Flash Gordon 3 - The Space Circus (6 page)

“Can you understand me at all?” Flash asked him.

Nord frowned. He repeated the pointing and the smiling, adding several loops traced in the air with his finger.

You’re referrring to my act, decided Flash. He’d been with the circus long enough to know this crippled blue man was an assistant of some sort to Barko. He’d been aware of Nord’s watching him from down below while he performed.

Suddenly the blue man inhaled sharply.

The guard jumped to his feet.

A harsh beeping sound poured out of two ceiling speakers.

“Some kind of emergency,” said Huk.

“Trouble up ahead,” said Jape.

“Might be something wrong with the cable,” suggested Sixy. “They’ve been known to unravel and snap in weather like this.”

“I told all of you,” said Booker. “I told you they’d get us killed.”

Their car was swaying wildly, traveling ahead in screeching lunges.

Nord reached his good hand under his cloak.

“It is the cable!” warned Jape. “They’re not going to be able to stop the train in time.”

Nord placed a ring of keys in Flash’s hand, then tapped at the manacle which held him.

The guard was running along the aisle, making a low moaning sound.

Through the roar of the storm new sounds came from outside: the shouting and screaming of the performers in the cars ahead.

The circus train left the cable and went plummeting down into darkness.

D
r. Zarkov sneered at the white metal walls. “Antiseptic,” he pronounced as he approached the EII computer he wanted.

The computer was a compact one with a white face built into one of the walls of the large computer wing. When he was ten feet from it, a wall panel slid open to allow what appeared to be an attractive young blonde girl to step into the room. To the perceptive Zarkov, it was immediately evident that this was an android.

“Good day,” the pretty blonde mechanical girl said in her pleasant, slightly husky voice. “My name is Jackie, and I’m hostess for this area of the Earth Interstellar Intelligence building. May I assist you?”

“Be gone,” bellowed the bushy doctor. He continued on toward the computer.

“Beg pardon, sir?”

“Scram,” said Zarkov. “Get back into your wall.”

“Won’t you need, sir, some help in operating this computer?” the attractive android asked. “They can be quite tricky.”

“Nothing is too tricky for Zarkov,” he assured the blonde mechanism. “Go away.”

“Well, at least let me get you a cup of pseudocoffee or perhaps—”

“Nothing.” Dr. Zarkov halted in front of the computer of his choice, then thumped it hard with his fist. “Wake up and let’s get to work.”

Tiny lights here and there on the computer’s face began to light up. “At your service, sir.”

“Or possibly a soydonut?” inquired the android hostess. “We have them today frosted with imitation maple frosting, synthetic nearcheese spread on artificial sunflower honey. Personally I’d recommend the nearcheese.”

Snorting, Zarkov took hold of the android by elbow and knee and deposited her in the cubicle from whence she’d come. “Gadgets,” he muttered, “too many useless gadgets.”

“I hope your condemnation doesn’t extend to me,” said the computer.

“We’ll see.” Zarkov tugged a handful of notes out of a pocket.

Several hours later, a door to the rear of Zarkov whirred open. “No donuts,” boomed the doctor, not looking around.

“I don’t have any with me anyway,” said Dale, approaching him. “But it might not be a bad idea for you to have something to eat, Doc.”

Zarkov had the sleeves of his worksuit rolled up. He turned and frowned at the dark-haired girl. “I left you elsewhere,” he said.

“Yes” she conceded. “I got impatient, then decided to come along here and see if you’d found out anything.”

“We’ve been going great guns,” said the computer out of its voice box.

“I talked to Agent Cox and he sent me down here,” continued Dale. “Apparently, there’s no new information about Flash.”

“Not until I finish wringing what I have to out of this gadget.”

“I was hoping, well, that possibly you were wrong. That Flash would turn up someplace on Earth, after all.”

Zarkov put a knobby hand on her shoulder. “You can’t help hoping for the best, Dale,” he told her. “But you have to keep in mind that Zarkov is never wrong. Flash has been taken to another planet.”

Inclining her head toward the computer the doctor had been working with, she asked, “Have you found out anything as to what planet it might be?”

“Gradually,” boomed Zarkov, “I’ve been able to extract what I want to know out of this verbose contraption here.”

