Chapter III

With a few dry, nervous chuckles, the cadet hunters hefted their equipment and started back up the trail. Just as the girl had predicted, shapes rustled in the foliage close by their sides, accompanied by an occasional growl or whine or snort that was somewhat unnerving. Pritchard could occasionally discern the shaggy shoulders of the gorilla-type, and some other lithe and slinking or lumbering shapes--with here and there a hump of slate-gray hide or a ridged, scaly back.

The return along the hacked-out trail was easier and quicker than their coming, and soon they saw the tip of the _Apollo's_ bow in the sky beyond the shoulder of the hill. As they toiled back up the slope through the clogging grass, they became aware that the animals were not following them further, but backward glances could still make out some vague shapes in the foliage.

Pritchard became aware, also, of McManus's silence. The redhead, usually garrulous, had been silent from the start of their retreat, his square jaw clamped hard shut. The Chief Hunter slapped the young man's broad back.

"Relax, Tom. Men have backed down from women before. It's not considered bad form at all. Now and then they outmaneuver us, and that's all there is to it."

A couple of the others chuckled, but McManus continued his stolid slogging up the hill without a sign. Pritchard shrugged. They all trudged across the burn, and the great grasshopper-leg let down the platform for them.

Waiting for it to settle, Pritchard braced with one hand at the base of a towering fin and began slapping dust from his breeches. He heard Sturgis say, "Hey, watch that!" and the tseeu of a snapper.

He jerked erect in time to see McManus lower his weapon, and hear a distant explosion. Down over the hill, in the tall grass, what appeared to be a huge boar or pygmy rhino was writhing and kicking. Somberly, Pritchard watched its six twitching legs quiet down and stiffen.

"That was a good shot, Tom," he said.

McManus came toward him, grinning with relief. "I'd had about all I could take--" he started to say, and then Pritchard's fist slammed into his jaw. His feet left the ground and he fell heavily onto the hard ground under the tubes.

Pritchard was picking him up again when he heard Sturgis's voice again. "You'd better make it snappy, chief. I think they're working up to something."

Shapes were moving up through the distant grass. Wings were flapping or tilted in soaring across the jungle not far beyond. There came to the ship a dim, vast babble of cries, grunts, squeals, howls and barks.

They carried the inert McManus over to the platform in a hurry. But Pritchard let his finger rest on the buzzer-button while he looked over the array of animals now gathering in plain sight, fanning out around the perimeter of the scorched ground.

There were the slate-gray ones, like that which McManus had downed--six-legged, suber-snouted, long-tusked. There were hulking, scaly-hided ones, resembling ant-eating bears--also six-legged. In fact, the six-legged skeleton seemed to prevail among the fauna of Thisbe II. The canine-like ones running this way and that were six-legged, and so were certain slinking, feline types. On the other hand, the maned gorillas had but four appendages, and so had the ungainly-looking, leaping ones, that looked like hairless kangaroos except for their wicked, underslung jaws.

Quite suddenly, this horde was charging across the burn, converging on the shining cylinder towering above them, aiming for the platform still resting on the ground.

"What's he waiting for?" Pritchard heard the whisper above the rising thunder about them, knew he was meant to hear it. He jabbed home the button and the rising floor pressed their feet. He stepped over to the squawkie and spoke into its 'phragm. "Chief on, Savage. Hold your fire. We're clear." Turning to the men on the now rapidly rising platform, he said, "No shooting."

Soberly, they all gazed down at the horde sweeping up below, swirling about, bumping into the fins and one another. Their silence, other than the noise of their thousands of feet and hooves, was oppressive and menacing. A few of the leaping ones soared up at the platform, wriggling in mid-air and pawing, but it had gone too high and they fell back.

Then Pritchard glanced up. His hand started for his snapper. Toward them through the air came a cloud of flying things--great leathery-winged birds, smaller, faster, feathered ones--rising on a line of flight that would carry them above the platform to a point of interception, claws distended, beaks open and eager.

