'ZOMBIES OF THE STRATOSPHERE', 1952
ZOMBIE QUEST
Narab lay where he had fallen beside the spaceship, waves of agony engulfing him from the injuries he had sustained when the craft had crashed, killing his compatriots. Now he lay, alone and gasping, both in pain and from the heavier Earth atmosphere. He slipped in and out of consciousness, each return to awareness more agonising than the last as the pain lanced through his tortured body. Dimly he realised that he was dying ...
---oo0oo---
"Hey, look! There's someone lying beside the spaceship!" exclaimed Jean Hanmer, junior reporter for the Daily Bugle.
"Say, so there is!" observed her companion, photographer Jack Bentley.
They hurried to where Narab lay, his back to them. Tentatively Jean reached out and, tugging the Zombie's arm, pulled him round till he lay on his back, groaning. She recoiled in shock, giving a small scream. She buried her head in Jack's chest, afraid to look at the alien face. "It - it's horrible!" she gasped. "What - what is it?"
Jack regarded the reddish-orange complexion. "Reckon it's one of them aliens from the spaceship!" observed Jack astutely. "Maybe there's others inside!"
"No! Don't go in! They'll kill you!" Jean said, trying unsuccessfully to stop Jack climbing the steps and entering the craft.
Inside, a cursory glance told Jack that the other Zombies were dead. Curiosity then got the better of him, and he looked around the control panels. "Say! We could go to Mars in this thing!" he called to Jean, who was standing anxiously outside. "Come on in and see!" As she entered, he ]oaded his flashgun and popped pictures of the ship's interior, then went out to where Narab lay and snapped more shots of the injured alien. "We gotta scoop here, baby!" Jack's eyes were shining with excitement. "C'mon, let's get back to the paper and write up the story!"
"Wait a minute!" Jean's hand was on his arm, restraining him. "What about - that?" and she pointed to the gasping Zombie. He coughed convulsively and a trickle of orange fluid escaped his lips.
"Ahhh, he's dead meat - leave him for the mortuary!" Jack turned to head back for the car.
"No! It - he's not dead - yet. Maybe we can help him!"
"Help him!" exclaimed Jack. "You don't know what tricks he's got up his sleeve. Leave well alone, baby, let the cops take care of him, if he's still alive when they come!"
The voices roused Narab and he opened his pain-filled eyes. "Help - me please - help me!" His voice was weak and husky with pain, his gasping becoming more pronounced. He reached out his hand beseechingly, and Jean felt compassion well within her. He was an alien, but he was hurt ... A thought struck her. "If we nursed him back to health, we'd get the story of the century from him - wouldn't we?"
"Nursed him!?" echoed Jack incredulously.
"Yes. Look, who else knows that he's alive? If we take him to a hospital, we'd never get anywhere near him - right?"
"Well ..."
"There's a general practitioner friend of mine who owes me a favour. He lives just ten miles down the road!"
"By the look of him, he's not gonna make it." observed Jack, looking at Narab.
"We'll just have to take that chance, won't we? Lift him into the back of the car!"
---oo0oo---
Larry Martin flew back to Headquarters after saving the world by defusing the Zombie bomb that would have knocked the Earth off its orbit. "Well," he commented to his colleagues as he removed his flying gear, "I guess that wraps it up!"
"Were all the Zombies killed?" asked Sue Davis, his pretty assistant.
"Uh, no, come to think of it. The young one - Narab - was still alive when I left him to defuse the bomb. He told me where the bomb was. He was hurt real bad, though."
"Shouldn't we get an ambulance out there - even though it's just to remove the dead Zombies' bodies? Reckon our scientists will be anxious to do some research on them!" Bob Wilson said, with a broad grin.
"Oh! What a gruesome thought!" said Sue, her hand going to her cheek in shock.
"Gotta be practical, Sue. There may be more of them critturs on the way, and we should know everything we can about them."
"I suppose so - but what about the injured one just now?" replied Sue.
"I'll buzz out there, see if he's still alive. You call the cops and the ambulance. If that Zombie is still alive, they'll want to interrogate him." And, so saying, Larry donned his flying suit, set the controls to 'On' and 'Up' and leaped out of the window.
---oo0oo---
"Dammit, Jean, I'm a doctor, not a veterinarian!" exclaimed Doctor McLeod, as he looked down on his unconscious, and by now barely breathing, patient.
"Can't you do something to save him?" implored Jean.
