The First Science Fiction Megapack

by Reginald Bretnor

  Wal, Rev’rend, he sure did give me a surprise—weren’t no proper man I’d ever seed before. He was wearing some kind of red clothes, real shiny and sort of stretchy and not wet from the water, like you’d expect, but dry and it felt like that silk and India-rubber stuff mixed together. And it was such a bright red that at first I didn’t see the blood on it. When I did I knew he were a goner. His chest were all stove in, smashed to pieces. One of the old tree-roots must have jabbed him as the current flung him down. I thought he were dead already, but then he opened up his eyes.

  A funny color they were, greeny yellow. And I swear, Rev’rend, when he opened them eyes I felt he was readin’ my mind. I thought maybe he might be one of them circus fellers in their flying contraptions that hang at the bottom of a balloon.

  He spoke to me in English, kind of choky and stiff, not like Joe the Portygee sailor or like those tarnal dumb Frenchies up Canady way, but—well, funny. He said, “My baby—in ship. Get—baby…” He tried to say more but his eyes went shut and he moaned hard.

  I yelped, “Godamighty!” ’Scuse me, Rev’rend, but I was so blame upset that’s just what I did say, “Godamighty, man, you mean there’s a baby in that there dingfol contraption?” He just moaned so after spreadin’ my coat around the man a little bit I just plunged in that there river again.

  Rev’rend, I heard tell once about some tomfool idiot going over Niagary in a barrel, and I tell you it was like that when I tried crossin’ that freshet to reach the contraption.

  I went under and down, and was whacked by floating sticks and whirled around in the freshet. But somehow, I d’no how except by the pure grace of God, I got across that raging torrent and clumb up to where the crazy dingfol machine was sitting.

  Ship, he’d called it. But that were no ship, Rev’rend, it was some flying dragon kind of thing. It was a real scarey lookin’ thing but I clumb up to the little door and hauled myself inside it. And, sure enough, there was other people in the cabin, only they was all dead.

  There was a lady and a man and some kind of an animal looked like a bobcat only smaller, with a funny-shaped rooster-comb thing on its head. They all—even the cat-thing—was wearing those shiny, stretchy clo’es. And they all was so battered and smashed I didn’t even bother to hunt for their heartbeats. I could see by a look they was dead as a doornail.

  Then I heard a funny little whimper, like a kitten, and in a funny, rubber-cushioned thing there’s a little boy baby, looked about six months old. He was howling lusty enough, and when I lifted him out of the cradle kind of thing, I saw why. That boy baby, he was wet, and his little arm was twisted under him. That there flying contraption must have smashed down awful hard, but that rubber hammock was so soft and cushiony all it did to him was jolt him good.

  I looked around but I couldn’t find anything to wrap him in. And the baby didn’t have a stitch on him except a sort of spongy paper diaper, wet as sin. So I finally lifted up the lady, who had a long cape thing around her, and I took the cape off her real gentle. I knew she was dead and she wouldn’t be needin’ it, and that boy baby would catch his death if I took him out bare-naked like that. She was probably the baby’s Ma; a right pretty woman she was but smashed up something shameful.

  So anyhow, to make a long story short, I got that baby boy back across that Niagary falls somehow, and laid him down by his Pa. The man opened his eyes kind, and said in a choky voice, “Take care—baby.”

  I told him I would, and said I’d try to get him up to the house where Marthy could doctor him. The man told me not to bother. “I dying,” he says. “We come from planet—star up there—crash here—” His voice trailed off into a language I couldn’t understand, and he looked like he was praying.

  I bent over him and held his head on my knees real easy, and I said, “Don’t worry, mister, I’ll take care of your little fellow until your folks come after him. Before God I will.”

  So the man closed his eyes and I said, Our Father which art in Heaven, and when I got through he was dead.

