"I don't get it," Big Leon said between clenched teeth from his position just behind Retief atop Gerthudion's ribbed shoulder-plates. "How'd you get out here in the woods? How'd you spot me? And how in the name of the Big Worm did you tame this man-eater? In forty years in the jungle I never—"
"You never tried," Retief finished for him.
"I guess I didn't," Leon sounded surprised. "Why would I?"
"We're sitting on one reason. I'll go into the other answers later, when things quiet down."
Gerthudion's rotors thumped rhythmically; wind whistled past Retief's head. A thousand feet below, the jungle was a gray-green blanket, touched with yellow light here and there where the afternoon sun reached a tall treetop.
"Hey, Retief!" Leon called above the whine of the slipstream. "Has your friend here got a friend?"
Retief looked back, following Big Leon's pointing arm. Half a mile behind, a Rhoon was rapidly overhauling the laden Gerthudion.
"Goblin at seven o'clock," Retief called to her. "Anyone you know, Gertie?"
The Rhoon lifted her massive head, then swung her body sideways—a trick she performed with only a slight lagging of forward motion.
"That's—but it couldn't be! Not Aunt Vulugulei!" the great creature honked. At once, she banked, swept in a tight curve back toward the trailing Rhoon, now closing fast.
"Aunt Vulgy!" she trumpeted. "Where in Quopp have you been? I've been worrying myself into a premature molt—"
The other Rhoon, a scant five hundred yards distant now, banked up suddenly, shot away, rising fast, its rotors whick-whicking loudly. Gerthudion swerved, causing her riders to grab for better holds, gave chase.
"Auntie! It's me, Gerthudion! Wait . . . !" The agitated flyer was beating her rotors frantically as she fell behind the unladen Rhoon, a quarter of a mile ahead now and two hundred feet higher. Sunlight glinted on spinning rotors as the strange Rhoon tilted, swung in a tight curve, swept down at top speed on its pursuer.
"Duck!" Retief called. "It's a zombie!"
Yellow light winked from a point behind the pouncing Rhoon's head. The buzz of a power gun cut through the tumult of rushing air. There was a harsh rattle of sound from behind Retief; blue light glared and danced at close hand as a pencil-thin beam lanced out, picked out the attacking Rhoon's left rotor, held on it as Gerthudion wheeled to the left, dropped like a stone, rocking violently in the air blast as the enemy flyer shot past.
"I nicked him," Leon growled. "The range is too long for a handgun to do much damage."
"He's got the same problem." Retief leaned forward. "Gertie, I'm sorry about Aunt Vulugulei, but you see how it is. Try to get above him; he can't fire through his rotors."
"I'll try, Tief-tief," Gerthudion wailed. "To think that my own auntie—"
"It's not your aunt anymore, Gertie; just a sneaky little Voion getting a free ride."
Gerthudion's rotors labored. "I can't gain on her—or it," she bawled. "Not with this burden . . ."
"Tell her not to try dumping us off," Leon barked. "My gun is the only thing that'll nail that Jasper! Just get me in position!"
The Voion-controlled Rhoon cadaver was far above now, still climbing. Gerthudion, her rotors thumping hard, was losing ground.
"He'll drop on us again in a minute," Retief said. "Gertie, as he gets within range, you're going to have to go into a vertical bank to give Leon a clear shot . . ."
"Vertical? I'll fall like a stone from a frost-shattered peak!"
"That's the way it's got to be, I'm afraid. Lead him down—and don't flare out until we're at treetop level. If we give him time to think, it will dawn on him all he has to do is stay right over us and pour in the fire!"
"I'll try . . ." The Rhoon was in position now, above and slightly off-side to the right. It stooped then, moving in for an easy kill. Gerthudion held her course; abruptly the enemy gun fired, a wide-angle beam at extreme range that flicked across Retief's exposed face like a breath from a blast furnace.
"Now," Retief called. Instantly, Gerthudion whipped up on her left side, her rotors screaming in the sudden release of load, and in the same moment Leon, his left arm clamped around Retief, lanced out with his narrow-beam weapon. A spot of actinic light darted across the gray belly-plates of the zombie, then found and held steady on the left rotor.
The fire from above was back on target now, playing over Gerthudion's exposed side-plates with an odor like hot iron.
