by Various
The Pirate Planet
_By Charles W. Diffin_
CONCLUSION
CHAPTER XVII
_He shot feet first into the waiting heads._]
[Sidenote: From Earth and sub-Venus converge a titanic offensive ofjustice on the unspeakable man-things of Torg.]
The little ship that Captain Blake had thrown with reckless speedthrough the skies over Washington, D. C., made history that day in therecords of the earth. None, now, could doubt that here, at last, wasthe answer that the world had hoped for until hope had died.Unbelievable in its field of action, incredible in its wild speed, butreal, nevertheless!--the countries of the earth were frantic in theiracclaim. Only the men who formed the International Board of Defensefailed to join in the enthusiasm. They sat by day and night in earnestconference on ways and means.
This little ship--so wonderful, and so inadequate! It was only apromise of what might come. There must be new designs made; men mustlearn to dream in new terms and set down their dreams in cold linesand figures on drafting boards. A cruiser of space must be designed,to mount heavy guns, carry great loads, absorb the stresses that mustcome to such a structure in flight and in battle. And above all, itmust take the thrust of this driving force--new and tremendous--ofwhich men knew so little as yet. And then many like it must be built.
The fuel must be prepared, and this, alone, meant new and differentmachinery, which itself must be designed before the manufacturingprocess could begin.
There was work to be done--a world of work!--and so few months inwhich to do it. The attack from the distant gun had long since ceasedand the instruments of the astronomers showed the enemy planetshrinking far off in space. But it would return; there was only a yearfor preparation.
* * * * *
Captain Blake was assigned to the direction of design. An entireoffice building in Washington was vacated for his use, and in a fewhours he rallied a staff of assistants who demanded the entire use ofa telephone system that spread countrywide. And the call went out thatwould bring the best brains of the land to the task before them.
The windows of the building shone brightly throughout the nights whenthe call was answered, and engineers and draftsmen worked at feverheat on thrusts and stresses and involved mathematical calculations.And, while owners of great manufacturing plants waited withunaccustomed patience for a moment's talk with Blake, the white sheetson the drafting boards showed growing pictures of braces and strutsand curved plates, of castings for gun mounts, and ammunition hoists.And the manufacturers were told in no uncertain terms exactly whatpart of this experimental ship they would produce, and when it must bedelivered.
"If only we dared go into production," said Blake; "but it is out ofthe question. This first ship must demonstrate its efficiency; we mustget the 'bugs' out of our design; correct our errors and be ready witha production schedule that will work with precision."
Only one phase of this proposed production troubled him; themanufacture must be handled all over the world. He talked with menfrom England and France, from Germany and Italy and a host of otherlands, and he raged inwardly while he tried to drive home to them thenecessity for handling the work in just one way--his way--if resultswere to be achieved.
The men of business he could convince, but his chief disquiet camefrom those whose thoughts were of what they termed "statesmanship,"and who seemed more apprehensive of the power that this new weaponwould give the United States of America than they were of the threatfrom distant worlds.
From his friends in high quarters came hints of the same friction, buthe knew that the one demand Winslow had laid down was being observed:the secret of the mysterious fuel would remain with us. Winslow hadshown little confidence in the countries of the old world, and he hadsworn Blake to an agreement that his strange liquids--that new form ofmatter and substance--should remain with this country.
* * * * *
And swiftly the paper ship grew. The parts were in manufacture, andarriving at the assembly plant in Ohio. Blake's time was spent therenow, and he caught only snatches of sleep on a cot in his office,while he worked with the forces of men who succeeded each other tokeep the assembly room going night and day.
There was an enormous hangar that was designed for the assembling of agiant dirigible; it housed another ship now. Hardly a ship, yet itbegan to take form where great girders held the keel that was laid,and duralumin plates and strong castings were bolted home.
A thousand new problems, and innumerable vexing errors--the "bugs"that inhere with a new, mechanical job--yet the day came when the shipwas a thing of sleek beauty, and her thousand feet of length encloseda maze of latticed struts where ammunition rooms and sleepingquarters, a chart room and control stations were cleverly interspaced.And above, where the great shape towered high in the big hangar, werethe lean snouts of cannon, and recesses that held rapid-fire guns andwhole batteries of machine guns for close range.
Rows of great storage batteries were installed, to furnish the firstcurrent for the starting of the ship, till her dynamos that weredriven by the exhaust blast itself could go into action and carry on.And then--
An armored truck that ground slowly up under heavy guard to delivertwo small flasks of liquid whose tremendous weight must be held incontainers of thick steel, and be hoisted with cranes to their restingplace within the ship. And Captain Blake, with his heart in his throatthrough fear of some failure, some slip in their plans--Captain Blake,of the gaunt, worn frame, and face haggard from sleeplessnights--stood quietly at a control board while the great doors of thehangar swung open.
* * * * *
At the closing of a switch the current from the batteries flowedthrough the two liquids, to go on in conductors of heavy copper to agenerator that was heavy and squat and devoid of moving parts. Withinit were electrodes that were castings of copper, and between them themiracle of regenerated matter was taking place.
What came to them as energy from the cables was transformed to atangible thing--a vast bulk of gas, of hydrogen and oxygen that hadonce been water, and the pressure of the gas made a roaring inferno ofthe exhausts. A spark plug ignited it, and the heat of combustionadded pressure to pressure, while the quivering, invisible live steampoured forth to change to vaporous clouds that filled the hangar.
The man at the control board stood trembling with knowledge of thepower he had unleashed. He moved a lever to crack open a valve, andthe clouds poured now from beneath the ship, that raised slowly andsmoothly in the air. It hung quietly poised, while the hands thatdirected it sent a roaring blast from the great stern exhaust, and thecreation of many minds became a thing of life that moved slowly,gliding out into the sunlight of the world.
