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Behind him, the forest crashed. In the rear search screen, he saw the thing
sweep after him . . . a vertical torrent, fifteen feet across, composed of
earth, brush, uprooted and shattered trees rushing into the air, sucked up by
a tractor beam. Beyond it, a group of flying figures darted into the forest,
fanned out.
In thick growth, Jeslin turned the Pointer left again, raced on, hugging the
ground, for a hundred yards, swung sharply to the right. For perhaps a minute,
he saw nothing in the screens except the thickets the machine was slashing
through. Then there was a glimpse of two machmen weaving around tree trunks
above the undergrowth. The roar of the tractor beam had lessened, now grew
stronger again. The Pointer flashed into another thicket.
Useless, Jeslin! Hulida was shouting. They ve found you and you can t shake
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them off!
For a while, it seemed Hulida was right. The fliers couldn t match the
Pointer s speed in the forest. They would be there for instants, coming down
through the crowns, fall behind as Jeslin swerved off, and vanish again. But
they could rise back up through the trees and overtake him in the open air,
and were doing it. He didn t know how many they were in all, but half the time
he seemed to be in momentary view of one or the other of them.
And the tractors followed the fliers. There must be at least two of the
machines moving across the forest after him, guided by the flying scouts.
Suddenly the roar of the beam would arise, shredding the growth as it rushed
in towards him; sometimes a second one appeared almost simultaneously from the
other side. Once he nearly ran the Pointer directly into one of the dark,
hurtling columns of forest debris; as he slewed away from it, the vehicle
shuddered as if it were being shaken apart, and Hulida uttered a short, hoarse
cry.
And then everything was quiet again. The Pointer rushed on a minute, two
minutes, three, four; and no pursuer appeared in the screens. Jeslin saw a
gully ahead, a narrow, dry water bed, dropped into it, moved along it a
quarter of a mile until it turned into a deep, rocky ravine almost enclosed by
dense undergrowth above. There he stopped the machine.
The time display in the instrument panel told him twelve minutes had passed
since he reached the edge of the valley. He would have said he had been
running from the tractors for nearly an hour.
He rubbed his sweating palms along his thighs, looked over at Hulida s slumped
form. There was no particular satisfaction in knowing that the chase had
unnerved the machman more than it had him.
Now talk, he said unsteadily, if you care to go on living. What happened?
Hulida straightened slowly but did not answer at once. Then he said, speaking
carefully and obviously struggling to recover his self-possession, Several of
the survey team members were given truth drugs and questioned as soon as we
secured the station. They told us of the long-range transmitter which was to
be used to call for help if the station was disabled or overwhelmed by a
hostile force. When you were warned off and escaped, it was assumed that that
was where you would try to go. The transmitter has been located and is, of
course, being guarded. We ran into the group which was watching the route you
were most likely to take.
Jeslin had a sense of heavy, incredulous dismay. He hadn t expected that
particular piece of information to get to the machmen so quickly. It had been
the one way left open now to defeat their plans.
After a moment, he asked, Where did those tractors come from?
They are part of our ship s equipment. The machines were sent ahead to help
in your capture.
Jeslin grunted. If one of the beams had touched us, he said, there s a good
chance we would have been torn apart before they made a capture! You re right
about your group not caring who stands in the way when they re out to do
something. He saw Hulida s cheeks go gray below the blindfold, added, Just
before they jumped us, you knew it was coming. You machmen have a built-in
communication system of some kind
Hulida hesitated, said, Yes, we do.
How does it operate?
I could attempt to describe it to you, Hulida said, but the description
would have meaning only to another machman. The use of the system cannot be
taught until it can be experienced.
At any rate, Jeslin said, your friends know we have stopped running and
have settled down somewhere.
Hulida shook his head.
I have not told them that. He managed a brief, shaky grin. After all,
Jeslin, I prefer to go on living . . . and there is no reason why either of us
should die. You can do nothing more, and you ve had a demonstration of what
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your life as a fugitive would be like. The group won t give up the hunt until
they have you. You can calculate your final odds for yourself. But surrender
to me now and all will still be well.
There had been a growing urgency in his voice. Jeslin watched him, not
answering. The machman s mouth worked. Fear, Jeslin thought. More fear than
Hulida should be feeling at the moment. His own skin began to crawl. Here at
the bottom of the ravine, the search screens showed him nothing.
He reached out quietly, switched on the Pointer s stungun.
Jeslin . . .
Jeslin remained silent.
Jeslin, there is no time to lose! Hulida s voice was harsh with desperation.
I did not tell you the truth just now. I can conceal nothing from the group.
There are multiple direct connections between the brains, the nervous systems,
of all of us. Our communication is not wholly a mechanical process we function
almost as units of a group mind. They know you are hiding in the area and have
been searching for you. At any instant
Jeslin turned the Pointer s nose upward, triggered the gun. The stunfield
smashed up out of the ravine, the machine following it. Man-shapes swirled
about limply among the trees like drifting leaves, and something came
thundering along the floor of the gully toward the place where the Pointer had
been hiding.
Then the nightmare chase began again . . .
An endless period later, Jeslin realized he was clear of the pursuit for a
second time. He kept the Pointer hurtling forward on a straight line, staying
below the trees where he could, but flicking through open stretches and over
streambeds without pausing. Once the screen showed him two figures wheeling
high against the sky; he thought they were machmen but was under cover again
before he could be sure.
Then something smashed against the Pointer s engine section in the rear.
Jeslin swung the machine about, saw a figure gliding away behind a massive
tree trunk, sent it spinning with the stungun, turned again and rushed on. A
minute later, there was a distant crashing in the forest; then silence.
The Pointer began to vibrate heavily, and presently the speed indicator
dropped. Jeslin looked at the location chart, chewing his lip. His arm muscles
ached; he was trembling with tension and fatigue. He found himself trying to
urge the machine onward mentally, made a snorting sound of self-derision.
Then there was warm, golden sunlight ahead among the trees. Jeslin brought a
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