THE HUNTED HEROES

 By ROBERT SILVERBERG

 _The planet itself was tough enough--barren, desolate, forbidding; enough to stop the most adventurous and dedicated. But they had to run head-on against a mad genius who had a motto:_

 _Death to all Terrans!_

"Let's keep moving, " I told Val. "The surest way to die out here on Marsis to give up. " I reached over and turned up the pressure on her oxymaskto make things a little easier for her. Through the glassite of themask, I could see her face contorted in an agony of fatigue. 

And she probably thought the failure of the sandcat was all my fault, too. Val's usually about the best wife a guy could ask for, but when shewants to be she can be a real flying bother. 

It was beyond her to see that some grease monkey back at the Dome was atfault--whoever it was who had failed to fasten down the engine hood. Nothing but what had stopped us _could_ stop a sandcat: sand in thedelicate mechanism of the atomic engine. 

But no; she blamed it all on me somehow: So we were out walking on thespongy sand of the Martian desert. We'd been walking a good eight hours. 

"Can't we turn back now, Ron?" Val pleaded. "Maybe there isn't anyuranium in this sector at all. I think we're crazy to keep on searchingout here!"

I started to tell her that the UranCo chief had assured me we'd hitsomething out this way, but changed my mind. When Val's tired andoverwrought there's no sense in arguing with her. 

I stared ahead at the bleak, desolate wastes of the Martian landscape. Behind us somewhere was the comfort of the Dome, ahead nothing but themazes and gullies of this dead world. 

[Illustration: He was a cripple in a wheelchair--helpless as arattlesnake. ]

"Try to keep going, Val. " My gloved hand reached out and clumsilyenfolded hers. "Come on, kid. Remember--we're doing this for Earth. We're heroes. "

She glared at me. "Heroes, hell!" she muttered. "That's the way itlooked back home, but, out there it doesn't seem so glorious. AndUranCo's pay is stinking. "

"We didn't come out here for the pay, Val. "

"I know, I know, but just the same--"

It must have been hell for her. We had wandered fruitlessly over the redsands all day, both of us listening for the clicks of the counter. Andthe geigers had been obstinately hushed all day, except for theirconstant undercurrent of meaningless noises. 

Even though the Martian gravity was only a fraction of Earth's, I wasstarting to tire, and I knew it must have been really rough on Val withher lovely but unrugged legs. 

"Heroes, " she said bitterly. "We're not heroes--we're suckers! Why did Iever let you volunteer for the Geig Corps and drag me along?"

Which wasn't anywhere close to the truth. Now I knew she was at thebreaking point, because Val didn't lie unless she was so exhausted shedidn't know what she was doing. She had been just as much inflamed bythe idea of coming to Mars to help in the search for uranium as I was. We knew the pay was poor, but we had felt it a sort of obligation, something we could do as individuals to keep the industries ofradioactives-starved Earth going. And we'd always had a roving foot, both of us. 

No, we had decided together to come to Mars--the way we decided togetheron everything. Now she was turning against me. 

 * * * * *

I tried to jolly her. "Buck up, kid, " I said. I didn't dare turn up heroxy pressure any higher, but it was obvious she couldn't keep going. Shewas almost sleep-walking now. 

We pressed on over the barren terrain. The geiger kept up a fairlysteady click-pattern, but never broke into that sudden explosive tumultthat meant we had found pay-dirt. I started to feel tired myself, terribly tired. I longed to lie down on the soft, spongy Martian sandand bury myself. 

I looked at Val. She was dragging along with her eyes half-shut. I feltalmost guilty for having dragged her out to Mars, until I recalled thatI hadn't. In fact, she had come up with the idea before I did. I wishedthere was some way of turning the weary, bedraggled girl at my side backinto the Val who had so enthusiastically suggested we join the Geigs. 

Twelve steps later, I decided this was about as far as we could go. 

I stopped, slipped out of the geiger harness, and lowered myselfponderously to the ground. "What'samatter, Ron?" Val asked sleepily. "Something wrong?"

"No, baby, " I said, putting out a hand and taking hers. "I think weought to rest a little before we go any further. It's been a long, hardday. "

It didn't take much to persuade her. She slid down beside me, curled up, and in a moment she was fast asleep, sprawled out on the sands. 

