The days and nights were busy and productive, though not as productive as he wished. The Neshgai looked so elephantine, they seemed above such human traits as pettiness, jealousy, graft, competition for prestige and money and position, backbiting, and just plain stupidity, Unfortunately, they were not above such things. It was true that they did not seem to be as active in these traits as their human counterparts. But this was because they were slower. And so events went at the pace of a sick turtle. Or an anemic elephant. He spent half of his time in straightening out administrative squabbles, soothing wounded egos, listening to petitions for advancement or wild schemes for using the blimps, trying to find out what had happened to materials or workers he had ordered.
He complained to Shegnif, who only shrugged his shoulders and waved his trunk about.
“It’s the system,” he said. “I can’t do much about it. I can threaten to cut off a few trunks here and there or even a head. But if the culprits were found, and then brought to trial, you would lose even more time. You’d have to spend too much time as a witness in court to get much done on your projects. Our courts are very slow. As the proverb says, ‘A head once cut off can’t be put back on.’ We Neshgai don’t forget that Nesh is, first of all, the god of justice. We can’t be too careful to avoid injustices.”
Ulysses tried being subtle. He said, “The border scouts report that large numbers of Vignoom and Glassim are gathering on the branches near the edge of The Tree. They should be attacking soon. Are you going to consider the course of possible injustice against them if you should attack them first? Or are you going to let them pick the time and the place?”
Shegnif smiled and said, “You are telling me that if I don’t take quick action with the new weapons and craft, we will be hurt badly? Well, you may be right, but I can’t do anything about speeding up your projects. Or cutting down the cost, either. And don’t argue with me.”
There was no one else to appeal to. Any appeal to the ruler, Zhigbruwzh IV, would go through Shegnif, and even if the Vizier passed it on, Zhigbruwzh was not likely to ignore the advice of his Vizier. Especially if the petition issued from an alien.
Ulysses was not sure that Shegnif did not plan to do away with him as soon as the gunpowder, aircraft manufacturing and the navigating techniques were complete and fully understood. After all, he was a human, and he had no reason to be loyal to the Neshgai. It was conceivable that Shegnif could suspect him of being an agent of The Tree. Ulysses could have been sent to spy on the land, stir up the slaves and get the Neshgai to build an air fleet which would be turned against the Neshgai.
Ulysses admitted to himself that, if he were Shegnif, he would be contemplating these possibilities. And he would be tempted to imprison Ulysses as soon as Ulysses’ basic work was done.
All Ulysses could do was hope that Shegnif realized he would need Ulysses for a long long time. Surely Shegnif must know that The Tree had to be killed before the Neshgai would be safe from it.
Meanwhile, the production of black gunpowder, bombs and rocket cases had started. The preliminaries of making sulfuric acid, and then getting enough zinc with which the acid could react to form hydrogen, had been passed. Iron, which also could have been used, seemed to be absent even in minute quantities. It was not altogether absent, of course, since it existed in many rocks. But the materials, labor and time needed to extract it was enormous—prohibitive, as far as Shegnif was concerned. Ulysses had trained a team to look for zinc, and within ten days a man had found it in the form of sphalerite. This sulfide ore was roasted to form the oxide, which was mixed with compressed charcoal and heated to twelve hundred degrees centigrade (or six hundred grengzhuyn). The zinc vapor was condensed outside the reaction chamber and then cast into spelter blocks. Using a low temperature process, the sulfide was roasted to the sulfate, later extracted with water. Zinc metal was then obtained by electrolysis, using the vegetable batteries.
The skin of the blimp was formed from the inner husk of the plant which furnished the motors. This was extremely light, strong and flexible; fifty sewn together made a large enough bag to contain the hydrogen.
The main problem was the motor. There was not enough iron to make even one motor nor any bauxite available to make aluminum nor any metals that could be substituted. The only propulsive power was the vegetable muscle-motor used to drive the cars, trucks and boats. Ulysses tried the water in a manner similar to that of the jet mechanism of land engines first but they just would not turn a propellor long enough and fast enough. He experimented with the jet motors of the sea ships, which took in and expelled water in a manner similar to that of the jet mechanism of an octopus. However, they were not effective when expelling air.
A solution to the problem came from Fabum, a human overseer on a motor plantation. He sent in a formal suggestion to Ulysses. The paper was lost somewhere in the administrative jungle that had grown up around the embryo air force. Fabum got tired of waiting for a reply and succeeded in getting permission from his immediate Neshgai superior to make the experiment himself. He enclosed two automobile motors in a gondola and grew the muscle ends of the two motors together. The result was that the energy output was tripled, not just doubled. Four such gondolas, containing eight motors, could turn propellers to drive a blimp at twenty-five miles an hour in still air.
Fabum’s boss then went directly to Ulysses (an act which got him several reprimands later on), and he told Ulysses what Fabum had done. Fabum was lucky in that his boss did not try to take all the credit, but there were honest and honorable Neshgai.
Of course, the addition of more motors, and thus more fuel, added to the weight. But the trip to the base-city of the Dhulhulikh, Ulysses estimated, would be helped by a tail wind all the way. Getting back was a different matter. If the blimps had to be abandoned and the return made on foot, so be it.
