Rama: The Omnibus

by Arthur C. Clarke

  Within five minutes a sprinting masket crossed the meadow and burst into the small glade. While it was explaining something to the pair of maskets beside Johann, a loud, deep, enduring noise, reminiscent of a foghorn, resounded in his ears. The three maskets turned instantly, their forehead indentations alive with movement, and looked out into the meadow along the forest line.

  The foghorn sounded again. Johann craned his neck to the side, saw something large and brown in the distance, and then moved closer to the meadow so that the trees would not obstruct his view The five maskets who had carried the two weapons, meanwhile, disappeared immediately into the woods, and the yellow maskets next to Johann dropped down low, out of sight. Only Scarface had the courage to follow Johann to the edge of the forest.

  Johann’s first sight of the creature was terrifying. It was much larger than he had expected. His estimate was that it was approximately the size of a small elephant. The creature was also intelligent, for it was purposely frustrating its masket prey by moving agilely back and forth, staying between the masket and its forest home. At periodic intervals the elevark, as Johann started calling it in his mind, would make its foghorn sound and then eject, in the direction of the masket, a baseball-sized clump of slimy material from the round hole below its long snout. When one of these clumps grazed the masket and knocked it down, the frightened smaller creature made a mistake and broke for the woods.

  Because the masket attempted to reach the forest on Johann’s side of the elevark, he had a perfect view of the kill. Out of the elevark’s snout dropped a long, rigid, cylindrical tube, open at the end, that seized the masket and immediately lifted it off the ground. For an instant Johann could see the masket struggling wildly against the powerful muscles at the end of the elevark’s tube. That struggle and the masket’s pitiful wails ended abruptly, however, when a thick fluid, coming down the elevark’s tube, engulfed the smaller creature and rendered it motionless in a few seconds. With a triumphant bellow, shorter and lower than its foghorn blasts, the elevark sucked the unconscious masket up its dripping tube and then slowly withdrew the bizarre protuberance into its snout.

  Johann was now standing almost in the meadow no more than fifty meters from the elevark. He suddenly realized that the creature, whose pseudojaw was moving up and down presumably preparing the masket for the elevark equivalent of a stomach, was now watching him with whatever eyes it possessed. Just above the snout, in the center of its head, the elevark had a large circular disc with four black holes located on the perimeter, separated one from another by ninety degrees. Johann did not have time to determine if this was indeed the organ that provided sight to the elevark, because the creature made its foghorn sound, expelled a clump of slime that fell far short of Johann, and began to move quickly in his direction.

  Johann, his heart pumping furiously, retreated into the forest. His masket companions had already disappeared. Johann reasoned correctly that the elevark would have great difficulty moving in the forest, so he stopped hurrying when he was thirty meters away from the edge. The elevark, meanwhile, came to the place where Johann had been standing and stuck its snout into the forest, extending its tube twice and searching around to see if it could grab anything of consequence. Johann noted from his secure position that the tube reached out almost three meters.

  The elevark, who had six thick legs the size of tree trunks and a massive body whose underside was a meter off the ground, now squatted at the edge of the meadow and seemed to be peering into the forest with its circular disc. Johann did not move. He could not tell if the elevark saw him. A few minutes later the elevark stood up again, turned around, and trundled back into the meadow

  SCARFACE AND THE yellow masket who had been the emissary returned a few minutes later to the glade where Johann was waiting. Soon thereafter, other yellow maskets arrived, bringing food and water. Johann was surprised to discover how hungry and thirsty he was. As he ate, and stared at his pair of weapons leaning against one of the trees opposite him, Johann realized that the club and the spear would be virtually useless against the elevark.

  So what is my least unsatisfactory option? Johann asked himself grimly, using an expression from his system-engineering days back on Earth. I can’t simply quit. For even if I could find my way back to Maria, I have no assurance that the maskets will release her. He paused, knowing what his next thoughts would be. And an open battle with that elevark will almost certainly result in a quick and painful death.

