Demons of the Dancing Gods (41 page)

in the monster, sucking in and grinding it in sharp and

nasty gear teeth.

The creature changed and became a terrible whirlwind, a

tomadolike funnel cloud that sucked up and broke apart the

machine with a thunderous roar. Overhead, immediately atop

the whirling mass, appeared a great orange explosion that rapidly

spread and grew until it covered the whole of the sky,

setting, it seemed, the very air afire. As it descended, a blazing

blanket, it drew up into it the very oxygen below; with its force,

it dissipated and swallowed the whirlwind. But it did not reach

the castle proper, vanishing just above it and leaving the region

oddly quiet.

From the sudden, deathly stillness came a huge shape, the

great roc of ancient and terrible legend, its condorlike beak

snapping furiously while from deep within its massive throat

came horrible shrieks. It swooped and whirled around, searching

for an adversary, and it found one, also coming out of the

sky, a strange blackness that approached at impossible speeds

and was gone again before even the tremendous explosive sounds

of its passing struck the great and terrible bird of old.

But the newcomer had not passed in demonstration but rather

had laid its eggs, dozens of them that now sped toward the roc

from all directions, including from above and below. Franti-

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DEMONS OF THE DANCING GODS JACK L. CHALKER 225

cally the bird tried to zoom up, then straight down, then from

side to side, but those horrible eggs kept matching its movements

and all the time coming closer, closer...

At least five struck the roc in its massive underbelly, exploding

with incredible force, driving white-hot bits of metal

into its flesh along with flaming jellied liquid that seemed only

to eat into the creature while refusing all efforts to be extinguished.

The roc reeled as seven more struck it, one in the

head, and the force of the explosion there and the spread of

the terrible burning jelly struck its eyes, rendering it blind. In

panic, burning, it raced for the surface of the lake and dove

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beneath the placid waters, sending a plume of water thirty feet

into the air as it did so.

Ruddy gore, his face and eyes showing tremendous strain

and concentration, stood on the castle wall and looked outward

to where the roc had entered the water. Within a short time,

the water was smooth once more, with no sign of the huge

entry.

Now, though, great bubbles issued up along a wide area

below the castle, as if some enormous creature was surfacing.

When it did, it was more terrible than anything of the old

legends, a monstrous mass of living green slime from which

issued thousands of wriggling tentacles as needed. It continued

to rise, its bulk so vast that it was soon almost the size of the

entire castle. Ruddy gore faced it impassively, not moving a

muscle as stench-ridden, sucker-covered tentacles reached out

for him.

From all around the beast, small white contrails broke the

surface of the water, dozens of them coming in a semicircular

pattern toward the beast's bulk. Just as the first tentacles of the

kraken closed upon Ruddygore, the objects struck, all within

a fraction of a second, sending up tremendous plumes of water

as each exploded with a roar that made all previous detonations

look like firecrackers. With the water, pieces of green slime

went up as well, and the kraken roared its terrible agony and

writhed in pain, its two giant eyes on great stalks glaring in

hatred.

Ruddygore reached down, picked up a strange-looking object,

and aimed it at the eyes. The thing shot more of the jellied

flame, which this time burned on and into the water, and the

creature groaned and thrashed in an unsuccessful attempt to

quench the spreading fires that covered it.

Suddenly the kraken vanished. For a moment, all was silence

again. Then there was a roar from the castle roof, and

Ruddygore spun around to face an enormous dragon that reared

back and shot hot, smoky flame at him. Boquillas was fighting

fire with fire.

Ruddygore flung back his right arm as if about to throw

something, but when he brought it forward, an enormous stream

of water rose out of the lake and struck the dragon full force

in the mouth. Suddenly the fat sorcerer was standing right on

the castle wall, holding and guiding a gigantic pressurized hose

that quenched the dragon's flame.

The dragon, its flame so easily extinguished while Ruddygore's

fires had been unquenchable, roared defiance and

leaped upon the man below, but suddenly the man wasn't there.

The dragon missed and plunged over the edge of the castle

wall, but there was no sound of an object striking the water.

Both men again stood facing each other on the outer wall,

neither actually hurt, but Boquillas' fine robes looked slightly

singed.

"It's called napalm," Ruddygore told him. "Just one of

technology's little gifts to mankind."

But Boquillas was no longer there. Instead, the whole castle

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shimmered and seemed to change into a terrible, menacing

jungle of carnivorous vines and animated plants. The transition

was so swift that Ruddygore found himself suddenly held by

strong tentaclelike vines that tightened and pulled in all directions

toward gaping plant jaws. The abrupt change had obviously

surprised him, and he showed real pain and discomfort,

but only for a moment.

There was a sound like a thunderclap, and down from the

sky rained a suffocating, yellowish cloud of gas. It quickly

covered all the plants and the sorcerer himself; but at its first

touch, the vines recoiled and the gaping mouths of the huge

plants seemed to scream in dreadful agony. The jungle was

suddenly in frantic, insane movement, screaming and tearing

itself to bits as it died. The more it writhed, the more it opened

its wounds to the yellowish powders.

Freed, Ruddygore, although slightly injured, did not pause.

