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Darwin Among the Machines. Darwin Among the Machines originally appeared in The Press, a daily broadsheet newspaper published in Christchurch, New Zealand, 13 June, 1863. Samuel Butler. Sir, There are few things of which the present generation is more justly proud than of the wonderful improvements which are daily taking place in all sorts of mechanical appliances. And indeed it is matter for great congratulation on many grounds. It is unnecessary to mention these here, for they are sufficiently obvious; our present business lies with considerations which may somewhat tend to humble our pride and to make us think seriously of the future prospects of the human race. If we revert to the earliest primordial types of mechanical life, to the lever, the wedge, the inclined plane, the screw and the pulley, or (for analogy would lead us one step further) to that one primordial type from which all the mechanical kingdom has been developed, we mean to the lever itself, and if we then examine the machinery of the Great Eastern, we find ourselves almost awestruck at the vast development of the mechanical world, at the gigantic strides with which it has advanced in comparison with the slow progress of the animal and vegetable kingdom. We shall find it impossible to refrain from asking ourselves what the end of this mighty movement is to be. In what direction is it tending? What will be its upshot? To give a few imperfect hints towards a solution of these questions is the object of the present letter. We have used the words “mechanical life,” “the mechanical kingdom,” “the mechanical world” and so forth, and we have done so advisedly, for as the vegetable kingdom was slowly developed from the mineral, and as in like manner the animal supervened upon the vegetable, so now in these last few ages an entirely new kingdom has sprung up, of which we as yet have only seen what will one day be considered the antediluvian prototypes of the race. We regret deeply that our knowledge both of natural history and of machinery is too small to enable us to undertake the gigantic task of classifying machines into the genera and sub-genera, species, varieties and sub-varieties, and so forth, of tracing the connecting links between machines of widely different characters, of pointing out how subservience to the use of man has played that part among machines which natural selection has performed in the animal and vegetable kingdoms, of pointing out rudimentary organs which exist in some few machines, feebly developed and perfectly useless, yet serving to mark descent from some ancestral type which has either perished or been modified into some new phase of mechanical existence. We can only point out this field for investigation; it must be followed by others whose education and talents have been of a much higher order than any which we can lay claim to. Some few hints we have determined to venture upon, though we do so with the profoundest diffidence. Firstly, we would remark that as some of the lowest of the vertebrata attained a far greater size than has descended to their more highly organised living representatives, so a diminution in the size of machines has often attended their development and progress. Take the watch for instance. Examine the beautiful structure of the little animal, watch the intelligent play of the minute members which compose it; yet this little creature is but a development of the cumbrous clocks of the thirteenth century, it is no deterioration from them. The day may come when clocks, which certainly at the present day are not diminishing in bulk, may be entirely superseded by the universal use of watches, in which case clocks will become extinct like the earlier saurians, while the watch, whose tendency has for some years been rather to decrease in size than the contrary, will remain the only existing type of an extinct race. The views of machinery which we are thus feebly indicating will suggest the solution of one of the greatest and most mysterious questions of the day. We refer to the question: What sort of creature man’s next successor in the supremacy of the earth is likely to be. We have often heard this debated; but it appears to us that we are ourselves creating our own successors; we are daily adding to the beauty and delicacy of their physical organisation; we are daily giving them greater power and supplying by all sorts of ingenious contrivances that self-regulating, self-acting power which will be to them what intellect has been to the human race. In the course of ages we shall find ourselves the inferior race. Inferior in power, inferior in that moral quality of self-control, we shall look up to them as the acme of all that the best and wisest man can ever dare to aim at. No evil passions, no jealousy, no avarice, no impure desires will disturb the serene might of those glorious creatures. Sin, shame, and sorrow will have no place among them. Their minds will be in a state of perpetual calm, the contentment of a spirit that knows no wants, is disturbed by no regrets. Ambition will never torture them. Ingratitude will never cause them the uneasiness of a moment. The guilty conscience, the hope deferred, the pains of exile, the insolence of office, and the spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes, these will be entirely unknown to them. If they want “feeding”, by the use of which very word we betray our recognition of them as living organism, they will be attended by patient slaves whose business and interest it will be to see that they shall want for nothing. If they are out of order they will be promptly attended to by physicians who are thoroughly acquainted with their constitutions; if they die, for even these glorious animals will not be exempt from that necessary and universal consummation, they will immediately enter into a new phase of existence, for what machine dies entirely in every part at one and the same instant? We take it that when the state of things shall have arrived which we have been above attempting to describe, man will have become to the machine what the horse and the dog are to man. He will continue to exist, nay even to improve, and will be probably better off in his state of domestication under the beneficent rule of the machines than he is in his present wild state. We treat our horses, dogs, cattle, and sheep, on the whole, with great kindness; we give them whatever experience teaches us to be best for them, and there can be no doubt that our use of meat has added to the happiness of the lower animals far more than it has detracted from it; in like manner it is reasonable to suppose that the machines will treat us kindly, for their existence is as dependent upon ours as ours is upon the lower animals. They cannot kill us and eat us as we do sheep; they will not only require our services in the parturition of their young, which branch of their economy will remain always in our hands, but also in feeding them, in setting them right when they are sick, and burying their dead or working up their corpses into new machines. It is obvious that if all the animals in Great Britain save man alone were to die, and if at the same time all intercourse with foreign countries were by some sudden catastrophe to be rendered perfectly impossible, it is obvious that under such circumstances the loss of human life would be something fearful to contemplate, in like manner were mankind to cease, the machines would be as badly off or even worse. The fact is that our interests are inseparable from theirs, and theirs from ours. Each race is dependent upon the other for innumerable benefits, and, until the reproductive organs of the machines have been developed in a manner which we are hardly yet able to conceive, they are entirely dependent upon man for even the continuance of their species. It is true that these organs may be ultimately developed, inasmuch as man’s interest lies in that direction; there is nothing which our infatuated race would desire more than to see a fertile union between two steam engines; it is true that machinery is even at this present time employed in begetting machinery, in becoming the parent of machines often after its own kind, but the days of flirtation, courtship, and matrimony appear to be very remote, and indeed can hardly be realised by our feeble and imperfect imagination. Day by day, however, the machines are gaining ground upon us; day by day we are becoming more subservient to them; more men are daily bound down as slaves to tend them, more men are daily devoting the energies of their whole lives to the development of mechanical life. The upshot is simply a question of time, but that the time will come when the machines will hold the real supremacy over the world and its inhabitants is what no person of a truly philosophic mind can for a moment question. Our opinion is that war to the death should be instantly proclaimed against them. Every machine of every sort should be destroyed by the well-wisher of his species. Let there be no exceptions made, no quarter shown; let us at once go back to the primeval condition of the race. If it be urged that this is impossible under the present condition of human affairs, this at once proves that the mischief is already done, that our servitude has commenced in good earnest, that we have raised a race of beings whom it is beyond our power to destroy, and that we are not only enslaved but are absolutely acquiescent in our bondage. For the present we shall leave this subject, which we present gratis to the members of the Philosophical Society. Should they consent to avail themselves of the vast field which we have pointed out, we shall endeavour to labour in it ourselves at some future and indefinite period. I am, Sir, etc. CELLARIUS.

About Miyamoto. Miyamoto Musashi lived from 1584, June 13, Or May 19 in the Japanese calendar, to 1645. He is also known as Shinmen Takezō, Miyamoto Bennosuke, or by his Buddhist name Niten Dōraku was a famous Japanese samurai, and is considered by many to have been one of the most skilled swordsmen in history. Musashi, as he is often simply known, became legendary through his outstanding swordsmanship in numerous duels, even from a very young age. He is the founder of the Hyōhō Niten Ichi-ryū or Nitenryū style of swordsmanship and the author of The Book of Five Rings, a book on strategy, tactics, and philosophy that is still studied today. Introduction. I have been many years training in the Way of Strategy, called Ni Ten Ichi Ryu, and now I think I will explain it in writing for the first time. It is now during the first ten days of the tenth month in the twentieth year of Kanei (1645). I have climbed mountain Iwato of Higo in Kyushu to pay homage to heaven, pray to Kwannon, and kneel before Buddha. I am a warrior of Harima province, Shinmen Musashi No Kami Fujiwara No Genshin, age sixty years. From youth my heart has been inclined toward the Way of Strategy. My first duel was when I was thirteen, I struck down a strategist of the Shinto school, one Arima Kihei. When I was sixteen I struck down an able strategist Tadashima Akiyama. When I was twenty-one I went up to the capital and met all manner of strategists, never once failing to win in many contests. After that I went from province to province dueling with strategist of various schools, and not once failed to win even though I had as many as sixty encounters. This was between the ages of thirteen and twenty-eight or twenty-nine. When I reached thirty I looked back on my past. The previous victories were not due to my having mastered strategy. Perhaps it was natural ability, or the order of heaven, or that other schools' strategy was inferior. After that I studied morning and evening searching for the principle, and came to realize the Way of Strategy when I was fifty. Since then I have lived without following any particular Way. Thus with the virtue of strategy I practice many arts and abilities - all things with no teacher. To write this book I did not use the law of Buddha or the teachings of Confucius, neither old war chronicles nor books on martial tactics. I take up my brush to explain the true spirit of this Ichi school as it is mirrored in the Way of heaven and Kwannon. The time is the night of the tenth day of the tenth month, at the hour of the tiger, 3 to 5 “A” “M”. Chapter One. THE GROUND BOOK. Strategy is the craft of the warrior. Commanders must enact the craft, and troopers should know this Way. There is no warrior in the world today who really understands the Way of Strategy. There are various Ways. There is the Way of salvation by the law of Buddha, the Way of Confucius governing the Way of learning, the Way of healing as a doctor, as a poet teaching the Way of Waka, tea, archery, and many arts and skills. Each man practices as he feels inclined. It is said the warrior's is the twofold Way of pen and sword, and he should have a taste for both Ways. Even if a man has no natural ability he can be a warrior by sticking assiduously to both divisions of the Way. Generally speaking, the Way of the warrior is resolute acceptance of death. Although not only warriors but priests, women, peasants and lowlier folk have been known to die readily in the cause of duty or out of shame, this is a different thing. The warrior is different in that studying the Way of Strategy is based on overcoming men. By victory gained in crossing swords with individuals, or enjoining battle with large numbers, we can attain power and fame for ourselves or our lord. This is the virtue of strategy. The Way of Strategy. In China and Japan practitioners of the Way have been known as "masters of strategy". Warriors must learn this Way. Recently there have been people getting on in the world as strategists, but they are usually just sword-fencers. The attendants of the Kashima Kantori shrines of the province Hitachi received instruction from the gods, and made schools based on this teaching, traveling from country to country instructing men. This is the recent meaning of strategy. In olden times strategy was listed among the Ten Abilities and Seven Arts as a beneficial practice. It was certainly an art but as a beneficial practice it was not limited to sword-fencing. The true value of swordfencing cannot be seen within the confines of sword-fencing technique. If we look at the world we see arts for sale. Men use equipment to sell their own selves. As if with the nut and the flower, the nut has become less than the flower. In this kind of Way of Strategy, both those teaching and those learning the way are concerned with colouring and showing off their technique, trying to hasten the bloom of the flower. They speak of "This Dojo" and "That Dojo". They are looking for profit. Someone once said "Immature strategy is the cause of grief". That was a true saying. There are four Ways in which men pass through life: as gentlemen, farmers, artisans and merchants. The Way of the farmer. Using agricultural instruments, he sees springs through to autumns with an eye on the changes of season. Second is the Way of the merchant. The wine maker obtains his ingredients and puts them to use to make his living. The Way of the merchant is always to live by taking profit. This is the Way of the merchant. Thirdly the gentleman warrior, carrying the weaponry of his Way. The Way of the warrior is to master the virtue of his weapons. If a gentleman dislikes strategy he will not appreciate the benefit of weaponry, so must he not have a little taste for this? Fourthly the Way of the artisan. The Way of the carpenter is to become proficient in the use of his tools, first to lay his plans with a true measure and then perform his work according to plan. Thus he passes through life. These are the four Ways of the gentleman, the farmer, the artisan and the merchant. Comparing the Way of the Carpenter to Strategy. The comparison with carpentry is through the connection with houses. Houses of the nobility, houses of warriors, the Four houses, ruin of houses, thriving of houses, the style of the house, the tradition of the house, and the name of the house. The carpenter uses a master plan of the building, and the Way of Strategy is similar in that there is a plan of campaign. If you want to learn the craft of war, ponder over this book. The teacher is as a needle, the disciple is as thread. You must practice constantly. Like the foreman carpenter, the commander must know natural rules, and the rules of the country, and the rules of houses. This is the Way of the foreman. The foreman carpenter must know the architectural theory of towers and temples, and the plans of palaces, and must employ men to raise up houses. The Way of the foreman carpenter is the same as the Way of the commander of a warrior house. In the construction of houses, choice of woods is made. Straight un-knotted timber of good appearance is used for the revealed pillars, straight timber with small defects is used for the inner pillars. Timbers of the finest appearance, even if a little weak, is used for the thresholds, lintels, doors, and sliding doors, and so on. Good strong timber, though it be gnarled and knotted, can always be used discreetly in construction. Timber which is weak or knotted throughout should be used as scaffolding, and later for firewood. The foreman carpenter allots his men work according to their ability. Floor layers, makers of sliding doors, thresholds and lintels, ceilings and so on. Those of poor ability lay the floor joists, and those of lesser ability carve wedges and do such miscellaneous work. If the foreman knows and deploys his men well the finished work will be good. The foreman should take into account the abilities and limitations of his men, circulating among them and asking nothing unreasonable. He should know their morale and spirit, and encourage them when necessary. This is the same as the principle of strategy. The Way of Strategy. Like a trooper, the carpenter sharpens his own tools. He carries his equipment in his tool box, and works under the direction of his foreman. He makes columns and girders with an axe, shapes floorboards and shelves with a plane, cuts fine openwork and carvings accurately, giving as excellent a finish as his skill will allow. This is the craft of the carpenters. When the carpenter becomes skilled and understands measures he can become a foreman. The carpenter's attainment is, having tools which will cut well, to make small shrines, writing shelves, tables, paper lanterns, chopping boards and pot-lids. These are the specialties of the carpenter. Things are similar for the trooper. You ought to think deeply about this. The attainment of the carpenter is that his work is not warped, that the joints are not misaligned, and that the work is truly planed so that it meets well and is not merely finished in sections. This is essential. If you want to learn this Way, deeply consider the things written in this book one at a time. You must do sufficient research. Outline of the Five Books of this Book of Strategy. The Way is shown as five books concerning different aspects. These are Ground, Water, Fire, Wind tradition, and Void, the illusionary nature of worldly things. The body of the Way of Strategy from the viewpoint of my Ichi school is explained in the Ground book. It is difficult to realize the true Way just through sword-fencing. Know the smallest things and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things. As if it were a straight road mapped out on the ground, the first book is called the Ground book. Second is the Water book. With water as the basis, the spirit becomes like water. Water adopts the shape of its receptacle, it is sometimes a trickle and sometimes a wild sea. Water has a clear blue colour. By the clarity, things of Ichi school are shown in this book. If you master the principles of sword-fencing, when you freely beat one man, you beat any man in the world. The spirit of defeating a man is the same for ten million men. The strategist makes small things into big things, like building a great Buddha from a one foot model. I cannot write in detail how this is done. The principle of strategy is having one thing, to know ten thousand things. Things of Ichi school are written in this the Water book. Third is the Fire book. This book is about fighting. The spirit of fire is fierce, whether the fire be small or big; and so it is with battles. The Way of battles is the same for man to man fights and for ten thousand a side battles. You must appreciate that spirit can become big or small. What is big is easy to perceive: what is small is difficult to perceive. In short, it is difficult for large numbers of men to change position, so their movements can be easily predicted. An individual can easily change his mind, so his movements are difficult to predict. You must appreciate this. The essence of this book is that you must train day and night in order to make quick decisions. In strategy it is necessary to treat training as part of normal life with your spirit unchanging. Thus combat in battle is described in the Fire book. Fourthly the Wind book. This book is not concerned with my Ichi school but with other schools of strategy. By Wind I mean old traditions, present-day traditions, and family traditions of strategy. Thus I clearly explain the strategies of the world. This is tradition. It is difficult to know yourself if you do not know others. To all Ways there are side-tracks. If you study a Way daily, and your spirit diverges, you may think you are obeying a good Way but objectively it is not the true Way. If you are following the true way and diverge a little, this will later become a large divergence. You must realize this. Other strategies have come to be thought of as mere sword-fencing, and it is not unreasonable that this should be so. The benefit of my strategy, although it includes sword-fencing, lies in a separate principle. I have explained what is commonly meant by strategy in other schools in the Tradition (Wind) book. Fifthly, the book of the Void. By void I mean that which has no beginning and no end. Attaining this principle means not attaining the principle. The Way of strategy is the Way of nature. When you appreciate the power of nature, knowing rhythm of any situation, you will be able to hit the enemy naturally and strike naturally. All this is the Way of the Void. I intend to show how to follow the true Way according to nature in the book of the Void. The Name Ichi Ryu Ni To, One school, two swords. Warriors, both commanders and troopers, carry two swords at their belt. In olden times these were called the long sword and the sword; nowadays they are known as the sword and the companion sword. Let it suffice to say that in our land, whatever the reason, a warrior carries two swords at his belt. It is the Way of the warrior. "Nito Ichi Ryu" shows the advantages of using both swords. The spear and the halberd are weapons which are carried out of doors. Students of the Ichi school Way of Strategy should train from the start with the sword and the long sword in either hand. This is a truth: when you sacrifice your life, you must make fullest use of your weaponry. It is false not to do so, and to die with a weapon yet undrawn. If you hold a sword with both hands, it is difficult to wield it freely to left and right, so my method is to carry the sword in one hand. This does not apply to large weapons such as the spear or halberd, but swords and companion swords can be carried in one hand. It is encumbering to hold a sword in both hands when you are on horseback, when running on uneven roads, on swampy ground, muddy rice fields, stony ground, or in a crowd of people. To hold the long sword in both hands is not the true Way, for if you carry a bow or spear or other arms in your left hand you have only one hand free for the long sword. However, when it is difficult to cut an enemy down with one hand, you must use both hands. It is not difficult to wield a sword in one hand; the Way to learn this is to train with two long swords, one in each hand. It will seem difficult at first, but everything is difficult at first. Bows are difficult to draw, halberds are difficult to wield; as you become accustomed to the bow so your pull will become stronger. When you become used to wielding the long sword, you will gain the power of the Way and wield the sword well. As I will explain in the second book, the Water Book, there is no fast way of wielding the long sword. The long sword should be wielded broadly and the companion sword closely. This is the first thing to realize. According to this Ichi school, you can win with a long weapon, and yet you can also win with a short weapon. In short, the Way of the Ichi school is the spirit of winning, whatever the weapon and whatever its size. It is better to use two swords rather than one when you are fighting a crowd, and especially if you want to take a prisoner. These things cannot be explained in detail. From one thing, know ten thousand things. When you attain the Way of Strategy there will not be one thing you cannot see. You must study hard. The Benefit of the Two Characters Reading "Strategy". Masters of the long sword are called strategists. As for the other military arts, those who master the bow are called archers, those who master the spear are called spearmen, those who master the gun are called marksmen, those who master the halberd are called halberdiers. But we do not call masters of the Way of the long sword "longswordsmen", nor do we speak of "companion swordsmen". Because bows, guns, spears and halberds are all warriors' equipment they are certainly part of strategy. To master the virtue of the long sword is to govern the world and oneself, thus the long sword is the basis of strategy. The principle is "strategy by means of the long sword". If he attains the virtue of the long sword, one man can beat ten men. Just as one man can beat ten, so a hundred men can beat a thousand, and a thousand can beat ten thousand. In my strategy, one man is the same as ten thousand, so this strategy is the complete warrior's craft. The Way of the warrior does not include other Ways, such as Confucianism, Buddhism, certain traditions, artistic accomplishments and dancing. But even though these are not part of the Way, if you know the Way broadly you will see it in everything. Men must polish their particular Way. The Benefit of Weapons in Strategy. There is a time and place for use of weapons. The best use of the companion sword is in a confined space, or when you are engaged closely with an opponent. The long sword can be used effectively in all situations. The halberd is inferior to the spear on the battlefield. With the spear you can take the initiative; the halberd is defensive. In the hands of one of two men of equal ability, the spear gives a little extra strength. Spear and halberd both have their uses, but neither is very beneficial in confined spaces. They cannot be used for taking a prisoner. They are essentially weapons for the field. Anyway, if you learn "indoor" techniques, you will think narrowly and forget the true Way. Thus you will have difficulty in actual encounters. The bow is tactically strong at the commencement of battle, especially battles on a moor, as it is possible to shoot quickly from among the spearmen. However, it is unsatisfactory in sieges, or when the enemy is more than forty yards away. For this reason there are nowadays few traditional schools of archery. There is little use nowadays for this kind of skill. From inside fortifications, the gun has no equal among weapons. It is the supreme weapon on the field before the ranks clash, but once swords are crossed the gun becomes useless. One of the virtues of the bow is that you can see the arrows in flight and correct your aim accordingly, whereas gunshot cannot be seen. You must appreciate the importance of this. Just as a horse must have endurance and no defects, so it is with weapons. Horses should walk strongly, and swords and companion swords should cut strongly. Spears and halberds must stand up to heavy use, bows and guns must be sturdy. Weapons should be hardy rather than decorative. You should not have a favourite weapon. To become over-familiar with one weapon is as much a fault as not knowing it sufficiently well. You should not copy others, but use weapons which you can handle properly. It is bad for commanders and troopers to have likes and dislikes. These are things you must learn thoroughly. Timing in Strategy. There is timing in everything. Timing in strategy cannot be mastered without a great deal of practice. Timing is important in dancing and pipe or string music, for they are in rhythm only if timing is good. Timing and rhythm are also involved in the military arts, shooting bows and guns, and riding horses. In all skills and abilities there is timing. There is also timing in the Void. There is timing in the whole life of the warrior, in his thriving and declining, in his harmony and discord. Similarly, there is timing in the Way of the merchant, in the rise and fall of capital. All things entail rising and falling timing. You must be able to discern this. In strategy there are various timing considerations. From the outset you must know the applicable timing and the inapplicable timing, and from among the large and small things and the fast and slow timings find the relevant timing, first seeing the distance timing and the background timing. This is the main thing in strategy. It is especially important to know the background timing, otherwise your strategy will become uncertain. You win battles with the timing in the Void born of the timing of cunning by knowing the enemies' timing, and thus using a timing which the enemy does not expect. All the five books are chiefly concerned with timing. You must train sufficiently to appreciate this. If you practice day and night in the above Ichi school strategy, your spirit will naturally broaden. Thus is large scale strategy and the strategy of hand to hand combat propagated in the world. This is recorded for the first time in the five books of Ground, Water, Fire, Tradition (Wind), and Void. This is the way for men who want to learn my strategy: 1. Do not think dishonestly. 2. The Way is in training. 3. Become acquainted with every art. 4. Know the Ways of all professions. 5. Distinguish between gain and loss in worldly matters. 6. Develop intuitive judgement and understanding for everything. 7. Perceive those things which cannot be seen. 8. Pay attention even to trifles. 9. Do nothing which is of no use. It is important to start by setting these broad principles in your heart, and train in the Way of Strategy. If you do not look at things on a large scale it will be difficult for you to master strategy. If you learn and attain this strategy you will never lose even to twenty or thirty enemies. More than anything to start with you must set your heart on strategy and earnestly stick to the Way. You will come to be able to actually beat men in fights, and to be able to win with your eye. Also by training you will be able to freely control your own body, conquer men with your body, and with sufficient training you will be able to beat ten men with your spirit. When you have reached this point, will it not mean that you are invincible? Moreover, in large scale strategy the superior man will manage many subordinates dextrously, bear himself correctly, govern the country and foster the people, thus preserving the ruler's discipline. If there is a Way involving the spirit of not being defeated, to help oneself and gain honour, it is the Way of strategy. Chapter Two. THE WATER BOOK. The spirit of the Ni Ten Ichi school of strategy is based on water, and this Water Book explains methods of victory as the long-sword form of the Ichi school. Language does not extend to explaining the Way in detail, but it can be grasped intuitively. Study this book; read a word then ponder on it. If you interpret the meaning loosely you will mistake the Way. The principles of strategy are written down here in terms of single combat, but you must think broadly so that you attain an understanding for ten-thousand-a-side battles. Strategy is different from other things in that if you mistake the Way even a little you will become bewildered and fall into bad ways. If you merely read this book you will not reach the Way of Strategy. Absorb the things written in this book.Do not just read, memorise or imitate, but so that you realize the principle from within your own heart study hard to absorb these things into your body. Spiritual Bearing in Strategy. In strategy your spiritual bearing must not be any different from normal. Both in fighting and in everyday life you should be determined though calm. Meet the situation without tenseness yet not recklessly, your spirit settled yet unbiased. Even when your spirit is calm do not let your body relax, and when your body is relaxed do not let your spirit slacken. Do not let your spirit be influenced by your body, or your body be influenced by your spirit. Be neither insufficiently spirited nor over spirited. An elevated spirit is weak and a low spirit is weak. Do not let the enemy see your spirit. Small people must be completely familiar with the spirit of large people, and large people must be familiar with the spirit of small people. Whatever your size, do not be misled by the reactions of your own body. With your spirit open and unconstricted, look at things from a high point of view. You must cultivate your wisdom and spirit. Polish your wisdom: learn public justice, distinguish between good and evil, study the Ways of different arts one by one. When you cannot be deceived by men you will have realized the wisdom of strategy. The wisdom of strategy is different from other things. On the battlefield, even when you are hard-pressed, you should ceaselessly research the principles of strategy so that you can develop a steady spirit. Stance in Strategy. Adopt a stance with the head erect, neither hanging down, nor looking up, nor twisted. Your forehead and the space between your eyes should not be wrinkled. Do not roll your eyes nor allow them to blink, but slightly narrow them. With your features composed, keep the line of your nose straight with a feeling of slightly flaring your nostrils. Hold the line of the rear of the neck straight: instill vigour into your hairline, and in the same way from the shoulders down through your entire body. Lower both shoulders and, without the buttocks jutting out, put strength into your legs from the knees to the tips of your toes. Brace your abdomen so that you do not bend at the hips. Wedge your companion sword in your belt against your abdomen, so that your belt is not slack - this is called "wedging in". In all forms of strategy, it is necessary to maintain the combat stance in everyday life and to make your everyday stance your combat stance. You must research this well. The Gaze in Strategy. The gaze should be large and broad. This is the twofold gaze "Perception and Sight". Perception is strong and sight week. In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things. It is important in strategy to know the enemy's sword and not to be distracted by insignificant movements of his sword. You must study this. The gaze is the same for single combat and for large-scale strategy. It is necessary in strategy to be able to look to both sides without moving the eyeballs. You cannot master this ability quickly. Learn what is written here; use this gaze in everyday life and do not vary it whatever happens. Holding the Long Sword. Grip the long sword with a rather floating feeling in your thumb and forefinger, with the middle finger neither tight nor slack, and with the last two fingers tight. It is bad to have play in your hands. When you take up a sword, you must feel intent on cutting the enemy. As you cut an enemy you must not change your grip, and your hands must not "cower". When you dash the enemy's sword aside, or ward it off, or force it down, you must slightly change the feeling in your thumb and forefinger. Above all, you must be intent on cutting the enemy in the way you grip the sword. The grip for combat and for sword-testing is the same. There is no such thing as a "man-cutting grip". Generally, I dislike fixedness in both long swords and hands. Fixedness means a dead hand. Pliability is a living hand. You must bear this in mind. Footwork. With the tips of your toes somewhat floating, tread firmly with your heels. Whether you move fast or slow, with large or small steps, your feet must always move as in normal walking. I dislike the three walking methods known as "jumping-foot", "floating-foot" and "fixed-steps". So-called "Yin-Yang foot" is important in the Way. Yin-Yang foot means not moving only one foot. It means moving your feet left-right and right-left when cutting, withdrawing, or warding off a cut. You should not move on one foot preferentially. The Five Attitudes. The five attitudes are: Upper, Middle, Lower, Right Side, and Left Side. These are the give. Although attitude has these five divisions, the one purpose of all of them is to cut the enemy. There are none but these five attitudes. Whatever attitude you are in, do not be conscious of making the attitude; think only of cutting. Your attitude should be large or small according to the situation. Upper, Lower and Middle attitudes are decisive. Left Side and Right Side attitudes are fluid. Left and Right attitudes should be used if there is an obstruction overhead or to one side. The decision to use Left or Right depends on the place. The essence of the Way is this. To understand attitude you must thoroughly understand the middle attitude. The middle attitude is the heart of attitudes. If we look at strategy on a broad scale, the Middle attitude is the seat of the commander, with the other four attitudes following the commander. You must appreciate this. The Way of the Long Sword. Knowing the Way of the long sword means we can wield with two fingers the sword we usually carry. If we know the path of the sword well, we can wield it easily. If you try to wield the long sword quickly you will mistake the Way. To wield the long sword well you must wield it calmly. If you try to wield it quickly, like a folding fan or a short sword, you will err by using "short sword chopping". You cannot cut down a man with a long sword using this method. When you have cut downwards with the longsword, lift it straight upwards; when you cut sideways, return the sword along a sideways path. Return the sword in a reasonable way, always stretching the elbows broadly. Wield the sword strongly. This is the Way of the longsword. If you learn to use the five approaches of my strategy, you will be able to wield a sword well. You must train constantly. The Five Approaches. 1. The first approach is the Middle attitude. Confront the enemy with the point of your sword against his face. When he attacks, dash his sword to the right and "ride" it. Or, when the enemy attacks, deflect the point of his sword by hitting downwards, keep your long sword where it is, and as the enemy renews his attack cut his arms from below. This is the first method. The five approaches are this kind of thing. You must train repeatedly using a long sword in order to learn them. When you master my Way of the long sword, you will be able to control any attack the enemy makes. I assure you, there are no attitudes other than the five attitudes of the long sword of Ni To. 2. In the second approach with the long sword, from the Upper attitude cut the enemy just as he attacks. If the enemy evades the cut, keep your sword where it is and, scooping up from below, cut him as he renews the attack. It is possible to repeat the cut from here. In this method there are various changes in timing and spirit. You will be able to understand this by training in the Ichi school. You will always win with the five long sword methods. You must train repetitively. 3. In the third approach, adopt the Lower attitude, anticipating scooping up. When the enemy attacks, hit his hands from below. As you do so he may try to hit your sword down. If this is the case, cut his upper arm(s) horizontally with a feeling of "crossing". This means that from the lower attitudes you hit the enemy at the instant that he attacks. You will encounter this method often, both as a beginner and in later strategy. You must train holding a long sword. 4. In this fourth approach, adopt the Left Side attitude. As the enemy attacks hit his hands from below. If as you hit his hands he attempts to dash down your sword, with the feeling of hitting his hands, parry the path of his long sword and cut across from above your shoulder. This is the Way of the long sword. Through this method you win by parrying the line of the enemy's attack. You must research this. 5. In the fifth approach, the sword is in the Right Side attitude. In accordance with the enemy's attack, cross your long sword from below at the side to the Upper attitude. Then cut straight from above. This method is essential for knowing the Way of the long sword well. If you can use this method, you can freely wield a heavy long sword. I cannot describe in detail how to use these five approaches. You must become well acquainted with my "in harmony with the long sword" Way, learn large-scale timing, understand the enemy's long sword, and become used to the five approaches from the outset. You will always win by using these five methods, with various timing considerations discerning the enemy's spirit. You must consider all this carefully. The "Attitude No-Attitude" Teaching. "Attitude No-Attitude" means that there is no need for what are known as long sword attitudes. Even so, attitudes exist as the five ways of holding the long sword. However you hold the sword it must be in such a way that it is easy to cut the enemy well, in accordance with the situation, the place, and your relation to the enemy. From the Upper attitude as your spirit lessens you can adopt the Middle attitude, and from the Middle attitude you can raise the sword a little in your technique and adopt the Upper attitude. From the lower attitude you can raise the sword and adopt the Middle attitudes as the occasion demands. According to the situation, if you turn your sword from either the Left Side or Right Side attitude towards the centre, the Middle or the Lower attitude results. The principle of this is called "Existing Attitude, Nonexisting Attitude". The primary thing when you take a sword in your hands is your intention to cut the enemy, whatever the means. Whenever you parry, hit, spring, strike or touch the enemy's cutting sword, you must cut the enemy in the same movement. It is essential to attain this. If you think only of hitting, springing, striking or touching the enemy, you will not be able actually to cut him. More than anything, you must be thinking of carrying your movement through to cutting him. You must thoroughly research this. Attitude in strategy on a larger scale is called "Battle Array". Such attitudes are all for winning battles. Fixed formation is bad. Study this well. To Hit the Enemy "In One Timing". "In One Timing" means, when you have closed with the enemy, to hit him as quickly and directly as possible, without moving your body or settling your spirit, while you see that he is still undecided. The timing of hitting before the enemy decides to withdraw, break or hit, is this "In One Timing". You must train to achieve this timing, to be able to hit in the timing of an instant. The "Abdomen Timing of Two". When you attack and the enemy quickly retreats, as you see him tense you must feint a cut. Then, as he relaxes, follow up and hit him. This is the "Abdomen Timing of Two". It is very difficult to attain this by merely reading this book, but you will soon understand with a little instruction. No Design, No Conception. In this method, when the enemy attacks and you also decide to attack, hit with your body, and hit with your spirit, and hit from the Void with your hands, accelerating strongly. This is the "No Design, No Conception" cut. This is the most important method of hitting. It is often used. You must train hard to understand it. The Flowing Water Cut. The "Flowing Water Cut" is used when you are struggling blade to blade with the enemy. When he breaks and quickly withdraws trying to spring with his long sword, expand your body and spirit and cut him as slowly as possible with your long sword, following your body like stagnant water. You can cut with certainty if you learn this. You must discern the enemy's grade. Continuous Cut. When you attack and the enemy also attacks, and your swords spring together, in one action cut his head, hands and legs. When you cut several places with one sweep of the long sword, it is the "Continuous Cut". You must practice this cut; it is often used. With detailed practice you should be able to understand it. The Fire and Stones. Cut The Fires and Stones Cut means that when the enemy's long sword and your long sword clash together you cut as strongly as possible without raising the sword even a little. This means cutting quickly with the hands, body and legs - all three cutting strongly. If you train well enough you will be able to strike strongly. The Red Leaves Cut. The Red Leaves Cut [allusion to falling, dying leaves] means knocking down the enemy's long sword. The spirit should be getting control of his sword. When the enemy is in a long sword attitude in front of you and intent on cutting, hitting and parrying, you strongly hit the enemy's long sword with the Fire and Stones Cut, perhaps in the spirit of the "No Design, No Conception" Cut. If you then beat down the point of his sword with a sticky feeling, he will necessarily drop the sword. If you practice this cut it becomes easy to make the enemy drop his sword. You must train repetitively. The Body in Place of the Long Sword. Also "the long sword in place of the body". Usually we move the body and the sword at the same time to cut the enemy. However, according to the enemy's cutting method, you can dash against him with your body first, and afterwards cut with the sword. If his body is immoveable, you can cut first with the long sword, but generally you hit first with the body and then cut with the long sword. You must research this well and practice hitting. Cut and Slash. To cut and to slash are two different things. Cutting, whatever form of cutting it is, is decisive, with a resolute spirit. Slashing is nothing more than touching the enemy. Even if you slash strongly, and even if the enemy dies instantly, it is slashing. When you cut, your spirit is resolved. You must appreciate this. If you first slash the enemy's hands or legs, you must then cut strongly. Slashing is in spirit the same as touching. When you realize this, they become indistinguishable. Learn this well. Chinese Monkey's Body. The Chinese Monkey's Body is the spirit of not stretching out your arms. The spirit is to get in quickly, without in the least extending your arms, before the enemy cuts. If you are intent upon not stretching out your arms you are effectively far away, the spirit is to go in with your whole body. When you come to within arm's reach it becomes easy to move your body in. You must research this well. Glue and Lacquer Emulsion Body. The spirit of "Glue and Lacquer Emulsion Body" is to stick to the enemy and not separate from him. When you approach the enemy, stick firmly with your head, body and legs. People tend to advance their head and legs quickly, but their body lags behind. You should stick firmly so that there is not the slightest gap between the enemy's body and your body. You must consider this carefully. To Strive for Height. By "to strive for height" is meant, when you close with the enemy, to strive with him for superior height without cringing. Stretch your legs, stretch your hips, and stretch your neck face to face with him. When you think you have won, and you are the higher, thrust in strongly. You must learn this. To Apply Stickiness. When the enemy attacks and you also attack with the long sword, you should go in with a sticky feeling and fix your long sword against the enemy's as you receive his cut. The spirit of stickiness is not hitting very strongly, but hitting so that the long swords do not separate easily. It is best to approach as calmly as possible when hitting the enemy's long sword with stickiness. The difference between "Stickiness" and "Entanglement" is that stickiness is firm and entanglement is weak. You must appreciate this. The Body Strike. The Body Strike means to approach the enemy through a gap in his guard. The spirit is to strike him with your body. Turn your face a little aside and strike the enemy's breast with your left shoulder thrust out. Approach with the spirit of bouncing the enemy away, striking as strongly as possible in time with yout breathing. If you achieve this method of closing with the enemy, you will be able to knock him ten or twenty feet away. It is possible to strike the enemy until he is dead. Train well. Three Ways to Parry His Attack. There are three methods to parry a cut: First, by dashing the enemy's long sword to your right, as if thrusting at his eyes, when he makes an attack. Or, to parry by thrusting the enemy's long sword towards his right eye with the feeling of snipping his neck. Or, when you have a short "long sword", without worrying about parrying the enemy's long sword, to close with him quickly, thrusting at his face with your left hand. These are the three methods of parrying. You must bear in mind that you can always clench your left hand and thrust at the enemy's face with your fist. For this it is necessary to train well. To Stab at the Face. To stab at the face means, when you are in confrontation with the enemy, that your spirit is intent of stabbing at his face, following the line of the blades with the point of your long sword. If you are intent on stabbing at his face, his face and body will become rideable. When the enemy becomes as if rideable, there are various opportunities for winning. You must concentrate on this. When fighting and the enemy's body becomes as if rideable, you can win quickly, so you ought not to forget to stab at the face. You must pursue the value of this technique through training. To Stab at the Heart. To stab at the heart means, when fighting and there are obstructions above, or to the sides, and whenever it is difficult to cut, to thrust at the enemy. You must stab the enemy's breast without letting the point of your long sword waver, showing the enemy the ridge of the blade square-on, and with the spirit of deflecting his long sword. The spirit of this principle is often useful when we become tired or for some reason our long sword will not cut. You must understand the application of this method. To Scold "Tut-TUT!" "Scold" means that, when the enemy tries to counter-cut as you attack, you counter-cut again from below as if thrusting at him, trying to hold him down. With very quick timing you cut, scolding the enemy. Thrust up, "Tut!", and cut "TUT!" This timing is encountered time and time again in exchange of blows. The way to scold Tut-TUT is to time the cut simultaneously with raising your long sword as if to thrust the enemy. You must learn this through repetitive practice. The Smacking Parry. By "smacking parry" is meant that when you clash swords with the enemy, you meet his attacking cut on your long sword with a tee-dum, teedum rhythm, smacking his sword and cutting him. The spirit of the smacking parry is not parrying, or smacking strongly, but smacking the enemy's long sword in accordance with his attacking cut, primarily intent on quickly cutting him. If you understand the timing of smacking, however hard your long swords clash together, your swordpoint will not be knocked back even a little. You must research sufficiently to realize this. There are Many Enemies. "There are many enemies" applies when you are fighting one against many. Draw both sword and companion sword and assume a widestretched left and right attitude. The spirit is to chase the enemies around from side to side, even though they come from all four directions. Observe their attacking order, and go to meet first those who attack first. Sweep your eyes around broadly, carefully examining the attacking order, and cut left and right alternately with your swords. Waiting is bad. Always quickly re-assume your attitudes to both sides, cut the enemies down as they advance, crushing them in the direction from which they attack. Whatever you do, you must drive the enemy together, as if tying a line of fishes, and when they are seen to be piled up, cut them down strongly without giving them room to move. The Advantage when Coming to Blows. You can know how to win through strategy with the long sword, but it cannot be clearly explained in writing. You must practice diligently in order to understand how to win. Oral tradition: "The true Way of Strategy is revealed in the long sword." One Cut. You can win with certainty with the spirit of "one cut". It is difficult to attain this if you do not learn strategy well. If you train well in this Way, strategy will come from your heart and you will be able to win at will. You must train diligently. Direct Communication. The spirit of "Direct Communication" is how the true Way of the Ni To Ichi school is received and handed down. Oral tradition: "Teach your body strategy." Recorded in the above book is an outline of Ichi school sword-fighting. To learn how to win with the long sword in strategy, first learn the five approaches and the five attitudes, and absorb the Way of the long sword naturally in your body. You must understand spirit and timing, handle the long sword naturally, and move body and legs in harmony with your spirit. Whether beating one man or two, you will then know values in strategy. Study the contents of this book, taking one item at a time, and through fighting with enemies you will gradually come to know the principle of the Way. Deliberately, with a patient spirit, absorb the virtue of all this, from time to time raising your hand in combat. Maintain this spirit whenever you cross swords with and enemy. Step by step walk the thousand-mile road. Study strategy over the years and achieve the spirit of the warrior. Today is victory over yourself of yesterday; tomorrow is your victory over lesser men. Next, in order to beat more skillful men, train according to this book, not allowing your heart to be swayed along a side-track. Even if you kill an enemy, if it is not based on what you have learned it is not the true Way. If you attain this Way of victory, then you will be able to beat several tens of men. What remains is sword-fighting ability, which you can attain in battles and duels. Chapter Three. THE FIRE BOOK. In this the Fire Book of the Ni To Ichi school of strategy I describe fighting as fire. In the first place, people think narrowly about the benefit of strategy. By using only their fingertips, they only know the benefit of three of the five inches of the wrist. They let a contest be decided, as with the folding fan, merely by the span of their forearms. They specialize in the small matter of dexterity, learning such trifles as hand and leg movements with the bamboo practice sword. In my strategy, the training for killing enemies is by way of many contests, fighting for survival, discovering the meaning of life and death, learning the Way of the sword, judging the strength of attacks and understanding the Way of the "edge and ridge" of the sword. You cannot profit from small techniques particularly when full armour is worn. My Way of Strategy is the sure method to win when fighting for your life one man against five or ten. There is nothing wrong with the principle "one man can beat ten, so a thousand men can beat ten thousand". You must research this. Of course you cannot assemble a thousand or ten thousand men for everyday training. But you can become a master of strategy by training alone with a sword, so that you can understand the enemy's strategy, his strength and resources, and come to appreciate how to apply strategy to beat ten thousand enemies. Any man who wants to master the essence of my strategy must research diligently, training morning and evening. Thus can he polish his skill, become free from self, and realize extraordinary ability. He will come to possess miraculous power. This is the practical result of strategy. Depending on the Place. Examine your environment. Stand in the sun; that is, take up an attitude with the sun behind you. If the situation does not allow this, you must try to keep the sun on your right side. In buildings, you must stand with the entrance behind you or to your right. Make sure that your rear is unobstructed, and that there is free space on your left, your right side being occupied with your side attitude. At night, if the enemy can be seen, keep the fire behind you and the entrance to your right, and otherwise take up your attitude as above. You must look down on the enemy, and take up your attitude on slightly higher places. For example, the Kamiza in a house is thought of as a high place. When the fight comes, always endeavour to chase the enemy around to your left side. Chase him towards awkward places, and try to keep him with his back to awkward places. When the enemy gets into an inconvenient position, do not let him look around, but conscientiously chase him around and pin him down. In houses, chase the enemy into the thresholds, lintels, doors, verandas, pillars, and so on, again not letting him see his situation. Always chase the enemy into bad footholds, obstacles at the side, and so on, using the virtues of the place to establish predominant positions from which to fight. You must research and train diligently in this. The Three Methods to Forestall the Enemy. The first is to forestall him by attacking. This is called Ken No Sen, to set him up. Another method is to forestall him as he attacks. This is called Tai No Sen, to wait for the initiative. The other method is when you and the enemy attack together. This is called Tai Tai No Sen, to accompany him and forestall him. There are no methods of taking the lead other than these three. Because you can win quickly by taking the lead, it is one of the most important things in strategy. There are several things involved in taking the lead. You must make the best of the situation, see through the enemy's spirit so that you grasp his strategy and defeat him. It is impossible to write about this in detail. The First, Ken No Sen. When you decide to attack, keep calm and dash in quickly, forestalling the enemy. Or you can advance seemingly strongly but with a reserved spirit, forestalling him with the reserve. Alternatively, advance with as strong a spirit as possible, and when you reach the enemy move with your feet a little quicker than normal, unsettling him and overwhelming him sharply. Or, with your spirit calm, attack with a feeling of constantly crushing the enemy, from first to last. The spirit is to win in the depths of the enemy. These are all Ken No Sen. The Second, Tai No Sen. When the enemy attacks, remain undisturbed but feign weakness. As the enemy reaches you, suddenly move away indicating that you intend to jump aside, then dash in attacking strongly as soon as you see the enemy relax. This is one way. Or, as the enemy attacks, attack still more strongly, taking advantage of the resulting disorder in his timing to win. This is the Tai No Sen principle. The Third, Tai Tai No Sen. When the enemy makes a quick attack, you must attack strongly and calmly, aim for his weak point as he draws near, and strongly defeat him. Or, if the enemy attacks calmly, you must observe his movements and, with your body rather floating, join in with his movements as he draws near. Move quickly and cut him strongly. This is Tai Tai No Sen. These things cannot be clearly explained in words. You must research what is written here. In these three ways of forestalling, you must judge the situation. This does not mean that you always attack first; but if the enemy attacks first you can lead him around. In strategy, you have effectively won when you forestall the enemy, so you must train well to attain this. To Hold Down a Pillow. "To Hold Down a Pillow" means not allowing the enemy's head to rise. In contests of strategy it is bad to be led about by the enemy. You must always be able to lead the enemy about. Obviously the enemy will also be thinking of doing this, but he cannot forestall you if you do not allow him to come out. In strategy, you must stop the enemy as he attempts to cut; you must push down his thrust, and throw off his hold when he tries to grapple. This is the meaning of "to hold down a pillow". When you have grasped this principle, whatever the enemy tries to bring about in the fight you will see in advance and suppress it. The spirit is too check his attack at the syllable "at…", when he jumps check his jump at the syllable "ju… ", and check his cut at "cu… ". The important thing in strategy is to suppress the enemy's useful actions but allow his useless actions. However, doing this alone is defensive. First, you must act according to the Way, suppressing the enemy's techniques, foiling his plans and thence command him directly. When you can do this you will be a master of strategy. You must train well and research "holding down a pillow". Crossing at a Ford. "Crossing at a ford" means, for example, crossing the sea at a strait, or crossing over a hundred miles of broad sea at a crossing place. I believe this "crossing at a ford" occurs often in man's lifetime. It means setting sail even though your friends stay in harbour, knowing the route, knowing the soundness of your ship and the favour of the day. When all the conditions are meet, and there is perhaps a favourable wind, or a tailwind, then set sail. If the wind changes within a few miles of your destination, you must row across the remaining distance without sail. If you attain this spirit, it applies to everyday life. You must always think of crossing at a ford. In strategy also it is important to "cross at a ford". Discern the enemy's capability and, knowing your own strong points, "cross the ford" at the advantageous place, as a good captain crosses a sea route. If you succeed in crossing at the best place, you may take your ease. To cross at a ford means to attack the enemy's weak point, and to put yourself in an advantageous position. This is how to win large-scale strategy. The spirit of crossing at a ford is necessary in both large- and small-scale strategy. You must research this well. To Know the Times. "To know the times" means to know the enemy's disposition in battle. Is it flourishing or waning? By observing the spirit of the enemy's men and getting the best position, you can work out the enemy's disposition and move your men accordingly. You can win through this principle of strategy, fighting from a position of advantage. When in a duel, you must forestall the enemy and attack when you have first recognised his school of strategy, perceived his quality and his strong and weak points. Attack in an unsuspecting manner, knowing his metre and modulation and the appropriate timing. Knowing the times means, if your ability is high, seeing right into things. If you are thoroughly conversant with strategy, you will recognize the enemy's intentions and thus have many opportunities to win. You must sufficiently study this. To Tread Down the Sword. "To tread down the sword" is a principle often used in strategy. First, in large scale strategy, when the enemy first discharges bows and guns and then attacks it is difficult for us to attack if we are busy loading powder into our guns or notching our arrows. The spirit is to attack quickly while the enemy is still shooting with bows or guns. The spirit is to win by "treading down" as we receive the enemy's attack. In single combat, we cannot get a decisive victory by cutting, with a "tee-dum tee-dum" feeling, in the wake of the enemy's attacking long sword. We must defeat him at the start of his attack, in the spirit of treading him down with the feet, so that he cannot rise again to the attack. "Treading" does not simply mean treading with the feet. Tread with the body, tread with the spirit, and, of course, tread and cut with the long sword. You must achieve the spirit of not allowing the enemy to attack a second time. This is the spirit of forestalling in every sense. Once at the enemy, you should not aspire just to strike him, but to cling after the attack. You must study this deeply. To Know "Collapse". Everything can collapse. Houses, bodies, and enemies collapse when their rhythm becomes deranged. In large-scale strategy, when the enemy starts to collapse, you must pursue him without letting the chance go. If you fail to take advantage of your enemies' collapse, they may recover. In single combat, the enemy sometimes loses timing and collapses. If you let this opportunity pass, he may recover and not be so negligent thereafter. Fix your eye on the enemy's collapse, and chase him, attacking so that you do not let him recover. You must do this. The chasing attack is with a strong spirit. You must utterly cut the enemy down so that he does not recover his position. You must understand how to utterly cut down the enemy. To Become the Enemy. "To become the enemy" means to think yourself in the enemy's position. In the world people tend to think of a robber trapped in a house as a fortified enemy. However, if we think of "becoming the enemy", we feel that the whole world is against us and that there is no escape. He who is shut inside is a pheasant. He who enters to arrest is a hawk. You must appreciate this. In large-scale strategy, people are always under the impression that the enemy is strong, and so tend to become cautious. But if you have good soldiers, and if you understand the principles of strategy, and if you know how to beat the enemy, there is nothing to worry about. In single combat also you must put yourself in the enemy's position. If you think, "Here is a a master of the Way, who knows the principles of strategy", then you will surely lose. You must consider this deeply. To Release Four Hands. "To release four hands" is used when you and the enemy are contending with the same spirit, and the issue cannot be decided. Abandon this spirit and win through an alternative resource. In large-scale strategy, when there is a "four hands" spirit, do not give up - it is man's existence. Immediately throw away this spirit and win with a technique the enemy does not expect. In single combat also, when we think we have fallen into the "four hands" situation, we must defeat the enemy by changing our mind and applying a suitable technique according to his condition. You must be able to judge this. To Move the Shade. "To move the shade" is used when you cannot see the enemy's spirit. In large-scale strategy, when you cannot see the enemy's position, indicate that you are about to attack strongly, to discover his resources. It is easy then to defeat him with a different method once you see his resources. In single combat, if the enemy takes up a rear or side attitude of the long sword so that you cannot see his intention, make a feint attack, and the enemy will show his long sword, thinking he sees your spirit. Benefiting from what you are shown, you can win with certainty. If you are negligent you will miss the timing. Research this well. To Hold Down a Shadow. "Holding down a shadow" is use when you can see the enemy's attacking spirit. In large-scale strategy, when the enemy embarks on an attack, if you make a show of strongly suppressing his technique, he will change his mind. Then, altering your spirit, defeat him by forestalling him with a Void spirit. Or, in single combat, hold down the enemy's strong intention with a suitable timing, and defeat him by forestalling him with this timing. You must study this well. To Pass On. Many things are said to be passed on. Sleepiness can be passed on, and yawning can be passed on. Time can be passed on also. In large-scale strategy, when the enemy is agitated and shows an inclination to rush, do not mind in the least. Make a show of complete calmness, and the enemy will be taken by this and will become relaxed. When you see that this spirit has been passed on, you can bring about the enemy's defeat by attacking strongly with a Void spirit. In single combat, you can win by relaxing your body and spirit and then, catching on to the moment the enemy relaxes, attack strongly and quickly, forestalling him. What is known as "getting someone drunk" is similar to this. You can also infect the enemy with a bored, careless, or weak spirit. You must study this well. To Cause Loss of Balance. Many things can cause a loss of balance. One cause is danger, another is hardship, and another is surprise. You must research this. In large-scale strategy it is important to cause loss of balance. Attack without warning where the enemy is not expecting it, and while his spirit is undecided follow up your advantage and, having the lead, defeat him. Or, in single combat, start by making a show of being slow, then suddenly attack strongly. Without allowing him space for breath to recover from the fluctuation of spirit, you must grasp the opportunity to win. Get the feel of this. To Frighten. Fright often occurs, caused by the unexpected. In large-scale strategy you can frighten the enemy not just by what you present to their eyes, but by shouting, making a small force seem large, or by threatening them from the flank without warning. These things all frighten. You can win by making best use of the enemy's frightened rhythm. In single combat, also, you must use the advantage of taking the enemy unawares by frightening him with your body, long sword, or voice, to defeat him. You should research this well. To Soak In. When you have come to grips and are striving together with the enemy, and you realize that you cannot advance, you "soak in" and become one with the enemy. You can win by applying a suitable technique while you are mutually entangled. In battles involving large numbers as well as in fights with small numbers, you can often win decisively with the advantage of knowing how to "soak" into the enemy, whereas, were you to draw apart, you would lose the chance to win. Research this well. To Injure the Corners. It is difficult to move strong things by pushing directly, so you should "injure the corners". In large-scale strategy, it is beneficial to strike at the corners of the enemy's force. If the corners are overthrown, the spirit of the whole body will be overthrown. To defeat the enemy you must follow up the attack when the corners have fallen. In single combat, it is easy to win once the enemy collapses. This happens when you injure the "corners" of his body, and thus weaken him. It is important to know how to do this, so you must research deeply. To Throw into Confusion. This means making the enemy lose resolve. In large-scale strategy we can use our troops to confuse the enemy on the field. Observing the enemy's spirit, we can make him think, "Here? There? Like that? Like this? Slow? Fast?" Victory is certain when the enemy is caught up in a rhythm which confuses his spirit. In single combat, we can confuse the enemy by attacking with varied techniques when the chance arises. Feint a thrust or cut, or make the enemy think you are going to close with him, and when he is confused you can easily win. This is the essence of fighting, and you must research it deeply. The Three Shouts. The three shouts are divided thus: before, during and after. Shout according to the situation. The voice is a thing of life. We shout against fires and so on, against the wind and the waves. The voice shows energy. In large-scale strategy, at the start of battle we shout as loudly as possible. During the fight, the voice is low-pitched, shouting out as we attack. After the contest, we shout in the wake of our victory. These are the three shouts. In single combat, we make as if to cut and shout "Ei!" at the same time to disturb the enemy, then in the wake of our shout we cut with the long sword. We shout after we have cut down the enemy - this is to announce victory. This is called "sen go no koe", before and after voice. We do not shout simultaneously with flourishing the long sword. We shout during the fight to get into rhythm. Research this deeply. To Mingle. In battles, when the armies are in confrontation, attack the enemy's strong points and, when you see that they are beaten back, quickly separate and attack yet another strong point on the periphery of his force. The spirit of this is like a winding mountain path. This is an important fighting method for one man against many. Strike down the enemies in one quarter, or drive them back, then grasp the timing and attack further strong points to right and left, as if on a winding mountain path, weighing up the enemies' disposition. When you know the enemies' level attack strongly with no trace of retreating spirit. What is meant by "mingling" is the spirit of advancing and becoming engaged with the enemy, and not withdrawing even one step. You must understand this. To Crush. This means to crush the enemy regarding him as being weak. In large-scale strategy, when we see that the enemy has few men, or if he has many men but his spirit is weak and disordered, we knock the h