The cheers of crowding men, insane with hysterical emotion at sight oftheir work's fulfillment, were lost in the thunder of the ship. Theblunt bow lifted where the sun made dazzling brilliance of hersweeping curves, and with a blast that thundered from her stern thefirst unit of the space forces of the Earth swept upward in an arc ofspeed that ended in invisibility. No enveloping air could hold hernow; she was launched in the ocean of space that would be her home.
* * * * *
Captain Blake, the following day, sat in Washington before a deskpiled high with telegrams of congratulation. His tired face wassmiling as he replaced a telephone receiver that had spoken words ofconfidence and commendation from the President of the United States.But he pushed the mass of yellow papers aside to resume hisexamination of a well-thumbed folder marked: "Production Schedule."The real work was yet to be done.
It was only two short months later that he sat before the same desk,with a face that showed no mark of smiles in its haggard lines.
His ship was a success, and was flying continuously, while men of theair service were trained in its manipulation and gunners receivedpractice in three-dimensioned range finding and cruiser practice inthe air. Above, in the
airless space, they learned to operate the gunsthat were controlled from within the air-tight rooms. They werelearning, and the ship performed the miracles that were now taken asmatters of fact.
But production!
Captain Blake rose wearily to attend a conference at the WarDepartment. He had asked that it be called, and the entire service wasrepresented when he reached there. He went without preamble orexplanation to the point.
"Mr. Secretary," he said, and faced the Secretary of War, "I have toreport, sir, that we have failed. It is utterly impossible, underpresent conditions, to produce a fleet of completed ships.
"You know the reason; I have conferred with you often. It was amistake to depend on foreign aid; they have failed us. I do notcriticize them: their ways are their own, and their own problems loomlarge to them. The English production of parts has come through, or isproceeding satisfactorily, but the rest is in hopeless confusion. TheRed menace from Russia is the prime reason, of course. With the Redsmobilizing their forces, we cannot blame her neighbors for preparingto defend themselves. But our program!--and the sure invasion thatwill come in six short months!--to be fighting among ourselves--it isdamnable!"
* * * * *
He paused to stare in wordless misery at the silent gathering beforehim. Then--
"I have failed," he blurted out. "I have fallen down on the job. Itwas my responsibility to get the cooperation that insured success.Let me step aside. Is there anyone now who can take up the work andbring order and results from this chaos of futility?"
He waited long for a reply. It was the Secretary of War who answeredin a quiet voice.
"We must not be too harsh," he said, "in our criticism of our foreignfriends, but neither should we be unfair to Captain Blake. You doyourself an injustice; there is no one who could have done more thanyou. The reason is here." He struck at a paper that he held in hishand. "Europe is at war. Russia has struck without warning; her troopsare moving and her air force is engaged this minute in an attack uponParis. It is a traitor country at home that has defeated us in our warwith another world."
"I think," he added slowly, "there is nothing more that could havebeen done: you have made a brave effort. Let us thank you, CaptainBlake, while we can. We will fight, when the time comes, as best wecan; that goes without saying."
A blue and gold figure arose slowly to speak a word for the navy. "Itis evident by Captain Blake's own admission, that the proposed venturemust fail. It has been evident to some of us from the start." It was afighter of the old school who was speaking; his voice was that of onewhose vision has dimmed, who sees but the dreams of impracticalvisionaries in the newer inventions, and whose reliance for safety isplaced only in the weapons he knows.
"The naval forces of the United States will be ready," he told them,"and I would ask you to remember that we can still place dependenceupon the ships that float in the water, and the forces who have mannedthem since the history of this country began."
* * * * *
Captain Blake had sprung to his feet. Again he addressed the Secretaryfor War.
"Mr. Secretary," he said, and there was a fighting glint in his eyes,"I make no reply to this gentleman. His arm of the service will speakfor itself as it has always done. But your own words have given me newhope and new energy. I ask you, Mr. Secretary, for another chance. Theindustrial forces of the United States are behind us to the last manand the last machine. I have talked with them. I know!
"We have only six months left for a prodigious effort. Shall we makeit? For the safety of our country and the whole world let us attemptthe impossible: go ahead on our own; turn the energy and the mind ofthis whole country to the problem.
"The great fleet of the world can never be. Shall we build and launchthe Great Fleet of the United States, and take upon our own shouldersthe burden and responsibility of defense?
"It cannot be done by reasonable standards, but the time is past forreason. Possible or otherwise, we must do it. We will--if you willback me in the effort!"
There was a rising discord of excited voices in the room. Men wereleaping to their feet to shake vehement fists in the faces of thosewho wagged their heads in protest. The Secretary of War arose to stillthe storm. He turned to walk toward the waiting figure of CaptainBlake.
"You can't do it," he said, and gripped the Captain by the hand; "youcan't do it--but you may. This country has seen others who have donethe impossible when the impossible had to be done. It's your job; thePresident will confirm my orders. Go to it, Blake!"
CHAPTER XVIII
The wires that bound the two men were removed, and McGuire and Sykesworked in agony to bring life back to the hands and feet that wereswollen and blue. Then--red guards who forced them to stumble on theirnumbed legs, where darting pains made them set their lips tight--acar that went swiftly through the darkness of a tube to stop finallyin another building--a room with metal walls, one window with abalcony beyond, high above the ground--a door that clanged behindthem; and the two men, looking one at the other with dismayed andswollen eyes, knew in their hearts that here, beyond a doubt, wastheir last earthly habitation.
They said nothing--there was nothing of hope or comfort to besaid--and they dropped soddenly upon the hard floor, where finally theheavy breathing and nervous starts of Professor Sykes showed that tohim at least had come the blessed oblivion of exhausted sleep. Butthere was no sleep for Lieutenant McGuire.
