Disgusted stare. Clatclit pointed to me, Snow, and then the boys, and followed with an attention-getting tremor of his tail. "Oh, yeah. We would have trouble getting out of here unguided, at that!" I said sheepishly. When Snow was around, I couldn't even see the obvious. "Any chance Baxter can find his way out of here alone?" I said. "If he gets to the spaceport before we do, he may get back to Earth and get an army back here after us." Clatclit thought it over. Then he placed an arm across my shoulders, and an arm across Snow's, and looked hopeful. "Damn," I said, not knowing whether to laugh or cry, "it's mighty nice of you to offer, but we can't spend the rest of our lives down here with you, Clatclit!" I shook my head. "We've got to get out of here and get the word to the World Congress before Baxter sews the Earth up tight." "Say," Ted's small voice interrupted, "what happened to the bars and stuff, hey?" I blinked, startled, and looked about us. Then, on an impulse, I dropped to my knees and felt the ground. It was plain old lava. I rocked back on my heels, bewildered, and then I understood, and started laughing. "Jery, what is it?" "Snow, baby, it's the laugh of the century, that's all. Unstable is hardly the word for the Ancients' universe! Not only did they dislocate, but they took their contact-material with them! MY guess is that right now there is no longer a splinter of parabolite in the solar system." "But why is that funny?" she asked, as I got to my feet again. "Because, honey, it means that all Baxter's deep, dire and devious schemes have come to naught, and by his own hand, at that! He'll never build his teleportation machine, now!" "His what?" she said. "You see, baby, he--Oh, hell, it's a long story. I'll tell you when we have more time. Right now, we have to head Baxter off, or things won't be very funny at all." Following Clatclit's light, Snow, the boys and I moved swiftly across the floor of that vast cavern, emptied of its space-stressed metal lining and occupants after heaven knows how many eons of existence there. The only hitch we encountered in our upward race was that spray-happy torrent which Clatclit couldn't cross without dribbling to death. However, a Space Scout is true, brave, and loyal, and he always carries a rubber poncho inside his travel-kit. It took three of them to swaddle our guide, but, with the assistance of two of the more sure-footed Scouts, I was able to tote him bodily across that perilous bridge, with nothing showing of him but his taillight, and that high in the air, away from most of the eroding spray. Once unwrapped, he took the lead again, tail high. Then, Snow's hand tightly in mine, we all took off like cross-country racers up those winding tunnels of Mars.