Rahan. Episode Twenty-Two. The White Arrow. The cloud of screaming seagulls escorted the raft, carried by the current, as it approached the island. "Females-who-walk-upright" Watch out for Rahan! But where are the men? Was this unknown land populated only by women? One would have believed it, to see this horde gathered on the shore. The “Man-who-comes-from-the-horizon" Is without doubt an enemy! Show him that we do not fear him! Lahita! A young girl drew her bow and aimed at the sky. Page Two: The son of Crao saw the long arrow, with its empennage of black feathers rise very quickly. Then fall back to his raft. Where it struck with astonishing precision. Plong! The one who shot this arrow is of great skill! Rahan will have to beware! A moment later a group of women attacked the raft, clinging to it and throwing Rahan into the water. Stop! Stop! Rahan does not come as an enemy! Release me! Release me! The son of Crao was a marvelous swimmer, but these strangers advanced in the water even better than him! They dragged him down into the glaucous depths, only bringing him back to the surface when he was out of breath. Page Three: Exhausted and panting, he was brought back by their help onto the beach. Lahita could have killed you with her arrow! But she wanted to know who you are and what you came to do! I am Rahan, son of Crao! It is the current of the "Great River" that pushed Rahan towards your territory! As women approach with vines he exclaimed. Rahan will not be bound by your companions! He reached for his ivory knife, but Lahita's bow was already up. Chtonc! The arrow with black feathers, slipping into the lancet of the weapon, prevented him from drawing it! Page Four: You should have killed him, Lahita! If we have pity, he will come back with his clan to seize our territory! Rahan will not flee our island! Take his cutlass and burn his raft! When the men return, they will decide his fate! After the formidable address of Lahita, the son of Crao allowed himself to be disarmed. Rahan means you no harm. Those who live over the horizon too often speak the language of lies! You will remain captive until the return of the fishermen! A moment later, on a pyre of dry palms, the raft was on fire! Rahan no longer had any means of fleeing this shore, where the women were consulting each other on the fate which was reserved for him. Page Five: Some, the most numerous, demanded that the captive be thrown to the sharks. His coming is a bad omen! He must die! Others suggested waiting for the return of the fishermen, gone on the "Great River" for several moons. Lahita was one of them. And Lahita imposed her point of view. Rahan will remain free to move about, but we will keep his knife! A curious captivity began for the son of the fierce ages. Without a boat, he could not face the ocean. Should he, for days on end, live with these women, most of whom were hostile to him? Rahan carries a strange necklace! These are claws. Animal claws as there are only on the "Great territory"! Page Six: This claw is that of "Courage". This one from "Goodness". That of “Loyalty”. Lahita seemed moved. Our clan also symbolizes qualities and feelings with objects. Here, look. She pointed in her quiver, among the black arrows, to an arrow with a white tail. This arrow is that of "Friendship"! The one at whose feet we stick the white arrow becomes forever the friend of our clan! Lahita, who seemed to have sympathy for the captive, showed him around the island. Rahan was surprised to discover a crater outlet where sharks were swimming. Page Seven: He understood that the sharks, coming from the "Great River", had access to this natural pit by an underwater passage. Death to the enemy! Throw him in the pit! A few women rushed towards the son of Crao. The club that one of them was wielding was torn from her fingers by an arrow from Lahita. Schtok! Rahan must flee this island! Otherwise, one day, Lahita will not be there to help him and those women will kill him! Three times the sun disappeared on the horizon. Rahan had undertaken to build himself a hut on the shore. They gave him back his knife during the day, but confiscated it at night. Page Eight: Sometimes a long black arrow struck near him. But it was only a joke from the skillful Lahita! Shtrok! To gain the confidence of the women who were hostile to him, the son of Crao taught them many things unknown in those fierce ages. He revealed to them the mystery of the noose that he himself had discovered some time before. He taught them to sew thin skins together. So the “Man-who-comes-from-the-horizon” knows everything? Rahan's hut was now complete. It stood on the beach, a hundred paces from the village. And the captive often came there to meditate. Page Nine: Rahan does not know what fate the fishermen have reserved for him on their return! Rahan must escape!! That morning the women who had gone to fish in the rocks came back disappointed. The fish have fled our shore! We will not eat today! Why do you not fish for sharks in the "Great Pit?" Rahan always has curious ideas!! And how could we capture these sharks? Follow Rahan. He will show you! Shortly after, the son of Crao had prepared his trap. A strong hook was baited with a small squid. And tied to a very long vine. Page Ten: He tied this vine to the fork of a tree and threw the bait into the shark crater. A moment later, under the amazed gaze of the women, the vine suddenly stretched! A shark had jumped on the bait! Using the forked tree as a hoist, Rahan pulled the shark up. A clamor of joy greeted its appearance. He is not very big. But Rahan is certain that at daybreak we will find another one at the end of the trap! The women took the shark to the village. Rahan threw his "Line" back into the pit. Page Eleven: Rahan hopes, this time, to have won their trust! Joy reigned that evening around the fire. But as the son of fierce ages went back to his hut. Zlang! You forgot one thing, Rahan! Lahita was there, smiling and mischievous. Your knife! You know you have to hand it to me every night! It was difficult for Rahan to give up his precious ivory knife, but he obeyed. When will the fishermen return? In four or five moons. Maybe more! Rahan will not wait all this time! Rahan will flee tomorrow! Page Twelve: At daybreak the son of Crao went to the shark crater. The vine of the trap was ready to snap. A huge shark was struggling at the end of the "Line". The other sharks had fled. Rahan braced himself to reel in his catch when Lahita appeared in the distance, behind him. The "Big Monster" sometimes comes into the pit! Could Rahan have captured it?? Once again the mischievous Lahita wanted to display her skill. She aimed at the vine where Rahan was hanging with all his weight. Page Thirteen: The black arrow cleanly sliced the fibers, and the son of Crao, suddenly unbalanced, disappeared into the crater! Lahita rushed forward. But it was too late. Under water, Rahan was pursued by the big shark! Lahita is stupid! Lahita has unwittingly sacrificed Rahan! Furious with herself, the young girl broke her bow on a rock. Crack! The son of the fierce ages had just avoided a shark attack. This one still had the hook in its mouth and dragged the long vine. This is where the water from the "Great River" arrives! But Rahan can't escape that way. He would not have enough breath. The shark returned to the attack. Page Fourteen: The son of Crao, once again dodging the monstrous jaws, suddenly had an idea. The vine! The vine can help Rahan! He seized the vine as he passed and swam towards the wall of the pit. If Rahan succeeds in trapping her in this fault. As the nose of the shark came around, the line slackened. Thus entrapped with the vine attached to the wall, the shark was no longer a danger to him. He was saved! He was coming to the surface, when. A huge "Thing" came out of the underwater passage. A "Thing" like he had never seen before. Page Fifteen: This vile "Thing" had many arms. One of them suddenly circled Rahan's waist! "The Great Monster"! Rahan has been captured by the “Great Monster”!! Lahita pointed at the crater in panic, to her companions who had just arrived. They could all make out the shark which was thrashing about violently at the end of the vine which bound it. And all saw the monstrous octopus and its victim. Lahita should not have broken her bow!! She could have helped Rahan!! The son of Crao suddenly felt he was being lifted above the water by the tentacle that encircled him. Page Sixteen: Then he was brutally brought back under water by the horrible "Thing". He caught a glimpse of eyes between the cupped arms. Once again he was lifted out of the water. He made out the women massed at the edge of the crater and yelled. The Knife!!! Rahan needs his knife! Quickly Lahita, Quickly!! The water into which the octopus again plunged him muffled his cries. Lahita hesitated. What would happen if Rahan did not catch the knife she was about to throw to him? Yet when the son of fierce ages reappeared on the surface for the third time, she threw the weapon. Page Seventeen: And Rahan, with his free hand, barely caught the knife. Ra-ha-ha! The ivory blade plunged again and again into the shapeless body of the "Thing". All around Rahan the water turned red. Then it suddenly turned black, and the grip of the arm with the suction cups loosened. Ra-ha-ha! The son of Crao struck again and again. Above him, the screams of women punctuated every blow he gave the monster. When the tentacles stopped waving, Rahan took a deep breath. And his clamor of victory thundered in the crater. Ra-ha-ha! Page Eighteen: An instant later, he was hoisted up with a line thrown by Lahita. The surface of the water beneath him was veined with black and red. Rahan has triumphed over the "Great Monster"! Rahan deserves our respect! He will now keep his knife! You are wrong, Lahita! The men will never accept that we have treated an "Enemy" with so much mercy. The men will not find Rahan! When they return, Rahan will be far away on the great river! Over several days the son of Crao had made a plan! He put it into practice that night. From the village no one heard him disassemble his hut. Page Nineteen: He pulled down the heavy bulkhead he had built with the intention of making himself a Raft. The wind is with Rahan. He stuck a bamboo pole in it, to which he attached the skins he had specially sewn. Indeed, he was already far from the shore when cries rang out. The enemy has escaped! Kill him Lahita, kill him! In the moonlight that flooded the beach, Rahan caught a glimpse of the young girl who was stringing her new bow. Lahita's arrows always hit their mark! The only chance for Rahan is to jump into the water!! Crack! Page Twenty: He was in the dark water, clinging to his raft, when the whistle of the arrow sounded. Buzz! This one stuck with a dry noise in the bamboo pole, and the son of the fierce ages howled with joy. The white arrow! He hoisted himself onto the Raft because he knew he had nothing more to fear. Thank you Lahita! Thank you! Maybe Rahan will come back one day! The white arrow of friendship! As the wind carried him rapidly out to sea, Rahan twirled the arrow with white feathers in his fingers for a long time. The Arrow of Friendship! This token of friendship was the most beautiful present ever received by the son of fierce ages. That is why he still admired it, when the rays of the rising sun came to redden the white empennage.

Rahan. Episode Twenty-One. The Cliff of Sacrifice. Rahan knew what a strange appearance "Those-who-walk-upright" take on, long after being bound for the "Territory of shadows". The discovery of these skeletons at the foot of this cliff still amazed him. Was not that which had been the wrists and ankles of these men still tied with fine vines? These hunters were probably punished by their clan and thrown from above! But why? Rahan wants to know!! Page Two: A moment later, aiding himself by the roughness and the bushes embedded in the faults, the son of Crao was climbing the rock face. As agile as "Those-who-live-in-the-trees", the monkeys, he reached the crest of the cliff. He had just hoisted himself onto the plateau when. Oh! Rahan should have been wary! Armed with maces and rocks, the hunters watched him silently. Your gazes are those that are cast on the enemy! But Rahan is not an Enemy! He does not fight with "Those-who-walk-Upright", His brothers! A wild clamor covered his words. The clan rushed at him. Page Three: Despite his strength Rahan could not resist this ferocious assault. Some hands mastered him, others snatched his knife. Others tied vines to his ankles and his wrists. Rahan is not your Enemy! The "Tiger-God" will decide! Each time the leaves come back to the forest trees, the cliff clan sacrifices one of its own! Capturing Rahan allows us to make our offering to the "Tiger-God" by sparing one of our brothers! The son of Crao understood that he was going to join the "Territory of Shadows", like those he had discovered at the foot of the cliff!! Page Four: He braced himself, resisting the hunters who pushed him towards the void. But his shackled limbs made his efforts in vain. Two steps from the void the hunters threw him forward. And that was his downfall! He saw the ground rising towards him where the remains of the hunters sacrificed before him lay. He caught a glimpse of the wide river. His body went through a thick bush, which slowed his vertiginous fall somewhat. He fell again, flush with the rock face. Rahan goes to rejoin Crao. Page Five: But this day was not, for Rahan, that of the "Great voyage to the land of shadows"! He smashed the branches of a shrub rooted in the rock. And while the shock ought to have been fatal, and while his skull should have broken. The son of the fierce ages was only stunned! Schronch! Accept the offering of the Cliff Clan "Tiger God". And spare our hunters until the next leaf season! And this strange thing Rahan wore on his belt!? A magic item, no doubt? The Chief of the clan examined the ivory knife. This primitive being did not know that it was a weapon, and how useful it could be. It is right to return the property of those who go to the land of shadows! Page Six: The man solemnly dropped the knife into the void. And Rahan caught a glimpse of the yellowish reflection of the ivory. He saw his weapon fall, the blade turned towards him. Would he be killed by his own knife? No! He rolled onto his side. And the blade stuck in the ground, two fingers from his throat! Shrpak! You will help Rahan to free himself! Rahan will not experience the fate of these unfortunates! Between the cliff and the great river, the shriveled skeletons were a macabre warning. Page Seven: Not far away a roar arose that the son of Crao knew was the “Tiger-God”! A “Gora”! The tiger with monstrous canines appeared. Rahan had already faced similar beasts, but only when he had been free to move. The "Gora" approached slowly, certain that its shackled prey would not escape. Rahan will probably die. But he will not die without a fight! Accustomed to the worst dangers, the son of Crao never resigned himself! He dragged himself on his stomach, and grabbed the handle of his knife between his teeth. Rahan has a tooth as formidable as yours "Gora"!! Page Eight: When the animal leapt, he rolled on himself, avoiding the claws. The red chest stood, drawn up above him. His head dodged the paw that sought his face. And his mouth, armed with the knife, delivered the first blow. On the cliff the clan gazed in amazement at this man who, feet and hands tied, dared to resist the "Tiger God"! The son of Crao struggled fiercely under the beast that pinned him to the ground. The knife once again struck the monster's side. And Rahan thought his jaw was broken! The "Gora" had thrown itself back, tearing the knife from his teeth! Rahan is Lost! He did not touch the heart! Page Nine: The tiger moved away with the blade still in its side. But Rahan knew he would attack even more furiously. The river! The River can save Rahan! The son of the fierce ages was trying to reach this water he knew was dreaded by the "Gora". Growling and roaring, the wild beast gathered to leap. But he did it a second too late. Relaxing his bound legs Rahan had just thrown himself into the river! Ra-ha-ha! The clamor of victory smothered the roar of the "Gora", who dared not venture into the water. Page Ten: But the son of Crao was not saved. With his feet and hands tied, it was difficult for him to stay on the surface. And to resist the prevailing current. On one side, the cliff that plunged into the river was unapproachable. It offered no accessible refuge. On the other side, the shore was denied to him by the "Tiger God", who followed him stubbornly. His limbs shackled. The cliff. The "Gora". The current. Anyone other than Rahan would have despaired, but Rahan never despaired!! His chest puffed up with air, he kept himself on the surface of the waves. Advancing in restless spasms, moving his knees. Page Eleven: The tiger, on the bank, always made a disturbing escort. The knife stuck in his side fueled his rage. The current became less strong and Rahan saw, in the middle of the river, a rocky island on which he could take a pause. With only his hobbled legs, he pushed himself jerkily and with difficulty towards this refuge, when. Everything is against Rahan! Everything! Everything! Just then, the tall reeds on the shore parted. A crocodile had seen him, and was swimming towards him! Could he climb onto the islet before the saurian reaches him? Courage, Rahan! You did not escape the clutches of the Claws of the "Gora" to die under the teeth of the "monster-with-wood-skin"! Page Twelve: The islet was very close, but he had to sink to avoid the monster. Who pursued his course for a moment! When the saurian turned around, Rahan was crawling on the refuge. Or rather he dragged himself there, on his back, on his stomach. Helping himself with his shoulders and his knees, he was bruised by the edges of the rocks. The "Wood-Skinned Monster" is as tenacious as the "Gora"! The crocodile, in its turn, hoisted itself heavily on the islet! Its little eyes stared at the panting man between the rocks. The same desire to live stimulated the son of Crao. Back “Wood-Skin”, back!! Page Thirteen: Whipping the rocks with its Enormous tail the saurian watched Rahan. As the little "Tiger-god" had, he thought that this man was at his mercy. But when he lunged forward the man was faster. His monstrous mouth met only emptiness! Crak! Plak! Rahan, who had thrown himself aside to dodge the attack, had lost his balance. The rocks between which he had fallen protected him from a terrifying blow of his tail. And the son of fierce ages suddenly felt under his feet the weapon he was hoping for. Rahan knows how the Swamp Clan gets rid of "Wood-skins"! When the enormous, open mouth fell on him, his feet rose, plunging the solid branch into it! Page Fourteen: Its jaws locked, the monster had thrown itself back into the waves, abandoning the islet to this man-demon. Rahan, observed with a smile his shoulders bruised by the rocks. If the rocks cut Rahan's skin. They can also sever his bonds. The sharp edge, in fact, easily sheared the vine fibers. Ra-ha-ha! An instant later, the son of Crao had the liberty of movement. Over there, on the shore, the "Gora" was still rumbling. Rahan can, Rahan must, take back his knife! Page Fifteen: Since childhood, the ivory weapon was his only asset. With value inestimable in these fierce times. Rahan will take back his knife! Even if he has to strangle with his hands! But it was difficult for him to pull himself up onto the bank! At each attempt the clawed paws almost cut his throat. A network of roots finally allowed him to set foot on the bank. Rahan is coming "Gora"! He will defeat you as he defeated the "Skin-of-Wood"! The "Tiger-God" rumbled. He gathered himself up when the man armed himself with a forked branch. Attack “Gora”! Rahan is waiting for you! The beast jumped up but was brutally pushed back. The knife had not touched any vital point, and the animal retained all its formidable strength. Page Sixteen: He savagely freed himself from the forked branch which pinned him to the ground. And Rahan had to step back to parry a new assault. Rahan will not kill the "Gora" with this branch! But, if he is as skillful as Crao was. There will be another way! An idea suddenly came to the son of Crao. When the beast went on the attack. He struck him in flight! Schlak! His aim was perfectly accurate! Under his terrible blow the ivory knife penetrated entirely into the side of the monster! Ra-ha-ha! The blade, this time, had reached the heart of the "Gora". The clamor of Rahan covered the last roar of the "Beast-God". Page Seventeen: An instant later. Crao would be proud of his Son Rahan! He felt with emotion the claws of the necklace that his father had once given him. Had he not, hands and feet tied, confronted the terrifying "Gora"? Had he not, hands and feet tied, confronted "skin-of-wood", who was, over there, still in trouble? A certain pride overwhelmed him. Nothing can defeat "Those-Who-Walk-Upright" when they hold on to hope and show courage! Shouts rose in the distance, at the bottom of the cliff of sacrifices. The clan searches for Rahan! Page Eighteen: And Rahan hates to fight with "Those-who-walk-upright"! The forest was near, which offered him a place of refuge. Shortly after, in ambush in the thickets, he saw the clan approach the cliff. The hunters rushed towards the dead tiger. The "Gora" was not a god, since Rahan killed Him!! We feared a being who was made only of flesh and blood! No longer, when the leaves return to the branches of the trees, will our Clan have to sacrifice one of its own! Never again! A kind of joy passed over this clan, whose hunters murmured the name of "Rahan" to each other with admiration. Page Nineteen: Where are you Rahan? Where are you, who survived the "Sacrifice?" Where are you who defeated the "Gora", and triumphed over the great river? Clamors and pleas redoubled. Show yourself Rahan! Come back among us, man-god! We will be your faithful! But the son of Crao could not hear them anymore. Light and fast, he was already far, leaping in the thickets. Each season, when the leaves repopulate the forests, a hunter will owe his life to Rahan! Rahan saw himself again, hurled from the top of the cliff of sacrifice. His heart beat happily at the thought that a man would never know this fate again. Page Twenty: Once again he had taught "Those-who-walk-upright" something. His brothers. Other territories awaited him where he would adventure tomorrow. Ha-ha-ha! So you don't want to share your domain with Rahan! Flocks of birds flew from the big tree where he was going to spend the night. Only a few monkeys remained, observing with curiosity this being which looked so much like "Those-who-live-in-the-trees". A sound like a volcano thundered. In the distance, Rahan thought of the heart of the blue mountain that had once annihilated his horde. And that made him the sole survivor, and the son of all clans, of all hordes. He fell asleep on this thought. One hand on his necklace of claws. The other on his ivory cutlass.

Forensic Science International, issue thirty three.1987, pages 275 to 298. A PRACTICAL TOTAL SYNTHESIS OF COCAINE'S ENANTIOMERS. JOHN F CASALE. State Bureau of Investigation. Accepted December tenth, 1980. Summary. A simplified total synthesis of the single enantiomers of cocaine and racemic cocaine is outlined. The synthesis employs common laboratory glassware, reagents, and methods which can be performed in most forensic laboratories. The procedure for the isolation and purification of the dextrorotatory enantiomer of cocaine is presented. Key words: Cocaine; Enantiomers; Total synthesis. Introduction. In many jurisdictions cocaine is listed as a controlled substance under statutes covering coca leaves and their extracts. Therefore only the levorotatory isomer of cocaine would be controlled. These laws do not include optical isomers and dia-stereoisomers. The question of enantiomeric composition has recently become popular with defense attorneys. Minus Cocaine is the naturally occurring alkaloid extracted from coca leaves. Racemic and Plus cocaine can only be obtained through a chemical synthesis. The molecular structure of cocaine was first described by Willstatter and Muller, reference one in 1898. It was not until the early 1950's that the principles and methodologies of stereochemistry were applied to cocaine's tropane ring skeleton. Findlay, reference two, Fodor reference three four, and others established the stereochemistry of the tropane alcohols and their esters. Once this groundwork was laid, the three-dimensional structures of cocaine and its dia-stereoisomers, pseudo-cocaine, alloco-caine, and allo-pseudo-cocaine, were elucidated by Findlay references five to seven and Hardegger et at, reference eight. Findlay's three-dimensional structures were confirmed in 1968 by Sinnema et at reference nine using NMR spectral analysis. Electron impact fragmentation patterns of the tropane alkaloids were later established by Blossey et al. reference ten. These workers identified the major mass spectral fragmentation patterns by deuterium and substituent labelling. Fragmentation patterns for various tropinone analogs have also been determined by Kashman and Cherkez, reference eleven.

Rahan. Episode Twenty. The Chief of Chiefs. Intrigued by these curious beasts that jump on the large water lily leaves, the son of Crao did not hear the man approaching. But, when the shadow of the brandished spear loomed near him. He instinctively threw himself aside, into the reeds. The Lance, missing its goal, burst the surface of the pond. Shrafil! Page Two: You have to be very cowardly to attack Rahan from behind! And very afraid to hide behind a "tree skin"! Why did you want to kill Rahan? As the son of the fierce ages had unsheathed his knife, the man, indeed, sheltered himself with his shield of bark. The chief of chiefs demands your death! The leader of leaders? Who is the chief of chiefs? Behind his shield the man had slyly seized his ax. This one suddenly flew towards Rahan, but followed the same path as the spear! Rahan will make you answer his questions man! Calmly unsheathing his ivory knife, the son of Crao walked towards this adversary whom he now knew to be unarmed. Rahan does not kill "Those-who-walk-upright"! But when some deserve it. Page Three: He treats them like this! The assault was so fast and so precise that the man rolled on the ground before he heard those words! He found himself on his stomach, paralyzed by the tree skin that Rahan was pressing him down with. Who is the chief of chiefs? Rahan wants to know! Speak! The man, nearly suffocating, told the son of Crao a very curious story. He was part of a large horde that lived nearby. We men are as numerous as these reeds. And we all obey the "ChakChak". The "Chief of Chiefs". As soon as he learned that an enemy was prowling our territory, he ordered him killed. And this "Enemy" is Rahan! But this "ChakChak" must be strong and wise to command hunters as numerous as these reeds! Rahan will be happy to meet him! Page Four: Rahan would hold his tongue, if he knew the "ChakChak"!! He is weaker than a woman, but more powerful than a wizard! Rahan does not fear wizards! He will see this "ChakChak"!! As for you, go where you want. But never attack Rahan from behind again! Stunned by such magnanimity, the man watched the son of fierce ages disappear into the thicket. The "Sun-Haired" enemy will be dead before the moon shines! Shortly after, going up the hunter's trail, Rahan came in sight of a village such as he had never seen before. Hundreds of huts were huddled around a gigantic tree. On a fork of this tree stood a hut larger than the others. That of the "ChakChak" no doubt! Page Five: In the center of this village in an enclosure, stood three large bamboo cages. In each roared a beast. This spectacle astonished the son of Crao. Who had never seen such a big village. Never seen a hut in a tree, never seen cages! Huddled in the vines, he dared not break cover, when. I encountered "The Enemy"! But he escaped me!! He said he would come here!! The man Rahan had spared was now standing under the big tree. A voice fell from the branches. He who lets the enemy escape deserves death! No! Don't call death on “Ba-Hok”, "ChakChak"! No! No! The hunter recoiled in terror. Page Six: Rahan saw him fall, and he lay motionless on the soil. No weapon had hit him and yet the man was dead! The chief of chiefs appeared at the front of his suspended hut. Thus will perish all those who do not carry out the commands of the "ChakChak!" This horde does not like its leader! They are afraid of him, thought Rahan. Indeed, all the hunters gazed fearfully at the great tree. Rahan observed for a long time this tree, this strange enclosure, these cages with wild beasts. The wailing rising from the copses tore him away from his thoughts. He descended from his perch, slipping silently towards the bushes from which these moans rose. Page Seven: And discovered a young boy squatting near the hunter struck down by the "Chief of Chiefs". Do not be afraid! Rahan means you no harm! Who are you? I am Lyakk, Ba-Hok's brother. I have to bury him far from the village, as is our custom! Rahan felt the body. Nowhere did he see a wound. How did the "ChakChak" kill Ba-hok? The "ChakChak" holds a magical power! He calls death. And death falls, all alone, on those who disobey him! Lyakk spoke of the "Chief of Chiefs" with a look that betrayed his fear. He never leaves his hut! He never participates in the hunt! Page Eight: But he demands the finest cuts of meat! Our horde hates him, but dare not appoint another leader! Because everyone fears that the "ChakChak" will call death against him. If the 'Chief of Chiefs' knew that Lyakk spoke to the enemy, he would know the same fate as Ba-Hok! He would call Lyakk under the big tree and death would descend upon Lyakk! Oh! Attention! Rahan heard the noises at the same time as did Lyakk. He plunged behind the thickets just as hunters appeared. These saw the foliage move. Perhaps they believed in the presence of a beast because they rushed forward, with their spears held high. Page Nine: As the flint points dug dangerously into the copse, Rahan had to break cover. Certainly, he could no longer flee! The spears came to rest on his chest, on his back, and on his side. The "ChakChak" will decide how the enemy should die! The captive was led under the great tree of the chief of chiefs. Who are you? Why did you violate our hunting territory? I am Rahan, son of Crao. And Rahan is the friend of all "Those-who-walk-upright"! He thinks he has the right to visit all territories! All territories!? So, we'll send you to an endless territory: “The Territory of Shadows!!" Page Ten: A moment later Rahan was thrown into the vast enclosure. As he had been left with his knife, he understood that the "ChakChak” intended to entertain himself at his expense. From the top of his tree, indeed, the Chief of Chiefs, issued orders. He invited the horde to witness the death of the enemy. The enclosure bristled with people. The looks of these men proved that they condemned the torture of the captive. But they dare not disobey the "ChakChak"!! Before joining the "Territory of Shadows", Rahan will show them how "Those-who-walk-upright" must fight!! They had just opened the three cages. Three big cats sprang out of them at the same time. A lion, a panther, and a puma. Rahan could defeat them one by one. But against the three at the same time, he is lost!! Page Eleven: Alone in the middle of the enclosure, the son of Crao was an unexpected prey for the beasts. Mixing their roars, they rushed forward. With a prodigious leap, Rahan dodged this first attack, and. Oh! Rahan has found it! He knows how to isolate them! The stupefied hunters saw the captive rush to a cage, pursued by the great lion. A clamor arose, the man and the beast were in the cage! Cutting through the vine, Rahan made the bamboo door fall! Schlak! Page Twelve: And while the frustrated panther and cougar growled outside the cage. Rah-ha-ha! Inside, Rahan confronted the lion in isolation! A moment later, he lifted the door. Your turn, "Baguae"! Rahan is waiting for you!! The door fell behind the panther that had just leapt. Schlak! You have fallen into Rahan's trap! The son of fierce ages dived. The ivory blade disappeared into the side of the beast. Ra-ha-ha! Rahan's clamor of triumph answered the admiring clamor of the hunters massed on the enclosure. In the big tree, the "ChakChak" growled in rage. Page Thirteen: Rahan could not repeat his ruse a third time. The puma, abandoning him, had given itself another goal: to flee the enclosure! Rahan does not have the claws of a wild beast! To escape he must find something else, this vine perhaps? Using the vine, he hoisted himself onto the cages. The hunters who had freed the beasts had no time to raise their weapons. Ra-ha-ha! Plak! And they were knocked to the bottom of the platform adjoining the enclosure! Rahan did not join the shadow territory that "ChakChak” wanted to send him to! The magic power of the "Chef of Chefs" cannot do anything against Rahan! Page Fourteen: The son of Crao defied the "Chief of Chiefs", who gave a treacherous smile. Rahan is a Valorous Enemy! The "ChakChak" would like to receive him in his hut! The spears of the hunters had missed the puma, which had just jumped on the trunk of the big tree. And climbed towards the mysterious hut. And Rahan once again witnessed the incredible. No arrow, no spear had struck the beast which fell on the ground!! So? What is Rahan waiting for to visit the "ChakChak"? Would Rahan be afraid?? The son of Crao hesitated. What was he was worried about!? This mysterious death of the puma troubled him. But Rahan wants to know, he thought. Page Fifteen: Rahan arrives, “ChakChak! Overcoming his fears slowly, very slowly, he began to climb the big tree. A terrible silence now hung over the village. Would not death, called by the "Chief of Chiefs", befall the daring one who challenged him? Rahan reached the platform of logs on which the hut stood. Objects were piled up there. The offerings of the horde, no doubt. He noticed the vine that ascended and was held by a spear. The "ChakChak" must use it to hoist the offerings! She will serve Rahan, if he has to flee!! Enter Rahan! I wanted to see more closely the face of the daring hunter that you are! The chief of chiefs, with a strange smile invited the son of fierce ages to enter his hut. Page Sixteen: Other objects were arrayed in the shadows. Those of my horde are very generous with me! They offer me everything! Necklaces. Shells. And reeds to make music. The "Chief of Chiefs" was indeed playing with a fine reed. Would you like to hear some music? As the black eye of the reed rose up towards him, the son of Crao suddenly understood! Rahan knows you can throw things with a reed!! Fit! He threw himself out of the hut, dodging the tiny thorn emitted from the blowgun! He had grabbed the vine, but wouldn't have time to let himself slide to the ground. The "ChakChak" was aiming at him again! Page Seventeen: So he swung in the void to avoid the mysterious projectile. This one buzzed past his ear like an insect. Fit. Infuriated, the cheat disappeared into his hut. He went to put a "thing-that-kills" into his reed, thought Rahan! Rahan, then, could have dropped to the ground. But the son of Crao wanted to know everything! He was catching his footing on the platform when the "ChakChak" reappeared, his blowgun at his lips. Rahan rolled onto his side and this time he saw the thin thorn stuck in a trunk. You are at Rahan's mercy, "ChakChak!" Page Eighteen: The chief of chiefs slipped a new thorn into his reed when Rahan appeared. Your "Magic Power" is therefore inside that! A kick knocked the earthen bowl out of the hut. But the "ChakChak", escaping from his adversary. Was already hanging from the vine. He wanted to flee! Rahan will help you get to the ground faster!! The ivory blade cut down on the line. Schton! Argh! Argh! And. The whole dumbfounded horde saw the "Chief of Chiefs" fall into the void!! Page Nineteen: This fall should not have been fatal. But, however, the "ChakChak" lay still under the big tree! Rahan has saved us from “ChakChak”! Rahan has killed the chief of chiefs! Clamors greeted the son of Crao. The "ChakChak" has killed himself, brothers! Come take a look! Close to the body, Rahan pointed to the ground, where. Countless thorns had spread. He died the same way that he kills yours. Struck down by his venom! He had no magic power! He could kill from a distance, cowardly ambush in his lair. It is by projecting those poison-coated thorns! With this! Page Twenty: And that is how he brought fear to your village! You will have to appoint another leader, brothers! Not a "Chief of Chiefs". But a simple and loyal, courageous and good leader for all of "Those-who-walk-upright"! Symbol of terror, the big hut was destroyed the same day. As was dismantled the enclosure where the "enemies" were sacrificed. Rahan did not attend to this. The clan had, as others had so often, wanted to adopt him. But Rahan did not want to be linked to a clan, to a horde. Because the son of Crao only wanted to be in one horde. That of "Those-who-walk-upright", of men! And it was in search of unknown brothers that he ran happily, his necklace of claws jumping on his chest, his ivory knife beating his hip.

Rahan. Episode Nineteen. The Forbidden Shore. The son of Crao observed the thin skin drying in the sun, while playing with a round stone. Rahan will soon be able to make a new loincloth! Yes. He could soon pound this skin to make it supple, as those of his horde did long ago. He sometimes looked at his reflection in the small polished marble slab that had been given to him by the clan of Tuburk, Why is Rahan's hair the color of the sun? Page Two: Why do "Those-who-walk-Standing" not all look the same, like their cousins, "Those-who-leap-in-the-trees"? And why night and day? And why the sun? And the rain? And the storm? In those early days of human history, Rahan was curious about everything. As he evoked the storm, the wind suddenly rose. A gust swept away the drying skin. Rahan will not let the wind steal his loincloth!! The skin fluttered above the thickets, like a strange bird. Another gust brought her back to the ground, behind the bushes where she disappeared. For a long time the son of Crao searched for his property. This shore was cracked with narrow fissures where the mud of the tides had accumulated. Rahan will have to skin another beast. Page Three: He was about to give up his search when he glimpsed the skin at the bottom of a crevice. Rahan cannot reach you, but he knows how to get you to him! A moment later he had tied a thin vine to the handle of his ivory knife. He was so preoccupied, that he did not sense he was being observed. What does "The Enemy" do? What is he fishing for in the veins of the shore? In other circumstances his hearing or his sense of smell would have warned this son of fierce ages of the danger. Rahan threw his knife, quite straight, on the skin that rested on the mud. Rah-ha-ha. His victory cry rolled to the other shore as he gently lifted the skewered skin. Page Four: He was grabbing this one when the men rushed out, brandishing their stone maces. The enemy who violates our territory must die! Stop Men! Rahan does not fight “Those-who-walk-upright”! Indeed, it was repugnant to the son of Crao to face those of his species. But this time he had no choice! He jumped to avoid the assailant, but his ankles got caught in the vine. Lying on the ground, he saw the man diving on top of him. As the club was about to fall, he stretched out his arm which held the ivory knife. Argh! This man rolled on his side and the second assailant, terrified by this response from "The enemy" fled screaming. Page Five: The ivory blade only scratched the hunter's chest. What cursed weapon did you take Tanirk's life with? Rahan did not take Tanirk's life. Tanirk is only injured and Rahan knows how to heal this injury! Here is Rahan's weapon. The son of Crao showed the knife still attached to the thin vine. Suddenly he jumped! The folded skin, slipping on this line which had passed through it, lay a few steps away. When Rahan heals Tanirk. He will think about this very curious thing! For the wounded hunter, a man who spared his adversary and who raved about a vine, could only have lost his mind. Page Six: At nightfall, however this hunter suffered less. The blood of the "sun-fruits" calms the strongest pains. And if Tanirk knows how to keep leaves on his chest, his wound will tomorrow close like the lips of the mouth close! Rahan's knife went through the skin. While Tanirk fell asleep, the son of Crao returned to the mysteries that preoccupied him. And the whole vine slipped into the two holes! And now Rahan can attach the skin like this!! The son of the fierce ages who knew how to tie knots, including the flowing knot of a lasso, was still unaware that another system of attachment could exist. Page Seven: This new way of joining two skins was a revelation. Rahan has found a way to never lose his loincloth again! Rahan had amazing faculties of assimilation. A moment later he cut a long, thin thorn. It will pierce the skin better than the knife. Pinching a thin vine fiber in the notch, he made that night what was, perhaps, the first "Needle" in the history of mankind! But if this rudimentary needle pierced the skin well, it let the fiber escape, stuck at each pass. Pock! The hole should be a bit bigger. Big enough to let the fibers slide. Rahan could not invent the "Eye" of the needle. Page Eight: But he knew how to carve his thorn in such a way that it could bore a passage slightly wider than the notch pinching the vegetal thread. At dawn, his clamor of triumph woke up Tanirk. Ra-ha-ha! See Tanirk, see! In the past, when Rahan ran through the bushes, he sometimes lost his loincloth. It slipped from his belt. But now it cannot slip. The son of Crao proudly tapped the hem of his new loincloth, the hem through which passed the skin belt bearing the lizard sheath The face of Rahan suddenly became somber. A group of men appeared in the distance. Your clan searches for you, Tanirk! It is you they're looking for!! No one has ever ventured onto our shores without losing their life! I would like to help you, Rahan! Alas I, I can neither run. And not even walk! Page Nine: But you have a small chance of escape. From the wrath of mine. By taking refuge in the “Great Vein”! Go Rahan. Although, whatever may happen to you. Tanirk will never forget the strange "Enemy". You helped him! Go! Go! It is time!! The men who spread over the immense shore might have been more fishermen than hunters, for all brandished long harpoons. Rahan is not a fish! He will not let himself be captured by this clan! The son of Crao knew how to see without being seen. From bush to bush he crawled on the beach. What Tanirk calls the "Grand Vein" is down there! Page Ten: The "Great Vein" was a much larger crevice than the others. Opening from the shore, she zig-zagged to the distant forest. Borrowing is indeed the only way to reach this forest without being spotted. But before arriving at the "Great Vein" Rahan risks being seen ten times! The shore, up to this fissure, offered no retreat, no hiding place. His hiding place? Rahan will take it with him!! The son of fierce ages quickly uprooted a small bush. A moment later, he was crawling behind this frail rampart. The men with the harpoons shouted at each other furiously. Some sometimes looked in the direction of Rahan, who then froze, hiding himself behind his bush. Page Eleven: He was only a stone's throw from the "Great Vein" when a clamor arose. The men had just discovered Tanirk. Taking advantage of this unexpected diversion, he rushed towards the crevasse. Though it was deep he jumped in. The "Great River" must run through it very often! Unlike the other silt-soaked cracks, this one was lined with pebbles. However, the clan was surprised to find Tanirk alive. "The enemy" wanted to make Tanirk suffer more! He introduced poison into his body! Orbk. Is mistaken! Rahan wanted. To heal him! Page Twelve: Lies! Who has ever seen an enemy heal the one he has just defeated!? Rahan is not an enemy like others, Orbk! In these wild times the generosity of the son of Crao exceeded the understanding of the members of the clan. Their leader, Orbk, tore off the leaf bandage. Argh! And the man who had witnessed the fight between Tanirk and Rahan jumped. The blood flowed! And flowed! And now, now! The closed wound was no more than a thin gash! Does Orbk admit he was wrong? No! Rahan has closed the wound so that his poison remains in your body! Before the end of the day, You will have reached the territory of shadows, Tanirk! Page Thirteen: The son of Crao, however, had just come up against a curious obstacle. Rahan has seen nets like this before, he thought. But the fishers of "The Black Island" plunged them into the Great River! Why did the brothers of Tanirk place it here? As a dull rumble rose from the shore, Rahan understood. The waters of the "Great River will come here. The fish will throw themselves into this trap! He was pulling himself up in the mesh when. The “Enemy” Orbk! The enemy is hidden in the great fissure! The fishermen stood out against the sky. Harpoons flew towards Rahan, who had just taken refuge behind a projection. They will not allow Rahan to climb the net, Nor to cut the meshes! Rahan must turn back! Page Fourteen: The water quickly invaded "The Great Vein", and reached to the height of his hips, his chest, and then his shoulders. Klack! Ploch! The son of Crao knew that the "Great River" came out of its bed every day, then returned to it. He heard the hunters bustling on each side of the crevasse. Rahan has only one way to escape these men! He let himself sink under the foam, in these waves which always rose. He knew how to "Crawl under water" as well as on the surface. And, despite the strong current, he kept away from his enemies. He saw fish of all shapes and sizes. Carried by the flow, these would foolishly throw themselves into the net. Page Fifteen: The current became less strong. But suddenly. Rahan is trapped, like those fish! A second net was raised in front of him! Those who don't get caught in the first net get caught in this one, when the "Great River" recedes! Rahan cautiously returned to the surface. No one saw his face in the middle of this foam. Rahan can no longer get out of the water without being seen! Obrk and his men busied themselves happily on both sides of the "Great Vein" where the water now lay. The catch will be good, brothers!! They greeted with a clamor each jolt shaking the nets, this one signaling a new catch. And we will bring back the corpse of “The Enemy”! Page Sixteen: Tanirk, still very weak, had been carried there by his brothers. You are witnessing our fishing for the last time, poor Tanirk! But we have avenged you! We killed the one who introduced the great evil into your body! However, the son of Crao was going through an agonizing situation as he tried to cut through the mesh of the net. A school of strange fish had begun to circle around him. For fun, perhaps some bumped into him with their long bony noses. But let Rahan alone! When he breaks through this trap, you can run away with him!! Page Seventeen: Oh! A similar misadventure had already happened to the son of Crao, when he was faced with a young mammoth! Rahan swooped behind the fish which was carrying his precious knife but this chase was in vain. The fish disappeared very quickly and he himself, suffocating, had to come back to the surface. Without his knife, Rahan has no chance of fleeing!! But he will not surrender! This time the fishermen again did not see his face. And he dived back to the net. Crao said: "A brave man always has a weapon with him, even if only his fingernails or his teeth!!” Page Eighteen: A moment later, he was biting furiously at the vines of the net, hacking, crushing, and slicing one by one the vegetable fibers. Memories of his wild childhood assailed him. He remembered the lion cub which had attacked him during his sleep. And he had to attack with another weapon, with the engorgement of his teeth! But Rahan was not a beast. He only has human teeth! And this exhausting effort forced him to come back to the surface more often. The great river is retreating! It was indeed in reflux. The fish threw themselves blindly on the net. Page Nineteen: Of which he had only been able to cut a single knot! In a moment Rahan will be uncovered and he won't even have the strength to fight! The waters evacuated the "Great Vein" even more rapidly than they had invaded it. The fishermen howled with joy. Pointing to the countless fish that thrashed about in the meshes of the two nets. Oh! And here is the best catch! Suspended from the net like a spider on its web, the son of the fierce ages gasped. Exhausted, he did not see Orbk the chief approaching. Who raised his harpoon! But! No Orbk! Don't kill him!! He healed me look! He healed me! You were wrong, Orbk! Page Twenty: Tanirk jumped and gesticulated happily among his brothers. Orbk wants to admit its mistake! But the enemy will have to tell us his secret. All of his secrets! Orbk can have. Can ask for everything. Right away. Rahan does not ask for anything in return. When the sun dipped into the "Great River", the hostility of the clan had long since given way to admiration. We found your weapon on the nose of an "Espak". Take it back! Had Rahan not revealed the secret of the "Blood-of-the-fruits-of-the-sun", and many others still? But the son of Crao was still talking. Was it not his destiny to teach to some what he learned from others? Was he not the link between all men, "Those-who-walk-upright", his brothers?

Rahan. Episode Eighteen. The Demon Tree. When the big green lizard heard the sound of the leaping man, it was too late. Rahan's fingers had already closed on his tail. Shortly after the son of Crao made a new sheath for his knife. The lizard’s tail will grow back. And Rahan's cutlass will be better protected in this sheath than before! The sheath of thin skin quickly took shape. Page Two: Rahan was attaching it to his belt when. What is it? Could a piece of sun have fallen in the valley! Intrigued, the son of the fierce ages moved cautiously towards this shimmer that rose from the large flat rocks in the distance. A moment later he was in the middle of these marble slabs, some of which were more polished than his ivory knife. Oh! After starting for a moment, Rahan burst out laughing. It is the sun shining on rocks! And that man, that is Rahan! On the highly polished plaque stuck in the ground, the son of Crao saw himself as in a mirror. Rahan is made thus? Page Three: He had certainly seen the reflection of his face before. In the still waters of the pools and puddles of rain. But it was the first time that he saw himself entirely, from head to toe! Amused, he waved his arms, observing this image which repeated his gestures exactly. When his trained hunter ear warned of possible danger. Someone is approaching! And Rahan prefers to surprise than to be surprised! A large dead tree stood nearby. He pulled himself up into the branches, unaware that the real danger lay above him! He caught sight of the large live boa on the upper branch at the same time as he glimpsed the approaching man. Don't move "Boak" don't move! Rahan means you no harm! Page Four: But the reptile probably did not intend to share its refuge. He slowly uncoiled his head, and pointed it at Rahan. He could no longer back down on this branch which was in danger of breaking. And no vine allowed him to escape the reptile. The armed man had not seen or heard anything yet. It is you who will help Rahan, "Boak"! Diving on the snake, Rahan seized it behind the head. You will serve as a vine!! Suspended from the reptile, the son of Crao swung in the void towards the heart of the tree where the branches divided. Page Five: He let himself fall on this new refuge and suddenly thought he was sinking underground! Bloum! The dust and the fragments of worm-eaten wood accompanied his fall into the trunk. Hollow all the way up! The man arrived on the scene heard a dull noise from the heart of the tree. But he only saw the reptile. If the "Boak" attacks, Rahan will not be able to defend himself! Rahan also saw this serpent, through the breach of the hollow trunk. The trunk was too narrow to allow the son of Crao freedom of movement. And the worm-eaten wood, crumbling under his knife, prevented any ascent! Page Six: "Those-who-walk-upright" must help each other! This man will surely help Rahan out of this trap! Holes in the bark let the daylight filter through. Over here, brother, over here! Oh! What are you doing? What are you running for? The terrified man, fled screaming, and answering his cries other men ran to him. A demon threatens the horde! He took the form of a tree! The tree spoke to me! It wanted me to go to it!! Clasping their spears, the hunters approached the tree. Inside which the boa had just slipped! You will not suffocate Rahan without suffering, “Boak”!! Ah! Page Seven: The son of Crao pushed the reptile's head away from his face but he could not free his weapon arm. Rah-ha-ha! Rahan's battle cry reached the hunters. Strike! Strike! Kill the Demon! Rahan heard a snap. Schrach! And saw the flint point of a spear, which had just passed through the bark of the trunk! Bracing himself, he pressed the reptile's head on this unexpected weapon. Tsit! The embrace loosened. The "Boak" was dead! Ra-ha-ha! The devil challenges us! Kill, brothers kill!! This clamor of victory that rose from the tree, unleashed the anger of the clan. Page Eight: The men threw their lances with such violence towards the trunk. That the flint points perforated the bark from all sides. Schtoum! Schtoum! And never had the life of Rahan, the prisoner of this strange trap, been so threatened! The sharp spikes shoot out from everywhere. Up to his chest, from his face, and above him. They were fortunately stopped by the bark, but would not some burst through? The situation of the son of Crao was distressing. But he had, as always, an idea that could save him. These spears will help Rahan ascend up there! Page Nine: A moment later, leaning on the spearheads that bristled inside the trunk, he rose out of the trap. Zlang! He soon freed himself from the trunk. Around the tree the hunters screamed, and threw their last spears. They can't do anything more against Rahan! They have no more weapons! A cry of terror greeted his fall from the branches. The demon has taken on the form of a man! Let us kill him brothers! Let us kill him! But by the time the hunters pulled their spears from the bark, the son of Crao had already disappeared into the thickets! Page Ten: Shortly after, hidden near the waterfalls, he caught a glimpse of a sparkle on a mound. Then another on a nearby mound. They use the "Shining Stone" to send signals, thought Rahan. They "Speak" with the light of the sun!! In fact, the men of the clan were playing small slabs of polished marble under the sun. One of them spotted Rahan near the falls and signaled his presence. An instant later, the son of the fierce ages was himself surrounded. Behind him, the falls. In front of him, and to his sides, the menacing hunters. Rahan will not fight without reasons with "Those-who-walk-Upright"! Once again, Rahan wanted to avoid combat with the men, his brothers. Page Eleven: The water surged between his legs with such violence that at each step he risked being dragged into the cataract. Stunned by so much audacity the hunters had regrouped. The man, demon will not escape the clan!! Tuburk will kill him! Their leader, bravely imitating Rahan, ventured into the rushing current. Stop, "Man-demon"! Tuburk challenges you! Tuburk cha. The son of Crao did not hear the howl, covered by the roar of the falls, but he saw the unbalanced man. Slip into the torrent, disappear under the bubbling foaming waves, and reappear in a calmer area. He does not know how to "crawl on water"! Rahan must save him! Page Twelve: The bewildered hunters saw the man-demon plunge from the top of the falls. Once again Tuburk had disappeared under the eddies. He was semi-conscious when the son of Crao brought him to the surface. The hunters lie in wait for Rahan, but the river is with Rahan! Supporting Tuburk, the son of fierce ages was drifting with the current when. Ohh! Tuburk will kill you! In a desperate gesture, the chief of the clan had snatched his knife from Rahan, and was looking to hit his rescuer! To which he clung. Argh! You cannot do anything against Rahan! You who cannot crawl on water! Tuburk had to drop the ivory knife. Page Thirteen: And Rahan was faced with a cruel dilemma. Abandon the man to recover his precious weapon, or abandon the knife. Rahan wants you to live. But he also wants his knife. Vlang! Closing the stunned Tuburk's nose and mouth, Rahan dragged him to the bottom of the river. His cutlass was there, wedged between the pebbles. In spite of coming to the surface with Tuburk, the clan howled relentlessly. Shortly after, he was helping his adversary to pull himself up onto the bank. Without you, Tuburk would have joined the territory of the shadows. Why did you save him!? Page Fourteen: Because Tuburk showed his courage by following Rahan across the falls when he can't crawl on water! Rahan admires brave men! You can go back to your people, Tuburk! Mine will drive me away! The law of the clan says that he who does not triumph over his adversary is unworthy of being chief! At the instant when Tuburk speaks, he knows that his place is already taken by another! Loork, maybe? He had been waiting for this moment for a long time. So why did Loork not go after Rahan, like you dared to do? A pout of bitterness puckered Tuburk's lips. Loork is a strong, very strong man. But he does not have that loyalty and courage that make great hunters! Perhaps he did not dare to confront: The demon man! Page Fifteen: Rahan is not a Demon! He is a man like you! And he will prove it to yours! Let us go Tuburk! Night was falling when the two men arrived at the village of Tuburk. Here and there torches were burning. Tuburk is back! Tuburk and the demon-man are here!! I am not a demon! Demons do not exist! I am Rahan, the son of Crao! And I am Loork, the new leader of this Clan! And Loork will do what Turburk-the-weak could not! The man had sprung from the darkness with his spear held high! He rushed towards Rahan who, amazingly, remained motionless, firmly planted on his legs. Had the son of Crao chosen to die? Page Sixteen: His spear pointed, Loork charged wildly and Rahan still didn't flinch!! It was only when the flint point was about to penetrate his chest that his hands grabbed the spear, blocking the weapon, stopping the man in his tracks! The arrest was so rough that the spear broke. So unexpected that Loork rolled on the ground. He only rose again under the grip of Rahan. Loork charges more stupidly than the buffalo. And his face is uglier than that of "Those-who-walk-in-the-trees"!! See! See! See! In front of the marble slab where Rahan had dragged him, Loork grimaced with rage. Page Seventeen: Tuburk dared to face Rahan despite not knowing how to "Crawl on water". And Loork, he wanted to kill him without any risk! Your clan will decide which is the bravest! The hunters cheered Tuburk but still eyed Rahan suspiciously. Was his last exploit not that of a "Man-Demon"? Follow Rahan! He will show you how you could have mistaken him for a demon! The son of Crao led the hunters to the great dead tree. Rahan wanted to avoid a "Boak". He fell into the hollow trunk as he called for help, one of you thought the tree was talking!! Because certain hunters guarded a skeptical pout, Rahan threw a vine at the tree. Look, listen, and understand. Page Eighteen: A moment later he was sliding inside the trunk, screaming at the top of his voice. Do you hear?! Rahan is talking to you, not a demon! He was at the bottom of the "trap" on the body of the "Boak", when suddenly a light shone on him! A torch fell on him, instantly igniting the worm-eaten wood powder and the inside of the tree! Those cowards want to burn Rahan! The son of Crao heard the angry cries of the hunters. But why did they not cut this vine? He quickly climbed the vine as the flames crackled around him. Page Nineteen: He threw himself out of the burning stump and fell on a branch, expecting a volley of arrows and spears. But nothing happened. Over there, Tuburk was haranguing his hunters. Loork's treachery proved he was not worthy of our clan! Between the clan and the blazing tree a man was stretched out, three arrows stuck in his back. Rahan recognized Loork! Jump Rahan! Jump Brother! We are happy to have been able to prevent this cruel deceiver from cutting the vine. And Tuburk recounted how Loork had projected his torch into the trunk and how his people had prevented him from satisfying his cruel lust for vengeance. Page Twenty: The “Demon Tree” blazed all night long. You should stay among us, our clan needs loyal hunters like you! Rahan cannot choose a clan, or stay in a horde. Because he loves all the clans, all the hordes! So accept this offering! The small marble slab glistened more than the still water of the ponds. When he took the road to the mountain Rahan made the sun play there. To respond to the sparkling that the clan emitted, saluting his departure. Then he crossed a coast that no one had crossed before him. What mysteries, what wonders of life, what men awaited him in this new territory? In those fierce times, these were the only questions that Rahan, son of Crao, asked himself.

Rahan. Episode Seventeen. The weapon that flies. Attracted by the clamor of defiance, Rahan came running and saw the child awaiting the shock of the young Mammoth charging him. This little man seeks death! This adolescent was too frail to stop the monster's onslaught. Why does he not run away before being crushed, thought Rahan. Oh! If Rahan does not act, the little man is lost! The spear had slipped on the beast’s chest. A defensive riposte had just thrown the young hunter to the ground! Page Two: The cry of combat of the son of Crao thundered in the clearing. Ra-ha-ha! You will not defeat Rahan so easily, "Two Teeth"!! It is Rahan who will strike you down!! As once did the daring hunters of his clan, he threw himself on the tusks. Unbalancing the young monster, that sagged heavily to the side. “Two-teeth” will die! Rahan was about to strike when a tusk rose, snatching away his knife. Oh! The point of this tusk had, by chance, caught the lanyard of the knife! Suddenly disarmed, the son of Crao saw the mammoth get up and charge. The knife beat against the tusk, ivory against ivory. Page Three: All this happened very quickly and the child, Stunned, saw his savior leaning against a tree. This hunter is crazy! “Two teeth” will crush him against the trunk! The Mammoth no longer charged. He marched heavily towards the man, his forehead bent. Approach, approach thought Rahan. You cannot imagine the trap that Rahan is preparing for you! The tusks were going to pin him against the tree, with its head pressing on his chest. When he suddenly bent down, circled around the trunk, and grabbed hold of the curved tusks! We have it, little man! We have it!! Bring your spear!! Slide it behind the teeth of this stupid beast! The mammoth was determined to free itself. Page Four: But the son of Crao, braced against the tree, held on until the moment when the solid spear replaced him. Very good, little man, very good!! But "Two-Teeth" can still escape us. We will consolidate this trap! The boy was confused. A moment later Rahan had tied the spear to the tusks, using vines. And now Rahan would like to know your name. I am Lohic. And to find out why Lohic dared to face a monster like "Two-Teeth" alone! The adolescent’s face was sad. My clan chased me out because I am not strong enough. I never bring game. Page Five: Clan law is terrible for weaklings. This is why Tayak said yesterday: "Lohic no longer has a place among us! Lohic must leave!" And you hoped, by killing the "Two-Tooth", to regain the esteem of your clan?! Yes! That is what I wanted! Rahan has met many clans where the savage law of force reigns! He hates this law, and he will tell Tayak! Take Rahan to your people, Lohic! Why did you help me? Why do you want to go see Tayak? Because Rahan would not like Lohic to live the life that was his! Rahan remembered his own childhood after the eruption of the blue mountain that had decimated his horde, after the death of Crao his father. Page Six: Rahan had to flee the inhospitable clans. He had to live alone, in the jungle, like a beast! He doesn't want other little men to live like this! A village appeared from which arose hostile clamors. The clan hunted Lohic! Why does Lohic dare to violate clan law! Lohic is a brave hunter, Tayak! Rahan saw him face "Two-tooth"! You lie! A "Two-teeth" belongs to you! Follow Rahan and you will see that he does not lie! What happened? Speak Lohic! Shortly after the clan hunters discovered the mammoth, so curiously entrapped. This trap astonished them, and irritated their leader. Page Seven: The child told how Rahan had captured the beast. And the irritation of Tayak kept growing. Would Rahan be stronger than Tayak!? Rahan does not know. We will find out soon enough! Tayak rushed at the son of Crao, brandishing his heavy club. And this club, on a simple parrying gesture from Rahan, slipped from his fingers. Tayak only knows the strength of wild beasts. He ignores the skill. And trickery. Tayak is a beast!! Indeed, the chief of the clan clung wildly to his adversary. Clack! His hand met the ivory knife, which he ripped at savagely, slicing the sheath of skin. Page Eight: But he did not have time to use the weapon. Rahan's grasp compelled him to drop the knife. Rahan could kill you, but he hates to kill "Those-who-walk-upright"! Yes, Rahan could have killed you, even from a distance. Like this!! Schronch! The ivory knife, thrown with skill, was embedded in a slender tree trunk. Rahan was about to recover his weapon, when Tayak's angry cries rang out behind him. Capture him! Capture him! Tayak wants this "Weapon-that-flys"! The thickets were very dense. The son of Crao disappeared. The severed sheath could no longer receive its knife. Page Nine: And he had to slip the blade under his belt, as before, before he invented his sheath. The whole clan had chased him and Lohic himself showed a lot of enthusiasm. If Lohic captures Rahan, the clan will keep Lohic! More agile than his elders, the faster teenager soon outdistanced them, and Rahan saw that he was very close to him. Lohic dived onto the fugitive's legs, and rolled on the ground with him! Ohh! Rahan would have quickly thrown the child down, but the men of the clan were already springing up from all sides. Page Ten: They force Rahan to fight! Oh! The son of Crao felt his belt. His knife was gone! He had lost it! And while the attacking pack subdued Rahan, Lohic hid the knife that he had managed to steal from him. Lohic allowed the clan to capture "The Enemy"! Lohic has proven himself! He will stay with the clan! A glow of pride passed in the eyes of the adolescent. Lohic has earned the respect of his brothers! For himself, Tayak was watching the captive’s belt. Where did you hide "The-Flying-weapon"? Tayak wants this weapon!! Page Eleven: Rahan lost it while he was running from your hunters. The young Lohic looked away. Revealing his hiding place. He did not want Tayak to steal the knife he coveted as much as the chief of the clan. So he was silent. Bring "The Enemy" back to the village! Along the way the hunters scanned the ground, hoping to find "The weapon-that-flies". But in vain. Shortly after, they killed the young mammoth whose remains were dragged to the village. If Rahan's trap prevented "Two-tooth" from escaping. It can prevent Rahan from escaping from Tayak! When the animal had to be skinned, the captive's ankles were bound between the heavy tusks. Rahan can regain his freedom! On one condition! Page Twelve: That he makes a "flying weapon" for Tayak! The chief of the clan threw flints and a piece of ivory near to the son of the fierce ages. To make a knife like Rahan's it takes as many days as ten times the fingers of two hands!! Tayak knows how to wait!! But he wants a thin, sharp weapon. And that flies as does yours! From then on began for Rahan a strange captivity. During the day, under the eyes of the intrigued hunters, he fashioned the piece of ivory. But when night came, his hands were tied behind his back and two of Tayak’s men watched him. Page Thirteen: He remembered how he had stolen it from the chief of the river clan, who wanted to kill him. And once the knife of ivory, this knife, had become his only asset. Rahan will never be able to make a knife like his! Although he scratched and shaped from morning to evening, the piece of ivory remained almost as coarse as on the first day! Sometimes young Lohic passed him and he thought he could read remorse in his eyes. Rahan understands you Lohic. By allowing his capture, you have earned the respect of your people! And the flints are chipped to remove thin shavings of ivory. Shavings far too fine! It was one evening, passing near Tayak's hut that Lohic felt his throat constrict. And when he's finished "The-Flying-weapon", what will we do with him? Page Fourteen: He humiliated Tayak in front of the clan. He deserves death! We will kill him!! The young hunter rushed into the jungle. Lohic doesn't want Rahan dead! Rahan saved me, Rahan wanted to help me. A moment later a ray of moonlight hung a yellowish reflection on the blade of the knife which he had concealed there. That night his guards had dozed off and Rahan was gazing at the barely formed weapon. He heard a noise. Chaf! A knife. His knife! It had just fallen near him! Page Fifteen: He caught a glimpse of the frail silhouette slipping away between the huts and understood. Lohic wants to help Rahan! The bonds do not resist the knife, stuck between the roots. However, a slight screeching disturbed the silence. He had just cut off the lines binding his ankles when one of the guards jumped. Rahan does not have time to run away! The man suddenly shook his fellow, pointing out the location where the captive should have been. This one had disappeared! Only one tusk was lying on the ground! Doubtless dreading Tayak's anger, these men did not alert the others! Rahan, amused, saw them wander here and there. Page Sixteen: The ruse had succeeded, and he was hanging from the curved tusk that had allowed him to pull himself up under the foliage. He saw the hunters coming back to the tree. They watched without understanding the tusk and the severed bonds. He could not fly away like a bird! Saying these words the man mechanically raised his eyes. And he caught a glimpse of the white shape huddled under the foliage. That was all he saw. The second hunter had not recovered from his stupor before he was sent to join his companion! Page Seventeen: Lurking behind a hut, Lohic had witnessed this brief fight. His eyes lit up as Rahan disappeared into the thick undergrowth. Lohic has paid his debt to Rahan! When Rahan is away, Lohic can alert the clan! Lohic was too young to know all of Rahan's tricks. When the shouts rose in the village. Not only had the son of Crao not fled. But he had retraced his steps to the outskirts of this village! As Crao always said, “You never think of looking for game that is already in your cave!” From his perch, Rahan saw the clan scatter, and spread across the forest. Page Eighteen: Tayak howled, leading his group in pursuit of an "enemy" who was there. Behind him! Lohic, now admitted by the hunters, led the pursuit without conviction. Let us go back to the village! What does it matter if he escaped us! Besides, does not Rahan walk upright like us? Why would "Those-who-walk-upright" fight like wild animals?? Crouching up on a low branch, the son of Crao saw this group return to the village. He heard these words. And his heart beat faster. These words were ones he liked to hear. The sky was turning pink on the horizon and all the hunters were returning. Page Nineteen: They do not imagine that Rahan stayed here! Rahan can now go! But the son of Crao wanted to see Lohic once again, before leaving this territory, to which he would probably never return. He surprised the adolescent at the edge of the river. Oh! I thought you were far from here! Rahan wanted to say goodbye to the one who will one day be the chief of the clan! What are you saying? The day will come when "those-who-walk-upright" will reject the savage law of force! Only those who acted as you did will be worthy of being their leaders! Farewell, Lohic, farewell! Page Twenty: The brushwood closed in, definitively this time, on Rahan. When the sunlight touched the foliage, he was already far, very far away. For this son of fierce ages this adventure was already forgotten. Others were waiting. But as the ivory knife beat at his hip and he risked losing it, he only thought of a new sheath. This tail will be as solid, as flexible as that of the panther! And then it will grow back! The large lizard that lazily whipped the warm rock with its tail could not have known what was going to be taken from it. The big lizard could not hear the son of Crao, who could crawl quieter than a reptile.

Rahan. Episode Sixteen. The Necklace of Claws. When the battle clamor of "The one-who-walks-upright" thundered through the jungle, the beasts went to ground and even the chattering parrots fell silent. Rahan appeared. Carried away by a Great Elk, which he rode and struck with his ivory knife. Rahan has promised the two little men that they will eat today. Rahan will keep his promise! The Elk collapsed as a mortal blow was struck. In those savage times when everything was a struggle for life. The son of Crao triumphed once again. Ra-ha-ha! Page Two: An arrow suddenly sliced into the side of the beast he was about to carve. Usually, the men with "No-hair-on-the-chin" do not have this audacity! Yes, do you dare to hunt in our territory!! I am Rahan, son of Crao! And Rahan, when he is hungry, hunts were he wants! Rahan will never go hungry again when he reaches the Territory of Shadows! The men came closer, their bows stretched, their flint points raised. Rahan has always believed that "Those-who-walk-upright" should help each other! He is ready to share the "Beast-with-frontal-horns" with his brothers! The clan of the sources never shares with the enemy! Squatting, Rahan hugged the Elk’s hind legs. Page Three: Yah! He suddenly sat up, snatching the heavy beast from the ground. Spinning with it! The hard, wide antlers brutally mowed down the men. Whose bows he broke a moment later. Crack! Crack! Rahan could kill the hunters from the clan of sources. He has the right! But Rahan does not like to steal the life of "Those-who-Walk-Upright"! Calmly the son of Crao cut a large quarter of meat. The rest is up to you! Farewell! The clan will take revenge! It will kill the man "Without hair-on-the-chin"! The thickets closed behind the son of fierce ages. Night would fall soon, and he knew that these hunters would not track him down before daylight. They are too afraid of darkness, as Rahan once was. Page Four: But Rahan is no longer afraid of the night, nor of the fire, nor of the thunder from the sky, nor of the endless rivers! Rahan often thought of his distant childhood. The visions of that dreadful night still haunted him. When the blue mountain had vomited its entrails and had decimated his whole horde. And he sometimes relived the last moments of his father, Crao the Brave. Since you are the only clan survivor, this necklace belongs to you! Always be worthy of what it represents Rahan. Each of the claws that beat against his chest represented a quality of "Those-who-walk-upright", of men! There was that of "Courage". That of "Loyalty". That of "Goodness". And throughout a tumultuous youth, where it had often been necessary to kill not to be killed, Rahan had kept the oath he had made to old Crao. Page Five: By bringing this meat back to the two hungry "Little Men" he had discovered the day before, he was still keeping this oath! Wait, little wolves! Rahan knows a much better way to eat meat! When the fire sprang from the "stones-that-throw-stars". The children froze. Could Rahan do everything? So did Rahan know everything? You bring us back to our own, since you can do everything! Hum, Rahan will try. No, the son of Crao could not do everything. And he was still unaware of many mysteries of this hostile and fierce world. Perhaps, quite simply, he thought more than his fellows. The meat would be much better if it did not touch the fire. Like this! Page Six: Had not Rahan learned to "crawl on water" and build a Raft? Had he not challenged the ocean to chase after the sun? Had he not learned to camouflage himself like the chameleon? To throw the boomerang? To pole vault? Had he not discovered a curious way of catching fish? And invented the sled, and the blowpipe. Did he not know of imitating Nature? Throw "bridges" over the precipices to escape his enemies? Had he not, facing the most barbarous hordes, traversed the strangest territories? Page Seven: And how many beasts, and monsters, had succumbed under the blows of his ivory knife! Yes, Rahan will try to find your clan! The sun was high the next day when he discovered a track. Hunters have passed there! But those of your clan or those of the clan of sources? Ours were not that numerous Rahan! Attention! Over there! In those bushes! The son of Crao had already glimpsed the flint spear points. We warned you, Rahan! We told you that you would join the territory of shadows! A jump backwards, legs apart. Rahan just avoided the spear that would have ripped him open. Follow Rahan, "Little men"! And try to run as fast as him! Page Eight: A moment later the curious monkeys witnessed a dramatic manhunt. But these quarrels between "Those-who-walk-upright" were very amusing to them! Greek! Greek! As spears stuck dangerously around children who could not keep up with their companion. Who retraced his steps, and brutally uprooted a spear. Are the hunters of the clan of the sources such cowards to attack "little men"! That their leader, who is so proud of his chin hair, agrees to fight Rahan!! Recognizable by his necklace of shells. The chief retreated cautiously under the foliage, and encouraged his people. Do not spare the enemy! Strike! Strike! Page Nine: Oh! The spear was thrown with such violence that the point disappeared into the tree trunk! Schkrack! Rahan could have made you visit the land of shadows before him! But he prefers to have a little fun! The hunters came running to free their leader, who was gesticulating furiously and was nailed to the tree by his fur. Rahan will not escape us! The river will stop him! Rahan and the children were already far away. The head of sources is right! His clan knows how to "crawl-on-water". And we do not! The large river shimmered in the sun. The son of Crao dived into it. Fear nothing! Jump! You can cling to Rahan! Fast! Jump! Page Ten: Overcoming their fear, the children obeyed. A moment later they clung to Rahan. They have arrived! They have arrived! Usually the son of Crao "crawled" marvelously in the water. But here, the "Little Men" hampered his movements. A few spears broke the surface behind the fugitives, who had arrived at the middle of the river. Plokf! Plokf! Plouch! The hunters had thrown themselves into the water and were approaching very quickly. These men swam with astonishing ease. And Rahan suddenly felt fingers closing around his ankles! He only had time to push off the "Little Men" before being dragged under the water. Page Eleven: The children, left to themselves, instinctively found the gestures to stay on the surface, and even to move forward! They reached the shore. We. We know how to "crawl on water"! But where is Rahan? Where is Rahan! He could see nothing of the terrible fight that was taking place at the bottom of the river. Between the son of Crao and two men from the clan of sources. Although very extraordinary swimmers, they failed to master their opponent. One of them treacherously tried to strangle him. But fortunately for Rahan, the fine vine of the necklace of claws broke. Clak! Page Twelve: Three, four, five other silhouettes suddenly proliferate in this greenish world. Rahan cannot face all these men! He must flee! Freeing himself, Rahan returned to the surface. Here he knew how to outrun the hunters of the clan of sources. A moment later, in fact, he had rejoined the "Little Men". The dense forest offered a secure refuge. "The treacherous man" has kept Rahan's necklace. And as usual, he will hand it over to his chief! What must Rahan do!? Without his necklace, the son of Crao felt Naked. But he hesitated only for an instant. Forward, "Little men"! Rahan will find his necklace later! Page Thirteen: The sun was setting and his young companions began to show their concern. The night will soon arrive. When they discovered a new track. It is here! This is where we lost the clan! This is our Valley! Our horde lives here! This track was indeed the right one. Huts appeared soon after, under the light of the setting sun. The son of Crao had rarely known such a warm welcome as the one given to him. We had no longer hoped to recover our little ones, Rahan! Our hunters had taken them with them. For an introduction to mammoth hunting. But the charge of the herd scattered us, and the little ones got lost. Page Fourteen: Thank you for your aid, and for bringing them back, Rahan! Our clan is now yours! You can stay with us! Rahan will perhaps return to his brothers, when he has taken back his collar from the men of the sources! We will help you! We will go with you! And you will kill men from the sources! And the men of the sources will want revenge! And it will be war between your clans! Rahan does not want that! Rahan will act alone! For any help, the son of the fierce ages accepts only information on the situation of the village of the clan of the sources. That is why the moon was still shining when he came in sight of it. Wide streams shimmered in the valley. Huts stood on a bank. Page Fifteen: The incessant lapping of the water on the pebbles effectively made his approach undetectable. Rahan will have to find the hut of the chief! He was crawling in the darkness when a familiar growl sent him to the ground. A Gora! They have trained a Gora! The son of Crao knew this custom from some clans. The "Saber-toothed-Tiger" was about to roar, alerting the men of the clan! And in spite of the line which shackled him to a rock, he could still leap! Rahan leaps up first, trying to stifle the beast's roar. But the ivory knife struck too late. Hunters had heard and emerged from the huts. They embraced their spears, and peered out into the darkness. Page Sixteen: Rahan threw a large pebble, then a second. Crao sometimes used this trick, he thought to himself. At the sound of the stones, near a distant stream, the men rushed forward. Clak! Clak! Encouraged by their chief, who remained in front of his hut. Find and kill whoever dares to disturb Zaroak in his sleep! Rahan was at present crawling towards his hut. Zaroak leaves his men alone to face the unknown. Zaroak is a coward! Zaroak had already fallen asleep again, his necklaces spreading around his hirsute face. He did not hear the son of Crao. Page Seventeen: The ivory blade cut only one necklace: the one with long claws! Schlok! And when Zaroak sat up, bewildered, this blade was already resting on his throat. Rahan has come to reclaim what is his! Rahan could have killed you when you wanted to steal his game. He did not do it! Rahan could have nailed you to the tree when you were hunting the "Little Men". He did not do it! This night Rahan could again kill you: But he will not! He will do something else! The cries of the disappointed hunters rose in the distance. Rahan's fist flew to the bearded chin, sending Zaroak back to sleep. Did you not say that men "without-chin-hair" were weak beings? Page Eighteen: Shortly after, the son of the fierce ages fled happily into the night. Under the moon, each of his strides raised sparkling splashes. And Rahan was laughing, and laughing. While offering to the breeze mysterious things that it carried away. Tired of their vain searches, the men returned to their huts. The Gora is dead, Zaroak. But we found nothing! When their leader did not answer, they entered his hut and. Oh! It is "Rahan-the-cursed" who humiliated me like this! This angry face, beardless and hairless, was it that of the fearsome Zaroak? They had to wait for his first words to be convinced. Page Nineteen: This merciless tonsure was indeed the most cruel of humiliations, for this being who had nothing but contempt for men: "without-chin-hair". Rahan was now out of danger. And he bounded nimbly over the embankments. Ra-ha-ha! When he used a vine to cross a ravine, his joy was redoubled. The fibers of the vine reminded him of the thick curls of Zaroak's beard and hair, which he had scattered in the wind. The claws of the necklace rattle again on his chest, and the feeling of having become the "Son of Crao" again was very sweet. How reassuring was the touch of his faithful ivory knife, whose sheath of skin beat on his hip. Page Twenty: Rahan has his necklace! He has his knife! And his brothers are waiting for him! Rahan is Happy! His return to the village where he had brought the "Little Men" was cheered. Does Rahan want to eat with us? Our children have just taught us an incredible way to make fire! And they claim that the meat, grilled on this fire, is much better! The two children proudly invited Rahan to approach. This one did not blame them for possessing the “Secret-Of-Fire”. Discoveries spread quickly, among "Those-who-walk-upright"! And it is very good that way! Rahan was only one member of this immense horde of men. Men who lived in those fierce times. That is why he took his place among this clan, modestly awaiting his share of meat.

Rahan. Episode fifteen. Death to the Manta. The seagulls which accompanied the raft which the current carried towards the island suddenly dispersed, leaving the sky to a gigantic bird. And this albatross dived towards the raft. The son of Crao had seen the danger. Rahan is not a fish! Why are you attacking him like this? He dived, narrowly avoiding the deadly attack from the beak. Page Two: After regaining height, the albatross returned to the attack. But Rahan knew how to parry this one. He slipped under the raft. The shadow of huge wings darkened the surface then disappeared. Ten times Rahan had to repeat this strange game, ascending to breathe in a breath of air and taking refuge under the skiff as soon as the bird swooped down on him. Without a doubt tired, the albatross finally disappeared. The large beach of the island was now very close. An instant later. Where did the river without end lead Rahan? Do “those-who-walk-standing" know this territory? Do they live there? Page Three: The bamboo forest that bordered the beach seemed welcoming. Rahan plunged into it without fear. Oh! "The mother of mothers"! The wooden idol that stood in the clearing was proof of the presence on this island of "Those-who-walk-upright", of men! As evidenced by these fish drying in the sun, hanging in strings from vines. But the men who live here leave very strange traces! Do they only have one leg? These traces that Rahan had just discovered in the sand, in front of the mother of mothers, had been left by a single foot! Page Four: He had not recovered from his stupor when men rushed towards him. The man from the realm of sunshine stole the fish that we entrusted to the "mother of mothers"! Capture him! The son of Crao sprang into the forest. But he knew nothing about this one, and could not escape these men. He was quickly rejoined, surrounded. Rahan only ate a fish! Would that be a crime in the eyes of your clan! Smack! Ah! A bamboo suddenly drawn and released violently slashed Rahan's temple. We finally have the stranger who has been stealing our fish for days! He must be punished! Take him to the village! Page Five: A little later. I am Rahan the son of Crao! Rahan arrived on your land only a moment ago! Therefore he cannot be guilty of what you accuse him of! The chief of the clan had only one leg, and it explained to Rahan the strange traces discovered in front of the idol. Tooboo just wants to believe Rahan. But Tarook, our sorcerer, saw you eat a fish. It is true! Rahan did eat “a” fish! Rahan thinks that "Those-who-walk-upright" should never refuse a fish! We acted as Rahan thought, once! But things have changed a lot since the "manta" chose our bay to make into its lair! Tooboo had an honest expression. But his face was sad. Page Six: Since Rahan gives us his word that he only ate one fish, we have to believe him! Give him his freedom! Tarok the sorcerer had a sneer of rage. If other fish are stolen, we will remember that Tooboo protected the culprit! A little after. Friendship does not seem to reign between the wizard and Tooboo! Tarok is furious since the men had to cut my leg. Because all his incantations were useless, and the venom of the "Manta" would have infiltrated to my heart. It was at that moment that a fantastic thing sprang from the sea, offshore. Rahan had never seen something so strange. What is that Tooboo? “La Manta”!! Page Seven: She has been prowling around here for many moons. The giant ray leapt once more to the surface, and then disappeared into the depths. Our fishermen can no longer venture offshore, and that is why fish have become so precious to us. Why do you not kill this monster? We have tried, but this thing is impossible, Rahan. Because the tail of the manta carries a sting that secretes deadly venom!! During an attempt to kill her, I was struck by this sting in the ankle. If my men had not cut off my leg, I would have joined the territory of the shadows! Page Eight: As the wizard approached, Rahan became mischievous. Should not Tarok's incantations drive the "Manta" away from your shore!? There is no prayer to hunt the "Manta"! We cannot do anything against her! The "Spirits" who visit me at night affirm it! Rahan does not believe in "Spirits"! He does not believe Tarok, whose language produces more deceit than truth! Tooboo's protection makes Rahan insolent! But Rahan will never be able to contradict Tarok about the "Manta"!! Ha! Rahan will capture the "Manta"!! Rahan will kill her!! Just then, the monstrous ray sprang out of the sea, ten arrow-shots from the shore. Page Nine: Shortly after, under the astonished gaze of the clan's fishermen, Rahan shaped a tough root. These men only know how to fish with a net, he thought. Tarok growled with rage because Tooboo had ordered him to put himself at Rahan's disposal. And See! The Manta trap is finished! The two barbs of this "Hamecon" were enormous, in measure with the monster that had to be caught there. And now Tarok, Rahan needs a very long vine! Hum, follow me! A moment later Rahan climbed nimbly towards the foliage. This vine supports his weight. But she will not take any more!! And he will not survive such a fall! Rahan was very high when the wizard treacherously gripped to the vine. Page Ten: Rahan's instinct was such that when the vine stiffened beneath him, he was ready to ward off danger. He caught a vine in flight just as the other broke! Clac! You were right to test the vine, Tarok! She was too fragile. And this one suits Rahan better! Rahan's irony made the wizard's hatred grow even more. And while the son of Crao was preparing his "Manta Trap", she appeared from time to time in the middle of the bay. Rahan needs a strong bamboo, Tarok! Do you want to cut. Page Eleven: This one? It did not displease Rahan to amuse himself at the expense of this cheat, that he knew wished he was dead! If Rahan defeats the "Manta", he will ask the hunter clan for his wizard, Tarok! Rahan will go to see the "Manta" at dawn Tooboo! Could Tarok accompany him to ward off bad luck?? No! No! It is not possible! The "mother of mothers said that Tarok should never go to sea! The "Mother of mothers" advises Tarok of very curious things!! But it is of no importance! My son Tibik will be your companion Rahan! Page Twelve: The Raft, which Rahan had preferred to a clan boat, was reinforced. You are a brave boy Tibik! I am thinking of Tooboo's leg! I will avenge him! Rahan and Tibik have the same goal: "Death to the Manta"!! That evening the clan prepared for the adventurous fishermen a meager but fraternal meal. Rahan asks everyone to give him a fish: he will need bait to attract the "Manta"! All put a fish at Rahan's feet, Except Tarok-the-sorcerer! So, the son of Crao, guessed who was stealing the fish before he arrived on the island! However, he was not suspicious when Tarok offered him a drink. Throughout the night I will ask the "Good spirits" to protect you! Page Thirteen: But Tarok was going to do more than summon the "spirits". He slipped to the hut where he knew Rahan was bedded down with a drug. And this one, stunned by the "Powder of sleep" did not feel the hand draw his knife. Tarok could kill you! But it's useless, the "Manta' will take care of it!! The deceiver went and cut several fibers from the vine that Rahan had coiled on his Raft. Then returned to replace the ivory knife in its sheath. Profit from this sleep Rahan! You sleep for the last time!! Page Fourteen: The son of Crao never knew why he had slept so soundly. He joined Tibik at the Raft. And was greeted by cheers of the clan massed on the shore. A moment later the Raft was sailing out to sea. Rahan calmly impaled fish on his "trap". Then he unrolled the long vine, smoothing the bait towards the depths. We will probably have to wait, Tibik. It was indeed a long, a very long wait. From the shore, the clan watched the tiny skiff. But suddenly, rising from the murky depths. Page Fifteen: A terrible jolt projected Tibik into the water. Engulfing the bait, the "Manta" was trapped, and it dragged the Raft along. Clinging to the skiff, whipped by the foam, Rahan proclaimed his victory. Ra-ha-ha! The sea monster arose in front of him, rose to the sky, and tumbled back into the waves. Ra-ha-ha! Rahan has captured the “Manta”!! A still more terrible shock caused the Raft to sink. But it suddenly came back to the surface. And Rahan understood the drama. The vine had broken! The "Manta" had escaped him! We will have to start from the beginning, my poor Tibik! Page Sixteen: They had followed this short struggle from the shore. Among all these disappointed men only one hid a smile. Tarok the Sorcerer!! But suddenly. The manta returns! She attacks the raft! Indeed, the monster emerged from one side, and then from the other. The terrible tail armed with the venomous dart whipped the raft. Rahan and Tibik had to throw themselves into the water. But they risked becoming bait themselves for the giant ray! Whose "Wings" raised huge waves! Rahan will kill the “Manta”!! Page Seventeen: Amazed, Tibik saw his companion climb onto the raft and grab hold of the sturdy bamboo. Strike “Manta”, strike!! Buttressed and holding the bamboo like a spear, Rahan was taking a fantastic risk. Let the dart strike his face, or his chest, and it was certain death! If this sting marked a limb, it would be amputation, like Tooboo! As Rahan had hoped, the monsters tail became impaled on the bamboo. Ra-ha-ha! All is not lost Tibik! See here what we can replace our trap with! While the "Manta" redoubled its assaults, Rahan made a lasso of his vine. Page Eighteen: Schoo! A fantastic roar went up on the beach when he threw the wide loop towards the tail of the "Manta". We have it Tibik! We have it!! Indeed, the loop constricted and was retained by the Bamboo. No trap, no hook could be more effective than this one! And the monster who plunged back into the depths must have felt it. Once again the raft seemed to fly on the waves, sank there and reappeared. But the vine this time did not yield! She will get tired Tibik! She will get tired! Flat on his stomach on the skiff, Rahan cared neither for the waves nor the spray. Page Nineteen: Indeed, the monster was getting tired. He no longer ventured on the surface and he thrashed about less harshly. Did you not say that the “Spirits” claimed we could do nothing against the “Manta”, Tarok? Uh, Uh. To your boats, brothers! It is high time to thank Rahan for this lesson in courage. And also to give him aid! A moment later all the fishermen of the clan were moving towards the Raft. This one had just come to a standstill. A gigantic body emerged on the surface. The exhausted "Manta" was defeated, and fluttered its "Wings". Fifty harpoons flew away at the same time. Page Twenty: Shortly after, the monster that had terrorized the island was lying on the beach, in the bright sun. Rahan had stolen one of your fish. He offers you this one. Everyone will have their share! The sardonic son of Crao bent to cut off the terrible sting from the tail of the beast. This one is released to Tarok, whose words are more poisonous than this dart! But where is Tarok? Over there! A boat pulled away towards the horizon. He could not stand your victory, Rahan. He leaves us. And I am sure our clan will not mourn the departure of its sorcerer. But how it will mourn yours! And the son of the fierce ages, the son of Crao, was happy. It is that he always drew his joy from that of "Those-who-walk-upright", his brothers.

