Invasion - Murray Leinster

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Invasion by Mary Leinster. It was August nineteenth, twenty thirty seven.
The United Nations was just fifty years old. Televisors were
still monochromatic. The Nittics had just won the World Series
in Prague. Compub observers were publishing elaborate figures on moving

(00:22):
specks in space, which they considered to be Martian spaceships
on their way to Earth, but which United Nations astronomers
could not discover at all. Women were using gilt lipsticks
that year. Heat induction motors were still considered efficient prime movers.
Thorn Hard was a high level flier for the Pacific Watch.

(00:43):
Bathelitis was the most prominent of nationally advertised diseases and
was to be cured by ro seventeen, the foundation of
personal charm. Somebody named Nerdlinger was President of the United Nations,
and somebody else named Crassen was Commissar of Commissars for
the compub Hubs. Newspapers were printing flat pictures in three

(01:03):
colors only and deploring the high cost of stereoscopic plates.
And thorn Hard was a high level flier for the
Pacific Watch. That is the essential point, of course. Thorn
Hard's work with the Watch. His job was officially hanging
somewhere above the twenty thousand foot level with his detector
screens out, listening for unauthorized traffic, and the normal state

(01:26):
of affairs between the Compubs and the United Nations being
one of highly armed truce unauthorized traffic meant nothing more
or less than spies. But on August nineteenth, twenty thirty seven,
thorn Hard was off duty, decidedly so. He was sitting
on top of Mount Wendell in the Rockies. He had
a ravishingly pretty girl sitting on the same rock with him,

(01:48):
and he was looking at the sunset. The plane behind
him was an official Watch plane, which civilians are never
supposed to catch a glimpse of. It had brought thorn
Hard and Sylvia west to this spot. It waited now
half hidden by a spur of age eroded rock, to
take them back to civilization again. Its g C General

(02:08):
Communication phone muttered occasionally like the voice of a conscience.
The colors of the mountain changed and blended. The sky
to westward was a glory of myriad colors. Man and
girl high above the world sat with the rosy glow
of dying sunlight in their faces, and watched the colors
fade and shift into other colors and patterns even more exquisite.

(02:31):
Their hands touched, They looked at each other. They smiled queerly,
as people smile who are in love or otherwise not
quite sane. They moved inevitably closer, and then the g
C phone barked raucously. Thorn Hard stiffened all over. He
got up and swung down to the stubby little ship
with its gossamer like wings of cellate, and touched the

(02:53):
report button. Plane two fifty seven a reporting seven ten
line thorn Hard flying on Mount Wendell on leave orders.
He was throwing on the screens even as he reported,
and the vertical detector began to whistle shrilly. His eyes
darted to the dial, and he spoke again. Added, report
detector shows traffic approaching bound due east seven hundred miles

(03:16):
an hour, high altitude correction sixty five miles correction six hundred.
He paused, traffic is decelerating rapidly. I think, sir, this
is the reported ship. And then there was a barely
audible whining noise high in the air to the west.
It grew in volume and changed in pitch. From a wine,

(03:37):
it became a scream. From a scream, it rose to
a shriek. Something monstrous and red glittered in the dying sunlight.
It was huge. It was of no design ever known
on Earth. Wings supported it, but they were obscured by
the blasts of forward rockets checking its speed. It was
dropping rapidly, then lifting rocket's spouted flame to keep it

(03:58):
from too rapid a descent. It cleared a mountain peak
by a bare two hundred feet some two miles to
the south. It was a hundred odd feet in length.
It was ungainly in shape, monstrous in confirmation. Colossal rocket
tubes behind it, now barely trickled vaporous discharges. It cleared
the mountain top, went heavily on in a steep glide downward,

(04:20):
and vanished behind a mountain flank. Presently, the thin mountain
air brought the echoed sound of its landing, of rapid fire,
explosions of rocket tubes, and then silence. Thorn Hard was
snapping swift, staccato sentences into the report transmitter, describing the clumsy,
glittering monster, its motion, its wings, its method of propulsion.

(04:41):
It seemed somehow familiar despite its strangeness. He said so.
Then a vivid blue flame licked all about the rim
of the world and was gone. Simultaneously, the g C
speaker crashed explosively and went dead. Thorn went on grimly
switching in the spare. A very violent electrical discharge went

(05:02):
out from it. Then a blue light seemed to flash
all around the horizon at no great distance, and my
speaker blew out. I have turned on the spare. I
do not know whether my sender is functioning. The spare
speaker cut in abruptly at that moment. It is stay
where you are and observe a squadron is coming. Then
the voice broke off because a new sound was coming

(05:23):
from the speaker. It was a voice that was unhuman
and queerly horrible, and somehow machine like. Hoots and howls
and whistles came from the speaker, wailing sounds, ghostly noises,
devoid of consonants, but broadcast on a wave length close
to the GC band and therefore produced by intelligence. Though unintelligible,

(05:45):
the unhuman hoots and whales and whistles came through for
nearly a minute and stopped stay on duty, snapped the
GC speaker. That's no language known on earth. Those are Martians.
Thorn looked up to see Sylvia standing by the watchplane door.
Her face was pale in the growing darkness outside. Beginning duty, Sir,

(06:05):
said Thorn steadily, I report that I have with me
Miss Sylvia West, my fiancee, in violation of regulations. I
asked that her family be notified. He snapped off the
lights and went with her. The red rocket ship had
landed in the very next valley. There was a glare
there which wavered and flickered and died away Martians, said

(06:26):
Thorn in fine irony, we'll see when the watch planes come.
My guess is com pubs using a search light. Nervy,
the glare vanished. There was only silence, a curiously complete
and deadly silence, And Thorn said, suddenly, there's no wind.
There was not not a breath of air. The mountains

(06:47):
were uncannily quiet. The air was impossibly still for a
mountain top. Ten minutes went by, twenty the detector whistles shrilled.
There's the watch said Thorn in satisfaction. Now we'll see.
And then abruptly there was a lurid flash in the
sky to northward, two thousand feet up and a mile away,
the unearthly green blaze of a hexy nitrate explosion lit

