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Science Fiction Books - Daily
Short Science Fiction Collection 069 - Various
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"Short Science Fiction Collection 069" presents a captivating array of imaginative works that stretch the boundaries of reality, inviting listeners into worlds where anything is possible. This anthology showcases the genre's unique ability to inspire...
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A. Stouffer this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Read by Dale Grothman Totem poles are a dime a dozen north of 63 degrees, but only catch the lying Eskimo vowed that they dropped out of the frigid northern skies. Solar Stiff By Charles A. Stouffer Phobos 5 gazed at the white expanse ahead, trying to determine where his ship would crash. Something was Haywire in the fuel system of his inner star runabout. He was losing altitude fast, so fast that all five pairs of his eyes couldn't focus on a place to land. Five pairs of arms, each pair about 3ft apart on the log like body, pushed buttons and rotated controls frantically, but to no avail. In a few short minutes it would be all over for Phobos 5. Even if by some miracle he remained unhurt after crashing, he would die shortly thereafter. The frigid climatic conditions of the third planet were deadly to Mercurians. He thought once of donning his space suit, but decided against it. That would merely prolong the agony from planet 3. When one has a smashed space cruiser, there is no return. Phobos V knew that Death was riding with him in the helpless ship. The situation did not necessarily dismay him. Mercurians are philosophers. Phobos V ceased to manipulate the unresponding controls, stretching his trunk like torso to its full 20ft. Four heads gazed through observation ports at the four points of the compass, while the remaining head dulcetorily watched the instrument panel. Since die he must, Phobos 5 would meet his end stoically, and five pairs of stumpy arms folded over five chests in a coordinated gesture of resignation. Phobos V thought fleetingly of his wife, Lingua 4, and remembered with some annoyance that she was the author of his present predicament. A social climber, Phobos V thought to himself, but aside from that, a good wife and mother. In addition to being a reigning beauty, Lingua 4 was tall even for a Mercurian. Already she had scaled seven dregs, or in earth terms, 14ft, and was beginning to show evidence of a fifth head. Five heads were rarely found on females, and Phobos V was justly proud of his good fortune. In all Mercury, at the present time he knew of but two females possessing five heads, and soon Lingua four would be a third of her sex to be thus endowed. Yes, thought Phobos V, a woman to be proud of. For today, after three vargs of marriage, the memory of her thin trunk with four pairs of eyes laughing mischievously, filled his five brains with flame. Slim as a birch, she stood in his memory, and eight eyes whispered lovers thoughts across space and time. Phobos V recalled his five minds from their nostalgic reverie and gazed at the contour of the earth that was rushing up to meet him. White, blazing white, reflecting the rays of the midnight sun covering the region as far as the eye could reach. Good, thought Phobos 5, the polar regions. That means the end will come quickly. One or two seconds at the most of that bitter cold would be enough. Turning away from the windows, Phobos V let his thoughts return to Lingua 4, to Phobos II, his son, and his home on the first planet from the sun. Ah, that is the place to live, thought Phobos. The temperature is an unchanging 327 degrees, just comfortably warm where one can enjoy a life of warmth and ease. Too bad that he would not live to see it again. Thirty vargs, he reflected, is such a short life. With luck, perhaps he would have lived to see a hundred vargs slip by, and perhaps in time he would have added three more heads and five dregs in length to his towering trunk. He thought of Phobos, too, and wondered idly if his son would also visit the barbarian worlds to collect Data for Lingua 4. He wished that he could have seen more of Phobos, too. That's an up and coming lad, he thought, not quite two vargs old and two heads already. Yes, indeed, he's quite a boy, Phobos 5 remembered proudly. Maybe his mother will keep him at home instead of running him all over the universe to get material for her committees. He wished that Lingua 4 would settle down and be content as a housewife, but he doubted that she would. Social ambition was boring, like a termite under her bark. Lingua 4 was determined to be the first lady of Arbor, the capital city of Mercury. To this end, Lingua 4 had labored unceasingly. She was president of half the women's clubs on Arbor. She could always be depended upon to furnish the best in new and diverting subjects. She headed almost all the committees for aid or research on any type of problem. It was owing to Lingua4 being President of the Committee for Undernourished Arboreans that Phobos V was making this ill starred trip. His purpose was to capture a few of the upright, divided trunk animals that inhabited the third planet. They were to be transported to Mercury and given over to scientific study as to their edible qualities. If it were found that the divided trunk creatures were fit for Mercurian consumption, the problem of undernourishment would no longer exist, since the supply of divided trunks was seemingly inexhaustible. Mercurians had made expeditions to the third planet before, and every report concluded with divided trunk creatures increasing in number. Privately, Phobos 5 doubted the possibility of using the divided trunks for food, since the last expedition once again reported a complete lack of captives due to the frail and tenuous bodies of the divided Trunks. Then, too, transportation and preservation opposed a tremendous problem, not to mention the difficulty of trying to eat something that might vaporize on your fork. But then, these questions may never arise, he decided. For of all the reports perused by Phobos V, not one expedition had succeeded in bringing a divided trunk to Mercury. All reports were read to the last letter by Phobos V before assembling equipment for his own trip. In the reports, he had noted many of the difficulties of the earlier missions. Planet 3 was impossible for Mercurians without a heated spacesuit. The temperature of the planet was so low that it would literally freeze a Mercurian stiff in a matter of seconds. The casualties on the early expeditions had been numerous. Many Mercurians had succumbed to the bitter cold due to flaws in spacesuits and other accidents. A break in the suit meant instant death. The victims of such mishaps were invariably buried in the isolated, sparsely inhabited polar region to avoid alarming the divided trunk creatures. It was strange, mused Phobos V, that the divided trunks were seemingly unable to bear the slightest increase in temperature. Their bodies disintegrated upon contact with the Mercurian. Some were roped and dragged from a distance up to the doors of the spaceship. But no inhabitant of Planet three had been closer to Mercury than the airlock of the space cruiser. As the Divided Trunk people were dragged into the airlock, warm air from the ship would be pumped into the lock to dispel the frigid air of Planet Three. As the warmth of Mercury enveloped the divided trunks, they became quite red, began to melt, and finally dissolved into a gaseous state, leaving a small pile of ashes and a disagreeable odor in the airlock that sometimes lingered for days. Phobos V believed that he had a solution for these obstacles in the path of scientific study of the Divided Trunks, he had decided to use guile in place of strength. For this reason, he had come alone and in a small space runabout to put his solution to the test. But his solution now could never be tried, he remembered morosely. In the aft compartment, Phobos 5 had constructed a refrigeration plant. By maintaining a constant degree of frigidity, he hoped to deliver a pair of each species of divided trunks to Mercury. He hoped especially to capture a complete set and perhaps a few over, to make up for breakage and losses. As to what form of subsistence the divided Trunks were accustomed to, he had no idea whatsoever. He had intended to bring samples of earth, vegetation and anything else that might have suggested a source of food for the divided trunks. The thought too had occurred to him that possibly the divided trunk creatures ate one another. On the possibility of this, Phobos 5 had determined to capture three black ones, three white ones, three yellow ones, three browns and three reds, and three of any other color he might find. He rather doubted that more colors or combination of colors existed. All previous expedition reports had mentioned only the five colors. However, Phobos V had determined to keep several eyes open on the off chance that he might find a new and different species. His refrigerator was modeled along the architectural lines of the dens of the divided trunks. The main room of the refrigerator opened to the outside of the ship by means of a small airlock. A Mercurian sized airlock was not needed for the divided trunks, as few had been found to be much over three dregs in height. Winches and cables to pull the divided trunks into the refrigerator were installed in the refrigerator room itself to avoid burning the divided trunks with hot cables from other parts of the ship. In addition, Phobos 5 had cunningly devised a refrigerated trap. This too was designed to simulate the caves of the divided trunk creatures, but was smaller. It was constructed with entrances readily seen and exits well hidden. Phobos 5 had expected great things from his trap. He had conceived of the idea after reading the report of a Mercurian expedition that explored the dens of the divided trunks at some place marked Coney Island. According to the reports, the divided trunks showed no hesitancy in entering these types of dens. In fact, the writer of the report gave it as his opinion that the divided ones perhaps played games in these sorts of caves. It also mentioned that some of the dens were equipped with flat, shiny surfaces that cast reflections or images. Phobos 5 had incorporated the image making surfaces into his trap design. A pity that all this effort might be wasted, thought Phobos as he once more turned to the observation port to check his remaining distance from the planet's surface. Seeing that his time was short, Phobos V turned all five faces forward in the Mercurian gesture of disdain for death. A moment later came the shock. A week later, the proprietor of a novelty shop in Fairbanks watched two natives with their dog team pulling something log like through the snow toward the trading post. Turning to a customer, he remarked, here comes Kitch and AKU dragging another totem pole. Guess that Kitch must be the biggest liar and ever produced by the Eskimos. He tried to tell me that totem poles fall from the sky. Says he can always find one when he sees it fall because it's so hot it melts the snow around it. Personally, I think he should be elected president of the Liars Club, but I'll buy the totem pole anyway. Those pesky tourists always whittle a chunk out of my totem pole for a souvenir. I'm glad he's bringing me another one, the storekeeper concluded. The one he sold me last year is about whittled away. The End of Solar Stiff by Charles A. Stouffer.
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Shipwreck in the sky by Iando Binder this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org shipwreck in the sky by Iando Binder the flight was listed at GHQ as Project Songbird. It was sponsored by the Space Medicine Labs of the US Air Force, and its pilot was Captain Dan Barstow. A hand pecked man. Dan Barstow, chosen for the AF's most important project of the year because he and his GX3 had already broken all previous records set by hordes of V2s, Navy aerobees, and anything else that flew skyways. Dan Barstow, first man to cross the sea of Air and sight open Unlimited space Pioneer flight to infinity. He grinned and hummed to himself as he settled down for the long jaunt. Too busy to be either thrilled or scared. He considered the 37 instruments he'd have to read, the twice that many records to keep and the miles of camera film to run. He had been hand picked and thoroughly conditioned to make it all the way without more than a 10% increase in his pulse rate. So he worked as manner of faculty as if he were down in the GS centrifuge of the Medicine Space labs where he had been schooled for the strip for months. He kept up a running fire of aural reports through his helmet radio down to rough rock and his seal. All Rogers are temperature falling fast, but this Rumberoid spacesuit keeps me cozy. No chills. Docplane will be happy to hear that Weightless sensation's pretty clear and I feel upside down as much as right side up, but no bad effects. Taking shots of the sun's corona now with color film, huh? Oh yes sir. It's beautiful alright, now that you mention it. But hell, sir, who's got time for aesthetics now? Oops, that was a close 1/10 meteor whizzing past. Makes me think of flak backs on those Berlin bombing runs. Dan couldn't help wincing when the meteors peppered down past the flak of space below. He could see the meteors flare out brightly as they hit the atmosphere. Most of those near his position were small, none bigger than a baseball, and Dan took comfort in the fact that his rocket was small, too. In the immensity around him, a direct hit would be sheer bad luck, but the good old law of averages was on his side. Yes, Colonel, this tin can I'm riding in is holding together okay. Dan continued to rough rock. If he paused even a second in his reports, a top sergeant's yell from his throat came back for him to keep talking. Every bit of information he could transmit to them was vital revelation in this USAF Alpha exploration of open space beyond Earth's air cushion with ceiling unlimited to infinity. Cosmic racer. Sure the reading shot up. Double on the geyser, huh? No, I don't feel a thing. Like Doc Baird suspected we invented a lot of old YF's tales in advance before going to space. I feel fine. So you can put down the cosmic ray intensity as a boogeyman. What's that? Yeah, yeah, sir, the stars shine without winking up here. What else? Space is inky black. No more. Deep purples are queer more than blacks like Europe. And say, there's something unexpected. I can see that hurricane off the coast of Florida. You said it, sir. Once we install a permanent space station up here, it will be easy to spot typhoons, volcano eruptions, tidal waves, earthquakes, what have you the moment they start. If you ask me, with a good telescope, you could even spot forest fires the minute they broke out. Not to mention a sneak bombing on the target city. Uh, sorry, sir, I forgot. Ann broke off and almost retched as his stomach turned a flip flop to end all flip flops. The VX3 had reached the peak of its trajectory of over 1000 miles of altitude and now turned down lazily at first. He gulped oxygen from the emergency tube at his lips and felt better turning back on schedule. Roughrock Peak altitude 1037 miles. Everything fine, no danger. This was all a kinch. Hey, wait. Something nodded the books as popped up standby. Dan had felt the rocket swing a bit strangely, as if gripped by a strong force. Instead of falling directly down to Earth, was at a slight pitch. It slanted sideways and spun on its long axis. And then Dan saw what it was beneath. Intercepting his trajectory, coming around fast over the curvature of the Earth was a tiny black worldlet998 miles above Earth. It might be an enormous meteor. But Dan felt he was right the first time, for it wasn't falling like a meteor, but swinging parallel to Earth's surface or an even kneel. He stared at the unexpected discovery as amazed as if it were a fire breathing dragon out of legend. For it was actually, as he realized in swift, stunned comprehension, more amazing than any legend. Dan kept his voice calm. Hello, Roughrock. Listen. Nobody expected this. Hold your hat, sir, and sit down. I've discovered a second moon of Earth. You heard me right. A second moon. Tie that, will you? Sure, it's tiny, less than a mile in diameter. I'd say dead black in color. Guess that's why my telescopes never spotted it. Tiny and black blends into the black backdrop of space. It has terrific speed. And that little maverick's gravitational field caught my rocket. Of course, it can't yank me away from Earth's gravity. But the trouble is, yipe. My rocket and the moonlet may be in for a mutual collision course. Dan's trained eye suddenly saw that grim possibility. Barreling around Earth in a narrow orbit with a speed of something near over 12,000 miles an hour, the tiny new moon had since his ascent charged directly into his downward free fall. It was a chance in a thousand for a direct hit, except for one added factor. The moonlet exerted enough gravity to pull out of its many million ton bulk to warp the rocket into its path. And the thousand two hundreds were thus wiped out, becoming even money. Nip and tuck, reported Dan, answering the excited pleadings and questions from Roughrock. It won't be a head on crash I may miss entirely. Oh Lord, not with that spire of rocks sticking up from it. I'm going to hit that. Dan had heard an atomic bomb blast once, and it sounded like a string of them set off. Once the rocket smashed into the rocky prominence, the rock splintered. But Dan was not there to be splintered. Likewise, he had jammed down a button at the critical moment and the rocket's emergency escape hatch ejected him a split second before the violent impact. But Dan blacked out, receiving some of the concussion from the exploding rocket. When his eyes snapped open, he was floating like a feather in open, airless space. His rubberoid spacesuit, living up to its rigid tests, had inflated to its elastic limit. But it held, and within its automatic units began feeding him oxygen, heat and radio power. He had a chance now, because he had been ejected cleanly from the rocket without damage to the protective suit. The stars wheeled dizzily around him. Dan finally saw the reason why he was not just floating as a free agent in space. He was circling the black moonlet at perhaps a thousand yards from its pitted surface. Hello, Roughrock, he called, still alive and kicking, sir. Only now, of all crazy mad things, I'm moon of this moon. The collision must have knocked me clear out of my down to Earth orbit. I must have been ejected at the same direction as the moonlet's course and its gravity field. I don't know. Let an electronic brain figure it out sometime. Anyway, now I'm being dragged along the orbit of the moonlet. How about that? Yes, sir, I'm circling down closer and closer to the moonlet. No, don't worry, sir. It was a peak gravity pull only a fraction of an Earth G. So I'm drifting down gently as a clown. Stand by for my landing on Earth's second moon. The bloated figure in the bulging spacesuit circled the black stony surface several more times in a narrowing spiral and finally landed with a soft skidding bump that didn't even jar Dan's teeth. He bounced several times from a diminishing height of 50 odd feet in a grotesque slow motion before he finally came to a stop. He sat still for a moment, adjusting to the fantastic fact of being shipwrecked on an infinite charted moonlit, crowding down his pulse rate, which might be over 10% normal now. Okay, Roughrock, I hear you. You're telling me, sir. Obviously I'm marooned here. No rocket to leave with, no way to get back to terra firma. What? If you'll pardon my saying so, sir, that's a silly question. Of course I'm scared. Scared Green. Sorry about the rocket, sir. Losing it for you. Me, sir? Thank you, sir. But stop apologizing, will you? I know you haven't got any duplicates of the VX3. Ready. No rescue rocket. Dan listened for a moment longer, then broke in roughly oh, for Pete's sake, will you stop crying over me, sir, So I get mine here. I might have gotten it over Berlin, too. Forget it, sir. Dan grinned suddenly. Look, what have I got to kick about? I'll go out in a flash of glory. At least one headline will put it that way. And I'll get credit in the history books as the man who discovered that the Earth has two moons. What more could I ask, really? Dan blushed at the reply from Roughrock. Will you lay off, please, Colonel? How else could a man take it? I'm scared silly inside. But look, I've really got something to report now. This little runt Moon makes tracks around Earth in probably two hours minus if I remember my spacenorths right, I'm already looking down over the Grand Canyon heading west. I'm going to get a pretty terrific bird's eye view about the whole world in about two more hours. Which is just about how much oxygen I've got left. Lucky, eh? Dan looked down, watching in fascination as the majestic wheeling of the Earth below him. His little moonlet did not rotate, or rather it rotated once for each revolution around the Earth just as the moon did, keeping one face earthward, giving him an uninterrupted view. The Sierras on Earth hove into clear view above the broad Pacific. There would follow Hawaii, then Japan, Asia, Europe. No, he saw he was slanting southwest. It would be across the equator, past Australia, perhaps near the South Pole, then up and over the top of the world past Greenland, following that circle around the globe. In any case, his was the speediest trip around the world ever made by man before. We're out of mutual range, Rough rock. I'm going to explore this new moon. Me and Columbus stand by for reports. Dan did his walking in huge leaps that propelled him 50ft at a step with slight effort due to the extremely feeble gravity of the tiny body. What did he weigh up here? Probably no more than an ounce or two. Nothing much to report, Colonel. It's a dead airless peepsqueak palanotoid. Just a big mile thick rock. Probably no life, no vegetation, no people, no nothing. Guess you might call me a man on the second moon. And the jokes on me. Well, one and three quarter hours of oxygen left by the gays or 105min. Sounds like more that way. What's that, sir? Your voice is getting faint. Any last request from me? Well, one favor. Maybe picking up my body someday with another rocket. Yeah, It'll stay preserved up here in the deep freeze of space. Thanks, Sir. I can't hear you much now. Going out of range. Give Betty my fondest. You know the blonde. Well, sir, goodbye now. Dan was glad to hear that Rough Rock's radio voice faded into a whispery nothingness. It wasn't easy to stay casual now. There was nothing more to say really. And he didn't want to hear any more crying from the CEO. The old man sounded almost hysterical. He wanted to just be alone with his thoughts now, making his final peace with the universe, he checked his gauge with his watch. 90 minutes of oxygen to zero. Or, he thought with a grin, eternity minus 90 minutes. He was beginning to have trouble breathing, but it was Awesomely grand. Watching the sweep of earth beneath him. The procession of dots that were islands strung across the Pacific South Seas were like a necklace of green beads. He was still within radio range of ships below at sea, yet he didn't contact them. He had nothing to say. Like a ghost in the sky, idly, he kept pitching loose stones, watching their rifle like speed away from him again a phenomenon of the weak gravity of the movement. Actually, he was able to pick up a boulder 10ft across and heave it away with ease. We who are about to die amuse ourselves, he thought. Then, because a thread of stubborn hope still clung in a corner of his mind, he got an idea. It had lurked just beyond his mental grasp for some time now. Something significant abruptly face alight. Dan switched on his radio and contacted a ship below, asking them to relay him through Roughrock with their more powerful transmitter. Ahoy, Roughrock. Stop adding up my insurance, Colonel. I'm coming back. No, sir, I haven't gone out of my head, sir. It's so simple it's a laugh, sir. See you in a few hours, sir. And he did it. Dan grimmed when they hauled his dripping form from the sea aboard the search plane. They cut him out of the spacesuit to which he was still attached to his emergency twin parachute. But his helmet was gone, ripped loose, for Dan had been breathing fresh air due to the long parachute descent. They stared at him as if dead man had come alive. Impossible to escape. He chuckled, repeating their babble. That's what I thought too, until I remembered those data tables on gravity and escape velocity and such. How on the moon the escape velocity is much less on Earth and on that tiny second moon. Well, my clue was when I threw a stone into the air and it never came back. Dan gulp taught coffee. I got off the moonlet myself, then got up to more than a mile above it where I was free of its female gravity. But I was still in the same orbit circling Earth. I have continued revolving as a human satellite forever, of course, but for this emergency gadget hooked to my belt, Dan held up a metal gun with its empty tank and needle nose half burned away. Reaction pistol fire cytrine and oxidizer ordinary jet rocket principle, aiming it towards the star's opposite Earth. Its reactive blast shoved me earthwards. Thanks to Newton, I need a speed of about half one mile a second. The powerful little jet gun only had a small mass to shove in its free space without gravity or friction. That broke me from the fee fall around Earth to gravity to fall toward Earth Then I spiraled down under the gravity pull. I reached a lung filling air density just in time before my oxygen gave out.
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One more danger was that I began heating up like a meteor due to air friction. I flung out a prayer first, followed by my twin parachutes designed for extreme initial shock. They held slug me to a prayer Trooper's drift the rest of the way down. Wait. A puzzled pilot objected. Your story doesn't hang together. How did you get off that moonlet? How did you get up there a mile above it, away from its gravity? There was nobody to throw you. Like a stone, I threw myself, said Dan. First I ran as fast as I could, maybe halfway around the moonlet to get a good running start. And then Dan Barstow's grin then was undoubtedly the biggest grin in history. Well then, since the feeble gravity couldn't pull me back again, what I really did was to jump clear off that moon. End of Shipwrecked in the sky by Iando Binder.
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The street that Wasn't There by Clifford D. Simic and Carl Jacoby this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org recording by Jedediah Smith the Street that Wasn't There by Clifford D. Simic and Carl Jacoby Mr. Jonathan Chambers left his house on Maple street at exactly 7 o' clock in the evening and set out on the daily walk he had taken at the same time, come rain or snow, for 20 solid years the walk never varied. He paced two blocks down Maple street, stopped at the Red Star Confectionery to buy a Rose Trofero Perfecto, then walked to the end of the fourth block on Maple. There he turned right on Lexington, followed Lexington to Oak, down Oak, and so by way of Lincoln, back to Maple again and to his home. He didn't walk fast. He took his time. He always returned to his front door at exactly 7:45. No one ever stopped to talk with him. Even the man at the Red Star Confectionery where he bought his cigar, remained silent while the purchase was being made. Mr. Chambers merely tapped on the glass top of the counter with his coin. The man reached in and brought forth the box, and Mr. Chambers took his cigar. That was all, for people long ago had gathered that Mr. Chambers desired to be left alone. The newer generation of townsfolk called it eccentricity. Certain uncouth persons had a different word for it. The oldsters remembered that this queer looking individual, with his black silk muffler, rosewood cane, and bowler hat once had been a professor at State University, a professor of metaphysics, they seem to recall, or some such outlandish subject. At any rate, a furore of some sort was connected with his name at the time, an academic scandal. He had written a book, and he had taught the subject matter of that volume to his classes. What that subject matter was had long been forgotten, but whatever it was had been considered sufficiently revolutionary to cost Mr. Chambers his post at the university. A silver moon shone over the chimney tops and a chill, impish October wind was rustling the dead leaves when Mr. Chambers started out at 7 o'. Clock. It was a good night, he told himself, smelling the clean, crisp air of autumn and the faint pungence of distant wood smoke. He walked unhurriedly, swinging his cane a bit less jauntily than 20 years ago. He tucked the muffler more securely under his rusty old topcoat and pulled his bowler hat more firmly on his head. He noticed that the street light at the corner of Maple and Jefferson was out, and he grumbled a little to himself. When he was forced to step off the walk to circle a boarded off section of newly laid concrete work before the driveway of 8:16. It seemed that he reached the corner of Lexington and Maple just a bit too quickly, but he told himself that this couldn't be, for he never did that. For 20 years, since the year following his expulsion from the University. He had lived by the clock, the same thing at the same time, day after day. He had not deliberately set upon such a life of routine, a bachelor living alone with sufficient money to supply his humble needs. The timed existence had grown on him gradually, so he turned on Lexington and back on Oak. The dog at the corner of Oak and Jefferson was waiting for him once again and came out snarling and growling, snapping at his heels. But Mr. Chambers pretended not to notice, and the beast gave up the chase. A radio was blaring down the street, and faint wisps of what it was blurting floated to Mr. Chambers, still taking place. Empire State Building disappeared. Thin air. Famed scientist Dr. Edmund Harcourt. The wind whipped the muted words away, and Mr. Chambers grumbled to himself. Another one of those fantastic radio dramas. Probably. He remembered one from many years ago, something about the Martians and Harcourt. What did Harcourt have to do with it? He was one of the men who had ridiculed the book Mr. Chambers had written. But he pushed speculation away, sniffed the clean, crisp air again, looked at the familiar things that materialized out of the late autumn darkness as he walked along. For there was nothing, absolutely nothing in the world that he would let upset him. That was a tenet he had laid down 20 years ago. There was a crowd of men in front of the drug store at the corner of Oak and Lincoln, and they were talking excitedly. Mr. Chambers caught some excited word. It's happening everywhere. What do you think it is? The scientist can't explain, but as Mr. Chambers neared them, they fell into what seemed an abashed silence and watched him pass. He, on his part gave them no sign of recognition. That was the way it had been for many years, ever since the people had become convinced that he did not wish to talk. One of the men half started forward as if to speak to him, but then stepped back, and Mr. Chambers continued on his walk back. At his own front door he stopped and as he had done a thousand times before, drew forth the heavy gold watch from his pocket. He started violently. It was only 7:30. For long minutes he stood there staring at the watch in accusation. The timepiece hadn't stopped, for it still ticked audibly, but 15 minutes too soon. For 20 years, day in, day out, he had started out at seven and returned at a quarter of eight. Now it wasn't until then that he realized something else was wrong. He had no cigar. For the first time he had neglected to purchase his evening smoke. Shaken, Muttering to himself, Mr. Chambers let himself in his house and locked the door behind him. He hung his hat and coat on the rack in the hall, and walked slowly into the living room. Dropping into his favorite chair, he shook his head in bewilderment. Silence filled the room, a silence that was measured by the ticking of the old fashioned pendulum clock on the mantelpiece. But silence was no strange thing to Mr. Chambers. Once he had loved music, the kind of music he could get by tuning in symphonic orchestras on the radio. But the radio stood silent in the corner, the cord out of its socket. Mr. Chambers had pulled it out many years before. To be precise, upon the night when the symphonic broadcast had been interrupted to give a news flash. He had stopped reading newspapers and magazines too, had exiled himself to a few city blocks. And as the years flowed by, that self exile had become a prison, an intangible, impassable wall bounded by four city blocks by three. Beyond them lay utter, unexplainable terror. Beyond them he never went. But recluse though he was, he could not, on occasion, escape from hearing things. Things the newsboy shouted on the streets, things the men talked about on the drugstore corner when they didn't see him coming. And so he knew that this was the year 1960, and that the wars in Europe and Asia had flamed to an end, to be followed by a terrible plague. A plague that even now was sweeping through country after country like wildfire, decimating populations. A plague undoubtedly induced by hunger and privation and the miseries of war. But those things he put away as items far removed from his own small world. He disregarded them. He pretended he had never heard of them. Others might discuss and worry over them if they wished. To him, they simply did not matter. But there were two things tonight that did matter. Two curious, incredible events. He had arrived home 15 minutes early. He had forgotten his cigar. Huddled in the chair, he frowned slowly. It was disquieting to have something like that happen. There must be something wrong. Had his long exile finally turned his mind? Perhaps just a very little. Enough to make him queer. Had he lost his sense of proportion, of perspective? No, he hadn't. Take this room, for example. After 20 years it had come to be as much a part of him as the clothes he wore. Every detail of the room was engraved in his mind with clarity. The old centre leg table with its green covering and stained glass lamp. The mantelpiece with the dusty bric a brac, the pendulum clock that told the time of day as well as the day of the week and month. The elephant ashtray on the tabouret, and most important of all, the marine print. Mr. Chambers loved that picture. It had depth, he always said. It showed an old sailing ship in the foreground on a placid sea. Far in the distance, almost on the horizon line, was the vague outline of a larger vessel. There were other pictures too. The forest scene above the fireplace, the old English prints in the corner where he sat, the Courier and Ives above the radio. But the ship print was directly in his line of vision. He could see it without turning his head. He had put it there because he liked it best. Further reverie became an effort as Mr. Chambers felt himself succumbing to weariness. He undressed and went to bed. For an hour he lay awake, assailed by vague fears he could neither define nor understand. When finally he dozed off, it was to lose himself in a series of horrific dreams. He dreamed first that he was a castaway on a tiny islet in mid ocean, that the waters around the island teemed with huge poisonous sea snakes, hydrophini, and that steadily those serpents were devouring the island. In another dream he was pursued by a horror which he could neither see nor hear, but only could imagine. And as he sought to flee he stayed in one place. His legs worked frantically, pumping like pistons, but he could make no progress. It was as if he ran on a treadway. Then again the terror descended on him, a black, unimagined thing, and he tried to scream and couldn't. He opened his mouth and strained his vocal cords and filled his lungs to bursting with the urge to shriek, but not a sound came from his lips. All next day he was uneasy, and as he left the house that evening at precisely 7 o', clock, he kept saying to himself, you must not forget tonight. You must remember to stop and get your cigar. The street light at the corner of Jefferson was still out, and in front of 8:16 the cemented driveway was still boarded off. Everything was the same as the night before. And now, he told himself, the Red Star Confectionary is in the next block. I must not forget tonight. To forget twice in a row would be just too much. He grasped that thought firmly in his mind, strode just a bit more rapidly down the street. But at the corner he stopped in consternation. Bewildered, he stood, stared down the next block. There was no neon sign, no splash of friendly light upon the sidewalk to mark the little store tucked away in this residential section. He stared at the street marker and read the word slowly. Grant. He read it again, unbelieving, for this shouldn't be Grant street, but Marshall. He had walked two blocks and the confectionery was between Marshall and Grant. He hadn't come to Marshall yet. And here was Grant. Or had he absent mindedly come one block farther than he thought, past the store as on the night before. For the first time in 20 years, Mr. Chambers retraced his steps. He walked back to Jefferson, then turned around and went back to Grant again, and on to Lexington, then back to Grant again, where he stood astounded while a single incredible fact grew slowly in his brain. There wasn't any confectionary. The block from Marshall to Grant had disappeared. Now he understood why he had missed the store on the night before, why he had arrived home 15 minutes early on legs that were dead things. He stumbled back to his home. He slammed and locked the door behind him and made his way unsteadily to his chair in the corner. What was this? What did it mean? By what inconceivable necromancy? Could a paved street with houses, trees, and buildings be spirited away and the space it had occupied be closed up? Was something happening in the world which he, in his secluded life, knew nothing about? Mr. Chambers shivered, reached to turn up the collar of his coat, then stopped as he realized the room must be warm. A fire blazed merrily in the grate. The cold he felt came from something somewhere else. The cold of fear and horror, the chill of a half whispered thought. A deathly silence had fallen, a silence still measured by the pendulum clock, and yet a silence that held a different tenor than he had ever sensed before. Not a homey, comfortable silence, but a silence that hinted at emptiness and nothingness. There was something back of this, Mr. Chambers told himself, something that reached far back into one corner of his brain and demanded recognition. Something tied up with the fragments of talk he had heard on the drugstore corner, bits of news broadcasts he had heard as he walked along the street, the shrieking of the newsboy calling his papers. Something to do with the happenings in the world from which he had excluded himself. He brought them back to mind now and lingered over the one central theme of the talk he overheard. The wars and plagues. Hints of a Europe and Asia swept almost clean of human life, of the plague ravaging Africa, of its appearance in South America, of the frantic efforts of the United States to prevent its spread into that nation's boundaries. Millions of people were dead in Europe and Asia, Africa and South America. Billions, perhaps, and somehow those gruesome statistics seemed tied up with his own experience. Something, somewhere, some part of his earlier life, seemed to hold an explanation. But try as he would his befuddled brain failed to find the answer. The pendulum clock struck slowly, its every other chime as usual setting up a sympathetic vibration in the pewter vase that stood on the mantel. Mr. Chambers got to his feet, strode to the door, opened it, and looked out. Moonlight tessellated the street in black and silver, etching the chimneys and trees against a silvered sky. But the house directly across the street was not the same. It was strangely lopsided, its dimensions out of proportion, like a house that suddenly had gone mad. He stared at it in amazement, trying to determine what was wrong with it. He recalled how it had always stood foursquare, a solid piece of mid Victorian architecture. Then, before his eyes, the house righted itself again. Slowly it drew together, ironed out its queer angles, readjusted its dimensions, became once again the stodgy house he knew it had to be. With a sigh of relief, Mr. Chambers turned back into the hall. But before he closed the door he looked again. The house was lopsided, as bad, perhaps worse than before. Gulping in fright, Mr. Chambers slammed the door shut, locked it, and double bolted it. Then he went to his bedroom and took two sleeping powders. His dreams that night were the same as on the night before. Again there was the islet in mid ocean. Again he was alone upon it. Again the squirming hydrophany were eating his foothold. Piece by piece. He awoke, body drenched with perspiration. Vague light of early dawn filtered through the window. The clock on the bedside table showed 7:30. For a long time he lay there motionless. Again the fantastic happenings of the night before came back to haunt him, and as he lay there staring at the windows, he remembered them one by one. But his mind, still fogged by sleep and astonishment, took the happenings in its stride, mulled over them, lost the keen edge of fantastic terror that lurked around them. The light through the window slowly grew brighter. Mr. Chambers slid out of bed slowly, crossed to the window. The cold of the floor biting into his bare feet. He forced himself to look out. There was nothing outside the window, no shadows, as if there might be a fog. But no fog, however thick, could hide the apple tree that grew close against the house. But the tree was there, shadowy, indistinct in the gray, with a few withered apples still clinging to its boughs. A few shrivelled leaves were reluctant to leave the parent branch. The tree was there now, but it hadn't been when he had first looked. Mr. Chambers was sure of that, and now he saw the faint outlines of his neighbour's house. But those outlines were all wrong. They didn't jibe and fit together. They were out of plumb, as if some giant hand had grasped the house and wrenched it out of true. Like the house he had seen across the street the night before, the house that had painfully righted itself when he thought of how it should look. Perhaps if he thought of how his neighbour's house should look, it too might right itself. But Mr. Chambers was very weary, too weary to think about the house. He turned from the window and dressed slowly. In the living room he slumped into his chair, put his feet on the old cracked ottoman. For a long time he sat trying to think, and then abruptly something like an electric shock ran through him. Rigid, he sat there limp inside at the thought. Minutes later he arose and almost ran across the room to the old mahogany bookcase that stood against the wall. There were many volumes in the case, his beloved classics on the first shelf, his many scientific works on the lower shelves. The second shelf contained but one book, and it was around this book that Mr. Chambers's entire life was centered. Twenty years ago he had written it and foolishly attempted to teach its philosophy to a class of undergraduates. The newspapers, he remembered, had made a great deal of it. At the time, tongues had been set to wagging narrow minded townsfolk failing to understand either his philosophy or his aim, but seeing in him another exponent of some anti rational cult had forced his expulsion from the school. It was a simple book really, dismissed by most authorities as merely the vagaries of an overzealous mind. Mr. Chambers took it down now, opened its cover and began thumbing slowly through the pages. For a moment the memory of happier days swept over him. Then his eyes focused on the paragraph. A paragraph written so long ago. The very word seemed strange and unreal. Man himself, by the power of mass suggestion, holds the physical fate of this earth. Yes, even the universe. Billions of minds seeing trees as trees, houses as houses, streets as streets, and not something else. Minds that see things as they are and have kept things as they were, destroy those minds and the entire foundation of matter, robbed of its regenerative power, will crumple and slip away like a column of sand. His eyes followed down the page. Yet this would have nothing to do with matter itself, but only with matter's form. For while the mind of man through long ages may have moulded an imagery of that space in which he lives, mind would have little conceivable influence upon the existence of that matter. What exists in our known universe shall exist always and can never be destroyed, only altered or transformed. But in modern astrophysics and mathematics, we gain an insight into the possibility, yes, probability, that there are other dimensions, other brackets of time and space impinging on the one we occupy. If a pin is thrust into a shadow, would that shadow have any knowledge of the pin? It would not. For in this case, the shadow is two dimensional, the pin three dimensional, yet both occupy the same space. Granting, then, that the power of men's minds alone holds this universe, or at least this world in its present form, may we not go farther and envision other minds in some other plane watching us, waiting, waiting craftily for the time they can take over the domination of matter? Such a conceit is not impossible. It is a natural conclusion. If we accept the double hypothesis that mind does control the formation of all matter and that other worlds lie in juxtaposition with ours, perhaps we shall come upon a day far distant, when our plane, our world, will dissolve beneath our feet and before our eyes as some stronger intelligence reaches out from the dimensional shadows of the very space we live in and wrests from us the matter which we know to be our own.
