by Various
There were about a dozen Mercutians in the long laboratory, and each had a sun-tube dangling from his belt, ready at hand. The laboratory was crowded with apparatus, but what had drawn Hilary's attention was a gigantic gleaming metallic sphere set up prominently in the center of the room. Protruding from it at all angles were great quartz tubes, through which a blue light pulsed and flamed. It was connected by huge cables to a spark-bathed dynamo. Other cables writhed through the translucent ceiling. The weather machine!
Hilary took a firmer grip on his automatic, nodded once to Grim. The two Earthmen stepped simultaneously through the open door.
"Raise your paws high and keep them up." Hilary's voice cracked like a whip through the busy confusion of the laboratory. The Mercutians, scattered as they were, whirled around from their tasks to face two deadly weapons held by two determined-looking men.
There was a chorus of strange guttural oaths, but every hand moved skyward, reluctantly.
* * * * *
Hilary picked out the most blasphemous sounding of the cursers, rightly deeming him the Cor in charge.
"You," he said, "what switches regulate the weather machine?"
The Mercutian Cor was a particularly ugly specimen. The gray warts were gigantic, hiding whatever semblance of manlike features there might have been beneath.
"I'll see you dogs burned to a cinder in the sun first," he growled.
"Keep them covered, Grim," Hilary said sharply. "I'll take care of this fellow personally."
He walked straight across the room for the Cor, eyes blazing, index finger on trigger. The Cor, fear staring out of his lidless eyes, backed slowly away from the approaching death. There was a hushed silence.
"I'll tell, I'll tell!" the Cor screamed, as the relentless weapon almost touched his paunchy stomach.
"I thought you would," Hilary said grimly, not for an instant relaxing the pressure against the trigger. "If you value your worthless hide, you'd better talk, and talk fast. What switch reverses the machine, to bring on rain? If you are wise, you won't try to fool me."
The wretch almost stumbled in his eagerness. "By the gray soil of Mercury I'll tell you the truth." His arm flung up, pointing. "That knob over there controls the--"
Hilary never heard the rest. There was a crash at the other end of the laboratory. One of the Mercutians, tired of keeping his arms high extended, had attempted to rest his huge bulk against a laboratory table. It went over with a splintering crash of glassware.
* * * * *
Hilary whirled around to face the noise. As he did so, the Cor seized his opportunity. His right arm dropped to his side, jerked up his sun-tube. Hilary heard Grim's warning cry, tried to pivot back again. But Grim beat him to it. The dynol pistol exploded sharply; the flaming pellet caught the Cor square in his side. There was a dull explosion and the Cor was torn violently into bits. He dropped, a mass of shapeless blobs.
But now hell had broken loose. The Mercutians were not cowards. At the moment of the diversion, every one of them had gone for his sun-tube. A flame streaked close to Hilary's head, shivered the opposite wall into molten fragments. He ducked behind a table and fired. A Mercutian threw up his hands, staggered and pitched forward heavily. Grim's dynol bullets whined in their passage, spattered the laboratory with flying blobs of flesh. They did terrible execution. Hilary's automatic spat its leaden hail.
But the Mercutians were entrenched now behind tables, machinery, whatever cover they could find. The beams from half a dozen sun-tubes slithered across the room, burning flaming paths through the overheated air, bringing the very walls down about them. It could not last long. Already Hilary had a nasty burn across one shoulder; there was a streak of red across Grim's forehead as he hid behind the panel of the entrance, whipping his pistol around to fire, and ducking back again. There were too many of the enemy, and overwhelming reinforcements could be expected any moment. The Earthmen's position was desperate.
Through it all the great weather machine hummed and crackled; the tubes were sheets of surging flame. Hilary cursed softly. If only the Cor had completed his sentence before he died. Hilary would have chanced a sudden rush forward to reverse it, to bring on a deluge of rain and clouds, even though it meant certain death. The machine seemed to gleam at him mockingly; the hum continued with tantalizing smoothness.
"Look out," Grim's voice came to him sharply. He jerked his head back, just in time. A ray streaked past his ear like a thunderbolt. The heat from it scorched his face.
