Thunderworld, p.2
Thunderworld, page 2
"Swamps," Zees said.
"Steam," Ellen said.
"A Precambrian world," Breed agreed. "Maybe some bugs, primitive life, nothing really interesting."
"Don't knock that," Duckworth said. "We're not looking for intelligent life." They were looking for living room. They were looking for a lifezone planet, a water planet, and the more they looked the more evident it became that old Earth was one of the blessed spots of the universe, the rare one, the one which had formed directly in the right spot, at just the right distance from just the right size of star to have water exist and, thus, to form life.
"Who's going down?" Ellen asked.
"Not you," Duckworth said. "I won't risk losing my doctor." They'd been through it all before, at each planetfall, each time something down there on some godforsaken ball of rock warranted investigation. There had been many planets. There had been Mars types and Mercury types and a couple of Venus types so shrouded with poisons that no deep exploration needed to be made. But this was the first water world. This one might, just might, be usable. This one might take a few of the crowded billions off the groaning crust of old Earth and give them a place for new hope and relieve the home planet, slowly, of the killing burden of overpopulation.
"You and Zees went last time," Ellen said.
"Ellen, when you learn to make a portable generator recite the multiplication table like Breed and Zees, you can come along on initial exploration. Until then, forget it," Don said.
"Actually, he wants my strength," said Breed, "in case of alien monsters."
Duckworth was tired. His arms felt heavy. He stood and stretched. "Your watch, isn't it, Zees?" Zees nodded. "I suggest that you two turn our new mudball over to the automatic monitors and follow my example, which is to get some sleep."
Alone on the bridge, Zees made her routine checks. Around her the Santa Maria hummed and clicked. She was a good ship, crowning achievement of Earth technology. And she was one of only three. The Nina, the Pinta, the Santa Maria. Quaint. Going way, way back for hope, for the names of the ships of a displaced Italian who set the scene for some very nasty competition between two halves of a world when he sailed his ancient water vessels into the unknown.
Four hundred light-years. But their trip, even though so much more impressive in sheer distances, had been made in more comfort than poor Columbus enjoyed. There were private quarters and a gym, library and film room, a lab and a mini-observatory.
The ship was both the pride and the hope of the western half of her world, and as such she bore a great responsibility. She'd been built, along with her sister ships, over great objections, both at home and abroad. People were going hungry on old Earth, and there were many who begrudged the time and materials and wealth spent on space. The big resentment had begun, Zees knew, at the time of the Great Expedition. There had been an uneasy peace, an era of cooperation, and the whole world had participated in building the fleet which, using the old, inefficient, barely predictable nuclear engines, had blasted away from Moon Base to disappear.
Zees had not been born when the great exploration fleet left Earth to find new planets, new relief valves for the exploding populations. Don Duckworth was just a boy. But Zees had heard recordings of the primitive radio communications with the fleet as the distances grew more and more vast and it took years for the signals to reach Earth. Men still listened, monitoring the assigned channels, hoping against hope, but the cynics said that the Great Expedition had been the Great Folly. They cited the good which could have been done on Earth with the outlay of wealth and talent it took to put the fleet into space. They gave up hope. And it was differences about the fleet which set the stage for new disputes between east and west.
It was hard to believe that in the modern world, with Jonathan Blink's new theories making it possible to cover in moments more distance than the fleet could cover in years, men could still hate, and dispute the few things left on depleted Earth worth disputing. It was hard to believe that after the total nuclear disarmament after the turn of the century, nations were once again building the bloated, deadly bombs.
There were times when she almost felt guilty. She was, in a way, a symbol of the new tensions, for it was a Texan who, in his own private laboratory, much to the consternation of the governments and corporations who spent billions on research, had developed the first really practical sublight drive. And the west's reluctance to share the discovery had become a critical issue.
Earth's troubles were far away, but they were there as Zees stood her watch, as the automatic monitors gathered information about the cloud-covered water planet below the orbiting Santa Maria. She hummed quietly. The others slept. Around the ship the seven planets of the little yellow star, sharing perhaps a dozen smaller satellites, marched through their orderly routine toward the eons which would see the little star mature. There was an asteroid belt between the fourth and fifth planets, and a wandering comet was just discernible on the ship's instruments.
She opened the viewport and looked down on the roiling atmosphere of the small water world. She felt like weeping. There had to be livable planets. Now that Earth had the means to move people—the power of the blink drive was relatively unlimited—there simply had to be planets of water and air and growing green things. Otherwise there was no hope. Otherwise the family squabble over food and land and the diminishing resources of Earth would grow and—
About that, she would not think. As it had been to millions before her who had faced the same threat, that was unthinkable.
3
DON Duckworth was awakened by a sting on his arm. He opened his eyes in time to see Ellen swab the spot. He himself rubbed the hickey which blew up where Ellen had injected nutrient spray. She knew he hated the thing and when she could, she shot it into him as he slept. That spray, which did something to slow the little biological clock in his system which said age, age, was one reason why, unlike his ancestors, he was not an old man at seventy.
"I put in a few extras," Ellen said. "Build up your antibodies in case there are bad bugs down there."
