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diff --git a/24958.txt b/24958.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..71ac1e2 --- /dev/null +++ b/24958.txt @@ -0,0 +1,777 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Second Landing, by Floyd Wallace + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Second Landing + +Author: Floyd Wallace + +Release Date: March 30, 2008 [EBook #24958] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SECOND LANDING *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +SECOND LANDING + +By FLOYD WALLACE + + + _A gentle fancy for the Christmas Season--an + oft-told tale with a wistful twistful of Something + that left the Earth with a wing and a prayer._ + + +Earth was so far away that it wasn't visible. Even the sun was only a +twinkle. But this vast distance did not mean that isolation could endure +forever. Instruments within the ship intercepted radio broadcasts and, +within the hour, early TV signals. Machines compiled dictionaries and +grammars and began translating the major languages. The history of the +planet was tabulated as facts became available. + +The course of the ship changed slightly; it was not much out of the way +to swing nearer Earth. For days the two within the ship listened and +watched with little comment. They had to decide soon. + +"We've got to make or break," said the first alien. + +"You know what I'm in favor of," said the second. + +"I can guess," said Ethaniel, who had spoken first. "The place is a +complete mess. They've never done anything except fight each other--and +invent better weapons." + +"It's not what they've done," said Bal, the second alien. "It's what +they're going to do, with that big bomb." + +"The more reason for stopping," said Ethaniel. "The big bomb can destroy +them. Without our help they may do just that." + +"I may remind you that in two months twenty-nine days we're due in +Willafours," said Bal. "Without looking at the charts I can tell you we +still have more than a hundred light-years to go." + +"A week," said Ethaniel. "We can spare a week and still get there on +time." + +"A week?" said Bal. "To settle their problems? They've had two world +wars in one generation and that the third and final one is coming up you +can't help feeling in everything they do." + +"It won't take much," said Ethaniel. "The wrong diplomatic move, or a +trigger-happy soldier could set it off. And it wouldn't have to be +deliberate. A meteor shower could pass over and their clumsy instruments +could interpret it as an all-out enemy attack." + +"Too bad," said Bal. "We'll just have to forget there ever was such a +planet as Earth." + +"Could you? Forget so many people?" + +"I'm doing it," said Bal. "Just give them a little time and they won't +be here to remind me that I have a conscience." + +"My memory isn't convenient," said Ethaniel. "I ask you to look at +them." + + * * * * * + +Bal rustled, flicking the screen intently. "Very much like ourselves," +he said at last. "A bit shorter perhaps, and most certainly incomplete. +Except for the one thing they lack, and that's quite odd, they seem +exactly like us. Is that what you wanted me to say?" + +"It is. The fact that they are an incomplete version of ourselves +touches me. They actually seem defenseless, though I suppose they're +not." + +"Tough," said Bal. "Nothing we can do about it." + +"There is. We can give them a week." + +"In a week we can't negate their entire history. We can't begin to undo +the effect of the big bomb." + +"You can't tell," said Ethaniel. "We can look things over." + +"And then what? How much authority do we have?" + +"Very little," conceded Ethaniel. "Two minor officials on the way to +Willafours--and we run directly into a problem no one knew existed." + +"And when we get to Willafours we'll be busy. It will be a long time +before anyone comes this way again." + +"A very long time. There's nothing in this region of space our people +want," said Ethaniel. "And how long can Earth last? Ten years? Even ten +months? The tension is building by the hour." + +"What can I say?" said Bal. "I suppose we can stop and look them over. +We're not committing ourselves by looking." + +They went much closer to Earth, not intending to commit themselves. For +a day they circled the planet, avoiding radar detection, which for them +was not difficult, testing, and sampling. Finally Ethaniel looked up +from the monitor screen. "Any conclusions?" + +"What's there to think? It's worse than I imagined." + +"In what way?" + +"Well, we knew they had the big bomb. Atmospheric analysis showed that +as far away as we were." + +"I know." + +"We also knew they could deliver the big bomb, presumably by some sort +of aircraft." + +"That was almost a certainty. They'd have no use for the big bomb +without aircraft." + +"What's worse is that I now find they also have missiles, range one +thousand miles and upward. They either have or are near a primitive form +of space travel." + +"Bad," said Ethaniel. "Sitting there, wondering when it's going to hit +them. Nervousness could set it off." + +"It could, and the missiles make it worse," said Bal. "What did you find +out at your end?" + +"Nothing worthwhile. I was looking at the people while you were +investigating their weapons." + +"You must think something." + +"I wish I knew what to think. There's so little time," Ethaniel said. +"Language isn't the difficulty. Our machines translate their languages +easily and I've taken a cram course in two or three of them. But that's +not enough, looking at a few plays, listening to advertisements, music, +and news bulletins. I should go down and live among them, read books, +talk to scholars, work with them, play." + +"You could do that and you'd really get to know them. But that takes +time--and we don't have it." + +"I realize that." + +"A flat yes or no," said Bal. + +"No. We can't help them," said Ethaniel. "There is nothing we can do for +them--but we have to try." + +"Sure, I knew it before we started," said Bal. "It's happened before. We +take the trouble to find out what a people are like and when we can't +help them we feel bad. It's going to be that way again." He rose and +stretched. "Well, give me an hour to think of some way of going at it." + + * * * * * + +It was longer than that before they met again. In the meantime the ship +moved much closer to Earth. They no longer needed instruments to see it. +The planet revolved outside the visionports. The southern plains were +green, coursed with rivers; the oceans were blue; and much of the +northern hemisphere was glistening white. Ragged clouds covered the +pole, and a dirty pall spread over the mid-regions of the north. + +"I haven't thought of anything brilliant," said Ethaniel. + +"Nor I," said Bal. "We're going to have to go down there cold. And it +will be cold." + +"Yes. It's their winter." + +"I did have an idea," said Bal. "What about going down as supernatural +beings?" + +"Hardly," said Ethaniel. "A hundred years ago it might have worked. +Today they have satellites. They are not primitives." + +"I suppose you're right," said Bal. "I did think we ought to take +advantage of our physical differences." + +"If we could I'd be all for it. But these people are rough and +desperate. They wouldn't be fooled by anything that crude." + +"Well, you're calling it," said Bal. + +"All right," said Ethaniel. "You take one side and I the other. We'll +tell them bluntly what they'll have to do if they're going to survive, +how they can keep their planet in one piece so they can live on it." + +"That'll go over big. Advice is always popular." + +"Can't help it. That's all we have time for." + +"Special instructions?" + +"None. We leave the ship here and go down in separate landing craft. You +can talk with me any time you want to through our communications, but +don't unless you have to." + +"They can't intercept the beams we use." + +"They can't, and even if they did they wouldn't know what to do with our +language. I want them to think that we don't _need_ to talk things +over." + +"I get it. Makes us seem better than we are. They think we know exactly +what we're doing even though we don't." + +"If we're lucky they'll think that." + + * * * * * + +Bal looked out of the port at the planet below. "It's going to be cold +where I'm going. You too. Sure we don't want to change our plans and +land in the southern hemisphere? It's summer there." + +"I'm afraid not. The great powers are in the north. They are the ones we +have to reach to do the job." + +"Yeah, but I was thinking of that holiday you mentioned. We'll be +running straight into it. That won't help us any." + +"I know, they don't like their holidays interrupted. It can't be helped. +We can't wait until it's over." + +"I'm aware of that," said Bal. "Fill me in on that holiday, anything I +ought to know. Probably religious in origin. That so?" + +"It was religious a long time ago," said Ethaniel. "I didn't learn +anything exact from radio and TV. Now it seems to be chiefly a time for +eating, office parties, and selling merchandise." + +"I see. It has become a business holiday." + +"That's a good description. I didn't get as much of it as I ought to +have. I was busy studying the people, and they're hard to pin down." + +"I see. I was thinking there might be some way we could tie ourselves in +with this holiday. Make it work for us." + +"If there is I haven't thought of it." + +"You ought to know. You're running this one." Bal looked down at the +planet. Clouds were beginning to form at the twilight edge. "I hate to +go down and leave the ship up here with no one in it." + +"They can't touch it. No matter how they develop in the next hundred +years they still won't be able to get in or damage it in any way." + +"It's myself I'm thinking about. Down there, alone." + +"I'll be with you. On the other side of the Earth." + +"That's not very close. I'd like it better if there were someone in the +ship to bring it down in a hurry if things get rough. They don't think +much of each other. I don't imagine they'll like aliens any better." + +"They