He climbed down the rocky promontory in front of the cave after resting there for a while, and perceived a thin, rusty streak that extended across the dry stones to the opposite side of the gorge floor. As he reached the spot, he saw that they were traces of blood. They had dried completely and faded, and had it not been for the unusually bright white color of the limestone-like rocks, he would most likely have missed the tracks. He tried to determine which direction the wounded man must have taken, but it was hopeless. So he marched up the valley arbitrarily, driven by the thought that the blood must have come from someone who was wounded during the battle between the Cyclops and the cloud, someone who had tried to leave the battle scene. The tracks intersected and broke off in places, but eventually they led him toward a cave which was one of the first he had searched before. He was all the more astonished when—directly by the entrance to the cave—a vertical, shaft-like narrow cleft opened, which he had failed to notice earlier. The blood ended there. Rohan kneeled down and bent over the shadowy hole in the ground. Although he had been prepared for the worst, he could not suppress a stifled cry when he saw Benningsen’s head staring at him with empty eye sockets and bared teeth. He recognized the man by his gold-rimmed glasses, whose lenses had remained undamaged by some fluke of fate and now sparkled brightly in the light reflected from the limestone slab that tilted over the stone coffin. The geologist was wedged between boulders, his shoulders jammed into the natural lining of the rocky shaft, so that his body had remained upright. Rohan did not want to leave the man’s remains behind, but when he gathered up his courage and tried to lift the body, through the thick material of the protective suit he could feel the corpse disintegrating under his touch. Decay had already done its work, accelerated by the effect of the sunrays that penetrated this spot every day. Rohan finally zipped open the breast pocket in Benningsen’s suit and removed the scientist’s dog tag. Before moving on, he gathered up his last ounce of strength and rolled one of the nearest rock slabs toward the shaft to seal the rocky tomb.
The first man had been found. Not until Rohan was a good distance away did it occur to him that he ought to have tested the corpse for radioactivity, for the degree of contamination might shed some light on the fate that had befallen the geologist and his friends. A high radioactive count would have proved that the dead man had been near the scene of the atomic battle. But he had forgotten to make the test, and nothing could have induced him to roll the coffin’s stone lid aside again. At the same time, Rohan became aware how important a role chance was playing during his endeavors, for he had undoubtedly made a thorough search all around this spot when he had first been there.
Inspired by a new thought, he now hastily pursued the blood trail in order to find its beginning. The trail led almost in a straight line down into the valley, in the direction of the atomic battlefield. But after just a few hundred paces, the trail made a sudden turn. The geologist had lost a great deal of blood; thus it was all the more surprising that he should have come so far. The stones, which had not been touched by a single drop of rain since the catastrophe, were covered with blood. Rohan climbed some large wobbly boulders and found himself in a spacious, basin-like trough below a barren cliff. The first thing he saw was the huge metal sole of a robot. It lay on its side, evidently split down the middle by a Weyr gun. Off to the side, farther down, a man was leaning against a stone in a half-seated position, his body almost folded over in two halves; his helmet was blackened by soot. The man was dead. The Weyr gun still dangled from his limp hand, its glittering barrel touching the ground. Rohan did not immediately dare to touch the man; instead, he knelt next to him and tried to look into his face, but it was just as disfigured by decay as Benningsen’s had been. Just then he discovered the broad, flat satchel of the geologist hanging over the shrunken shoulder of the corpse. It was Regnar himself, the leader of the expedition that had been attacked in the crater. According to the radioactivity readings, the Arctane had been wrecked by the charge of a Weyr gun: the indicator registered the characteristic isotopes of rare earth. Rohan wanted to remove Regnar’s dog tag but he could not bring himself to do it. He simply unbuckled the satchel, so that he did not have to touch the corpse. But the satchel was crammed full with samples of various minerals. He hesitated briefly, then with his knife cut off the geologist’s initials which were fastened to the leather. He put the metal initials in his pocket. Then, standing on a tall rock, he surveyed the entire scene once more, trying to comprehend what actually had happened here. It looked as if Regnar had shot at the robot. Had the Arctane perhaps attacked the geologist or Benningsen? Was it even possible for an amnesiac to have fended off an attack? He realized that he would never find the solution to this mystery; he had to continue his search. Once more he glanced at his watch; it was almost five o’clock. If he had to rely on his own oxygen supply, then he would have to start back now. But it suddenly occurred to him that he could remove the oxygen container from Regnar’s backpack. He lifted the entire apparatus from the dead man’s shoulders and found that one of the flasks was still full. He exchanged it for his empty container and started to pile up stones around the corpse. This took nearly one hour, but he felt that the dead man had more than paid for it by handing over his oxygen supply. When the stone mound was complete, Rohan considered that it would have been a good idea to equip himself with a weapon, and the Weyr gun was probably still loaded. But again he had thought of it too late and had to leave the scene empty-handed.
