Chapter V

The onslaught came the next day. Hundreds of the Beast People poured into the valley--screaming, gibbering, eager to taste blood. They moved over the rocky surface like some evil blight cast up from the uttermost depths of Hell.

Gene's oil trick would not work now, for there was no oil with which to carry it through. The plants from which it was obtained grew outside the valley, and no one had dared venture forth to pluck them. The tribe would not be in misery much longer.

The warriors had thrown up a stone barricade in front of the caves, and from behind this they looked out upon the fast-approaching horde. Not a man among them looked with fear, but with contempt and detestation for the vermin that came to crush them.

The invaders were within range now. Gene raised his energy-ray and tightened his finger around the trigger. Nothing happened. Its power was exhausted by the almost constant use to which he had put it since arriving here. He flung it aside and snatched up a spear.

The first wave of half-men loosed a hail of crude shafts, hurling them with all the venom that was in their black hearts. Some went to the mark, piercing the breasts of those too slow in ducking. Their aim was poor, but they had many spears and many men to throw them.

Gene tossed his own javelin and had the pleasure of seeing it bury itself in the neck of a squat creature, severing the jugular. Then the battle waxed furious.

The tribe fought desperately to stem the tide. Even Old One and the venerable warriors whose day of battle should be past added their bit to the cause. But nothing could turn those squealing, hate-maddened beings that charged.

Of a sudden, a hairy, hideous face poked above the barrier. The thing snarled and pulled itself over the rocks to land squarely on Gene.

Man and beast met in a fight for life. The slavering brute bore Gene down with crushing strength, wrapping an arm about his waist and pushing back on his chin, trying to snap his spine.

The agony was unbearable. Gene brought up a hand and clamped it on the back of the half-man's head, digging his thumb in behind the ear.

An infinite moment passed, then his adversary straightened slowly, swaying on his feet. The biologist quickly wound his arms around its neck and went dragging it over the ground to a boulder. Once, twice, he bashed the filthy head against the stone. The lifeless body dropped.

Hand to hand battles were raging all about Gene, and though the Wronged Ones fought valiantly, the knowledge was in their eyes that they were lost.

In horror, he saw Old One threshing about on the ground, the fangs of a half-man fastened in his throat. Before Gene could move, an avenging form hurtled through the air and lit on the hell-creature. A stone dagger came down, slashing, tearing, wielded by the hand of a grief-maddened Kac.

The explorer turned away, a choking lump rising in his throat. Then, in his sorrow, a daring plan came to him. Heart thumping against its prison of ribs, he raced away to the Cave of Talkers.

* * * * *

No one was there. The women and children were all huddled in their homes and, of course, every man was outside defending the city. He clambered up to the platform and threw himself in the bucket seat, hoping against hope that this experiment would work.

The ego-transposer hummed with unholy sentience as he threw in a switch, and a soft glow appeared deep in the silver-beaded screens.

Slowly, the image of a tiny organism took form on one screen. Almost at the same moment an identical likeness swam into view on the other. Then began a parade of life-forms across the screens, each succeeding animal a bit higher on the evolutionary scale than its predecessor.

The sounds of battle grew nearer. He had to hurry now.... Ah! There! The flat, repulsive face of a half-man loomed before him. His finger stabbed at a stud, and the likeness was transfixed on the screen.

The procession continued on the other glowing surface until the physique of a Wronged One took shape in the depths and came to focus.

The two reproductions stared out at him with unwinking eyes. Deep in the bowels of the machine the basic mind make-up of the beings was being analyzed. An instant later the throbbing transposer would set up an en masse connection with the race egos, then....

A green light flashed on the panel and Gene brought his hand forward on the master switch. It was done!

Elated, he scrambled down from his perch and hurried outside. As he passed between the strangely inactive creatures at the entrance, a horrified voice croaked: "What terrible deed has been done?"

Gene grabbed the foul thing by the shoulders. "Kac! Is it you?"

"No," it whispered. "It is my mind, yes, but it is not my body." His hands went to his face. "Gene! I cannot see!"

* * * * *

"Easy!" Gene hissed. "You'll cause a panic." He realized that although the Wronged Ones could, with effort, talk with the strange vocal cords, it would take them some time to master the high-pitched shrill.

"Listen, Kac," he said. "Call out and tell your people to banish fear from their minds, or many will die by the spears of the crazed Beast People. Tell them to fall on the ground and not to rise until you so instruct them. Hurry now, there is no time to lose!"

Dazedly, Kac obeyed. Though his voice was cracked and unrecognizable, it boomed with authority. Suppressing their fright, the transposed Wronged Ones dropped to the ground and lay unmoving.

Then Gene crouched beside his fearful companion and looked upon the debacle. The transported Beast People were groping about uncertainly.

They were in the same boat as their hated enemies. Sight was a thing unknown to their brutish minds, thus the eyes they now possessed were utterly useless; and try as they would, they could not produce the inaudible squeal which gave them knowledge of their surroundings with the vocal cords of their new bodies.

Two of them collided, and immediately struck out with their stone knives. To each, the flesh they felt was the flesh of a Wronged One--a feared foe who must be destroyed. Both toppled, screaming defiance even in their final death throes.

The scene was repeated time and again, till the valley floor was but a mass of shrieking, struggling, mangled bodies.

