by L. P. Davies
One moment I was leading a cautious way between a mass of thread-thin, wax-white tendrils and an outcropping of knife-edged black rock. The next I was coming out onto open ground with the stream of the nuclear extension almost at my feet, and behind, the motionless green-tinged curtain of mist.
Relief that we had come this far was replaced by apprehension that the time had come for my experiment, and that our lives depended upon its outcome. I stepped over the stream and then turned to help in the hazardous business of lifting Adam over. We managed it with some effort, lowering him to the strangely solid ground, where he leaned back on his hands, head back, eyes closed, his chest rising and falling painfully. He was in a sorry state: sweat streaming down a face drawn with pain, his fur tunic open to the waist, blood showing through the bandages on his feet. For a few minutes we rested in that no-man’s-land between the living stream and the living skin of the cell.
When Maver made the first move I slipped quickly past him, with the dual purposes of helping Lee tug Adam back to his feet and letting the Professor now take the lead and so be the first one to enter the mist barrier.
He plunged into it and was immediately brought to a halt, still visible to us, held there while he struggled without result, almost seeming to be suspended above the ground, his arms spread wide. He struggled —we could see how he fought to move forward— then, realising the futility, he fell back, staggering, turning a face filled with dismay in our direction.
“No—” he gasped. “It’s no use …”
The first part of my experiment was over. It had been successful. And now …
“Maybe if we all try together,” I suggested. “A wedge—with me in the lead, the same way we came in.”
He shook his head. “It’s useless, Morton …” But stunned, he still came to take my place at Adam’s side. “You saw what happened. It has changed … I think I anticipated this. But I hoped … Now it is impenetrable.”
Lee said doubtfully, “It doesn’t look any different.”
“It is living matter, able to change its consistency without altering in appearance. Its original purpose would most certainly have been to protect the vulnerable parts of the cell against damage by the magnetic storms. It is also strong enough to resist the Toparian heat-rays. Matter that is so strong will certainly be able to resist our passage through it if the Vorted is so inclined. For obvious reasons it allowed us to enter. It will not let us escape.”
“We can but try,” I said.
His shrug was a mixture of annoyance and impatience. “If you must satisfy yourself …”
So we formed a wedge with myself as the apex. I knew that it wasn’t because we all entered the mist at the same time that it parted to allow us through. It was because I was in the lead. I thrust forward, giving myself no time to think. The mist resisted and then gave, forming a tunnel. There was the now familiar sensation of force flooding through my body and then I was out, out into the dazzling sunlight with the others only a pace behind. Relief was so intense as to bring a feeling of sickness.
At first the light was too fierce for eyes accustomed to the grey dimness of the cell. Shielding them, I blinked tears away. Gradually my vision cleared. We had emerged from the Vorted only a short distance from our original point of entry. There—I could see it now through narrowed eyes—over to the left was our hill. But not our hill as I had last seen it.
The crude platform Lee and I had examined in the hollow had been set in position, almost at the top of the slope. My gaze lifted automatically. I think I knew what I was to see there, hanging in the sky, even before I was able to focus on that flickering, wavering oblong of light. Relief flooded again, and unimaginable joy. They were emotions that died as my eyes moved back down to the hill.
There they were, the Toparians; countless numbers of them it seemed, gathered in a silent watching crowd, a multitude, all armed with the heat-projectors. They crowded our hill, they were massed on adjoining slopes, they were packed in every hollow and ravine. They were everywhere—except for one place. There was a reason why they had left empty the stretch of level ground at the foot of the hill. That was the ground that lay in front of the mist.
And the mist—the skin of the cell—was moving. Slowly, creeping forward so slowly, inching its way towards the hill and the door.
The platform had been set immediately beneath the lambent oblong in the sky, so that a man had but to mount the ladder, take three steps and he would be on the threshold of the door. And all they were waiting for, this multitude of fur-tunicked men, was their leader. They would be ready now to follow him through into our world.
The Vorted must have known that too. Which was why it was moving, why the mist was changing its shape, sending out a feeler towards the foot of the hill.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
An age ago—it seemed an age—Lee, only half seriously, had envisaged the situation that might arise; three groups of people waiting on the starting line to see which would be the first to reach the door. At the time I had tried to picture the scene. Now, reality was infinitely worse than had been my imagined picture. Worse because it was obvious we three humans stood no chance at all of getting through those massed ranks of Toparians. Even worse still because one of the groups wasn’t a group at all, but one monstrous thing. And it was that thing, that single, gigantic, intelligent cell, that was making the first move towards the door. Creeping slowly forward, with the Toparians falling back in front, keeping their distance, not even bothering to use against it weapons they knew to be futile. Standing helplessly there, I had a vivid mental image of the Vorted reaching the door and flowing through it. Through into the laboratory where Leming would be waiting. It would wrap itself about him and move relentlessly on, out into the farmyard, spreading slowly into the fields, absorbing the richness of earth as it went, finding the food that had been lacking in its own dimension, able to grow more and more quickly, spreading, engulfing, covering everywhere… .
