FOR THE NEXT five days they were well occupied. An extensive
exploration of the inner valley, on foot and in the air, revealed
no other evidences of the former civilization. And the Terrans
decided against inhabiting the farm. About those domes there dung
the shreds of ancient fear and disaster, and Dard was not the only
one to feel uneasy within their walls.
The tree of golden apples was one of their best finds. The
hamsters relished the fruit and, so encouraged, the humans raided
along with the valley's furred and feathered inhabitants, because
the globes were as good as they looked and smelled—though their
intoxicating effect did not hold with the Terrans. The grain also
proved to be useful, and Harmon took the risk of rousing one of the
two heifer calves, carried in the ship, and feeding it in the
forsaken fields where it lived and grew fat.
On the other hand a bright green berry with a purplish blush was
almost fatal to a hamster and had to be shunned by the Terrans,
although the hoppers and the birds gorged upon it.
Quarters were established, not outside the cliffs which walled
the valley, but within them. The second day's exploration had
located a cave which led in turn to an inner system of galleries,
through one of which the rivers wove a way. Habituated to such a
dwelling from their years in the Cleft, they seized upon this
discovery eagerly. More of the adult passengers were awakened and
put to work assembling machines, laboring to make the caves into a
new home which could not be easily detected. For the threat kept
before them by the ruined farm was always in their minds.
Three more bodies were carried from the star ship to be interred
beside Lui Skort, still encased in the boxes which had held them
during the voyage. But Kordov continued to insist that they had
been very lucky. There were fifteen men at work now, and ten women
added their strength to harvesting the strange grain and making
habitable the cave dwelling.
"Blast it!" Kimber drew out of the motor section of the sled and
made a grab at thin air.
"What's the matter?" Dard began. Then he caught sight of what
had brought the pilot to the exploding point.
A hopper bounded toward the tall grass, something shiny between
its front paws. Stealing again!
Dard dived, and his fingers closed about the small, frantically
kicking body, while a squeak which approached a scream rent the
quiet of their outdoor workshop. The boy freed his captive to nurse
a bitten hand, but the hopper had also dropped the bolt it had
stolen. Now it retired empty pawed into the bushes uttering
impolite remarks concerning Dard's destination and ancestry.
"Better go and have that bite looked after," Kimber ordered with
resignation as he accepted the rescued bolt.
"I don't know what we are going to do about those little beasts.
They'd carry off everything they could lug if we didn't watch them
all the time. Regular pack rats."
Dard cradled the bitten hand in the other. "I'd like to find one
of their burrows, or nests, or whatever they build to keep their
loot in. It should be a regular curiosity shop."
"If any one can—you will," Cully spoke from the cylinder he was
dismantling. "Ever notice, Sim," he continued, "how this kid gets
around? I'll wager he could walk through the grain field and not
make a sound or leave a trail another could follow. How'd you ever
learn that useful trick, fella?"
Dard was sober. "The hard way, living as an outlaw. You know,
those hoppers are awful pests, but I can't help admiring them."
Kimber snorted. "Why? Because they know what they want and go
after it? They are single-minded, aren't they? Only I wish they
were a little more timid. They should be more like the duck-dogs,
willing to watch us, but keeping their distance. Cut along, kid,
and get that finger seen to right away. Working hours aren't over
yet."
Dard traced Carlee Skort to where she was busy fitting up the
small dispensary, a niche in the wall of the second cave, and had
his bite sterilized and bandaged with plasta-skin.
"Hoppers!" She shook her head. "I don't know what we're going to
do to discourage them. They stole Trude's little paring knife
yesterday and three spools of thread."
He could understand her dismay over these losses. Little things,
yes—but articles which could not be replaced.
"Luckily they appear to be afraid to come into the caves. So far
we haven't caught any of them inside. But they are the most
persistent and accomplished thieves I have ever seen. Dard, when
you go out, stop in the kitchen and pick up a lunch for your
working crew. Trude should have the packets made up by now."
He obediently made his way past work gangs into the other small
cave room where Trude Harmon with an assistant was setting out
stacks of plastic containers. The rich scent which filled the air
tickled Dard's nose and made him very aware of hunger. It had been
hours and hours since breakfast!
"Oh, it's you," Trude greeted him. "How many in your gang?"
"Three."
