"(novel) (ebook) - Perry Rhodan 0023 - (16) Secret Barrier X" - читать интересную книгу автора (Perry Rhodan)

"H'm," Bell thought out loud. "If you haven't made any error, it won't do any good to repeat the experiment."
"I'll be damned if I attempt it again! I beg your pardon, sir. Don't think I'm talking about insubordination. I can't explain it to you."
"You referred to hell?"
"There's no other word to describe it. I was in a void and yet it was full of pain and torture. There can only be one explanation for it."
"And that would be?"
"The robot brain repulsed me. The secret barrier repels everything in whatever form it exists. This includes pure energy. After we were prevented from landing, a total interruption of our radio communications was imposed. Now we were shown that five-dimensional energy currents of teleportation are intercepted, too. I must have been transferred to a time field of higher order during my dematerialised state."
"Which all boils down to what?"
"We're dealing with a discrepancy in the duration of my absence. All of you claim I was gone five seconds at the most. In my reality, however, my absence lasted considerably longer."
As proof of his contention Tako raised his left arm, exhibiting the dial of his chronometer on his multipurpose bracelet. "My watch is two and a half hours fast. Isn't this valid proof?"
They agreed. From this moment on the crew of Good Hope V accepted with resignation the fact that they were unable to assist Perry Rhodan in the jungles of Venus. Rhodan and his companions were left to their own resources. They had to find the solution of their problems by using their wits.








2/ OF SEALS & SORCERERS


John Marshall ran for his life.
Running had been his main occupation recently. He was running from the people of Terra and from the Venusian beasts. The entire planet had conspired to destroy him.
Panting loudly he fell over the knee high root of a tree, rolled over his shoulder like a parachute jumper and turned around to face the creature. The root offered enough security as long as the threat came only from one side.
He squinted upward but the trunk of the tree was too smooth. It was 30 feet up to the first branches, making it impossible for him to climb up. The beast approached rapidly. With its length of more than 300 feet not even the highest tree on Venus could have offered a safe refuge.
Out of the underbrush slid the long pointed head of a slimy worm. It weaved left and right six feet above the ground. Failing to recognize any danger it advanced steadily.
When Marshall had first encountered the ugly creature about an hour ago, he had reached in desperation for his automatic rifle. The fear that the shots might betray him to his human pursuers was greater than his horror of the Venusian monster. He knew that the slimy giant worm possessed very limited intelligence and that it was highly dangerous because of its instinctive reactions. A victim fallen in its grip could only say his last prayer.
Against this seemingly boundless mass of repulsive flesh an attack with a conventional automatic gun was almost ineffective. After the first shock of surprise, therefore, Marshall took his thermo-impulse beamer and fired continuously for 20 seconds at the white body of the serpent. The result was only a division of the beast into two parts, both taking up the chase after him. The flight had cost Marshall his last energy.
Now he was lying behind the tree root which curved like a protective wall before him.
What if he aimed at the monstrosity in his gunsight squarely from the front?
It was only an idea which, however, nobody had tried out yet. The attack from the side had severed the body of the snake. How about a frontal approach? It would penetrate the body head on and, by concentrating the focus, the whole slimy body would be dissolved by the energy radiating from controlled nuclear fusion.
This was the way he had figured. He had no strength left to escape by running away. But he was still able to aim his weapon and pull the trigger.
The telepath John Marshall levelled his impulse-beamer. The top of the root presented a good support for accurate aiming.
His plan simply had to succeed because it was beyond his comprehension that he could die here away from human civilization and alone without witnesses.
The head of the huge worm swayed in front of his gunsight. But it was not yet in the right position for his shot as the sinuous body still formed an angle with the axis of his impulse-beamer's bore.
When the distance to the loathsome worm had shrunk to 20 yards, Marshall suddenly realized that it had apparently changed its mind. Of course it was stretching the point a little to speak of a mind in view of the low capacity of the creature's brain, which contained nothing worth calling reason. It reacted strictly with reflexes to stimulations. This was Marshall's explanation for the senseless action of the worm.
It crawled toward the tree but passed it on the opposite side of the six foot trunk and continued sticking to a straight line in the direction of the undergrowth not far behind.
John Marshall held his breath. Not only his excitement but also the penetrating odour, to which no man from Terra was accustomed, forced him to choke. It took more than 15 minutes for the worm to go by. Nauseated and tantalized he finally sighed with relief when the tail of the monster disappeared harmlessly in the jungle.
Somewhere the worm would find a deep hole teeming with centipedes where it could crawl in and live in peaceful symbiosis with the scaly animals.
Marshall wiped the sweat from his brow. The sight of the white tail end of the worm aroused his curiosity. An hour ago, when he had cut the worm in two with his impulse beamer, both ends were burned black. Soon after a crust formed to seal them off and the other half of the worm grew a new head.
Marshall was aware of these strange peculiarities of life on Venus and he knew that he was not yet out of danger.
It was his own fault that he had created two snakes out of one. And the reptile appeared just at the moment that he looked around to safeguard his position.
What had caused the first one to suddenly ignore him after it had hunted him stubbornly and methodically for an hour?
Marshall could think of only one reason. The movements of the fugitive had attracted its attention and prodded it continuously into his pursuit. When he threw himself behind the cover of the root and remained motionless, the goal had become unrecognizable for the primitive brain of the creature. The tactic of playing dead was valid for all worlds where the fight for existence took place according to eternal laws.
However, John Marshall was soon disappointed in his new hope.
Not that the second snake was smarter than the first one. But it just so happened by accident that it crawled exactly toward the root of the tree behind which Marshall was lying.
This time Marshall had to defend himself. He saw at the last moment that he would not get away by merely keeping watch. And the vehement move with which he jerked up his impulse beamer sufficed to draw the attention of the beast to him.
The white pointed snout shot forward. The first 15 or 20 feet of the serpent's length were on a straight line and the energy of the impulse beamer bored into the body.
His speculation was correct!
There was no partitioning and encasing in the lengthwise direction of the worm. Each of the transverse disks was a separate living unit. As soon as it was hit by the lethal energy it died away.