As on a Darkling Plain
- 288 stron
- 11 godzin czytania
Earthlings are sent to Saturn's largest moon to investigate machines that were left behind centuries ago by an alien race.



Earthlings are sent to Saturn's largest moon to investigate machines that were left behind centuries ago by an alien race.
Their Civilization Was Founded On The Stargates But Now No Man Knew How To Operate Them!
Surrounded by armed, watchful soldiers, Shan and Luvici followed the priests down the low-ceilinged corridor. The smell of damp was everywhere. As they turned the corner, the two men had their first glimpse of the room where they would be offered as human sacrifices in some ancient, savage ritual. "Look!" Shan cried. "The shrine -- it's a gate!" The Stargate itself was unlike any construction he had ever seen; it was framed by twisting pillars of translucence. What was a Stargate doing here in this primitive place? How could these barbarians have one of the gates...the very gates which enabled Shan's civilization to move instantly from any one of their 3000 worlds to any other? How could a Stargate possibly be in this dungeon which reeked of human blood and superstition? Shan followed the steps down, down, down...his eyes riveted on the gate. Would the gate still function? That was his only hope...
For a million years the bubble had been growing, like a vast abscess, below the root of the mountains. Now the abscess was about to burst. Captain Harris had left the controls on autopilot and was talking to the front row of passengers as the first tremor shook the boat. For a fraction of a second he wondered if a fan blade had hit some submerged obstacle; then, quite literally, the bottom fell out of his world.It fell slowly, as all things must upon the Moon. The sea was alive and moving . . . Every stage of that nightmare transformation was pitilessly illuminated by the earth light, until the crater was so deep that its firewall was completely lost in shadow, and it seemed as if Selene were racing into a curving crescent of utter blackness – an arc of annihilation.In darkness and in silence, they were sinking into the Moon. . . .