"Where did you say he was from?" asked McLeod, scratching his head.
"Mars." replied Jack, knowledgeably.
"What's different about Mars?" asked McLeod.
"Lower gravity, thinner atmosphere." Jack replied.
Suddenly Narab, lying on the operating table, became restless and then began to convulsively gasp for breath, turning a weird shade of purple. "Ohmigod!" exclaimed the doctor. "His breathing's blocked! Get the hell outta here - I'm going to have to perform a tracheaectomy - fast!"
Jean and Jack left hastily and sat anxiously outside, awaiting the outcome. If the alien died, bang went their scoop story...
Dr McLeod emerged an hour later, pale faced and shaking.
"Are you OK doc?" asked Jack anxiously.
'I - don't know what I've just operated on, but it sure ain't human!"
"Is he - alive?" enquired Jean.
"Yeah - for now. His lungs were where his heart should be, his heart was - somewhere else. One lung was punctured by two ribs and had collapsed. His lungs are double our lungs' size. He was overdosing on oxygen. He's on a respirator just now and I've strapped up his broken ribs. I wonder... Dr McLeod rubbed his chin pensively.
"What is it, doc? Might he still die?" asked Jack, anxiously.
"His bones - they're very fragile. I'm afraid with the extra Earth gravity that they may not heal at all. He needs to be put into a similar environment to his own planet. What did you say Mars' gravity was?" he asked Jack, searchingly.
"One-sixth Earth's gravity." Jack replied, pleased at his astronomical knowledge.
"Hmmm." The doctor pondered for a few moments, then he snapped his fingers, eyes flashing as an inspiration occurred to him. "What if I float him? That would take the weight off his body!" He entered the bathroom and pulled the water for a full bath. The doctor wrapped Narab in polythene to keep his operation handiwork dry, then Jack and he gently laid the unconscious alien into the bath. Immediately Narab's strained breathing eased and his pain-filled face relaxed.
"Like a duck to water!" commented Jack. "Maybe he lives in the canals of Mars!"
Dr McLeod rubbed his hands over his face in exhaustion. "Look," he said, regarding his two visitors, "it's dark outside now and it's a long way back to LA. Why don't you stay here tonight? I'll watch over our guest for a while, make sure he's going to pull through. OK?"
"Why don't we take turns?" suggested Jean helpfully. "You take a rest, doe, I'll take first watch!"
---oo0oo---
While Bob and Sue notified the authorities Larry, flying low, returned to the site of the Zombie spaceship crash. From the air he could see no sign of life and, on landing, there was no sign of Narab, either. Larry searched around, saw some footprints in the dusty soil. One set of footprints looked like ladies' high heels, judging from the spike-like indentation in the sand. The other set of footprints, obviously a man's, seemed to be staggering under an extra weight. Further away, he saw tyre marks, to which the footprints were leading. he put two-and-two together. Someone, presumably a man and a woman, had kidnapped the Zombie! Larry could hear the police cars sirens howling ever nearer. Three black-and-whites screeched to a halt and twelve armed officers jumped out of the cars, doors slamming. Lieutenant Jacobs, in plain clothes, recognised Larry. "Where are they?" he asked, eyes switching from side to side apprehensively.
"The Zombies in the spaceship are dead, but there's one on the loose! He can't have got very far, though, as he was injured. I'll fly round for a look-see." and, so saying, he took a running jump-off again, the cop cars following him as best they could. He could not fly for long in the gathering evening, but he headed for the nearest small township and landed near a well-lit house that had a board outside reading "Dr J McLeod, General Practitioner". With his flying suit. still on, he knocked at the door...
---oo0oo---
Dr McLeod, aroused from his rest, gasped in surprise when he opened his front door to a masked man in a flying suit.
"Don't be alarmed, sir." said Larry. "I'm working with the police and we're looking for an injured alien whose spaceship crashed ten miles up the road. Six feet tall, young, slender, unusual skin colour ...
"Uh, sorry, haven't seen him, mister." the doctor replied, unable to meet Larry's eyes, but Larry could see by his reaction that he was lying.
"Mind if I come in while I wait for the police to catch up?"
"Uh, no, of course not, come in! This way!" and he ushered Larry into the waiting room.
"Mind if I - uh - freshen up?" Larry asked, removing his flying helmet in anticipation.
Listening behind a door, Jack and Jean scrambled to find a covering for the bath where Narab lay. Just in time they found a tarpaulin and flung it across the bath, then they ran into the living room and sat down, casually.
