BY JIM CLEVELAND
CHAPTER 2
Charles Hunter; Oberlieutenant and first officer on the "Deneban Star," the largest liner in the Deneban colonial fleet, allowed himself a sigh of satisfaction as the ship dropped neatly into its precalculated orbit. A companionway portal opened behind him and the captain came through onto the bridge.
Turning, Hunter snapped to attention. "Everything is in order, sir," he reported.
Returning his salute with a dismissive wave, Captain Voss strolled past him, to look at the settings on the console monitors. Satisfied, he glanced overhead through the huge domed canopy, that covered the bridge, to where a swirling ball of blue and white, the planet Lovella, hung as if suspended in the star pricked void above them. Standing pensive, he took it in for just a moment before turning back to Hunter.
"Very good, Oberlieutenant," "I will take her in from here, You may make preparations for disembarkation."
"Yes sir," snapped Hunter with the obligatory salute and heel click before taking his leave. He hurried out through the companionway behind the bridge and went down to the tactical operations sector a deck below. Everyone snapped to attention as he came in.
"At ease gentlemen," he told them.
"All stations report ready, sir," volunteered the duty officer.
"Very good. Activate surveillance. We'll want a good look at the terrain around the base before we go down. You may notify the passengers that touchdown is imminent and prepare those due for disembarkation to leave the ship. I'm going below to see to those in steerage," replied Hunter.
Hurrying out, he headed toward a transport conduit. His presence on the lower deck was not really necessary. Disembarkation was a standardized procedure so that he needed only to give the order and everything would be done. It was for another reason that he was going there now. An old friend of his family was sponsoring a group of immigrants who were travelling in steerage and Hunter would have just enough time prior to atmospheric penetration to wish them good luck.
Doctor Albert Morris had given up a lucrative practice on Deneb to pursue his dream of settling a colony in the wilderness. He might have travelled in comfort on an upper deck, but he had chosen to endure the privations of steerage with his charges instead. Hunter admired his resolution, but he wondered if the doctor really knew what he had let himself in for.
Reaching the transporter terminus at the end of the corridor, he pressed the service bottom, and the port slid open. Settling himself in the capsule-like compartment within, he dialled the deck and sector co-ordinates required and the capsule started off with a whoosh. Smoothly and quickly it sped him through the labyrinth of conduits, negotiated the proper intersections, and brought him to his destination a couple hundred feet below and over a quarter of a mile away from his point of entry.
At this level, just above the massive damping pumps of the antimatter injectors, the deck never ceased its throbbing pulse. The resonator whined in the distance, but its tooth grinding reverberations were transmitted to every corner of this cavernous space. During the multifrequency phasing, which preceded a jump into hyperspace, the high decibel output from the generator was almost beyond bearing. It was this, even more than the crowding, that made travel in steerage so unpopular.
On every side were pipes, hoses, pumps, valves, and ducts, all built to a massive scale. At the moment the whole capiliform complex was vibrant with squeals, slushes and gurgles as water feeds were being adjusted and helium was undergoing compression in preparation for atmospheric penetration. The entire system was being brought down to an internal temperature as near to absolute zero as practicably possible. In this state, monopoles were produced to counteract the effect of gravity at critical points around the frame of the ship. Otherwise, they could never have risk taking so massive a vessel down to the planet's surface.
Wending his way among the tubes and machinery, Hunter's path took him past the detention sector. He noted with distaste the fetid odour emanating from beyond the electrified barrier. Besides the six thousand colonists destined for Lovella, there were many more going to other places. The two thousand convicts held here would expiate their crimes in the mines of frozen Crom.
Dr. Morris was supervising a busy commotion when Hunter arrived. After three months spent in the perfidious accommodations of steerage, he was getting his people ready for disembarkation. Seeing Hunter threading his way through the bustle toward him, he went to meet him.
Thrusting his hand out to grip that of the younger man, he could not suppress his enthusiasm. "Wonderful to be arriving at last," he shouted over the noise.
Returning his handshake, Hunter leaned toward the older man and shouted in his turn. "We will be going down within the hour. I will be busy then. I just wanted to take this chance to wish you luck and say that I admire your spirit in undertaking this enterprise."
"Why, a strapping young man like you should join us. Think of the adventure. It's a whole new world down there," admonished the Doctor.
Hunter chuckled. "Sorry Doc. I've got a few years left on my stint with the fleet yet. Besides, as you know very well, persons with my technological background are not permitted to settle on interdicted planets."
"Oh well, just a thought," he replied, as the flicker of the alert light on Hunter's communicator interrupted their conversation.
"Hunter here," acknowledged the younger man after switching to reception.
"Comm. officer Epstein here," came the concise voice from the other end. "We have not been able to open a channel through to Lovella base. Oberlieutenant Thomas thinks there might be a problem."
"Keep trying. I'll come up," responded Hunter.
"Trouble?" asked Doctor Morris, catching his look.
"Probably nothing, but I have to attend to it. Make sure your people are properly strapped in during the descent. I won't have a chance to get back to you before then."
"No need to worry on that account. You have a very efficient crew of droids down here. Nothing larger than a mouse moves after the klaxon sounds," assured the Doctor giving him a parting handshake.
Hurrying toward the nearest transport kiosk, Hunter selected a capsule and dialling the co-ordinates for the communication sector, settled in for the quick ride through the tubes to his destination. Anticipating his arrival, Comm. Officer Epstein had come to meet him.
"Anything yet?" inquired Hunter.
"No sir. We have been straight across the band. Either their equipment is out of order or there is nobody there to attend it."
Switching his wrist comm. to transmit, Hunter dialled the surveillance sector. "What have you got on ground search?" he demanded, when the officer of the watch acknowledged.
