Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 by Various

Author:Various,
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Science Fiction, Post-1930, Periodical, Short Story Collection
Publisher: manybooks.net

CHAPTER XXXVI

The Battle in the Crater

Grantline led us. We held about level. Five hundred feet beneath us the brigand ship lay, cradled on the rocks. When it was still a mile away from us I could see all its outline fairly clearly in the dimness. Its tiny hull-windows were now dark; but the blurred shape of the hull was visible and above it the rounded cap of dome, with a dim radiance beneath it.

We followed Grantline's platform. It was rising, drawing the others after it like a tail. I touched Anita where she lay beside me with her head half in the small hooded control-bank.

"Going too high."

She nodded, but followed the line nevertheless. It was Grantline's command.

I lay crouched, holding the inner tips of the flexible side-shields. The bottom of the platform was covered with the insulated fabric. There were two side-shields. They extended upward some two feet, flexible so that I could hold them out to see over them, or draw them up and in to cover us.

They afforded a measure of protection against the hostile rays, though just how much we were not sure. With the platform level, a bolt from beneath could not harm us unless it continued for a considerable time. But the platform, except upon direct flight, was seldom level, for it was a frail, unstable little vehicle! To handle it was more than a question of the controls. We balanced, and helped to guide it, with the movement of our bodies--shifting our weight sidewise, or back, or forward to make it dip as the controls altered the gravity-pull in its tiny plate-sections.

Like a bird, wheeling, soaring, swooping. To me, it was a precarious business.

* * * * *

But now we were in straight flight diagonally upward. The outline of the brigand ship came under us. I crouched tense, breathless; every moment it seemed that the brigands must discover us and loose their bolts.

They may have seen us for some moments before they fired. I peered over the side-shield down at our mark, then up ahead to get Grantline's firing signal. It seemed long delayed. We were almost over the ship. An added glow down there must have warned Grantline that a shot was coming. The tiny red light flared bright on his platform.

I hissed on our Benson curve-light radiance. We had been dark, but a soft glow now enveloped us. Its sheen went down to the ship to reveal us. But its curving path showed us falsely placed. I saw the little line of platforms ahead of us seem to move suddenly sidewise.

It was everyone for himself now; none of us could tell where the other platforms actually were placed or headed. Anita swooped us sharply down to avoid a possible collision.

"Gregg--?"

"Yes. I'm aiming."

I was making ready to drop the little explosive globe-bomb. Our search-light ray at the camp, answering Grantline's signal, shot down and bathed the ship in a white glare, revealing it for our aim. Simultaneously the brigand bolts came up at us.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.