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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/32487-h.zip b/32487-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..cbf7179 --- /dev/null +++ b/32487-h.zip diff --git a/32487-h/32487-h.htm b/32487-h/32487-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bc71a34 --- /dev/null +++ b/32487-h/32487-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1507 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<!-- $Id: header.txt 236 2009-12-07 18:57:00Z vlsimpson $ --> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of A Gift For Terra, by FOX B. HOLDEN. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; +} + +table { + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; +} + +.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; +} /* page numbers */ + +.linenum { + position: absolute; + top: auto; + left: 4%; +} /* poetry number */ + +.blockquot { + margin-left: 5%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + +.sidenote { + width: 20%; + padding-bottom: .5em; + padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; + padding-right: .5em; + margin-left: 1em; + float: right; + clear: right; + margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; + color: black; + background: #eeeeee; + border: dashed 1px; +} + +.bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + +.bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + +.bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + +.br {border-right: solid 2px;} + +.bbox {border: solid 2px;} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + +.u {text-decoration: underline;} + +.caption {font-weight: bold;} + +/* Images */ +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; +} + +.figleft { + float: left; + clear: left; + margin-left: 0; + margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-right: 1em; + padding: 0; + text-align: center; +} + +.figright { + float: right; + clear: right; + margin-left: 1em; + margin-bottom: + 1em; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-right: 0; + padding: 0; + text-align: center; +} + +/* Footnotes */ +.footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + +.footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + +.footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + +.fnanchor { + vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: + none; +} + +/* Poetry */ +.poem { + margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; + text-align: left; +} + +.poem br {display: none;} + +.poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + +.poem span.i0 { + display: block; + margin-left: 0em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +.poem span.i2 { + display: block; + margin-left: 2em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +.poem span.i4 { + display: block; + margin-left: 4em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Gift For Terra, by Fox B. Holden + +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: A Gift For Terra + +Author: Fox B. Holden + +Illustrator: Paul Orban + +Release Date: May 23, 2010 [EBook #32487] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A GIFT FOR TERRA *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h1>A GIFT FOR TERRA</h1> + +<h2>BY FOX B. HOLDEN</h2> + +<h3>Illustrated by Paul Orban</h3> + +<p>[Transcriber Note: This etext was produced from If Worlds of Science +Fiction September 1954. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence +that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="sidenote"><i>The good Martian Samaritans rescued Johnny Love and offered +him "the stars". Now, maybe, Johnny didn't look closely enough into the +"gift horse's" mouth, but there were others who did ... and found +therein the answer to life....</i></div> + + +<p>His head hurt like blazes, but he was alive, and to be alive meant +fighting like hell to stay that way.</p> + +<p>That was the first thing returning consciousness told him. The next was +that his helmet should have been cracked wide open when the bum landing +had wrenched the acceleration hammocks out of their suspension sockets +and heaved his suited body across the buckled conning deck. It should've +been, but it wasn't.</p> + +<p>The third thing he knew was that Ferris' helmet had been smashed into a +million pieces, and that Ferris was dead.</p> + +<p>Sand sifted in a cold, red river through the gaping rent in the side of +the ship, trying to bury him before he could stand up and get his +balance on the crazily tilted deck. He shook loose with more strength +than he needed, gave the rest of the muscles in his blocky body a try, +and there wasn't any hurt worse than a bruise. Funny. Ferris was dead.</p> + +<p>He had a feeling somewhere at the edge of his brain that there was going +to be more to it than just checking his oxygen and food-concentrate +supply and walking away from the ship. A man didn't complete the first +Earth-Mars flight ever made, smash his ship to hell, and then just walk +away from it. His astrogeologer-navigator was dead, and the planet was +dead, so a man just didn't walk away.</p> + +<p>There was plenty of room for him to scramble through the yawning rip in +the buckled hullplates—just a matter of crawling up the river of red +sand and out; it was as easy as that.</p> + +<p>Then Johnny Love was on his feet again, and the sand clutched at his +heavy boots as though to keep him from leaving Ferris and the ship, but +it didn't, and he was walking away....</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Even one hundred and forty million miles from the Sun, the unfiltered +daylight was harsh and the reflection of it from the crimson sand hurt +his eyes. The vault of the blue-black sky was too high; the desert plain +was too flat and too silent, and save for the thin Martian wind that +whorled delicately-fluted traceries in the low dunes that were the only +interruption in the flatness, there was no motion, and the planet was +too still.</p> + +<p>Johnny Love stopped his walking. Even in the lesser gravity, it seemed +too great an effort to place one booted foot before the other. He looked +back, and the plume of still-rising smoke from the broken thing that had +been his ship was like a solid black pillar that had been hastily built +by some evil djinn.</p> + +<p>How far had he walked; how long?</p> + +<p>He turned his back on the glinting speck and made his legs move again, +and there was the hollow sound of laughter in his helmet. Here he was, +Johnny Love, the first Martian! and the last! Using the last of the +strength in his bruised body to go forward, when there was no forward +and no backward, no direction at all; breathing when there was no +purpose in breathing.</p> + +<p>Why not shut off the valves now?</p> + +<p>He was too tired for hysteria. Men had died alone before. <i>Alone, but +never without hope! And here there was no hope, for there was no life, +and no man had ever lived where there was not life!</i></p> + +<p>But he had come to see, and he was seeing, and in the remaining hours +left to him he would see what no man had seen in a half a million years.</p> + +<p>Harrison and Janes or Lamson and Fowler would not be down for twenty +days at the inside; that had been the time-table. Twenty days, twenty +years ... he heard himself laugh again. Time-table!</p> + +<p>He and Ferris first. Then Harrison and Janes. Then Lamson and Fowler, +all at twenty-day intervals. If all landed safely, they would use +Exploration Plan I, Condition Optimum. If only two crews made it down, +Plan II; Condition Limited. And if only one made the 273-day journey +from the orbit of Terra—that would be Plan III; Condition Untenable, +Return. The twenty-day interval idea had come from some Earth-bound +swivel-chair genius who had probably never even set foot in a Satellite +operations room. Somebody had impressed on him when he was young that +egg-carrying was a safer mission with a multiplicity of baskets; it was +common sense that if anything happened to Mars-I touching down, at least +it wouldn't happen to II and III at the same time.</p> + +<p>Common sense, Johnny thought, and he laughed again. Space was not +common, and it was not sensible. And nobody had ever taught it the rules +men made.</p> + +<p>He kept walking, seeing, thinking and breathing.</p> + +<p>For a long time. He fell once or twice and picked himself up again to +walk some more, and then he fell a final time, and did not get up. Red +sand whispered over him, danced lightly, drifted....</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The flat, wide-tracked vehicle swerved in a tight arc, throwing up low +ruby-colored clouds on either side. Its engines throbbed a new note of +power, and it scuttled in a straight line across the desert floor like a +fleck of shiny metal drawn by an unseen magnet. Behind it rose a +thinning monument of green-black smoke, and between its tracks was a +wavering line of indentations in the sand already half-obliterated by +the weight of their own shallow walls. But they became deeper as the +vehicle raced ahead; and then at length they ended, and the vehicle +halted.</p> + +<p>There was a mound of sand that the winds, in their caprice, would not +have made alone, for they sculptured in a freer symmetry. And the +child-like figures seemed to realize that at once.</p> + +<p>With quick precision they levelled the mound and found Johnny Love. They +took him into their vehicle, and deftly matched and replenished the +waning gas mixture in the cylindrical tanks on his back.</p> + +<p>Then they drove away with him.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>"Ferris?"</p> + +<p>"Ferris was your astrogeologer-navigator. He died when you crashed."</p> + +<p>"Harrison ... <i>Janes</i>?"</p> + +<p>"Harrison and Janes are not due for nine more days. But you are in no +danger."</p> + +<p>There was darkness and warmth; his throat was dry and it burned. It was +hard to talk, and Ferris was dead. Harrison and Janes were not due for +nine more days. Somebody said so. Nine more days and then everything +would be—</p> + +<p>Panic shook him, sent blood throbbing to his head and brought +consciousness back hard. His eyes opened and he was suddenly sitting +bolt upright.</p> + +<p>"But Lamson, you were twenty days behind—" And the racing thought froze +solid in his fumbling brain. Then there was a torrent of thoughts and +memory overran them, buried them, and red desert was rushing up to +engulf him. He screamed and fell back with his hands clawing at his +eyes.