The Kyben Stories

by Harlan Ellison

  We sit here, not speaking for a while.

  “Now what do we do? Where do we go?”

  “That’s up to you,” she says.

  “Will you go with me?”

  She shakes her head uncertainly. “I don’t think so. Every time I free a man he wants that. But I just haven’t wanted to go with any of them.”

  “Could we go back to the Home Galaxy, the place we came from, where the war was?”

  She stands up and walks around the stateroom where we have coupled for three weeks. She speaks, not looking at me, looking in the viewplate at the darkness and the far, bright points of the stars. “I don’t think so. We’re free of our ships, but we couldn’t possibly get them working well enough to carry us all the way back there. It would take a lot of charting, and we’d be running the risk of activating the intermind sufficiently to take over again, if we asked it to do the charts. Besides, I don’t even know where the Home Galaxy is.”

  “Maybe we should find a new place to go. Someplace where we could be free and outside the ships.”

  She turns and looks at me. “Where?”

  So I tell her what I heard the intermind say, about the world of golden crab-creatures.

  It takes me a long! time to tell, and I make some of it up. It isn’t lying, because it might be true, and I do so want her to go with me.

  They came down from space. Far down from the starsun Sol in a Galaxy lost forever to them. Down past the star-sun M-13 in Perseus. Down through the gummy atmosphere and straight down into the sapphire sea. Ship, Starfighter 31 settled delicately on an enormous underwater mountaintop, and they spent many days listening, watching, drawing samples and hoping. They had landed on many worlds and they hoped.

  Finally, they came out; looking. They wore underwater suits and they began gathering marine samples; looking.

  They found the ruined diving suit with its fish-eaten contents lying on its back in deep azure sand, sextet of insectoidal legs bent up at the joints, in a posture of agony. And they knew the intermind had remembered, but not correctly. The face-plate had been shattered, and what was observable within the helmet—orange and awful in the light of their portable lamp—convinced them more by implication than specific that whatever had swum in that suit, had never seen or known humans.

  They went back to the ship and she broke out the big camera, and they returned to the crab-like diving suit. They photographed it, without moving it. Then they used a seine to get it out of the sand and they hauled it back to the ship on the mountaintop.

  He set up the Condition and the diving suit was analyzed. The rust. The joint mechanisms. The controls. The substance of the flipper-feet. The jagged points of the face-plate. The ... stuff ... inside.

  It took two days. They stayed in the ship with green and blue shadows moving languidly in the viewplates.

  When the analyses were concluded they knew what they had found. And they went out again, to find the swimmers.

  Blue it was, and warm. And when the swimmers found them, finally, they beckoned them to follow, and they swam after the many-legged creatures, who led them through underwater caverns as smooth and shining as onyx, to a lagoon. And they rose to the surface and saw a land against whose shores the azure, aquamarine seas lapped quietly. And they climbed out onto the land, and there they removed their face-masks, never to put them on again, and they shoved back the tight coifs of their suits, and they breathed for the first time an air that did not come from metal sources; they breathed the sweet musical air of a new place.

  In time, the sea-rains would claim the corpse of Starfighter 31.

  SLEEPING DOGS

  The only "positive" thing Lynn Ferraro could say about the destruction of the cities of Globar and Schall was that their burning made esthetically-pleasing smears of light against the night sky of Epsilon Indi IV.

  “The stiffness of your back tells me you don’t approve, Friend Ferraro.” She didn’t turn at his words, but she could feel her vertebrae cracking as she tensed. She kept her face turned to the screens, watching the twin cities shrink as the flames consumed them, a wild colossus whose pillared legs rose to meet a hundred meters above the debacle.

  “A lot of good my disapproval does, Commander.”

  He made a sighing sound at her response. “Well, you have the satisfaction of knowing your report will more than likely terminate my career.”

  She turned on him, her facial muscles tight as sun-dried leather. “And a hell of a lot of good that does the people down there!”

  She was an Amicus Hostis, a Friend of the Enemy, placed on board the Terran dreadnought Descartes, Solar Force registry, number SFD/199-660, in this the forty-first year of the Earth-Kyba War, to prevent atrocities, to attempt any kind of rapprochment with the Kyben, should a situation present itself in which the Kyben would do other than kill or be killed. And when it had become clear that this lunatic, this butcher, this Commander Julian Drabix was determined to take the planet—at any cost—no matter how horrifyingly high—scorched earth if nothing short of that monstrousness would suffice-when it had become clear her command powers would be ignored by him, she had filed alight-wave report with Terran Central. But it would take time for the report to reach Central, time for it to be studied, time for a report-judgment and time for instructions to be light-fired back to the Descartes. And Drabix had not waited. Contravening the authority of the Amicus, he had unleashed the full firepower of the dreadnought.

  Globar and Schall burned like Sodom and Gomorrah.

  But unlike those God-condemned hellholes of an ancient religion, no one knew if the residents of Globar and Schall were good, or evil, or merely frightened natives of a world caught in the middle of an interstellar war that seemed destined never to end.

