Lord of the Spiders or Blades of Mars

  There were no propellers, however - nothing that would serve as propellers. These would have to be made, somehow.

  Our next great discovery was of a machine that could be keyed to run out sections of the tough, light synthetic material of which so much of the place was built.

  The machine was large and evidently connected to some unseen reservoir.

  Ii was a boon to us. On a panel in front one made a careful drawing of the part wanted. This had to be done like a plan - side-view, top-view and front-view. The size of the required piece was selected, buttons were pressed and, within, minutes, the part came out into a pan lying beneath the main machine.

  We could have as many propellers as we needed - indeed, we could have our cabin custom-built, too. I wished then that I might have more time to saunter around this fantastic underground city and discover just what powered it, what synthesis of elements produced the super-strong plastic, how the machine worked ... I resolved to return as soon as I could, bring with me men who could be trained to work with me on a project that would have as its ultimate end the wresting of all the city's secrets from it, the correlation of information, the analysis of machines and materials.

  When that came about, a new age would dawn on Mars!

  Meanwhile we worked hard, transporting all the things we needed into the domed hall where, apart from anything else, we were close to the water supply.

  We also found dehydrated food in air-tight containers. This food was tasteless but nourishing.

  As the balloon began to take shape our spirits rose higher and higher.

  During this time we did not forget to look after our personal appearance. I made a point of shaving regularly - although the only mirror I could find was a great reflector as big as me which I somehow dragged into the domed chamber simply to use as a shaving mirror.

  While Jil Deera and Vas Oola worked on the balloon -we had found that the pressure of a warm human hand on the fabric served to weld it together, facilitating the making of the gas-bag - Hool Haji and I climbed the wall and began to finish nature's work of breaking open the dome.

  In order that the inhabitants of the place might continue to live - if life it was - we had constructed a kind of hatch-cover which could be fitted in place of the dome to stop sand drifting down and clogging the fountain.

  Soon the helium tanks were fitted to the valve of the gasbag and the four of us watched the great mound of fabric slowly fill out.

  We had not yet fitted the driving bands to engine and propeller shaft, but apart from that the balloon was ready. I was in all essential respects a powered airship and, though slower and more vulnerable than the Martian aircraft that I had encountered, would do its job well, I thought.

  Soon the gas-bag was taut. The balloon began to strain at its mooring ropes and looked as if it could lift a hundred such as us. We began to laugh and slap one another on the back - though it was a bit of a stretch for me to slap Hool Haji's back! We had done it!

  The cabin was enclosed, suspended from the strong ropes that covered the outside of the gas-bag. It was made of sections of synthetic material and had open port-holes. Unfortunately we had found no means of providing transparent panes, so we had to construct shutters instead. Inside it was provisioned with water, spare gas tanks and dehydrated food.

  We were very proud of the ship. Crude it may have been, but it was soundly constructed and soon, when we had let her up through the roof a bit and fitted the driving bands to the engine, we should be ready to go wherever we chose. Probably back to Mendishar where, as Hool Haji pointed out, the arrival of their leader, thought dead or chased away from the country, in a flying ship would probably hearten the populace to such an extent that much that had been lost in the attack on the village might be regained by this spectacular return!

  Hool Haji and the other two blue giants were talking earnestly about this possibility when the opposite door -the one we had blocked against any attempt of the white ghouls to enter - began to melt.

  The material which I had regarded as indestructible was bubbling and running like cheap plastic in a fire. A terrible smell - acrid and sweet at the same time - began to come from the door.

  I did not know what was happening but I acted nonetheless.

  'Quick,' I yelled. 'Into the balloon!'

  I pushed at my companions, helping them clamber into the cabin.

  Then I turned as the door collapsed completely - and there were several of the white inhabitants of the place.

  In their hands was a machine.

  Plainly they did not know what it was. All they knew was enough to hold it and point it.

  It was an odd paradox - a machine so advanced as that in the hands of those imbeciles.

  It was emitting a ray - a ray which struck the opposite wall now, narrowly missing the balloon and me. A heat ray, doubtless. A laser ray!

  It was then that I realised no one had cut the mooring lines.

  I sprang towards them, drawing my sword.

  I knew, in fact, that the knowledge of portable lasers had belonged to the older race, I should have been prepared for something like this.

  In their insensate rage these descendants of the Yaksha had perhaps dredged up some race memory, found the projector and brought it back to deal out death to the interlopers.

  Whatever the cause, we should all be dead soon unless I was swift. I sliced the mooring ropes.

  Hool Haji yelled at me from the cabin as he saw what I was doing.

  The balloon began to rise, gently bumping the roof. Shortly the gas would take them to safety as it sought the air beyond the roof. The aperture created by breaking the dome was just wide enough to take it.

  Now the ghouls levelled the laser at me again. I was bound to be killed by it. The ray was sweeping tie room, melting or slicing apart everything it touched.

  And then the idea came!

