Discs of Daedalus

Years of experimentation paid off for the research team made up of earth's greatest biophysicists. After repeated failures, they perfected a bio-interfaceable anti-gravity compound— a synthetic metal which, when brought into contact with living cells such as in a human hand, would float like a helium balloon.

But the team's triumph was short-lived. For warmongering Jershans, who monitored the broadcast of the scientists' press conference, kidnapped the entire team and enslaved them to work in laboratories on various planets throughout the Jershan space system, planning to exploit their genius for the purpose of weapon design. An early warning system protecting all the planets prevents any spacecraft from landing and staging a rescue attempt. The Jershans did not count on earth's elite rescue corps using the scientists' own invention to save them. For by dropping pieces of the anti-gravity substance to the planet's surface from a safe distance above, the scientists could be enabled to float to the rescue ships -and freedom.

The fragments to be used, cast by the scientists in the shape of weightlifting plates, have been code named the Discs of Daedalus, after the character in Greek myth who escaped imprisonment on wings of his own invention. Published in Ahoy! 1986/11 (Issue #35).