by Hal Clement
On the narrow space of seat to the left of his motionless body, a blob of greenish semiliquid was spreading. Its shape was obviously under intelligent control; instead of spreading out and flowing to the floor, it kept in a small space, remaining on the cloth covering of the seat and sedulously avoiding contact with the already warm metal of the jeep. As they watched, it reached carefully over the metal side, and established contact with the ground below. It winced for a moment as it went below the protection the car body furnished from the fire’s radiation; but evidently it decided that a little now was preferable to more later, and the tentacle remained in place while the whole weird body flowed through it and assembled itself on the ground. The arm disappeared into the main mass, and with a surprisingly rapid amoeboid motion the thing began to flow away from the car and fire, directly toward the hidden watchers. It remained in the shade of the shed roof for the time being, but that point did not interest either Dob or the Hunter.
As the fugitive started to move, the boy’s muscles tensed; and this time the Hunter made no objection. They rounded the corner at Bob’s highest speed, and raced toward the car. The alien saw Bob coming, and stopped his journey for a moment; two or three pseudopods appeared, as though it considered attaching itself to the boy; then the realization that he was heading back toward the fire, which it had no desire to approach for any reason, seemed to cause the creature to hesitate, and before it could come to any constructive decision Bob had passed it in a single bound and was at the stalled car.
For the first time, he saw how close the fire had come, and felt its blistering heat; but he wasted no time in expressing surprise or dismay. He pushed Mr. Kinnaird’s body from behind the wheel and got into the front seat himself. He had driven the vehicle often enough; and while the menacing thing on the ground was still making up its mind, he had started the engine and backed the jeep out to the track, fifteen yards away. There he stopped, leaped out, and, still bearing his oil can he dashed back toward the shed, wrenching frantically at the can’s cap as he went.
The alien was still fairly close to the fire, and seemed to be suffering some inconvenience now that the slight protection of the jeep’s body had been removed. It had resumed its journey toward the corner of the shed, and seemed to make an effort toward even greater speed as the boy approached. It must have known that the Hunter was also present, and by then had certainly realized that Bob was participating intelligently in the hunt, and it made one final effort. Knowing that it could not possibly outspeed the human being bearing down on it, the creature stopped where it was, assumed a hemispherical form, and began, very slowly, to dwindle in size.
The Hunter knew what was going on—he had used the same trick to approach Bob, that first day; but the ground on which the shed was built was a very different proposition from the sand of the beach.
It was harder, moister, and much more solidly packed; the space between grains was far smaller, and more completely blocked with fluid. Long before any significant part of the creature’s mass had soaked into the earth Bob had arrived on the scene, with the cap finally removed from the can of oil.
Without showing any sign of the hesitation he had displayed earlier at the thought of killing, the boy began pouring the sticky liquid over and around the dwindling mass of jelly. When the container was half empty he stopped pouring, and swung it violently, sending a trail of oil from his newly made pool to the blaze raging ten yards away. Then he dropped the can and ran back out of the already uncomfortable hot area.
The trail caught fire rapidly enough; but the oil was heavy stuff, and the flame did not spread as rapidly as he would have liked. After watching for a moment, Bob whipped out his book of matches once more, ran to the edge of the pool which surrounded the still visible body of the alien, ignited the whole folder, and tossed it as accurately as he could onto the center of the oil-covered lump of jelly. This time he had no occasion to be disappointed or doubtful: he barely got himself away in time.
The Hunter wanted to stay until the fire had burned out, and make sure of the results; but Bob, once he had done all he could, turned his attention at once to his father. A single glance at the inferno surrounding the fugitive’s last known position was enough for him. He ran back to the jeep, glanced at his father’s still motionless form, and sent the vehicle jouncing down the track toward the doctor’s office. The Hunter dared make no remark; interference with the boy’s eyesight at the speed they were making would have been a serious error.
Mr. Kinnaird had been able to see ever since the alien had left his body; he had been conscious the whole time. Unfortunately, the paralysis endured for some time after being administered, and he had not been in a position to see very well what went on by the shed. He knew Bob had stopped at what seemed to him dangerous proximity to the fire, and gone back for something; but he did not know what; and struggled all the way down the road to get the question past his vocal chords.
He recovered enough to sit up and talk shortly before they reached the doctor’s office; and the questions began to pour forth as the jeep pulled up before the door.
Bob, of course, was relieved to see the recovery; but he had developed a rather serious worry of his own in the meantime; and merely said: “Never mind about what happened to the shed and me; I want to find out what happened to you. Can you walk in, or shall I help?”
It was a well-phrased question, and shut the elder Kinnaird up with a snap. He emerged with dignity from the car and stalked ahead of Bob toward the doctor’s door. The boy followed; normally, he would have been grinning in triumph, but a worried expression still overcast his face.
