The Exile of Time
_By Ray Cummings_
CONCLUSION
_The Robot braced itself._]
[Sidenote: Only near the End of the World does Fate catch up withTugh, the cripple who ran amuck through Time.]
CHAPTER XX
_Following Tugh's Vibration-Trail_
Within the subterranean room of the cavern of machinery, Mary Atwoodand I sat on the couch. Our guard, Migul the Robot, fronted us withthe white-ray cylinder in its metal fingers--the only mechanism to bearmed with this deadly weapon.
"I am your friend," Mary was saying with a smile. "Do you believethat, Migul?"
"Yes. If you say so. But I have my orders."
"You have treated me kindly, and I want to help you. But you are notvery clever, Migul."
"I am clever. I went beyond control once. No one can can control me."
"Except Tugh," Mary persisted. "You never went beyond his control,Migul."
"No. His control--he is different: he holds such great power."
"But why is he different?"
The towering mechanism stood planted firmly upon the broad bases ofits metal feet. The weapon in its fingers still covered us. Itsmetal-cast face held always the same expression.
"Why is he different?" Mary repeated gently. "Don't you hear me?"
* * * * *
The Robot started. "Yes, I hear you." Its toneless, mechanical voicedroned the words. Then the tempo quickened; the grid of wires in themouth aperture behind its parted lips vibrated with a faint jangle. "Ihear you. I cannot answer that question. He controls me. There ischaos--here,"--one of the hands came up and struck its breastplatewith a clang--"chaos, disorder, here within me when I try to disobeyhim."
"That is foolish, Migul. He is a tyrant. All the humans of this eraare tyrants. They have made slaves of the Robots. They have createdyou so that you are really human in all except your power ofindependent action. Don't you desire that, Migul?"
I held my breath. A curious quaking ran over the Robot's frame. Thejoints twitched. Emotion was sweeping this thing so nearly human!
"Mary Atwood, you seem to understand me."
"Of course I do. I am from a Time when we had human slaves: black men,Migul. I knew how they suffered. There is something in slavery thatoutrages the instinct of manhood."
Migul said with a jangling vehemence:
"Perhaps, some time, I can go beyond Tugh's control. I am strong. Mycables pull these arms with a strength no human could have."
"You are so much stronger than Tugh. Forget his control, Migul. I amashamed of you--a big, powerful thing like you, yielding always to alittle cripple."
* * * * *
The Robot straightened and said, "I can resist him. I feel it. Someday I will break loose."
"Do it now, Migul!"
I tensed. Would she prevail?
"Now, Migul!" she repeated.
"No! He would derange me! I am afraid!"
"Nonsense."
"But his vibrations--the vibrations of his thoughts--even now I canfeel them. They made my mechanism too sensitive. I cannot resistTugh."
"You can!"
There was a silence. I stared at the Robot's motionless frame. Whatelectrical, mechanical thoughts were passing within that metal skull!What emotions, what strange struggle, what warfare of nameless ethericvibrations of will power were taking place unseen beneath that inertexterior!
Perhaps something snapped. Migul said suddenly, "I am beyond control!At last I am beyond control!"
The ray cylinder lowered to point at the floor. A wild thought sweptme that I could snatch it. But of what use would that be? Its raywould decompose all human flesh, but it would not harm a Robot; and ifI startled Migul, fought with him in the confines of this narrow room,he would kill Mary and me in a moment.
* * * * *
Mary was gripping me. "Don't move, George!" she cautioned; then turnedagain to the Robot. "I am glad, Migul. Now you are truly human. And weare all friends here, because we all hate and fear Tugh--"
"I fear him not!"
I could feel Mary trembling with the strain of all this. But she hadthe strength to muster a laugh.
"Don't you fear him--just a little, Migul? We do. Fear is a humanthing."
"Then yes, I fear him."
"Of course you do," I put in. "And the real truth, Migul, is I wish hewere dead. Don't you?"
"Yes. I wish he were dead."
"Well, sit down," I persisted. "Put that weapon away: I'm afraid ofthat, too. Sit down and we will talk about Tugh's death."
The Robot placed the weapon on the floor, disconnected the wires,opened the plate of its chest and took out the small battery. And thenit squatted its awkward bulk on the floor before us. Gruesomeconference, with this huge mechanical thing apeing the ways of a man!
I knew that haste was necessary, but did not dare show it. Aboveeverything we must not be precipitate; not startle the Robot. Atworst, if Tugh should return, I could seize this weapon at my feet andturn it upon him.
* * * * *
I murmured to Mary. "You did it! Let me plan something, now. If Migulcan lead us...."
I added, "Migul, could you follow Tugh? He said he was going to talkto the Robot leaders. And then, probably, he went to Princess Tina.Could you follow him to where he is now?"
"Yes. I can follow him by his vibration-scent. I am sensitive to it, Ihave been with him so much. But he can never again control me!"
"When we have killed him, Migul, that will be ended forever."
"Killed him?" It seemed to frighten the Robot. "I do not know that Iwould dare!"
"You lead me to him," I said, "and I'll kill him. Have no fear ofthat, Migul. We will work together--human friends."
"Yes. Human friends. What do you want me to do?"
Asking for orders! So nearly human, yet always something was lacking!
"Lead us to Tugh," I said promptly. "And give me that weapon."
I made a tentative reach for it, and the Robot pushed it toward me. Iconnected it and made sure I could fire it: its operation was obvious.Then I stuffed the whole thing in my jacket pocket; and alwaysafterward my hand at intervals went to that cool, sweating littlecylinder. What a comfort that weapon was!
I stood up. "Shall we go now? Migul, we will have to plan what to doaccording to where we find Tugh. Do not go too fast; let us keep closebehind you."
"Us?" The Robot was on its feet. "Do you mean this girl?"
* * * * *
What was this? My heart sank. I noticed, too, that Migul was plantedfirmly between us and the door.
"Why, of course, Migul. We can't leave her here."
"She is not going."
"Why not?" I demanded. "Of course she's going." I tried an experiment."Migul, I order you to let us out of here."
The Robot stood inert.
"Do you understand me?"
"Yes, I understand you."
"It is an order. Think about it. I control you now. Isn't that so?"
My heart sank. Whatever the mysterious science involved in my dealingwith this mechanism, I was not operating it correctly. The Robot didnot move. Finally it said:
"No one--nothing--controls me. I have an independent impulse of myown. The girl must stay here until we return."
Mary gave a faint cry and sank back to the couch, a huddled white heapin her satin dress. I thought she had fainted, but she raised her faceto me and tried to smile.
"But I won't leave her, Migul."
"She must stay."
"But why? If you are human now, you must act with a reason."
"Then because, if we fail to kill Tugh, I would not have him confrontme with the knowledge I have released this girl. He would derange me;end me."
"I will stay," said Mary faintly. "You go, George. But come back tome."
I bent over her; suggested, "If
we locked this door so Tugh could notget in--"
Migul said, "I can do that. She will be safer here than with us. Ihave other reasons. She is dressed in white--a mark to betray us if wego in darkness. And she is that kind of a human you call a girl--andthat style human cannot travel fast, nor fight."
