Part 3

IV

It took their eyes a minute to adjust to the slanting afternoon sunlight into which they were thrust. The rocky backbone of the planet pierced the red sands here, and through the ages the wind-driven sand had carved the outcropping into caves and spires and overhanging ledges and gaunt pockmarked cliffs, all piled together in wildest confusion. They were left in a rough, rocky bowl deep within the outcropping, hidden from the desert by the surrounding cliffs and pinnacles.

The tunnel mouth was merely a black hole, almost indistinguishable from a multitude of shadowed cavities where sand-laden storm winds had found soft spots in the stone.

Cautiously Nick climbed the slanting wall of the bowl.

"Come here, Sue," he called.

Shading their eyes against the red glare of the wasteland they could discern the hangars and barracks of Central Camp a few miles to the south, and beyond that the hulking, dark mass of the ancient Martian city. But it was Central Camp, its buildings and landing ground and the thin metallic ribbon of the barrier, that held their attention.

"No ship," Susan said. The small rocket hangars could not possibly hide the bulk of a spacecraft.

"The supply freighter just left. Not another scheduled for eight weeks."

"What'll we do?" she asked plaintively.

Nick's answer was noncommittal. "First we get out of this sun."

"Then we stay here?" Her knowledge of the Martians was useless in this arid waste, and she turned to him for leadership.

"What else?" he replied with a shrug. "We'd scorch on the desert even if the Mec rocket patrols didn't pick us off. Here we can last for a while at least, and hope for a break."

Darkness fell without twilight, and almost at once the air took on a penetrating chill. They found refuge in a sheltered crevice, huddling close together for warmth while the rising wind howled a dirge of desolation and the two moons of Mars cast wavering shadows. They slept fitfully and uneasily.

* * * * *

A pebble clinked against a stone. Nick's eyes opened in the orange dawn. A silhouette that was not human moved against the luminous sky and his grip tightened on his knife as he slid noiselessly out of the crevice.

He recognized Klev just in time. Then he stared and sheathed his knife again, for the Martian presented a picture of battered dejection. His face was shapeless, one eye almost closed by a pinkish swelling, and the crest atop his head was even more tattered than before. His shoulders seemed smaller, and Nick saw they were bare. His _varlu_ was gone, and the other _voras_ of his clothing were shredded and damaged.

At a rising hum from the south he made frantic gestures and the old Martian stumbled toward the hidden crevice, dragging one leg as though it were partially paralyzed.

Nick saw he could never reach shelter before the patrol rocket sighted him. He leaped forward, seized the Martian in both arms and carried him bodily the few steps to the protecting nook, dropping him and throwing himself flat just as the silvery hull appeared over the rim of the bowl. Susan awakened with a startled outcry but had the presence of mind to remain motionless until the rocket had roared away.

"We'll have to watch out for them constantly," Nick warned. "They'll gun or bomb anything that moves."

"Klev, what happened to you?" Susan asked anxiously as she saw the Martian's condition.

He grimaced as he tried to sit up, his injuries not helped by Nick's necessarily rough treatment. Then he chirped a few sentences.

"Oh Klev! You shouldn't have done it," she protested in English.

"What is it?" Nick wanted to know.

"The Council voted to attack Central Camp, using their _voras_ as weapons. Klev tried to warn them it would be suicide, and he and Merlo fought. Merlo is much younger, and although he has the Plague he's still strong. Then he accused Klev of treachery because he was friendly to us, and had him exiled to the surface too."

The injured, beaten Martian touched Sue's hand and chirped a few words as though in apology.

"When will they attack?" Nick asked.

"Nineteen days from now," Susan translated the Martian's answer.

"How?"

"They'll come up through the tunnels into the old city, spread out, and attack the camp at night."

Nick looked thoughtful.

"What difference does it make?" Susan asked. "They'll all be killed on the charged barrier, if the proton cannon let them get that far. They can't win."

"Maybe," was all Nick could reply.

The heat grew unbearable, and several times during the long morning they were forced to change position to remain in the shade. They moved as little as possible, saving their energy and conserving their precious body water by avoiding any exertion that would bring on sweating.

