Amazing Stories, Vol. 3, No. 2 — page 67: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ing high overhead, making the enclosure as light Me adel ee a ake oF oe Oe 162 flesh appearing on my body, “T don’t like this at all.” The Professor repeated his question in French, Spanish, Italian; he asked it in Portuguese, and in what he later told me were several Indian dialects ; but all to no purpose. Only every time he paused to catch his breath, there came that dry rustling as of the rasping of metal on metal. Suddenly he stepped back and caught me by the shoulder. “Those creatures,” he whispered, gesturing towards the shaggy men, “are controlled.” “Controlled!” I exclaimed. ‘‘What do you mean?” “That there is something on their shoulders.” I thought the Professor was taking leave of his senses. ‘What could it possibly be,” I began, then stopped, for the shaggy men were in motion. They divided, one group going to the right of us and the other to the left. In our rear they joined ranks and made us retreat before them. It was then I caught my first glimpse of the unbelievable riders that perched on their shoulders and rode them, much as human beings ride horses. Long antennae reached down on either side of the shaggy men’s faces, grip: ping the corners of their mouths and serving to guide them as with bit and bridle. Other antennae waved in the air, or rubbed one on the other, pro- ducing the rasping noise which had so grated on my nerves. The bodies to which these antennae were attached were about a foot in length, “In the name of God, what are they, Professor ?” fT screamed, half raising my piece of iron as if to throw it at the slowly advancing horrors. But the Professor gripped my arm. “Don’t start fighting,” he warned sternly, “unless you have to. As to what they are, I’m not certain, but I believe them to be some sort of ant-like insects.” We retreated, slowly at first, then at a brisk walk, finally at a trot. When we moved in a given direction the insects were content to keep their steeds at a distance; but when we veered from it they urged on the shaggy mem to head us off. “I believe those insects are driving us in front of them as men herd cattle,” gasped the Professor. We topped a rise and saw stretching away before us a level plain. Far out on this plain—several miles away, perhaps—-were numerous mounds, and it did not take us long to suspect that they were our destination. Several times the Professor sank to the earth, utterly winded, unable to. run another step. At such times, I stood over his body with my iron club, determined to sell our lives dearly, but there was no need to fight. The shaggy men were brought to a halt and their uncanny riders waited patiently until the Professor could regain his feet, when we were once more urged ahead at a brisk pace. Night had fallen and it was almost’ too dark to see when we finally staggered through a narrow gap into a large enclosure and were left to our own de- vices. The splash of water led us to a stream, where we slaked our thirst and bathed our sore and swollen feet; and then, too miserable and tired to care what further happened to us, we huddled together for warmth and fell asleep. The Master Ants . awoke, chilled to the bone. G ievote hours later, the Professor and I of cloth clinging to our backs. Fhe moon was rid * xi Giop took to grubbing in the ground for some si Profe ae ES fessor. = And no wonder! = “They once were.” For we were practically naked, only shreds __ " AMAZING STORIES as day. Now and then the silence would be broken with a shrill scream or a heavy snort. Once or twice we heard the metallic slithering of antennae; and once, in looking up, I saw an insect crawling on top of a mound, its sinuous body etched sharply against the sky. I shivered with more than the cold. “Professor,” I whispered, “is this a nightmare or am -I really awake?” “I’m very much afraid that both of us are wide awake,’’ said the Professor with a sigh. “But it doesn’t seem possible,’ I exclaimed. “Those bugs .... My God, Professor, what has hap- pened to the world!” The Professor pulled thoughtfully at his unkempt beard, “I don’t know. In our day there were sci- entists who held insects to be a growing menace to man’s rule. Perhaps ... But you could ‘see for yourself that those ants rode men!” “Were they men?” “Yes; I believe they were.’ “But their hair?” “Could be accounted for by the fact that they were exposed, naked, to all kinds of weather. The fit, in this case, the strong, hairy ones, would survive and breed. A few centuries of such breeding could possibly produce the type we saw.” The thought of a world in which insects were the dominant species and men subject to them as beasts of burden, filled me with horror. If such were the case, what would our fate be? In spite of the chill night wind, in spite of the fact that we were cold and hungry, I dreaded the morning. But daylight came at last, and then we were better able to exam- ine our surroundings. The enclosure was probably a half mile square and fenced in with an irregular line of mounds anywhere from ten to twenty feet high, Across the stream from us, bedded against the walls of a mound, were several hundred of the shaggy men. Soon after daylight they were afoot and came down to the stream to drink, wading into the water, in some cases, up to the waist, and drink- ing with an animal-like abandonment that filled me with disgust. It couldn’t be possible that those crea- tures had once been human beings like the pro- fessor and myself. No, no! It seemed incredible that mankind could ever have fallen so low. Some of the shaggy men crossed the stream to view us more closely. Most of these were ‘females, stooping forward as they walked. One of them came quite close to us, uttering plaintive cries, and _ the Professor stepped forward in an attempt to-speak — to her. At this a great hulking bull of a fellow, — with fiery red hair that glinted in the sun, and who would have stood well over six feet if he had straightened up, rushed at the Professor with a roar. The latter retreated hastily; whereupon the leader of the herd—for you could have called the gather- ing of shaggy men nothing else than a herd, and the red-haired giant the leader of it—turned upon the females, and with blows of his fists and sundry kicks of his splay feet, drove them back across the stream where they all, men, women and childre: roots. — ee ee ee oe : “And you call them human,” I said to the Pro- _I shook my head, — “Those creatures. are bent. almost double. Even the children are so formed, and the posture seems a- Coimicboolks Conn