by Leo Lukas
Then the conference was over. Garm Hesset felt an almost reprehensible tingling feeling of anticipation. He stepped before the cube-shaped control module floating in the air and switched on the Construction.
"Thank you," Icho Tolot had said over the com, and his own voice had answered him from the Space-Jet: "You're welcome."
He felt as though he had been struck by lightning—frozen, as though touched by the icy breath of Eternity.
Although it was severely overloaded due to all the many emergency measures it was processing, he had the struggling on-board computer run a voice analysis of the com message. The result was precisely what Tolot expected. On the basis of the sound parameters, wave envelope curves, ascending and descending tones, and other characteristic features, it could be stated without any doubt that the speaker was the Halutian, Icho Tolot.
"How is that possible?" he asked over the still open connection. "No one can exist as two selves at the same time. Or can they?"
"You will understand, Ichos," came the reply. "I may not say more since I did not say more."
A coded data packet arrived, then the Space-Jet disappeared from his detection range as though it had never existed. Which of course could have just been the result of the now only limited functioning of his ship's systems. Tolot opened the data file. A large-format, three-dimensional depiction of Gorbas IV appeared, and on it a conspicuous mountain formation on one of the continents in the southern hemisphere had been marked in color.
This world was listed in the star catalogs as life-hostile. If Tolot could trust his instruments—and given the current state of the HALUTE, he couldn't do so absolutely—it was choked with vegetation. He roared under a thousand meters over the highest elevations, observing in fascination how gigantic vines whipped towards him. He was too fast for them, however, so they snaked after the smoke cloud that trailed him like a comet's tail. He circled the planet twice until he was certain he would recognize the formation again. Then he turned the ship over to the autopilot and stepped out.
Braking with his battlesuit's antigrav, he had hardly put two or three kilometers between him and the HALUTE when a combined energy beam from a previously inactive ground position struck it. The spherical spacecraft went into a spin, crashed, and bored its way into a rocky slope. Explosions rocked the mountain cliffs, triggering avalanches and mud-slides.
Icho Tolot found himself about a hundred kilometers from the position that the other Icho Tolot had given him.
His first thought was: Where is Perry?
It was like flying through Hell itself. However, the Terran Resident piloted the lifeboat undamaged through the storm of energy beams that shot at him from the surface of Gorbas IV.
Solina Tormas admired the calmness with which Perry Rhodan operated the controls. Meanwhile, he'd even had time to reassure his passengers: "This looks worse than it is. The automatic targeting is set for larger objects. We're too small, too well-shielded, and too maneuverable for them to get a lock on us."
They dove through the cloud deck and shot over the bizarre landscape that stretched out beneath them.
Boryk was open-mouthed with astonishment, and Solina was much the same. She had always liked to travel and had visited many exotic planets. Although she personally preferred a dry climate, hot and humid jungle worlds were not unfamiliar to her. But the unleashed flora and fauna of Gorbas IV was beyond anything she could have imagined. The plant and animal kingdoms of the planet seemed to have gone completely mad. They were so grotesquely oversized that it was though she wasn't looking through the small craft's porthole but through the lenses of a microscope. Pale vines, many kilometers long snaked towards them. At the ends of towering, glistening brown stalks were seedpods the size of a corvette-class spaceship. They swelled in a fraction of a second, burst, and spewed a thousand purple spheres over the waving botanical inferno that shimmered in all shades of green and blue. Blossoms the size of tennis courts unfolded and flooded their surroundings with reddish-gold slime. Moments later they had rotted into a fertile bed of compost for new wildly sprouting growths.
"It's sick, repellant, unnatural," Isaias Shimon said, shaking his head. "You can bet it's not the product of undisturbed evolution. Such abnormal plant growth can't happen in any extreme ecosphere like this. So it has to be artificially induced. Those aren't plants, they're tumors."
"Could it be due to the radiation we detected emanating from the planet's interior?" Hartich van Kuespert asked.
"Very possibly. What we're observing here is a constant mutation taking place at an insane speed. It's almost like a time-lapse movie, without any control or purpose—if you ignore the fact that certain growth genes are being systematically forced. This can't go on for long, and it won't go on for long because the soil will soon be exhausted. Disgusting."
"If this rape of nature is the work of the Beasts," Solina said, "what are they trying to accomplish?"
"Biological warfare, girl." Hayden Norwell grinned lewdly. "The impenetrable jungle will be their first line of defense against an invasion by foot soldiers. In an environment like this they will be considerably at an advantage over our kind. Pray, folks, that we don't have to get out of the lifeboat. Otherwise we'll have a little nature hike to look forward to that I wouldn't exactly call a walk in the park."
She didn't like the prospector, but she had to admit he was right. Even the weather was going crazy. They flew through tropical cloudbursts, over areas where whirlwinds raged, and repeatedly saw thick columns of smoke from forest fires ... No, Solina wouldn't go outside for anything in the world, not even wearing her space suit, although she was aware that the security of the lifeboat was only an illusion.
