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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/29202-h.zip b/29202-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4a5ac59 --- /dev/null +++ b/29202-h.zip diff --git a/29202-h/29202-h.htm b/29202-h/29202-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..95234b1 --- /dev/null +++ b/29202-h/29202-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1700 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Hammer of Thor, by Charles Willard Diffin + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; background-color: #FFFFFF; +} + + +p { + margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; +} + +.tr {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; margin-top: 5%; margin-bottom: 5%; padding: 2em; background-color: #f6f2f2; color: black; border: dotted black 1px;} + +.f1 {font-size:xx-large; font-weight:bolder; } +.f2 { font-size:x-large; font-weight:bolder; } +.f3 { font-size:x-large; font-weight:bold; } +.sidenote { + width: 20%; + padding-bottom: .5em; + padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; + padding-right: .5em; + margin-left: 0.25em; + margin-right: 0.5em; + float: left; + clear: left; + margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; + color: black; + background: #eeeeee; + border: dashed 1px; +} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +/* Images */ +.figright { + float: right; + clear: right; + margin-left: 1em; + margin-bottom: + 0em; + margin-top: -0.5em; + margin-right: 0; + padding: 0; + text-align: center; +} + +/* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Hammer of Thor, by Charles Willard Diffin + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Hammer of Thor + +Author: Charles Willard Diffin + +Release Date: June 22, 2009 [EBook #29202] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HAMMER OF THOR *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="tr"><p class="center">Transcriber's Note:</p> + + <p class="center">This etext was produced from Astounding Stories March 1932.<br /> + Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br /> + the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.</p> +</div> + +<div class="figright"><img src="images/image_001_01.jpg" alt="Illustration" width="600" height="472" /></div> +<div class="figright"><img src="images/image_001_02.jpg" alt="Illustration" width="286" height="550" /></div> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p class="f1">The Hammer<br /> +of Thor</p> +<p class="f2">By Charles<br /> +Willard<br /> +Diffin</p> + + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>he Director General of District Three, Ural Division of the Russian +States, was a fool. Danny O'Rourke had reached that conclusion some +time before—a conclusion, however, that he was most careful to keep +unexpressed.</p> +<div class="sidenote">Like the Hammer of Thor was the clash of Danny O'Rourke +with the mysterious giant of space.</div> +<p> </p> + +<p>And then Danny not only thought it; he knew the Director was a fool; +and the amazing incident that proved it took place in Stobolsk, the +Governmental Headquarters of District Three. Although Danny's regular +station was on a lonely peak in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in the +United States, the occurrence was nevertheless observed by him; and +this happened for two reasons.</p> + +<p>The New Soviet Government that took over control of all the Russias in +1943 wanted, among other things, to install the most modern +fire-fighting system, the equal of anything in the world. They turned, +quite naturally, to the United States of America for their +instruction; and this was reason number one why Danny O'Rourke, pilot +of the Air Fire Force, was where he was on the morning of June 13th.</p> + +<p>The second reason was the tremendous timber wealth in the Ural +Division and the threat to destroy it by fire.</p> + +<p>Perhaps there might be mentioned a third reason: that this same Danny +O'Rourke, red-haired, smiling, and debonair was listed on the Air Fire +Force of the United States with the highest rating that the A. F. F. +has to give its pilots. But Danny would have grinned at such a +suggestion and would have countered with a denial that he was better +qualified than "the rest of the boys."</p> + +<p>But Danny was there; he had been talking at length with the Director +General on the technical differences of the hot and cold nitrogen +blasts for controlling fires on a wide front when suddenly the big man +was brought in.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>he great figure stooped almost double to enter the room, and Danny +ran a hand through his shock of red hair and stared open-mouthed at +the giant when he straightened again and towered above the guard of +Red soldiers who had brought him into the high-ceiled room.</p> + +<p>He was clothed in a single garment of glinting blue that wrapped him +about and fell in heavy folds to the floor. Danny felt the resemblance +to the shimmering blue of steel that has passed through fire, and his +eyes held to that garment in fascination until his gaze went on and up +to the face.</p> + +<p>The man's face was red, as if the flesh had been burned; here was one +man Danny could not classify. He had met the people of many lands but +never had he seen one like this.</p> + +<p>In one quick staring glance, Danny caught a picture of heavy jaws—a +flashing of yellow teeth when the mouth opened to emit guttural, +unrecognizable words—nostrils that ran crosswise of the face in a +nose broad and flat! The forehead above was low and sloping. From the +straggling yellow hair it slanted down to brows that overhung +deep-sunk and cavernous eyes.... And when Danny O'Rourke's own curious +eyes met those of the stranger, they were held in a grip that was +almost hypnotic.</p> + +<p>"Like a dirty, crawlin' snake's!" he was telling himself over and +over. "Heaven help us if that boy ever gets rough. Who he is or what +he is, I don't know, but if I was the Director, I'd treat him nice +till I found out."</p> + +<p>Danny and the Director were standing side by side. The giant figure +fixed a cold stare on Danny and barked short sentences that seemed to +the listener to be an explanation.</p> + +<p>But Danny motioned helplessly to the official at his side. "Maybe you +can savvy that," he suggested; "it's new talk to me."</p> + +<p>The newcomer repeated the guttural sounds. Upon the Director's face +was a frown of suspicion and puzzled wonder; the Director General did +not like to encounter either happenings or persons he could not +readily understand; it was disturbing to one's official dignity. The +giant must have read some of this, for he tried to make himself clear.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">H</span>e repeated the sentences slowly. Then he waved one huge hand in air +and pointed upward, and the hand moved up and up as if to indicate +some tremendous distance. He pointed to himself; then brought one +aiming finger down as if he were coming from that far-off place. And +Danny got the significance.</p> + +<p>"It's happened!" he told the Director explosively. "I knew it would +come some day—I knew they'd get here! And us monkeyin' with our +stratosphere ships and thinkin' we were beatin' the rest of the +Universe!"</p> + +<p>The Director regarded the young American with about the same degree of +disfavor as he had shown the giant. "What is it you say?" he +questioned. "You mean—what? I do not understand."</p> + +<p>And, in careful words, Danny explained. He told the Director of +District Three something of his dreams that space might not be an +insurmountable bar; he told him, with enthusiasm driving his words out +faster and faster, that here was a man—or if not a man, a living +creature of some sort—that had come out of space.</p> + +<p>"Where did they find him?" he demanded. "Where is his ship?"</p> + +<p>But he ceased to ask questions as he noticed the Director's mirth. For +that official was rocking with roaring laughter that had a distinctly +uncomplimentary sound. And he added some words in Russian that were as +incomprehensible to Danny as the growling talk of the giant man, but +the O'Rourke temper flamed as he saw the other Russians in the room +smiling appreciatively.</p> + +<p>Then: "Take him away!" the Director thundered. "We'll see where he +comes from. Search him! And if he hasn't any passports—" The unended +sentence was suggestive.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">B</span>ut an hour later, Danny saw the giant furnish his own ending to the +incompleted order. He had left the Director's room. Across the street +was the gray stone building where prisoners were held for disposition +by the courts. And once more Danny O'Rourke's jaw dropped in +open-mouthed, unbelieving amazement as he saw a section of gray stone +wall fall outward where the edge of it was sharply outlined in +white-hot, dripping stone.</p> + +<p>A great figure stepped forth. In his hand was a rod like an elongated +pencil attached to a heavy butt. And though nothing visible came from +the rod, Danny saw it pointed back at the building where iron bars +softened till they sent rivulets of molten steel splashing upon the +pavement.</p> + +<p>A squad of soldiers in the blood-red color of their service stood +nearby. One gave an order, and a dozen rifles were swung toward their +shoulders. But the rifles never came to rest.</p> + +<p>Danny saw the quick swing of the slender rod. And he saw the men's +mouths opened in screams that were never uttered. For, quicker than +nerves could send their message to human brain and muscles, some +unseen force had slashed their bodies in two as if a fiery sword had +been swung by invisible hands.</p> + +<p>The pointing rod lingered upon the huddled bodies for an instant, +while that which had been human flesh vanished in a bursting cloud of +smoke; while the stones beneath turned to a seething pool of molten +rock.... Then the rod moved slowly toward the frozen figure of Danny +O'Rourke.</p> + +<p>Did the strange being sense that Danny had not been disbelieving like +the rest? Danny could never know. He knew only that he stood rigid +with horror, entirely unable to move, while that rod swung upon him; +he knew that the hand that held it released something that clicked, +wherefore his life had been spared; and he knew that the savage face +above wrinkled into something resembling a snarling, triumphant smile, +as the rod was returned to its hiding place under the garment of +shimmering blue, and the mysterious figure turned and strode savagely +down the Avenue Stalin in the city of Stobolsk.</p> + +<p>Danny O'Rourke was to carry that picture clearly in his mind—the +figure that moved unhurriedly on, towering above the others, men and +women, who scurried fearfully from his path. But he was to retain yet +more vividly the recollection of a group of red-clad bodies that were +severed at their waists as a slim tube swung—then a bursting cloud of +oily smoke, and a pool of molten rock where they had been.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">S</span>omething of this, perhaps, was clouding the eyes of Danny O'Rourke, +Pilot of the A.F.F. a month and more later, as he sat at lookout duty +in a gleaming white tower on a high peak of the Sierras. Not that the +job of lookout was part of O'Rourke's duty, now that he was back in +the U. S. A., but a cylinder of scarlet rested on a great rack at the +base of the tower, and Danny had no wish to hear the roar of that +cylinder's stern exhaust for a time.</p> + +<p>Even the novelty of flying the newest rocket-ship in the service had +worn off. Besides, he had patrolled his route, and he told himself +that the "Infant" needed a rest.</p> + +<p>The "Infant," better known on the records of the A. F. F. as Morgan, +David E., Lookout, Station 39-G, was sleeping soundly on the elevating +table where a map of the district was mounted under glass. His +cherubic face was pink and white, more suggestive of the age of three +than of twenty-three. And O'Rourke, glancing at him protectingly, hung +up a paper to keep the sunlight from striking the young man's face.</p> + +<p>The Infant had been Danny's special charge from the day he entered the +service, and now, except for the Chief and some other officials, only +Danny knew that the Infant was there to teach and not to learn. For +behind those eyes that might have been taken from one of Rafael's +cherubim lay a brain that Danny had learned to respect.</p> + +<p>"Fifteen minutes more. I'm givin' you," he said inaudibly; "then I'll +be on my way, and you'll do your own squintin' and peekin'." But the +Infant's fifteen minutes were cut to that many seconds—</p> + +<p>Danny had been looking toward the south before he had turned to gaze +at the Infant: his eyes came back to the same point to take up their +reconnaissance. But now, where clear sky had made a blue back-drop for +rugged peaks, was a line of black. And the line, while Danny watched +in disbelief, moved like a smoky serpent: its head stretched out and +out while from behind it there came the ominous line of black.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">A</span>ll this happened in a matter of seconds, and the moving head ceased +at last to move; the line no longer grew. But, where it had been at +first a thin mark of black, it changed now to billowing gray.</p> + +<p>It was fifty miles away at least; but it showed clear and sharp. And +the first gray had hardly bloomed from its black beginning before the +long arm of Danny O'Rourke had swept the sleeping Infant to the floor, +while, with the other hand, he swung an instrument of telescopic +sights upon distant smoke.</p> + +<p>He set it in careful focus—took a reading for distance—another for +direction—and while he was doing it he was vaguely conscious of one +single sharp flash in the sky above that far-off cloud. In his +range-finder it showed once, like a glittering star; then it vanished, +but the trained eye of O'Rourke observed its passage like a ray of +light overhead.</p> + +<p>The pink-faced youngster on the floor was still protesting sleepily +when O'Rourke slammed down a switch and heard a voice answer promptly +from an instrument on the wall. Danny shouted out his bearings on the +fire:</p> + +<p>"Thirty-nine-G! O'Rourke speaking for Morgan. Reporting fire on a wide +front—bearing Two-O-Seven to Two-Four-Nine! And for God's sake, +Chief, get a line on this quick. The whole thing shot up in a +second—fifty miles of fire!"</p> + +<p>Another voice broke in excitedly. "Station +Fourteen-Fourteen-Fourteen!" The voice was stammering in evident +confusion. "The whole earth has exploded—it's on fire now! I—I—"</p> + +<p>The Chief's voice broke in with a quiet, "Bearing, please! Report your +bearing, Fourteen!"