A Jungle of Stars (1976) (20 page)

"We're too late," Savage said in a low normal tone.

"Quiet!" Jennifer hissed. "Listen!" All he could hear was the extremely loud cricket chorus.

"What?" he demanded. "I don't hear anything."

"Below us! The basement!"

Savage cursed himself for a fool. He spotted the basement door, slightly ajar, just under the stairwell, and brought Jenny over to it. She felt it gingerly. He gave her one of the grenades and put her finger into one of its rings. She nodded that she understood.

This was some kind of woman! he thought. Thanks to his single real hand, he could handle a pistol or a grenade, but not both.

Edging open the door cautiously, he saw a shaft of light down below.

Jenny felt the edge of the step and descended with him. They found a small landing, or platform, where the stairs turned right; and, as they stepped on it, it creaked noisily.

The sounds downstairs ceased for a moment, then a low whine began.

Savage saw a shadow flicker on the cement walls of the basement, and heard someone walking toward them. Jennifer heard it almost before he did, and froze."Well, Mr. Savage!" Joseph McBride's voice boomed out, echoing through the cellar. "I guess I couldn't avoid It."

A beam of searing hatred -- that was the only way to describe it -- hit them both, and Jenny gasped.

"Ah, the girl, too!" McBride's voice exulted. "That makes it just perfect. Some entertainment to pass the lonely hours till morning!"

Savage and Jenny both felt it come upon them: they felt their love for each other grow larger and larger within themselves until their sexual drives were driven into a sudden frenzy of lust, pushing all other thought from their minds. Standing on the landing, they became animals in heat, forgetting everything but each other, the overpowering emotional blitz sweeping them both into madness. They virtually clawed at each other in an animalistic orgy, all reason gone.

The figure of McBride, smiling broadly, now appeared at the bottom of the stairs, a shotgun casually under one arm. A purplish mass sat in the curve of his neck.

The Kah'diz was well satisfied with itself. It could maintain this all night, and if -- or rather, when -- they tumbled down the stairs that would still present no problem. The waves from the two on the landing poured forth, bathing the creature in ecstasy.

With a thumping sound, Savage's pistol tumbled and slid down the stairs and landed at the Kah'diz's feet. It kicked the weapon idly away.

"Savage!" Petersen's voice rang from the floor above. "Savage! Where are you? It's got a portable force-field generator! We can't get through!"

The creature bathed itself in the ocean of rapture, worrying little about the other two -- knowing that, in the morning, when the ship was lifted and the control was effective, it could dispense with such trifles.

Savage and Jennifer had practically torn each other's clothing to bits in their animalistic attack, it noted with amusement, and the girl was bleeding from some superficial wounds.

All night. It could keep this up all night! The Kah'diz reveled in the knowledge of what it was like to be a god.

Then, abruptly, another object bounced down the stairs, hitting the fourth step, then the sixth, then the ninth, then rolling onto the floor almost up to the feet of the Kah'diz, who glanced at it idly. But suddenly the creature realized what it was.

In her desire to do it right, Jenny had removed the pin from the grenade and had been holding the handle shut tightly in her grip. Now the handle was out.

The Kah'diz felt momentary panic seize it. The force-field generator that kept the others out would keep blast very localized. Eight seconds seemed like an eternity as it tried to seek shelter in some part of the basement.

In a hundred households across the peaceful, sleeping valley below, a hundred or more children suddenly awoke, screaming.

STEP FOUR

1

SHE WAS CARRIED along in a gentle fog, floating in air like a bird. She had no visions -- there had never been anything to envision -- but there were noises, some harsh, some sweet and high, like alien bells.

Slowly, very slowly, the sounds became voices.

"Yeah, that was some smart girl," the lower voice was saying. "She pulled the pin so even if shot or whatever -- and what a 'whatever'! -- she'd drop it and gravity would do the rest."

"And one not-so-clever Kah'diz," added the higher voice. "if the creature had done anything else to her, it wouldn't have worked."

"Right," the first voice agreed. "Love into hate or that kind of thing wouldn't have served the purpose. Only by amplifying as much as possible what was already there could it get the feedback it needed."