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Start your free trial@shopify.com he stood astounded beside the bookcase, his eyes staring unseeing into the fire upon the hearth. He had written that, and because of those words he had been called a heretic, had been compelled to resign his position at the university, had been forced into this hermit life. A tumultuous idea hammered at him. Men had died by the millions all over the world. Where there had been thousands of minds, there now were one or two, a feeble force to hold the form of matter intact. The plague had swept Europe and Asia almost clean of life, had blighted Africa, had reached South America, might even have come to the United States. He remembered the whispers he had heard, the words of the men at the drugstore corner, the buildings disappearing, something scientists could not explain. But those were merely scraps of information. He did not know the whole story. He could not know. He never listened to the radio, never read a newspaper. But abruptly the whole thing fitted together in his brain like the missing piece of a puzzle into its slot. The significance of it all gripped him with damning clarity. There were not sufficient minds in existence to retain the material world in its mundane form. Some other power from another dimension was fighting to supersede man's control and take his universe into its own plane. Abruptly Mr. Chambers closed the book, shoved it back in the case, and picked up his hat and coat. He had to know more. He had to find someone who could tell him. He moved through the hall to the door, emerged into the street. On the walk he looked skyward, trying to make out the sun. But there wasn't any sun, only an all pervading greyness that shrouded everything. Not a grey fog, but a gray emptiness that seemed devoid of life, of any movement. The walk led to his gate and there it ended. But as he moved forward the sidewalk came into view and the house ahead loomed out of the gray, but a house with differences. He moved forward rapidly. Visibility extended only a few feet, and as he approached them the houses materialized like two dimensional pictures without perspective, like twisted cardboard soldiers lining up for review on a misty morning. Once he stopped and looked back and saw that the grayness had closed in behind him. The houses were wiped out, the sidewalk faded into nothing. He shouted, hoping to attract attention, but his voice frightened him. It seemed to ricochet up and into the higher levels of the sky as if a giant door had been opened to a mighty room high above him. He went on until he came to the corner of Lexington. There, on the curb, he stopped and stared. The gray wall was thicker there, but he did not realize how close it was until he glanced down at his feet and saw there was nothing, nothing at all beyond the curbstone, no dull gleam of wet asphalt, no sign of a street. It was as if all eternity ended here, at the corner of Maple and Lexington. With a wild cry, Mr. Chambers turned and ran back down the street. He raced, coat streaming after him in the wind, bowler hat bouncing on his head. Panting, he reached the gate and stumbled up the walk, thankful that it was still there. On the stoop. He stood for a moment, breathing hard. He glanced back over his shoulder, and a queer feeling of inner numbness seemed to well over him. At that moment, the grey nothingness appeared to thin. The enveloping curtain fell away, and he saw, vague and indistinct, yet cast in stereoscopic outline, a gigantic city was lined against the darkling sky. It was a city fantastic, with cubed domes, spires and aerial bridges and flying buttresses. Tunnel like streets, flanked on either side by shining metallic ramps and runways, stretched endlessly to the vanishing point. Great shafts of multicolored light probed huge streamers and ellipses. Above the higher levels and beyond, like a final backdrop, rose a titanic wall. It was from that wall, from its crenelated parapets and battlements, that Mr. Chambers felt the eyes peering at him. Thousands of eyes glaring down with but a single purpose. And as he continued to look, something else seemed to take form above that wall. A design this time that swirled and writhed in the ribbons of radiance and rapidly coalesced into strange geometric figures without definite line or detail. A colossal face, a face of indescribable power and evil. It was staring down with malevolent composure. Then the city and the face slid out of focus. The vision faded like a darkened magic lantern, and the grayness moved in again. Mr. Chambers pushed open the door of his house, but he did not lock it. There was no need of locks, not any more. A few coals of fire still smouldered in the grate, and going there, he stirred them up, raked away the ash, piled on more wood. The flames leaped merrily, dancing in the chimney's throat. Without removing his hat and coat, he sank exhausted in his favorite chair, closed his eyes, then opened them again. He sighed with relief as he saw the room was unchanged, everything in its accustomed place. The clock, the lamp, the elephant ashtray, the marine print on the wall. Everything was as it should be. The clock measured the silence with its measured ticking. It chimed abruptly and the vase sent up its usual sympathetic vibration. This was his room, he thought. Rooms acquire the personality of the person who lives in them, becoming a part of him. This was his world, his own private world, and as such it would be the last to go. But how long could he, his brain, maintain its existence? Mr. Chambers stared at the marine print, and for a moment a little breath of reassurance returned to him. They couldn't take this away. The rest of the world might dissolve because there was insufficient power of thought to retain its outward form. But this room was his. He alone had furnished it. He alone, since he had first planned the house's building, had lived here. This room would stay. It must stay on. It must. He rose from his chair and walked across the room to the bookcase, stood staring at the second shelf with its single volume. His eyes shifted to the top shelf and swift terror gripped him. For all the books weren't there. A lot of books weren't there. Only the most beloved, the most familiar ones. So the change had already started here the unfamiliar books were gone, and that fitted the pattern, for it would be the least familiar things that would go first. Wheeling, he stared across the room. Was it his imagination, or did the lamp on the table blur and begin to fade away? But as he stared at it, it became clear again, a solid, substantial thing. For a moment real fear reached out and touched him with chilly fingers, for he knew that this room no longer was proof against the thing that had happened out there on the street. Or had it really happened? Might not all this exist within his own mind? Might not the street be as it always was, with laughing children and barking dogs? Might not the Red Star Confectionary still exist, splashing the street with the red of its neon sign? Could it be that he was going mad? He had heard whispers when he had passed, whispers the gossiping housewives had not intended him to hear, and he had heard the shouting of boys when he walked by. They thought him mad. Could he be really mad? But he knew he wasn't mad. He knew that he perhaps was the sanest of all men who walked the earth, for he and he alone had foreseen this very thing, and the others had scoffed at him for it. Somewhere else the children might be playing on a street, but it would be a different street, and the children undoubtedly would be different too, for the matter of which the street and everything upon it had been formed, would now be cast in a different mould, stolen by different minds in a different dimension. Perhaps we shall come upon a day far distant, when our plane, our world, will dissolve beneath our feet and before our eyes as some stronger intelligence reaches out from the dimensional shadows of the very space we live in and wrests from us the matter which we know to be our own. But there had been no need to wait for that distant day. Scant years after he had written those prophetic words, the thing was happening. Man had played unwittingly into the hands of those other minds in the other dimension. Man had waged a war and war had bred a pestilence, and the whole vast cycle of events was but a detail of a cyclopean plan. He could see it all now by an insidious mass. Hypnosis, minions from that other dimension. Or was it one supreme intelligence had deliberately sown the seeds of dissension. The reduction of the world's mental power had been carefully planned with diabolic premeditation. On impulse, he suddenly turned, crossed the room, and opened the connecting door to the bedroom. He stopped on the threshold and a sob forced its way to his lips. There was no bedroom. Where his stolid four poster and dresser had been. There was grayish nothingness like an automaton. He turned again and paced to the hall door. Here, too, he found what he had expected. There was no hall, no familiar hat rack and umbrella stand. Nothing. Weakly, Mr. Chambers moved back to his chair in the corner. So here I am, he said half aloud. So there he was, embattled in the last corner of the world that was left to him. Perhaps there were other men like him, he thought. Men who stood at bay against the emptiness that marked the transition of from one dimension to another. Men who had lived close to the things they loved, who had endowed those things with such substantial form by power of mind alone that they now stood out alone against the power of some greater mind. The street was gone. The rest of his house was gone. This room still retained its form. This room, he knew, would stay the longest. And when the rest of the room was gone, this corner with his favorite chair would remain. For this was the spot where he had lived for 20 years. The bedroom was for sleeping, the kitchen for eating. This room was for living. This was his last stand. These were the walls and floors and prints and lamps that had soaked up his will to make them walls and prints and lamps. He looked out the window into a blank world.
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His neighbors houses already were gone. They had not lived with them as he had lived with this room. Their interests had been divided, thinly spread. Their thoughts had not been concentrated as his upon an area 4 blocks by 3, or a room 14 by 12. Staring through the window, he saw it again, the same vision he had looked upon before, and yet different in an indescribable way. There was the city illumined in the sky. There were the elliptical towers and turrets, the cube shaped domes and battlements. He could see with stereoscopic clarity the aerial bridges, the gleaming avenue sweeping on into infinitude. The vision was nearer this time, but the depth and proportion had changed, as if he were viewing it from two concentric angles at the same time. And the face, the face of magnitude, of power, of cosmic craft and evil. Mr. Chambers turned his eyes back into the room. The clock was ticking slowly, steadily. The grayness was stealing into the room. The table and radio were the first to go. They simply faded away. And with them went one corner of the room and then the elephant ashtray. Oh, well, said Mr. Chambers. I never did like that. Very well. Now, as he sat there, it didn't seem queer to be without the table or the radio. It was as if it were something quite normal, something one could expect to happen. Perhaps if he thought hard enough he could bring them back. But after all, what was the use? One man alone could not stand off the irresistible march of nothingness. One man all alone simply couldn't do it. He wondered what the elephant ashtray looked like in that other dimension. It certainly wouldn't be an elephant ashtray, nor would the radio be a radio, for perhaps they didn't have ashtrays or radios or elephants in the invading dimension. He wondered, as a matter of fact, what he himself would look like when he finally slipped into the unknown. For he was matter too, just as the ashtray and radio were matter. He wondered if he would retain his individuality, if he would still be a person, or would he merely be a thing? There was one answer to all of that. He simply didn't know. Nothingness advanced upon him, ate its way across the room, stalking him as he sat in the chair underneath the lamp. And he waited for it. The room, or what was left of it, plunged into dreadful silence. Mr. Chambers started. The clock had stopped. Funny the first time in 20 years. He leaped from his chair and then sat down again. The clock hadn't stopped. It wasn't there. There was a tingling sensation in his feet. End of the street that Wasn't There By Clifford D. Simic and Carl Jacoby Recording by Jedediah Smith.
- [86:21]
A City Near Centaurs by Bill Doad this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org recording by Zunera Qureshi a city near Centaur's by Bill Dod the city was sacred, but not to its gods. Michelson was a God, but far from sacred. Crouched in the ancient doorway like an animal peering out from his burrow, Mr. Michelson saw the native. At first he was startled, thinking it might be someone else from the Earth settlement who had discovered the old city before him. Then he saw the glint of sun against the metallic skirt and relaxed. He chuckled to himself, wondering with amusement what a web footed man was doing in an old dead city so far from his people. Some facts were known about the people of Alpha Centaurus ii. They were not actually natives, he recalled. They were a colony from the fifth planet of the system. They were curious people. Some were highly intelligent, though uneducated. He decided to ignore the man for the moment. He was far down the ancient street, a mere speck against the sand. There would be plenty of time to wonder about him. He gazed out from his position at the complex variety of buildings before him. Some were small, obviously homes. Others were huge, with tall, frail spires standing against the pale blue sky. Square buildings, ellipsoid, spheroid, beautiful dream stuffed bridges connected tall conical towers, bridges that still swung in the wind after half a million of years. Late afternoon sunlight shone against ebony surfaces. The sands of many centuries had blown down the wide streets and filled the doorways. Desert plants grew from roofs of smaller buildings. Ignoring the native, Mr. Michelson poked about among the ruins, happily exclaiming to himself about some particular artifact, marveling at its state of preservation, holding it this way and that to catch the late afternoon sun. Smiling, clucking gleefully, he crawled over the rubble through old doorways half filled with accumulation of ages. He dug experimentally in the sand with his hands like a dog under a roof that had weathered half a million years of rain and sun. Then he crawled out again, covered with dust and cobwebs. The native stood in the street less than a hundred feet away, waving his arms madly. Mr. Earth God. He cried. It is sacred ground where you are trespassing. The archaeologist smiled, watching the man hurry closer. He was a short one, even for a native. Long gray hair hung to his shoulders, bobbing up and down as he walked. He wore no shoes. The toes of his webbed feet dragged in the sand, making a deep trail behind him. He was an old man. You never told us about this old dead city, michaelson said chidingly. Shame on you. But never mind. I found it now. Isn't it beautiful? Yes, beautiful. You will leave now. Leave? Michelson asked, acting surprised, as if the man were a child. I just got here a few hours ago. You must go. Why? Who are you? I am keeper of the City. You? Michaelson laughed. Then, seeing how serious the native was, said, what makes you think a dead city needs a keeper? The spirits may return. Michelson crawled out of the doorway and stood up. He brushed his trousers. He pointed. See that wall? Built of some metal, I'd say some alloy impervious to rust and wear. The spirits are angry. Notice the inscriptions. Wind has blown sand against them for eons and rain and sleet. But their story is there once we decipher it.
- [90:20]
Leave.
- [90:21]
The native's lined, weathered old face was working around the mouth in anger. Mikaelson was almost sorry he mocked him. He was deadly serious. Look, he said. No spirits are ever coming back here. Don't you know that? And even if they did, spirits care nothing for Old cities half covered with sand and dirt. He walked away from the old man, heading for another building. The sun had already gone below the horizon, coloring the high clouds. He glanced backward. The web foot was following. Mr. Earth God. The web foot cried so sharply that Michelson stopped. You must not touch, not walk upon, not handle. Your step may destroy the home of some ancient spirit. Your breath may cause one iota of change and a spirit may lose his way in the darkness. Go quickly now or be killed. He turned and walked off, not looking back. Michaelson stood in the ancient street, tall, gaunt, feet planted wide, hands in pockets, watching the wet foot until he was out of sight beyond a huge circular building. There was a man to watch. There was one of the intelligent ones. One looked into the alert old eyes. I told him that. Mikaelson shook his head and went about satisfying his curiosity. He entered buildings without thoughts of roofs falling in or decayed floors dropping him under his weight. He began to collect small items, making a pile of them in the street. An ancient bowl, metal, untouched by the ages. A statue of a man one foot high, correct to the minutest details, showing how identical they had been to Earthmen. He found books still standing on ancient shelves, but was afraid to touch them without tools. Darkness came swiftly and he was forced out into the street. He stood there alone, feeling the age of the place. Even the smell of age was in the air. Silver moonlight from the two moons filtered through clear air down upon the ruins. The city lay now in darkness, dead and still, waiting for morning so it could lie dead and still in the sun. There was no hurry to be going home, although he was alone, although this was Alpha Centaurus Second, with many unknowns, many dangers, although home was a very great distress away. There was no one back there to worry about him. His wife had died many years ago back on Earth. No children. His friends in the settlement would not look for him for another day at least anyway. The tiny cylinder buried in flesh behind his ear, a thing of mystery and immense power, could take him home instantly, without effort, save a flicker of thought. You did not leave as I asked you. Michelson whirled around at the sound of the native's voice. Then he relaxed. He said, you shouldn't sneak up on a man like that. You must leave or I will be forced to kill you. I do not want to kill you, but if I must. He made a clucking sound deep in his throat. The spirits are angry. Nonsense, superstition. But never mind. You have been here longer than I. Tell me, what are those instruments in the rooms. It looks like a clock, but I'm certain it had some other function. What rooms? Oh, come now. The small rooms back there look like they were bedrooms. I do not know. The web foot drew closer. Michaelson decided he was 60 or 70 years old at least. You've been here a long time. You are intelligent, and you must be educated. The way you talk. The gadgets look like a timepiece of some sort. What is it? What does it measure? I insist that you go. The web foot held something in his hand. No. Michelson looked off down the street, trying to ignore the native, trying to feel the life of the city as it might have been. You are sensitive, the native said in his ear. It takes a sensitive God to feel the spirits moving in the houses and walking in these old streets. Say it any way you want to. This is the most fascinating theme I've ever seen. The Inca's treasure. The ruins of Pompeii. Egyptian tombs. None can hold a candle to this Mr. Earth God. Don't call me that. I'm not a God and you know it. The old man shrugged. It is not an item worthy of dispute. Those names you mention, are they the names of gods? He chuckled. In a way, yes. What is your name? Ma Ota. You must help me, Ma Ota. These things must be preserved. We'll build a museum. Right here. In the street? No. Over there, on the hill just outside the city. We'll collect all the old writings and perhaps we may decipher them. Think of it, Maota. To read pages written so long ago and think their thoughts. We'll put everything under glass, build and evacuate chambers to stop the decay. Catalog itemize. Mikaelson was warming up to his subject, but Maota shook his head like a waving palm, fond, and stamped his feet. You will leave now. Can't you see? Look at the decay. These things are priceless. They must be preserved. Future generations will thank us. Do you mean, the old man, aghast, asked, that you want others to come here? You know the city abhors the sound of alien voices. Those who lived here may return one day. They must not find their city packaged and preserved and laid out on shelves for the creek, curious to breathe their foul breaths upon. You will leave now. No. Michaelson was Adam'd the Rock of Gibraltar. Maota hit him quickly, passionately, and dropped the weapon beside his body. He turned swiftly, making a swirling mark in the sand with his heel, and walked off toward the hills outside the city. The weapon he had used was an ancient book, its paper thin pages rustled in the wind as if unseen hand turned them reading while Mikaelson's blood trickled out from the head wound upon the ancient street. When he regained consciousness, the two moons bright sentinel orbs in the night sky had moved to a new position down their sliding path. Old Maota's absence took some of the weirdness and fantasy away. It seemed a more practical place now. The gash in his head was painful, throbbing with quick, short hammer blows synchronized with his heartbeats. But there was a new determination in him. If it was a fight that the old web footed fool wanted, a fight he would get. The cylinder flicked him at his command across 500 miles of desert and rocks to a small creek he remembered. Here he bathed his head in cool water until all the caked blood was dissolved from the hair. Feeling better, he went back. The wind had turned cool. Michaelson shivered, wishing he had brought a coat. The city was absolutely still except for small gusts of wind sighing through the frail spires. The ancient book still lay in the sand beside the dark spot of blood. He stepped over and picked it up. It was light, much lighter than most Earth books. He ran a hand over the binding. Smooth, it was untouched by time or climate. He squinted at the pages, tilting the book to catch the bright moonlight. But the writing was alien. He touched the page, ran his forefinger over the writing. Suddenly he sprang back. The book fell from his hands.
- [97:28]
God in heaven.
- [97:29]
He exclaimed. He had heard a voice. He looked around at the old buildings down the length of the ancient street. Something strange about that voice. Not Maota, not his tones, not his words. Satisfied that no one was near, he stooped and picked up the book again. Good God, he said out loud. It was the book talking. His fingers had touched the writing again. It was not a voice, exactly, but a staring in his mind like a strange language heard for the first time. A talking book. What other surprises were in this city? Tall, fragile buildings laughing at time and weather. A clock measuring God knows what. If such wonders remained, what about those already destroyed? One could only guess at the machines, the gadgets, the artistry already decayed and blown away to mix forever with the sand.
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I must preserve it, he thought, whether Mata likes it or not. They say these people lived half a million years ago, a long time. Let's see now. A man lives 100 years on the average, 5,000 lifetimes, and all you do is touch a book and a voice jumps across all those years. He started off towards the tall building he had examined upon discovery of the city. His left eyelid began to twitch and he laid his forefinger against the eye, pressing until it stopped. Then he stooped and entered the building. He laid the book down and tried to take the clock off the wall. It was dark in the building and his fingers felt along the wall, looking for it. Then he touched it. His fingers moved over its smooth surface. Then suddenly he jerked his hand back with an exclamation of amazement. Fear ran up his spine. The clock was warm. He felt like running, like flicking back to the settlement where there were people and familiar voices, for hair was a thing that should not have been half a million years. And here was warmth. He touched it again, curiosity overwhelming his fear. It was warm, no mistake, and there was a faint vibration, a suggestion of power. He stood there in the darkness, staring off into the darkness, trembling. Fear built up in him until it was a monstrous thing, drowning reason. He forgot the power of the cylinder behind his ear. He scrambled through the doorway. He got up and ran down the ancient sandy street until he came to the edge of the the city. Here. He stopped, gasping for air, feeling the pain throb in his head. Common sense said that he should go home, then nothing worthwhile could be accomplished at night, that he was tired, that he was weak from loss of blood and fright and running. But when Michelson was on the trail of important discoveries, he had no common sense. He sat down in the darkness, meaning to rest a moment. When he awoke, dawn was red against thin clouds in the east. Old Mata stood in the street with wet feet planted far apart in the sand, a weapon in the crook of his arm. It was a long tube affair, familiar to Michaelson asked, did you sleep well? No. I'm sorry to hear that. How do you feel? Fine, but my head aches a little. Sorry, mata said. For what? For hitting you. Pain is not for gods like you, Michelson. Relax. And what? What kind of man are you? First you try to break my skull, then you apologize. I abhor pain. I should have killed you outright. He talked about that for a moment, eyeing the weapon. It looked in good working order, slim and shiny and innocent. It looked like a glorified African blowgun. But he was not deceived by its appearance. It was a deadly weapon. Well, he said, before you kill me, tell me about the book. He held it up for Mayota to see. What about the book? What kind of book is it? What does Mr. Earth God mean? What kind of book? You have seen it. It is like any other book, except for the material and the fact that it talks. No, no. I mean what's in it? Poetry. Poetry? For God's sake, why poetry? Why not mathematics or history? Why not tell how to make the metal of the book itself? Now there is a subject worthy of a book. Maora shook his head. One does not study a dead culture to learn how they made things, but how they thought. But we were wasting time. I must kill you now so I
- [103:09]
can get some rest.
- [103:10]
The old man raised the gun. Wait. You forget that I also have a weapon. He pointed to the spot behind his ear where the cylinder was buried. I can move faster than you can fire the gun. Maota nodded. I have heard how you travel. It does not matter. I will kill you anyway. I suggest we negotiate. No. Why not? Maoto looked off toward the hills, old eyes filmed from years of sand and wind, leather skin lined and pitted. The hills stood immobile, brown grey, already shimmering with heat and impotent. Why not? Mikaelson repeated. Why not what? Maota dragged his eyes back. Negotiate. No. Maota's eyes grew hard as steel. They stood there in the sun, not 20ft apart, hating each other. The two Moons very pale and far away on the western horizon stared like to bottomless eyes. Alright then. At least it's a quick death. I hear that thing just disintegrates with a man. Pfft.
- [104:05]
And that's that.
- [104:06]
Michaelson prepared himself to move with the old man's finger slid closer toward the firing stud. The old man raised the gun. Wait. Now what? At least read some of the book to me before I die. Then the gun wavered. I'm not an unreasonable man, the web foot said. Michaelson stepped forward, extending his arm with the book. No, stay where you are. Throw it. This book is priceless. You just don't go throwing such valuable items around. It won't break. Throw it. Michaelson threw the book. It landed at Maota's feet, spouting sand against his leg. He shifted the weapon and picked up the book and leaf threw it, raising his head in a listening attitude, searching for a suitable passage. Michelson heard the thin metallic pages rustle softly. He could have jumped and seized the weapon at that moment, but his desire to hear the book was strong. Old motor read. Michelson listened. The cadence was different, the syntax confusing, but the thoughts were there. It might have been a professor back on earth reading his students. Keats, Shelley, Browning. These people were human, with human thoughts and aspirations. The old man stopped reading. He squatted slowly, keeping Michaelson in sight, and laid the book face up in the sand. Win moved the pages. See, he said. The spirits read. They must have been great readers, these people. They drink the book as if they were an elixir. See how gentle they lap at the pages like a new kitten tasting milk. Michelson laughed. You certainly have an imagination. What difference does it make? Maota cried, suddenly angry. You want to close up all these things in boxes for posterity who may have no slightest feeling or appreciation. I want to leave the city as it is, for spirits whose existence I cannot prove. The old man's eyes were furious now, deadly. The cunt came down directly in line with Earthman's chest. The gnarled finger moved. Michaelson, using the power of the cylinder behind his ear, jumped behind the old web foot Tomota. It seemed that he had flicked out of existence like a match blown out. The next instant Michelson spun around him and hit him. It was an inexpert fist belonging to an archaeologist, not a fighter. But Maota was an old man. He dropped in the sand, momentarily stunned. Michelson bent over to pick up the gun, and the old man, feeling it slip from his fingers, hung on and was pulled to his feet. They struggled for possession of the gun, silently gasping, kicking sand. Faces grew red, lips drew back. O' er Michaelson's white teeth wore Mata's pink toothless gums. The dead city's fragile spars threw impersonal shadows down where they fought. Then, quite suddenly, a finger or hand. Neither knew whose finger or hand touched the firing stud. There was a hollow whooshing sound. Both stopped still, realizing the total destruction they may have caused. It only hit the ground, mikaelson said. A black charred hole 2ft in diameter, and they could not see how deep, stared at them. Maura let go and sprawled in the sand. The book. He cried. The book is gone.
- [107:10]
No.
- [107:10]
We probably covered it with sand while we fought. Both men began scooping sand in their cupped hands, digging frantically for the book. Saliva dripped from Maura's mouth, but he didn't know or care. Finally they stopped, exhausted. They had covered a substantial area around the hole. They had covered the complete area where they had been. We killed it, the old man moaned. It was just a book. Not alive, you know. How do you know? The old man's pale eyes were filled with tears. It talked and it sang. In a way, it had a soul. Sometimes on long nights, I used to imagine it loved me for taking care of it. There are other books. We'll get another. Maota shook his head. There are no more. But I've seen them down there in the square building. Not poetry. Books, yes, but not poetry. That was the only book with songs. I'm sorry you killed it. Maura suddenly sprang for the weapon, lying forgotten in the sand. Mikaelson put his foot on it, and Maota was too weak to tear it loose. He could only weep out his rage. When he could talk again, Maota said, I am sorry, Mr. Earth God. I've disgraced myself. Don't be sorry. Michelson helped him to his feet. We fight for some reasons, cry for others. A priceless book is a good reason for either. Not for that. For not winning. I should have killed you last night when I had the chance. The gods give us chances, and if we don't take them, we lose forever. I told you before, we are on the same side. Negotiate. Have you never heard of negotiation? You are a God, Mata said. One does not negotiate with gods. One either loves them or kills them. There's another thing. I'm not a God. Can't you understand? Of course you are. Matou looked up. Very sure. Mortals cannot step from star to star like crossing a shallow brook. No, no, I don't Step from one star to another. An invention does that? Just an invention. I carry it with me. It's a tiny thing. No one would ever guess it has such power. So you see, I'm human. Just like you. Hit me and I hurt. Cut me and I bleed. I love, I hate. I was born. Someday I'll die. See, I'm human. Just a human with a machine. No more that. Mata laughed and sobered quickly. You lie. No. If I had this machine, could I travel as you? Yes. Then I'll kill you and take yours. It would not work for you. Why? Each machine is tailored for each person. The old man hung his head. He looked down into the black, charred hole. He walked all around the hole. He kicked at the sand, looking half heartedly again for the book. Look, michaelson said, I'm sure I've convinced you that I'm human. Why not have a try at negotiating our differences? He looked up. His expressive eyes, deep, resigned, studied Michaelson's face. Finally he shook his head sadly. When we first met, I hoped we could think the ancient thoughts together. But our paths diverge. We have finished, you and I. He turned and started off, shoulder slumped dejectedly. Michaelson caught up to him. Are you leaving the city? No. Where are you going? Away. Far away. Maoto looked off toward the hills, eyes distant. Don't be stupid, old man. How can you go far away and not leave the city? There are many directions you would not understand. East, west, north, south, up, down. No, no. There is another direction. Come, if you must see. Michaelson followed him. Far down the street. We came to a section of the city he had not seen before. Buildings were smaller spires, dwarfed against larger structures. Here a path was packed in the sand, leading to a particular building. Michelson said, this is where you live? Yes. Mata went inside. Michelson stood in the entrance and looked around. The room was clean, furnished with handmade chairs and a bed. Who is this old man? He thought, far from his people, living alone, choosing a life of solitude among ancient ruins but not touching them. Above the bed, a clock was fastened to the wall. Michelson remembered his fright, thinking of the warmth where warmth should not be. Maota pointed to it. You asked me about this machine, he said. Now I will tell you. He laid his hand against it. Here is power to follow another direction. Michelson tested one of the chairs to see if it would hold his weight, then sat down. His curiosity about the instrument was colossal, but he forced a short laugh. Maota, you are complex. Why not stop all this mystery, mystery nonsense and tell Me about it? You know more about it than I, of course. Maura smiled a toothless, superior smile. What do you suppose happened to this race? You tell me. They took the unknown direction the books speak of it. I don't know how the instrument works, but one thing is certain. The race did not die out as a species becomes extinct. Mikaelson was amused, but interested. Something like a fourth dimension. I don't know. I only know that with this instrument there is no death. I have read the books that speak of this race as wonderful people who conquered all disease, who explored all the mysteries of science, who devised this machine to cheat death. See this button here on the face of the instrument? Press the button and. And why? I don't know exactly, but I have lived many years. I have walked the streets of the city and wondered and wanted to press the button now. I will do so quickly. The old man, still smiling, pressed the button. A high pitched whine filled the air, just within audio range. Steady for a moment, it then rose in pitch, passing beyond hearing. Quickly, the old man's knees buckled. He sank down, fell over the bed, lay still. Michaelson touched him cautiously, then examined him more carefully. No question about it. The old man was dead. Feeling depressed and alone, Michelson found a desert knoll outside the city, overlooking the tall spires that shone in the sunlight and gleamed in the moonlight. He made a stretcher, rolled the old man's body onto it, and dragged it down the long ancient street and up the knoll. Here he buried him, but it seemed a waste of time. Somehow he knew beyond any doubt that the old native and his body were completely disassociated, in some sense more complete than death. In the days that followed, he gave much thought to the clock. He came to the city every day. He spent long hours in the huge square building with the books. He learned the language by sheer bulldog determination. Then he searched the books for information about the instrument. Finally, after many weeks, long after the winds had obliterated all evidence of Mata's grave on the knoll, Michelson made a decision. He had to know if the machine
- [113:26]
would work for him.
- [113:27]
And so one afternoon, when the ancient spires threw long shadows over the sand, he walked down the long street and entered the old man's house. He stood before the instrument, trembling, afraid but determined. He pinched his eyes shut tight like a child, and pressed the button. The high pitched whine started. Complete utter silence. Void. Darkness. Awareness and memory. Yes. Nothing else. Then Mata's chuckle came. No sound, an impression only like the voice from the ancient book. Where was he? There was no left or right, up or down. Mauta was everywhere. Nowhere. Look, Maatus thought, was directed at him in this place of no direction. Think of the city and you will see it. Michelson did, and he saw the city beyond as if they were looking through a window. And yet he was in the city, looking at his own body. Maura chuckled again. The city will remain as it is. You did not win after all. Neither did you. But this existence has compensations, mautou said. You can be anywhere, see anywhere on this planet. Even on your Earth. No. Mikaelson felt a great sadness seeing his body lying across the old homemade bed. He looked closer. He sensed a vibration or life force. He didn't stop to define it in his body. Why was his dead body different from old Mata's? Could it be that there was some thread stretching from the reality of his body to his present state? I don't like your thoughts, maota said. No one can go back. I tried. I have discussed it with many who are not presently in communication with you. No one can go back. Michelson decided he'd try.
- [115:03]
No.
- [115:04]
Mata's thought was prickled with fear and anger. Michaelson did not know how to try. But he remembered the cylinder and gathered all the force of his mind in spite of Maota's protests, and gave his most violent command. At first he thought it didn't work. He got up and looked around. And then it struck him. He was standing up. The cylinder. He knew it was a cylinder. That was the difference between himself and Maoja. When he used the cylinder, that was where he went. The place where Maota was now. It was a door of some kind leading to a path of some kind where distance was non existent. But the clock was a mechanism to transport only the mind to that place. To be certain of it, he pressed the button again with the same result as before. He saw his own body fall down. He felt Maota's presence. You devil. Mata's thought scream was a sword of hate and anger. Irrational, suddenly, like a person who knows his loss is irrevocable. I said you were a God. I said you were a God. I said you were a God. A City Near Centaurs by Bill DOD Recording by Zunera Qureshi in the San Francisco Bay Area.
- [116:23]
Doorway to Destruction by Gerald S. Hatfield this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Read by Dale Grothman it was the Doorway to Earth's Destruction. And Calvin Martin, the only man who could lock it, had lost the key. Doorway to Destruction By Gerald S. Hatfield Old Calvin Martin strained futilely against the ropes that held immovable his thin wrists. A crimson bruise raced across his forehead where Vance had slugged him with a heavy hand. Don't be a complete fool, Vance, he said harshly. That machine can't bring you anything but trouble. The scientist burly assistant glanced wearily up from where he coupled heavy batteries in series at the rear of the glittering machine that entirely filled one corner of the windowless room. Shut up, he said tonelessly. Calvin Martin sagged back in sheer futility, felt a deadly numbness creeping through his extremities from the tightness of his bonds. He watched the other out of eyes faintly fearful and desperate. I'll make you a deal, Vance, he said finally. I've got about $8,000 in the bank. Free me and don't use the machine and the money is yours. John Vance's laughter was brittle and scornful. Eight thousand? He sneered. Hell, I've seen those snapshots you brought back. Any one of those gems the other people wore would bring that. And I intend to bring back all I can carry. Calvin Martin shivered, remembering the ruthless cruelty that had lain in the creatures he had found with his machine. There was still a dull ache along his ribs where a needle like ray of terrific energy had seared. They aren't human, Vance. He tried to speak quietly, endeavoring to drive his point with impersonal logic. They are of a fierceness and cruelty such as you can't comprehend, and with their superior weapons they'd subjugate the entire world in a matter of days. Hooey. Jon Vance Spat insolently, patting the.45 automatic on his hip. I think I might do a bit of subjugating myself. He tested the batteries. I don't know how it works, Martin, he said briefly. But I don't care, as long as it makes me rich. Of course, Jon Vance did not fully understand the machine. Even he himself had trouble at times comprehending the space warping propensities of the machine he had built over a period of three years. He knew only that the machine warped itself and its occupant into another universe, a galactic maelstrom of whirling suns and gigantic planets, into a world where he had met a race of living beings that seemed to be super endowed with inhuman hate and cruelty. He felt the sickness of futility within him when he remembered the one time he had invaded the other space he had stepped from the machine and been greeted cautiously but cordially by those great headed superbeings. For days he had been entertained and shown the weird sights of that alien planet, and it wasn't until he woke one night to see the curious machine hanging motionless over him, its pale blue aura covering his sleeping couch, that he realized that he was being drained of his knowledge. Subtly. Every night he had raced from his sleeping room, fought with the single gun he had taken with him, blasted his way through the screaming mob that tried to hold him captive. He had fought down the long stairs through the palace door and had fled into the night, pursued by the men who had protested their friendship. With his last bullet he had killed the high priest, stepped over the prone body, and lurched into his machine. His fingers had flicked the levers on the control panel. There was an instant hum of purring power, and then the machine had whisked him back to his own planet. He had sat for hours in the machine, too drained of energy to move, knowing that only a miracle had saved his machine's secrets from the aliens who had planned to use it for an invasion of another space. But now, because of the stupid greed of John Vance, because the man did not realize the slavery and terror the aliens would bring to Earth, the machine was gone and he was a prisoner in the laboratory room. He made one final, desperate plea. All right, Vance, if that's the way it is, he said tiredly. But if anything goes wrong, destroy that machine. Those monsters will use it to invade our system. Jon Vance whistled thoughtfully, watching the scientist out of shiny eyes, his heavy features drawn into a frown. Then he shrugged. If things don't go as planned, maybe I can make a deal, he said. After all, I always did think I'd like to be a big shot. You couldn't. Sheer horror froze Martin into motionlessness. The hell I couldn't. Jon Vance stooped, edged through the gleaming wires, seated himself at the machine's controls. He twisted a rheostat, closed a switch, grinned at the supine scientist. Calvin Martin said nothing more, but there was a grim determination replacing the panic in his faded eyes. A vacuum tube swelled with coruscating colors, and a nimbus of light grew from the lacing of the wires around the edges of the machine. There was a dull throbbing in the close air, a rushing sense of the release of terrible, unknown power. A misty curtain seemed to be drawing tight about the machine's outline. Then the machine was gone from its platform, and Calvin Martin was alone in the great bare experimental room. Kelvin Martin didn't move for a second. Then he struggled into a sitting position. He fought the ropes with a silent doggedness that sent the hot blood pounding turgidly at his temples. His mouth gaped as he strained and twisted futilely, and the panic in his eyes was a terrible force. Then he sagged limply, realizing that the ropes were too well knotted for him to release them unaided. God, he prayed. He drew his legs beneath him, shoved himself back until his shoulders touched the side wall. Sitting there, he searched the room with feverish eyes for any object with a cutting edge. His heart sank when he saw the bare sterility of the room. Without windows, without tools or furniture, there was nothing in the room that could be broken or used to sever the cutting ropes at his wrists. Calvin Martin sobbed deep in his throat, glanced at the door, remembering how Vance had locked it and pocketed the key. He remembered the cigar lighter in his pocket, tried to fumble it out with the intention of burning his bonds. Dull horror pounded at his mind when he realized that his hands were completely numb. Without the power of following the dictates of his mind, he had no way of visualizing how long the treacherous Vance would be gone, no way of knowing whether the man would return victorious. But clear reasoning told him that the monstrous people on the other world would slay Vance, then use Martin's machine as the doorway through which to pass their conquering hordes. 2 the machine would serve as a model for more carriers. He straightened at the thought. Memory struggled for expression in his mind. He followed the lines of the wall, leaning against them for support, edging forward with agonizing slowness by jumping his tied feet. Perspiration dotted his white face, and his thinning hair lay tight on his small head. But slowly the smile broadened on his lips. At last he rested against the wall, then gently slid to a sitting position. He tested his bonds again, ceased the futile struggle almost immediately. He sat for a time, then lay back and stared at the ceiling. He thought of many things in those passing moments. Thoughts of his dreams, of giving scientific miracles to the world, of having his bust in the hall of Fame, of people he had known and things he had done. Regret shadowed his memories when he remembered things that he had left undone and unforgiven. Then he struggled a bit, lay breathing quietly, waiting for the machine to return. He felt a sensation of releasing forces a few seconds before the machine reappeared. He sat, drawing his legs to his chest, scooted back a few feet. He waited, content, wondering just what would happen. He was smiling when the machine and its inhuman occupants whisked out of nothing into shadowy being. One glance they had of the smile on his tired face, then the very air seemed to explode with gigantic twistings and loopings of unleashed forces. Poor scientist Kevin Martin had remembered one scientific fact from his college days. 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by Grainger for the ones who get it done. You're wasting our resources, Thack, he declared. You have taken two years of labor by dozens of workers, and for what? So that you may look at the sky? Thak's tentacles purpled, a sign of irritation. You military men, he retorted. It was your kind, Mitfah, that destroyed our civilization and reduced our race to a few hungry thousands. You have ruined progress and science forever. You have hastened the death of our race. Unless he waved through the open doorway, pointing out the early evening sky. Just rising over the horizon was a blue body that was a dazzling brilliance, outshining all the other heavenly bodies. Thack's voice became emotional. On that planet, he said, are civilized beings. They hold the only hope for salvation of our race. We must work to contact them, as long as there is one of us to carry on. What is this, Thak? Mitford demanded angrily. How can you say, Old One, that people of intelligence live on the blue planet? You will tell me next that you've been there. The soldier laughed scornfully, but Thack's voice was unruffled as he explained, this is no mere fancy of mine. These people have been signaling to us for some time, and when I signaled back by creating a network of space warping lines through our entire power system, they strengthened their signal. Then came your war. Space warps, mytha growled. More power wasted. How was this accomplished? The workers were bolting the last legs of the telescope into position, and the students were making happy squeaks. Thack looked gratefully towards his new instrument and towards the scholars. A fine lot of young ones, these. Perhaps in them astronomy would become once more a science of great importance. Perhaps they would be the salvation of Mars. He answered Miphth's questions. The power used was very small. You have heard of controlled space warps? What about it? Grumbled the soldier. An interesting laboratory trick, but it also occurs in nature. As a youth, I once saw the light of stars bent around the sun in a selectroscope. Indeed, it was this very phenomenon that showed our scientists how to make their own warps. Enough of your lecture, old one. What was the result of this scientific trickery. One as stupid as you would not understand the method, thack replied levelly, but the result of warping all our power beams was a network of opaque lines that to an observer would be an obvious signal. And now, if you are quite ready to leave. Grumbling, Mitvah departed, taking his soldier workers with him. Thak checked the placement of the telescope, finally nodded in satisfaction as he found everything in proper order. The four students crowded around, watching with interest. He gazed good naturedly at them. Our work is a great one, he declared. We must communicate with the third planet by means of a system of signals that we shall work out in time. But there is so little time. His tentacles curled thoughtfully about him. You have followed the work of our great physicist Morg Grann, you mean? Asked an alert youngster named Rofan, the probability tables worked out by him showing that the end is near for our race. Thack nodded sadly. Indeed, lad, the future appears dark. War and its disorganization must inevitably strangle civilization. Even now our race is thinned in numbers, and the beasts of the desert multiple there, he went on, waving toward the blue planet, is our only hope. If we can effect communication with them and be guided by their superior wisdom, we may yet rally. They may have some secret, some way to prevent wars there, thak said. There lies our only hope. You continue to speak of their superior wisdom, Mork Thackeray, said Rofan. How can you be so sure of that? It is obvious, lad. Their signal system consists of spots of light over the greater part of the land surface of their planet. I have shown you the old photographs taken before the last war, showing these lights. Even with the small telescope I have been forced to use during these lean years, I have watched the lights. What a mighty science theirs must be that can make the nighttime light merely to signal another planet, for that can be the only purpose of the lights. Rofan let his tentacles curl about him as he concentrated. You must be right, he finally agreed. I was going to suggest that they might be the lights of cities. I noticed many of them were situated where a city would be likely. But there must be millions of beings to populate so many cities. One of the other pupils made a loud, amused noise. Who ever heard of a city without a roof? He demanded. Could light be seen through a roof? Rofan was embarrassed, and he remained very quiet for a while, wondering how he could have made such a stupid error. Of course the lights could not be seen through a roof, and who had ever heard of a city without a roof? Thack, paying no attention to the by play focused his lens with great care. The students gathered around the concave bowl of white quartz. The lights were lowered, and into the bowl moved a blurred sphere. As Thack's tentacles moved the lens closer and closer into focus, the sphere resolved itself more and more clearly until it was a fine image of the third planet. Awed by the splendor of the sight, the students could only stare, and indeed it was a breathtaking spectacle, as if they were gathered in the immense void of space itself, looking at the planet from a height of of several thousand miles. There were five continents in two major land masses, Thack had told them. In addition, there were several islands of great size, at least one being practically of continental dimensions, besides a host of islands, large and small, which dotted the surface of the planet. The hemisphere on which they gazed was mostly water. The larger land mass was passing from sight, and half of the smaller mass was presented to their vision, a double continent that spread almost from pole to pole, with a narrow isthmus joining north and south. Like all Martians, they thrilled to the scene of fearful beauty, and they stood around the quartz bowl for a long time, not speaking, merely watching the twin continents come into full view. None noticed old Thax eyes peering desperately at the image of the third planet, nor did they see the look of utter despair that grew in his face. They were too intent on the strange scene. It was Rofan who first felt that something was wrong. The novelty was wearing off, and an elusive thought made him uncomfortable. Something was wrong with the picture. What was it? Suddenly he realized. He turned to Thack. But the light Morsak. The signals. Thack's face looked as old as Mars itself as he gazed at his pupil. He started to speak several times before he could manage. We have failed, he said in a heavy tone. Our signals must have been too weak for the beings of the blue planet to detect. I had hoped he arose and looked sadly into the evening sky. I had hoped I was wrong. For two years now, our years, I have watched through my small telescope. The lights have been disappearing one by one sometimes, but more often several at a time. I thought it was the weakness of my instrument. I was wrong. Every light on the blue planet has been blacked out. His voice was a low wail. And the blacking out of those lights means the blackout of life on Mars, a planet wide blackout. The End of Blackout By Joseph Farrell.