</p> + +<p>And the stammering voice steadied to give a figure.</p> + +<p>"Headquarters speaking," said the quiet voice. "Orders for O'Rourke. +For the love of Pete, get on that fire, Danny. Every instrument in the +office is chattering. Every patrol ship has spotted that blaze. You +can't all be crazy. It's in Section Eight—never mind the exact +bearings—you'll find it without any trouble I imagine. Now beat it! +And let me know what kind of a fire this is that starts on a +fifty-mile front! You're in charge till I come."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>en seconds later, had the Infant been watching, which he had not—for +his eyes were all on the distant smoke—he would have seen the +beautiful curving sweep of a scarlet projectile, whose screaming +propeller swept her off and up; he would then have seen it lie back +flat as the great stern exhaust made a rocket of the ship to send it +roaring into the heights.</p> + +<p>And in the air-tight cabin of the newest fire-fighting machine of the +A. F. F., Danny O'Rourke pulled his body out of the slumped position +into which his quick acceleration had forced him; then set his ship on +her course to where a distant smoke made puffballs of gray against a +cloudless sky. And, like his Chief, he was wondering with a wonderment +that bordered upon disbelief what manner of fire this was that shot +like a fifty-mile serpent across mountains and valleys.</p> + +<p>He was over it in less than ten minutes, flying high to clear the tiny +dots slipping swiftly across his view-finder. They were other +firecraft; he saw them darting in and down from all sides. For +himself, he took the line of smoke at its western end where it had +begun. Here it would be at its worst, perhaps, although no reports +were in as yet.</p> + +<p>The radio had been bringing in messages unceasingly as patrols and +firecraft answered the call. Some nearer than himself were reporting +themselves "on the fire"; he saw them grouped in the usual echelon +formation up to windward of the blaze. They darted down and in as he +looked, and Danny thrilled at the sight which had never yet failed to +reach the core of his emotional Irish nature.</p> + +<p>The smoke and fire swallowed them up; their red bodies and short black +wings drove unswervingly into the holocaust of flame.</p> + +<p>"Like a bunch o' bats out o' hell!" said Danny admiringly. "And 'tis +hell they're goin' into!" Which fact there was none to dispute with +Danny O'Rourke who knew, if any man did, the full truth of the remark.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">H</span>e saw them as they struck the fire; saw the whirling blast of snow +that drove under them as they went into the fight with the wildest +enemy of man; and he knew that a smothering blanket of carbon dioxide +was driving with hurricane force upon the flames.</p> + +<p>On the instrument at his side flashed the "Ascend!" order of the +squadron commander, and an instant later the flight reappeared a half +mile away.</p> + +<p>The commander must have sighted O'Rourke's ship. "Shall we repeat over +same course?" the instrument spelled out, while Danny, circling above, +watched the effects of the drive.</p> + +<p>It had checked the flames, that first blast of the CO_2 squadron; he +saw blackened, jagged trees where a roaring furnace had been. But the +flames were building up again. "Repeat!" O'Rourke answered; then +watched them drive in again.</p> + +<p>From a wooded valley beyond a low range came a call for help. A lone +ship in the red and black of the service had driven down into that +valley that was like a cauldron of seething flame.</p> + +<p>"I can't touch it!" a thin voice said. "The up-draft kills my blast."</p> + +<p>Danny O'Rourke was sending out another call. The answer came from +powerful sending instruments.</p> + +<p>"Nitro squadron Hundred and One, on the fire!" it said, and gave a +position in quick figures. Danny's own voice transmitter was on. He +snapped out the position of the lone fighter. "Get in there!" he +ordered; "Show your stuff! No—wait! Follow me; I'll lead you in!"</p> + +<p>And to himself he added: "Now we'll see what pure nitrogen will do in +a real scrap."</p> + +<p>He closed a switch, and from a compartment at his back a low whine +rose and grew to a scream. It was echoed in a shriek more shrill from +the bow where a port had opened to take in the air. And Danny knew +that that air, of which eighty percent was nitrogen, was being rid of +its oxygen in the retort at his back, and the nitrogen alone was +pouring out beneath him in a tremendous and ceaseless blast.</p> + +<p>The squadron had appeared—a row of dots that came in on a long +slanting drive from the ten thousand level. They swung into faultless +formation to "ride his tail" into whatever flaming breath he might +lead. And Danny O'Rourke threw his red ship down and into the valley +that seethed with a brew from the Pit itself.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>here had been pines in that valley, and firs towering hundreds of +feet in the air. They were living torches now, half seen through a +whirling chaos of flame. It billowed as if the very gases that burned +were tortured in the burning. The black-red of smoke-choked flames +parted at times to show a deadlier white light below—a white, glaring +heat in the heart of this gigantic, furnace—a scintillant, quivering +horror on which Danny fixed the cross hairs of his sights as he rode +his screaming meteor down into the pit.</p> + +<p>"Bats out o' hell!" And now the brood was returning, it must have +seemed. But beneath them, as they passed, that vivid whiteness went +dead. Yet before it changed Danny saw unbelievable things—pools of +molten rock, glaring white through the smoke.</p> + +<p>Up and out at the end of the valley! And Danny gasped for breath even +in the shelter of his cabin's insulated walls. And, used as he was to +the red menace that they fought, he went sick at sight of a message +that spelled itself beside his controls.</p> + +<p>"Ship number six down. Failed to come out." It was signed with the +name of the squadron commander who had followed where he led.</p> + +<p>And the valley! For five miles they had laid a blanket of +non-combustible gases. For five minutes, perhaps, their course could +be seen. And at the end of that time it was as it had been before, and +the flames raged on unchecked.</p> + +<p>His own Chief's number flashed before him; then a message that clicked +across his scanning plate:</p> + +<p>"O'Rourke! Get out of that hole! Nitrogen won't touch it; we can't +pour in enough. It's the same all along the line. We'll have to break +it up—smother it one part at a time. Have you tried your sound +dampener?"</p> + +<p>And Danny O'Rourke had the grace to blush even through the flush that +the fire's breath had given his face. "Forgot it!" he shouted into his +voice sender. "Forgot the ship had the little doodad on it!"</p> + +<p>The Chief responded audibly. "You didn't forget to go first into that +doorway to hell," he said drily. "You fool Irishman, go back down and +try the thing; give the 'little doodad' a chance!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">O</span>nce more the red ship fell swiftly under Danny's hand. As before, the +valley yawned like the living threat of a volcano in eruption. But +this time, instead of the whining nitro-producers, there came from +beneath the ship a discordant shriek like nothing that the quiet +mountains had ever heard. And Danny's fingers played over a strange +keyboard whose three keys were rheostats, and the crashing discord +below rose to a horror of sound that tore and battered at the ship's +thick walls to set the nerves of the crouching man a-jangle. But his +eyes, watching through a lookout below, saw strange disturbances of +the flames; he saw the masses of flame shiver as if stricken—fall +apart—vanish!</p> + +<p>And he held the sound controls at that same horrendous shriek while +his ship swept on and the thunder of her passing was lost in the +pandemonium that went before. But the valley, when the red ship had +passed, was a place of charred skeleton trees—of gray, swirling +ashes, and of embers, here and there, that blew back to life only to +be smothered by the gases of the ships that followed in his wake.</p> + +<p>And the voice that spoke from the instrument beside him still spoke +drily. "There's fifty miles more of that ahead," said the voice. "Just +keep moving along; we'll mop up behind you.... Oh, and by the way, +O'Rourke, give my congratulations to the Infant on the success of his +invention. His sound-dampener is some little doodad; we'll be needing +more of them, I should say."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">I</span>t was an hour or more later at the Headquarters of the Mountain +Division that the Chief amplified that remark in a way he himself +could not have foreseen. He had been talking to Danny, and now on the +wall of an adjoining room, where men sat at strange instruments, a red +light flashed.</p> + +<p>"We still don't know what started it all," the Chief was saying. "But +it made a fine tryout for Morgan's invention. If I thought you and he +could do it, I would believe you had started that fire yourselves for +a"—his voice rose abruptly to a shout—"Man! There's the red on the +board—a general alarm!"</p> + +<p>"Throw the big switch!" he roared. "Cut us in, quick! Cut us in!"</p> + +<p>Danny O'Rourke, under any ordinary circumstances would have been +hugely amused at the extraordinary sight of the Chief of the Mountain +Division in a ferment of excitement that was near hysteria. But the +flashing of the red that swept like a finger of flame across every +station number of the big board did not mean that ordinary matters +were at hand. A voice was speaking; its high-pitched shrillness showed +that the excitement of the moment was not confined to the office of +the Mountain Division alone.</p> + +<p>"A. F. F. Headquarters, Washington," it shrilled. "General Alarm. +Chicago destroyed by fire. Flames sweeping in well defined paths +across the country. Originated in Mountain Division. Cause +undetermined. Three lines of fire reported; coming east +fast—unbelievable speed.... There! Cleveland has got it; reports a +path of fire has cut across city melting steel and even stone.... Now +Buffalo!... God knows what it is." The voice broke with excitement for +an instant; Danny could almost see the distant man fighting for +control of himself as a maze of instruments about him wrote incredible +things.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">"O</span>rders!" said the voice now. "All A. F. F. ships report to your +Division Headquarters. Division officers keep in communication with +Washington. Mountain Division send all equipment east. Flying orders +will be given you en route. The country—the whole world—is in +flames!"</p> + +<p>Beside him, Danny O'Rourke heard the voice of his Chief. +"Unbelievable—impossible—preposterous!" His voice like that other +was growing shrill. "The country—world—in flames!"</p> + +<p>But he found voice to snap out a command to a waiting officer in the +doorway of the adjoining room. "Repeat general order. Send all craft +east!"</p> + +<p>To Danny he whispered. "Your 'little doodad'—I wish to heaven we had +a thousand of them now! But what does it mean? Lanes of fire across +the country—whole cities destroyed! What devil's work is this?... +There's nobody who knows."</p> + +<p>But Danny was staring as if he saw through the high, instrument-covered +walls. Back to a valley of flame that was like a doorway to hell, where +rocks, gray with the frosty years, had been melted to pools ... back to +a glinting light where something swift and scintillant had flashed once +in a cloudless sky ... back—far back ... back to a street in a town +half across the world, and a figure of a giant who strode away with a +smile of triumph on his ill-formed face ... but first that giant had +melted his way through walls of stone; and, like the stone, steel bars +and human flesh were as nothing before the invisible heat that come from +a slender rod!</p> + +<p>His own voice, when he moved his dry tongue to speak, came huskily; it +was as if another person were speaking far off:</p> + +<p>"I think you're wrong ... yes, I thing you're wrong, Chief. There's +one man who knows and 'tis myself is that one.... One man—and the +other is a beast like no livin' man on the face of the earth! <i>He</i> +knows—he and the devils he's brought with him!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">I</span>t was an unsatisfactory interview that Danny had with the Chief. +"You're crazy!" was the verdict of that A. F. F. official when Danny +had finished. "You're crazy, or else—or else—" His voice trailed +off; his eyes were on the moving letters that flashed their message of +disaster in an ever changing procession across the scanning screen on +the wall.</p> + +<p>"... outbreaks have ceased ... tremendous destruction ... no rational +explanation ... meteors, perhaps ... thousands of lives ... no +estimate...."</p> + +<p>There seemed no end to the tale of disaster, and the Chief's voice +died away into silence. If Danny was right he had no words to fit the +unbelievable truth.</p> + +<p>"Get into your new ship," the Chief ordered brusquely, "and take the +Infant with you. I'll send a relief man to his station. Go east—lay +your course for Washington; you'll get other orders on the way!"</p> + +<p>And a half hour later the first rocket ship of the A. F. F. was +blasting its way through the thin gases of the stratosphere eastward +bound. But by now Danny O'Rourke had a more sympathetic listener than +before.</p> + +<p>"In big puddles it was, and lakes! 'Twas still melted, some of it, in +that valley."</p> + +<p>"Why not?" asked the Infant casually. "Radiant heat moves with the +speed of light. We wouldn't think anything of focusing ten million +candle power of light energy into a spot like that. Why not heat? Just +because we haven't learned to generate it—focus it—shoot it out in a +stream like water from a hose—there's no use in denying that someone +else has beat us to the punch."</p> + +<p>The Infant's calm blue eyes were upon the luminous plates of the +ship's microscope where the swift moving terrain beneath them was +pictured clearly. The mountains were behind them now; endless miles of +ripening grain made the land a sea of yellow and brown and, across +that ocean, like the lines of foam that mark the wake of ships, lay +three straight lines of black.