“The place certainly seems deserted,” said Jet.
“They’re probably keeping out of sight,” said Lemmy, “waiting to grab us when it’s too late for us to go back.”
“If they intended to be violent, they could have come into the ship. Now let’s get down to ground level.”
“If only we had a gun or something,” said Lemmy, as he descended the ladder.
“You don’t need guns to explore a lifeless world,” said Mitch.
“This is no lifeless world.”
“No, but the Moon is and it was the Moon we set out to explore.”
“Now,” said Jet, “keep close together and we’ll go over to that town or whatever it is. And keep your radios on all the time in case the Voice calls us.”
Ten minutes later we were wandering through the strange city. There were no streets or pavements. The domes rose straight out of the ground, which was still in its natural state.
Suddenly our tour was brought to a stop by a frightening roar. The shock was so great, I stood rooted to the spot-- petrified. It had come from behind us. We turned, and there, not thirty yards away, its head down and tail lashing, was a horrifying creature. It looked rather like a lioness, it was the same tawny colour, perhaps a little darker. It had short, pointed ears, its eyes were set well forward in its face, and from its upper jaws protruded two long fangs. It was a giant cat; the sabre-toothed tiger, in person. It, too, had obviously been wandering through the domes when it caught sight of us and, very likely, was just as frightened to see us as we were to hear it roar. “Don’t move,” said Jet, “don’t anybody move.”
The animal seemed to regard us with some curiosity. It stood still, emitting an occasional low purr from its throat, its tail lashing incessantly. It didn’t come any closer, but remained half crouching, and staring. After a while it slunk to one side and then, with a bound, disappeared behind a dome.
Lemmy breathed an audible sigh of relief. “I thought we’d had our chips then,” he said.
“I think he was scared of us at first,” I said, “until he knew we didn’t intend to harm him.”
“If he’d chosen to attack us,” said Mitch, “we wouldn’t have stood a chance.”
“Well, that just about establishes what period of time we are in,” said Jet. “That thing couldn’t possibly be in the future.”
“And it also establishes,” said Lemmy, “that we’re not safe out here. We’ve got to get back into the ship and quick.” “Yes, I think we’d better. Come on.” Jet took a few paces forward, then stopped. There, in the city of domes, every one identical and equidistant from the next, it was impossible for us to have any sense of direction. We were lost.
“Now wait a minute,” said Mitch, “which was the last building we looked at?”
“The one directly behind us,” said Jet.
“No it wasn’t,” protested Lemmy, “it was that one over there.”
“I’m sure it’s this way,” said Mitch.
“And I know you’re wrong; it’s this way.” Lemmy pointed in the opposite direction.
“Now hold on,” said Jet. “We’d better face it, none of us knows which is the right way.”
“We shouldn’t have come in tar so,” I said, “not without taking our bearings first.”
“Well, there’s no point in going any farther,” said Jet. “Now, when we came out of the ship, did any of you notice which way the sun lay?”
None of us had. We didn’t even know at which point of the compass the ship was standing in relation to the city we were in.
“Maybe if we could climb to the top of one of these domes we could get high enough to see the ship,” said Lemmy, “before it gets too dark.”
“And what do we use for footholds?” asked Mitch. “It would be like trying to climb a wall of glass.”
“Then what are we going to do? Stay out here all night with them tigers and heaven knows what else walking around and licking their chops?”
“Unless we find a way out of this maze, that’s just what we’ll have to do.”
“Then how about calling up his nibs again? Maybe he’ll reply to us this time and perhaps he can help us.”
Jet switched on his radio but didn’t even have to make the preliminary call, for out of his ear-piece we could all faintly hear the Voice: “Hullo--hullo, Luna.” We all hastily switched on our sets and listened intently.
“Hullo,” said Jet, “we can hear you.”
“Why didn’t you answer before?
“We did call you, before we left the ship, but you never replied.”
“No. We were too busy watching you.”
“Watching us--do what?”
“Exploring our city.”
“Then it is a city.”
“Does that surprise you? Many forms of life all over the Universe live in communities.”
“But what’s the idea of watching us?” asked Lemmy.
“Just curiosity. See how you would react to what you saw.”
“All we did was get lost,” said Jet in disgust.
“And meet a tiger,” added Lemmy indignantly. “Do you know those things are hanging around here?”
“Of course, many other animals, too.”
“You mean you let them?”
“Why not? They do us no harm, and we certainly do them none.”
“But one normally expects a wild animal to attack you.”
“Attack?”
“Yes, attack,” repeated Jet. “Fly at you--kill you, maybe.”
“Unless you kill him first, of course,” said Mitch.
“The thought never occurred to me.”
“Then how do you protect yourself from such creatures?” said Lemmy.
“They never bother us, nor we them.”
“Oh, I see.” Lemmy turned to Jet and spoke in a whisper. “They must look more horrible than we thought--even a sabre-toothed tiger is scared to go near them.”
“Have you seen enough of the outside of our city?” asked the Voice.
“More than enough,” said Lemmy. “We want to get back to the ship, where we feel safe.” “You are afraid?”
