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cover us with this and carry him too."
For an answer, Flinx slipped his right arm between Pocomchi's legs and hooked
it around the man's right thigh. Then he took the Indian's right arm in his
left hand, bent, heaved, and swung the swarthy miner onto his shoulders.
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"I can manage him," Flinx assured the bigger man. Both of them ignored
Pocomehi's protests. "Just show me the way."
Teeth formed a line of enameled foam beneath the incredible nose. "It's a
right good fight you two made of it till I got to you, young feller-me-lad.
Maybe we'll all make it back unskewered."
With the man's powerful rifle keeping the pursuing Otoid at a respectful
distance, they started down into seemingly impenetrable jungle. Flinx hardly
felt the weight on his back.
Just when it appeared that they would run up against an impassible rampart of
bushes and vines, the big man would gesture left or right and Flinx would find
himself running down a gap only an experienced jungle hand would have noticed.
Ab skipped along behind them, apparently enjoying all the excitement.
The sounds of Otoid crashing and racing through the trees alongside them grew
louder, more perceptible. While the terrible fire from the heavy military gun
cut down any aborigines who ventured too near, it still seemed to Flinx that
they were tightening a ring around the fugitives.
Flinx's concern wasn't alleviated by the expression on the big man's face.
Sweat was pouring down him now, and he was breathing in long, strained gasps,
despite his strength. The tripod blaster was beginning to sap his reserves. It
was not meant to be used like a handgun, much less to be carried and fired
while on the run.
"I don't know, young feller-me-lad," he said blinking the sweat from his eyes
and talking as they ran. "They may cut us off yet."
They ran on, until Flinx's heart felt like a hammer on his chest and his lungs
shrieked in protest. The formerly light Pocomchi now seemed to be made of
solid lead.
Then, just when he thought he couldn't move another step, he heard a shout
from his huge companion. Wiping aside perspiration and a few soaked strands of
hair, Flinx thought he could see a dark rectangle looming ahead of them. The
ancient portal rose a good four meters high and two across. It formed an
opening into a creeper-wrapped temple built of sparkling green stone. The
temple appeared isolated from any other structures. Its color enabled it to
blend inconspicuously into the surrounding forest.
The building was low, compared to many of the imposing edifices Flinx had
passed in Mimmisompo proper-not more than two stories aboveground, flat and
broken on top from the action of
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Apprehensively he studied their apparent destination. "In there? But it's
small, and there's nowhere to retreat to. Can't the Otoid ...?"
"You can always try to make it back to your skimmer, lad," his rescuer
suggested pleasantly.
Arrows continued to fall around them as they staggered, exhausted, toward the
catacomblike entrance. One bolt whizzed past so close that it slit Flinx's
shirt under his left arm. Glancing down and over, he saw that the point had
nicked the skin and he was bleeding slightly.
Just ahead, several figures ducked down into tall grass. Emerald eyes glinted
malevolently at them.
"It's no good," Flinx wheezed, defeated. "They're ahead of us now."
"'How many?" the big man asked, crouching alongside Flinx and swinging the
rifle around.
"I don't know, I don't know," Flinx panted, wondering if be would be able to
stand again with
Pocomchi's weight on his back. Next to him, Ab imitated his posture and
offered a hopeful verse.
Flinx was not comforted.
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"Little devils know how to fight, how to hide themselves. If they ever get
organized, they'll run the prospectors and the scientists off Alaspin." Flinx,
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