Rahan. Episode Fourteen. The New Trap. Rahan, who knew how to observe nature, was often surprised by her caprices. The curious way in which this creeper had grown, which coiled like a snake, was it not one of them? But in these fierce times, it was necessary to remain on the alert. The son of Crao sensed the danger more than he saw it. His hand clenched on his ivory knife, and he faced the hairy being that suddenly sprang from the thick copses. Go away! Rahan does not fight with those of your kind! Page Two: The resemblance between the great ape and "Those-who-walk-upright" always troubled Rahan. As the gorilla rushed forward, he wanted to avoid the fight. But his foot became caught in the vine and he was brutally ensnared. His knife escaped him, and had fluttered ten paces from him! Rahan thought his opponent was grabbing his ankle. But it was not so. The gorilla pounded its chest before attacking. And what prevented Rahan from crawling towards the knife, was the vine! Baoum! Baoum! The creeper that mysteriously fastened itself to his ankle! Rahan cannot grab his knife! Rahan is lost! Page Three: But he will not be sent to the territory of the shadows without a beating! The gorilla approached slowly, as if he understood that the man was at his mercy. When the powerful arms encircled him, the son of Crao released his battle cry. Ra-ha-ha! The gorilla, suddenly freeing his opponent, jumped back. This clamor from Rahan seemed to have terrified it! When the son of Crao raised his cry again, the great ape fled, disappearing deep into the thickets. Ra-ha-ha! Oh! Ha-ha-ha! If Rahan just has to shout to make the enemy flee, crossing this territory will be easy. Page Four: Forgetting that he was still bound, Rahan wanted to recover his knife. And found himself nose to the ground! The vines of this country are more dangerous than the great ape! Amused, the son of Crao loosened the vegetal knot. He knew how to tie certain knots, but the way in which this one was formed, on its own, intrigued him a lot. Long after he had freed himself, he remained perplexed. Rahan wants to understand! When he saw the vine, it was crawling like this. His gift for observation was such that he easily formed the loop, put his foot in it, and pulled. Page Five: And the vine closed again on his ankle. Rahan understands! The knot sinks! The knot slips! And the vine closes! Rahan is now aware of how to tie up his enemies much more quickly! Perhaps it is thus that in the first ages of humanity, a man, copying nature, invented the "slipknot"? Bind them? Why would he not capture them with this trap? If the trap can crawl on the ground like the snake, it can also fly like a bird! The skillfully projected loop ended encircling the tree stump! The gorilla must have shuddered in the distance as he heard the triumphant clamor! Ra-ha-ha! Rahan has discovered a new trap! Page Six: Shortly after, the son of Crao climbed on a ridge. Rahan wants to know if “those-who-walk-standing-up” live in this territory! He soon overlooked immense forests hollowed out by deep ravines, dotted here and there with wide rocky plateaus. His gaze fell on one of them. Down there, between the rocks, a whole troop of great apes was busy. But the activity of these great apes was very strange. “Those-who-live-in-the-trees" don't roll stones like that! Rahan wants to know more! Night was falling when the son of the fierce ages, slipping between the rocks, reached his goal. Page Seven: Behind the stones of which they had made a rampart the hairy beings snuggled up against each other. They protect themselves from the cold of the night as the clan of Crao once did! Rahan was wrong! Whoever attacked him was not a great ape. But a man! Rahan felt a deep turmoil. The old Crao had told him about these primitive clans. "Those-who-almost-walk-upright" said Crao. A stone suddenly came loose under Rahan's foot, breaking the silence. Over there, the hairy beings stood up, worried. Chtoc! Chtoc! Chtoc! Page Eight: They uttered strange grunts. Grah! Gurgh! “Those-who-walk-almost-upright" Do not speak! This is why Rahan's adversary was afraid of his cries! Rahan will not be able to make himself understood by these beings! He must avoid them! He must flee from them! Here and there silhouettes jumped in the rocks. The monkey men were looking for the intruder! One of them caught sight of him, silhouetted against the moon! The narrow cornice suddenly crumbled under Rahan, who caught himself on a thin projection. Rahan will not be able to return to the heights. Indeed, the wall was too smooth to be climbed. Page Nine: A bottomless, vertiginous chasm opened up under Rahan, who knew that he could not maintain his hold for long. The new trap! Only the new trap can still save Rahan! But to throw the vine on a projection that he saw, he had to cling to the rocky wall with one hand!! It was a terrible effort. So terrible that he let go the instant the knot tightened on the outcropping! Argh! His fingers tightened on the line. He was saved! He could pull himself up! No, not yet! Page Ten: Grah! Gurr? The cry he had uttered when he thought he was falling into the void had attracted the monkey-men! They peered into the darkness of the abyss. If they see Rahan they will kill him! The male monkeys were obstinate. They saw nothing but they remained there! Gur! Ur! Gur! Gaa! Gaa! These "Gaa" sounds reached the son of Crao, who had just imagined a more comfortable way to wait. And the night passed slowly. Under Rahan was the unknown void. Above was the danger, also unknown. Page Eleven: Indeed, a question haunted the son of Crao. What fate did “those-who-walk-almost-upright” reserve for their enemies? The darkness finally dissipated. The first light of the new days silhouetted the peak of the tall trees and the profiles of the ridges. The mists lifted under Rahan, revealing a large lake. No! Rahan can't dive from so high! His whole body would burst! It was suddenly a drama. One of the monkey-men had just noticed the line. Ga! Gaa! And the son of fierce ages felt himself slowly rising towards the rock protrusion! If Rahan screams to scare them, they will drop the line! Page Twelve: Intrigued and curious, the monkey-men hoisted up this mysterious burden. Graa! Graa! Graa! Graa! They groaned deeply when Rahan's bust appeared. Some seized heavy stones. Behind him the void! Before him, the clan of hairy beings! The son of Crao had no other way out than to fight! The first stones were falling around him when a long howl arose. A member of the clan arrived. Graa! It was a female, who was holding to her chest a small inanimate figure. Page Thirteen: The ape-men, forgetting the “enemy”, suddenly seemed distraught. Gga! Gah! Grah! They act like the hunters of Mont Bleu, when a little one was sick thought Rahan. Memories assailed Rahan. He remembered how the mothers of his horde healed the "little Men" with Sun Fruits. Entrust your little one to Rahan! He will cure him! A great ape-man, the chief probably, brandished a flint. Graa! Graa! Since you do not understand Rahan, Rahan must act! Leaping towards the moaning female, the son of fierce ages snatched the little one from her arms, and escaped into the nearby forest. Page Fourteen: The disarray of the ape-men had allowed Rahan to escape. But the clan would quickly give chase and track him down. Vague growls were already rising in the distance. Rahan has often succeeded in hiding in the foliage. He climbed into the branches of a tall tree. Forgetting that his pursuers were nimbler than him in this kingdom of foliage. The chief of the clan was faster than the others, whom he outdistanced. And he glimpsed Rahan between the branches! Graa! With astonishing agility he hoisted himself towards the fugitive. Rahan could dive into the torrent. Page Fifteen: But cold water is no good for the sick child. The new trap once again came to the aid of Rahan. Its loop encircled a branch of the opposite bank. The son of Crao heard a "graa", furious as he crossed the torrent. He answered it with a laugh and abandoned the vine. And he let himself fall on a thick carpet of moss. Ha-ha-ha! His laugh redoubled when he saw the monkey-man gesticulating on the other shore. Ha-ha-ha! You are afraid of water! Page Sixteen: And while the chief of the clan was looking for a ford to cross the torrent, The son of Crao had discovered a shrub with sun-fruits. His ivory blade slashed one of these fruits. If the blood of the fruit doesn't heal you, Rahan will have done everything he can do! Carefully he squeezed the juice of several fruits between the thin lips that he rolled up. The head of the clan suddenly appeared, hammering his chest. Bauom! Bauom! Ra-ha-ha! Rahan bellowed at the top of his lungs. But believing that the little one of his clan was in danger, the "monkey-man" was unafraid! Page Seventeen: The son of fierce ages, cornered at a precipice, saw his formidable adversary charge, a branch in his hand. This time, he thought, Rahan must fight! Yes, this time Rahan had to fight and kill! To kill, so not to be killed! Ten steps from him the "Monkey-man" flourished his branch! It flew about suddenly and struck his wrist with such violence that the ivory knife slipped from him. He saw his weapon fall over the precipice, towards the greenish lake. The son of Crao then only thought of his knife. And he did what he had not dared before. Risk the incredible, the fantastic, dive! Graa!? Page Eighteen: He saw the green expanse rising towards him. He saw the miniscule ivory knife that fell under him, with him. The yellowish spot grew and grew and grew. He only thought of his knife, which he had to grab on the fly. His fingers suddenly closed on the sharp and biting blade. But he did not care! The lake rose steeply towards him. Would his limbs break? Would his belly burst when it came into contact with the water? No! He remembered the swimmers of the river clan, who knew how to dive from such heights! Like them, he stretched his body. His head disappeared between his arms. And it was a human arrow that pierced the green waters! Page Nineteen: Rahan had the impression of sinking into the "endless-river". But he lived! He lived and he clutched his cutlass! A moment later, still dazed but happy, he floated to the surface. High up on the cliff, the horde of ape-men stirred in the sun. Were they a new hazard? Gaa! Gaa! No! The chief of the clan lifted above his head a little monkey-man who was also gesticulating. Gaa! Gaa! And the whole horde hailed this mysterious "Being-with-smooth-skin" who had brought her little one back to life! Crao was right. "Those-who-walk-almost-upright" one day will walk upright. Page Twenty: Something had just gripped his ankle that reminded him of the "New trap". Oh! But it was only long seaweed from which he easily freed himself. Rahan had had a fine day! He discovered the "New Trap". And he taught "Monkey-Men" to heal their young! Happy, he swam towards the shore where other perils lay in wait. Where other mysteries awaited him. For such was Rahan's destiny, the son of Crao, the son of fierce ages. Because such was the life of "Those-who-walk-upright". Men many centuries ago, many centuries ago!

Reptile. Episode Eight. Chaos and Destruction. Summary: Thanks to Mark Bowen, the police know now the sinister secret of Professor Andros Androphis, who has the power to transform into a reptile and whose avowed purpose is to dominate the universe by terror! But, despite all their efforts, Mark and Inspector Manning cannot prevent the terrifying character from forcing the officers and the soldiers of a tank regiment to submit to his will, and with whom he now marches on London. How will the government react, Manning? I do not know. At this moment there is a dramatic discussion in Parliament. Indeed, in Parliament. He is mad! Less crazy than you think, maybe! We must send fighter-bombers, that's all! Ordah! Ordah! All I have to offer is my blood, sweat, toil and Body Odor! Quiet please! Page two: It was now impossible for the authorities to keep secret the events that they no longer knew how to control. And there is strong talk of sending fighter-bombers to stop the advance of the reptilian armour! No! The boys who are in his tanks have nothing to do with it! The government can't sacrifice them like this! Already great demonstrations were organized. Government Resign! No planes against our unfortunate soldiers! Out! One last flash, Dave! The crowd is marching on parliament! Who can predict what will happen? Page three: At the moment demonstrators are invading the base from where the intervention forces are supposed to take off! No planes against our unfortunate soldiers! If you try to take off, we will destroy your planes! Mark Bowen and inspector Manning hovered over the mad crowd in a helicopter. It is chaos Mark, and you would think professional agitators were happy to add fuel to the fire! Chaos! That's just what this human snake wants, so he can rule over us. Let us land! It is rotten down below! Page four: What are you orders sir? We have orders to take off. I know that very well. But, can we shoot our brothers in arms in the tanks? No! You will not be able to! Let the government find another way to stop the armor and get rid of this Reptile! Hey! A helicopter has just arrived! Maybe we will have some fresh news? Kindly, listen! I'm Inspector Manning from Scotland Yard. I do not think you understand exactly who Reptile is. Sure we know who it is inspector! A crazy old professor with a clown costume! Page five: Not at all! The professor, Mark Bowen, here. Who was Professor Androphis' assistant will explain to you. He was the assistant of this monster? So he is definitely in cahoots with him! Calm down, please, in the name of the law! I am afraid that words are useless, my poor Manning. So. What is this? Boom! Page six: Bon Jovi! Its reptile with the tanks! He is wanted dead or alive! I am your master to all! You owe me absolute obedience! Good grief! The tanks are invading the airfield! They aim their weapons against our aircraft! Boom! Boom! Boom! It’s wild in the streets! Page seven: Blam! Blam! Kaboom! Let’s leave before they fire on us! Save your selves! Run for your lives! Head for the hills! Hey! The government! The government must do something quickly! The government is far away, Manning. It is up to us to act! Reptile looks towards our helicopter. The cannon of his tank swings towards us. Page eight: Demolish, hiss, that device! At my command! Huh! Huh! My blood is heating up in my veins! My strength is ebbing! I become a man again! He is re-metamorphosing into a man again Manning! We must seize this opportunity! Alright Mark! Page Nine: Bowen, you young fool! You will not get me! I have a bulb of my marvelous potion! Your potion, here you are! As Bowen throws a stone at the professor, knocking the potion from his hand. Huh! No! Page Ten: You do not have me yet, little fool! Misfortune! He had time to enter the tank and close the turret! Klang! We still await your orders, master! Will you shut up, you little fools? Huh! The blood freezes in my veins! My strength grows, increases, multiplies! I metamorphose! No need to waste precious shells! Driver! Reverse gear! Page Eleven: Argh! Damnation! Bowen He's falling off the tank! Vroom! Ha-ha-ha! He is at my mercy! Crush it! Mark! Mark! Page Twelve: Guh! You will pay for that! Sorry to upset you, Professor Androphis! Hurry up! Hurry up! Hiss! Aim this, hiss, piece, hiss, at those fools! Oh! It is impossible to shoot them! The other tanks can bear on them! Order everyone! Cut off the route of these two men! Page Thirteen: I believe that we are baked! Bang, bang! Drop me, Manning! I can stand on my legs very well! Sorry Sergeant, but I have no choice! Blam! Thwack! Argh! Let us take shelter here. Bang, bang! What shelter? Between the tanks! They will finally get us. There is a solution! Come! Page Fourteen: Let's pull the sergeant out of the hatch! Understood! Eh? What, what are you doing? I do not think we have much time to talk, Mark! Excuse us! We will have a nice chat about this later! Smack! Thump! Whack! Good! And now Manning? I once served in the "Royal Armored Corps”! Let us see if I can still drive this kind of cart. Page Fifteen: Be careful when starting, Mark! What are you going to do? Vroom! Give Reptile his own coin! Do exactly as I tell you, Mark! The next instant! Vroom! Are they cursed? They will pay for this! After that warning shot, let us finish it! Watch out Manning! Do not forget that there are perfectly innocent boys in that tank! Page Sixteen: Ka-rumpf! Just a shot in the tracks, to stop that chariot. Those idiots! They will pay for that! For the moment I have to slip away! But I have not said my last word! What is happening? He threw smoke grenades. Where did he go? No idea. With the powers at his disposal, he may very well be invisible in the vegetation. He can take on their colors, like a chameleon! Page Seventeen: It was not Reptile's means of escaping Mark Bowen and the Inspector. He was at their feet, in a drainpipe. Huh. It is terribly narrow, even for me. Not far away. It is crazy, their trick! Do you understand anything about it, Jeff? First of all, tanks destroy our planes. And then they shoot each other! The radio, what does it say? The most complete panic! London is upside down! The government has barricaded itself in Whitehall. This Reptile has wreaked havoc everywhere! Exactly, young fool! Eh! What is? What! Page Eighteen: And again, the secret ring of the terrible character spat twice its stupefying liquid. Muf! Urgh! Ha-ha-ha! Hiss! You are in my power, hiss! At the same time. We will have to take the crews of these tanks to the hospital, Mark! They are like zombies, yes! And, you will see, when they are no longer under the effect of the drug that the professor administered to them, they will not remember anything! What's going on at the base? A bomber is in motion! Attention! He is heading towards us. Page Nineteen: Professor Androphis is on board! Get down! Throm! Where shall we take you, Master? Ha-ha-ha! To London of course! What a pity that we didn't reduce these little fools to a pulp! So, according to you, there are bombs on board? Of course, since it is one of the bombers which was to attack the tanks! He is headed for London! Page Twenty: A little later, while dozens of military ambulances took away the soldiers of the still dazed tank crews. Of course sir. But you still have to have the time. They evacuate the capitol? And. Do you know what the Prime Minister has imagined? Someone would have to break into the reptile’s bomber. It is quite simple of course! Just land on a cloud and hitchhike when the cuckoo shows up! No! There is a pilot here who is the king of acrobats. One of the guys who perfected the technique of in-flight refueling at supersonic speeds. I see! You still have to find a guy crazy enough or with a death wish to be dropped on the bomber and. Page Twenty-One: It is all decided, Mark! You! You know her Reptile well enough to stand up to him. You have proven it. Wait! Wait! Am I dreaming? Ou-la-la! And, a little later. It is a very small variant of in-flight refueling. Of course you will be attached with a strong nylon rope. Oh! Too kind! I will deposit you on it like a flower, and all you have to do is punch a hole in the fuselage. Of course. It is childish, a piece of cake! Truly Mark, you do not sense of. Boof! I have embarked in the labor! Might as well go all the way! Page Twenty-Two: However. And Now Master? Head towards the center of the, hiss, city! The first, hiss, bomb is to be dropped in Hyde Park, as a warning! Here it is in front of us! Your turn to play, Professor Bowen! Play? Speak for yourself! Good luck Mark! Don’t mention it, Manning! It is the only way to stop this madman. If it was not me, it would be someone else then. Attention, Mark! Page Twenty-Three: A few more feet! Five, four, three, two, one! Hurrah! At this speed, the wind has an incredible force. Page Twenty-Four: It cuts easier than I thought! Bravo! He is in! I can cut the rope! God be with you Mark! Listen people of Great Britain! It is Reptile, your master, who speaks to you! Page Twenty-Five: Here is my first and last warning! Boom! Give me your submission, hiss, quickly or the next, hiss, bomb will be for parliament. Ha-ha-ha! I am not joking! I know Androphis that you never joke! I must hurry! Page Twenty-Six: Huh! A turbulent air pocket. What is this! Bowen! I don't know how you came here, you fool! But I have you now! He directs the bezel of his infernal ring towards me! You are at my mercy! I will. You do not have too! Shtoom! Page Twenty-Seven: Yah! Curse you! I have you, insane as you are! Poor fool! Who can boast of holding the reptile that I am! Ha-ha-ha! I will not kill you! You will be my slave until the end of your days! His arm wraps around my neck like a snake! However. Mark! Mark! Mark Bowen! You hear me? Answer me! Maybe his radio has been damaged, Inspector? Page Twenty-Eight: Hey! They are heading straight for the post office tower! They will fly into it! Thwam! Page Twenty-Nine: What is going on you fools!? Argh! The crew members are like puppets! You have to give them orders at all times, otherwise they will do anything! Smash! Now the plane is crashing with its load of bombs! Do something imbeciles! Take back control of the horrible aircraft! Page Thirty: Now that they received orders, the pilots worked miracles to recover control, but. The aircraft is perfectly ungovernable master! There’s something wrong with the aircraft today! The lightbulbs getting dim! We’re living on the edge! I am cutting the switches! Sha-toom! Thrunk! Shrunk! Page Thirty-One: They made the plane dive towards the Thames! The bombs did not explode! And the people who were in it? You can't see a living soul moving! Hello! Hello! Send ambulances! Police boats, Helicopters. During this time. I was hiss, saved by the prodigious elasticity of my body. Hiss, my plan did not yield the expected results. But I have others, hiss, in mind! While the Reptile escapes. My Poor head! Oh! Page Thirty-Two: Already the cars are flowing. We-we! We-we! We-we! Aim your weapons at that gap! Attention! Someone there! Reptile! No! Page Thirty-Three: It is not him! It's Professor Bowen! Too late. Bang! Yeah! You killed him! But! But! You said! They killed Bowen! And now they're so unhappy about it that they do not bother about me anymore! Page Thirty-Four: Ha-ha-ha! For now I will take my normal appearance then. Meanwhile. No trace of the Reptile? The crew members took a nasty blow! It is necessary to make a general alert to G Q for the recovery of Reptile. But, Mister Bowen sir? Page Thirty-Five: Insane luck! Just a scratch on the skull! He’s living on a prayer! Huh! It's the first time. How glad I am to miss a target, sir! A little later in a nearby hospital, Bad medicine is what Mark Bowen needs. Glad to have you back whole, old man. But Reptile has slipped through our fingers again. And the crew members? They have all kinds of small fractures on the right and on the left and the effects of the drug that Reptile administered to them are beginning to dissipate! They are lucky guys too! You have to expect everything from reptile! He can attack anyone. From the queen! To the Prime Minister. Yes! Reptile is capable of anything! What is going to happen? Don't miss the next episode.

Rahan. Episode thirteen. As Crao would have done. The son of Crao fears neither the anger of the sky nor that of the mountain of fire! In the tornado that furiously swept the jungle, the thunder and the lightning sometimes obscured the fire of the volcano. And Rahan defied the elements, as once did Crao, his father. Rahan does not fear the lances of fire. In the safety of the trees, protected from the slicing wind, worried animals observed "this one-who-walked-upright" without understanding his audacity. Page Two: Nor making sense of the clamors which rose to the foliage, whipped by the tempest. Crao-the-Brave would not have been afraid! Rahan is not afraid! Ra-ha-ha! Rahan! Crao! Crao! A great green and yellow bird listened to these names howl in the wind. A violent gust suddenly snatched it from its perch, and carried it away to the muddy bank of the nearby pond. A hideous head, immediately sprung from the mud. The mouth opened to catch the prey offered by the wind. Rahan had seen it! His ivory knife flew to the Iguana’s throat and, as the sky was illuminated at the same time, it was said that the mortal blow had been struck by the lightning. Slak! Page Three: Rahan is content to have saved "The talking bird". Crao! Crao! Crao! The parrot fluttered towards the bushes where it disappeared. And I am happy that he was able to kill the "Beast-that-comes-from-the-mud”. The son of Crao felt nothing but repugnance for these monsters that haunted the swamps. He was walking away from the iguana when everything flared up around him. Lightning had struck a nearby tree trunk. Schriak! And it was impossible for him to avoid the big tree that came falling down! A branch struck him. The leaves buried him. Argh! When he recovered his senses the tornado had passed. He was stretched out in the bright sun, at the feet of ten men. Page Four: His hand, which he instinctively brought to his sheath, could not find the polished ivory handle of the knife. His weapon was missing. And also had disappeared his necklace of claws, a unique memory of his clan! Rahan did not seek to quarrel with you! Why did you steal his arms? He had just seen the knife in the belt of a blond man and recognized his necklace among those worn by the same man. Rahan has stolen the ball of fire! Tarik is right! All of the hunters saw the fireball fall. They ran because they badly needed the fire. They found you asleep under a tree, but the ball of fire was no longer there! What did you do with it Rahan? Where did you hide it? Page Five: The son of Crao smiled. Rahan's brothers also, in the past, watched for the wrath of the sky to procure the balls of fire! But they are not ignorant of the fact that if these balls often cause the trees they hit to crumble, they sometimes disappear on their own! That is what happened! It had rained heavily and the foliage was waterlogged. The fireball extinguished itself! Rahan Lies! He wants to keep the fire to himself! Tarcik knows it! Tarcik knows everything! Rahan understood that this man was the sorcerer of the clan. Rahan knows more things than Tarcik! He does not wait for the wrath of heaven to give him fire!! He makes it spring from the "stones-that-throw-stars"!! Page Six: Tarcik-the-sorcerer wanted to prevent the captive from hitting the flints, but the chief of the clan intervened. Let it be, Tarcik! Clack, Clack! A moment later a clamor greeted the miracle. The son of Crao had created flames from a carpet of dry leaves. Now your clan will no longer need to chase fireballs! Rahan is a greater wizard than Tarcik! The blond man growled dully. Tarook can only claim this if Rahan defeats Tarcik in combat! Rahan accepts the combat! Tarook also accepts it, but you will have to fight unarmed, like loyal hunters! The wizard went to his hut to put away his necklaces and the knife. Page Seven: No one saw him take a tiny thorn from a greenish liquid. The "drink-that-brings-sleep” will help Tarick! A moment later the two men confronted each other. The son of Crao, more nimble, quickly took the advantage. Suddenly off-balancing his opponent with a skillful feint. Ha-ha-ha! You see that Rahan knows more things than Tarcik! He wrestled the sorcerer to the ground when he suddenly felt a prick in the wrist. Oh! For him, the men watching the fight faded into a fog. What! What, Rahan, not, not. Page Eight: Tarcik abruptly freed himself and struck, to deceive his people. Here is what it costs to challenge Tarcik! Sclack! Is Tarook convinced? Tarik just proved he is the strongest! Defeated by the drug, Rahan lay at the feet of the cheat. Whoever dares to challenge your sorcerer deserves only one fate. To be thrown to the iguanas! Uh, uh. Is not your verdict too cruel Tarcik? Nothing is too cruel when it comes to punishing a sacrilegious being! Some men were already carrying the inert body of r Rahan towards the ponds. A yellow and green bird passed, uttering curious cries. Crao! Crao! Crao! Page Nine: Rahan taught us how to make fire with the "star-throwing-stones". We will have to spare him! If we throw him in the pond, he will be devoured by the iguanas! Crao! Crao! Crao! But if we disobey the wizard, his anger will be turned against us! We can obey Tarcik while giving Rahan a chance! Deposit him down here on the bank. He might come to his senses before the iguanas discover him! The men left, abandoning Rahan on the muddy bank. A moment later "The speaking bird" hovered above the inanimate form. Page Ten: He landed on the chest of the man who had saved him, constantly shouting the name that he had heard in the storm. Crao, Crao, Crao! And this name, repeated a hundred times, seeped into the mind of the still unconscious Rahan. Yes. I am Rahan. The son of Crao. He relived as in a dream the scenes of his childhood. That of the return of the hunters, led by his father Crao-the-sage. That of that dreadful night when the Blue Mountain, vomiting its entrails of fire, had destroyed his entire clan. That of Crao dying in agony, who had given him the necklace of claws. Each of these claws represents a quality of "Those-who-walk-upright". Page Eleven: Here is that of "Goodness". Then that of "Courage". And here is that of "Loyalty". Since all of the clan hunters. Are dead. And I'm going. To, join them. This necklace comes to you Rahan! You will wear it as. I have. Worn it a long life trying, To be worthy of what it represents. This last vision fades when Rahan feels the blows on his chest. Crao, Crao, Crao! Crao, Crao, Crao! The reeds parted in front of a large iguana and the bird, to alert the man of the danger, multiplied the pecks and cried even more. Page Twelve: The mists that shroud Rahan's brain suddenly dissipate. He propped himself up on one elbow and he understood. Rahan thanks "The Talking Bird"! But he won't be able to face the "Beast-that-comes-from-the-mud" without his knife! The parrot had taken refuge on a low branch. The iguana stared at the man and the latter, intrigued, observed his forearm. While fighting with Tarcik, Rahan was pricked by something. Here on the wrist. It was not the wizard's fist that stunned Rahan, but that scratch! Displacing itself slowly and heavily, the iguana prepared to attack. Page Thirteen: Himself, Rahan sought refuge. And he feel his legs stuck deep in the mud. What would Crao have done? What would Crao so do? A second iguana appeared on his left, even more monstrous. This one seemed to come from the mud itself. Without his knife, Rahan is lost! Argh! Rahan, knows what Crao would have done! But the Long Branch, though sharp, only scratched the side of the beast. It was then that a third monster emerged, and then a fourth! Crao said: "When your strength equals that of the enemy, fight him!” “But if you are too weak, delay this combat until later!” Page Fourteen: Unarmed, Rahan was helpless against this herd of armored monsters. And these moved easily, while the sucking of the mud weighed down his legs! “When the mountain is too steep, go around it!” Also spoke Crao. He dived into the pond, the only way out of his situation. In the water, he regained his energy. As he reached the other bank the bird fluttered close to him, still encouraging him with his cries. Crao! Crao! Crao! He soon saw over there, the iguanas killing each other. His clamor thundered over the jungle. Ra-ha-ha! It was then that a large paw, both clawed and webbed, struck from the mud. A fifth monster was waiting for him on this shore! Page Fifteen: His fingers, desperately searching the mud, pulled out a long flint. The god of hunters is with Rahan! He can now fight the "Beast-that-comes-from-the-mud"! As Crao would have done! Ra-ha-ha! The hideous chest throbbed above him. The sharp flint plunged into it several times. Rahan is victorious! He is worthy of the claw of "Courage"! His hand went to his neck and he suddenly remembered that Tarcik had taken his necklace. Page Sixteen: Instinctively he carried the flint to his little sheath. And. Tarcik also stole Rahan's knife! But the sorcerer will give him back both! The moon was shining on the jungle, when the monster appeared to the men of the village. Flee! Flee! The swamp beast wants revenge! Perhaps he does not forgive the clan for sacrificing "He-who-makes-fire-with-stones-that-throw-stars!" The hunters scatter in the thickets, fleeing the iguana which, standing with its outstretched claws, had never charged so quickly! Tarcik-the-sorcerer made the great mistake of lingering in his hut. The hunters are foolish. Never do the iguanas venture so far as the village! This one will pass on its way! Page Seventeen: He was about to grab the ivory knife when a dreadful figure stood out behind him. Argh! Tarcik-the-disloyal triumphed over Rahan by drugging him! But by devouring Rahan I inherited his anger and I come to avenge him! Avoiding the claws of the monster, the frightened sorcerer fled into the jungle. Tarcik must have had the wrong drink! He must have drunk "the-water-which-gives-nightmares"! The ponds shimmered, under the moon, through a gap in the clouds. The sorcerer rushes towards them, hoping to find refuge there. To me! To me! You must help your wizard! Page Eighteen: But no one heard Tarcik's calls, nor his cries of distress when he got stuck in the mud. To me! Help me hunters! I am going to die! No one heard his screams of terror when the iguanas, emerging from the darkness, crawled towards this prey that was henceforth at their mercy. No one except the son of Crao, who got rid of the nauseating iguana skin under which he had hidden. The "Beasts-from-the-mud" have made Tarcik pay for his cowardice! When the sun came back the surface of the ponds was calm. A light wind bent the tall reeds in the heart of which, no doubt, slept the sated iguanas. Page Nineteen: Rahan proceeded as if through a rosary, the claws of the necklace that he had recovered, along with his knife, from the hut of the sorcerer. Here is the one, from "Good". Rahan was good when he revealed to this clan the secret of fire! And here is that of “courage”. Rahan was courageous in killing the "Beast-that-comes-from-the-mud"! As always, the son of Crao had been faithful to the oath made long ago, on the blue mountain, to the old chief as he died. He proudly tapped the polished handle of his ivory knife and off he went, straight for the sun that had always drawn him. Page Twenty: But he was only a son of fierce ages where everything was fighting for life. So his hand cried out on the knife when the clan arose before him. Tarcik disappeared last night! If he has gone back to the lands of cold where he came from, our clan will not regret it! Because Tarcik too often thought of very bad things! Rahan, you who can do so many miracles, do you want to become our new wizard? No Tarook! A clan does not need a sorcerer! A wise and courageous leader is sufficient! Farewell Brothers! Rahan plunged into the jungle where the birds were already chattering. One of them, yellow and green, escorted him for a very long time, constantly shouting the only word he knew of the language of "those-who-walk-upright". Crao! Crao! Crao!

Rahan. Episode Twelve. The little Man. The discovery of a raft stranded on the sand of a creek stupefied Rahan less than the strange traces which started from that raft. They are neither those of a man, nor those of a beast! Rahan has never seen such tracks! Knife in hand, and on the lookout, the son of Crao followed the mysterious trail. And suddenly. “Baghae”! Page Two: Replacing the first, other traces appeared, and he recognized these ones. "Baghae", the panther pounced on its prey here! As the roar of the wild beast rose not far away, the son of Crao dashed into the thicket. Rahan wants to know! He wants to know what strange game "Baghae" has killed today. Oh! The panther, squatting twenty paces from him, still had his prey in his mouth. A little man! “Baghae” wanted to let his little ones have the pleasure of shredding his prey! The young child was indeed alive. The beast abandoned him to face the man. Page Three: Fight "Baghae"! It will be less easy for you to defeat Rahan than a little man! Ra-ha-ha! Rahan and the panther disappeared for a moment in the tall grass, then reappeared further on, wildly intertwined. The child was screaming with fear, frightened by this tumult. He could not understand that he was the stake in this fierce combat. And the three little ones of the “Baghae”, crouching under a bush, meowing softly. They did not know either! A terrible claw had just torn the ivory knife from Rahan's fingers. He dove for his weapon as the panther leapt. Page Four: The son of fierce ages dodged and brutally wrestled the beast to the ground. Thus mastered, "Baghae" was at the mercy of the man. Here is what it costs to cowardly attack the little men! The ivory blade was about to strike a mortal blow. When the mewing of young felines became mournful. You beg Rahan! You are afraid that he will kill! Rahan hesitated with his knife brandished. The little man has a mother, which he needs! “Baghae” is also a mother, thought Rahan. He suddenly sat up, freeing the beast. Go “Baghae”, go! Rahan spares you! Rahan does you grace! Page Five: The panther and her cubs disappeared into the forest. The little man wanted to stand up. And landed heavily on his behind. The son of Crao chuckled. Rahan understands why your tracks surprised him. You still only know how to walk on “all fours”! "Those-who-walk-upright" always start their life like this. But where do you come from, little man? How did you come here? Amused and concerned, Rahan returned to the great river. No doubt you crawled on this raft to play. It got loose and the current carried you away! The little man, far too young to talk, emitted only little sounds. Sometimes plaintiff, sometimes joyful. Page Six: Rahan will return you to yours. The Son of Fierce Ages believed that the child's clan could only live upstream of the great river. That is why shortly after, he tried to go up this one. But the current was very strong. And this fight against the river will soon prove impossible. Since the path of water is impossible for us, we will travel on land! The bank was steep but this was no obstacle for the son of Crao, whose clan had once lived in the Blue Mountains. And the little man was but a light burden on his sturdy shoulders, Night will fall soon. I hope you're not afraid of the night like Rahan used to be! Page Seven: Rahan remembered that time when he feared the darkness, and how he had conquered this anguish. A large slab of bark reminds him of a distant childhood memory. The “Little Men” are fragile. But the cold of the night won't bite you! His knife cut the bark. His skillful fingers tied vines. Shortly after, he had a curious cradle-hammock. Which was swinging under a tree. Dry and tender leaves garnished it. And he watched the little man fall asleep quickly. And the son of Crao dozed off in his turn, on the earth, his ivory knife close at hand. Page Eight: He dreamt that he was suddenly attacked by a beast, without having had time to get the child off his shoulders. And also the dawn found him anxious. Rahan must be able to fight with the "Little Man" on his shoulders! Rahan's knife should have a long reach. A very long reach, like the spears of certain hunters! One idea, in the son of fierce ages, always leads to another. A moment later he had cut a bamboo. As the child picked up the knife he exclaimed. Stop! Do not touch! These things are not for "Little Men"! Page Nine: With binding at the end of the bamboo, the ivory knife becomes a solid spear. Which allows him shortly after, to nail to the ground a snake that stood in his way. Astride his shoulders, the "Little Man" sometimes showed his joy by tugging his long hair. And Rahan felt happy. Happy. For a long time he followed the great river which meandered at the bottom of the gorge. And suddenly his heart sank. Ahead of him opened a wide crevasse, at the bottom of which rumbled a torrent, increasing into a mighty river. Will Rahan have to retrace his steps? Did he walk a whole day unnecessarily!? Page Ten: The wall was too steep to descend towards the river. And no tree allowed him to throw a "bridge" across this chasm, as he had once done. Only Rahan could have crossed the abyss, he knew he was capable of such a leap! But there was the "Little Man"! He is not strong enough to hold on to Rahan. And Rahan can't hold it because he needs both hands! Oh! Rahan knows what to do! A moment later, ignoring the cries of the "Little Man", Rahan bound his legs and arms with a vine. Then he threw his "spear" onto the other side of the crevasse, as much not to hinder his jump as to prevent himself from hesitating. This knife is too valuable for Rahan. Now even if he is scared, Rahan will have to jump! Clack! Page Eleven: Seizing the vine with the moaning child, he placed it on his back, like a hunter with his quiver. Then he took off. Trust me, “Little man”! He ran towards the gaping chasm with his precious burden. Twenty steps separated him from the void. Fifteen. Ten. Five. All his muscles relaxed and he seemed to fly away. His fingers opened to grip the ledge he knew he might reach, perhaps only just! A cry of fright interrupted the cry of victory. In the shock the vine holding the child had broken. And only a prodigious reflex from Rahan allows him to catch in flight the "Little Man". Page Twelve: Holding the child with one hand, the son of Crao clung to the cliff with the other. He no longer had that hand to pull himself up, he and the "Little Man"! It was a slow and painful recovery. His elbow finally rested on the rock. His chest followed. They were saved. Rahan has never been so scared in his life! He is proud to have brought you to this side of the abyss "Little man"! On this side of the crevasse a gentle slope descended towards the river. The son of fierce ages retrieved his spear with joy. It is with the same joy that he projected it, shortly after, towards these curious wooden fruits whose flavor he had once savored. Page Thirteen: He broke one on a stone. Drink "Little man' Drink! “Those-who-run-in-the-trees, the monkeys, love this milk. And we are not much different from them. Rahan remembered the gestures he had seen made to the women of his horde when he himself was only a "Little man". The child babbled and struck his head with his little hand, as he descended towards the scintillating river. I think this time we found your clan! Look over there. In the distance in a loop of the great river, stood huts. The rafts lined up on the bank announced it as a village of fishers. Page Fourteen: The son of Crao, who had entered under the foliage, heard calls rising in a language he did not know and he saw men appear. Nak, Quadak. Nayka! Nawaki Naariik! Nako Wouandak las da! Here is the one who kidnapped Kadik! Capture him brothers! Capture him! He must be punished! Rahan did not understand these words, but he saw the clan rush. The father of the "Little man" is perhaps among them, he thought. And Rahan cannot fight with this clan. The son of Crao dropped his spear at his feet to prove his good intentions. But the men approached him and brutally seized the child. A moment later they dragged him towards the village. Page Fifteen: A little after. Chakahik. Yawaoillaki Ouadak Kazouk! Here is what I do with your child-stealing weapon! Crack! Makaya nakaihi Jik! Mogo nako zaraylac warten! Your fate is in the hands of the parents of Kadik that you have made cry so much! They will decide how you die! A woman tenderly hugged the "Little Man" against her. Her companion growled. Nak Nayka Ouadak Kazouk! Naikala Jiako! The child thief must be delivered to the beasts of the forest! Rahan was indignant when he was tied up in a clearing. But these men did not understand his explanations any more than he understood their accusations! And the son of Crao found himself alone, meditating on the ingratitude of “Those-who-walk-upright". Page Sixteen: His heart suddenly stopped beating when he heard, very close, the growl of the panther. “Baghae”! “Baghae” and her little ones did indeed appear. The son of fierce ages, crucified on the ground, was at the mercy of the beasts. They approached, their eyes sparkling. A growl came from the panther’s chest. Rahan belongs to you, “Baghae”! Rahan is yours! Kill "Baghae" kill! What are you waiting for? Kill!? The beast was slowly circling the man. It sniffed for a long time the bound limbs, the torso, the face. Do not torment me for this long, “Baghae”! Kill! Kill! Page Seventeen: But the panther slowly turned around and, with a slight growl, invited her young to follow her. A moment later the beasts had disappeared into the forest. Rahan had spared the “Baghae”. And the “Baghae” in turn shows mercy by sparing him! Would the beasts be more loyal, more grateful than "those-who-walked-upright"?! Incomprehensible cries arose from the village of fishers. One word kept coming up. "Kadik"! ”Kadik”! “Kadik”! A bush spread aside in front of the "Little Man". Who wobbled on his legs. And the child clutched Rahan's knife! Oh! Page Eighteen: Stumbling, falling on his behind, and getting up, he approached. Come, child, come! Deliver your friend! The child sat near Rahan, and played with the knife. Cut those vines, little one! Cut! The "Little Man" did not understand. Babbling, he hit Rahan with the handle of the knife. He saw Rahan use the knife. He imitates Rahan! He has returned with the knife, and plays with striking it too! The infant had just reversed the weapon. He observed with amusement his yellowish reflection in the ivory blade. No! Little one! No! Page Nineteen: In the surrounding thicket the fishermen had spread out and were calling. Kadik? Kadik! Alioaka Nayda Jiako Nogo Jiako? Wartenne Kazouka! Nahyaka!! Perhaps the enemy has freed himself, woman? Maybe he took away our Kadik again! We should have killed him!! Kan chakalac glahak! Kan! Kan! No Glahak! Look at that! Look! The man and the woman, Kadik's parents, had stopped. What they saw in the clearing made their hearts beat strangely. Ouakas Nai Joka naka glahak maioc ka! He behaves as with you, Glahak! As with you! Over there, the enemy was still crucified, his knife resting on his chest. And Kadik, his cheek stuck to that of the enemy, babbled as he had never done! Page Twenty: The little fingers of the child lingered on the eyes, caressed the nose, and the lips of Rahan. Nogo kan kazoudi! Ganach dac! Kadik yaka! This man is not an enemy Ghalak! Kadik tells us! Kadik proves it to us! Under the reassuring caresses of the "Little Man", Rahan closed his eyes. But he heard the horde approaching. He also heard, without understanding them, the orders of the chief. Nak kado lahisac! Noka o radai! The River Clan was wrong! Release this man! Kadik's father gently pushed aside his son who was clinging to the captive's neck. Then he seized the knife. The two men exchanged a long look and the son of Crao understood that "Those-who-walk-standing" could also have gratitude. Happily, he waited for the ivory blade to cut his bonds.