Thin and remote, a two-toned whistle sounded. Sounded again. The converging flocks wheeled, fluttered and fell away, gliding off toward the jungle. Far below, the milling horde flung up a varied array of heads, and then began to move, a drift that became a surge, trotting and hopping away across the burn.

"Phew!" said someone behind Pritchard. "That girl really has an army."

McManus sat up, shaking his head and staring at the smooth shining hull of the _Apollo_ swinging down to them. He felt his jaw and squinted up at Pritchard.

"Quarters for you," the tall saturnine man said softly.

* * * * *

Late that evening Pritchard was in the chart room talking with Captain Savage. The _Apollo's_ ventilation system had been in operation for over thirty hours now and the blowers had sucked out the last vestige of mechanically purified air, with its taint of ozone, metal and oil. It was pleasant to rock gently in the gimbal chairs and sniff the lush night air of Thisbe II. Aloft, in the nose, the watch was idly working out a game of kru, that old Martian solitaire involving domino-like counters. The autoscanner hooked to the magnar was ready to clang at the first blip on the screens. Below, in the wardrooms, the cadet hunters were amusing themselves with a runoff of the day's cam-rec spool ("Get this line about the synthetabs!" ... guffaws of laughter). Midway down the curving tail section Tom McManus sulked in his quarters, fingering the bruise on his jaw.

"So we'll pick up in the morning, hey?" mused the captain. His was a squat, ape-like body, surmounted by a long, goat's face and a grizzled skull.

"Yes." Pritchard drained his tall glass. "I'm not going to bother with her. If she can send a whole army of her animals against us it's going to make hunting a little difficult. We could set down on the other side and maybe get in a bit of shooting, but she'd catch up with us. Even if we try hunting from the air with the jet cruisers...." He shook his head. "It's too dangerous. I've got to look out for these boys, after all. No, I don't want to get messed up with her in any way." He stared calmly at the wall, seeing once again that lithe body straining out of his grasp, and knew himself for a liar.

"Well...." The captain rubbed his nose, furtively eyeing the other man's profile. He knew when a man was lying. It was one of the things one developed long before one got to be a hundred and thirteen years of age. He lowered his wrinkled old eyelids and went on, "... she's hung on here for four years. Maybe she isn't too crazy at that. Of course, it's kind of too bad to leave a filly like her running around loose."

"We'll just hope we won't be too much criticized for not bringing her home," Pritchard cut in quickly. "Thank God, we shot all that cam-rec footage. It'll--"

He lifted his head, his long nostrils flaring. "Murder! What's that stink coming from?"

The old man grimaced up at the air-grill.

"Eeugh! Low tide on Venus!"

Pritchard got up and went toward the intercom. "Something's died, I'd say, inside the ship or close by."

At that instant the intercom's tiny diaphragm screamed. Screamed, and broke off into a hoarse babble. The two men froze, scowling at each other. The babble rose again into a sharp screaming "NO!"--and then stopped.

Pritchard stepped to the 'phragm. "Chief on. All stations and quarters report, please."

Voices came back at him out of the wall. "Nose watch. All X here, Mr. Pritchard. What happened?"

"Stern watch. All X, chief. What--?"

"Wardroom, Greene on. All X. Something stinks, chief."

"Engine room. All X."

"Majinski on, retired to quarters. Pee-yew!"

Then, silence, pregnant with listening.

"McManus," snapped Pritchard.

"Louder," said the captain. "He may be asleep."

"McManus!" The tall hunter shouted. "TOM!"

Then he was out the door. The captain strode to the intercom. "All free hands to McManus. Fast!" he barked, and then ran after Pritchard who was already stepping into the axial lift.

McManus's quarters were well down in the tail. Pritchard found half a dozen men clustered at his cabin door which they had torched open. Their eyes were watering and they were gagging at the incredibly foul stench roiling the air.