(07:10):
the whole earth with unbearable brilliance. Stop your ears, snapped Thorn.
The racking concussion wave of hexy nitrate will break human
ear drums at an incredible distance. But no sound came though.
The seconds went by. Then two miles away there was
a second gigantic flash, then a third, but there was
no sound at all. The quiet of the hills remained unbroken,

(07:33):
though Thorn knew that such cataclysmic detonations should be audible
at twenty miles or more. Then lights flashed on above,
two three, six of them. They wavered all about, darting
here and there. Then one of the flying searchlights vanished utterly,
and a fourth terrific flash of green. The watch planes
are going up, said Thorn, dazedly, blowing up, and we

(07:56):
can't hear the explosions. Behind him, the g C speaker
barked his call. He raced to get its message. The
watch planes we sent to join you, said a curt
voice he recognized as that of the commanding General of
the United nations have located an invisible barrier by their
sonic altimeters. Four of them seem to have rammed it

(08:16):
and exploded without destroying it. What have you to report.
I've seen the flashes, Sir, said Thorn unsteadily, but they
made no noise, and there's no wind, Sir, not a
breath since the blue flash. I reported a pause. Your
statement bears out their report, said the GC speaker harshly.
The barrier seems to be hemispherical. No such barrier is

(08:38):
known on earth. These must be martians, as the compubs said.
You will wait until morning and try to make peaceful
contact with them. This barrier may be merely a precaution
on their part. You will try to convince them that
we wish to be friendly. I don't believe their martians,
Sir Sylvia came racing to the door of the plane, Thorn,

(08:59):
something's coming. I hear it droning. Thorn himself heard a dull,
droning noise in the air coming toward him. Occupants of
the rocket ship, Sir, he said, grimly, seemed to be approaching.
Orders evacuate the ship, snapped the GC phone. Let them
examine it. They will understand how we communicate and prepare
to receive and exchange messages if they seem friendly, make

(09:21):
contact at once. Thorn made swift certain movements and dived
for the door. He seized Sylvia and fled for the
darkness below the plane. He was taking a desperate risk
of falling down the mountain slopes. The droning drew near
it passed directly overhead. Then there was a flash and
a deafening report. A beam of light appeared aloft. It

(09:42):
searched for and found Thorn's plane, now a wreck. Flash
after flash and explosion after explosion followed. They stopped their echoes,
rolled and reverberated among the hills. There was a hollow,
tremendous intensification of the echoes aloft, as if a dome
of some solid substance had reflected back the sound. Slowly,

(10:03):
the rollings died away. Then a voice boomed. Threw a
speaker overhead, and despite his suspicions, Thorn felt a queer surprise.
It was a human voice, a man's voice full of
horrible amusement, Torn hard, Torn hard? Where are you? Thorn
did not move or reply. If I have not killed you,

(10:26):
you hear me? The voice chuckled, Come see me, Tornhard
der doma force his big yes boot. You can no
more get out than your friends can get in. And
now I have destroyed your phone, so you can no
longer chat with them. Come and see me torn Hard,
so I will not be bored. We will discourse deir

(10:47):
compoobs and bring their lady friend. You may play dear chaperon.
The voice laughed. It was not a pleasant laughter, and
the humming drone in the air rose and dwindled. It
moved away from the mountain top. It lessened and lessened
until it was inaudible. Then there was dead silence. Again

(11:07):
by his accent, He's a Baltic Russian, said thorn grimly
in the darkness, which means com pubs, not martians. Though
we're the only people who realize it, and there starting
a war, and we, Sylvia must warn our people. How
are we going to do it? She pressed his hand confidently,
but it did not look promising. Thorn Hard was on
foot without a transmitter, armed only with his belt weapons,

(11:31):
and with a girl to look after, and moreover, imprisoned
in a colossal dome of force which hexy nitrate had
failed to crack. It was August twentieth, twenty thirty seven.
There was a triple murder in Paris, which was rumored
to be the work of a COMPUB spy, though the
murderer's unquestionably gallic touches made the rumors dubious. Newspaper vendor

(11:51):
units were screaming raucously Martians land in Colorado, and the
newspapers themselves printed colored photos of hastily improvised models in
their accounts of the landing of a blood red rocket ship.
In the widest part of the Rockies. The Intercontinental tennis
matches reached their semi finals in Havana, Cuba. Thorn Hard
had not reported to watch headquarters. In twelve hours, quadruplets

(12:15):
were born in Des Moineses, Iowa. Crassen, Commissar of the
Commissars of the Compubs, made a diplomatic inquiry about the
rumors that a Martian spaceship had landed in North America.
He asked that COMPUB scientists be permitted to join in
the questioning an examination of the Martian visitors. The most
famous European screen actress landed from the morning Transatlantic plane

(12:36):
with her hair dyed a light lavender and beauty shops
throughout the country placed rush orders for dye to take
care of the demand for lavender hair, which would begin
by mid afternoon. The heavyweight champion of the United Nations
was warned that his title would be forfeited if he
further dodged a fight with his most promising contender, and
thorn Hard had not reported to watch headquarters in twelve hours.

(12:59):
He was, as a matter of fact, cautiously parting some
bushes to peer past a mountain flank at the red
rocket ship Sylvia West, lay on the ground behind him,
both of them weary to the point of exhaustion. They
had started their descent from Mount Wendell at the first
gray streak of dawn in the east. They had toiled
painfully across the broken country between to this point of vantage.

(13:22):
Now thorn looked down upon the rocket ship. It lay
a little askew upon the ground, seeming to be partly
buried in the earth. A hundred feet and more in length.
It was even more obviously a monstrosity as he looked
at it in the bright light of day. But now
it was not alone. Beside it was a white tower
reared upward, pure white and glistening in the sunshine. A bulging,

(13:46):
uneven shaft rose a hundred feet sheer. It looked as
solid as marble. Its purpose was unguessable. There was a
huge fan shaped space where the vegetation about the rocket
ship was colored a vivid red in air foess. The
rocket ship would look remarkably like something from another planet.
But near by Thorn could see a lazy trickle of

(14:06):
fuel fumes from a port pipe on one side of
the monster. That tower is nothing but cellate foam, which hardens.
And Sylvia see. She came cautiously through the brushwood and
looked down. She shivered a little. From here they could
see beneath the bowels of the rocket ship. And there
was a name there in the Cyrillic alphabet, which was

(14:29):
the official written language of the Compubs. Here on United
Nations soil, it was insolent. It boasted that the red
ship came not from an alien planet, but from a
nation more alien still to all the United Nations stood
for the Compubs. The Union of Communist Republics, were neither
communistic nor republics, but they were much more dangerous to
the United Nations than any mere Martians would have been.

