"So they got you too," he said. "Thatlittle display at the airlock was a phony. You were sent out here tolure me back into the ship. Just another Judas."
She nodded slowly. "That's right," she said. "We all have to go to theMasters. It is--it--is--is--"
Her eyes glazed, and she swayed on her feet. The pistol wavered andswung in a feeble spiral, no longer pointed at Wayne. Gently, he took itfrom her nerveless fingers and caught her supple body as she fell.
He wiped his forehead dry. Up above, the sun was climbing toward the topof the sky, and its beams raked the planet below, pouring down heat.
* * * * *
He glanced at his wristwatch while waiting for his nerves to stoptingling. Sherri must have been the last one--the drug must have takeneffect at last, and not a moment too soon. He decided to wait anotherhalf hour before he tried to get into the spaceship, just the same.
The huge globe of the _Lord Nelson_ stood forlornly in the center of thevalley. The airlock door stayed open; no one tried to close it.
Wayne's mouth was growing dry; his tongue felt like sandpaper.Nevertheless, he forced himself to sit quietly, watching the shipclosely for the full half hour, before he picked up Sherri, tied hisrope around her waist, and lowered her to the valley floor. Then hewandered around the rocks, collecting the six unconscious men, and didthe same for them.
He carried them all, one by one, across the sand, burning a path beforehim with the needle beam.
Long before he had finished his task, the sand was churning loathsomelywith the needles of hundreds and thousands of the monstrous littlebeasts. They were trying frantically to bring down the being that was soeffectively thwarting their plans, jabbing viciously with their upthrustbeaks. The expanse of sand that was the valley looked like a pincushion,with the writhing needles ploughing through the ground one afteranother. Wayne kept the orifice of his beam pistol hot as he cut his wayback and forth from the base of the cliff to the ship.
When he had dumped the seven unconscious ones all inside the airlock, heclosed the outer door and opened the inner one. There was not a soundfrom within.
_Fifty-nine down_, he thought, _and none to go_.
He entered the ship and dashed down the winding staircase to the waterpurifiers to change the water in the reservoir tanks. Thirsty as hewas, he was not going to take a drink until the water had been clearedof the knockout drug he had dropped into the tanks.
After that came the laborious job of getting everyone in the shipstrapped into their bunks for the takeoff. It took the better part of anhour to get all sixty of them up--they had fallen all over the ship--andnestled in the acceleration cradles. When the job was done, he went tothe main control room and set the autopilot to lift the spaceship highinto the ionosphere.
Then, sighting carefully on the valley far below, he dropped a flarebomb.
"Goodbye, little monsters," he said exultantly.
For a short space of time, nothing happened. Then the viewplate wasfilled with a deadly blue-white glare. Unlike an ordinary atomic bomb,the flare bomb would not explode violently; it simply burned, sendingout a brilliant flare of deadly radiation that would crisp all lifedozens of feet below the ground.
He watched the radiation blazing below. Then it began to die down, andwhen the glare cleared away, all was quiet below.
The valley was dead.
When it was all over, Wayne took the hypodermic gun from his pouch,filled it with the anti-hypnotic drug that he had taken from the medicalcabinet, and began to make his rounds. He fired a shot into each andevery one aboard. He had no way of knowing who had been injected by thesmall monsters and who had not, so he was taking no chances.
Then he went to the colonel's room. He wanted to be there when theCommanding Officer awoke.
* * * * *
The entire crew of the _Lord Nelson_ was gathered in the big mess hall.Wayne stared down at the tired, frightened faces of the puzzled peoplelooking up at him, and continued his explanation.
"Those of you who were under the control of the monsters know what itwas like. They had the ability to inject a hypnotic drug into a humanbeing through a normal space boot with those stingers of theirs. Thedrug takes effect so fast that the victim hardly has any idea of whathas happened to him."
"But why do they do it?" It was Hollingwood, the metallurgist, lookingunhappy with a tremendous bruise on his head where Wayne had clobberedhim.
"Why does a wasp sting a spider? It doesn't kill the spider, it simplystuns it. That way, the spider remains alive and fresh so that youngwasps can feed upon it at their leisure."
Wayne glanced over to his right. "Lieutenant Jervis, you've been underthe effect of the drug longer than any of us. Would you explain what_really_ happened when the _Mavis_ landed?"
The young officer stood up. He was pale and shaken, but his voice wasclear and steady.
"Just about the same thing that almost happened here," Jervis said. "Weall walked around the valley floor and got stung one at a time. Thethings did it so quietly that none of us knew what was going on until wegot hit ourselves. When we had all been enslaved, we were ready to dotheir bidding. They can't talk, but they can communicate by means ofnerve messages when that needle is stuck into you."
Nearly half the crew nodded in sympathy. Wayne studied them, wonderingwhat it must have been like. They _knew_; he could only guess.
"Naturally," Jervis went on, "those who have already been injected withthe drug try to get others injected. When everyone aboard the _Mavis_had been stung, they ordered me to take the ship home and get anotherload of Earthmen. Apparently they like our taste. I had to obey; I wascompletely under their power. You know what it's like."
"And what happened to the others--the eight men you left behind?" askedColonel Petersen.
Jervis clenched his teeth bitterly. "They just laid down on thesand--and waited."
"Horrible!" Sherri said.
* * * * *
Jervis fell silent. Wayne was picturing the sight, and knew everyoneelse was, too--the sight of hordes of carnivorous little aliensburrowing up through the sand and approaching the eight Earthmen who laythere, alive but helpless. Approaching them--and beginning to feed.
Just when the atmosphere began to grow too depressing, Wayne decided tobreak the spell. "I'd like to point out that the valley's beencompletely cauterized," he said. "The aliens have been wiped out. And Ipropose to lead a mission out to reconnoitre for the double-nucleusberyllium."
He looked around. "MacPherson? Boggs? Manetti? You three want to startover where we left off the last time?"
Sergeant Boggs came up to him. "Sir, I want you to understand that--"
"I know, Boggs," Wayne said. "Let's forget all about it. There's work tobe done."
"I'm sorry I misjudged you, Wayne. If it hadn't been for your quickaction, this crew would have gone the way of the _Mavis_."
"Just luck, Colonel," Wayne said. "If it hadn't been for thoseheavy-soled climbing boots, I'd probably be lying out there with therest of you right now."
Colonel Petersen grinned. "Thanks to your boots, then."
Wayne turned to his team of three. "Let's get moving, fellows. We'vewasted enough time already."
"Do we need spacesuits, sir?" Manetti asked.
"No, Manetti. The air's perfectly fine out there," Wayne said. "But I'dsuggest you wear your climbing boots." He grinned. "You never can tellwhen they'll come in handy."
THE END
Transcriber's Note:
This etext was produced from _Amazing Stories_ October 1956. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note.
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