“With your equipment,” Stan asked, “can you ascertain which is the purest?”
“There's no difficulty in that, Doctor.”
“Then draw me off a sample. This sounds like the pure royal jelly I need.”
After a moment Norbert said, “It is done.”
“Good,” Stan returned. “We'll meet up soon. Bring the sample with you. What are they doing with Mac?”
“The alien holding him has brought him into the queen's chamber. He is offering him to the queen.”
“That is the queen ahead? The image is not distinct.”
“There is a diffracting vapor in this room, Doctor. It is difficult to make out anything clearly. Take it easy, Mac!”
Stan said, “Why did you speak to the dog?”
“To get him to be quiet, sir. We don't want to mar matters as he is presented to the queen. She is receiving him now. Although I am not expert in alien physiognomy, I'd say she finds pleasure in the gift She's holding him up to her olfactory receptors —“
“You should have killed him first,” Julie interrupted.
“I was not instructed to do so,” Norbert said. “No matter. He is beyond pain now. Doctor, one of the guards is coming over to me. It is to be another inspection.”
“Well, you've passed them before.”
“Yes, sir. But there are three guards interested in me this time. It must be because I came so close to the queen. Or maybe it was when I took the sample. I am stepping up my production of pheromones.”
“Good idea,” said Stan. “Is it helping any?”
“It doesn't seem to be doing much good. They are making odd head movements. I do not know what it means.”
“What the hell has gone wrong?” Stan asked urgently. “What are they doing now?”
“They seem suspicious. They have seized me. What do you want me to do, Doctor?”
“Damn it,” Stan spat. “I should have gotten you out of there before this! Norbert! Break free and get out!”
“Yes, sir,” Norbert said. The big robot whirled, tearing himself free from the aliens' hooked claws. Then, dropping to all fours, he began scuttling down the corridor.
A reverse sensor in the back of Norbert's head clicked on and showed the view: the long winding tunnel curving behind, the three aliens scurrying on all fours after him.
Norbert was running full out. Stan had never seen him go so fast before. A thrill of pride went through him as he witnessed his creation in action. With speed like that, surely …
Stan could tell from the jarring movement of his sensor lens when the alien guard landed on Norbert's back. Stan winced as though the blow had landed on him. How could the guard be that fast? he wondered.
To Norbert he said, “Fight him off! Get out of there!”
“I'm trying, Dr. Myakovsky. But there are three of them —“
Abruptly the screen went blank.
Stan cried, “Norbert! Can you hear me? Come in!”
“Nothing,” Gill said. He touched a dial, shook his head. “He's off the air.”
“He's dead!” Julie cried.
“I didn't want this to happen,” Stan screamed. “Not Norbert! Not Norbert!”
Julie said urgently, “Stan, get a hold of yourself.”
Stan shuddered and let out a deep breath. He seemed calmer. “Can you get Captain Hoban?” he asked.
“Not yet, sir,” Gill said.
Julie had stepped out of the control area for a moment. Now she was back, and her hair was flowing around her head like a network of electrical sparks had gotten into it.
“Stan,” she said. “I just checked the short-range weather forecaster in the rear cabin. It's going haywire!”
“Just what we need,” Stan groaned.
53
“There's the Bay port, just ahead,” Andy Groggins said. He had run ahead of Badger and the rest of the party. He had a slug-thrower with telescopic wire stuck under his arm. Strapped to his waist was a Geiss needle. He'd tied a bit of cloth around his forehead to keep sweat out of his eyes.
“We'll just ease our way in it,” Red Badger said. His synthide shirt was torn, revealing his hairy freckled chest and prominent paunch. His small eyes gleamed as he pressed forward. He had a Krag beamer under his arm, its selector pointing to rapid intermittent.
The corridor widened at this point. There were separate passageways leading to “stores” in one direction and to “power” in the other.
As they came out into the wide opened area between corridors, a voice called out, “Freeze, you!”
Badger stood motionless. The others, coming along behind him, managed to slink into the shadows. But Red Badger felt very exposed. He didn't let his apprehension show, however.
He took two casual steps forward and said, “It's all right, the captain sent us.”
“He didn't tell me nothin' about that,” the voice said.
Badger had it located now. It was coming from a paint locker on the far side of the corridor. The guard who was stationed here must have taken refuge when the trouble began elsewhere in the ship. But where was his partner?
“I don't blame you for being cautious,” Badger said. “But I'm telling you it's all right. We're here to relieve you.”
As he talked he peered ahead, trying to figure out how long it would take him to blast through the paint locker and kill the man inside. Too long, he decided. The guard could get him in a single well-placed burst first.
“Stop right there and drop your weapons,” the guard called out.
“You're making a mistake,” Badger said, and kept on coming. “Captain Hoban told us to secure this area as quickly as possible. Damn it, man, this is serious!”
“Stop right now, or —“
At that moment there was a double burst of slugthrower fire as Glint and Connie opened up almost simultaneously from opposite sides of the corridor. They held down their fire while the paint locker rattled up and down and bounced against the corridor wall, finally letting up only after blowing the door off the hinges and seeing the single guard inside fall out onto the deck.
“Let's go,” Badger said, leading the way to the pod. “We're getting out of here.”
54
“It's Badger and his men,” one of the engineers remarked, reading the terse information that flowed to the TV screen from all parts of the ship. “He's killed the guard.”
“Damn it!” Captain Hoban said. “Can you see what they're doing now?”
“They've just entered the pod.”
“Seal the ports!” Hoban ordered.
“Too late. They've already opened them.”
“Close them again!”
The engineer punched buttons then shook his head. “They've locked them into place. They're blasting off.”
Hoban watched on the screen as a schematic came up, showing the Dolomite's landing pod lifting out of its bay and maneuvering away from the ship's side.
“I can still pull them back with the short-range tractors,” the engineer said, his fingers poised on the controls.
Captain Hoban hesitated. At this range, he knew that the tractors would pull the pod apart. Badger and the others wouldn't stand a chance. He didn't want to go that far. There would be a court of inquiry over this. He needed to keep his record clean.
“Book their departure in the ship's log,” he ordered.
“I don't know that they'll make it,” the engineering officer said. “The weather's really bad out there.”
Hoban looked and saw that an entire weather front had moved in while they were dealing with Badger. Long ragged clouds covered the planet's surface, clouds that were whipped and torn apart by the wind's violent action. Lightning flashed, huge jagged blue-violet bolts, several miles long, lancing out of the black-bellied clouds into the naked land below. Although the Dolomite was well above it, Hoban gave an involuntary shudder at the size of the storm.