shrill command fromtheir leader, they began cautiously edging forward toward Joan andPowell. The two gave ground slowly, working their way back overtoward the projecting tongue of rock. Out on the end of that narrowstrip, Powell knew that he could hold the horde at bay for a fewmoments at least.
* * * * *
They reached the rocky projection, and began backing slowly andcarefully out toward its end. The guards, galvanized into action bytheir captives' retreat, suddenly came surging forward in a furiouscharge.
Powell emptied the two automatics in a crashing volley that nearlywiped out the charging guards. The few survivors turned and fled inpanic back to the main horde. Powell reloaded his clips withfeverish haste.
The thousands of rat-men in the main horde were now milling in whatwas apparently a last moment of hesitation before surging forward inan irresistible stampede toward the beleaguered two out on the rockystrip.
Several bolder individuals at the edge of the horde edged a stepforward. Their example was followed by a hundred others. Anotherhesitant step or two--and then the whole horde was in motion.
Powell swept the front rank with a rain of lead from one of theautomatics, holding the other as a reserve. The heavy bullets plowedmurder into the close-packed furry bodies. The charge waveredmomentarily. Then Powell felt Joan tugging frantically at his arm.
"Larry, the rocks under us are crumbling!" she cried. "We'll behurled down into the pit!"
Even as she spoke, Powell felt the narrow strip of rock under themquiver and settle. He looked quickly down. All along its length, thenarrow rocky projection, weakened by their weight, was breakingswiftly away from the pit's edge. And on the floor of the pit belowthem the two waiting Devil Crystals moved with musical, tinklingsounds as they waited restlessly for their prey to fall among them.
The horde of rat-men rallied and swept on forward in a wave thatnothing could have stopped this time--but their charge was too late.The entire rocky projection collapsed with a final sickening lurch,and slid to the pit's floor, carrying Joan and Powell with it in aminiature avalanche of rocky rubble.
* * * * *
Even in the chaos of their wild descent, Powell retained his gripupon the loaded automatic in his hand. They struck the bottom andstaggered half-dazed to their feet, to confront the two crystallinemonsters rocking on their rounded bases scarcely ten feet away.
The fatal cone-shaped projection was already beginning to form uponthe silver-faceted side of the nearest Devil Crystal. Before thelance-like arm of crystal could flash outward, Powell sent twobullets crashing into the crystal's side just over the opalescentnucleus.
The leaden missiles caromed harmlessly off, as though they hadstruck armor-plate, but the nucleus clouded momentarily and thecone-shaped projection dissolved back into the side.
With lightning speed Powell shifted his aim to the other crystaljust as its partly-formed arm was flashing toward them. His bulletcrashed into the silvery side squarely over the nucleus. Again thebullet's effect was the same. This crystal nucleus clouded murkily,and the lance-like arm telescoped back into the faceted bulk.
But the effect of the bullets was only momentary. Swiftly the nucleiof both crystals cleared. A deep blue film, apparently protective innature, formed between the outer wall and each nucleus. The conesbudded, and again the arms started forth.
Powell fired again, and this time uselessly. His bullet strucksquarely, but the shock of its impact was apparently nullified bythe protective blue film. He emptied his gun in a last crashingfusillade, but without effect of any kind upon the film-guardednuclei of the giant crystals.
Their forming arms never wavered as they came lancing forward withdeadly accuracy straight toward Joan and Powell. In a last effort tosave Joan from the terrible doom of the crystal lances as long aspossible, Powell flung his own body as a shield in front of thehalf-fainting girl. The tip of one of the crystalline arms struckhis chest with a crashing tinkle of musical glass.
Instantly the tip sprayed into a web of fine filaments that laced onaround his body. A tinkling shock raced through his every nerve fromthe contact with the weird life force of the great crystal.
The arm began contracting. Powell was helpless against the terrificpower of the slender, diamond-hard lance of crystal. He felt himselfirresistibly drawn toward the silver-faceted wall of the DevilCrystal.
His senses reeled in the babel of alien sounds--the crashing,glass-like music of the crystalline monsters and the snarling,squealing, paean of jubilant triumph from the thousands of rat-mennow lining the rim of the pit above.
* * * * *
Then suddenly the pit, the Devil Crystals, and everything else inthe nightmare world of Arret was blotted out in a vast swirlingcloud of pulsing roseate flame that seemed to sweep him bodily upinto the air and whirl him dizzily around.
His dazed brain staggered from the shock of the cataclysmic forcethat was disintegrating an entire world around him, but through theutter chaos one thought rang clear and exultant in his consciousness.
Benjamin Marlowe had finally broadcast the recall wave!
For what seemed endless eons of time Powell hurried through alimitless universe of swirling, tinted fires, while vibrations of amighty force tingled with poignant ecstasy in every atom of hisbody.
Then the eddying clouds of flame began to coalesce and solidify withstartling suddenness. A moment later, like the abrupt lighting of aroom when an electric switch is snapped, the mists vanished andPowell felt firm footing again under his feet. Around him were thefamiliar objects of Benjamin Marlowe's laboratory.
He was standing upon the floor-plate in the center of the areabounded by the banked green tubes, and beside him stood Joan,sobbing with relief at their last-minute rescue from the DevilCrystals of Arret. And over by the control panel of the recallmechanism was the slight figure of old Benjamin Marlowe, with agreat joy now shining in his faded eyes.
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