Star Hunter by Andre Norton (reading fiction .TXT) 📕

forward in a rising thrust of speed. Then the smooth purr of the propulsion unit faltered, broke into protesting coughs. Hume worked over the controls, beads of sweat showing on his forehead and cheek in the gleam of the cabin light.

“Deading⁠—deading out!”

He brought the flitter around in a wide circle, the purr smoothed out once more in a steady reassuring beat.

“Out run them!”

But Vye feared they were back again on the losing side of a struggle with the unknown alien power. As they had been herded along the river, so now they were being pushed across the sky, towards the mountains. The enemy had followed them aloft!

Some core of stubborn will in Hume would not yet allow him to admit that. Time and time again he climbed higher⁠—always to meet climbing, twisting, spurting lines of lights which reacted on the engine of the flitter and threatened it with complete failure.

Where they were now in relation to Wass’ camp or that of the safari, Vye had no idea, and he guessed that Hume could not be too certain.

Hume switched on the flitter’s com unit, tried a channel search until he picked up a click of signal⁠—the automatic reply of the safari camp. His fingertip beat out in return the danger warning, then the series of code sounds to give an edited version of what must be guarded against.

“Wass has a man in your camp. His skin is in just as much danger as the rest. He may not relay it to the Patrol, but he’ll keep the force barrier up and the civs inside⁠—anything else would be malicious neglect and a murder charge when the Guild check tape goes in. This call is on the spacer tape now and will be a part of that⁠—he can’t possibly alter such a report and he knows it. This is the best we can do now⁠—”

“We’re close to the mountains, aren’t we?”

“Do you know much about this part of the country?” Vye persisted. Hume’s knowledge might be their only hope.

“Flew over the range twice. Nothing to see.”

“But there has to be something there.”

“If there is, it didn’t show up during our survey.” Hume’s voice was dull with fatigue.

“You’re a Guild man, you’ve dealt with alien life forms before⁠—”

“The Guild doesn’t deal with intelligent aliens. That’s X-Tee Patrol business. We don’t land on any planet with unknown intelligent life forms. Why should we court trouble⁠—couldn’t run a safari in under those conditions. X-Tee certified Jumala as a wild world, our survey confirmed that.”

“Someone or something landed here after you left?”

“I don’t believe so. This is too well organized an action. And since we have a satellite guard in space, any ship landing would be taped and recorded. No such record appeared on the Guild screens. One small spacer⁠—such as Wass’⁠—could slip through by knowing procedure⁠—just as he did. But to land all those beasts and equipment they’d need a regular transport. No⁠—this must be native.” Hume leaned forward again, flipped a switch.

A small red light answered on the central board.

“Radar warn-off,” he explained.

So they wouldn’t end up smeared against some cliff face anyway. Which was only small comfort amid terrifying possibilities.

Hume had taken the precaution just in time. The light blinked faster, and the speed of the flyer was checked as the automatic control triggered by the warn-off came into command. Hume’s hands were still on the board, but a system of relays put safety devices into action with a speed past that which a human pilot could initiate.

They were descending and had to accept that, since the warn-off, operating for the sake of the passengers, had ruled that move best. The directive would glide the flitter to the best available landing. It was only moments before the shock gear did touch surface. Then the engine was silent.

“This is it,” Hume observed.

“What do we do now?” Vye wanted to know.

“Wait⁠—”

“Wait! For what?”

Hume consulted his planet-time watch in the light of the cabin.

“We have about an hour until dawn⁠—if dawn arrives here at the same time it does in the plains. I don’t propose to go out blindly in the dark.”

Which made sense. Except that to sit here, quietly, in their cramped quarters, not knowing what might be waiting outside, was an ordeal Vye found increasingly harder to bear. Maybe Hume guessed his discomfort, maybe he was following routine procedure. But he turned, thumbed open one of the side panels in Vye’s compartment, and dug out the emergency supplies.

IX

They sorted the crash rations into small packs. A blanket of the water-resistant, feather-heavy Ozakian spider silk was cut into a protective covering for Vye. That piece of tailoring occupied them until the graying sky permitted them a full picture of the pocket in which the flitter had landed. The dark foliage of the mountain growth was broken here by a ledge of dark-blue stone on which the flyer rested.

To the right was a sheer drop, and a land slip had cut away the ledge itself a few feet behind the flitter. There was only a steadily narrowing path ahead, slanting upward.

“Can we take off again?” Vye hoped to be reassured that such a feat was possible.

“Look up!”

Vye backed against the cliff wall, stared up at the sky. Well above them those globes still swam in unwearied circles, commanding the air lanes.

Hume had cautiously approached the outer rim of the ledge, was using his distance glasses to scan what might lie below.

“No sign yet.”

Vye knew what he meant. The globes were overhead, but the blue beasts, or any other fauna those balls might summon, had not yet appeared.

Shouldering their packs they started along the ledge. Hume had his ray tube, but Vye was weaponless, unless somewhere along their route he could pick up some defensive and offensive arm. Stones had burst the lights of the islet, they might prove as effective against the blue beasts. He kept watch for any of the proper size and weight.

The ledge narrowed, one shoulder scraped the