"I'm beginning to understand. We designed the weapons for them to fight the war. They used our weapons without realizing -"

"We designed them and the saps used them to destroy themselves," Fashold interjected. "It was Nature's crucible, the elimination of one species and the emergence of another. We gave them the weapons and they destroyed themselves. When the war ended the surface was fused, and nothing but ash and hydroglass and radioactive clouds remained.

"We sent out scouting parties from our underground labs and found nothing but a silent, barren waste. It had been accomplished. They were gone, wiped out. And we had come to take their place."

"Not all of them could have been wiped out," Harl pointed out. "There are still a lot of them up there on the surface."

"True," Fashold admitted. "Some survived. Scattered remnants here and there. Gradually, as the surface cooled, they began to reform again, getting together and building little villages and huts. Yes, and even clearing some of the land – planting and growing things. But they're still remnants of a dying race now almost extinct, as the Neanderthal is extinct."

"So nothing exists now but males and females without homes."

"There are a few villages here and there – wherever they've managed to clear the surface. But they've descended to utter savagery, and live like animals, wearing skins and hunting with rocks and spears. They've become almost bestial remnants who offer no organized resistance when we go up to raid a few of their villages for our factories."

"Then we -" Harl broke off abruptly as a faint bell sounded. He turned in startled apprehension, snapping on the vidphone.

His father's face formed on the screen, hard and stern. "Okay, Harl," he said. "We're ready."

"So soon? But -"

"We set the time ahead. Come down to my office." The image on the screen dimmed and vanished.

Harl did not move.

"They must have got worried," Fashold said, grinning. "They were apparently afraid you'd pass the information along."

"I'm all ready," Harl said. He picked up his blast gun from the table. "How do I look?"

In his silver communications uniform Harl looked splendid and impressive. He had put on heavy military boots and gloves. In one hand he gripped his blast gun. Around his waist was his screen control-belt.

"What's that?" Fashold asked, as Harl lowered black goggles over his eyes.

"These? Oh, they're for the sun."

"Of course – the sun. I forgot."

Harl cradled his gun, balancing it expertly. "The sun would blind me. The goggles protect my eyes. I'll be safe up there, with my screen and gun, and these goggles."

"I hope so." Still grinning, Fashold thumped him on the back as he moved toward the door. "Bring back a lot of saps. Do a good job – and don't forget to include a female!"

The mother ship moved slowly from the warehouse, and out onto the lift stage, a rotund black teardrop emerging from storage. Its port locks slid back, and ramps climbed to meet the locks. Immediately supplies and equipment were on their way up, rising into the bowels of the ship.

"Almost ready," Turner said, his face twitching with nervousness as he gazed through the observation windows at the loading ramps outside. "I hope nothing goes wrong. If the Directorate should find out -"

"Quit worrying!" Ed Boynton ordered. "You picked the wrong time to let your thalamic impulses take over control."

"Sorry." Turner tightened his lips and moved away from the windows. The lift stage was ready to rise.

"Let's get started," Boynton urged. "Have you men from the department at each level?"

"Nobody but department members will be near the stage," Turner replied.

"Where is the balance of the crew?" Boynton demanded.

"At the first level. I sent them up during the day."

"Very well." Boynton gave the signal, and the stage under the ship began slowly to rise, lifting them steadily toward the level above.

Harl peered out the observation windows, watching the fifth level drop below and the fourth level, the vast commercial center of the under-surface system, come into view.

"Won't be long," Ed Boynton said, as the fourth level glided past. "So far so good."

"Where will we finally emerge?" Harl asked.

"In the latter stages of the war our various underground structures were connected by tunnels. That original network formed the basis of our present system. We'll emerge at one of the original entrances, located in the mountain range called 'The Alps'."

"The Alps," Harl murmured.

"Yes, in Europe. We have maps of the surface, showing locations of sap villages in that region. A whole cluster of villages lie to the North and North East in what used to be Denmark and Germany. We've never raided there before. The saps have managed to clear the slag away from several thousand acres in that region, and seem gradually to be reclaiming most of Europe."

"But why, Dad?" Harl asked.

Ed Boynton shrugged. "I don't know. They don't seem to have set themselves any organized objective. They show no signs at all, in fact, of emerging from their savage state. All their traditions were lost – books and records, inventions, and techniques. If you ask me -" He broke off abruptly. "Here comes the third level. We're almost there."

The huge mother ship roared slowly along, gliding above the surface of the planet. Harl peered out, awed by what he saw below.

Across the surface of the earth lay a crust of slag, an endless coating of blackened rock. The mineral deposit was unbroken except for occasional hills sharply jutting up, ash-covered, and with a few sparse bushes growing near their tops. Great sheets of sun-darkening ash drifted across the sky, but nothing living stirred. The surface of the earth was dead and barren, without sign of life.

"Is it all like that?" Harl asked.

Ed Boynton shook his head. "Not all. The saps have reclaimed some of the land." He gripped his son's arm and pointed. "See off that way? They've done quite a bit of clearing up there."

"Just how do they clear the slag?" Harl asked.

"It's hard," his father replied. "Fused, like volcanic glass – hydroglass – from the hydrogen bombs. They pick it away bit by bit, year after year. With their hands, with rocks, and with the axes made from the glass itself."

"Why don't they develop better tools?"

Ed Boynton grinned wryly. "You know the answer to that. We made most of their tools for them, their tools and weapons and inventions, for hundreds of years."

"Here we go," Turner said. "We're landing."

The ship settled down, coming to rest on the surface of the slag. For a moment the blackened rock rumbled under them. Then there was silence.

"We're down," Turner said.

Ed Boynton studied the surface map, sending it darting through the scanner. "We'll send out ten eggs as a starter. If we don't have much luck here we'll take the ship farther North. But we should do well. This area has never been raided before."

"How will the eggs cover?" Turner asked.

"The eggs will fan out in a spectrum, giving each egg a separate area. Our egg will move over toward the right. If we have any success, we'll return to the ship at once. Otherwise, we'll stay out until nightfall."

"Nightfall?" Harl asked.

Ed Boynton smiled. "Until dark. Until this side of the planet is turned away from the sun."

"Let's go," Turner said impatiently.

The port locks opened. The first eggs scooted out onto the slag, their treads digging into the slippery surface. One by one they emerged from the black hull of the mother ship, tiny spheres with their backs tapering into jet tubes, and their noses blunted into control turrets. They roared off across the slag and disappeared.

"Ours, next," Ed Boynton said.

Harl nodded and gripped his blast rifle tightly. He lowered his protection goggles over his eyes, and Turner and Boynton did the same. They entered their egg, Boynton seating himself behind the controls.