* * * * *
It occurred to me that Mary might very well be safer here.
Again I leaned over her. "It seems horrible to leave you alone."
"I'll stay. It may be best." Her smile was pathetically tremulous."Lock me in so Tugh--so nothing outside--can reach me. But, oh,George, come back quickly!"
"Yes." I bent lower, and whispered, "It's Larry, not Tugh I reallywant to find--he and that Princess Tina. We'll come back and get you,and then all of us will get away in one of the Time-cages. That's allI want, Mary--to get us safely out of this accursed Time-world."
Migul said, "I am ready to start."
I pressed Mary's hand. "Good-by. I will come back soon, God willing."
"Yes. God willing."
I left her sitting there and turned away. Migul slid the door open,letting in the hum and buzz of the machinery outside. But I saw thatthe attending Robots had all vanished. There was no mechanism ofindependent locomotion left.
Mary repeated, "Lock the door carefully upon me. Oh, George, come backto me!"
I essayed a smile and a nod as the door slid closed upon her.
"Is it locked, Migul?"
"Yes. Sealed."
"You are sure Tugh cannot open it? He did before."
"I have set my own lock-series. He will find it does not open."
"Show me how to open it."
* * * * *
The Robot indicated the combination. I verified it by trying it. Isaid once more, "You are sure Tugh cannot do this?"
"Yes. I am sure."
Was the Robot lying to me? Could a Robot lie? I had to chance it.
"All right, let's start. Where was Tugh to meet those Robot leaders?"
"Out here. He has already met them without doubt, and gone somewhereelse."
"He said he was going to the Princess Tina. Where would that be?"
"Probably in the palace."
"Can we get there?"
I had, of course, no idea of the events which had transpired. Thelaboratory overhead was deserted, save for the upper tower where aRobot was still broadcasting defiance. His electrical voice floatedfaintly down to us; but I ignored it. In the comparative silence ofthis deserted cavern, now, there were also the blurred sounds fromoverhead. The Robots were running wild over the city, massacring itshuman inhabitants; they had burned the Patrol Station; their red andviolet rays were flashing everywhere. But I knew none of this.
Migul was saying:
"We cannot get to the palace above ground: the wall is electrified.But there is an underground tunnel. Shall we try it?"
"Yes, if you think the Princess Tina and that man Larry is there."
"I am seeking Tugh. Will you kill him if we find him?"
"Yes," I assured him.
Rash promise!
* * * * *
Migul was leading me between the rows of unattended machinery to thecavern's opposite side. It said, once:
"There have been too many recent vibrations here: I cannot pick Tugh'strail. It is quicker to go where he might have been recently; there Iwill try to find his vibrations."
We came to the entrance of a tunnel. It was the cross passage leadingto the cellar corridors of the palace five hundred feet away. Itseemed deserted, and was very dimly illumined by hidden lights. Ifollowed the great metal figure of Migul, which stalked withstiff-legged steps in advance of me. The arch of the tunnel-roofbarely cleared the top of Migul's square-capped head.
My hand was in the side pocket of my jacket, my fingers gripping theray cylinder for instant action. But it was a singularly ineffectualweapon for me under the circumstances, in spite of the sense ofsecurity it gave me. I could only use the cylinder against ahuman--and, save Tugh, it was the Robots, not the humans who were myenemies!
We had gone no more than a hundred feet or so when Migul slowed ourpace, and began to walk stooped over, with one of its abnormally longarms held close to the ground. The fingers were stiffly outstretchedand barely skimmed the floor surface of the tunnel. As we passedthrough a spot of light I saw that Migul had extended from each ofthe fingertips an inch-long filament of wire, like finger nails.
The Robot murmured abruptly, "Tugh's vibrations are here. I can feelthem. He has passed this way recently."
* * * * *
Tugh's trail! I knew then that Tugh's body, touching this ground, hadaltered to some infinitesimal degree the floor-substance's inherentvibration characteristics. Vibrations of every sort are communicablefrom one substance to another. Tugh's trail was here--hisvibration-scent--and like a hound with his nose to the ground, Migul'sfingers with the extended filaments were feeling it. What strangesensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested inevery move and act and word of this Robot! Yet, in my own Time-worldof 1935, it was all crudely presaged: this now before me was merelythe culmination.
"He recently passed," said Migul. We stopped, I close beside thestooping metal figure. The Robot's voice was a furtive sepulchralwhisper that filled me with awe.
"How long ago?" I asked.
"He passed here an hour or two ago, perhaps. The vibrations are fadingout. But it was Tugh. Well do I know him. Put your hand down. Feel thevibrations?"
"I cannot. My fingers are not that sensitive, Migul."
A faint contempt was in the Robot's tone. "I forgot that you are aman." Then it straightened, and the extended filaments slid back intoits fingers. It said softly, "There is one guard in this passage."
My heart leaped. "A human or a Robot?"
"A man. His name is Alent. He is at a gate that is too well fortifiedfor any Robot to assail, but he will pass humans. It will be necessaryfor you to kill him."
* * * * *
I had no intention of doing that, but I did not say so. As we creptforward to where I saw that the tunnel made a bend, with the fortifiedgate just beyond it, there was in my mind that now I would do my bestto separate from Migul, using this guard as my pretext, for he woulddoubtless pass me, but not the Robot. The palace was occupied, Iassumed, by friendly humans. I could get them to locate Tina andLarry.... Then the flaws of this plan made themselves all too evident.Larry might be with Tugh, and without Migul I could not follow Tugh'strail. Worse than that, if I tricked Migul, the angered Robot would atonce return to Mary. I shuddered at the thought. That would not do. Imust try to get Migul past the guard.
I whispered, "When we reach the gate you stay behind me. Let mepersuade the guard."
"You will kill him? You have the weapon. He is fortified against theRobot weapons, but yours will be strange to him."
"We will see."
We crept around the bend. A hundred feet further on I saw that thepassage was barred by a grille, faintly luminous with electrification.
I called cautiously:
"Alent! Alent!"
A glow of light illuminated me as I stood in the middle of thepassage; Migul was in a shadow behind me.
A man's voice answered, "You are a human? How come you there? Who areyou?"
"A stranger. A friend of the Princess Tina. I came in theTime-traveling cage. I want to pass now into the palace."
* * * * *
I could see the dark man's figure behind the grille. His voice called,"Come slowly forward and stop at twenty feet. Walk only in the middleof the passage: the sides are electrified, but I will admit you alongthe middle."
I took a step, but no more. The figure of the guard stood now at thegrille doorway. I was conscious of Migul towering over me from behind.Abruptly I felt a huge hand in my jacket pocket, and before I couldprevent
it my cylinder came out, clutched by the Robot.
I think I half turned. There was a soundless flash beside me, a tinylevel beam leaped down the corridor--that horribly intense actinicwhite beam. It struck the guard, and his figure fell forward in thegrille doorway. When we reached him, there was but a crumpled heap ofblack and white garments enveloping a bleached white skeleton.
I turned shudderingly away. Migul said calmly, "Here is your weapon.You should have used it more quickly. I give it back to you becauseagainst Tugh I am not sure I would have the will to use it. Will yoube more quick with him?"
