CHAPTER 2
Ross, absorbed in the scene before him, was not prepared for the suddenand complete darkness which blotted out not only the action but thelight in his own room as well.
"What--?" His startled voice rang loudly in his ears, too loudly, forall sound had been wiped out with the light. The faint swish of theventilating system, of which he had not been actively aware until it haddisappeared, was also missing. A trace of the same panic he had known inthe cockpit of the atomjet tingled along his nerves. But this time hecould meet the unknown with action.
Ross slowly moved through the dark, his hands outstretched before him toward off contact with the wall. He was determined that somehow he woulddiscover the hidden door, escape from this dark cell....
There! His palm struck flat against a smooth surface. He swept out hishand--and suddenly it passed over emptiness. Ross explored by touch.There _was_ a door and now it was open. For a moment he hesitated, upsetby a nagging little fear that if he stepped through he would be out onthe hillside with the wolves.
"That's stupid!" Again he spoke aloud. And, just because he did feeluneasy, he moved. All the frustrations of the past hours built up in hima raging desire to do something--anything--just so long as it was what_he_ wanted to do and not at another's orders.
Nevertheless, Ross continued to move slowly, for the space beyond thatopen door was as deep and dark a pit as the room he left. To squeezealong one wall, using an outstretched arm as a guide, was the bestprocedure, he decided.
A few feet farther on, his shoulder slipped from the surface and he halftumbled into another open door. But there was the wall again, and heclung to it thankfully. Another door ... Ross paused, trying to catchsome faint sound, the slightest hint that he was not alone in thisblindman's maze. But without even air currents to stir it, the blacknessitself took on a thick solidity which encased him as a congealing jelly.
The wall ended. Ross kept his left hand on it, flailed out with hisright, and felt his nails scrape across another surface. The spaceseparating the two surfaces was wider than any doorway. Was it across-corridor? He was about to make a wider arm sweep when he heard asound. He was not alone.
Ross went back to the wall, flattening himself against it, trying tocontrol the volume of his own breathing in order to catch the slightestwhisper of the other noise. He discovered that lack of sight can confusethe ear. He could not identify those clicks, the wisp of flutteringsound that might be air displaced by the opening of another door.
Finally, he detected something moving at floor level. Someone orsomething must be creeping, not walking, toward him. Ross pushed backaround the corner. It never occurred to him to challenge that crawler.There was an element of danger in this strange encounter in the dark; itwas not meant to be a meeting between fellow explorers.
The sound of crawling was not steady. There were long pauses, and Rossbecame convinced that each rest was punctuated by heavy breathing as ifthe crawler was finding progress a great and exhausting effort. Hefought the picture that persisted in his imagination--that of a wolfsnuffling along the blacked-out hall. Caution suggested a quick retreat,but Ross's urge to rebellion held him where he was, crouching, strainingto see what crept toward him.
Suddenly there was a blinding flare of light, and Ross's hands went tocover his dazzled eyes. And he heard a despairing, choked exclamationfrom near to floor level. The same steady light that normally filledhall and room was bright again. Ross found himself standing at thejuncture of two corridors--momentarily, he was absurdly pleased that hehad deduced that correctly--and the crawler--?
A man--at least the figure was a two-legged, two-armed body reasonablyhuman in outline--was lying several yards away. But the body was sowrapped in bandages and the head so totally muffled, that it lacked allidentity. For that reason it was the more startling.
One of the mittened hands moved slightly, raising the body from theground so it could squirm forward an inch or so. Before Ross could move,a man came running into the corridor from the far end. Murdockrecognized Major Kelgarries. He wet his lips as the major went down onhis knees beside the creature on the floor.
"Hardy! Hardy!" That voice, which carried the snap of command wheneverit was addressed to Ross, was now warmly human. "Hardy, man!" Themajor's hands were on the bandaged body, lifting it, easing the head andshoulders back against his arm. "It's all right, Hardy. You'reback--safe. This is the base, Hardy." He spoke slowly, soothingly, withthe steadiness one would use to comfort a frightened child.
Those mittened paws which had beat feebly into the air fell onto thebandage-wreathed chest. "Back--safe--" The voice from behind the facemask was a rusty croak.
