Astounding Stories of Super-Science 4

Astounding Stories of Super-Science 4

Tommy looked about him. He was astonished to see that the place was, in

a way, furnished. Bram had carved out a very creditable couch, and

several low chairs, evidently with a stone ax, for by the light of the

fire, which cast a fair illumination even at that distance, Tommy could

see the marks of the implement, rough and irregular, in the wood.

 

On the ground were thick rugs, woven of hair, and two or three more rugs

of the same material lay on the couch. It was evident that the human

herd was expected to furnish textile materials as well as meat.

 

"Sit down, and make yourself comfortable," said Bram, when they had

raised Dodd to the couch. "We'll have dinner, and then we'll talk. I can

give you a fine vegetarian meal. Those dirty shrimp-eating savages look

on me as a cannibal because I eat the fruits of the trees." He grinned.

"There's a bad shortage of food in Submundia, as I've named this part of

the world," he went on, "for until I came the beetles simply devoured

the humans wholesale, instead of breeding them, like I taught them. And

there's another of the hundred-and-fifty year swarms due to hatch out

soon. However, we'll talk about that later. And all those fine fruits

going to waste! Excuse me, Travers."

 

* * * * *

 

He disappeared, and returned in a minute or two with a small table,

piled high with luscious fruits unknown to Tommy, though among them were

some that looked like loaves of natural bread.

 

Tommy, whose appetite never failed him even in the worst circumstances,

fell to with a will. He was enjoying his meal when he happened to look

up, and saw that the penumbra at the edge of the lighted zone was dense

with beetles.

 

Thousands--perhaps millions, for they stretched away as far as the eye

could see, were packed together, their antenna waving in unison, their

heads, beneath the shells, directed toward the fire.

 

Bram saw Tommy's look of disgust, and laughed. "The fire seems to

intoxicate them, Travers," he said. "They always throng the entrance

when I'm here. It's as far as they dare go. They're quite blind in the

least light. Care to smoke? I've learned the art of making some quite

decent cigars." He produced a handful. "Oh, by the way, you didn't see

my lighter anywhere, did you?" he went on, with a pretense of

carelessness.

 

"No," lied Tommy. "I was surprised you--"

 

"Oh, there's a supply of petrol in the rocks. No matter," answered Bram

carelessly. "Your friend looks bad," he added, glancing at Dodd, who had

fallen asleep. "Travers, I'm sorry I lost my temper. The--the shock of

meeting men from the upper world, you know."

 

* * * * *

 

Dodd opened his eyes and tried to whisper. Tommy bent over him and

listened.

 

"He wants to know whether he can have that girl to take care of him," he

said.

 

"What, the one I saw you with? Why, she's a cull, Travers."

 

"What d'you mean?" asked Tommy.

 

"Why--useless, you know. There's several of them running loose, and

waiting to be rounded up. We raise two breeds, one for replenishing the

stock, and one for meat. She's just a cull, a reversion, no use for

either purpose. I'll have her brought by all means. I--I like Dodd. I

want to get him to like me," Bram went on, with a sort of penitence

that had a pathetic touch. "Our little differences--quite absurd, and I

can prove he's wrong in his ideas.

 

"Make yourself comfortable as long as you're here, Travers, and don't

mind me. Only, don't try to escape. The beetles will get you if you do,

and there's no way out of here--none that you'll find. And don't try to

follow me. But you're a sensible man, and we'll all get along famously,

I'm sure, as soon as Dodd recovers."

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER V

 

_Doomed!_

 

 

There were no means known to Tommy of reckoning time in that strange

place of twilight. His watch had been broken in the airplane fall; and

Dodd never remembered to wind his, but they estimated that about two

weeks had passed, judging from the number of times they had slept and

eaten.

 

In those two weeks they had gradually begun to grow accustomed to their

surroundings. Haidia, the girl, had arrived on beetle-back within an

hour after Bram's departure, apparently into a cleft of the rocks--how

he had communicated his order to the beetle steeds Tommy had no idea.

And under the girl's ministrations Dodd was making good progress toward

recovery.

 

That Haidia was in love with Dodd in quite a human way was evident. To

please the girl, both Dodd and Tommy had learned to eat the raw shrimps,

which, being bloodless, were really no worse than oysters, and had a

flavor half-way between shrimp and crawfish. To please the men, Haidia

tried not to shudder when she saw them devouring the breadfruit and

nectarines of which Bram always had a plentiful supply. Bram was

solicitous in his inquiries for Dodd's health.

 

"Jim, I've been thinking about our chances of getting away," said Tommy

one morning. "It's evident Bram's only waiting for your recovery to put

some proposition up to us. Suppose you were to feign paralysis."

 

"How d'you mean? What for?" demanded Dodd.

 

"If he thinks you're helpless, he'll be less on his guard. You haven't

walked about in his presence." That was true, for the activities of the

two had been nocturnal, when Bram had vanished. "Let him think a nerve's

been severed in your neck, or something of the sort. If it doesn't work,

you can always get better."

