Revolt on Alpha C Page 6

  He’s not the game-playing kind,” Larry said. He fingered the fine controls on the guitar, trying to restore the sound. There was no improvement.

  “It seems to be in tune. But the sounds are coming out sour.”

  “I know,” Larry said. “Maybe there’s something broken in the soundbox. There’s a little latch under here—”

  He reached in and groped around in the heart of the guitar. “There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong in here—uh—” he reached a little deeper in—“oh, here’s the trouble! There’s a piece of something wedged in here that’s been ruining the sound. Wonder why O Hare didn’t take it out before he gave me the guitar?”

  Larry drew forth a folded piece of paper and closed the latch on the guitar. He strummed the guitar once again, and this time the sound was quite satisfactory. Then, remembering the piece of paper he had taken out, he put down the guitar and unfolded the grimy sheet.

  He stared at it. It was a letter, written painstakingly in O’Hare’s flourishing script. Larry read it through twice without saying a word, and looked at it a third time almost uncomprehending.

  “Why—I don’t believe it,” Larry said. He held the paper out and scanned it once again.

  What does it say, Larry?” Harl asked softly.

  “Yeah. Why the mystery?” Heitor put in.

  “I’m sorry. Here—I’ll read it out loud. ‘Dear Larry,’ it says. ‘I hope you won’t hold it against O’Hare for what he’s done. Maybe they haven’t missed me yet, but pretty soon they’ll find out I’m gone. And you can show them this, after I’m gone.

  “ ‘I’ve switched sides, lad. I want you to tell that to Reinhardt and anyone else who’s interested. That was my whole idea in coming along on this voyage. I saw from the beginning that it was what I’ve always wanted to do. I’ve decided to join the revolutionaries on Alpha C and help them in their fight for independence.

  Larry paused and tried to piece together the fragments of his world. Harl was staring solemnly at him; even Heitor was frozen and grim.

  “ ‘I Know how you feel about all this,’ ” Larry continued reading. You probably think I’m a traitor to Earth, a rebel and all the rest, and you’re wondering how your pal O’Hare could have done it. Well, if the word pleases you, call me a rebel. I’m only doing what I have to do. Someday you’ll learn that everyone has to do what he has to do, and that day you’ll wake up.”

  “What does he mean by that?” Larry asked.

  “Finish reading,” Harl said.

  “ ‘O’Hares have always been—well, rebels, and I can’t let my father down any more than you can. I can’t accept any hard and fast rules when I can see better things beyond. The Clan O’Hare is moving to the stars for good. I won’t be coming back to Earth.

  “ ‘Don’t be angry with me, lad. We all do what we have to do, and this I must do. Just as you must go to space and serve the Patrol. Have a long and great career, Larry, and keep that guitar well-tuned. Your friend always, Patrick O’Hare.’ ”

  Larry put down the letter.

  “I never dreamed he’d do anything like that.”

  “I did. He told me about it a long time ago,” Harl said. “He was planning to do it all along.”

  “He never told me,” Larry said. “He never told me.” He stood still, looking at the letter, acutely conscious that O’Hare’s stunning personal rebellion made an impression on him that not even Browne’s impassioned plea for freedom had. He had felt toward O’Hare as he’d felt toward few people before, and here was O’Hare running oft to join the rebels too. When he got back to Earth Larry had planned to tell his father all about O’Hare, hoping to get him a promotion of some sort. But he knew now that his father would never have approved of his friendship with O’Hare in the first place. O’Hare was a tubemonkey, not a Patrolman. Just a big ox who cleaned the jets.

  And now he would be fighting against Earth. Sudden tears blinded Larry’s eyes, and anger filled him and drove all else from his mind. O’Hare couldn’t! He couldn’t join the rebels! For a moment Larry hated the big fellow for running away to London Colony. He was destroying everything Larry held most dear. He had no right to—

  Suddenly Larry was conscious of his two roommates standing silently and staring at him. They didn’t understand, he thought. No one did. But maybe there was still time. Maybe.