"Back, safe," the major assured him.
"Dark--dark all around again--" protested the croak.
"Just a power failure, man. Everything's all right now. We'll get youinto bed."
The mitten pawed again until it touched Kelgarries' arm; then it flexeda little as if the hand under it was trying to grip.
"Safe--?"
"You bet you are!" The major's tone carried firm reassurance. NowKelgarries looked up at Ross as if he knew the other had been there allthe time.
"Murdock, get down to the end room. Call Dr. Farrell!"
"Yes, sir!" The "sir" came so automatically that Ross had alreadyreached the end room before he realized he had used it.
Nobody explained matters to Ross Murdock. The bandaged Hardy was claimedby the doctor and two attendants and carried away, the major walkingbeside the stretcher, still holding one of the mittened hands in his.Ross hesitated, sure he was not supposed to follow, but not ready eitherto explore farther or return to his own room. The sight of Hardy,whoever he might be, had radically changed Ross's conception of theproject he had too speedily volunteered to join.
That what they did here was important, Ross had never doubted. That itwas dangerous, he had early suspected. But his awareness had been anabstract concept of danger, not connected with such concrete evidence asHardy crawling through the dark. From the first, Ross had nursed vagueplans for escape; now he knew he must get out of this place lest he endup a twin for Hardy.
"Murdock?"
Having heard no warning sound from behind, Ross whirled, ready to usehis fists, his only weapons. But he did not face the major, or any ofthe other taciturn men he knew held positions of authority. Thenewcomer's brown skin was startling against the neutral shade of thewalls. His hair and brows were only a few shades darker; but the generalsameness of color was relieved by the vivid blue of his eyes.
Expressionless, the dark stranger stood quietly, his arms hangingloosely by his sides, studying Ross, as if the younger man was someproblem he had been assigned to solve. When he spoke, his voice was amonotone lacking any modulation of feeling.
"I am Ashe." He introduced himself baldly; he might have been saying"This is a table and that is a chair."
Ross's quick temper took spark from the other's indifference. "Allright--so you're Ashe!" He strove to make a challenge of it. "And whatis that supposed to mean?"
But the other did not rise to the bait. He shrugged. "For the time beingwe have been partnered----"
"Partnered for what?" demanded Ross, controlling his temper.
"We work in pairs here. The machine sorts us ..." he answered brieflyand consulted his wrist watch. "Mess call soon."
Ashe had already turned away, and Ross could not stand the other's lackof interest. While Murdock refused to ask questions of the major or anyothers on that side of the fence, surely he could get some informationfrom a fellow "volunteer."
"What is this place, anyway?" he asked.
The other glanced back over his shoulder. "Operation Retrograde."
Ross swallowed his anger. "Okay, but what do they do here? Listen, Ijust saw a fellow who'd been banged up as if he'd been in a concretemixer, creeping along this hall. What sort of work do they do here? Andwhat do we have to do?"
To his amazement Ashe smiled, at least his lips quirked faintly. "Hardygo
t under your skin, eh? Well, we have our percentage of failures. Theyare as few as it's humanly possible to make, and they give us everyadvantage that can be worked out for us----"
"Failures at what?"
"Operation Retrograde."
Somewhere down the hall a buzzer gave a muted whirr.
"That's mess call. And I'm hungry, even if you're not." Ashe walked awayas if Ross Murdock had ceased to exist.
But Ross Murdock did exist, and to him that was an important fact. As hetrailed along behind Ashe he determined that he was going to continue toexist, in one piece and unharmed, Operation Retrograde or no OperationRetrograde. And he was going to pry a few enlightening answers out ofsomebody very soon.
To his surprise he found Ashe waiting for him at the door of a room fromwhich came the sound of voices and a subdued clatter of trays andtableware.
"Not many in tonight," Ashe commented in a take-it-or-leave-it tone."It's been a busy week."
The room was rather sparsely occupied. Five tables were empty, while themen gathered at the remaining two. Ross counted ten men, either alreadyeating or coming back from a serving hatch with well-filled trays. Allof them were dressed in slacks, shirt, and moccasins like himself--theoutfit seemed to be a sort of undress uniform--and six of them wereordinary in physical appearance. The other four differed so radicallythat Ross could barely conceal his amazement.