* * * * *
The Mercutians were stealthily crawling nearer, pushing heavy, tables in front of them as shields. He was almost outflanked now. In another minute he would be exposed.
Hilary thought rapidly. His position was untenable. He would have to run for it. A sudden dash to the door might possibly win through. But the machine! He set his teeth hard. If he could not change the weather, at least he could destroy the infernal thing, stop its grinding out perfect sunshine for the Mercutians.
He lifted his weapon. Off to one side a Mercutian arm advanced cautiously, bringing up a sun-tube. He swung on it and fired. The sun-tube clattered to the floor and the arm jerked back, accompanied by a howl of anguish. Hilary smiled grimly, took careful aim at the metal sphere of the machine. The bullet leaped true for its mark. A little round hole showed--but nothing happened. The infernal machine hummed softly as ever.
He cursed, fired again. Another round hole, and that was all. With increasing viciousness he turned his aim on the quartz tubes, pierced them through and through. Before his very eyes, the quartz seemed to run and melt around the holes, to seal them tight as if he had never shot. The blue flames leaped and surged mockingly. The Mercutians were jeering now; raucous calls went up.
* * * * *
Hilary felt a sinking despair. He had failed; would have to run for it now. Small chance to make it, too. Then he heard Grim's deep bass. "Hold it a moment," he said as if he had read his thoughts.
Fascinated, Hilary saw the giant's pistol slowly thrust its long barrel around the edge of the crystal slide. A half dozen rays leaped viciously, for it. But a flaming pellet streaked out of its orifice before it was jerked back.
Hilary could see its red path as it struck the sphere of the machine. The next instant there was a dull explosion and the whole machine disintegrated into a smother of flying fragments. The expanding dynol had done the trick where lead had failed. There would be no more weather control.
But Hilary did not pause to see the finish. Even as the machine burst, he was running across the room, bending low. Fragments whizzed by him at a fearful clip; rays crisscrossed all about him.
But somehow he was through. Grim's finger was on the slide button. It closed with a snap behind him, cutting off the pursuing howls of rage.
Silently the two men darted up the ramp to the pent-apartment, dashed into the master bedroom. The Mercutian guard whom they had left securely bound, was gone. The Earthmen looked at each other, a great fear in their eyes. In one bound Hilary was at the door slide, thrusting it open. He tore out upon the open terrace, Grim right behind him.
* * * * *
They looked wildly about. The terrace was empty. There was no sign of the Vagabond, or of Joan and Wat. High overhead hovered a great burnished diskoid. Long streamlined Mercutian fliers darted through the air, but nowhere was there a sign of the familiar sphere.
Hilary gripped his companion's arm. "They've been captured, Grim," he choked.
"Nonsense," the giant said gruffly, to hide his own misgivings. "They just took alarm at something and winged off."
"But where is the guard then?"
Grim shook his head. He could not answer that. Despair overwhelmed Hilary. After all he had gone through, to have Joan snatched away from him at the moment of success. It was terrible. Wat too, that freckled-faced bantam.
"I should never have left them alone," he accused himself remorsefully.
"Here," said Grim sharply, "none of that. You did exactly the prop
er thing. We'll find them yet."
It was a confidence that he did not feel. There was the noise of padding feet up the ramp. The Mercutians were coming, in force.
Grim gripped Hilary by the shoulder, shook him vigorously. "They're coming. We're trapped."
Grendon snapped out of the lethargy into which he had sunk, face drawn and gray.
"No. There is a way. Follow me."
The first of the Mercutians pounded heavily into the room when Hilary had thrust Grim into the secret lift. He whirled and fired. The Mercutian coughed and fell forward. Other gray warty faces, furious, thrust from behind their dying comrade. But Hilary was in the lift, pressing the button for full speed down. A darting ray showered them with rounded smoking bits of vita-crystal, but they were dropping headlong through the building.
* * * * *
Ten minutes later they emerged cautiously from the entrance to the Pullman Building. It was deserted, deathly still. The two Earthmen stopped short, horror-struck at what they saw.