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Native Sun By TD Hamm this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit Librivox.org Tommy Benton, on his first visit to Earth, found the long anticipated wonders of 21st century New York thrilling the first week, boring and unhappy the second week, and at the end of the third he was definitely ready to go home. The never ending racket of traffic was torture to his abnormally acute ears. Increased atmospheric pressure did funny things to his chest and stomach, and quick and sure footed on Mars, he struggled constantly against the heavy gravity that made his movements clumsy and uncoordinated. The endless canyons of towering buildings with their connecting skywalks oppressed and smothered him, remembering the endless vistas of Rabora fields beside the canal that was like an inland sea. Homesickness flooded over him. He hated the people who stared at him with either open or hidden amusement. His Aunt Bee, for instance, who looked him up and down with frank disapproval and said loudly, for heaven's sake, Helen, take him to a good tailor and get those bones covered up. Was it his Fault he was 6 inches taller than the Touraine boys his age and had long thin arms and legs? Or that his chest was abnormally developed to compensate for an oxygen thin atmosphere? I'd like to see her, he thought fiercely. Out on the flatlands she'd be gasping like a canal fish out of water. Even his parents, happily riding the social merry go round of Terra after 11 years in the Martian flatland, hands didn't seem to understand how he felt. Don't you like Earth? Tommy? Queried his mother anxiously. Oh, it's all right, I guess. A nice place to visit, said his father sardonically. But I wouldn't live here if they gave me the place, said his mother, and they both burst out laughing for no reason that Tommy could see. Of course, they did that lots of times at home, and Tommy laughed with them just for the warm, secure feeling of belonging. This time he didn't feel like laughing. When are we going home? He repeated stubbornly. His father pulled Tommy over in the crook of his arm and said gently, well, not right away, son. As a matter of fact, how would you like to stay here and go to school? Tommy pulled away and looked at him incredulously. Honestly, I've been to school. Well, yes, admitted his father, but only to the colony schools. You don't want to grow up and be an ignorant Martian sandfoot all your life, do you? Yes, I do. I want to be a Martian sandfoot, and I want to go home where people don't look at me and say so, this is your little Martian. Benton Senior put his arm around Tommy's stiffly resistant shoulders. Look here, old man, he said persuasively. I thought you wanted to be a space engineer. You can't do that without an education, you know. And your Aunt Bee will take good care of you. Tommy faced him stubbornly. I don't want to be any old spaceman. I want to be a sandfoot like old Pete. And I want to go home. Helen bit back a smile at the two earnest, stubborn faces, so ridiculously alike and hasten to avert the gathering storm. Now look, fellows, Tommy's career doesn't have to be decided in the next five minutes. After all, he's only 10. He can make up his mind later on if he wants to be an engineer or a rebora farmer. Right now he's going to stay here and go to school, and I'm still staying with him. Resolutely avoiding both crestfallen faces, Helen, having shepherded Tommy to bed, returned to the living room, acutely conscious of Big Tom's bleak, hurt gaze at her back. Helen, you're going to make a out of the boy, he said at last. There isn't any reason why he can't stay here at home with Bea. Helen turned to face him. Earth isn't home to Tommy and your sister. Bea told him he ought to be out playing football with the boys instead of hanging around the house. But she knows the doctor said he'd have to take it easy for a year till he was accustomed to the change in gravity and air pressure. He answered incredulously. Exactly. She also asked me, helen went on grimly, if I thought he'd be less of a freak. As he got older, Tom Benton swore Bea always did have less sense than the average hen, he gritted. My son a freak. Hell's bells. Tommy, arriving at the hall door in time to hear the tail end of the sentence, crept back to bed, feeling numb and dazed. So even his father father thought he was a freak. The last few days before parting was one of strain for all of them. If Tommy was unnaturally stubborn, no one noticed it. His parents were not feeling any great impulse toward Gayety either. They all went dutifully sightseeing, as before. They saw the zoo and went shopping on the skywalks, and on the last day day wound up at the great showrooms of Androids, Inc. Tommy had hated them on site. They were at once too human and too inhuman for comfort. The hotel was full of them, and most private homes had at least one. Now they saw the great incubating vats in the processing and finally the showroom where one of the finished parts products was on display as a maid sweeping and dusting. There's one that's a dead ringer for you, Helen. If you were a little better looking, that is. Tommy's dad pretended to compare them judiciously. Helen laughed, but Tommy looked at him with a resentfulness, comparing his mother to an Android. They say for a little extra you can get an exact resemblance. Maybe I'd better have one fixed up like you to take back with me, big Tom added teasingly. Then as Helen's face clouded over, oh, hon, you know I was only kidding. Let's get out of here. This place gives me the collywobbles. Besides, I've got to pick up my watch. But his mother's face was still unhappy and Tommy glowered so sullenly at his father's back all the way to the watch shop. It was a small shop with an inconspicuous sign down in one corner of the window that said Only Krubyn Watches and was probably the most famous shop of its kind in the world. Every spaceman landing on Terra left his watch to be checked by the dusty little old man who was the church genius of the place. Tommy ranged wide eyed about the clock and chronometer crammed interior. He stopped, fascinated, before the last case in it was a watch. But what a watch. Besides the regulation terrain dial, it had a second smaller dial that registered the corresponding time on Mars. Tommy's whole heart went out to it in an ecstasy of longing. He thought wistfully that if you could know what time it was there, you could imagine what everyone was doing and it wouldn't seem so far away. Haltingly he tried to explain. Look, mom, he said breathlessly, it's almost five o'. Clock. home Dewey will be coming up to the barn to be fed. Gosh, do you suppose old Pete will remember about her? His mother smiled at him reassuringly. Of course he will, silly. Don't forget he was the one who caught and tamed her for you. Tommy gulped as he thought of Dewey, scarcely as tall as himself, the big rounded mouse like ears in the flat cloven pads that could carry her so swiftly over the sandy Martian flatlands. One of the last dwindling herds of native Martian Deweys, burden carriers of a vanished race. She had been Tommy's particular pride and joy for the last three years. Behind him Tommy heard his mother murmur under her breath, tom, the watch. Could we? And his dad regretfully, it's a pretty expensive toy for a youngster, Helen. And even a Rebora Bracer's bank account has limits. Of course, dear. It was silly of me. Helen smiled a little ruefully. And if Mr. Crumbian has your watch ready, we must go. Bea and some of her friends are are coming over and it's only a few hours till you leave. Big Tom squeezed her elbow gently, understandingly, as she blinked back quick tears trailing after them. Tommy saw the little by play and his heart ached. The guilt complex building up in him grew and deepened. He knew he had only to say, look, I don't mind staying. Aunt Bee and I will get along swell and everything would be all right again. Then the terror of this new and complex world, as it would be without a familiar face, swept over him and kept him silent. His overwrought feelings expressed themselves in a nervously rebelling stomach, culminating in a disgraceful moment over the nearest gutter. The rest of the afternoon he spent in bed, recuperating in the living room. Aunt Bee spoke her mind in her usual high pitched voice. It's disgraceful, Helen. A boy his age, none of the Benton's ever had nerves. His mother's reply was inaudible, but on the heels of his father's deeper tones, Aunt Bee's voice rose and raspberry indignation. Well, I never. And for my own brother too. From now on, don't come to me for help with your spoiled brat. Goodbye. The door slammed indignantly. His mother chuckled and there was a spontaneous burst of laughter. Tommy relaxed and lay back happily. Anyway, that was the last of Aunt Bee. The next hour or two passed in a flurry of ringing phones, people coming and going, and last minute words and reminders. Then suddenly it was time to leave. Dad burst in for a last quick hug and a promise to send him pictures of Dewey and her fowl due next month. Mother dropped a hasty kiss on his hair and promised to hurry back from the the spaceport. Then Tommy was alone with a large painful lump where his heart ought to be. The only activity was the almost noiseless buzzing as the hotel Android ran the cleaner over the living room. Presently even that ceased and Tommy lay relaxed and inert, sleepily watching the curtains blow in and out at the open window 30 stories above the street. The noises were pleasantly muffled and remote and his senses drifted aimlessly to and fro on the tides of half sleep. Drowsily, his mind wandered from the hotel's Android servants to the strictly utilitarian mechanical monstrosity at home known affectionately as Old John to the Android ship showroom where they had seen the one that dad said looked like Mother. He jolted suddenly, sickeningly awake. Suppose, his mind whispered treacherously, suppose that dad had ordered one to take Mom's place, not on Mars but here, while she returned to Mars with him. Suppose that instead of mom he discovered discovered one of those things. Or even worse, suppose he went on from day to day, not even knowing it was a bad five minutes. He was wet with perspiration. When he lay back on his pillows, a shaky smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. He had a secret defense against the terror. He giggled a little at the thought of what Aunt Bee would say, say if she knew. And what had brought him back from the edge of hysteria was the triumphant knowledge that with the abnormally acute hearing bred in the thin atmosphere of Mars, no robot ever created could hide from him the infinitesimal ticking of the electronic relays that gave it life. Secure at last, his overstrain nerves relaxed and he slid gracefully over the edge of sleep. He woke abruptly, groping after some vaguely remembered sound, a soft clicking of heels down the hall. Of course, his mother back from the spaceport. Now she would be stopping at the door to see if he were asleep. He lay silently. Through his eyelashes he could see her outlined in the soft light from the hall. She was coming in to see if he was tucked in. In a moment he would jump up and startle her with a hug as she leaned over him. In a moment, screaming desperately, he was out of bed, backing heedlessly across the room. He was still screaming as the low still of the open window caught him behind the knees and toppled him 30 stories to to the street. Alone in the silent room, Helen Benton stood dazed, staring blindly at the empty window. Tommy's parting gift from his father slid from her hand and lay on the carpet, still ticking gently. It was 9:23 on Mars. End of Native sun by TD Hamm recording by Curtis Richardson.
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The Victory of Clahn by Wilbur S. Peacock this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Read by Dale Behold, I bring my people light. But it was a deadly triumph for Clah, wriggling, slimy Lord of eternally Veiled Venus. The Victory of Clon by Wilbur S. Peacock Clahn fled from fern to fern like a drifting shadow circling the new clearing that had been torn in the steamy jungle by the gleaming monster that had come from the eternal fog that clothed his world. He halted now and then, slipping into the stagnant water that covered nine tenths of the planet, and listened for the slightest sound that would warn him of a hidden watcher spying on his movements. Satisfied that he was alone in the jungle swamp, he edged closer to the clearing whose edge was a charred and ragged circle. His lidless eyes gleamed phosphorescently in the darkness that never changed, bringing into sharp detail the shadows that were two shades of blackness, for there were no colors on his earth. He slipped over the burned ground, wincing at the bruises given him by the unaccustomed hardness beneath his body. He hissed a bit in anger that he should suffer so, then went rigid as the thing happened again. An amazing Light shadow had suddenly come into being on the roundness of the gleaming visitor from somewhere above. Clah wanted that Shadow, wanted that thing that was brighter than anything he had ever seen, and his purpose was to gain it in any way possible, for possession of that light shadow would make him greater than anyone else on the planet, mightier even than Valak. Khlon knew that his time was growing short. The nation would declare their new leader within a very short while, and he knew that possession of the Light shadow was the one thing that would assure him victory over his rival for leadership. His gills opened and closed automatically, involuntary muscles working even when his lungs worked on the damp air. He winced a bit from the lightness of the shadow, for never had his eyes seen one that was so without blackness. Then Clah was at the roundness of the thing, the touch of its coolness sending a thrill of dread through his heart. He moved slowly until he was just below the circle of lightness, then climbed upwards with his sucker disks, slowly, carefully, instantly ready for flight to safety. He lifted his head until his eye was pressed against the light shadow. He felt tiny pains running through his eye, back into his head and down into his body, but he gave it no heed, for he was seeing something that none other of his race had had the courage to face. He saw things but dimly, and the horrendousness of the scene almost made him lose his hold. Four nightmarish creatures moved within the gleaming thing, moving on, stiff tentacles gesturing with others, while above on the thin neck, fanged mouths opened and closed in sickening motion. The shadows of their skin were of shades of lightness and darkness that were terrifying to Clon's senses, that had never met the like before. He gasped audibly, swung back from the circle of likeness, shaking with a horror at what he had seen Inside the gleaming spaceship, three men were seated on the collapsible bunks. Kurt Overland, his muscular body unclad except for shorts, was speaking in his even tone. Well, he said cheerfully, even as his steady voice failed to conceal the burning energies within him, we're finally ready. I just made the last repair on the things broken by landing. Frank Barker grinned at him from across the cell like room, stretching his six feet of blond top. Lanky strength happily. Suits me, he said. I'm tired of being cooped up in this animated bullet that's been home for so long. We had to wait, gray haired Professor Kent said mildly. After all, if we are met by hostile beings, we want to be able to escape.
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by Grainger for the ones who get it done. Kurt Overland grinned. Maybe you're right, professor, he said. But I'd hate to return to Earth and say that we'd been run off before we had a chance to bring back proof of our expedition's success. That would be a calamity, barker broke in. Remember what a devil of a time we had getting permission to make this flight through space. The president told me just before we took off that because of the many deaths in faulty rockets, a law had been passed to forbid any more flights. He said that it was only his influence that made it possible for us to leave Earth on a trip to Venus, and that if we failed to make good, there would probably be no more flights for possibly hundreds of years. So Professor Kent nodded his head. Then I am glad we did not fail, for it is apparent that we are the vanguard of a new phase of our civilization. Kurt Overland stood, flexed his arm. Well, come on, let's go, he said. It's time we took a look around. The three of them slipped into their space suits, each one of them tight, breathed with the eagerness to explore the second of the planets. They were strangely silent as they dressed. Better slip the COVID over the rad light. Professor Kent tried to keep his voice even. There may be poisonous insects outside that would be attracted by it. We will go outside without lights, then switch them on when the port is closed. Frank Barker moved toward the rad light, slipped the COVID over its eternal brightness with a gloved hand. Then he joined the other two at the port. For a long second the three of them stood shoulder to shoulder. Professor Kent, kurt Overland said softly. Please go first. It is your right that you should be the first to step onto the world, made accessible only by your genius. Professor Albert Kent's shoulders shook silently for a moment in great emotion, then straightened with pride. He nodded, swung shut his visor plate, dogged it securely. Baker and Overland followed suit, clicking on their radio receivers. They waited patiently for their leader, knowing the feelings that must have been his at the moment, and then unsealing the port, clutching the American flag gently in his left hand, ready for its planting on Venus, Professor Kent stepped through the port, the first human to land on the veiled planet. Behind him, following with a clumsy speed, came Frank Barker and Curt Overland. We three, professor Albert Kent began. Clon dropped from the side of the ship. He paused for a moment over the lifeless bodies of the three intrepid explorers, then moved away, disgusted by his closeness to the horrible creatures he had slain so swiftly and casually. His every sense was alert for the slightest movement on the long gleaming thing beside him, to retaliate in quick revenge for the slaying of the things that lived within its belly. Clon crouched there for moments, then moved toward the ship. He climbed into the port entrance, leaving a thick trail of slime in his wake. He moved eagerly toward the small hole in the opposite wall, his heart thudding with bursting eagerness. He had seen Frank Barker slip the shield over the shadow that was so unlike anything on his Earth, and now he moved through the darkness of the spaceship, slipping surely through a darkness that was natural to him and his fellow creatures. He lifted the small box from its recess, turned, and sped from the ship, vague terror and superstition overcoming the courage that had taken so long to build to a white heat. He rushed past the men who slept the eternal sleep before the port of their ship, slipped into the warm water at the edge of the clearing, began his long journey to the meeting place at which the leader would be chosen. He clasped the box close to him as he raced through the swampy jungle, afraid that it might disappear before he could reach his destination. He did not pause to examine his prize, knowing that the time was growing short, feeling certain a longer wait would only make the globe of Lightness more thrilling. The people of Clonze Nation had gathered in the council clearing, silent as each of the candidates for leader extolled his own virtues and explained his qualification for the position as their leader. Hisses of approval and sounds of disapproval greeted each candidate as he placed himself on the stone at the clearing center, and then Clah slipped into the clearing. He hissed greetings as he made his way to the center stone. Still clutching the box tightly to his body, he climbed to the top of the stone, faced his nation. A respectful silence fell as his powerful body loomed high in the air over the heads of his people. Klon stood for a moment, silently considering the short speech he intended to make. He caught the glance of Valak's eyes, looked away. His gaze traveled over the clearing, making out familiar features of his people. The crowd was not large, for Klon's nation was a small one. It was large in the sense that no other group on the planet was as large, and it was the only race with useful intelligence. Clah looked at his people, and pride made his heart beat even faster. I am here to prove to you that I am the mightiest among you, he hissed. I have here the thing that will prove what I say. He lifted the small box so that everyone could see. A wave of interested hisses grew in sudden applause. Then a respectful silence fell again. Clah hesitated for a moment longer. Then I got this thing from the belly of the thing that came from the clouds, killing three horrible creatures single handedly. Thus I have proved that I am clever, brave, and strong. What is this thing you have brought us, brave Clan? Valak's sneering hiss broke in upon Plann's words, it is a thing like nothing any of you have ever seen. It's a shadow lighter than anything on this world, clah said proudly, and placed the small box on the rock beside him. He paused again, knowing the effect his weight would have on his audience, and then he whisked. The COVID from the rad light slid from the central stone. The rad light flared with a dizzying gleaming whiteness on the stone, bringing with it a light such as had never penetrated the always present clouds that veiled Venus. Clon stood proudly to one side, drinking in the hissing applause and the hisses of surprise and awe that greeted his showing of the Globe of Light Shadow. He knew then that he had won the coveted leadership of his nation. This, he hissed over the uproar of his people, is the Clon gasped in sudden, intolerable agony, fiery fingers of pain tearing at every bit of his body, cutting off his speech almost at its very inception. He crumbled slowly to the ground, dimly conscious that other cries were echoing his own. He died then, hearing the agonized hisses of his friends, his last sight of life being that of the globe that burned with the white hot light on the top of the center stone. And slowly but with increasing speed, his people died too. They fell like tiny trees before a huge storm, falling even as they tried to find a reason for the death around them, like a wave eddying out from the central stone, death cut its merciless sweep, and within seconds there was no life in the clearing. Within seconds an entire nation, every intelligent being on Venus, was dead of the unleashed light rays, the like of which had never penetrated the miles of fog that lay between Earth and the sun. The red light gleamed brightly on the center stone, shedding radiance over the last beings of intelligence ever to be on Venus. Perhaps forever. The End of the Victory of Klahn By Wilbur S. Peacock. Origin's Formula by RR Winterbotham this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Read by Dale Grothman the formula was a simple equation, but Catto had to have it, for knowing its answer meant he would rule the universe. Oridon's formula by R.R. winterbotham Orodin the recluse listened to the threat wireless from the spaceship that was hoving to in the landing orbit around the planetoid Azer. I have a bead on your atmosphere plant, said the snarling voice. One false move and I'll blast it to stardust. Auradin shrugged as he heard the words. One more fool had come to Azerbaijan looking for the secret that the recluse of the asteroids was supposed to possess. Your threats are unnecessary, stranger, oradin replied in the microphone of his radio. Everyone is welcome here as long as he behaves. I have ways of dealing with those who don't. I'm warning you, came the voice again, that I will stand for no foolishness. I'll kill you if you try to resist. Orodin smiled. Land stranger, you need not fear me. The hermit arose and went to the galley of the warm little house that seemed to grow from solid rocks of the tiny planet. He pressed a button, waited a second, and then opened a small compartment. In the box was a steaming pot of coffee freshly made by Orden's automatic cook. Outside the transparent shelter, the air grew blue from the reflection of landing rockets. Orodin glanced to the leveled surface on which the ship was coming to rest. He saw a turret trained on the little house. Orodin was not afraid. The visitor probably would be interesting. Even a recluse can grow lonesome on a minor planet. A figure emerged from the spaceship. He wore an oxygen helmet. Although Auradin plentifully supplied the planetoid with artificial atmosphere from a small plant at the North Pole, the stranger did not believe that Orodin would not resist. Again. Orodin smiled. Deep in the rocks of Azer were guns that could have blasted the visitor a thousand times had Auradin wished. But there was nothing clever about blowing a foe to pieces. The foe too often was killed before he sensed defeat. Auradin enjoyed an equal battle, or even won against odds. Open up. Cardo snapped, or I'll blow my way in. Open up. Open up, I tell you, or I'll burn my way in. Demanded the visitor. He's certainly not deceiving me as to his intentions, Oridon decided. The recluse pushed a button on the wall and a giant gate swung outward, admitting the stranger. The fellow was tall and as muscular as Oroden himself, but the space suit and the gaping blaster he held in his hand made the visitor seem much more formidable. Oridon himself was dressed in bell bottomed slacks and a loosely fitting slip over coat. His beard softened his countenance and made him seem quite gentle, except for a certain gleam in his eyes that seemed to warn that Oroden loved a contest, and this would seem to be a deadly contest. Auradon bowed. You are welcome, stranger, he said. Take off your helmet, for the air is pure. Put aside your gun, for I am unarmed and I do not intend to harm you. The stranger hesitated uncertainly. No tricks, Oroden, he warned. Tricks? Oroden laughed tauntingly. You are not very confident for a man of your caliber. I have heard of you often, Cato velexis. They say you have conquered whole nations single handed, and yet you are afraid of an unarmed hermit. I'm not afraid of you, kato said in a tone that hinted he was. Catto removed his helmet and holstered his blaster, but Auradin noticed that the terrestrial giant did not move the firing button to safe. Will you have some coffee? Auradon asked. It will refresh you after your long trip. And you must have had a long trip, for we are in a very sparsely populated part of the sky. Oroden lifted the pot and poured the brown steaming liquid into a thick metal mug. Kaddo waved it aside. I have no time. Do not be alarmed, oroden said. The patrol will not be near Azer for three days. Oroden sat down. His fingers felt under the arm of the chair, where a series of buttons controlled other mechanisms in the room. Kado had relaxed his watchfulness. In three days I'll be well toward the other side of the solar system, kado said. Boridan lifted his eyebrows toward the Earth. You have undertaken something this time. Yes, kado said. It's the Earth I am after. I have all I want of the outlying planets and planetoids. You can capture a hundred of them and be no better off than you were at first. But if you capture Earth, you can rule the universe. Ordin touched one of the buttons. A tiny pinhole in the wall of the room seemed to blink. There was a blinding flash, and the smell of burned leather permeated the place. Caddo gave a cry of alarm and sprang back, knocking over his chair. He was on his feet, holding his blaster in his hand. In a second, across the top of his helmet was a scorched streak. You tried to kill me. Kato screamed. You dirty swine. Auradin's lips parted in a smile as he looked without fear into the mouth of the trembling weapon. Don't underestimate yourself, Catto, he said. The hot beam was only a warning, something to let you know that I could kill you any time I wished. Even now, before you could squeeze the trigger on the weapon. I could cause certain things to happen. No, no. You are safe, Kato. I could cause you to die if I wished. But you are interesting, a dangerous man. It would be better accomplished for me to give you a punishment you deserve. The fear that shone in Catto's eyes faded away. For a moment he watched Oroden. Then he laughed. So it's that kind of game, is it? I can play it, too. Your threats do not frighten me. Nor am I afraid of your hot beam. Look. Kato thrust his arm toward the path of the beam. There was a puff of smoke as the tremendous heat vaporized particles of dust on the leather sleeves. Then nothing happened. I have a neutralizing force powered with a small battery in my clothing, kato said foolishly. I did not have it turned on a moment ago. But you can't hurt me now. Moradin shrugged. I am still not afraid of you, Catto. If you had come here to loot, you would have killed me long ago. But what you want is something you cannot gain by killing me. What is it? You are going to give me the secret that will make me the Master of the Earth and the Master of the Universe, kato announced. Auradin poured himself a mug of coffee. I knew you did not want gold, although Azer is filthy with the stuff, he said. But what secret have I that's so powerful? The discovery, kato said. I have many. Orodin blinked toward the wall, and the pinhole of light blinked out. I want the secret of the universe. Caddo spoke tensely. Come. Don't be so melodramatic. Auradon shouted. The universe is full of secrets. You're stalling. You know what I mean. I think I do, oridon agreed. My erratic experiments have revealed a certain mathematical function which theoretically opens the door to action without probability. Is that what you want, Catto? The value of J? The mathematical bombsite, catto said. It removes probability and makes certainty of everything. With my calculations based on certainty, I'll be fate itself. I can conquer the world, chain the universe, and govern creation. Oradon laughed quietly. Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon, Genghis Khan, and Hitler spoke those words, and they were willing to bargain with the devil himself to make them come true, he said. I suppose I am the devil, for I know the answer, and I can tell you the answer for a price. You'll give it to me for nothing. Caddo patted the blaster, now in the holster at his side. Is that your only offer? Oridon asked, still wearing an amused half smile. It is. Auradon rose and moved toward the safe under two clocks on the wall across the room. One of these clocks gave the terrestrial days, hours, and minutes according to General Meridian time. The other registered the four hour rotation of Azer. Wait. Cato halted Auradin. No tricks. Give me the combination and I'll open it. Origin turned to the Space Pirate. The safe is unlocked. The formula is inside. Kato's eyes betrayed his suspicion. The most valuable secret in the world is in an unlocked safe. Warily, Kato stepped forward. He hesitated, wondering if even his neutralizing force was enough to protect him. There's no danger. Go ahead. Help yourself, oroden urged. Catto was desperate. He touched the handle of the door. It was unlocked. He flung it open. Inside the safe was a single sheet of white paper. Kato seized it eagerly. His eyes widened in amazement as he read. The certainty of success in any course of operations, expressed in mathematical terms, represents the sum of all factors, beginning at the starting point, which must be described as real zero, and ending with the objective also reduced to a real numerical value. The constant of certainty, j, can be the determining factor which leads an operation from the beginning to the objective. Catto read the paper and re read it again and again. Is this all of it? He asked, turning to Orodin. Every bit, orodin replied. The formula is simple, like the one to determine the sum of an arithmetical progression. The first number of the progression plus the last number multiplied by the number of terms in the progression and divided by two. In your case, the progression lies between what you have and what you want. The certainty of getting it is the sum of all the factors. Catto sat down in a chair at the desk. He seemed to forget his suspicions of Auradin, who had placed a stack of paper beside him. Catto was engrossed in the formula, and Catto, as a mathematician, knew that everything in the world could be expressed in figures. What would Napoleon or Hitler have given for this formula? The beginning is zero, catto spoke aloud. Which is different from a mathematical zero, oroden said. I might say that zero, like absolute vacuum, never occurs. Even if we have two apples and eat two of them, the atoms of the apples continue to exist in the formula. You have a small fraction instead of zero. It serves the same purpose. If you multiply a number x by 0, the answer is 0. Multiplying a fraction approaching 0 0.000000001 by another number and that number approaches 0 2. If that number is a fraction, it will be even closer to zero than our real zero. In fact, we are dealing with trans zero numbers, just like the transfinite numbers discovered by Gregor Cantor. Yes, yes, catto said eagerly. He picked up a pencil. He scribbled furiously. His objective was all the power in the world expressed in ergs, all the gold in the world expressed in dollars, all of the land expressed in acres, the people in individuals, Oridon moved softly behind him. A multiple calculator made its appearance in the room. Paper flew from under Kato's pencil. Sweat poured from his space browned face. The two clocks on the wall recorded the turning of the Earth and the planetoid Azer. Catto forgot about Orodin. He forgot about everything except the figures that revolved in his brain. Origin moved out into the warm artificial atmosphere of his planetoid. He was a recluse again. He was alone. A momentary contact with the greed and avarice of the human race had been wiped away. Far out in space was a glow of rockets. A ship was going to land. It seemed only a short time since Kato had landed, but that was three terrestrial days ago. This was the patrol. I've a prisoner for you, orodin informed the captain. It's Caddo. Caddo. He's the number one universal enemy man. You'll grow rich with the rewards offered on nine planets for his capture. You can have the reward, oroden said. Take him away. He's a nuisance. They found Catto in the lounge of Oroden's house, chewing on a book of logarithms. His mind was gone. He could only babble figures. His fingers twitched with cramps from writing with the pencil and punching the keys of the calculating machine. Every spark of vitality had been taken from his body. The batteries of his force armor had been burned out. What's the matter with him? The captain asked. He wanted too much, oroden replied. I gave him a simple little formula for success. But the formula ceases to be simple as the definition for success grows more demanding. Had he sought perfection, Catto would have seen that even this was unrecognizable, although the certainty is only halfway to infinity. Sorry, Mr. Orden, but I'm not a mathematician, the captain said. There's nothing difficult in the formula. It proves that certainty is unrecognizable. You'll have to admit that a goal to be reached has to follow a path, and that path is determined by two points. The beginning is one, and the second one makes the ultimate objective certain. Therefore, the second point is certainty. But certainty is unrecognizable. Oridon brought forth his formula and allowed the captain to read it. The patrol officer blinked his eyes and scratched his head. Oridon wrote his formula. J is certainty a our starting point, and one is unity or perfection. Our starting point is close to zero, but not zero. But for convenience we'll say that it's a fraction so close that we can call it 0. Then certainty J is 1/2 of infinity which, you'll have to agree, does not approach infinity and may well be within the realm of human comprehension, although we will not recognize perfection because we do not know what the number is halfway to infinity. Caddo overlooked the fact that he went further and further into the trans infinity with each number he added to his equation, for there are an infinity of numbers between any two whole numbers and any two fractions, and their sum is always infinity. The patrol captain already was muttering to himself, and Orodin hurried him out of the house and into the patrol ship with his prisoner. After the spacecraft had gone, Oroden returned to his living quarters and replaced his formula in the locked safe. He cleaned the litter made by Catto and sat down. Once again. Auradin was a recluse, and he would remain so until someone else had a dream of conquering the universe. The End of Oridin's formula by R.R. winterbotham.
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Time Fuse by Randall Garrett this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org recording by Dan Gerzinski Time Fuse by Randall Garrett the ultra drive had just one slight drawback. It set up a shock wave that made suns explode, which made the problem of getting back home a delicate one indeed. Commander Benedict kept his eyes on the rear plate as he activated the intercom. All right, cut the power. We ought to be safe enough here. As he released the intercom, Dr. Leisher of the astronomical staff stepped up to his side. Perfectly safe. He nodded. Although even at this distance, a star going nova ought to be quite a display. Benedict didn't shift his gaze from the plate. Do you have your instruments set up? Not quite, but we have plenty of time. The light won't reach us for several hours yet. Remember, we're out racing it at 10 lights. The commander finally turned slowly, letting his breath out in a soft sigh. Dr. Leisher, I would say that this is just about the foulest coincidence that could happen to the first interstellar vessel ever to leave the solar system. Leisher shrugged. In one way of thinking, yes, it is certainly true that we will never know now whether Alpha Centauri A ever had any planets. But in another way, it is extremely fortunate that we should be so near a stellar explosion because of the wealth of scientific information we obtain. As you say, it is a coincidence, and probably one that happens only once in a billion years. The chances of any particular star going nova are small. That we should be so close when it happens is of a vanishingly small order of probability. Commander Benedict took off his cap and looked at the damp stain in the sweatband. Nevertheless, Doctor, it is damned unnerving to come out of ultradrive a couple of hundred million miles from the first star ever visited by man and have to turn tail and run because the damn thing practically blows up in your face.
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Leisure could see that Benedict was upset. He rarely used the same profanity twice in one sentence. They had been downright lucky at that. If Leisher hadn't seen the star begin to swell and brighten, if he hadn't known what it meant, or if Commander Benedict hadn't been quick enough in shifting the ship back into ultra drive. Leisher had a vision of an incandescent cloud of gaseous metal that had once been a spaceship. The intercom buzzed. The commander answered, yes, sir. Would you tell Dr. Leisher that we have everything set up now? Leisher nodded and turned to leave. I guess we have nothing to do now but wait. When the light from the nova did come, Commander Benedict was back at the plate again, the forward one this time. Since the ship had been turned around in order to align the astronomy lab in the nose with the star Alpha Centauri, A began to brighten and spread. It made Benedict think of a lightbulb connected through a rheostat, with someone turning that rheostat at turning it until the circuit was well overloaded. The light began to hurt Benedict's eyes even at that distance, and he had to cut down the receptivity in order to watch. After a while he turned away from the plate, not because the show was over, but simply because it had slowed to a point beyond which no change seemed to take place to the human eye. Five weeks later, much to Leisher's chagrin, Commander Benedict announced that that they had to leave the vicinity. The ship had only been provisioned to go to Alpha Centauri, scout the system without landing on any of the planets, and return at 10 lights, top speed for the ultra drive. It would take better than three months to get back. I know you'd like to watch it go through the complete cycle, benedict said, but we can't go back home as a bunch of starved skeletons. Leisher resigned himself to the necessity of leaving much of his work unfinished and although he knew it was a case of sour grapes, consoled himself with the thought that he could at least get most of the remaining information from the 500 inch telescope on Luna. Four years from then, as the ship slipped into the not quite space through which the ultra drive propelled it, Leisher began to consolidate the material he already gathered. Commander Benedict wrote in the 54 days out from Soldiers, Alpha Centauri has long since faded back into its pre blow up state. Since we have far outdistanced the light from its explosion, it now looks as it did two years ago. Itpardon me, Commander Leisher interrupted, but I have something interesting to show you. Benedict took his fingers off the keys and turned around in his chair. What is it, Doctor? Leisher frowned at the papers in his hands. I've been doing some work on the probability of that explosion happening just as it did, and I've come up with some rather frightening figures. As I said before, the probability was small. A little calculation has given us some information which makes it even smaller. For instance, with a possible error of plus or minus two seconds, Alpha Centauri A began to explode the instant we came out of ultra drive. Now the probability of that occurring comes out so small that it should happen only once in 10 to the 467th second. It was Commander Benedict's turn to frown. So, Commander, the entire universe is only about 10 to the 17th seconds old, but to give you an idea, let's say that the chances of its happening are once in millions of trillions of years. Benedict blinked. The number, he realized, was totally beyond his comprehension or anyone else's. Well, so what now? It has happened that one time. That simply means that it will almost certainly never happen again.
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But commander, when you buck odds like that and win, the thing to do is look for some factor that is cheating in your favor. If you took a pair of dice and started throwing sevens one right after another for the next couple of thousand years, you'd begin to suspect they were loaded. Benedict said nothing. He just waited expectantly. There's only one thing that could have done it. Our ship. Leisher said it quietly, without emphasis. What we know about the hyperspace or superspace or whatever it is we move through in ultradrive is almost nothing. Coming out of it so near to a star might set up some sort of shock wave in normal space, which would completely disrupt that star's internal balance, resulting in the liberation of unimaginably vast amounts of energy, causing that star to go nova. We can only assume that we ourselves were the fuse that set off that nova. Benedict stood up slowly. When he spoke, his voice was a choking whisper. You mean the sun? Sol might. Leisher nodded. I don't say that it definitely would, but the probability is that we were the cause of the destruction of Alpha Centauri A and therefore might cause the destruction of Sol in the same way. Benedict's voice was steady again. That means that we can't go back again, doesn't it? Even if we're not positive, we can't take the chance. Not necessarily. We can get fairly close before we cut out the drive and come in the rest of the way. At sub light speed it'll take longer and we'll have to go on half or one third rations, but we can do it. How far away? I don't know what the minimum distance is, but I do know how we can gauge a distance. Remember, neither Alpha Centauri B or C were detonated. We'll have to cut our drive at least as far away from Sol as they are from A. I see. The commander was silent for a moment, then, very well, Dr. Leisher. If that's the safest way. That's the only way. Benedict issued the orders while Leisher figured the exact point at which they must cut out the drive and how long the trip would take, the rations would have to be cut down accordingly. Commander Benedict's mind whirled around the monstrousness of the whole thing, like some dizzy bee around a flower. What if there had been planets around Centauri A? What if they had been inhabited? Had he all unwittingly killed entire races of living, intelligent beings? But how could he have known? The drive had never been tested before. It couldn't be tested inside the solar system. It was too fast. He and his crew had been volunteers, knowing that they might die when the drive went on. Suddenly Benedict gasped and slammed his fist down on the desk before him. Leisher looked up. What's the matter, Commander? Suppose, came the answer. Just suppose that we have the same effect on a star when we go into ultradrive as we do when we come out of it. Leisher was silent for a moment, stunned by the possibility. There was nothing to say, anyway. They could only wait a little more than half a light year from Sol. When the ship reached the point where its occupants could see the light that had left their home sun more than seven months before, they watched it become suddenly, horribly brighter. A hundred thousand times brighter. End of Time Fuse by Randall Garrett.
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The Next Time We Die by Robert Moore Williams this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org the next time We Die by Robert Moore Williams
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nooning, with the sun high overhead and the shadows huddling dispiritedly at their sides, the threat that existed in this wild desert was completely invisible. The girl, Nora Martin, said, what I don't understand is why we were so stupid as to come here in the first place. We could have stayed on Earth and had homes and families. Becoming conscious of what she had said, she hastily corrected herself. I mean, each of us could have had a home and a family. Pike McClane shifted the muzzle of the Rangely just a trifle, adjusting it so that the crosshairs in the periscope's sight covered the exact spot where he expected and hoped the next native would appear. He tried to dig the sand out of his eyes. Since he had sand on his hands, this only got more of the gritty particles into his eyes. He wished fervidly for a deep, satisfying breath of the thick, muggy air of Earth before he died. This air, there's not anything to it, he muttered. The girl glanced sharply at him. She had eyes that were as blue as the skies of earth on a sunny day. The dirt on her nose made her look human. At this moment, the eyes had anger in them. Back of the anger were unshed tears. Did you hear what I said? She repeated. McClane shifted his long body so that it lay a little lower in the depression in the sand. I guess you came here because you're an archaeologist and you're getting paid to examine ruins. I came here because I'm a roustabout who's supposed to be able to do anything, which is what I'm getting paid for. He paused and removed an offending grain of sand from his right eyelid. Dying is not much, he continued. Why are you so frazzled about it? It doesn't even hurt when you really get to it, that is. You talk as if you've died before. Well, I have, he answered, surprise in his voice. Hundreds of times since we first crawled out of the mudflats and grew feet and left our gills behind us. That's a long time. We've been dying ever since, that's for sure. And probably for a much longer time. I thought you were talking about reincarnation, the astonished archaeologist said. So I was, the roustabout answered. There are only different approaches and aspects of the same problem. We reincarnate in order to take another crack at the puzzle of evolution. Someday we'll solve it. Then we'll fall heir to the farthest stars instead of just this little old duck pond of a solar system. You sound very sure of yourself.
- [204:53]
What proof?
- [204:54]
It's in the book, maclean answered. We're Homo sapiens, and that means something. The mudflats didn't stop us. We crawled off them and onto the high ground and into the forests and overran a planet. The atom bomb didn't hold us up up too long, even when we got to using it on each other. Where in all that space? His hand swept upward in an arc that included the vast expanse of the stars dimly seen here on this world, even at high noon. Is anything that can stop us when we can keep coming back to take another crack at the problem?
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is, can be solved if we can keep working at it long enough. Enthusiasm sounded in his voice, then faded out. He drew his hand down. Two of the fingers were missing. McClane stared at the ooze of blood and plasma and set his lips against the pain. That damned needle ray sure can knock a hunk out of a man, he said. Oh, pike, why did you have to be so careless. Sliding the pack from her back, she opened it, taking great care not to get her head above the edge of the hole. She opened the first aid kit and applied antiseptics and bandages to the skin stumps of the two fingers. Alternately, she scolded and then soothed him. You do that real well, he said approvingly. You should have been a mama instead of an archaeologist. Raised a whole slather of kids so you could bandage up all their cuts and pat away all their bruises. A longing as deep as the seas of earth showed in her blue eyes. That was what I wanted, but I got sidetracked into a profession. The longing washed away in a film of sudden tears.
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Today on Monday.com McClane closed his lips even tighter. He applied one eye to the side of the Rangeley, now adjusted to function as a periscope level and apparently free of all danger. The grim red sand swept away to the low mountains in the distance. The air was so clear and so thin that he could even see the ruins of the city that had been their destination when they had left the ship. The city was a vast mass of tumbled masonry sprawled on treeless, forgotten hills on the sand. Nothing moved, yet death was there in front of him, and his eye had seen, certainly passed over it. The nice little foxes are all in their nice little holes, he said. The girl made a wan effort to smile. How are your fingers? I mean, do they hurt much? They feel like I don't have them. Grinning at his own joke, MacLane swung the side of the Rangeley around to their desert buggy. The oversized tires loomed up like huge rubber donuts sprouting mysteriously out of the desert sand. The door of the car was invitingly open. Only a quarter of a mile, he said. We could sprint that far. But how could we run at all without legs? We have legs, the girl said eagerly. Let's try to make the car. We wouldn't have him if we jumped out of this hole and started running. Little foxes have sharp teeth.
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Oh.