I had to fight to cleanse my thoughts of that terrifying picture. There was perhaps one chance of thwarting the Toparians’ intentions. Not a good chance, and to take it I would have to act quickly. I had to talk to Adam; I had to try to make a bargain with him. And to do that, I would have to take advantage of his dazed condition, using the truth and a great deal of bluff.
He stood alone, refusing assistance now that he was in the presence of his people, unsteady on his feet, but with his head up, shoulders proudly back. Although he must be aware of the urgency, Adam seemed too proud to make a move to rally his followers until he had regained sufficient strength to walk unaided.
Lee and his uncle had moved a short distance away, standing there, watching the scene on the hill, their faces filled with consternation. It was now or never. I went to stand at Adam’s side. He ignored my presence until I spoke.
“We know why you wanted to go through the mists,” I said, and at that he turned cold eyes on me. “You were hoping to form an alliance with the Vorteds.”
And I hoped to God that I wouldn’t have to waste precious time in telling what the Vorted Nest really was. On our way back from the nucleus I had heard them talking behind me. I hoped fervently that Maver had been explaining everything to him.
“You saw what it is like in there,” I said. “There are no such people as Vorteds. All that—”
He knew, and broke in curtly: “Save your breath.”
Over the first hurdle. “We helped you in there,” I said. “We saved your life. Now it lies within your power to help us.”
I was conscious of sounding over-dramatic, my phraseology pompous and flowery. But that, I felt, would be the most likely way of making an impression on him.
“I was expecting that.” His features were impassive. “No. The future of my people is f^r more important than- the repayment of a trivial personal debt.”
I had expected something along those lines, a self-satisfied reply that could have been lifted from any third-rate melodrama. I wondered how much of
his spare time in our world had been spent at the cinema.
Now I had to press on with this unreal interchange in an attempt to smash through his facade of complacent superiority. I swung to point towards the hill.
“You can see what is happening. The Vorted knows where the door leads and is already moving towards it.”
“It moves only slowly.” He was unshaken, unperturbed. “There is time enough. I am going to my people now. They will follow me when I give the command. We will be first through the door.”
When he would have moved I put my hand on his shoulder. He shook it off angrily.
“Some of you will get through,” I said as quickly as I could. “But not many. Then, unless you want the Vorted to follow, you will have to close it from the other side. The few of you that have managed to get through will be insufficient for your purpose.”
As I half-expected, he had an answer to that.
“We will let the Vorted through. There will be only the one. The others are too far away. One Vorted can do no harm.”
“Don’t you realise what will happen to it once it reaches our world? Here, in your dimension, its growth has only been slow because of lack of food. Our world is different. You know that. Food is unlimited. It will grow quickly, and you will have no way of stopping it. And it has intelligence. Once it has covered the land it will find a way of crossing the sea. You will be worse off in our world than you have been here.”
The first stirring of doubt moved his swarthy features.
“I will make a bargain with you,” I said. “I will help you if you will help us.”
“A bargain?” His cold smile verged on a sneer. “What have you to bargain with?”
“Knowledge. We were only able to enter the Vorted Nest because I was with you. I was the only one able to save you from the nucleus. We were only able to leave again because I led the way.”
“You are talking foolishness,” he said roughly, but he was remembering and wavering.
“I know how the Vorteds can be destroyed,” I said. “I will trade that knowledge in return for your help in getting us back to our own world.”
And when he hesitated, the smug superiority gone at last from his features, conflicting emotions in its place, I rammed the thing home, speaking with all the intensity I could muster.
“I can tell you how to penetrate the mists unharmed. You can use heat-projectors to burn the hearts away. “The Vorteds will die. Where they have been will be rich soil on which you can grow food.”
I set the alternative in front of him.
“If you refuse the bargain then both your people and mine will be doomed. If you accept, the lot of your people will be infinitely better than it is now. It is as simple as that.”
Common sense, on the face of it. Just so long as he wasn’t allowed too much time to think. This was the crisis …
And it worked, thank God. My bluff—for that was mainly what it was—worked. But then he was still partly dazed from his experience in the Vorted. And it was obvious he had to make a decision without delay.