Since their fellows accepted them without comment, Ross silently stoleglances at them as he waited behind Ashe for a tray. One pair wereclearly Oriental; they were small, lean men with thin brackets of longblack mustache on either side of their mobile mouths. Yet he had caughta word or two of their conversation, and they spoke his own languagewith the facility of the native born. In addition to the mustaches, eachwore a blue tattoo mark on the forehead and others of the same design onthe backs of their agile hands.
The second duo were even more fantastic. The color of their flaxen hairwas normal, but they wore it in braids long enough to swing across theirpowerful shoulders, a fashion unlike any Ross had ever seen. Yet anysuggestion of effeminacy certainly did not survive beyond the firstglance at their ruggedly masculine features.
"Gordon!" One of the braided giants swung halfway around from the tableto halt Ashe as he came down the aisle with his tray. "When did you getback? And where is Sanford?"
One of the Orientals laid down the spoon with which he had beenvigorously stirring his coffee and asked with real concern, "Anotherloss?"
Ashe shook his head. "Just reassignment. Sandy's holding down OutpostGog and doing well." He grinned and his face came to life with anexpression of impish humor Ross would not have believed possible. "He'llend up with a million or two if he doesn't watch out. He takes to tradeas if he were born with a beaker in his fist."
The Oriental laughed and then glanced at Ross. "Your new partner, Ashe?"
Some of the animation disappeared from Ashe's brown face; he wasnoncommittal again. "Temporary assignment. This is Murdock." Theintroduction was flat enough to daunt Ross. "Hodaki, Feng," heindicated the two Easterners with a nod as he put down his tray."Jansen, Van Wyke." That accounted for the blonds.
"Ashe!" A man arose at the other table and came to stand beside theirs.Thin, with a dark, narrow face and restless eyes, he was much youngerthan the others, younger and not so well controlled. He might answerquestions if there was something in it for him, Ross decided, and filedthe thought away.
"Well, Kurt?" Ashe's recognition was as dampening as it could be, andRoss's estimation of the younger man went up a fraction when the snubappeared to have no effect upon him.
"Did you hear about Hardy?"
Feng looked as if he were about to speak, and Van Wyke frowned. Ashemade a deliberate process of chewing and swallowing before he replied."Naturally." His tone reduced whatever had happened to Hardy to amatter-of-fact proceeding far removed from Kurt's implied melodrama.
"He's smashed up ... kaput...." Kurt's accent, slight in the beginning,was thickening. "Tortured...."
Ashe regarded him levelly. "You aren't on Hardy's run, are you?"
Still Kurt refused to be quashed. "Of course, I'm not! You know the runI am in training for. But that is not saying that such can not happen aswell on my run, or yours, or yours!" He pointed a stabbing finger atFeng and then at the blond men.
"You can fall out of bed and break your neck, too, if your number comesup that way," observed Jansen. "Go cry on Millaird's shoulder if ithurts you that much. You were told the score at your briefing. You knowwhy you were picked...."
Ross caught a faint glance aimed at him by Ashe. He was still totally inthe dark, but he would not try to pry any information from this crowd.Maybe part of their training was this hush-hush business. He would waitand see, until he could get Kurt aside and do a little pumping.Meanwhile he ate stolidly and tried to cover up his interest in theconversation.
"Then you are going to keep on saying 'Yes, sir,' 'No, sir,' to everyorder here----?"
Hodaki slammed his tattooed hand on the table. "Why this foolishness,Kurt? You well know how and why we are picked for runs. Hardy had thedeck stacked against him through no fault of the project. That hashappened before; it will happen again----"
"Which is what I have been saying! Do you wish it to happen to you?Pretty games those tribesmen on your run play with their prisoners, dothey not?"
