“But always hostile nature fought against them with ever-increasing cunning. The gases which poured out of vents in the floor of Tycho became less and less in volume. As a result, the atmosphere rapidly rarefied. Similarly, the water was vanishing, and thus the area of land that could be irrigated decreased. The cultivated fields were roofed over to keep in the warmth and to lessen the leakage of air and moisture into space. The city now consisted of an immense labyrinth of underground passages and chambers, which could be hermetically sealed from the out-of-doors.
“Something would have to be done soon to alleviate the situation, or else the whole race would become extinct. There were ways of checking the leakage of the vital elements, but there was no means of absolutely preventing it.
“For a long time before I was born, astronomers had been looking hopefully toward the earth. In some distant day that still dully glowing sphere of hardening lava would cool sufficiently so that we could establish ourselves there. But before the coming of that time the moon would be only a dead cinder of a world, devoid of all life except, perhaps, a few of the simplest forms of vegetation.
“It was I, Number 333, who solved our greatest problem. We are naturally a hibernating race. Why not sleep until the great planet, which shone so brilliantly in the night sky, would be ready to receive us?
“After a long period of experimentation I discovered two gases. One, when taken into the lungs, produced complete suspension of animation. Under its influence, any living thing could sleep for ages, without any decay of its body tissues. The other was an active stimulant capable of arousing a subject from that sleep.
“The rest was easy. A thousand spaceships were built to carry us and our equipment to earth, when the time came. Each of the ships was heavily armed, for we feared that when we migrated there would be flying monsters similar to those which once inhabited the moon on the larger planet. All the water and air we could collect was imprisoned in underground reservoirs. Food was stored and the seeds of plants, preserved by the sleep-producing gas, were packed safely away.
“The great machine, which you found in the chamber at the bottom of the well, was constructed. It is nothing more than a pump, to force the anaesthetic to the steel cocoons, to draw it off again at the end of a certain period, and then to force the reviving vapor to the sleepers.
“At length all was ready. We shut the airtight gates of the city and descended to the chamber of the pump. Calmly each of us crept into the cocoon which had been assigned to him by number. The doors clicked shut and the machine, actuated by an automatic device, began working.
“I recall clearly the last moments of my wakefulness before the long sleep. I was resting on the upholstery inside the metal bottle. Above me a faint light sifted in through the glass door. Presently I smelled an overpowering sweetness, like the perfume of a certain purple flower which, in the moon’s youth, used to grow with such profusion along the edges of the lunar seas. My consciousness wavered; the last thought that passed through my brain before I slept was whether the time-clock connected with the starting mechanism of the pump would set the machine in motion at the end of two hundred and fifty million years.
“ ‘Of course it will,’ I said to myself. ‘It is too simply and perfectly constructed to do otherwise.’
“The ages passed like an instant. We awoke; a hasty study of the thoughts in your mind, and of the existing terrestrial and lunar conditions told us that the time-clock had failed, and that we had slept many millions of years longer than we had planned. We are deeply grateful to Mr. Gerold Olson for throwing the switch that freed us, even though he did it unintentionally.”
The monotonous voice coming from the box ceased. A door opened and two Lunarians entered. There was an exchange of tentacular signs between Number 333 and the new arrivals. Then the voice began again:
“Gentlemen,” it said, “Number 6042 and Number 9435 have orders to take you up into the crater immediately. The space ships are to be given a test flight, and it has been decided that you are to see it. Don your space armor. When you return I shall tell you more.”
A tunnel-car carried us in a few seconds to the sunlit plain within Tycho’s ramparts. We emerged through an opening in the ground, which the Lunarians seemed to have just freed from the accumulated dust and debris.
Our guides were beside us. They were again enveloped in their protecting auras of blue light. We were standing on the brink of a great rectangular opening which yawned at our feet. We peered downward. In contrast to the intense glare of the sun the glow of the bottom seemed like semi-darkness.
