Haydn of Mars (22 page)

There was a visible gasp as the
chug-boom chug-boom
sound grew very loud.
 
Now there was a silhouette growing to the northwest, starting to fill the sky in front of us.

“I would fire now,” Newton said, his voice taking on a bit of urgency.

The two workers were still fiddling, but then one of them cried, “Go!” and threw a switch.

Nothing happened.

My ears were filled with a thunderous roar:
CHUG-BOOM CHUG-BOOM.

“Again!” Newton ordered.

The silhouette in front of us became a shadow and then suddenly a real thing: a huge roaring monster bearing down on us, big and angry enough to crush the entire camp–

“Now!”

The switch was thrown.

I involuntarily shouted as a blast of light brighter than the sun erupted with a high hissing sound from the muzzle of the instrument.
 
There was a second blinding lighter greater than the first, and the monstrous beast, caught in the act of leaping, gave a mournful keening scream and fell with a thudding crash to the ground just in front of us. It gave a single long defeated breath, which I felt hot and beast-sour on my face, it was so close, and then was utterly still.

The night returned to quiet, and the stars were once again the brightest points of light above the silent distant mountains.

A collective breath was let out.
 
Merlin was already scrambling out of the camp to examine the beast.
 
She turned a bright electric torch on which Newton, fearing it would broadcast our location, immediately made her extinguish in favor of a hand lantern.
 
Unable to dampen my curiosity, I joined her.

“They say that, hundreds of thousands of years ago, these beasts roamed in packs that could destroy a town,” Merlin said, playing the weak light over the rough brown hide of the beast.
 
It was mottled and pitted, and still warm to the touch.
 
We slowly circled, examining first the tail, long and thick and whip-like with a flare of black fur on the tip as wide as a feline's head, and then the tufted ridges along the spine and crown and finally the massive head, tufted and ridged, the black empty eyes big as eating bowls and the mouth lined, top and bottom, with massive teeth, the underjaw anchored with two tusks, not white as in pictures but stained and streaked with dried blood and the leavings of many killed beasts.
 
The snout was long, the same color as the tail, a hose-like object known to crush victims with its encirclement.

“Amazing,” Merlin said, again and again.
 
She bent her head close to look into the mouth, where the dark red tongue lolled.
 
She backed away quickly at the stench, as did I.

“This fellow ate not long ago, and did not believe in brushing his teeth.”

“He is magnificent, in a way,” I commented.

“Oh, yes.
 
The King of Mars, in his time.
 
But that is long past.
 
These tusks still bring a queen's ransom in some quarters.
 
There are old folk tales...” She blushed, evident even in the weak light.

I laughed.
 
“You mean their supposed amorous properties when ground into powder?”

“Well, yes.”

“Old wives' tales?”

“We will take them with us, regardless.”
 
She shrugged, her blush receding as another point of interest caught her eye.

My curiosity sated, I went back to the camp.

Newton was standing, arms folded, looking thoughtful.

“We will have to move on tonight, I'm afraid,” he said.

“Why?”

He nodded his head toward the downed beast.
 
“That prize will bring visitors of all sorts.”

“Such as...?”

“Other predators, smelling meat.
 
Or worse.
 
Baldies, perhaps.”

I told him that Merlin had noted that the beast had eaten recently.

“Then there's no time to waste.”

He gave orders.
 
Soon we had broken camp, leaving the tuskless carcass of the killed beast behind.
 
Already, while we had done our work, scavengers, birds and scuttering things had darted in to take a taste of the fallen monster.
 
As we drove away I heard something larger and breathing heavily, hit the body with a thud.
 
I shivered, thinking of what it might be, wondering if these gargantuan animals ate their own kind.
 
For the first time I was thankful for the motor vehicle, imaging what would happen if one of the creatures overtook a horse and rider.

I thought Newton would make camp again.
 
But instead we drove all night, stopping just before dawn to sleep in what I was told was a secure spot close to our goal.
 
Once again the perimeter was set up, but I was asleep before it was finished, having done my own chores and, secure with the protection we had and exhausted, set up my own blanket to curl up on under the stars.
 
I was reminded as I closed my eyes of all the nights I had slept this way while traveling with the Mighty.

The ground felt suddenly soft, and I slept like a kit.

The dawn was well past when I arose.
 
Or was roused from sleep by Merlin, rather, who was tapping me all too gently on the shoulder.

“You couldn't wake a mouse like that, Merlin,” I commented, yawning myself out of a wonderful dream, something to do with floating on a cloud over the massive volcano Olympus Mons.

She was looking at me curiously, and skittered back, pulling her hand away.

“You have the oddest look on your face, Merlin,” I said.

She tried to speak, but could only stutter out, “I t-t-tried it.”

“Tried what?”

“This morning, th-th-thinking to make use of my time, I w-w-woke early and sh-shaved a bit of the harlow tusk and ground it and put it in my tea...”

I held my laughter in check.