Something like a black leech larger than the PALENQUE, LAS-TOOR, and HALUTE put together suddenly leaped up from the green hell. Going higher and higher, it almost reached the craft, but then fell back again before Rhodan had to take evasive action. Boryk cried out and clung to Solina. She didn't really know how to reassure him, but clumsily patted him on the shoulder while humming a soft melody. Finally he loosened his grip a little.
"How did that thing sense us in spite of our deflector shield?" Hartich wondered. "And how can a body of that size leap so high? Does that thing have a natural built-in detector and anti-grav organ or what?"
"Natural isn't the word for this here," Isaias said disgustedly, "but anything is possible. Maybe it reacts to air movements or residual emissions? Maybe it produces gases within its body that are lighter than air, or maybe it's flung upwards by an organic catapult ... May I take this opportunity to ask, Perry, where exactly we're flying and what we plan on doing there?"
"Our first destination is the HALUTE's landing site. When we've found Icho Tolot, we'll figure out our next step."
Misty veils drifted towards them, enveloping the craft. Rhodan fired the lifeboat's thermo-gun. One of the veils lit up and whirled away, but three more took its place. The animals—if that was what they were—had the form of dirty white polygons more than a kilometer across. They were thin and billowed in the storm wind like canvas sails, and milky lumps of slime hung from their corners. Rhodan swore softly, fired again, then sent the small craft steeply downwards. He rocked it back and forth until Solina felt she was going to be sick, keeping up continuous fire until the last veil-creature was shaken off. When he pulled the lifeboat out of the dive, the jungle was uncomfortably close.
And the leeches. The air was suddenly filled with their pitch-black, twitching bodies. Eight or nine of the creatures leaped at the lifeboat. They died in bursts of ghostly light when they touched the defensive force field, which began to flicker in rainbow-like colors. Now Boryk wasn't the only one screaming. Only Rhodan kept his nerve, wrenching the craft up—into the middle of a cloud of veils. And down, and up, and down ... Although they were strapped into their seats, they were so shaken up that Solina could hardly hear or see any longer. The engines howled like sirens. Back and forth they dodged between the living sails and the leaping worms. Ea
ch time, both above and below, there were more of them. Out the portholes Solina could only make out writhing blackness and dirty white, with bright flashes of light mixed in. Her fear was that Rhodan hadn't been able to see to fly for some time now.
The shield collapsed, formed again at once, only to dissolve flickeringly once more. Suddenly Solina realized that they couldn't hope to hold out against these monsters. Deathly fear seized her. Now she was the one holding Boryk tightly, as though the dwarf—of all people—could reassure her or even give her protection.
I don't want to die! Not here, not now ...
Then there was a sound, so horribly bestial that it went right through her. Boryk howled. She perceived his voice not only with her ears, but with every fiber of her body, even within her brain. Boryk howled. He howled, and the monsters that clung by the dozen to their craft answered him.
Then the view was suddenly free. They were speeding directly towards a wall of rock. In the last second Rhodan managed to turn the lifeboat on end and send it through a narrow crevice without scraping on either side. The crevice became a narrow, winding canyon that Rhodan followed at reduced speed. Sobbing in relief, Solina hung in her safety straps. When she had regained her self-control to the point that she could look around, she saw that the others weren't much better off. Only gradually did the pressure in her head abate.
"Was that you, Boryk?" Rhodan asked as casually as though asking for the time.
"Yes. I'm sorry. I, I didn't w-want to, but I was so afraid ... "
"Take it easy, little guy. Everything's all right and it's thanks to you. I was out of ideas by then and those things were about to finish off the boat and us with it. You saved us, Boryk. Thank you."
"Yes, thank you very much," Hayden Norwell moaned. "My skull feels like the dentist drilled all the way to the midbrain."
Even so, the Lemurian had a radiant expression on his entire child-like face even though his straps were half choking him.
Solina closed her eyes, let the air out of her lungs, wiped the moist streaks of tears from her cheeks. Her knees trembled. The intensity of Boryk's mental outburst had affected the people in the cabin as well as the creatures outside. Even the PsIso-Nets under their helmets had not protected them. Only the mentally stabilized Perry Rhodan had been immune to it.
"It'll pass!" he encouraged his passengers. "More good news—I was just able to make contact with our Halutian friend."
Icho Tolot regretted the wreck of his ship. He would have been keenly interested in seeing how much it had been damaged in the space battle and the crash landing that followed. He wondered if it would ever be capable of traversing the endless expanses of space again. But for now, the answers to those questions would have to wait. There were more important things. Perry and the lifeboat's crew had first priority.
And then ...
"You will understand, Ichos," he had said.
A clue lay hidden in that form of address. Halutians conducted themselves towards other intelligent beings, even those of their own kind, with a distant formality. This was reflected in their manners, which were marked by polite reserve. Only very close friends of many years were permitted a certain intimacy, which was expressed by adding the syllable "-os" to their last name. It was considered a great honor and the highest level of familiarity to be addressed by a Halutian as, for example, "Rhodanos," and in turn to be allowed to address him as "Tolotos."
An informal use of the first name, however, was allowed only in a single case: from older ones to younger ones related by blood. Or, as the Terrans said, from father to child.