Whilst washing the dust of the desert off his hands and face, however, curiosity got the better of Larry and, as the three cop cars screeched to a halt outside, he whipped the cover off the bath.
Narab floated, unconscious, on the water.
---oo0oo---
Narab came to gradually. The buoyancy of the water was easing the weight from his broken bones. He was breathing more easily, no more wracking gasps in an attempt to force the heavy air in and out of his tortured lungs. He was aware of pressure round his mouth and nose. A mask! The right mixture of air was being fed through a respirator. Slowly, reluctantly, he opened his eyes. Four people were standing around the makeshift bath/bed. Trapped! He was trapped! But where on Earth was he?
"Look, doctor! He's awake!" a female voice said.
He saw someone else draw a pistol. "Put that away!" A man in a white surgical coverall with an authoritative voice ordered. "He's not going anywhere like that!"
"He mustn't escape again!" This time Narab recognised the voice of Larry Martin. Wearily, Narab closed his alien eyes and slept a healing sleep.
---oo0oo---
Out in the desert, near the crashed spaceship, something stirred. The air whipped itself into eddies that whirled the sand faster and faster in their wake. There was a clunk, then a click as indentations appeared in the sand, but nothing could be seen to cause them. The eddies lessened, then stopped. Slowly, a shape shimmered, dark on darkness, until the spaceship fully materialised and sat silently, waiting. A periscope lifted up from the body of the craft, turned a full circle then, satisfied, was lowered again. There was nobody guarding the crashed spaceship. A few moments later the front hatch of the newly arrived ship opened and a shaft of dim light lanced the desert night. Three human-like forms appeared, silhouetted in the light, and they descended the steps to the ground. One had an apparatus in his hand, which he turned on, tuned in, and, walking away from the proximity of the ship, he studied readings that were appearing on its dials. Silently, the first alien nodded to the second alien, who returned to the ship. A few moments later a larger cargo hatch opened and a small, two-seater vehicle skimmed down the ramp. The first two Zombies sat in it while the third visitor returned to the ship, closed the hatches and re-activated the cloaking device. The two aliens started up the groundcar, which skimmed silently over the desert in the direction of the house where Narab lay.
---oo0oo---
"You three are under arrest for concealing a wanted criminal." Lieutenant Jacobs announced accusingly as he turned away from the bath in which Narab lay. "We'll wait till sunup, then we'll all return to LA - him, too." added the cop, indicating the supine alien.
"If you move him at all he may die!" protested Dr McLeod.
"The only good alien's a dead alien!" stated the cop flatly. "You, you and you, guard - that!" he detailed three of his men, jabbing a finger towards Narab. "You three - hands out!" and he snapped handcuffs on Jean, Jack and the doctor. "The rest of you guys," the lieutenant added, addressing the remainder of his men, "back to your cars and keep guard outside till morning."
---oo0oo---
Deep in the night, Narab regained consciousness slowly. Without moving, he allowed his senses to explore his body's injuries. Good! The healing was complete, thanks to the doctor's skill and his own fast recuperation time. He extended his extra sensory perception to investigate outside the bath in which he lay. He could see ... policemen, surrounding him inside and outside the house. He could also see the three who had helped him sitting huddled and handcuffed on the floor. Far off, but getting nearer, he could also sense - something else. It seemed like compatriots were approaching. But Marex and the others were all dead. If not them, then who else? Slowly, oh, so slowly, so as not to make a rippling noise in the water, he lowered his feet and raised his head, carefully removing the respiratory device. He took an experimental breath of the alien air. Satisfied his body had re-acclimatised, he looked over the rim of the bath. he three guards in the room next to the bathroom were playing cards while the others were sleeping wherever they could. Very carefully, Narab hunkered down in the bath beneath the guards' sight then raised and extended a long-fingered hand in their direction and, with all his mental resources, created a time bubble around them and willed them to freeze inside it.
The guards, intent on their game, became immobile. Narab rose to his full height in the bath, then stepped out, tearing the covering of polythene from his body. Jean, Jack and the doctor, who were dozing, awoke to find the tall Zombie standing ominously over them. Jean suppressed a scream just in time, and Jack and the doctor gasped in amazement at their visitor's sudden improvement in health.
"Do not he afraid." said Narab, assuringly. "I will not harm you, but I must escape quickly."
"Release us!" whispered Jack.
