Chapter XXXVII: Looking Down

Presently the three men were standing at the door of a vast room, one entire side of which was wide open to the outer air. It was filled by a number of queer, shining objects. At first glance Chick took them to be immense beetles.

The Jan Lucar spoke to the Geos:

“We had best take the June Bug of the Rhamda Avec.”

Watson thought it best to say nothing, show nothing. The Jan ran up to one of the glistening affairs, and without the slightest noise he spun it gracefully around, running it out into the centre of the mosaic floor.

“I presume,” apologised the Geos, “that you have much finer aircraft in your world.”

Aircraft! Watson was all eagerness. He saw that the June Bug was about ten feet high, with a bunchy, buglike body. On closer scrutiny he could make out the outlines of wings folded tight against the sides. As for the material, it must have been metal, to use a term which does not explain very much, after all. In every respect the machine was a duplicate of some great insect, except that instead of legs it had well-braced rollers.

“How does it operate?” Watson wanted to know. “That is, what power do you use, and how do you apply it?”

The Jan Lucar threw back a plate. Watson looked inside, and saw a mass of fine spider-web threads, softer than the tips of rabbit’s hair, all radiating from a central grey object about the size of a pea. Chick reached out to touch this thing with his finger.

But the Geos, like a flash, caught him by the shoulder and pulled him back.

“Pardon me, my lord!” he exclaimed. “But you must not touch it! You--even you, would be annihilated!” Then to the Lucar: “Very well.”

Whereupon the other did something in front of the craft; touched a lever, perhaps. Instantly the grey, spidery hairs turned to a dull red.

“Now you may touch it,” said the Geos.

But Chick’s desire had vanished. Instead he ventured a question:

“All very interesting, but where is your machinery?”

The Rhamda was slightly amused. He smiled a little. “You must give us a little credit, my lord. We must seem backward to you, but we have passed beyond reliance upon simple machines. That little grey pellet is, of course, our motive force; it is a highly refined mineral, which we mine in vast quantity. It has been in use for centuries. As for the hair-like web, that is our idea of a transmission.”

Watson hoped that he did not look as uncomprehending as he felt. The other continued:

“In aerial locomotion we are content to imitate life as much as possible. We long ago discarded engines and propellers, and instead tried to duplicate the muscular and nervous systems of the birds and insects. We fly exactly as they do; our motive force is intrinsic. In some respects, we have improved upon life.”

“But it is still only a machine, Geos.”

“To be sure, my lord; only a machine. Anything without the life principle must remain so.”

The Jan Lucar pressed another catch, allowing another plate to lower and thereby disclose a glazed door, which opened into a cosy apartment fitted with wicker chairs, and large enough for four persons. There was some sort of control gear, which the Jan Lucar explained was not connected directly with the flying and steering members, but indirectly through the membranes of the web-like system. It was uncannily similar to the nervous connections of the cerebellum with the various parts of the anatomy of an insect.

“Does it travel very fast?”

“We think so, my lord. This is the private machine of the Rhamda Avec. It is rather small, but the swiftest machine in the Thomahlia.”

They entered the compartment, Watson took his seat beside the Geos, while the soldier sat forward next to the control elements. He laid his hands on certain levers; next instant, the machine was gliding noiselessly over the mosaic, on to a short incline and thence, with ever increasing speed, toward and through the open side of the room.

The slides had all been thrown back; the compartment was enclosed only in glass. Watson could get a clear view, and he was amazed at the speed of the craft. Before he could think they were out in mid-air and ascending skyward. Travelling on a steep slant, there was no vibration, no mechanical noise; scarcely the suggestion of movement, except for the muffled swish of the air.

Were it not for the receding city below him, Chick could have imagined himself sitting in a house while a windstorm tore by. He felt no change in temperature or any other ill effects; the cabin was fully enclosed, and heated by some invisible means. In short, ideal flight: for instance, the seats were swung on gimbals, so that no matter at what angle the craft might fly, the passengers would maintain level positions.

Below stretched the Mahovisal--a mighty city of domes and plazas, and, widely scattered, a few minarets. At the southern end there was a vast, square plaza, covering thousands of acres. Toward it, on two sides, converged scores of streets; they stretched away from it like the ribs of a giant fan. On the remaining two sides there was a tremendously large building with a V-shaped front, opening on the square. The play of opal light on its many-bubbled roof resembled the glimmer from a vast pearl.

In the air above the city an uncountable number of very small objects darted hither and thither like sparkling fireflies. It was difficult to realise that they, too, were aircraft.

To the west lay an immense expanse of silver, melting smoothly into the horizon. Watson took it to be the Thomahlian ocean. Then he looked up at the sky directly above him, and breathed a quick exclamation.

It was a single, small object, perfectly white, dropping out of the amethyst. Tiny at first, amost instantly it assumed a proportion nearly colossal--a great bird, white as the breast of the snowdrift, swooping with the grace of the eagle and the speed of the wind. It was so very large that it seemed, to Chick, that if all the other birds he had ever known were gathered together into one they would still be as the swallow. Down, down it came in a tremendous spiral, until it gracefully alighted in a splash of molten colour on the bosom of the silver sea. For a moment it was lost in a shower of water jewels--and then lay still, a swan upon the ocean.

“What is it, Geos?”

“The Kospian Limited, my lord. One of our great airships--a fast one, we consider it.”

“It must accommodate a good many people, Rhamda.”

“About nine thousand.”