Far below I saw moving patches of light and the sheen of something big and gleaming.
We had been looking silently below for some time when suddenly a dazzling yellow ray came into being. Then a mighty bulk shot up from the depths with such speed that it was far over our heads before we saw what it was. A space ship! The hole before us was a huge door in the roof of the chamber that housed the Lunarian interplanetary vessels. Another craft whisked up past us, and then at timed intervals of about ten seconds they continued to come.
The first twenty formed a “V,” and then, propelled by yellow rays projected from nozzle-like devices at their sterns, they rushed toward the western wall of the crater. Long before they reached them a great section of the encircling mountains before them vanished, blasted into nothing by some unguessable magic of science.
I can imagine how I looked then—eyes bulging and ghastly pale. I turned toward Paxton, and then for a time we stared at one another, both frozen into cat-like crouches of complete terror. The ships continued to shoot up past us and to conduct their aerial circus far over our heads—wheeling, darting, and driving.
“Did you see that, Jerry?” gasped the professor. “And they’re going to earth; they planned it maybe three hundred million years ago. They’ll smash us—our cities, our works of art, our knowledge—everything. Maybe they’ll wipe the whole race out of existence! Those weapons, my God! But the human race will fight! See, there is the Black Meteor only half a mile away. If we can get to it, we’ll go back and give our people a warning. By God, we’ll do it! Come on, lad!”
WE turned about, and adopting the most rapid means of locomotion on the moon for a man on foot—jumping—we began to move rapidly toward the conical black tower which was our space ship.
Our guides leaped after us for a short distance and then gave up the pursuit. Why they did so I was then quite unable to guess, for they covered the ground fully as rapidly as we did.
We entered the Black Meteor and climbed to the control room. If the Lunarians had ever invaded the ship, they had apparently not disturbed anything.
With frantic haste the professor tugged at the starting lever. The rocket motors roared into life. We were shooting upward at a terrific rate. The awful pressure of acceleration made it almost impossible to breathe.
Anxiously we watched the view-plates for the expected pursuit, but it did not come. The ships of the Moon Men continued to whirl and maneuver within the ramparts of Tycho, rapidly dropping away beneath us. In a few moments those ships had so diminished in size that they looked like silvery beetles crawling about on the ground.
As soon as the Black Meteor was under way Paxton went to the radio room and gave his warning. “Hello, Earth!” he called, “Paxton of the Moon Rocket speaking. The Lunarians are coming with a thousand armed space ships. Prepare for war!”
Throughout the homeward voyage, I navigated and guided our vessel without any assistance from my companion. He spent all his time in the radio room, talking with terrestrial stations, and in consequence very few words passed between us.
The sight of the vast Lunarian battle fleet, and the realization that humanity was facing a greater and more bizarre danger than it had ever faced before seemed to have numbed my mind. I did not know what to think. In a vague sort of way I felt that it was odd that the Lunarians had treated us so well. Were they not our enemies? But why try to explain the actions of a people s
o totally alien? After all, were they so alien? Earthmen ordinarily treat their prisoners of war with consideration. Personally, I had sensed behind the mechanical voice of the Lunarian, who had related to us the history of the moon, a kindly something which might easily respond to friendship.
When we landed on the earth we found it in a whirling turmoil of activity. Paxton’s story had been pretty generally accepted as truth. Astronomers had seen queer things happening in Tycho. They certainly could not believe that we were responsible for the vanishing of a quarter of its wall in an instant!
The armies of the world were being mobilized. Hundreds of thousands of planes were being concentrated near the great cities, ready for action. There were swift pursuit ships capable of speeds in excess of five hundred miles an hour. They carried those wicked little machine guns which fired bullets as fine as needles but impregnated with a poison that meant instant death. There were giant bombers—veritable battleships of the air. Besides, there were millions of commercial ships which had been commandeered and equipped to meet the enemy. The united armadas of the earth seemed like a force of unlimited power, but when I remembered the shining bulks, which had rushed through the lunar skies armed with weapons that dissolved mountains like a mist, it paled into pitiful insignificance.
