"Incredible," he murmured. "You do not believe me?" The scientist shook his head. "My dear fellow--I do not even believe _in_ you. So--naturally--" He turned with abruptness to the colonel. "How did he get aboard? His papers?" He now saw the colonel's frantic, imploring eyes. "Great God, man--you don't accept--?" "It's the truth," Colonel Calm responded. Sopho looked quickly at Learned--who glanced away. The scientist seemed, for the first time, alarmed. Not alarmed at the statement made by the man but at its effect upon two persons whom he had considered impervious to wild suggestion. Obviously, it was up to him to break the lunatic's spell. Some fabulous stowaway--and the journalist and the soldier--drawn overfine by the magnitude of this mission--had become prey to imagination. One humors the mad--at any rate, to begin with. "I see," said Sopho. He now faced the stranger--who stood in their midst. "Tell me. Just why did you decide to accompany this particular raid?" Chris, still smiling, repeated his words about his promise--and after that, the promise. "End of the world, eh?" Sopho chuckled. "You sure?" "Your world--perhaps." "You want us to give it up? The mission?" Sopho pointed at the bomb bay. "That?" Chris looked steadily at him. "If I remember rightly, doctor, you began the preparation of--that--" he, also, pointed--"not to use against men, but to have on hand if your other enemy employed such instruments. He did not. He lies defeated." Sopho nodded. "Right. Now we are using it to shorten the war. Save lives." "_Save_ lives?" "By shortening the war, man! Simple arithmetic--!" "What about--the next war? And the next? The wars beyond that?" "This weapon should--and in my opinion will--put an end to war." Slowly, Chris shook his head. "Strange reasoning. A _weapon_ will put an end to war." "An absolute weapon, man! The world will never again risk going to war. Never again dare take the risk!" "It will fear too much, you think?" "Precisely." "But isn't it fear, doctor, that has always caused men to wage war? Fear in this form today--tomorrow in that form--?" "Can you think of a better means of ending wars--foolish wastes!--than an absolute weapon? We have changed the whole picture of war!" "But not changed men!" There ensued a moment without talk. Chris presently said, "This weapon. Where it falls, the genes of men will be broken. Perhaps their children--perhaps their grandchildren--will carry the heritage. Headless bodies. Eyeless faces. There--teeth everywhere. And yonder--no voice. Generation after generation, for a thousand years--this great invention will go on waging your present war, doctor, against the unborn." The colonel grabbed the scientist's arm. "Is that true?"