The Revolt of the Star Men

by Raymond Z. Gallun

Realizing that these fleet space riders could easily catch up with his flier if they so chose, Shelby made no attempt to elude them. Instead he clung doggedly to the straight course toward Mars.

The twin machine guns, responding obediently to their directing mechanism, swung on their swivel toward the hurtling foes. Shelby peered into the eye-piece of the "sighter," a complicated arrangement of mirrors and lenses which enabled the pilot to always look directly through the ring-sights regardless of what direction the gun barrels were pointing. He pressed the trips, and soundlessly, out in the vacuum of space, the guns went into action. Flickering green flames of detonating radio-active explosive darted from their muzzles.

Almost immediately there were answering flashes among the approaching shapes, for the high-calibre bullets were also loaded with explosive. One projectile took effect—another! Emerald flares of light, and nothing remained of two bold space men and their queer disc-like vehicles but torn fragments of flesh and metal.

The Space Men were very close now. Jan and Shelby could see the light flashing on their jeweled harnesses and on the weapons which they flourished defiantly. There must have been almost five hundred in the party. Somehow their wild charge was vaguely reminiscent of a band of fierce Bedouin marauders, racing madly across the desert, bent on pillage. Only it was the Arabs who suffered by this comparison, for the desert of these mysterious Space Men was the whole of interstellar emptiness; and their forms and those of the things they rode, were the forms of the forces of Iblees himself.

Apparently these henchmen of Alkebar had some object in view other than the mere destruction of the flier, for they made no move to use their weapons. They were pulling upon levers on their vehicles, checking their headlong flight.

Now they were coursing with the little craft, swarming about it, edging nearer, at the same time taking care to keep out of range of Shelby's guns.

There was a scraping against the hull and a light jolt as a talon secured a hold on an eyelet ring. A black bulk dropped down on the nose of the craft. A pair of hands gripped the barrels of the machine guns, and with an easy tug, tore them from their mountings. There were shifting scratching sounds coming through the flier's light shell—heavy bodies moving about, and then a sudden ripping vibration. The control lever felt loose in Shelby's hand. He could no longer guide the vessel. And there was nothing either he or Jan could do except wait. The rocket motors still purred evenly.

"I guess they've got us this time, Jan," the young man said to his companion. "I wonder what they are going to do with us?" He spoke as casually as though this latest unfavorable turn of fortune was no more serious than the loss of a game of chess.

Janice Darell was equally cool. "Next time we win," she laughed. It is odd how human beings so often react to strange and terrifying situations. "I'm always ready, you see. Here I was crouching behind you throughout the fight with this perfectly useless pistol in my hand, hoping foolishly that I might be able to use it. That's loyalty."

They fell to studying the two monsters which rested on the nose of the craft in front of the pilot's observation window, where the guns had been. The Space Man was crouching out there trying to peer in at them. He was very much like Alkebar—only not so large, and his equipment and adornment did not boast so many jewels.