"Stay with that wide beam another ten seconds, and you're a gone Bug," Leon grated out. The Rhoon above dipped to one side now, feeling the sting of the blaster, but Leon followed, held the rotor in the beam while air shrieked up past him like a tornado.
"Right myself now I must, or perish!" Gerthudion honked. "Which is it to be, Tief-tief?"
"Pull out!" Retief grabbed for handholds as the great body shifted under him, surging upward with a crushing pressure. The whirling vanes bit into air, hammering; Leon broke off his fire—
"Hey, look!" The attacking Rhoon had veered off at the last possible instant, gun still firing; now lazily it rolled over, went into a violent tumble. Pieces flew; then the zombie was gone against the darkness below.
"I think you burned through his wiring," Retief called. "Gertie, stay low now; it's only another couple of miles."
"Low shall I stay, like it or no," the Rhoon called. "I thought my main armature, its windings I would melt!"
Retief felt the heat of the overworked body scorching his legs. "If we meet another one in the air we've had it."
"If far it is, we're lost," she wheezed. "I'm all but spent . . ."
"There it is!" Leon pointed to a tiny cluster of buildings against the sweep of jungle ahead, ringed by tilled fields.
Gerthudion flew on, dropping even lower, until she labored just above the high crowns of trees whose leaves glittered in her backwash like rippling water. The forest ended abruptly, and she was swooping across the fields that surrounded the trading town, packed solid now with Voion soldiery.
"Look at 'em," Leon called. "Jammed in so tight they can't even maneuver! If those Bugs knew anything about siege tactics, they'd have wiped us out the first night!"
"Better try some evasive action," Retief called. "They may have some big stuff down there."
Gerthudion groaned, complied sluggishly.
"If they have, they're holding it back," Leon yelled behind him. "All they hit us with so far is a lot of talk, plenty of rocks and arrows, and a few handguns."
Blasters winked below now, searching after the Rhoon as she threw her massive weight from one side to another, flying a twisting course toward the squatty palisade ahead and the cluster of low buildings behind it. Leon took careful aim, poured a long burst from his power gun into a Voion gun crew. There was a flicker, then a violent burst of pale yellow light that puffed outward in a dingy smoke cloud, faded quickly as fragments whistled past Gerthudion's head and clattered against her rotors. Then the giant flyer staggered over the wall in a billow of dust, slammed the ground at the center of the wide central plaza of the town. Men appeared, running toward the Rhoon.
"Hold your fire!" Big Leon bellowed. "It's me—and Retief! This Rhoon's a tame one! The first bushwhacker lays a hand on her's got me to answer to!"
The embattled Terrans were all around now, gaping as Retief and Leon slid down from their places.
"Jumping jinkberries, Leon—how'd you catch that critter?"
"You sure it don't bite?"
" . . . thought you was one of them that been buzzing us all day—"
"Quiet, the lot of you!" Leon held up his hands. "The bug rebels are out of the picture. We're on our own." He motioned to Retief. "I picked up a recruit, name's Retief."
"Well, you're just in time for the massacre, Mister," someone greeted.
"Hey, Leon—what about this Rhoon of yours? Maybe it could airlift us out of here—"
"I'll carry no burden . . . this day," the Rhoon gasped out. Her rotors sagged as she squatted, her massive keel against the ground. "Grave damage . . . to my windings . . . I fear I've done . . . such burdens to bear up . . . the while I gamboled like a Phip . . ."
"You did OK, Gertie," Leon said. "Just take it easy, girl." He faced the crowd of some forty unshaven, unwashed frontiersmen. "What's been going on while I was gone?"
"They hit us again just after First Eclipse," a wide, swarthy man with a low-slung pistol belt said. "Same old business: Come at us in a straight frontal assault, whopping it up and shooting arrows; a couple Rhoon making passes, dropping leaflets and stones; our guns—we still got three working—kept 'em at a safe altitude. We kept our heads down and peppered 'em and they pulled back before they hit the stockade. They been quiet since noon—but they're up to something. Been working since before dawn on something."
Leon grunted. "After a while those Bugs are going to figure out all they have to do is hit us from four sides at once, get a couple magnesium fires going against the walls, and we've had it."
