by Stan Lee
Matavi approached the table of leaders, leaning forward to convince them—and as a further sweetener, giving them an eyeful. “A large investment, yes, but think of the dividends! Success here could well neutralize the most powerful asset the S-Force now possesses ... John Cameron!”
At the end of the table, a lightly armored figure stirred. Emsisdin was not the most powerful gang leader in the Deviant pecking order, but he had the single most potent weapon in their surviving armory—the force cannon.
“I believe Matavi’s plan is feasible,” he said, a cocky grin on his half-exposed face.
“And necessary, since you failed during the attack on the Citadel of Silence,” Scaladon pointed out.
“I destroyed one of their leaders,” Emsisdin said defensively. “Besides, did you really want me to kill the one who operates the gateway to the Sphere of Exile? I thought the idea was to put him in our power.”
He leaned forward. “And this will accomplish that end. I believe enough in Matavi’s plan to volunteer my services.”
“Another important asset put at risk,” Scaladon grumbled.
“Consider it insurance,” Emsisdin responded. “Under my command—”
Matavi whipped around. “I will command!”
Emsisdin shrugged. “With our joint efforts, success is inevitable.”
Peg Faber stared at the holographic image floating above the recording box. The beautifully sculpted blond face reminded her vaguely of Leslie Ann Nasotrudere. But the earthly newswoman had never allowed such a look of terror on her face.
“I’ve followed your adventures on 3-D, and feel you’re the member of the S-Force who might listen to me. I run an ortho-farm to the southeast of Kemot. It’s a large place, mostly mechanized. But lately, I’ve noticed ... anomalies. Air traffic has risen tremendously. I’ve seen lights at night in far parts of the farm. A shipment of chemicals arrived that I’d never ordered—later, on the news, I learned that these chemicals, when mixed, create a high-explosive potential. Such chemicals were used in the destruction of that restaurant.”
The young blond woman shook her head. “You may think me foolishly fearful, but I’ve noticed odd screen patterns on my communicator. We had a problem here years ago with someone who tapped into transmissions. The same sort of patterns appeared on the screens then, so I decided to send you this recording instead of calling your information line.” She looked downward for a moment, then up again, trying to control her worry. “Perhaps it’s nothing, but when I heard the Deviants had been driven underground, I—well, wondered if they might truly have gone under ground. Perhaps at your leisure you could investigate.”
She proceeded to give coordinates, and the holographic recording ended.
Peg glanced up at Melador. ‘This tape came in two hours ago?“
The head technician nodded. “It was addressed directly to you—I don’t think you’ve ever received any other messages.”
“I guess Argonian culture is a little too civilized for fan mail.”
The Argonian’s bland features showed puzzlement. Peg realized the translation device must have hit a glitch. “On my world people sometimes attempt to show too high a regard for public figures they admire. Sometimes, they even expect to have personal relationships with these public figures. It can become annoying.”
“Ah.” Melador seemed to find the whole idea distasteful. He gestured at the recording. “What shall we do about this?”
She shrugged, three blinks away from exhausted sleep. “Let’s file it under future investigations—when we have time.”
There the matter would have stayed, except that a few days later, after a hellish work shift trying to find a guerrilla sniper, Melador wakened Peg from a catnap to come to the communicator bank.
There were odd interference patterns on the screen, and the same blond woman now looking totally terrified. “Something is happening. Platforms have been landing in the farther fields, and some sort of loading process is going on. Please send—”
Something smashed in the distance. The young woman turned and screamed.
Then the screen went blank.
Peg whipped round to Melador. “We’ve got to field a squad immediately.”
He looked distinctly unhappy. “We can’t. Our Kemot squad was called for backup against the flyby shootings in Kaldoa. Even our reserve here has been deployed.”
“Somebody’s got to go,” Peg said, trying to press back her guilt at not responding earlier. “Call John in Kaldoa, and ask him to send a squad—what were those coordinates?”
Melador provided them from his files. “If you can wait, I’ll try to rouse some of the off duty people.”
She shook her head decisively. “I’ll go and check things out. Send them after me.”
Moments later, she was fully armored and flying for the coordinates she’d recorded. Peg had paid little attention to the land between the spire-cities. Who’d have thought a super-science world like Argon would have a farm lifestyle?
She arrived at a set of vast fields tended by robots. There was a little domelike structure in the middle of the farm complex, shaded by a copse of what looked like cherry trees.
Not trusting the radio link, Peg cast out a mental link to John. A moment later, she felt his presence.
I’ve arrived at the farm, she reported.
Bafflement flowed over their connection. What farm? John asked.
Didn’t Melador contact you? I guess he must have scraped up a reaction force at the Citadel.
She quickly passed on the report of possible Deviant activity, feeling John’s mood darken deeper.
I’m on my way, John sent. Don’t walk into that place alone.
The girl who called us might be in trouble, Peg responded.
At least be careful, John begged. We’ve had too many ambushes lately.
Flying low to the ground, Peg circled the periphery of the farm, extending mental probes. There didn’t seem to be any human traces ... no. Wait—that was an unconscious mind!