  “All I know,” Drabix had said, by way of justification, “is that planet’s atmospheric conditions are perfect for the formation of the crystalline form of the power-mineral we need. If we don’t get it, Kyba will. It’s too rare, and it’s too important to vacillate. I’m sorry about this, but it has to be done.” So he had done it.

  She had argued that they didn’t even know for certain if the mineral was there, in the enormous quantities Drabix believed were present. It was true the conditions were right for its formation and on similar worlds where the conditions were approximated they had found the precious crystals in small amounts...but how could even such a near-certainty justify destruction so total, so inhuman?

  Drabix had chosen not to argue. He had made his choice, knowing it would end his career in the Service; but he was a patriot; and allegiance overrode all other considerations.

  Ferraro despised him. It was the only word that fit. She despised everything about him, but this blind servitude to cause was the most loathsome aspect of his character.

  And even that was futile, as Globar and Schall burned.

  Who would speak the elegy for the thousands, perhaps millions, who now burned among the stones of the twin cities?

  When the conflagration died down, and the rubble cooled, the Descartes sent down its reconnaissance ships; and after a time, Commander Drabix and Friend Ferraro went to the surface. To murmur among the ashes.

  Command post had been set up on the island the natives called Stand of Light because of the manner in which the sunlight from Epsilon Indi was reflected back from the sleek boles of the gigantic trees that formed a central cluster forest in the middle of the twenty-five kilometer spot of land. Drabix had ordered his recon teams to scour the planet and bring in a wide sample of prisoners. Now they stood in ragged ranks up and down the beach as far as Lynn Ferraro could see; perhaps thirty thousand men and women and children. Some were burned horribly.

  She rode on the airlift platform with Drabix as he skimmed smoothly past them, just above their heads.

  “I cant believe this,” Drabix said.

  What he found difficult to accept was the diversity of races represented in the population sample the recon ships had brought in. There were Bleshites a
nd Mosynichii in worn leathers from the worlds of 61 Cygni, there were Camogasques in prayer togas from Epsilon Eridani, there were Kopektans and Livides from Altair II and X; Millmen from Tau Ceti, Oldonians from Lalande 21185, Runaways from Rigel; stalk-thin female warriors of the Seull Clan from Delta Cephei III, beaked Raskkans from the hollow asteroids of the Whip belt, squidlike Silvinoids from Grover; Petokii and Vulpeculans and Rohrs and Mawawanias and creatures even Drabix’s familiarity with the Ephemeris could not identity.

  Yet nowhere in the thousands of trembling and cursing prisoners—watching the airlift platform as it passed them—nowhere in that horde, could be seen even one single golden-skinned, tentacle-fingered Kyben. It was this,perhaps, that Drabix found the more impossible to accept. But it was so. Of the expeditionary force sent from far Kyba to hold this crossroads planet, not one survivor remained. They had all, to the last defender, suicided.

  When the knowledge could no longer be denied, Lynn turned on Drabix and denounced him with words of his own choosing, words he had frequently used to vindicate his actions during the two years she had ridden as supercargo on the Descartes. “‘War is not merely a political act but also a political instrument, a continuation of political relations, a carrying out of the same by other means,” as Karl von Clausewitz has so perfectly said.’”

  He snarled at her. “Shut your face, Amicus! I’m not in a mood for your stupidities!”

  “And slaughter is not merely an act of war, is that right, Commander? Is it also a political instrument? Why not take me to see the stacked corpses? Perhaps I can fulfill my mission...perhaps I’ll learn to communicate with the dead! You deranged fool! You should be commanding an abattoir, not a ship of the line!”

  He doubled his right fist and punched her full in the face, within sight of the endless swarm of helpless prisoners and his own crew. She fell backward, off the airlift, tumbling down into the throng. Their bodies broke her fall, and within seconds members of Drabix’s crew had rescued her; but he did not see it; the airlift had skimmed away and was quickly lost in the flash of golden brilliance reflecting off the holy shining trees of Stand of Light.

  The adjutant found her sitting on a green glass boulder jutting up from the edge of the beach. Waves came in lazily and foamed around the huge shape. There was hardly any sound. The forest was almost silent; if there were birds or insects, they had been stilled, as though waiting.

  “Friend Ferraro?” he said, stepping into the water to gain her attention. He had called her twice, and she had seemed too sunk in thought to notice. Now she looked down at him and seemed to re-focus with difficulty.

  “Yes, I’m sorry, what is it Mr. Lalwani?”

  “The Commander would like to see you.”

  Her expression smoothed over like the surface of the pale blue ocean. “Where is he?”

  “On the main continent, Miz. He’s decided to take the forms.”

  She closed her eyes in pain. “Dear souls in Hell...will there never be an end? Hasn’t he done enough to this wretched backwash?” Then she opened her eyes and looked at him closely. “What does he want with me? Has there been a reply from Central? Does he simply want an audience?”

  “I don’t know, Miz. He ordered me to come and find you. I have a recon ship waiting, whenever you’re ready.”

  She nodded. “Thank you, Mr. Lalwani. I’ll be along in a few moments.”