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  City of the Spider

  As THE beam came closer and closer, weaving somewhat at random in the hand of the moronic ghouls, I suddenly saw the great reflector which I had been using as a having mirror.

  It was a powerful reflector. It might work.

  Quickly I rushed towards it and got behind it.

  The laser beam sliced away part of the fountain which fell with a splash into the water. The fountain spurted sporadically now.

  The beam came closer and melted a whole section of the wall, revealing the next chamber beyond. The white things shuffled closer, their soft, near-boneless arms cradling the powerful projector.

  Then the beam struck the reflector.

  Laser-rays are concentrated light. A mirror reflects light

  This one did.

  The mirror bent the ray and spread it for a few moments. Then for a few seconds it turned the whole ray back on those who were directing it.

  Most of the white ghouls were shrivelled in a second. The rest yelled in terror, retreated a short way and then came at me yelling!

  I dashed for one of the dangling mooring lines just as the balloon began to ascend through the aperture.

  I grabbed the last few feet of the line.

  As claws scraped at me I began to haul myself up towards the cabin.

  Then the balloon was shooting into the air and, in that moment of escaping the danger of the white creatures and finding myself in a new danger, I realised that we had forgotten one vital thing m our haste to escape.

  We had forgotten to load our ballast - the balloon was rising too rapidly!

  Twice I was nearly shaken from my hand-hold as I clung desperately to the rope, trying to pull myself towards the cabin.

  Then I saw Hool Haji open the hatch of the cabin and, balancing with only a toe-hold on the outside of the cabin, he stretched out and grabbed the rope from which I was suspended.

  The ground was far below, the black, shining desert spinning beneath me.

  Hool Haji managed to drag himself back into the cabin, still clutching the rope. Then he and the other two
began to haul me in.

  My hands were aching and torn by the friction. I was almost ready to let go.

  Just as I felt I could hang on no longer I felt their great hands seize me and drag me in to the cabin. They closed the hatch.

  Panting with exhaustion and relief, I lay on the floor of the cabin until 1 had recovered my breath. We were still rising far too rapidly and would soon escape the slightly thinner Martian atmosphere - it must be remembered that the atmosphere of that age was much thicker than it is now.

  I rose shakily and went to the controls. They were simple, makeshift controls and would have been tested before we took the air if we had had the chance. Now we would have to see if they worked. If they did not, we were done for.

  I pulled a lever which controlled the valve of the gas-bag. I had to let gas out and hope that it would be just enough and not so much that would send us plummeting earthwards!

  Slowly our altitude levelled out and I knew the control was working.

  But we were still drifting at random on the air-currents. We would have to land and fix the driving bands to the engine. Under power we should be able to return to Mendishar in less than a day.

  I was rather annoyed at this waste of our valuable helium, but there was nothing else for it. Very slowly, I began to take the ship down.

  We were still some two thousand feet up when it seemed the balloon was suddenly kicked by an enormous foot and buffeted about, sending us all flying. I could not keep my footing and was hurled away from the control panel.

  I believe I lost consciousness for some time.

  When I came to my senses it was almost dark. There was now no longer the sensation of being the ball in some ^me played by giants far more huge than my blue companions, but a sense, instead, of speeding along at tremendous velocity.

  I rose unsteadily and went to a port-hole, sliding back a shutter.

  I looked down and at first could not believe what I saw.

  We were heading over the sea - a rough, storm-tossed sea. We were travelling at a good hundred miles an hour - probably more.

  But what was propelling us?

  It was a natural force of some kind. It seemed to be a wind by the moaning and howling sound that reached my ears.

  But what kind of wind could have struck so rapidly without warning?

  I turned back to find Hool Haji was beginning to stir. He, too, had been knocked out.

  I helped him up and together we revived our companions.

  'What is it, Hool Haji? Do you know?' I asked.

  He rubbed his face with his big hand. 'I should have watched the calendar more carefully,' he said.

  ‘Why?'

  ‘I did not mention this because I felt that we should either be out of the desert or dead - that was before we found the tower and the underground city, I did not mention it while we were underground because I knew we should be safe, there being no sign of damage to the city.'

  'What didn't you mention? What?'

  'I am sorry - it is my fault. Probably the reason why the city of the Yaksha has not been reported is because of the Roaring Death.'

  'What is the Roaring Death?'

  'A great wind that periodically crosses the desert. Some think that it was originally the cause of the desert, that before the Roaring Death came the desert existed as a fertile place. Perhaps the city of the Yaksha was built before the coming of the Roaring Death. I do not know - but the Roaring Death has crossed the desert for centuries, producing mighty sandstorms, levelling everything.'

  'And where does the wind go?' I asked. 'For we might as well know since we're being borne along by it.'

  ‘Westwards,’ said Hool Haji.

  'Over the sea?'

  ‘Just so.'

  ‘And where then?'

  ‘I do not know.'

  I went to the port-hole again and looked down.

