by Ryder Stacy
“Possibly,” Rockson muttered, somewhat disturbed at the answer. “But philosophy doesn’t interest me right now-—I want out of here. Can you get me help?”
“No. This is a visi-phone, that is all, son. Sorry. I’m just a ham. I’m not near no Mount Jubal. I live in Canada, near Moose Lake. You know where that is?”
“Can you ask someone else to contact me, get me out of here?”
“You can do that yourself, if you call the Mounties, son.”
“Damn it,” Rock cursed. “Mount Jubal is in Colorado, a thousand miles from Canada. Any other ideas?”
“What am I son, a goddamned information center? Oh, very well, sit back, relax, think of a carrot, then think of a bird. You can just float up out of any cave. I’ve done it myself.” The old-timer said all of this in a bored voice.
Rockson realized he’d reached a kook with this strange radio, or whatever it was. The old coot was too far away to help, and too crazy, probably, even to contact someone else. Angrily, he moved his hand to twist the channel knob, to search for another signal.
“Don’t do that, son. I can read your mind with that there device, and I can tell you’re a smart ’un. Now, you just let your Uncle Julius guide you outta that cave. Relax.”
“You can read my mind? Over a thousand miles?”
“Yup. Now you just sit pat and let me enter your mind. Do that and I’ll get you outta there in two shakes of a snake’s tail.”
Something happened. Rockson felt his astral soul-body separating from his body, floating up through a layer of solid gray mountain. Just like that. It was like he was a balloon! He broke free, into the bright sunshine in seconds, moved in the air like a bird. The feeling was wonderful, exhilarating.
“Come back, son,” a voice cried out . . . the old man’s. “Set yourself down on the ground; my little trick is over.”
Somehow, Rock complied. And he sat there, in a patch of snow, feeling very weird indeed. He doubted his senses, as a matter of fact. But the snow felt real.
“Well, I’m out,” Rock exclaimed, taking in a deep breath. “But I don’t know how. Hey, old-timer,” he yelled, and his voice echoed. “Thanks!”
There was no answer, but for a moment Rockson thought he saw the smiling face of a Glower, one of the strange race of inside-out beings that lived out in the radioactive western deserts, on the face of the mountain. It had looked like his old friend, the being known as Turquoise Spectrum. But it couldn’t be.
Then Rockson shrugged; bundled up his collar to the cold air, and set out for the south, in the direction his men should have taken. When he met Chen, he was led back to the others. He refused to explain what had occurred. Why let them think he’d gone loony?
Nine
After another three hours of trekking, Rockson noticed that the hills nearby suddenly looked like they’d grown porcupine quills. He sighed and called a halt to the column. Too many porcupine quills . . . maybe a thousand.
“What’s up, Rock,” Chen asked.
“I think we’ve found the Millies,” he whispered.
There was no chance to reach for their weapons, so they meekly surrendered. The painted, naked women-warriors were beautiful but deadly looking. They wore bone necklaces and anklets and little else, save for the human skull earrings and skullcaps.
The women had them trussed up in jig time, and then the men were unceremoniously thrown over the saddles of their ’brids. The horses and the chariot-of-hellfire were walked along down the pass into a large hangar-shaped building jammed between two mountains. It looked to Rock like an Egyptian temple, once they were taken inside. A giant throne rose up between flickering torches. Only women—luscious, beautiful, cruel looking women—were present. There were piles of human skulls everywhere, Rock observed from his upside-down position.
“I don’t like this,” Detroit muttered in true movieland style. Rock winked back at him, but he, too, was pessimistic.
Archer was less perturbed. The simple giant was fairly drooling at the sight of all the beautiful women. “No worry, Rock, they like me. Me sure.” Indeed, the Millies seemed to look at Archer with wide smiles on their narrow green-eyed faces. Still, the women roughly threw Archer off his mount and pushed him along with their sword tips, just the way the other men had been handled.
“What breasts,” Archer exclaimed. “What pussy.”
“Oh, shut up,” Chen complained.
Rock was thrown to the foot of the throne where, on a striped narga-beast skin, sat a large-busted woman painted green. “I am She-Who-Is-the-Best,” the head woman shouted. She glared at Rockson with her deep green eyes. “I am Millie the Fourth, ruler of the land of Yes-Yes. We are the maintainers of the Goddess Millie. No doubt you wished to spy on us, steal our ritual.”
