Snowman in Flames Read online

  This strange little furry creature was gifted with an astonishing degree of adaptability. He was hardly bothered by the icy cold of the dead planet. He could stay out of doors for a short while without the benefit of a spacesuit and could breathe easily the icy air. On this world existed only one other being which was his equal in this respect.

  But could a robot really be called a 'being?'

  RB-013 'Aubrey'—was over 7 feet tall, had two powerful legs and four arms. His two lower arms were actually perfect energy rayguns. The robot was part of the routine equipment of the three-man destroyer and it was the only thing the crew had been able to salvage, besides their lives, when their craft had been shipwrecked. Only thanks to the robot's assistance had they succeeded in melting a livable cave into the icy surface of the deadly planet. Aubrey was an excellent fighter and also a superb, untiring worker.

  Ever since Pucky had been deposited by Bell on this iceworld—a dare-devil feat in itself—in order to come to the aid of Tiff and his crew, the situation had become more bearable, although nerves were on edge from the constant attacks by the Springers. However, now they had a large enough supply of food and equipment to hold out for awhile. Pucky was sitting on a box in a corner having his furry stomach tickled by the kind-hearted Felicita Kergonen.

  "You are an angel," Pucky chirped with an improbably high-pitched voice. "I already envy your future husband."

  "Let's hope all he'll want is to have his stomach tickled!" Humpry Hifield said spitefully from another corner.

  "Sour grapes!" remarked Klaus Eberhardt with surprising reaction speed this time. "If I were a girl I wouldn't tickle your stomach!"

  "I'm glad you aren't a girl," countered Humpry coldly. His voice lacked any warmth although it was fairly warm in the cave. The robot had built a small airlock so that at least here inside they could open their helmets.

  "Can't you can your eternal squabbling!" intervened Tiff. "There are plenty of more urgent things to worry about. If the Springers manage to locate our robot, they'll gas us down here. They've already removed the ice cover from half the planet—we're lucky we didn't drown so far."

  "Thank heavens the cave is on a mountain—or isn't it?" Hump asked insolently. "And if they rake the mountain with their ship's cannons, Hump, what then?" Hump did not answer. Pucky sighed in his corner: "Isn't it lucky I'm the only telepath here!" Tiff threw a swift glance at the mouse-beaver. He was getting sick and tired of the whole affair with

  Hump and he decided not to mince any words toward Rhodan when... Yes, indeed, when! Suddenly Pucky rose to his full height. The hair on the back of his neck was bristling. Slowly he pushed

  Felicita's hand aside, cocked his head as if listening to something. Tiff noticed at once. He watched the mouse-beaver with great interest. Finally he could restrain himself no longer. "Something going on, Pucky?"

  "Yes, I think so. They're attacking again. Three ships this time. And they're flying suspiciously slow."

  "Can you see them?"

  "Just a moment!" Said Pucky—and vanished.

  The rest of the group in the cave looked at each other with dumbfounded faces. The mouse-beaver had once more transported himself without warning out into the open in order to reconnoiter the terrain.

  Klaus Eberhardt was just about to say something when Pucky rematerialized in the middle of the cave. His brown fur was covered with snow. "We've to get out of here!" he shrieked in excitement. "One more minute and this mountain will be a hell. The Springers discovered me. But I still managed to destroy one of their ships."

  "Destroy?" gasped Hump, perplexed.

  "Later!" replied Pucky. "Fortunately, meantime I used the opportunity to scout around for another hiding place. I'll take you there. Right away! Close your eyes—and your space helmets. The new place hasn't any airlock yet."

  "Airlock?" wondered Tiff, but vanished the same instant before he had a chance to say anything more.

  The two girls followed one second later. Then it was Eberhardt's and Hump's turn. Finally the robot and the boxes with equipment followed suit.

  It was just like magic. Pucky was standing in the center of the cave and directing the entire proceedings like a field marshall. Whatever he was looking at would disappear as if carried off by an invisible ghost. Within a fraction of a second he could transport anything anywhere he desired, provided it did not exceed one 1000 times his own weight. And that was exactly what he was doing now.

