Brood of the Dark Moon
another world now; my former allegiance to Herr Schwartzmann is ended.
This is--what is it you say?--a new deal. I would like to see it; and I
use another of your American aphorisms: I would like to see it a square
deal."
* * * * *
The voice of a scholar, thought Chet; one more used to the precision of
laboratory phrases than to wild talk like this; but no man to be trifled
with, nevertheless. Chet did not hesitate to turn despite the pistols
that were still aimed at him.
But Herr Kreiss was not looking in his direction; his eyes were trained
steadily in the same line as his gun. This little experiment he was
conducting seemed to require his undivided attention until the end. To
Schwartzmann he said sharply:
"Your men--order them to drop their weapons. Quick!"
As they clattered upon the floor the scientist turned and extended his
hand to Chet.
"And still speaking not too technically," he continued, "this is one
hell of a fix that you have got us into. Even in desperate straits it
took nerve to do that." He pointed to the shattered remains of the
multiple bars that had been the control mechanism, and added:
"I admire that kind of nerve. And, if you don't mind, since we are
exiles together--" His throat seemed choking him again.
There were weapons in the hands of Chet and Harkness; they were not
making the same mistake twice. Chet shifted his gun to his left hand
that he might reach toward the scientist with his right.
"I knew you were white all the time," Chet told him; "I'll say you
belong!"
CHAPTER VII
_The Red Swarm_
It was a matter of a half hour later when Harkness ordered them all
outside. He had accepted Kreiss as an addition to their ranks and had
made himself plain to Schwartzmann.
To the scientist he said. "You remarked that no ship could hold two
commanding pilots: that goes for an expedition like this, too. I am in
command. If you will take orders we will be mighty glad to have you with
us."
And to Schwartzmann, in a different tone: "I am sparing you and your
men. I ought to shoot you down, but I won't. And I don't expect you to
understand why; any decency such as that would beyond you.
"But I am letting you live. This world is big enough to hold us both,
and pretty soon I will tell you what part of it you can live in. And
then remember this one thing, Schwartzmann--get this straight!--you keep
out of my way. I will show you a valley where you and your men can stay.
And if ever you leave that valley I will hunt you down as I would one of
the beasts that you will see in this world."
Chet had to repress a little smile that was twitching at his lips; it
always amused him hugely to see Harkness when roused.
"Turn us out to starve?" Schwartzmann was demanding. "You would do
that?"
"There will be food there," said Harkness curtly: "suit yourself about
starving. Only stay where I put you!"
Back of the others of Schwartzmann's men, the pilot, Max, was stooping.
Half-hidden he moved toward the doorway to the rear cabin and to the
storage-room and gun-rooms beyond. Chet glimpsed him in his silent
retreat.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you, Max," he advised quietly.
"Personally, I think you're all getting off too well; as for myself, I'm
sort of itching for an excuse to let off this gun."
It was here that Harkness turned to the open port.
"Put them out!" he snapped. "You, Chet, go out first and line them up as
they come--but, no, wait: there may be gas out there."
* * * * *
Chet was beside the port; a breath from outside came to him sweetly
fragrant. A shadow was moving across the smooth lava rock. "A bird!" he
thought. Then a flash of red in startling vividness swept past the open
door: it was like a quick flicker of living flame. He could not see what
it was, but it was alive--and this answered his question.
"Send 'em along," he said; "it seems all right now." He stepped through
the opening in the heavily insulated walls.
It was early morning, yet the sun was already hot upon the smooth
expanse of the lava flow. Some ancient eruption from the distant peaks
that hemmed in the valley had sent out this flood of molten rock; it was
hard and black now. But, to the right, where the valley went on and up,
and rose gently and widened as it rose, a myriad of red flames and jets
of steam told of the inner fires that still raged.
These were the fumeroles where only a month before he and Harkness and
Diane had found clustering savages who were more apes than men; they had
been roasting meat at these flames. And below, where the lava stopped,
was the open glade where the little stream splashed and sparkled: in the
high rock walls that hemmed the glade the caves showed black. And,
beyond the open ground, was the weird forest, where tree-trunks of
ghostly white were laced with a network of red veining. They grew close,
those spectral columns, in a shadow-world beneath the high roof of
greenery they supported.
Here was the scene of an earlier adventure. Chet was swept up in the
flood of recollections born of familiar sights and scents. Herr
Schwartzmann, cursing steadily in a guttural tongue, came from the ship
to bring Chet's thoughts back to the more immediate problem.
* * * * *
There were five others who followed--the pilot and Schwartzmann's four
men. There had been another, but his body lay huddled upon the bare
lava. He had followed his master far--and here, for him, was the end.
Kreiss' pistol was still in his hand as he came after. Harkness and
Diane were last.
Harkness pointed with his gun. "Over there!" he ordered. "Get them away
from the ship, Chet. Line them up down below there; all the ape-men have
cleared out since we had our last fight. Get them down by the stream.