- [208:25]
Her voice dropped as the color faded from her eyes. Then what are we going to do? Stay here and hope they send out another desert car from the ship looking for us? If we don't return in a reasonable time, they may become curious about us. And if they don't come? Well, we'd try and outfox the foxes if we had a radio. We do, but it's in our buggy. If we were there, we wouldn't need a radio. The dur steel body of the car would stop the beam from the needle gun. How the hell does it happen that wild tribesmen with no science and no industry living here in the desert have a weapon like that needle ray gun? When they built this city here, they weren't desert tribemen, the girl explained. They were going somewhere. Then they had science and at least light industry and skilled workers. When they came back to the desert, they left everything behind them except their weapons. A primitive will always choose a weapon over anything else. He will value it as he values his life, because that's what it is. Why did they come back to the desert? That's one thing we expected to discover in the ruined city. Pike. The girl's voice took on the patient tone of the expert instructing the amateur war with a neighboring tribe in which they were defeated might have been the reason. Change in climate might have been a factor. Perhaps there were other reasons, too. Famine. Pestilence. They started up, then went back. This has happened so often that it seems to me the seeds of decay always sprout at the same time as the seeds of greatness. I wish I were an archaeologist and
- [209:52]
a philosopher and understood all those things, McClane said longingly.
- [209:57]
You are a man. Which is more important? Do you mean male? No, man. M A N. She spelled the word for him.
- [210:05]
Man.
- [210:05]
The highest level reached by the life force on Earth to date, or in the solar system as we know it. Oh, you mean top of the heap, maclane said. Sure, we know that. But the little foxes hiding in their nice little hogs don't know it. They don't think that being a man is so much. A thin sparkle of light flickered through the air above his head as he spoke. He had the impression that a crackling sound went with the death beam, like the rustle of static in space. See? That's what they think of us. Targets. The girl dodged downward. McClane advised her not to be a sissy and turned his attention to the side of the rangeley. Nothing was in sight. This did not surprise him. He had not expected to see anything except sand. I bet you I'm looking right at two or three of those little devils and not seeing them, he grumbled. They're adept at protective coloration, the girl said. Let me look. She applied her eye to the scope of the rangeley, moving it on its mounting so that it swept across the sand. There's one, she said, sudden excitement in her voice.
- [211:03]
Where?
- [211:03]
McClane demanded, pushing her aside and put his eye to the scope. Right where I have the sight centered. Can't you see that little bulge right there? She started to stand up and point. McClane jerked backward and shoved her face into the sand. Don't get so excited. You start to stand. Stand up, he growled. Light sparkled through the air above them. I forgot, the girl said meekly. Let me get my head up. You've got my nose and mouth full of sand out here. You only forget once, the Rastabout said, releasing her. I still don't see anything, he said, peering through the scope. He moved aside as she pushed at his shoulder. Again she studied the terrain. Making a minute adjustment of the sight, she pulled the trigger. The Rangely burped softly. It was a gas operated gun. Then three quick explosions took place out in the desert where the explosive pellets hit. A wild yell followed. McClane got his eye to the sight just in time to see a tribesman spin crazily within 50ft of him. The fellow turned one last cartwheel, then collapsed into a bundle of dead rags. You got one. McClane yelled triumphantly. Did I? I'm sorry, I mean. Her voice trailed, choked with fear. He looked quickly at her. The girl's eyes were filled with tears. I didn't really mean to do it. She blubbered. Cut out and stop the gang, Caterwallon, he ordered.
- [212:15]
This is war.
- [212:16]
The fact that just you and me and some wild Martian Indians are involved in this war doesn't make it any less deadly. If we don't get them, they'll get us. He held up his bandaged hand. You think the tribesman to do that was after me fingers? He wasn't. What he wanted was me head. Alright, alright, I understand this intellectually. It's just a my emotions. Get involved. Get them uninvolved. He said. How could you see that Martian when I couldn't? Better ability to differentiate colors, probably, the girl answered. Women can usually see colors better than men. That's the way I picked him out. Do some more differentiating between colors, he invited, waving her back to the sight of the Rangeley. Maybe by Harry we'll get out of
- [212:56]
here alive after all.
- [212:58]
Hope surged in his voice. If we do. If we do, then what? The girl asked. He shook his head. If we do get out. I couldn't tell you anyhow. There's no point in talking. But in case we don't get out, I want you to know you're a mighty nice kid. Thanks. Her eyes were deep blue again, like the skies of Earth. She moved toward him. Hey, what'd you do that for? Just an impulse. I always kiss men who tell me I'm a nice kid. Nice kid, nice kid. Nice kid. McLean said. You're too eager. The blush on her cheeks was visible through the sand. Hastily she applied her eye to the side of the Rangeley. McClane sighed. He'd never had a girl. It seemed to him that fate was playing him a cruel joke to try and give him one under these conditions. A hole in the sand with wild Martian tribesmen surrounding him. He mentally estimated the distance to the desert buggy, considered their chances of making
- [213:49]
this trip and arriving alive.
- [213:51]
He was shaking his head at his own estimate when the rangeley burped again. I missed, the girl said. Oh, Here he comes. McClane shoved her away from the sight. The Martian was moving toward them fast. Instead of a gun, he had a spear. You didn't miss, the roustabout said. You hit him, but you only wounded him. This is his death charge. He pressed the trigger of the rangeley. The gun burped twice in the distance. The exploding slugs threw up small geysers in the sand. The native kept coming in sight. He looked to be 10ft tall. Vaulting the rangely, he seemed to grow even more in stature. He screamed at the top of his lungs as he thrust downward with the spear. McClane shoved the girl away from him, rolled in the other direction. He caught a glimpse of a metal spear point burying itself in the sand in the exact spot where he had been laying. The roustabout wrapped both arms around the legs of the Martian and yanked hard. The fellow came down on top of McClane. The human shoved him aside. The Martian was twisting, squirming, raging, biting, clawing, kicking, wild tangle of knobby knees and knobbier elbows. Whichever of these knobby joints hit, it hurt. The fellow had a knife in his belt, which he was struggling to get free. McClane, seeing the knife, was trying equally hard to keep him from getting it. The human caught the hilt of the knife with his left hand. With his right fist, he struck at the native's stomach. Grunting, the Martian opened his mouth and tried to bite MacLane. The roustabout, no stranger to this kind of fighting, butted him in the open mouth with the top of his head and then struck savagely at the stomach. He felt his fists sink home in leathery tissue. There. The native grunted and went limp. MacLane jerked a knife from its scabbard. He did not have to use it, a series of fine tremors passing through his body. The Martian was dying. The explosive slug from the Rangeley had finally done its work. With relief, MacLane let the body drop. McClane wiped sweat and sand from his face. It was the death charge, all right. But you didn't miss, see? He pointed to the wound in the Martian's chest. The Rangeley stopped burping as the girl took her eyes from the sight and looked around. Glancing at the Martian, she hastily averted her face. An instant later she was back at the sight. The Rangeley began burping again. McClane had the impression that all the time he had been fighting with the Martian, the Rangeley had been burping. She had kept the gun going. There was something he wanted to say to this archaeologist. He waited until he had enough breath to say it. You're right, he said at last. I mean, you use your head and keep the others holed up while I fight this one. She flashed a smile at him. They're not hold up. They're running, she answered. McClane lifted his head. Above the level of the hole. A corpse was sprawled almost at the muzzle of the Rangeley. A second lay 50ft away. A third was perhaps a hundred yards distant. While he had been fighting the berserk Martian, the others had seized the opportunity to charge.
- [216:31]
Good girl.
- [216:32]
You saved our necks. He watched the running tribesmen. She was keeping the sand at their heels, thoroughly stirred up with slugs from the rangely. Wonderful, McClane breathed. Lift your sides just a little. Derangeley went into silence. Looking down, he saw that her shoulders were shaking with sobs. I know how you feel, he said gently. But you had to do it to save our necks. Come on, let's get back to our car while they're still running and we have the chance. He swung into action, collapsing the sight into place. He swung the Rangeley and its tripod mounting over his shoulder. Catching the girl by one hand, he began to run. To both, the car looked like heaven. It was that and more here in this desert. Each had found in the other something he had searched for all his life but had not found. There was heaven in this thought. Maclean could hear the girl panting as she ran beside him, but she was also laughing. He began to laugh too, from pure happiness. He squeezed her hand and she squeezed back. His laughter went into quick silence as he saw the tube of the needle ray gun projecting past the rear tyre of the desert car. The bright, baleful eye of a Martian crouching there was visible behind the weapon. It's a trap. He gasped. They ran on purpose, knowing we would beat it to our car as soon as they were gone. Skidding to a halt, he tried to bring the Rangeley off his shoulder. The needle ray gun winked at him. He coughed and went down in the sand. The gun winked again, spitting its bright eye of light at the girl. She went down like a falling doll. McClane pulled himself up on one knee. In one hand. There was a hole in his chest as big as his fist, but there was no pain. The high energy radiation from the needle gun seared the nerve endings so that no sensations were transmitted. The Rustabout shook his fist at the native crouched under the car. He got us this time, he yelled.
- [218:12]
But we'll be back again.
- [218:13]
You can't lick us. We'll get you if it takes another million years. The drive that had brought the Homo sapiens up from the mudflats was in his voice. His head began to swim. He took another deep breath. Beside him, the girl lay completely silent. Only her eyes showed that she knew what had happened. McClane looked at her. There was still something he wanted to say. His mind was fogging and he had difficulty in finding the words. Next time through. I want to meet you earlier, he said at last. I want us to have the chance. We miss this trip home and a bunch of. He coughed. A bunch of kids. He ended. The girl said nothing. She was beyond the ability to speak, but she understood him. The glow that came into her eyes made them as beautiful and as full of promise as the skies of Earth. McClane quietly laid down. The returning tribesmen danced their wild victory dance around the two humans. Level and bare, the endless sands of Mars stretched far away. END of the Next Time WE Die by Robert Moore Williams Recorded by Evan Williams Wellington, New Zealand.
- [219:33]
Moment of Truth by Basil Wells this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Read by Dale Grothman beyond the false windows. She could see the reddish brown wasteland where dust clouds spun and shifted so slowly. Moment of Truth by Bessel Wells she had been asleep. Now she stretched luxuriously beneath the crisp white sheet that the vapid August heat decreed from memory to memory. Her dream fog mind drifted, and to the yet to be. It was good to remember and to imagine and to see and to feel and to hear. She smiled. She was Ruth Halsey, 14, brunette, and pretty. Earle and Harry and Buell had told her she was pretty, especially Buell. Buell was her favorite date. Now the room closed around her with its familiar colors and furnishings. Sometimes she would dream she was elsewhere, unfamiliar ugly places. But then she would awake to the four long windows with their coarse beige drapes of monk's cloth, and the fantasies were forever dispelled. Her eyes loved the two paintings, the dark curls of the pink and white doll sitting Priscilla atop the dresser and the full length mirror on the open closet door, the pictured design of the wallpaper, its background merging with the pastel blue of the slanted ceiling, almost as they had blended together that first day when she was 12. Yet not the same. She corrected her thoughts, frowning. Sometimes, as today, the design seemed faded and changed. The gay little bridges and the flowered, impossible blue trees seemed to change and threatened to vanish. She laughed over at the demurely sitting doll. Essie had been her favorite doll when she was younger. Of course, now that she was 14, she did not play with dolls any more, but it was permissible that she keep her old friend neatly dressed and ever at hand as a confidant. She smiled at the thought. Essie never tattled. It must be from the polio, she told Essie, knowing all the time that she was almost well now and needed plenty of rest and careful doses of exercise. It makes my eyes funny. Essie smiled back glassily, and Ruth laughed. It was good to be awake and see the thick black arms of the maple tree outside the windows. It was good to have the cool green leaves waving at her and see the filtering dapplings of sunlight cross and recross them. She loved that old tree. She had played among its long horizontal branches from childhood. Her brother Alex, who had been killed in the Normandy landing during World War Three, had loved the tree too. He had built a railed, shingle roofed little nest high up in the tree's crotch heart, where Ruth kept some of her extra special notes and jewelry and a book of poems. One of the two paintings on the bedroom walls was of an old tree. The tree dominated the old story and A half white house with the green shutters that was the Halsey's home, Her home. Alex had painted that picture as well as the other, showing the graceful loop of the river and the roofs of the village of Thayer in the distance. Ruth had been with him as he painted the second picture from the jutting rock ledge 500ft above the river. I was just tanned then, Essie, she chirped gaily. I remember how afraid I was of the height and how Alex scolded. But Alex was dead now, and all she had to remember of him was the paintings and the photographs that Mother kept in a battered brown leather folder. For a moment the bright sunlight in her beloved maple tree's leaves seemed to dim and the room wavered about her. She wondered about that. She must tell her father or her mother. Perhaps the polio light touch of it or not, had hurt her eyesight glasses. She shuddered at the thought. The room shimmered and blurred and suddenly broke apart to reform into something. She squinched her eyes, shut to the hideous vision, and then opened them the merest slit. Nothing had changed. Mother. She cried. Daddy. She cried. What has happened? She heard the door to to this hideous travesty of a room opening. Her eyes darted around the sunken metal walled shell. Even the ceiling curved overhead and she saw two grotesque daubs taped to the walls that parodied the paintings of her dead brother, Alex. The coloring was ugly and the proportions out of line, and it was not canvas but curled sheets of paper taped and painted to resemble frames. A big man, sandy haired, with vertical wrinkles deep between pierced blue eyes, came into the room. She shrank into the bed, seeing that the sheet she had tugged taut across her breast was ragged and blue. Ruth, he said, and slowly smiled, making his face almost handsome. You're better. You haven't spoken in weeks. Ruth wanted to giggle, as though they could keep her quiet. Daddy was always shushing her. But who was this big man in his dusty drab coveralls and dropped dust masks dangling upon his chest? Don't you know me, dear? It's Buell. Your husband. Buell was 15 and only a couple of inches taller than Ruth. Of course he had sandy hair like this man, but this man was old enough to be Buell's father. This was crazy, like one of the dreams that always made her unhappy. So? So it was a dream. She felt warmth and release. Why not see what this dream had to offer? That might be amusing to remember and tell Buell sometime soon? Wouldn't he laugh when he heard she had dreamed about him and been married to him. She saw the strip of shiny metal that masqueraded as her mirror. And where her four long windows with their thick, loose woven drapes had been, there were only four tape strips of paper with crude pictures of draped windows daubed on them. There were even green dabs of paint and black slashes to simulate her beloved maple tree. Ruth, do you feel better now? Please don't smile at me like that. I know you love the baby, but this Martian atmosphere is tough, even for men. It wasn't your fault. Go ahead and talk. Ruth laughed gaily. This is just another bad dream and I know it. I'll wake up in a little while and be back in my cool old room. Blast your room and your dreams. The man went across the room in a swift rush and tore down one of the false windows, the painted strip of paper, and beyond. Through a dusty oval glass window, Ruth could see a reddish brown wasteland where dust clouds spun and shifted slowly, and a dusty huddle of what looked like Quonset huts or storage sheds of metal. This is reality, Ruth. You must see it. This pretence, this sleazy imitation of your old room is wrong. You're strong enough and I love you. You can accept the truth. His face changed. All expression sponged from it instantly as he looked into her eyes. And then it seemed to dissolve into something ugly and yet childish. She saw tears burst through and furrow the dust on his cheeks. Dear Lord, he cried almost reverently. Must this go on forever? Will she ever come back to me? His voice choked off and he stumbled across the room and out the door. She heard it shut behind him and she was hunting for Essie, already having forgotten the ill mannered intruder. There was no Essie, only a manikin of cloth stuffed white nylon and lipstick with black nylon for hair. And then the room shimmered and broke apart and reformed and she was back in her bed with the sun on the slowly dancing green leaves outside the four long windows. Essie was smiling down at her from the dresser and the paintings were, as always, soft colours and perfectly drafted. Had she thought there were four windows? How silly of her. The second from the right was a small oval of glass, or rather a glass covered picture of a desert scene. Odd that she had forgotten about that picture. Oh well, what did it matter?
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she would be well enough again to climb out on the giant limbs and into the tree nest that her brother Alex had built, and the boys would come to see her and take her to the drug store for sodas and sundaes. Yes, she was sure now she did like Buell Austin best. The End of Moment of Truth By Basil Wells.
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Message from Mars by Clifford D. CMAC this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Message from Mars by Clifford D. CMAC 55 pioneers had died on the bridge of bones that spanned the void to the rusty plains of Mars. Now the 56th stood on the red planet, his only ship a total wreck, and knew that Earth was doomed unless he could send a warning within hours. You're crazy, man, Snapped Stephen Alexander. You can take off for Mars alone. Scott Nixon thumped the desk in sudden irritation. Why not? He shouted. One man can run a rocket. Jack Riley's sick and there are no other pilots here. The rocket blasts in 15 minutes and we can't wait. This is the last chance, the only chance we'll have for months. Jerry Palmer, sitting in front of the massive radio, reached for a bottle of Scotch and slopped a drink into the tumbler at his elbow. Hell, dark, he said. Let him go. It won't make any difference. He won't reach Mars. He's just going out in space to die like the rest of the them. Alexander snapped savagely at him. You don't know what you're saying. You drink too much. Forget it, Doc, said Scott. He's telling the truth. I won't get to Mars. Of course you know what they're saying down in the base camp, don't you? About the Bridge of bones. Walking to Mars over a bridge of bones. The old man stared at him. You've lost faith. You don't think you'll go to Mars. Scott shook his head. I haven't lost my faith. Someone will get there sometime. But it's too soon yet. Look at that tablet, will you? He waved his hand at a bronze plate set into the wall. The roll of Honour, said Scott bitterly. Look at the names. You'll have to buy another soon. There won't be room enough. One Nixon already was on that scroll of bronze. Hugh Nixon, 54th from the top. And under that, the name of Harry Decker, the man who had gone out with him. The radio blurted suddenly at them, jabbering, squealing, howling in anguish. Scott stiffened, ears tensed as the code sputtered across millions of miles. But it was the same old routine, the same old message repeated over and over again, the same old warning hurled out from the ruddy planet.
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No. No. No. Come. Danger.
- [233:41]
Scott turned toward the window, stared up into the sky at the crimson eye of Mars. What was the use of keeping hope alive? Hope that Hugh might have reached Mars, that someday the Martian code would bring some word of him. Hugh had died like all the rest of them, like those whose names were graven in the bronze there on the wall. The maw of space had swallowed him, had flown into the face of silence, and the silence was unbroken. The door of the office creaked open, letting in a gust of chilly air. Jimmy Baldwin shut the door behind him and looked at them vacantly. Nice night to go to Mars, he said. You shouldn't be up here, Jimmy, said Alexander gently. You should be down the base tending to your flowers. There are lots of flowers on Mars, said Jimmy. Maybe someday I'll go to Mars and see. Wait till somebody else goes there first, said Palmer bitterly. Jimmy turned about hesitantly, like a man who had a purpose but had forgotten what it was. He moved slowly towards the door and opened it. I gotta go, he said. The door closed heavily, but the chill did not vanish from the room, for it wasn't the chill of the mountain's peak, but another kind of chill, a chill that had walked in with Jimmy Baldwin and now refused to leave. Palmer tipped the bottle, sloshed the whiskey in the glass. The greatest pilot ever lived, he said. Now look at him. He still holds the record, Alexander reminded the radio operator. Eight times to the moon and still alive. The accident had happened as Jimmy's ship was approaching Earth on that eighth return trip, a tiny meteor had struck the hull, drilling a sharp cut hole. It had struck Andy Mason, Jimmy's best friend, squarely between the eyes. The cabin had been filled with the scream of escaping air, had turned cold with a deadly breath of space, and frost crystals had danced in front of Jimmy's eyes. Somehow Jimmy had patched the hole in the hull, had reached Earth in a smashing rocket drive, knowing he had little air, that every minute was a borrowed eternity. Most pilots would have killed themselves or blown up their ships in that reckless race for Earth. But Jimmy, ace of all the spacemen of his day, had made it. But he had walked from the ship with a blank face and babbling lips. He still lived at the rocket camp because it was home to him. He put it among his flowers. He watched the rockets come and go without a flutter of expression, and everyone was kind to him, for in his face they read a fate that might be theirs. All of us are crazy, said Scott. Every one of us, myself included. That's why I'm blasting off alone. I refuse to let you go, said Alexander firmly. Scott rested his knuckles on the desk. You can't stop me. I have my orders to go make the trip. Whether I go alone or with an assistant pilot makes no difference. The rocket blasts on time and I'm in it when it goes. But it's foolishness, protested Alexander. You'll go space mad. Think of the loneliness. Think of the coordinates, snapped Scott. Delay the blast off and you'll have to work out a set of new ones. Days of work, and then it'll be too late. Mars will be too far away. Alexander spread his hands. All right, then. I hope you make it. Scott turned away, but Alexander called him back. You're sure of the routine? Scott nodded. He knew the routine by heart. So many hours out to the moon, landing on the moon to take on extra fuel, taking off for Mars at an exact angle at a certain minute. I'll come out and see you off, said Alexander. He heaved himself up and slid into a heavy coat. Palmer shouted out to Scott, so long, big boy. It was nice knowing you. Scott shrugged. Palmer was a little drunk and very bitter. He'd watched them go too long. His nerves were wearing out. Stars shone like hard, bright jewels in the African sky. A sharp wind blew over the summit of Mount Kenya, a wind that whined among the ice bound rocks and bit deep into the flesh. Far below blazed the lights of the base camp, hundreds of feet down the slope from the main rocket camp. Here atop the mountain, set squarely on Earth's equator, the Rasping voice of a radio newscaster came from the open door of the machine shop.
- [238:27]
New York.
- [238:28]
Shrieked the announcer. Austin Gordon, famous African explorer, announced this afternoon he will leave soon for the Congo Valley, where he will investigate reports of a strange metallic city deep in the interior. Natives bringing reports of the discovery out of the jungle claim the city is inhabited by strange metallic insects. Someone slammed the door and the voice was cut off. Scott hudged into the wind to light a cigarette. The explorers are going crazy, too, he said. Probably later on in the program the announcer would have mentioned Scott Nixon, and Jack Riley would blast off in a few minutes in another attempt to reach Mars. But it would be well along in the program, and it wouldn't make much time. Ten years ago Mars had been big news. Today it rated small heads in the press. Slight mention on the air, but the newscaster would have been wrong about Jack Riley. Jack Riley lay in the base camp hospital with an attack of ptomaine. Only an hour before, Jack had clasped Scott's hand and grinned at him and wished him luck. He needed luck, for in this business a man didn't even have an inside chance. Scott walked toward the tilted rocket. He could hear the crunch of Alexander's feet as the man moved with him. It won't be new to you, alexander was saying. You've been to the moon before. Yes, he had been to the moon three times, and he was still alive. But then he had been lucky. Your luck simply didn't hold forever. There was too much pride to gamble on in space. Fuel, for one thing. Men had experimented with fuel for 10 years now, and still the only thing they had was a combination of liquid oxygen and gasoline. They had tried hydrogen, but that had proved too cold, too difficult to confine, treacherous to handle, too bulky. Because of its low density. Liquid oxygen could be put under pressure, condensed into little space. It was safe to handle. Safe until combined with gasoline, and then it was sheer death to anything that got within its reach. Of course there had been some improvements. Better handling of the fuel, for instance. Combustion chambers stood up better now because they were designed better. Feed lines didn't freeze so readily now as when the first coffins took to space. Rocket motors were more efficient but still cranky. But there were other things. Meteors, for one, and you couldn't do much about them. Not until someone designed a screen and no one had. Radiations were another. Space was full of radiations, and despite the insulating jacket of ozone, some of them seeped through. Scott climbed through the rocket valve and turned to close it. He Hesitated for a moment, drinking in the smell and sight of earth. There wasn't much that one could see. The anxious face of Alexander, the huddled shadows that were watching men, the twinkling base camp lights. With a curse at his own weakness, Scott slammed the valve lock, twirled at home. Fitting himself into the shock absorbent chair, he fastened the straps that held him. His right foot reached out and found the trip that would fire the rockets. Then he lifted his wrist in front of his eyes and watched the second hand of the watch. 10 seconds. 8. Now 5. The hand was creeping up, ticking off the time it rested on the zero mark, and he slammed down his foot. Cruel weight smashed down upon him, driving his body back into the padded chair. His lungs were flattened, the air driven from them. His heart thumped. Nausea seized him and black mists swam before his eyes. He seemed to be slipping into a midnight chasm and he cried out weakly. His body went limp, sagging in the chair. Twin streams of blood trickled from his nose and down his lip. He was far out in space when he struggled back to consciousness. For a time he did not stir. Lying in the chair, it took long minutes to realize where he was. Gradually his brain cleared and his eyes focused. His ears registered the silence that steeped the ship, the weird, deathly silence of outer space. Weakly he stirred and sat upright, his eyes automatically studying the panel. The fuel pressure was all right. Atmospheric pressure was holding. Speed was satisfactory. He leaned back in the chair and waited, resting, storing his strength. Automatically his hand reached up and wiped the blood from from his lips and chin. He was in space, headed for the moon and from there for Mars. But even the realization of this failed to rouse him from the lethargy of battered body and tortured brain. Taking orphan a rocket was punishment. Severe, terrible punishment. Only men who were perfect physical specimens could attempt it. Someday rockets would be perfected. Someday rockets would rise gently from the earth, shaking off Earth's gravity by gradual application of power rather than by tremendous thrusts that kicked steel and glass and men out into space. But not yet. Not for many years. Perhaps not for many generations. For many years men would risk their lives in blasting projectiles that ripped loose from the earth by the sheer savagery of exploding oxygen and gasoline. A moan came from the rear of the ship, a stifled, pitiful moan that brought Scott upright in his chair, tearing with nervous hands the buckles of his belt. With belt loosened, body tensed, he waited for a second, hardly believing he had heard the sound. It came again, a piteous human cry. Scott leaped to his feet, staggered under the lack of gravitation. The rock was coasting on momentum now, and while its forward motion gave it a simulation of gravity enough so a man could orient himself, there was in actuality, no positive gravity centre in the shell. A bundle of heavy blankets lay in the corner formed by a lashed down pile of boxes, and the bundle was moving feebly. With a cry in his throat, Scott leaped forward and tore the blankets aside. Under them lay a battered man, crumpled with a pool of blood soaking into a blanket that lay beneath him. Scott lifted the body. The head flopped over, and he stared down into the vacant, blood streaked face of Jimmy Baldwin. Jimmy's eyes fluttered open, then closed again. Scott squatted on his heels, wild thoughts hammering in his head. Jimmy's eyes opened again and regarded the pilot. He raised a feeble hand in greeting. The lips moved, but Jimmy's voice was faint. Oh, Scott. What are you doing here? Scott demanded fiercely. I don't know, said Jimmy weakly. I. I don't know. I meant there was something, but I forgot. Scott rose and took a bottle of water from a case. Wetting his handkerchief, he bathed the bloodied face. His hands ran over Jimmy's body, but found no broken bones. It was a wonder the man hadn't been killed outright. Some more Baldwin luck. Where where are we, Scott? Jimmy asked. We're in space, said Scott. We're going out to Mars. No use of telling him anything but the truth. Space, said Jimmy. I used to go out in space. Then something happened. He shook his head wearily. Mercifully, the memory of that something had been wiped from his brain, half dragging, half carrying. Scott got him to the assistant pilot seat, strapped him in, and gave him a drink of water. Jimmy's eyes closed and he sank back into the cushions. Scott resumed his chair, leaned forward to look out into space. There was little to see, space viewed from any angle, unless one was near. A large body looked pretty much the same. The moon was still out of his range of vision. It would be hours before it would move upward to intersect the path of the rocket's flight. Scott leaned back and looked at Jimmy. Apparently the man had sneaked aboard just before the takeoff. No one paid much attention to him. Everyone was kind to him, and he was allowed to do as he pleased, for he was not insane. The tragedy of those few minutes years before had merely wiped out his memory, given him the outlook of a child. Perhaps when he had gotten into the ship he had held some reason for his action, but now even that purpose had escaped him. Once again, Jimmy Baldwin was a bewildered child's brain in the body of a man. Anyway, said Scott, half speaking to himself, half to the silent form, you're the first rocket stowaway. They would miss Jimmy back at the camp, would wonder what had happened to him. Perhaps they'd organize a posse and search for him. The possibility was they would never know what happened, for there was slight chance, Scott told himself, that he or Jimmy or the ship would ever get back to Earth again. Someone else would have to tend Jimmy's flowers now, but probably no one would, for his flowers were the Martian lilies, and Martian lilies no longer were a novelty. It had been the lilies that started the whole thing, this crazy parade of men who went into space and died. Slightly over 12 years ago, Dr. Stephen Alexander reported that from his observatory on Mount Kenya he had communicated with Mars by ultra short wave radio. It had been a long and arduous process. First the signals from Earth repeated in definite series at definite intervals, and then finally the answer from the red planet. After months of labor, slow understanding came. We send you, signalled the Martians. We send you over and over again, a meaningless phrase. What were they sending? Slowly Alexander untangled a simple skein of thought. Mars finally messaged, we send you token. That word token had been hard. It represented thought, an abstract thought. The world waited breathlessly for the token. Finally it came, a rocket winging its way across space, a rocket that flashed and glinted in the depths of space as it neared Earth, kept informed of its location by the Martians, Earth's telescopes watched it come. It landed near Mount Kenya, a roaring, screaming streak of light that flashed across the midnight sky. Dug up, it yielded an inner container, well insulated against heat and cold, against radiation and shock. Opened, it was found to contain seeds planted jealously guarded, carefully tended, the seeds grew were the Martian lilies. They multiplied rapidly, spread quickly over the Earth. Back on Earth today, the Martian lilies grew in every hamlet, clogged the fence rows of every farm, relieved whatever natural enemies and checks they might have had on their native planet. They flourished and spread, became a weed that every farmer cursed wholeheartedly, their root structure probed deep into the soil. Drought could not kill them. They grew rapidly, springing to full growth almost overnight. They went to unkillable seed, which was what might have been expected of any plant nurtured on the stubborn soil of Mars. Earth to the Martian lilies was a paradise of air and water and sunlight, and as if that first token load had not been enough, the Martians kept on sending rocket loads of seeds at each opposition the rockets came, each announced by the message from the Martian transmitter, and each of them landed almost precisely on the spot where the first had landed. That took mathematics. Mathematics and a superb knowledge of rocketry. The rockets apparently were automatic. There was no intelligence to guide them once they were shot into space. Their courses must have been plotted to the finest detail, with every factor determined in advance. For the Martian rockets were not aimed at Earth as one broad target, but at a certain spot on Earth. And so far, every one of them had hit that mark. At the rocket camp, each Martian rocket was waited anxiously with the hope it would bring some new payload. But the rockets never brought anything but seeds, more Martian lily seeds. Jimmy stirred restlessly, opened his eyes and looked out the vision plate. But there was no terror in his eyes, no surprise, no regret. Space? He asked. Scott nodded. We're going to the moon. To the moon first, said Scott. From there we go to Mars. Jimmy lapsed into silence. There was no change upon his face. There never was any change upon his face. I hope he doesn't make any trouble, Scott told himself. It was bad enough just to have him along, bad enough to have this added responsibility for space flight was a dangerous job. Ever since the International Mars Communications center had been formed with Alexander in charge, space had flung men aside. Ship after ship, pilot after pilot. The task alone of reaching the moon had taken terrible toll. Men had died. Some had died before they reached the moon. Some had died on the moon. But mostly they had died heading back for Earth. For landing on Earth. Jockeying a rocket through Earth's dense atmosphere is a tricky job. Others had died en route to Mars, ships flaring in space or simply disappearing, going on and on, never coming back. That was the way it had been with Hugh. And now his brother Scott was following the trail that Hugh had blazed. The trail to the moon and out beyond, following in a bomb of potential death, with a blank faced stowaway in the chair beside him. Halfway to Mars and the ship was still intact, running true to course, running on schedule, flashing through space under the thrust of momentum built up during the blast out from the moon. Halfway to Mars and still alive, but too early yet for hope. Perhaps other men had gotten as far as this. And then something had happened. Scott watched the depths of space, the leering, jeering emptiness of the star, studded velvet that stretched on and on. There had been days of waiting and watching. More days of waiting and watching loomed ahead, waiting for that warning flicker on the instrument panel that split second before red ruins struck as cranky fuel went haywire. Waiting for the tick of a tiny meteor against the ship's steel wall. The tiny ringing sound that would be the prelude to disaster. Waiting for something else, for that unknown factor of accident that would spatter the ship and the two men threw it many empty miles. Endless hours of watching and waiting. Hastily snatched catnaps in the chair, hastily snatched meals. Listening to the babbling Jimmy Baldwin, who wondered how his flowers were getting on, speculated on what the boys were doing back in the rocket camp on Earth. One thing hammered at Scott Nixon's brain. The message of the Martian radio. The message that had been coming now for many years. No, no, no come danger. Always that and little else. No explanation of what the danger was. No suggestion for circumventing or correcting that danger. No helpfulness in Earthmen's struggle to cross the miles of space between two neighbouring planets. Almost as if the Martians didn't want Earthmen to come. Almost as if they were trying to discourage space travel. But that would hardly be the case, for the Martians had readily co operated in establishing communications, had exhibited real intelligence and earnestness in working out the code that flashed words and thoughts across millions of miles. Without a doubt had they wished the Martians could have helped. For it was with seemingly little effort that they sent their own rockets to Earth. And why had each Martian rocket carried the same load each time? Could there be some significance in those Martian lily seeds? Some hidden meaning the Earth had failed to grasp? Some meaning that the things from Mars hoped would be read with each new rocket load? Why hadn't the Martians come themselves? If they could shoot automatic rockets across the miles space, certainly they could navigate rockets carrying themselves. The Martian rockets had been closely studied back on Earth, but had yielded no secrets. The fuel always was exhausted. More than likely the Martians knew to the last drop how much was needed. The construction was not unlike Earth rockets, but fashioned of a steel that was hardened and toughened beyond anything Earth could produce. So for 10 years Earthmen had worked unaided to cross the bridge of space, launching ships from the Earth's most favored takeoff point from the top of Mount Kenya, heading out eastward into space, taking advantage of the mountain's three mile height, the Earth's rotation speed of 500 yards per second at the equator. Scott reviewed his flight, checked the clock like routine he had followed. Blast off from Earth, landing in the drear desolate Mare Serenitatus on the moon, refueling the ship from the buried storage tanks, using the Caterpillar tractor from the underground garage to haul the rocket onto the great turntable, cradle, setting the cradle at the correct angle and direction, blasting off again at the precise second, carrying a full load of fuel, something impossible to do and still take off from Earth, taking advantage of the moon's lower gravity, its lack of atmosphere, using the moon as a stepping stone to outer space. Now he was headed for Mars. If he landed there safely, he could spend two days, no more, no less, before he blasted off Earth again. But probably he wouldn't reach Mars. Probably he and Jimmy Baldwin, in the end, would be just a few more bones to pave the road to Mars. A gigantic building rising to several hundred feet in height, domed without door or window, stood lonely in the vastness of the red plain that stretched off to the far off black horizon. The building and nothing more. No other single sign of habitation, no other evidence of intelligent life. The Martian lilies were everywhere, great fields of them, bright scarlet against the redness of the sand. But in its native soil the Martian lily was a sorry thing, a poor apology for the kind of flower that grew on Earth. Stunted, low, growing with smaller and less brilliant flowers. The sand gritted under Scott's boots as he took a slow step forward. Forward. So this was Mars, here at the North Pole, the single building, the only evidence of intelligence on the entire planet. As the ship had circled the planet, cutting down its tremendous speed, he had studied the surface in the telescopic glass, and this building had been the only habitation he had seen. It stood there, made of shimmering metal, glinting in the pale sunlight. Bugs, said Jimmy at Scott's elbow.
- [260:20]
What?
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What do you mean, bugs? Asked Scott. Bugs in the air, said Jimmy. Flying bugs. Scott saw them then, things that looked like streaks of light in the feeble sunshine. Swarms of them hovered about the great building, and others darted busily about.
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Scott shook his head. They weren't bees. They glinted and flashed when the sun's light struck them, and they seemed more mechanical than lifelike. Where are the Martians? Jimmy demanded. I don't know, Jimmy, declared Scott. Damned if I do. He had envisioned the first Earth men reaching Mars as receiving thunderous ovation, a mighty welcome from the Martians.
- [261:57]
Martians.
- [261:57]
But there weren't any Martians. Nothing stirred except the shining bugs and the lilies that nodded in a thin cold breeze. There was no sound, no movement, like a quiet summer afternoon back on Earth. With a veil of quietness drawn over the flaming desert and the shimmering building, he took another step, walking toward the great building. The sand grated protestingly beneath his boot heels. Slowly he approached the building, alert, watching, ready for some evidence that he and Jimmy had been seen. But no sign came. The bugs droned overhead. The lilies nodded sleepily. That was all. Scott looked at the thermometer strapped to the wrist of his oxygen suit. The needle registered 10 above centigrade. Warm enough, but the suits were necessary, for the air was far too thin for human consumption. Deep shadow lay at the base of the building, and as he neared it, Scott made out something that gleamed whitely in the shadow. Something that struck a chord of remembrance in his brain. Something he had seen back on Earth. As he hurried forward, he saw it was a cross. A white cross thrust into the sand. With a cry he broke into a run before the cross. He dropped to his knees and read the crudely carved inscription on the wood. Just two words. The name of a man carven with a jackknife. Harry Decker. Harry Decker. Scott felt his brain swimming crazily. Harry Decker. Here. Harry Decker under the red sand of Mars. But that couldn't be. Harry Decca's name. Couldn't be here. It was back on Earth. Graven on that scroll of bronze. Graven there, directly beneath the name of Hugh Nixon. He staggered to his feet and stood swaying for a moment. From somewhere far away he heard a shout and, swinging around, ran toward the corner of the building. Rounding it, he stopped in amazement. There in the shelter of the building lay a rusted spaceship, and running across the sand toward him was a space suited figure. A figure that yelled as it ran and carried a bag over its shoulder. A bag bouncing at every leap. Hugh yelled, scott. And the grotesque figure bellowed back.
- [264:35]
Scott.
- [264:35]
You old devil. I knew you'd do it. I knew it was you the moment
- [264:39]
I heard the rocket blasts.
- [264:43]
It's nice and warm here now, said Hugh. But you ought to spend a winter here. An arctic blizzard is a gentle breeze compared with the Martian Pole. In wintertime you don't see the sun for almost 10 months and the mercury goes down to 100 below centigrade. Hoarfrost piles up 3, 4ft thick and a man can't stir out of the ship. He gestured at the bag. I was getting ready for another winter, just like a squirrel. My supplies got low before the spring and I had to find something to store up against another season. I found half dozen different kinds of bulbs and roots and some berries. I'd been gathering them all summer, storing them away. But the Martians. Protested Scott. Wouldn't the Martians help you? His brother looked at him curiously. Martians? He asked. Yes, the Martians, Scott, hugh said. I haven't found any Martians. Scott stared at him. Let's get this straight now. You mean you don't know who the Martians are? Hugh nodded. That's exactly it. I tried to find them hard enough. I did all sorts of screwy things to contact that intelligence which talked with the Earth and sent the rockets full of seed. But I've gotten exactly nowhere. I've finally given up. Those bugs, suggested Scott. The shining bugs. Hugh shook his head. No soap. I got the same idea and managed to bat down a couple of them. But they're mechanical, that's all. Just machines operated by radium. It almost drove me nuts at first, those bugs flying around and the buildings standing there and the Martian lilies all round, but no signs of any intelligence. I try to get into the building, but there aren't any doors or windows. Just little holes the bugs fly in and out of. I couldn't understand a thing. Nothing seemed right. No purpose to any of it. No apparent reason. Only one thing I could understand. Over on the other side of the building I found the cradle that is used to shoot the rockets to Earth. I watched that done. But what happened? Asked Scott. Why didn't you come back? What happened to the ship? We had no fuel, said Hugh. Scott nodded his head. A meteor in space? Not that, hugh told him. Harry simply turned the petcocks and let our gasoline run into the sand. Good Lord, was he crazy? That's exactly what he was, Hugh declared, batty as a bedbug. Touch of space madness. I felt sorry for him. He cowered like a mad animal, beaten by the sense of loneliness and space. He was afraid of shadows. He got so he didn't act like a man. I was glad for him when he died. But even a crazy man would want to get back to Earth, protested Scott. It wasn't Harry, hugh explained. It was the Martians. I am sure. Whatever or wherever they are, they probably have intelligences greater than ours. It would be no feat for them, perhaps, to gain control of the brain of a demented man. They might not be able to dominate us, but a man whose thought processes were all tangled up by space madness would be an easy mark for them. They could make him do and think whatever they wanted him to think or do. It wasn't Harry who opened those petcocks, Scott. It was the Martians. He leaned against the pitted side of the ship and stared up at the massive building. I was plenty sore at him when I caught him at it, he said. I gave him one hell of a beating. I've always been sorry for that. What finally happened to him? Asked Scott. Took me half an hour to run him down and bring him back. Exposure to the Martian atmosphere plays hell with a man's lung tissues. You can breathe it, all right, might even be able to live in it
- [268:57]
for a few hours.