 

* * * * *

 

Dodd's realistic portrayal of a man with a partly paralyzed right side

brought cries of horror from Bram next morning. Solicitously he helped

Dodd back to the couch. Bram, when not under the influence of his drug,

had moments of human feeling.

 

"Can't you move that arm and leg at all, Dodd?" he asked. "No feeling in

them?"

 

"There's plenty of feeling," growled Dodd, "but they don't seem to work,

that's all."

 

"You'll get better," said Bram eagerly. "You must get better. I need

you, Dodd, in spite of our differences. There's work for all of us,

wonderful work. A new humanity, waiting to be born, Dodd, not of the

miserable ape race, but of--of--"

 

He checked himself, and a cunning look came over his face. He turned

away abruptly.

 

At the end of two weeks or so, an amazing thing happened. One day

Haidia, with a look of triumph in her eyes, addressed Dodd with a few

English words!

 

Her brain, which had probably developed certain faculties in different

proportions from those of the upper human race, had registered every

word that either of the two men had ever spoken, and remembered it. As

soon as Dodd ascertained this, he began to instruct her, and, with her

abnormal faculties of memory, it was not long before she could talk

quite intelligently. The obstacle that had stood between them was swept

away. She became one of themselves.

 

In the days that followed the girl told them brokenly something of the

history of her race, of the legend of the universal flood that had

driven them down into the bowels of the earth, of the centuries-long

struggle with the beetles, and of the insects' gradual conquest of

humanity, and the final reduction of the human race to a miserable,

helpless remnant.

 

* * * * *

 

Everywhere, Haidia told them, were beetle swarms, everywhere humanity

had been reduced to a few handfuls. Bram, by breeding mankind from

prolific strains, and using the new-born progeny for food, had

temporarily averted universal starvation. But a new swarm of beetles was

due to hatch out shortly, and then--

 

The girl, with a shudder, put her hand to her bosom, and brought out a

little bright-eyed lizard.

 

"The old man you saw with me, who is one of our wise elders, has told

our people that these things feed upon the beetle larvae," she said. "We

are putting them secretly into the nests. But what can a few lizards do

against millions." She looked up. "In the earth above us, the beetle

larvae extend for miles, in a solid mass," she said. "When they come out

as beetles, it will be the end of all of us."

 

Bram had grown less suspicious as the time passed. His sudden visits to

the cavern had ceased. Dodd and Tommy knew that he spent the nights--if

they could be termed nights--lying in a drugged slumber somewhere among

the rocks. They had asked Haidia whether there was any way of escape

into the upper world.

 

"There are two ways from here," answered the girl. "One is the way you

came, but it is impossible to pass the beetle guards without being torn

to pieces. The other--"

 

She shuddered, and for an instant drew back the film from across her

pupils, then uttered a little cry of pain at the light, dim though it

was.

 

"There is a bridge across that terrible monster that devours all it

touches," she said, shuddering, meaning the fire.

 

Suddenly Dodd had an inspiration. He still had the fur coat that he had

worn, and, reaching into a pocket he drew out a pair of snow goggles,

which he adjusted over Haidia's nose.

 

"Now look!" he said.

 

Haidia looked, blinked and, with an effort kept her eyes open. She gazed

at Dodd in amazement. Dodd laughed, and pulled her toward him. He kissed

her, and Haidia's eyes closed.

 

"What is this?" she murmured. "First you give me medicine that opens my

eyes, and then you give me medicine that closes them."

 

"That's nothing," grinned Dodd. "Wait till you understand me better."

 

* * * * *

 

Bram's eyes were preternaturally bright. It was evident that he had been

increasing his dose of late, and that he was fully under the influence

of it now.

 

"Well, gentlemen, the time has come for us to be frank with one

another," he said, as the three were gathered about the little table,

while Haidia crouched in a far corner of the cave. "I want you to work

for me in my plans for the regeneration of humanity. The time for which

I have long labored is almost at hand. Any day now the new swarm of

beetles may emerge from the pupal stage. But before I speak further,

come and see them, gentlemen!"

 

He rose, and Dodd and Tommy rose too, Tommy supporting Dodd, who let his

arm and leg trail awkwardly as he moved.

 

Bram led the way into the cleft among the rocks into which he had been

in the habit of passing. Beyond this opening the two men saw another

smaller cavern, with a beetle guard standing on either side, antenna

waving.

 

Bram shrilled a sound, and the antenna dropped. The three passed

through. Tommy saw a hair-cloth pallet set against the rocks, a table,

and a chair. Beyond was a sloping ramp of earth. Overhead was a rock

ceiling.

 

Bram led the way up the ramp, and the three stepped through a gap in the

rocks and found themselves on an extensive prairie. But in place of the

red grass there was a vast sea of mud.

 

By the light cast by the petrol fire, which roared up in the distance, a

veritable fiery fountain, the two Americans could see that the mud was

filled with huge encysted forms, grubs three or four feet long,

motionless in the soil.

 

* * * * *

 

Bram scooped up one of them and tossed it into the air. It thudded to

their feet and remained motionless.

 

"As far as you can see, and for miles beyond, these pupae of the beetles

lie buried in the decaying vegetation in which the eggs were hatched,"

said Bram. "Every century and a half, so far as I have been able to

judge from comparative anatomy, a fresh swarm emerges. See!"

