Out of Time's Abyss
food and recurrence to the statement that there was a way out; but by
firmness and patience the Englishman drew out piece-meal a more or less
lucid exposition of the remarkable scheme of evolution that rules in
Caspak. In it he found explanations of the hitherto inexplicable. He
discovered why he had seen no babes or children among the Caspakian
tribes with which he had come in contact; why each more northerly tribe
evinced a higher state of development than those south of them; why
each tribe included individuals ranging in physical and mental
characteristics from the highest of the next lower race to the lowest
of the next higher, and why the women of each tribe immersed themselves
each morning for an hour or more in the warm pools near which the
habitations of their people always were located; and, too, he
discovered why those pools were almost immune from the attacks of
carnivorous animals and reptiles.
He learned that all but those who were cos-ata-lu came up cor-sva-jo,
or from the beginning. The egg from which they first developed into
tadpole form was deposited, with millions of others, in one of the warm
pools and with it a poisonous serum that the carnivora instinctively
shunned. Down the warm stream from the pool floated the countless
billions of eggs and tadpoles, developing as they drifted slowly toward
the sea. Some became tadpoles in the pool, some in the sluggish stream
and some not until they reached the great inland sea. In the next
stage they became fishes or reptiles, An-Tak was not positive which,
and in this form, always developing, they swam far to the south, where,
amid the rank and teeming jungles, some of them evolved into
amphibians. Always there were those whose development stopped at the
first stage, others whose development ceased when they became reptiles,
while by far the greater proportion formed the food supply of the
ravenous creatures of the deep.
Few indeed were those that eventually developed into baboons and then
apes, which was considered by Caspakians the real beginning of
evolution. From the egg, then, the individual developed slowly into a
higher form, just as the frog's egg develops through various stages
from a fish with gills to a frog with lungs. With that thought in mind
Bradley discovered that it was not difficult to believe in the
possibility of such a scheme--there was nothing new in it.
From the ape the individual, if it survived, slowly developed into the
lowest order of man--the Alu--and then by degrees to Bo-lu, Sto-lu,
Band-lu, Kro-lu and finally Galu. And in each stage countless millions
of other eggs were deposited in the warm pools of the various races and
floated down to the great sea to go through a similar process of
evolution outside the womb as develops our own young within; but in
Caspak the scheme is much more inclusive, for it combines not only
individual development but the evolution of species and genera. If an
egg survives it goes through all the stages of development that man has
passed through during the unthinkable eons since life first moved upon
the earth's face.
The final stage--that which the Galus have almost attained and for
which all hope--is cos-ata-lu, which literally, means no-egg-man, or
one who is born directly as are the young of the outer world of
mammals. Some of the Galus produce cos-ata-lu and cos-ata-lo both; the
Wieroos only cos-ata-lu--in other words all Wieroos are born male, and
so they prey upon the Galus for their women and sometimes capture and
torture the Galu men who are cos-ata-lu in an endeavor to learn the
secret which they believe will give them unlimited power over all other
denizens of Caspak.
No Wieroos come up from the beginning--all are born of the Wieroo
fathers and Galu mothers who are cos-ata-lo, and there are very few of
the latter owing to the long and precarious stages of development.
Seven generations of the same ancestor must come up from the beginning
before a cos-ata-lu child may be born; and when one considers the
frightful dangers that surround the vital spark from the moment it
leaves the warm pool where it has been deposited to float down to the
sea amid the voracious creatures that swarm the surface and the deeps
and the almost equally unthinkable trials of its effort to survive
after it once becomes a land animal and starts northward through the
horrors of the Caspakian jungles and forests, it is plainly a wonder
that even a single babe has ever been born to a Galu woman.
Seven cycles it requires before the seventh Galu can complete the
seventh danger-infested circle since its first Galu ancestor achieved
the state of Galu. For ages before, the ancestors of this first Galu
may have developed from a Band-lu or Bo-lu egg without ever once
completing the whole circle--that is from a Galu egg, back to a fully
developed Galu.
Bradley's head was whirling before he even commenced to grasp the
complexities of Caspakian evolution; but as the truth slowly filtered
into his understanding--as gradually it became possible for him to
visualize the scheme, it appeared simpler. In fact, it seemed even
less difficult of comprehension than that with which he was familiar.
For several minutes after An-Tak ceased speaking, his voice having
trailed off weakly into silence, neither spoke again. Then the Galu
recommenced his, "Food! Food! There is a way out!" Bradley tossed him
another bit of dried meat, waiting patiently until he had eaten it,
this time more slowly.
"What do you mean by saying there is a way out?" he asked.
"He who died here just after I came, told me," replied An-Tak. "He
said there was a way out, that he had discovered it but was too weak to
use his knowledge. He was trying to tell me how to find it when he
died. Oh, Luata, if he had lived but a moment more!"
"They do not feed you here?" asked Bradley.
"No, they give me water once a day--that is all."
"But how have you lived, then?"