Narab leaned down and, with one wrench of his strong hands, snapped open the handcuffs. Rubbing their wrists in relief, the three stood up and looked around. They saw the 'frozen' guards, trapped in a time bubble like flies trapped in amber.
"What did you do to them?" whispered Dr McLeod, amazement in his voice.
"They will remain like that for 30 of your Earth-minutes. They will not remember what occurred. I must go." Narab turned towards the door. Outside, the cop cars sat, their crews inside them, attempting to keep warm in the night chill.
---oo0oo---
Something woke Larry with a start. He jumped up off the floor and ran through the main room to where the captured Zombie lay. He took in in an instant that the cops were helpless and that the three human captives were helping the alien to escape. Heroically, he threw himself at Jack and the doctor, and a fist fight ensued around the 'frozen' police guards. The noise awoke the other cops, but Narab 'froze' them all in their tracks. Narab hurriedly opened a side window and climbed out. The police in their cars outside heard the ruckus inside the house, drew their guns and ran in, expecting to see an alien. Instead he saw Larry lying unconscious and all the others strangely motionless, awake but not alive, like zombies. As the cops ran in, Narab and his three allies escaped through the window. Under cover of darkness and with the advantage of surprise, with a pointing gesture Narab caused all but one of the cop cars' tyres to puncture. Jack jumped into the driving seat of the remaining undamaged car and gunned it into life. The surprised police ran back out of the house in time to see them roar off in a cloud of dust.
---oo0oo---
"There! In this direction!" the Zombie with the direction-finding device showed his partner driving the ground car the road to take. "He's coming towards us - quick, hide behind that billboard!" They parked and waited ...
---oo0oo---
The stolen cop car, tyres screaming, headed towards the crashed Zombie craft. Jean, sitting beside Narab in the back, turned to him. "Tell me, where are we going?"
"Back to the ship."
"But your ship is damaged beyond repair! You can never escape!"
"I do not intend to remain here and be treated like an animal in one of your barbaric zoos, which is exactly what would happen. No, I will return to my planet and inform the Elders not to come to Earth again - it is too dangerous for the likes of us!"
Jean looked at Narab, unsure whether the alien was telling the truth, or whether he knew what a lie was, but he was staring intently on the road ahead. Suddenly, from behind a billboard just within stopping distance, a strange wheelless car skimmed out and settled in the middle of the road. The groundcar's occupants stood in front of the vehicle, hands raised in a gesture which clearly meant 'Stop!' Jack, driving, slammed on the brakes.
In the gathering daylight Jean could see quite plainly another two Zombies! Narab jumped out of the car and ran towards them. Stopping a few feet before them, he raised his hand in a strange salute of welcome. "I am called Narab of D 'jimlah." he announced.
"I am called Laxex, brother of Marex. This is Senex, my cousin. We came to bring my brother home."
"All are dead except myself." confirmed Narab. "These humans have helped in my escape from the clutches of the human lawmen and the one in a flying suit."
"We thank you." Laxex bowed formally towards the humans. "But now we must return quickly to our spaceship."
"Wait! called Jean, seeing her story of the century slipping away. "Please - take me with you!" and she ran towards the group of aliens.
"Jean - no, come back!" called Jack, anguish in his voice. Dr McLeod, however, stood back and said nothing. He was of the opinion that if she wanted to go with these weirdos, she was welcome to anything that came to her. He had fulfilled, at some considerable personal danger, his obligation to her. He sat back in the car, awaiting the outcome.
"Don't you realise, Jack, we could go with them to their planet, meet their people, take the most wonderful pictures and come back to Earth?" We would be rich beyond the dreams of avarice."
"There are a few things you've forgotten, Jean." She looked up into his grey eyes askance. "One - their atmosphere is virtually unbreatheable for humans. Two - they're not coming back to Earth ... he looked at Narab, who nodded in confirmation, "and, three, I love you and I want to grow old here, on Earth, with you." He held her in a kiss.
The Zombies,•unfamiliar with amorous human activities, turned away and stepped into the Zombie groundcar. In a whisper, Laxex asked Narab "What are they doing?"
"Uh, I believe it's called 'kissing', Laxex."
"Oh. For a moment I thought...
"No, no. But I can tell you ..."
"Later, Narab." Laxex silenced him curtly. "You may present me with a scientific study of humankind in the future. Now, we go!" Senex drove off at high speed, leaving behind the three humans, two of whom were still embracing.
