Part 6 (1/2)
”Tell me of your world,” I said.
The telling took a long time but not a word of it was dull. According to Lo-as-ro, his world was a planet revolving about one of the stars in the Big Dipper. It was slightly smaller than Earth, with about the same climates and development of life. It was peopled with only one race, the Orbiwah, who lived much as the Indians in America did before the arrival of the white man. Recently s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps from another planet in the same solar system had landed on the Orbiwah world. These newcomers were friendly, had no thought of conquest, and possessed a science and culture of amazing proportions.
From them the Orbiwah learned of a planet on which were men of their own kind. Lo-as-ro, fired by the thought of establis.h.i.+ng contact with people like himself, had borrowed s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps manned by robots and crossed the void to Earth. For weeks they had hovered in our atmosphere, at first saddened, then angered, by the fate meted out to the Indians.
Since the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps were able to move through Time into the past, Lo-as-ro hit on the idea of going back to the days when the Indian was still in control of most of America. With the power at his control he could force the white man from the continent and restore the land to those who owned it.
Arriving near the close of the Eighteenth Century, he found a sizeable encampment of Indians, brought the s.h.i.+p down among them, and summoned the chiefs to a Council of War, where he outlined to them his plan. To his astonishment he found the chiefs suspicious of outside help and confident that they could defeat the white man alone. In vain did Lo-as-ro explain that they were doomed; they could not, or would not, believe that he had visited the future. He offered to take them ahead and let them see for themselves--an offer that was quickly refused.
Whereupon Lo-as-ro decided to return to the Present and wrest the land from the white man and hand it over to the downtrodden remnants of a once-powerful race. It was on that return trip that Wetzel had arrived in the present century.
When Lo-as-ro finished, I leaned back against the side of the s.h.i.+p and lit a cigarette, bringing a startled grunt from the chief. I said, ”You cannot defeat the white man, Lo-as-ro. He has weapons such as you have never dreamed: machines that can throw things that explode and kill hundreds of braves at one time, machines that travel through the air as does the one you came in, things that can wipe out all life within a circle as wide as a brave can ride around in one day on a fast horse.
”No, n.o.ble Lo-as-ro. Return to your world and leave this one to the white man. He took it long ago and he will never give it up. I have spoken.”
The chief of the Orbiwah smiled grimly. ”In the s.h.i.+p in which I arrived on your world is a small machine. It is working for me now.
Within its reach no weapon is useful, no explosion can take place, no signal can be sent. Only Man is not touched by this machine, but when it works he has no weapons with which to fight. Each hour the influence of this machine widens. Soon all this land will be helpless.
Then the robots will take charge and those who oppose them will be slain.”
I thought of the ”dead spot” I had first heard about on the newscast the night before, and how it was steadily growing. I remembered the slain farmer with the missing scalp, the two companies of soldiers helpless without radio, guns and transportation. I thought of a mechanized America helpless before a few score of these s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps ...
and I knew that counter-violence would be useless.
”Give the country back to the Indians!” The cry of the over-burdened citizen. It seemed it was about to come to that!
For a long time I sat there, thinking, trying to hit on an answer that would save my country. And when the answer finally stirred at the back of my mind, it was so completely bizarre that I almost missed it entirely....
”n.o.ble Lo-as-ro,” I said, ”I must return to the Great White Father and tell him what I have learned. I will tell him that there is nothing to be done to oppose the Chief of the Kornesh. Within a few hours I will return with his reply.”
Lo-as-ro inclined his fine head in a.s.sent. ”Let it be so.”
”Until my return,” I said, ”let the influence of the machine draw back until it holds helpless only a small section of land about your s.h.i.+p.
Only in this way will I be able to return quickly to the White Chief.”
Again Lo-as-ro agreed. I took my leave of him ceremoniously, and a few minutes later Wetzel and I were hurrying back toward the highway.
Four hours later I was on my way back, this time with four companions.
The plane landed us at the edge of the newly set ”dead spot” and the five of us forced our way through the forest until we reached the clearing where the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p still crouched.
A silent group of Indians watched us as we crossed the open ground.
This time the two robots flanking the doorway did not leave their posts. As I came up the ramp with my companions, Lo-as-ro appeared in the doorway of the s.h.i.+p.
He eyed me and the others without expression. I said, ”n.o.ble Lo-as-ro, I have brought with me four of my world's...o...b..wah. They have come to hear your plan for them and their people. I have told them nothing of what you said to me, only that you have come from another world and are of their blood.”
One by one I presented my companions. Yellow Arm was Johnny Armin, an old school friend of mine; Iron Eagle, with whom I had spent a year in Korea, had his telephone listed under the name of Luke Riegel; Strong Wind was Sidney Storm, whom I had met while spending a year in Southern California; and Lone Pine, known as Lionel Patterson, lived a few doors down the street from me in Was.h.i.+ngton and shot eighteen holes any day in the low seventies.