</p> + +<p>"You are in no danger. You had thought our planet lifeless; it was an +error. We live underground, John Love. That is why you did not see us, +or surface indications of our existence. A group of us speak your +language, because for eleven days we have been studying your brain and +analyzing your thought-patterns."</p> + +<p>Johnny was bolt upright again, and now his eyes were wide and his hands +were knotted, and where there had been only light and shadow before +there was full sight now. Swiftly he was off the low cot and on his feet +looking for the speaker, arms ready to lash out and hit.</p> + +<p>But he was alone in the small, sterile-looking chamber, and his muscles +were so much excess baggage. He tried to recover his balance: he had +forgotten about the slight gravity. He tried too hard, and his body +crashed, confused, into a wall. A—damn them, a <i>padded</i> wall!</p> + +<p>He regained his feet. Stood still, and raced his eyes about him. There +it was—above the cot. A small round, shuttered opening—some sort of +two-way communication system. He wondered if they could see him, too. If +they could, that part of it worked only one way.</p> + +<p>"All right, whoever you are, so you've analyzed me!" He had to direct +his sudden anger at something, so he shouted at the shuttered aperture. +"Now what...."</p> + +<p>There was silence for a tiny eternity, and he could feel them probing, +evaluating him, as a human scientist would study a rare species in a +cage. The feeling ignited a new anger in him, and made him want to curse +the teachings that had conditioned his lifetime of thinking to the +belief that Man <i>was</i> more than an animal.</p> + +<p>He'd been sold short....</p> + +<p>"Damn you! God damn you, what are you going to do to me?"</p> + +<p>In a corner of his mind he was aware of a gentle hissing sound, but he +did not listen. The fear and terror had to be broken. Make them tell, +<i>make</i> them tell....</p> + +<p>His muscles grew heavy and his face was feverish with his effort, and +his eyes stung. Something ... like roses. But there were no roses on +dead planets—</p> + +<p>"Earthman, can you still hear?"</p> + +<p>"I can hear," Johnny said. It was suddenly easier to talk. Even easier +to understand. They had done something....</p> + +<p>"We are surprised that your state of shock was not more severe. In the +process of analyzing you, we discovered that you were totally unprepared +for Space-flight, and therefore—"</p> + +<p>"Unprepared? What do you think all those months of physical conditioning +were for? Yeah, and all those damned textbooks? You think that barrel I +cracked up was built in a Kindergarten class—"</p> + +<p>"Space-flight requires but a relative minimum of those things, Earthman. +Required most is psychological and philosophical conditioning."</p> + +<p>"To what?"</p> + +<p>"To all things unreal. Because they are the most real; infinity applies +to probability and possibility far more directly than to simple Space +and Time. But—are you calm now?" The voice was growing deeper, and +seemed almost friendly. Johnny tried his muscles; they weren't +paralyzed—he could move easily, and his head was clear. And there was +no anger, now. No "shock."</p> + +<p>"Go ahead," he said.</p> + +<p>"Our examination of you has indicated that your race is a potentially +effective one, with a superior survival factor. We feel that, properly +instructed and assisted, such a race might be of great value as a friend +and ally. In short, we receive you in peace and friendship, Earthman. +Will you accept us in like manner?"</p> + +<p>Johnny tried to think. Hard thoughts, the way men were supposed +to think. What kind of game was it? What were the strings? The +angles ... the gimmicks. What did they really want?</p> + +<p>His lips were dry and barely moved over his teeth, but the words came +easily. "Who says you're a friend?"</p> + +<p>"We would have learned as much about you by examining your corpse, +Earthman."</p> + +<p>So he was alive, and that had to prove something. And it might have been +a lot of trouble to keep him that way. The hell of it was you couldn't +<i>know</i> ... <i>Anything</i> ... you couldn't know anything when you were +tossed into the middle of the impossible. He felt the skin on the back +of his neck chill and tighten.</p> + +<p>But who held out their hand like this?</p> + +<p>Whoever did anything like that?</p> + +<p>No.</p> + +<p>"We wish to help you, Earthman, and your race. We have observed your +kind at close quarters, yet we have never landed among you nor attempted +communication because of fear for ourselves. But with proper help, there +need be no fear between us. We offer you friendship and progress."</p> + +<p>"You keep talking about what <i>we</i> get out of it." Johnny stared upward +at the ceiling, got his eyes off the little shuttered aperture. He +wished he had a cigarette. "You sound too damned much like a +politician."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps at this point you should be informed that your ship is +completely repaired, and ready for your return to Earth whenever you +desire."</p> + +<p>"So, it's—You said Harrison and Janis would be here in nine days! That +means I've been out for nearly two weeks! For a nap that's a long time, +but nobody could get that bucket back in one piece in eleven days! Not +after what I did to it—"</p> + +<p>"Your ship is completely repaired, Earthman."</p> + +<p>Johnny knew somehow that the voice wasn't lying. So maybe when you got +off of Earth miracles did happen. He just didn't <i>know</i> enough.</p> + +<p>"We wish to give you data to take back to your Earth which will banish +disease for you—<i>all</i> disease. Data which will give you spacecraft that +match our own in technical perfection. Data that will make you the +undisputed masters of your environment. We offer you the stars, +Earthman."</p> + +<p>He shut a thousand racing thoughts out of his head. "Maybe I'll believe +this fairy tale of yours on one condition," Johnny said, "because I +can't intelligently do otherwise."</p> + +<p>"And that—condition?"</p> + +<p>"Tell me <i>why</i>."</p> + +<p>There was a pause, and it was as though something forever unknowable to +men hung in the silence.</p> + +<p>"Picture, if you can, Earthman," the answer came at last, "several small +islands in the center of a great sea; all without life, save two. The +men on one have learned to build boats which can successfully sail the +sea within certain limits—they can visit the other islands, but are too +frail and too limited in power to venture past the horizon. It is +infinitely frustrating to them. The only places to which they may go are +dead places. Save for one—only one, and it becomes magnified in +importance—it becomes an entire <i>raison d'etre</i> in itself. For without +it, the men with the boats sail uselessly....</p> + +<p>"We are old, Earthman. We have watched you—waited for you for a long +time. And now you have grown up. You have burst your tiny bubble of +human experience. You have set out upon the sea yourselves...."</p> + +<p>"You guys should give graduation talks. I didn't ask for a scaled-down +philosophy. You tell me that you want to give us every trick in your +hat—for free, no questions asked. So I asked why. And the question +isn't changing any."</p> + +<p>"The answer should be self-evident, Earthman. We are old. And we are +lonely."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>There was a logic at work somewhere in his brain even during the dream. +It told him that he was exhausted from the day's tour with the +child-like men of Mars, and that the dream was only the vagaries of a +reeling, tired mind of a badly jarred subconscious. It told him that the +things he had seen had been too alien for his relatively inflexible +adult Earth mind to accept without painful reaction, and this was the +reaction.</p> + +<p>This, the dream. That was all it was; his logic said so.</p> + +<p>Faith spread out before the undisciplined eye of his dreaming brain, and +the near-conscious instant of logic faded. The fertile plains that once +had been yellow desert-land mounted golden fruits to a temperate sun, +and beyond the distant green of gently-rolling hills spread the +resplendent city, and there were other cities as gracefully civilized +beyond the untroubled horizon.</p> + +<p>And in the dream, these were all things men had done, as though sanity +had invaded their minds overnight. It was the Earth that men had +intended, rather than that which they had built.</p> + +<p>The sun dimmed. The air chilled, and the grains and fruits wilted, and +the rolling hills were a darker hue than green as the shadow lengthened, +spread to the gleaming cities beyond and then as it touched them and ran +soundlessly the length and breadth of their wide malls, there were other +changes....</p> + +<p>Skeletons, reaching upward to a puffy, leaden sky.</p> + +<p>The horizon split into jagged, broken moats of dark flame, and Earth was +no longer what men had built, but what they eternally feared they must +one day create....</p> + +<p>Then Johnny Love was suddenly awake bolt upright in his cot and his eyes +were open wide. His muscles were taut and cramped. And he was afraid +although the men of Mars had offered friendship and told him that there +was nothing for him to fear.</p> + +<p>Slowly, he lay down again. And gradually, the cold perspiration that had +encased him vanished; his body relaxed, and the fear subsided.</p> + +<p>The day's tour had been exhausting both mentally and physically, and +there was the excitement of knowing that in five more days Harrison and +Janes would land. If they did not, his own ship would carry him safely +back to Earth on the day following, for the little men had miraculously +repaired it; they had shown him. They had shown him, and he wanted to go +home.</p> + +<p>Johnny Love rolled over on the wide, soft cot, sighed, and went back to +sleep.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>"<i>He sleeps again, Andruul.</i>"</p> + +<p>"<i>Yes, but the damage is probably done.</i>"</p> + +<p>"<i>No, or he would not sleep again so easily. His kind do not have such +emotional control.</i>"</p> + +<p><i>The two turned away from the fading transparency of the sleeping-room +wall, and their short, thin bodies were in incongruous contrast to the +spaciousness of the metal-sheathed corridor down which they walked.</i></p> + +<p>"<i>Psychoanalysis showed up the difference in his brain structure—that +apparently accounts for the poor efficiency our screens are showing. +What does Kaarn say?</i>"</p> + +<p>"<i>He says we should never have allowed the theft.