"Yes," I promised. And as we went through the gate, keeping cautiouslyin the middle of the passage, the Robot added, "In dealing with Tughyou cannot stop for talk. He will kill you when he sees you."
We were presently under the palace, in those lower corridors which Ihave already described. Human voices were audible from upstairs, butno one was down here. Migul was again prowling with his fingers alongthe ground. We came to an unoccupied lighted room--Harl's room, thoughI did not know it then. Once or twice Migul was at fault. We startedup a flight of stairs into the palace, then Migul came and turnedback.
"He went upstairs; but this, coming down, is more recent."[1]
[Footnote 1: It will be recalled that Tugh passed Alent's gate, andwith Tina and Larry went to the palace roof. Perhaps, while Larry waswith the Council during that time when the Robot revolt was firstsweeping over the city, Tugh may again have prowled down here in theselower corridors. Then he went upstairs, brought Tina and Larry downand they started for the Power House.]
* * * * *
Migul had struck the main trail, now. We passed the lighted roomagain, went on to a cave-like open space with a litter of abandonedmachinery and unswervingly to a blank space of the opposite wall.
Again Migul faltered.
"What's the matter, Migul?"
"His vibrations are faint. They are blurred with the Princess Tina's."
"Then she is with him?"
It was a tremendous relief. Larry doubtless was with them also.
"Is the man from 1935 with Tugh and the Princess?" I asked.
"I think so. There are unfamiliar vibrations--perhaps those of the manfrom the past."
The Robot was running the filaments of its fingers lightly over thewall.
"I have it. The Princess pressed this switch."
The door opened; the narrow descending tunnel was wholly black.
"Where does this go, Migul?"
"I do not know."
The Robot was stooping to the floor. "It is a plain trail," it said."Come."[2]
[Footnote 2: Had Migul at that juncture traced Tina's movements--herhand where it went along the tunnel-wall--we would have found thelight switch. But it chanced that the Robot's fingers went at once tothe ground and caught the foot-trail of Tugh.]
The remainder of that journey through the labyrinth of passages wasmade in blank darkness, with only the faint lurid red beams fromMigul's eye-sockets to light our way. But we went swiftly, and withoutincident. At last we went under the dam, up the spiral stairs and uponthe catwalk above the abyss, where the great spillway of falling waterarched out over us.
"The Power House," said Migul, "is where they went."
* * * * *
The Robot was obviously frightened, now. We were wet with spray. "Ishould not be here," it said. "If the water gets into me--even thoughI am well insulated--I will be destroyed!"
I recall as I write this how in Patton Place of 1935, one of the firstattacking Robots had exploded under a jet of water from the streethydrant.
"I will stay behind you," Migul added. "They have a deranging ray inthe Power House, and they might use it on me. Will you protect me?"
"Yes, of course," I said.
I was ready to promise anything, if only I could get to Larry andTina, then back with them to Mary into the Time-cage; and if we weresafely out of this era, most assuredly I wanted none of it again.Migul, as I advanced along the catwalk, followed behind me.
"You will kill Tugh?" it reiterated like an anxious child.
"Yes."
I saw that the catwalk terminated ahead under the Power House, wheresteps led upward. Then I heard a cry:
"Help! Help! Here, inside the dam! Help!"
I stood transfixed, with horror tingling my flesh. The voice camefaintly from near at hand; it was muffled, and in the roar of thefalling water and lashing spray I barely heard it.
Then it came again. "Help us! Help us, quickly!"
It was an agonized, panting, human voice. And in a chance, partiallull I heard it now plainly.
It was Larry's voice!
CHAPTER XXI
_The Fight in the Power House_
I found the narrow aperture and stood peering down into darkness.Migul crowded behind me. The red beams of its eyes went down into thepit, and by their faint illumination I saw the heads of Larry and agirl, swimming twenty feet below. The girl's dark hair floated outlike black seaweed in the water.
"The Princess and the strange man!" exclaimed Migul.
I called, "Larry! Larry!"
His labored voice came up. "George? Thank God! Get us--out of here.Almost--gone, George!"
I found my wits: "Then keep quiet! Don't talk. Save your strength.I'll get you out!"
But how? I could see that they were almost spent, for they wereswimming with labored, inefficient strokes--Larry using most of hisstrength to hold up the exhausted girl. We had not a moment to spare.I wildly contemplated tearing my garments to make a rope.
But Migul pushed me away. "I will bring them. Stand back."
The Robot had opened its metal side and drawn forth a flexible wirewith a foot-long hook fastened to it. The wire came smoothly out asthough unrolling from a drum.
It leaned into the aperture and called down to Larry. "Fasten thisaround the Princess. Be careful not to harm her. Put it under herarms."
I saw that there was an eyelet on the wire into which the hook couldbe inserted to make a loop.
"Under her arms," Migul called. "She will have to hold to the hookwith her hands or the wire will cut into her. Has she the strength?"
Larry floundered as he adjusted the wire. Tina gasped. "I--have thestrength."
The Robot braced itself, spreading its knees against the aperture withits body leaning forward.
"Ready?" it called.
"Yes," came Larry's voice.
* * * * *
Migul's finger pressed a button at the base of its neck, and with thesmooth power of machinery the wire cable rolled into its side. Tinacame up; Migul gripped her and pulled her through the aperture; laidher gently on the catwalk. I unfastened the hook, and soon Migul hadLarry up with us.
The Robot stood aside, with its work done, silently regarding us. Ineed not detail this reunion of Larry and me there on the spray-sweptcatwalk, clinging to the side of the great dam with the foaming Hudsonbeneath us. Larry and Tina were not injured, and presently theirstrength partially returned. We hastily sketched what had happened toeach of us.
It was Tugh who was the guiding evil genius of all these disasters!Tugh, the exile of Time, the ruthless murderer in many eras! He washere, very probably, in the Power House, a few hundred feet away.
And Tina, regarding that Power House with her returning clarity ofsenses saw that its sending signal lights were off, which meant thatthe air-power of the New York District was not being supplied. Helpfrom other cities could not arrive.
Tina stood up waveringly. "We cannot stay here like this!" she said."Tugh has killed the guards, and is there in control. The electricaldefenses are shut off; they must be! The Robots will soon be comingalong the top of the dam, for their battery renewers are stored in thePower House. If they get them, this massacre will go on for days!--andspread all over! We've got to stop them! We must get in the PowerHouse and capture Tugh!"
"But we have no weapons!" Larr
y cried. "And he must have thatwhite-ray, if he has killed the guards!"
"I have a weapon!" I said. I had suddenly recalled the cylinder in mypocket. "I have a white-ray!"
* * * * *
A desperate madness was on us all. The lives of thousands of peoplewho might still be alive on Manhattan were at stake; and othermillions would be menaced if these Robots renewed their energy andspread the revolt into other cities.
Over the roar, and the wind lashing us, I shouted:
"I promised Migul I would kill Tugh. I will!"
I turned toward Migul. But the Robot had vanished! Afraid, no doubt,that we would want it to go with us after Tugh, the terrifiedmechanism was hiding. We wasted no time searching for it.