"Nothing definite yet. We have run a full scale scan, but the computer hasn't finished with the enhancements. We should have the telemetry in a few moments," replied the officer.
"Send them to the bridge as soon as you get them," snapped Hunter, who had already started in that direction. The nearest entrance was just up the companionway, but by the time he got there the readouts had already been relayed from surveillance and Captain Voss was scrutinizing them.
Looking up as Hunter came in, he acknowledged his salute with a dismissive wave, and directed his attention to where the enhancements were displayed upon a console screen. "It appears that we have trouble on Lovella base," he told him.
The resolution on the digitized images was remarkable. The computer had transposed across the range of frequencies to remove cloud and ionic distortion. The buildings of the compound stood out clearly while you could not have hidden a chicken in the cleared ground around them. There was no sign of recent occupation. In fact, the whole place had the look of neglect about it. The buildings had fallen into disrepair while the clearing itself had to a great extent run wild with weeds and shrubs. Focussing in on full magnification, Hunter scanned for signs of life, and finally identified the presence of a person, by the cast of his shadow, from where he was standing under the branch of a tree. More than two thousand people had been settled here just five years before and except for that one shadow there was no sign of any other presence.
"Where could they have gone?" he speculated.
The captain shrugged. "We will know better when we get down there," he said. "We make atmospheric penetration in fourteen minutes. I want a security squad to go over that compound with a fine- toothed comb before anybody else gets off. See to it and take a couple of combat droids with you just in case."
Saluting, Hunter hurried out. He had preparations to make before the ship went in. Atmospheric penetration by one of these colossal Deneban liners was no casual undertaking. If it were not for its monopole augmentation at stress points throughout the hull, it would not have been able to support its own mass. As it was, a landing could only be effected upon water, after which the ship had to draw into shore like a conventional ocean going vessel. A docking wharf had been built at the time of her first visit and to this the spaceliner would eventually be made fast.
It was usual for the Captain to conduct such critical manoeuvres himself so that Hunter was free to prepare his squad for disembarkation. Thus, it was, that he came down the ramp upon landing ,at the head of a well equipped and well- briefed platoon of soldiers. They were ready for anything, but there was no sign of the colonists. It was not possible that anyone in the compound could have failed to notice the ship pulling into the dock and yet no one had come out to meet them. Disquieted, he ordered the two tank like droids, which they had brought out with them, into the lead as they pressed inland. Approaching the barracks, he found nothing in their appearance to alleviate his foreboding. Doors hung askew from broken hinges, windows had been smashed and paint had begun to peel off the sides of the buildings. while the grounds had overgrown and were spewed with the litter of long discarded garbage.
Something moved in a nearby building and when they turned to see what it was they were confronted by the silhouette of an emaciated spectre of a man in a doorway. Weapons swung in his direction, but Hunter barked an order for them to hold their fire. Howling, the man ducked back inside and a Droid followed. A few moments later it reemerged bringing the fugitive out with it. Having caught him by the wrist, nothing short of amputation would have loosened that mechanical grip, now that it had latched onto him.
It proved no use questioning him since the briefest of inquiries was enough to convince them that he was completely deranged. He could do little more than drool and jabber, but the identification voucher implanted in the flesh of his wrist indicated that he had been a member of the colony's maintenance crew.
This settlement had been placed here under the auspices of a limited dispensation granted to Deneb by the Federation of Galactic Worlds. Even so, permission had been given contingent upon the proof that there were no prior intelligent inhabitants anywhere on this Southern continent and that there should be no intercourse whatsoever with the populations of the interdicted Northern continents.
In fact, surveys had revealed no substantial forms of animal life in the region at all. There were no dangerous bacterial infestations and even the virus' appeared benign. Although only a narrow strip of land along the coast was judged suitable for settlement, this ran a long way, so that Deneb had had great hopes for the colony. The prerequisite quarantine of five years between the initial settlement and those that would follow had seemed to be only a formality, but now, clearly something had gone dreadfully wrong.
Directing the droid to escort the madman onto the ship, Hunter ordered the search continued. Perhaps the medical staff could make something out of the man's ravings? In the meantime he hoped that a perusal of the command centre might turn something up. Upon reaching the offices, however, he found that it too had been ransacked. File cabinets had been rifled and turned over, desks had been smashed and papers had been strewn about. Weather and mould had gotten to most of it and little could be put together of the rest. A wall safe, had however, remained unopened, until responding to the command codes in Hunter's ID voucher, it permitted entry. Inside, he found a couple of data capsules and an old fashioned written journal, which upon investigation proved to be a backup for the station's log.
After reading the crystals into the drive on the remaining droid, Hunter leafed through the journal. What it told was a sad tale of disappearances and disaster. Whole patrols had gone missing without a trace, but mostly the losses had been sustained among the work crews clearing inland near the desert. They had been lost one after another, and although speculation had run rampant, no one actually knew what had become of them. Suspicions had begun to ferment until a reluctance to leave the security of the compound had become panic and that had led to rebellion.
Beyond that, there were no further entries and Hunter was left to decide for himself what to make of it.
The crystals offered little more than to confirm what had been written in the book, so that when the droid began to spit out statistical speculation Hunter switched it off. The machine knew no better than he what had happened and it annoyed him to hear its ramblings. Deciding to do an extensive search beyond the confines of the compound, he sent back to the ship for reinforcements, and by nightfall had routed out seven more survivors. None of these were in any better shape than the first, however, so that by the time darkness forced a return to the ship he was no closer to a solution to the mystery than he had been earlier.
