We lunged up the passage. Figures barred it but they scattered; a bolt
hissed at us, but missed. At the kiosk a group of workers and several
peering little brains leaped away in terror to let us pass.
We gained the open air. With the small gravity rays darting down with
repulsion upon the rocks we mounted like rockets out of the cauldron.
The upper plateau lay silent in the starlight, but the cauldron behind
us was ringing with alarm, and again the danger siren was blaring.
I changed my way of direction, swung it to the plateau rocks ahead.
The arc of my flight was sharply bent as I went hurtling down. Over
me, I saw Snap use the same tactics. I tried to aim for where we had
left the girls and Molo. I could not see them down there amid the
starlit crags; and suddenly a wild apprehension filled me. How had we
dared leave them to Molo's trickery?
Then, ahead and below me, I saw the slight figure of one of the girls,
standing on a rock with arms outstretched to signal us. I changed my
ray to repulsion barely in time to avoid crashing. The landing flung
me in a heap. Twenty feet away, Snap came whirling down. We picked
ourselves up, saw Anita waving from the rock, and bounded to her.
The girls were safe. Venza sat intent, with unwavering watchful gaze
across the intervening space to where Molo had flattened himself
against his rock, not daring to move.
"Still got him," Venza exulted. "He wasn't willing to take any chances
with us. You did it, Snap?"
"I'm a motor-oiler if we didn't. Come on; got to get out of this.
They're after us! We wrecked the whole damn place, Venza. Wandl's a
normal planet now. No more of this accursed dislocation of Earth."
We learned later that our hope and our assumption that we had
irretrievably wrecked the entire gravity control system of Wandl was
proven to be a fact. Wandl was, in effect, a normal celestial body
now. The beams planted in Greater New York, Ferrok-Shahn and Grebhar
still streamed across space. But there was no giant beam from Wandl to
seize them, and Wandl now could not move through space of her own
volition. Like Earth, and all other known planets, satellites, comets
and asteroids, she was subject now to all the normal natural laws of
celestial mechanics. We had done a thorough job of it.
Now I shoved at Snap. "No time to talk. You tow the girls; I'll take
Molo. Got to get to the _Star-Streak_."
I lunged over and seized Molo. "We did it. Now for your vessel! It
will be ill for you if she is not where you say she is."
"She will be there, Gregg Haljan."
He docilely put himself in position for me to hook my forearm under
his crossed, bound wrists and carry him. Snap rose up past us, towing
the girls. Over the nearby cauldron a figure mounted to gaze and see
the nature of this strange attacking enemy, and then sank back.
With Molo hanging to me, I mounted with my ray, following Snap and the
girls into the starlight, with the turmoil of the cauldron receding
until in a moment or so it was gone behind our horizon.
We headed now, not toward Wor, whence we had come, but over at an
angle to the side. Our great bounding arcs soon left the mountains
behind. We crossed the river, another portion of the forest, and came
over undulating lowlands.
It was a flight of under half an hour. The pursuit, if indeed anyone
followed us, remained below our little segment of curving horizon.
Everywhere there was evidence of the storm; the forest trees were laid
flat, strewn like driftwood over the area. The river had in several
places lashed over its banks. The lowlands were dotted thick with
globe-dwellings. Some were hanging awry on their stems; others were
pulled from their place, cracked and piled into a litter.
We kept well aloft. The surface scenes were only glimpses of wreckage,
moving lights and people. And there were areas which the wind had
seemingly spared.
The confusion from the storm was mingled now with the spreading alarm
from the gravity station; the sound of the danger siren there was
still audible behind us. As we advanced into what now seemed the
outskirts of a city like Wor, with a pile of solid-looking metal
structures ranging the horizon ahead, I saw a distant spaceship rise
up and wing away. Wandl was proceeding with the dispatching of her
space navy to oppose the distantly gathering ships of Earth, Venus,
and Mars. No doubt with the wrecking of the control station, the
masters of Wandl immediately recognized the paramount importance of
the coming battle.
The huge, globular, disc-like ship sailed high over us, rotating with
the impulse of its rocket-streams. In a moment it was lost in the
stars. And then another rose and followed it.
There were many human figures in the air around us now. I mounted
higher, and Snap with the girls followed me. The figures, intent upon
their own affairs, did not seem to heed us.
Molo's vessel lay alone upon a low metal cradle. No other ship was
near it; but half a mile away on both sides we could see others
resting on their stages. Lights were moving around and upon them, but
the _Star-Streak_ was dark and neglected.
We poised a thousand feet over her, and to one side. I saw her as a
long, low, pointed vessel, dead gray in color, longer than the
_Cometara_, and seemingly narrower, but very similar in aspect.
"Meka and I are supposed to be gathering our crew," said Molo. "No one
bothers with my vessel. Will you take me to Wor now to get Meka?"
"I will not."
Snap was drifting down with the girls. They were near us. His arm
waved at me with a gesture. And then came the muffled tone of his
voice: "Shall we drop down, Gregg?"
"Yes, but cautiously. Have your gun ready."
Molo protested, "I would like to take Meka with us, and a few of my
crew. You will have trouble handling the _Star-Streak_, just us three
men."
"We'll take our chances."
We dropped swiftly down upon the dark and vacant platform. The gray
hull of the _Star-Streak_ loomed beside us, her dome arched still
higher. An inclined catwalk went up to her opened deck-port.
"I'll go first," I said softly to Snap. "Come quickly after me. Watch
out: there might be someone on board."
Venza still clung to her weapon. Mine was in my hand as I lifted Molo.
And, ignoring the incline, bounded the thirty feet for the deck-port.
I landed safely, and stood Molo upon his feet. "Don't you move," I
admonished him sternly.
He stood docilely against the cabin wall of the superstructure. No one
here. We had thought there might easily be one or two workers on
board.
Snap and the girls came sailing, one after the other, and landed on
the deck beside me. We stood silent, alert. No one appeared from
within the cabin or from the lengths of the deck. Venza was watching
Molo with her weapon upon him. Snap and I had planned this boarding:
Anita and Venza to stay here and guard Molo while we searched the
ship, and inspected the controls. We started for the cabin door oval.
"Gregg!"
It was all the warning Snap could give. I was within the dim cabin,
but he, behind me, was still on the deck. I whirled to see a dozen
dark forms leaping from the roof of the cabin superstructure. Snap was
all but buried by them. These were not men of Wandl, but Molo's pirate
crew, Martians, Earthmen and Venusians. Snap's ray-gun spat as he went
down; one of the men dropped away. I saw Venza turn with startled
horror, as the huge figure of Meka leaped down upon her and Anita from
the roof.
For an instant, weapon in hand, I paused in the doorway. I could not
fire into the turmoil of that struggling group, so instead plunged
into it, striking with my fists.