by Don Wilcox
By this time hundreds of thousands of televisors over central Europe were tuned in to bring the strange underground drama before puzzled spectators.
Suddenly the television! world was aghast. Helmets removed, the two mysteriously reticent figures became no other than the two great dictators in person!
What was this—a faked show? An impersonation? A new brand of propaganda? No, seeing was believing, and no one in the civilized world, could mistake the faces of these two much photographed war gods. Moreover, their voices—
“What happened to my gun?” the dictator of Terrany barked.
The lean young man on the little; platform set his teeth. “You’ve no need for a gun. Brubbazein doesn’t have one.”
The wiry, black mustached dictator tossed his oxygen helmet aside and took a threatening step toward the young man with the pistol. There was powerful defiance in his perspiring face. The hosts of invisible onlookers fully expected him to pounce to the platform and overpower the keen-eyed boy with sheer pressure of a domineering, personality.
“You can’t get away with this!” he snarled. He leaped forward.
With a quick step, Arden’s toe pressed a button in the platform floor. A screen of live steam, shot outward in all directions from the base of tie steps. Jaazel threw his arms up over his face. Then the white cloud filled the picture. The television audience heard the long hiss of steam, saw nothing except, the dim figure of the girl escaping from the scene.
Over Terrany the word spread as fast as radio could take it. History’s most sensational news caught in the very making. Jaazel was trapped. Trapped with Brubbazein. Foul business. Both capitals quickly denied any knowledge of the plot. President Marbl’s staff were completely baffled.
Whatever the mystery back of it, the masses of people and regiments of soldiers went wild with excitement, crowded over televisors enthralled.
“The dictators have come together!” The newscasters screamed. Everywhere regular television service switched off scheduled programs to cut into, the sensational drama. News commentators slipped words of interpretation in edgewise now that there was a silent moment. Here it was at last, they said; the clash of the world’s two great heroes, inflamed at each other from years of hostile relations, their angers at fever pitch from three months of devastating warfare. How they had come together was still unknown, but . . . “here they are glaring at each, other through the mist. The war is in their hands now, ladies and gentlemen! Like the giants of old who stepped forth from their armies . . . Brubbazein and Jaazel, ready to fight it out!”
Jaazel was the first to speak. He shot curt words at his husky, blond-haired enemy. “Who planted you here?”
The iron man of Belligia glowered at him. “Nobody plants me. I’m no pawn. My mistakes are my own—and that goes for this one.”
The two iron men looked each other in the eye. The invisible hundreds of thousands of spectators, whether in Terrany, Belligia, or elsewhere, could not mistake that exchange “of looks: it betrayed a light of common understanding.
“It’s obvious we’re both victims of a cheap trick,” Brubbazein added.
Jaazel nodded. “A frame-up to bring us together.” He looked about hopefully for the girl but she was nowhere to be seen. He turned upon Arden, who still occupied the platform. “All right, here we are. You’ve pulled us in with a fake volcano—
“Fake?” Arden’s ejaculation was defiant.
“Here we are. Go ahead and have your laugh, then get me out of here. I’ve got business—”
The dictator of Belligia, fists on his hips, broke in with an arrogant challenge to the young engineer. “I’ll call your bluff on, that artificial volcano, you damned upstart! Cut it loose and rip my capital to pieces if you think you can! Go on! Do it!”
The two war gods started to charge him, shaking their fists. Again the steam blast hissed. The challengers writhed, fell back.
“Well,” Brubbazein groaned, touching his scalded face painfully, “what’s your game? What do you want out of us?”
Arden’s steady eyes gleamed through the clearing fog. He stood like a delicately poised statue before the glare of the two enraged dictators. Chills played through him. This was the moment he had lived for.
“I thought you two were at war with each other,” he said! They continued to stare at him. “Then why don’t you fight each other?” Silence. “Well, here you are. What are you going to do about it?”
