Part 2
His face was blue when he dropped the dust on the white hot heat coil. The red dust changed to gleaming droplets of mercury. Oxygen--rich pure oxygen was released in the change. He breathed the life-giving fumes through pinched nostrils.
When strength came pouring back into his air-starved system he advanced on the weakened flames. They hugged the rocks--inert in the savage cold of the mountain. Some of them had changed to glowing liquid. One, higher on the slope than the rest, had frozen to an opalescent solid. When the newly generated oxygen flowed over them they exploded harmlessly to grey powder. As the last one disappeared Rod turned to face a grinning, space-clad figure.
“Nice work, Rod,” the figure called, “I see you answer your mail.”
“Bill Williamson!” Rod grinned his relief. “Oblige me, pal, by not writing any more notes.”
Williamson was beside him. He slipped a fresh cannister of air into place on Rod’s space suit and supported him while they clambered further up the mountain-side.
“That oxygen trick!” he exulted. “That’s a nice wrinkle! They sounded like popcorn going off.”
Williamson led him to a cave entrance buried deep in a gorge. The concealed opening was covered with a heavy wind-proofed canvas. They entered through the double fold.
“Oxygen equipped!” Rod stared his surprise.
“We have our creature comforts.” Williamson unlatched his helmet. “Crude but effective. We’ve been heating mercury oxide. There’s lots of it around. Set awhile--while I call the gang. They’ll be glad to see you.”
When the handshaking was over, Rod faced the hardbitten, sand-burned Survivors. These were the men who, like himself, had come through the testing. They had found the way to live on this planet--in the teeth of the conquerors of Earth. Now they needed him--needed his genius to guide them along the path to freedom--to conquest over the hated tetrarchs.
* * * * *
Rod looked at the intent faces about him. “First,” he said, “I want the answers to some questions. I’ve figured part of it out myself--check me if I go wrong.
“The Tetrarchs are not human in shape. They’re really flame-like gobs of energy--probably phosphoric in nature. For some reason, they fashioned plastic bodies which resembled human figures. They have always used these bodies in their dealings with humans--unless they’re hunting.”
Williamson nodded approvingly. “We stole a few of those imitation bodies. They’re all pretty much the same, except for the masks. The ones they use on Earth are built in. Here in Tetrarch they’re removable. They fashioned them to conceal their real structure after they investigated Earth. We humans never knew of them until they made their appearance in camouflage. They studied us first, devised the body and then established relations.”
“Yeah,” a Survivor interrupted, “When they took us in, they took us over--but good! They couldn’t have done it any other way--with their one lousy town on a two-bit planet.”
“Under normal temperature conditions,” Rod continued, “they’re gaseous. As it gets colder they become less active and then they turn to liquid.”
“That’s right, chief, and when it gets really cold,” another Survivor added, “they turn to solid. When we win this fight I’m going to get me a tetrarch, freeze it, and use it for a light in my fishing lodge.”
“Oh no, you’re not,” a barrel-chested earthman, incongruously named Bunny, informed him, “you’re going to contribute it to help spell Mona Darlanan’s name in lights on Broadway.”
“What’ that again?” Rod’s tone had sharpened.
“Mona Darlanan, boss. She’s the greatest actress of them all--bar none.” Bunny grinned disarmingly. “Bet you didn’t know you was her messenger boy.”
“That’s right, Rod.” Bill Williamson picked up Rod’s discarded space suit. “Here,” he suppressed a smile with difficulty, “she’s put a note on your helmet latching. It’s in code and says she expects to get called in to start you on your way.”
There was no stopping Williamson’s laughter, “Look! It says here she’s known you a long time and you’re an old sober-sides. She expects to hug you before you start out and she hopes you’ll like it.”
“Nice goin’, chief. She didn’t hug me.” Bunny was glum on this point.
“Wait a minute, guys.” Rod silenced the laughter. “You’re all wrong. That girl betrayed me--she’s gone over to the tetrarchs--lock, stock and barrel.”
“Let’s hear about it, Rod.” Williamson was intent.
Rod recounted briefly what had happened when Mona Darlanan had read his sign language.