  As Johann searched for some way out of his predicament, an image from his teenage years, from a trip he had taken with his school class to the Berlin Museum of Natural History popped into his mind. He remembered standing in front of a diorama showing native Americans, armed with only spears and bows, harassing a huge mastodon near the edge of a cliff. “That’s it,” Johann suddenly shouted.

  The maskets around him stopped eating and stared at their alien colleague. Johann sat on his knees, picked up a mixture of mud and leaves, and began fashioning an object that looked a lot like the elevark. Scarface came over beside him to watch. The others followed. “We’ll wait until it’s asleep,” Johann said, pushing the crude elevark over on its side and trying to communicate the concept of sleep with gestures and noises…

  ALL AFTERNOON JOHANN attempted to explain his plan to the maskets. He eventually cleared a sizable section of the forest floor, created a dirt ramp that abruptly terminated to represent the cliff, and even poured water into the trench below the end of the ramp to simulate the lake. Johann used every possible communication technique he could imagine, and he thought that the maskets had understood, but when night came and it was time to implement the plan, all the maskets curled up and went to sleep, as they usually did, at different locations around the glade.

  Johann picked up the spear the masket artisan had fashioned for him and moved noiselessly to the edge of the forest. Questions were racing though his mind. What if the the elevark does not sleep in the meadow? he thought. What if its circular disc is not used for sight? Johann knew that if either of his assumptions was wrong, there was no chance that his plan would work.

  He briefly debated whether or not he should awaken the maskets. I guess I should find the elevark first, he answered himself Johann took a deep breath and then eased out into the meadow to begin his search. He stumbled twice in the unfamiliar territory before deciding to light his torch. Johann knew that the torch would make it easy for the elevark to see him, but he considered it too dangerous to proceed in the dark.

  Johann wandered in the meadow for a long time without finding any sign of the elevark. Once he returned briefly to the glade. The maskets were still sound asleep. On his second excursion into the meadow Johann encountered two large piles of droppings that were warm and fresh. Later, while standing still and drinking from his water pouch, Johann heard a peculiar sound just above his hearing threshold. The noise was off to his right, in the general direction of the cliff. Johann moved slowly in that direction, stopping often. When the sound became louder, and Johann convinced himself that what he was hearing was coming from some kind of an animal, he extinguished his torch. After his eyes had adjusted again to the darkness, Johann moved cautiously toward the sound. At length he was able to make out the outline of a large hulk lying on the ground.

  The creature’s loud snores made it easy to locate from any direction. At one point Johann approached within five meters, close enough that he could ascertain its sleeping position. The elevark stirred, breaking its snoring rhythm, and Johann felt a surge of fear race through him. He stood absolutely still as the elevark relocated its huge mass and continued sleeping.

  Thee times Johann walked back and forth between the cliff and the sleeping elevark, both to measure the distance and to make certain there were no obstacles that might cause him to trip. Twice he dropped down over the side to a ledge, half a meter wide, where he hoped to stand when the charging elevark hurtled over the cliff. Standing on this ledge, Johann noticed that he could barely hear th
e noise of the waterfall. He climbed back up to the meadow and walked along the rim of the cliff beyond the end of the safety ledge. He could no longer hear the waterfall. Johann smiled to himself and made a mental note. He now knew for certain how to find the ledge when, he was retreating.

  He told himself he was ready. Johann took a long, slow drink of water, put the spear in his right hand, and started walking warily toward the elevark. When he heard a guttural growl close to his right ear, Johann’s heart nearly leaped out of his body.

  It was Scarface and the yellow masket. They were carrying the wooden club. Johann took the club in his left hand and then waited several seconds for his pulse rate to slow down. Gesturing to the two maskets to stay behind, Johann moved closer to the elevark.

