From this high vantage point his view was that much better. Seated here on his bike, for a moment he found himself calculating the dimensions of these mighty columns:
At its base, this one would be maybe two hundred metres through, tapering down to about half of that as it rose all of a kilometer and a half to its turret-clad crest. Basically the tower was - well, a stone stack! Natural as any of the Grand Canyon's grotesque outcrops, its awesomeness lay mainly in its size and the structures built upon it. But as his eyes travelled up the tremendous, sky-scraping height of the thing, so he noticed what he took to be activity of some sort in the darkness of a huge cavern close to the top.
He narrowed his eyes in an attempt to bring the activity into focus. Now what was... that!
Stuffed into the bottom of his main back-pack - packed in haste, when he hadn't been thinking too clearly - Vyotsky knew there were binoculars. All well and good, but he didn't want to waste the time necessary to retrieve them now. But staring at the stack with its many gravity-defying structures, its watchtower castle and now this bustling activity in the -
Something launched itself outwards from the high cavern!
Vyotsky's spine prickled and his fleshy lips drew back from teeth which were still sore from the battering Simmons's elbow had given them. He drew breath in a gasp, straining his eyes to make out what it was that floated now like a black boiling cloud, forming an airfoil as it circled slowly about the great stack and lost a little height.
And in the next moment all of the blood drained from the Russian's face as it dawned on him just what this flying thing might be - namely, the twin of Encounter One! An alien dragon in the sky of an alien land!
Vyotsky was paralysed with dread, but only for a moment. Now was not the time to go into shock. He switched off his engine, and keeping to the lee of the wall let his bike free-wheel and carry him down from the foothills back to the plain. There he found a massive outcrop of rock and parked the bike in its shadow. The moon, which seemed to be moving across the sky remarkably quickly, was now almost directly overhead, making concealment difficult. In what little shadow there was, the Russian fumbled to unhook his packs, loaded his SMG with a fresh magazine and stuffed a spare into a pocket of his one-piece. Then he primed his small flame-thrower, and even though he was faithless thought: Christ! - and a lot of good this will be against that!
'That' had meanwhile circled the titan stack a second and third time, and was now less than a thousand feet high. Suddenly it veered sharply toward the plain, then seemed to expand rapidly as it came swooping in a series of glides and dips directly toward Vyotsky's hiding place. And he knew then that it was no use pretending any longer, no use hoping that the flight of this thing was merely coincidental to his being here. The - creature? -knew he was here; it was looking for him!
It passed overhead a little to the north, laying a huge shadow on the plain like a vast, swiftly flowing inkblot, and Vyotsky was able to look up at it and measure its size. He saw with only a minimum of relief that it wasn't nearly as huge or terrifying as the murderous thing which had half-wrecked Perchorsk. Fifty feet long, with wings spanning a distance something greater than that, it formed a shape similar to the great mantas of Earth, with a long trailing tail for balance. Unlike the manta, however, there were huge lidless eyes on its underside, peering in as many different directions as could be imagined!
Then the thing banked left and came swooping back, dropped lower still in a controlled stall, finally set down in a fanning of fleshy wings that churned up a cloud of dust which for a little while obscured it. It landed no more than thirty or forty metres away; as the dust settled Vyotsky saw it lolling there, turning what was best described as a 'head' this way and that in a manner which could only be called vacant or at best aimless.
Vacant, yes - and vacated! For now the Russian saw the thing's harness - and the empty saddle of ornately carved leather upon its back. But mainly he saw the man who stood on the ground beside the thing, staring in the direction of his hiding place. Saw enough of him, at least, to know that he wasn't a man, not entirely. For just such a 'man' as this had burned to death on the walkway in Perchorsk's core: a Wamphyri warrior!
He stared hard, apparently right at Vyotsky, then began to turn in a slow circle. Before he turned away, Vyotsky saw the glint of his red eyes like small fires burning in his face. But more than the warrior's face, the Russian was concerned with - concerned about - the gauntlet-like weapon he wore on his right hand. He knew the damage that weapon could do. But not to Karl Vyotsky. Not this time.
The big Russian remained quiet as a mouse in the shadows; he didn't move, didn't breathe, didn't blink an eye. The warrior completed his circling turn, then looked up and gazed for a moment at the castle on the stack. He spread his legs, put his hands on his hips, cocked his head sharply on one side. And he whistled a high-pitched, penetrating whistle that was more a throbbing on the eardrums than a real sound. Down from the sky fell a pair of familiar shapes; they circled the warrior once, then headed straight for Vyotsky where he crouched in the shadows of leaning boulders. It was so unexpected that the big Russian was caught off-balance.
One of the bats almost struck Vyotsky with a pulsing wing, so that he must duck to avoid it. The short barrel of his SMG clattered against stone, and he knew his cover was broken. The warrior faced him again, whistled to call off the bats, came striding forward. There was no uncertainty now, none. He knew where his quarry was hiding. His red eyes burned and he grinned a strange, sardonic grin; he tossed back his forelock from the side to the back of his head; he held himself proudly, chin high, shoulders pulled sharply back.
Vyotsky let him get as close as twenty paces, then stepped out into view, onto the stony plain in the yellow light of the half-moon. He pointed his weapon, called out: 'Halt! Hold it right there, my friend, or it ends for you right here!' But his voice was shaky, and the warrior seemed to know it. He simply swerved to change his angle of approach, came head-on as before.
Vyotsky didn't want to kill him. He had to try and live here, not die in some vendetta for the death of this heathen brave. The Russian would prefer to deal, not fight, not with an entire world against him. He put his weapon on single shot, fired a round over the advancing warrior's head. The bullet plucked at the warrior's forelock, it passed so close. He stopped, looked up, sniffed at the air. And Vyotsky called out:
'Look, let's talk.' He held up his free hand, palm open toward the warrior, lowered his SMG to point it at the stony ground. It was the best way he could think of to signal peace. But at the same time his thumb switched the weapon to rapid fire. The next time he pulled the trigger, it would be for real.
The warrior put his hand up to touch his forelock. He brought it down again, sniffed suspiciously at his fingers with his squat, almost swinish snout. Then his eyes widened and went as round as blood-hued coins. He snarled something Vyotsky half-recognized, which he made out or guessed to be: 'What? You dare threaten?' Then the warrior's right arm rose up toward his right shoulder in a sort of salute. His gauntlet was clenched, but at the apex of the salute it sprang open and showed an arrangement of blades, hooks, claws.
He went into a crouch, affected a combat stance, made as if to hurl himself at Vyotsky. But the big Russian wasn't waiting. Over a distance of only six or seven paces he couldn't possibly miss. He squeezed the trigger, opened up, hosed the warrior across the body with a stream of lethal lead - or should have!