‘I saw movement!’ Condor lifted the laser. ‘Stay down while I check.’
‘Let me have a chance,’ Ozen protested.
Ethne pushed herself erect, holding the hand-stunner, and her teeth were glinting between her slightly parted lips.
‘Oh no!’ she gasped, and Condor started past her, catching a glimpse of the dreaded Humic figures approaching along the gully. He counted half a dozen at first glance, and there was movement farther back.
‘We’re trapped!’ Ozen snarled. ‘What happens now, Condor? You’ve led us into trouble.’
Condor pushed by Ethne and lifted the laser. ‘You’d better stick close to me,’ he said through his teeth. ‘We’re going along the gully, and this weapon should clear a path for us.’
The foremost Humic was already lifting his right arm, and Condor knew what to expect. He took aim with the projector and fired, sending a streak of brilliance along the gully. The powerful beam disintegrated the first half dozen Humics, the blast filling the gully with smoke and flame. Condor started running forward, ready to fire again, and Ethne and Ozen followed him closely.
Twice more Condor used the laser. There were more than thirty Humics in the gully, and he hit them before they could attack him. They ran past shattered bodies that lay like gigantic broken toys, and Condor was amazed when he glanced down at one in passing to see that the Humics were solid clay, with wire and bright mechanism running through them like veins and sinews.
The air was vibrant with discharged force of energy, and it was difficult to breath. Condor saw no more trouble ahead, and relief swamped through him as he kept running, occasionally glancing back to ensure that Ethne and Ozen were following. When he checked once more upon the slope he found that they had escaped the cordon that had been closing in around them, and the line of Humics was pushing towards the camp below.
‘We’d better get out of here now and make a run for the ridge,’ Condor said, glancing at the sky. He saw a dot far above, towards the other side of the valley, and he wondered if the Cranums had scanners powerful enough to watch details from that distance.
Ethne climbed up to his side, gasping for breath, her face shining with perspiration, and Ozen was grunting harshly as he climbed steadily. When they reached him, Condor held out a hand to Ethne and pulled her level. He looked into her eyes, saw that she was not completely exhausted, and started climbing out of their cover. He stood up, watching the Humics, darting glances around in all directions, and for the moment they seemed to be out of trouble. He waited for them to join him, and then started up the slope again, his leg muscles protesting against the fierce exercise.
When he reached the crest he dropped flat in cover and lay staring around, waiting for the others to come up.
He saw the Humics closing upon the Nether camp, and the savages were fleeing into the clearing, standing huddled together in fear. Condor thinned his lips as he watched, knowing that he was responsible for this disturbance, and he guessed that he couldn’t stand around if the Cranums gave the order for the Nethers to be wiped out.
‘Let’s keep moving, shall we?’ Ozen demanded, dropping at Condor’s side for a moment and wiping sweat from his fleshy face. His dark eyes glinted as he met Condor’s pale gaze.
‘You go ahead with Ethne,’ Condor retorted. ‘I want to see what’s going to happen here. Those Nethers are my friends, and I won’t stand by and watch them obliterated by the Humics.’
‘Professor, you can’t remain behind,’ Ethne said tightly as she came up. ‘Think of what’s waiting on Earth! ’ She broke off and stared at Ozen in some embarrassment, and Condor smiled.
‘It seems to me that we have a problem here to solve before we can think of returning to Earth,’ he commented.
‘Me?’ Ozen stiffened, catching his breath, and the weapon in his hand came up to cover Condor.
‘Lower the gun,’ Condor said slowly. ‘You don’t have the initiative, General, until we get back to Earth. Give me the weapon.’
Condor held out his hand, and Ozen backed away slightly, still menacing with the weapon. Ethne turned her hand-stunner upon the general, covering him, and silence closed in around them.
‘You’d better do like the professor says, General,’ Ethne said. ‘You have no idea how we can get back to Earth. If you don’t surrender to us you’ll be marooned here.’
‘And so will you,’ Ozen retorted sullenly.
