Pelham crouched over a UN-issue heavy lasgun. Over the heads of his impassioned followers, his black eyes were gleaming in malignant triumph. His waving white hair was disarrayed and he looked as if he had run hard and fast. He had won and they had lost, and he reveled in his moment of victory.

  "Silence, all of you! JayBee commands here!" His voice had not lost its power or charm, even in curt commands. The thirty or so new clan warriors fell silent at their leader's order.

  In the quiet that followed, Slater could hear the breath of the two behind him. He moved very slightly, shuffling his feet on the pad, and managed to move in front of Danna.

  "I do believe it is my dear friend Colonel Muller. You took me once, I recall, and put me behind bars. Now you are the one behind bars, and I shall not make the mistake you did. The Master Hunter of Mars himself, and two flunkies! What a downfall, eh, Muller? Strange how life always favors the better man, right?"

  Louis Muller's voice was calm. "I told them to execute you, Pelham. I said you were as dangerous as plague spore and ought to be expunged. But you know how politics is—perhaps better than any. Your judgment and sent
encing had to be done by the letter of the law. I live under rules and the law. You live under nothing but your own desire to be omnipotent. And you are not stupid. So the plague bacillus escaped and like any kind of disease germ, found itself a wound to fester in. And, of course, you found allies as well, like these poor men who don't know you or even what they really want or what's good for the planet. I'd call it a bad turn of the dice, Pelham, that's all. And don't try to lie to me and tell me you had us trapped!"

  There was a surge of the muttering now. The savages who glared at them picked up the contempt in Muller's voice. They understood little Unit, but keen ears could easily detect the lack of respect and the cold dislike in their imprisoned enemy. So could Pelham, and he lost his temper.

  "You fool! You are in my grip and you have the gall to say I didn't trap you!" His voice rose in anger and Slater could see that Muller was provoking him. The longer he could keep the Master Mind busy and arguing, the longer it gave Scott and the strike force to penetrate down to their underground prison.

  The colonel's level voice, unexcited yet very audible, was quick to reply. "This slide is too big for just a few people and you know it. Satreel's race and what came before them must have built it for something else. Probably a trap for any of the big animals that got loose which could be herded into that passage or lured in with food."

  He laughed, a sneer evident in the sound, and then waved at the men assembled across the room from JayBee.

  "I could see that they all were surprised as well as impressed by your great cleverness, Pelham. I'd be willing to bet you had no idea where we were at all until this tube spilled us down here. Sheer dumb luck—so of course you're claiming credit for it. Bah! Spare me your boasts. Impress these peasants as you did the more stupid colonists up top when you were still a respectable petty crook on the make."

  Slater watched the play of emotion on JayBee's furious face, then scanned the other members of the audience. Something registered on his brain. One of the tall, scowling figures—a very tall one, dirty and unshaven—was known to him! Their eyes met for an instant and he had it. It was Nak!

  Slater turned back to warn the colonel but he was distracted as Pelham, his face livid with rage, was preparing to fire. He was obviously aiming at Muller who stood to Slater's left. But Pelham had forgotten something. Suddenly a small door behind his platform whipped open and first one and then another figure darted out.

  The flame hair of the first was evidence that the strange captive was loose. Behind her ran Mohini Dutt-Medawar as she tried to catch the fugitive. "Stop her, JayBee, stop her before she does something!"

  The big clansmen merely gaped and even Pelham seemed momentarily paralyzed. But one brain did not freeze. "Run, now, through the bars," Muller hissed.

  The incredible orange-fire hair had come to a sudden halt, at an angle of the wall between JayBee and his followers. She leaped up and to the side and seized a thin lever that jutted inconspicuously from a boxlike bulge in the wall. The rod was a strange mixture of flaming pink and subtle blue. With both hands, the fugitive wrenched at the thing and it descended with a loud, grinding sound. A strange low hum became audible.

  At this point, Pelham seemed to come awake. He wheeled the big lasgun and took aim, but he was too late and too fast on the trigger. Mohini had just grasped one arm of the captive when a line of white light and inconceivable heat struck both bodies. In a second they were ash, the wall behind them molten plastic and stone.

  Slater had lost his alien gun in the fall down the shaft and had not had a chance to find it. But Muller, with the instinct of the born old fighting man he was, had not lost his. He took aim now and yelled as he did so, for he was out past the wide-spaced bars and in the room.

  "Try this for size, Pelham, you butchering bastard!" Then he pressed the button to release the explosive bullets. Alas for the colonel. Nothing happened at all. The fight with the last monster had exhausted the load.

  Pelham whirled to fight, but another was quicker still. One of the new clansmen had drawn back his arm at the colonel's shout and hurled a light spear like a striking snake.

  Slater had turned and grabbed Danna's sword then leaped forward, but he was not fast enough. The spear drove deep into Muller's body, and he staggered and fell at the impact. The crowd yelled and JayBee's voice was higher and louder than any.