It was close to six o’clock. He was so tired that he could hardly drag his feet. He still had four stimulant tablets in his possession. He took one of them and after a minute felt sufficiently revived to get up from the ground. Since he had not the faintest idea where to press on with his search, he simply walked forward in the direction of the rock gate. He was still more than half a mile away when his geiger counter warned him of increasing radioactive contamination. For the time being the contamination was fairly mild, and he walked ahead, keeping the surrounding terrain under observation. Since the ravine had many turns, only some of the rocks showed traces of the melting process on their surfaces. The farther he advanced, the more frequently he encountered the characteristic cracked glaze, until eventually he saw entire boulders congealed into one single, huge blister, where their rocky surface must have boiled when the thermal explosions hit. Actually there was no reason for him to stay here any longer; yet he kept walking on. The counter on his wrist gave off a light ticking sound that gradually picked up speed, until the instrument hand danced madly across the scale of the dial. At long last he recognized, far off in the distance, the remains of the rock gate, which had collapsed into a trough-like crater. The crater resembled a small lake whose waters, as a result of the tremendous impact, had splashed out over the shoreline, where they had become solidified in weird shapes. The base of the rock gate had changed into a thick lava crust and the formerly black pelt of the metal shrubs had turned into a uniformly ragged rug of ashes. Between the rock walls in the interior of the ravine glistened gigantic clefts of lighter coloration. Rohan swiftly turned back again.
Once again chance came to his aid. As he reached a second, considerably broader rock gate behind the scene of the battle, nearby, on a spot he had previously passed by, he noticed a sparkling metal object. It was the aluminum reductor of an oxygen container. In a shallow crevice between the rock and the dry bed of the brook he saw a man’s dark back clad in a spacesuit blackened by smoke. The corpse had no head. The terrible air pressure had hurled the man across a stone heap and dashed him against the rocks. To the side lay an undamaged weapon holster with a Weyr gun firmly wedged inside, gleaming brightly as if it had only recently been polished. Rohan picked up the gun. He wanted to identify the dead man, but it was impossible.
He continued to march up along the ravine. Over on the eastern slope, the light was already red and glided up like a flaming curtain as the sun sank behind the mountain crest. It was a quarter to seven. Rohan was faced with a real dilemma
. So far he had been lucky—in one sense, at least: he had carried out his task, had escaped safe and sound, and could now return to the space cruiser. He was convinced that the fourth man was no longer alive, but they had assumed as much back aboard the Invincible. His duty now was to make sure that this was really the case. Did he have the right to turn back now? The oxygen supply from Regnar’s tank would last another six hours. However, a whole night lay before him, and he would be unable to undertake anything, not just because of the cloud, but simply because he was almost totally exhausted. He swallowed another pill, and while he waited for its effect to take place, he tried to design a halfway reasonable plan for the rest of his mission.
The blood-red glow of the setting sun now bathed the black jungle on the mountain ridge high above him with ever-deepening shades: the sharp points of the bushes sparkled and shimmered in deep violet hues.