Only Klev remained in the sun, his alien body gratefully soaking up the harsh rays. Occasionally he moved, each motion bringing a half suppressed mew of pain to his lips.

"How bad?" Nick asked.

Susan shook her head.

"He says he will be all right, but that swelling Merlo's _varlu_ made near his eye looks serious. His leg is badly hurt, and he's terribly old, Nick."

By midafternoon their faces were flushed and dry, and the powder-fine sand itched intolerably where it had sifted into their clothing. Susan napped, but stirred restlessly and muttered of water.

"Sue," Nick asked when she opened her eyes. "Is Klev in shape to talk sense?"

The Martian saw his glance and chirped affirmatively, then clamped his thin lips to smother an exclamation of anguish.

"Ask him if the passage through which they brought us up connects with any of the water caverns you mentioned."

She looked at him inquiringly.

"Might as well be killed by the Martians as die of thirst. Ask him."

Sue talked to the Martian, who nodded and began to trace a complicated diagram in the sand with one finger, hesitating before adding each line as though resurrecting old and almost forgotten memories.

* * * * *

Nick watched a while. Then a patrol rocket whistled over heading south, and after it had passed he climbed once more to the rim of the bowl. He watched it settle inside the barrier with a flare of braking jets and a cloud of red dust. And while he watched he thought.

To go below for water was absolutely necessary, but a purely defensive action which could at best only postpone the end. And nothing had ever been won by defensive action alone. Pure defense always meant eventual defeat.

He thought some more, then scrambled hurriedly down the rocks just as Klev completed the diagram.

"Sue," he panted, still out of breath. "Those creatures bred to tunnel and pump water. Are they still alive? Is there any way to make them work? Ask him!"

Sue hesitated, not understanding.

"Can they pump water up as well as down? Ask him!" Nick barked impatiently.

Suspicion showed in the Martian's manner as Sue made the request.

"He won't answer until he knows what you're planning," she reported. "If the Exploiters found water they'd never leave."

"One of us has to get back to Earth." Nick tried to be as patient as possible. "After everything that happened during the War years you can be damned sure the New Governments would handle Harmon fast and tough--if they knew what he is doing and planning. We need a ship, but when the next supply ship comes out eight weeks from now it will be too late. We've got to get a ship out _ahead of schedule_, and only one thing will do it. Water!"

"But how can you get--?"

"I'm not sure, yet," he admitted. "But it's worth a chance. Now ask him again."

The Martian looked doubtful. For a moment his hand hovered over the chart in the sand as though to erase it.

"Give him time," Susan advised.

"It's a gamble," Nick admitted. "But the _voras_--"

"Live almost forever," she responded. "Whether we could make them work for us--"

The sun was almost down before Klev decided, but then he chirped and clicked for a good three hours. The water caves could be reached, he said, but some of the _vora_ burrows through which they must crawl were so small it would be impossible to carry him, and his own strength was insufficient. And the distance from the water caves to the surface was too great for him to reach the water-_voras_ by thought alone, the usual method.

"You made the screen-_vora_ work," Nick reminded Susan.

She was uncertain. "Water-_voras_ are different. But I'll try."

The moon shadows were too black to permit them to study Klev's chart during the night. Klev slept, with the patience and resignation only age can bring. Once or twice Sue nodded in Nick's arms, but he remained fully awake, thinking.

In the first light of dawn Martian and Earthman studied the diagram together, but it was already hot when Nick turned his back on the original and reproduced it in another patch of sand. Klev checked it and nodded approval.

"Let's go," Nick said, starting to rise.

Klev restrained him and fumbled in the torn folds of his clothing to produce a glowing sphere the size of a marble. It seemed to be a portable form of the glow-plates with which he was familiar.

"Thanks," he said. "Take it easy until we get back--I hope."

The Martian understood the sense though not the actual words.

Then he and Susan dashed across the small expanse of sun-baked rock and squeezed into the passage.