---oo0oo---
The third alien, called Ganex, left alone to guard the cloaked Zombie spaceship, was becoming agitated. Earth dawn was lighting the sky and there was no sign of his compatriots. Without lowering the cloaking device, he opened the hatch and walked through the cloaking field towards the road. Above he heard a strange mechanical noise. He looked up in time to see Larry in his flying suit soar over the hill and land expertly a few feet away from him. Ganex turned to run back to the safety and invisibility of the spaceship but Larry was too quick for him. They fought hand-to-hand and Larry landed a lucky punch, laying Ganex flat but, as he fell, he fell through the cloaking field. Amazed at his adversary's sudden disappearance, Larry tentatively moved forward. He felt an electrical shock course through him as he went through the field and then, to his amazement, he saw the alien spaceship, hatch open and inviting, before him.
---oo0oo---
"Just up here, among these rocks!" directed Laxex to Senex. Narab heaved a sigh of relief. It would be good to leave this crazy planet behind, get back to normal atmosphere and gravity. although the planet's Elders in Council had agreed to let him try it, Narab knew that Marex's idea had been doomed to failure from the start. However, through an obligation Marex held over him, he had been compelled to go along to assist him in his evil plot. It had so very nearly worked, but now Narab had no regrets that he had told the flying man about the bomb and its effects on the Earth should it have gone off. Narab knew, however, that he would have to face the Elders on his return to Mars, and face the consequences of his traitorous actions. Grimly, he knew only too well what these consequences would be.
Senex drove the groundcar up over the rocky land and stopped, flashed his lights to indicate to the waiting Ganex that all was well and to decloak the ship. He flashed, then flashed again as nothing happened. It was the right spot, he could just discern the indentations where the legs of the craft pushed into the sand.
Something was wrong.
---oo0oo---
Larry lay in wait, gun in hand, inside the Zombies' spaceship. He was intent on stopping them once and for all.
Outside, Ganex stirred, came to and staggered to his feet. Alarmed, he ran towards his waiting friends to warn them. Larry, realising his mistake in leaving the alien where he had fallen, took aim and fired. Ganex fell through the cloaking field and lay still, orange blood oozing from a wound in his side. All Larry had to do was wait till the cops arrived, as he would not allow the Zombies to gain access to their spaceship.
---oo0oo---
"Oh, please Jack, let's follow them and see them take off!" Jean wheedled her new fiancé as they prepared to drive back to town.
"Well, all right. I guess it'd make a real swell picture for the paper!"
"Uh, if you don't mind, I'll wait for the cops. I've got some explaining to do to them, if they don't clamp me in irons first!" asserted Dr McLeod gruffly. He alighted from the car and sat waiting by the roadside. Jean and Jack drove on.
---oo0oo---
"Calling all cars! Calling all cars! Intercept aliens! Do not permit their spaceship to take off! Calling all cars! Calling all cars!" Lieutenant Jacobs jumped into a newly-arrived squad car and tapped the driver's shoulder to head down the road. A short while later they screeched to a halt again as Dr McLeod flagged them down. "How far are the aliens ahead of us?" rapped out the lieutenant.
"Twenty, twenty-five minutes." responded the doctor.
"Hell!" imprecated the lieutenant. "Jump in!" and they and two other squad cars roared, sirens wailing, down the desert road.
---oo0oo---
Back at the Zombie spaceship, Narab, Laxex and Senex had retreated behind a boulder. There was so little time- the police were coming, and they had to leave Earth within the next 15 Earth-minutes to make the computer trajectory to intersect Mars, otherwise they would have to roam the Galaxy for the rest of their lives.
They hurriedly planned an assault on the ship. Laxex and Senex touched a control on their belts, then broke cover and ran in a zig-zag fashion towards the ship. On the ship's, and Larry's, blind side, Narab approached. Larry stated firing his gun at the approaching Zombies, but every shot seemed to miss its target. The Zombies' advanced technology afforded them protection through a deflector field built into their suits. When Larry's gun was empty, Narab jumped up through the ship's hatch and grappled with him, quickly backed up by Laxex. Senex was then able to recover the badly wounded Ganex, carrying him over his shoulder into the ship.
Inside the ship, Laxex unstowed ray guns, pointed one at Larry and fired. Stunned, Larry fell to the floor. Narab, still weak from his recent serious injuries, dropped to his knees, gasping. Allowing Narab time to recuperate his strength, the other three Zombies hurriedly transferred the bodies of their dead comrades from the crashed ship to their own and, wrapping them up, stowed them in the ship's hold. Senex raised the ship's laser cannon, pointed it towards the derelict Zombie ship and fired. It disintegrated in a flash of light, thus ensuring that Earth people could not gain their advanced space technology before they were due to.
