Wanderers of Time, Page 5

  Roy introduced himself. He added: ‘Do you know of any safe place for us? We’re mostly about played out.’

  Jim Hollis scratched his chin reflectively through his matted beard. He cast a glance towards the Sun, now well in the west.

  ‘Can you make two miles—maybe, two and a half?’ he inquired.

  ‘If it’s worth while, I guess we could manage that.’

  ‘It’s worth while, all right. There’s some caves I found in a cliff over there.’ He jerked his head in an easterly direction. ‘I’d be there now, myself, but I couldn’t make the entrance on my own. Way up above my head.’

  ‘It can be defended?’ asked Del, from a branch near-by.

  The man looked curiously at the dwarf. ‘Sure,’ he agreed, ‘but it don’t need it. If I couldn’t make the grade, I’m damned if one of them tin things could. If we’re goin’, we’d better move right now. It’ll be sunset in a couple of hours.’

  He swung himself down the branches and dropped to the ground. The rest of them followed his lead. The dwarfs’ true proportions were revealed when they had descended, and at sight of them and the accompanying Numen, the man’s eyes widened with amazement.

  ‘Say, what the——?’ he began.

  Roy tactfully interposed. ‘Lead on,’ he said. ‘I’ll tell you as we go.’

  ‘You’ll have to. I’m all dazed up. It’s all happened so suddenlike. I was just hiking along, hoping to jump a truck-ride to Indianapolis, when a guy comes out from a shack by the roadside and says he’ll give me five bucks if I’ll lend him a hand. I’d clean forgot what five bucks looks like, so I said I would. He’d got a piece of machinery he couldn’t move by himself, and he wanted it brought out of the shack into the yard. Rummy lookin’ sort of cage, with a sling-seat in it. We got it out easy enough between us, and then he went back to find the five bucks, so I sat down in the sling-seat. There was a lot of little switches and thingummies in front of it, so I pressed one, just interested like. Next thing I knew, me and the machine was crashin’ down through a lot of branches like these.’

  He looked disparagingly at the growths about him. ‘And they ain’t even ordinary trees. Nothin’s ordinary around these parts—what’s more, I ain’t got my five bucks.’

  Roy attempted to explain the situation, and to tell how the rest of them had similarly come to grief. Jim Hollis grunted doubtfully.

  ‘Sounds crazy to me,’ he observed, ‘but then, it’s no crazier than having them tin things runnin’ about the place. Ants inside of ’em, you say?’

  ‘Yes, ants.’

  Jim sniffed. He was still a trifle uncertain whether this might not be some deep scheme to pull his leg.

  And what about the big red things that walk on two legs? What’s in them—black beetles?’

  Roy had forgotten the red machines. He smiled at Jim’s suggestion, and admitted that none of the party had yet had an opportunity of investigating these inhabitants of this strangely transformed world.

  Jim’s estimate of two miles was modest by half, but they came at length, and without hesitation, to the edge of the forest. Across a hundred yards of turf rose a cliff-face, pitted in many places with dark holes.

  ‘How’s that?’ asked Jim, triumphantly pointing to the largest. It measured some ten feet in diameter at the entrance.

  ‘But how do we get there?’ Julian objected, looking at the twenty-five feet of sheer cliff which must be scaled.

  ‘Easy enough to reach it by standing on one anothers shoulders.’

  ‘I have a better idea than that,’ said Del. He produced a ray tube and, with a series of heat-jets, drilled a zig-zag line of holes up the rock face.

  ‘Gee! That’s a dandy flashlight you’ve got,’ Jim murmured admiringly.

  Roy ascended the holds, after a short interval for cooling. As a precaution, he took with him a heat-ray set ready at low-power. The first glance showed him that the cave was both empty and dry. It broadened out to about fifteen feet, a yard or two inside the entrance, and ran back nearly thirty feet into the cliff. Luck had favoured them with an ideally safe refuge. He stood up at the mouth and looked out towards the setting Sun.