When he was through, Bill Williamson was silent for a long moment. Then he spoke slowly, “Rod, you’re the only one who ever arrived on Tetrarch knowing of our existence. As a matter of fact, Mona was responsible for smuggling that note aboard the space ship--the one that brought you here. You came close to giving the whole show away with your sign language gag. Mona Darlanan was smart enough to realize that and she took the one sure way to get you on your way to us.”
“I don’t catch.” Rod Harrow’s face was a study in bewilderment.
“I’m not surprised.” Williamson was half smiling. “Mona does that to guys. We first got in touch with her when one of the boys--he’s gone the glowing way now--used one of our captured humanoid suits and made like a guard. We selected Mona as our contact because she’s completely and utterly loyal. And she’s probably the finest actress there is.
“To get herself solid with the tetrarchs she ‘adopted’ that little jerk, Jerry Wilson. That was to convince them that she was sincere.”
Rod, listening intently, nodded--he understood the why of that gnawing thought back on the lowlands now.
“She keeps us informed of what the tetrarchs are planning--and she’s got them hoodwinked--particularly that rat, Latham Koler.
“Guys are always trying to escape from the mines. Sometimes they survive. When they do there’s always some message from her. When they go she tells them how to get to us. But they have to promise to destroy the note if it looks as though they won’t get through.”
“She didn’t say anything like that to me,” Rod flared.
“She had faith in you,” Williamson said shortly, “besides she knew you knew.”
“If you say so, Bill. I admit I missed the boat.” Rod’s thoughts were veering crazily.
“But to get back to business, Rod,” Bill Williamson said, “I don’t know how long we’re going to be safe here. Our one lucky string is the tetrarch’s principle of the Hunt.”
“I was going to ask you about that.” Rod was now alert. “Why don’t the tetrarchs account for every human that escaped?”
“Well, boss,” the barrel-chested Bunny spoke, “they figure, how can they lose? All of us are due for the torch parade once we hit twenty-five.”
“Further,” Williamson added, “from the info I’ve gotten from Mona, the tetrarchs use the Hunt to test themselves. For each quarry caught without aid of any kind a tetrarchian guard gets promoted. If the guard himself is overcome--on his home field--so to speak--the idea is they’re well rid of him. That means a constant process of self selection.... And it leaves us facing highly dangerous adversaries.”
* * * * *
The canvas covering the cave entrance rippled and a Survivor entered. “Look alive, pals,” he said, “there’s another guy looks like he’s going to get through to us.”
“Hope he makes it,” the barrel-chested Bunny rose. “It’s my turn to put out the welcome mat.”
“What does he plan to do?” Rod turned to Bill Williamson.
“’Bout the same thing I did for you. If the fellow gets far enough along, the tetrarchs will retreat, or freeze, and the big fellow will bring him in.”
“Why don’t we help the guy?”
“What do you mean? What can we do?”
“You said we had plenty of oxygen, didn’t you?”
“Yeah. We got it stored in tanks we stole from the tetrarchs.”
“Well, c’mon, Bill. Let’s explode a few or four.”
“Lor Lumme! Tetrarch popcorn! What all will we need, Rod?”
“About eight men. Two teams--two each--for diversion. And four men for the push. We’ll try it small scale for size.”
The oxygen tanks were quickly distributed. Rod gave eight Survivors rapid instructions. “I’ll give you ten minutes to get in position,” he finished, “Williamson and I will watch from the top heights.”
By the time Rod and Williamson had taken their position high on the mountain-side the staggering human had won to within a hundred yards of the final slope. The flames were circling--darting forward--retreating--only to renew the attack. They were so intent on their prey they missed the helpless second figure--until he set up a hoarse scream for help.
When the flames realized there was a second quarry they hesitated--but not for long. If anything, the second man was farther gone than the one who was now scrambling up the slope.
The new quarry was bent over a cylinder of some sort. His legs kicked feebly. His arms were jerking spasmodically as he tried to tear his suit fastenings.
Almost half the flames raced to him. Tentacles outstretched, they swooped--into the oblivion of hissing oxygen. A few tried to escape. Another human stepped from behind a concealing boulder. Rod watched him play an oxygen stream over them like a pest-sprayer.
The flames which had remained behind reacted instinctively. They retreated. Their vanguard exploded before two more humans who rose from the sand-misted shadows of a narrow gorge in the plateau.
They broke then. They fled in wild disorder in the only direction open. Now, four men rose from concealed positions to bar their way.
