Weber dashed around with a hypodermic. After what seemed hours, we had them full of sedative. A few of them broke loose and got away, but the rest were sleeping peacefully.
I got a gun and took over guard duty while the other men went back to bed.
I stayed down near the cages, walking back and forth because I was too tense to do much sitting down. It seemed to me that between the animals" frenzy to escape and Fullerton's disappearance, there was a parallel that was too similar for comfort.
I tried to review all that had happened on the planet and I got bogged down time after time as I tried to make the picture dovetail. The trail of thought I followed kept turning back to Kemper's worry about the critters" lack of a defense mechanism.
Maybe, I told myself, they had a defense mechanism, after all — the slickest, smoothest, trickiest one Man ever had encountered.
As soon as the camp awoke, I went to our tent to stretch out for a moment, perhaps to catch a catnap. Worn out, I slept for hours.
Kemper woke me.
"Get up, Bob!" he said. "For the love of God, get up!"
It was late afternoon and the last rays of the sun were streaming through the tent flap. Kemper's face was haggard. It was as if he'd suddenly grown old since I'd seen him less than twelve hours before.
"They're encysting," he gasped. "They're turning into cocoons or chrysalises or…"
I sat up quickly. "That one we found out there in the field!"
He nodded.
"Fullerton?" I askecl
"We'll go out and see, all five of us, leaving the camp and animals alone."
We had some trouble finding it because the land was so flat and featureless that there were no landmarks.
But finally we located it, just as dusk was setting in. The ball had split in two — not in a clean break, in a jagged one. It looked like an egg after a chicken has been hatched. And the halves lay there in the gathering darkness, in the silence underneath the sudden glitter of the stars — a last farewell and a new beginning and a terrible alien fact.
I tried to say something, but my brain was so numb that I was not entirely sure just what I should say. Anyhow, the words died in the dryness of my mouth and the thickness of my tongue before I could get them out.
For it was not only the two halves of the cocoon — it was the marks within that hollow, the impression of what had been there, blurred and distorted by the marks of what it had become.
We fled back to camp.
Someone, I think it was Oliver, got the lantern lighted. We stood uneasily, unable to look at one another, knowing that the time was past for all dissembling, that there was no use of glossing over or denying what we'd seen in the dim light in the gully.
"Bob is the only one who has a chance," Kemper finally said, speaking more concisely than seemed possible. "I think be should leave right now. Someone must get back to Caph. Someone has to tell them."
He looked across the circle of lantern light at me.
"Well," he said sharply, "get going! What's the matter with you?"
"You were right," I said, not much more than whispering. "Remember how you wondered about a defense mechanism?"
"They have it," Weber agreed. "The best you can find. There's no beating them. They don't fight you. They absorb you. They make you into them. No wonder there are just the critters here. No wonder the planet's ecology is simple. They have you pegged and measured from the instant you set foot on the planet. Take one drink of water. Chew a single grass stem. Take one bite of critter. Do any one of these things and they have you cold."
Oliver came out of the dark and walked across the lantern-lighted circle. He stopped in front of me.
"Here are your diet kit and notes," he said.
"But I can't run out on you!"
"Forget us!" Parsons barked at me. "We aren't human any more. In a few more days…"
He grabbed the lantern and strode down the cages and held the lantern high, so that we could see.
"Look," he said.
There were no animals. There were just the cocoons and the little critters and the cocoons that had split in half.
I saw Kemper looking at me and there was, of all things, compassion on his face.
"You don't want to stay," he told me. "If you do, in a day or two, a critter will come in and drop dead for you. And you'll go crazy all the way back home — wondering which one of us it was."
He turned away then. They all turned away from me and suddenly it seemed I was all alone.
Weber had found an axe somewhere and he started walking down the row of cages, knocking off the bars to let the little critters out.
I walked slowly over to the ship and stood at the foot of the ladder, holding the notes and the diet kit tight against my chest.