There was a face that shone too clearly in the dark, and his thoughtsrevolved endlessly in words of reproach for his folly in allowingAlthora's love to lead her to share his risk. From the night outsidetheir window came a ceaseless clatter and hubbub, but to this he wasoblivious.
Only with the coming of morning's soft golden light did McGuire knowthe reason for the din and activity that echoed from outside--and thereason, too, for their being placed in this room.
* * * * *
Their lives should end with the sailing of the fleet, and there,outside their window, were the ships themselves. Ships everywhere, asfar as he could see across the broad level expanse, and an army of menwho scurried like ants--red ones, who worked or directed the others,and countless blues and yellows who were loading the craft withenormous cargoes.
"Squawk, damn you!" said Lieutenant McGuire to the distant shriekingthrong; "and I hope they're ready for you when you reach the earth."But his savage voice carried no conviction. What was there that Earthcould do to meet this overwhelming assault?
"What is it?" asked Sykes. He roused from his sleep to work gingerlyat his aching muscles, then came and stood beside McGuire.
"They have put us here as a final taunt," McGuire told him. "There isthe fleet that is going to make our world into a nice little hell, andTorg, the beast! has put us here to see it leave. Then we get ours,and they don't know that we know that."
"Your first way was the best," the scientist observed; "we should havedone it then. We still can."
"What do you mean?" The flyer's voice was dull and lifeless.
Sykes pointed to the little balcony and the hard pavement below.
"Althora," he said, and McGuire winced at the name, "seemed to thinkthat we were in for some exquisite torture. Here is the way out. It isa hundred-foot drop; they think we are safe; but they have beenunintentionally kind."
"Yes," his companion agreed, "they don't know that we know of the torture.We will wait ... and when I am sure that--Althora--is--gone ... when thereis nothing I can do to help--"
"Help?" queried the professor gently. "There is nothing now of help,nor anyone who can help us. We must face it, my boy; _c'est fini_. Ourlittle journey is approaching its end."
* * * * *
There was no reply, and McGuire stood throughout the day to stare witheyes of smouldering hatred where the scurrying swarms of living thingsmade ready to invade and infest the earth.
Food and water was pushed through the d
oorway, but he ate sparingly ofthe odd-colored fruits; the only thing that could hold his thoughtsfrom the hopeless repetition of unanswerable "whys" was the sight ofthe fleet. And every bale and huge drum was tallied mentally as itpassed before his eyes. The ships were being loaded, and with theirsailing--But, no! He must not let himself think of that!
Throughout the day ships came and departed, and one leviathan, ablazein scarlet color; sailed in to settle down where great steel armsenfolded it, not far from the watching men. Scarlet creatures inauthority directed operations, and workmen swarmed about the greatship. Once McGuire swore softly and viciously under his breath, for hehad seen a figure that could be only that of Torg, and the crowdsaluted with upraised arms as the scarlet figure passed into thescarlet ship. This, McGuire knew, was the flagship that should carryTorg himself. Torg and ----. He paled at the thought of the othername.
The only break in the long day came with the arrival of a squad ofguards, who hustled the two men out into a passageway and drove themto another room, where certain measurements were taken. The muscularfigures of the two were different from these red ones, but it was amoment before McGuire realized the sinister significance of theproceedings. Their breadth of shoulders, the thickness of theirchests--what had these figures to do with their captivity? And thenthe flyer saw the measures compared with the dimensions of a steelcage. Its latticed shape could be endlessly compressed, and within, hesaw, were lancet points that lined the ghastly thing throughout. Longenough to torture, but not to kill; a thousand delicate blades topierce the flesh; and the instrument, it seemed, was of a size thatcould enclose the writhing, helpless body of a man.
Other unnameable contrivances about the room took on new significancewith the knowledge that here was the chamber of horrors whose workingshad been seen by Althora in the mind of their captor--horrors of whichshe could not speak.
* * * * *
McGuire was sick and giddy as the guards led him roughly back to theirprison room. And Professor Sykes, too, required no explanation of whatthey had seen.
The guards were many, and resistance was useless, but each man lookedsilently at the other's desperate eyes when the metal cords weretwisted again about their wrists, and their hands were tied securelyto metal rings anchored in the wall beside the window.
"And there," said the flyer, "goes our last chance of escape. Theywere not as dumb as we thought: they knew how good a leap to thepavement would look after we had been in there."
"Less than human!" Sykes was quoting the comment of Althora's brother."I think Djorn was quite conservative in his statement."
McGuire examined carefully the cords that tied his hands to the wallbeside him. The knots were secure, and the metal ring was smooth andround. "I didn't know," he said, as he worked and twisted, "but theremight be a cutting edge, but we haven't a chance. No getting rid ofthese without a wire cutter or an acetylene torch--and we seem to bejust out of both."
Professor Sykes tried to adopt the other's nonchalant tone. "Carelessof us," he began--then stopped breathless to press his body againstthe wall.
"It's there!" he said. "Oh, my God, if I could only get it, it mightwork--it might!"
"The battery," he explained to the man beside him, whose assumedindifference vanished at this suggestion of hope; "--the littlebattery that I used on the gun, to fire the explosive. It has anastounding amperage, and a voltage around three hundred. It's in mypocket--and I can't reach it!"
"You can't keep a good man licked!" McGuire exulted. "You mean thatthe current might melt the wire?"
"Soften it, perhaps, depending upon the resistance." Sykes refused toshare the other's excitement. "But we can't get at it."
"We've got to," was the answer. "Move over this way." The man in khakitwisted his arms awkwardly to permit him to bend his body to one side,and beads of sweat stood out on his forehead as the strain forced thethin bonds into his wrists. But he brought his agonized face againstthe other's body, and gripped the fabric of Sykes' coat between histeeth.