The streets were shambles. Hundreds of bodies lay sprawled in tumbling twisted heaps. Earthmen all, with here and there the grotesque huge bulk of a Mercutian who had failed to hear the warning signal. The bodies were scorched, blackened. Raw agony appeared on contorted desperate faces. It was not good to look upon.
"Wh--what has happened?" Grim gasped, his breath coming heavily.
"Just a little pleasantry of the Mercutians," Hilary said bitterly. He looked upward. High overhead hovered a gigantic shape, motionless.
Its great disk, burnished and dazzling in the cloudless sky, seemed to cast a sinister shadow over the city it had destroyed a second time.
"There's the toy that did it," said Hilary. "I felt the heat while I was a captive up in the Robbins Building. You must have flown over after, and missed it."
Grim shook a great brawny fist aloft. His deceptively mild eyes were hard flames now. His face was set in great strong ridges. Hilary had never seen him this way before.
"I'll rip every Mercutian to pieces with my bare hands--shred him into little bits." He meant it too. Hilary shuddered.
Far off down the wide thoroughfare came the glint of weapons, the sight of massed ranks. A Mercutian patrol was shambling along, heavy-gaited.
"Come on, Grim, let's get out of here," said Hilary.
They flattened like shadows against the wall, slunk stealthily through radiating streets. As much as possible they kept their eyes away from the sickening sights, the poor burned bodies of their fellow men. Steadily they headed for the branch local conveyors as being less likely to be under surveillance.
The Ramapos was their destination. Hilary went dully, listlessly. Joan was gone again; this time he could not possibly know where. Every step he took though, seemed to lead him farther away from her. His glazed eye searched the shining skies as he stumbled along. Not a sign anywhere of the Vagabond. Only the hateful swift-moving Mercutian fliers.
It was only Grim's insistence that kept him going. The secret gorge was the headquarters of the revolt, he argued. If the fools he had left in charge hadn't thrown their men recklessly on New York against his instructions to join that last foolhardy heroic attack, there was still a chance of salvaging the revolution.
CHAPTER X
Back to the Ramapos
It was dark when they reached the first swellings of the Ramapo Range. It was dangerous to try and make their way through tangled brush and mountain trails. All night they camped on the bare ground, sleeping fitfully, cramped cold, shivering. They dared not light a fire; it would draw instant unwelcome attention.
When dawn came, they were on the move, glad to stretch their sodden limbs. Unerringly Grim homed for the invisible cleft. Nothing stirred in the forests, even the birds seemed gone. The fog had lifted, the sun blazed forth in unclouded majesty. The damp on them dried quickly.
But Grim shook his fist at the unwitting orb.
"Damn that weather machine," he growled. "Breaking it seems to have made matters worse. Even the regular midnight shower has stopped. I'd give ten years of my life for the sight of a cloud."
"It will never rain again," Hilary said wearily. "It has forgotten how."
The bright sunny sky seemed a brazen hell to the footsore Earthmen. It mocked and jeered at them with sparkling waves of warmth.
Before them was an unbroken mass of underbrush. The next instant they were on the brink of the chasm.
"They haven't found us yet," said Morgan, surveying the looped end of the rope ladder. They climbed swiftly down the swaying rungs. The rock slanted with them, turned sharply and fell sheer. Below there was a confused murmur, the sound of movement.
A voice came floating up to them, sharp, commanding.
"Stop where you are, you two. You're covered."
"It's Morgan," Grim bellowed, not pausing an instant in his descent.
The next instant he dropped lightly to the floor of the gorge. A moment later Hilary stepped beside him.
Men were crowding about Grim, clean-cut, determined-looking Earthmen. Nothing like the men he had encountered on his first trip on the express conveyor. The bottom of the gorge had all the appearance of a wartime camp.
There were at least a hundred men encamped in the narrow cleft, crowded and crowding. A tall man thrust himself forward, spare, angular.
* * * * *
"Welcome, Captain Morgan," he cried. "We had given up all hopes of seeing you again."