</p> + +<p>"Meteors!" sneered the Infant. "Yet if you'd tell your story to some +of these wise men they would die of laughing—and maybe that wouldn't +be a bad idea, either; they will be dying in a way that's a damned +sight more unpleasant unless someone finds how to catch these birds."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">A</span>head of them the lookouts framed blue emptiness. Below, on direct +sight, was but the vaguest blur that meant earth and clouds far +beneath. Only the magnification of the microscope brought out the +details, and on its screen the unrolling picture showed those three +lines broadening and merging to widespread desolation; then the smoke +clouds came between to shut off a world reeking with the fumes of +destruction. An occasional flash of red wings showed where the units +of the A. F. F. were at work.</p> + +<p>They beheld a city, below them—and smoking ruins where three great +gashes had been torn with torches of flame. To Danny there came a +thought that was sickening: it was as if some great three-toed beast +had drawn one paw, red with the blood of helpless humans, ripping +across the bosom of the land.</p> + +<p>His number was flashing on the call board that had been registering +incessant orders to other craft. He cut in on the Headquarters wave.</p> + +<p>"O'Rourke—Mountain Division—Unit Five!" he reported. "Do you get my +voice or shall I send by key?"</p> + +<p>The man at Headquarters did not trouble to reply to the question. His +voice came faint but clear:</p> + +<p>"Number Five—O'Rourke—Orders! If that new ship of yours has any +speed, show it now! Bear on Washington! Get here as quick as the good +Lord will let you! Mountain Division says you've got something good in +that sound-dampener; if you have, we need it now!"</p> + +<p>O'Rourke shot back a crisp acknowledgment; took a reading from two +radio beacons; projected them on the map; and pricked a point at their +intersection. He had his own ship on a line with the Capitol in a +matter of seconds.</p> + +<p>"And there's hell poppin' there, I'm bettin'! That Headquarters lad +didn't tell much—he wouldn't be worth a dime on a newscast—but I +gathered there was somethin' doin'."</p> + +<p>He had spoken more to himself than to his companion who had been a +silent listener to the incoming orders. But the Infant replied in his +own peculiar way.</p> + +<p>"The one you saw," he said inquiringly: "he did his dirty work with a +little rod or tube, you said?"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">W</span>ith an effort, O'Rourke brought his thoughts in line with the +question. "Oh, you mean the man-thing I saw in Stobolsk? Yes, that's +right; he had a thing like a gun."</p> + +<p>"And he held it in his hand?"</p> + +<p>"In the big paw that passed for a hand, yes!"</p> + +<p>"All right! Now think carefully, Danny, and tell me: was there +anything fastened to it—a wire, perhaps—a connection of some kind +with the ground?"</p> + +<p>O'Rourke stared at the pink and white face of the cherub who sat with +him in the control room of a rocket-ship that threw itself like a red +meteor across the high skies. "You're a bit of a devil, yourself," he +said wonderingly at last. "How in the names of the Saints did you +know? Yes, there was a wire, and I had forgotten it myself. It hung +down, I remember, from the butt of the thing. But not to the ground. +Infant—you missed it there; 'twas looped back like into the folds of +the damn blue nightie he wore."</p> + +<p>"And then went to the ground," said the Infant imperturbably, +"—through his shoes most likely; or, if the robe was metal, that may +have dragged on the ground instead."</p> + +<p>He smiled seraphically at the bewildered pilot as he added: "That's +all, Danny, for the present. Fly your little tin ship. I've got some +heavy thinking to do."</p> + +<p>Danny heard him ask one cryptic question, but he asked it as one who +knows that only from his own brain can come the answer.</p> + +<p>"How do they get rid of it?" the Infant was demanding. "If they stay +in the air, how do they get rid of the load?"</p> + +<p>And Pilot O'Rourke was glad enough to leave the answer to that one to +the Infant. For had not the Infant alone seen the only reasonable +answer to the puzzle of the mysterious man? And Danny had learned that +it takes a real man and a real mind to track truth to her hiding place +and accept the absurd improbabilities on which truth rests.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>hey were approaching their destination when the Infant opened his +Cupid's-bow mouth to pronounce one additional question. "How high," he +asked, "will your little tin ship fly? I know they've reached just +under a hundred thousand experimentally, but how high will this one +go?"</p> + +<p>"And that's a question neither you nor I can answer, Infant." Danny +was working with careful fingers at tiny levers; their control room +was filled with whining whispers and thin shrieks. "We're goin' down +now," he continued, and again flipped over the switch that would put +him in communication with the Washington office of the A. F. F.</p> + +<p>"O'Rourke—Mountain Division—Unit Five," he said quietly. +"Approaching Washington at altitude sixty-five thousand. Descending. +Orders, please!"</p> + +<p>Within the control room, where the voice of a Washington operator should +have answered on the instant, there was silence. The rocket motor had +been stilled. The two men were suddenly breathless with +listening—listening!—where was heard only the whispering shrillness +from without. The whispering grew as the red ship slanted down into +denser air; it built up in volume; it varied its pitch and timber till +it sounded like echoing voices ... ghostly voices and phantom words ... +like orders from the dead....</p> + +<p>And Danny O'Rourke found his eyes staring into those of the Infant, +where he read only the confirmation of his own fears.</p> + +<p>It was the Infant who first found words with which to break the +dreadful silence.</p> + +<p>"Headquarters is gone," he said in a strange, dry voice, "wiped out! +They must have got it! It looks as if we were on our own.</p> + +<p>"Where are you going?" he asked. "It's your ship."</p> + +<p>And Danny answered with a single word, though he added other for +emphasis under his breath:</p> + +<p>"Down!" he said quietly. "And be damned to them!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">R</span>olling smoke clouds came to meet them. Danny O'Rourke was watching +his altimeter sharply as he neared the ground. But he glanced more +than once at the smoke. It was shot through with tongues of flame as +they settled down; that was only what might be expected. But Danny was +puzzled by the gray-white whirls that rose through the billowing +smoke, until he knew it for the dust of powdered masonry, and realized +that below him, where great buildings had been, were tumbled ruins.</p> + +<p>Beside his control board a radio warning was telling of approaching +ships. Danny cut in on then on emergency wave-length, and found that +two full squadrons of nitro-ships were at hand with others coming.</p> + +<p>"Let them tend to it!" the pale-faced youngster beside him choked—one +does not see his country's capital destroyed without a tightening of +the throat. "They can cool it with CO_2 and put down a rescue squad, +though what they can do in that furnace is more than I can see."</p> + +<p>Danny nodded mutely; he opened the exhaust to the full, and the +rocket-plane swept out on whirlwinds of raging fire, and smoke, whose +flames reached up even where they flew and licked hungrily at their +ship.</p> + +<p>Jarring explosions sent shudders through their craft. Ahead of them +bright flashes illumined the swirling fumes where bursting shells +marked the destruction of some ammunition stores outside the city.</p> + +<p>And Danny, as he drove his red meteor into the clear air of the upper +levels, was searching the heavens above for the enemy he had expected +to sight down below. He knew now that his mad plunge into the seething +flames was only a blind impulse—an effort to satisfy that demand +within him for a foe upon whom to wreak revenge.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">B</span>eside him, his companion spun the dial of a receiving set for the +Airnews Service; a voice was shouting excitedly into their cabin: +"... physicists unable to find cause ... no meteoric material seen ... +new rays ... enormous temperatures ... some new and unknown conditions +encountered in space—"</p> + +<p>"Hell!" said the Infant wearily, and snapped off the instrument. +"Meteors! New conditions in space! But, come to think of it, we can't +blame them for being off the trail. You know that the bird that's +doing this flies high and fast ... and when he stops there's nobody +left alive to tell of it!... And don't look for him here."</p> + +<p>"Why not?" Danny demanded aggressively. "This ship isn't armed, but if +I get my sights on that flyin' devil—"</p> + +<p>"You won't," said the Infant darkly. "He's off somewhere discharging +the load he's accumulated."</p> + +<p>He reached for a map, stuck his finger on a point in eastern New York +State. "Let's go there, Danny—and I'd like to get there <i>right now</i>!"</p> + +<p>And Danny O'Rourke, who, ordinarily was a bit particular about who +gave him orders, looked at the Infant's blue eyes that had gone hard +and cold, and he swung his roaring ship toward the north and a place +that was marked by a steady finger on the map.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">N</span>ew York was a place of flashing reflections far beneath them as they +passed. Danny pointed downward toward the miniature city, where a +silvery river met the sea; where a maze of flaming lights in all of +the colors of the spectrum gave indication of activity at the great +Navy Field.</p> + +<p>"How did he miss it, the murderin' devil?" he asked. "How come that he +hit Washington first? Did he have some way of knowin' that it was the +heart of the whole country?"</p> + +<p>"And why pick on us here in this country? Or are we just the first, +and will he spit his rage over the rest of the world before he's +through? It it the end of the world that's come?"</p> + +<p>To all of which there was no answer. And at last, when New York had +vanished, they came to a smaller city and a broad expanse of roof that +took their wheels.</p> + +<p>Danny followed where his companion led into great buildings and a +place of offices where excited officials stood in knots about +news-casting cones; then they were in a quiet room, in the presence of +a lean-bodied man whose hawklike face turned flinty at some request +the Infant made.</p> + +<p>"What the lad wants, I don't know," said Danny to himself, "but +whatever it is he won't be gettin' it from old Gimlet-eyes."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">B</span>ut he saw the Infant write something on a card and he heard him say, +as he handed it to the official: "Send that to the President—<i>at +once</i>!" And though the words were hardly audible they had a quality +that brought an instant response; while the written words brought a +portly man who shook the Infant's hand fervently and inquired what +service a great electric company could render.</p> + +<p>Danny heard Gimlet-eyes protesting; heard broken bits of sentences: +"... the great Sorenson tube ... he knows of our disintegrator ... +insists upon our furnishing ... preposterous...."</p> + +<p>The portly man cut him short. "You will give Mr. Morgan whatever he +wishes," he ordered crisply. Then Danny saw him clutch at a desk for +support as still another man appeared at the open door to shout:</p> + +<p>"New York! My God! New York's gone! Burning! The Empire State Building +melted! Crashed!... The whole city is being destroyed!"</p> + +<p>And in the moment of numbness that seized Danny O'Rourke he heard the +Infant say: "How soon can we have it? I want it in our ship—up +above—an hour? We'll be there." But Danny had no further interest in +the Infant's arrangements for obtaining some unknown equipment; he was +plunging through the doorway and running at full speed toward the ramp +where they had descended.</p> + +<p>He knew dimly that the younger man had followed and was crowding into +the cabin after him. Danny, as he locked the port and lifted his red +ship off her guides, was fully conscious of only one fact: that a +hundred miles south a city was being destroyed and that somewhere in +the vast heights above the city he would find the destroyer.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>he Hudson that had been a thread of silver was no longer bright as +they approached the city at its mouth; burnished now with its +reflection of black smoke clouds and red tongues of flame, it vanished +at last under a mountain of black that heaped itself in turbulent +piles and whirling masses until the winds swept the smoke out over the +sea.</p> + +<p>And high above it all—so high that all clouds were below it—there +hung in a lucent sky one tiny, silvery speck. There was a delicate +steering sight on Danny's ship; he could direct the red craft as if it +were in very fact a projectile that could be controlled in flight. And +under the cross hairs of that sight swung a silvery speck, while the +man who looked along the telescopic tube cursed steadily and +methodically as if in some way his hate might span the gap and reach +that distant foe.</p> + +<p>And then the speck vanished. Danny followed it with the powerful +glasses of his sighting tube; he saw it swing inland—saw it move like +a line of silvery light, almost, swifter in its motion than his +instrument could follow. But even in that swift flight Danny's eyes +observed one fact: the enemy ship was coming down; it slanted in on +that long volplane that must have ripped the air apart like a bolt of +lightning. And Danny's red rocket swept out and around in a long, +looping flight, while he laid the ship on the course that other had +followed.</p> + +<p>"That's one of them," he said savagely; "there must be two more. But +I'll get this one if I have to crash him in air and smash my own ship +right through him."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>he mind of Danny O'Rourke was filled with only one idea; he had +sighted his prey—the ship in which sat a man-thing who had sent a +terrible death to Danny's fellows. And, though his hands moved +carefully and methodically, though externally he was cool and +collected, within him was a seething maelstrom of hate. All he saw was +that giant figure as he had seen it before; all he knew was that he +must overtake that speeding ship and send it to earth.</p> + +<p>He had even forgotten Morgan; perhaps he was never fully conscious of +his coming from the moment when that other trembling, shaken man had +shouted: "New York! New York's gone!"