She rose higher into the air, spotting the still, half-armored form lying near the dome, half-hidden by the cherry trees. Peg made a snap decision and arrowed straight down.
She was ten feet above the body when the cherry trees came to unnatural life, whipping branches around her with inhuman speed. In seconds, she was imprisoned. Peg curled her fingers into the tridigirector, trying to cut herself free.
Even as her blasters activated, an odd sparkle shimmered through the too-supple branches that pinioned her. Peg’s suit suddenly went dead, including the radio. And when she tried to send a mental S.O.S., a cloud of psionic static surrounded her head, muffling her transmission.
Peg’s shock began to dissolve into fear. She saw figures moving on the ground below her, human figures besides the now not-unconscious body. But when she tried to probe them, her thought-tendrils encountered a seamless shield.
John! she called again desperately, to no avail.
Peg marshaled all her strength, calling to mind the incredible sense of oneness she’d felt with John during their lovemaking.
TROUBLEJOHNHELPME! The message was brief and, she hoped, powerful enough to get through.
The formerly unconscious figure rose gracefully to its feet. Peg found herself looking down at the classically beautiful face of the girl who’d called her here.
She has a surprisingly powerful mind. Peg caught the snatch of thought from her captor’s mind. She stared, frozen in surprise within her dead armor. That woman had telepathic powers!
The female in half-armor called orders in Argonian, orders Peg couldn’t understand because her translator was as dead as the rest of the circuitry in her armor.
Then the blond woman climbed into the tree, accompanied by another Argonian—one wearing S-Force armor. As they reached her, the blonde’s companion removed his helmet to reveal the bland, gloating features of Melador, his brow surrounded by what appeared to be a band of aluminum foil.
“You’ll be able to
understand us now,” he sneered. “I’ve equipped this suit with a translator.”
“Were you impressed by our capture trees?” the blonde asked. “Rather expensive, specialized robots. The branch/tentacles are also equipped with the circuitry from your S-Force nullifier nets. You’re quite helpless.”
The blonde undid the catches on Peg’s helmet and removed it. Peg stared up at her as the woman reached into a utility pouch on her armor and came out with something that looked like a cross between a dart and a miniature hypodermic needle.
Peg turned desperately to Melador. “Why are you doing this?” She stared at her erstwhile comrade with wide eyes. “I thought this was your fight!”
“I, too, thought it was my fight—at first,” Melador snarled. “But if it was, why did we have to bring in a bunch of alien barbarians to take our part? Triadon even let himself be bossed by you—you, who don’t know a doohickey from a Framistat!”
Even through the psychic muffling, Peg felt his contempt. She drove desperate tendrils of thought toward Melador, trying to get some taste of his mind. “I’ve scanned you for security dozens of times. This isn’t—”
“Deep conditioning,” the blonde—Matavi, Peg got the name from Melador—explained. “And, of course, a little mind control.” She frowned, obviously aware of Peg’s frantic mental activity.
Peg was trying with all her might to pierce the shield around Melador’s mind, attempting her own brand of mind control. She scrabbled at the psionic defenses around his mind. If she could get control, even for a second, get him to cut her free...
Matavi jabbed the dart into Peg’s neck.
“Nooo!” Peg slurred as her whole body seemed to go inert.
“Get the platform. As soon as I slip this on her, we’ll be ready to go. I’m not so sure she didn’t get a message off, despite my blocking.” Matavi slipped the foil circlet over Peg’s forehead. “It will be—interesting—to experiment on this one.”
The brow-band was in place, and for the first time since she’d Rifted to the giants’ world, Peg Faber was totally alone in her head, psionically deaf, dumb, and blind.
Doubtless it would have been most distressing for her, if the blackness hadn’t swallowed her up.
If John had been a few minutes later, the abduction crew might well have made its getaway. But he’d redlined his suit’s gizmoidal drive all the way from Kaldoa, swooping down just in time to see a crowd of Argonians releasing Peg from a tree whose branches were strangely wrapped around her.
John took quick stock of the situation. Peg was unconscious, and all but one of the Argonians was invisible to his mental scans. The remaining Argonian, a female, had fairly powerful shields, which opened as she tried to disable him with a rapier thrust of mental energy.
He deflected it with his own psionic shields, raising his hands in the tridigirector to blast the cargo platform onto which the Deviants were about to dump Peg.
Another figure appeared from behind the vehicle, toting the silvery bulk of the force cannon. John had to go into wild aerobatics as he avoided blaster bolts, the force cannon at its widest bore, and psionic thrusts.
One of them would find him soon ...
It was the force cannon. Its blast caught John, sending him into a tailspin, half the circuitry in his suit ruined, his helmet just... gone, a steady, sticky flow of blood making its way down his face.
The blond telepath down there leapt through his remaining defenses, determined to seize his mind. John got angry. In a hurricane of rage, he spewed her out of his mind, then tore right through her defenses to assail her psyche.
She collapsed like a stone, unconscious.
John knew his gizmoidal drive was failing. He didn’t understand the circuitry well enough to stop his downward spiral. But he knew there was another way, a possibility. He reached out mentally, attempting something he’d tried on other occasions, but on a much smaller scale.
