Part 18 (1/2)

”The Sea Maid has told us that this s.h.i.+p sits on the bottom of the harbor. If we could board it--” began Torgul.

”Yes!” Vistur brought his fist down against the end of the bunk on which the Terran still sat, jarring the dull, drug-borne pain in Ross's head.

”Take it--then turn it against its crew!”

There was an eagerness in all Rover faces. For that was a game the Hawaikan seafarers understood: Take an enemy s.h.i.+p and turn its armament against its companions in a fleet. But that plan would not work out.

Ross had a healthy respect for the technical knowledge of the galactic invaders. Of course he, Karara, even Loketh might be able to reach the sub. Whether they could then board her was an entirely different matter.

Now the Polynesian girl shook her head. ”The broadcast there--Tino-rau rates it as lethal. There are dead fish floating in the bay. He had warning at the reef entrance. Without a s.h.i.+eld, there will be no way of getting in.”

”Might as well wish for a depth bomb,” Ross began and then stopped.

”You have thought of something?”

”A s.h.i.+eld--” Ross repeated her words. It was so wild this thought of his, and one which might have no chance of working. He knew almost nothing about the resources of the invaders. Could that broadcast which protected the sub and perhaps activated the weapons of the invaders ash.o.r.e be destroyed? A wall of fish--sea life herded in there as a s.h.i.+eld ... wild, yes, even so wild it might work. Ross outlined the idea, speaking more to Karara than to the Rovers.

”I do not know,” she said doubtfully. ”That would need many fish, too many to herd and drive----”

”Not fish,” Torgul cut in, ”salkars!”

”Salkars?”

”You have seen the bow carving on this s.h.i.+p. That is a salkar. Such are larger than a hundred fis.h.!.+ Salkars driven in ... they might even wreck this undersea s.h.i.+p with their weight and anger.”

”And you can find these salkars near-by?” Ross began to take fire. That dragon which had hunted him--the bulk of the thing was well above any other sea life he had seen here. And to its ferocity he could give testimony.

”At the sp.a.w.ning reefs. We do not hunt at this season which is the time of the taking of mates. Now, too, they are easily angered so they will even attack a cruiser. To slay them at present is a loss, for their skins are not good. But they would be ripe for battle were they to be disturbed.”

”And how would you get them from the sp.a.w.ning reefs to Kyn Add?”

”That is not too difficult; the reef lies here.” Torgul drew lines with the point of his sword on the table top. ”And here is Kyn Add. Salkars have a great hunger at this time. Show them bait and they will follow; especially will they follow swimming bait.”

There were a great many holes in the plan which had only a halfway chance of working. But the Rovers seized upon it with enthusiasm, and so it was set up.

Perhaps some two hours later Ross swam toward the land ma.s.s of Kyn Add.

Gleams of light p.r.i.c.ked on the sh.o.r.e well to his left. Those must mark the Rover settlement. And again the Terran wondered why the invaders had remained there. Unless they knew that there had been three cruisers out on a raid and for some reason they were determined to make a complete mop-up.

Karara moved a little to his right, Taua between them, the dolphin's super senses their guide and warning. The swiftest of the cruisers had departed, Loketh on board to communicate with Tino-rau in the water.

Since the male dolphin was the best equipped to provide a fox for salkar hounds, he was the bait for this weird fis.h.i.+ng expedition.

”No farther!” Ross's sonic p.r.i.c.ked a warning against his body. Through that he took a jolt which sent him back, away from the bay entrance.

”On the reef.” Karara's tapped code drew him on a new course. Moments later they were both out of the water, though the wash of waves over their flippered feet was constant. The rocks among which they crouched were a rough harborage from which they could see the sh.o.r.e as a dark blot. But they were well away from the break in the reef through which, if their outlandish plan succeeded, the salkars would come.

”A one-in-a-million chance!” Ross commented as he put up his mask.

”Was not the whole Time Agent project founded on just such chances?”

Karara asked the right question. This was Ross's kind of venture. Yes, one-in-a-million chances had been pulled off by the Time Agents. Why, it had been close to those odds against their ever finding what they had first sought along the back trails of time--the wrecked s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps.