Somewhere a voice, p.1
Somewhere a Voice, page 1
Somewhere a Voice
(1965)*
Eric Frank Russell
Contents
SOMEWHERE A VOICE
U-TURN
SEAT OF OBLIVION
TIELINE
DISPLACED PERSON
DEAR DEVIL
I AM NOTHING
Book information
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SOMEWHERE A VOICE
THEY CRAWLED, WALKED, TOTTERED or jumped out of the battered little lifeboat, each according to his or her mental or physical condition. There were nine of them. The lifeboat had been designed to carry twenty but only nine emerged and only two remained within it.
All around towered the tangled jungle of a world notoriously hostile to their kind. High above burned the intense blue furnace of a sun that lent their faces a ghastly glow and made them peer through lids narrowed to the minimum. The air was thick, cloying, full of vegetable smells and vaguely reptilian but unidentifiable stenches. The jungle brooded in utter silence, waiting, waiting, waiting.
First Officer Alex Symes automatically took charge. Nobody disputed his right. Tall, grey-haired, laconic, he was the senior-ranking member of the party. Not that rank counted for much in these dire circumstances; or if it did it wouldn't be for long. A corpse has no promotional status. Facing the others, he informed, "Near as I can make out, this is Valmia, sixth planet of ZM17." He threw a brief, narrow-eyed glance at the fiery orb above them. "Don't take it we're lucky. There are a million far better places in the cosmos."
"We're alive," put in Max Kessler, captain of the third watch. "That's something."
"The problem is to stay alive," countered Symes. "And that's something else." His gaze went over them, studying, estimating. "Valmia has a rescue-station under a dome on the fortieth parallel. Our only hope lies in reaching it." He waited a bit for that to sink in, then said, "I reckon we've between seventeen hundred and two thousand miles to go."
"Say forty miles a day," hazarded Kessler. "Fifty days. We'll make it."
"Tvorty milers!" echoed Mrs. Mihailovik, her broad, puddeny face suffused with dismay. She felt for and grasped her husband's hand. "Grigor, ve nod able are to do tvorty milers."
The dumpy and equally pudden-faced Grigor patted her thick fingers. "Is best for to vait und tsee."
Watching the pair of them, Bill Mallet decided that fate could and should have arranged things much better. To his mind, salvation functioned on too haphazard a basis to leave room for common justice. A lot of real people had given up the ghost when that superfast lump of rock had smacked the Star Queen and split her open from end to end. A hell of a crash and a vast whoof of air and they were all gone. Ainsworth, Alcock, Banks, Balmer, Blundell, Casartelli, Casey, Corrigan, a battalion of them, all one hundred percent people.
And look at some of the rabble that had got away. Only three of them amounted to anything. Four if you counted Feeny, the late Captain Ridgeway's Irish terrier. As deputy engineer of the first watch and two hundred pounds of lavishly tattooed muscle to boot, he, Bill Mallet, had some call to be picked for survival by whoever or whatever did the .choosing. The same applied to Symes and Kessler, both good men and true, skilled, white and literate.
As for the rest, well, there were infinitely more deserving cases now floating bloated and lifeless in space. These Mihailoviks, for instance. Refugees from some village of mud hovels to which they'd been no ornaments. Squat, myopic and stupid. Mere earth-tillers, elderly, ugly and without visible merit. Not even able to speak plain English.
On the first day out he had passed Mrs. Mihailovik in a corridor just as a whirr and a thump had startled her and she'd demanded in panic, "Vot ist dot?"
"Dot," he had informed with contempt she'd been too dimwitted to detect, "ist der vater pvumps vot pvumps der vater."
"Ah, tso?" she'd said, idiotically relieved. "Mine t'anks!"
"Tsink of it nozzings," he had snorted.
A choice pair to be snatched from the very maw of death and granted life denied to others. The universe would never have missed them. Now they'd be a serious handicap on the long march, an unwanted liability, whereas any two of the doomed crew would have been an asset. Destiny had a mighty poor notion of the proper way in which to arrange things.
Another survivor was Hannibal Paton, a lanky, soft-voiced Negro, former engine-room hand of the third watch. The only darkie aboard the vessel. He'd had a miraculous escape while more able men had been swept clean out of the scheme of things. It didn't seem right somehow.
One could feel pretty much the same way about the yellow-faced monkey known as Little Koo. A spindly, thin-limbed, emaciated creature who once had performed some kind of lowly, unskilled task in the officers' mess. A slit-eyed, toothy, apologetic specimen who kept his silences and spoke only when spoken to. Quiet and secretive. Nobody knew his real name. Probably Kwok Sing, or something like that. But always he had been called Little Koo.
Lastly there was Sammy Finestone, youngish, swarthy, black-haired, flashily dressed, a passenger from Earth and said to be a petty trader in rare crystals. A typical Hebe, in Bill Mallet's estimation. One that had never soiled his hands with honest work. No doubt Sammy had been first in the lifeboat when the big bang came, grabbing the safest seat and clutching his bag of diamonds with an eager, claw like grip.
