“Talk about robots!” cried Roverton. “Did you ever see anything like them? Look at those copper joints that are as flexible as the joints of an acrobat. Look at those fingers or toes with seven flanges that can bend in any direction.”
Two-score of the multifarious entities had grouped themselves around the vessel and were examining it with their single or manifold eyes. Behind the fixed inhuman expression of their metal masks, in the movements of their cunningly constructed limbs, the curiosity of an incomprehensibly alien people somehow made itself felt. And the orchestral chattering of their voices, with notes that were resonant as drums, or shrill as clarions, or sweet as lute-strings, could be heard through the sound-valves of the Alcyone. They came nearer and touched the sides of the vessel as if to determine the material of which it was made; and some of them climbed the ladder to the man-hole and inspected it closely. After a little these latter descended and seemed to be holding a serious debate with the others, as if to decide a moot point or a course of action, while all of them continued to watch the Alcyone.
Now the crowd drew back and a number departed, to return in a few minutes bearing among them an instrument whose use defied conjecture. It was a large tripod of some antimony-type substance, supporting a revolving globe of the same material, from which issued a long, slender tube with a flaring mouth. The tube was levelled at the vessel’s man-hole; and when a lever at the side of the tripod was pressed, a thin stream of ghostly yellow light emerged from the mouth and played upon the neo-vitriolene of the man-hole’s lid. Then, as if in response to the electrical mechanism by which it was operated, the lid unscrewed; and likewise the inner door of the ether-ship, giving on the compartment where Volmar and his crew were gathered, flew open to the same mysterious agency.
III
An atmosphere of humid warmth, laden as with hot-house odors of an ultra-tropical flora, flooded the vessel’s interior. Obviously there were strange elements, non-terrestrial gases in this air, for Volmar and his men began immediately to gasp for breath, and to experience a peculiar giddiness and lightheadedness. Volmar pressed the button which should have closed the outer and inner doors; but the mechanism refused to work, as if the batteries had gone dead or their force had somehow been nullified or paralyzed.
“Quick! The respirative masks and air-tanks!” cried Volmar with a voice that fought the asphyxiating elements. These masks, covering the entire head and connected by a tube with a tank that was strapped to the shoulders, had been carried along for use in landing on alien worlds where the air might prove unfit for human respiration.
The apparatus was quickly donned, and none too soon; for one of the men fainted, and the others had to fasten his mask. All of them felt an instantaneous relief from the symptoms of vertigo and difficult breathing.
The act of putting on the masks had no sooner been completed, when a number of the weird multiform entities invaded the vessel one by one and surrounded Volmar and his crew. They gibbered among themselves with their instrument-like voices, they eyed the men with the unchanging glare of their single or triple or quadruple eyes, which offered the appearance of many-angled and diverse-tinted gems; they inspected and fingered the machinery and the furniture, and showed in many ways the investigative spirit which is the invariable mark of the scientist.
“Of all the burglarious entries!” exclaimed Jasper. “No earthly safe-cracker could compete with these beings.”
All the men stood irresolute, wondering as to the best mode of procedure, and the motives and dispositions of their visitors. The invaders gave no sign of hostile or unfriendly intentions; but in every motion of their metal flanges, every silver or bronze or iron tone of their voices, a spirit beyond the range of human sensation or understanding was manifest. They were plainly intelligent; but their exterior was that of highly organized and subtly animated machinery; and it was impossible to conceive them as possessing the motives, interests, or desires of normal biological forms.
With perspicacious immediacy they had singled out Volmar as the leader of the expedition, for they were now addressing him in tones vaguely suggestive of invitation. Then, one by one, they left the compartment, walking backward with perfect surety toward the man-hole, and making signs that Volmar and his companions should follow them.
“I believe they are asking us to be their guests,” Roverton observed.
There was a brief discussion as to the best course of action.
“These people,” said Volmar, “are plainly the masters of forces which we are perhaps not even fitted to understand. For some unknowable purpose, they have captured us; and any effort to escape would be fruitless, since the Alcyone is held as firmly as though it were anchored with a thousand chains and cables, doubtless by some magnetic ray. It would be more judicious not to antagonize our captors in any way, but to assent voluntarily to whatever they wish. I vote that we accept their invitation.”
The others agreed that Volmar had summarized the situation and its potentialities very wisely and succinctly. They might as well yield without the ineffectual folly of resistance. And in spite of the humiliating and mystifying manner in which their vessel had been trapped, in spite of their ignorance regarding the intentions of these odd people, they were full of excited curiosity and were eager to see more of this remarkable world, which differed so uniquely from all others that they had hitherto examined.
Descending the vessel’s steel ladder, they found that the throng had dispersed, leaving only a mere half-dozen of the beings with globular heads and triangular bodies, who were manifestly a reception committee. With elaborate genuflections that were like those of marionettes, these beings led the way through the fantastic roof-garden, with its winding spaces and pathways of stone, and semi-circular rows of indescribable plants and trees, toward a sort of open cupola that was visible about a hundred yards away.
The cupola was supported by pillars carven with anaglyphs of a character so unusual that it was impossible to know whether they were miniature bas-reliefs, picture-writings, or phonetic symbols. Within, there were two large circular pits in the floor, which seemed to descend to the very base of the building. Their walls were perpendicular, with no sign of rungs or stairs or machinery of the elevator type. To the surprise and consternation of the earth-men, two of their guides stepped into the nearest pit as casually as if the descent were no more than a pace; and instead of falling headlong, they floated gently down with a feather-like movement utterly incongruous in view of their corporeal structure. The others made signs to the men that they should follow; and when the earthlings hesitated, another of them entered the pit and was wafted downward.
“Well,” said Volmar, “if they can do it, I guess it is safe for us also. There must be a current of some gravity-negating force in the shaft.”
He stepped over the circular verge, and felt as if he were being born on invisible cushions that sank slowly down between the walls of the shaft. His crew followed, and after them came the remaining three of the delegation of guides.
The shaft descended for a well-nigh incalculable distance, far greater than the height of any terrestrial building. At regular intervals there were landings that gave on the various innumerable stories of the edifice; and there were glimpses of unending rows of titan columns in rooms that seemed to stretch without walls till they terminated in far-off balconies; and there were smaller rooms whose construction displayed an unfamiliar geometry, where scores and hundreds of the metal-sharded people were engaged in tasks of an unsurmisable nature by the light from glowing spheres of ever-shifting iridescent colors that hung in mid-air without chains or brackets. Also, there were glimpses of the second shaft, in which people were continually ascending, and from which they could step on any of the landings as if by a mere effort of will.