</i>"</p> + +<p><i>Andruul cursed. "Allowed it! Those nomadic scum are like flies! No +matter how many you exterminate, they never fail to come back in double +their number. And they strike at the precise moment you are certain the +bones of the last one are sinking beneath the sand. Somehow Central +Patrol has got to get that unit back.</i>"</p> + +<p>"<i>You're certain it was a theft, then?</i>"</p> + +<p>"<i>Don't be an idiot. Since when can those gypsies build anything more +complex than a crude electrical generator? Let alone a psibeam unit? +They've forgotten what little their civilization ever knew.</i>"</p> + +<p>"<i>They are clever enough at evading directed over-surface missiles.</i>"</p> + +<p><i>Andruul muttered something, and lapsed into silence.</i></p> + +<p>"<i>Well there is one thing for certain at any rate.... A psibeam unit is +unaccounted for, and despite our protective screening, the Earthman was +visibly disturbed in his sleep. His encephalotapes show that clearly. +They know about him, Andruul, and they're making their bid. Central +Patrol had better be quick and certain this time.</i>"</p> + +<p><i>Andruul kept his silence. But he thought. He thought Central Patrol was +getting less efficient and more stupid every day.</i></p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>It was a strange feeling; a feeling with which no human was emotionally +equipped to deal.</p> + +<p>Johnny looked at his flawlessly renovated ship, poised like a snub-nosed +bullet against the blue-black brittleness of the Martian sky, and then +looked behind him at the crescent-shaped formation of tracked vehicles +that had escorted him back across the sucking red sand to this place. +With each heavy-booted step away from them he closed the short distance +between them and his ship, and there was not enough time to think about +the feeling. Or about the heavy sealed tube they had given him to take +back to his people.</p> + +<p>Usually, when a man ventured beyond the bounds of familiar existence, +there was conflict. Either a struggle to win, or, immediately +recognizable success, with no struggle or hint of conflict at all.</p> + +<p>But not this. Not this success that seemed—what was the <i>word</i>? +Hostile? That was ridiculous. These people were friendly. <i>But +somehow—there was an empty ring—</i></p> + +<p>Hell! They had saved his life. Rebuilt his ship. Given him the tube that +contained transcriptions, in his own language, of every scientific +secret his people could ever hope to learn for themselves in the next +thousand years! And, they had even buried Ferris....</p> + +<p>Use the brains of a mature man, Johnny Love! You've pulled it off +without even trying! The most stupendous thing any man in any age has +ever pulled off ... without even trying! For God's sake don't +question—don't question things you don't understand! Take the credit +and let the soul-searching go!</p> + +<p>He looked behind him again. They were still there. A special, smiling +farewell escort, watching a single, solitary figure cross a short +expanse of sand to a towering, glistening thing of power.</p> + +<p>He raised a booted foot to the bottom fin-step, hauled himself up by the +stern mounting rungs, hammered the outer lock stud with his gloved fist +and the hatch swung open. Like a trap.</p> + +<p>He could feel the skin at the back of his neck tighten but he forced +himself to ignore it. The lock cycled up to thirteen psi and the inner +port swung automatically inward, and then he was inside, clambering up +the narrow ladder past the titanium alloy fuel tanks and the spidery +catwalks between them to the tiny control room in the forehull.</p> + +<p>He would not be waiting for Harrison and Janes. He would get the hell +out of here and then radio them and let them make all the decisions from +there. Earth for him. Home. He ached for it.</p> + +<p>He strapped himself in the hammock, punched the warming studs for each +engine, and there was a dull, muffled throb below him as each jumped +into subdued life. The banks of dials that curved in front of him glowed +softly, and he started an almost automatic blast-off check. It took +twelve precious minutes.</p> + +<p>Then he was ready. Scanners on, heat up ... ready.</p> + +<p>The Martian sky was like frozen ink above him and his hands were wet +inside his gloves and there was a choking dryness in his throat. +<i>Now....</i></p> + +<p>And he could not move. There was a sudden, awful nausea and his head +spun, and before his eyes there spread a bleeding Earth; the sun dimmed, +and fertile plains were cast in sudden shadow.... The air chilled, the +shadow spread, and there were skeletons reaching upward to a puffy, +leaden sky!</p> + +<p><i>And Earth was no longer what Men had built!</i></p> + +<p>Then the horror in his head was gone, and he felt an awful pressure on +each side of it. His hands ... he had been pressing with insane strength +at both sides of his skull as if to crush it with his bare hands.... His +face was wet, and he was breathing, choking, in strangling gulps.</p> + +<p>A scanner alarm clanged.</p> + +<p>He forced his eyes to focus on the center screen.</p> + +<p>"Earthman! Emergency! There has been a flaw discovered in the repair of +your ship! Do not blast off! Do not...."</p> + +<p>The other image caught him as his arm was in mid-flight toward the +control bank. Sweet and warm ... the fertile plains mounting their +golden fruits to a mellowed sun, and beyond the distant gently-rolling +hills spread the resplendent city, and there were other cities....</p> + +<p>But his arm kept going, its muscles loose, and it fell. Heavily. +Squarely on the stud-complex toward which its fist had been aimed a +split-second before.</p> + +<p>The engines roared, and the ship lurched upward from the red sand.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p><i>The command flicked into the Captain's brain like a lash of ice.</i></p> + +<p>"<i>Slaazar! Converge, sheaf!</i>"</p> + +<p>"<i>Converging, sir...." It would be no use, of course. If the high brass +had been content to rely on the beams rather than on their own subtlety +in the first place, the Earthman would never have fallen prey to the +Nomads, even for a second. But they had wanted to be as forthright as +possible—force, they said, would only arouse suspicion. Psibeam units +only as a last resort.... The lowliest Patrol Lancer could have told +them the folly of that!</i></p> + +<p><i>Hastily, Slaazar issued orders to his battery crews tracking the +ascending Spaceship, their units already nearing overload potential. But +the desert-scum would see some real psi-power now! They'd see it wasted +completely if they saw it at all.... Because they'd outmaneuvered the +brass again!</i></p> + +<p>"<i>Convergence impossible, sir.</i>"</p> + +<p><i>As he had expected.</i></p> + +<p>"<i>Colonel Truul, this is Captain Slaazar. Target has passed critical +planetary curvature. Convergence impossible. Standing by, sir.</i>"</p> + +<p><i>For several moments after that, the thin atmosphere of Mars was warmed +a little....</i></p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Acceleration blackout had not been total; leaving Mars was even easier +than leaving the surface of Earth for the orbits of the Stations. But +there was a period of no-thought, no-time, no-being. And then full +consciousness seeped back slowly. But not as it was supposed to.</p> + +<p>Johnny Love knew he had come to because he could see the banked +instruments glowing palely before him; because he could realize from +reading them that his ship was doing its job to perfection. Almost ready +to complete the blast-off ogee, and—</p> + +<p>Angrily he belted the scanner switches off and the dull red sphere faded +from the viewplates.</p> + +<p>And he could feel the sweat start again all over his body. No, the +returning consciousness was all wrong.... All wrong, and the image +wouldn't go away....</p> + +<p>Red desert he had seen before, yet had not seen. There were dark ridges +of brown-green at its horizon; oddly-formed crater-places that might +once have held placid lakes. And on all the vast surface there was no +hint of the Patrol tracks, no sign of—anything.</p> + +<p>But he had to descend to the place.</p> + +<p>He did not know how to locate it, but the image told him that it did not +matter. The image said merely that he must begin cutting his power.</p> + +<p>There was no strength in his arms and hands, yet they moved in front of +him as though things detached from his body; skillfully, surely, playing +deftly across the colored studs.</p> + +<p>Scanners on. Scanners on, kid....</p> + +<p>He watched the screens again, unconscious of what his fingers did on the +panels. The dull red sphere loomed large once more. The picture was +off-center; without knowing what he did he rectified course with the bow +jets; it was centered again. But it was a different place. Still the +desert, but with ridges of brown-green at its horizon; oddly-formed +crater-places....</p> + +<p>It was coming up fast, now; faster, until the horizon was only a gentle +arc against a thin span of blackness, and the rest was cold red.</p> + +<p>Hardly knowing what he did, his fingers suddenly raced over the control +console, even before the scanner-alarms began their ear-splitting +clanging!</p> + +<p>The ship lurched into a direction-change that threatened to wrench the +hull apart, and the picture in the scanner reeled crazily. He knew his +own brain was not dictating the commands of control to his fingertips, +nor was it evaluating for itself the madly fluctuating values indicated +on the panels. A human brain could not have done it, he knew that....</p> + +<p>He had cut power. At least there was no power. He was falling at a crazy +angle and the desert was rushing up now, hurtling up to smash him. +They'd hit him, then, yet he'd felt nothing....</p> + +<p>It was getting hot. His hull must be glowing, now, even in the thin +atmosphere of Mars—it was a long fall. Slower than a fall on Earth, +through thinner air layers, yet he was glowing like a torch.</p> + +<p>The ocean of sand rushed up.</p> + +<p>And suddenly his left hand rammed the full-power stud.</p> + +<p>It was as though he'd been hit from behind with all the brute force of +some gigantic fist, and there were two things. There was the +split-second glimpse of a crescent formation suddenly wheeling toward +him and there was the clang of the scanner-alarm. There were those two +things his brain registered before the titanic force of full power +squeezed consciousness from it and left him helpless.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>He was running. In a nightmare of a dead planet that was not dead, he +ran, away from something.