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diff --git a/29599.txt b/29599.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5d51a75 --- /dev/null +++ b/29599.txt @@ -0,0 +1,717 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Homesick, by Lyn Venable + +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: Homesick + +Author: Lyn Venable + +Illustrator: Ed Emshwiller + +Release Date: August 3, 2009 [EBook #29599] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMESICK *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +[Illustration] + + +_Homesick_ + +By LYN VENABLE + +Illustrated by EMSH + + + _What thrill is there in going out among the + stars if coming back means bitter loneliness?_ + + +Frankston pushed listlessly at a red checker with his right forefinger. +He knew the move would cost him a man, but he lacked enough interest in +the game to plot out a safe move. His opponent, James, jumped the red +disk with a black king and removed it from the board. Gregory, across +the room, flicked rapidly through the pages of a magazine, too rapidly +to be reading anything, or even looking at the pictures. Ross lay +quietly on his bunk, staring out of the viewport. + +The four were strangely alike in appearance, nearly the same age, the +age where gray hairs finally outnumber black, or baldness takes over. +The age when the expanding waistline has begun to sag tiredly, when +robust middle age begins the slow accelerating decline toward senility. + +A strange group to find aboard a spaceship, but then _The Columbus_ was +a very strange ship. Bolted to its outer hull, just under the viewports, +were wooden boxes full of red geraniums, and ivy wound tenuous green +fronds over the gleaming hull that had withstood the bombardment of +pinpoint meteors and turned away the deadly power of naked cosmic rays. + +Frankston glanced at his wristchrono. It was one minute to six. + +"In about a minute," he thought, "Ross will say something about going +out to water his geraniums." The wristchrono ticked fifty-nine times. + +"I think I'll go out and water my geraniums," said Ross. + + * * * * * + +No one glanced up. Then Gregory threw his magazine on the floor. Ross +got up and walked, limping slightly, to a wall locker. He pulled out the +heavy, ungainly spacesuit and the big metal bulb of a headpiece. He +carried them to his bunk and laid them carefully down. + +"Will somebody please help me on with my suit?" he asked. + +For one more long moment, no one moved. Then James got up and began to +help Ross fit his legs into the suit. Ross had arthritis, not badly, but +enough so that he needed a little help climbing into a spacesuit. + +James pulled the heavy folds of the suit up around Ross's body and held +it while Ross extended his arms into the sleeve sections. His hands, in +the heavy gauntlets, were too unwieldy to do the front fastenings, and +he stood silently while James did it for him. + +Ross lifted the helmet, staring at it as a cripple might regard a +wheelchair which he loathed but was wholly dependent upon. Then he +fitted the helmet over his head and James fastened it down and lifted +the oxygen tank to his back. + +"Ready?" asked James. + +The bulbous headpiece inclined in a nod. James walked to a panel and +threw a switch marked INNER LOCK. A round aperture slid silently open. +Ross stepped through it and the door shut behind him as James threw the +switch back to its original position. Opposite the switch marked OUTER +LOCK a signal glowed redly and James threw another switch. A moment +later the signal flickered out. + +Frankston, with a violent gesture, swept the checker board clean. Red +and black men clattered to the floor, rolling and spinning. Nobody +picked them up. + +"What does he do it for?" demanded Frankston in a tight voice. "What +does he get out of those stinking geraniums he can't touch or smell?" + +"Shut up," said Gregory. + +James looked up sharply. Curtness was unusual for Gregory, a bad sign. +Frankston was the one he'd been watching, the one who'd shown signs of +cracking, but after so long, even a psycho-expert's opinion might be +haywire. Who was a yardstick? Who was normal? + +"Geraniums don't smell much anyway," added Gregory in a more +conciliatory tone. + +"Yeah," agreed Frankston, "I'd forgotten that. But why does he torture +himself like this, and us, too?" + +"Because that's what he wanted to do," answered James. + +"Sure," agreed Gregory, "the whole trip--the last twenty years of it, +anyhow--all he could talk about was how, when he got back to Earth, he +was going to buy a little place in the country and raise flowers." + +"Well, we're back," muttered Frankston, with a terrible bitterness. +"He's raising flowers, but not in any little place in the country." + + * * * * * + +Gregory continued almost dreamily, "Remember the last night out? We were +all gathered around the viewscreen. And there was Earth, getting bigger +and greener and closer all the time. Remember what