Pass he did, in a moment more, his monstrous shapeless body gliding to the shaft's edge and peering down there at us in passing, as usual. Then he was gone, gliding on down the corridor, and instantly we sprang to our feet. At once Jor Dahat stepped over to the wall, standing with his back against it and his feet braced widely on the floor. Then Sar Than climbed nimbly up over the plant-man's body until two of his four limbs rested on the shoulders of Jor Dahat, who now grasped those two limbs in his own hands and raised them as high as he could reach, holding the Arcturian above him by the sheer force of his powerful muscles. With his other two limbs Sar Than also was reaching upward and now I clambered up in turn, over the plant-man and the Arcturian, until the latter, grasping my own feet, had raised me in turn as high as he could reach. Thus upheld I was just able to reach the shaft's rim above with my upstretched hands, and there, in that precarious position, we awaited the return of the guard. It could hardly have been more than a minute, at most, that we waited, but to ourselves, balancing there with muscles strained to the utmost, it seemed an eternity. I heard the rustling glide of the guard's approach, now, but at the same time felt the Arcturian's hold giving, beneath me, heard the great muscles of the plant-man cracking beneath the weight of both of us. I knew that my two companions could hold out for but a moment longer, and then, just as the Arcturian's grip on my feet began to slip, the returning guard had reached the pit's edge, pausing there, directly above me, to peer down as usual. The next moment I had reached up with a last effort and had gripped him, and then we four were tumbling down into the well, pulling the guard down with us. As we fell I had heard his weapon rattle on the floor above, knocked from his grasp, but as we reached the well's floor he had already gripped us with a half-dozen pseudopod arms that formed themselves lightning-like out of the shapeless mass of flesh that was his body. Then we were plunging about the floor of the well in a mad, weird battle, as silent as it was deadly. The thing could not cry out for help, but for the moment it seemed to us that alone it might conquer us, its suddenly formed arms coiling swiftly about us, great tentacles of muscle that were like to have choked us in the first moment of combat. Strike and grasp as we would there seemed no vulnerable spot on the creature's slippery body, and weary as we were the outcome of the struggle was for a time extremely doubtful. I heard Sar Than utter a strangled cry as a thick arm noosed itself about his body, felt another striving for a hold on my own head, and then saw Jor Dahat suddenly grasp two of the slippery arms and literally tear the thing's shapeless body into half with those two holds. There was a soft ripping sound and then the creature had slumped to the floor, a limp mass of dead flesh.