The argument seemed reasonable, the more so since Wla.s.sow could have found his way to Tomisenkov's tent blindfolded. He marched ahead and paid no attention as some shadowy figures sprang suddenly out of the dark, leaped at the throats of his comrades and choked them till they lost consciousness.

"O.K.," a voice whispered in the darkness. "Let's strip them!"

Wla.s.sow turned around and took a few steps back. Two men were busy taking off the unconscious guards' uniforms. "Take your time," Wla.s.sow said calmly. "We've got 15 minutes before the sergeant gives the alarm."

The two sentries were tied up, gagged and hidden in the bushes. The camp was safe from wild animals - except from big ants. a.s.suming that the ants didn't invade the camp in the next hour, the two men were not in danger of their lives.

A stocky, powerful shadow rose from the darkness and gave Wla.s.sow a hearty slap on the shoulder. "Well done, my boy," Tomisenkov said admiringly.

Wla.s.sow grinned with embarra.s.sment. "I feel a little uneasy about it," he replied.

Tomisenkov made a brushing gesture with his hand. "You'll soon get over that," he added quickly.

One of the other men said: "We're ready chief!"

"O.K. Is everybody here? Wla.s.sow, Alicharin, Breshnjew, Zelinskij, Thora?"

"All present, chief! "

Tomisenkov nodded. "Very well, let's go!"

The sergeant at the gate didn't become suspicious when Wla.s.sow returned so soon with two men whose faces couldn't be recognized. His companions were clad in the neat uniforms which distinguished Raskujan's troops in contrast to the ragged clothing of the soldiers from the s.p.a.ce Landing Division.

"Is everything in order?" the sergeant asked.

"Yes. He crawled out under the wall of the tent and took a walk. I don't believe ...."

He didn't have to say any more. He had reached the sergeant. Quick as a flash he lifted the hand holding the heavy service revolver and hit the sergeant hard over the head with the b.u.t.t. Wla.s.sow caught the large body of the man and put him gently down on the gra.s.s.

One of the other guards stuck his head out of the rough guardhouse. "What's the mater? What happened to ..."

"Come here! He suddenly collapsed."

Unsuspecting, the guard came over to help Wla.s.sow. As he bent over the unconscious figure he also was struck a hard blow on the head so that he fell on the limp body of the unconscious sergeant.

Wla.s.sow made short shrift of the last guard. He entered the guardhouse with his gun drawn. The man stared at him sleepily. "Get up and raise your hands!" Wla.s.sow ordered. Sleepy and terrified, the man obeyed.

"Go out the door in front of me," Wla.s.sow continued. The soldier complied. When he stepped through the door, he was whacked over the head by one of Tomisenkov's men and fell to the ground like his two comrades. Wla.s.sow whistled twice. There was a stirring, in the darkness and Tomisenkov, Alicharin and Thora came out.

"Tie them up, gag them and take their weapons," Tomisenkov ordered curtly. They worked fast. The three unconscious men were also concealed in the bushes at some distance from the guardhouse. They thereby hoped to delay the search for the fugitives until the next inspection patrol had found the missing guards.

Altogether seven sentries had been overwhelmed and removed. One in front of Thora's tent and one at the tent in which Alicharin, Breshnjew and Zelinskij had been held together; the two guards a.s.signed to Wla.s.sow by the sergeant and finally the sergeant himself and his two comrades. The eighth of the missing guards would puzzle the patrol: Wla.s.sow. It was difficult to believe that one of Raskujan's soldiers would give up the security of the rocket post to follow a man marked as a renegade in Raskujan's political vernacular into poverty and peril.

Perhaps doubts like these would delay the beginning of the pursuit for a few more minutes.

With Tomisenkov at the head the little group pa.s.sed through the wide open gate of the camp. Wla.s.sow, loaded down with two automatic pistols and plenty of ammunition, formed the rearguard and closed the gate carefully.

Tomisenkov turned northeast in order to get around the well-guarded landing pad for the rockets. Five minutes later they reached the edge of the jungle at the side of the swath drawn through the forest by the Stardust a year ago.

Wla.s.sow was informed of Tomisenkov's plan to reach as quickly as possible the protective screen of the New Power's Venusian base. The idea of stealing a helicopter was dropped immediately. A helicopter could not be started without being noticed. Raskujan's men would be on their heels within a few minutes and with a ratio of twenty to one the outcome of the chase could easily be foreseen.

They just as quickly abandoned a plan to use the burned-out path for their escape so as to advance more swiftly. This was exactly what Raskujan would have antic.i.p.ated. By choosing to make their way through the jungle, they not only misled Raskujan but were at the same time well-protected from discovery by sight.

Tomisenkov was certain that his flight wouldn't be detected before two hours when the next inspection patrol pa.s.sed by. He also knew from his year of experience on Venus that a path broken through the jungle would grow over no later than 90 minutes so that their pursuers would be unable to tell it from the untouched jungle. As far as Tomisenkov was concerned, he had solved all his problems with a maximum of reliability. He was reasonably well convinced that only such circ.u.mstances as were impossible to predict could lead to the detection and capture of his group as long as he was guiding it.

The question of final success was a different matter. Wla.s.sow didn't understand what the Arkonide woman had in mind, having received only second hand information from Tomisenkov. It had something to do with the defense screen against which Raskujan had vainly b.u.t.ted his head every day for a year. Thora seemed to know the special function by which the barrier was held in position and this would enable her and her companions to enter the terrain of the base by applying the appropriate methods.

