Quofum

by Alan Dean Foster

  Valnadireb considered. The gleaming, valentine-shaped head turned to regard the human xenologist. “My memory is distressingly hazy. Was I really that far gone?”

  N’kosi’s reply was somber. “For a minute out there I thought I’d lost you completely. I considered stunning you and dragging you back.”

  The thranx nodded slowly, gesturing simultaneously with the truhand that was not holding the beaker. “So dangerous. So subtle. Such an insinuating environment. Very well. Your caution is well considered, Mosi. No nocturnal research for a while.” Inflexible mouthparts prevented a thranx from smiling, but Valnadireb shaped the equivalent expression with animated movements of his hands.

  “You promise? I’ll be working down the coast as usual and I won’t always be able to keep an eye on you.”

  Antennae stiffened. “I am not a larva, Moselstrom N’kosi. I can guarantee control of myself here as effectively as in a proper hive.”

  N’kosi nodded his understanding, indicating that his colleague’s terse pledge was sufficient assurance.

  It would have to be.

  14

  Despite the promise Valnadireb had given him, N’kosi could not keep from worrying about the state of his colleague’s mind as he headed southward to continue his own work. So apprehensive was he that if not for one small matter on which he was most anxious to follow up, he would have stayed at camp just to watch over the thranx. That small matter, however, did more than draw him southward one more time down the coast.

  It all but compelled him.

  Several hours of travel on the scooter brought him to the temporary campsite he had established. He was relieved to see it was exactly as he had left it. The campsite lay at the extreme southern edge of the scooter’s round-trip range. Neither native sentient nor animal had disturbed it in his absence. Not that there was much to disturb. Cobbled together out of driftwood, drift silicates, and other natural materials he had scavenged from the beach and the edge of the forest, the ramshackle lean-to resembled a shelter from pre-technology old Earth. With its clipped-together plant-leaf roof flapping in the wind and its unmortared rock-and-shell lower walls, its function would have been immediately familiar to one of his own primitive ancestors.

  Though not critical to his work, the shelter certainly added to his comfort while he conducted his local surveys and processed the specimens he acquired for the main camp’s burgeoning collection. The impermanent walls of loose stone and harvested vegetable matter protected him from the occasionally gusty ocean breezes and the hot, humid winds that blew outward from the depths of the forest. The sandy-floored interior boasted a couple of crude workbenches and rough seats he had thrown together. While inadequate to pass muster at an artisan’s gathering, they allowed him to work without having to sit on the damp sand or an exposed log. Used to relying on advanced technology to facilitate his toil, he was inordinately proud of having knocked something together with his own hands and a few simple tools. Still, he knew that his research would have progressed faster had he had the use of the skimmer.

  On the other hand, if he had been the one utilizing that speedy, long-range transport, he might not have found the entrance.

  The entrance to what, he did not yet know. He fully intended to share his discovery with his colleagues. But first he wanted to find out more about it. As yet there was little to describe scientifically beyond a dark hole in the ground. Well, not in the ground actually, he reminded himself as he left scooter and shelter behind and made his way into the edge of the forest that bordered the beach. More in a hillside than in the ground.

  It was a short walk through the usual frantic Quofumian vegetation from the temporary shelter to the discovery site. Small flying things darted at his face and buzzed his ears as he pushed his way through the brush. He waved at them and they dodged nimbly, whistling their outrage at his persistent refusal to let them land on and suck fluids from his exposed face. With half their ten-centimeter body lengths consisting of long, sharp-pointed snouts, he had no desire to study their feeding method firsthand.

  Ten minutes after leaving the shelter and the beach behind he found himself once more standing before the opening. He had discovered it on his previous trip. Searching for some of the exotic Quofumian life-forms that absorbed, concentrated, and then secreted metallic compounds to form protective shells or body armor, he had been startled when the handheld scanner he had been using had unexpectedly gone borderline berserk. Hastily recalibrating the device and following its signal, he had pushed through the forest until he found himself confronted by the hole in the hillside.

  It was not all that impressive. Approximately twice his height and width, the gap gave way rapidly to total darkness. Shining a light within revealed only a dark tunnel running straight into the hillside.

  Of more immediate interest and the find that had drawn him back was the wide ring of black metal that framed the opening. It ought to have been overrun with vegetation. Instead, it was completely bare and exposed, as if it had been installed yesterday—or regularly maintained. As neither explanation made any sense, he had come back in search of one. A gleaming, highly reflective charcoal-gray, visually the metal frame most nearly resembled a primitive ancient alloy called wrought iron. That it was something else entirely was confirmed as soon as he passed his field analyzer over it. The result was a readout best described as confused. As a xenologist whose focus was biology it was not surprising that he was unfamiliar with the initial readings. An experienced astronomer would have been quicker to recognize their significance, though they would have left him even more bemused.

  The alloy of iron, chromium, and titanium was a signature indicative of a rare type of binary system known as an iron star. But the applicable reading for such stellar phenomena were always detected and recorded as emissions, not as a solid. It was as if the metal ring that framed the opening in the hillside had been forged from a particular type of stellar wind. Pure fantasy, N’kosi thought as he read through the analyzer’s layman’s description of what he had stumbled across. Except—he was looking at it.

