“I can’t see any.”
“Then how the devil does the knife hold up? I mean, if it were some kind of plow, there should be the marks of wheels or—or
“I still can’t see any, Skip.”
“What’s it supposed to be? A boundary line? A frontier?”
“Maybe. I don’t know. I guess the only way to find out is to follow the line until we bump into whatever made it.”
“Yes, George, and we might bump into whoever’s behind those guns. Don’t be too hasty about dashing off to explore. We’d better stick together here for a while, and wait and see if the natives approach us. They don’t seem over-friendly. We may need all hands to beat off an attack. We’ll set up a command post in one of these craters; I’ve a notion we may be safer below ground level, and if—”
The Captain broke off. From somewhere far off came a thin, keening wail, getting louder. The crew started to shout and point. There was something moving out there on the plain.
“Your telescope!” snapped the Captain, and George passed it to him. Even through the telescope the thing racing towards them was not easy to see in the poor light, especially as it was almost edge on. Captain Freiburg had once seen the wheel of a racing car come off and go bowling on by itself at a hundred miles an hour. Something like that was coming along the ground in their direction at about the same speed, but it was all of seven metres in diameter. An unattached wheel of solid, gleaming metal tapering down from the hub to an edge of extreme thinness. It was like the wheel off an enormous bacon-slicer, run amok.
“Everybody down the craters!” bawled Freiburg.
The rising scream of the wheel’s approach all but drowned his voice. He waved frantically, and the crew began to run for the holes. When he saw they’d taken shelter, he ran, with George at his side, to the nearest crater. It was pretty shallow, but if the wheel came their way its speed might carry it to the far lip of the crater without touching them. He had no doubt that this frightening thing had cut that track, but he remembered that the track wasn’t very deep. The scream of the wheel made the air quiver now, and the ground seemed to be shaking in sympathy. In one respect, Freiburg was glad of that; it camouflaged his own trembling.
The two lay there, faces in the dirt, waiting for the wheel to pass them by. But the howling went on and on, accompanied by a secondary swishing noise, like that of an electric fan.
And still it went on.
Cautiously, they raised their heads and peeped out of the crater. The wheel was running in a wide circle around them and the whole group of craters. It pursued its circular course so swiftly that there appeared to be dozens of blurred wheels chasing themselves around, forming a hazy, glimmering barrier seven metres high.
Their space-ship stood near enough exactly at the center of the circle. George shouted in the Captain’s ear: “That darn wheel’s gotten itself stuck in a groove!”
Freiburg ignored the humor. “Follow me.” And he started running back to the ship. George was surprised, but jumped out of the crater and ran across the quivering earth after the Captain. Heads popped out of craters here and there and regarded them inquiringly. Freiburg waved them back. Inside the ship it was a little quieter.
“Get hold of Sparks! Bring him down to the armory,” said the Captain, breathlessly.
George nodded. So much for hope, he thought, as he climbed towards the radio room.
There had been some controversy concerning whether the first expedition to Venus should be an armed one or not. Much nonsense had been talked, considering that nobody knew whether Venusians were warlike or peaceful, human or non-human, monsters or insects—or if they existed at all. There was general agreement on one point: no atomic weapons should be taken. Their use could start something nobody could finish. On the other hand, it wouldn’t be fair to the crew to risk putting them in the spot of fighting off, say, carnivorous dinosaurs with their bare fists. A light, portable but potent weapon seemed the golden mean. The old bazooka was finally chosen. It was simple to operate, and every man in the crew soon passed the test in its use.
And everyone hoped it would never be needed.
George found Sparks staring out of his porthole and trying to make sense of what was happening out there. On the way down he did his best to put him in the picture.
The Captain had unpacked the tripod and barrel of a bazooka.
“I’ll take this,” he said. “You two get a box of shells each.”
The boxes had been heavy on Earth and were still quite heavy enough here. As George staggered after Freiburg with his, he called: “Did you spot any Venusians, Skip?”
