Ullr Uprising Read online

  II

  Carlos von Schlichten, General of the troops on Ullr, threw hiscigarette away and set his monocle more firmly in his eye, steppingforward to let Brigadier-General Themistocles M'zangwe and littleColonel Hideyoshi O'Leary follow him out of the fort. On the littlehundred-foot-square parade ground in front of the keep, his aircar wasparked, and the soldiers were assembled.

  Ten or twelve of them were Terrans--a couple of lieutenants,sergeants, gunners, technicians, the sergeant-driver andcorporal-gunner of his own car. The other fifty-odd were Ullrans. Theystood erect on stumpy legs and broad, six-toed feet. They had fourarms apiece, one pair from true shoulders and the other connected to apseudo-pelvis midway down the torso. Their skins were slate-gray andrubbery, speckled with pinhead-sized bits of quartz that had beenformed from perspiration, since their body-tissues were siliconeinstead of carbon-hydrogen. Their narrow heads were unpleasantlysaurian; they had small, double-lidded red eyes, and slit-likenostrils, and wide mouths filled with opalescent teeth. Beingcold-blooded, they needed no clothing, beyond their belts andequipment, and the emblem of the Chartered Ullr Company painted ontheir chests and backs. They had no need for modesty, since all wereof the same gender--true, functional hermaphrodites; any individualamong them could bear young, or fertilize the ova of any otherindividual.

  Fifteen years before, when he had come to Ullr as a newly commissionedcolonel in the army of the Ullr Company, it had taken him some time toadjust. But now his mind disregarded them and went on worrying aboutthe mysterious disappearance of pet animals from Terran homes; theremust be some connection with the subtle change he had noticed in theattitudes of the natives, but he couldn't guess what. He didn't likeit, though, any more than the beginning of cannibalism among the wildJeel tribesmen. Or the visit of Paula Quinton on Ullr as field-agentfor the Extraterrestrials' Rights Association; now was no time to stirup trouble among the natives, unless his hunch was wrong.

  He shrugged it aside and climbed into the command-car, followed byM'zangwe and O'Leary. Sergeant Harry Quong and Corporal HassanBogdanoff took their places in the front seat; the car lifted, turnedto nose into the wind, and rose in a slow spiral.

  "Where now, sir?" Quong asked.

  "Back to Konkrook; to the island."

  * * * * *

  The nose of the car swung east by south; the cold-jet rotors beganhumming, and the hot-jets were cut in. The car turned from the fortand the mountains and shot away over the foothills toward the coastalplains. Below were forests, yellow-green with new foliage of thesecond growing-season of the equatorial year, veined with narrow dirtroads and spotted with occasional clearings. Farther east, the dirtygray woodsmoke of Ullr marked the progress of the charcoal-burnings.That was the only natural fuel on Ullr; there was too much silica onUllr and not enough of anything else; what would be coal-seams onTerra were strata of silicified wood. And, of course, there was nopetroleum. There was less charcoal being burned now than formerly; theUllr Company had been bringing in great quantities of syntheticthermoconcentrate-fuel, and had been setting up nuclear furnaces andnuclear-electric power-plants, wherever they gained a foothold on theplanet.

  As planets went, Ullr was no bargain, he thought sourly. At times, hewished he had never followed the lure of rapid promotion andfanatically high pay and left the Federation regulars for the army ofthe Ullr Company. If he hadn't, he'd probably be a colonel, at fivethousand sols a year, but maybe it would be better to be a middle-agedcolonel on a decent planet than a Company army general at twenty-fivethousand on this combination icebox, furnace, wind-tunnel andstonepile, where the water tasted like soapsuds and left a cracklyfilm when it dried; where the temperature ranged, from pole to pole,between two hundred and fifty and minus a hundred and fifty Fahrenheitand the Beaufort-scale ran up to thirty; where nothing that ran orswam or grew was fit for a human to eat.

  Ahead, the city of Konkrook sprawled along the delta of the Konk riverand extended itself inland. The river was dry, now. Except in Spring,when it was a red-brown torrent, it never ran more than a trickle, andnot at all this late in the Northern Summer. The aircar lost altitude,and the hot-jet stopped firing. They came gliding in over the suburbsand the yellow-green parks, over the low one-story dwellings andshops, the lofty temples and palaces, the fantastically-twistedtowers, following a street that became increasingly mean and squalidas it neared the industrial district along the waterfront.

