The Bloodless Peril by Will Garth (Henry Kuttner)
Page 2
This second laboratory was about
yawning, closed it as flashing death struck thirty feet high and as large as a football it, sagged to the peat moss bed, then grew field. Its light was different. Looking up, green and tall again. There were perennials Storm saw that only half the bank of lights too: plants taking longer than a season to were on. There were no tanks in here, save grow. These mushroomed in three-second
a small one nearby which was empty; a
spurts until they were tall trees, dropped temporary forcing bed of some sort no
fantastic blooms, then died again.
longer used but not yet taken from the big
“Plants as rulers of Earth,” Laura
room. The plant life of the place grew from Hart said softly, as she unlocked the inner peat moss on the floor, open and
door. “Flowers as overlords. There will be unrestricted.
peace when human beings are gone. Plants
And what plant life!
have no greed for power, no instinct for
Each plant was twelve to fifteen
murder. They do not kill as men do.”
feet tall and as large around as a man’s
Storm was awed by this woman thigh. Its Upper half was a naked stalk who had gone as far in botany as he had in crowned with a blazing orange bloom as
bacteriology. But he couldn’t let that pass.
big as a hogshead.
“A world of cabbages!” he snorted.
A forest of the things stretched
“Peace? It will be the peace of a turnip! I’d from door to far wall of the secret
rather be ruled by bloody despots than by laboratory. And though there was no breeze milkweeds!”
in here, they swayed a little as though
He stared curiously at her.
imbued with animate life.
“You know,” he said in a different
“The common day-lily,” said Laura
tone, “I’m wondering if this sweet future Hart. “At least it was the common day-lily world of yours will be as serene as you
a million generations ago. Now it is as you think! It may be that some law of survival see it—the probable future ruler of Earth.”
of the fittest will hold true even then. There
“The sweet flower king, eh?”
are warlike plants, you know. And all will growled Ryder. “But I don’t believe it.
fight for the root-spread that means their What are these things, after all, but
existence.”
overgrown yellow flowers? Any beast that
browses can cut them down. There may be
LAURA smiled. The smile made Ryder’s
evolving insects to kill them. Or man—the hands clench. It was so unmoved and scientist of the future—can find ways to impersonal. If he could only reach this annihilate their whole species.”
woman—hurt her—do anything so she
“Insects?” smiled Laura Hart.
would become a human being instead of a
“These plants have developed sap that is
pacifistic thinking machine!
poisonous, searing. Man? If humanity
“I have worked with plants all my
doesn’t decimate itself in war, it will refuse life, Ryder. I know them. Animals, to work together—as always in history—
including man, are vile and murderous. until too late. Beasts? They can’t harm Plants are clean and placid. But you shall them unless they develop higher reasoning see.”
powers than these flowers possess.”
Storm followed her into the inner
Storm stared at her.
The Bloodless Peril
7
“You
mean
to
say—these
grimly, “your beautiful plants which will vegetables can reason?”
some day make this a better world—seem
“Yes. They can. They possess not to be so peaceful after all. There goes intelligence, Ryder. I don’t profess to know the last of your peonies. The lilies have what kind, or what sort of nervous system devoured them!”
produces it. But they have it. And
Laura’s hand was at her throat. Her
experiments prove that they are face was like death, as she saw the limp occasionally mobile; they can move from
roots of the lesser plant slowly and grimly place to place as animal things can. That drawn into the beautiful bloom of the
means they could move from dry spots to
larger.
moist ones, from barren ground to fertile.”
To her this was supreme tragedy.
She stopped and frowned.
For half her life she had built her ideas on
“That’s odd,” she said, looking the thought that some day the world would down between rows of enormous, weaving
be governed by things of peace—plant-
flower stalks. “There was a bed of giant
things among which there would be none
peonies in here. I don’t see them now.”
of the wars and destruction practiced by
“They may have evolved right out
humans. She had dreamed of a brighter,
of the picture,” Storm grunted.
better day; and, dreaming, she hadn’t cared Laura took the sentence seriously.
in the least what happened to humankind
“No. I stopped the rapid growth-
including herself.
span of these plants at this perfect stage.
And now—one species of her
The proper chemicals are in their peat moss super-plant had warred on another! Had
bed, but they must have the violet light for warred and won, and devoured the losers!
rapid evolution.”