Her lips moved, counting silently, as she apportioned the
containers and set them in a carrier.
"Mind you bring those back. And don't, don't you dare leave them
where any hoppers can put paw on them!"
"No, ma'am. Something sure smells good."
She smiled proudly. "Those golden apples. We stewed some up into
a kind of pudding. Just you wait 'til you taste it, young man.
Which reminds me—where is that queer leaf, Petra?"
The dark-haired girl who had been stirring the largest pot on
the stove pulled a glossy green leaf from one of her pockets. It
was an almost perfect triangle in shape— green, threaded by bright
red and yellow veins.
"Ever see one like that before, Dard?" Trude asked.
He took it and examined it curiously before he answered with a
shake of his head.
"Pinch it and give a sniff!" Trude suggested.
He did and the good odor of cooking was nullified by another
aromatic, clean fragrance, a mixture of herb and flower—of all the
pleasant scents he had ever known.
"You can rub it on skin or hair and the scent lingers," Petra
told him eagerly.
"And you'll never guess where we got that one," Trude broke in.
"Tell him."
"I saw a hopper carrying it out in the grain field when I was
gleaning yesterday. I thought it had been stealing from our food
and chased it. Then when it wriggled through a hole in the brush
fence it dropped the leaf. I picked it up and at first we thought
it might be good to eat because the hopper wanted it. But it is
just nice perfume."
"Sure, and if you want to get on the good side of the kitchen
detail," Trude twinkled at him "you just find out where you can get
about a peck of those, Dard. We ain't got the smell of that ship
off: us yet—nasty chemicals. And we'd admire a chance to get some
perfume. You do a little looking around when you're off on this
jaunt of yours and see what you can find us. Now—clear out. Take
your lunch."
Dard gave the leaf back to Petra and picked up the carrier. But
he went out of the kitchen puzzled. What had Trude meant by "this
jaunt of yours?" As far as he knew he was not intending to leave
the valley. Had some other plans been made?
He started back to Kimber, determined to have an
explanation.
"Lunch, huh?" Cully crawled out from under the cylinder as Dard
sat the carrier on the ground. The engineer wiped his hands on the grass and then on a piece of
waste. "What do they have for us this time?"
"Stew of apples for one thing," Dard returned impatiently.
"Listen, Kimber, Mrs. Harmon said something about my going on an
expedition."
Sim Kimber pried the lid off a container of stew and poked into
the depths of the savory mixture before he replied.
"We have to earn our keep, kid. And not being specialists in
anything but woodcraft and transportation, it's up to us to do what
we can along those lines. You knew the woods and mountains back on
earth, and you have a feeling for animals. So Kordov assigned you
to the exploration department."
Dard sat very still, afraid to answer, afraid to burst out with
the wild exultation which surged in him now. He had tried, tried so
hard these past few days to follow Harmon's overpowering interest
in the land, to be another, if unskilled, pair of hands in the work
about the cave. But the machines they were assembling at top speed
were totally unknown to him. The men who worked on them lapsed into
a jargon of functions he knew nothing about, until it seemed that
they jabbered a foreign tongue.
For so long he had been responsible for others—for Lars and
Dessie, for their food, their shelter, even their safety. And now
he was not even responsible for himself. He was beginning to feel
useless, for here he knew so little that was of any account.
All his training had been slanted toward keeping alive, at a
minimum level of existence, in a hostile world. With that pressure
removed he believed he had nothing to offer the colonists.
What he had dreamed and longed to do was to leave this compact
group where he was the outsider, to go on into this new world,
searching out its wonders, whether that meant trailing a hopper to
its mysterious lair or flying above the cliffs into the unknown
country beyond. Exploration was what he wanted, wanted so badly
that sometimes just thinking about it hurt.
And here was Kimber offering him that very thing! Dard could not
say anything. But maybe his eyes, his rapturous face answered for
him, as the pilot glanced up, met Dard's wide happy eyes; and
quickly looked away. Then the boy's feelings were under control
again, and he was able to say, in what he believed was a level and
unmoved voice:
"But what are you planning?"
"Go up and over." It was Cully who answered that before Kimber
could swallow his mouthful of stew. "We load up this old bus," the
engineer patted the sled affectionately, "and take off to see what
lies on the other side of the cliffs. Mainly to discover whether we
need expect any visitors."