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DEMONS Of THE DANCING GODS

"Now smell the world of the perfect future! Breathe it and

weep!" he cried. The air changed, and the stars and moon were

blacked out. All around was a dense, wet fog that choked

anything it touched, a fog filled with the metal particulates

from a billion smokestacks and the noxious fumes of a hundred

chemical and power plants. It was the condensation of all that

had been pumped into the air by mankind's progress through

the centuries, and it was more horrible than any monster of

Husaquahr.

Again Boquillas was disoriented by the tactic, which was

more terrible and incomprehensible to him than anything he

had known. He tried to fight his way out of it, to rise above

it, but it was so dense and so horrible that he could not seem

to find a break in it.

Suddenly the way was clear, and he made for it, but it was

not a pleasant clearing. Although the pretty farms and fields

appeared lush and green and the little town looked both alien

and very familiar with its small cottages and dirt main streets,

it was a scene of total terror. Two armies, it seemed, were

going at each other, but not in any formal way. The entire

pastoral vista was one of pure carnage and disorganization, and

men were falling from bullets so thick in the air that the entire

countryside seemed infested with some sort of locust. When

any man showed even a part of himself, though, those locusts

struck and tore gaping wounds open, causing terrible pain and

agony. Men fell by the hundreds, by the thousands, in an

impersonal carnage that turned the little creek that ran through

the fields and then through the town into a river of blood.

Antietam Creek had become Bloody Lane.

Just as abruptly, the scene changed, yet somehow stayed

the same. It was a horrible wasteland now, any trace of what

it might have been before having been long obliterated. Shells

burst in the air in an almost constant barrage of concussion and

shrapnel, while men huddled in long trenches and died every

time they tried to advance en masse just a few yards from those

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holes...

Then the sky was filled with a shattering roar as machines

of destruction flew over in so dense a formation that the city

below seemed blocked from sunlight. Most of the people were

below, in shelters against the rain of bombs, but nothing could

JACK L. CHALKER

227

protect them from this onslaught of explosions that created a

firestorm above, rather than on the surface, sucking out the

oxygen and killing them, men, women, children, old and young,

dogs and cats, soldiers and bankers and janitors, as they huddled

in their shelters...

Boquillas whirled, but the place now was a new place,

without explosions or bombs. He saw rows upon rows of men

so thin and emaciated they looked like what the line marching

the road to Hell must look like, only these were human beings,

some being forced to shovel out piles of human remains from

enormous ovens, the remains of men, women, children, and

none of them soldiers...

The sights sickened and appalled him at first; but after a

while, their very sameness brought him a measure of respite,

a crack in the chamber of horrors, allowing reason to resume

command. Ruddygore was effectively showing him the evils

of technology, but without any of the benefits, and he fought

back in this Never-Neverland of the mind.

Gleaming cities of steel and stone... Highways that were

ribbons of concrete stretching from coast to coast, spanning

continents, filled with horseless vehicles in astounding numbers

... Homes, powered and heated by oil, gas, even the sun

itself, in tremendous profusion, and not a castle in sight... Huge

symphonies in large, well-lighted halls of acoustical perfection,

playing wondrously beautiful pieces...

Ruddygore, ready, counterattacked...

Family units all grouped around boxes from which issued

moving pictures in full color, all hypnotically staring at the

screen for hours on end, all watching incredible drivel...

A band on a huge stage entertaining tens of thousands of

young people, but the band was dressed in weird, half-naked

fashion, its lead singer's jewelry including razor blades for

earrings; all their faces were terribly made up, while their hair

was shaved in strange ways and dyed in greens and blues and

reds. They were singing of death, destruction, and hopelessness

to a crowd that was at one and the same time worshipping

them, emulating them, and watching with that same hypnotic

fascination as those in front of the little boxes...

Inventory, Boquillas commanded. And in his mind appeared

fallout shelters, missile silos, satellite guidance systems...

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DEMONS OF THE DANCING GODS

Mutual Assured Destruction... the hydrogen bomb...

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He located what he needed, targeted it, and aimed it properly.

The great missile broke back through the atmosphere,

targeted not on a city but on a single individual, its lenses and

computers interacting to locate that one man, who, when spotted,

turned to the onrushing death from the sky...

Only it was not Ruddygore. It was a small, helpless beggar

child with pitiful eyes, his hands still grubby and stained from

rooting through dockside garbage. He looked up at the missile

with sad, fatalistic eyes, then turned to Boquillas, who watched,

horrified. The boy reached out, pleading with him, pleading...

Count Esmilio Boquillas screamed and fell back against the

battlements. Again back in his own world, under a starry,

moonlighted night sky, he was not alone. The poor beggar

child was still there, still approaching, those sad eyes boring

down upon him. And now the child spoke, a halting, hurt sort

of tone. "Please, my lord, why do you wish to kill me?"

Only a child, only a little child now. He could reach out,

crush that child, beat in his brains, and toss him from the

battlements to the cold waters below. He could, he could...

"I cannot!" Boquillas sobbed. "Hiccarph! Save me! Save

me from the child/"

Behind the child, abruptly, a ghastly shape formed, towering

over both child and man, a rotting, stench-filled body filling

out a grand costume of crimson and lavender, its eyes consumed

with hatred and contempt. A gnarled, clawed hand reached out

for the boy, then picked him up. The boy screamed as he was

pulled into the air and mercilessly crushed in the foul hand of

the demon, his body quickly limp and then reduced to a bloody

mass of tissue which the demon contemptuously discarded.

Then the demon stood there, looking down on Boquillas, and