(14:52):
We'll have some heavy ships here to investigate soon, said
Thorn grimly. Then I'll signal. He flung back his head
hi up and far away, beyond that invisible barrier against
which watchplanes had flung themselves in vain, there were tiny
moats in mid air. These were watch planes, too, hovering
outside the obstacle they could not see, but which even

(15:13):
hexy nitrate bombs could not break through. And very far away, indeed,
there was a swiftly moving dark cloud. As Thorn watched,
that cloud drew close and his eyes glowed, it resolved
itself into its component specks, small two man patrol scouts,
larger ten man cruisers of the air, huge massive dreadnaughts

(15:34):
of the Blue. A complete combat squadron of the United
Nations Flying Forces was sweeping to position about the dome
of force above the rocket ship. The scouts swept forward
in tiny whirling clouds. They sheered away from something invisible.
One of them dropped a smoking object. It emitted a
vast cloud of paper, which the wind caught and swept away,

(15:54):
and suddenly wrapped about a definite section of an arc.
More and more of the tiny smoke bombs released their
masses of cloud like stuff. In mid air, a dome
began to take form, outlined by the trailing streaks of gray.
It began to be more definitely traced by inter linings.
An aerial lattice spread about a portion of a six
mile hemisphere. The top was fifteen thousand feet above the

(16:17):
rocket ship, twenty five thousand feet from sea level, as
high as Mount Everest itself. Tiny moats hovered even there
where the smallest of visible specks was a ten man cruiser,
and one of the biggest of the aircraft came gingerly
up to the very inner edge of the lattice work
of fog and hung motionless, holding itself aloft by powerful
helicopter screws. Men were working from a trailing stage. Scientists

(16:41):
examining the barrier. Even hexy nitrate would not break down.
Thorn set to work. He had come toilsomely to the
neighborhood of the rocket ship because he would have to
do visual signaling, and there was no time to lose.
The dome of force was transparent. The air fleet would
be trying to communicate through it with the Martians they
believed were in the rocket ship. Sunlight reflected from a

(17:02):
polished canteen would attract attention instantly from a spot near
the red monster, while elsewhere it might not be observed
for a long time. But trying every radio wave band
and every system of visual signaling and watching and testing
for a reply, Thorn's signal ought to be picked up instantly.
He handed his pocket speech light receptor to Sylvia. It

(17:24):
is standard equipment for all flying personnel, so they may
receive non broadcast orders from flight leaders. He pointed to
a ten man cruiser, from which showed the queer electric
blue glow of a speech light. Listen in on that,
he commanded, I'm going to call them. Tell me when
they answer. He began to flash dots and dashes in
that quaintly archaic telegraph alphabet. Watch flyers are still required

(17:46):
to learn. It was the watch code call, sent over
and over again. They're trying to make the Martians understand,
said Sylvia, unsteadily, with the speech light receiver at her ear.
Flash flash flash Thorn and kept on grimly. The canteen
top was slightly convex, so the sunlight beam would be spread.
Accuracy was not needed. Therefore, he covered and uncovered it,

(18:09):
uncovered and uncovered it, they answered, said Sylvia. Eagerly, They said,
Thorn hard report At once there was a hissing, roaring
noise over the hillside where the red rocket ship lay.
Thorn paid no attention. He began to spell out, in
grim satisfaction. Rocket ship is look out, gasped Sylvia. They say,

(18:32):
look out, Thorn. Then she screamed. As Thorn swung his
head around, he saw a dense mass of white vapor
rushing over the hillside toward them. He picked Sylvia up
in his arms and ran madly. The white vapor tugged
at his knees. It was a variation of the vortex stream.
He fought his way savagely toward higher ground. The white
vapor reached his waist, it reached his shoulders. He slung

(18:55):
Sylvia upon his shoulder and fought more madly still to
get out of the wide white current. It submerged him
in its stinging, bitter flood. As he felt himself collapsing,
his last conscious thought was the bitter realization that the
bulbous white tower had upheld television lenses at its top,
which had watched his approach and inspection of the rocket ship,
and had enabled those in the Red Monster to accurately

(19:17):
direct their spurt of gas. His next sensation was that
of pain in his lungs. Something that smarted intolerably was
being forced into his nostrils, and he battled against the
agony it produced. And then he heard someone chuckle amusedly,
and felt the curious, furry sensation of electric anesthesia beginning.
When he came to himself again, a machine was clicking erratically,

(19:39):
and there was the soft whine of machinery going somewhere.
He opened his eyes and saw red all about him.
He stirred, and he was free. Painfully, he sat up
and blinked about him with streaming gas irritated eyes. He
had been lying on a couch. He was in a
room perhaps fifteen feet by twenty, of which the floor

(19:59):
was slightly off level, and everything in the room was red,
floor and walls and ceiling, the couch he had lain on,
and the furniture itself. There was a monstrous bulk of
a man sitting comfortably in a chair on the other
side of the room, pecking at a device resembling a
writing machine. Thorn sat still for an instant, gaining strength.

(20:19):
Then he flung himself desperately across the room. His fingers
curved into talons five feet ten, with the slant of
the floor giving him added impetus. Then his muscles tightened convulsively.
A wave of pure agony went through his body. He
dropped and lay writhing on the floor while the high
frequency currents of an induction screen had their way with him.
He was doubled into a knot by his muscles responding

(20:41):
to the electric stimulus instead of his will. Sheer anguish
twisted him, and the room filled with a hardy bellow
of laughter. The monstrous whiskered man had turned about and
was shaking with merriment. He picked up a pocket gun
from beside him and turned off a switch at his elbow.
Thorn's muscles were free. Go back, my friend, boomed the

(21:03):
same voice that had come from a speaker the night before.
Go to Derkauch. You amuse me, and you have already
been useful, but I have no hesitation in killing you.
You are torn hard. My name ees Kreenborg. How do
you do? Where's my friend? Demanded Thorn savagely. Where is she?