it felt like to be +going back, after thirty years?" + +"Thirty years cooped up in this ship," grumbled Frankston. "All our +twenties and thirties and forties ..." + +"But we were coming home." There was a rapt expression on Gregory's +lined and weathered face. "We were looking forward to the twenty or +maybe thirty good years we had left, talking about what we'd do, where +we'd live, wondering what had changed on Earth. At least we had that +last night out. All the data was stashed away in the microfiles, all the +data about planets with air we couldn't breathe and food we couldn't +eat. We were going home, home to big, friendly, green Earth." + +Frankston's face suddenly crumpled as though he were about to weep and +he cradled his head against his arms. "God, do we have to go over it all +again? Not again tonight!" + +"Leave him alone," ordered James with an inflection of command in his +voice. "Go to the other section of the ship if you don't want to listen. +He has to keep going over it, just like Ross has to keep watering his +geraniums." + +Frankston remained motionless and Gregory looked gratefully at James. +James was the steady one. It was easier for him because he understood. + +Gregory's face became more and more animated as he lost himself, living +again his recollections: "The day we blasted in. The crowds. Thousands +of people, all there to see us come in. We were proud. Of course, we +thought we were the first to land, just like we'd been the first to go +out. Those cheers, coming from thousands of people at once. For us. +Ross-- Lt. Ross--was the first one out of the lock. We'd decided on +that; he'd been in command for almost ten years, ever since Commander +Stevens died. You remember Stevens, don't you? He took over when we lost +Captain Willers. Well, anyway, Ross out first, and then you, James, and +you, Frankston, and then Trippitt, and me last, because you were all +specialists and I was just a crewman. _The_ crewman, I should say, the +only one left. + +"Ross hesitated and almost stumbled when he stepped out, and tears began +pouring from his eyes, but I thought--well, you know, coming home after +thirty years and all that. But when I stepped out of the lock, my eyes +stung like fire and a thousand needles seemed to jab at my skin. + +"And then the President himself stepped forward with the flowers. That's +where the real trouble began, with the flowers. I remember Ross +stretching out his arms to take the bouquet, like a mother reaching for +a baby. Then suddenly he dropped them, sneezing and coughing and sobbing +for breath, and the President reached out to help him, asking him over +and over what was wrong. + +"It was the same with all of us, and we turned and staggered back to the +ship, closing the lock behind us. It was bad then. God, I'll never +forget it! The five of us, moaning in agony, gasping for breath, our +eyes all swollen shut, and the itching ... that itching." Gregory +shuddered. + + * * * * * + +Even the emotionally disciplined James set his teeth and felt his scalp +crawl at the memory of that horror. He glanced toward the viewport, as +though to cleanse his mind of the memory. He could see Ross out there, +among the geraniums, moving slowly and painfully in his heavy spacesuit. +Occupational therapy. Ross watered flowers and Gregory talked and +Frankston was bitter and ... himself? Observation, maybe. + +Gregory's voice began again, "And then they were pounding on the lock, +begging us to let the doctor in, but we were all rolling and thrashing +with the itching, burning, sneezing, and finally James got himself under +control enough to open the locks and let them in. + +"Then came the tests, allergy tests. Remember those? They'd cut a little +row of scratches in your arm ..." Each man instinctively glanced at his +forearm, saw neat rows of tiny pink scars, row on row. "Then they'd put +a little powder in each cut and each kind of powder was an extract of +some common substance we might be allergic to. The charts they made were +full of 'P's, P for positive, long columns of big, red 'P's. All pollen, +dust, wool, nylon, cotton, fish, meat, fruit, vegetables, grain, milk, +whisky, cigarettes, dogs, cats--everything! And wasn't it funny about us +being allergic to women's face powder? Ha! We were allergic to women +from their nylon hose to their face powder. + +"Thirty years of breathing purified, sterilized, filtered air, thirty +years of drinking distilled water and swallowing synthetic food tablets +had changed us. The only things we weren't allergic to were the metal +and plastic and synthetics of our ship, _this_ ship. We're allergic to +Earth. That's funny, isn't it?" + +Gregory began to rock back and forth, laughing the thin high laugh of +hysteria. James silently walked to a water hydrant and filled a plastic +cup. He brought Gregory a small white pill. + +"You wouldn't take this with the rest of us at supper. You'd better take +it now. You need it." + +Gregory nodded