The Onslaught from Rigel

by Fletcher Pratt

  CHAPTER II

  A Metal Community

  The conversation turned into a discussion of the possibilities of theirnew form. Whether they would need sleep was a moot point, and they werediscussing the advisability of training mechanics as doctors when thefirst footsteps announced themselves.

  They belonged to a man whose face, ornamented by a neat Van Dyke inwire, gave him the appearance of a physician of the more fleshly life,but who turned out to be a lawyer, named Roberts. He was delighted withthe extraordinary youthfulness and vitality he felt in the newincarnation. Fully dressed in morning clothes, he bore the informationthat he was one of a group of four who had achieved the metaltransformation atop the French building. He promptly plunged into adiscussion of technicalities with Ben that left the other two out of it,and they moved off to the Seventh Avenue side of the building to seewhether any more people were visible.

  "Do you miss the people much?" asked Murray, by way of makingconversation.

  "Not a bit," she confessed. "My chief emotion is delight over not havingto go to the de la Poers' tea tomorrow afternoon. Though I suppose wewill miss them as time goes on."

  "I don't know about that," Murray replied. "Life was getting prettycomplicated and artificial--at least for me. There were so many thingsone had to do before one began living--you know, picking the properfriends and all that."

  The girl nodded understandingly. "I know what you mean. My mother wouldthrow a fit if she knew I were here talking to you right now. If I metyou at a dance in Westchester it would be perfectly all right for me tostay out with you half the night and drink gin together, but meeting youin daylight on the street--oh, boy!"

  "Well," Murray sighed, "that tripe is all through with now. What do yousay we get back and see how the rest are getting along?"

  They found them still in the midst of their argument.

  "--evidently some substance so volatile that the mere contact withanimal tissue causes a reaction that leaves nothing of either theelement or the tissue," Ben was saying. "You note that these metal bandsreproduce the muscles almost perfectly."

  "Yes," the lawyer replied, "but they are too flexible to be any metal Iknow. I'm willing to grant your wider knowledge of chemistry, but itdoesn't seem reasonable. All I can think of is that some outside agencyhas interfered. These joints, for instance--," he touched Ben's elbow,"--and what about the little rubber pads on your fingers and toes andthe end of your nose?"

  There was a universal motion on the part of the others to feel of theirnoses. It was as the lawyer had said--they were, like the fingers andtoes, certainly very much like rubber--and movable!

  "Don't know," said Ben. "Who did it, though? That's what boggles yourscheme. Everybody's changed to metal and nobody left to make the changesyou mention. However, let's go get the rest of your folks. I wonder ifwe ought to have weapons. You two wait here."

  He clanked off with the lawyer to the taxi. A moment later, the tootingof the horn announced their return. The party consisted, beside Robertshimself, of his daughter, Ola Mae, a girl of sixteen, petulant over thefact that her high-heeled shoes were already breaking down under herweight; a Japanese servant named Yoshio; and Mrs. Roberts, one of thosetall and billowy women of the earlier life who, to the irritation of themen, turned out to be the strongest of any of them. Fat, apparently, hadno metallic equivalent, and her ample proportions now consisted of bandsof metal that made her extraordinarily powerful.

  With these additions the little group adjourned to Times Square to watchthe billowing clouds of smoke rising above the ruins of the opera house.

  "What next?" asked Gloria, seating herself on the curbstone.

  "Look for more people," said Murray. "Surely we can't be the only frogsin the puddle."

  "Why not?" put in Ben, argumentatively, with a swing of his arm towardthe wreckage-strewn square. "You forget that this catastrophe hasprobably wiped out all the animal life of the world, and we seven oweour survival to some fortunate chance."

  The Japanese touched him on the arm. "Perhaps sir can inform inquirer,in such case, what is curious avian object?" he said, pointing upward.

  They heard the beat of wings as he spoke and looked up together to see,soaring fifty feet past their heads a strange parody of a bird, withfour distinct wings, a long feathered tail, and bright intelligent eyesset in a dome-like head.

