Harper looked up in surprise. "Does it know about Napoleon?"
"Of course not, you fool!" screamed Pillbot. "It has the Napoleonic complex, identifies itself with some great conqueror of its own realm. And now it's on the rampage. We have to get out of here—" He clutched at Harper as another upheaval of the surface threw them down.
Rising, Harper put away his pad. His calculations were complete. He could now show engineers how to build high buildings, taking advantage of space stress instead of trying to fight the stress.
For the first time, the danger of their position seemed to penetrate to his consciousness. He looked about—and his eyes rested on a strange familiar projection rising from the invisible floor a few feet away. It was the section of his clay statue that had vanished—vanished because its peculiar shape had somehow caused it to be warped into the fourth dimension!
Why hadn't he been able to move it—Professor Gault moved about freely.
He and Pillbot went over to it, tried to move it. A slight filmy webwork around the projection caught Harper's eye. Now he knew—the Being had somehow affixed it to the spot as a landmark, so It could locate the laboratory. It must have been this projection that had first attracted the Being's attention to the three dimensional world, since, ordinarily, It would never have noticed the presence of three dimensional life, any more than humans would notice the presence of two dimensional life if such existed!
Harper looked up at a bleat from Pillbot. Above them was a sudden furious play of lights and shades. Vast masses seemed shifting in crazy juxtapositions, now descending rapidly toward them.
"Quick," Harper, now fully aroused, gasped to Pillbot. "Climb down this projection!"
"Climb down it—?"