  I got him up on Kate, but he was cruel heavy for all he was such a tall skinny fellow. Then I wrapped that there baby up in the cape thing and took him home and give him to Marthy. And the next day I buried the fellow in the south medder and next meetin’ day we had the baby baptized Matthew Daniel Emmett, and brung him up just like our own kids. That’s all.

  All? Mr. Emmett, didn’t you ever find out where that ship really came from?

  Why, Rev’rend, he said it come from a star. Dying men don’t lie, you know that. I asked the Teacher about them planets he mentioned and she says that on one of the planets—can’t rightly remember the name, March or Mark or something like that—she says some big scientist feller with a telescope saw canals on that planet, and they’d hev to be pretty near as big as this-here Erie canal to see them so far off. And if they could build canals on that planet I d’no why they couldn’t build a flying machine.

  I went back the next day when the water was down a little, to see if I couldn’t get the rest of them folks and bury them, but the flying machine had broke up and washed down the crick.

  Marthy’s still got the cape thing. She’s a powerful saving woman. We never did tell Matt, though. Might make him feel funny to think he didn’t really b’long to us.

  But—but—Mr. Emmett, didn’t anybody ask questions about the baby—where you got it?

  Well, now, I’ll ’low they was curious, because Marthy hadn’t been in the family way and they knew it. But up here folks minds their own business pretty well, and I jest let them wonder. I told Liza Grace I’d found her new little brother in the back pasture, and o’course it was the truth. When Liza Grace growed up she thought it was jest one of those yarns old folks tell the little shavers.

  And has Matthew ever shown any differences from the other children that you could see?

  Well, Rev’rend, not so’s you could notice it. He’s powerful smart, but his real Pa and Ma must have been right smart too to build a flying contraption that could come so far.

  O’course, when he were about twelve years old he started reading folks’ minds, which didn’t seem exactly right. He’d tell Marthy what I was thinkin’ and things like that. He was just at the pesky age. Liza Grace and Minnie were both a-courtin’ then, and he’d drive their boy friends crazy telling them what Liza Grace and Minnie were a-thinking and tease the gals by telling them what the boys were thinking about.

  There weren’t no harm in the boy, though, it was all teasing. But it just weren’t decent, somehow. So I tuk him out behind the woodshed and give his britches a good dusting just to remind him that that kind of thing weren’t polite nohow. And Rev’rend Doane, he ain’t never done it sence.

  EARTHMEN BEARING GIFTS, by Fredric Brown

  DHAR Ry sat alone in his room, meditating. From outside the door he caught a thought wave equivalent to a knock, and, glancing at the door, he willed it to slide open.

  It opened. “Enter, my friend,” he said. He could have projected the idea telepathically; but with only two persons present, speech was more polite.

  Ejon Khee entered. “You are up late tonight, my leader,” he said.

  “Yes, Khee. Within an hour the Earth rocket is due to land, and I wish to see it. Yes, I know, it will land a thousand miles away, if their calculations are correct. Beyond the horizon. But if it lands even twice that far the flash of the atomic explosion should be visible. And I have waited long for first contact. For even though no Earthman will be on that rocket, it will still be first contact—for them. Of course our telepath teams have been reading their thoughts for many centuries, but—this will be the first physical contact between Mars and Earth.”

  Khee made himself comfortable on one of the low chairs. “True,” he said. “I have not followed recent reports too closely, though. Why are they using an atomic warhead? I know they suppose our planet is uninh
abited, but still—”

  “They will watch the flash through their lunar telescopes and get a—what do they call it?—a spectroscopic analysis. That will tell them more than they know now (or think they know; much of it is erroneous) about the atmosphere of our planet and the composition of its surface. It is—call it a sighting shot, Khee. They’ll be here in person within a few oppositions. And then—”

  Mars was holding out, waiting for Earth to come. What was left of Mars, that is; this one small city of about nine hundred beings. The civilization of Mars was older than that of Earth, but it was a dying one. This was what remained of it: one city, nine hundred people. They were waiting for Earth to make contact, for a selfish reason and for an unselfish one.