</p> + +<p>That was how his consciousness returned. While he ran. He stopped, +stumbling, turned to look behind him.</p> + +<p>And the ship was there. Landed perfectly, stubby bullet-nose pointing to +the sky. And above it—</p> + +<p><i>Run!</i></p> + +<p>The command hit his brain with almost physical force. A will that was +not his own took hold of his whole being, and he was running again, +plowing his way through the sucking sand with strength summoned from a +well of energy within his body that had never been there before.</p> + +<p>Through the thin glassite walls of his helmet he could hear the <i>thuk, +thuk, thuk</i> of his boots as they pounded somewhere below him, and there +was another pounding, a deadly rhythmic bursting pressure in his chest. +And a whine in his ears....</p> + +<p>The wind-strewn sand stretched flat and infinitely before him. Then +leaped at him headlong and there was no horizon; there was only the +sudden awful wrench of concussion, a tremor of pure sound which would, +in denser atmosphere, have destroyed him with the inertia of his own +body.</p> + +<p>He could not move. Only cling to the shifting desert floor that rocked +sickeningly beneath his outstretched body ... cling to it for dear life.</p> + +<p>There was no thought, no understanding. Only a sensation which he could +not comprehend, and the sure knowledge that none of this was real. Not +real, but the end of survival nonetheless.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Pain, and seeing two bright objects transiting the darkness at which he +looked; seeing something then between.</p> + +<p>His brain began identifying. The darkness; sky. The bright objects; +Diemos, Phobos.... And the something between—</p> + +<p>It was a transparency of some sort; curved, or he would not have been +able to detect it at all. A vaulted ceiling through which he could +see....</p> + +<p>His full consciousness came flooding back, then. He tried the muscles +in his neck, they hurt, but they worked, and he could move his head from +side to side. There was the same transparency, as though he were covered +by some huge, invisible bowl.</p> + +<p>And there were men. Big, muscular creatures, yet thin, tall.... Not like +the others at all....</p> + +<p>He sat bolt upright, and they did not move. It was not the same as +before. No small room. No voice that he could not see. They had not even +removed his suit or his helmet, and he was lying on a hard, cold +substance.</p> + +<p>Then he saw what they were doing. There were two of them apart from the +others, working to bring a compact-looking machine into position near +him. A gleaming, short cylinder, swung on gymbals between slender forks, +mounted on a thin wheeled standard. They were aiming it at him.</p> + +<p>"No! <i>No</i>—" He tried to get to his knees, but it was as though there +were no muscles in his body.</p> + +<p>"Man of—Earth! We are friendly. Is that understood?"</p> + +<p>The thought-words formed in his brain as the strange images had before, +and then he knew. <i>Should have guessed it</i>, part of his mind was telling +him in a fantastically detached way, <i>the dreams ... the compulsions +over which he had had no control in the ship.... This—thing. It +probably—</i></p> + +<p>"You are quite astute, Earthman. But it is not our technology which +created this device. To save you and the civilization which you +represent—and ultimately, our own—it was necessary for us to steal it. +It cost six lives."</p> + +<p>"Steal...."</p> + +<p>"From your former captors. It is their invention, as are so many things +with which they destroy. With this instrument, they have succeeded in +taking one of Nature's more subtle phenomenon—psychokinesis—and +amplifying its energies nearly a million-fold. Those stepped-up energies +can then be projected in a tight or fanned beam at will.</p> + +<p>"They can make a man 'dream,' as you did—or they can destroy him +outright, depending on which of the 'psi' factors, ESP or PK, is given +dominance during projection. But we are not skilled in its +operation—they detected our use of it on you while you slept, and from +that moment on you were so well screened that even at the risk of +burning this unit out, we were not able to project powerfully enough to +do more than merely touch your brain—"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>There was a strange calm in his mind, now. He understood the words +and accepted them as matter-of-factly as they were given. Even now +they were manipulating him like some intangible puppet, yet he was +convinced it was not a malevolent manipulation. Convinced. The +conviction—manipulation, too....</p> + +<p>"Only partly, Earthman. We said we are friendly, and we are. We have +calmed you and erased your fear. From this point on, we will use this +instrument only for communication."</p> + +<p>And then he felt the fear in him again, gnawing, and his body was again +damp and cold. But he had control, now. Control enough to speak.</p> + +<p>They stood before him, immobile, watching.</p> + +<p>Somewhere, Johnny Love found his voice.</p> + +<p>"Look, I've been through this 'friendly' act before...." He hesitated, +and they did not try to interrupt him. "Well don't just stand there!" +The fear was suddenly turning to the bitter anger of frustration, they +had him whipped, and he was tired. "Tell me why! You stick that thing +into my head when I'm blasting for home. You force me to drop back. You +blow up my ship. Real friendly! Real sports!" For a moment he had run +out of words, and again they made no effort to answer him. "All right! I +don't understand you—I don't know what you want. But nobody is trying +to hurt you, nobody's after your little desert paradise. We had an idea, +that's all. We thought we could make it work. People have been talking +'go to Mars' on my planet for longer than most of 'em can remember. So +we finally gave it a whirl! Sorry!"</p> + +<p>He looked at them hard, then, and thought that there was something +almost like a smile on the face of one. Smile, then, damn you....</p> + +<p>"We want nothing, Earthman, but to prevent from happening on your planet +the thing that happened on this. If they succeed in destroying you as +they have us, then this System will always be under their heel, and we +shall never be rid of them. Understand, their numbers were too few ever +to conquer a planet with a civilization as large and as highly organized +as that of Earth, by physical means.</p> + +<p>"Knowing that, we—they call us gypsies, nomads, desert-scum today—we +were not too alarmed when they landed here two centuries ago. We were +glad to take from them, without paying a price. We were awed by their +gifts. Their papers and their books, which would show us how to rebuild +our waning civilization—advance us a thousand years in less than fifty; +restore to us our lost arts.... And compared to you, we were so very +few.</p> + +<p>"In return, they said that all they wanted was permission to set up a +research site. They told us they were a scientific expedition from far +out-System. Aldeberan, they said. Part of a vast exploratory program +which they had been conducting for centuries.</p> + +<p>"We believed them—why not? One day, we thought, we too will be in +Space. And with that day would begin one of the greatest projects of +exploration that our race had ever known. So we agreed, and gladly."</p> + +<p>"Hold it, hold it! 'They'—who the hell are 'they'? You can spare the +suspense...."</p> + +<p>And then there was no more words. The pictures formed in his mind as +before, only stronger, now, and there were no details left out.</p> + +<p>The weapons of war had been built, not by the out-System men, but by +their hosts. The plans had not proven too difficult to follow....</p> + +<p>The new knowledge was not hoarded, was not held under jealous guard by +those who had given it, but by those to whom it had been given. One man +from another; one group of men from another. States and nations from +each other.</p> + +<p>Until there was no trust left on all the planet.</p> + +<p>There were the wars, then.</p> + +<p>And when they were over, the new masters had established their first +beachhead in the new System.</p> + +<p>"But, it was only a beachhead, and had been only intended as such—" The +pictures broke off; the unspoken words resumed. "Your planet was the +ultimate target, but at first, your civilization was not adequately +advanced to fall prey to their technique. Their weapon is knowledge, but +the potentialities of that knowledge must be understood by a people +before it can be effectively used to destroy them.</p> + +<p>"The rest must be self-evident. After we destroyed ourselves, they sank +their infectious, hollow roots into our planet. And from then, +investigated your Earth from time to time ... and waited....</p> + +<p>"Waited, because they knew you would be coming. And they knew what kind +of men you would be. Strong men, with the light of the stars in your +eyes. Yet confused, weak men, with the darkness of suspicion and +jealousy still in your souls. Such are humans, after all....</p> + +<p>"That is why we stopped you, Johnny Love. Once your blast-off ogee had +carried you beyond the curvature of their horizon and brought you over +us, our psibeam was effective and theirs were not. We are sorry about +your ship. Once they realize that you were under our influence, and were +returning rather than taking their precious data to your people, they +zeroed-in with those damnable guided juggernauts—"</p> + +<p>"It wasn't you, then. You mean they—"</p> + +<p>"There is little that they cannot do. Destruction is their forte. They +could not keep us from preventing your taking their 'gift' to your +people, but they could keep that 'gift' from falling into our hands—and +they did. They do not always win. But they never lose."</p> + +<p>"But I—" Johnny's thoughts raced. The ship, gone. And Harrison and +Janes, Lamson, and Fowler. They would be landing in a few days. They—</p> + +<p>"Yes," the thoughts of the true Martians before him answered. "And they +will be given a 'gift' for Terra as you were. If your friends return +successfully to your planet with that 'gift'—then—"</p> + +<p>The thought was not completed. But it did not have to be.</p> + +<p>A beachhead was one thing. These scattered, struggling people who had +once been masters of Mars might one day unseat it, for they were not yet +beaten people, and their will to survive was yet strong. But beyond +that—</p> + +<p>Earth taken, the System taken.</p> + +<p>There it was.</p> + +<p>There was a sudden coldness inside him now that the fact had +crystallized, had become real. Here was no fantasy; no wild surmise.