Collected short fiction, p.645
Collected Short Fiction, page 645
“That one surviving ship is manned with robots,” he said. “Its survival is ironic, because it was built to take the greatest danger. The refugees built it to open a way from space to space, for their escape. When the way was open, it was to come through first, to survey the new space and secure a bridgehead for their invasion.”
Lilith’s cold hand clenched hard on mine.
“I’m not sure what all went wrong,” Ken Star said. “We found no records we could read—none except those old machines. But I believe part of the fleet was trapped in that galactic explosion. Nothing less could have fused and battered those magnificent ships into the things we took for natural asteroids.
“I think more of them were mauled when they came into the new universe too soon—while its expanding mass was still as deadly as the exploding galaxy. Perhaps there were other fatal excursions—we can only speculate. But the deadliest surprise of all must have been the anomaly of time.”
“And that’s a fearful thing!” gasped old Habibula. “But for Lil’s precious serum I’d be frozen and dead a thousand years ago in that foreign universe!”
Shivering, he drained his wine.
“The crippled fleet must have been left to wait while the robots came through to prepare for their invasion,” Ken Star said. “At the different rates of time, a million years—or a hundred million—may have passed for the fleet before the robots could send the signal for it to follow.
“By that time, the invading race was dead—”
“So we’ve just machines to fight?” I whispered. “No living things at all?”
“Just machines.” Ken Star nodded. “Such machines as those four robots we saw.”
“Mortal great machines!” gasped old Habibula. “On their fearful scale of time and size, we’re less than any insect!”
“But still they are machines.” Ken Star smiled bleakly at him. “They are excellent machines. They do what they were built to do, and that is all—I am quoting Giles. He observed them. He saw their function in their form. That’s how we escaped alive—”
“I thought we had escaped.” Old Habibula sat staring sadly at the empty bottle. “Until we found we were still caught in this old game the robots play.”
“A game?” Squeezing Lilith’s hand, I tried not to shiver. “With robots?”
“I suppose they’ve been playing it, in different times and spaces, since our universe was born. They make a crossing. They prepare a base. They signal for the fleet. Of course it cannot come—except for those few hulks that are caught and drawn through by the forces of the nexus itself.”
“What happens then?”
Sitting hunched and tense and old, Ken Star peered at the screen.
“We’re waiting to find out,” he said. “I hope the robots conclude that the invasion point was somehow unsuitable. I hope they retreat, to try some other point—perhaps in some other universe.”
“Do you think they will?”
“The evidence hints that in the past they have.” His gaunt head nodded. “Hundreds of thousands of times, I imagine. The mother machine is old enough itself—though time is almost stopped in the anomaly and those wrecked ships have been exposed to perhaps a billion-fold the time—
“Look at that!” His voice lifted sharply. “Another spray of debris, I suppose, from the shot that hit this asteroid.”
The screen glowed again, with sparks and plumes of pale green fire. Born among the dim stars around that circle of darkness, they flowed into it, spilling over the lip of that dreadful funnel, flowing before us in a giddy torrent toward that midnight universe. They lit the mother machine.
It looked bright and near, terribly huge and terribly strange. Parts of it sprang out at me—jutting things that were not booms or planes or antennas or jets. It was swiftly turning—swinging so that its seven fused spheres merged into one, so that their enclosing cage became three projecting tabs.
“It’s pointing straight at us!” Alarmed, I turned to Ken Star. “What does that mean?”
“We’ll soon know.”
Desperately, I swung to the chart on the opposite wall. The green point of Nowhere Near was deep in the creature’s belly. The machine was a bright red point. They were creeping together.
“A collision course!” I gasped. “That’s what the computer shows. We’re going to hit it!”
“I don’t think so.” Ken Star’s old voice seemed oddly calm. “They won’t let that happen—whatever they do.” His hollowed eyes flashed at old Habibula. “Giles, what do you think?”