Inside, the doctor finally obtained a more or less coherent idea of what had happened from their two stories, and ordered Mr. Kinnaird to get on the examination table. The man objected, saying that he wanted to learn something from Bob first; but the doctor insisted; and Bob, muttering something about having left the engine running, hastily went outside again. The worry that was working on him was not for his father, who was no worse off than Bob himself had been.
Outside the door he stopped, and, making sure no one was around, he spoke to the Hunter.
“What are you going to do, now that your job here is finished? Go back to Allane?”
“I told you that was not possible,” was the silent answer. “My ship was totally wrecked: and even if the other was not, there would now be no way on earth to locate it—I got the impression during my brief conversation with the fugitive, that it, like mine, fell in the water but that its occupant had taken much longer than I to reach land. His ship was probably damaged beyond repair, and, if not, it is probably somewhere in the very deep water around this island. You told me the depth was over eighty fathoms within a half mile of shore.
“I have a rough idea of how a spaceship works, but I could never build one—I told you that. I am on Earth for life, my friend. Whether I am your companion for life depends on you—we do not force ourselves on those who do not want our company. What do you say?”
Bob hesitated, looking back across the village toward the pillar of black smoke that was now thinning over the hill. The Hunter assumed he was considering the advantages and disadvantages of the proposed alliance, and felt a little hurt that there should have been any hesitation; but he did not yet know Bob fully.
The boy was intelligent for his age, as was evident enough; but he was still a boy, and was still apt to consider his immediate problems before indulging in long-term planning. He spoke at last, however; and the Hunter never did find the words to express his own feelings at what he heard.
“I’m glad you’re staying around,” Bob said slowly. “I was a little worried about it. I like you, and you can certainly help me right now. There’s one problem that I didn’t consider very carefully when I made up this trap for your enemy, and now we’ve got to have an answer.
“In a few minutes, Dad is going to come out that door with his mouth full of questions and his eye full of fire. One of those questions is goin
g to be, ‘How did that fire get started?’ I don’t think the fact that I’m fifteen will make any difference in what’ll happen if I don’t have a very sound explanation for it. I didn’t stop before to think of a good reason, and I sure hope you can find an answer for me now. If you can’t, then get to work on the job of toughening up the protective net you’ve told me you maintain under my skin. I can tell you where it’s going to be needed most!”
THE END
1951
ICEWORLD
First of three parts. The first novel in over half a year brings Hal Clement telling of an interstellar narcotics agent and a world of terrible, unapproachable cold—our earth!
Sallman Ken had never been really sure of the wisdom he had shown in acceding to Rade’s request. He was no policeman and knew it. He had no particular liking for physical danger. He had always believed, of course, that he could stand his share of discomfort, but the view he was now getting through the Karella’s port was making him doubt even that.
Rade had been fair enough, he had to admit. The narcotics chief had told him, apparently, everything he himself knew; enough so that Ken, had he used his imagination sufficiently, might even have foreseen something like this.
“There has never been much of it,” Rade had said. “We don’t even know what the peddlers call it—it’s just a ‘sniff’ to them. It’s been around for quite a few years now; we got interested when it first appeared, and then took most of our attention from it when it never seemed to amount to much.”
“But what’s so dangerous about it, then?” Ken had asked.
“Well, of course any habit-forming drug is dangerous—you could hardly be a teacher of science without knowing that. The special menace of this stuff seems to lie in the fact that it is a gas, and can therefore be administered easily without the victim’s consent; and it seems to be so potent that a single dose will insure addiction. You can see what a public danger that could be.” Ken had seen, clearly.
“I should say so. I’m surprised we haven’t all been overcome already. A generator in a building’s ventilation system—on board a ship—anything like that could make hundreds of customers for whoever has the stuff to sell. Why hasn’t it spread?” Rade had smiled for the first time.
“There seems to be two reasons for that, also. There are production difficulties, if the very vague stories we hear have anything in them; and the stuff doesn’t keep at normal temperature. It has to be held under extreme refrigeration; when exposed to normal conditions it breaks down in a few seconds. I believe that the active principle is actually one of the breakdown products, but no one had obtained a sample to prove it.”
“But where do I come in? If you don’t have any of it I can’t analyze it for you. I probably couldn’t anyway—I’m a school teacher, not a professional chemist. What else can I do?”
“It’s because you’re a teacher—a sort of jack-of-all-trades in scientific matters, without being an expert at any of them—that we think you can help us. I mentioned that there seemed to be production troubles with the drug.
“Certainly the producers would like to increase volume. They would like, of course, to get a first-rate production engineer. You know as well as I that they could never do it; no such person could be involved secretly in such a matter. Every competent engineer is well employed since Velio was discovered, and it would be too easy for us to trace one who was approached for such a purpose.
“You, however, are a comparatively inconspicuous person; you are on vacation, and will be for another year; no one will miss you—we expect these people to think. That’s why we took such extreme precautions in arranging this interview.”
