The Hunted Heroes - Robert Silverberg

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
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

(00:22):
all terns. Let's keep moving. I told Val the surest
way to die out here on Mars is to give up.
I reached over and turned up the pressure on her
oxy mask to make things a little easier for her.
Through the glass sight of the mask, I could see
her face contorted in an agony of fatigue, and she

(00:44):
probably thought the failure of the sand cat was all
my fault too. VAL's usually about the best wife a
guy could ask for, but when she wants to be,
she can be a real flying bother. It was beyond
her to see that some grease monkey back at the
dome was at fall. Whoever it was who had failed
to fasten down the engine hood. Nothing but what had

(01:05):
stopped us could stop a sand cat. Sand in the
delicate mechanism of the atomic engine. But no, she blamed
it all on me somehow. So we were out walking
on the spongy sand of the Martian desert we'd been
walking a good eight hours. Can we turn back now, ron,

(01:25):
Val pleaded, Maybe there isn't any uranium in this sector
at all. I think we're crazy to keep on searching
out here. I started to tell her that the Uranko
chief had assured me we'd hit something out this way,
but changed my mind. When VAL's tired and overwrought, there's
no sense in arguing with her. I stared ahead at

(01:47):
the bleak, desolate wastes of the Martian landscape. Behind us,
somewhere was the comfort of the dome. Ahead, nothing but
the mazes and gullies of this dead world. Try to
keep going, Val, My glow had reached out and clumsily
and folded hers. Come on, kid, remember we're doing this
for Earth. We're heroes, she glared at me. Heroes hell,

(02:11):
she muttered, that's the way it looked back home, But
out there it doesn't seem so glorious. And Uranko's pay
is stinking. We didn't come out here for the pay, vow.
I know, I know, but just the same, it must
have been hell for her. We had wandered fruitlessly over
the red sands all day, both of us listening for

(02:31):
the clicks of the counter, and the Geigers had been
obstinately hushed all day except for the constant undercurrent of
meaningless noises, even though the Martian gravity was only a
fraction of Earth's. I was starting to tire, and I
knew it must have been really rough on Vow with
her lovely but unrugged legs. Heroes, She said bitterly, We're

(02:53):
not heroes, were suckers. Why did I ever let you
volunteer for the Gygcorps and drag me along? Which wasn't
anywhere close to the truth. Now I knew she was
at the breaking point, because val didn't lie unless she
was so exhausted she didn't know what she was doing.
She had been just as much inflamed by the idea
of coming to Mars to help in the search for

(03:15):
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 of
radioactive 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 together on everything. Now

(03:38):
she was turning it against me. I tried to jolly her.
Buck up kid, I said, I didn't dare turn up
her oxy pressure any higher, but it was obvious she
couldn't keep going. She was almost sleep walking. Now we
pressed on over the barren terrain. The Geiger kept up
a fairly steady click pattern, but never broke into that

(03:59):
sudden explode of tumult that meant we had found pay dirt.
I started to feel tired, myself, terribly tired. I longed
to lie down on the soft, spongy Martian sand and
bury myself. I looked at Val. She was dragging along
with her eyes half shut. I felt almost guilty for
having dragged her out to Mars, until I recalled that

(04:20):
I hadn't. In fact, she had come up with the
idea before I did. I wish there was some way
of turning the weary, bedraggled girl at my side back
into the vow who had so enthusiastically suggested we join
the guides. Twelve steps later, I decided this was about
as far as we could go. I stopped, slipped out

(04:41):
of the Geiger harness, and lowered myself ponderously to the ground.
What's the matter, ron Val asked, sleepily. Something wrong, No, baby,
I said, putting out a hand and taking hers. I
think we ought to rest a little before we go
any further. It's been a long, hard day. It didn't

(05:02):
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?

(05:25):
I looked down at valerie sleeping form and thought of
our warm, comfortable little home on Earth. It wasn't much,
but people in love don't need very fancy surroundings. I
watched her sleeping peacefully, a wayward lock of her soft
blonde hair trailing down over one eyebrow, and it seemed
hard to believe that we'd exchanged Earth and all it

(05:45):
held for us for the raw, untamed struggle 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 just liked 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,

(06:06):
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 into weird shapes. The
Guide Corps preferred married couples working in teams. That's what
had finally decided it for us. We were a good team.
We had no ties on earth that couldn't be broken
without much difficulty, so we volunteered, and here we are heroes.