Rapid computations were made for the escape trajectory and velocity, then Laxex carried Larry, still unconscious, out of the ship and lay him well away from the ship's rockets. He was just returning to the ship when Jean and Jack, their car parked down the hillside, ran up. Jean had her pencil and shorthand pad at the ready, and Jack was focusing his camera. Narab came to the hatch to help Laxex close it and recognised the two.
"Narab!" called Jean, waving.
"No! Please leave the area now! We must depart!" The sirens of the approaching police cars could be heard in the distance.
"C'mon, Jean, let's get outta here - these guys are dangerous! You saw what they just did to the other spaceship!"
"No! Just a minute!" and Jean ran up to Narab, just as the police arrived.
The police lieutenant raised his bullhorn. "Do not attempt to depart! You are all under arrest. Come out with your hands up!"
On an impulse, Laxex grabbed Jean and held her in front of him, shielding him from the guns of the police. He pointed the laser gun he had used on Larry towards one of the cop cars and fired. It disappeared in a flash of light.
"Stand back!" ordered Laxex. "She comes with us as a hostage!" If you shoot us down, she dies too!" and he backed up, one arm around her waist, the other hand holding the laser gun menacingly. He backed up into the ship and Senex pressed the lever for the airlock. The hatch slammed shut, with Jean inside.
Suddenly she realised the predicament she was in. Instead of wanting, as she had done only a short while before, to go with the Zombies, she now only wanted back to her fiancé's side, safe in his arms. She squirmed in Laxex's vice-like grip until the hatch was shut, then he threw her to the floor.
Narab, still exhausted from his escape and flight, staggered to Jean's side, helping her to her feet. "Are you all right?" he asked, genuine concern in his voice.
"What are you going to do with me?" she asked, terror in her eyes.
"Laxex," said Narab, "we cannot take this Earthwoman with us. As soon as we depressurise, she will die. She cannot survive in our atmosphere."
"That is her misfortune." commented Laxex, dispassionately, as he fired the rockets and the ship gathered momentum, then soared into the blue sky. Briefly they heard bullets pinging off the superstructure, then they were beyond range of the humans' puny guns.
"Please, let me go back!" pleaded Jean to Narab, in whom she knew she had an ally. She could see the land receding in the portholes.
"Laxex, let her go!" demanded Narab.
"No!" Laxex pulled out his laser gun and pointed it towards Narab. Just in time, Narab sidestepped the deadly bolt, and, before Laxex could fire another shot, Narab disarmed him and fought hand-to-hand with him. Senex was steering the ship and could not leave the controls. The two Zombies fought around the cabin until Laxex caught Narab a powerful uppercut. Narab staggered back, dazed, and knocked the airlock lever to 'Open'. The ship shook and Narab saw Jean lose her footing and slide towards the open hatch. He made a lunge, caught her wrist and held on, but the slipstream outside caught her and she fell, screaming, out of the Zombie ship.
---oo0oo---
Larry, recovered from the laser stun, watched the spaceship, with Jean inside, take off and disappear into the blue. Jack, who was frantic with worry as his new fiancee had just been abducted by aliens, ran over to him. "Please, save her from their evil clutches!" he pleaded. Without another thought, Larry turned on his rocket backpack, set the controls to 'On' and 'Up' and took a running jump into the sky in hot pursuit. He had no idea what to do, even if he caught up with the ship, but he had to try to save Jean...
He could see the spaceship, flying erratically, up ahead. Looks like it's in trouble, he thought. Then, to his amazement, he saw something - no, someone, falling from it. Touching the emergency overdrive button, with a burst of speed he flew to the falling, screaming girl and caught her in his arms moments before she would have been dashed to death on the rocks below.
A few moments later they landed safely and Jean ran over to Jack's waiting arms. She was shaking with fright at her close encounter.
Larry looked up into the sky, but could no longer see the alien spaceship. The police lieutenant's radio called him. "The eagle has flown - repeat - the eagle has flown. Our planes cannot catch them!"
"Well, I reckon that's that." commented Jack, relievedly.
"I sure hope so," replied Larry, "but I'm not so sure. I wonder if you've noticed - they always come in threes...
---oo0oo---