The annihilation was complete!
On the heights above, Williamson was dancing a war jig. “We wowed ’em, Rod,” he screeched. “We wowed ’em. Look at that grey powder! Look at it! Them’s dead tetrarchs, me boy.”
He pounded Rod on the back in complete forgetfulness of the glowing doom. “When we get back to earth I’m gonna marry me a nice girl. And I’m gonna throw pop corn parties every night in the week. And I’m gonna invite all the neighbors. And when the kernels go ‘Pop’ I’m gonna say, ‘That’s what we did to the tetrarchs.’”
He was still pounding Rod’s back when Bunny came puffing up. “You’d better come in a hurry, boss,” he said, “that guy down there wants to talk to you and he ain’t got much time left.”
Rod frowned. “Lets go,” he said briefly.
He ran down the slope to the inert figure that lay like a blade of mown grass at the base.
When the others arrived he was kneeling by the fallen slave, supporting him by the head and shoulders. There was no mistaking the ghastly pallor spreading over the waxen face.
His breathing was jerky--almost spasmodic as he whispered, “And then they worked on Rickter. They had grown suspicious when things started to disappear ... when more slaves escaped and never got caught.”
His breathing paused. The skin on the man’s forehead lost its waxy pallor. It became dry--harsh--yellow-tinged.
Rod braced him more firmly--the tortured chest heaved again. “When they found out ... about the Survivors ... they decided to finish us. They had been working to find out about a cure for the gryxon burn. Koler worked with them and discovered how to make it work faster ... said it was a catalyst ... forced us to eat it ... one by one.”
“Mona?” Rod asked gently.
“They’ve saved her and a few more ... going to experiment ... operate ... say humans no use as slaves ... too stiff-necked ... make better guinea pigs ... we’re finished.”
* * * * *
The slave tried to speak again. But his chest was rigid, fixed. His eyes filmed. He ceased the struggle.
Rod laid him down, still gently and straightened him, crossing his hands over his chest. Smoke came in a fine haze from the flaring nostrils. Bloody froth flew from between the drawn lips. The Satanic grin came with the onslaught of the greenish glow.
And then--there were ashes!
“We’re ready, boss.” Bunny’s voice was quiet.
“Yes,” Williamson’s voice was equally low, “we’ve got time until we’re twenty-five--to exterminate every tetrarch on the planet. The best we can hope for is a dead draw. Shall we get started, Rod? There’s little time left to us.”
“We’ll have the advantage of surprise,” Rod agreed, “unless we walk into a trap. But I think we can outmaneuver them.”
He turned quickly. “Anyone here within a week of their twenty-fifth birthday?”
“I don’t think so, Rod.”
“Anyone within a month of their twenty-fifth birthday who is also from the Mediterranean section of Earth?”
He paused. Their silence gave him his answer.
“Good,” he said, “in this game we’ve still got our hole card.
“Now, remember this one thing. Our objective is the science building--they operate there--and that’s where they’ll store the catalyst. Anything else is secondary.
“We’ll try a feint on the slave compartment. We’ll drive in force on all communication centers. I’ll make maps showing their locations--I made it my job to get that info before I left Earth. And we’ve got to kill every tetrarchian space ship crew either at the same time or immediately after we destroy communications. We’ve none too much oxygen for a job of this size. That’s our main weapon. So make it count. We’ll use what blasters we have. And if you run into any tetrarchians with space suits on aim for the mask. That’s all you need to do before you give him the explosion treatment. Is everything clear?”
“All we need is to know who’s going to lead who to where,” Bunny said.
“I’ll have plans drawn up at headquarters in half an hour,” Rod promised. “Meantime leave a twenty-percent reserve of oxygen here and break the rest down from tanks to all the cannisters you can get your hands on.”
Rod walked rapidly up the hill outlining details of the battle plan to Williamson as they entered the cave.
The slave compartment feint-party left first. Communications-destroyers left in four groups. Space-hangar attack-parties followed. Under Bunny’s direction, they had managed to rig up a fairly creditable camouflage.
There was an argument about command of the main force against the science building. Rod had assumed it without second thought. Williamson was obdurate.
“I don’t care who handles it, Rod,” he said, “but you can’t. If anything goes wrong there’ll be no one left to carry the fight. You’ve got to stay here until we control the lowlands.”