  ‘It’s okay,’ he called to the group of upturned faces. ‘Come on, all of you! Back to the Stone Age! ’

  ‘The problems of food and water have been easily settled,’ said Del, addressing the group on the following day. ‘It is indeed lucky for us that fruit grows in such profusion, but though this will keep us alive, it will not assist us to solve the problem of our return. For that, one thing is essential—we must have metal.’

  Roy looked up from his occupation of plaiting creepers strands into a rope.

  ‘I was wondering what you intended to do about that,’ he remarked.

  ‘What’s the metal for?’ asked Jim.

  ‘We must have a framework for the machine which I propose to build—and it must be a metal framework. You want to get back, don’t you?’

  ‘Sure I do. That guy still owes me five bucks.’

  ‘What kind of metal? Roy inquired.’

  Del shrugged his shoulders. ‘A steel containing chromium and tungsten in small quantities would be best; failing that, some other hard metal could be made to serve. I also want some copper, or other good conductors. Very luckily, most of our salvaged parts have withstood the journey.’ Turning to Jim he added: ‘Is your machine still in the branches where it fell?’

  ‘No the tin things found it and carried it off. I watched them from a tree.’

  Reflectively, Del looked out of the cave towards the giant anthill towering over the trees in the distance. Jim’s arrival accounted for one of the extra time-travellers they had seen there. He wondered about the others … Jim’s voice broke in on the unprofitable speculation.

  ‘Maybe, if we scouted round a bit more, we might find a town or something. Anyway, there ought to be a road leading to a town—and where there’s a town, there’s sure to be metal.’ Del shook his head gently. ‘You don’t realise. There are no towns.’

  ‘No towns?’

  ‘Neither towns, nor men.’

  ‘You’re foolin’ me! They can’t all be dead.’

  ‘They must be, or the insects would not be ruling.’

  ‘But—but do you mean the ants have killed all the men?’

  ‘It seems unlikely. Probably men just stopped.’

  ‘I don’t get you.’

  ‘Men did not kill off the great reptiles who ruled the world before them—the reptiles just stopped. It seems to me that man too, has “had his little day and ceased to be.” ’

  ‘But what’s the good of his ever havin’ lived, if it all finishes this way?’

  ‘What is the use of life? Perhaps man came to a glorious finish, fulfilled his destiny and vanished from the Earth—he had to leave the Earth sooner or later. At least, he has not been compelled to linger on a globe which is drifting into senile decay.’

  ‘It doesn’t look decaying to me.’ Jim gazed out at the gently swaying trees.

  ‘But we found ourselves in a desert when we stopped. Miles of it, overlaying what once was fruitful country…. How far did that desert stretch? For all we know, this may be an oasis of forest in a world of deserts. And have you noticed the Sun— how much larger and more fiery red it is than our accustomed Sun? Signs of the coming end, both of them.’

  He was silent for a moment before he added: ‘Then there was the ant-machine which questioned us. Its knowledge of the Past must have been profound, yet it tried us with a series of symbols utterly unknown to any of us. One wonders what strange creatures used those symbols, some time between the end of man and the rise of the insect. Yes; we are far past the age of homo sapiens…

  No one spoke for a while. It was Roy who broke the spell.

  ‘This is morbid,’ he declared. ‘Our present concern is to regain the age of homo sapiens—and our immediate need is metal.’

  Jessica, sitting beside him, drew a breath as though to speak, and then changed her
mind.

  ‘Yes?’ he encouraged.

  ‘I hardly like to suggest it. I mean, it’s dangerous.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Well, the ants’ white machines-’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Well, they must be made of a very hard metal.’

  Roy brought his hand down on his knee with a slap of approval.

  ‘Good girl, you’ve hit it! We’ve got to grab one of those machines, somehow or other.’

  The expeditionary force eventually comprised only three men: Roy, Jim Hollis and Julian. The two Numen would have been useful but, since it was considered unwise to trust them with heat-rays, they would have been defenceless in casd of an attack. They would, therefore, be summoned later to help with the portage, if necessary. Moreover, it was important that some weapons should be left with the rest of the party, in case of trouble. Both Roy and Jim, before they left, were handed high-power rays and instructed in the use of them; Julian retained his own, low-power weapon.