(06:32):
The wind blasted a massive sand into my face and
I felt it tinkle against the oxy mask. I glanced
at the suit chronometer, getting late. I decided once again
to wake Val. But she was tired, and I was
tired too, tired from our wearying journey across the empty desert.
I started to shake Val, but I never finished. It

(06:53):
would be so nice just to 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 let myself doze off. Come on, Val,
I said savagely, and started to rise to my feet.
I couldn't. I looked down. I was neatly bound in thin,

(07:17):
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 for a trapped fly. It wasn't Martians that
had done it. There weren't any Martians, hadn't been for
a million years. It was some earth man who had
bound us. I rolled my eyes toward Val and saw

(07:40):
that she was similarly trussed in the 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 a short time ago. I realized, Ron, don't
try to move, baby. This stuff can break your neck
if you twist it wrong. She continued for a moment

(08:01):
to struggle futilely, and I had to snap lie still
vow A very wise statement, said a brittle, harsh voice
from above me. I looked up and saw a helmeted
figure above us. He wasn't wearing the customary skin tight,
pliable oxy suits we had. He wore an outmoded bulky
spacesuit and a fish bowl helmet, all but the face

(08:24):
area opaque. The oxygen canisters weren't attached to his back
as expected, though they were strapped to the back of
the wheel chair 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 this
struck me odd I thought I knew every one on

(08:46):
sparsely settled Mars. Somehow I'd missed him. What shocked me
most was that he had no legs. The spacesuit ended
neatly at the thighs. He was holding in his left
hand the tangle gun with which he had an trapped us,
and a very efficient looking blaster was in his right.
I didn't want to disturb your sleep, he said coldly,

(09:08):
So I've been waiting 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 realized he must be totally insane.
I could feel my stomach muscles tighten, my throat can
strict painfully. Then anger ripped through me, washing away the terror.

(09:30):
What's going on, I demanded, staring at the half of
a man who confronted us from the wheelchair. Who are you?
You'll find out soon enough, he said. Suppose now you
come with me. He reached for the tangle gun, flipped
the little switch on its side to melt, and shot
a stream of watery fluid over our legs, keeping the

(09:51):
blaster 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, considering our arms were
still tightly bound against the sides of our oxy suits. Walk,
the stranger said, waving the tangle gun to indicate the direction.

(10:14):
I'll be right behind you. He holstered the tangle gun.
I glimpsed the bulk of an outboard atomic rigging behind him.
Strapped to the back of the wheelchair. He fingered a
knob on the arm of the chair, and the two
exhaust ducts behind the wheelhousings flamed for a moment, and
the chair began to roll obediently. We started walking. You

(10:35):
don't argue with a blaster, even if the man pointing
it is in a wheelchair. What's going on, ron, Val
asked in a low voice as we walked behind us.
The wheelchair hissed steadily. I don't quite know, Val, I've
never seen this guy before, and I thought I knew
everyone at the dome. Quiet up there, Our captor called,

(10:57):
and we stopped talking. We trudged along together, with him
following behind. I could hear the crunch crunch of the
wheelchair as its wheels chewed into the sand. I wondered
where we were going and why. I wondered why we
had ever left Earth. The answer to that came to
me quick enough. We had to Earth needed their radioactives,

(11:18):
and the only way to get them was to get
out and look. The great atomic wars of the late
twentieth century had used up much of the supply, but
the amount used to blow up half the great cities
of the world hardly compared with the amount we needed
to put them back together again. In three centuries, the
shattered world had been completely rebuilt. The wreckage of New

(11:38):
York and Shanghai in London and all the other ruined
cities had been hidden by a shining new world of
gleaming towers and flying roadways. We had profited by our
grandparents' mistakes. They had used their atomics to make bombs.
We used ours for fuel. It was an atomic world. Everything,
power drills, printing press us as typewriters, can openers, ocean

(12:02):
liners powered by the inexhaustible energy 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. The
mighty 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 a madman's prisoners on Mars.

