Hunters Out of Space Part 18

They waited there for a time to see if they had attracted any attention from the city of the violet dome. Nothing happened, so they advanced again.

At least five thousand men now made up this little army. Val guessed that there were a hundred thousand fighters left in the city, not counting the experienced ruffians that Grim Hagen had brought with him.

They had advanced not over half a mile before the pale glow of the night turned to utter darkness. Something that looked like a vast sea-nettle was slowly sinking down toward them from the sky. Its tentacles glowed faintly as it fell--and it must have been a hundred yards across at the top. Once more bullets, lightning bolts and sheets of flame were hurled at the descending thing. It fell apart and came writhing down. Men rushed to get away from the reach of those flailing arms. They laid low and watched while the thing died.

"Listen," Gunnar warned.

From far away came the sound of shots and an eerie whine that seemed faintly familiar. The shots died down. The whine continued, louder and louder, almost to the top peak of sound, as though a tiger was growling to itself as it feasted.

Then all was still.

"It was from the Old Ship," Gunnar said. "I wonder--"

But there was no time left to wonder. As the thing died, the phosphor glow faded from its lashing tentacles. Finally it was still. They picked themselves up and went on toward the dome.

The dome was propped upon miles of forty-foot columns, all carved and decorated like those from the Hall of Kings. Below the dome, the same barrier came pouring down like an unseen waterfall. Again they used their protective umbrella-frames. Then, sweating and cursing and grunting, they hauled their weapons of war into the city.

Val the Loren had explained that the city was not a city as Ato and Odin understood the words. Being domed, there was no use for rooms of any kind. The temperature stayed constant. There were wide streets, paved with blocks of pink and black marble. These streets were flanked by sidewalks and walls. At intervals of a hundred feet the huge columns were placed. They were minutely decorated and carved. These supported a silver and clear-plastic framework that held up the violet dome. Looking upward, Odin had the impression that he was standing beneath a vast spider-web.

There were many hedges, all neatly trimmed. Some resembled privet, but most of them were like pomegranate with larger reddish blossoms that seemed to drip blood.

Here and there were railings with steps going down. Like subway entrances, Odin thought, except they were more elaborately carved. These steps went down to tier after tier of labyrinths. It was a skysc.r.a.per-city turned upside down, Odin gathered from Val's explanations. The first level below the city was made up of factories and machine shops. The next was where plants, flowers, and trees were forced, producing the city's food. Below that, for nearly a thousand feet, were the living quarters of the people.

The ground-level of the city was in reality a beautiful park. During the day, Val explained, it was busy with street-vendors, open-air schools, theaters, and thousands who came up from underground to drink the air and the sun.

Now, it was nearly empty. The columns were evenly s.p.a.ced and at a spot exactly between each two columns was a great cresset of stone. At the top of each cresset were flickering flames that burned without leaving any smoke. "Like stone tulips with petals of flame," Gunnar said as he looked at them. They stood nearly twelve feet high. Their pedestals were broad; their stems were nearly a foot thick, nearly a yard across. Their flames were violet, tipped with blue. They made a beautiful sight, but it did not matter. For within less than an hour this lovely park with its carved columns and tulip-shaped cressets of fire was turned into a shambles.

They had not gone a quarter of a mile before a guard hailed them. A score of guns popped like opened bottles and the guard died before the echo of his voice was gone. But his cry was taken up by others. And now Odin saw that up there in the spider-web framework that held the dome were hundreds of little cubicles--all manned.

Shafts of flame darted through the dim-lit area. Bullets whizzed. Ato's needle-nosed machines began to whine and the metal in the guards' cubicles grew red-hot and melted. Charred bodies came tumbling down. Men came pouring out of the subway entrances. There was a crashing and grinding as hidden elevators brought weapons of death to the surface. The fires in the cressets danced higher. They fought now in mid-day light.

There was a blast nearby that nearly burst Odin's eardrums. A crash of flame that half-blinded him. A gun-crew screamed and died as one of the needle-nosed machines melted into puddles of steel. One by one these guns exploded, taking their crews with them. But even as they died, they littered the streets with the bodies of those who were pouring up from the depths of the city. Even as one melted, its needle-nose swung upward and its beam cut through girders as though they were soft cheese. There was an awful grating sound as the heavy dome sagged a few inches. Splinters of gla.s.s and plastic rained down upon invader and defender alike.

Guns burst in men's hands--or turned to soft wax. The machine guns grew red-hot and melted. Ato sent his swirling bombs toward the enemy. The scythe-blades dripped as they cut swaths through ma.s.sed rows of human flesh. But from far down the street a swarm of red sparks came rushing at the bombs like hornets. They swirled about them, humming angrily. And then the bombs and the hornet-sparks were gone.

