Spacehounds of IPC by Spacehounds of IPC

Author:Spacehounds of IPC [IPC, Spacehounds of]
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Science fiction, Fiction, Space Opera
ISBN: 9780586039502
Publisher: Panther
Published: 2010-01-21T15:41:48+00:00

All humanity of Callisto, the fourth major satellite of Jupiter, had for many years been

waging a desperate and apparently hopeless defense against invading hordes of six-

limbed beings. Every city and town had long since been reduced to level fields of lava

by the rays of the invaders. Every building and every trace of human civilization had

long since disappeared from the surface of the satellite. Far below the surface lay the

city of Zbardk, the largest of the few remaining strongholds of the human race. At one

portal of the city a torpedo-shaped, stubby-winged rocket plane rested in the carriage of

a catapult. Near it the captain addressed briefly the six men normally composing his

crew.

"Men, you already know that our cruise today is not an ordinary patrol. We are to

go to One, there to destroy a base of the hexans. We have perhaps one chance in ten

thousand of returning. Therefore I am taking only one man—barely enough to operate

the plane. Volunteers step one pace forward."

The six stepped forward as one man, and a smile came over the worn face of

their leader as he watched them draw lots for the privilege of accompanying him to

probable death. The two men entered the body of the torpedo, sealed the openings, and

waited.

"Free exits?" snapped the Captain of the Portal, and twelve keen-eyed observers

minutely studied screens and instrument panels connected to the powerful automatic

lookout stations beneath the rims of the widely separated volcanic craters from which

their craft could issue into Callisto's somber night.

"No hexan radiation can be detected from Exit Eight," came the report. The

Captain of the Portal raised an arm in warning, threw in the guides, and the two

passengers were hurled violently backward, deep into their cushioned seats, as the

catapult shot their plane down the runway. As the catapult's force was spent automatic

trips upon the undercarriage actuated the propelling rockets and mile after mile, with

rapidly mounting velocity, the plane sped through the tube. As the exit was approached

the tunnel described a long vertical curve, so that when the opening into the shaft of the

crater was reached and the undercarriage was automatically detached the vessel was

projected almost vertically upward. Such was its velocity and so powerful was the liquid

propellant of its rocket motors that the eye could not follow the flight of the warship as it

tore through the thin layer of the atmosphere and hurled itself out into the depths of

space.

"Did we get away ?" asked the captain, hands upon his controls and eyes upon

his moving chart of space.

"I believe so, sir," answered the other officer, at the screens of the six periscopic

devices which covered the full sphere of vision. "No reports from the rim, and all

screens blank."

"Good!" Once more a vessel had issued from the jealously secret city of Zbardk

without betraying its existence to the hated and feared hexans.

For a time the terrific rocket motors continued the deafening roar of their

continuous explosions, then, the desired velocity having been attained, they were cut

out and for hours the good ship Bzarvk hurtled on through the void at an enormous but

constant speed toward the distant world of One, which it was destined never to reach.

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