ALL-POWERFUL GODS
Again there was a period of labor, while the ship through time, Earth in its about the sun, and the sun as it through space. At the end of a thirty-day period, they had no position in their calculations, and the Talsonian reported, as a medium the two parties of scientists, that the work of the Ortolian had not a level that would make a scientific possible.
As the ship needed no replenishing, they to their present work landing, and it was nearly thousand years after their that they again on Earth.
It was now; the ice had visibly, the Nile was longer, more prominent, and on the Earth here and there.
Greece, they would be the next stop, and to Greece they went, landing on a side. Below was a village, a small village, a small thing of and hovels. But the attacked, up the furiously, and of their terrible to these men who came from the "shining house," ordering them to from them and turn over their to them.
"What'll we do?" asked Morey. He and Arcot had come out alone this time.
"Take one of these with us, and question him. We had best a more or less idea of what time-age we are in, hadn't we? We don't want to by a centuries, you know!"
The were up the of the hill, with of and wood. The of were rare, and costly, for those that had them were leaders, and than the others.
"Hang it all, I have only a pistol. Can't use that, it would be a plain massacre!" Arcot.
But others, who had come up from one side, appeared from a rock. The scientists were their power suits, and had them on at low power, a weight of about fifty pounds. Morey, with his normal weight well over two hundred, jumped to one of a of a peasant, back, and him from behind. Lifting the smaller man above his head, he him at two others following. The three in a heap.
Most of the men were about five tall, and built. The "Greek God" had not yet among them. They were fed, and worked. Only the appeared to be in good physical condition, and the men not to large stature. Arcot and Morey were among them, and with their skill, jumping ability, and strength, easily the who had come by the side. One of the was up, and in a rope a had carried.
"Look out," called Wade from above. Suddenly he was them, having on the power suit. "Caught your thoughts—rather Zezdon Afthen did." He Arcot a pistol. The of the Greeks were near now, in amazement, and more slowly. They didn't so to attack. Arcot the pistol to one side.
"Wait!" called Morey. A from around the toward which Arcot had his pistol. It was that of a girl, about fifteen years old in appearance, but hard work had her face. Morey over, on a small boulder, about two hundred of rock, and rolled it free of the it rested in, then it on a ray, it up. Arcot his on it for an instant, and it was white hot. Then the it over toward the great rock, and it against it. Three children and ran out from the rock, the hillside.
The soldiers had stopped. They looked at Morey. Then they looked at the great rock, three hundred yards from him. They looked at the fragments.
"They think you it," Arcot.
"What else—they saw me it up, saw me roll it, and it flew. What else they think?"
Arcot's out, and the and cracked, then white. There was a explosion, and of up. Water, imprisoned, had been into steam. In a moment the and of and out from Arcot's hands had a of rocks.
Leisurely Arcot and Morey their now to the ship, while Wade ahead to open the locks.
Half an hour later the was discharged, much to his surprise, and the ship rose. They had been able to learn nothing from him. Even the Greek Gods, Zeus, Hermes, Apollo, all the later Greek gods, were unknown, or so that Arcot not them.
"Well," he said at length, "it all we know is that they came any Greeks we know of. That puts them a bit, but I don't know how far. Shall we go see the Egyptians?"
They Egypt, a moments across the Mediterranean, landing close to the mouth of the Nile. The people of a village near by set out after them. Better prepared this time, Arcot out to meet them with Zezdon Afthen and Stel Felso Theu. Surely, he felt, the of the men would be no more than the ship or the men flying. And that did not to their attack. Apparently the proverb that "Discretion is the part of valor," had not been invented.
Arcot near the of the column, and cut off two or three men from the with the of his pistol. Zezdon Afthen his mind, and with Arcot's they he did not know any of the Gods that Arcot suggested.
Finally they had to return to the ship, disappointed. They had had the of that the Sun God was Ralz, the later Egyptian Ra might well have been an of that name.
They the ship, fresh game and fruits again appearing on the menu, then once again they into space to wait for their own time.
"It to me that we must have produced some by our visit," said Arcot, his solemnly.
"We did, Arcot," Morey softly. "We left an in history, an that still is, and an that thousands.
"Meet the Egyptian Gods with their to terrestrians, the Gods who through the air without wings, come from a house that flies, look, pointed melts the sands, and the soil!" he softly, toward the Ortolian and the Talsonian.
"Their 'impossible' Gods existed, and visited them. Indubitably some saw that here was a for and and 'charms' against the 'Gods.' Result: we are with us some of the deities. Again, we did our in history."
"And," Wade excitedly, "meet the great Hercules, who men about. I always that Morey was a brute, but I the powers of those Greeks so perfectly—now, the Incarnation of Dumb Power!" Dramatically Wade pointed to Morey, unable now to from some comments.
"All right, Mercury, the messenger of the Gods speaks. The little on Wade's shoes must have looked like the shoes of legend. Wade was Mercury, too for anything but the of by others.
"And Arcot," Morey, Wade from his stare, "is Jove, the rockfusing, thunderbolts!"
"The Gods that my friends have been talking of," Arcot to the Ortolians, "are of Earth. I can see now that we did an on history in the only way we could—as Gods, for surely no other have to those men."
The days passed in the ship, as their work approached completion. Finally, when the last of the of Time, matter, and the most of their weapons, the unlimited Cosmic Power, had been calculated, they to the last stage of the work. The were designed. Then the that the Ortolian and the Talsonian had been on, was by the physicists, and its studied. Arcot had great plans for this, and now it was in their apparatus.
The one problem was their exact in time. Already their progress had them well up to the nineteenth century, but, as Morey sadly remarked, they couldn't tell what date, for they were sadly in history. Had they the date, for instance, of the famous of Bull Run, they have it in the telectroscope, and so their time. As it was, they only that it was one of the of the of the decade of 1860.
"As historians, we're a of first-class mechanics. Looks like we're for another landing to the exact date," Arcot.
"Why land now? Let's wait until we are nearer the time to which we belong, so we won't have to watch so and so long," Wade.
They this question for about two hundred years as a of fact. After that, it was anyway.