</p> + +<p>They left him in silence while he thought, their psibeam turned away, +now.</p> + +<p>Harrison and Janes. Lamson, and Fowler. Had to stop them. Stop them, and +then somehow, get home. He ached for home.</p> + +<p>He thought about Ferris, who had given his life for this thing.</p> + +<p>No, Ferris would not be going home. Ferris was dead.</p> + +<p>He signalled for the psibeam to be turned toward him again.</p> + +<p>"You'd have to know their positions out there to make contact, wouldn't +you?" They did not answer. He worked to get the words formed, and there +was a fleeting thought of a green, lush planet far away, its wide +streets and rolling fields bathed in warm sunlight. "I can figure 'em," +he said. "I know blast-off schedules, speeds. I know the works! <i>Those</i> +things they had in the books. Then you guys can do the rest with—that +thing. Right?"</p> + +<p>They answered him, then.</p> + +<p>"Thank you," they said. And that was all.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>"Answer me!" the General barked again. "You, Janes! Lamson! +Fowler—Harrison! For the last time, what happened out there?"</p> + +<p>The four stood silently before the nervous figure of their commander, +and it was Fowler who finally spoke.</p> + +<p>"Plan III, sir, as we've already said. Condition Untenable—Return...."</p> + +<p>"That is all you can say?"</p> + +<p>"That is—all, sir."</p> + +<p>The General turned away. There was frustration and anger in his face, +and it hid the fear beneath it like a mask. Plan III. It would be Plan +III for a long time yet.</p> + +<p>It was the thing he saw in the faces of the four men that told him that. +There had been too many giant steps, too fast. He had seen this thing in +the faces of men before, but never so nakedly.</p> + +<p>One day, perhaps, men could think of Plan I again. One day, but not now.</p> + +<p>He turned back to the four, and looked once more into their faces.</p> + +<p>Plan III. Condition Untenable.</p> + +<p>"Dismissed!" the General said.</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Gift For Terra, by Fox B. Holden + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A GIFT FOR TERRA *** + +***** This file should be named 32487-h.htm or 32487-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/4/8/32487/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan 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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Holden + +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: A Gift For Terra + +Author: Fox B. Holden + +Illustrator: Paul Orban + +Release Date: May 23, 2010 [EBook #32487] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A GIFT FOR TERRA *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + A GIFT FOR TERRA + + BY FOX B. HOLDEN + + Illustrated by Paul Orban + +[Transcriber Note: This etext was produced from If Worlds of Science +Fiction September 1954. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence +that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] + + +[Sidenote: _The good Martian Samaritans rescued Johnny Love and offered +him "the stars". Now, maybe, Johnny didn't look closely enough into the +"gift horse's" mouth, but there were others who did ... and found +therein the answer to life...._] + + +His head hurt like blazes, but he was alive, and to be alive meant +fighting like hell to stay that way. + +That was the first thing returning consciousness told him. The next was +that his helmet should have been cracked wide open when the bum landing +had wrenched the acceleration hammocks out of their suspension sockets +and heaved his suited body across the buckled conning deck. It should've +been, but it wasn't. + +The third thing he knew was that Ferris' helmet had been smashed into a +million pieces, and that Ferris was dead. + +Sand sifted in a cold, red river through the gaping rent in the side of +the ship, trying to bury him before he could stand up and get his +balance on the crazily tilted deck. He shook loose with more strength +than he needed, gave the rest of the muscles in his blocky body a try, +and there wasn't any hurt worse than a bruise. Funny. Ferris was dead. + +He had a feeling somewhere at the edge of his brain that there was going +to be more to it than just checking his oxygen and food-concentrate +supply and walking away from the ship. A man didn't complete the first +Earth-Mars flight ever made, smash his ship to hell, and then just walk +away from it. His astrogeologer-navigator was dead, and the planet was +dead, so a man just didn't walk away. + +There was plenty of room for him to scramble through the yawning rip in +the buckled hullplates--just a matter of crawling up the river of red +sand and out; it was as easy as that. + +Then Johnny Love was on his feet again, and the sand clutched at his +heavy boots as though to keep him from leaving Ferris and the ship, but +it didn't, and he was walking away.... + + * * * * * + +Even one hundred and forty million miles from the Sun, the unfiltered +daylight was harsh and the reflection of it from the crimson sand hurt +his eyes. The vault of the blue-black sky was too high; the desert plain +was too flat and too silent, and save for the thin Martian wind that +whorled delicately-fluted traceries in the low dunes that were the only +interruption in the flatness, there was no motion, and the planet was +too still. + +Johnny Love stopped his walking. Even in the lesser gravity, it seemed +too great an effort to place one booted foot before the other. He looked +back, and the plume of still-rising smoke from the broken thing that had +been his ship was like a solid black pillar that had been hastily built +by some evil djinn. + +How far had he walked; how long? + +He turned his back on the glinting speck and made his legs move again, +and there was the hollow sound of laughter in his helmet. Here he was, +Johnny Love, the first Martian! and the last! Using the last of the +strength in his bruised body to go forward, when there was no forward +and no backward, no direction at all; breathing when there was no +purpose in breathing. + +Why not shut off the valves now? + +He was too tired for hysteria. Men had died alone before. _Alone, but +never without hope! And here there was no hope, for there was no life, +and no man had ever lived where there was not life!_ + +But he had come to see, and he was seeing, and in the remaining hours +left to him he would see what no man had seen in a half a million years. + +Harrison and Janes or Lamson and Fowler would not be down for twenty +days at the inside; that had been the time-table. Twenty days, twenty +years ... he heard himself laugh again. Time-table! + +He and Ferris first. Then Harrison and Janes. Then Lamson and Fowler, +all at twenty-day intervals. If all landed safely, they would use +Exploration Plan I, Condition Optimum. If only two crews made it down, +Plan II; Condition Limited. And if only one made the 273-day journey +from the orbit of Terra--that would be Plan III; Condition Untenable, +Return. The twenty-day interval idea had come from some Earth-bound +swivel-chair genius who had probably never even set foot in a Satellite +operations room. Somebody had impressed on him when he was young that +egg-carrying was a safer mission with a multiplicity of baskets; it was +common sense that if anything happened to Mars-I touching down, at least +it wouldn't happen to II and III at the same time. + +Common sense, Johnny thought, and he laughed again. Space was not +common, and it was not sensible. And nobody had ever taught it the rules +men made. + +He kept walking, seeing, thinking and breathing. + +For a long time. He fell once or twice and picked himself up again to +walk some more, and then he fell a final time, and did not get up. Red +sand whispered over him, danced lightly, drifted.... + + * * * * * + +The flat, wide-tracked vehicle swerved in a tight arc, throwing up low +ruby-colored clouds on either side. Its engines throbbed a new note of +power, and it scuttled in a straight line across the desert floor like a +fleck of shiny metal drawn by an unseen magnet. Behind it rose a +thinning monument of green-black smoke, and between its tracks was a +wavering line of indentations in the sand already half-obliterated by +the weight of their own shallow walls. But they became deeper as the +vehicle raced ahead; and then at length they ended, and the vehicle +halted. + +There was a mound of sand that the winds, in their caprice, would not +have made alone, for they sculptured in a freer symmetry. And the +child-like figures seemed to realize that at once. + +With quick precision they levelled the mound and found Johnny Love. They +took him into their vehicle, and deftly matched and replenished the +waning gas mixture in the cylindrical tanks on his back. + +Then they drove away with him. + + * * * * * + +"Ferris?" + +"Ferris was your astrogeologer-navigator. He died when you crashed." + +"Harrison ... _Janes_?" + +"Harrison and Janes are not due for nine more days. But you are in no +danger." + +There was darkness and warmth; his throat was dry and it burned. It was +hard to talk, and Ferris was dead. Harrison and Janes were not due for +nine more days. Somebody said so. Nine more days and then everything +would be-- + +Panic shook him, sent blood throbbing to his head and brought +consciousness back hard. His eyes opened and he was suddenly sitting +bolt upright. + +"But Lamson, you were twenty days behind--" And the racing thought froze +solid in his fumbling brain. Then there was a torrent of thoughts and +memory overran them, buried them, and red desert was rushing up to +engulf him. He screamed and fell back with his hands clawing at his +eyes. + +"You are in no danger. You had thought our planet lifeless; it was an +error. We live underground, John Love. That is why you did not see us, +or surface indications of our existence. A group of us speak your +language, because for eleven days we have been studying your brain and +analyzing your thought-patterns." + +Johnny was bolt upright again, and now his eyes were wide and his hands +were knotted, and where there had been only light and shadow before +there was full sight now. Swiftly he was off the low cot and on his feet +looking for the speaker, arms ready to lash out and hit. + +But he was alone in the small, sterile-looking chamber, and his muscles +were so much excess baggage. He tried to recover his balance: he had +forgotten about the slight gravity. He tried too hard, and his body +crashed, confused, into a wall. A--damn them, a _padded_ wall! + +He