</p> + +<p>"There aren't two more," the Infant was saying from his seat at the +rear of the cabin: "there's just one. Those three lines were always +parallel except when they widened out: that meant that he had gone up +higher. If we ever see that ship, we'll see three discharge tubes for +the ray."</p> + +<p>Danny O'Rourke turned his eyes that had gone haggard and deep-sunk +with the sights they had seen. He stared vacantly at the Infant.</p> + +<p>"Didn't know," he said thickly, "—didn't know you were here. I'll set +you down; I'll let you out before I ram him...."</p> + +<p>For reply, the other pointed ahead. The red ship had torn through a +layer of thick clouds; Danny was flying below them above a mountainous +world of bare hill-tops and wooded valleys. Directly ahead, hovering +high over a mountain higher than its fellows, was the white craft of +the enemy; Danny, saw it in hard outline against the darker masses of +clouds beyond. He saw that it was motionless, that a slender cable was +suspended for a thousand feet below, and that the end of the cable, +hanging close above the mountain top, was split into a score of wires +that stood out in all directions, while, from each, poured a stream of +blue fire.</p> + +<p>And once more all this that he saw was as nothing to the pilot; all +thought, too, of his fellow victim went from his mind. He could see +only the white ship, doubly hideous because of its seeming purity; +and, as before, he brought the cross hairs of directional sights upon +it while he opened the rocket exhaust to the full.</p> + +<p>But even pilot O'Rourke, with the highest rating in the A. F. F., +could not follow the lightning-swift leap of the snow-white thing that +buried itself in the smother of cloud banks above.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">D</span>anny set his red ship down on that same barren hilltop; he motioned +Morgan to follow as he stepped out.</p> + +<p>"We're somewhere in Pennsylvania," he announced. "You're stayin' here. +Sorry to dump you out like this, but you'll find a way out. Get to a +radio—call a plane." He held out his hand in unspoken farewell.</p> + +<p>But the other man disregarded it. "What's the idea?" he inquired.</p> + +<p>Danny's reply came in short, breathless sentences. "Going up to find +that ship. Ram it. No use of your getting smashed up, too. Good-by, +Infant; you're a good old scout."</p> + +<p>Danny's mind was all on what lay ahead; he was wildly eager to be off +on the hunt. It took him an instant to comprehend the look from +Morgan's steady, blue eyes.</p> + +<p>"Listen!" the younger man was ordering. "You're not going to do that; +I am! And not just that way, either."</p> + +<p>"Did you see that cable and the electric discharges?" he demanded +excitedly. "It's just as I thought: he accumulates a negative charge; +he has to get rid of it—he's just like a thunder-cloud loaded with +static—and the heat ray does it. I had it figured that way."</p> + +<p>"Remember the little tube you saw before—that's why I asked about the +wire. I knew he would have to ground it without its going through his +body."</p> + +<p>Danny O'Rourke was an intent listener now. When the Infant talked like +this he was a person to be listened to with respect, even if all he +said was not understood.</p> + +<p>"Now," said the Infant with finality, "let's forget this idea of +ramming him. You couldn't hit him anyway; even a cruiser couldn't do +it. If it could you would have radioed for a squadron an hour ago—you +know that."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>he pilot nodded his acknowledgment. "But, my God, man," he exploded, +"I've got to do something; I've got to try!"</p> + +<p>"We'll do it," was the confident reply, "—or I will. Now we'll go +back to the Consolidated Electric; they will have the Sorenson +disintegrator ready. I'll put it in your machine and—"</p> + +<p>"And what?" broke in the pilot. "Is this some new death ray? We've +been hearing about them for years—just hearing about them. If that's +what you mean, then your idea is all wet; it's worse than mine. I'm +going up."</p> + +<p>Perhaps the younger man saw something of the wild impatience in +Danny's deep-sunk eyes. He laid a restraining hand on the pilot's arm +while he explained:</p> + +<p>"No death ray, Danny—that will come later; we haven't got it now. But +we've got the disintegration of matter—the splitting of the atom, on +something bigger than a laboratory scale. Sorenson did it. There is a +flood of electrical energy poured out—streams of electrons—negative +electricity. It leaves a positive charge that is tremendous if it +isn't neutralized.</p> + +<p>"I said that devilish white thing was like a thunder-cloud; well, I'll +make your ship like the earth; then I'll bring them near each +other—no need to ram him—and it will be like the hammer of Thor—"</p> + +<p>The Infant's words ended in a crackling roar from above. Danny +O'Rourke found his whole body tingling as if he were filled with +stinging sparks; each single fiber of each muscle was twitching.</p> + +<p>A blue light shone eerily overhead. He bent his stiffened, jerking +neck till he could look—till he could see, with eyes that were filled +with flashing fires of their own, other ripping blue flashes from the +ends of outstanding wires, and above him a thousand feet, the belly of +a white ship.</p> + +<p>And through the brain-hammering clatter of the static discharge he +heard the voice of the Infant, whose words came jerkily between the +shudders that shook him:</p> + +<p>"He doesn't dare, damn him! Can't let the wires touch us. Has +to—discharge—in air.... But he'll burn us—afterwards!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">"S</span>tand still!" said Danny through stiffened lips. "Don't make a move! +He hasn't seen us, it may be!"</p> + +<p>The crackling discharge had ceased; the rain of miniature lightning +bolts that had shot around them and through them had ended. The cable +had gone up before their eyes and hidden itself in the white ship. The +pilot's eyes clung to that white-bellied thing, so slender and round +and gleaming against the dark clouds overhead; he saw it hang +motionless for long minutes while it seemed that the breath in his +throat must choke him. Then he saw that white roundness enlarge as the +ship settled swiftly down.</p> + +<p>It hung in another moment directly above their red ship. Danny saw +three round holes open in the white shell—the three outlets that the +Infant had predicted. It had descended noiselessly, but now there came +from within a high-pitched whining hum. The dreaded heat and ray! They +were about to see their own ship destroyed! And, as for themselves—! +Danny was still waiting for the first, devastating blast of +intolerable heat, when the ship settled softly down.</p> + +<p>Green port-holes stared at him like eyes. A door was outlined with a +line of black that spread to a round opening as a door swung wide. A +huge door in the side of a huge ship, but it was none too large for +the giant figure that crept through.</p> + +<p>And Danny O'Rourke stared wordlessly at the flat-nosed face above a +robe of chilled steel blue.</p> + +<p>"'Tis him!" he gasped out that the Infant might hear. "The same +one—the devil I saw in Stobolsk!" And if any other identification +were needed it came in the slender rod, whose heavy metal butt was +gripped in the giant's hand. At sight of the wire looping back from +the weapon; at remembrance of the Infant's shrewd guess; and with the +conviction that now this same weapon was to annihilate the only two +men who knew how to combat this destroyer, Danny threw back his head +and laughed—until his harsh laughter died away in a snarl of rage.</p> + +<p>"Go on and do it," he heard, "you ugly devil. You killed those Reds; +you've killed thousands of us since, you murderin' beast! Go on and +kill us, too!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>he slender tube was aimed at him squarely. Danny waited to hear the +faint click that would mean his death as the invisible ray sawed into +his body. Instead the huge figure leaned down to stare at the pilot; +then straightened while a crooked smile of recognition appeared on the +deformed face.... And the slender rod moved on—on—in a slow circle +toward the other waiting man!</p> + +<p>It clicked before it reached him. Danny heard it, and "No—no!" he +screamed in a horrible voice. "Run, Infant! Beat it, for God's sake!"</p> + +<p>The enemy was twenty feet away; it seemed as many miles to Danny as he +threw himself at the foe. He did not see the ray strike. He heard only +the Infant's steady voice calling: "Remember Danny—the Sorenson +machine—if you live."</p> + +<p>Then a blast of reflected heat swept upon him, and he felt himself +stifling. There was a pool of molten rock, white and glaring with heat ... +and a puff of smoke, grayish black, and ashes that whirled in the wind that +swept up from the pool....</p> + +<p>Danny tried to raise himself from the hot stone where he had fallen, +so near he was to the pool of death. He saw the grotesque figure of +the giant move over toward the red ship, look at it, sneer +contemptuously, and turn back to his own ship of doom. He saw the +black entrance swallow the huge foe and he saw the door close, while +the great ship, so innocently white in its sleek slender roundness, +rose again in the air where the clouds took it up.</p> + +<p>And Danny, resting on scorched but unfeeling hands, stared after him +until he got the enemy's direction of flight as he entered the clouds, +then he turned towards a place of glowing rock where the air rose in +quivering waves.</p> + +<p>"You said it, Infant," he whispered; "you knew I was just a fightin' +fool that wouldn't think the way you would. You told me to get the +Sorenson machine—" He brushed at his suddenly blinded eyes with one +seared hand, then turned to stare grimly and appraisingly where the +white ship had gone.</p> + +<p>"And I'm thinkin'," he told the beastly occupant of that carrier of +death, "that you didn't shoot your damned ray quite quick enough. The +Infant beat you to it! He got his message to me first!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">H</span>ow he got to the flat-roofed landing zone of the Consolidated +Electric, Danny, doubtless, could never have told. Nor was he aware of +the hand that set in the forward cabin of his ship a strange machine. +But he growled his instructions:</p> + +<p>"Set it goin'! 'Tis the Infant's orders—I mean Mr. Morgan's. What the +devil it is I don't know, but 'Turn it on!' he told me—'Have them put +it on full!'" And, though a man whom Danny knew only as Gimlet-eyes +stared at him curiously, he reached down to the apparatus, set a dial, +closed a switch here and there, then stepped back.</p> + +<p>But Gimlet-eyes ventured one protest. "You're not grounding it!" he +exclaimed, in a voice that was tinged with horror. "You'll get an +accumulation on your ship that will shoot off like lightning—millions +of volts!"</p> + +<p>"How long would that be takin'?" Danny inquired gruffly.</p> + +<p>And Gimlet-eyes replied, as one who washes his hands of all +responsibility in a rather horrible affair: "An hour—not more than an +hour!"</p> + +<p>"Then I'll just be drivin' around for an hour," said Danny, and +slammed shut the door-port of the red ship.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">T</span>he red rocket drove in slow circles that were a hundred miles across +while that hour passed and the numbness of mind that had held Danny in +a stupor slipped away. For the first time he realized the emptiness of +the world that the Infant had left; he knew with a sharp stab of +self-reproach how much had gone from his life in that instant when he +sprang vainly toward the giant enemy.</p> + +<p>He called himself wild names for his fancied sluggishness. Then that, +too, passed, and at thought of the weapon the Infant had given him and +of the work that lay ahead, his haggard face forgot the lines that +horror had drawn and relaxed into a tired smile that told of a mind +content.</p> + +<p>Gradually his looping whirls had carried him toward the east. Another +city was being devastated by the enemy; that Danny got from the +newscast. Only that and one other message broke the tedious eternity +of that long hour.</p> + +<p>Danny's number flashed on the screen beside his controls. +Unconsciously he answered, but he sat up alertly at sound of his +Chief's voice.</p> + +<p>"I can't get anyone," the voice said. "Headquarters is gone; I just +called you on a chance. And I believe you now, Danny. That devil wiped +out a whole fleet of our planes; melted the cruisers with one shot, +and the scouts couldn't go fast enough to escape. Only one got +away....</p> + +<p>"But where are you? What's to be done? I've just got here. My God! +What can we do?"</p> + +<p>"Wait," said Danny O'Rourke calmly, and glanced at his watch; "wait +for another ten minutes! He's over Boston now. And he's waitin' there +for me—though he doesn't know it yet. But I'll be droppin' in on +him."</p> + +<p>"Don't be an utter fool, Danny," urged the voice of the Chief; "there +isn't a thing you can do. You try to come down on him, and he'll do as +he did with the cruisers—just slip aside like lightning and nail you +with his damned heat ray when you're below! I'm near Boston now. You +keep away. Where can I meet you? We've got to think—got to do +something!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">A</span>nd Danny, before he opened the switch that ended their talk, said +meditatively: "Like lightnin' he moves ... but he'll have to move +<i>faster</i> than lightnin' to dodge me. And if you're near Boston, stick +around; I'm comin' now, but not to meet you, Chief; I've got another +important engagement. I'm keepin' it for—for the Infant. And give the +Infant the credit, Chief; give it all to him, he's earned it: he's +paid for it in full." Then the snap of a switch cut off the sound of +Danny's voice before it showed a tell-tale quaver.</p> + +<p>It was steady some minutes later, when Danny swept in above the +mounting clouds that he had learned to know. Beneath them invisible +fingers of death were sweeping back and forth where men and women ran +shrieking in terror or waited calmly and dry-eyed for the end. Above +them a slender rounded thing wove its pattern of destruction back and +forth ... back and forth. A spectral ship—a pale phantom, elusive +and dimly seen until it came against the black of rolling smoke from +below.</p> + +<p>But to Danny O'Rourke, slanting down from tremendous heights, the +white shape was never lost. On the cross hairs of his directional +sights the ghostly ship hung, and Danny threw his own red rocket like +a living flame over and down where the white one sensed his coming and +waited.