Tarrano the Conqueror - Cover

Tarrano the Conqueror

Public Domain

Chapter XXXVI: City of Ice Besieged

We were not greatly harmed by this surprise attack; the power house was superficially damaged, but soon repaired. That night--I call it that though the constant weak daylight made the term incongruous--activity showed in the City of Ice.

It came with a vertical spray of light rising from the ice wall which encircled the city. Spreading light beams rising from points a hundred feet apart along the wall. The beams spread fan-shape, so that within fifty feet above their source they met and merged into a thin sheet of effulgence rising into the sky. Tarrano’s barrage.

It seemed then that beyond suicidal sorties of the kind we had just repulsed, Tarrano was planning to stand purely on the defensive. It was our own plan to surround the city with our towers; even those on the further side would be within range of our power house; and with the city thus beleaguered, we would attack the wall from every side at once.

We tested now this barrage Tarrano had thrown up. Sprays of its insulated area came down to protect the wall in front; and protected also the triangular spaces between the sources of the main beams. Tentatively one of our towers approached within range; but our rays only beat into the barrage with the hiss of molten metal plunged into water, and with a burst of interference sparks. Even at a horizontal thousand feet we could do nothing. Then we tried altitude. Our projectors, mounted individually on small platforms automatically controlled to fly without human pilot, went up and we strove to get them over the barrage.

At five thousand feet one went over safely. But the electronic bomb it dropped into the city was an easy mark for Tarrano’s watchful defense rays. He exploded it harmlessly when it was still high above him.

After the next time of sleep we invested the city. Our towers were set in a ring about it, two thousand feet from the wall. They were mobile units, ready to sail forward or back or upward at any moment. Georg stayed in command of the instrument room. It was never placed, but sailed continuously in slow circular flight around the city above our line. The power house remained in its place, with our largest projector mounted on the cliff beside it in order to frustrate any further attacks.

 
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