Bulgariansdown, by the way, and oxygen brought them to. So naturally they gave usthe same treatment. Very effective."
The colonel looked both chastened and truculent. "How'd you know MajorPangalos for what he was? He was accepted everywhere as a man."
"His eyes were queer," said Coburn. He stood up experimentally. "Ifigured they would be, if one looked. I saw the foam suit that creaturewore up-country, when he wasn't in it. There were holes for the eyes. Itoccurred to me that his eyes weren't likely to be like ours. Notexactly. So I hunted up the real Dillon, and his eyes weren't like Iremembered. I punched him in the nose, by the way, to make sure he'dbleed and was human. He was."
Coburn continued, "You see, they obviously come from a heavy planet andmove differently. They're stronger than we are. Much like the way we'dbe on the moon with one-sixth Earth gravity. They probably are used to athicker atmosphere. If so, their eyes wouldn't be right for here. They'dneed eyeglasses."
"Major Pangalos didn't--"
"Contact eyeglasses," said Coburn sourly. "Little cups of plastic. Theyslip under the eyelids and touch the white part of the eye. Familiarenough. But that's not all."
The American colonel looked troubled. "I know contact lenses," headmitted. "But--"
"If the Invaders have a thick atmosphere at home," Coburn said, "theymay have a cloudy sky. The pupils of their eyes may need to be larger.Perhaps they're a different shape. Or their eyes may be a completelyalien color. Anyhow, they need contact lenses not only to correct theirvision, but to make their eyes look like ours. They're painted on theinside to change the natural look and color. It's very deceptive. Butyou can tell."
"That goes to Headquarters at once!" snapped the colonel.
He went out briskly. Coburn followed him out of the room to look forJanice. And Janice happened to be looking for him at exactly the samemoment. He was genuinely astonished to realize how relieved he was thatshe was all right.
He said apologetically: "I was worried! When I felt myself passing out Ifelt pretty rotten at having failed to protect you."
She looked at him with nearly the same sort of surprised satisfaction."I'm all right," she said breathlessly. "I was worried about you."
The roaring of motors outside the hospital interrupted them. More andmore vehicles arrived, until a deep purring filled the air. A Greekdoctor with a worried expression hurried somewhere. Soldiers appeared,hard-bitten, tough, professional Greek soldiers. Hallen came out of ahospital room. The Greek general appeared with one of the two colonelswho'd been at the airport. The general nodded, and his eyes seemedcordial. He waved them ahead of him into a waiting elevator. Theelevator descended. They went out of the hospital and there was anarmored car waiting. An impressive escort of motorcycle troops waitedwith it.
* * * * *
The Greek general saw Coburn's cynical expression at sight of theguards. He explained blandly that since oxygen brought sleepingBulgarians out of their slumber--and had been used on them--oxygen washandy for use by anybody who experienced a bright flash of light in hismind. The Bulgarian soldiers, incidentally, said that outside thevillage of Ardea they'd felt as if the sunlight had brightenedamazingly, but they felt no effects for two hours afterward, when theyfell asleep at Naousa. So, said the general almost unintelligibly, ifanything untoward happened on the way to the airport, everybody wouldstart breathing oxygen. A sensation of bright light would be untoward.
The armored car started off, with motorcyclists crowded about it withweapons ready. But the ride to the airport was uneventful. To othersthan Janice and Coburn it may even have been tedious. But when sheunderstood the general's explanation, she shivered a little. She leanedinsensibly closer to Coburn. He took her hand protectively in his.
They reached the airport. They roared through the gateway and directlyout upon the darkened field. Something bellowed and raced down a runwayand took to the air. Other things followed it. They gained altitude andcircled back overhead. Tiny bluish flickerings moved across the overcastsky. Exhaust flames.
Coburn realized that it was a fighter plane escort.
The huge transport plane that waited for them was dark. They climbedinto it and found their seats. When it roared down the unlighted fieldand took to the air, everything possible had been done to keep anybodyfrom bringing any weapon to bear upon it.