Shegnif, hearing the latest reports, was pleased. He gave Fabum his freedom, which meant that he still, in practice, was a slave. But he could live in better quarters and could make more money, if his employer cared to pay him more. And he did not have to ask permission to leave the immediate area.
The Grand Vizier was not at all worried about the limited range or the speed of the blimps. He had no plans for using them except on the perimeter of The Tree close to the Neshgai borders.
Three weeks later, the first blimp took its maiden voyage. The day was bright, and the wind was only six miles an hour. The flight took an hour with several circles over the palace so that the populace could see it. Then, on the way back to the hangar, the blimp dropped twenty thirty-pound bombs over a target, an old house. Only one bomb made a direct hit, but that was enough to blow it apart. And Ulysses told Shegnif that practice would improve their aim.
Nine more blimps were built while the crews were given their ground training. Ulysses complained again about the excess number of Neshgai officers and the consequent reduction in range and bomb capacity. Shegnif said that that did not matter.
There were more reports from scouts about the massing of giant ursoids and leopardoids, and the clashes between border patrols and small groups of enemy became more frequent. Ulysses did not understand why they had not made a large-scale raid before now. They certainly had enough personnel to penetrate some distance into the Neshgai territory if they made a surprise attack. Moreover, keeping peace among those naturally hostile groups and feeding them was a job requiring much organization. Since none of the groups seemed capable of the sophistication necessary for this, he suspected the batpeople. There were more of them around, according to the scouts, but not in numbers to alarm.
Three times, a lone winged man appeared over the airfield, just out of arrow range, and observed them. Four times, a bat-man flapped alongside a blimp in flight. Other than a few insulting gestures, they offered no harm.
By then, Ulysses had moved his headquarters from the palace—with Shegnif’s permission—to the airfield. This was ten miles outside the city, and he could not afford the travel time back
and forth. He used the radio plants to report to Shegnif twice daily, however.
Lusha was gone. Although detailed to Ulysses, she had been promised in marriage to a soldier stationed on the border. Weeping—although she was glad to be married to the man—she took her leave. Even Thebi, who could not have been blamed for being jealous of her, wept and kissed her and said she hoped they would see each other soon. Awina seemed glad that she was getting rid of one woman but she took up her sullen attitude toward Thebi as soon as Lusha was out of sight. Thebi, by now sure of her position, had begun treating Awina as if she were a slave girl. Awina took the indirect insults and off-handed treatment without replying in kind. Apparently, she did not want to endanger her relationship with Ulysses by displaying the violence she normally would have used against an insulter. But she was seething. Ulysses could tell that. So he had reprimanded Thebi, causing her to burst into tears and Awina to smile like a cat that had just eaten a stolen salmon.
Ulysses was working so late into the night and getting up to early, he wanted only to fall into bed when his day’s work was done. He permitted no one into his bedroom, and so Awina gloated over this. Thebi did not protest that she was allowed little chance to serve him. She was still a slave, and, moreover, she was not that sure of him. He was an alien, despite his similarity to her people, and he had very strange ways of thinking and acting. But she let Ulysses know in several ways, some subtle and some not so subtle, that she was hurt.
He was getting tired of balancing the one female against the other. He just did not have the time for delicate relationships, and he wished, sometimes, that both would leave him alone. Though he could have sent both packing with a few words, he did not want to hurt them that much. Besides, he liked both of them, though in different ways. Awina was very quick and very intelligent. She was from a preliterate society, but she learned swiftly, and she was able to act as a very efficient secretary. Such duties were beyond Thebi. She was proficient in domestic activities, but anything outside taking care of a man or children did not interest her.
One day he took out all ten of the blimps and put them through some very demanding maneuvers. The wind was a stiff fifteen miles an hour from the seacoast, and the big gasbags moved sluggishly when pushing against the wind. Once, two collided, and they tore the motor gondolas off each other. Immediately, they swung away from each other and were carried away by the wind. Ulysses gave the order over the radio for the gas to be let out to bring the craft to the ground. The crews should then walk to the field, which was about twenty miles away. He would radio orders for cars to be sent out to pick them up.
The blimps turned home then, and they reached the field shortly before sunset. Just before his vessel was hauled into the hangar, he looked out the rear port of the gondola. There, outlined against the red rays near the horizon, was a number of tiny figures. They could have been birds, but their silhouettes made him believe they were bat-men. He put in an alert notice and went to his office.
That night, he was awakened by a screaming outside his door. He leaped out of bed (it was built for a human), and opened the door. Outside, the sentry was trying to separate two struggling screeching forms. They were hand to hand, face to face, with Awina holding a flint knife and Thebi’s hand locked around the wrist that held the knife. Awina was shorter and lighter, but she was also much stronger, and only the desperation of Thebi and the sentry’s efforts had kept the knife from going into Thebi’s belly.
Ulysses shouted for her to drop the knife.
At the same time, there was an explosion outside the building, and the windows blew in, cutting all of them in dozens of places.
Ulysses and the sentry flopped on the ground.