“I’ll be twenty-five next month,” Rod said briefly. “So it can’t matter much one way or the other.”
“Sorry, Rod. I forgot about that. I’ve only six weeks to go myself. One of the youngsters will have to take over the reserve.”
“Then you and I will take a whack at this together.”
Williamson draped two cannisters of oxygen about his waist. “Let’s go,” he said.
Their pace down the mountain was swift but unhurried. On the plateau Williamson scuffled tetrarchian ashes whenever he found them. They were fast disappearing in the swirling sand.
They scattered their force when they left the foothills. There was an occasional tetrarch flame to draw the men’s fire.
* * * * *
They encountered their first resistance within blaster range of the mines. From the roof of the slave compartment purple blaster arcs rained down. The fire was scattered at first but it increased in volume when the main body of the Survivors surged into view.
The tetrarchs were no mean marksmen. The stench of burning, smoking flesh tainted the atmosphere.
As the men broke for cover Rod demonstrated counter measures. He took position behind a corner wall and fired three times. Each shot punctured a tetrarchian mask. When the enemy huddled to replace them he lobbed an oxygen cannister over the roof and blasted it as it poised at the height of its arc. The hissing gas struck quickly. He saw one of the unprotected tetrarchs collapse. Its imitation body toppled over the parapet to the ground. A Survivor wiggled toward it and snatched a blaster from its limp hand. He accounted for three more on the roof before they killed him.
His sacrifice gave his fellows an opportunity. While he had engaged the tetrarchs two Survivors wedged themselves in the corner of a supporting abutment. One had clambered on the other’s shoulders. The men scrambled up this living ladder and over the parapet.
In the midst of a wild melee support came--through the roof. The feinting force that had attacked earlier had taken the interior of the slave compartment. They cut through the roof when they heard the scuffling. Oxygen roared through the opening into Tetrarch’s dead atmosphere. The struggle was brief--and without quarter to the tetrarchs.
Rod, meanwhile, had reorganized his forces and directed them to proceed to the science building and surround it.
His Survivors were better equipped now. They had gained blasters. The feint on the slave compartment had won them the oxygen-making equipment. It had diverted the enemy from Rod’s main objective. And the men of the feint-party now stood ready to reinforce him.
A courier dashed to him. Bunny was reporting that all space ship hangars had been immobilized. He had then turned to assist in the communications clean up. He wanted further orders.
The orders were brief: to explode all tetrarchians encountered while proceeding to the science building.
His own men waited in silence. They waited before a quiet, ominous building. It stood--a squat, sullen pile--a citadel of science perverted--of infamous torture.
And from it--through a door quickly opened and as quickly shut--a human emerged. A human who limped and snuffled as he crossed the clearing toward the Survivors.
“Harrow,” he called, “I’m an emissary to Rod Harrow. I want to speak to Rod Harrow.”
“All right. What is it?” Rod strode forward despite Williamson’s restraining hand.
The whimpering slave gathered himself together and spoke as if he had memorized his piece.
“The tetrarchs say if you’ll surrender yourself they’ll spare the rest of the humans.”
“Bluff! A miserable bluff!” Williamson had come forward blazing with indignation. His contempt at the servile gestures of the slave was mounting. “We’ll kill every tetrarch on the planet--and you with them, if you’re not careful. You can sniffle on back there and tell them that their position is hopeless.”
“But don’t you see,” the coward was almost in tears, “they’ve got the catalyst.” The tears, no longer denied, streaked down his face. “At first it would work in eight hours no matter what our age. Now, Latham Koler’s got it so it can work in five min--O-oh! I’ve been hit!”
Rod caught a quick glimpse of Latham Koler’s saturnine grin. He had appeared at the building opening for a moment and fired.
Rod couldn’t see the weapon he had used but its results were plain. A tiny dart had pierced the coward’s helmet. It protruded from the back of his neck.
Williamson plucked the dart and held it in his hand. “It doesn’t look dangerous,” he said. But Jerry had collapsed.
Rod pointed to the fallen coward. A familiar pallor was spreading over his features.
“The glow! Rod! Look at it! It’s working already!”
“It’s a stepped-up catalyst all right.” Rod was thoughtful. “That dart is really a hypo needle. Lets get to cover and see what we can do about it.”