* * * * *
The twisting of his head raised the cloth an inch at a time, anddespite Sykes' efforts to hold the garment with his elbow, it slippedback time and again. McGuire straightened at intervals to draw achoking breath and ease the strain upon his tortured wrists; then backagain in his desperate contortions to worry at the cloth and pull andhold--and try again to raise the heavy pocket where a battery madesagging folds.
He was faint and gasping when finally the cloth was brought where thescientist's straining fingers could grasp it to writhe and twist inclumsy efforts that would force the battery's terminals within reach.
"I'll try it on mine," said Sykes. "It may be hot--and you've had yourshare." He was holding the flat black thing to bring the copper tipsagainst the metal about his wrists. McGuire saw the man's lips gowhite as a wisp of smoke brought to his nostrils the sickening odor ofburned flesh.
The metal glowed, and the man was writhing in silent self-torture whenat last he threw his weight upon the strands and fell backward to thefloor. He lay for a moment, trembling and quivering--but free. And theknowledge of that freedom and of the greater torture they would bothescape, gave him strength to rise and work with crippled hands at hiscompanion's bonds, till McGuire, too, was free--free to forget his ownswollen, bleeding wrists in compassionate regard for the other.
Like an injured animal, Professor Sykes had licked with his tongue athis wrists, where hot wire had burned deep and white, and he wastrying for forgetfulness an hour later, in examination of the door totheir room.
"What is the idea?" McGuire inquired, when he turned from hisceaseless contemplation of the fleet. "Not trying to get out, areyou?"
"I am trying to stay in," said Sykes, and looked again at the objectthat interested him. "These long bolts," he explained: "top andbottom; operated from outside, but exposed in here. They come togetherwhen unlocked; five inches apart now. If I had something to hold themapart--
"You haven't a piece of steel about five inches long, have you?--oranything to substitute for it? If you have, I can lock this door sothe devils won't come in and surprise us before we can make the jump."
"The battery?" suggested McGuire.
* * * * *
Sykes shook his head. "I tried it. Too long, and besides it wouldcrumble. They operate these with a lever; I saw it outside." He wenton silently with his study of the door and the little gap betweenheavy bolts, which, if closed, would mean security from invasion.
"They're about through," McGuire spoke from his post at the windowafter some time. "The rush seems to be about over. I imagine they'llpull out in the morning."
He pointed as Sykes stood beside him. "Those big ones over beyond havenot been touched all day; only some of the crew, I judge, workingaround them. And way over you see forty or fifty whaling big ones:they must have been ready before we came. They have finished on thesenearer by. It looks like a big day for the brutes."
And Professor Sykes led him on to talk more of the preparations he hadseen, and his deductions as to the morrow. It was all too evident whatwas really on the lieutenant's mind. It was not the thought of theirown immediate death, but the terrible dread and horror of Althora'sfate, that hammered and hammered in his brain. To speak of anythingelse meant a moment's relief.
Sykes pointed to a tall mast that was set in the plaza pavement, somehundred feet away. Wires swung from it to several points, one of themending above their window and entering the building. "What is that?"he asked, "--some radio device? That ball of metal on the top might bean aerial." But McGuire had fallen silent again, and stared stonily atthe deadly fighting ships he was powerless to combat.
* * * * *
On the morning that followed, there was no uncertainty. This was theday! And from a balconied window up high in the side of a tall stonebuilding, two men stood wordless and waiting while they watched thepreparations below.
>
The open space was a sea of motion like flowing blood, where thousandsof figures in dull red marched in rank after rank to be swallowed inthe mammoth ships that McGuire had noted in the distance. Then othercolors, and swarms of what they took to be women-folk of this wildrace--a medley of color that flowed on and on as if it would nevercease, to fill one after another of the great ships.
"Transports, that's what they are," said McGuire. "I can see now whythey have no steel beaks like the others. They don't need any rams,nor ports for firing that beastly gas. They are gray, too, while thefighting ships are striped with red, all except the scarlet one ofTorg's. Those are colonists we are watching, and soldiers to conquerthe Earth where the damned swarm settles."
He stopped to stare at a body of red-clad soldiers, drawn up atattention. They made a lane, and their arms were raised in the salutethat seemed only for Torg. They stood rigid and motionless; then, frombelow the watching men, came one in the full splendor of his scarletregalia. The air echoed with the din of his shouted name, but thebedlam of noise fell on deaf ears for McGuire. He could hear nothing,and in all the vast kaleidoscope of color he could see only oneobject--the white face of a girl who was half led and half carried bya guard of the red ones, where their Emperor led the way.
* * * * *
It was a strangled cry that was torn from the flyer's throat--the nameof this girl who was going to the doom she had failed to avoid. Herlife, she had said, was hers to keep only if she willed, but her planshad failed, and she went faltering and stumbling after a scarlet manbeast.
"Althora!" called the flyer, and the figure of the girl was strugglingwith her guards in a frenzy that tore their hands free. She turned tolook toward the sound of the voice, and her face was like that of onedead as her eyes found the man she loved.
"Tommy," she called: "oh, Tommy, my dear! Good-by!" The words wereended by the clutch of the scarlet Emperor who turned to seize her.
A clatter came from the door behind them, but Lieutenant McGuire gaveno heed. Only Professor Sykes sprang back from the balcony to seizeand struggle with the moving bolts.
The man on the balcony was hardly less than a maniac as he glaredwildly about, but he was not too unreasoning to see the folly of awild leap into the throng below. He could never reach her--never. Andthen his eyes fell upon the wire that led from above him to the greatpole in the open plaza. There was shouting from behind where theexecutioners were wrestling with the bolts.
"Hold them," the flyer shouted, "just for a minute! For God's sake,Sykes, keep them back! There's a chance!"
