It only took Ted a moment to reach the huge diamond-shaped door through
which the girl and her two abductors had disappeared, but when he
entered it there was no one in sight.
He found himself in an immense room, the ceiling of which was supported
by carved figures scarcely less colossal than the ones which held up the
portico. They represented huge, bandy-legged, round-bodied Lunites, with
enormous heads and scrawny arms. The walls were shelved clear to the
top, and the shelves were piled high with thousands of metal cylinders,
varying in their diameters from two to about eight inches, but uniformly
about fifteen inches in length. A few ornate ladders, the gilded sides
of which represented lean-bodied dragons, stood against the walls, but
many had fallen to the floor as had a number of the cylinders.
Great cracks and breaches here and there in the walls showed the
devastating effects of the explosion of his projectile, as did a
considerable quantity of fallen plaster and stone.
The place was lighted by an indirect yellow radiance which came from the
tops of the heads of the colossi, and was reflected by the glossy
ceiling.
Sprawled and huddled here and there on the floor were a great number of
bodies of fallen Lunites. They were surrounded by great swarms of
insects, and he judged from the appearance of those nearest him that
they were in an advanced state of putrefaction. As he glanced around, he
saw a huge gray creature, rat-like in appearance, but as large as a full
grown Shetland pony, dart through one of the breaches in the wall, seize
a body, and quickly carry it back whence it had come.
The bodies, he noticed, were clothed in loose-fitting garments which
slightly resembled pajamas, and the massive heads were not covered with
glass helmets as had been those of the Lunites in the spherical craft he
had just quitted. Evidently these were the bodies of a few of the people
of Ur who had been slain by the explosion of his projectile.
Ted gave slight heed to all these sights as he looked this way and that
in the hope of seeing Maza an Ma Gong and her abductors. That they could
not have traversed the length of the great hall in so short a time was
obvious. They might, however, have been able to slip through the nearest
breach in the wall before he reached the doorway.
As he bounded forward to investigate this possibility, his path led him
past one of the colossi. Without warning, a deadly green ray suddenly
flashed from behind one of the gigantic limbs. As it struck the helmet
of the young scientist he instinctively pointed and fired a pistol
degravitor in the direction whence it had come. There was a flash of
brilliant green light, a terrific pain in his head, and he crashed to
the floor, the glass of his helmet tinkling on the hard tiles. Then came
oblivion.
How long he lay unconscious on the floor of the huge, subterranean
building, Ted had no means of estimating. He awoke with a dull headache
and the feeling that something was crushing him—bearing down on his body
and limbs with terrific force.
Raising his head to investigate, he cut his chin on the jagged remnant
of his shattered glass visor before he was able to see what was lying
across him—a number of pieces of what appeared to be broken plaster.
After considerable effort he managed to work his arms free and unscrew
the now useless collar of his helmet, with its menacing glass fragments.
The air of the place, he noticed, was fairly cool and practically as
dense as the atmosphere of the earth—a condition far different from that
on the surface of the moon, where the atmosphere was extremely tenuous
and the heat of the lunar mid-day far too great for the existence of
unprotected men. It was good, he thought, to be able to breathe outside
a glass helmet once more, even though the air was laden with unpleasant
charnel odors.
Five minutes of exhausting labor freed his body and lower limbs from the
heavy fragments which pinned them to the floor. When he rose to survey
the scene the cause of the fall of plaster was immediately apparent. His
degravitator ray, fired in the direction from which the green ray, which
had destroyed the top of his helmet, had come, had cut away the base of
the supporting colossus behind which his assailant had been concealed,
and this had crashed to the floor, carrying with it a considerable
portion of the plastered ceiling which it had supported.
Beside a leg of the image he saw the remains of a Lunite, partly
destroyed by his degravitor ray—probably his attacker. Beneath the leg
was the crushed, dead body of another Lunite, but of Maza an Ma Gong he
saw no sign. Had she escaped, leaving him for dead beneath the heap of
plaster? Or did her slender body lie crushed and bleeding under the
fallen statue?
Filled with apprehension, he walked clear around the prostrate image
without seeing a sign of her whom he sought. Then he was startled to
hear his name called: “Ted Dustin. Ted Dustin.” It was the voice of
Maza, and seemed to issue from the colossus. He leaped astride the giant
body, seeking some hollow which might explain the enigma, but it was not
until he had stepped out on one of the huge thighs that he saw the girl.
She was imprisoned on the floor in the hollow between the two enormous
knees.
Drawing a pistol degravitor, he found it but the work of a moment to cut
away enough of one of the huge legs to free the girl.