  Those involved noticed nothing. Although they retained their natural body forms, the transport was effected so rapidly that their sense organs had no chance to register even the slightest impressions. Tiff was still exhaling when he found himself in a pitch-dark room. Quickly he shut his helmet; it was ice cold in the place.

  He turned around and noticed a faint glow of light in the distance which he took to be the entrance to the cave. How far away the new cave was removed from their former hiding place, he was unable to guess, for there was no relation to the distance covered by a telekinetic transport and its duration. Within seconds all the others appeared nearby in the darkness. He sensed rather than saw it. Not until RB-013 lit up his lamp could Tiff reassure himself that all were safely reassembled.

  Except for Pucky.

  This fact however did not worry Tiff unduly.

  "He probably wants to watch what's happening at the old cave," he guessed. "Too bad we'll have to build another airlock here again. By the way, that's not ice here, it's solid rock. I think Pucky has brought us to the equator where there are still some ice-free spots. It seems to me, also, it isn't quite so cold here."

  "Yes" Hump laughed sarcastically. "Instead of 150° below freezing we have only 125° below."

  The emotionless voice of the robot interjected. "It is exactly -70° Fahrenheit. If I switch on the heating aggregates, we can manage quite well without an airlock. It will suffice if we use the boxes with the equipment as an entrance door."

  "That's a splendid suggestion," said Tiff. "Let's go to work!"

  "And how about Pucky?" wondered Klaus Eberhardt.

  Hump glanced at him with a lofty air.

  "How stupid can you get! Since when can Pucky be stopped by some boxes?"

  Eberhardt was just about to reply but had hardly opened his mouth when Pucky suddenly returned.

  "Friends!" shouted the little guy and his voice was shrill with excitement. "That was some sight! I'll never forget it as long as I live! They melted down our whole ice mountain."

  "At first I managed to destroy one of the three attacking ships. I teleported into its command center and almost tore out the commander's red beard. The guy was so startled that he lost control of his ship, ramming it at high speed into the nearest glacier. His ship disappeared halfway into the mountainside. I can't imagine any survivors of this disaster—their sister ships were busy letting their comrades go up in steam. Whether it's part of their strategy not to permit any survivors, isn't clear to me. In any case, I leaped off the ship at the last moment to carry you all to safety. Then I returned. The two ships were just about to turn our ice cave into an ocean of flame. I'm telling you, my friends, we would have been miserably burnt to death—or drowned. Anyhow, I still managed to put another Springer ship out of action. I jumped into its arsenal and set off an atom bomb stored inside. Unfortunately I couldn't save our auxiliary vessel."

  "You mean to say then, Pucky, that only one of their ships escaped?" Tiff inquired. He no longer looked as dejected as before. "Man alive, Pucky, what would we do without you?"

  "No insults, please," Pucky replied soberly, at the same time displaying his lone incisor, a sign that he really didn't mean what he was saying. "After all, I don't call any of you a mouse."

  Tiff grinned. "What part of the planet is this here?"

  "I transported you about 300 miles farther south. This iceworld is approximately as large as your Earth but has a smaller gravity which leads us to conclude it has also a smaller density. We are now near the equator in a natural rock cave. The
Springers should find it rather difficult to roast us down here—600 feet of rock are not to be sneezed at!"

  "The way you talk!" complained Hump. "It's obvious Bell gave you language lessons."

  "Kindly refrain from insulting Mr Bell," Pucky defended his secret pal in a very formal manner.

  "So we are underground?" asked Tiff. Pucky shook his head.

  "No, not exactly underground. We are inside a mountain. But we are surrounded by solid rock not by ice. Let's settle down here and wait comfortably till Rhodan picks us up. And if he picks us up, Tiff, you will have served your purpose."

  Tiff was suddenly wide awake. "Purpose? What purpose?"