“Wouldn’t you be in our place?”
“I don’t think so. Animals are timid but you have no reason to be, because, unlike animals, you can reason.”
“I don’t see that that follows at all,” said Lemmy. “It’s just because I can reason that I know when to be scared.”
“You must be more primitive, more backward than we thought.”
“Now look, mate, there’s no need to get personal,” argued Lemmy. “You told us yourself we were in great danger. That’s how you persuaded us to come here.”
“To be in danger is not necessarily to be afraid.”
“Look,” said Jet determinedly, “whether we’re scared or not we have no desire to remain here all night. Can you guide us back to the ship? At least we can stay there until morning.”
“If you really wish it. But I was about to guide you somewhere else.”
“Where?”
“To me.”
“Oh,” said Jet. “Is that far?”
“No.”
“What do you say, Mitch--and you, Doc?”
“If we’re going to end up with the Voice anyway,” said Mitch, “we might as well go now.” “Yes, Jet,” I agreed.
“All right,” said our captain, addressing the Voice. “What do we have to do? Where do we go?” “You see the dome in front of you?” “Yes.”
“Walk round to the other side.” “Just that--nothing else?” asked Jet.
“No, nothing else.”
“All right, gentlemen,” said Jet, “let’s go.”
I was convinced we’d walked round this same dome before; however, when we got round to the opposite side this time, we found a door.
It was the entrance to a tunnel which sloped steeply down and was lit up for about twenty yards. There the light stopped and it was too dark for us to see what lay beyond.
The moment we entered the door closed behind us. There was no turning back now. We walked slowly down the slope. As we did so, lights came on further ahead and those behind us went out so that only part of the tunnel immediately before and behind us was illuminated. It was an ingenious device, and once we understood it we continued on our way with more confidence.
We must have walked for an hour, our footsteps echoing round us as we made our way deeper and deeper into the earth.
“I don’t think we’re ever coming to the end of this tunnel,” said Lemmy, wearily. “If it’s like everything else in this place --built on a circular pattern--all we’ll do is end up where we started.”
“Hey, wait--stop a minute. See--there.” Jet pointed directly ahead. Before us in the darkness was a pinpoint of bluish light. “It looks just like an eye. Well, doesn’t it?” he went on when none of us replied.
Lemmy gulped. “Now you mention it,” he said, “it does.”
“And it’s as though it’s watching us,” I said, “staring at us.”
“Here,” said Lemmy, “do me a favour, will you, Doc?” Then, “Hey! That couldn’t be the Voice, could it?”
“How can an eye be a voice?” asked Mitch. “I mean his eye.”
“Only one?” said Jet.
“Why not? If he’s as different from us as he says he is, maybe he’s only got one. Maybe that’s all he is--an eye.”
“How could an eye stay up in the air like that, with no support?” said Mitch disparagingly.
Jet switched on his radio. “Hullo--hullo,” he said anxiously. “Can you hear me?”
“Yes,” came back the Voice.
“We can see a light, a bluish light--very small and directly ahead. We don’t quite know what to make of it.”
“Keep walking until you reach it, and you will pass through it.”
“What do you think we are,” said Lemmy, “mice?”
“It will grow as you approach it.”
“Oh, I see.”
“Then we’ll keep going,” said Jet, “and thank you.”
“It’s a pleasure,” the Voice replied.
“That’s more than it is for me,” said Lemmy. Jet switched off the radio and we continued our walk in silence, each of us wondering what lay at the end of it.
Chapter 13 – ESCAPE
We caught our first glimpse of what lay beyond before we actually reached the outlet and we all broke into an involuntary run to get closer to the unbelievable sight before the vision faded. But it was real enough.
There, a hundred feet or more below us, lay a vast plain. Like most things with which we’d been concerned lately, it was circular. It was an immense garden, filled with flowering trees, but of shapes and sizes I had never seen before. They appeared to be akin to the cacti family but their blooms, while just as brilliant, were far more profuse. Gorgeous reds, blues, yellows, pinks, whites and purples were to be seen everywhere; it was as though the multi-coloured clouds of a brilliant sunset had been snatched from the sky and laid on the earth. The trunks and boughs of the trees were the colour of red cabbage. Most of them were covered in scales like a pineapple and from each scale there projected a thin, pointed leaf, about two feet along and perfectly straight.
But the most fantastic thing was the sky. It was a delicate, pale blue and although it was impossible to tell where the light came from, its soft rays shone down to bathe the whole scene in a delicate warmth.
“It’s all a dream,” said Mitch, almost in a whisper. “It must be.”
“Or a nightmare,” said Lemmy. “A beautiful nightmare.”
“It’s daylight,” exlaimed Jet. “How can you have daylight underground, at night? And the sky is. . .” He paused and looked again. “It’s not the sky,” he said, “it’s a roof. This whole thing is artificial--an artificial world laid out under the largest dome one could ever conceive.”
“How does it keep up there,” asked Mitch, his engineering instincts coming to the fore, “with nothing to support it? There must be millions of tons of earth above it; the pressure must be fantastic.”
We stood silent for a while, enthralled by the majestic scene.