Upon reporting to the bridge, he found Captain Voss stalking impatiently back and forth, and not especially sympathetic to his concerns. "We have spent enough time on this," he announced. "Intelligence can take it from here. Buggered if I know what to make of it and we've got a schedule to meet. Nobody gets off here. We can dump the Lovella lot at Crom when we get there."
"Sir?" remonstrated Hunter. "Crom is a frozen waste. The only habitation is the penal complex. The colonists will be worked to death before they earn enough to buy a way out of there."
"What of it?" snapped the Captain. "They should have read Ship's articles before they signed onboard. I want to be out of here within the hour. Prepare the ship for departure."
Appalled, though he was, at the fate that was about to befall his friend, Hunter had no choice but to comply with the order. There was no leeway to countermand a superior on a Deneban vessel. Distracted, he almost ran into Oberlieutenant Thomas as the ship's second came onto the bridge.
"Whoa there, you look a bit sick," remarked Thomas.
"I just heard a sentence of death proclaimed upon a friend," explained Hunter.
"Oh, you mean the old man is shipping the Lovella colonists onto Crom. I Figured he would. It's an old scam. The mining combines pay head money for colonists dropped there."
Hunter comprehended that well enough. He had wondered why Captain Voss had been so upset that they were carrying fewer convicts than usual. Doubtless, this opportunity to legitimize the dumping of the colonists on Crom would improve his mood. There was nothing to be done about it, though, and Hunter could not even vent his frustration. In the fleet's hierarchy, you did what was required of you, and kept your mouth shut about the rest.
It was a tricky business warping the massive ship off the weather shore. A wind had come up while they were docked and now in the last few minutes of daylight they were having to push through high waves to gain the deep water required for takeoff. No motion could be felt within the ship, but out there beyond the hull it was getting rougher and it required constant attention to keep her on a steady beam. He hoped that in the exercise of this task he would find absolution for his abandonment of his friend, but despite his preoccupation he found there was no relief to be had.
When the alert light on his wrist comm. blinked, he switched to reception and inquired what was wanted. "Security sir," came the crisp voice from the micro speaker. "We have a problem on steerage level. A possible mutiny. A group of colonists have disabled a security droid and stole its gamma ray gun. We have cornered them in an airlock, but they are standing us off with the gun and are demanding to be let out of the ship."
"Bloody hell. Who are they?" demanded Hunter.
"A Doctor Morris appears to be the ring leader. He's the one making the noise anyway. I can get you a complete list if you need it," replied the Provost Sergeant.
Hunter's heart sank. "No. That won't be necessary. Hold your position where you are. I'll be right down." He knew he had to hurry. Dr. Morris could not possibly know the extent of the trouble he was in. There would be no negotiations. Even if the fugitives held the robots off for a few minutes, the force of takeoff, which was due shortly, would put an end to their resistance. Mutiny was a capital offense on a Deneban ship and the court would observe no mitigation. How could they have expected to get away with a stunt like this? Their lives were as good as forfeit, every one of them, and there was nothing that he could do, but lead them to the executioner.
It was not far from his station to a transit kiosk, so he reached the lower deck within seconds. The provost sergeant, who had spoken to him earlier, was waiting at the terminus to meet him. "This way sir," he announced snapping a salute.
Hurrying after him, Hunter strapped on the force shield generator that the sergeant had brought him. Such gear was standard issue in a situation like this and it was no use to refuse the protection. Regulations required it. Arriving at the cordoned off section of deck fronting the airlock, Hunter found a couple dozen heavily armed troopers crouching behind blinds, while nearly as many droids were lined up in attack formation. All that could be seen of the dissidents was the barrel of a GRP cannon sticking out through a narrow gap in the partially opened airlock door.
"I'll talk to them," said Hunter, stepping up behind the nearest blind. "Hallo in there," he called. "This is Oberlieutenant Hunter, hold your fire, I'm coming in."
There was a pause and then Dr. Morris poked his head out. "Come in then, but tell those others to stay back. We will shoot if we have to," he warned.
Spreading his hands wide before him, Hunter stepped out into the corridor. The door opened enough to let him into the airlock where he found himself immediately accosted by two men who took his sidearm and frisk him in case of concealed weapons. Satisfied, they opened a way through the press of dissidents to where Dr. Morris was waiting. Their eyes met and Hunter could see the appeal in the older man's look. Beyond him, two men had been attempting to force the outside port, but paused now, evidentially having discovered the futility of their endeavour.
"Not a chance," responded Hunter to their unspoken query.
At that, one of the men stepped back from the port, but the other took a bar and began to pry once more. "What are our options?" demanded Dr. Morris, not looking much like he really wanted to know. Perspiring, he pushed his glasses back onto his forehead, and pulling out a handkerchief, began to mop his brow.
Hunter didn't answer. He couldn't find the words, but Dr. Morris could see the truth in his eyes. "For the love of God, Charles. They were going to dump us on Crom. Do you know what that would mean? I promised these people a better life. You have got to help us," he pleaded.
Hunter did not drop his eyes, but he didn't like having to say what had to be said. "There is no help," he told them at last.
Dr. Morris didn't know what to say, but the young man who had been working on opening the outside hatch came over and pointed an accusatory finger at Hunter. "You can open this hatch. We just want to get off the ship," he challenged.
"You don't understand. We are twenty miles out at sea preparing for takeoff. There is a God awful storm blowing and its night out there. That is no place that anyone would ever want to go," argued Hunter.
"And what are our alternatives?" demanded the young man.
"Surrender. You can't win a fight and this ship is about to take off. When it does, you will all be flattened by the force of liftoff. It will then just be a matter of slipping the cuffs on the survivors."
At that, the will appeared to have gone out of most of those around him, but the young man's determination did not waver. "It's either you open that portal for us or we die," he accused.
