by Alex Raymond
“I would have heard anyone approaching,” said Mallox. “Even the smallest animal.”
“But you didn’t,” said Huk. “None of us did.” He unfurled his wings. “I’d better go up and take a look around.”
Flash returned to the place where they’d piled their supplies. He took up the stun rifle, scanning the trees around them. “They may still be out there.”
Jape rubbed one of his hands over his chin. “If it’s the national militia I’ve been hearing about,” he said, “I don’t see why they didn’t take us all.”
“Once when we played a little town on the jungle’s edge, I got to talking with a fellow who worked as a slave for one of the food vendors,” said Sixy. “He told me there’s more than one kind of slaver on Mesmo.”
“Men who don’t travel to other planets, you mean?” said the hawkman.
“Exactly,” said Sixy. “Bands of renegades who are more or less pirates, land-going pirates. This fellow knew of a man who’d escaped from one master only to be caught by a band of roving slavers. These fellows will even capture their own kind.”
“That might explain,” said Jape, “why they only took the girl and Booker.”
“I’ll wager they were afraid to tackle all of us,” said the strongman.
Flash said, “Huk, you go on and take a look around from above. If you don’t spot anything, then we’ll follow their trail on the ground.” Carrying the rifle, he went again to examine the tracks around the place where Narla had stood.
CHAPTER 22
“Another Zarkov masterpiece,” said Zarkov, “if I do say so myself.” The light stripe which criss-crossed the ceiling of his large workshop, tinting him a pale yellow, threw prickly shadow images of his beard against the side of the spacecraft he’d been at work on. He stepped back, admiring the low cylindrical ship. “Not bad for a rush job.”
He glanced at the one-way pseudoglass walls of the big workroom, noticing it was night outside. He crossed to a table where he’d left a cup of broth. He took a sip, then scowled. “That sure got cold fast.”
“I brought the soup to you four hours ago,” said Dale as she came into the workshop.
“That accounts for its being cold.” Dr. Zarkov extended one hand, palm up and fingers spread toward the ship. “Handsome, isn’t it?”
“And certainly roomy enough to carry two.”
Zarkov frowned into the mug of cold broth. “This is going to be a solo rescue operation, Dale.”
“I don’t know why,” said Dale, “you keep thinking I’m not capable of handling myself—”
“It’s not that,” cut in the bearded doctor. “The thing is, we know very little about the planet Mesmo. The PlanExplo Foundation has never sent a survey team out there. Most of the data on the planet comes from a couple of EII robot-ship flybys.”
“I’ve gone into a heck of a lot of unexplored places with you and Flash,” the girl reminded him. “Including landing on several planets where no outsider had ever set foot before, from Mongo on.”
“There’s always a chance,” said Zarkov, “that I won’t come back. Even somebody as competent as Zarkov fouls up now and then.”
“Seems to me,” said Dale, “the chances of your fouling up will be less with me along to back you up.”
Zarkov banged the mug down onto the table. “Out of the question!” he boomed. He opened the door to the cabin of the revamped spacecraft and boosted himself in with a chesty grunt.
Dale came up beside the ship and stood looking inside. “You’ve finished your modifications?”
“Yeah, it’s ready to go,” he said. “With a few more little adjustments.” He clicked the tip of an electric screwdriver against his front teeth. “I’ve come up with an interesting variation on the conventional spacewarp equipment. Much more compact, and it should be a great deal more efficient. If I wasn’t in such a hurry to get off, I’d hop back down to Washington, and take out a patent on it.”
“To get to Mesmo,” said Dale, “we have to jump across both space and time then?”
“Unless you want to spend a couple of lifetimes or more enroute,” bellowed Zarkov. He hunched, frowning at the control panel. He tinkered for a moment, then said, “I notice you said we!”
“You know how I feel about Flash,” said Dale. “I have to go along.”
The doctor concentrated on his tinkering for another minute. “Okay,” he said. “You’ve appealed to Zarkov’s sentimental side.”
Dale laughed. “And most people say you don’t have one. I’ll get my spacesuit ready and pack some basic things in a rucksack.”
“Hum,” said Zarkov. “I just happened to pack an extra rucksack and stow it in here. To test the floor space. You can use that.”
“I see,” said the girl, smiling.
“What you can do, though,” said Zarkov, “is go turn the house down to its lowest operational level. I don’t want those nitwit servos mixing drinks and playing mood music all over the place while I’m gone.”
Dale climbed up inside the ship, caught hold of Zarkov’s arm. She kissed him on the cheek. “Thanks,” she said.
As she jumped from the cabin, the doctor said, “You had better be prepared for the possibility that we may not find him at all, you know, Dale.”
“Oh,” she said, “I know we’ll find Flash.”
CHAPTER 23
Sixy dug his toes into the mossy ground. “They all got together here,” he said. “The three who got Booker and the two who took Narla. Then they headed that way.” He poked a finger at the jungle looming up a quarter of a mile away.
“That would explain,” said the hawkman, “why I didn’t see anything from up above. Those big trees make a roof over the whole jungle.”
“Well, we were figuring on going into the jungle anyway,” said Sixy, examining twigs and bits of leaf with his agile toes.
