the enemy, to them came the advantage; and they meant to be the first.
CHAPTER VII
The Battle Is Joined
NOW, quite suddenly, they saw life ahead. Like a telescopic view of an anthill, the distance making them so tiny, and the penetrative rays making all the rock about the far off titan burrows like so much glass. They saw the city of the intruders.
This was what once had been the home of the lost tribe of Votan Indians; Indians inheriting all the pride and culture of a race more advanced than the Mayan plus the knowledge of science that centuries of life in the wonder caverns of the Elder race had given them. The ancient original beauty of the place was overhung with the semi-barbaric trappings, the feathered head-dresses, the blankets woven in bizarre and ancient symbolic patterns, woven by nimble fingered squaws here where all the beauty of the Elder work inspired to greater understanding of the nature of beauty than ever surface red men rose to acquire. Pelts of wolf and hides of deer, the fleeces of sheep and the hides of bear decorated the ancient spring-metal couches and softened the polished stone to the foot.
Sprawled amid this semi-barbaric Indian splendor were some few hundred European aliens, clad in modern clothing, loud jackets and slacks; gaudy silk dresses from surface shops. On the women, bare white shoulders aped surface luxury, while waiting on them were the Indians who had lived and ruled secretly here up to their advent. Lane knew they had not been here more than two years. Hugging the hope that their short tenure had not given them time to get fully acquainted with all the resources and weapons of the intricately chambered tiers of caverns, Lane swung the nozzle of his dis-cannon[1] in line with his vision penetray, prepared to fire when the others were aligned to fire with him.
Stim rays bathed the great chambers where the white newcomers lolled, apparently engaged in a debauch. The Indians, clad in loin cloths or in grey linen jackets and skirts which seemed to be a kind of servant's uniform, bore drinks and food; or stood stony faced, as door tenders; or pushed mop and bucket along the endless corridors.
For entertainment, one of the gaudier females was crushing the eight-foot, stick-like limbs of a "creep" inch by inch with a hammer; two men held his piteously screaming form while she plied the hammer and the rest looked on. Evidently this was great sport. Lane ground his teeth at the needless, purely wanton cruelty. Lane had much to learn of the nature of these people.
In the great war-ray chamber near at hand to the lolling sybarites who ruled the place, were the stub fingered ray ro.[2]
Lane had learned from Saba that the ancients' word for the magnetism between sexes—between man and woman—was "ne." He had observed this animal magnetism that binds all humanity together in an electrical matrix, over the telaug beams which augment all these subtle electrical flows into mental vision strength. He had realized that "ne" was a most important part of life, making it much more inter-
- ↑ These dis-cannon are of several varied kinds. Mostly they have a dial which controls atunement, and fire over a penetrative conductive "lead" as vision ray which conducts the destructive bolt but is not itself harmful in any way. The control dial alters the nature of the dis-bolt so that it can be slowly changed through a long series of intensities, from mildly warm to harmful "de" to straight dis, which latter and worst will melt a hole through the rock for many miles. Usually such a cannon is used on the "de" set which will knock out an animal at thirty miles, or kill if held there for a short time. This "de" is an detrimental ray used for many purposes, originally designed apparently for such purposes as an insecticide—it can be set to sweep a great area with diffuse beams of mildly destructive power, or concentrated into a stronger beam one shot of which upsets a man's mind into temporary insanity.
- ↑ These are men found around any of the dero "bunches." Men who have been used by "make-ray" (ray control) to fire the more detrimental of the huge old rays; used in warfare until their fingers rot off from X-ray infection; until their minds cease to exist as anything but unnecessary adjunct. They are often huge men, drafted into such service for their size and strength, and never thereafter allowed any freedom. They wait in their ray-chambers just as the great old mechanisms wait—until it is time for action. Then the "make-rays" reach in, seize their poor minds and direct them in the battle.