"Where's McManus?" he demanded, starting to shoulder through them. The stench caught at his throat so that he choked on the words.

A cadet hunter clutched at his sleeve. "Don't go in there, chief," he gasped. "You can't do Tom any good now."

Savage was at the wall intercom. "Meyer, for God's sake, blow this ship out," he yelled hoarsely.

Pritchard shook off the detaining hand and stepped to the open door. He looked once at the dripping mess in the gimbal chair and jerked his head away.

The pie-shaped cubicle was otherwise normal at first glance. The hammock hung suspended between its swivels. The viewport was properly sealed. The bath and disposal unit in one far corner stood in spotless order, as did the sectional drawer case opposite.

What had come in here? And how had it gotten in? The door had been electro-locked in its sliding frame and the men, who had quite properly not waited for the magnekey Captain Savage alone carried, had had to burn through the lock wiring. There was no other way into the room.

Pritchard stepped over to the air-grill. His eyes swimming in the terrible stench in the cabin, he nevertheless could discern how the heavy chrome mesh had been torn loose from its bolts to lie at the foot of the wall. He shot one tortured, speculative glance at the six-inch hole in the wall and then hastily backed out, hand to mouth against his rising gorge.

The steel walls thrummed with the surge of the revved-up blowers. But there was no answering draft screaming up into a gale from the air grills. The lights flickered briefly, and then the blowers' thrum died.

"Shorted," a man muttered thickly.

More men were coming, sliding down the long poles until they reached the stench which was now spreading up through the ship. As soon as it hit their nostrils they gripped the poles to slow their descent, cursing. Down the passageway, two of those who had arrived first were now being sick.

* * * * *

Pritchard leaned against the wall trying to keep his breathing shallow, his eyes hard and steady on the open doorway and the lighted chamber beyond. Gradually, all eyes were turning to him, waiting, their owners breathing in short, labored gasps.

He stepped to the intercom. "All hands to the muster deck," he managed to choke out. "That means everybody. And use extreme caution. Something has boarded the ship and killed McManus. Listen to me. It is still on board! Arm yourselves and report to the muster deck immediately. Sturgis, step into the storeroom and break out the masks. Greene and Majinski, help him. Use the lift to bring them to the muster deck. Got it?"

Several strangling voices replied in order. Pritchard and Savage crowded into the lift with the rest of the men and went aloft.

"What do you think it is, son?" said Savage. Pritchard shrugged. "I don't know. What kind of thing or things could get through the ventilating system?"

The old man pursed his lips. "That's right. That's how we smelled it first. And then the blowers kicked off when all that compression backed up to them. You're right, Mr. Pritchard, whatever it is, it's still in the ducts."

The lift halted at the muster deck and the door slid open. "So here's what we'll do," said Pritchard as they stepped off. The old man heard him out and then nodded slowly, his rheumy eyes narrowing.

They waited while the men arrived, the whole ship's company of twenty cadet hunters (less McManus, now) and five crewmen. They all stood around eyeing Pritchard and the captain. The air was heavy with that lurking stench, but it was not too thick here to be unbreathable.

As soon as the gas mask detail had shoved the last of the cartons off the lift Pritchard started for the controls.

The muster deck was a heavily insulated circular chamber a bit forward from amidships.

The entire ship could be controlled from there. In emergencies it could be detached from the ship and used as a temporary space raft, having all necessary supplies in its padded wall lockers.

"First," announced Pritchard, "we're going to button this ship up tight." He reached for the ventilator switch and flicked it on.

Little motors all over the inner and outer hulls began wheeling shut the valves that closed the six-inch holes that were the ventilating system's intake and exhaust ports. In a matter of seconds the _Apollo_ would stop breathing the wine-like night air of Thisbe II.

On the wall above the switch little green lights began to blink off one by one. As if gradually understanding his strategy, the men began to move up behind Pritchard, their eyes on the bank of fiery green points winking out.

The last little gem flickered, died, and then, strangely, flamed up again.

