by Jerry
“It was a sort of—of imaginary history,” Chyana stammered. “About the twenty-sixth century. I cannot see what harm—”
The Master turned slightly and smiled at his associates—a thin, purely mechanical smile. “History of the twenty-sixth century,” he repeated. “She cannot see what harm.”
“It—it was a romantic book,” Chyana said hopelessly.
“Romantic! A word. Merely another proof of your atavistic tendencies. But I repeat, if you wish to reconsider, you have only to put yourself under the surveillance of a committee for a period of three months, during which time we shall receive a report as to your conduct and habits. Otherwise—” He purposely left the alternative unspoken, and leaned forward, awaiting her reply.
SHE looked at them, returning their implacable stares. Then, realizing they were waiting for her to speak, her attitude changed. Her lips tightened. She took a step forward, arms stiffly at her sides and fists clenched.
“I can only say that for cold, calculating scientists which you claim to be, you are reacting to my case in a most emotional manner! Do you arrive at all your decisions governing state affairs with such hesitancy? You say I am atavistic. Surely you do not hesitate to spare the feelings of such an unfit subject as I? I demand to know my fate, for I tell you again I refuse to submit to be examined like a guinea-pig!”
The scorn in her voice stung the Master to action. He rose swiftly to his feet. The rest of the Council also rose as the Master pronounced sentence:
“Since you are a unique case, indeed the first to appear before the Council in nearly two hundred years, we have determined upon an equally unique and satisfactory solution. One of our scientists has recently completed a time-transportation device. It has not yet been actually tested, but he is sure it will behave strictly according to his theory. Since this is a dangerous thing, we have passed a decree forbidding any more time experiments. You, however, are to be sent back through time to a period of human evolution in which you more logically belong.”
The Master paused and looked down at Chyana coldly, expecting her to show some emotion, but she remained silent.
“Since you seem so interested in the twenty-sixth century,” he continued, “we shall set the dials roughly at that remote era. Upon your arrival the device will automatically be disrupted, so you need not anticipate using it to return!”
“Return !” she exclaimed, and there was something like a fervent prayer of thanks in her voice. “May all the gods I believe in prevent that I should ever return!” Chyana did not flinch when they led her to the time-device, a glassy box with bewildering mechanism in one end. Nor, when they had sealed her in, was she afraid at the sudden minatory whine that assailed her ears, like, the drone of an angry, prodigious metal bee. She stood there tense, her hands upon the glassy walls, awaiting whatever sensation a flight through time might incur.
Then, overcome by a strange drowsiness, she felt herself slipping slowly to the floor. Her last glimpse of the world she hated was the pale white row of the Council’s faces pressing close, peering in at her; and her last conscious thought was to wonder if this were not some diabolic trick . . .
CHAPTER TWO
A Bizarre Friend
CHYANA was aware of silence and pleasant warmth. She opened her eyes. Bright sunlight hurt them and she quickly turned her head away. Blinking, she discovered that the crystalline time-sarcophagus reposed in what seemed to be a green-walled canyon.
As she sat up and her gaze encompassed more of the surroundings, she discovered she was lying in a little alcove. It was formed on three sides by crumbling, lichen-covered walls. On the fourth side were tangled weeds.
She pushed at the glass door and it opened easily. She stepped out, but hadn’t taken five steps when there was a splintering, tinkling crash behind her. She spun around and saw all that was left of the time-device: a heap of twisted metal and shattered glass. She had been a little bewildered, her mind far away somewhere. But now memory was flooding back swiftly, and with a little shock she remembered. A world she hated . . . the Council . . . they had sent her back, and they had indeed been thorough to prevent her possible return.
This, then, must be the twenty-sixth, century. But how strange! She had not had time enough to know what to expect in the twenty-sixth century—but certainly not this! Something must be wrong.