Diane and I will bring them some supplies, and then we can send them off
for good."
Chet sent Kreiss down first, where an easy slope made the descent a
simple matter; it had been the bow-wave of the molten lava--here was the
end of that inundation of another age--and the slope was wrinkled and
creased. Schwartzmann followed; then the others. The last man was ready
to descend when Diane and Walt came back.
They had packages of compressed foods. This was all right with Chet, but
he raised his eyebrows inquiringly at sight of several boxes of
ammunition and an extra gun. Harkness smiled good-naturedly.
"I will give them one pistol," Walt told him, "and a good supply of
shells. We don't need to be afraid of them with only one gun, and we
can't leave the poor devils at the mercy of every wild beast."
"You're the boss," said Chet briefly; "but, for me, I'd sooner give this
Schwartzmann just one bullet--right where it would do the most good.
"Let's make him work for it," he suggested, and called to the men below:
"Come back up here, Schwartzmann! A little present for you--and I'm
saying you don't deserve it."
He watched the return trip as Schwartzmann dragged his heavy bulk up the
slope; he was enjoying the man's explosive, panted curses. Beside him
were Diane and Walt. With them, it was as it had been with him at first.
They had eyes only for the familiar ground below: the stream, the open
ground, the trees....
* * * * *
Each of them was looking down at that lower ground.
It was Kreiss standing down there who first caught Chet's attention.
Kreiss was trying to shout. Chet saw his waving arms; he stared,
puzzled, at the facial contortions--the working lips from which no sound
came. He knew that something was wrong. It was a moment or two before he
realized that Kreiss could not speak, that the throat, injured by the
choking fumes, had failed him. Then he heard the strangled croak that
Kreiss forced from his lips: "_Behind you!--look behind you!_"
Schwartzmann was scrambling to the top where they stood; every man was
accounted for. What had they to fear? And suddenly it was borne in upon
Chet's consciousness that he had been hearing a sound--a sound that was
louder now--a rustling!--a clashing of dry, rasping things! The very air
seemed to hold something ominous.
He knew this in the instant while he whirled about; while he heard the
dry rustling change to a humming roar; while he saw, like a cloud of
flame, a great swarm of red, flying things like the one that had flown
past the port--and one, swifter than the rest, that darted from the
swarm and flashed upon him.
It was red--vividly, dazzlingly red! The body of a reptile--a wild
phantasm of distorted dreams--was supported by short, quivering wings.
The body was some five feet in length, and it was translucent.
A shell, like the dried husk of some creature long dead!--yet here was
something alive, as its quick attack proved. It had a head of dry scales
which ended in a projecting black-tipped beak that came like a sword,
straight and true for Chet's heart. It seemed an age before he could
bring his pistol up and fire.
* * * * *
Detonite, as everyone knows, does not explode on impact; the cap of
fulminate in the end of each bullet sets it off. But even this requires
some resistance--something more than a dry, red husk to check the
bullet's flight. There was no explosion from the tiny shell that Chet's
pistol fired, but the bullet did its work. The creature fell plunging to
the rocky ground, and its transparent wings sent flurries of dust where
they beat upon the ground. There were others that went down, for the
bullet had gone on and through the great swarm.
And then they attacked.
The very fury of the assault saved the huddle of humans. So close were
the red things pressed together that their vibrating wings beat and
locked the swarm into a mass. They were almost above their prey. Chet
knew that he was firing upward into the swarm, but the sound of his
pistol was lost. The red cloud hung poised in a whirling maelstrom; and
the pandemonium of clashing wings whipped down to them not only the
sound of their dry scraping but a stench from those reptile bodies that
was overpowering.
Sickly sweet, the taste of it was in Chet's mouth; the sound of the
furious swarm was battering at his ears as he knew that his pistol was
empty.
There were red bodies on the bare rock before him. A scaly, scabrous
thing was pressing against his upflung hands that he raised above his
head--a loathsome touch! A beak that was a needle-pointed tube stabbed
his shoulder before he could flinch aside: the quick pain of it was
piercingly sharp....
* * * * *
Other red horrors dropped from the main mass overhead; he saw Harkness
beating at them wildly while he made a shelter of his body above the
crouched figure of Diane. Two of them--two incredible, beastly, flying
things! He saw them so plainly where they hovered, and Harkness striking
at them with a useless, empty gun, while they waited to drive home their
lance-like beaks.
The picture was so plain! His brain was a photographic plate,
super-sensitized by the utter horror of the moment. While the red
monster stabbed its beak into his shoulder, while he drove home one blow
against its parchment body with his empty pistol, while the wild,
beating wings lifted the creature again into the air--he saw it all.
Here were Diane and Harkness! Nearby Schwartzmann was on the ground! His
man--the one who had not yet descended with the others--was running
stumblingly forward. He was wounded, and the blood was streaming from
his back. Chet saw the two monsters hovering above Harkness' head; he
saw their thick-lidded eyes--and he saw those eyes as they detected an
easier prey.