Lolan's eyes narrowed. "When they need us most," the ex-emperor
had said. Why were they needed especially now--because of a coming
revolution? He drove the question from his mind. "Don't quibble!" he
snapped. "I can't promise you more than a few hours' leeway. You've got
to leave within the hour."
"It's no use," Mora smiled wearily. "Our people look up to us for the
answer to every problem that arises. What would they think of us if we
ran out now?"
"What good will you be to them dead?" Lolan argued desperately. "Arzt
means to have you out of the way once and for all. You're dangerous
and he knows it. Get your things together and let's go!" The flush of
repressed fear colored the flat angles of his jaws. His mind was a
whirlpool of hope and regret--regret at losing Mora forever, though
he could never own her; a deep soul-sickness at the idea of sending a
force-charge into her lovely body....
But Mora was shaking her head and Atarkus had smashed his fist on the
table. "Arzt can't scare us!" the aged monarch scorned. "They say we
Venusians are weak, that we don't know how to fight. Some day soon the
butcher will learn differently." His eyes grew softer. He laid his
bony hand on Lolan's hard forearm. "I know your position, young man.
You have taken a liking to us for some reason--I think I know what it
is--and the thought of killing us disturbs you. Perhaps you won't have
to perform that duty--"
Suspicion and wonder blended into the creases of Lolan's forehead.
"Then you won't go?" he breathed.
"We can't," Mora told him. "But you have our gratitude for all you've
done."
Lolan straightened. He tried to keep his voice clipped and emotionless.
"You are foolish--and brave. Good night!"
When he reached the boulder-hidden rocket ship it was still safely
masked in its hiding place. The fog had torn apart for a few hours, and
through the ragged holes in it he could see stars blinking solemnly
down at him. The young Martian's heart leaped at the thought of leaving
for one of those far-off worlds; no one would miss him before morning
and he could stock up on supplies and leave right away. But a leaden
despondency kept that idea from gaining much headway. Gloomily he
climbed into the ship.
It was when his fingers had sent the rocket car tearing up into the low
clouds that Arzt's voice, just behind him, made his blood turn to water
and his lips go dry.
"You're heading the right way, Sub-Commander. Over the hill to the
Sulphur Holes. Tonight's warning was my last."
* * * * *
In the gleaming black disk of one of the space-ports Lolan could see
Arzt's reflection, then, looming squat and dangerous three feet in back
of him. He had quietly removed Lolan's pistol and held it on the back
of his head.
"Planning a trip, were you?" the taunting voice went on. "I found quite
a store of food here. The only trip you'll be making now is into the
bottom dungeon of the Holes. By the gods, Lolan, you're a fool!"
"Am I? It might as well be now as four days from now. You know I
couldn't kill them."
"I knew this: That if you couldn't, you weren't fit to be a Martian
officer. Now I'll have to do the job myself. Because you're going to
die tomorrow!"
Silence piled up between them. Too soon the gaping slash on the
planet's surface known as the Sulphur Holes was pivoting beneath them
as they circled to a landing. Here, where subterranean forces had
carved a series of natural dungeons and rock-bound gases still seeped
through the holes in a stifling mist, the least fortunate of Arzt's
prisoners were imprisoned.
Burly guards came running up to take charge of Lolan. Arzt stood back
with fists on hips. "Take him to the bottom level," his guttural
command came. "Watch him closely. The devil's been conspiring with
Venusians for a revolution!"
He watched coldly while they jostled his former chief officer into the
little rock house that housed the elevator. He stood there stolidly
until a deep-pitched sigh emanated from the structure, denoting that
one more soul had been carried down ... to hell. A fierce grin twisted
his lax features. He was so engrossed in his own thoughts that he did
not hear the closing of the storage-hatch on the pursuit ship they
had come in, nor did he see the spidery form that slid from it to the
shelter of some rocks. Deeply and sadistically satisfied, Commander
Arzt turned and departed.