“They’re machines.” Habibula’s pebble-colored eyes blinked uneasily. “They’re doing what they were built to do. They hold us no malice at all. They aren’t wicked like nature or men. But if they read the movement of the asteroid as a threat to their task, they’ll destroy us instantly.”
“Shall we abandon Nowhere Near?” I looked anxiously at Ken Star. “We might get away in your escape rocket, under cover of the station—”
“Too late to think of that.” His haggard head shook grimly. “The station wouldn’t give us cover long enough. The robots would pick up the flare of our rockets, and they’re programmed to shoot any unidentified craft.”
His haunted eyes went back to the dark funnel about to swallow us, to that enormous alien ship waiting in its throat. Now the ship looked like a single globe, ring-marked and greenish, bright in the fall of fire around it.
“We’ll have to wait,” he muttered huskily. “We’ll have to see—”
Old Habibula sat staring at the screen, clutching his empty bottle as if it held some promise of escape.
“Tell ’em how we found that fearful ship,” he gasped. “Tell ’em how the laser signal flamed out of it, burning red as blood, to call their fleet—that couldn’t answer. Tell ’em how we came to the signal, clinging in the precious shadow of a dead and drifting ship.”
Haggard eyes fixed on that black, unthinkable passage before us, on the bright-green image of that monster machine in the ring of falling fire, Ken Star said nothing.
“Tell ’em how we got aboard,” croaked old Habibula. “Tell ’em how I found the wave-guide duct. Tell ’em how I opened it. Tell ’em how we had to leave the rocket and climb through that cold steel gut.”
The fall of fire that rimmed that dreadful funnel was spreading out to take us in. The bright globe of the robot ship was swelling fast ahead.
“Tell ’em how we hid and schemed and fought to learn the mortal secret of the ship,” old Habibula whined forlornly. “Tell ’em how we got into the quarters of the vanished master-creatures. Tell ’em how the wicked robots hunted us. Tell ’em how we got inside that fearful main computer.”
Lit by that circular torrent of toppling greenish fire, every part of the alien ship looked bright and cold, unbelievably enormous, chillingly strange. I saw things in motion. Clutching Lilith’s icy hand, I braced myself—for precisely what, I could not guess.
“Tell ’em how we got away,” whimpered old Habibula. “Tell ’em how we worked it out. Tell ’em how we got back inside our own precious rocket. Tell ’em how we waited till the mortal robot ship had brought us halfway back from that fearful universe. Tell ’em how we pushed off beneath that fan of falling fire.”
Watching the bright-green disk of the alien ship growing wider on the screen, I made a quick computation. Its apparent diameter had doubled in the last forty seconds. That meant our falling station had covered half the distance to it in the same forty seconds. We had forty seconds to live—unless something happened.
“Tell ’em how we got back,” old Habibula rasped. “Tell ’em how you computed the angle of the sterilizing ray. Tell ’em how we gained our velocity in the shadow of the mortal ship itself, and slipped beneath the fan of fire with all rockets dead, and coasted on to the precious station—” His rusty voice sobbed and stopped.
“Lars!” Lilith’s hand squeezed mine desperately, vibrant and alive again. “Oh, Lars!”
The anomaly was gone.
Black funnel and green machine had flickered off the telescreen. The northward stars shone clear where they had been, no longer dimmed or reddened. Nowhere was nowhere—with a small letter now.
Unbelievingly, I looked at the other end of the drum. That devouring creature had become a thin gray ghost fading from the electronic chart. The bright magnetic web dissolved. In a moment all the chart was blank, except the bright green dot of Nowhere Near.
“They’ve closed the gate.” Ken Star’s voice was faint and shaken. “I knew—I nearly knew they would. Giles said they wouldn’t let us strike them.”
“They’re machines,” old Habibula wheezed. “They do what they must. When the fleet didn’t follow, they had to go back.”
“I thought—” I had to catch my breath. “I thought they’d fire on us.”
“We got inside their main computer,” old Habibula puffed. “We smashed a hatful of transistors to take care of that.”