Dr. Morris appeared to have shrunk into his shoes. "Surely not, surely they will spare the children?" he groaned.
Hunter's gut twisted at the question. He knew only too well the answer to that. Fleet regulations had been written before anyone could have imagined a situation like this. There would be no leniency, not even for the children. It wasn't in the Articles.
In the midst of this thought the ship's klaxon sounded. That was it, liftoff was eminent and the onus of decision was upon him. "Alright," he conceded. "I'll do what I can. These overhead lockers contain life jackets. Put them on, everybody, and hook your safety line onto that cable running toward the hatch. Hurry now. I'll need help with these cylinders. They contain inflatable liferafts."
Everything was activity now. Those men who had been manning the GRP gun pulled it in and closed the door to the corridor. Hunter was wrestling a liferaft into position for launching while trying to show the dissidents how to do the same with several others. The rest were fashioning on life jackets while Dr. Morris was generally fretting about trying to make himself useful and succeeding mostly at making everybody else nervous around him.
Happening to find himself close to Hunter, he asked if they were letting him in for much trouble?
Hunter did not want to think about that. His career was ruined, that was a certainty, but they might spare his life if he could convince the authorities that the escape of the dissidents was a matter of incompetence rather than design. "I'll say I was overpowered," he replied, not seeing any point in burdening his friend with recriminations.
As soon as, the last cylinder was gotten onto the launch track, Hunter called for attention. "Listen up. I've only got enough time to say this once and I want to be understood," he announced. "Here's the drill. You will find a snaphook and line on your life jacket. Hook it to this overhead line. That is the safety line. It connects you to one another and to the rafts. When I open this hatch, the liferafts will launch and trail this line after them. You follow, men first, they will be needed to pull themselves onto the liferafts and help the others on after. Once onboard get out from beneath the disk of the ship as quickly as possible. You would not like to be there when the ship takes off."
Too bewildered to argue, the fugitives did as they were told, and waited while Hunter keyed a priority override sequence on his wrist comm. The hatch slid open and a wall of water, bleak and cold, surged in upon them. Hanging onto a stanchion, Hunter braced himself against the wash and leaned back as the liferafts whooshed through the opening past him, to disappear into the inky darkness beyond.
The first man in line balked at the impenetrable maw of emptiness that had opened before him. Not thinking this to be the time for niceties, Hunter pushed him through along with the backwash of the wave that had wetted them. Even as the wind ripped the scream from the man's lips, another person stepped forward to take his place. This one, a woman, looked drained as a corpse, but she made the leap on her own. One after another they brought their dread to that abysmal threshold and had to go through.
Hunter wasted no time on commiseration. The clock was winding down toward liftoff and before that could happen this hatch would close and nothing he could do would prevent it. Soon, only Dr. Morris and the terrified child he held clutched in his arms, remained to go. Seeing the old man's glasses hanging askew, Hunter snatched them off his face, and shoved them into the strip sealed pocket on his life jacket. In the next instant a wave hit them and everyone was swept, helter skelter, in the midst of the current.
Coming up gasping and spitting water, Hunter groped about for a hold against the resurgence. The lights had miraculously survived the wetting, so that as he shook the water from his eyes, he saw that the safety line to the rafts had broken. Dr. Morris was missing, but the little girl that he had been holding remained sprawled, half drowned, against a bulkhead. As the implications of this development struck him, the klaxon sounded its final warning and the hatch began to close.
There was no margin for consideration. Within the span of a single heartbeat, Hunter had to make a decision that would determine the course of everything that would come after. Against that, stood the life of the child, so that even as he reached for her, Hunter knew that there had really been no choice at all. Scooping her out of the backwash, he wrapt her in his arms, and dove through the hatch. The light blinked out as it snapped shut behind them and they found themselves falling in an abyss of inky blackness.
Down they plunged to splash into the cold of the water below. Like a folded fist, it hit them, knocking the breath from their lungs and enfolding them in its suffocating embrace. There could be, but one imperative and that was to reach the surface. That Hunter brought the child up with him was more a matter of entanglement than design.
There was not a great deal to be lauded when they did reach the surface, either. It was difficult to discern the margin between ocean and sky. The wind was blowing the spume off the waves and whipping it into their faces while the dark was as near to absolute as made no difference. They could hardly get a breath without tasting salty water and they were bobbing up and down like corks in a bottle. Fearing that they might be crushed between the waves and the overhang of the ship, Hunter began to swim, but with no real idea of where he was headed.
After a while he spotted a light flickering in the distance and turned toward that. The impulse engines on the Deneban Star were about to ignite and they had to be clear before then. He could only hope that those already in the rafts had had sense enough to have gotten themselves clear.
That he would reach his objective at all was by no means a certainty. Hunter found himself weighed down by his clothing and the little girl's life jacket had not been designed to carry the extra weight. Numbed by the cold, and straining just to keep his head above water, he was tiring quickly. It took every vestige of resolution he could summon to deny the lethergy that threatened to draw him down.
Then, with a shock, he felt himself slide off the face of a wave to come up hard against something firm, but resilient. Hands groped around him, but he rebounded and was swept away. "Damn. He's as slippery as a greased pig," exclaimed a voice from the darkness.
Remembering his force shield, Hunter switched it off. They had missed a chance, though, and the wave that had brought them so close to rescue began to carry them away. The rafts beckoning light might have been a star in the heaven for all that Hunter could do to reach it. Then, in the face of his desperation, the storm relented and the wave that followed brought them together again. This time the hands that reached for them did not lose their grip. They pulled the child up first and then strained to bring Hunter onboard after her.