  There was a moment of excited babbling.

  "What is it?"

  "Never saw anything like it before."

  "Did the comet do _that_ to chickens?" And then, as the strange creaturedisappeared among the forest of spires to the east, the voice of thelawyer, used to such tumults, asserted its mastery over the rest.

  "I think," he said, "that whatever that bird is, the first thing to bedone is find a headquarters of some kind and establish a mode of life."

  "How about finding more people?" asked Gloria. "The more themerrier--and there may be some who don't know how nice castor oil is."She smiled a metallic smile.

  "The fire--" began Ben.

  "It would keep some people away."

  * * * * *

  They debated the point for several minutes, finally deciding that sincethose present had all come from the top floors or penthouses of tallbuildings, the search should be confined to such localities. Each was totake a car--there were any number for the taking around TimesSquare--and cover a certain section of the city, rallying at sundown tothe Times building, where Ola Mae and Murray, who could not drive, wereto be left.

  Roberts was the first one back, swinging a big Peugeot around with theskill of a racing driver. He had found no one, but had a curious tale.In the upper floors of the New Waldorf three of the big windows weresmashed in, and in one corner of the room, amid a maze of chairsfantastically torn as though by a playful giant, a pile of soft cloths.In the midst of this pile, four big eggs reposed. He had picked up oneof the eggs, and after weighing the advisability of bringing it withhim, decided he had more important things to do. The owners of the nestdid not appear.

  As he emerged from the building, however, the quick motion of a shadowacross the street caused him to look up in time to catch a glimpse ofone of the four-winged birds they had seen before, and just as he wasdriving the car away, his ears were assailed by a torrent of screechesand "skrawks" from the homecomer. He did not look up until the shadowfell across him again when he perceived the bird was following closebehind him, flying low, and apparently debating the advisability ofattacking him.

  Roberts waved his arms and shouted; it had not the slightest effect onthe bird, which, now that it was closer, he perceived to move its hindwings only, holding its fore-wings out like those of an airplane. Hewished he had a weapon of some kind; lacking one, he drew the car up tothe curb and ran into a building. The bird alighted outside and began topeck the door in, but by the time it got through Roberts had climbed amaze of stairs, and though he could hear it screaming throatily behindhim, it did not find him and eventually gave up the search.

  The end of this remarkable tale was delivered to an enlarged audience.Gloria had arrived, bringing a chubby little man who announced himselfas F. W. Stevens.

  "The boy plunger?" queried Murray absent-mindedly, and realized fromGloria's gasp that he had said the wrong thing.

  "Well, I operate in Wall Street," Stevens replied rather stiffly.

  Ben came with three recruits. At the sight of the first, Murray gasped.Even in the metal caricature, he had no difficulty in recognizing thehigh, bald forehead, the thin jaws and the tooth-brush moustache ofWalter Beeville, the greatest living naturalist. Before dark the otherswere back--Yoshio with one new acquisition and Mrs. Roberts, whoseenergy paralleled her strength, with no less than four, among them anelaborately gowned woman who proved to be Marta Lami, the Hungariandancer who had been the sensation of New York at the time of thecatastrophe.

  They gathered in the Times Square drug store in a strange babble ofphonographic voices and clang of metal parts against the
stone floor andsoda fountains. It was Roberts who secured a position behind one ofthese erstwhile dispensers of liquid soothing-syrup and rapped fororder.

  "I think the first thing to be done," he said, when the voices had grownquiet in answer to his appeal, "is to organize the group of people hereand search for more. If it had not been for the kindness of Mr. Rubyhere, my family and I would not have known about the necessity of usingoil on this new mechanical make-up nor of the value of electricalcurrent as food. There may be others in the city in the same state. Whatis the--ah--sense of the gathering on this topic?"

  Stevens was the first to speak. "It's more important to organize andelect a president," he said briefly.

  "A very good idea," commented Roberts.

  "Well, then," said Stevens, ponderously, "I move we proceed to electofficers and form as a corporation."

  "Second the motion," said Murray almost automatically.

