Air Wonder Stories, December 1929 — page 58: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

= Sy ee ere u RM Ps % 536 AIR WONDER STORIES upon the city around us, we were as cut off from the world: as though upon the moon... Twice each day, at dawn and: at dusk, our door was.opened by the guards that brought our food, that food: being as in our own air-cities: the paste-like synthetic compounds of artificial proteins and fats and carbohydrates which had_-decades before replaced the old natural foods. But though our door was.thus flung open twice each day, there was no: hope of escape for us in that fact. For the two. guards who brought our-food in-to us carried their heat-pistols always in one*hand, and-always, night and day, there-watched in. the corridor outside a full score of. similarly armed guards: by whom one could not hope to pass living toward the-cage-lifts, It seem- ed indeed, as Connell ‘had ‘said, that weeks of frenzied meditation could never disclose any plausible plan of escape, and so I lapsed with him into a state of half- lassitude that had been induced: by our utter despair. And ‘so days passed.. Not-even the prospect of our own deaths which I knew to be looming before us, was sufficient to:rouse me from:that Jassitude, not even the fact that at the end of that fortnight, as I had-guessed, the great attack pf the air-cities was to be: launched upon: the American Federation, and that it was for that reason that our captors had given us that-time, Connell, Macklin, myself—-we three had faced in our time perils.and risks enough, but: so: overwhelming was the doom that hung over us and over our. nation now that it’stunned us, held.us in stupefied despair. But one of us there was that was not so stunned, and that was Hilliard, my young second officer, His eager, restive nature, chafing at our-imprisonment and at the thing that was looming for our land, resisted. stub- bornly the deep. hopelessness-that had settled upon the rest of us, and hour after hour he spent in ‘pacing about the little cell, or in striving to devise some means for escaping from it. And at last, upon the fourth day of our imprisonment there in the tower, he turned suddenly toward us with an eager cry upon his lips. CHAPTER VI A Daring Venture “a HAVE it!” he exclaimed. “A way. that two. of us can win free with—and maybe all! A chance out of millions; with death at the end of it, maybe, but a chance to get Connell and_-his secret-back !” ‘Bat how?” I- questioned. “How can two of. us, even, get clear of this cell?” “The guards!” he exclaimed: excitedly. “The two guards that bring our food each dawn and dusk—if we can overpower them—” “It’s useless, Hilliard,” I-said, “Even if we did overpower them we could not pass the score of other guards in the corridor outside, or the scores of others on its lower floors,” “But listen,” he appealed, and then, as he went. on to detail to us the-plan that he had devised, I felt some slight measure: of hope rising within me,-saw that dawning hope reflected in the faces of Connell and Macklin. “Tt ts a chance!” he exclaimed. “And if we can-do it, if I can get back to our own land, it means.a chance still for the American: Federation! For the European and Asiatic Federations won't be starting their at- tack for another ten-days or more, their preparations not finished till then, and.in that: time by bending every effort toward it our own engineers cotld put the new tube-propellers: in all our American air-cities! Could make those cities able to meet the-enemy cities, attack when=it comes!” . So,. with: that foremost in mind, we swiftly decided that upon that very: evening, when our guards brought our food-at dusk, we would put the plan into operation, would stake everything upon-it. For-even if but two of us could escape by it, if Connell could be one of those two, and could get back across the Atlantic with his tremendous secret, it meant a fighting-chance for our Federation. . And with that in mind the-rest of us were-willing-to take all chances, to dare-all risks. Risky enough, the thing-would be, we knew, all depending uponwhat occurred in one moment of rushing action, and numberless were the features of it-that might go entirely wrong and ruin-us. But we steeled ourselves with the thought of what would become-of our Feder- ation if we failed. And so ready and tense with re- solution we waited for the coming of dusk, To: me, through the remaining hours of that day, it seemed that never had the sun sunk westward so slow- ly. From our window we could see all the activities that went on in the great air-city about us, could see far across all this great mass of towers and streets and thronging crowds which hung here miles in the air above the earth, and could see those activities lessen- ing somewhat as the long shadows of sunset fell across narrow streets and smooth plazas. In the great plaza beneath, at the foot-of that electrostatic tower in which we_were imprisoned, there rested always a number of great cruisers of the European fleet, reporting to the First Air Chief there in the: tower’s base, and now with the approach of night other cruisers from the swarming masses: above the city were slanting down to rest upon the plaza, And these-cruisers we watched with intent gaze as the sunset’s light declined. Outside.in the corridor we could hear the oc- casional movement of feet-as the score of guards there moved about now and then, but heard not the ap- proaching: feet:of the two that brought our food. What if they were not to come upon this evening? Or what if more than two, or less than two, were to come? Either-contingency. would be equally ruinous ‘to our plan; and with the passing of each moment we sat in an increasing agony of expectation, Connell’s eyes burning, Macklin as imperturbable as ever, Hilliard eager and tense. Then at last, when the shadows of dusk. were falling across the great city of the air out- side, were deepening in-our little cell, we heard: voices outside, the greetings of our guards in the corridor, and then a moment later the solid metal door of our cell had: clicked open. _Then into the cell ‘stepped our two usual guards with our food, their heat-pistols ready as always in: their-right hands. The eyes of one warily upon-us, the other took both of the metal containers of synthetic food and reached to place them, as usual, upon the lower bunk-rack, at the room’s right hand‘side. Macklin was lying upon that .bunk-rack having stretched himself out as though sleeping. The rest of us were lounging at the -cell’s other. side, the ‘second guard’s heat-pistol watchfully upon us while the first reached toward the bunk-rack to place the: metal food-containers beside the supposedly- sleeping Macklin’s head. But-as he placed them there, as he began to turn away from it, Macklin’s hands shot suddenly behind his head as he lay there and grasped the arm of the first guard in a single movement, jerking him toward the bunk-rack! Like lightning the second guard turned with his pistol toward that sudden move- ment and: as he did-so, forgetful for the instant of the rest of us, we three had-leaped: upon him! And then as Hilliard and I bore the second guard to the floor,