When I got there, I turned around and looked back at them and it seemed I couldn't leave them.
I thought of all we'd been through together and when I tried to think of specific things, the only thing I could think about was how they always kidded me about the diet kit.
And I thought of the times I had to leave and go off somewhere and eat alone so that I couldn't smell the food. I thought of almost ten years of eating that damn goo and that I could never eat like a normal human because of my ulcerated stomach.
Maybe they were the lucky ones, I told myself. If a man got turned into a critter, he'd probably come out with a whole stomach and never have to worry about how much or what he ate. The critters never ate anything except the grass, but maybe, I thought, that grass tasted just as good to them as a steak or a pumpkin pie would taste to me.
So I stood there for a while and I thought about it. Then I took the diet kit and flung it out into the darkness as far as I could throw it and 1 dropped the notes to the ground.
I walked back into the camp and the first man I saw was Parsons.
"What have you got for supper?" I asked him.
The Fellowship of the Talisman
Original copyright year: 1978
1
The manor house was the first undamaged structure they had seen in two days of travel through an area that had been desolated with a thoroughness at once terrifying and unbelievable.
During those two days, furtive wolves had watched them from hilltops. Foxes, their brushes dragging, had skulked through underbrush. Buzzards, perched on dead trees or on the blackened timbers of burned homesteads, had looked upon them with speculative interest. They had met not a soul, but occasionally, in thickets, they had glimpsed human skeletons.
The weather had been fine until noon of the second day, when the soft sky of early autumn became overcast, and a chill wind sprang from the north. At times the sharp wind whipped icy rain against their backs, the rain sometimes mixed with snow.
Late in the afternoon, topping a low ridge, Duncan Standish sighted the manor, a rude set of buildings fortified by palisades and a narrow moat. Inside the palisades, fronting the drawbridge, lay a courtyard, within which were penned horses, cattle, sheep, and hogs. A few men moved about in the courtyard, and smoke streamed from several chimneys. A number of small buildings, some of which bore the signs of burning, lay outside the palisades. The entire place had a down-at-heels appearance.
Daniel, the great war-horse, who had been following Duncan like a dog, came up behind the man. Clopping behind Daniel came the little gray burro, Beauty, with packs lashed upon her back. Daniel lowered his head, nudged his master's back.
"It's all right, Daniel," Duncan told him. "We've found shelter for the night."
The horse blew softly through his nostrils.
Conrad came trudging up the slope and ranged himself alongside Duncan. Conrad was a massive man. Towering close to seven feet, he was heavy even for his height. A garment made of sheep pelts hung from his shoulders almost to his knees. In his right fist he carried a heavy club fashioned from an oak branch. He stood silently, staring at the manor house.
"What do you make of it?" asked Duncan.
"They have
seen us," Conrad said. "Heads peeking out above the palisades."
"Your eyes are shaper than mine," said Duncan. "Are you sure?"
"I'm sure, m" lord."
"Quit calling me "my lord." I'm not a lord. My father is the lord."
"I think of you as such," said Conrad. "When your father dies, you will be a lord."
"No Harriers?"
"Only people," Conrad told him.
"It seems unlikely," said Duncan, "that the Harriers would have passed by such a place."
"Maybe fought them off. Maybe the Harriers were in a hurry."
"So far," said Duncan, "from our observations, they passed little by. The lowliest cottages, even huts, were burned."
"Here comes Tiny," said Conrad. "He's been down to look them over."
The mastiff came loping up the slope and they waited for him. He went over to stand close to Conrad. Conrad patted his head, and the great dog wagged his tail. Looking at them, Duncan noted once again how similar were the man and dog. Tiny reached almost to Conrad's waist. He was a splendid brute. He wore a wide leather collar in which were fastened metal studs. His ears tipped forward as he looked down at the manor. A faint growl rumbled in his throat.
"Tiny doesn't like it, either," Conrad said.