(12:25):
With every source of uranium mine dry on Earth, we
had tried other possibilities. All sorts of schemes came forth.
Project Sea Dredge was trying to get uranium from the oceans.
In forty or fifty years. They'd get some results, we hoped,
But there wasn't forty or fifty years worth of raw
stuff to tide us over until then. In a decade

(12:47):
or so, our power would be just about gone. I
could picture the sort of dog eat dog world we'd
revert back to millions of starving, freezing human's tooth and
clawing it in the useless shell of a great atomic civilization.
So Mars. There's not much uranium on Mars, and it's
not easy to find or any cinch to mine. But

(13:10):
what little there is helps. It's a stopgap effort, just
to keep things moving until Project Sea Dredge starts functioning.
Enter the GYG Corp volunteers out on the face of Mars,
combing for its uranium deposits. And here we are, I thought.
After we walked on a while, a dome became visible.

(13:30):
Up ahead. It slid up over 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 where all
of Uranko's guide corps were located. But another look told
me that this was actually quite near us and fairly small,

(13:52):
a one man dome of all things. Welcome to my home,
he said. The name is Gregory Leadman. He hearded us
off to one side of the airlock, uttered a few
words keyed to his voice, and motioned us inside. When
the door slid up. When we were inside, he reached
up clumsily holding the blaster and unscrewed the ancient spacesuit

(14:13):
fish pole. His face was a bitter, dried up mask.
He was a man who hated. The place was spartanly furnished,
no chairs, no tape player, no decoration of any sort.
Hard bulkhead walls, rivets studded glared back at us. He
had an automatic chef, a bed, and a writing desk,

(14:34):
and no other furniture. Suddenly he drew the tangle gun
and sprayed our legs again. We toppled heavily 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
behind her oxy mask. What others I'd never bother to

(14:58):
find out their names, Ledman said casually. They were other
guigs I caught unawares like you out on the desert.
That's the only sport I have left, guyg 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 bright against the redness. Of

(15:18):
the sands. They were the dried, parched skeletons of earthmen,
bits of cloth and plastic once oxy masks and suits
still clung to them. Suddenly I remembered there had been
a pattern there. All the time. We didn't much talk
about it. We chalked it off as occupational hazards. There
had been a pattern of disappearances on the desert. I

(15:40):
could think of six eight names. Now. None of them
had been particularly close friends. You don't get time to
make close friends out here, but we'd vowed it wouldn't
happen to us it had. You've been hunting gigs, I asked, why,
what have they ever done to you? He smiled as
calmly as if I just praised his housekeeping. Because I

(16:04):
hate you, he said blandly, I intend to wipe every
last one of you out, one by one. I stared
at him. I'd never seen a man like this before.
I thought all his kind had died at the time
of the atomic wars. I heard val sob he's a madman. Now,
Ledmand said evenly. I'm quite saying, believe me, But I'm

(16:27):
determined to drive the GUIDs and Uranko off Mars eventually
I'll scare you all away. Just pick us off in
the desert, exactly, replied Leedman. And I have no fears
of an armed attack. This place is well fortified. I've
devoted years to building it, and I'm back against those hills.
They couldn't pry me out. He let his pale hand

(16:49):
run up to his gnarled hair. I've devoted years to this,
ever since, ever since I landed here on Mars. What
are you going to do with us, Val finally asked,
after a long silence. He didn't smile this time. Kill you,
he told her, Not your husband. I want him as
an envoy, to go back and tell the others to

(17:10):
clear off. He rocked 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
rocking back and forth, A nightmare. I found myself fervently
wishing I was back out there on the infinitely safer desert.

(17:31):
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 mine and ship the radioactives back to Earth to
keep the atomic engines going right, I nodded. Over at
our guider counters, we we volunteered to come to Mars,

(17:53):
Val said, irrelevantly, Ah, two young heroes. Ledman said, acidly,
how sad. I could almost feel 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

(18:13):
Sadlerville blast, he asked, of course, and I did too.
I'd never forget it, No one would. How could I
forget that great accident, killing hundreds, injuring thousands more, sterilizing
forty miles of Mississippi land when the Sadlerville pile went up.
I was there on business at the time, Leadman said,

(18:34):
I represented leadmin Atomics. I was there to sign a
new contract for my company. You know 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, he said,
just enough to necessitate the removal of He indicated the