  * * * * *

  Von Schlichten, on the right, glanced idly down, puffing slowly on hiscigarette. Then he stiffened, the muscles around his right eyeclamping tighter on the monocle. Leaning forward, he punched HarryQuong lightly on the man's right shoulder.

  "Yes, sir; I saw it," the Chinese-Australian driver replied. "Terransin trouble; bein' mobbed by geeks. Aircar parked right in the bloodymiddle of it."

  The car made a twisting, banking loop and came back, more slowly. VonSchlichten had the handset of the car's radio, and was punching outthe combination of the Company guardhouse on Gongonk Island; he helddown the signal button until he got an answer.

  "Von Schlichten, in car over Konkrook. Riot on Fourth Avenue, just offSeventy-second Street." No Terran could possibly remember the names ofKonkrook's streets; even native troops recruited from outside foundthe numbers easier to learn and remember. "Geeks mobbing a couple ofTerrans. I'm going down, now, to do what I can to help; send troops ina hurry. Kragan Rifles. And stand by; my driver'll give it to you asit happens."

  The voice of somebody at the guardhouse, bawling orders, came out ofthe receiver as he tossed the phone forward over Harry Quong'sshoulder; Quong caught it and began speaking rapidly and urgently intoit while he steered with the other hand. Von Schlichten took one ofthe five-pound spiked riot-maces out of the rack in front of him.

  Bogdanoff rose into the ball-turret and swung the twin 15-mm.'saround, cutting loose. Quong brought the car in fast, at aboutshoulder-height on the mob. Between them, they left a swath ofmangled, killed, wounded, and stunned natives. Then, spinning the cararound, Quong set it down hard on a clump of rioters as close aspossible to the struggling group around the two Terrans. VonSchlichten threw back the canopy and jumped out of the car, O'Learyand M'zangwe behind him.

  There was another aircar, a dark maroon civilian job, at the curb; itsnative driver was slumped forward over the controls, a shortcrossbow-bolt sticking out of his neck. Backed against the closed doorof a house, a Terran with white hair and a small beard was clubbingfutilely with an empty pistol. He was wounded, and blood was streamingover his face. His companion, a young woman in a long fur coat, waslaying about her with a native bolo-knife.

  * * * * *

  Von Schlichten's mace had a spiked ball-head, and a four-inch spike infront of that. He smashed the ball down on the back of one Ullran'shead, and jabbed another in the rump with the spike.

  "_Zak! Zak!_" he yelled, in pidgin-Ullran. "_Jik-jik_, youlizard-faced Creator's blunder!"

  The Ullran whirled, swinging a blade somewhere between a bigbutcher-knife and a small machete. His mouth was open, and there wasfroth on his lips.

  "_Znidd suddabit!_" he shrieked.

  Von Schlichten parried the cut on the steel shaft of his mace."_Suddabit_ yourself!" he shouted back, ramming the spike-end into theopal-filled mouth. "And _znidd_ you, too," he added, recovering andslamming the ball-head down on the narrow saurian skull. The Ullranwent down, spurting a yellow fluid about the consistency of gun-oil.

  Ahead, one of the natives had caught the wounded Terran with bothlower hands, and was raising a dagger with his upper right. The girlin the fur coat swung wildly, slashing the knife-arm, then choppeddown on the creature's neck.

  Another of them closed with the girl, grabbing her right arm with allfour hands and biting at her; she screamed and kicked her attacker inthe groin, where an Ullran is, if anything, even more vulnerable thana Terran. The native howled hideously, and von Schlichten, jumpingover a cou
ple of corpses, shoved the muzzle of his pistol into thecreature's open mouth and pulled the trigger, blowing its head apartlike a rotten pumpkin and splashing both himself and the girl withyellow blood and rancid-looking gray-green brains.