“Millie?” Rock smiled, getting up. “You mean Milis, the rocket?”
“Silence! Do not speak of her without bowing low.”
Rock bowed. And then he winked his charming best at the woman.
“That’s better. Hmmm . . . come here.”
He went up to her, walking rather ungracefully, for his steps were restricted by the gold chains about his ankles. He was careful to not lose his balance. He had his hands chained behind his back, too. No way to cushion any fall. Besides, he wanted to look confident.
Millie the Fourth took his chin in her long-fingernailed hand and studied Rock’s face. His mismatched left eye winked again at her. He smiled his charming best once more.
“You are good breeding stock,” she concluded, letting go of him. “All of you are. You for beauty, and for strength, I think, as well. The others look fit enough, if plain. Except that one.” She pointed at Archer. “He is very strong and virile. He will please many Millies, I am sure.”
Some of the tribesgirls giggled. “And if he gets tired of doing his sexual duty, of course, there is the gna-tebit juice aphrodisiac drink. The duty must be fulfilled,” she concluded.
Rock started to explain that they had come in peace, and that they needed the Milis rocketship for an important mission.
“Silence!” she cried out. “You will be allowed to enter the Goddess if you wish. It is written that men will come to enter her. But only on one condition.” She smiled lasciviously, taking a bite of an apple. “You each must please five of us Millies apiece in one night. Is it too much to ask?”
“Sex in exchange for the rocket?” Rock didn’t see anything wrong with a trade like that. But five times . . . it was a challenge.
“Yes. Do you not see our sad state? We girls are bereft of offspring. We are unhappy, lost, because we bear no children. The last man to pass here was many, many years ago. And the bastard was sterile. He had to be destroyed. You men are not sterile, are you?” She glared at Rockson.
“No. Definitely not,” Rock insisted. “I like the deal. Unchain us and—”
She pressed the apple to his lips, and Rock bit in and swallowed.
“The deal is sealed,” Millie the Fourth said. “Release their hands and feet. Lead them all to the bridal suites—all except this one.”
The women warriors unchained the others and, giggling now, kissed the other men and fed them fruit, while they led them away, unprotesting.
“Rock—is this safe?” Chen shouted over his shoulder as he left.
Rock shouted back, “Enjoy it. And remember, you’re doing it for your country, and for all mankind.”
Rockson was unchained and went off with only the Queen Millie. She wanted him all to herself. Fine with him. Better than a spear in the gut.
The green-head was hellfire in bed, Rock soon found out. She had orgasms one after another, each time making a sound like a locomotive crashing. He was never so exhausted than when she finally fell asleep. His back was raked into red lines by her sharp nails. She only catnapped, and shook his shoulder: “That was wonderful,” she said, rubbing ointment on his nail scratches. “Sorry, I get carried away! We Millies have a gene mutation. One of our ancestor’s genes was fused with a part of
a cat’s genetic makeup. We are mutants as a result of the war—the nuke war. I cannot help but scratch a man when I get excited.”
“Easy with that ointment,” he said, ignoring her excuses. She kissed his neck as she rubbed him. He heard a low purr issuing from her green-lipsticked lips.
After the hours of lovemaking during which they’d hopefully impregnated all the Millies, the team was reunited. Rockson didn’t have to ask whether or not his men had fully served their country. They all wore candy-eating grins. The other women fairly hung to their ankles and arms, caressing them, and running their hands over their hard-muscled bodies, which were now covered with ointment. The men, like Rockson, were all naked except for the Millie-provided green loincloths.
“Well, we all look like a fit and happy bunch of savages,” Rock commented. Then he turned to Millie the Fourth and asked, “Now will you let us go to the rocket—I mean, to the Goddess Millie?”
“Yes, of course! I know I will bear the greatest child. Of course, it will be female. Our children, due to the gene-altering radiation our foreparents endured, are always girls. Mine will be called—say, what shall I call her?”
Rock thought a moment and said, “Call her Ronakimcharity the Fifth.”