"It's the only place we've seen," said Duncan. "It's shelter. The night will be wet and cold."
"Bedbugs there will be. Lice as well."
The little burro sidled close to Daniel to get out of the cutting wind.
Duncan shucked up his sword belt. "I don't like it, Conrad, any better than you and Tiny do. But there is a bad night coming on."
"We'll stay close together," Conrad said. "We'll not let them separate us."
"That is right," said Duncan. "We might as well start down."
As they walked down the slope, Duncan unconsciously put his hand beneath his cloak to find the pouch dangling from his belt. His fingers located the bulk of the manuscript. He seemed to hear the crinkle of the parchment as his fingers touched it. He found himself suddenly enraged at his action. Time after time, during the last two days, he'd gone through the same silly procedure, making sure the manuscript was there. Like a country boy going to a fair, he told himself, with a penny tucked in his pocket, thrusting his hand again and again into the pocket to make sure he had not lost the penny.
Having touched the parchment, again he seemed to hear His Grace saying, "Upon those few pages may rest the future hope of mankind." Although, come to think of it, His Grace was given to overstatement and not to be taken as seriously as he sometimes tried to make a person think he should be. In this instance, however, Duncan told himself, the aged and portly churchman might very well be right. But that would not be known until they got to Oxenford.
And because of this, because of the tightly written script on a few sheets of parchment, he was here rather than back in the comfort and security of Standish House, trudging down a hill to seek shelter in a place where, as Conrad had pointed out, there probably would be bedbugs.
"One thing bothers me," said Conrad as he strode along with Duncan.
"I didn't know that anything ever bothered you."
"It's the Little Folk," said Conrad. "We have seen none of them. If anyone, they should be the ones to escape the Harriers. You can't tell me that goblins and gnomes and others of their kind could not escape the Harriers."
"Maybe they are frightened and hiding out," said Duncan. "If I am any judge of them, they'd know where to hide."
Conrad brightened visibly. "Yes, that must be it," he said.
As they drew closer to the manor, they saw their estimation of the place had not been wrong. It was far from prepossessing. Ramshackle was the word for it. Here and there heads appeared over the palisades, watching their approach.
The drawbridge was still up when they reached the moat, which was a noisome thing. The stench was overpowering, and in the greenish water floated hunks of corruption that could have been decaying human bodies.
Conrad bellowed at the heads protruding over the palisades. "Open up," he shouted. "Travelers claim shelter."
Nothing happened for a time, and Conrad bellowed once again. Finally, with much creaking of wood and squealing of chains, the bridge began a slow, jerky descent. As they crossed the bridge they saw that there stood inside a motley crowd with the look of vagabonds about them, but the vagabonds were armed with spears, and some carried makeshift swords in hand.
Conrad waved his club at them. "Stand back," he growled. "Make way for m" lord."
They backed off, but the spears were not grounded; the blades stayed naked. A crippled little man, one foot dragging, limped through the crowd and came up to them. "My master welcomes you," he whined. "He would have you at table."
"First," said Conrad, "shelter for the beasts."
"There is a shed," said the whining lame man. "It is open to the weather, but it has a roof and is placed against the wall. There'll be hay for the horse and burro. I'll bring the dog a bone."
"No bone," said Conrad. "Meat. Big meat. Meat to fit his size."
"I'll find some meat," said the lame man.
"Give him a penny," Duncan said to Conrad.
Conrad inserted his fingers into the purse at his belt, brought out a coin, and flipped it to the man, who caught it deftly and touched a finger to his forelock, but in a mocking manner.
The shed was shelter, barely, but at the worst it offered some protection from the wind and a cover against rain. Duncan unsaddled Daniel and placed the saddle against the wall of the palisade. Conrad unshipped the pack from the burro, piled it atop the saddle.
"Do you not wish to take the saddle and the pack inside with you?" the lame man asked. "They might be safer there."