Half drowned he slumped gasping on the floor of the raft and was sick. That the raft was overloaded, half full of water, and wallowing like a wounded cow in the troughs, still too close to the Deneban Star, was of no moment to him. He was alive and each breath was a blessing.
For those who had been onboard long enough to appreciate the desperation of their plight it was a different matter. There was little comfort here for any of them. They were exposed on the open ocean in the teeth of a driving storm and with the immediate threat to their lives having passed they were beginning to respond to their desolation. Drenched and cold, they found no solace in the howling maelstrom around them. Dread lay like a coiled beast in their hearts and only the utter stupefaction of their circumstances kept them from hysteria. They had ceased to imagine themselves the agency of their own salvation.
For Hunter, however, the habits of training and conditioning were powerful countermands to such resignation, so that as soon as he came to himself again he realized that he must take charge. "We have to get out from under the disk of the ship," he shouted over the howl of the storm, as he undid the tie downs on the paddles at the sides of the raft, and distributed them among the most likely of the refugees around him. Getting those in the other rafts to respond was a more difficult undertaking. Although the safety line ran taught between them, the darkness and the storm forged such a gulf that they might as well have been worlds apart.
With two men pulling in on the line, and with him shouting himself horse, he finally did make himself heard, however. Using his paddle to extinguish the beacon light on his own raft, he exhorted the others to do the same. The authorities on the Deneban Star were not just going to let this desertion run by them unchallenged. If the sea were calm, or if it were daylight, Captain Voss would have simply sent out a launch to pick them up, but under the circumstances Hunter hoped that would not be possible. He would probably satisfy himself with sniping at them as they came out from under the ship and those beacons were a dead giveaway.
It was therefore with some relief that he saw the other lights blink out one after another as well. Either the storm would hide them or it would not. There was nothing more that he could do to effect that now. Hypothermia was another consideration, however, and that could be dealt with. There was no need for the refugees to die of exposure when the liferafts were equipped with survival gear. Fumbling with the latches on one of the floor lockers, he finally managed to pry it open and pulled out the waterproof sleeping bags that were stored within. Each was equipped with its own heating unit, but he left those be for the moment. No need to give the Deneban Star any unnecessary signatures for her scanners to latch onto. Just getting everybody into them would have to suffice for the moment.
There were not actually enough bags to go around. The paddlers were not in immediate need, though, and they could double up later. Assuming that there was a later. The sudden glare of light from above alerted them that they had more immediate problems to concern them than the cold. They had come out from under the rim to find searchlights probing the darkness. Flicking from wave crest to wave crest, the beams lit the peaks, but it remained mostly dark in the troughs. Hunter hoped that this would be enough to hide them.
Whether that was what saved them, was not certain, but what was, was that the engines of the big ship suddenly ignited. With a roar that muted the storm, they beat the waves beneath her into flattened submission. Gathering herself, she rose slowly, pulling her huge bulk out of the water, and began the hard climb up through the atmosphere toward the freedom of open space.
Buffeted in her wash, the refugees watched her go. Looming above them, its massive underbelly blazed with an inferno glow, while a halo of ghostly light rimmed the disk, and reflected eerily off the clouds further up. Hesitating, as if to brace itself against the contradiction of its immensity, it paused for an instant, and then forged upward through the clouds and was gone.
Hunter shivered into the vacuity of its passing. With that ship went his career, his ambitions, everything that had until scant minutes ago occupied the focus of his life. The others were too numbed to comment. These were simple people, indentured workers from the agricultural combines mostly, completely unprepared for the gulf that the ship's parting had opened before them.
Recalling his situation, Hunter saw that their plight left no allowance for unproductive ruminations. They would have to fight if they wished to survive and they had a long hard night left before them. Setting a couple men to bail the raft he showed the others how to activate the heating units on their survival bags and then routing about in the lockers, located and pulled out a couple flashlights, along with packages of rations. With the heat from the bags, and a little food in their stomachs, their plight would at least be made more bearable.
Doctor Morris was not in this raft and Hunter had no way of knowing whether he had made it into another. Neither could anyone account for the parents of the little girl that Hunter had rescued. With only six bags and seven passengers, Hunter had made room in his own bag for her, so that she was clinging to him now with a desperation that completely unnerved him. He wasn't ready for anything like this. He could only hope that morning would reveal her parents safely aboard another raft.
Continuing unabated, the storm tossed them this way and that, sweeping them before it like a cork in a stream. For the most part, the refugees had given into their lethergy, lying cramped together trying to sleep and otherwise coping with their misery as best they could. Hunter could hardly think. He was trying to inventory their resources, but his mind refused to co-operate. He kept losing track, and shaking himself, would have to start over. Except for the flashlights they had no light, and wanting to conserve these, he was obliged to construct his list from memory. Aside from the survival bags, and rations, they had water, a desalinator, a medical kit, a small heater for cooking ,and a dozen other items which the fleet had deemed necessary for someone stranded on an alien shore. They had even been provided with firearms. Automatic rifles and lots of ammunition, very reassuring in a land that boasted no animal life forms larger than a microbe.
His mind drifted and other concerns intruded upon his consciousness. He knew better than anyone else how disparate their situation actually was. They would come ashore, if they came ashore at all, in a barren land. They had no supplies beyond what was in the emergency lockers in the rafts. Everything meant to sustain them during the tentative years of colonization was still on the Deneban Star. There was nothing to hunt, no seeds to plant, and little in the line of edible flora to harvest. They might fish, but the viability of that option had not been tested. There were few places in which access to the sea would be possible in any case. He had studied the maps and knew that the coast ran on and on in an almost unbroken rampart of sheer cliffs and treacherous reefs. The storm was pushing them toward that shore and he hoped that it would be daylight before they reached it. He did not relish facing such an inhospitable coast in the dark.