 

He pointed to the pupa he had unearthed, which, as if stirred into

activity by his handling, was now beginning to move. Or, rather,

something was moving inside the cocoon.

 

The shell broke, and the hideous head and folded antenna of a beetle

appeared. With a convulsive writhing, the monster threw off the covering

and stepped out. It extended its wings, glistening, with moisture, from

the still soft and pliant carapace, or shell, and suddenly zoomed off

into the distance.

 

* * * * *

 

Tommy shuddered as the boom of its flight grew softer and subsided.

 

"Any day now the entire swarm will emerge," cried Bram. "How many

moultings they undergo before they undergo the finished state, I do not

know, but already, as you see, they are prepared for the battle of

life. They emerge ravenous. That beetle will fall upon the man-herds and

devour a full grown man, unless the guards destroy it."

 

He raised his arms with the gesture of an ancient prophet. "Woe to the

human race," he cried, "the wretched ape spawn that has cast out its

teachers and persecuted those who sought to raise it to higher things!"

 

* * * * *

 

Tommy knew that Bram was referring to himself. Bram turned fiercely upon

Dodd.

 

"When I joined the Greystoke expedition," he cried, "it was with the

express intention of refuting your miserable theories as to the fossil

monotremes. I could not sleep or eat, so deeply was I affronted by them.

For, if they were true, the dasyuridae are an innovation in the great

scheme of nature, and man, instead of being a mere afterthought, a jest

of the Creative Force, came to earth with a purpose.

 

"That I deny," he yelled. "Man is a joke. Nature made him when she was

tired, as the architect of a cathedral fashions a gargoyle in a sportive

moment. It is the insect, not man, who is the predestined lord of the

ages!"

 

And for once in his life, perhaps because at this point Tommy dug him

violently in the ribs, Dodd had the sense to remain silent. Bram led the

way swiftly back into the larger cave.

 

"When this swarm hatches out," he said, "I calculate that there will be

a trillion beetles seeking food. There is no food for a tithe of them

here underneath the earth. What then? Do you realize their stupendous

power, their invincibility?

 

"No, you don't realize it, because your minds, through long habit, are

only attuned to think in terms of man. All man's long history of

slaughter of the so-called lower creatures obsesses you, blinds your

understanding. A beetle? Something to be trodden underfoot, crushed in

sport! But I tell you, gentlemen, that nature--God, if you will--has

designed to supplant the man-ape by the beetle.

 

"He has resolved to throw down the wretched so-called intelligence of

your kind and mine, and supplant it by the divine instinct of the

beetle, an instinct that is infinitely superior, because it arrives at

results instantaneously. It knows where man infers. Attuned closely to

nature, it alone is able to fulfil the divine plan of Creation."

 

* * * * *

 

Bram was certainly under the influence of his drug; nevertheless, so

violent were his gestures, so inspired was his utterance, that Tommy and

Dodd listened almost in awe.

 

"They are invincible," Bram went on. "Their fecundity is such that when

the new swarm is hatched out their numbers alone will make them

irresistible. They do not know fear. They shrink from nothing. And they

will follow me, their leader--I, who know the means of controlling them.

How, then, can puny man hope to stand against them?

 

"Join me, gentlemen," Bram went on. "And beware how you decide rashly.

For this is the supreme moment, not only of your own lives, but for all

humanity and beetledom. Upon your decision hangs the future of the

world.

 

"For, irresistible as the beetles are, there is on thing they lack. That

is the sense of historic continuity. If they destroy man, they will know

nothing of man's achievements, poor though these are. My own work on the

fossil monotremes--"

 

"Which is a tissue of inaccuracies and half-baked deductions!" shouted

Dodd.

 

Bram started as if a whip had lashed him. "Liar!" he bawled. "Do you

think that I, who left the Greystoke expedition in a howling blizzard

because I knew that here, in the inner earth, I could refute your

miserable impostures--do you think that I am in the mood to listen to

your wretched farrago of impossibilities?"

 

"Listen to me," bawled Dodd, advancing with waving arms. "Once and for

all, let me tell you that your deductions are all based upon fallacious

premises. No, I will not shut up, Tom Travers! You want me to aid your

damned beetles in the destruction of humanity! I tell you that your

phascalotherium, amphitherium, and all the rest of them, including the

marsupial lion, are degenerate developments of the age following the

pleistocene. I say the whole insect world was made to fertilize the

plant world, so that it should bear fruit for human food. Man is the

summit of the scale of evolution, and I will never join in any infamous

scheme for his destruction."

 

Bram glared at Dodd like a madman. Three times he opened his mouth to

speak, but only inarticulate sounds came from his throat. And when at

last he did speak, he said something that neither Dodd nor Tommy had

anticipated.

 

"It looks as if you're not so paralysed as you made out," he sneered.

"You'll change your mind within what used to be called a day, Dodd.

You'll crawl to my feet and beg for pardon. And you'll recant your lying

theories about the fossil monotremes, or you die--the pair of you--you die!"