(18:54):
empty space at his thighs so I got off lightly.
He gestured at the wheelchair. Blank it. I still didn't understand.
But why kill us guides, We had nothing to do
with it. You're just in this by accident, he said.
You see, after the explosion and the amputation, my fellow
members on the board of leadmin Atomics decided that a

(19:16):
semi basket case like myself was a poor risk as
head of the board, and they took my company away.
All quite legal, I assure you. They left me almost
a pauper. Then he snapped the punchline at me. They
renamed leadmin Atomics. Who did you say you worked for?
I began Urine don't bother, a more inventive title than

(19:40):
leadmin Atomics, but not quite 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 get even.
There's not a great deal of uranium on this planet,
but enough to keep me in a style to which,
unfortunately I'm no longer accustomed. He consulted his wristwatch. Time

(20:03):
for my injection. He pulled out the tangle gun and
sprayed us again, just to make doubly certain. That's another
little souvenir of Sadlerville. I'm sort on red blood corpuscles.
He rolled over to a wall table and fumbled in
a container among a pile of hypodermics. There are other
injections too, adrenaline, insulin, others. The blast turned me into

(20:26):
a walking pin cushion. But I'll pay it all back,
he said. He plunged the needle into his arm. My
eyes widened. It was too nightmarish to be real. I
wasn't seriously worried about his threat to wipe out the
entire Guide Corps, since it was unlikely that one man
in a wheelchair could pick us all off. No, it
wasn't the threat that disturbed me so much as the

(20:48):
whole concept, so strange to me that the human mind
could be as warped and twisted as leadman'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 you can kill
every earth man on Mars of all the insane cock

(21:10):
eyed VAL's quick, waried head shake cut me off. But
Ledenmann had felt my words all right, yes, oh Geed,
even with every one of you for taking away my legs.
If we hadn't meddled with the atom in the first place,
I'd be as tall and powerful as you to day
instead of a useless cripple in a wheel chair. You're sick,

(21:32):
Gregory Ledman. Val said quietly. You've conceived an impossible scheme
of revenge, and now you're taking it out on innocent
people who've done nothing, nothing at all, to hurt you.
That's not sane, his eyes blazed. Who are you to
talk of sanity? Uneasily, I caught VAL's glance from a

(21:52):
corner of my eye. Sweat was rolling down her smooth
forehead faster than the auto wiper could swab it away
to do something. What are you waiting for, Ron, easy baby,
I said, I knew what our ace in the hole was,
but I had to get Leedman within reach of me first. Enough,
he said, I'm going to turn you loose outside right after.

(22:15):
Get sick, I hissed to Val lo She began immediately
to cough, violently, emitting harsh, choking sobs. Can't breathe, she
began to yell, writhing in her bonds that did it.
Ledman hadn't much humanity left in him, but there was
a little. He lowered the blaster a bit and wheeled

(22:36):
one hand over to see what was wrong with Val.
She continued to wretch and moan most horribly. It almost
convinced me. I saw VAL's pale, frightened face turned to me.
He approached and peered down at her. He opened his
mouth to say something, and at that moment I snapped
my leg up hard, tearing the tangle cord with a
snicking rasp, and kicked his wheelchair over. The blaster went off,

(23:00):
burning a hole through the dome roof. The automatic sealers
glued it instantly. Ledmond went sprawling helplessly out into the
middle of the floor, the wheelchair up ended next to him,
its wheels slowly revolving in the air. The blaster flew
from his hands at the impact of landing and spun
out near me. In one quick motion, I rolled over

(23:21):
and covered it with my body. Ledmand clawed his way
to me with tremendous effort, and tried wildly to pry
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. He fetched up against the
wall of the dome and lay there. Val rolled over
to me. Now, if we could get free of this stuff,

(23:45):
I said, I could get him covered before he comes too.
But how teamwork? Val said. She swiveled around on the
floor until her head was near my boot. Push my
oxy mask 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

(24:05):
this time it snapped open. I got the tip of
my boot in and pried upward. The oxy mask came off, slowly,
scraping a jagged red scratch up the side of VAL's
neck as it came there. She breathed, that's that. I
looked uneasily at leadmon. He was groaning and beginning to stir.