"Safe here," insisted Conrad. "Should anyone touch them, he will get smashed ribs, perhaps his throat torn out."
The raffish crowd that had confronted them when they crossed the bridge had scattered now. The drawbridge, with shrill sounds of protest, was being drawn up.
"Now," said the lame man, "if you two will follow me. The master sits at meat."
The great hall of the manor was ill lighted and evil smelling. Smoky torches were ranged along the walls to provide illumination. The rushes on the floor had not been changed for months, possibly for years; they were littered with bones thrown to dogs or simply tossed upon the floor once the meat had been gnawed from them. Dog droppings lay underfoot, and the room stank of urine—dog, and, more than likely, human. At the far end of the room stood a fireplace with burning logs. The chimney did not draw well and poured smoke into the hall. A long trestle table ran down the center of the hail. Around it was seated an uncouth company. Half-grown boys ran about, serving platters of food and jugs of ale.
When Duncan and Conrad came into the hail, the talk quieted and the bleary white of the feasters" faces turned to stare at the new arrivals. Dogs rose from their bones and showed their teeth at them.
At the far end of the table a man rose from his seat. He roared at them in a joyous tone, "Welcome, travelers. Come and share the board of Harold, the Reaver."
He turned his head to a group of youths serving the table.
"Kick those mangy dogs out of the way to make way for our guests," he roared. "It would not be seemly for them to be set upon and bitten."
The youths set upon their task with a will. Boots thudded into dogs; the dogs snapped back, whimpering and snarling.
Duncan strode forward, followed by Conrad.
"I thank you, sir," said Duncan, "for your courtesy."
Harold, the Reaver, was raw-boned, hairy and unkempt. His hair and beard had the appearance of having housed rats. He wore a cloak that at one time may have been purple, but was now so besmirched by grease that it seemed more mud than purple. The fur that offset the collar and the sleeves was moth-eaten.
The Reaver waved at a place next to him. "Please be seated, sir," he said.
"My name," said Duncan, "is Duncan Standish, and the man with me is Conrad."<
br />
"Conrad is your man?"
"Not my man. My companion."
The Reaver mulled the answer for a moment, then said, "In that case, he must sit with you." He said to the man in the next place, "Einer, get the hell out of here. Find another place and take your trencher with you."
With ill grace, Einer picked up his trencher and his mug and went stalking down the table to find another place.
"Now since it all is settled," the Reaver said to Duncan, "will you not sit down. We have meat and ale. The ale is excellent; for the meat I'll not say as much. There also is bread of an indifferent sort, but we have a supply of the finest honey a bee has ever made. When the Harriers came down upon us, Old Cedric, our bee master, risked his very life to bring in the hives, thus saving it for us."
"How long ago was that?" asked Duncan. "When the Harriers came?"
"It was late in the spring. There were just a few of them at first, the forerunners of the Horde. It gave us a chance to bring in the livestock and the bees. When the real Horde finally came, we were ready for them. Have you, sir, ever seen any of the Harriers?"
"No. I've only heard of them."
"They are a vicious lot," the Reaver said. "All shapes and sizes of them. Imps, demons, devils, and many others that twist your gut with fear and turn your bowels to water, all with their own special kinds of nastiness. The worst of them are the hairless ones. Human, but they are not human. Like shambling idiots, strong, massive idiots that have no fear and an undying urge to kill. No hair upon them, not a single hair from top to toe. White—white like the slugs you find when you overturn a rotting log. Fat and heavy like the slugs. But no fat. Or I think no fat, but muscle. Muscle such as you have never seen. Strength such as no one has ever seen. Taken all together, the hairless ones and the others that run with them sweep everything before them. They kill, they burn, there is no mercy in them. Ferocity and magic. That is their stock in trade. We were hard put, I don't mind telling you, to hold them at arm's length. But we resisted the magic and matched the ferocity, although the very sight of them could scare a man to death."
All Flesh Is Grass and Other Stories Page 53
