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attention. But the other beast, maneuvering adroitly under the diplodocus s
legs, approached closer to its head, then jumped out of the water in a jerk,
instantly bit off the head, and dived,
Evgeny closed his mouth, his teeth chattering. The picture was unusually
bright and distinct. The diplodocus stopped for a second, raised its
decapitated neck high and ... walked on, just as evenly dipping the bleeding
stump into the turbid water. Only after several paces did its front legs
buckle. The hind legs continued walking, and the enormous tail waved
unconcernedly from side to side. The neck shot upward to the sky one last
time, and then helplessly flopped down into the water. The front part of the
body began to collapse on its side, but the hind part continued to move
forward. Then the hind legs collapsed too, and instantly dozens of snarling
toothy mouths surfaced in the turbid foaming water and darted forward.
Wow! said Evgeny, wiping away sweat. What a sight!
A typical scene of predatory dinosaurs hunting a large diplodocus, the
librarian said in a businesslike tone. They ate each other all the time.
Almost all the data which we receive from that epoch is uninterrupted
predation. But how did you like the quality of the image, Comrade Slavin?
Excellent quality, said Evgeny. Except for some reason it s always
blinking.
Above the tops of the acacias, a pot-bellied six-engined craft thundered by.
The librarian ran out of the studio. The equipment! she shouted. Let s go,
Comrade Slavin that s the equipment coming in.
But please! yelped Evgeny. What about the rest? You promised to show me
another one!
You don t want to see it, believe me, the librarian said with conviction.
She hurriedly folded up the chair. I don t know what got into Paul s head.
Number seven-five-one-two is the slaughter in Constantinople. Fifteenth
century. The image quality is excellent, but it s such an unpleasant scene.
Really, Comrade Slavin, you don t want to see it. Let s go watch Paul catch
the monsters instead.
The enormous six-rotored helicopter had landed near the place where Evgeny had
left his pterocar, and the unloading of equipment was in full swing. Platforms
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on high wheels, loaded with dull yellow boxes, rolled out of the opened holds.
They took the boxes to the foot of one of the acacias, where in the space
between two mighty roots the indefatigable Rudak supervised their assembly.
His stentorian voice rang out far across the evening savanna.
The film librarian excused herself and ran off somewhere. Evgeny began walking
in uncertain circles around Rudak. Curiosity was getting the better of him.
The platforms on high wheels rolled up, unloaded, and departed, and the
servants of CODD guys and girls put the yellow boxes in place and screwed
them together, and soon the contours of an enormous angular construction had
taken form under the acacia. Rudak rushed off somewhere into its bowels,
humming, whistling, and emitting booming shouts. It was noisy and cheerful.
Strong and Joy, get busy with the intravisors!
Dum-didi-dum-didi-dum-dum! Whoever s there, hand me the contact thingie.
The feeders! Where did the damn feeders get to?
Ooh-la-la! Farther to the right! That s good.
Frost, get me out of this mess!
Someone innocently poked Evgeny in the side, and he was asked to move out of
the way. At last the enormous helicopter was unloaded, and it began to roar,
stirring up a wind and shreds of grass, and moved off from under the acacia
over to the landing pad. Rudak crawled out from under the assembly on hands
and knees, got up, brushed his hands, and said, Well, we can get started.
Stations, everyone. He jumped up on the platform where a small control panel
was set up. The platform creaked. Pray for us, Great CODD, yelled Rudak.
Stanislav hasn t come back yet! someone shouted.
That spells trouble! Rudak said, and climbed down from the platform.
Does Professor Lomba know about all this? a slim maiden with a boyish hair
cut asked timidly.
Professor Lomba will find out, Rudak said grandly. But just where is
Stanislav?
The ground in the clearing in front of the acacias bulged and cracked. Evgeny
jumped a full yard. It seemed to him that the pale, tooth-filled maw of a
dinosaur was poking up from the grass.
At last! said Rudak. I had already started worrying his oxygen ran out a
minute ago. Or two minutes, actually.
A ringed metallic body half a yard thick drew itself out of the ground slowly
and clumsily, like a giant earthworm. It kept crawling and crawling, and it
was still unclear how many rings might yet be hidden underground, when its
front part started turning rapidly, screwed itself off, and fell into the
grass. A damp, scarlet face with a wide-gaping mouth stuck out of the black
aperture.
Aha! Rudak roared. Took you long enough, Stanislav!
The face hung over the edge, spat, and declared in a strong voice, It s got a
whole damn arsenal down there. Entire armadas of crawling disks. Get me out of
this thing.
The ringed worm kept crawling and crawling out of the ground, and rays of the
red setting sun played on its metal sides.
Let s get going, Rudak declared, and again climbed onto the platform. He
smoothed his beard out on the left and on the right, made faces at the girls
who had crowded below, and with a pianist s gesture lay his hands on the
board. The board blazed with indicator lights.
Then everything in the clearing went quiet. Evgeny, picking up his movie
camera, noted worriedly that several people had scrambled into an acacia and
were sitting on the branches, while the girls crowded more closely toward the
platform. Just in case, Evgeny moved closer himself.
Strong and Joy, get ready! Rudak thundered.
Ready! two voices shouted.
I ll start warbling on the main frequency. You sing on the flanks. And let s
have a lot of noise.
Evgeny expected everyone to begin singing and drumming, but it got even
quieter. A minute went by.
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Turn up the voltage, Rudak ordered softly.
Another minute went by. The sun set, and the brighter stars appeared in the
sky. Somewhere an emu cried sleepily. A girl standing next to Evgeny sighed
heavily. Suddenly there was movement up above, on the acacia branch, and
someone s voice, trembling with excitement, shouted, There they are! There,
in the clearing! You re looking in the wrong direction!
Evgeny did not understand where he ought to look, nor did he know who they
might be, or what one might expect of them. He picked up the movie camera and
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