"We—who?"
Kimber named those who would share in the adventure.
"I'll pilot. Cully goes along to keep the sled ticking. And
Santee is to provide the strong right arm."
"To fight—?" But Dard didn't complete that question before
Kimber had an answer.
"Killing," he said, staring thoughtfully down at the full spoon
he balanced on its way to his mouth, "is not on the program if we
can help it. Even such pests as—Cully! behind you!"
The engineer slowed around just in time to snatch up a small
wrench and so baffle the furry thief that tried to seize it.
"Even those pests are safe from us," Kimber continued before he
added to the swearing engineer, "Why don't you sit on everything,
Jorge? That's what I am doing." He moved to let them see that all
the smaller tools he had been using were now covered by his body.
"It may not be comfortable, but they'll still be here when I need
them!
"No," he returned to his earlier theme, "we're not going to kill
anything if we can help it. To save our lives—for food, if it is
absolutely necessary. But not for sport—or because we are unsure!"
His lips twisted in a sneer. "Sport! The greatest sport of all is
the hunting of man! As man finally discovered, having terrorized
all of the rest of the living earth. Our species killed
wantonly—now we have a second choice and chance. Maybe we can be
saner this time. So—Santee is a crack shot—but that does not mean
he is going to use the rifle."
Dard had only one more question. "When do we go?"
"Tomorrow morning, early. On our last swing around the cliffs
two days ago we sighted indications of a road leading eastward from
the other side. It could be the guide we want."
They finished their work upon the sled in mid-afternoon and
spent the remaining hours of work time stowing away supplies and
equipment. Kimber made preparations for five days' absence from the
valley—flying east to the interior of the land mass on which the
star ship had earthed.
"That tube we found pointed in that direction. If it was a
freight carrier for some city—and I am of the opinion that it
was—that's where we may find the remains of civilization."
Kimber's voice came muffled as he checked dials behind the wind
screen of the aircraft.
"Yeah." Santee added a small bag of his own to the supplies.
"But—after what we seen at that there farmhouse—they played rough
around here once upon a time. Better watch out that we don't get
shot down before we make peace signs."
"It's been a long time since the farm was looted," Dard ventured
to point out. "And why didn't the looters return—if they were the
winners in some war. Harmon says this land is rich, that any farmer
would settle here."
"Soldiers ain't farmers," said Santee. "Me, I'd say this was
lootin' done by an army or somebody like them blasted Peacemen.
They was out to smash and grab and run. Land don't mean nothin', to
them kinda guys. But I see what Harmon means. If the war ended why
didn't somebody come back here to rebuild? Yeah, that's sense."
"Maybe there was no one left," Dard said.
"Blew themselves up?" Kimber's expressive eyebrows rose as he
considered that. "Kind of wholesale, even for a big-time war. The
burn-off took most of Terra's cities and the purge killed off the
people who could rebuild them. But there were still plenty of men
kicking around afterward. Of course, they were ahead of us
technically here—those things in the carrier point to that. Which
argues that—if they were like us—they were way ahead in the
production of bigger and more lethal weapons, too. Well, I have a
feeling that tomorrow or the next day we're going to learn about
it."
The light was that gray wash which preceded sunrise when Dard
sat up in his bedroll to answer the shadowy figure who roused him.
He shivered, more with excitement than the morning chill, as he
rolled his bag together and stole after Cully out of the cave to
the sled.
There the four explorers made a hasty breakfast on cold scraps
while Kimber talked disjointedly with Kordov, Harmon and Rogan.
"We'll say five days," he said. "But it may be longer. Give us a
good margin for error. And don't send out after us if we don't make
it back. Just take precautions."
Kordov shook his head. "No man is expendable here, Sim, not any
more. But why should we borrow trouble in such large handfuls? I
will not believe that you won't return! You have the list of
plants, of things you are to look for?"
Simba Kimber touched a breast pocket in answer. Cully took his
place in the second seat of the sled and beckoned Dard to join him.
When Kimber was behind the control Santee scrambled in, a stun
rifle across his big knees.
"I'll listen for any broadcast," Rogan promised. And Harmon
mouthed something which might have been either reminder or farewell
as Kimber took them up into the crisp air of the dawn.