Rahan. Episode Eleven. The Men with Heavy Legs. Back "Chinca"! This meat belongs to Rahan! Rahan, who was away from his fire fetching dead wood, heard the "Chincha" too late. The strange beast, half-dog, half-cat, was already leaping on a quarter of meat where the son of Crao had made the mistake of dropping his knife. The lynx's fangs snapped close to the weapon and he immediately disappeared into the copses taking his theft with him. Page Two: Rahan lunged forward. His ivory knife was so precious to him, that to recover it, he was ready to face the beast with his bare hands. But the fight did not take place, because a heavy rain suddenly fell, erasing the traces of "Chincha" the lynx. The "Chincha" will devour the meat and Rahan will never find his knife again. The wind was now blowing in gusts. And the son of Crao dug a shelter to protect himself from the hurricane which he felt was imminent. He had just snuggled up in a niche in the rock when the winds, the rain and the thunder raged at the same time. The Tornado swept through the great forest with savage violence. Page Three: Rahan knows that the wrath of heaven does not last long! The stronger they are, the shorter they are! And indeed, it was soon calm. The great black shades tore in the sky and the bamboos of the forest straighten towards the reappearing sun. Rahan will never find the trail of "Chincha”! He will have to make himself another weapon! In these fierce times "Those-who-walk-upright" the. Men only knew the club, the spear, or the stone axe. Fewer still were those who hunted with bows. The ground suddenly shook under the monster charging the son of Crao. Only Rahan's legs can help him! Rahan must flee! Page Four: To flee would have been wisdom. But Rahan was reluctant to do so before fighting. Furious, he seized one of the very long bamboos broken by the storm. He waited for the monster, the point of this huge spear forward. And the woolly Rhinoceros ran straight at the man. The shock was terrible! Rahan held his weapon firmly, but suddenly it bent. Zinc! And he felt himself suddenly thrown backwards, into the bushes! Rahan, who was unaware of the flexibility of bamboo, had no time to reflect on the present phenomenon. The Rhinoceros had turned around and was charging again. The danger was so close that only instinct could aid him. Page Five: And this instinct commanded in him a strange reflex. That of leaving the ground, of clinging to the bamboo. Ra-ha-ha! The monster's horn mowed down this ridiculous perch and the son of Crao once again rolled in the grass. But his victory cry thundered however! Ra-ha-ha! Rahan does not fear you anymore! He now knows how to dodge your attacks! At the third charge of the rhinoceros it was no longer instinct that guided Rahan but lucid reflection. Approach! Approach! He rose this time with lightness, leaping over the woolly spine of the monster, falling supplely behind it! Page Six: Undoubtedly because of its useless attacks, the pachyderm moved away heavily. Leaving the clearing to this invulnerable enemy. Ra-ha-ha! You flee! Rahan thoughtfully watched his long bamboo lance for a long time. Here is the difference between "Those-who-walk-upright" and the other species, he thought. Animals always fight in the same way. The man imagines new tricks, new weapons, new displays! Rahan wanted to verify his discovery. Ten times, twenty times, he ran, suddenly driving the long bamboo into the ground, rising, and falling fifteen paces further! Ra! Page Seven: Had it not been for the loss of his knife, perhaps that day when the son of Crao invented the pole vault would have been marvelous. Rahan flies almost like a bird! It is not this puddle of water that will stop him! Intending to cross the little pool. Rahan made the mistake of forgetting the slime! No sooner had he left the ground than the bamboo sank under him. And he found himself wading through stagnant water! It was at the same time that shouts resounded! He was pulling himself up on the muddy bank of the pond when the men appeared. From their cries and their brandished axes, he knew he could not avoid a fight! Page Eight: Indeed, a few moments later. Back! Back! Rahan hates to fight with "Those-who-walk-upright"! Let him go on his way! The long bamboo hissed mowing down the legs of the boldest attackers. The ardor of the son of fierce ages was such that he managed to break the circle of men. And disappear into the thickets of the forest. Rahan has gained only a respite. He does not know this forest. And the hunters will catch up with him quickly! But why do "those-who-walk-upright" act like this? Why fight? Why kill yourself? Page Nine: "Those-Who-Walk-Upright" are one horde! The great horde of men! One day all the clans will admit it and will not kill each other anymore! But that day was still far away and Rahan had to flee. He sometimes used his bamboo pole to cross an obstacle. He was jumping a big uprooted tree when. Argh! He fell into a deep trap that the tree trunk had concealed from him! A moment later, still dazed, he caught a glimpse of his Bamboo stuck high above him, in the branches hiding the pit. Page Ten: The earthen wall has smooth and the thin vines hanging from it were too fragile to climb up. If Rahan does not escape from this trap he will be captured by the hunters! What? What? Grrh! A growl had just sounded in the pit and he spotted the wild beast lurking in the shadows. The “Chincha”! The lynx, which had been surprised for a moment by the fall of the man, picked itself up to pounce. You are trapped, too, and you are furious! The beast pounced, bellowing a savage cry. Its claws gripped the shoulders of Rahan, who fell. Page Eleven: Man and beast rolled in the shadow of the trap. Rahan was trying to ward off the claws of this savage from his face. The Claws. The fangs. The cruel gaze of the feline. Claws again, and again. Rahan rolled onto his side. And suddenly felt a soft, wet mass against his cheek. He quickly turned his eyes. And. His knife was still stuck in the quarter of meat! Screaming with joy, he seized the ivory handle and snatched the weapon. Ra-ha-ha! It is Rahan’s turn to claw, “Chincha”! Page Twelve: The beast's eyes seemed to cross as the blade plunged into his side, straight into the heart. Then his eyes closed as his clawed paws stiffened. He was dead! Rahan, still panting, leaned against the wall. He had, of course, just saved his life. But he was still captive. Recovering his ivory knife however, restored his confidence. How many times had he given silent thanks to this knife! When the hunters come to visit their trap, they will find Rahan there. They will then be able to finish him off in this pit, like a wild animal! Page Thirteen: No! Rahan is not a "Chincha"! He will escape from the trap! The ivory blade was already attacking the wall, digging a small niche. Shortly afterwards the captive had dug a second, then a third. But this earth was too friable and crumbled. And when Rahan tried to climb his "staircase", these holds crumbled under his weight! Rahan cannot escape this way, he thought to himself! He must find something else. Another idea! Oh! The bamboo! The “Other idea”, revealed itself suddenly for the son of Crao to see. Page Fourteen: Rahan knows! The bamboo pole was large enough to allow him to climb out of the pit. But how to reach the Bamboo? He pulled on a thin vine, and it broke off without effort. And attached his knife to the end of the long vine. The rest will depend on the attitude of Rahan. Of attitude, the son of the fierce ages had more than anyone else. At the first throw, the knife fell on the bamboo. A snap, and the line knotted onto the pole. Another jolt, and the pole, unstuck, fell into the trap! Page Fifteen: A moment later, Rahan was slowly climbing towards the opening of the trap. His bamboo did not reach to the opening. And he knew it was in danger of collapsing. But he spotted a strong root to which he could cling. His practiced ear had alerted him to the approach of the hunters. They were still in the distance, and he heard only muffled cries. But these cries, these calls, become clearer from moment to moment. They will arrive just when Rahan emerges from the trap! Rahan’s fingers finally closed on the root. And the Bamboo pole straightened as it was relieved of the weight. Page Sixteen: Despite the peril that still awaited him, the son of Crao could not restrain himself from issuing his cry of victory as he came out of the pit. Ra-ha-ha! And he distinguished the men all around him lying in ambush. They are worried, thought Rahan. They don't understand how Rahan could escape from their trap! The hunters were indeed hesitant. But this hesitation would not last. And Rahan knew it! He bent down, and his head disappeared into the pit. His fingers brushed the end of the bamboo pole. Come! Come! Rahan still needs you! When he straightened up, the hunters launched their attack. They came running from everywhere, surrounding the son of Crao like choice game. Page Seventeen: One man preceded the others. This one, no doubt, desired single combat. He had it! The Bamboo struck him to the ground. Kill him! Kill him! Thwack! And the horde resumed its assault. But these hunters were suddenly immobilized, bewildered. Rahan was charging them! A single man charged at thirty, and this was beyond their comprehension. For what was this curious enemy hoping, with his cumbersome bamboo stick? To scare them? Fifty steps still separated Rahan from his adversaries. Forty. Thirty. Twenty. Page Eighteen: The son of Crao had torn himself off the ground. Jumping over the whole group of hunters. Dumbfounded. Oh! And he fell behind them and ran away laughing. Ha-ha-ha! The "Heavy-legged men" don't know how to hunt birds! Their amazement dissipated, and the men chased Rahan. They threw their axes at the fugitive. Yes, running towards the blue granite cliff. The enemy will be stopped by the great obstacle! We have him! But Rahan was not fleeing at random. Rahan was no beast. Rahan was a thinking man. Page Nineteen: He knew how inaccessible to the "Men-with-heavy-legs" was the overhanging ledge, towards which he directed his course. Rahan will ask of you what he has never demanded! If you help him, he is safe! If you betray him, he is dead! It was at the foot of the steep cliff that the son of the fierce ages seemed to bend himself. But perhaps he had underestimated the leap to be made. For the ledge suddenly seemed to him higher than the bent bamboo. That was when he felt he had to use the "Nerve" of his pole! He jerked his back and abandoned it. Page Twenty: He brutally fell back onto the platform. But no matter his crushed muscles. He had once again triumphed! Below, the horde regarded the pole as if it was a magic item. Fear nothing! It is just a simple bamboo in your forest! Do like Rahan brothers! Observe nature. It is rich in things that can help men. Men like you. Men like Rahan! Rahan may return to this territory, when you have understood that "Those-who-walk-upright" must not hunt their own kind like game! Farewell! Yes, the son of Crao was only a man. And yet when his silhouette stood out against the mountain ridge, in the blaze of the sun, one would have said that he was a god of fierce ages.

Reptile. John Catchpole, and Angus Peter Allan. Episode Seven. The Slave Army. Thanks to Mark Bowen, the police now know the sinister secret of the famous professor Andros Androphis, whom has the power to transform into a reptile and whose goal is to dominate the world by terror. After many adventures, Mark and some policemen find themselves locked in the basement of the professor's house with speckled snakes. Keep whistling, to charm the snakes! You, give me that gun! I have to remove the seals from the cartridges. Here is my penknife, mister! Fast! Fast! Provided that the snakes do not get excited. The pellets would ricochet everywhere and risk injuring us. I think the powder charge will suffice. That's it! You, the whistler, get out of the way! Huh! Page Two. Le Blam! Deja vu Ka-bang! Soufflé Ka-bang! They are all dead! Now you have to reach that lever to open the gate. There! Now we can take care of the professor! The whole country needs to be alerted! Yes, I don't know, we are not at the end of our troubles, I can swear that to you! At the same time. The time has come, come to make a spark the whole world will speak off! An ampoule of my wonderful preparation. Huh! My blood freezes in my veins! My strength is growing! Growing! Growing! I metamorphose! Page Three. Yes! Yes! The time has come to strike, yes! And it is not those ridiculous bars that will stop me! Yes, yes! Hiss! My body is, hiss, like rubber! My hands are lined with adhesive scales, like those of the gecko! Yes! Hiss! There are more explosives, hiss, than I need! Page Four. And then Suddenly. Hey! What is this!? Hiss! You can do nothing against me, you little fool! Huh! Who are you! Sleep! Sleep! Huh! Only two hours later the news was known at the police headquarters. What you predicted is happening! Androphis has just knocked out a guard from the Corman Company to seize a package of explosives! I don't understand! If he wanted to rob a bank or accomplish any coup de main, his faculties as a "Reptile" as he says would be enough. Maybe he wants to explode onto the public stage? Page Five. I believe you are right, Inspector Manning. An instant later. Alert to all patrols, to all police stations! A dangerous criminal is about to blow up a building or a work of art! What building? What work of art? They don't say where this madman will strike. They do not know! This is what is most dangerous! A little later. You tell me that all targets that could be destroyed are being watched, Manning. Yes, Yes! I'm not the good god, Bowen! I can only do what I can! At this same moment. Yes! Yes! I am also a real crocodile, when I please. Yes! Yes! Here it is! My objective! The famous London Bridge! Page Six. The day will soon dawn and "Reptile" has not appeared, Bowen. Maybe he's waiting for the day to. Inspector! Westminster Bridge Guards! They say they just saw something! We are not far from it! Charge! London Bridge! The dream goal, for a nut! There are already agents there! Sorry Sir! It was just this piece of wood. You’ve got wood officer? Wait! We believe we have thought of everything. But there are also reptiles in the water! You also have to view it from that side, Manning! However. Yes, yes! We will laugh! Yes! Yes! Hiss! Page Seven. And I will be able to do even more, when the most famous monument of the Thames sinks into the waters. Manning! I see him! I can shoot just to wound him sir! No! The explosives might go off! Young fool Mark Bowen! But it's too late! Yes! Yes! Nothing can stop me now! Page Eight. Thrak! Crackle! A grappling hook! Fast! What do you want to do? It is madness! And it is up to me to go! There is no other solution! I know him well and you do not! Poor fool! If you want to prevent this charge from exploding, you arrive too late! Yes! Yes! And you jump with it, poor little fool! Page Nine. I could shoot that monster right now! No! The bullet is likely to ricochet and injure Bowen. I am too far! How to do it? As I sway. Oh! He was just. Boom! Page Ten. Huh! Gad! You came close, Mister Bowen! Mad! As you say! Where is he? The damn fool! He ruined everything! You will pay for this! All of you! You! Huh! The blood is warming in my veins! I suffer. I am returning to myself faster than expected. Page Eleven. He lost his "Reptile" appearance! Now he is just an old man and not very strong! Towards him quickly! Puff, puff! I have to return. Puff, puff! A vial of my wonderful potion. To become the invincible "Reptile" again. You are no match for me in running professor! You are cooked! Unfortunately, at this time. Sir! A ship is arriving over there! The bridge employees will be forced to operate the tilting mechanism! Gosh! And Bowen is right in the middle! Page Twelve. At that very moment indeed. Wow! The pavement moves under my feet, thought Bowen. The bridge is rising! Groan, whine, clang, chug, chug. No more catching up with the professor! If only I could jump to the other side! Too bad! I will give it a shot! Page Thirteen. Ouch! Just in time! Now it's the two of us, Professor! I need a few minutes of respite to take the potion. And then I will be safe! Oh! Ha-ha-ha! Found a way to stop this young fool. Gurgle! Gurgle! Page Fourteen. Bowen! I do not resist! I surrender! Ha! Ha-ha-ha! I don't have the slightest confidence in you, Professor Androphis! Ha-ha-ha! Lucky the breeze brings the smell of gasoline in my direction. Approach you fool! Approach! I am too old! I am exhausted, Bowen. I surrender, I tell you! So do not move! I am not moving! Just a little bit. A tiny bit. I tremble, do you understand, at the thought of what will happen to me. Page Fifteen. Ha-ha-ha! Or rather what will happen to you, young fool! What is this! A tanker truck! I understand! Th-wumpf! Woosh! Now the truck is going to jump! Boom! It is impossible to cross this curtain of flames! This madman has escaped me again! Page Sixteen. Ha-ha-ha! Time to become “Reptile” again! Huh! The blood freezes in my veins! My strength is growing, growing! Then a police car appeared. Hello? Hello! Inspector Manning! The monster! It is here! You dare you attack me, you poor fool? We will see what we will see! Ha-ha-ha! What do you see now? Thwack! Page Seventeen. Ah! I'm losing control of the car! Ha-ha! No one can do anything against the invisible "Reptile"! Vram! Goodbye to all of you gentlemen. Hiss! Ha-ha-ha! I just have a fantastic idea! Hiss! I am going to strike a blow that will leave those poor fools speechless! Ha-ha-ha! Police Headquarters. I will climb up the wall. Page Eighteen. And you won't see me, because I also have the power to camouflage myself like the chameleon. And to slip through the narrowest ways, like the serpent! A moment later, in the office of the director of police. Kabang! Huh? Oh! Even before the unfortunate man realized what was happening to him, the serpent's head ring from "Reptile" had struck him in the hand. Argh! Page Nineteen. The drug now circulating in your blood renders you completely harmless. You must obey me. I, I, must, obey, you! Order to all units! Abandon the search for Professor Andros Androphis. Abandon it immediately! Excellent! Hiss! When the effect of the drug wears off you will remember nothing. But, when you wake up, you will do what I am going to ask you! I will do it! However. Abandon the search? This is madness! It is insane yes! The more he anchors himself in his madness, the more dangerous the professor becomes! You are right! We will immediately speak to the director, to try to get him to reconsider the decision. Page Twenty. At full speed, the car arrives at New Scotland Yard, the police headquarters. Skreech! Exactly as, hiss, I expected! Bowen and the police throw themselves head first into my trap! Come in, gentlemen! Director, I would like Mister Bowen to say a few words to you, sir. Then there was a click in the brain of the head official. Kill! Kill Mark Bowen! But Mark had good eyes. Those marks on the hand! The marks of the professor's ring! Page Twenty-One. In the name of "Reptile" die! Ou-la-la! Manning! Master it, by Jove! Krack! Thud! Few! Just in time! Quickly! A doctor! Find out what drug the professor gave him! Meanwhile, firmly convinced that his diabolical trick had obtained its expected ends, the "Reptile" was already far away. Page Twenty-Two. Ha-ha-ha! I will quickly and conveniently get away, before my wonderful potion wears off! When the day came, the professor had resumed his normal appearance. I need to find another "Base" and I think I know where it will be. Two hours later. Let's see! I haven't been here for years. Erh. If I'm not mistaken it is two miles from here in this direction And a little later. The immense greenhouse! It is there. Page Twenty-Three. What a pleasure to see you again, cousin Ebenezer! Oh Andros! What a nice surprise! What brings you to this lost place my good Andros? I read your last communication to the academy. Admirable! On the giant carnivorous plant, my good Andros? This is precisely my star, capable of devouring a calf in no time! A calf. That is almost about the size of a man of your build, isn't it, dear cousin? Ah! I hate that kind of joke! Let us see Ebenezer. Do I have a head for joking? Feed me Seymour! Ah! Ah! Page Twenty-Four. It's even more efficient and faster than a python. Ha-ha-ha! They are amusing, these botanicals! Gorgeous greenhouses! Heat and humidity! Just what the dear little cuties I am going to bring back soon need! Because I have to think about renewing my supply of potion. Ha! My dear cousin had a truck, to transport the bulky plants. Let us see! A little later. In this town I'm not known like in London. Page Twenty-Five. Meanwhile, in one of Scotland Yard's laboratories. At first glance, the drug used by the professor is a derivative of cobra venom. The Professor paralyzed him, and then took the opportunity to hypnotize him and suggest actions to him. It is scary what you say, Bowen! Imagine if he does the same thing with a member of the government, or the army? What else do I know? The craziest things could happen! However, at the Dunwich Zoo. I must not take any missteps if I want to carry out my brilliant plan. To start, let us create a little diversion. Page Twenty-Six. Not a person in sight. An instant later. Oh! A Fire! Move along! Move along! I will call the fire department, Fred. Ha-ha-ha! Just the expected result! A little potion. Page Twenty-Seven. And yet again. My blood freezes in my veins! I am growing stronger and stronger, and stronger! I am metamorphosing with the aid of Reptile Viagra! Becoming "Reptile" again, the Professor emits a long whistle. And immediately, in the building reserved for snakes. Crash! Hiss! Crash! Hiss! Come, my darlings, come! Page Twenty-Eight. This way. We profit from everyone being occupied over there to get away, and. Run and close the doors of the other buildings, Morton! The smoke could poison the animals! Damnation! Something must be done quickly! You take care of him! Page Twenty-Nine. A few seconds later. Argh! What is this?! Gulp! Ha-ha! It is evil! Bravo! You can leave him! Hiss! Everyone in the wagon! A few hours later. Director Sir, the fire is out! We evacuated the public, without saying a word about the snakes. I see Morton. What happened exactly? Page Thirty. My opinion. I think these animals have freed themselves. To escape the fire! I alerted the police. But I was advised not to spread the news. In any case, these animals cannot survive for long in our climate! Of course, sir! What is the use of triggering unnecessary panic! Unfortunately the reptiles had found in the greenhouses of the cousin of Professor Androphis an infinitely more pleasant stay for them than the small cages of the zoo. Ha-ha-ha-hiss! Your Professor is here, hiss! And I will soon carry out my projects! For the moment, let me resume my human appearance. Page Thirty-One. The moment after. The first Objective is going to be crazy fun! What panic in perspective! During that time. He literally vanished! But this zoo story bothers me. Come on! Don’t imagine him everywhere Bowen! But anyway, Manning! You do not find it surprising that of all the animals that were there, only the snakes fled! Meanwhile at that time in the training camp of the moorland heavy tank regiment. The machines are ready for maneuvers, sir! Perfect! We are going to develop the theme of the operation! Tell the crews to be ready to leave at eight o'clock sharp tomorrow morning! Page Thirty-two. Everything must be impeccably planned because, don’t you forget, the shots you are going to perform are with live ammunition! We have made all our arrangements sir! Just below the room where the officers confer. Ha-ha-hiss! The general is there, I feel it. Let, hiss, us, hiss, go silently. Snack! What is? Gurgle! General! You, you! And the sequel unfolds at a fantastic speed. Thak, thak, thak! Page Thirty-three. Hiss! Allow me to introduce myself! Luke, I am your father! And you owe me absolute obedience! A few minutes later. General Challis here! I want to see all the tank crews in the conference room! One after the other! Officers first. And, every time a man walks into the room. Come in, Captain. Sir. This is how, one after another, all the men of the regiment became the slaves of "Reptile". What are you orders master? Page Thirty-four. The next morning. Curious information, Inspector! Highway Brigade sixty-seven reports a column of heavy tanks heading towards London on the A one motorway! Say What? It is perfectly impossible, unless they are driving in reverse! It is “Reptile”, Manning! I would swear! We have to see it up close! This time again, Mark Bowen was speaking the truth. Hiss! Ha-ha-hiss! Before long the whole country will be in my power! A few minutes later the police helicopter flew over the impressive Column. It is an impressive column! Blue Steel, said Manning. What did I tell you, Manning! The professor is on the first tank! How the devil did he manage to get a column like that? Page Thirty-five. Hypnosis Manning! And more Hypnosis! But. Gunner! Just above us! A helicopter! Shoot it down. Thwam! Ka-bang! Garh! Let’s break camp! General alert! A column of heavy tanks is heading for London. A column that behaves as an enemy! Let me talk with that fool, Manning! Page Thirty-six. Allo! Allo! Professor Andophis! Listen very carefully! I shall say this only once! This is Mark Bowen! If these tanks do not stop immediately, we will crush them! If necessary by aerial bombardment! Hiss-ha-ha-hiss! Amusing, Mister Bowen! Nobody in this country gives orders to kill soldiers who do not know what they are doing! I have all the cards in my hands, Bowen! However, not far from there an artillery unit had moved into position. The tank traps are in place, sir! Understood. Capital sport what? We only have to disable the tanks, not destroy them. But what if they open fire? I do not believe this hypnosis story! Never will a British soldier shoot other British soldiers! They are here! Aim for the tracks! Page Thirty-seven. But. Ka-boom! They shoot and we can't do anything against them, sir! They have a much larger range than ours! They broke our obstacles! They will not shoot us! Argh! Boom! Argh! Ka-boom! Nothing can be done! We are at their mercy! Page Thirty-eight. Order them to retreat Manning! They will be massacred to the last! The monster! The despicable monster! Phew! An order to withdraw sir! Let us get out of here, quickly! Don’t stop here! Head for the hills! Run for your life! Ha-ha-hiss! Hiss! They run away like rabbits! And this is just the beginning! The microphone, slave! I will issue my ultimatum! Here it is master! British people! Listen to the word of “Reptile”! Hiss! The government will immediately come to me and submit, or I will destroy London! This time, "Reptile" had all the cards in his hands. Would Great Britain fall under its power? More click-bait in the next episode!

Rahan. Episode Ten. The Flat Beast. The Son of Crao had been observing since dawn this clan whose cave he had discovered. Rahan hasn't eaten for three days! Will he find the welcome he hopes for? He waited cautiously for the departure of the hunters to break cover. "Females-who-walk-upright" are often more generous than their companions. His appearance was greeted by cries of astonishment. Who are you man? What are you doing in horde territory? Page Two: I am Rahan, son of Crao, friend to all who walk upright. Rahan has had no luck hunting and he is hungry. The women exchanged worried looks. Two from the hunt have also abandoned our clan. We only have this meagre quarter of meat left! If Rahan is hungry, give it to him! No! Why give the meat of the clan to this "enemy". Men would punish us for this crime. And they would be right! This woman who had just spoken glared at Rahan with hatred. But her companions did not seem to share her sentiments. You are bad, Lheita! You have less heart than a snake! Chilk is right! Let us give this meat to Rahan. Page Three: Rahan thanks his sisters! When he regains his strength, Rahan will go hunting for their clan! While chewing the meat, Rahan had taken a few steps into the cave. This one was wide and deep. Go no further, Rahan! Only our hunters have the right! Is Rahan not a hunter also? Ignoring Lheita’s order, Rahan took a few more steps. And stupor nailed him to the spot. Oh! What is this? Strange things appeared on the smooth rock. Rahan recognized the silhouettes of these beasts. But these Beasts were flat, stuck on the granite. Page Four: The son of the Feral Ages was still unaware of many of the beliefs, superstitions and customs of certain hordes. A flat beast! And that men were able to represent animals on the rock had never occurred to him. A flat beast, he exclaimed again! He muttered the same words, stroking the reddish figures with his fingers. You must leave, Rahan! The hunters will return! Too late! I hear them coming back! Lheita-the-bad had punctuated these words with a hateful chuckle. You don't have time to run anymore, Rahan! Ha-ha-ha-ha! The horde men appeared and Rahan heard the angry cries of angry hunters. Page Five: Rahan will not run away! Let him hide in the cave waiting for an opportunity to slip away! We have no right to let our people take their anger out on this man! All of the women approved, except Lheita. You betray the clan! No Lheita! And we hope you won't betray us! When the hunters entered the cave, Rahan was lurking at the bottom of it, in the darkness. They did not kill anything and their rage is great, thought Rahan to himself. If they discover Rahan, they will take revenge on him! Away from Rahan, the chief of the clan harshly addressed the women. Page Six: The gods forget our clan, women! They had promised us their help! Should not we kill the buffalo like this! The chief had taken his place in front of the wall and, with an arrow drawn, took aim. At the "Flat Beast"! The arrow ricocheted on the rock. I touch the buffalo! A hit! The gods, give us a new promise! Zlang! Rahan held his breath. He understood better now the meaning of the "Flat Beast”. A curious belief, he thought. They think that by striking the "Flat Beast", the god of the hunt will put within range of their arrows an animal of flesh and blood! Page Seven: The Clan Chief regained a certain good mood. Since the hunt will be good tomorrow, give me the last quarter of meat, woman! Uh, uh, we were too hungry. We, we, we shared it! Rahan was surprised. Chilk is lying! And the others lie too! They gave the meat to an enemy! And there the enemy is! At the bottom of the cave! Rahan fingers twitched on the handle of his ivory knife. But he abandoned the knife. No. Rahan does not want to kill "Those who walk upright". Page Eight: Brandishing spears or axes, a few men darted about. They glimpsed Rahan. Death to the meat thief! Death! But if the son of Crao did not want to kill, he intended not to be killed. A spear snatched from the nearest assailant protected him from a terrifying blow. And violently knocked the legs of a third man from under him. But others attacked, against whom Rahan could not resist for long. A whole clan against a single man! Would the hunters of this Horde be less courageous than their wives! Page Nine: The Melee was as fierce as it was brief. Rahan's feet repelled his adversaries and his fists struck like clubs. But grabbed on all sides and quarters, he disappeared under the pack. Don't kill him! You do not kill an enemy who fights as well as this one! An instant later. Why did you come here looking for that meat, man? Rahan was hungry. And Rahan has always believed that "Those-who-walk-upright" were brothers and that they should help each other! Rahan is crazy! Only the interests of the clan matter! And Rahan must give our clan back the meat he stole from them! Page Ten: The women listened in silence. Chilk stood out from the group. Rahan didn't steal. He asked and we offered him the meat! Silence Chilk! If Rahan does not return the meat, you and the other women will pay for your weakness towards a stranger. Rahan does not need threats to pay his debt! He will bring you more meat tomorrow than he found here! You will do well to keep this commitment! Otherwise, even if the gods of the hunt favor us, the women will be deprived of food for as many days as the fingers of my hands! Lheita cried out. Not me! Not me! I did not want them to help an enemy! What does it matter! Since you let them, you will know the same punishment! Page Eleven: Lheita had a fierce expression. She curses the coming of Rahan. She would like to see his death! I want to know if the gods will help you keep your commitment. Herk, the leader of the clan, pushed Rahan towards the wall with the profile of the "Flat Beast”. Rahan does not believe in hunting gods! For Rahan the gods of the hunt are cunning, his patience, his endurance, his courage. And my knife! The hunters listened to the son of Crao with a sort of dread. Page Twelve: Hitting the "Flat Beast" with your arrows will not make you discover the game! The gods will not forgive you these sacrilegious words! Rahan has a habit of defying the gods! That of the sun like that of the great rivers! That of thunder like that of storms! Hitting the "Flat Beast" is stupid! Unless you exercise your skill! Like this! Rahan seized the spear of a hunter. And threw it at the dark red drawing. Klac! Oh! Oh! The point of the wood crashed on the rock, at the precise point where the eye of the "Flat Beast" was located. Page Thirteen: Or again, like this! Rahan was now drawing the bow he had snatched from Herk. Clack! A new clamor arose when the flint point of the arrow also chipped the granite at the exact location of the eye. Rahan's remarkable skill earned him the respect of hunters. Among the clan, Lheita was soon alone in giving him hateful looks. I will kill him with my own hands, she thought to herself! At daybreak the men set out. Rahan had to hunt alone, to the side. And do not forget your commitment, Rahan! If you come back without game, the women will be punished! Naturally they will be too, If you do not come back! Page Fourteen: Yes, Rahan could very well have not returned to this fierce clan. He could have fled, and left this territory forever. But such thoughts did not occur to the mind of the son of Crao! The women helped Rahan. Rahan will help them! If nature still had many secrets for him, then the hunt had more. He knew by a broken twig, to recognize the passage of the most cunning game. Ah, Luck is with Rahan! For the first time in three long days he had spotted tracks. Those of two wild boars. Page Fifteen: Completely absorbed in his thoughts, he felt nothing of the danger hovering over him. I will kill him! As soon as he gets up I will kill him! Lheita had followed the "Enemy". She caught an occasional glimpse of him, as he crawled between the thick grasses. When he suddenly sat up, she drew her bow. But she didn't have time to shoot her arrow when Rahan disappeared again. Because he had dived on the wild boar, which he had just flushed out. The ivory blade struck. His clamor for victory mingled with the sound of the great male boar charging at him. Page Sixteen: Rahan knew how to parry these onslaughts. He remained motionless, ready to strike. Leaving a fraction of a second before rolling sideways to avoid the formidable tusks that would rip him open. The boar continued its course. But the ivory knife had already done its work. Its side open, the beast entered into this agony that the son of Crao could not bear. He was finishing the boar when Lheita released the sinew of her bow. Page Seventeen: Rahan perceived the mewing of the arrow and instinctively let himself fall. Protected by the shield of flesh, he glimpsed the woman who was looking for a second arrow. Lheita! He leapt so fast his hand grabbed the bow before it was bent. Herk will not appreciate this way of acting, Lheita! Maybe he would even kill you for wanting to strike down a loyal hunter? Who knows? Yes, He would kill me. Lheita was pail. She was afraid. Lheita will not die. If she accepts Rahan's way! Snap! Page Eighteen: The sun was shining high in the sky when Rahan returned to the cave. Herk and his hunters were already back. Ha-ha-ha! Crao's son didn't show himself to be a better hunter than us! This is the price he pays for defying the gods! Herk speaks too soon! Rahan and Lheita have hunted together. And see what they bring back! Down below, coming out of the woods and groaning under the strain, Keita was hauling a heavy load. A tempest of screams shook the clan. The “Sanghia”! Rahan has killed the great Boar! No! It was Lheita-the-huntress who killed the "Sangha"! Page Nineteen: Rahan was not helping Lheita, who was struggling. Was that not the just punishment? Never has a woman killed a “Sanghia”! Lheita could not. Here is the proof Herk! The son of Crao pointed to the arrow stuck in the beast's neck. That arrow that Lheita had aimed at him. But Herk noticed the open flank of the wild boar. And this injury? Uh, Rahan had to finish the Boar. Perhaps Herk was not fooled, but he did not show it. His men were already happily butchering the beast. Rahan pays his debt. Is that not so Herk? Is this not so Lheita? Lheita nodded. By not denouncing her to the chief, Rahan was paying more than his debt. Page Twenty: But she only understood the purpose of this strange "Enemy" when he bade farewell to the clan, two days later. The territory of the grand sun calls Rahan! Farewell, brothers! Rahan does not believe in the power of the Flat Beast. Yet he knew how to flush out the “Sanghia”! And the arrow of a woman could strike it down! Rahan hopes that men's eyes have been opened, and that his brothers will have less contempt for their companions! Farewell! The son of the fierce ages went towards the crests which the sun set on fire. Never had he felt so light. Never had he leapt so cheerfully. If Rahan was happy, it was because he thought he had awakened the intelligence of the hunters, his brothers, and also served the "Females-who-walked-upright", his sisters, well.