regained his feet. Stood still, and raced his eyes about him. There +it was--above the cot. A small round, shuttered opening--some sort of +two-way communication system. He wondered if they could see him, too. If +they could, that part of it worked only one way. + +"All right, whoever you are, so you've analyzed me!" He had to direct +his sudden anger at something, so he shouted at the shuttered aperture. +"Now what...." + +There was silence for a tiny eternity, and he could feel them probing, +evaluating him, as a human scientist would study a rare species in a +cage. The feeling ignited a new anger in him, and made him want to curse +the teachings that had conditioned his lifetime of thinking to the +belief that Man _was_ more than an animal. + +He'd been sold short.... + +"Damn you! God damn you, what are you going to do to me?" + +In a corner of his mind he was aware of a gentle hissing sound, but he +did not listen. The fear and terror had to be broken. Make them tell, +_make_ them tell.... + +His muscles grew heavy and his face was feverish with his effort, and +his eyes stung. Something ... like roses. But there were no roses on +dead planets-- + +"Earthman, can you still hear?" + +"I can hear," Johnny said. It was suddenly easier to talk. Even easier +to understand. They had done something.... + +"We are surprised that your state of shock was not more severe. In the +process of analyzing you, we discovered that you were totally unprepared +for Space-flight, and therefore--" + +"Unprepared? What do you think all those months of physical conditioning +were for? Yeah, and all those damned textbooks? You think that barrel I +cracked up was built in a Kindergarten class--" + +"Space-flight requires but a relative minimum of those things, Earthman. +Required most is psychological and philosophical conditioning." + +"To what?" + +"To all things unreal. Because they are the most real; infinity applies +to probability and possibility far more directly than to simple Space +and Time. But--are you calm now?" The voice was growing deeper, and +seemed almost friendly. Johnny tried his muscles; they weren't +paralyzed--he could move easily, and his head was clear. And there was +no anger, now. No "shock." + +"Go ahead," he said. + +"Our examination of you has indicated that your race is a potentially +effective one, with a superior survival factor. We feel that, properly +instructed and assisted, such a race might be of great value as a friend +and ally. In short, we receive you in peace and friendship, Earthman. +Will you accept us in like manner?" + +Johnny tried to think. Hard thoughts, the way men were supposed +to think. What kind of game was it? What were the strings? The +angles ... the gimmicks. What did they really want? + +His lips were dry and barely moved over his teeth, but the words came +easily. "Who says you're a friend?" + +"We would have learned as much about you by examining your corpse, +Earthman." + +So he was alive, and that had to prove something. And it might have been +a lot of trouble to keep him that way. The hell of it was you couldn't +_know_ ... _Anything_ ... you couldn't know anything when you were +tossed into the middle of the impossible. He felt the skin on the back +of his neck chill and tighten. + +But who held out their hand like this? + +Whoever did anything like that? + +No. + +"We wish to help you, Earthman, and your race. We have observed your +kind at close quarters, yet we have never landed among you nor attempted +communication because of fear for ourselves. But with proper help, there +need be no fear between us. We offer you friendship and progress." + +"You keep talking about what _we_ get out of it." Johnny stared upward +at the ceiling, got his eyes off the little shuttered aperture. He +wished he had a cigarette. "You sound too damned much like a +politician." + +"Perhaps at this point you should be informed that your ship is +completely repaired, and ready for your return to Earth whenever you +desire." + +"So, it's--You said Harrison and Janis would be here in nine days! That +means I've been out for nearly two weeks! For a nap that's a long time, +but nobody could get that bucket back in one piece in eleven days! Not +after what I did to it--" + +"Your ship is completely repaired, Earthman." + +Johnny knew somehow that the voice wasn't lying. So maybe when you got +off of Earth miracles did happen. He just didn't _know_ enough. + +"We wish to give you data to take back to your Earth which will banish +disease for you--_all_ disease. Data which will give you spacecraft that +match our own in technical perfection. Data that will make you the +undisputed masters of your environment. We offer you the stars, +Earthman." + +He shut a thousand racing thoughts out of his head. "Maybe I'll believe +this fairy tale of yours on one condition," Johnny said, "because I +can't intelligently do otherwise." + +"And that--condition?" + +"Tell me _why_." + +There was a pause, and it was as though something forever unknowable to +men hung in the silence. + +"Picture, if you can, Earthman," the answer came at last, "several small +islands in the center of a great sea; all without life, save two. The +men on one have learned to build boats which can successfully sail the +sea within certain limits--they can visit the other islands, but are too +frail and too limited in power to venture past the horizon. It is +infinitely frustrating to them. The only places to which they may go are +dead places. Save for one--only one, and it becomes magnified in +importance--it becomes an entire _raison d'etre_ in itself. For without +it, the men with the boats sail uselessly.... + +"We are old, Earthman. We have watched you--waited for you for a long +time. And now you have grown up. You have burst your tiny bubble of +human experience. You have set out upon the sea yourselves...." + +"You guys should give graduation talks. I didn't ask for a scaled-down +philosophy. You tell me that you want to give us every trick in your +hat--for free, no questions asked. So I asked why. And the question +isn't changing any." + +"The answer should be self-evident, Earthman. We are old. And we are +lonely." + + * * * * * + +There was a logic at work somewhere in his brain even during the dream. +It told him that he was exhausted from the day's tour with the +child-like men of Mars, and that the dream was only the vagaries of a +reeling, tired mind of a badly jarred subconscious. It told him that the +things he had seen had been too alien for his relatively inflexible +adult Earth mind to accept without painful reaction, and this was the +reaction. + +This, the dream. That was all it was; his logic said so. + +Faith spread out before the undisciplined eye of his dreaming brain, and +the near-conscious instant of logic faded. The fertile plains that once +had been yellow desert-land mounted golden fruits to a temperate sun, +and beyond the distant green of gently-rolling hills spread the +resplendent city, and there were other cities as gracefully civilized +beyond the untroubled horizon. + +And in the dream, these were all things men had done, as though sanity +had invaded their minds overnight. It was the Earth that men had +intended, rather than that which they had built. + +The sun dimmed. The air chilled, and the grains and fruits wilted, and +the rolling hills were a darker hue than green as the shadow lengthened, +spread to the gleaming cities beyond and then as it touched them and ran +soundlessly the length and breadth of their wide malls, there were other +changes.... + +Skeletons, reaching upward to a puffy, leaden sky. + +The horizon split into jagged, broken moats of dark flame, and Earth was +no longer what men had built, but what they eternally feared they must +one day create.... + +Then Johnny Love was suddenly awake bolt upright in his cot and his eyes +were open wide. His muscles were taut and cramped. And he was afraid +although the men of Mars had offered friendship and told him that there +was nothing for him to fear. + +Slowly, he lay down again. And gradually, the cold perspiration that had +encased him vanished; his body relaxed, and the fear subsided. + +The day's tour had been exhausting both mentally and physically, and +there was the excitement of knowing that in five more days Harrison and +Janes would land. If they did not, his own ship would carry him safely +back to Earth on the day following, for the little men had miraculously +repaired it; they had shown him. They had shown him, and he wanted to go +home. + +Johnny Love rolled over on the wide, soft cot, sighed, and went back to +sleep. + + * * * * * + +"_He sleeps again, Andruul._" + +"_Yes, but the damage is probably done._" + +"_No, or he would not sleep again so easily. His kind do not have such +emotional control._" + +_The two turned away from the fading transparency of the sleeping-room +wall, and their short, thin bodies were in incongruous contrast to the +spaciousness of the metal-sheathed corridor down which they walked._ + +"_Psychoanalysis showed up the difference in his brain structure--that +apparently accounts for the poor efficiency our screens are showing. +What does Kaarn say?_" + +"_He says we should never have allowed the theft._" + +_Andruul cursed. "Allowed it! Those nomadic scum are like flies! No +matter how many you exterminate, they never fail to come back in double +their number. And they strike at the precise moment you are certain the +bones of the last one are sinking beneath the sand. Somehow Central +Patrol has got to get that unit back._" + +"_You're certain it was a theft, then?