bleakly, sobering at once, and swallowed the pellet. He +made a face after the water. + +"Distilled," he spat. "Distilled ... no flavor ... no life ... like +us ... distilled." + +"If only we could have blasted off again." Frankston's voice came +muffled through his hands. "It wouldn't have made any difference where. +Anywhere or nowhere. No, our fine ship is obsolete and we're old, much +too old. They have the spacedrive now. Men don't make thirty-year +junkets into space and come back allergic to Earth. They go out, and in +a month or two they're back, with their hair still black and their eyes +still bright and their uniforms still fit. A month or two is all. Those +crowds that cheered us, they were proud of us and sorry for us, because +we'd been out thirty years and they never expected us back at all. But +it was inconvenient for Spaceport." Bitter sarcasm tinged his voice. +"They actually had to postpone the regular monthly Trans-Galactic run +to let us in with this big, clumsy hulk." + +"Why didn't we ever see any of the new ships either going out or coming +back?" asked Gregory. + + * * * * * + +Frankston shook his head. "You don't see a ship when it's in spacedrive. +It's out of normal space-time dimensions. We had a smattering of the +theory at cadet school ... anyway, if one did flash into normal +space-time--say, for instance, coming in for a landing--the probability +of us being at the same place at the same time was almost nil. 'Two +ships passing in the night' as the old saying goes." + +Gregory nodded, "I guess Trippitt was the lucky one." + +"You didn't see Trippitt die," replied James. + +"What was it?" asked Frankston. "What killed Trippitt? So quickly, too. +He was only outside a few minutes like the rest of us, and eight hours +later he was dead." + +"We couldn't be sure," answered James. "Some virus. There are countless +varieties. People live in a contaminated atmosphere all their lives, +build up a resistance to them. Sometimes a particularly virulent strain +will produce an epidemic, but most people, if they're affected, will +have a mild case of whatever it is and recover. But after thirty years +in space, thirty years of breathing perfectly pure, uncontaminated air, +Trippitt had no antibodies in his bloodstream. The virus hit and he +died." + +"But why didn't the rest of us get it?" asked Gregory. + +"We were lucky. Viruses are like that." + +"Those people talked about building a home for us," muttered Frankston. +"Why didn't they?" + +"It wouldn't have been any different," answered James gently. "It would +have been the same, almost an exact duplicate of the ship, everything +but the rockets. Same metal and plastic and filtered air and synthetic +food. It couldn't have had wool rugs or down pillows or smiling wives or +fresh air or eggs for breakfast. It would have been just like this. So, +since the ship was obsolete, they gave it to us, and a plot of ground to +anchor it to, and we're home. They did the best they could for us, the +very best they could." + +"But I feel stifled, shut in!" + +"The ship is large, Frankston. We all crowd into this section because, +without each other, we'd go mad." James kicked the edge of the magazine +on the floor. "Thank God we're not allergic to decontaminated paper. +There's still reading." + +"We're getting old," said Gregory. "Some day one of us will be here +alone." + +"God help him then," answered James, with more emotion than was usual +for him. + + * * * * * + +During the latter part of the conversation, the little red signal had +been flashing persistently. Finally James saw it. Ross was in the outer +lock. James threw the decontaminator switch and the signal winked out. +Every trace of dust and pollen would have to be removed from Ross's suit +before he could come inside the ship. + +"Just like on an alien planet," commented Gregory. + +"Isn't that what this is to us--an alien planet?" asked Frankston, and +neither of the other men dared answer his bitter question. + +A few minutes later, Ross was back in the cabin, and James helped him +out of his spacesuit. + +"How are the geraniums, Ross?" asked Gregory. + +"Fine," said Ross enthusiastically. "They're doing just fine." + +He walked over to his bunk and lay down on his side so he could see out +of the viewport. There would be an hour left before darkness fell, an +hour to watch the geraniums. They were tall and red, and swayed slightly +in the evening breeze. + + --LYN VENABLE + + + + +Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from _Galaxy Science Fiction_ December 1952. + 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 Homesick, by Lyn Venable + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMESICK *** + +***** This file should be named 29599.txt or 29599.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/5/9/29599/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://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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