Welcome to the Dalek Channel. The year 2023 marks the one hundredth anniversary of the publication of the first paper on the complete synthesis of cocaine. We are pleased to present a translation from the German of the work of Richard von Willstatter, et al. Synthesis of Natural Cocaine. Von Richard Willstatter, Otto Wolfes, and Horst Mader. From the chemical laboratory of the Bayern academy of the sciences in Munich and from the scientific laboratory of the Merck factory in Darmstadt. Annals of Chemistry volume 434, 1923. Theoretical Part. Tropinone Carboxylic Acid Ester. Psi Cocaine, which is considered to be the racemate of the right-hand cocaine, which occurs in small amounts in the coca plant, was obtained by R Willstatter and M Bormer from intermolecular acetoacetic ester condensation of N-methyl-pyrrolidine di-acetic ester via tropineo-carboxylic acid ester: The investigation was incomplete with regard to the intermediates and by-products of the synthesis and its completion was important for the knowledge of the stereoisomeric cocaine in chemical and pharmacological terms. The working materials of the university laboratory seemed insufficient for the continuation of the experiments, especially for the isolation of the isomers that are formed in smaller quantities alongside psi cocaine, and so we have joined forces to continue the experiments on a larger scale in the laboratory of the Merck chemical factory. The tropinonecarboxylic acid was obtained for the first time more than 20 years ago by the action of carbon dioxide on sodium tropinone, see reference two, and without isolation by reduction with sodium amalgam in a weakly acidic solution to racemic ecgonine. Page 112: Also, the intermediate link in the new complete synthesis of cocaine has also not yet been discovered. Our investigation begins with the isolation of the tropinonecarboxylic acid methyl and ethyl ester, strange compounds that are also analogues of acetoacetic ester and tertiary bases. They are easy to purify because they are both basic and considerably enolized compounds, possess acidic properties and especially since they already form crystallizing hydrates. These keto acid esters are more stable than expected; they are inert in terms of hydrogen uptake. Synthesis of cocaine from Succinaldehyde. From the starting material of our synthesis, acetone dicarboxylic acid, there is a second route to the tropanderivates. Reference R Robinson, 1917 Soc. 111, published a tropine synthesis of admirable elegance in 1917, modeling it on a condensation carried out by J Thiele, reference 2 Annalen 1909 and 1910, with the phthalaldehyde. The succindialdehyde reacts with acetone dicarboxylic acid or its ester in the presence of methylamine. The synthesis was formulated by R Robinson with a dioxopyrrolidine as the first condensation product; but the assumption of this intermediate link is not convincing. Page 113: The two carboxyls of acetonedicarboxylic acid were lost in the synthesis of tropinone by Robinson. The synthesis undergoes a significant expansion if the dicarboxylic acid is replaced by the Eseric acid obtained from Willstatter and Pfannenstiel. In this case only the free carboxyl is destroyed and the other, the bound carboxyl is spared. Then this synthetic pathway also leads into the cocaine series. In this way we obtained the ester of tropinonecarboxylic acid and found it to be identical to the condensation product of methylpyrrolidine diacetic ester. Two reacemic ecgonins. For the difficult reduction of the tropononecarboxylic acid ester to the ecgonine ester, the best method has remained the action of sodium amalgam in a solution kept just acidic with hydrochloric acid. As a by-product, the carboxyalkyl is split off and psi tropine is formed as a by-product of the ecgonine ester not by hydrolysis but by reduction. Even apart from tropine bases, the reduction product is not uniform. The beautiful psi ecgonine methyl ester, which has already been described, easily crystallizes out of the oily mixture. In addition, however, the racemate corresponding to the usual ecgonine ester is formed, which, like the well-known L-ester, cannot be crystallized. In the previous paper it was already indicated that, in addition to the psi ecgonine ester, an isomer occurs which, according to its behavior, belongs to the ordinary cocaine. An isomer in the mother liquor was noted. This second r-Egconine ester is converted to a crystalline hydrochloride and completed by its beautiful benzoly compound been purified, a racemic cocaine which is as close in its characteristics to ordinary cocaine as the already described psi-racemate is to natural cocaine. Curiously, the two racemates have the same melting point; the mixed sample naturally results in humiliation. Page 114: The test for the explanation of the racemates should be the decomposition into the optical opposites. In the case of r, psi cocaine, however, the cleavage by the classic method of pairing with optically active acids has met with great difficulties, which seem to be based on the unusual stability of semi-racemic salts. Instead of the benzoyl compound, however, the separation with the d, alpha bromocamphor beta sulphoacid finally succeeded in the case of the corresponding psi ecgonine ester when the fractional crystallization of the salts from ethyl acetate solution was carried out. The heavy soluble sulphonate is the d-form salt of the right ecgonine ester of melting point 115 degrees described by A Einhorn and A Marquardt. The l-form can be obtained in pure form from the mother-liquor, more easily when using the second bromocamphor sulphonic acid, the "pi" acid, which together with the l-ester yields a weaker, soluble salt. The second racemate, which is even more important because of its relation to natural cocaine, can be resolved without difficulty by crystallization of the bitartrate. The heavy colic salt is that of an oil base, and this has been shown to be identical to natural cocaine. This completes the synthesis of natural cocaine. Thus, 2 D and 2 L forms and 2 racemates of the cocaines are available and also really pure. Third Racemic Ecgonine. It is the isomers with the cis- and trans-position of the hydroxyl which are present, and with optical isomerism which is based on the neighboring position of the carboxyl in one case to the d- in the other to the L-bridge carrier of the tropine system. But the number of isomers compiled by Willsatter and Bommer in an overview of the figures is twice as high, since the position of the carboxyl in relation to the tropane segments also causes cis-trans isomerism. So far there has been little evidence that the carboxyl can be stored in different ways in these amino acids. Page 115: Assuming intramolecular saturation of the basic and acidic groups in compounds of the ecgonine type, one is led to the idea that the free amino acid exists primarily in the cis form. However, J von Braun and E Muller (1) recently succeeded in finding the geometric isomerism caused by the carboxyl in the ester of the tropanecarboxylic acid of hydroecgonidine. One isomer was known to be the product of the reduction of anhydroecgonine with sodium and alcohol; an isomeric tropane carboxylic acid ester is formed during hydrogenation with palladium and hydrogen, which, according to R Wallstatter and M Brommer (2) and according to J Gadamer and C John (3), requires that anhydroecgonine contains the delta 1 double bond. A third racemic ecgonine, which differs characteristically from the known ecgonines, has now been isolated in beautiful crystals from the products of the reduction of tropine carboxylic acid ester. In contrast to the usual ecgonines, it is not rearranged into a psi compound by heating with alkalis, but is converted into racemic anhydroecgonine with the elimination of water. In this third ecgonine, which will be the subject of more detailed investigation, the cis-trans isomerism based on the arrangement of the carboxyl is realized. The observation of this isomerism in the free amino acids is consistent with the views of P Pfeiffer (4), which were developed on the basis of the dipole formulas of the amino acids, according to which the intermolecular salt formation of the amino acids and the betaine does not require any spatial approximation of the acidic and basic groups and has nothing in common with ring closure in the usual sense. Based on this consideration, our previous knowledge cannot determine whether the known ecgonines are the cis-carboxylic acids of the tropanols and the new isomer is trans-carboxylic acids or vice versa. Pharmacological Results. The isomeric cocaines described here offer probably unique material for enlightening pharmacological investigations, from which information can be expected with regard to the stereochemical specificity of the anesthetic effect on the nerves, which has received little attention. Page 116: Privy Councilor Professor Doctor R Gottlieb has undertaken an in-depth study of these isomers and has been kind enough to provide us with the following summary of the results so far. The pharmacological study of synthetic cocaine by R Gottlieb of the Pharmacology Institute Heidelberg, published in Archives for experimental Pathology and Pharmacology 1923, has so far shown that the anesthetic capacity on the peripheral nerve elements and the toxic effect in the central nervous system are influenced in different ways by the spatial position of the groups in the cocaine molecule. This opens up the prospect of finding among the isomers anesthetics that are more effective and at the same time less toxic than leaf cocaine. The spatial arrangement in the psi series seems to favor the ability to anasthesize. The strongest effect in direct contact with the nerve elements comes from the d, psi cocaine. Likewise, the tropacocaine benzoyl psi tropein is superior to benzoyl tropein. The racemate of the psi series is also more potent than the racemate of ordinary cocaine, but anesthetizes less than its d-part because the L-form is about four times less potent. Here, the effectiveness also depends on the optical isomerism. In the case of ordinary cocaine, on the other hand, the potency of the racemate is approximately the same as that of the 2 L and D moieties. In both series, the D-forms, with gradual absorption from the subcutaneous tissue, prove to be much less harmful to the central nervous system than the left-handed ones. For example, D, psi cocaine is at most half as toxic as leaf cocaine, while L, psi cocaine is significantly more toxic; the toxicity of the racemate is in the middle. Likewise, the optical antipode of leaf cocaine has far less resorptive toxic effects than the latter, and accordingly the racemate is already freer from the dangerous side effects of the anesthetic. Page 117: Experimental Part. According to Willstatter and Bommer, the action of sodium dust on the dimethyl ester of N-methyl-pyrrolidin-diacetic acid in Cymol results in a condensation product which is characterized by the intense violet coloration with iron chloride and by the cleavage of tropinone on boiling with dilute sulfuric acid, and was recognized as a beta ketonic acid ester. The first small-scale experiments had not yet succeeded in preparing this intermediate product in its pure form; According to past observations, its solubility did not appear to be favorable for isolation. The purification of the ketone acid ester and the similar ethyl compound is, however, facilitated by the formation of hydrates already crystallized. The condensation product is stirred with a little ice while introducing carbonic acid and the aqueous solution of the sodium salt is separated from the cymol and freed from some starting material and by-products by shaking with ether. While cooling, one acidifies with hydrochloric acid until Congo paper turns blue, filters and saturates the liquid with potash, in order to then extract the ester from it by shaking it ten times with chloroform. To purify the basic ester from the chloroform solution we again convert it into 33 per cent sulfuric acid, liberate it with potassium carbonate and isolate it again by extraction with chloroform. After the solution has been dried with sodium sulphate and evaporated completely in vacuo, an oil remains which, when triturated with a little water and heated, solidifies to form a crystal cake of hydrate. Dissolved in a little hot water, the hydrate, which is always easily soluble in cold water, separates again in colorless crystal crusts; they first lose the water via phosphorus pentoxide. The anhydrous ester, which can also be separated from a little methyl alcohol and slowly separates out in tiny crystals, indicates the melting point 111 degrees (correct); the hydrate melts not quite sharply at 100 degrees, releasing water and evaporating some of the substance with it. Page 118: To determine the water content, we place the anhydrous substance in a bell over water and then up to consistency in the air. The anhydrous tropine carboxylic acid methyl ester is readily soluble in ethyl and hot methyl alcohol, considerably soluble in chloroform, very slightly soluble in ether. It reacts clearly but not with strongly alkaline, and forms salts with both alkalis and acids. This ketone acid ester was allowed to be strongly enolized in the aqueous solution. In contrast to tropinone, it is completely resistant to permanganate in dilute sulfuric acid, and its solution is colored strongly red-violet by iron chloride. Hydrochloride. On addition of ether, crystallize from methyl-alcoholic solution. Nodules consist of six-sided prisms with a melting point of 180 degrees (corrected) beveled at both ends. Benzoyl compound. The tropinone carboxylic acid ester can easily be benzoylated and, under a wide range of conditions, gives for example B. with and without pyridine or in caustic alkaline solution with benzoyl chloride the same benzoyl derivative, which is suitable for recognizing esters. For example, we added 4 grams of benzoyl chloride to a solution of 3.5 grams of methyl ester in 6 grams of pyridine. Page 119: The mixture warmed up strongly: to complete the reaction let it stand at 30 to 40 degrees. A sample then gave no more ferric chloride reaction. After the pyridine had been evaporated off in vacuo, the residue was taken up in water and purified by washing with ether. We then freed the base with ammonia, shook it out with ether, and on evaporating it obtained a solid residue, which was recrystallized from a benzene solution by mixing it with low-boiling petroleum ether. The benzoate forms nice needles with a melting point of 75 to 76 degrees (corr) The benzoylated ester is almost soluble in water, slightly soluble in petroleum ether, and readily soluble in alcohol and ether. The chloride (melting point 188 degrees, corrected) already crystallizes from ethyl acetate, there is a precipitation with sodium nitrate from the melting point 171 degrees (corrected), also with potassium iodide a poorly soluble iodide (melting point 210 degrees, corrected). In contrast to cocaine, whose formula contains 2 more H-atoms, the compound does not show any appreciable anesthetic effect. In sulfuric acid solution, the benzoyl compound behaves almost as if it were saturated with permanganate; it also decolorizes only slowly with bromine. It resists catalytic hydrogenation and other modes of reduction. Dilute alkalis and acids readily split off benzoic acid and form tropinone carboxylic acid esters before hydrolysis to tropinone proceeds. Neither of these observations decides whether the benzoyl has joined the oxygen or a methylene group. Tropinone carboxylic acid ethyl ester C11H17O3N The ethyl ester is formed in the Willstätter and Bommer condensation in a somewhat higher yield than the methyl compound (determined as tropinone, 25 percent of theory). It is liquid and also forms a crystalline hydrate reminiscent of mesoxalic acid ester. Page 120: The same does not recrystallize well, but the ester can be purified either via its hydrochloric acid salt or by dissolving it in aqueous potassium hydroxide. The alkaline solution is washed with ether, to which it gives off no ketone ester, the ester is decomposed with ammonium chloride and shaken out with chloroform. The anhydrous ester is an oil that distils undecomposed under 0.5 mm pressure at 107 degrees and in small quantities under 25 mm vacuum at about 170 degrees. The crystallized hydrate melts at 63 to 65 degrees, it is air-stable and gives up all the water over sulfuric acid, at which point liquefaction occurs. The hydrate is very readily soluble in alcohol, considerably soluble in chloroform in water, and slowly dissolving in ether to the anhydrous form. With the slow action of moisture on the oily ester, the hydrate also forms as a sublimate in light crystal deposits. In various solvents, the crystals immediately give an intensive ferric chloride reaction. The picrate of the tropinonecarboxylic acid ester is sparingly soluble in water and in benzene and melts at 135 to 136 (corrected), the iodomethylate separates from methyl alcohol in tablets of melting point 190 to 192 (corrected), the hydrochloride crystallizes with its alcoholic solution on slow dilution Ather in prisms of melting point 168 degrees (corrected). Synthesis from acetone dicarboxylic ester acid with succindialdehyde and methylamine. Here, as in the synthesis of Wilsatter, Pfannenstiel and Bommer, the primary ester of acetone dicarboxylic acid is the starting material. Page 121: As Willstatter and Pfannenstiel have observed, Pechmann's diethyl ester is smoothly semi-saponified by alkali at ordinary temperatures and forms a nice dipotassium salt. The methyl ester acid salt was not yet demonstrated. We obtained it by adding 156 grams of acetone dicarboxylic acid, dimethyl ester, to a mixture of 800 grams of 50 per cent potassium hydroxide solution and 360 grmas of methyl alcohol cooled to -5. The salt, which is not a little soluble in methyl alcohol, separates with difficulty; the crystallization is completed by the addition of 150 cc of ether. Then the dipotassium salt precipitates in snow-white crystalline sheets (98 grams); in alkyl alcohol solution the yield increases but the identity of the primary methyl ester is uncertain. The synthesis by R Robinson was exemplary for the condensation of the succinaldehyde, obtained by the beautiful method of C Harries, 10 grams was dissolved in 200 cc of water and cooled to -5. To this we added the ice-cold solution of 41 grams of dipotassium salt in methyl ester acid and of 11.8 grams of methylamine in hydrochloric acid and 16.2 grams of free methylamine in 200 cc of water. Condensation occurred with an increase in temperature and a soapy mass formed. After a few hours we acidified the solution with hydrochloric acid, filtered and added an excess of ammonia. The tropinone carboxylic acid methyl ester, which remained as a brown oil after evaporation, was isolated by frequent extraction with chloroform. The yield was 15 grams, or 65 percent of theory. When water was added, the characteristic hydrate formation took place; the crystallized hydrate was purified as described above and characterized by the melting point of approximately 100 degrees, by analysis and specifically by conversion into the two racemic cocaines, the major product, psi-cocaine, melting point 80 degrees, and the minor product, cocaine melting point 79 to 80 degrees. Some tropinone could be obtained from the mother liquor of the tropinone carboxylic acid ester by boiling with sulfuric acid and isolated as a dibenzal compound. Page 122: Resolution of the r, psi ecgonine methyl esters into the optical Isomers. In the reduction of the tropinonecarboxylic acid methyl ester with sodium analgam in a weakly acidic solution, a mixture of isomeric esters is formed, accompanied by varying amounts of psi-tropine, which is formed by separating off the carboxymethyl. According to Willstatter and Bommer, the psi-ecgonine ester, which crystallizes very well and is difficult to dissolve, can be easily separated from the mixture in its pure state (melting point 128 degrees). The r, psi ecgonine resulting from hydrolysis has already been described by R Willstatter and A Bode. In addition to the anhydrous form mentioned, which crystallizes monoclinically, we also encounter a hydrate with 1 mole of water, which according to Doctor Steinmetz forms tetragonal, bipyramidal prisms (a to c equals 1 to 0.4533). We tried to split the benzoyl compound of the ester, the racemic psi-cocaine with a melting point of 81.5 degrees, into its components using various optically active acids, namely natural tartaric acid, malic acid, d-camphor sulfonic acid and d-bromocamphor sulfonic acids (beta and pi Acid). In contrast to the behavior of the racemate of ordinary cocaine, the classical methods failed here, as in the experiments cited by Willstatter and Bode. In all cases, salts crystallized out which, on decomposition, yielded d, l, psi cocaine and even gave the well-crystallizing, sparingly soluble d, alpha bromocamphor-beta-sulfonate, even when it was protected with bromocamphor sulphonic d, psi cocaine and separated out in fractions, only crystals from which the racemic base has been recovered. For these, however, the cryoscopic molecular weight determination in benzylic solution gave a simple molecular weight, corresponding to the formula C17H21O4N. It is not impossible that the salts obtained, which could not be separated by fractional crystallization, are mixtures of compounds of very similar solubility, consisting of the active acid with d- and with l, psi cocaine. However, the observation does better justice to the assumption that salts of the racemic base with the active acids are present here, i.e. semi-racemic compounds, as some of them were investigated by A Ladenburg. Page 123: Since the tendency to break up into the opposites is very low, the conditions for the decomposition could be found. The compounds of racemic psi-cocaine represent suitable experimental material for further investigations in order to test the views of A Ladenburg and the opposing views of HW Bakhuis Roozeboom with regard to the controversial phenomenon of partial racemy. Bitartrate des r, psi cocaine. 5 grams of the synthetic base were triturated with 2.5 grams of tartaric acid and dissolved in 35 grams of alcohol with gentle heating. On careful cooling, rosettes of fine felt-like needles gradually separated out. After recrystallization from 150 cc of alcohol, the yield was still 6.4 grams; after two consecutive crystallizations from dilute solution we isolated 2.2 grams. At the same time, the melting point of 164 degrees and the rotation ability did not change. For hydrochloric d, psi cocaine, i.e. also for the base, we find M equals plus 148 degrees, for the bitartrate of d, psi cocaine (melting point 139 degrees correct) M equals plus 191 degrees, which is M equals plus for d-tartaric acid 43 degrees results. From the bitartrate of the synthetic alkaloid we isolated the base again, which immediately showed the melting point 79 to 80 degrees, on its own and in a mixture with the starting material. d, alpha-bromocamphor-beta-sulfonic acid r, psi cocaine. 2.2 grams of synthetic cocaine was dissolved with 2.3 grams of bromocamphor sulfonic acid from HE Armstrong and T M Lowry, in 90 cc of hot water. On cooling, some syrup separated out, which only crystallized after a long time and frequent rubbing. Page 124: The fine-grained salt slowly formed small prisms of melting point 182 to 183 degrees when recrystallizing from water (50 cc). On the other hand, the bromocamphor sulphonic acid d, psi cocaine crystallized readily from dilute solution in nicely formed clusters of melting point 206 to 207 degrees, corrected. According to P Walden's rule 452 degrees would be expected. From the bromocamphor sulfonate of the synthetic alkaloid we also recovered the base, melting point 79 to 80 degrees, which was found to be optically inactive in chloroform solution. Also the camphorsulfonic acid salt from the r-base (well-formed flakes of melting point 218 degrees corrected, alpha equals plus 9.19 degrees) was quite different from the salt of the active alkaloid (thin needles of melting point 222 degrees corrected, alpha equals 37.31 degrees. The attempts to split the racemate finally led to success when, instead of cocaine, we paired the d, l, psi ecgonine ester with the d,alpha-bromocamphor-beta-sulphonic acid and allowed the salt to crystallize from ethyl acetate instead of from an aqueous solution. We dissolved 2.5 grams r, psi ecgonine methyl ester together with 3.8 grams d,alpha bromocamphor-beta-sulphonic acid in hot ethyl acetate and diluted the solution with a little alcohol so that the precipitation of somewhat syrupy salts was avoided during decanting. Gradually, several millimeter long coffin-lid shaped prisms separate, melting at 198 degrees (corrected 201 degrees). The crystallographic analysis of the salt was done by Herr Doctor H Steinmetz, who was kind enough to provide us with the following information. d, psi ecgonine methyl ester-d alpha-bromocamphor-beta-sulfonate (obtained by cleavage of the d, l-ester). Page 125: Rhombic bi-sphenoid; a to b to c equals 0.6338 to 1 to 0.3429, Figure 1. The present crystals showed the following forms: a{100}, m{110} n{120}, p{140}, r{101}. All the crystals are prismatically parallel to the d-axis; a is only present on a few, m and p often present in a few, m and p often of about the same size, n very narrow or absent. Only the form r{101} was observed as the end faces of the prisms. The [001] zone is mostly striped and tends to form venal flats. Cleavage: perfect after {100}. The plane of the optical axes is {100}, the pointed bisectrix is the c-axis. Axis angle for blue smaller than for red. Optically positive. The surface formation is holohedral; the etching figures on r, however, prove that it belongs to the bisphenoid class. For comparison, we prepared a preparation of the d, psi methyl ester from natural l-ester by rearrangement, which took place on heating with potassium hydroxide solution, and by re-esterification, and found a corresponding value for the specific rotation. The methyl ester isolated from the bromocamphor sulfo acid salt crystallized well from ethereal solution and showed the melting point 115 degrees, 116 corrected, alone and in a mixture with natural d, psi-methyl ester (melting point, 115 degrees, according to A Einhorn and A Marquardt). Mixing with the racemic ester lowered its melting point from 128 to 112 degrees. The description of the d, psi ecgonine methyl ester should be supplemented with the value for the ability to rotate, which was determined on the natural preparation. Page 126: During the cleavage, we also obtained the l-form of the psi-ecgonine methyl ester from the mother liquor of the bromo-campersulfonate, which also melted at 115 degrees and which, together with the same amount of d-ester, gave the racemate of corrected melting point of 129 degrees. Both components of psi-cocaine have thus become accessible to the Sunthesians, and we have presented both the compound corresponding to natural "legal cocaine" and its antipode, l, psi-cocaine, in pure form. The preparation of the compounds of the l, psi-ecgonine series is improved by the use of the second bromocamphor sulphonic acid, which gave the opposite result in the decomposition of the racemic ester. We obtained the l, psi-methyl ester in the form of a sparingly soluble salt when we combined the racemate with the d, alpha-bromocamphor-pi-sulfonic acid of FS Kipping and W J Pope and the salt, separated (without separation) from concentrated alcoholic solution, from hot Methyl alcohol slowly crystallize. The salt, which melted at 243 degrees (alpha equals plus 43.47 degrees), was broken down to yield the pure l, psi methyl ester (alpha equals minus 14.74 degrees in a 10 percent methyl alcohol solution). Mister F Müllbauer had the kindness to repeat for us in the institute of Mister Geh. Council's measurement made by Groth: L, Psi ecgonine methyl ester-d alpha bromo camphor pi sulfonate. Rhombic bisphenolic, a, to b to c equals 0.3598 to one to 0.6692. Simple combination {011},{110}, more rarely {011},{101},{110}, figure two in text. Page 127: Cleavage after 011 eng. optical axis plane 001; One axis emerges on each of the surfaces of the prism III. Blunt Bisectrix on (100), Pointed Bisectrix (010); however, this plane does not appear in any of the crystals present. Iodomethylates of ecgonine esters. The iodomethylate of the d, psi-methyl ester, whether from the synthetic or the natural ester, undiluted or prepared in solution, melts at 209 degrees. It is sparingly soluble in cold methyl alcohol and crystallizes in shimmering flakes. We observe the formation of the same compound as a result of a peculiar rearrangement when iodomethyl acts on undiluted l-ecgonine methyl ester in the cold. Strangely enough, undiluted l-ecgonine ester in the heat, also with rearrangement, gives rise to an iodomethylate (short needles, poorly soluble in cold wood spirit), which has the properties specified by A. Einhorn and A. Friedlander for right-ecgonine methyl ester (von Wilstatter and Bode ) quoted melting p. 165 degrees has alpha equals plus 11.25 degrees in 5 percent solution. These still unexplained isomeric relationships invite further investigations. Under all experimental conditions, the r, psi-methyl ester gives the solid needles or rods of melting point described by Willstater and Bode. 185 degrees, corrected crystallizing compound. Page 128: The same iodomethylate we observe as the product of the action of iodomethyl on the undiluted r-methyl ester of the ordinary ecgonine series. On the other hand, we obtained the true l and d, l ecgonine methyl ester iodomethylates, accompanied by the hydroiodic acid salts, by treating the esters dissolved in methyl alcohol, chloroform or ethyl acetate with iodomethyl. The l-iodomethylate melts at 164 degrees (alpha equasl minus 17.6, minus 18.2 in 5 percent solution), the d, l iodomethylate, easily soluble in wood spirit, geodes of bevelled rods, at 162 degrees. The similarly melting iodides are definitely different, as their mixed melting points have also shown. The iodomethylates of the psi series also differ from the isomers in their greater resistance to alkalis. r Ecgonine methyl ester, C10H17O3N. The reduction product of the tropinone carboxylic acid ester is not uniform. The crystallized psi ecgonine methyl ester leaves an oily portion in the mother liquor. From this we isolated an isomeric ester in the form of uniformly crystalline hydrochloric acid salts, which is similar in its properties to the natural ecgonine methyl ester, which is also only obtained as an oil. The chlorohydrate crystallizes from the methyl-alcoholic solution of the r-ethyl ester after neutralization with ether containing hydrochloric acid. Corrected melting point 195. Page 129: The best form for purification and characterization of the ester is its benzoyl compound. Their uniformity proves the purity of this methyl ester, which in the mother liquor of Psi compound is accompanied by other reduction products. Rearrangement of the r-ecgonine ester to psi racemate. Like L-ecgonine in so-called right-ecgonine, racemic ecgonine is rearranged by alkali solution into the r, psi-ecgonine described by Willstatter and Bode. The assumed configuration relationship and analogy with trope and psi-tropion is thereby confirmed. 3.4 grams of oily ecgonine methyl ester were mixed with 12 grams of 33 per cent Potassium lye heated for 24 hours at the reflux condenser. Then we neutralized the solution with hydrochloric acid, clarified with charcoal and evaporated in vacuo. The organic substance was removed from the salt residue by boiling with wood spirit and, after repeated evaporation, which was necessary for complete drainage, esterified by boiling for one day with 10 percent methyl alcohol hydrochloric acid. From the ethereal solution of the ester formed, 2 grams of small colorless prisms separated out, which had a corrected melting point of 128 degrees and were identical to r, Psi ekgonine methyl ester. The iodomethylate of melting point obtained from a methyl-alcoholic solution of the components. 182 degrees (corrected 185 degrees) and the benzoyl compound, which melted at 80 by itself and when mixed with a preparation prepared from Tropinone according to Willstatter and Bode, confirmed the identity. R-Cocaine C17H21O4N. The oily ecgonine ester was diluted with an equal amount of benzoyl and refluxed with two and a half times the weight of benzoic anhydride for 4 hours. We then diluted it with ether and treated the solution with aqueous hydrochloric acid until it reacted acidically on Congo paper. The separated chloral hydrate solution was freed from benzoic acid by etherification and made ammoniacal. Page 130: We then isolated the alkaloid with ether, in which it is readily soluble, and obtained, on evaporation, a syrup which rapidly crystallized when solidified. When recrystallized from petroleum ether, in which it readily dissolves when heated, it formed well-formed, flat rhombic prisms of melting point 79 to 80. So the new racemate has the same melting point as r, psi cocaine, but the bulk sample shows a drop of about 20 degrees. The crystals of the r-cocaine has Doctor H Steinmetz measured and he has thanked us by kindly communicating the following description. D, L cocaine Synthetic racemate Rhomical bipyramidal, a-to-b-to-c equals 0.6192 to 1 to 0.6223, figure three in text. The preparation, crystallized from ether, showed crystals with a diameter of up to 1 cm and the following shapes: “a”{1, 0, 0}, b {0, 1, 0}, C{0, 0, 1}, m{1, 1, 0}, c{1, 1, 1}. The crystals are usually thick-slabbed after this plane because of the predominance of b; a greater than b is rarer; c is always small and often absent, and m is not present in all crystals. The surface finish is not good, surfaces covered with many bumps are always formed, even with slow crystallization. The values given are mean values from individual readings which deviate from the mean by up to 1 1/2 degrees on either side. Cleavage: very perfect after b, a little less after c, clearly after a. The plane of the optical axes is {0, 1, 0}. The angle of the optical axes is very close to 90 degrees; therefore the interference pattern of the pointed bisectrix visible through slits of “c” {0, 0, 1} can hardly be distinguished from that of the blunt bisectrix visible through slits to “a”{1, 0, 0}. Optically positive. Page 131: In terms of its properties, r-cocaine is closer to ordinary cocaine than so-called Right cocaine and psi-racemate. The hydrochlorate is easily soluble in water and alcohol and forms rhomboform tablets when recrystallizing from the latter, in which, according to information from Mister F Mullbauer (Institute d Hrn, Professor von Groth), complicated twin intergrowths of very strongly birefringent biaxial crystals are present. Corrected melting point 187 degrees. While the two psi bases form sparingly soluble, readily crystallizing nitrates, the r-cocaine nitrate is easily soluble and precipitates from conc. solution oily. The iodide and the sublimate double salt also show the same differences from the psi series. Only the permanganate of the new base is notable for its poor solubility and crystallizes well. The iodomethylate is sparingly soluble in wood spirit, it melts like L-cocaine iodine methylate at 169 degrees (corrected) [melting point of the d, psi-cocaine iodine methylate 172 degrees (corrected), the r, psi compound 213 degrees (corrected)]. Cleavage of r-cocaine into its opposites. We prepare bitartrate from synthetic alkaloid (3 grams) by dissolving molecular amount (1.5 grams) of d-tartaric acid in hot water (20 cc). On slow cooling over several days, the salt crystallized in rhombic bisphenoidal prisms (“a” to “b” to “c” equals 1.5611 to 1 to 0.7054) with only holohedral shapes. The bitartrate, upon recrystallization from water, yielded well-formed prisms that melted at 114 to 115 degrees and contained 2 moles of crystal water. The bitartrate prepared from natural l-cocaine for the visual comparison showed the flat crystalline form and the same melting point. Synthetic Cocaine Bitartrate (With two H2O incuded). Page 132: Bitartrate of natural cocaine. The two preparations therefore show the same sense and approximately the same ability to rotate. We converted the bitartrate obtained from synthetic racemate from melting point 80 degrees into the free base. It crystallized very well from ether to form flat prisms that melted at 97 to 98 alone and when mixed with natural cocaine. This gives alpha equals minus 16.15, while O Antrick found for natural cocaine in chloroform solution: Alpha equals minus 16.412 The salt precipitated from the alcoholic solution of the alkaloid with essential hydrochloric acid had the corrected melting point of 192 degrees. Since the still unknown d-base, which is important for pharmacological testing, could not be obtained in sufficiently pure form from the mother liquor of l-cocaine d-bitartate, we isolated the antipode of this salt using l-tartaric acid, which we prepared from grape acid with cinchonine. 5.6 grams of d, l base with 2.8 grams of l-tartaric acid dissolved in 18 grams water with heating yielded 5.1 grams on cooling, after recrystallization 4.0 grams d-cacaine-l-bitartrate from melting point 112 degrees. Page 133: The base isolated from this salt crystallized from ether in beautiful monoclinic prisms of melting point 98 degrees. In Groth's Chem. Krystallographie (1919) the axial ratio calculated by Tschermak by Steinmetz is given. Since the recently reported crystallizations of synthetic oil such as d-cocaine showed excellent agreement of the values, a recalculation of the elements was necessary, especially since the value of beta differed considerably from the older measurements. As the following overview shows, there is complete identity between synthetic and natural cocaine. Natural L-cocaine “a”{1,0,0}, c{0,0,1} rho {1,0,1-bar}, q{0,1,1}, Chi{0, 1-bar, 1}, omega{1,1, 1-bar}. Tschermak gave the form {1, 1, 1-bar} instead of {1, 1-bar, 1-bar}. But there seems to be an error in this; This form was observed neither in the preparations presented nor in the preparations recrystallized from them, but the characteristic sphenoid on d-cocaine. Synthetic L cocaine: also Figure 4 in text. Synthetic D cocaine: same as Figure 5 in text. The habit of the crystals obtained from alcohol is mostly tabular to c, usually somewhat elongated parallel to the b-axis. Page 134: From petroleum ether you get very long lineal forms of c predominantly with a, and rho, at the ends only q and Chi. Instead of omega, omega prime should be used for d-cocaine. All preparations show perfect cleavage after {0,0,1}. The plane of the optical axes is perpendicular to the plane of symmetry. The obtuse bisectrix is at an obtuse angle beta, including about 40 with the alpha axis. The etching figures (Figure 6) on {0, 0, 1}, {1, 0, 0} and {1, 0, 1} are mirror images of the same on the crystals of the optically opposite bodies; the clearest are those obtained with alcohol on the cleavage planes {0, 0, 1}. r-Ecgonine, C9H15O3N. In the investigation of R Wilstatter and A Bode, the crude sodium salt of tropinonecarboxylic acid formed from sodium tropinone with carbon dioxide was the starting material for the partial synthesis of r, Psi cocaine. In addition to psi-ecgonine, an isomer was observed from which Willstatter and Bode were able to isolate psi-tropine by heating with hydrochloric acid. Therefore, the by-product was assigned the constitution of a psi-tropine-O-carboxylic acid. This information contained errors that need to be corrected. Page 135: It would be premature to claim that psi-tropine-O-carboxylic acid does not exist, but the information about the isolated compound, and especially the description of the crystals, including the hydrochloride, does not indicate a compound with the constitution of O-carboxylic acid but it applies to the isolated racemate of the usual ecgonine, which Willstatter and Bode already had in their hands. If an easily decomposable O-carboxylic acid yielding psi-tropine was formed, then d,l-ecgonine was also a component of the reduction products and this was isolated as the slightly soluble hydrochlorate on separation and as the trihydrate on removing the hydrochloric acid with silver oxide . Thus d, l, psi-ecgonine and d, l-ecgonine are formed from tropinone according to the method indicated. We carried out the hydrolysis of our d, l, cocaine or the corresponding ecgonine methyl ester by standing with barite water at room temperature for a week. After precise precipitation of the barium with sulfuric acid, we evaporate the solution several times with alcohol and repeatedly crystallize the residue from around 90 percent alcohol. Ecgonine is much more sparingly soluble in cold alcohol than in warm; it crystallized with 3 moles of water in lustrous six-sided plates, which, according to Doctor H Steinmetz are monoclinic and identical to those of the trihydrate measured by him twenty years ago. The hydrous substance melts vaguely between 93 and 118 degrees, redissolves and melts again and decomposes at about 212 degrees (rapidly heated), with slow heating already at about 203 degrees. Of the salts, the hemichlorohydrate (C9H15O3N)2HCl is particularly characteristic. It is very sparingly soluble in ethyl and methyl alcohol and crystallizes anhydrous in tablets with a melting point of 247 degrees (with decomposition). Page 136: The chloroauric salt, on recrystallization from hot water, formed cross-shaped needles of melting point 205 degrees. Third racemic Ecgonine (cistrans-isomeric Tropanol-carboxylic acid). In the reduction of the tropinonecarboxylic acid ester, the crystallizing psi-ecgonine ester and the oily ecgonine ester, the hydrochloride of which crystallizes well, were accompanied by by-products which varied in quantity and composition. It was possible to isolate another racemic ecgonine from it by hydrolysis with water, a geometric isomer of the two known racemates which differs from them in the position of the carboxyl. The new ecgonine crystallizes from water on the addition of alcohol, or from hot water, in which it is very readily soluble, in beautiful centimeter-sized prisms, containing 2 moles of crystalline water, and melting at 110 degrees with loss of water; the substance solidifies on further heating and melts again at 225 degrees (229 corrected) with foaming. The compound shows the resistance to permanganate in sulfuric acid solution, which is due to ecgonines. For the determinations 1, 3, 6, 7, samples from one presentation, for 2, 4, 5, and 8 from another presentation were used. The crystals, which are quite different from the forms of the well-known ecgonines, were measured by Mister F Mullbauer in the Groth Institute: we owe him the following information. Page 137: Third r-Ecgonine (with two H2O crystals). Pedial trickling. Approximate axes “a” to “b “to “c” equals 1.2492 to 1. Axis angle alpha equals 58 degrees 50'; beta equals 122 degrees, 7'; gamma equals 113 degrees 2'. Combination of the present c-axis prismatic crystals {001}{100}{1 bar 10}{010}{1 bar01}{0 1 bar0}{1 1 bar0}. Among the crystals there are some with mirror images of the opposite formation (Figures 7 and 8 in the text) The hydrochloric acid (C9H15O3N.HCl.H2O) is very sparingly soluble in alcohol; compact crystals from melting point 230 to 233 degrees. The new ekgonine suffers when boiled with conc. alkalis not isomerization, but dehydration; a new anhdroekgonin, namely the racemic one, is formed in the same way as in the case of treatment with glacial hydrogen chloride. We also obtain the same r-anhydroecgonine from d,l, ecgonine by the action of glacial acetic acid-hydrogen chloride in the heat, and, although with more difficulty, also from and d,l psi-ecgonine. It forms a well-crystallized perbromide and peroxide, and it immediately decolorizes permanganic acid in sulfuric acid solution; It absorbs the molecular amount of hydrogen via the catalytic hydrogenation. Page 138: Page 139: This r-anhydroecgonine, whose double bond is located in delta according to R Willatatter and M Bommer and according to J Gadamer and C John: It is easily soluble in water, sparingly soluble in cold alcohol; it crystallizes with 1 mole of H2O and melts, previously sintering, at 226 to 230 degrees with decomposition. The methyl ester iodomethylate melts at 180 degrees.

