Travelers of Space - [Adventures in Science Fiction 03]

by Edited by Martin Greenburg

  I pretty well managed to forget it until we got back to headquarters and Reagan met me with a grin that split his homely mug into horizontal halves. He said, ”Chief, you did it.”

  “Swell,” I said. “I did what?”

  “Gave me the answer what to use for reinforcing foundations. You solved the problem.”

  “Yeah?” I said.

  “Yeah. Didn’t he, Mike?”

  Michaelina looked as puzzled as I must have. She said, “He was kidding. He said to use the stuff in the empty crates, didn’t he?”

  Reagan grinned again. “He just thought he was kidding. That’s what we’re going to use from now on.

  Nothing. Look, chief, it’s like the conditioner—so sim­ple we never thought of it. Until you told me to use what was in the empty crates, and I got to thinking it over.”

  I stood thinking a moment myself, and then I did what Reagan had done the day before—hit myself a whack on the forehead with the heel of my palm.

  Michaelina still looked puzzled.

  “Hollow foundations,” I told her. “What’s the one thing widgie birds won’t fly through? Air. We can make buildings as big as we need them, now. For foundations, we sink double walls with a wide air space between. We can—”

  I stopped, because it wasn’t “we” any more. They could do it after I was back on Earth looking for a job.

  ~ * ~

  And Thursday went and Friday came.

  I was working, up till the last minute, because it was the easiest thing to do. With Reagan and Michaelina helping me, I was making out material lists for our new construction projects. First, a three-story building of about forty rooms for a headquarters building.

  We were working fast, because it would be midperiod shortly, and you can’t do paper work when you can’t read and can write only by feel.

  But my mind was on the Ark. I picked up the phone and called the radiotype shack to ask about it.

  “Just got a call from them,” said the operator. “They’ve warped in, but not close enough to land before midperiod. They’ll land right after.”

  “O.K.,” I said, abandoning the hope that they’d be a day late.

  I got up and walked to the window. We were nearing midposition, all right. Up in the sky to the north I could see Placet coming toward us.

  “Mike,” I said. ”Come here.”

  She joined me at the window and we stood there, watching. My arm was around her. I don’t remember putting it there, but I didn’t take it away, and she didn’t move.

  Behind us, Reagan cleared his throat. He said, “I’ll give this much of the list to the operator. He can get it on the ether right after midperiod.” He went out and shut the door behind him.

  Michaelina seemed to move a little closer. We were both looking out the window at Placet rushing toward us. She said, “Beautiful, isn’t it, Phil?”

  “Yes,” I said. But I turned, and I was looking at her face as I said it. Then—I hadn’t meant to—I kissed her.

  I went back, and sat down at my desk. She said, ”Phil, what’s the matter? You haven’t got a wife and six kids hidden away somewhere, or something, have you? You were single when I had a crush on you at Earth Polytech—and I waited five years to get over it and didn’t, and finally wangled a job on Placet just to . . . Do I have to do the proposing?”

  I groaned. I didn’t look at her. I said, “Mike, I’m nuts about you. But—just before you came, I sent a two-word radiotype to Earth. It said, `I quit.’ So I’ve got to leave Placet on this shuttle of the Ark, and I doubt if I can even get a teaching job, now that I’ve got Earth Center down on me, and—”

  She said, “But, Phil!” and took a step toward me.

  There was a knock on the door, Reagan’s knock. I was glad, for once, of the interruption. I called out for him to come in, and he opened the door.

  He said, “You told Mike yet, chief?”

  I nodded, glumly.

  Reagan grinned. ”Good,” he said; “I’ve been busting to tell her. It’ll be swell to see Ike again.”

  “Huh?” I said. “Ike who?”

  Reagan’s grin faded. He said, “Phil, are you slipping or something? Don’t you remember giving me the answer to that Earth Center radiotype four days ago, just before Mike got here?”

  I stared at him with my mouth open. I hadn’t even read that radiotype, let alone answer it. Had Reagan gone psychopathic, or had I? I remembered shoving it in the drawer of my desk. I jerked open the drawer and pulled it out. My hand shook a little as I read it.

  REQUEST FOR ADDITIONAL ASSISTANT GRANTED.

  WHOM DO YOU WANT FOR THE JOB?

  I looked up at Reagan again. I said, “You’re trying to tell me I sent an answer to this?”

  He looked as dumfounded as I felt.

  “You told me to,” he said.

  “What did I tell you to send?”

  “Ike Witt.” He stared at me. “Chief, are you feeling all right?”

  I felt so all right something seemed to explode in my head. I stood up and started for Michaelina. I said, “Mike, will you marry me?” I got my arms around her, just in time, before midperiod closed down on us, so I couldn’t see what she looked like, and vice versa. But over her shoulder, I could see what must be Reagan. I said, ”Get out of here, you ape,” and I spoke quite literally because that’s exactly what he appeared to be. A bright yellow ape.

