Deathworms of Kratos (v1.1)

by Edmund Cooper

  He held her gently, gently kissed her. “You can’t be everything. You are one hell of a good heart surgeon. The infallible Kwango says so. And you are a five-star Expendable. I say so. Isn’t that enough?”

  Suddenly, she was crying. “No, it’s not enough! I—I feel as if Lou were my brother. I feel as if I failed him.”

  “Lou is our brother,” corrected Conrad gently. “Fidel is our brother also, and Liz was our sister. We are an elite corps. We belong to each other…” He turned towards Andreas. “Hey, Lou! You think Lieutenant Smith is no good?”

  No response. Lou Andreas gazed tranquilly at nothing.

  “Lou wants me to speak for him,” said Conrad. “He wants me to say: thank you for trying so goddamn hard. He says he’s sorry for lousing up the schedule, and he asks me to remind you that he made you learn to love the all-American beefburger—Kratos style.”

  “Tell him,” sobbed Indira, “tell him I did my best.”

  “He already knows… Now let’s get him into the Santa Maria and under S.A. If you can’t face the cooling procedure, Matthew can do it. He’s fully programmed.”

  Suddenly, she pulled herself together. “Andreas is my patient, Commander. I will put him down.”

  “O.K., Lieutenant. Proceed… When we get back, Lou will have the best brain surgeons in the solar system. This, I swear.”

  Day 179. Entry in Commander’s log, Santa Maria. This day, the first stage in the construction of Jamestown is completed. We now have the necessary facilities to support the first colonists. Have signalled Terra to this effect.

  Day 205. In the evening, Conrad held a party in the saloon of the Santa Maria. He thought he was the only one who knew why. He was wrong. Kwango knew why.

  The menu was special. The foods were the foods of Kratos, but the wines were the wines of Earth. It seemed symbolic.

  After everyone had eaten and drunk just a little too much, Conrad decided it was time to make a speech.

  “Ladies and gents,” he began clumsily.

  “Cancel statement,” interrupted Kwango. “There are no ladies and gents present, Massa Boss, only damn awful Expendables.”

  “Well, then, damn awful Expendables,” amended Conrad, “when I first met you, I thought you were a horrible bunch of misfits. After spending much time in your company, I see no reason to change my opinion. But you have proved Kratos. And I am proud to have known you. I speak like this only because I am slightly pissed and because this evening has a special significance. It is—”

  “New Year’s Eve,” said Kwango.

  Conrad gazed at him severely. “Black scum!” he said without heat.

  “White trash,” retorted Kwango.

  “Why the hell do you always have to anticipate?”

  “Isn’t that what you hired me for, Massa Boss?”

  Conrad sighed. “I suppose so. But it gets wearing.

  And, incidentally, for insubordination you will now be fined—”

  “One booze ration!” The four voices were perfectly in unison.

  “Happy New Year, everybody,” said Conrad. “We have survived on Kratos one planetary cycle. Tomorrow, Matthew and his merry band will erect the matter receiver in Jamestown. Don’t ask me how it works. That information is stored only in Matthew’s circuits and the Santa Maria computer’s memory banks. But, pretty soon, now, the covered wagons are going to roll across the prairie.”

  Fidel Batista stood up. “James—yes, I know, that is going to cost me a booze ration—James, may I propose a toast?”

  “Fidel, you may.”

  “It is an English toast,” said Fidel. “Peculiarly English. They are a mad people, as we all know. But, in some things, they have style.”

  “Heah, heah,” said Kwango in an atrocious imitation of the ancient Oxford accent.

  “To absent friends,” said Fidel, raising his glass.

  “To absent friends,” responded Conrad, raising his own glass. He thought of Liz and Lou, and was glad that only one eye could become moist.

  SEQUENCE TWO

  Mission Ends

  It was a fine, spring-like afternoon. Conrad sniffed the air appreciatively and glanced about him at Jamestown. The sunlight gave it a slightly romantic aspect—rather like one of the deserted ghost towns in those quaint twentieth century westerns. But, presently, it would look less like a ghost town and more like a boom town. For the first hundred colonists were on their way.

  Matthew, at Conrad’s request, had tried to explain to him the theory of matter transmission by sub-space. But Conrad was little wiser. He had also looked up sub-spatial m/t in the Santa Maria‘s?, tape library. He got a lot of maths for his pains and very little enlightenment. Even the hitherto omniscient Kwango could not master the theory—which afforded Conrad some small satisfaction.

