"A teletransporter. I get more of the picture now," said Henry. "Underground stations like this may be scattered all over the planet. Transportation between them is accomplished instantaneously by this means. Perhaps, with the proper setting of controls, one could walk around the world, through various stations, in a few minutes!"
"Whoa!" said Uncle Andy. "When did you ever see a teletransporter?"
"I didn't, but their possibility may be extrapolated from a set of known facts in our own era of time. One premise is that energy may be propagated at the speed of light through the ether, in various pulsation patterns that can be used for the reintegration of sound or light in receivers. Another premise is that matter is energy. Therefore, it lies within the realm of possibility to reduce matter to its basic energy components, broadcast the energy in a representative pattern sequence—perhaps on multiple wavebands—and reintegrate the same form of matter at the other end. On the other hand, new principles may have been discovered after our own time, such as the manipulation or use of hyper-space or ether warp of some kind. But I'm sure this is a bonafide teletransporter. We have only to step through it, the way it is adjusted now, and be where our friends are. Since Scarface is armed, I think we need not fear being surprised by the alien."
Scarface raised his brows and looked at the others. "It's simple when you know how," he said, wryly. "But there's an easier way of analyzing this contraption. I'll walk through it. If I don't come back, you can decide for yourselves if you want to follow or take up camping in that jungle outside for the rest of your lives. Here goes!"
"Wait!" cried Uncle Andy.
But Scarface walked into the mirror and disappeared.
They waited. Five minutes. Ten minutes. And Scarface did not return. Finally, Pee Bee offered a solution.
"Ah sees it like this," he said, breaking an oppressive silence. "Ah feels safe when ah's on de right side of dat gun. Now if we goes through dat mirror an' finds Scahface, we's better off than we is here. If we goes into dat mirror an' gets snuffed into nothin'—then dat means Scahface an' all de rest is probably big, flattened out blobs of nothin', too. So we might as well join 'em instead of hangin' around here. Ah's sick of it, an' ah's ready!" Before they could stop him, he hurled himself into the mirror and disappeared.
The remaining castaways looked at each other in silence for almost thirty seconds.
Then Uncle Andy said, "I think we'd better try it."