by Hal K. Wells
Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
_Blake made a lightning snatch at a tentacle with bothhands._]
Zehru of Xollar
By Hal K. Wells
Three Earthlings are whisked on an inter-dimensional journey to the den of the Scientist Zehru.
When the rolling thunder of infra-bass first came to their ears, RobertBlake and Helen Lawton were standing on the platform of a New Yorksubway station waiting for the arrival of an uptown express to bear themto their homes.
They made a strikingly attractive couple as they stood there. New Yorkhad not had time as yet to remove the bronze tan of an outdoor life fromBlake's ruggedly good-looking face. His tall athletic figure was stillconspicuous for the lithe strength that had made him an All-Westerntackle less than two years ago.
Standing beside Blake's husky figure, Helen Lawton looked like a tiny,very perfect, blonde doll, with an exquisitely molded face framed incurly bobbed hair that was the clear golden-amber hue of orange honey.There was a diamond sparkling on the ring finger of the girl's slim lefthand, placed there by Blake.
It was well after midnight, and the only other passenger waiting on thestation was a burly chap leaning against one of the white pillars on theother side of the platform. After a casual glance at the fellow, withhis derby hat shoved far back from a low forehead, his blatantlyconspicuous clothing, and the suspicious bulge under one arm-pit, Blakehad mentally set him down as a minor gangster, probably a strong-arm manfor some beer mob.
Blake and Helen had been standing there but a few minutes when thestrange sound first became audible. For a moment Blake thought it wasmerely the rumbling roar of an express approaching far down the tunnel.Then he realized that no subway train could possibly produce a soundeffect so oddly disturbing and strangely alien.
It was like no sound that Blake had ever heard before. Vibrant withcolossal power, it suggested a sustained note struck from a giant organ,a note so low in pitch that it seemed a full octave below the lowestbass note ever struck. Whatever it was, the thundering vibration ofinfra-bass was coming nearer with startling swiftness.
* * * * *
It was impossible to locate the source of the mighty pulsing note. Itseemed to be coming simultaneously from all directions, like a greathollow sphere of invisible sound waves closing in with the stationplatform as its central focal point.
Helen's face was white with dread as she shrank closer into Blake'sembrace. Blake noted that the gangster across the platform was standingtensely at bay with his back against the pillar and his right handthrust under his coat as he stared wildly about him in an effort todiscover the cause of the disturbance.
The rolling thunder closed in upon them with a final rush that broughtit so near that their very bodies seemed to vibrate in harmony with thatmighty note of shuddering bass. Then with startling abruptness the greennet came.
Out from the walls and down from the roof spurted scores of quiveringribbons of blinding green flame. Swiftly the radiant tendrils rushed inupon the shrinking three from every side, while the infra-bass thunderedin mighty crescendo.
Blake instinctively swept Helen close within the shelter of his arms inan effort to protect her with his own body against the searing menace ofthose onrushing green flames. The next moment the fiery ribbons wereupon them, lashing about their bodies, crossing and crisscrossing in theair above and around them in a great tangled web of interlacing lines offlame that filled the entire platform.
* * * * *
With a shock of relief Blake found that there was no heat in thosestrange flames, but his relief was short-lived as the next secondbrought him realization of the real menace of the radiant ribbons. Therewas a solidity and strength in those glowing streamers that held them ashelplessly captive as though they were gripped in ribbons of steel.Dazed and helpless, the three struggled for a moment in the meshes ofthe weird net of flame like fish caught in the strands of some giantcosmic seine.
The trembling thunder of infra-bass abruptly changed to a thin whiningnote so high in pitch that it seemed the nearly soundless ghost of ametallic scream. With the change in sound Blake became aware of a newand astounding change in his surroundings.
The walls and roof of the station seemed closing in upon him as thoughhe were growing in size at an incredible rate. The next moment he shotthrough the roof, hurtling on and upward with the velocity of a rocket.The sensation was one that his reeling brain could not even grasp. Hisbody seemed to be inside every stone, iron bar, and lump of earth, yetat the same time every exterior object seemed _within_ his body. It wasan eery chaos of a dozen different dimensions blending to form a Spacein which there was no known dimension.
As they flashed on out to the surface Blake had one hazy glimpse ofManhattan's glowing lights spread all about them. Then the speed oftheir progress leaped into a new and terrible acceleration that blottedout every tangible sensation from Blake's brain.
Time and Space alike seemed to vanish as their hurtling flight sent themrocketing on for distances inconceivably vast through a bleak andappalling Nothingness, where neither sight nor sound existed.
Then abruptly the speed of their flight seemed to be lessening.Sensation returned to Blake. He again heard the thin high-pitchedmetallic wail, now swiftly deepening to the familiar growl of rollingbass. He again noted the presence of the glowing green ribbons of thenet that still encircled them.
* * * * *
A blindingly brilliant purple mist was now closing in upon them fromevery direction, bringing with it a nameless and agonizing force thatseemed to be shaking the very atoms in Blake's body asunder. Then theydropped swiftly down out of the purple mists, and the strange agony atonce vanished. Blake felt their downward progress come to an end withthe gentle arrival of his feet upon firm ground.
The encircling net of green flame glowed dazzlingly brighter for a briefmoment, then swiftly vanished into thin air, while the mutter of bassvibrations simultaneously died away into silence. Blake staggered andnearly fell as the sudden release from the net's strands again left hisbody free.
He looked down at Helen as she stood huddled close beside him, still inthe shelter of his arms. The girl's face was white with terror as shelooked back up at him.
"Bob, what happened--and where on earth are we?" Her voice trembled alittle in spite of her plucky effort to keep it steady.
Blake's bewildered gaze was already roving around them trying tocomprehend the incredible details of their surroundings. "I've no ideawhat happened, dear," he answered slowly. "As to where we are now, I'mvery much afraid it's nowhere on Earth!"
"Then where is this hopped-up layout anyway, fellah, if it ain't onEarth?" broke in a voice with a decided East Side twang. Blake quicklyturned and saw that the gangster had remained with them in that eeryflight in the green net. There was an expression of dumfounded amazementupon the man's heavy face, and he was obviously anxious to be friendlywith the two who now represented the only link with the familiar worldhe had known.
"Gee, for a minute I thought they had me on the spot in some new way,sure!" he chattered excitedly as he came quickly over to join Helen andBlake. "There's plenty of guys wantin' to turn the heat on me there inthe Big Town. I'm Gil Mapes, see? But this ain't no frame-up like any Iever heard of. What happened anyway, fellah?"
* * * * *
For the moment Blake did not answer. The three of them were silent asthey stared about them with eyes that were dazed by the startlinglyunfamiliar aspect of every detail in their surroundings.
From the twin purple suns that blazed down through the tenuous mistsover
head to the barren blue-gray ground underfoot, there was not asingle object familiar to Earthly eyes. The huge enclosure in which thethree of them stood was obviously the work of intelligent beings of somekind, but its mechanical details were products of a science differentfrom any known to Blake.
The purpose of the enclosure seemed to be to maintain an area of clearair in the midst of the swirling purple vapors that pressed in againstit from the top and from every side. In shape it was a great oblongcell, some fifty feet high, two hundred yards long, and about onehundred yards wide. The three captives stood near the center.
Fencing in the enclosure at twenty-yard intervals and reaching upward tothe ceiling were slender posts of some lusterless black metal. Betweenthese posts streamed unbroken, nearly transparent sheets of some unknownforce, the only visible sign of which was the presence of countlessmillions of tiny shimmering golden flecks which danced like dust motesin a ray of sunlight. It was obviously this thin sheet of