Rohan still could not make up his mind. As he sat there under a huge boulder, he heard in the distance the full-toned hum of the approaching cloud. And strangely enough—he was not frightened. Throughout the course of this one day his relationship with the cloud had undergone strange changes. He knew—or at least he believed he knew—how far he could go, like a mountain climber who has no fear of the death lurking on the icy walls of a glacier. In point of fact, he was not fully aware of this inner change, for his mind had not consciously registered the moment when his senses first opened to the somber beauty of the black brushy growths that shimmered in opalescent tinges of violet on the slopes. But now, even as he caught sight of two black clouds swarming out off the opposite slopes and coming closer, he did not move at all, nor did he try to protect himself by pressing his face against the rocks. After all, it made no difference whatever he did as long as the hidden instrument was working properly. He fingered the thick cloth of his protective suit, trying to locate the coin-like disc sewn into his collar, and with his fingertips he felt a delicate vibration. In order not to challenge fate, he settled in a more comfortable position, to avoid shifting his body unnecessarily. The clouds now occupied both sides of the ravine. Some kind of an order-creating stream seemed to flow through the black globular densities, for now the clouds thickened at the edges, while their interior surfaces arched out steadily, reaching out toward each other. As if a giant sculptor were shaping them with swift, invisible strokes. Brief discharges flashed through the air between the closest points of the two clouds. They seemed to race toward each other, yet each remained on its own side, and only the spherical condensations in the middle fluttered in an increasingly violent rhythm. The glare of these bolts of lightning was strangely dark. Both clouds flared up in this light for a few seconds, like myriads of silvery-black crystals arrested in their flight. Muffled thunderclaps bounced back and forth a few times from the rock walls, which suddenly seemed covered by some sound-absorbing material, and then both sides of the black ocean met, quivering and tensed to the utmost, and flowed into each other. The air underneath grew dark, as if the sun had set, and at the same time blurry fleeting lines made their appearance inside. It was some time before Rohan understood what it was that confronted him there: the grotesquely contorted mirror image of the bottom of the valley. In the meantime, the mirage below the cloud bank surged and expanded, until all at once he perceived a gigantic human figure whose head projected into the darkness. The figure stared straight at him without moving, although the image itself quivered and danced ceaselessly, flaring up and dying down in a constant, mysterious rhythm. And once more several seconds passed before he recognized in it his own mirror image, a fata morgana floating in the empty space between the lateral lobes of both clouds. He was so amazed, so paralyzed by the inexplicable activity of the cloud, that he forgot everything. He thought that perhaps the cloud was aware of him, of the microscopic presence of the last living human being in the midst of the rocks: however, even that thought did not frighten him. Not that it seemed too unlikely—nothing was impossible at this point—he simply felt an urge to participate in this murky mystery, whose significance, he was quite sure, would forever remain beyond his understanding. His gigantic mirror image, through which he caught faint glimpses of the distant rock walls, became diffused in the upper parts of the gorge, where the shadow of the cloud did not extend. At the same time, innumerable arms extruded from the cloud. As soon as it had reabsorbed some of these projections, new ones appeared in their place. A black rain began to fall, constantly growing heavier. Tiny crystals dashed over him, brushed against his head and slid down along his protective suit, accumulating in the folds of the garment. The black rain kept falling and the voice of the cloud swelled to a crescendo, to a raging sound which apparently filled not only the valley, but the entire atmosphere of the planet. Individual whirlpools formed inside the cloud, like windows through which the sky could be seen. The black cloak tore right down the middle and two mountainous clouds sailed sluggishly toward the brushwork, submerged and finally vanished in the motionless, rigid thicket.
Rohan still dared not make a move. He could not make up his mind whether it was advisable to shake off the crystals that were strewn all over him. They lay everywhere on the stones, and the entire bed of the brook, that heretofore had glistened as white as snow, seemed sprayed with ink. Carefully, he seized a triangular crystal between thumb and forefinger. Suddenly it appeared to come alive, brushed against his hand with a delicate breath of warmth and rose into the air as Rohan instinctively opened his fist. All of a sudden, as if on cue, the whole surrounding area began to crawl like an anthill. The movement was chaotic for a bare second, then black points formed a kind of misty layer hovering close to the ground, concentrated, grew dense, clustered and climbed skyward like pillars. It looked as if the boulders themselves had turned into gigantic, sacrificial flameless torches. At this instant an incomprehensible maneuver took place: while the ascending swarm hung exactly above the center section of the gorge, hovering there like a cumulus cloud, there emerged, pitted against the gradually darkening sky the gigantic black balloons of those clouds that but a short while ago had vanished in the brushy growths and now raced with incredible speed toward the first cloud suspended quietly in mid-air. Rohan thought he heard the peculiar grinding noise of colliding air masses, but it was probably just a delusion. He was all ready to believe that he was witnessing a battle, that the clouds had managed to expel the dead insects they had wanted to get rid of and dash them to the bottom of the valley—and then it all turned out to be nothing but a false conclusion on his part. The clouds parted and nothing remained of the puffed-up sphere. They simply had swallowed it. Soon after, only the mountain tops bled as before in the last rays of the setting sun, and the wide basin lay quiet and deserted.