And, just as it went out for good, the entire muster deck gave a lurch. Feet scuffled, slipped, staggered. Here and there a body thudded to the steel plates of the floor.

Pritchard's voice rose thundering above the abrupt commotion. "Grab hold! Something's got the ship--something--"

The muster deck swung in a wild circle, men sliding helplessly, caroming off the walls. Pritchard's flailing hand caught something and his long bony fingers laced about it in a grip of steel.

In benumbed fascination, he saw his body lengthen out, straining against that grip, appearing to levitate from the deck. The whole chamber tilted slowly until it seemed to hang below him. Men were slipping and falling down into the curved well of its farther wall, but some had grabbed out at holds here and there--a door-pull, or a stanchion, and dangled like Pritchard.

At the last instant he understood that the _Apollo_ was falling. He had just time to pull himself up, to give his arm some play against the shock to come--

The great pointed cylinder struck with an awesome, deafening clangor--fell with a single bounce across its landing burn and settled to roll over approximately one-third its circumference.

Pritchard's grip, he discovered later, was to the handle of a locked chart drawer. The massive wrench of that impact straightened his arm with a jerk, but at the same time the drawer's lock broke. He fell away in a shower of sheet film just as the _Apollo_ rolled, and a curve of smooth steel wall swung out to catch him and break his fall into a plunging glide against a cushion of stunned men's bodies.

It was a miracle that nobody was seriously injured. The slowness of the ship's fall at the outset, the curvature of walls, the general fitness of trained minds and bodies--all combined to prevent anything more serious than cuts and contusions.

Captain Savage was the first Pritchard pulled out of the tangle. The wiry old man was unhurt, though dazed. In spite of his age he gamely pulled himself together with a terrier-like shake.

"What hit us?" he croaked.

"I think whatever was in the ship did it," said Pritchard. "But then, that must mean it's outside now. Think we sustained much damage?"

The old man scoffed. "Man, this ship was built for crash landings. The surface glaze must be cracked. And all the supplies we broke out after landing must be all over hell."

He gazed aloft at the muster deck's controls, now high overhead. "Have to right her," he muttered, "but I can't get at them. I'll have to get to the master set, I guess." His gaze switched dubiously to the hatch leading to the nose, halfway up the curving wall. "I can set her back up on her tail, firing the beam tubes."

"Majinski," called out Pritchard, "build a ladder or pyramid of men up that hatch so the captain can get to the controls. Sturgis, you and you and you--" he picked out half a dozen cadet hunters "--let's scout through the ship. I want to be sure our friend has left."

It was awkward work, clambering over girders and through crazily slanting doors and along upside down passages where, in deep space, they floated past with ease. They held their snappers ready while Pritchard opened door after door with the captain's magnekey.

They found something in the compression chamber of Number Two Blower. What they found, after taking down the side panel, was a long, flopping red thing--something like a ten-foot carrot, writhing and curling in on itself wetly. It was a foot thick at its big end.

It fell out on the curving wall beneath the blower. They watched it soberly as it twisted this way and that convulsively, contracting and lengthening out. It gave off that same sickening odor.

"Is this what gave us all the trouble?" somebody demanded.

"No." Pritchard's nostrils flared slightly. "Just a part of it, that's all. Most of it got away."

"_Most_ of it!"

He nodded slowly. "It was leaving when I started closing those ports. It was leaving by this intake port--maybe the way it came in--and the valve started to slice into it. In other words, we had it by the tail. It tried to yank free and that's what tipped us over."

"Y-y-you mean--?" They stared at him, refusing to credit the comprehension dawning in their minds.

"What else?" Pritchard's cheeks twitched in amusement.

"Hey, that's big!" said Sturgis softly.

"Quite big," murmured the tall hunter. "And quite intelligent if it came for McManus."

Their jaws dropped and their eyes protruded glassily.

"On the other hand," went on Pritchard musingly, "it might not be as smart as the person who sent it."