Slaves of The Klau Page 7

  There was a hiss, the talk halted; faces swung around as if operated by a lever.

  Barch gave the pilot to Kerbol. "Lower him into one of the potholes on a rope." He turned back to the big table. "We've two or three hours work outside. Let's get it over with. Bring out your knives and axes."

  There was uneasy movement, slow uncomfortable rising to the feet. Barch watched impassively.

  Flatface said in a surly voice, "Work is for daytime. This is night. Let the work wait." The others watched anxiously, poised and uncertain as rabbits.

  This was the first test, the most important. Barch made no sudden move. He waited, let the suspense build up. Flatface nervously glanced at Barch's gun. Barch said softly, "Where is your axe, Flatface?"

  Flatface motioned to the wall. "There it lies."

  "Get it!"

  Flatface slowly gained his feet. Barch jumped two quick steps forward. There was a startled swaying back. "Everybody! Outside!" He took the two lamps, went to the entrance, waited while the tribesmen filed out past him.

  In the lamplight the barge was a large dark shape, vastly more impressive than words Barch could have used inside the cave. "There's your spaceship."

  The tribesmen muttered with awe, excitement.

  "Tomorrow we'll unload the cargo, but tonight we've got to cover it over with branches so it can't be seen from above."

  Barch pulled himself up from his couch with the first glimmer of light. He pulled on the Modok smock, went out to inspect the barge. It seemed to fill half the flat, like a whale in the front yard.

  To check the camouflage he mounted the raft, floated up into the sky. The forest was a matted black tangle, the barge an extension of the same tangle. Satisfied, he dropped back to the ground.

  It was essential that the Klau remained ignorant of his plans. He must avoid giving them provocation. In one sense, killing the Klau yesterday was a mistake. But it had been necessary-an act which had given him an aura of power that killing Clet ten times would have failed to do. In the future he might have to back down on some of his fire-eating threats. Avoid the Podruods as best as possible; fight if cornered.

  He circled the barge. The seamless hull rose four feet over his head. He tried to visualize a super-structure, and achieved only the picture of a deck-house on a sea-going freighter.

  He climbed aboard. About half the cargo was crates of various sizes. Toward the bow lay four bundles of heavy pipe, a half-dozen mechanisms, apparently drill torches, a dozen spools of smooth cable. A good haul, thought Barch. He revised his mental picture from a deck-house to a dome of air-tight fabric over the barge, held down against air pressure by a net of cables.

  He jumped to the ground, returned to the hall. Standing by the fire, he watched the women set out pots of gruel to boil.

  Kerbol came blinking into the room, followed by the dour woman who was his mate. Barch felt a sudden sense of warmth, companionship. He had at least one friend in Palkwarkz Ztvo.

  After breakfast he took Kerbol out to the barge, to inspect the cargo. Kerbol snapped open a crate marked with black and red symbols; inside were cannisters the size of apples.

  "Those are abiloid," said Kerbol, "a slow explosive. This" -he opened a smaller crate, which held dense semi-metallic bars supported on a red plastic rack-"is super."

  "Super-what?"

  Kerbol shrugged. "Super is what they call it at the quarry. A small cut of super is equal to ten crates of abiloid. But it's fast. It smashes. Abiloid pushes."

  "I hope you can detonate them."

  Kerbol picked out one of the cans of abiloid, touched a wisp of thread. "This is the three minute timer. To detonate the super, you set it under a can of abiloid."

  "It's all yours," said Barch. "There are you torches. Pick yourself a helper and open out Big Hole."

  Barch returned to the cave, sent Flatface out in charge of a hunting crew.

  At noon Kerbol reported the cave wall ready for firing. Barch doubtfully eyed the sky. Fog was creeping down the slope of Mount Kebali. "We'd better wait till dark. Then if any Klau fly over, the hole in the mountain won't hit them in the eye."

  By mid-afternoon, the fog shrouded Palkwarkz Ztvo. Barch signaled Kerbol. "Set off your shots."

  A few minutes later six blasts sent streamers of mist flying.

  Barch entered the hall, took the down passage past Clet's old chamber, leaned over the pit at whose bottom sat the pilot. "Feel like working?"