"The lizards and the rats," replied An-Tak. "The lizards are not so
bad; but the rats are foul to taste. However, I must eat them or they
would eat me, and they are better than nothing; but of late they do not
come so often, and I have not had a lizard for a long time. I shall
eat though," he mumbled. "I shall eat now, for you cannot remain awake
forever." He laughed, a cackling, dry laugh. "When you sleep, An-Tak
will eat."
It was horrible. Bradley shuddered. For a long time each sat in
silence. The Englishman could guess why the other made no sound--he
awaited the moment that sleep should overcome his victim. In the long
silence there was born upon Bradley's ears a faint, monotonous sound as
of running water. He listened intently. It seemed to come from far
beneath the floor.
"What is that noise?" he asked. "That sounds like water running
through a narrow channel."
"It is the river," replied An-Tak. "Why do you not go to sleep? It
passes directly beneath the Blue Place of Seven Skulls. It runs
through the temple grounds, beneath the temple and under the city.
When we die, they will cut off our heads and throw our bodies into the
river. At the mouth of the river await many large reptiles. Thus do
they feed. The Wieroos do likewise with their own dead, keeping only
the skulls and the wings. Come, let us sleep."
"Do the reptiles come up the river into the city?" asked Bradley.
"The water is too cold--they never leave the warm water of the great
pool," replied An-Tak.
"Let us search for the way out," suggested Bradley.
An-Tak shook his head. "I have searched for it all these moons," he
said. "If I could not find it, how would you?"
Bradley made no reply but commenced a diligent examination of the walls
and floor of the room, pressing over each square foot and tapping with
his knuckles. About six feet from the floor he discovered a
sleeping-perch near one end of the apartment. He asked An-Tak about
it, but the Galu said that no Weiroo had occupied the place since he
had been incarcerated there. Again and again Bradley went over the
floor and walls as high up as he could reach. Finally he swung himself
to the perch, that he might examine at least one end of the room all
the way to the ceiling.
In the center of the wall close to the top, an area about three feet
square gave forth a hollow sound when he rapped upon it. Bradley felt
over every square inch of that area with the tips of his fingers. Near
the top he found a small round hole a trifle larger in diameter than
his forefinger, which he immediately stuck into it. The panel, if such
it was, seemed about an inch thick, and beyond it his finger
encountered nothing. Bradley crooked his finger upon the opposite side
of the panel and pulled toward him, steadily but with considerable
force. Suddenly the panel flew inward, nearly precipitating the man to
the floor. It was hinged at the bottom, and when lowered the outer
edge rested upon the perch, making a little platform parallel with the
floor of the room.
Beyond the opening was an utterly dark void. The Englishman leaned
through it and reached his arm as far as possible into the blackness
but touched nothing. Then he fumbled in his haversack for a match, a
few of which remained to him. When he struck it, An-Tak gave a cry of
terror. Bradley held the light far into the opening before him and in
its flickering rays saw the top of a ladder descending into a black
abyss below. How far down it extended he could not guess; but that he
should soon know definitely he was positive.
"You have found it! You have found the way out!" screamed An-Tak.
"Oh, Luata! And now I am too weak to go. Take me with you! Take me
with you!"
"Shut up!" admonished Bradley. "You will have the whole flock of birds
around our heads in a minute, and neither of us will escape. Be quiet,
and I'll go ahead. If I find a way out, I'll come back and help you,
if you'll promise not to try to eat me up again."
"I promise," cried An-Tak. "Oh, Luata! How could you blame me? I am
half crazed of hunger and long confinement and the horror of the
lizards and the rats and the constant waiting for death."
"I know," said Bradley simply. "I'm sorry for you, old top. Keep a
stiff upper lip." And he slipped through the opening, found the ladder
with his feet, closed the panel behind him, and started downward into
the darkness.
Below him rose more and more distinctly the sound of running water.
The air felt damp and cool. He could see nothing of his surroundings
and felt nothing but the smooth, worn sides and rungs of the ladder
down which he felt his way cautiously lest a broken rung or a misstep
should hurl him downward.
As he descended thus slowly, the ladder seemed interminable and the pit
bottomless, yet he realized when at last he reached the bottom that he
could not have descended more than fifty feet. The bottom of the
ladder rested on a narrow ledge paved with what felt like large round
stones, but what he knew from experience to be human skulls. He could
not but marvel as to where so many countless thousands of the things
had come from, until he paused to consider that the infancy of Caspak
dated doubtlessly back into remote ages, far beyond what the outer
world considered the beginning of earthly time. For all these eons the
Wieroos might have been collecting human skulls from their enemies and
their own dead--enough to have built an entire city of them.
Feeling his way along the narrow ledge, Bradley came presently to a
blank wall that stretched out over the water swirling beneath him, as
far as he could reach. Stooping, he groped about with one hand,
reaching down toward the surface of the water, and discovered that the
bottom of the wall arched above the stream. How much space there was