</p> + +<p>Beside him a human voice, high with horror, called to him. "Come +back!" the Chief of the Mountain Division was commanding. "Danny! For +the love of Heaven, turn back!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><span class="f3">B</span>ut the voice was unheard by Danny O'Rourke. There was another voice +speaking ... he could almost see the smiling pink and white face of +one beside him who spoke of his "little tin ship" ... spoke, too, of a +white ship that would be like a great thunder-cloud ... and of his own +screaming meteor that was like the earth ... and there was to be a +messenger of death like the hammer of Thor that would flash between +the two....</p> + +<p>Danny saw the white one slipping easily aside; the ship was swelling +suddenly before him—it was close ... but the jagged lightning—the +ripping flash of blue that joined the two craft in a crashing arc—was +neither seen nor heard by Danny. Danny was too busy to notice, for he +was engaged in smiling converse with one whom he called the "Infant" +and whose pink and white face beamed gladly upon him "like a damned +little cherub," as Danny was telling him....</p> + +<p>But the Chief of the Mountain Division who saw all from afar could say +nothing. He only stared from the lookout of his own speeding plane +that framed a picture of two ships; where the red one, flaming from +within, kept on in its swift, straight dive; while the white one fell +slowly, turning sluggishly to show its gashed and blasted sides ... +till the black clouds wrapped them both in a billowy shroud....</p> + +<p>But clouds are no bar to man's inner vision. And the Chief looked +through, as Danny had done, to see as in a lightning flash a world +beaten to its knees, hopeless, ravaged and scarred—a world where +courage might again be born—a world that would still be a world of +men.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Hammer of Thor, by Charles Willard Diffin + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HAMMER OF THOR *** + +***** This file should be named 29202-h.htm or 29202-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/2/0/29202/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Hammer of Thor + +Author: Charles Willard Diffin + +Release Date: June 22, 2009 [EBook #29202] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HAMMER OF THOR *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from Astounding Stories March 1932. + Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that + the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed. + + + + [Illustration: _He could see, above them, the belly of + a white ship_] + + + + The Hammer of Thor + + By Charles Willard Diffin + + * * * * * + + + + +[Sidenote: Like the Hammer of Thor was the clash of Danny O'Rourke +with the mysterious giant of space.] + + +The Director General of District Three, Ural Division of the Russian +States, was a fool. Danny O'Rourke had reached that conclusion some +time before--a conclusion, however, that he was most careful to keep +unexpressed. + +And then Danny not only thought it; he knew the Director was a fool; +and the amazing incident that proved it took place in Stobolsk, the +Governmental Headquarters of District Three. Although Danny's regular +station was on a lonely peak in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in the +United States, the occurrence was nevertheless observed by him; and +this happened for two reasons. + +The New Soviet Government that took over control of all the Russias in +1943 wanted, among other things, to install the most modern +fire-fighting system, the equal of anything in the world. They turned, +quite naturally, to the United States of America for their +instruction; and this was reason number one why Danny O'Rourke, pilot +of the Air Fire Force, was where he was on the morning of June 13th. + +The second reason was the tremendous timber wealth in the Ural +Division and the threat to destroy it by fire. + +Perhaps there might be mentioned a third reason: that this same Danny +O'Rourke, red-haired, smiling, and debonair was listed on the Air Fire +Force of the United States with the highest rating that the A. F. F. +has to give its pilots. But Danny would have grinned at such a +suggestion and would have countered with a denial that he was better +qualified than "the rest of the boys." + +But Danny was there; he had been talking at length with the Director +General on the technical differences of the hot and cold nitrogen +blasts for controlling fires on a wide front when suddenly the big man +was brought in. + + * * * * * + +The great figure stooped almost double to enter the room, and Danny +ran a hand through his shock of red hair and stared open-mouthed at +the giant when he straightened again and towered above the guard of +Red soldiers who had brought him into the high-ceiled room. + +He was clothed in a single garment of glinting blue that wrapped him +about and fell in heavy folds to the floor. Danny felt the resemblance +to the shimmering blue of steel that has passed through fire, and his +eyes held to that garment in fascination until his gaze went on and up +to the face. + +The man's face was red, as if the flesh had been burned; here was one +man Danny could not classify. He had met the people of many lands but +never had he seen one like this. + +In one quick staring glance, Danny caught a picture of heavy jaws--a +flashing of yellow teeth when the mouth opened to emit guttural, +unrecognizable words--nostrils that ran crosswise of the face in a +nose broad and flat! The forehead above was low and sloping. From the +straggling yellow hair it slanted down to brows that overhung +deep-sunk and cavernous eyes.... And when Danny O'Rourke's own curious +eyes met those of the stranger, they were held in a grip that was +almost hypnotic. + +"Like a dirty, crawlin' snake's!" he was telling himself over and +over. "Heaven help us if that boy ever gets rough. Who he is or what +he is, I don't know, but if I was the Director, I'd treat him nice +till I found out." + +Danny and the Director were standing side by side. The giant figure +fixed a cold stare on Danny and barked short sentences that seemed to +the listener to be an explanation. + +But Danny motioned helplessly to the official at his side. "Maybe you +can savvy that," he suggested; "it's new talk to me." + +The newcomer repeated the guttural sounds. Upon the Director's face +was a frown of suspicion and puzzled wonder; the Director General did +not like to encounter either happenings or persons he could not +readily understand; it was disturbing to one's official dignity. The +giant must have read some of this, for he tried to make himself clear. + + * * * * * + +He repeated the sentences slowly. Then he waved one huge hand in air +and pointed upward, and the hand moved up and up as if to indicate +some tremendous distance. He pointed to himself; then brought one +aiming finger down as if he were coming from that far-off place. And +Danny got the significance. + +"It's happened!" he told the Director explosively. "I knew it would +come some day--I knew they'd get here! And us monkeyin' with our +stratosphere ships and thinkin' we were beatin' the rest of the +Universe!" + +The Director regarded the young American with about the same degree of +disfavor as he had shown the giant. "What is it you say?" he +questioned. "You mean--what? I do not understand." + +And, in careful words, Danny explained. He told the Director of +District Three something of his dreams that space might not be an +insurmountable bar; he told him, with enthusiasm driving his words out +faster and faster, that here was a man--or if not a man, a living +creature of some sort--that had come out of space. + +"Where did they find him?" he demanded. "Where is his ship?" + +But he ceased to ask questions as he noticed the Director's mirth. For +that official was rocking with roaring laughter that had a distinctly +uncomplimentary sound. And he added some words in Russian that were as +incomprehensible to Danny as the growling talk of the giant man, but +the O'Rourke temper flamed as he saw the other Russians in the room +smiling appreciatively. + +Then: "Take him away!" the Director thundered. "We'll see where he +comes from. Search him! And if he hasn't any passports--" The unended +sentence was suggestive. + + * * * * * + +But an hour later, Danny saw the giant furnish his own ending to the +incompleted order. He had left the Director's room. Across the street +was the gray stone building where prisoners were held for disposition +by the courts. And once more Danny O'Rourke's jaw dropped in +open-mouthed, unbelieving amazement as he saw a section of gray stone +wall fall outward where the edge of it was sharply outlined in +white-hot, dripping stone. + +A great figure stepped forth. In his hand was a rod like an elongated +pencil attached to a heavy butt. And though nothing visible came from +the rod, Danny saw it pointed back at the building where iron bars +softened till they sent rivulets of molten steel splashing upon the +pavement. + +A squad of soldiers in the blood-red color of their service stood +nearby. One gave an order, and a dozen rifles were swung toward their +shoulders. But the rifles never came to rest. + +Danny saw the quick swing of the slender rod. And he saw the men's +mouths opened in screams that were never uttered. For, quicker than +nerves could send their message to human brain and muscles, some +unseen force had slashed their bodies in two as if a fiery sword had +been swung by invisible hands. + +The pointing rod lingered upon the huddled bodies for an instant, +while that which had been human flesh vanished in a bursting cloud of +smoke; while the stones beneath turned to a seething pool of molten +rock.... Then the rod moved slowly toward the frozen figure of Danny +O'Rourke. + +Did the strange being sense that Danny had not been disbelieving like +the rest? Danny could never know. He knew only that he stood rigid +with horror, entirely unable to move, while that rod swung upon him; +he knew that the hand that held it released something that clicked, +wherefore his life had been spared; and he knew that the savage face +above wrinkled into something resembling a snarling, triumphant smile, +as the rod was returned to its hiding place under the garment of +shimmering blue, and the mysterious figure turned and strode savagely +down the Avenue Stalin in the city of Stobolsk. + +Danny O'Rourke was to carry that picture clearly in his mind--the +figure that moved unhurriedly on, towering above the others, men and +women, who scurried fearfully from his path. But he was to retain yet +more vividly the recollection of a group of red-clad bodies that were +severed at their waists as a slim tube swung--then a bursting cloud of +oily smoke, and a pool of molten rock where they had been. + + * * * * * + +Something of this, perhaps, was clouding the eyes of Danny O'Rourke, +Pilot of the A.F.F. a month and more later, as he sat at lookout duty +in a gleaming white tower on a high peak of the Sierras. Not that the +job of lookout was part of O'Rourke's duty, now that he was back in +the U. S. A., but a cylinder of scarlet rested on a great rack at the +base of the tower, and Danny had no wish to hear the roar of that +cylinder's stern exhaust for a time. + +Even the novelty of flying the newest rocket-ship in the service had +worn off. Besides, he had patrolled his route, and he told himself +that the "Infant" needed a rest. + +The "Infant," better known on the records of the A. F. F. as Morgan, +David E., Lookout, Station 39-G, was sleeping soundly on the elevating +table where a map of the district was mounted under glass. His +cherubic face was pink and white, more suggestive of the age of three +than of twenty-three. And O'Rourke, glancing at him protectingly, hung +up a paper to keep the sunlight from striking the young man's face. + +The Infant had been Danny's special charge from the day he entered the +service, and now, except for the Chief and some other officials, only +Danny knew that the Infant was there to teach and not to learn. For +behind those eyes that might have been taken from one of Rafael's +cherubim lay a brain that Danny had learned to respect. + +"Fifteen minutes more. I'm givin' you," he said inaudibly; "then I'll +be on my way, and you'll do your own squintin' and peekin'." But the +Infant's fifteen minutes were cut to that many seconds-- + +Danny had been looking toward the south before he had turned to gaze +at the Infant: his eyes came back to the same point to take up their +reconnaissance. But now, where clear sky had made a blue back-drop for +rugged peaks, was a line of black. And the line, while Danny watched +in disbelief, moved like a smoky serpent: its head stretched out and +out while from behind it there came the ominous line of black. + + * * * * * + +All this happened in a matter of seconds, and the moving head ceased +at last to move; the line no longer grew. But, where it had been at +first a thin mark of black, it changed now to billowing gray. + +It was fifty miles away at least; but it showed clear and sharp. And +the first gray had hardly bloomed from its black beginning before the +long arm of Danny O'Rourke had swept the sleeping Infant to the floor, +while, with the other hand, he swung an instrument of telescopic +sights upon distant smoke. + +He set it in careful focus--took a reading for distance--another for +direction--and while he was doing it he was vaguely conscious of one +single sharp flash in the sky above that far-off cloud. In his +range-finder it showed once, like a glittering star; then it vanished, +but the trained eye of O'Rourke observed its passage like a ray of +light overhead. + +The pink-faced youngster on the floor was still protesting sleepily +when O'Rourke slammed down a switch and heard a voice answer promptly +from an instrument on the wall. Danny shouted out his bearings on the +fire: + +"Thirty-nine-G! O'Rourke speaking for Morgan. Reporting fire on a wide +front--bearing Two-O-Seven to Two-Four-Nine! And for God's sake, +Chief, get a line on this quick. The whole thing shot up in a +second--fifty miles of fire!" + +Another voice broke in excitedly. "Station +Fourteen-Fourteen-Fourteen!" The voice was stammering in evident +confusion. "The whole earth has exploded--it's on fire now! I--I--" + +The Chief's voice broke in with a quiet, "Bearing, please! Report your +bearing, Fourteen!" + +And the stammering voice steadied to give a figure. + +"Headquarters speaking," said the quiet voice. "Orders for O'Rourke. +For the love of Pete, get on that fire, Danny. Every instrument in the +office is chattering. Every patrol ship has spotted that blaze. You +can't all be crazy. It's in Section Eight--never mind the exact +bearings--you'll find it without any trouble I imagine. Now beat it! +And let me know what kind of a fire this is that starts on a +fifty-mile front! You're in charge till I come." + + * * * * * + +Ten seconds later, had the Infant been watching, which he had not--for +his eyes were all on the distant smoke--he would have seen the +beautiful curving sweep of a scarlet projectile, whose screaming +propeller swept her off and up; he would then have seen it lie back +flat as the great stern exhaust made a rocket of the ship to send it +roaring into the heights. + +And in the air-tight cabin of the newest fire-fighting machine of the +A. F. F., Danny O'Rourke pulled his body out of the slumped position +into which his quick acceleration had forced him; then set his ship on +her course to where a distant smoke made puffballs of gray against a +cloudless sky. And, like his Chief, he was wondering with a wonderment +that bordered upon disbelief what manner of fire this was that shot +like a fifty-mile serpent across mountains and valleys. + +He was over it in less than ten minutes, flying high to clear the tiny +dots slipping swiftly across his view-finder. They were other +firecraft; he saw them darting in and down from all sides. For +himself, he took the line of smoke at its western end where it had +begun. Here it would be at its worst, perhaps, although no reports +were in as yet. + +The radio had been bringing in messages unceasingly as patrols and +firecraft answered the call. Some nearer than himself were reporting +themselves "on the fire"; he saw them grouped in the usual echelon +formation up to windward of the blaze. They darted down and in as he +looked, and Danny thrilled at the sight which had never yet failed to +reach the core of his emotional Irish nature. + +The smoke and fire swallowed them up; their red bodies and short black +wings drove unswervingly into the holocaust of flame. + +"Like a bunch o' bats out o' hell!" said Danny admiringly. "And 'tis +hell they're goin' into!" Which fact there was none to dispute with +Danny O'Rourke who knew, if any man did, the full truth of the remark. + + * * * * * + +He saw them as they struck the fire; saw the whirling blast of snow +that drove under them as they went into the fight with the wildest +enemy of man; and he knew that a smothering blanket of carbon dioxide +was driving with hurricane force upon the flames. + +On the instrument at his side flashed the "Ascend!" order of the +squadron commander, and an instant later the flight reappeared a half +mile away. + +The commander must have sighted O'Rourke's ship. "Shall we repeat over +same course?" the instrument spelled out, while Danny, circling above, +watched the effects of the drive. + +It had checked the flames, that first blast of the CO_2 squadron; he +saw blackened, jagged trees where a roaring furnace had been. But the +flames were building up again. "Repeat!" O'Rourke answered; then +watched them drive in again. + +From a wooded valley beyond a low range came a call for help. A lone +ship in the red and black of the service had driven down into that +valley that was like a cauldron of seething flame. + +"I can't touch it!" a thin voice said. "The up-draft kills my blast." + +Danny O'Rourke was sending out another call. The answer came from +powerful sending instruments. + +"Nitro squadron Hundred and One, on the fire!" it said, and gave a +position in quick figures. Danny's own voice transmitter was on. He +snapped out the position of the lone fighter. "Get in there!" he +ordered; "Show your stuff! No--wait! Follow me; I'll lead you in!" + +And to himself he added: "Now we'll see what pure nitrogen will do in +a real scrap." + +He closed a switch, and from a compartment at his back a low whine +rose and grew to a scream. It was echoed in a shriek more shrill from +the bow where a port had opened to take in the air. And Danny knew +that that air, of which eighty percent was nitrogen, was being rid of +its oxygen in the retort at his back, and the nitrogen alone was +pouring out beneath him in a tremendous and ceaseless blast. + +The squadron had appeared--a row of dots that came in on a long +slanting drive from the ten thousand level. They swung into faultless +formation to "ride his tail" into whatever flaming breath he might +lead. And Danny O'Rourke threw his red ship down and into the valley +that seethed with a brew from the Pit itself. + + * * * * * + +There had been pines in that valley, and firs towering hundreds of +feet in the air. They were living torches now, half seen through a +whirling chaos of flame. It billowed as if the very gases that burned +were tortured in the burning. The black-red of smoke-choked flames +parted at times to show a deadlier white light below--a white, glaring +heat in the heart of this gigantic, furnace--a scintillant, quivering +horror on which Danny fixed the cross hairs of his sights as he rode +his screaming meteor down into the pit. + +"Bats out o' hell!" And now the brood was returning, it must have +seemed. But beneath them, as they passed, that vivid whiteness went +dead. Yet before it changed Danny saw unbelievable things--pools of +molten rock, glaring white through the smoke. + +Up and out at the end of the valley! And Danny gasped for breath even +in the shelter of his cabin's insulated walls. And, used as he was to +the red menace that they fought, he went sick at sight of a message +that spelled itself beside his controls. + +"Ship number six down. Failed to come out." It was signed with the +name of the squadron commander who had followed where he led. + +And the valley! For five miles they had laid a blanket of +non-combustible gases. For five minutes, perhaps, their course could +be seen. And at the end of that time it was as it had been before, and +the flames raged on unchecked. + +His own Chief's number flashed before him; then a message that clicked +across his scanning plate: + +"O'Rourke! Get out of that hole! Nitrogen won't touch it; we can't +pour in enough. It's the same all along the line. We'll have to break +it up--smother it one part at a time. Have you tried your sound +dampener?" + +And Danny O'Rourke had the grace to blush even through the flush that +the fire's breath had given his face. "Forgot it!" he shouted into his +voice sender. "Forgot the ship had the little doodad on it!" + +The Chief responded audibly. "You didn't forget to go first into that +doorway to hell," he said drily. "You fool Irishman, go back down and +try the thing; give the 'little doodad' a chance!" + + * * * * * + +Once more the red ship fell swiftly under Danny's hand. As before, the +valley yawned like the living threat of a volcano in eruption. But +this time, instead of the whining nitro-producers, there came from +beneath the ship a discordant shriek like nothing that the quiet +mountains had ever heard. And Danny's fingers played over a strange +keyboard whose three keys were rheostats, and the crashing discord +below rose to a horror of sound that tore and battered at the ship's +thick walls to set the nerves of the crouching man a-jangle. But his +eyes, watching through a lookout below, saw strange disturbances of +the flames; he saw the masses of flame shiver as if stricken--fall +apart--vanish! + +And he held the sound controls at that same horrendous shriek while +his ship swept on and the thunder of her passing was lost in the +pandemonium that went before. But the valley, when the red ship had +passed, was a place of charred skeleton trees--of gray, swirling +ashes, and of embers, here and there, that blew back to life only to +be smothered by the gases of the ships that followed in his wake. + +And the voice that spoke from the instrument beside him still spoke +drily. "There's fifty miles more of that ahead," said the voice. "Just +keep moving along; we'll mop up behind you.... Oh, and by the way, +O'Rourke, give my congratulations to the Infant on the success of his +invention. His sound-dampener is some little doodad; we'll be needing +more of them, I should say." + + * * * * * + +It was an hour or more later at the Headquarters of the Mountain +Division that the Chief amplified that remark in a way he himself +could not have foreseen. He had been talking to Danny, and now on the +wall of an adjoining room, where men sat at strange instruments, a red +light flashed. + +"We still don't know what started it all," the Chief was saying. "But +it made a fine tryout for Morgan's invention. If I thought you and he +could do it, I would believe you had started that fire yourselves for +a"--his voice rose abruptly to a shout--"Man! There's the red on the +board--a general alarm!" + +"Throw the big switch!" he roared. "Cut us in, quick! Cut us in!" + +Danny O'Rourke, under any ordinary circumstances would have been +hugely amused at the extraordinary sight of the Chief of the Mountain +Division in a ferment of excitement that was near hysteria. But the +flashing of the red that swept like a finger of flame across every +station number of the big board did not mean that ordinary matters +were at hand. A voice was speaking; its high-pitched shrillness showed +that the excitement of the moment was not confined to the office of +the Mountain Division alone. + +"A. F. F. Headquarters, Washington," it shrilled. "General Alarm. +Chicago destroyed by fire. Flames sweeping in well defined paths +across the country. Originated in Mountain Division. Cause +undetermined. Three lines of fire reported; coming east +fast--unbelievable speed.... There! Cleveland has got it; reports a +path of fire has cut across city melting steel and even stone.... Now +Buffalo!... God knows what it is." The voice broke with excitement for +an instant; Danny could almost see the distant man fighting for +control of himself as a maze of instruments about him wrote incredible +things. + + * * * * * + +"Orders!" said the voice now. "All A. F. F. ships report to your +Division Headquarters. Division officers keep in communication with +Washington. Mountain Division send all equipment east. Flying orders +will be given you en route. The country--the whole world--is in +flames!" + +Beside him, Danny O'Rourke heard the voice of his Chief. +"Unbelievable--impossible--preposterous!" His voice like that other +was growing shrill. "The country--world--in flames!" + +But he found voice to snap out a command to a waiting officer in the +doorway of the adjoining room. "Repeat general order. Send all craft +east!" + +To Danny he whispered. "Your 'little doodad'--I wish to heaven we had +a thousand of them now! But what does it mean? Lanes of fire across +the country--whole cities destroyed! What devil's work is this?... +There's nobody who knows." + +But Danny was staring as if he saw through the high, instrument-covered +walls. Back to a valley of flame that was like a doorway to hell, where +rocks, gray with the frosty years, had been melted to pools ... back to +a glinting light where something swift and scintillant had flashed once +in a cloudless sky ... back--far back ... back to a street in a town +half across the world, and a figure of a giant who strode away with a +smile of triumph on his ill-formed face ... but first that giant had +melted his way through walls of stone; and, like the stone, steel bars +and human flesh were as nothing before the invisible heat that come from +a slender rod! + +His own voice, when he moved his dry tongue to speak, came huskily; it +was as if another person were speaking far off: + +"I think you're wrong ... yes, I thing you're wrong, Chief. There's +one man who knows and 'tis myself is that one.... One man--and the +other is a beast like no livin' man on the face of the earth! _He_ +knows--he and the devils he's brought with him!" + + * * * * * + +It was an unsatisfactory interview that Danny had with the Chief. +"You're crazy!" was the verdict of that A. F. F. official when Danny +had finished. "You're crazy, or else--or else--" His voice trailed +off; his eyes were on the moving letters that flashed their message of +disaster in an ever changing procession across the scanning screen on +the wall. + +"... outbreaks have ceased ... tremendous destruction ... no rational +explanation ... meteors, perhaps ... thousands of lives ... no +estimate...." + +There seemed no end to the tale of disaster, and the Chief's voice +died away into silence. If Danny was right he had no words to fit the +unbelievable truth. + +"Get into your new ship," the Chief ordered brusquely, "and take the +Infant with you. I'll send a relief man to his station. Go east--lay +your course for Washington; you'll get other orders on the way!" + +And a half hour later the first rocket ship of the A. F. F. was +blasting its way through the thin gases of the stratosphere eastward +bound. But by now Danny O'Rourke had a more sympathetic listener than +before. + +"In big puddles it was, and lakes! 