The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Sky Trap, by Frank Belknap Long

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Title: The Sky Trap

Author: Frank Belknap Long

Release Date: January 3, 2008 [EBook #24151]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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[Illustration: _Nothing affected it._]

The SKY TRAP

by FRANK BELKNAP LONG

Lawton enjoyed a good fight. He stood happily trading blows with
Slashaway Tommy, his lean-fleshed torso gleaming with sweat. He
preferred to work the pugnacity out of himself slowly, to savor it as
it ebbed.

"Better luck next time, Slashaway," he said, and unlimbered a left hook
that thudded against his opponent's jaw with such violence that the big,
hairy ape crumpled to the resin and rolled over on his back.

Lawton brushed a lock of rust-colored hair back from his brow and stared
down at the limp figure lying on the descending stratoship's slightly
tilted athletic deck.

"Good work, Slashaway," he said. "You're primitive and beetle-browed,
but you've got what it takes."

Lawton flattered himself that he was the opposite of primitive. High in
the sky he had predicted the weather for eight days running, with far
more accuracy than he could have put into a punch.

They'd flash his report all over Earth in a couple of minutes now. From
New York to London to Singapore and back. In half an hour he'd be
donning street clothes and stepping out feeling darned good.

He had fulfilled his weekly obligation to society by manipulating
meteorological instruments for forty-five minutes, high in the warm,
upper stratosphere and worked off his pugnacity by knocking down a
professional gym slugger. He would have a full, glorious week now to
work off all his other drives.

The stratoship's commander, Captain Forrester, had come up, and was
staring at him reproachfully. "Dave, I don't hold with the reforming
Johnnies who want to re-make human nature from the ground up. But you've
got to admit our generation knows how to keep thing