Veritably a motley mob characteristic of those who crawl like lice over every space-going vessel bound for faraway and supposedly better parts. Space-hardened crewmen learn to waste no time upon them, to avoid them, steer clear of them—unless compelled by disaster to consort with them cheek by jowl.
Symes was still talking. "All I know about Valmia consists of odd items dragged up from my memory. The total doesn't amount to much. We've no reference books, nothing else to go upon." He looked around in half-hearted hopelessness. "Is there anyone who happens to be well-informed about this planet?"
They were glumly silent except for Mallet, who grunted, "Never so much as heard of the place until now."
"All right." Frowning to himself, Symes went on, "What I remember is that it has a rescue-station, as I mentioned before. Also that this world has never been assigned for settlement. That means it's considered unsuitable for human habitation."
"Do you recall the reasons?" asked Kessler.
"Unfortunately I don't. I suppose they're the usual ones: hostile life forms, inadequate or dangerous food supplies, an atmosphere that kills quickly or slowly, a sun that does little."
You can't say whether it's just one of those features or the whole lot?"
"No, I can't," admitted Symes, lugubriously. "But the rescue-station is located under an airtight dome and that fact speaks for itself. They don't go to all the trouble and expense of creating livable conditions within a shield unless they are unlivable outside of it."
"So what you're trying to tell us," said Kessler, meeting him eye to eye, "is that our time is limited."
"Yes."
"And we don't know for sure how many weeks, days or hours we've got?"
"No, we don't." Symes' forehead was deeply corrugated as he strove to bring back cogent facts that he'd never expected to need. "I have a slight idea that something is wrong with the atmosphere but I can't swear to it. When you've been stuffed with information on ten thousand planets, most of which you'll never live to see, you tend to forget nine-tenths of it. A man's mind can hold only so much."
"The air smells and tastes all right to me," commented Bill Mallet, drawing a deep breath. "Bit thick and stuffy but that's nothing to worry about."
"You can't tell by how it seems," Symes said. "What you breathe may take six months to kill—or less."
"Then the sooner we get out of this the better," put in Sammy Finestone.
"That goes for everyone," retorted Mallet, giving him the hard eye.
"He said ve und nod I" Mrs. Mihailovik pointed out.
"Tso vat?" said Mallet, giving her a share of his stare.
"Shut up, all of you," ordered Symes, displaying irritation. "The time to squabble is when we get someplace good and safe. Until then we've better use for our energies." He gestured toward the lifeboat. "First, we'll bring out those two bodies and give them decent burial."
They went silent. Max Kessler and Hannibal Paton entered the boat, reappeared with the bodies, laid them side by side on a carpet of purple moss. When Kessler had snatched them into an airlock five seconds before the lifeboat blew free they had been already beyond help and were cold before the propulsion tubes grew hot. Now they lay upon the alien moss while the big blue sun scowled down and gave their complexions a horrid tinge of green.
One spade was included among the few emergency tools racked in the boat. Taking turns with this, they dug two graves in dark red soil that smelled like old iron far gone in rust. They composed the two in their last resting-places while Little Koo looked on expressionlessly and Mrs. Mihailovik snivelled noisily into a rag that helped to serve as a handkerchief.
With glossy-peaked cap held in one hand, Symes looked at the blazing sky and said, "Flaherty was a Roman Catholic. He died without a priest. You won't hold that against him, will you, God? He had no choice about the matter."
He stopped, embarrassed by his own role and by Mrs. Mihailovik's loud and uncontrolled sobs, but he still kept his gaze above.
"As for Murdoch's faith, he had none and said so. But he was a good man, the same as Flaherty. They were both fine, upstanding men. Please forgive them any little sins that may be recorded against them and grant them the last haven of good sailors."
Mr. Mihailovik was comforting his wife, patting her shoulders and saying, "There, Momma, there, there!"
After a short pause, Symes finished, "Amen!" and put on his cap.
"Amen!" murmured the others.
"Amen!" lisped Little Koo with the air of one only too willing to do that which is decent and proper.
Feeny sniffed around the graves, went in turn to each of the silent watches and emitted a querulous whine.
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"The lifeboats armament was hopelessly inadequate. Nobody could be saddled with the blame for this. The tiny vessel had been undergoing its weekly check-up at the moment of disaster. Much of its normal contents had been lying outside in the corridor when the Star Queen got clobbered. Even its fuel tanks had not received compensation for their loss by evaporation.
Feeny and Paton had been actually in the boat. Seven more still surviving in the shapeless lump that was one-third of the Star Queen's tail-end had staggered to it with scaled lips, pinched noses and starting eyes. Two more had been dragged in, the pair now buried. And they'd blown free with what little they had.
No face masks. No oxygen cylinders. No portable ray projectors. Only one pocket compass and that with its face cracked. A radio that did not work because of some mysterious defect that Thomason might have cured in two minutes had he not been among the floaters in space. Three automatic pistols, a box of ammunition, a large quantity of iron rations and a few metal implements including half a dozen heavy, razor-edged machetes. Nothing more.