He sprang to the balustrade of the balcony, but he saw as he leapedwhere Professor Sykes had raised his leg to force the thickness of hisknee between the bolts whose levers outside were bringing them closertogether.
"Go to it," was the answer. "I can hold them"--a stifled groan--"fora--minute!" Professor Sykes had found his substitute for five inchesof steel, and the living flesh yielded but slowly to the pressure ofthe bolts.
* * * * *
McGuire was working frantically at the wire, then held himself incheck while he carefully unwound it from its fastening. There was asplice, and he worked with bleeding fingers to unfasten the tightcoils. And then the end was free and in his hands. He dropped to thebalcony to pull in the slack, and he wrapped the end about beneath hisarms and twisted it tight, then leaped out into space. No thought ofhimself nor of Sykes in this one wild moment, only of Althora in thegrip of those beastly hands.
He was struggling to turn himself in the air as the colored masses ofpeople seemed sweeping toward him, and he shot as a living pendulum,feet first, into the waiting heads.
He was on his feet in an instant and tearing at the twisted wire thatheld him. About him was clamor and confusion, but beyond the nearerfigures he saw the one who waited, and beside her a thing in scarletthat shrieked orders to his men.
He flung off one who leaped toward him, and ducked another to dashthrough and reach his man. And he neither saw nor felt the creature'sripping talons as he drove a succession of rights and lefts to theblood-red face.
The scarlet one went backward under the fusillade of blows; he wasdown, a huddle of color upon the pavement, and a horde of paralyzedsoldiers had recovered from their stupefaction and were rushing uponthe flyer. He turned to meet them, but their rush ended as quickly asit began: only a step or two they came, then stopped, to add theirwild voices to the confusion of ear-splitting shrieks that rose fromall sides.
* * * * *
McGuire crouched rigid, tense and waiting, nor did he sense for aninstant that the assault was checked and that the faces of all abouthim were turned to the sky. It was the voice of Althora that arousedhim:
"Tommy! Tommy!" she was calling, and now she was at his side, herarms about him. "What is it, Tommy? Look! Look!" And she too wasgazing aloft. And then, above all other sounds McGuire heard theroar--
The clouds were golden above with the brilliance of midday--andagainst them, hard and sharp of outline, was a shining shape. A cloudof vapor streamed behind it as it shot down from the clouds, and thethunder of its coming was like the roar of many cannon.
A ship of the red ones was in the air--a fighting ship, whose stripesshowed red--and it drove at the roaring menace with its steel beak anda swirling cloud of gas. It seemed that they must crash, when toMcGuire's eyes came the stabbing flash of heavy guns from the shiningshape. A crashing explosion came down to them as the great beak partedand fell, and the body of the red-striped monster opened in burstingsmoke and flame, tore slowly into fragments and fell swiftly to theearth.
It struck with a shattering crash some distance away, but one pair ofeyes failed to follow it in its fall. For in the clear air above, withthe golden light of distant clouds upon it, a roaring monster ofsilvery sheen had rolled and swept upward to the heights. And itshowed, as it turned, a painted emblem on its bow, a design ofclear-cut color, unbelievably familiar--a circle of blue, and withinit a white star and a bull's eye of red--the mark of the flyingservice of the United States!
* * * * *
McGuire never knew how he got Althora and himself back to the buildingwhence he had come. Nor did he see the struggling figures on abalcony, or the leap and fall of a maimed body, where Professor Sykes,when the door had yielded, found surcease and oblivion on the pavementbelow.
He was to learn that later, but now he had eyes only for a sight thatcould be but a dream, an unreal vision of a disordered brain. He heldthe slim form of Althora to him in a crushing grip, while he stared,dry-eyed, above, and his own voice seemed to shout from afar off:"They're ours!" that voice was screaming in a frenzy of exultation."They're our ships! They've come across!"
The fighting fleet of the red man-things of Venus was taking to theair! The ships rose in a swarm of speeding, darting shapes, and thegreat one of Torg was in the lead, climbing in fury toward theheights.
Far above them the clouds of gold silhouetted a strange sight, and theair was shaking with the thunder from on high, where, straight andtrue, a line of silver ships in the sharp V of battle formation drovedownward in a deadly, swift descent.
And even afar off, the straining eyes of a half-crazed man could seethe markings on their bow--a circle and a star--and the colors of hisown lost fighters of the air.
CHAPTER XIX
The Earth-fleet was a slanting line of swiftness that swept downwardfrom the clouds. A swarm of craft was rising from below. Thered-striped fighters met the attack first with a cloud of gas.
The scarlet monster--the flagship of Torg, the Emperor--was in thelead, and they shot with terrific speed across the bows of theoncoming fleet to leave a whirlwind of deadly vapor as they passed.McGuire held his breath in an agony of fear as the cloud enveloped theline of ships, but their bow guns roared staccato crashes in thethunder of their exhausts as they entered the cloud. And they werefiring from the stern as they emerged, whil
e two falling cylinders ofred and white proved the effectiveness of their fire.
The formation held true as it swept upward and back where the swarmingenemy was waiting. They were outnumbered three to one, McGuire saw,and his heart sang within him as he watched the sharp, speeding V thatclimbed upward to the enemy's level then swung to throw itself like alance of light at the massed ships that awaited the attack.
Another cloud of gas!--and a shattered ship!--and again the lineemerged to correct its broken formation and drive once more toward thecircling swarm.
They came to meet them now, the clusters of red-striped fightingships, and they tore in from all sides upon the American line, theirhooked beaks gleaming in the sun.
* * * * *
And now, at an unseen signal, the formation broke. Each ship foughtfor its life, and the stabbing flashes of their guns made ceaselessjets of light against the smoke and gas clouds that were darkening thesky.