  He moved abruptly to the door.

  CHAPTER 10

  “WHERE ARE YOU going?” Harl asked.

  To tell Reinhardt. He’ll be able to keep O’Hare from getting a copter, if he’s not gone yet.”

  Harl moved between Larry and the door. “You mean you’d report O’Hare to the captain? He’s your own friend!”

  Larry looked at Harl. The short, squat Martian had the door blocked. Heitor circled uncertainly somewhere behind.

  “Get out of my way, Harl.”

  Harl made no move. Larry stepped forward and tried to push him, but he was firmly planted and Larry could not budge him.

  “You’re a traitor too!” Larry said. He could hardly see from rage; somewhere in the back of his mind he knew that he was hopelessly ensnarled in something he did not understand, but now all he was conscious of was that he had to get through that door.

  He grabbed Harl by the arm and tried to twist him away from the door. The Martian was barely five-six, and Larry was an even six feet tall, but Larry knew Harl outweighed him considerably and his muscles, trained under the rigorous gravity of Jupiter, would serve him much better on this heavy world than Larry’s Earth-trained ones.

  Harl gave a little and backed away, taking Larry with him. Larry succeeded in pushing Harl toward the center of the room and tried to break away and dash through the door. But Harl held him fast. Larry tugged but could not break loose.

  Harl drew Larry to him the way a fisherman would reel in a fish, and held him. Larry managed to work one arm loose from Harl’s grip and push away with it, levering off Harl’s chest. He widened the gap between them and with a sudden twist got his other arm loose. They circled each other, breathing hard, Larry trying to break past Harl to the door and Harl waging a defensive fight to keep Larry in the room.

  Larry looked at his short adversary. Harl’s darkskinned face was set in an iron mask of concentration. Time was on his side, and he only had to keep Larry under control. Larry felt all of his anger and frustration rush to the surface. Harl, his adversary in argument all through the voyage, had now become his physical adversary as well.

  Larry dashed at Harl as hard as he could, hitting him amidships with his shoulder. A bolt of pain shot down Larry’s arm, and Harl went spinning across the room to crash against the wall. He hit hard and stayed there a moment, and Larry rushed to the door, only to find Heitor standing by the door with a confused expression on his face, as if he did not know whose side to take in the struggle. Larry shoved him aside and, just as Harl recovered himself and headed for him, he opened the door.

  He dashed through, Harl following and grasping for his arm. Larry raced out the door and collided with someone who was coming in. For a moment he thought he would ignore the collision and keep going, but then he realized who it was he had crashed into.

  Captain Reinhardt.

  Immediately the mad dash ended. He stood as straight as he could and tried to catch his breath. The captain stared at him gravely. There was a long silence.

  “May I ask what’s been happening here?” the captain said.

  Larry said nothing. Harl said nothing. Heitor said nothing. The three cadets looked at each other and at the captain. There was another long silence.

  But just as Larry began to speak, there was the sound of a copter taking off just outside. Captain Reinhardt strode to the window and watched as the copter rose over the wall and headed out toward the jungle.

  “What was that?” he said.

  “O’Hare, sir,” Larry said. “He’s going to London Colony to join the revolution!”

  “What!”

  Larry nodded. Harl abru
ptly left the room without a word.

  “What was that fight about?” the captain snapped.

  “It was unimportant, sir. Just a squabble. But O’Hare left this note for me. Said he’s decided to join the rebels.”

  “I see,” the captain said. “When did he leave the note?”

  “Just now.”

  “And why didn’t you come to me immediately, Cadet Stark?”

  Larry paused. He didn’t want to incriminate Harl, but there was no other explanation. And Larry was beginning to feel that Harl had even less love for Earth than he thought.

  “Because—because Cadet Ellison delayed me, sir,” Larry finally said, feeling like a betrayer.

  The door flew open and Olcott burst into the room. “O’Hare, sir! He just grabbed a copter and took off in it!”

  I know,” Captain Reinhardt said. “You say he’s joined the rebels, Cadet Stark?”

