The Warlord of the Air (23 page)

W
e had, at some cost, won the first engagement, but there were many more still to come before we should know if we had driven the Great Powers away for good. We learned that their land invasion had also met with failure and that the allied forces had withdrawn. We exulted.

During the next few days we waited and recouped our strength and it was during this period that I, at last, offered my services to the Warlord of the Air, who accepted without comment of any kind and put me in command of my old ship, now the
Shan-tien
.

It was confirmed that Captain Korzeniowski and his entire crew had been killed when
The Rover
was shot down.

Then the attack began afresh and I prepared to go aboard my ship, but Shaw asked me to remain in the headquarters tower for it had become swiftly evident that the ships of the Great Powers had adopted a more cautious strategy. They came as far as the hills on the horizon and hovered there while they tried to shell the sheds where our
Fei-chi
were stored. I noticed, once again, that Shaw seemed more anxious for the safety of the Project NFB building than for the flying-machine sheds, but neither was badly hit, as it turned out.

I felt an appalling sense of outrage, however, when some of the shells exploded in Dawn City, damaging the pretty houses, breaking windows, blasting trees and flower-beds, and I waited impatiently for orders to go to my ship. But Shaw remained cool and he let the enemy expend his fire-power for nearly an hour before he ordered the
Fei-chi
into the sky.

“But what about me?” I said, aggrieved. “Aren’t you going to let me have a crack at them? I’ve several deaths to avenge, you know—not least Korzeniowski’s.”

“We all have much to avenge, Captain Bastable.” (As was his practice he had conferred a rank on me). “And it is not quite the time, I’m afraid, to let you take yours. The
Shan-tien
is to fly the most important assignment of them all. But not yet—not yet...”

That was all I could get from him then.

Once again our heavier-than-air machines drove the flying ironclads beyond the hills and destroyed seven in the process. But this time we had casualties, for the airships had equipped themselves with fast-firing machine-guns which could be mounted on the tops of the hulls in hastily manufactured armoured turrets where they could, while they lasted, give good retaliatory fire. The delicate two-man machines were easily destroyed once hit and we lost six during that second engagement.

The attack continued for nearly two weeks with constant reinforcements being brought up by the enemy, but with our own reserves slowly dwindling. I don’t think even Shaw had expected the Great Powers to show such absolute resolve to destroy him. It was as if they felt their grip on all their territories would weaken if they were beaten by the warlord. We heard encouraging news, however. All over China peasants and workers and students were turning on their oppressors. The entire nation was in the grip of revolution. Shaw’s hope was that trouble would break out in so many areas at once that the allied forces would be spread too thinly to be effective.

As it was, Dawn City had forced the Powers to concentrate much of their strength in one area and successful revolts had taken place in Shanghai (now in the control of a revolutionary committee) and Peking (where the occupying Japanese had been bloodily put to death) as well as other cities and parts of provinces.

From Dawn City Shaw heard the news of his revolution’s spreading and his spirits rose, even as our supplies shrank.

Yet still we managed to hold the combined strength of the Great Powers at bay and Shaw took an even keener interest in the progress of that secret project of his.

One morning I was walking from my sleeping quarters to the central tower when I heard a commotion ahead of me and broke into a run. I found a crowd of people staring out at the airpark and pointing into the sky.

In astonishment I saw that a single airship was drifting in, its engines dead. There was no mistaking the Union Jack emblazoned on its tail planes. Hurriedly I ran towards the headquarters tower, certain that they must have seen the mysterious ship by now.

As I reached the door of the tower there came an enormous explosion which made the whole place shudder. I entered the lift and was borne swiftly up to the top of the building.

The little British airship—not nearly so large as the men-o’-war we had learned to expect—was bombing the
Fei-chi
sheds! It had waited for a favourable wind and then drifted in at night, unseen and unheard, with the object of destroying our flying machines.

Already every gun we had was opening up on the airship, which was very low in the sky. Luckily its bombs had not yet struck the sheds themselves, though several smoking craters showed that it had only just missed. This was no heavily armoured ship and its hull soon burst, the ship plummeting down stern first and bouncing right across the airpark, narrowly missing our tethered “fleet” before coming to a stop. Immediately I and a number of others left the tower and climbed into a motor car. We raced out of Dawn City and across the airpark to where the ship was already being surrounded by Shaw’s colourfully dressed bandit-soldiers. As I thought, few of the crew had been badly hurt. For the first time on that shattered hull I saw the name of the ship and I received a shock of recognition. I had almost forgotten it. It was the first airship I had ever seen. Evidently the British had called upon their Indian air fleet to give assistance. The survey ship I saw broken on the ground, quite close to the Project NFB building, was none other than the
Pericles
—the ship which had saved my life.

I
t gave me an odd turn to see that ship again, I don’t mind admitting. I realized that the Great Powers must be using every ship they could spare in their efforts to destroy Dawn City.

And then I saw Major Enoch Powell himself come staggering from the wreckage, a wild look in his dark eyes. His face was smeared with oil and his uniform was torn. One arm was limp at his side, but he still clutched his baton as he supervised his men’s escape from the ship. He recognized me right away.

His voice was high and strained. “Hello, Bastable. In league with our Coloured Brethren now, are you? Well, well—wasn’t much good saving your life, was it?”

“Good morning, major,” I said. “Let me compliment you on your bravery.”

“Stupidity. Still, it was worth a try. You can’t win, you know— for all your bloody little airboats. We’ll get you in the end.”

“It’s costing you rather a lot, though,” I pointed out.