"A dog-fight!" breathed Lieutenant McGuire; "and what a dog-fight!"His words were lost in the terrific thunder from above: the roar ofthe ships and the dull thuds of the guns engulfed them in a maelstromof noise that battered like physical blows on the watchers below. Heswore unconsciously and called down curses upon the enemy as he sawtwo fighters meet while the shining beak of a ship of the reds crashedthrough the body of an opposing craft.
The red ship dipped at the bow; it backed off with terrific force; andfrom the curved beak a ship with the insignia of the red, white andblue slid downward in a swift fall to the death that waited.
They had fought themselves clear, and the Americans, by what must havebeen arrangement or wireless order, went roaring to the heights. Therewere some who followed, but the guns of the speeding ships drove themoff. Red-and-white shapes fell swiftly from the clouds where thefighting had been, and McGuire knew that his fellows had given anaccount of themselves in the fighting at close range.
Again the thundering line was sharp and true, and another unswervingattack was launching itself from above. And again the deadlyformation, with ever-increasing speed, drove into the enemy withflashing guns, then parted to close with the ones that drovecrushingly upon them, while the sharper clatter of rapid-firing gunscame to shatter the air.
The fighting craft had been rising from their level field in asuccession that seemed endless. They were all in the air now, and onlythe great transports remained on the paved field.
* * * * *
A red-striped fighter swept downward in retreat, and, from the smokeclouds, a silvery shape followed in pursuit. It reached the red andwhite one with its shells, and the great mass crashed with terrificimpact on the field. Its pursuer must have seen the monsters still onthe ground, and it swung to rake them with a shower of small-calibershells.
There were machine-guns rattling as it passed above the throngedreds--the troops who were huddled in terror in the open court. It toreon past them--past a figure in khaki who raced forward with the goldenform of a girl within his arms, then released her to wave franticallyas the silver ship shot by.
Unobserved, McGuire and Althora had been, where they stood beside thebuildings: the eyes of their enemies, like their own, were on themonstrous battle above. But now they had called themselves to theattention of the reds, and there were some who rushed upon them withfaces livid with rage.
McGuire reached for a weapon from a victim of the machine-gun fire andprepared to defend himself, but the weapon was never used. He saw thesilvery shape reverse itself in the air; it turned sharply to throwitself back toward the solitary figure in uniform of their service andthe golden-clad girl beside him.
The flyer raised his weapon, but the jostling swarm that rushed uponhim melted: the ripping fire of machine guns was deafening in hisears. Their deadly tattoo continued while the great ship sank slowlyto touch and rest its huge bulk upon the pavement. A door in theship's curved side opened that the blocky figure of a man might leapforth.
He was grimy of face, and his uniform was streaked with the smoke andsweat of battle, but the face beneath the grime, and the hands thatreached to embrace and pound the flyer upon the back, could be onlythose of one he had known as his captain--Captain Blake.
"You son-of-a-gun!" the shouting figure was repeating. "You damnedIrish son-of-a-gun! A. W. O. L.--but you can't get away with it! Comeon--get in here! I'm needed up above!"
* * * * *
McGuire was struggling to speak from a throat that was suddenly tightand voiceless. Then--
"Althora," he gasped; "take Althora!" and he motioned toward the girl.And then he remembered the companion he had left in the room above.The battle that had flashed so suddenly had blasted from his mind allother thoughts.
"My God!" he said. "--Sykes! I--must get Sykes!"
He turned to run back to the building, only to stop in consternationwhere a huddle of clothing lay beneath the balcony of their prisonroom.
It was Sykes--Sykes who had sacrificed himself to make possible theescape of his friend--and McGuire dropped to his knees to touch thebody that he knew was shattered beyond any hope of life. He raised thelimp burden in his arms and staggered back where more khaki-cladfigures had gathered. Two came quickly out to meet him, and he letthem take the body of his friend.
"_C'est fini!_"--he repeated the words that Sykes had said; "the endof our little journey!" The arms of Althora were about him as Blakehurried them into the waiting ship, and the roar of enormous powermarked the rising of this space ship to throw itself again into thefray.
* * * * *
A small room with a dome of shatter-proof glass; a pilot who sat thereto look in all directions, a control-board beneath his hands. Besidehim on his elevated station was room for Captain Blake, and McGuireand Althora, too. The ship was climbing swiftly. McGuire saw whereflashing shapes circled and roared in a swelling cloud of smoke andgas.
Blake spoke sharply to an aide: "General orders! All ships climb toresume formation!"
An enemy ship was before them: it flashed from nowhere to bear downwith terrific speed. The floor beneath them shook with the jarring ofheavy guns, and McGuire saw the advancing shape bursting with puffs ofsmoke, while their own ship shot upward with a sickening twist. Asilver ship was falling!--and another!
"Two more of ours gone," said Captain Blake through set teeth. "Howmany of them are there, Mac? Tell me what you know: we've got a hellof a fight on our hands."
"They're all here," McGuire told him, in jerky, breathless speech."These are transports on the ground. Their weapons are gas and speed,and the rams on their beaked ships. There are other weapons--deadlierones!--but they haven't got them: they belong to another race. I'lltell you all that later!"
"Keep them at a distance, Blake," he said. "Make them come toyou--then nail them as they come."
"Right!" was the answer; "that's good dope. We didn't know what theyhad; expected some devilish things that could down us before we gotwithin effective range; had to mix it with them to find out what theycould do, and get in a few solid cracks before they did it.
"How high are we?" He glanced quickly at an instrument. "Ten thousand.Order all ships to withdraw," he instructed his aide. "Rendezvous atfifty thousand feet for echelon formation."
* * * * *
Another brush with an enemy craft that slipped quickly to oneside--then the smoke clouds were behind them, and a score, of silveryshapes were climbing in vertical flight for the level at fiftythousand.