  The troubled sea, cold and dark, still lay below us, but through the gloom I thought I could make out, very faintly, some sort of land-mass.

  ‘What lies beyond the western sea?' I asked Hool Haji.

  'I do not know - a land unexplored, save along its coasts. An evil land by all accounts.'

  The land was almost below us now.

  'Evil? What makes you say that?' I asked my friend

  'Legends - travellers' tales - exploration parties that never return. The Western Continent is a place of jungles and strange beasts. It was the continent worst struck by the struggles of the Mightiest War. When the war was over, so they say, strange changes took place in nature - men. animals, plants were all - altered - by something that was left behind after the Mightiest War. Some say this was a spirit, some say a kind of gas, other a machine. But, whatever the reason, the continent in the West has always been avoided by sane men.'

  'All that seems to indicate is an atomic war, radiation and mutation.' I mused. 'And in the thousands of years since the war took place it is unlikely that there is any dangerous radiation. We need not fear from that.'

  Some of the words I used were in English since, though there probably were words to describe the things of which I spoke, they were not in the current Martian vocabulary.

  The 'Roaring Death' was beginning to abate, it seemed, for our movement became slower.

  I felt that our fate was out of my hands as we sped deeper inland.

  The two moons of Mars dashed through the sky above 191 us, illuminating the sight of strange, waving jungles of peculiar colourings.

  I must admit that the peculiar vegetation did disturb me somewhat, but I told myself that we could come to no harm while we rode the wind at this altitude.

  When the wind no longer bore us along we could land at leisure, fix the engines and, under power, go where we wished.

  The opportunity did not come for some hours. Where the wind came from and where it finally died I could not tell -unless it circled the globe permanently, gathering force as it travelled. 1 was no meteorologist.

  At last we were able to escape the airstream and drift towards the huge trees whose dense foliage seemed to form a solid mass below us.

  Great, shiny leaves waved on sinuous boughs and the colours were shades of black, brown, dark green and mottled red.

  A sense of evil hung heavily on this jungle and we did not like the prospect of having to land in it. But at length, by morning, we found a clearing large enough to take the balloon and we began to descend.

  We landed quite neatly for such unskilled aeronauts. We moored the ship and inspected it for damage. The Yaksha building materials had stood up to a wind that would have shaken almost anything else to pieces. There was comparatively little damage, considering the buffeting we had taken.

  All we had to do now was spend an hour or so fixing the driving bands and finding something that would serve as ballast. Then we'd top up the helium - and be heading for Mendishar in no time.

  We soon had the engines working well and the propellers spinning.

  While we worked, however, we began to get a definite sense of being watched. We saw nothing save the dark jungle, its trees rising several hundred feet into the air and all tangled together to form a lattice of twisting boles going up and up on all sides, covered in a tangle of other vegetation - warm and damp-smelling.

  How the glade could ever have been formed I do not know. It was a freak of nature. Its floor consisted of nothing but smooth, hard mud almost the consistency of rock. At its edge grew the dark, shiny leaves of the lower, shrubs, a tangle of vines that, from the comer of one's eye, tended to look like fat snakes, unhealthy looking bushes and creepers gathered around the spreading roots of the trees.

  I had never seen anything so big in a forest. There seemed to be a variety of levels stretching up and up so that from the outside the forest looked like a gigantic cli3 in which were dark openings of caves.

  It was easy for one to imagine being watched. I suspected that it was only my imagination at work, for the surroundings were such that they set the subconscious going nineteen to
the dozen!

  Now all we had to do was find ballast. Jil Deera suggested that logs cut from the branches of trees might do as well as anything. It would be a crude ballast but would probably serve us adequately.

  While Jil Dera and Vas Oola aided me in putting the finishing touches to the motor, Hool Haji said he would go and get some logs.

  Off he went. We finished our work and waited for him to return. We were impatient to get out of this mysterious jungle and return to Mendishar as soon as possible.

  By late afternoon we had shouted ourselves hoarse but Hool Haji had not replied to us.

  There was nothing for it but to enter the forest and see if he was hurt - possibly knocked unconscious in some minor accident.

  Vas Oola and Jil Deera said they would search with me, but I told them our balloon was all-important - they must stay with it and guard it. I managed to convince them of this.

  I found the spot where Hool Haji had entered the forest and began to follow his trail.

  It was not difficult. Being a large man, he had left many signs of his passing. In some places he had hacked away some of the undergrowth.

  The forest was dark and dank. My feet trod on yielding, rotting plants and sometimes sank to the mire beneath. I continued calling my friend's name, but he still did not reply.

  And then I came upon traces of a fight and knew that I had not imagined we were being watched after all!

  Here I found Hool Haji's sword. He would never have discarded that unless captured - or killed!

  I scouted around for signs of captors but could find none!

  This was very perplexing, for I rather prided myself on my tracking ability. AU I could notice were signs of some sticky substance, like strands of fine silk, adhering to the surrounding foliage.