For a while they followed the tunnel through which they had been ejected, but shortly encountered a branching passage they recognized from Klev's map. It spiraled down, narrower and steeper than the main tunnel, and soon it too branched. Once more they took the steeper route. The air grew stagnant but cool.

Most of the way they were forced to stoop or crawl, and three times they encountered sections so constricted that they had to stretch out flat and inch tortuously along. Little by little the air grew humid.

At last they came to an almost level passage where they could walk erect, rounded a turn, and their greenish light no longer was reflected by enclosing walls.

"Nick," Sue whispered. Her voice reverberated hollowly, dying away in distant echoes that seemed incredibly loud. Nick paused with hand on knife to see if they had been overheard.

Finally they tiptoed out along a sloping shelf of rock, out into the great cavern. And then the light shielded in Nick's hand gleamed on a sheet of black, still water. At once both were on their knees, scooping up the precious liquid in their hands, drinking their fill.

Satisfied, Nick placed his lips to her ear. "Where are the _voras_?" he breathed.

She pointed to the water.

* * * * *

Together they piled their clothing on the ledge, hooding the light with Nick's shirt so that only a faint glimmer showed. Then they waded out into the chill, unfathomable blackness of the underground lake, holding hands to steady each other. Nick's scalp was tingling and with every step he half expected his bare feet to encounter something soft and _alive_.

The water deepened rapidly and soon they had to swim. Nick had never had the opportunity to become an expert, so although he tried to be quiet his arms made small splashing sounds as he raised and lowered them, sounds that echoed sibilantly throughout the gigantic chamber. Sue swam close, invisible in the darkness, and he flinched momentarily as a current of water from her hand felt like something living brushing his side. She grasped his hands, pulling his arms through the motions of a breast stroke that would not require lifting them above the surface. He touched her to show he understood.

After that they swam more quietly, keeping together by the faint sounds of each other's breathing and an occasional touch of hands.

Every few minutes they stopped and floated motionless, listening and feeling with every fiber of their bodies.

Sue felt it first, a tiny, almost unnoticeable pulsation in the black water. She touched Nick's wrist, indicating a direction, and swam a few more strokes. The pulsation grew stronger. Nick felt it too, and only an effort of will kept him from threshing away as tingles of terror oozed along his spine. He felt very naked and helpless and vulnerable as he floated.

Again Sue swam a few strokes and stopped. For a full minute she lay quietly, allowing her breathing to ease. Then there was a faint splash as she dived, and it seemed to Nick as though hours passed while he waited alone in the darkness.

"Psst!" he hissed softly at the sound of her head breaking surface. She rested a while, dived again, and when she came up this time the pulsations were appreciably stronger.

Something below turned and moved uneasily, questioningly, disturbed in its long slumber by their presence.

A third time Susan dived. Nick waited, counting seconds. She did not come up. He waited. And still she did not come up. Panic began to grip him.

He floundered into a clumsy dive and swam downward through the inky fluid. His ears hummed and his chest began to burn, but his groping hands encountered nothing. At last he fought his way dizzily to the surface.

She was just calling him the second time as his head broke water and he gulped a lungful of air.

"Nick!" The word was roaring from the rocks as she heard his splash and indrawn breath.

"I touched it, Nick! I had to go deep," she panted as she swam toward him. "I think it got my thoughts, just what you told me."

Deep in the black lake something huge and unguessably powerful heaved and stirred, creating wavelets that raced toward shore and filled the cavern with insane, reechoing laughter as they broke against the rocks.

Racing now, without any attempt at silence, Nick and Susan swam toward the reassuring green pinpoint of light that marked the shelving ledge.

The waves were rising, lapping almost to their clothing, as they waded ashore. Without pausing to dry themselves they dressed and dashed up the tunnel.

Halfway to the surface they paused to rest, sitting on the cold, curving floor.

"What was it like?" Nick asked.

In the greenish light he could see her shudder.

"I--I really don't know," she confessed. "It was huge and it had no real shape, but some parts were hard and some weren't."

"Will it do what we want?"

"I--I think so. It was so _different_ that I couldn't understand all its reactions."