‘With the situation such as it is on Earth I think I’d rather stay here,’ Condor bluffed. ‘What about you, Ozen?’
‘I’ve got nothing to go back for, unless I take you as a prisoner, Professor,’ came the thick-toned reply. ‘I had my orders from the World Master, and if I didn’t get you within twenty-four hours then I would be executed for failure of duty.’
‘When Aubin is toppled from power you won’t have to worry about your life, Ozen.’ Condor smiled thinly, his eyes still watching the grim scene below in the camp. ‘If you had any intelligence at all you would throw in with us and help to return the world to sanity.’
‘So you admit you were a member of that resistance Group!’ The general’s eyes glinted.
‘I am, and proud of it. You could do worse than join us now. With Aubin gone from power no one would have to worry about dying for failure of duty. Aubin is as good as finished when I get back on Earth.’
‘Your machine which put us here,’ Ozen said. He shook his head slowly. ‘It will be impossible to get at the World Master on Retarc. You know the obstacles to an attack as well as I do, Professor. You put most of the defensive measures on Retarc.’
‘Let me worry about that part of it,’ Condor retorted. ‘You had better start thinking about your own future between now and the time we reach the slope.’
Ethne uttered a gasp that distracted them, and Condor glanced at the girl to see why she was staring into the sky. Condor looked up and saw four airships appearing over the valley. They were in pairs, with a considerable distance between the pairs. Condor tightened his lips.
‘They’re coming for us,’ he said. ‘They’ll attack from all directions, and while we’re fighting one of them another will get us. We’d better split up and make our separate ways to the wrecked airship. We’ll rendezvous there as soon as possible.’
‘No!’ Ethne stared into his face. ‘I refuse to be parted from you. I’ll go where you go.’
He stared into her face for long moments, and the silence around them was vibrant. Ozen coughed impatiently, and Condor let his eyes shift to the general’s face.
‘You’d better start out, General,’ he said. ‘Try and make good time.’
‘And what happens to me if you both get killed?’ Ozen demanded, glancing at the sky. ‘I don’t know how to get back to Earth.’
‘Then pray that one or other of us will make it,’ Ethne said. ‘None of us would be in this predicament if you hadn’t done your duty so well, General.’
‘I wish the World Master could hear you say that,’ Ozen retorted through his teeth. ‘Which way do I go now, can you tell me?’
Condor glanced around, and recognized the peak beneath which he had first landed. He pointed it out, and the general got to his feet and started running away. They watched him, and when Ozen was out of sight Condor sighed heavily.
‘I’m sorry, Ethne, for getting you involved in all this,’ he said softly.
‘I’m not sorry,’ she retorted. ‘It’s been a pleasure and an honour to work with you, Professor Condor.’
‘It’s been more than that, hasn’t it?’ he demanded. ‘I’m sure you’ve been in love with me for a very long time.’
She smiled and sighed heavily, and her pale gaze flickered as she glanced up at the sky. The black dots had grown considerably, and were taking on details with each fleeting second.
‘This is neither the time nor the place to talk of love,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘I think we’d better change position, Professor.’
He nodded, checking the approaching flyers. ‘
Do you think we shall succeed in disposing of Aubin, if we should get back to Earth?’ he asked.
‘I’ve always had complete confidence in you,’ she retorted, and pushed to her feet.
Condor brought his mind back to their problems, and looked around, remembering the gullies that raked this hot land. He led the way into a maze of rocks, spotted a gully that was leading in the general direction they wanted, and plunged into it, with Ethne following. They started running again, and before many moments had passed they had to duck into cover as two ominous black shapes went by overhead.
They lay together in the shade of a large boulder and hugged each other tightly. Ethne had her eyes tightly closed, but Condor was wide-eyed, weighing up their chances as he watched the craft circling around, obviously searching for them. Earth seemed so remote now. Those insurmountable troubles under the rule of the World Master didn’t seem so terrible in the face of what they had before them now.