  From its silhouette Johann could tell that the creature had rolled over while it was sleeping. Its head was now facing the opposite direction. He circumnavigated the elevark and crept up close to the head and snout. The creature’s snores were so loud they hurt Johann’s ears. The smell of its breath was disgusting. Measuring his distance carefully in the darkness, Johann summoned all his strength and thrust the spear forward into the circular disc just above the snout.

  Fluid burst out of the disc, some spurting on Johann. He turned to run, just as he had planned, as the elevark, bellowing ferociously, awakened and bolted upright on its feet. Seconds later, when Johann was certain he was on a correct course, he began to shout at the top of his lungs. The enraged elevark, still bellowing, thundered after him. Johann shouted again and raced toward the cliff.

  Johann had assumed he would be able to outrun the huge elevark. He was wrong. The giant silhouette was actually closing the distance between them. It emitted its foghorn noise and one of its clumps flew by Johann, narrowly missing him. A second clump hit him directly in the back, knocking him to the ground. Johann rolled over quickly and saw that the elevark was almost upon him.

  At that moment an unbroken stream of hoots, barks, and whistles emanated from a position about twenty meters to Johann’s left. The elevark slowed its charge, turned its head and snout, and altered course toward the continuous masket noises. Johann scrambled quickly to his feet and saw a darting movement where the masket sounds had been.

  The elevark sounded its foghorn and discharged a series of clumps in the direction of the fleeing masket. Seconds later, it extended its fearsome rigid tube to the ground and grabbed its prey. Masket wails split the night, sending shivers down Johann’s spine. He raced over -to where the elevark was holding its captive aloft. Using all the strength he could muster, Johann struck the tube with the wooden club. The elevark bellowed as its tube recoiled and released its prey

  Johann was already running, and shouting as he ran. The elevark was now after him again. Between the bellows and the foghorn noises, Johann did not have the presence of mind to listen for the waterfall. He had to trust that he was heading in the right direction.

  He dodged one elevark clump but a second one knocked him down again, just as he reached the edge of the cliff. Johann crawled frantically over the side and pressed himself against the cliff face. His feet came to rest on the solid ledge as the elevark hurtled over the side, its bellow fading away as it slowly accelerated downward toward the narrow beach.

  Johann sat in a crouch on the ledge for several minutes. He could not believe it was over. When, at length, he pulled himself back up to the meadow, and took a few steps on his trembling legs, Johann realized how utterly exhausted he was. He sat down and took a drink from his water pouch. A few minutes later, artificial daylight returned to his alien world.

  Johann walked to the edge of the cliff and looked over the side. There, far below in the fine spray from the waterfall, he could see a brown mass lying motionless on a stretch of sand. Hearing barks and whistles behind him, Johann glanced back into the meadow A group of yellow maskets had come out of the forest and were now standing in a circle around something. They moved aside to let Johann pass when he approached.

  Scarface was lying unconscious on the ground. Without any hesitation, Johann bent down and picked up his masket friend whose courage had undoubtedly saved his life. He carried Scarface toward the forest, accompanied by a growing contingent of noisy yellow maskets.

  SEVEN

  SCARFACE REGAINED CONSCIOUSNESS before the elaborate yellow masket ceremony was completed. Johann’s masket friend had been anesthetized by the fluid in the elevark’s tube, but was not otherwise hurt. Johann was impatient during the long ceremony. He was pleased that the yellow maskets were so grateful to him for destroying their nemesis; however, what he wanted most was to return quickly to the other side of the island and be reunited with Maria.

  A yellow masket warrior accompanied Johann and Scarface as far as the beach beside the lake. When they were alone, and had finished the lunch provided by the yellow maskets, Scarface waded out into the water and attempted to communicate with Johann with an unusual combination of gestures and growls. It took Johann five minutes to realize that Scarface wanted a swimming lesson.

  Johann’s first impulse was to dismiss Scarface’s request as ridiculous. But as he stood watching his alien companion floundering in about forty centimeters of water, and looking at him with those deep, dark, curious eyes, Johann realized that he had been provided with an opportunity for another unique experience. Besides, Johann said to himself, this creature saved my life. I can certainly take a little of my time to teach it to swim.

