Free Triumph by Philip Wylie

rest watching, he recovered his sensibilities briefly. At least, he asked, "Where's this? What happened?"

    A relatively close explosion brought down an even larger fragment of the roof.
    Vance said, "Get into the passageways, everybody! They'll be safer!"

    People started toward various corridors leading from the main chamber. Ben assisted Farr in trying to lift the stranger to his feet. And Lodi Li attempted to explain:

    "The atomic war happened," she said, stepping in front of the rising, wobbling man. "But you're all right. This is a very deep shelter."

    "Atomic war!" the man bellowed that, then screamed, "I've got to get to Hartford at once! My mom's there— alone!"

    Farr said, quietly, "You can't get anywhere, fellow."

    The distraught man had by then focused his eyes on Lodi Li. Fantastically, he yelled, pointing a finger. "You're Chinese!"

    She snapped, "I can't help it!"

    He continued to scream. "I've been captured! You want to torture me!" And he began to struggle so violently that it took both men, with Kit and George helping, to convey him by force to one of the bedrooms. There, nothing sufficed to diminish his frenzy. After half an hour of cold showering, of wrestling, of frantic efforts to reach his raving mind with calm words, they decided that a hypodermic shot, from the dispensary stocks, was necessary. That had put him to sleep for some hours, although later more sedation had been necessary to halt his screams.

    Recollection of that facet of the day's experiences made the Japanese youth grin.
    "Pete's still out cold. Funny, how it hit him!"

    "Yes. And sad." Ben picked up the headphones. "The rest okay?"

    George nodded. "Asleep--or reading in bed, I think. Mr. Farr issued sleeping pills-
    -you heard him say he would when we ate dinner."

    Ben nodded. "Good thing." He felt in a pocket of his shirt. He still wore just that, and slacks, and loafers--his own clothing. George had changed to one of the coveralls stored in the shelter. "Hardly ever took a sleeping pill." Ben smiled. "Think I will, by-and-by. "

    "Still nothing?"

    Ben shook his head. "Now and again a phrase comes through, on some frequency or other. Nothing intelligible. No wonder, either, with the radioactive disturbances up there."

    "Like me to try awhile?"

    "If you want." Ben knew by then that George Hyama understood the use of every item in the communications chamber. "Motors okay?"

    George smiled. "Purring." He took the scientist's place. They exchanged an unselfconscious gaze, each reflecting on the change in the other--the hollow-eyed look, the paleness, the tendency to perspire, though the average, interior temperature of the chambers was, at the moment, seventy-three degrees. George asked, "Tried every possible frequency?"

    "Everything, but for satellites."

    "Why not that?" The inky, oriental eyes gleamed. "I think the weather-station people might be sending, still."

    Ben said, "Damn! Never thought!"

    Instead of leaving, he took a chair beside George and assisted in a complex tuning. "Wish," Ben muttered, "we had more aerial than the pair of antennas we could extrude."

    "Get more pushed out, later," George replied. "Hey!"

    They both heard the voice, faintly. They both turned dials, delicately. Words came in more clearly, though still with a far-away sound that at times faded to near-inaudibility. What they heard was a very tired, male voice with a noticeably Yankee accent saying:

    "Repeat. This is Station Three, Project Icarus, United States of America.
    Commander Clyde speaking. We are still in our original, experimental position, over the equator, at longitude seventy-five degrees west of Greenwich, altitude seven hundred eighteen miles. Arrived on station as scheduled, midnight, day before yesterday, Thursday." The monotonous words faded and came again--"gather that there has been an all-out nuclear attack. Entire mid-section of North America, under generally fair weather as of earlier report which was sent from this