“Y-Y-You're the only other female in camp!” she cried in despair.
 
She was exhibiting all the effects of lust, and her eyes darted to the many males walking to and fro.
 
“What am I to do, Ransom!
 
What am I to do?”

“Let us hope that the effects are short term, Merlin,” I began, but she suddenly rose and ran off, lamenting.

“What have I done?”

Shaking my head and smiling, I broke my meager camp and joined Newton, who had already eaten, but who lingered over a cup of his own coffee, devoid of enhancement, I trusted, while I ate.
 
I then took out one of my precious cigarettes and lit it.

Newton studied me.
 
“We've done some research on those tobacco sticks,” he said laconically.
 
“They may not be good for your health.”

“And being attacked by a harlow is?” I joke.

Camp was breaking around us.

He grunted, changing the subject.
 
“We haven't far to go,” he said.
 
“And it's just as well, because we are being followed.
 
I don't know by whom, but it's very bad luck.
 
That harlow attracted far too much attention last night.”

I thought of Merlin and the beast's tusks but said instead: “Are you worried?”

“Yes.
 
But it would be just as dangerous to turn around at this point as to go on.
 
When we get to the Arabia Terra station it will afford us some protection if we need it.”

I mentioned that with the weapon I had seen in operation last night, he should have little to worry about.

“Have you ever seen a Baldy attack?” he asked, dead serious.

“No.
 
And in the picture books they're depicted almost comically.”

“There's nothing comical about them.
 
And there is no such thing as one Baldy.
 
If you see one, there are usually thousands, traveling like wild animals.”

His worry was palpable, and I hurriedly finished my cigarette.

He was already giving orders, and soon we were on our way.

The vast plains of Arabia Terra stretched before and below us like an endless carpet of red and green.
 
It reminded me much of my native country in the south, with the exception of the cold looking mountains to the north, ice tipped even at this time of year.
 
But the plain itself was inviting, rolling hills and soft valleys filled with vegetation and dotted with blue lakes looking like shimmering coins from a distance.
 
Newton pointed east to what at first I took to be a natural structure, a hill taller than the rest.

“The station,” he announced, handing his spy glass to me, and now the lines of what I took to be a hill resolved into a structure similar to the one I had visited, though on a massive scale.

“It looks much larger than what I saw,” I told him.

I continued to study.
 
“And much more intact.”

“There was a time we thought we could bring it back to life,” Newton said.
 
“There is a lot of equipment still in working order.”

A thrill went through me, thinking of those massive stacks, ten of them intact, as I counted, bellowing their production into the atmosphere, the engines humming mightily, lights making the station a glowing beacon at night.

I lowered the spy glass.
 
“I can't wait to see it.”

The trip took a good portion of the morning and part of the afternoon, but by the time the sun was lowering the structure was rising before me like a towering peak.
 
Its scale was massive, making the one I had been in nearly insignificant.

“The one in Meridiani was tiny compared to this,” I said.

“Impressive, isn't it?”

We drove through a huge gate under a stone archway.
 
The iron gates were rusted permanently open.
 
There was debris, but overall the place looked well preserved.
 
There were many more buildings than I expected: free standing structures as well as rows of blockhouses which Newton explained contained bunks as well as what must have been at one time shops for the station's large population.

“We estimate that at one time up to ten thousand Old One's resided here.”

“I'm surprised Jeffrey never found remains,” I replied.

“He looked, but the soil is not suitable for fossilization.”

It occurred to me that I had not seen Merlin since that morning.

As I opened my mouth to ask Newton about it he abruptly stopped the vehicle and got out.

“This is where we start,” he announced.

The caravan came to a halt.
 
We entered, under another huge archway and open door, to a room huge in scale but similar to the one in Meridiani: offices, machines of every sort, tall pillars and wide, boxy structures.

Newton gave orders, but they were not what I had expected.

“It sounds like you're fortifying this place rather than exploring it.”

“Come with me,” he said, and strode toward the far end of the building where a set of stairs led up to the catwalk overhead.

Our boots clanging on the metal stairway, we ascended.
 
I followed across a bridge, trying not to look down.
 
Newton stopped and mounted four metal steps to a trap door overhead.
 
He pushed it open and I followed him out.

The afternoon was moving toward dusk.
 
It was cool on the roof, which was flat and expansive.
 
It made me feel like a small creature.
 
Newton marched with purpose to the far wall.

When we reached it he stopped and pointed to the west, from where we had come, and then to the north.

The fields and valleys and hills were covered with tiny white moving things, like maggots.

“We would look as small and insignificant from here,” Newton said.
 
“Those are Baldies.”

There were thousands of them making their way toward us.
 
The nearest was just over the hill we had topped not a half hour ago.

“Our scout saw one of them early this morning as we broke camp.
 
A second scout never returned.”

“What can we do?”

“Fight them, for as long as we can.”

I had seen many things in this feline's eyes over the time I had spent with him, but this was the first time I had ever seen something like fear.

“There's no hope?”