_" + +"_Don't be an idiot. Since when can those gypsies build anything more +complex than a crude electrical generator? Let alone a psibeam unit? +They've forgotten what little their civilization ever knew._" + +"_They are clever enough at evading directed over-surface missiles._" + +_Andruul muttered something, and lapsed into silence._ + +"_Well there is one thing for certain at any rate.... A psibeam unit is +unaccounted for, and despite our protective screening, the Earthman was +visibly disturbed in his sleep. His encephalotapes show that clearly. +They know about him, Andruul, and they're making their bid. Central +Patrol had better be quick and certain this time._" + +_Andruul kept his silence. But he thought. He thought Central Patrol was +getting less efficient and more stupid every day._ + + * * * * * + +It was a strange feeling; a feeling with which no human was emotionally +equipped to deal. + +Johnny looked at his flawlessly renovated ship, poised like a snub-nosed +bullet against the blue-black brittleness of the Martian sky, and then +looked behind him at the crescent-shaped formation of tracked vehicles +that had escorted him back across the sucking red sand to this place. +With each heavy-booted step away from them he closed the short distance +between them and his ship, and there was not enough time to think about +the feeling. Or about the heavy sealed tube they had given him to take +back to his people. + +Usually, when a man ventured beyond the bounds of familiar existence, +there was conflict. Either a struggle to win, or, immediately +recognizable success, with no struggle or hint of conflict at all. + +But not this. Not this success that seemed--what was the _word_? +Hostile? That was ridiculous. These people were friendly. _But +somehow--there was an empty ring--_ + +Hell! They had saved his life. Rebuilt his ship. Given him the tube that +contained transcriptions, in his own language, of every scientific +secret his people could ever hope to learn for themselves in the next +thousand years! And, they had even buried Ferris.... + +Use the brains of a mature man, Johnny Love! You've pulled it off +without even trying! The most stupendous thing any man in any age has +ever pulled off ... without even trying! For God's sake don't +question--don't question things you don't understand! Take the credit +and let the soul-searching go! + +He looked behind him again. They were still there. A special, smiling +farewell escort, watching a single, solitary figure cross a short +expanse of sand to a towering, glistening thing of power. + +He raised a booted foot to the bottom fin-step, hauled himself up by the +stern mounting rungs, hammered the outer lock stud with his gloved fist +and the hatch swung open. Like a trap. + +He could feel the skin at the back of his neck tighten but he forced +himself to ignore it. The lock cycled up to thirteen psi and the inner +port swung automatically inward, and then he was inside, clambering up +the narrow ladder past the titanium alloy fuel tanks and the spidery +catwalks between them to the tiny control room in the forehull. + +He would not be waiting for Harrison and Janes. He would get the hell +out of here and then radio them and let them make all the decisions from +there. Earth for him. Home. He ached for it. + +He strapped himself in the hammock, punched the warming studs for each +engine, and there was a dull, muffled throb below him as each jumped +into subdued life. The banks of dials that curved in front of him glowed +softly, and he started an almost automatic blast-off check. It took +twelve precious minutes. + +Then he was ready. Scanners on, heat up ... ready. + +The Martian sky was like frozen ink above him and his hands were wet +inside his gloves and there was a choking dryness in his throat. +_Now...._ + +And he could not move. There was a sudden, awful nausea and his head +spun, and before his eyes there spread a bleeding Earth; the sun dimmed, +and fertile plains were cast in sudden shadow.... The air chilled, the +shadow spread, and there were skeletons reaching upward to a puffy, +leaden sky! + +_And Earth was no longer what Men had built!_ + +Then the horror in his head was gone, and he felt an awful pressure on +each side of it. His hands ... he had been pressing with insane strength +at both sides of his skull as if to crush it with his bare hands.... His +face was wet, and he was breathing, choking, in strangling gulps. + +A scanner alarm clanged. + +He forced his eyes to focus on the center screen. + +"Earthman! Emergency! There has been a flaw discovered in the repair of +your ship! Do not blast off! Do not...." + +The other image caught him as his arm was in mid-flight toward the +control bank. Sweet and warm ... the fertile plains mounting their +golden fruits to a mellowed sun, and beyond the distant gently-rolling +hills spread the resplendent city, and there were other cities.... + +But his arm kept going, its muscles loose, and it fell. Heavily. +Squarely on the stud-complex toward which its fist had been aimed a +split-second before. + +The engines roared, and the ship lurched upward from the red sand. + + * * * * * + +_The command flicked into the Captain's brain like a lash of ice._ + +"_Slaazar! Converge, sheaf!_" + +"_Converging, sir...." It would be no use, of course. If the high brass +had been content to rely on the beams rather than on their own subtlety +in the first place, the Earthman would never have fallen prey to the +Nomads, even for a second. But they had wanted to be as forthright as +possible--force, they said, would only arouse suspicion. Psibeam units +only as a last resort.... The lowliest Patrol Lancer could have told +them the folly of that!_ + +_Hastily, Slaazar issued orders to his battery crews tracking the +ascending Spaceship, their units already nearing overload potential. But +the desert-scum would see some real psi-power now! They'd see it wasted +completely if they saw it at all.... Because they'd outmaneuvered the +brass again!_ + +"_Convergence impossible, sir._" + +_As he had expected._ + +"_Colonel Truul, this is Captain Slaazar. Target has passed critical +planetary curvature. Convergence impossible. Standing by, sir._" + +_For several moments after that, the thin atmosphere of Mars was warmed +a little...._ + + * * * * * + +Acceleration blackout had not been total; leaving Mars was even easier +than leaving the surface of Earth for the orbits of the Stations. But +there was a period of no-thought, no-time, no-being. And then full +consciousness seeped back slowly. But not as it was supposed to. + +Johnny Love knew he had come to because he could see the banked +instruments glowing palely before him; because he could realize from +reading them that his ship was doing its job to perfection. Almost ready +to complete the blast-off ogee, and-- + +Angrily he belted the scanner switches off and the dull red sphere faded +from the viewplates. + +And he could feel the sweat start again all over his body. No, the +returning consciousness was all wrong.... All wrong, and the image +wouldn't go away.... + +Red desert he had seen before, yet had not seen. There were dark ridges +of brown-green at its horizon; oddly-formed crater-places that might +once have held placid lakes. And on all the vast surface there was no +hint of the Patrol tracks, no sign of--anything. + +But he had to descend to the place. + +He did not know how to locate it, but the image told him that it did not +matter. The image said merely that he must begin cutting his power. + +There was no strength in his arms and hands, yet they moved in front of +him as though things detached from his body; skillfully, surely, playing +deftly across the colored studs. + +Scanners on. Scanners on, kid.... + +He watched the screens again, unconscious of what his fingers did on the +panels. The dull red sphere loomed large once more. The picture was +off-center; without knowing what he did he rectified course with the bow +jets; it was centered again. But it was a different place. Still the +desert, but with ridges of brown-green at its horizon; oddly-formed +crater-places.... + +It was coming up fast, now; faster, until the horizon was only a gentle +arc against a thin span of blackness, and the rest was cold red. + +Hardly knowing what he did, his fingers suddenly raced over the control +console, even before the scanner-alarms began their ear-splitting +clanging! + +The ship lurched into a direction-change that threatened to wrench the +hull apart, and the picture in the scanner reeled crazily. He knew his +own brain was not dictating the commands of control to his fingertips, +nor was it evaluating for itself the madly fluctuating values indicated +on the panels. A human brain could not have done it, he knew that.... + +He had cut power. At least there was no power. He was falling at a crazy +angle and the desert was rushing up now, hurtling up to smash him. +They'd hit him, then, yet he'd felt nothing.... + +It was getting hot. His hull must be glowing, now, even in the thin +atmosphere of Mars--it was a long fall. Slower than a fall on Earth, +through thinner air layers, yet he was glowing like a torch. + +The ocean of sand rushed up. + +And suddenly his left hand rammed the full-power stud. + +It was as though he'd been hit from behind with all the brute force of +some gigantic fist, and there were two things. There was the +split-second glimpse of a crescent formation suddenly wheeling toward +him and there was the clang of the scanner-alarm. There were those two +things his brain registered before the titanic force of full power +squeezed consciousness from it and left him helpless. + + * * * * * + +He was running. In a nightmare of a dead planet that was not dead, he +ran, away from something. + +That was how his consciousness returned. While he ran. He stopped, +stumbling, turned to look behind him. + +And the ship was there. Landed perfectly, stubby bullet-nose pointing to +the sky. And above it-- + +_Run!_ + +The command hit his brain with almost physical force. A will that was +not his own took hold of his whole being, and he was running again, +plowing his way through the sucking sand with strength summoned from a +well of energy within his body that had never been there before. + +Through the thin glassite walls of his helmet he could hear the _thuk, +thuk, thuk_ of his boots as they pounded somewhere below him, and there +was another pounding, a deadly rhythmic bursting pressure in his chest. +And a whine in his ears.... + +The wind-strewn sand stretched flat and infinitely before him. Then +leaped at him headlong and there was no horizon; there was only the +sudden awful wrench of concussion, a tremor of pure sound which would, +in denser atmosphere, have destroyed him with the inertia of his own +body. + +He could not move. Only cling to the shifting desert floor that rocked +sickeningly beneath his outstretched body ... cling to it for dear life. + +There was no thought, no understanding. Only a sensation which he could +not comprehend, and the sure knowledge that none of this was real. Not +real, but the end of survival nonetheless. + + * * * * * + +Pain, and seeing two bright objects transiting the darkness at which he +looked; seeing something then between. + +His brain began identifying. The darkness; sky. The bright objects; +Diemos, Phobos.... And the something between-- + +It was a transparency of some sort; curved, or he would not have been +able to detect it at all. A vaulted ceiling through which he could +see.... + +His full consciousness came flooding back, then. He tried the muscles +in his neck, they hurt, but they worked, and he could move his head from +side to