For the first ten minutes after his captors had left him, Lolan sat on
the edge of a hard, filthy cot with his head buried in his hands. The
cell was low-ceilinged, with eroded sandstone walls studded with sharp
metal crystals. Through the barred door drifted stringy tendrils of
gas--sulphur smoke, belching up from the planet's bowels. From nearby
cells came horrible moans, a ragged scream, the rattling of a door as
some hapless prisoner shook it and shouted for food. The soft plod-plod
of someone pacing the floor like a caged beast reached the Martian's
ears.
Lolan's lungs seemed filled with acid. He coughed until tears streamed
from his eyes. Finally he fell back in despair on the cot. But even in
his desperate physical pain he was far more conscious of acute despair
over the failure of his plans to save Mora and Atarkus. He felt that no
torture could be worse than imagining what devilish end Arzt would find
for them.
The grating of a key in the lock brought Lolan to a sitting posture.
Then he had sprung to the door as Captain Irak, spindly, grinning
little imp that he was, flung the door open and dodged in.
"Irak--what the devil are you doing here?" Lolan coughed.
The other pressed something hard and cold into his hand--a gun.
"No questions now!" he rapped. "Follow me and use this if you need
it--which you will!"
"But the keys--how did you get them?"
Irak closed one shoe-button eye in a sly wink, and gestured with his
gun. "Come on!" he jerked his head. Roughly he shoved the younger man
into the tunnel.
Not understanding what it all meant, Lolan fled through the corridors
beside him. Hope was kindling like a fire in his breast. Once the
captain paused before a cell and through the bars tossed the bunch
of keys. "Use them yourself and pass them on!" he laughed at the
astonished prisoner.
Up ahead the elevator loomed out of the wisps of gas. Irak plunged into
it and Lolan followed. There was silence until they had almost reached
the top.
"Be on your guard," Irak snapped. "I killed the turnkey to get the
keys. If they've found his body--" The automatic door flew open, light
from the guard-house flooded their figures and they stiffened. The
shouting of angry men reached their ears from outside.
Irak looked at him in somber decision. "We'll try a run for it out the
back. There's a rocket car in the field. It's our one chance."
Lolan grinned boyishly, ready for anything. "Lead the way!" he offered.
"I'm with you!"
* * * * *
But they had not gone forty feet when a harsh shout arrested them.
"There they go--_get them_!" Five men sprang up from where they had
knelt about the body of a dead Martian.
Captain Irak stuck a skinny leg between Lolan's running feet and
sent him sprawling in the dirt. Lolan was puzzled, until he felt
the searing impact of force bolts inches over his head. The movement
had saved his life. Instantly he had twisted about to sight down the
chrome-steel shaft of his pistol. It roared, jarred heavily against his
hand. And one of the men staggered back with his head and shoulders
half torn off.
Irak chuckled fiendishly. His own gun blasted twice, destroying a man
at each shot. The remaining pair spread out and came at a low run for
them, with guns crackling blue lightning over the terrain. Lolan's
eyes were hard and narrow, his jaw was firm. The impact of deadly
charges exploded all around him, making his ears ring with the terrific
concussion. He cuffed at his coat-sleeve as blobs of molten earth
splattered on it. Some of the fiery stuff bit through to his skin.
The Martian's hate-twisted countenances were plain now, thirty feet
away. With a simultaneous impulse they flung themselves prone and
leveled their guns. Lolan squeezed the trigger of his weapon. He kept
it pulled back until the gun grew hot and smoking and the last bolt had
been launched. Irak had done the same.
A grisly silence came down over the field. Horror gripped Lolan as the
smoke drifted away and showed two shapeless masses of burning flesh on
the ground before them. Doggedly he turned away, getting to his feet.
From nearby came the clamor of hurrying guards. "Quick!" Irak's voice
crackled. "Into the ship."
They made it none too soon. Force charges were exploding under their
soaring ship like blue balloons that swelled to magnificent proportions
and then exploded. Not until they had gained thirty thousand feet
altitude did Lolan relax from the controls.
His face was sweaty and grinning. "Am I crazy or are you, Irak? I
thought you were Captain of the Secret Service, sworn to track down
rebels like me--not help them escape!"
Irak was lighting a Martian cigarette. He paused with the lighter held
to the cylinder's tip. "Quite true," he smiled. "That is my job. But
when the rebel is a fellow-Venusian, I am tempted to reverse the usual
order of things!"