"Gee, I love that medical talk," Don said, rising to pull on his tights. Ellen took no notice. Ship's crews were not chosen on the basis of sex, but after two plus years aboard a ship as small as the Maria, modesty took a beating. Moreover, the crew of the Maria had proved to be very compatible. It was not the first time Ellen Partance had seen the ship's commanding officer in the nude.
Zees was seated in the command chair, feet up on a console. She was humming when Duckworth entered. Seeing him, she smiled. "I'm not sure, but there seems to be a faint life reading down there now and then."
"Sabertooth tigers?" he asked.
"Even if it's a young planet it can't be all bad," Zees said.
"Is Breed awake?"
"I wish you'd take me," Zees said.
"It's Breed's turn," he told her. "Did you by any chance send our position?"
"No," she said. "I was going to wait. No need raising hope back home until we find out for sure what's down there."
Behind them, stretching backward toward Earth, each segment straight, a zigzag line marked by small blink beacons was their link. In theory, it was possible to blink from one side of the galaxy to the other. In practice the stars and space debris got in the way. A ship which blinked too close to the gravitational well of a star would, although it hadn't happened, most probably be destroyed or, at best, tossed to the far reaches of the universe, never to find its way home. Blink travel was, by necessity, slow and painstaking, and each leap taken by the Maria had to be calculated carefully, aimed by the shipboard telescopes and instruments to go only so far as a straight line extended without approaching mass. A message, on the other hand, could travel home almost instantaneously, being relayed by the preset blink beacons. With blink coordinates established, a ship wishing to travel the same route which had been traveled by the Maria on the way out could make the trip in a fraction of the time. There were, however, no other blink ships, except the two sister ships, and they were off in other parts of the near galaxy doing the same thing Maria was doing, looking for a lifezone planet.
"There's an interesting weather system down there," Zees said. "There's a hurricane blowing in the southern hemisphere. Mountains along the equator keep most of the weather in the south. It's rather strange."
He studied pictures. She superimposed a grid and indicated the probable landing area of the ship's boat. "There's an area of calm here," she said. "The jet streams run up high and move the dust clouds and make it look rough, but on the surface it's strangely quiet."
"Almost unnatural," Don said.
"That's not a wild statement. Look." She pointed. Instruments had been constructing a computerized profile of the landmasses of the planet. "Look at these mountains. It's much too much. They are extensive and huge. She's probably as unstable as hell."
Duckworth ran a hand over his face. "Well, we'll do a thorough survey from the boat."
"At any rate, this looks like the best landing spot," Zees said. She put her hand on his arm. "I don't have to remind you to be careful, do I?"
He grinned.
She went back to the growing computer image of the landmasses. "Isn't it strange that she's a three planet, just like Earth? We've talked lifezone all our lives, and I never knew what it meant, really. The ratio of her size and distance from her sun is the same as Earth's. And just the one water planet. The others are little balls of rock or gas giants."
"I guess systems are all formed the same way," Don said.
"If so, why haven't we found an Earth in each system?" she asked.
He shrugged. "Punishment for our sins?"
"It makes one wonder. The conditions for formation of a lifezone planet are so elusive. Sometimes it makes me wonder if Earth isn't unique after all, and if we weren't put there for the sole purpose of peopling the galaxy."
"We were put there to fornicate," Don said, "and overpopulate."
"Exactly. To fornicate and make things so miserable on Earth that we're forced to go out and people the galaxy. So why aren't there more habitable worlds?"
"Maybe we were supposed to stop breeding after a while."
"Or learn to live without air, or in subzero ice, or in boiling ammonia."
"Easier to stop fornicating," Don said, grinning.
"Hmmm," she said.
"Or be sensible about it," he amended. Her lips were heavy. In two plus years they'd come to know each other well. "Stop it. I'm going planetside."
"Breed isn't ready," she whispered, lowering her feet from the console and coming into his arms.
Thus occupied, they missed seeing the brief clearing of the skies over the desert. Ellen caught it on film a few minutes later.
"We'll go down here," Duckworth said. "We'll land on the flats near the high scarp."
"Sixty-two thousand feet of mountain up there," Breed said, pointing.
"Hidden under permanent smog," Ellen said. "A shame."
"I've been doing some calculations and I was right," Zees said. "She's a little unstable. She wobbles. The mountains throw her out of kilter."
"Gee, I love that scientific talk," Don said.
"I can see the ads now," Ellen said. "Live a life of high adventure. Experience ash storms and earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Risk the ultimate thrill of a planet shifting on its axis."
"We'll need a good name," Breed said. "How about Agagin's World?"
"Precipitous," Ellen said, "for the mountains."
"She's not going to tip while we're down there, is she, Zees?" Breed asked.
"I don't think so. She's not wobbling much. She's a lady who hasn't made up her mind, though. She's still forming mountains. That biggest landmass is too much in itself. I suspect continental breakup is just beginning. She's quite hot on the inside, and that heat might help the greenhouse effect to keep her unfrozen. Volcanism can release a terrific amount of heat. There are probably a dozen major quakes a day. There's one huge amount of strain on the crust. And when I say earthquakes, I'm not talking about a Southern California tremor. I mean like tossing up the Rockies."