The fact that she was unhurt, he judged little short of miraculous, but
whether it was due to chance or to her own dexterity he had no means of
finding out. She had the front of her helmet open, and he noticed that
the antennae of her miniature radiophone were smashed.
As soon as she was free she picked up a green ray projector which one of
the Lunites had dropped, and started for the door, beckoning him to
follow. They had barely reached the ramp when Ted heard a great clatter
behind them and the sound of running feet. Turning, he saw a horde of
armed men rushing through an archway in the rear of the building.
Instead of glass helmets and furry clothing, these men wore metal
helmets and plate armor, and carried, in addition to their ray
projectors, long swords, and spears with heads like long-toothed buzz
saws.
With his degravitors leveled in two lethal arcs, Ted cut down the
foremost ranks of the attackers and gave the others pause. Evidently
they were dumfounded at the sight of weapons that fired invisible rays.
While they hesitated he caught up his companion, and turning, bounded
down the tiled ramp with mighty fifty foot leaps that amazed them still
more, crossed a circular plaza over which were scattered
indiscriminately, rock debris, fallen and broken statuary, and dead
bodies, many of which were partly devoured, and dodged in among the
remains of a fallen colossus.
The clank of arms and accoutrements became increasingly audible, and Ted
turned to see if any of their pursuers were in sight. At that moment his
foot encountered empty air, and he fell, dragging his companion with
him, into a steeply slanting tunnel which was about four feet in
diameter at the mouth.
Sliding and tumbling, the two at length brought up against the wall of a
transverse passageway which slanted downward to their left.
A shout and the clatter of weapons from the ground above brought Ted
quickly to his feet. Helping his companion to arise, he took her hand
and the two hurried down the inclined ramp. They had not covered more
than a hundred feet before the way grew dark and the tunnel tortuous, so
they were forced to proceed with the utmost caution. They felt their way
along in the inky blackness for some time. Presently all sounds save
those of their own footsteps ceased. Then Ted was suddenly and
temporarily blinded by a glare of light. When his eyes had become
accustomed to it, he saw that it came from a small lens fastened in his
companion’s helmet just above her forehead. Evidently she had not turned
it on before for the sake of caution.
Then it was the girl who became the leader in their flight. As they
encountered a labyrinth of passageways, she would turn now to the right,
now to the left, always following the ramps which slanted downward, and
Ted saw her glance from time to time at queer Lunite symbols painted on
the walls, which evidently marked the way.
Presently she switched off her light, and Ted noticed that there was a
strange, phosphorescent luminescence in the passageway ahead of them.
Its source became apparent when they suddenly emerged from the end of
the tunnel into a wide lane which wound through a thick grove of tall
straight plants that appeared to Ted like gigantic shoots of asparagus
painted with phosphorus. They varied from a thickness of six inches to
well over three feet at the base, and some of the tallest towered fully
seventy feet into the air. The light they gave off was quite as
brilliant as the full moon appears from the earth, and was reflected by
myriads of gleaming, white stalactites depending from an arched vault
far above them. Stalagmites, also, gleamed here and there among the
shining plants, and the lane or road which they were following was
evidently made from the same white material crushed into small fragments
and rolled smooth.
Suddenly the girl grasped Ted’s arm, and pulling him in among the tall,
luminous trunks, secreted herself behind one of the larger ones and
motioned him to do likewise.
Scarcely had he followed her example, ere there came to his ears a
cracking, rumbling sound. Then, from around the bend in the lane, there
waddled a huge, hulking creature of most fearsome aspect. Ted had seen
pictures of wingless Chinese dragons, and this ugly vision, now less
than fifty feet from him, was one of those pictures immensely
magnified—for it was as tall as a camel and three times as long. Just in
front of its spiny crest and behind its relatively small ears, a
round-bodied Lunite was perched on its massive head. Luminous vapor
issued from its nostrils at intervals of a few seconds, and the myriad
scales that covered its long, twisting body, as well as its thousands of
sharp dorsal spines, reflected the phosphorescent light of the forest
that bordered the lane.
This ugly monster straddled a long pole with its four bowed legs, the
front end of which was attached to a U shaped collar that circled its
scaly neck, and the rear end of which was fastened to a long chain of
creaking, bumping carts, fastened together by hooks and rings. Each of
these carts traveled on two large rollers in lieu of wheels, and
contained many metal cylinders which jolted and banged together as the
vehicle lumbered along.
Walking beside the cart on each side was a long row of Lunites clad in
sandals and coarse, loose fitting tunics that reached to the knees. The
long black hair of these workmen was twisted up in a pointed,
pagoda-like effect on top of the head. Each man carried a two handled
metal urn, a short tube pointed at one end like a quill, and a small
mallet.