“Yes. That sounds very noble—and long,” said Millie the Fourth. “Proper for a queen!”
The Freefighters were led down a long, torchlit corridor into the heart of the rectangular concrete building. The Millie Queen explained further about the prophecy as they walked in the semi-darkness: “It has been written that one day our great metal Goddess Millie shall be visited by men of iron, men who will renew our lifestream with their virility. These virile ones—you men—will enter the Goddess, and she will rise up into the heavens where she belongs. There she will, legend says, have her powers restored. The Goddess will save us all. Now it comes to pass, as the great Millie the First has written!”
A door opened. Lights flashed on—long fluorescent lamps set high above. “Behold the Goddess Millie,” the queen said, bowing. With final kisses and breast squeezes, Rockson and his men walked on toward the huge rocket. “Bless you. Bless the progenitors,” the Millie tribeswomen chanted over and over as they withdrew from the Goddesses’ presence.
The rocketship loomed before them.
“What do you think, Scheransky? How does that baby look to you?”
“She looks fit! And her launch track and all the boosters look good.” The Russian ran up to the white steel of the giant horizontal spacecraft and banged a hand on her hull. It rang. “She’s a beauty. Best that NASA ever built.”
Rockson didn’t like the look of the rails. He bent and with a finger rubbed one. Too rusty. “The rails need work,” he stated flatly. “Heaven knows what we’ll find inside the rocket.”
There was a commotion behind them. The Millies had returned, pushing the nuke-device-laden chariot. “Here,” announced the Queen, “is your great dark present for the goddess.”
“Thanks,” Rock said, “you girls are stronger than horses.”
That set them to giggling like schoolgirls.
When the girls left, Scheransky said, “True, these rails will have to be restored a bit. But the rocket is air sealed, or should be. Give me a hand.”
They popped the door at the front end of the rocket with some difficulty. A wind rushed out—hot, moist air. Air that smelled like mildew and dry-rot.
“Shit, it’s too warm in there. Something gone bad in there. I hope it’s not anything that can affect its operation.”
“Right,” Rock said. “Let’s have a look inside.” Rock twisted the airlock door handle, and the door swung open wider. The stale, rotten smell grew worse. They entered, flashlights in hand, and saw ten dusty seats, and then a door. “Into the cockpit,” Rock ordered. “You first, Blondie.”
With a cough, Scheransky quickly went forward and entered the cockpit. Rockson followed on his heels. The Russian technician carefully looked over the controls, now covered with dust. He consulted several crumbly manuals on a console and then took notes on an old pad with a crumbling pencil. Mold covered the cabin walls.
As the Russian worked, Rock told the four technical men they’d brought to check the wiring, and main rocket boosters, and so on. The rest of the team poked around in a desultory way.
It took hours to check everything out. Finally Scheransky went over his notes for Rockson: “What we have here, Rock,” he said gloomily, crushing the dry plastic handle of a control lever in his hand, “is a rotted out museum-piece, not a space vehicle. She won’t fly.”
Rockson shook his head in dismay. With ultimate sadness in his tone, he muttered, “She certainly won’t fly the way she is, I agree with that. And we don’t have the equipment to make her fly, either. What the hell is that sour smell, though?”
“It seems that the Millies just maintained the outside well,” Scheransky said, “but the natural decay of insulation and so on, inside, in the sealed rocket, did too much damage. That’s the main odor. If only they’d aired her out once in a while.”
After they’d opened several air vents, Rockson sat brooding and dejected for a long while on the cracked leather of the pilot’s seat. He studied the dials again and again. “This gizmo looked different than anything I’d ever flown before, anyway. Even if she’d been in working order, I’d have had a fit figuring out this stuff.”
He heard Detroit’s heavy footfalls, and a hand on his sagging shoulder. “Rock, what do we do now? I figure it was worth a try to see if anybody back in C.C. had any answers for us. I’ve activated the old radio. Doc Schecter is advised of all the problems we have. He has no solution. By the way, he wasn’t shot. Schecter got a medal for taking decisive action to save the earth, from the new council chairman.”
“Who’s that?”
“C.J.! The election was yesterday. McGrugle died of a heart attack when he found out it wasn’t us he had trapped down in the mines.”
