The Man on the Meteor by Ray Cummings

Nona regained her mount above the forest and continued on to join her girls. I can tell you this part of the battle only as Nona told it to me-briefly, for my Nona talks little of her own deeds. The girls on the dolphins were beyond the forest, down near the sea-bottom. And they were engaged with the enemy when Nona arrived.

It was the last of the Maagog columns, just entering the forest when the dolphins attacked it. A very brief engagement. A few score of the last, heavy-swimming Maagogs. And without trouble the girls cut them down-drove them into the forest.

Atar and I, rising alone from our defeat, met our main army coming down to help us. The light-sleighs had carried the news.

Hastily we told them of our disaster. It was my fault, no doubt; I should never have split my forces. How easy it is to look back and say what should have been done!

Atar was anxious to descend at once, with all our men, in one desperate attack. But I was learning the art of warfare. Inexperienced still, yet now not wholly so. We must wait here, I told them, for Nona and the girls to return. And by then the enemy would be on this side of the forest. In the open, we would attack them with all our forces at once, as Atar said.

"Look! " shouted Atar.

Above us, in the direction of the forest, the blur of swiftly moving forms showed, with lines of white, V-shaped, behind them.

It was Nona and the girls-victorious in what they had undertaken. The news heartened us. We had lost a few of the girls and dolphins-and two hundred and fifty of our best men. But we had done the enemy all told a more than equal amount of damage.

For half an hour we waited. Atar and I twice cautiously descended. The Maagogs seemed all out of the forest-and were advancing on Rax. High over them in the water, we followed; and almost within sight of Rax, we dove down in a mass upon them.

It was a scene of carnage which at first seemed inextricable confusion. My forces spread out-attacked the enemy everywhere at once. The Maagogs seemed to prefer the sea-bottom; they clung there and fought stubbornly.

At Atar's insistence, I held my dolphin at first in mid-water, out of range of the fighting. Below me was the center of the struggling mass-the main force of sword-armed Maagogs. Against them, in the glare of Atar's light-sleighs, I hurled my older men. They were fighting down there in the brilliant light. We were outnumbered in this section, but I could see that my men were more than holding their own.

Off to the left-toward the forest-a cloud of the black fishes had come up. With them were the Marinog electric men; and against them I sent my own two hundred and fifty youths-and the girls and dolphins.

It was this segment that I most feared. I could see them now; the men were locked in hand-to-hand conflict-lashing the water-hundreds of little groups. The black fishes were mingled with them; and about the whole struggling mass, the girls on the dolphins dashed back and forth.

How long I watched I do not know. I was alone, save that near at hand were Caan and his dark-sleighs, holding themselves in readiness.

A Marinoid fighter came wavering up to me, wounded and gasping.

I descended. The fighters in this central melee had split into two separate sections-and on one side were far outnumbered. Atar was down here; he saw me, and rushed forward.

"Nemo-on this side we lose."

It was impossible to transfer quickly any considerable number of my men from one side to the other.

"Take the lights from the losing side," I shouted; and when Atar had dashed away, I swam my mount up to Caan.

With his dark-sleighs, we swept down into the threatened area. Men were fighting all around us; the dead were everywhere. The ink-bags on the sleighs released their fluid; the water darkened-turning to night.