was not his game; it could not be. Yet he summoned voice enough to
add in turn:

"Six--"

When it came the Foanna answer was a warning:

"To aid us you must cast aside your shields, allow your identities to
become one with our forces. Having done so, it may be that you shall
never be as you are now but changed."

"Changed...."

The word echoed, perhaps not in the place where they stood, but in
Ross's head. This was a risk such as he had never taken before. His
chances in the past had been matters of action where his own strength
and wits were matched against the problem. Here, he would open a door to
forces he and his kind should not meet--expose himself to danger such as
did not exist on the plane where weapons and strength of arm could
decide victory or defeat.

And this was not really his fight at all. What did it matter to Terrans
ten thousand years or so in the future what happened to Hawaikans in
this past? He was a fool; they were all fools to become embroiled in
this. The Baldies and their stellar empire--if that ever had existed as
the Terrans surmised--was long gone before his breed entered space.

"If you accomplish this with our aid," said Ashe, "will you be able to
defeat the invaders?"

Again a lengthening moment of silence before the Foanna replied:

"We can not tell. We only know that there is a force laid up here, set
behind certain gates in the far past, upon which we may call for some
supreme effort. But this much we also know: The Evil of the Shadow
reaches out from here now, and where that darkness falls men will no
longer be men but things in the guise of men who obey and follow as
mindless creatures. As yet this shadow of the Shadow is a small one. But
it will spread, for that is the nature of those who have spawned it.
They have chanced upon and corrupted a thing we know. Such power feeds
upon the will to power. Having turned it to their bidding, they will not
be able to resist using it, for it is so easy to do and the results
exult the nature of those who employ it.

"You have said that you and those like you who travel the time trails
fear to change the past. Here the first steps have been taken to alter
the future, but unless we complete the defense it will be ill for all of
us."

"And this is your only weapon?" Ashe asked once more.

"The only one strong enough to stand against that which is now
unleashed."

In the pavement the fiery lines were bright and glowing. Even when R