Page:Stirring Science Stories, March 1942.djvu/16

 orange grove.

"Hello," he called softly.

For a brief second the little creature cowered further back into the shadows, his broad ugly features frozen with terror into an ashen gargoyle mask. Then he hesitantly inched forward up to the encircling stone wall.

He was a squat misshapen little monster, his huge fuzzrimmed head perching like some monster spider atop his warped frail body. Like some imagined man of the Future thought Rolf for there was the flame of intelligence in this creature's mismatched eyes.

"I am Jek," said the little man in clipped, oddly accented English. "Who are you, Moster, and what do you here in the Forbidden Field?"

"Moster?" queried Rolf. "Oh I get you—monster! I am no monster. My name is Rolf Cameron. About five minutes ago I was experimenting with an invention of mine when, pffft and here I am."

"You," the little man's blue eye widened and his other squinted, "are Rof the Sleeper? You are he who slept in the Forbidden Field these many years in a bed of lightning?

"Yes," he answered himself, "the fire is gone. Rof is gone. You are Rof the Sleeper."

"I could be," reluctantly admitted Rolf, his jaw tightening with a click. "How long have I—slept on my bed of lightning?"

"My people have lost count of time," Jek said sadly. "Long years before the Great Change you slept here. This I know from the fables of my people. It was death to touch the fire that surrounded you. So this wall was built about you."

Rolf chewed at his upper lip for a moment, staring off into empty blue space as he digested this startling news. Apparently the shorting circuit had somehow resulted in a mighty surge of time-annihilating power that carried him far forward into the future.

"Tell me, Jek," he requested, "why are you so tiny. Why are the trees, the village—even the grass—so tiny?"

DO not know all," admitted Jek solemnly. "My people have destroyed so many writings of the ancient days. Only a few of us, atavistic humans like myself, desire knowledge. Few of us can read. Few of us are curious or even try to think. We work, we eat, we sleep. If they see me away from my work I will be killed. It is the law.

"If they see you they will kill you. All Mosters must be killed. But have no fear. I will not kill you. I am not like the others."

Rolf smiled, grimly amused at the little man's words.

"Before the Great Change," Jek went on, "all men were giants. Too many men crowded Earth. Even in the oceans they lived on artificial islands. There were many wars to capture land already overcrowded. Men and women starved.

"So the scientist reduced the size of men. By radiations, glandular treatment or some other means. The records are not clear and many of the books are destroyed. But when men were a foot tall Earth was big enough for all of them."

"I rather imagine," murmured Rolf making rough mental calculations. "The area would be increased by 62—thirty-six times as many square miles as before."

"The Great Change destroyed us," droned on Jek. "Sons of miners remained miners. The sons of farmers remained farmers. The power to reason is gone. Our brains are too small."

"Right," agreed Rolf. "And Jek, unless I'm greatly mistaken that same thing has happened before on Earth. The Age of Reptiles must have had some species with great intelligence. They are gone. Perhaps an ant civilization once dominated this planet—giants that lived in great city domes. The ants' orderly system of life and their galleried domes of earth and sand are pitiful survivals of their one-time civilization—wrecked by a desire for more room to live!"

Jek scratched his fuzzy, skull in bewilderment.

At that moment a shrill shout of hatred sent Rolf's eyes flashing toward the village. Advancing through the low groves and across the mossy green meadows came perhaps a hundred of the little people, miniature spears gripped in their hands and glinting toy swords of hammered metal at their side.

Jek groaned. "You must escape," he shouted. "They will kill you and eat your flesh. You are a Moster. I will go with you. They will kill me too."

"Come on then," cried Rolf swinging Jek up to a perch on his shoulder. "Where do we go from here?"

Jek's arm thrust before Rolf's eyes, indicating the northern range of hills and the canyons beyond—the wild country of the upper Colorado.

"Mosters live there," he said simply.

A shower of little spears flashed about them as Rolf began to run. Two of them pierced the loose cloth of Rolf's baggy pants leg, where he found them dangling later in the day, while another grazed his side.

Then they were beyond effective range of the thrown weapons and Rolf sent a half-dozen heavy rocks crashing back into their advancing ranks. Jek tugged at his ear and pointed again toward the distant hills.

"Soon," he shrieked, "the horsemen will come. They can run like the swift rabbits. They will follow us. When we sleep they will plunge spears into our eyes. Thus do they kill the Mosters."

"Jek," demanded Rolf, "what are these monsters you talk about, the ones we go to find?"

"Giants," said Jek eagerly. "Men like you. Men who Would not submit to the Great Change."