Chapter XII

Time was the thing that counted. The remorseless pressure of minutes and hours that passed and could never be recalled! The tyrants who lorded it over Gral-Thala had no weapons more deadly than the electronic guns that had been common on Earth two hundred years before. A battalion of troops from Earth, wearing armor of dura-steel and carrying ray-guns, could probably have overthrown the Invaders very quickly. But--there was no time! The toll of the Gray Death was increasing with each passing hour, back there on the Good Green Planet, and the little group on the Moon would have to do what they could without hope of assistance.

They could not pause for proper preparations or careful planning. It was only half an Earth day after they had landed on the Moon, time enough to snatch a few hours' sleep, that Larry found himself moving up toward the surface in a slowly crawling cable car. Chotan already lay behind and far below them, and the oxygen indicator fastened to the sleeve of the space suit showed him that the air was thinning rapidly.

Colton and Pyatt were with him. All three of them wore space suits of the Lunarian patterns, that had a metal helmet with glass windows at the front and sides, for the difference in design of the space suits from the _Sky Maid_ would have made them too conspicuous. Pyatt had come along because he had often penetrated beyond the Great Barrier in disguise, and a second Lunarian was waiting for them up on the surface.

Ripon had also wanted to come, the idea of this daring raid setting the old, reckless light danging in his eyes. Finally he agreed that one of the leaders of the _Sky Maid_ expedition had better remain in the Caverns in case of disaster to the raiders.

"That's the hell of getting along in years, young feller!" he rumbled regretfully. "There's nothing I'd like better than to penetrate the barrier with you and pull the whiskers off the tyrants in their lair. A quick wit and a ready weapon! But I couldn't keep up with you younger men if the going gets hot--though I never thought the day would come when I'd hear Crispin Gillingwater Ripon admit a thing like that!--and you'd better go on without me."

"We'll be back soon," Larry said. Ripon snorted.

"If you're not back in five days I'm coming after you with the crew of the _Sky Maid_ and as many of the folk of the Caverns as I can get to come along!"

* * * * *

The Cavern of Chotan was in that part of the Moon which is sometimes in sunlight and sometimes in darkness, and it was night when they came out of the tunnel. The moisture on the space suit instantly froze into a fine white frost. A few Lunarian sentries waited for them there, and nearly a hundred of the Insect-men. With them were two carts that had high wheels and springs, something like an old-fashioned Earthly buckboard.

For a few moments, Pyatt talked to the leaders of the Insect-men in their clicking tongue. The glowing knobs atop their antennae bobbed up and down as they nodded their heads in understanding. Then Pyatt motioned Colton into one of the carts and climbed in beside him. Another Lunarian, slender even in the bulky space suit, climbed into the second cart beside Larry. Pyatt swung his right arm forward.

A score of the Insect-men instantly scampered ahead as scouts, spreading out like the spokes of a fan. Small parties went out to either flank. The rest, about thirty to each cart, gripped the trailing ropes and darted ahead with the wagons following behind them. They went at almost incredible speed, the four legs of each giving them a steady drive.

Even though the Insect-men were picking the smooth stretches of the rock and were evidently following a definite though unmarked trail, it was rough going. The light wagons jolted and banged as they whizzed along, and Larry had to cling to the rail with both hands to keep from being thrown off.

"Is all the way as rough as this?" he panted to his companion.

"Better soon," the Lunarian said shortly.

After about three hours they turned into a smooth and level road. It wound up and down over the rolling rocky plain, evidently a highway of great age. Occasionally they passed crumbling ruins beside it. Larry supposed that the road and the ruins dated back to those very ancient days before the Lunarians withdrew their shrinking supply of air within the Great Barrier.

Now that the road was smooth, the Insect-men pulled the carts along at a whizzing pace. The light wheels whirred as the wagons shot ahead. The scene, Larry reflected, was like a nightmare. All about him were the chill mountains and craters of the Moon, lifting their jagged peaks against the cold stars. Ahead of the speeding wagon ran the toiling cluster of Insect-men, their hard shells gleaming faintly in the starlight and their glowing antennae bobbing in a swift rhythm as they ran. The treads of the wheels rattled on the rocky surface of the road, the horny feet of the Insect-men made a steady scraping sound as they ran. The two men seated in the cart ahead were monstrous and misshapen figures in their space suits.

Larry's companion had remained sullenly silent, in spite of several efforts to start a conversation. This was unusual in one of the normally pleasant and talkative Lunarians, but Larry had not thought much about it. Now, as he made some remark about the speed of their progress, he heard a low chuckle and in his earphones sounded the voice of Diana Staunton.

"Yes, Larry, we travel fast. In a few days we will enter the zone of sunlight."

"_You_," he exclaimed. "This expedition is too dangerous. I would never have let you come if I had known."

"Why else do you think I kept so silent until now, when it is too late to send me back?" she asked, and though he could not see her face through the glass of her helmet in the darkness he could tell that she was smiling. "Neither would Pyatt of Kagan or my father have let me come. I stole the space suit of the young man who was to accompany you and left him locked in a storeroom."

"You will have to remain outside when we go within the barrier."

"Where you go, I go," she said with finality.

* * * * *

Sunrise on the Moon! There was no sudden onslaught of light as on the Earth, for the Moon day was twenty-eight days long! Yet, as they progressed steadily toward the horizon, the Moon's rotation brought the edge of the sun gradually into sight above the barren horizon, and as the days passed, a blinding glare of light swept in upon them and they moved the dark glasses into place in front of the windows of their space-suit helmets.

The temperature rose rapidly with the coming of the two weeks' sunlight, and before long the frost on the space suits was melting. Then, stretching along the crest of a mighty mountain range ahead, Larry saw a lofty gray wall that went so high its top was almost lost from view above. They had come within sight of the Great Barrier!