The Infra-Medians | Page 5

city, and through crooked, dismal streets, toward the
center of the city.
A great crowd of creatures similar to my captors hemmed us in. Before
us, they thinned into nothingness as we approached, only to swarm into
being in some other spot. It was terrifying; an unbelievable experience
that made me question my sanity. The only vestige of comfort left me
was the hope that they were taking me to Hope and Vic.
* * * * *

At the entrance of one of the huge misshapen black buildings, the
creature with the brilliant stone at his throat appeared as suddenly as a
light flashes up in the darkness. With him were two others, each
wearing a similar jewel of authority. They stood aside for us to enter,
and then followed us down a long corridor which was not lighted by
any device I could discern, and yet which was not dark.
A broad door swung open, and I was thrust through the doorway.
"Pete!" shouted a familiar voice, and I scrambled to my feet. There was
Vic, his red hair tousled, and his face gray with worry. Behind him, her
big blue eyes brimming, her lips quivering, was Hope.
"Vic! Well, here I am. And Hope, dear...."
My voice trailed off. These were not Vic and Hope before me; they
were unreal creatures, like the beings which had captured me. I could
recognize the face and the figure of the woman I loved and of her
brother; but they seemed to have no substance.
Hope suddenly put her arms about me. She was sobbing.
"Don't, Peter!" she whispered.
"Don't look at me like that. I know how you feel. You--you and
Vic--you aren't real to me, either! We're just shadows--lost souls...."
"Buck up, Hope!" Vic's voice was kindly, yet firm and gravely
commanding. "We're all right. Only--temporarily--we're Infra-Medians.
Sit down, Pete, and let's talk. It may be that there's no time to lose in
making some plans."
* * * * *
"First of all," I insisted, "tell me where we are; what's happened to us.
Do you know?"
"Where we are? Surely. Looking at it in one way, we're less than a mile
from my laboratory."

"But, Vic!" I protested. "Do you really mean that we're less than a mile
from your laboratory; from our own world? If we were, we could see it;
we'd bump into our own trees and houses and people; we'd be knocked
down by automobiles, and--"
"Two bodies cannot occupy the same space at the same time. Old law
of simple physics. Is that what you mean?" interrupted Vic.
"Why, yes."
"And a body; what's that?"
"A body? Why, matter, I suppose."
"And matter is what?"
"Anything that occupies space," I replied triumphantly. I had
remembered that much from my physics classes.
"True," smiled Vic. "But let's see. It is possible to have sound and light
in the same place, isn't it? We can even add other things: heat and
electricity, for example. Speaking of electricity, a tremendous current
of it adds nothing to the weight of the wire carrying it, and nothing to
its bulk, unless we have a heating overload. Current enough to kill a
thousand men, or to do the work of a million horses, weighs nothing, is
invisible, and actually does nothing until released in some form or other,
either by accident or design."
"True, but electricity isn't matter. Our old world is matter; I'm matter,
and you're matter. Why don't we bump into things?"
"Our old world is matter, true enough, but for the rest, you're wrong,
Pete, old son. You're not matter, any more. You're something else. In
terms of our own being, you do not exist in your present form. This
world does not exist. And the reverse is just as true."
* * * * *
I stared at him, bewildered.

"What am I, then--a ghost?"
"Nothing of the sort. You're old Pete Grahame, a darned good half-back,
and the world's rottenest scientist. Only you've been passed into another
form of being, through the action of four little quartz bulbs whose
periods of vibrations form a beat--but that's over your head, Pete, old
son, and we'll have time to talk over details when we get back. Right
now, we're in somewhat of a jam." Instinctively, he glanced at Hope; it
was her danger, and not his own, that had brought that haggard pallor
to his face in so short a time.
"That's what I don't understand. What do these people--if you can call
them that--want of us?"
Vic looked down, frowning.
"I'm not sure I'm right," he replied after a moment, "but if I am--they
wish us to kill them. As many as possible.
"When I found myself here, I wandered nearly to the city before I was