"Their tactics are likely to improve suddenly," Retief said. "There's a Groaci military adviser in the area. I imagine he'll take the troops in hand before many hours pass. In the meantime, we'd better start making some plans—"
"Some wills, you mean," someone corrected. "They'll flatten us like a tidal wave once they get rolling."
"Still, we don't want to make it too easy for them. Leon, what have you got in the way of armaments, other than those three guns I heard mentioned?"
"My iron makes four; it's got about half a charge left. There's a couple dozen heavy-duty hunting bows; some of the boys are pretty good with 'em—and I had Jerry trying to tinker up a rig to drop a few thousand volts to the perimeter wall—"
"I have it going, Leon," Jerry called. "Don't know how long it will last if they throw a big load on the line."
"We finished up the ditching while you was gone, Leon," a man called. "If they get past the stockade, they'll hit a six-foot trench; that ought to slow 'em down some."
"This is all just peanuts," Leon said. "Sure, we'll take a few hundred with us—but that won't stop us from going."
"It will be dusk in another few hours," Retief said. "I think we can count on a go-for-broke attack before then, with General Hish calling the plays. Let's see if we can't arrange a suitable reception."
From a top-floor room in a tower that formed one corner of the compound at Rum Jungle Retief studied the ranks of the Voion that moved restlessly all across the half-mile of cleared ground surrounding the fortress.
"Uh-huh, our Groaci military expert is on the scene," he said. "That formation's not exactly a parade-ground effect, but it's a long way from the mob we flew over on the way in."
"It's not that that gives me the willies," a thick-set man with a short blond beard said. "It's them damned Rhoon circling up there." He motioned toward floating dots far overhead that indicated the presence of a pair of the huge flyers.
"If they knew Gertie's crowd were out looking for them, they'd be a little less carefree up there," Retief commented. "But I'm afraid our aerial allies are combing the wrong stretch of sky."
A man hurried in, breathing hard. "OK, Big Leon," he said. "I guess that does it: We rigged the ropes and the tank-traps, and all the boys are posted up as high as they could get. Les's got a good head o' steam up on both boilers, and—"
"All right, Shorty," Leon said. "Just tell everybody to look sharp and don't make a move before the signal goes up."
"Get ready," Retief said. "I think something's starting down there now."
Barely visible in the dim light, the Voion were crowding back, opening narrow lanes through their ranks; bulky shapes were trundling forward along the paths thus formed.
"Oh-oh, looks like they got some kind of heavy equipment," Shorty said.
"Nope—not equipment; friends," Leon stated. "Those are Jackoo. I guess that cuts it. Those boys can steamroller right through the walls."
"Correction," Retief said. "Six, two, and even those are zombies—like the Rhoon."
"What do you mean?" Leon and the other stared at Retief. He gave them a brief explanation of the Voion technique of installing an energy cell and a pilot in a dead Quoppina.
"The drive mechanism and circuitry are all there," he concluded. "All they have to do is supply the power and the guidance."
"That's far from simple," Jerry said. "Ye gods, the technical knowledge that implies . . . ! Maybe we've been underestimating these Voion!"
"I think the Groaci have a digit in the pie," Retief said.
"Groaci, huh," Jerry nodded, looking worried. "It fits; they're skillful surgeons as well as exporters of sophisticated electronic and mechanical devices—"
"How can they butt in here?" Shorty demanded. "I thought that kind of stuff was frowned on by the CDT."
"You have to get within frowning range first," Retief pointed out. "They've done a good job of keeping under cover."
"Looks like they're getting set to hit the wall, all right," Leon said. "I count eight of 'em. The game'll be over quicker'n I figured."
Retief studied the maneuvers below, dim in the pre-dawn light. "Maybe not," he said. "See if you can get me seven volunteers, and we'll try to stretch it into extra innings."
Retief waited, flattened against the wall of a one-story structure the back of which was no more than ten feet from the timber wall surrounding the compound.