side. There was the same transparency, as though he were covered +by some huge, invisible bowl. + +And there were men. Big, muscular creatures, yet thin, tall.... Not like +the others at all.... + +He sat bolt upright, and they did not move. It was not the same as +before. No small room. No voice that he could not see. They had not even +removed his suit or his helmet, and he was lying on a hard, cold +substance. + +Then he saw what they were doing. There were two of them apart from the +others, working to bring a compact-looking machine into position near +him. A gleaming, short cylinder, swung on gymbals between slender forks, +mounted on a thin wheeled standard. They were aiming it at him. + +"No! _No_--" He tried to get to his knees, but it was as though there +were no muscles in his body. + +"Man of--Earth! We are friendly. Is that understood?" + +The thought-words formed in his brain as the strange images had before, +and then he knew. _Should have guessed it_, part of his mind was telling +him in a fantastically detached way, _the dreams ... the compulsions +over which he had had no control in the ship.... This--thing. It +probably--_ + +"You are quite astute, Earthman. But it is not our technology which +created this device. To save you and the civilization which you +represent--and ultimately, our own--it was necessary for us to steal it. +It cost six lives." + +"Steal...." + +"From your former captors. It is their invention, as are so many things +with which they destroy. With this instrument, they have succeeded in +taking one of Nature's more subtle phenomenon--psychokinesis--and +amplifying its energies nearly a million-fold. Those stepped-up energies +can then be projected in a tight or fanned beam at will. + +"They can make a man 'dream,' as you did--or they can destroy him +outright, depending on which of the 'psi' factors, ESP or PK, is given +dominance during projection. But we are not skilled in its +operation--they detected our use of it on you while you slept, and from +that moment on you were so well screened that even at the risk of +burning this unit out, we were not able to project powerfully enough to +do more than merely touch your brain--" + + * * * * * + +There was a strange calm in his mind, now. He understood the words +and accepted them as matter-of-factly as they were given. Even now +they were manipulating him like some intangible puppet, yet he was +convinced it was not a malevolent manipulation. Convinced. The +conviction--manipulation, too.... + +"Only partly, Earthman. We said we are friendly, and we are. We have +calmed you and erased your fear. From this point on, we will use this +instrument only for communication." + +And then he felt the fear in him again, gnawing, and his body was again +damp and cold. But he had control, now. Control enough to speak. + +They stood before him, immobile, watching. + +Somewhere, Johnny Love found his voice. + +"Look, I've been through this 'friendly' act before...." He hesitated, +and they did not try to interrupt him. "Well don't just stand there!" +The fear was suddenly turning to the bitter anger of frustration, they +had him whipped, and he was tired. "Tell me why! You stick that thing +into my head when I'm blasting for home. You force me to drop back. You +blow up my ship. Real friendly! Real sports!" For a moment he had run +out of words, and again they made no effort to answer him. "All right! I +don't understand you--I don't know what you want. But nobody is trying +to hurt you, nobody's after your little desert paradise. We had an idea, +that's all. We thought we could make it work. People have been talking +'go to Mars' on my planet for longer than most of 'em can remember. So +we finally gave it a whirl! Sorry!" + +He looked at them hard, then, and thought that there was something +almost like a smile on the face of one. Smile, then, damn you.... + +"We want nothing, Earthman, but to prevent from happening on your planet +the thing that happened on this. If they succeed in destroying you as +they have us, then this System will always be under their heel, and we +shall never be rid of them. Understand, their numbers were too few ever +to conquer a planet with a civilization as large and as highly organized +as that of Earth, by physical means. + +"Knowing that, we--they call us gypsies, nomads, desert-scum today--we +were not too alarmed when they landed here two centuries ago. We were +glad to take from them, without paying a price. We were awed by their +gifts. Their papers and their books, which would show us how to rebuild +our waning civilization--advance us a thousand years in less than fifty; +restore to us our lost arts.... And compared to you, we were so very +few. + +"In return, they said that all they wanted was permission to set up a +research site. They told us they were a scientific expedition from far +out-System. Aldeberan, they said. Part of a vast exploratory program +which they had been conducting for centuries. + +"We believed them--why not? One day, we thought, we too will be in +Space. And with that day would begin one of the greatest projects of +exploration that our race had ever known. So we agreed, and gladly." + +"Hold it, hold it! 'They'--who the hell are 'they'? You can spare the +suspense...." + +And then there was no more words. The pictures formed in his mind as +before, only stronger, now, and there were no details left out. + +The weapons of war had been built, not by the out-System men, but by +their hosts. The plans had not proven too difficult to follow.... + +The new knowledge was not hoarded, was not held under jealous guard by +those who had given it, but by those to whom it had been given. One man +from another; one group of men from another. States and nations from +each other. + +Until there was no trust left on all the planet. + +There were the wars, then. + +And when they were over, the new masters had established their first +beachhead in the new System. + +"But, it was only a beachhead, and had been only intended as such--" The +pictures broke off; the unspoken words resumed. "Your planet was the +ultimate target, but at first, your civilization was not adequately +advanced to fall prey to their technique. Their weapon is knowledge, but +the potentialities of that knowledge must be understood by a people +before it can be effectively used to destroy them. + +"The rest must be self-evident. After we destroyed ourselves, they sank +their infectious, hollow roots into our planet. And from then, +investigated your Earth from time to time ... and waited.... + +"Waited, because they knew you would be coming. And they knew what kind +of men you would be. Strong men, with the light of the stars in your +eyes. Yet confused, weak men, with the darkness of suspicion and +jealousy still in your souls. Such are humans, after all.... + +"That is why we stopped you, Johnny Love. Once your blast-off ogee had +carried you beyond the curvature of their horizon and brought you over +us, our psibeam was effective and theirs were not. We are sorry about +your ship. Once they realize that you were under our influence, and were +returning rather than taking their precious data to your people, they +zeroed-in with those damnable guided juggernauts--" + +"It wasn't you, then. You mean they--" + +"There is little that they cannot do. Destruction is their forte. They +could not keep us from preventing your taking their 'gift' to your +people, but they could keep that 'gift' from falling into our hands--and +they did. They do not always win. But they never lose." + +"But I--" Johnny's thoughts raced. The ship, gone. And Harrison and +Janes, Lamson, and Fowler. They would be landing in a few days. They-- + +"Yes," the thoughts of the true Martians before him answered. "And they +will be given a 'gift' for Terra as you were. If your friends return +successfully to your planet with that 'gift'--then--" + +The thought was not completed. But it did not have to be. + +A beachhead was one thing. These scattered, struggling people who had +once been masters of Mars might one day unseat it, for they were not yet +beaten people, and their will to survive was yet strong. But beyond +that-- + +Earth taken, the System taken. + +There it was. + +There was a sudden coldness inside him now that the fact had +crystallized, had become real. Here was no fantasy; no wild surmise. + +They left him in silence while he thought, their psibeam turned away, +now. + +Harrison and Janes. Lamson, and Fowler. Had to stop them. Stop them, and +then somehow, get home. He ached for home. + +He thought about Ferris, who had given his life for this thing. + +No, Ferris would not be going home. Ferris was dead. + +He signalled for the psibeam to be turned toward him again. + +"You'd have to know their positions out there to make contact, wouldn't +you?" They did not answer. He worked to get the words formed, and there +was a fleeting thought of a green, lush planet far away, its wide +streets and rolling fields bathed in warm sunlight. "I can figure 'em," +he said. "I know blast-off schedules, speeds. I know the works! _Those_ +things they had in the books. Then you guys can do the rest with--that +thing. Right?" + +They answered him, then. + +"Thank you," they said. And that was all. + + * * * * * + +"Answer me!" the General barked again. "You, Janes! Lamson! +Fowler--Harrison! For the last time, what happened out there?" + +The four stood silently before the nervous figure of their commander, +and it was Fowler who finally spoke. + +"Plan III, sir, as we've already said. Condition Untenable--Return...." + +"That is all you can say?" + +"That is--all, sir." + +The General turned away. There was frustration and anger in his face, +and it hid the fear beneath it like a mask. Plan III. It would be Plan +III for a long time yet. + +It was the thing he saw in the faces of the four men that told him that. +There had been too many giant steps, too fast. He had seen this thing in +the faces of men before, but never so nakedly. + +One day, perhaps, men could think of Plan I again. One day, but not now. + +He turned back to the four, and looked once more into their faces. + +Plan III. Condition Untenable. + +"Dismissed!" the General said. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Gift For Terra, by Fox B. Holden + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A GIFT FOR TERRA *** + +***** This file should be named 32487.txt or 32487.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/4/8/32487/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan 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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