"We've done it at last!" he sighed.
"I always knew we would," Cecil said complacently. "Wait 'til tonight."
Ecstatically the two got up and left, intent on the preparations for the coming disaster.
"Those two haven't got a decent impulse to split between them," Toffee said.
"And I invented this thing!" Marc said wretchedly. "I'm as guilty as if I were bombing the city myself. I wish I were dead!"
"You will be," Toffee said, "if something doesn't happen. I heard them talking last night. They've decided not to give you any food today. After they've fired the bomb, they're going to let you float off into space with everything else." She closed her eyes against the thought. "We've got to get out of here and stop this thing." She looked at Marc imploringly. "Can't you go to sleep?"
"They've been giving me all those powders."
"If only that supernatural serpent would just show himself," Toffee said. "I'm sure we could talk George into something if we just had the chance and enough time."
After that they fell silent, lost in a mood of black desolation. Outside the sky failed to produce the full promise of day; the grey dawn lingered and became a dark storm color. Gerald left his work long enough to throw the levers that closed the metal coverings over the turrets. A moment later rain could be heard splattering against them. The tangled shadows of the fantastic equipment grew darker and more formidable under the glare of the overhead worklights. Toffee looked at Marc, and for the first time the dullness of true despair was in her green eyes.
"We've got to get out of here, Marc," she said. "We've got to!"