"Bet it was something!" the higher voice enthused, a bit envious.

"Indescribable," replied the other. "I think I tore her up more than the grenade did. It's a miracle she's alive."

"What would have happened if the grenade hadn't gone off?" mused the high voice.

"Well, that force-field generator was pretty good, but it was only a portable from 'Charley's' crash kit, really intended for fending off wild animals and the like. Della Rosa had already called for heavy artillery, and they'd have been able to penetrate, I think, in time. I hope so. But that was closer than I'd like,"

"Did they find the body of the fourth lizard?"

"Yeah," the low voice chuckled. "Guess where."

"Oh, not in the--"

"Yep. Preserved good as new in the ice cream truck's freezer compartment. Not a mark on it."

Jennifer moaned. "Paul . . . !" she cried out.

"It's all right, honey," soothed the low voice. "I'm here." He reached over and patted her hand.

Her whole body ached fiercely, but she was conscious -- and alive -- and Paul was here.

"What . . . happened?" she managed.

Savage summarized the events up to the moment, concluding, "The moment it died, its hold on everybody -- us included -- stopped abruptly, although it looks as if the kids got some kind of death feedback. The blast knocked both of us out, and Petersen got us and hauled us away."

He let go of her hand and she cried out, tried to sit up, to reach out for him. He calmed her down by murmining softly to her, "I'm here, love. I'm here.""Don't let go, Paul; please don't let go," she pleaded, and he gripped her hand tighter.

"An aftereffect of the emotional overload," the high voice explained.

"She'll get over it in time."

"Who's that with you, Paul?" Jenny asked.

"Just a doctor. You're in, well, a hospital."

"I don't care where I am, as long as it's with you," she breathed.

"You're stuck, Savage," the doctor smirked. "For a while, you'll be God to her. She'll be like an obedient puppy -- loving, absolutely willing to please, insistent on constant love and attention. You're lucky -- you ought to see some of the really messed-up ones we get. If you're gonna be crazy for a while that's the way to do it."

"How long did you say this would go on," Savage asked in an friendly tone, his hand already paining him from her grip.

The doctor shrugged. "Varies with the individual. A few hours -- days.

Not more than a month at the outside."

Savage groaned.

Paul Savage entered the small office without knocking. It was the first time he had ever been in Stephen Wade's Haven headquarters office, although he'd been in Haven itself several times.

If the office was any indication, Wade was a pig.

It was not a large room, as things go, but it had an enormous assortment of business machines, from a typewriter to a total communications system that would connect Wade with any part of his domain, Earthbound or otherwise. Books lined the place -- not only covering every wall, but on top of file cabinets, desk, even piled up on the fancy stereo system. Mountains of paper covered the floor, and Savage had to thread a narrow passage to one of the chairs.

Wade sat in a large, green highbacked swivel office chair that could scarcely move because of the junk around it.

"Take a chair, Paul," he invited, not looking up from some reports he appeared to be sifting through.

Savage unpiled some papers and books from a wicker-type chair and sat down. After a couple of minutes, Wade lit one of his fancy cigars and turned to him.

"Aren't you afraid the place will catch fire?" Savage asked nervously.

Wade shrugged and said, "In Haven, all things are possible. I think you know at least part of the reason I sent for you."

Sayage nodded. "I'm off the investigative payroll."

"Yes. Unless you're willing to leave Jenny here at all times and go back to the normal routine, you're of no good to us on the outside. So I've put Bumgartner on your territory and you'll take his place here."

"Bumgartner!" Savage's bushy eyebrows rose. "So destiny strikes again."

Wade looked somewhat sheepish. "You know that you two have met before?"

"You hired a detective, didn't you?"

"I guess I did," Wade laughed. "Maybe one day we put the two of you together in a room and let you kill each other until you get bored with it.

And, in our defense, I might say that we didn't invent that patrol -- just took advantage of it -- and if it hadn't been for Ralph's little gadgets you never saw, the VC would have found you and killed you all, anyway. Enough of that, though. I have more serious work here -- a bum situation. It smells, and I need help."