There was no way of gauging their progress. The night was dark as pitch and the waves jerked and spun them about in dizzying confusion. Sleep was impossible for him. With every lift and fall of the heaving sea he expected to be dashed to his doom on some invisible peril. It was exhausting and more nerves than his own were frayed by the time a tinge of light oozed over the Eastern horizon to precurse the dawning day.
Slowly the silhouettes of the other rafts came into view. Hunter counted, but the number would not come out right. He had launched six rafts and now, no matter how hard he stared, he could only make out five. This fact had not escaped the notice of the other refugees, either. Everybody was peering into the gloom trying to discern whether loved ones and friends were safe.
Dr. Morris was among them, but the look that Hunter saw etched upon the old man's features was unsettling in the extreme. Gripping the side of his raft, he was staring out over the water with such intensity, that Hunter found himself turning to see what it was that had inspired such a paroxysm of horror, and there, looming out of the gloaming of the misting light, was a precipitous headland.
Up and up, the cold stone rose from out of the sea ,while huge breakers foamed at its root. There appeared to be no hope of avoiding being toppled into that boiling maelstrom. They were already close and every wave was driving them closer. Paddling proved useless against the strength of the current ,so that getting themselves clear of their survival bags was about all the refugees could do in preparations for the impending catastrophe.
It wasn't long coming, either. Suddenly, a huge breaker took hold of the rafts and carried them upon its crest toward the shore. The more intrepid of the refugees continued to paddle, but it was no use. Almost too late, Hunter realised that they were going over and dropping his paddle, barely had the chance to get a grip upon the little girl he had saved the previous night, before the wave broke and pitched them together into the froth.
Cursing and praying, he went under, to be driven this way and that against his volition in the wash. Gasping for breath, he hung onto the child clawing his way to the surface, but barely got a breath before he was pulled back under by the undertow. Another wave hit and he found himself torpedoed forward upon the surge. With lungs burning and eyes blinded by the froth, it seemed he must eventually succumb, but then the impetus lessoned and he found himself gasping for breath on a shoaling ledge.
Finding his footing, he lifted the little girl with him from the water, and staggered blindly against the wash. With salt stinging his eyes and hair plastered across his face, he could barely make out which way to go, so that had it not been for the help of others, who had escaped the waves before him, he might have staggered back into the surf. As it was, he was able to climb higher up the ledge beyond the reach of the waves before collapsing, coughing water and gasping for air, but thankful to be alive. For a time that was all that he could do, but recollection of the situation that still confronted them soon roused him from his stupor.
Struggling to his knees he found that the girl had fared worse than he had. She needed respiration so that it wasn't until a few minutes later that he was sure enough of her safety to offer his assistance to others. Some of these were still in the water and needed help badly. That any of them had escaped death was an almost miraculous stroke of fortune. They had been swept into a declivity in the cliffs that had not been visible from the open ocean. Here, a small ledge jutted out from the base of the cliff to provide a place of refuge above the waves. It was even more fortunate that one of the rafts had reached the ledge right side up. Her crew had hardly even been wetted, so that they had been able to go immediately to the rescue of those less fortunate than themselves. One of these people had even had the presence of mind to tie the line of rafts to the shore, preventing them from being carried out again in the resurgence.
The rescue was still in progress, and having done what he could for the child, Hunter struggled to his feet to see what remained to be done. With his legs feeling like rubber he had to reach deep within himself to find the fortitude to go back into the water, but seeing the orange of a life jacket within reach, he waded out to where a woman was foundering in the surf and caught her hand. So powerful was the undertow that the best he could do was hang on and anchor them both against the resurgence until another rescuer came out to assist him. Together they wrestled the woman ashore and then went back to do the same for another.
This one was so distraught that had the young man not been able to subdue her she might have pulled them both in with her. Finding himself completely spent, Hunter could do no more than to stagger to the ledge and collapse against the cliff, as others continued with the rescue. A final child was pulled from the water, but the tell tale flash of orange on the swell further out indicated that not all their efforts had been successful.
Hunter could have wept. Thinking that there must be something more he could do, he dragged himself to his feet, but he was not prepared for the vehemence of the white-faced woman who suddenly flung herself upon him. "It's you that did this to us," she screamed as she pommelled him upon the chest with blows that at another time would have proven completely ineffectual. As it was, he was beaten back and had not the woman's husband come to his rescue, he would have been felled by her frenzy.
"That's our child out there. She's not her right self just now," he placated, as he dragged her off.
Hunter had no words for that. Looking about, he saw the echo of the woman's accusation in the eyes of many others. Dr. Morris crouched near by, averting his gaze, and saying nothing. For the rest, they appeared too sunken in their desolation to offer reproach. Hunter hardly knew which way he should turn, but then he felt a tug on his leg. The little girl that he had rescued had come over to him and thrown her arms around him.
"Her name's Micel," volunteered Dr. Morris. "Her parents are missing. Oh God! It wasn't supposed to be like this."
Stooping, Hunter picked her up and as he straightened the young man who had challenged him to let them off the ship the night before came over and told him that the tide was coming in. Cold spume was already spraying over them so that it was clear that their position was not going to remain tenetable for long. The alternative appeared to be a hard climb up the cliff, an option that Hunter thought as impracticable as it would have been to launch the rafts back into the storm driven breakers.
Looking up, the young man allowed that he had done some climbing. "Arrens the name," he added, offering Hunter his hand. "There is plenty of rope in the rafts. If I make it to the top, I can drop a line down and we can pull those who can't manage the climb up afterward."