It was night when they edged out through the narrow opening, but Klev was awake and watching. His jaw dropped in astonishment as Sue told of their journey, of how she had actually touched the water-_vora_.

"Martians can't swim, Nick," she explained.

"How soon?" he wanted to know.

"An hour or two," she said after conferring with Klev. "But he's not sure. This has never happened before in all the history of Mars."

After a while Nick crept up to the rim of the rocky bowl, shivering as the cold, sand-laden wind whipped his exposed face. Both moons were below the horizon, leaving the desert in darkness relieved only by the stars and the lights of Central Camp.

Phobos rose rapidly in the west, throwing long, distorted shadows over the red sands. And as the shadows grew shorter Nick thought he detected something. He rested his eyes and looked again. Yes, it was there, a darker, glimmering patch in a low spot a mile or so to the east.

"Sue," he called excitedly. "It's starting."

Quickly she was beside him, looking where he pointed.

The patch of wet sand and standing water had grown to several hundred yards across when the orange flare of one of the night patrols flashed up from Central Camp. From several miles away the pilot sighted the unusual patch in the desert and swung to investigate.

"Duck!" Nick warned as a flare blossomed into a circle of blinding whiteness.

* * * * *

Three times the rocket dived and circled the growing lake, and when it left as the last flare died it returned to the field at full throttle. Nick could imagine the pilot's almost incoherent radio reports. Water on Mars! A lake in the desert!

The number of lights in Central Camp doubled while they watched. A gate in the barrier opened and three huge half-tracks roared out with searchlights glaring. They reached the pond, and even from the distance of their hiding place Susan and Nick could see the tiny figures of men as they rushed to the shore, touching the water, kneeling to dip their arms in it, even raising it to their lips.

The green star of Earth rose over the horizon, and then the thing for which Nick had been hoping actually happened.

All the lights of Central Camp went dim as power connections were changed. And then the flare of the great subatomic space beacon began to wink a message, the great beacon that depleted the power resources of the camp so badly that it was to be used only for messages of extreme urgency. But this was urgent indeed. Water on Mars! An hour, two, the coded news flamed into space.

Nick and Susan crept down the slope, bone-chilled from their windswept watch, to tell the injured Martian what had happened.

"If that doesn't bring a special ship out, then nothing will," Nick exulted.

At dawn a procession of armored cars began to flow between the camp and the lake, and just before noon several hastily improvised tank trucks appeared, loaded and returned. No patrol rockets went out, for it seemed the entire schedule of the camp had been disrupted.

Shortly after noon the lake ceased growing and began to dwindle. Slowly at first, then with increasing rapidity the water vanished into the sand. There was confusion in Central Camp and at the shores of the pool.

By midafternoon it was gone, leaving only an expanse of mud that dried and cracked under the glaring sun.

Klev twittered anxiously at this latest development.

"He says the Martians have discovered what we did, and set the _vora_ to pumping the water away again," Susan translated.

"No matter. The ship is on the way by now."

As evening approached Nick wedged a large boulder firmly into the mouth of the tunnel, placed his back against it and announced his intention of sleeping there.

"At least we'll know if they come after us," he said.

Klev nodded approval.

But the Martians made no attempt at reprisal for the humans' interference, as they were too busy preparing their attack on the camp.

Next morning truckloads of drilling equipment rolled out from camp, and soon a dozen rigs were boring through the sand and underlying rock. Floodlights were erected and the drilling went on day and night.

But the space beacon did not flame again with the news that the water had vanished. Power was too precious.

Nick counted the days as he doled out the water from the canteens they had refilled in the underground lake. His concentrated emergency rations, shared with Susan and Klev, gave out at last. The Martian did not drink, but finally the last trickle of water went down Susan's throat and the period of torture began.

Nick slept during the torrid days now, panting and itching and thirst-tormented beneath an overhanging rock, and through the nights lay on the edge of the bowl watching the sky. They did not talk much, for the effort hurt their parched throats.

It seemed a vision born of wishful thinking when at last the distinctive fan-shaped trail of a spaceship showed against the stars, dim at first but steadily growing brighter. And then it was in the upper atmosphere, the scream of the braking jets rising and falling as the pilot jockeyed the throttles. Down it came in a flaming arc, to land amid the beckoning lights of Central Camp.