  The matter receiver had been erected in Andreas Square, near to the large insulated storage chamber where the sealed cylinders would be kept until their occupants could be taken out of S.A.

  Conrad idly imagined a string of one hundred steel sausages, somewhere between Kratos and Terra, sixteen light years away. He imagined them hurtling through space at unimaginable velocities, annihilating the light years. But he knew it wasn’t like that at all. In terms of conventional space-time, the suspended animation units now en route to Jamestown simply did not exist. They and their contents were now what the sub-space physicists called molecular echoes and they were in a continuum which, apparently, could only be defined mathematically.

  Anyway, the important thing was that the matter receiver was functioning, the instrumentation showed that it would presently be operative, and all was ready for reception.

  With the exception of Andreas all the Expendables were present, as were the robots Matthew and Mark. It was an occasion.

  The matter receiver was a large steel box with one massive door capable of being vacuum-sealed. It had its own built-in atomic generator to produce the immense voltages for the receiving field.

  There was a sudden hiss as all air was pumped out of the reception chamber.

  “Reception sequence one, commencing,” said Matthew. “All systems normal… Molecular echoes now matching pattern equation… Acceptance sequence commencing. All systems normal. Physical resolution now commencing. All systems normal.”

  Conrad gazed at the matter receiver, fascinated, though there was nothing yet to be seen. But inside that enigmatic black box a miracle was taking place. Matter —steel, flesh, bone, blood—that had leaped the light years as a colossal but insubstantial and controlled blast of sub-spatial radiation was now returning to its normal form. Conrad was reminded of the saying of some ancient Terran philosopher: What man has imagined and desired, that he will ultimately achieve.

  Lieutenant Smith shivered. “I feel as if we are in the presence of ghosts.”

  Kwango laughed. “These ghosts will live and breed more ghosts. Pretty damn soon, there will be a population problem.”

  Fidel said: “Kurt—as our esteemed brother Lou would have put it—you are full of colonic verbalese.”

  Chantana gave a faint smile. “As an ecologist, Kurt, you should know that it will take a thousand years before Kratos has any population problems. Maybe by then mankind will have acquired a little wisdom.”

  “Physical resolution completed,” said Matthew. “All systems normal. Unit one ready for disposal. Instructions required.”

  “Open up,” said Conrad. “Wheel it out.”

  “Decision noted,” said Matthew imperturbably. “Execution proceeds.”

  There was a further hiss as air was readmitted to the chamber. Matthew pressed the button that released the vacuum seal. The door of the matter receiver opened.

  Mark entered the chamber and pulled out a titanium cylinder, smoothly rounded at each end like a vast Mexican jumping bean. The cylinder slid out noiselessly on its built-in rollers.

  Stencilled in large letters on the side of the cylinder was the word: Doctor. Underneath that in small lettering were the wor
ds: John K. Howard, aged twenty-nine, I.Q. 175, specialist tropical diseases, U.S. citizen.

  “Welcome to Kratos,” said Conrad to the cylinder. He turned to Mark. “Wheel him away to storage.”

  “Decision noted, Commander. Execution proceeds.”

  Matthew said: “Permission requested to recommence reception cycle.”

  “Permission granted.”

  “Decision noted. Execution proceeds.”

  The next one came out of the matter receiver seven minutes later.

  The legend read in large letters: Geologist. In small letters: Mikhail Subakow, aged thirty-one, I.Q. 164, specialist seismology, Russian citizen.

  “Welcome, Mikhail Subakow,” said Conrad. “Wheel him away.”

  And so it went on through the long afternoon and into the night, with electric lights shining in Andreas Square, and with the robots indefatigably carrying out their duties.

  The colonists came from all parts of Earth—probably as a deliberate result of U.N. policy.

  Biologist: Greta Bergman, age twenty-seven, I.Q. 181, Swedish citizen.

  Engineer: Jean-Baptiste Girdo, age thirty-four, I.Q. 133, French citizen.

  Teacher: Flora Makinnon, I.Q. 128, Scottish citizen.

  Psychologist: Mohan das Gupta, I.Q. 155, Indian citizen.

  And so it went on… Scientists, engineers, technologists, teachers farmers, doctors—men and women with the skills that would be needed to build a human civilisation on the fertile world of Kratos…

  It was almost daybreak before the last of the titanium cylinders had come out of the matter receiver. Matthew and Mark, needing no rest, had continued their work with absolute precision. Conrad, feeling irrationally that his presence might be needed, had stayed by the matter receiver until more than seventy colonists had arrived safely and been transferred to the storage chamber. Then he had returned to the Santa Maria and slept restlessly for a couple of hours.