(21:24):
Dear lady friend, dear, the whiskered man pointed negligently with
the pocket gun. I gave her a book to slumberin.
There was a niche in the wall which Thorn had
not seen. Sylvia was there, sleeping, the same heavy, dreamless
sleep from which Thorn himself had just awakened. He went
to her swiftly. She was breathing naturally, though tears from

(21:47):
the irritating gas still streaked her face, and her skin
seemed to be pinkened a little from the same cause.
Thorn swung around. His weapons were gone. Of course, the
huge man snapped on the induction screen mean switch again
and put down his weapon. With that screen separating the
room into two halves, no living thing would cross it
without either such muscular paralysis as Thorn had just experienced

(22:10):
or death coils in the floor induced alternating currents in
the flesh itself, very like those currents used for supposed
medical effects in the medical batteries and shockers. Be calm,
said Craneborg, chuckling. I am pleased to have Compigny deces
der Lonni a spot in dei Ruki's It was chosen

(22:32):
for Dreison. But I shall be here for maybe moods,
and now I shall not be loneally the of der
campoobs have sci antific resources such as your fools have
never dreamt of, but there is no scientific substitute for
a pretty woman. He turned again to the writing device.

(22:52):
It clicked half a dozen times more, and he stopped.
A strip of paper came out of it. He inserted
it into the slot of another mechanism and switched on
a standard GC phone. As the paper began to feed.
In seconds, the room was filled with unearthly hoots and
wails and whistles. They came from the device into which
the paper was feeding, and they poured into the g

(23:13):
C transmitter. They went on for nearly a minute and ceased.
Kremborg shut off the transmitter. My code, he observed, comfortably,
giving their good news to Stalliingrad. Everything is going along boutifully.
I roused der fer Sylvia and Kist a few times
to make her scream into a racod, and I interpreated

(23:35):
her screamings into their last code transmission. Your vised men
think their martian have v vsected her. They are concentrating
their entire fighting force of their United Nations outside der
dome of force, and all for a few gieses. Thorn
was white with rage. His eyes burned with a terrible fury.

(23:57):
His hands shook. Kremborg chuckled again, Oh she is unharmed
so far. I have not much time now presently der
toeu of you vilvais leves der time, but not now.
He switched on the g C receiver in the room
filled with a multitude of messages. Thorn sat beside Sylvia, watching, watching, watching,

(24:20):
while invisible machinery whined softly, and Kraneborg listened intently to
the crisp kurt official reports that came through on the
Fighting Force Band. Three combat squadrons were on the spot
now one three and eight four more were coming at
fast cruising speed four hundred miles an hour. One combat
squadron of the whole fleet alone would be left to

(24:41):
cope with all other emergencies that might arise. A television
screen lighted up, and Thorn could see where the lenses
on the bulbous tower showed the air all about filled
with fighting planes hovering about the Dome of Force, like
moths beating their wings against a screen. The strongest fighting
force in the world, helpless against a field of electrical energy.

(25:03):
It is a mussing. Chuckled Kreenbourg, looking at the screen complacently,
der Tomov forces now envihantion. It has heterodyning of one
frequency upon another at pray determined distance. It has all
their properties of meat ray except mass and limit of strength.
There is no limit to its strength boot it cannot

(25:27):
be made except y and sphere. So at Fairst it
seemed only defensive. Viepan with it. We could defy their
United Nations to a tacus, but we wished to do more.
So I propose plan, and I have their honor of
carrying it out. If I fail, Grass and dissevers me.

(25:49):
But I shall not fail, and I shall end as
Commissar for their continent of North America. He looked wisely
at Thorn, who sat motionless. You keep quiet, eh, and
wait for me to say something, and discreet very well.
I tell you we are in sort of a goldfish

(26:10):
globe of electric force. Your air fleet cannot break in.
You know that also if they were in, they could
not break out again. So I d very patiently prayed
the ending to be martian until all your fighting force
has gathered around in radiness to fight me. Bot I

(26:34):
shall not fight. I shall simply make dough an larger
goldfish globe outside of this one. And then I go
out and make faces at their fighting force, of their
united nurturns im preasent between their two of them. And
then their compoop fleet comes in. He stood up and

(26:54):
put his hand on a door knob. Is it not pretty,
he asked blandly. And two vegs der erfleet will begin
to starve, and three dervil be kannibalism unless der compubs,
except der surrender, imagine, he laughed. But do not fear,
my friend. I have Prophisians for a year. If you

(27:18):
are a musing, I feed you. In any case, I
y exchange filled for kises with their charming Sylvie. It
will be a musing to change her from women who
SCRAMs as I kiss her to one who weeps for joy.
If I do not have to kill you, you shall
witness it. He vanished through a doorway on the farther

(27:40):
side of the room. Instantly Thorn was on his feet.
The dead slumber in which Sylvia was sunk was wholly familiar.
Electric anesthesia used not only for surgery but to enforce
complete rest at any chosen moment. He dragged her from
that couch to his own He saw her stir and
her eyes were instantly wide with terror. But Thorn was

(28:01):
tearing the couch to pieces cover pneumatic mattress. He ripped
out a loosely fitting frame piece of steel. Quick now,
he said, in a low voice, I'm going to short
the induction screen. We'll get across it, then out the door.
She struggled to her feet, terrified, but instantly game Thorn
slid the rod of metal across the stretch of flooring

(28:22):
he had previously been unable to cross. The induced currents
in the rod amounted to a short circuit of the field.
The rod grew hot and its paint blistered smokily. Thorn
leaped across, with Sylvia in his wake. He pointed to
the door, and she fled through it. He seized a chair,
crashed it frenziedly into the television screen, and had switched

(28:42):
on the g C phone when there was a roar
of fury from Kraneborg. Instantly there was the splitting sound
of a pocket gun, and in the red room the
racking crash of a hexy nitrate pellet. Nothing can stand
the instant crash of hexy nitrate. Its concussion wave is
a single pulsation of the air, the cellate diaphragm of