  * * * *

  MARTIAN civilization had developed in a quite different direction from that of Earth. It had developed no important knowledge of the physical sciences, no technology. But it had developed social sciences to the point where there had not been a single crime, let alone a war, on Mars for fifty thousand years. And it had developed fully the parapsychological sciences of the mind, which Earth was just beginning to discover.

  Mars could teach Earth much. How to avoid crime and war to begin with. Beyond those simple things lay telepathy, telekinesis, empathy….

  And Earth would, Mars hoped, teach them something even more valuable to Mars: how, by science and technology—which it was too late for Mars to develop now, even if they had the type of minds which would enable them to develop these things—to restore and rehabilitate a dying planet, so that an otherwise dying race might live and multiply again.

  Each planet would gain greatly, and neither would lose.

  And tonight was the night when Earth would make its first sighting shot. Its next shot, a rocket containing Earthmen, or at least an Earthman, would be at the next opposition, two Earth years, or roughly four Martian years, hence. The Martians knew this, because their teams of telepaths were able to catch at least some of the thoughts of Earthmen, enough to know their plans. Unfortunately, at that distance, the connection was one-way. Mars could not ask Earth to hurry its program. Or tell Earth scientists the facts about Mars’ composition and atmosphere which would have made this preliminary shot unnecessary.

  Tonight Ry, the leader (as nearly as the Martian word can be translated), and Khee, his administrative assistant and closest friend, sat and meditated together until the time was near. Then they drank a toast to the future—in a beverage based on menthol, which had the same effect on Martians as alcohol on Earthmen—and climbed to the roof of the building in which they had been sitting. They watched toward the north, where the rocket should land. The stars shone brilliantly and unwinkingly through the atmosphere.

  * * * *

  IN Observatory No. 1 on Earth’s moon, Rog Everett, his eye at the eyepiece of the spotter scope, said triumphantly, “Thar she blew, Willie. And now, as soon as the films are developed, we’ll know the score on that old planet Mars.” He straightened up—there’d be no more to see now—and he and Willie Sanger shook hands solemnly. It was an historical occasion.

  “Hope it didn’t kill anybody. Any Martians, that is. Rog, did it hit dead center in Syrtis Major?”

  “Near as matters. I’d say it was maybe a thousand miles off, to the south. And that’s damn close on a fifty-million-mile shot. Willie, do you really think there are any Martians?”

  Willie thought a second and then said, “No.”

  He was right.

  HAPPY ENDING, by Fredric Brown and Mack Reynolds

  There were four men in the lifeboat that came down from the space-cruiser. Three of them were still in the uniform of the Galactic Guards.

  The fourth sat in the prow of the small craft looking down at their goal, hunched and silent, bundled up in a greatcoat against the coolness of space—a greatcoat which he would never need again after this morning. The brim of his hat was pulled down far over his forehead, and he studied the nearing shore through dark-lensed glasses. Bandages, as though for a broken jaw, covered most of the lower part of his face.

  He realized suddenly that the dark glasses, now that they had left the cruiser, were unnecessary. He slipped them off. After the cinematographic grays his eyes had seen through these lenses for so long, the brilliance of the color below him was almost like a blow. He blinked, and looked again.

  They were rapidly settling toward a shoreline, a beach. The sand was a dazzling, unbelievable white such as had never been on his home planet. Blue the sky and water, and green the edge of the fantastic jungle. There was a flash of red in the green, as they came still closer, and he realized suddenly that it must be a marigee, the semi-intelligent Venusian parrot once so popular as pets throughout the solar system.

  Throughout the system blood and steel had fallen from the sky and ravished the planets, but now it fell no more.

  And now this. Here in this forgotten portion of an almost completely destroyed world it had not fallen at all.

  Only in some place like this, alone, was safety for him. Elsewhere—anywhere—imprisonment or, more likely, death. There was danger, even here. Three of the crew of the space-cruiser knew. Perhaps, someday, one of them would talk. Then they would come for him, even here.