may be unfriendly," Ethaniel acknowledged. Now he switched a +monitor screen until he looked at the slope of a mountain. It was +snowing and men were cutting small green trees in the snow. "I've +thought of a trick." + +"If it saves my neck I'm for it." + +"I don't guarantee anything," said Ethaniel. "This is what I was +thinking of: instead of hiding the ship against the sun where there's +little chance it will be seen, we'll make sure that they do see it. +Let's take it around to the night side of the planet and light it up." + +"Say, pretty good," said Bal. + +"They can't imagine that we'd light up an unmanned ship," said Ethaniel. +"Even if the thought should occur to them they'll have no way of +checking it. Also, they won't be eager to harm us with our ship shining +down on them." + +"That's thinking," said Bal, moving to the controls. "I'll move the ship +over where they can see it best and then I'll light it up. I'll really +light it up." + +"Don't spare power." + +"Don't worry about that. They'll see it. Everybody on Earth will see +it." Later, with the ship in position, glowing against the darkness of +space, pulsating with light, Bal said: "You know, I feel better about +this. We may pull it off. Lighting the ship may be just the help we +need." + +"It's not we who need help, but the people of Earth," said Ethaniel. +"See you in five days." With that he entered a small landing craft, +which left a faintly luminescent trail as it plunged toward Earth. As +soon as it was safe to do so, Bal left in another craft, heading for the +other side of the planet. + + * * * * * + +And the spaceship circled Earth, unmanned, blazing and pulsing with +light. No star in the winter skies of the planet below could equal it in +brilliancy. Once a man-made satellite came near but it was dim and was +lost sight of by the people below. During the day the ship was visible +as a bright spot of light. At evening it seemed to burn through the +sunset colors. + +And the ship circled on, bright, shining, seeming to be a little piece +clipped from the center of a star and brought near Earth to illuminate +it. Never, or seldom, had Earth seen anything like it. + +In five days the two small landing craft that had left it arched up from +Earth and joined the orbit of the large ship. The two small craft slid +inside the large one and doors closed behind them. In a short time the +aliens met again. + +"We did it," said Bal exultantly as he came in. "I don't know how we did +it and I thought we were going to fail but at the last minute they came +through." + +Ethaniel smiled. "I'm tired," he said, rustling. + +"Me too, but mostly I'm cold," said Bal, shivering. "Snow. Nothing but +snow wherever I went. Miserable climate. And yet you had me go out +walking after that first day." + +"From my own experience it seemed to be a good idea," said Ethaniel. "If +I went out walking one day I noticed that the next day the officials +were much more cooperative. If it worked for me I thought it might help +you." + +"It did. I don't know why, but it did," said Bal. "Anyway, this +agreement they made isn't the best but I think it will keep them from +destroying themselves." + +"It's as much as we can expect," said Ethaniel. "They may have small +wars after this, but never the big one. In fifty or a hundred years we +can come back and see how much they've learned." + +"I'm not sure I want to," said Bal. "Say, what's an angel?" + +"Why?" + +"When I went out walking people stopped to look. Some knelt in the snow +and called me an angel." + +"Something like that happened to me," said Ethaniel. + +"I didn't get it but I didn't let it upset me," said Bal. "I smiled at +them and went about my business." He shivered again. "It was always +cold. I walked out, but sometimes I flew back. I hope that was all +right." + +In the cabin Bal spread his great wings. Renaissance painters had never +seen his like but knew exactly how he looked. In their paintings they +had pictured him innumerable times. + +"I don't think it hurt us that you flew," said Ethaniel. "I did so +myself occasionally." + +"But you don't know what an angel is?" + +"No. I didn't have time to find out. Some creature of their folklore I +suppose. You know, except for our wings they're very much like +ourselves. Their legends are bound to resemble ours." + +"Sure," said Bal. "Anyway, peace on Earth." + + +THE END + + + + +Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from _Amazing Science Fiction Stories_ + January 1960. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that + the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling + and typographical errors have been corrected without note. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Second Landing, by Floyd Wallace + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SECOND LANDING *** + +***** This file should be named 24958.txt or 24958.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/9/5/24958/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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