  Pucky grinned. His incisor seemed to wink roguishly at Tiff. "The cell sender sewn inside you during an operation has a range of two light-years. Our telepaths therefore always know where you can be found. You can't get lost. But the Springers believe you know a lot of secrets, that's why they're after you and not after Rhodan, who wanted to shake them off his back for awhile. Rhodan went to the Planet of Eternal Life meanwhile in order to get a new weapon, since he couldn't handle the Springers with the arms at his disposal. So if he returns that will mean he has obtained the new weapon. Sounds logical, doesn't it?"

  "Sure does," admitted Tiff. He looked rather unhappy and startled. "That means I was nothing but bait here for the Springers all the time?"

  Pucky was still grinning. "So was I, don't worry. All of us!" Suddenly he turned serious. "It was most important, however, that Rhodan obtain that new weapon, otherwise Earth would have been lost."

  "He hasn't got it yet!" objected Hump.

  "True," said Pucky. "I only claimed that he will have it in his possession when he comes here to liberate us. Till then we'll have to be patient. By the way, I hope to be able to establish better communication with the semi-sleepers. They should be more alert here near the equator."

  "Semi-sleepers?" asked one of the girls who so far had not participated in the discussion.

  "Yes, Milly. That's what I call the inhabitants of this planet. So far we haven't seen any of them but I was able to receive their thoughts. They are rather confused but still quite intelligent thoughts. They live somewhere below the planet's surface under the ice and as far as I could make out come above ground when the ice melts during the planet's short summer. But this won't happen for a few decades."

  Tiff shook his head. "I'd never believed there could be life on this iceworld."

  "If you could call this life in our sense of the word; we'll have to wait and see," Pucky cast a damper on their expectations. "Maybe we'll soon find out. I'll try to establish contact with them. But first let's build a wall to ward off the cold. Let's do it with our hands; we need the exercise.

  "And afterwards I want to go for a walk outside on the surface."

  "I'll come with you," Mildred added quickly.

  "Me too," whispered Felicita.

  Pucky nodded his little mouse-head.

  "You can leave as soon as we're through here with the work. Our robot can produce enough heat to make life bearable for us down here. Outside you'll need half the capacity of the heating aggregate in your spacesuits. A space helmet is not absolutely necessary."

  "Well, let's get to work now!"

  Tiff was not too astonished that the mouse-beaver had practically relieved him from his responsibilities as leader of the group. As surprising as this fact might seem, it actually shouldn't be that way, for Pucky was the most able mutant in Rhodan's Corps. He certainly was one of the most important members of the fighting troop which at the present time had to defend Earth. Admittedly Pucky was not a human being but the members of the space fleet had understood long since that one should not judge a living creature by its exterior appearance.

  Pucky cocked his head a little as he looked at Tiff. "Difficult problems, aren't they?" he asked and grinned impishly. "But don't worry needlessly. I'm only trying to help you before you get too discouraged. You carry the whole responsibility on your shoulders, for you are the leader of this group. I have come here solely to help you out. And if once in awhile I arrange things, I do it only so as not to let boredom take over. For nothing is more dangerous in this situation than too much introspection."

  "It's alright," Tiff smiled gratefully. "We understand each other."

  They dragged the boxes toward the exit, where they piled them up to build a wall. They left a narrow passage which they closed off with a blanket. This way they were sheltered from the cold outside air.

  Contentedly, Pucky rubbed his paws together. "And now go for your walk. Hump will prepare a meal in the meantime. Eberhardt can help him with it. He must be a good cook—his figure is ample proof of it—and I'll..."

  "Always these snide remarks about my figure!" complained the cadet. "I can't help it if I am pleasantly plump!"

  "That's the understatement of the year!" called out Hump, roaring with laughter. "No wonder he's getting fatter every day: He eats double rations like he was getting paid for it! It's a good thing we have plenty of supplies!"

  ...make an exploratory trip down into the depths of this cave," Pucky persisted. "Maybe I'll discover something interesting."

  Little did he know at that moment how much truth there was to this mere surmise.

  2/ "A NEW SUN"

  Etztak nearly burst with fury when the returning commander reported that two of the three ships he had sent out had failed to return with him. One of the ships had crashed as the result of a navigational error and had to be destroyed to prevent its failing into the hands of the enemy who might extract some information from the crew. The other ship had suddenly exploded in midair.