  But that was a chance he could not avoid. Nor were the odds bad, for three people out of a whole solar system knew where he was. And those three were loyal fools.

  The lifeboat came gently to rest. The hatch swung open and he stepped out and walked a few paces up the beach. He turned and waited while the two spacemen who had guided the craft brought his chest out and carried it across the beach and to the corrugated-tin shack just at the edge of the trees. That shack had once been a space-radar relay station. Now the equipment it had held was long gone, the antenna mast taken down. But the shack still stood. It would be his home for a while. A long while. The two men returned to the lifeboat preparatory to leaving.

  And now the captain stood facing him, and the captain’s face was a rigid mask. It seemed with an effort that the captain’s right arm remained at his side, but that effort had been ordered. No salute.

  The captain’s voice, too, was rigid with unemotion. “Number One…”

  “Silence!” And then, less bitterly. “Come further from the boat before you again let your tongue run loose. Here.” They had reached the shack.

  “You are right, Number…”

  “No. I am no longer Number One. You must continue to think of me as Mister Smith, your cousin, whom you brought here for the reasons you explained to the under-officers, before you surrender your ship. If you think of me so, you will be less likely to slip in your speech.”

  “There is nothing further I can do—Mister Smith?”

  “Nothing. Go now.”

  “And I am ordered to surrender the—”

  “There are no orders. The war is over, lost. I would suggest thought as to what spaceport you put into. In some you may receive humane treatment. In others—”

  The captain nodded. “In others, there is great hatred. Yes. That is all?”

  “That is all. And, Captain, your running of the blockade, your securing of fuel en route, have constituted a deed of high valor. All I can give you in reward is my thanks. But now go. Goodbye.”

  “Not goodbye,” the captain blurted impulsively, “but hasta la vista, auf Wiedersehen, until the day…you will permit me, for the last time to address you and salute?”

  The man in the greatcoat shrugged. “As you will.”

  Click of heels and a salute that once greeted the Caesars, and later the pseudo-Aryan of the 20th Century, and, but yesterday, he who was now known as the last of the dictators. “Farewell, Number One!”

  “Farewell,” he answered emotionlessly.

  * * * *

  Mr. Smith, a black dot on the dazzling white sand, watched the li
feboat disappear up into the blue, finally into the haze of the upper atmosphere of Venus. That eternal haze that would always be there to mock his failure and his bitter solitude.

  The slow days snarled by, and the sun shone dimly, and the marigees screamed in the early dawn and all day and at sunset, and sometimes there were the six-legged baroons, monkey-like in the trees, that gibbered at him. And the rains came and went away again.

  At nights there were drums in the distance. Not the martial roll of marching, nor yet a threatening note of savage hate. Just drums, many miles away, throbbing rhythm for native dances or exorcising, perhaps, the forest-night demons. He assumed these Venusians had their superstitions, all other races had. There was no threat, for him, in that throbbing that was like the beating of the jungle’s heart.

  Mr. Smith knew that, for although his choice of destinations had been a hasty choice, yet there had been time for him to read the available reports. The natives were harmless and friendly. A Terran missionary had lived among them some time ago—before the outbreak of the war. They were a simple, weak race. They seldom went far from their villages; the space-radar operator who had once occupied the shack reported that he had never seen one of them.

  So, there would be no difficulty in avoiding the natives, nor danger if he did encounter them.

  Nothing to worry about, except the bitterness.

  Not the bitterness of regret, but of defeat. Defeat at the hands of the defeated. The damned Martians who came back after he had driven them halfway across their damned arid planet. The Jupiter Satellite Confederation landing endlessly on the home planet, sending their vast armadas of spacecraft daily and nightly to turn his mighty cities into dust. In spite of everything; in spite of his score of ultra-vicious secret weapons and the last desperate efforts of his weakened armies, most of whose men were under twenty or over forty.