  Johann waded into the tepid lake and grasped Scarface by the front two legs. They eased out into water that was only waist deep for Johann but would have been over the masket’s head if it had been standing upright on its back two legs. Johann then put both forelegs in one of his huge hands and lifted Scarface’s furry torso with the other, so that the masket’s body extended along the surface of the water.

  When Scarface was more or less floating, Johann grabbed both of the masket’s back legs and moved them back and forth in a rapid motion. “Now kick,” he said simultaneously knowing full well that the masket had no idea what he was saying. Three times Johann repeated this routine, alternately moving the back and middle legs when he said “kick.” Scarface finally understood. The next times that Johann said “kick” while he was holding the masket’s forelegs with both his hands, all four of the other legs immediately began the kicking motion.

  Scarface was eager to learn, and adventurous to the point of being foolhardy. Several times in the ensuing hour the masket swallowed a large amount of water, and made a terrible cackling sound that must have been its way of coughing. Once, Scarface’s body shook and trembled so much that Johann, who had pulled the masket completely out of the water and thrown it over his shoulder, was afraid he might have drowned his friend.

  The lesson was ultimately successful. By the time they left the beach, Scarface could do a passable dog paddle, and was able to swim underwater with his entire body submerged for ten seconds or so. Being that close to Scarface for such an extended period of time had taught Johann some other things as well. Although he had not yet figured out the exact functions of each of the three extraordinary forehead organs, Johann had learned how to recognize certain kinds of masket facial expressions, and had convinced himself that the creatures possessed a guileless honesty that was admirable. He was more certain than ever that Maria would be released upon their return.

  Scarface apparently had some kind of natural biological system that measured time very accurately. Late in the day, the masket hurried Johann so that they reached a clearing beside a stream in time for Scarface to dash off into the adjoining grove and pick some fruit for their dinner. Only a few minutes after Scarface returned, with the two of them sitting together and sharing the fruit, the masket suddenly put what it was eating on the ground and pointed up with both its forelegs. Two or three seconds later the artificial daylight vanished.

  Scarface was asleep soon thereafter. Johann stretched out beside the stream, his hands behind his head, and gazed up at the dark, distant
ceiling. His first thoughts were about Vivien, Maria, and how his life might be changed by the child that would soon arrive. But these more personal thoughts were soon pushed away by the overwhelming questions that Johann knew he could not answer.

  Who or what created this artificial world? For what purpose? Why are the maskets, the tuskers, the nozzlers, and the elevark all here? What are the ribbons, and what is their relationship to all these other creatures?

  Johann still remembered vividly, even though it had taken place more than eight years before, both the glowing ribbons and the pattern of lights in the sky the terrible night that Beatrice had died. Only moments before the white Beatrice had arrived in the brilliantly white hovercraft, and beckoned him to bring the infant Maria and join her, that pattern had indicated that their spherical spaceship was en route to another world, a real planet somewhere, one with large twin moons. Had Johann misunderstood the pattern? Had it been simply a rich symbolism that was not meant to be taken literally?

  He recalled a wonderful evening when a pregnant Beatrice and he had sat together, holding hands and very much in love, on the beach below their cave. They had been talking about God, Beatrice’s favorite subject, and she had been chiding Johann because he had admitted that he had never been able to believe wholeheartedly in a personal, Christian God. Why not? she had asked.

  “The concept does not make logical sense to me,” he had answered, “and is unable to provide answers to reasonably simple questions. How, for example, could a merciful, caring God have permitted you to be raped by Yasin and to conceive a child from that violent act?”

  “Sweet Brother Johann,” Beatrice had said, touching her hand to his cheek and using the appellation of the Michaelites, “even after all this time you still don’t understand. God is not required to make logical sense to you, nor to answer all your questions. He has given you a brain by which you reason, and a heart with which you feel. God loves all your attributes, but knows that you believe in Him mostly with your heart.”