'Twas still melted, some of it, in +that valley." + +"Why not?" asked the Infant casually. "Radiant heat moves with the +speed of light. We wouldn't think anything of focusing ten million +candle power of light energy into a spot like that. Why not heat? Just +because we haven't learned to generate it--focus it--shoot it out in a +stream like water from a hose--there's no use in denying that someone +else has beat us to the punch." + +The Infant's calm blue eyes were upon the luminous plates of the +ship's microscope where the swift moving terrain beneath them was +pictured clearly. The mountains were behind them now; endless miles of +ripening grain made the land a sea of yellow and brown and, across +that ocean, like the lines of foam that mark the wake of ships, lay +three straight lines of black. + +"Meteors!" sneered the Infant. "Yet if you'd tell your story to some +of these wise men they would die of laughing--and maybe that wouldn't +be a bad idea, either; they will be dying in a way that's a damned +sight more unpleasant unless someone finds how to catch these birds." + + * * * * * + +Ahead of them the lookouts framed blue emptiness. Below, on direct +sight, was but the vaguest blur that meant earth and clouds far +beneath. Only the magnification of the microscope brought out the +details, and on its screen the unrolling picture showed those three +lines broadening and merging to widespread desolation; then the smoke +clouds came between to shut off a world reeking with the fumes of +destruction. An occasional flash of red wings showed where the units +of the A. F. F. were at work. + +They beheld a city, below them--and smoking ruins where three great +gashes had been torn with torches of flame. To Danny there came a +thought that was sickening: it was as if some great three-toed beast +had drawn one paw, red with the blood of helpless humans, ripping +across the bosom of the land. + +His number was flashing on the call board that had been registering +incessant orders to other craft. He cut in on the Headquarters wave. + +"O'Rourke--Mountain Division--Unit Five!" he reported. "Do you get my +voice or shall I send by key?" + +The man at Headquarters did not trouble to reply to the question. His +voice came faint but clear: + +"Number Five--O'Rourke--Orders! If that new ship of yours has any +speed, show it now! Bear on Washington! Get here as quick as the good +Lord will let you! Mountain Division says you've got something good in +that sound-dampener; if you have, we need it now!" + +O'Rourke shot back a crisp acknowledgment; took a reading from two +radio beacons; projected them on the map; and pricked a point at their +intersection. He had his own ship on a line with the Capitol in a +matter of seconds. + +"And there's hell poppin' there, I'm bettin'! That Headquarters lad +didn't tell much--he wouldn't be worth a dime on a newscast--but I +gathered there was somethin' doin'." + +He had spoken more to himself than to his companion who had been a +silent listener to the incoming orders. But the Infant replied in his +own peculiar way. + +"The one you saw," he said inquiringly: "he did his dirty work with a +little rod or tube, you said?" + + * * * * * + +With an effort, O'Rourke brought his thoughts in line with the +question. "Oh, you mean the man-thing I saw in Stobolsk? Yes, that's +right; he had a thing like a gun." + +"And he held it in his hand?" + +"In the big paw that passed for a hand, yes!" + +"All right! Now think carefully, Danny, and tell me: was there +anything fastened to it--a wire, perhaps--a connection of some kind +with the ground?" + +O'Rourke stared at the pink and white face of the cherub who sat with +him in the control room of a rocket-ship that threw itself like a red +meteor across the high skies. "You're a bit of a devil, yourself," he +said wonderingly at last. "How in the names of the Saints did you +know? Yes, there was a wire, and I had forgotten it myself. It hung +down, I remember, from the butt of the thing. But not to the ground. +Infant--you missed it there; 'twas looped back like into the folds of +the damn blue nightie he wore." + +"And then went to the ground," said the Infant imperturbably, +"--through his shoes most likely; or, if the robe was metal, that may +have dragged on the ground instead." + +He smiled seraphically at the bewildered pilot as he added: "That's +all, Danny, for the present. Fly your little tin ship. I've got some +heavy thinking to do." + +Danny heard him ask one cryptic question, but he asked it as one who +knows that only from his own brain can come the answer. + +"How do they get rid of it?" the Infant was demanding. "If they stay +in the air, how do they get rid of the load?" + +And Pilot O'Rourke was glad enough to leave the answer to that one to +the Infant. For had not the Infant alone seen the only reasonable +answer to the puzzle of the mysterious man? And Danny had learned that +it takes a real man and a real mind to track truth to her hiding place +and accept the absurd improbabilities on which truth rests. + + * * * * * + +They were approaching their destination when the Infant opened his +Cupid's-bow mouth to pronounce one additional question. "How high," he +asked, "will your little tin ship fly? I know they've reached just +under a hundred thousand experimentally, but how high will this one +go?" + +"And that's a question neither you nor I can answer, Infant." Danny +was working with careful fingers at tiny levers; their control room +was filled with whining whispers and thin shrieks. "We're goin' down +now," he continued, and again flipped over the switch that would put +him in communication with the Washington office of the A. F. F. + +"O'Rourke--Mountain Division--Unit Five," he said quietly. +"Approaching Washington at altitude sixty-five thousand. Descending. +Orders, please!" + +Within the control room, where the voice of a Washington operator should +have answered on the instant, there was silence. The rocket motor had +been stilled. The two men were suddenly breathless with +listening--listening!--where was heard only the whispering shrillness +from without. The whispering grew as the red ship slanted down into +denser air; it built up in volume; it varied its pitch and timber till +it sounded like echoing voices ... ghostly voices and phantom words ... +like orders from the dead.... + +And Danny O'Rourke found his eyes staring into those of the Infant, +where he read only the confirmation of his own fears. + +It was the Infant who first found words with which to break the +dreadful silence. + +"Headquarters is gone," he said in a strange, dry voice, "wiped out! +They must have got it! It looks as if we were on our own. + +"Where are you going?" he asked. "It's your ship." + +And Danny answered with a single word, though he added other for +emphasis under his breath: + +"Down!" he said quietly. "And be damned to them!" + + * * * * * + +Rolling smoke clouds came to meet them. Danny O'Rourke was watching +his altimeter sharply as he neared the ground. But he glanced more +than once at the smoke. It was shot through with tongues of flame as +they settled down; that was only what might be expected. But Danny was +puzzled by the gray-white whirls that rose through the billowing +smoke, until he knew it for the dust of powdered masonry, and realized +that below him, where great buildings had been, were tumbled ruins. + +Beside his control board a radio warning was telling of approaching +ships. Danny cut in on then on emergency wave-length, and found that +two full squadrons of nitro-ships were at hand with others coming. + +"Let them tend to it!" the pale-faced youngster beside him choked--one +does not see his country's capital destroyed without a tightening of +the throat. "They can cool it with CO_2 and put down a rescue squad, +though what they can do in that furnace is more than I can see." + +Danny nodded mutely; he opened the exhaust to the full, and the +rocket-plane swept out on whirlwinds of raging fire, and smoke, whose +flames reached up even where they flew and licked hungrily at their +ship. + +Jarring explosions sent shudders through their craft. Ahead of them +bright flashes illumined the swirling fumes where bursting shells +marked the destruction of some ammunition stores outside the city. + +And Danny, as he drove his red meteor into the clear air of the upper +levels, was searching the heavens above for the enemy he had expected +to sight down below. He knew now that his mad plunge into the seething +flames was only a blind impulse--an effort to satisfy that demand +within him for a foe upon whom to wreak revenge. + + * * * * * + +Beside him, his companion spun the dial of a receiving set for the +Airnews Service; a voice was shouting excitedly into their cabin: +"... physicists unable to find cause ... no meteoric material seen ... +new rays ... enormous temperatures ... some new and unknown conditions +encountered in space--" + +"Hell!" said the Infant wearily, and snapped off the instrument. +"Meteors! New conditions in space! But, come to think of it, we can't +blame them for being off the trail. You know that the bird that's +doing this flies high and fast ... and when he stops there's nobody +left alive to tell of it!... And don't look for him here." + +"Why not?" Danny demanded aggressively. "This ship isn't armed, but if +I get my sights on that flyin' devil--" + +"You won't," said the Infant darkly. "He's off somewhere discharging +the load he's accumulated." + +He reached for a map, stuck his finger on a point in eastern New York +State. "Let's go there, Danny--and I'd like to get there _right now_!" + +And Danny O'Rourke, who, ordinarily was a bit particular about who +gave him orders, looked at the Infant's blue eyes that had gone hard +and cold, and he swung his roaring ship toward the north and a place +that was marked by a steady finger on the map. + + * * * * * + +New York was a place of flashing reflections far beneath them as they +passed. Danny pointed downward toward the miniature city, where a +silvery river met the sea; where a maze of flaming lights in all of +the colors of the spectrum gave indication of activity at the great +Navy Field. + +"How did he miss it, the murderin' devil?" he asked. "How come that he +hit Washington first? Did he have some way of knowin' that it was the +heart of the whole country?" + +"And why pick on us here in this country? Or are we just the first, +and will he spit his rage over the rest of the world before he's +through? It it the end of the world that's come?" + +To all of which there was no answer. And at last, when New York had +vanished, they came to a smaller city and a broad expanse of roof that +took their wheels. + +Danny followed where his companion led into great buildings and a +place of offices where excited officials stood in knots about +news-casting cones; then they were in a quiet room, in the presence of +a lean-bodied man whose hawklike face turned flinty at some request +the Infant made. + +"What the lad wants, I don't know," said Danny to himself, "but +whatever it is he won't be gettin' it from old Gimlet-eyes." + + * * * * * + +But he saw the Infant write something on a card and he heard him say, +as he handed it to the official: "Send that to the President--_at +once_!" And though the words were hardly audible they had a quality +that brought an instant response; while the written words brought a +portly man who shook the Infant's hand fervently and inquired what +service a great electric company could render. + +Danny heard Gimlet-eyes protesting; heard broken bits of sentences: +"... the great Sorenson tube ... he knows of our disintegrator ... +insists upon our furnishing ... preposterous...." + +The portly man cut him short. "You will give Mr. Morgan whatever he +wishes," he ordered crisply. Then Danny saw him clutch at a desk for +support as still another man appeared at the open door to shout: + +"New York! My God! New York's gone! Burning! The Empire State Building +melted! Crashed!... The whole city is being destroyed!" + +And in the moment of numbness that seized Danny O'Rourke he heard the +Infant say: "How soon can we have it? I want it in our ship--up +above--an hour? We'll be there." But Danny had no further interest in +the Infant's arrangements for obtaining some unknown equipment; he was +plunging through the doorway and running at full speed toward the ramp +where they had descended. + +He knew dimly that the younger man had followed and was crowding into +the cabin after him. Danny, as he locked the port and lifted his red +ship off her guides, was fully conscious of only one fact: that a +hundred miles south a city was being destroyed and that somewhere in +the vast heights above the city he would find the destroyer. + + * * * * * + +The Hudson that had been a thread of silver was no longer bright as +they approached the city at its mouth; burnished now with its +reflection of black smoke clouds and red tongues of flame, it vanished +at last under a mountain of black that heaped itself in turbulent +piles and whirling masses until the winds swept the smoke out over the +sea. + +And high above it all--so high that all clouds were below it--there +hung in a lucent sky one tiny, silvery speck. There was a delicate +steering sight on Danny's ship; he could direct the red craft as if it +were in very fact a projectile that could be controlled in flight. And +under the cross hairs of that sight swung a silvery speck, while the +man who looked along the telescopic tube cursed steadily and +methodically as if in some way his hate might span the gap and reach +that distant foe. + +And then the speck vanished. Danny followed it with the powerful +glasses of his sighting tube; he saw it swing inland--saw it move like +a line of silvery light, almost, swifter in its motion than his +instrument could follow. But even in that swift flight Danny's eyes +observed one fact: the enemy ship was coming down; it slanted in on +that long volplane that must have ripped the air apart like a bolt of +lightning. And Danny's red rocket swept out and around in a long, +looping flight, while he laid the ship on the course that other had +followed. + +"That's one of them," he said savagely; "there must be two more. But +I'll get this one if I have to crash him in air and smash my own ship +right through him." + + * * * * * + +The mind of Danny O'Rourke was filled with only one idea; he had +sighted his prey--the ship in which sat a man-thing who had sent a +terrible death to Danny's fellows. And, though his hands moved +carefully and methodically, though externally he was cool and +collected, within him was a seething maelstrom of hate. All he saw was +that giant figure as he had seen it before; all he knew was that he +must overtake that speeding ship and send it to earth. + +He had even forgotten Morgan; perhaps he was never fully conscious of +his coming from the moment when that other trembling, shaken man had +shouted: "New York! New York's gone!" + +"There aren't two more," the Infant was saying from his seat at the +rear of the cabin: "there's just one. Those three lines were always +parallel except when they widened out: that meant that he had gone up +higher. If we ever see that ship, we'll see three discharge tubes for +the ray." + +Danny O'Rourke turned his eyes that had gone haggard and deep-sunk +with the sights they had seen. He stared vacantly at the Infant. + +"Didn't know," he said thickly, "--didn't know you were here. I'll set +you down; I'll let you out before I ram him...." + +For reply, the other pointed ahead. The red ship had torn through a +layer of thick clouds; Danny was flying below them above a mountainous +world of bare hill-tops and wooded valleys. Directly ahead, hovering +high over a mountain higher than its fellows, was the white craft of +the enemy; Danny, saw it in hard outline against the darker masses of +clouds beyond. He saw that it was motionless, that a slender cable was +suspended for a thousand feet below, and that the end of the cable, +hanging close above the mountain top, was split into a score of wires +that stood out in all directions, while, from each, poured a stream of +blue fire. + +And once more all this that he saw was as nothing to the pilot; all +thought, too, of his fellow victim went from his mind. He could see +only the white ship, doubly hideous because of its seeming purity; +and, as before, he brought the cross hairs of directional sights upon +it while he opened the rocket exhaust to the full. + +But even pilot O'Rourke, with the highest rating in the A. F. F., +could not follow the lightning-swift