Monster territory. It lay behind him, bathed in its own peculiar light. Now. Why not? Now, when he was in a place of comparative safety. He could take a chance. He wanted to take a chance.
He turned, gingerly, fearfully. He raised his eyes. He looked.
The cry that tore from his lips was completely involuntary and frightened him almost as much as what he saw. He shut his eyes and threw himself down and sideways. He lay where he had fallen for a long while, almost paralyzed.
It couldn't be. He hadn't seen it. Nothing was that high, nothing ran on and on for such incredible distances!
After a time, he opened his eyes again, keeping them carefully focused on the dark near him. The gloom in this covered place had diminished somewhat as his eyes had grown more accustomed to it. Yellowish light from his glow lamp was providing illumination now: he could make out the walls, about as far apart from each other as those in a burrow, but—unlike a burrow's walls—oddly straight and at right angles to the floor and ceiling. Far off there was an immense patch of darkness. The burrow will open out into a great big space, a real big and real dark space.
What was this place, he wondered? What was it to the Monsters?