"Get ready," Shorty called from the roof above. "They're rolling now; boy, look at 'em come! Brace yourself—he's gonna hit right—"
There was a thunderous smash; a section of wall six feet wide bowed, burst inward; amid a hail of splinters, the dull magenta form of a two-ton Jackoo appeared, wobbling from the terrific force of the impact, but still coming on, veering past the corner of the structure half in its path, gathering speed again now as it plunged past Retief at a distance of six feet—
He swung out behind the bulky shape, took three running steps, jumped, pulled himself up on the wide back—even broader than Fufu's ponderous dimensions, he noted in passing. Directly before him, in a hollow chopped out behind the massive skull—the brain location in all Quoppina species—the narrow back of a Voion crouched, a heavy helmet of gray armor plate protecting the head. Retief braced himself, reached forward, hauled the driver bodily from his cockpit, propelled him over the prow; there was a heavy ker-blump! as the broad wheels slammed over the unfortunate Quoppina. Clinging to the now unguided zombie, Retief reached into the cockpit, flipped up a large lever dabbed with luminescent orange paint. The groan of the drive ceased instantly; the juggernaut slowed, rolled to a stop a foot from the six-foot moat dug by the defenders.
There was a confused shrilling behind; Retief turned, saw the leaders of a column of Voion pressing through the broached wall.
"Now!" someone shouted from a rooftop. At once, a brilliant cascade of electric blue sparks leaped across the packed mass of invaders struggling on high wheels across the shattered timbers; the two foremost members squalled, shot forward; those behind also squalled, but impeded by the uneven ground and the efforts of their fellows, failed to dart clear. The high voltage continued to flow—here leaping a gap to the accompaniment of miniature lightnings, there bringing adjacent patches of Voion to red heat before welding them together. More Voion, coming up fast from the rear, joined the press, found themselves instantly joined in the wild dance of arcing current and randomly stimulated nerves and gear trains.
Retief returned to the task at hand, flipped the "back" switch, hastily maneuvered the captured ram to face in the direction from which it had come. The two Voion who had leaped clear of the confusion dashed toward him, seeking refuge. Retief grabbed up the issue club dropped by the former operator in his hasty exit in time to slam the gun from the grip of one of them, knock the other spinning with a backhanded swipe to the head. Then he pushed the "go" lever into the forward position, threw the speed control full over, and vaulted over the side.
"Cut the power," Shorty yelled from above. At once, the showering sparks from the electrified attack column died, leaving only the dull red glow of hot spots; then the riderless zombie was into the welded mess, slamming through the obstruction to disappear into the mob beyond.
"Get them cables back in place!" a voice yelled. Men darted out, hauled at the one-inch steel lines, stretching them across the gap three feet from ground level. Retief looked around. Across the compound, other dark gaps showed in the wall. Here and there lay the slumped form of a Voion, and one Jackoo bulked, immobile.
"Six of 'em busted through," Big Leon's voice said, coming up beside Retief, breathing hard. "One got stuck in his own hole; another one was damaged—couldn't get him going again. The boys sent the others back to spread joy according to plan."
"Any casualties?"
"Les got a busted arm; he was kind of slow knocking over a Bug that got through. Your scheme worked out neat, Retief."
"It slowed them a little. Let's see how Gertie's doing."
They walked across to where the big flyer still rested, her four legs sprawled, her eyes dull.
"Gertie, they'll make it through on the next try," Retief said. "How are you feeling?"
"Bad," the Rhoon groaned. "My circuitry I've overloaded. A month's nest-rest I'll require to be myself again."
"You're going to have to lift off in a few minutes or you'll wind up being somebody else," Big Leon said. "Think you can do it?"
Gerthudion lifted an eye, gazed distastefully across at the signs of the recent fray. "If I must, I must. But I'll wait until the last, my powers to recover."
"Gertie, I have an important mission for you," Retief said.
He outlined the plan while Gerthudion breathed sonorously, like a pipe organ being tuned.
" . . . that's about it," he concluded. "Can you do it?"
" 'Tis no mean errand you dispatch me on, Retief; still, I'll aloft, these dastards to forestall. Then I'll return, your further needs to serve."
"Thanks, Gertie. I'm sorry I got you into this."
"I came willingly," she honked with a show of spirit. "Sorry am I my fellow Rhoon so far afield have flown, else a goodly number of the rascals we'd have disassembled for you." She started her rotors with a groan, lifted off, a vast dark shadow flitting upward in the gloom, tilting away toward the dark wall of the jungle.