  He saluted and walked away up the beach and around the bend. She sat staring out across the ocean; as always: an observer.

  They had charted the positions of the fifty “forts” during the first pass at the planet. Whether they were, in fact, forts was entirely supposition. At first they were thought to be natural rock formations—huge black cubes sunk into the earth of the tiny planet; featureless, ominous, silent—but their careful spacing around the equator made that unlikely. And the recon ships had brought back confirmation that they were created, not natural. What they were,remained a mystery.

  Lynn Ferraro stood with Drabix and stared across the empty plain to the enormous black cube, fifty meters on a side. She could not remember ever having seen anything quite so terrifying. There was no reason to feel as she did,but she could not shake the oppression, the sense of impending doom. Even so, she had resolved to say nothing to Drabix. There was nothing that could be said. Whatever motivated him, whatever passions had come to possess him in his obsession about this planet, she knew no words she might speak to dissuade him.

  “I wanted you here,” he said, “because I’m still in charge of this operation, and whatever you may think of my actions I still follow orders. You’re required to be in attendance, and I want that in the report.”

  “It’s noted, Commander.”

  He glanced at her quickly. There had been neither tone nor inflection revealing her hatred, but it trembled in the air between them.

  “I expected something more from you.”

  She continued staring at the black, featureless cube in the middle of the plain. “Such as?’’

  “A comment. An assessment of military priorities. A plea to spare these cultural treasures. Something...anything...to justify your position.”

  She looked at him and saw the depth of distaste he held for her. Was it her Amicus status, or herself he feared and despised. Had she been repelled less by his warrior manner, she might have pitied him—”There are men whom one hates until that moment when one sees, through a chink in their armor, the sight of something nailed down and in torment.”

  “The validity of my position will insure you never go to space again, Commander. If there were more I could do, something immediate and final, I would do it, by all the sweet dear souls in Hell. But I can’t. You’re in charge here,and the best I can do is record what I think insane behavior.”

  His anger flared again, and for a moment she thought he might hit her a second time, and she dropped back a step into a self-defense position. The first time he had taken her unaware; there would be no second time; she was capable of crippling him.

  “Let me tell you a thing, Amicus, Friend of the Enemy! You follow that word all the way? The Enemy? You’re a paid spy for the Enemy. An Enemy that’s out to kill us, everyone of us, that will stop nowhere short of total annihilation of the human race. The Kyben feed off a hatred of humankind unknown to any other race in the galaxy...”

  “My threshold for jingoism is very low, Commander. If you have some information to convey, do so. Otherwise, I’ll return to Stand of Light.”

  He breathed deeply, damping his rage, and when he could speak again he said, “Whether this planet has what I think it has, or not, quite clearly it’s been a prize for a long time. A long time. A lot longer than either of us can imagine. Long before the war moved into this sector. It’s been conquered and reconquered and conquered all over again. The planet’s lousy with every marauding race I've ever even heard of. The place is like Terran China...let itself be overrun and probably didn’t even put up a fight. Let the hordes in, submitted, and waited for them to be swallowed up. But more kept coming. There’s something here they all wanted.”

  She had deduced as much herself; she needed no long-winded superficial lectures about the obvious. “ And you think whatever it is they wanted is in the fifty forts. Have you spoken to any of the prisoners?”

  “I’ve seen intelligence reports.”

  “But have you spoken to any of the prisoners personally?”

  “Are you trying to make a case for incompetence, too?”

  “All I asked is if you’ve spoken-”

  “No, dammit, I haven’t spoken to any of that scum!”

  “Well, you should have!”

  “To what end, Friend?” And he waved to his adjutant.

  Drabix was in motion now. Lynn Ferraro could see there was nothing short of assassination that would stop him. And that was beyond her. “Because if you’d spoken to them, you’d have learned that whatever lives inside those forts has permitted the planet to be conquered. It doesn’t care, as long
as everyone minds their own business.”

  Drabix smiled, then snickered. “Amicus, go sit down somewhere, will you. The heat’s getting to you.”

  “They say even the Kyben were tolerated, Commander. I’m warning you; let the forts alone.’.

  “Fade off, Friend Ferraro. Command means decision, and my orders were to secure this planet. Secure doesn’t mean fifty impregnable fortresses left untouched, and command doesn’t mean letting bleeding hearts like you scare us into inaction with bogey men..’

  The Adjutant stood waiting. “Mr. Lalwani,” Drabix said, “tell the ground batteries to commence 0!1 signal. Concentrate fire on the southern face of that cube.”

  “Yes, sir.” He went away quickly.

  “It’s war, Commander. That’s your only answer, that it’s war?”

  Drabix would not look at her now. “That’s right. It’s a war to the finish. They declared it, and it’s been that way for forty years. I’m doing my job...and if that makes doing yours difficult, perhaps it'll show those pimply-assed bureaucrats at Central we need more ships and less Friends of the Enemy. Something has to break this stalemate with the Kyben, and even if I don’t see the end of it I’ll be satisfied knowing I was the one who broke it.”

  He gave the signal.