“Giles!” Lilith threw her arms around him, gay malice glinting in her wide bronze eyes and breathless laughter ringing in her voice. “I never quite believed the yarns you used to tell—”
“But now you know I’m an immortal hero!” He kissed her on the mouth. “A mortal hungry hero! We found wonder and danger and secrets enough in that dead universe, but precious little to eat and drink. Let’s find my caviar and wine!”
“Come along, Ken.” She slipped away from old Habibula to catch Ken Star’s time-shrunken arm. “Let’s go by the station hospital. I want to look at our patients there—and you need a shot of Giles’ serum.”
I stood alone in the drum as they all turned to go, the taste of triumph strangely flat. Nowhere Near was safe again and still my own command—though now our task was done. Interstellar communication would be open now. We could report to sector base and request relief.
Heavy at heart, I stood watching Lilith. Here in our own native space and time, her weapon would work again. She was once more a goddess, no longer afraid of the dull cold skull on her finger. With life and death to give, serene in absolute authority, she was leaving me.
I took a step to follow her, but I couldn’t chase a goddess. I stopped and let her go, trying not to envy her laughing joke for old Habibula, her thoughtful hand on Ken Star’s arm. Woodenly, I turned back to the computer.
After all, I had enough to keep me busy. Nowhere Near had lost air and suffered damage. The blast area had to be decontaminated. The wrecked atomic plant had to be inspected. Interstellar communication had to be restored. I had to keep us all still alive, while we waited for relief.
“Lars—” I heard Lilith’s voice, choked and high. “Did you think—did you think I didn’t need you now?”
I turned and saw her coming back to me, flying across that low-G space like a white and graceful bird. I caught her in my trembling arms, warm and quick and wonderful. Tears shining in her wide bronze eyes, she clung to me desperately, more girl now than goddess. I held her hard, and kissed the white distress from her face, knowing now that she needed me.
1968
Rogue Star
PART ONE
In a universe where stars and men were joined as brothers, something new—and dangerous!—was born
I
His name was Andreas Quamodian, short, stout, self-important. Waiting his turn to enter the luminous iris of the transflex cube, that would whisk him across the interstellar gulfs between star and star, he looked out of place. He didn’t look like the sort of man who would be engaged in business important enough to justify the use of the transflex cube. But he didn’t look like the sort of man on whom the lives of countless billions of beings might depend; and, curiously, he was both those things.
The control dome flashed a signal to him as he entered the ramp. “Identification, sir?”
“Ridiculous,” muttered Andy Quamodian. “Silly red tape!” But he let his flyer hover while he sorted out the documents of his interstellar citizenship. The dome extended a long, nimble finger of pale plasma to scan his passport.
The passport bore his ident number, an endless row of binary digits. Below it another line translated the numbers into the universal language:
Name: Andreas Quamodian.
Race: Human.
Birthplace: New Europe, Planet 5, Star 4894, Sector B-311-C, Galaxy 1.
Organization: Companions of the Star.
Status: Monitor.
Priority:—
But the last line was blank. “Hurry up, will you?” Quamodian barked. “Can’t you see I’m in a hurry?”
The tendril of plasma turned the passport disk about, catching in it a reflection of his dark, round face. “Destination, sir?” the control dome inquired.
“Earth. That’s—confound it, let me see—yes, that’s Planet 3, Star 7718, Sector Z-989-Q, Galaxy 5. Route me through the Wisdom Creek station, Octant 5.”
The plasma tendril winked out. Quamodian caught the passport disk as it dropped and stowed it away, then resumed his inching crawl toward the cube. A long silver tank, no doubt filled with a liquid citizen, was vanishing through the closing gate. Behind it a multiple creature followed a horde of small, bright, black things, hopping and tumbling inside a communal cloud of luminous blue mist A gray-scaled dragon shuffled just ahead of Quamodian, burdened with a bright metal turret on its back that probably housed unseen symbiotes. Winking crystal ports in the turret peeked at Quamodian.
