Watch out, captain! They'll get you, too, and the others! _Ahh!_ Somebody struck me on the back of my head. Darkness. Dark. Dark. Rockabye baby on the tree-top ... when the wind blows.... "Okay, Halloway, _any_ time. Just any old time you want to come to." Dark. A voice talking. Dark as a whale's insides. Ouch, my head. I'm flat on my back, I can feel rocks under me. "Good morning, _dear_ Mr. Halloway." That you, captain, over in that dark corner? "It ain't the president of the United States!" Where is this cave? "Suppose _you_ tell us, you got us into this mess with your eternally blasted popcorn! Why'd you get off the street-car?" Did the West Side gang truss us up like this, captain? "West Side gang, _goh_! Those faces, those inhuman, weird, unsavory and horrible faces. All loose-fleshed and--gangrenous. Aliens, the whole rotting clutch of 'em." What a funny way to talk. "Listen, you parboiled idiot, in about an hour we're going to be fried, gutted, iced, killed, slaughtered, murdered, we will be, ipso facto, dead. Your 'friends' are whipping up a little blood-letting jamboree. Can't I shove it through your thick skull, we're on Mars, about to be sliced and hammered by a lousy bunch of Martians!" "Captain, sir?" "Yes, Berman?" "The cave door is opening, sir. I think the Martians are ready to have at us again, sir. Some sort of test or other, no doubt." "Let go a me, you one-eyed monster! I'm coming, don't push!" We're outside the cave. They're cutting our bonds. See, captain, they aren't hurting us, after all. Here's the brick alley. There's Mrs. Haight's underwear waving on the clothes-line. See all the people from the beer hall--what're they waiting for? "To see us die." "Captain, what's wrong with Halloway, he's acting queer--" "At least he's better off than us. He can't see these creatures' faces and bodies. It's enough to turn a man's stomach. This must be their amphitheatre. That looks like an obstacle course. I gather from their sign lingo that if we make it through the obstacles, we're free. Footnote: nobody's ever gotten through alive yet. Seems they want you to go first, Berman. Good luck, boy." "So long, captain. So long, Gus. So long, Halloway." Berman's running down-alley with an easy, long-muscled stride. I hear him yelling high and clear, even though he's getting far away. Here comes an automobile! Berman! Ahh! It hit him! He's fallen! Berman, get up, get up! "Stay here, Halloway, it's not your turn yet." My turn? What do you mean? Someone's gotta help Berman. "Halloway, come back! Oh, man, I don't want to see this!" * * * * *