by Paul Ernst
CHAPTER VIII
_Tremendous Odds_
Like living spokes of a half-wheel, with the Earthman as the hub, theRogans converged toward Brand, a howling roar outside indicating thatthere were hundreds more waiting to jam into the dome as soon as theywere able. There were still no shock-tubes in evidence: evidently theworker who had gone for help had gathered the first Rogan citizens hehad encountered on the streets. But the very numbers of the mobspelled defeat for Brand.
However, there was still the great lever behind him to yank away fromits switch-socket. The glass bell was almost off now. With a last madblow, he knocked loose the remaining bolt that held it. The bellclattered to the floor.
A concerted shriek came from the crowding Rogans as they saw theEarthman's hand close on the lever. Whatever effect the throwing ofthat master-switch could have, there was no doubt that they wereextremely anxious to prevent it!
And now, in the rear of the crowding columns, appeared Rogans tallerthan the others, with an authoritative air, who waved before them,eager to unleash their power, batteries of the death-tubes.
Resigning himself to annihilation in the next instant, Brand pulleddown hard on the lever.
* * * * *
The effect wrought by the throwing of that great switch was almostindescribable.
In a flash, as though all had been struck at once by a giant's hand,every Rogan in the mob shot toward the floor, long thin legs cavingunder him as if turned to water. Writhing feebly, they endeavored toget up, but could not; and, still weakly ferocious, began to creeptoward the Earthman like huge-headed worms.
Brand himself had been thrown to the floor with the falling of thatswitch. He had felt as though an invisible ocean had been poured onhim, weighting him down intolerably. To move arms or legs requiredenormous effort; and to get up on his feet again was like rising undera two-hundred-pound pack.
The movement of the switch, he saw, had cut off the gravity reducingapparatus of the Rogans--whatever that might consist of. They werenow, abruptly, subjected to the full force of gravity exerted byJupiter's great mass. They could no more stand erect on theirtottering, lofty legs than they could fly.
But, though greatly handicapped by the gravity pull, they were stillnot entirely helpless. Like huge, long insects they continued to wormtheir way toward Brand, using their four arms and their boneless legsto help urge them over the flooring. And in their rear the Roganguards struggled to lift their tubes and level them at the escapedprisoner.
Prompt to avoid that, Brand went down on his hands and knees. Thus hewas shielded by the foremost crawling Rogans: the ones in the rear,with the tubes, could not raise themselves high enough to bore downover their fellows' heads at the Earthman.
Squatting on his knees, Brand awaited the first resolute crawlers.And, on his knees, whirling the now thrice weighty bar at heads thatwere conveniently low enough to be accessible, he began his laststand.
* * * * *
On the Rogans came, evidently determined, at any sacrifice of life, toget the Earthman away from that vital control board. And to right andleft, crouching low to escape the tubes of the guards slowly crawlingforward from the rear, Brand laid about him with the bar.
He got a little sick at the havoc he was wreaking on theseslow-moving, gravity-crippled things: but remembrance of their grislyfeeding habits, and the torture they must by now have inflicted onDex, kept him flailing down on soft heads with undiminished effort.
With the gravity pull what it was, the Earthman was immeasurablystronger than any individual Rogan. For a time the contest was all inhis favor. It was like killing slugs in a rose garden!
Nevertheless, these slugs were, after all, twelve feet long andpossessed of intelligence, besides being hundreds in number. After awhile the tide of battle began to turn in their favor.
Brand began to feel his arms ache burningly with the sustained effortof wielding a weapon that now weighed about twenty-five pounds. Heknew he couldn't keep up the terrific strain much longer. And, inaddition, he could see that the armed Rogans in the rear were steadilyforging ahead among the unarmed attackers, till they soon must be in aposition to blast him with their weapons.
Brand brought down his bar, with failing force but still deadlyeffect, on the loathsome face of the nearest Rogan, grunting withsatisfaction as he saw it crumple into a shapeless mass. He thrust it,spear-like, into another face, and another.
Then, abruptly, he found himself weaponless.
Raising it high to bring it down on an attacker who was almost aboutto seize him, he felt the metal bar turn white hot, and dropped itwith a cry as it seared the skin from the palms of his hands. SomeRogan guard in the rear had managed to train his tube on the bar; andin the instant of its rising had almost melted it.
* * * * *
Weaponless and helpless, Brand crawled slowly back before thetortuously advancing mob, keeping close enough to them to be shieldedfrom the tubes of the rear guards. Without his club he knew the endwas a matter of seconds.