(29:03):
the GC transmitter tore across from its violence, and Thorn
cursed bitterly. There was no way now of signaling a
second racking crash. As the second pellet flashed its tiny
green flame. Kraneborg was using a pocket gun, one of
those small, terrible weapons which shoot a projectile barely larger
than the graphite of a lead pencil, but loaded with

(29:24):
a fraction of a milligram of hexy nitrate. Two hundred
charges would feed automatically into the bore as the trigger
was pressed. Thorn gazed desperately about for weapons. There was
nothing in sight to gain the outside world. He had
to pass before the doorway through which the bullets had come,
and suddenly Thorn seized the code writer and the device
which transmitted that code as a series of unearthly noises

(29:47):
which the world was taking for martian speech. He swung
the two machines before the door in a temporary barrier.
Whatever else Kreenborg might be willing to destroy, he would
not shoot into them. Thorn madly passed the door as
Kramborg roared with rage again. He paused only to hurl
a chair at the two essential machines, and as they

(30:08):
dented and toppled, he fled through the door and away.
Sylvia appeared anxiously at him from behind a huge boulder.
He raced toward her, expecting every second to hear the
spitting of Kraanborg's pocket gun. With the continuous fire stud down,
the little gun would shoot itself empty in forty five seconds,
during which time Kramborg could play it upon him like

(30:28):
a hose that spouted death. But Thorn had done the
hundred yards in eleven seconds years before. He bettered his record. Now.
The first of the little green flashes came when he
was no more than ten yards from the boulder, which
sheltered Sylvia. The tiny pellet had missed him by inches
three more, and he was safe from pursuit. But we've

(30:49):
got to get away, he panted. He can shoot gas
here and get us again. He can cover four hundred
yards with gas, and more than that with guns. They
fled down a tiny water course, midget figures in an
infinity of earth and sky, scurrying frenziedly from a red
sluglike thing that lay askew in a mountain valley. Far
away and high above hung the war plains of the

(31:11):
United Nations, big ones and little ones, hovering in hundreds
about the outside of the dome of force. They could
neither penetrate nor understand. A quarter of a mile a
half a mile, there was no sign from Kraneborg or
the rocket ship. Thorn panted. He can't reach us with
gas now, and it looks like he doesn't dare use
a gun. They'd know he wasn't a martian at night.

(31:34):
He'll use that helicopter, though, If we can only make
those ships see us, They toiled on. The sun was
already slanting down toward the western sky at four by
the sun Thorn could point to a huge air dreadnought
hanging by lazily revolving gyros, barely two miles away. He
waved wildly frantically, but the big ship drifted on unseeing.

(31:57):
The fighting force was no longer looking for Thorn and Sylvia.
They had been carried into the rocket ship fourteen hours
and more before. Sylvia's screaming had been broadcast with the
weird hoots and whistles the United Nations believed to be
the language of interplanetary invaders the United Nations believed them dead.
Now a watch was being kept on the rocket ship

(32:18):
to be sure, but it was becoming a matter of fact,
sort of vigilance, pending the arrival of the rest of
the fighting force and the cracking of the Dome of
Force by the scientists who worked on it night and day.
On level ground, Thorn and Sylvia would have reached the
edge of the dome in an hour. Here they had
to climb up steep hillsides and down precipitous slopes. Four

(32:39):
times they halted to make frantic efforts to attract the
attention of some nearby ship. It was six when they
came upon the rim. There was no indication of its existence,
save that three hundred yards from them, boughs waved and
leaves quivered in a breeze. Inside the dome, the air
was utterly still. There it is panted Thorn. Wearied and

(33:00):
worn out as they were, they hurried forward, and abruptly
there was something which impeded their movements. They could reach
their hands into the impalpable barrier for one foot two
or even three, but an intolerable pressure thrust them back.
Thorn seized a sapling and ran at the barrier as
if with a spear. It went five feet into the

(33:21):
invisible resistance and stopped, shot back out as if flung
back by a jet of compressed air. He told the truth,
groaned Thorn. We can't get out. Long shadows were already
reaching out from the mountains. Darkness began to creep upward
among the valleys. Far far away, a compact dark cloud
appeared a combat squadron. It swept toward the dome and

(33:45):
disassociated into a myriad specks, which were aircraft. The flyers,
already swirling about the invisible dome, drew aside to leave
a quadrant clear, and Combat Squadron seven merged with the rest,
making the pattern of dancing specks mark denser with a fire,
said Thorn, desperately. They'll come, of course, But Creambourg took

(34:06):
my lighter, Sylvia said, hopefully. Don't you know some way
rubbing sticks together? I don't, admitted Thorn grimly, but I've
got to try to invent one. While i'm at it.
You watch for flyers. He searched for dry wood. He
rubbed sticks together. They grew warm, but not enough to smoke,
much less to catch. He muttered a drill. That's the idea,

(34:31):
all the friction in one spot. He tugged at the
ring under his lapel, and a parachute fastened into his
uniform collars shot out in a billowing mass of gossamer silk,
flung out by the powerful elastics designed to make its
opening certain savagely. He tore at the shrouds and had
a stout cord. He made a drill and revolved it

(34:51):
as fast as he could with the cord. A second
dark cloud swept forward in the gathering dusk and merged
into the mass of fliers about the dome. Five minutes later,
a third dense. As the air traffic was riding, lights
were necessary. They began to appear in the deepening twilight.
It seemed as if all the sky were alight with

(35:11):
fireflies whirling and swirling and fluttering here and there. But
then the fire drill began to emit. A tiny wisp
of smoke. Thorn worked furiously. Then a tiny flickering flame appeared,
which he nursed with a desperate solicitude. Then a larger flame,
then a roaring blaze. It could not be missed. A

(35:32):
fire within the dome could not fail to be noted
and examined. Instantly, a searchlight beam fell upon them, illuminating
him in a pitiless glare. Thorn waved his arms frantically.
He had nothing with which to signal save his body.
He flung his arms wide and up and wide again,
in an improvised adaptation of the telegraphic alphabet to gesticulation.

