The nape of his neck prickled. Here was something he could not understand, and he did not like it. Like an animal scenting danger he shrank into himself, not crouching, but withdrawing, so that a smaller man seemed to stand there, ready and waiting for the next move. Only his eyes were not motionless. They raked the room for the unseen speaker—for some weapon to use when the time came for weapons.
His glance came back to the dark screen above the machine. And the voice said again, in the tongue of ancient Klanvahr:
“I am not used to waiting, Sanfel! If you hear me, speak. And speak quickly, for the time of peril comes close now. My Enemy is strong—”
Dantan said, “Can you hear me?” His eyes did not move from the screen.
Out of that blackness the girl’s voice came, after a pause. It was imperious, and a little wary.
“You are not Sanfel. Where is he? Who are you, Martian?”
Dantan let himself relax a little. There would be a parley, at any rate. But after that—
Words in the familiar, remembered old language came hesitantly to his lips.
“I am no Martian. I am of Earth blood, and I do not know this Sanfel.”
“Then how did you get into Sanfel’s place?” The voice was haughty now. “What are you doing there? Sanfel built his laboratory in a secret place.”
“It was hidden well enough,” Dantan told her grimly. “Maybe for a thousand years, or even ten thousand, for all I know. The door has been buried under a stream—”
“There is no water there. Sanfel’s home is on a mountain, and his laboratory is built underground.” The voice rang like a bell. “I think you lie. I think you are an enemy—When I heard the signal summoning me, I came swiftly, wondering why Sanfel had delayed so long. I must find him, stranger. I must! If you are no enemy, bring me Sanfel!” This time there was something almost like panic in the voice.
“If I could, I would,” Dantan said. “But there’s no one here except me.” He hesitated, wondering if the woman behind the voice could be—mad? Speaking from some mysterious place beyond the screen, in a language dead a thousand years, calling upon a man who must be long-dead too, if one could judge by the length of time this hidden room had lain buried.
He said after a moment, “This place has been buried for a long time. And—no one has spoken the tongue of Klanvahr for many centuries. If that was your Sanfel’s language—” But he could not go on with that thought. If Sanfel had spoken Klanvahr then he must have died long ago. And the speaker beyond the screen—she who had known Sanfel, yet spoke in a young, sweet, light voice that Dantan was beginning to think sounded familiar. … He wondered if he could be mad too.
There was silence from the screen. After many seconds the voice spoke again, sadly and with an undernote of terror.
“I had not realized,” it said, “that even time might be so different between Sanfel’s world and mine. The space-time continua—yes, a day in my world might well be an age in yours. Time is elastic. In Zha I had thought a few dozen—” she used a term Dantan did not understand, “—had passed. But on Mars—centuries?”
“Tens of centuries,” agreed Dantan, staring hard at the screen. “If Sanfel lived in old Klanvahr his people are scarcely a memory now. And Mars is dying. You—you’re speaking from another world?”
“From another universe, yes. A very different universe from yours. It was only through Sanfel that I had made contact, until now—What is your name?”
“Dantan. Samuel Dantan.”
“Not a Martian name. You are from—Earth, you say? What is that?”
“Another planet. Nearer the sun than Mars.”
“We have no planets and no suns in Zha. This is a different universe indeed. So different I find it hard to imagine what your world must be like.” The voice died.
And it was a voice he knew. Dantan was nearly sure of that now, and the certainty frightened him. When a man in the Martian desert begins to see or hear impossibilities, he has reason to be frightened. As the silence prolonged itself he began almost to hope that the voice—the implausibly familiar voice—had been only imagination. Hesitantly he said, “Are you still there?” and was a little relieved, after all, to hear her say,
“Yes, I am here. I was thinking. … I need help. I need it desperately. I wonder—has Sanfel’s laboratory changed? Does the machine still stand? But it must, or I could not speak to you now. If the other things work, there may be chance. … Listen.” Her voice grew urgent. “I may have a use for you. Do you see a lever, scarlet, marked with the Klanvahr symbol for ‘sight’?”
“I see it,” Dantan said.
“Push it forward. There is no harm in that, if you are careful. We can see each other—that is all. But do not touch the lever with the ‘door’ symbol on it. Be certain of that. … Wait!” Sudden urgency was in the voice.
“Yes?” Dantan had not moved.
“I am forgetting. There is danger if you are not protected from—from certain vibration that you might see here. This is a different universe, and your Martian physical laws do not hold good between our worlds. Vibration … light … other things might harm you. There should be armor in Sanfel’s laboratory. Find it.”
Dantan glanced around. There was a cabinet in one corner. He went over to it slowly, his eyes wary. He had no intention of relaxing vigilance here simply because that voice sounded familiar. …
Inside the cabinet hung a suit of something like space armor, more flexible and skin tight than any he had ever seen, and with a transparent helmet through which vision seemed oddly distorted. He