(24:25):
Val rolled on to the floor and her face lay
near my right arm. I saw what she had in mine.
She began to nibble the vile tasting tangle cord, running
her teeth up and down it until it started to give.
She continued unfailingly. Finally one strand snapped, then another. At last,
I had enough use of my hand to reach out

(24:46):
and grasp the blaster. Then I pulled myself across the
floor to Leadman, removed the tangle gun and melted the
remaining tangle cord off. My muscles were stiff and bunched,
and rising made me WinCE. I and freed vow. Then
I turned and faced Leadman. I suppose you'll kill me now,
he said. No, that's the difference between sane people and insane.

(25:10):
I told him, I'm not going to kill you at all.
I'm going to see to it that you're sent back
to Earth. No, he shouted, no, anything but back there.
I don't want to face them again, not after what
they did to me. Not so loud, I broke in.
They'll help you on Earth. They'll take all the hatred
and sickness out of you and turn you into a
useful member of society again. I hate earth men, he

(25:35):
spat out. I hate all of them, I know, I
said sarcastically. You're just all full of hate. You hated
us so much that you couldn't bear to hang around
on Earth for as much as a year after the
Sadlerville blast. You had to take right off for Mars
without a moment's delay. Didn't you. You hated Earth so
much you had to leave. Why are you telling all

(25:58):
this to me? Because if you'd stayed long enough, you'd
have used some of your pension money to buy yourself
a pair of prosthetic legs, and then you wouldn't need
this wheelchair. Ledman scowled, and then his face went belligerent again.
They told me I was paralyzed below the waist, that
I'd never walk again, even with prosthetic legs, because I

(26:18):
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 as well.
Soon after you left, they developed atomic powered prosthetics, amazing things,
virtually robot legs. All the survivors of the Sadlerville blast

(26:42):
were given the necessary replacement limbs free of charge. All
except you. You were so sick you had to get
away from the world 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

(27:02):
almost felt sorry for him. A pathetic, legless figure propped
up against the wall of a dome at laster Point.
But then I remembered he'd killed twelve guides or more
and would have added vow to the number had he
had the chance. You're a very sick man, led men,
I said. All this time, you could have been happy,
useful on Earth instead of being holed up here nursing

(27:24):
your hatred. You might have been useful on earth, but
you decided to channel everything 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, weakly, but stubbornly. Still, I could see his

(27:45):
whole structure of hate starting to topple, and I decided
to give it the final push. Haven't you wondered how
I managed to break the tangle cord when I kicked
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 my oxy suit. Look,

(28:05):
I said, I pointed to my smooth, gleaming metal legs.
The almost soundless purr of their motors was the only
noise in the room. I was in the Sadlerville blast too,
I said, but I didn't go crazy with hate when
I lost my legs. Ledman was sobbing o k Ledman,
I said. Val got him into his suit and brought

(28:26):
him the fishbowl helmet. Get your helmet on, and let's
go between the sikes and the prosthetics. Men. You'll be
a new man inside of a year. But but I'm
a murderer, that's right, and you'll be sentenced to psych
adjustment when they're finished, Gregory Ledman, the killer will be
as dead as if they'd electrocuted you, but there'll be
a new and sane Gregory Ledman. I turned Val got

(28:51):
the Geigers honey. For the first time since Leedman had
caught us. I remembered how tired Val had been out
in the desert. I realized now I had been driving
her 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 how unfair I had been. She

(29:12):
lifted the Geiger harness and I put Leadman back in
his wheelchair. Val slipped her oxy mask back on and
fastened it shut. Let's get back to the dome in
a hurry, I said. We'll turn leadman over to 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,

(29:32):
you can find another wife after we dump this guy.
I'm sacking in for twenty hours, and then we're going
back out there to finish that search pattern. Earth needs
the uranium, honey, and I knew you'd never be happy
quitting in the middle like that, she smiled. I can't
wait to get out there and start listening for those
telltale clicks. I gave a joyful whoop and swung her around.

(29:54):
When I put her down, she squeezed my hand hard.
Let's get moving, fellow hero, she said. I pressed the
stud for the airlock, smiling. And of the Hunted Heroes
by Robert Silverburgh