The carnage all but over, Gene grabbed up a spear and went forth to mop up. Some of the transposed Wronged Ones had not dropped as Kac, now their chief, had commanded, but stood about with vacuous expressions on their faces. He suddenly realized that there were no guiding minds in these husks. The Beast People had outnumbered the tribe; consequently many of the monstrosities had been left mindless when the change took place.

Finishing his grisly task, he flung the spear from him in disgust and hurried back to the cave, shouting as he went: "Victory is ours, Kac! The Beast People are defeated! Now your tribe can rejoice!"

But there was no joy in Kac, he found. Now, there was a greater sadness on the new chief's face than was there at any time previous. Strange people! What could be the grievance now?

Kac must have sensed the question in his mind. He gestured disdainfully at his squat, hairy body. "Look you, Gene. You have made our plight far worse. Now we cannot see to hunt or to harvest the puny crops that we wrest from this woe-begone world. This had to be, that is to my knowing. But I fear the tribe will not understand. I can sense their rage even now, my brother."

Gene whirled and stared sickly at the warriors rising from the ground. It was true. Wrath was on their features as they fumbled toward the cave, guided by the very sound of his breathing impinging against their sensitive ears.

The blood-spattered biologist was stunned. "Wait, my brothers!" he cried, throwing up his arms. "You have not been betrayed! Today, you have won a great victory over your enemies; on this same day you shall begin a new life--a life of plenty, of happiness."

But his words were lost in the roar of a people aroused. Nearer they groped. Kac added his appeal, to no avail. They would have the blood of this false-tongued specimen of a race that revelled on a world that was not his own.

If only they would listen to his plan! But argument would only bring about his death--and the end of all hope for a once-mighty people. He turned despairingly to his one remaining friend.

"Hear this now, Kac," he said urgently. "I am going into the cave to--to appeal to the all-powerful Talkers. It is your task to remain here and hold off your warriors as long as possible. In a few moments wondrous magic will be worked on you and all your people, but fear not. Know I am your friend, no matter what strange, new vista your eyes next look upon, and never would I do you harm. When next we meet, it will be in a paradise far more glorious than that for which you mourn. Will you do this your brother asks?"

The great jaws parted and one resolute word came from them: "Yes!"

Gene took the gnarled, furry hand in a warm grip, then turned and bounded down the steps. His hands seemed to be all thumbs as he climbed the ladder.

At least, he thought as he spun the dials to long range, the ego-transposer would undo some of its horrors before its evil existence came to an end.

The splendid, sun-tanned form of a tall youth coalesced on one screen and Gene froze it there with a flick of his finger.

A panorama of life hastened across the other screen, and he recoiled impulsively as the flat, stupid face of a half-man leaped at him from its depth. But he knew that intelligence reposed behind those fearsome features--intelligence that would build a world.

Now the transposer was analyzing the race-egos--and the Wronged Ones were swarming into the cave!

* * * * *

Kac had been unable to hold them. They had merely side-stepped him and come on, silent now and grim. They would not harm their chief, but they would let nothing stand in the way of their vengeance.

Gene rushed to the platform's edge and brought his foot down on a shaggy hand. A stone dagger swished past his ear and shattered against the machine. Heart racing, he flung himself against the master switch and slammed it shut.

Silence, then a chorus of meaningless grunts drifted up to his ears. Below, the half-men milled about like cattle, feeling stupidly of their bodies. They could not understand; they felt wonderingly of their heads where eyes should be, trying to lift the darkness.

The _New Frontiers_ still rested where it had crashed--how long ago? Gene replaced the smashed tube and jockeyed the ship clear of the debris. The tubes roared with power and the landscape fell away.

As he sped toward the cave city, his thoughts went back to the events of a few short hours ago.

In his feeling for the Wronged Ones, he had followed the only course that offered itself. That was the transference of their egos to Venus, to the bodies of the human-like inhabitants of that planet. To those whom Man had wronged long in the dim past. Gene had given a new life, atoned for Man's darkest deed.

At the same time, he had given new hope to Man himself; for now, trade between Earth and Venus would become a reality as soon as the Wronged Ones could orient themselves to the new surroundings--a year at the most. The clouds of Venus had long since lifted, and the tribe would thrive in the warm sunshine that now bathed the planet. Under Kac's able leadership they would aid in restoring Earth's depleted mineral wealth, and in turn Earth would help them in building a lasting civilization.

Now he was over the cave city, and he knew what he must do. On the Vizio-screen he could see tiny specks moving about in the valley. They were stumbling away from the caves, away from what they could not understand.

He dived on the city and depressed the firing stud of the atomic-cannon. A gigantic concussion rocked his ship as the valley wall exploded upward.

On the screen he could see the remains of the machines in the rubble below. So ended the ego-transposer, a devil machine that could lift the spider-web of self from the very brain on which it was spun.

So, too, ended the destructive ray that a desperate people, ever greedy for new wealth, had unwittingly turned upon themselves on that day of infancy in the now-forgotten past.

Now to Venus, where the end of his strange adventure awaited. There had been many more Venusians than Wronged Ones. This surplus now belonged to the beasts--mindless, with only the instincts of the beast remaining. These mindless ones must be segregated to prevent inter-breeding with the others.

As the _New Frontiers_ flashed sunward, Gene caught one final glimpse of the transposed Venusians on his Vizio. Now a race without hope, were they. In undoing one great wrong, he had committed another. But this was a primitive, ignorant people to whom intelligence would never have come in time to aid Earth in the crisis that threatened.

He had played God to them, but they would never know, never realize ... or would they?