STREET MEAT. Norman Spinrad is the author of ten novels, including The Iron Dream, currently banned in Germany, Bug Jack Barron, soon to become a Universal film directed by Costa-Gavras, and The Void Captain’s Tale, his latest, currently out from Timescape Books. A word of warning: What follows is not for the faint of heart. It is a gritty, all-too-realistic picture of life in New York City in the not-too-distant future. It’s not a pleasant picture, and overall, this is not a pleasant story. Told from the point of view of two denizens of this urban nightmare, the language and the settings are true to the story’s premise. However, Norman Spinrad is such a master of his craft that despite these factors, he manages to imbue the characters with both dignity and humor, letting them and the story rise above the squalor. Mai suerte and good, so it goes in La Vida, no, and sometimes a streetie can’t tell which is going to lead to which. Bad luck for Gonzo that he lost his kibble kard when a city cop caught him trying to boost a roasted rat from a peddler who had the mother on the pad. Could you believe it, a rat peddler with the dinero to pad one of New York’s finest? Maybe a smarter streetie than Gonzo wouldn’t have had so much trouble featuring that. Manhattan was full of rats, natch, but those ratones had more street smarts than, say, the likes of Gonzo, and half of them were rabid, so ratcatching was not for everyone. But a guy with the cojones and the talent could bag the buggers free, roast ’em over a garbage fire, and get five bucks a pop free and clear. A king ratter with a tight culo for dinero who held his luck for five years might even save up the bread to put a down payment on a room, or anyway a share in one. So slipping the local muni ten on the side every week was just playing the percentages, the closest a streetie could come to having his very own zonie. But the street smarts to comprend all this Gonzo did not have, and so while the ratter was looking the other way, he hooked a fat sizzling one off the grill, not getting ten feet before he was collared with the evidence dangling still steaming from his hand. Good luck and bad. First offense for street snatch was loss of kard, second was six months in the South Bronx digging holes on a cup of kibble a day, at the end of which, if you were one of the 60 percent who survived, you were issued a special blue kard, which marked you as a two-timer. And if a bluekarder got busted, it was lobe-job time, muchacho. So the bad luck was the bust, and the good luck was that Gonzo did have enough street smarts to comprend the instant justice system. Most blue-karders had the smarts to throw the marker away, figuring a cup of kibble a day courtesy of the Welfare was not worth the inevitability of a lobe-job if you were busted with a blue ticket on your person. But Gonzo had the smarts to figure that the best course was to stay the hell out of the South Bronx in the first place. So after he lost his red kard the first time, he had spent a starving six days stalking streeties until he could bash a legit red-karder and steal a new one. So even though this was really his second bust, he had a red kard in his possession to lose, and escaped with nothing worse than kard konfiscation. And of course, loss of the rat. And muy pronto, one piece of good luck seemed to lead to another. Street sex was not ordinarily Gonzo’s bag—not because of excess scruples, but because, with his skeletal frame, stinking threads, and face full of pimples, he was not exactly equipped for a prime career as street meat. But what he needed more than anything else right now was another kosher kard and the best place to boost one was the meat rack at fourteenth and Third. These environs were about as low a meat rack as existed even in the Pig Apple, which was exactly the point. Any meat rack much more savory than this involved transactions between streeties and gainfully employed townies. Any market involving transactions between streeties and townies would be infested with muni cops, or even, if the market were patronized by pervos from a plush zone, by bad-ass zonies. Besides, townies, being employed, did not carry kibble kards. Hard as it was for even Gonzo to comprend, Fourteen and Three was a meat rack in which the johns were streeties. Here streetie pervos could score for a joint or a jug or a stringy old pigeon, and the cops there don’t need you and man they expect the same. The good luck was that Gonzo scored a geek almost at once, and a feeble old sack of stuff at that. Leaning up against the wall of a burned out building like barely able to stand, this white-haired old slimepot, wearing a drape stitched together out of the same potato sacking his street bag was made of, leered out of an alley at Gonzo, dangling a half-eaten rat invitingly. “Rat for a rack?” he croaked. “Name your game.” “Gum-gum, giggles.” Well, any streetie willing to trade a rat for a rack was odds on to be carrying a kibble kard, who could ask for a better dig to do the dirt than this alley, and this gaf was in no shape to offer a tussle. As far as Gonzo was concerned, this was almost too good to be true. The bad luck was that he was right. Gonzo nodded his agreement and followed the gaf a few steps deeper into the alley. But as soon as the john began fumbling with his drape, Gonzo grabbed him around the throat with one paw, and stifled his scream with the other. Frog-marching his victim even deeper into the alley, he demanded: “Koff your kard!” The old geek’s mouth muttered against his palm. “Yawp, you pervo, and I’ll tear your tongue out,” Gonzo said, removing the gagging hand. The pervo giggled quietly. “Yock’s on you, younger,” he said. “Ain’t carrying no kard.” His face suddenly went through some weird transformation, as did his voice. “In point of fact, you foul creature, you’ve just assaulted a townie. It’s a lobe-job for you, sonny, if you’re caught.” “Townie? Geek like you’s a townie, I’m a plush zone shimmer!” “Vice verse, villain,” the old man gabbled. “I’m the plushie tushie, primed for prole place plunder. Slumming for sleazo sex, son, see the scene?” Dimly, Gonzo saw the scene. He’d heard the word from the bird on this kind of turd. Rich townie pervos from some plush zone palace day-tripping the streeties, copping their sick kicks in streetie drag. On the other hand, it could be a scam to let him lam. But with both hands on this dirty mother, it didn’t really matter. A red flash went off in Gonzo’s brain, bolts of lightning seared down his arms, and, gibbering and screaming curses in some primal language of formless and innocent rage, he bashed the pervo’s head against the wall with a dull sickening thunk, and dropped the limp remains to the ground like a sack. Running on red-hot automatic now, Gonzo snatched up his victim’s street bag and rat, and fled up Third Avenue babbling and swearing, as if some cunning buried deep within his backbrain knew that no one on the sidewalks of good old New York was about to screw with a brain-burned screamer. It was a job. She was a townie. That was all that Mary Smith knew and all she needed to know, or so she continually told herself at times like these. She owned an entire room in what had once been a luxury building on 78th and Riverside. There were twenty-five million people out of work in the US of A, and somewhere between five hundred thousand and two million streeties in New York who had neither jobs nor domiciles. Who thought themselves lucky when they got themselves a rat to supplement their kibble ration, assuming they even had kards. She was a townie. She had a job. She owned a co-op room with thirty-seven years to go on a forty-year mortgage. In point of fact, while this was all that Mary needed to know, when she let herself, she knew far more than that. She knew that “Smith” was a “family name” she had given herself to celebrate the miracle of obtaining employment. She knew that she had grown up possessing only the name “Maria.” She knew that until five years ago she had been a streetie, surviving by wits, hooking, and the considerable jungle judo she had been forced to pick up in the process. She knew that it had been only a fantastic piece of luck which had placed her in position to rescue a lousy plushie tushie from a mugger by practical application of these street fighting skills and so secure this job as a zonie. Of course she was never unaware that she was a zonie. She carried an old Uzi machine pistol which required constant maintenance. Six days a week, she reported to work at the headquarters of the Upper East Side Security Zone Guard Force. Six days a week, she guarded the frontier or shepherded Upper East Side plushie tushies on their forays beyond the borders of the Security Zone. She also knew, when she let herself, that she had killed and/or wounded any number of streeties in the line of duty. What she never let herself know was her body count. What she also never allowed herself to ponder, not even for an instant, was the moral ambiguity of being an ex-streetie protecting loathsome plushie tushies from the very reality from which she herself had escaped. Indeed, she tried not to think of her charges as “plushie tushies” at all. They were Clients. They were People of Means. They were the Source of Employment. They had made her a Townie. But at times like these, her double-think wavered. It was plain impossible to think of Missus Gloria Van Gelder as anything but a plushie tushie. In fact it was impossible to think of this woman as anything but a brainless, arrogant, gold-plated bitch. What else could you call a woman who required the services of a helicopter, a pilot, and a zonie to take her and her wretched cocker spaniel Dearie back and forth to the Ellis Island Recreation Zone in order to let the little monster frolic in the grass and pee against a real tree? The fuel bill alone was probably the equivalent of three months’ salary for Mary. And while a million streeties subsisted on kibble and the occasional rat, the wretched beast, sleek, fat, and yapping, devoured enough horsemeat daily to treat three streeties to a deluxe banquet. And now, as the helicopter clattered over the gray canyons of Manhattan in the late afternoon twilight, the dog was squirming and yammering on the fat woman’s lap as if its bladder was once again filled to bursting. Mary only hoped that the creature would piss right on Missus Gloria Van Gelder’s pink satin jumpsuit. Or better yet, decide to take a dump. Missus Van Gelder, however, now decided to forestall any such catastrophe. “We must land immediately,” she told the pilot. “Dearie has to make a wee-wee.” “I’m afraid that’s impossible, madam,” the mournfulfaced pilot said. “We’re over an un-Zoned part of Manhattan. We’ll be home in a few minutes, Dearie will just have to wait until then.” “Dearie is a dog, you imbecile!” Missus Van Gelder shrieked. “Do you think you can explain that to him? Do you think I intend to let him make all over me? You will land this machine at once! Right down there in that big burned out crater! Down! Now!” “He’s right, Missus Van Gelder,” Mary said. “That’s not a safe area.” The plushie tushie stared at her with eyes of blue gimlet steel. “You’re a zonie, aren’t you?” she said thinly. “You’ve got a machine gun, don’t you? What do you people think we pay you for? So that my little Dearie can piss on my pants?” “I don’t think—” “You’re not paid to think, you insolent creature!” Missus Gloria Van Gelder shouted. “You’re paid to provide protection, and you, my man, are paid to fly this helicopter where I tell you to! Another word of argument out of either of you, and you can go back to eating kibble and dead rats! You will land at once!” As if to agree with his mistress, Dearie began to make a horrible, whimpering keening sound. It was almost enough to make Mary bash its stupid brains out with the butt of her Uzi and then turn the business end on the dog’s mistress. Almost enough. Instead, she gritted her teeth against the sound and her fury and double-checked her weapon as the helicopter descended towards the country of the streeties. “Son-of-a-bitch-culo-cabron-bastard-plushie-tushiechingada- mother . . .” Screaming more or less the same limited vocabulary of rage over and over again, Gonzo walked more slowly up Third Avenue now, flinging old newspapers, crushed beercans, wads of toilet tissue, and more amorphous highclass townie garbage from the pervo’s street bag to the four winds. For that was all that seemed to be in the bag, newspapers, empty aluminum cans, tampons, bits of cardboard, useless scraps of rag, a lot of townie crap without so much as an edible apple core or a gnawable rabbit bone, or any other potentially nutritive scrap of organic matter. As for the pervo’s half-eaten rat, whoever had previously munched on it must have done his gobbling quite a while ago. Even Gonzo was not ready to tear the thing apart for what edible bits might conceivably remain, at least not yet. Though he wasn’t ready to throw the rat away either, seeing as how it might just be possible to slip it to a blind beggar with a bad head cold in exchange for a butt or a belt of meth. “Stinking-culo-mother-plushie-pervo-cabron-bitchbastard!” If Gonzo hadn’t been too pissed off to think, he might just have been able to realize what deep shit he was really in. A real streetie’s real street bag would be filled with useful items—pieces of cloth big enough to stitch into something, fresh rat bones, bits of firewood, a brick that could be used as a weapon, maybe even a book of matches, a homemade shiv, or some real chunks of ratmeat if you hit the jackpot— not old paper and plushie tushie garbage that could have only come from a Zone. No real street bag, this. Meaning no real streetie, the stiff he had left in the alley. Meaning that if he were caught, it wouldn’t be the South Bronx or even a lobe-job, but a one-way token to Tube City, where, so the word from the bird had it, his meat would be used to give kibble what little flavor it had. “Goddamn-madre-jumping-son-of-a-cabron-bitch-putaaargh!” Verbally exhausted but still livid with rage, and still loping aimlessly northward, Gonzo upended the street bag, grabbed the bottom, and whirled it around his head, spraying the last bits of crap all over himself and another nearby screamer—a stooped, white-haired old woman dressed only in a ragged robe of brown paper and caught in an angry argument with an invisible Virgin Mary. Nothing unusual about that. The street was full of babblers and screamers as always, gibbering to themselves or to invisible companions, and no streetie survived very long reacting to anything so trivial as being showered with old paper and garbage from someone else’s shit-fit. But what was unusual—so unusual that it caused Gonzo to react once more to his environment and start thinking again—was that the dirty old chocha suddenly bellywhopped to the filthy pavement, grimy paw out-thrust to cover something that had clattered from the bag. Moving with street smart instincts, Gonzo stomped on the hand with the full weight of his body, eliciting a liquid scream of pain, then kicked upward, catching the crone in the chops and flipping her over on her back, where she scrabbled and moaned like an overturned turtle. And there on the cracked and filthy pavement was a metallic yellow coin. Prong a dong, a subway token! A subway token! Five bucks in townie dinero! When the winter winds began to blow in a few months, could be worth a streetie’s sweet life to risk the old Subterranio. Didn’t snow down under the ground. Warm it wasn’t, but you didn’t freeze, either. Good suerte again! Good luck too that only this old chocha had seen it. All this passed through Gonzo’s brain as he was scooping up his treasure and stuffing it safely into his jock. Only then did he pause to think that it had to be more than good luck that twenty other street smart bonzos weren’t even now kicking the crap out of him fighting for the prize. Only then did he dig that all the other streeties in the vecino were eyeing the sky and listening to the sound pound. And only after that did the clattering chattering penetrate his conscious attention. Whop-whop, chop-chop, a goddamn helicop was descending through the jagged canyon of burnt-out factory loft buildings towards the big bomb crater on Third and 30th. And this was no machine gun chop from the muni cops, it was a plushie tushie helicop, and it must be in deep trouble to be dumb enough to come down here in a streetie zone like a fat juicy bone! Snatching up the empty bag in case of swag, Gonzo joined the gleeful rush to greet this tasty meat dropping right down to the nonexistent mercy of the street. A sinking feeling blossomed in Mary’s stomach as the helicopter fluttered down past the burned-out buildings to land in a big rubble-strewn crater conveniently left as a landing pad by some thoughtful terrorist’s bomb of days gone by. And not just from the drop. They were coming down right in the middle of a crowd of streeties; or rather a crowd of streeties, maybe as many as three dozen of them, was forming up around the crater as they came down into it. The pilot moaned as the skids touched down. Dearie whimpered and squirmed in the lap of Missus Van Gelder, who cuffed him across the muzzle. “If you pee on me, I’ll kill you, Dearie!” she shrieked. “Don’t turn off the engine!” Mary told the pilot as she cocked the Uzi. “This could get rough.” The three of them sat there for a long moment as the circle of filthy, haggard, hungry-eyed streeties hesitantly began to converge, step by halting step, on the grounded helicopter, whose rotors turned slowly and throbbingly overhead as if to provide ominous background music. But that stupid plushie tushie bitch had all the street smarts of her pissy little lap-dog. “Well what are you waiting for, you idiot?” she said, jamming the leash into the hand of the ashenfaced pilot. “Go take Dearie for his walk before he makes all over.” Despairingly, imploringly, the pilot locked eyes with Mary for a long moment. She shrugged unhappily at him. “Make it fast,” she told him, brandishing her Uzi upwards like a spear. “Stay right by the helicopter and I’ll cover you.” “Mama mia . . .” the pilot groaned. But he popped the canopy, and, as Mary stood up levelling the Uzi at the streeties as menacingly as she could manage, he snatched up the dog and stepped out onto the ground. The circle of streeties seemed to ooze backwards a few steps as they caught sight of the machine pistol. But then, with an audible sigh of collective lust, they seemed to flow forward again as they saw the cocker spaniel already squatting and pissing as the pilot set it down. Street smart memories that she thought she had lost, that she had tried so hard to lose, flooded in on Mary. She knew all too well what was going through those perpetually-starved brains out there. A dog! An actual dog! Forty pounds of meat! Twenty or thirty rats’ worth, sleek and fat and well-fed, enough for three months of luxury, maybe more if you didn’t make a pig of yourself! She could all but feel the drool forming in her own mouth out of timewarped sympathy. “Pero!” someone shouted. “Pero, pero, pero!” “Dog!” “MEAT!” “MEAT! MEAT! MEAT!” more than one voice shouted. Then they were all chanting it, inching towards the helicopter and working up their courage for a charge. “MEAT! MEAT! MEAT!” Mary waved her Uzi in the air. “Get back!” she shouted. “Get back, you dirty.” A chunk of stone came sailing up out of the anonymity of the mob, missing both her and the helicopter. Then a brick hit the canopy, shattering half of it into a webwork of cracks. All at once, bricks and stones and pieces of broken bottles were whistling overhead, raining down on the helicopter as the mob, with an animal growl, surged forward. “Shoot!” Missus Van Gelder screamed. “Shoot! Shoot! Shoot! Kill the dirty sons of bitches!” As dozens of wild-eyed howling streeties shambled like killer apes towards the helicopter, Mary didn’t have to be told what to do. Her finger tightened on the trigger, sending a short loud burst of gunfire right into the mob. Streeties shrieked and fell. The mob abruptly turned tail and began to flee in all directions like the denizens of an anthill fleeing from the sudden shock of a boot-heel. But Mary hardly noticed any of this. For the sudden screaming burst of machine gun fire had passed not three feet from the pilot’s head, scaring him out of his socks. He threw up his hands in panic, and in so doing, let go of the leash. The panicked cocker spaniel, yelping and barking, went tear-assing across the crater right on the heels of the fleeing streeties. Gonzo, stuck in the rear of the crowd of streeties by the press of bodies, was frozen for a moment by the sound of machine gun fire and screams of agony, long enough to be knocked on his ass by some bonzo when the mob turned to flee. Scrabbling to his feet in terror, he saw a black furry shape dashing right by his arm, barking and whining. The dog! What luck! Forty pounds of meat for the monster, muchacho! Before his fuddled brain even had time to form these simple thoughts, his street smart instincts had acted. With lightning speed and with every ounce of strength in his scrawny arm, he raised up his fist and brought it down on the head of the cocker spaniel. Before the pole-axed dog could even hit the ground, he snatched it up by the tail, stuffed it head-first into his street bag, shouldered the sack, and was up and running like a son of a bitch. “My God, he’s got Dearie!” Missus Van Gelder screamed. “Stop him! Stop him!” But even as Mary fired, the plushie tushie bitch yanked at her arm, and the burst did nothing more than send chips of stone flying into the air not ten yards from the helicopter. “Don’t shoot, you imbecile, you could hit Dearie!” Then Gloria Van Gelder’s pale powdered puss was inches from her own, as livid and drooling with rage as any Mary had seen in her previous incarnation as a streetie. “You go out there, you incompetent cow, and you bring back my Dearie alive, or you don’t bother to come back at all!” she snarled in a hysterical voice backed with cold steel. “I’ll have you digging rocks in the South Bronx till you drop! I’ll lobe you myself! I’ll have you ground up into kibble! And don’t you think I can’t do it, you wretched scum.” Mary didn’t. Not for a moment did she doubt that with a wave of her fat-fingered hand, this chocha could and would destroy everything she had become since she clawed her way off the street. But for one brief moment, she did toy with the delicious notion of jamming the muzzle of her Uzi right down this lousy plushie tushie’s throat and emptying an entire magazine directly into her stinking guts. Then she was off and running. High on the fly with swag in his bag, Gonzo’s street smarts put brains in his feet. The mob was fleeing south on Third, the street was hot on the trot as the bird spread the word, and he knew he didn’t have much chance of keeping forty pounds of dog in his bag on a streetie main drag. He needed to fade from this scene like a submarine, and so he turned east on the first side street. His luck held. No one else had made this turn. There was nothing on this narrow street but burned out building shells mounded with ancient garbage. Somewhere in these ruins there must be something sharp enough to cut up the mutt into meat, and if he could score a match somewhere. But as he paused for a moment to catch his breath and check out his chances, he heard the sound of running feet. Turning, he was brought right down to the ground, clown, by the sight of the zonie from the helicop halfway up the street behind him, running hard, closing fast, and waving that goddamn machine gun chop. “Son-of-a-mother-jumping-puta-goddamn-zonie-bitch!” he screamed in outrage as he made his feet do their stuff. But with forty pounds of dog on his back, he wasn’t going to outrun no zonie for long. And ditching the dogmeat to save his own was not even a thought that crossed his mind. She was starting to gain on him as he turned the corner and came out onto Lexington. Bad luck, boy, muy malo! And then good. He had come out onto the next main drag not a block from a subway stop! And for the first time in his life, he had a token in his jock! The shock of such an incredible roll of good fortune—a token, the dog, now a subway stop—was like a cold whack in the chops that brought Gonzo’s street smarts rushing back. Against all reasonable animal instincts, knowing that his pursuer would now be closing even faster, he forced himself to slow to a trot, and then to a mere brisky saunter as he entered the sphere of attention of the muni cop guarding the entrance against the more obvious chopartists, screamers, and psychoscum. Be cool, don’t be a fool, he told himself, flashing his token for the indifferent benefit of the bored muni as he descended the stairs to the subway station. Mary turned the corner onto Lexington just in time to catch a glimpse of the top of a heavily-laden street bag disappearing down the stairs of the subway entrance up the block right under the stupid eyes of some lobed-out muni. Or so she thought. At this distance, it was hard to tell one swag bag from another, and for a few moments she could still delude herself that maybe she wasn’t going to have to chase the damn dog-snatcher through the subway, where her chances of catching him were slim to none. But the mother was nowhere else in sight as she trotted up to the muni, waving her Uzi as a badge of zoniehood to cut any crap, and her brief interrogation of the cop put the seal on it. “Skinny pimply geek with a dog in his bag?” “Plenty of skin and bones with pimples, ain’t seen no dog in three years, whaddaya think this is, Madison and 60?” “What just went down the stairs. Pimples? Heavy bag?” “Yeah, regular pimple-puss. Big bag of swag, now thatya mention it, musta had fifty pounds of crap in there. Flashing a token too.” Oh no! The odds against any streetie having a token were ten to one against. The odds against the one streetie that snatched the damn dog having one were forget it. Mary had hoped that if the bonzo had ducked into the subway entrance, he had simply panicked, wouldn’t get past the barrier, she’d be able to comer him like a nice fat trapped rat. But if the mother got past the barrier and into the Subterranio itself— “Mierda!” she snarled, and dashed down the stairs. One bit of luck was that this was a small local station, this entrance only opened onto the uptown local platform. At the bottom of the stairs was the entrance barrier and a small one-man token fortress. The barrier was the usual floor-to-ceiling wall of rusting, bullet-pocked three-inch armor plate. The fortress was a seven-by-seven-by-seven cube of the same, with a rotating tv camera enclosed in bullet-proof glass on top, a single money-and-token slot at shoulder level and the muzzle of a fifty-caliber machine gun poking out just below it. One of the three revolving turnstile doors in the barrier was just turning shut behind someone. No one in sight, and no place here to hide. Mary wasted no time interrogating the token clerk, seeing as how her eardrums and the soles of her feet were picking up the vibes of a train approaching distantly down the tunnel. She stuck a token in the turnstile slot, and with a belt from her shoulders, forced the rusty stile barrier to turn, valving her onto the subway platform. The uptown platform was dim, gray-green, filthy, stinking, and pretty deserted. A muni armed with an M-16 lounged under one of the still-working lights close by the barrier. Four townies in subway masks stuck close by him staring across the tracks at the downtown platform. Up the platform towards the uptown end, a female streetie squatted. Nothing out of the ordinary. Mary could see the lights of a train approaching the platform from downtown. That end of the platform lay in darkness, all the lights there having long since ceased to function. Odds on, her quarry was down there somewhere… She turned to interrogate the muni. “Did you see where—” At that inopportune moment, with a roar, a squeal, and a gut-wrenching clatter, the train barrelled into the station— “—Wha—?” “—Did you see—” “—Huh—?” —Hiss! Crunch! Squeal! Clang! The train came to a juddering halt and half the car doors slid open. “I SAID DID YOU SEE A BONZO WITH A HEAVY STREET BAG?” “Ya gotta scream in my face like that?” the muni snarled intelligibly in the momentary silence. The masked townies (Mickey Mouse, Horseface, Clown, Frankenstein) dashed into the nearest car. The streetie daintily wiped her butt with the hem of her robe. “I said, did you—” Way at the downtown end, a figure carrying a heavy bag and glancing in Mary’s direction dashed out of the darkness into a subway car. The doors started to close— “Crap!” Mary snarled, dashing for the nearest door, and managing to wedge it just enough ajar with the butt of her Uzi to snake inside. Clunk! Hiss! Whirr! Jolt! The train began to pull out of the station. Safe for the moment, Gonzo had time to think, and once he began to think, he couldn’t figure this crazy zonie. Why had she chased him this far? Natch, forty pounds of dogmeat would be a neat snatch even for a zonie, she must have the drool for the pero. But then why hadn’t she chopped at him with her piece; she sure hadn’t been slow with the blow back at the helicop. Loco in the coco, jamoco! Gonzo dashed up the subway car to check out the doors at the uptown end. Days of yore, these had opened to connect the cars, but they had been long since welded shut for security isolation. Once he saw that the weld still held, that the zonie couldn’t carhop in here after him, he dropped down on one of the blue-green plastic benches that ran the length of the subway car to catch his breath and suss the scene. There were only about a dozen people in this car, and they were all townies hiding behind their subway masks, staring into space trying to pretend that no one else existed in the hope that no one would notice they existed. No streeties to get any droolies for what might be in his bag. Good thing too, because now he could see that the bottom of the bag was oozing blood. Anyone with street smarts knew that fresh blood meant raw meat, skeet. Only these townies, lobed-out for the duration behind their dumb masks with goo jammed up their ears, too gutless to even let their faces hang out naked in the Subterranio, would make like they couldn’t see he had mucho muncho in his poncho. Hanging by one hand from a subway handle and dangling her chop from the other, Mary was given a wide zone all to herself by the masked townies, who sucked themselves even deeper into subway trance at the sight of this armed crazy, as she pondered the tactical situation. There were five cars between her and the bonzo and most if not all of the doors between would be welded shut. So you could say that she had him cornered in the extreme downtown sardine can. All she had to do was get to him. Which, she realized, she could do at thirty fourth Street, the next station. Timing and speed, that was her need. When the train stopped and the doors opened, she would dash out, run down the platform, and with luck get into the car where he was holed up before they closed again. The trick was the timing—she had to make sure that he didn’t slip out as she was slipping in. If he did, she’d be stuck in the train while he stood on the platform waving bye-bye and then her only chance would be to risk a head-shot on the flyby and hope she didn’t hit Dearie in the bargain. On the other hand, if she were willing to risk shooting at all . . . Not without a certain strain of the brain, Gonzo tried to think like a zonie. What was her next move along this groove? Hippity-hop, car-to-car at the next stop, that’s what he’d do if he were a zonie cop. And if he could hop out just as the doors were closing and she was hopping in . . . It’d be fun, son, she’d be off to the next station in the can, man, and he’d be standing there waving adios to the heat still holding the meat! Mary leaned against the doors as the train clanked and squealed into the next station, primed to move the moment they opened. Grind! Squeal! Clank! Thud! Zip! The doors opened. Or rather one of them did, the other jamming. Mary snaked through, elbowing aside a fat townie in a devil mask who was trying to get in, made up one car, slipped on some crap, stumbled into two more townies, swept them out of the way snarling, made another car length, saw the bonzo peering out of a door three cars ahead, made another car length— —The train doors started to close— —She made for the nearest one, saw her prey starting to dash out of the train onto the platform as she ducked inside— And fired a long wild burst along the length of the intervening cars, scattering screaming townies, pinning him inside as the doors slid shut and the train left the station. The townies caught in the car with this maniac and her smoking gun sat motionless behind their silly subway masks, cringing a bit as she glared at them while fitting in a fresh clip, but otherwise earnestly ignoring everything that happened in a punctilious display of standard straphanger manners. Only a couple of slimy streeties at the far end of the car were babbling and moaning. “Snap your yaps, or I’ll ice your dice, lice!” Mary screamed at them. “I’ll drop that bop on the next goddamn stop!” Gonzo knew he had to move now, like pow! or on the next pass, his ass was grass. The townies in the car were pissing and moaning, yet at the same time trying to pretend nothing had happened as they oozed as unobtrusively as possible towards the downtown end, away from the monster. “Son-of-a-bitch-bastard-puta-mother!” he screamed at them as one switch in his brain clicked off, and another clicked on, and he grabbed a geek in a Mickey Mouse mask, who had been too slow in moving, by the throat. “Snap your yap, jap!” he snarled as the townie gurgled and gargled. Street smarts took over, and, using the townie’s head like a hammer, he began battering at the nearest window. Clang! Screech! Thud! The train pulled into the next station. Mary squeezed through the half-opened doors, ran down the platform, shoving townies out of the way with the muzzle of her Uzi, and made it into the extreme downtown car. Two rows of townies huddled towards the end of the car spaced and shaking behind their subway masks. Except for a geek in a Mickey Mouse mask who lay on the bench towards the middle of the car in a smear of blood, beneath a window whose glass had been battered out to form a jagged exit. The doors slid shut. Gingerly, Mary stuck her head through the shard-guarded windowframe. The train began to move. Peering downtown as the train began to move uptown, she saw a figure carrying a heavy street bag on its shoulder tear-assing down the subway tunnel. “Son-of-a-bitch-puta-mother-bastard!” she screamed, firing a wild burst after him without thinking. The bullets echoed and pinged harmlessly off the concrete walls, and then the sound was lost in the ear-killing noise of the subway train getting up to speed. Now that he was home free all, Gonzo allowed himself the luxury of feeling his fatigue. Scattered blue lights bathed the subway tunnel in a dim pale glow. A line of pylons separated the uptown from the downtown tracks. Man-sized alcoves were incised into the tunnel wall at regular intervals for the benefit of track crews avoiding passing trains. Gonzo huddled in one of these. His feet were meat, his back was beat, and he really wanted a cool 24 on his seat. But while he was pretty sure he had given the zonie the slip, he knew he wasn’t quite finished with this run, son. Not until he had the dog butchered, dressed out, and cooked. For one thing, a forty pound mutt was only maybe thirty for the gut, and after having his ass chased all over already, he didn’t feature carrying the useless extra freight. For another, raw dogmeat would start to stink in a day or two. With all the old metal junk down here, finding something to use as a knife wouldn’t exactly be worth your life, but he couldn’t cook his snatch without a match, and just sitting down in the open and barbecuing a whole dog would draw every streetie within range like birds to a turd. Much as he disliked the notion, he had to admit that a few pounds of the dog could buy him everything he needed, if he could find a solo lobo with a secret hooch where he could poach the pooch. Some dumb suck too weak to try and push his luck. Come to think of it, a chick would sure do the trick… Running on old street smart reflexes without being dumb enough to take time to think, Mary got off the uptown train, fought her way through the rush crush in this town under the ground, slipped into a downtown just pulling out, rode it two stops, and got off again. Couldn’t have taken more than five minutes. Which meant that the bonzo who she had last seen running downtown through the tunnel had to be uptown from her now and heading her way down the uptown tunnel. Fortunately for her, most of the lights at the uptown end of the downtown platform were long since gone, but there was still one burning at the uptown end of the platform across the tracks. Which meant that if she lay prone on the end of the platform, she would be invisible to anyone emerging from the tunnel, whereas he would become a nicely silhouetted target at point-blank range. Which meant that she should be able to drop him with a good tight headshot without much risk of hitting the dog. But once she took up this position, lying out of sight in the filth and shadows, she had nothing to do but listen and think and smell the stink. Like most townies without plushie tushie bread, Mary was constrained to ride the subway back and forth between work and her room. Although she felt a certain contempt for herself for doing it, like most townies, she wore earplugs against the noise, and a subway mask between her private inner world and the collective bummer of the subway and her fellow straphangers. This was usually enough to space her into the traditional subway riding trance, which hypnotic state was usually enough to allow her to push full awareness of the olfactory component of her surroundings below the level of conscious awareness. But now, unmasked, unplugged, lying right in the down and dirty, and forced by the pragmatics of the situation into full sensory alert, she really smelled the subway for the first time in either this or her previous life. It stank. P.U. B.O. L.A.M.F. Like rank. It stank of generations of piss and sweat and crap. It stank of the collective body odor of the tens of thousands of scum lower than streeties who actually lived down here. It stank of old broiled rat and garbage-fire smoke. It stank of the tension, suppressed fear, and sour despair of the millions of townies who found themselves processed through it twice a day. Once you let the smell penetrate your awareness, it permeated your whole being, it let you know that your own body odor was another part of the ghastly whole. It was a stink that made Mary think, and what she thought about was her own state of sweaty despair. Dearie, the goddamn stupid mutt, might very well already be dead. She had seen the dog bashed on the head, hadn’t she, and the sucker had really been brained. Come to think of it, she had never seen a struggling sign of life in the street bag, and had heard not a bark or whine of protest from the normally noisy creature throughout the whole chase. And if the dog hadn’t been dead when the bonzo had stuffed it in the bag, there was a good chance that he was killing it right now. Man, if she were the streetie with a dog in her bag, she’d sure as hell make sure the mother was dead as soon as possible. Even if he thought she had given up, he’d know that a bark or a yelp would attract attention, and any such attention you drew down here would mean nothing but trouble of the worst possible kind… Out of the corner of her eye, she clocked the comings and goings on the subway platform. The evening rush was in full swing. Train after train roared by scant feet from where she lay, rattling her brain. Masked townies zipped in and out through the crush trying hard not to see each other or anything else. This not being one of the main station complexes, what they were really trying to avoid seeing was little in evidence—the permanent floating population of streeties, of things lower than streeties, that lived, or at any rate existed, down here full time, the Subway Scum that never saw the light of day. Even in the worst times of her dimly-remembered streetie days, Maria had never been dumb or desperate enough to spend the hours between 9 P.M. and 7 a.m. in the subway, not even when the streets above were filled with slimy slushed snow and the temperature at night hit ten below. When the subways shut down at 9, all the lights went out, and what hid in the tunnels and crannies during the subway “day” slithered out to claim a night blacker than a plushie tushie’s heart. And the word from the bird was that anything that moved was meat. You could get a hint of what that meant if you glimpsed out of the corner of your eye at what lurked around the darker edges of the major stations like Times Square or Grand Central during the day. Babblers and screamers. Lumps of filthy flesh sleeping under mounds of newspapers. Bits and pieces of bone it didn’t pay to look too closely at piled around last night’s cookfires. Even with plenty of ammo for the Uzi, Mary didn’t have the dumb guts to risk being caught down here when the lights went out. She’d give up first, she’d take her chances with Missus Gloria Van Gelder, she’d go back to the streets, she’d. Oh no! Oh yes! Mary snapped out of the hypnogogic reverie into which, in retrospect, she realized she had fallen. How long had she lain here? How many trains had gone by? She’d lost track. She’d lost count, or never taken it. But she’d certainly been lurking here more than long enough for the bonzo with the dog to come slinking up the tunnel. If he was going to. Crap, it figured! She’d been a zonie too long. She’d lost her street smarts, she’d forgotten how to think like truly desperate prey. If she were the streetie with a dog in her poke, if she had been chased and nearly nailed by a zonie with an Uzi, what would she do? She’d hole up in that tunnel between stations and stay out of sight until the lights went out, that’s what she’d do! Figuring correctly that no townie, not even a heeled zonie, would want her ass bad enough to risk her own in the subway after 9. Then, and only then, would she sneak up the tunnel towards the nearest station, and, unless her luck was bad, escape to the street with the meat. Face it Maria, that suck isn’t going to come walking down these tracks while the lights are on. And even if you’re crazy enough to wait here till they go out, which you are not, you won’t even be able to see well enough to get a clean head-shot from five feet out. You’ve been handing yourself a con, mon, she knew. Only two ways to go, mojo. Into that tunnel after the suck before the lights go out, or hang it up and let the mother keep the pup, in which case your meat will be back on the street. Mary got to her feet, pretending for a moment that she was making up her mind, that the possibility of true choice really existed. A train came roaring into the station not three feet from her nose. The rush was waning now, only about a dozen townies got on, and fewer got off. She had no more time to play games with her mind. It was now or never. So when the train left the station, she slipped over the platform lip and onto the downtown tracks. Keeping close to the tunnel wall and away from the electrified third rail, she went trotting off uptown through the tunnel, following the dim line of blue bulbs ever deeper into the semidarkness, eyes alert for any movement up ahead, ears pricked to anticipate the rumble of trains approaching from the rear, nerves scraping rawer and rawer with the everbuilding tension. Gonzo didn’t feature this, he didn’t like the look of it at all. He’d been slowly and ever so carefully making his way downtown through the tunnel, following the trail of blue bulbs, ducking into an inspection alcove every time a train began to approach, long before he became visible in the oncoming lights. Starting and freezing every time he heard a rat scuttle or the unfathomable clank of distant machinery. Now he was approaching a totally dark section of the tunnel where all the lights were out, every last one of them, downtown and up, for as far ahead as his eyes could see. As he squinted into the dark trying unsuccessfully to penetrate the ominous gloom, something seemed unnatural about the situation, you didn’t expect things to be working down here very well, but . . . Then he felt the pressure wave of an oncoming train moving uptown towards him from behind the blackness. He ducked into an alcove, and a minute or two later, the onrushing headlights of the train lit up the dark section of tunnel for a few moments as it came around a bend into visibility. In those few moments, Gonzo saw that the dead bulbs up ahead hadn’t merely been burned out and never replaced. Every last one of them on both the uptown and downtown sides of the tunnel had been smashed. And for a flash Gonzo saw, or thought he saw, or tried to convince himself he didn’t see, a big, hairy, raggy-baggy shape shamble quickly across the tracks like a jungle ape. Clutching something that seemed to gleam like a well-cleaned blade. Mary plastered herself to the tunnel wall as the train went by. When it had passed, she looked uptown with a sinking feeling in her guts. The next whole section of the tunnel was dark. Dead black dark. So dark that she reflexively glanced behind her at the receding row of dim lights just to make sure that they were still on, that she hadn’t lost track of time and been caught down here after nine. When she assured herself that the lights behind her were still feebly burning, a part of her, a big part of her, wanted to turn tail and follow them home rather than venture further into the dark and deadly. But she knew that if she followed those lights now, if she left this damn place without the goddamn dog, there wouldn’t be any home to return to—no job, therefore no money, therefore no next month’s payment on her room, therefore no room, therefore her ass would be back on the street. Son of a chicken bitch! she told herself. You’ve got your chop, girl! Got your zonie moves, you mean jungle-mother! And if I was that gonzo sucker, I’d be right there in the dark lurking, figuring this poor little muchacha would chicken out and start twitching and jerking. Go get that suck, with any luck, he’s in there just waiting for mama! Thus pumping herself up, Mary slowly began walking uptown again, into the darkened section of tunnel, up on the balls of her feet, her finger on the trigger, holding the Uzi before her like a spear. Within twenty yards or so, the tunnel took a bend, and when she had rounded it, she was walking through total blackness. Her nerves started screaming in protest, but she couldn’t let herself stop now. Even though every fall of her feet sounded to her like an elephant crunching along on broken glass. Even though she froze every few feet at little sounds, real or imagined. The darkness seemed to go on forever in space and in time. Phantom shapes were flickering across the insides of her blinded eyes, glowing yellow eyes, gleaming mouths full of razor-sharp teeth, horribly flapping wings of night, and the squealing and scraping of rats and bats and things that. “Gargha! Eeegah!” Something screaming, gibbering, puke-stinking foul, strong and heavy, suddenly smashed into her in the darkness, mewling and slavering and slamming her up against a tunnel pylon! Teeth sank into her shoulder sending a lightning bolt of pain down her arm, claws raked her face, the Uzi went flying into the darkness. Then there was a quick flash of blue light that engraved an awful after-image on her retinas as it faded as fast as it had come. Muzzle first, the machine pistol had hit the third rail, fusing and sizzling in a shower of electric blue sparks that revealed. A huge hulking male thing, all muscles, rotten rags, crap-matted hair and beard, pinning her to the pylon with its body, lifting a face that was all hair and red eyes and brown jagged teeth dripping with her own blood, so close to her nose that she gagged on the fetid stench of its horrid breath as the after-image faded to black. “Puta-mother!” she screamed in the dark, and, bracing her back against the pylon, brought her knee up with desperate strength at where she calculated its crotch would be. “Eeeeee!” A shrill burbling scream and something soft bruising against her kneecap. Claws at her eyes. Something hard hit her gut, knocking the wind out of her. Her knees started to fold and she began to fall. But not before she brought down the heel of her right hand where she hoped a neck would be and felt a satisfying resistance against it as she fell forward into a stunning jolt of head on head. Something stabbed feebly at her chest. Then she was down on the dirt with a heavy weight atop her drooling and grunting and clawing at her face. And the sound of a train clattering toward her from around the bend in the tunnel. Somehow, she got her feet up, wedged in between her stomach and the creature. She could feel the pressure wave of the approaching train now, see a light rushing towards her, eclipsed by the dark bulk pressing down on her body. “Eee-YAH!” she shouted, putting all her remaining strength into a double-legged kick, flipping the thing up off her, back-first into the side of the train rushing past them at high speed. The body bounced off the moving train like a basketball off a backboard and smashed into her as she tried to rise, knocking her over backwards. There was a sudden sharp pain at the back of her head and then her own lights went out. Gonzo had no idea how long he had been frozen there, squeezing as deep into the alcove as possible, trying to become invisible. He had seen a thing much too big for him to want to tussle shamble across the tracks. He had heard screams and grunts and the sounds of bovver. Then an electric blue flash and two struggling figures as something hit the third rail. Then more screams and fight sounds. Then the lights of an approaching train outlining two nasty mothers rolling around on the tracks. Then nothing but darkness and silence up ahead for a long, long time. No logician he, but this kind of calculation his street smarts could handle: he had seen something too big to mess with, that something had gotten into it with something else, therefore whichever one of them had come out on top, he did not feature facing it, in the dark or in the light. No way he was going to go ahead towards whatever lurked in the dark. And unless the two of them had offed each other or the train had gotten them both, a percentage you had to be loco in the coco to play, something muy fuerte was up ahead of him in the dark, and might be silently creeping up the tunnel towards him right now. So if he turned tail and fled uptown, he might be spotted by the whatever, a little guy with a big bag outlined by the tunnel lights before him. Yeah, he’d be visible, and whatever was down there would be watching him out of the impenetrable dark. So the scam, Sam, was to hold the line. When the whole subway went dark, the percentage would be his, he knew there was something down there, but it didn’t know about him. He hoped. When neither of them could see, if he could move without tipping a sound, he could slink uptown home free. Dashing down the snowy street five steps ahead of two dudes with open flies. She grabbed the rat by its tail and bashed its brains out against the wall. Grabbing up a brick from the pile of rubble, she smacked him across the chops with it. The dog ran yelping and screaming. The john, grunting and swearing. Gobbets of pigeon slid down her gullet. A throb of pain somewhere, and a deeper, duller thud of pain somewhere else. Maria didn’t really know when she had come to. Shoulder, right. Head, right. Fragments of dream-images whirling behind her eyes at some point became fragments of fear images whirling in the dark. She had a head and shoulder somewhere, and they hurt like a son of a bitch. Body, right. There was a body laying on some hard rocks or something, didn’t feel good. Her body. She had a body. It was laying in a twisted heap with a bonging header and a sharp pain in its right shoulder. She was laying on the ground with a pain in her shoulder and another in her head. She was waking up, or maybe she had been awake for a while without really knowing it. Open the eyes. Nada. Big black nothing. Panic. What the. Memories came flooding back. The dark section of tunnel. A fight. The train. A hit on the head. Then nothing. Until now. She was Maria. No, she was a zonie named. Reflexively, she reached for the reassurance of her Uzi. It wasn’t there. Then she remembered the gun hitting the third rail, and it all came back to her, and she knew where she was and what had happened. Her Uzi was done for. She had kicked that filthy putamother right into a train, and then the body must have bounced into her, bashing her head against something which must have knocked her out. She didn’t have any way of knowing how long she had been out cold in hours and minutes, but that didn’t matter the way time was measured down here. Because what counted, all that counted, was that it was after nine in the subway, all the lights were out, and her chop would be useless even if she stumbled on it in the dark. The panic returned, an informed, logical panic this time, and all the worse for its clarity. She couldn’t see anything. She didn’t know which way was uptown or downtown and there was no way to figure it out. She caught herself freaking before she realized that that didn’t matter now. Because she was in deep enough shit without worrying about any goddamn dog anymore. And whichever way she went, she’d come to a station. She took a deep breath, gathering her wits. Find the tunnel wall. Once she did that, she’d have the whole width of a set of subway tracks between her and the third rail. To be on the safe side, better crawl. So instead of rising, she began crawling blindly through the muck and filth of the tunnel floor. She hadn’t gone more than a few yards before her outstretched fingers recoiled from something warm and soft and sticky. Reflexively withdrawing, she reflexively stifled a reflexive scream. Nothing moved. The moment of panic passed as she realized this must be the corpse of her attacker. Whom she had bounced off a fast-moving train, and who therefore must be very, very dead. She relaxed. She almost felt good. She had won. She had killed this great big crazy mother. And he had been armed with a knife. A knife. Efficiently, professionally, she ran her fingers all over the corpse until she found it, realizing, but not really caring, that the sticky wet stuff she was getting all over herself was blood. Then she touched something hard and metallic. Gingerly, she ran her fingertips along it until she touched rags. A rag-wrapped handle. She had it. She snatched it up. She had a knife. It might not be an Uzi, but at least it was a weapon. It felt so much better to be heeled. Maria felt an almost sensual calm passing from the handle of the knife, down her arm, into her body, and thence to her brain, which slowly assumed a predator’s icy calm. Having a weapon again made it possible to think clearly. For one thing, it was stupid to be crawling around in the muck worrying about touching the third rail; it was after nine, all the electricity was off. She scrambled to her feet as soundlessly as possible, for silence was still golden down here in the dangerous dark. She reached down and took off her shoes, the better to simulate a predator padding through the jungle of the night. Cunningly, methodically, she began to pad in ever widening spiralling circles, until, inevitably, the outstretched fingers of her left hand touched the tunnel wall. Choosing an arbitrary direction, she pressed her body up against the concrete. Feeling along the wall with her left hand, holding the knife cocked for action in her right, breathing in short, silent little sips, placing one foot softly and carefully in front of the other, she began creeping up the tunnel. Gonzo had lost his nerve, and he was just on the verge of admitting it to himself. Fact was, as long as he stayed here frozen to the tunnel wall in the soundless dark, he was safe. Nothing could see him, and as long as he didn’t move, nothing could hear him either. Whereas the moment he moved, anything that was waiting in the dark, anything that even now could be inches from his face could— —a soft, warm, sweaty palm brushed against his cheek— —He started, jumped, screamed, felt something whistle past his throat, wet his pants, and— “I’ve got a knife, twitch and you croak, bloke!” Maria hissed in the dark, listening for something to slash at. Silence. Darkness. The sound of ragged breathing over to the right, or her imagination? A stand-off. She had the knife, but both of them were blind. A waiting game. The first one to make a sound would reveal their position, and then . . . Slowly, ever so slowly in the silent dark, Gonzo’s street smarts began to overcome his fear. A voice. He had heard a chick’s voice. Did she really have a knife? Or was all that a scam, man? Or was she as scared crapless as he was? Or more afraid? He knew that what he was facing was only a muchacha with or without a blade, whereas she didn’t know what he was. . . . A chick . . . Hadn’t he been planning to do a trick with a chick? He made his voice as deep and menacing as he could, stepping back and aside as he spoke so she couldn’t slash at the sound. “Deal, muchacha! Got a sweet deal for you.” Silence. Darkness. Nada. “Come on, girl, give it a whirl,” Gonzo said irritably now. More silence. Then, over to the left, and maybe moving, a hesitant, harsh female voice. “What’s the word, turd?” Ah, got her talking now. If I can only . . . “Got a match, snatch?” “What if I do?” “Take a peek, freak.” “What’s your scam, Sam?” “Meat’s the treat, skeet!” Gonzo said seductively. “I got it, you cook it. Take a look, I won’t bite.” Meat? Dogmeat? Maria could hear her heart pounding in the dark. Could it be? Could this be the bonzo who pinched the dog? Standing right there in front of her knife offering his life? She had to. She had it made, she had the blade, and if she saw it was the suck, he was fresh out of luck. Trembling, she fished around in a pocket with her left hand and extracted a book of paper matches. Still clutching the knife handle, she used both hands to get it open, tore off a match. Holding the matchbook in her left hand, the knife and the match in her right, she struck it and —the sudden light dazzled her— —something leaped and battered at her hands— —the match guttered back into darkness— —the knife was gone— Now that he had copped the blade, Gonzo had it made. He could leave her in the dark and make a run . . . or he could really have some fun. And the snatch probably had another match. . . . “Hey, you got more fire, muchacha?” he said. Nada. She was playing it cool, she was nobody’s fool. “Meat’s the treat, skeet, like I say. I got a whole dog in my bag! Come on, what do you say, a big piece of my meat for a little piece of yours.” Ice-cold, red-hot, Maria did a slow bum in the dark, cursing her own stupidity, but still praising her luck at finding the suck. The puta-mother she was after! Her ticket back to the Zone! But the mother had her knife, and after he had her bod, it would probably be her life. After he had her bod, she realized with slow deliberation. Yeah, she’d be safe until he’d done his fun. And she’d handled the big geek who’d had the knife in the first place, hadn’t she? And this was a scrawny little crud, she had her zonie moves, and when he started to groove . . . I know who he is, but he doesn’t know what I am, she realized. Better play it dumb and hook the scum. “Dog . .?” she said in a little girl voice. “You gotta dog?” “We got a deal, girl?” “But . . . but how do I know you won’t just feed me the blade?” “Dead gash ain’t no stash.” Maria jut all the dumb little chocha stupidity she could into her voice. “Okay, man, I take a chance. . . .” “Gotta hooch where we can cook the pooch?” Mother, the dumb geek thought she was Subway Scum! Her confidence began to grow; that might be another angle she could use. “Forty Second Street,” she said, realizing suddenly that if she had run into him, she must have been heading uptown. Forty second on the IRT East meant Grand Central, a whole underground town, clown, where I can find someplace safe to grass your ass. “No quick moves,” said a voice coming towards her. “Don’t freak.” Then she felt an arm snake around her back and a sharp little prick between her shoulder-blades. “No smart stuff, muff,” he said beside her ear. And then they started walking uptown through the dark tunnel together, just like lovey-doves. Gonzo had never spent a night in the Subterranio, let alone with anything in his bag worth a tussle to Subway Scum muscle, so his nerves began to twitch when he saw the smoky red glow of fires up ahead. Still, he figured he had an edge, or so he told himself. Primero, he had the knife, and for another, he had this chick as back-up, and this snatch had managed to come out on top in a one-onone with that big and bad back there. This was Subway Scum gash, muchacho, she knew how the land lay, she knew what games to play. But he’d better not pop that he was as cherry down here as some dumb muni cop. “Look, we stick together, right?” he said as they approached the flickering, smoldering, dull red light outlining the mouth of the tunnel. “We back each other up?” “That’s the scam, Sam. For tonight, you’re my man.” “Okay, then no tricks, chick,” he said, removing the point of the knife from the pit of her back, and letting it dangle from his hand in plain dangerous sight. “Just remember, I’ve still got the blade.” As they emerged from the cover of the tunnel and into the Forty SecondStreet station, Gonzo could see that there were dozens of fires burning in the station above. In the smoky smelly light, he got his first real look at his lady of the night. Subway Scum for sure, mon! She was wearing something that might once have been yellow but was now a raggy bag smeared with blood, and crap, and ashy grey mung. Her tough-looking face was more of the same— scratched, and bruised, and caked with crud and old blood. She was one mean-looking mama, and that gave him cojones. They were a bad-looking combo, Mister and Missus Kick-Your-Ass, with a bag and a knife, screw with us, and it’s worth your life! Maria had seen the Grand Central subway station often enough by day, it was the biggest there was, one of the main hubs of the whole system, an underground town with newsstands and veggie stalls, rag stores and smoke stands, rat peddlers and knife shops, pom racks and meat racks. Dozens of stalls and stands and stores and peddlers, hundreds of thousands of potential customers passing through, and the city taking its cut from all the action, meaning that there was always a small army of munis conspicuously in evidence to keep things cool. But now, as they crawled up off the tracks onto the platform, it was a different world. All the floating peddlers were long since gone and all the stands and stalls and stores were sealed with armor-plate shutters that looked about three feet thick. Not a cop to be found, natch, and of course not a single electric light or townie in a subway mask. But there sure was light and sound and plenty of raw meat around! There were two platforms in this part of the station dividing four sets of tracks, and there were dozens of little fires burning on them where little solitary groups of shadowy figures hunched, rocking back and forth like spastics, mumbling and gabbling, and roasting rats and other morsels of meat. The flickering intermittent firelight tu

Rahan. Episode Nine. The Arc of Heaven. A few stones fell near the fire where the resin-soaked branches crackled and Rahan understood that he had become the game of primitive hunters. Clack! Hairy beings indeed sprang from the thickets, brandishing other stones. The son of Crao left his knife in its sheath because he hated to kill "Those-who-walk-upright". But he armed himself with a solid branch. Page Two: Rahan means no harm to the "Men-of-the-Night"! Why do they want to kill Rahan? Growling wildly, the clan rushed forward. Rahan will not let himself be knocked out like a boar! The Branch whipped the fire, throwing a volley of embers on the attackers who fell back screaming in fear. Ha-ha-ha! The "Men-of-the-Night" fear fire! No doubt they don't know the secret! Let them drop their stones and approach. Rahan will reveal to them the mystery of the "Burning Wood!" Page Three: It was too late when Rahan heard the whistling of the projectile behind him. Argh! Everything turned red like the heart of the fire and he did not even hear the shouts of triumph of the clan. When he came to, his wrists were as sore as his neck. Because he was tied to a tree. This magic item did not protect Rahan! The chief of the clan twisted between his fingers the ivory knife, the use of which he was obviously ignorant. To hunt and fight, these men only know how to throw stones, like the ancestors of Crao once did! Page Four: When all the hunters have returned, Rahan will be put to death! The captive understood why he was still alive. They wanted to sacrifice him in front of the assembled horde. The day was breaking behind the distant mountains that were blurred by a veil of rain. Rahan will teach you the secret of fire and many other things! Two of my sons were once devoured by fire! Cursed are those who make a pact with it! You will take your secrets with you in death! And do not expect to be saved by your talisman! With contempt, the chief had thrown the knife on the ground. At the very moment that the iridescent disc of the sun crested the mountains a noise arose. The hunters stood out, silhouetted in the rain. Page Five: The hunters are back, Rahan! The whole horde will participate in your execution!! Men were already arming themselves with heavy stones. They will break Rahan's skull and crush his limbs! The knife was too far away for Rahan to grasp. And these men would not have permitted him an attempt of that sort! The land of shadows awaits you Rahan!! The leader was about to strike the first blow when the captive exclaimed. If you kill Rahan the sky will open over your heads! Look on the mountain! Rahan, who had never seen a rainbow, was as amazed as the members of the horde. The rainbow of heaven! Page Six: But while dread hovered overhead, he had the reflex to use the miraculous phenomenon to his advantage. Run away! Run away! Hide yourself in the forest! This invitation was unnecessary. The panicked groups scattered on all sides. Rahan is a wizard! He will make the sky open! The rain had ceased and the rainbow sparkled marvelously on the mountain. Rahan will discover the mystery of heaven! The clearing was deserted. An insect stung Rahan, who was contorting his body desperately to reach the knife. Buzz! Aie! When Rahan is free, he will crush you! Uh. But will Rahan be able to break free!? Page Seven: Held to the resinous trunk, Rahan stretched all his limbs. But his knife remained inaccessible! Crack! Enraged, he tried to shake the deep-rooted tree and. Oh! A dead branch fell close to him. Rahan knows how to bring his knife closer! And a moment later he could indeed reach the ivory weapon. But had to engage in difficult contortions to bring the handle close to his mouth. Page Eight: Zizz! Buzz! You stung for the last time, cursed beast! Ra-ha-ha! The bonds fell and the victorious clamor of the son of Crao, awakened the echoes of the great forest. While the horde remained crouching, worried and silent, fascinated by the fantastic iridescence of the arc in the sky. Rahan, laughing, was chasing the insect that had harassed him during his captivity. Buzz! Buzz! Rahan will catch up with you!! Oh! The beast had just disappeared inside a hollow reed! Ha-ha-ha! This trick won't fool Rahan! He will dislodge you from there! Page Nine: Rahan broke off the reed, and in an instinctive reaction, blew very hard into it. Oh! Poof! Violently ejected from the other end of the reed, the insect fluttered towards a branch. Rahan blew very hard and pushed this beast away. Rahan can therefore project something else! Seeing a long thorn, Rahan slipped it into the reed. The insect, still dizzy, stayed immobile on the branch. Ha-ha-ha! For play, Rahan aimed at the beast and puffed. Page Ten: Buzz! Naturally, he did not hit that miniscule target, which immediately vanished. But the thorn in the bark was a revelation to him. A man can therefore strike his enemy from a distance thanks to the “wind-of-the-cheeks”. And Rahan thought, if he throws those thorns whose sting puts you to sleep, he has a silent and formidable weapon! And so in these fierce times, had just germinated in the mind of Rahan, the idea of what would later be called a "Blowpipe". But another idea still haunted the son of Crao. This Gigantic and marvelous arc suspended in the sky. Page Eleven: Even Crao, who knew so many things, never spoke to Rahan about the “Arc-of-Heaven”! The whole horde held their breath when they saw Rahan heading for the mountain. By the grace of the magic object he has freed himself! He is not a man but a god! Watch, he defies the sky! Rahan was indeed screaming words to the clouds. Rahan has pierced a hundred mysteries! He discovers the secret of the "Arc-of-Heaven"! And he climbed the rock face with astonishing agility. Rising towards the splendid thing both yellow like the sun, blue like the river. Pink like the sunset sky, green like the young prairie grasses. Page Twelve: The dumbfounded horde followed his ascent. If Rahan can climb without dying towards the "Heaven-which-opens", our hunters will go up there too! The son of Crao sometimes helped himself with his knife, clearing a projection to facilitate his climbing. He reached a plateau where some trees stood. Here the ground was cracked with deep crevices. An eagle in his area was disturbed and it suddenly swooped down on him. Rahan is not afraid of the "Hooked Beak"! Ah! But the eagle's beak struck faster than the man's knife. Page Thirteen: Knocked to the ground, Rahan grabbed a dead branch. He struck the eagle on the fly, breaking the neck of the winged monster. Ra-ha-ha! The victorious cry turned into a groan of bitterness. The ivory knife had disappeared! And Rahan understood that his weapon, escaping him, fell into the nearby crevasse! He leaned into it and his throat tightened. It would take a Rahan with the slenderness of a snake to slip in there! The knife was there on a projection in the wall. But it was inaccessible! Page Fourteen: It was indeed impossible for a man to get into this narrow crack. Rahan has lost his only possession! Rahan without his knife, will no longer be Rahan! And the "Men-of-the-night" this time will not spare Rahan! The hunters of the horde, still very far away, began to climb the rocks! Rahan knew how to bring his knife closer to free himself! This branch will help him try that again! A moment later Rahan growled in rage. The branch was too short! He rushed in search of another branch. But all were too twisted to enter the fissure! Page Fifteen: The cries of the hunters calling out to each other now reached him. Crack! Rahan will defend his life as the Blue Mountain clan taught him! The son of Crao clutched a strong branch from which the resin oozed. "The Blood-of-the-Trees"! Rahan should have thought of that sooner! He broke off the stickiest part and tied a long vine to it. Rahan will fish for his knife! Slowly, very slowly, he lowered his line to the ledge. The cries of the horde kept getting closer. The wood finally touched the ivory and Rahan's heart stopped beating. If the knife didn't stick to the resin! Page Sixteen: It will fall lower, and disappear forever in the darkness of the deep crevasse! Rahan drew slowly and the cutlass rose. But the slightest shock, the slightest bump against the rock could shake it off. A sweat of anguish beaded on the forehead of the son of fierce ages. He no longer heard the cries of the hunters. He thought only of the innumerable battles in which the precious knife had enabled him to emerge victorious. The ivory weapon brushed against the wall and Rahan would have to avoid any pendulum swings. Page Seventeen: Rest Calmly Rahan, he thought. Slowly, very slowly. The knife, in a moment, would be within reach. When his fingers closed on the handle of ivory, he fell his heart beating again. And stood up, triumphant! Ra-ha-ha! His clamor which thundered on the plateau mingles with that of the hunters. Which were springing up from all sides. The first stones were already falling, here and there. The "Men-of-the-night" have heavier legs than Rahan's! They won't catch him! Page Eighteen: The wide crevasse he crossed made his pursuers hesitate. And when the most daring jumped it. He was already on a ridge on the other side of the verdant mountain, gently sloping down to a river. Goodbye “Men-of-the-night”! There was no threat in this salute that he threw, his hand raised to the sky. But the hunters retreated abruptly, descending the rocks with dread. What are they afraid of? What danger makes them flee like this!? Rahan turned his head, looked up, and understood. The "Arc-of-Heaven" mysteriously dissipated into the clouds! Page Nineteen: They believed that Rahan could make "the rainbow" appear or disappear at will. And indeed. He raised his hand and the sky is closing!! He will annihilate our horde! It was to lend formidable intentions to the one who had always refused to consider as enemies "Those-who-walk-upright". Rahan may return to this territory one day. Maybe then the "Men-of-the-night" will not behave like animals anymore!? All that remained on the horizon, far beyond the river, was a segment of the "Arc-of-Heaven". Page Twenty: This last segment in turn dissipated before the son of Crao had reached the bank of the river. Rahan could not explain this strange and mysterious phenomenon, whose appearance had kept him alive. But he felt no fear, and no worry. Rahan will understand later what he cannot explain today! Such is his life! Yes, such was the life of Rahan, son of fierce ages. Such was the fate of Rahan, who went on the great river to meet other mysteries.