Dard was too excited to waste any time waving goodbye or looking
back into the safety of the valley. Instead he was leaning forward,
his body tense, as if by the sheer power of his will he could speed
their flight into the unknown.
They kept to a speed about equal to that of a running man as
they followed the cliffs along to the narrow upper end of the
valley. Close packed below to the edge of those stone wails was the
woods the exploring parties had located earlier, only to be kept
from penetration by the density of the growth.
"Queer stuff," Cully remarked now as they soared over the tree
tops. "A limb grows long, bends over to the ground, touches, then
takes root and another tree starts to grow out right there. That
whole mass down there may have started with just one tree. And you
can't break or hack through it!"
The sky before them was bannered with pink streamers. A flight
of the delicately hued butterfly-birds circled them and then flew
as escort until they were just beyond the valley wall. What the
explorers saw beneath them now was a somber earth-covering blanket
of blue-green, vaguely dismal and depressing with its unchanging
darkness. Another collection of the self-planting trees made an
effective border along the eastern side of the cliffs, and this was
not a small wood but a far-stretching forest.
"There!" Santee pointed downward. "That there's it! Them trees
cover it some, but I say it's a road!"
A narrow ribbon of a light-colored substance, hidden for long
distances by the invading trees, ran due east. Kimber brought the
sled into line over it.
But it was a full hour before they reached the end of the forest
and saw clearly the cracked and broken highway which was their
guide. It threaded across open plains where now and again they
sighted more of the dome dwellings standing alone and deserted,
wreathed with masses of greenery.
"No people—the land is empty," Dard commented as the sled
crossed the fourth of these.
"War," Kimber wondered, "or diseases . . . Must have made a clean
sweep in this section. And a long time ago—by the growth of the
bushes and the appearance of the road."
It was more than two hours after they left the valley that they
came upon what had been a village. And here was the first clue to
the type of disaster which had struck the land. One vast pit was
the center of the clustered domes. Crushed and shattered buildings
ringed it, bearing the stains and melted smears of intense
heat.
"Air raid?" Cully asked of the silence. "They got it good—and
for keeps; it was war then."
Kimber did not circle the damage. Instead he stepped up the
speed of the sled, driven by the same desire that possessed them
all, the longing to know what lay beyond the broken horizon.
A second town, larger, brutally treated, its remaining
structures half melted, its heart a crater, passed under them. Then
again open country, beaded by deserted farms. The road ended at
last in a city, shattered, smashed. A city planted on the shore of
a bay, for here the sea curved in from the northwest to meet them
once more.
There were towers, snapped, torn, twisted, until those in the
sled could not be sure of their original shape, looming beside dark
sores of craters. And at the waterside there was literally nothing
but a slick expanse of crystalline slag reflecting the sun's
rays.
Sea waves lipped that slag, but its edges remained unworn by the
touch of water and time alike. And beyond, in the bay, the waves
also curled restlessly about other wreckage—ships? Or parts of the
buildings blown there?
Kimber cruised slowly across the spiderweb map of the ancient
streets. But the wreckage was so complete they could only guess at
the use or meaning of what they saw. Mounds of disintegrating metal
might mark the residue of ground transportation devices, their
weathered erosion testifying in part to the age of the disaster.
And from the sled the explorers sighted nothing at all which might
mark the remains of those who had lived there.
They landed on a patch of grassy ground before a huge pile of
masonry which had three walls still standing. The ruined farmhouse
had pictured for them tragedy, fear and cruelty. But this whole
city—it was impersonal, too much. Such complete wreckage was
closer to a dream.
"Atom bomb, H-bomb, Null-bomb," Cully recited the list of the
worst Terra had known. "They must have had them here—all of
them!"
"And they were certainly men—for they used them!" Kimber added
savagely. He climbed out of the sled and faced the building. Its
walls reflected the sun as if they were of some metallic substance
but softly, with a glow of green-blue—as if the blocks used in
building had been quarried of sea water. A flight of twelve steps,
as wide as a Terran city block, led up to a mighty portal through
which they could see the sun glow bright in the roofless
interior.
Around that portal ran a band of colors, blending and
contrasting in a queer way which might have had meaning and yet did
not—for Terran eyes. As he studied the hues Dard thought he had a
half-hint. Perhaps those colors did have a deliberate
sequence—perhaps they were more than just decoration.