Such were her thoughts as she stepped from between the walls and looked out upon a vast expanse of crumbled ruins! In every direction, as far as she could see, they extended—hideous remains of what must have been once a proud and glorious city. Many walls still stood, but none were more than three stories high; crumbling and cracked, and all green with climbing vines. In some places bare steel girders reached higher, but these were corroded, and some of them drooped to the ground, giving the effect of huge spiders poised to spring. In other places only heaps of powdery masonry and tangled metal marked the spots where buildings had stood.
What had once been streets were long since blown over with the dust and dirt of ages, from which tall tangled grass flourished.
Not knowing which way to turn, Chyana walked straight ahead along what had been a wide thoroughfare. With a sudden shrinking of the heart she looked about her at this unexpected denouement to her time trip. But she tried not to be panicky, and as she walked along she tried to think. There was something else wrong here; she had felt it almost at once. And now suddenly she knew what it was.
In all the luxuriant, almost tropical vegetation she saw around her, there should have been something else: life. The flitting of birds and the tiny, scarce-heard insect noises. But here there was none of that. In all this deadly calm and ruin there was neither the moving nor sounding of any other living thing.
Chyana did not try to delude herself with any false hope. She could not be certain, but she considered it quite probable that she was the only person now alive on this world. These ruins around her were not the result of some sudden cataclysm. They seemed the final toll of relentless centuries. At least, whatever people had built this city must have long preceded it to dust. Could this really be, then, the twenty-sixth century? Might not the Master have set the dial wrong and sent her ahead into time instead of back? Chyana shrugged her shoulders and dismissed the question.
She walked aimlessly over to one of the ruins and stood peering down into a vast cavity that had once been a sub-foundation. Suddenly the crumbling stone beneath her feet gave way, and she clambered to safety just in time to escape being carried down with the minor avalanche she had caused. She sat upon a piece of masonry, chin in hand, and tried to take a calm cognizance of the immediate present.
It was then that she became aware of the sound behind her—the sound that was not the avalanche, for the avalanche had stopped. This was another sound from below that brink, a frantic, clawing, clambering sound. Chyana whirled around, facing the brink behind her. She felt her heart pounding the blood into her ears. Quickly she picked up a jagged piece of rock and held it ready as a possible weapon. The clambering sound became louder. She wondered what sort of thing this might be. Then Chyana saw a long arm reach up, and another, as the thing came clawing up from below and over the edge.
CHYANA had been ready to flee, or to scream, or to fling her weapon, but now she only stood there gaping. She was not quite sure she hadn’t lost her sanity. The thing she faced was all of metal! It came up over the edge of the pit and moved clumsily through the ruins, then stopped.
Hesitantly Chyana walked over and looked at it. It seemed harmless enough, and was of very simple construction, merely a box-like affair upon four jointed, metal legs. At the rear of it a hexagonshaped protuberance led downward, like a thick tail.
It now stood quite still, this clumsy, clambering contrivance. Chyana thought she knew what had happened. Her avalanche had dislodged it somewhere down there, and its mechanism, long dormant, had miraculously carried it up the side of the pit. But it did not quite seem like an accident, somehow! The thing’s movement had been
almost intelligent as it crawled over the rim from below.
Chyana walked around it. What on earth could it be? It looked so grotesque and clumsy standing there, that she wanted to laugh. Then, near the tapering rear of the thing, she saw a metal tag with a serial number, and the letters HEX—R. Near the tag were two buttons, one red and one white. Impulsively Chyana reached out and pressed the red button.
The absurd thing came to life so abruptly that Chyana nearly fell over backward getting out of the way. It took five steps forward, then stopped. The jointed legs buckled until the hexagonal tube touched the ground. It arose again, took five steps toward the retreating Chyana, squatted, arose, took five more steps, and repeated the process. And each time the machine walked forward it left behind it on the ground a red, hexagonal piece of tile perhaps six inches in diameter, firmly cemented ! The process never varied, and no matter how fast Chyana ran before it, the machine came swiftly a few yards behind her, stopping every fifth step to lay a tile.