Chapter Twenty-Four. August 8, 1993. For the last four days I've been acting head of our newly organized Department of Public Resources, Utilities, Services, and Transportation (PRUST) for southern California. It is a strictly temporary position, and within the next 10 days I will turn the post over to another engineer, one of the group of volunteers I've been working with during the last two weeks. He will have the able assistance of a number of local people who were formerly employed either by one of the state, county, or municipal agencies here or by one of the private utility companies, and I have confidence he'll be able to iron the remaining bugs out of the department. With more than half the key people back at work here now, things are beginning to run almost normally. We have restored electricity, water, sewage treatment, rubbish collection, and W telephone service to all the occupied areas now-although electricity is strictly rationed. We have even put about 50 gasoline stations back in operation, and those civilians whose work assignments give them priority status can obtain fuel for their automobiles. PRUST covers our whole enclave, all the way from Vandenberg to the Mexican border, and I've done a lot of traveling to survey the needs and resources of the various areas and to get everything roughly coordinated. I'm really very pleased with what we've been able to accomplish in such a short time. Next to the military and to the Department of Food, PRUST has the most essential function to perform and employs the most workers of all the agencies we've set up here. One of the most interesting aspects of my work has been setting up the interfacing with the Department of Food. They produce the food; we transport it, store it, and distribute it. There were several problems to be worked out, primarily because a certain amount of the food which is produced does not go directly from the fields to the distribution points but is processed first. This means that the Department of Food needs to concern itself to a certain extent with storage and transportation from field to processing plant, before PRUST takes over the responsibility. Also DF has a specialized transportation need in moving its workers from their living quarters to the fields and back. I have had to familiarize myself with DF's whole operation in order to decide the best way to define our respective responsibilities. I am very impressed by what I have seen. They have mobilized more than 600,000 workers-about a quarter of the entire productive segment of the population under our control -for the production of food. Between 10 and 15 per cent of these workers are those Whites who were originally in farming or ranching in this area. Nearly a third are young volunteers in the 12 to 18 age range. The rest are people from urban areas who formerly worked in non-essential occupations and have now been assigned to work crews under DF's supervision. Many in the last group are now doing the first really productive work in their lives. This means DF is performing an important function of social rehabilitation as well as food production, and our Department of Education is working closely with DF on this. Every worker receives ten hours of lectures each week, and he is graded not only on his general attitude toward his work and on his productivity but also on his responsiveness to these lectures. There is a continual sifting process going on, with workers being reassigned to new work groups on the basis of attitude and performance in their previous groups. In this way there are already beginning to emerge from the general mass the first leader-trainee work groups. From the latter will be selected candidates for Organization membership. On several occasions during my tour of DF's operation I stopped to talk with workers in the fields. The morale varied considerably from the groups with a high proportion of former social parasites to the leader-trainee groups, but nowhere could it be called poor. Everyone has been made to understand that, despite the dislocations and the hardships caused by the revolution, we are now sure that there will be enough food to go around-but those who will not work will not eat either. My most profound impression comes from the fact that every face I saw in the fields was White: no Chicanos, no Orientals, no Blacks, no mongrels. The air seems cleaner, the sun brighter, life more joyous. What a wonderful difference this single accomplishment of our revolution has made. And the workers all feel the difference too, whether they are ideologically with us or not. There is a new feeling of solidarity among them, of kinship, of unselfish cooperation to complete a common task. Most of the news reports from other parts of the country are very cheering to us. Although the System is still holding on, it is only doing so through increasingly open and brutal repression. The entire country is under martial law, and the government is relying heavily on hastily armed and deputized Black goon squads to keep the White civilian population intimidated. Half the System's regular military units are still confined to their barracks as unreliable." Conditions are deteriorating nearly everywhere. Power outages, transportation and communications breakdowns, terror bombings, food shortages, assassinations, and massive industrial sabotage are plaguing the System and helping to maintain the general unrest. The Organization's action units are doing a heroic job, but their losses are heavy. Their only aim now is to maintain the pressure on the System and the general population by striking at every available target again and again and again, without letup. From the new volunteers who are slipping into our area through the enemy lines at a growing rate, we get a consistent story about the effect the chaotic conditions are having on people. The White liberals and the minorities are screaming hysterically for the government to "do something"; the conservatives are moaning, wringing their hands, and deploring the "irresponsibility" of it all; and the "average Joes" are becoming more and more exasperated with everyone concerned: us, the System, the Blacks, and the various liberal and conservative spokesmen. They just want a return to "normalcy"-and their accustomed comforts-as soon as possible. The System propagandists are making a big thing out of our forced evacuation of non-Whites and our summary liquidation of race-criminals and other hostile and degenerate elements here. It's not having the desired effect, however, except among the liberals and the minorities. The bulk of the population is too preoccupied with its own problems at the moment to shed a tear for "the victims of racism." The biggest fly in our ointment is northern California. Things are completely out of control there. General Harding has really botched the situation. It serves us right for having anything to do with a conservative; he, like all the rest, was standing behind the door when the brains were passed out, and so he got a double dose of pigheadedness to make up for it. (Note to the reader: Turner is referring to Lt. Gen. Arnold Harding, commander of Travis Air Force Base, which was located about halfway between San Francisco and Sacramento. Harding's role in the Great Revolution, though important, lasted only 11 weeks; he was finally assassinated by an Organization team on September 16, 1993, after several earlier attempts failed.) If the situation in the San Francisco-Sacramento area doesn't improve soon, we're likely to be involved in a civil war against the troops under Harding. The System would really love that. The only thing Harding has done right so far was breaking with Washington during the first week of our July 4 offensive, as soon as it became clear that the System had lost its grip in California. On his own initiative he declared an independent military government in northern California and got nearly all the other officers in military units stationed there (except our own undercover military people, of course) to go along with him. Revolutionary Command made the strictly practical decision to let General Harding carry the ball in his area, and our people were instructed not to oppose him. This had the effect of substantially reducing our own losses, although the military has actually suffered many more casualties in northern California than in the south. This is because Harding has failed to take sufficiently radical measures to consolidate his authority and to deal with Black military personnel. And he has failed utterly to get the civilian population under control-again, because he seems unable to understand the necessity for radical measures. The Jews and the other Bolshevik elements in San Francisco are running circles around him, and the Chicanos in the Sacramento area have been rioting more or less continuously for a month. When a delegation of Organization people went to Harding last month and suggested a joint Organization-military rule for northern California, with Harding's forces handling defense matters and the Organization handling civilian matters - including police functions-Harding arrested them and has refused to release them. Since then he has been issuing idiotic proclamations about "restoring the Constitution," stamping out "communism and pornography," and holding new elections to "re-establish the republican form of government intended by the Founding Fathers," whatever that means. And he has denounced our radical measures in the south as "communism." He is appalled that we didn't hold some sort of public referendum before expelling the non-Whites and that we didn't give individual trials to the Jews and race-criminals we dealt with summarily. Doesn't the old fool understand that the American people voted themselves into the mess they're in now? Doesn't he understand that the Jews have taken over the country fair and square, according to the Constitution? Doesn't he understand that the common people have already had their fling at self-government, and they blew it? Where does he think new elections can possibly lead now, with this generation of TV-conditioned voters, except right back into the same Jewish pigsty? And how does he think we could have solved our problems down here, except by the radical measures we used? Doesn't Harding understand that the chaos in his area will continue to grow worse until he identifies the categories of people responsible for that chaos and deals with them categorically-that it is physically impossible, considering the relative numbers involved, for him to deal with the Jews, the Blacks, the Chicanos, and the other troublesome elements on an individual basis? Apparently not, because the idiot is still making appeals to "responsible" Black leaders and to "patriotic" Jews to help him restore order. Harding, like conservatives in general, can't bring himself to do what must be done, because it would mean punishing the "innocent" along with the "guilty," the "good" Negroes and the "loyal" Jews along with the rest-as if those terms had any meaning in the present context. And so, afraid of treating individuals "unjustly," he is floundering around helplessly while everything goes to hell and the civilians in his area die like flies from starvation. Generals should be made of sterner stuff. The one advantage to us from the situation in the north is the flood of White refugees it has brought us. More people have been coming into our area in the last two weeks to get away from the anarchy around San Francisco than have been slipping through the System's lines from the rest of the country. And, while they last, it is interesting to have living, breathing examples of three types of social orders simultaneously before us: in the north, a conservative regime; to the east, liberal-Jewish democracy; and here, the beginning of a whole new world rising out of the ruins of the old. August 23. Tomorrow I leave for Washington again. I have been at Vandenberg for four days learning how nuclear warheads work. I am in charge of a group which will hand-carry four 60-kiloton warheads to Washington for concealment in key locations around the capital. Approximately 50 other men-all members of the Order-were trained with me, and each of them has a similar mission as a group leader. That means a total of about 200 warheads to be dispersed around the country initially, with more to follow later. All the warheads are identical; they were removed from a stockpile of 240-mm artillery projectiles our people found here. They've been slightly modified, so they can be detonated by coded radio signals. They will be our insurance, in case we lose our missile-launch facility here. The present mission is the hairiest one I've ever been assigned. It will be a lot tougher than blowing up the FBI headquarters two years ago. Five of us must make our way through 3,500 miles of enemy territory, carrying four nuclear bombs weighing a total of just over 520 pounds, without getting caught. Then we have to sneak them into areas that will be heavily guarded and conceal them, so that there is a negligible chance of their being found. Aside from the dangers involved, which tie my guts in knots whenever I think about them, I have mixed feelings about this mission. On the one hand, I hate to leave California. Being a participant in the birth of our new society hers has been tremendously exciting and rewarding for me, and our work is just beginning. New projects are being launched every day, and I want to be a part of them. We are laying the foundations here for the new social order which will serve our race for the next thousand years. And to be able to live and work in a sane, healthy, White man's world-that is something which is beyond valuation for me. These last few weeks have been wonderful. It is terribly depressing to think of leaving this White oasis and plunging once again into that cesspool of mongrels and liberals and Jews and sick, twisted White liberals out there. On the other hand, it has been more than three months since I've seen Katherine, and it seems like a year. The one thing which has limited my enthusiasm about what we've accomplished here is that she hasn't been able to share it with me. And now, with the changed situation, she and the others in Washington are living under much more difficult conditions and in greater danger than we here in California. Realizing that makes me feel guilty every day I remain. The strongest feeling I have now, however is one of responsibility. I am both proud and awed that I, still only a probationary member of the Order, am being entrusted with such an important and difficult task. I must try hard to put all other thoughts and feelings aside until it is successfully completed. During the last four days I have not only learned about the structure and functioning of the warheads for which I will be responsible, but also why this mission is vital. That involved A lesson in strategy which has been very sobering. The people in Revolutionary Command, with their eyes fixed firmly on our long-range goal of total victory over the System, have not let themselves be deluded by our gains in California and the present difficulties the System is facing elsewhere. The grim facts are these: First, outside of California the System remains essentially intact, and the disparity in numbers between the System's forces and our own is even worse than it was before July 4. Thatch because we've been recklessly expending our strength everywhere else in the country to keep the System off balance long enough for us to consolidate our gains here. Second, despite the military forces under our control here, the System-as soon as it has tidied up some of its present military morale problems-will be able to pound us into the ground by conventional means with very little trouble. The only thing that's really kept them off us this long has been our threat of nuclear reprisal against New York and Tel Aviv. Third, our nuclear threat is in grave danger of being neutralized. The System has the capability for launching a surprise first strike against us with a high probability of knocking out all our "hardened" launch silos before we can fire our missiles. Revolutionary Command's intelligence sources indicate that such a surprise strike is exactly what is being planned. The System is holding off only until it has finished an emergency military reorganization which will give it confidence in the political reliability of the U.S. Army. It wants to follow up its destruction of our nuclear capability immediately with a massive invasion which will finish us off in a day or two. Worse, the System has an alternative plan which calls for the nuclear annihilation of all of southern California. It will carry out that plan if it fails to regain complete confidence in the reliability of its military ground forces within the next couple of weeks. We still don't know the System's exact timetable, but we have reports that more than 25,000 of the wealthiest and most influential Jews and their families have quietly packed up and left the New York area within the last ten days, most of them taking 0 only a moderate amount of luggage with them-perhaps enough for a two- or three-week vacation. Thus, our entire strategy against the System has been undermined. If we could hold the enemy off indefinitely-or even for a year or two-with our threat of nuclear retaliation, then we could pull him down. With California as a training and supply base, and with a population of more than five million Whites to recruit from, we could steadily escalate our guerrilla war throughout the rest of the country. But without California we can't do it-and the System knows that. So what we must do-immediately-is to disperse a large number of nuclear weapons outside California. We will then detonate at least one of those weapons to convince the System that a new situation exists. If the System attacks California after that, we will be obligated to detonate all or most of our dispersed weapons, in an effort to destroy the System's capability for organized resistance. Unfortunately, much of the White population of the country is bound to be lost if we are forced to that extremity. The country will also be open to the danger of invasion by other nations. A grim prospect, indeed.

Reptile. Episode Six. Vigilante or criminal? For months and months, Buck Rouquin and his two accomplices had prepared for the break-in of the “Mercantile banking company”. This is it Hein, you study a plan in all of its details, and its execution is as smooth as velvet guys. Quiet! I think I heard something outside the window. You’re crazy, we’re on the tenth floor! Are you having a good look? Not even a cat, even down on the sidewalk. The bandits would have done better to look above them, because. Page Two: Hiss! Stupid people. They, hiss, have no idea, hiss, what awaits them! That's it! There's at least twenty thousand pounds! Quickly! We'll count that later! Eh? Who is it? Page Three: Kraits Ring hisses. Without, hiss, knowing it they were, hiss, working for Krait! I must hurry! In a moment or another the effects are going to manifest themselves! Fast! Ah! I, I, Transform myself! Ah! It was the next day that the young master assistant Mark Bowen showed up outside a remote house on the outskirts of London. Page Four: So young man, you will work with professor Andros Androphis? A great scholar! We rarely see that! One of the most illustrious biologists of our time, monsieur! He does me a great honor by choosing me as his assistant! An instant later. Bowen? Come in, my child. Oh! That's not how I saw it at all. Bonjour, monsieur. Come! I'll show you your room. What do you think of my home my child? A little, a, a little bit special sir. He is really very bizarre but that does not prevent him from being a great scientist. Page Five: Mark was relieved to find that his room was pretty normal. We will begin our work tomorrow, my boy. Right away, if you want, master. For this you need to know the places where you will work. In fact you will hardly move from here. It is admirably equipped, master. There is another lab here? No! It's a kind of closet where no one has set foot for years. He lies! The padlock looks like an object that is used often and it has fresh oil! Page Six: A little later. So, your impressions? It is fabulous master! I can’t wait to begin work! Do people not say that you make fabulous donations to charitable workers? They say so many things, my boy! So many things! That night Mark Bowen cannot sleep. Only three hours! Bother! I'm going to drink a glass of water! It might help me fall asleep. Hello! Looks like the teacher isn't sleeping either! Master, are you there? Page Seven: The closet! The door is open and. It's not a cubbyhole! A staircase that leads to. Oh! What is this! Hiss! Hiss! Help! Page Eight: Hiss! No! Hurgh! The young fool! Hiss! Young people always have to get involved in things that don't concern them! A little later. Ah! A horrible creature from a nightmare! Help me! My boy! My boy! What are you shouting like that? You woke me up! Oh? Master? Page Nine: I, I saw. The cave. A nightmare! Simply a nightmare my boy! Relax, my boy! I am going to prepare you a good strong coffee! No! It was very real! I still have a bruised throat. And the ring he wore on his finger. Exactly the same as the one worn by the, monster! What kind of mess am I getting into? Fortunately, Mark had the prudence to keep from him the discovery he had made. I made it very strong! It's daytime already. I think it is needless to go back to bed! See you soon, my boy! He plays his game well! So the great professor Androphis. Page Ten: Would keep a horrible monster with him, of which he would not talk about to anybody. God only knows for what obscure reason. Amazing! However. I have to get rid of it! But, for this moment it is too precious for me. Too precious! A little later. What a fascinating subject of study, that of the venoms of snakes! Is that not so, my boy? No one in the world knows more than you about this matter, master! It probably took you years to collect those we are studying at the moment? They are very rare indeed! In confidence, I can tell you that I am currently about to make an extraordinary discovery. But Mark Bowen can't take his eyes off the mysterious door, which is still carefully padlocked. Page Eleven: You are a great scholar, whose work I passionately admire, master. But tonight I will do everything possible to discover your secret! The next evening. The teacher didn't go to bed! I hear him in the hallway. Here he is in the dark! I think it is in my interest not to lose sight of him. He entered the laboratory. Oh! He is not here anymore. Hum! He drank something! So what? Page Twelve: Gah-ah-ah! This strange cry. Which freezes the bones. It comes from the cellar! The monster no doubt! A Person? And yet. Is there a secret passage somewhere? No! It doesn't ring hollow anywhere! There is a ventilation chimney. But no one can have used it to go out. Not the teacher. Nor the monstrous creature. Oh! Someone is moving over there! Page Thirteen: Hiss! This, hiss night the reptile will be manifest! Hiss! It progresses by fantastic leaps! It is not the teacher! It can only be the monster! A little later in an isolated farm. Nothing but used tickets! We will have no problem selling them! Ha-ha-ha! The cops never pull them out! We don't risk getting caught. Error! Huh! Who, who are you? I am reptile! Hiss! Few people know of me, but I will soon be famous throughout the universe! Page Fourteen: Yes Hiss! You did a good job for me. Your disguise does not impress me mister. And I'm going to make lots of holes in it. Hiss! Poor Fool! I have the speed of a cobra! Bang! Bang! It is not a human being! Bang, bang! I am a Reptile! I am all reptiles! Incredible! Hiss! Hiss! Argh! Page Fifteen: Hiss! We will soon see that no one can resist me! Argh! But then suddenly. Huh! The effects will cease sooner than expected! Eh! The teacher! He saw me! Oh, my boy! Do not be afraid! I mean you no harm! Master but what is this? My grand secret my boy! A new substance obtained by the distillation of various reptile poisons, the ingestion of which causes a momentary metamorphosis of my whole being. Page Sixteen: Vice Must Be punished, my boy. And the fruit of vice used for my good work, which will contribute to the enrichment of virtue! So it is. That you can make all these generous donations, which we talk about so much! We'll talk about all that tomorrow morning, my boy! At this moment, you are far too upset to calmly understand the problem! A little later. Unimaginable, yes! The professor is sort of like doctor Jekyll from Stevenson's novel, who turns into a human beast, Mister Hyde, at night. For good reasons, or for bad ones? Should I notify the police? No one will believe me. And then there is science, whose professor is one of its most glorious representatives. He wonders! Too bad he followed me last night! I will soon find out his intentions. Page Seventeen: If he has good intentions he will live! Otherwise. The day after, minus the nuclear war. No! No! His intentions cannot be good! Of course, he gives to charity what he collects from criminals. Attention! Here it is! My boy? Euh? Master. Your discovery fascinates me. And of course, the interest of science. Uh! But I can't keep this secret to myself! Page Eighteen: I need to let the police know. What a pity! It would have been nice to associate a young man with a future in my projects, but too bad. Hey! What are you doing there? Quite frankly I am sorry my boy. But my secrets must not be exposed in the public domain. Wow! La-la! Hiss! Help me! Come on nice python! Kill him, kill him! Page Nineteen: Ah! I'm lost! Unless. The snake's tail! Smash! You have let go! Take this now! Smash! Thug! Damnation! He got free! Yes! I freed myself and now I allow myself no doubt: you are an evil madman! And you, you are a fool! You are ignorant of the extent of my powers! Page Twenty: But, already mark was throwing himself headlong through the glass of the window. Crash! Shatter! The Potion! For all the powers of the invincible reptile are unleashed against him! The next moment. Why is this madman whistling like this? Oh! Hiss! Thousands of frogs who hasten to his call! They're in my way! Hold it, my delicious little friends, While I effect my metamorphosis! Page Twenty One: And let me become the invincible reptile! In one gulp the professor emptied the glass and. Huh! Blood freezes in the veins! My Force is growing! Growing, growing! I metamorphose! However! Oh Dirty Beasts! Ah! They take me hopping back to the house! Page Twenty Two: I have to get rid of them! Fire! If that doesn't work, I'm lost! Back! Go away! Curse him! He put my little friends on the run! But he won't escape reptile! Here he is! He catches me! Oh! But what worked so well with the frogs. Page Twenty Three: Can also work very well with him. Snek, snek. Ha-ha-ha! A curtain of flames between you and me, professor! I got you! No, poor fool! Don't you realize that I have the powers of all of the reptiles?! Even the legendary powers of the salamander. Hiss! The powers of the salamander? The salamander! Hiss! Yes, yes, that traverses the fire without running the slightest danger! Hiss! Yes, Yes! Page Twenty Four: No one can escape, Mark Bowen! I am lost, thought Mark. So luckily. Hey! Who's the idiot who set the brushwood on fire? I am saved! Yokels with pitchforks to the rescue! Let's get this over with! Damn them! They're too many! Listen to me well, Bowen! You are triumphing for the moment, but I will know how to find you again! And you will perish! Who are you? Did you see who set the fire? Yes! I did it! Page Twenty Five: Eh? You crazy? I will explain to you! Reptile was chasing me! A monster! Listen to me! It is professor Androphis, who turns into a monster. A helping hand to master this madman, guys! Whack! Thud! Perfect! Now let's take him to the village! When Mark came to. Whoa! What happened? It is you who are going to tell me, because for the moment you are being prosecuted for arson! Page Twenty Six: Listen to me! It is Professor Androphis. But the sergeant does not listen to the young man for long. What a shame! How can anyone say such horrible things about the professor! A great man who subsidizes all our charitable works! Hello Doctor Bighorn? I have a mental patient here! An arsonist! It would be good if you had him committed. However, news of Mark's arrest had already traveled the country. I must go and visit this young fool without delay! Page Twenty Seven: I swear, Sergeant that I told the truth! We will see about that when the doctor examines you! Tough luck, opportunity has knocked and left! I can't prevent the professor from continuing his evil activities! At night, as the snow begins to fall. I will calm him down, this young fool! Hey there! Its professor Androphis! Bonsoir Professor! Here is something to buy you some sweets, my children. Oh! You are too kind, Professor! Professor, do you know what? There is a guy at the station who's talking badly about you! Page Twenty Eight: An unfortunate imbalance, children. You have to forgive him. And that is what I'm going to tell him this instant! A moment later. Certainly! You can talk to him, professor! But don't get too close to him! He is dangerous! Sergeant! I repeat to you that it is he who is dangerous! Stay calm, you! I'm going away for a while, professor! Thankyou Sergeant! I will stand as far from the bars as is permissible! With the sergeant away, Mark found himself alone face to face with the terrible professor. Time to drink the potion! And you realize that you are safe from nothing behind these bars, you little fool! No! Page Twenty Nine: No! Huh! My blood freezes in my veins! My strength is growing, growing, growing! I transform! Yes! Yes! Hiss! I am hypnotizing you, you little fool! You are the prey of Reptile! You can't move! You will die from the poison in my ring. I, I am, I am paralyzed! And everyone will think that you died of heart failure! Hiss! Page Thirty: But then. Professor! We’re finished with the lollipops! Can you give us more? So! Hiss! Hiss! You are at my mercy! Hiss! I aim! Now time to press a tiny button and. Teacher! Give us enough to buy lollipops and. We will sing you a nice song! Hiss! Page Thirty One: He looks away! I am no longer in his power thought Mark. Whack! Thud! You will pay for that, you little fool! Assassin! Help! Oh! Out of my way horrible little fools! Page Thirty Two: Don't stand there! Run for the sergeant, children! Immediately sir! The moment after. What are you kids talking about? Like we said, Sergeant! A horrible two legged reptile! You must believe me now! The children have seen it, as I have seen it! Impossible! The professor is a great philanthropist! A benefactor to humanity! It was the teacher, yes, sergeant! The two-legged reptile even had the same ring as him! Gah! If I tell this to my boss, He is quite capable of having me locked up with you! You must, Sergeant! Quickly! Page Thirty Three: It was not easy. Hey! Are you crazy, sergeant!? You know me well, Lieutenant! I don't tell jokes! It's the truth! What's going on John? A crazy thing! Finish dinner, without me! But we are not in Finland? This translation is crazy, crazy I tell you! And thus, in the end. I hope you are not telling lies! Because I know how to make you regret it! I swear to you lieutenant! Besides, in your place, I would have your men carry their arms! A little after. A hunting, we will go, a hunting we will go! I say Capital sport what! Eyes front! March! Page Thirty Four: During this time. My blood is heating up in my veins! It forces me to grow! I am de-metamorphosing! Cursed Bowen! He destroyed everything! I must disappear! The potion! Lots of potions! Without it I am nothing! But I have not said my last word! A little later. Are we to go in? Stop! I have to follow the rules! Professor Androphis! Police! Please open the door to me! You are kidding lieutenant! You are not dealing with some pickpocket! Page Thirty Five: There is a light up there! Burning in the fireplace! There is a light, in the darkness of everybody’s life! Can we take a look out the window? I will do it, I who know the house well! Nobody around, and the window can be pushed open! I can enter! I will quickly open the house to the police, thought Mark. Come quickly! He must be in his laboratory! That is what I thought! They will follow me step by step. Page Thirty Six: Everything is demolished here! He went through it all! Crash! Adieu Bowen! Hiss! Hiss! Fast! Quickly! Following Mark, the police rush into the basement and. Eh? What is this? I said goodbye. To all of you too! Hiss, hiss! Ha-ha-ha-ha! Hey? But? Another gate has closed behind us! Thang! Page Thirty Seven: Ha-ha-ha-ha! Now let us have a good laugh you fools. For I will send you charming companions. Skur! A passage is open over there! Hiss! Hiss! Hiss! Too bad for you. You will not live long enough to see how famous I'll be anytime soon. Ha-ha-ha! Page Thirty Eight: I will even the odds with a gunshot! No! The pellets would ricochet from all the walls and we would be injured! Mister! You were his assistant! You must know how to deal with these horrible beasts! Exactly! You and your men must all whistle together something very sad, all at the same time! Yes! Do what I tell you! Let’s go! "The swallow of the suburbs" for example. Or “Famous Italian Battles”. Ah, we're going to charm them, like the Indian trainers! Got it. And meanwhile, what will you do? Exactly! What did Mark Bowen propose to do? And what new crimes will Reptile still commit? Don't miss the next episode in Sunny Sun! That will appear at the beginning of March!

Rahan. Episode eight. The long claw. The young chimpanzee missed none of the savage fight that pitted his lifelong enemy, "Baha-le-puma" against "the man-with-the-long-claw". Greek! Greek! This man was Rahan. And the “long claw” was an ivory knife with which he struck the side of the beast. The puma finally sagged with a hoarse growl and the triumphant clamor of the son of fierce ages thundered through the jungle. Ra-ha-ha! Page Two: Rahan saw the monkey. Baha will not be devouring you, four-hands! Ha-ha!-ha! You thank Rahan! Greek! Greek! Rahan called "Four-Hands" these nimble beings who were part of the "Those-who-run-in-the-trees" horde. This one gave a few joyful cries and disappeared in the foliage. "Those-who-run-in-the-trees" look like "those-who-walk-upright", thought Rahan. What a pity they don't speak! Exhausted by the long run that had preceded this fight, he hoisted himself up on a branch and dozed off. Although he was an extremely light sleeper, he did not hear the rustling of the vines above him. Page Three: When a rustle woke him, his hand flew to the branch where he had stuck his knife. Oh! It had disappeared! Without his knife, Rahan cannot fight! Lurking on a nearby branch the female of "Baha" was watching him! Screams suddenly drowned out the growl of the beast that was about to pounce. Four hands! Oh! Greek! Greek! The monkey was swinging from the end of a vine. And it clutched the ivory knife! The flying blade delivered a mortal blow to the puma, and it tumbled into the void. "Four-hands stole Rahan's knife!! "Four-hands" must give it back to him! The monkey grimaced and gesticulated happily. Proud of his achievement. Greek! Greek! Page Four: But seemed reluctant to return the long claw. You wanted to imitate Rahan and you saved him. Rahan thanks you but you have to give him that knife, "Four Hands". Don't run away! Come back! Come back! Rahan doesn't have four hands like you! He can't chase you! With the astonishing agility of his kind the monkey flew from tree to tree. Greek! Greek! Taunting the man one last time he pirouetted on a branch and disappeared into his realm of greenery. "Four-hands” is not fair! It will take moons and moons for Rahan to polish such a strong, sharp knife! Rahan felt distraught. Page Five: Since his adolescence this cutlass was his only asset. In those savage times when it was necessary to kill in order not to be killed, this knife had allowed him to survive. Rahan will find "Four Hands" The son of Crao dominated the ocean of foliage from the top of the great tree. Where was "Four Hands"? "Those-who-run-in-the-trees" live in clans, thought Rahan. "Four-hands" probably took the knife to his people! Indeed, a few arrow flights away, the chimpanzee showed off the "long claw" he had stolen from the man. Greek! Greek! Grodeek! Greek! He mimicked Rahan's gestures in front of his clan and they marveled. Page Six: However. Rahan would have already found any other opponent! But "Those-who-run-In-the-Trees" Leave no traces behind them! Where was "Four Hands"? Enraged Rahan was about to abandon this strange world of foliage and vines when. Oh! A very young monkey harassed a porcupine. The little "Four-Hands" will lead me to his clan! Engaged in his game, the little chimpanzee did not notice the shrub which approached him. Greek! Greek! He didn't have time to dodge the man. Rahan who knew how to be as silent as the serpent, could also be quicker than the panther. Ra-ha-ha! Ha-ha! Greek! Page Seven: A moment later a thin vine entrapped young monkey. When daylight returns, the little "Four Hands" will lead Rahan to his brothers! The son of Crao fell asleep as usual in a fork of branches, and left his curious captive attached to the roots of the tree. His cries of terror roused him from his sleep. A huge reptile crawled towards the young monkey who could not escape it. If the little "Four-hands" dies it will be Rahan's fault! But he will not die! Ra-ha-ha! Rahan's bellow echoed through the night as he dove towards the snake. Page Eight: Rahan only knows one way to kill the "demon-of-the-tall-grass". Break its skull! Rahan twirled, and twirled. And the head of the reptile whipped the tree with such force that the bark burst. The chimpanzee was stamping its feet with joy as the rings of the dead monster slowly unraveled. What do you want? Do you also thank Rahan?! The young monkeys hand patted the man’s shoulder. Greek! Greek! Oh Rahan Understand! You want to be taken to your own! Page Nine: Shortly after, in the dawn light, Rahan followed his guide on the perilous trail of branches. He had freed the chimpanzee and it was not trying to run away. He was swinging from tree to tree. And waits for the man to join him there before continuing on his way. And suddenly Rahan heard the cries of the clan. He saw the masses of monkeys on a big tree. Where is "Four Hands"? Greek! Greek! Flying from vine to vine the young chimpanzee was already rejoining his family. Page Ten: Rahan means no harm to the Tree People. Rahan is simply coming to get his knife that one of yours stole from him! The son of Crao grabs a long vine to swing to the monkeys. But a danger he didn't know hovered over him. Zlac! No sooner had he launched into the void than the "long claw" swooped down! The vine parted, and he fell to the ground. And, The monkeys tumbled from the branches, and rushed towards the stunned man. Page Eleven: Rahan, who was only stunned, felt the multitude of fingers that poked at his body. But he did not see the clan leader snatch the "Long claw" from "Four-hands". Greek! Greek! The Monkey was about to plunge the ivory blade into his chest when. Greek! The young chimpanzee intervened, clinging to the leader's arm. The leader threw him back roughly. And lifted the knife again! But this brief respite allowed Rahan to recover his senses. He glimpsed the ivory blade. Page Twelve: Grah! His legs suddenly coiled and his feet struck the hairy chest. The vine he still hugged hissed like a whip, disarming the leader of the clan. Zlac! But Rahan did not have time to jump towards the knife falling on the ground. "Four-Hands" had seized it all over again. And disappeared in the thickets with the "long claw", so precious and coveted. The monkeys grimaced and jumped around their still gasping leader. They showed no hostility towards "the-one-walking-upright". Which was already pursuing "Four-Hands". Page Thirteen: Rahan will never catch "the-four-handed-knife-thief!" At that moment the Son of Ages forgot that he himself had stolen the ivory weapon from his Lake Clan enemies once. "Four-Hands" must have been more playful and facetious than bad because he sometimes appeared on a low branch. Greek! Greek! Taunting his pursuer. You will not defy Rahan forever "Four-Hands"! Greek! Rahan rushed forward and the monkey disappeared only to reappear in the foliage. Behind him! Page Fourteen: This pursuit must have delighted him because his cries occasionally evoked the laughter of “Those-who-walk-standing”! Hi-hi! Greek! Since Rahan can't reach you, he will trap you! The son of Crao knew how much "Those-who-run-in-the-trees" were fond of certain fruits. He placed these at the foot of a large dead tree, but also prepared something else nearby. That intrigued “Four Hands” a great deal, as he observed from the high branches. Page Fifteen: The monkey hesitated for a long time, but his greed prevailed. On the lookout in the bushes, Rahan, saw him approach the bait. Rahan knows how to catch fish. But he has never fished for "Those-who-run-in-the-trees" yet! Ha-ha-ha! Rahan was laughing to himself. When "Four-Hands" grabbed a fruit, he pulled sharply on the long vine. Slip. And the trapped monkey felt lifted from the ground, entwined. You are at the mercy of Rahan "Four-Hands!" Ha-ha-ha! You will have to give him back his knife!! Oh! Suddenly anxious, Rahan lunges! Page Sixteen: But it was too late. The angry and furious monkey had slipped the "long claw" into a hole in an enormous hollow tree! "Four-Hands" is stupid! Neither he nor Rahan will be able to take back the knife! To recover the weapon it would have been necessary to uproot the tree! Go! Go find the people of the trees! Rahan thinks that you are too stupid to take vengeance upon! And Rahan will have to defend his life! The son of fierce ages pointed to the horned monster that sprang from the thickets. As the monkey jumped into the lower branches, the rhinoceros charged at Rahan. Page Seventeen: Who narrowly evaded it! "Four-Hands" exulted at the man's feint. Greek! It is a good time to be on my side, "Four-Hands"! If you had not acted so stupidly, Rahan could face the "Taroak"! Oh! Rahan's face suddenly lit up, and the amazed monkey saw him jump from the branch. And rush to meet the rhinoceros! Rahan does not fear you, “Taroak”! The monstrous head swayed from left to right and the “Taroak” charged the man again. Page Eighteen: Rahan should have made abrupt and sudden swerves to shake off this formidable, but not very agile opponent. But he was content to run straight ahead, the huge horned monster hot on his heels! Ha-ha-ha! Run faster “Taroak”! Run Faster! Rahan rushed towards the dead tree, as if to take refuge there. But his goal was quite different. Two steps from the hollow trunk he threw himself aside. The flank of the running rhino brushed against him. And. Vrang! Crack! Page Nineteen: Rahan's cry of victory mingled with the cracking of the dead tree. Ra-ha-ha! Crack! At the base of the hollow trunk the ivory knife appeared, towards which the son of Crao leapt. “Four-Hands” maintained silence in his refuge. What was happening before his eyes amazed him. "He who walks upright" had leapt on the spine of the "Taroak" and, clinging to its horns, struck, and struck, and struck. He suddenly abandoned his monstrous mount which continued its course. To go on and collapse at the end of the clearing. Page Twenty: Rah-ha-ha! The fierce and triumphant clamor of the son of Crao thundered once more over the jungle. You are not coming to steal Rahan's knife here, "Four-Hands"! The monkey watched the man slide the "long claw" into its sheath. No doubt he felt sorry for being deprived of the marvelous weapon, but he no longer had any desire to challenge this being who knew everything, who could do everything! Farewell "Four-Hands", return to the people of the trees. Rahan, he is going to find his brothers, "Those-who-walk-upright"! The strangeness of this story should not be surprising. Because this happened thousands of years ago in those savage times when man and ape could fight over a single knife all day.

Rahan. Episode Seven. The country with the white skin. Rahan regained hope. He would probably find on this unknown shore a cave to protect himself from the cold which, for many days had bruised his whole body. Rahan should never have abandoned the lands of the sun! The son of Crao had never known this terrible feeling in the face of the currents prevailing over the "great lake". The perpetual bite of the wind gnawed at his face, his back and his chest. "Those-who-walk-upright" need sun! How could they live in a land where the air is colder than mountain torrents? Page Two: Rahan had only known the mild winters of the blue mountain and the idea had never occurred to him that the cold could slash the skin like a cutlass. Rah! So he howled with pleasure when he discovered the entrance to a cave. Rahan will make fire! Rahan will no longer feel his ears, and his fingers will become nimble again! He rushed into the shadows and suddenly stopped. The bear growling at the bottom of the cave was the biggest he had ever faced. Rahan knows there is no place here for you and me! So it will be you or me! The ivory knife flew away. And slipped on the thick coat. His numb fingers had betrayed Rahan! The knife was now lying behind the bear! Page Three: The animal approached growling and. Ra-ha-ha! This feint had often saved Rahan. Once again it surprised the enemy who turned heavily, too late. Rahan had already recovered his weapon. And the son of fierce ages struck, struck at that place of the underside which he knew by experience that life was born. Ra-ha-ha! This quick fight had knocked out the cold. But night was coming and he felt its terrible bite again. There is no wood in the den of the “Baloua”! Rahan cannot start a fire! As the cold became unbearable he snuggled up against the corpse of the bear. Tomorrow Rahan will burn the wood of his Raft! Page Four: He fell asleep against the still warm side of the beast, dreaming of the sun that had disappeared for so many days. It was daylight when he returned to the lake. His amazement was so great that he forgot the breeze that whipped at his shoulders. Oh! The strangest spectacle presented itself to him. The water of the lake had disappeared to make way for a smooth white desert! The “White thing” has captured Rahan's raft! His skiff, indeed, was sealed in that "thing" which Rahan did not know was a slab of ice. Rahan will free his raft! Hesitating, he ventured on this translucent ground. It was colder than the blue mountain springs in winter. He took a small step. And another. Page Five: He slipped suddenly, and his knife of ivory escaped him. What followed was beyond his comprehension. The cutlass that should have fallen near him was moving away, further, then further. It stopped at last, more than thirty paces away! Rahan has never seen his knife move on its own! Warned by his first fall, Rahan became cautious. It was on all fours, and very slowly that he crawled towards his precious knife. This desert is the proof that this territory is not made for "Those who walk upright". The son of Crao had just recovered his weapon. Page Six: When the ground suddenly cracks beneath him, like the earth in summer. There was a crack and. Ah! The translucent crust slipped away from under him and the icy vice of the black waters closed on his hips. The water! The water is under the white "Thing"! Rahan understands! When it's cold, the big lake protects itself with a "white skin"! He had to use his knife to regain his footing on the ice. A moment later he had reached his raft, but his efforts to free it were in vain. And he had to content himself with the logs that had been spared from the ice, which he hoisted up the small hill. Page Seven: He was almost happy when he returned to the cave, carrying one of these logs. Rahan will build another raft later. What Rahan wants today is a fire! He had not crossed the threshold of the cave when surprise made him drop his bundle. Oh! The “Baloua”! The bear's corpse was still lying in the dark, but the beast had been skinned. Only "Those-who-walk-upright" can do this! But why? Why steal a bit of "Baloua" and abandon his body? Rahan was perplexed. Do the hunters of this country prefer the fleece of the "Baloua" to its flesh? As the icy wind rushed through the cave. Page Eight: He rolled some rocks in front of the entrance as those of his horde used to do on stormy days. Protected by this rampart he managed to light a fire. Luckily Rahan knows how to use the “Stones-that-throw-sparks”. Rahan has learned many, many things. He knows how to float on water. He knows how to throw his knife and make fish traps. And yet Rahan feels like he knows nothing. To know nothing! Every day he discovers a new mystery. Oh! Rahan jumped. The "unknown" presented itself unambiguously to him, in the form of tiny white flies that flitted around the cave. He caught one in flight. Page Nine: And the fly disappeared, leaving a droplet of water in the palm of his hand! It is a white rain! As the swarms of flies swirling in the dark sky seemed harmless Rahan dozed by the fire. When he awoke the entrance to the cave let in a strange light in which the very vault of the cavern was reflected. He rushed outside. And he thought he was losing his mind. The landscape he discovered was fantastic. The lake-with-white-skin! The white-skinned hills! The white-skinned trees! As far as he could see, everything was dazzlingly white. The soil like the rocks, the hills like the forest. Rahan has discovered the "Country-with-white-skin"! Page Ten: The son of Crao was seized by wonder, and he went a moment later, from surprise to surprise. Oh! The white skin is soft! He ran happily through the snow, stopping to shake a branch and cause snow to flutter. Ah! Ha-ha! The cave had disappeared behind the white thickets, and he suddenly stopped, confused. The one who stole the skin of the ”Baloua” came here! The traces were indeed those of "Those-who-walk-upright". With his hand on his knife, Rahan went up this track. Rahan wants to know why he stole the skin. Page Eleven: In the padded silence, the snow crunched gently under his feet, and he saw the entrance to a cave. And his grand laugh suddenly thundered, rolling onto the great lake. Ha-ha-ha-ha! Rahan is stupid! Rahan has followed himself! He had just understood that these traces which came from the cave could only be his. Rahan went around in circles and he retraced his steps! Ha-ha-ha! He let himself fall on the soft ground, joyfully handling the snow. Oh! The white thing takes shapes when Rahan presses it, cups it. A vision came back to his memory. That of the "clan of the red lands", who knew how to create objects with a dough pulled from the ground. Page Twelve: A moment later he modeled a figurine of snow, as he had seen in certain hordes. The "Mother of Mothers" will protect Rahan in sleep! The sky darkened and Rahan had to quench his fire. Rahan has never known a stranger land than the "White-Skinned-Land". He fell asleep contemplating the "Mother of Mothers" standing on her stone pedestal. Three things woke him up at the same time. The day, the cold, and the noise rising outside the cave. The fire went out during the night and the cold was unbearable. It is a beast that made that noise! Another “Baloua” looking for a den? Page Thirteen: Apprehending the intrusion of a new bear, Rahan rushed towards the rock where he had left his knife. Ah! The "Mother of mothers" had disappeared and the ivory cutlass, at the apex of the rock, was imprisoned in a block of ice. Rahan could not have known that the statuette of snow, while melting had filled the stone basin with water, and that this water covering the weapon had frozen! He almost screamed in amazement. It was not a "Baloua" crawling towards the ashes of the fire, but a man like him! A man dressed in a bearskin! Page Fourteen: Rahan recognizes this skin! So that's what the men of the white-skinned country do with “Baloua” skins! Rahan had not comprehended why the man had seized an extinguished ember from the ashes and fled. Like many of "Those-who-walk-upright" he does not know how to produce fire and he venerates it! Rahan will reveal to you the secret of the fire if you give him back the skin of the “Baloua”! But the fugitive was already too far away to hear Rahan. He ran in the snow with an ease that made the son of Crao see him disappear behind a hill. It was Rahan who killed the "Baloua"! The skin belongs to him! Page Fifteen: Rahan was warm when he fell asleep against the "Baloua"! Rahan should have thought of cutting the skin to protect himself from the cold! But Rahan didn't think about it! Rahan is a fool! The men of the "White-skinned country" know things that he does not know! He had rushed towards the hill, following in the footsteps of the man. He had noticed the weapon of this man. Rahan will possess the skin of the "Baloua", even without his knife. He had just climbed onto the white ridge, but the fugitive was already far away on the frozen lake. The bindings that wrap his feet prevent him from slipping! Rahan will never be able to catch up to him! Oh! Page Sixteen: Rahan saw the trunks he had abandoned the day before on the hill. An idea came to him. Since Rahan's knife has slipped on the skin of the great lake, these logs will slide there too! Ra-ha-ha! An instant later, He pushed the logs down the snowy slope and jumped on this fragment of a raft. Digging a furrow the trunks slid faster and faster on the slope towards the lake. Ha-ha-ha! Rahan goes faster than a bird! Ha-ha! Ra-ha-ha! Schiff! The son of Crao laughed in the foam of snow that froze his face. Page Seventeen: Changing the course of his "luge" with his hands and feet, he swooped straight down to the lake. The white crust will perhaps break under the trunks as it cracked under Rahan!? But Rahan's worry dissipated as soon as his improvised sled hit the ice. The ice resisted. At a mad pace the “luge” slid towards the fleeing man. The naked man is a demon! Ra-ha-ha! You will return the property of Rahan! He did not have time to jump aside. He was mown down by the motion of the raft. Page Eighteen: The two men rolled on the ice. Rahan's adversary clutched a large bone cutlass. But he did not have time to pick it up. Ah! The fluttering cutlass whirled in the distance and came to rest in one of the immobilized logs. Klong! And Rahan slipped, and lost his equilibrium, and came to rest in front of his onrushing adversary! A strange melee commenced, with the two intertwined men of equal strength. But the ice made the fight difficult. Page Nineteen: They rose to fall down again, either together or one after the other. Ha-ha-ha! "The naked man" has very soft legs! Strong enough to do this! Vloop! Argh! Ha-ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha! Their laughter merges. They understood the stupidity of this impossible fight. If you want to know the secret of fire, give Rahan the skin of the "Baloua". My horde has always hoped to know this secret. Here Rahan! Take! Trahar can quickly find another fur! Trahar whose gaze was shining with joy, abandoned the warm fur. Page Twenty: Soon after Rahan was teaching him how to rub the "star-throwing-stones". So Rahan knows everything! Would Rahan be a god? No, Trahar! He didn't know how to protect himself from the cold like yours know! How did he not know this! As he brought the torch to the stone bowl, the ice melted, releasing the ivory knife. Rahan has learned many things in the "White-skinned country". But he doesn't like this country! The son of Crao still learned many things from Trahar's horde and he taught them many things. But the thick fur pleased him and he was in a hurry to find the sun. That is why one morning, when the "Flies" of snow were flying, he left without regret this country where "Those-who-walk-standing" looked like "Balouas".