  ‘What puzzles me is how we are going to attract the things,’ Roy said.

  ‘Forget it. There’s no attractin’ needed,’ Jim assured him. ‘All we’ve got to do is get up a tree near a clearing, and wait. They’ll come along soon enough. It’s dollars to dough-nuts we spot some within a couple of hours. Them tin things are for ever snoopin’ around—the Lord knows what for.’

  They progressed cautiously, with Jim in the lead, scanning the surrounding growths for the slightest sign of a metallic flash, and ready to jump for the branches. The chosen clearing, a mile or so distant, was reached without alarms. There, they climbed one of the loftiest trees and settled themselves among the boughs to wait. After an hour of patience, Roy caught the sound of activity on the far side of the open space. As it approached, it resolved itself into a crackling of branches accompanied by a faint clanking. He moved into an attitude of readiness, and slipped the ray tube out of his pocket. Jim put out a restraining hand.

  ” ‘It ain’t the tin things. It’s the big, red brutes. I know the sound of em.

  The next minute proved him right. Five of the twenty-foot machines left the trees and stalked stiffly on their trellised legs across the other end of the clearing.

  ‘Five again,’ Roy murmured.

  ‘Always five together—never more, nor less. And if I know anything about it, it means that some of the ant-machines are around these parts,’ Jim replied.

  Less than ten minutes after the red stalkers had disappeared, there came a flash of reflected sunlight among the trees. A moment later, no less than ten of the six-legged machines emerged. They paused in a bunch, and there was a great waving of silver tentacles. Roy wondered why it was that the machines were not rendered less conspicuous with a coating of neutral-shaded paint; it was merely one of many puzzling points about them.

  As a result of the conference, the party broke up. Eight scurried away in the wake of the red monsters; another doubled back the way they had come, while the remaining one retreated to the shadow of the trees and stood motionless. Jim nudged Roy.

  There’s our meat,’ he said.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CASTAWAYS IN A DEAD WORLD

  With stealth and care, they wriggled back along the branches and slid to the ground. Keeping about twenty yards back from the edge of the clearing, they began to work round into position. The fact that their progress was accompanied by a considerable crackling of twigs underfoot did not worry them, but it was essential that no waving of bushes, carelessly brushed aside, should attract the attention of the sharp lenses. Moreover a look-out must be kept for other roving machines. At fifty yards’ range, Jim suggested that they take to the trees again.

  Roy, through a leafy gap, trained his ray on the motionless sentry, and pressed the catch. His aim was good. A quick switch of the wrist from left to right, and the narrow blade of intense heat scythed the legs from beneath it. It fell with a thud. The tentacles writhed for a few seconds, and then dropped, to lie listlessly on the ground. As they sank, the ant army came surging from its fallen craft. Roy swiftly adjusted his tube to lower power and wider aperture, and joined Jim and Julian, who were already fanning their beams at the black flood. In a few moments, the insects had withered from sight and the damaged machine was theirs.

  Roy swung down from the tree, and advanced with his tube cautiously levelled against the possibility of another rush of ants. He tapped experimentally on the metal casing, but none emerged. Again he set his ray to a small aperture, preparatory to slicing the metal into portable sections. Barely had he raised the tube when there came a cry from Jim, who pointed wildly across the clearing.

  Roy spun round, to see two more white machines headed in a scuttering dash towards him. He swung his ray without hesitation, and brought down the leader. Its own momentum sent it sliding a dozen yards on its shining belly. As it fell, he turned his attention to the other. But the second attacker was not destined to fall such an easy victim.

  He was raising his hand when a metal tentacle from behind him snapped around his body, knocking his weapon spinning towards the tree. He realised, as the arm gripped him, that he had been fooled. Some of the ants still remained in the first machine, and had successfully played ’possum until this moment. He cursed himself for not having the foresight to put its lenses out of action.