FOR THE NEXT five days they were well occupied. An extensive
exploration of the inner valley, on foot and in the air, revealed
no other evidences of the former civilization. And the Terrans
decided against inhabiting the farm. About those domes there dung
the shreds of ancient fear and disaster, and Dard was not the only
one to feel uneasy within their walls.
The tree of golden apples was one of their best finds. The
hamsters relished the fruit and, so encouraged, the humans raided
along with the valley's furred and feathered inhabitants, because
the globes were as good as they looked and smelled—though their
intoxicating effect did not hold with the Terrans. The grain also
proved to be useful, and Harmon took the risk of rousing one of the
two heifer calves, carried in the ship, and feeding it in the
forsaken fields where it lived and grew fat.
On the other hand a bright green berry with a purplish blush was
almost fatal to a hamster and had to be shunned by the Terrans,
although the hoppers and the birds gorged upon it.
Quarters were established, not outside the cliffs which walled
the valley, but within them. The second day's exploration had
located a cave which led in turn to an inner system of galleries,
through one of which the rivers wove a way. Habituated to such a
dwelling from their years in the Cleft, they seized upon this
discovery eagerly. More of the adult passengers were awakened and
put to work assembling machines, laboring to make the caves into a
new home which could not be easily detected. For the threat kept
before them by the ruined farm was always in their minds.
Three more bodies were carried from the star ship to be interred
beside Lui Skort, still encased in the boxes which had held them
during the voyage. But Kordov continued to insist that they had
been very lucky. There were fifteen men at work now, and ten women
added their strength to harvesting the strange grain and making
habitable the cave dwelling.
"Blast it!" Kimber drew out of the motor section of the sled and
made a grab at thin air.
"What's the matter?" Dard began. Then he caught sight of what
had brought the pilot to the exploding point.
A hopper bounded toward the tall grass, something shiny between
its front paws. Stealing again!
Dard dived, and his fingers closed about the small, frantically
kicking body, while a squeak which approached a scream rent the
quiet of their outdoor workshop. The boy freed his captive to nurse
a bitten hand, but the hopper had also dropped the bolt it had
stolen. Now it retired empty pawed into the bushes uttering
impolite remarks concerning Dard's destination and ancestry.
"Better go and have that bite looked after," Kimber ordered with
resignation as he accepted the rescued bolt.
"I don't know what we are going to do about those little beasts.
They'd carry off everything they could lug if we didn't watch them
all the time. Regular pack rats."
Dard cradled the bitten hand in the other. "I'd like to find one
of their burrows, or nests, or whatever they build to keep their
loot in. It should be a regular curiosity shop."
"If any one can—you will," Cully spoke from the cylinder he was
dismantling. "Ever notice, Sim," he continued, "how this kid gets
around? I'll wager he could walk through the grain field and not
make a sound or leave a trail another could follow. How'd you ever
learn that useful trick, fella?"
Dard was sober. "The hard way, living as an outlaw. You know,
those hoppers are awful pests, but I can't help admiring them."
Kimber snorted. "Why? Because they know what they want and go
after it? They are single-minded, aren't they? Only I wish they
were a little more timid. They should be more like the duck-dogs,
willing to watch us, but keeping their distance. Cut along, kid,
and get that finger seen to right away. Working hours aren't over
yet."
Dard traced Carlee Skort to where she was busy fitting up the
small dispensary, a niche in the wall of the second cave, and had
his bite sterilized and bandaged with plasta-skin.
"Hoppers!" She shook her head. "I don't know what we're going to
do to discourage them. They stole Trude's little paring knife
yesterday and three spools of thread."
He could understand her dismay over these losses. Little things,
yes—but articles which could not be replaced.
"Luckily they appear to be afraid to come into the caves. So far
we haven't caught any of them inside. But they are the most
persistent and accomplished thieves I have ever seen. Dard, when
you go out, stop in the kitchen and pick up a lunch for your
working crew. Trude should have the packets made up by now."
He obediently made his way past work gangs into the other small
cave room where Trude Harmon with an assistant was setting out
stacks of plastic containers. The rich scent which filled the air
tickled Dard's nose and made him very aware of hunger. It had been
hours and hours since breakfast!
"Oh, it's you," Trude greeted him. "How many in your gang?"
"Three."