They were fewer now than they had been, and the line that formedbehind the flagship of Blake was shorter than the one that had madethe V which shot down so bravely to engage with an unknown foe.
The enemy was below; an arrangement of mirrors showed this from thecommander's station. They were emerging from the clouds of smoke toswarm in circling flight through the sky. And now the bow of their owncraft was depressed at an order from Blake, and the others were
behindthem as they drove to renew the attack.
"They're ganging up on us again," said Blake. "We'll fool them thistime; we'll just kid them a little."
The flagship swerved before reaching the enemy, and the othersfollowed in what looked like frightened retreat. Again they were inthe heights, and some few of the enemy were following. Blake led inanother descent.
* * * * *
No waiting swarm to greet them now! Blake gave a quick order. Theroaring column shifted position as it fell: the flagship was the apexof a great V whose arms flung out and backward on either side--a Vformation that curved and twisted through space and thundered upon thesmaller formations that scattered before the blasting guns.
"Our bow guns are the effective weapons," Blake observed; his casualtone was a sedative to McGuire's tense nerves. "We can use a broadsideonly of lighter weight; the kick of the big 'sights' has to be takenstraight back. But we're working, back home, on recoil-absorbing guns:we'll make fighting ships of these things yet."
He spoke quietly to the pilot to direct their course toward a groupthat came sweeping upon them, and the massed fire of the squadron wassquarely into the oncoming beaks that fell beneath them where themirrors showed them crashing to the earth.
They were scattered now; the enemy was in wild disorder; and Blakespoke sharply to his aide.
"Break formation," he ordered; "every ship for itself. Engage theenemy where they find them; shoot down anything they see; prevent theenemy reforming!" He was taking quick advantage of the other'sscattered forces, and he scattered his own that he knew could takecare of themselves while they engaged the enemy only by ones or twosor threes.
"Clear the air of them!" he ordered. "Not one of them must escape!"
The skies were a maze of darting shapes that crossed and recrossed tomake a spider's web of light. Ship drove at ship, to swerve off at thelast, while the air quivered and beat upon them with the explosion ofshells and guns.
"There's our meat!" Blake directed the pilot, and pointed ahead wherea monster in scarlet was swelling into view.
It came swiftly upon them, darting down from above, and McGuireclutched at the arm of the man beside him to shout: "It's the leader;the flagship! It's the Emperor--Torg, himself! Give him hell, Blake,but look out--he's fast!"
* * * * *
The ship was upon them like a flash of fire; no time for anything butdodging, and the pilot threw his craft wildly aside with a swerve thatsent the men sprawling against a stanchion. Then up and back, wherethe other had turned to come up from below.
"Fast!" McGuire had said, but the word was inadequate to describe thespeed of the fiery shape.
Another leap in the air, as their pilot swung his controls, and thered shape brushed past them in a cloud of gas, while the quick-firersripped futilely into space where the great ship had been.
"Get your bow guns on him!" Blake roared. The ship beneath themstrained and shuddered with the incredible thunder of the generatorthat threw them bodily in the air. The pilot had opened in full forcethe ports that blasted their bows aside.
No time to gather new speed; they were motionless as the scarletmonster came upon them, but they were in position to receive him. Theeight-inch rifles of the forward turret thundered again and again, tobe answered by flashes of flame from the scarlet ship.
McGuire crouched over the bent form of the pilot, whose steady fingersheld the ship's bow straight upon the flashing death that bore downupon them. Another salvo!--and another!--hits all of them.... Smokebursting from ripping plates, and flaming fire more vivid than thescarlet shape itself!--and the floor beneath McGuire's feet drovecrushingly upward as their pilot pulled a lever to the full.
The great beak flashed beneath--and the mirrors, where McGuire's eyeswere fastened, showed the terrific drive continue down and down, wherea brilliant cylinder that marked the power of Venus tore shriekinglyon to carry an Emperor to his crashing death.
* * * * *
The skies were clear of the red-striped ships: only the survivors ofthe attacking force showed their silvery shapes as they gathered neartheir flagship. There were two that pursued a small group of theenemy, but they were being outdistanced in the race.
"We have won," said Blake in a tone of wonder that showed how only nowhad come a realization of what the victory meant. "We have won, andthe earth--is saved!"
And the voice of McGuire echoed his fervent "Thank God!" while hegripped the soft hand that clung tightly to his, as if Althora, thisradiant creature of Venus, were timid and abashed among the joyful,shouting men-folk from another world.
"And now what, Captain?" asked McGuire of his command. "Will you land?There is an army of reds down there asking for punishment."
Blake had turned away; his hand made grimy smears across his facewhere he wiped away the tears that marked a brave man's utterthankfulness. He covered his emotion with an affectation ofdisapproval as he swung back toward McGuire.
"Captain?" he inquired. "Captain? Where do you get that captainstuff?"
He pointed to an emblem on his uniform, a design that was unfamiliarto the eyes of McGuire.
"You're talking to an admiral now!--the first admiral of the newestbranch of your country's fighting service--commanding the first fleetof the Space ships of the United States of America!" He threw one armabout the other's shoulders. "We'll have to get busy, Mac," he added,"and think up a new rank for you.
"And, yes, we are going to land," he continued in his customary tones;"there may be survivors of our own crashes. But we'll have to count onyou, Mac, to show us around this little new world of yours."
* * * * *
There was an army waiting, as McGuire had warned, but it was waitingto give punishment and not to take it. The vast expanse of the landingfield was swarming with them, and the open country beyond showedcolumns of marching troops.
They had learned, too, to take shelter; barricades had been hastilyerected, and the men had shields to protect them from the fire ofsmall arms.