For nine days after our arrival the earth watched, like a defiant beast, fortifying itself as best it could. Then one night, a swarm of tiny specks began to trail out of the moon like hornets coming from a glowing hornet’s nest. Just before dawn the next day, they shot into the terrestrial atmosphere over central North America. So great was their speed that they left trains of fire behind them like falling meteors.
During the interplanetary journey, the observatories kept the various air fleets constantly posted as to the position of the Lunarians. It was possible to tell about where they would enter our atmosphere, and so when they arrived fully a million fighting planes had collected from all over the United States to meet them.
They were lined up in orderly rows on the great Hinton Flying Field located about seventy-five miles west of Milwaukee. Others were constantly coming in.
For hours during the night the pilots had stood close beside their machines. A few carried on conversations consisting for the most part of a few monosyllabic words with one another. But nearly everyone maintained a tense and expectant silence. I was among the rest.
When the first dim glow of morning was welling into the east, two hours before the Lunarian fleet streaked into the earthly air, a siren began to hoot weirdly. Its far-reaching call could be heard for miles around. Time to take off!
With the calmness of one resigned to his fate, I climbed into the cockpit of my trim little craft. I closed an electric switch on the instrument board. There was a loud report, and then my Diesel motor roared into action. There were other reports coming from down the field—so many that it sounded like a sham battle. And the thrumming of warming motors grew ever greater in volume.
For a minute I busied myself with my equipment—my safety belt, my oxygen mask, my heavy electrically-heated gloves, my little devil-riveter of a machine gun. Yes, all was ready. I tested the controls—O. K. Then the siren blew two short blasts. Take to the air!
In rows of a thousand abreast, at timed intervals, the planes rolled down the field and slipped into the sky toward the east. I was among the first to leave.
According to the plan which had been worked out by our best aerial tacticians, each group of a thousand was to act as a military unit, and was to attempt to bring down an enemy battleship.
ONCE in the air, each squadron formed into a compact “V,” and then began to climb. And, oh, what a climb it was! Up, up, up, into the icy air until it seemed that the gates of the Empyrean must be ready to receive us.
Thirty thousand, thirty-five thousand, thirty-eight thousand feet we ascended, and there we began to cruise. All eyes were on the squadron commander’s plane flying at the apex of the “V.” Presently a puff of gray smoke appeared above it. At the signal, each man catapulted a small grenade above him by means of a sort of spring-gun. Those grenades exploded, and formed a dense protecting layer of smoke, that looked like natural clouds, over our heads. The other squadrons behind us hid themselves in a similar fashion.
We wheeled and circled about, close under the vapor shield, waiting for developments. Our squadron was now above the city of Milwaukee beside Lake Michigan, which spread out like a gray picture of calmness in the gray dawn. Nature apparently cared nothing for the fate of man.
A bright silvery streak in the east where the stars were fading. Another and another; then five or six all at once. The Moon Men had come! They were entering the atmosphere at a point over the lake about twenty-five miles distant from us.
A faint wind was blowing our cloud toward the north-east. We followed it. This was favorable to us, for now Milwaukee would not be in any danger of receiving any damage from our bombs.
As I wheeled and banked my plane, I studied the enemy fleet through my binoculars. I could see the long string of lighted portholes along the side of each vessel. What foolishness was this? Why did they expose themselves so boldly in enemy territory? And then for a moment, I felt with a touch of bitterness, that they realized that we were powerless to harm them. But I quickly checked the thought. It seemed traitorous and cowardly.
The battleships which had entered the earth’s gaseous envelope were moving at a snail’s pace toward us. The light of the sun, not yet visible to us, struck the polished metal of the craft still out in space, and made them glow like a string of glorious stars.