  The trees behind him literally exploded into flame, as the tube fell among them. Jim and Julian leaped from their perches with lightning agility, and came pounding to Roy’s defence with ready weapons. The last, unharmed machine dashing on with tentacles extended, was almost upon him. Their line of fire was masked by Roy’s body. He tugged frenziedly at his metal bond, but it had frozen into inflexibility, holding him as prey for the other.

  Jim decided to take a desperate chance. He steadied, and aimed. The searing heat-beam passed within inches of the helpless Roy, and the hot air scorched his face, but the blast passed on to shear the legs from one side of the rushing monster. The unsupported side fell with a crash, and the machine swivelled wildly to one side. It rolled over and over, till it came to a final rest within a yard of Roy’s feet. But the danger was far from over. Jim bounded towards him, fused the remaining tentacle at its base, and dragged him free just as the swarming ants broke from their wrecked craft. Only then did the three men become aware of the great flames licking out from the blazing trees towards them.

  ‘We’ve got to get out of this quick. We’ve sure started something this trip,’ said Jim, as Roy unwrapped the severed tentacle. ‘The Lord knows what that tube will do, now it’s on the loose. All the walkin’ tin cans in this crazy world are likely to happen along, just to see who’s been jokin’ around here.’

  ‘But the metal-’

  ‘Damn the metal. There’s plenty more—we can’t move fast and carry the stuff. Till this blows over, we can go home and lie doggo for a bit.’

  The three crossed the clearing at top speed. In the shelter of the opposite trees, they paused to look back. A vast funnel of flame was belching into the heavens and, above it, thick clouds of smoke broadened, mushroom-like. Jim shook a rueful head. ‘Ain’t that just our darned luck?’ he growled.

  There followed several weeks, uneventful to the castaways. Roy and Jim had returned to the scene of their fight, on the following day, and made encouraging discoveries. The first was that the fire started by Roy’s lost tube had spread only a very little distance beyond its raging centre. With no wind to fan them, the flames had dwindled away, and finally snuffed out. The tube itself was irretrievably lost, somewhere in a crater of its own making. It had melted the ground and the rocks beneath it, and sunk out of sight into the molten pool. Whether it had destroyed itself, or whether it was still digging deeper and deeper into the earth, neither of the men knew, nor cared to any extent. They were far too elated at finding that the machines they had vanquished still lay where they had fallen.

  ‘Wonder why they haven’t taken them away?’ Roy had said. Jim snorted.

  ‘You
’re always wondering about the things. What’s the use of tryin’ to get inside an insect’s mind, anyway? You couldn’t do it in a life-time. Maybe they never repair—only build new machines. The thing that counts, now, is that here’s the metal just waiting for us to carry it off.’

  With the help of most of the party, the transport had been successfully accomplished; though more than once on the Journey it was necessary to drop their burdens and take to the trees, to avoid wandering machines. A growing acquaintance with the dangers of the world about them, and with the limited capabilities of their enemies, began to have a tonic effect on the party. Jim Hollis had never shown anything more than contempt for what he called ‘walking tinware,’ and the rest were fast adopting his point of view.

  Del, with Kal for an assistant, had gone to work right away on the construction of a new time-traveller, once he had assured himself that the metals were suitable. Ril, whose offer of assistance had been refused on the ground that more that one helper would lead to confusion, busied himself in experimenting with the least damaged of the captured machines, a pursuit in which he was joined by Julian. Jim Hollis was appointed head of the foraging staff and, with the help of the two Numen, saw that a plentiful supply of fruit and water was maintained.

  Jessica and Roy found themselves much together. Since the ant-machines were seldom to be seen in the immediate vicinity of the cliffs, they had formed the habit of taking their strolls in the neighbourhood. Roy, after a month or more of this existence, had come to accept their way of life as a commonplace rather than an adventure. He discovered, with a sense of surprise, that Jessica did not share this view.

  ‘How long,’ she asked him one morning, ‘do you think it will be before Del completes his machine?’

  Roy looked at her doubtfully. There was something in her tone that he could not place. It was not exactly an eagerness for release from this strange world, and yet…