At last she stopped, and the machine stopped too. She walked slowly back toward it, and it didn’t move. She walked away from it again, very slowly. It followed her, very slowly—and on the fifth step it squatted again and laid a tile. Thoughtfully Chyana walked back to it.
Again she examined the clumsy contrivance, but could see no mechanism except the two buttons. She pressed the white button this time but it seemed jammed.
“A mechanical tile-layer!” she laughed a bit wildly. “Fantastic! Clumsier than anything I ever saw in my century. Maybe I am back in the twenty-sixth century after all!”
Dismissing it from her mind she walked away, toward what she thought might be the edge of the city that she could see on the horizon. She wanted to see what lay beyond these ruins.
But the tile-layer came clattering noisily behind her down the grass-grown street!
Impatiently she stopped and faced it. It stopped too, a few yards behind, and laid a tile.
“Stop following me!” she said, annoyed. “Go lay your tiles somewhere else f Go home—if you have one.” Then she laughed at her absurdity. She walked on, but again heard the clatter of it behind her.
“Well, I’ll fix you,” she muttered to herself. She walked over to a five-foot stone wall. The tile-layer followed. Chyana climbed over the wall and walked straight ahead. She looked back defiantly, and saw the thing climbing over the wall with case! It stopped halfway down the side to lay a tile, then came on after her.
Chyana laughed, and gave a little shrug of resignation. “All right, my friend,” she said as she walked back to the street, “come on then!”
But it didn’t need her invitation. It came anyway.
HER encounter with this bizarre piece of mechanism should have prepared her for what happened next; but it came too suddenly for her to be anything but amazed.
First she was aware of a most raucous and fearsome sound, coming from down the street ahead of her. The sound was nothing but the barking of a dog, but Chyana did not know that; in her far century there had been no dogs. She stopped at the sound, and the faithful tile-layer stood still behind her.
Then she saw the source of the sound running toward her down the street, and she gave a gasp of surprise. Another thing of metal! It was really a robot-dog, but to Chyana it was merely a fantastic little metal creature from which issued a ferocious and discordant noise; and it might be dangerous.
But the robot-dog braced its feet and came to a stop a safe distance in front of Chyana. It cocked its jointed head quizzically and two intelligent, glowing eyes looked up at her. They blinked. Chyana laughed at this. It barked sharply again and ran a little distance away, its jointed metal tail wagging. It stopped and looked back, and seeing she did not follow, barked again insistently. It trotted back to her and repeated the process.
After several such maneuvers Chyana comprehended. She had never seen a dog, not even a robot-dog, but such a language cannot be mistaken. She followed the creature down the street.
But she had forgotten the tile-layer. As she moved it followed her faithfully, laying its red hexagonal tile every fifth step. The dog stopped once and looked back—and seeing the clumsy thing plodding along behind Chyana, he ran back and circled it cautiously, growling in mock ferocity. But the tile-layer moved steadily, disdainfully along. The robot-dog was as puzzled as Chyana had been, and finally, with something like disgust, he trotted on ahead, looking back every once in a while to make sure Chyana was following.
Thus the strange procession moved for perhaps a quarter of a mile. Then the dog stopped before a ruin that seemed to have withstood the ages better than any edifice Chyana had yet seen. The four walls still stood, towering above anything around it.
The robot-dog stopped stiffly. It looked back and barked once. Then it scurried into a low entrance.
CHAPTER THREE
Ral Vahn
CHYANA followed cautiously and stood just within the door to let her eyes become accustomed to the gloom beyond. She heard the metal creature bark again, and saw it standing before what seemed to be a low dais.
Chyana came closer. She stood looking down upon a square box-affair, perhaps seven feet in length. The material was transparent, but within it she could only see a quiescent milky whiteness. Then, peering closer, she dimly discerned a vague, darker shape within that mistiness, a shape that lay prone and reminded her of—Chyana’s heart leaped to her throat as the realization came like a blow. The shape within this receptacle was a human being!