"Hello, Waters," said Grim. "Where's Lieutenant Pemberton?"
The other looked shamefaced.
"He's, gone," he muttered. "Took two hundred men with him."
Morgan's face was awful. "Disobeyed orders, did he? Where did he go?"
"To join in the attack on Great New York. Reports came in that the countryside was up in arms, moving to attack the Mercutians. I couldn't hold him. Said you were crazy, never coming back. He went, and two hundred of the boys went with him."
Grim said: "Know what happened?"
Waters shook his head. "Our radio communication went dead yesterday afternoon."
"He's dead," said Grim softly. "The others too."
A groan went up as he described swiftly the holocaust of the day before. "That was why I warned you all to wait. We can't fight them yet. But I'm forgetting...." He turned to Hilary, who had remained quietly aside. "This is Hilary Grendon, your Chief. He's the man who is responsible for the revolt. I told you about him. We all take orders from him hereafter. If anyone can beat the Mercutians, here's your man."
A babel of sound burst about him like a bomb. Men patted him on the back, shook his hand, crowded him until he was almost smothered. It was a rousing reception. The kind Hilary had dreamed of on his return from his tremendous flight through space--and had not received.
For his act of revolt, unwitting as it was, had fired the imaginations of the Earth people, who in their degradation and despair had come to believe the Mercutian overlords invulnerable. It had been the little spark that touched off a far-reaching train of events. In the few days that had elapsed Hilary had become a legendary figure.
The sparkle came back to his eyes, his brain cleared of the fog of hopelessness as he took command. Joan was lost--yes--but there was the Earth to be saved.
* * * * *
His orders crackled. The little gorge became a hive of activity. With Grim and Waters as efficient assistants he soon whipped the tiny company into ordered discipline. Absurdly few to fight the Mercutians, but Hilary counseled patience. They were a nucleus merely, he told them. When the time arrived to fight in the open, the peoples of the Earth would swell their ranks.
To provide against the day, he sent scouts out to filter through the surrounding villages and towns; unarmed, to all seeming meekest of the Earthlings. They stirred the embers of revolt with muted whisperings; they found trustworthy leaders in each community to organize secretly all able-bodied men; they returned with tidings of the outside world, with food and other necessities.
Sometimes they
did not return. Then others went out to take their places. It was the fortune of war. Day and night a sentinel was posted in a dugout directly under the overhanging lip of the gorge. It was his duty to warn of impending attack; above all, to rake the sky ceaselessly with a crudely-contrived periscope for signs of gathering clouds, be they no bigger than a handsbreadth.
But the heavens were a brass blaze by day and a glittering mask of stars by night. Weather machine or none, in truth it seemed that it had forgotten to rain.
* * * * *
Hilary was hard put to it to restrain the impatience of his men. Reports drifted in from the scouts. The premature revolt had been crushed in blood and agony. New York was deserted except for the Mercutians. The country round had been ruthlessly rayed; not only had the armed bands of Earthmen been ferreted out and destroyed, but peaceful communities had been wantonly burned into the ground.
Strong reinforcements had been rushed to the Great New York territory from more peaceful sectors of the world. There were three of the terrible diskoids hovering within a radius of one hundred miles, ready to loose their hideous destruction at the slightest sign of disaffection.
But this time the spirit of the Earthmen was not broken. Their gait was springier, their glance more forthright than heretofore. For every one knew that Hilary Grendon, the prime mover, the defier of the Mercutians, had escaped. The invaders sought him ceaselessly, offering huge rewards for knowledge of his whereabouts. But there were no traitors. Even these few who knew would suffer unimaginable tortures rather than reveal him to the enemy.
"Patience," Hilary counseled his little band. "I know it is hard; I have my own scores to even. But we could only bring disaster upon ourselves and the cause of Earth's freedom by premature action. What have we? A handful of men, poorly armed. A few pistols; only, three of which can use the dynol pellets; a little ammunition. The rest of you have knives, axes, pitchforks. Poor enough weapons against the terrible rays of the Mercutians. We must wait."