"Oh, shut up!" Jansen got to his feet. Since he loomed at least fiveinches above Kurt and probably could have broken him in two over onemassive knee, his order was one to be considered. "If you have anycomplaints, go make them to Millaird. And, little man"--he poked amassive forefinger into Kurt's chest--"wait until you make that firstrun of yours before you sound off so loudly. No one is sent out withoutevery ounce of preparation he can take. But we can't set up luck inadvance, and Hardy was unlucky. That's that. We got him back, and thatwas lucky for him. He'd be the first to tell you so." He stretched. "I'mfor a game--Ashe? Hodaki?"
"Always so energetic," murmured Ashe, but he nodded as did the smallOriental.
Feng smiled at Ross. "Always these three try to beat each other, and sofar all the contests are draws. But we hope ... yes, we have hopes...."
So Ross had no chance to speak to Kurt. Instead, he was drawn into theknot of men who, having finished their meal, entered a small arena witha half circle of spectator seats at one side and a space for contestantsat the other. What followed absorbed Ross as completely as the earlierscene of the wolf killing. This too was a fight, but not a physicalstruggle. All three contenders were not only unlike in body, but as Rossspeedily came to understand, they were also unlike in their mentalapproach to any problem.
They seated themselves crosslegged at the three points of a triangle.Then Ashe looked from the tall blond to the small Oriental. "Territory?"he asked crisply.
"Inland plains!" That came almost in chorus, and each man, looking athis opponent, began to laugh.
Ashe himself chuckled. "Trying to be smart tonight, boys?" he inquired."All right, plains it is."
He brought his hand down on the floor before him, and to Ross'sastonishment the area around the players darkened and the floor became astretch of miniature countryside. Grassy plains rippled under the windof a fair day.
"Red!"
"Blue!"
"Yellow!"
The choices came quickly from the dusk masking the players. And uponthose orders points of the designated color came into being as smalllights.
"Red--caravan!" Ross recognized Jansen's boom.
"Blue--raiders!" Hodaki's choice was only an instant behind.
"Yellow--unknown factor."
Ross was sure that sigh came from Jansen. "Is the unknown factor anatural phenomenon?"
"No--tribe on the march."
"Ah!" Hodaki was considering that. Ross could picture his shrug.
The game began. Ross had heard of chess, of war games played withminiature armies or ships, of games on paper which demand from theplayers a quick wit and a trained memory. This game,
however, was allthose combined, and more. As his imagination came to life the movingpoints of light were transformed into the raiders, the merchants'caravan, the tribe on the march. There was ingenious deployment, abattle, a retreat, a small victory here, to be followed by a biggerdefeat there. The game might have gone on for hours. The men about himmuttered, taking sides and arguing heatedly in voices low enough not todrown out the moves called by the players. Ross was thrilled when thered traders avoided a very cleverly laid ambush, and indignant when thetribe was forced to withdraw or the caravan lost points. It was the mostfascinating game he had ever seen, and he realized that the three menordering those moves were all masters of strategy. Their respectiveskills checkmated each other so equally that an outright win was faraway.
Then Jansen laughed, and the red line of the caravan gathered in a tightknot. "Camped at a spring," he announced, "but with plenty of sentriesout." Red sparks showed briefly beyond that center core. "And they'llhave to stay there for all of me. We could keep this up till doomsday,and nobody would crack."
"No"--Hodaki contradicted him--"someday one of you will make a littlemistake and then----"
"And then whatever bully boys you're running will clobber us?" askedJansen. "That'll be the day! Anyway, truce for now."
"Granted!"
The lights of the arena went on and the plains vanished into a dark,tiled floor. "Any time you want a return engagement it'll be fine withme," said Ashe, getting up.
Jansen grinned. "Put that off for a month or so, Gordon. We push intotime tomorrow. Take care of yourselves, you two. I don't want to have tobreak in another set of players when I come back."
Ross, finding it difficult to shake off the illusion which had held himentranced, felt a slight touch on his shoulder and glanced up. Kurtstood behind him, apparently intent upon Jansen and Hodaki as theyargued over some point of the game.
"See you tonight." The boy's lips hardly moved, a trick Ross knew fromhis own past. Yes, he _would_ see Kurt tonight, or whenever he could. Hewas going to learn what it was this odd company seemed determined tokeep as their own private secret.