"Ichos," the other in the space-jet had said. In—with all probability—the same Space-Jet that the Keeper had used to fly away from the ice planet of Mentack Nutai. "Ichos"—as though he was Tolot's parent. That would have explained the nearly one hundred percent similarity of his outward appearance and voice. Yet Icho Tolot's immediate ancestor had not been alive for thousands of years. Halutians were autogamous beings. Production of an embryo and the ensuing birth of a child was accomplished by conscious control of their bodily functions. That took place only when they sensed their own death was approaching, or when a member of their race had unexpectedly died. Ever since the last 100,000 Halutians had withdrawn to the planet Halute, 37,500 years before the beginning of Old Terran time reckoning, they had kept their population stable. They had sworn to do so shortly after their pacification, and they had held to their promise to the present day.
It was impossible for the Keeper to be Icho Tolot's parent, but he had called him "Ichos” even so. What was he trying to tell him?
That while he wasn't his parent, he was nevertheless an elder? Not his actual ancestor, but ... some kind of older self?
And why did he express himself in such a cryptic manner?
"You will understand, Ichos. I may not say more since I did not say more."
If a time loop had been involved in the events surrounding the star arks ... Halutians had been opposed to experiments with time for as long as they had existed. They didn't believe in a life after death. They neither hoped for eternal bliss nor did they fear eternal damnation. The concept of an all-powerful god, so often encountered among humanoids, frightened them as little as that of its equal counterpart. If there was a nemesis that they warned their offspring against, it was this:
Time paradox.
Tolot the Elder had given Tolot the Younger a destination and at the same time an explanation. Which implied nothing more and nothing less than ...
There was a buzz. The picosyn announced that the lifeboat had finally been detected. Since he and Rhodan used only ultra-brief signals of the lowest intensity in such dangerous situations, that meant the auxiliary craft must be close by.
Good!
Tolot had moved in the direction of the place marked by the Elder and on the way had fought off numerous attacks by the short-lived creeping and flying things that the planet had thrown at him. If he hadn't been so engrossed in his ponderings, he might have even enjoyed the harmless massacre. This was a world practically made for an urge-purge. In their plans for remodeling Gorbas IV, the bio-designers responsible had undoubtedly taken into consideration the nature of its new inhabitants. At certain intervals, Halutians—or "Beasts"—went berserk in order to give free rein to their pent-up aggression. Tolot felt the temptation to drop into the waving foliage and change the molecular structure of his cells. Such a process was completely under his conscious control. His body assumed the consistency and penetrating power of a block of Terkonite steel. He would then simply plunge ahead without holding back, trampling or smashing everything that got in his way and leaving a trail of destruction behind him. He would engrave a message on this world that said: Tolot was here ...
Instead he assured himself that the background radiation emitted by the planet's mutated bioforms would drown out the conversation. He called Perry Rhodan over the com. "We must go higher into the mountains."
"Oh? But why?"
"I do not know, but I know it."
"Uh ... Are you all right, Tolotos?"
"Yes indeed. I will explain it to you very soon. I am now sending you the destination coordinates."
"Got 'em. What do you think we'll find there?"
"The solution to the mystery, Rhodanos. To all the mysteries of the star arks, the Keeper, and Levian Paronn."
Veiling his knowledge and his intentions behind such cryptic hints wasn't at all like Icho Tolot. Still, he must have good reason for it. So Rhodan restrained his curiosity and left things at that for the time being. They agreed that until further notice they would continue on separately, although contacting each other at regular intervals.
Using the structural analysis scanner, Rhodan had scouted the path of the canyon up ahead. He wanted to follow the chasm as much as possible as it wound, more than three kilometers deep, roughly in the direction of their destination. The rocky walls approached each other as closely as ten meters and Rhodan had to continually turn the lifeboat on its si
de to pass through. But he gladly tolerated this uncomfortable flying position because they were spared more attacks from plant and animal monstrosities that way. The biomass churned and writhed at the bottom of the chasm much like out on the plain, but it didn't reach up to them. The overhanging walls above them were encouragingly smooth and bare. The rock was shot through with layers of red. Rhodan wouldn't have thought that the sight of naked rock would ever cheer him up so much. His optimism was short lived though, as they maneuvered around the next bend.
The exterior microphones picked up a distant but rapidly approaching roaring. Then the flood hit. The stream at the bottom of the canyon swelled into a raging river, as though the gates of a colossal reservoir had been opened. Within seconds, the thick liquid had filled the lower third of the narrow gorge. According to the scanner analysis, it wasn't water but a poisonous, radioactively contaminated, viscous sludge. And it was continuing to rise.
At the same time, the arching rock walls above the lifeboat met in the middle and merged into a solid vault.
Rhodan realized that they had flown into a gigantic trap. How the defense mechanism had been triggered didn't greatly concern him, much less whether the process was directly controlled by the Beasts or ran automatically. He kept the small craft balanced, pointed it upwards, and fired the bow-mounted thermo-beamer. Useless. The reddish crystals grew faster than he could turn the heat ray. He gave up the frustrating attempt and flew onwards. Perhaps there would be a chance to escape at the end of the chasm.