the odd visual effect, which was like gazing into the
twisting heat rays rising from an overheated oven, he saw that there was a small flat
region between the mountains. And in the center of this valley was a large black structure
of some sort. The twisting effect of the light around it made it impossible to tell more.
"That's it," said Burl. His father nodded, shifted the pack to ease his shoulders,
unstrapped the hunting rifle slung over his back, and carefully checked its loads.
Burl saw what his father was doing and suddenly understood the danger. What could be
doing a thing like this? What but something not of this Earth? Something of distant space,
of a science beyond that of man and unfriendly besides. Now, for the first time, Burl
realized what he had not had time to before this was an enemy he and his father were
facing an enemy of all mankind and utterly unknown.
He gulped, gripped his rifle, and followed his father down the sliding rocky trail.
As they drew nearer the base of the mountain, the effects of the strange vibrations grew
more pronounced. Burl avoided looking directly ahead, keeping his eyes on the ground
before his feet, yet even so, he could not help noticing how the stones around them
seemed to shimmer in the invisible waves. From the base of the valley the sky now
seemed streaked with black and gray rings, as if they were reaching the center of some
atmospheric whirlpool. Out of the mountains, after hours of arduous scrambling, they
started across the barren rocky plain.
Before them rose a vast circular structure several stories high, ominously black and
without any sign of windows or doors. Above the building protruded two great
projections ending in huge, shining discs. One of the monstrous cuplike discs was facing
the Sun, the other pointed in the opposite direction.
As the two men came nearer and nearer, the strangeness in the air increased. They felt
they were being penetrated through and through with invisible lances, with tiny prickles
of heat. "Radiation?" queried Burl softly, afraid of the answer. His father trudged grimly
on for a moment, and then put down his pack. He took out a Geiger counter and activated
it.
He shook his head. "No radioactivity," he said. "Whatever this is, it isn't that."
They reached the wall of the building. Oddly, here they seemed sheltered from the
unusual vibrations. Burl realized that the source was above them, probably the two
mighty discs raised high in the sky.
The Dennings surveyed the building, but found no entrance. It must have been a quarter
of a mile around its walls, but there was no sign of a door or entry. The wall was of a
rocklike substance, but it was not like any rock or plastic Burl had ever seen.
"We've got to get in," said Burl as they returned to the starting point, "but how?"
His father smiled. "This way." He opened his pack and took two cans of blasting powder
from it. "I thought these would come in handy. Lucky we had some left over from the
blasting we did last week."
He set both cans at the base of the high wall, wired them together, and ran the wire as far
as it reached. When the two men were a safe distance away, Mark sparked off the
explosive.
There was a thunderous roar: rocks and dirt showered around them, and bits of black
powdery stuff. When the smoke cleared, Burl and his father leaped to their feet, rifles in
hand.
There was a crack in the side of the wall where the explosive had gone off. And the rip
was large enough to get through!
Without a word, they charged across the ground, still smoking from the concussion, and
squeezed through the mysterious walls of the enigmatic building.
The walls were thin, thin but hard, as befit masters of atomic engineering. Inside, they
found a roomless building one single chamber within the frame of the outer walls.
A dim, bluish light emanated from the curving ceiling. On the uncleared rocky ground
which was the floor of the building were a number of huge machines.
They were spherical glassy inventions, many times the height of a man, connected by
strings of thick metal bars and rows of smaller globes, none of which was familiar. There
was a steady humming noise, and above, the two giant, metal masts penetrating the
ceiling rotated slowly. Doubtless, the great Sun-trapping discs were affixed to the top of
these masts.
There was no living thing in sight.
Burl and his father stood silently, half crouched, with rifles at the ready, but nothing
moved to challenge them. There was only the humming of the Sun transmitters.
Burl
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