Planet in Peril

III. Fire Trolls

Riding its arch of atom-fire, the Jolly Roger hurtled through the void, passing "beneath" the asteroids and approaching the orbit of Mars. Ere long the Red Planet could be seen dead ahead, and in his mind's eye Star Pirate could see the vast plains of ochre dust, the half-ruined cities of ancient amber marble, the broad belts of rubbery blue vegetation which were the famous "canals"

"Phath, keep trying to get Zoar on the 'visor," he directed. "I'm going back to consult the library computer. We need all the dope we can get on these Fire Trolls, legendary or not!"

"Right, chief," nodded the Venusian.

A little while later, finding nothing of use in the computer memory, Star returned to the control cabin and discovered that Phath had just managed to get through to Dr. Zoar. Indeed, the dwarfish Martian was glaring out of the screen at the grinning Venusian. "What is it now, you moss-eared swamp-lizard?" snapped the savant impatiently, bending a malignant scowl on the albino. "Don't you realize that I am on the verge of a momentous discovery—?"

Phath flushed a little and his pink eyes went hard and venomous. "Izzat so, you knee-high green toad? Why, you wouldn't know a momentous discovery if you fell over one— which, considering your height, so called, wouldn't be hard to do!" he returned with vigor in his hissing tones.

Zoar's scowl, if possible, grew even more malignant than before. "Now listen, you web-footed, mudwallowing, fungus-eating—!"

"Why, you dust-swallowing midget! I'd step on you, if I didn't know that with your bloated ego, you'd explode like a pricked balloon, you—!"

"Children—children!" sighed Star Pirate in long-suffering tones, stepping between the Venusian and the Martian mirrored in the 'visor screen. Grumbling a curse to his low swamp devil-god, the lithe Venusian relinquished the chair and Star took a seat before the machine. At the sight of him, Zoar relaxed his ferocious scowl and his age-seamed and time-wrinkled features assumed an expression almost mild.

"Oh, it’s you, lad! You'll be interested to hear the results of my latest observations—I have detected the most interesting slight perturbations in the orbit of Pluto! If they recur on a periodic basis, I may have found proof of the existence of a trans-Plutonian planet—the one astronomers have inferred and alleged may well exist on the uttermost verge of the Solar System—the long-rumored ’Persephone,’ Pluto’s ancient companion on the long voyage through the blackness of space ..."

"Interesting, Doc, but some other time," rapped Star. "I’m on a case that seems to have the Patrol baffled, and I need some information on the Mercurian legends of so-called Fire Trolls. Can you give me a hand?"

Zoar’s froglike face became thoughtful. "Extra-planetary anthropology and folklore is a little out of my range, lad," he admitted slowly , "but, of course, I have glanced at the material a time or two, over the decades. Precisely what do you need to know?"

"That’s the trouble," Star said ruefully. "At this stage in the game, I haven' t a wisp of an idea what might or might not be of help to me, in the way of data. First, what are they supposed to look like?"

"Crudely humanoid; broad-shouldered, deep-chested, hump-backed; flat, hairless heads crowned with immense cow-horns; glaring red eyes; parrot-like beak; yellow, rugose hide—"

Phath, at Star’s shoulder, wrinkled up his slim nose. " 'Rugose'?" he murmured. "What’s 'rugose'—?"

"Scaly," Star snapped, with an impatient shrug of burly well-muscled shoulders. "Don’t interrupt! Go on, Doc, anything else?"

"They supposedly dwell on the Sunside, since their own bodies are as hot as molten lead," said the scientist. "When strangers from the Twilight Belt invade their parched and burning wastes, they kill ruthlessly and without compassion ... searing the flesh of ordinary mortals to the bone with a touch of their super-heated four-clawed paws. And that’s about all I can tell you, lad: just dusty old Mercurian legends, dating from the old days long before the arrival of the first Earthling explorers."

Star asked: "Any possibility such creatures might actually exist?"

Dr. Zoar puffed out his sunken cheeks. "Absolutely not, boy! Nothing that lives, not even the hardiest bacteria, could survive for an instant in temperatures that turn solid iridium, cadmium, silver and lead to pure liquids ."

After a few more words, Star signed off and the televisor screen went blank and lifeless. He turned away from the machine, a slight frown on his space-tanned features.

"Find out what you were lookin’ for, chief?" inquired Phath hopefully.

Slowly, reluctantly, Star shook his red head.

"The only thing I found out I already had a hunch I knew," he muttered. "That the monsters we’re looking for don’t even exist—and can't!"