They passed around the wreckage, following the line of unwrecked planes until their way led to a building. There were many bones here. Many men had died trying to get the machines into the air—too late.
When they reached the building, both turned and looked back at the path of destruction and the two lines of curiously untouched bombers still waiting. The sky they would never again travel was clear and blue with small, clean-cut white clouds drifting across it in patterns. In the west other and darker clouds were gathering. A storm was in the making.
“This,” Arskane pointed down the devastated field, “must never happen again. No matter what heights our sons rise to—we must not tear the earth against each other—Do you agree, brother?”
Fors met those dark burning eyes squarely. “It is agreed. And what I can do, that I shall. But—where men once flew they must fly again! That also we must swear to!”
9. INTO THE BLOW-UP LAND
Fors hunched over the table, leaning on his elbows, hardly daring to breathe lest the precious cloth-backed squares he was studying crumble into powdery dust. Maps—such a wealth of maps he had never dreamed of. He could put finger tip to the point of blue which was the edge of the great lake—and from that he could travel across—straight to the A-T-L-A-N-T-I-C Ocean. Why, that was the fabulous seat He looked up impatiently as Arskane came into this treasure room.
“We are here—right here!”
“And here we are like to stay forever if we do not bestir ourselves—”
Fors straightened up. “What—?”
“I have but come from the tower at the end of this building. Something alive moves at the far end of the field of machines. It is a shadow but it slides with too much purpose to be overlooked by a cautious—”