(35:55):
He sent the watch call over and over again. A
little cloud of riding light swept toward dome from an
infinite distance away. Darkness was falling so swiftly that they
were still merely specks of light as they swept up
to and seemed to melt into the swirling, swooping mass
of flyers about the dome. Cold sweat was standing out

(36:16):
on Thorn's face. Despite the violence of his exertions, he
was even praying a little, and suddenly the search light
beam flickered a welcome answer, we understand report. Thorn flung
his arms about madly, sending get away quick, calm pubs

(36:39):
here will make other dome outside to trap you. The
searchlight beam upon him flickered, an acknowledgment. He knew what
was happening. After that, the GC phones would flash the
warning to every ship and every ship would dash madly
for safety. A sudden, concerted quiver seemed to go over

(37:01):
the whirling maze of lights, aloft a swift, simultaneous movement
of every ship in flight. Thorn breathed an agonized prayer.
There was a flash of blue light. For one fractional
part of a second, the stars and skies were blotted out.
There was a dome of flame above him, and all
about the world of bright blue flame, which instantly was

(37:23):
and instantly was not. Then there was a ghastly blast
of green hexy nitrate going off in this glare where
silhouetted a myriad motes in flight, but there was no noise.
A second flare, and then Thorn, hard groaning, saw flash
after flash after flash of green monster explosions, colossal explosions,

(37:45):
terrific detonations which were utterly soundless, as the ships of
the fighting Force in flight from the menace of which
Thorn had worn them, crashed into an invisible barrier and
exploded without cracking it. It was August twenty fourth, twenty
thirty sive. For three days now seven of the eight
great combat squadrons of the United Nations Fighting Forces had

(38:05):
been prisoners inside a monstrous, transparent dome of force. There
was a financial panic of unprecedented proportions in the great
financial districts of New York and London and Paris. Martial
law was in force in Chicago, in Prague, in Madrid,
and in Buenos Aires. The compubs were preparing an ultimatum
to be delivered to the government of the United Nations.

(38:27):
Thorne and Sylvia were hunted fugitives within the inner Dome
of Force, which protected the red rocket ship from the
seven combat squadrons it had imprisoned. Newspaper vendor units were shrieking,
air fleets still trapped, and a prominent American politician was
promising his constituents that if a foreign nation dared invade
the sacred territories of the United Nations, a million embattled

(38:49):
private plains would take to the air, and he seemed
not to be trying to be humorous. Scientists were wringing
their hands in utter helplessness before the incredible resistance of
the dome. It had been determined that the dome was
a force field which caused particles charged with positive electricity
to attempt to move in a right hand direction about
the source of the field and particles charged with negative

(39:11):
electricity to attempt to move in a left handed direction.
The result was that any effort to thrust an external
object into the field of force was an attempt to
tear the negatively charged electrons of every atom of that
substance free from the positively charged protons of nuclei. An
object could only be passed through the field of force
if it ceased to exist as matter, which was not

(39:33):
an especially helpful discovery, and thorn Hard and Sylvia were
still hunted fugitives inside the inner dome. The sun was
an hour high when the helicopter appeared to hunt for them.
By day after the first time, they had never dared
light a fire because Greenborg in the helicopter searched the
hills for a glow of light, But this day he

(39:55):
came searching for them. By day, thorn had speared of
fish for Sylvia with his SI stick he had sharpened
by rubbing it on a crumbling rock. He was working
discouragedly on a little contrivance made out of a forked
stick and the elastic from his parachute pack. He was
haggard and worn and desperate. Sylvia was beginning to look
like a hunted wild thing. Two hundred yards from them,

(40:18):
the most formidable fighting force the world had ever seen
littered the earth with gossamer seeming cellate wings and streamlined
bodies at all angles to each other, and it was
completely useless. The least of the weapons of the air
fleet would have been a godsend to Thorn and Sylvia.
To have had one ship, even the smallest where they were,
would have been a godsend to the fleet. But two

(40:41):
hundred yards, with the dome of force between made the
fleet just exactly as much protection for Sylvia as if
it had been a million miles away. The droning hum
of the helicopter came across the broken ground, now louder,
now momentarily muted, its moments of loudness, grew steadily more strong.
It was coming nearer. Thorn gripped his spear in an instinctive,

(41:02):
utterly futile gesture of defense. Sylvia touched his hand. We'd
better hide, they hid. Thick brush concealed them utterly. The
helicopter went slowly overhead, and they saw Kremborg gazing down
at the earth below him. Nearly overhead, he paused, and
suddenly Thorn groaned under his breath. It's the flagship, he

(41:23):
whispered hoarsely to Sylvia. Ah, what fools we were. The
flagship he knows the General would have brought it to
earth opposite us to question us. The flagship was nearly
opposite to find. The flagship was more or less to
find where Thorn and Sylvia hid, but they had not
realized it until now. The speaker in the helicopter boomed

(41:45):
above their heads. Ah, my friends, I think you hear me.
Answer me, I have offair to make shivering, Sylvia pressed
close to thorn der compub fleet, saunder Vay said Cranebourg, chuckling.
Seven eights of their United Nations fleet is just outside.

(42:07):
You have observed it. In six hours their campup fleet
begins their conquiest of their country and their execution of
persons most antagonistic to our Rejim. But I have still
very vegx of keeping their air fleet prisoner. Who deal
its personnel is too veak from staffation to offer racistance

(42:28):
to our soldiers. So I'll make their offer come and
vile away their very ars for me, and I accept
you both from their executions. I shall find it necessary
to decree refuse, and I get you anyhow, and you
vill regret your refusal very much. Thorn's teeth ground together.

(42:51):
Sylvia pressed close to him. Don't let em get me, Thorn,
she panted hysterically. Don't let em get me. The droning
monotony is hummed of the helicopter over their heads continued.
The little flying machine was motionless, The air was still.
There was no other sound in the world silence save
for the droning hum of the helicopter. Then something dropped.

(43:13):
It went off with an inadequate sort of explosion, and
a cloud of misty white vapor reared upward on a
hillside and began to settle, slowly spreading out. The helicopter moved,
and other things dropped, making a pattern the air still,
said Thorn, quite grimly, That stuff seems to be heavier
than air. Its flowing down hill toward the dome wall.