_Poor kid_, I thought. Maybe we shouldn't have come to Mars after all. But, I reminded myself, _someone_ had to do the job. 

A second thought appeared, but I squelched it:

Why the hell me?

I looked down at Valerie's sleeping form, and thought of our warm, comfortable little home on Earth. It wasn't much, but people in lovedon't need very fancy surroundings. 

I watched her, sleeping peacefully, a wayward lock of her soft blondehair trailing down over one eyebrow, and it seemed hard to believe thatwe'd exchanged Earth and all it held for us for the raw, untamedstruggle that was Mars. But I knew I'd do it again, if I had the chance. It's because we wanted to keep what we had. Heroes? Hell, no. We justliked our comforts, and wanted to keep them. Which took a little work. 

 * * * * *

_Time to get moving. _ But then Val stirred and rolled over in her sleep, and I didn't have the heart to wake her. I sat there, holding her, staring out over the desert, watching the wind whip the sand up intoweird shapes. 

The Geig Corps preferred married couples, working in teams. That's whathad finally decided it for us--we were a good team. We had no ties onEarth that couldn't be broken without much difficulty. So wevolunteered. 

_And here we are. _ Heroes. The wind blasted a mass of sand into my face, and I felt it tinkle against the oxymask. 

I glanced at the suit-chronometer. Getting late. I decided once again towake Val. But she was tired. And I was tired too, tired from ourwearying journey across the empty desert. 

I started to shake Val. But I never finished. It would be _so_ nice justto lean back and nuzzle up to her, down in the sand. So nice. I yawned, and stretched back. 

 * * * * *

I awoke with a sudden startled shiver, and realized angrily I had letmyself doze off. "Come on, Val, " I said savagely, and started to rise tomy feet. 

I couldn't. 

I looked down. I was neatly bound in thin, tough, plastic tangle-cord, swathed from chin to boot-bottoms, my arms imprisoned, my feet caught. And tangle-cord is about as easy to get out of as a spider's web is fora trapped fly. 

It wasn't Martians that had done it. There weren't any Martians, hadn'tbeen for a million years. It was some Earthman who had bound us. 

I rolled my eyes toward Val, and saw that she was similarly trussed inthe sticky stuff. The tangle-cord was still fresh, giving off a faint, repugnant odor like that of drying fish. It had been spun on us only ashort time ago, I realized. 

"Ron--"

"Don't try to move, baby. This stuff can break your neck if you twist itwrong. " She continued for a moment to struggle futilely, and I had tosnap, "Lie still, Val!"

"A very wise statement, " said a brittle, harsh voice from above me. Ilooked up and saw a helmeted figure above us. He wasn't wearing thecustomary skin-tight pliable oxysuits we had. He wore an outmoded, bulkyspacesuit and a fishbowl helmet, all but the face area opaque. Theoxygen cannisters weren't attached to his back as expected, though. Theywere strapped to the back of the wheelchair in which he sat. 

Through the fishbowl I could see hard little eyes, a yellowed, parchment-like face, a grim-set jaw. I didn't recognize him, and thisstruck me odd. I thought I knew everyone on sparsely-settled Mars. Somehow I'd missed him. 

What shocked me most was that he had no legs. The spacesuit ended neatlyat the thighs. 

He was holding in his left hand the tanglegun with which he hadentrapped us, and a very efficient-looking blaster was in his right. 

"I didn't want to disturb your sleep, " he said coldly. "So I've beenwaiting here for you to wake up. "

I could just see it. He might have been sitting there for hours, complacently waiting to see how we'd wake up. That was when I realizedhe must be totally insane. I could feel my stomach-muscles tighten, mythroat constrict painfully. 

Then anger ripped through me, washing away the terror. "What's goingon?" I demanded, staring at the half of a man who confronted us from thewheelchair. "Who are you?"

"You'll find out soon enough, " he said. "Suppose now you come with me. "He reached for the tanglegun, flipped the little switch on its side toMELT, and shot a stream of watery fluid over our legs, keeping theblaster trained on us all the while. Our legs were free. 

"You may get up now, " he said. "Slowly, without trying to make trouble. "Val and I helped each other to our feet as best we could, consideringour arms were still tightly bound against the sides of our oxysuits. 

