Мюррей Лейнстер: The Fifth-Dimension Tube

Five minutes later it began again, and this time the attackers waded out into the softer ooze and flung themselves down, and then began a half–swimming, half–crawling progress behind bits of tree–fern stump, or merely pushing walls of the jellylike mud before them. The white light expanded and grew huge—but it dulled as it expanded, and presently seemed no hotter than molten steel, and later still it was no more than a dull–red heat, and later yet….

Tommy shot savagely. Some of the Ragged Men died. More did not.

"I'm afraid," he said coolly, "they're going to get us. It seems rather purposeless, but I'm afraid they're going to win."

Evelyn thrust a shaking hand skyward. "There, Tommy!"

A strange, angular flying thing was moving steadily across the marsh, barely above the steamlike haze that hung in thinning layers about its foulness. The flying thing moved with a machinelike steadiness, and the sun twinkled upon something bright and shining before it.

"A flying machine," said Tommy shortly. His mind leaped ahead and his lips parted in a mirthless smile. "Get your gas mask ready, Evelyn. The explosion of that thermit–thrower made them curious in the City. They sent a ship to see."

The flying thing grew closer, grew distinct. A wail arose from the Ragged Men. Some of them leaped to their feet and fled. A man came out into the open and shook his fists at the angular thing in the air. He screamed at it, and such ghastly hatred was in the sound that Evelyn shuddered.

Tommy could see it plainly, now. Its single wing was thick and queerly unlike the air–foils of Earth. A framework hung below it, but it had no balancing tail. And there was a glittering something before it that obviously was its propelling mechanism, but as obviously was not a screw propeller. It swept overhead, with a man in it looking downward. Tommy watched coolly. It was past him, sweeping toward the jungle. It swung sharply to the right, banking steeply. Smoking things dropped from it, which expanded into columns of swiftly–descending vapor. They reached the jungle and blotted it out. The flying machine swung again and swept back to the left. More smoking things dropped. Ragged Men erupted from the jungle's edge in screaming groups, only to writhe and fall and lie still. But a group of five of them sped toward Tommy, shrieking their rage upon him as the cause of disaster. Tommy held his fire, looking upward. A hundred yards, fifty yards, twenty–five….

The flying machine soared in easy, effortless circles. The man in it was watching, making no effort to interfere.

Tommy shot down the five men, one after the other, with a curiously detached feeling that their vice–brutalized faces would haunt him forever. Then he stood up.

The flying machine banked, turned, and swept toward him, and a smoking thing dropped toward the earth. It was a gas bomb like those that had wiped out the Ragged Men. It would strike not ten yards away.

"Your mask!" snapped Tommy.

He helped Evelyn adjust it. The billowing white cloud rolled around him. He held his breath, clapped on his mask, exhaled until his lungs ached, and was breathing comfortably. The mask was effective protection. And then he held Evelyn comfortably close.

For what seemed a long, long while they were surrounded by the white mist. The cloud was so dense, indeed, that the light about them faded to a gray twilight. But gradually, bit by bit, the mist grew thinner. Then it moved aside. It drifted before the wind toward the tree–fern forest and was lost to sight.

The flying machine was circling and soaring silently overhead. As the mist drew aside, the pilot dived down and down. And Tommy emptied his automatic at the glittering thing which drew it. There was a crashing bolt of blue light. The machine canted, spun about with one wing almost vertical, that wing–tip struck the marsh, and it settled with a monstrous splashing of mud. All was still.

Tommy reloaded, watching it keenly.

"The framework isn't smashed up, anyhow," he observed grimly. "The pilot thinks we're some of Jacaro's gang. My guns were proof, to him. So, since the Ragged Men didn't get us, he gassed us." He watched again, his eyes narrow. The pilot was utterly still. "He may be knocked out. I hope so! I'm going to see."

Automatic held ready, Tommy moved toward the crashed machine. It had splashed into the ooze less than a hundred yards away. Tommy moved cautiously. Twenty yards away, the pilot moved feebly. He had knocked his head against some part of his machine. A moment later he opened his eyes and stared about. The next instant he had seen Tommy and moved convulsively. A glittering thing appeared in his hand—and Tommy fired. The glittering thing flew to one side and the pilot clapped his hand to a punctured forearm. He went white, but his jaw set. He stared at Tommy, waiting for death.

"For the love of Pete," said Tommy irritably, "I'm not going to kill you! You tried to kill me, and it was very annoying, but I have some things I want to tell you."

He stopped and felt foolish because his words were, of course, unintelligible. The pilot was staring amazedly at him. Tommy's tone had been irritated, certainly, but there was neither hatred nor triumph in it. He waved his hand.

"Come on and I'll bandage you up and see if we can make you understand a few things."

Evelyn came running through the muck.

"He didn't hurt you, Tommy?" she gasped. "I saw you shoot—"

The pilot fairly jumped. At first glance he had recognized her as a woman. Tommy growled that he'd had to "shoot the damn fool through the arm." The pilot spoke, curiously. Evelyn looked at his arm and exclaimed. He was holding it above the wound to stop the bleeding. Evelyn looked about helplessly for something with which to bandage it.

"Make pads with your handkerchief," grunted Tommy. "Take my tie to hold them in place."

The prisoner looked curiously from one to the other. His color was returning. As Evelyn worked on his arm he seemed to grow excited at some inner thought. He spoke again, and looked at once puzzled and confirmed in some conviction when they were unable to comprehend. When Evelyn finished her first–aid task he smiled suddenly, flashing white teeth at them. He even made a little speech which was humorously apologetic, to judge by its tone. When they turned to go back to their fortress he went with them without a trace of hesitation.

"Now what?" asked Evelyn.

"They'll be looking for him in a little while," said Tommy curtly. "If we can convince him we're not enemies, he'll keep them from giving us more gas."

The pilot was fumbling at a belt about the curious tunic he wore. Tommy watched him warily. But a pad of what seemed to be black metal came out, with a silvery–white stylus attached to it. The pilot sat down the instant they stopped and began to draw in white lines on the black surface. He drew a picture of a man and an angular flying machine, and then a sketchy, impressionistic outline of a city's towers. He drew a circle to enclose all three drawings and indicated himself, the machine, and the distant city. Tommy nodded comprehension as the pilot looked up. Then came a picture of a half–naked man shaking his fists at the three encircled sketches. The half–naked man stood beneath a roughly indicated tree–fern.

"Clever," said Tommy, as a larger circle enclosed that with the city and the machine. "He's identifying himself, and saying the Ragged Men are enemies of himself and his Golden City, too. That much is not hard to get."

He nodded vigorously as the pilot looked up again. And then he watched as a lively, tiny sketch grew on the black slab, showing half a dozen men, garbed almost as Tommy was, using weapons which could only be sub–machine guns and automatic pistols. They were obviously Jacaro's gangsters. The pilot handed over the plate and watched absorbedly as Tommy fumbled with the stylus. He drew, not well but well enough, an outline of the towers of New York. The difference in architecture was striking. There followed tiny figures of himself and Evelyn—with a drily murmured, "This isn't a flattering portrait of you, Evelyn!"—and a circle enclosing them with the towers of New York.