Ferocious predatory machines--spiders, wheel-bugs, scorpions--formidable in their armor and bristling with guns, lay alongside the more pacific slugs and caterpillars and snails which in ordinary times were their natural prey, and were freely fuelled and provisioned out of the stores which normally their possessors would have fought to the death to safeguard against the despoilers.... In the presence of the drones, there were no more natural enmities. For the drones were the Enemy. Their coming meant that all life was kindred; deep in the heritage of every people was the almost instinctive knowledge that, if the drones were not checked as tradition decreed, their blind automatic propagation would end by sweeping every living thing from the face of the Earth. Toward morning, the chiefs of a score of tribes held council of war in the very shadow of the Barrier. Their consultation was brief; there was no arguable question of what must be done, only of how. And if the drones were about to swarm, they must act promptly. No time to wait for the gathering of more distant peoples; no time to send word to the wasps or the hornets and gain aerial support. They must strike with what they had. * * * * * Dworn started awake as a hand touched his shoulder. He sat up, angrily flinging a coverlet from him. "I didn't intend to sleep!" he muttered, rubbing his eyes and realizing where he was--below ground in the spiders' colony, whither he and Qanya had been taken and where he had been persuaded to lie down and rest a little while the warning was carried by others. The tall blonde spider, Purri, was grinning maliciously down at him. "Hear the beetle talk! I suppose, after a day spent in what, for you was comparative idleness, you felt like doing something really strenuous ... say going out and demolishing the drones' hive bare handed...?" Dworn climbed to his feet. With a violent effort he kept from wincing at the protest of stiffened muscles and yesterday's collection of bruises. "What's going on out there now? Where's Qanya?" "There's really nothing more _you_ can do, you know. I merely woke you because I thought you'd want to hear that your beetle-folk have been contacted--they'd holed up to lick their wounds about twenty miles south of here--and have joined the fighting force that's getting ready to attack the drones at dawn. As for dear little Qanya, she's sleeping angelically in the next chamber...." "No, she isn't," said Qanya from the doorway. "You, too?" said Purri with irritation. "And what do you want, scapegrace?" Qanya's black eyes narrowed dangerously. She moved forward to Dworn's side and took a grip on his arm. "I might ask what you're doing here disturbing--" "Both of you, you're wasting time," growled Dworn.