"Walk, " the stranger said, waving the tanglegun to indicate thedirection. "I'll be right behind you. " He holstered the tanglegun. 

I glimpsed the bulk of an outboard atomic rigging behind him, strappedto the back of the wheelchair. He fingered a knob on the arm of thechair and the two exhaust ducts behind the wheel-housings flamed for amoment, and the chair began to roll. 

Obediently, we started walking. You don't argue with a blaster, even ifthe man pointing it is in a wheelchair. 

 * * * * *

"What's going on, Ron?" Val asked in a low voice as we walked. Behind usthe wheelchair hissed steadily. 

"I don't quite know, Val. I've never seen this guy before, and I thoughtI knew everyone at the Dome. "

"Quiet up there!" our captor called, and we stopped talking. We trudgedalong together, with him following behind; I could hear the_crunch-crunch_ of the wheelchair as its wheels chewed into the sand. Iwondered where we were going, and why. I wondered why we had ever leftEarth. 

The answer to that came to me quick enough: we had to. Earth neededradioactives, and the only way to get them was to get out and look. Thegreat atomic wars of the late 20th Century had used up much of thesupply, but the amount used to blow up half the great cities of theworld hardly compared with the amount we needed to put them backtogether again. 

In three centuries the shattered world had been completely rebuilt. Thewreckage of New York and Shanghai and London and all the other ruinedcities had been hidden by a shining new world of gleaming towers andflying roadways. We had profited by our grandparents' mistakes. They hadused their atomics to make bombs. We used ours for fuel. 

It was an atomic world. Everything: power drills, printing presses, typewriters, can openers, ocean liners, powered by the inexhaustibleenergy of the dividing atom. 

But though the energy is inexhaustible, the supply of nuclei isn't. After three centuries of heavy consumption, the supply failed. Themighty machine that was Earth's industry had started to slow down. 

And that started the chain of events that led Val and me to end up as amadman's prisoners, on Mars. With every source of uranium mined dry onEarth, we had tried other possibilities. All sorts of schemes cameforth. Project Sea-Dredge was trying to get uranium from the oceans. Inforty or fifty years, they'd get some results, we hoped. But therewasn't forty or fifty years' worth of raw stuff to tide us over untilthen. In a decade or so, our power would be just about gone. I couldpicture the sort of dog-eat-dog world we'd revert back to. Millions ofstarving, freezing humans tooth-and-clawing in it in the useless shellof a great atomic civilization. 

So, Mars. There's not much uranium on Mars, and it's not easy to find orany cinch to mine. But what little is there, helps. It's a stopgapeffort, just to keep things moving until Project Sea-Dredge startsfunctioning. 

Enter the Geig Corps: volunteers out on the face of Mars, combing forits uranium deposits. 

And here we are, I thought. 

 * * * * *

After we walked on a while, a Dome became visible up ahead. It slid upover the crest of a hill, set back between two hummocks on the desert. Just out of the way enough to escape observation. 

For a puzzled moment I thought it was our Dome, the settlement whereall of UranCo's Geig Corps were located, but another look told me thatthis was actually quite near us and fairly small. A one-man Dome, of allthings!

"Welcome to my home, " he said. "The name is Gregory Ledman. " He herdedus off to one side of the airlock, uttered a few words keyed to hisvoice, and motioned us inside when the door slid up. When we were insidehe reached up, clumsily holding the blaster, and unscrewed the ancientspacesuit fishbowl. 

His face was a bitter, dried-up mask. He was a man who hated. 

The place was spartanly furnished. No chairs, no tape-player, nodecoration of any sort. Hard bulkhead walls, rivet-studded, glared backat us. He had an automatic chef, a bed, and a writing-desk, and no otherfurniture. 

Suddenly he drew the tanglegun and sprayed our legs again. We toppledheavily to the floor. I looked up angrily. 

 * * * * *

"I imagine you want to know the whole story, " he said. "The others did, too. "

Valerie looked at me anxiously. Her pretty face was a dead white behindher oxymask. "What others?"

"I never bothered to find out their names, " Ledman said casually. "Theywere other Geigs I caught unawares, like you, out on the desert. That'sthe only sport I have left--Geig-hunting. Look out there. "

He gestured through the translucent skin of the Dome, and I felt sick. There was a little heap of bones lying there, looking oddly brightagainst the redness of the sands. They were the dried, parched skeletonsof Earthmen. Bits of cloth and plastic, once oxymasks and suits, stillclung to them. 