He had an impulse to leap full into the mass of repulsive, crawlingbodies and die fighting as his fists battered at the gruesome faces.But a second impulse, and a stronger one, was the blind instinct topreserve his life as long as possible.
Hesitantly, almost reluctantly, acting on the primitive instinct ofself-preservation, he continued to back away from the advancing horde;away from the switch and toward the rear of the dome.
With the instant of his withdrawal, a Rogan turned toward the lever topush it back up into contact and release the red kingdom from theburden of Jupiter's unendurable gravity. And now ensued a curiousstruggle. The lever, placed for the convenience of creatures twelvefeet or more tall, was about five feet from the floor. And the Rogancouldn't reach it!
* * * * *
Stubbornly he heaved and writhed in an effort to raise hisinordinately heavy body from the floor to a point where one of theweaving arms could reach the switch. But the pipe-stem legs would notbear its weight. Each time it nearly reached the lever, only to fallfeebly back again in a snarl of tangled limbs.
Meanwhile, Brand had flashed a quick look back over his shoulder tosee, in the wall behind him, a metal door he hadn't noticed before. Hefound time for a flashing instant to wonder why there were no Rogansentering from that doorway, too; but it was a vain wonder, and itfaded from his mind as the ever advancing, groping monsters before himkept crowding him back.
Instinctively he changed his course a trifle, to edge toward themetal door. Perhaps, behind it, there was sanctuary for a few moments.Perhaps he could force it open, spring out, and bar it again in thefaces of the pursuing mob. It sounded improbable, but at least itoffered him a slim chance where before no chance had seemed possible.
He reached the door at last, fumbled behind him and felt, high overhis head, a massive sliding bolt.
* * * * *
In the spot Brand had left, the struggle to throw the gravity-leverback into closed contact position went on. The Rogan who wasfruitlessly trying to reach up to it paused and said something to onenear him. That one halted, and began to crawl toward him.
The two of them tried to reach it, one bracing the other and helpinghim pry his body up from the implacable pull of Jupiter's uninsulatedmass. The top Rogan reached a little higher. The flesh sucker-diskthat served as a hand almost grasped the lever, but failed by only afew inches.
A third Rogan crawled up. And now, with two arching their backs tohelp the other, the thing was done. The hose-like, groping arm went upand pushed the lever back into place.
The blue streamer began to hum and crackle from coil to coil again.The invisible weight that pressed down was released as once more thegiant planet's gravity was nullified. The Rogans got eagerly to theirfeet and began to race toward Brand in their normal long bounds.
Brand, just cautiously rising, when the power went bac
k on, foundhimself leaping five feet into the air with the excess of his musculareffort. And in that leap he saw the Rogans in the rear straighten upand point their tubes. However, also in that leap, his fumbling handshot back the bolt that securely shut the metal door.
With a shout of defiance he jumped out of the door and slammed it shutafter him, feeling it grow searing hot an instant later under theimpact of the rays from the tubes that had been trained on him.
A stinging shock reached him through the metal, flinging him to theground. He rolled out of its range and leaped to his feet to race awayfrom there. Then, with a gasp, he flattened his body back against thewall of the dome building.
He was in the enclosure that held the gigantic, lizard-like thing thathad nearly got him on his escape from the tower room.
He wheeled frantically to go back and face the Rogan death-tubes.Anything rather than wait while that mammoth heap of tiny-brainedferocity ran him down and tore him to shreds! But even as he turned,he heard the bolt shoot home on the inside of the door; heard vengefulsqueals of triumph from his pursuers.
* * * * *
At the other end of the enclosure, near the foot of the towerbuilding, the great lizard eyed him unblinkingly, its tremendous jawsgaping to reveal a cavernous mouth that was hideously lined withbright orange colored membrane. Then, squatting lower with every stepit took, like a mountainous cat about to spring on its prey, it beganto stalk on its tree-like legs toward the tiny creature that hadleaped into its yard with it.
Brand whirled this way and that, mechanically seeking a way out. Therewas none. The walls of the great enclosure were not like the wall ofthe tower. Here were no rough hewn stones, with protruding ridges ofmortar set between. These walls were as smooth as glass, and just assmooth was the curved wall of the dome building behind him.
The monstrous beast stalked nearer, almost on its belly now. As itadvanced, the great tail stirred up a cloud of reddish dust, and leftbehind it a round deep depression in a surface already crisscrossedwith a multitude of similar depressions. A bellowing hiss came fromits gaping mouth, and it increased its pace to a thunderous, waddlingrush.