"And if they murder us all? What about the ship?"
She said, "Leave orders to blow it up if we fail."
Pink scratched his jaw. The girl had something, or the nucleus ofsomething, there. He saw other possibilities in it--it was tantamount tosuicide, but there was nothing else left to try. He said, "If we livethrough this, Circe, I'll see you make lieutenant!"
"I'd rather make ... well, never mind." She turned to go into the room.He wondered if she had had Joe Silver in mind.
CHAPTER XVI
He said to the alien, "Where's your home planetoid?"
"Why?" it asked, mockery still in its weak voice.
"I'm capitulating. I want to make a deal with your people."
It said, "Ah, the human has sense after all. Our home is the largest ofthe asteroids, as you call them. The one you said at supper last nighthad a diameter of 440 miles. We call it Oasis--and a poor one it is,when we remember Earth."
Jerry said, astounded, "_What?_" His narrow face worked with surprise.
"Shut up, Jerry." Pink still had things to find out. "Can you tell yourrace, telepathically, what we're doing? I don't want them to losepatience and tear up the hull. We have a very angry gent atop us."
"It's the girl," snarled Jerry, before the alien could answer. "She'sgot you fooled like a--like a--good Lord, Pink, are you so crazy abouther you can't see she's been waiting to put this idea in your head allthis time?"
"Jerry," he said through his teeth, "shut your damn mouth. I'm captainof the _Elephant's Child_."
Jerry was aiming the Colt at him; accidentally, Pink hoped. Then the O.O. said, "If I have to blow out your guts to save us, Pink, I will." Histortured features writhed with pain. "Oh, hell, boy, wake up!"
"Give me one more minute, before you fly off the handle and make an assof yourself--and a mess of me." Pink had to have that minute. It was sovital he couldn't save himself from the angered Jerry with the onephrase that would explain everything. "Jerry, one lousy minute."
"Just tell me you don't mean it about giving in."
He couldn't. My God, he couldn't. There was too much of a chance thatthis brute on the floor was telepathic with its own kind. "I have to doit, Jerry," he said.
"Then I have to tie you up till you're sane," said Jerry. "First,though, I've got to make sure about this girl." The muzzle of the guntraveled toward Circe, steadily, remorselessly.
Pink had no alternative; the lives of all his men hung in that teeteringbalance. He jerked his right hand, and the tiny gambler's gun, theantique Derringer he had hidden up his sleeve for emergencies, slid downinto his palm. Instinctively his forefinger caught the trigger and withsorrow and determination he shot Jerry high in the chest, below theclavicle and a safe distance from the lung. Jerry staggered back, a lookof amazement spreading over his face; he fired the Colt wildly, puttinga slug into the floor. Then he sat down, making hurt, uncomprehendingnoises. Circe took the gun from his hand.
Pink heard a babble from the intercom. He grasped that some of hisofficers must have seen the occurrence. He still hadn't much more than aminute.
"Circe," he snapped, "turn off that intercom and then lock the door." Tothe giant he said, "Well, can you tell your friends?"
"I would have doubted you, had you not eliminated your objectingofficer," it told him. "Now I will say that I cannot communicate with myrace through thought transference; but if you head for Oasis, you willbe safe."
Pink breathed a little easier. He snatched down a bottle of whisky andtwisted off the cap. There was another fact he must learn. He knelt andpresented the bottle to the inert lips. "Have a slug," he said.
"You are sensible," said the being with satisfaction. "Pour it into mymouth or my eye; I can absorb it through any orifice." Pink pouredrapidly. The liquor ran down over the yellow hide.
"No, no," gurgled the monster. "Slowly! I absorb it far more slowly thanyou do--"
* * * * *
Pink stood up. He took a drink from the bottle and handed it to Circe.His face was radiant with success. "Toast the last slim chance, honey,"he said, voice cracking with relief. "We just found out what we neededto know." He retrieved the bottle after she had downed a gulp, gave itto the dazed Jerry. "Cheer up, boy," he said. "You didn't get your pinkskin plugged for nothing. Now listen." Rapidly he outlined Circe's plot,then the additions he had concocted. "See why I had to do it?" he askedfinally.