Rohan got to his feet and stood there on shaky legs. Suddenly he felt ridiculous standing there with the Weyr gun he had taken so hastily from the dead man: he felt so superfluous in this realm of perfected death, where only dead forms could emerge victoriously in order to enact mysterious rites never to be witnessed by any living creature. Not with horror, but rather with numbed awe and great admiration had he participated in the fantastic spectacle that just had taken place. He knew that no scientist would be capable of sharing his sentiments, but now his desire was no longer merely to return and report what he had found out about their companions’ deaths, but to request that this planet be left alone in the future. Not everywhere has everything been intended for us, he thought as he slowly descended. There was still some light in the sky, and he soon arrived at the scene of the battle. There he had to speed up his pace, because of the increasing radiation from the glassy boulders, which whizzed by like eerie silhouettes in the descending dusk. The rock walls picked up the reverberation of his steps and passed it on, and accompanied by the sound of this endless echo, summoning him to a tremendous haste, he jumped from rock to rock, straining to the utmost, ran past fragments of machines, molten beyond recognition, and reached a winding slope—but here too the dial glowed ruby red as he checked his radiation coun
ter.
He dared not stand still, although he had become short of breath. Without slowing down his pace he turned the reductor of his oxygen tank almost all the way over to stop. Even if he used up all his oxygen by the time he arrived at the end of the ravine, and then had to breathe the air of this planet, it would certainly still be preferable to remaining here longer than absolutely necessary, where each square inch of rock emitted deadly radiation. The oxygen pounded against the inside of his mouth like a cool wave. He raced easily over the surface of the congealed lava stream, which the retreating Cyclops had left behind along the trail of its defeat. The path was smooth, in some places even glassy. Fortunately he wore well-fitting shoes with rubber-tread soles and did not skid. In the meantime it had grown so dark that he could make out the downward road only by occasional brightly gleaming pebbles which peered out from under the layer of glass. The path led downhill all the time. He knew that there was at least another mile and a half of such road ahead. It was impossible during this wild chase to make any calculations but now and then he nevertheless managed to glance quickly at the pulsating red dial of his radiation counter. About one hour would be the upper safety limit for staying here among these rocks, bent and cleft due to the annihilation; then his exposure to the rays would not exceed 200 Roentgen. An hour and a quarter would still be acceptable, but if he should not reach the desert’s edge by that time, there would no longer be any reason to hurry.
About twenty minutes later Rohan reached the crisis point. His heart felt like a cruel insuperable entity that alternately tried to push his chest apart from the inside and then squeezed it together again. The oxygen burned his mouth and throat like raw, liquid fire; sparks danced before his eyes. The worst part, however, was that he began to stumble more and more frequently. Although the radiation had diminished somewhat by now and the indicator barely glimmered in the dark, like a dying ember, he knew that he must hurry on despite all, had to keep running, while his legs threatened to give out. Every muscle fiber had had enough by now; every cell of his body was screaming for him to stop and throw himself down onto the seemingly cool, harmless, cracked glass sheets on the grounds. He tried to glance up to the stars but he tripped and fell headlong onto his outstretched hands. Sobbing, he gasped for air. He scrambled to his feet again, staggered on for a few steps, until the rhythm returned and carried him along. By now he had lost all sense of time. How could he find his way around at all in this gloomy blackness? He had forgotten the dead, the bony, sardonic grin of Benningsen; Regnar, resting under the heaped-up stones next to the demolished Arctane; the man without a head whom he had been unable to identify; he had even forgotten, yes, the cloud. He was totally crushed by this darkness; it had forced the blood into his eyes that, in vain, looked for the big starry sky above the desert—the sandy wasteland seemed like a port of refuge to him now. He hurried on blindly, his eyelids smarting with sweat, driven by some inner force whose undiminished presence kept amazing him from time to time. Would this ceaseless running, would this night ever take an end?
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