Little was beginning to get ideas about his captors—he had, indeed, begun to get them some time since, as his cryptic remark to Albee had indicated. Every action they performed gave evidence of most peculiar motivation and thought processes, evidence which was slowly sifting its way through Little's mind. He continued to let it sift as the men, still ringed by pentapods, began to march toward the fort.
The great outer gate opened into a chamber large enough to hold the entire group with room to spare. It was about fifteen feet high, metal walled, and possessed but two doors—the outer valve and another, smaller, in the opposite wall, giving access to the interior of the structure. As though the room were an air lock, the inner portal was not opened until the outer had shut. Then the group passed into a brilliantly lit corridor, stretching on ahead of them far into the bowels of the fort. Hallways branched from this at intervals of a few yards, some brightly lighted like the main passage, others in nearly total darkness. They had gone only a short distance when the men were stopped by their escort in front of a small doorway in the left-hand wall.
One of the guards activated a small control in the wall beside the door, causing the latter to slide open. The small chamber disclosed was evidently an elevator car into which five of the pentapods beckoned an equal number of the men. The door slid to behind them, and several minutes of uneasy silence ensued. Little asked the Vegan if it knew where they were being taken.
"Our quarters are in a superstructure on the roof," gestured the creature. "They may put you there, or on the roof itself. You can live in the open under this sunlight; we need supplementary lighting, both visual and ultraviolet. They have told me nothing. I do not even know whether we will be allowed to communicate any further—though I hope so. My companions and I have long wanted to have someone besides ourselves to talk to."
"I suspect we shall be allowed as much contact as we wish—they may even quarter us in adjoining rooms," remarked Little hesitantly. The Vegan eyed him closely for a moment.
"Ah, you have found a way into their minds, Earthman?" it asked. "I congratulate you. We have never been able to understand their motivation or actions in the slightest degree. It may, of course, be that they think more after your fashion than ours—but that seems unlikely, when your minds and ours are sufficiently alike to agree even on matters of philosophy."
"I am not at all sure I have penetrated their minds," answered Little. "I am still observing, but what I see has so far strengthened the impression I obtained almost at the first. If anything constructive results from my ideas, I will tell, but otherwise I should prefer to wait until I am much more certain of my conclusions."
The return of the elevator interrupted the laborious exchange of ideas. It had been gone many minutes, but the Vegan sign language is much slower than verbal speech, and the two allies had had time for only a few sentences. They watched silently as five more men and their guards entered the car and disappeared. There was little talk in the ensuing wait; most of the beings present were too fully occupied in thinking. One or two of the men exchanged low-voiced comments, but the majority kept their ideas to themselves. The Vegan, of course, was voiceless; and the guards stood about patiently, silent as ever, rock-still except for the slow, almost unceasing, wave of the black, blunt spines. They did not seem even to breathe.
The silence continued while the elevator returned and departed twice more. Its only interruption consisted of occasional faint metallic sounds of indeterminable origin, echoing and re-echoing along the corridors of the vast pile. To Little, they were interesting for the evidence they provided of activity through the place, and therefore of the presence of a very considerable garrison. Nothing was seen to substantiate this surmise, however, although it was possible to view objects at a considerable distance along the well-lighted passage.