"What do we do now?" Susan asked.

"Steal it."

"But how?"

Nick shook his head wearily. "Wait for the Martians to attack. Then try to break through."

"But the barrier? We'll be killed too, just like the Martians."

He looked at her sharply.

"I'm going with you, of course."

V

With full daylight three half-tracks moved out from beside the grounded spacer to the site of the drilling operations. They paused while a group of men got out to inspect the dry holes and the line of stakes that had been placed to indicate the margins of the vanished lake. Then the cars moved on, scouting the surrounding desert.

The three wheeled together and headed straight for the outcropping, while Nick and Susan crouched low to keep their heads below the skyline. They came on and on until Nick began to have an uneasy suspicion they had been spotted, but at last they turned aside.

"Nick!" Susan's voice was vibrant with hatred. "That man in the turret of the center car is Gerald Harmon himself!"

Nick shielded his eyes and tried to study the tiny figure in the plastic dome, but the distance was too great to distinguish details. He cursed fluently and wished for any sort of power weapon, understanding now why the spaceship had seemed larger and sleeker than the usual freighters. The overlord of the Martian Exploitation Company had come to investigate in person, bringing his own personal cruiser.

Nick tried to rest, falling at last into an uneasy sleep disturbed by dreams of rippling streams and drenching rainstorms. He slept until the rays of the sinking sun crept under the ledge to bring him back to the realization of his arid, deadly surroundings.

But somewhere amid his dreams an idea had been born.

"You can handle a spacer, can't you?" he asked.

"Certainly. You don't think Dad handled the _Trailblazer_ alone?"

"Good. There may be a chance for you then. I don't like that blue-faced Merlo at all, but we have to play along with him. And this thing is bigger than any of us as individuals."

"You've seen how the camp is built in a hollow to protect it from the wind?"

"Yes, but--"

"They never thought of floods."

Susan's eyes gleamed as she sensed his idea.

"You mean if the Martians made their water-_voras_--?"

"A dozen _voras_ and a dozen water caves. The barrier would short out and the Martians could get in. There'd be hell's very own confusion and no lights. You might make it."

"And you?"

"Merlo is a blue-faced, pigheaded, tradition-bound fool, and no general. He'd just beat his men's lives out against the charged barrier without thinking of the only weapon he has that's worth a damn. I'm going down and tell him, right now. The attack is tomorrow night."

Susan's grey eyes searched his face.

"Aren't you a bit confused?" she asked mildly.

"How?" He was annoyed at her implied criticism.

"You are a fighter. I'm not. I speak Martian. You don't."

"They'd kill you, Sue! I can't let--"

"Then tell me, in Martian, just what you'd say to Merlo!"

"But--"

She threw his own words back at him. "This thing is bigger than any one of us. I'm going."

Reluctantly he agreed that her words made sense.

"All right," he sighed. "Tell Klev."

The Martian broke into twittering, remonstrating speech as Susan explained, pointing at himself. Slowly and painfully he climbed to his feet and took a few uncertain steps. But then his injured leg collapsed and he crawled ignominiously back.

"That leaves it to me," Susan declared. "Roll that boulder out of the way."

The old Martian, shamed by his own weakness, sat with shoulders slumped and face hidden in his hands as Susan prepared to leave.

She came to Nick and in an unexpected move threw her arms around him and pulled his face down. For a moment he held her close, their sun-parched, cracked lips clinging together.

"It could have been so lovely," she whispered as she broke away.

She was crying openly as she squeezed into the tunnel. Nick's fingernails dug into his palms as he stared after her, but there was nothing he could do.

The day was long, and without Susan beside him the night was even colder than the others. Once he woke and found his arms reaching out as though to touch her. But the following day, the last lonely day of waiting, was the worst and longest. Once he tested the point of his knife against his thumb. If the plan worked at all, he resolved, he would look for Merlo in the camp even before going after the spaceship. At least there would be revenge.