“Nothing,” said Jaazel dryly. “You must be a simpleton if you think this will get you anywhere.”
“I want you to fight!” Arden shouted. “For years I’ve heard each of you rave about what a menace the other is. All right, give us a demonstration of how you feel! Show us what you’d do if your armies were standing back of you, looking on—”
“Crack-pot!” Jaazel yelled, “Damned imbecile!” With a slight turn toward Brubbazein, “He doesn’t know the first principles of modern warfare.”
The two dictators apparently had no intention to fight. At a safe distance from his platform Arden had planted hydrants with hoses and nozzles attached, to give them the opportunity to shoot live steam upon each other if they desired. Not so deadly as machine guns, he reminded them, nor so painful as the flames which they made their soldiers use upon each other, but at least they could express their feelings toward one another.
They only snorted in disgust.
Red anger shot through Arden’s face. “Jaazel, what kind of man are you? I want to know. You’ve roared to Terrany that the one person responsible for the world’s trouble is Brubbazein—just as he says the same thing about you. You tell the people they can’t have the kind of world they want as long as his regime lasts. They must cut a path of blood to get to him. All right, there stands Brubbazein!” Arden fairly screamed, feeling his plan turn to dust in his hands. “What are you going to do about it?”
“NOTHING!!!”
“Jaazel, if the people of Terrany could hear you say that—”
“The people be damned! I know what I’m doing. I stand ready to negotiate with Brubbazein when the time comes—after our fighting fools have had their fill.” His eyes flicked in Brubbazein’s direction, caught the hint of an approving nod.
“I regret,” said the Belligian war god in a stentorian voice, “that this embarrassment has arisen. Mr. Jaazel, you have voiced my sentiment as well as your own. This damned hot-head doesn’t seem to realize that what we tell our people is necessarily a very simple version of the real issue. If we told them nothing but the truth, the saps wouldn’t fight. We’ve got to prime them with plenty of war juice to get any kind of results. For you and I know, Mr. Jaazel, that our difference is worth fighting for!” His manner became elegant. “It is rooted deeply. It must be resolved in blood!”
“Whose blood?” Arden cried. “If the people aren’t capable of understanding the issue—”
“They’re quite capable of fighting and dying. That’s their share! Let them go to it! After the smoke of battle has cleared there must be men of vision to come together and make peace.”
With a sickening feeling Arden knew his plan was spent. If their words had carried out to their people by television, perhaps something had been accomplished—perhaps a little of their sham had registered. But the hope of forcing them to fight out their own troubles—that was vain. Men of vision indeed!
“The smoke of battle is clear down here,” cracked Arden, “and you can take all the time you want to negotiate.”
The men edged closer together as if they wanted to confer in private. All right, he’d leave them here and let them confer till they rotted. It seemed a harsh thing, but it was kindness compared to the hell they sent their soldiers into.
They were well back from the platform now, but not out of range of the concealed television receptor, for Sondra—unconsciously it had warmed Arden’s heart to catch glimpses of her from time to time—lurked in a shadowed corner, kept the instrument turned on them to best advantage.
The receptor was sh
elved too far away, however, to hear the low words which Jaazel spoke to Brubbazein.
“I know who this person is—he said I killed his father—now I recall the resemblance to one of my traitors—caught in a purge. Later the son escaped the country. That’s our cue. A runaway. If we threaten him, we’ll find him a coward!”
Brubbazein muttered, “He doesn’t act like a coward to me—”
“Help me corner him,” Jaazel said through tight lips, “and I’ll put the works on him—with pleasure!”
“Let him talk himself out first,” Brubbazein mumbled, “then we’ll split and get out of range of that steam and . . .”
“And find the girl!” Jaazel snapped.
Arden shouted at them again. Though the telecaster caught up his words, they seemed only a hodgepodge of meaningless instructions at the time. The two chummy dictators appeared to ignore them, but the time was not far ahead that they would recall them to the last detail.