  And then there were the deeply embossed hieroglyphs.

  At least, he assumed they were glyphs. They appeared too elaborate and too diverse to be the letters of an alphabet. There were hundreds of them, minute and perfectly stamped into the metal. If they were letters or characters, they far exceeded in variety the components of ancient Terran languages such as Chinese or ancient Egyptian. On his previous visit he had utilized his beam cutter in an attempt to excise a sample to take back to camp and show Valnadireb, reasoning that it was as important for his colleague to see the material itself as well as just a recording of the inscriptions. His advanced, high-tech tool would not score much less cut the metal. It would not even warm it. That also made no sense. The heat from the cutter had to go somewhere. Either the gray alloy was a heat sink of unique molecular composition or else there was another explanation that exceeded his limited knowledge of metallurgy.

  Unable to interpret the hieroglyphs or take a sample of the metal into which they were imprinted, he had returned to the site with fully charged long-lasting lights. At least he could explore the tunnel. He had also made certain to bring not one but two sidearms with him, both a beamer and a pulsepopper. The tunnel was too welcoming a potential habitat for it to have been ignored by Quofum’s fauna, and he fully expected to encounter at least one imposing species as he explored its depths. He had no intention of doing so unprepared in case any current residents took exception to his trespass.

  Yet as he advanced deeper and deeper into the passageway he encountered nothing larger than a few harmless, nonambulatory growths eking out a precarious existence on the walls and floor. Though fashioned of the same singular metal as the ring that framed the entryway, the latter were as smooth to the touch as glass. Soil or decomposing organic compounds that might have been expected to have been blown, drifted, or been dropped inside were utterly lacking. Clearly the impenetrable metal was not a hospitable envi
ronment for hardy fungi, or even bacteria.

  The sensors on his scanner stayed flat, indicating a complete absence of radiation, heat, or other life-inhibiting factors. It was as if the tunnel walls themselves comprised a self-sterilizing environment on which nothing could grow. Nor did he encounter the hypothesized forest fauna that might have been expected to lay claim to such a splendid uncolonized habitat. In addition to life-forms, the tunnel was empty even of hieroglyphs.

  Whether tired or not, he stopped every hour to rest, drink something, and eat a small snack to keep his energy level up. The circle of light that marked the tunnel entrance had long since shrunk into oblivion. At least he did not have to worry about taking a wrong turn. There were no side passages, no dark tributaries down which to stumble and lose his way. The perfect straightness of the corridor was almost as startling as its composition.

  That it was artificial in origin was a conclusion he had reached long ago. As to who or what had created it and for what purpose he had not the slightest idea. The dark alloy itself corresponded to nothing in the extensive reference archives contained in his analyzer and communit. He remained as ignorant of its nature as he did of the meaning of the extensive glyphs that decorated the tunnel’s entrance. Thus far the unmarked, unmarred corridor was nothing more than a horizontal shaft leading deep into the rippling range of low hills that constituted this portion of the unbroken surface forest’s most notable geologic feature.

  He had been hiking for a little over four and a half hours when his eyes sensed light that was not being given off by the glowbeam attached to his headgear. The faint radiance strengthened as he lengthened his stride. His analyzer confirmed that the light was of artificial origin, so it was not coming from outside. So he had not walked all the way through a hill or ridgeline. Soon it had brightened enough for his glowbeam to shut down automatically in response. He slowed. Though he was unaware of it, his lips parted and left him standing with his mouth slightly open.

  Spread out before him was a subterranean panorama of tubes, conduits, relays, light-wave connectors, transmitters, siphons, spigots, emitters, electronic transposers, and a host of variegated apparatus and instrumentation he did not recognize. It appeared to go on forever. Trying to make sense of it all and to compare it to something identifiable, he found himself imagining all the pasta that had ever been produced and consumed by humankind transmuted suddenly into chrome and gold, tossed with a googolplex of jewels, and then dumped in a vat of soup the size of Cachalot’s world-girdling ocean. The technical spectacle sprawled out before him was simply incomprehensible.

  He could see through the maze as far as his excellent distance vision allowed. Pulling a scope from his duty belt, he found that even at maximum magnification he could not discern the end of the complex. One unblocked lane allowed him an uninterrupted view through the serpentine maze all the way to the horizon. As near as he could tell, the tortuous byzantine meandering of cables and conduits and flashing lights extended not only to that horizon but beyond. How far beyond he had no way of telling.

  He resolved to leave and return with the scooter. It would allow him to explore far more of this temple of connectivity than he could ever hope to see on foot. Unfortunately, the tunnel was too narrow to admit the skimmer. That restriction led him to ponder the lengthy but constricted corridor’s purpose. A ventilation duct of some kind, perhaps. Knowing nothing of the size or shape of those who had bored the shaft, he supposed it might be wide enough to admit lesser craft intended for beings smaller than himself.