“Whoever built it,” I said at last, “must have a great love of beauty.”
Our reveries were finally interrupted by the Voice. “How do you like our home?” it said.
“Is this where you live, is this your city?” “What is left of it.”
“We’d hardly call this a ruin,” said Jet, a trace of humour his voice.
“No, not a ruin, but a city is not alive without inhabitants, and they are all gone, or very nearly.”
“You mean you’re going to leave all this behind?” I asked.
“We are taking specimens of every plant with us to our new home. We could not live without them. They supply us with food and keep the air fresh.”
“But why do you live underground?” asked Jet.
“The climate of Earth is too violent for us to live permanently on its surface.”
“Hm,” said Lemmy, “they can’t be as tough as we thought.”
“Well,” the Voice went on, changing the subject, “you’d better come down.”
We were standing on a large platform, about twelve feet square, and running down from it were three very steep flights of stairs.
“Fall down that lot and you’d have a nasty bump,” observed Lemmy. Nevertheless, we made our way down, finding the going difficult as the distance between the steps was just a little more than our legs could comfortably manage.
On reaching ground level, we discovered the trees were, on an average, about twelve feet tall and even the trunks of some of them were covered in blooms. The scent was almost overpowering, but strangely invigorating, like fresh sea air. We began to feel good-humoured and quite cheerful again. We followed the path that led from the steps and wandered aimlessly along, intrigued by the purply trees, the multicoloured flowers and the dark-red soil.
Suddenly the Voice brought us back to reality. “Hullo,” it said.
“Yes?” answered Jet.
“You are getting very close to me now. In a few moments we shall meet.”
We were standing near where the path divided. One branch led to a sphere, a complete one this time. Instinctively we sensed that the Voice, whoever or whatever he was, was in it.
“Soon the door will open, but you needn’t enter if you don’t want to,” the Voice said. “You may just like to look in.”
“Very well,” said Jet. We moved towards the sphere and as we did so a circular door near the ground began to slide open.
Fear took hold of Lemmy. “I don’t like this,” he gasped. “Let’s go back.”
“No, Lemmy.” I spoke sharply. “We’re staying right here.” The door was completely open now.
“Can you see anybody--anything in there?’ asked Jet.
“No,” said Mitch. “It’s rather dark, it’s--yes, I can. There --see?” His voice changed. “Oh--cripes!”
We all gasped, for what we saw was indescribably horrifying. There was too little light to reveal much detail and what there was seemed to emanate from the creature itself. It was about twelve feet high and was scaled all over with what appeared to be a kind of bright armour. Whether it was sitting or standing, I couldn’t say, but its knees were bent and it was probably in a squatting position. Its arms-- it had two--hung loosely at its side and the scales on its body were flashing in all colours, like luminous mother-of-pearl. But the most luminous and fearsome part of the thing was its face. It glowed in red and blue.
Lemmy took one petrified glimpse, then took to his heels, shrieking: “Let me get out of here.” Jet immediately started after him, and in the moment Mitch and I turned to watch them the door of the sphere had closed again.
We looked at each other uneasily.
“He must have seen how the sight of him affected us.”
“It was a hell of a shock,” I said. “Quite unlike anything I’d expected.”
“He was like a-
-well--I. . .”
“An armadillo.”
“Yes, I suppose you could describe it as that--armoured anyway. It stood up on its hind legs.”
“And it had a blue and red face, like a--a mandrill.”
“It was the bright colours that gave me the biggest shock, expected somebody rather like ourselves; flesh-coloured, it least.”
Jet returned with a protesting Lemmy. “What happened?” he asked. “Did the door shut again?”
“Yes, Jet--almost immediately,” I said. “It was as though wished to hide himself from us as quickly as possible.”
Lemmy was almost whimpering. “Jet, let’s go away from here.”
“No, Lemmy. We mustn’t let him see we’re afraid.”
“I’m not afraid, not anymore,” said Lemmy indignantly. “I just couldn’t stand to see anything so ugly again, that’s all.”
“The sight of you had much the same effect on us when re first saw you,” the Voice broke in.
“Eh?” said Lemmy.
“But we got over it and now we accept you.”
“But we couldn’t be that ugly.” “Quiet, Lemmy,” said Jet urgently. “It’s all a matter of comparison, what you’re used to--the habit of accepting what you think is normal.”
“A fellow can’t help his ugly mug,” said Lemmy, “but you’ve taken things a bit too far.”
“I’m sorry, but I did warn you. You need not see us again if you’d rather not.”
“Thanks. I’d rather not,” said Lemmy with finality.
“You must excuse us,” I said, placatingly, “but you’re so unlike anything we expected.”
“We understand. You need worry about it no more. Now I expect you’d like to refresh yourselves and rest.”
“Yes, we’d like to very much,” said Jet.
“It has all been arranged. If you follow this path, you will come to another sphere, just like this one. Go inside. When you have rested, I will contact you again.”
Lemmy, who had got over his fright and now seemed rather ashamed of his behaviour, said: “Thanks a lot. I’m sorry I kicked up all that fuss.”
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