There was reassurance in that grip. Nodding his assent, Hunter was glad to relinquish the lead in this undertaking. Even the thought of attempting that climb made him queasy.
Except for the one raft that had come through the surf right side up, all the others had capsized, and now lay either swamped or bottom up amid the backwash. Sheltered by the defile, it was easy enough to pull the first two out of the water, but the third came harder. When they turned it over, they found the body of a woman who had become missing in the confusion of the landing. Still in her survival bag, she had not had any chance to save herself. Benumbed, the refugees stood staring at her, while her brother broke down and cried.
"Pull her out. We will take her up with us," commanded Hunter, prodding them to action. There was no time for remorse. Arren had not yet made it a third of the way up the cliff and waves were already lapping around their ankles. Necessity was pressing hard upon them and they could not afford to falter. Collecting them together for warmth and mutual support, he ordered those who still had their faculties about them to prepare slings for the impending rescue operation.
By looking straight up, he could see that Arren was finding the climbing difficult. With no proper gear to aid him, and having to carry a heavy coil of rope up with him, he was making slow progress. Groping for hand and toe holds where Hunter could see none he kept at it, however, until finally he shinnied the last few feet and disappeared over the ridge. A few seconds later his head reappeared over the edge, and looking down, he dropped the rope to those below.
Catching the end, Hunter tied on a heavier line which he had rigged with pullies, and waited while Arren pulled it up and secured it. With that in place, they could assist the harnessed climbers, or even pull them up where necessary. The tide was rising quickly, though, so that if they were not efficient they might still be in trouble. A couple of men went up first to help with the lifting and then came the children in the slings.
They went up scared and not without a few scrapes or bruises, but they went up nevertheless. The women followed, but the threat to those still on the ledge was worsening. Fearful that they would be swept away, a few of the more intrepid of the men attempted to free climb the cliff as Arren had, but inevitably slowed the proceedings as each in turn got stuck and had to be rescued.
In the end, just two men besides Hunter were left to ascend. The waves were becoming extremely threatening. They had to cling to the cliff each time one broke, and yet Hunter was not satisfied just to get the people up. He knew that they would need the rafts and the supplies they carried in the days to come. Wrestling them into place between the breakers, he tied them onto the rope, and had them hoisted up one by one after the refugees. They got three of them up that way before one of the remaining men lost his nerve and fled up the rope himself. The second man lasted another couple of waves and another raft before he deserted, leaving Hunter to deal with the last raft alone.
He could appreciate the trepidation that had prompted the desertions, but he knew better than they how desperately they needed to complete this operation. Determined to see it through, he hauled the remaining raft toward the cliff and managed to secure it to the line just before the next wave broke. Spilling over him like a tsunami, it all but washed him off the ledge before it receded. Even then it was about all he could do to drag himself to the rescue line and tie himself into the sling before the next wave hit. After that, he just hung on and let himself be pulled up along with the raft.
Reaching the summit, he flopped down on the earth, and hugged it as he would a lover. No one seemed to be thinking beyond their relief, which right now, felt like salvation. Having given themselves over to their exhaustion they lay where they had dropped and no one wanted to move. If all the world had fallen on him, Hunter would not have felt less like rousing himself. After a while he noticed that Micel had come over and lay down beside him. Forlorn and dazed, she seemed inadequate to the ordeal that had overtaken her. It occurred to him that he had not heard her speak since they had left the ship. He wondered if she could speak.
Forcing himself to sit up, he took a long look at her. She could not be much more than four years old. A pretty thing, but not a responsibility he wanted to take on just now. What she needed was her parents. He could only hope that the same tide which had brought the rest of them to safety had brought them to shore somewhere else along the coast. If that were the case, he supposed, then it was likely that they were in need of assistance.
Groaning, he pulled himself to his feet and stood unsteadily looking about him. They were on high ground here and so had a fair view of the landscape around them. From this height the white flecked ocean beneath them appeared less threatening. The sun had burst over the horizon in an explosion of fiery hues lighting the arid waste inland beyond where they had come ashore. Nothing lived in that direction. It was a vast sterile desert, a place of glass and crystal where silicates had run riot, vanquishing carbon entirely. It was as hot as an oven in there, not a place where any person would want to be. Only, this narrow strip along the coast was congenial to life. The terrain was mostly savanna, in some places approaching a desert itself with thorns and cactus commanding the vegetation, while in other places patches of greenery showed more promise. They had come ashore in the midst of a particularly narrow strip of near desert, where long defiles, like the one by which they had come ashore, had cut far inland. The missing raft might lay hidden in any of these.
Arren was stirring too. After coiling the ropes and pullies by which they had climbed the cliffs, he came over and inquired whether he might help to inventory the supplies. With Hunters assent they went to the rafts together and pulled out the contents of one of the emergency lockers. There wasn't a lot, but each item had been included with a purpose, and these things might well make the difference between survival and death.
Picking up a rifle Arren pulled back the bolt to examen the firing mechanism. Clearly he knew what he was about, but Hunter did not see much use in that. "You aren't going to find anything worth shooting at around here," he told him.
Shrugging, Arren stuffed a couple of loaded clips in his pocket. "Something to lean on, then," he asserted.
Hunter didn't argue. He wondered if his own sidearm, which he had noticed tucked into the belt of one of the men, as he scaled the cliff, had survived its double wetting. He would have to get it back. He might need it later when the Deneban authorities came looking for him. Right now he needed the binoculars from the survival kit more than he needed a gun. That and a canteen, some rations and a medical kit would do for the moment. Seeing that some of the others among the refugees were beginning to revive, he got them up and dividing them into three
separate groups, began to prepare a search for the missing colonists. One group would go north, while another went south, with the remainder staying behind to set up a camp.
