Chapter THREE: Caught By the Giants

The machine men lost no time in exploring the region where they had come down. Moving at great expense of energy, they radiated in a circle from the great tangle of vegetation until one of them found a break in the forest.

A level expanse stretched away to mountains that loomed in the background. Tiny specks flew high in the sky. These puzzled the machine men until they saw one of them drop low above the forest and veer toward the fallen spaceship in curiosity.

It was an enormous bird with an animal-like snout. Four legs and the wing tips ended in talons.

"What monsters!" exclaimed 744U-21. "The bird is fully half as long as our spaceship from one wing tip to the other!"

"Forms of life would have a tendency to run to size here," Professor Jameson remarked. "Creatures on this planet must of necessity be uncommonly strong, too."

They came to refer to the giant world as Ajiat, expressing the mental thought of the spoken word they had known in their organic lifetimes back on Zor. The word referred to anything huge or colossal.

With specially designed apparatus they carried for just such emergencies, the machine men quickly located and commenced mining the various ores and minerals they required in repairing the ship. When helium was discovered in large quantities, the professor was seized with an inspiration.

"Let us discover more about this world now that we are on it. From on high, we can look over a great deal of the surrounding country."

"But how shall we get up there?"

"The helium," Professor Jameson voiced his hidden thought. "We can make a balloon and rise on its lifting power."

For observation purposes, a metal globe was quickly fashioned, the basket of the balloon made of light metal framework and covered with wood from the surrounding forest. Firmly anchored to the ground with metal hawsers, the globe was filled with helium. The basket carried four machine men with their equipment. With him, Professor Jameson took 6W-438, 12W-62 and 29G-75.

"From what we know of the atmosphere, the amount of helium in the globe should carry us four miles or higher."

"The birds will probably attack you," warned 119M-5.

"We expect as much. It is why we have three power guns installed."

Once the hawsers were loosed, they shot off the ground like an arrow. Not until their ascent became slowed did the professor and his companions cast out the large stones they carried for ballast.

One of the great birds dropped down to meet them and was blasted from the sky. Another flew croaking from their path in alarm. They were nearly six miles above the ground before the balloon stopped rising.

With powerful glasses, they examined the terrain for several hundred miles in every direction except towards the mountains. A pall of cloudy mist hung among the peaks. In the opposite direction, their horizon was far-flung due to the enormous size of the planet.

With their scientific apparatus, they gathered data which they were unable to obtain from the ground and had been too involved and disinterested to notice during their perilous descent.

A bevy of the huge birds came to investigate, interrupting their observations to circle, growl and chatter at them. One of the winged monstrosities made a purposeful lunge at the metal ball above their heads, and they blew him to fragments with rapid and well-directed fire. Another met the fate of the first, before the others winged away in screaming anger and alarm in the direction of the mountains.

"Do you think we could deal with them if they attacked us in large numbers?" 12W-62 queried.

"Not if they attacked us in a mass," the professor replied. "But we can descend by freeing some of the helium if they become too numerous or troublesome."

A sudden gust of air swayed the basket. The breeze had freshened, and they found that they had been drifting towards the mountains.

Like stately spires, the mountain peaks loomed before and above them. Those in the background were lost in a gray fog which had crept among them since the machine men had risen in their balloon.

Hundreds of the great birds could be seen darting and wheeling above the mountainside. As the balloon was carried nearer by the rising wind, they spread on the wing and flapped about the strange invader, voicing their weird cries and veering menacingly about the metal globe and basket. Several of them attacked and were destroyed.

The others became a bit cautious, yet they never abandoned their gliding vigil. They, too, finally swept down upon the balloon. More of the birds came swarming to take their place, and the machine men soon found themselves busy protecting their skycraft.

"They probably have their nests in the mountains close by," said the professor, "and they suspect us. That is why they have grown more ferocious and daring since we neared the mountains."

The wind was quickening. More of the great birds came to replace each one killed. One came so close that a wing brushed the basket, knocking the machine men off their feet. They were finding it difficult to defend the balloon against so many of them. They were in danger of being wrecked!

Dark clouds had settled over the mountains--which were now so near that the machine men could distinctly see objects such as trees and rocks. The wind had risen to a gale, and they were being carried on it.

"We are rising!" 6W-438 exclaimed. "The wind is carrying us above the mountains and into that approaching storm area!"

"Let out part of the helium!"

"We cannot do that now," the professor told them. "The force of the wind would dash us against the mountainside!"

* * * * *

A dull flush of pink lit the drifting depths of the cloud masses momentarily, and the terrific roar which followed shook the balloon and made the metal globe hum with strange music.

With the advent of the storm, the birds gave up the attack and winged off to their lofty retreats in screeching alarm.

The wind continued to carry the balloon at a great speed, and soon they were over the mountains and into the dense, angry masses of clouds. Then they were buffeted by cross winds and freak air currents, falling, to be lifted up once again and tossed around like a leaf.