Quickly now she circled the dais, examining it carefully from all sides. Finally, at the farthest end she found a metal plate. It was green with verdigris, but there were words in raised metal letters. With handfuls of dirt she rubbed it clean enough to read:
TAHOR THIRD, EMPEROR OF THE AMERICAS, SENDS TO YOU RALPH VAUGHN, THAT HE MAY SEE THE LASTING GLORY OF TAHOR THIRD. A.D.2087.
This was quite meaningless, and searching further, all she could find was a tiny wheel extending from a pipe at the base of the dais. She tried to turn it, but all her strength was to no avail. She found a heavy rock, and pounded at the wheel until it snapped off. She stood for several moments waiting for something to happen. Nothing did.
Then she was aware that something was happening. There was a slight swirling of the mistiness in the glass box, a faint hissing sound, and she was getting suddenly very drowsy. Just in time she staggered back to the entrance and breathed the clean, fresh air.
Even from where she stood she could now see the mistiness slowly swirling, dissolving. Within ten minutes the square receptacle was quite transparent and Chyana could clearly see the prone figure within it.
But she stood there quite still, just within the entrance of the ruin—watching, not moving, waiting to see what was going to happen . . .
RALPH VAUGHN opened his eyes and looked up into a vague, dusky place. He turned his head. How dark it was in here! Off to the left, however, he could see an entrance through which bright sunlight fell.
This was funny! Just a moment before all the others had been here, gathered around him; one sneering, haughty face in particular.
Then it burst upon him. It hadn’t been just a moment before. It had been many moments, many years before! He raised his hands and touched the heavy, glassy lid above him. He pushed, and it lifted slightly. He lay back, gathering his strength; then with a mighty heave he lifted the lid so that it shifted and slid to the ground. He climbed out and stood a moment, listening. What a vast silence! He opened his mouth and yelled with all the power of his lungs:
“Tahor the Third was a tyrant! May his name have vanished with the dust!” The words went rebounding about the walls, and finally faded away. Vaughn grinned, and felt a hundred percent better already. He had remembered his final resolution, just before his memory had slipped entirely away: the resolution to shout those words the moment he awoke.
As the words died away he heard a sharp, joyful bark near at hand.
“Pete!” he exclaimed. “So they sent you too, as I asked!
I didn’t think they would. Where are you? It’s so damn gloomy in here I can’t see much. Come on, Pete! Here boy!”
Vaughn heard the bark again, and a moment later he received the shock of his life. He saw a blurred shape catapulting through the air toward his arms. It struck him with such force that he was nearly bowled over, and he thought a rib cracked where something hard struck. In his arms he held a thing of metal which was trying in a very canine way to lick his face.
“Hey!” Vaughn exclaimed. And he flung the thing very hard to the ground. He passed a bewildered hand across his brow. “I could have sworn I heard Pete’s bark! Maybe I’m still dreaming.”
He didn’t hear the bark again, and as he walked over to the door and the sunlight, he didn’t see the robot-dog that trotted faithfully at his heels. Vaughn stood there a moment looking out upon the expanse of ruins. The light was so bright in his eyes that he did not immediately see the figure standing there just within the entrance. Then the figure made a slight movement and he turned his head and saw a girl.
“Hello!” said Vaughn. “I’m glad there’s someone around I can talk to. Say, did you hear what I yelled just then, about Tahor the Third? But of course you heard. Is that name familiar to you—Tahor?”
The girl didn’t answer and didn’t move.
“Well,” Vaughn continued, “I guess it isn’t familiar to you or you’d acknowledge it at once. I was right, then. Damn, I’m glad I was right! The name and the power of Tahor is no more. It’s vanished, as I said, with the dust. But so has everything else, as far as I can see.” Vaughn looked out again upon the ruined city. “What year is this?” he said again to the girl.
Still she didn’t answer; merely stared at him.
“Supposed to be a thousand years hence,” Vaughn went on. “At least that’s when Tahor said I’d awake. I came from the year 2087, you know.”