ly. Down a short slope, a
glowing room was disclosed, with two or three workmen moving within
it.

The main control room! We could not doubt it. Molo, in his enthusiasm,
had once described it clearly to the girls, its great skeins of little
thread-like wires spread upon the walls, the myriad tiny opalescent
discs contacted with the small gray rock surface under the tangled
masses of thread-wire, the levers and dials banked on the circular
tables: they were unmistakable features.

"There it is, Snap," I whispered in his ear. "In that central rack.
Those insulated rods, see them? Anita told us they used them to adjust
the discs. Watch out for the current."

"But it's off now, Gregg!"

"There's still danger in it, and you'd short-circuit somewhere. Keep
your hands off. Use the rods."

"The operators...."

He got no further. A figure lunged into us from behind, a giant
worker! His largest pincer bit into my shoulder; his hollow shout
resounded. The operators of the control room came with leaps at us.

There was a moment of wild confusion. Light, seemingly almost
weightless bodies flapped against us. Arms gripped us, but they were
flimsy. The huge body-shells cracked gruesomely as we struck with our
solid fists.

A moment of turmoil passed. No bolts were fired. The shouts were brief
down here in the narrow confines of the tunnel. Panting, bruised more
by our collisions against the rocks than by our adversaries, we ceased
our wild lunges. We did not look at the scattered, broken and crushed
bodies drifting now to the floor.

"Now, Snap! Hurry! Others may come."

We lunged into the glowing control room, seized the long insulated
poles from the central rack. They had a grateful feel of weight. I
picked one up, jumped with a twenty foot leap to the wall.

The wires came down like cobwebs under my sweeping blows; the little
discs knocked off as though they were fungus growth. Sparks flew
around us. Shafts of electronic radiance spat out. The wall was
hissing over all its length as I ranged up and down it. The tangled
broken threads of wire writhed like living things on the floor; then
crumpled, fused and turned black.

I swept that wall-segment with frantic haste, lunged around and
started another way. Across the room I saw Snap doing the same. A
turmoil of electrical sound was reverberating around us, deafening,
and the glare was blinding. A belt-shaft shot from the wreckage under
my rod. It seared my left arm.