The Turberites had stormed the eastern warehouse depots of what was once Long Island City. Hordes of them began spreading west. It was part of this drive toward our tower-space.
A message now came:
"Turberites making drive in Van Cortlandt tubes toward our main dynamos."
Had they got up that far? It seemed incredible. An attack in the subterranean northern city toward the main lighting plant! If successful it would plunge us into darkness. And these Turberites had obsolete flash lights from my own age, no doubt, with which our forces were not equipped.
I saw upon the mirrors later a few scenes of this attack. The vast buried bowels of the city. The upright girders drilled and set deep into the rocks; the deep-set foundations of the pneumatic lifts; the gigantic sewerage system; the underground traffic tubes; the storage vats of chemicals. Narrow, gloomy tunnels of streets; vertical ladders; pneumatic tubes for freight transfer strung everywhere like capillaries in a section of flesh laid bare.
The Turberites came prowling; and finding the ventilation still working, brought hordes of their fellows.
I saw, in the subterranean city, in a dark open area of tracks on a viaduct beneath the Hudson River, where a hundred or two of the city troops were making a stand. In my day, this was about Dyckman Street.
The city forces had set up a battery of air-cannons on a metal terrace; the missiles rained down; but as though the terrace were some ancient rampart, the Turberites stormed it. Gas bombs were thrown by both sides, but the ventilation cleared the fumes away quickly. The terrace, with its northward underground corridor toward the light plant, was stormed and taken, after a siege of half an hour. A rain of missiles—nondescript chunks of metal thrown by hand; spears and javelins and darts—a cloud of poisoned arrows from a band of Indians posted at a distance; and arrows flaming with fire. Scaling ladders such as firemen of my day might have used came up from below and swarmed with men carrying dirks in their teeth as they climbed.
The terrace was finally carried. The Turberites ran northward to where at some other point the police were making a stand. Or climbed up the spirals into the city overhead. It was difficult to keep track of them. Groups appeared suddenly in many sections well within our safely held areas. They had to be hunted down and killed.