CUBE ROOT OF CONQUEST

By Rog Phillips

[Transcriber Note: This etext was produced from Amazing Stories October 1948. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

Jan ran tirelessly, his long clean limbs carrying him at express train speed across the uneven terrain. The small deer was beginning to show evidences of tiring. Its foam-flecked mouth was open, the swollen tongue protruding over the teeth. The ten or more miles of the chase had proven Jan's superior strength.

The deer rounded a dense patch of blackberry bushes and bounded out of sight over the crest of the hill. To Jan's keen eye it seemed that the deer stumbled at the instant of vanishing from view. Eagerly he put on a burst of speed to catch up and make the kill.

The scene that burst into view brought amazement into his clear blue eyes. The deer had stumbled, but caught itself, and was bounding down the gentle slope. Jan thrust curiosity away and concentrated on regaining the ground lost. His naked feet touched the turf with pile driver force every ten feet. The muscles under the tanned skin of his legs worked with smooth effort.

The deer was headed directly toward a glistening square spot just ahead. It was in mid stride when it reached it, its front legs doubled, ready to straighten and touch the ground at the right instant, its hind legs stretched out behind.

In that position it sailed over the glistening square that was set flush into the ground, and—vanished.

It vanished about like it might vanish around a tree. Its head and antlers went first, followed by the rest of it. One hoof seemed to hesitate, hanging in the air by itself. Then it was gone.

Jan turned desperately to avoid the spot and brought himself to a halt a few feet beyond. The hair on the back of his neck felt prickly with fear of the unknown. He returned cautiously to inspect the mysterious, glistening square slab.

It was no more than four feet across each way. There was no way of telling what its surface was like. About where its surface might be was a soft carpet of glistening, cool force that seemed neither solid nor fluid. It was something like the surface of a glowing ember in a dying fire, smoothed out flat and spread with uniformity over an area of sixteen square feet.

Jan's eyes pulled away from this fascinating thing and turned to survey what had first caused him to break his pace in surprise. A short distance away a skeleton of twisted and sheered off steel girders hinted at what had once been a bridge across a deep gash in the rolling terrain. On the other side was what had once been a huge city of sky-scrapers, though Jan had never heard of such a thing and did not know that that was what it had been.

Nothing was visible in the mysterious plate, yet a man had gone into it!

With a frown of uneasiness he dismissed the ruins of the city and the bridge and turned to the mysteriously glowing square once more. The deer had vanished over it. Therefore it must have something to do with the vanishing of the deer. Since he had chased the deer so far, it would be foolish to turn away without investigating. The deer might still be there somewhere.

Jan's face lit up with an idea. He looked around until he spied a rock about as big as a fist. He came back with it and stood thoughtfully near the edge of the mysterious square. Then he tossed it with just enough force to carry it across. When it reached a point above the edge of the square it vanished. Jan waited, but it didn't land on the other side. It had simply ceased to exist!

Jan looked thoughtful for a moment. He turned and went back to the patch of blackberry bushes. Taking his long slim blade from its deerskin scabbard he cut a long, tough stick, trimming the younger shoots away. With this he returned to the calmly glistening, mysterious slab.

Ready to drop his hold on the stick at the first sign of the unusual, he thrust it part way into the area where things vanished. The end of the stick disappeared. There was no sign of any force creeping along the stick to his hand. He waited, reassuring himself. Then he stuck the stick in a little farther and it vanished a little farther along toward his hand.

He held it that way, his nostrils flaring with tenseness. Then slowly he drew the stick back. The vanished part of it returned to sight. It came out and was not changed in the least.

He sniffed at it. It smelled no different than it should. He felt of it carefully. It felt normal.

Reassured, he thrust it into the area of vanishment again. He pulled it out again. It delighted him to watch it vanish and reappear. He laughed gleefully. The deer was forgotten in the excitement of this strange game in the shadow of the crumbling bridge.

Suddenly the vanished end of the stick jerked in his hand. In spontaneous alarm he pulled toward him. The stick came unwillingly. Something held it.

Terrified, Jan dug his heels in the turf and pulled. Slowly inch by inch, the stick reappeared. But with it appeared a fat, pale hand, followed by a sleeved arm.

Jan slapped at the hand and pulled harder. The hand hung on grimly. Another hand appeared, gripping the slowly emerging arm. It fingered its way up the sleeve until it too gripped the stick.

Jan let go and sprang back several feet. He hesitated, ready to flee.

When he let go of the stick the hands dropped to the ground. The fat fingers dug into the sod and hung on. A bloated face came into sight and drew back into nothing once more.

The face appeared again and stayed, flushed with exertion. Little by little the face was followed by a neck, shoulders, and a thick torso. The last to appear was two short legs.

The figure stood up shakily. It was covered by a brown uniform. Although Jan did not know it, this was the uniform of a field marshal.

The pig like eyes in the fat face blinked at him stupidly, then turned to survey the ruined city.

Jan recognized the newcomer for a man, though he had never seen one with such a shape. Vaguely he wondered how such a man could catch wild animals,—and if he couldn't, how he could eat enough to have grown up.

The man was even more of an enigma to Jan than the glistening square. And he might be dangerous.