Their weapons seemed extremely elderly, but they twisted and turned and intersected his barrage perfectly, causing an enormous explosion, which resulted in a gigantic ball of flame and debris.
Hunter let go another barrage. Again the Phantoms fired at it. Again they hit it on the nose. Another ball of flame was produced; this one quickly joined with the first.
Counterweaponry? The word just popped into Hunter's head.
Before he could ponder it any further though, more bells and whistles went off in his cockpit.
One was from the quadtrol, and it was bearing surprisingly good news. He'd asked it way back at the beginning of the journey to look for any world that would qualify as Far Planet. At least according to the star charts. The strange thing now was, the device had found it.
How? By checking the map. Just like Tomm said.
Hunter was astonished. Every point and star on the chart was wrong and intentionally put out of place, except the small dot of a world called Far Planet. It was right where it was supposed to be. And that was no more than a few hundred miles below his present position.
He immediately put the nose of the craft down and boosted his throttles, hoping to shake the Phantoms and make for the planet as well. But then came the second warning, this one from right inside his head.
Hawk, check your six!
Damn…
Hunter turned around and saw not the flight of Phantoms coming at him, but the ball of flame and debris that had resulted from their counterblasting his warning shots. Before he could hit his throttles, the orb of high-speed shrapnel slammed into the back of his spacecraft. He nearly went through the canopy, the impact was so great. His spacecraft immediately began spinning out of control. There were so many warning buzzers going off now, he couldn't tell which one was warning him about what.
He went hard right and pointed the nose straight down— this took him out of the spin and punched him through the top of the planet's atmosphere. He yanked the throttles back to 1/ 10,000 percent power — this to avoid a very nasty collision with the ground below — only to look behind him again and see that the tail of his Flying Machine was on fire. He turned forward and started pulling on his joystick.
A steep ascent back into space might put the fire out. But it was no good. His controls were not responding.
There was another explosion, and the curve of the planet below became more acute. Smoke began filling the cockpit. The fire was crawling up his wings. He began pushing control panels, hoping something would work. But it was no use. All of the lights on his flight board had blinked out for good.
Came one final explosion — and everything started to go black.
Hunter couldn't believe it. He'd just shot himself down.
17
Hunter awoke, facedown, in the middle of a shallow stream.
The water was cold. It was running up his nose and into his mouth and even into his ears. He could not move. Every bone in his body was broken, or at least that's how it felt. He couldn't see, either.
Something warm and sticky was keeping his eyelids shut. Most of all, his head hurt. A lot.
/ guess this isn't Heaven, he thought.
He managed to roll onto his back, allowing the water to pour over his chest. It felt like ice, but it seemed to revive him. He cupped a handful of water and brought it up to his eyes. It was so cold it stung, but it helped clear away whatever was blocking his vision. Another splash of water, then another. Finally he was able to see.
He was in the middle of a forest. His uniform was burned and ripped; his helmet was floating in a pool nearby. The F-Machine was caught in an enormous tree off to his right. Hanging about twenty feet off the ground, its wings and tail section were still on fire. Hunter felt a sharp pain in his chest; the aircraft looked irreparably damaged. The canopy had fallen off, his ejector seat had activated, and his ancient parachute had billowed open. But it was hanging off another tree nearby.
This didn't make sense. How had he wound up here, dumped not on the jagged rocks that surrounded the bottom of the huge tree but in the freezing-cold stream? It had not been a soft landing for him. But it had not been a fatal one, either.
He managed to lift himself to his knees and then finally got to his feet. Though he was in a deep woods, it was very warm. There was a large yellow sun almost directly overhead; it felt strangely soothing on his battered face. The air here was dry and sweet. Wherever he was, the puff was holding up well. The trees were numerous in all directions, with only the stream running through them, and a small grassy bank on each side.
He took a step and was amazed that his legs weren't shattered for good. Two more steps, and he was out of the water. He half expected the Phantoms to swoop down on him at any second, so he made for the cover of the nearest tree. But the only things overhead were fair weather clouds and the deep blue sky. Nor was there any sound, except the wind in the leaves.
He retrieved his helmet, then made his way over to the tree holding his Hying Machine. He took one long look, then fell to the seat of his pants. The fuselage bent and scored. The cockpit insides were still burning, and the tail section was in dozens of pieces. The crash had been catastrophic. His aircraft was destroyed. Dead…
But how could he still be alive?
He began walking.
The trees ran very thick past the tiny grassy bank, so he followed the stream, trying to retrace the path the Flying Machine took on its way down. He finally reached an outcrop of rock, which after climbing, he was able to look back toward the crash site. What he saw astonished him. There was a wide swath cut through the dense forest, clearly made as his machine had burned its way in. The damage to the tops of the trees was extensive — big limbs cracked and torn asunder, small pockets of flame still burning fiercely.
He had no memory of this; no memory of ejecting or separating from the aircraft at the last moment.
Had he passed out? Had he been knocked unconscious? He didn't know.
Only one thing was for sure: there was no way he should have survived that kind of crash.
He sat down on a flat rock and activated the image capsule Tomm had given him; it had somehow survived as well. Suddenly the spitting image of the space monk was floating in front of him.
"You are activating this for only one reason," the diminutive priest began. "You made it to Far Planet. Are you still in one piece?"
Hunter reviewed the various bumps, bruises, and contusions covering his battered body. "We'll have to see about that," he said.
The image smiled. "Is this place what you expected?"
Hunter shook his head no. "I was expecting someplace much wilder…"
"Wilder?"
He scanned the pastoral setting. "It looks like any other scrub planet in the Galaxy. Lots of grass. Lots of trees. After what I had to do to get here, I thought it would be much different. I thought there'd be big cities and lots of people."
The image of Tomm laughed. "Brother Hawk, I know at some time in the past I must have counseled you on this, but allow me to do so again: Few things in this universe are as they first seem. Keep an open mind out here, my friend. You are going to need it."
"So what's your crucial advice?" Hunter asked the image. He was anxious to get going, keenly aware that the clock was still ticking and that if he didn't at least try to complete this part of the mission — whatever the hell it was — then there was a good chance there would be a disaster at Zero Point when the rest of the UPF fleet emerged.