Astounding Stories of Super-Science, August 1930

Right before them, so close that they all but rested in its shadow, was one of those monster aircars, its tentacles moving to and fro as though wafted into motion by some vagrant breeze. But since neither Sarka nor Jaska could feel the breeze, Sarka knew that it was life which caused the waving motion of those tentacles of terror. "Note," he said to Jaska, "that there is a tiny trap-door in the bottom of the aircar, and that the thing rests on a half-dozen of those tentacles!" "I see," came Jaska's reply. Jaska went on: "Note the gleaming thing on the ground, right below the aircar? I wonder what it is?" They studied the thing there, which seemed to be a huge jewel of some sort that glittered balefully in the eery light of the Moon. It was, perhaps, twice the size of an average man's torso, and was almost exactly cubical in shape. As Sarka studied the thing, he sensed that feeling flowed out of it--that the cube, whatever it was, was alive! He tore his glance away from it, and realized that he accomplished the feat with a distinct effort of will--as though the cube had willed to hold his gaze, knew he was there. His eyes, peering around the inner slope of the crater--which dipped over, some hundreds of feet down, and plunged downward to some unknown depth--noted a broad, flat stone, off to his right; and around the rim of the crater he counted a full hundred of the aircars, all with their tentacles waving as if they belonged to sentient creatures.