Thebi released her hold and, staring, turned away from Awina.
Awina, ignoring the explosion, and the three that followed it, thrust at the woman.
But Thebi had raised her arm, and the knife sliced across it, gashing it and sending a spurt of blood across Awina’s face. The knife continued on an upward direction and stabbed into Thebi’s jaw. Its force, however, was much reduced.
Thebi screamed. Ulysses leaped up and chopped across Awina’s wrist, knocking the knife to the floor.
Another explosion, much closer, blew in the door at the end of the hall and sent a cloud of smoke into the hall.
Awina had gone to her knees, but she sprang up again as soon as the smoke reached her. Ulysses took the knife, but she shouted at him, “No! Give it back! I won’t use it on Thebi! Don’t you understand? We’re being attacked! I might need that knife!”
Although he was half-deafened by the explosion, he could hear her. Silently, he held out the bloody blade, and she took it by the hilt. A figure dashed through the smoke, crying, “Lord, it’s the bat-men!”
It was Wulka, the Wagarondit, covered with black gunpowder smoke and bleeding from a wound on his shoulder. Ulysses ran out past him into the hangar, which housed his office and living quarters. Two blimps were anchored to the ground by thick plastic cables. A great-winged pygmy swooped out of the darkness in the upper part and a streak shot toward Ulysses. He had dived back, and it may have been this, or bad marksmanship, that caused the tiny poisoned arrow to plunge into the dirt a few inches before his feet. An Alkunquib archer raised his bow, coolly tracked the winged man, and loosed an arrow that went upward through the flier’s leg and into his belly. The bat-man plunged into the ground a few feet from Ulysses.
There were several other Dhulhulikh flying around in the upper part of the hangar and a number who had settled down on top of the blimps. These were shooting their poisoned arrows. Apparently, all those inside the hangar had dropped their bombs. Outside, lit intermittently by the electric bulbs and torches, was a swarm of the winged men. They swooped in and out of the illumination, dropping little stone-weighted wooden darts, shooting tiny arrows or dropping small round bombs with lit fuses.
The explosions from the bombs added their momentary illumination to the scene.
There were bodies inside the hangar and outside on the field. Most of these were the defenders: Neshgai, humans and the felines, but Ulysses could see at least a dozen pairs of leathery wings spread out among the corpses and wounded.
He turned and shouted at Awina, “Outside! Through the other door!”
She looked startled and he repeated his order. She ran back into the door of the building. He yelled his command again to the felines shooting at the bat-men above them, and then he shouted, “Get away from the blimps before they catch fire!”
They had been lucky so far. None of the exploded bombs had set off the hydrogen in the great bags. If they had, everybody in the hangar would have died.
Even as he turned, there was a loud roar, and light streamed out from a hangar nearby. A blimp, two blimps probably, since there were two to a hangar, had just gone up in flames. Which meant that the other hangars were bound to catch fire and to ignite the blimps they housed.
He waited until his men had streamed in through the door or else run out through the cavernous front end. Some of them did not make it; poisoned, they fell.
He whirled and pushed the Wufea ahead of him through the door and then through several rooms to the door that opened in the side of the hangar. Once all were outside, he got them into battle order, and they moved out between the two hangars into the open area of the field. Another hangar to the right burst into noise and flame, and, in two minutes, all six buildings were burning fiercely. His entire air fleet was destroyed.
There was nothing to do but to take his people out onto the broad field. They could not go back, and they had to get out of the brightness and into the dark. The Dhulhulikh had not left, but were flying overhead, seemingly intent on killing all the air force personnel. Ulysses’ troops fell on all sides of him, but he had seized a shield dropped by some dead human and held it overhead. A few arrows thudded into its leather-wrapped wooden disk, and heavy stone-tipped wood darts and arrows thunked around him, or struck those around him. No bombs were tos
sed at them, although these would have been the surest way of killing. He presumed that they had expended them in the initial attack. It was possible, however, that other bat-men with bombs were being called in.
Then they were on the edge of the darkness and under trees. They formed concentric circles and shot out at those bat-men who came low enough to provide reasonably good targets.
Far to the west, where the city was, the clouds reflected bright lights, probably from burning buildings.
There were other dangers besides flying bat-men. An armored car drove up, and a human hopped out and ran up to him. He ordered Ulysses to report to the Neshgai officer in the car. Ulysses did so, and found Bleezhmag, the equivalent of a colonel in the armored car corps, waiting there by the open door. Bleezhmag had a deep gash across his forehead, a light cut across his trunk and a hole in his left arm. His human soldiers had gotten out of the car and were shooting wooden bolts from wooden crossbows.
“I have orders from the Grand Vizier to take you out of the danger zone, wherever that is,” he said. He leaned out and looked up at the great-winged figures flickering from darkness to the glare of burning gas. “We’ve been hit twice on the roof by bombs, but aside from temporary deafness, we haven’t suffered. Get in!”
“I can’t desert my men!” Ulysses said.
“Oh, yes, you can!” Bleezhmag said. He trumpeted impatiently—perhaps a trifle hysterically—through his proboscis.