"Yeah. Yes, I see." Jerry blinked. "Would you spray a little sulfahealon this hole, Pink? It hurts.... Okay, I give in. I'm with you. It's amad notion, but I sure can't better it. I'm with you." He looked atCirce, who was already busy with sulfaspray and bandages. "But can wetrust this wench, Captain? She could be a wonderful decoy for 'em."
"She's in the clear, Jerry; if we hadn't been so blasted rattled we'dhave realized it long ago. There was a test she could have passed in twoseconds that would have eliminated all this fat-headed suspicion."
"What?"
"Holy Holmendis, boy--_lead_! If she were alien, the touch of lead wouldhave crisped her up with pain and paralysis." Pink opened the door then,and the first tide of officers coming to Jerry's rescue were halted atsight of Circe tending his wound. Pink said to Jerry, and to them all,"While I was standing in the hall, I took a cartridge out of thisDerringer, and rubbed the lead across the back of her neck. She neverwinced. That vouches for her, doesn't it?"
Jerry said, "It does. Heaven forgive us for a pack of droolingimbeciles! It does indeed."
Circe stood up. She came to Pink and stared him in the face. "So thatwas it," she said quietly. "You were testing me. And I thought it was acaress. Oh, you--" Then she hauled off and smacked Captain John Pinkhamsquare in the left eye.
It hurt like sin, but Pink could hardly blame her. So he apologized,without words. He took her in his arms and kissed her soundly.
And Circe kissed him back.
CHAPTER XVII
The _Elephant's Child_ rested on the surface of the asteroid Oasis, awaterless, airless, cold and gray ball as uninviting as any solid bodyin the universe. At the entrance to Air-lock One, the officers stood ina tight group listening to Pinkham; their spacesuits were fastened on,only the helmets remaining to be donned; their gloves were the modifieddigitmits which enabled the wearers to hold small objects and to operatemachinery or firearms.
There were seven officers, and now three crewmen in spacesuits joinedthem. Jerry, whose wound was nearly healed already, thanks to thesulfaspray, passed out guns from the captain's collection. Each mancarried a handgun, or, in two cases a long rifle. The ammunition for allamounted to one thousand two hundred and five rounds, in the mainhandgun cartridges. Pink had decided against using the Kentucky rifle,which was difficult for a modern man to load.
At each belt hung half a dozen curious objects, shaped like bottles butof a dull gray color and rough surface texture. These sloshed andgurgled when the men moved.
Pink concluded his instructions on the use of the weapons and the graybottle-things. "Remember," he said, "keep in touch by your radio, anddon't travel more than a mile from the ship if you can help it. Try thelure first, then when the containers are full, the guns. Be sure to keepat least one portion of lure for emergency; don't use it all." Hegrinned. "And don't drink any of the lure."
The men laughed, easing tension. Pink went on. "You'll have some troubleadjusting to the gravity--our average weight will be six or sevenpounds, or, in Jerry's case, three or four." They chuckled again."Remember we don't know how they'll react, so keep your minds open anduse your own judgment in everything. Now let's go."
As he turned and activated the sliding panel that covered the firstchamber of the air-lock, and they all settled their helmets down ontotheir shoulders and fastened them, an eleventh figure joined them, itshelmet already in place. Jerry, shaking his head reprovingly, handedthis one the last weapon, a small automatic from the so-called "GangsterAge" of America. Then they went into the air-lock and the door shuttight behind them.
&
nbsp; In the control room, Jackson and a few others watched tensely on theviewscreen as one by one the landing party jumped to the planetoid. Helooked at his watch. "Two hours," he said. "Oh my God, I hope they makeit!" For in precisely two hours, if they had not returned to the ship,Jackson was to blow it to metallic dust, and all the remaining humanswith it.
Forty miles above the surface of the small world, the _Diogenes_ and the_Cottabus_ cruised at a good rate of speed, to keep their hulls free ofhitchhiking giants while watching the progress of the expedition.
On the floor of Pinkham's quarters, the dying alien lay alone and cursedweakly at the sly and crafty doublecross he had so stupidly fallen for.He called upon a number of strange gods to curse these mortals; amongthe names he uttered was that of a deity called Allah.
