A moment later, a dozen or more short, hairy-faced creatures closely resembling the first stranger came tumbling through a passageway behind him and stood rooted with astonishment at the sight of Dynamon and Keltry. Their bodies were completely covered, the torsoes, with loose, gray tunics, and the legs with ugly, baggy tubes. They advanced cautiously on the two people from Earth.
"Take off your helmet and mask," Dynamon directed Keltry, "the air is perfectly good. We'll try and find out the mystery of how these humans ever got here."
He turned and addressed the first stranger, again enunciating slowly and carefully. Immediately the whole crowd burst into excited jabbering. Here and there Dynamon thought he recognized a word. Finally, one man taller than the rest stepped forward.
"Yoo cum thus," he declared.
"Certainly," Dynamon nodded with a smile, and reached out a hand to Keltry. The crowd, with wondering eyes, opened up a line and the two young people from Earth followed their self-appointed guide through it. A short narrow passageway led off at a sharp angle through the rocky wall of the pit, and presently Dynamon and Keltry found themselves on what appeared to be a hill top. Both of them gave little gasps as a vast and magnificent panorama spread out before their astonished eyes. It was as if they had stepped into a new world.
A gently undulating plain stretched away in three directions as far as their eyes could see. It was predominantly gray in color, but here and there, were scattered long, narrow strips of green. These green strips all had shimmering, silvery borders, and Dynamon couldn't help recalling to mind some arid spots back on the Earth that were criss-crossed with irrigation ditches. There were no trees on this vast plain, but strewn around in a haphazard way, were a quantity of great boulders. And these rocks, like the rocks at the base of the pit, glowed luminously. However, the landscape was clearly illuminated by some other source than those scattered rocks. Dynamon lifted his eyes upward and saw that above them, and stretching as far as the eye could reach, there was a softly luminous ceiling. There was no way of telling how high up this ceiling was. It might be twenty feet or twenty miles. The effect was like that of certain days on the Earth, when wide-spread clouds blanket the sky and diffuse the sun's rays.
The plain was by no means deserted. Here and there along the green strips four-legged creatures moved slowly, creatures that, on Earth Dynamon would have said were cows. Nearer at hand, a flock of small white creatures milled around aimlessly, and Dynamon could have sworn he heard the cackle of hens. Dynamon glanced over his shoulder and saw that the little hairy-faced men were filing out of the passageway to the pit. The guide tugged at his sleeve.
"This oo-ay," he said and pointed to his right.
Still holding Keltry's hand, Dynamon turned and followed the man, and the others fell in behind them. Their way eventually led toward a tall set of cliffs at the base of which a score or so of cave-like openings could be seen.
"These are humans, aren't they, Dynamon?" Keltry whispered.