Suddenly I remembered. There had been a pattern there all the time. Wedidn't much talk about it; we chalked it off as occupational hazards. There had been a pattern of disappearances on the desert. I could thinkof six, eight names now. None of them had been particularly closefriends. You don't get time to make close friends out here. But we'dvowed it wouldn't happen to us. 

It had. 

"You've been hunting Geigs?" I asked. "_Why?_ What've they ever done toyou?"

He smiled, as calmly as if I'd just praised his house-keeping. "BecauseI hate you, " he said blandly. "I intend to wipe every last one of youout, one by one. "

I stared at him. I'd never seen a man like this before; I thought allhis kind had died at the time of the atomic wars. 

I heard Val sob, "He's a madman!"

"No, " Ledman said evenly. "I'm quite sane, believe me. But I'mdetermined to drive the Geigs--and UranCo--off Mars. Eventually I'llscare you all away. "

"Just pick us off in the desert?"

"Exactly, " replied Ledman. "And I have no fears of an armed attack. Thisplace is well fortified. I've devoted years to building it. And I'm backagainst those hills. They couldn't pry me out. " He let his pale hand runup into his gnarled hair. "I've devoted years to this. Ever since--eversince I landed here on Mars. "

 * * * * *

"What are you going to do with us?" Val finally asked, after a longsilence. 

He didn't smile this time. "Kill you, " he told her. "Not your husband. Iwant him as an envoy, to go back and tell the others to clear off. " Herocked back and forth in his wheelchair, toying with the gleaming, deadly blaster in his hand. 

We stared in horror. It was a nightmare--sitting there, placidly rockingback and forth, a nightmare. 

I found myself fervently wishing I was back out there on the infinitelysafer desert. 

"Do I shock you?" he asked. "I shouldn't--not when you see my motives. "

"We don't see them, " I snapped. 

"Well, let me show you. You're on Mars hunting uranium, right? To mineand ship the radioactives back to Earth to keep the atomic enginesgoing. Right?"

I nodded over at our geiger counters. 

"We volunteered to come to Mars, " Val said irrelevantly. 

"Ah--two young heroes, " Ledman said acidly. "How sad. I could almostfeel sorry for you. Almost. "

"Just what is it you're after?" I said, stalling, stalling. 

"Atomics cost me my legs, " he said. "You remember the SadlervilleBlast?" he asked. 

"Of course. " And I did, too. I'd never forget it. No one would. Howcould I forget that great accident--killing hundreds, injuring thousandsmore, sterilizing forty miles of Mississippi land--when the Sadlervillepile went up?

"I was there on business at the time, " Ledman said. "I representedLedman Atomics. I was there to sign a new contract for my company. Youknow who I am, now?"

I nodded. 

"I was fairly well shielded when it happened. I never got the contract, but I got a good dose of radiation instead. Not enough to kill me, " hesaid. "Just enough to necessitate the removal of--" he indicated theempty space at his thighs. "So I got off lightly. " He gestured at thewheelchair blanket. 

I still didn't understand. "But why kill us Geigs? _We_ had nothing todo with it. "

"You're just in this by accident, " he said. "You see, after theexplosion and the amputation, my fellow-members on the board of LedmanAtomics decided that a semi-basket case like myself was a poor risk asHead of the Board, and they took my company away. All quite legal, Iassure you. They left me almost a pauper!" Then he snapped the punchlineat me. 

"They renamed Ledman Atomics. Who did you say you worked for?"

I began, "Uran--"

"Don't bother. A more inventive title than Ledman Atomics, but notquite as much heart, wouldn't you say?" He grinned. "I saved for years;then I came to Mars, lost myself, built this Dome, and swore to geteven. There's not a great deal of uranium on this planet, but enough tokeep me in a style to which, unfortunately, I'm no longer accustomed. "

 * * * * *

He consulted his wrist watch. "Time for my injection. " He pulled out thetanglegun and sprayed us again, just to make doubly certain. "That'sanother little souvenir of Sadlerville. I'm short on red bloodcorpuscles. "

He rolled over to a wall table and fumbled in a container among a pileof hypodermics. "There are other injections, too. Adrenalin, insulin. Others. The Blast turned me into a walking pin-cushion. But I'll pay itall back, " he said. He plunged the needle into his arm. 