leap of the snow-white thing that +buried itself in the smother of cloud banks above. + + * * * * * + +Danny set his red ship down on that same barren hilltop; he motioned +Morgan to follow as he stepped out. + +"We're somewhere in Pennsylvania," he announced. "You're stayin' here. +Sorry to dump you out like this, but you'll find a way out. Get to a +radio--call a plane." He held out his hand in unspoken farewell. + +But the other man disregarded it. "What's the idea?" he inquired. + +Danny's reply came in short, breathless sentences. "Going up to find +that ship. Ram it. No use of your getting smashed up, too. Good-by, +Infant; you're a good old scout." + +Danny's mind was all on what lay ahead; he was wildly eager to be off +on the hunt. It took him an instant to comprehend the look from +Morgan's steady, blue eyes. + +"Listen!" the younger man was ordering. "You're not going to do that; +I am! And not just that way, either." + +"Did you see that cable and the electric discharges?" he demanded +excitedly. "It's just as I thought: he accumulates a negative charge; +he has to get rid of it--he's just like a thunder-cloud loaded with +static--and the heat ray does it. I had it figured that way." + +"Remember the little tube you saw before--that's why I asked about the +wire. I knew he would have to ground it without its going through his +body." + +Danny O'Rourke was an intent listener now. When the Infant talked like +this he was a person to be listened to with respect, even if all he +said was not understood. + +"Now," said the Infant with finality, "let's forget this idea of +ramming him. You couldn't hit him anyway; even a cruiser couldn't do +it. If it could you would have radioed for a squadron an hour ago--you +know that." + + * * * * * + +The pilot nodded his acknowledgment. "But, my God, man," he exploded, +"I've got to do something; I've got to try!" + +"We'll do it," was the confident reply, "--or I will. Now we'll go +back to the Consolidated Electric; they will have the Sorenson +disintegrator ready. I'll put it in your machine and--" + +"And what?" broke in the pilot. "Is this some new death ray? We've +been hearing about them for years--just hearing about them. If that's +what you mean, then your idea is all wet; it's worse than mine. I'm +going up." + +Perhaps the younger man saw something of the wild impatience in +Danny's deep-sunk eyes. He laid a restraining hand on the pilot's arm +while he explained: + +"No death ray, Danny--that will come later; we haven't got it now. But +we've got the disintegration of matter--the splitting of the atom, on +something bigger than a laboratory scale. Sorenson did it. There is a +flood of electrical energy poured out--streams of electrons--negative +electricity. It leaves a positive charge that is tremendous if it +isn't neutralized. + +"I said that devilish white thing was like a thunder-cloud; well, I'll +make your ship like the earth; then I'll bring them near each +other--no need to ram him--and it will be like the hammer of Thor--" + +The Infant's words ended in a crackling roar from above. Danny +O'Rourke found his whole body tingling as if he were filled with +stinging sparks; each single fiber of each muscle was twitching. + +A blue light shone eerily overhead. He bent his stiffened, jerking +neck till he could look--till he could see, with eyes that were filled +with flashing fires of their own, other ripping blue flashes from the +ends of outstanding wires, and above him a thousand feet, the belly of +a white ship. + +And through the brain-hammering clatter of the static discharge he +heard the voice of the Infant, whose words came jerkily between the +shudders that shook him: + +"He doesn't dare, damn him! Can't let the wires touch us. Has +to--discharge--in air.... But he'll burn us--afterwards!" + + * * * * * + +"Stand still!" said Danny through stiffened lips. "Don't make a move! +He hasn't seen us, it may be!" + +The crackling discharge had ceased; the rain of miniature lightning +bolts that had shot around them and through them had ended. The cable +had gone up before their eyes and hidden itself in the white ship. The +pilot's eyes clung to that white-bellied thing, so slender and round +and gleaming against the dark clouds overhead; he saw it hang +motionless for long minutes while it seemed that the breath in his +throat must choke him. Then he saw that white roundness enlarge as the +ship settled swiftly down. + +It hung in another moment directly above their red ship. Danny saw +three round holes open in the white shell--the three outlets that the +Infant had predicted. It had descended noiselessly, but now there came +from within a high-pitched whining hum. The dreaded heat and ray! They +were about to see their own ship destroyed! And, as for themselves--! +Danny was still waiting for the first, devastating blast of +intolerable heat, when the ship settled softly down. + +Green port-holes stared at him like eyes. A door was outlined with a +line of black that spread to a round opening as a door swung wide. A +huge door in the side of a huge ship, but it was none too large for +the giant figure that crept through. + +And Danny O'Rourke stared wordlessly at the flat-nosed face above a +robe of chilled steel blue. + +"'Tis him!" he gasped out that the Infant might hear. "The same +one--the devil I saw in Stobolsk!" And if any other identification +were needed it came in the slender rod, whose heavy metal butt was +gripped in the giant's hand. At sight of the wire looping back from +the weapon; at remembrance of the Infant's shrewd guess; and with the +conviction that now this same weapon was to annihilate the only two +men who knew how to combat this destroyer, Danny threw back his head +and laughed--until his harsh laughter died away in a snarl of rage. + +"Go on and do it," he heard, "you ugly devil. You killed those Reds; +you've killed thousands of us since, you murderin' beast! Go on and +kill us, too!" + + * * * * * + +The slender tube was aimed at him squarely. Danny waited to hear the +faint click that would mean his death as the invisible ray sawed into +his body. Instead the huge figure leaned down to stare at the pilot; +then straightened while a crooked smile of recognition appeared on the +deformed face.... And the slender rod moved on--on--in a slow circle +toward the other waiting man! + +It clicked before it reached him. Danny heard it, and "No--no!" he +screamed in a horrible voice. "Run, Infant! Beat it, for God's sake!" + +The enemy was twenty feet away; it seemed as many miles to Danny as he +threw himself at the foe. He did not see the ray strike. He heard only +the Infant's steady voice calling: "Remember Danny--the Sorenson +machine--if you live." + +Then a blast of reflected heat swept upon him, and he felt himself +stifling. There was a pool of molten rock, white and glaring with heat ... +and a puff of smoke, grayish black, and ashes that whirled in the wind that +swept up from the pool.... + +Danny tried to raise himself from the hot stone where he had fallen, +so near he was to the pool of death. He saw the grotesque figure of +the giant move over toward the red ship, look at it, sneer +contemptuously, and turn back to his own ship of doom. He saw the +black entrance swallow the huge foe and he saw the door close, while +the great ship, so innocently white in its sleek slender roundness, +rose again in the air where the clouds took it up. + +And Danny, resting on scorched but unfeeling hands, stared after him +until he got the enemy's direction of flight as he entered the clouds, +then he turned towards a place of glowing rock where the air rose in +quivering waves. + +"You said it, Infant," he whispered; "you knew I was just a fightin' +fool that wouldn't think the way you would. You told me to get the +Sorenson machine--" He brushed at his suddenly blinded eyes with one +seared hand, then turned to stare grimly and appraisingly where the +white ship had gone. + +"And I'm thinkin'," he told the beastly occupant of that carrier of +death, "that you didn't shoot your damned ray quite quick enough. The +Infant beat you to it! He got his message to me first!" + + * * * * * + +How he got to the flat-roofed landing zone of the Consolidated +Electric, Danny, doubtless, could never have told. Nor was he aware of +the hand that set in the forward cabin of his ship a strange machine. +But he growled his instructions: + +"Set it goin'! 'Tis the Infant's orders--I mean Mr. Morgan's. What the +devil it is I don't know, but 'Turn it on!' he told me--'Have them put +it on full!'" And, though a man whom Danny knew only as Gimlet-eyes +stared at him curiously, he reached down to the apparatus, set a dial, +closed a switch here and there, then stepped back. + +But Gimlet-eyes ventured one protest. "You're not grounding it!" he +exclaimed, in a voice that was tinged with horror. "You'll get an +accumulation on your ship that will shoot off like lightning--millions +of volts!" + +"How long would that be takin'?" Danny inquired gruffly. + +And Gimlet-eyes replied, as one who washes his hands of all +responsibility in a rather horrible affair: "An hour--not more than an +hour!" + +"Then I'll just be drivin' around for an hour," said Danny, and +slammed shut the door-port of the red ship. + + * * * * * + +The red rocket drove in slow circles that were a hundred miles across +while that hour passed and the numbness of mind that had held Danny in +a stupor slipped away. For the first time he realized the emptiness of +the world that the Infant had left; he knew with a sharp stab of +self-reproach how much had gone from his life in that instant when he +sprang vainly toward the giant enemy. + +He called himself wild names for his fancied sluggishness. Then that, +too, passed, and at thought of the weapon the Infant had given him and +of the work that lay ahead, his haggard face forgot the lines that +horror had drawn and relaxed into a tired smile that told of a mind +content. + +Gradually his looping whirls had carried him toward the east. Another +city was being devastated by the enemy; that Danny got from the +newscast. Only that and one other message broke the tedious eternity +of that long hour. + +Danny's number flashed on the screen beside his controls. +Unconsciously he answered, but he sat up alertly at sound of his +Chief's voice. + +"I can't get anyone," the voice said. "Headquarters is gone; I just +called you on a chance. And I believe you now, Danny. That devil wiped +out a whole fleet of our planes; melted the cruisers with one shot, +and the scouts couldn't go fast enough to escape. Only one got +away.... + +"But where are you? What's to be done? I've just got here. My God! +What can we do?" + +"Wait," said Danny O'Rourke calmly, and glanced at his watch; "wait +for another ten minutes! He's over Boston now. And he's waitin' there +for me--though he doesn't know it yet. But I'll be droppin' in on +him." + +"Don't be an utter fool, Danny," urged the voice of the Chief; "there +isn't a thing you can do. You try to come down on him, and he'll do as +he did with the cruisers--just slip aside like lightning and nail you +with his damned heat ray when you're below! I'm near Boston now. You +keep away. Where can I meet you? We've got to think--got to do +something!" + + * * * * * + +And Danny, before he opened the switch that ended their talk, said +meditatively: "Like lightnin' he moves ... but he'll have to move +_faster_ than lightnin' to dodge me. And if you're near Boston, stick +around; I'm comin' now, but not to meet you, Chief; I've got another +important engagement. I'm keepin' it for--for the Infant. And give the +Infant the credit, Chief; give it all to him, he's earned it: he's +paid for it in full." Then the snap of a switch cut off the sound of +Danny's voice before it showed a tell-tale quaver. + +It was steady some minutes later, when Danny swept in above the +mounting clouds that he had learned to know. Beneath them invisible +fingers of death were sweeping back and forth where men and women ran +shrieking in terror or waited calmly and dry-eyed for the end. Above +them a slender rounded thing wove its pattern of destruction back and +forth ... back and forth. A spectral ship--a pale phantom, elusive +and dimly seen until it came against the black of rolling smoke from +below. + +But to Danny O'Rourke, slanting down from tremendous heights, the +white shape was never lost. On the cross hairs of his directional +sights the ghostly ship hung, and Danny threw his own red rocket like +a living flame over and down where the white one sensed his coming and +waited. + +Beside him a human voice, high with horror, called to him. "Come +back!" the Chief of the Mountain Division was commanding. "Danny! For +the love of Heaven, turn back!" + + * * * * * + +But the voice was unheard by Danny O'Rourke. There was another voice +speaking ... he could almost see the smiling pink and white face of +one beside him who spoke of his "little tin ship" ... spoke, too, of a +white ship that would be like a great thunder-cloud ... and of his own +screaming meteor that was like the earth ... and there was to be a +messenger of death like the hammer of Thor that would flash between +the two.... + +Danny saw the white one slipping easily aside; the ship was swelling +suddenly before him--it was close ... but the jagged lightning--the +ripping flash of blue that joined the two craft in a crashing arc--was +neither seen nor heard by Danny. Danny was too busy to notice, for he +was engaged in smiling converse with one whom he called the "Infant" +and whose pink and white face beamed gladly upon him "like a damned +little cherub," as Danny was telling him.... + +But the Chief of the Mountain Division who saw all from afar could say +nothing. He only stared from the lookout of his own speeding plane +that framed a picture of two ships; where the red one, flaming from +within, kept on in its swift, straight dive; while the white one fell +slowly, turning sluggishly to show its gashed and blasted sides ... +till the black clouds wrapped them both in a billowy shroud.... + +But clouds are no bar to man's inner vision. And the Chief looked +through, as Danny had done, to see as in a lightning flash a world +beaten to its knees, hopeless, ravaged and scarred--a world where +courage might again be born--a world that would still be a world of +men. + + * * * * * + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Hammer of Thor, by Charles Willard Diffin + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HAMMER OF THOR *** + +***** This file should be named 29202.txt or 29202.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/2/0/29202/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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