  “Yes, sir. And when I went to tell you Harl—I mean—well, we got into this fight, sir. When you found us.”

  “What sort of fight?”

  “A meaningless one, sir. It was just an argument that turned into a brawl.”

  “Where is he now?”

  Larry looked around. “He’s—that is, he was a minute ago—I was sure—

  “He just walked out, sir,” Heitor said.

  “Go find him,” the captain said. This is serious.” There was a roar from overhead. They all turned to look out the window.

  Another copter was soaring over the wall, heading for the jungle.

  “I don’t think we’ll find him now, sir,” Larry said.

  CHAPTER 11

  “IS HE A traitor too?” the captain asked. “Is there one loyal man left in my crew?”

  Larry felt sick. First O’Hare, then Harl.

  “Let me get this straight,” Captain Reinhardt said.

  O’Hare took a copter to go to London Colony. He let you know first. You were on your way to tell me when you got into a fight with Cadet Ellison. Now he has taken a copter too, presumably to go to London Colony also. Right?”

  Larry nodded.

  “I think it’s time we cracked down on this. You two—Stark and Van Haaren—get a copter and go to London Colony too. Tell them you’re switching sides too; tell them anything. But find out exactly what they plan to do, when they plan to go up in arms, and get back here as soon as you have something concrete. Then we call in the Patrol and let them squash this. Tell those two turncoats that they’re under arrest as deserters. Olcott, give these cadets a copter.”

  Olcott led them downstairs and let them have one of the copters parked in the street. It was an old model, Larry could see, probably some twenty or thirty years old. He knew no jetcopters were being manufactured on Alpha C IV, and wondered how much else of Centauran life depended on imports from Earth.

  They climbed in. Despite the age of the copter, it was equipped with standard controls and presented no problems. Larry swung into the pilot’s seat and Heitor sat next to him.

  He checked the compass and got the engine working, and they felt the copter lift. London Colony was a thousand miles due west; the planners of the colonies had established their settlements according to a neat geometric pattern.

  The copter cleared the wall, crossed the clearing, and headed out over the jungle between the two colonies.

  As Larry looked down through the front window he saw wingfingers hovering over the green, strange-looking trees just a few dozen feet below. Farther down, on the ground, he caught glimpses of the great beasts of the jungle, roaming in search of food, locked in combat, paddling around in the many lakes and streams.

  Uneasily he lifted the copter another fifty feet. He had no wish to be any closer to the turbulent jungle below.

  “What happens when we get there?” Heitor asked.

  “I’m not at all sure,” Larry admitted. “We’ll snoop around a little and head back. Maybe we can get those two to come back with us.”

  “Some chance,” Heitor snorted.

  The copter roared on over the jungle. Larry watched the fuel indicator with some alarm; it showed the tank was almost empty. They had left in such haste that he had forgotten to check it.

  The compass showed them traveling in the right direction. Larry stepped up his speed; if the fuel was going to give out, he would just as soon have it give out someplace else than in the heart of the jungle.

  An hour passed. Larry stared impassively ahead, watching for some sign of London Colony, while Heitor remained silent. Larry Wed to forget all about the events of the past day and concentrate solely on piloting the copter.

  The fuel-tank indicator finally reached zero. Larry knew he had a little fuel left anyway, a safety reserve, but it would not be enough to get them to London Colony. He squinted out over the jungle.

  “Look,” he said, nudging Heitor out of his reverie.

  They looked. Far off in the distance they saw the wildness of the jungle begin to thin out into a clearing, and then they saw a great wall standing high and separating the colony from the wilderness.

  For a wild moment he thought he had gone in a circle and arrived back at Chicago Colony, but the village he could see was much bigger than the other colony, and the compass confirmed that he was at London Colony—almost.

  Heitor suddenly noticed the fuel-tank indicator for the first time. Larry had carefully not said anything about it to him, reasoning that it wouldn’t do any good to have both of them worrying.

  “I know,” Larry said. “We may make it or we may not, depending on the size of the safety margin in this copter.”

