Part 29 (1/2)

”Didn't know any better? They're savages.” Mandy's voice rose. ”They deserve to be wiped off theface of the planet.”

”I know how you feel,” Jacob said.

”Apache Oneto control. ” Mandy spoke into the communicator.

”Go, Mandy,” Rodrick said.

”Are you going to let these savages get away to attack again without warning?” she asked.

Rodrick was silent for a moment. ”How are you, Mandy? Are you injured?”

”I'm fine,” she said. ”Duncan, they killed over two hundred people. You must kill them. You must wipe them out totally.”

”Mandy, I want you to relax. As soon as we can we'll get you back here,” Rodrick said.

”Don't try to humor me,” she hissed. ”I saw it. I saw them ax down women and children.”

”Jacob, will you please take the communicator from Dr. Miller?” Rodrick asked. ”Control out.”

Grace Monroe, still in her wedding dress, came onto the bridge ahead of Max.

Max took a look at the pictures being transmitted by the scouts, scratched his mussed hair, and said, ”Must be hydrogen. One burst of fire, and they'd go up like blazes.”

”Clay Girard put an explosive round into one up north,” Rodrick said. ”It didn't burn.”

”Helium?”

”Or something we don't know about, Max.”

”And spears,” Grace said, shaking her head. ”It doesn't make sense.”

”That's why I'm not ordering them to be exterminated,” Rodrick said. ”We might have to kill a few of them, because there's a fleet of them twice this size moving in from the sea.”

”Fascinating,” Grace said. ”Humanoid?”

”Arms and legs like sticks, like the ill.u.s.trations from Stoner's Valley. Huge, protruding, faceted eyes.

Almost like insect eyes,” Rodrick said.

”We must contact them,” Grace said. ”They're an intelligent, alien race. We're the ones who have invaded their planet.”

”I'm more than willing to talk,” Rodrick said, ”if we can find a way to make them understand.”

”Capture one,” Max suggested. ”Let Grace have a go at him with her translation machine.”

”I won't endanger anyone,” Rodrick said. ”Fair enough.”

”Let's find out what the fleet coming in from the sea makes of antiaircraft fire,” Rodrick said. ”Fire control and Mopro.” Paul and Mopro reported. ”When the fleet from the sea closes, put up a curtain of air bursts, high explosives. Do not shoot to hit. Just put a curtain of bursts in front of them.”

It happened quickly. The fleet from the sea, riding the prevailing winds, closed fast, and there was a roar of sound as theSpirit of America 's weapons joined Mopro's.

”Well, they're not dumb,” Max said, as the fleet veered northward, Jack Purdy'sDinahmite keeping between the fleet and Hamilton City.

”Apache One, ” Rodrick called. ”We want live prisoners. Put a hole in a gasbag and bring it down. Then use stunners. Try to pick one close to the city. We'll send out a capture party by crawler.”

”Roger,” Jacob said. ”I think I've got the leader spotted, Cap'n. His s.h.i.+p is all red. The others are painted blue and white, like clouds and sky.”

”You should be putting explosive rounds into the gondolas,” Mandy complained, as Jacob flew to the red airs.h.i.+p and put a hole a yard wide in the gasbag. The s.h.i.+p quickly settled. Before it hit the ground, stickmen began to leave it on their gliding wings, andApache One joined the other scouts in low-level runs to stun each of the flyers as he hit the ground.

The remaining s.h.i.+ps of the fleet allowed the wind to blow them toward the west. Jacob keptApache One in position until the crawlers from Hamilton reached the scene and began to load the stunned stickmen.

Duncan Rodrick helped lift one of the stickmen, who was light, weighing only about sixty pounds, with hard, scaly skin. The eyes were like the enlarged eyes of an insect. One had suffered a broken arm in landing, and a yellowish liquid oozed from the compound fracture.

Each captive was immobilized with many bands of tape around arms and body and legs.

”Skipper,” Paul Warden said when the stickmen were all loaded, ”it looks as if we're going to have to share this planet with a race evolved from insects.”

IV.

THE WHORSK.

TWENTY.

Grace Monroe had changed to slacks and blouse. Max thought she looked more beautiful than ever with her musing, thoughtful face bent toward a stickman lying, carefully trussed, on an examination table. Maxhad helped her attach the brain scanner on the pointed, hairless head. He took his eyes off Grace and watched the feedback being made by a marker on a roll of paper.

”High nodes,” he grunted. ”I think he's coming around.”

Adam Hook, the colony's sergeant at arms, a short, round man with a bulldog face, was standing at the foot of the examination table, well armed, ready for anything. The strength of the stickman was not known. Max, too, wore a sidearm.

”I want to take a look at Mandy,” Grace said. ”Call me when he's conscious, will you, Max?”

”Happy wedding day,” Max said, saluting, but he grinned. He knew that everyone was pitching in. His fellow groom, Duncan, was south of the city, with a medical party and a heavily armed guard, doing a distasteful ch.o.r.e. Over two hundred bodies, some of them in shocking states of mutilation, had to be bagged and returned for burial. Hamilton's cemetery was going to be well populated, and far sooner than anyone had imagined. One-sixth of the strength of the colony had been decimated in one hour.

Mandy's hospital bed was empty. Grace walked rapidly to the operating room, and there she was, in white, limping around, one knee swollen to twice its normal size.

”Mandy, what the h.e.l.l do you think you're doing?” Grace demanded.

”We tried to keep her out,” said Dr. Robert Allano.

”I feel better working, Grace,” Mandy said. ”I'm all right. Tired. That's all.”

The stickman with the broken arm was lying on the operating table. ”All we could do was put the break back in place,” said Dr. Norman Jacks, the top bone specialist on the Life Sciences staff. ”That stopped the oozing of fluid.”