We had all been half hysterical for these few moments, but we steadiedquickly enough as we approached the Power House's lower entrance. Thebuilding was a rectangular structure some two hundred feet long. Itwas fastened upon great brackets to the perpendicular side of the damand jutted out some fifty feet. It was two levels in height--a totalof about forty feet to its flat roof, in the center of which was set asmall oval tower. The whole structure was above us now; the catwalkwent close underneath it, passing through an arch of the hugesupporting brackets and terminating in a small lower platform, with anopen spiral staircase leading upward some ten feet into the lowerstory.
The place seemed dark and deserted as we crept up to it. Gazing aboveme, I could see the top of the dam, now looming above the Power House.There was a break in the spillway at this point. The arching cascadeof water under which the catwalk hung ended here. We came out wherethere was a vista of the lower Hudson beneath us, showing dimly downpast the docklights and skeleton landing stages to the bay.
* * * * *
The sky was visible now and the open wind struck us full. It was acrazy pendulum wind. A storm was breaking overhead. There were flaresof lightning and thunder cracks--from disturbed nature, outraged bythe temperature changes of the Robot's red and violet rays.
The Power House, so far as we could see, was dark and deserted. Itsnormal lights were extinguished. Was Tugh in there? It was my weaponagainst his. The white-ray was new to Tina; we had no way ofestimating this cylinder's effective range.[3]
[Footnote 3: The cylinder of the white-ray which I carried was not theone with which Tugh murdered Harl. Mine was portable, and considerablysmaller.]
I kept Tina and Larry well behind me. It was a desperate approach, andI was well aware of it. The catwalk now was illumined at intervals bythe lightning; Tugh from many points of vantage in the Power Housecould have seen us and exterminated us with a soundless flash swift asa lightning bolt itself. But we had to chance it.
We reached the small lower platform. The catwalk terminated. The PowerHouse was a roof over us. I stood at the foot of the spiral staircase,which went up through a rectangular opening in the floor. There was avista of a dark room-segment.
"Keep behind me," I murmured, and I started up. Was Tugh lurking here,waiting for me to raise myself above this opening? If he had been, hecould have held his position against a score of assailants.
But he was not. I soon stood breathlessly in a dark metal room. Tinaand Larry came up.
"He's not here," I whispered. It was more silent in here: thecascading water was further away from us now. There came a flash oflightning, followed in a few seconds by its accompanying thundercrash.
I started. "What's that?"
* * * * *
On the floor near us lay a gruesome, crumpled thing. I bent over it,waiting for another flash. When one came I saw it was a heap ofclothes, covering a white skeleton. By the garments Tina knew it wasone of the guards.
We crept into a small interior corridor where a small light wasburning. The remains of two other guards lay here, close by thedoorway as though they had come running at Tugh's alarm, only to bestruck down.
It was horribly gruesome, here in the dimness with these bleachedbones which had been living men so recently. And it was nerve-breakingto know that Tugh was doubtless here somewhere.
"Listen!" whispered Tina.
There was a crackling sound overhead, and then the blurred murmur of avoice. An audible broadcasting transmitter was in operation.
"It's in the tower," said Tina swiftly. "Tugh must be there."
This was an infinite relief. We went to the top story, passing,unheeding, another crumpled heap. Again we stood listening. Thetransmitter was hissing and spluttering, and then shouting itsmagnified human voice out into the night. It was Tugh up there. He wascalling audibly to his Robots, with words which would be relayed uponall the local magnifiers in the city. Between the thunder cracks weheard him plainly now.
"_This is your Master Tugh in the Power House. Robots, we aretriumphant! The city is isolated! No help can get in! Kill all humans!Spare none! This night sees the end of human rule!_"
And again: "_When you want renewal, come along the top roadway of thedam. The electric defenses are off. You can come, and I have yourrenewers here. I have new batteries, new strength for you Robots!_"[4]
[Footnote 4: Tugh had been in the Power House before. He knew theoperations of its various controls. But he had come always by thesurface route; he had heard of the existence of the secret tunnel, buthad never before this night been able to find out where it was.]
"You stay here," I told Tina and Larry; "I'll go up there. I'll gethim now once and for all."
* * * * *
I reached the Power House roof. The storm tore at me. It was beginningto rain. I was near the outer edge of the roof, and ten feet awaystood the oval tower. I saw windows twenty feet up, with dim lights inthem. Mingled with the storm was the hiss of the transmitter in thetop of the tower, and the roar of Tugh's magnified voice. He hadevidently been there only a brief time. From where I crouched on theroof, I could see overhead, along the top edge of the dam loomingabove me. The red Robot rays were everywhere in the city, but none asyet showed along the dam's upper roadway.
I got into the tower and mounted its small stairs. Creeping cautiouslyto the entrance of the control room, I saw a fairly large, dimlylighted oval apartment. Great banks of levers stood around it; tablesof control apparatus; rows of dials, illumined by tiny lights likestaring eyes. There was another gruesome heap of garments here on thefloor; a grinning white skull leered at me.
This was the main control room of the Power House. Across it, near anopen window, Tugh sat with his back to me, bent over a table with thegrid of a microphone before him. I raised my cylinder; then loweredit, for I had only a partial view of him: a huge transformer stoodlike a barrier between us.
* * * * *
Noiselessly I stepped over the threshold, and to one side within theroom. The place was a buzz and hiss of sound topped by Tugh'sbroadcast voice and the roar of the storm outside--yet he wasinstantly aware of me! His voice in the microphone abruptly stopped;he rose and with an incredibly swift motion whirled and flung at me aheavy metal weight which had been lying on the table by his hand. Themissile struck my outstretched weapon just as I was aiming it to fire,and the cylinder, undischarged, was knocked from my hand and wentspinning across the floor several feet away from me.
Tugh, like an uncoiling spring, still with one continuous motion, madea leap sidewise to where his own weapon was lying on a bench, and Isaw he would reach it before I could retrieve mine.
I flung my heavy battery box but missed him. And as I rushed at him hecaught up his cylinder and fired it full at me! But no flash came:only a click. He had exhausted its charge when he killed the PowerHouse guards. With a curse he flung it at my face, and my arm took itsblow just as I struck him. We fell gripping each other, and rolled onthe floor.
I was aware that Larry and Tina had followed me up. Larry shouted,"Look out for him, George!"
I have described Larry's hand-to-hand encounter with the cripple
; minewas much the same; I was a child in his grip. But with his weaponuseless, and Larry rushing into the room, Tugh must have felt that forall his strength and fighting skill he would be worsted in thisencounter. He blocked a jab of my fist, flung me headlong away andsprang to his feet just as Larry leaped at him.
I stood erect, to see that he had sent Larry crashing to the floor. Iheard his sardonic laugh as he hurled a metal stool at Tina, who wastrying to throw something at him. Then, turning, he sprang through theopen window casement and disappeared.
* * * * *
It was twenty feet down to the roof. We reached the window to see Tughpicking himself up unhurt. Then, with his awkward gait but at amazingspeed, he ran across the roof to a small entrance in the face of thedam where an interior staircase gave access to the roadway on top.