Storm, guessing her tragic thoughts,
She
pointed
upward.
took her hand in his.
“As you see, the violet ray tubes are
“Don’t feel like that,” he said
not on. Only ordinary sunlight tubes. So the gently. “You’re a great scientist, but you’ve peonies could not have completed their made the mistake so many pacifists make.
evolutionary span while I was away—”
That is, to ignore the rule that life Is a battle. Nothing lives that doesn’t have to AGAIN she stopped. Her eyes widened.
fight something else for its life. In your
“Ryder — something is wrong in
future, which turns out to be not so sublime here! I can feel it—”
after all, the lilies are crowded by the
“Yes, I think something is!” Storm
peonies, so they war on them and the war
exclaimed. “And I think I can tell you
can only end in the extinction of one or the where your peonies are! Look!”
other. In the present, the yellow race feels He pointed to a great plant. The big
crowded by the white, so there is a war that yellow bloom was closed. But from the
can end only in—”
tight-closed rim a wilted green length
He stopped. His hand tightened
trailed. It was like a vine tendril trailing over hers.
from the mouth of a tightly closed sack. Or
“What is it?” Laura asked
like the tail of a small serpent protruding apathetically.
from the swallowing jaws of a larger,
“The door. Look toward the door.”
cannibalistic one!
Laura turned. Slowly the desperate
“Your sweet flowers,” Storm said
disillusion in her eyes was replaced by an
Thrilling Wonder Stories 8
emotion that had nothing to do with general living quarters, but there are two intellect: the emotion of stark fear.
locked metal d
oors between us and them.
Between them and the door, where
We can’t get out because of the lilies. Help there had been a wide, clear aisle, there was can’t come to us because of the locks—”
now a weaving triple row of gigantic day-
All the great flowers had their roots
lilies!
exposed now. And all were advancing, rank
“Ryder! What does it mean?”
on rank, closing in on the two.
Storm had his arm defensively
“I’ll try to get to the door,” said
around her shoulders.
Storm, with his forced calm. “These things
“The things have surrounded us—to
can’t be able to move fast.”
give us the same fate as the peonies! It
He walked toward the front rank of
means they’re so warlike that they’ll attack the plant-things that had got between them anything moving and living within their
and the exit. He leaped forward, big arms range!”
driving to tear a way between the stalks.
“But it can’t be! I’ve been in here
Like a flash the nearest stalks
many times before, alone, and they haven’t whipped down. Green tentacles coiled
acted like this.”
around his arms and body.
“Probably because they were
“Ryder!” screamed the woman.
weakened and dull from too rapid growth.
But Storm was only too desperately
You have now slowed their growth to aware of what had just happened. With normal, and they have gathered normal their swift moves, the plants had dropped strength—and mobility!”
the big flowers from their stalks. Like giant He stared at the nearest lily, nerves
toads, the blooms hit the moss-covered
crawling in his body.
cave floor with a dreadful soft plopping
The roots of the thing were slowly
sound. But they did not lie there.
withdrawing from the peat moss. Like
With the instant of their landing,
bloodless worms creeping, they came out
they began to move on weaving fringes
of the bed; and when they were bared, the toward the big red-bearded man.
plant they supported moved teeteringly
“Ryder—”
toward them.
One of the separated blooms
enveloped him to the hips. Its curling,
NEAR the door the lily stalks all stood on lovely cup sucked tight. From sections of exposed roots. They joined in the slow
its vast rim came slow trickles of some sort march toward Laura and Storm.
of digestive acid.
Intelligence? Yes, they did have
Sweat beaded Storm’s forehead.
some sort of intelligence. Must have it!
The muscles of his arms and barrel chest
Only reason could have made them move
writhed as he fought to tear free. Death
between the man and woman and their one
stared at him. Then, with a cracking of
way of exit.
shoulder tendons, he wrenched his arms
“They’re coming closer—”
from the green coils. He fell back over the whispered Laura, primeval fear in her eyes.
blossom that had clamped his legs together,
“What can we do?”
and rolled away.