My eyes widened. It was too nightmarish to be real. I wasn't seriouslyworried about his threat to wipe out the entire Geig Corps, since it wasunlikely that one man in a wheelchair could pick us all off. No, itwasn't the threat that disturbed me, so much as the whole concept, sostrange to me, that the human mind could be as warped and twisted asLedman's. 

I saw the horror on Val's face, and I knew she felt the same way I did. 

"Do you really think you can succeed?" I taunted him. "Really think youcan kill every Earthman on Mars? Of all the insane, cockeyed--"

Val's quick, worried head-shake cut me off. But Ledman had felt mywords, all right. 

"Yes! I'll get even with every one of you for taking away my legs! If wehadn't meddled with the atom in the first place, I'd be as tall andpowerful as you, today--instead of a useless cripple in a wheelchair. "

"You're sick, Gregory Ledman, " Val said quietly. "You've conceived animpossible scheme of revenge and now you're taking it out on innocentpeople who've done nothing, nothing at all to you. That's not sane!"

His eyes blazed. "Who are you to talk of sanity?"

 * * * * *

Uneasily I caught Val's glance from a corner of my eye. Sweat wasrolling down her smooth forehead faster than the auto-wiper could swabit away. 

"Why don't you do something? What are you waiting for, Ron?"

"Easy, baby, " I said. I knew what our ace in the hole was. But I had toget Ledman within reach of me first. 

"Enough, " he said. "I'm going to turn you loose outside, right after--"

"_Get sick!_" I hissed to Val, low. She began immediately to coughviolently, emitting harsh, choking sobs. "Can't breathe!" She began toyell, writhing in her bonds. 

That did it. Ledman hadn't much humanity left in him, but there was alittle. He lowered the blaster a bit and wheeled one-hand over to seewhat was wrong with Val. She continued to retch and moan most horribly. It almost convinced me. I saw Val's pale, frightened face turn to me. 

He approached and peered down at her. He opened his mouth to saysomething, and at that moment I snapped my leg up hard, tearing thetangle-cord with a snicking rasp, and kicked his wheelchair over. 

The blaster went off, burning a hole through the Dome roof. Theautomatic sealers glued-in instantly. Ledman went sprawling helplesslyout into the middle of the floor, the wheelchair upended next to him, its wheels slowly revolving in the air. The blaster flew from his handsat the impact of landing and spun out near me. In one quick motion Irolled over and covered it with my body. 

 * * * * *

Ledman clawed his way to me with tremendous effort and tried wildly topry the blaster out from under me, but without success. I twisted a bit, reached out with my free leg, and booted him across the floor. Hefetched up against the wall of the Dome and lay there. 

Val rolled over to me. 

"Now if I could get free of this stuff, " I said, "I could get himcovered before he comes to. But how?"

"Teamwork, " Val said. She swivelled around on the floor until her headwas near my boot. "Push my oxymask off with your foot, if you can. "

I searched for the clamp and tried to flip it. No luck, with my heavy, clumsy boot. I tried again, and this time it snapped open. I got the tipof my boot in and pried upward. The oxymask came off, slowly, scraping ajagged red scratch up the side of Val's neck as it came. 

"There, " she breathed. "That's that. "

I looked uneasily at Ledman. He was groaning and beginning to stir. 

Val rolled on the floor and her face lay near my right arm. I saw whatshe had in mind. She began to nibble the vile-tasting tangle-cord, running her teeth up and down it until it started to give. She continuedunfailingly. 

Finally one strand snapped. Then another. At last I had enough use of myhand to reach out and grasp the blaster. Then I pulled myself across thefloor to Ledman, removed the tanglegun, and melted the remainingtangle-cord off. 

My muscles were stiff and bunched, and rising made me wince. I turnedand freed Val. Then I turned and faced Ledman. 

"I suppose you'll kill me now, " he said. 

