They stood on a bare expanse of pitted rock. The _Sky Maid_ had crashed
on the outer slope of one of the craters, and the ground rose steadily
to the jagged rim of the rocky bowl. Other bare peaks were all about
them, black teeth against the starry sky. The earth gleamed large and
pale above them. The scene was bleak and silent, unutterably desolate
and forlorn, and the little group of Earthlings drew closer together.
Then Ripon pointed up the ridge.
"We'll go up there and look around. Larry--you carry the radium
detector. We mustn't let the exploring fever make us forget our main
purpose in having come here."
They toiled slowly up the slope. Walking was difficult. Due to the
power of their Earthly muscles on this planet of so much lighter
gravity, they had a tendency to bound into the air at each step in
spite of the heavy leaden soles on the feet of the space suits.
Gradually they learned the necessary muscular control, a sort of
sliding step, and then they made better progress.
Ripon was some yards in the lead as they reached the rim of the crater.
For a moment the tall scientist was silhouetted against the stars, then
he abruptly dropped flat on the rock and motioned back to them to do
the same. His voice was a faint whisper in the ear phones.
"Crawl up here slowly, one at a time. Careful!"
Larry was the first to join him, lying flat on the rock at Ripon's
side. Together they peered down into the crater. It's flat floor was
swarming with some sort of queer animal!
This particular crater was a small one, and the level floor was only
some thirty yards below the rim. Larry stared in amazement at the
creatures who were coming to sit in long rows around a small mound in
the center of the crater. He hardly knew whether to call them men or
animals. They had the hard shell and articulated legs of an insect,
but their faces had a semi-human appearance in spite of the pair of
long antennae that grew out of their foreheads. Their feet made a dry
rustling sound as they clambered down over the rock, and they carried
metal clubs with spiked heads. Larry saw that they walked with four of
their six limbs while the upper pair were equipped with three curved
fingers each. On the top of each antenna was a round ball that glowed
with a phosphorescent light.
"I thought there wasn't any life on the Moon!" Larry whispered. Ripon
grinned at him through the duro-glass of his helmet.
"You thought a lot of things that were wrong, young feller!"
It was a weird scene in the cold pale light of the Earth. Some of the
insect men came out of small, dome-shaped mounds that might have been
houses. Others came climbing down the far side of the crater. Their
glowing antennae bobbed in ceaseless motion, and there was a constant
dry clicking. Suddenly Larry realized that the creatures were talking
together!
That meant that there was at least some atmosphere on the Moon!
Enough to carry sound! Perhaps it had a different composition than
the atmosphere of the Earth. It was certainly very thin, for the air
in the control room had instantly escaped through the shattered side
and the man with the broken helmet had smothered, but there was enough
here to sustain these odd creatures. Then Ripon touched him on the
arm, and Larry saw something that a group of the insect-men were very
ceremoniously carrying to the mound in the center of the crater. It was
an ordinary metal chair of a very common and familiar Earthly pattern,
the sort of chair to be found in the cabins and mess rooms of any
stratholiner.
"One of those old ships must have reached the Moon after all!" Larry
whispered. "That chair must be from the wreckage."
"Heaven help the survivors if those many-legged devils got hold of
them!"
"They can't be very strong, with the Moon's gravity so slight," Larry
said.
"That doesn't prove a thing. They can be light in frame and still very
strong. Think how many times his own weight our ant can carry, or how
far a flea can jump."
The chair had been placed in the center of the mound, and the
Insect-men drew back. Now thin jets of steam or mist began to pour up
around the mound, forming a foggy curtain that hid it. The mist only
rose a little way, then dropped slowly down again to form an icy film
on the cold rocks. The jets ceased, and mist vanished, and Larry Gibson
stared in open-mouthed amazement. A dark-haired girl was standing erect
on the crest of the mound!