“I was designed to be thorough,” said the computer in its defense. “If you insist upon skimming and skipping over the pertinent descriptions of flora, fauna, and terrain of each specific planet, you cannot expect precise results.”

“Purple prose,” said Zarkov. “This thing is stuffed chock-f of the most highfalutin jargon.” He drilled into his thick tangled beard with the end of his electric pencil. “I’ve been able, in spite of the difficulties, to narrow my list down.”

“Then you know where Flash is?” the girl asked hopefully.

“Right now,” said the doctor, “I’m ninety percent certain Flash was picked up by a craft hailing from the remote planet, Mesmo. A few more minutes of digging and I should be a hundred percent sure.”

Dale said, “When you’re sure, then what?”

“Then I’ll go to Mesmo,” said Zarkov, “and help Flash get back home.”

T
he rain pounded down through the broken and twisted metal of the roof. There was a harsh burnt smell everywhere.

Flash stirred, shaking his head, and looked around him. Water was running along the sharply slanted floor of the train car. The bent blue man who had handed him the keys just before the train smashed to the ground was nowhere in sight.

“The keys,” remembered Flash, shaking his head again. He found he still held them clutched in his hand.

He tried several of the keys on the manacle holding him to his chair. The fourth one worked; he was free. His wrist was bloody, the metal had cut into it when the train hit, but the injury was not serious.

“I’m dying,” said the unhappy voice of Booker. “I’m all smashed up and dying.”

From nearer at hand came a groan. It was the pudgy Sixy. He was slumped in his twisted chair, a bleeding gash zigzagging across his forehead.

Flash eased across the aisle and began to try the keys Nord had given him.

“Get me loose first and I can help out,” said Huk the hawkman.

“You okay?” asked Flash as he turned toward him.

“A sprained wing is about all the damage, I think.”

Flash moved along the wet slippery floor. Rain was spraying down on him through the ruined ceiling. He freed the hawkman.

“What about me?” yelled Booker. “I’ll die if somebody doesn’t pay any attention to me soon.”

“You’re pretty talkative for someone who’s dying,” said Jape. He was holding his head with two of his hands, feeling his ribs with another and massaging a welt on his knee with the fourth.

“Just because I can talk doesn’t mean I’m not all busted up inside.”

Sixy groaned again while they were unlocking him. His eyelids flickered, tried to open, but stayed shut.

Huk stared up at the rents in the roof of their car. The rain slapped at him, making him narrow his eyes. “I can carry him out through that biggest hole up there.”

“You guys going to fly away and leave me to die here?” Booker wanted to know.

“Set him down clear of the wreckage,” said Flash. “Then come back for the rest of the injured.”

Huk extended his wings, splashing water. “Hard to take off in wet weather, but here goes.” He got hold of the unconscious Sixy under the arms, went flapping up to the ceiling of the train car, and then out into the rainy darkness.

“Doesn’t seem,” said Jape, when Flash came to unlock him, “as though our guard is up and around.”

“He’s slumped back there in his chair,” said Flash, nodding. “I don’t think he’s alive.”

“I won’t be alive much longer myself,” said Booker, “unless somebody does something.”

Jape went to him. “What’s wrong, exactly?”

“How do I know? I’m not a doctor. I got pains all over, and internal injuries.”

While Jape was trying out keys on Booker’s manacle, Flash worked his way over to Narla. The blonde girl was hanging out into the aisle, long hair brushing against the rain slick floor. “Narla,” he said, touching her hand.

She did not respond.

“Is she alive?” asked Jape.

“Yes,” answered Flash. “I can feel her pulse. I don’t quite know what’s wrong with her.”

“She’s probably got internal injuries like me,” said Booker.

Jape found the key which released the silent girl.

The hawkman returned, landing near them. “We’ve been very fortunate,” he said.

“How serious is the damage to the rest of the train?” asked Jape.

Huk shook his head. “There won’t be many other survivors. Many of the other cars are twisted beyond recognition. And some of them are burning.” He noticed Narla. “She all right?”

“She’s alive,” said Flash. “You better take her out next.”

“How about me?” asked Booker. “I’m hurt worse than her.”

The hawkman took the blonde girl gently in his arms. He flew up and away with her.

“What about Zumm?” asked Flash, glancing around.

“There he is,” said Jape. “Seems to be unconscious, too.” He went to the side of the slumped clown. “We’ll have you out of there in a minute, Zumm, and—”

“What is it?” said Flash.