  Now, as the last colonists were arriving, here he was once more, watching Matthew check the reception sequences with unwavering efficiency. He glanced up. Soon the lights could be switched off. The sky was already grey and the stars were winking out, one by one.

  “Physical resolution completed,” said Matthew. “Unit one hundred received. All systems normal.”

  “All systems normal,” echoed Conrad. He smiled. The phrase seemed, somehow, absurd. He had just witnessed the completion of a scientific and technical miracle. He felt privileged. He was in at the beginning of man’s colonisation of the first extra-solar world. Privileged and humble… All systems normal…

  “Permission requested to shut down matter receiver, Commander.”

  “Permission granted.”

  “Decision noted. Execution proceeds.”

  “Permission requested to watch the dawn of a new day on Kratos, Commander.” It was not the voice of Matthew. Conrad knew whose voice it was.

  He turned and saw Lieutenant Smith standing a little behind him. She looked tired—tired and beautiful.

  “Permission granted.”

  Indira smiled and stepped forward. “Decision noted. Execution proceeds.”

  Conrad held her hand, remembering when he had first held it, more than 1 K-year ago.

  “You have a heavy resuscitation programme ahead of you, Indira. Can you and Matthew bring ten out tomorrow—I mean today? I’ll schedule the priorities, and we’ll all help.”

  Indira sighed. “You are a hard man, James.”

  He grinned. “The sooner we get them out and give them their basic orientation, the sooner we can get ourselves put down and return to Earth.”

  “Why are you in such a hurry?”

  “Two reasons. The first is that I am impatient to get the top brain surgeons working on Lou. The second is that we shall all get a long leave. I thought of spending most of it on Terra at a place called Applecross in the North-West Highlands of Scotland…” His grip on her hand tightened. “I thought—foolishly perhaps— that you might like to see Applecross, too.”

  “My tin legs don’t bother you?”

  He touched his silver eye patch. “Does that bother you?”

  “No.”

  “Or my tin arm?”

  Indira shook her head. “Tell me about Applecross,” she said. “Look, the sun is rising… Look at those wonderful streaks of crimson in the sky.”

  “It will be even more wonderful in the Scottish Highlands,” predicted Conrad.

  “Then I had better go with you, Commander, if only to see if you are telling the truth.”

  “Decision noted, Lieutenant. Execution proceeds.”

  Addendum

  Conrad, James. Ex-commander U.N.S.S., Commander Expendables, Team One. Age 37. Nationality British. Awarded Grand Cross of Gagarin for services rendered on Kratos. Offered reinstatement in U.N.S.S. with restored rank of captain. Offer declined. Elects to remain Expendable.

  Smith, Indira. Ex-surgeon lieutenant, Terr an Disaster Corps. Second-in-Command, Expendables, Team One. Age 29. Nationality Indian. Awarded D.S.S.C. for services rendered on Kratos. Offered rank of captain in Terran Disaster Corps. Offer declined. Elects to remain Expendable.

  Kwango, Kurt. Ecologist, felon. Age 32. Nationality Nigerian. Granted free pardon for crimes committed. Awarded U.N. Gold Medallion for services rendered on Kratos. Offered Chair of Ecology, Syrtis University, Mars. Offer declined. Elects to remain Expendable.

  Andreas, Lou. Engineer. Age 37. Nationality American. Awarded U.N. Silver Medallion for services rendered on Kratos and the Solar Cross for injuries received in the course of duty. Discharged with honour, unfit for further service.

  Le Gros, Chantana. Scientist, felon. Age 28. Nationality Vietnamese. Granted free pardon for crimes committed. Awarded U.N. Silver Medallion for services rendered on Kratos. Offered Chair of Extra-terrestrial Chemistry, Brisbane University, Terra. Offer declined. Elects to remain Expendable.

  Batista, Fidel. Weapons and explosive expert, felon. Age 31. Nationality Cuban. Granted free pardon for crimes committed. Awarded U.N. Silver Medallion for services rendered on Kratos. Offered post as Advisor on Weaponry, U.N. Extra-Solar Division Offer declined. Elects to remain Expendable.

  James, Elizabeth. Biologist, felon. Age 26. Nationality Welsh. Posthumously granted free pardon for crimes committed. Posthumously awarded U.N. Silver Medallion for services rendered on Kratos.

  FILE CLOSED