  "And what's the story with Rhodan's people?" asked the patriarch after having calmed down sufficiently to resume his questioning. "Have you caught them?"

  "I couldn't say for sure," admitted the commander of the one remaining ship of this ill-fated expedition. "We shelled the entire area where they must have been staying. Of course it was not possible to check the results of this bombardment. But I saw something."

  "Something," inquired Etztak without properly understanding.

  "Like what? Let me hear!"

  "What I saw was no Earthling, it was much shorter, perhaps half as tall as we are. I would say a young Terranian but this doesn't seem to make any sense."

  "Nor to me," Etztak countered with sarcasm, for he remembered Pucky quite well. "So what was it then?"

  He received no answer. Instead there came a hum from the intercom. With an impatient wave of his huge hand he missed the unlucky commanding officer and switched channels. The bearded face of a radioman appeared on the screen.

  "A hyperwave message, sir." Etztak noticed at once how puzzled the man seemed to be, that he had difficulty speaking. "From Topthor."

  Etztak couldn't believe his ears. "From whom?"

  "From Topthor, sir."

  Etztak leaned back heavily in his armchair. The leader of the Mounders!

  "What is that supposed to mean? I haven't asked the Mounders to come mixing into our affairs! I need no protection."

  "I don't think that's what the message is about," the radio technician dared to utter a mild protest. "At least not directly."

  "Is that what you think? How about reading the message out to me? Maybe the matter will make more sense then."

  The radio technician looked at a piece of paper and read: "To Etztak, patriarch of the clan of Etztak. Perry Rhodan, the Terranian, has succeeded in obtaining a new weapon. With it he destroyed five of my ships. Impossible to offer any resistance. I warn you, Etztak! Secure our services! Rhodan will attack and destroy you. Only a surprise attack can render him harmless. I'll call back with my new position. Awaiting your offer. Topthor, Clan of the Mounders."

  Etztak nodded his head to acknowledge the message. Then he ordered the message brought to him. He cut off the connection to the radio room. Without delay he gave the signal for general alarm. For the time being the second planet with Rhodan's five people had beco
me non-essential. His first and fore-most task now was to prepare for Rhodan's imminent attack.

  At least this is what Etztak tried to make himself believe. Secretly it began to dawn on him that he had committed an irreparable mistake: He had permitted himself to be distracted from his real opponent. While he thought Tiff to be one of the main foes, he had actually been just an unimportant figure placed in this situation merely to sidetrack and throw him off Rhodan's scent, his trip to the Planet of Eternal Life and the new super-weapon. To his sorrow he had to admit to himself his enemy's plan had fully succeeded.

  "Orlgans!" he yelled into the microphone as the questioning faces of his clan friends appeared on the picture screens. "Rhodan has got the new weapon. I received a warning from Topthor..."

  "The Mounder?"

  "Who else?" Etztak snapped furiously. "He is roaming around here somewhere in the vicinity though I didn't request his aid. But still, he has warned me. Rhodan plans to attack us. I don't know any details about this new weapon but I'm sure we'll be able to handle that threat. Orlgans, in the meantime I want you to proceed to the second planet with another ship. Let that planet go up in an atomic explosion."

  "Explode the whole planet?" Orlgans raised his eye-brows. "Turn the entire planet into a sun? Don't you realize that this goes against all laws if you annihilate an inhabitable world without a proper reason?"

  "Isn't it a sufficiently compelling reason if I want to revenge myself on Rhodan and especially on the escaped prisoners?"

  "Is that a compelling reason?" doubted Orlgans.

  "For me it is!" raged the patriarch. "I want to teach him a lesson once and for all: not to stick his nose in my affairs!" Etztak conveniently forgot that just the opposite had been the case: he was the one who planned interfering with the affairs of Earth. Rhodan was merely defending himself against the Springers' assault. "And part of this lesson will be to wipe out his men and the planet on which they found refuge."

  "Total annihilation by an atom bomb—unleashing an atomic fire that can never be extinguished?"