“He’s dead,” said Jape. “Neck’s broken.”

Flash looked at the dead clown for a few silent seconds. “Anybody else to set free.”

Squinting, Jape said, “Someone on the floor down there in the shadows. Must be that crippled fellow who was standing by you when we dropped.” Holding on to the seats with two of his hands, Jape went down the slanting floor to the figure of Nord.

“How is he?” called Flash.

Jape touched the blue man with his third hand, then pulled it back streaked with blood. “He’s dead, too.”

“I don’t even know who he was,” said Flash. “But he saved us by giving me these keys.”

“It doesn’t do any good to stand around crying over the dead and gone,” said Booker. “Why doesn’t somebody pay attention to me? I’m badly hurt.”

Flash took a step toward Booker, halted, and took a deep breath. Then he proceeded. He stooped and ran his hands over Booker. “No sign of broken bones,” he said.

“I told you it’s inside that I’m wrecked,” said Booker.

“We’ll find out when we get you outside.”

“I don’t suppose they had a doctor on this train.”

“If they did,” said the returning Huk, “he’s dead now. We seem to be the only survivors.”

“Wrong,” said a rumbling voice from up above.

They all looked up. “Mallox,” said Flash.

“That little bounce we took,” said the strongman, “was just what I needed to smash my cage.” He laughed his growly hooting laugh. “Yes, they put me in a cage, not trusting those little handcuffs for Mallox.” He thrust a massive leg down through the ruined roof. “Stand back and I’ll drop down there. I can help boost everybody out of this thing.”

The car shook when the giant hit the floor.

“We’re free then,” said Huk. “There are no guards to stop us, no trainers to tell us what to do. We’re free.”

“Free of the circus,” said Jape, “but a long way from being free of this planet.”

Flash gestured at a broken window. “What’s out there, Huk?”

“Forest country,” replied the hawkman. “And beyond that the jungle.”

“That’s where we better head then,” said Flash.

“We may have a chance there,” said Jape.

“What about me?” said Booker. “How am I going to travel in the jungle, a guy in my condition?”

“You’ll make it all right,” Flash assured him.

“How do you know that?”

“Because if you don’t, we’ll leave you behind.”

T
he hawkman dropped down through the dawn, arms full of gathered weapons. He landed in a clear space between the trees and made his way to the sheltering branches where the others waited. His hands and arms were streaked with soot which the hard-driving rain hadn’t completely washed away. “This should be enough,” he said.

“Six shocksticks, three stunguns, and a blaster rifle,” said Jape, cataloguing the haul as the winged man set the weapons down on the dry ground.

Huk said, “I would settle for fewer weapons and more food.” On an earlier trip to the train which lay twisted and broken a quarter of a mile downhill, he’d found three cartons containing some kind of dry-food rations.

“From what you say,” said Flash, “there’s no chance of retrieving any more supplies.”

The hawkman shuddered. “Everything else is destroyed down there.”

Flash was kneeling beside Narla. He returned to watching the still unconscious girl.

“Do you think she’s seriously hurt?” asked Huk.

“Doesn’t appear to be,” answered Flash with a frown. “Nothing’s broken, and her eyes are okay. So a concussion doesn’t seem likely. But she should have awakened by now.”

“Good thing I’m not out cold,” said Booker. “I’d get tossed in a pit like a dead dog if I was.”

“That’s not a bad idea even with you wide awake,” said Sixy. He’d come to soon after they’d carried him into the woods beyond the monorail track.

“If I wasn’t hurt so bad,” said Booker, who was sitting with his back resting against a tree trunk, “I’d fix you good, you monkey-footed fool.”

“Enough,” put in the giant Mallox. “We want no squabbles. Those little blue devils will be hounding us soon enough. We must all work together.”

“I’m helpless,” said Booker. “I can’t run.”

Jape said, “You better get rid of that notion right now, Booker. I’ve examined you and there’s nothing much wrong with you beside a few bumps and bruises.”

“You’re no doctor.”

Mallox said, “He’s close enough to a doctor to satisfy me.” He held one huge hand, fingers slightly clenched, out toward the black man. “If you want to pretend to be sick for a while, I can carry you. Because when it’s time to move from here, we’ll move.”