"No. That's the difference between sane people and insane, " I told him. "I'm not going to kill you at all. I'm going to see to it that you'resent back to Earth. "

"_No!_" he shouted. "No! Anything but back there. I don't want to facethem again--not after what they did to me--"

"Not so loud, " I broke in. "They'll help you on Earth. They'll take allthe hatred and sickness out of you, and turn you into a useful member ofsociety again. "

"I hate Earthmen, " he spat out. "I hate all of them. "

"I know, " I said sarcastically. "You're just all full of hate. You hatedus so much that you couldn't bear to hang around on Earth for as much asa year after the Sadlerville Blast. You had to take right off for Marswithout a moment's delay, didn't you? You hated Earth so much you _had_to leave. "

"Why are you telling all this to me?"

"Because if you'd stayed long enough, you'd have used some of yourpension money to buy yourself a pair of prosthetic legs, and then youwouldn't need this wheelchair. "

Ledman scowled, and then his face went belligerent again. "They told meI was paralyzed below the waist. That I'd never walk again, even withprosthetic legs, because I had no muscles to fit them to. "

"You left Earth too quickly, " Val said. 

"It was the only way, " he protested. "I had to get off--"

"She's right, " I told him. "The atom can take away, but it can give aswell. Soon after you left they developed _atomic-powered_prosthetics--amazing things, virtually robot legs. All the survivors ofthe Sadlerville Blast were given the necessary replacement limbs free ofcharge. All except you. You were so sick you had to get away from theworld you despised and come here. "

"You're lying, " he said. "It's not true!"

"Oh, but it is, " Val smiled. 

I saw him wilt visibly, and for a moment I almost felt sorry for him, apathetic legless figure propped up against the wall of the Dome atblaster-point. But then I remembered he'd killed twelve Geigs--ormore--and would have added Val to the number had he had the chance. 

 * * * * *

"You're a very sick man, Ledman, " I said. "All this time you could havebeen happy, useful on Earth, instead of being holed up here nursing yourhatred. You might have been useful, on Earth. But you decided to channeleverything out as revenge. "

"I still don't believe it--those legs. I might have walked again. No--no, it's all a lie. They told me I'd never walk, " he said, weaklybut stubbornly still. 

I could see his whole structure of hate starting to topple, and Idecided to give it the final push. 

"Haven't you wondered how I managed to break the tangle-cord when Ikicked you over?"

"Yes--human legs aren't strong enough to break tangle-cord that way. "

"Of course not, " I said. I gave Val the blaster and slipped out of myoxysuit. "Look, " I said. I pointed to my smooth, gleaming metal legs. The almost soundless purr of their motors was the only noise in theroom. "I was in the Sadlerville Blast, too, " I said. "But I didn't gocrazy with hate when I lost _my_ legs. "

Ledman was sobbing. 

"Okay, Ledman, " I said. Val got him into his suit, and brought him thefishbowl helmet. "Get your helmet on and let's go. Between the psychsand the prosthetics men, you'll be a new man inside of a year. "

"But I'm a murderer!"

"That's right. And you'll be sentenced to psych adjustment. When they'refinished, Gregory Ledman the killer will be as dead as if they'delectrocuted you, but there'll be a new--and sane--Gregory Ledman. " Iturned to Val. 

"Got the geigers, honey?"

For the first time since Ledman had caught us, I remembered how tiredVal had been out on the desert. I realized now that I had been drivingher mercilessly--me, with my chromium legs and atomic-powered muscles. No wonder she was ready to fold! And I'd been too dense to see howunfair I had been. 

She lifted the geiger harnesses, and I put Ledman back in hiswheelchair. 

Val slipped her oxymask back on and fastened it shut. 

"Let's get back to the Dome in a hurry, " I said. "We'll turn Ledman overto the authorities. Then we can catch the next ship for Earth. "

"Go back? _Go back?_ If you think I'm backing down now and quitting youcan find yourself another wife! After we dump this guy I'm sacking infor twenty hours, and then we're going back out there to finish thatsearch-pattern. Earth needs uranium, honey, and I know you'd never behappy quitting in the middle like that. " She smiled. "I can't wait toget out there and start listening for those tell-tale clicks. "

I gave a joyful whoop and swung her around. When I put her down, shesqueezed my hand, hard. 

"Let's get moving, fellow hero, " she said. 

I pressed the stud for the airlock, smiling. 

THE END

Transcriber's Note:

 This etext was produced from _Amazing Stories_ September 1956. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U. S. Copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note.