“If you have this knowledge,” he said curtly, “we trade. Now.”
“No.” I pointed now to the hill where the creeping mist had reached our cairn of stones. “We trade when we are standing on that platform on the threshold of the door.”
He didn’t like that. His eyes narrowed with suspicion.
“How do I know you will keep your part of the bargain?”
“You will have to trust me,” I told him, and then brought out a pre-prepared offering. “I saved your life when you were an enemy, a threat to my world. I could easily have let you die. But I saw you as a human being. The Vorted is alien to both of us. It would give me great pleasure to see it—all of them— destroyed. Or know that they were going to be destroyed.”
And a finishing touch, something I knew could not fail to find its mark: “You will be the only one of your people to know the secret. You will be their saviour. You will mean more to them than you do now.”
He stared at me for a long moment and then turned to limp away, shouting commands in his own language. The ranks broke, the dark-faced Toparians moving back, leaving the way clear. Lee and the Professor turned startled looks in my direction. But there was no time for even the briefest of explanations. The Vorted had swallowed the cairn and was moving, more quickly now, up the higher slope.
“Hurry!” I hurled at them, and left the urgency of my voice to do the rest. They moved after me as I followed Adam to the level ground at the base of the hill.
We were only able to go slowly, held back by Adam’s limping pace. A quick assessment of the distance between the mist and the platform sent an icy, shuddering wave of apprehension through me. I knew that if we were able to reach the platform only moments ahead of the Vorted, I would be able to hold it back while we went through the door. But I had the feeling from the glowering, openly suspicious Toparian faces turned in our direction that if I were to race ahead they might use their weapons against me. I was only safe so long as I was with their leader.
If the mist reached the door first, we would be too late. Once it started to flow through, there would be nothing I could do to halt its progress. We would have to wait, and that was something I didn’t want. It would give Adam time to think. And it wouldn’t take him long to realise there were other ways he could take the secret from me without having to bargain for it.
We were climbing the hill now, moving parallel to the creeping mist. The Toparians were on our right and behind us. I glanced quickly at Adam’s face. It was frowning, filled with doubt, its message plain. At any moment he was going to come to a halt and call our bargain off. That was when I took the risk of racing ahead. And my guess was right, for he put out his hand to stop me, his grip sliding off my elbow as I went.
I reached the ladder leading up the platform in the same moment that the mist touched it. Momentarily forgetful I grasped one of the uprights with my left hand, using the other to try to ward off the Vorted. Terrifyingly, it ignored me, thickening, wrapping itself about my legs.
Then reason returned. Changing my grip I held out my left hand, and the mist recoiled, drawing back on itself, leaving my legs free again. Lee was panting at my side. I motioned for him to climb, but he waited for Maver to go first. And then Adam was there too, shouting something in his own language, his intention still clear enough although the words meant nothing to me. I pushed him frantically away, more roughly than I had intended, for he went staggering back down the slope.
I knew what the consequences of that would be. Lee had reached the platform on his uncle’s heels and I was halfway up the rickety ladder, looking back over my shoulder, when the first heat-ray came lancing slowly towards us, gathering momentum and brilliance as it came. It struck the base of the construction as I scrambled onto the platform. Flames crackled, smoke rose in dark billows, and the platform swayed sickeningly.
The Professor was on his knees—I hadn’t seen him stumble—almost on the threshold of the flickering oblong of light. Lee stood over him, trying to pull him back to his feet. Mist surged over the smoke-tree side of the platform, a tentacle probing towards me. It coiled sharply back as I warded it off with my hand. A second heat-ray came sweeping towards us. But Maver was on his feet at last and plunging into the blue light of the door, flicking out of existence. Lee turned an anguished face towards me, shouting, the words lost in the roar and crackle of the flames, then swinging round to vanish in his turn through the door.
Now it was my turn. The door was waiting, but there was something I had to do first. I still intended fulfilling my part of the bargain. Adam stood there, one hand to his side, looking up at me through the smoke. I unstrapped my wrist-watch and tossed it down to him. Then, only waiting long enough to see him catch it, I turned to go through the door.
There was the old feeling of plunging down a bottomless lift-shaft, terrifying moments of nothingness, the sickness of forces at work in my body, and then I was sprawling on my han
ds and knees on the blessed concrete floor of the laboratory. I slipped sideways, catching my head against one corner of the block on which the generators were mounted so that for a few moments I was partly stunned, only vaguely aware of what was going on around me.