  "Pardon me." It was the voice of Beeville the naturalist. "I don't thinkwe ought to adopt any formal organization yet. It hardly seemsnecessary. We are practically in the golden age, with all the resourcesof an immense city at the disposal of--fourteen people. And we know verylittle about ourselves. All the medical and biological science of theworld must be discarded and built up again. At this very moment we maybe suffering from the lack of something that is absolutely necessary toour existence--though I admit I cannot imagine what it could be. I thinkthe first thing to do is to investigate our possibilities and establishthe science of mechanical medicine. As to the rest of our details ofexistence, they don't matter much at present."

  A murmur of approval went round the room and Stevens looked somewhat putout.

  "We could hardly adopt anarchy as a form of government," he offered.

  "Oh, yes we could," said Marta Lami, "Hurray for anarchy. The Red Flagforever. Free love, free beer, no work!"

  "Yes," said Gloria, "what's the use of all this metallizing, anyway? Wegot rid of a lot of old applesauce about restrictions and here you wantto tie us up again. More and better anarchy!"

  * * * * *

  "Say," came a deep and raucous voice from one of the newcomers. "Whydon't we have just a straw boss for a while till we see how things workout? If anyone gets fresh the straw boss can jump him, or kick him out,but those that stick with the gang have to listen to him. How's that?"

  "Fine," said Ben, heartily. "You mean have a kind of Mussolini for awhile?"

  "That's the idea. You ought to be it."

  There was a clanging round of metallic applause as three or four peopleclapped their hands.

  "There is a motion--" began Roberts.

  "Oh, tie a can to it," said Gloria, irreverently, "I nominate Ben Rubyas dictator of the colony of New York for--three months. Everybodythat's for it, stick up your hands."

  Eleven hands went up. Gloria looked around at those who remainedrecalcitrant and concentrated her gaze on Stevens. "Won't you join us,Mr. Stevens?" she asked sweetly.

  "I don't think this is the way to do things," said the Wall Street manwith a touch of asperity. "It's altogether irregular and no permanentgood can result from it. However, I will act with the rest."

  "And you, Yoshio?"

  "I am uncertain that permission is granted to this miserable worm tovote."

  "Certainly. We're all starting from scratch. Who else is there? Whatabout you, Mr. Lee?"

  "Oh, I know him too well."

  The rest of the opposition dissolved in laughter and Ben made his way tothe place by the counter vacated by Roberts.

  "The first thing we can do is have some light," he ordered. "Doesanyone know where candles can be had around here? I suppose there oughtto be some in the drug store across the street, but I don't know whereand there's no light to look by."

  "How about flashlights? There's an electrical and radio store up theblock."

  "Fine, Murray you go look. Now Miss Roberts, will you be our secretary?I think the first thing to do is to get down the name and occupation ofeveryone here. That will give us a start toward finding out what we cando. Ready? Now you, Miss Rutherford, first."

  "My name is Gloria Rutherford and I can't do anything but play tennis,drink gin and drive a car."

  The rest of the replies followed: "F. W. Stevens, Wall Street,""Theodore Roberts, lawyer," "Archibald Tholfsen, chess-player," "H. M.Dangerfield, editor," "Francis X. O'Hara, trucking business," (this wasthe loud-voiced man who had cut the Gordian knot of the argument aboutorganization). "Are you a mechanic, too?" asked Ben.

  "Well, not a first class one, but I know a little about machinery."

  "Good, you're appointed our doctor."

  "Paul Farrelly, publisher," "Albert F. Massey, artist"--the voicesdroned on in the uncertain illumination of the flashlights.

  "Very well, then," said Ben at the conclusion of the list. "The firstthing I'll do is appoint Walter Beeville director of research. Factnumber one for him is that we aren't going to need much of any sleep. Idon't feel the need of it at all, and I don't seem to see any signsamong you. O'Hara will help him on the mechanical side.... I suggestthat as Mr. Beeville will need to observe all of us we make theRockefeller Institute our headquarters. He will have the apparatus thereto carry on his work. Let's go."