(43:34):
It will be here in five minutes. We've got to move.
Sylvia seemed to be stricken with terror. He helped her
to her feet. They began to move toward higher ground.
They moved with infinite caution in the utter silence of
this inner dome. Even the rustling of a leaf might
betray them. It was the presence of the air fleet
within clear view that made the thing so horrible. The

(43:57):
defenders of a nation were watching the enemy of a nation,
and they were helpless to offer battle. The helicopter hummed
and droned, and Craneborg grinned and searched the earth below
him for a sign of the man and girl who
had been the only danger to his plan, and now
were unarmed fugitives. And there were four air dreadnoughts in
plain sight, and five thousand men watching, and Kreenborg hunted

(44:21):
for sport a comrade. Of the five thousand men and
a woman, every one of them would have risked or
sacrificed his life to protect. He seemed certain that they
were below him. Presently he dropped another gas bomb, and another,
and then Sylvia stumbled and caught at something, and there
was a crashing sound as a sapling wavered in her grasp,

(44:42):
and Thorn picked her up and fled madly, but billowing
white vapors spouted upward before him. He dodged it, and
the helicopter was just overhead, and more smoke spouted, and
more and more they were hemmed in, and Sylvia clung
close to Thorn and sobbed five thousand men and in
a thousand grounded aircraft shouted curses that made no sound.

(45:04):
They waved weapons that were utterly futile. They were as
impotent as so many ghosts. Their voices made not even
the half heard whisper one may attribute to a phantom.
The fog vapor closed over Thorn and Sylvia as Kraneborg
grinned mockingly at the raging men without the dome of force.
He swept the helicopter to a position above the last

(45:25):
view of Thorn and Sylvia, and the downward beating screws
swept away the foggy gas. Thorn and Sylvia lay motionless,
though Thorn had instinctively placed himself in a position of defense.
Above her, the fighting force of the United Nations watched
raging while Kranborg descended deliberately into the area. The helicopter
screws kept clear while he searched Thorn's pockets reflectively and

(45:49):
found nothing more deadly than small pebbles which might strike sparks,
and a small forked stick. While he grinned mockingly at
the raging armed men and made triumphant just sticulations before
carrying Sylvia's limp figure to the helicopter. While the little
ship rose and swept away toward the rocket plane, it
descended and was lost to view. Thord lay motionless on

(46:13):
the earth. Seven eighths of the fighting force of the
United Nations was imprisoned within the space between two domes
of force. No matter could penetrate. A ring two miles
across and ten miles in outer diameter held the whole
fleet of the United Nations paralyzed. There was sheer panic
throughout the Americas and Europe, and the few outlying possessions

(46:33):
of the United Nations. And it was at this time,
with a great fleet already half way across the Pacific,
that the Compubs declared war in a fine gesture of
ironic politeness. It was within half an hour of this
time that the seventh Combat Squadron, the only one left unimprisoned,
dived down from fifty thousand feet into the middle of
the Compub fleet and went out of existence. In twenty

(46:56):
minutes of such carnage as is still stuff for epics.
The seventh Squadron died, but with it died not less
than three times as many of the foe, and then
the com pub Fleet came on. Most of the original
force remained, surely enough to devastate an undefended nation, to
shatter its cities and butcher its people, to slaughter its

(47:17):
men and enslave its women, and leave as shambles and
smoking ash heaps where the very backbone of resistance to
the red flag had been. It was twenty minutes before
Thorn hard stirred. His lungs seemed on fire, his limbs
seemed lead, his head reeled and rocked. He staggered to
his feet and stood there, swaying dully. A vivid light

(47:38):
brighter than the sunshine played upon him from the flagship
of the fleet, which now was helpless to defend its nation.
Thorn's befogged brains stirred dazedly as the message came compub
Fleet on way seventh Combat Squadron wiped out nation defenseless.
You are only hope, for God's sake, Try something anything,

(48:03):
Thorn roused himself. By a terrific effort. He managed to
ask a question by exhausted gestures in the watch visual alphabet.
Kraneborg took her to rocket ship came the answer. She
recovered consciousness before being carried inside, and Thorn, reeling on
his feet and unarmed and alone, turned and went staggering

(48:23):
up a hillside toward the rocket ship's position. He could
only expect to be killed. He could not even hope
for anything more than to ensure that Sylvia also die mercifully.
Behind him, he left an unarmed nation awaiting devastation, with
a mighty air fleet speeding toward it at six hundred
miles an hour. As he went, though, some strength came
to him. The fury of his toil forced him to

(48:46):
breathe deeply, cleansing his lungs of the stupefying gas, which,
because it was visible as a vapor, had been carried
in the rocket ship. A visible gas was, of course,
more consistent with the early pretense that the rocket ship
bore invaders from another planet. And Thorn became drenched with sweat,
which aided in the excretion of the poisonous stuff. His

(49:07):
brain cleared, and he recognized despair and discounted it, and
began to plan grimly to make the most of an
infinitesimal chance. The chance was simply that Kraneborg had ransacked
his pockets and ignored a little forked stick. Scrambling up
a steep hillside with his face hardened into granite, Thorn
drew that from his pocket. Again, crossing a hill top,

(49:30):
he stripped off his coat. He traveled at the highest
speed he could maintain, though it seemed painfully deliberate. An
hour after he had started, he was picking up small,
round pebbles wherever he saw them in his path. By
the time the tall, bulbous tower was in sight, he
had picked up probably sixty such pebbles, but no more
than ten of them remained in his pockets. They, though,

(49:51):
were smooth and round, and even perhaps an inch in diameter,
and all very nearly the same size, and he carried
a club in his hand. He went down the last
slope openly. The television lenses on the tower would have
picked him out in any case, if Kremborg had repaired
the screen. He went boldly up to the rocket ship Kreenborg.

