Far from abandoning them, it was championing them.
Emotionally wrought up as he was, George felt an odd lump arise in his throat. It was David against Goliath, but mad, useless courage in this case. The monster tank was far too big and heavy to be overthrown, as the midget tank had been, by the sheer impetus of the HQ. If it tried that, the HQ would only smash itself to pieces like a boat splintering on a rock. George thought, no, it won’t do a fool thing like that. It’s just aiming to be of nuisance value. It’ll worry the monster, like a dog worrying a bear. It’ll keep throwing it off its aim, using its own far superior speed to keep itself out of danger.
Using unsuspected small quick-firing guns, the huge tank opened up on the thing rocketing towards it. The HQ drove through this crackling gunfire unchecked. It veered out to the right, as though it were going to bypass the big tank. Then it swung around sharply and made a flanking attack. Its sharp nose caught the tank squarely in the side. There was a flash of white light which seemed to rive both heaven and earth. While the watchers were temporarily blinded, the blast wave hit them and bowled them over like so many ten-pins.
They picked themselves up, dazed. Thunderous echoes of explosion were repeating themselves endlessly around the horizon.
Sparks needed immediate medical attention. His lower lip was just raw flesh now, like a burst tomato. He was moaning with the pain of it. Off came Freiburg’s shirt again. This time he ripped it into rough bandages. Between them they made a good job of binding the radio-operator’s jaw, though it meant gagging him.
When they took a look at the wreck of the giant tank, it was blazing like a great bonfire. Both its tracks had been blown clean off, and its turret lay in two pieces maybe half a kilo away. Its gun was broken off short as though it were a stick of chalk. There was a jagged crack down the thick frontal armor-plate. It was just a mass of scrap metal.
By some freak, one wheel of the HQ had been blown back in their direction. It lay out there in the middle distance isolated from other general debris. It appeared to be the only remaining trace of the HQ, and to George at least there was a poignant touch obout this.
The small tanks which had sheltered behind their champion had been scattered like rubbish in a gale. Those which had survived intact had fled out of sight.
Their own guard of white circle tanks had lapsed into silence and disinterestedness.
The skipper turned from surveying the battlefield, and was obviously moved. He said to George; “They were really great guys. They were riding a cargo of dynamite. They knew it and didn’t care so long as they knocked out the big fellow. Their fuel tanks burst, I guess.”
George said: “And we’ll never even know who they were… if they existed.”
“What’s that?” said Freiburg, sharply.
“Well, we’re only surmising that the thing had a crew, aren’t we?”
“I’ll stake my life there were people in there who knew just what they were doing,” said the skipper, stubbornly.
George didn’t argue. For one thing, you can’t argue without knowing the facts. For another, it was obvious that Freiburg had an emotional need to believe that there were Venusians on his side, faithful unto death, that the whole planet wasn’t hostile towards the men from Earth. That belief had lifted him from despair, had given him some faith back. What did it matter if the belief was right or wrong, so long as it sustained him? He could be right, anyhow. They inspected their space-ship inside and out. Things had been pretty badly shaken up, but the only thing beyond ultimate repair was the radio apparatus. The fins were grotesquely crumpled, but could be straightened out on the portable workbenches, given time.
After that, the great problem would be to get the ship back to standing vertically on its tail in the blastoff position.
“If only we had some winches,” said Freiburg.
By now the mate had recovered his nerve and demonstrated that his wits were back in good order. He suggested: “Maybe we could use the tanks to haul the ship up… somehow.”
Freiburg pondered. “H’m. I rather suspect these tanks were directed and powered from the vehicle we called the ‘HQ.’ As that’s been atomized, the odds seem against the idea. Besides, we’d need cables—and we don’t have any cables.”
“I remember reading in old war books about tank warfare that tanks sometimes got bogged in mud-holes,” said George. “And that they carried cables and winches for getting themselves out. It could be worth taking a close look at those things…”
They found that each tank had a cable locker at the rear, containing some fifty metres of oiled steel cable—thick, tough stuff.
“It’s like an answer to a prayer,” said Freiburg. “We can join the cables together. Then if— if—we can get eight or nine of these tanks working somehow…”
George said: “You know, I’ve been wondering about those driving seats. Seems to me they point to the fact that the tanks weren’t always remotely controlled. Maybe they don’t always have to be, even now. There could be alternative provision for manual control. That panel facing the seat certainly has manual switches on it. I’m going to try everything. Keep clear of the treads.”
He climbed into the nearest tank.
None of the switches or levers was marked, and he began a game of trial and error with them. He hit the forward movement lever at the second try. The engine burst into life and the tank jolted and ground forward. It went quite a way before he discovered how to stop it. He experimented some more, and found the controls simple to use once he’d mentally labelled them. The TV screen provided a sharp view of his surroundings. Twenty minutes later, he was giving Freiburg driving lessons. The skipper mastered the tank almost as quickly, brought it to a halt, then sat thoughtfully regarding the image of the fallen space-ship on the TV screen. He said, presently: “We’ve a fortnight’s work to do on those fins. Even if the triangle gang doesn’t attack us again, and we’re left in peace to finish it, there’s always the danger these tanks may take it into their heads to wander back wherever they came from—before we have a chance to use ’em. Wonder if there’s any way of switching off the remote controls?”
“We can try,” said George.
They experimented, and found eventually that if one of the antennae was removed, the tank’s engine stopped and all its instruments went dead. George said: “Well, there you are, you can do it that way. But it also means the manual controls become useless, because you aren’t getting any power. So, while you’re actually using the tanks, you’ll just have to accept that they may be taken over by remote control at any moment.”
“Fine if that happened just as we were raising the ship,” said Freiburg. “It could cause a first-class catastrophe. Look, George, I want you to try to contact the white circle General Headquarters, whoever and wherever they are. I know you’re itching to scout around in your helicopter and see more of Venus. So you might as well make it a definite mission.”
“I’d like to, Skip. What do I tell ’em, provided they haven’t scalped me first?”
“Tell them we appreciate the way they’ve defended us, and we hope they’ll continue to act that way. That we come in peace. Ask ’em if they mind our borrowing their tanks just for a while to set up the ship. Tell ’em we’d be grateful for any help they could offer in effecting our repairs—maybe they’ve got mobile workshops. And tell them how enormously impressed we are by the magnificent action of their comrades in sacrificing themselves to save us.”
“Sure, Skip, I’ll do that. I didn’t aim to quit Venus without meeting the Venusians or having a wider look at the place. Let’s unload the ’copter now.”
It was easy to do that. The helicopter had been very carefully packed in sections, and was undamaged. Normally, it would be lowered piece by piece from the hatch near the ship’s nose. But now that hatch was almost at ground-level, and it was like unloading from a railroad box-car. The Earthmen assembled the helicopter and adjusted the variable pitch vanes to cope with the denser air. The trail flight was wobbly, but a further adjustment got the pitch right. George circled the area widely and saw no signs of any other tanks, friendly or enemy.