  Despite the unending display of activity that continued to flash and flare before his eyes, there was no sign of whoever had built the visceralike network. Every time he saw motion, whether through the scope or just with his eyes, the source of the activity proved to be automata. Their method of propulsion was as enigmatic as their shapes, and he recognized neither. Blobs of liquid metal or plastic glided through the underground world as effortlessly and silently as if elevated by helium. Animated conduits and serpentine tools slithered like snakes or waved back and forth like windblown plant stems until they completed their own necessary connections and disconnects. Solid transparencies drifted to and fro like so many preprogrammed jellyfish, dipping low or ascending ceilingward to execute designated tasks with bursts of intensely colored light.

  More than size or sight, it was the abounding silence that struck him most forcefully. So much activity, so many things going on at once, and all of it taking place in the absence of any noise louder than a puff of displaced air or a fleeting electronic whisper. The utter lack of clash and clamor bespoke a dearth of friction, which in turn implied a technology sophisticated beyond that achieved by any humanx science. There was much going on here, he told himself, and not all of it was visible. The implications of what he was not seeing were more overawing than the shapes and actions his optic nerves were able to define.

  Who had built this place, and why? What was the function of what appeared to be an endless subterranean ganglion of tubes and electronics and devices he was unable to identify? Why did thousands of lines and conduits and photonic tracks disappear into the perfectly smooth, eggshell-white, highly pearlized ceiling or into the equally featureless floor? All manner of possible explanations raced through his mind, running into one another, only to crash and burn on the bumpy, potholed field of logic.

  Whatever its purpose, whoever had built it had arranged for it to be automatically maintained, cleaned, serviced, and possibly upgraded. A sudden thought made him glance down at his wrist chronometer. He had been standing and staring in one place for nearly half an hour. A full hour remained to him before he needed to start back up the tunnel in order to emerge from its entrance in time to return to his makeshift beach camp before dark. Not that he couldn’t find his way back after dark—all he had to do when he stepped out of the metal-framed exit was turn right and keep walking until he reached the ocean. But he was mindful of the same advice and warnings he had forced on his colleague Valnadireb about roaming around in the forest at night.

  What he was looking at now left him even less inclined than usual to engage in any nocturnal rambling.

  He could not simply stand where he was on the edge of the tunnel and stare. No scientist in his position could do so and claim to be worthy of the name. In the absence of the scooter he would have to explore what he could as best he could on foot. Tentatively extending his right leg and putting a boot down on the seamless cream-colored floor, he took a step forward.

  A pale violet luminescence immediately flared beneath the sole, spreading like ripples in a pond. Hastily he drew his foot back into the tunnel. Spreading outward in all directions, the ripples of embedded light faded away. His feathery imprint had generated no sound.

  Bending his knee and bringing his foot up, he felt gingerly of the boot sole. It was perfectly cool to the touch. Taking a deep breath, he stepped forward once again. This time when the radiating light appeared beneath his foot he did not retreat. Bringing his other leg forward, he let all his weight rest on the vitreous, shining surface beyond the tunnel. It was as solid and unyielding beneath him as the metal floor of the corridor or the land outside.

  Though the surface was solid enough, the ripples of light that flared outward in concentric circles of energy every time he put a foot down made him feel as if he were walking on water. Or more accurately, he corrected himself, on cream. And just because he heard nothing, he reminded himself, did not mean he was not making any noise. His footsteps and the dynamic technology that now surrounded him could very well have been generating frequencies beyond his plebeian human range of hearing. Returning to this place with more sophisticated instruments for analyzing its surroundings would doubtless allow him to answer many of the questions that were presently crowding his mindspace for attention.

  He set out on a relatively straight line through the hallucinogenic techno-tangle, relying on his communit’s tracker to guide him safely back to the tunnel in the event he lost sight of it.
Looking over his shoulder, the black circle that marked the corridor’s location seemed as out of place in the all-glistening weird-wired whiteness as a hippo on an iceberg. Though he had heard virtually nothing since leaving the tunnel mouth, his ears strained for sound.

  Deep caves were like this, he told himself. Deep and dry and dead, they were places where the silence was so profound you could hear your own heart beating. But though the pulse of energy and activity was all around him, he heard nothing beyond the occasional tantalizing whisper of speeding electrons.

  He estimated that he had hiked about a kilometer from the end of the tunnel when the spheres confronted him.

  There were two. Globular in shape with edges that were in constant motion like the rim of a sun in the process of setting, each was some two meters in diameter. They came rushing toward him from behind a trio of enormous discontinuous cables that spiraled upward to tie floor and ceiling together with flickering blue filaments. Strain as he might, N’kosi could not see anything connecting the intermittent flashes of azure. Some kind of energy field, he decided, was all that was holding them together.

  He started to turn and run, hesitated, then decided to hold his ground. For one thing it was unlikely he could outrun spheres composed of nothing but light. If the approaching shapes wanted to run him to ground he felt certain they could do so easily enough.

  Instead of making contact they halted a body length away, hovering in the air, featureless and refulgent. One was a deep pulsing purple, the other an intense throbbing orange. He could not escape the feeling that he was being scrutinized. Like everything else in the immense underground chamber they made no sound.