Then as they backed farther away and began to divide, they saw him beckon toward a corner nearby.
Almost on the instant Sondra reappeared. She fled across the open room. She and Arden tried to make a break toward the exit. But the cumbersome refrigeration suit and the bold crystal threads that striped the floor played havoc. Sondra tripped, spilled.
Arden and Jaazel were about the same distance from her as she went down.
There were millions of television watchers and listeners by this time. Most of them were still stunned by the very intimate revelation of war gods they had just witnessed—war gods with the shell of deceit cracked off. Consequently there were millions who saw something unspeakably treacherous in the glitter of Jaazel’s eyes as the girl fell.
They saw him spring into action, leap across the floor to seize her. They heard Arden’s breath as he plunged to her rescue, saw Arden’s helmet roll back of him spilling two pistols. And they could not miss seeing Brubbazein’s determined jaw as he followed into the fray, scrambled for the weapons.
One instant Jaazel was on his feet, the next he staggered from a left t° the jaw. A right followed through. Another left. He went down.
The young engineer turned to face the dictator of Belligia, who, tearing a left hand out of a glove, jabbed a trigger finger through one of the pistols.
“Higher!” Brubbazein growled. “Leave the girl alone. You’re the one I want. Come on—now! We’re going! You’re going to take me back.”
Sweat streamed down the big man’s face. His gloved hand held the second gun awkwardly against his body. He brought it into his grasp. Keeping the business hand carefully poised, he gathered up his helmet and glove.
Jaazel was still down, his eyes half closed, as the larger dictator forced the engineer toward the door. Sondra had apparently gone into a faint.
“They can look out for themselves,” Brubbazein snarled. His heartless words rang through the telecast even though he and his prisoner moved out of the picture.
At once the girl looked up, crept to her feet,-slipped off in another direction. For the moment the breathless world saw only the prone figure of Jaazel. They could still hear voices, however. Brubbazein’s orders. The young engineer stalling for time.
“So you’re going to leave the volcano to Jaazel!” Brubbazein’s. heavy trudge stopped. “It’s a fake.”
“Do you think so?”
From his bluster of words the Belligian dictator was evidently caught between courses. Then he came back, marching his prisoner ahead of him, headed straight for the little platform;
Jaazel came up to a sitting position in time to see them march in front of him. They moved as with a single purpose.
Brubbazein was so intent he didn’t look to either side until the shadow of the girl crossed his path. Five yards from the lever he turned with a jerk, saw what was coming.
To the television audience there was simply a slushing sound like the splash of hot metal. A. black stream cut across the picture to strike Brubbazein’s hand’s. Steaming lava. A gun shot went wild. Everything dropped from the big dictator’s hands, he gave a sharp huff of pain.
The girl and the boy ran out. Doors sounded. A machine rumbled and hummed away into dimness.
CHAPTER VII
Two Capitals Wait
Back in the whirl of the electric mole again, Sondra found relief in a stupor more genuine than her recent faint. An hour later she awoke, was alarmed to find Arden crowding the, throttle as if it were a matter of life-and-death.
“I want as much elevation as I can get, just in case they should set off the volcano,” he explained, “I’ve planted a number of safeguards through this shaft—still—” He made an effort to relax. “We’re probably all right by now.”
“Then it’s really so?” Sondra gasped. “The tunnels and all? It would really blow up both-capitals?” Arden nodded. “They doubted it, but if they meddle with that lever—”
The girl shook her head. “What a jolt that would
.be! Think what a shake-up it would give the war!”
“Speaking of shake-ups, I only hope both warring nations got to listen in on what they said. I thought my scheme had failed at first, when I found they wouldn’t fight. But as X look back on it, their words may prove more explosive than, any volcano. It wouldn’t, surprise me if the troops on both sides made some decisions of their own after this.”
He cut the. speed to a more comfortable gait.