In dressing room B, a technician discovered a crewman who was sittingagainst a wall rubbing his skull. "Somebody bopped me," said the manglumly. "I'm supposed to go out there and blast giants, dammit. Whocould have swiped me so hard?"
* * * * *
Pink took an experimental hop. It should have carried him, at Terragravity, about two feet. He soared over a hillock and came down gentlyon a plain of rock that looked like lava; his hop had carried him somescores of yards. He felt for an instant like a kid let loose on awonderful playground. Then he snapped into it and began to scan theterrain for signs of life.
To the right was the mountain they had seen from the descending ship,with its irregular rows of gaping holes which suggested caves andtherefore possible habitations. It wouldn't take more than five minutesto reach them at an easy amble, or a minute at a brisk walk; about amile away, they seemed.
Then with a horrified start he remembered the giant who had been atophis ship. Washington Daley had been delegated to deal with it--and Pinkhad forgotten, had not even glanced back to see how his lieutenant wasmaking out! He whirled neglecting caution, and fell on his face. Luckilyhe came down like a big bulky feather, and caught himself and bounced upagain, a rubber ball of a man on this alien world Oasis.
He was just in time to see the giant, bending forward over the front ofthe ship, begin to blur and stream downward toward the tiny figure ofthe human who stood below him. In a moment he resembled a cloud oftobacco-smoke, drawn into the gray container in Daley's hand. Hevanished entirely, Daley clapped on the sealing lid, and gave atriumphant wave to his captain. Pink blew out a breath of gratitude andremorse; he'd have to be on his toes from now on, really vibrant withwatchfulness. Laxity in one thing could lose this weird battle.
Strung out in a straggling line of erratically progressing units, themen of Earth headed for the caves. In a time so short as to be faintlyridiculous, they were moving up the mountainside. The gaping holes_were_ caves, and obviously deep ones. Pink stood at the entrance of onefor a moment, checking on the number of his men; then he waved a handover his head, and entered the great den. Behind him came anotherfigure, one whose slimness told him it was probably Jerry.
Their chest lamps lit up the interior, which was as gray, knobby, andfeatureless as the outside world. Pink held his Colt .44 in his righthand, one of the bottles in his left. The technicians of the _Elephant'sChild_ had worked like drudges over those bottles....
Every bottle of liquor aboard had been requisitioned. The liquid hadbeen poured into plastic containers; only a few spoonfuls had been leftin each bottle.
Then lead, melted down and beaten into sheets, was wrapped around eachbottle, forming a thin and chinkless layer over all the glass but thelip; and the lead was painted with tough plastikoid paint, which coveredit with a film one-twentieth of an inch thick. Caps of lead were madefor the bottles. At the end of a couple of hours, they had sixty-sixbottles, glass inside, lead covered, and topped off with plastikoidwhich would conceal the presence of lead from any known test short ofX-ray.
Each of the eleven men carried six of these bottles, then, actually leadcontainers, but apparently plastikoid; the lead stoppers were concealedin joerg-hide bags. If the giant who had been beaten in the spaceshipwas a criterion, the enemy would not recognize the presence of leaduntil it actually touched them--and then, thought Pink, with a quickprayer, it would be too late for them.
Beaming the radio to a distance of ten feet, he said, "Hey, Jerry, wantto lay a bet on who bags the first brute?"
"Sure. Twenty bucks says I get him. And don't call me Jerry," said thesweet, quiet, and thoroughly startling voice of organicus officer CirceSmith.
CHAPTER XVIII
I didn't have to do it, Pink thought. I could have changed the orderswhen I saw that no giants were in sight. We could have blasted the oneon top of the _Elephant's Child_ and taken off and got out of range of'em and gone back to Earth. We were free in that instant, when Daleycaught the alien and corked it up in the lead bottle with the liquorthat drew it. We shouldn't have come out here to the caves. We shouldhave left Oasis to itself.