“They have a few hours on us,” said Flash, “don’t they?”
“Judging by their tracks, yes. They probably made their move not long after Booker and Narla took over the watch.”
“That Booker,” rumbled Mallox. “We should have tossed him to the little blue devils long ago.”
Flash shifted his grip on the rifle he was carrying. “Let’s get going, then.”
The tallest trees in the jungle rose up, thick and straight, for two hundred feet. Their fat leaves and branches formed a green ceiling over a good part of the ground below. The sunlight fell in slanting columns, like the light coming through stained-glass cathedral windows. Vines were twisted and snarled around branches and trunks, corkscrewed across the ground. Huge ferns—green, yellow, and deep purple—festooned the spaces between trees. Gigantic orchids, with bright scarlet petals, grew all around.
Down at ground level, the jungle was hot, the air thick and musky. Sparkling patches of fungi grew on the dark sides of the trees, pale-yellow fungus, dead-white fungus and a bloody-red fungus. There were many birds, small flickering ones and large birds that flapped high above. Insects buzzed, hummed, flittered.
“Damn,” said Mallox, slapping two lavender-winged mosquitoes off his bare arm. “You fellows won’t make a meal of me.”
Sixy brushed a swirl of hundreds of silvery little gnats away from his face. “Look here, Flash,” he said.
“What is it?”
“There’s a print made by Narla,” said Sixy. “Means they set her down at this point and let her walk.”
“So at least we know she’s okay,” said Flash.
“She can walk, anyway.”
A dozen monkeys swung through the trees about fifty feet above, chittering. Part of a red banana skin came spinning down to splat on Mallox’s head.
“Little polka-dot devils,” he hollered up at the swinging monkeys.
Jape had the earphones of the radio on again. He removed them now as he came up beside Flash. “The militia is still searching for us,” he said. “They report they will soon have us all in captivity.”
“No mention of Narla and Book
er then?” asked Flash.
“None.”
“Then these are definitely slavers we’re tracking,” said Flash. “If the militia had got them, they’d be bragging about it by now.”
“Yes, I agree,” said the four-armed man. “One thing I’ve learned from listening to all this: they sound very stubborn, very determined. I don’t think they’re likely to give up hunting us.”
“Once we find Narla and Booker,” said Flash, “we might turn the tables and start hunting the militia.”
Mallox slapped at the steamy afternoon air. “Watch what you try, little red rascal.” A tiny hovering bird had just taken a peck at his ear.
“There’s something about you that seems to attract the wildlife,” said Huk.
“You’d expect the birds at least to prefer you,” growled the strongman.
“Huh?” said Sixy, who was at the head of the procession. He halted, squatted down, and poked at the ground with toes and fingers. “That’s interesting.”
Flash joined him. “Seems they split up at this point.”
“Yes, some of them went north and the rest south.”
“What about our friends?” asked Jape.
Sixy put his face close to the ground. “I think three of the slavers took Booker with them and headed to the north,” he said after several quiet seconds. “The other two boys kept Narla with them and went that way.”
“It could have something to do,” suggested Flash, “with where they intend to sell Narla and Booker.”
“Different markets,” said Huk. “That might be it.”
“I don’t like this,” said Mallox, making huge fists out of his hands. “Selling a woman to a circus is one thing, but these blue devils more than likely have something much worse in mind for Narla.”
“We’ll have to stop them,” said Flash.
“As far as I’m concerned,” said the strongman, “they can have Booker. We’ll save the girl.”
“No,” said Huk. “We have to try to rescue both of them.”
“Man,” said the giant, “we’re fugitives. You can forget about your fancy rules and beliefs. What I’m concerned about is staying alive.”
“We’re going to stay concerned with each other,” said Jape. “That’s just the way it is, Mallox. We can’t make you do what you won’t, but you can’t keep us from doing what we have to do.”
“And what might that be?”
“We obviously have to separate here.”
“All right, you go find Booker,” said Mallox. “The rest of us—”
“Try to be as sensible as I know you are,” said the hawkman. “We have evidence right here on the ground before us that three men have taken Booker with them. Therefore, we’re going to need the majority of our group to rescue him.”
“Nonsense,” said the giant. “Why I could handle three men myself.”
“Very well,” said Huk, “then lets you and I go after Booker.”
Mallox snorted, scratched his fingers across his chest. “Very well, Huk. I’ll go with you to see they don’t pluck your feathers and roast you on a spit.”
“I’ll appreciate that,” said the hawkman, giving his wings a flap.
“Maybe I’d better go with you, too,” said Sixy. “To help read the trail. Flash can track the fellows who’ve got Narla.”
“Okay,” said Flash. “Jape and I will follow her trail.”
Jape rubbed his chin with one hand, scratched his head with another. “We have to get back together again,” he said. “I’d like to suggest that whoever finds their quarry first backtracks and tries to catch up with the other party.”
“I’ll wager I find that useless Booker sooner than you locate Narla,” said Mallox.
“In that case,” said Jape, “turn around and follow us.”
“You’ll probably need me by that time,” said the giant. He slapped his big hands together. “Come along then, Sixy, lead the way. I’m anxious to meet with those devilish slavers.”