Then the airships started loosing off their weapons, and the hot ground heaved and shuddered under the barrage. Flickering light assailed the earth, probing with deathly thoroughness. Indiscriminate energy waves jolted through the still air and blotted out whole sections of the ground.
Condor clung to Ethne and waited in mindless fashion, hoping against hope for their survival, not for themselves but for what they stood for. If they died here, then Earth would go on groaning under Abelard Aubin’s despotic rule for generations to come!
Ethne hardly felt the shuddering ground as the barrage blasted down. She felt safe in Condor’s strong arms, and while he held her everything was all right…
Chapter Eleven
Herri Ozen was too old to continue running. He had been subjected to too many rejuvenation sequences in the past to be able to maintain a young man’s physical effort. He dropped heavily to the ground and crawled into cover before looking around, and he saw that he had covered only half the distance to the wrecked airship. He looked back, saw no sign of Condor and the girl, and sat resting, trying to ease his palpitating lungs. Sweat ran down his face and into his eyes, and the heat from the twin suns was intolerable. He gripped the gun in his hands and began to pray that the nightmare in which he seemed to have fallen would soon be ended.
He didn’t know what to make of the situation he had found upon recovering consciousness. He didn’t know what had hit him. One moment he had been bending over the base to examine it in the Lab, and the next thing he knew was when he awoke to find himself on the slope, with two suns in the sky overhead. He still half suspected that Ethne Stound had duped him in some way, that they were still on Earth but that he was being tricked for some vague reason he could not see.
Yet the Cranums and the Humics half convinced him that this was no trick. They could not be on Earth! He thought of his position, and knew time was fast running out for him. If they did get back to Earth and he could assume the initiative and arrest Condor then he would be well rewarded by the World Master, but he knew Death in some awful guise awaited his failure.
He sighed as he started to his feet once more, and he looked around cautiously. He didn’t want to fight with anyone, especially with aliens who were doing what any race would do if invasion came to their planet. He hoped nothing would happen to Condor and the girl because he had no idea how to return to Earth. He still hadn’t worked out how he had left Earth, although he supposed it had something to do with the strange projector set up in Condor’s Lab.
When he sighted the first pair of skycraft he wasn’t unduly worried. He dropped to cover once more and lay motionless, watching the strange craft drifting silently across the bright blue void. He soon saw the second pair, and began to feel worried, finally losing his resolution to his fear and getting to his feet to continue his flight towards the rendezvous.
No sooner had he started moving when one of the nearer two craft came gliding down swiftly, like a hawk dropping upon its prey. Ozen, keeping an eye on the craft, felt a pang of alarm, but kept running, finding the going difficult as he met an incline. He checked the weapon in his hand and wondered if it were powerful enough to shoot down one of the craft.
When he saw a beam of light flicker and stab down towards him he hurled himself behind a large boulder and tried to decide what to do. He heard an explosion, and rocks and dust filled the air. He looked up, peering through the murk for sight of the craft, and spotted it coming still lower. He lifted the hand gun and loosed an energy bolt, jerking under the blast of it. He saw a flash wink on the underside of the aircraft, and it sideslipped and lost height quickly before recovering and shaling away. He clenched his teeth and fired at it once more, loosing a longer spate of energy, and the craft dipped and spun like a crazy bird.
He didn’t spot the second one of the pair, and his first intimation of having overlooked it was when a terrific explosion encompassed him and gushed around him. He was hurled through the air, breathless and dazed, and fell heavily, driving the wind from his body with the impact. He lay gasping, staring around, and soon saw that the blast had actually missed him by several yards. He had been caught up in the vortex caused by the eruption of energy.
Knowing there would be another attack, he pushed himself wearily to his feet and started running again, and covered several yards before he realized that he was moving in the wrong direction. He turned doggedly, watching the sky for trouble, but the dust was thick around him and he could not see.
He went up the slope again, heartened by the knowledge that he was near to the rendezvous. He came out of the dust and halted when he saw three ominous figures standing some yards ahead of him. Condor had called them Humics, and Ozen knew he had a fight on his hands. He lifted the energy-gun and started shooting, and two of the robots went down before they could attempt to do anything about him.