Already wearing a belt holding one of the automatics, Symes said, "I'll keep this weapon and the compass. We'll march in single file with me in front." His attention shifted to Kessler. "If we walk into any serious trouble I'll be the first to catch it. I may not get out of it alive. In that event, Max, you must take over the lead." He tossed an automatic to him. "So you have this one. In the meantime keep to the end of the line and function as our rearguard."
He surveyed the others, trying to decide who should have the third gun. Mallet needed it least, being of exceptionally powerful build and fully capable of making redoubtable use of a machete. The same applied to Paton, whose black body was well-muscled. As for the Mihailoviks, they could not be trusted to take straight aim in a crisis even if they knew how to fire a gun. Feeny could not use it even if he wanted to.
That left Sammy Finestone and Little Koo. The latter was by far the smaller and as a member of the crew must have had some training in handling firearms. Little Koo should know which way to point the thing when he pulled the trigger. He gave the third automatic to Little Koo.
"The rest of you take those broadswords," he ordered, indicating the machetes. "Divide the rations, each of you taking as much as he can carry. Fill your water bottles from the boat's reservoir and let's get started."
They did as instructed, humping their respective loads, looking with uneasy faces at the waiting jungle and reluctant to leave the sanctuary of the little ship. For most of a dreadful week the small metal cylinder had been home, a man-made fortress protecting them from the cosmos that so suddenly had raged against them. It seemed sheer ingratitude to abandon it now, leaving it to long-term corrosion and eternal silence.
Sensing this feeling because he shared some of it, Symes told them, "If we make it to the rescue-station they'll send out a helicopter with a load of fuel and recover this boat. It's too valuable to be left to rot."
That soothed them slightly. They started out, heading northward and following a yard-wide path made by nobody knew what. Symes was in the lead, automatic in hand. Next came Hannibal Paton and Feeny. Then Little Koo, the Mihailoviks, Sammy Finestone, Bill Mallet and Max Kessler.
The jungle closed around, a riot of colours in which a dark and almost black green predominated. The malignant blue sun became shielded by overhead growths but still drove its rays through rare gaps, making brilliant shafts among massed foliage as if spotlighting unimaginable things lying in wait among the tree-trunks and shrubs.
They covered a mile, stumbling over roots and creepers, twisting comers, occasionally hacking at ropey things that straggled across the path. Some of the slashed vines writhed away like mutilated worms. The line halted and Symes called back.
"Watch out for this orchid-covered thing—it made a bite at me."
"They shuffled on. The path took a sharp turn to the left and on the corner stood a huge growth bearing great crimson trumpeted flowers. Mullet could see Mrs. Mihailovik edging nervously around it, as far from it as she could get, her eyes wide, her steel rimmed spectacles halfway down her nose. Her husband was urging her on though no less wary himself.
"Is got by now Momma. Nod worry. You is got by."
"Am trouble vor you, Grigor. Make hurry!"
Grigor edged round in exactly the same way, watching the plant every moment, trying to maintain as much distance as possible without putting himself nearer to some other danger behind. He made it, joined her and pushed on. Sammy Finestone approached the corner cautiously, neared it, rounded it in one mad dash.
Sniffing his disdain, Mallet marched brawnily up the path, machete poised in readiness. He could now see some of the crimson trumpets straining hungrily toward the path, pulling at their stalks in eagerness to get within reach. One lay on the ground, decapitated by Paton's knife when it had made a stab at Symes.
Mallet came abreast, posed barely within reach and dared the plant to come on. A trumpet immediately lunged at him. He got a fragmentary glimpse of an enormous crimson maw armed with a thousand slender needles, then his gleaming machete struck it from its stem. The thing let out an eerie gasp as it fell.
Behind him, Kessler said dryly, "I wouldn't have bothered."
"Why not? I'm using no ammo."
"You're using strength and nervous tension. You made a tiny loss of both and may be praying for it before you're through."
"Tell that to Sammy. Notice the way he scuttled around it? Like a frightened hare!" He gave a loud laugh and chopped a piece of vine which promptly coiled and coiled again. "Sammy's only worry is Mrs. Finestone's little boy—and his bag of diamonds."
"Has he got a bag of diamonds?" asked Kessler in open surprise.
"Ever know of a Yid who hadn't?"
"Sh-h-h!—he'll hear you."
"So what?" Speeding his pace, Mallet caught up with the subject of the conversation. Sammy was waiting on the next turn of the trail, his dark eyes anxious.
"For a moment I thought something had happened."
"Fat lot you did about it," Mallet gave back.
"I was just about to return for a look when I heard your voices."
"Did your ears burn?" asked Mallet, grinning.
"No." Sammy showed puzzlement. "Should they have done?"
"Maybe. We were having fun about the way you cornered on two wheels past that—"
From somewhere well ahead Symes bawled, "What's the hold-up back there?"
"Coming!" yelled Kessler.
They moved on in silence.
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