Earth's Last Citadel by Henry Kuttner

Author:Henry Kuttner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FICTION/Science Fiction/General
Publisher: Diversion Books
Published: 2014-07-17T04:00:00+00:00

He sighed again, heavily, and for a while they drifted in silence along the slow stream. The tunnel walls went past in the dimness, opening enigmatic arches upon caverns where the creatures of the Aliens must have lived out their misshapen lives so long ago.

“About the Light-Wearer—” Alan prompted presently.

“Oh. Well, he knows he’s alone now, and he knows he’ll have to die, too, if he can’t get at us. We were domned lucky back there in the ship, laddie, that he didn’t suspect then what had happened. He must ha’ wakened and gone in search of the race he led here, and by the time he knew they’d come and ruled and died, we’d escaped. I imagine him going back to the citadel and sending out calls all over the world—and only Evaya answered. He followed us to Carcasilla—remember? He was still unsure then, I think, stunned by the shock of what he’d found here. And afterward, when he knew, he couldn’t reach us. You were safe in Carcasilla, and we—well, the Terasi ha’ found a way to keep the thing at bay.

“It isn’ flesh, ye ken. Its metabolism isna human at all. It may have no body as we know bodies. So the bullets I fired didn’t hurt the creature. No, I think it was the psychic shock of the concussion. It’s a highly specialized being in which body had been sacrificed to mind. Perhaps a vortex of pure force. How can we conceive of such a being!” Sir Colin rubbed his forehead wearily, the slight motion rocking him upon the current of air. “Ye recall what happened back there when the devil attacked ye?”

Alan shivered. “It was in my brain—sucking—”

“So I think it’s a mental vampire. It lives on lifeforce—mental energy—and only the energy of intelligent human beings. The Aliens may ha’ bred human slaves for that purpose only. And now this last of them’s ravenous—starving. And only we and the Terasi are available now. Ye saw how it cast aside the Carcasillians. They’re protected, somehow.”

“Well, the Light-Wearer came out of his citadel and went hunting. And he found the Terasi. And he came ravening among them as we saw him come into Carcasilla. But the Terasi have a weapon. They have great gongs that make the whole cavern shiver with noise. And noise those Aliens canna stand. Ye remember Carcasilla is a silent city? So they fight him with noise. He’s been besieging them a long while now. We dare not leave the city without portable gongs, and even they aren’t really powerful enough. The food-caverns—mushrooms and suck-like things—are a little way from the city, and we can’t get enough now. He won’t let us. We’ve starving each other out, really.” Sir Colin grinned. “But I think the Alien may win.”

“So you came after me alone?”

Sir Colin shrugged. “I had my gun. Besides, you saved my life a few billion years ago, in Tunisia, and I wanted to pay the debt. As for why I delayed—I did come once, and couldn’t pass the barrier into Carcasilla.

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