It was decided that Hunter would lead those going south, himself, and he asked Arren to come with him. Dr. Morris insisted that he should be included in one of the search groups and after a moment of hesitation Hunter decided to take him as well. If the search became protracted, the old man might prove a liability, but on the other hand, Hunter wanted to talk to him in private. They were going to have to make some hard decisions soon and Hunter wanted the doctor on side before he made any announcements.
The coast ran away from them in a long sweeping curve, revealing the cliffs for miles along its surf -washed shore, but no matter how long they scanned the breakers through the binoculars, nothing resembling the missing liferaft presented itself to their view. This was no evidence that those they sought were not out there, however. Anything could lay hidden in those deep cut declivities. They would have to search each one individually. It was easy going at first, but as they progressed the terrain worsened, and after a while Dr. Morris began to show signs of fatigue. Hunter suggested that they should take a rest, but the old man would have none of that. Refusing to admit that he was tired, he forged doggedly ahead. Shaking his head, Hunter let him go, until at the end of another hour, with it becoming obvious that the doctor was at the end of his tether, Hunter did call a halt.
"I can keep up," protested Dr. Morris, but there was nothing of conviction in his assertion. Slumping onto the sunburnt grass he pulled his glasses off his face and began to mop his brow.
"We have to talk," remonstrated Hunter, who found a warm rock and sat down beside him.
Arren, however, with the impatience and the vigour of youth, was not content to just sit idly by while the two men chatted. Saying that he would explore a little further ahead, he went off, leaving the two to have their discussion.
Hunter opened his canteen and handed it to Dr. Morris. Accepting it with a muttered thanks, the old man took a long drink and passed it back. "Bloody mess," he said. "I am sorry I dragged you into it."
"What's done is done. I made my own decision," replied Hunter.
Doctor Morris sighed. "If only it could be as easy as that. No; this is a nightmare. People have died and it's all my fault. I dragged them out here and look at you; the most promising young officer in the fleet; and I've ruined that. What will I say to your father if I ever see him again?"
Hunter ignored the question. He saw no point in voicing recriminations and they were in enough difficulties as it was without encouraging contrition. Instead, he asked what he planned to do now that they had reached the shore?
"Find the base, I suppose. I really hadn't thought beyond getting off the ship," he admitted.
Hunter shook his head. "They are going to come after us," he told him.
"Do you think so? Surely we are not that important. We were scheduled to disembark here anyway."
Hunter said nothing. He did not consider such naivety worthy of a comment. "Well, you would know, I suppose," conceded Dr. Morris at last. "I guess we will have to hide. It is a big continent after all."
Hunter threw a stone at a bush a little distance from them, and missing, stood up in agitation. "Hide, not bloody likely," he retorted. "They will have left surveillance satellites to watch us. There is no cover to speak of anywhere along this coast and not much chance of escaping their notice if there was. We've got about as long as it takes them to get word of our desertion back to security, and for them to send a cruiser out here to pick us up, to come up with something better than that."
Dr. Morris didn't have anything to say to that. He just sat staring at Hunter like a lost child at a stranger. Hunter didn't know what to tell him either. He had a couple of ideas, but none of them offered much cause for optimism. Taking another turn, he alluded to the mystery of the missing colonists. "We still don't know what happened to them. Perhaps it was some sort of exotic disease. We may be infected already," he speculated.
"No; not disease," responded Dr. Morris. "I did the tests on the survivors you sent on board. That's how I found out about Crom. There was no evidence of physiological disorders other than malnutrition on any of them."
"What then?" mused Hunter, but at that moment his speculation was interrupted by a shout from across the defile. Arren was gesturing for them to come around, and putting other considerations aside, they hurried to do so.
"Got something here," he announced as they reached him.
Looking down toward the surf far below, where he was pointing, they saw what appeared to be a large portion of an overturned liferaft. Beside it, a splotch of vermillion caught in the foam revealed what was unmistakably a life jacket. There was no sign of bodies, but the raft appeared to have been torn apart.
Raising his binoculars to take a better look, Hunter saw nothing to reassure him. With each lift of the surge the raft rose like some breaching sea creature and then slipped back into the froth. It had not been torn in two. It had been bitten and that was only a portion of a life jacket. Something had cut right through the straps that held it together.
Grimacing, Hunter supposed he might have to reconsider his notion of attempting an escape by water. If the ocean around here harbored predators that could do that to the resilient fibres of a liferaft, then that about shut the door on that option.
"Dear Lord. I don't suppose that it is likely that anyone is still alive down there," stammered Dr. Morris.
"Only one way to find out," replied Arren, uncoiling a length of rope in preparation for making a descent. The other two watched as he went down. After a while he dropped below their line of sight and Dr. Morris turned away as if he could not bear to witness the confirmation of his foreboding. Moving a little ways back from the edge of the cliff, he slumped down heavily on an exposed boulder.
Hunter followed. He could imagine what his friend was feeling, but this was no time to lose his composure. If there was anybody alive down there, they were going to need a doctor. "Pull yourself together," he commanded. "People are relying on you."
"They're dead. They're all dead. Eight of them and there is not one person back at camp who won't be touched by this," he whimpered, but Hunter did not register his complaint.
His attention had suddenly been diverted by a disturbance in the shrub further inland. Something very large was coming toward them. Crashing through the bushes, it sounded very close, and yet, stare as he would, he could see nothing of the creature itself.
Bewildered, he reached for his handgun, and found nothing but an empty holster, even as, to his astonishment, his eyes revealed a marvel that chilled him right to the marrow. There, appearing as if by magic in the dirt before him, were huge three-toed footprints, and they were headed in fathom length strides straight at him.