"I think Ellen said she wanted to go down with you," Breed said, making as if to remove his pressure suit.
"Knock it off and let's go take a look," Don said.
4
Twice before the unseen sun sank to leave the world in cooling darkness, the Great One made futile excursions to the barrier. Each time Goroin studied him and admired him. For perhaps the first time in his life he could understand what old Roag had meant, for it was difficult not to love that great head, that long and graceful neck. His awe and admiration were, indeed, akin to love, but perhaps that grew from his need, from his awareness that his body was growing weaker.
He used the time for inventory and remembrance. It would be important to have all his knowledge refreshed, so that it might resist the trauma. So it was that he lay alongside the barrier and let his mind journey backward in time, to reexperience his long and peaceful life as a free one in the desert with the delightful Melin of Grace, to remember his last flowing and the pain and to know that it would come again. And beyond that, into those areas of his mind which were different, for he was Melt of Roag, and although that which had once been Roag was no more, there were the pockets of information which had been gathered by Roag the Rememberer and emblazoned into that life stuff which had melted. He knew that he was unique. He had known no other Melt, although there were others.
The time clung, cloyed, crawled. The night saw heat, trapped beneath the roiling clouds, close down over the desert, and it was comfortable to lie uncovered. The morning brought no change in weather, but as Goroin tried to arise he was astounded by his new weakness, and the food was gone. Oh, World, had he waited too long?
Then the dull eyes of the great beast were peering once more over his barrier, and the Great One was making a low and desperate noise of hunger deep in his long neck. Black, moist nostrils twitched as the beast smelled the freshness of the sparse desert growth and longed to be free, to roam the flats and search out the tidbits of vegetation. He was a creature of the desert, the Great One, and his powerful legs would carry his bulk many marches in a day while the long neck lowered to browse the scant, vegetation or to dart out and seize an unwary food creature.
"Soon, Great One," Goroin said silently. "Soon it will be over and we will stoke the furnaces of that huge body with good flesh." He could almost feel the beast's panic, the yearning to move, to be freed of the blockading barrier. And he knew that the situation was becoming quite delicate, and that he would have to choose his moment carefully. If he waited too long the fear of death by starvation would overcome the instinctive and powerful fear of loose footing and uneven places. If he showed himself too soon the built-in caution of the Great One would foil everything, for in a time when all of the free-roving Great Ones had been taken, all save, perhaps, the Great One of Goroin, the beast could not have survived without knowledge that the glow of life in the eyes of his prey dictated flight, not attack.
When the Great One went back to the water to try to kill hunger with great gulps, Goroin sank within himself, slowed the painful beating of his tired heart, began, once more, to review his inventory of memories and knowledge. Twice and then once more he was able to start with newness, through the memories of Roag the Melted, and to see the sights gathered by Roag and remember the newness, the almost total learning process, of Goroin the New. The number of seasons had no meaning to him, but they stretched back and back.
Such self-examination produced some new thoughts. The people looked upon a melt as weak, a being of marred unity. He could, while knowing the world through two sets of memories, his own vivid ones and the scarcely known ones of the melted one, come to the conclusion that he was not marred. Indeed, if anything, he was somewhat blessed. He had never been handicapped by the presence of a subset of memories, for he dominated them, used them only when he needed them. For example, although he had never left the high desert he knew the land of the fires. He knew the heat and the feel and the smell and the dangers as great earthpains racked the land to the south. He knew the dangers of the trek and the cold of the high passageways between the towering mountains. He knew the feeling of inadequate air at the mountain heights, and could remember how young lungs had pumped the harder. He could feel the cold and the unbearable tiredness.
What he did not know was Roag's reasons for the trek. Knowledge? Of what benefit was it to know that the land of fires was a deadly place where one risked the flow of fire and burning mud and the fall of so deadly a curtain of ash that not even the strongest could lift himself from the crushing burden? Yet, one had to admire the Historian, for he had the ability to understand. If one knew, for example, exactly what Roag had meant in his talk of the love for the eater, if one could understand and not become confused by the word, itself, into comparing Roag's concept with male-female joy, then it all might come clear. What was love? Was it his feeling when he entered a fruitful area of desert on a clear, cold day and discovered the young Melin, unnamed, newly eaten, her new body uncoordinated and waiting to be trained? Ah, but she was a joy, reverting in her enthusiasm to the atavistic two-legged hop, rolling in playful awkwardness as they blended, soft-furred, fully rounded as the new body was altered by life and began its rapid growth into maturity.
"One does not hop," he had told her laughingly. "Hopping is the mode of movement for springers. One, how do I explain? One falls forward, vaults, in a way, from one extremity to the other. The weight of the body falls forward and is caught, halted in its fall, by the placement of the other leg."
It was a characteristic of the people. It separated them from the springers, that mode of bipedal locomotion, but to a newly young Melin such concerns had no importance and she tweaked him and hopped away. In love, he hopped after her, for he was not long past having been eaten, his body vigorous, agile, capable of limitless travel in the high desert. It was a harmless exuberance to hop like a springer, to feel the powerful legs thrust together and send the body soaring to leave the earth for a joyful moment.