Her lips moved, counting silently, as she apportioned the
containers and set them in a carrier.
"Mind you bring those back. And don't, don't you dare leave them
where any hoppers can put paw on them!"
"No, ma'am. Something sure smells good."
She smiled proudly. "Those golden apples. We stewed some up into
a kind of pudding. Just you wait 'til you taste it, young man.
Which reminds me—where is that queer leaf, Petra?"
The dark-haired girl who had been stirring the largest pot on
the stove pulled a glossy green leaf from one of her pockets. It
was an almost perfect triangle in shape— green, threaded by bright
red and yellow veins.
"Ever see one like that before, Dard?" Trude asked.
He took it and examined it curiously before he answered with a
shake of his head.
"Pinch it and give a sniff!" Trude suggested.
He did and the good odor of cooking was nullified by another
aromatic, clean fragrance, a mixture of herb and flower—of all the
pleasant scents he had ever known.
"You can rub it on skin or hair and the scent lingers," Petra
told him eagerly.
"And you'll never guess where we got that one," Trude broke in.
"Tell him."
"I saw a hopper carrying it out in the grain field when I was
gleaning yesterday. I thought it had been stealing from our food
and chased it. Then when it wriggled through a hole in the brush
fence it dropped the leaf. I picked it up and at first we thought
it might be good to eat because the hopper wanted it. But it is
just nice perfume."
"Sure, and if you want to get on the good side of the kitchen
detail," Trude twinkled at him "you just find out where you can get
about a peck of those, Dard. We ain't got the smell of that ship
off: us yet—nasty chemicals. And we'd admire a chance to get some
perfume. You do a little looking around when you're off on this
jaunt of yours and see what you can find us. Now—clear out. Take
your lunch."
Dard gave the leaf back to Petra and picked up the carrier. But
he went out of the kitchen puzzled. What had Trude meant by "this
jaunt of yours?" As far as he knew he was not intending to leave
the valley. Had some other plans been made?
He started back to Kimber, determined to have an
explanation.
"Lunch, huh?" Cully crawled out from under the cylinder as Dard
sat the carrier on the ground. The engineer wiped his hands on the grass and then on a piece of
waste. "What do they have for us this time?"
"Stew of apples for one thing," Dard returned impatiently.
"Listen, Kimber, Mrs. Harmon said something about my going on an
expedition."
Sim Kimber pried the lid off a container of stew and poked into
the depths of the savory mixture before he replied.
"We have to earn our keep, kid. And not being specialists in
anything but woodcraft and transportation, it's up to us to do what
we can along those lines. You knew the woods and mountains back on
earth, and you have a feeling for animals. So Kordov assigned you
to the exploration department."
Dard sat very still, afraid to answer, afraid to burst out with
the wild exultation which surged in him now. He had tried, tried so
hard these past few days to follow Harmon's overpowering interest
in the land, to be another, if unskilled, pair of hands in the work
about the cave. But the machines they were assembling at top speed
were totally unknown to him. The men who worked on them lapsed into
a jargon of functions he knew nothing about, until it seemed that
they jabbered a foreign tongue.
For so long he had been responsible for others—for Lars and
Dessie, for their food, their shelter, even their safety. And now
he was not even responsible for himself. He was beginning to feel
useless, for here he knew so little that was of any account.
All his training had been slanted toward keeping alive, at a
minimum level of existence, in a hostile world. With that pressure
removed he believed he had nothing to offer the colonists.
What he had dreamed and longed to do was to leave this compact
group where he was the outsider, to go on into this new world,
searching out its wonders, whether that meant trailing a hopper to
its mysterious lair or flying above the cliffs into the unknown
country beyond. Exploration was what he wanted, wanted so badly
that sometimes just thinking about it hurt.
And here was Kimber offering him that very thing! Dard could not
say anything. But maybe his eyes, his rapturous face answered for
him, as the pilot glanced up, met Dard's wide happy eyes; and
quickly looked away. Then the boy's feelings were under control
again, and he was able to say, in what he believed was a level and
unmoved voice:
"But what are you planning?"
"Go up and over." It was Cully who answered that before Kimber
could swallow his mouthful of stew. "We load up this old bus," the
engineer patted the sled affectionately, "and take off to see what
lies on the other side of the cliffs. Mainly to discover whether we
need expect any visitors."
