ble cities nor massed
bodies of men for them to destroy, nothing but vast stretches of silent
forests and hills, where our forces lurked, invisible from the air.

CHAPTER II

The "Ground Ships" Threaten

One of our Wyoming girls, on contact guard near Pocono, blundered into a
hunting camp of the Bad Bloods, one of the renegade American Gangs,
which occupied the Blue Mountain section north of Delaware Water Gap. We
had not invited their cooperation in this campaign, for they were under
some suspicion of having trafficked with the Hans in past years, but
they had offered no objection to our passage through their territory in
our advance on Nu-Yok.

Fortunately our contact guard had been able to leap into the upper
branches of a tree without being discovered by the Bad Bloods, for their
discipline was lax and their guard careless. She overheard enough of the
conversation of their Bosses around the camp fire beneath her to
indicate the general nature of the Han plans.

After several hours she was able to leap away unobserved through the
topmost branches of the trees, and after putting several miles between
herself and their camp, she ultrophoned a full report to her Contact
Boss back in the Wyoming Valley. My own Ultrophone Field Boss picked up
the message and brought the graph record of it to me at once.

Her report was likewise picked up by the Bosses of the various Gang
units in our line, and we had called a council to discuss our plans by
word of mouth.

We were gathered in a sheltered glade on the eastern slope of First
Mountain on a balmy night in May. Far to the east, across the forested
slopes of the lowlands, the flat stretches of open meadow and the rocky
ridge that once had been Jersey City, the iridescent glow of Nu-Yok's
protecting film of annihilation shot upward, gradually fading into a
starry sky.

In the faint glow of our ultronolamps, I made out the great figure and
rugged features of Boss Casaman, commander of the Mifflin unit, and the
gray uniform of Boss Warn, who led the Sandsnipers of the Barnegat
Beaches, and who had swooped over from his headquarters on Sandy Hook.
By his side stood Boss Handan of the Winslows, a Gang from Central
Jersee. In the group also were the leaders of the Altoonas, the
Camerons, the Lycomings, Susquannas, Harshbargs, Hagersduns, Chesters,
Reddings, Delawares, Elmirans, Kiugas, Hudsons and Connedigas.

* * * * *

Most of the