  "Good shot! Now let me get the other Greenies and that's it, True People!" He turned and leveled the lasgun. Slater braced himself for a hot and instant death, but he had forgotten something and JayBee, sure of triumph, had never known it at all. A bull's bellow shook the whole room and a giant figure leaped high, in a way no one born under Martian gravity could have done. "Try this one, Pelham," Helge Nakamura roared. And as he reached the summit of his upward leap, well over the heads of the crowd around him, he hurled a spear with all the power of his great arm. As a balancing act, despite the lesser gravity, it was superb. It was also accurate! The spear flew like an arrow, and it took JayBee Pelham to death, hitting him at the base of his corded throat with such an impact that he was hurled off his platform and hit the floor with an audible thud.

  The mob of Rift-dwelling clansmen froze in horror. That one of their own should slay their new leader held them numb and shaken with combined amazement and horror.

  Slater was already on the move. He had a clear path in front of the stupefied warriors and he took it straight to JayBee's platform, now empty of its occupant. In ten or so strides he was there and had vaulted up. Spinning and stooping, he levered the fallen lasgun onto its tripod and leveled it at the new clansmen, his finger in place on the trigger.

  "Freeze or I kill!" he yelled. "Any of you move and you all die!" He kept the barrel swiveling back and forth. They flinched as he did. "Get up here, Nak, while I have them covered!" His second yell was unnecessary for Nakamura was already moving to him, keeping to the side so as not to interfere with Slater's field of fire. In an instant he was beside Slater with a great sword in his fist.

  "Drop weapons! Drop all weapons! Do not move or I kill all of you!"

  The new clansmen obeyed.

  "Take over this thing, Nak, and keep them quiet. I have to see to the colonel."

  Slater ran to one side and raced to where Danna keeled beside Muller's prostrate body. As he ran up, he could see the spear was still protruding from the colonel's chest and wondered why she had left it.

  Muller's calm voice answered the unspoken thought. "Hurry up, my boy. That spear caught me cold. If she pulled it out, I'd be gone in a second. I have a little time and I want to use it well.

  "Be good to each other. I loved Danna's mother and I would have left the service for her. She died when I was far away. Get Thau Lang to tell you about her, dear. He knows it all. You two can bring a new message to the planet to the True People can live in peace without losing their independence. Look up the history of the treatment of Amerindians of that area today called the United States of North and Central America. Learn what the rulers did wrong and the few things they did right." He smiled wearily, but his strength was fading. "I wish that damned maniac had not killed the redheaded female. She wasn't one of us or Satreel's people. I think you'll have to find who and what she was, Slater. Perhaps one of the ancient rulers of Satreel's race, frozen or something—Wish I knew." His voice was growing fainter and they bent over his head, straining to catch every word.

  "Now, listen hard and move fast—That lever that she pulled. I think it means death, death and destruction. It's what I would do in that place she was in. Hear that droning hum? I think something's running down or winding up. The three of you, leave me and go. Go now, That's an order!"

  Slater took Danna's arm and she gave no trouble, just bent and kissed Muller on the mouth once. Then she was up and following her man.

  "Nak, we're getting out and fast. Give me that weapon. You lead. The colonel thinks the whole place is gonna blow."

  Nakamura handed over the lasgun and bellowed once at the silent and disarm
ed men. "We are leaving. All should follow. This place becomes a place of death. Those who stay will die, die in agony. Follow us!"

  With that, he led off at a fast trot and the other two followed. Slater cradled the lasgun, which was heavy but not impossible, once he had freed it from the tripod. As he followed Nakamura into the large tunnel upward, the group of new clansmen began to follow. And he saw the prone figure wave one arm and then let it drop. Moisture burned his eyes and he blinked rapidly to clear them. Then he and Danna rounded a corner and the scene was lost.

  They ran upward at a steady jog, and he could see over his shoulder that the men of the Rift were following. They were not too close however. They knew what he carried in his arms and they thus kept back a little.

  As they ran, Nakamura shouted over his shoulder about how he had managed to mingle with the giants. "Colonel Muller told me to wait outside until I decided you weren't coming at all—then I was to try to get out and get the word to base. I stood it until I saw this bunch coming through the woods. They weren't any we'd seen before, so, when they left a guard at the tunnel entrance I waited, until the sentinel was alone, killed him, and ran down. They were so hyped up no one even noticed me. It was simple, really." He led on, panting only a trifle.

  When they had made several broad but easy loops up the tunnel, they emerged into an open space like a high-ceilinged warehouse or a great barn. They had ran steadily upward all the time and Slater was sure they were close to the surface if not on it already. Any doubts they might have had were soon brought to an abrupt halt.

  "Freeze, Ruckers! Drop that piece, you in front. Anyone moves and they're dead!"

  "We're officers from Fort Agnew in disguise," Nakamura shouted, dropping his sword. Slater had let go of the lasgun with relief. "Take us to your chief and get moving, you guys, get moving fast! This whole place may blow in a few minutes!" Nakamura's voice was a help. In seconds they had been checked out and were explaining to a grizzled sergeant and his squad of Space Marines. They warned him of the disarmed men following and to lead them out in a hurry.