“That’s nice,” Rock said gloomily. “But it won’t matter in two weeks. Schecter, and us too; everyone dies.”
Then Rockson pounded the dusty console with his fist. “No!” he exclaimed, “There has to be a way. If only someone could repair the main thrusters and its wiring, then we could jerry-rig the rest of the stuff.”
“Who the hell could do that?” Detroit replied. “It would have to be welded in a million places, by lasers, probably. You can’t just wish things like that to happen, can you?”
Rockson snapped his fingers. “Some beings can just wish things to happen. The Glowers!”
“The Glowers?” Detroit’s jaw dropped. “You mean Turquoise Spectrum and his weird bunch?”
“Yes. We have to contact the Glowers. It’s the only way. Listen: they can hear my weak-powered ESP calls; I’ve done it before. But I need to be alone, away from everyone. I will try to use all my psi powers. We are a lot closer to the Glower City out here than back in C.C., assuming the Glowers are in about the same location where we last saw them.”
So it was that Rockson went out alone into the wilderness. He climbed a lonely butte and sat cross-legged lotus position on the top as the sun went down. Breathing short yogi breaths—ten in one nostril, ten in the other—then sucking all the air into his diaphragm, Rockson brought all the chi energy into his blood veins. And then he steered it into his hypothalamus gland. Soon he felt the joining of his right and left brain parts in the center of his forehead. Then he felt that peculiar magnetic feeling he always felt when he used his psi powers. Rockson tried to reach out over the lonely, cold miles, out to other minds. To the strange, alien, somewhat frightening minds that he had touched briefly, once before.
Would the Glowers answer? The Glowers were quixotic. They did the things they chose to do, and nothing more.
Rock repeated the psychic message until midnight . . . until he was dizzy from trying; until his bones ached with the cold. He was finally answered. Rockson felt it in a peculiar way: he groaned and twitched, like a medium, as a voice spoke to h
im out of his own lips: “ROCKSOOON. IT IS REMMMMMERRROOOO. I AM THE LESSER OF ALL THE GLOWERS, SO I CAN READ YOUR PETTY, WEAK MIND CALL. I HAVE TOLD THE OTHERS. THE ONE YOU CHOOSE TO CALL, THE TURQUOISE SPECTRUM, IS NO LONGER OF THIS WORLD. DEAD FOR A LONG TIME, NOW. HE IS IN THE OTHER PLACE. BUT THE ELDERS SAY YOU MAY COME TO US, AND TELL US YOUR PROBLEMS . . . WE WILL SEE IF WE CAN HELP YOU.”
Rockson tried to tell Remaroo the nature of the problem, but he just got one message: “COME TO US. ALL WILL BE DISCUSSED. WE WILL COME FOR YOU . . . ROCKSON . . . IN OUR SANDSHIP. YOU WILL BOARD IT ALONE. THE ELDERS AWAIT YOUR VISIT. ALONE . . . ALONE.”
There followed a short burst of instructions indicating that Rock should be a mile north from the hangar at dawn. The location was burned into Rockson’s mind until he screamed, so he couldn’t forget. Then contact was broken.
Rockson’s spasms stopped. And Rockson vomited, and took in deep, heaving breaths of icy air. To be in contact with a Glower’s mind is a terrible, awesome thing.
And a holy thing, too.
Ten
Early in the morning Rockson returned from his night of solitary meditation. He informed the other men of the message he’d received from the Glower called Remaroo.
“I don’t like it,” a trembling Jacob Cohen snapped out. He and the other technicians the Rock Team had brought along had endured a few too many shocks on the trek. They all now voiced the opinion that they didn’t want Rock, their leader, to disappear on them. “You going out there among those ghouls alone,” Detroit agreed, “especially since Turquoise Spectrum is dead, could be a bad thing.”
Archer had been slow to get the upshot of what Rockson had said, but now he too piped up. “Alone? You go out there all alone? No take me?”
“Sorry, Arch. Though I’d like to take you, I need the Glowers’ full support. If, in order to get that help, I have to play by their rules, I will. Besides, I wouldn’t worry. The Glowers, strange and ghoulish as they are, have always helped us before, saved my life several times, as a matter of fact. It’ll be all right.”