parachute—"

Hailard's eyes met Alston's in understanding. He nodded, shouting orders.

Rocket tubes blasting, the tiny plane drew a trail of fire through the gray sky. Over the city it nosed into a steep power dive, bored down in thunder, skimming walls and terraces. Over the shadowy courtyard of the temple enclosure, it pulled out, zoomed swiftly, topped the near buildings, and vanished. Behind it, a parachute burst open in white flowering.

Burdened with the carrying case of grenades and a portable flame-thrower, Alston dropped like a plummet. Pressing a release, he slipped from the harness before his feet touched the ground. He landed, running.

Before him, the flame-thrower belched its roaring scimitar, and snarls of the knotted greenery withered from his path. Half a moment brought him to the oval portal. Gouts of fire washed it clear of the tangling obstructions.

Choking, he kicked through the smoking ashes and burst into the temple's gloom. The place was alive with menace. Murmurings built into shrill tumult.

Down the crumbling terraces, he stumbled, cutting a wide swath with the swishing flame. The temple buzzed like an angry beehive. At the pit's edge, the flame-thrower's reservoir ran dry. It hissed and the fiery jets died. He flung it into the pressing dark.

Kneeling, he stared into the quivering horror of the pit! The jellied light within stirred with life, bubbling furiously. With his teeth Alston drew out the pins of two grenades, dropped them. Two more. Feverishly, as rapidly as his hands could function, he jerked out pins and hurled the bombs deep into the churning protoplasm in the pit.

From below came a staggered flash, followed by jarring concussions. The pit was a manifold convulsion of movement. Fans of flame spurted upward, becoming fountains of light and uproar. Waves of sound and pressured air hurled Alston back from the curbing. With the last burst, shot up quivering, ugly chunks of pulpy matter which clung and burned.

Crawling masses of vegetation reached him, struck, broke in myriad struggling forms. Tentacles and tendrils of vine bore him down, overwhelming in their clinging embrace. His heat gun burned them through, loosening their grip. He broke clear.

Something like a fiery whip flicked his face, drawing blood and shooting rivulets of pain 

 Prev. P 30/32 next