"Jim?"
"The longbows are ready," Tip"s treble imitation of Jim Chiara"s voice answered. "We"ll black out their searchlights when the time comes."
"Andy?" he asked.
"The last of us for this section are coming in now," Andy Taylor answered.
He made his check of all the subleaders, then looked up to the roof to ask, "All set, Jimmy?"
Jimmy Stevens" grinning face appeared over the edge. "Ten crossbows are c.o.c.ked and waiting up here. Bring us our targets."
They waited, while the evening deepened into near-dusk. Then the airlock of the cruiser slid open and thirteen Gerns emerged, the one leading them wearing the resplendent uniform of a subcommander.
"There they come," he said to Lake and Craig. "It looks like we"ll be able to trap them in here and force the commander to send out a full-sized force. We"ll all attack at the sound of the horn and if you can hit their rear flanks hard enough with the unicorns to give us a chance to split them from this end some of us should make it to the ship before they realize up in the control room that they should close the airlocks.
"Now"--he looked at the Gerns who were coming straight toward the stockade wall, ignoring the gate to their right--"you"d better be on your way. We"ll meet again before long in the ship."
Fenrir and Sigyn looked from the advancing Gerns to him with question in their eyes after Lake and Craig were gone, Fenrir growling restlessly.
"Pretty soon," he said to them. "Right now it would be better if they didn"t see you. Wait inside, both of you." They went reluctantly inside, to merge with the darkness of the interior. Only an occasional yellow gleam of their eyes showed that they were crouched to spring just inside the doorway.
He called to the nearest unarmed man, not loud enough to be heard by the Gerns:
"Cliff--you and Sam Anders come here. Tell the rest to fade out of sight and get armed."
Cliff Schroeder pa.s.sed the command along and he and Sam Anders approached. He looked back at the Gerns and saw they were within a hundred feet of the--for them--unscalable wall of the stockade. They were coming without hesitation----
A pale blue beam lashed down from one of the cruiser"s turrets and a fifty foot section of the wall erupted into dust with a sound like thunder. The wind swept the dust aside in a gigantic cloud and the Gerns came through the gap, looking neither to right nor left.
"That, I suppose," Sam Anders said from beside him, "was Lesson Number One for degenerate savages like us: Gerns, like G.o.ds, are not to be hindered by man-made barriers."
The Gerns walked with a peculiar gait that puzzled him until he saw what it was. They were trying to come with the arrogant military stride affected by the Gerns and in the 1.5 gravity they were succeeding in achieving only a heavy clumping.
They advanced steadily and as they drew closer he saw that in the right hand of each Gern soldier was a blaster while in the left hand of each could be seen the metallic glitter of chains.
Schroeder smiled thinly. "It looks like they want to subject about a dozen of us to some painful questioning."
No one else was any longer in sight and the Gerns came straight toward the three on the steps. They stopped forty feet away at a word of command from the officer and Gerns and Ragnarok men exchanged silent stares; the faces of the Ragnarok men bearded and expressionless, the faces of the Gerns hairless and reflecting a contemptuous curiosity.
"Narth!" The communicator on the Gern officer"s belt spoke with metallic authority. "What do they look like? Did we come two hundred light-years to view some animated vegetables?"
"No, Commander," Narth answered. "I think the discard of the Rejects two hundred years ago has produced for us an unexpected reward. There are three natives under the canopy before me and their physical perfection and complete adaptation to this h.e.l.lish gravity is astonishing."
"They could be used to replace expensive machines on some of the outer world mines," the commander said, "providing their intelligence isn"t too abysmally low. What about that?"
"They can surely be taught to perform simple manual labor," Narth answered.
"Get on with your job," the commander said. "Try to pick some of the most intelligent looking ones for questioning--I can"t believe these cattle sent that message and they"re going to tell us who did. And pick some young, strong ones for the medical staff to examine--ones that won"t curl up and die after the first few cuts of the knife."
"We"ll chain these three first," Narth said. He lifted his hand in an imperious gesture to Humbolt and the other two and ordered in accented Terran: "Come here!"
No one moved and he said again, sharply, _"Come here!"_
Again no one moved and the minor officer beside Narth said, "Apparently they can"t even understand Terran now."
"Then we"ll give them some action they can understand," Narth snapped, his face flushing with irritation. "We"ll drag them out by their heels!"
The Gerns advanced purposefully, three of them holstering their blasters to make their chains ready. When they had pa.s.sed under the canopy and could not be seen from the ship Humbolt spoke:
"All right, Jimmy."
The Gerns froze in midstride, suspicion flashing across their faces.
"Look up on the roof," he said in Gern.
They looked, and the suspicion became gaping dismay.
"You can be our prisoners or you can be corpses," he said. "We don"t care which."
The urgent hiss of Narth"s command broke their indecision:
_"Kill them!"_
Six of them tried to obey, bringing up their blasters in movements that seemed curiously heavy and slow, as though the gravity of Ragnarok had turned their arms to wood. Three of them almost lifted their blasters high enough to fire at the steps in front of them before arrows went through their throats. The other three did not get that far.
Narth and the remaining six went rigidly motionless and he said to them:
"Drop your blasters--quick!"
Their blasters thumped to the ground and Jimmy Stevens and his bowmen slid off the roof. Within a minute the Gerns were bound with their own chains, but for the officer, and the blasters were in the hands of the Ragnarok men.
Jimmy looked down the row of Gerns and shook his head. "So these are Gerns?" he said. "It was like trapping a band of woods goats."
"Young ones," Schroeder amended. "And almost as dangerous."
Narth"s face flushed at the words and his eyes went to the ship. The sight of it seemed to restore his courage and his lips drew back in a snarl.
"You fools--you stupid, megalomaniac dung-heaps--do you think you can kill Gerns and live to boast about it?"
"Keep quiet," Humbolt ordered, studying him with curiosity. Narth, like all the Gerns, was different from what they had expected. It was true the Gerns had strode into their town with an attempt at arrogance but they were harmless in appearance, soft of face and belly, and the snarling of the red-faced Narth was like the bl.u.s.ter of a cornered scavenger-rodent.
"I promise you this," Narth was saying viciously, "if you don"t release us and return our weapons this instant I"ll personally oversee the extermination of you and every savage in this village with the most painful death science can contrive and I"ll----"
Humbolt reached out his hand and flicked Narth under the chin. Narth"s teeth cracked loudly together and his face twisted with the pain of a bitten tongue.
"Tie him up, Jess," he said to a man near him. "If he opens his mouth again, shove your foot in it."
He spoke to Schroeder. "We"ll keep three of the blasters and send two to each of the other front groups. Have that done."