- [268:59]
But it's deadly just the same. Well, it's all over now, declared Scott. We'll get my ship squared around and we'll blast off for Earth. We made it here and we can make it back. And you'll be the first man who ever set his foot on Mars. Hugh grinned. That will be something, won't it, Scott? But somehow I'm not satisfied. I haven't accomplished a thing. I haven't even found the Martians. I know they're here. An intelligence that's at least capable of thinking along parallel lines with us, although its thought processes may not be parallel with ours. We'll talk over it later, said Scott, after we get a cup of coffee into you. I bet you haven't had one in weeks.
- [269:41]
Weeks?
- [269:42]
Jeered Hughes. Man, it's been 10 months. Okay then, said Scott. Let's round up Jimmy. He must be round here somewhere. I don't like to let him get out of my sight too much. The silence of the dreaming red deserts was shattered by a smashing report that drummed with a mighty clap against the sky above. A gash of red flame spouted over the domed top of the mighty building, and metal shards hammered spitefully against the side, settling up a metallic undertone to the ear. Shattering explosion. Sick with dread, Scott plunged to the corner of the building and felt the sick dread deepen where his spaceship had lain. A mighty hole was blasted in the sand. The ship was gone. No part of it was left. It had been torn into tiny fragments and hurled across the desert. Wisps of smoke crept slowly from the pit in the sand, twisting in the air currents that still swirled from the blast. Scott knew what had happened. There was no need to guess. Only one thing could have happened. The liquid oxygen had united with the gasoline, making an explosive that was sheer death itself. A single tremor, a thrown stone, a vibration, anything would set it off. Across the space between himself and the ship came the tattered figure of a man. A man whose clothes were torn. A man covered with blood, weaving, head down, feet dragging. Jimmy yelled, Scott. He sprinted forward, but before he could reach his side, Jimmy had collapsed. Kneeling beside him, Scott lifted the man's head. The eyes rolled open and the lips twitched. Slow, tortured words oozed out. I'm sorry, Scott. I. I don't know why. The eyes closed, but opened again. A faint flutter and more words bubbled from the bloody lips. I wonder why I did it. Scott looked up and saw his brother standing in front of him. Hugh nodded. The Martians again, Scott. They could use Jimmy's mind. They could get a hold of him. Blasted brain of his. Scott looked down at the man in his arms. The head had fallen back. The eyes were staring. Blood was dripping on the sand. Hugh, he whispered. Jimmy's dead. Hugh stared across the sand at the little glimmer of white in the shadow of the building. We'll make another cross. The Martians hadn't wanted them to come. That much, at least was clear. But having gotten here, the Martians had no intention of letting them return to Earth again. They didn't want them to carry back the word that it was possible to navigate across space to the outer planet. Maybe the Martians were committed to a policy of isolation. Maybe there was a hands off sign set up on Mars. Maybe a no trespassing sign. But if that had been the case, why had the Martians answered the radio calls from Earth? Why had they cooperated with Dr. Alexander in working out the code that made communication possible? And why did they continue sending messages and rockets to Earth? Why didn't they sever diplomatic relationships entirely, retire into their isolation? If they didn't want Earthmen to come to Mars, Why hadn't they trained guns on the two ships as they came down to the Scarlet sand, wipe them out without compunction? Why did they resort to the expedient of forcing Earth men to bring about their own destruction? And why, now that Harry Decker and Jimmy Baldwin were dead, didn't the Martians wipe out the remaining two of the unwanted race? Perhaps the Martians were merely efficient, not vindictive. Maybe they realized that the remaining two Earthmen constituted no menace. And maybe, on the other hand, the Martians had no weapons. Perhaps they never had held a need for weapons. It might be that they never had to fight for self preservation. And above and beyond all, what and where were the Martians in that huge building, invisible in caverns beneath the surface? At some point far away maybe, perhaps why? Speculation and wonderment. But there was no answer, not even the slightest hint. Just the building shimmering in the unsettling sun, the metallic bugs buzzing in the air, the lilies nodding in the breeze that blew across the desert. Scott Nixon reached the rim of the plateau and lowered the bag of roots from his shoulder, resting and waiting for Hugh to toil up the remaining few yards of the slope. Before him, slightly over four miles across the plain, loomed the Martian building. Squatting at its base was the battered, pitted spaceship. There was too much ozone in the atmosphere here for the steel in the ship to stand up. Before many years had passed, it would fall to pieces, would rust away, but that made little difference, for by that time they probably wouldn't need it. By that time another ship would have arrived. Or they would be dead. Scott grinned grimly. A hard way to look at things, but the only way one had to be realistic here. Hard headed planning was the only thing that would carry them through. The food supply was short, and while they'll probably be able to gather enough for the coming winter, there was always the possibility that the next season would find them short. But there was hope to cling to. Always hope. Hope that the summer would bring another ship winging out of space. That this time, armed by past experience, they could prevent its destruction. Hugh came up with Scott, slid the bag of roots to the ground and sat on it. He nodded at the building across the desert. That's the nerve center of the whole business, he declared. If we could get into it. His voice trailed away. But we can, Scott reminded him. We've tried and we can't. There are no doors, no openings. Just those little holes the bugs fly in and out of. There's a door somewhere, said Hugh. A hidden door. The bugs use it to bring out machines, to do the work when they shoot a rocket out for Earth. I've seen the machines. Screwy looking things work. Units, pure and simple, but so efficient you'd swear they possessed intelligence. I've tried to find the door, but I never could. And the bugs always waited until I wasn't around before they moved the machines in or out of the building. He chuckled, scrubbing his bearded face with a horny hand. That rocket business saved my life, he said. If the power lead running out of the building to the cradle hadn't been there, I had been sunk. But there it was, full of good old electricity. So I just tapped the thing and that gave me plenty of power. Power for heat, for electrolysis, for atmospheric condensation. Scott sank down heavily on his sack. It's enough to drive a man nuts, he declared. We can reach out and touch the building with our hand. Just a few feet away from the explanation of all this screwiness. Inside that building we'd find things we'd be able to use. Machines, tools. Hugh hummed under his breath. Maybe, he said. Maybe not. Maybe we couldn't recognize the machines, fathom the tools. Mechanical and technical development here probably wasn't any more parallel to ours than intelligence development. There's the rocket cradle, retorted Scott. Same principle as we use on Earth. And they must have a radio in there and a telescope. We wouldn't be able to figure them out, even be able to send Doc Alexander a message. Yeah, agreed Hugh. I thought of that, too. But we can't get in the building. That settles it. The bugs get under my skin, scott complained. Always buzzing around, always busy. But busy at what? Like a bunch of hornets. They're the straw bosses of the outfit, declared Hugh, carrying out the orders of the Martians. The Martian's hands and eyes, you might say. He dug at the sand with the toe of his space boot. Another swarm of them took off just before we started out on this trip. But you were here in the ship. I watched them until they disappeared straight up and out, until you couldn't see them. Just like they were taken off for space. He kicked savagely at the sand. I sure as hell would like to know where they go, he said. There have been quite a few of them leaving lately, said Scott, as if the building were a hive and they were new swarms of bees. Maybe they're going out to start new living centers. Maybe they're going to build more buildings. He stopped and stared straight ahead of him, his eyes unseeing. Going out to start new living centers. Going out to build new buildings. Shining metallic buildings like a cold wind from the past. It came to him, a picture of that last night on Earth. He heard the winding wind on Mount Kenya once again, the blaring of the radio from the machine shop door, the voice of the newscaster. Aston Garden Congo Valley. Metallic city. Strange metallic insects. The memory shook him from head to foot, left him cold and shivery, without his knowledge.
- [280:06]
Hugh.
- [280:07]
He croaked. Hugh, I know what it's all about. His brother stared at him. Take it easy, kid.
- [280:15]
Don't let it get you.
- [280:16]
Stick with me, kid. We're gonna make it alright.
- [280:19]
But you.
- [280:20]
Scott yelled. There's nothing wrong with me. Don't you see? I know the answer to all this Martian business now. The lilies are the Martians. Those bugs are migrating to Earth. They're machines, don't you see? They could cross space and the lilies would be there to direct them. He jumped to his feet. They're already building cities in the Congo. He yelled. Lord knows how many other places they're taking over the Earth. The Martians are invading the Earth, but the Earth doesn't know it.
- [280:53]
Hold on.
- [280:54]
Hugh yelled back at him. How could flowers build cities? They can't, said Scott breathlessly. But the bugs can. Back on Earth, they are wondering why the Martians don't use their rockets to come to Earth. That's exactly what the Martians are doing. Those rockets full of seeds aren't tokens at all. They're colonizing parties. Wait a minute. Slow down, Hugh pleaded. Tell me this. If the lilies are the Martians and they sent seeds to Earth 12 years ago, why hadn't they sent them before? Because before that it would have been useless. They may have sent rockets of seeds before, but if they did, nothing came of it. For the seeds would have been useless. If they weren't taken from the rocket, the rocket probably would have weathered away in time, releasing the seeds. But by that time, the seeds would have lost their germinating power. Hugh shook his head. It seems impossible, he declared. Impossible, that plants could have real intelligence, that flowers could hold the mastery of a planet. I'm ready to accept almost any theory but that one. Your mind sticks on parallel evolution, Scott argued. There's no premise for it on Earth. Animals took the spotlight, pushing the plants into a subordinate position. Animals got the head start, jumped the gun on the plants. But there's absolutely no reason why plants should not develop along precisely the same lines here that animals developed on Earth. But the Martian lily lives only one season. 10 months, and then it dies, Hugh protested. The next season's growth comes from seed. How could plants build intelligence? Each new crop would have to start all over again. Not necessarily, declared Scott. Animals are born with instinct, which is nothing more or less than inherited intelligence. In mankind, there are strange evidences of racial memory. Why couldn't the plants do the same thing with their seed progress even a step further? Why couldn't the seed carry along with its other attributes, all the intelligence and knowledge of the preceding generation? That way the new plan would have to start from scratch, but would start with all the accumulated knowledge of its immediate ancestor and would add to that knowledge and pass the sum total onto that generation that was to follow. Hugh kicked absentmindedly at the sand. There would be advantages in that sort of development, he agreed. It might even be the logical course of survival on a planet like Mars. Some old Martian race, for all we know, might deliberately have shaped their development toward a a plant existence when they realized the conditions toward which the planet was headed. A plant society will be a strange one, said Scott. A sort of totalitarian society. Not the kind of a society animals would build for an animal is an individual, and a plan is not in. A plant race individually would count for nothing. The race would count for everything. The driving force would be the preservation and the advancement of the race as a whole. That would make a difference. Hugh glanced up sharply. You're damned right that would make a difference, he said. There would be a deadly race once they got started. Nothing could stop that singleness of purpose. His face seemed to blanch under the tan. Do you realize what's happening? He shouted. For millions of years these plants have fought for bare existence on Mars. Every ounce of their effort has been toward race preservation. Every fall, the bugs carefully gather all the seeds and carry them inside the building, bring them out, and plant them in the spring. If it hadn't been for some arrangement like that, they probably would have died out years ago. Only a few scattered patches of them left now. But on Earth, said Scott, and the two of them, white faced, stared at one another. On Earth, the Martian lilies would not have to carry on a desperate fight for their very existence. On Earth they had plenty of water, plenty of sunlight, plenty of good, rich soil. On Earth they grew larger and stronger and straighter. Under such conditions, what would be the limit of their alien powers? With the lilies multiplying each year, growing in every fence row, every garden, crowding out the farmers crops, lining every stream, clogging every forest with swarm after swarm of the metallic bugs driving out into space, heading for Earth? What would happen? How long would the lilies wait? How would they attack? Would they simply crowd out every other living thing conquering by a sort of population pressure? Or would they develop more fully those powers of forcing animal minds to do their bidding? Or did they have perhaps even stronger weapons. Hugh, scott rasped. We have to warn Earth somehow. We have to let them know. Yes, hugh agreed. But how? Together, limed against the harsh horizon, they stood looking out across the desert toward the Martian building. Tiny figures, dimmed by distance, scurried about the building. Scott squinted his eyes against the desert glare.
- [286:52]
What are those?
- [286:53]
He asked. Hugh seemed to jerk out of a trance. The machines again, he said wearily. They're getting ready to shoot another rocket out to Earth. It'll be the last one of the season. Earth is drawn away again. More seeds, said Scott. Hugh nodded. More seeds and more bugs going out. And the worst of it is that Earth doesn't know. No man in his right mind on Earth could even dimly speculate upon the possibility of high intelligence in plant life. There's no reason to no precedent upon which to base such a speculation. Earth plants have never had intelligence. A message is all we need, declared Scott. Just get word to the Earth. They'd root up every plant on the face of the entire globe. They'd he stopped abruptly and stared out across the desert. The rocket, he whispered.
- [287:55]
The rocket is going to Earth.
- [287:57]
Hugh swung on him fiercely. What are you? We could send a message by the rocket. Yelled Scott. They always watch for them. Always hoping each one will carry something new, some new thing from Mars. It's the only way we can get a message back to Earth. But they won't let us near, protested Hugh. I've tried to get up close to the cradle when they were launching one, and those machines always drove me away. Didn't hurt me, but threatened. We have guns, said Scott. Guns, Said Hugh. Wouldn't be worth a damn against them. The bullets would just glance off. Even explosive bullets wouldn't hurt them. Sledges, then, said Scott. We'll make junk out of the damn things. We've got a couple of sledges in the ship. Hugh looked at him levelly. Okay, kid, let's get going. The machines paid them no attention. No higher than a man's waist, they curiously resembled grotesque spiders. Gangling rods and arms sprouted out all over them, and from their trunks sprouted waving steel antennae. Overhead hung a swarm of metallic bugs, evidently directing the work of making the rocket ready. It just takes three minutes or thereabouts from the time they finally have her ready. Until she blasts, said Hugh. Whatever we are going to do has to be done in those three minutes, and we've got to hold them off until the rocket blasts. They'll suspect there's something wrong, and we'll try to Stop it. But if we can hold them off, they must already have radioed Earth. The rocket is coming, said Scott. We always got word in advance. Probably they won't follow up with their location messages, but Doc will be watching for it anyhow. They stood tensed, waiting, each grasping a heavy hammer. The space about the cradle was a scene of intense but efficient activity. Last minute adjustments were made, readings and settings were checked. Each machine seemed to act by rote, while overhead hung the cloud of humming bugs. We know what we're to do, said Hugh. We've simply got to do it. Scott nodded. Hugh shot a glance at him. Think you can hold them off, kid? It'll take a while to unscrew the inner and outer caps, and we've got to get that message inside the inner container or it'll burn when the rocket hits atmosphere. You just get that message in and the caps back on, said Scott. I'll hold them off for you. Suddenly the machine scurried back from the cradle, leaving a clear space of several yards around it. Now. Hugh shouted, and the two men charged. The attack was a surprise. Their rush carried the line of machines between them and the cradle. One machine barred Scott's way, and he smashed at it savagely with a heavy hammer. The blow flung it aside. Crippled, dented, half smashed, Hugh was already at the cradle, clambering up the superstructure. A machine rushed at Scott, steel arms flailing, ducking a murderous swipe, the earthman brought his sledge into play. It sheared through the arms, smashed into the body of the machine. The stricken mechanism seemed to reel, staggered erratically, then collapsed upon the sand. In two leaps. Scott gained the superstructure, scaled it, and straddled the cradle. He sledge smashed savagely upon a climbing mechanism, flung it to the ground, but others were swarming up the steel latticework. Tentacles snaked out, seeking to entrap him. A wicked blow on the leg almost brought him down. His sledge worked steadily, and at the foot of the cradle, broken mechanisms bore testimony to its execution.
- [291:57]
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of his eye he saw that Hugh had inserted the envelope carrying the message in the inner container with the seeds and was tightening the screw cap. All that remained was to screw on the larger, heavier outer cap. But only seconds must remain, precious seconds, before the rocket blasted. And before that happened. It had to be away from the cradle for the backlash of flames would burn them to a cinder. Scott felt perspiration streaming over his body, running off his eyelids, blaring, his sight trickling down his nose. He heard the rasp of metal as Hugh drove home the cap with savage thrusts of the wrench. A machine rushed up the lattice at him, and he smashed at it with unreasoning fury. The head of the sledge bit deep into the metal body. A tentacle wrapped about his leg and jerked. He felt himself losing balance, tumbling off the cradle into the melee of threshing metal beings beneath him. Then he was on the ground, buffeted and pounded by the maddening metal creatures. He fought savagely, blindingly, staggering forward. The shatterproof glass in his vision plate had been broken, its texture smashed into a million tiny criss cross lines until it was like frosted glass. He heard the tough fabric of his suit rip with a screeching sound. The bugs still were hammering against him. The thin, acrid atmosphere of Mars burned into his nose, and his lungs labored unseeingly. He swung his sledge in swath like circles, shrieking like a wild Indian. He felt it smash and slam into the bodies of his metallic opponents. Then the world was blotted out by a resounding roar, a Niagara of sound that beat in waves against one body. That was the rocket leaving
- [294:54]
Hugh.
- [294:56]
He yelled insanely, Hugh.
- [294:58]
We did it.
- [295:00]
The attack had fallen away, and he stood unsteadily on his feet, panting, stiff from punishment but filled with exultation. They had won. He and Hugh had sent the message. Earth would be warned, and Mars would lose its hope of conquering a new and younger world. Whatever dreams of conquest this old red planet may have nurtured would never come to be. He put his hands up and ripped the helmet from his head, flinging it on the ground. The metallic machines were ringed around him, motionless, almost as if they were looking at him, almost as if they were waiting for his next move. Wildly he whooped at them. Start something, damn you. Just start something. But the line in front of him parted and he saw the blackened thing that lay upon the sand, the twisted, blasted, crumpled thing that huddled there. Scott dropped his sledge and a sob rose in his throat. His hands clenched at his side and he tottered slowly forward. He stood above the body of his brother, flung there on the sand by the searing backlash of the rocket blast.
- [296:18]
Hugh.
- [296:19]
He cried.
- [296:22]
Hugh.
- [296:26]
But the blackened bundle didn't stir. Hugh Nixon was dead. Eyes bleared, Scott stared around at the machines. They were breaking up, scattering, moving away.
- [296:45]
Damn you.
- [296:46]
He screamed. Don't you even care? But even as he spoke, he knew they didn't care. The plant civilization of Mars was an unemotional society. It knew no love, no triumph, no defeat, no revenge. It was mechanistic, cold, logical. It did only those things which aimed at a definite end. So long as there was a chance of protecting the rocket, so long as there was hope of halting its flight after it had been tampered with, the SAT civilization would act. But now that it was in space, now that it could not be recalled, the incident was over. There would be no further action. Scott looked down at the man at his feet. Harry Decker and Jimmy Baldwin. And now Hugh Nixon. Three men had died here on Mars. He was the only one left, and he probably would die too, for no man could for long breathe that Martian air and live. What was it Hewitt said on the first day? Please, hell with the tissues of your lungs. He stared around him, saw the interminable red deserts and the scarlet patches of Martian lilies nodding in the breeze, saw the humming bugs flashing in the pale sunlight, saw the shimmer of the mighty building that had no doors or windows. His lungs were aching now, and his throat was raw. It was harder and harder to breathe. He knelt in the sand and lifted the blackened body. Cradling it in his arms, he staggered along. I have to make another cross, he said. Far overhead in the depths of space twinkled the blue planet whose life would never know the slavery of the emotionless race of a dying world. End of Message FROM Mars by Clifford D. Simak Recording by Liam Green.
- [299:20]
Year of the BIG Thaw by Marion Zimmer Bradley this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Year of the Big Thaw by Marion Zimmer Bradley. In this warm and fanciful story of a Connecticut farmer, Marion Zimmer Bradley has caught some of the glory that is in man's love for man, no matter who he is, nor whence he's from. By heck, you'll like little Matt. You say that Matthew is your own son, Mr. Emmett? Yes, Reverend Doane. And a better boy never stepped. If I do say it as shouldn't, I've trusted him to drive team for me since he was 11. And you can't say more than that for a farm boy. Way back when he was a little shaver so high when the war came on, he was bounden. He was going to sail with the Admiral Farragut. You know, boys that age like runaway colts. I couldn't see no good in his being cabin boy on some tarnation navy ship, and I told him so. If he waited to sail out on a whaling ship, I low I'd have to let him go. But Marthy, that's the boy's mom took on so that Matt stayed home. Yes, He's a good boy and a good son. We'll miss him a powerful lot if he gets the scholarship thing. But I low it'll be good for the boy to get some learnin' besides what he gets in the school here. It's right kind of you, Reverend, to look over this application thing for me. Well, if he is Your own son, Mr. Emmet, why did you write birthplace unknown on the line here? Reverend Doane, I'm glad you asked me that question. I've been turning it over in my mind, and I've just about come to the conclusion it wouldn't be nohow fair to hold it back. I didn't lie when I said Matt was my son because he's been a good son to me and Marthy. But I'm not his PA and Marthy ain't his ma, so could be I stretch the truth just a mite, Reverend Doane. It's a tarnal funny yarn, but I'll walk into the meetin house and swear to it on a stack of Bibles as thick as a cord of wood. You know, I've been farming the old Corning place these past seven years. It's good flat Connecticut bottom land, but it isn't like our land up in Hampshire, where I was born and raised. My PA called it the Hampshire Grants, and all that was King's land when his PA came in there and Started farming at the foot of Scuddock Mountain. That's Injun for fires, folks say, because the engines used to build fires up there in the spring for some of their heathen do dads. Anyhow, up there in the mountains we see eternal power of queer things. You call to mind the year we had the big thaw, about 12 years before the war. You mind the blizzard that year? I heard tell it spread down most to York. And at Fort Orange, the place they call Albany now, the Hudson froze right over, so they say. But those York folks do a sight of exaggerating, I'm told. Anyhow, when the ice went out, there was an almighty good thaw all over. And when the snow run off Scuddick Mountain, there was a good sized hunk of farm land and our valley went under water. The crick on my farm flowed over the bank and there was a foot of water in the cowshed. And down in the swimmin hole in the back pasture wasn't nothing but a big gully 50 foot and more across. Rushing through that pasture, deep as a lake and brown as the old cow, you know, fresh at floods. Full up with sticks and stones and old dead trees and somebody's old shed floating down the middle. And I swear to goodness, parson, that stream was running along so fast. I saw 4 inch cobblestones floating and bumping along. I tied the cow and the calf and Kate, she was our white mare, you mind. She went lame last year and I had to shoot her. But she was just a young mare then and skittish as all get out. But she was a good little mare. Anyhow. I tied the whole kit and caboodle of them in the woodshed up behind the house where they'd be dry. Then I started to get the milk pail. Right then I heard the goshawfulest screech I ever heard in my life. Sounded like thunder and a freshet and a forest fire all at once. I dropped the milk pail. I heard Marthy scream inside the house and I run outside. Marthy was already there in the yard. And she points up in the sky and yelled, look up yonder. We stood looking up the sky over Chatuk Mountain where there was a great big shoot. Now, I don't know as I can call its name, but it was like a trail of fire in the sky. And it was making the dangest racket you ever heard, Reverend. Looked kind of like one of them fourth of July skyrockets. But it was big as a house. Marthy was screaming and she Grabbed me and hollered, Hez, what in Tunket is it? And when Marthy cusses like that Reverend, she don't know what she's saying. She's so scared. I was plumb scared myself. I heard Liza. That's our young un. Liza Grace. They got married to the Taylor boy. I heard her crying on the stoop, and she came flying out with her penny all black and hollered to Marthy that the pea soup was burning. Marthy let out another screech and ran for the house. That's a woman for you. So I quieted Liza down some, and I went in and told Marthy it warn't no more than one of them shooting stars. Then I went and did the milking. But, you know, while we were sitting down to supper, there came the most awful grinding, screeching, pounding crash I ever heard. Sounded as if it were in the back pasture, but the howl shook as if something had hit it. Marthy jumped a mile, and I never saw such a look on her face. Hez, what was that? She asked. Shoot, now. Nothing but the freshet, I told her, but she kept on about it. You reckon that shooting star fell in our back pasture?
- [306:56]
Hez?
- [306:57]
Well, now, I don't. Low it did nothing like that, I told her, but she was jittery as an old hen, and it weren't like her nohow. She said it sounded like trouble. And I finally quieted her down by saying I'd saddle Kate up and go have a look. I kind of thought, though I didn't tell Marthy, that somebody's house had floated away in the freshet and run aground in our back pasture. So I saddled up Kate and I told Marthy to get some hot rum ready in case there was some poor soul run aground back there. And I rode Kate back to the back pasture. It was mostly uphill because the top of the pasture is on high ground, and it sloped down to the creek on the other side of the rise. Well, I reached the top of the hill and looked down. The creek were a regular river now, rushing along like Niagara. On the other side of it was a stand of timber, then the slope of Shatuk Mountain, and I saw right away the long streak where all the timber had been cut out in a big scoop with roots standing up in the air and a big side of rocks down the water. It was still raining a mite, and the ground was sloshy and squanchy underfoot. Kate scrunched her hooves and got real balky, not Liking it a bit. When we got to the top of the pasture, she started to whine and whicker and stamp, and no matter how loud I whoaed, she kept on stamping. And I was plump scared she'd pitch me off in the mud. Then I started to smell a funny smell, like something burning. Now, don't ask me how anything could burn and all that water, because I don't know. When we came up on the rise, I saw the contraption. Reverend, it was the most tarnal, crazy contraption I ever saw in my life. It was bigger nor my cowshed, and it was long and thin and as shiny as Marthy's old pewter pitcher her ma brought from England. It had a pair of red rods sticking out behind and a crazy globe fitted up where the top ought to be. It was stuck in the mud, turned halfway over on the little slide of roots and rocks, and I could see what had happened all right. The thing must have been. Now, Reverend, you can say what you like, but that thing must have flew across Shatuk and landed on the slope in the trees, then turned over and slid down the hill. That must have been the crash we heard. The rods weren't just red, they were red hot. I could hear them sizzle as the rain hit them. In the middle of the infernal contraption there was a door, and it hung all to other as if every hinge on it had been wrenched halfway off. As I pushed old Kate alongside it, I heard somebody hollering alongside the contraption. I didn't know how get the words, but it must have been for help, because I looked down and there was a man, a flopping along in the water. He was a big fellow and he wasn't swimming, just thrashing and hollering. So I pulled off my coat and boots and hove in after him. The stream was running fast, but he was near the edge and I managed to catch on to an old tree root and hang on, keeping his head out of the water till I got my feet aground. Then I hauled him onto the bank. Up above me, Kate was still whinnying and raising Ned, and I shouted at her as I bent over the man. Well, Reverend, he sure did give me a surprise. Warn't no proper man I'd ever seed before. He was wearing some kind of red clothes, real shiny and sort of stretchy and not wet from the water like you'd expect, but dry, and it felt like the silk and Indian rubber stuffed mixed together, and it was such a bright red that at first I Didn't see the blood on it. When I did I knew he were a goner. His chance chests were all stove in, smashed to pieces. One of the old tree roots must have jabbed him as the current flung him down. I thought he were dead already. But then he opened his eyes a funny color. They were greeny yellow. And I swear, Reverend, when he opened them eyes I felt he was reading my mind. I thought maybe he might be one of them circus fellers in their flying contraptions that hang at the bottom of a balloon. He spoke to me in English, kind of choky and stiff. Not like Joe the Portuguese sailor or like those tarnal dumb Frenchies up cannady way. But well, funny. He said my baby in ship. Git baby. He tried to say more but his eyes were shut and he moaned hard. I yelped, God a'. Mighty. Scuse me, Reverend, but I was so blame upset that just what I did say. God a mighty man. You mean there's a baby in there? Ding foal contraption. He just moaned so. After spreading my coat around the man and a little bit I just plunged in that there river again. Reverend, I heard tell once about some tomful idiot going over Niagara in a barrel. And I tell you it was like that when I tried crossing that freshet to reach the contraption I went under and down and was whacked by floating sticks and whirled around in the freshette. But somehow I don't know how except by the pure grace of God I got across that raging torrent and clomb up to where that crazy ding fought machine was sitting. Ship he called it. But that were no ship, Reverend. It was some flying dragon kind of thing. It was a real scary looking thing. But I clumb up to the little door and hauled myself inside it. And sure enough there was other people in the cabin. Only they was all dead. There was a lady and a man and some kind of an animal. Looked like a bobcat, only smaller with a funny shaped rooster comb thing on its head. They all, even the cat thing was wearing those shiny stretchy clothes. And they all was so battered and smashed I didn't even bother to hunt for their heartbeats. I could see by the look they was dead as a doornail. Then I heard a funny little whimper like a kitten. And in a funny rubber cushion thing there's a little boy, babylooked about six months old. He was howling lusty enough. And when I lifted him out of the cross cradle kind of thing I saw why that boy baby, he was wet and his little arm was twisted under him. That there flying contraption must have smashed down awful hard. But that rubber hammock was so soft and cushiony all it did to him was jolt him good. I looked around, but I couldn't find anything to wrap him in. And the baby didn't have a stitch on him except. Except a sort of spongy paper diaper, wet as sin. So I finally lifted up the lady who had a long cape thing around her, and I took the cape off her real gentle. I knew she was dead and she wouldn't be needing it. And that boy baby would catch his death if I took him out bare naked like that. She was probably the baby's ma, a right pretty woman she was, but smashed up something shameful. So anyhow, to make a long story short, I got that baby back across the Niagara Falls somehow and laid him down by his paw. The man opened his eyes kind and said in a chalky voice, take care, baby. I told him I would, and I said I'd try to get him up to the house where Marthi could doctor him. The man told me not to bother. I dying. He says we come from Planet Star up there. Crash here. His voice trailed off into a language I couldn't understand, and he looked like he was praying. I bent over him and held his head on my knees real easy, and I said, don't worry, mister. I'll take care of your little fellow until your folks come after him before God. I will. So the man closed his eyes and I said, our Father, which art in heaven. And when I got through, he was dead. I got him up on Kate, but he was cruel, heavy for all he was. Such a tall, skinny fellow. Then I wrapped that there baby up in the cape thing and took him home and give him to Marthy. And the next day I buried the fellow in the South Meadow. And next meetin day we had the baby baptized. Matthew Daniel Emmett and brung him up just like our own kids, that's all. All. Mr. Emmett, didn't you ever find out where that ship really came from? Why, Reverend, he said it come from a star. Dyin men don't lie, you know that. I asked the teacher about them planets he mentioned, and she says that on one of those planets can't rightly remember the name March or Mark or something like that. She says some big scientist feller with a telescope saw canals on that planet. And they'd have to be pretty near as big as this here Erie Canal to see them so far off. And if they could build canals on that planet, I'd know why they couldn't build a flying machine. I went back the next day when the water was down a little to see if I couldn't get the rest of them folks and bury them, but the flying machine had broke up and washed down the creek. Marthy's still got the cape thing. She's a powerful saving woman. We never did tell Matt, though. Might make him feel funny to think he didn't really belong to us. But Mr. Emmett, didn't anybody ask questions about the baby where you got it? Well, now, I'll low there was curious because Marthy hadn't been in the family way and they knew it. But up here folks mind their own business pretty well and I just let them wonder. I told Liza Grace I'd found her new little brother in the back pasture, and of course it was the truth. When Liza Grace growed up, she thought it was just one of them yarns old folks tell the little shavers. And has Matthew ever shown any differences from the other children that you could see? Well, Reverend, not so you could notice it. He's powerful smart, but his real PA and ma must have been right smart to build a flying contraption that could come so far. Of course, when he were about 12 years old he started reading folks minds, which didn't seem exactly right. He did tell Marthy what I was thinking and things like that. He was just at the pesky age. Liza Grace and Minnie were both a courtin then, and he'd drive their boyfriends crazy telling them what Liza Grace and Minnie were a thinkin and teased the gals by telling them what the boys were thinking about. There warn't no harm in the boy though. It was all teasing, but it just warn't decent somehow. So I took him out behind the woodshed and gave his britches a good dustin just to remind him that kind of thing weren't polite no how. And Reverend Doane, he ain't never done it since End of Year of the Big Thaw By Marion Zimmer Bradley.
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Zen by Jerome Bixby this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org recording by Tommy Hirson Zen by Jerome Bixby it's difficult when you're on one of the asteroids to keep from tripping because it's almost impossible to keep your eyes on the ground. They never got around to putting portholes in spaceships, you know. Unnecessary when you're flying by GB and psychologically inadvisable besides. So an asteroid is about the only place, apart from Luna, where you can really see the stars. There are so many stars in an asteroid sky that they look like clouds, like massive heaped up silver clouds floating slowly around the inner surface of the vast ebony sphere that surrounds you and your tiny foothold. They are near enough to touch, and you want to touch them, but they are so frighteningly far away and so beautiful. There's nothing in creation half so beautiful as an asteroid sky you don't want to look down. Naturally, I had left the Lucky Pierre to search for fossils. I'm David Kunz, the Lucky Pierre's paleontologist. Somewhere off in the darkness on either side of me were Joe Hargraves, gadgeting for mineral deposits, and Ed Rice, hopefully on the lookout for anything alive. The Lucky Pierre was back of us, her body out of sight behind a low black ridge, only her gleaming nose poking above like a porpoise coming out for air. When I looked back, I could see along the jagged rim of the ridge the busy reflected flickerings of the bubble camp the Tecks were throwing together. Otherwise all was black except for our blue white torch beams that darted here and there over the gritty Rocky surface. The 29 of us were ETI Team 17, whose assignment was the asteroids. We were four years and three months out of Terra and we'd reached Vesta right on schedule. 10 minutes after landing. We had known that the clod was part of the crust of Planet X, or Sorna to give it its right name, one of the few such parts that had been blown clean out of the solar system that made Vesta extra special. It meant settling down for a while. It meant a careful months long scrutiny of Vestas, every square inch and a lot of her cubic ones, especially by the life scientists.
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on Monday.com fossils, artifacts, animate life. A surface chunk of Sorna might harbor any of these, or all. Some we'd tackled already, had a few. In a day or two, of course, we'd have the one man beetles and the crew boats out and the floodlights orbiting overhead, and Vesta would be as exposed to us as a molecule on a micro screen. Then work would start in earnest. But in the meantime, and as usual, Hargraves, Rice, and I were out prowling, our weighted boots clomping along in darkness. Captain Feldman had long ago given up trying to keep us science minded charges from galloping off alone like this. In spite of being a military man, Feld's a nice guy. He just shrugs and says scientists when we appear brightly at the airlock waiting to be let out. So the three of us went our separate ways and soon were out of sight of one another. At Rice, the biologist was looking hardest for animate life, naturally. But I found it. I had crossed a long, rounded expanse of rock, lava, wonderfully colored, and was descending into a boulder, cluttered pocket. I was nearing the bottom of the chunk, the part that had been the deepest beneath Soren's surface before the blow up. It was the likeliest place to look for fossils. But instead of looking for fossils, my eyes kept rising to those incredible stars. You get that way, particularly after several weeks of living in steel. And it was lucky that I got that way this time, or I might have missed the Zen. My feet tangled with a rock. I started a slow, light gravity fall and looked down to catch my balance. My torch beam flickered across a small red furred teddy bear shape. The light passed on. I brought it sharply back to target. My hair did not stand on end. Regardless of what you've heard me quoted as saying, why should it have, when I already knew Yurt so well considered him, in fact, one of my closest friends? The Zen was standing by a rock, one paw resting on it, ears cocked forward, its stubby hind legs braced, ready to launch it into flight. Big yellow eyes blinked unemotionally at the glare of the torch, and I cut down its brilliance with a twist of the polarizer lens. The creature stared at me, looking ready to jump halfway to Mars or straight at me if I made a wrong move. I addressed it in its own language, clucking my tongue and whistling through my teeth. In the blue white light of the torch. The Zen shivered. It didn't say anything. I thought I knew why. 3,000 years of darkness and silence, I said. I Won't hurt you again. Speaking in its own language, the Zen moved away from the rock, but not away from me. It came a little closer, actually, and peered up at my helmeted mirror glassed head, unmistakably the seat of intelligence. It appears of any race anywhere. Its mouth, almost human shape, worked. Finally words came. It hadn't spoken except to itself for 3,000 years.
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You are not Zen, it said. Why now do you speak Xenakhai?
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It took me a couple of seconds to untangle the squeaking syllables and get any sense out of it.
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It.
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What I had already said to it were stock phrases that Yurt had taught me. I knew still more, but I couldn't speak Zedekai fluently by any means. Keep this in mind, by the way. I barely knew the language, and the Zen could barely remember it. To save space, the following dialogue is reproduced without bumblings. Blank stares. And what did you says in reality? Our talk lasted over an hour. I am an Earthman, I said through my earphones. When I spoke, I could faintly hear my own voice, as the Zen must have heard it in Vesta's all but non existent atmosphere. Tiny metallic, cricket like. I pointed at the sky, the incredible sky from out there, from another world. It thought about that for a while. I waited. We already knew that the Zens had been better astronomers at their peak than we were right now, even though they'd never mastered space travel. So I didn't expect this one to boggle at the notion of creatures from another world. It didn't. Finally it nodded, and I thought, as I had often before, how curious it was that this gesture should be common to Earth, men, and sin. So Ersk, it said, and you know what I am. When I understood, I nodded too. Then I said yes, realizing that the nod wasn't visible through the one way glass of my helmet.
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I am life of sin, it said.
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I said nothing. I was studying it closely, looking for the features which Yurt had described to us. The lighter red fur of arms and neck, the peculiar formation of flesh and horn on the lower abdomen. They were there. From the coloring I knew this Zen was a female. The mouth worked again, not with emotion, I knew, but with the unfamiliar act of speaking.
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I have been here for.
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For.
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She hesitated.
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I don't know. For 500 of my years.
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For about 3,000 of mine, I told her. And then blank astonishment sank home in me, astonishment at the last two words of her remark. I was already familiar with Azen's enormous intelligence, knowing Yurt as I did. But imagine thinking to qualify years with my when just out of nowhere a visitor from another planetary orbit pops up. And there had been no special stress given the distinction, just clear, precise thinking, like yurts. I added, still a little we know how long ago your world died. I It was child then, she said.
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I don't know what happened. I have wondered.
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She looked up at my steel and glass face. I must have seemed like a giant. Well, I suppose I was.
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I told her how SORN had gotten careless with its hydrogen atoms and had blown itself over half of creation. This the ETI teams had surmised from scientific records found on Eros, as well as from geophysical evidence scattered throughout the other bodies. I was child, she said again after a moment.
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Again I felt amazement at its intelligence, and it suddenly occurred to me that astronomy and nuclear physics must have been taught in Soren's elementary schools, else that my years and atom explosion would have been all but impossible. And now this old, old creature, remembering back 3,000 years to childhood probably to those elementary schools, remembering and defining the differences in environment between then and now, and more wondering at its existence in the different now and then I got my own thinking straightened out. I recalled some of the things we had learned about the Zen. Their average lifespan had been 12,000 years, or a little over. So the Zen before me was, by hour standards, about 25 years old. Nothing at all strange about remembering when you are 25, the things that happened to you when you were 7. But the Zen's question, even my rationalization of my reaction to it, had given me a chill. Here was no cuddly teddy bear. This creature had been born before Christ. She had been alone for 3,000 years, on a chip of bone from her dead world beneath a sepulcher of stars. The last and greatest Martian civilization, the Lahrai, had risen and fallen in her lifetime, and she was 25 years old.
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How do I live here?
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She asked again. I got back into my own framework of temporal reference, so to speak, and began explaining to a Zen what a Zen was. I found out later from Yurt that biology, for the reasons which follow, was one of the most difficult studies. So difficult that nuclear physics actually preceded it. I told her that the Zen had been all evidence indicated, the toughest, hardest, longest lived creatures God had ever cooked up, practically independent of their environment, no special ecological niche, just raw, stubborn tenacious life developed to a fantastic extreme, a greater force of life than any other known one that could exist almost anywhere under practically any conditions, even floating in mid space, which, asteroids or no, this Xen was doing right now. The Zens breathed all right, but it was nothing they'd had to do in order to live. It gave them nothing. Their incredible metabolism couldn't scrounge up out of rock or cosmic rays or interstellar gas, or simply do without for a few thousand years. If the human body is a furnace, then the Zen body is a feeder pile. Maybe that, I thought, was what evolution always worked toward.
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Please, will you kill me?
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The Zen said. I'd been expecting that. Two years ago, on the bleak surface of Eros, Yurt had asked Engstrom to do the same thing. But I asked, asked why, although I knew what the answer would be, too. The Zen looked up at me. She was exhibiting every ounce of emotion a Zen is capable of, which is a lot, and I could recognize it, but not in any familiar terms. A tiny motion here, a quiver there, but very quiet and still for the most part. And that was the violent expression restraint. Yurt, after two years of living with us, still couldn't understand why we found this confusing, difficult. Aliens or being alien. I've tried so often to do it myself, the Zinn said softly.
