For it was plainly visible, upon the great screen beside me, that the commanders of the enemy were striving to form their great circle into a line that could meet our own more effectively in mid-air. We saw their cities rushing inward and changing formation there beside us; but we knew that our change had come and so hung upon the flank of the great mass of cities, our line rushing along it with all our guns turned toward it. And now, though Quebec was falling in our line, our guns had sent down Copenhagen, Yokohama and Calcutta in the mass beside us; since by now we had raced past the mass of the European air-cities and our guns were thundering against the Asiatic cities. Their guns roared sullenly in answer to us as we flashed past them; but, for the moment, in their disorganization, in their attempts to reform swiftly from their circle into a line like our own, their fire was seriously hampered by their own movements. In that moment we were pouring a smothering hail of shells upon them, and city upon city was whirling downward in wild destruction. Then suddenly, with a supremely swift effort, their circle had lengthened, straightened, their confusion of the moment had vanished; and their cities had formed almost instantly into a long line, like our own, but longer than our own. We found ourselves in that moment with our own line parallel in mid-air to theirs, a mixture of European and Asiatic cities directly opposite us; and then, as we raced on, they were racing on with us, their own batteries thundering with newly-released fury, as they sought to blast us from the air beside them! I heard the sharp order of the First Air Chief beside me, and held New York steady at the head of our line. The two great city-fleets were racing through the air in a great running fight, with every gun thundering! Directly opposite New York there raced, at the head of their line, the mighty air-city of Peking, third of the three great air-capitals. The two giants were evenly matched; and now at the head of our respective lines we engaged in a tremendous duel in mid-air, a duel so intense that, almost, I forgot the fate of the rushing armadas behind us. In all New York about us mighty fountains of brilliant light and awful heat, were flaring with each salvo of heat-shells from the Asiatic capital. But, at the same time, our own gunners were working their batteries like madmen; and we could see similar giant craters of fusing metal springing into being over all the vast mass of clustered towers that was Peking. Far behind in the enemy's line raced the third great air-capital of Berlin; and we guessed that it was now from Berlin that the movements of all our foes were being directed. But so awful was the battle that we were undergoing with the Asiatic capital opposite us that for the moment we forgot almost all else.