"We—who?"
Kimber named those who would share in the adventure.
"I'll pilot. Cully goes along to keep the sled ticking. And
Santee is to provide the strong right arm."
"To fight—?" But Dard didn't complete that question before
Kimber had an answer.
"Killing," he said, staring thoughtfully down at the full spoon
he balanced on its way to his mouth, "is not on the program if we
can help it. Even such pests as—Cully! behind you!"
The engineer slowed around just in time to snatch up a small
wrench and so baffle the furry thief that tried to seize it.
"Even those pests are safe from us," Kimber continued before he
added to the swearing engineer, "Why don't you sit on everything,
Jorge? That's what I am doing." He moved to let them see that all
the smaller tools he had been using were now covered by his body.
"It may not be comfortable, but they'll still be here when I need
them!
"No," he returned to his earlier theme, "we're not going to kill
anything if we can help it. To save our lives—for food, if it is
absolutely necessary. But not for sport—or because we are unsure!"
His lips twisted in a sneer. "Sport! The greatest sport of all is
the hunting of man! As man finally discovered, having terrorized
all of the rest of the living earth. Our species killed
wantonly—now we have a second choice and chance. Maybe we can be
saner this time. So—Santee is a crack shot—but that does not mean
he is going to use the rifle."
Dard had only one more question. "When do we go?"
"Tomorrow morning, early. On our last swing around the cliffs
two days ago we sighted indications of a road leading eastward from
the other side. It could be the guide we want."
They finished their work upon the sled in mid-afternoon and
spent the remaining hours of work time stowing away supplies and
equipment. Kimber made preparations for five days' absence from the
valley—flying east to the interior of the land mass on which the
star ship had earthed.
"That tube we found pointed in that direction. If it was a
freight carrier for some city—and I am of the opinion that it
was—that's where we may find the remains of civilization."
Kimber's voice came muffled as he checked dials behind the wind
screen of the aircraft.
"Yeah." Santee added a small bag of his own to the supplies.
"But—after what we seen at that there farmhouse—they played rough
around here once upon a time. Better watch out that we don't get
shot down before we make peace signs."
"It's been a long time since the farm was looted," Dard ventured
to point out. "And why didn't the looters return—if they were the
winners in some war. Harmon says this land is rich, that any farmer
would settle here."
"Soldiers ain't farmers," said Santee. "Me, I'd say this was
lootin' done by an army or somebody like them blasted Peacemen.
They was out to smash and grab and run. Land don't mean nothin', to
them kinda guys. But I see what Harmon means. If the war ended why
didn't somebody come back here to rebuild? Yeah, that's sense."
"Maybe there was no one left," Dard said.
"Blew themselves up?" Kimber's expressive eyebrows rose as he
considered that. "Kind of wholesale, even for a big-time war. The
burn-off took most of Terra's cities and the purge killed off the
people who could rebuild them. But there were still plenty of men
kicking around afterward. Of course, they were ahead of us
technically here—those things in the carrier point to that. Which
argues that—if they were like us—they were way ahead in the
production of bigger and more lethal weapons, too. Well, I have a
feeling that tomorrow or the next day we're going to learn about
it."
The light was that gray wash which preceded sunrise when Dard
sat up in his bedroll to answer the shadowy figure who roused him.
He shivered, more with excitement than the morning chill, as he
rolled his bag together and stole after Cully out of the cave to
the sled.
There the four explorers made a hasty breakfast on cold scraps
while Kimber talked disjointedly with Kordov, Harmon and Rogan.
"We'll say five days," he said. "But it may be longer. Give us a
good margin for error. And don't send out after us if we don't make
it back. Just take precautions."
Kordov shook his head. "No man is expendable here, Sim, not any
more. But why should we borrow trouble in such large handfuls? I
will not believe that you won't return! You have the list of
plants, of things you are to look for?"
Simba Kimber touched a breast pocket in answer. Cully took his
place in the second seat of the sled and beckoned Dard to join him.
When Kimber was behind the control Santee scrambled in, a stun
rifle across his big knees.
"I'll listen for any broadcast," Rogan promised. And Harmon
mouthed something which might have been either reminder or farewell
as Kimber took them up into the crisp air of the dawn.