The third robot turned and lifted its right arm. Ozen smiled thinly because he couldn’t see any weapons on the Humic. He fired at it, and grinned tightly when it erupted and fell writhing. He knew a thing or two about fighting, he thought remotely. He didn’t want trouble, but if these aliens did then he was ready to accommodate them!
A black shadow fell upon him, moving slowly over the hard ground, and Ozen was startled, looking up swiftly. He cursed these alien ships because they were silent, and he threw up his hand to bring his energy-gun into play when he saw the large aircraft hovering above him. But he was too late. He saw a number of small figures on the catwalk of the craft, and some of them were pointing long, tube-like weapons at him. He saw the flickers of light that darted towards him, and started firing his gun. Before he could score a hit on the craft the whole world seemed to blow up in his face.
He was conscious of a searing white light, intense heat and intolerable pain. Then everywhere went black and he crumpled. A split second later he was nothing but a brown smear upon the dusty ground!
Condor was watching the battle, and he knew he could do nothing about it. When the energy-guns started shooting he dropped into cover, dragging Ethne with him, and they lay watching, realizing that Ozen was in trouble. They saw the Cranum aircraft get hit and begin to go down, and they continued to watch it as it flew across the ridge to disappear from view behind it, still dropping slowly like an exhausted bird.
‘We’ve got to do something to help the general,’ Ethne said. She was shivering with apprehension and her face was set harshly, her pale eyes dull with worry and concern.
‘What can we do?’ Condor demanded. ‘We have to get away from here in one piece. We can’t think of anything else but getting back to Earth to do what must be done.’
‘I never thought it would be possible for me ever to be pleased to see Ozen,’ the girl went on softly. ‘For years he’s been a thorn in our sides. But when I returned here and came looking for you and saw Ozen I was delighted to set eyes upon him.’
‘He came down on our side of the fence for a time,’ Condor said slowly. He was watching closely as the second aircraft hovered over a particular spot. He saw a spurt of light stabbing do
wn towards the ground, and an answering flash from below. Then the ground flash was obliterated in broiling fire, and he closed his eyes and held his breath for a moment.
They’ve got him,’ Ethne said in anguished tones. She began to cry. ‘I brought him here! I’m directly responsible.’
Condor was staring at the sky, and he saw the skycraft turn and float away. His lips were thin and taut, his eyes narrowed, and there was hopelessness inside him as he tried to assemble his thoughts in order.
‘He was our enemy, and we would have been in serious trouble if he’d got back to Earth with us. We can’t think of ourselves, Ethne. We have to think of what we’re planning to do. The world can’t go on much longer as it is doing. Aubin has to go! If we delay further then there will be widespread revolt, and that will mean millions of deaths. We’ve known of this unrest for a long time, and I’m only surprised that the trouble hasn’t started before now.’
The girl nodded, her eyes seeming strangely dark as she stared at the settling dust over where Ozen had put up his last fight. She had tears in her eyes, and Condor reached out tenderly and touched her shoulder.
‘Come along,’ he said. ‘We’re not out of this ourselves yet. If we don’t try to get away then we’ll get ourselves trapped, and that will be the end of everything.’
‘Look! ’ There was a tremor in Ethne’s voice. ‘The craft are going away! ’
Condor tightened his lips as he stared up into the sky, and he saw the three surviving craft drifting effortlessly away. He glanced towards the valley, and stiffened in sudden fear.
‘The Humics,’ he said.
Ethne glanced in the same direction, and she uttered a low cry of hopelessness when she saw a stream of Humics climbing back out of the valley.
‘Are you ready to run for it?’ Condor demanded.
‘Are they coming this way?’ she asked nervously.
They watched for long moments, and then Condor uttered a long sigh of relief.
‘They’re going away,’ he said. ‘Look at them. They’re going back the way they came. The hunt has been called off!’
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