Behind the first dragon came two others, similarly harnessed and
attended, and Ted, noticing that the last dragon snatched from time to
time at the shoots of the luminous plants which grew by the roadside,
munching each phosphorescent mouthful with apparent relish, saw the
reason these creatures appeared to breathe fire. It was some time later
that he learned this was a crew of sap gatherers, returning with a
supply of cylinders filled with the luminous fluid with which the Lunite
chemists made the yellow, light-emitting liquid which, suspended in
transparent containers, lighted their underground cities.
When the cavalcade had passed out of sight down the road the girl
motioned him to rise, and together they resumed their flight. They
passed many cross-lanes in the luminous forest, unmolested. Then the one
on which they were traveling came to an end.
The cultivated area now gave way to an immense tangle of luminous and
non-luminous plants of various hues and shades—a tremendous hodge podge
of winding creepers, low fungi of every conceivable shape, and tall
trunks, jointed, smooth, and spiny—some topped like mushrooms, spears,
stars or globes, others with long waving fronds like palms or ferns.
Most of the non-luminous plants were white, although some were gray or
black. Here and there among the common phosphorescent types of luminous
plants were scattered groups and individuals which gave off red, green,
pink, violet or yellow light. Some of them emitted two or three shades
of one color, or even several colors of light. The whole scene was a
vast, weird, fairyland of color and shade—at once, beautiful and
forbidding.
Into this tangle the girl plunged without the slightest hesitation. Ted
followed, a pistol degravitor in his hand ready for instant action.
As they progressed further and further into this subterranean wilderness
the fauna of the place became more and more in evidence, indicating to
Ted that, if one might judge from the conduct of the wild things, they
were gradually receding from the haunts of man.
From the shadows many pairs of burning eyes glared out at them. Small
animals, sensing their approach, scurried hastily from their pathway.
Featherless birds, or winged reptiles—Ted did not know which to call
them—flitted among the branches above their heads. Larger ones, some of
them appearing huge enough to have flown off with elephants, soared far
up near the vaulted roof or flapped lazily back and forth above the
tree-tops, evidently in search of prey. Some of them had luminous body
areas which gleamed dully as they flew, but flashed from time to time
from crests, throats, or wing-tips like the display of a swarm of
fireflies magnified ten thousand fold.
There were luminous insects and worms, also, of various shades—and
luminous serpents coiled on boles and branches, some of them flashing
crests or tail-tips when disturbed as if to warn an intruder of their
dangerous presence.
The air was filled with a cacophonous medley of roars, bellows, croaks,
shrieks, growls and hisses, sometimes interspersed with more melodious
warbling, whistling or bell-like tones.
At times huge monsters, most of them dragon-like dinosaurs, crashed
fearlessly through the jungle, pausing now and again to crop herbage or
devour huge mouthfuls of luminous fungus, and exhaling great clouds of
phosphorescent vapor that hung like wraiths in the still air above their
enormous heads.
And everywhere was a dank, musty odor as if mold and matches had been
mixed with stagnant water and brewed in a cauldron over a slow fire.
Presently they emerged from the jungle into a broad savanna of white,
jointed grass with luminous tips, that reached to Ted’s shoulders. They
walked side by side, now, and Ted noticed that the girl often glanced at
a small instrument clamped on her wrist—evidently a compass.
For a moment his attention was distracted by a pair of enormous
creatures, each well over fifty feet in height, browsing leisurely not
more than a quarter of a mile to his right. Then a fearful thing
happened.
Ted’s first intimation of it was the whistle of giant pinions just
behind him. Then something struck the back of his head, knocking him
flat on his face.
He scrambled to his feet and quickly brought up his pistol degravitor as
he saw the girl, already far above the ground, struggling in the talons
of a mighty flying reptile. His finger trembled on the trigger yet he
did not pull it, for there suddenly came to him the realization that to
destroy the monster would be to as surely kill the girl. A fall from
that great height would have crushed her frail body to a pulp.
The creature flew with terrific speed, and in a moment, had disappeared
from view with its prey.
Dejectedly, Ted holstered his degravitor. His downward glance fell on
the green ray projector which the girl had carried—evidently knocked
from her hand by the swoop of her captor.
He was about to pick it up, when suddenly far off in the dim mistiness
toward which she had been carried, he saw a brilliant, star-like light,
moving rapidly. It was unlike the phosphorescent gleam of the light
carrying flyers, and he instantly recognized its import. Maza had
lighted her brilliant head lamp in a last, desperate effort to guide him
to her rescue.
With mighty bounds which, on earth, would have been phenomenal, but on
the moon were quite normal leaps for his earth-trained muscles, he set
out in swift pursuit.