  But he knew they would not. The engine was starting to sputter already, and they would never make it to the colony, which was at least ten miles off.

  They traveled on for a minute more in silence and then the motor began to choke in earnest.

  “This is it,” Larry said. “We’re going to come down here—and we’ll have to leg it through the jungle for the rest of the way.”

  The copter began to slip lazily down to the jungle. They were about a mile from the wall, Larry noted. He guided the copter down through the trees as best as he could. It hit the ground gently and they leaped out.

  Larry consulted his compass and they headed off toward the west. Five thousand two hundred eighty feet, Larry thought. One mile through this prehistoric jungle. He took a couple of steps. Five thousand two hundred seventy-five feet, he thought.

  He headed through the jungle, warily, with Heitor behind. The jungle smell was overpowering—humid, tropical, overwhelmingly alive and growing. It was dark down under the trees, and the vegetation was twisted and tangled and they were hard put to make much headway through the thick plant life. They marched as quickly as they could, not looking anywhere but straight ahead. Larry tried hard not to think of the dinosaurs roaming through the jungle.

  The jungle was alive with sounds—the chittering of a billion insects, the curious croak of the wingfingers soaring overhead, the thumping of froglike animals in the streams, and, someplace off in the distance, the great booming roar of some huge reptile.

  The direct nuisance of the insects bothered Larry more than the distant menace of dinosaurs. They walked through what amounted to a soup of insects of all sizes which flew at them, covered their faces with little bites, got in their eyes and ears. Occasionally an immense dragonfly the size of a turkey would buzz by, droning an ominous note.

  Larry set as fast a pace as he could, and Heitor puffed along behind. They had traveled for ten or fifteen minutes—Larry estimated another five minutes would get them out of the jungle and into the clearing—when Heitor sank down on a rotting tree stump. Wait a minute, Larry,” he called. “I’m winded.” Larry turned and saw Heitor wiping the sweat from his lace. He was exhausted, Larry saw, and there would be nothing he could do to get him to move.

  “Come on, Heitor,” he said impatiently. Just another few minutes and you can rest inside the walls.” He batted away a large insect which came too close.


  Let’s go.

  Heitor continued to mop away perspiration. “I can’t, Larry. I’m not as strong as you are.”

  “But we’re exposing ourselves to all sorts of dangers as long as were in the jungle, Heitor. Come on—I’ll go slowly so you can keep up.”

  “O.K., Larry,” Heitor said. A smile crossed his pudgy face. “Why not catch a dinosaur and I could ride on him?”

  Just then a small animal bounded out of the thick vegetation behind them, gave them a puzzled glance, and continued at a rapid clip. It was some three or four feet high, standing upright like a kangaroo on two legs, balancing on a long tail, and holding two tiny arms folded at its chest.

  “There’s one now,” Heitor said. “A small one. I don’t think he could carry me,” Heitor struggled to his feet. “Well, let’s get on. But slowly.

  They moved onward at a reduced pace for a few minutes more. An immense butterfly whose beautifully colored wings were the size of serving dishes flew by. Two more of the small kangaroolike animals came by, moving with great speed, and a third somewhat larger followed them. Two more of a different sort, but still small, followed.

  A wingfinger trumpeted overhead. Larry stepped up the pace, sensing something unusual happening in the forest, and Heitor, panting, tried to keep up.

  They heard a great crashing off to the left. Larry looked through the trees and dimly saw one of the ponderous twotails crashing through the forest in a path parallel to theirs. Browne had said they were harmless, but Larry was uneasy about the nearness of the great beast. It might not eat the two cadets, but in its clumsy way it might trample them if their paths coincided. Larry watched it, and saw with relief that it was wending its way toward some body of water hidden behind the trees.

  A small brown and green animal skittered out from under their feet and climbed the trunk of a scaly tree right in front of them. Larry chuckled with amusement at the little squirrel-like beast, but the amusement turned to horror as he saw what he thought had been a vine suddenly come to life and wind itself around the little animal.