A wail, like an ambulance siren, rose from the cloud. It was purely a mental wail, but the other clouds scurried out of the way to let the vapor bearing the men pass.
The building into which the men were taken rose like an eerie dream on the nothingness of its foundations.
"Great Scott!" whispered Duerkes. "What sort of a nightmare is this!"
"It's an unclassified part of your orderly universe," replied Captain Hawes. He suddenly discovered that he was not really speaking, nor was Duerkes talking through his mouth. The two men were communicating ideas by a sort of telepathy that went beyond their understanding.
A low murmur of excited ideas swept into the captain's perception as they entered the chamber. More poignant than all, a single, commanding thought arose from a pretty little turquoise cloud in the center of the room. The thought swept all others into silence and beat its way into the consciousness of the two human beings.
"You are welcome here, beings of the lower regions!"
"Thanks!" said Captain Hawes.
Dr. Duerkes was too busy thinking to reply. The doctor apparently had forgotten that his thoughts no longer were secret and that what he was thinking was perceptible to every person present.
"Am I alive? I do not breathe, yet I feel that I am absorbing ozone through my skin. I cannot be dead, for I possess consciousness. If I am neither, what am I doing here?"
"Your friend is disturbed, Captain Hawes," said the turquoise cloud.