  The pilot looked up sullenly. "Kill me and have done."

  "I don't want to kill you. I need your help. I wouldn't keep you in this hole if I thought you wouldn't run away."

  The pilot's face became instantly cheerful. "I have nowhere to go; I cast my lot with yours."

  Barch grinned. "That's a sensible decision, quickly arrived at." He lowered the rope, the pilot jerked himself up nimbly.

  Barch took him to the barge, pointed to the gap in Big Hole.

  "I want the barge inside."

  The pilot swung himself quickly into the dome. "The work of an instant."

  Barch climbed aboard behind the pilot. "We'll fly in together."

  "As you wish," said the pilot peevishly.

  The barge rose off the ground, glided up the slope, inched inside the gap. Two fires burned on a level area at the far end. "Land between the two fires," said Barch.

  The barge slid through dimness. Stalactities, stalagmites clicked and crashed to the floor.

  The barge grounded. Barch saw Kerbol already had men at work piling rocks back into the opening. He turned to the pilot. "How is it that the Klau trust you with a barge? Aren't they afraid you'll escape to the hills?"

  The pilot made a supple gesture. "What would I gain? We pilots live well. In the hills the wild men eat each other like garfish."

  Barch forebore to challenge the statement. "What would happen if you went back now?"

  "I would be discredited."

  Barch studied the pilot's mercurial face. "I don't want to kill you," he said slowly. "But I don't want the Klau to come looking for their barge."

  "Far from likely."

  "Unless you carried them tales."

  The pilot blew out his cheeks. "My loyalty is yours forever."

  "No one here but you knows how to pilot the barge. In a sense, you are essential to the success of our plan."

  "And what is this plan?"

  "There's no harm telling you. We'll build an airtight hatch over the barge and leave Magarak."

  "Ah." The pilot nodded. "Now, indeed, I will join you."

  "Now? Your previous promises could not have been sincere."

  "You misunderstand. We of Splang are very delicate in our meanings."

  "Chevrr up there is a Splang; I have no difficulty understanding him."

  The pilot hissed contemptuously. "He is the mountain stock, a crude uncouth race. We of the coast forests are a different people entirely."

  "Well, no matter," said Barch. "I'll take a chance on you. What's your name?"

  The pilot said something like, "T'ck-T'ck-T'ck."

  "I'll call you Tick," said Barch. "You understand that I'll think poorly of any attempt to visit Quodaras?"

  "Certainly. That's to be expected."

  "Then help fill the hole with rock. I'll talk more to you later."

  Barch sat studying his list of the tribe members, a heterogeneous crew. Of men with technical skills useful in the conversion of a cargo barge to a space-ship, there was a depressing paucity. Pedratz claimed a knowledge of welding; Kerbol displayed familiarity with explosives; Tick could fly the barge. But who knew anything about air purification, who could repair drive-circuits, who knew the lore of space navigation?

  Barch looked unseeingly into the fire, drumming his fingers, thinking. The first thing to do was isolate the problems, work on each by itself. First, there must be greater security against the Klau. Barch critically inspected the opening to the cave, where nothing prevented Podruods from stepping in to kill them all.

 
He rose to his feet, walked through the winding crevice out into the night. Darkness everywhere. The wind roared down the valley, the great black leaves flapped a melancholy undertone, like surf on a rocky beach. Behind him the faintest glimmer of light shone out from the crevice.

  Tomorrow he would arrange some kind of trip-alarm system around the clearing. But there was still tonight. Barch returned within. Nearest the opening sat two Calbyssinians, Ardl and Arn busy at their incomprehensible love-making, each trying to divine the other's sex. Barch knelt beside them, took off his wrist watch. "Tonight we keep guard. You two will watch first, for as long as it takes this little finger to move from here to here. Then one of you will wake"-he looked over his shoulder-"the two Griffits. Come outside and I will show you where you must station yourselves. It's important."

  At the cave mouth he said, "Arn, you stand here; Ardl, you walk quietly through the forest at the edge of the clearing. At every circuit report to Am. Change off if you like. When you wake the Griffits, give them the same instructions."

  Returning inside he set four more watches, himself taking the middle watch with Kerbol.

  One problem temporarily shoved back out of the way.