They separated into two groups and set off in opposite directions.
Flash and Jape could hear the strongman boasting long after they had lost sight of him.
CHAPTER 24
The light of the day began to fail, seeping away through the high, straight trees. A hundred feet up small orange frogs, squatting on branches, began to croak forlornly. Tiny golden butterflies came fluttering through the warm jungle forest air.
“Here’s where they stopped again,” said Flash, kneeling.
Jape detached himself from the portable radio set to study the spot. “This would have been their midday break for a meal,” he said. “Which means we’re several hours behind them still.”
Flash studied the signs and indentations on the ground, poked a finger at the few minute remains of food. “Don’t think it was that long ago,” he said. “We could be as close as a couple of hours traveling from them.”
“Then,” said the four-armed man, “we should catch up with them when they camp down for the night.”
“If they do.” Flash straightened up. “They may continue on all night, we have no way of telling.”
Jape took a new grip on the radio as they continued on. “Our early capture is still being promised,” he told Flash.
“Anything that might help us find a spaceport?”
“Nothing so far,” said Jape. “They broadcast a good deal of news and propaganda on the only stations I can get. Then some quite interesting ten-tone music. There don’t seem to be, surprisingly, any advertisements. The radio networks are apparently government-owned.”
A luminous moss began appearing on the tree trunks now. The light beneath all the branches was thin and soon the last of it died away as blue-black night filled the jungle. But the moss glowed more strongly.
A frown touched Flash’s forehead. “Hear that?”
Jape tugged off the earphones. “What?”
“Some kind of odd humming.” Flash tilted a thumb skyward. “Up above us somewhere.”
Jape studied the jungle overhead, eyes narrowed. “Could be almost anything,” he said. “There’s a great diversity of life in this jungle.”
The humming grew louder. Mixed with it was another sound, a high-pitched squeaking sound which resembled laughter but wasn’t.
“There they are!” said Flash.
Flapping down through the dark branches were two dozen huge bats. They glowed a faint, ghostly blue.
“Coming for us, too,” said Jape. He set the radio aside, quickly got out a stungun and a shockstick.
“Hold off,” cautioned Flash, his blaster rifle held lightly in both hands. “Let’s make sure it’s us they plan to attack.”
“Big fellows like that are more than likely vampires,” said Jape.
Some of the pulsing glowing bats were gliding, tracing slow circles about fifty feet above the two men. As they moved behind tree trunks and into sight again, they seemed to flash on and off.
The squeaking laughing noise was all around them now. The bats hung in the air for a few seconds, then two of them dived—dived straight down through the blackness for Jape and Flash.
“It’s us they want.” Flash squeezed the trigger.
The thin beam of the blaster rifle sizzled across the night. The two bats turned to dust, glistening dust, that slowly drifted down through the trees.
More of the bats were diving now, humming and squeaking.
Flash fired again, then again.
Some of them got by him. A huge fat-winged bat, its rat teeth flashing white, lunged through the air at Flash’s neck.
“Watch out!” Jape swung his shockstick, swatting the creature across the skull.
The glowing bat stiffened, wings folding up. It fell at their feet.
Two more made for Flash.
Jape swatted again, firing the stungun at the same time.
He got both of them.
Flash pivoted, shot again up into the darkness. “Thinning them out,” he said.
Jape swung at anothe
r bat. He missed and the creature whirled and sank his teeth into his shoulder. An instant later, Jape used his stungun on it. The bat let go and fell away from him. But blood was flowing down his arm. He used one of his free hands to press against the wound.
The remaining bats made louder squeaking noises now, concentrating on trying to get at the bleeding Jape.
Flash kept on firing.
Soon the dark night was filled with glistening sparkling dust which had been the bats.
The last five went flapping up and away finally, leaving Flash and Jape.
Flash inhaled and exhaled through his mouth. “So much for the bats,” he said. “How are you doing?”
“It hurts a good deal,” said Jape. He put away his weapons while he got out a cloth handkerchief from a pocket. He pressed it hard against the bite wound. “The bleeding’s almost stopped.”
“We don’t know much about the local wild life,” said Flash. “I’m wondering if there’s a risk of rabies.”
“Not much we can do about it if there is,” said Jape.
Flash shrugged out of his pack. “There was something that looked like a first-aid kit in what we salvaged from the train wreck. Maybe we can at least disinfect the wound.”
“Yes, that’s a good idea,” said Jape. “Although—”
He saw them first. Five men came out from behind the nearby trees.
Flash had set down his rifle to dig in the pack. He looked back over his shoulder now.
Three of the men were blue; all five held guns.
CHAPTER 25
Huk’s powerful wings ceased flapping and he drifted down through the dusk. “I can see nothing of them from above,” he announced as he landed on the ground.
“Don’t worry about that,” said the strongman. “We’re still on their trail, getting closer all the time. If you’d let me forge on ahead, I could catch the whole pack of blue devils and snatch back that worthless Booker.”
“We stay together,” said Huk.
Sixy was poking at the ground with his toes. “They’re not all blue men we’re after, by the way.”