  The floor was shaking under my feet, but other things were happening to Inc, too, and I didn’t realize what the shaking meant until the ape turned back and yelled, ”A flight of birds going under us, chief! Get out quick, before—”

  But that was as far as he got before the house fell down around us and the tin roof hit my head and knocked me out. Placet is a crazy place. I like it.

  <>

  ~ * ~

  Action on Azura

  BY ROBERTSON OSBORNE

  O

  n the thirty-third day out of Earth Central, the Special Agent heterodyned itself out of w-space and re-entered the normal continuum. The little 1400-ton vessel fell free toward the fifth planet of Procyon for half an hour before planetary drive was applied to slow it into an orbit.

  Allan Stuart, linguist, in this maiden mission of contact incorporated, felt seasick again during the period of free fall. Of the six men aboard, he was the only one who hadn’t spent at least one hitch in the Solar System Patrol. He was doggedly trying to steady his nerves by floating a row of dictionaries in midair when the intercom startled him. It was the voice of James Gordon, ship’s captain and head of the new firm.

  “All hands! We start spiraling in shortly and we should land on Azura in about five hours. Nestor, relieve White in the drive room. The rest of you come on up to Control for a final briefing.”

  The bony little linguist sighed, put away his books, and unstrapped himself. Nausea made him hiccup. Detouring sadly around the intricate, day-old wreckage of what had been a beautiful cephaloid unit, he swung stiffly out of the lab. In the corridor he had to squeeze past a badly torn-up wall. Dan Rogers, one of the two planetary scouts, shut off a welding torch and coasted along with him.

  “Little old piece of nickel-iron sure raised heck, didn’t it, Mr. Stuart?” drawled the scout. “Come out into normal space for two minutes to get a bearing, and—WHAM!” He propelled himself along with the effortless efficiency of a man accustomed to doing without gravity.

  Stuart, correcting course with some difficulty, took a moment to answer. “Hm? Oh, the meteor! Yes, indeed it did. My leg is still stiff, and of course half my equipment is just junk now. But I guess we were rather fortunate at that, since none of us was killed. All the way to Procyon . . . three point four parsecs. Dear me!” He clucked, shaking his head, and wondered again how the other five men in the crew could take these things so casually.

  He drifted into the control room with Rogers and hovered near the desk. Brettner, the other scout, came in playing some outlandish sort of guitar; White, engineer and assistant astroga
tor, joined him in a final caterwauling chorus of “The Demon of Demos.”

  The ship’s captain swung his chair to face them, his angular face folding into a responsive grin. Then he waved a teletape at the four men and looked more serious.

  “Here’s Patrol’s latest summary of the situation,” he announced. “Still no response from Procyon V, otherwise known as Azura. No activity in the ruined cities. No further clashes with traders, because the traders have given up. However, the natives are still taking pot-shots from the woods at any scouting parties that dare to sit down on the planet. Every attempt at contact is fiercely rejected.

  “The Patrol lads, naturally, are forbidden to shoot back, at least until they find out what this is all about . . . which, of course, is where our own little expedition of specialists comes in. Incidentally, it seems fairly certain the natives know nothing of radio, so we’ll be safe in using microwave to feel our way down in the dark.”

  He accepted a cigarette from Rogers and nodded toward a month-old report titled: Unofficial Data as of 31 October 2083; Procyon V (Azura).

  “I know we have precious little to go in there with, but that’s the situation. A million credits from Earth Central, if we establish friendly contact.” He smoked a while, grey eyes on the ceiling. Then, as nobody spoke, he added: “The Patrol has had two more skirmishes, not far from here, with what we’ve called the Invader culture. None of their ships has been captured, but it’s fairly certain they’re the same vicious crowd we’ve fought near Rigel, Alpha Centauri, and so on. They seem to be heading this way again slowly. Here . . .”

  ~ * ~

  He handed out half a dozen photographs of strange-looking spacecraft. “They’re undoubtedly the gang that blew hell out of Azura a few years ago, before we got here, and gave the natives such a violent dislike of strangers. The Invader’s weapons are somewhat inferior to ours, but he apparently has the considerable advantage of having superior position in regard to bases . . . particularly around here. The patrol simply can’t stand up to a determined attack in this region unless a base is made available, preferably on Azura.”

  Brettner said, softly, “That’s what we’re really after, isn’t it? Nobody’s handing us a million credits just for cultural purposes.”

  The leader of the expedition nodded. “Yep. Once we talk to these Azurans, I think we can convince them we all have a common enemy. An enemy who seems to enjoy smashing things just for fun. I have a hunch the Azurans expect the Invaders back, too . . . that might account for their apparent determination to remain hidden.” He reached for the log. “Incidentally, what’s the latest on the damage situation?”

  Stuart shook his head unhappily and brushed hair out of his eyes. “One cephaloid is completely ruined. It was the one I had trained to translate into Universal Speech from whatever other language would be fed into it later. I was going to teach it what Azuran I could pick up and use it as a direct interpreter. We have to use Universal Speech, you see, because cephaloids simply can’t handle homonyms such as ‘see’ and ‘sea,’ or ‘threw’ and ‘through.’ However,” his worried look lessened, “the multiple analyzer is all right. And the stand-by, originally conditioned only for generalized language response, has been retrained in Universal Speech and will learn Azuran from the analyzer.”

