The undeveloped sphere made no move to launch a deadly bolt toward the men. Apparently at this stage of incubation the spheres were harmless.

"Pember!"

"Yes, sir!" the soldier appeared in the doorway, carrying his bayonetted gun.

"Keep a lookout for other spheres. Masters and I are going to dump this metal pot."

"Yes, sir!"

An electric motor ordinarily dumped the pot into molds, but this motor, like everything else electrical in the plant, now was out of commission. Masters, however, found a block and tackle and rigged it to a beam above the pot. The hook he attached to the bottom of the pot.

"Grab hold, Cap!" he said, taking the end of the rope.

Taylor loosened his tunic and seized the rope.

"Heave!" Masters chanted.

The two men strained. Slowly the pot tilted.

Pember, standing at a window, called out over his shoulder:

"They're coming back!"

Above the creak of the pulleys rose the murmuring whisper of the spheres.

"Heave!" Both men joined in the rhythmic call, putting their weight on the rope. The pot tilted more.

The half-formed sphere whistled loudly and the spheres circling over the plant answered.

"Hurry!" Pember urged.

"Heave!" chorused the men on the ropes. The pulleys creaked.

The room suddenly blazed with a brilliant orange glow as a maddened sphere floated through the hole in the roof. It hung in the air, pulsating, scanning what was taking place below.

"Heave!" cried the two men. The pot was at an angle. The hatching sphere screamed to the globe above.

The floating sphere shrieked. Flame danced over its surface.

"It--It's got--eyes!" Masters said, s.p.a.cing his words with tugs on the ropes.

"Don't look!" Taylor warned. "Heave!"

Pember faced the sphere. He patted his Garand.

"Give 'im h.e.l.l, boy!"

He swung the rifle to his shoulder and fired. The bullet whined off the sphere as if it were steel. Pember jerked his head in despair. Angrily he fired again. His tin hat slid to one side of his head at a rakish angle.

"You sp.a.w.n of h.e.l.l!" he cried.

Pember lowered his gun. The sphere pulsed ominously. Then the doughboy charged.

Beneath the brim of his helmet Pember's jaws were set. His half-closed eyes, glazed by the dazzling light from the sphere, were two slits of savage determination.

There was something glorious in that charge. It was a soldier going into battle against hopeless odds. And it was more. The army of human civilisation at that moment consisted of one buck private, pitting everything he had against something that even science could not a.n.a.lyze.

The sudden attack seemed to surprise the sphere. It bounded back, moving swiftly out of the way of the advancing one-man army.

Pember roared. There were no words in what he shouted. It was just a cry, the battle cry of humanity.

"Heave!" chorused Taylor and Masters.

They too had a battle cry. Every man was doing his best and would die doing it, if necessary.

There was a crack and a hiss. A flicker of flame flashed over the charging soldier. An odor of charred human flesh filled the room.

Then came a new sound, the hissing splash of spilled metal.

The pot was dumped.

Taylor dropped the rope and faced the sphere. He saw the charred pile of ashes beside the inhuman creature. Nearby was a fused tube of metal, all that was left of Pember's rifle.

"All right, you devil!" shouted Taylor. "Strike and be d.a.m.ned!

There's one thing you can't fix, and that's the metal pot. Your spores are dead. Your mistake was in having a metal pot for a mother!"

Taylor sensed understanding in the sphere. Those eyes that were not eyes, but windows of the mind, seemed to fade. Flame licked out again from the monster, but it did not launch toward Taylor.

Nor was Masters the target.

Instead, the flame reached toward the fading yellow hemisphere and the cooling pool of metal on the floor. There lay the hopes of the species on this planet, wrecked with a block and tackle.

_Plop_!

The hemisphere exploded like a bubble.

_Plop_!

The mourning sphere disappeared.

_Plop. Plop. Plop._

Three more spheres appeared in the opening in the roof and vanished.

Masters tugged on Taylor's sleeve.

"Come on! We've got a chance, if we can get to the tunnel!"

Taylor shook his head.