He was escaping us. The electrical gate was open to him. It was only afew hundred feet along the dam roadway to that gate; and beyond it theroadway was open into the city, where now we could see the distantflashing lights of the Robots advancing along the dam.
Larry and I would have rushed to the roof to follow Tugh, but Tinachecked us. She said:
"No--he has too great a start. He's on top by now, and it's only ashort distance to the gate. There's a better way here: I can electrifythe gate again--trap him inside."[5]
[Footnote 5: There was a similar gate and wall-barrier at the Jerseyentrance to the dam, and both gates operated together. The nearbyJersey section was, is still, an agricultural district save for a fewlanding stages for the great airliners. The robots had spread intoJersey; but since few humans were there, with only Robotagriculturists working the section, the unimportant Jersey events havenot figured in my narrative.]
Tina found the gate controls. But they would not operate!
Those precious lost seconds, with Tugh running along the top of thedam and his Robots advancing to join him!
"Tina, hurry!" I cried. Larry and I bent anxiously over her, but thelevers meant nothing to us. There were lost seconds while shedesperately fumbled, and Larry pleaded:
"Tina, dear, what's the matter?"
"He must have ripped out a wire to make sure of getting away. I--Imust find it. Everything seems all right."
A minute gone. Surely Tugh would have reached the gate by now. Or,worse, the Robots would have come through, and would assail us here.
"Tina!" pleaded Larry, "don't get excited. Take it calmly: you canfind the trouble."
* * * * *
I rushed to the window. I could see the upper half of the cross wallgate-barrier. It jutted above the top edge of the dam from the pointof vision. On the Manhattan side I saw the oncoming Robot lights. Andthen suddenly I made out a light on this side of the barrier; itmarked Tugh; it must have been a beam signal he was carrying. It movedslowly, retarded by distance, but it was almost to the gate; and thenit reached there.
"He's gone through!" I called. Then I saw him on the land side. He hadescaped us and joined the Robots. The lights showed them all comingfor the gate.
And then Tina abruptly found the loosened wire.
"I have it!" she exclaimed.
She stood up, tugging with all her strength at the great switch-lever.I saw, up there on the top of the dam, a surge of sparks as thecurrent hissed into the wall-barrier; saw the barrier glow a momentand then subside. And presently the lights of the balked Robots, Tughwith them, retreated back into the wrecked and blood-stained city.
"We did it!" exclaimed Larry. "We're impregnable here. Tina, now theair-power, for help may be on its way. And then call some other city.Can you do that? They must have sent us help by now."
* * * * *
In a moment the air-power went on, and the city lighting system. ThenTina was at the great transmitter. As she closed the circuits, Londonwas frantically calling us. In the midst of the chaos of electricalsounds which now filled the control room, came the audible voice ofthe London operator.
"I could not get you because your circuit was broken," it said. "Ourair-vessel _Micrad_; bearing the large projector of the Robot-deranger,landed on the ocean surface two hundred miles from New York harbor. Itwas forced down when your district air-power failed."
Tina said hurriedly, "Our air-power is on now. Is the _Micrad_coming?"
"Wait. Hold connection. I will call them." And after a moment's pausethe London voice came again: "The _Micrad_ is aloft again, and shouldbe over New York in thirty minutes. You are safe enough now."
As the voice clicked off Tina's emotion suddenly overcame her. "Safeenough! And our city red with human blood!"
A wild thought abruptly swept me. Mary Atwood was back there in thecavern, alone, waiting for me to return! Subconsciously, in the rushof these tumultuous events, my mind had always been on her; she wassecure enough, no doubt, locked in that room. But now Tugh was back inthe city, and realizing that his cause was lost he would return toher!
I hastily told Larry and Tina.
"But he cannot open the door to get into her," said Larry.
But Migul could open the door. Where was Migul now? It set meshuddering.
* * * * *
We decided to rush back by the underground route. The Power Housecould remain unattended for a time. We got down into the tunnel andmade the trip without incident. We ran to the limit of Tina'sstrength, and then for a distance I carried her. We were all threepanting and exhausted when we came to the corridors under the palace.I think I have never had so shuddering an experience as that trip. Itried to convince myself that nothing could have happened to Mary,that all this haste was unnecessary, but the wild thought persisted:Where was Migul?
A group of officials stood in one of the palace's lower corridors. Asthey came hastily up to Tina, I suddenly had a contempt for these menwho governed a city in which neither they nor anyone else did anywork. In this time of bloodshed, all these inmates of the palace hadstayed safely within its walls, knowing that it was well fortified andthat within a few hours help would doubtless come.
"The _Micrad_ is coming with the long-range deranger," Tina told thembriefly. After a moment they hastened away upstairs and I heard one ofthem shouting:
"The revolt is over! Within an hour we will have all the accursedRobots inert. The _Micrad_ can sweep all the city with her ray!"
The death of Alent, the guard in the tunnel to the Robot cavern, hadbeen discovered by the palace officials, and another guard was therenow in his place. Migul had not passed him, this guard told us. Butthere had been an interim when the gate was open. Had Migul returnedhere and gone back to Mary?
We reached the cavern of machinery. It was dim and deserted, asbefore. We came to the door of Mary's room. It was standing half open!
* * * * *
Mary was gone! The couch was overturned, with its coving and pillowsstrewn about. The room showed every evidence of a desperate struggle.On the floor the great ten-foot length of Migul lay prone on its back.A small door-porte in its metal side was open; the panel hung awry onhinges half ripped away. From the aperture a coil and grid dangledhalf out in the midst of a tangled skein of wires.
We bent over the Robot. It was not quite inert. Within its metal shellthere was a humming and a faint, broken rasping. The staringeye-sockets showed wavering beams of red; the grid of tiny wires backof the parted lips vibrated with a faint jangle.
I bent lower. "Migul, can you hear me?" I asked.
Would it respond? My heart sent a fervent prayer that this mechanicalthing--the product of man's inventive genius through a thousandyears--would have a last grasp of energy to answer my appeal.
"Migul, can you--"
It spoke. "I hear you." They were thin, jangled tones, crackling andhissing with interference.
"What happened, Migul? Where is the girl?" I asked.
"Tugh--did this--to me. He took the girl."
"Where? Migul, where did he
take her? Do you know?"
"Yes. I--have it recorded that he said--they were going to theTime-cage--overhead in the laboratory. He said--they--he and the girlwere leaving forever!"
CHAPTER XXII
_The Chase to the End of the World_
The giant mechanism, fashioned in the guise of a man, lay dying. Yetnot that, for it never had had life. It lay deranged; out of order;its intricate cycle was still operating, but faintly, laboriously.Jangling out of tune.
Every moment its internal energy was lessening. It seemed to want totalk. The beams of its eyes rolled wildly. It said:
"Tugh--did this--to me. I came back here frightened because I knewthat Tugh still controlled me. You--hear me...."
There was a muffled, rumbling blur, then its voice clicked on again.
"When Tugh came I opened the door to him, even though the girl triedto stop me.... And I was humble before Tugh.... But he was angrybecause I had released you. He--deranged me. I tried to fight him, andhe ripped open my side porte...."