Dard was too excited to waste any time waving goodbye or looking
back into the safety of the valley. Instead he was leaning forward,
his body tense, as if by the sheer power of his will he could speed
their flight into the unknown.
They kept to a speed about equal to that of a running man as
they followed the cliffs along to the narrow upper end of the
valley. Close packed below to the edge of those stone wails was the
woods the exploring parties had located earlier, only to be kept
from penetration by the density of the growth.
"Queer stuff," Cully remarked now as they soared over the tree
tops. "A limb grows long, bends over to the ground, touches, then
takes root and another tree starts to grow out right there. That
whole mass down there may have started with just one tree. And you
can't break or hack through it!"
The sky before them was bannered with pink streamers. A flight
of the delicately hued butterfly-birds circled them and then flew
as escort until they were just beyond the valley wall. What the
explorers saw beneath them now was a somber earth-covering blanket
of blue-green, vaguely dismal and depressing with its unchanging
darkness. Another collection of the self-planting trees made an
effective border along the eastern side of the cliffs, and this was
not a small wood but a far-stretching forest.
"There!" Santee pointed downward. "That there's it! Them trees
cover it some, but I say it's a road!"
A narrow ribbon of a light-colored substance, hidden for long
distances by the invading trees, ran due east. Kimber brought the
sled into line over it.
But it was a full hour before they reached the end of the forest
and saw clearly the cracked and broken highway which was their
guide. It threaded across open plains where now and again they
sighted more of the dome dwellings standing alone and deserted,
wreathed with masses of greenery.
"No people—the land is empty," Dard commented as the sled
crossed the fourth of these.
"War," Kimber wondered, "or diseases . . . Must have made a clean
sweep in this section. And a long time ago—by the growth of the
bushes and the appearance of the road."
It was more than two hours after they left the valley that they
came upon what had been a village. And here was the first clue to
the type of disaster which had struck the land. One vast pit was
the center of the clustered domes. Crushed and shattered buildings
ringed it, bearing the stains and melted smears of intense
heat.
"Air raid?" Cully asked of the silence. "They got it good—and
for keeps; it was war then."
Kimber did not circle the damage. Instead he stepped up the
speed of the sled, driven by the same desire that possessed them
all, the longing to know what lay beyond the broken horizon.
A second town, larger, brutally treated, its remaining
structures half melted, its heart a crater, passed under them. Then
again open country, beaded by deserted farms. The road ended at
last in a city, shattered, smashed. A city planted on the shore of
a bay, for here the sea curved in from the northwest to meet them
once more.
There were towers, snapped, torn, twisted, until those in the
sled could not be sure of their original shape, looming beside dark
sores of craters. And at the waterside there was literally nothing
but a slick expanse of crystalline slag reflecting the sun's
rays.
Sea waves lipped that slag, but its edges remained unworn by the
touch of water and time alike. And beyond, in the bay, the waves
also curled restlessly about other wreckage—ships? Or parts of the
buildings blown there?
Kimber cruised slowly across the spiderweb map of the ancient
streets. But the wreckage was so complete they could only guess at
the use or meaning of what they saw. Mounds of disintegrating metal
might mark the residue of ground transportation devices, their
weathered erosion testifying in part to the age of the disaster.
And from the sled the explorers sighted nothing at all which might
mark the remains of those who had lived there.
They landed on a patch of grassy ground before a huge pile of
masonry which had three walls still standing. The ruined farmhouse
had pictured for them tragedy, fear and cruelty. But this whole
city—it was impersonal, too much. Such complete wreckage was
closer to a dream.
"Atom bomb, H-bomb, Null-bomb," Cully recited the list of the
worst Terra had known. "They must have had them here—all of
them!"
"And they were certainly men—for they used them!" Kimber added
savagely. He climbed out of the sled and faced the building. Its
walls reflected the sun as if they were of some metallic substance
but softly, with a glow of green-blue—as if the blocks used in
building had been quarried of sea water. A flight of twelve steps,
as wide as a Terran city block, led up to a mighty portal through
which they could see the sun glow bright in the roofless
interior.
Around that portal ran a band of colors, blending and
contrasting in a queer way which might have had meaning and yet did
not—for Terran eyes. As he studied the hues Dard thought he had a
half-hint. Perhaps those colors did have a deliberate
sequence—perhaps they were more than just decoration.