Their bodies were enclosed in their gas-tight uniforms whose uglyhead-pieces served only to conceal the greater ugliness beneath. Theymet the ships as they landed with a showering rain of gas that wasfired from huge projectors.
"Not so good!" Blake was speaking in the safety of his ship. "We havemasks, but great heavens, Mac!--there must be a million of thosebrutes. We can spray them with machine-gun fire, but we haven'tammunition enough to make a dent in them. And we've got to get out andget to our crashed ships."
He waited for McGuire's suggestions, but it was Althora who replied.
"Wait!" she said imperatively. She seemed to be listening to somedistant word. Then:
"Djorn is coming," she exclaimed, and her eyes were brilliantlyalight. "He says to you"--she pointed to McGuire--"that you wereright, that we must fight like hell sometimes to deserve ourheaven--oh, I told him what you said--and now he is coming with allhis men!"
"What the devil?" asked Blake in amazement. "How does she know?"
"Telepathy," McGuire explained: "she is talking with her brother, theleader of the real inhabitants of Venus."
He told the wondering man briefly of his experience and of the peoplethemselves, the real owners of this world.
"But what can they do?" Blake demanded.
And McGuire assured him: "Plenty!"
* * * * *
He turned to Althora to ask, "How are they coming? How will they gethere?"
"They are marching underground; they have been coming for two days.They knew of our being captured, but the people have been slow indeciding to fight. Djorn dared not tell me of their coming; he fearedhe might be too late.
"They will come out of that building," she said, and indicated thetowering structure that had been their prison. "It has the oldconnection with the underground world."
"Well, they'd better be good!" said Blake in
credulously.
He was still less optimistic when the building before them showed thecoming of a file of men. They poured forth, in orderly fashion andranged themselves in single file along the walls.
There must be a thousand, McGuire estimated, and he wondered if thewomen, too, were fighting for their own. Then, remembering Althora'sbrave insistence, he knew his surmise was correct.
Each one was masked against the gas; their faces were concealed; andeach one held before him a tube of shining metal with a larger bulbousend that rested in their hands.
"Electronic projectors," the lieutenant whispered. "Keep your eye onthe enemy, Blake; you are going to learn something about war."
The thin line was advancing now and the gas billowed about them asthey came. There were some few who dropped, where masks weredefective, but the line came on, and the slim tubes were before themin glittering menace.
* * * * *
At a distance of a hundred feet from the first of the entrenched enemythere was a movement along the line, as if the holders of the tubeshad each set a mechanism in operation. And before the eyes of theEarth-men was a spectacle of horror like nothing in wars they hadknown.
The barricades were instantly a roaring furnace; the figures thatleaped from behind them only added to the flames. From the steady rankof the attackers poured an invisible something before which the hostsof the enemy fell in huddles of flame. Those nearest were blasted fromsight in a holocaust of horror, and where they had been was ascattering of embers that smoked and glowed; even the figures ofdistant ones stumbled and fell.
The myriad fighters of the army of the red ones, when the attackersshut off their invisible rays, was a screaming mob that raced wildlyover the open lands beyond.
Althora's hands were covering her eyes, but McGuire and Blake, and thecrowding men about them, stared in awe and utter astonishment at thedevastation that was sweeping this world. An army annihilated beforetheir eyes! Scores of thousands, there must be, of the dead!
The voice of Blake was husky with horror. "What a choice little bitout of hell!" he exclaimed. "Mac, did you say they were our friends?God help us if they're not!"
"They are," said McGuire grimly. "Those are Althora's people who hadforgotten how to fight; they are recapturing something that they lostsome centuries ago. But can they ever destroy the rest of that swarm?I don't think they have the heart to do it."
"They do not need." It was Althora speaking. "My people are sickenedwith the slaughter. But the red ones will go back into the earth, andwe will seal them in!--it is Djorn who tells me--and the world will beours forevermore."
* * * * *
A matter of two short days, crammed to the uttermost with therealization of the astounding turn of events--and McGuire and Althorastood with Blake and Djorn, the ruler, undisputed, of the beautifulworld of Venus. A fleet of great ships was roaring high in air. Oneonly, the flagship, was waiting where their little group stood.
The bodies of the fallen had been recovered; they were at rest now inthe ships that waited above. McGuire looked about in final wonder atthe sparkling city bathed in a flood of gold. A kindly citynow--beautiful; the terrors it had held were fading from his mind. Heturned to Althora.
"We are going home," he said softly, "you and I."
"Home?" Althora's voice was vibrant with dismay.
"We need you here, friend Mack Guire," the voice of Djorn broke in, inprotest. "You have something that we lack--a force and vision--somethingwe have lost."
"We will be back," the flyer assured him. "You befriended me: anythingI can do in return--" The grip of his hand completed the sentence.
"But there is a grave to be made on the summit of Mount Lawson," headded quietly. "I think he would have preferred to lie there--at theend of his journey--and I must return to the service where I have notyet been mustered out."
"But you said--you were going home," faltered Althora. "Will thatalways be home to you, Tommy?"
"Home, my dear," he whispered in words that reached her only, "is justwhere you are." His arm went about her to draw her toward the waitingship. "There or here--what matter? We will be content."
Her eyes were misty as they smiled an answer. Within the ship that waslifting them, they turned to watch a city of opal light grow faintlyluminous in the distance ... an L-shaped continent shrunk to tiny size ...and the nebulous vapors of the cloudland that enclosed this world foldedsoftly about.
"We will lead," the voice of Blake was saying to an aide: "sameformation that we used coming over. Give the necessary orders. But,"he added slowly to himself, "the line will be shorter; there are fewerof us now."
An astronomical officer laid a chart before the commander. "We are onthe course, sir," he reported.
"Full speed," Blake gave the order, and the thundering generatoranswered from the stern. The Space Fleet of America was going home.
(_The End_)