Roaring crashes of thunder threatened to split the sky apart, and great blades of lightning stabbed through the clouds. The storm grew worse, and the machine men entangled themselves in the hawsers holding the metal ball to the basket, to keep from being tossed out by the storm's fury. The basket was threatening to part from the metal globe that supported it.

The winds wrenched and tore at them, hurling gusts of rain like spray--fine and hard. Lightning flashed dangerously near, and the farther they were swept into the storm area, the blacker it grew. Had it not been for the lightning which played almost constantly, it would have seemed like night.

The four machine men lost all sense of direction as they were whirled and thrown viciously about. The basket finally broke away from the ball of helium, leaving them clinging to the strong wire hawsers hanging from the globe.

Here they swung and clashed against each other and against the metal ball, slowly gathering the slack in the hawsers about their metal bodies and creeping closer to the globe which was whirled and tossed more freely since it had lost its restraining basket.

To the machine men, it seemed that the storm raged for hours. The first intimation of its cessation came with a lessening of the gloom and fewer shafts of lightning.

"I am near a valve," 29G-75 reported. "Shall we release some of our helium and come down?"

"As soon as we see where we are."

"We shall soon come down whether we choose or not," said 12W-62. "There is a slow leak in the globe not far from me."

When the clouds lifted, the machine men found themselves on the other side of the mountain. More mountains loomed in the distance. Below them stretched a level plain. They were descending slowly. As more helium escaped, their descent became faster, yet they landed safely.

"We must not get too far from the mountain," the professor said. "If we cannot find some way of getting back over it, we must wait until 744U-21 sends us help."

"We may stay and see the nova," said 6W-438 grimly. "It will be a wonderful sight."

"A better way to die than those who were killed when our spaceship crashed. Doomsday on Ajiat will usher in a beautiful morning of flaming brilliance."

"Followed by a gloomy night of desolation and death."

The machine men walked slowly back in the direction of the mountain. Night fell. Still they kept on their way.

Their progress was forced. They knew that their mechanical parts would never stand the strain of climbing up the mountain. Their energies would soon be exhausted by the strain, parts would wear out, and they could neither be refueled nor repaired in the absence of the spaceship. They could only remain in a conspicuous and advantageous position near the mountain, waiting for the help they knew 744U-21 would send if they could be found.

Through the night, fire suddenly lit the sky ahead of them. There was first a dull, soft glow. This grew to towering proportions in a single, leaping flame. The fire was no farther than half a mile ahead of them, and soon they were able to distinguish black, shadowy forms which passed between them and the fire.

The professor called a halt. Several times they saw large fire brands carried. From the size of these, and the height at which they were carried, and from what they were able to see of the black shadows, the machine men knew the creatures to be veritable giants.

"Quite in keeping with this world," Professor Jameson observed. "It goes without saying that they are unusually strong. We shall do well to remain undiscovered."

With the coming of morning, the fears of the professor were justified. From afar, the machine men could see more distinctly the lofty, bulking figures which had been etched in silhouette against the campfires of the night before.

The creatures moved with large, easy bounds at several times the best speed the machine men had been able to attain on worlds much smaller than Ajiat. They covered the ground with such amazing swiftness that the machine men were scarcely aware of their danger before several colossal forms grew upon their vision and suddenly they found themselves surrounded.

The things towered fully fifty feet in the air. That was the professor's first impression. His second one conveyed the fact that they were of little intelligence. They stood on legs which resembled a small forest of tree trunks suddenly grown up about the four Zoromes. Two in number, these legs terminated in three long claws spread equidistant on tough, layered pads.

Jaws armed with long fangs featured the physiognomy of the things, while most curious were the eyes which projected on short, thick pedicles and were over-arched and protected by a rough, bony protuberance.

The professor was suddenly seized and lifted close to one of the terrifying faces for an inquisitive inspection!

The creature sniffed at him with flat, distended nostrils. Huge fingers, seven in number, clutched him tightly. He saw that the thing had two arms and that their hairless bodies were roughly criss-crossed with deep lines.

Another interesting feature next claimed his attention. A web of elastic membrane extended halfway down each arm to the body. A muttering gabble issued from these gargantuans of Ajiat as they examined the machine men.

"Do not act alive," the professor radiated, "and they may become disinterested in us."

Although subtracting from the interest of the great brutes, this plan did not prevent their seizure. One of the things emitted a bellowing roar, which the machine men found themselves at a loss to properly interpret. The creature turned and dashed away in the direction from which the machine men had come.

Far off, the huge beast had seen the gleaming, metal ball which had contained the helium. The others waited patiently, gently pulling at the legs and tentacles of the strange, metal contraptions they had found, until he returned with it.

Then they all set out at whirlwind speed to join the main body, setting up a cloud of dust behind them and passing by the black, smoking embers of last night's fire.

With the rest, they made their way to the mountain, climbing up to a plateau. Cliffs loomed on two sides, and in tunnels and rocky defiles splitting into the side of the mountain, these creatures made their homes.