  Tick, the hatchet-faced pilot, was engaged in conversation with Chevrr, his brittle countryman. Barch joined them. "How did you get your assignments? Did you work out of a central transportation depot?" he asked.

  "Correct. My depot is-was-Quodaras Thirteen, and every day I might receive a different assignment."

  "You must know Magarak well."

  Tick preened himself. "As well as any man can know it."

  "What if there was freight for a strange location?"

  "There is always the locator in the dome."

  "Locator?" Barch pricked up his ears. "A chart?"

  Tick said with airy superiority, as if he himself had designed the mechanism, "No, no. Much more complicated and complete. It's a three-dimensional view-box, indexed to all parts of Magarak."

  "Let's look at this locator."

  Tick spoke volubly as they climbed the winding passage to Big Hole. "… a good barge, a fine sleek barge, freshly fueled, and why? Because I, Tick, have done favors for Goleimpas Gstad, dispatcher for Quodaras Thirteen: a Bornghaleze, very influential. 'Tick,' says Gstad, 'the range of the hangar is yours; select a barge which reflects your own excellence.' So daily I watch the route strip and only two days past comes a barge fresh from the growth vats-"

  "Growth vats? Do they grow the barges, too?"

  "Indeed." Tick turned Barch a look of surprise. "Do you not grow ships and vessels on your planet?"

  "No," said Barch. "We use different methods."

  "If you arrive home, as I confidently expect, you will be a great innovator. It is all a matter of selecting the correct secretors, of priming them with responsible fluids and directing the growth with care. As a result-" They rounded the sharp chunk of marble agate at the top of the passage, stepped out into Big Hole. Tick waved at the sleek black hulk silhouetted against the firelit limestone wall.

  Barch stopped, impressed by the magnitude of his acquisition. "How do you refuel the barge?"

  Tick made a disdainful gesture. "I am the pilot. I am never concerned with such matters… However, the accr is inserted in the hatch under the dome."

  "How much? How often?"

  Tick blocked a rectangle six by three inches in the air. "Once a month perhaps, a new charge is inserted."

  Fuel shortage would be no problem, thought Barch. Accr was evidently an atomic fuel, compressed electricity, solidified radiation. It made no real difference as long as he could lay his hands on enough of it.

  Tick sprang nimbly into the dome. Barch thought with grim humor that if Tick ever made it into the trees, he'd be a hard man to catch. He followed more sedately. Tick was peering with interest into a glowing slit, a trifle to the left of the seat. "Ha, hm."

  Barch waited impatiently. "Well?"

  "Quodaras Thirteen is very active; I was watching the traffic."

  "Let's see." Barch pressed Tick out of the way, looked inside the slit.

  His first impression was of looking at a glowing abstract painting. There were pink blocks, orange squares, feathery light-blue towers. Black lines webbed the pattern; almost invisible squares of white film floated above. Sparks of every conceivable color drifted slowly over the panorama. "Those sparks," asked Barch, "What are they? Barges?"

  "Correct," said Tick cheerfully. "Each district has a distinct color; Quodaras Thirteen is pale green."

  Barch said in a strained voice, "This barge shows as a green spark?"

  Tick hesitated, as if troubled by a passing thought. "Well, yes."

  "Show me on the chart."

  Tick slowly twirled a knob, glanced into the slit. "There is Palkwarkz Ztvo. And there-"

  Barch peered down at a pale gray physiographic outline of the mountains. A green spark showed dimly against the mountainside.

  Barch looked up quickly. Tick was sidling restlessly toward the door. "Come back here."

  Tick crossed the dome with a cheerful expression on his face.

  "How do you disconnect whatever is broadcasting our position?"

  Tick's eyes wandered toward a little knob joined by a chain to the box. "Best not think of it."

  Barch leapt forward like a leopard. Tick's eyes popped in alarm. "Disconnect that light, or I'll kill you right here!"

  Tick babbled in a frenzy, "It's not allowed; Goleimpas Gstad would discredit me completely."

  Barch tightened his fingers around the pipe-stem throat. Tick's eyeballs protruded an incredible distance. Barch released the pressure. "Disconnect that light!"