“Thanks,” she murmured. “I’m still rather dizzy—though it’s partly from the whirl of events,” she added, “laughing. “Do you think the dictators will manage to get out of their tunnels as you instructed them?”
“It could be done, but I don’t know . . . We also left them the guns. I think we’ve done our duty by them.”
He slackened the speed a little more, turned to-her, smiling. “We’re out of danger now, I’m sure . . . I want to talk about us, Sondra. It’s what I’ve been wanting for four years, and now, all at once here you are—right beside me—almost in my arms.”
She drew closer, and he put his arms around her.
“It’s a curious world,” he said. “It gets in some devilish tangles, and some of us get twisted and crushed till we don’t know whether we’re still human—”
“There’s nothing crushed about you,” said Sondra. “You’ve practically tied the world in knots today.”
“Maybe,” he smiled broadly. “Anyway, now that that’s off our shoulders and we’ve done all we know to do, it doesn’t seem nearly so important to me as—”
“As what?”
“As finding you . . .” His lips found, hers, and again she found herself whirling dizzily . . .
Miles below them a tense drama continued. Miles above, the world watched, waited.
And though the drama seemed at a standstill, few of the millions of unsuspected watchers could tear themselves away from their televisors. The vast majority, including hosts of entrenched soldiers, government officials the world over, news correspondents, common people stunned from being called fools by their leaders—held on for the last ounce of bitter truth.
For most of two hours the world’s two great dictators simply sat, talked-little, seldom looked at each other. Their harsh brooding expressions were clearly visible under the blaze of lights.
The thing which gave a magnetic tension to their arrested drama was the object which stood between them—a small dark platform only three steps high, from which a lever, extended straight up.
Their eyes continually roved to this object. They were far from aware that every glance toward it sent thousands of their subjects scurrying out of the capitals—for by this time the listening world was assured by alert commentators of its unspeakably dreadful function.
When they grew silent, the television audience became all the more enthralled, for the news commentators carried on, pondered what schemes might be revolving in their minds, discussed every chance action and clue.
In a low, mumbling conversation, the two trapped men spoke of tryi
ng” the perilous escapes the young engineer had indicated. Time was precious. There was no chance of a rescue down here. They agreed to take their chances on their respective tunnels.
They rose to go. Their guns still lay on the floor in the foreground. They decided to leave them untouched. Except for an occasional, almost indefinable indication given here and there—a sharp glance, a nervous twitch of the fingers—which only the most alert observer could catch, the breathless world might have believed these deadly enemies were ready to part on terms of trust and friendship. If Jaazel knew that Brubbazein had once got the upper hand on the young engineer and nearly slipped away, leaving him flat, he evidently chose to forget it.
The men shook hands, took up their oxygen masks, turned their backs upon the television audience and started away, Jaazel toward the corridor on the left, Brubbazein to the one on the right.
An alert news commentator who had recorded Arden’s strange words of instruction two hours before, now reread them.
“You’ve each got one chance to get back to your capitals.” At the end of that left corridor there’s a valve entrance to the big tunnel that leads up to Terrany. In the right one, an entrance to the Belligian tunnel. Once you get in, you’ll find the compressed air so buoyant that you’ll rise part of the way. When that runs out, remember the threads in the wall are deep. Each tunnel runs on an angle. You can climb. I’ll inform your governments where to look for you.”
The two dictators trudged out of sight. Minutes passed.
Back into the picture came Jaazel, slipping along stealthily, his eyes on the lever. He grew more cautious as fie neared the point where their ways had parted.
From the other side of the projecting partition Brubbazein reappeared. He too moved with caution, looked toward the same goal.
At the corner they met, faced each other. Again a suave demeanor on the part of both.
“I was coming back to call you,” said Jaazel, “to make sure you found your entrance.”
“Yes, and you? . . . We’re all set, then.”
Again they parted. Again the picture seemed deserted. Then Brubbazein came back, marching brazenly past the corner straight for the platform.