  He managed a feeble smile. “After all, the natives are manlike, and we know they had a city culture much like ours, so there is a good possibility of our finding mutually intelligible symbols. And we know what their language sounds like, thanks to the trader who got away with a recording.”

  White spoke up. “I hope you weren’t counting too much on the portable teleview, Mr. Stuart. It’s a total loss. So is the long-range microphone. It’s going to be tough to study their language at a distance.” He looked at Gordon. “The ship is okay, chief, except for the debris we’re still cutting away. All the animals are dead; I guess you knew that. And all we’ve salvaged from the jeep is the power unit and one repulsor. We’ll have to walk where we can’t use the scout-ship.”

  Brettner, when the captain looked at him, said quietly: “We’re awful low on food. Just about enough to get us back, with three or four days to spare. Can’t we eat any of this Azuran stuff?”

  Gordon shook his head. “The water and air are all right, but there’s no food for us down there. Good thing, in a way.”

  He laughed at the surprised expressions. “All Terrestrial life is based on complexes of iron, magnesium, or copper, but Azuran life seems to be built on cobalt complexes. Consequently both sides are immune to the diseases of the other. You remember the terrible plagues that hit the Terrestrial port areas in the old days, and the grim effects of our landings on Alpha Centauri III and Proxima II. But the biostat labs report that Terrestrial and Azuran tissue cultures have only a toxic effect on each other ... no parasitic viability whatever.”

  He looked up at the chronometer. “About time to begin our spiral, if we’re to land before daybreak in that area we picked out. Let’s get some sleep. White, you’ll relieve me for a couple of hours, soon as we’ve established our trajectory.”

  ~ * ~

  Stuart, on the way out, picked up the sheaf of papers summarizing what was known about Azura. He strapped into his bunk absent-mindedly and lay there trying to visualize his first non-solar planet. Many kinds of intelligent animals, the reports agreed. Evidently a mutation leading to intelligence had occurred quite early in the diversification of the animal phyla.

  One of the traders, said the report, claimed he had even learned to converse in a limited way with what he called monkey-rats. These had about the intelligence of a five-year-old human, and displayed the group cooperation common to many Azuran forms.

  Too bad the trader hadn’t been able to stay there longer. He had finally found some of the natives, just at the time they had found him. He was preparing to leave his ship and accept their thanks for the fine gifts he had set out, when gifts, trees, and nearby boulders began to blow up all around. He had taken off without further discussion.

  Four other traders and three Patrol ships had failed. A small freighter, landing to make emergency repairs, had disappeared. The only weapon the natives had, apparently, was a disrupter of some sort, with a range of only two or three kilometers. But the wreckage of the cities showed plainly that the invaders had used weapons of the same type as Earth’s, probably with a range of hundreds of kilometers. That meant—

  He awoke, struggling, as if from a nightmare. The klaxon was sounding off, jarring his teeth. Gordon’s slightly nasal voice came over the loudspeaker: “Landing stations, everybody. We’re sitting down in fifteen minutes.”

  The linguist hastily unfastened his safety belts, rolled out, and scrambled into primary space gear. “Secondary equipment?” he asked Rogers, who was getting dressed beside him.

  “Naw, no armor. Leave your oxygen off, too. This is a Class E planet, just like home.”

  Stuart scrambled down to the control room and strapped himself in beside the stern-view screen. He could hear White and Brettner in the drive room, sleepily arguing about who had mislaid the coffee jug. Such nonchalance! he thought. Trembling with excitement, he nearly dropped his camera. “I wonder how soon I can get some pictures,” he muttered. “If I could only photograph our landing . . . that would really liven up the next meeting of the Philological Society!” He had already taken over a hundred pictures of the expedition, and his hobby was the subject of much ribbing from the rest of the six-man corporation.

  Gordon looked over from the control board and interrupted his thoughts. “Stuart! See anything out there?”

  A dial over the linguist’s head indicated only a hundred meters to go. His screen showed a dark landscape, illuminated by two of the four moons. “Tree directly below,” he announced. “Better move to the red side about twenty meters.”

  The vessel shifted slightly and eased down smoothly under Gordon’s practised handling. Relays clacked; the drive hummed softly.

  Suddenly a
rough branch scraped along the side, making metallic echoes in the double walls. Seconds later the ship settled with a gritty crunching. A few kicks of the drive leveled it off.

  ~ * ~

  II

  There was profound silence for a moment after the drive died away. Someone yelled “Wahoo!” Then Rogers came clattering down the ladder. He beckoned to Stuart, who was already climbing out of the seat eagerly.

  “Time for the landing party,” said the scout. He eyed the camera. “Remember now, play your cards close to your chest. Don’t go skittering off to take pictures. First we patrol once around the ship, then we get the camouflage nets pegged down, right away. Then we sit tight ‘til we’ve had a good look around in daylight.”