He knew that he had squelched this idea before it was born, because hehad longed for a good fight; he recognized this alien life-form asunclean, and he'd wanted to stamp it out, or make a dent in its numbersanyway. So he'd gone ahead with the project, and now here was Circe,risking her life to be with him, and if anything happened to her he'dkill himself ... well, at least he'd mop up the giants who'd drawn himhere, he'd make a pogrom, a massacre to avenge her....
She isn't dead, boy, he told himself. She's just in danger. Don't getdistracted.
"Stick close," he told her shortly. "I'll whale the pants off you whenwe get back for this trick, but for now, stay close and keep your eyesopen."
Then he tuned his radio outward. "Report," he said. His men checked in.Nothing had been sighted thus far.
So it was Captain Pinkham's luck to meet the first alien.
Rounding a turn, he saw that the cavern enlarged, became a huge grotto;seated around its walls, staring at one another in the uncanny silenceof this airless place, were many of the giant life-forms. Only one wasnear him, and this monster was first to see him; it leaped at him withthe abruptness of perfect muscular control, its feet a little off thefloor of the cavern--Pink recalled that these things could levitatethemselves in space.
There was no time to use the lure of the bottle. He threw up his oldrevolver and fired point-blank, catching Circe by the arm and hurlingher to one side as he did so. The giant recoiled as at a wall, doubledand thrashed in agony. Pink, rooted to the spot, waited to see theeffects. Would one slug of lead be enough? And evidently it was, forsuddenly the thing fell and writhed futilely on the ground, flinging itsarms wide with diminishing strength. In a moment it was helpless, itsonly motion a slight heaving as its life retreated far within thegigantic bulk. Its red eyes glowed at him malevolently in the glare ofhis chest-lamp.
Strangely enough, none of the others had seen him yet, nor had any ofthem moved from the sitting posture. Swiftly he unhooked four of his sixbottles and set them in a row on the rock floor. Circe returned, havingbounced like a bit of india-rubber a dozen yards before checkingherself. "You big bully," she said over the radio, and, her tuning beingfor distance, Daley in another cave said "What? Who?" in a startledtone.
Pink dragged her, five pounds of resistance on the tiny planet, andplunked her down behind a rock. "Sit tight," he said urgently. "Keep thegun handy. And check that you haven't spilled any alky--we'll need allthe bottles we can get." Then he turned and shone his beam full on thetraps he had set out. One of the aliens was bound to spot them soon.
When one did, it came at them with a rush, snarling soundlessly as itsought the source of the illumination. Towering over the insignificantbottles, it halted, shuddered, stared down--Pink held his breath--andthe incredible disintegration and flow of the body happened. The giantentered the bottle, leaving not a trace of its thousand-foot carcassoutside. Restraining a desire to leap out and cork up that bottle, Pinkwaited. The movement of this alien had caught the red eyes of others;they advanced, some hurrying and some cautious, till two more hadscented or sensed the alco
hol and poured into bottles. Pink kept hiseyes on the little containers. Beside him, Circe gazed with horrifiedfascination at the coming gargantuas....
* * * * *
A trio of them were misting now; this was the test. One empty bottleremained. What would happen, Pink wondered; was one giant per bottle themaximum content? The three streaked down, like smoke sucked into avacuum cleaner. They jetted into the bottles, and again nothing was leftoutside. Pink said "Good," in a mutter, and forced himself to waitlonger. The more the merrier. How long would it take them to soak up thealcohol? His captive had said the process was slow. How slow? How longdid he dare wait?
He caught eight more, then the next hesitated, looking around for thesource of light. Either he was capable of more resistance to theseductive element, or the bottles were now full of churning, lappingaliens. There were more of them approaching, but he didn't dare wait anylonger. He jumped forward, potting at the foremost.
It went down thrashing, and he shot over it into the yellow of them.Emptying the Colt, he reloaded hastily and plugged or nicked anotherhalf dozen. By then he was standing over the bottles. Nothing hademerged yet. He stooped to slam on the caps.
With horrible speed two giants pounced for him; he saw them out of thecorner of his eye. Then they slammed full length to the rock, and heknew that Circe's automatic was in action. He corked the last bottle andslung it on his belt, put down the two remaining containers. Then heturned and made a mighty jump away from them, dragging Circe with him.The aliens came on.