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Why do I want you to kill me? She was even quieter. Maybe she was crying.
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how do you know there are no others in There are no others, she said almost inaudibly. I suppose a human girl might have shrieked it a child, I thought, when your world blew up and you survived. Now you're a young 3,000 year old woman, uneducated, afraid, probably crawling with neuroses. Even so, in your thousand year terms, young lady, you're not too old to change.
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She asked again, and suddenly I was having one of those eye popping third row center views of the whole scene. The enormous beautiful sky, the dead clad Vesta, the little creature who stood there staring at me. The brilliant ignorant human like alien old young creature who is asking me to kill her. For a moment the human quality of her thinking terrified me. The feeling you might have waking up some night and finding your pet puppy sitting on your chest, looking at you with wise eyes and white fangs gleaming. Then I thought of Yurt, smart, friendly Yurt, who had learned to laugh and wisecrack, and I came out of the jeebies. I realized that here was only a sick girl, no tiny monster, and if she were as resilient as Yurt, well, it was his problem. He'd probably pull her through. But I didn't pick her up. I made no attempt to take her back to the ship. Her tiny white teeth and tiny yellow claws were harder than steel, and she was, I knew, unbelievably strong for her size. If she got suspicious or decided to throw a phobic tizzy, she would scatter shreds of me over a square acre of Vesta in place, less time than it would take me to yelp.
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She began again. I tried shakily. Hell no. Wait there. Then I had to translate it. I went back to the lucky pier and got Yurt. We could do without him, even though he had been a big help. We taught him a lot. He'd been a child at the blowup too, and he'd taught us a lot. But this was more important, of course. When I told him what had happened, he was very quiet, crying perhaps, just like a human being with happiness. Cap Feldman asked me what was up and I told him, and he said, well, I'll be blessed. I said, yurt, are you sure you want us to keep hands off? Just go off and leave you? Yes, please. Feldman said, well, I'll be blessed. Yurt, who spoke excellent English, said, bless you all. I took him back to where the female waited from the ridge. I knew the entire crew was watching through my nocks. I set him down, and he fell to studying her intently. I am not a Zen, I told her, giving my torch full brilliance for the crew's sake. But Yurt here is. Do you see? I mean, do you know what you look like? She said. I can see enough of my own body, too. And yes, Yurt, I said, here's the female we thought we might find take over. Yurt's eyes were fastened on the girl.
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She whispered worriedly. I'm afraid that's something only a Zen would know, I told her, smiling inside my helmet. I'm not a Zen. Yurt is. She turned to him. You will tell me if it becomes necessary. He moved closer to her, not even looking back to talk to me. Give us some time to get acquainted, will you, Dave? And you might leave some supplies and a bubble at the camp when you move on, just to make things pleasanter. By this time he had reached the female. They were as still as space. Not a sound, not emotion. I wanted to hang around, but I knew how I'd feel if ah Zen, say, wouldn't go away, if I were the last man alive and had just met the last woman. I moved my torch off them and headed back to the lucky pier. We all had a drink to the saving of a great race that might have become extreme instinct. Ed Rice, though, had to do some worrying before he could down his drink. What if they don't like each other? He asked anxiously. They don't have much choice, captain Feldman said. Always the realist. Why do homely women fight for jobs on the most isolated space outposts? Rice grinned. That's right. They look awful good after a year or two in space. Make that 25 by Zen standards, or 3,000 by ours, said Joe Hargraves. And I'll bet they look beautiful to each other. We decided to drop our investigation of Vesta for the time being and come back to it after the honeymoon. Six months later when we returned, there were 1200 Zen on Vesta. Captain Feldman was a realist, but he was also a deeply moral man. He went to Yurt and said, it's indecent. Couldn't the two of you control yourselves at least a little? 1200 kids? We were rather surprised ourselves, yurt said complacently. But this seems to be how Xen reproduce. Can you have only half a child? Naturally, Feld got the authorities to quarantine Vesta. Good God, The Xen could push us clear out of the solar system in a couple of generations. I don't think they would, but you can't take such chances, can you? End of Zen by Jerome Bixby Read by Tommy Hersant, Carlsbad, California.
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Survival Tactics by Al Sivchik this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Survival Tactics by Al Sevchik There was a sudden crash that hung sharply in the air, as if a tree had been hit by lightning some distance away. Then another. Alan stopped, puzzled. Two more blasts quickly together and the sound of a scream. Faintly frowning, worrying about the sounds, Alan momentarily forgot to watch his step until his foot suddenly plunged the hill, throwing him to the jungle floor. Damn. He cursed again for the 10th time and stood uncertainly in the dimness from tall moss shrouded trees, wrist thick vines hung quietly, scraping the spongy ground like the tentacles of some monstrous tree bound octopus. Fitful little plants grew straggly in the shadows of the mossy trunks, forming a dense underbrush that made walking difficult. At midday. Some few of the blue sun's rays filtered through to the jungle floor, but now, late afternoon on the planet, the shadows were long and gloomy. Alan peered around him at the vine draped shadows, listening to the soft rustlings and faint twig snappings of life in the jungle. Two short popping sounds echoed through the stillness, drowned out almost immediately and silenced by an explosive crash. Allen started blaster fighting. But it can't be. Suddenly anxious, he slashed a hurried X into one of the trees to mark his position, then turned to follow a line of similar marks back through the jungle. He tried to run, but vines blocked his way and woody shrubs caught at his legs, tripping him and holding him back. Then through the trees he saw the clearing of the campsite, the temporary home for the scout ship, and the 11 men who, with Alan, were the only humans on the jungle planet Waimea. Stepping through the low shrubbery at the edge of the site, he looked across the open area to two temporary structures, the camp headquarters, where the power supplies and the computer were, and the sleeping quarters beyond. Nose high stood the silver scout ship that had brought the advance exploratory party of scientists and technicians to Waimea three days before. Except for a few of the killer robots rolling slowly around the campsite on their quiet treads, there was no one about. So they've finally got those things working. Alan smiled slightly Guess that means I owe Peter bourbon and soda. For sure. Anyone that can build a robot that hunts by homing in on animals Mind impulses. He stepped forward just as a roar of blue flame dissolved the branches of a tree barely above his head. Without pausing to think, Alan leapt back and fell sprawling over a bush just as one of the robots rolled silently up from the right, lowering its blaster barrel to aim directly at his head. Alan froze. My God, Pete built those things wrong. Suddenly, a screeching whirlwind of claws and teeth hurled itself from the smouldering branches and crashed against the robot, clawing insanely at the antenna and blaster barrel. With an awkward jerk, the robot swung around and fired, its blaster completely dissolving the lower half of the the cat creature, which had clung across the barrel. But the back pressure of the cat's body overloaded the discharge circuits. The robot started to shake, then clicked sharply as an overload relay snapped and shorted the blaster cells. The killer turned and rolled back towards the camp, leaving Alan alone. Shakily, Alan crawled a few feet back into the undergrowth, where he could lie and watch the camp, but not himself be seen. The visibility didn't make any difference to the robots. He felt safer somehow hidden. He knew now what the shooting sounds had been and why there hadn't been anyone around the campsite. A charred blob lying in the grass of a clearing confirmed his hypothesis. His stomach felt sick. I suppose, he muttered to himself, that Pete assembled these robots in a batch and then activated them all at once. Probably never living to realize that they're tuned to pick up human brain waves, too. Damn.
- [353:37]
Damn.
- [353:38]
His eyes blurred and he slammed his fist into the soft earth. When he raised his eyes again, the jungle was perceptibly darker. Stealthy rustlings in the shadows grew louder with the setting sun. Branches snapped unaccountably in the trees overhead, and every now and then leaves or a twig fell softly to the ground close to where he lay. Reaching into his jacket, Alan fingered his pocket blaster. He pulled it out and held it in his right hand. This pop gun wouldn't even singe a robot, but it might just stop one of those pumas. Slowly, Allen looked around, sizing up his situation. Behind him, the jungle rustled forbiddingly. He shuddered. Not a very healthy spot to spend the night. On the other hand, I certainly can't get to the camp with a pack of mind activated mechanical killers running around. If I could just hold out until morning when the big ship arrives. Big ship? Good Lord, Peggy. He turned white. Oily sweat punctuated his forehead. Peggy arriving tomorrow with the other colonists, the wives and kids, the metal killers tuned to blast any living flesh would murder them the instant they stepped from the ship. A pretty girl. Peggy, the girl he'd married just three weeks ago he still couldn't believe, was crazy. He supposed to marry a girl and then take off for an unknown planet with her to follow, to try and create a home in a jungle clearing. Crazy, maybe. But Peggy and her green eyes that changed color with the light, with her soft brown hair and her happy smile ended 30 years of loneliness and had at last given him a reason for living. Not to be killed. Alin unclenched his fists and wiped his palms bloody where his fingernails had dug into the flesh. There was a slight creak above him, like the protesting of a branch too. Heavily laden. Blaster ready, Allen rolled over onto his back. In the movement, his elbow struck the top of a small earthy mound and he was instantly engulfed in a swarm of locust like insects that beat disgustingly against his eyes and mouth.
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Thaa.
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Waving his arms before his face, he jumped up and backwards away from the bugs. As he did so, a dark, shapeless thing plopped from the trees onto the spot where he had been laying stretched out. Then, like an ambient fungus, it slithered off into the jungle undergrowth. For a split second the jungle stood frozen in a brilliant blue flash, followed by the sharp report of a blaster, then another. Alan whirled, startled. The planet's double moon had risen and he could see a robot rolling slowly across the clearing in his general direction, blasting indiscriminately at whatever mind impulses came within its pickup range. Birds, insects, anything. Six or seven others also left the camp headquarters area and headed for the jungle, each to a slightly different spot. Apparently the robot hadn't sensed him yet, but Allen didn't know what the effective range of its pickup devices was. He began to slide back into the jungle. Minutes later, looking back, he saw that the machine, though several hundred yards away, had altered its course and was now headed directly for him. His stomach tightened. Panic. The dank, musty smell of the jungle seemed for an instant to thicken and choke in his throat. He then thought of the big ship landing in the morning, settling down slowly after a lonely two week voyage. He thought of a brown haired girl crowding with the others to the gangway, eager to embrace the new planet, and the next instant a charred nothing, unrecognizable, the victim of a design error or misplaced wire in a machine. I have to try, he said aloud. I have to try. He moved into the blackness.
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tank, the killer robot was equipped to crush, slash, and burn its way through the undergrowth. Nevertheless, it was slowed by the larger trees and the thick clinging vines, and Alan found that he could manage to keep ahead of it, barely out of blaster range. Only the robot didn't get tired. Alan did. The twin moons cast pale, deceptive shadows that wavered and danced across the jungle floor, hiding debris that tripped him and often sent him sprawling into the dark. Sharp edged growths tore at his face and clothes, and insects, attracted by the blood matted against his pants and shirt. Behind, the robot crashed imperturbably after him, lighting the night with fitful blaster flashes as some winged or legged life came within its range. There was movement also in the darkness beside him, scrapings and rustlings and an occasional low, throaty sound like an angry cat. Alan's fingers tensed on his pocket blaster. Swift, shadowy forms moved quickly in the shrubs, and the growling became suddenly louder. He fired twice blindly into the undergrowth. Sharp screams punctuated the electric blue discharge as a pack of small feline creatures leaped, snarling and clawing, back into the night. Mentally, Allen tried to figure the charge remaining in his blaster. There wouldn't be much. Enough for a few more shots, maybe. Why the devil didn't I load fresh cells this morning? The robot crashed on louder now, gaining on the tired human, legs aching and bruised, stinging from insect bites. Allen tried to force himself to run, holding his hands in front of him like a child in the dark. His foot tripped on a barely visible insect hill, and a winged swarm exploded around him. Startled, Allen jerked sideways, crashing his head against a tree. He clutched at the bark for a second, dazed. Then his knees buckled. His blaster fell into the shadows. The robot crashed loudly behind him. Now, without stopping to think, Allen fumbled along the ground after his gun. Straining his eyes in the darkness, he found it just a couple of feet to one side, against the base of a small bush. Just as his fingers closed upon the barrel, his other hand slipped into something sticky that splashed over his forearm. He screamed in pain and leaped back, trying frantically to wipe the clinging, burning blackness off his arm. Patches of black scraped off onto branches and vines, but the rest spread slowly over his arm, as agonizing as hot acid or as flesh being ripped away layer by layer. Almost blinded by pain, whimpering, Alan stumbled forward. Sharp muscle spasms shot from his shoulder across his back and chest. Tears streamed across his cheeks. A blue arc slashed at the trees a mere hundred yards behind. He screamed at the blast. Damn you, Pete. Damn robots. Damn. Damn. Oh, Peggy. He stepped onto emptiness. Coolness, wet, slowly washed by the water. The pain began to fall away. He wanted to lie there forever in the dark, cool wetness, forever and ever. And the air thundered. In the dim light he could see the banks of the stream, higher than a man, muddy and loose, growing right to the edge of the banks. The jungle reached out with hairy, disjointed arms, as if to snag even the dirty little stream that passed through, timidly through its domain. Allin, lying in the mud of the streambed, felt the earth shake as the heavy little robot rolled slowly and inexorably towards him. The Lord High Executioner, he thought, in battle dress. He tried to stand, but his legs were almost too weak and his arm felt numb. I'll drown him, he said aloud. I'll drown the Lord High Executioner. He laughed. Then his mind cleared. He remembered where he was. Alan trembled. For the first time in his life, he understood what it was to live. Because for the first time he realized he would sometime die. In other times and circumstances he might have put it off for a while, for months or years. But eventually, as now, he would have to watch, still and helpless, while death came creeping. Then, at 30, Allen became a man. Damn it. No law says I have to flame out now. He forced himself to rise, forced his legs to stand, struggling painfully in the shin deep ooze. He worked his way to the bank and began to dig frenziedly, chest high, about 2ft below the edge. His arm, where the black thing had been, was swollen and tender, but he forced his hands to dig, dig, dig, cursing and crying to hide the pain and biting his lips, ignoring the salty taste of blood, the soft earth crumbled under his hands until he had a small cave about 3ft deep in the bank. Beyond that, the soil was held too tightly by the roots from above, and he had to stop. The air crackled blue, and a tree crashed heavily past Elin into the stream above him on the bank, silhouetting against the moons, the killer robot stopped, and its blaster swiveled slowly down frantically. Elen hugged the bank as a shaft of pure electricity arced over him, sliced into the water, and exploded in a cloud of steam. The robot shook for a second. Its blaster muzzle lifted erratically, and for an instant it seemed almost out of control. Then it quieted, and the muzzle again pointed down. Pressing with all his might, Alan slid slowly along the bank, inches at a time, away from the machine above. Its muzzle turned to follow him, but the edge of the bank blocked its aim. Grinding forward a couple of feet slightly overhanging the bank, the robot fired again. For a split second, Alan seemed engulfed in flame. The heat of hell singed his head and back, and mud boiled in the bank by his arm. Again, the robot trembled. It jerked forward a foot, and its blaster swung slightly away, but only for a moment. Then the gun swung back again. Suddenly, as if sensing something wrong, its track slammed into reverse. It stood poised for a second, its treads spinning crazily as the earth collapsed underneath it where Alan had dug. Then it fell with a heavy splash into the mud 10ft from where Allen stood. Without hesitation, Alan threw himself across the blaster housing, frantically locking his arms around the barrel as the robot's treads churned furiously in the sticky mud, causing it to buck and plunge like a Brahma ball. The treads stopped and the blaster jerked upwards, wrenching Alan's arms, then slammed down. Then the whole housing whirled around and around, tilting alternately up and down like a steel skinned water monster trying to dislodge a tenacious crab. While Alan, arms and legs wrapped tightly around the blaster barrel and housing, pressed fiercely against the robot's metal skin. Slowly trying to anticipate and shift his weight with the spinning plungers, Alan worked his hand down to his right hip. He fumbled for the sheath clipped to his belt, found it, and extracted a stubby hunting knife. Sweat and blood in his eyes. Hardly able to move on the wildly swinging turret, he felt down the sides to the thin crack between the revolving housing and the stationary portion of the robot. With a quick prayer, he jammed in the knife blade and was whipped headlong into the mud as the turret literally snapped to a stop. The earth, jungle and moon spun in a pinwheeled blur, slowed and settled to their proper places. Standing in the sticky, sweet smelling ooze, Allen eyed the robot apprehensively. Half buried in mud, it stood quiet in the shadowy light, except for an occasional, almost spasmodic jerk of its blaster barrel. For the first time that night, Allen allowed himself a slight smile. Blade in the old gearbox, eh? How does that feel, boy? He turned. Well, I better get out of here before the knife slips or the monster cooks up some more tricks with whatever it's got for a brain. Digging little footholds in the soft bank, he climbed up and stood once again in the rustling jungle darkness. I wonder, he thought, how Pete could cram enough brain into one of those things to make it hunt and track so perfectly. He tried to visualize the computing circuits needed for the operation of its tracking mechanism alone. There just isn't room for the electronics. You'd need a computer as big as the one at camp headquarters. In the distance, the sky blazed as a blaster roared in the jungle. Then Allen heard the approaching robot crunching and snapping its way through the undergrowth like an onrushing forest fire. He froze. Good Lord. They communicate with each other. The one I jammed up must be calling others to help. He began to move along the bank away from the crashing sounds. Suddenly he stopped. His eyes widened. Of course.
- [366:19]
Radio.
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I'll bet anything they're automatically controlled by the camp computer. That's where the brain is. He paused. Then if that were put out of commission. He jerked away from the bank and half ran, half pulled himself through the undergrowth towards the camp. Trees exploded to his left as another robot fired in his direction, too far away to be effective but churning towards him through the blackness. Allen changed directions slightly to follow a line between the two robots coming up from either side behind him. His eyes were well accustomed to the dark now. He managed to dodge most of the shadowy vines and branches before they could snag or trip him. Even so, he stumbled in the wiry underbrush and his legs were a mass of stinging slashes from ankle to thigh. The crashing rumble of the killer robots shook the knight behind him, nearer sometimes, then falling slightly back, but following constantly, more unshakable than bloodhounds because a man can sometimes cover a scent, but no man can stop his thoughts Intermittently, like photographers, strobes, blue flashes would light the jungle about him. Then for seconds afterwards, his eyes would see dancing streaks of yellow and sharp multi coloured pinwheels that alternately shrunk and Exploded, expanded, as if in a surrealist nightmare. Allen would have to pause and squeeze his eyelids tight shut before he could see again, and the robots would move a little closer to his right. The trees silhouetted briefly against brilliance as a third robot slowly moved up in the distance. Without thinking, Allen turned slightly to the left, then froze in momentary panic. I should be at camp now. Damn. What direction am I going? He tried to think back, to visualize the twists and turns he'd taken in the jungle. All I need is to get lost. He pictured the camp computer with no one to stop it, automatically sending its robots in wider and wider forays, slowly wiping every trace of life from the planet. Technologically advanced machines doing the job for which they were built completely, thoroughly, without feeling, and without human masters to separate sense from futility. Finally, parts would wear out, circuits would short, and one by one the killers would crunch to a halt. A few birds would still fly then, but a unique animal life, rare in the universe, would exist no more. And the bones of children, eager girls, and their men would also lie beside a rusty hulk beneath the alien sun. Peggy. As if in answer, a tree beside him breathed fire, then exploded. In the brief flash of the blaster shot, Alan saw the steel glint of a robot only a hundred yards away, much nearer than he had thought. Thank heaven for trees. He stepped back, felt his foot catch and something clutched futilely at some leaves and fell heavily. Pain danced up his leg as he grabbed his ankle. Quickly he felt the throbbing flesh. Damn the rotten luck anyway. He blinked the pain tears from his eyes and looked up into a robot's blaster jutting out of the foliage 30 yards away. Instinctively, in one motion, Allen grabbed his pocket blaster and fired. To his amazement, the robot jerked back. Its gun wobbled and started to tilt away. Then, getting itself under control, it swung back again to Faz Allen. He fired again, and again the robot reacted. It seemed familiar somehow. Then he remembered the robot on the riverbank, jiggling and swaying for seconds after each shot. Of course, he cursed himself for missing the obvious the blaster static blanks out radio transmission from the computer. For a few seconds, they even do it to themselves. Firing intermittently, he pulled himself upright and hobbled ahead through the bush. The robot shook spasmodically with each shot, its gun tilted upward at an awkward angle. Then, unexpectedly, Allen saw stars. Real stars, brilliant in the night sky. And half dragging his swelling leg, he stumbled out of the jungle into the camp clearing. Ahead, across 50 yards of grass, stood the headquarters building housing the robot controlling computer. Still Firing at short intervals, he started across the clearing, gritting his teeth at every step, straining every muscle. In spite of the agonizing pain, Alan forced himself to a limping run across the uneven ground, carefully avoiding the insect hills that jutted up through the grass. From the corner of his eye, he saw another of the robots standing shakily in the dark edge of the jungle, waiting, it seemed, for his small blaster to run dry be damned. You can't win now. Alan yelled between blaster shots, almost irrational from the pain that ripped jaggedly through his leg. Then it happened. A few feet from the building's door, his blaster quit. A click, a faint hiss when he frantically jerked the trigger again and again, and the spent cells released themselves from the device, falling in the grass at his feet. He dropped the useless gun.
- [370:50]
No.
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He threw himself on the ground as a new robot suddenly appeared from around the edge of the building a few feet away, aimed and fired. Air burned over Allen's back and ozone tingled in his nostrils, blinding itself for a few seconds with its eyes own blaster static. The robot paused, momentarily jiggling in place. In this instant, Allen jammed his hands into an insect hill and hurled the pile of dirt and insects directly at the robot's antenna. In a flash, hundreds of the winged things erupted angrily from the hole in a swarming cloud, each part of which was a speck of life, transmitting mental energy to the robot's pickup devices. Confused by the sudden dispersion of mind impulses, the robot fired erratically as Alan crouched and raced painfully for the door. It fired again, closer, as he fumbled with the lock release. Jagged bits of plastic and stone ripped past him, torn loose by the blast. Frantically, Allen slammed open the door as the robot, sensing him strongly now, aimed point blank. He saw nothing. His mind thought of nothing but the red clad safety switch mounted beside the computer. Time stopped. There was nothing else in the world. He half jumped, half fell towards it slowly in tenths of seconds that seemed measured out in years. The universe went black. Later, brilliance pressed upon his eyes. Then pain returned, a multi hurting thing that crawled through his body and dragged ragged tentacles across his brain. He moaned. A voice spoke hollowly in the distance. He's waking.
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Call his wife.
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Alan opened his eyes. In a white room, a white light hung over his head. Beside him, looking down with a rueful smile, stood a young man wearing space medical insignia. Yes, he acknowledged the question in Allen's eyes. You hit the switch. That was three days ago. When you're up again, we'd all like to thank you. Suddenly a sobbing, laughing, green eyed girl was pressed totally against him. Neither of them spoke. They couldn't. There was too much to say. End of Survival Tactics by Al Sevchick Recorded by Evan Williams, Wellington, New Zealand.
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The Sloths of Crovni by Verne Fearing this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org here's golf legend John Daly.
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This Monday.com ad was created by a team of people and AI agents. Reese, our content agent, wrote the copy based on our best practices, like mentioning Monday.com three times. That was the second. Johnny, our coordination agent, built the timeline and kept everyone aligned. Olivia, our human creative director, stayed in the loop because agents are great, but they don't always know when a joke lands. She had one note tell listeners it only takes minutes to build an agent. So minutes. Create your own AI agent. Today on Monday.com the sloths of Crivni
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by Verne Fearing this world we live in is a pretty grim place. It's tough to make a living. At any moment we may get blown up, down, or sideways by the atom bomb. The day after tomorrow may never come. And on top of all this, TV commercials are getting worse and worse. It seems that our only salvation is a sense of humor. So we give you, the sloths a very unserious yarn. Broadly broad shoulders. Friends call him Brad, wore broad, wore shoulders, stood grim lipped, as is the custom of spacemen, and waited for the Commander to speak fateful words. He was an obese youth, fully five feet tall without a shred of muscle, but he wore the green tunic of the Galaxy Patrol proudly, and his handsome bony head boasted a tidy crop of Venusian fungus. His gleaming eyes gleamed. Brad, we are in a tough fix, the Commander said suddenly. His name was Metternich, known also as Foxy Grandpa. He had spoken in capitals all over Europe and continued the practice. Since we are up against it, he went on, the fate of the world may be at stake. What's wrong, Chief? Asked Brad jauntily. Plenty, wrote Metternich. Nobody's attacking the Earth. That's what's wrong. Nobody is out to conquer the universe. How come, may I ask? Brad gulped. Could he believe his ears? No one attacking good, kind old Earth. Was there nothing in which a man could pin his face, let alone his ears? Were they indeed his ears? He turned to his best friend, Hug, who stood beside him. Would he stand behind him? Did he realize they were on the verge of amission? Hug was a pastiche or intermezzo, a cross between a Martian and a Texan, as loathsome and stupid a combination as one could wish. Why he was Brat's best friend was a mystery. Squarely he met Brat's gaze, which left him an eye to spare. It winked, and Brad shuddered. It was an omen. I want to know why. The commander shouted. You have your secret orders. Off with you. A really fat omen. The good ship Lockswink was almost ready to go. She was a fine, spaceworthy craft, brand new. Just the same, it was disconcerting to see rats that deserting her by the thousands. Not that he missed them. Some were sure to return as soon as Oohg appeared on the scene. He seemed to fascinate them. Just then the rats paused. Sure enough, Ogoe was coming. He was reeling. He had apparently made the rounds, as is the custom of spacemen swilling vast quantities of airplane dope, and he was high as a kite. Brad glommed him glumly in the gloaming, with more than a glimmer of gloomy foreboding. It was wrong, he thought. All wrong. If only it hadn't been too late to turn back. But it wasn't. They hadn't even started yet. If anything, it was too early. There was no way out. He entered the spaceship with a sigh. Cy, whose whole name was Silas Mariner, shook his hand weakly, muttered, remember the Albatross? And tottered out. It was an omen. Presently Brad and Oak were blasting off as a cigar shaped vessel rose to the starry void. Spacemen, their visages lined and tanned like cigars, held their cigars aloft in silent salute and gently flicked their ashes while softly a cigar band played Maracas. Why you no love me no more? Two days out, Brad summoned Oog. How fast are we going? Oh, say, 30,000 miles an hour. Brad calculated rapidly and put down his abacus. At this rate It'll take us 14 years just to get out of our own lousy solar system. He barked. Faster. Oog said, yes, sir, and vice versa. Then he upped the speed to 186,000 miles per second and came back and shyly told Brad. Brad said, bah, we'll be 70 years reaching the Big Dipper.
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Faster.
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But nothing can go any faster, protested Hug. According to Einstein. To hell with Einstein, rode Brad. Is he paying your salary? So they went faster. The ship sped onward, unless it was upward to fulfill its mission. Again and again Brad found himself wondering where he was going. The mission was real stiff. He knew only that since there was practically no life anywhere in the solar system except for good, kind old Earth, Earth had seen to that. Anyone attacking Earth or not doing so was obviously somewhere in outer space. But here the trail ended. Courage, he told himself, courage. After all, was he not the grandson of Pierre Fromage, inventor of the rubber band motor? With a start he realized he was not. His own heritage, while covered with peculiar glory, was a more tragic one. The spaceman's heritage. The broad shoulders were brave, but things happened to them. His grandfather, a traffic officer, had chased a comet for speeding and had unfortunately overtaken it. His father had been spared the fire. But one day aboard his spaceship, someone spilled a glass of water. The gravity was off at the time, and the water just hung there in mid air until Brad's father walked into it and drowned. What would be his own end, he wondered. What other way was there to die? Just then, through the bulkhead, he could hear Hug swinging in his hammock, playing the violin. He wondered if the rats were dancing like the last time he'd surprised him. Another thought was on the way. Something about rats and a new way to die. But Brad was already asleep, mercifully having a nightmare. It was morning of the fifth day when the emergency alarm was suddenly activated. Instantly, a host of automatic devices went off. One turned on the fan, another blew the fuses. A third made the beds. Bells clanged and bugles sounded, every call from battle stations to abandon ship. Brad and Og slept through it all. Nothing was wrong, except with the emergency alarm ea it wore itself out and the eventful voyage continued. Brad woke on the ninth day. The two day bill he'd taken on the third day had evidently done its work well. He was rested. He felt optimistic again. When he looked out the porthole, he could see plenty of space for improvement. But what was that? There, half obscured in a tumbling, swirling mass of misty gray clouds, he could make out something white. He pressed his nose against the porthole and strained his eyes. It gave him the feeling of peering into a bandix, as is the custom of spacemen. His mouth went damn dry. This was it, whatever it was. Ugh. He shouted, all agog. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. Dashed in, wheeling a large kaleidoscope. Expertly, they read the directions and trained it on the mysterious formation. The indicator turned pale. By the ring tailed dug Star of Sirius. Barked Brad. Why, it's nothing more than an enormous gallstone revolving in space. This is serious. Barked Oog. That's what I barked. Snapped Brad. And don't ask me whose it is. It's big enough to support life, that's the main issue. Prepare to land a strange yet resplendent civilization, thought Brad, looking out at a sunlit sunscape or goldscape of molten gold. The houses, stylish igloos and mosques were sturdily constructed of three ply cardboard and driftwood. Before each house mysteriously stood a Berber pole of solid peppermint. Brad and Oog bounded out of their ship. The two bounders stood there encased in heat resistant Pyrex pants, expecting the natives to make things hot for them. Dumbfounded at the delay, they waited for the attack to commence. It did not. I never, said Brad. Presently, if we needed proof, we've got it. Such a display of indolence is testimony enough that these people are responsible for not attacking Earth. We shall have to use Stratamerji. Swiftly he took off his pants, revealing underneath the red flannel costume of a 17th century century French courtier, complete with powdered wig and Falstaff. Hugues ran up a flag emblazoned with a legend Diplomacy and Agriculture, then planted beans all around the ship while Brad postured and danced the minuet. The clever scheme worked beautifully. Soon an old man began circling them on a bicycle, keeping a safe distance. Clearly he was someone of importance, for his long white beard was carefully braided and coiled in a delivery basket on the handlebars. Furthermore, he wore a glowing circlet on his forehead so that Brad knew he was able to read their minds, if they had any. How about throwing us a couple circlets? Brad cried. Instead, the old man, who was hard of hearing, flung them a couple cutlets, which worked even better and had protein besides. Thus fortified, they were escorted to the palace. Some moments earlier Brad had learned first, that Cruvni was the name of this unusual culture, and second, that the High Cruv himself, attended by all his nobles, would see him. Brad had then entered the kruv chamber, or trapeze room, and he had learned nothing since. It was all true, he told himself. The High cruff was hanging by his toes from a trapeze, and so were all his nobles. The only difference was that the high cruise trapeze was more ordinate than the rest. Yes, said Brad to himself, it was all true. He had been shaking and punching his head, and nothing had changed. I come, he said, from a far away land. Shut up. Cried the croup. Who cares? At this the old man, who was still on his bicycle, whispered to to Brad, they've all got headaches. He nodded, stroking his beard sagebrushly. It's all part of a great cosmic error, a tragedy played among the spiral nebulae to the hollow ringing laughter of the gods. You see, we sloths are only half the population of Groveni, he went on. On the other side of our world live the Side men or sad sacks. Legend has it that aeons ago the Side Men were mistakenly delivered a cargo of saxophones from Saxe Fifth Avenue. The old man's voice was hushed as he added, they have been practising ever since. I see, said Brad. And that account for the headaches here. Small wonder, said the old man. I blessed the day I went deaf. But why do they do it? Asked Brad. The Sidemen. They're trying to drive us off on the ranch. The planet, I mean. You see, they claim they made this whole darn goldstone themselves. Made it? Asked Brad. Dolly. Aha. The old man spat. Mercurian tobacco juice. Just like on Earth, where myriad minute oceanic organisms pile their skeletons to form coral islands. You see, the Sidemen eat radishes, love em, in fact, but it gives them gallstones. They claim this whole world is the collected gallstones of their ancestors. The old man wiped Mercurian tobacco juice from his beard and shoes. Kind of a hard claim to beat, he opined. I see, said Brad. That explains the misty swirling clouds all around this planet, and why it's seldom visible. You follow me? Yep, said the old man. It's gas. Them radishes'll turn on you every time. Suddenly the High crow began to sob. Now you see, don't you, why we haven't attacked Earth? A body can't keep his mind on anything around here. I asked for a few secret weapons, and what did I get? He was blubbering now. Oh, I tried. I tried appropriations and all that, you may be sure. We lined our pockets, but after years of stalling they showed up with two weapons they swore were terrible enough to put an end to war. One of them was a water pistol I see, said Brad. And the other? A ray gun. Brad's eyes brightened. A ray gun. May I see how it works? Indeed you may. A platoon of maroon dragoons dragged in a queer apparatus. It looked like a medieval cannon with a Victorian phonograph speaker flaring from its business end. The dragoons ranged around the weapon, keeping their backs to it. One of them clutched the firing lanyard. There was a pause, a brittle silence. Then the lanyard snapped. Ray. Shouted the ray gun. What was that? Asked Brad. Twice more. The lanyard snapped. The ray gun boomed.
- [388:40]
Ray.
- [388:41]
Ray. You mean all it does is shout, Ray? Asked Brad. Well, it can also shout Max, said the old man. Fearful, ain't it? Yes, said Brad. He took a piece of old parchment from a breast pocket. This, he stated, is the original deed to Manhattan. Notice here on the bottom where it says $24. I'm signing it over to you. He signed with a flourish. Now you have a legal claim, a crusade, and a nice piece of property. Go get it. But the head aches. Cried the old man. Cool, man, cool. Said Brad. I'll mix a Bromo. Is it habit forming? Cried the High Cruise. Not a bit, said Brad, mixing it simply. Take one an hour. Forever. And now I must bid you farewell. Wait. Cried the crow. Don't you want to take my lovely daughter back with you? Brad looked at her. She was lovely. She had scales, but she was lovely. She had magnificent blond hair, some of it almost an inch long, none of it on her head, but she was lovely. Well, said Brad hesitatingly. He had his eyes glued on her. When he took them off, they made a noise like vacuum cups.
- [389:57]
Plop.
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Your mother won't like her whispered oog. Well, said Brad. He could feel duty tugging inside. Not for him, the pipe and slippers. He was one of Spaceways men. He would go the spaceman's way off into Wayman's space. Waymen, not women, he told himself sternly.
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Ethereum, the vacuous void, the black velvet wastes, the outspread cloak of the universe dripping with stardust, the undreamt of galaxies. These were the things by which he lived. Well, said Brad. Come on, said Ooh, we'll only fight over her. Slowly they bounded back to their spaceship. The ship sped backward, headed for Earth. It was days before the mistake was discovered. Discovered. And this alone spared their lives. For had they completed their journey on schedule? But why be morbid? The fact is, the Earth blew up. What a sight, the whole thing whirling one minute like the globe in Ms. Fogarty's geography supply closet. The next minute, wham. O. Gee. Said Ooh soberly. Guess we're lucky, huh? Well, said Brad. He hadn't said anything else for days, but he didn't seem well at all. Funny, he thought, they promise you if you go on working, work hard, and don't fool around, don't ask questions, just do your job, everything'll come your way. The next thing, they're all dead and there's nobody to complain to. Even was it selfish to think of one's career at a time like this. No, he told himself, it was all he knew. The patrol was all that mattered. He did some rapid calculations. They were far off the interplanetary travel lanes. Their fuel supply was down to a single can of kerosene. Food for perhaps two days remained. As he listened to Oohe tuning his violin, scarcely audible over the squeakings and squealings that filled the spaceship, he realized that the only solution, the only thing that could save them or the future of Earthman, was for a shipload of beautiful dames to rescue them within the next 36 hours. He figured the odds against this to be 50 billion to one. But Brad had fought big odds before. Grim lipped. He shaved. End of the Sloths of Crovni by Verne Fearing.