A little nervously we waited. Had the Moon Men discovered us? It seemed hardly likely. In the faint half-light, hidden as we were close beneath the smoke clouds, there seemed but slight likelihood that we had been seen. The droning of our motors was drowned by the louder roar of the propelling mechanisms of the mooncraft.
The enemy fleet crept on toward us. The ships were moving in a long column, four abreast. They were at a somewhat lower level than we were. Like a shadow our entire force zoomed upwards through the smoke screen. Cautiously we scattered more grenades.
Though, under all ordinary circumstances, we were now perfectly invisible to our foes, we could still see them clearly through the vapor with the aid of the Richter Ray attachments on our binoculars. The Richter Ray, as everybody knows, resembles the X-ray in its powers of penetration and its ability to produce fluorescence, but it is vastly superior to the X-ray in that it can be focused and thus can produce real pictures instead of mere shadows.
An observer on one of those opposing vessels would have seen only a majestic bank of what appeared to be thunder clouds, dull gray like tarnished silver, unless the Lunarians possessed devices similar to our ray binoculars. I sincerely hoped that they had never heard of the Richter Ray.
Our foes were coming closer. Now a group of four battleships, the leaders of the van, were passing directly under the cloud which our squadron had formed. An involuntary thrill came over me, as I realized how majestic and wonderful they were. Around each huge hull was a faint halo. Those halos looked like the frost rainbows which sometimes appear in the upper air. But that was impossible, for there was no sun.
How easy to blast those giants out of existence with our bombs! We were waiting for Lieutenant Stanton, the squadron commander, to discharge a blue rocket—the signal which meant action. But he was not in a hurry. The Lunarians seemed to be still ignorant of our presence. Let the squadrons behind us take care of the first four. We would pick other victims.
Suddenly it occurred to me that it was queer to the point of ridiculousness that such highly intelligent foes were blundering into such a trap!
Another group of four passed under us, and another and another. I watched Stanton’s bomber, wheeling and circling almost a thousand feet from me; still there was no sign. But when the next group glided under our bomb-racks, he made up his mind. Certainly, the apparently stupid Moon Men must have discovered us by now! Our cloud had g
rown thin in spots!
A purple tongue of light leaped up from the bomber. What luck! Four in the bag! Bombs were falling like rain. In a couple of seconds a shower of metal scraps would be all that would be left of the great ships. And then, as I looked down at our victims, I saw something odd. My bombs were hurtling straight toward the deck of the craft below, but as they approached their target, they swerved aside, pushed by some strange force, and continued to tumble down toward the surface of the lake. The halos were protecting the battleships!
A feeling of bitterness came over me. What chance had we against these demons who could make our every weapon useless? Presently their rays would sweep up at us, and a few minutes later earth’s last hope of salvation would be destroyed as completely as if it had never existed. But the instinct of self-preservation demands that every creature should die, trying to save itself. We must fight! We would fight!
I pulled my joystick sharply back and gunned my motor. As I zoomed upward, I saw that a number of other pilots were doing the same. I intended to dive down upon one of the Lunar battleships from a greater altitude, meanwhile spraying it with machine gun bullets. I continued to climb vertically for about a thousand feet, then I turned the plane quickly over on its back and started down. Our cloud was thinning rapidly. My machine gun had begun to hum like a low-pitched tuning fork, but if the tiny pellets had penetrated the force shield of the battleship and had done any damage to the automatons that swarmed its decks, there was no evidence of it.
Hundreds of machine guns were buzzing now, the air was filled with the din of bursting shells, and bombs were still dropping. But behind their thick walls of force, the Moon Men were as safe as though a million miles separated us from them. They made no move against us.
I had dropped eight hundred feet, and was preparing to climb again, when I heard a sound coming up from below where the Lunar craft were gathering. It was deep and sonorous, and powerful enough to be heard above the noise of the battle. Could it be true? A voice? Yes, it was true! Something down there was speaking English words, and what it said made me wonder for a moment if I were not really dreaming.
Then and Now: Another Collection of Science Fiction Page 4