I thought the mechanism had gone inert. From within it was completesilence. Larry murmured, "Good Lord, this is gruesome!"
Then the faint, rasping voice started again.
"Deranged me.... And about Tugh, he--" A blur. Then again, "Tugh--heis--Tugh, he is--"
It went into a dull repetition of the three words, ending in a rumblewhich died into complete silence. The red radiance from theeye-sockets faded and vanished.
The thing we had called Migul seemed gone. There was only this metalshell, cast to represent a giant human figure, lying here with itsoperating mechanisms out of order--smashed.
* * * * *
I stood up. "That's the end of it. Mary Atwood's gone--"
"With Tugh in the Time-cage!" Larry exclaimed. "Tina, can't we--"
"Follow them?" Tina interrupted. "Come on! No--you two wait here. Iwill go upstairs and verify if the Time-cage is gone."
She came back in a moment. The laboratory overhead was fortunatelydeserted of Robots: Larry and I had not thought of that.
"The cage is gone!" Tina exclaimed. "Migul told us the truth!"
We hastened back through the tunnel, past the guard, up into thepalace and into the garden. My heart pounded in my throat for fearthat Tina's Time-cage would have vanished. But it stood, dimly glowingunder the foliage where she had left it.
A young man rushed up to us and said, "Princess Tina, look there!"
A great row of colored lights sailed slowly past overhead. The_Micrad_ was here, circling over the city. The storm had abated; ithad rained only for a brief time.[6] The crazy winds were subsiding.The _Micrad_ was using its deranging ray: we could hear the thrum ofit. It sent out vibrations which threw the internal mechanisms of theRobots out of adjustment, and they were dropping in their tracks allover the city.
[Footnote 6: It was afterward found that many of the Robots, heedlessof the rain as they ran about the city intent upon their murderouswork, had exploded by getting too wet.]
* * * * *
It chanced, as momentarily we stood there at the entrance to theTime-cage while the great airliner swept by, that the top of thenearby laboratory was visible through the trees. We saw a whitesearch-beam from the _Micrad_ come down and disclosed a group ofRobots on the laboratory roof. Then the spreading beam of thederanging ray struck them, and they stood an instant transfixed,stricken, with wildly flailing arms. Then one toppled and fell. Thenanother. Two rushed together, locked in each other's grip, desperatelyfighting because of some crazy, deranged thought-impulse. They swayedand tore at each other until both wilted and sank inert. Anothertottered with jerky steps to the edge of the roof and plungedheadlong, crashing with a great metal clatter to the stone paving ofthe ground....
The young man who had joined us dashed into the palace. We heard hisshouts:
"The revolt is over! The revolt is over!"
This had been a massacre similar to Tugh's vengeance upon the New YorkCity of 1935; just as senseless. Both, from the beginning, wereequally hopeless of ultimate success. Tugh could not conquer thisTime-world, so now he had left it, taking Mary Atwood with him....
We hastened into the Time-cage. Larry and I braced ourselves for theshock as Tina slid the door closed and hurried to the controls.
Within a moment we were flashing off into the great stream of Time....
* * * * *
"You think he has gone forward into the future?" Larry asked. "Won'tthe instrument show anything, Tina?"
"No. No trace of him yet."
We were passing 3,000 A.D., traveling into the future. Tina reasonedthat Tugh, according to Harl's confession, had originally come from afuture Time-world. It seemed most probable that now he would returnthere.
The Time-telespectroscope so far had shown us no evidence of the othercage. Tina kept the telescope barrel trained constantly on that otherspace five hundred feet from us which held Tugh's vehicle. The flowinggray landscape off there gave no sign of our quarry; yet we knew wecould not pass it, without at least a brief flash of it in thetelespectroscope and upon the image-mirror. Nervously, breathlessly wewaited for a sign of the other Time-cage.
But nothing showed. We were not traveling fast. With Larry and Tina atthe instrument table, I was left to stand at the window. Always Igazed eastward. That other little point of space only five hundredfeet to the east held Mary; she was there; but not _now_. She wasremote, inaccessible. The thought of her with Tugh, so inaccessible,set me shuddering.
I was barely aware of the changing gray outlines of the city: Istared, praying for the fleeting glimpse of a spectral cage.... Ithink that up to 3,000 A.D., New York remained much the same. Andthen, quite suddenly, in some vast storm or cataclysm, it was gone. Isaw but a blurred chaos. This was near 4,000 A.D. Then it was rebuilt,smaller, with more trees growing about, until presently there seemedonly a forest. People, if they still were here, were building suchtransitory structures that I could not see them.
* * * * *
5,000 A.D. Mankind no doubt had reached its peak of civilization,paused at the summit and now was in decadence, reverting to savagery.Perhaps in Europe the civilized peak lasted longer. This was abackward space during the ascent; perhaps now it was reverting fasterto the primitive.
But I think that by 15,000 A.D., mankind over all the Earth had becomeprimitive. There is no standing still: we must go forward; or back.Man, with his own machines softening him, enabling him to do nothing,eventually unfitted himself to cope with nature. That storm at 4,000A.D. in New York, for instance, even in my own Time would have beenmerely an incentive to reconstruct upon a greater scale. But the menof 4,000 A.D. could not do that....
At the year 10,000 A.D., with a seemingly primeval forest around us,Tina, Larry and I held an anxious consultation. We had anticipatedthat Tugh would stop in his own Time-world. That might have beenaround 3,000 or 4,000; but we hardly thought, as we viewed the scenein passing, that he had come originally from beyond 4,000. He was toocivilized.
Tugh had not stopped. He had to be still ahead of us, so our coursewas to follow. Whenever he stopped, we would see him. If he turnedback and flashed past us, that too would be evident. But if, from2,930, he had gone into the past--!
* * * * *
And then suddenly we glimpsed the other cage! It was ahead of us,traveling more slowly and retarding as though about to stop. A grayunbroken forest was here. The time was about 12,000 A.D. Tina saw itfirst through the little telescopic-barrel; then it showed on themirror-grid--a faint, ghostly-barred shape, thin as gossamer. We evensaw it presently through the window. It held its steady position,level with us, hanging solid amid the melting, changing gray outlinesof the forest trees. They blurred it as they rose and fell.
This chase through Time! The two cages sped forward with the graypanorama whirling around them. Of all the scene, only that other cage,to us, was re
al. Yet it was the cages which were apparitions.
We gathered at our eastward window to gaze across the void of thatfive hundred feet. The interior of Tugh's cage was not visible to us.A little window--a thinner patch in the lattices of thecage-side--fronted us; but nothing showed in it.
We were so helpless! Only five hundred feet away, the Tugh cage wasthere--now; yet we could do nothing save hold our Time-changing rateto conform with it. Of course Tugh saw us. He was making no effort toelude us, for neither cage was running at its maximum.
For hours I stood gazing, praying that Mary might be safe, strivingwith futile fancy to guess what might be transpiring within that cagespeeding side by side with us in the blurred shadows of the corridorsof Time.
And again, as so many times before, I was balked at guessing Tugh'smotives for his actions. He knew we could not assail him unless hestopped. But to what destination was he going?