As Quamodian inched after the dragon a flashing signal halted him. “Sir,” said the control dome, “we have no record of your priority for this trip.”
“Oh, great stars,” cried Quamodian, “can’t you see I’m in a hurry?” But grumbling, he held up a scrap of yellow transfac film for the plasma sensor to scan. The plasma hesitated and recoiled.
“Sir, that document is not in the universal language.”
“Of course not!” Quamodian snapped. “It’s in English. Read it!”
“I have no equivalence data for ‘English,’ sir.”
“Well, then I’ll translate it. It’s transmitted from Earth—that’s the mother planet of my race, you know. The sender is a girl—I mean, a youthful female human creature—named Molly Zaldivar. Her message is addressed to me. It is of great importance, and—”
“Sir.” Ahead the multiple creature had already disappeared into the transflex cube and the dragon was lumbering forward. “You are delaying transshipment I ask for your priority authorization now.”
“I’m giving it to you! Listen to what she says: ‘Dear Andy, please forgive me for leaving you so rudely. If you can, come to Earth at once. The local Companions have never heard of rogue stars; they won’t pay any attention to my warnings. But—Andy, dear Andy, I’m frightened! Rogue men are in contact with rogue stars right now, and I have no hope but you!’ ”
“Sir, that is not an acceptable priority. Please leave the ramp!”
“Confound you,” shouted Quamodian, “don’t you understand? That’s priority enough for anything! That’s a threat to the whole human race!”
“Sir. The human race is identified in my files as an insignificant little breed of barbarians, just recently admitted to provisional citizenship. No human being is authorized to issue a priority for interstellar travel.”
“But they may be in grave danger of—”
“Sir, please leave the ramp. You may apply through official channels for authorization for your trip.”
“There’s no time! The danger is urgent!” The dome did not reply, but ominously the plasma tendril thickened and began to spread. “Wait!” Quamodian cried desperately. “I’m a member of the order of Companions of the Star! Surely you know of them. Our mission is to protect humanity, and other races, too.”
“My indices do not show any authorization issued to you for this journey by the Companions of the Star, sir. You are holding up traffic. Please move off the ramp.”
Quamodian glanced bleakly at the citizen crowding behind him: Forty tons of sentient mineral, granite-hard, jagged and black, afloat on its own invisible transflection field and impatiently extending its own passport at the tip of a blue finger of plasma. “Don’t shove, Citizen!” he barked. “There’s been a misunderstanding. Listen, Control. Check your records. We humans are allied to the multiple citizen named Cygnus, which is a symbiotic association of fusorians, stars and men. Its chief star is Almalik . . . or don’t you care about sentient stars any more than you do about men?”
His irony was wasted on the dome. “Get out of line,” its signal flashed imperatively. Then, a split-second later. “You may wait on the side of the ramp. The multiple citizen Cygnus is listed on our indices. We will call the star Almalik, in Galaxy 5.
Disgruntled, Quamodian switched his flyer out of line, giving up his place to the granite citizen, who passed him with an air of disdain. He hovered impatiently at the edge of the ramp, watching the gate ahead expand again as it swallowed the gray-scaled dragon and its turret of symbiotic fellows.
For a moment Quamodian thought of making a mad dash for the iris aperture, but there was no sense in that. However fast his flyer moved, the dome would be faster; and then he would be even longer delayed in getting to Earth.
He snatched a light-pen and scribbled hastily on his message panel: “Molly, I’m having a little trouble.
But I’m coming, as fast as I can.” He added the routing information and watched the hungry tongue of plasma lick away the photons in the message, storing them as spin-variances in an electron cloud. He knew that his invisible package of tagged electrons was already enroute for the transflex fields around the cube, automatically seeking out the fastest route through the shifting sub-universes of transflection to home in on Molly’s distribution point.
With any luck, he would follow at the same speed, arriving almost as fast as the message. But if his luck was low . . . if the monitor dome would not permit him to pass . . .
Quamodian shuddered and stared blankly out at the horde of beings slowly moving past him on the ramp.