- [393:15]
World in a Mirror by Albert Teichner this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org Recording by Andrew Gantz World in a Mirror by Albert Teichner God knows I didn't want Hacker in the preliminary delegation. Right from the start, I wasn't thinking either of the screwball ways history can go about poetically repeating itself sometimes. I just knew that an uppity smart alecky kid of 50 could only cause trouble. He already had. Rena had been our earlier landfall on the first interstellar expedition. It possessed a fairly intelligent form of life, even if the Rainin's were oviparous and technologically retarded. Hacker had taken over the bulldozer to clear the area around our craft, Terra One, and he had been repeatedly told to stay very close to it. But no, he insisted on flattening out the peat like top of the nearest hill, too. Unfortunately, that hilltop was an incubation bed for rain and fledglings. The massacre involved not only a vast number of hatchling eggs, but five adult females, and we had to get away pronto, while thousands of paper limbs waved threateningly at the murderers from Earth. I'm only the science chronicler of this expedition, but Dr. Barnes is chief medical officer. His protests should have mattered where mine didn't. I'm a hundred percent behind Johnson, he told Captain Webber. That kid's no damned good. The three of us will go into town with these New Tanians, and sure as I'm standing here, Hacker will do something wrong. Captain Webber, looking worried as usual, tried to explain, he'll just do the chauffeuring. But he got off that tack immediately when he saw we were not following along. Look, I know he's a pest, but this is a political matter for the good of the Space Corps. His great, great uncle is President of the World Council, for all I know. The old man hates his guts, won't listen to a word he says. But let's not take any chances. We're going to need plenty of these. Expeditions and hyperdrive craft take an awful lot out of the economy. The upshot of the matter was that we patriotically agreed to the setup. The Captain gave Hacker a good chewing out about respecting the rights of the Neutanians. The kid turned out to be surprisingly amenable on that score. They're human, he said, and I could see he was very sincere about it. I wouldn't do anything to hurt them, sir. What's more, they must be almost as smart as we are, and I'm not about to commit suicide. So the three of us got into the jeep and rolled out of Terra 1 onto Newtain's soil. I still felt uncomfortable about Hacker, though. He had tasted blood on Reina, and the effect of that on him had been unusually bad. He had acquired a reckless attitude toward the rights of intelligent life, his own included. As if to prove me wrong, he drove very carefully over the special road the Neutanians had laid out overnight from our landing area to the highway a mile or so away, the three carloads of scowling plenipotentiaries up ahead looked appealingly funny. While the Neutanians were remarkably, even handsomely like us. Except for a certain closeness of the eyes and reversed ordering of their fingers, their facial muscles carried a different emotional convictions. On our landing, 10 hours before, those officials had thought our smiling faces indicated angry aggressiveness, and we had been equally uncertain about their intentions. But their semanticizer had eventually made the true state of affairs clear. Evolution had determined that an upward set of Newtonian facial muscles meant a bad situation. A downward set pleasure and cordiality. The more they scowled, the more we smiled, and everybody was happy about the potential flowering of transgalactic culture that we were instituting. When we turned on to the magnificent superhighway, however, Hacker became furious. He kept trying to pull over to the right, but a steady stream of scarab shaped cars filled with curious sightseaters kept getting in his way. This is crazy. He cried. I think they drive on the left here, Dr. Barnes tried to explain. That's what I mean. They're crazy. They did it that way in England for centuries, I said. It took a long time to get them to change. Fine, fine. Suddenly he laughed, as if pleased with his capacity for tolerance. If it's good enough for them, it's good enough for us. Visitors. They sure know how to build beautiful roads. I suppose I should have been pleased with this shift toward good humor, but I wasn't. I could just not like the youngster. He had been forgivably cocky for his age before, but now something nasty had been added. Still, he remained on his best behavior as we approached Cronus, the capital city. Its golden towers gleamed in the sun, and everywhere there were crowds of beautiful tan people waving to us and happily scowling their welcome. The lead cars stopped before a particularly elegant skyscraper that was set in the middle of vast, symmetrical gardens. We got out and were greeted by dignitaries, accompanied by technicians with semanticizing equipment. If this equipment worked slowly, it was still faster than any we'd developed. The men who came toward us were puzzled when we extended our hands, but once the translation came through and they understood it was an Earth custom, they copied our gesture, only they all put out their left hands. It took a while before reasonable contact could be made. Interesting, said Dr. Barnes. They all seemed to be left handed. I don't see what's so interesting about that. Hacker snorted through his puggish nose. I've seen left handed people on Earth. Good for you, the doctor answered dryly. Hacker looked a little annoyed, but for once managed to keep quiet. I explained to the receiving delegation how hyper radio contact could be established with our system for information exchanges, and then told them tomorrow's group from Terra One would be much larger. It would be in a position to set out the technical arrangements in all the necessary detail. The dialogue crept along as translations were made, but finally an especially regal figure stepped forward and told us the rest of the proceedings would take place within the building. We followed the Newtanians into a hall so vast that we still seemed to be outdoors. Subtle colors were playing freeform patterns on the walls, and the synesthetic reaction was that of hearing a music too beautiful, too perfect for the relative crudity of the human ear to grasp alone. This, hacker laughed, is my idea of heaven. I wasn't about to unbend and openly agree with him on anything but Celestial it really was. And then the subtly rich smells of the food began to play on our nostrils. It was brought out on great automatic servers and robot arms set heaping steaming plates before the 50 Neutanians. We, of course, had to refuse taking out our compacted rations and setting them before us. All the Neutanians were still meat eaters. The main course was a small fowl, thoroughly browned in gravy. For me, the most interesting thing about it was that four drumstick legs stuck out of each each torso rather than the regulation two found on all Earth based birds. For Hacker, though, a more practical matter was involved. I'd sure like to try a helping of that bird, he said. The two of us naturally were shocked. That must have been a living creature once, said Barnes. So what? Well, our civilization is essentially vegetarian. They just haven't reached our level as yet. And that respect nuts. Loaf to you, hacker snapped. And synthetic yeast pie too. I've eaten flesh. That really upset me. I know there's still a little surreptitious meat consumption on Earth. Genetics show we must get a few throwbacks in every generation, but I'd never before met anyone who openly boasted about it. Synthetic foods meet gourmet needs better than traditional ones do anyway. Of course I don't mean the dull compacted stuff we get on long space hops, but the food served on Terran planets themselves. Any Earthman eating flesh back home is deliberately trying to taste the atavistic sensations of savagery. You know how immoral that is, I told him. Hacker, let's forget the moral issue, barnes said, considering him with disgust. Let's just be Sensible. We don't know enough about Newtain yet to eat anything. Hacker laughed. Why, it smells just like our own food, only better. He picked at his Vita concentrate. Oh, let's forget about the whole thing. We tried to. Several dignitaries rose to their full seven feet and spoke slowly into semanticizers, flinging their queer hands out for emphasis with their thumbs waving where our pink monkeys do. Suddenly, though, Hacker got up from his seat and hurried down the long table to the place where the leading spokesman was eating. He leaned over him, speaking into the nearest translator, and I could see the Newtanian smiling broadly as if trying to refuse something, while Hacker frowned. Finally the smile faded into a friendly scowl. Nothing good could be coming out of this. A minute later a robot arm proffered a loaded plate to Hacker and he started back to us with it. Barnes rose to stop him, but before Hacker reached us he had taken two mouthfuls of the meat. I have never seen such sheer self satisfied delight on a human face as after those first bites. You shouldn't be doing that, barnes said when he sat down next to us again. You're just old fogies. Hacker grunted through a meat stuffed mouth. This is the best food I've ever eaten. He somehow shoveled another load of meat between his lips. Thirty seconds later, his face twisted into a caricature of the human physiognomy, all writhing lines as if every muscle were breaking loose from its neighbors. The last unswallowed portion of food erupted from his mouth and he fell forward into the vile mess. He was dead. Pandemonium spread through the hall everywhere. Wildly smiling faces expressed despair at such an end for an honored guest. Barnes sprang into action, pulling the portable medical kit from his belt and immediately starting blood tests while some native doctors joined him with their emergency equipment. Must start revitalizing immediately, he said, then stopped, ashen faced as he studied an analyzer tube. Fantastic. No, it can't be. The Newtanians were equally bewildered. They rushed Hacker to a nearby treatment chamber. All I could do was wait while the Newtanian leader explained that Hacker had told him we had authorized his trying the food. There was no need to doubt his story. It was just what the kid would have done. I did my best to assure him that we knew his intentions had been honorable. A half hour later, Barnes returned, a robot platform following with Hacker, body covered by a preservative glaze on it. Nothing can be done, he said. I've tried everything. Hacker's too thoroughly dead for anything ever to bring him back. We'll just have to take his body home for further study. But what killed him? I demanded a dozen or so things out of a thousand possibilities. You mean you don't have any idea? Oh, I have some idea. Too many ideas, in fact. Look, Johnson, chemistry's not your specialty, but this is fairly elementary. All life contains protein, right? Right. And all protein consists of amino acids. Every natural protein back home is built on levo left turn amino acids. Here it is just the opposite, the mirror image of what we know. Every amino acid is dextro to the right. But how can it be different here, Johnson? They could ask the same question about us with equal justification. Or rather, equal lack of justification. I was trying to feel my way through the confusion, Barnes. I know a world could be made of antimatter, but no. No. Antimatter is a reversal of changes within the atom. These atoms are the same as ours. It's the organization that is different. Regular molecules with a different twist. But why should it have killed him, then? We absorb starch and reject cellulose, which is closely related, but the body just refuses to accept the cellulose. It doesn't necessarily go ahead and die. Starch and cellulose are both dextro, old man. This is a more fundamental difference. Maybe the body just throws off some of these compounds, too, but there were some. Plenty, I suspect, it couldn't throw off. He glanced toward the stiffening corpse sympathetically. The poor kid couldn't leave well enough alone. Well, we are two universal days out from newtain, and soon we will drop from hyperdrive as we reach the orbit of Pluto. I shouldn't still be feeling uneasy as I do. I'm sure I shouldn't. We have had five friendly, informative days with the people of a great civilization remarkably like ours, and President Hacker has radioed he understands perfectly that we were not responsible for the tragedy. Tragedy? Nobody was. The kid, it seems, wasn't the apple of his eye anyway. 90 men and 1 corpse returning to the security of terra firma. I should, when all is said and done, be happy with the way most things have worked out. But I am a chronicler, and I know the peculiarly symbolic, seemingly superficial ways in which history manages to repeat itself. It is more than three centuries since the last war on Earth between rightists and leftists that was a matter of differing concepts of economics and politics. I can't help wondering, though, whether there are not even more fundamental points of eventual conflict in the universe that we have barely discovered. If there are, I'm beginning to suspect they'll still have something to do with the unfair, unfathomable difference between right and left, a difference that took many lives centuries ago and may not be through with us yet. End of World in a Mirror by Albert Tykeler.
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is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org ham sandwich by James H. Smich There was no one standing or sitting around in the tastefully furnished entry hall of the Institute of Insight when Wallace Cavendar walked into it. He was almost half an hour late for the regular Sunday night meeting of advanced students, and Even Mavis Greenfield, Dr. Ormond's secretary, who always stayed for a while at her desk in the hall to sign in the Stranglers had disappeared. However, she had left the attendance book lying open on the desk with a pen placed invitingly beside it. Wallace Cavendar dutifully entered his name in the book. The distant deep voice of Dr. Alloy's Ormond was dimly audible, coming from the direction of the lecture room, and Cavendar followed its faint reverberations down a narrow corridor until he reached a closed door. He eased the door open and slipped unobtrusively into the back of the lecture room. As usual, Most of the 30 odd advanced students present had seated themselves on the right side of the room, where they were somewhat closer to the speaker. Cavendar started towards the almost vacant rows of chairs on the left, smiling apologetically to Dr. Ormond, who, as the door opened, had glanced up without interrupting his talk. Three other faces turned towards Cavendar from across the room. Reuben Jeffries, a heavy set man with a thin fringe of black hair circling an otherwise bald scalp, nodded soberly and looked away again. Mavis Greenfield, a few rows further up, produced a smile and a reproachful little headshake. During the coffee break she would carefully explain to Cavendar once more that students too tardy to take in Dr. Ohl's introductory lecture missed the most valuable part of these meetings. From old Mrs. Folsom in the front row on the right, Cavendish's belated arrival drew a more definite rebuke. She stared at him for half a dozen seconds with a coldly severe frown, mouth puckered in disapproval, before returning her attention to Dr. Ormond. Cavendish sat down in the first chair he came to and let himself go comfortably limp. He was dead tired, had even hesitated over coming to the Institute of Insights to night, but it wouldn't do to skip the meeting. A number of his fellow students, notably Mrs. Folsom, already regarded him as a black ship, and if enough of them complained to Dr. Ormond that Cavendish's laxness threatened to retard the overall advance of the group of towards the goal of Total Insight, Ormond might decide to exclude him from further study. At a guess, Cavendar thought cynically, it would have happened by now if the confidential report the Institute had obtained and his financial status had been less impressive. A healthy bank balance wasn't an absolute requirement for membership, but it helped. It helped. All but a handful of the advanced students were in the upper income brackets. Cavendar let his gaze shift unobtrusively about the group while some almost automatic part of his mind began to pick up the thread of Dr. Al's discourse. After a dozen or so sentences, he realized that the evening's theme was the relationship between subjective and objective reality, as understood in the light of Total Insight. It was a well worn subject. Dr. Al repeated himself a great deal. Most of his audience nevertheless was following his words with intent interest, many taking notes and frowning in concentration. As Mavis Greenfield liked to express it, quoting the doctor himself, the idea you didn't pick up when it was first presented might come clear to you the fifth or sixth time around. Cavendish suspected, however, that as far as he was concerned, much of the theory of Total Insight was doomed to to remain forever obscure. He settled his attention on the only two students on this side of the room with him. Dexter Jones and Perry Rochelle were sitting side by side in front row chairs, the same chairs they usually occupied during these meetings. They were exceptions to the general run of the group in a number of ways. Younger, for one thing. Dexter was 29 and Perry 23, while the group averaged out at around 45, which happened to be Cavendish age. Neither was blessed with worldly riches. In fact, it was questionable whether the Rochelle girl who described herself as a commercial artist even had a bank account. Dexter Jones, a grade school teacher, did have one, but was able to keep it barely high enough to cover his rent and car payment checks. Their value to the Institute was of a different kind. Both possessed esoteric mental talents, rather modest ones to be sure, but still very interesting, so that on occasion they could state accurately what was contained in a sealed envelope or give a recognizable description of the photograph of a loved one hidden in another student's wallet. This provided the group with encouraging evidence that such abilities were indeed no fable, and somewhere along the difficult road to Total Insight might be attained by all. In addition, Perry and Dexter were volunteers for what Dr. Alois Ormond referred to cryptically as very advanced experimentation. This group at large had not been told the exact nature of these experiments, but the implication was that they were mental exercises of such power that Dr. Al did not wish other advanced students to try them until the brave pioneer work being done by Perry and Dexter was concluded and he had evaluated the results. Headaches, Dr. Al, said Perry Rochelle. Sometimes quite bad headaches. She hesitated. She was a thin, pale girl with untidy arranged brown hair who vacillated between periods of vivacious alertness and activity and somewhat shorter periods of blank faced withdrawal. And then she went on, there are times during the day when I get to feeling sort of confused and not quite sure whether I'm asleep or awake, you know. Dr. Ormond nodded, gazing at her reflectively from the little lectern on which he leaned. His composed smile indicated that he was not in the least surprised or disturbed. Disturbed by her report on the results of the weeks experiments, that they were in fact precisely the results he had expected. I'll speak to you about it later, Perry, he told her gently. Dexter, what experiences have you had? Dexter Jones cleared his throat. He was a serious young man who appeared at meetings conservatively and neatly dressed and shaved to the quick and rarely spoke unless spoken to. Well, Nothing very dramatic, Dr. Al, he said diffidently. I did have a few nightmares during the week, but I'm not sure there's any connection between them and what you were having us do. Dr. Ormond stroked his chin and regarded Dexter with benevolence. A connection seems quite possible, Dexter. Let's assume it exists. What can you tell us about those nightmares? Dexter said he was afraid he couldn't actually tell them anything. By the time he was fully awake he'd had only a very vague impression of what the nightmares were about, and the only part he could remember clearly now was that they had been quite alarming. Old Mrs. Folsom, who was more than a little jealous of the special attention enjoyed by Dexter and Perry, broke in eagerly at that point to tell about a nightmare she she'd had during the week and which she could remember fully, and Cavendish's attention drifted away from the talk. Mrs. Folsom was an old bore at best, but a very wealthy old bore, which was why Dr. Ormond usually let her ramble on a while before stirring the conversation back to the business of the meeting. But Cavendar didn't have to pretend to listen. From his vantage point behind most of the group, he let his gaze and thoughts wander from one to the other of them again. For the majority of the advanced students, he reflected, the Institute of Insight wasn't really too healthy a place, but it offered compensations. Middle aged or past it on the average financially secure, vaguely disappointed in life, they'd found in Dr. Al a friendly and eloquent guide to lead them into the fascinating worlds of their own minds. And Dr. Al was good at it. He had borrowed as heavily from yoga and Western mysticism as from various orthodox and unorthodox psychological disciplines, and composed his own system, almost his own cosmology. His exercises would have made conservative psychiatrists shudder, but Hugh was clever enough to avoid getting his flock into too serious mental difficulties. If some of them suffered a bit now and then, it made the quest of total insight and the thought that they were progressing towards that goal more real and convincing. And meeting after meeting, Dr. Al came up with some intriguing new twist or device, some fresh experience to keep their interest level high. Always bear in mind, he was saying earnestly at the moment, that an advance made by any member of the group benefits the Group as a whole. Thus, because of the work done by our Young Pioneers this week, I see indications tonight that the Group is ready to attempt a new experiment. An experiment at a level I frankly admit I hadn't anticipated you would achieve for at least another two months. Dr. Ormond paused significantly, the pause underlying his words. There was an expectant stirring among the students. But I must caution you, he went on, we cannot, of course, be certain that the experiment will succeed. In fact, it would be a very remarkable thing if it did succeed at a first attempt. But if it should, you will have had a rather startling experience. You will have seen a thing generally considered to be impossible. He smiled reassuringly, stepping down from the lectern. Naturally, there will be no danger. You know me well enough to realize that I never permit the group or individuals to attempt what lies beyond their capability. Cavendish stifled a yawn, blinked water from his eyes, watching Ormond walk over to a small polished table on the left side of the room, in front of the rows of chairs. On it, Mavis Greenfield had placed a number of enigmatic articles, some of which would be employed as props in one manner or another during the evening's work. The most prominent item was a small suit case in red alligator hide. Dr. Ormond, however, passed up the suit case, took a small, flat wooden plate from the table, and returned to the centre of the room. On this, he said, holding up the plate, there rests at this moment the air of this planet and nothing else. But in a minute or two for each of you in his or her world of subjective reality, something else will appear on it. The students nodded comprehendingly. So far, the experiment was on familiar ground. Dr. Ormond gave them all a good humored wink to emphasize, he went on, that we deal here with practical, down to earth real matters, not some mystical nonsense. To emphasize that, let us say that the object each of you will visualize on this plate will be a ham sandwich. There were appreciative chuckles, but Cavendar felt a twinge of annoyance at the moment when, along with fighting off fatigue, he'd been trying to forget that he hadn't eaten since noon.
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like an unfortunate one. Cavender happened to be very fond of ham. Now here, ormund continued, putting the plate down, is where this experiment begins to differ from anything we have done before, for all of us will try to imagine, to visualize as being on this plate the same ham sandwich. And so there will be no conflict in our projections. Let's decide first on just what ingredients we want to put on it. He smiled. We'll make this the finest ham sandwich our collective imagination can produce. There were more chuckles. Cavendar cursed under his breath, his mouth beginning to water. Suggestions came promptly. Mustard? Dr. Ormond said. Of course. Not too sharp, though. Eleanor. He smiled at Mrs. Folsom. I agree. A light touch of delicate salad mustard, crisp lettuce, finely chopped. Gherkinsvery. Well, put it all on rye, cavendar said helplessly. Toasted rye. Toasted rye. Ormond smiled at him, looked around. Any objections? No. Toasted rye it shall be, Wally. And I believe that completes our selection. He paused, his face turning serious. Now, as to that word of caution I gave you, for three minutes, each of you will visualize the object we have chosen on the plate I will be holding up before me. You will do this with your eyes open, and to each of you, in your own subjective reality, the object will become, as you know, more or less clearly discernible. But let me tell you this. Do not be too surprised if, at the end of that time, when the exercise is over, the object remains visible to you, does not disappear. There was silence for a moment, then renewed chuckles, but slightly nervous ones, and not too many. Dr. Orman said. I am serious about that. The possibility, though it may be small to night, is there. You have learned that by the laws of insight, any image of subjective reality, if it can be endowed with all the attributes of objective reality by its human creator, must spontaneously become an image in objective reality. In this case, our collective ham sandwich, if it were perfectly visualized, could not only be seen by you, but felt its weight and the texture of each of its ingredients, perceived their appetizing fragrance savoured. Cavendar groaned mentally and more. If one of you were to eat this sandwich, he would find it exactly as nourishing as any produced by the more ordinary methods of objective reality. There are people in the world today, Dr. Ormond concluded, speaking very earnestly now, who can do this. There always have been people who could do this, and you are following in their footsteps, being trained in even more advanced skills. I am aware to a greater extent than any of you of the latent power that is developing, has developed in this group to night. For the first time, that power will be focussed, drawn down to a pinpoint, to accomplish one task. Again, I do not say that at the end of our exercise a ham sandwich will lie on this plate. Frankly, I don't expect it. But I suggest very strongly that you don't let it surprise or startle you too much if we find it here. There was dead stillness when he finished.
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Silence.
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Speaking. Cavendar had a sense that the lecture room had come alive with eerie little chills. Dr. Ormond lifted the plate solemnly up before him, holding it between the fingertips of both hands. Now, if you will direct your attention here. No, Elinor, with your eyes open. Let us begin. Cavendar sighed, straightened up in his chair, eyes fixed obediently on the wooden plate, and banned ham sandwiches and every other kind of food firmly from his thoughts. There was no point in working his appetite up any further when he couldn't satisfy it, and he would have to be on guard a little against simply falling asleep during the Next three minutes. The cloudiness of complete fatigue wasn't too far away. At the edge of his vision, he was aware of his fellow students across the room, arranged in suddenly motionless rows like staring zombies. His eyelids began to feel leaden. The three minutes dragged on, came to an end. Ormond slowly lowered his hands. Cavendair drew a long breath of relief. The wooden plate, he nodded with no surprise, was still empty. You may stop visualizing, ormond announced. There was a concerted sense sighing, a creaking of chairs. The students came out of their semi trances, blinked, smiled, settled into more comfortable positions, waiting for Dr. Owl's comments. No miracles this time, ormond began briskly. He smiled. Mrs. Folsom? Said Dr. Owl? He looked over at her. Yes, Eleanor? Eleanor Folsom hesitated, shook her head. No, she said. Go on. I'm sorry I interrupted. That's all right. Dr. Al gave her a warm smile. It had been, he continued, a successful exercise, a very promising first attempt, in spite of the lack of an immediate materialization, which of course had been only a remote possibility to start with. He had no fault to find with the quality of the group's effort. He had sensed it as they too presently would be able to sense it, as a smooth flow of directed energy with a little more practice one of these days. Cavendish stifled one yawn, concealed another which didn't allow itself to be stifled behind a casually raised hand. He watched Ormond move over to the prop table, put the wooden plate down beside the red suit case without interrupting his encouraging summary of the exercise, hesitate, then pick up something else, something which looked like a flexible copper trident, and start back to the centre of the room with it. Mrs. Folsom's voice said shrilly. Doctor, I. Yes, Eleanor, what is it? Just now, Mrs. Folsom said, her voice still holding the shrill note just a moment ago on the plate over there. I'm certain. I'm almost certain I saw the ham sandwich, she added breathlessly. And that's what I was going to say before Dr. Owl, I. Right after you told us to stop visualizing. I thought I saw the sandwich on the plate, but it was only for a moment and I wasn't sure, but now I'm sure, almost sure that I saw it again on the plate on the table. The old woman was pointing a trembling finger towards the table. Her cheeks showed spots of hectic red in the rows behind her. The students looked at one another, shook their heads in resignation, some obviously suppressing amusement. Others looked annoyed. They were all familiar with Eleanor Folsom's tendency to produce such little sensations during the meetings. If the evening didn't promise to bring enough excitement, Elinor always could be counted on to take a hand in events. Cavendar felt less certain about it this time. Mrs. Folsom sounded genuinely excited, and if she actually believed she'd seen something materialise, she might be fairly close to getting one of those little heart attacks to she kept everyone informed about. Dr. Al could have had the same thought. He glanced back at the prop table, asked gravely, you don't see it there now, do you, Elinor? Mrs. Folsom shook her head. No, no, of course not. It disappeared again. It was only there for a second, but I am sure I saw it now. This is very interesting, ormond said seriously. Has anyone else observed anything at all unusual during the last few minutes? There was a murmured chorus of dissent, but Cavendar noticed that the expressions of amusement and annoyance had vanished. Dr. Al had changed the tune, and the students were listening intently. He turned back to Mrs. Folsom. Let us consider the possibilities here, Eleanor, he said. For one thing, you should be congratulated in any case, because your experience shows that your visualization was clear and true throughout their exercise. If it hadn't been, nothing like this could have occurred. But precisely what was the experience? There we are. As of this moment, on uncertain ground, you saw something that no one else saw. The same thing might mean simply that no one else happened to be looking at the plate at those particular instances in time. I, for example, certainly gave it no further attention after the exercise was over. You may then have observed a genuine materialization. Mrs. Folsom nodded vigorously. Yes, I. But, ormond went on, under the circumstances, the scientific attitude we maintain at this institute demands that we leave the question open for now, because you might also, you understand, have projected for yourself only a vivid momentary impression of the image you had created during our exercise and were still holding in your mind. Mrs. Folsom looked doubtful. The flush of excitement began to leave her face.
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Why?
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Well, yes, I suppose so, she acknowledged unwillingly. Of course, ormond said. So to night. We shall leave it at that the next time we engage in a similar exercise. Well, who knows? He gave her a reassuring smile. I must say, Eleanor, that this is a very encouraging indication of the progress you have made. He glanced over the group, gathering their attention, and raised the Triton like device he had taken from the table. And now for our second experiment this evening. Looking disappointed and somewhat confused, Eleanor Folsom settled back in her chair. Cavendar also settled back, his gaze shifting sleepily to the remaining items on the prop table. He was frowning a little. It wasn't his business. But if the old woman had said, started to hypnotize herself into having hallucinations, Dr. Owl had better turn to a different type of meeting exercises. And that probably was exactly what Ormond would do. He seemed very much aware of danger signals. Cavendar wondered vaguely what the red suit case on the table contained. There was a blurry shimmer on the wooden plate beside the suit case. Then something thickened there suddenly, as if drawing itself together out of the air. Perry Rochelle, sitting only 10ft back from the table, uttered a yelp somewhere between surprise and alarm. Dexter Jones, beside her, abruptly pushed back his chair, made a loud, incoherent exclamation of some kind. Cavendar had started upright, heart hammering. The thing that had appeared on the wooden plate vanished again, but it had remained visible there for two full seconds, and there was no question at all of what it had been for several minutes. Something resembling pandemonium swirled about the walls of the lecture room of the Institute of Insight. The red suit case had concealed the wooden plate on the prop table from the eyes of most of the students sitting on the right side of the room, but a number of those who could see it felt they had caught a glimpse of something. Of just what? They were unsure at first, or perhaps they preferred not to say. Perry and Dexter, however, after getting over their first shock, had no such doubts. Perry, voice vibrant with excitement, answered the questions flung at her from across the room, giving a detailed description of the ham sandwich which had appeared out of nowhere on the polished little table and stayed there for an incredible instant before it vanished. Dexter's Jones, his usually impassive face glowing and animated, laughing, confirmed the description on every point. On the opposite side of the room, Eleanor Folsom, surrounded by her own group of questioners, was also having her hour of triumph, in the warmth of which a trace of bitterness that her first report of the phenomenon had been shrugged off by everyone, even in a way by Dr. Al, gradually dissolved. Dr. Al himself, Cavendar thought, remained remarkably quiet at first, though in the excitement this wasn't generally noticed. He might even have turned a little pale. However, before things began to slow down, he had himself well in hand again. Calling the group to a semblance of order, he began smilingly to ask specific questions. The witnesses on the right side of the room seemed somewhat more certain now of what they had observed. Dr. Ormund looked over at Cavendar. And you, Wally? He asked you were sitting rather far back, to be sure. Cavendish smiled and shrugged. Sorry, Dr. Owl. I just wasn't looking in that direction at the moment. The first suggestion I had that anything unusual was going on was when Perry let out that wild squawk. There was general laughter. Perry grinned and flashed. Well, I'd have liked to hear your squawk, she told Cavendar, if you'd seen a miracle happen right before your nose. Not a miracle, Perry, ormond said gently. We must remember that we are working here with natural forces which produce natural phenomena. Insufficiently understood phenomena, perhaps, but never miraculous ones. Now, how closely did this materialization appear to conform to the subjective group image we had decided on for our exercise? Well, I could only see it, of course, Dr. Owl, but as far as I saw it, it was exactly what wed no, wait. Perry frowned, wrinkling her nose. There was something added. She giggled. At least I don't remember anyone saying we should imagine the sandwich wrapped in a paper napkin. Across the room, a woman's voice said breathlessly, oh, a green paper napkin, Perry. Perry looked around, surprise. Yes, it was Mavis. Mavis Greenfield hesitated, said with a nervous little laugh, I suppose I did that. I added a green napkin after we started the exercise. Her voice quavered for an instant. I thought the image looked neater that way. She looked appealingly at the students around her. This is really incredible, isn't it? They gave her vague smiles. They were plainly still floating on a cloud of collective achievement. If they hadn't created that sandwich, there could have been nothing to see. It seemed to Cavendar that Dr. Ormond's face showed a flicker of strain when he heard Mavis explanation, but he couldn't be sure because the expression, if it had been there, was smoothed away at once. Ormond cleared his throat, said firmly and somewhat chidingly, no, not incredible, Mavis, although he turned on his smile. My friends, I must admit that you have surprised me very pleasantly, of course. But what happened here is something I consider to be only a very remote possibility to night. You are truly more advanced than I'd realized. If even one of you had been lagging behind the others, if there had been any unevenness in the concentration each gave to the exercise to night, this materialization simply could not have occurred. And that fact forces me now to a very important decision. He went over to the prop table, took the suitcase from it. Mavis, he said gravely, you may put away these other devices. We will have no further need for them in this group. Dexter, move the table to the centre of the room for me, please. He waited while his instructions were hastily carried out, then laid the suit case on the table, drew up a chair, and sat down. The buzz of excited conversation among the students hushed. They stared at him in anticipatory silence. It appeared that the evening surprises were not yet over and they were ready for anything now. There is a point, Dr. Ormond began in a solemn voice, riveting their eager attention on him. A point in the orderly advance towards total insight at which further progress becomes greatly simplified and accelerated because the student has now developed the capability to augment his personal efforts by the use of certain instruments. Cavendar thoughtfully reached inside his coat, brought out a cigarette case, opened it, and slowly put a cigarette to his lips. About to flick on a lighter, he saw Reuben Jeffries watching him with an expression, expression of disapproval from across the aisle. Jeffries shook his head, indicated the no SMOKING sign on the wall. Cavendar nodded, smiling a rueful apology for his absent mindedness, and returned the cigarette to its case. He shoved his hands into his trousers pockets, slouched back in the chair. I have told you, ormond was saying, that the contributions many of you so generously made to the Institute were needed for, and being absorbed by, vital research. Tonight I had intended to give you a first inkling of what that research was accomplishing. He tapped the suitcase on the table before him. In there is an instrument of the kind I have mentioned. The beneficial forces of the cosmos are harnessed by it, flow through it. And I believe I can say that my efforts in recent months have produced the most effective such device ever seen. Dr. Al, Mrs. Folsom interrupted firmly, I think you should let them know how the instrument cured my heart condition. Faces shifted toward her, then back to Dr. Al. The middle aged majority of the students pricked their ears, for each of them conscious of the years of increasingly uncertain health to come, Mrs. Folsom's words contained a personal implication, one that hit home. But in spite of the vindication of her claim to have seen a materialized ham sandwich, they weren't quite ready to trust her about this. Dr. Ormond's face was grave. Elinor, he said reprovingly, that was letting the cat out of the bag, wasn't it? I hadn't intended to discuss that part of the matter just yet. He hesitated, frowning, tapping the table top lightly with his knuckles. Mrs. Folsom looked unabashed. She had produced another sensation and knew it. Since it was mentioned, Ormond said with deliberation at last, it would be unfair not to tell you, at least in brief, the facts to which Elinor was alluding. Very well, then. Elinor has served during the past several weeks as the subject of certain experiments connected with his instrument. She reports that after her first use of it, her periodically recurring heart problem ceased to trouble her. Mrs. Folsom smiled, nodded vigorously. I have not, she announced, had one single touch of pain or dizziness in all this time. But one should, of course, Dr. Ormond added objectively, hesitate to use the word cure under such circumstances. In the front row Someone asked Dr. Al, will the instrument heal well, other physical conditions? Ormond looked at the speaker with dignity. John, the instrument does and is supposed to do one thing, providing, as I've said, that the student working with it has attained a certain minimum level of insight, it greatly accelerates his progress towards total insight very greatly. Now, as I have implied before, as one approaches the goal of total insight, the ailments and diseases which commonly afflict humanity simply disappear. Unfortunately, I am not yet free to show you proof for this, although I have the proof and believe it will not be long before it can be revealed, at least to the members of this group. For this reason I have preferred not to say too much on the point. Yes, Reuben? You have a question? Two questions, Dr. Al, Reuben Jeffreys said, first, is it your opinion that our group has now reached the minimum level of insight that makes it possible to work with those instruments? Ormond nodded emphatically. Yes, it has. After tonight's occurrence, there is no further question about that. Then Geoffrey said, my second question is simply, when do we start? There was laughter, a scattering of applause. Ormund Smile said, an excellent question, Reuben. The answer is that a number of you will start immediately. A limited quantity of the instruments, 15, I believe, are available now on the premises, stored in my office. Within a few weeks I will have enough on hand to supply as many of you as wish to speed up their progress by this method. Since the group's contributions paid my research expenses, I cannot, in justice, ask more from you individually now than the actual cost in material and labor for each instrument. The figure. I have it somewhere. Oh, yes. Ormond pulled a notebook from his pocket, consulted it, looked up, and said mildly, twelve hundred dollars will be adequate, I think. Cavendish lips twitched sardonically. Three or four of the group might have flinched inwardly at the price tag, but on the whole they were simply too well heeled to give such a detail another thought. Cheque books were coming hurriedly into sight all around the lecture room. Reuben Jefferies unfolding his Dr. Al, I'm taking one of the 15, half the students turned indignantly to stare at him. Now wait a minute, Reuben, someone said. That isn't fair. It's obvious there aren't enough to go around. Geoffrey smiled at him. That's why I spoke up, Warren. He appealed to Ormond. How about it, Dr. Al? Ormond observed judiciously. It seems fair enough to me. Elinor, of course, is retaining the instrument with which she has been working. As for the rest of you, first come, first served, you know. If others would like to have Mavis put down their names. There was a brief hub as this suggestion was acted on. Mavis Dexter Jones and Perry Rochelle then went to the office to get the instruments while Dr. Ormond consoled the students who had found themselves left out. It would be merely a matter of days before the new instruments began to come in, and yes, they could leave their checks in advance. When he suggested tactfully that financial arrangements could be made if necessary, the less affluent also brightened up. 15 identical red alligator hide suit cases appeared and were lined up beside Ormond's table. He announced that a preliminary demonstration with the instrument would be made as soon as those on hand had been distributed navies. Greenfield, standing beside him, began to read off the names she had taken down. Reuben Jeffreys was the fifth to come up to the table, hand Ormond his cheque, and receive a suit case from the secretary. Then Cavendar got unhurriedly to his feet. Dr. Ormond, he said loudly enough to center the attention of everyone in the room on him, may I have the floor? For a moment Ormond appeared surprised, then startled. His glance went up to Reuben Jeffries, still standing stolidly beside him, and his face slowly whitened. Why? Well, yes, Wally. His voice seemed unsteady. What's on your mind? Cavendish faced the right side of the room, the questioning faces turned towards him. My name, as you know, he told the advanced students, is Wallace Cavendar. What you haven't known so far is that I am a police detective, rank of lieutenant, currently attached to the police force of this city and in temporary charge of its Banco Squad. He shifted his gaze towards the front of the room. Ormond's eyes met his for a moment, then dropped. Dr. Ormond, Cavendish said, you're under arrest. The immediate charge, let's say, is practising medicine without a license. Don't worry about whether we can make it so stick or not, we'll have three or four others worked up by the time we get to downtown. For a moment there was a shocked, frozen stillness in the lecture room. Dr. Orman's hand began to move out quietly towards the checks lying on the table before him. Reuben Jeffreys big hand got there first. I'll take care of these for now, Dr. Owl, Jeffrey said with a friendly smile. The lieutenant thinks he wants them. Not much more than 30 minutes later, Cavendar unlocked the door to Dr. Ormond's private office, went inside, leaving the door open behind him, and sat down at Ormond's desk. He rubbed his aching eyes, yawned, lit a cigarette, looked about in vain for an ashtray, finally emptied a small dish of paper clips on the desk and placed the dish conveniently close to him. There had been an indignant uproar about Dr. Al's arrest for a while, but it ended abruptly when uniformed policemen appeared in the two exit doors, and the sobering thought struck the students that any publicity given the matter could make them look personally ridiculous and do damage to their business and social standing. Cavendar had calmed their fears. It was conceivable, he said, that the District Attorney's office would wish to confer with some of them privately in connection with charges to be brought against William Fitzgerald Grady, which, so far as the police had been able to establish, was Dr. Orman's real name. However, their association with the Institute of Insight would not be made public, and any proceedings would be carried out with the discretion that could be fully expected by blameless citizens of their status in the community. They were fortunate, cavendar went on. In another respect, probably none of them had been aware of just how much Grady had milked from the group, chiefly through quiet private contributions and donations. During the two years he was running the Institute, the sum came to better than $200,000. Grady, naturally, had wasted none of this in research, and he was not a spendthrift in other ways. Cavendar was therefore happy to say that around two thirds of this money was known to be still intact in various bank accounts, and that it would be restored eventually to the generous but misled donors. Dr. Al's ex students were beginning to look both chastened and very much relieved. Cavender briefly covered a few more points to eliminate remaining doubts. He touched on Grady's early record as a confidence man and blackmailer, mentioned the two terms he had spent in prison and the fact that for the last 18 years he had confined himself to operations like the Institute of Insight, where risks were less, the profits, if anything, had been higher because Grady had learned that it paid off in the long run to deal exclusively with wealthy citizens, and he was endowed with the kind of personality needed to overcome the caution natural to that class. As for the unusual experiences about which some of them might be now, thinking these, Camden concluded, should be considered in the light of the fact that Grady had made his living at one time as a stage magician and hypnotist, working effectively both with and without trained accomplices. The lecture had gone over very well, as he'd known it would. The ex students left for their homes, a subdued and shaken group grateful for having been rescued from an evil man's toils. Even Mrs. Folsom, who had announced at one point that she believed she had a heart attack coming on, recovered sufficiently to thank Cavendar and assure him that in future she would take her problems only to a reliable physician. Footsteps were coming down the short hall from the back of the building. Then Reuben Jeffreys voice, go into the office. The Lieutenant's waiting for you there. Cavendar stabbed out his cigarette as Dexter Jones, Perry Rochelle, and Mavis Greenfield filed into the office. Jeffries closed the door behind them from the hall and went off. Sit down, cavendish said, lighting a fresh cigarette. They selected chairs and settled down stiffly, facing him. All three looked anxious and pale, and Perry's face was tear stained. I suppose you've been wondering why I had Sergeant Jeffries tell you three to stay behind, perry began, her eyes and voice rather wild. Mr. Cavendaleut, Cavendar. Either will do, Cavendar said. Mr. Cavendar, I swear you're wrong. We didn't have anything to do with Dr. Owls. Mr. Grade is cheating those people. At least I didn't. I swear it. I didn't say you had anything to do with it, Perry, kavanagh remarked. Personally, I think none of you had anything to do with it. Not voluntarily, at any rate. He could almost feel them go limp with relief. He waited. After a second or two, Perry's eyes got the wild look back. But yes? Cavdare asked. Perry glanced at Dexter Jones, at Mavis. But then what did happen? She asked, bewildered of the other two as much as of Mr. I saw something appear on the plate. I know it did. It was a sandwich. It looked perfectly natural. I don't think it could have possibly been something Mr. Grady did with mirrors. And how could it have had the paper napkin Mavis had just been thinking about wrapped around it? Unless. Unless it actually was a materialization of a mental image you'd created between you, cavendish said. Now settle back and relax, Perry. There's a more reasonable explanation for what happened tonight than that. He waited A moment went on. Grady's one real interest is money. And since none of you had any
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was that you could help him get it. Perry and Dexter showed some genuine talent to start with, in the line of guessing what card somebody was thinking about and the like. It's not too unusual an ability, and in itself it wasn't too useful. Useful to Grady, but he worked on your interest in the subject. All the other students, the paying students, had to lose was a sizable amount of cash, with the exception of Mrs. Folsom, who's been the next thing to a flip for years. Anyway, she was in danger and you three stood a good chance of letting Grady wreck your lives. I said he's a competent hypnotist. He is also a completely ruthless one. He looked at Mavis. As far as I know, Mavis, you haven't ever demonstrated that you have any interesting extrasensory talents like Dexter's and Perry's. Rather the contrary, right? She nodded, her eyes huge. I've always tested negative. Way down. Negative. That's why I was really rather shocked when that of course, I've always been fascinated by such things, and he insisted it would show up in me sometime. And Cavendish said several times a week you had special little training sessions with him, just as his two star pupils here did to help it show up. You were another perfect stooge from Grady's point of view. Well, what it amounts to is that Grady was preparing to make his big final killing off this group before he disappeared from the city. He would have collected close to $30,000 tonight and probably twice as much again within the next month or so, before any of the students began to suspect seriously that Dr. Al's instruments could be the meaningless contraptions they are. You three have been hypnotically conditioned to a fare you well, in those little private sessions you've had with him during the past week, you were set up for the role you were to play to night when you got your cue. But I guess it was Mrs. Folsom's claim that she'd seen the ham sandwich materialize. You started seeing, saying, acting, and thinking exactly as you'd been told to see, say, act, and think. There's no more mystery about it than that. And in my opinion, you're three extremely fortunate young people in that we were ready to move in on Grady when we were. There was silence for a moment. Then Perry Rochelle said hesitantly. Then Mrs. Folsom. Mrs. Folsom, Kavendor said, has also enjoyed the benefits of many private sessions with Grady. She, of course, was additionally paying very handsomely for them. Tonight she reported seeing what she'd been told to report seeing to set off the hypnotic chain reaction. But Perry said, she said her heart attack stopped after she started using the instrument. I really don't see how that could have been just her imagination. Very easily, caviter said. I've talked with her physician. Mrs. Folsom belongs to a not uncommon type of people whose tickers are as sound as yours or mine, but who are convinced they have a serious heart ailment and can dish up symptoms impressive enough to fool anyone but an informed professional. They can stop dishing them just as readily if they think they've been cured. He smiled faintly. You look as if you might be finally convinced, Barry. She nodded. I. Yes, I guess so. I guess I am. All right, cavendar said. He stood up. You three can run along, then. You won't be officially involved in this matter, and no one's going to bother you. If you want to go on playing around with ESP and so forth, that's your business. But I trust that in future you'll have the good sense to keep away from characters like Grady. Periods of confusion, chronic nightmares, even chronic headaches are a good sign. You're asking for bad trouble in that area. They thanked him, started out of the office in obvious relief. At the door, Perry Rochelle hesitated, looked back. Mr. Cavendar? Yes? You don't think I I need psychiatric help? No. But I understand, Cavendish said, that you have a sister in Maine who's been wanting you to spend the summer with her. I think that's a fine idea. A month or two of sun and salt water is exactly what you can use to drive the last of this nonsense out of your mind again. So good night to the three of you, and good luck. Carpenter snapped the top of the squat little thermos flask back in place and restored it to the glove compartment of Jeffreys cord car. He brushed a few crumbs from the knees of his trousers and settled back in the seat, discovering he no longer felt nearly as tired and washed out as he had been an hour ago in the lecture room. A few cups of coffee and a little nourishment could do wonders for a man even at the tail end of a week of hard work. The last light in the institute building across the street went out, and Cavendar heard the click of the front door. The bulky figure of Detective Sergeant Reuben Jeffries stood silhouetted for a moment in the street lights on the entrance steps. Then Jeffries came down the steps and crossed the street to the car. All done? Cavendar asked. All done, jeffries said through the window. He opened the door, eased himself in behind the wheel, and closed the door. They took Grady away by the back entrance. He told Cavendar the records in his files. He wasn't keeping much, of course, and the stuff in the safe and those instruments went along with him. He was very cooperative. He's had a real scare. He'll get over it. Jeffries hesitated. I'm something of a Jonny come lately in this line of work, you know. I'd be interested in hearing how it's handled from here on. In this case it will be pretty well said. Standard procedure, cavendish said. To Morrow. Around noon I'll have Grady brought in to see me. I'll be in a curtain bitter mood, the frustrated honest cop. I'll tell him he's in luck. The DA's office has informed me that because of the important names involved in this fraud case, and because all but around $40,000 of the money he collected in this town have been recovered, they've decided not to prosecute. He'll have till midnight to clear out. If he ever shows up again, he gets the book. Why leave him the 40,000? Jefferies asked. I understood they know darn well where it's stashed. Cavendish shrugged. The man's put in two years of work, Reuben. If we clean him, he might get discouraged enough to get out of the racket and try something else. As it is, he'll have something like the Institute of Insight going again in another city three months from now, in an area that hasn't been cropped over recently. He's good in that lineone of the best, in fact. Jefferies thoughtfully started the car, pulled out from the curb. Halfway down the block, he remarked, you gave me the Go ahead sign with a cigarette right after the Greenfield girl claimed she'd put the paper napkin into that image. Does that mean you finally came to a decision about her? Uh huh. Jefferies glanced over at him. Is there any secret about how you're able to spot them? No. Except that I don't know if I could describe to anyone how to go about it. We might have our work cut in half, but I can't, and neither can any other spotter. It's simply a long, tedious process of staying in contact with people you have some reason to suspect of being the genuine article. If they are, you know it eventually. But if it weren't that men with Grady's type of personality attract them somehow from 10 miles around, we'd have no practical means at present of screening prospects out of the general population. You can't distinguish one of them from anyone else if he's just walking past you on the street. Jefferies brought the car to a halt at a stoplight. That's about the way I'd heard it, he acknowledged. What about negative spotting? Is there a chance there might be an undiscovered latent left among our recent fellow students? No chance at all, Cavendish said. The process works both ways. If they aren't, you also know it eventually, and I was sure of everyone but Greenfield over three weeks ago. She's got as tough a set of obscuring defences as I've ever worked against. But after the jolts she got to night, she came through clear immediately. The light changed and the car started up. Jeffries asked, you feel both of them can be rehabilitated? Definitely, Cavendish said. Another three months of Grady's pseudo yoga might have ruined them for good, but give them around a year to settle out and they'll be all right. Then they'll get the call. It's been worth the trouble. Jones is good, medium grade, and that Greenfield, she'll be a powerhouse before she's half developed. Easily the most promising prospect I've come across in six years. You're just as certain about Perry Rochelle? Uh huh. Pradda's sigh Fairly typical. She's developed as far as she ever will. It would be a complete waste of time to call her. You can't train something that just isn't there. Jefferies grunted. Never made a mistake, eh? Kavanagh yawned, smiled. Never have yet, Reuben. Not in that area. How did you explain this sandwich to them? And Greenfield's napkin? They couldn't have bought your stage magic idea? No. Told them those were Dr. Al's post hypnotic suggestions. It's the other standard rationalization. They drove on in silence for a while. Then Jeffries cleared his throat. Incidentally, he said I should apologize for the slip with the sandwich, even though it turned out to our advantage. I can't quite explain it. I was thinking of other matters at the moment, and I suppose Cavendar, who had been gazing drowsily through the windshield, shook his head. As you say, it turned out very well, Reuben. Aside from putting the first crack in Mavis Greenfield's defences. It shook up Dr. Al to the point where he decided to collect as much as he could to night cash the cheques and clear out. So he set himself up for the pinch. We probably gained as much as three or four weeks on both counts. Jefferies nodded. I realize that, but. Well, you'd have no reason to blame yourself for the slip in any case, cavendar went on, the fact is, I'd been so confoundedly busy all afternoon and evening I forgot to take time out for dinner. When that sandwich was being described in those mouth watering terms, I realized I was really ravenous. At the same time I was fighting off sleep between the two. I went completely off guard for a moment and it simply happened. He grinned. As described, by the way, it was a terrific sandwich. That grub had real imagination. He hesitated, then put out his hand, palm up before him. As a matter of fact, just talking about it again seems to be putting me in a mood. For seconds something shimmered for an instant in the dim air. Wrapped in its green tissue napkin, a second ham sandwich appeared. End of Ham Sandwich by James H.