When Rod outlined his plan Williamson was adamant. They couldn’t go through with it. He, Williamson, wasn’t going to permit it. But Rod had his way.
They picked the best marksmen arbitrarily. There were volunteers in plenty to storm the building if the ruse worked.
It took a little time to stuff their clothes with sand. Williamson checked them personally to make sure that the layer under their clothes was at least three inches thick.
When everything was ready Rod strode forward like Achilles taunting the Trojans. He exhausted his vocabulary. All the vituperative terms he could remember and a few that came to him extempore were hauled out to describe the tetrarchs. He told them they would be frozen to provide lights for their own mines--that the humans would break them into small chunks to make jewels for Earth’s women.
It worked. It was more than tetrarch nature could take.
* * * * *
Doors opened for a fleeting second. The vengeful flames showered him with darts.
In that brief interval they were met with withering blasts from the marksmen. The humans had brought the oxygen machinery up from the slave compartment. It streamed toward the building like water from a pressure hose.
At the same instant the volunteers rushed. For an instant the fight teetered in the balance--and then they were in.
Rod bristled with sand-blunted darts as he battered his way through the honey-combed building, searching for the operating chamber. He burst through the entrance--to face Mona Darlanan.
They hadn’t had time to work on her. But they’d done their best. They’d tied her to a vertical platform first.
The dart in her breast had drawn blood!
Latham Koler squirmed from behind the platform. His cadaverous face was transfixed with the grin of a skeleton skull. He aimed a blaster point blank at Rod and fired.
The streaming arc buried itself harmlessly in the three-inch sand layer over Rod’s chest. And he was on Koler like a berserk.
He broke the traitor’s helmet first. And forced fingers and thumb around his windpipe. When the peering eyes protruded and the thin-lipped mouth hung agape Rod lifted the dart gently from Mona Darlanan’s body.
He jammed it down Koler’s throat.
Williamson came pounding in. “We’ve got them all, Rod. Tetrarch IV is in our hands!”
Rod was frantically tearing at his sleeve. “Get me a knife,” he ordered, “quickly.”
He ripped the sleeve off. As more and more Survivors came piling into the room he ordered liters of distilled water.
Meanwhile he was busily plying the scalpel Williamson brought to him. The gash on his arm had never quite healed was getting probed. Rod dug with the scalpel as though he were going after a bullet.
The small platinum capsule he forced from the cut in his arm was not unlike one.
He glanced anxiously at Mona’s face. The pallor had gone. A harshening of her exquisite skin had taken its place.
The contents of the capsule dissolved in five liters of water in a matter of seconds. Rod picked an unfilled dart from a litter on a table. He filled it with his newly made solution and injected it in the girl’s arm.
They waited.
“Will it do any good, Rod?” Williamson was solemn in the quiet room.
“I don’t know. We developed it on Earth in our lab in the Rockies. There was plenty of gryxon in our machines. Volunteers exposed themselves to it. That capsule, Bill, was purchased at the price of martyrdom.”
“If it works, our race is saved.”
“That’s how they felt about it. We found that raw gryxon was instant death to humans over twenty-five. Those under twenty-five were immune unless they came from stock that matured early--as the Mediterranean peoples. They succumbed before twenty-five. That was what really gave us our answer. We knew that ankylosis--joining of certain spinal vertebrae--occurred earlier in humans that matured earlier--and that age twenty-five was the time for the joinder to occur. So we turned to the serums that had increased human life spans by retarding ankylosis--and developed this one.”
They studied Mona’s face again.
* * * * *
Was it possible that the yellow tinge was stayed--was turned to waxen ivory? The girl’s breast rose and fell--ever so gently.
“I concealed our serum,” Rod went on slowly, “from the tetrarchs by burying it in my arm. I had to get a hypo needle before I could use it here.”
“Have I had a fever, Rod?” Mona’s grey eyes were open. “Or is this delirium?”
Rod Harrow crossed to her swiftly. He cradled her head in his arms. She was smiling again--relaxed.
Then he turned to Williamson. “Line ’em up, Bill. With five liters we can inoculate every human on Tetrarch IV. There’ll never be a gryxon glow again.
“And as soon as a company has had all men injected, send them to the cave to bring back the reserves. We’ll need their help.”