  O'Leary, jumping forward after von Schlichten, stuck his dagger intothe neck of a rioter and left it there, then caught the girl aroundthe waist with his free arm. M'zangwe dropped his mace and swung thefrail-looking man onto his back. Together, they struggled back to thecommand-car, von Schlichten covering the retreat with his pistol.Another rioter was aiming one of the long-barreled native air-rifles,holding the ten-inch globe of the air-chamber in both lower hands. VonSchlichten shot him, and the native literally blew to pieces.

  For an instant, he wondered how the small bursting-charge of a 10-mm.explosive pistol-bullet could accomplish such havoc, and assumed thatthe native had been carrying a bomb in his belt. Then anotherexplosion tossed fragmentary corpses nearby, and another and another.Glancing quickly over his shoulder, he saw four combat-cars coming in,firing with 40-mm. auto-cannon and 15-mm. machine-guns. They sweptbetween the hovels on one side and the warehouses on the other,strafing the mob, darted up to a thousand feet, looped, and cameswooping back, and this time there were three long blue-graytroop-carriers behind them.

  These landed in the hastily-cleared street and began disgorging nativeCompany soldiers--Kragan mercenaries, he noted with satisfaction. Theycarried a modified version of the regular Terran Federation infantryrifle, stocked and sighted to conform to their physical peculiarities,with long, thorn-like, triangular bayonets. One platoon ran forward,dropped to one knee, and began firing rapidly into what was left ofthe mob. Four-handed soldiers can deliver a simply astonishing volumeof fire, particularly when armed with auto-rifles having twenty-shotdrop-out magazines which can be changed with the lower hands withoutlowering the weapon.

  * * * * *

  There was a clatter of shod hoofs, and a company of King Jaikark ofKonkrook's cavalry came trotting up on their six-legged,lizard-headed, quartz-speckled, mounts. Some of these charged intoside alleys, joyfully lancing and cutting-down fleeing rioters, whileothers dismounted, three tossing their reins to a fourth, and went towork with their crossbows. Von Schlichten, who ordinarily entertaineda dim opinion of the King of Konkrook's soldiery, admitted,grudgingly, that it was smart work; four hands were a big help inusing a crossbow, too.

  A Terran captain of native infantry came over, saluting.

  "Are you and your people all right, general?" he asked.

  Von Schlichten glanced at the front seat of his car, where HarryQuong, a pistol in his right hand, was still talking into theradio-phone, and Hassan Bogdanoff was putting fresh belts into hisguns. Then he saw that they had gotten the wounded man into the car.The girl, having dropped her bolo, was leaning against the side of thecar.

  "We seem to be, Captain Pedolsky. Very smart work; you must have thosevehicles of yours on hyperspace-drive.... How is he, colonel?"

  "We'd better get him to the hospital, right away," O'Leary replied. "Ithink he has a concussion."

  "Harry, call the hospital. Tell them what the score is, and tell themwe're bringing the casualty in to their top landing stage.... Why,we'll make out very nicely, captain. You'd better stay around withyour Kragans and make sure that these geeks of King Jaikark's don'tlet the riot flare up again and get away from them. And don't let themget the impression that they can maintain order around here withoutour help; the Company would like to see that attitude discouraged."

  "Yes, sir; I understand." Captain Pedolsky opened the pouch on hisbelt and took out the false palate and tongue-clicker without which noTerran could do more than mouth a crude and barely comprehensiblepidgin-Ullran. Stuffing the gadget into his mouth, he turned and beganjabbering orders.

  Von Schlichten helped the girl into the car, placing her on his right.The wounded civilian was propped up in the left corner of the seat,and Colonel O'Leary and Brigadier-General M'zangwe took thejump-seats. The driver put on the contragravity-field, and the carlifted up.

  "Them, see if there's a flask and a drinking-cup in the door pocketnext you," he said. "I think Miss Quinton could use a drink."

  * * * * *

  The girl turned. Even in her present disheveled condition, she wasbeautiful--a trifle on the petite side, with black hair and black eyesthat quirled up oddly at the outer corners. Her nails wereblack-lacquered and spotted with little gold stars, evidently a newfeminine fad from Terra.

  "I certainly could, general.... How did you know my name?"