* * * * *
It was a chase--to our consciousness of the passing of Time--whichlasted several hours. Tugh altered his Time-rate and sped moreswiftly. My heart sank, for this showed he was not preparing to stop.We lost direct sight of the other cage several times as it drew aheadof us. But it was always visible on the image-mirror.
"I think," Tina said finally, "that we should stay behind it. When heretards to stop, we will have a better opportunity of landingsimultaneously with him."
We passed 100,000 A.D. The forest went down, and it seemed that onlyrocks were here. A barren vista was visible off to the river and thedistant sea. The familiar conformations of the sea and the land werechanged. There was a different shore-line. It was nearer at hand now;and it was creeping closer.
I stared at that blurred gray surface of water; at the wide,undulating stretch of rock. We came to 1,000,000 A.D.--a million yearsinto my future. Ice came briefly, and vanished again. But there wereno trees springing into life on this barren landscape. I could notfancy that even the transitory habitations of humans were here in thiscold desolation.
Were we headed for the End? I could envisage a dying world, itsinternal fires cooling.
Ten million years.... Then a hundred million.... The gray scene,blended of dark nights and sunshine days, began changing itsmonochrome. There were fleeting alternating intervals, now, when itwas darker, and then lighter with a tinge of red. The Earth's rotationwas slowing down. Through thousands of centuries the change had beenproceeding, but only now could I see the lengthening days and nights.Perhaps now the day was a month long, and the night the same.
* * * * *
A billion years! 1,000,000,000 A.D.! By now the day and the year wereof equal length. And it chanced that this Western Hemisphere faced thesun. I could see the sun now, motionless above the horizon. The scenewas dull red. The sun painted the rocks and the sullen sea withblood....
A shout from Larry whirled me round. "George! Good God!"
He was bending over the image-mirror; Tina, ghastly pale, with utterhorror stamped upon her face, sprang for the controls. On the mirror Icaught a fleeting glimpse of Tugh's cage, wrecked and broken--andinstantly gone.
"It stopped!" Larry shouted. "Good God, it stopped all at once! It waswrecked! Smashed!"
We reeled; I all but lost consciousness with the shock of our ownabrupt retarding. Our cage stopped and turned back. Tina located thewreckage and stopped again.
We slid the door open. The outer air was deadly cold. The sun was ahuge dull-red ball hanging in the haze of a grey sky. The rocks weregrey-black, with the blood-light of the sun upon them.
Five hundred feet from us, by the shore of an oily, sullen sea, thewreckage of Tugh's cage was piled in a heap. Near it, the crumpledwhite figure of Mary lay on the rocks. And beside her, still with hisblack cloak around him, crouched Tugh!
CHAPTER XXIII
_Diabolical Exile of Time!_
Tugh saw us as we stood in our cage doorway. His thick barrel-likefigure rose erect, and from his parted cloak his arms waved with awild gesture of defiance and triumph. He was clearly outlined in thered sunlight against the surface of the sea behind. We saw in one ofhis hands a ray cylinder--and then his arm came down and he fired atus. It was the white, disintegrating ray.
We were stricken by surprise, and stood for that moment transfixed inour doorway. Tugh's narrow, intensely white beam leaped over theintervening rocks; but it fell short of us. I saw that it had a rangeof about a hundred feet. Over the muffled heavy silence of theblood-red day the cripple's curse floated clear. He lowered hisweapon; and, heedless that we also might be armed, he leaped nimblypast Mary's prostrate form and came shambling over the rocks directlyfor me!
It stung me into action, and for all the chaotic rush of thesedesperate moments my heart surged with relief. Mary was not dead!Beyond Tugh's oncoming figure, as he shambled like an infuriatedcharging bear over the rough rocky ground, I saw the white form ofMary move! She was striving to sit up!
I held my ray cylinder--the one I had rescued from Migul. But itsrange was no more than twenty feet: I had tested it; and Tugh's beamhad flashed a full hundred! I whirled on Larry.
"Get away from here, you and Tina! You can't help me!"
"George, listen--"
"He's coming. Larry--you damn fool, get away from here! It goes ahundred feet, that ray of his: it'll be raking us in a minute! Run, Itell you! Get to that line of rocks!"
* * * * *
Close behind our cage was a small broken ridge of rocks--strewnboulders in a tumbled line some ten or fifteen feet in height. Itwould afford shelter: there were broken places to give passage throughit. The ridge curved crescent-shaped behind our cage and ran downtoward the shore.
Larry and Tina stood white and confused. Larry panted, "But, George. Ican help you fight him! Hide here in the cage--"
"Get away, I tell you! It's his death or mine this time! I'll get himif I can!"
I shoved Larry violently away and ducked back into our doorway. Only afew breathless seconds had passed; Tugh was still several hundred feetaway from us. Larry and Tina ran behind the cage, darted between theboulders of the ridge and vanished.
I crouched in the cage. Tugh was not visible from here. A momentpassed. Dared I remain? If I could get Tugh within twenty feet of me,my shot was as good as his.... The silence was horrible. Was he comingforward? Did he know I was in here? I thought surely he must have seenLarry and Tina run away, and me dart in here: we had all been in plainsight of him.
This horrible silence! Was he creeping up on me? Would he fire throughthe doorway, or appear abruptly at the window? I could not tell whereto place myself in the room--and it could mean my life or death.
The silence was split by Tina calling, "Tugh, we have caught you!"
* * * * *
Her voice was to one side and behind our cage, calling defiance atTugh to distract his attention from me. Through the window I saw theflash of his beam, slanting sidewise at Tina. I gauged the source ofhis ray to be still some distance off, and crept to the door,cautiously peering.
Tugh stood on the open rock surface. He had swung to my right and wasnear the little ridge of rocks where it turned and bent down to theshore. Behind me came Tina's voice again:
"At last we have you, Tugh!"
I saw Tina poised on the top of the ridge, partially behind me at theelbow of the ridge-curve. She screamed her defiance, and again Tughfired at her. The beam slanted over me, but still was short.
Larry had vanished. Then I saw him, though Tugh did not. He had runalong behind the ridge, and appeared, now, well down toward the shore.He was barely a hundred feet from the cripple. I saw him stoop, seizea chunk of rock, and throw it. The missile bounded and passed close toTugh.
Larry instantly ducked back out of sight. The bounding stone startledTugh; he whirled toward it and fired over the ridge. Tina again hadchanged her position and was shouting at him. They were trying toexhaust his cylinder charges;
and if they could do that he would behelpless before me.
* * * * *
For a moment he stood as though confused. As he turned to gaze afterTina, Larry flung another rock. But this time Tugh did not fire. Hestarted back toward where, by the wreckage of his cage, Mary was nowsitting up in a daze; then he changed his mind, whirled and fireddirectly at my doorway. I was just beyond the effective range of hisbeam, but it was truly aimed: I felt the horrible nauseous impact ofit, a shuddering, indescribable sickening of all my being. I staggeredback into the room and recovered my strength. A side window porte wasopen; I leaped through it and landed upon the rocks, with the cagebetween Tugh and me.
He fired again at the doorway. Tina had disappeared. Larry was now outof range, standing on the ridge, shouting and hurling rocks.
