LITMIR.BIZ

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darkness. He could barely see water below. If he fell from this height, he might survive hitting feet-first. Otherwise, a seventy-five foot drop into water was like striking concrete if you didn’t punch an entry hole. The collision would knock him unconscious and he’d drown.

      John took time to study the central base where he was hanging. The siphon tube and water chamber were in the center. On the opposite side, the sphincter opened wider. It began to emit a purple phosphorescent glow. Unfortunately, he learned the reason why at that moment.

      The previously encountered body arrived at the opening. The sphincter began the process of slowly sucking it up, legs first. The lifeless corpse suddenly had one last spasmodic opposition to being swallowed. An arm wearing an orange wristband pounded violently on the purple sphincter without effect. The body sucked upward until only the head remained out of the opening.

      John looked directly in the upside-down face of the man. He recognized him as the gray-haired passive warrior who had invited John to join him only minutes before. When the man appeared to notice John, he said nothing, but an expression of surprise and confusion merged with terror. With a loud pop, the head disappeared through the sphincter.

      A green, gelatinous substance extruded out the sphincter and dripped as the glowing, purple sphincter clamped down. John, paralyzed from horror, could only watch as walls of the digestive chamber moved with the struggle of the passive warrior. The entire digestive chamber phosphoresced an intense purple, which began to fade as the struggle slowed to a standstill.

      From John’s estimate of the digestive chamber size, it could hold between eight and ten bodies. This explained why airwars let some bodies hang in the tentacles and if there were too many, why they would drop others to the ground.

      Thanks to John’s medical experience, he was able to disassociate himself from the previous drama. He immediately shifted his full attention to his own dire situation. On closer inspection, the bellows seemed to have many branching tubes spreading to all areas of the external hydrogen sac, like veins on a leaf. The base of the water chamber was smooth at the siphon entrance. Two feet out from the entrance, tiny worm-like tentacles hung like thousands of earthworms. These covered the entire water chamber base.

      John reached out and grabbed the fringe of miniature tentacles. They weren’t slippery or wet, nor did they move. Some ruptured and popped when he squeezed hard. As the small gas pockets burst in the worm-like appendages, the sound reminded him of popping that occurs when breaking air blisters in bubble wrap.

      John thought, These must be the organs that electrolyze water into hydrogen and oxygen. Squeezing these firmly provided a good handhold. He felt, if he had to, he could move around under the airwar sac, holding on to the fringe while wrapping his legs around either the air tube or siphon tube.

      John also observed, in the clear area surrounding the siphon tube’s entrance, four smooth softball-sized lumps equidistant apart, like cardinal points on a compass. He had no clue to their function.

      John noticed the airwar finished taking on water, or at least peristaltic boluses stopped ascending. He was thinking of sliding down the siphon tube when it suddenly coiled.

      The tightly curled tube was seven to eight feet in diameter and looked like a large coiled fire hose. It hung three to four feet beneath the base of the water chamber. John reached one leg over and pushed on top of the coil. It didn’t budge.

      Holding onto the mass of appendages in the fringe, he swung, put both feet on top of the coil, and pushed down. The coil didn’t unwind. He slid one arm down around the four-foot section of siphon tube, which was the neck between the water chamber and coil. He straddled the coil and sat down.

      It looked like he was riding a velocipede, the old style bicycle with one large front wheel. After a few moments, it was evident the siphon wasn’t going to uncoil from his weight, and he decided to move back to the air tube.

      Once he was securely on the air tube, he began to reanalyze his situation. The only way down besides jumping was sliding down the siphon as it uncoiled. It might be another 24 hours before the airwar took on water again.

      How could he better secure himself? He was wearing surf shorts and nothing else. His phone was long gone, and his wallet and keys were lost during his swim and aerobatics. The shorts did have a drawstring made of a cotton cord. He thought he might be able to secure this for a better handhold. John figured it was better for his shorts to fall than him. He pulled out the cord and looped it around the air tube.

      He began pulling the cord tightly around the air tube, which reduced its diameter between two support rings. The whooshing sound of air passing through the breathing tube changed to a higher pitch. As the cord tightened, the pitch of the airflow became a high whistle. When he constricted the lumen to a diameter of a couple of centimeters, the airwar started jerking. Tentacles began writhing spasmodically. John smiled maniacally and thought, So you like breathing, Mr. Airwar?

      He wrapped the cord around his wrist several times and pulled hard. The loop constricted, blocking all airflow. The bellows kept contracting, at a rapid pace, but no air passed.

      Below John, tentacles were writhing like a pit of snakes that had hot grease poured on them. The bellows pumped so furiously that small tears formed at the base of the hydrogen sac. He could hear a steady hissing. John held fast, never releasing his tight grip on the cord.

      John estimated less than three minutes passed since wrapping the cord around the air tube. The last twitching of tentacles had ceased two minutes before. The coil of the water siphon suddenly released downward. John thought this would be his chance to escape, but he didn’t want to release his chokehold yet. His dilemma ended when he noticed the sensation of descending.

      He looked down. The airwar was gently floating toward the water. The only sound was the hissing tears in the hydrogen sac where the bellows attached. The sac was losing hydrogen at a rate fast enough for the airwar to drift downward. He wrapped the cord around the air tube a few more times, tied a knot, then looked for an exit point.

      From above, lifeless tentacles looked like a plate of giant red spaghetti on the water ’s surface. He didn’t want to end up trapped between tentacles and the hydrogen sac base. As the airwar ’s breathing tube descended to fifteen feet above the water, John saw an opening between the tentacles and dropped through. The drop plunged him several feet under water, then he began swimming.

      As he looked toward the surface, it was obvious the mass of tentacles was blocking his exit. John swam at least twenty meters, then began to see flickers of light between tentacles. He aimed at a sliver of light and dolphin-kicked hard, forcing two tentacles to the side and passed through the interface to air. After several breaths, he re-submerged, swam fifteen more meters underwater and popped out to a tentacle-free surface.

      As it was, he ended up only ten meters from shore. Although airwars were visible in the distance, the attack was over and they appeared to have moved on. General mayhem was occurring around the lake, which was typical following an airwar attack, but the developing crowd in front of him seemed unusual. As he stepped from the water, the crowd cheered.

      For a moment, he didn’t understand the reason for cheers, then he looked back at the floating airwar carcass. He suddenly realized he single-handedly killed an airwar. The sac was deflated, but intact, and not one solitary juvenile was released.

      Not knowing how to respond, he waved to the crowd and shrugged. The cheers heightened. He noticed several cameras, phones, and video cameras aimed his way. He thought, I’ll be on the Internet shortly if I’m not live now. I guess I’m the next Ube. Five armed marines pushing through the crowd immediately broke that thought.

      “Sir, you must come with us!” ordered the largest, a sergeant with a chiseled body who was sporting a blond flat-top haircut.

      A marine on either side grabbed his arms firmly, while the other two created a path in the crowd with pointed rifles. The sergeant, pistol drawn, ran point directly in front of him. The crowd began to boo. The marines walked, half-carrying John to a large gray-colored military van with side doors that slid open at his approach. John hesitated entering for a moment, but found himself lifted

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