- [465:50]
Schmitzeru of Zoller By Hal K. Wells this is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox. When the rolling thunder of Infrabase first came to their ears, Robert Blake and Helen Lawton were standing on the platform of a New York subway station waiting for the arrival of an uptown express to bear them to their homes. They made a strikingly attractive couple. As they stood there, New York had not had time as yet to remove the bronze tan of an outdoor life from Blake's ruggedly good looking face, his tall, athletic figure was still conspicuous for the lithe strength that had made him an All Western tackle less than two years ago. Standing beside Blake's husky figure, Helen Lawton looked like a tiny, very perfect blond doll with an exquisitely molded face framed in curly bobbed hair that was the clear golden amber hue of orange honey. There was a diamond sparkling on the ring finger of the girl's slim left hand, placed there by Blake. It was well after midnight, and the only other passenger waiting on the station was a burly chap leaning against one of the white pillars on the other side of the platform. After a casual glance at the fellow with his derby hat shoved far back from a low forehead, his blatantly conspicuous clothing, and the suspicious bulge under one armpit, Blake had mentally set him down as a minor gangster, probably a strong arm man for some bure mob. Blake and Helen had been standing there but a few minutes when the strange sound first became audible. For a moment, Blake thought it was merely the rumbling roar of an express approaching far down the tunnel. Then he realized that no subway train could possibly produce a sound effect so oddly disturbing and strangely alien. It was like no sound that Blake had ever heard before. Vibrant with colossal power, it suggested a sustained note struck from a giant organ, a note so low in pitch that it seemed a full octave below the lowest bass note ever struck. Whatever it was, the thundering vibration of infra bass was coming nearer with startling swiftness. It was impossible to locate the source of the mighty pulsing note. It seemed to be coming simultaneously from all directions, like a great hollow sphere of invisible sound waves closing in with the station platform as its central focal point. Helen's face was white with dread as she shrank closer into Blake's embrace. Blake noted that the gangster across the platform was was standing tensely at bay with his back against the pillar and his right hand thrust under his coat as he stared wildly about him in an effort to discover the cause of the disturbance. The rolling thunder closed in upon them with a final rush that brought it so near that their very bodies seemed to vibrate in harmony with that mighty note of shuddering bass. Then, with startling abruptness, the green net came out from the walls and down from the roof spurted scores of quivering ribbons of blinding green flame. Swiftly the radiant tendrils rushed in upon the shrinking three from every side, while the infra bass thundered in mighty crescendo. Blake instinctively swept Helen close within the shelter of his arms in an effort to protect her with his own body against the searing menace of those onrushing green Flames.
- [469:45]
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The next moment, the fiery ribbons were upon them, lashing about their bodies, crossing and criss crossing in the air above and around them in a great tangled web of interlacing lines of flame that filled the entire platform. With a shock of relief, Blake found that there was no heat in those strange flames. But his relief was short lived, as the next second brought him realization of the real menace of the radiant ribbon. There was a solidity and strength in those glowing streamers that held him as helplessly captive as though they were gripped in ribbons of steel. Dazed and helpless, the three struggled for a moment in the meshes of the weird net of flame, like fish caught in the strands of some giant cosmic seine. The trembling thunder of infrabass abruptly changed to a thin whining note, so high in pitch that it seemed the nearly soundless ghost of a metallic scream. With the change in sound, Blake became aware of a new and astounding change in his surroundings. The walls and roof of the station seemed closing in upon him, as though he were growing in size at an incredible rate. The next moment, he shot through the roof, hurtling on and upward with the velocity of a rocket. The sensation was one that his reeling brain could not even grasp. His body seemed to be inside every stone, iron bar and lump of earth, yet at the same time, every exterior object seemed within his body. It was an eerie chaos of a dozen different dimensions blending to form a space in which there was no known dimension. As they flashed on out to the surface, Blake had one hazy glimpse of Manhattan's glowing lights spread all about them.
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Then the speed of their progress leaped into a new and terrible acceleration that blotted out every tangible sensation from Blake's brain. Time and space alike seemed to vanish as their hurtling flight sent them rocketing on for distances inconceivably vast, through a bleak and appalling nothingness where neither sight nor sound existed. Then, abruptly, the speed of their flight seemed to be lessening. Sensation returned to Blake. He again heard the thin, high pitched metallic wail, now swiftly deepening to the familiar growl of rolling bass. He again noted the presence of the glowing green ribbons of the net that still encircled them. A blindingly brilliant purple mist was now closing in upon them from every direction, bringing with it a nameless and agonizing force that seemed to be shaking the very atoms of Blake's body asunder. Then they dropped swiftly down out of the purple mists, and the strange agony at once vanished. Blake felt their downward progress come to an end with the gentle arrival of his feet upon firm ground. The encircling net of green flame glowed dazzlingly brighter for a brief moment, then swiftly vanished into thin air while the mutter of bass vibrations simultaneously died away into silence. Blake staggered and nearly fell as the sudden release from the net strands again left his body free. He looked down at Helen as she stood huddled close beside him, still in the shelter of his arms. The girl's face was white with terror as she looked back up at him. Bob, what happened and where on earth are we? Her voice trembled a little in spite of her plucky effort to keep it steady. Blake's bewildered gaze was already roving around them, trying to comprehend the incredible details of their surroundings. I've no idea what happened, dear, he answered slowly. As to where we are now, I'm very much afraid it's nowhere on earth. Then where is this hopped up layout anyway, fellow? If it ain't on earth? Broke in a voice with a decided east side twang. Blake quickly turned and saw that the gangster had remained with them in that eerie flight in the green net. There was an expression of dumbfounded amazement upon the man's heavy face, and he was obviously anxious to be friendly with the two who now represented the only link with the familiar world he had known. Gee, for a minute I thought they had me on the spot in some new way. Sure, he chattered excitedly as he came quickly over to join Helen and Blake. There's plenty of guys wanting to turn the heat on me there in the big town. I'm Gil Mapes, see? But this ain't no frame up like any I ever heard of. What happened anyway, fellow? For the moment Blake did not answer. The three of them were silent as they stared about them with eyes that were dazed by the startling unfamiliar aspect of every detail in their surroundings. From the twin purple suns that blazed down through the tenuous mists overhead to the barren blue gray ground underfoot, there was not a single object familiar to earthly eyes. The huge enclosure in which the three of them stood was obviously the work of intelligent beings of some kind, but its mechanical details were products of a science different from any known to Blake. The purpose of the enclosure seemed to be to maintain an area of clear air in the midst of the swirling purple vapors that pressed in against it from the top and from every side. In shape it was a great oblong sail, some 50ft high, 200 yards long, and about 100 yards wide. The three captives stood near the center fencing in the enclosure. At 20 yard intervals and reaching upward to the ceiling were Slender posts of some lustreless black metal. Between these posts streamed unbroken nearly transparent sheets of some unknown force, the only visible sign of which was the presence of countless millions of tiny shimmering golden flecks which danced like dust motes in a ray of sunlight. It was obviously this thin sheet of unknown force that was keeping the purple mists at bay for fan like antenn. At the top of each post spread a similar shimmering sheet that formed a ceiling for the clear aired area. The three earthlings were facing one of the side walls of the big enclosures. The purple mists outside made it hard to see clearly from any distance. Distance. But Blake had an impression that the surrounding terrain was featured by the same barren, nearly desert bleakness that characterized the interior of the enclosure, where scattered clumps of dead spiky black branches of shrub like vegetation were the only sign of plant life. Just within the distant end of the wall at their right, there was a low platform surmounted by a wide arch some 10ft in height, both constructed of silver colored metal. There was nothing between them and the end wall to their left, but they could see that the ground sloped sharply upward from the barrier sheet. And on the crest of the ridge a gigantic cone shaped structure of solid black could be seen dimly through the intervening mists. The cone building seemed to be the source of the power that kept the enclosure intact. Slender cables of black metal ran down the slope from it into the clear aired space, spreading out over the dusty gray blue ground to the base of each of the tall posts with a heavier copper colored cable running on the silver arch. From within the windowless interior of the cone there was audible a low hum as of a tremendous power being generated there. Gee, what a rummy joint this place is. There was frank awe in the gangster's voice as he at last broke the silence. That guy with the green net sure took us for one sweet ride. Maybe we're on the moon now. Or Mars, huh? Blake shook his head. No, we're completely out of our entire solar system. Those twin purple suns up there prove that we may even be in another universe or another dimension from our own. A piece of apparatus that could whisk us up through 50ft of earth and masonry as that Greenette did obviously works in dimensions of which we've never dreamed. The only thing we're sure of is that we were brought to this purple world deliberately and intentionally by an intelligent being of some kind, scooped up like tadpoles from a mud puddle and dumped here in this elaborate enclosure. It had already prepared for us. Blake nodded to where the black coned building loomed through the purple mists outside the end wall. Whoever or whatever the thing was that brought us here, I have a hunch it's there in that power house, watching us. I'd suggest that we walk down toward that end of the enclosure for a closer look. We may at least find out whether we're guests or prisoners. Listens good to me, fellow, agreed Mapes, sliding a hand up his shoulder holster and bringing out a squat black automatic pistol of heavy caliber. We'll do a prowl over that way, and if his nibs tries any more funny business, mebbe a few slugs out of this rod will change his mind for him. Better go easy with that gun, Mapes, advised Blake as the three of them started slowly toward the cone building. From what we've already seen, there must be weapons in this world that would make your pistol look like a kid's pop gun. We'd better go easy till Ha. Wait. What's that? The thin, high pitched whine, followed promptly by the familiar growling thunder of infrabass had again become audible. At the same moment a long pencil like beam of green light glowed into visibility, extending from the tip of the cone to a point high within the enclosure just back of them. As they halted abruptly and watched, they saw the interlacing meshes of the green flame net materialize suddenly at the end of the beam. The beam curved into an arc that dropped the net swiftly to the ground some 30 yards from them. Its meshes were packed nearly full of dark, writhing figures. Looks like some more tadpoles arriving for our pond. Mapes exclaimed. I wonder what part of N yawk. His nibs yanked these babies from. Blake's answer died on his lips as the net and beam glowed blindingly brighter for a brief strange second, then disappeared, leaving the dark figures in full view. Helen choked back a gasp of horror. Mapes swore in consternation and hurriedly swung his pistol into line with those writhing shapes. The nest's latest captives were not from New York, nor were they from any other part of the planet Earth. Hideous spawn of some unknown world out in the black void of space. They writhed for a moment in a nightmare chaos of countless brown furred bodies, then swiftly disentangled themselves before the staring eyes of the three earthlings. The things were apparently too low in the mental scale to have any reaction to their situation other than a blind instinct to attack any other living being within reach, for they promptly headed for the three captives from Earth as the creatures came shambling rapidly forward on powerful, bowed legs, and with the tips of their long, hairy arms brushing the ground, they looked like grotesquely distorted apes. The crowning horror of those shambling figures, however, lay in the fact that they were completely headless. Even when the things approached to a distance of less than 10ft before halting in momentary indecision, Blake could detect no sign of any normal skull in the blunt space at the top of the powerful hairy torso. There was a furry lipped mouth opening of some kind in the hollow between the bulging shoulders, but of eyes, ears, nose, or brain cavity there was no discernible trace. For a long moment, the headless ape things and the three human beings stood silently facing each other. Other Mapes pistol was levelled point blank at the nearest of the creatures, but their overwhelming numbers made the gangster hold his fire. There were two distinct groups of the things. At least 20 members of each group were in the crowd facing the earthlings. To the rear of these attackers, two oddly repulsive objects were carried and carefully shielded by picked guards of four unusually large and powerful apart things. The nature of those two guarded objects puzzled Blake. They looked like large eggs of dirty gray jelly, about a yard in length. They were obviously alive, for the gelatinous masses quivered and trembled in constant activity. Blake noted that there seemed to be a curious connection between the ebb and flow of pulsations in the egg masses and the movements of the ape phase. His attention was abruptly recalled to the headless things in front of him as they suddenly began shambling forward again. There was no possible mistaking the intention of those advancing horrors. They were moving to the attack. They reached barely to Blake's shoulders, but he realized that their enormous numbers and hooked taloned hands would make the result of the battle almost a foregone conclusion. The fact that the headless things were without eyes was no handicap to them. The swift certainty of their movements proved that they had a sense of sight of some kind that was in every way as efficient as eyesight. Blake looked hurriedly around him, seeking a place where they might be at the best possible advantage in the impending battle. There was a small, dense thicket of spiky dead branches half a dozen yards to the right. At Blake's low command, the three made a dash for the thicket. Arriving there, they ranged themselves against it with their backs at least partially protected from attack. The maneuver seemed to puzzle the ape things. For a moment they stood passively watching the retreat of the three until they had reached the thicket. Then the creatures again began slowly closing in upon them. Blake snatched up a dead branch from the ground near the thicket and was delighted to find that its weight and toughness fiber made it an excellent club. He stripped off his topcoat and passed it back to Helen. Its tough fabric, heavily rubberized for proof against rain, might guard her head and face, at least momentarily from those ripping talons if the headless attackers came to close quarters. With Helen safely behind them, Blake and Mapes turned grimly to face the enemy. The attack was prompt in coming, moving with the perfect synchronization of a single unit.
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groups came shambling in, followed an instant later by the other group. Mape's pistol sent a bullet crashing squarely into the nearest attacker. The creature staggered momentarily, then came lurching on again, apparently not even crippled. Blake swung his heavy club in a whistling arc that sent two of his adversaries, broken and writhing to the ground. He heard Mapes pistol bark four times more as the things closed in. The gun was knocked from the gangster's grip by a groping talon armed hand. Mapes tried to batter back his assailants with his naked fists, but the flailing arms of the horde knocked him from his feet. His limp body was promptly tramped into unconsciousness by the milling feet of the close packed group. Blake lashed the heavy club about him with a burst of savage fury that for the moment sent the furred horse reeling backward. Their retreat ended after a scant 2 yards. Reforming their ranks, they again began cautiously shambling forward in a New attack that, Blake realized, would probably mean the end. It was easy enough to batter the things to ground, but it seemed impossible to seriously hurt them. Their incredible vitality and their overwhelming numbers made them almost invincible. Grimly, Blake set himself to battle as long as he could. In that last desperate effort to keep the hordes at bay, he noticed idly that the two groups still kept their oddly separated formation. Behind them, the two egg masses of jelly were now seething in new activity. After a brief lessening of their gruesome shivering, Blake now saw that there was a direct and unmistakable connection between the activity of the jelly and the corresponding activity of the ape things. Realization of the fact sent a sudden flash of inspiration flaming through Blake's weary brain, correlating the real significance of a dozen different things he had been subconsciously noting ever since the first appearance of the weird beasts. Those attacking things were not hordes of individual animals. They were merely two complete organisms, with the members of each organism controlled by its nucleus through invisible lines of nervous force. As the various individual cells of the human body are linked by nerve fibers, no wonder the creatures themselves were blind. The egg mass that was the nucleus of each of the two groups was eyes, brain and seat of life for every ape thing in the group. With a swift surge of hope, Blake realized the way to conquer the things. If he could only shatter those flaccid masses of jelly, he would destroy the swarming dozens of beasts at the same time. Reaching the jelly ovoids seemed, at first consideration, to be an impossible task. They were carefully guarded, far in the rear of the attacking groups. Blake knew that he had scarcely a chance in a hundred of battering his way through the intervening ape things. Then he remembered the gangster's pistol. His searching eyes found it immediately there on the ground, nearly under the feet of the ape things. As they again shambled forward to the attack, Blake staked everything upon a last desperate sortie against the advancing things. With his club whistling around his head and crashing blows that wrought murderous havoc in the close packed hordes, he drove them back for one breathless moment that gave him time to leap forward and snatch up the pistol. The ape things were already springing back upon him as he swung the pistol into line with one of the jelly masses. He barely pressed the trigger before the charging brutes knocked him from his feet. As he went down, he flung his arms over his head to protect his face from the expected attack of those hooked talons, but none came. A body thudded down upon him, then slid limply off again without making any move. To attack. Blake scrambled to his feet, writhing upon the ground. All around him were ape things in their death agonies. On the ground beyond them, quivering and broken in the midst of its dying guards, was a viscid mass of loathsome gray jelly. Blake's shot had apparently struck home squarely in the center of that vulnerable blob. Even as he watched, the gelatinous mass shuddered in a last convulsion, then became quite still. At the same instant, the last sign of life vanished from the writhing ape things on the ground. A good half of the attacking creatures were included in the dead bodies. The other half, Blake now saw, had retreated to cluster in wild panic about the remaining blob of jelly. Realizing exultantly that his single shot had slain one of the two weirdly disassociated organisms, Blake, with pistol in hand, advanced toward the other, trying to get a clear shot at the jelly through the furry bodies clustering around it. The group promptly turned and fled in blind panic. Blake sent the pistol's last shot crashing into the mass without any appreciable effect. Then the thing stampede carried them, hurtling on through one of the gold flecked side walls, out into the swirling purple mists. The gold flecked sheet flowed together again so swiftly behind the things that a fraction of a second later, there was not even the slightest indication in its shimmering, unbroken surface to show that it had ever been pierced. For 30 yards, the fleeing ape things sped on into the purple vapors. Then disaster struck them with bewildering swiftness. They stopped in full flight, shuddered for a moment, then slumped to the ground with their limbs writhing in agony. In their center, the jelly ovoids quivered madly in the same strange torture. Tiny patches of vivid purple appeared at a hundred different points upon the dying creatures. The patches spread and merged with lightning rapidity until a solid sheet of livid purple covered the writhing mass. Swiftly, that mass lost both movement and shape as it melted down into a pool of turgid purple slime. Then the slime vaporized into purple mists that blended into the surrounding vapors, and all trace of the ape things in their jelly nucleus had vanished. Stunned by the incredible speed of this general dissolution, Blake realized for the first time the real reason for the presence of the gold flaked walls of force. Without those shimmering walls, the captives would not have lived for a minute in the deadly purple atmosphere of this weird world beneath the twin suns. The gold flecked walls were both their protection and their prison. The swirling purple mists outside those walls held the earthlings as effectively and hopelessly prisoner in their enclosure as goldfish in a bowl of water. Blake turned back to the thicket to see how Helen and Mapes had fared in that terrific battle with the headless things. He was relieved to see that the girl had apparently escaped without even a scratch. She was kneeling beside Mapes prone figure, doing what she could to revive him. The gangster was badly battered, but he seemed to have no serious injuries. He was already beginning to stir weakly and show signs of returning life. Blake started to step over to the two. Then he stopped abruptly as he heard a sharp metallic clang from the cone building out in the purple mist beyond the end of the wall. He looked up quickly and saw that an oval window had opened in the structure near its tip. Framed in the opening was what seemed to be a large concave mirror. At one side of the mirror was a living being of some kind. But the intervening mists prevented Blake from making out any details beyond a hazy glimpse of a cluster of what seemed to be long, slender snake like black tentacles. The next moment there spurted from the mirror a broad and swiftly spreading beam of red light so brilliant that it glowed clearly even in the bright purple rays of the twin suns. Before Blake could shout a warning to Helen, the racing flood of ruddy radiance was upon them. The scene reeled in a blurred kaleidoscope of flaming colors before Blake's eyes for a brief second, then complete oblivion swept over him. After an interval that seemed hours, consciousness returned to him as suddenly as it had left him. His first bewildered look around him disclosed the fact that fact that startling changes had occurred in his surroundings during the period while he was under the anesthesia of the red ray. His first effort at movement brought realization that he was in the grip of a strange paralysis. His head and neck seemed quite normal in every way, but from the throat downward his body was completely dead as far as any power of voluntary movement was concerned. He twisted his head stiffly to one side and saw that Helen was standing there beside him. Just beyond her was the motionless figure of Gil Mapes. Both the gangster and the girl were in the grip of the same strange paralysis. Like Blake, they were standing there rigidly motionless, facing the gold flecked barrier wall just in front of them. A moment's painful scrutiny of their position showed Blake that the post forming the wall of the enclosure at the end of the toward the cone had been brought in nearly a hundred yards toward them while they slept. The shimmering barrier sheet was now scarcely a yard from their faces. Yet they still stood near the thicket where they had battled the headless horrors. Blake saw his coat half buried in the blue gray dust near his feet, where Helen had discarded the garment to minister to Mapes. Their unseen captor had obviously made definite preparations for whatever his next purpose with them was to be, for a long wheeled platform had been brought to a position opposite them, just outside this shimmering gold flecked sheet. Blake noted the shattered remains of Mape's pistol on the ground at one side of the platform. It had apparently been fished from the enclosure and rendered harmless after the captor had seen the weapon's efficient use against the headless ape things. Clustered upon the wheeled platforms was an assemblage of intricately winding coils, glowing tubes, and other apparatus that conveyed no more meaning to Blake's bewildered gaze than a sight of the interior of a metropolitan power house would to a Congo savage. There was only one piece of the apparatus regarding whose probable function Blake could even guess. This was a pair of long slender arms that projected through the shimmering walls into the enclosure, supporting at their end a large thin metal plate located just over the heads of the three earthlings. Blake was willing to wager that it was this overhead plate that was responsible for the odd paralysis that held them helpless. Then a figure came slowly into view from where it had been concealed by the apparatus, and Blake forgot all thought of the strange mechanisms as he watched the monstrous thing clamber stiffly from the platform and halt squarely in front of the captives to stare at them through the transparency of the intervening force sheet. The thing was a curious blending of human and bestial features. It stood barely five feet in height, yet its great scale armored skull was at least three times as large as that of a grown man. There was colossal mental power, a nameless evil glowing in the dark depths of the two abnormally large eyes that stared fixedly out from under the heavy forehead. The thing had no nose. The mouth opening surrounded by a rosette of flabby gray skin, was a mere slit. The entire skull and face were covered with small, closely overlapping scales of lustreless gray. The head merged directly into the short black torso nearly as wide as the skull itself. From this trunk there writhed a score of long black snake like tentacles, each terminating in a flexible three fingered hand. The trunk was supported by two short thick legs armored with gray scales and ending in broad three toed feet. Greetings, Earthlings. The voice that emanated from the grotesque mouth was surprisingly resonant in tone. Allow me to present myself. I am Xeru, Imperial Scientist of Zolar. The monstrosity seemed amused at the expressions of blank surprise upon the faces of his captives. I learned your crude language from your brain cells while you slept under the red ray, he explained. Also, I learned many other things regarding your planet Earth. I am glad to find your world so well adapted to my purpose. Within a few years after my arrival there, I shall be its unquestioned ruler. Blake started to voice the many questions that were surging through his mind, but an imperious gesture of an outflung tentacle stopped him. Silence, Earthling. There was tolerant contempt in Zeru's ringing voice. I will explain some of the things that puzzle you. There is no reason why I should trouble myself to do so. Yet it may while away the tedium of the short wait yet remaining before my apparatus becomes charged to the required point. Listen carefully, Earthling, for at best you will find many of my thoughts beyond the feeble limits of the word forms with which you have provided me. 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way by which I can flee to your far distant universe, where not even the powers of the Council of Three can follow me. That way lies through the door of interdimensional space. In space as you know it, the almost unthinkable distance of a million light years separates Zolar from the dwarf star you call your sun. Yet traveling between space, the two planets nearly touch each other. The same situation of being near neighbors in interdimensional space holds two with Zolar and at least seven other planets located in widely separated parts of your universe. Let me try to illustrate what I mean by traveling between space we will assume a nearly two dimensional universe in the form of a circular piece of paper three feet in diameter. There is a dot in the exact same center of each side of this paper. To a two dimensional creature forced to travel only on the surface of the paper, the distance between the two dots can never be less than 36 inches. Yet by cutting between the two surfaces and going directly through the paper, the dots are less than 100th of an inch apart. Such is the case with Zolar and the planets in your universe, which are our immediate neighbors in interdimensional space. In order to reach those planets, I had only to develop a method of using sufficient force to cut between the three dimensions of intervening space. In solving this problem, I developed both an interdimensional met to bring beings from your universe to mine, and an interdimensional gate to permit beings to pass from here back to worlds in your galaxy. You have already seen the workings of the Net. It was the device of Green Fire that brought you here. The use of the Net was a vital part of my plans, for without the use of a physical body from some world in your universe, I could not hope to live longer than a few minutes after leaving Xolar via the interdimensional gate. The inherent characteristics and basic elements of your galaxy and the Andromedan universe are so different in every way that an inhabitant of either star group cannot exist in the other. Zolar's purple atmosphere is characteristic of Andromedan worlds. Your oxygen saturated air is typical of worlds in your galaxy, just as Zolar's purple Mist would be immediately fatal to you. So would your clear, oxygen tainted air be quickly fatal to me. Accordingly, my only chance of surviving in one of your worlds is to first transfer my intelligence to the body of one of the dwellers upon that planet. Of the seven planets within reach of my net, I found only two that promised to be at all suitable. One was your Earth, the other a minor planet circling the star you call Vega. I brought both you and the net load of Vegans here to this oxygen filled enclosure I had already prepared. The Vegans were the headless things with the jelly nuclei. I watched your battle with them and waited to choose as my vehicle the planetary type that proved the stronger. You vanquished the Vegans. So it is in the body of an Earthling that I shall leave Zolar and it is to the planet Earth that I shall be hurtled through the interdimensional gates. Aside from the slight difficulty caused by having to keep my body and yours, each in its proper element during the operation, the matter of transfer into one of your bodies is a simple one. It involves none of the clumsy brain surgery of your earthly science. We of Zolaar have found that the real intelligence of a being is an invisible force, not at all dependent for existence upon the protoplasm through which it manifests. My intelligence can function quite as well in your brain cells as in my own. I require no assistant in the transfer. Zeru indicated an intricate piece of apparatus on the platform behind him. It was a massive cylinder of fluorescent metal with two long metallic cables running from its center, each cable ending in a saucer shaped disk. I have only to thrust one cable through the force wall into your enclosure and place its disc upon one of your heads, then place the other disk upon my own head. The apparatus is entirely automatic. Three seconds after both disks are in place, my intelligence will course into the Earthling brain, driving out his intelligence and destroying it as mine enters. I will, of course remove the selected body from under the paralyzing plate before I attach the disks. Then, when I am safely transferred to the Earthling body, I will have only to walk on through the enclosure to the silver arch at the far end and leave Xolar forever. That silver arch is the interdimensional gate to your Earth. Its operation is slightly different from that of the letter where the net was capable of reaching under the surface of your planet. A proceeding I tried. When two attempts upon the surface prove fruitless, the gate is so adjusted that it will place its passenger exactly upon the surface of your world. It requires no co operation from this end, when I step under the arch, I merely close a black lever there. Interdimensional force immediately catapults me to your earth. Then the automatic mechanism of the gate will, within a half minute of my departure, release an explosion that will shatter everything within a radius of a mile here, and so prevent the Council of Three from even guessing the method of my escape. But what of the two of us whose bodies you do not need? Blake protested. Can you not at least take them through the arch gate with you back to their home world? Why should I do anything so foolish as that? Answered callously, they might easily be a menace to my first attempts to establish myself upon your planet. Far better to leave them here in their present state of paralysis, to be safely destroyed in the explosion of the gate. Deru now thrust three of his tentacles into a vat of milky fluid and withdrew them, coated with a silver sheen on the black flesh, the silver glaze seemed to be an insulation against both the oxygen and of the enclosure and the paralyzing force of the overhead disk, for the Xolarian promptly thrust the three silver coated arms through the wall and began handling the bodies of Mapes and Blake in a painstaking process of examination. Again Blake noted that the shimmering gold flecked wall closed quickly in and kept its surface unbroken no matter how often objects were thrust through it. Completely ignoring, Helle lifted first Mapes, then Blake, his tentacles probing, fingering, exploring. There was enormous power in the Xolarian's grotesque body. He lifted the men as though they were wooden dolls, bringing them close to the shimmering wall to peer at them, then setting them carefully down again on their feet under the disk. Blake wondered idly why their stiff bodies did not topple over when they were left unsupported, then decided that the paralyzing force of the disc probably left the automatic muscular balancing movements unimpaired, affecting only the powers of voluntary movement. Then, as Zeru sat him down after one of the periods of examination, Blake noticed a new and startling change. The moment his feet touched the ground, his right leg and right arm were no longer dead. He hurriedly glanced down at the ground at his feet and promptly found what seemed to be the reason for his partial freedom from the paralysis. In setting his body down the last time, Zero had moved Blake slightly. His right foot now rested upon the corner of the discarded topcoat, lying half buried there in the blue gray dust. The heavily rubberized cloth apparently acted as an insulating sheet that prevented the effective grounding of the paralyzing force that streamed down through Blake's body from the overhead disk. Consequently, all portions of his body between the coat and the disk were free from the paralysis. For a moment, Blake wondered at Zeru's carelessness. Then he realized that the insulating qualities of rubber would naturally be unknown to a Zollarian. Noting that Zeru was busy at the moment with his work upon Mapes, Blake quickly grasped at the faint chance the presence of the rubberized cloth offered him. Working with infinite slowness and caution, he edged his right foot over an inch at a time, dragging the rest of his body with it. Luck was with him, Zeru continued, absorbed in his work upon Mapes. The Xolarian's telepathic powers apparently functioned only with the aid of the red ray, for he remained oblivious of Blake's actions. One final cautious dragging movement and Blake's entire body was upon the cloth and every muscle again vibrantly alive. Blake stood there motionless, faking paralysis while his brain raced in an effort to figure the best use to make of his present advantage. He was still trapped, not daring to reach even a hand beyond the protection of the cloth under foot. The first essential of any effort at escape would have to be a lunge of sufficient power to take him safely beyond the area of the disk's influence. Blake's first thought was to hurl himself through the barrier wall upon Zeru, trusting to sheer surprise to overwhelm the Zolarian. But he quickly dismissed that plan. It left too many elements in Zeru's favor. There was a tube like weapon thrust in a belt around Xeru's middle and there were probably a dozen other different weapons lying handy to his reach among the apparatus on the platform. The deadly purple mist beyond the wall would alone in all probability overcome Blake before he could batter Zeru down. By far the best plan was to stage the battle inside the enclosure where Blake would be in his own native element. If he could yank Zeru inside the wall, he would have him away from the contact with his mechanical weapons and battling in an atmosphere inherently poisonous to him. Under those circumstances, Blake felt that he might have an even chance in a hand to hand combat with the powerful but slow footed Xolarian. Once Zero was eliminated, escape back to Earth should be a simple matter. The Silver Gate, with its automatic mechanism needing only the closing of a leverage, was ready and waiting there in the enclosure behind them. For long, tense minutes, Blake forced himself to remain rigidly motionless while Zeru labored over Mapes. Then finally, the Xolarian turned his attention briefly back to Blake and thrust two tentacles in to grip his body. No sooner had the tentacles crossed over the border of the cloth than Zero realized that something was wrong. He tried to whip his arms back again, but too late. Blake made a lightning snatch at a tentacle with both hands and in the same lithe movement turned from the barrier wall and flung himself headlong toward the center of the enclosure. Zeru had no time to brace himself. He was jerked bodily through the shimmering wall and on after Blake's lunging body. One of the Xolarian's waving tentacles grasped wildly at the overhead disk in an effort to stay his flight. The only result was to bring the entire disk and its supports crashing in ruins to the ground upon the struggling figures of Blake and himself. Blake was upon his feet again. Instantly snatching up a yard long scrap of metal from the wreckage of the disk, he flung himself upon Xeru. The Xolarian seemed for the moment too dazed by his fall to fight back. With tentacles raised to guard his head, he staggered backward in retreat, every step taking him farther away from the wall and the purple mists. Blake was vaguely aware that Helen and Mapes, freed by the wrecking of the disk, were scrambling to their feet. Mapes was already running toward the combatants. Blake was glad at the prospect of an ally. Zeru's dazed condition was swiftly passing. He had now stopped his retreat and was already fumbling a tentacle toward the tube. Weapon in his belt. Blake flung himself upon Zeru in another effort to beat him down before he could draw that weapon. But his metal club glanced harmlessly off the tentacles Zeru raised to shield his head. Then, beyond Zeru, Blake saw something that made him stop his assault. It was Mape, sprinting toward the silver arch gate at the other end of the enclosure. Blake's heart sank as he realized the gangster's treachery. If he once reached that arch, he could send himself safely hurtling back to earth, while Blake and Helen would be left to perish with Zeru in the explosion that would immediately follow. It was too late for Blake to head the gangster off. He had already covered half the distance to the arch. Zeru noted Mape's fleeting figure almost as quickly as did Blake. Swiftly, the Xolarian swung his tube weapon into line with the fleeing gangster. A thin pencil of dull yellow light of a peculiar density spurted from the tube toward Mapes. There was a flash of blinding flame as the light beam met the gangster's body. Then Mapes figure seemed to literally explode, as though blasted by dynamite from within. So devastating was the force of that explosion that nothing remained in Mape's body beyond a few scattered fragments of shoes and clothing. Blake was still dazed at the cataclysmic suddenness of Mape's death as Deiru swung the tube around to train it upon him. Only a last minute, desperate effort upon Blake's part saved him. His wildly thrown metal club made a lucky hit on the tube itself, knocking it shattered and useless, out of Zero's grasp. Unharmed, Zeru faced Blake with his face contorting in agony. For a moment the Xolarian swayed there, apparently trying to gather his failing strength for the next move. The deadly air of the enclosure was already taking hideous toll. The scaly flesh of his head and face was dissolving like melting butter. Zaru's strength was ebbing too swiftly for him to have any chance of gaining safety through either of the distant side walls. His only hope of fighting back to the purple mists was to pass Blake and go through the nearby end wall through which he had originally been drawn. He came lunging forward in an attack whose sheer fury made Blake give ground before the menace of the lashing tentacles. Blake took another backward step, then staggered as his foot struck a rough spot on the ground. Deru's tentacles were upon him. Before he could recover himself, his club was jerked from his fingers and sent hurtling far out of reach. Half a dozen of the tentacle arms lashed around his throat in a strangling grip. He clawed wildly at the choking coils, but they failed to loosen even a fraction of an inch. Desperately, Blake sent his fists smashing into the gray face. The scale armor of Zeru's skull, fast weakening in the liquefying influence of the oxygen, gave way beneath that battering attack. He staggered and his coiling tentacles relaxed slightly. Blake tore himself free. A final smashing blow, with every ounce of his 190 pounds behind it, sent Zeru crashing to the ground. The Xolarian tried to rise, then feebly slumped back. His strength spent, Blake leaped forward to finish his opponent, but stopped as he saw that his efforts were not needed. The deadly air of the enclosure was now overwhelming Zero with swift and hideous death. He was literally rotting before Blake's horrified eyes, the gray scaled skin sloughing off in streaming rivulets of pallid ooze and the entire body contorting in what was obviously a death agony. Sickened, Blake stepped back a pace or two. Zeru's tentacles feebly beat the ground around him. Then suddenly, one of the writhing arms blundered upon a thin cable running along the ground. Before Blake could spring forward to stop him, Zeru, with a last surge of power, ripped the fragile metal strand completely in two. It was the Xolarian's dying effort. He slumped in a motionless, nearly loquaccent heap. But that last blind blow at the earthlings threatened to be a deadly one. The severed cable led to one of the black posts surrounding the enclosure. With the cables parting, an entire section of one of the gold flecked barrier walls vanished. Zolaar's deadly purple mists were already surging in. Speed was the Earthling's only chance now. Helen was as quick to realize the danger as was Blake. Side by side, they started their mad race toward where the silver arch gate loomed nearly a hundred yards away. They had covered barely half the distance when the air around them began to show a definite tinge of purple. With the appearance of the purple hue there came a strange and swiftly increasing agony, a torturing vibration that seemed to be tearing every atom of their bodies asunder. They were within 10 yards of the arch when Helen fell. Blake grabbed her up in his arms and stumbled on There was no longer enough oxygen in the air to even breathe. Blake's lungs were on fire. Every cell in his body seemed vibrating in unbearable torment. It was all that he could do to struggle. Up on the low platform. He staggered across the space and under the arch. It took the last shred of strength in his tortured body for him to lift his hand and pull the black lever down into place. Its action was instantaneous. The agony of the purple mist was blotted out in a surging wave of mighty force that swept Blake and Helen up and away through a spaceless universe where black chaos reigned awesomely supreme. There was a long, terrible moment of hurtling through distances inconceivably fast. Blake's brain reeled in nausea. Then suddenly all motion ceased and everything was normal again. There was firm grassy ground under his feet and a cool breeze was blowing in his face. He opened his eyes and saw the gray half light of early dawn. After the first swift look around him, he sighed in mighty relief. To his left was the familiar skyline of Fifth Avenue. To his right was Central Park West. They were somewhere in Central park, safe again in their own world, and somewhere in that other world beneath the twin purple suns. The time mechanism of the Silver Gate should even now be releasing the explosive that would forever blot out all trace of the evil handiwork of cosmic fissure of Zolar End OF Zeru of Zolar By Hal K. Wells.
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