But it was over Wla.s.sow's head and he simply trusted Tomisenkov's knowledge. If Tomisenkov saw a chance of success in Thora's plans, he was likely to have valid reasons for his optimism.

They had traveled a distance of one and a half miles from the exit of the shaft when a bomb exploded. The forest was illuminated for a few seconds by a pale light which was clearly noticeable through the dense roof of leaves. Half a minute later the shockwave of the explosion rolled over the land.

They were not affected by the blast. It was a smell fusion bomb with a non-critical split ma.s.s, reaching the critical factor of one at the time of ignition by utilizing a suitable reflector such as graphite or beryllium oxide. The dangerous radioactivity was confined to the immediate proximity of the explosion. The cave of the seals, which had served as their haven for a few minutes, and its surroundings in 1500 foot radius, would be a contaminated area for some time, but if the seals heeded the warning they wouldn't be hurt by the despicable bombing.

Nonetheless, the deployment of an atomic bomb was additional proof for Perry Rhodan that it would be criminal irresponsibility to leave Venus to the mercy of people like Colonel Raskujan. They treated Venus like an outpost of Terra. They failed to understand that a new world called for new methods. It was beyond their comprehension that the international rivalry on which politics between the countries on Terra was based, could not be allowed to be transplanted and continued on Venus.

What these people lacked was "cosmic thinking" as Perry Rhodan had come to term it.

Rhodan felt it extremely regrettable that so far he had been prevented from putting Raskujan in his place.

Of the 22 miles to the perimeter of the defense screen less than two had now been covered Time for an extended rest had to be taken out in the next five hours or their legs and senses would give out.

They spent the pause in the highest and least hazardous level of the forest. Son Okura selected a tree promising comparative comfort and security. With some difficulty he reached - at a height of about 120 feet - a fork in the tree big enough to offer a safe place for all of them in its hollow. Rhodan volunteered to take the first watch of two hours. Then it was the turn of the j.a.panese, with John Marshall completing the cycle.

They settled down as best they could and both Marshall and Okura were fast asleep in a minute. Rhodan, however, used the time to ponder some of the problems that had so far remained unsolved.

A year ago he had deprived general Tomisenkov's hostile s.p.a.ce Landing Division of their ships and driven them into the forest with the intention of creating from Tomisenkov's 10,000 men - or rather what was left of them - the first stock of inhabitants of Venus. The plan had proceeded very well. Tomisenkov's division had split up as expected. Ideological splinter groups formed, such as the pacifists under Lieutenant Wallerinski. The separation had not taken place without inner conflicts. There had been some fighting. But the groups had established themselves, most of them on the rocky islands rising from the dense murderous jungle, which offered a good view and a semblance of security.

However, in the meantime Colonel Raskujan had landed with his fleet of supplies. For one year he had tried to conquer the base of the New Power and thus had unknowingly given time to Tomisenkov and his followers to adjust to life on Venus. Then came the fateful moment when Raskujan learned that remnants of the s.p.a.ce Landing Division had survived and he set out to subjugate them and achieve the designs dictated by his l.u.s.t for power.

At any rate, Raskujan was a serious stumbling block. He had to be eliminated lest he cause even greater damage. There was only one important contribution Raskujan's fleet could make: A major part of the crew consisted of women, who were an essential requirement for forming a biologically balanced community. In every other respect Raskujan's presence was detrimental.

In Rhodan's opinion, Tomisenkov was the man capable of developing a thriving colony. This belief was untainted by feelings of a personal nature. Rhodan was uncertain whether he could ever form a close relationship with Tomisenkov. He knew the man only from reports by the prisoners he had made a year ago. The image they reflected was not overly pleasant or harmonious. But Rhodan gave Tomisenkov credit, as long as he had not personally met him, that a year on Venus had made a wiser and humbler man of him.

When he had arrived at this point in his train of thought he heard an intermittent rustling noise among the mult.i.tude of sounds emanating from the jungle at all times. It seemed to come from close by. Rhodan retreated behind the cover of the branches and watched. His eyes used to the darkness, he was able to see a distance of about 10 feet, sufficient to keep any menace away with his impulse-beamer.

A long narrow object slid into view from above. For awhile it dangled aimlessly between the branches. Then it lurched down and grew bigger, dragging an elastic lump with constantly changing shape behind it and descending on a track of self-produced slime along the huge trunk of the tree.

Rhodan knew the animal. It was one of the landbound mollusks living on Venus that built caves in the ground as traps and went hunting when their appet.i.te was unsatisfied by the victims in their pits.

Rhodan waited impatiently. He knew it was useless to shoot at the single tentacle dangling close before his eyes.

The spongy body of the mollusk was covered with a leathery skin on the greater part of its epidermis. It kept in hiding for awhile behind the foliage. Then it continued slithering and sc.r.a.ping down the trunk of the tree, stopped again, then lunged with its swinging tentacle to seize its prey.

Rhodan held still as the repulsive scaly arm glided over his head to his right shoulder and began to hug him around his hip. He'd already slowly raised his impulse-beamer and carefully aimed the barrel at the thick lump of the beast's body. He planted both feet against a branch of the fork and when the mollusk began to jerk him from his seat, he fired.

As it was necessary with a thermo-gun, his shot was highly accurate. The blinding beam hit the body of the mollusk at the farthest point from the trunk. The substance of the animal burned and steamed as it hissed and sprayed a yellow shower of sparks into the dark jungle. Rhodan could feel the strength of the tentacle ebbing away. The mollusk loosened its grip and fell, falling victim to the heat he had generated with his shot.