"Everything connected with this operation so far has smelled of something or other," Savage retorted. "Why should you be different?"

Wade's face grew, serious. "I've had 114 agents get dug up, exposed, or run out of town in the last few weeks," be said. "A total of only 92 made it, to get picked up."

"So? Is that an unusually low number?"

"No, it's an impossibly high one. Far too high to be mere chance. Almost a record."

"So what's the problem?" Savage asked. "I'd think you'd be happy to get them out. They represent a substantial investment in training and experience, and we can always use them."

"True," Wade agreed, "but -- well, let's take these in my hand, here --

which came from Bumgartner's pickup.

"Item: One Aruman Vard, a Fraskan -- which is meaningless to you. But the record says that Vard delayed unpardonably in getting his operation shut down, then made his way single-handed out of a domed city already secured by the enemy. Or this one:

"Gayal, one of the wives of our resident agent. Absolutely no training.

Now, while our resident agent goes off and gets his fool head blown apart, Gayal runs the whole communications net on two days' training,; yet sticks around until a Kah'diz with a nice silver rod starts converting the family to loyal citizens of the empire. Then, in the middle of the night, she sneaks out of a house filled with relatives and the enemy, radios her pickup, gets away after blowing up the installation, and hides out in the hills for three weeks, evading an intensive search until she's finally made by them at the very moment Bumgartner arrives to conveniently shoot a batch of them and spirit her away. Think about it. Or, this one:

"Koldon, a double agent who's always been reliable, even if he was the bastard who originally outfitted Rhambda, gets taken for a sucker -- one of the finest telepaths in history! -- and lured onto a ship just teeming with the enemy. Despite this, be knocks off a few of them, steals a lifeboat --

which is no easy matter -- and escapes close enough to one of our worlds that his distress signal reaches us almost immediately, but somehow is never picked up by the enemy. He spends nine days in the lifeboat, yet Bumgartner makes him in ten minutes. See what I mean?"

"You think they're ringers," Savage put in.

Wade shook his head no. "No, they're not all ringers. I think one of those 92 is a ringer. I know all of them were helped to escape, to 91's good fortune. It's number 92 that I'm worried about."

"Camouflage," Savage replied, seeing the point. "Too many suspects to really get down to cases on, and The Bromgrev's in and lost in the crowd."

"Exactly!" Wade pointed his finger at Savage. "And one final note. That very daring attack on us was well planned. It came damned close to breaking the line. It caught us flat-footed, and it was as well directed as you can get. If The Bromgrev didn't have to keep all those reserves back on the occupied worlds, he could have taken us. But since that battle, not a single offensive, not a tiny grouping, not even a feint. They're avoiding battles whenever possible."

"Like they're in a holding pattern?"

"Right! If The Bromgrev's in Haven, he's out of contact with the Rbambdan mass-mind. That puts a strain on The Mind just to keep things together. In fact the Rhambdans themselves have drawn back, leaving the conquered systems entirely to allied troops."

"I suppose it wouldn't have done any good to kill or quarantine new arrivals?"

"None at all," Wade replied. "The Bromgrev would just become someone else -- and make the work even harder. Look what it's taken just to narrow things down to this number!"

Savage shifted in his chair and reached for a cigarette. Wade passed him an ashtray.

"So where do I fit in?" Savage asked.

"I call myself The Hunter. That implies an offense, an aggressive seeking-out of the quarry. So far, I've spent all my time defensively -- and I'm losing! On the other hand, The Bromgrev's conquests are agonizingly slow.

He's obviously decided that the best thing to do to speed things up is to take me out. That's why I'm sure he's here, waiting for some chance at me. I'm sure of it!" Wade banged his fist on the desk. "And I have to get him first! To do so, I long ago developed a plan which so far is working out. But it can go against me at any moment."

Wade explained things as they had progressed to date, to Savage. And cleared up a lot of minor mysteries.

"And now, the big one," Wade concluded. "I have divided the new arrivals into teams, three to five to an agent. The guise will be routine indoctrination and training, which will be complete. You'll undergo it with your people. Along the way, we'll sow some traps and see if my wayward brother falls into them."