Odin learned that the toadstool-shaped weapon which Val's men carried was a defense against the lancing beams from the gla.s.sy tubes. So one by one the weapons of offense and the weapons of defense fell apart. Sirens were screaming within the city. Hordes were still arriving from the depths below.

Ato had set up a huge, slowly-whirling globe that was studded with spines.

As it turned upon its axis, it emitted a strange pulsing light. As the defenders came rushing up the stairways to the upper world, the guns at their belts exploded in furious heat. They died by the hundreds at those entrances. They filled the stairways and the halls below. Screams from seared throats drowned out the noise of battle. The stench of burned flesh and blood was now so heavy that it was hard to breathe. Another wild sh.e.l.l crashed into the spider-web framework of the dome. It sagged again with a shriek and a groan of protest. And once more a rain of gla.s.s showered down upon them.

The defenders cleared the choked stairways and came on--dying at the entrances and falling back and blocking the stairs again.

At the last they unbuckled their belts and their weapons and threw them aside. Then they plunged through the entrances in a flood, armed with only knives and clubs.

Meanwhile, Ato's guns were going out. The last became a white torch when a magnesium blob struck it.

The side-arms were all gone.

They fought now with sword and knife.

Jack Odin felt a heavy hand upon his arm. Gunnar was at his side. "It is even as I foretold you, Nors-King. The weapons are all gone. Stay close by Gunnar's side now. We will fight together, as we fought before.

Eh, they are coming up from underground like ants. I think we have lost the advantage. Hagen's dead lie thick, though. And now it is our turn.

The old swords and the swinging chant. Ah, Old Blood-Drinker will not be thirsty tonight. Brace yourself. Here comes the first a.s.sault."

And with his huge short legs spread wide apart, Gunnar swung his broadsword. The first wave of attackers went down like ripe wheat.

Gunnar and Odin cut their way through them, and came out against a smoking hedge. Behind them, Ato and his Lorens strewed the streets with dead.

Gunnar and Odin went through a hole in the hedge. A defender was making for it from the other side, and Gunnar broke the man's neck. Clinging to the thin shadow of the hedge they moved forward, killing as they went.

CHAPTER 16

Gunnar and Odin followed the hedge for a long way, until they came out against the far side of the dome. The noise of fighting still continued.

It was back of them, but drawing nearer. Odin guessed--or hoped--that Ato and Val were driving the defenders before them.

They came out upon a lane that was flanked by the beautiful colonnades.

Near them was one of the entrances to the tunnels below, and beside it was one of the stone cressets with a high-flaring flame. At the end of the lane was a dais. Upon this dais stood Grim Hagen, shouting instructions to a crew of white-skinned, soldiers below him who were trying to set up a strange machine. It looked like a model of Saturn balanced upon a tripod.

Except that it had three concentric rings about it.

Grim Hagen's shirt was scorched and tattered. It was falling from his lean shoulders. His face was seamed and lined. The muscles upon his neck stood out in cords. His hair was gray now. His left arm was gashed from elbow to wrist, and blood was dripping down his fingers. He dashed the drops aside as he screamed orders. His black eyes still blazed with that old feral hate, and though the years had wasted him, his hips were still as thin as an Apache's and he looked iron-hard.

Odin and Gunnar knelt beside the railing that marked the entrance to the tunnels below. Neither Hagen nor his men saw them.

Gunnar grasped Odin's shoulders and pulled him down. "Listen," he whispered in Odin's ear. "Do you hear anything strange?"

Odin listened. Above the tumult behind them came that same sound which he had heard out on the plain. A whining, purring sound. The purring of a tiger feeding contentedly.

Then screams drowned out the whining sound, and Odin wondered if he had not imagined it.

Nearly a hundred of the defenders came running toward Grim Hagen. They were in mad flight now. Most of them were weaponless. Grim Hagen cursed them, rallied them about him, and urged them to pick up new weapons and fight.

Now, Ato and Val and another hundred men came charging forward.

Leaving three men to set up the strange machine, Grim Hagen's trained Aldebaranians met them. They clashed head-on--blade against blade, fist against bone. They held there, like two wrestlers evenly matched. For a moment Grim Hagen's men were forced back. Then some new defenders swarmed out of the side-alleys and joined them. A head was poked up from the stairway below, Gunnar split the man's skull and sent him tumbling down upon some new replacements.

Now Grim Hagen spied Odin and Gunnar as they advanced to help Ato.

Standing upon the dais, his face livid with rage, Hagen pointed to them and screamed--as mad as any of the last Caesars who had gone insane from too much power.

"Look, men of the Lorens," Hagen cried, still pointing. "I will give immortality to the men who bring me those two alive."