Powell glared around suspiciously at Shaw’s soldiers. “What are they going to do? Torture us to death? Send our bodies back as a warning to others?”

“You’ll be well treated,” I told him. I fell into step with him as he and his men were disarmed and escorted back towards Dawn City. “I’m sorry about the
Pericles
.”

“So am I.” He was almost crying—whether with fury or with sorrow, I could not tell. “So that’s what you were—a bloody nihilist. That’s why you claimed to have amnesia. And to think I believed you were one of us.”

“I was one of you,” I said quietly. “Maybe I still am. I don’t know.”

“This is a bad show, Bastable. All China in revolt. Parts of India have caught the fever now, not to mention what’s going on in South-East Asia. Poor benighted natives think they’ve got a chance. They haven’t, of course.”

“I think they have—now,” I said. “The days of imperialism are ending—at least, as we understand it.”

“If they are ending—it’s to plunge us all back into the Dark Ages. The Great Powers have ensured the peace of the world for a hundred years—and now it’s all over. It’ll take a decade to get back to normal, if we ever do.”

“It will never be ‘normal’ again,” I said. “That peace, major, was bought at too dear a price.”

He grunted. “They’ve certainly converted you. But they’ll never convert me. You’d rather have war in Europe, would you?”

“A war in Europe should have happened a long time ago. A war between the Great Powers would have destroyed their grip on their subject peoples. Don’t you see that?”

“I don’t see anything of the kind. I feel like someone witnessing the last days of the Roman Empire. Damn!” He winced as he struck his arm against a shed.

“I’ll get that arm attended to as soon as we reach the city,” I said.

“Don’t want your charity,” said Powell. “Bloody Chinks and niggers running the world—that’s a laugh.”

I left him then and I did not see him again.

If I had been in two minds about my loyalties before, I was no longer. Powell’s parting sneer of contempt had succeeded in my deciding to choose Shaw’s side once and for all. The mask of kindly patronage had dropped away to show the hatred and the fear beneath.

W
hen I got back to the central tower Shaw was waiting for me. He looked resolute.

“That sneak attack determined something,” he said. “Project NFB is complete. I think it will be successful, though there is no time—or method—to test it. We shall do what that ship did. We’ll leave tonight.”

“I think you had better explain a little more clearly,” I smiled. “What are we to do?”

“The Great Powers are using the big airship yards at Hiroshima as their main base. That is where they go for repairs and spares. It is the only relatively nearby place where they can be serviced properly. Also it is where many of the big flying ironclads are built. If we destroy that base—we have considerably greater flexibility of manoeuvre, Captain Bastable.”

“I agree,” I said. “But we haven’t enough airships to do it, General Shaw. We have very few bombs. The
Fei-chi
cannot fly that distance. Also there is every likelihood that we shall be sighted and shot down when we leave the Valley of the Morning or at any point beyond it. How can we possibly do it?”

“Project NFB is ready. Is there a chance of taking the
Shan-tien
out tonight and getting past the allied ships?”

“We’ve as good a chance as that ship had in reaching here,” I said. “If the wind’s right.”

“Then be ready to leave, Captain Bastable, at sunset.”

I shrugged. It was suicide. But I would do it.

B
y sunset we were all aboard. During the day there had been a few desultory attacks by the enemy airships, but no serious damage had been done.

“They are waiting for reinforcements,” Shaw told me. “And those reinforcements, according to my information, are due to come from Hiroshima, starting out tomorrow morning.”

“It’s going to be a long flight for us,” I said. “We’ll not be back by morning, even if we’re successful.”

“Then we’ll go to Peking. It is in the hands of fellow revolutionists now.”

“True.”

Ulianov, von Bek and Una Persson had come aboard with General Shaw. “I want them to see it so that they will believe it,” he told me. Also on board were a number of scientists who had supervised the loading of a fairly large object into our lower hold. These were serious-looking Hungarians, Germans and Americans and they said nothing to me. But they had an Australian with them and I asked him what was going on.

He grinned. “Going up, you mean. Ha ha! Somebody ought to tell you, but it’s not my job. Good luck, sport.”

And he left with the rest of his fellow scientists.

General Shaw put an arm round my shoulders. “Don’t worry, Bastable. You’ll know before we get there.”

“It must be a bomb,” I said. “A particularly powerful bomb? Nitro-glycerin? A fire bomb?”

“Wait.”

We all stood on the bridge of the
Loch Etive
watching the sun go down. The ship—I should call her the
Shan-tien
—was not the luxury liner I had known. She had been stripped of every non-essential fitting and through her portholes jutted the snouts of General O.T. Shaw’s recoilless guns. What had been promenade decks were now artillery platforms. Where passengers had danced, ammunition was stored. If we were discovered, we should give a good account of ourselves. I thought back to that stupid incident with “Roughrider Ronnie” Reagan. But for him, I should not today be in command of this ship, flying a foolhardy assignment whose nature I could not even guess at. It seemed that more time had passed since my encounter with Reagan than had passed since I had been flung from my own time into the future.

Ulianov came up beside me as I stood at my controls and began to prepare to let slip from the mast.

“Brooding, young man?”

I looked into his old, kindly eyes. “I was wondering what made a decent English army officer turn into a desperate revolutionist overnight,” I smiled.

“It happens to many like that,” he said. “I have seen them. But you have to show them so
much
injustice first... Nobody wants to believe that the world is cruel—or that one’s own kind are cruel. Not to know cruelty is to remain innocent, eh? And we should all like to remain innocent. A revolutionist is a man who, perhaps, fails to keep his innocence but so desperately wants it back that he seeks to create a world where all shall be innocent in that way.”