  Tick, moaning and wheezing, bent over the box, tenderly broke the chain, slid back a plate, punched a glossy green bubble. "Gstad will reduce me to the manure belts."

  Barch looked into the viewer. The pale-green spark had disappeared.

  Barch turned back to Tick, who was feeling his neck. Tick said quickly, "There are other useful aspects to the locator. Observe. If I would return to Quodaras Thirteen hangar, I find the name on this index." He gave a rotary spindle a whirl, characters glowed and spun. "Then I touch this cell here-" He looked up plaintively as Barch grabbed his wrist.

  Barch growled, "You don't seem to worry much about your life expectancy."

  Tick made a chattering sound with his teeth. "A Splang Coaster defies death. The exact hour of his passing is chronicled at his birth in the beach sand. No act of God, Klau or man can mar the chart of his life."

  "A good comfortable philosophy," said Barch without interest. He looked into the locator again. "I suppose every Klau on Magarak knows where the barge is by now?"

  "Possibly, possibly not," said Tick. He pursed his lips thoughtfully. "It depends a great deal on how rapidly the lack of explosive at the quarry will be reported to the coordinator."

  "And what's the coordinator?"

  Tick said with an air of complete candor, "I don't know."

  "What do you think it is?" asked Barch patiently.

  "I assume it to be a mechanical brain, that notes and integrates apparently unrelated occurrences, calculates the most likely causes of effects and effects of causes."

  "Oh," Barch nodded. "A kind of mechanical super-detective." He turned back to the locator. "Can this thing be detached? I'd like to take it down to the hall."

  "Certainly, indeed." Tick sprang to the locator, snapped loose a pair of clips.

  "I'll take it," said Barch. He motioned to the cave floor. "After you."

  Tick jumped nimbly to the ground, started toward the passage down to the hall.

  Barch said in a casual voice, "What's the hurry?"

  Tick stopped short, turned Barch a quick smile. "None whatever."

  Barch climbed to the floor with the locator under one arm, and ostentatiously hitched at the weapon in his belt. "Now we'll go down."

  CHAPTER VIII

  In the hall Barch set the locator on the table, went to look out int
o the night. Arn and Ardl, lounging close together, sprang apart with a guilty start. "Damn it," cried Barch, "if you can't stop love-making or whatever you call it long enough to stand watch, I'll strip you naked and then there'll be an end to this foolishness."

  Ardl went smartly on his rounds. Barch turned to Arn. "Don't let that Splang pilot get past you."

  "No, Roy."

  Barch looked up into the sky. Suppose the position of the barge had been noted. If so, a barge-load of Podruod troops might drop down at any minute. He shrugged. If they came, they came.

  Back in the hall, Tick was seated on the table, a hand placed proprietarily on the locator. "Many pilots fly dead; they set the cell, they sleep. Not I. I look at my locator"- he patted the box-"and I fly with my hands." He held up his hands. The fingers ended in knobs, like a tree toad's.

  Barch saw Chevrr sitting in a corner scornfully. He crossed the room, squatted beside him. "Are all his race like him?"

  Chevrr nodded dourly. "We stay in the mountains to avoid them. They breed twins once a year, they swarm in the trees, they are worthless except as acrobats and prostitutes."

  "But how can I control him?"

  "Kill him."

  Barch grimaced. "I find killing hard to get used to. Besides he is the only one who can fly that barge."

  The folds of Chevrr's gloomy face went through an amazing process of opening, smoothing, widening. Chevrr was smiling. "He wears a lucky charm; all coast-folk do. It is his birth sac, with the diagram of his beach sands. You will find it inside a leech which sucks at his belly. Take this charm and you are his master."

  "Ah," said Barch.

  "Be careful. If he knows what you plan, he becomes a demon, a giant. No one in the room could hold him."

  Barch stood up, went to Kerbol, spoke briefly, passed on to Flatface, then to Moranko.

  Barch went to the table, moved the locator to the side of the room. Tick weighed no more than a hundred thirty pounds. He looked stringy and agile.

  Kerbol and Flatface came up behind. Each seized an arm; Moranko grasped the spidery legs.

  Tick looked up in sudden wonder. Barch stepped forward, pulled up the front of his yellow blouse.