“But you’ll have to publicize me some way, or they would never know I existed, either,” Ken pointed out.
“That can be done—in fact, has already started. I trust you’ll forgive us for that; but the job is important. The whisper has already started in criminal circles that you are the manufacturer of the bomb that wrecked the Storm plant. We can give you quite a reputation—”
“Which will prevent my ever getting an honest job again.”
“Which will never be heard of by your present employers, or by any respectable person not associated with the police.”
Ken was not yet sure why he had accepted. Maybe the occupation of policeman still carried a little subconscious glamour, though certainly it was now mostly laboratory work. This looked like an exception—or did it? He had as Rade expected been hired by an extremely short-spoken individual, who claimed to represent a trading concern. The understanding had been that his knowledge was to be placed at the disposal of his employers. Perhaps they would simply stick him in a lab with the outline or a production problem, and tell him to solve it. In that case, he would be out of a job very quickly, and if he were lucky might be able to offer his apologies to Rade.
For he certainly had learned nothing so far. Even the narcotics man had admitted that his people knew no one at all certainly connected with the ring, and it was very possible that he might be hired by comparatively respectable people—compared, of course, to drug-runners. For all Ken could tell at the moment, that might have happened. He had been shepherded aboard the Karella at the North Island spaceport, and for twenty-two days had seen nothing at all.
He knew, of course, that the drug came from off the planet. Rade had become sufficiently specific to admit that the original rush had been checked by examining incoming refrigeration apparatus. He did not know, however, that it came from outside the Sarrian planetary system. Twenty-two days was a long journey—if it had been made in a straight line.
Certainly the world that hung now beyond the port did not look as though it could produce anything. Only a thin crescent of it was visible, for it lay nearly between the ship and a remarkably feeble sun. The dark remainder of the sphere blotted out the Milky Way in a fashion that showed the planet to be airless. It was mountainous, inhospitable, and cold. Ken knew that last fact because of the appearance of the sun. It was dim enough to view directly without protection to the eyes; to Ken’s color sense, reddish in shade and shrunken in aspect. No world this far from such a star could be anything but cold.
Of course, Rade’s drug needed low temperature—well, if it were made here, Ken was going to resign, regardless. Merely looking at the planet made him shiver.
He wished someone would tell him what was going on. There was a speaker over the door of his room, but so far the only times it had been used was to tell him that there was food outside his room and the door was unlocked for the moment.
For he had not been allowed to leave his room. That suggested illegal proceedings of some sort; unfortunately it did not limit them to the sort he was seeking. With the trading regulations what they were, a mercantile explorer who found an inhabited system more often than not kept the find strictly for his own exploitation. The precaution of concealing its whereabouts from a new employee was natural.
At a venture, he spoke aloud. After all, the fact that they were hanging so long beside this world must mean something.
“Is this where I’m expected to work? You’ll pardon my saying that it looks extremely unpleasant.” A little to his surprise there was an answer, in a voice different from the one that had announced his meals.
“I agree. I have never landed there myself, but it certainly looks bad. As far as we know at present, your job will not require you to visit that world.”
“Just what is my job? Or don’t you want to tell me yet?”
“There is no harm in telling you more, anyway, since we have arrived at the proper planetary system.” Ken cast an uneasy eye at the feeble sun as he heard these words, but continued to listen without comment.
“You will find the door unlocked. Turn to your right in the corridor outside, and proceed for about forty yards—as far as you can. That will take you to the control room, where I am. It will be more comfortable to talk face to face.” The speaker’s rumble ceased, and Ken did as he was told.
&nb
sp; The Karella seemed to be a fairly common type of interstellar flyer, somewhere between one hundred fifty and two hundred feet in length, and about one third that diameter. It would be shaped like a cylinder with slightly rounded ends. Plenty of bulk—usable for passengers, cargo, or anything else her owner cared.
The control room contained nothing worthy of comment, except its occupants. One of these was obviously the pilot; he was strapped to his rack in front of the main control panel. The other was floating free in the middle of the room, obviously awaiting Ken’s arrival since he had both eyes on the door. He spoke at once, in a voice recognizable as the one which had invited the scientist forward.
“I was a little hesitant about letting you see any of us personally before having your final acceptance of our offer; but I don’t see that it can do much harm, after all. I scarcely ever visit Sarr nowadays, and the chance of your encountering me if we fail to reach a final agreement is small.”
“Then you are engaged in something illegal?” Ken felt that there could be little harm in mentioning a fact the other’s speech had made so obvious. After all, they would not expect him to be stupid.
“Illegal, yes, if the law be interpreted—strictly. I feel, however, and many agree with me, that if someone finds an inhabited planet, investigates it at his own expense, and opens relations with the inhabitants, that he has a moral right to profit from the fact. That, bluntly, is our situation.”
Ken’s heart sank. It began to look as though he had stumbled on the very sort of petty violation he had feared, and was not going to be very useful to Rade.