Free The Old Man of the Stars by John Burke Page B

suddenly called: “Clifford. Better come back. We’re not sure. Don’t take any chances.”
    The leading car, an angry droning little midge, swooped. Light stabbed like a bright lance from its side. There was a spurt of dust a few yards in front of Clifford, and then the ray struck him.
    His arms were still outspread. They glowed for a fraction of a second. His body was outlined in flame. Then he crumpled and dissolved: where he had been there was a haze of dust, a swirl of movement that retained the shape of a man of a moment and then was dispersed.
    Alida screamed. She would have flung herself past Matthew and out into the open, but he caught her arm and held her back.
    â€œBellhouse—the doors!” he shouted.
    Bellhouse thumbed the switch, and the airlock door closed with a thud. As its echoes died away there was a sharp sound as though a great fingernail had scratched piercingly down the outside of the spaceship.
    â€œIt’ll take more than that to pierce the hull,” snapped Matthew.
    The sound came again. Through the ports they saw the helicars swooping and plunging, sending out against the side of the ship a succession of vicious bright rays.
    Alida was crying, her body racked by bitter sobs. Matthews’ eyes narrowed with pain. He tried to put an arm about her shoulder, but she shook him off and showed him a face contorted by hatred.
    â€œYou!” she spat. “This is your fault. Your expedition to Earth...your selfishness...and it was you who let Clifford go out there.”
    He said: “Alida....”
    â€œWhere will it end? What hope is there now?”
    Two of the women took her arms and led her gently away, trying to soothe her. The sound of her sobs came back with a hollow, resonant note as she went down the corridor.
    Bellhouse said, not looking at Matthew: “Before we start any arguments, we ought to get clear of this place.”
    â€œRun away?” said Matthew, enraged. “We’ll man the disruptors and blow those little insects out of existence.”
    â€œThat’s a fair-sized town over there,” said Bellhouse, “and if I’m not mistaken they’ve got other resources. There’s something moving over there now.”
    The two of them looked out of a port. Visibility was poor because of the columns of dust that lashed up out of the ground every time one of the helicar’s rays swept across But Bellhouse was right. A vague shape of some heavy vehicle was moving into position at the end of one of the town’s wide streets.
    Matthew said; “We can stand up to it. We can give as good as we get.”
    â€œCan we? They’ll be calling up reinforcements. They don’t like the look of human beings—that’s plain enough. And one hole blown in the side of the ship means we’re stuck here until we can make repairs. What’s it going to be: do we clear out before we’re damaged, or do we make a last stand?”
    Matthew’s every impulse was to stand fast. The need to avenge Clifford’s death burned in his mind.
    â€œOf course,” said Bellhouse ironically, “we might be able to make them understand, after a while, that we mean no harm. But whether we’d get a chance of explaining is open to question.”
    The ground almost directly below the port burst into a fury of flame. The ship rocked violently, and Matthew was thrown back against the corridor wall.
    Then another tremor ran through the ship, as the disruptors opened fire. Matthew thrust himself upright with a scowl of satisfaction.
    Then he said, sharply: “You’re right. Of course you’re right. We can’t expect to have a quiet talk with creatures who fire as soon as they see a human being, and we can’t defeat them. It would be madness to come this far and then be wiped out because we were too proud to cut and run.”
    He called for one of the auxiliary pilots. Bellhouse went back into the