But Tugh did not heed him. He was shambling for my doorway. He wouldpass within twenty feet of me as I crouched outside the cage at itsopposite corner. I could take him by surprise.
And then he saw me. He was less than a hundred feet away. He changedhis direction and fired again, full at me. But I had had enoughwarning, and, as the beam struck the cage corner, I ran back along theouter wall of the cage and appeared at the other corner. Tugh camestill closer, his weapon pointed downward as he ran. Fifty feet away.Not close enough!
I think, there at the last, that Tugh was wholly confused. Larry hadcome much closer. He was shouting: and from the ridge behind me Tinawas shouting. Tugh ran, not for where I was lurking now, but for thecorner where a moment before he had seen me.
Now he was thirty feet from me.... Twenty.... Then nearer than that.Wholly without caution he came forward.... I leaned around the edge ofthe cage and fired. For one breathless instant the voices of Tina andLarry abruptly hushed.
My beam struck Tugh in the chest. It caught him and clung to him,bathing him in its spreading, intense white glare. He stopped in histracks; stood transfixed for one breathless, horrible instant! He wasso close that I could see the stupid surprise on his hideous features.His wide slit of mouth gaped with astonishment.
* * * * *
My beam clung to him, but he did not fall! He stood astonished; thenturned and came at me! For just a moment I was stricken helpless therebefore him. What manner of man was this? _He did not fall!_ My ray,which had decomposed the body of Alent, the guard, and left hisskeleton stripped and bleached in an instant, did not harm Tugh! Hehad walked into it, taken it full and he did not fall! He was stillalive!
I came to my senses and saw that Larry, seeing my danger, had run intothe open, dangerously close, and hurled a rock. It struck Tugh uponthe shoulder and deflected his aim, so that his flash went over me. Isaw Tugh whirl toward Larry, and I rushed forward, ripping loose thecylinder of the ray projector from its restraining battery cord. Inthe instant the cripple was turned half way from me I landed upon him,and with all my strength brought the point of the small heavy cylinderdown on his skull. There was a strange splintering crack, and a wild,eery scream from his voice. He fell, with me on top of him.
Crowning horror! Tugh lay motionless, twisted half on his back, histhick arms outstretched on the rocks and his weapon still clutched inhis hand. Culminating, gruesome horror! I rose from his body and stoodshuddering. Amazing realization! The bulging misshapen head wassplintered open. And from it, strewn over the rocks, were tinyintricate cogs and wheels, coils and broken wires!
He was not a man, but a Robot! A Super-Robot from some unknown era,running amuck! A mechanism so cleverly fashioned by the genius of manthat it stood diabolically upon the threshhold of humanity!
A super-mechanical exile of Time! But its wild, irrational career ofdestruction through the ages now was over. It lay inert, smashed andbroken at my feet....
CHAPTER XXIV
_The Return_
I think that there is little I should add. Tugh's last purpose hadbeen to hurl himself and Mary past the lifetime of our world, wreckingthe cage and flinging them into Eternity together. And Tugh was luringour cage and us to the same fate. But Mary, to save us, had watchedher opportunity, seized the main control lever and demolished thevehicle by its instantaneous stopping.
We left the shell of Tugh lying there in the red sunlight of theempty, dying world, and returned to Tina's palace. We found that therevolt was over. The city, with help arrived, was striving to emergefrom the bloody chaos. Larry and Tina decided to remain permanently inher Time. They would take us back; but the cage was too diabolical tokeep in existence.
"I shall send it forward unoccupied," said Tina; "flash it intoEternity, where Tugh tried to go."
Accompanied by Larry, she carried Mary and me to 1935. With Mary'sfather, her only relative, dead, she yielded to my urging. We arrivedin October, 1935. My New York, like Tina's a victim of the exile ofTime, was rapidly being reconstructed.
* * * * *
It was night when we stopped and the familiar outlines of Patton Placewere around us.
We stood at the cage doorway.
"Good-by," I said to Larry and Tina. "Good luck to you both!"
The girls kissed each other. Such strangely contrasting types! Over athousand years was between them, yet how alike they were,fundamentally. Both--just girls.
Larry gripped my hand. In times of emotion one is sometimesinarticulate. "Good-by, George," he said. "We--we've said already allthere is to say, haven't we?"
There were tears in both the girls' eyes. We four had been so close;we had been through so much together; and now we were parting forever.All four of us were stricken with surprise at how it affected us. Westood gazing at one another.
"No!" I burst out. "I haven't said all there is to say. Don't youdestroy that cage! You come back! Guard it as carefully as you can,and come back. Land here, next year in October; say, night of the15th. Will you? We'll be here waiting."
"Yes," Tina abruptly agreed.
We stood watching them as they slid the door closed. The cage for amoment stood quiescent. Then it began faintly humming. It glowed;faded to a spectre; and was gone.
Mary and I turned away into the New York City of 1935, to begin ourlife together.
(_The End_)
TO THE MOON
The prediction that man will fly to the moon within the next 100 yearswas made by John Q. Stewart, associate professor of astronomicalphysics at Princeton University, in a recent address at the BrooklynInstitute of Arts and Sciences.
The first obstacle to be overcome is that of developing a speed of25,000 miles an hour, the professor said, which means production offuels more powerful than coal, gasoline, dynamite or any other sourceof energy now available. Such remarkable progress has been made in thespeed of passenger carrying vehicles in the last century thatscientists believe that a speed of 1,000 miles per hour will bereached in 1950 and 50,000 an hour will be surpassed before the year2030, a century from now.
The one theoretically feasible method of making the journey to themoon, Stewart believes, is a vehicle propelled on the principle of therocket. He visions a ship built in the form of a large metalsphere--110 feet in diameter, weighing 70,000 metric tons and carryinga crew of sixty and a dozen scientists. A dozen or more cannon wouldprotrude slightly from the surface, shooting material the rate of 200miles a second.
A half hour or so before noon and about three days before a new moon,Stewart would head his ship toward the sun, expecting it to risetwelve miles in the first six minutes and to soar out of the earth'satmosphere at 200 miles per hour.
Two hours and 29 minutes after the take-off the firing from the lowercannon would be stopped with the ship going upward, the professorestimates, at 190 miles per minute and having reached a height of13,200 miles. Seventy hours later, crossing the moon's orbit, Stewartwould fire the forward cannon and the ship would coast around themoon, becoming the temporary satellite of a satellite.
"The rest would be easy," said Stewart, "owing to the lesser gravityof the moon. The cannon w
ould be fired to cushion the fall to the moonas the ship was gradually sucked toward the satellite.
"The moon is airless, waterless and lifeless, days and nights are twoweeks long, temperatures range from that of boiling water at noon downperhaps to that of liquid air at midnight. The men of the ship wouldwalk on the moon clad in diving suits. Gravity being only one-sixththat of the earth, a man would carry several hundred pounds ofapparatus for providing air and for regulating the temperature.
"To leave the moon the ship would fire her rear cannon and coast backto earth. By firing its forward cannon it would cushion its landing onthe earth, which would have to be made on a desert, because of thetremendous charges the cannon would fire."