  "You've been on Ullr for the last three months; ever since the _Cityof Canberra_ got in from Niflheim. On Ullr, there aren't enough of usthat everybody doesn't know all about everybody else. You're Dr. PaulaQuinton; you're an extraterrestrial sociographer, and you're afield-agent for the Extraterrestrials' Rights Association, likeMohammed Ferriera, here." He took the cup and flask from ThemistoclesM'zangwe and poured her a drink. "Take this easy, now; Baldurhoney-rum, a hundred and fifty proof."

  He watched her sip the stuff cautiously, cough over the firstmouthful, and then get the rest of it down.

  "More?" When she shook her head, he stoppered the flask and relievedher of the cup. "What were you doing in that district, anyhow?" hewanted to know. "I'd have thought Mohammed Ferriera would have hadmore sense than to take you there, or go there, himself, for thatmatter," he added quickly.

  "We went to visit a friend of his, a native named Keeluk, who seems tobe a sort of combination clergyman and labor-leader," she replied."I'm going to observe labor conditions at the North Pole mines in ashort while, and Mr. Keeluk was going to give me letters ofintroduction to friends of his at Skilk. We talked with Mr. Keeluk fora while, and when we came out, we found that our driver had beenkilled and a mob had gathered. Of course, we were carrying pistols;they're part of this survival-kit you make everybody carry, along withthe emergency-rations and the water desilicator. Mr. Ferriera's wasn'tloaded, but mine was. When they rushed us, I shot a couple of them,and then picked up that big knife.... I never in my life saw anythingas beautiful as you coming through that mob swinging that warclub!"

  * * * * *

  The aircar swung out over Konkrook Channel and headed toward theblue-gray Company buildings on Gongonk Island, and the Companyairport.

  "Just what happened, while you and Mr. Ferriera were in Keeluk'shouse, Miss Quinton?" O'Leary asked, trying not to sound official."Was Keeluk with you all the time? Or did he go out for a while, sayfifteen or twenty minutes before you left?"

  "Why, yes, he did." Paula Quinton looked surprised. "How did you guessit? You see, a dog started barking, behind the house, and he excusedhimself and...."

  "A dog?" von Schlichten almost shouted. The other officers echoed him.

  "Why, yes...." Paula Quinton's eyes widened. "But there are no dogs onUllr, except a few owned by Terrans. And wasn't there somethingabout ...?"

  Von Schlichten had the radio-phone and was calling the command car atthe scene of the riot. The sergeant-driver answered.

  "Von Schlichten here; my compliments to Captain Pedolsky, and tell himhe's to make immediate and thorough search of the house in front ofwhich the incident occurred, and adjoining houses. For hisinformation, that's Keeluk's house. Tell him to look for traces ofGovernor-General Harrington's collie, or any of the other terrestrialanimals that have been disappearing--that goat, for instance, or thoserabbits. And I want Keeluk brought in, alive and in condition to beinterrogated."

  "But, what ...?" the girl began, her voice puzzled.

  "That's why you were attacked," he told her. "Keeluk was afraid to letyou get away from there alive to report hearing that dog, so he wentout and had a gang of thugs rounded up to kill you."

  "But he was only gone five minutes."

  "In five minutes, I can put all the troops in Konkrook into action.Keeluk doesn't have radio or TV--we hope--but he has his forcesconcentrated, an
d he has a pretty good staff."

  "But Mr. Keeluk's a friend of ours. He knows what our Association istrying to do for his people...."

  "So he shows his appreciation by setting that mob on you. Look, he hasa lot of influence in that section. When you were attacked, why wasn'the out trying to quiet the mob?"

  "When they jumped you, you tried to get back into the house," M'zangweput in. "And you found the door barred against you."

  "Yes, but...." The girl looked troubled; M'zangwe had guessed right."But what's all the excitement about the dog? What is it, the sacredtotem-animal of the Ullr Company?"

  "It's just a big brown collie named Stalin. But somebody stole it, andKeeluk was keeping it. We want to know why. We don't like geekmysteries--not when they lead to murderous attacks on Terrans, atleast."

  It seemed to satisfy her, as the aircar let down on the hospitallanding stage. But it didn't satisfy von Schlichten. He could smelltrouble brewing. Just what could the geeks do with a dog? Nothing, sofar as he could tell--but they didn't go in for such behaviour withoutwhat they considered good reason. Good for them, that is!