(50:12):
He called Kreenborg. He felt himself being surveyed. A door
came open, Kreenborg stood chuckling at him, with a pocket
gun in his hand. Ah, just in time, my friend,
I have been very busy. Der campub fleet is just
due to pass and refew above der Verkimiuni did nations

(50:33):
combat squadrons. I have been keeping them last minute information
and assurance that der Dom's a force are solid and
can hold for effort. I have a few minutes to spare,
which I had intended to der Foot to dr fair
Silfia Bot, what do you fish, I'm offering you a bribe,

(50:54):
sent Thorn, his face, A mask, A billion dollars an
immunity to cut off the outer dome force. Kreenborg grinned
at him. It is too late. Besides being traitor, I
would be assassinated instantly. Also, I shall be Commissar for
North America anyhow, two billion, said Thorn, without expression. No,

(51:19):
said Krenborg amusedly. Throw away their club. I shall amuse myself.
Vit you, Tornhart. You shall vatch their progress of romance
between me and Sylvia. Throw away their club. The pocket
gun came up. Thorn threw away the club. What you want?
If two billions not enough, emusemient, said Kreenborg jovially. I

(51:45):
shall be bored in this inner tom waiting for der
air fleet to starve. I wish emusemient and I shall
get it. Come inside. He backed away from the door,
his gun trained on Thorn, and Thorn saw that the
continuous fire stud was down. He walked composedly into the
red room in which he had once awakened. Sylvia gave

(52:06):
a little choked cry at the sight of him. She
was standing desperately defiant on the other side of the
induction screen area on the floor. There was a scorched
place on the floor where Thorn had shorted that screen,
and the bar of metal had grown red hot. Kreenborg
threw the switch and motioned Thorn to her. I do
not bother to search you for weapons, he said dryly.

(52:30):
I died eat so short a time ago, and you
had only club. Thorn walked stiffly beside Sylvia. She put
out a shaking hand and touched him. Kreenborg threw the
switch back again. De screeny son, he chuckled, consoliate ya
their children. I am glad you came, Thornhart the watch

(52:51):
der grandrifew of der campob fleet den I tearn little
in fiencin of my nupanyo. It is heathree of very
limatier range. It will be my matode of wooing der
fair Sylvia. Then she sees you in torment. She kisses
me sweetly for their privilege of stopping their heat ray.

(53:13):
I count upon you, my friend, to plead with her
to grant me their most extravagant of concissions. Then their
heat ray is searing their flesh from your bones. I
feel that she is soft hearted enough to oblige you. Yes,
he touched a button, and the repaired television screen lighted up.

(53:34):
All the dome of mountains and sky was visible in it.
There were dancing motes in sight which were aircraft. I
have removed all meatl work from that side of their room,
added Cranebourg comfortably, so I can't dare to turn my back.
You cannot short their induction screen again. That was clever,

(53:56):
But you faced scientists torn hard. You have lost. A
sudden surge of flying craft appeared on the television screen.
The grounded fleet of the United Nations was taking to
the air again in the narrow two mile strip between
the two domes of force. It swirled up and up.
Kreenborg frowned. Now, vats dear idea of dot, he demanded.

(54:19):
He moved closer to the screen. The pocket gun was
left behind five feet from his finger tips. Torn hard,
you vill explain it, they hope, said Thorn grimly. Your
fleet can make gaps in the dome to shoot through.
If so, they'll go out through those gaps and fight foolish,
said Kreenborg. Blandly der only viepen vihaff to us his

(54:42):
deter normal metiabolism of der humann sistorm hunger. Thorn reached
into his pocket. Kreenborg was regarding the screen absorbedly through
the haze of flying dots which was the United Nation's fleet,
a darkening spot till westward became visible. It drew nearer
and grew larger. It was dense, It was huge, It

(55:03):
was deadly. It was the compub battle fleet, nearly equal
to the imprisoned ships in number. It swept up to
view its helpless enemy. It came close so every man
could see their only possible antagonists rendered impotent. Such a
maneuver was really necessary when you think of it. The
compub fleet had encountered one combat squadron of the United

(55:24):
Nations fleet, and that one squadron dying had carried down
three times its number of enemies. It was necessary to
show the Compub personnel the rest of their enemies imprisoned,
in order to hearten them for the butchery of civilians
before them. Kranborg guffawed as the Compub fleet made its
mocking circuit of the invisible dome, and Thorn raised his head. Kranborg,

(55:48):
he said, grimly. Look. There was something in his tone
which made Kreinborg turn and Thorn held a little forked
stick in his hand. Turn off the induction screen, or
I kill you. Kraenborg looked at him and chuckled. It
is bluff, my friend, he said dryly. I have seen
many viapens. I am scientist. You played their game of poker.

(56:10):
You try bluff, but I answer you vittrhitrae. He moved
his great bulk and Thorn released his left hand. There
was a sudden crack on Kreanborg's side of the room.
A pebble a little over an inch in diameter fell
to the floor. Kraenborg wavered and toppled and fell three
times more, his face merciless. Thorn drew back his arm

(56:32):
and three times Kreenborg's head jerked slightly. Then Thorn faced
the panel on which the induction screen switch was placed.
Several times, he thrust his hand through the screen and
abruptly drew it back with pain, in an attempt to
throw the switch. At last, he was successful, and now
he walked calmly across the room and bent over the
motionless kreenborg skull fractured. He said, grimly, all right, Sylvia.

(56:57):
He went through the narrow doorway beyond, picking up the
pocket gun. As he went. There was a noise of
whining machinery. Now Thorn was emptying pellets into the mechanism
that controlled the dome of Force. There was a crashing
of glass. It stopped. There were blows and thumpings. That
noise stopped too. Thorn came back, his eyes glowing. He

(57:18):
flung open the outer door of the rocket ship, and
Sylvia went with him. He pointed far away, the fighting
force of the United Nations was swirling upward, like smoke
from a campfire or winged dance from a tree stump.
They went up in a colossal, twisting spiral, beyond the domes,
and above them. The domes existed no longer, up and

(57:39):
up and up, And then they swooped down upon the
suddenly fleeing enemy, vengefully, savagely, with all the fury of men,
avenging not only what they have suffered, but also what
they have feared. The combat squadrons of the United Nations
fell upon the invaders. Green hexy nitrate explosions lighted up
the sky. Ear cracking detonations reverberate among the mountains. There

(58:01):
was battle there, and death and carnage and utter destruction.
The roar of combat filled the universe. Thorn closed the
door and looked down at Kramborg, who breathed stentoriously, his
mouth foolishly open. Our men will be back for us,
he said shortly. We needn't worry. Then he said, huh.

(58:22):
He called himself a scientist, and he didn't know a
slingshot when he saw one. But then Thornhard dropped a
weapon made of a forked stick and strong elastic from
his shoot pack and caught Sylvia hungrily in his arms.
And of Invasion by Mary Leinster