“Have you an ax?” asked Storm,
Laura ran to him. With raking nails
keeping his voice calm.
she clawed at the ferocious flower cup. Its
“Not in here. There are some in the
walls were thin but tough, like orange-
The Bloodless Peril
9
enamelled patent-leather. They defied her to lift the lid, too, and get in to them!
hands. But some of the rim reached
The blunt, fiowerless end of one of
hungrily for her, and with that slight them found the overhang of the lid. It lessening of the deadly grip, Storm tore
moved up, with the lid opening as it
free.
moved.
His eyes thanked her for the help—
“We’ll fix that,” Storm said thickly.
probably the first destructive move she had He motioned Laura to the side of the case ever made. But he only said jerkily:
on which was the lid hinge. He leaned
“That tank! Run, before they cut us
powerfully against the glass wall, and she off from that too!”
added her weight to his. The glass tilted, Behind them was the glass fell on its side. The green coil which had experimental tank, noted before by Storm.
entered was wrenched out by the
Empty, unused, it offered a forlorn haven.
movement of the case. Again—and the
A whipping stalk looped down glass tank lay on its top, sealing the lid shut before them as they ran for the tank. The with its own weight.
flower dropped from it, to plop on the moss
“They can’t get in now.”
and start inching toward them. Storm
No, they could not get in. But
seized the thick stalk and wrenched at it.
neither could the two victims get out!
He did not succeed in tearing it in two, but Storm exclaimed suddenly. His
the whole plant shivered and jerked back, clothes from the waist down were
leaving the way clear for a few seconds.
beginning to smoke. The skin of his legs
felt as though bathed in liquid flame.
THE tank had a glass top as well as glass The digestive acid dripped by the
sides. The top was hinged, a glass lid.
first flower cup was eating in.
Storm lifted it up.
He tore the garments from him,
“In,
Laura!”
then ripped off the tunic of his shirt and The woman climbed in. Storm wiped the deadly stuff from his legs. He slithered after her. The lid banged down.
straightened, big torso bared from the waist The two stared at each other with
up, and his breath hissed between his teeth.
eyes in which horror was only a little
Flower cups were clustered against
lessened. The tank was a haven for the
the glass tank like bees on honey. From
moment. It would probably be their coffin each dripped the viscous stuff they secreted in a little while!
for absorption of victims. And under the
Moving with amazing quickness on
slow drip of that stuff the unbreakable glass their wormlike roots, the giant stalks had was turning milky—and was pitting!
surrounded the tank. On all sides, the big
“They can actually disintegrate
orange blooms crawled toward the glass,
glass!” Storm exclaimed. “See those pits!
separated from their stems. They piled up They’ll be through in an hour or less!”
around the case, sucking at it with acid-
Laura Hart nodded in a dazed sort
dripping rims, trying to reach the two. And of way. Her eyes were filled with despair.
then they proved again that they were able
“We’re going to die in this tank.
somehow to see and reason.
We’re going to be killed and eaten—by the These two creatures had entered the
creations I thought so peaceable and
glass case through an uplifted lid—
superior to humanity.”
promptly the tough stalks felt along the top She began to shudder, almost
Thrilling Wonder Stories 10
rhythmically. Storm held
her close.
Besides, the rapid evolutionary process
“We’re not dead yet.”
can’t help but weaken the plants. Laura,
Then he thrust her from him. He
where’s that switch?”
cursed deep in his throat, at himself, curses Hope dulled again in her sea-blue
that sounded like prayers.
eyes.
“What an idiot! There is a way—”
“It’s over on that panel.” She
pointed toward the wall of the subterranean HE caught Laura’s shoulder. “Where is the laboratory forty feet away. “We can’t
switch controlling the overhead ultra-
possibly reach it. There are dozens of the violet-tubes?”
things between this tank and it.”
“The violet-tubes?” repeated Laura.
“But we can reach it! We can get to
“Yes. Listen—You said you had it simply by rolling this tank over and over slowed the evolution of these damnable
toward it. We rolled it over on its top to things by shutting off the violet rays clamp the lid shut, didn’t we? Then why overhead.”
couldn’t we roll it some more—to reach a
Laura nodded, eyes mystified.
definite goal?”
“All right. Suppose we could switch
“Ryder—”
Laura’s
fingers bit into
them on again. The rapid growth-span of
his arm. “I really think we could. But if we the plants in here would be resumed, can do that, why not simply roll to the door wouldn’t it? They’d pick up their quick
and escape?”
progress in evolution wouldn’t they, with
“Because the door happens to open