Psychokinesis could be used to tear things, like the time he’d disabled the robot that attacked Peg by ripping apart its circuits. But it could also be used as a push, to brake his fall.
He landed hard, but it was ten-foot drop hard as opposed to a ten-story drop. Even so, he lay like a man dead, his head pounding with the terrible effort he’d had to put out.
“You’ve killed him!” a furious voice yelled. A familiar voice, John realized. It was Melador.
“The mistress said we were to capture the girl and use her as a hostage.” The Argonian stood with Peg’s inert body in his arms. Now he aimed one of his wrist projectors at the side of her head, his fingers curling into the tridigirector. “No need for her now.”
John didn’t know where he found the strength. One moment, he was helpless on the ground. The next, he was upright, his mind reaching out to the invisible shield that protected Melador’s brain, coiling around the defenses, crushing inward against them. This was a mechanical shield, inflexible, unable to respond to different pressures. Given time, John could probably have wormed his way in.
But he didn’t have time. The brute strength approach was needed. John found a weak spot and loosed an eruption of unrestrained mental force, in full knowledge that doing so would fry Melador’s brains.
The programmed traitor stiffened, his hand splayed, and he fell dead, Peg landing atop him.
For a few brief seconds, the other Deviant footsoldiers debated between firing at John and grabbing Peg as a hostage. John didn’t hesitate. With greater and greater surety, John smashed through their defenses until all eight of the underlings were dead.
The Deviant with the force cannon made quite a different decision. He bundled the unconscious Matavi aboard the still-functioning flight platform and burned gizmo getting out of there.
John considered hurling a mental attack after them, but he no longer had the strength of emotion to power himself. Slowly, he fumbled his way out of half-dead armor and carried Peg away from the midst of the nine sprawled bodies. He’d always be glad she was unconscious for those terrible moments.
John found a dome-shaped construction nearby, the Ar-gonian equivalent of a farmhouse. The door was open, and the communicator inside worked. John contacted the Citadel to get help. The mobile reserve had returned, and would be on its way in seconds.
Then, after leaving Peg on a floating sofa, he walked outside, back to the dead. He hated what he was about to do, but he had to do it.
John took one of the dead Deviants, propped him up, and extended the corpse’s arm to point at Melador’s head. Forcing a probe into the still-warm nervous system, John triggered neurons.
The hand he held twitched, formed the tridigirector, and the blaster erased the manner of Melador’s death.
John’s face seemed older as he left the steaming remains. What Argon needed now was heroes—living or dead—and he’d just provided another for the pantheon.
* * *
CHAPTER 17
“I’d say the Lessers in California think much more of their pleasures than the little people here in New York,” Victor told the group sitting around the campfire at Heroes’ Manor. “They even heat the water in their swimming places.”
All evening since his return, he’d been telling tales and answering questions about his visit to exotic California.
“What was this acting like?” one of the males, a handsome young fellow named Andrew, wanted to know.
“Mainly make-believe,” Victor admitted with a small grimace. He’d acted in a couple of scenes as himself, but it hadn’t taken him long to realize that most of his work was as a stunt double and stand-in for Robert.
The leader of the giants had flown off in the Heroplane soon after Victor had landed, going to California to film his scenes. Robert’s absence allowed Victor to feel at ease and speak freely around the campfire. “Much of it was boring. They record the action scene by scene, and much time is wasted as they set these scenes up. Also, they don’t ‘shoot’—that’s what they call it—the scenes in order.” He shrugged. “I’m still n
ot quite sure what the whole story is about.”
“Did you really have to take orders from the Lessers?” another male asked.
“It was more like taking advice,” Victor said. “The Lesser in charge—he’s called the director—would take us aside and discuss the scene. He was most respectful, but that was his normal manner of working. I saw him act the same way with the Lesser stars.”
“Stars?” a busty brunette named Penelope asked the question. Since she was a beauty who’d never paid much attention to Victor, he began to see why movie acting might be the goal of many Lessers.
“Some of the Lessers who regularly act in films have followings. Using the right star can result in what the Lessers call ‘big box office’—much money and great success for the film.”
“Among Lessers,” a voice at the edge of the group noted.
‘The stories can be interesting,“ Victor explained. ”There was an outdoor theater showing films not too far from where we were living. I saw several different stories. Some, to be honest, I didn’t understand. Others were quite exciting.“
“It sounds as if you enjoyed this faraway California place,” one of the giantesses said a little jealously.
“It’s warmer than here, and very much different,” Victor admitted. “But the Lessers have the same preoccupations. Money. Crime.” He smiled. “One could easily become a hero out there.”
He pointed to the pile of complimentary Fantasy Factory comic books they were using as kindling. “Have you actually read any of these? The make-believe heroes in the stories live in many different cities all over this domain. It’s not such a bad idea.”
Anything, he thought, to get out from under the thumb of Robert and the heavy-handed Thomas.
Victor sensed silent agreement around the campfire.
“I for one,” he said, “wouldn’t mind taking on L.A.”