LITMIR.BIZ

      COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

      Copyright © 1986, 2003, 2012 by David A. Hardy

      A version of Act Two appeared as a short story under

       the title “Rock” in the magazine Orbit in 1986.

      Published by Wildside Press LLC

      www.wildsidebooks.com

      CKNOWLEDGMENTS

      I am indebted to the late Dr. Anthony T. Lawton, one-time President of the British Interplanetary Society, for checking and supplying data on star evolution and the mechanism of novae and supernovae. To Michael Guest, former Secretary of Midland Dowsers, for checking the description of dowsing. The interpretation of this information is entirely mine! To Paul Barnett for his encouragement and for editing the final ms. And not least to my wife, Ruth (a non-SF reader, normally), for painstakingly reading and re-reading this story and offering many valuable comments, suggestions, and corrections.

      ACT ONE

      ANY PORT IN A STORM

      The darkened land lay swathed in bandages of cloud which, pallidly reflecting the light of a full moon, hid fresh wounds and old scars alike.

      The horizon flattened as he leveled the craft out at 4,000 meters. When the clouds parted, not a glimmer appeared below except a glint of moonlight on water in the distance. To his unaided eyes, the city spread out beneath him might be totally lifeless. His instruments said otherwise, though; they showed he was passing through a lattice of powerful radio beams. Reaching forward slightly, he touched a button. Just a regular pulse throbbed in his ears: no voices.

      With a reflex that startled even himself, he swooped upward, narrowly missing the black-coated craft which had suddenly appeared before him, diving across his own line of flight. Only its four sets of flickering exhausts had picked it out to his keen eyes. Increasing the sensitivity of his screen (and mentally cursing himself for relying on his own vision until then), he saw it drawing away from him; but others were approaching. Five...ten...twenty.... All were roughly at his own level, but losing height.

      He eased his craft into their line, following them down to about 3,000 meters. Above, a few stars shone coldly.

      Below and ahead of him, a cluster of brilliant new stars appeared as though sprinkled by a giant hand. The coils of the great river he had seen earlier shone like molten silver in the brightening glow. The blue-white flares were joined by more—and more. Now there were hundreds, dripping from the sky beneath plumes of white vapor until they drowned out the moonlight.

      It seemed, at first, a beautiful sight, reminiscent of the pyrotechnics at a carnival. But soon it became obvious that this incandescent snow had an evil intent. Alighting upon buildings, it transformed itself swiftly into orange and red flames which licked hungrily at roofs and windows. In the fitful light of the flames he could see thick black smoke begin to billow upward. Now great gouts of fire started to leap into the air at various points along the sides of the river, then further into the city. He could envisage bricks, tiles, and chunks of concrete flying in all directions.

      The river turned from silver into blood. Pale beams of light sprang from the ground and probed at the clouds, sweeping slowly back and forth.

      His craft rocked, buffeted by a blast of hot air from below. Spiraling slowly downwards he headed further south, away from the worst of the destruction, and began to descend.

      He had no option. His fuel was almost exhausted.

      * * * *

      The Heinkel was “riding the beam” above the English coastline, the strong and regular pulse in the wireless operator’s earphones showing that his receiver was keeping them on course for their target, ignoring the decoy beams laid by other German stations to bluff the British. Hauptmann Herman Schirmer, the pilot, knew exactly where to deliver his package that night: Waterloo Station. In just about thirty minutes the bomb-doors would open and eight incendiaries would be followed by two 250-kilo high explosives.

      The thought gave Schirmer no pleasure. Ten years earlier, when he’d been seventeen, he had visited Britain and made many friends. Quite possibly he was now about to destroy some of those friends...but he had been trained to obey orders without question, so he would drop his deadly load and then return for more. The most he could do was to try to ensure that his aim was accurate and would not senselessly destroy the homes of innocent Londoners.

      As midnight approached, his aircraft flew steadily at 290 kilometers per hour and five kilometers high, following in line on the tails of a dozen identical Heinkels. Some of their pilots, he knew only too well, would not be so scrupulous about where their loads landed. Just drop them and get back to base, that was their attitude. He sighed and rubbed his cramped neck.

      There was no need now for the intersecting beams to guide them to their target. As he drew closer, Schirmer could clearly see that London was ablaze, burning like a bonfire on the horizon.

      The sight appalled him.

      The misty-white pencils of the searchlights quested to and fro, but he felt fairly confident that the coating of lamp-black on the Heinkels would absorb the light.

      He certainly hoped so....

      There was a sudden hellish racket in the cockpit, and he saw the unmistakable glowing red lines of tracer drawing a dotted line through the thin metal skin to his right.

      A sharp stab of pain in his calf, and he could see, through a windscreen now streaming with black oil from the starboard engine, the familiar shape of a Spitfire pulling away for a second attack. A yellow tongue of flame burst from the Heinkel’s engine.

      He hauled on the stick—the craft was yawing to starboard—but it would not respond.

      “Get rid of the bombs!” he gasped.

      His aircraft must be lightened. He felt a perverse pleasure, despite his Luftwaffe training, as he imagined the bombs falling harmlessly on the open countryside below. Then he realized with a shock that the Heinkel was already well over the capital.

      “Bail out!” he barked into his intercom.

      No reply.

      “Hans? Wernher?”

      He glanced behind him. All four of his crew were slumped across their controls.

      Through a jagged hole in the floor he glimpsed a broad, shining curve of the Thames reflecting burning warehouses and factories. Frantically he searched for somewhere to crash the Heinkel; not, as he knew he should, where it would do maximum damage, but where it would do as little as possible.

      But where? The river was behind him. There was nowhere else....

      As the plane began to spin it struck him forcibly that he did not want to die. He struggled desperately with the escape hatch. It finally burst open and he was choked by the acrid smell of the thick, oily smoke that blinded him before it swirled away in the slipstream.

      He leapt into emptiness.

      Moon. Clouds. Black buildings silhouetted against flames. Each whirled past time and again. He was falling, falling.

      Schirmer jerked frantically at the ripcord. Too late—he had left it too late.

      Then the parachute fluttered above him with a jolt that almost pulled his arms out of their sockets.

      He knew he was travelling too fast, too close to the ground.

      He had not called upon God in years, but now, eyes closed, he muttered a silent prayer.

      * * * *

      When he opened his eyes again there was a shape beside him. For a moment he thought he was about to collide with another parachutist. But this figure had no chute—and he had the strangest feeling that it had risen towards him, not fallen. As it reached out its arms to him, a mere thirty meters above dark rooftops, it seemed not to touch him but to engulf him in a firm yet pliable

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