"All safe now!" said the voice of the American colonel in the darknessof the unlit plane, as the plane gained height. "Incidentally, Coburn,why did you want to look at Pangalos' palm? What did you expect to findthere?"
"When I started for the airport," Coburn explained, "I bent a pin aroundthe band of a ring I wear. I could let it lie flat when I shook hands.Or I could make it stand out like a spur. I set it with my thumb. I sawPangalos' eyes, so I had it stand out, and I made a tear in his plasticskin when I shook hands with him. He didn't feel it, of course." Hepaused. "Did anybody go to the address I gave Hallen?"
Hallen said, in the darkness: "Major Pangalos got there first."
The blackness outside the plane seemed to grow deeper. There wasliterally nothing to be seen but the instrument dials up at the pilots'end of the ship.
The Greek general asked a question in his difficult English.
"Where'd they come from?" repeated Coburn. "I've no idea. Off Earth,yes. A heavy planet, yes. I doubt they come from our solar system,though. Somewhere among the stars."
The Greek general said something with a sly up-twist of his voice.Whatever and whoever the Invaders were, he said, they did not likeBulgarians. If they'd knocked out the raiding party simply to test theirweapons against human subjects, at least they had chosen suitable andpleasing subjects for the test.
* * * * *
There was light. For an instant Coburn tensed. But the plane climbed andthe brightness steadied. It was the top of a cloud bank, brilliantlywhite in the moonlight. They had flown up through it, and it reached asfar ahead as they could see. A stubby fighter plane swam up out of themist and fell into position alongside. Others appeared. They tookformation about the transport and all flew steadily through themoonlight.
"I wish I knew," said the American colonel vexedly, "if those creatureswere only testing weapons, or if they were getting set to startbargaining with us!"
"Meaning?" asked Coburn.
"If they're here," said the colonel angrily, "and if they do mean tomeddle in our business, they may set up a sort of auction with usbidding against the Iron Curtain gang for their friendship. And _they'd_make any deal!"
The Greek general agreed drily. He said that free people were notpractical people. They were always ready to die rather than cease to befree. Surely the Greeks had proved themselves ready to die. But peoplelike the Bulgarians thought that to continue to live was the mostimportant thing in the world. It was, of course, the practicalview-point....
"They can have it!" growled Coburn.
Janice said hesitantly: "But the Invaders haven't killed anybody we knowof. They could have killed the Bulgarians. They didn't. The one whocalled himself Dillon stopped one man from killing them. And they couldhave killed us, earlier today at the airport. Could they want to befriends?"
"They're starting the wrong way," said Coburn.
The Greek general stirred in his seat, but he was pointedly silent.
The pilot snapped abruptly from up at the bow of the plane: "Colonel!sir! Two of the fighters are climbing as if they've spotted something.There go the rest."
Coburn leaned across Janice to stare out the window. When the fighterswere below the transport, they could be seen in silhouette against theclouds. Above, their exhaust flames pin-pointed them. Small blue flamesclimbed steeply.
The big ship went on. The roar of its motors was steady and unvarying.From a passenger seat it was not possible to look overhead. But suddenlythere were streaking sparks against the stars. Tracer bullets. Fightersswerved and plunged to intercept something....
* * * * *
&n
bsp; And a Thing came down out of the sky with a terrific velocity. Tracerbullets sprayed all around it. Some could be seen to ricochet off itssides. Flashings came from the alien craft. They were not explosionsfrom guns. They were lurid, actinic, smokeless blasts of pure light. TheThing seemed to be made of polished metal. It dodged, trying to approachthe transport. The fighters lunged to prevent it. The ghastly game ofinterception seemed to rush here and there all over the sky.
The strange object was not possibly of human design or manufacture. Ithad no wings. It left no trail of jet fumes or rocket smoke. It wasglittering and mirror-like, and it was shaped almost exactly like twoturtle-shells base to base. It was flat and oval.