(back)   (page 2 of 3)   Millions of years passed. Then one day the Watchers came to Fengi again. They told her that the earth was being rent with the scratches of the great thunder lizards, who were taking all of the food. Another race had once again laid claim to their birthright.   So Fengi went to see the dinosaurs' Grand High Council. She stood before them, a hundred miles wide, with thousands of legs, rattling and hissing her war-cry.   'Issue number two hundred and four,' read the speaker, 'discussion of land entitlement rights, i.e. the planet Earth, in regards to the Autarch of the subterranean peoples referring to themselves as Watchers, properly Dictyoptera Blattodea. The floor is now open to said Autarch.' He looked nervously at the gigantic Fengi.   'You are destroying my world,' she hissed. 'You offer your people a birthright which is not theirs. My children rule this world, not yours.'   The council leader stood. 'My dear madam, we fail to understand your claim to rulership of this planet. As can be seen, our species, indeed our entire genus, as it were, is a great deal larger, stronger, and generally gifted with warlike ability than yours. We suggest that you file the proper forms, begin meeting with our Minister of Cross-cultural and Interspecies relations, and apply for benefits as an Impoverished Nation. We will be happy to come to an agreement then.'   'You disgust me,' hissed Fengi. 'We will go to war.'   So Fengi gathered her troops, and the dinosaurs gathered theirs.   'It is resolved,' proclaimed the dinosaurs' messenger, 'that, to demonstrate our superiority over the most uncooperative race known as the Watchers, all Thunder Lizards are to make full use of their teeth, claws and other physical gifts, as well as our innate hunting and killing ability, to kill every one of said Watchers. A more specific description of the abilities to be granted will be issued next Tuesday.'   Then Fengi turned to her people. 'You will be survivors,' she whispered. 'You will live a long, long time, and so will your children. The flame will not burn you, the ice will not freeze you; steel will not cut you, and poison will not kill you. You will need neither water, nor air, and the earth itself shall be your food, until the sun falls from the sky, and darkness rules at last.'   This war lasted hundreds of millions of years, and for all that time the dinosaur civilization, though it accomplished things very slowly, thrived and prospered. But eventually the sun, which burns away all in time, grew brighter and stronger, and in the heat the air became poisonous; and then the smoke from the scorching earth rose into the sky, and darkened it, so that no plants grew and the air grew cold, and the great beasts died off. Only a handful of beings, who had fur and could withstand the cold, survived. Except for these few, the world was once again still and silent. Then Fengi's children, the Watchers, who had survived as always, returned to the earth as though nothing had happened.   (next)